Vegetable Couscous with parmesan and black pepper

That's really a fancy name for "Ohhhh I can't be bothered, what do we have in the house?" food.

This is pretty easy to cook.

Firstly, make up the couscous for however many people you are cooking for. 1/2 cup of dry couscous is enough for one person, and you need equal parts water and couscous. Put the water, some olive oil and salt in a saucepan and bring to the boil. Once its boiled, stir and take off the heat, adding the couscous and leaving it for two minutes.

Meanwhile (probably best to start while the water is boiling), put some chopped vegetables in a container and cover with water. Put the lid on and put in the microwave - I think about 10 minutes is normal but basically just until they're soft. I used zucchini and beans.

Back to the couscous - after the two minutes, add some butter and maybe more oil if its sticking, and put on a low heat. Separate the couscous with a fork so its all fluffy. At this stage, I grate some parmesan in so it melts into the couscous. Also because I love parmesan :D You only need to keep the couscous on the stove top for about three minutes.

Combine the couscous and vegetables in a bowl (I also put some chopped cherry tomatoes in at the end, but in hindsight maybe feta would be good as well?), grate some more parmesan over the top and add some cracked pepper. Yummy food in about 15 minutes!

Things that have been happening

Lots of cooking, and buying things for the flat.
Getting my synth and amp and all that jazz moved up. My room looks a lot smaller with a huge amp in the corner but I'm happy.
Spent a week in Rottnest with the basic day pattern of wake up, spend about an hour on breakfast and reading and cups of tea, going to the beach, coming home for lunch, having a nap and then chilling before dinner.
Uni orientation! I start tomorrow. WOOO.
7 hours straight of Project Runway with pasta and green tea and icecream straight from the tub.
Saying every day I'm going to cut my nails and always forgetting.
Not getting a job! I've applied for at least thirty so far. Gosh.
Loving the necklace I got for Christmas from Etsy, as (kind of badly) shown here WITH NEW HAIR

Tiger Food: Spinach Eggs on Doorstopper Toast

Morning! This is my new favourite breakfast. It made two gigantic serves, so you could probably use it for four people. In fact, four people ate it because I couldn't finish mine. The original recipe was in the Australian Women's Weekly cookbook "The Fast Egg".

This was actually made pretty much entirely from leftovers of the Carbonara we made the night before - it used up the leftover eggs, facon, mushroom and the loaf that we used to make garlic bread. ECONOMICAL, GUYS. Also good because I've just moved out of home and I can't really afford to waste food.

SPINACH EGGS ON DOORSTOPPER TOAST

Stuff you need:
A loaf of awesome bread. We had a Pane di Casa, but Sourdough would be equally spectacular
3 eggs
Milk
Spinach leaves
Some sort of sliced ham or similar - we used facon because I made it for the Boy but I think the recipe I looked at used pancetta
Mushrooms

1. Cut the bread to your desired thickness of bread. Doorstopper slices are the way to go, but a lot of people like thinner bread so however you roll, homies.


Om nom nom bread

2. Break the ends off the spinach leaves and wilt them in the pan. Put a bit of butter or olive oil in the pan and wait until they've just changed colour (so about thirty seconds) and that makes them a bit less crunchy but not actually mushy. Put them on a plate and whack that in the oven to keep warm.


Pre-wilted spinach

3. Chop up the mushrooms and fry them, and fry the whole slices of your selected ham. I sliced half of the facon and left half whole because I'm silly and forgot I wasn't making carbonara and in fact didn't have to slice the facon. Put those bad boys in the oven as well.

4. Toast your bread. In the toaster, in the pan, under the grill, whatever works for you! Then keep that warm as well.

5. SCRAMBLE THOSE EGGS. I would give you directions for this but I'm not entirely sure how we did it, so... ask your mum how to.

6. Put it all together! We did the toast, then a whole piece of facon, then the eggs, then the vegetables. Serve with your selected breakfast beverage.


Yummy breakfast!

Food porn!

So, hi everyone, I've moved in with Tara (yesterday) and today is my first full day of unemployed, arts student life. Although I took a resume to the cafe down the road so hopefully that will change! I digress. As a result, I've watched a lot of daytime TV today.

I am a sucker for cooking shows. Nigella is a perennial favourite, I didn't really get into MasterChef until the repeats were on during my lunch break at work, but any reality TV show incorporating food is a win in my books. Thus, I enjoyed the repeat of My Kitchen Rules today and THANK GOODNESS, its on tonight as well!

So! Here are some lovely recipes and cooking sites and that to lust after. I'm planning to try and post recipes of mine soon, but I haven't had to cook dinner here yet :D


Roasted Butternut Squash with Caramelised Onion, Gorgonzola and Crispy Fried Sage from Closet Cooking. That website is amazing, by the way. And my inner vegetarian loves a good vege meal.


The Lime Cheesecake that made me feel all hungry-like from My Kitchen Rules. I had a really good lime cheesecake on the weekend at Grandma's and I really need to either get the recipe or find out where she bought it. Cheesecake crust, along with apple crumble topping, is one of my absolute weaknesses.


Chestnut Gnocchi from Not Quite Nigella. I love, love love love, gnocchi, but I've never been able to make it very well. When I worked at the Italian cafe, the chef made me gnocchi in butter with fried bread and herbs for lunch one day and it was quite possibly the greatest thing I've ever eaten.



An actual Nigella recipe - Orange French Toast. I'm not the biggest fan of OJ (too much pulp! *shudder*) but this sounds yummy.

Any food websites you like? Recipes? General love of food?