Woot! I'm back baby! Picked up my laptop from the apple store today after hearing good news from Genius Simon that it was back up and running.

I've been trying a whole lot of recipes from the Masterchef website. Not always the ones they feature on the show, but also the ones the sponsors put up. And now that I have my own kitchen, I can cook whatever I want, and as many meatballs as I want! Om... ah nom nom nom nom!!



I had never made meatball mix with stock before. I was a little hesitant at first wondering if the mixture would even combine with liquid. But the breadcrumbs did an excellent job of soaking them up. For a mixture with not that many ingredients, it should did smell fantastic as I was rolling them into little balls of delicious-ness.

The end result, juicy, flavoursome packed meatballs, with pasta and a rich tomato sauce, all in done in less than an hour.


3. Stir in risoni & tomatoes. Cook for 8 mins, uncovered, stirring occasionally, or until pasta is al dente. Garnish with parsley & serve with steamed vegetables and parmesan.

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For us Australians, for the last 3 months or so we have been glued to our televisions 6 nights a week watching Masterchef. I've tried a few recipes from the show, but there are heaps more I want to try, especially from the latest pressure test, the cake I've nicknamed; "The Cake of Doom". It is essentially a chocolate mousse cake, but inside there are 7 layers! Just looking at the recipe gives you a headache! However, I have vowed that one day I will make this cake of doom!

So it's down to 2 women, home cook and lovable mum, Julie, and my favorite from the start, Malaysian artist, Poh, (her website here).

Julie has been a solid performer, and has not lost a pressure test, or elimination round yet! The woman is unbeatable! She always seems to be in a tizz, and we all felt sorry for her when she couldn't finish plating up for celebrity chef, Donna Hay.

Poh has had 2 second chances, but what I love about her is she is a risk taker. She will try things she has never tried before, which has resulted in her losing sometimes. But since getting a wild card entry back into the competition, she has excelled. I really want to try those deep fried meringues! Oh, and well she is Malaysian, so how could I not love that being part of my heritage!


For me I'd love Poh to win, but I think Julie deserves it more. Julie has been there from the very beginning, hasn't been home to see her family, and being a mum of 3 boys, if anyone needed to go home to spend some time with their family, it would have to be Julie. Either way, whoever wins, I will be happy!

It's been a great series, with some of my favorite chefs making an appearance, Donna Hay, Bill Granger and Adrian Richardson. My newest favorite chef the series introduced me to is Emmanuel Stroobant; the man is a dream!
Some amazing recipes, some shocking recipes, but it's really brought lots of people together, especially my family, we would all rush dinner so we could sit down and watch it together.

I will miss Friday's masterclass and seeing the 3 musketeers until the next season!
It's just been confirmed there will be a celebrity version of Masterchef... hmm that will be interesting!

So on Sunday night, we will all be glued to our TV sets, waiting to find out who will be Australia's first Masterchef. I will be having a few people around, possibly making some food inspired from the series. The box of tissues will be on hand as with any good reality TV show there will be tears!

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As I mentioned in my previous post, I had a Masterchef inspired night. This recipe was in a pressure test challenge where 3 of the worse performing chefs have to follow a recipe, and the chef that served the worst dish goes home immediately.

Whilst this may seem like a simple recipe, you can easily stuff it up. You can easily burn the caramel, you can burn your pastry, you can under cook the pastry....the list goes on.

I followed the recipe, but didn't have an oven proof frying pan, so I did the first few steps in the frying pan, then transferred everything to an ovenproof dish for baking.
I was happy with the result. Matt Preston would have been happy that my pastry had a nice crunch! I served mine with vanilla ice-cream, the caramel was a little bitter but the apples were rather sweet. So it all balanced out rather well.

Apple Tarte Tatin
Kate Nichols

3 Golden Delicious apples
1 tbs lemon juice
½ cup (110g) caster sugar
20g unsalted butter, chopped
Ready-rolled puff pastry sheet
Cream or ice-cream, to serve

1. Preheat oven to 220ºC (200ºC fan-forced).

2. Peel apples, cut into quarters, remove cores (cutting each quarter at the core so it has a “flat” side), and toss the quarters in a large bowl with the lemon juice and 1 tablespoon of the sugar.

3. Using a 20cm frying pan as a guide, cut pastry into a round slightly larger than the pan, prick with a fork.

4. Melt butter in a 20cm non-stick frying pan over medium-high heat. Cover with the remaining sugar. Cook over medium-low heat, shaking pan occasionally to spread around any dark spots that appear, until a rich caramel forms.

5. Place apple quarters into pan, rounded side down, arranging them around pan. Cut remaining apple to fill gaps. Cook the apples over medium heat for about 10 minutes until caramel is bubbling up in the pan, shaking pan occasionally to prevent burnt spots.

6. Lay the pastry over the apples, tucking any protruding edges around edges of pan.

7. Place the pan in the oven, cook for about 25 minutes, or until the puff pastry has risen and cooked. The pastry should be dry and flaky. Stand tarte in pan for 10 minutes before carefully turning out onto a serving plate. Serve with cream.

Serves 4.

Voila! Bon Appétit!

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For those of us following Masterchef in Australia, you would have been familiar with the "Guess the ingredients in the bolognaise" challenge where the vegetarian cook cried because she didn't want to have to taste it to guess what was in it.

There were 17 ingredients they had to guess, by both smelling and tasting the sauce. Once all the ingredients were revealed, there were some things I would have never considered putting in a bolognaise sauce. I've been hanging out to try it since I saw it, and I finally made time to make it.
I also made a tarte tatin that was in one of the pressure test challenges, so I had a very Masterchef inspired night! Photos of that in my next post!

It is definitely a more interesting sauce than what I'm used to. We could all pick up different flavours. For me the cinnamon stood out, for my mum she could really pick the bayleaf, for Rob, it was more the cloves. I should have added more nutmeg, but overall it was quite a lovely sauce.

George Calombaris' "Best Bolognaise Sauce"
An adaption by "Stephsmail" on the Masterchef forums (Thank you!)

a good splash of olive oil
2 onions, finely chopped
3 cloves garlic, crushed
300g minced beef
300g minced pork
300g minced veal
2 carrots, finely chopped
2 stalks celery, finely chopped
2 cups white wine
2 heaped teaspoons ground nutmeg
2 heaped teaspoons ground cinnamon
5 bayleaves
5 cloves
425g tin crushed tomatoes
200g tomato paste
salt to taste
pepper to taste

1. Put olive oil in a large hot saucepan. Add onion and cook until translucent. Add garlic and cook for a few minutes.

2. Add the beef, pork and veal and cook until browned. Add the carrots and celery. Add the white wine.

3. Add the rest of the ingredients and simmer over a low heat for as long as possible.
I left mine over night off the heat to develop more flavour, and slow cooked it for about 2 hours before serving.

Serves 5.

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