Cheeky Drop’s Friday Drinks

April 11, 2012January 21, 2015 - Alex Leave a comment

Disclaimer: the nice squirrels at Cheeky Drop are providing Eating Adelaide with some Friday drinks of its own.

You would imagine that Friday drinks are something of an institution but I bet many readers are out there who have never worked anywhere where Friday drinks are on the boss. There’s a massive number of reasons for this: obviously someone in accounts has to open the corporate wallet but bosses also have to be mindful of responsible consumption. Yep – some people still think it’s OK to drink and drive (especially if someone else is paying) and then unfortunately you always get the few people who exploit the boss’s generosity, have too many drinks and then behave like idiots. As with the schoolyard, there’s very often just the one person who spoils it for everyone.

I’ve been very lucky. Quite a few of my employers (including my current one) have laid on drinks on some form or another. One place had very casual team based drinks every Friday (I kid you not) and then on a regular basis had a bigger, catered events for the whole company. Currently, I can enjoy a few free drinks on the first Friday of the month. When I lived in England, free drinks on any kind of regular basis were thin on the ground – but that might have been because everyone was more than happy to go to the pub and pay for their own! But that didn’t stop employers putting on very impressive Christmas dos and putting on things like beer and pizza on Christmas Eve. And when I say “Christmas Eve” I mean 10am.

Personally, I’m in favour of Friday drinks – it’s lovely to socialise with colleagues and I suspect bosses are secretly pleased with the amount of work chat that goes on! I’ve never been to a works drinks where everyone hasn’t been catered for – I enjoy my work functions just as much when holding a glass of water or orange juice as I do when holding a beer.

Anyway, enough about me because this is actually all about you and how you and your colleagues can treat yourselves to Friday drinks. And not just any Friday drinks … but Friday drinks delivered by a squirrel*. The squirrel will turn up with a case of wine and all you have to do is enjoy yourselves.

Of course, you do have to put some effort in here. You need to tell the squirrels why you need the drinks, you need a bit of facebook or twitter action (and while you’re over at facebook don’t forget to like Eating Adelaide). The competition is open now and a winner is going to be drawn every Wednesday (so delivery can be arranged in time for Friday) until 30 May. The first winner is drawn next Wednesday 18 April.

Full details can be found over at Cheeky Drop. Get entering!

* Note that the squirrel is a person in costume, but I have been assured that that is what you will get!

Chettinad Fried Chicken

April 5, 2012 - Alex 1 Comment

There is a restaurant review in the works but today I’m running short of time so here is an excellent chicken recipe that you might find useful over the long break. This is an Indian recipe (Chettinad is a region in Tamil Nadu, in southern India) but it’s a really welcome change to a big saucy curry. It stands on its own perfectly well, but if you are putting together a curry extravaganza, then this is a pleasant contrast to sauce rich dishes. It’s also fab because it doesn’t require 3000 different spices, carefully roasted and ground.

I got this recipe from my mum and I’m pretty sure it did originally come out of a cookbook – I’m sure she’ll let us all know which one!

Begin by taking about 1kg of chicken (I use skinned thigh fillets cut into large cubes) and rub it with about 1 tsp of salt and a generous sprinkle of turmeric. Set aside.

Prepare some salted water – 3 tbsp of water with ¼ tsp of salt. Ensure the salt dissolves in the water.

Heat some peanut (or other flavourless oil) in a wok and ½ tsp of mustard seeds, ½ tsp of fennel seeds, and 5 whole dried hot red chillis. Keep the chillis whole – this does keep the heat of the dish under control. If you have it, also add 1-2 tablespoons of skinned urad dahl. If you don’t have it – don’t bother seeking it out. You could also add some curry leaves.

When the spices are crackling and starting to darken add a finely chopped onion and cook until brown (that’s brown – not burnt – don’t get impatient and whack the heat up!).

Add the chicken to the onion and stir fry, sprinkling on some salted water as you go. Keep adding the water. You want to have used up all the water by the time you finish cooking BUT you must sprinkle the water in, so you don’t end up stewing your meat.

It’s best if you can cook the chicken all in one batch but realistically that might not happen. Just be aware that the longer you have the heat on the chillis the more likely they are to start breaking down and the hotter the finished product will become. If you do want to keep some of this dish mild then reserve some cooked chicken from the first batch.

When the chicken is cooked and the salted water is used up, remove the chicken (and onion and spices, of course) from the wok and serve. You don’t need to serve straight away – this dish is perfect to prepare in advance. Once cooked, put everything into an oven proof dish, cover with tin foil and reheat (with the tin foil on) when you are ready to serve.

Best eaten with pappadums, raita, naan … and don’t worry about having too much – there’s very rarely any left over!

Corn and Spinach Muffins

April 2, 2012January 24, 2014 - Alex 2 Comments

Personally, I am not really into savoury muffins at all. However, what I am very much into at the moment is food that is portable, self contained and freezer friendly. This means that, with minimal planning, I always have something I can feed to the Eating Machine (that’s the baby) at relatively short notice.

So I now love savoury muffins because I can pack all manner of stuff into them and they take only a morning to defrost.

I’ve been doing quite a lot of experimenting and have found that many recipes end up being a little heavy. However, this recipe, cribbed from the back of a pack of Coles own brand frozen corn*, produced light muffins that froze well.

The recipe claimed it would make 12. Coles’ home economists must make giant muffins because I halved the recipe and ended up with 9 regular muffins.

Another good thing about muffins is that they don’t require the use of the food processor (so you can make them while babies are asleep without any fear of waking them!) – and in fact it’s imperative to keep your mixing as light and as minimal as possible. Overwork the batter and then you will indeed get heavy muffins.

Perfectly good while still warm, but even better when frozen and thrown in the nappy bag when heading out for a coffee!

* Please note that this was AUSTRALIAN corn. Always check your frozen veggies for country of origin – you could well be shocked – and don’t forget to buy Australian.

You can either print this recipe, or download the pdf. And if your little ones are enjoying this recipe, please share it with your friends!

Corn and Spinach Muffins

Ingredients

dry ingredients

1 cup self raising flour
½ cup frozen corn kernels (straight from the freezer)
½ cup spinach (again, from the freezer, but you'll need to defrost so you can mix)
½ cup grated cheese
small handful of chopped sun dried tomatoes
salt & pepper to taste

wet ingredients

1 egg, beaten
½ cup plain yoghurt
¼ cup light olive oil

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 180° fan and lightly grease your muffin pan.
Mix the dry ingredients and wet ingredients in separate bowls and then mix the wet ingredients into the dry.
Don't over work - mix until they are just combined.
Spoon into the muffin tray and bake for 15-20 minutes, or until golden.

https://eatingadelaide.com/corn-spinach-muffins/