Hairy Dieters' Easy Chicken Tray Bake

From my recent posts, you can tell that I have been giving The Hairy Dieters Eat For Life a work out.  There are just so many tasty, tempting recipes in this book, with the added advantage that they are easy on the hips.

Another recent dish that I made from this book was the Easy Chicken Tray Bake.   You can also find the recipe online here. This dish basically cooks itself - chicken breasts, sweet potatoes, red onion, capsicum, zucchini, tomatoes and cheese, tossed into a baking dish and baked until cooked.  Dinner is served!

This is such a colourful dish, and has plenty of veggies to help you get your 5 a day.  Yet another winner from the Hairy Dieters.

EwE - Kitchen Sink Cookies - Beach Party Snacks

Peggy chose the theme of Beach Party Snacks for this week's Eating with Ellie.  When I think of a beach party, I think of portable food, so that was the inspiration for my recipe choice.

I chose Ellie's Kitchen Sink Cookies, as they are portable and packed with good things to give you energy for a beach party.  They contain apple sauce, dried cherries, dried apricots, walnuts, oatmeal and chocolate.

These cookies are not particularly sweet, but they are quite satisfying, and certainly deserve their "everything but the kitchen sink" moniker. 

To see what everyone else made this week, visit the LYL section of the Eating with Ellie website.

This is our last theme for a while to give everyone a chance to regroup.  If you are interested in joining us, leave a message for us in the comments section of the Eating with Ellie  website, or contact Kayte, Margaret, Peggy  or me directly.

TWD - Les Whoopies

Blogging is terrific for broadening your experiences.  Until I began reading blogs, I had never heard of the US treat known as Whoopie pies, but became fascinated with them because of their pretty cool name.  The origin of Whoopie pies is disputed, but are thought to have been the creation of the Pennsylvanian  Amish community.  They are also the state pie of Maine.  A Whoopie pie comprises two cake-like cookies which are sandwiched together with a sweet filling of some kind. 

This week's Tuesday with Dorie recipe is Les Whoopies, and it is the first time that I have made Whoopie pies.  There is a café down the road from me that sells great Whoopie pies, so I have tried them before.

I didn't bother getting a Whoopie pie pan - having known about Whoopie pies for around 10 years and never having made them before, I don't think I can justify a Whoopie pie pan.  It is not necessary to have a special pan to make them, and while it would have made  my Whoopie pies slightly more regular in shape, I was quite happy with my results without it.

These Whoopie pies are light, fluffy and chocolatey, and the peanut butter flavoured filling is a perfect match for the chocolate.  I would happily make these again.

To see what everyone else made this week and what they thought of it, visit the LYL section of the TWD website.

Hairy Dieters' Beef Stroganoff

I like hearty dishes in cold weather, and the Hairy Dieters' Beef Stroganoff surely hit the spot.  The Hairy Dieters have taken an old favourite and made it calorie friendly, for example, by subbing cream with half fat crème fraiche.

You can find the recipe posted online here, but I highly recommend the book that it comes from, The Hairy Dieters Eat For Life.  What's not to love - beef, mushrooms, onions and of course, sauce!

I served my beef strog with boiled wholegrain rice to soak up all the lovely sauce.  Definitely a winner!

Garden State Hotel, Flinders Lane, Melbourne

In the US, New Jersey is the Garden State, but in Australia, Victoria was previously known as "The Garden State".  (Now I think Victoria is "On the Move".)

In Flinders Lane, there is a hotel named the Garden State Hotel.  One Sunday for lunch, before seeing Viceroy's House at Kino, Tim and I wandered into the Garden State Hotel's Public Bar for lunch: 

Above our table, I loved this print quoting Rumer Godden, author of The Greengage Summer (which I have read and became aware of through the lovely Jane Asher, who starred in a movie adaptation of the book as a child, and who once dated Paul McCartney - hence there is a Beatles connection!):  

They have quite an extensive "Beer Garden" menu.  On the day, Tim ordered the market fish with Kipfler potatoes, caper and peppercorn dressing ($21):

Tim said that this meal was delicious.  I especially liked that the fish was served with potatoes instead of fries, making it slightly unusual and more healthy.

I ordered the Borrowdale pork schnitzel with brussels sprouts and mustard ($22): 

I was initially rather surprised to see the brussels sprouts shredded and covering the top of the schnitzel, but I think that the idea was to make them into a sauce with the mustard.  I enjoyed it, although in the end it was probably a little large for me to handle (not a bad issue).

The atmosphere at Garden State was relaxed and casual, the staff were friendly, and at this Sunday lunchtime, it wasn't overcrowded or noisy. 

We enjoyed our spontaneous lunch at Garden State and would go back again.

Garden State Hotel

101 Flinders Lane, Melbourne

Ph: 03 8396 5777

EwE - Asian Chicken Wrap - Picnic Day

This week's Eating with Ellie theme is Picnic Day, chosen by moi.  For my recipe, I chose Ellie's Asian Chicken Wrap from So Easy, also online here.

I made a couple of changes to the recipe.  The recipe called for Asian cabbage (wombok) leaves, but my supermarket rarely stocks those, so I used lettuce leaves instead.

I also detest raw capsicum, so I subbed in sliced tomatoes.

Here is the filling before being wrapped: 

I really liked the sauce that Ellie included in the recipe to drizzle over the ingredients.  It lifted the wrap from boring to interesting.

To see what the others made for Picnic Day, visit the LYL section of the Eating with Ellie website.

TWD - My Newest Chocolate Chip Cookies

This week's Tuesday with Dorie (Cookies) recipe is My Newest Chocolate Chip Cookies.  The recipe made 50 cookies, so I quartered it to avoid drowning in cookies.

These cookies are buttery, chewy and packed with chocolate.  I ate two warm out of the oven and they were delicious. 

When you taste cookies like this, you wonder why anyone with an oven and a baking tray would buy hard, tasteless store-bought versions.  These cookies are quick to prepare, require no special skills (I made them while keeping an eye on Cake Wars, so wasn't even giving them my full attention) and yield a terrific result for little effort. 

To see what cookies the other Dorie bakers made this week and what they thought of them, visit the LYL section of the TWD website.