I have just bought this cook book.
I am so happy I bought this cook book. It is spectacular. The photos make you want to eat the food right off the pages! The ingredients are divine and easily purchased or picked from your garden. It is broken up into the seasons and each has a suggested meal plan so you can easily create a simple meal or an indulgent dinner party. ABC Delicious More Please by Valli Little is inspiring, beautiful and each recipe is stunningly simple!

Well, we finally won something…..a seafood tray! I am not a huge fan of any seafood except fish and the occasional prawn, dripping with sauce, more like a bit of prawn with your sauce kinda thing! My husband on the other hand loves it all, so he was happy happy that he won. He decided he wanted to make the oysters really good by cooking them…..somehow. I suggested the Worcestershire/Kilpatrick style without the bacon, as we didn’t have any, but he wanted to make something completely original! He is quite chuffed with himself because they were delicious and just what he felt like to eat! I will have to say, even though I couldn’t bear to eat one, they did look rather delicious and tempting! Maybe next time!

What You Need:

• 1 doz oysters
• 1 ripe tomato
• 1/2 onion
• cheese, finely grated
• salt and pepper

What You Need To Do:

Heat the oven to 170 degrees and line a baking tray with scrunched up foil or baking paper. This helps to hold the oysters upright. Finely dice the onion and the tomato, mix together and place a spoonful on each oyster. Season with the salt and pepper and then sprinkle on the grated cheese. Place the tray in the oven for about 5 minutes or until the cheese is melted and golden brown.

If you are serving them nicely, as opposed to eating them straight off the baking tray as he did, (well it was Sunday night dinner, you know the toasted sandwich/leftovers/make your own type of dinner!) place some rock salt on a plate before putting the oysters on top. This will keep them upright so all the juice doesn’t run out. Serve with some lemon wedges.

Hello!  Yes, I know it has been ages since I have put any recipes or photos on Nattycook but I have been extremely busy with working, studying and now managing the canteen at my children’s school!
I will ease back into it with a simple lunch recipe.  Well actually it is really nice for dinner if you add some roasted pumpkin or sweet potato.  A lovely lady that I work with is really into vegetarian and organic foods so when we work together we have Fine Food Tuesday!  This is one of the favourite meals we make the most.  You can also add avocado, capsicum, snow pea sprouts, whatever you like.  Sometimes we put homemade pesto on the bread.

What You Need:

• Turkish Bread
• Olive oil
• Balsamic vinegar
• Baby english spinach leaves
• Onion finely sliced
• Cucumber
• Cherry tomatoes
• Fetta cheese

What You Need To Do:

There are a few ways to make this really tasty.  You can simply toast the bread in the toaster or under the grill but if you really want to ramp up the flavour brush the bread with some oil and grill it on a hotplate, the bbq is perfect!

Once the bread is toasted, put it on the plate you are going to serve it on because you don’t want to be moving it around too much!  Drizzle some of the oil over the bread to moisten.  Layer the spinach, cucumber, tomato, onion and fetta over the bread and pour a little more oil over the salad.  Next tip a little of the balsamic over the top.  You need to moisten the salad enough so some of the oil and vinegar mix and soak into the bread a little ( this is divine!).  Season with a little salt and pepper and dig in!

It’s a really easy and quick meal to make and really flexible with the ingredients.  I usually try to use red onion but I didn’t have any today so I had to use brown.   You can even reduce the balsamic over a low heat and add some brown sugar to sweeten it up if you like.  This makes a really tasty sticky dressing that is perfect with the fetta!  Enjoy and I will try to take some more photos soon!!