Roasted garlic and pumpkin risotto

Donna's Roasted Garlic and Pumpkin Risotto

Making good on my every Monday commitment, even after an internet problem that I fixed myself!! (the old turn off / turn on trick - my old IT work colleagues would be proud) is one of the first Donna's I ever made - her Roasted Garlic and Pumpkin Risotto, from issue 14, page 138. I should thank Crystal for this - she made it once years ago and it has been a favourite of my family's ever since! It is super easy, the only bother is the time standing at the stove while you stir the stock in, probably about 20 minutes. And it is very open to personal touches - the last time I made this (which isn't the photo below because we ate last weeks batch before I remembered to take a photo) I added sliced swiss mushrooms about halfway through adding the stock. I had planned to saute them and stir them through at the end with the pumpkin however our stovetop was already rather full because along side this risotto I was making a, ahem, breast milk risotto for Flynn. Which by-the-by he loved! But cooking the mushrooms in with the risotto worked well anyway.

This photo does not do the taste justice!

But back to the Donna - my top tips:

• I always throw a few extra garlic cloves into roast then the 8 she recommends because roasted garlic is LOVED in this house!
• I normally use dried oregano because I rarely have fresh in my crisper and it's still good
• I would recommend using a semi-decent stock rather then the powdered version/stock cube if you can, but it is still nice if you powdered is all you have. I used the new stock paste in a tube and it was good.
• If you put the pumpkin and garlic into the oven before doing anything else, it tends to be ready just as the risotto is ready. Nice!

Let me know if this is a regular in your house, or if you try making it for the first time.

And a question - has anyone made the dark chocolate and caramel pudding the the front of the last issue's cover? If so, is it worth cooking?

Classic barbecued pork ribs - Mr C.T.Sanger

Erm hmmm, hi (sheepish).
Sorry about the HUGE delay between posts, but a small technical difficulty (where I nearly lost the photos from Flynn's first 3 months of life PANIC in the disco but luckily the lovely Che fixed it) was followed by a rather large motivation difficulty... but I hereby state (ohhh the commitment scares me so) that apart from about 3 weeks in September when I toddle off to the UK I will post at least every Monday.

Classic barbecued pork ribs alla Donna

Anyways, enough with the babble. This will be short and sweet because I didn't even cook this (what a cop out for the first post back!) the lovely Mr C.T.Sanger did. Donna's classic barbecued pork ribs from issue 45, page 112. AH-FREAKING-MAZING. Or maybe it just happened to hit the spot at the time. But it was very more-ish, easy (well.... it was for me (o: ) and didn't take too long at all. Che added a little cumin and smoked paprika to the recipe, just because he likes the spices, and he couldn't see the cider vinegar right at the front of the cupboard so used half white wine and half balsamic, and said next time he would use all balsamic. It was also too cold to bbq outside so we ovened it on .... hmmm will get Che to let you know that one in the comments or this post will never get done..... a heat, I'll guess 200/220. Anyway, it's a recipe you can play around with and it is still YUM. The pre-boiling made the pork realllyyy tender and juicy and it didn't have a fatty feel or taste to it, just mouth watering bbqy goodness, it had a smokey taste even without actually barbecuing it, though both Che and I are keen to cook this again and try it on the bbq to compare. We served it with potato wedges and mayonnaise... and that was it. So bad! But sooooo good :o)

Classic pork ribs alla Che

I hope this inspires you to cook this, as warm wintry comfort food it was arrrgghhhh (homer drool). For those on a diet...... maybe see the beautiful post previous to this one :o)
Issue 45, page 112

Banana cake with passionfruit icing

Donna's donna

Morning all! Yesterday I had lady finger bananas to use up (I stupidly forgot I don't like lady finger bananas when I bought them) and some frozen passionfruit too so this recipe was perfecto for my cause! It's from issue 21, page 170, and it was very straight forward, I didn't change anything apart from baking the cake about 10 minutes longer but thats fairly usual for our oven.

The missing slice is PFB's husband tax

The cake without any icing (when PFB's tax was charged) was a little on the dry side... but that may have been my fault because it was a little under cooked when the timer went off so I put it back in and promptly forgot about it until the next add break in Offspring.... :o) But once it was iced it was perfect so maybe it was for the better anyway! Oh and I didn't have time to wait for the lemon juice and passionfruit to cool completely before adding the icing sugar so the icing was a little runny, but that's my fault, not donna's!

And by-the-by, this recipe taught me the difference between allspice and mixed spice - I had mixed spice and was going to substitute it but when I googled the two and realised they weren't the same I changed my mind. I'm glad I did because I think it's the allspice in this cake that gives it a really nice flavour (well, apart from the banana of course!!). The link is below for anyone else interested

http://womansday.ninemsn.com.au/food/foodfeatures/993536/allspice-mixed-spice-and-five-spice

Asparagus and ricotta pizza

Donna's version - classy!

I really do want to sound, well if not posh, but like my life is a little polished, but I'll be honest, I made this recipe because we had asparagus that had been in the fridge for a week- ok I'm not going to lie, I think it might have actually been two weeks, but it was fine! I promise! Just a little bit limp, but not throw out-able or anything! I was being, you know, environmental, non food wastey etc....

Our audience - Pete and Rarfy

 Anyway, so I searched on "asparagus" in the recipe index on the website and found this little gem in issue 41, page 32. It is full of ingredients I like which is always a good start! We (this was a joint effort between PFB and me) followed the recipe apart from adding artichokes, which if you decide to do the same, don't do what we did and put them on the pizza before baking as they burn before the rest of the ingredients are ready and you have to pick them off and eat them as a entree :o)

Final verdict - it was tasty, a tip: make sure you spread the ricotta around evenly (unlike my trying to be artistic blobs), otherwise the bites without ricotta are quite dry. The lemon ricotta mix is really nice, I'm trying to think of something else I could use it in as I really liked it.

Ta-da!!!

Chorizo, tomato and feta frittata

Morning peeps!

Hope you are all recovering well from the public holiday bonanza! My outlaws are going home today after being here for two weeks, I'm sad to see them go, especially Che's Mum's Chinese cooking, but it will be nice to have Flynn back to myself again!

My attempt to replicate Donna's photo...

Anyhoo, enough of my waffle - this recipe was YUM, even Che who isn't that keen on Spanish food (I think he holds a grudge because he reckons that Spanish tapas is ripping off Chinese yum cha...... :o) crazy fool) liked it. I followed the recipe as is and it really doesn't need any changes. I used feta because goats cheese was really expensive and I was being a cheapskate that week, but I think the goats cheese would make it even tastier. Oh - my one little issue was I wasn't sure if you stirred the egg into the tomato mixture in the pan or not, so I just did a really shallow little stir, not enough to mix it, just enough to make the egg layer not entirely even.... if that makes sense. And that seemed to work. The coriander on it was really good to.

I don't have Donna's photo to add because I'll never get this loaded if I don't do it now, but it's on page 35 of issue 56. I hope this inspires someone else to cook it!

How we ate it, with salad and sauteed mushrooms, yum yum yum!!!

Spicy meatballs with coconut noodles - by Jade Tsang

As this is the first post for the Rate my donna blog I'll keep it simple and not bore you with my waffling! This is the "donna" that gave me the idea to do this blog.

The magazine version

One day whilst heavily pregnant Che and I made Donna's spicy meatballs with coconut noodles from issue 54 - I made the mince mixture then went off to the gym, and he put the rest of the dish together. You'd think being 8 months pregnant and just having been to the gym I'd have thought whatever food was placed in front of me was a taste sensation, but both Che and I agreed that the dish was tasty - but - the sauce and mince mixture needed salt, and the mince could have done with marinating if you had the time. Also, we added twice the amount of noodles as the recipe suggested and whilst it wasn't quite as soupy, it worked better for us as we are fatty poombas and like big portions!

Tsanger version!

I made a note in my magazine as I do when I alter one of her recipes and that's when I started thinking wouldn't it be fab to have access to everyone else's little notes and alterations? So here we are! I hope this becomes a little community of cookery obsessed types, where we can show off our creations, inspire each other to give a "donna" a try and share our hints and tips. If I can type that sentence in the least corny way possible!

Issue 54, page 73

PS A big HAPPY BIRTHDAY to Elizabeth!!! Yes, the full name, I'm sorry, but I can't change!