Thermomix choc chip cookies - not failsafe or dairy-free

I made these cookies using the recipe in the TM Everyday Cooking recipe book.

I usually make a batch of choc chip cookies each week for the non failsafe members of the family for snacks, school lunch boxes, etc and for when people visit.

These cookies were a lot more "puffy" than my normal ones (which are flat) and look nothing like the picture in the TM book which makes me wonder if they've used a stock image or if I did something wrong.

Hubby says they're not as nice as my normal ones but the kids like them and it is so easy to make them in the TM.

Next week I'll experiment with my normal recipe and see if I get flatter cookies as a result.

Failsafe varoma chicken dumplings

This recipe is modified from the Varoma Chilli chicken dumpling recipe posted on the forum thermomix site. As soon as my registration is approved I'll post this there!



Ingredients

Dumpling dough.
300g SR flour
100 ml of hot water
3 tbsp canola oil
Cold water, extra - I needed about 60 ml extra!

Add all ingredients to the TM bowl, turn dial to close lid position and knead for 2 min on interval speed.
After 1 min of kneading, check dough. If not coming together to form a ball, add 1 tablespoon of water. Carefully continue to add water until dough forms a ball. If too much water is added and dough becomes sticky, add an extra sprinkle of flour.
Turn out dough onto a floured surface or a silicon baking mat and roll to 1-2 mm thick. Use an egg ring to cut circles of dough. My circles kept shrinking and I had a lot of trouble till I started cutting them on mass and then rolling them larger with the rolling pin immediately before putting mixture in them.

For the last one I rolled mixture into a ball, flattened and then rolled thin. I think next time I would do this instead of cutting all those circles only to have to reroll them out.

Chicken filling
1 half chicken breast roughly chopped
3 spring onions, roughly chopped
1 ripe pear, peeled
1/6th purple cabbage, chopped roughly
1 celery stalk
1 T soy sauce

Place chicken, spring onions, pear, cabbage and celery into TM bowl and turn dial to close lid position. Pulse several times using the turbo button or until meat mixture is smooth.
Add soy sauce and pulse a further 2 times to combine. The mixture went a crazy purple colour!

Place teaspoonfuls of mixture onto dumpling circles. Fold dumpling dough in half to make a pasty shape and press edges with a fork to seal.



Place 500ml water into the TM bowl. Lay dumplings in the Varoma and place into position. Steam for 12-15 min on Varoma temp, speed 1.


The recipe gave the tip of steaming extra mixture as meatballs. This worked beautifully and I did some for Kate with neocate and amaranth mixed in.

Verdict
Made heaps - enough for all of us, very filling and yummy, plus enough for the hubby and Mr 6 for lunch tomorrow.

Next time
Making the circles was a pain - try rice papers???

Failsafe mayonnaise

This recipe draws on the recipe on p55 of Everyday Cooking and that on of 239 of Friendly Food.

Ingredients

1 Clove garlic
1 Egg room temp and separated
salt
2 t hot water
1 t citric acid
150 ml canola oil
100 ml peark juice

Method

Peel garlic: I used the tip from the Forumthermomix board o putting clove in on reverse, speed 4 to peel - worked a treat
My egg wasn't room temperature so I separated it and put the egg yolk, chopped garlic, salt, citric acid and water in TM bowl and mixed on speed 4 at temp of 37 for 2 minutes.

With blases rotating on speed 4 I slowly added the oil and pear juice. I didn't read the book correctly - I should have left the MC ON and this would have helped with consistent speed of adding. Did this over 4-6 mins.

Then added egg white and mixed for 10 seconds.

Verdict

It is a little runny but tastes delicious. Can't wait to make coleslaw with it.

Play-dough

Not really failsafe related - especially not the colouring (but a good use of all those colours in my cupboard!) We had kids coming over today so I made up a batch of play-doh using the TMX recipe on p168 of Everyday Cooking

Ingredients
250g water
100g cooking salt
1T cream of tartar
250g plain flour
20g cooking oil
Food colouring

I used olive oil (need to use it up as not failsafe) and 20g was too much. I'll use 15g next time and may need to go down to 15g. I needed to add more flour.

Method
Put water, salt, cream of T in TM bowl and heat for 5 mins at 60 on speed 3.
Add flour and mix for 40 seconds or until mixture combined and thick. Leave to cool
Set dial to closed lid position.
When dough is cool add the oil and knead for 1-2 minutes on interval speed

Divide into bowls and mix colour through

Verdict. Fantastic playdoh and so easy

Failsafe modified beetroot salad - Moderate salycilate

This recipe is adapted from p 39 of the TM Everyday cooking book.

My lovely TM consultant actually modified all the recipes at my demo so I could eat them - this is one she did and I have further modified.

Ingredients
1 raw beetroot
2 carrots
1/3 leek
1 golden delicious apple
1 stick celery
parsley (I only had a miniscule amount)
2 T canola oil
2 T water
1/2 t citric acid
celtic sea salt

Method
As per TM instructions.

Place all veg in TM bowl and chop on speed 5 for 3 seconds. scrape sides, add dressing ingredients and chop speed 5, 3 seconds.

Verdict
Delicious!
More parsley and add mung beans next time (my TM consultant did this and it was divine!

Note
It has "moderate" salycilates so very sensitive people may not be able to tolerate.

Steamed lemon chicken, rice & veges using the varoma (Failsafe recipe adaptation)

This was my first attempt at using the varoma and it was not entirely successful. My TM consultant told me you can cook a chicken and veg and rice all at the same time in the varoma and TM. I couldn't work out how so I did the chicken first and then the rice and veg.

I did some research first and drew on the following recipes for ideas regarding sauce and cooking methods:

http://thermomix-er.blogspot.com/2009/04/drunken-chicken-version-1-in-varoma.html

http://thermomix-er.blogspot.com/2009/04/soy-chicken-in-varoma.html

(1) Lemon Chicken

Ingredients
1.4kg free range chicken that needed to be eaten same day
1/2 cup pear juice
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 t citric acid
2 cups water
1 clove garlic (chopped in TM first)

Method
Combine all sauce ingredients in TM bowl and cook for 10 minutes at 100°C on reverse + speed 2.

Wash the chicken

Add chicken and sauce to a Glad roasting bag

Put chicken (in bag) in side Varoma

Put 1200ml of water in TM bowl and steam the chicken for 30 minutes at Varoma temperature on speed 2.

It did not look cooked so I cooked it for another 5 minutes. Took the chicken out of the varoma and left it to sit inside the sauce in the bag.

I then went and cooked the rice and veges. While these were cooking I cut the chicken open (after it had sat for about 20 minutes in bag. It was very pink and not cooked.

So, I chopped the chicken into pieces and after the rice was cooked I took the basket with rice out of the TM bowl and put the chicken pieces into the bowl, poured all the lemon sauce in and extra water)

I then put the TM on to Varoma Temp, speed 2 reverse for 20 minutes. I had the veges steaming some more in the varoma at the same time.

(2) Rice & Veg
I followed the TM instructions for rice and it came out perfectly. The vegs were on for the same time - 16 minutes - in the varoma and were still very hard. Next time I would cut them all a lot smaller so they cook faster. They ended up needing about 35 minutes.

Verdict

The meal was lovely, if late due to it taking longer than I had counted on. Veges were beautiful, chicken was lovely and moist.

Next time I will add an extra 1/2 t of citric acid to make it more lemony

I need to learn how to use the Varoma - I wonder if there is a chart around showing how long certain items need to be cooked for?

Vegetable stock concentrate - Failsafe version

This recipe is adapted from the vegetable stock concentrate one on page 17 of the TM Everyday cooking book.

I had altered the ingredients to make it failsafe. Note that parsley has recently been changed from "low" to "moderate" so very sensitive people may not be able to tolerate the parsley in this.

Ingredients
200g celery, roughly cut
3 carrots, thickly peeled, roughly cut
1 large spring onion bulb, halved (you can buy huge ones at woolies - they sell them individually as white globe onions)
1/4 red cabbage, roughly cut
1 Clove garlic
1 bunch parsley
150g celtic sea salt
1 T canola oil

Method
As per TM instructions.

Place all veg in TM bowl and chop on speed 6 - I had to chop for about a minute and use the spatula to get all the veg down and chopped (especially the cabbage)

Add salt and oil and cook for 20 mins at Varoma temp on speed 1

Mix by slowly turning the speed dial to speed 6 then pulverising for 1 min on speed 9

Verdict

It looks like the concentrate I saw at the TM demo, basically like a pesto. Smells great (and smelt divine while cooking) and tastes very salty! I will try it in a soup later and report back.