Tutorial on Tuesday: Easter Chick

Another Easter tutorial for you today, but really, it can be made all year round. I know Miss2 would appreciate it at any time!

Firstly, grab yourself a slice of cheese (I used tasty cheese) and a glass. Use the glass as a cutter to cut a circle from your cheese. Put it on your plate.

Next, take a strawberry and cut off about 2-3mm or 1/8 inch from the very bottom (the non-green leafy end). With the piece that you cut off, cut that in half as shown. Place on your cheese as the two eyes.

Cut 2

Cut 1

Take a carrot and cut two thinner rounds (2-3mm or 1/8 inch) and one thicker round (12-14mm or 1/2 inch). Set the thicker slice aside for now.








Taking one of the thinner slices, use a knife to cut the base off, just below the centre "core" of the carrot (the inner ring). Next, use your knife to cut two upside down "v" shapes from the carrot along the edge that you just cut. Do not discard/eat all of these "v" shapes - you will need one.

Repeat again for the second thinner slice of carrot, and put them in place on your cheese as the feet.

Pop the "v" shape of carrot just below the strawberry eyes - this has just become the chick's beak.

Now take your thicker slice of carrot. Place it on your chopping board so that it stands up on the flat edge. Cut two slices as shown.

With the middle slice (the one that is flat both sides, not curved on side which the first slice would be), cut three lengths as shown. Place at the top of your slice of cheese for the tufts of feathers that chicks seem to have (in cartoon versions).

Finished:

Another suggestion:

This one uses a cornthin for the body and sultanas for the eyes. The carrot instructions are the same as for the cheese chick.










How did you go? What did you use to make a chick with?

Big Ship and Oshtapush

We had reason to clean the house top to bottom this weekend, and what a weekend it was!! I have to admit though, it was rather nice to cook up a meatloaf in a nice clean kitchen.

Ship: meatloaf hull, roast potato bridge, carrot mast, roast pumpkin sails, broccoli portholes.
Sea: tomato "dip-dip" sauce.
Octopus (Oshtapush if you are Miss2): squash body, purple carrot eyes, orange carrot tenticles.

Next week's "pretty plate" is already in the thought stage, and there should be another Easter tutorial sometime tomorrow for Tutorial on Tuesday.

A Squashy Submarine

Firstly, I apologise for the photography. I left the white plates in the car (which my husband took to work this afternoon), and we had our "pretty plate" for dinner rather than lunch today, so a few shadows! I will learn my lesson the hard way!

Anyway.

Yesterday Miss2 and I had the pleasure of running into Spring Creek Organics at Yendon Gourmet Tomatoes pick-your-own strawberry day (they had run out of strawberries by the time we got there - next time!!). Spring Creek Organics were very excited to see the Carrot Tulips that we did a few weeks back, and were most intrigued with what was going to happen this week.

What else do you do with yellow squash and a request for a submarine or ship?

Pasta ocean, carrot fish, strawberry coral, squash submarines (which didn't entirely survive the cooking process) cheese and snow pea boats and tomato birds. And a lot of shadows.

The tomatoes were from Yendon Gourmet Tomatoes, and the squash and carrots were from Spring Creek Organics. I'm looking forward to having another go at another submarine sometime soon, and using some more rainbow carrots to come up with something else. Any ideas?

Squash anyone?

Rabbit Tutorial - Perfect for Easter!

With Easter drawing near, I thought I could share something that you might like to share with some children (or adults!) in your life, and my first Tutorial on Tuesday - a rabbit.




Cut a slice of apple from across the apple so you get the star in the middle from the core. I used the slice very close the base of the apple, so only have a dot instead of a star for the core. The whole slice is about 3-4mm thick (1/8th inch for all of my USA readers).

 Take two sultanas and place just above the centre of the core to form two eyes.

Take a grape. Lie it so it is an oval on the chopping board (rather than a circle when looking from above). Cut it in half and place it in the centre of the core to be a nose.

Take a carrot, and cut some really thin matchsticks (the ones you see here aren't thin enough - I cut them a lot thinner before I used them). Alternatively, you could use a vegetable peeler to peel a thin slice of carrot, and then use a knife to cut it into matchsticks. If you have a grater than makes matchsticks, that is a great option too. Take off the grape and arrange the carrot to be whiskers before replacing the grape on top.

Next, take a cucumber. I prefer the lebanese cucumbers (the smaller ones). A baby cucumber would work well too. Lie it on the chopping board so it looks like a surfboard. Cut it in half. Stand the cucumber up on its end (the cut end on the chopping board) and cut slices so that it looks like those shown. Then, cut the non-skin end (the raw-edge) on an angle so that it fits against the apple slice.

Ta-da!! Finished rabbit!

 Other ideas...

Bread circle face, grape tomato nose, cheese bow tie, blueberry eyes and sausage ears. Miss 2 loved eating leftovers that looked like a "wabbit"!

I haven't made this, but it has an apple face, carrot whiskers, raspberry nose, blueberry eyes and banana ears. Gorgeous!

 Looking forward to seeing/hearing all of your wonderful rabbits!!

Cheese Toot-Toot!!

A quick and basic one today - Miss2 was rather impatient and insisted on "helping" me!!

I grew up in a town that had was near the escarpment above Wollongong. There were numerous freight trains that hauled coal that frequently passed through our town. I remember counting the number of carriages on a particular train from the school bus as we were waiting at the level crossing - it seemed to never end!

Unfortunately Miss2 has never seen a coal hopper, and thought the ones I included on her lunch plate today were boats.

Cheese coal hopper (trucks/wagons), bread flat-truck/car (with cheese car and shipping container), tomato couplings, blueberry wheels, fairy-bread locomotive with strawberry chimney/stack and carrot steam.

The blueberries were being consumed faster than I could cut them. And now she is sitting beside me, pointing at the photo, saying "pretty lunch".

Keep the suggestions coming - I'm looking forward to trying a ship/sub very soon!

Lunchables Butterfly

Lunchables is what I call lunch-suitable foods: ham, wraps, tomatoes, carrot, blueberries, pineapple ("piie-abble!") strawberries, bread, shredded chicken, cheese etc. Its rare that Miss 2 has any thing else for lunch. Okay. Sometimes chocolate appears on that list too.

Wrap skeleton, ham body, carrot, blueberry, snow pea, mushroom, tomato, cheese and capsicum wings, celery antennae, tomato head

And because today is a public holiday, Matt made her a dessert... Do you want to build a snowman?

Ice-cream body, flake arms, oreo crumb eyes, jelly lolly nose, flake crumb hair

What do you want to see in the next few weeks? Leave a comment below with your suggestions, and if you want a tutorial on any of the "pretty-plates" that have already been featured, let me know below too.

Life's a Treat with Brinner Sheep!

Some nights in our house, we have "Brinner" (breakfast for dinner) as our evening meal. Given that Miss 2 won't eat egg, she generally has bacon (mmm! bacon!!) and toast. Tonight, she had sheep.

Cheese, bread, bacon and hash brown sheep, carrot faces and legs, vegemite eyes, lettuce grass and tomato sun

Life's a treat with brinner sheep!!