Easy Peasy Cheesy – Making Fresh Cheeses with the Thermomix

It’s so hard for me to choose my favourite foods but cheese is certainly up there as a favourite food – it just tastes so good & makes everything else taste so good too, so imagine how delicious your own homemade cheeses taste! It’s kind of dangerous but good. Here are my favourites & maybe some day I will get a chance to make some hard cheeses or even a brie!!

For my step by step guide to making Halloumi Cheese see my guest blog post on Quirky Cooking.

Labne B

This is my homemade Labna cheese in one piece, I start from scratch & make homemade yoghurt in the Thermomix (I use the automated recipe rounding up the cream & the starter yoghurt) & then it is simply left to strain over night so it becomes firm. There is also a recipe for this in the In the Mix (first book).

Labna

Labna 2

You can roll it into balls & marinate with your favourite herbs & spices & then cover it with oil & keep in the fridge. This cheese is so versatile you can eat it on toast with crackers or veggies sticks served in salads or sandwiches. Or simply on it’s own as a cheeky snack – So good!!

Next is the ricotta or paneer cheese – they are pretty much the same thing but used for different dishes – heat up milk (some recipes have cream too) & then add some vinegar to it, let it sit & then strain the liquid away & you are left with the soft fresh cheese to cook with. Try a ricotta gnocchi recipe or a spinach & ricotta pie.

ricotta_1 ricotta

Paneer Curry

Click on this link for the recipe for Paneer Curry 🙂 Which includes the recipe for making the paneer.

 

The other cheese you can easily make in the Thermomix is Mascarpone, I will be making this again soon & will take some photos to share with you. I hope I have inspired you to give cheese making a go? It’s so fun & rewarding and best of all it’s delicious 🙂

 

Thermomix Lemon & Poppy Seed Cake

lemon poppy seed cake

This recipe is a slight variation on a family favourite when we were growing up, also the first job I ever had was helping a lady bake cakes to sell to cafe’s, & we made a version of this (along with the Chocolate Zucchini Cake recipe).

First soak your poppy seeds in the milk ( also if you run out of poppy seeds you can substitute with black sesame seeds if you need too :-))

poppy cake

Next blitz the lemon zest with the sugar, to make a lemon flavoured sugar.

lemon poppy seed cake making step 1

Mix all the cake ingredients together; the time is quick & the speed slower to avoid making the cake to tough & dry.

Another tip from my younger days is if you are not using your homemade butter use the paper that the butter came in instead of baking paper, it’s something my mum always did & she saved the butter papers in the fridge in case we needed to use them for a cake. It’s a great way to save money & time because the paper is already “pre-greased” with some of the leftover butter 🙂

lemon poppy seed cake in tin 2

While the cake is cooking you cake make the glaze. If you don’t have whole vanilla beans & you want to use vanilla bean paste that is fine too :-).

When the cake is cooked through poke some holes all around it & pour the glaze over so it soaks into the cake.

lemon poppy seed cake in tin

It’s the best served warm with a cuppa – enjoy!

lemon poppy seed cake

Lemon & Poppy Seed Cake
Author: 
Recipe type: Baking
Prep time: 
Cook time: 
Total time: 
Serves: 12
 
Ingredients
  • CAKE
  • 100 grams poppy seeds
  • 120 grams milk
  • Zest from 1 Lemon
  • 200 grams sugar raw
  • 140 grams vegetable oil, or rice bran oil
  • 300 grams plain four
  • dash ground cinammon
  • 2.5 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 2 eggs
  • GLAZE
  • ⅓ vanilla bean, or 1 tsp vanilla extract/paste
  • zest from 1 Lemon
  • 40 grams butter cubes
  • 50 grams honey
  • 15 grams lemon juice
Instructions
  1. Soak poppy seeds in milk for 1 hr.
  2. Preheat oven to 175 degrees.
  3. Put sugar & lemon zest into the TM bowl & process for 20 secs on speed 10.
  4. Add rest of the cake ingredients to TM bowl & mix for 4 secs speed 4, scrape down sides of bowl & mix 4 secs on speed 4.
  5. Pour into lined cake tin & bake for approx. 45 mins or until cooked through.
  6. While the cake is cooking make the glaze by placing vanilla bean & lemon zest into the TM bowl & process for 20 secs on speed 10.
  7. Add remaining ingredients for the glaze and cook 2 mins 50 degrees speed 2.
  8. Process for 10 secs on speed 10.
  9. While cake is still warm stick a skewer into it quite a few times all over the cake & pour over Vanilla, Lemon Glaze.

Inspirational Recipes & The Thermomixers 30 Day Challenge

Yes people are still buying Thermomix!! Of course they are because they are so awesome!!

MODEL5 bush backdrop

When I deliver a Thermomix I want people to get the most out of their new kitchen friend & ask them if they would like to accept the Thermomix 30 Day Challenge. “Your mission should you choose to accept it is to make 1 new thing a day in the Thermomix everyday for 30 days, it can be something as simple as making icing sugar in 10 secs, also if you miss a day you can make up for it on another day. In the challenge try to use every part of the Thermomix at least once including the Varoma. It is optional to share photos of the food you make in your 30 day challenge on social media with the hashtag #thermomix30daychallenge. (Feel free to share on my Arwens ThermoPics Facebook page too)” Of course you don’t have to be a new owner to accept the challenge either, you might just want to try some new recipes for 30 days 🙂

At your 1 hour delivery session, you learn all about your new Thermomix & how to use it, as well as cook your first recipe while your consultant helps. We recommend hosting another Thermomix demo a few weeks after your Thermomix has arrived because at any presentation you will only remember 20% of the information. Or you may like to go to one of the Thermomix demonstration style cooking classes.

Here are my tips on the best places for inspirational Thermomix recipes.

Sign up to Cookidoo. (It’s available for TM31,Model 5 & TM6 Thermomix owners – you just register with your serial number from your Thermomix on the TM31 it is underneath & on the Model 5 it’s under the settings menu in about Thermomix) It is best to use either google chrome or firefox as your internet browser or download the cookidoo app. So what are you waiting for? if you need any help setting up cookidoo you can ask your consultant or ring Thermomix directly on 1800 004 838.

The Thermomix Recipe Community has thousands of recipes & growing everyday. This is a place where Thermomix enthusiasts upload their favourite recipes they have converted to the Thermomix. These are not tested recipes. It is a fantastic tool you can search for a favourite recipe or ingredient or even a user like me arwen.thermomix. The advantage of creating your own profile on the recipe community is you can create your own folders & keep your favourite recipes in them – you can also ask other users to be your “friend”. Your friends will be able to see your collections & you will be able to see their recipe collections.

Subscribe to the Thermomix in Australia YouTube Channel and like the Thermomix in Australia Facebook page.

For more inspiration & recipes from me, subscribe to my monthly customer newsletter & like my Arwens ThermoPics Facebook page or follow me on Instagram.

Quirky Cooking & Fiona Hoskin have fantastic sites especially if you have allergies or food intolerances.

The Dani Valent website is available for amazing Thermomix recipe videos, you get 1 free video or recipe a month for the free subscription or for $197 a year you get 1 Thermomix video and or (printable) recipe a week & you start with over 200 recipes/videos when you join. There are also monthly & 3 monthly subscription options. It’s great value & features home cooking recipes by Dani & also amazing chef’s recipes too. I’m kind of addicted to this site. See everything I have cooked from it here (yes I have cooked & eaten absolutely everything!!)

Here is my guide to converting your own recipes to the Thermomix.

Of course you can just google Thermomix & whatever recipe you are looking for & there are so many blogs, Facebook groups & pages for you to join too! I think one of the great things about the Thermomix it really has built a community of Thermomix lovers & we love to help each other with our Thermomixing & share our favourite recipes. The main thing to remember is we all cook differently no matter which appliance we are using & we all have different tastes or requirements for our food, lifestyles, our families & friends. So don’t be scared of your new best kitchen friend, pick up your trusty spatula, just be brave & Thermomix!

Making The Healthy Chef’s Apple Bread Recipe in the Thermomix

I am sure I have mentioned before what a fan I am of Teresa Cutter – The Healthy Chef & I love all her recipes – they are not Thermomix recipes but so easy to make in the Thermomix here is her recipe for Apple & Cinnamon Bread. I wanted to take the recipe 1 step further back by making my own spelt flour so I started with spelt grains. Did I mention i just love milling in the Thermomix?

Wheat in bowlFlour

ApplesApples chopped with ingredientsApple bread before ovenApple bread cooked & sliced_1

YUM!! I chopped the apples in the Thermomix too & used my Thermomix milled cinnamon stick & homemade vanilla bean paste & it was just delicious!!

 

 

Best Vegetarian Meals in the Thermomix

Mole' HR

Quirky Cooking’s Black Bean Mole’ (Chilli Bean Chocolate)

Thermie Green Quiche

Thermie Green Quiche

Beetroot risotto

Mushroom or Beetroot or Leek, Lemon & Zucchini Risotto

If you need a vegan option instead of parmesan cheese try this amazing recipe given to me by a customer.  250g almonds soaked over night, rinsed & drained (if you don’t have time you can soak for 1/2 hour in hot water) 2 tbs of savoury yeast & 1/2 tsp salt (to taste) Chop on speed 9 for 5 secs or until desired consistency.

My other favourite Vegetarian recipes are My Kinda Hunza Pie, Zucchini & Feta Fritters, Beetroot Sushi, Creamy Tomato & Zucchini Sauce to go with fresh pasta.

Dahl

Great vegetarian meals from the basic cookbook at Dhal Curry (use extra fresh chilli & plenty or salt or veggie stock paste) & Ratatouille.

Other great recipes vegetarian recipes I will upload soon are mushroom veloute’, vegetable Tagine with cous cous, pumpkin ravioli with sage butter sauce, lentil burgers & falafel’s.