Feijoas make a delicious pie

This time of year sees the short feijoa or pineapple guava season in New Zealand. I'm not much of a fan of them raw but love them cooked in pies. I've read that feijoas can be substituted for apples in pretty much any dessert recipe.
One of the favourites in our household is this recipe from Alison Holst.

Pastry:

1 1/4 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
75-100g very cold butter (I freeze mine) the bigger quantity for a richer, flakier pastry
1/2 cup milk to which 1 tsp white wine vinegar has been added

Put flour and baking powder into bowl. Grate the butter and mix with a fork. Add the milk gradually while tossing with a fork. Gently press dough together then refrigerate for about 10 mins.

Filling:

about 600g feijoas
1/2 cup ground almonds
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 Tbsp melted butter

Halve feijoas. Scoop feijoa flesh into bowl. Add ground almonds, sugar and melted butter. Stir.

Preheat oven to about 200deg C. Roll out pastry to a largish round. I place this round on a baking tray or in a dish, then fill with the feijoa filling, then I just tuck the pastry over at the edges, pleating a few times, "free form" style.

Bake for about 25 mins. Serve with whipped cream, or your home made vanilla ice cream.

Delicious!

Steak and kidney pie, crock pot version

Once again we were very fortunate to be given some more fine food. This time, fresh kidneys and some liver courtesy of hubby's workmate Bruce, who had recently had a steer butchered. So steak and kidney pie was on the menu.
I found a good recipe for a crock pot version of cooking the steak and kidney, then just make some short crust pastry for the actual pie.

Ingredients:

Some Stewing beef about 500 or 600g
Kidneys or just one chopped up beef kidney, it was quite large
3 Carrots, peeled and chopped
2 onions, chopped
A good slug of Worcestershire sauce
A small dash of Balsamic vinegar
About 8 juniper berries
About 8 whole black peppercorns
A squirt of tomato ketchup
A small handful of dried shitake mushrooms, soaked in hot water (add some of this liquid to the stew)
A handful of fresh thyme, chopped
Enough stock to almost cover the contents of the crock pot

Preheat crock pot and spray with oil. Chop up the beef and kidney into bite size pieces. Toss in flour to coat. Add to crock pot. Add carrots and onions and stir.Add other ingredients and stir. Cook for about 10 hrs. I started mine on high for a couple of hours then turned it to low.

Pastry:

2 cups flour
1 tsp salt
about 180g cold butter chopped
about 6 Tbspn ice cold water

Make pastry, chill then cut in half, roll out to fit base of pie dish, plus top. I used a pie funnel, put meat filling in, then topped with pastry. Brush with beaten egg. Cook 180degs C for about 35 mins.

Roast chicken (our very own)

Last night we ate the Indian Game rooster that hubby had butchered while I was away on my travels. For what looked like a small bird it was 2kgs in weight so not bad at all.

I stuffed it with a mixture of prune, couscous and pistachios, also a little fresh ginger, cardamom and cayenne. Then I roasted it in the oven for a couple of hours. Very nice.

Our first attempts at eating our own chicken weren't quite so successful as previously we took the feathers and skin off together as it was much easier than plucking. However, the meat dries out too easily without the skin so it's worth the extra effort to pluck the bird, rather than take the easier option. One or two errant feathers still remaining in the skin came out after cooking so no problem there.