The types of comfort foods we eat are different for everyone. For me, I associate things that are loaded with calories—some sweet, some savoury—with comfort and feeling better. I know I’m not alone in that. I mean, realistically, has anyone ever come home from a bad day at work and said, “I’ve had such a bad day, I really need some salad to cheer me up”? No, it’s things like chocolate, ice cream, or potato chips that we crave…

So what are the key qualities of comfort food? As I see it:

• nostalgia—some of my favourite comfort foods, the ones more like a meal than a snack, are the dishes that take me back to nana’s kitchen or special family dinners. For me, that’s things like roast lamb with mint sauce or pumpkin soup
• a treat—if something in my life isn’t going quite to plan I like to give myself a little boost with a sweet treat. Chocolate caramel slice anyone?
• pleasurable to eat—the sheer enjoyment of eating something decadent and delicious, even if it may not quite fit in with the healthy eating plan. I make a very simple dish that I class as comfort food—it’s the creamy sauce of garlic chicken majestic. I just love it!

Looking back over some of my previous posts it seems I have quite a few comfort foods. In addition to the ones I’ve already mentioned, take a look at:

• ‘stralian beef curry. Who doesn’t love a good curry?
• scrambled eggs. Best…brekkie…ever!
• herbed rissoles served with creamy mashed potato. Two comfort foods on the one plate—heaven!
• savoury beef roll. It’s like a giant sausage roll…need I say more?

Hmmm, nothing healthy in that list. I would love to hear from you if salad really is your comfort food. And if so, what’s the salad recipe? It’s gotta have bread or potato or creamy mayonnaise, right?!

To pack the soup full of flavour, it’s really important to cook the shallots and mint slowly on a low heat. All the crunch should be gone from the shallots. They should be soft and golden, and starting to pull apart into threads. It’s also important to go light on salt in the soup itself. Remember, you’ll be adding prosciutto at the end, which is quite salty. You want a creamy soup with just a hint of sweetness, crunchy croutons and salty, crisp prosciutto for a perfectly balanced dish.

Ingredients:

½ loaf of stale ciabatta
Olive oil
1 large handful of fresh mint, leaves picked and chopped
12 slices of thin prosciutto
1 bunch of spring onions, ends trimmed and finely chopped
2 tbs butter
500g frozen peas
500ml chicken stock
500ml chicken consommé
½ cup thickened cream
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Method:

Break the bread into irregular 2–3cm pieces. Put these into a roasting tray and drizzle with a little olive oil; toss to coat. Cover the bread with the prosciutto slices and place under a hot grill until the bread and prosciutto are crunchy and golden, around 5 minutes.

Meanwhile, slowly fry the spring onions and mint in the butter for until soft. Turn up the heat, add frozen peas and the chicken stock and consommé. Bring to the boil then lower the heat and simmer uncovered until slightly reduced. The key is to reduce the stock up to the point where the peas are still lovely and green, not green–grey, as this will end up the overall colour of your soup. With a stick blender (or in the food processor), puree the soup until it is smooth.

Add the cream and simmer gently until reduced, approximately 15–20 minutes. Season to taste.

Ladle the soup into bowls and sprinkle with bread, prosciutto and mint leaves (serves 4–6).

We were out to dinner with friends last week and when the dessert options were presented, I couldn’t resist the chocolate mousse with fresh cream and berries.

There’s something very enticing about chocolate mousse. It’s simple but elegant; rich and velvety, yet somehow light. And the best bit, it’s one of those incredibly decadent desserts that is surprisingly easy to make.

Years ago, my friend Lise gave me her recipe. I don’t tend to experiment with the recipe as much as she does, in terms of adding liqueurs and marbling dark and white chocolates, but have had great success by keeping it simple.

200g dark chocolate, I use Green & Black’s organic (at least 70 per cent cocoa)
250ml cream, suitable for whipping
¼ cup caster sugar
3 eggs

Method:

Whip the cream into soft peaks and set aside.

Break up the chocolate and melt slowly in a double-boiler. Put aside to cool.

Combine the eggs and sugar, and mix on high with electric beaters for about five minutes or until the mixture is pale in colour and has increased in volume.

With a metal spoon, fold the melted chocolate into the egg mixture. Whip it with a metal fork until well combined.

Fold in the whipped cream and mix thoroughly.

Put this in a glass serving bowl (or martini glasses for individual desserts) and cover with cling wrap. Refrigerate for at least three hours.

When ready to serve, add a dollop of cream to the top and cover with grated chocolate, chopped nuts or fresh berries. Mmmmm, so good…

Corinne’s favourite dessert is crème brûlée and so I have attempted to make it for her many, many times. Sometimes with great success, but other times requiring a bit more finesse. So I have been on a quest to find the perfect crème brûlée recipe; the one that works every time, without too much fiddling around.

The crème brûlée harks back to olden times, well, at least to the 1700’s when it was first recorded in Francois Massialot’s 1691 recipe. It comes under multiple names – crème catalina, burnt cream, Trinity cream – and is essentially a custard dessert with a crisp sugar shell on top. The custard is traditionally flavoured with vanilla, but can also be flavoured with other ingredients, including lemon zest, liquors, coffee, orange blossom water, ginger, and the list goes on.

One of my favourites is flavoured with the little juicy bubble like compartments found within a finger lime. The beautiful creamy texture of the brûlée, the crunchy sugar top and little explosions of lime in every mouthful make it a simply gorgeous dessert.

There are essentially two ways to make a crème brûlée. One method is to bake the custard in an oven using a water bath (see Larousse Gastronomique); the other method involves cooking the custard on the stove top, as in the 1691 recipe.

The original recipe also called for burning the sugar on top using a fire shovel; however, the fire shovel isn’t a common utensil in the modern kitchen so we suggest you use a blow torch or the grill.

After a few attempts at the oven method, I am now convinced that the stove top is the way to go. In the oven it’s difficult to get the timing correct and, depending on how reliable your oven is temperature-wise, it may require multiple “experiments” in order to get the length of time right.

The custard is best when it is thick and creamy, just set; not too runny and certainly not the consistency of scrambled eggs, which will happen if left in the oven for too long.

It is also worth noting that using the grill to caramelise the sugar topping is a rather risky venture and can be detrimental to the delicate custard underneath if placed under it for too long. I recommend using a blow torch to get the caramelised sugar on top just right.

The following recipe is a stove top version:

Makes 4-6
500ml double cream
5 egg yolks (free range)
1 vanilla pod, seeds scraped out
1 tbsp caster sugar, plus more for the top

Place the cream into a saucepan and add the seeds from the vanilla pod. Heat gently until it is just starting to simmer around the edges. Remove the cream from the heat and allow it to rest for around 10 minutes. Meanwhile, beat the egg yolks and sugar until thickened slightly. Add the cream to the egg yolk mixture in a continuous stream, stirring constantly. Next, using a double boiler, place the custard mix over hot but not boiling water and stir until thickened. It should thickly coat the back of the spoon.

Pour the custard into ramekins and, after they have cooled a bit, place the desserts in the fridge until cold and set.

Next sprinkle an even layer of caster sugar over each dessert. I recommend a layer of around 3mm thick, but there is some leeway here depending on how sweet your tooth is. Using a blowtorch, evenly crisp the sugar topping. It is best to take your time here and not rush the process. After the sugar is a nice golden colour, plate up and serve to your eagerly waiting guests!

Recently that was a quick dish grandly called Garlic Chicken Majestic. Grand it may sound, majestic it is in taste, but it is simple comfort food at its best.

I have no idea where the recipe came from, and it sounds like a strange combination, but it is absolutely delicious and very quick to prepare.

2 chicken breasts, cut into chunks
20g butter
1 tsp oil
1 tbs soy sauce (or tamari)
1-2 tbs curry powder
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 tsp plain flour (optional)
1 cup cream

Heat butter and oil in a saute pan. Cook chicken over medium heat until cooked through and golden. Remove from the pan and cover with foil to rest.

Reduce heat to low and saute the garlic. Add curry powder and soy sauce, and stir into a paste. Add cream (and plain flour if desired) and heat gently till the sauce starts to thicken.

Return chicken and juices to the pan and heat through. Serve chicken on a bed of rice with your choice of steamed greens.