Santa's midnight Nigella snack

This year Santa is getting in a few more calories than last year. If Nigella can indulge in multiple midnight snacks, then so can Santa.
This year the bickies are bigger, we have certified reindeer carrots and the supersized mug is full to the brim with that dodgy milky powdered tea that someone thought I might want to drink. But no, you go ahead Santa, drink up. Or else the powdered tea will sit on the shelf again till next Christmas.
It is only Dec 21, but we are impatient and trying to help Santa spread out his workload a little bit. We are hoping this tempting offering might just tempt Santa to make his delivery a little earlier this year, to save mummy's sanity.

Sweet potato gnocchi

Ok, you got me - I eat from Pooh Bear plates ;) Tonight I had a craving for both gnocchi and sweet potatoes, so decided to try making gnocchi with sweet potatoes. I usually make potato gnocchi, tried pumpkin once but it didn't work. I think the issue is moisture, potatoes and sweet potatoes are quite dry and that makes for good gnocchi.

Making gnocchi is really quite simple. I simply peeled two large sweet potatoes and steamed them whole. I then used my potato ricer to turn them into mash. You can just use a masher if you prefer, or even a fork. After mashing leave the sweet potato to cool down to room temperature.
I added a sprinkle of Herbamare seasoning and then used one hand to knead as I very slowly added a small amount of GF flour. I sometimes use potato flour instead.
Just keep adding flour and kneading until you have a dough like consistency, but be careful not to add more flour if you think it's not coming together. Give it a few minutes of kneading and you will see that it will all come together.

When the dough is ready, sprinkle some flour onto a board and gradually break off sections of dough and roll them into thin snake shapes. Break off or cut small sections of the snakes of dough to make the gnocchi - as seen above.

Boil your water and add a good quantity of salt to the boiling water. Add your gnocchi and remove with a slotted spoon once it floats to the surface.

The gnocchi can then be served with any sauce you like. This time I put some macadamia oil and garlic, but a tomato based sauce would also work well. Two large sweet potatoes makes about 3 servings of gnocchi. Mmmm, now I want some more!

P.S The gnocchi that I put in the fridge and cooked up later turned out much better than the ones cooked right after making the dough

Gluten Free Vegan Cornbread Pizza

My picasa albums are full of photos of food that I've cooked and never gotten around to blogging. I've been pretty busy with uni etc, so even though I might find time to cook I don't usually have time to blog about it as well. So slowly, I will be adding to my blog with things I've been cooking over the past few months.

This pizza base is made from PAN precooked cornmeal. I bought my last pack online from USAfoods.com.au, but I do know that the greengrocer next to Coles in Burnside has it too. That is where I used to buy it. I know that some of you live pretty close to that area.

Basically to create the base, I use about 1 cup of warm previously boiled water a teaspoon of massel vege stock and a pinch of salt. I then use one hand to mix while I slowly add PAN cornmeal until I get to a dough like consistency. The dough should get to a point where it doesn't stick to your hand when rolled in a ball.

The next step is to roll and flatten your dough out as you would with pizza dough. Trickle with a little olive oil, top with thinly sliced vegetables or topping of your choice and pop in the oven for about 15 - 20 minutes at about 200c until the base is crisp.