Alright, so there's a lot going on with New Zealand! I was worried about not finding anything super traditional or unique, but ended up making two dishes (or three if you count the ice cream separately.)
I'll start with dessert first. Honeycomb toffee is a popular candy throughout the UK, Australia, and New Zealand. While it's not unique to NZ, their second most popular ice cream flavor is hokey pokey--of course they have an even cutesier name for it. It consists of vanilla ice cream with bits of honeycomb (or hokey pokey) mixed in.
The first step in making the hokey pokey is boiling sugar and some kind of syrup. Golden syrup is generally used in NZ, as well as Australia and the UK. It's not as easy to find in the US, so I used corn syrup.
Once it reaches the right temperature, you add baking soda to it to make it nice and bubbly. Once combined, it turns a nice golden color.
You then have to quickly pour it onto a sheet so it spreads out in an even layer.
After an hour, it hardens up and you can break it into pieces! I was pretty happy with the way it turned out, except for a few bits of baking soda here and there. The holes could have been bigger and more uniform, but for a first time I was pretty proud! Also a first was making ice cream in my ice cream maker attachment for my stand mixer. I've been trying to cut out most dairy from my diet since my body just hates it more and more the older I get. So I made a coconut milk ice cream that turned out really well! The end result will come later--also pictured at the beginning.
Now, speaking of dairy, the next recipe used a lot of butter, which I've still been eating as it doesn't seem to effect me as much. Bacon and egg pie is kind of like a rustic quiche lorraine that also has a lid, I guess. It starts with flaky pastry, which is kind of like puff pastry but a tiny bit easier. It still requires quite a bit of work, rolling out the dough, dotting with butter and shortening, folding, chilling, rolling out again...rinse and repeat. You end up with a flaky (duh) crust, but if I were to make this again I would just go with a regular shortcrust pastry. I'm not sure if I cared for the greasiness caused by all the butter and shortening.
Once the pastry dough is ready and chilled enough to handle, you fit some of it into a baking dish. I decided on a smaller, square casserole dish.
You then add some bacon. As you can see from the picture, that's obviously not real bacon. I used some Lightlife brand veggie bacon. I find it much tastier than the frozen Morningstar kind. And it's easier to cook however you want.
I then added some diced onion for extra flavor. They're optional, but honestly I'm not sure I would enjoy a pie with literally just eggs and bacon in it. At this point you can add whatever you want to it. Some people add green peas or other veggies. As for the eggs, it seems the consensus on whole or broken eggs is that there is no consensus. I found recipes calling for whole, some saying to split the yolks, some that scrambled the eggs before adding them. I opted for whole eggs, not just because I love hard boiled eggs, but because it was the most interesting choice. Like I said before, it's kind of like a quiche lorraine, so to really make it unique I think you have to forgo scrambling the eggs so it's less of a quiche.
Once all the filling is in, you top with some more flaky pastry dough. I ended up with a bit more dough than I needed--I simply folded over what was overhanging in the baking dish then added a small square on top to complete it. I had about one tart's worth of dough left over which I froze and was able to use months later. Once baked, it comes out looking greasy and delicious and like a million calories. Which is fine by me.
The eggs cooked perfectly, no grey around the yolks which is a pet peeve of mine. If your hard boiled eggs are grey, you're cooking them too long! The pastry was nice and flaky on the very top. A little soggy on the inside layer and the bottom, but tasted fine! I think the steam from the eggs baking definitely caused that. If this were a tart without a lid, I think it would have been fine. The bottom was nice and crispy though.
Now, back to the ice cream. As I said before, this was made with coconut milk rather than cream. It was also my first time making dairy free ice cream! I was really happy with how it turned out. The pictures here make it seem kind of grainy and not super creamy, but that's only because I didn't wait long enough for it to thaw. Once soft enough to properly scoop, it was perfectly creamy and delicious. Once I made the ice cream in my attachment, and while it was still soft, I mixed a bunch of small pieces of hokey pokey into it, then froze it until it was solid. The sugar in the candy somehow melted a bit within the ice cream, which made it a bit softer and caramel-y, which was perfect. The flavor was similar to a toasted marshmallow, which makes sense because it's literally just cooked sugar. The combination of toasted sugar and coconut was A+, would recommend. I brought the leftover candy into work and my coworkers loved it, which is always a good sign.
In conclusion, these two dishes were some of the most fattening things I've ever made for this project, but I have no regrets. I certainly wouldn't eat these things every single day, and I'm sure kiwis don't either; everything in moderation. I read that the bacon and egg pie is a great picnic food, which makes a lot of sense. It's delicious either hot or cold and it sturdy enough to stand up to being packed and transported. A lot more interesting and filling than a ham and cheese sandwich, that's for sure. As for the hokey pokey, I would absolutely order that flavor in an ice cream shop if I ever visit New Zealand.
Recipes Used: Honeycomb toffee // Bacon & Egg Pie // Flaky Pastry
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