A sweet and savory weekend

It was a great weekend. I bought some great new tortoise glasses, picked paint and wallpaper for our living room (stay tuned for details!), did some crafting, took some photos, spent quality time with my man and some gal friends, and of course, did some cooking. I’ve been experimenting with breads lately, so I cooked up a little something sweet and a little something savory.

Let’s talk sweet. Actually, let’s talk Pioneer Woman’s French Breakfast Puffs. These delicious muffins of buttery, sugary goodness taste exactly like a mini doughnut. Mini doughnuts- the only way you can drag me to most sporting events. Even now, as Chris flips between like three “super important” football games, I could be convinced to watch with the temptation of a mini doughnut muffin.

The second best part of this easy recipe is rolling the baked muffs in melted butter and then coating them in sugar and cinnamon. The first best part is a strong cup of coffee in one hand and the moist caloric bundle in the other. Eat up mon cheri!






Round two of the carb fest this weekend included another winner from Donna Hay’s beautiful cookbook, Seasons. We roasted a chicken and I thought a great savory loaf would be a nice accompaniment, so I made Butternut Pumpkin and Feta loaf. We had a big bag of organic butternut squash in the freezer I’d been wanting to use, so in the adapted recipe below, I’ve switched out the pumpkin, cut down on the onion and increased the rosemary. Happy baking.

Butternut squash and feta loaf
from Seasons by Donna Hay (with slight adaptations)

400g butternut squash, peeled and chopped
2 teaspoons olive oil
salt and pepper
2 tablespoons active dry yeast
½ cup warm water
¼ onion, peeled and roughly chopped
½ cup olive oil
½ cup milk
2 eggs, lightly beaten
2 tablespoon chopped fresh rosemary
2 teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons sugar
3 cups all-purpose flour
200g soft crumbled feta

Preheat the oven to 320°F. Place the squash, oil, salt and pepper in a bowl and toss to coat. Place on a baking tray and roast for 15 minutes or until tender. Set aside.

Place the yeast and water in a bowl and stir to combine. Allow to stand in a warm place for 10 minutes or until mixture starts to foam. Place the onion, oil, milk, eggs, rosemary, salt and sugar in a food processor and blend until smooth. Place the flour, onion mixture and yeast mixture in a bowl and stir well to combine. Cover the bowl and allow to stand in a warm place for about 1 hour or until the dough is doubled in size.

Add the feta and squash to the dough and mix well. Spoon the dough into a lightly greased loaf tin and bake for 1 hour or until cooked thoroughly. Allow to cool 10 minutes before removing from the tin.






Delicious food always makes a good weekend great. Hoping you enjoyed a few lovely days off or have some downtime to look forward to this week.

Relish the times when the most pressing issue is planning what to have for dinner.
- Donna Hay