After a lovely, relaxing time at the beach, we battled through traffic on Sunday – when the temps hit 41C (105F) – to come home and discover the air conditioning in our room and Ollie’s was blowing out nice hot air and no it wasn’t because we had it set to heating.
This is the same air conditioner that leaked through Ollie’s ceiling when he was a baby after it wasn’t serviced properly and I literally spent about 10 hours over 5 months battling the company to get them to take responsibility and pay for the ceiling repair.
Lucky for us the air con in the rest of the house was still working so for the past few nights Will and I have been in the spare room and Ollie has been camping out in the port-a-cot
in my office. When I went in to get him on Monday morning he was fascinated standing up looking at everything around him including my very disorganised shelf of styling goodies.
We have pretty much had the air on since then and so begins the period of a nice chilled house and a terrifying electrical bill. We can’t not have it though. I couldn’t bake in at 30+ degree kitchen and we couldn’t have that. How would I create such delicacies as macadamia
brownies with lemon myrtle
?
The idea came to me, ok was given to me, at the Good Food and Wine show where I tasted an array of brownie flavours that I never would have dreamt of. The lemon myrtle particularly caught my eye and my tongue and my mind when to the little sachet of lemon myrtle in my pantry.
To make them even more Aussie, I added macadamia nuts instead of walnuts for that must-have crunch.
They were rich, they were gooey but the best part was the little hint of something unusual thanks to the lemon myrtle. I may have eaten the entire batch for dessert over the course of a week. Enjoy!
What about you? Where have you been inspired lately? Any air con disasters?
Macadamia brownies with lemon myrtle
Ingredients
- 90g (3oz) unsalted butter
- 120g (4oz) dark chocolate, chopped
- 2 large free-range eggs, lightly beaten
- 225g (7.5oz) raw sugar
- 90g (3oz) wholemeal flour
- 1 tsp lemon myrtle
- 50g (2oz) macadamia meal
- 1/4 cup roasted, salted macadamias, chopped
- Icing sugar for dusting
Instructions
- Pre-heat the oven to 160C (350F) fan-forced and grease and line a loaf tin so the paper extends over the long sides.
- Place the butter and dark chocolate in a large, microwave-safe bowl.
- Microwave for 20 seconds and take out and stir. If not smooth then return to the microwave for 20 seconds at a time.
- Set aside to cool for 5 minutes.
- Whisk in the eggs then the sugar.
- Stir through the flour, lemon myrtle and macadamia meal and then fold in the chopped macadamias.
- Spread into the tin and bake for 30-35 minutes.
- Leave to cool in the tin on a wire rack.
- Slice up and dust with icing sugar to serve.
That is so hot! We’ve had a couple of hot days so far this season but nothing over 40C. We don’t have air-con or even fans but our house stays very cool (freezing in winter) so it’s not essential but I think if I lived in QLD I’d definitely be battling huge electricity bills. I love lemon myrtle and often use it to sprinkle over chicken. Must try it in a brownie xx
Oh yes I think it’s just a given in QLD you accept huge power bills. I will have to try lemon myrtle chicken next x
These sound wonderful, but where on earth do you find lemon myrtle, and what is wholemeal flour?
Hi Norma. I have added an Amazon link to where you can get it there but if you do a Google you should be able to find some http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B00080MJDI/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B00080MJDI&linkCode=am2&tag=clakcre-20&linkId=B2TIP5JW57HJRIAN
We are so lucky living where we do. There’s always a breeze so we rarely need air conditioning. I had it on today because I steamed the Christmas pudding for 5 hours but other than that, it’s been off. I would turn it back on to bake these though!
Oh yes the sea breeze is wonderful isn’t it?!
Hehe we don’t have air conditioning although our place has nice cross breezes but it’s hideous on those really hot, still days! But I can imagine that if I had it, I would definitely avail myself of it :)
I don’t think I could live without air conditioning!
I love anything with macadamia nuts! I add them to everything too.
There’s a packet of them in my snack draw always!