​This one is perfect on a warm day, it's refreshing and super easy to make.

​Recipe adapted from Family Circle 'Cocktails and Party Drinks' Cookbook

Makes 1

Crushed Ice
30ml gin
15ml Campari
Juice of 1 ruby red grapefruit
Lime wedge
​

Fill a highball glass with crushed ice. 

Pour in the gin and Campari, then top up with ruby red grapefruit juice.

Squeeze a lime wedge into the drink and add the squeezed wedge to the glass.

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​A fajita in tex-mex cuisine is any grilled meat that is served as a taco on flour or corn tortillas.

Recently I had some chicken drumsticks in the fridge and I had to try and make something with them. This recipe came up on a google search, so I thought why not try it, it looks nice. There was one salsa with the original recipe, but I felt like more, so I found two more recipes and dinner was organised.

We loved it, it was simple, it was delicious.

This recipe is a really easy way to feed six people. You just put the chicken in a roasting tray with the spices and let the oven do the work. Then while the chicken is roasting you make one or all of the salsas, they are really easy to make. Heat up some tortillas, then everyone makes their own wraps at the table.

What is even better is this would be perfect for a party, you could barbecue the chicken, the recipe is easily doubled or tripled, a few great salsas and you have simple, but delicious party food. You could even try it with chicken thigh fillets or fillet the drumsticks yourself (keep the bones for soups or stocks), and then at parties you don't even have the bone to deal with, the fillets barbecue quickly and you have fed a lot of people.

Why make three salsas, because in my house we love salads and sides, and some of us love avocado and some of us don't. And because these are all quite easy to make, I just make different ones for variety and because we love them. Any leftovers become lunch with some corn chips the next day.

If using frozen corn, add corn to boiling water and cook for 3-4 minutes.

I don't add fresh coriander to all my salsas, in case someone doesn't like it, but I always have it on the side if people want to add it when assembling the fajitas.

With the flour tortilla wraps, I just wrap them all in some aluminium foil, then place them in the oven on a baking tray in the last 10 minutes of the chicken cooking time. With the corn tortillas, I fry them in a frying pan sprayed with cooking oil, it doesn't take long.

Recipe adapted from www.bbc.com 

Serves 6​-8

12 chicken drumsticks
Salt and pepper, to taste
1 tbsp paprika
1 tbsp ground cumin
2 teaspoons chilli powder, optional
4 garlic cloves
1 tbsp vegetable oil
12 small flour or corn tortilla wraps

Avocado and Tomato Salsa:
2 ripe avovados, peeled, stoned and diced
2 ripe tomatoes, finely diced
2 spring onions, finely sliced
1 lebanese cucumber, finely diced
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 teaspoons white wine vinegar
salt and pepper, to taste

Avocado and Corn Salsa: 
200g tin corn, drained and rinsed or 200g frozen corn kernels, cooked
1 red capsicum, seeds removed, finely diced
2 spring onions, finely sliced
1 lebanese cucumber, finely diced
1 large ripe avocado, peeled, stoned and diced
Juice of 1 lemon
1 tablespoon olive oil
salt and pepper, to taste

Peach and Tomato Salsa:
2 large ripe tomatoes, finely diced
1 lebanese cucumber, finely diced
1 large peach or nectarine, stoned and finely diced
1/2 cup fresh coriander, chopped
1 tablespoon olive oil
1-2 teaspoons white wine vinegar, to taste
salt and pepper, to taste

​Sour cream, to serve, optional
​Extra fresh coriander, to serve
​
​Preheat the oven to 200C/180C fan forced.

Tip the chicken into a large roasting tray and sprinkle over the spices. Lightly crush the garlic, leaving the skins on, and add to the tray with the chicken. Drizzle with the oil and season with salt and pepper, give everything a quick toss to ensure the spices are mixed all over the chicken.

Roast for 40 minutes, turning halfway through cooking, until the chicken is lightly charred on the outside and perfectly cooked inside.

While the chicken is cooking, make the salsas.

For the Avocado and Tomato Salsa: In a large bowl add the avocado, tomato, spring onion and cucumber. Add olive oil and white wine vinegar. Season with salt and pepper, toss gently to combine. Transfer to a serving bowl.

For the Avocado and Corn Salsa: Tip the corn into a bowl, add the capsicum, spring onions, cucumber and avocado. Add the lemon juice and oil. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Mix gently until well combined. Transfer to a serving bowl.

For the Peach and Tomato Salsa: In a large bowl add the tomato, cucumber, peach and coriander. Season with salt and pepper. Add the olive oil and white wine vinegar, toss to combine. Transfer to a serving bowl.

When the chicken is cooked, place on a serving platter with some lime wedges with the salsas on the side.

To eat: Shred the chicken from the bone and then wrap in warmed tortilla wraps, serve with the salsas.

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Recipe adapted from www.dinneratthezoo.com

Makes 2 smoothies

1 1/2 cups apple juice
1 banana, sliced
1 1/2 cups frozen mixed berries
3/4 cup Greek yoghurt
1 tablespoon sugar or honey (optional)

Garnish with fresh berries and a mint sprig (optional)


Place the apple juice, banana, mixed berries and yoghurt in a blender and blitz until combined, about 30 seconds. Taste, if it needs sweetening, add honey or sugar.

​Pour into two glasses and garnish with fresh berries and mint sprigs, if desired.

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Recipe adapted from www.lifeasastrawberry.com 

Makes 3-4, depends on the glass you use

For the triple berry syrup:

1 cup water
3/4 cup sugar
1/3 cup blackberries
1/3 cup sliced strawberries
1/3 cup blueberries

For the cocktail:

1/4 cup sugar or salt (for glass rims)
2 cups ice (you can eyeball this)
1/2 cup triple berry simple syrup
1/2 cup fresh lime juice
1 cup tequila
Garnishes: Lime slices, fresh berries


Make the triple berry syrup: Combine all ingredients in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Bring mixture to a simmer and cook 4-5 minutes until berries have softened and sugar has dissolved.

Remove syrup from heat and let it cool completely.

Strain the simple syrup to remove the berry pieces and set strained simple syrup aside for the margaritas. 

Make the margarita: Spread salt onto a sheet of baking paper or on a plate. Using the limes that you squeezed rub a little lime onto the rim of your glass, dip the rim of the glass into the salt or sugar.

 Fill each glass with 1/4 cup or so of ice, and set aside.

Combine triple berry simple syrup, lime juice, and tequila in a cocktail shaker. (Depending on the size of your shaker, you may need to do this in two batches). Add a handful of ice and shake well until margaritas are chilled.

Divide margaritas evenly between your four cocktail glasses.

Garnish margaritas with extra lime slices and fresh berries (optional) and serve immediately.

To save the recipe to your favourites go to www.whatscookingella.com/triple-berry-margarita.html 
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These baked chicken wings are delicious. They are tasty, crunchy and so easy to make.

What made me try these, well, over the Christmas period I had loads of bread left over from several parties that I held, and so I don't through food away I decided to make breadcrumbs out of them. And now I have loads of homemade breadcrumbs, so now I need to cook with them, which is not a problem as home made breadcrumbs are absolutely delicious and they taste better than store bought crumbs.

Why bake, not fry them. I have no problem with frying chicken schnitzels, it's fast, it's easy. But when you include chicken with bones into the mix, I prefer baking over frying, it is easier to cook and there's no guessing if they are cooked properly. And when you are making a lot of them, baking is easier, quicker and more practical.

The spice combination here is delicious, don't forget to season with salt and pepper also, very important.

If you don't have home made breadcrumbs, use panko breadcrumbs. 

If you want to make breadcrumbs here's how 

​Place slices (or soft rolls, roughly chopped) on a baking sheet and dry out slightly in a 150C/130C fan forced oven for 15 minutes. Allow to cool.
To make the breadcrumbs in the food processor, place chunks of the dried bread into the processor. Pulse to desired crumb size, approximately the size of grains of rice. For the best results, add the bread chunks in small batches.
If you prefer to make them by hand, place dry bread in a sealed bag. Smash with a rolling pin to break into crumbs.

You can serve it with fries, a sauce of your choice and a salad of your choice for a complete meal.

Next time you feel like a schnitzel, give these a try. ​

​Recipe adapted from www.taste.com.au

Serves 4

1 1/2 cups homemade breadcrumbs, you can use panko crumbs
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon smoked paprika
1/3 cup finely grated parmesan
2/3 cup plain flour
2 eggs
​2 tablespoons milk
1kg chicken nibbles
Olive oil cooking spray
​
Preheat oven to 200C/180C fan-forced. Line a large baking tray with baking paper.

Combine breadcrumbs, garlic powder, paprika and parmesan in a large bowl. Season with salt and pepper.

​Place flour in a large bowl. Whisk eggs and milk in a separate bowl.

Working 1 at a time, toss chicken nibbles in flour, shaking off excess. Dip in egg, then toss in breadcrumb mixture to coat. Place in a single layer on prepared tray.

Spray both sides of the crumbed chicken liberally with oil.

Bake for 40 minutes or until golden and chicken is cooked through.

Serve with fries, your favourite dipping sauce and a salad.

To save the recipe to your favourites go to www.whatscookingella.com/crunchy-baked-chicken-wings.html 
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​Recipe adapted from www.foodnetwork.com

Makes 1 drink

4 raspberries
4 ice cubes
30-60ml gin
30ml freshly squeezed lime juice
120ml tonic water

Lime wedge and a few extra raspberries, to decorate
​
Place the raspberries, ice cubes, gin and lime juice in to a cocktail shaker and shake to blend.

Pour into a 260ml glass of your choice, you can strain it in, but I don't mind the raspberries pieces, so I don't. Add the tonic. Stir.

Garnish with a lime wedge and a few extra raspberries. Serve immediately.

To save the recipe to your favourites go to www.whatscookingella.com/raspberry-and-lime-gin-and-tonic.html 
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​My daughter hates sandwiches for school lunches, really hates them, she much prefers leftovers or fresh salads like this one. So quite often I will make her a salad, pack the dressing on the side and them she just adds the dressing at lunchtime and enjoys a fresh salad for lunch.

This is one of her favourite salads, she absolutely loves it. It is tasty, fresh, crunchy, it's delicious.

Now I love this to and will quite often will make this with grilled or barbecued chicken for lunch, dinner, for a party, a picnic. It's so simple and the recipe can be doubled, tripled.

To cook the 8 chicken thighs (skin on) to serve with the salad simply preheat a greased barbecue or char-grill pan over medium heat. Spray chicken with oil and season with salt and pepper. Barbecue or char-grill chicken for 4-5 minutes on each side until golden and just cooked through.

This is so easy to make and is so full of flavour. Give this a try soon.

​Recipe adapted from www.sydneymarkets.com.au

Serves 4

175g green beans, trimmed 
1⁄2 small Chinese cabbage, trimmed and shredded (about 3 cups)
1 orange carrot, shredded 
1 purple carrot, shredded 
3 green onions (shallots), trimmed and thinly sliced 
1-2 (to taste) small red bird’s eye chillies, deseeded and chopped 
1 cup coriander leaves, roughly chopped 
1⁄3 cup roasted peanuts, roughly chopped 
Lime wedges, to serve


LIME & PEANUT DRESSING: 
1 tbs peanut or rice bran oil 
2 tbs lime juice 
1 tbs salt reduced soy sauce 
2 tsp brown sugar

This salad goes well with grilled or barbecued chicken see notes above


Bring a small saucepan of water to the boil over high heat. Add beans and cook for 2-3 minutes until just tender. Drain, refresh in cold water and place into a large bowl.

Add cabbage, carrots, green onions, chillies and coriander. Gently toss and set aside.

To make lime & peanut dressing: combine all ingredients in a screw-top jar. Shake until well combined. Set aside until ready to serve.

Just before serving, shake dressing and drizzle over the salad. Add peanuts and gently toss to combine. Serve with grilled chicken and lime wedges.

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​My family love crepes, they love them filled with nutella or lemon and sugar or jam or nutella and strawberries, the list is endless.

So for Valentine's day this year I found a recipe for red velvet crepes, tried them, and hated them. They were tough and quite ordinary. So a few days later I decided to make my crepe recipe but tint them red with a little food colouring, just for fun.

​​I also came up with this idea of making a crepe stack filled with Nutella mixed with cream and adding sliced strawberries. I had no idea if it would be good, but I figure it was worth trying.

Once set in the refrigerator this is so good, absolutely delicious. I made this for my family first, they loved it, then I made normal crepes (not red ones) for guests, and they all loved them to.

Once you get the hang of making crepes, you will never use a recipe again. As you can see my stacks are quite high, the recipe will not give you that many, but as my family love them so much, I always make extra.

You will find a link to my crepe recipe below, you will need around 10 crepes. If you are new to crepe making, and some don't work, just make an extra batch. If some have a few holes in them, it doesn't matter. When you have made the crepes, you come back here and continue with the recipe.

If you prefer you can use bananas instead of strawberries.

​​Find how I make crepes at www.whatscookingella.com/crepes.html

300ml thickened cream, whipped
1/2 cup nutella
250g strawberries, 

Make the crepes following my recipe or use your own recipe, allow to cool completely.

​​Halve 4-5 strawberries to decorate the top of the cake, leave stalks attached. Thinly slice the rest for the filling​, removing stalks.

Beat whipped cream, until light and fluffy, be careful not to overbeat it. Place the nutella in a large bowl, add 1/3 of the whipped cream, gently fold the cream through the nutella to lighten it, as nutella is quite dense. Add the remaining whipped cream, and fold it all through gently.

To assemble the stack: Place a crepe on a serving plate, spread with a thin coating of the nutella cream, top with another crepe, spread with another thin layer of nutella cream, this time place some sliced strawberry on top of the cream, not to completely cover the crepe, scattered the strawberry about.

Repeat this process of crepe, nutella cream, crepe, nutella cream, then strawberry slices, until all your crepes are used up. Strawberries get added to every second crepe layer, and as you scatter the strawberry each time, make sure you add strawberries to hollow bits so the crepe stack stays level.

Cover with cling film, and refrigerate for at least 4 hours, overnight is good also.

Thirty minutes before serving take it out of the refrigerator to allow the crepes to soften a little. Just before serving,  decorate with some halved strawberries if you like, and a dusting of icing sugar.

To save the recipe to your favourites go to ​www.whatscookingella.com/strawberry-and-hazelnut-cream-crepes.html 
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​Here is a recipe I have been making for over 20 years. It was in my late teens that my mother started to encourage me to cook, she worked shift work and I started showing an interest in cooking. So while she was at work, I made dinner. My mother would allow me to pick recipes I wanted to try and then leave me in the kitchen and my parents would eat whatever I served up, I really could cook whatever I wanted, I loved cooking new things and they loved trying new things. Fast forward a few years to my early 20's and this recipe made an appearance. 

This became a family favourite and I made it for years. 

But as I keep trying new things, moving forward, this recipe got left behind, I didn't make it for a long time. But recently my mum asked me to make it again, she never forgot it. So I started making this again for my family now, well it won't be forgotten here, my family loves it.

This is a really easy recipe and the flavours are so good. The rice is delicious, and the seafood needs to be just cooked and it is perfect. Just have everything ready before you start cooking, and you will have dinner on the table in under 30 minutes. Once you've done the prep work, the cooking part is easy.

If you don't have a paella pan, they are readily available these days in good kitchen shops, you can use a very wide frying pan. 

With the seafood I like to use scallops, prawns, calamari or baby squid and mussels. Buy whatever seafood you like, and how I truly measure how much I buy is by the handful, a handful of this, a handful of that. I did give a measurement below, but you can add more if needed, you just want the seafood in one layer over the rice, not piled high.

A crust is supposed to form at the base of the paella. It is delicious, just watch it doesn't burn, so a low heat simmer is best. You want it to simmer not boil hard.

This is a quick and easy dinner idea, great to serve at parties, this is just great and needs to be made.

​Recipe adapted from New Idea Magazine, July 1997, a Margaret Fulton recipe.

Serves 6-8

1/2 cup olive oil
2 garlic cloves, chopped
1 medium onion, finely chopped
1 red capsicum, halved, seeded and cut into strips
5 cups chicken stock
2 1/2 cups short grain rice, washed
3 roma tomatoes, halved, seeded (quartered if large)
1 small can anchovy fillets (optional)
12 green prawns, peeled, tails left on
12 scallops
2 medium sized squid, cleaned and sliced
12 mussels, scrub the shells if needed


Prepare all your ingredients before you start, so that once you start cooking you are ready to go. Here is how I prep the seafood.

Scallops: remove brown bits from the main scallop mussel. The corals, (orange-pink flesh) may be used. 

​Green Prawns: you can use the whole prawn-with heads, shells and tails still on, however I like to shell, behead and remove the intestinal tract from the prawns, I do leave the tail on, just because it is easier to eat when cleaned. I do freeze the shells for when I make prawn bisque. It is up to you whether you shell or don't shell. I even for my dad, leave the heads and tails on, but remove shell and intestinal tract, and serve it that way also.

Calamari or baby squid: Gently pull the tentacles from the hood of the squid, rinse off ink under cold water. Pull out the hard clear material that forms the skeleton. I don't peel the skin, as I like it, it adds colour, I don't know why chefs remove it, but you can peel it if you want to, slice the squid hood into rings. Cut away and discard the 'beak' mouth from the tentacles. Chop the tentacles, which are delicious, and add with the squid rings.

Mussels: Scrub the mussels well using a good, stiff brush. Pull off the beard that clings around the edges, discard any that are not shut tightly.

Chop the garlic and onion. Slice up the capsicum.

Wash the rice in a colander until the water runs clear.

​Bring the stock to a boil in a small saucepan.

Now we are ready to cook.
​
Heat the oil in a large paella pan, add garlic and onion and cook until is soft. Add the capsicum strips and continue frying for a further minute.

​Add the well washed rice to the paella pan and fry for 3-4 minutes. Now add the boiling stock and stir gently. When the rice is bubbling, reduce the heat and then cook gently for 12 minutes, the rice will absorb the stock.
​
Start the decoration of the paella. Put on the tomatoes, anchovies (if using) and seafood in a pattern. Push the seafood into the rice gently, I do it by adding mussels first, then prawns, squid and scallops . Cover with a lid or with a sheet of foil and cook a further 10 minutes or until the rice is cooked and the seafood is tender.

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​I love a margarita, it is truly one of the easiest cocktails to make and it's so refreshing to drink in summer. 

This recipe easily doubles if needed and the reason I say it serves 1-2 is it will depend on the size of your glasses. For me it serves 1.

Feel free to use lemon instead of lime, they both taste great, but I prefer lime.

I like it with salt on the rim, you may prefer it with sugar for a sweeter option, or you don't need to add anything.

Although not classical, for those that like a lighter cocktail, you can add lemonade, if you find it too strong, I do it sometimes and it tastes great.

A simple and refreshing cocktail to make for yourself, your family or friends.

​Recipe adapted from www.taste.com.au 

Makes 1-2 margaritas

60ml tequila
30ml Cointreau
30ml freshly squeezed lime juice
1 cup ice
Sea salt, to serve
​
Place your cocktail glass in the fridge to chill.

​Combine the tequila, cointreau, lime juice and ice in a food processor. Pulse on and off until ice is crushed.

Spread salt onto a sheet of baking paper or on a plate. Using the lemons that you squeezed rub a little lemon onto the rim of your glass, dip the rim of the glass into the salt .

Fill glass with your margarita mix.

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