.Thermomix Cooking - Easy Apricot Slice.

Have you heard of a Thermomix?  It is my kitchen life-saver at the moment.  You might have noticed that I haven't written a Recipe Monday blog post for ages.  Life got busy, I didn't have as much time to do all of the things I wanted to and cooking started to become a chore.  Then I got a Thermomix.  Basically it is a multifunctional kitchen machine that can do almost anything and very quickly!  It weighs, chops, mixes, stirs, cuts, grates, grinds, purees, kneads, cook, simmers AND cleans itself!  Do a quick google search or watch some You Tube videos and you'll get a better idea.

The Thermomix does come with a hefty price tag and I was very anti-thermo for quite awhile after a few of my friends bought theirs.  Then I became time-poor and went to a demo (highly recommend having a demo if you are interested - there is no expectation to buy and you get a yummy, free, 6-course lunch or dinner cooked for you!) and I was sold.  For the first few weeks I wondered what I had got myself into, but with a bit of practice using the machine my confidence grew and I think it is totally worth every dollar spent.  

The things I love about my Thermomix is that everything is SUPER fast, I can whip up dinner in a flash, and use it to do all of my sweets baking, bread making, etc.  The amount of dirty dishes from cooking has drastically reduced...most of the time I am only cleaning up the Thermomix jug and a spatula.  Plus you can make virtually anything from scratch and know exactly what ingredients you are putting into everything you cook.

Anyway, the point of this blog post is not to try and sell one to you, but to introduce a new series of posts I'm going to be sharing on my blog in the future...

There is actually  one thing that I do not like about my Thermomix - that the cookbooks don't come with many photos!  I like to know what I am cooking is supposed to look like before I start :)  There are also tons of recipes online that are shared on forums or blogs but many of those don't have photos either.  So...from now on, I am going to take a photo of everything I cook in my Thermomix and share the recipe and picture on my blog.  I know I have a few friends and family members who read my blog and will enjoy the recipes - I don't know how many other people will be interested in reading, but even if you don't have a Thermomix, a lot of these recipes could be made using other appliances or by hand - they will just take a lot longer than 5 seconds!!

So without further adeau...here is my first Thermo recipe.  This one was from a Thermomix Forum (HEAPS of awesome recipes there) and I adapted the quantities a little to make it bigger.  In hindsight, I don't think I would have increased the amount of cake mixture as much as it was very filling, but good if you are feeding a crowd.  Yummy for dessert served with custard or a scoop of icecream - or both?!

Easy Apricot Slice

For apricot filling:
350g dried apricots
450g water
50g sugar

For cake:
185g butter
185g sugar
3 eggs
185g plain flour
185g self-raising flour


To make apricot filling:
Place all ingredients in the TM bowl and cook for 20 minutes on Varoma temperature, speed 2.  
Puree cooked mixture for 6 seconds on speed 9.


To make cake:
Cream butter, sugar and eggs for 10 seconds on speed 8.
Scrape down the sides of the bowl.  Add flours and mix for 30 seconds on speed 7.

Spread half the cake mixture over the base of a greased, square cake tin.  Place apricot filling on top and spread.  Dollop remaining cake mixture over top of apricot filling and gently spread to cover apricot filling.

Bake in 180 degree Celsius oven for 15-20 minutes.