Christmas? Relax, it’s still a week away…

The first signs of Christmas chaos were evident on our Monday morning post office run this week. It was 9am, and the queue was already out the door. Whilst we don’t want to sound complacent, there’s still a week to go until Christmas, and plenty of time to get your orders in. 

Forget about fighting for parking at the shopping centre – grab a cuppa and head on over to www.mrgift.com.au.

You don’t even have to worry about gift wrapping or queuing in the post office to post your gifts – we can send them directly to your recipient. We gift wrap for free (just add the comment ‘Please gift wrap’ when you place your order).

Below are a few gifts ideas to suit every budget to give you some inspiration…
 

We’re also offering FREE DELIVERY on all orders over $100 until midnight Wednesday 24/12/14.  

Use Coupon Code SPECIAL in the Coupon Code field when you place your order.  

Drinking Arm Cufflinks
Guitar Multitool
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Christmas Favourites: RAW Lemon Tarte

Lemon Tart is one of my all-time favourite sweet treats, and this recipe uses lots of lovely fresh, healthy ingredients. It’s nice and easy to put together and can be made ahead of time, which means you can focus on entertaining your guests.

Ingredients:
Crust

  • 1/2 cup cashew nuts
  • 1/2 cup unsweetened, dry coconut
  • 1 tablespoon agave nectar or liquid sweetener of choice

Filling

  • 2 cups pine nuts, soaked overnight, drained and rinsed
  • 3/4 cup coconut oil
  • 1/2 cup lemon juice
  • 1/2 cup raw honey
  • 3 tablespoons lemon zest
  • 1/2 cup dried large flake unsweetened coconut
A deliciously refreshing Lemon Tarte that is the perfect summer dessert



Method:

Crust

1. Place all ingredients in the food processor. Process until well ground.
2. Pat into 7″ cake ring
 
Filling

1.  Place pine nuts, coconut butter, lemon juice and agave in high-speed  blender. Blend until smooth.
2. Add the lemon zest and pulse once or twice to blend.
3. Pour over crust. Top with flaked coconut.
4. Refrigerate for three hours

Dress the tart with coconut, berries or pomegranate seeds.

This recipe was kindly shared with us by Dorota Trupp. Dorota is the Director of Trupp Cooking School in Melbourne and is a qualified nutritionist who specialises in digestive health. Check out their website: www.truppcookingschool.com and Facebook page for unique cooking classes, delicious recipes, and other cooking tips.

 

Christmas Favourites: Little Apple and Spice Cakes

These delicious little cakes showcase some wonderful Christmas spices: Mixed Spice, Nutmeg and Cinnamon. Make them look even more Christmassy by using patty pans in Christmas colours and topping with a glace cherry.

Preparation Time: 25 minutes
Cooking Time: 15 minutes
Serves: 12
 
Ingredients:

  • 2 cups SR flour, sifted
  • 1 tsp Mixed Spice
  • 1 tsp Nutmeg Ground
  • ¾ cup castor sugar
  • 1/4 cup (65ml) apple juice
  • ½ cup (125ml) milk
  • 125g butter, melted
  • 2 eggs

 
Decoration:

  • 1 cup icing sugar
  • boiling water
  • 1 tsp Cinnamon Ground
  • 12 glace cherries
Glace cherries and red, green, gold or silver patty pans make these little Apple and Spice Cakes look extra Christmassy

 

Method:
1. Grease a 12 cup muffin pan or line with patty pan cases. Preheat oven to 200oC. 
2. Sift together flour, Mixed Spice, Nutmeg and castor sugar in a large bowl. Make a well in the centre. Mix the apple juice, milk, butter and eggs and pour into the dry mix. Using a metal spoon, stir gently to combine.
3. Spoon mix carefully into the patty pan cases, then place in preheated oven. Bake for 12 – 15 minutes, or until a skewer inserted comes out clean. Cool on a wire cake rack.
4. When cold, combine icing sugar with just enough boiling water to make a thick paste, and ice the top of each cake carefully. Sprinkle each with a little cinnamon, then top with a glace cherry. If you can find it, serve with sprigs of holly or fresh apple leaf but remove before eating.
 
This recipe was kindly shared with us by Dianne Ward. Dianne is a mother of two young children, freelance writer and founder of food blog www.thesassycook.com that champions being fast and fabulous in the kitchen. Check out www.thesassycook.com for more delicious recipes and clever cooking tips.

Christmas Favourites: New Atkins purple cabbage, cranberry and walnut salad

Looking for a new summer salad? This one combines two of my favourite ingredients – cranberries and walnuts. Another great thing about this salad is the crunchy texture, which is really refreshing on hot summer days.

A refreshing summer salad, perfect for BBQs and hot days


Ingredients:

  • 20 grams dried cranberries
  • 4 cups shredded purple cabbage
  • ¼ cup chopped toasted walnuts
  • 1 tbsp chopped parsley
  • 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 tbsp lemon juice
  • Sprinkle of salt and pepper


Method:

1. In a bowl, combine shredded cabbage, walnuts, parsley and cranberries.
2. In a separate container, mix olive oil, lemon juice, and a sprinkle of salt and pepper– pour dressing over salad and mix through to serve.

This recipe was kindly shared with us by the New Atkins team. New Atkins are the original low carb experts. To learn about controlling carbohydrates, and for tips and hints to manage your long-term weight loss or management goals, visit www.Atkins.com

Christmas Favourites: New Atkins Country Style Glazed Ham

Christmas wouldn’t be Christmas without a ham, especially if it’s glazed. I love the addition of bourbon whisky in this recipe…

Ingredients:

Serves 6

  • 1.5 – 2kg ham with bone, or 1-1.5kg boneless ham
  • 1 tsp rice malt syrup 
  • ¼ cup stevia (or similar)
  • ½ tsp mustard powder
  • ½ tsp white vinegar
  • 1 tbs bourbon whisky
  • 1 tsp whole cloves
There won’t be any left-overs with this ham recipe



Method:

  1. Preheat oven to 180ᵒC. Mix together rice malt syrup, stevia, mustard, vinegar, and whisky, and set aside.
  2. Remove the rind from the ham, and using a sharp knife score the top and sides in a diamond like pattern (around 2-3 cm diamonds, with incisions around 1 – 2 cm deep). Make a small incision into the centre of each diamond, and insert a clove into each.
  3. Place ham in a baking tray scored side up and brush over glaze. Bake for 20 minutes per kilo of ham, or until ham starts to brown and is warmed through.

This recipe was kindly shared with us by the New Atkins team. New Atkins are the original low carb experts. To learn about controlling carbohydrates, and for tips and hints to manage your long-term weight loss or management goals, visit www.Atkins.com

Christmas Favourites: Christmas Santa Cookies with chocolate fudge icing

What are the key things you associate with Christmas? For me, it’s the lovely traditional food we cook and enjoy at this time of year. Come January, I usually can’t look at another piece of shortbread or a fruit mince pie since these foods have been my staple diet throughout December. But, without fail, by the end of November I’m looking forward to eating my favourite Christmas foods again.

This Christmas, we’ve teamed up with some talented chefs, passionate home cooks, food bloggers, and people who’ve just got a cracking Christmas recipe in our latest blog series, Christmas Favourites. This series will feature a selection of our favourite Christmas recipes to get us through the silly season.

Our first recipe is a sweet treat from freelance writer and blogger, Dianne Ward:

Delicious chocolate fudge icing



Ingredients:
 
Cookies:

•60g softened butter
•1 cup sugar
•1 egg
•Pinch salt
•1 tsp (approx.) natural vanilla essence
•1 cup desiccated coconut
•1 1/2 cup self raising flour
 
Icing
•1 1/2 cups icing sugar
•4 tablespoons good quality cocoa
•2 tablespoons melted butter

 
Method:
1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Line baking tray with baking paper.
2. Cream butter and sugar, then beat in egg, salt and vanilla. Add coconut and flour and mix well.
3. Roll into a log then cut into rounds and place on lined baking tray.
4. Bake for 20 mins until golden. Ice when cool.
 
Icing
Sift icing sugar and cocoa into a bowl.  Add melted butter and about 2 tsp water and mix to a fudgy consistency. 

Lemon/passionfruit icing – instead of water gradually add 2 tablespoons of lemon juice or passionfruit pulp. 
Raspberry – instead of water add about 2 to 3 tablespoons of raspberry puree gradually.

…and the finished result

   
This recipe was kindly shared with us by Dianne Ward. Dianne is a mother of two young children, freelance writer and founder of food blog www.thesassycook.com that champions being fast and fabulous in the kitchen. Check out www.thesassycook.com for more delicious recipes and clever cooking tips.

Christmas Favourites: New Atkins capsicum sleighs

Capsicum takes on a completely new identity when roasted – it becomes gloriously sweet and actually makes a great little vessel for stuffing with other delicious ingredients, such as the below assortment of vegetables. I’ve even filled capsicum halves with a bolognaise-style ragu before, which is also really tasty. You can be as creative as you like!

Ingredients:
 
Serves 8, 7.5 grams of carbs per serve.

  • 2 medium sized red capsicums
  • ½ red onion
  • 3 cloves garlic
  • 100 grams sliced mushrooms
  • 40 grams cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
  • 1 zucchini grated
  • 1 cup shredded silver beet
  • 2 tbsp chopped parsley
  • 50 grams green beans, chopped
  • 2 tomatoes, chopped in quarters
  • Olive oil
  • ½ brown onion
  • Handful fresh basil, roughly chopped

Roasted capsicum halves taste sweet and delicious, and make a great little ‘bowl’ for other ingredients

 
Method:

1. Pre-heat oven to 180ᵒC.
2. Cut the red capsicums in half, remove seeds and place on a baking paper lined baking tray.
3. Place quartered tomatoes on a separate part of the tray, and sprinkle with one clove of crushed garlic, salt, pepper and drizzle with olive oil. Place the tray in the oven and roast for 20 minutes.
3. Sauté red onion, two cloves of garlic and olive oil in a large pan over medium heat.

4. Once the onion is soft, add mushroom, zucchini, silver beet and green beans and sauté until soft. Remove from heat and combine parsley and drained cannellini beans.
5. Remove the capsicum halves from the oven, and evenly spoon with vegetable mixture. Return to oven for another 15 minutes.
6. In a saucepan, sauté brown onion in oil until soft. Add the roasted tomatoes, a splash of water and simmer for 10 minutes. Turn off heat and finish off by stirring through fresh basil. 
7. Once capsicums are removed from oven, allow to cool slightly before serving with a drizzle of warm Napoli sauce on top. Once cooled, cut the capsicums in half again to make stuffed quarters.


This recipe was kindly shared with us by the New Atkins team. New Atkins are the original low carb experts. To learn about controlling carbohydrates, and for tips and hints to manage your long-term weight loss or management goals, visit www.Atkins.com

Why I do what I do: Chantal Imbach from Simply In Order

I’m a firm believer that ‘everyone has a story’. We often downplay our life experiences and think that other people lead much more interesting lives than us. But the truth is, it’s all the little experiences that make up our life journey that are the most interesting. Our latest blog series, Why I Do What I Do is a celebration of personal journeys (and an opportunity for me to indulge my interest in other people’s stories). We hope you enjoy reading these stories as much as we have.

This week we caught up with Chantal Imbach from Simply In Order…

Chantal Imbach from Simply In Order

1.Tell us a bit about yourself…

I’m a Swiss-Australian living in a beautifully green and hilly suburb of Melbourne, a wife and a mum to two lively primary-school aged boys, a professional organiser and business owner specialising in office organisation and time management. I love to read and to travel and can’t wait to see more of Australia.

2.What led you to doing what you do today?

Before I started a family I worked in the corporate world for about 20 years. Most of the time as a personal assistant, but also in project offices and as a financial controller. I went back to part-time work after I had the boys but it didn’t feel right anymore because my priorities had shifted. Very soon I knew that I wanted to be my own boss.

But what to do? I had many interests but I didn’t feel passionate enough about anything to start a business. In the meantime, I did a lot of volunteer work at our school, much of it was event management. Everyone suggested I should do this professionally but for me it didn’t tick all the boxes.

One day, a friend suggested to become a virtual assistant. I did some research on that and stumbled across professional organising. Wow! That was just totally me! Everything fell into place, I immediately started training and started my own business called Simply In Order.

3.What else would you be doing if you didn’t do what you do?

I would probably run a B&B.

4.What is the most important lesson life has taught you?

I think this would have to be that one never knows what is waiting around the corner (so better make the best of today). It can be good or bad and hit you out of the blue. The two main events in my life that taught me this was the sudden diagnosis that my dad had cancer and a month later he passed. A day before his 62nd birthday.

The other one was the relocation to Australia seven years ago. My husband received a job offer out of the blue and we kind of new from the first second that we were going to accept this challenge. We had travelled in Australia before but never looked or even thought about moving away from Switzerland. We had just bought a house and had two young boys aged 1 and 3.

The job was a chance in a lifetime and we have never regretted the move even though we of course do miss our loved ones a lot. In the meantime, our boys are more Australian than Swiss and we all became very proud Australian citizens last year.

This country has opened doors for us that we never even dreamt of and we’re so grateful for this. One of them is starting my own professional organising business. It’s still a very new industry and back in Switzerland or Europe it is even newer and I’m not sure whether I would have come across it at all. My hubby would probably say that one of his dreams came true when he finally has a big enough backyard to have a ride-on mower ;-).

5.What is your next must-do?

Professionally it’s definitely to get the accreditation as an Accomplished AAPO member (AAPO is the Australasian Association of Professional Organisers). On the personal side, it’s traveling the West coast and the Kimberly in one of the coming years with my family.

That’s where we spent our honeymoon and we’d love to take the boys to this absolutely wonderful part of Australia.