Creamy Chicken and Corn Soup

Eating a good soup is a delicious way to warm up and it can also be a healthy food choice. Soups with some lean protein, plenty of vegetables and a good whole grain starch such as barley, whole wheat pasta or legumes are ideal to eat anytime. This kind of soup would provide plenty of protein, vitamins, minerals and phytochemicals, which are required for a healthy immune system. The soup offers an extra benefit in warmth which appears to increase satiety better than cold food. Comfort food is always ideal for the expected cold winter days, so choose your favourite soup to cuddle up with on the chilly evenings.

Rustic Italian Salad

It is a quick salad to make that can be served as a light lunch, an accompaniment to pasta dishes or as part of a picnic. Mesclun is a slightly bitter salad mix of assorted small, young, delicate wild or cultivated salad leaves and greens of varying textures and colors. The traditional mix includes chervil, arugula, leafy lettuces and endive in equal proportions, although in modern kitchens it may include an undetermined mix of fresh and available lettuces, spinach and rocket leaves. Mesclun should be tossed with light vinaigrette.

Featuring Christopher McMahon's dish “Creamy Mussel and Prawn Linguini”

My interest for food started at school with food tech and work experience. My ambition was to be a professional tennis player, however I stopped playing tennis and moved from Glen Innes to Coffs Harbour. C.EX Coffs gave me the opportunity to become a chef and offered me an apprenticeship. I would be lost without cooking and find myself happy and amused when cooking or talking about food. I love the buzz and pressure of service, when I get through a big night and have worked really hard it is very fulfilling. Watching people enjoy my food and seeing their reactions is very rewarding.

My knives are my favourite kitchen tools especially for chopping and cutting things up into shapes which I find therapeutic. I like the colours mixing, matching and being able to put my ideas into practice. “The Cooks Companion” is a very good book with references to many ingredients. Jamie Oliver inspires me, as he is always trying to change peoples eating habits for the better.

Every kitchen should always have eggs, milk, cream, sugar, chili, garlic, onion, tomatoes and flour in the pantry. There seems to be a trend in kitchens to stack food on a plate to create height. When creating a dish always imagine eating it yourself enjoy and take the time to do things correctly.

I like food I can eat with my fingers, like “hotdogs with bacon and cheese”,  “chicken and vegetable soup” is great whenever I am sick. An excellent classic recipe is “Mussels Mariniere” which is such a simple dish but ooh so good.

I recall an incident when a kitchen hand accidently mixed up salt instead of sugar in the Chantilly cream and it was served with a desert, we did however receive positive compliments!!

Creamy Mussel and Prawn Linguini

Turkey Lasagna

Lasagna is wide flat pasta, placed in alternating layers with cheese, sauce plus other ingredients such as ground beef, sausage or spinach and is characteristic of the Italian cuisine with many regional variations. In Southern Italy the sauce is expected to be a simple tomato sauce or a ragù and in Northern Italy a Béchamel sauce is used. Lasagna Verdi which means "green lasagna" is pasta that incorporates cooked spinach.