Logue grew up in country New South Wales and was taught to cook by her grandmothers. Today, the Simmone Logue Fine Food Company has a kitchen team of 80 supplying cakes, pies and casseroles to supermarkets, football stadiums and airlines from a bakery in Sydney.

“I began my cake business in 1990 in a little one-bedroom flat,” she writes. “I used to walk up a steep hill to hand deliver my cakes to the local café owners.

“My first leap into the retail world was leasing an old butcher’s shop in Balmain [Sydney]. The demand for my cakes, pies and puddings grew quickly and I expanded my range into other areas like ready-to-heat, home-style food and catering.”

After 25 years of cooking, Logue has just released her first cookbook, In the Kitchen, containing her signature recipes divided into chapters on breakfasts, picnic lunches, Sunday roasts, daily salads, braises, pies and pastries, sweet tarts and puddings, party food and more.

Here, she shares a recipe from her book that is perfect for Mother’s Day breakfast.

French toast with passionfruit curd and rose petals

Not just one of the prettiest breakfast dishes ever, this French toast is also lusciously delicious and an ingenious way to use up left-over sourdough. Putting slightly stale bread to such exquisite use always gives me a good feeling, and my customers love it too. Instead of the passionfruit curd, you could drizzle the toasts with maple syrup and top with a scattering of blueberries or sliced banana.

‘In the Kitchen’ by Simmone Logue, $39.99, Murdoch Books.

Ingredients

4 free-range eggs
250ml (1 cup) thin (pouring/whipping) cream
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
4 tablespoons caster (superfine) sugar
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
pulp of 2 passionfruit
125ml (½ cup) lemon curd (see recipe below)
8 thick slices sourdough bread about 4cm thick
4 tablespoons vegetable oil
4 tablespoons butter
unsprayed rose petals, to garnish (optional)

Method

In a bowl, whisk together the eggs, cream and vanilla. On a large plate, mix together the caster sugar and cinnamon.

Gently fold the passionfruit pulp into the lemon curd. Cut each slice of bread into two pieces.

Place a large frying pan over high heat. Add half the vegetable oil and half the butter and warm until the butter starts to foam. Turn the heat down to medium.

Dip half the bread slices in the egg custard mixture and cook for 2 minutes, or until golden underneath. Turn the slices over and cook the other side. Drain on paper towel, then toss the slices in the cinnamon sugar.

Clean out the pan and repeat with the remaining oil, butter, custard and bread. Meanwhile, heat four plates.

Stack four pieces of toast on each plate. Spoon the passionfruit curd over the top, scatter with rose petals, if using, and enjoy straightaway.

Serves 4

Lemon curd

Ingredients

250g unsalted butter
zest of 2 lemons, plus the juice of 3 lemons
3 large free-range egg yolks
190g caster (superfine) sugar

Method

Put the butter and lemon zest in a heavy-based saucepan and place over medium heat.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the egg yolks and sugar.

When the butter has melted, add the egg yolk mixture and lemon juice, then whisk constantly over medium heat until the curd thickens. This will take about 10 minutes.

Leave to cool, then ladle into a sterilised jar and seal. The curd will keep for at least 2 months in the fridge.

Makes 500ml