Cinnamon & Raisin Bagels

Tweet

Boilin' the Bagels

A trip to New York is never complete without ordering a bagel from a deli. The bagel emerges toasty hot and stuffed to the gills with your chosen filling. Pastrami to the thickness of a couple of inches, topped with thin ribboned iceberg lettuce and mayo and tomato. It's a feat to try and take in that first bite.

Since I've visited New york twice, I can by no means make any claims to be an expert. The bagels there are different from the ones you get in the local Spar here. A real bagel has to be boiled, and I don't see no large vats of bubbling water beside the ovens churning out the jambons and chicken fillets. After boiling they are indeed baked as well, but the boiling gives them a chewy and slight hint of dumpling that you just can't get here.

Leaning Tower of Bagels on a Sunny Day!

I decided to make some of my own after reading Donal Skehans post on his mammoth eating holiday in Manhattan. I found a recipe for Cinnamon and Raisin Breakfast Bagels on his blog too - so that all came together nicely. Donal is a long time Irish blogger, just celebrating the release of his second cook book 'Kitchen Hero' Congrats to Donal, hope the book does fantastically!


I followed his recipe faithfully here, and now have a freezer half full of bagels, just pop them in the toaster for instant breakfast or afternoon tea. Spread with fresh butter, or cream cheese. I attempted hot cross buns last year - and failed miserably, these are much better alternative.


Enjoy!

Pancake Stack with Toasted Almonds and Maple Syrup

Tweet

Today is Tuesday

Some confusion arose this morning as to - firstly what day of the week it was and then subsequently - was this pancake Tuesday? I decided it was and went off to fix myself a massive coffee and what turned out to be an equally enormous stack of pancakes.


It is pancake Tuesday - but not until next week, so for once I am ahead of the game and have this recipe for you to try on the real pancake Tuesday!

Ingredients
Serves 2 - makes 10 mini pancakes (diameter 10cm!)
55g plain flour
1 egg
100 ml of milk with 35 ml cold water added in
melted butter - around a tablespoon
Maple Syrup
Large Handful Toasted Almonds

• Sieve the flour into a large bowl. Add in a pinch of salt if you like.
• Make a well in the centre of the sifted flour. Break the egg into the centre. Break up the eggs with a spoon and then gently stir, so that the egg pulls in a little flour with each stir. Continue to do this until the mixture is getting thick.
• Add in a little of the milk mixture - continue until all the flour has been incorporated. If you don't rush then you should have a nice batter that has little lumps. If you do have lumps give it a whisk with a balloon whisk.
• Allow the mixture to rest for a few minutes if you did use a balloon whisk.
• Heat up a small non stick frying pan on a med/high heat. Add in a small nob of butter. When it begins to bubble add in a spoonful of the pancake mixture. Swirl around to coat the base of the pan.

• If you have the pan heated up well - the pancake should take 230 seconds or so on each side. You can see the batter on top slowly turning opaque as it cooks through.

• Stack pancakes in a warm oven on a plate covered with kitchen towel until you have a huge pile of pancakes. Then enjoy with your topping of choice - sugar and lemon, maple syrup, nutella, banana and Chantilly cream.

Raspberry Creme Brullee

Tweet

Irish Foodies Cookalong

Love, love, love

So long I have tried and failed to participate in an Irish Foodies cookalong. Today I have succeeded in participating, though it may be conceived as cheating, I'll submit it anyway. Our best previous attempt was me and Lola trying to enter us the Christmas cookalaong. Some mince pies were made - then stew went in the oven whilst we got pretty drunk, then turned the oven off and went to the pub - total cookalong fail.

So today I made these creme brullees - in Cooks Academy I'll admit so that's possibly where the cheating element comes in. I did however match them with nice romantic napkins and seasonally inappropriate raspberries. At least I'm not down the pub already!!

Chocolate Pots

Tweet

Or 'I'm moving house and only have use of a microwave' pots!

These are the most wonderful little desserts that are deceptively made in your microwave in 25-30 seconds. Sadly the only photo Ihave was when I attempted to make a kind of baked Alaska version, This didn't work and the ice-cream just melted and escaped over the top.

I've been moving recently and Delo shared this recipe which he invented in a previous career as a bar-tender! They can be knocked up with a few store cupboard ingredients and some milk and cream. Maybe one to keep in store for this festive season.

Ingredients - for one

2 oreos

1 heaped teaspoon of horlicks

1 shot glass of half and half (1/2 milk 1/2 cream)

Blend together the oreos and the horlicks. You can use a blender - or the end of a rolling pin in a cup (which I did). Then combine with the half and half. Put into a small microwaveable dish  - like a ramekin or I used espresso cups. 

Microwave at full power for 34 seconds - if you're using a 750watt microwave. There will be a little experimenting here to see what suits your machine best. Then serve right away with a dollop of cold vanilla ice-cream.

The colour is so dark - it makes me wonder what the hell is in oreos. Don't let this picture fool you - they can look very pretty if you're more careful than me and don;t throw ice-cream in the microwave. I'm not one to use ready made ingredients like this often, but when needs must. This really is a super little 'cheats' desert.

In other exciting news I'm heading to the Cooks Academy in the new year to get some proper tuition in how to be a massive food mastermind. I can't wait, if anyone has some spare chef tunics lying around all donations will be gladly accepted.

Happy Christmas

Lu x

Lemon Yogurt Drizzle Cake

Tweet

The Sasa Special

I found this wonderful recipe for Lemon Cake on Sasasunakku blog. It's a lovely witty blog - with some great recipes, this is the first one I've tried and it was amazing. Thanks for letting me use your recipe on the blog Sasa. There is a large amount of yogurt in the cake - making it wonderfully moist, and relatively good for you! Hurray. I made it in some little ramekins - and they popped out small and cute. I followed her quantities and it made 5 large portions (I'm greedy!) I used Glenisk Greek yogurt, I doubt you can use low-fat yogurt, but don't take my word for it.

Thanks to the lovely Des Moriarty for the great pictures! Aren't they amazing?? We had a fun day of food photography over in my kitchen. Think we got some beautiful and delicious shots. Check out his other work here.

I'm putting my neck out here - but I think I prefer lemon cake to chocolate cake ..... what d'ya reckon?

Chorizo and Waffle Hash

Tweet

Chorizo & Potato Waffle Hash

So the first post we ever made was the Waffle Omelette. At the time I wasn’t sure about having a blog, but decided to give it a try. I posted up the waffle omelette and then emailed the blog to Lola - and the rest is history, since then I’ve mostly posted my more serious recipes and pretended I never ate convenience foods. I do love potato waffles though - and have a box in the freezer for food emergencies- actually who am I lying to here - they’re there for hangover emergencies!

We made this the morning / afternoon after our dinner party and LOVED it, in the way you can only love food the morning after the night before.

Picture doesn't do this justice!

Serves 2
6 pieces of chorizo
1 onion
some garlic crushed
some red and yellow pepper - diced
Fresh thyme
fresh parsley
6 Birdseye potato waffles
2 eggs

Fry the  onion over a med/high heat along with the chorizo, after 2 mins throw in the garlic - cook for another two mins or so and then add in the thyme and peppers. While you’re doing this you can grill the waffles (it’s the only way for me!) Then in a separate pan- fry up two eggs as you like them (both our yokes cracked - but we weren’t prepared to start again.

When your waffles are crispy and golden brown - break them up - add to the chorizo and onion mixture - pile onto two plates top with a fried egg and a generous sprinkling of black pepper - and you‘re good to catch the re-run of x-factor.

Hash is an American invention - yes? Invented by cowboys I believe!

Hazelnut Meringue with Apricot Filling

Tweet

Ah lovely background with mini - accordian and pack of fags!

Ingredients
6 egg white
12oz caster sugar
4 oz ground hazelnuts
6oz dried apricots soaked overnight in water
1 inch of cinnamon
Juice of two oranges
2 inch piece of orange rind
2 tablespoons of brown sugar
500 ml single or double cream
Extra hazelnuts for decorating - I used 18 - that was 1 oz!
3 cake tins - lightly oiled and lined with parchment on the bottom.

I started out by toasting the hazelnuts until golden - toast a few extra as you’ll eat a few. Pop them out of their skins and roughly blend them in a  blender, not forgetting to keep a few extra whole over to decorate the top of the dessert when done.

Separate out your eggs - being super careful not to allow any yolk in - otherwise your meringue will fail miserably. Also worth washing your utensils just before starting the meringue - as any dirt or grease could affect the fluffiness of your egg whites- leaving you with one flat meringue.

Put the 6 egg whites in a bowl / food processor with whisk attachment - and whisk until  they form soft peaks. Then slowly add in the caster sugar spoon by spoon. The whites should stay smooth and get a little glossy. Then fold in the ground hazelnuts gently with a metal spoon. 

Spoon the mixture into the tins and bake at the middle of the oven for 30 mins at Gas Mark 5.

Now make the apricot filling. Drain the apricots over a bowl. Add 4 tablespoons of the soaking liquid into the pan with the fruit cinnamon, brown sugar, orange peel and juice. Bring to a gentle simmer and let it bubble away for about 20 minutes until the apricots are breaking apart. Add more of the soaking liquid if it appears to be getting too dry..

Remove the meringues from the oven - they should have a light brown tinge. Leave to cool in the tins for 15 mins before turning them out onto a wrack to cool fully. Just before serving assemble the meringue - put one meringue with half of the apricot mixture and a third of the whipped cream. then another meringue followed by the rest of the apricot filling, more cream, meringue and then the rest of the cream and a few toasted hazelnuts. This dessert is pretty sweet - so if you prefer a less sugary dessert - I recommend you try something else - but for sugar junkies - this will be a tasty hit!

Mum's Chocolate Cake

Tweet

Cake is gonna get you!

Here's Cake-ie!

My mum has been making this cake ever since I can remember - I think she got the recipe from Martha down the road - but I'm claiming it for my mum. Any occasion of note which involved kids saw this cake getting whipped up. It's a moist and delicious and appears a lot more complex than the simple recipe that makes it. The secret ingredient is black treacle - I won't hide it from you! 

Ingredients

9oz Caster Sugar

9oz Self Raising Flour

9oz Butter

3 eggs

2 tablespoons of Cocoa Powder

1/2 teaspoon of Baking Powder

1 tablespoon of Black Treacle

A dash of milk

For the icing

5oz of Icing Sugar

1.5oz Cocoa Powder

2oz Caster Sugar

3 tablespoons Water

3 oz Butter

Preheat the oven to Gas mark 4/180oc, and grease 2 circular cake tins, and line the bottoms. I used cake tins that had a diameter of 10 inches.

Sift the flour, baking powder and cocoa powder together in a large bowl. Add in the softened butter, eggs, treacle and the milk. Blend them all together until very well mixed, add more milk if the mixture appears too chick. Spoon into the tins and bake at the centre of the oven for 40 mins. 

Meanwhile you can prepare the icing. Sift the icing sugar and the cocoa powder into a bowl. Place the caster sugar, water and butter in a small pan.

When the cake is cooked it should spring up from a gentle press down, or a skewer should come out clean when poked into the centre. Remove gently form tins and allow to cool.

To make the icing - melt together the contents of the pan and then mix into the icing sugar mixture. If the mixture is a little thick for spreading - just add the smallest dash of boiling water and that should loosen it out a small bit. Similarly if it's to runny you could sieve in some more icing sugar. Spread over and between the two cooled sponges and you're done.

Decorate with chocolates and marshmallows for kids - or give it a dusting of icing sugar or cocoa powder for the adults. You can also make this in a tray and slice out little squares. It looks a bit like a scary ominous monster in this photo I think! It's the cake for every chocolate cake moment

Pecan & Banana Loaf

Tweet

Bananas!

I used to play in a band - where I met my boyfriend and the lovely Jane and Andy. There was a song that had a strange stop in it - and the only way we could all come back in at the right time was for Jane to sing the word - Bananas! Then it became everyone's favourite part of the song - good memories!

Ingredients

6 oz softened butter 

6oz golden caster sugar 

3 eggs 

5oz of self raising flour 

3oz ground almonds 

½ tsp baking powder 

100ml/3.5 fl oz milk 

2 small really ripe bananas

2oz pecan nuts – chopped

Pre-heat your oven to 160c/Gas Mark 3. Grease and line a 2lb/900g loaf tin.

To make the loaf batter simply lob all the ingredients into your trusty vintage Kenwood Chef (Did I mention I was given a lovely old Kenwood Kitchen Chef from my parents friends?)

Whisk together until you get a lovely batter. Then lob this into your loaf tin.

Lob this into the oven for 45-50 minutes.

Then lob into your face – after a modest amount of cooling on a wrack. Yummy 

You could always add some icing or frosting if you like – but I thought this was perfectly sweet light and spongy – maybe next time another banana.

This picture is silly and I love it! It's Friday let's all be silly

Lemon Meringue Pie

Tweet

Guest Chef no.5 - Jane Fitzgerald

Jane Fitzgerald is a mutual friend of both Lola and mine - we met her on the first day of college also, though not over a cigarette. She's a great cook, and prepared a fabulous dinner for us and a few other friends last Saturday. The entire meal was wonderful but the piece-de-resistance was an enormous Lemon Meringue Pie, it's size was matched only by how delicious it was.

She kindly agreed to share the recipe with us below, enjoy ......

Lemon meringue pie - a 50's housewife's piece de resistance. Don't be scared off by the long recipe, it'll be well worth the effort, and isn't too laborious if you have a food blender.

Ingredients:
For the pastry:
4 oz (110 g) plain flour
pinch salt
2 oz (50 g) butter, at room temperature and cut up into dice - sized cubes
1 -2 tablespoons of water

For the filling:
grated zest (see my tip below!) and juice of 2 large lemons
3 level tablespoons cornflour
2 oz (50 g) golden caster sugar
3 large egg yolks
1½ oz (40 g) butter

For the meringue:
3 large egg whites
6 oz (175 g) golden caster sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla essence

Serves 6.

Pre-heat the oven to gas mark 5, 375°F (190°C).

You will also need a 1 inch deep pie tin with sloping sides, measuring 7½ inch at the base and 9½ inch at the top. It helps if it's a nice dish as you'll be serving the pie in it.

Start by making the pastry. Sieve the flour and a pinch of salt into a large bowl. Then add the butter, cut into smallish lumps, and, using only your fingertips, lightly rub the butter into the flour until it looks like breadcrumbs. Sprinkle in some cold water – about 1 tablespoon. Knead the pastry, adding a few more drops of water until you have a smooth dough that will leave the bowl clean. Or if you're lucky enough to have a food processor, mix the butter, salt and flour together until it does the same thing, then add the water. If you have enough time, leave it wrapped up the fridge for half an hour as this makes it easier to roll out. This also gives you time to put your curlers in and do your nails for when your husband comes in from a hard day at the office.

Next, roll the pastry out to a circle about ½ inch larger all round than the rim of the tin and lay it out in the tin. Make sure not to leave any air under it, and press a fork around the entire rim so that the pastry doesn't come away from the tin as it cooks. Then prick the base all over with a fork. Bake in the oven for 20-25 minutes, or until cooked through. Remove the pastry case from the oven and immediately lower the heat to gas mark 2, 300°F (150°C) for the meringue.

Now, for the filling, otherwise known as lemon curd (you can have anything left over for your toast in the morning!). Measure 10 fl oz (275 ml) cold water into a jug, and spoon the cornflour and sugar into a bowl. Add enough of the water to the cornflour to make a smooth paste, then pour the rest of the water, along with the grated lemon zest, into a small saucepan. A little tip here. If you have a hand held blender and hate zesting lemons, do this instead. Using a peeler, peel the lemons, taking care not to peel off too much pith, then put this in a hand held blender and whizz around. Hey presto - hassle free zest.

Bring the mixture in the saucepan to the boil, then pour it gradually on to the cornflour, mixing all the time until it is smooth. Now return the mixture to the saucepan and bring back to the boil, still mixing. Next, simmer very gently for about 1 minute, stirring all the time to prevent any lumps forming. Then remove the pan from the heat and beat in the egg yolks, lemon juice and, finally, the butter. Pour the lemon mixture into the pastry shell and spread it out evenly.

Finally, for the meringue, use a large, roomy bowl (or a blender) and whisk the egg whites until they form stiff peaks. Now whisk in a quarter of the sugar at a time, then spread the meringue to the very edge of the pastry rim with a spatula, so that it seals the edge completely. Use a spatula to smooth out the meringue, or add a few swirls. Cook in the oven on the centre shelf for 35 - 40 minutes, or until the meringue turns a golden beige, and is squishy on the inside and crunchy on the outside.

I prefer to serve this luke warm, and all on its own.

It's a good thing that I'm salivating as I type!

This recipe is taken (mostly) from Delia Smith’s Complete Cookery
Course and Delia Smith’s Complete Illustrated Cookery Course.

Jameson Whiskey Cake

Tweet

Paddy Cake!

We stayed in Wexford in a big old farmhouse over New Years and Lu's birthday. Lu and I are kind of fans of naff 70s decor, which is just as well because the whole place looked like the house from Father Ted, In fact, I was watching Father Ted recently and Mrs Doyle has the EXACT same ceramic dogs as were in this place.

Anyway, I digress...
On the night before new years, which is Lu's birthday, we cooked a meal for 12 people and one of our guests, Camille, who had just arrived from the USA that day, produced the most delicious whiskey cake all the way from DC for dessert/birthday cake.

Here is Lu blowing out the candles on the original version We thought it would be the perfect thing to make for Paddy's day so after some advice from Camille I decided to merge the earlier ginger cake recipe from Nigel Slater with the recipe Camille gave me. It produced a heavier cake that really soaks up the booze. Its different to the original recipe, but its still pretty good, as anything that contains a whole shoulder of whiskey is bound to be! Here is the recipe:

Ingredients

300g self-raising flour

1 level tsp bicarbonate of soda

a pinch of salt

3/4 teaspoon ground cloves

3/4 teaspoon allspice

3/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg

200g golden syrup

125g butter

1/2 cup Jameson whiskey

100g chopped walnuts

125g dark muscavado sugar

2 large eggs

240ml milk

For the glaze

1 cup jameson whiskey

4 oz butter

1 tbsp water

2 oz sugar

Sift the flour, bicarb, salt and spices into a bowl. In a saucepan melt the syrup with the butter and sugar until the sugar has dissolved. Add in the whiskey. It will bubble madly. Add this all to the flour and stir well. mix the milk with the eggs and whisk. Then add this into the four mixture. It will look quite sloppy but it will be ok! Pour this into a grease cake tin and bake at gas 3/160c for about 40 mins or until a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean.

While the cake is baking, combine all the glaze ingredients in a saucepan and melt until the sugar has dissolved. When the cake comes out of the oven and is still hot, pour 1/3 of the glaze over it. Allow the cake to cool and turn it out of the cake tin on to a plate. Pour a further 1/3 of the glaze over the underside of the cake. Wrap in clingfilm and refrigerate the cake for 2 - 3 days. When you are ready to serve, take the cake out of the fridge so that it can come back up to room temperature. Then gently heat the remaining glaze before pouring it over the cake and serving!!

Deicio! Our cake tin even is slightly reminiscent of a shamrock! Cant wait till tomorrow so we can eat it!

Thanks Camille

Ginger cake

Tweet

Post cake

Lu and I have a friend who is poorly at the moment and I really wanted to send him a care package. I thought cake sent by post would be a novel idea and might be just what the doctor ordered for a pick me up.

So I made this, as I needed something that would keep. Not only does this keep for a week but it actually gets better with age. The first day it was good, the 5th day it was spectacular! Gingery, sticky and delicious. All you have to do is wrap it up in greaseproof paper, put it in a good strong box and post it to who ever you know would appreciate cake delivered straight you their door in an unorthodox fashion.

This is a Nigel Slater recipe from one of the THREE Nigel Slater cookery books I got over the last month.... and it is pretty much as good as a cake can be. Next time Im making one I will keep it all for myself!

I've just copied the recipe here as I didn't make any changes whatsoever. Its simple and perfect!

Ingredients
250g self-raising flour 
2 level tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 level tsp bicarbonate of soda
a pinch of salt
200g golden syrup
2 tbsp syrup from the ginger jar
125g butter
3 lumps of stem ginger in syrup (about 55g)
2 heaped tbsp sultanas
125g dark muscavado sugar
2 large eggs
240ml milk

You will need a square cake tin measuring approximately 20-22cm, lined on the bottom with baking or greaseproof paper.

Set the oven at 180°C/gas mark 3. Sieve the flour with the ginger, cinnamon, bicarbonate of soda and the salt. Put the golden and ginger syrups and the butter into a small saucepan, and warm over a low heat. Dice the ginger finely then add it to the pan with the sultanas and sugar. Let the mixture bubble gently for a minute, giving it the occasional stir to stop the fruit sticking to the bottom.

Break the eggs into a bowl, pour in the milk and beat gently to break up the egg and mix it into the milk. Remove the butter and sugar mixture from the heat and pour into the flour, stirring smoothly and firmly with a large metal spoon. Mix in the milk and eggs. The mixture should be sloppy, with no trace of flour.

Scoop the mixture into the non-stick or lined cake tin and bake for 35-40 minutes, or until a skewer, inserted into the centre of the cake, comes out clean. Unless you are serving it warm, leave the cake in its tin to cool, then tip out on to a sheet of greaseproof paper. Wrap it up again in foil and leave to mature for a day or two before eating.

Valentines Dinner for Two

Tweet

Guest Chef No 4. Lamb Stew and Gratin Dauphinoise

Guest Chef Number 4 is David Delahunty (it’s his first official guest chef title but he’s been involved in lots of the previous posts!)

So Valentines Day was started in a most romantic of ways - waking up in the back of the van, after Chinese New Year. Then it was off to the Stilorgan shopping centre for a fry. Nothing says I love you more than eating sausage and beans in the finest example of mid-80’s retail architecture!

After a nice walk on Bull Island - it was home to the couch and the fire, and successfully releasing Stephen (the canary) for his first flight around the sitting room, after 30 mins he was hungry and just hoped back into his cage.

Then we whipped up this, and it cooked and bubbled away in the oven, while we got our fill of rom-coms on the TV!

Lamb Stew - made by my valentie

Ingredients 
2 lamb chops - cubed - or stewing lamb
1 red pepper
a large sprig of fresh rosemary
2 sticks of celery - finely sliced
3 large tomatoes - chopped
A glass of red wine
I red onion - cubed
Seasoning

Heat a little olive oil in a large frying pan, and brown cook the onion and celery until the onion is translucent.. Then add in the lamb to brown a little. Then stir in the red pepper and tomatoes and rosemary and cook for another 3/4 minutes. Add a dash of wine - bring up to a simmer and then remove.

Place the meat mixture into separate dishes - or one large on and place on the centre shelf of the oven at gas mark 6 for one and a half hours.


For Gratin

2 large potatoes
1 cup of cream
1/2 cup of milk
2 cloves of garlic crushed
Seasoning

Slice the potatoes as thinly as you can. I have a small handheld mandolin, which makes this easy. Rinse them under the tap and then pat dry. Mix the remaining ingredients together. Layer the potatoes into your dish and pour the cream mixture - 3/4 of the way up the edge of your dish. 

Cover and bake also in the oven for one and a half hours at gas mark 6. Remove the lid for the last 10-15 minutes if you want to get the top a little browner (I didn’t and it still looks good)

Serve with a nice glass of red wine, and some Barry White. A special thank you goes out to Pamela Quinn for buying me these awesome dishes for my birthday - thanks Pam - my first Le Crueset - very brilliant present

Steamed Treacle Pudding

Tweet

Quicker than your normal Christmas pudding

Lola and Me and our housemate Sarah decided to have an Christmas dinner before we all go our separate ways for the break. We took a course each and I got pudding - I'd been wanting to make this for a while now - so any excuse and a pudding is a pudding at Christmas time

Serves 10

6oz unsalted butter - room temperature
4 tablespoons of golden syrup
1 orange - zest and juice
6 oz soft brown sugar
3 eggs - beaten together
1 tsp black black treacle
6 oz self raising flour

Butter your pudding basin - I got a 3 litre one - but it would fit into a two litre one. Combine the golden syrup and orange juice and zest - add it to the greased basin.

In a bowl beat together sugar and butter. Then slowly add the beaten eggs and combine well together. Next add in the black treacle - and combine well. Sieve in your flour , mixing all the time. Spoon the mixture gently into the basin.

Cover the basin with the fitted lid - or cover with greaseproof paper and then cover with tin foil - with a crease down the centre - secure with some string. Place in a large saucepan - with boiling water halfway up the sides of the basin. Cover and simmer for two hours. Check regularly to make sure it doesn't boil dry.

When ready - remove lid - place a clean plate on top and then gently turnover - as there will be a nice amount of treacly orange syrup flying around - Lola's phone loved it - sorry honey! Serve with custard - or pouring/whipped cream - which ever you like. I quite like cold custard to contrast with the hot sweat steamy pudding. It looks pretty impressive on the plate too! Serve with custard or cream - enjoy!

This dessert really went down a treat.

Super Fast Bread & Butter Pudding

Tweet

My Secret Shame

After a hard days work in the garden, I decided have a nice relaxing bath. As the bath ran my mind turned to dinner, I had three slices of white bread, some cream and eggs..... hmmmm, then it struck me - bread and butter pudding, not really a dinner I know, but hey I deserve it. They've been discussing on the Guardian - about things people eat when they're on their own - I felt better about this dinner after reading it - some of them are so gross! Yuck - sardine juice on cottage cheese...... dear lord It's very quick and easy to put together, given more time - it's good to leave the bread soak up all the goo for an hour or so, but if you don't have that time - it's still very good. It's great for using up the end of a sliced pan that is a little stale.

Ingredients a few imprecise ones here - sorry!
3 slices of bread (I left the crusts on but you can remove if you prefer)
Butter
Cream
Milk
2 eggs
Raisins
Mixed Peel
2 desert spoons Caster Sugar 1) Butter your bread on both sides and cut into little triangles
2) Put them in a greased oven proof dish
3)Scatter around them the raisins and mixed peel
4) Combine - eggs, milk, cream and caster sugar and mix thoroughly together
5) Pour over the bread making sure that all the bread gets a moist or the dry parts may burn sprinkle on a little more sugar
6)Bake at gas mark 4 for 30 mins, till solid and a little browned on top. Serve - with cream, custard or ice-cream - or by itself.

Other variations include - throwing in some chocolate chips instead of raisins, or spreading the bread with marmalade after the butter and making mini marmalade sandwich pudding - both of these are delish!

Sticky Spare Ribs

Tweet

Skeletons Bones

At a Halloween party we had as a kid, my mum made barbecued spare ribs and called them skeletons bones. It being that time of year again I got a craving for slow roasted pork covered in sweet sticky dark sauce.

This recipe is far enough from perfect - not an ideal way to cook your ribs but it worked out well, so I'll share it and make recommendations after? Is that allowed?

Ingredients

8 spare ribs

Marinade

1.5 teaspoons of caraway seeds

2 serving spoons of Sherry Vinegar

1.5 serving spoons of olive oil

1 serving spoon of soy sauce

1 tablespoon of honey

1 teaspoon of honey

1 teaspoon of crushed chillies

3 serving spoons of ketchup

6 cloves

2 cloves of garlic crushed

Combine all the ingredients in a bowl. Toss the ribs well. Cover and refrigerate for 1-8 hours - however long you have, but the longer the better I suspect.

Preheat your oven to 200. Put your ribs into a large oven proof dish and put on the lid or cover with kitchen foil. After half and hour reduce the heat to 160. After a further half hour remove from the oven and take off the lid.

Now here's where it gets a bit odd. The ribs were cooking but were half submerged in liquid and a little fat - so I quickly poured this away (into a bowl no the sink - promise!) i decided to whip together a quick glaze so that they'd be nice and crispy and browned on the outside in half an hour. So I combined.....

1 dessertspoon of honey

1 dessertspoon of sweet chili sauce

1 teaspoon of honey

I smeared this over the ribs - and in half an hour - they looked great - well cooked meat - not falling off the bone - but more than ready to part company - if persuaded. We served them with some steaming hot baked potatoes and braised red cabbage - delicious! Very high in salt, so don't eat them everyday and you shouldn't die.

Doing this again I'm not sure what to change, the original marinade imparted a great depth of flavour - particularly the caraway seeds - so this method is messy but damn tasty. Fooled you I'm not making any recommendations - these were divine

Raspberry lemon Curd Bakewell Tart

Tweet

Crispy, buttery, raspberry citrus explosion!

My mum bought me a gorgeous new blue glass cake stand and I wanted to make something to put on it. 'Wouldn't a lovely bakewell tart be nice', I thought. At the same time, Lu expressed her hankering for some lemon-curd related dessert, during a workday email. I did some research on my favorite food related spotting site (not to be named as in seldom takes our photos! Grr!) and it seems that the raspberry-lemon combination is a classic and has been used many a time before my fevered and hungry imagination dreamed it up.

I think the pastry was the real winner of this concoction. The whole thing was delish... but.... The pastry... *sigh*... crunchy and crispy and almondy.... definite pastry win!

Raspberry and lemon curd bakewell tart

For the pastry:

125 g plain flour

75g unsalted butter

25g caster sugar

1 egg yolk

1 teaspoon almond essence

For the Lemon Curd:

2 eggs

2 1/2 oz caster sugar

1 1/2 oz unsalted butter cut into cubes

juice and zest of 1 lemon

For the topping:

150g unsalted butter, at room temperature

150g caster sugar

3 eggs

120g ground almonds

1/2 teaspoon almond essence

1 handful flaked almonds

1 small punnet fresh raspberries

Start by making the pastry. Using your finger tips, rub the butter into the flour until it resembles fine breadcrumbs. Add the sugar and mix it about. Then add the egg yolk and the almond essence and bring the whole lot together using your hands. If its too dry, add a tablespoon of cold water, but I didn't find this necessary. Chill the pastry for an hour if you have time. Roll the pastry out on a floured surface and press it into a greased circular spring-form tin. Line this with some greaseproof paper and fill it with baking beans. bake in a preheated over at about 160c for 15 mins or so. Be careful as the edges can burn quite easily. Take it out and remove the beans and the paper, brush the pastry with egg white ( you will have one left over from making the pastry) and bake for a further 5 mins or until it is cooked. You are not aiming for it to be totally brown and done, just for the pastry to go opaque and crumbly all over.

While this is happening make your lemon curd.

Lemon Curd:

Combine the eggs, sugar and butter together in a heavy bottomed sauce pan. Turn on the stove to the lowest possible heat and stir until the butter is melted. The aim here is to make sure the eggs don't cook and scramble, so keep the heat as low as possible, and even remove the pan from the heat at intervals. When the butter is melted and the sugar dissolved, add the lemon juice and zest. The mixture will turn opaque. Keep on the heat and continue stirring until the sauce goes nice and thick, so that it coats the spoon in a nice spreading consistency. This should take about 10 mins. Transfer the curd to a bowl and chill until needed ( you can make double this amount and use the extra for whatever else you like)

When the pastry shell is cooked, take it out of the oven and leave it to cool. Spread the lemon curd all over the base of the pastry shell.

Now make the topping:

Cream together the butter and caster sugar with an electric whisk until the mixture is light yellow and fluffy. Fold in the eggs one at a time, sprinkling in a tablespoon of ground almond after each addition, to keep the mixture from curdling. Now gently fold in the rest of the almond and the almond essence.

Pour this mixture over the lemon curd in the pastry shell. The curd might rise up the edges of the shell a bit so make sure that the curd is 'sealed in' by completely covering it with the topping, right to the edges. Then arrange the raspberries in a circular pattern on top, pushing them in to the mixture so that only half of each berry is visible.

Bake in your preheated oven at 160c. After about 20 minutes, take it out and sprinkle the almonds over the top. Then bake for a further 20 minutes until the tart is set in the middle and firm to touch.

Absolutely delicious! God, I wish I had some right now!

PS: if you want to make a delicious lemon tart, make the same pastry without the almond essence, and make twice the amount of lemon curd. bake the pastry shell as above, add the prepared lemon curd, and bake the whole thing at about 180c for 20 mins or so, until the lemon filling is set. this is also absolutely wonderful and a bit less work! i might have to make one soon!

Rhubarb & Almond Cake

Tweet

A la Daily Spud I've been reading The Daily Spud for over a year now. It's where I learned of the heavenly combination of spud and harissa, and it's where I got the recipe for this super lovely cake. It's a perfect combination of almondy sweet sponge and tart rhubarb. I made it for my parents and then made it again the following weekend for our dinner party. Set out in the middle of the table it looks like we're having a kids party - great.
Here's the spuds version I followed the recipe to the letter but I'll re-write the recipe anyways

180g butter
180 g ground almonds
180g self raising flour
180g of caster sugar (so far so easy to remember)
360g rhubarb cut in good fine chunks
1 teaspoon of ground cinnamon
1 egg
1 egg yolk
Icing sugar for looking fancy at the end

Grease a 20cm loose bottomed round tin, and line the sides with baking parchment and pre-heat your oven to gas mark 5. In a pan melt the butter. In a large bowl, sift the flour and then mix in the almonds, ground cinnamon and sugar. Combine your egg and the egg yolk. Pour the melted butter over the flour and mix, then add in the egg. When you mix all of this together, you'll get a thick ball of cake batter- don't be alarmed this is the plan.

Spread half of this over the bottom of your tin. Then toss in the rhubarb.
Add the rest of the cake mixture on top. You may need to do some subtle squishing here and there to ensure you cover as much of the fruit as you can, but a few little bits sticking out here and there is fine. Bake for an hour until the top is a rich golden brown colour. We served this with cream, but would be divine with some nice vanilla ice-cream especially if it was still warm from the oven.... Writing this is making me a little sad that it's all gone nowThat is pretty much our entire crop of red-currants on top of that cake!! Stupid slugs

Fruit Scones

Tweet

The original and best

I haven't made scones in years and I got a serous nostalgia kick putting these beauties together. Have them with butter and strawberry jam (and cream if you want to be extra decadent!)

Fruit Scones

500g self raising flour

100g butter

60g caster sugar

250ml milk

pinch of salt

75g raisins or sultanas

Sift the flour and salt together into a bowl. Rub in the butter using your fingers until all incorporated. Add sugar and raisins and mix. Using your hands, add in the milk until you have a soft dough that is not too wet. You should be able to pick it up without your hands getting too gooey.

Roll out the dough to about an inch thickness on a floured surface. using a biscuit cutter (or a glass) dipped in flour, cut out as many scones as you can. Then gather together the offcuts, roll them out again and cut out more scones until you have no dough left. This recipe should make about 8 medium sized ones. Place the scones on a well greased baking tray, brush the tops with some extra milk and sprinkle them with some extra sugar if you like. Bake in a preheated oven (gas 7/220 degrees centigrade) for 15 mins. They will be golden brown and well risen. Best served warm with a lovely cup of tea.