Category: Recipes

In half term I was meeting up with some friends, and knew I fancied making something with chocolate and salted peanuts, I just didn’t know what.

A quick google found this Nigella recipe. Chocolate? Check. Salted peanuts. Check. Honeycomb? Well, not on my original list but it makes it sound even better.

I have made honeycomb before, but when I was buying nuts in the little health food shop I found a bag of honeycomb, so bought that for ease.

I ended up following the recipe here, because I really don’t like recipes that use cups- they make a lot more mess for one, and just are not as accurate. I had no golden syrup so used either rice syrup or agave, I can’t remember.

Then I only took one photo, of a piece left over. But trust me, it was amazing. And very easy to make- basically melt stuff in a pan, add nuts and crushed honeycomb. Pour into tin. Cool. Try not to eat all at once.

Enjoy 🙂

Recently Andy’s mum gave us a vegetarian cookery book. We have tried a few recipes from it, and our most recent success is a vegetarian risotto. I am not a huge fan of rice usually, but I do like a nice flavourful risotto, although if I was out I would not often choose one as I worry about what sort of stock has been used.

The book is a Good Food book (101 Veggie Dishes) but the recipe is here too.

It is pretty simple to make- chop the onion and cook it in the oven a bit, add the rice, vegetable stock (we don’t use wine, we use a small carton of passata instead) and rosemary, and leave in the oven for more, then drain a jar of antipasto peppers (Aldi do a jar for 99p), add that and some spinach, and bake again.

Last week we bought a huge bag of spinach, so it would not all fit in the risotto- I added some to my plate so the warm rice wilted it a bit too. The recipe says to use vegetarian parmesan- style cheese, but we have just grated a little cheddar to melt on top.

Much easier than one that cooks on the hob and needs constant stirring.

We are ones to get stuck in a bit of a meal routine, so it was great to try something new and we have had this for a few weeks now, as it is lovely and warming on a chilly evening.

Have you tried baking a risotto before? Are you good at trying new meals or do you tend to stick to the same ones?

Shhh, it is not many weeks until Christmas will be upon us.

With that in mind, Sainsbury’s asked for some ideas of pretty edible gifts that people could make, so here are my two.

First up, Marzipan Chocolates, because it isn’t Christmas without marzipan.

All you need for this is some chocolate- I used 200g dark chocolate, and some marzipan- around 50g.

Melt the chocolate (I do it in the microwave, but you can do it over a pan of boiling water if you prefer), and chop the marzipan into little pieces.

I have a chocolate mould from Lakeland, but you can use little cupcake cases instead.

Spoon a small amount of chocolate into each mould/ case, and leave to set for a few minutes.

Roll the marzipan into balls, and put one ball in each case.

Then top with the rest of the melted chocolate, and leave to harden.

Sorry for the picture- it was no longer daylight when I did this!

Then you can pop them out of the cases (or leave them in if you used paper cases) and put into little bags ready for giving away.

I got these little bags from ebay- check that they are suitable for food use when you buy them, as some are not.

I have also made these before and added in a dried cherry with the marzipan, or you could add in a whole almond to amp up the nut factor.

Next up, the king of edible sweets, Christmas Pudding Fudge.

I first made this a few years ago after seeing the idea of adding the pudding on The Pink Whisk website, although I use a different fudge recipe. It has become a festive regular for me as it is so lovely to give as a gift.

You will need:

100g butter

1 tin of light condensed milk

450g dark brown soft sugar

1 small (100g) ready-to-eat Christmas pudding

You will also need a sugar thermometer, and an electric whisk.

 

But, the key to this is in the preparation. 

Put the butter, sugar and condensed milk in a pan.

Chop up the pudding (it does not need to be small pieces as the beating later on will blitz it down), line a brownie pan with baking paper, and get your electric whisk ready.

I also like to have a side plate ready to catch drips from the beaters.

Then, and only then, begin to make the fudge. Patience is also key here. Gently heat the mixture and stir frequently.

It will darken quite quickly, but don’t worry.

Keep stirring. Don’t worry about the bubbling around the edges, just keep stirring.

A few minutes more….

I have an electric thermometer, and I prefer to keep it on the F setting, as the C setting is not as accurate I don’t think. So the mixture needs to be heated until it reaches 235F (or 113C, or the soft ball stage if you don’t have one). Then take it off the heat, remove the thermometer and spatula (I put them on the side plate so they don’t stick to the work surface) and carefully add in the chopped up Christmas pudding.

I have turned off the heat here but it still bubbles a lot so be careful when you put the pudding in, as if it splashes on you it will really burn.

Then, get your beaters going.

This can take a while. It will go from very easy to mix, to feeling stiffer and leaving trails for longer in the mixture.

The longer you beat it, the crumblier it will be, but I prefer it to be softer, rather than crumbly like Scottish tablet, so you can always put a bit on the plate, leave to cool for a minute and see if it is the texture you like. If not, keep on beating.

I tend to stop when it leaves thick trails in the mixture, and when you stop some of it still clings to the beaters.

The stalactites stay there on the beaters as a cooks perk!

Then pour it into the lined pan, and leave to cool. The pan will be very hot, so make sure it is on a heat resistant surface when you leave it.

Leave overnight to cool, at room temperature, before slicing into small squares and bagging up ready for gifts.

I do sometimes use ribbon, but these bags came with little ties.

What edible gifts do you like to make/ receive?

Ages ago I bought myself a copy of The Clandestine Cake club recipe book.

I have to say, I have never had a bad recipe from it, and now it is pretty much my go-to book for any cakes that I want to make.

Last weekend Andy’s parents were back, and I fancied making a carrot cake for Sunday tea. Now, I love carrot cake but have often struggled to find a good recipe- they are either too dry, or crumbly, not spiced enough or don’t seem to bake properly because of too much carrot.

The search is over.

The CCC book has a wonderful recipe- the sultanas are soaked in orange juice, it has nuts (I used pecans and not walnuts), not too much carrot, spiced and just delicious.

Also, I have never made a good cream cheese icing, but again I have found it!

I added orange zest to the icing because I had used the juice for the cake, and also I just love orange cream cheese icing.

Perfection. I am already wondering when I can make it again!

I also made some banana bread, again using the CCC book.

One for work (with cream cheese icing, although a slightly different recipe) and then a plain one for home.

Mmmmmmmmm, banana bread. Keeping me going after long days at work, runs in the evening and more work after that.

I feel like I need to do a Julia and Julia style bakeathon- bake everything in the book! I have already made caramel cake, red velvet cake, battenberg cake, elderflower cordial cake, Dutch Speculaas cake (had a sort of home-made marzipan centre layer), lime and coconut loaf, lemon polenta cake, white chocolate and raspberry loaf and harvest spiced apple cake. And they have all been amazing. But there are 120 recipes so it is going to take me a while!

What is your favourite recipe book?

So a while ago Sainsbury’s sent me some flour, and for a while I was thinking about what I fancied making with it.

It is ages since I have made bread. I did have a spate of making sourdough a while back, but then I ran out of time at the weekends, and we discovered M&S’s San-Fran style which is just amazing.

While perusing the internet I came across a few recipes for sourdough cinnamon rolls, and once the idea was in my head that was it, I wanted to make them. This was the recipe I went for in the end.

First up I had to make the sourdough starter, which although can take as little as a week, I ended up feeding it for two weeks. There are all sorts of weird recipes for sourdough starter out there, some involving yoghurt, or even apple cores, but actually all you need is flour and water. That is it. You want it to capture the natural yeast (bacteria? Something) that is in the air. I used half wholewheat and half white bread flour, mixed in a jar with warm water. Then each day add a tablespoon of flour, a tablespoon of water, and stir. I think you are meant to throw some away each day too, but I only do this every now and then. I have read I could keep it in the fridge, as then it does not need feeding, so I might do that now I have used some of it.

The recipe I found told you to put it all in the machine, so I kneaded it for probably 10 minutes. At first it was sticky, but it soon turned, as if by magic, into a lovely ball of smooth dough.

Here is where it went a big wrong. The recipe was massive- I printed off two pages, but missed off the filling. Never mind, I can make one with butter, brown sugar and cinnamon. Which was fine, but not quite right I don’t think!

I didn’t manage to roll them too tight either. I think next time I would roll it thinner to have a proper swirl in there. Half I have put in the freezer (as the recipe said you could) and half went in the fridge overnight.

In the morning I as heading off on a long run (I did 10.5 miles at a steady pace- felt strong even though my legs were sore after Body Pump)- then when I got home I put on the oven and baked them while I had a shower.

They didn’t rise a huge amount, but I left out the yeast in the recipe, as my opinion is that the sourdough should make them rise enough. They smelled amazing while baking, but the filling leaked all over the pan!

I did have a starter of fruit and soya yoghurt as I was too hungry to wait for them to cook.

Then they were enjoyed with a cup of tea. Such a good treat. Since going back and checking the recipe I saw that I could have made icing for them too, with icing sugar and vanilla, and I suppose that would make them more like a dessert, but I quite liked them with just the filling for breakfast.

The verdict? Not as good as Starbucks cinnamon rolls (but what is really?) but I love using sourdough for the gentle overnight rise- this was great to be baking (and smelling amazing) when I got out of the shower. I think using the sourdough means they have a denser feel, a bit chewier and perhaps more filling than a normal one too.

Favourite cinnamon roll recipe? I have made these ones before (often on Christmas Eve) as that recipe is really simple. I have also seen some amazing ones like apple caramel ones, or pumpkin ones. Not enough time in the week for all these goodies!

*Sainsbury’s sent me a voucher to cover the cost of additional ingredients, but all opinions are my own.