Chocolate and Almond Brownies - Gluten free and low #FODMAP

For these brownies they are definitely both gluten and wheat free, the FODMAP part is on the border - I did check them out with my dietitian as under FODMAP you are allowed 10 almonds - which after working out the total and scaling down is roughly 8-10 almonds per portion, so if you eat two, ahem, then they are taking you over that almond limit! Not that I ate two of course... that would never happen.. though I did have an amusing conversation at work today with a dental health nurse over a particular form she was showing me and after reading through it (as part of the project I am on) I did mutter the words 'is it bad I had a brownie for breakfast'! Apparently, yes. Oh well...

Baking is a passion of mine - it tends to happen quite organically without much prior planning and I love nothing better than destroying the kitchen and dusting everything with a fine scattering of icing sugar but following FODMAP has definitely tested my repertoire to the max and I've explored whole new areas of baking! After initial hit and miss I seem to be getting into a rhythm and these brownies are pretty darn good! The fact that there are just under 4 left out of 9 from the last night is a pretty good sign they are keepers! (though by the time I have now finished writing this up post a blinking windows update grr there are two!) B even gave them a 10 which is a huge improvement on the previous experiments!

These are not fudgey as some brownies but they are soft, light but not too light and chocolatey. I did umm and arr over putting rum in them but I did resist on this occasion. Maybe next time....(though I think am getting a reputation as at a friends annual birthday bbq the other night I was asked if my flapjacks had alcohol in them!!)

The one main ingredient in making these brownies a little on the squidge side - mashed banana. They need to be very ripe, on the edge of packing their bags and walking out the fruit bowl. You won't taste the banana but they keep the brownies so moist without lots of butter - I found with earlier gluten free bakes they were a little on the dry side but not with these!

Makes 9 brownies

Ingredients

100g butter

125g light brown muscavado sugar

2 tbsp golden syrup

75g rice flour

25g ground almonds

25g cocoa

1 tsp baking powder

2 small ripe bananas, mashed

2 eggs beaten

50g dark chocolate,chopped

2 tbsp flaked almonds

Preheat oven about 190o (my oven still flexible but basically a medium hot oven)

Line a square tin with baking paper

In a pan melt the butter, sugar and golden syrup until slightly foaming and syrupy, leave to one side

Sift together the rice flour, ground almonds, baking powder and cocoa. Stir in the mashed banana and lightly beat in the eggs.

Use a fork to gently stir through the melted sugary mix until combined. Fold in the chocolate chunks. Pour into the prepared tin, scatter over the flaked almonds and bake for 35-40 minutes or until just cooked through.

We had ours in a bath of soya custard (surprisingly nice!)

Banana, Sultana and Choc Chip Muffins #FODMAP

Yesterday I was very lucky to spend it attending a full day workshop on Quality Improvement for healthcare, which working for the NHS as part of a project to improve patient safety it was super beneficial and very interesting. I am really lucky to work with a great bunch - and a great Trust which is committed to improving quality to benefit both us staff and patients. I knew the provided sandwich lunch would be a no go on FODMAP but I had planned ahead and took some leftover baked millet & veggies. However, the hardest part was in the afternoon when trays of amazing looking and smelling cakes appeared - there was glossy topped caramellos, fancy cupcakes and lots of other treats and not a single one was suitable! All I could think about was cake!!

So last night after dinner and still craving cake, I decided to try again with some FODMAP suitable baking, last weeks banana bread was not a huge hit but I decided to persevere with a the banana theme, mainly though as I had two very, very ripe ones to use up! After a rummage through my cookery books I dusted off a copy of 'the egg book'. Its not a book I've admittedly used very much but it does have a few good recipes inside... I chose the banana muffins recipe but tweaked it to be FODMAP friendly, also I increased the liquid to allow for the gluten free flour - which seems much thirstier, and changed the honey to maple syrup. I also had no ground almonds so subbed for ground rice too! Oh and I added some suitable dark chocolate chips and sultanas and left out the nutmeg!

The mixture looked quite sloppy and I easily filled 12 cases rather than the 10 stated! I didn't hold out much hope but was pleasantly surprised and it satisfied my cake longing! The resulting muffin was light and taste rather good even if they did stick super well to their paper cases! Oh and as ever I had great fun making a mess!

Make 12 muffins

225g gluten free plain flour (I used Dove's Farm)

3 tsp baking powder

25g ground rice

1 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

50g light soft brown sugar

2 large mashed bananas

2 large eggs

2 1/2 tbsp sunflower oil

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

150ml soya milk, unsweetened

3 tbsp maple syrup

50g sultanas

50g dark chocolate chips (check labels for suitability)

Pre-heat oven to 190o

Sift the flour, baking powder, cinnamon and ground rice together.

Separately mix together the eggs, banana, oil, milk and maple syrup. fold into the dry mixture gently and stir through the chocolate chips and sultanas, spoon into prepared muffin cases.

Bake for 20-25 minutes or until lightly golden and a skewer comes away cleanly

Peanut Butter Oreo Crumble Cake

Biscuits, biscuits everywhere is pretty much the theme tune to the last few days! There has been bashing, blitzing, slicing and dicing testing out break-ability and of course a little tasting here and there too! If you are wondering why then it was a because I was a sent a few packets of some Special Edition Oreo's to play with. I do like a challenge and had good fun experimenting with them! Something I don't often get the chance to do as we flat-share and they were thankfully away for a few days whilst I destroyed the kitchen with crumbs and using nearly every bowl we own in the process!

**I have received product from Oreo for this post. It is an entry to the Foodies100 Wonderfilled recipe challenge sponsored by Oreo, which marks the launch of two exciting new flavours: Peanut Butter and Golden. The delicious new flavours are available in all major supermarkets at an RRP of £1.08. To find out more, visit www.facebook.com/oreo**

After a lot of scribbling and buying random kids sweets that never got used (I am sure won't hang around long once I declare to my boyfriend they can be eaten, shh!) I ended combining parts of other recipes I had been making for years, along with pure experimental madness! It paid off as this cake went down very well at work! Its my final week in my current job, and as a result I was requested to make lots of cake - they had chai tea fruit cake yesterday and today received this Oreo cake - the finale on Friday my renowned Sticky Toffee and Orange pudding! Next week is salad week!!

This cake has a soft, custard laced base sponge, topped with a banana and peanut puree, then crumbled up peanut butter Oreo's and oats, then a shiny chocolate glaze, oh and the requisite sprinkles of choice! I am tempted next time to add more banana to make a thicker layer but stick to two if you are are less persuaded by the idea! I roast my own peanuts (shelled from monkey nuts) as they taste better for baking and have no nasties, then grind them fresh to order - un-ground they will keep a fair few months in a cool air tight container. 

You will need a 8 " square pan, lined with parchment paper

Ingredients:

120g soft butter

130g golden caster sugar

2 medium eggs

50g wholemeal self raising flour

25g porridge oats

10 Peanut Butter Oreo's

100g plain flour

5 tsp custard powder

2 bananas, mashed

1 heaped tsp cornflour

1/4 tsp vanilla extract

20g roasted peanuts

pinch of sea salt

Glaze ingredients:

50g golden caster sugar

3 tbsp milk

20g cocoa

Pre-heat oven to 180o.

Sift together the flours, salt and custard powder. In a separate bowl cream together the butter, sugar and egg, fold in the dry mix. Spread over the base of the prepared lined pan.

Mix the cornflour with 2 tbsp water, add to a small saucepan and heat - stirring constantly, once bubbling add the vanilla, then stir in the bananas and cook for two minutes. Remove to one side.

Crush the Oreo's to small chunks, about 5cm at the biggest - I found the end of my wooden rolling pin most effective! Combine with the oats and put to one side.

Add the slightly cooled banana mix to the prepared sponge layer and smooth over. Top with the Oreo crumbs and press lightly down, bake in the middle of the oven for 30-35 minutes or until the sponge has cooked through.

In a saucepan, melt the butter, add the sugar and cocoa whisking until smooth and the sugar has melted, then whisk in the milk to form a smooth, thick sauce and simmer on a moderate heat for 2-3 minutes or until lovely and glossy.

Spoon the sauce over the cake, then decorate with sprinkles of choice and allow to cool fully in the tin.

There has been a few of us Foodies 100 bloggers taking part and some other Oreo related treats for you -

Peanut Butter and Golden Oreo Pudding from Fab Food 4 All

Peanut Butter Oreo Moon Rocks from Utterly Scrummy Food for Families

Oreo Nutella Ice Cream Cake from Kerry Cooks

White Chocolate Oreo Blondie Brownie from Ellie Bee Bakes

Slow Cooker White Chocolate Oreo Brownies from Baking Queen 74

Hidden Oreo Cupcakes from Sophie Loves Food

Peanut Butter Oreo Milkshake from Foodie Quine

Brandy & Marshmallow Brownies

We love brownies here, and this makes the 5th brownie recipe I have blogged, though there has been lots of experimental's in between! This one took inspiration from my Banana and Rum Brownies, though I had run of out rum this time and had to borrow my boyfriends rather lovely imported Brandy and due to lack of brown bananas's I upped the butter quantity a bit. Fortunately the experimentation worked and it resulted in a heavenly batch of brownies that didn't make it past the day! They were made for my friend M's birthday and were very well received at the party!

You will need a lined 8"square cake pan.

Ingredients:


100g butter
150g golden caster sugar
50g light brown muscavado sugar
115g plain chocolate, broken up
2 eggs
2 tbsp good brandy
1tbsp golden syrup
100g plain flour
25g cocoa powder
100g dark chocolate chunks
1/2 tsp baking powder

2 heaped tbsp mini marshmallows
1 large very ripe banana  mashed up


Pre-heat oven to 180o

1) Melt in a saucepan the butter, syrup and sugars. Stir in the cocoa and baking powder and remove from the heat.

2) Meanwhile mix the flour, egg, brandy and banana together. Fold into the melted chocolate mixture. Scatter over the chocolate chunks and stir lightly so they start to melt into the mixture.

3) Spoon into the lined pan, sprinkle over the mini marshmallows and press into the cake batter lightly and bake for 35-40 minutes - my oven is quite slow but modern ovens are faster! A skewer should come out fairly clean, not as clean as cake mix but enough to show its just cooked! It should be cracking slightly on top.

4) Leave to cool in the pan for ten minutes then transfer on the liner to a cooling rack. Place in an airtight container when cool.

The brownies were moist, chocolaty and are a definite keeper! Plus you can pretend they are healthy-ish with the banana addition! You can't really taste it but it just adds to the texture in a good way!

Lovely Layered Lemon Cake

Its been a few weeks of no baking, so it was time to come back with a bang! This was a fusion of a Delia lemon cake, but super charged with lashings of lemony cream! It vanished embarrassingly fast between 4 adults! I took mere scraps for my cake fiend friend at work! I have been also told I am most welcome to make again anytime soon...though as it is I've had to borrow a larger sized dress to attend a work summerball shortly, maybe I shouldn't make it quite so soon perhaps!

I followed a lemon cake I found online from Delia initially - though I misread slightly and added all the lemon's juice to the sponge - a happy accident really as I would do exactly the same second time around!  Also I cheated and bought a jar of lemon curd, no less than a classy jar of value lemon curd - it worked perfectly! Weirdly Delia's recipe on her site and the BBC one vary - after much puzzling it seems I used the bbc one! I have written it out to save confusion!

Serves 8:

Ingredients

175g self raising flour
175g soft butter
175g caster sugar
3 large eggs
1 tsp baking powder
1 lemon, juiced and zested


Line two sandwich pans and grease the sides. (I love cake release!) Pre-heat oven to 180o

Sift the flour, baking powder and sugar into a mixing bowl of a mixer (or use electric hand whisk), add the butter, lemon juice and zest, then the eggs, then beat until creamy, and light.

Spoon even amounts into prepared trays and bake for 30-35 minutes or until lightly golden and cooked through. Cool for 5 minutes in the tin then transfer to a cooling rack until cold.

Slice both cakes horizontally (don't worry, icing holds a multitude of sins!)

Spread three of the layers with a generous lashing of lemon curd.

Filling:

300ml whipping cream

1/3 jar lemon curd

Whip the cream till starting to thicken, then beat in 3 heaped tbsp lemon curd until thickened and stands in fairly firm peaks. 

Spread over a third of the prepared lemon cream mixture for the three prepared layers, topping with the final sponge. 

Lastly make up the glace with:

4 heaped tbsp sifted icing sugar

one lemon, juiced and zested
Sprinkles optional of choice - I used these super cute mini lemon meringues!

Sift the icing sugar into  a bowl, stir in enough lemon juice to form a smooth consistency. Spoon over the top of the sponge, scatter over the zest and decorate as desired.

Allow to set before slicing.

Trust me - you want to bake this cake - you will win friends! Though this is bad as it also means you don't get to eat as much of it...! Its so light, and lemony, and oh oh oh, and can I really fit one more slice in?

Spiced Kiwi and Apple Jam

My jam and preserve making tends to follow a slightly erratic randomness with no fixed rules other than the sugar to fruit ratio and this batch of Spiced Kiwi jam made no exception! My late and beloved Nanny J was a fabulous jam maker and queen of the marmalade and I take pride in keeping her memory alive with my somewhat experimental jam making and hope I can do her memory justice! I sadly have none of her actual jam or marmalade recipes other than a couple of random cookery books with notes and clippings but I hope she is looking down with happiness at my feeble attempts with some pride!

What triggered this particular batch of jam mostly was that I had bought the preserving sugar on a whim, reduced to 50p a bag (how could really I not resist!) and whilst I had offered some to my aunt, she politely declined and it left me with my 4kg of preserving sugar to play with! It was something quite new to me – I am lazy and have always got away with using regular sugar with the odd apple for luck but as the kiwi fruit were packing their bags and about to make their final bid for bin bag freedom, it was time to see if they could make a harmonious match….so other than a brief amount of stirring the pan into the night I really didn’t have much to lose..

It was quite a frugal jam – as well as the sugar being reduced the kiwi also were purchased yellow stickered, weirdly I have found I can’t tolerate kiwi eaten raw anymore – my mouth goes painfully fuzzy but fortunately the jam is edible and doesn’t affect me and I was glad not to have thrown the poor little kiwi away!

Fortunately despite the jam initially smelling slightly overwhelming spicing wise and had me slightly doubting if my brain was wired correctly it was in fact the perfect amount when finished – its fragrant, a little punchy and makes for excellent hot buttered toast or muffins, or crumpets ..or whatever you want to toast or bake really!

 

Here it is adorning my recent batch of Banana Pancakes:

 

Makes 2 standard sized jars

Ingredients

5 kiwi fruit, ripe, peeled and cut into chunks
3 small eating apples, peeled and cored, cut into small chunks
420g preserving sugar
1 tbsp ground cardamom
1 tbsp ground ginger root

Method:

Place everything in a large heavy based saucepan and gently bring to the boil.

 

Then gently simmer for an hour or so, or until the mixture has broken down and thickened nicely. Use a hand blender to reduced to a more smoother jam if preferred.

Pour into the prepared sterilised jars, put the lid on and allow to cool. Store in the fridge once opened and it will keep for a while - mine is still going strong!

 

Easy as that!

 

As my jam used up the sad, neglected Kiwi I am sending this recipe over to Elizabeth's Ktichen Diary No Waste Food Challenge

 

 

 

If you fancy even more jam do check out these fabulous jam recipes:

 

Plum and ginger Jam from Emily's Recipes and Reviews

Prize winning One Punnet Strawberry Jam from FabFood4All

Secret Raspberry Jam from The Crafty Larder

Rhubarb and Ginger Jam from Farmersgirl Kitchen

Blueberry and Chia Jam from Rough Measures

Blackberry Jam from Citrus Spice and all Things Nice
Chilli Jam from Happiness is Homemade
Apricot and Vanilla Jam from Chocolate Log Blog
Speedy 10 minute Strawberry Jam from Little Sunny Kitchen

 



Sticky Toffee and Orange Pudding

This week has passed in a M25/ A40/ Back streets of hell kinda blur and its only Thursday! I am typing this after 250 un-glorious miles since Monday entirely considering getting a dash-cam, as living out in the sticks I had become amused by the odd bad bout of Surrey drivers but oh my gosh the stuff these past few days has left me shaken and entirely grateful I had picked up a bottle of red in the weekly shop, if only to soothe my fried nerves upon flopping onto the sofa home! Hopefully tomorrow will be the end of this joyous saga...

Anyway I have squeezed in a little blogging and tonight with consent I give to you my Sticky Toffee and Orange Pudding! Quite amazingly up until Christmas just past I had never baked Sticky toffee pudding, and I am now a convert! I had originally made a rather delicious and rich Sticky Toffee Pudding from a fellow lovely blogger Sue over at Mainly Baking for our works Christmas party (and kindly gave me permission to re-produce here), and it was super popular but a few weeks later, a few odd things lying around post Christmas and the creative brain cells kicked in and I tweaked the recipe into a Sticky Toffee Orange Pudding, and I must admit it is glorious and the little bit of orange just lifts it into something heavenly! It is not at all diet friendly and never will be but you can eat in moderation. It is not for those lacking a sweet tooth!

The dates as always are bought from a late night grocery kinda place near my dad, Turkish owned. They are gorgeously gooey, almost toffee like on their own. Sue recommends blending the fruit mixture but I skip this stage as they go all lovely and smoodgy on their own. If you have regular dates and it doesn't look puree like then by all means blitz them.

Our ovens thermometer is still slacking but I guess approx. 180/160 fan in a working oven!

Makes one brownie sized tray - 8x8inch ish.

Ingredients:

175g dates, stoned and chopped - buy the best you can!
50g Dried mixed fruit - including mixed peel
1/2 juice of one orange
175g ml boiling water
1 teabag
100ml milk
2 tbsp black treacle
175g self raising flour
140g light muscavado sugar
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
2 medium eggs, beaten
85g butter

Sauce:
175g light muscavado sugar
50g butter
225ml double cream
1 tbsp. black treacle
1/2 orange juice
1 tbsp. orange zest

Zest a 2 inch piece of the orange and put to one side - before you cut in half! Add half the juice to the dried fruit mixture below.

Place the stoned, chopped dates, mixed fruit and teabag in a bowl. Pour over the boiling water and steep for ten minutes, discard the teabag.

Pre-heat oven to 180o.

Grease a 8 inch square tin (I swear by Dr Oetker Cake Release!)

Instructions based on a stand mixer:
Cream together the butter and sugar in the mixer. Sift the flour and bicarb together. Add a little egg to the butter sugar mix, then a little of the flour mix, repeat in two more stages. Beat in the milk last, then fold in the prepared fruit mixture.

Pour the batter into the prepared tin and level. Bake in the middle for 35-40 minutes or until it springs back to touch and a skewer removes clean.

Meanwhile make the sauce -

Heat in a medium saucepan the butter, sugar and half of the cream until nicely mixed and the sugars dissolved, when boiling add the treacle and remaining orange juice and gently bubble for about 4-5 minutes or until starting to thicken, remove from the heat and stir in the cream.

Oh to bathe in sauce!

When the cake is cooked, stab the surface with a skewer and gently pour over a little sauce too fill the holes, allowing it to sink in until you have used just under half. Keep the rest to serve with the pudding and allow to rest for at least 15 minutes before eating, with more sauce!! Sprinkle over the reserved zest.

Eating time!!

It is undeniably rich, and sweet but has everything a good baked pudding needs! You could easily add a swirl of custard or scoop of vanilla ice cream too accompany this and the sauce alone is worth making, the gentle orange hint makes it fabulous!

As my pudding used up a leftover Christmas orange (from making red cabbage - we don't eat oranges), a long neglected tin of treacle and a carton of just-gone-by-due-by-date cream donated by a bemused friend I am sending this over to Elizabeth's Kitchen Diary No Waste Food Challenge, one that I firmly believe in too - I hate waste and always get upset even over tiny amounts of food!

Many thanks again to Sue for letting me play around with her lovely recipe and I hope you like my version of it too!!

Boozy Mincemeat and Marzipan Puff

So I have relented on the word 'Puff' following my recent strudel post. I’ve decided it doesn't have to mean that I have indeed baked dragons (or worse!) and as this was a folded filo parcel kinda pudding puff it shall remain, as it really wasn't strudel like. Well sort of but not really. Maybe I need to invent a new word, something catchy like Strupuff or Puffdel perhaps? Yeah, me neither.

Anyway I digress, this was one of those emergency puddings after realising I had half a packet of Filo pastry leftover from baking the strudel, which kinda needed eating 24 hours earlier but a quick sniff and visual check I deemed it was fine, fortunately I had wrapped it in damp paper towel which had kept it moist enough too, as filo is rather evil and dries out so fast! Whilst I had already made a cake for the impending family visit that evening, they are all good eaters and I thought they wouldn’t mind an extra pudding or two! I did joke it was my gigantic size cheffy man size trio of desserts!! I think with my boyfriend being away at the time I was missing cooking for two and it was lovely to have my dad and brother over to feed! 

The pudding was purely made up as I went along throwing nice things together quickly– the marzipan was leftover in the fridge from when I made the GBBO Swedish Princess tortlettes, the beloved Polish cocoa is always in the store-cupboard and the mincemeat was from a half opened jar at some point earlier this year... I do like a recipe that uses up odds n sods! Oh and the brandy was ‘borrowed’ from my dearest’s special imported bottle from South Africa…shh!

Serves 4:

Ingredients:

210g mincemeat
70g marzipan, roughly chopped into ½ cm chunks
10g cocoa powder
2 tbsp brandy
50g butter, melted
4 sheets filo pastry
2 tbsp icing sugar

Method:

Pre-heat oven to 210o.

On a larger sheet of foil or parchment paper, lay out a sheet of filo at  a landscape angle and brush with melted butter, repeat with the remaining 3 sheets, to form a thick rectangle.

Combine the mincemeat, cocoa, marzipan and brandy until nicely mixed. Spoon the filling down the middle of the pastry, leaving an inch from the ends. 

Fold up the left and right sides inwards, brush the top half of the filo with butter, fold up the bottom half and gently tease over the top sheet to overlap. 

Brush liberally with butter and sprinkle over half the icing sugar. Place on a lined baking tray and bake for about 25-30 minutes or until golden and crispy, dust with remaining icing sugar and serve sliced up with lashings of hot custard.

Overall the pudding was very highly received - the slightly boozy, fruity nutty and chocolately filling inside crisp buttery sweet pastry was heavenly and its a definite 'keeper' of a recipe!

It’s also really quite acceptable the next day too cold if you have a spare piece!

As this lush puff used up all sorts of odds n ends I am sending it over to the December No Waste Food Challenge at Elizabeth's Kitchen Diary. Over the year I have really enjoyed taking part and hosting challenges and gained some amazing recipes along the way! Bring on 2015!!

Banana Bread Bundt Cake with Chocolate Glaze

Every week despite our small household of two we go through a lot of eggs - from simple omelettes for supper to baking all sorts of lovely cakes or just a simple egg wash on something naughty but nice like a homemade sausage roll, and buying free range is the bare minimum of quality for us. Also with thanks to the Lion Quality Mark on the eggs we buy, it guarantees that they have been laid by hens within the UK, and are produced to the highest standards of food safety. Eggs are full of nutrition too so you can pretend that cake is healthy too! The egg white nutrition part in particular is protein rich, carb free and low in fat. Okay so yeah the rest of the cake is a maybe a bit more carby but its winter afterall and we need more insulation!

This gorgeous Banana Bread Bundt Cake with Chocolate Glaze makes no exception and naturally contained free range eggs, all date stamped with the Lion quality mark on them. It also means the eggs were stamped with a date, so I can tell how fresh they are, plus the laying hen has been vaccinated against salmonella. Something I really don't want to give to my loved ones along with a nice piece of cake! I was an 80's baby and only vaguely remember the news back then but what I do remember was Salmonella being all over the news, how fortunate we are now!

Moving on to the cake  the lovely Betty Ann from the Asian in America website gave me permission to post this recipe, after I had spotted it in her archives, that she had borrowed from a book – a fabulous sounding one called "Breakfast for Dinner" by Lindsay Landis and Taylor Hackbarth. I really love how recipes that work get passed between people – as you know they are loved and by baking them for new people to love, you therefore spread the love around! Cake also equals happiness so not only are you spreading love you create happiness! Something this world is in short supply at times with so much sadness amongst us, we have to also remember there are good people too and that love will always win.

Also as its from an American website its in cups so apologies as I know for some this can be off-putting but I have translated the butter for you as I already own measuring cups and used them for the dry ingredients and converted the temperature. (I adore my Russian Doll ones and can highly recommend them!) I made a different icing compared to the original version, mainly as I forgot to buy cream during a bit of a daft moment in the the supermarket and I didn’t think the crème fraiche I had instead bought would be quite the same in the icing…also I used sultanas as the raisins have gone missing! I swear there was a bag in the pantry…think I need to have a good tidy up in there!

Anyway I digress – this cake was delicious! I adore the regular banana bread I have made a zillion times from the Avoca cookbook but after falling in love with my bundt tin all over again thanks to cake release spray from Dr Oetker, when this popped onto my laptop screen I knew it had to be my next bake! Miraculously for once my oven didn't ruin it too! (lots of issues!) Its bananary without being in ya face nananana and the little drizzle of chocolate icing completes it! I also got to sneak over some Christmas tree sprinkles too despite it only being October! It is of course also a fabulous way to use up neglected bananas!

*You will need a large bundt tin - mine has a 24cm base and is quite deep*

Ingredients:

2 ½ cups plain flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

½ tsp bicarbonate of soda

½ tsp salt

1 cup caster sugar

¾ cup Butter (171g)

2 large eggs

3 large bananas, mashed

1 tsp vanilla extract

½ cup milk

½ cup sultanas (or raisins)

Glaze:

4 heaped tbsp icing sugar

1 heaped tbsp dark cocoa powder (I always use a dark one from the local Polish shop)

Sprinkles of choice

Pre-heat oven to about 180o

Sift together the flour, salt, bicarb and baking powder.

In a mixer, unless you are feeling particularly strong cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, then add the eggs one at a time, until well mixed. Mash the banana and add along with vanilla, mix again to just combine.

Add a third of the dry mix along with a third of the milk, and repeat until all mixed well. Stir through the sultanas and pour into the prepared bundt pan, smooth over.

Bake in the centre of the oven for about 45-50 minutes, or until a skewer comes away clean and its lightly golden on top. Your kitchen will smell rather lovely at this moment and you might want to dive in. But resist the urge, let it cool a little - say 10-15 minutes before releasing the sides of the pan/ turning onto a wire rack (will depend on your pan!). Allow to cool as long as you can endure before making the icing.

Sift together the icing sugar and cocoa, add a teaspoon of water a time until you have a desirable consistency and spoon over the cake. Add a nice scattering of sprinkles over the top of your choosing.

Ours lasted 24 hours. Probably would keep for a few days.

With heartfelt thanks to Betty Ann for sharing this wonderful bake, and in turn the original recipe keepers Lindsay Landis and Taylor Hackbarth for creating such a lovely treat!

Disclaimer: I was not paid to mention British Lion Eggs but its something I do really believe in and I received an electric egg boiler as a gift which I am slowly mastering!

Fruit Bowl Gratin

Now its starting to get a bit chillier and the nights are drawing in pudding starts becoming a warm or hot pudding and in typical style all the fruit in the bowl was super ripe and ready at the same time - and there is really only so much fruit we can eat in one sitting! I have in the past made jams or the odd upside down cake but apples are not something I bake often with, especially the weeny size gala's we had lately! Also really not enough fruit to justify a jamming sessions!

Whilst trying to decide what to make with it all I spotted this Apple and Pear Gratin recipe on the Baking Mad website, who had also got in touch with me recently about recreating one of their recipes and this fruity gratin dish popped up. It sounded intriguing, we had everything in or near enough and decided to make it together for pudding! 

It was really good to add something easy to the pudding repertoire and it will be a keeper recipe for next time everything ripens at once! I think it could easily be scaled up or down to feed how many need pudding! It might just well feature next time my dad's over for dinner as those nights have to involve pudding and it can be a bit of a challenge getting everything ready after work but this gratin was so easy to make and can fairly easily fit around whatever you are making, adapted to what needs using up in the fruit bowl!

When it comes to buying eggs I will only ever buy free range at a minimum - I usually pick up the mixed weight trays in Sainsbury's which are a bit cheaper compared to pre-sized trays and guess by eye their size! When baking sponge cakes I always start by weighing the eggs anyway, so it doesn't make any difference to the recipe anyway! Buying cage free is important to me, I can't bear the thought of chickens kept in cages, with nowhere to move and certainly no life for the poor birds kept in those conditions. I am sure you have seen the videos and as I mentioned before, buying eggs in larger and mixed quantities helps keep the price down - I paid £2.40 for 15 free ranger's in Sainsbury's which is more than affordable. We go through a lot of eggs here and can go through a tray a week easily!

As my fruit was odd shapes and sizes, I made up the difference by adding plums to the apple and pear mixture, which went deliciously well together! I do love discovering a recipe that I can play around with and it also stops any waste! All of the above fruit was so ripe it was about to leave home by itself so its great to have a good use to it!

Recipe adapted from Baking Mad

Serves 4

You will need a large baking dish or 4 individual ones

Ingredients:

250ml milk
1 dsp butter
1 cinnamon stick
4 free range eggs
3-4 apples
2-3 pears, conference
2 plums
16 tsp golden caster sugar

Topping:
4 tsp Light muscovado sugar

Method:

Melt the butter in a large saute pan, pre-heat the oven apx 200o/ Gas mark 6

Peel the fruit, remove cores and cut into large chunks, add to the pan along with the cinnamon stick and 8 tsp of the caster sugar, gently cook for about ten minutes or until the fruit is starting to soften

Beat the eggs, add the milk and remaining sugar.

Remove the cinnamon stick and place the fruit along with any juices into a suitable baking dish (note it will need grilling, best to read this bit first!) and make into a even layer

Pour over the eggy mixture, bake for 18-20 minutes or until lightly golden and set.

Remove the dish from the oven and sprinkle over the muscovado sugar. Place under the grill on high heat, and caramelise the sugar - about 2-3 minutes.

Allow to cool slightly and serve. A nice scoop of ice cream would be welcome but we sadly have none in but a splash of Devon dream was lovely, though in all honestly its rather delicious by itself!

Despite some reservations over what the finished result would be like, afterall we don't often combine egg and fruit together in the same dish, we actually loved this pudding so much! Its sweet, fruity and really very tasty! The egg sets to form a souffle type texture and the caramelised sugar on top makes it that bit more special! I had to wait for my portion as I had dashed out to my pilates class but I came to back to 3/4 empty dish so my boyfriend clearly approves of this recipe! 

As I saved the fruit from being wasted, I am sending this over to Elizabeth's Kitchen Diary's 'No Waste Food challenge' which is being hosted by Vohn's Vittles for October. 

Disclaimer - I received a  package of sugar and flour from Baking Mad and personally chose this recipe to make and received no payment, images remain the property of Annes Kitchen. 

With thanks to Sainsbury's who provided vouchers to cover my ingredients and time making a Free range Egg recipe.

Apple, Rhubarb and Ginger Jam

Growing up we were spoiled by my lovely, and sorely missed Nanny J’s home made jams and marmalade's. In fact three years ago today the angels took her under their wings and we all miss her dearly. I have fond memories of wheeling around a trolley full of heavily reduced strawberries in order for her to make a giant vat of strawberry jam and over the years I have made the odd random pickle and jam but too few and far between! 

Last month I picked up some reduced rhubarb for 38p in one shop and a bag of bramley apples for 39p elsewhere and being rather hooked on ginger of late, I decided on a really hot evening to make a batch of jam involving all three ingredients. Fortunately after much stirring it magically worked and set perfectly with no need for fancy jam sugars – apple naturally contains high levels of pectin which helps the jam to set, one less bag to find space for too!

I am really pleased with the results, the ginger is not overpowering it just complements the rhubarb flavour perfectly with a lovely sticky, thick jammy texture. Its great for crumpets and toast! It proved popular after mentioning it on facebook – my spare jars went very fast with requests for more! you will all have to wait for the next Rhubarb season I am afraid!

Ingredients:

440g rhubarb, trimmed and cut to 1cm dice

1 bramley apple, apx 230g, peeled, cored and into 1 cm dice

390g granulated sugar

260g light soft brown sugar

2 pieces stem ginger, very finely chopped

Place everything in a large, heavy based saucepan, add 2 tbsp of water to help get it started. Gently bring almost to the boil, then reduce heat slightly and simmer for about an hour until you have a sticky pan full of jam – if using a thermometer you are aiming for 105o celsius. If desired mash up the apple chunks – I used a potato masher or leave them whole depending on personal preference.

Pour into your sterilised jars. Makes 3 jar fuls. Store in a cool place and refridgerate after opening.

I am sending my lovely jam made with my bargain finds over to this months Credit Crunch munch, held by Elizabeth's Kitchen Diary created by Fuss Free Flavours and Fab Food 4 All

*I place my jars after a good soapy hot wash, in a deep roasting pan full of boiling water and cook them in a hot oven for about 20 minutes, then very carefully wearing gloves turn onto clean kitchen paper to drain. Remember to remove any rubber rings first too- they are not too keen on ovens*

Rum baked Peaches with Chocolate Coconut Ice cream for We Should Cocoa

Sometimes I have too much time on my hands. Okay this is rare admittedly but the old brain goes wandering, normally in the middle of doing something else and it resulted in some random googling on my phone in the kitchen (our signal booster box is worth its hassle getting it!), whilst making dinner and the outcome was a tub of chocolate coconut ice cream! I am not entirely sure what provoked me that evening other than this unrelenting heatwave that's slowly cooking me through but it was a good provocation!

Back tracking a little, with regards to one of the recipe components a few months back I posted up an article for Good Housekeeping on creating an alternative dairy and gluten free pudding, in the form of my lush Sticky ginger and Almond rice pudding. As part of its development I had received a box full of free from items, and one of those items was a hot chocolate syrup called Choc Shot…which became the chocolate part of this recipe as it was, well, er easier! *blushing with shame* It also has only 14 calories per teaspoon, 100% natural and low GI and diabetic friendly so you can really tell yourself its a healthy ice cream treat!  

Anyway, despite the heatwave it resulted in me playing around in the kitchen the other night and I decided to make a batch of coconut milk ice cream, using the syrup as a chocolate flavouring, along with some forgotten about meringue nests, after coming up with the idea of some kind of semi-freddo dessert… I managed three lots of hand churning but eventually fell asleep despite the best intentions of some inconsiderate neighbour's doing their best to keep the block awake with their incessant shouting, shrill laughter and loud music, so the next day I had to let it thaw a little for some more half hourly beatings... I think it still needs a teeny bit of work texture wise as its frankly a bugger to scoop out but it worked so well with the baked peaches and so I have forgiven it!

Next on to the baked peach part - Ohmigod where has u been all my life! I took inspiration for this quick pudding from the recent Waitrose magazine, though I pretty much exchanged all the ingredients apart from the peaches as to what we had in the cupboards! Fortunately it still was fabulous and even called for my wicked auntie to comment that I really should be the size of a barrel after sharing pictures on my facebook page! It is fruit mostly...! The sweet soft peach flesh, combined with crunchy sweet biscuit and hint of spiced vanilla rum is a heady concoction and one i feel might just become a regular dish in my kitchen!

Coconut and Chocolate Icecream

1 tin full fat coconut milk, good quality.

8 tsp chocolate syrup

3 meringue nests - not essential - mine dissolved mostly!

Place the coconut milk in a blender and blitz until smooth. Combine the syrup and crumble over the meringue nests, turn into a suitable container for freezing.

Every 30 minutes, take a whisk or fork to the mixture breaking up any ice crystals for about 4-5 times. Ta da!

Rum baked Peaches

These are so quick and easy, and entirely worth making!

2 peaches, halved

2 digestive biscuits, crushed

1 tbsp golden granulated sugar

1 heaped tsp butter

2 tbsp spiced rum

Crush the biscuits in a small bowl or pestle & mortar. 

Then add the sugar and rub through the butter – best to cut into little pieces, until you have a crumble mix of sorts. 

Spoon into the peaches and place on a lined baking tin. Drizzle over the rum and bake for 15 mins @ 180o and serve warm, with the ice cream.

I am sending my lovely pretend its healthy treat to this months We Should Cocoa, held by the lovely Elizabeth's Kitchen Diary

Soured Cream Bundt cake with Butter Glaze

Oh oh oh sweet dreams are made of these.. and who am I to disagree!! Not meeeee! I didn't find anyone either who disagreed! This is not my own original bake - apart from adding the sugar confetti its entirely borrowed from a BBC Good Food recipe. 

This cake was one of those that you make purely out of using up things, in this case a tub of sour cream but are not really sure if you would like it – I must admit the whole soured cream cake thing didn’t exactly get me salivating but I am a changed woman – this cake is so gorgeously vanilla laced with a sweet glaze heaven and it was that good despite making it on Wednesday I just had to make another one on the Saturday to satisfy our cravings! Its like floating on a sweet scented vanilla cloud and one you will want to repeat.

My neighbour and friend C was a gem and I must give her thanks here – my oven, is well temperamental, and she let me use hers even though it was 9.40pm on a weeknight! I did chance it and made the second one in my oven – with the assistance of the oven thermometer – our oven only seems to reach a magical figure of 170o at the most – even if it says you have put in on 210o and my housing landlord think the oven works the engineer said ‘because the elements come on’ and not even bribery with cake will budge them. Sad days. Anyhow it did fortunately work so it’s a well tested cake – both for fast fan assisted and slow ancient think about it later ovens!

The recipe calls for a 6 cup bundt pan. I have no idea what size my bundt tin is, just remember than it came from Ikea years ago and converts between a bundt and large cake tin, I think it’s a little bigger than theirs but it still fortunately worked!

I must admit that in the past I have been a little put off using the bundt tin, purely as trying to remove the cooked product has resulted in breakages and tears however I have a trick up my flour coated sleeves – Dr Oetker’s Cake Release spray I was sent to try. Okay I did break the first batch very slightly as it came out with so much ease it took me by surprise but the 2^nd batch I was more cautious and it worked a treat!

Ingredients:

125g softened butter

180g caster sugar

2 large eggs, beaten

180g plain flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp vanilla extract

150g sour cream

Pinch salt

Glaze:

100g caster sugar

50g butter

4tbsp water

¼ tsp vanilla extract

Optional – sprinkles of choice. I adore these sugar confetti and used in both of my bakes!

Method:

Cream together the butter and sugar, until light and fluffy. Your mixer will do the hard work for you.

Add a little of the egg at a time until its all combined along with the vanilla.

Sift together the flour, baking powder and mix half of it into the cake batter, along with half the sour cream until combined. Add the remaining flour mix and sour cream and beat well until all nicely combined. 

Spoon into your prepared pan and bake for 30-40 minutes or until golden, risen and a skewer comes away cleanly. Cool for at least 5 minutes before carefully upturning onto a cooling rack and allowing to cool fully before glazing.

Place the glaze ingredients into a small saucepan, bring to the boil and simmer for about 3-4 minutes until it is starting to reduce and thicken. Allow to cool for a couple of minutes before paining or spooning over the cake. Allow the first layer to set slightly before repeating with the remaining mixture.

Allow your glazed cake to set for a good few hours - overnight is best if you can resist its lure that long.

 Many thanks to Lucy at Citizen & Dr Oetker for the Cake Release sample!

Pecan and Ginger Fudge

This hideously nice but naughty recipe finally gave me a chance to use my long forgotten sugar thermometer. I bought it on the internet, some 5 years or so ago after deciding on a whim to make coconut ice however I just never got around to making said coconut ice.. it just goes to show those simplifying perfectionist websites who say clear stuff out after a year were lying, hoarding is just fine by me. This recipe is also a prime example of if you fail, you just dust yourself off and try again. A good life lesson too...

I do now have yet another 'tester' in the form of my brothers flatmate who has willingly pledged to try any more fudge varieties I might care to make...as you can see from this plate there was not much left after I had taken a batch of this Pecan and Ginger Fudge to his house, still warm in the baking tray in order to give my dad a bagful for Fathers Day! One happy dad too!

Recently I've switched to working a regular hour job and now have weekends.. at least for now anyway... Something strange and a novelty after 5 years of shift work and find myself now alone most weekends in the kitchen.. its proving dangerous for my waistline! Anyway for some reason I was sitting around googling random stuff on Saturday afternoon and remembered I had bought some crystalised ginger a few weeks to make a cake recipe I have culled from a magazine, and dug it out... however it was from our upstairs larder/ hall cupboard/ storage room and right next to it by chance was a tin of condensed milk I had bought on a whim, and at that moment it screamed fudge to me.... Though after checking online it turns out I was thinking of Nigella’s chocolate fudge but I had just used nearly all my chocolate supplies in making Rocky Road (to follow!) and needed another option and stumbled across Carnations website, admittedly my tin was not Carnation branded but they did have a promising sounding fudge recipe on their site, and I had nothing better to do and decided to make my first batch!

Oh my, arm strength is good here. Not something I have or will ever achieve. My first batch without the thermometer was not quite thick enough and I had to reboil it later for which I made my boyfriend do! He was quite fascinated how the texture changed during cooking and I think it made him appreciate the workings of the kitchen a little bit more! The optimum temperature was above 118o Celsius for the record however on the successful batch I waited till 120o to be certain!

The flavour combination of Pecan and Ginger came about as whilst I didn’t end up using the crystalised ginger, I opted for stem ginger instead to make a bit more punchy! And as regulars know by now I love pecans soo much!! For my first ever batch I am super chuffed with the final result! Crunchy sweet pecans, fragrant ginger to just hum and not overwhelm the fudge flavour -  it was a real winner! Though just next time I might not just reboil it and have to make brownies with it instead, which was suggested for fudge that doesn't set! Yum!

Now it depends what size bits of fudge you want but I used a traybake tin and the fudge was just under a centimetre in height. Prepare your tin by dotting a little oil or butter and lining fully with baking paper. It will cut maybe about 60 little pieces. Which vanish very fast. Sad times is the empty tupperware last night. I think we are both fridge pickers (and as the saying goes fridge pickers wear bigger knickers!!)

Ingredients:

1 tin sweetened condensed milk (397g)

150ml milk

400g Demerara sugar

115g unsalted butter

16 pecan nuts

2 balls stem ginger

1 tbsp stem ginger syrup

Method:

In a heavy based saucepan heat the butter, sugar, milks and gently bring to the boil, keep stirring (a silicon spoon is fab here!) and on a gentle boil keep on stirring until *very* thick, about 15 minutes, then remove from the heat onto a cool surface and carry on beating until its quite actually hard to beat any further and its kinda solid but just about pourable – my temperature was at 120o Celsius. 

Transfer into the baking tin quickly and smooth over. Allow to cool fully in the tin before slicing into desired shapes. Then tie hands behind back to prevent further testing.

Notes: If like mine first time it  was still to soft, re-boil with 2 tbsp of evaporated milk and use a thermometer. My ‘soft ball’ stage was a complete fail! I ended up with lots of glasses filled with sweet water.

Warning: hot sugar fudge mix is very, very hot! Do not attempt any licking of fingers here!

And oh how we loved this fudge! Crumbly a little, sweet enough to be magical and the little pecan bursts with sweet ginger pockets was quite, well er heavenly!