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Chocolate & Pale Ale cake!

Light moist chocolatey cake-yum! The recipe is simple and the icing absolutely spectacular!

Ingredients:

Cake:

300ml pale ale

75g cocoa powder

270g plain flour

1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1 1/2 teaspoons bicarbonate of soda

165g unsalted butter

400g DARK soft brown sugar

3 eggs

Icing:

75g unsalted butter

3 tablespoons of ale

2 tablespoons of milk

175g dark chocolate

170g icing sugar

Method:

Preheat the oven to 180C.

Cream the butter and sugar.

Add the rest of the ingredients to the butter and sugar in a food processor and blend.

Pour the mixture into 2 greased cake tins (23 cm) evenly, and cook in the preheated oven for 30 minutes, or until it has shrunk from the sides of the tin and is springy to touch.

Take the cake out of the oven and let it stay in the tin for 5 minutes before turning onto a wire rack to cool completely.

Beat the butter and sugar together until a butter icing is made.

In a bain marie melt the chocolate.

When completely melted, take the chocolate out of the bain marie and add the butter icing and all of the liquid.

Fold the mixture until you get a smooth consistency.

Spread over the cooled cake.

Leave the icing to firm up before you eat the cake (I know this will be hard!)

Enjoy!

Variations:

Use beer or stout for a richer, heavier and more decadent cake.

Bechamel fish + mash + sautéed courgettes

This dish is a delicious quick supper. Just remember to take the fish out of the freezer at least 6 hours prior to serving.

You will need:
4 large potatoes (perhaps Maris Piper- light and fluffy)
4 frozen fish
anchovies (the kind you buy from the deli)
roasted peppers and roasted garlic cloves
a jar of bechamel sauce (you can make your own, but remember this was first made on a Wednesday night at 8 o'clock!)
2 courgettes
2 knobs of butter
dash of cream
capers
pepper (as in salt and pepper)

30 minutes
preheat the oven to 180C
put the defrosted fish in a baking tray and season with pepper.
cover with the anchovies, capers, roasted peppers and garlic cloves.
cover the fish with bechamel sauce.
peel the potatoes and cut into relatively small chunks.
rinse the potatoes to get rid of the excess starch.
put the potatoes in a pot, cover with water and put on the hob to boil.
put the fish in the oven.

10 minutes
put a pan on medium heat.
chop the courgettes with a diagonal slant (this will enable the courgette to take in more heat)
put a knob of butter in the pan with a little groundnut oil.
when the butter has melted and combined with the oil, add the courgettes, flipping them every 2 and a half minutes.
drain the potatoes and mash.
add the other knob of butter and a dash of cream and some pepper to the mash and mash.

0 minutes
SERVE!


Notes:
The capers and anchovies contain a lot of salt, so this is why I haven't put in any additional salt in the recipe.

Coffee and walnut loaf cake

Simple yet yummy cake! This can easily not be a loaf cake, just cook it in a cylindrical tin.

Ingredients:

250g self raising flour

250g soft brown sugar

225g soft unsalted butter

4 eggs

40ml very concentrated espresso coffee (about 1tsp ground espresso)

20ml whiskey - optional

handful of roughly chopped walnuts

250g icing sugar

25g soft unsalted butter

175g cream cheese

How to make:

Preheat the oven to 180C and grease a (loaf) tin.

Beat the butter and sugar until creamy, like a butter icing.

Add the eggs one at a time whilst constantly beating.

Pour in the coffee and whiskey and mix.

Fold in the flour and make sure the mixture is combined.

Add the walnuts and give a quick stir.

Pour the mixture in the tin and cook in the oven for at least 40 minutes.

When the cake mixture is cooked, turn out on a wire rack so that the air can get to it and the cake can cool down.

Beat the unsalted butter and cream cheese into a smooth paste.

Add the espresso mixture and icing sugar and beat until there are NO lumps.

Spread evenly/drizzle the mixture over the cake.

The cake will keep in an airtight container for 3-5 days. Well it might be gone before it reaches anywhere near three days...

Notes:

If the butter is not soft, put it in the oven for 10-30 seconds, depending on how big the butter pieces are. REMEMBER, you don't want to melt the butter, just soften it.

Take the eggs out at leat 30 minutes prior to using so that the mixture doesn't curdle.

If you stick a fork into the sponge and it comes out clean or with a few crumbs, the cake is cooked.

Bread and butter pudding

Our bread and butter puddings

Bread and butter pudding is a traditional British dessert that I have been keen to try for a while after being told it was not soggy bread as I had assumed.

Ingredients:

A loaf of sliced plain white bread

Butter (I would use unsalted unless making a caramel sea salt flavour or chocolate and salt bread and butter pudding)

Raisins

Cherries soaked in kirsch

5 eggs

200ml of milk (plus more if needed)

a tablespoon of soft brown sugar, or caster sugar

How to make:

Preheat the oven to 180C.

Grease an ovenproof bowl or baking tray with butter.

Generously butter the bread and begin to tile around your baking dish. After you have done one layer, sprinkle on some raisins and some cherries.

Repeat this until you have filled up the dish.

Whisk the eggs and milk together until one liquid.

Pour the liquid evenly over the bread. If you don't have enough make and add more egg/milk mixture.

Squash down the bread with a spoon to compress it.

Cook in the oven for 30-40 minutes, or until the crust in brown and hardened.

Eat 5 minutes after it has come out of the oven.

Bread and butter pudding is also nice for breakfast straight from the fridge.

Remember there's barely any sugar, and there is fruit in it (-and unless you alter it, NO cream!)

Variations:

Replace some of the milk with cream, yoghurt or creme fraiche.

Add chocolate chips to the pudding before you cook it.

Bruschetta

For me, baguette is the best bread to use.

In a hot oven (about 180C) put in some sliced bread.
Meanwhile, chop up cherry tomatoes and season with salt and pepper.
When the bread has been nicely toasted/ crusty on top (normally about 5 minutes), rub garlic on them. By rubbing garlic on them, the garlic infuses the bread without being overpowering.
Drizzle olive oil over the bread, and top with the tomato salsa.


Variations/ additions
Just top the bread with whatever you like, but a few suggestions are:
Chorizo, shallots (finely sliced), buffalo mozzarella, fresh basil pesto.

Notes
This dish is really light, so perfect for a starter or light lunch. It's healthy and can be altered to many different tastes.

Azuki bean paste

What is it?
Azuki bean paste is more commonly known as red bean paste. It originated in China and is mostly used in South East Asian cooking (Chinese, Japanese and Korean). The beans are dark red.

What does it taste like?
Sweet but bland. Just like mashed red beans...

How do I make it?
Boil the red (azuki) beans and mash. To sweeten the taste (which the Japanese do because they tend to use the paste for sweet things,) you add either sugar or honey.

Anything I should know?
For a smoother taste, you should push the paste through a sieve just as you might push a raspberry coulis through a sieve to remove the seeds. Sieving the Azuki beans removes their husks.


Daifuku is my absolutely FAVOURITE Japanese dessert, I strongly recommend trying them!

Daifuku is also known as daifukumochi and translates as great luck. It is a 'glutinous' rice cake filled with the red bean paste.

Here is a recipe for Daifuku:
http://japanesefood.about.com/od/japanesedessertsweet/r/daifuku.htm

Beef Rogan Josh

Ingredients:

beef (I used stewing, but casserole is probably best)

3 tsp cumin seeds

1 tsp chilli flakes (add more depending on your taste)

1 tsp ground ginger

1 tsp ground cinammon

1 medium tomato (about half the size of your palm), chopped

4 tbsp vegetable oil

6-8 cloves of garlic, chopped

1 red onion, chopped

1 tsp paprika

1/2 tsp salt

10 cardamom pods

150ml orangle juice

400ml water

How to make:

In a food processor, blitz the tomato, cumin, chilli, ginger, cinammon, garlic, salt and onion to a paste.

In a deep saucepan pour in the vegetable oil.

Whilst the oil is heating up, cut the beef into bitesize chunks, and lightly crush the cardamom pods.

Put the cardamom and beef into the pan and wait for the beef to brown.

When the beef has browned, add in the spice paste you made.

Constantly the beef and paste around the saucepan for 5 minutes.

After 5 minutes, add in the orange juice and 150ml of water.

Cover the saucepan with a lid and leave to simmer for an hour.

Every 10 minutes, stir the curry, and if the sauce has reduced to much, add some of the remaining (250ml) water.

The beef should be tender when it has simmered for an hour on the hob. If it is not tender after and hour, give it an extra 15 minutes, but no more.

Serve with rice or naan (or in my case, Yorkshire puddings...)

Variations:

Use lamb (which is the traditional meat used).

Replace the water and orange juice with beer for a more filling taste.

Notes:

I used this recipe as a guideline http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/simplelambroganjosh_67784

Flapjacks

Ingredients:
450g my muesli mix (oats, raisins, nuts)
40g dried fruits - optional
200g unsalted butter
200g soft brown sugar
200g honey

How to make:
Preheat the oven to 180C.
Melt the honey, butter and sugar in a pan over a medium heat until it has become one joint liquid and all the sugar has dissolved.
Add all the rest of the ingredients into the pan and mix.
Pour the mixture into a lined baking tray and put in the oven for 20 minutes.
When you take it out of the oven, cool in the tin and then cut into pieces.

This is the healthiest I can make it... If you want a good indulgent one, use 400g rolled oats, 150g unsalted butter, 50g salted butter, 200g caster/muscovado sugar, 200g golden syrup and follow the same instructions as above.
Dip the flapjacks into yoghurt (healthy) or chocolate (not healthy).
However, if you don't like my recipe, this website is absolutely foolproof. http://duramecho.com/Food/Flapjack/ The only change to it that I would make would be to use 100% rolled oats as they give a much better flavour and texture.

5 minute champagne breakfast!

You will need:
2 eggs
pepper (as in pepper and salt)
salt
smoked salmon
a bottle of champagne
2 oranges

5 minutes:
put the champagne in the fridge
crack the eggs in a cup and beat furiously whilst adding pepper and salt to season
put the pan on the hob with a bit of butter and heat

4 minutes:
juice the oranges

3 minutes:
pour the egg into the pan
get the smoked salmon out of the fridge
stir the egg around the pan

2 minutes:
you can either chop up the salmon and add to the scrambled egg in the pan, or you can serve it on the side of your plate. I f you put the salmon into the egg, do it now!
stir the egg
open the champagne

1 minute:
pour the champagne into a glass and pour orange juice into it
put your egg (and smoked salmon onto a plate)

0 minute:
EAT



Variations:
You can always leave out the juice or replace with a different juice- pineapple juice is especially tasty with it!
Replace smoked salmon with ham or bacon.

Muesli

My first (and quite possibly the only) healthy recipe of 2012.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!


Ingredients
500g large rolled oats
200g raisins
100g toasted hazlenuts
100g flaked almonds

Recipe
Put all the ingredients into a box and shake.


This is only a basic recipe, so you can add whatever you like.

Variations
This muesli can be used as the base for a cheesecake (if you add a little melted butter).
With a little less raisins, you can use this with a mixture of breadcrumbs for the outside of a fish cake!

Chocolate Fudging Pudding

My chocolate pudding.

This recipe is based on the 'Chocolate Fudge Hot-Pot Pudding' from The Great Briish Bake Off- How to bake by Linda Collister. I have tweaked it and made it my own. Kind of.

This recipe serves 9.

Ingredients:

The Sponge

190g softened unsalted butter

190g caster sugar

1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

6 eggs

110g self-raising flour

6 tablespoons of cocoa powder

75g chocolate (the higher the percentage of cocoa solid in it, the better)

the zest of one orange

1 teaspoon ground ginger

1 teaspoon of cayenne

8 tablespoons of milk

1 glug of whisky (1 capful/ 2tbsps)

The Sauce

190g soft brown sugar

450ml boiling water

6 tablespoons of cocoa powder

Method:

Beat the butter until creamy, then add the caster sugar and vanilla extract whilst still beating.

Stop beating the mixture when the mixture appears pale and fluffy (like buttercream).

Crack the eggs into the mixture and whisk.

Add the milk, ginger, cayenne and orange zest into the mixture.

Sift the flour and cocoa powder into the mixture and fold it all in together.

Pour the mixture into a greased dish.

Add boiling water to the soft brown sugar and cocoa powder and mix until it is all dissolved.

Pour the liquid on top of the cake mixture evenly.

Chop the chocolate very finely and sprinkle over the mixture.

Put the mixture into the fridge to chill and preheat the oven to 180C.

Once the mixture has chilled foe 30 minutes, put into the preheated oven and cook for 30 minutes, or until the sponge springs back when you touch it, and the sauce bubbles.

Variations:

I thought this seasoning was suitably festive as the raw mixture especially smelt and tasted like a Terry's chocolate orange.

If you're planning to serve it mostly to children, I would suggest pushing marshmallows into the mixture along with white chocolate. The marshmallows will turn gooey and the chocolate will melt and give a nice contrast of colour.

Maybe use a couple less eggs as it is prone to give an eggs taste and appearance.

I am aware it all looks highly unappetising so I would suggest serving it in individual pots.

Festive spirit

Roast chickens topped with gingerbread stars

Chocolate molleux, walnut brittle, raspberry sorbet and chantilly

Chocolate molleux, walnut brittle, raspberry sorbet and chantilly

Chocolate molleux

200g dark chocolate

200g white chocolate (and a few extra pieces for gooey bits in the middle)

8 eggs

100g plain flour

300g unsalted butter

200g icing sugar

Preheat the oven to 200C and grease a tin or several ramekins.

Melt the chocolate and butter over a bain marie.

In another bowl, whisk the eggs, sugar and flour together.

When the chocolate and butter has melted, pour it into the egg-sugar-flour mix.

Whisk it together until thoroughly mixed.

Pour the mixture into the case and dot in some white chocolate pieces into the batter.

Either cook immediately, or put into the fridge until time to be used.

Cook the molleux in the preheated oven for 10 minutes or until the mixture has risen a few centimetres.

Serve hot or cold, it still tastes delicious!

If you serve straight out of the oven, this is the time when it is gooiest (gooyest?gooiyest?HELP!)

Walnut brittle

Walnut brittle is best made a few hours in advance - preferably left to set overnight- or it will turn out liquidy like mine..

120g caster sugar

30 ml water

100g walnuts

Cover a baking tray with greaseproof paper.

Melt the sugar and water over a medium heat in a saucepan.

When all the sugar has dissolved and you have a light golden syrup, set it aside in another container to cool.

Toast (not burn) the walnuts in a pan with NO oil or butter. You do not need any excess flavour, and the walnuts already contain oil.

Blitz the walnuts into a chunky powder (a bit like crumble with different sizes).

When the syrup and walnuts have considerably cooled down, mix them together and pour into the lined baking tray.

Tilt the tray to spread the mixture as thinly as possible.

Leave the walnut mixture to dry out in order to turn into walnut brittle.

When serving the walnut brittle, gently break it into shards and serve as an accompaniment to a main dessert (such as a chocolate molleux).

Tip: put hot soapy water into the saucepan as soon as you have finished with it, otherwise the syrup will be a demon to get out because it sets.

Raspberry sorbet

MAKE SEVERAL HOURS IN ADVANCE in order for the sorbet to freeze!

500g raspberries (fresh or frozen)- I use frozen as they tend to be cheaper than fresh yet all the flavour has been retained)

citrus juice (most recipes say lemon juice, but I think orange juice works well with raspberries)

150ml water (or champagne for a twist. Depends how drunk you want to make your guests...)

100g icing sugar

Make a syrup by melting the sugar and water in a saucepan over a medium heat.

When all the sugar has dissolved, turn the heat up until the sugar solution begins to boil, and then take off the heat to cool.

In another saucepan, put in the raspberries and squeeze your lemon/orange over.

Heat the raspberries until you have a juice.

When you have your juice, push through a sieve into your syrup. It's not nice to get seeds in your teeth.

Mix together and put in the freezer.

2 or 3 hours after you have put the sorbet into the freezer, get a fork and chisel bits of it off and mash it all up.

Put the sorbet back in the freezer to set.

Chantilly

600 ml double cream

2 tbsp icing sugar (more or less to taste)

tsp vanilla extract or essence or pod (NEVER FLAVOURING!)

Whisk the cream, sugar and vanilla in a large bowl until soft peaks form.

Chill in fridge until ready to use.

Tip: chantilly is really good for using in choux and other pastries.

Soupe à l'oignon (onion soup)

French onion soup avec gruyère croutons

Ingredients

enough onions to make up 8 averaged sized onions (I used 10 red and white onions and a couple of shallots- oooh matron!)

butter

2/3 beef stock cubes to make 1.2 litres

copious amounts of DARK beer- I used 200ml - DO NOT USE STOUT!

herbs de provence

pepper salt

bay leaf- optional

baguette

about 200g gruyère cheese

Recipe

Finely slice the onions and fry in a knob of butter until browned. This can take over 30 minutes.

When the onions are nearly browned, sprinkle the herbs over the onions.

When the onions are browned, add the 1.2 litres of stock and beer to onions and simmer over a low heat for an hour. Season with pepper and salt.

About 5 minutes before you serve, slice some baguette and top with grated gruyère cheese.

Put the croutons under a preheated grill until the cheese has melted.

Serve the onion soup with a crouton or two floating on top.

Tips

You can fry the onions in oil but I would suggest you don't as it can leave unsightly globules of oil.

Be careful to not let the mixture reduce! If it does like mine did, add more water or beer.

If you use a bay leaf, put it into the soup when you are simmering the soup for an hour, and take it out prior to serving.

This recipe serves 8.

The soup keeps for about 3 days after it has been made (refridgerate if keeping for later use).

Crispy coating

Whether you're making scotch eggs, schnizel or whatever there is a basic way to do the coating.

Coat your meat/ vegetable in flour and shake off all the excess flour.
Unless you will cook straight away, don't follow the process until you are about to cook your food.
Coat your mixture in beaten egg, and then roll in breadcrumbs.
Fry or bake. If you fry, make sure the oil is really got before you use it, because you don't want your food to be soggy and to have absorbed a lot of oil.
For those of you with a lot of time/ patience/ enthusiasm (delete as appropriate) complete all the stages again, except the rolling in flour.

Season your breadcrumbs accordingly;
Lamb-Rosemary
Chicken- thyme, lemon zest
Prawns, dried chilli, dried garlic
Cauliflower- curry powder (it works really well!)

Try to use dry ingredients when seasoning as it works better.

Tip of the day

When you deep-fry something in batter, use ice-cold fizzy water to make the batter light and NOT claggy.

Pear frangipane

In my opinion, a frangipane tart is just a tart with cake mixture and a dash of fruit. I used pear as it was the only suitable fruit in my fridge, but plums, apricot, peaches, DEFINITELY cherries and most stone fruits work well. I don't think apples would work particularly well because they're best in a plain apple pie, apple crumble, or tarte tatin.

Ingredients

For the pastry

300g plain flour

150g unsalted butter (cold and diced)

125g caster sugar (recipes tend to use the same amount of butter and sugar, but you'v got a sweet filling and sweet fruit so i don't think it's necessary)

water

For the frangipane

4 eggs (make sure they have been left out at room temperature for at least 30mins prior to use)

110g butter (softened!)

110g caster sugar

100g ground almonds

dash of vanilla essence-optional

dash of almond essence- optional

1 tbsp plain flour

For the topping

fruit

For the pasty:

Thoroughly mix the sugar and flour, then add the butter.

Turn the mixture into a crumble by hand, or alternatively use food processor.

Add enough water for the mixture to become a dough.

Wrap the mixture in cling film, and leave to set in the fridge whilst you make the frngipane filling

Preheat the oven to 180C.

For the frangipane filling:

Cream together the sugar and softened butter.

Add the eggs in slowly and mix. Make sure the mixture does not curdle or separate.

Add the flour and ground almond to the mixture.

Roll out the pastry and cover a tart case. Prick the bottom.

Blind bake the pastry (put greaseproof paper on the pastry, and add baking beans and rice).

Cook for 20 mins in the preheated oven.

When the pastry has been in the oven for 20mins, take it out and take off the greaseproof paper and beans.

Put the frangipane filling into the tart case, top with the fruit and leave to cook for 30mins.

This dessert is best enjoyed warm with ice-cream, or cold with a glass of liqueur which matches the fruit.

Variations

Use a mixture of ground almonds and FLAKED almonds in the frangipane filling to give texture.

Use dessicated coconut in the frangipane mixture

In the pastry use any sugar except dark brown sugar as it's not sweet enough.

bread!

Ingredients

250g bread flour/ strong flour

dash of salt

yeast

olive oil

water

This is a basic guideline for bread and it serves 8 portions or 4 generous hunks.

Method

Mix the bread flour, salt and yeast so that the dry mixture is fully combined.

Add olive oil and water until the mix becomes a dough.

I tend to use about half olive oil and half water because olive oil makes the bread moist, but too much is greasy and rich.

Leave the mixture to double in siz\e in a warm place, and then preheat the oven to 200C.

When the bread dough has risen, knead it to knock all the extra air out of it.

Place it on a baking tray in any design; I normally do it as a kind of mound.

I score the top to make the crust crusty. Adding some rock salt to the top makes a tasty addition.

If you want a glossy top, paint the top of the bread with egg.

When you put the bread in the oven, leave it on 200C for about 20 minutes, and then turn it down to about 180C. It is important for the first bit of cooking for the oven to be at a high temperature so that a nice crust forms. Then you should turn it down because you don't want to dry out the bread.

After about 40 minutes, or when the bread sounds hollow if you tap it, it is ready to come out of the oven. The bread is best eaten warm with butter generously spread on it topped with smoked ham.

There are lots of variations you can make, like adding a shot or two of whisky. The good part is that you don't have to feel guilty because the alcohol is burnt off whilst cooking.

Lemon soufflés

Me with my lemon soufflé

Am I brave or just plain foolhardy?!

At an unknown time too early on a Saturday morning (past midday) I attempted to make lemon soufflés.

I used the Mary Berry's recipe: http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/mary_berrys_lovely_lemon_73914

I had to slightly improvise on the recipe as I didn't have enough cream or a measuring jug. (This is what happens in the recession.)

They appeared to look soufflé like, but tasted slightly like lemony scrambled egg which was surprisingly edible, and dare I say,TASTY?!