I'll Be Home for Christmas

Hopefully, assuming we don't have a problem with our flight.  We are now all ready for Christmas - presents are wrapped, food for the hamper is made, Milly's rag doll is almost finished and the spare room has become cardboard box city from all the deliveries.  Must do something with those in the new year.  I'm thinking play shop.

This week we made biscotti (or sausage biscuits as miss likes to call them) and its a recipe from good food, so I'll just give you a link to that below.  We stuck almost to the recipe but I substituted cherry for cranberries, just because I like them.  We did, however, do a very very quick gift craft which makes a relatively low cost gift a little more personal.  Its another of those where you do most of the work, but such is life with kids and crafting.

Here Comes Santa Claus

You will need:

A vase big enough to put your entire hand inside
A sharpie (remember those from the labels?)
Paper and pens
Sticky tape of whichever brand you prefer

Cut your paper so its no larger than the height of your vase

Ask your child to draw whatever pictures you (or rather they) want.  Milly decided on Father Christmas, a snowman, a helicopter cat and a round Christmas tree. 

Cut out the pictures you want to put on to the vase (I decided on Father Christmas and the snowman, plus her name) and tape them on the inside.

Trace around with the sharpie.  You might need to do this a couple of times because the pen doesn't always draw that well.  I should imagine it would be better on a ceramic but then you have the faff of getting the picture on there in the first place.  Its one for us to do in future when Mill can be trusted to not draw a helicopter cat on something.

Remove the paper and allow to dry.  Jobs a good un.

I haven't tried to wash these so I have no idea if the picture is going to wash off the minute it touches water, but I don't think it really matters since they still have a vase at the end of it.

We've also been tagging and wrapping.  The bird seed feeders now look like this

Bird Seed Feeders with a touch of Christmas Sparkle

and our Christmas hampers look like this (minus the bag of biscotti)

Christmas Food Goodies

if you want a list of the recipes I've used here you go:
Spiced beetroot and orange chutney   This is lovely and can be done at last minute
Spiced plum chutney  I make this every year.  Its a bit late for it to be ready for Christmas but its still suitable for a gift with strict instructions to leave it for a few weeks.
Christmas Cake I make mine in October but there is no reason why you cant do a last minute version.

Champagne and Strawberry Jam  

This is my recipe and it makes an 8oz jar of jam .

You will need :

200g strawberries
180g jam sugar
1 large bottle of champagne (or cava)
1 lemon.
A saucer in the fridge

Chop the strawberries in to 4 and add to a pan with the sugar.  Leave for about an hour for the juices to start flowing (or don't if you're in a rush).  If you want big chunky strawberries at the end, leave overnight.

Add a squeeze of the lemon and about half a glass of champagne.  Get your saucer ready.

Heat gently to dissolve the sugar, stirring as you go, and then bring to the boil.for about 5 minutes (double check after four).  Remove from the heat and spread a little on the saucer, give it a minute and then push it about a bit.  It should be all jammy and thick and wrinkly when you push and not sloppy.  If you have slop, give it another minute or two and retest.

Allow to cool and then pour in to sterilised jam jars.

Drink the rest of the champagne to celebrate.

Christmas Biscotti / Sausage Biscuits

The biscuits are simply shortbread with 1/2 tsp of cinnamon and topped with cane sugar.

So, its been a busy old week.  There are other things I will show you in the new year but since they're gifts for people who read this blog they're staying under wraps for now.


So that just leaves me to say have a very merry Christmas and a wonderful New Year xxx

Making Christmas, making Christmas

lalala

Yes, its still October and yes, I've said the C word.  I admit that I'm a bit of a Christmas maniac - I'm the type of person to put a tree in every space of our house and I fully intend to infect the small one with this fever so by the time she is a women in her 30s she will still get excited at the first holidays are coming advert on the tv.

We've actually been quite busy crafting over the last few weeks on Christmas gifts from Milly, but nothing is finished.  This is one of those spanning lots of weeks project so you will have to come back if you want to see the final product.  Its the lord of the rings of craft projects, if you will, only with fewer potential endings and no elves.  Ok, maybe elves.

Not bread again

...said Milly when I announced we were making salt dough

1 cup flour plus some for rolling
1/2 cup warm water
1/2 cup salt
1 tbsp oil (optional - I find it makes the dough easier to work with)

to make that in to a Christmas decoration

absolutely anything to cut out a shape
absolutely anything to make impressions in the dough (optional)
a rolling pin
assorted paint (we used a metallic paint from tesco, a gold glitter paint from ELC and some white paint from asda)
a decision on how to hang it and either rings or string depending on what you choose


Mix everything together and that's it really!  If its too dry shove in some more water, too wet add flour.  

We decided to make some impressions in the dough using some snowflake cutters I had for last years Christmas cakes and then cut out shapes with cookie cutters, but you could use just about anything really - finger print impressions and a circle cut using an egg cup would be great.

Once cut decide how you're going to hang them.  We're trying a combination of ribbons which require cuts in the shape, string requiring a hole (I used a cocktail stick to form this), and rings which I will buy at some point in the next couple of days and glue in place.  We had rather a lot of dough left at the end of our cutting so we made little beads too so miss can have a princess necklace.  Not sure Kate would wear a salt dough necklace but you never know.

There are lots of cooking instructions on the web for salt dough.  I normally bake mine at 100 degrees for 3 hours (or until they are firm but not coloured in any way) but I wanted to try the microwave method.  For this you apparently simply place in the microwave for 1 - 2 minutes and bing they're done. Unfortunately I bing almost set my microwave on fire and bing made my kitchen smell of bonfires.   If you know how to do this without causing a major crisis then go for it.

Once cooked and cooled, its time to paint, and that's what today's activity was for us

Witch costume also optional

Next I will varnish them and then we will put them all together and attach them to the labels we've made (instructions coming soon).  But that's an activity for another day!  One without witches I imagine.

When rhyming goes wrong

Milly loves rhyming and will happily sing song her way through bizarre combinations of words, birds, sirds, flubberlerds.  Many make absolutely no sense but its cute to listen to, until it goes very wrong and then you have to not react to luck, suck, duck f... you see where I'm going with this.

So today we're making food that has no rhyming risk factor.  I have a feeling this may become a theme over the next few weeks, or until the next phase hits.  Please dont let it be a reoccurance of "where do babies come from?".

Nice Ice Rice Flice Buns Huns Suns Guluns

1 batch of basic bread mixture recipe here 
75g sugar
1 egg

Icing sugar
Food colouring
Assorted sprinkly goodies.

Extra flour for rolling.
Vegetable oil to prevent the bread sticking


Make up the basic bread mix with the sugar and egg added.  Alternatively take any white bread mix / recipe and add the sugar and egg, leave to prove in an oiled bowl for 30 minutes.

Remove the dough and smack around a bit.  Make tthhhhhssssss noises at the same time.

Divide in half, and then divide each half in to 5.  Hand over to your miniture person and have them split each portion in half and form a ball shape.  Dont expect equal quantities but its nice for them to learn the concept of half and double.  Roll each ball in to a sort-of-sausage.  Its much easier for them to roll the dough (which is rather sticky) if you get them to flour their hands slightly before you start.

Milly demonstrates a dough sausage

Add each sausage to an oiled tray, cover with oiled clingfilm and leave in a warm place to double in size before baking in my oven at 170 degrees for 10 minutes.  Keep an eye on them - they do cook quickly so can turn just as fast.

Remove and allow to cool completely.  Open every door and window in your house so everyone gets a chance to smell freshly baked bread.  Pat yourself on the back for making the neighbourhood jealous.

Make some thick icing for the top - we went for tiffany blue and bubblegum pink (see, I can be foody when I want to be).  Pour on to a side plate and press each bun in to the icing.  Top with funky sprinkles and shove in the fridge to allow the icing to set.  Eat the left overs.

Scoff, cough, loff, bo....maybe not.

You have to ask the right questions.

Question : Would you like to make pastry Milly? 
Answer : In a minute.

This is basically how the first hour of our morning went.  Honestly it was my fault because at some point in time I asked if she wanted the Disney channel on and Jake and the Neverland Pirates is always going to superior to anything I say. I turn in to an adult from those Charlie Brown and Snoopy cartoons as far as the small one is concerned.   I thought I made perfect sense but her toddler ears were hearing whaaaa whaaa whaaa.  So a change of tact was required and instead it became:

Question :  Would you like to make pastry, then we can put it in the fridge to go cold enough for you to roll out and cut in to shapes?
Milly translation : whaaaawhaaaa whaaaa roll whhaaaawahhhaaaaa cut out  whaa

but I used enough child friendly words in my overly long question to break through the power of the cartoon and away we went.

Whhaaaa whaaaa apple pie

 For the shortcrust pastry

100g plain flour
50g softened butter (it really does need to be butter, so set a reminder to leave it out)
20g icing sugar
1 egg

For the filling

2 - 3 medium eating apples
2 tbsp sugar plus extra for sprinkling over the top
1 tsp vanilla extract
Rind and juice of 1/2 orange


To make the pastry sift the flour and sugar together, add in the butter and get your hands in there!  Rub the butter and flour between your fingers until it looks like squashy sand which smells nice.

Add roughly half the egg and bring the pastry together with your hands.  Wrap in clingfilm and bung in the fridge for half an hour.

Watch an episode of Jake and the Neverland Pirates.  By the end of that it should be time to...

...finely chop the apples and place in a bowl.  We didn't cook these, mainly because I prefer the texture of whole chunks of apple rather than apple puree, so they need to be pretty small.  If you want to cook the apples, then chop whatever size you want and cook with the orange juice and vanilla.

Add the rest of the ingredients, stir well and put to one side.

By this time your pastry should be nicely chilled so remove from the fridge, flour your surface and hand over to your small person to have fun with a rolling pin and assorted cutters.  

Once you've finished the rolling stage give the apples another stir.  There is going to be a lot of liquid at the bottom of the bowl so drain some off if you have a dive in there toddler who doesn't care about soggy bottoms.

We decided we were going to make decorated free form pies simply because they're easy to do.  Whatever you choose, cut your pastry to suit the case and fill with the apple mix.  Top and brush with the remaining egg.  Sprinkle on the sugar (or sugar and a touch of cinnamon) and bake for 20 - 25 minutes at 160 degrees in my oven, or until golden brown.

To make free form pies just cut the pastry to size for your toddler once they've finished rolling and they can do the rest.   Under 2's will need a little more guidance but its still a great one for them to assert a little independence in the kitchen.  Push the pastry in to the case, slightly over fill and then push the pastry back over the filling.  Decorate with pastry shapes.

With the remaining pastry Milly made an apple tart for Areal who, being a mermaid princess, prefers them to pies.  She also has a fondness for toffee ice cream.

I could cook apple pies all day every day.  Its one of the first things that I was taught to cook as a child by my grandmother.  One day I might make a pie that tastes as good as hers.

Party planning

The small ones birthday is rapidly approaching and so its time to try out some new ideas and recipes.  I asked some friends for their tried and tested cream free cakes and got this recipe : Easy chocolate cake from the bbc (thanks Mel).  They're right, its easy.  I halved all of the quantities and used less water, but this is simple enough that a child can run solo until the boiling water point.  Once cooked and cooled slightly, I filled them with peanut butter. 

So that's the birthday cake sorted but I also wanted to add in a savoury recipe.  I'm on a bread free diet at the moment so I thought I'd torture myself a little.

When is a pizza not a pizza?

I googled that question and there appear to be lots of answers involving Nepal and a handful of restaurants.  That is not where we're going with this recipe.

1 batch of basic bread maker dough (or bread dough of your choice) * see below
1/4 jar pesto
1/2 ball mozzarella
1 cooked chicken breast
2 tbsp chopped green olives
Black pepper

Prepare your dough.  Once risen turn out and roll in to a rough rectangle, about the size of a standard oven tray.

Spread the pesto over the dough and dot the other toppings over.   Try to keep any thicker toppings in line with the longest edge.

Roll from the longest edge, flour your knife and cut in to one inch thick rounds.  These aren't going to be perfect because of the size of the toppings so squish them about a bit.  Add to an oiled tray, pushing each slice against the last, and leave somewhere warm to rise for 30 - 45 minutes.  They should be the size of the tray 

Bake for 20 minutes or until golden brown.

Tear and share, as the law of these thing go

I think we're going to try the next ones with a rosemary and tomato sauce, goats cheese and black olive and a pepperoni and mozzarella.  Basically if you can imagine it on a pizza, you can shove it in this bread.

Daddy Dough

Mr Geek has been baking bread for close to 2 years now and is a bit of an expert in my opinion.  This is his basic machine dough that will make a medium / large loaf, 8 - 10 rolls or a tear and share pizza bread.

1 1/8 cup tepid water
3 cups strong white flour
1 tbsp oil (he uses vegetable)
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tbsp caster sugar
2 tsp dried active yeast

Bung the lot in the machine, select the dough option and away you go.  If you're putting it on the timer, add the wet ingredients in first, followed by the flour, salt and sugar and finally add the yeast.

Holla!!!

Our voyage on the savoury sea hit a Disney princess shaped iceberg this week.  Tangled ever after was on tv and this will always be better than baking as far as Milly is concerned, so we waited for that to be over.  Then there was some sort of Disney princess special on with women in very large dresses and wigs and even the promise of plaiting bread couldn't tempt her in to the kitchen, so today I ran solo.  I'm adding the recipe anyway because it is something a toddler can do, just not one with a princess obsession.

I decided to make challah bread as a nod to my years being educated in a Jewish school.  It was always one of my favourites and something I used to make rather a lot.   There are lots of variations out there that use different quantities of sugar or honey but this is one I like.  Feel free to remove the fruit if you're not a fan.

Time to get plaiting

You will need:

750g strong white flour

4 tbsp vegetable oil

1 tbsp dry yeast

200ml boiling water

100ml cold water

4 tbsp sugar

1/2 tbsp salt

75g mixed dried fruit (I used raisins, currents and cranberries)

3 eggs

for the topping

1 egg

sesame or poppy seeds

Dissolve the yeast, sugar and salt in the water and add the oil.  Leave for 5 - 10 minutes until the yeast starts to foam slightly.

Add in the eggs one at a time and mix well.  I use a hand mixer for this but you can do it by hand if you want.

Mix in around 3/4 of the flour and combine well.  It should be sticky and stringy at this point.  I gave up with the mixer around half way through the flour because it starts to travel up and makes a mess, so it was hands in at that point.

Turn out on to a floured surface.  Add in the rest of the flour and knead for a good 10 minutes.  Place in an oiled bowl, cover with cling film and leave in a warm place for an hour.  Since we own a new fangled eco style house which contains the worlds largest heat recovery system in the airing cupboard I stick my bread in to the top of our double oven with the bottom turned on to its lowest setting.

After an hour turn out again and punch it about a bit.  If you're doing this with your children then you can complete the next stage if you want but you will get a better bread if you leave it to prove for another 30 - 40 minutes or so if you can.

Turn the bread out again and flatten slightly.  Pour the fruit in to the middle and fold back on itself.   Do not over knead at this point.  If you want to do half without the fruit then split first and use less fruit.

Split the dough in two and plait in any way you wish.  I went for a simple three strand which is suitable for a toddler to do and slightly more complex 6 strand option which isn't unless they're in mensa.  There are lots of tutorials on the net for doing this if you have done it before.  Youtube is worth its weight in gold when it comes to bread plaiting.

Beat the remaining egg and brush over the top of the bread.  Top with sesame or poppy seeds as desired and cook for around 30 minutes at 160 degrees or until golden brown and hollow sounding if you tap the bottom.

3 and 6 strand plaited challah

Its rather nice served warm  - ideal for afternoon tea

Check out my irregular plaiting skills

One day I'll teach Milly to bake bread.  Maybe.

Slave to the Gogglebox

Last week I decided that we were going to do more savoury recipes in the coming weeks.   Hubby bakes bread and it always looks like such fun that I thought perhaps we could work up to that, starting out with a sweet bread and breaking in to savoury types later on.  So today should have been spent making cinnamon rolls, an item that not only have I never made but I've never actually tasted.  Unfortunately when I started looking around for recipes they all said things like mix together and leave for 2 years to rise.

Patience is only a virtue for those who don't work in the afternoons so I decided to use the bread maker, found a recipe to base our morning on, got the ingredients ready....and then watched the Great British Bake Off on tv and all plans went out of the window.  Savoury can wait - I wanted cake!

Actually its upside down

(said Milly to my mum)

This makes 6 small cakes.  If you want to make a large cake, double up on everything and add some extra fruit. We used a very shallow brownies tin which meant we didn't want lots of berries in there.

A good handful of berries of your choice (we used a mixture of strawberries and blueberries)

25g unsalted butter

25g light brown sugar

1 lemon

2 eggs

100g self raising flour

100g caster sugar

100g whatever fat floats your buttery boat

Chop the strawberries to blueberry sizes bits.  Milly is old enough to do this herself, which was shouted at me when I offered to help out.

Whilst your toddler is asserting their authority, melt the butter and sugar in a pan.  Remove from the heat and toss in the berries.  Shove on the side.

(Basic viccy sponge coming up).  Cream together the butter and sugar.  Add in the eggs one at a time.  Add the zest of about half of the lemon (and juice if you want - I didn't).  Add in the sifted flour.  Its an often repeated recipe on here.   Apparently it also makes the best mix to lick at the end.

Add a spoon of the berry mix to the base of each of your cases or tins.  Top with the cake mix and bake for about 20 minutes at 160 degrees.  Do remember to put a tray underneath because the fruit juices and caramel mix will probably go everywhere.  Of course I did this and wont be spending my evening cleaning the oven.  

Turn out on to a tray or plate and shove the tin in to water before everything gets sticky.   Ice the top if you want to but, in all honesty, this is a pretty ugly cake.  Tastes good though so I forgive it.  It would be gorgeous served warm with a good blob of clotted cream.

Beauty is only cake deep

and since I'd found that recipe anyway, I made the rolls

Recipe here

but I halved everything, ignored the nuts and sultanas and made a topping of icing sugar, vanilla and milk.  I also rolled from the short edge, chopped in to 8 exactly equal sections (honestly) and cooked them in a muffin tin.   If you have an under 2  give them the cinnamon sugar to sprinkle and the finished rolls to ice.

Mill ices cakes and gets the tea ready

I think that's Christmas morning breakfast sorted for this year.  They are very very yummy.

I Dont Like Cream

I sometimes wonder if Milly was switched at birth.  I can cover just about anything in cream and be a happy lady.  Soup is a bit boring, add cream.  Pasta needs a little something, add cream.  Cream cake is not quite creamy enough, add cream.  Its the greatest thing in the world.

Milly hates it.  Not just single cream either but all cream variations and anything even slightly cream-like in texture.  That's just not normal is it?

I decided we were going to play with choux pastry today but I needed something that didn't involve cream or creme anglaise.  Once again, we're experimenting in the kitchen and enjoying it.

Peanut Butter Chocolate Choux Drops

(nothing like profiteroles at all.  Honest)

75ml cold water

1 egg

30g strong white flour

1 tsp caster sugar

25g + 1 tbsp butter

4 tbsp peanut butter

100g icing sugar

Milk

50g milk chocolate

To make the pastry, heat the water together with the 25g of butter in a pan until it is just melted.  Don't let the water boil.  As soon as the butter has melted remove the pan from the heat.  At this stage you need to tip in all of the flour and sugar in to the water so its a good idea to have it all ready in a bowl or jug.  Dump it in and mix like crazy until the pastry comes away from the side of the pan.

It should look something like this

and not like this

This is what happens when you aren't paying attention to the amount of water

Beat your egg and add a little at a time, mixing well each time.  The mix should slide of a spoon but definitely should not be liquid.  I used a little over half an egg but I wanted something a little wetter than normal to give a flat based drop rather than a profiterole ball. 

Grease and dampen a sheet of greaseproof paper.  Normally I just spoon the mix on to the trays but I thought piping would be more fun so we piped little messy blobs. You can make any shape and any size you want. 

Cook for about 10 - 12 minutes at 190 degrees.

Melt the chocolate (again, I went for the microwave method) and leave to the side to cool

Whilst everything is cooling prepare the peanut butter filling.  

I was hoping to sneak in some sort of cream to this, but I didn't have any so I went with a frosting variation.  I have to admit, I'm not a big fan of the eye twitching sweetness of frosting but this is just about on the edge of my tolerance for icing sugar.  The shape and size of the drops means you aren't going to put a great amount in each one.  If you love frosting, make balls and load them up.

Mix together the peanut butter and butter until they are well combined.

Sift in the icing sugar.  You should have a granulated bowl of yack at this stage so add a little milk and keep adding until it gets to a slightly wet piping consistency.  If its too sweet to taste now, add more peanut butter.

By now the pastry drops should be cool so pipe in the peanut butter frosted and dip in the melted chocolate.  Once complete bang in the fridge to let everything set.

I also made a larger batch but I forgot to grease the paper.  Its been one of those days filled with a million things to do at the same time.  As a result, they stuck to the paper but I could peel them off and make little cups.  Waste not want not and all that, so I filled them with the frosting and chocolate.

Not quite so cute and bite sized but delicious all the same!

Its the future

The whole family was home for lunch today.  His lordship had a call to make which meant keeping the small one busy for the duration and the whole thing was a bit unexpected so I hadn't prepared a craft for us to do. 

Like many kitchen dabblers, I have a few go-to recipes that I know work and are reasonably easy to throw together.  One of mine is banana bread and I happened to have a load of over ripe bananas that needed using up.  I've been using the same recipe for years despite being tempted by talk of chocolate banana bread so today was the day I decided to mix it up a bit.  Whats the worst that can happen after all.

Of course, if it was terrible I would take all of the blame and not suggest that a 3 year old in the kitchen isn't always going to produce great food.  *ahem*

Chocolate Banana Bread - Cake Style

125g soft butter (or fat of your choice)

180g soft brown sugar

2 eggs

300g plain flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder

125 ml milk

1 tsp vanilla extract

50g chocolate (we used milk but dark would have been much nicer)

3 bananas

pinch of salt

Melt the chocolate (I did the microwave for 45 seconds method) and set aside to cool slightly.

Beat together the sugar and fat until well combined and then add the eggs, one at a time.

Combine the flour, salt and baking powder in one bowl and the milk, mashed banana and vanilla in another.  Sift in half of the flour and mix well.  Once combined add in the milk and mix again.  Add the remaining flour and mix.  This will result in a large amount of gloop so prepare for volcanic levels of overspill if you don't have a large mixing bowl.

Put approximately half of the mix in to another bowl and mix in the cocoa powder.  Resist the temptation to pour the melted chocolate straight in to your mouth and add it to the mix instead.

Spoon blobs of the chocolate and non-chocolate mix in to a prepared baking tin and marble by running a kebab stick / knife / dinosaur tail through the lot.

Lick the spoons, bowls, whisk - basically everything.  This mix is lush.

Cook for an hour in my oven at 160.

Normally we eat banana loaf warm.  This cake is much much better served cold.  

Cutting it with a butter knife will result in a messy slice of cake

Milly decided she wanted to make a round cake, so you will need to adjust this recipe if you're making a standard loaf.  I normally bake my loaf for an hour and then foil the top and continue to cook for about 20 minutes.  I also add about 25g more flour and if I made this again I'd probably bung it in.

Getting Five a Day

"Would you like to make cakes with vegetables Milly?  Does that sound like fun?".
"No".

In my head, that conversation went a lot better.  I imagined a startled response, curiosity piqued by the potential of adding something savoury to a normally sweet product.  Then I remembered that Milly is three and knows that I talk mostly nonsense.  FACT.   Still, I want to encourage her to explore food a little more so we're making vegetable based and this *will* be fun.

Mother Knows Best Vegetable Cakes

Carrot & Orange

1 large egg

90g golden caster sugar

50ml vegetable oil

100g self raising flour

1 tsp mixed spice

1 carrot

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Zest and juice of half an orange

Mix together the egg, sugar, oil and orange juice.  I gave Milly the first try at the hand blender.  Unfortunately using a blender is difficult with both hands over your ears so I did that part for her instead.

Fold in the flour, spice, grated carrot, vanilla and orange zest.  Laugh to yourself about what it would be like if you used old spice instead of mixed spice.  Wonder if this is the onset of madness.

hat optional

Divide in to 6 large muffins or mini loaf cases and bake in my oven at 160 degrees for 20 minutes.

Whilst you're waiting for these to cool, it gives you time to bake

Chocolate & Courgette

1 large egg

2 tbsp vegetable oil

75g golden caster sugar

120g self raising flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

1 1/2 tbsp unsweetened cocoa

1 courgette

handful of chocolate chips (optional)

Mix together the egg, sugar and oil in a bowl.   


Its a day of firsts and courgette is a lot soften than carrots so Milly got to grate her first vegetable.  Add to the mix and smile at how proud your child is with themselves.


Mix in the flour, cocoa, baking powder and chocolate chips if you're using them.  Doing the usual dance is also optional.


Cook as with the carrot cakes.




Once these come out of the oven you can frost (or not) the carrot cake.  We went for orange cream cheese frosting (recipe).

Carrot Cake Squares with Orange Cream Cheese Frosting.

The chocolate courgette cakes can take quite a lot of sweetness.  If anything they need it, so we went with a mixture of vanilla frosting and strawberries.  If I had it in, I would have gone with a white chocolate ganache instead.

Mini Chocolate Courgette Cakes

Humidity is rising, Barometer's getting low

No man rain to be seen though.  In fact no rain of any type which means the house is about 8 million degrees, or there abouts.  The thought of spending the morning in the kitchen with the oven on gives me the shudders.  Fortunately fathers day is coming up so with busy ourselves with other things for the majority of the day (more on that next week) but it wasn't enough to hear "can we make cakes now" on repeat, so I caved and went for an easy option and decided on shortbread.  I got as far as the kitchen before remembering this weeks scouts fail - no golden caster sugar.  I do, however, have a small mountain of brown sugar so lets give this a go...

Better than toddler meltdown shortbread

50g brown sugar

140g - ish plain flour

100g room temperature butter or margarine

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

20g chocolate chopped in to small chunks or a handful of chocolate chips.

2 tsp caster sugar

Preheat my oven to 160 degrees.

Measure out the sugar and add to a bowl.  Make the mistake of putting it in front of your child.  Remove when you hear "mmmm, this tastes nice".  Add the fat and cream well.

Add in the vanilla extract and chocolate chips and give them a good stir.

Sift in the flour.  I normally start with 100g of flour and then keep adding until I have a nice dough.  Tip the bowl and it should fall rather than stay in a sticky mess.  Never ever demonstrate it not being ready by tipping the bowl over your head.  This action will stay in toddler memory until a point in time where you are in a crowded situation - probably a wedding - and will be re-enacted with soup. 

Gently roll out the dough on a well floured surface and cut in to whatever shape you wish.  Sprinkle the last of your caster sugar over the top and bake in my oven for 15 - 20 minutes (depending on biscuit thickness).  You want them firm to the touch but only coloured on the edges.

Remove from the tray and allow to cool.

They were a lot better than I expected in all honesty.  Brown sugar can sometimes make me go cccccccchhhhhhhhhh when I taste it but I think the chocolate and vanilla helped out with that.

Of course we didn't just want to eat one on a day like this so we took two and shoved a scoop of ice cream in between them.  You could turn this in to quite a fancy pants pudding if you did delicate thin biscuits and posh ice cream.  Top with a drizzle of melted chocolate.  Yum!

Fish Pie is my FAVOURITE

When something is announced as Millys current favourite thing it generally means she wants to make it.  Of the ingredients I need to make said pie I had milk and peas so this isn't really the best start for a recipe.  She may only be 3, but I'm not getting away with milky pea pie even on my best day.  I did remember eggs at the supermarket this week though so last weeks planned Dora loaf would provide me the time I find something a food stuff that rhymed with fish.  Once again, I ignored the recipe and did my own thang.

Haven't you done this recipe before cake *

40g golden caster sugar

50g butter or margarine

75g self raising flour

1 egg

Rind of half an orange

Juice of half an orange plus 1 tsp

1 tbsp soft cheese (brand and fat content is entirely up to you)

icing sugar

Assorted decorations (again, up to you).

Preheat my oven at 160 degrees

Cream together the room temperature fat (yeah right - straight from the fridge in my case but we all know what it *should* be) and sugar.

Get a bit too confident with your child's ability to crack an egg and watch it smash against the jug.  Add 5 minutes of fish rhyming time to the bank whilst you sort out the mess.  Whisk whatever is left.

Pour the egg in to fat and sugar and mix well, adding in the rind and juice as you mix.

Sift in the flour and mix again.  Simple as anything this one.

Pour in to your mini loaf tins.  This is enough to make 2 if you fill to the top, 3 if you're a bit more conservative with your mix.  I have one tin, so we made mini fairy cakes with the rest.

Of course, lick the spoon and bowl

Cook for 20 minutes or until brown and springy to the touch.

Remove from the oven and allow to cool.

To make the orange cream cheese topping:

Mix together the soft cheese and tsp of orange juice until they are well combined and sift in the icing sugar.  How much you use is entirely a personal preference.  Obviously the more you use the thicker (and sweeter) the mix.  I rather like it so it is thick enough to hold but will still drip, so I add 75g icing sugar and then increase a tbsp at a time until I get what I want.

Decorate immediately.  I wanted to go with slices of kiwi fruit but Milly wanted chocolate.  We compromised by putting chocolate on the cake and I ate the kiwi.

* yes, its a slight variation of that victoria sponge but its a nice one.

Whilst the cake is cooling ready for its cream cheese topping, we made

Stick it all in a dish when we don't have fish pie

I know.  Terrible

70g plain flour
35g butter or margarine
Half a slice of ham
1 tbsp peas and sweetcorn
Extra mature cheddar
1 tbsp milk
Black pepper
Beaten egg
Oregano

Mix together the flour and fat until it forms "really funny looking sand" / breadcrumbs.  Add a tbsp cold water and bring together.  Add more water a tsp at a time until you have a dough (if you add too much just add a little more flour).  Wrap in cling film and shove in the fridge.  It should go in there for 30 minutes but fish pie face wouldn't wait that long, so we went with as long as it took to sort out the filling.

Tear or cut the ham into small pieces and place in a bowl with the vegetables, grated cheese (as much or as little as you want) and milk.  Stir together and season well.  Add a pinch of oregano.

Remove the dough from the fridge and let the small person roll out to approx 1/4 cm.  It needs to be quite thin because the mix is quite dry.  Cut out two circles (I don't have cutters of this size so I used the lid of an M&S mini cakes tub, but a saucer would work).  Hand any leftovers over for the kiddies to make decorations or pastry shapes.

Divide the filling between the two pastry circles.  You can overfill these slightly due to the lack of moisture but make sure you only put it on one side and leave the edges clear.

Brush egg along the edge of one half and cover so you have a half moon.  Crimp together with a fork to seal.  Brush egg over the top and make a small slit in the top.  Cook for around 20 minutes or until golden brown all over.

For the more organised of this world than myself, these are lovely with things like left over casserole, chilli con carni, bolognese or even the Sunday roast, veg and stuffing with a touch of gravy.  Of course, fish pie is much much nicer.  (Milly) FACT.

Take my mother in law

We had the in laws around for Sunday lunch this weekend.  I like cooking for them - they like food so I always get the chance to try out a few new things.  This week it was leg of lamb cooked on top of potatoes, which is a completely new concept for me.  I was a bit concerned about cooking spuds for that long and that concern was justified when they attached themselves to the bottom of the tray.  Still, once chiseled off they were really lovely and I'd do that again with a few adjustments!  The concept is simple enough - thickly slice potatoes, season, add 1/2 litre of stock, put lamb on top, cook.  Definitely worth giving it a try.

Since I was going for risky main, I went for easy as heck pudding which also happens to be my mother in laws favourite.  I was originally drawn to a bbc good food recipe because I liked the chocolate on top, but then I read it and decided to do my own thing anyway.  This is one of those that is great to do with a joint of meat because it needs a lot of fridge action. 

Clares-banoffee-pie-of-sorts

14 chocolate digestives

60g unsalted butter (it really does need to be butter for this, and it doesn't even matter if you forget to get it out of the fridge!)

Either a tin of caramel or a tin of condensed milk boiled for approximately 2 hours to make a tin of caramel

Large pot of double cream

1 tbsp extra fine caster or icing sugar

3 bananas

approx 40g chocolate (the size of a mini chocolate bar)

Crush 12 of the digestive biscuits.  Either shove them in a food processor or beat out your rage with a rolling pin.  Depends what sort of day you've had really.

Melt the butter slowly in a pan.  Eat the other two biscuits while you wait.

Add the crushed biscuits to the butter and mix well.

Press the mix into a loose bottom flan or cake tin and allow it to rise up the sides.  Refrigerate for 20 - 30 minutes.

Remove the biscuity goodness from the fridge and spoon on the caramel.  Don't stir or over mix this.  Return to the fridge for a couple of hours (which is about the time it takes to cook the lamb).  Lick the spoon.

Slice up your bananas and place on top of the now cool and slightly firm caramel.

Melt your chocolate either in a baine marie or in the microwave.  Its such a small amount of chocolate that I went for the microwave method.  Allow to cool whilst you whisk together the sugar and cream until thick.  Spoon over the bananas and cover the entire cake.

Drizzle the melted chocolate over the top and refrigerate for another 15 minutes so it hardens.  Mix together any left over chocolate and the cream in the bottom of the jug.  Eat.  Pretend you didn't.

I forgot to take a picture, so I've pinched the one my mother in law took.

The epically poor slicing was down to the other half and a lack of cake slice.

We demolished the entire thing between 5 adults and Milly who ate it even though she doesn't like cream.  She also ate my base and pinched some from other plates, so that's a win for that pudding.

If you have a few more minutes, and the tins to do it, this is lovely made in to small individual pies.

Be Prepared

I never attended brownies or guides as a child.  The lack of brown owl in my life is quite clear, poor hard-done-by that I am, in my complete inability to prepare properly for the things I have planned.  Most of the time my cupboards are stacked well enough for me to get away with it but this week was my first Mummy and Milly Day disaster.  The weekends baking (I didn't photograph it all) resulted in the use of 24 eggs so, of course, this morning I was completely out and therefore the planned orange mini loaf was not going to happen.  Tears were threatening from Mill so it was over to my backup recipes and no eggs means just one thing to me - biscuits.  We had those cookie cutters I bought a couple of weeks back too so Milly was a very happy girl.

Disaster Saving Biscuits

40g golden caster sugar

135g plain flour

1 tbsp unsweetened cocoa

85g butter or margarine 

Juice of half an orange

Cream together the fat and sugar.  You don't need to go OTT with this but get the fat as soft as possible.   If you're well prepared and you've got the butter out in advance it should be soft enough to let your child do this bit.  Ooops.

Sift in the flour and cocoa powder (you already know the best way to do this) and mix with a fork until it starts to come together.  Pour in the juice and mix a little more.

Now for the fun bit.  Get your hands in and bring it all together until you have brown playdoh.  If its still a bit wet and sticky at this stage throw in a bit more flour, too dry and add a touch more orange.  You want something that looks like a big ball of soft yum rather than something that covers your hands in goo or breaks into little crumbs.

For under 2's get it to this stage and then hand it over for them to have some fun with rolling and cutting.

Flour your work surface (throw in a bit of cocoa if you care about white flour on chocolate biscuits - we don't so I didn't) and roll out your dough until its around 1/2 cm or there abouts.  Cut out whatever shape you want

Add the shapes to a tray covered in greaseproof paper.  They can be reasonably close together because they aren't really going to increase in size.  Bake for around 10 minutes and allow to cool on the tray for around 10 minutes.

Once cooled, decorate in any way you wish.  We went with orange icing (3 tbsp icing sugar mixed in with a few squeezes of orange juice to make a thick paste), assorted sprinkles, mini fudge pieces and fresh strawberry slices.  These would be lovely made in to a sandwich with a chocolate filling.

Unintentional Dora Face-Palm

Who needs eggs and brown owls anyway.