Food on Friday #5 Grasshopper Bark (sans Grasshopper's)

 

-Here's a little surprise for you!

- Chocolate.

- I can't eat it anymore, but it just looks so darn pretty! haha Chocolate and mint are some of my favourite flavours, and one night whilst perousing pinterest (!) I stumbled over this ingenious concoction. Borrowed from here.

- It didn't last long in our fridge.

 
- She's pretty simple really!

1. Do some crazy origami with some greaseproof paper inside your roasting tin!

2. Melt one bar of white chocolate over a bain marie, once melted, remove from the heat and stir in a few drops of peppermint flavouring and sufficient green colouring to turn the chocolate a nice shade of grasshopper green! - Pour into your prepared tin an allow to set.

3. Melt one bar of milk or dark chocolate in the same manner as the white, remove from the heat and allow to cool slightly. Whilst cooling, chop up a handful of after eight mints (or Tekkies alternative if yer cheap like me).

4. Pour the slightly cooled chocolate over the white, and sprinkle on your massacred mints. 

5. Allow to cool.

No here's the fun bit, unfold your creation!




Now chop it up. Keep it in the fridge; and chomp on it whilst reading the latest novel!
 

Food on Friday #4 Vegan Coconut Ice Cream

Being Vegan doesn't mean you have to give up ice-cream! You just have to get a little inventive. . . . But Vegan ice-cream, doesn't mean you have to be Vegan!

I'm currently an accidental vegan, but I don't mind too much, I'm enjoying eating foods I probably would never have come accross otherwise. There really is a vast variety to choose from. I got home the other night and the boy had made me quasadillas with quorn mince, yum! anyway,

Here is my take on coconut vegan ice-cream. Enjoy. (and I know it's the end of summer, but in our household you eat ice-cream all year round, whether you like it or not!)

Take one tin of Coconut Milk, and one tin of Coconut Cream ( you don't have to use coconut cream, it works with just the milk, but the texture is closer to 'real' ice-cream with the coconut cream) 

  Measure out 600ml of soya milk (I know, some crazy substances are going into this, trust) 

   
In a small dish, add 1tbsp of arrowroot powder to a splash of soya milk, stir well and set aside for later.

  To the 600ml of soya milk, add 1/2 cup of brown sugar, stir until mostly dissolved and transfer entire mixture to a pan. Heat gently until sugar is entirely dissolved then stir in the arrowroot mixture, bring pan to the boil continuously stirring. When boiling point is reached the mixture will be thick like this (now turn off the heat!) 

   
stir in the Coconut Cream and the Coconut Milk and leave to cool. Once significantly cool either transfer into containers to freeze stirring hourly until frozen, or (my favourite method!) bung it in your parents' ice-cream maker, wait an hour and then devour! 

 

Food on Friday #3 Cinnamon Rolls

- Every now and then you have to treat yourself. . right. . . right?!

- This week's Food on Friday is a little more complex than others, but totally worth it. It's not a difficult recipe, it's just time-consuming because of the rising time of the dough.

- I wasn't actually allowed to eat any of these, however I did share one with my mother and they are ace, the best we've managed so far, although we think that along with the nuts there should either be some chopped dates or raisins.

 

(before second rising, they fill all of the gaps eventually!)

I found the recipe at AllRecipes.com, I didnt really make any alterations, except I used some chopped nuts instead of peacans, because we had a package of chopped mixed nuts in the pantry, and I didnt want to go and do any special ingredients for this project.

Dissolve 1 package of fast action yeast in 1/2 a cup of warm water

While this is beginning to react, heat 1/2 a cup of milk gently in a small saucepan adding 1/4 cup of white sugar, 1/4 cup of butter and 1 teaspoon  of salt stirring until melted & dissolved

 combine the milk mixture with the yeast mixture, add two beaten eggs to this mixture

Stir in 4 cups of self raising flour, 1 cup at a time.

Pull your dough together & knead for approximately 5 minutes until it becomes particularly elastic to touch.

Lightly oil a bowl, roll your dough in this bowl and set aside in a warm place covered with a damp tea towel, after an hour your dough will have doubled in size.

melt 3/4 cup of butter and mix with 3/4 cup of brown sugar and 1/2 cup of chopped nuts, place in the bottom of baking tins - I used two IKEA small roasting tins ( I don't really think this step is needed and if I did it again I would miss it out!)

Roll out your dough paint  1/4 cup of melted butter and sprinkle with a mixture of 3/4 cup of brown sugar, 1 tbsp of cinnamon powder and 1/2 cup of  chopped nuts ( This is where I would have added some dates, I think some grated apple would be nice aswell.)

Roll up your dough into a long sausage shape and cut into rounds - I believe I yeilded 32 overall!

Place into your prepared tins and let rise for an hour, covered with your damp tea towel

Bake at 190 C for 25 minutes.

Good served hot, or cold!

 

Food on Friday #2 Savoury Kale Cheesecake!

- I love brunch! who doesn't love brunch? when you can be really lazy, do things in your own time. It is the perfect saturday!

- I made this "cheesecake" - which is more or less a quiche, for a very special brunch!, it is my Granddad's 81'st birthday tomorrow so I decided to treat him to a yummy brunch.

 - Obviously there will be other things to eat, a selection of cheese and ham and salami, various breads, cinnamon rolls (coming next week!), croissants and (of course) cake! haha.

 - Anyway, whatever your saturday holds, I hope it is a good one, and I hope you all get your breakfasts' in bed!

Combine 8oz of Plain Flour with 4oz of butter- process in the food processor until they resemble bread crumbs 

with the processor still running add warm water (about 1 tbsp) until the pastry forms a clump and lumps around the machine (it will combine itself) (of course you can do this by hand, which is also dead easy, I just like to do it this way) roll out pastry on a floured surface, and line quiche lorraine dish 

chop up two handfull's of kale, 1 onion, 1 chilli, add 1tbsp of rosemary, 1tbsp of basil and 1tbsp of dried chilli flakes

 In a jug combine 8oz of soft cheese with 6 eggs, 2oz of grated sharp cheddar and 1 tbsp of milk

 layer the prepared ingredients into the pastry, and fill up the case with the egg mix. bake at 180 degreees c for 35 minutes 

 

Food on Friday #1 - Flourless Cake

- I am well aware I post quite a few of my adventures in the kitchen to my blog!

- Although I don't want this to turn into an entirely food obsessed blog, I still like to share my escapades! Therefore I thought I would start "Food on Friday" in order to share recipes!

 - As many of you who have been reading for a while may know, I have quite a few health problems! haha! - one of the newest dilemmas for me to overcome has been the strict dietary requirements, I've had to adapt the way I cook to suit my needs, so here is a recipe for a flourless cake, which just so happens to be very low-carb aswell!

 recipe found here.

   

I took 1/2 cup butter and softened in the microwave

4 1/2 ounces almond flour were then whizzed in the food processor with 1/4 cup dessicated coconut. 

I then added 1 1/4 cup granular Splenda (or equivalent of sugar if needed)

Stir in 1 beaten egg 

Then add 1 tablespoon lemon zest, from one large lemon!,1/2 teaspoon vanilla essence,1/4 teaspoon baking soda and 1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar

Spread into a baking tin lined & greased with tin-foil 

( I used the small IKEA roasting tin- you all know this is my favourite tin ever!! seriously, buy one) 

Bake at 160ºC for 15-20 minutes. 

*These keep really well in the fridge and also freeze well

 

1 :1 :1 Coconut Creams

- It's been a while. Life always seems to get in the way.

- I'm currently employed on a 0-hours contract (to enable me to find a new job), but it has left me with quite a bit more time on my hands than I typically like.

 - I felt like sharing something nice, sweet, and summery! So here you go, coconut creams, with blueberries or rhubarb (It's recently been brought to my attention that there is no rhubarb in America?)

- Inspired by this Good Food recipe

- I speak for no one but myself when I say, I really love reading through people's recipe's posted online, but  I never really get inspired unless I see the steps (That's why I always put them in, when I can!)

1. Start by dissolving 2 tbsps of powdered gelatine in 2 tbsps of boiling water (you can use leaf gelatine, but I've never done so, I believe it works on the same principles, 2 sheets in 2tbsps of cold water, but don't hold me to it!) 

2. In a pan bring to the boil 200ml of double cream and 400ml of skimmed milk, add 1 tbsp of coconut milk powder (just one of those things we always have lying around! - but you can do it with coconut milk!)

3. Add a few drops of vanilla extract and the now-soaked gelatine

4. let cool slightly before decanting into serving glasses ( I used these colourful cocktail glasses, because they are of a good size - and they look super pretty!)

5. While the creams are in the fridge setting, brew a cup of herbal tea! (This is cranberry & orange) 

This step is not desperately needed, I was just faffing now!

6. Measure out 2 tbsps of blueberries (This is VERY approximate,  I just bashed a few into a ramakin!, you could use frozen too)

7. Take a bit of you tea, and bathe the blueberries!

8. Microwave for a minute! (Full power 750mw)

9. Take some rhubarb and slice into inch long segments (America : Take note!)

10. Heat over a low heat with a splash of water until tender - add sugar to taste (or, sweetner : whatever!)

(Forced, or early rhubarb is the pinkest - therefore the prettiest, it is also slightly sweeter)

Spoon the compote's on top of the now set creams

Refridgerate a little more before serving

Enjoy!

 

7 :1 Hey You! Whaddya Goin'a Do With All That Turkey!?! : Turkey Pizza!

- I don't know about you, buuuuuuut we ALWAYS have waaaayyyy too much turkey left over at the end of Christmas!

- And the reason this is a day early - is that traditionally my family has dinner on Christmas Eve, so Christmas day is set free for making new things with Turkey!

- Once we have expired Turkey Soup, Turkey Cobbler, Turkey Curry, Turkey Salad. . . . . What do you do with the leftovers? Well I present you with. . . Turkey Pizza.

- One of my favourite Pizza Places in the whole world, Pizza House (ever in the area - trot on, it's a beaut!) Has the best Pizza that is created called BBQ Chicken, and this is the Christmas homage to that!

- Most ridiculously easy thing in the world! We create the base any way we please, (Here's a good one!) (but you can also use the dough from the flat breads I made here!) we chuck some tomato puree and sage on, some Turkey, some cheese and some BBQ sauce! We bake in the oven for 15 minutes at 190 °!

- Devour with family!

- Happy days guys!

3 :4 The Best Homemade Chewy Cookies!

- I'm not even going to beat around the bush here. These are amazing. The best cookies ever, just chewy enough, just firm enough, just sweet enough. Perfect!

- 2 cups of plain flour

- 1 tsp of Bicarbonate of soda

- 2 eggs

- 1 1/2 cup of butter melted.

- 1 1/2 cups of brown sugar

- 1 cup of granulated sugar

- Handfull of butter tablet roughly chopped, & handfull of chocolate roughly chopped

-  15 minutes at 170°c

- Make sure they are well spaced on the greased baking sheet, because these will grow!

3 :3 Homemade Ginger Syrup for Ginger Beer!

- Nothing better than some ice cold ginger beer on a hot muggy day (muggy, humid, sticky, blegh, when is the snow coming?!)

1. Whizz 1 root of ginger in the food processor

2. Add the peel of 1 lime and 1 lemon along with 4 cups of sugar 6 cups of water and the juice of the lemon.

3. Slowly dissolve the sugar over a low heat, then bring to the boil, turn off the heat. Leave to infuse for at least 15 minutes, then let completely cool

4. Bottle it up all pretty like!

5. Serve over ice, with a measure of vodka (or not if there are children present), and topped up with agua con gas. (star shaped ice cubes make everything better!)

3 :2 Raspberry Flapjack! (Bizarre, But it Works!)

-So we all love flapjack! How can you not?

-When I was at school (woah, flash back, long time ago!) I did a project on 'high fibre' in cookery. . . so of course we made high fibre flapjack (this was just an excuse to make flapjack so me and my best friend Gins (Lindsey, but for some unknown reason I call her Gins!) could eat them through french) Which then morphed into a whole TWO YEARS making QUICHE! How can you spend two years making quiche? I don't know. . but I sure know I don't like quiche any more!!!

- Anyway, this is a recipe me and my sister invented to reduce the number of ever increasing raspberries we have lingering at home!

- We used the raspberry flesh and pips left over from when we made out Raspberry Sorbet

- But you know, every household has the annoying member who refuses to eat any fruit/vegetables/ anything that isnt available at a takeaway! . . .So we had to make half of this batch with chocolate chips in for my brother. . . annoying!

1. melt 1 cup of margerine (or butter if you're posh) with 1/2 cup of golden syrup and 1/2 cup sugar

2. Stir into 2 cups of porridge oats (if it is a little runny, add a few more oats until you get the desired consistency)

3. To half of this mixture add some chopped up chocolate

4. To the other half add the raspberry gunk (technical, oh yes it is!. . . you could always add fresh raspberries, I'd use about 1 cup of fresh)

Press into two lined and greased 9''x9'' baking tins (The small Ikea roasting tins are perfect for this!*) 

Bake for 20-30 minutes, or until firm to touch in an oven at 175°C. . . it doesn't matter so much about the length of time, but the oven NEEDS to be at 175°C. . any hotter and you end up with a more crunchy granola-y type thing. . . and we don't want that!

5. Melt some white chocolate 

6. Artfully drizzle on top of cooked flapjack and cut up. . . and eat!

* The small Ikea roasting tins, are brilliant for EVERYTHING! everyone should own at least one!. . . they are perfect for roasting a whole chicken, for making lasagne. . . just. everything! Plus. . Ikea is freaking awesome!

3 :1 Homemade Raspberry Sorbet!

- I told you we were inundated with raspberries as is obvious here and here!

- For this *BrandSpankingNew* Raspberry recipe I present you with. . Lime and Raspberry Sorbet! (round of applause por favor)

1. Add the juice of 2 limes to 1kg of frozen raspberries

2. slowly dissolve 2 cups of sugar in a litre and a half of water, then bring to the boil. Allow to cool

3. Cook the raspberries down.

4. Strain the raspberry juice from the pips and most of the flesh (don't throw these away! I'll show you what you can do with this tomorrow. fridge it!)

5. Add two tbsp of golden syrup.

6. whisk in the sugar and water mixture and freeze! (We bunged ours into the ice cream maker, but you can be all old-fashioned and what not by freezing it and taking it out and stirring it every hour until frozen)

- Easy peasy!

- Perfect for summer BBQ's, that much I promise you.

- Take it easy, and I hope everyone is ok, and not having to work 14 hour days like me at the moment! It's only  monday, and I can't wait for Friday allready!

2 :21 M&M Blondies (i.e. The Colourful-est Cake Ever!)

- THIS is what happens when I get left to my own devices!

- Not that anyone really complained!

- I found the reicpe here, and her beautiful photography made me want to attempt! So after a morning of spring (or should that be summer?) cleaning my sister and I knocked these up.

-We made a few alterations to the recipe, but it is basically the same as the original, we reduced the amount of m&m's mainly because we couldn't be bothered to go buy more, but I think it was definitely enough, not sure I would have wanted any more in.

-We also have a fan oven, so we reduced the cooking time to 20 minutes.

1 1/4 cups unsalted butter

2 cups packed brown sugar

1/2 cup granulated sugar

2 large eggs

4 teaspoons vanilla extract

2 1/2 cups self raising flour

2 1/2 cups sweetened flaked coconut

1 6oz bag of M&M's (with a few reserved for the top)

-We cut them a lot smaller than the originals and boy am I glad we did, they get a little sickly, but they are amazing all the same! A once in a while treat!

2 :16 Strawberry Salad?

- I like doing weird things to salads.

- I don't know about you, but this is something my family would never consider doing, fruit? in salad? odd. However I do have family in canada, and they do all sorts of funky things like marshmallows and Jello in salad, so maybe it's not that odd. (Do you put crazy dessert related things into salad? or are you a strict lettuce, tomato, cucumber, celery, mayonaise kinda person?)

- This is my favourite salad, ever.
- My mother will vouch for me here, I'll take this over most other foods, every time.

Super simple, all it is is 1cup of strawberries, 3tbsp of Red Wine Vinegar and 1tbsp of sugar if needed (I recently stopped drinking drinks with sugar in regularly, and I'm not saying I cut them out completely, but with a meal, instead of drinking fruit cordial, I'll just have water, and I've found that I like things a lot less sweet now, so I don't put the sugar in anymore) Just whizz it up in the food processor and bottle it up, (we save the bottles from bought salad dressings)

-I've tried this with Kiwi's (we had some and they were past best, you know a little squishy, no-one wanted them and they would probably have been chucked out) and raspberries (I've explained the raspberry issue we have at current!) and they are just as nice, they also keep FOREVER, I think it's because you are basically pickling the fruit with the vinegar. (note: by forever, I mean a long time, but don't take it too literally because forever is a long time!)

-I like to serve it with some crumbled goats cheese, a few sliced strawberries and Spinach (I know it's not spinach up there, but we didn't have any!)

2 :9 Traditional Flat Breads : Hanna's Way!

It's Han's way, or the highway!

- I know these are UGLY, but it's bread, there's not many ways to make bread look good!!

- I'm pretty lazy, not in the I never bother doing anything kinda way, in the I look for the easiest way to do everything.

-Flat breads are pretty traditional, and a bit of a staple in the household, so they have to be easy to make, fuss free and quick. I lost our non-stick frying pan, but these are better without the oil, done in the non-stick frying pan.

-2 Cups of Self Raising Flour (this is what makes it rise, if you don't have any Self Raising Flour, use Plain Flour with 2tsp of Baking Powder)

-1tsp Salt

-1 tbsp Vegetable Oil

-Enough WARM water to bind the mixture into a dough, if you make it too sticky, add a little more flour, it's very flexible!

-Make sure your surface is floured, cut the dough into 8 equal pieces

-Roll each of these pieces until they are 1mm thick (trust me they rise when they are cooked even if they look very thin now!)

-Shallow fry the bread 1 at a time (I had two frying pans going!!) They will take about 30seconds each side on a medium heat.

-Enjoy warm, especially good with spiced cheese and cucumber salad (That's what I had last night!! YUM)

- I know there are loads of ways to do this, but most of the ones I have come across have yeast in, that's cool if you have  an hour spare for proving, I don't know about you, but I leave everything until last minute, so I definitely do not have and hour to wait! 10 minutes and these are ready! That quick! 

- I have heard some argue, that without yeast these are simply tortilla's, call them what you will, but they most certainly do  not resemble tortillas because they do rise, tortillas in my head are not doughy, but are instead very thin. 

-Use these breads in place of any bread you would normally have, with salads, with BBQ's, for sandwiches. . .

- Here's a recipe card for you.

2 :8 Raspberry Cocktails

- Just because I mentioned the ridiculous amount of raspberries we have at the moment, I thought Id share with you the raspberry cocktails we enjoyed the other night!

4 cups of raspberries blended and strained

4 shots of cherry sourz

slosh of vodka

dash of vanilla essence

topped up with lemonade

- We served with frozen raspberries floating about! (and yes, yes I was ridiculously impressed with myself!!)