Caramel Shard Cookies

I requested John Whaite's 'John Whaite Bakes' as one of my Christmas presents and was lucky enough to receive it. Yesterday was a day to bake cookies and after trawling through some recipe books I remembered spotting this one and decided to give it a go. I will be honest and say I wasn't 100% happy with how they turned out. I'm not sure what quite went wrong (although I suspect it's either baking them for too long or making them too small in size) but they still taste ok. They are crunchy rather than chewy in texture. The recipe is supposed to make 20 however I only managed to make 17.

Ingredients:

Caramel:
100g caster sugar
3 tablespoons water

Cookie dough:
200g light brown muscovado sugar
150g salted butter (room temperature)
200g plain flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
Seeds from 1 vanilla pod (or 1 teaspoon vanilla paste or extract - I used vanilla extract)

Method:
1) Begin by making the caramel. Place the sugar and water in a pan and stir to mix them. Then place the pan over a high heat and allow to boil without stirring it again. After about 5 minutes the sugar will start to turn amber in colour and the bubbles will become smaller (you need to be paitent - it will happen). Pour onto a baking sheet and leave to solidify for at least 10 minutes (I lined my baking sheet with baking parchment).

2) Then make the cookie dough. Beat the sugar and butter together until pale in colour and lighter in texture using a freestanding mixer or an electric whisk. Add the remaining ingredients and mix by hand into a stiff dough (I started by using a wooden spoon but then had to use my hands). Place to one side.

3) Break the dried caramel into small shards (I used a rolling pin to do this) and add to the cookie dough. Stir or knead the shards into the dough until they are well incorporated. Chill the dough in the fridge for 30 minutes.

4) Preheat your oven to 170C / Gas 3.
5) Divide  and roll the dough into 20 small balls. Place these, well spread our, on baking sheets. Bake for 15-20 minutes, or until the cookies are baked and have turned golden brown around the edges. Remove from the oven and allow to cool.

6) Enjoy with your favourite hot drink. 

Dulce & banana cake

I received Lorraine Pascale's 'Fast, Fresh and Easy Food' as a Christmas present from Mr Birdie. One of the recipes that caught my eye was this 'Dulce & banana cake' which is an upside down banana cake with a sticky toffee topping. I am a big fan of banana cake and had been keen to try making it. This weekend gave me the opportunity to try it out as we had a training day at work today and I thought it would make a good break time snack. It was definitely well received and kept our brains going. It works well cold as a cake or warm as a dessert with cream or ice cream. You can find the recipe here on the BBC website. You will need a 20cm square tin.

Ingredients:

Sticky topping
50g butter
50g soft light brown sugar

Sponge
50g pecan nuts (optional)
150g butter (softened)
175g soft brown sugar
4 medium eggs (at room temperature)
1/2 vanilla pod (I used a couple of drops of vanilla extract)
100g self-raising flour
75g wholemeal flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
3 teaspoons ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 tablespoon treacle
Pinch of salt

2 small bananas (firm)
1 tablespoon Calvados (optional - I didn't have any so didn't use this)

Method:
1) Preheat the oven to 180C/160C Fan/350F/Gas 4. Grease and line a 20cm square tin with baking parchment and grease again.
2) Start by making the sticky topping. Place the butter and soft light brown sugar in a small pan over a medium heat. Once the butter has melted, turn up the heat and let the mixture bubble away for a few minutes until it starts to thicken. Make sure you stir it frequently so it doesn't catch.

Pour the mixture into the bottom of your lined tin and tip it back and forth so that the mixture spreads out. (You need to do this now as the mixture will solidify.)

3) If using the pecan nuts, tip them onto a baking tray and toast them in the oven. After 5 minutes remove them from the oven and set aside to cool.

4) To make the sponge mixture, cream together the butter and sugar in a large bowl using a hand-held whisk or freestanding mixer until the mixture becomes lighter in colour.

Add the eggs one at a time, beating well between each addition.

If using the vanilla pod, split it open, scrape the seeds out and add (or alternatively add the vanilla extract).Then fold in both flours, the baking powder, ginger, cinnamon, treacle and salt and set aside.

5) Slice the bananas into 5mm thick pieces. Arrange them in a single layer in the bottom of the tin (I lined mine up but you can arrange them however you want.) Pack them in tightly and drizzle over the Calvados if using.

6) Roughly chop the pecans and stir them through the cake mix.

7) Carefully dollop the cake mix over the bananas and gently spread it out with the back of a spoon or a palette knife, levelling the top. Then place in the oven and cook for 35-45 minutes.

8) After the cake has been cooking for 35 minutes, remove it from the oven and insert a metal skewer into the centre. It should come out clean, if not put back in for another 5 minutes until cooked.
9) Once the cake is cooked, remove it from the oven and leave it to cool for 10 minutes.

Then put a large flat plate over the top of the tin, and holding the tin and the plate, flip the whole lot over so that the tin is now upside down. Gently remove the tin and peel off the baking parchment to reveal the cake.

10) Cut into squares and serve warm or cold. Enjoy with your choice of accompaniment (crème anglaise, softly whipped cream or ice cream.)

Pork en Croute with Spicy Cabbage Stuffing

When out doing a spot of last minute Christmas shopping with Mr Birdie we found Rachel Allen's 'Bake' for a bargainous £3! I spent a lot of the Christmas holidays perusing the recipes. One of the recipes I spotted was this pork en croute recipe which I thought sounded interesting. When food shopping just before the New Year I spotted some pork fillet which was reasonably priced so snapped it up. This weekend I decided to try it out.

It is the first time I have tried anything savoury pastry based and this ambitious! I have to say I thought there was a point during the making of it that I thought it would all end up going horribly wrong but I was pleasantly surprised. As you can see from the photo above I did have a few cracks and sadly a 'soggy bottom' but for a first attempt I was pretty pleased. I used the flaky pastry recipe from Ruth Clemens 'The Pink Whisk' blog which you can find here. I found it was just the right amount of pastry with enough left over to decorate it. I served it as a Sunday roast accompanied by roast potatoes, roast carrots and parsnips and Brussels sprouts. The bonus of this recipe is that it can be prepared beforehand and can stay in the fridge for up to 24 hours or in the freezer for up to 3 months.

Ingredients:

Pastry:
300g plain flour
225g butter (cold diced)
1 teaspoon salt
6-8 tablespoons cold water
1 egg (beaten)

Filling:
50g butter
200g cabbage (quartered, cored and finely shredded)
2 tablespoons water
Salt and freshly ground pepper
125ml  double cream
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon ground coriander
1 teaspoon English mustard
1 large fillet of pork (approximately 600g, trimmed)

Method:
1) Begin by making your pastry. Dice the cold butter into small pieces. Use a plate to slice the butter and add a spoonful of the flour for the pastry to it. This will help it to stop sticking.

2) Add the butter to the flour and start to rub it in with your fingertips. Only rub it in half way so that you are left with little lumps of butter.

3) Add the salt and then start to add the water, a couple of tablespoons at a time. Mix it together using the blade of a table knife until it just comes together without being crumbly.

4) Lightly knead the pastry in the bowl to form a ball. Then wrap it in cling film or a freezer bag and place it in the fridge to chill for 1 hour.

5) When your pastry is chilled you can start to prepare the filling. Preheat the oven to 230C/450F/Gas 5.

6) Melt the butter in a large saucepan, add the cabbage and water, season with salt and pepper and cook for 5-7 minutes.

7) Add the cream, spices and mustard and simmer slowly for a further 10 minutes. Allow to cool.

8) Split the pork fillet down one side and open out flat (take care not to cut the whole way through). Season with salt and pepper. Add the stuffing along the length of the park and fold the meat over, bringing the sides together and tucking the ends in (I found this a bit of a struggle and had to make a second attempt. I had to flatten out the pork with a rolling pin to be able to fit all the stuffing in).

9) Roll out the pastry on a lightly floured work surface and lay the pork on top. Bring up the ends of the pastry and overlap them on top of the meat. Trim to neaten. Turn the parcel over so that the smooth side of the pastry is on top.

10) Re-roll the pastry trimmings, cut out leaves and stick to the top with some of the beaten egg.

11) Brush the beaten egg over the exposed pastry and bake in the oven for 10 minutes, reducing the oven tempertaure to 200C/400F/Gas 6 for the final 30 minutes. 

12) Enjoy with your choice of accompaniment! 

Blueberry and Cranberry Crumb Muffins

Just before the New Year I bought a packet of fresh cranberries which until today had been sat in the fridge. I knew I wanted to try making some muffins with them. I thought I would probably go for cranberry and white chocolate as this is a combination of flavours I like but after some research I found the recipe for these blueberry and cranberry crumb muffins which looked interesting (and also vaguely healthy given they're packed full of fruit!) It is an American recipe from a blog called 'Oh Sweet Day!' which you can find here. You'll need cups or alternatively if you're going to convert the measurements I find this page from Delia's website handy. The batter is quite thick but don't let this disconcert you! The crunchy crumble topping makes a nice contrast to the fruity, moist muffins. I made 15 muffins from this mixture.

Ingredients:

Muffins 
2 cups and 1 tablespoon flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup butter (softened)
3/4 cup caster sugar (I used golden)
1 egg
1/2 cup milk
1 cup blueberry
1 cup cranberry

Crumb topping

1/4 cup caster sugar

1/4 cup brown sugar

1/4 cup butter (softened)

1/3 cup flour

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

Method:
1) Preheat oven to 200C/400F. Line your muffin tins with paper cases.
2) In a large bowl sift together the 2 cups of flour, baking powder and salt and set aside.
3) In a bowl cream the butter using an electric whisk until it is light and fluffy. Gradually add the sugar and continue to beat until it is well combined and fluffy. Add the egg and mix until just blended.

4) Slowly add half the flour mixture and mix until just blended (I did this by hand using a wooden spoon). Add the milk and mix until just blended. Slowly add the remaining flour, scraping down the sides of the bowl with a spatula (A word of warning - I found this quite tough going as the batter is quite thick in consistency).

5) Toss the berries with 1 tablespoon of flour and gently fold into the batter.

6) Divide the batter evenly among the muffin cases and set aside.
7) In a small bowl, combine the topping ingredients and rub together with your fingers until you have a crumble-like consistency.

8) Sprinkle about a tablespoon of topping on top of each muffin.

9) Bake for 20 to 25 minutes until golden brown on top.

10) Allow to cool and then enjoy!