Elderflower Champagne

I had zero faith in this working and had nightmares about exploding bottles but it was really really easy and is totally delicious i will be making a lot more next year

I got this recipie from Channel4.com and its a Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall recipie

Makes 6 litres

4 litres Hot Water

700g Sugar

Juice and Zest 4 Lemons

2 tbsp White Wine Vinegar

15 Elderflower Heads in full bloom (i used about double this)

I used a bucket to make mine. Put hot water and sugar into the bucket and stir until sugar dissolves. Top up with cold water so you have 6 litres in total. Add the lemon juice and zest, white wine vinegar and elderflowers and stir. Cover with muslin (i used pillowcase) and leave in a cool, airy place for a couple of days. The recipe says to check it after two days and its not foaming to add a pinch of yeast. To be honest mine wasnt foaming but when i shook the bucket i could hear it fizz so assumed it was alright. Leave again for another 4 days. Then strain the liquid through a sieve lined with muslin and decant into plastic fizzy drink bottles. I didnt have any glass and didnt want to risk the explosion with glass but the plastic bottle were perfect. Seal bottles and leave to ferment for at least a week before serving chilled.

I really didnt think this would work and would be left with flat scuzz but it really does work and was left with proper fizzy champagne!! (very, very low alcohol content) Lovely flavour and apparently keeps for several months so saving a bottle for christmas

Blackberry Crumble Cake - the last of last years blackberries!

115g Butter
175g Caster Sugar
1 Egg
280g Self Raising
125ml Milk
200g Blackberries
Crumble :
115g Caster Sugar
85g Plain Four
50g Butter

Beat the butter and sugar in a bowl with electric whisk until light and fluffy. Whisk in the egg and fold in the flour and milk. Spoon into tin - i used 9inch square tin. Sprinkle the blackberries over the cake mix. To make the crumble mix the flour and sugar together in a bowl and rub in the butter until you get breadcrumbs. Sprinkle over the cake/blackberry mix and bake in oven 180/160/4 for 45 mins
It took longer than this for mine to cook through. There was too much cake mix really i would be tempted to halve the cake mix next time or use a larger, shallower tin. Cake itself is very good will definately make more when the blackberries are in season

Cinnamon Nutella Cake

175g Butter

175g Golden Caster Sugar

3 Eggs

200g Self Raising

1tsp Baking Powder

2tsp Ground Cinnamon

4 tbsp Milk

4 tbsp Nutella

50g Hazlenuts

Put all the ingredients apart from the hazlenuts into a large mixing bowl. Beat until light and fluffy

Spoon 2 thirds of the mix into 20cm round cake tin. Spoon in the nutella in 4 blobs and cover with the remaining cake mixture. With a skewer or sharp thin knife swirl the mixture. Roughly chop the hazelnuts and sprinkle over the top.

Bake in oven 180/160/4 for about an hour. If it starts to catch cover with tin foil. When a knife inserted comes out clean the cake is done.

I found the nutella sank to the bottom so i would put it on the top of the mixture and just push under rather than the recommended 2 thirds/third above

Sausage and Egg Pasties

This is from August Good Food - really easy as uses ready made pastry, taste = :-p Original recipe was for 8 so I have halved it here :
5 Medium Eggs (not large otherwise they wont really fit in)
4 Pork Sausages with the meat squeezed out
3 or 4 Spring Onions finely chopped
500g (1 block) frozen short crust pastry defrosted
Plain Flour for dusting

Bring pan of water to the boil and add 4 of the eggs. Bring back to the boil and simmer for 4 mins. Drain under cold water and peel
Meanwhile mix the sausagemeat and spring onions together. Dust surface with flour and roll out the pastry. You will need to make 4 x 25cm circles out of the pastry. Using wetish hands so the sausage meat doesnt stick to you, spread quater of the meat onto each circle going almost to the edges. Place one of the eggs in the middle of the circle, then pull the sides up over the egg and seal. Place all pasties onto a lined baking sheet. Beat the remaining egg and brush over the pasties.
Cook in oven (220/200/7) for 30 mins or until pastry golden brown all over

Red Onion and Cheese Tart

500g (1 block) frozen short crust pastry
1tbsp olive oil
1tsp caster sugar
1tbsp butter
1tbsp balsamic vinegar
500g red onions thinly sliced
3 large eggs
300ml single cream or full milk
125g grated strong cheddar

Roll out the pastry and use it to line a 23cm flan/quiche tin. Price the base and bake blind (cover with baking paper and use cooking beans to weight it down) for 1o mins. Uncover and cook for further 4 mins. Remove from oven and leave to one side to cool.
Meanwhile fry the onions in a large frying pan with the oil and butter until soft. Add the sugar and balsamic vinegar and cook for further few minutes until deep brown. Place the onions into the flan and season. Beat together the eggs and cream/milk and add the grated cheese. Pour over the onions and bake in oven 2oo/180/6 for 30 mins
Make sure the flan sits flat in the oven unlike mine which slopped over a bit

Red Velvet Cup Cakes with Cream Cheese Frosting

140g Self Raising
2 tbsp Cocoa
1/2 tsp Bicarb of Soda
110ml Buttermilk (I made my own using 110ml milk and few drops of lemon juice)
1 tsp Vinegar
1/2 tsp Vanilla Extract
1 tbsp Red Food Colouring
60g Butter
170g Caster Sugar
1 Large Egg
Oven 170 15-20 mins
In a large bowl, mix together the flour, cocoa, bicarb and a pinch of salt. In a mug, mix the buttermilk, vinegar, vanilla and red food colouring. Beat the butter and sugar together until pale and fluffy. Beat in the egg a little at a time. Mix in a third of the flour mixture, followed by half the buttermilk mixture, then another third of the flour, the rest of the buttermilk and finally the last of the flour mixture. Line 12 hole muffin tin with paper cases. Divide the mixture between the paper cases. Bake for 20 minutes, until risen and springy
Cream Cheese Frosting :
50g Butter
100g Cream Cheese
250g Icing Sugar
Cream the butter and cream cheese and add the sieved icing sugar, the cream cheese/butter gets quite soft so I added more icing sugar and chilled in the fridge. Double the recipe if you want to smother the cakes in icing. I grated a bit of chocolate over the top for decoration

Apple Strudel Muffins

250g Self Raising
3g Baking Powder
2g Bicarb of Soda
115g Butter
100g Soft Brown Sugar
100g Golden Caster Sugar
2 eggs
190g Apples peeled and cored (I used 4 - two shredded using cheese grater, two choopped into small cubes)
1 tsp Mixed Spice or Cinnamon
Topping :
150g Soft Brown Sugar
20g Self Raising
30g Butter
2 tsp Mixed Spice or Cinnamon
I found this recipe on line but have amended it using more apple, brown sugar and mixed spice and doubling the topping
Preheat oven to 180 and line muffin tin with paper cases makes approx 10-12

Mix flour, baking powder, mixed spice and bicarb in bowl. In separate bowl mix butter, sugar and eggs until smooth. Stir in the apples and gradually add the flour mix until smooth. Spoon into the muffin cases.
Next make the topping by mixing sugar, flour and mixed spice/ cinnamon. Then cut in the butter with a metal knife until you have coarse breadcrumbs. Sprinkle generous amount of topping over each muffin and bake in oven for 15-20 mins. These have been taste tested and get the thumbs up!

Cookies

175g Margerine

225g Caster Sugar

2 Eggs

350g self Raising

100g Chocolate Chips (i used chopped up dairy milk and smarties as thats what I had in the house)

Oven 180 15-20 mins

This is so easy : put all the ingredients into a bowl and mix until it forms a dough. Spoon onto a lined baking tray and bake. depending on how you like cookies use between 1tsp and 1tbsp of mixture per cookie. I like the dough raw in the middle so cooked for less than the specified time. I made some big and some small so watch them in the oven if smaller so they dont over cook. The raw dough is also very nice with ice cream :-p

Lemon Drizzle Cake

225g Butter
225g Caster Sugar
4 Eggs
225g Sel Raising
Finely grated zest 1 Lemon
Drizzle:
85g Caster Sugar
Juice of 1 and 1/2 lemons
Oven 180(f)/160/GM4

Cream the butter and sugar until pale and creamy, then add the eggs one at a time with a spoonful of the flour with each. Sift in the rest of the flour and add the lemon zest and fold in. Transfer to a lined loaf or cake tin (to line a loaf tin use strips of greaseproof paper leaving little handles dangling over the edge which you can use to lift the cake out) and cook as above for 40-50 mins. While the cake is still warm in the tin make the drizzle: mix the lemon juice and sugar together. Prick the cake all over with a skewer or thin knife and pour the drizzle over. Leave in the tin until completely cool. I served mine warm with extra thick double cream and ice cream

Elderflower Cordial

Approx 40 Elderflower head (most recipies say 20 but I wanted a strong flavour!)

1 Sliced Lemon

2tsp Citric Acid (to ask the pharmacist for this - and they will ask you what you want it for)

1.5kg Sugar

2.5 Pints Boiling Water

I made this in a bucket as I didnt have a bowl or anything big enough and i doubled the recipie as i wanted more.

Boil the kettle for the water and pour it into the bucket, add the sugar and stir until dissolved. Add the citric acid, lemon and elderflowers and stir gently.

Cover the bucket with a tea towel and leave in a cool dry place for 5 days, stirring twice a day.

After 4 days you end up with a syrupy cordial. The cordial needs to be strained to remove the elderflowers and all the bits. I strained mine through muslin 3 times to make it as clear as possible. Pour into any bottles to hand and it should keep in the fridge for about a month. It can be frozen too but leave space in the top of the bottle.

My favourite way to drink it is in lemonade or champagne

Chocolate, Nutella and Melted Chocolate Cake

I have to say this is the best chocolate cake I have ever made. (Its not as big as it looks on the picture as its sat on a site plate not a dinner plate)
140g Soft Butter
140g Golden Caster Sugar
3 Eggs
100g Self Raising
25g Cocoa Powder
Approx 5 tbsp Nutella
110g Cadbury Dairy Milk
Sprinkling of Chopped Mixed Nuts
Put the butter, sugar, eggs, flour and cocoa powder into a bowl and blitz with electric whisk for 2 mins. I have a small 6inch victoria sponge tin so I put half the mixture in this and cooked in 180 oven for about 15 mins. Then i did the same with the second half of the mixture. Once the cakes were cool i spread one with the nutella and sandwiched them together. Next melt the chocolate in a bowl in the microwave and pour over the cake and sprinkle with the nuts.
You would bet about 8 small slices out of this - or 4/5 greedy sized slices. This is my favourite chocolate cake so far

Lemon Cupcakes with Lemon Icing

125g Soft Butter
175g Caster Sugar
Finely Grated Zest of 1/2 Lemon
2 Eggs Beaten
150g Plain Flour
1/4 tsp Baking Powder
Icing
75g Soft Butter
125g Sifted Icing Sugar
Grated Zest 1/2 Lemon
1-2 tsp Lemon Juice
Cake Method : Cream the butter and then add the sugar and grated lemon zest. Beat until light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs, soft in the flour and baking powder and fold in. Divide into 12 paper cases in muffin tin. Bake for 7-10 mins at 180
Icing Method : Cream the butter and add the icing sugar and beat. Add lemon zest and enough lemon juice to soften the icing into a spreadable consistency. I found I had to add more icing sugar as it went quite runny and i wanted to pipe the icing on. If you are going to spread the icing on then follow the recipie as it is. Spread or pipe icing on to cakes

Cheese Scones

225g Self Raising

pinch salt

55g Butter

25g Mature Cheddar Grated

150ml Milk

Put the flour and salt into a bowl and add the cold butter and rub into breadcrumbs. Stir in the cheese and the milk to make a soft dough. Roll out on a floured surface and use round cutter to cut out circles approx 1 inch thick. Bake at 220 for 10-12 mins.

I find my scones dont rise enough and dont know why - have tried all the suggestions of keeping everything as cold as possible, have tried adding baking powder and baking soda but they still dont really rise as much as i want them too - frustrating!

These taste best warm and spread with loads of marmite :-)

Custard Star Cake

This isnt a new recipie but i used the Custard Cup Cake recipie and just made one big cake! I used my new silicone star shaped cake 'tin' (thank you to Emily for my fab present). As one big cake the texture is really moist and takes about 30 mins in the oven or until the centre is set and doesnt wobble. The icing is just the same as before - icing sugar and water. End result = :-P

Peanut Butter Mini Muffins and Smartie Muffins

To make both of these flavours I used the basic recipe for muffins as per Peanut Butter and Dairy Milk Caramel Muffins but omitted the dairy milk caramel and kept them plain for the mini muffins and added smarties for the slightly larger muffins. One batch of the mixture made 24 mini muffins and 8 of the larger muffins so it goes a long way

The only problem with smarties as you can see from the picture is that the colour bleeds. I think I will try with M&M's next time

Cookies

I took a choc chip cookie recipie from the Good Food website and twiddled about with it to make these. Instead of choc chips I used Reece's Peanut Butter Pieces (kindly donated by Linda from her recent trip to Florida)
100g Reece's Pieces
125g Butter
100g Granulated Sugar
75g Soft Brown Sugar
2tsp Vanilla Extract
150g Plain Four
1/2 tsp Baking Powder

Heat the butter in the microwave. Mix the two sugard together in a mixing bown and pour in the melted butter. Beat with wooden spoon. Add the egg and vanilla and beat again. Sift in the flour and baking powder and stir and then add the chocolate pieces. I added more flour as the consitency seemed to runny so ended up using approx 200g flour but see how it goes.
On a lined baking sheet blob on desert spoon amounts of the dough. I did it in two batches with 6 blobs at a time because as they cook they spread out.
Bake at 190 for 10 -15 mins until light golden brown

Rocky Road Crunch

This is dead easy to make. if you cannot eat headache inducing dark chocolate, milk choc would work just as well. Likewise you could substitute the rich tea biscuits for more or less any other biscuit,have nuts instead of marshmallows etc etc

125g butter
300g dark chocolate (i use Bournville)
3 tbsp golden syrup
200g rich tea biscuits
100g marshmallows (mini ones or chop up regular sized)
icing sugar to dust (optional)

Melt the butter, choc and syrup in a pan over a low heat. Once melted pour 125ml into a measuring jug. Put the biscuits in a bag and smash with rolling pin or wooden spoon so you get crumbs and pieces. Add the smashed biscuits and the marshmallows into the melted choc in the pan and stir well. Pour into foil tray/trays (depending on size you have) or line a baking tray with greaseproof paper and squash mixture into this. Then pour over the melted choc that was set aside in the jug. Chill in fridge until you cant wait any longer. Makes approx 20 pieces but depends what size you want!

Banana Cake

100g butter

170g Caster Sugar

225g Self Raising

2 eggs

2 or 3 very ripe bananas

Cream the butter and sugar together and add the eggs with a spoonful of the flour and mix. In a separate bowl mash the bananas to sludge. Add the banana to the butter/sugar/egg mix and stir. Fold in the sifted flour. Pour into a greased loaf tin and bake at 180/GM4 for 30 mins (may take longer check its cooked through by sticking a knife in when it comes out clean its done!

Birthday Cake

To make this birthday cake i adapted the recipie for Chocolate Fudge Cup Cakes (see earlier post) to make one big cake with the butter icing in the middle and all purpose choc icing to cover the entire cake

So for the Cake :

140g soft butter

140g golden caster sugar

100g self raising

3 eggs

25g cocoa powder

Butter Icing:

85g milk or dark choc

85g butter

140 icing sugar

All Purpose Choc Icing

125g milk or dark choc

75g butter

2 eggs beaten

500g icing sugar

1tsp vanilla extract

Put all the cake mixture into mixing bowl and beat for couple of mins with electric whisk. Divide between 2 greased and lined sandwich tins and bake at 190 for approx 15-20 mins check as you go. Once out of the oven leave to cool in the tins then remove to wire rack. Make up the butter icing by beating icing sugar and butter until creamy, melt the choc in the microwave and beat in. Then spread over one of the cakes and sandwich together.

Make up the all purpose icing to cover the entire cake with. Melt the choc and butter in the microwave. Beat in the eggs whilst choc hot then add the vanilla extract and sifted icing sugar. Mix briskly until smooth leave to cool a little so not too runny and then spoon and spread over entire cake. This is messy so put down some newspaper and sit the cake on a wire rack. Once iced I then decorated with smartied and milk and white chocolate buttons as this was a kids birthday cake (though tbh would have done the same no matter who)

Peanut Butter and Cadburys Dairy Milk Caramel Muffins

I have experimented with Muffin recipes for a while now as most of them turn out to chewy and heavy and dont rise enough for my liking. Nearly all the recipies i found use plain flour. I have ditched this in favour of self raising and baking powder and i think it produces a much lighter rather than stodgy muffin
250g Self Raising
85g Golden Caster Sugar
1 tbsp Baking Powder
5 tbsp Crunchy Peanut Butter
1 tbsp Soft Butter
60g butter melted
1 large egg
175ml Milk
200g Bar of Cadbury Dairy Milk Caramel roughly chopped up

Sift flour and baking powder into mixing bowl and add peanut butter and tbsp butter. Mix into breadcrumbs. Add the melted butter, milk and egg and stir into thick batter. Add the chopped up chocolate and stir. Spoon into large muffin cases this will make approx 10 depending on how big you want them!
Bake at 200 for 20-25 mins (check as you go as the caramel will burn if it bubbles to the top. I dont have a photo of these yet but they are by far the best muffins i have made. You can substitute the caramel chocolate for any other type really. Another alternative is to omit the chocoalte and use large dollops of nuttella in the middle of the individual muffins (half fill the cases, add a large blob of nutella, cover with more muffin mix)
For a plain muffin omit the peanut butter and use butter instead then add any other ingredient you fancy.

Chocolate Biscuits

This is not my recipie its Nigella Lawson but these are really easy to make and taste amazing

250g soft butter

150g caster sugar

40g cocoa powder

300g plain flour

1/2 tsp bicarb of soda

1tsp baking powder

topping:

2 tbsp cocoa powder

175g icing sugar

60ml boiling water from kettle

hundreds and thousands

Cream butter and sugar with electric whisk then beat in cocoa powder. When thats mixed in beat in flour, bicarb and baking powder. The mixture is very soft and sticky so its messy but pick off lumps of mixture about size of a walnut, roll into a ball and flatten into discs as you place them on a lined baking tray. This recipie is for approx 24 biscuits but depends how big you make them. Bake each batch for 15 mins at 170/GM3 she doesnt specify for fan oven so i checked after 10 mins.

Once biscuits are cool make the topping. First time i made this it was far too runny but i didnt know how it was supposed to turn out however 2nd time it was much thicker so i must have mis read the recipie first time. Should be runny but not liquid and not thick like icing. Anyway put the cocoa powder, water and icing sugar into a small saucepan and whisk over a low heat until smooth and combined. Take off heat and leave for 10 mins. Drizzle each biscuit with as much or little topping as you like and sprinkle with hundreds and thousands as you go.

Choc Fudge Cup Cakes

Cakes:

140g Soft Butter

140g Golden Caster Sugar (normal works if you dont have golden)

3 eggs

100g Self Raising

25g Cocoa Powder (Bournville)

Icing :

85g Chocolate (Plain or Milk)

85g Butter

140g Icing Sugar

Put all of the cake ingredients into a mixing bowl and whisk with electric whisk for a couple of minutes. Line 12 hole muffin tin with paper cases and spoon in mixture. This mix makes more than 12 cakes so i cook in 2 batches will prob get approx 16 cakes in all. Cook for 10-15 mins (check after ten you want the top to be set and not to wobble) at 190/170/GM5.

for the icing whisk the butter and icing sugar together until smooth. Melt the chocolate in the microwave and beat into the butter/icing sugar mixture until combined. Put a generous amount on each cake. Depending on the time of year I top with Cadbury Mini Eggs for Easter or rest of the time Cadburys Giant Chocolate Buttons. Use milk or dark choc depending on how rich your tates are i think dark chocolate is preferable.

Custard Cupcakes

Recipie :

100g self raising

100g custard powder ( I use Birds)

200g soft butter (I use Stork for all my cakes)

2 eggs

4tbsp Milk

140g Caster Sugar

150g Icing Sugar

Use an electric whisk to mix custard powder, butter, eggs and milk. Stir in the sugar and fold in sifted flour. Spoon into paper cases in muffin tray (makes about 12) and bake in oven at 180/160 fan/ gas mark 4 for approx 20 mins. Leave to cool then mix icing sugar with 3tbsp water (be careful not to make it too runny add more icing sugar if necesary) to make a thick paste. Cover cakes with generous amoutn of icing and sprinkle with hundreds and thousands

This is my new blog to keep track of my ideas and recipies!