Maple Pecan Bundt Cake

Maple Pecan Bundt Cake

This recipe comes from Nigella's Kitchen.  I was keen to try out my new baking tins and this recipe sounded good.  It did not disappoint.

for the maple pecan filling:

75g plain flour
30g soft unsalted butter
1 tsp ground cinnamon
150g pecans (or walnuts), roughly chopped
125ml maple syrup

for the cake:

300g plain flour
1tsp baking powder
1tsp bicarbonate of soda
125g soft unsalted butter
150g caster sugar
2 eggs
250ml creme fraiche or sour cream
1-2 tsp icing sugar, for decoration
flavourless oil, for greasing

1x23cm bundt tin

Preheat the oven to 180C/gas 4. Using flavourless oil grease your bundt tin, and leave upside down on newspaper for the excess oil to drain out.

Make the filling for the cake by mixing together the 75g flour and 30g butter with a fork, till you end up with the sort of mixture you’d expect when making crumble topping. Then, still using the fork, mix in the cinnamon, chopped nuts and maple syrup, to form a sticky, bumpy paste. set a side for a moment.

For the cake, measure 300g flour, the baking powder and bicarb into a bowl.

Now, cream the butter and sugar together, then beat in 1tbsp of the flour mixture, then 1 egg, then another tbsp of flour mixture followed by the second egg.

Add the rest of the flour mixture beating as you go, and then finally the creme fraiche or sour cream. You should expect to end up with a fairly firm cake batter.

Spoon just more than half the cake batter into the oiled bundt tin. Spread the mixture up the sides a little and around the funnel of the tin to create a rim. You don’t want the sticky filling to leak out the sides of the tin.

Dollop the maple filling carefully in to the dent in the cake batter, then cover the filling with the remaining batter. Smooth the top and put the tin in the oven for 40 minutes, though it’s best to check with a cake tester after 30 minutes.

Once cooked, and the cake tester comes out clean where it hits the sponge (obviously, any gooey filling will stick to the tester), let the cake cool on a wire rack for 15 minutes in its tin, then loosen the edges with a small spatula, including around the middle funnel bit, and turn the cake out onto the rack.

When the cake is cold, dust with icing sugar by pushing a teaspoon or so through a tea strainer.

Mincemeat Cheesecake

Mincemeat Cheesecake

OK this was a bit of a make-it-up as you go along cheesecake. 

Base:

Pack of shortbread biscuits with a couple taken out and eaten, so maybe 200g

100g butter, melted

Filling:

Mincemeat to cover the biscuit base

2 x 250g pots of Phiadelphia light

300ml double cream

1-2 tbsp brandy or other of your choice

Juice of 1 lemon

Chocolate to drizzle over

Blitz the biscuits until crumbs.  Mix with the melted butter and press into the base of a loose bottomed 9" (23cm) tin.  Set in the fridge.

Cover the biscuit base with mincemeat of your choice , as thick or thin as you like.

Whisk the double cream and cream cheese with the lemon juice and brandy. Add sugar here if you like a sweeter filling. Pour over the mincemeat and leave in the fridge to set overnight.

Drizzle with melted chocolate in a fancy pattern and decorate as you will with fruit of your choice, or more chocolate !

Notes
You could add sugar to the base and the filling if you prefer a sweeter cheesecake.  You could mix the mincemeat into the cheesecake filling.  You could also set the filling using gelatine sheets.  

Prawns in Chilli and Coconut Sauce

Prawns in Chilli and Coconut Sauce

I love to cook from scratch but also love to try new foods that come onto the market, and lets face it, it's always nice to have a quick meal up your sleeve.

I came across these sauces at the BBC Good Food Show in Harrogate last weekend.  There's a recipe on the back of the pack but if you go to their website there is a whole raft of recipes to try.

For this I used:

1 tsp oil

2 small onions, cut into wedges

1 red and 1 green pepper cut into strips

About 250g raw prawns ( I was finishing a pack off from the freezer)

The pack of sauce.

I fried the onions and peppers in the oil until they softened.  Removed them from the pan.  Added the prawns and cooked gently until they were pink.....just a couple of minutes.

Added the vegetables back to the pan and stirred the sauce through.  Once it was heated through I served it over some mixed wild and white rice.

This was absolutely delicious and I am looking forward to trying the other sauces in the range which I also bought.

Note

This would have been lovely done fajita style in a wrap. 

Shredded Chicken with Peanut Sauce

Shredded Chicken with Peanut Sauce

This recipe is adapted from an old WW recipe book "The New Food Plan Cookbook" from the 1980's.  It was always a favourite and so I dug out the recipe and made it again.

Serves 3

frylight

3 skinless boneless chicken breasts, cut into thin strips

1 onion, cut into strips

1 clove garlic, crushed or chopped

chilli flakes to taste

1 red pepper, sliced a similar size to the chicken

4 tbsp peanut butter (crunchy) (6syns)

2 tbsp peanut butter powder (2syns)

1 tbsp soy sauce

stock or water

2 tbsp Chinese rice wine (2syns)

Start by spraying a large frying pan or wok with frylight.  I find with frylight that it is best not to have the pan too hot.  Add the onion and garlic to the pan and cook gently until softened.  

Add the chicken and the chilli flakes, turn the heat up slightly and cook for a few minutes to seal the chicken. 

Add the pepper and cook for a few minutes.

Meanwhile mix the peanut butter powder and peanut butter with a little hot water or stock (about 2-3 tbsp) to dissolve slightly. Add the soy sauce and rice wine and pour into the pan.

Cook a few minutes so that the sauce coats the chicken.  Add a little more stock or water if it seems too thick.

Serve with rice and broccoli or other veg of your choice.

Notes:

This can be tweaked in a number of ways which I'm sure i will try over time.  You don't need to use the peanut butter powder if you don't have it, but it is lower in calories/syns/points so adds more flavour for less.  You could add other spices such as curry powder and make a thinner sauce if you wanted.

Viennese whirl mince pies

Viennese whirl mince pies

This is a John Whaite (of Great British Bake Off fame) recipe and it's one I'll make again.  I love Viennese whirls and I love mince pies so what's not to like here?

Pastry

200g plain flour
1tsp mixed spice
100g butter, cubed
1 large egg, beaten

(or 300g shop bought shortcrust pastry)

Filling and Topping

12 tsp mincemeat, approx 170g
150g unsalted butter
150g plain flour
30g cornflour
30g icing sugar and extra to dust

For the pastry, toss the flour and spice together and rub in the butter until it looks like fine breadcrumbs. Add the beaten egg and bring the pastry together. If necessary add water a few drops at a time to make a soft dough.

Flatten the dough and wrap in cling film.  Chill for at least 30 minutes.

For the Viennese whirl topping, beat the butter until it is very soft, add the flour, cornflour and icing sugar until you have a smooth paste, like thick buttercream.

Roll the pastry on a lightly floured surface, as thinly as you can and cut circles to fit a 12 hole bun tin which has been greased. Line the holes with the pastry circles.

Fill the pastry with 1 tsp mincemeat. Using a piping bag fitted with a large star nozzle, pipe a neat spiral on top of each pie.  Chill for 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to Gas 6/200ºC .

Bake the pies for 15-20 minutes or until the topping is just starting to turn a light golden brown. Cool in the tray, carefully remove and dust with icing sugar.

British Rail Gingerbread

British Rail Gingerbread

So, we were in Newcastle for the Chinese New Year Celebrations, and afterwards, walking back to the car we gazed in the window of the Pink Lane Bakery where they had on sale "British Rail Gingerbread".  I was intrigued and so "googled" it and came across this recipe on a blog called Bakestone, which is a hybrid of recipes by Linda Collister in the Baking Book, Food From the Place Below and Nigella Lawson in How to Eat.

I'm still not entirely sure why it's called British Rail Gingerbread, but I'll go along with it.

So:

Ingredients

225g self raising flour

1 tsp bicarbonate of soda

1 tbsp ground ginger

1 tsp ground cinnamon

grating of fresh nutmeg

100g butter

3 pieces of stem ginger

100g muscovado sugar/dark brown sugar

300ml milk

100g black treacle

100g golden syrup

3 balls of stem ginger (approx 45g)

1 egg, beaten

Preheat the oven to Gas 4/180ºC

Grease and line a 2lb loaf tin.

In a pan, dissolve the sugar in the milk and leave to cool.  Melt together the syrup and treacle. Let them cool.

Mix the flour, bicarbonate of soda and spices and rub in the butter.  Grate in the stem ginger.  Now add the milk mixture, the treacle mixture and the beaten egg and mix well.  

Pour into the tin and bake for 45 mins to 1 hour.

Wrap in greaseproof paper and it will keep for several days in a cake tin. (Based on what evidence I wonder?)

Here's mine.....it's lovely.....reminds me of my Gran's gingerbread

Frangipane topped mince pies

Frangipane topped mince pies

This is a based on a Paul Hollywood recipe.  I enjoyed them, lets face it, there's no such thing as a bad mince pie, but personally, I would have liked them more almondy, more like a Bakewell tart filling, so next time I make them I will make them so! I may even make them into one big tart like a Bakewell.

Makes 12

400g mincemeat, preferably home-made

Pastry

165g plain flour

25g ground almonds

120g cold butter, diced

55g caster sugar

1 medium egg

Frangipane

100g softened butter

100g caster sugar

40g plain flour

60g ground almonds

2 large eggs,  beaten

2 tbsp flaked almonds

To make the pastry, stir the flour and ground almonds together in a bowl.  Rub in the butter until it looks like fine breadcrumbs, stir in the sugar and then gradually add the egg until it comes together into a soft dough. 

Tip onto your lightly floured work surface, flatten to a disc and wrap in clingfilm. Chill this for at least 3 hours before using.

Preheat your oven to Gas 6/200ºC. Grease your 12 hole bun tin.

Roll out the pastry on a lightly floured surface to 3mm thick. Cut out discs using a 10cm pastry cutter, re-rolling if neccessary so you have 12 discs.

Line the prepared tin with the pastry.

Make the frangipane by beating together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.  Mix in the flour, add the beaten eggs and mix well. Now stir in the ground almonds.

Put about 1½tsp mincemeat into each pie case.  Don't be tempted to overfill as it can leak out when the pies are cooking. Spoon the frangipane over, or pipe if you prefer. Scatter with the flaked almonds.

Bake for 20 mins until the topping is golden, risen and set. Carefully remove from the tin onto a wire cooling rack. Serve dusted with icing sugar.