Pitta bread pizza's

 I've not had pitta bread pizza's in years! they're something I always had at my friends house when we were younger, and we'd always make them ourselves which added to the fun :)
They're super easy to make and providing you have pitta breads, then you can usually make these with your store cupboard items!

Ingredients:

Pitta bread

tomato puree or left over tomato pasta sauce

grated cheese

oregano

optional - basil leaves

Method:
Spread the puree or sauce over the whole pitta bread. You could cut them in half if you like but i think the thickness is fine on a whole one! Grate some cheddar cheese and sprinkle over the pitta and puree. Sprinkle a few shakes of dried oregano onto the pizzas and a few basil leaves if you have them.
Put under a hot grill for 5-8 minutes, (or until the cheese is browned and bubbling).
And that's it!

Scott, myself and mum had these over the weekend and they really warmed us up on a cold afternoon! I'm sure if you have kids they'd also be great as I always loved putting them together and eating them when I was little!

Chocolate Chip Cookies

Whilst at home this weekend Scott and I baked gooey chocolate chip cookies and they were scrummy!

Usually when we decide to bake I end us baking and Scott fafs about, but this time he was very helpful and helped equally which made the biscuits/cookies extra special. Cookies are extra specially nice when their warm and the chocolate chips are still soft, and they remind me of break time in school where we'd all que to get the best warm cookies form the canteen!

Ingredients:

250g (9oz) plain flour 

1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda 

1/2 teaspoon salt 

170g (6oz) unsalted butter, melted 

200g (7oz) soft brown sugar 

100g (3.5oz) caster sugar 

1 tablespoon vanilla extract 

1 egg + 1 egg yolk 

250g (9oz) chocolate of your choice, chopped into small chunks

Optional - Desiccated Coconut  

Method:

Preheat your oven to 170°C / Gas mark 3-4. 

 In a big, dry bowl, sift your flour, bicarb & salt together. Set to one side.

In a separate bowl mix together your sugars & butter. 

Next beat in your eggs & vanilla extract.  Add to the dry mixture and stir thoroughly! you can add your chopped chocolate and nuts/dried fruits if you fancy (hazelnuts are good!!).

Line a baking sheet with greasproof paper and make small ball shapes out of the dough. Place on lined baking sheet quite spaced apart and cook for 10 - 13 minutes (until they are lightly bronzed at the edges). I sprinkled a little desiccated coconut on some but thats up too you!

Leave to cool on a wire rack (if you can!!)

I really like separating the yolk from the white!

I had mine once they had cooled slightly but were still soft and warm :) yum!

Scott was a big fan too and has devoured quite a few already :P...

A weekend at home..

I was lying in bed on Friday morning in Uni, and had not planned anything for the weekend. so I thought why not go for for the weekend?! It was a very spontaneous decision resulting in me packing like a maniac and hot and bothered-ly (new word) running to catch the next train at Leicester Station. But it was well worth it as I had a lovely few days with the family :) I was also glad to use a washing machine that dosnt charge me £2.50 to use each time i wash my clothes... Uni problems..

Anyway! i pulled my weight and made a lovely roast Lamb dinner for us on Sunday which was very scrummy, and went for a lovely walk with Scott, mum and the dogs.

I love the colourful orange carrot peelings! I roasted carrots and parsnips with butter, olive oil, and honey and they were DELICIOUS! Have I ever said that my favourite vegetable is a parsnip? If not i'm saying it now! Theres is no comparison to a overly roasted parsnip :)

I just drizzled a little olive oil over the lamb, seasoned it and added a few sprigs of rosemary from the garden!

Mum took a few snaps of us on the walk! This never happens.. I'm usually the irritating one that likes to take pictures of EVERYTHING ...
Scott and the dogs were quite excited to be walked ;)...

I really like this photo of Scott, and Ella running on ahead as she does :)

Molly (Seabear) patiently waiting until we turned around so she could carry her lead home ... this happens every time, and she refuses to walk unless we let her carry it :)

The girls and myself! I wasn't expecting to be snapped in my lovely painting coat and farmer wellies but this is the kind of terrible dog walking outfit I usually wear so theres no point kidding anyone I guess!

And lastly Molly basking in the delightful, stinky, Sheep poo ridden pool she manages to always find on any walk we go on....

Simple Brownies

Chocolate Brownies..... Need I say more?

They `re my ultimate cake, yes I have finally decided (for now at least) that brownies are my favoruite kind of cake. I've never been a massive sponge fan, and I'm defiantly a chocolate lover, so naturally I tend to dip towards brownies as my go-to cake when i'm out.

I've made brownies a few times myself, but never really found a recipe that worked quite right for me - until now people :)...

 Ingredients:

185g Butter

185g Dark Chocolate

85g Plain Flour

40g Cocoa Powder

100g chocolate (white,milk,or dark)

3 Large Eggs

275g Caster Sugar

Method

Melt the butter and dark chocolate in a heatproof bowl over some hot water (on the stove/hob) or in the microwave if you prefer. Leave the melted mixture to cool.

Preheat your oven Gas Mark 4, or 180C   Line the bottom of a 20cm square tin (or the nearest size you have).

Mix together the flour and cocoa powder. In a separate bowl mix together the eggs and caster sugar. It's best to use a hand mixer/machine so the mixture becomes thick and creamy.

Poor the egg/sugar mixture into the cooled chocolate and butter. Fold in gently (I hate this bit). Chop the 100g chocolate into chunks (I use a sharp thick knife on the chopping board to do this). Sprinkle over the mixture, along with the dry ingredients and again fold.

Poor carefully into your lined tin. I topped mine with a few chopped pistachio's! 

Bake for 25 minutes. (ours took a little longer as Scott kept opening the oven.... The mixture should be left a little gooey, but if its still wobbling when you take it form the oven, give it another 5 minutes or so!

This is the pretty marbling effect that happens when your 'gently' (Im so impatient with folding) the brownie mixture.

I drizzled a few chopped Pistachio nuts on the top for a little colour pop! But you could try and nut or dried fruit you fancied! Cranberries and freeze dried raspberries work great too.

And then it's ready :) Ideally you should leave the brownies to cool before eating as they do taste better that way and are a lot easier to cut!

Carrot and Coriander Soup

Just a quickie-

Here is one of my favourite soup recipes, its dead simple and one I make quite often.

Ingredients:

7 large carrots

1 large onion

chicken/vegetable stock (enough to cover the carrots and onions)

tsp dried coriander

1 tbsp butter

fresh coriander

salt & pepper

Method:

Chop the onions and sauté in butter until translucent. Whilst the onions are sautéing, chop the carrots and add them to the onions. Stir for 2-3 minutes and ensure carrots are coated in the butter. Pour over the stock, season and add the dried coriander. Cook on low until the carrots are soft (about 20 minutes) Remove from heat, add the fresh coriander and blend your soup. If the soup is to thick, you can thin it down with a little milk or cream, depending on how healthy your feeling....

Serve with a little chopped fresh coriander and soup bread and butter, because lets face it, what is soup with bread?!

Bagel Time

Well I've just finished my first week of university and I'm already experimenting with lots of options for breakfast lunch and dinner. I'm used to food shopping for my family, but food shopping for one is slightly trickier yet more exciting as I can choose anything I fancy (within budget of course) and eat when and whatever I like. Of course there are draw backs, I have to buy little and often opposed to one big shop, but that means I get more creative with the ingredients I already have. However, walking through the isles in Morrision's I was heavily tempted by the 5 for £1 bagel offer in the bakery section. Bagel's aren't something I regularly eat, but occasionally I get a craving for them, and this was was on of those times. It's probably due to the fact I've been watching the Great British Bake off on BBC iplayer where they've recently made bagels. Did you know they part boil the bagel before putting it in the oven ? This is apparently what gives them their chewy texture. But besides that little gem of information, I was once again influenced by TV and couldn't wait to have a bagel for breakfast.

 Scott stayed this weekend which was really lovely. We both had bagels, but with different spreads. I personally like Philadelphia and strawberry jam, I know how weird that sounds, but I once had it at a friends house and never looked back !!! Scott opted for strawberry jam and cheese... a combination also favoured by my grandparents on sandwiches, but that's another story.....

 I also like peanut butter (and when I'm in a really terrible mood, peanut butter and nutella, wow), and I also like to have it as a ham and salad sandwich. We toast ours but that again is optional!

 There is obviously no need for me to write a recipe for this, it was more a sort of inspiration for breakfast, as it can be quite monotonous to have the same breakfast everyday and sometimes you just need a little change. So bring on the bagels :)

Berry Custard Flan

It's now a standing joke on family meal night that where possible I like to add toffee sauce to everything. I mean I do make my own sauce and it is very tasty and everyone likes it, I just seem to try and pair it with everything ;)

So once again this dessert was paired with a lovely homemade toffee sauce. The beautiful thing about this dessert is that it looks so pretty and tastes very yummy, but requires very little skill or effort, which is very handy when you've been paying more attention to the main course :)

This is similar to a dessert I've already posted except I changed the cream to custard and chose berries instead of strawberries ....

Ingredients:
1 store bought flan case.
custard - I used birds custard powder and made it thicker than the instructions said but you could be fancy and make your own
your jam of choice
a selection of berries or your favourite seasonal fruit.

Method:
Cook the custard according to the instructions / your recipe.  Remember to make it thicker than usual as it will need to set and hold it's shape. Place in the fridge to set and cool. (roughly and hour).
Spread an even layer of jam on the flan case, this I like to call the moist maker like on friends with the turkey sandwich episode? anyone ? no, ok...
Now spread/pour on the cold custard and return to the fridge to set again, roughly half an hour or so.
Now your flan is ready to decorate s you wish. I used raspberries, blueberries and red currents but you can choose what you like.
Layer them on top of the custard and that is it!

TOFFEE SAUCE.
1 large knob butter
3 tablespoons soft dark brown sugar
1/2 pint double cream.
 Melt the butter in pan, add the sugar, gently stirring, and then add the cream. Do not over cook, but make sure the sugar is dissolved.  I serve my toffee sauce warm so it is runny as it goes thicker is cool.

 It's a little messy to dish up, but I think that was because my custard wasn't quite thick enough, so be careful not to make it too runny..

Lastly Alfred was being a little pain as I was photographing the dessert, cheeky little worm :)

Moroccan Chicken One Pot

Officially the, or at least one of the nicest stews/evening meals I think I've ever made. I honestly can't describe how good this was, but we had it for family meal night, and the whole family were in love with it. maybe it was because it was the last family meal night before I go to uni, or maybe it was just that good, but something when on tonight and this was awesome.

I was inspired by the front cover of good Food magazine. It's a sort of Moroccan stew/one pot dish which I adapted in my own way.

I don't usually document savoury dishes as often as i do sweet on here as they are much harder to photograph, and I'm not the best photographer!! But this was so tasty I felt it had to be shared with you.

ingredient's: (my version of the good food dish)

4-6 chicken breasts

1 Tbsp olive oil

2 onions

4 tomato's

1 tin chopped tomato's

ginger for grating

3 garlic cloves or a dessert spoon of garlic puree

1 tsp turmeric

1 desert spoon of cumin,coriander 

1 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp chilli flakes

1 large butternut squash

1/2 bag thinly chopped cabbage (obviously you can chop your own they were just reduced in Tesco)

 1pt chicken stock

 2 tbsp vinegar (red wine or cider)

1 tablespoon honey

handful of dries cranberries.

method:

In a frying pan with the olive oil, brown both sides of the chicken breasts, and then set to one side. With the remaining oil in the same pan, add the onions and tomatoes (I blitzed mine in a food processor to form a sort of paste, but you could chop them finely if you don't have one). Add the grated ginger and the garlic. return the chicken to the dish and add the chopped tomato's and chicken stock. now add the vinegar and honey. Now add your spices (turmeric,cumin,chilli flakes,and coriander. chop the butternut squash into pieces (small-medium) and add to the dish. season and cook in the oven for about 2 hours on gas mark 3-4. 

20 mins before serving add the chopped cabbage, and when serving add the cranberries.

 I served our with pan fried mange-tout with salt and pepper, and mash potato. It was a real hit and so comforting on a cold September evening :) I also added a few leaves of mint because once again I like to add mint to EVERYTHING, and it also added a nice green colour.

 I hope you enjoy as much as we all did at home!

BLT - Scott and Beth Style

You cant beat a good old BLT. For those of you who don't know what a BLT is (I say this as my Grandad didn't have the faintest idea), a BLT is one of the world's yummiest sandwich consisting of Bacon, lettuce and tomato's. I like to have my with freshly cooked warm bacon but it can be served hot or cold. Scott and I do not tend to eat sandwich's for lunch very often, we usually prefer picking at random things in the fridge and making an odd combination of left overs and yummy things, but today we fancied a sandwich, and this one in particular. Another favourite of ours in Brie and cranberry, it's just so yummy!!!But like i said, today was BLT day so this was how we did it-

Ingredients:

French baguette, cheesy bread, whatever floats your boat.

2-3 pieces of bacon per person (we like smoked bacon)

1 large or two small tomato's per person

lettuce of your choice - We had baby leaf but something crunchy like baby gem would work well too.

butter

optional - tomato chutney

method:

Not that I really need to explain how to make a sandwich, it's more of a food inspiration for lunch times, but for those with very basic food knowledge (and you have to start somewhere, actually we were taught how to make a sandwich in cookery class at school one year, so it's not so silly!?)

cut open your bread and butter both sides. If you are using chutney you can spread that on now before the sandwich gets full of the other fillings.

Fry your bacon. I usually cut the rind off before cooking as Scott hates the fat, and I'm not a big fan either unless it's frazzled towards an inch of it''s life. Once the bacon is cooked, add it to the bread straight away, this will gently heat the bread and melt the butter which is extra yummy. Chop your tomato thinly and layer on the side of bread that doesn't have the bacon. now layer on the lettuce and 'sanwhich' it all together. We had to use cocktail sticks as we had overfilled (in a good way) our sandwiches and they were collapsing and leaking filling onto our laps :)

 And that's it! A very simple yet extra tasty option for lunch :)

Giving it a go - Apple Lattice Pie

I have never been any good at pies. it's usually the pastry where I tend to fall, but even when that goes right I can never guarantee success with the filling ! This pie however (with the sneaky aid of shop bought pastry)  was pretty darn good to be honest. I've never made a lattice pie before (the ones that look like weaving on the top) but was heavily influenced by a couple of American food blogs and decided it was finally time....

I chose apple and ginger as it's not quite blackberry season, and Tesco don't sell fresh blackcurrants at the minute.

I've also recently made a pumpkin pie, but my family devoured it before I had time to photograph it, so I will have to make that again as it was very worth posting on here!

ingredient's:

1 pack shortcrust pastry (or you could be good and make your own)

5 cooking apples

fresh ginger

2 tablespoons caster or brown sugar

sprinkle of cinnamon

egg yolk for brushing over the top

Method

Roll our your pastry and place it into your desired oven proof dish. scrape away the excess pastry from the rim and chill in the fridge whilst you prepare your apples. Keep the excess ass you'll need it for the lattice part..

preheat oven to gas mark 6.

Cut up your apples into chunks. This part is totally your call - some people like the apple thinner, some chunky, some mushy some firm etc.

I like some chunky firm pieces but also a nice bit of oozy apple.

Stew your apple in a pan along with the sugar and cinnamon, you may need to add a dessert spoon of water to stop the apple sticking to the pan initially. I then grated the fresh ginger into the apple mixture and left to simmer for a few minutes. If you want a few chunky pieces in the pie hold a few back on a little plate and add them to the mixture once the rest have almost cooked.

I put my apples into a bowl and left them to cool before adding them to the pastry.

once the apples have cooled, add them the prepared pastry dish.

Now roll out the remaining pastry, and cut thin slices (long enough to cover the top of the pie).

If your having trouble, there are plenty of videos on you tube showing how to do this part). Brush the top pastry with egg yolk for colour, and you can always sprinkle a little more sugar on here too.

once you've finished preparing your pie it's ready for the oven.

Cook for about 30 - 40 mins, depending on how browned you like it.

And that's it!

 Scott and I had our pie with clotted cream, and my grandparents and dad enjoyed theirs with custard!

I feel all autumny recently as the weather has changed so quickly, and i'm already enjoying bringing out the winter socks, blankets and warming puddings :)

Frozen chocolate banana's

I have a new food obsession, again....

These frozen chocolate banana's are too die for, honestly, I can't describe how delicious they are (providing you like chocolate and bananas?!)

I was inspired to make some after finding them on this blog 'Smile and wave' and I couldn't wait to give them a go :) Scott absolutely hates banana's so unfortunately these weren't to his taste, but if your a banana freak like me then I can guarantee you will think these are awesome! They are also dead easy to make (a little messy) and use a lot of the ingredients I used for my Dipped chocolate ice cream cones recipe!

What you will need:

Banana's (3-4 ripe ones)

lolly pop sticks/ cake pop sticks

200g milk, dark or white chocolate

nuts, sprinkles, m&m's, marshmallows, dessicated coconut etc

 Method:
Divide you banana's into three parts per banana, roughly 3 inches each.
Now insert your lolly pop stick about 3/4 of the way up each banana.
Lay your banana's on a sheet of baking tray paper, and freeze for 2-3 hours (or overnight).

Melt your chocolate ( I use the hot water and stove method) until fully melted. Set aside for a minute or too to almost cool. While waiting you can start chopping nuts , or making small  piles of toppings.

Now there are two ways for the next step, you can either dunk the bananas into the chocolate, and then into the toppings, or you can spoon the chocolate on and then sprinkle to toppings over that way. I have to say either way is quite messy, but I preferred spooning the chocolate on.

Now place back onto the baking tray paper and freeze for about 20 minutes, or until the chocolate has set. And that's it! 

 This picture makes me giggle, it reminds me of Stonehenge almost?!

 I prefer the chopped coconut and dark chocolate version :)

 Here is a sneak peak of the chopping board I used to add the toppings with - As you can see  I'm a messy cook, but these were well worth the spilt chocolate for!