Spicy Apple Sandwich

I love the sound of this recipe and love all things that involve apple and cinnamon..

I think I actually imagined this to be made with more of a sponge rather than a pastry. I made up the pastry and rolled out half of it to line a cake tin. I had halved this and was using a 6 inch cake tin..

I needed 2 apples for this and perhaps could’ve made more of an effort to place them in some sort of a pretty design but I just kind of throw them on top of the pastry!

Then I sprinkled over the sugar and cinnamon..

Then that was topped with the rest of the pastry..

An hour and a quarter seemed like an awfully long time for this to cook, but even after all that time it was just a light golden..

I have to say this smells amazing! I cut into quarters and probably should’ve picked up some cream to have with it..

So I know this doesn’t looking particularly exciting but it tastes pretty good! The pastry is nice and crisp but some bits are all sticky from the apples and sugar which is fab. The filling is soft and tastes great!

Would I make this again? Yes!

Ham Loaf

I think this is one of those recipes that anyone would struggle to make look appetising, I am actually a bit embarrassed to actually post any photos of this one!!

I had decided to make this with a can of ham! I just felt that was fitting with this book, and can imagine that’s what the recipe intends! I decided to blitz that in a food processor for a few seconds, I think too long and I would’ve ended up with a mush!

The ham I had weighed 200g so I had to try reduce everything else, but I actually ended up using a whole onion, 2oz of oats and the whole egg in an effort to bulk this up..

All mixed together and then pressed into a tin. Really doesn’t look great at this point..

After about 40 minutes it doesn’t really look much better, but it does smell quite nice! Maybe I’m just so hungry that I’d say that about anything..

I think because I had used significantly less meat compared to the other ingredients, my loaf has ended up a tad soft and kind of falls apart a bit too easily..

Well I have to say this tastes way way better than it looks! It’s really soft and hasn’t kept its shape at all but we did eat the lot!

Would I make this again? Even though we did eat it all I don’t think I’d bother making again!

Beef and Mushroom Casserole

It’s definitely casserole weather, and this is my favourite kind of recipe, slow cooked all in the one pot…

Annoyingly the shop I was in didn’t have baby onions, and then when I got home I realised I had forgotten the carrots! So I just used 2 large onions sliced and then I used a whole turnip to replace the carrots.

Then I cut my meat into chunks before rereading the recipe and realising it says strips! Pretty sure that’s not essential!! So the meat was dipped in the seasoned flour and then fried and then into the casserole..

Then I fried the vegetables and perhaps my turnips were in slightly too big slices..

Once they were starting to brown I transferred to the casserole with the mushrooms. Then I cooked the flour in the pan, added the stock and then once it had been boiling for a few minutes it was poured into the casserole..

So after what ended up being nearly 3 hours it was looking pretty good to me!

The meat was almost falling apart, and the turnips had kept their shape mostly but were lovely and soft, so maybe it was a good thing I’d kept them as larger slices!

This was delicious! I’m not the biggest fan of turnip and don’t cook it much, but in this it was sooo good! It almost had a slight sweetness to it that was good. Overall this was well worth the wait!

Would I make this again? definitely..

Apple Snowballs

I do love the name of this recipe, and think it’s the perfect sounding pudding for the colder months!

First thing I did was prepare the apples, and its not easy scooping out the cores! I don’t have an apple corer so had to chop them out! Then the apples went into the sugary water to simmer, although I took my eye off them for a bit and ended up boiling a bit too furiously! After only a matter of minutes they had started to disintegrate, and had actually fallen apart!

I had to use the jam to stick them back together!

I had used my homemade rhubarb and ginger jam for this.

So then I started with the meringue, and think I’m going wrong somewhere. It looked lovely and shiny when the egg whites had been whisked until stiff and then the sugar whisked in. Then it goes all grainy when I folded in the sugar. Was thinking I should’ve stopped after I’d whisked in the sugar. Anyway that was spread round the apples..

After just over 15 minutes they were a light golden brown..

Maybe a perhaps too brown? Anyway I managed to successfully lift them on to a plate and this was pudding..

This was great! The meringue is soft, but not too soft, and just the right level of sweetness. The apples are nice and soft and they are sharp but that combined with the jam and meringue is pretty great! Overall another fab recipe!

Would I make this again? Yes!

Banana Surprise with Jam Sauce

There’s a few slighty odd banana recipes in this book, weirdly bananas features a bit too often in some savoury dishes which is hard to get used to! Thankfully this is a sweet recipe..

So I think my husband and daughter are a bit wary when I suggest a banana recipe so I was making this just for me! So I quartered everything, and I have a Yorkshire pudding tin which I put in the oven to heat up with some butter in it.

Then I poured in the mixed up batter..

I sliced my banana rather than cut in half crosswise and then lengthwise, then dropped the pieces into the batter..

This went back into the hot oven, and rather than leave for 45 minutes like the recipe suggests, I kept a much closer eye on it. After 15 minutes it was looking really puffed up and starting to golden, so I left for about another 10 minutes, and by then was looking pretty impressive..

It came out of the tin very easily and smells so good!

I was going to make a jam sauce but the suggested recipe needs arrowroot which I don’t have, so I just heated up some jam and kind of drizzled over it..

So this was my pudding and I blooming loved it!! It’s basically a banana Yorkshire pudding with jam, but it really is great! I was wishing I’d made more even just for me!

Would I make this again? Yes, loved it!

Roast Mock Duck

There’s no actual duck in this recipe and bit of an unusal recipe this one…

I went off to the butcher to get the flank steak which I was told is just a braising steak, so bought 1lb to make for the three of us.

I bashed the steaks out and lined a casserole pot with half of them..

Then I mixed up the herbs and only had purple basil!

When the recipe says 1 tbsp of green pepper I wasn’t sure if this is meant to be a chilli pepper or a regular large pepper. I had one green pepper in the fridge and rather than just use half a tablespoon of that I threw the whole thing in..

The stuffing mix was then spread over the steak in the casserole..

Then the rest of the bashed steak was placed on top..

Finally I poured over the stock, covered and put in the oven for about an hour and a half, and then another 30 minutes with the lid off.

After all that time and especially after the time with the lid off, the meat looks a little bit dried out..

Doesn’t really look anything like a duck so am still not seeing the relevance of the title! It does cut up really easily, despite the meat looking all dry on the top it just falls apart.

The steak underneath is much softer as you would expect!

I couldn’t decide what to have with this, and ended up just making some rice..

So it does all look a bit dry but on eating is actually moist in places! The stuffing and the meat on then bottom are lovely and soft and actually is pretty good combined with the drier meat on top. I have to admit I was disappointed when I took this out of the oven but yet again tastes way way better than it looks and the three of us ate the lot!

Would I make this again? Yes!

Lamb Cutlets Sautes

We don’t normally have lamb as often as twice in one week but I’d stocked up on lamb at the butcher recently and it was this or beans on toast for tea..

So not very many ingredients involved in this, and was also thinking I hadn’t fried something in butter for a while!

I had actually bought a rack of lamb from the butcher and asked them to slice into cutlets for me..

So they went into a pan with rather a lot of butter..

Each one was turned over after a few minutes and then sprinkled with sugar..

Once the sugary sides of the lamb hit the buttery pan it all starts to get nice and sticky..

I do think this is perhaps a bit too much cooking for these, by the time both sides have had 3-4 minutes caramelising they’ve been cooking sometime. Have to admit though, they do look quite good..

So it says to serve with a cutlet frill, which I am assuming is the wee white thing that is sometimes served in the top of the bone! Unfortunately I am all out of them..

We just had these with some veg, and I don’t think I’ve seen my daughter so excited over a cut of meat! We all loved the caramelised cutlets, and although I was worried they’d been overcooked they were actually still quite soft.

There’s not much eating on one of these and we scoffed these in record time!

Would I make these again? Yes!

Ham Piggies

Sounds odd and looks a bit odd and is not something I’d ever think to do with a sausage but weirdly I was actually looking forward to this..

I’ve still not mastered the art of cutting photos and putting them together so have taken a photo of the full page!

So for this I was using some good quality chipolata sausages and I didn’t have French, only English mustard, and the chutney I have in the fridge is rhubarb chutney, interesting combinations going on!!

So spread some mustard and chutney onto the ham..

Then topped that with some cheese..

As the chipolatas are quite thin I decided to put two into each parcel..

Wrapped up and then they are ready for the oven..

After 30 minutes the ham was looked a tad browned round the edges and a lot of the stuff inside had started to ooze out..

So I know this looks terrible, but I’d challenge anyway to make this look appealing! I have to say the smell is quite good and my daughter walked into the kitchen just as I was pulling these out of the oven and she said they looked yummy!!

This couldn’t really be classed as high end cooking and probably won’t appeal to many (if anyone) but I actually quite liked this! The chutney and mustard are great and I’m glad I used decent sausages!!

Would I make this again? Possibly!

Chantille Sponge

I imagine this to be a really light sponge cake, I tried to search for other recipes but just kept finding recipes for chantilly cream sponges! The name conjours up a light fluffy delicate cake, but after reading the ingredients and seeing the flour to butter and sugar ratio I’m not so sure it will be that light…

First off I creamed the butter and sugar..

Then added the eggs and flour. It’s hard to say if it’s too dry at this stage, I thought it seemed ok so didn’t add any milk..

Then I added the almonds and walnuts..

I opted to use my multicoloured cherries, and 1 oz of Angelica actually works out as quite a lot! Think it’s going to be a colourful cake!

The cherries and Angelica are all added, and usually when making a cake with cherries I coat them in flour before gently stirring in to avoid sinkage. For this I just added them as they are, the cake mix feels quite thick so hoping they will stay mixed through ok and not all sink to the bottom..

After an hour and 15 minutes is a nice dark golden colour and fairly well risen..

I left it to cool slightly before trying. It’s certainly got quite a bit of a crust! Then inside it is a bit crumbly, I maybe should’ve added some milk!

Well I love the crust and all the walnuts and fruit have stayed well distributed which is good! Yes it’s not the light airy sponge I had imagined but it’s still really good and brilliant with a cup of tea! I love the cherries and Angelica through it and the walnuts add a nice crunch.

Would I make this again? Yes!

Lemon Delicious

I do love the name of this recipe and conjours up images of a lovely lemony sponge like pudding…

As you can see the recipe says this should turn out as a sponge with sauce underneath, I do quite like a self saucing pudding!!

It’s quite an unusal recipe I think, really small amount of butter to sugar ratio which made it harder to cream together..

Then adding the flour made it even harder to mix,

Finally adding the lemon rind and juice gives the mixture a bit of wetness..

Next I added the egg yolks and milk which then turns the mixture really wet, it almost feels too wet and isn’t going to turn out too well..

I got my wee sous chef to help with the next stage! We whisked the egg whites and then folded them into the mix..

So the mixture was gently poured into a pie dish and into the oven..

I checked on it after 45 minutes and was looking a bit pale and still felt a bit soft, so I left for the full hour and by then it looked and felt ready..

So I was expecting a sponge with a little bit of a sauce at the bottom, but it didn’t quite turn out like that!

It’s maybe not too easy to see from my photo but it’s like the top half of it is sponge and the bottom half is like what can only be described as lemon scrambled egg!! It really doesn’t look pretty when spooned out into a plate..

Appearances aside it is actually delicious!! The spongy bit is really lovely and the weird eggy layer is actually quite nice, it’s just not the most pleasant consitency!! We did all finish it, even my daughter enjoyed it! I just don’t think it turned out quite right and wonder if I had cooked it even longer would it have been more sponge and less scrambled egg!!

Would I make this again? Not sure, did enjoy it but it’s not quite turned out like I’d hoped!