Rock Cakes

Today we made rock cakes. They're not the prettiest of cakes but they taste good and are loads of fun to make.

To make them you will need:

225g Self raising flour
75g Caster Sugar
1tsp Baking Powder
125g Unsalted Butter
150g Dried Fruit
1 Egg
1 Tbsp Milk
                                                                                    2 Tsp Vanilla Extract

Mix the flour, sugar and baking powder in a bowl and rub in the butter until the mixture looks like breadcrumbs, then mix in the dried fruit.

In a clean bowl, beat the egg and milk together with the vanilla extract.


Add the egg mixture to the dry ingredients and stir with a spoon until the mixture just comes together as a thick, lumpy dough. Add a teaspoon more milk if you really need it to make the mixture stick together.


Then divide the dough into small golf ball sized pieces and put on a greased tray.

Put in the oven at 180 degrees for 15 to 20 minutes until golden brown.
Leave them to cool and dust with icing sugar .
Then enjoy either on there own or with some jam and clotted cream.

Tortellini with Spinach and Ricotta

Today at Come Dine With Us we made Tortellini which was stuffed with ricotta and spinach.

Here are the ingredients:

Fresh pasta sheets

200g Spinach

200g Ricotta

30g Grated Parmesan

salt and Pepper

Firstly mix the ricotta, parmesan, salt and pepper and mix until smooth.

Then cook the spinach in a saucepan for a couple of minutes and add to the ricotta mix.

Then make small parcels by putting some of the ricotta and spinach on a pasta sheet and folding it and sealing around the edges with a fork.

We then put the parcels in a glass tray and poured a sage butter over them, simply made by melting butter and adding sage and pepper.

We then covered in foil and put in the oven at 180 degrees for 10 to 15 minutes.

Winter Salad 

We also made a wonderful winter salad with the following ingredients:

Red onion

Green cabbage

Grated carrots

Radish

Beetroot

Mange Tout

Spinach

All these were thinly sliced and put in a bowl.

We then made a dressing using:

Olive oil

Red wine vinegar

Two Garlic Cloves (crushed)

Dijon Mustard

Salt and Pepper

We mixed together all these ingredients to make the salad.

Here is the finished Tortellini with a winter salad.

The group really enjoyed the meal because of the interesting textures and flavors. 

This is a great meal on a busy day because it is quick but incredibly tasty and healthy.

Flippin' Pancakes

Its Pancake day and what better way to celebrate than the flip-a-pancake challenge.
The group made a deal: if you can flip your pancake you can eat it, what better motivation!

First we had to whip up a batter:

120g/4oz plain flour
pinch of salt
2 eggs
210ml/7fl oz skimmed milk
90ml water

First mix the flour and salt in a bowl then crack in the two eggs and beat into the flour.
Mix the milk and water together and gradually add to the flour and egg and mix until a smooth consistency.

Lightly grease a frying pan and pour in some of the batter. cook for about 45 seconds on one side then attempt to flip! or you could just use a palette knife to turn the pancakes but that would be to easy!

This mix should make 6 pancakes.
 Here are some of the group having a go at flipping their pancakes:

Fantastic flipping

 Not all of them went to plan but they still tasted good.

We topped our pancakes with the classic lemon and sugar but you can put whatever you like on them!

Have fun flippin'!

Happy Chinese New Year!

Last week was chinese new year so we decided to create a chinese feast to celebrate!

The group made vegetable noodles with chilli and ginger, egg fried rice, BBQ spare ribs and sweet chilli chicken wings.

The vegetable noodles were simple but tasty, here's how we did them:
 You will need:  Fresh Noodles
                        Soya Sauce
                        Chillies (We used medium hot red chillies)
                        Fresh Ginger
                        Fresh Garlic (2 cloves)
                        Chinese 5 spice
                        Beansprouts
                        Spring Onion
                        Pak Choi
                        Broccoli
                        Carrots
                        Waterchesnuts
Then:
Slice up all vegetables into strips or bitesize pieces, crush the garlic and grate the ginger.
Heat about 2 tspoons of oil in a wok and add the vegetables, chillies, ginger and garlic and cook for a two minutes whilst continually stirring.
Then add the soya sauce and chinese five spice then the noodles and cook for another two minutes.
Then serve!
This is quick, fresh and delicious and the group really enjoyed them!


The egg fried rice was really simple too: add cooked rice, peas and soya sauce to a preheated wok and pour in an already beaten egg. Then stir until the egg is cooked through.

Come Dine With Us has a little confession...the marinades for the ribs and chicken wings were shop bought but hey, we're a busy bunch and they still tasted incredible.

The Group tucking in after a hard days work!