Category / Baking

Baking Christmas Recipe

Festive Sausage Rolls

I think everyone that I know loves sausage rolls, especially at parties. I make a batch of rolls quite often and keep them in my freezer, so I always have something handy in a party emergency! I use ready rolled shop bought puff pastry as it works very well and is easy and cheap to buy. I buy the one without butter so it can work for vegans too. 

If you want vegan rolls, I use Richmond’s meat-free sausages for the filling and add my own seasoning in the same way as I do use pork sausages. I also seal and glaze them with soya milk. 

I like to jazz up my filling by adding a few spices or fresh herbs. At Christmas time I put a little cranberry sauce in the mixture to add some festive flavours. Sausage rolls are so versatile so get inventive and come up with your own ideas. 

Ingredients 

    • One pack ready to roll puff pastry 
    • One beaten egg 
    • One pack of pork/meat-free sausages 
    • Handful finely chopped fresh parsley 
    • 1 Tbs cranberry sauce 
    • 1 tsp garlic puree 
    • Salt and pepper

    Method 

    Unroll the pastry and cut it into half along the long side.

    Squeeze the sausages out of the skins and place in a bowl. Mix in the other ingredients and then lay the mixture along the middle of each length of pastry. 

    Brush the pastry with beaten egg and then roll the pastry over the filling and seal the edges well. I use a fork to press the seam together to seal.

    Slice into the size rolls you prefer, snip the top of each roll with scissors or slash with a sharp knife.

    Brush well with egg and then bake in a 200c oven for about twenty minutes or until puffed up and golden.  

    Baking Recipe Yorkshire

    Rhubarb and Custard Cheesecake

    I developed this recipe for this year’s Rhubarb Festival in Wakefield. It combines all the classic elements we think of around rhubarb and its pairings. Rhubarb and custard is a great combination and works really well in this dessert. Thanks to Dave G. for encouraging me to post this recipe!

    Ingredients

    Base

    • 300g custard cream Biscuits (crushed)
    • 85g melted butter.

    Cheese Filling

    • 600g full fat cream cheese
    • 60g icing sugar.
    • 300g double cream
    • 400g rhubarb

    Creme Diplomat

    • 6 egg yolk
    • 35g custard powder
    • 75g caster sugar
    • 1 tsp vanilla extract
    • 1 Tbs agar agar
    • 450 ml milk
    • 100 ml double cream

    Rhubarb Puree

    • 400g rhubarb sliced.
    • 200g caster Sugar
    • Juices of an orange

    Jelly

    • Sieved Liquid from puree.
    • 1 Tbs arrowroot
    • Half tsp agar agar
    • Red food colour
    • 1 Tbs aperol (optional)

    Method

    Mix melted butter and crushed biscuits together and press into a greased tin lined with acetate collar. Chill in fridge.

    Gently poach the rhubarb in a pan with the sugar and orange juice. Drain off the fruit and conserve the liquid.

    To make the crème diplomat, whisk egg yolks, sugar, custard powder and vanilla in a large bowl. Bring the milk to a boil and pour over the egg mixture stirring constantly. Return to pan and bring to a boil, mix the agar agar with a little water and stir into the pan. Tip the custard into the bowl. Chill in the fridge.

    Whip the double cream and mix into the custard once the custard is cold.

    Beat the cream cheese, cream, and icing sugar together. Stir through the cooked and cooled rhubarb. Chill in the fridge.

    In a pan bring the rhubarb liquor to a boil, add a bit of food colour. Mix the arrowroot and agar with a little water to make a slurry. Add slurry to the liquor and stir it through, remove from the heat and add the aperol. Allow to cool and thicken.

    Assembly.

    Spread the rhubarb cheese mixture over the biscuit base and smooth the top.

    Pour over the Diplomat cream and smooth the top.

    Pour over the jelly and allow to set in the fridge.

    Baking Christmas Recipe

    Vegan Wellington

    I made this recipe as a main dish for our Vegan daughters Christmas meal. The pastry I made from scratch but most shop bought Puff Pastry is vegan so its easy to use that too.This is what I did.

    Pastry

    Ingredients

    250g strong white bread flour

    200g Vegan block (must be hard/solid, I bought mine from Sainsbury)

    1 Tsp lemon Juice

    1 tsp salt

    150ml chilled water

    (extra flour for dusting/ rolling)

    Soya milk (for brushing to seal and glaze)

    Method

    Pre heat oven 20 210c

    Place flour, salt, lemon juice into a mixing bowl. Chop the vegan block into dice and add to the flour. Stir it around to coat with flour. Add about two thirds of the water and mix to form a soft dough, add more of the water if needed. At this point we do not want to blend the vegan block into the flour. Just ball it all up with cold hands, wrap in film and place in th fridge for half an hour.

    Remove from fridge onto a well floured surface and roll out to about an A4 rectangle. keep dusting the pin and surface to stop it sticking. Keep the edges neat. Fold the top third down and the bottom third up to cover the top. Wrap in film and chill for half an hour.

    Repeat the above twice more. Then keep in the fridge while you prepare the filling.

    Filling

    1 peeled and chopped onion

    3 Portobello mushrooms sliced

    1 Tbs oil

    1 tsp Marmite

    salt and pepper

    Half a peeled and diced butternut squash

    2 sweet potatoes unpeeled and diced

    1 pouch cooked lentils

    1 pouched cooked chestnuts (chopped roughly)

    2 tsp chia seeds

    1 cup pumpkin seeds

    1 grated nutmeg

    fresh sage and rosemary chopped

    zest and juice of 1 orange

    1 Tsp English mustard

    2 Tbs balsamic vinegar

    1 small jar cranberry sauce

    Method

    Preheat oven to 180c

    Soften the onions and mushrooms in a frying pan in the oil, add marmite and salt and pepper.

    Roast the butternut squash and the sweet potato until tender.

    Remove from the oven and place into a large mixing bowl, add the onion and mushroom mixture and all the other ingredients. Stir well and chill.

    Assembly

    Remove the pastry from the fridge and roll out to a large rectangle about 5 mm thick. Using a pizza roller cut the pastry into two strips horizontally. The base bout a third of the pastry and the top about two thirds.

    Place the base pastry on a greaseproof sheet on a baking sheet.

    Mound the filling along the pastry leaving a cm uncovered all the way around.(a margin) Spread the cranberry sauce on top.

    Brush the pastry margin with soya milk and the lay the top pastry over everything. Press down well to join the bottom pastry to the top and crimp with your fingers and a thumb using both hands. Brush the whole thing with soya milk and place back in the fridge to chill for about half an hour. Brush again with soya milk and bake for about 40 minutes until golden and puffed up. Any bits of pastry left can be place on the wellington before cooking as decorations.

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    Baking Christmas Recipe

    Yule Log

    The Yule log or Buche de Noel is a traditional Christmas bake. Going back many centuries the Yule Log was an actual log felled at the time of the Winter Solstice when days were short and cold and at Yule time a bit of warmth from an open fire was something everyone looked forward to. This cake is decorated to resemble a log and is quite easy and fun to make.

    It comprises as Genoese style cake baked on a flat sheet and rolled prior o being filled so that it remembers to be a log shape. It is then filled with either whipped double cream, buttercream or chocolate ganache. The final stage is to cover the filled cake with chocolate ganache and a sprinkling of snow (icing sugar) and a sprig of holly.

    I

    Recipe

    Sponge

    3 Eggs

    75g caster sugar

    70g plain flour

    20g cocoa

    (1 Tbs caster sugar and cocoa mixed together for dusting)

    Method

    Grease a 26cm x 36cm baking tray and line the bottom with greaseproof paper. Preheat oven to 190c.

    In a large bowl mix the eggs and the sugar with an electric mixer until very light, frothy and doubled in size. Combine the flour and cocoa and sift over the egg mixture. Using a large metal spoon carefully fold in the flour and cocoa making sure not to deflate the mixture, so be gentle. Por the batter into the tray and bake for about 8 minutes and remove from the oven.

    Sprinkle the cocoa and sugar onto a sheet of clean greaseproof paper and invert the sponge on to it. peel off the paper it has been cooked on and discard it.

    with a blunt knife run a line (do not cut right through the sponge) 2 cm in from one of the short ends. and roll it up with the fresh paper rolled inside it. Leave it to cool completely.

    Ganache

    250ml double cream

    250 g dark chocolate

    In a medium pan warm the cream a tiny bit with the chocolate, just enough to melt the chocolate and then stir it all together. Leave to cool and set to the consistency of soft butter.

    Assembly

    Unroll the sponge and fill with a smooth layer of a filling of your choice. Roll the sponge back up and cover with the ganache. use a fork or the back of a knife to give a log like appearance. Dust with a little icing sugar.

    Baking Caravan Blog September 2020

    Blog Day 15, Unicorns

    Day 15, getting there readers, this blog is drawing towards its end, we have only a few more days then we head home once again. The weather did exactly what had been forecast and it hammered it down. There is something rather nice about being tucked up under a tin roof with the sound of wind and rain gusting about outside, I am not even kidding, it is cosy! I talked about September birthdays yesterday and how there seems to be an abundance of them. Our granddaughter Silke is four on September 25th. Each year I try to make her a decent cake, having been on The Great British Bake Off it is to be expected of me. Every year I fail. Its always because I am away from home, in the caravan. This year I forgot all my tools bar some nozzles. Due to the rule of 6 she cant have a party so we only needed a little something. Challenge was on to make something out of shop bought cake and icing using whatever I could fashion as tools!

    Kit piping

    Birthday girls mum is my eldest daughter Katharine aka Kit. Here you see we have bought a red velvet and vegan lemon cakes from the supermarket. Paul Hollywood detests even a shop bought sprinkle lol! We split the cakes and stacked them and then we start to cover them in buttercream from a tub.

    Skewer as a paintbrush

    We needed to smooth the buttercream around and an top of the cake. To do this I found a bit of laminated cardboard with enough flexibility to cope. Normally I would use a turntable but not one to be had or a lazy Susan so we just had to cope. If I had longer to chill the layers in a fridge it would have been better but birthday girls was only out of the house a short time and the cake is a surprise (surprise to me too as to how it will look in the end). For the eyes and mouth I just dragged a skewer with edible colour on the tip and hoped for the best. Lopsided if you look closely!

    Beautiful happy Nicu performing on cue

    With the help of my nozzles that I had packed we frosted up a mane and tail. Trusty glitter sprays are always with me so they glam things up a bit. I had made the horn, ears, rainbow and letters at home using edible modelling paste and had sprayed and hand painted those so they make it look a bit better.

    2 of my beauties!
    Its OK

    So that done we hid the cake in a cool place ready for the next day. We wrapped up some presents and John and I made our way back to the campsite. Fortunately in Brighton there is no shortage of buses and we only had to wait a couple of minutes with the rain thrashing down everywhere.

    A quick gallop over the field in the park once off the bus and I was warm and dry with a glass of plonk once again.

    Cheers

    Remember the Elkie Brookes song, Sunshine After the Rain? well within ten minutes of the last photo we had a double rainbow!! Quite apt since we are in rainbow Brighton and I had just done the rainbow unicorn cake, all well with the world!

    Here endeth day 15, thanks for reading and same time same place tomorrow!

    Baking Caravan Blog September 2020 GBBO Visits

    Caravan Blog: Day 6

    Eggs Benedict

    How do you like your eggs in the morning? I like mine with a smile! That’s how the song goes. Well to start our day off with an energy boost I made eggs benedict, first time ever. Terry showed me the ropes as it is his regular brekkie. Very delish. it is a toasted muffin, or in our case sliced bread with grilled bacon, poached eggs and a dollop of hollondaise sauce. terry likes to add a bit of parmesan and a trimming of green herbs, we used parsley and that is it. Apparently it was invented by a chef in the 1860’s for a Mrs Benedict who was fed up of bacon and eggs. We cheated (camping allowed) and used a packet of hollondaise but I did learn a crafty trick with the poached eggs. Terry cracked each one into cling film draped over a cup and made a little bag containing each egg, twisted secure at the top. All the eggs went in the pan at the same time for three minutes, and hey presto, perfect poached eggs!

    The reason we wanted a hefty breakfast was we were going to walk along the Malverns. We set off in the car and found a place to park up and began the climb along the tops. very hot and very beautiful. I decided to take Terrys little dog Meg and wait it out in the shade while John and Terry went up to the beacon. It was really grand!

    Malvern Selfie

    We headed back to the caravan and camping club site at Malvern where we were pitched, had a shower and cuppa and then headed off to a farm shop that had been recommended to us. Clive fruit farm – it was on the edge of Upton on Severn. We had decided on a BBQ for tea so we bought what we fancied from the butchers department. I spied a big barrel of what was called Wobble Juice so decided it was too interesting a name to ignore. Scrumpy pressed on the farm! I bought some to take back to the caravan, well it had to be done! We had an ice cream and headed back to site.

    John fired up the charcoal BBQ and I assembled the Safari Chef 2 Cadac. We had lamb burgers, sausages (of course) and I skewered up some pork for kebabs, which were doused in the wobble juice! It was a real feast and the evening was still warm and sunny.

    I used up some left over mash and transformed them into potato cakes, I just added plain flour, goat cheese and spices. I used the cadac to heat them up and they got a fab crusty bottom on them!

    We also had afters! remember all those Elgar’s apples? Terry used some up and made apple cream horns with from scratch puff pastry, hey how about that then!!

    What a great finale to our few days at Malvern. We really have had the best time. To top it off the new bakers for The Great British Bake Off 2020 were announced so BBC Hereford and Worcester called us up during our BBQ to chat on air about the bake off, icing on the cake

    Baking Caravan Blog September 2020 Visits

    Caravan Blog: Day 5

    Day five of my travel blog already. As I mentioned yesterday Terry from my Bake Off year joined us on the campsite here at Malvern Hills. We had a great site based first day with him but I had a visit lined up for us today. I had started to follow a patisserie wholesaler on Instagram, just because their beautiful wares had taken my eye. I have always been in awe of anyone that can make the patisserie that the french are renowned for. I discovered that the company is in Cheltenham just a half hours drive from the campsite. They agreed to show us their work and premises so off we went to find them.

    When we arrived we were welcomed by Bee and she gowned us up to make us Covid safe and we went in and were introduced to her husband Xavier the Patissier. Born near Geneva he moved to the UK aged twenty and worked in the likes of the Ivy and Harrods, where he met Bee. Ten years ago they set up The Patisserie Box and supply to the wholesale market. Like everyone they have been hit hard by the pandemic but are up and running now and trying to adapt the the changing world.

    Here we are with Xavier who shows us how to make the most delicious chocolate mousse with a hard to spell almondy biscuit base. I was mesmerised by the beauty of everything they made and was really delighted when we were gifted a few items to take away with us to sample back at the site.

    Team of Four

    Here is the link to their website https://www.thepatisseriebox.com/ I suggested they apply for Bake Off The Professionals and they told us they have been approached a few times but can’t afford to close down their unit for the length of time filming would take, shame as they are great!

    Once back on site we settled down to relax and just enjoy the sunshine. It was so hot, everyone was out doing their own thing which mostly seemed to involve a BBQ and cold drinks. Our little trio plus Meg the dog had other plans for supper on a really hot day you have got to have some steak pie and mash, of course you do!! It was Terry’s turn to do the hospitality and he made a de constructed steak pie, the pastry was made from scratch, puff too! It was exceptional, as you can see I almost forgot to take a photo as we tucked right in, so excuse the half eaten potato tower!

    Our plans for tomorrow include a walk up and along the Malverns and a trip into Upton on Severn. It will be our last night at the Malvern site and we are going to have a BBQ. Terry will be leaving to return home and we will head south but that’s all another day and another blog. So for today readers, cheers for staying with me and there is two more weeks of blog to come so stay tuned!

    Baking Caravan Blog September 2020 GBBO Visits

    Caravan Blog: Day 4

    Here we are on day four already. Still the sun shines, it is so fantastic and makes a big difference to a trip. Terry – my friend that I met while we were both competitors on The Great British Bake Off – arrived onsite. He drove down from his home in his motorhome. It was so brilliant to see him again, we keep on touch by zoom but its always better in real life. We decided that we would do a local bake on site and video it. We came up with a Malvern Pudding. It is normally steamed but we decided to bake it in the oven to save the gas, steaming takes so long. The bake itself is like an apple cake (remember all those apples from Elgar’s orchard!) We made a caramel sauce to pour over the top. Everything worked out fine and the elderly gentleman next to us was intrigued with our antics. He said ‘please get an article in the Caravan and Motorhome magazine’ as he thought it would prove to be of interest to members, perhaps we will 🙂

    See on this photo, Terry’s little dog Meg got a piece of the action. She is such a little princess and just as fluffy and even tempered as a teddy bear. gorgeous!

    Remember the pizza dough I made yesterday? Well here is the result. We enjoyed it sat in the sun and we also had something very special to wash it down with. Terry has his own craft brewery and as a surprise brought us a big crate of three of his finest. I am not a beer connoisseur but these were really fine and a little history with each bottle. Also he brought cheese from his own cheese place and some honey from his bees.

    We had a meal in our caravan. I made something from Rick Stein, not fish though, it was a Croatian pot roast, slow cooked in balsamic vinegar and red wine with dates and apples in the mix! Beautiful!!

    So that was day four. A steady day all on the campsite. Next up is a trip to a patisserie in Cheltenham, see how the professionals do it, very excited to see. Watch this space, will report asap!

    Baking Recipe

    Stilton, Pear,Walnut Tart

    Its that time of year when Summer is drifting away and Autumn comes calling. Orchard fruits are everywhere and here I use pears as a crown on a bed of stilton custard and walnut pastry. its another alternative to a cheese board or a great starter to a fancy meal. It is a quiche but dressed up to impress!

    Walnut Pastry

    175g plain flour. 90g butter. 2 Tbs cold water. 50g walnuts (blitz in food processor) Pinch salt.

    Using fingertips rub the butter into the flour until it resembles breadcrumbs. Add salt and walnuts. Add the water a little at a time and mix until it makes a firm dough. Wrap in film and chill in the fridge for half an hour. Heat the oven to 190 degrees. Grease a 20cm loose bottomed tin. remove the pastry from the fridge and roll out to the thickness of a pound coin. Lift the pastry and line the tin with it, easing in with thumbs and fingers. Run the rolling pin over the top to trim the excess. Put the tin into the freezer for ten minutes to chill down. Place a sheet of greaeproof paper over the chilled pastry and fill with baking beans (or dried pasta/rice) this is to partially blind bake the pastry to prevent a soggy bottom. Pop this in the oven and bake for ten minutes, then remove paper and beans and bake for a further five minutes.

    Reduce oven temperature to 160 degrees. remove the pastry from the oven.

    Savoury custard

    Beat 2 eggs and add 150ml double cream, mix well. Add 100g crumbled stilton cheese and a handfull of crushed walnuts.

    Poached Pears

    Peel four small pears and place in a pan containing 100g sugar,100ml white wine and 100ml red wine and a teaspoon of cinnamon. Bring to boil and then simmer until the pears are tender. Remove from syrup and cool. Slice the bottoms off to so they will stand upright.

    Place the custard into the pastry shell and then stand the pears in the custard. Bake in the oven until the custard is just set. Serve hot or Cold. The image shows apricots set into the custard too, which is another option!

    Baking Recipe

    Chocolate, Praline, Hazelnut and Sea Salt Caramel Tart

    This is a deliciously rich and decadent tart I created for The Taste of Kent Food Festival

    Ingredients

    Pastry

    50g Crushed hazelnuts

    115 g butter

    50g caster sugar

    2 egg yolks

    200 g plain flour

    2 Tbs cold water

    Caramel

    120g condensed milk

    60g golden syrup

    150g butter

    150g light brown sugar

    Large pinch smoked sea salt flakes

    Ganache

     225g 70% chocolate

    175ml Double Cream

    30g butter

    Praline

    100g caster sugar

    50 g hazelnuts

    Decorations

    100 g dark chocolate

    Rub all the dry ingredients together and the add egg yolk and water and form a ball. Chill in the fridge for half an hour. Roll out the pastry and place in a 20cm loose bottomed flan tin. Blind bake the pastry in a pre heated 180 degree oven for 15 minutes, remove the baking beans and lining paper and continue to cook for about another 10 minutes .

    Make the caramel by heating all the ingredients together in a saucepan until it reaches a temperature of 110 degrees. Pour into the pastry case.

    Make the ganache by very gently warming the ingredients together until melted and glossy. Pour onto the caramel.

    To make the praline gently heat the sugar in a heavy bottomed fry pan, swirling as it melts not stirring. When it has become a golden colour pour over the hazelnuts. Once cooled grind together in a food processor until it is like coarse sand.

    Sprinkle the praline around the circumference of the ganache.

    Using melted chocolate in a small piping bag makes triangles to resemble sails. Cool in the fridge and the stand upright in the ganache.

    sprinkle ground sea salt over the top of the ganache.