Simple things and stranger things

This week has been awesome and then tremendously empty. Once you find Stranger Things,  get completely hooked and then realise that there are only 8 episodes. Well everything has slightly less shine now! Aw, I joke but honestly this show is fantastic!! It creates such a wonderful atmosphere of 80s nostalgia and childhood adventure with a hint of the mysterious paranormal!

Image property of Netflix

So I thought naturally that I would accompany this post with a simpler thing - Scones.

Scones are one of the first things I ever learnt to make, scones and brownies. When I was about the age of the Stranger Things kids, maybe a little younger. My Mum taught me how to make these two things from a Darina Allen book and I was absolutely enthralled!! I felt like I was being taught some kind of super-power;You can just make treats?! Mind-blown! Well as you can tell, I started there and didn't stop but today I wanted to revisit the ole favourite with a bit of a healthy twist. 

Obviously scones are sweet breads so they are inevitably carbs but I have made a few adjustments to make them as healthy as carbs can be, and honestly you wouldn't know he difference. They definitely passed the fiancé test. These two lasted about five minutes between us.

So what are the adjustments - the flour is a fine ground wholemeal flour. Fine ground is important here, it can be called pasta flour but it makes a very big difference.

The second big alteration, these contain no added sugar. They are sultana scones and thereis  natural sugars in the sultanas but otherwise there is no sugar, no sweetner and no way to tell that it's no added sugar, I promise!

The secret is to soak the sultanas in tea. The tea adds a depth of flavour anyway but as the sultanas are soaked the natural sugars seep into the tea and then the whole lot is added into the scones which adds just enough sweetness, not to mention beautiful plump juicy sultanas. So you would never know that I didn't add sugar, why not give it a try?!

Healthy Scones (Wholemeal, No Added Sugar) (Makes 12 large)

1-1.5 Cups Sultanas

Black tea - enough to cover the above

500g Wholemeal fine ground plain flour

1 tsp Baking powder

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp Nutmeg

1/2 tsp all-spice

1 egg

2 tbsp milk of choice

2 tbsp oil of choice (I used almond)

Egg-wash to beautify

1 - Soak the sultanas for at least an hour up to overnight

2 - Preheat oven to 180'C. Sieve together the flour, baking powder and spices

3 - Pour in the sultanas and mix

4 - Add the rest of the wet ingredients and mix until a dough is formed

5 - Knead the dough for 5-10 minutes

6 - Form into even sized balls, try to hide the sultanas inside, and place on a lined baking tray

7 - Egg-wash to finish and bake for 15-20 minutes or until hollow sounding when tapped.

8 - Allow to cool and enjoy with some sneaky butter ;)

Perfect for enjoying during an episode of Stranger things. I haven't spoken about it much but I feel that I don't wish to spoil anything. Suffice is to say that it is well, well worth watching! My favourite character was Eleven, shortly followed by Dustin, toothless kid, because he was just a hero and so cute whenever he speaks! If you don't have Netflix, get it, there is more and more amazing ontent there every week. I am not sponsored to say this, I just appreciate Netflix more and more every day and you will need it to see Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life, which I will review, episode by episode! Not to mention catching up, or rewatching Gilmore girls as I am doing right now to put together a full review for you shortly. So anyway for now, watch Stranger things, make these scones and thank me later =)

A Dairy-free Birthday Treat

Every year, on my birthday I bake a cake. Not this year, although I went back to dairy this year I decided to give myself the time to work on something else that I have been craving - Almond Butter cups!

As I mentioned in a previous post, we recently took an amazing trip to Vegas! It was wonderful to be in Vegas but also to be in the states again. There were so many things I had missed from my time living there. There were also so many new things that I wanted to try. When you follow various food blogs you get to see some of the delicious new things people are loving in America and around the world. Since my time living in the US, it seems that healthy eating has become much more prevalent and, with it, a whole bunch of exciting new healthy products. One of the things that had tempted me was the Justin's products and particularly his heathy peanut butter cups. However when I went to get some I saw that he included sea salt, which is something that I don't eat. So I disappointedly walked away =(

(It's an unfortunate belief that sea salt is more fancy or healthy than normal salt and therefore many healthy food companies include sea salt in an attempt to appeal to the healthier customer, however it ignores those that cannot take it)

However I never gave up on the idea of a healthy nut butter cup, and preferably my favourite nut butter - Almond! So for this birthday I decided to dedicate my baking time to chocolate work.

Almond Butter Cups

240g Dark Chocolate Chips
100g Almond Butter
50g Almonds, toasted and ground
1-2 tbsp Agave Nectar
1 tbsp Coconut Oil
1 tsp Salt


I used some of my delicious 70% + dark chocolate. I melted down two thirds of it and then added the final third to bring down the temperature and temper the chocolate. Then I poured them into my mini-cupcake cases

For the almond butter centre I mixed store bought almond butter with more toasted ground almonds to thicken it, coconut oil for smoothness, salt in enhance the flavour and a tiny bit of agave nectar for sweetness. I then made little balls and pushed it into the hardened chocolate cases

From there I froze the cups to cool everything and facilitate the covers hardening. Then poured on the bottoms from the tempered chocolate.And then I simply let them hardened et voila...

As you can possibly see, the bases are not completely flat. This is due to the container having a raised lip. However I appreciate the thick bases as it's a nice chunk of chocolate to balance the almond butter.

As you can also see I left some lovely chunks of almond, but this is obviously optional! So now I have my dream treats and I will definitely be making these again, even if they leave a little bit of clean up.....

I would highly highly recommend making these. They are incredibly delicious, vegan, healthy and full of goodness. The best part is that it lasts so much longer than cake. I ate one of these while I typed this tonight and there is still plenty more =)

Irish Soda Bread

This past week was St Patrick's Day and you may have seen a few dozen Irish or green things around the interwebs. Recently I saw a couple of posts about 'Irish Soda Bread.' This interested me because I love soda bread but when I went to the sites what I saw were horrendous mockeries of my beloved bread and I could not stand for it. So this week I am bringing you my recipe for Irish Soda Bread.

This bread is so simple and I threw it together in 1 hour start to fully cooked bread! Of which 45-50 minutes the bread is in the oven so as long as you set a timer you can do what you want with this time! There are very few Irish things that I crave when living away from home (probably because we are somewhat limited in traditional foods). However we do have the best tea (Barry's), wonderful dinners (Stew, Bacon and Cabbage) and more than anything amazing soda bread!! So forgive me for getting irritated when one of the few simple things gets butchered but I guess I'm somewhat fussy. In actuality the bread you see above is a bit too tall so I'm not a total perfectionist! But if you follow my pictures here you will see how incredibly simple this delicious bread really is.

Ingredients

400g Wholemeal flour
200g White bread flour
1 tsp Salt
1 tbsp Baking Soda
500ml Milk (Any kind - dairy or nut - I used skimmed lactose free here)
1 tbsp lemon juice

1 -  Preheat oven to 180'C. Add the lemon juice to the milk and let sit while you whisk together your flours, salt and baking soda

2 - Slowly add the milk mixture into the flour in sections and stop when you have a thick dough. Note - This bread is free form, if you want to use a bread tin then just add all the milk and mix

The Milk in this picture was left over as I had reached the desired texture as shown

3 - Knead the dough a little bit (at most for 30 seconds to a minute) just to bring it together and get a smooth ball of dough

4 - Then (and I forgot to do this) roll it out just a tiny bit and cut a cross into the top

5 - Bake for 15 minutes and then cover in tin foil and finish baking for another 30-35 minutes or until it sounds hollow inside. Then allow to cool with a tea towel over it to soften the crust.

Then slice it up and enjoy with butter and jam or toasted with cheese or with soup or any which way you please!!!

Healthy and happy

This week's recipe is super easy and I must admit that I am a little bit late on this bandwagon. However we tried this recently and I have to say, it was a revelation! It's so delicious and so so simple. It makes a meal feel so much healthier and when it's this little effort, well why not?! What is it??

Cauliflower Rice!!

New year, new you?! thoughts and healthy dessert

It is the second week of January and it definitely feels like it! Some of the new year motivation subsides and the dreary January blues might be settling in. Yet everywhere we are still surrounded by advertisements, tweets, instagram pictures and television shows about how to lose weight and 'detox' after Christmas. Which is...................great, I guess, it's good for people to feel motivated to make healthy choices. I don't really believe in 'detoxing' but I think that's a subject for another post, or possibly another blog. However I do believe in making healthy choices and particularly healthy substitutions. This weeks post is one of my favourite dessert substitutions.

This bowl of deliciousness can be made super healthy. The biscuit here is garnish but without it this dessert contains no added sugar, no fat but tonnes and tonnes of flavour. It tastes like apple pie and ice-cream but without any (unnecessary) guilt. The 'ice-cream' is actually just 0% fat greek yoghurt with vanilla mixed in.

On to the 'apple pie.'

4 Stewing Apples
2 Lemons
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp all spice

1-  Preheat oven to 180'C. Roughly dice the apples

2- Cover in the lemon juice as you go to prevent browning

3- Add the spices and mix well

4- Place in a ceramic bread tin and cover with tin foil.

5 - Bake for 30-40 minutes on the middle shelf.

The apples before they go into the oven

When you take the apples out of the oven, they will look as if nothing has happened

The apples post-cooking

Now here you have to just trust me...and stir. These apples will then turn into the apple pie filling below

It's that simple!!

As you can see I find this recipe perfect as it is. However if you find that you need more sweetness, or less bitterness then I have two suggestions. First, try adding a tiny pinch of salt. It sounds weird but apparently salt and bitter tastes use the same receptors on the tongue so salt can block out the bitterness. Then if you still need a little sweetness you can add honey or agave nectar.

This recipe makes new year's resolutions or healthy choices that much easier to stomach! Dessert is a very important part of a healthy diet! Healthy for body and soul! I make this throughout winter and absolutely love it. I would definitely recommend you try it, enjoy some January guilt free deliciousness and I will see you next week =)

Gingerbread and reflections

Today I considered not posting. I had planned this post since last week but somehow in light of what's happened in Paris and Beirut somehow happy seasonal food recipes just don't seem as important anyway. However this morning I decided it would be better to post and talk a little about the many many wonderful times I have spent in Paris.

So, it being the middle of November, it is starting to feel seasonal but yet it's not really reasonable to start indulging yet. These gingerbread bites are the absolute business. They are vegan, wholegrain, fat-free, and (unless you cover them with icing sugar for aesthetic purposes) refined sugar free!! They taste really good too and they hit that cake craving nicely! I also used the lovely Sweetpea Pantry ginger giggles mix that includes barley and rye flour. But before you eat me for using pre-made mix on a baking blog, know that it's just an ingredient and my own recipe!

The last time we went to Paris was very funny! My boyfriend and I have a habit when we go away of getting a little apartment style hotel room or hostel place and walk around everywhere to learn the area and pretend for a week that we live there. Paris is such a lovely place to do this because you can establish your local boulangerie/patisserie for a week and even within that limited space of time I get the impression that the boulanger will get to know you, which adds to the experience massively! Another wonderful thing about the pretending to live there part is that you have oodles of time to sit around in parks observing people and really soaking in the culture. Some of my happiest moments have been in france and sitting in a park with my bf just taking it all in forms the basis of a good few of those.

Back to the recipe

Vegan, Wholegrain Barley and Rye Gingerbread Bites (makes 15 inch square cubes)

200g Ginger Giggles Mix
Egg- replacer (use your product directions for the equivalent of 1 egg)
150ml Apple sauce                                                                

1 tsp vanilla extract
2-3 tbsp Agave Nectar






1- Preheat oven to 180'C/ 350'F/ Gas mark 4.

2- Mix everything together  (could it be simpler)

3- Line a bread tin and pour in the mixture

4- Bake for 15-20 mins or until golden brown on top

5- Let cool and slice into cubes to enjoy

So I'll finish off with one of my favourite memories of paris and the wonderful people who live there. On our last visit there myself and my partner were walking around trying to find a great place to eat. We had been walking for a couple of hours sight-seeing and the like and we were pretty hungry. You know the type of hungry that takes on a life of it's own?! Well our seperate hungers were leading and each had a different goal in mind. We searched and searched and looked at so many delicious restaurants but each time, either I wasn't satisfied or he wasn't. Well, this had been going on for about an hour and the hunger was bad when we finally found a place that met all the criteria, Halleluia! But..... the kitchen was closed, in fact all the kitchens were closed until dinner time! Devastated!! We alked away starving and depressed and headed to the only thing we could see that was still open - McDonalds. You can imagine how unexcited I was, except I was forgetting that this was France. My McDonalds meal was the freshest and most delicious Mc Donalds I had ever had, with real dijon mustard and a much needed coffee on the side! Not only that but there was some tables outside and a group singing for some reason I never gathered. Now I'll grant you, my hunger may have added to the flavour but one thing cannot be denied - Parisians can add class to anything!! Which is exactly what we have seen in the wake of this tragedy! Parisians out holding their heads up in the face of terrorism and calling on others not to allow the acts of a few extremist segregate the muslim community in France. Now this is not and never will be a political blog and I am aware that there are several aspects of this situation that are more complex. However I would like to focus on the good and on my happy memories of paris, while I pray for all those involved and affected this weekend!

Look after yourself and enjoy this little post, til next week, a bientot =)

Apple cinnamon Granola

It's finally autumn/fall and I am so happy about it. A while back I made a homemade granola for Mother's day and it was a beautiful summer treat but granola is a year round so why not make this more spicy and autumnal?

This mound of golden deliciousness is full of all sorts of wonderful natural flavours that evoke those seasonal senses.

Ingredients

1 cup organic rolled oats
1 cup irish quick oats
3 tbsp flax seeds
2 tbsp pumpkin seeds
1/4 cup almonds (activated by soaking overnight)
1/4 cup hazelnuts (activated by soaking)
1/2 cup dried apple rings
4 slices of candied lemon rind
1/2 tsp cinnamon
pinch of all spice
pinch of nutmeg
generous pinch of salt


3 tbsp almond oil
3 tbsp honey
1 tbsp almond butter

1. Preheat the oven to 130'C. Chop the apple rings and lemon rinds into small pieces.

2. Cover the apple and lemon pieces in the spices and mix well.

3. Mix together the oats, seeds and apple/lemon pieces together

4. In a small saucepan mix together the almond oil, honey and almond butter and heat gently until boiling.

5. Pour 90% over the oats and mix thoroughly.

6. Line a baking sheet in tinfoil and spread out the mixture.

7. Bake on for 20 minutes, keeping a close eye on them.

8. Pour the nuts into the end of the almond oil/honey mixture and mix until all the nuts are covered.

9. Mix the nuts into the rest of the granola and bake for a final 10 minutes.

10. Serve with yoghurt and fruit of your choice (I choose fresh apple, sprinkled with more cinnamon)

This granola tastes amazing!! I am so pleased with how it turned out, the lemon rind gives a zingy freshness which compliments the spicy apple perfectly and all the delicious nuts and seeds provide even more texture and crunch. So if you are looking for a taste of autumn that doesn't involve pumkin I would definitely recommend this. Til next week, enjoy =)

Galettes- Pancake day alternative, or addition?

Pancake Tuesday is one of my favourite days. In Ireland, Christian traditions dominate the popular culture, so pancake Tuesday is everywhere you look. In our house pancakes means crepes, not the thicken and equally delicious American style pancakes. So every year my Mum prepared a giant vat of batter in the afternoon, and let it rest on the counter, tempting us with thoughts of the upcoming feast. The hardest part was eating the normal dinner (always fish) before we could make the sweet pancakes. Well I don't repeat that torture in my home, for main meal we eat galettes!

Baked Oatmeal with cinnamon and raisins

When I started writing this blog I used to work shifts, often overnight. Shift work is incredibly draining at times and there were many nights when I would reach my normal bedtime and know that I had a full grueling 8 hours ahead. On those occasions I often made an oatmeal pancake from oats, eggs and milk. It would fill me up and give me the energy I needed to get through the night. So seeing pins of baked oatmeal brings me back to that time, it also makes me think of how much of us need an energy boost at this time of the year. I thought I'd try it out again with a basic version of the recipes I see most places and then maybe suggest some changes

Peanut Butter Choc chip Energy Balls

 So it's the week of my bf's birthday and we are getting all excited to celebrate. We are getting ready for a weekend of cake and fun times. I am very excited. That said other things are happening this week. I am going back to college (yay eternal student!) and there are a great many things to organize. So when I was thinking about what to make for this post I wanted something delicious, energy giving but healthy, as we want to be able to look good next weekend. Yet it was important that it was really delicious and enjoyable for the birthday boy and he has a nose for when things are  healthy (a term he uses disparagingly). After much sampling (he'd say not enough) the bf's verdict - 'Too tasty to be good for you!' Ah but that is where he is happily mistaken!

The ingredient list for these puppies is beautifully short and filled with healthy ingredients that do not include any dairy, wheat or processed sugar.  The end result is all natural, raw, vegan and oh so good!

Peanutbutter Chocolate Chip Energy balls

10 dates
40 ml warm water
3 heaped tsp crunchy all natural peanut butter
2 heaped tsp smooth cashew butter
1 1/2 tsp agave nectar
40g 70% dark chocolate chips (for these to be vegan they need to contain no milk products)
100g organic oats

to cover:
Ground hazelnuts
Raw cocao

1- Soak the dates in the warm water for an hour or so

2 - If you have a blender blend the water and dates, if not pour the water into a bigger bowl and then chop up the soaked dates as much as possible and add them to the big bowl.

3 - Add the nut butters into the date mixture and mix well

4 - Then add the oats and mix thoroughly before adding the chocolate chips.

5 - Finally add the agave nectar. I added this last because if it's easy to gauge how much you need or want by adding bit by bit and tasting, you may want/need more or less.

6- Finally take small amounts and roll into balls before rolling in the ground nuts or the raw cocao.

The raw cocao has a strong flavour and adds a little more energy kick but my favourite and the bf's favorite was the ground hazelnuts. As you can see I did a relatively small batch here so feel free to double or triple the recipe (I think bf would have preferred if I had ;). Also if you don't have agave nectar feel free to use honey but just note that they will not longer be vegan. So I do hope you try these I am very very happy with them and I hope you enjoy.

Look at the deliciousness!

Comfort Healthy food

Jamie Oliver appears to have a new television show and book out entitled 'Comfort Food,' which reportedly puts a spin on classic comfort food dishes and encourages people to treat themselves. Well it has inspired me to make my own comfort food, but it may not be what you think.

A year ago I wrote about how I was moving to the UK and I made some delicious double chocolate chip cookies (link) to comfort myself then. Now a year on I am settling into UK living and enjoying exploring the varieties of cuisine available as well as all the different cultural and (SOMETHING) opportunities. However there are things that I miss from home; my family (of course), my friends (naturally) and dark wholemeal seeded soda bread! 'Erm, what??!' you may be asking, and ok it may seem somewhat unconventional but it is my favourite type of bread. It's healthy but hearty and sometimes one slice will fill you up. Toasted with butter, there is simply no better bread (in my humble Irish opinion). I have searched for this deliciousness without success, sure you can get a normal soda bread everywhere but that pales (literally) in comparison to this beauty. In Ireland I would go through a loaf (at least) of this a week and since moving over here I have craved it and made sure to over-dose on the stuff every time I go home. So when the concept of comfort food was plastered in every book window and channel four advertisement, the first thing I thought of was this deliciousness and then it hit me!! Like an ACME anvil from a cliff - 'Cat, you're a home-baker!!! Make your own for goodness sake!!!!' Oh yeah, duh!

So I scoured the internet for recipes. My favourite is the loaf from Avoca and that's where I started my search. However I couldn't find the recipe, so I widened the search and voila deliciousnutritiousambitious had made the recipe from the Avoca Cookbook but altered it to suit an american baker. So using the recipe posted there in combination with my own knowledge of irish bread baking I put together a recipe and tried it out. Thankfully it amazing and I will share it with you here.

Dark Brown Seeded Irish Soda Bread
Adapted From deliciousnutritiousambitious and the Avoca Cookbook

200g Strong white bread flour (I use organic, non-bleached)
350g Malted wholemeal flour
1 tbsp Baking soda
1 tsp salt
2 tbsp sesame seeds + more to sprinkle on top
2 tbsp sunflower seeds
2 tbsp linseed
2 tbsp pumpkin seeds
2 tbsp poppy seeds + more to sprinkle on top
(Or 10 tbsp of seed mix)
500ml milk (I made this today with skimmed, lactose free milk and it's perfect)
1 tbsp lemon juice
3 tbsp black treacle

1 - Preheat your oven to 200'

2 - To your 500ml milk add the tablespoon of lemon juice and let sit (this will turn the milk sour and
      you want that!)

3 - In a large bowl measure out and then whisk together the white flour, wholewheat flour, baking
     soda and salt until thoroughly combined.

4 - Create a well in the flours and pour in the milk/lemon juice and the black treacle.

5 - Mix only until fully combined, do not knead or overmix as the bread will be tough.

6 - Prepare a bread tin with butter and flour

7 - Pour your dough into the tin, it should be sticky but not too wet.

8 - Smooth out the dough and then sprinkle the extra sesame and poppy sides on top.

9 - Bake for 45 minutes in the center of the oven. After 20 minutes you might want to cover the top with tin foil in order to prevent burning. Remove from the oven and bread tin and tap the base when the time is up. If it sounds hollow then place on a wire wrack to cool slightly (at least 15 minutes) before cutting and eating.

If you are from Ireland and you know this bread then I would say that it comes out more like a Superquinn or Supervalu dark brown seeded loaf than AVOCA. So if you have been buying your bread there or craving this bread from there then this is the perfect recipe. Does it taste like the AVOCA loaf? not quite but this has not deterred me. I will be revisiting this recipe so expect another similar one soon. For the moment I am happily comforted with my healthy bread and I really hope you try this out and enjoy it for yourself.

My bag-o-seeds! Yum

 An end-note about the seeds: It's funny that I was inspired to make this by Jamie Oliver's 'Comfort Food,' as my major complaint about the recipes of Mr. Oliver is his use of ingredients. The man is clearly a culinary genius but any time I consult one of his recipe I notice that he will use a tiny amount of some unique ingredient that I never have in my kitchen already and that would probably cost me a couple pounds to buy. However he sometimes neglects to take into account that I'll need to buy a whole container to use one tablespoon and I probably won't use this again quickly enough, so one tablespoon really cost me £3-£4 and a whole lots of waste. I will be making lots of this bread so I went out and spent £10 on organic versions of all the seeds included and made a beautiful collection of bread seeds (pictured above). However it's not necessary for you to do the same. If you want to try this out then I recommend using 10 tablespoons of any seed mix instead. Most seed mixes will have pumpkin and sunflower and therefore some of the important flavours are covered . Now you have no excuse, so try this!