Hannah friendly

Chocolate and orange cake

2018-02-25T13:20:00+00:00

This is going to be a big year! My little sister is getting married in August, which is exciting in itself. Also exciting, but also terrifying, is the prospect of decorating her wedding cake. Our mum is getting involved with the baking of the cake but, for some reason, I've been chosen to provide the artistic direction for the overall look. This is obviously a huge honour but I need to get cracking. My cake decorating debut unexpectedly came a few months ago at my sister's engagement party - it was an epic affair with lemon drizzle, lemon curd, butter cream and a limoncello drizzle, and all dairy free. The downside was not very much time to put this creation together and very limited equipment so lots of improvisation was required. It was fun and looked and tasted great so definitely successful but lots of refinement was required.

Over the last few months, I've been challenging myself to try new techniques and styles for decorating cakes, spending one weekend a month trying out new flavours and decorations. The brief I've been given for the wedding is three cakes, each with four layers, decorated in a semi-naked style. That's been the focus of my practice - although I've dabbled with a few other things (chocolate ganache coatings for instance...) The main challenge is has been perfecting a lactose-free buttercream - I've had to give up on dairy free as it was just too sweet for my liking. Anywho... I'm planning to record the good, the bad and the ugly of this exercise starting with my most recent adventure. This is a basic chocolate sponge filled with orange curd and orange buttercream. The orange curd was delightful to make and even tastier to eat, so will definitely be making that again very soon! The buttercream worked a treat, adding in the lactose-free marscapone (thank you, Tesco!) really helped the structural stability and balancing the sweetness.

In terms of deocration - not my finest effort, it's a bit scrappy in places. I'm on the lookout for tips to get a better, flatter rise and I need a little more patience when it comes to cutting my cakes. But I've had a read of a few blogs and am prepped for next time. The top also looked a bit dull which I'll ponder for next time. Just a note, I've down-graded to two 15cm baking tins as I was getting through a lot of eggs and struggling to finish the end result with my 22cm tins!

This recipe makes four-layer, 15cm cake.

Ingredients

10oz plain flour
10oz caster sugar
10oz Vitalite
1tsp baking powder
5 eggs
4tbsp cocoa
100g hard margarine (I used Sainsbury's baking block)
100g lactose-free marscapone
1 orange, zest
350g icing sugar
1 orange, zest and juice
40g caster sugar
2 eggs
50g baking block

1. Place the cake ingredients (flour, sugar, Vitalite, baking powder, eggs, and cocoa) into a bowl and mix thoroughly until combined. Pour into two greased 15cm tins and bake at 180C for 30 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean.

2. For the buttercream, mix the baking block and marscapone together with the orange zest. Gradually mix in the icing sugar until stiff. Place in the fridge until ready to use.

3. For the orange curd, whisk the orange zest and juice, sugar, and eggs together in a glass bowl. Add in the baking block cut into cubes. Place the bowl over a pan of boiling water and gently heat for around ten minutes. Stir the curd from time to time, until it thickens. Then leave to cool.

4. Once the cakes are out of the oven and cool, cut in half so you have four equal sized cakes. Pipe buttercream around the edge of each inner layer and fill the remainder with orange curd. Stack the layers then top with buttercream. Smooth round the edges of the cake, filling any gaps with remaining buttercream.

Chocolate and hazelnut truffles

2018-01-01T13:20:00+00:00

Why hello there and hello 2018! This is my first blog first in quite a while. I'm not entirely sure what happened to blogging in 2017. I certainly had good intentions to begin with, and you can see from my instagram that I definitely had lots of tasty food in 2017, I just didn't seem to be able to write much of it down. Hey ho, it's a new year and I will try again. There are plenty of exciting things going on in 2018 that will keeep me busy in the kitchen and with my camera - not least the wedding of my little sister. I'm in charge of cake decorating for this, most special of occassions and currently have more ambition than skill so there will be plenty of cake practice recorded on these pages in the months to come. We've also set ourselves a bit of a challenge to waste less food in 2018 but more on that some other time.

This post is all about chocolate. It may be January and you may be full of good intentions about eating healthily but I'm all about the 'everything in moderation' philosophy. I went to a chocolate making class a couple of years ago so every now and then I like to fool making truffles. The run up to Christmas brought with it the nostalgia of ferrero rocher - a Christmas treat from my childhood (back when I could enjoy milk) and I was inspired to have a go at making my own. It's been a long time since I last had a ferrero rocher so I had to do a bit of Googling to remind myself of the technical details - I could remember the whole hazelnut on the inside but had forgotten about the wafer. Apparently, the whole commercial process is incredibly secretive so there could be other steps that both the Internet and I are not aware of but I got the gist. Anywho, armed with this knowledge I set out to make my own.

I've kept the ganache plain so you really focus on the hazelnut-y goodness inside and outside the truffle. Otherwise, there's a whole hazelnut in the centre, silky-smooth ganache around it, then a little tempered chocolate, a coating of chopped hazelnuts and a final layer of tempered chocolate. All of this is dairy-free (and vegan!) but mostly delicious.

I'll set out the step by step instructions below but first a word about tempering chocolate. It's not as scary as you might think. But a digital thermometer is important, possibly essential. From my incredibly unscientific point of view, there are three steps - 1) melting your chocolate, 2) rebuilding it - using non-melted chocolate both to cool your melted chocolate down and to remind it of the molecular structure it should once it has cooled, 3) cooling it down to the right point. This is where the thermometer comes in! You're aiming for 31-32C.

This recipe makes around 40-50 truffles.

Ingredients

250g good quality dark chocolate (around 55-60% cocoa solids)
160ml coconut cream (I use Waitrose)
250g hazelnuts, roasted (leave around 40 whole for the centre of your truffles then blitz the rest to coat the truffles)
300g tempered chocolate plus a few extra squares

1. Melt the dark chocolate in a glass bowl over a pan of boiling water. In a separate saucepan, heat the coconut cream until melted. Gently stir the coconut cream into the melted chocolate. This will take a few minutes, don't rush it. This is your ganache.

2. Once combined, pour the ganache into a disposable piping bag (no nozzle required). Snip the end off the piping bag and pipe onto baking parchment. I snake the ganache around the sheet - with the snake about 1.5-2cm wide. Leave to cool and harden in the fridge for around 30 minutes.

3. Take the ganache out of the fridge. Using a butter knife, cut the ganache into lengths about 5cm long ready to roll into truffle shapes. Roll this ganache into a ball around a roasted hazelnut and then set aside on your baking parchment. Repeat until you have used all your ganache. For these truffles, I would err on the side of making them small as the remaining layers will definitely add heft! Place these naked truffles into the fridge while you temper your chocolate.

4. Now to temper your chocolate. Gently melt 300g good quality dark chocolate in a glass bowl over a pan of boiling water. Once all the chocolate has melted remove from the heat. Place your digital thermometer in the bowl - the chocolate will be around 55-60C, you're aiming for 31-32C. I'm impatient so I place the glass bowl in a dish with some cold water in the bottom (if I'm really impatient, I add ice), this will kick start the cooling process. Stir the melted chocolate around the bowl. Add in a square of unmelted chocolate and continue stirring. You will notice the temperature of the chocolate is dropping. Continue this process, stirring and adding in squares of chocolate (one at a time) until the thermometer shows a temperature between 31-32C.

5. This tempered chocolate will set very quickly so you'll need to get to work fast. Each truffle needs to be lightly dipped into the tempered chocolate, coated in chopped hazelnuts and then immersed in tempered chocolate again. To do this, drop your naked truffle into the tempered chocolate, roll it around using a fork allowing the excess to drip off before rolling in chopped hazelnuts. I did this for all the truffles by which point my tempered chocolate had set so I re-melted and went through the tempering process again to do the final chocolate-y coating.

6. Once complete, the truffles can be stored in the fridge for 2-3 weeks, although they never last that long in our house....

Pain aux raisins

2017-02-22T17:03:00+00:00

Our travels this summer took us back to France. We spent a delightful week in a small village near Lyon with the most amazing boulangerie. On the few occassions I was awake early enough to get the bread, I would stand outside the bakery marvelling at the range of breakfast pastries on offer. If you've visited my blog (or seen my Instagram feed) you will know I enjoy a breakfast pastry. I've been making my own croissants for the last few years. I like to think my technique has improved, I've gathered together everything I've learnt so far into this (hopefully) helpful step-by-step guide.

Anyway, while I've more-than dabbled with croissants, trying out chocolate and almond fillings, I've never toppled the pinnacle of breakfast pastries, the holy grail, the pain au raisin! It was never something that particularly interested me as a dairy-consuming child but since becoming lactose intolerant I've become somewhat obsessed with that which I cannot have, in this case the beautiful, raisin-stuffed spirals of joy... (see, I've built them up massively). I've never had the nerve to try making my own until now. Why, you ask? Well, the thought of making my own, dairy-free creme patissiere has always stopped me in my tracks. I did some research into 'cheats' pain aux raisins that would skip over this step but my Google foray led to dead ends. I would simply have to get face my fear and make my own. Having done so, I'm not entirely sure what the fear was all about. In fact, it turns out I've made it several times before for a little something my family likes to call Chocolate Cream Pie (hold that thought, we'll return to this another day). I've no life-changing tips to offer, just keep your head and have a go.

So here it is, my dairy free pain aux raisins. This recipe made enough for 6 pain aux raisins with around half of the croissants dough. I used the rest of the dough to make croissants (novel idea, I know!).

You will need:

Ingredients

1 quantity croissants dough
50g caster sugar
25g cornflour
1 egg
200ml soya or almond milk
50g raisins
2tsp ground cinnamon

I'm assuming you can make the croissants dough. If not, look here for my step-by-step guide.

1. Beat the sugar, cornflour and egg together in a bowl.

2. Heat the milk in a saucepan until it just starts to boil.

3. Pour the hot milk onto the egg mixture, stirring it constantly.

4. Put the mixture back into the saucepan and gently heat, still stirring all the time. Once this thickens (this should happen pretty quickly, maybe 3 minutes or so) remove from the heat and leave to cool.

So now to put everything together...

5. Cut the croissants dough in half, use half for making croissants and the rest will be for pain aux raisins. Roll the dough out into a rectangle, about 0.5cm thick.

6. Spread the cooled creme patissiere over the dough, sprinkle with raisins and cinnamon. Tightly roll the dough up along the long side. Cut into 6 discs, around 1-2cm thick.

7. Leave the pain aux raisins to prove for a few hours or overnight in the fridge.

8. Cook for 20-25 minutes at 180C.

PS. Don't forget to make the rest of the dough into croissants!

Snickers energy balls

2017-02-06T21:31:00+00:00

This post accidentally typifies my approach to new year's resolutions. I started this post and, indeed 2017, with the best of intentions - I would blog prolifically, persuasively, regularly. I would reinvigorate the Hannah-friendly twitter feed (and, to an extent, Instagram feed) with all the new and exciting recipes from my kitchen. I would try new recipes and post them with beautiful photos (thanks to a lovely, thoughtful book from my brother- and sister-in-law on photography for food bloggers). And here we are in February. Oh well. If the end of last year was busy and hectic, the start of this one has been busier. I enjoy that, but it comes at the price of regular blogging! That, combined with improvements we're making to the kitchen means that the usual rhythms of the kitchen have been disturbed along with a fair amount of brick dust.

Anyway, very much in the spirit of goof intentions, clean slates and resolutions, I bring you these delicious chocolate-peanut Snickers balls. In the bleak first days of the new year, with spring still a long way off, these sweet treats bring hope and, most importantly, chocolate! Born out of a desire to occassionally try something a bit different in the sweet treat department, these tasty treats are both virtuous and tasty. They're vegan and gluten free so a nice inclusive snack.

A chocolate shell filled with a nutty caramel and yet more chocolate. First time I made these I didn't bother to temper the chocolate shell and they worked very well. The extra crunch of tempered chocolate around the outside would provide a crisp contrast to the soft interior. Tempering chocolate isn't as terrifying as it sounds but if you're not convinced then just go with melted chocolate.

This recipe makes around 10 serious balls but you could split it up to make smaller, bitesize balls if you wanted.

Ingredients

180g raw peanuts
240g dates
1 tbsp cocoa powder
1 tbsp maple syrup
100g dark chocolate, melted

1. Roast the peanuts for around 10 minutes in a preheated oven (around 180C) until the skin turns from red to brown. While the nuts are still warm remove the outer skin (do can do this by hand or shake them in a sealed tupperware until they jump off).

2. Blitz the peanuts in a food processor until they resemble breadcrumbs. Add in the dates and cocoa powder and continue to blitz. keep the food processor running and pour in the maple syrup, use enough maple syrup to form a dough.

3. Shape the mixture into 10 large or 16-20 small balls, rolling them in your hands. Leave in the fridge for at least 15 minutes to cool.

4. Melt the chocolate in a bowl over a pan of water. (If you wish you can temper the chocolate at this stage - remove the melted chocolate from the heat and stir in a couple of extra squares of chocolate until the temperature of the chocolate reaches between 31 and 32C) Using a fork, roll each ball in the chocolate then place on a covered baking sheet to cool.

Aubergine involtini

2016-11-15T22:55:00+00:00

I could title this recipe 'An ode to the aubergine' but I went with a rather more conventional name. For those who don't already know, I'm an aubergine enthusiast! I'm thinking of having jackets made. Regular readers of the blog (if we have any of those) will have seen my take on my nonna's classic melanzane parmigiana which epitomises my love of all things aubergine. Anyway... I'm back with another dish where the aubergine is king. I've been enjoying the aubergine season over the summer (more of this to come in future blog posts, keep your eyes peeled) and I fully intend to focus on aubergine in the coming weeks.

This dish is a revised, vegetarian take on braciole or involtini de manza which are pieces of beef steak stuffed with tasty things, rolled up and slow-cooked in a rich tomato sauce. I developed my recipe for the meaty version last summer, when I was creating an Italian menu to go with a selection box of Jacob's Creek Reserve - although never got around to posting it. While I provided a veggie alternative at the time, it occured to me after the time that aubergine could be a lovely alternative to the meat. Admittedly, slow-cooking isn't really applicable with the aubergine as too much structural integrity would be lost but the flavours of the stuffing - the garlic, basil, parsley, oil - balances really well with the aubergine and smothered in a wonderful tomato sauce.

Talking vegan options - the stuffing in the recipe includes egg which adds a nice richest (and was quite important in the meat-y version as it kept the dish moist) but isn't essential. You could add raisins instead - sounds weird but, trust me, it works.

Here's what you need.

Ingredients

2 aubergines, sliced lengthways
1 tbsp pine nuts, toasted
1 egg, hard boiled and grated
1 garlic clove, crushed
2 tbsp breadcrumbs
2 tbsp fresh basil, chopped
2 tbsp fresh parsley, chopped
5 tbsp olive oil
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1 tin tomatoes
1 tbsp tomato puree

1. Start by making up the stuffing. This needs to sit and mull for a while. Bash the toasted pine nuts in a pestle and mortar until finely ground. Mix in the basil, parsley, grated egg, breadcrumbs, crushed garlic (1 clove) and olive oil with a little salt and pepper. Leave to one side so it can think about itself.

2. Now to start the tomato sauce. Fry 2 cloves of garlic gently in some oil until it starts to go golden and fills your kitchen with a glorious smell. Add the tomatoes (wash the can out with a little water and throw this in too) and crush with the back of a spoon if you're not using chopped tomatoes. Cook down adding the tomato puree and a little salt after about 10 minutes. This should take around 25-30 minutes in total.

3. While the tomato sauce is cooking, turn your attention to the aubergines. Slice them lengthways into thin-ish slices (up to 1cm thick). Fry the aubergine slices in a vegetable oil until soft and slightly golden, a minute or two on each side.

4. Now to roll up the aubergine. With the short edge towards you, spoon around a teaspoon of stuffing onto the end and roll the aubergine up. Place into an oven-proof dish and repeat until you're out of aubergine slices or stuffing (whichever comes first).

5. Add the tomato sauce to the top of the aubergines and place in the oven for 10-15 minutes at 180C.

We serve this with oven-roasted, garlic potatoes and some green beans. Would be good with some butter-y garlic bread too if you want more carbs!

Churros and chocolate sauce

2016-09-13T20:22:00+01:00

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day, it can also be the finest meal of all. The weekends always give us the opportunity to put a bit more effort into our breakfasts. This often involves eggs, occassionally a pancake or two but every now and then we like to treat ourselves to something more decadent. These churros definitely fit the bill. Light and crispy and served with a rich chocolate sauce - they don't exactly scream healthy living but, every now and again, a little treat does you no harm whatsoever.

We've often enjoyed the churros of Churros Garcia whose vegan Spanish treats can often be found on London's South Bank. And while on holiday in Spain, I'll look longingly at the super light and ultra crispy treats being enjoyed by locals in cafes for breakfast with steaming hot chocolates. Enough, I said. Time to recreate this at home.

This recipe makes more than enough for two people (probably more like 3 or 4 if you're not greedy). It's not a filling breakfast but, for a fried breakfast, it sure is classy!

Ingredients

50g non-dairy margarine (we use Vitalite)
250g plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
100g dark chocolate
75ml coconut cream
vegetable oil for frying

1. Add 350ml boiling water to the melted margarine and stir.

2. Sift the flour and baking powder into a bowl Add the wet ingredients and beat until you have a lump free batter (it will be quite a thick, sticky paste) Leave to rest for 15 minutes or so.

3. Heat a saucepan that is just under half full of oil (please be careful - and sensible - with this). Transfer your batter into a piping bag with a star shaped nozzle. Once the oil is hot, pipe lengths of batter into the oil and cook until golden (2-3 minutes).

4. For a delicious dipping sauce, gently melt the chocolate and coconut cream, mixing occassionally until smooth.

Mocha mousse pots

2016-09-04T22:48:00+01:00

So, you're having people round for dinner or you're after a quick-and-easy dessert hit on a weeknight? Then this one is for you! Mocha mousse pots. Three ingredients, minimal time - it's perfect. Chocolate-y, coffee-y, light yet rich and delicious. And you can use the leftover egg yolks not used here to make ice cream (try this one), everyone's a winner! This recipe makes 4 mousse pots and takes less than 15 minutes.

Ingredients

100g dark chocolate
4 egg whites
1 tbsp caster sugar
1 tbsp instant coffee granules

1. Melt the dark chocolate in a bowl over a pan of water.

2. While the chocolate is melting, beat the egg whites until stiff then whisk in the caster sugar.

3. Mix the instant coffee with 1 tablespoon boiling water and add to the almost melted chocolate, stirring until combined.

4. Gently fold the chocolate into the egg whites and divide into four ramekins or glasses to serve. Simples.

Roasted vegetable lasagne

2016-08-17T22:30:00+01:00

So I was scrolling through the blog the other day, only to realise that in over a year and a half of posting recipes I'd not posted a recipe for my vegetable lasagne. How can this be? I thought. And I don't have an answer to that... I've been making this for years. I put it together while at university, I'd never had a non-meat lasagne before so I was keen to try some meat free alternatives. I've tinkered around with the recipe a bit over the years, the exact vegatables that are included will always depend on what is in the fridge at the time, but it has remained largely unchanged.

It's a family favourite, in my family at least. There are even times when we'd prefer to have this over the meatier alternative - a pretty serious endorsement, I think you'd agree. The lentils in the tomato sauce add a bit of weight and a nice texture, then there's the roasted vegetables (roasted with plenty of garlic I might add). I'll leave you to make up your mind as to which you prefer, but give this a go - I'm prepared to guarantee that you won't miss the meat.

On its free-from credentials, I like to top my lasagne with Lactofree cheese but it's equally tasty with no cheese on top. I've been making this lasagne for so long that it pre-dates Lactofree cheese (even the slightly rubbery variety). Maybe it's because I didn't know any better at the time but I thought it was fabulous on its dairy-free, vegan lonesome.

This recipe yields four portions, which gives two nice portions for dinner and then leftovers for lunch (always a winner in our house). If I'm feeling super organised (or I'm making this for a busy evening) then I'll roast the vegetables the night before and leave them in a tupperware in the fridge.

Ingredients

1 aubergine, cubed
2 courgettes, cubed
1 onion, cut into wedges
4-8 garlic cloves, leave these whole
1 tin whole plum tomatoes
3/4 cup red lentils
1 tbsp tomato puree
50g non-dairy margarine (we use Vitalite)
50g flour
350-400ml soya milk
salt and pepper
lasagne sheets
Lactose free cheese (or other toppings of your choice)

1. Roast the aubergine, courgettes, and onion together with 4-6 cloves of garlic (leave these whole, the clove inside goes wonderfully sweet and can be used to make some cracking garlic "butter") and a good glug of olive oil. Leave in the oven for around 40-50 minutes at 190C until the vegetables are soft. Leave to cool (potentially overnight if you're being organised).

2. Now to make the tomato sauce. Peel and crush 2 cloves of garlic and gently fry in a little oil for a couple of minutes until golden. Add in the tomatoes, breaking up the large pieces of tomato with your wooden spoon. Add in the red lentils and tomato puree and season with a little salt. Leave to cook for 20-25 minutes until the lentils are soft, stirring occassionally. You can add some water in if the sauce is looking a little dry.

3. Next, the white sauce. Although it sounds painful, I do prefer using the roux method - it tastes better and yields a smoother sauce. Start by gently melting your dairy-free spread in a saucepan. Once this is melted, remove from the heat and add in the flour beating it in quickly until it comes together in a ball. Slowly add in the soya milk a little at a time, stirring until it's incorporated and lump-free before moving on and adding more. I tend to switch between having this over the heat and not - you don't want it to reduce too quickly, so try to find a sweet spot on your hob. Failing that, do what I do which is dance backwards and forwards around the heat. Once you've got your sauce to the desired consistency, stop adding milk - you may not need all the milk. I prefer my white sauce to be on the thick side as it stops your lasagne from being sloppy.

4. Mix the tomato sauce with the roasted vegetables then spread one-third of this mixture into an over-proof container. Top with 2-3 lasagne sheets depending on the size of your dish. Then add one-third of the white sauce. Repeat this order twice more then top with cheese if you wish.

5. Bake your lasagne for 30-35 minutes at 180C until the pasta is soft (and the cheese is bubbling if you've got cheese). Serve with salad and maybe some garlic bread if you want all the carbs (try this one)!

Strawberry, mint and gin sorbet

2016-06-26T22:10:00+01:00

Strawberries are in season and I could not be more grateful! I try to be good and only buy them when they are in season so at their tastiest (very occassionally I am weak and give in but I really try to be good). Anyway, no need to restrain myself at the moment, it's full steam ahead with strawberries for at least the next month. So time to have some fun. I've tried making strawberry ice cream before in the hope that it would taste better than some of the, frankly, plastic strawberry ice creams out there. Sadly, the fresh strawberries didn't really improve things so clearly sorbet is the way to trap the flavour of my favourite (there I said it) berries in frozen form. This sorbet really shows strawberries at their best. Combined with mint and with a little kick of gin, it's beautifully refreshing and oh-so summery.

The joy of sorbet is that you don't even need an ice cream maker. We usually make sorbets in our (beloved) ice cream maker but have made it the old-school way a couple of times with great success - it just requires a bit more patience.

Ingredients

500g strawberries
90g caster sugar
1 cup water
10g fresh mint leaves
4-6 tbsp gin

1. Hull and chop up the strawberries, blitz them in a blender under smooth - you may need to do this in batches. Once smooth, pass it through a sieve to remove any particularly large seeds.

2. Place the water, sugar, and mint into a saucepan and heat gently until the sugar dissolves. Leave to one side to cool.

3. Mix the strawberries together with the sugar and mint syrup, stirring well. Add in the gin and chill for about an hour.

4. Place in your ice-cream maker and follow its instructions. Transfer to a container and place in the freezer.

4b. Alternatively, if you don't have an ice cream maker. Place in a container and put in the freezer. Every hour, break up the sorbet with a fork and place back into the freezer. The idea is to break up the crystals to maintain a nice smooth texture.

Curry night (lamb style)

2016-06-22T21:31:00+01:00

I didn't think this day would ever come. While I love a good curry (I can't really emphasise this enough) my attempts at experimentation or any deviation from recipes don't usually end up tasty. I rely heavily on Maunika Gowardhan's blog for recipes and ideas - her butter chicken (with Hannah-friendly substitutions) is delicious as are her slow-cooked lamb recipes. Indian food at home means buttery naans (yes, spread a butter-y substitute all over them, it's amazing!) as well as yogurt-y, mint-y dips. All the good things! Anyway, I'm not really one for experimenting and trying out my own thing when it comes to curries - it's possibly the only time when I actually follow a recipe. Yet here I am blogging a curry recipe. What happened?

Well, I was trying to recreate a bhuna-style curry (one of David's favourites whenever we go out for curry). Having done some research, I couldn't find one recipe I liked or, more importantly, had all of the ingredients for. I decided to go it alone (cue some sort of action movie music). I started with loads of ginger and garlic (can't go wrong with that, can you?) then grabbed a load of spices, then stirred and tasted, stirred and tasted, adding a few extra spices as I went. The result was a lusciously rich curry with a thick sauce and beautifully tender lamb. I thought I'd write it down so I don't forget...

Ingredients

450g lamb, diced
5 garlic cloves
3cm fresh ginger, peeled
1 green chilli
2 tbsp soya or lactose free yogurt
lemon juice
2 tsp cumin seeds
4 tsp coriander seeds
1/4 cinnamon stick
1 tsp chilli flakes
1 tsp tumeric
1 tsp garam masala
1 onion, finely sliced
1 green pepper, finely sliced
4 tomatoes, diced or one tin of tomatoes
1/2 tsp garam masala
1/2 tsp fenugreek powder

Getting down to business then... this makes enough for two hungry people but with some leftovers. You might get four portions out of it if you have lots of sides or not much appetite.

1. First, the lamb. This needs a couple of hours head start. Bash your garlic and ginger into a paste with a little water and the green chilli. I used a stick blender in a narrow jug to do this because I'm lazy. You're aiming for a paste. Mix this with the yogurt, a squeeze of lemon juice and some salt and pepper. Leave in the fridge for at least 2 hours or as long as you've got.

2. Toast your spices (cumin seeds, coriander seeds, and cinnamon stick) in a pan on the hob for a couple of minutes until the seeds start to change colour. Remove from the heat and grind in a pestle and mortar adding the chilli flakes, tumeric and 1tsp of garam masala.

3. Heat some vegetable oil in a large frying pan and add in the onion and green pepper. Cook for 5-6 minutes before adding the lamb together with the marinade. Cook until the meat is browned (around 5 minutes) then add in the ground spices.

4. Add in the chopped tomatoes and cover, turning the heat down. Gently cook for around 30 minutes, making sure you keep an eye on it, stirring it regularly to make sure it doesn't catch or burn.

5. Sprinkle over 1/2 tsp garam masala and fenugreek powder and cook for a further 5 minutes.

6. Serve with rice and naan and any of your other favourite Indian treats.

Croissants - a step-by-step guide

2016-06-14T23:31:00+01:00

So we first published our croissants recipe a while ago but I've been making croissants every 5 weeks or so for the last two years. I've picked up a few more hints and tips and thought I'd share them. I've taken many, many photos along the way to try to help you enjoy these tasty croissants at home. I've also been experimenting with fillings (why have croissants when you could have chocolate croissants, almond croissants, hazelnut croissants...)

Believe it or not, this recipe is vegan. No 'all butter' labels here. You do need a butter/hard fat substitute. I get mine from Sainsbury's but I've found some at Lidl too.

Anyway, first things first. This is not a quick win. If you want to make croissants, start early. Like a few days in advance. It's not that they are difficult to make, you just can't rush some things. They take time. If you're concerned you may get a craving for croissants then I suggest you make a batch, cook them then freeze any leftovers. I make 10 at a time, cook them altogether then freeze that 8 that aren't eaten. I've done some highly scientific tests and decided that it's best to cook then freeze rather than freeze the raw croissants and either cook straight from frozen or defrost then cook. Cook first. Then freeze. Winner.

On to fillings. Chocolate is now non-negotiable. When I make croissants, some need to contain chocolate. With the rest, I alternate between almond (making a paste of ground almonds, sugar and Vitalite/dairy free spread) or hazelnut (much the same as almond but using toasted, chopped hazelnuts instead of almonds). You could leave them plain, I guess.

So, let's begin. This recipe makes 10 croissants.

Ingredients

300g strong white bread flour
2 tsp salt
30g caster sugar
2.5 tsp dried yeast
250g margarine (hard fat/baking block)
chocolate (optional)
75g ground almonds (optional)
75g hazelnuts, toasted then chopped (optional)
Non-dairy margarine (optional)
75g additional caster sugar (optional)

1. Mix the bread flour, salt, sugar, yeast with enough warm water to form a soft dough (around 150 to 200ml). Knead the dough until it becomes elastic. Place in a bowl, pour over a little vegetable oil, cover and put in the fridge for about an hour. The dough should double in size.

2. Flatten your fat, bashing it between some greaseproof paper until it's only a couple of centimetres (one inch) thick. Roll the dough into a large rectangle. Place the flattened fat into the middle and fold the dough around the fat to make a dough-y envelope. Cover then place back into the fridge and chill for another hour.

3. Roll the dough out into a large rectangle once again. It's time to fold again, this time working in as many folds as possible. I like to fold the long sides into the middle then fold this over on itself 3 or 4 times (see the photo, it'll make more sense). Put back in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.

4. Repeat step 3 two more times returning to the fridge in between each time.

5. Leave in the fridge for between 8 and 24. This is crucial. You can't rush this.

6. Take the dough out of the fridge and roll out. Cut the dough into 10 triangles. Now to fill and roll your croissants.

6a. For chocolate croissants, chop 3 squares dark chocolate and place along the bottom of the triangle. Roll the croissant up and curve into a crescent shape.

6b. For almond croissants, mix ground almonds together with caster sugar and Vitalite until it comes together in a paste. Spread this along the bottom of the triangle but don't go right up to the edges (else it will ooze out during cooking). Roll the croissant up and curve into a crescent shape.

6c. For hazelnut croissants, roast 75g hazelnuts in a hot oven for around 10 minutes. Remove the skins either by rubbing the hazelnuts together in a tea towel or tossing into a tupperware and shaking vigourously. Chop the skin-free hazelnuts finely and mix with sugar and Vitalite. Use this to stuff your croissants.

7. However you choose to fill your croissants, place the croissants onto two lined baking sheets and leave to prove for at least another hour (I usually leave these overnight).

8. Glaze with beaten egg or dairy-free milk then cook at 180C for 20-25 minutes until golden. Either devour straight from the oven or, if you can control youself, place some into tupperware and freeze for consumption later on.

9. To rescue the croissants from the freezer, defrost overnight, sprinkle with water then reheat in the oven, warming for 10-15 minutes in a cool-ish oven (around 150C).

Warm green salad

2016-06-13T21:27:00+01:00

It does occassionally feel like summer here in London, it is June now so it really should! Every now and again, the rain stops and the temperature creeps up. Being England, you have to seize the moment. Every spare inch of grass is taken up with bare and reddening bodies, and I make salad! To be fair, I make salads regardless of the weather. I love them. For dinner, with dinner, or as a snack between meals - I find you can't go wrong.

I've called this one warm green salad because my first thought looking at this bowl is green. Let me be clear, this is not your typical, insipid green salad. (At the risk of sounding like an M&S advert...) This is a green salad with a difference. A hearty, healthy bowl of goodness. Recently, I experimented with a warm salad/side of courgettes dressed with a orange and honey as well as some toasted hazelnuts and this was the inspiration for the salad I'm sharing today. The dressing is quite possibly the favourite thing about this salad - olive oil, honey, orange juice, garlic and chilli. Each mouthful gives a slightly different flavour, bringing out different aspects of the salad.

Anyway, let's get down to business. This makes enough for one pretty filling portion.

Ingredients

1 courgette, made into ribbons
3-4 new potatoes, sliced into 1cm rings
100g spinach
1/2 avocado, sliced
30g hazelnuts, toasted
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp orange juice
1 garlic clove, crushed
1/2 tsp chilli flakes
1 tsp honey

1. Use a vegetable peeler to make ribbons from the courgette. You could do this with a knife if you have impressive knife skills and more patience than me. Gently fry the ribbons in a little oil until soft and vibrantly green.

2. Boil the new potatoes in cold water for 5-7 minutes until they can be easily pierced by a knife. You want them to be cooked but not to fall apart. Drain and set aside.

3. Mix together the oil, orange juice, garlic, chilli and honey. This is your dressing, leave it to one side for now.

4. Now to construct the salad. Put the spinach into a large flat-ish bowl or plate. Scatter over the new potatoes and the courgette ribbons. Next add the sliced avocado then drizzle the dressing everywhere, making sure it will trickle down to reach the spinach. Finally, sprinkle with toasted hazelnuts. Then enjoy.

Brownies!

2016-06-06T21:31:00+01:00

We've been promising this for a while and the time may finally be right... brownies! Now, this is David's area of speciality. This is one of the first things he baked and he's been tinkering with the recipe ever since. Who's to say whether this is actually the finished product. We're pretty happy with our brownies as things stand (and certainly the people we occassionally make them for seem to like them) but there's always room for improvement, right? Right?!

We've packed just about as much chocolate into these as we possibly could, even taking out some flour just to accommodate the extra chocolate. And we've added extra chocolate chunks to the top just in case you thought there wasn't enough. Unlike many baked goods, we think these need to mature a bit before they are at their best. Obviously you can eat them straight from the oven (in fact, we'd be impressed if you managed to avoid this) but if you can wait a day or two, they really improve. Counter-intuitive, yes, but trust us. It's true!

Hannah has been doing some (unsanctioned) experiments adding other flavours and toppings recently. This has included toasted hazelnuts, chilli and will soon include coffee too (please note, only try one at a time!)

This recipe makes around 20 small-ish brownies.

Ingredients

125g Non-dairy margarine (we use Vitalite)
150g dark chocolate (we like to use a mix of around 70% cocoa solids and 50% cocoa solids chocolate)
30g cocoa powder
40g plain flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
160g caster sugar
2 eggs, beaten
50g dark chocolate, chunks

1. Preheat your oven to 180C. Line and grease your tin.

2. Melt the Vitalite and 150g dark chocolate in a bowl over a pan of boiling water.

3. Mix the dry ingredients in a bowl before stirring into the chocolate mixture.

4. Take the chocolate mixture off the heat and add in the beaten eggs, stirring until you have a nice glossy mixture.

5. Pour your brownie mix into the lined tin and sprinkle over the chocolate chunks. Bake for 20-25 minutes, you want there to still be a hint of wobble so you get a nicely fudge-y brownie.

6. Try to wait two days to eat them at their best... Good luck with that!

Pizza with chilli-garlic prawns

2016-06-01T21:04:00+01:00

Friday night is firmly pizza night in our house. Maybe not every week, but any Friday when we're struggling to come up with a plan for dinner, there's a good chance we'll end up having pizza. This is clearly not a problem (who doesn't love pizza, especially on a Friday??) but does mean we're always on the look-out for tasty meat-free pizza toppings (just a point on definitions, fish is not meat on Fridays). Anyway... last Friday, true to form, we were going through ideas for dinner and settled on dinner. The only decision left was what to put on top? In a slightly reckless fashion, we made a decision while standing in Sainsbury's - prawns with rocket, garlic and chilli. Possibly one of our finest decisions for a long time!

This pizza really packs a punch, plenty of garlic and a good kick of chilli. However, the absence of cheese means it's not too heavy, perfect for a summer's evening (when they come around).

Now, we've been making pizza for a while, following the slightly unorthodox approach of Franco Manca (more on that later). We like to leave our dough to prove for at least 6 hours. Our latest approach involves making double the amount of dough we need and freezing the rest for a later date. The dough defrosts in a couple of hours meaning you don't need to be quite so prepared for your pizza. Anyway, details on how to make the dough can be found here. Double this and you can save some for later.

Moving on...

Ingredients

1 quantity of pizza dough (using 100g flour)
6 garlic cloves, crushed
1 tin tomatoes
Tomato puree
1 red onion, finely sliced
150g raw prawns
1 red chilli, finely sliced
Olive oil
50g rocket

1. Add four cloves of crushed garlic and chilli to the prawns with a little olive oil. Cover and leave in the fridge for an hour or so.

2. Make your tomato sauce, fry two of the crushed garlic cloves in a little olive oil until golden (and smelling amazing). Add in the tinned tomatoes, breaking them up as necessary. Stir in the tomato puree and simmer until reduced. Taste and season as necessary.

3. Stretch out your pizza dough on a floured surface. Heat a heavy-based frying pan and toss in the pizza base. Cook for 3-5 minutes until the base starts to cook, bubbles may appear under the surface of the dough.

4. Spread the tomato sauce over the base and sprinkle over the red onion. Transfer the pizza to a preheated grill and leave there for around 5 minutes until the edges of the dough are cooked.

5. While the pizza is under the grill, cook the prawns in a frying pan - frying for 3-4 minutes on each side until pink. Once cooked, sprinkle over the pizza and cover with the rocket.

And there you have it. Cheese-free but altogether amazing Friday night pizza.

Chocolate orange cheesecake

2016-05-29T18:12:00+01:00

We've been quite socialable lately, inviting lots of friends (and occassionally family) around for dinner to see our lovely new house. These are typically three-course affairs but, if not, dessert is non-negotiable. Seriously, there is no way I'm inviting people round and not making dessert. The dessert I'm sharing with you today has recently come back into my repertoire, I've made a few changes with these latest iterations and it's ready to go.

So, here we have it. Cheesecake. Quite possibly one of the things I miss most since becoming lactose intolerant (ok, that's a pretty tough list to put together, but I think it would make the top ten). And not just cheesecake but chocolate orange cheesecake. I love it. Crunchy, chocolate base with a light and zesty (maybe with an extra zing of Cointreau...) baked cheesecake filling, topped with arty chocolate curls. After much testing, I've decided it's physically impossible to make the chocolate curls look anything other than artistic (definite win in my book). I like a chocolate-y base for this cheesecake for two reasons. 1) More chocolate = win. 2) It gives a much crispier base, no soggy bottoms here.

Anyway, enough blabbering about the cheesecake, here's how you make it... It gives 10-12 portions (depending on how hungry you are) using a 7in/18cm springform tin.

Ingredients

200g dark chocolate
50g Non-dairy margarine (we use Vitalite)
300g oat based biscuits (Hobnobs or similar)
500g Lactofree creamcheese
150ml Alpro soya yogurt
200g caster sugar
2 eggs, separated
1 tbsp plain flour
zest of 1 orange
50ml Cointreau (optional)
70g dark chocolate

1. First of all, grease your tin. It's no good making a cheesecake if you can't serve it nicely to anyone. Done that? Right, let's proceed.

2. Melt 200g dark chocolate with the Vitalite or other dairy free spread. Bash up the biscuits in a plastic bag, try to get the pieces as small and even as possible (although, I usually run out of patience before that point...) Mix the biscuit crumbs into the chocolate mixture and spread across the base of your tin. Put in the fridge to cool and set while you make the filling.

3. Mix your cream cheese of choice together with the yogurt, caster sugar and 2 egg yolks. Then add in flour, orange zest and Cointreau (just for extra orange-y-ness, honest!) and mix again.

4. Whisk the leftover egg whites until stiff then fold in to the orange mixture.

5. Pour the filling over the biscuit base then cook at 180C for 35 to 40 minutes until the filling is slightly golden and still has a bit of wobble. Chill it until you need to serve - it may crack slightly on top but that's what the chocolate curls are for (as well as looking awesome).

6. For the chocolate curls, melt your chocolate in a bowl over a pan of water. The exact amount of chocolate isn't too important, I've done it with as little as 50g but as much as 150g - it just varies how much chocolate is leftover for other things. Once the chocolate is melted pour it onto a flat, clean baking sheet or a chopping board. Place into the fridge to cool. Once the chocolate has set, take a long knife and, holding the handle and the blade (carefully), pull the knife towards you to create curls. You may need to place a tea towel under the baking sheet/chopping board or try bracing it against your body so it doesn't slide around. Sprinkle the chocolate curls over the top of the cheesecake and serve to your impressed guests.

Dead-easy burgers

2016-05-24T16:53:00+01:00

The days are getting longer, lighter, and hotter which can mean only one thing... barbecues (or BBQs, if you're not in the UK and don't insist on spelling things out!) I love a good barbecue/BBQ especially now we've got our own garden and can actually generate our own barbecue and not rely on other people to invite us to theirs! Now we've sorted out the garden, we've bought a barbecue (not quite assembled it yet, it's on the to do list...) so now all we need is some good weather and a decent burger recipe. Ok, it's London so the good weather is hard to organise but I've been working on the burger recipe and it's now ready for sharing.

I love a good burger, and they're even better at home (where I can put my own cheese on them than have to live without it). That said, these burgers are so flavourful you could definitely get away without the cheese. Can't quite believe I'm saying that... they definitely don't need ketchup (and I'm a big ketchup fan, that's quite an admission) and while the cheese is incredily tasty it isn't strictly a requirement. Ok? Let's move on to the actual burger bit... This recipe makes two burgers but is very easily scalable.

Ingredients

250g beef mince
1 small red onion, finely chopped
Splash balsamic vinegar
1 garlic clove, crushed
1 tsp smoked paprika
1 tsp oregano
salt and pepper
Lactose free cheese (or other toppings of your choice)

1. Take the onion and gently fry in a little oil. Once the onions are soft (around 5-7 minutes) add in a splash of balsamic vinegar and continue to cook for another few minutes. Remove from the heat and leave to cool.

2. Place the beef, crushed garlic, spices, salt and pepper into a bowl and mix thoroughly. I find it's easiest to do this with your hands. You want to make sure the mince is well broken up and all the spices are evenly distributed throughout the mixture. Add in the cooled onion.

3. Divide the mixture in half and shape into patties. Cover and leave in the fridge for at least 20 minutes.

4. Once chilled, heat a frying pan (or stoke up the barbecue) and cook to your liking. I like 6 minutes on each side and I put the cheese on once I've flipped it.

Falafel

2016-05-18T21:31:00+01:00

We've been experimenting with a more vegetarian diet of late. We've not fully taken the veggie-plunge but during the week (when we're at home, sometimes when we're out but it can be tricky for me) we try to keep meat out of our diet. This started during Lent but we've kept going post-Easter and our repetoire of veggie meals is slowly growing. We always tried to skip meat once or twice a week both because we seem to rely on meat to make a meal and because it's not the healthiest way to live. Over the last few months, we've discovered new blogs and bought new cookbooks to increase the number of veggie meals we cook - there's only so many times you can eat veggie lasagne in one week, no matter how tasty it is! Anyway, this has meant we've not been playing around with so many of our own recipes, instead looking to others for ideas and inspiration. Now, we're a bit more comfortable with meat-free cooking, we thought it was about time to share a new homemade favourite.

Now, falafel isn't exactly a 'new' favourite. I've been frankly slightly obsessed with falafel for a while. There's this great market stall near my work that sells quite possibly the best falafel wraps... EVER! But how to recreate this at home. I've tried a number of different recipes but never quite getting it right (usually making something closer to 'chickpea mess', they often would just fall apart). This latest strategy suffers from none of those problems. Instead you have balls of intensely chickpea and herb-packed goodness. All coming together in the food processor so you don't need to get your hands (too) dirty.

Ingredients

1 can chickpeas, drained
1 large spring onion, roughly chopped
2 tsp cumin
1 tsp sumac
½ green chilli
1 garlic clove, crushed
fresh coriander and parsley
Sesame seeds
Gram flour

Getting down to business then... this makes enough for two people but with no leftovers.

1. Start with your chickpeas. Toss these into your food processor with the spring onion, cumin, sumac, green chilli, and crushed garlic. Finally throw in some fresh coriander and parsley. The exact amount is up to you, I put in a good handful of each both for colour and taste but you can play around with what works for you. Season

2. Blitz until the mixture comes together. If it's a bit wet then add one tablespoon gram (chickpea) flour and blitz again. You want everything to be well mixed and coming together into a paste-dough-type thing.

3. Once this happens, you're ready to start shaping. We make six patties out of this mixture, shaping each one into balls then flattening slightly (more like burger patties). Coat in gram flour and sesame seeds then leave in the fridge to chill for around 20 minutes.

4. On to the cooking, gently shallow fry in a little vegetable oil for 3-4 minutes on each side - much longer and the sesame seeds will start to burn, no one wants that! Serve with hummus, flatbreads and salad.

Chocolate making

2016-05-14T21:31:00+01:00

Time is flying by once again; the clocks have gone forward and my resolution to blog more frequently has (once again) not materialised! That's not to say we've not been eating tasty food, we have, and we've even managed to take some nice photos along the way... I've found a great spot in the corner of our new kitchen for taking photos in the morning, lots of lovely natural light.

Back in March, I went on a little Hannah-friendly adventure. My Christmas present this year was a chocolate making workshop with Bianca Marton at her shop in Brentford. She specialises in dairy-free and vegan truffles and chocolates. She's an inspiring and incredibly generous woman, and her chocolates are divine.

I ended up having a private lesson as it was a quiet evening. I learned about the history of chocolate, how it is made from bean to and tasting it at various stages along the way (note to self: it's not really tasty until it actually becomes chocolate...) We made ganache and flavoured it and I learned how to temper chocolate - something I've been meaning to do for a while. We made truffles and dipped them in chocolate. We also filled chocolate shells with the flavoured ganache before sealing them up, all the while marvelling at how all these tasty treats are dairy free!

This is all the long way round to saying I will be spending more time in the months ahead attempting to make tasty chocolates at home, practising the patience Bianca taught me was required in the process.

Turn up the heat: chocolate-chilli ice cream

2016-03-04T22:27:00+00:00

So much for turning over a new leaf and blogging all the time in 2016. It's been a busy start to the year with life (and moving house) slightly getting in the way of blogging. While cooking (and eating!) has continued finding the time to take all the lovely photos and write them up has just proved too difficult. If I had one of those watches that stops time then maybe things would be different...

Anyway, back to food. And possibly the best food of all, ice-cream! Yes, it may be February but that's no reason not to have ice-cream. In fact, that's every reason to have ice-cream! We love ice-cream. We love to be creative with flavours and try new things - especially as the market for Hannah-friendly ice-cream, whether it's lactose free, dairy free or vegan, is pretty limited. Anyway, we dug our trusty ice-cream maker out from it's box (it doesn't usually get treated this way, it's just all the moving house stuff!) and thought we'd put it to work. After deliberating whether to make our traditional mocha ice-cream or maybe our chocolate-peanut ice-cream, we decided it was time to be brave and try something new. We were fixed on chocolate, but what to mix it with? Then it came to me. Chilli. Of course, we love the chilli flavoured chocolate that Lindt and others sell so why not make that into ice-cream? The finished result was a triumph. Beautifully, silky-smooth chocolate ice-cream with a healthy kick and a bit of warmth from some chilli powder and a little cayenne pepper.

Ingredients

250ml Lactofree milk
3 egg yolks
75g caster sugar
100g chocolate (70% cocoa solids)
100g chocolate (50% cocoa solids)
1/4 tsp chilli powder
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
250ml Lactofree cream

So here's how you do it...

1. As ever, you start by making a custard. Bring the Lactofree milk just to the boil, and then remove from the heat.

2. Mix your egg yolks with the caster sugar in a large bowl. Add the milk to the yolks and sugar and then return the combined mixture to the heat but make sure it does not boil. Stir continuously for 5 minutes while the custard thickens, then put it in the fridge to cool.

3. In a bowl placed over a pan of simmering water melt both kinds of chocolate together with the spices, make sure there are no lumps. You may want to reduce the amount of cayenne pepper (or omit entirely) if you're not so much the spicy fan!

4. Leave the pan on the heat but turn down to low and add the Lactofree cream into the melted chocolate stirring continuously to produce a smooth liquid. Cool both liquids in the fridge and then combine.

5. Add the mixed chocolate and custard to your ice-cream maker following its instructions.

Chocolate and peanut butter brownies (and they're vegan!)

2016-02-21T21:31:00+00:00

So scrolling through the recipe archive, it appears we've been quite remiss and never actually posted our brownie recipe. This has been carefully curated over many years, tweaked and perfected until we were prepared to write it down. It was the first thing to go into the special notebook of "our" recipes. Now that I remember, this is because we've struggled to take a photo of them that truly conveys just how chocolatey and how tasty they are! One day we'll manage it, but for now here's a vegan alternative that we've recently discovered.

This is based on a Jamie Oliver recipe but with one slight (dare I say it?) improvement... peanut butter. Peanut butter and chocolate has to be one of my all-time favourite combinations. The mix of salty and sweet it delightful. On an indulgent day I will use this as the topping for my porridge (on a normal day it's usually frozen berries and peanut butter, always peanut butter). I love it. And what better way to celebrate the combination than to bake it into some brownies! It lends a richness to these brownies that will leave you wondering whether they really are vegan.

So the starting point of the recipe was Jamie's but with a few additions and substitutions. Obviously, the addition of peanut butter is one. I substituted almond milk for soya milk, because I'm in the throws of a love affair with almond milk and can't keep it out of everything I'm making. I also added a few swirls of peanut butter on top and some chocolate chips. So here goes...

Ingredients

150g dark chocolate
2 tbsp crunchy peanut butter
170g self-raising flour
4 tsp cocoa powder
160g caster sugar
pinch of salt
5 tbsp sunflower oil
230ml almond milk
50g dark chocolate, chopped
smooth peanut butter

1. Melt the chocolate and crunchy peanut butter in a bowl over a pan of boiling water, stirring occassionally until the chocolate is completely melted. Set to one side to cool slightly.

2. Sieve the self-raising flour and cocoa powder into a bowl, stirring in the caster sugar and a pinch of salt.

3. Stir in the sunflower oil and almond milk to the dry ingredients. Add the melted chooclate mixture and mix until everything is combined.

4. Pour the mixture into a greased and lined baking tin, swirl another tablespoon or two of peanut butter on top (I used smooth this time rather than crunchy) and scatter over the chopped dark chocolate.

5. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes at 180C until cooked on the outside but nice and gooey inside.

Bean Burgers

2016-01-06T00:00:00+00:00

Doesn't time fly? It's been a little while since our last post but, fear not, we're still here and cooking Hannah-friendly things! So, onto today's recipe. While we aren't quite as brave as some of the bloggers out there so won't be doing vegan January (or Veganuary), we do make an effort to be at least veggie a couple of times a week - it's good for us and helps us to be more creative. The no lactose restriction means that often our veggie-ness turns to vegan. This is a great vegan recipe of ours that we've been tinkering around with for a while and are now happy enough with it to share with you! These bean burgers are delicious and massively flavourful. Depending on the prevailing mood, the can be considered even better than the meaty alternatives. We don't want to overstate things, but they are super tasty - forget any insipid little thing you were palmed off with at a barbecue, this bean burger can hold its own. Plus they're really easy to make, all you need is a food processor. Alternatively, you can use a potato masher but the food processor is so much faster (and easier to wash afterwards). This recipe makes four patties, we usually cook two and freeze two ready for next time.

Ingredients

1 can kidney beans
1/2 red onion
1/2 white onion
1 carrot, grated
2 cloves garlic, crushed
chopped coriander
1/2 tsp chilli powder
1/2 tsp salt
3 tbsp breadcrumbs

1. Start with the kidney beans, red onion, white onion, grated carrot and garlic. Throw all these ingredients (chopping the onions into smaller pieces first) into a food processor and blitz until mostly combined.

2. Add in a handful of coriander, chilli powder and salt and blitz again.

3. Finally, add in the breadcrumbs and blitz again until the mixture starts to come together and feels slightly drier.

4. Carefully remove the mixture from the food processor and shape into four, even patties. Dip these in flour and leave in the fridge to set for at least 15 minutes.

5. Once you're ready to cook them, fry gently in a little oil for 3-4 minutes on each side. Enjoy in a burger bun with chips and salad.

Sweet Potato and Butternut Squash soup

2015-10-26T00:00:00+00:00

We never really look forward to the end of British Summer Time, but there are one or two benefits to the temperature getting a bit colder. One is that the tube (the Subway for our American readers) becomes more bearable, and the other is that we can have soup for lunch (which we find a bit weird in July). Here is a recipe for the soup we had last week.

Cut 1 butternut squash and 2 sweet potatoes into small chunks. Drizzle with 1 tbsp honey and some olive oil, and roast at 180C until soft (about 1 hour). Meanwhile, cut 1 onion into rings and gently fry with 2 cloves garlic.

Once everything is ready, throw it all into a pot and add 2l of vegtable stock (made with 1 stock cube), 0.5 tsp chilli and 2 tsp cinnamon. Simmer for 20 minutes and then blitz using a hand blended or liquidiser.

Stuffed courgettes and a meaty alternative

2015-10-18T00:00:00+01:00

We recently hosted six of our lovely friends for a delicious Italian feast. We'd been given six bottles of wine to help us host the party and we really went to town on planning out the various courses based on my Nonna's Sunday lunch. One our guests is veggie and while the majority of the meal was veggie-friendly (and Hannah-friendly, obviously) the meat course was going to be a challenge! We decided on Braciole, a southern Italian version of involtini di manzo - thin steak stuffed with tasty things rolled up and cooked in a rich tomato sauce. Clearly, not very veggie friendly. So we were a little creative (incidently, we realised after the fact that you could sub the steak for aubergine but we already had aubergine in this meal, so a little variation is no bad thing!) Anyway, we decided to take the stuffing from the Braciole, mix with the flesh of an oven-roasted courgette then stuff it all back in there. Sounds pretty tasty, no?

This recipe is enough for one serving, but very easily scalable.

Anyway, start by slicing a courgette in half and roasting both halves in a pre-heated oven (190C) until the flesh is soft, about 40 minutes. While that is in the oven you can start to prepare the stuffing. Start by gently roasting 1 tablespoon pinenuts in the oven for about 7 minutes then roughly crush in a pestle and mortar. Add in 2 tablespoons fresh chopped basil and 2 tablespoons fresh chopped parsley, 1 glove crushed garlic, 2 tablespoons breadcrumbs, 1 tablespoon raisins, 5 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil. Then grate in 1 hard boiled egg and a little pecorino if you like. Stir, cover and leave in the fridge so the flavours have a chance to all mix together.

Once the courgettes are soft, carefully scoop out the flesh and mix with the rest of the stuffing mixture. Fill the courgette skins with the stuffing mixture and put back in the oven for 10 minutes. We served this with our melanzane parmigiana and some green beans. We'll post the braciole recipe soon, promise!

Chocolate, courgette and hazelnut cake (psst, they're vegan too!)

2015-10-11T00:00:00+01:00

We've been meaning to play around with courgette cake for ages. Carrot cake is a always a winner in this house so we couldn't see why courgette cake wouldn't be, plus this cake has chocolate in which just makes it even better, right? We certainly like to think so. This is a wonderfully moist and rich cake, and together with the sticky, fudgy icing is seriously decadent. Oh, and it's vegan! We've been doing some experimenting with alternative milks recently - in tea, on cereal, and in baking. This week was the turn of hazelnut milk which, let's be honest, is a bit weird in tea but is delicious with cereal and, so far, the baking experiments have been super tasty.

So, let's begin... we've made these into 12 pretty serious muffins but you could definitely make one large cake, or maybe two sandwiched together with the icing (more on that later).

First of all, sift together 250g plain flour, 225g caster sugar, 85g cocoa powder, 2 teaspoons baking powder and 1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda. Mix the dry ingredients until the cocoa powder is evenly dispersed. In a jug, mix 300ml hazelnut milk, 125ml vegetable oil and 2 teaspoons vanilla extract. Slowly pour the wet ingredients into the dry and miz until thoroughly combined. Now mix in 250g grated courgettes and 75g chopped roasted hazelnuts.

Divide the mixture into a 12-hole muffin tin and cook for 20-25 minutes at 180C, until the muffins have risen, are springy to the touch, and a knife or skewer comes out clean. While the muffins are cooling, melt 40g Vitalite or other dairy free spread, together with 2 tablespoons boiling water. Once melted, sift in 20g cocoa and 250g icing sugar then stir until it comes together into a reasonably stiff icing - you can always add more icing sugar if it looks a bit runny. Spread the cooled muffins with the icing and leave to dry.

Pesto and roasted vegetable pizza

2015-10-09T00:00:00+01:00

There is a slight risk that our little blog will descend into an exclusively pizza and ice-cream affair, hold on... what's wrong with that exactly?! We've been experimenting with lots of new flavours and combinations on both fronts recently, and generally having an excellent time doing so! This Friday night was no exception with a delightful new veggie pizza as a result. The added bonus of this week's experiment was that we used some leftover pizza dough from the freezer. We were a little concerned that maybe we wouldn't achieve the same lightness as with a fresh dough but largely our fears weren't realised.

By now you should be familiar with the slightly unorthodox way we like to cook our pizzas in order to try to capture that pizza oven crispiness (what, you're not? Well you better check out this post to find out more!) To this we've added our specially homemade pesto, a lovely tomato sauce, roasted aubergines and courgettes, a few sundried tomatoes and a generous helping of Lactofree cheese. Now here's how you do it...

So, follow our original post for the pizza dough recipe as well as the low down on the cooking methodology. Top tip: the longer you leave the dough to prove, the better it gets! We usually leave it for at least 8 hours, so we'll knock up some dough before going off to work. Once you've got your dough ready to go, and have made a nice light tomato sauce, fry some thinly sliced aubergine and courgette (around half an aubergine and half a courgette will do nicely, in 8-10 slices) in a little olive oil. Then it's time to make some pesto. We've been working on this recipe for a while, flexing it to precisely the requirements of the recipe (sometimes runnier, sometimes a bit thicker). Start by toasting a handful (around 10-15g) pinenuts either in a pre-heated oven for 5-7 minutes or in a frying pan, until they start to change colour. Bash 15g fresh basil in a pestle and mortar (removing any stalks), add in one clove crushed garlic and the pinenuts and bash some more! Add in a tiny pinch of salt and enough extra virgin olive oil to get a runny consistency (suitable for spreading on a pizza base).

Now, for construction. Roll your pizza dough out to a circle that will fit in your frying pan. Get the frying pan nicely hot and toss in your base. Cook for 3-4 minutes then remove the pan from the heat temporarily to give yourself enough time to add the toppings. Firstly, spread the pizza base with pesto, then add the tomato sauce. Scatter with the roasted vegetables and 6-8 sundried tomatoes before adding the around 150g grated Lactofree cheese. Put the pan back on the heat and cook for 2-3 more minutes. Place the pan under a pre-heated grill and cook for 5-7 minutes until the cheese bubbles. Serve with a green salad and a nice glass of wine.

Caramel shortbread

2015-10-04T00:00:00+01:00

This one isn't really a recipe, more some encouragement to try making these Lactofree caramel shortbreads! Caramel shortbread (or millionaire's shortbread) was one of my favourite treats growing up one not the easiest thing to try to recreate in a Hannah-friendly way. There are now some nice (and reasonably convincing) free from alternatives available in supermarkets (this Lazy Days Foods one is my favourite) but there's nothing quite like making it yourself - plus I have no problem eating gluten.

Anyway, I noticed this recipe on the Lactofree website a while ago and have tried it out a number of times with much success. I use a different recipe for the shortbread, largely because I never seem to have any rice flour. The most important bit though is making your own condensed milk as that's what isn't available to buy.

My next test is going to be trying with soya milk to see if it can be vegan. So far I've only tried with Lactofree products.

Pistachio and orange ice cream

2015-09-27T00:00:00+01:00

So our summer of experimenting with ice cream flavours is continuing despite the fact that the days are getting shorter and and colder. There's nothing like denial to get you through the winter, and ice cream is an integral part of this denial! It would be fair to say that the other discovery of the summer has been pistachios. Now, I've long enjoyed a pistachio too, not least on family holidays in France, but it is only recently I've learnt to appreciate and use pistachios in my cooking. Anyway, aside from adding a lovely crunch to salads and a wonderful flavour to biscotti, pistachios are delightful in ice-cream form.

The basis for this recipe is our the custard from our mocha ice-cream (which you can find here). But first, the pistachios! Start with 100g pistachios, shells on and preferably unsalted. Shell the pistachios and remove as much of the skins as possible exposing the lovely green-ness. Roast the pistachios at 180C for 5-10 minutes. When the pistachios are cool enough to handle, remove any remaining skin that couldn't be shaken off before roasting, then whiz them in a food processor until finely ground. Add the ground pistachios together with the zest of one orange to 250ml Lactofree milk in a sauce pan. Gently bring the milk to the boil and then remove from the heat. Mix 3 egg yolks with 75g caster sugar in a large bowl. Add the milk to the yolks and sugar and then return the combined mixture to the heat but do not boil. Stir continuously for 5 minutes while the custard thickens. Put the custard in the fridge to cool. Once the custard is cool stir in 250ml Lactofree cream and then follow your ice cream maker's instructions to make the ice cream.

Garlic and herb plait

2015-09-21T00:00:00+01:00

It's not often I post a bread recipe here, I make a reasonable amount of bread but tend to stick to using other people's recipes rather than making my own. But this evening I was feeling creative. I was going to make my usual garlic bread using some partbake bread but I thought I'd make my own. These were delicious, not quite as obviously garlic-y as my normal garlic bread but balanced nicely with the bread, and such super soft bread! This was my first time plaiting bread dough, in fact my first time plaiting anything apart from hair, and I was a little nervous but it's not as terrifying as it first seems!

Start with 180g strong bread flour then add in 10g sugar and 7g easy bake yeast, one teaspoon salt and a drizzle of olive oil. Mix together before adding in enough warm water to bring together into a soft dough, before kneading for 5-7 minutes. Place the dough back into the bowl, drizzle the dough with a little olive oil and cover the bowl with cling film. Leave in a warm place for 30 minutes or until doubled in size. While the dough is proving mix 75g Vitalite together with 5 crushed cloves garlic, handful chopped fresh parsley, one teaspoon dried oregano and a few fresh basil leaves, finely chopped. Once the dough has proved, divide it into two pieces. Roll each one into a rectangle about 1cm thick. Spread one piece of dough with the garlic and herb butter, and place the other on top, before gently rolling again.

Cut the dough into six equal strips, enough for two loaves. Take three strips at a time and place the top end of each strip on top of each other, then commence plaiting (there are YouTube videos which can help with this, essentially take the left strip and lay over the centre one, then take the right strip and place over the new central strip. Continue this pattern until you run out of dough). Once you've plaited, pinch the ends together and tuck the end under the plait to neaten up. Repeat with the other three dough strips then leave on a baking sheet covered with cling film. Leave to prove for a second time for around 30 minutes until roughly doubled. Bake at 190C for 30 minutes until golden.

Gnocchi...

2015-09-20T00:00:00+01:00

This is something that has long been on my to do list. I've had a soft spot for gnocchi since I was a child but it's not often that you can find a Hannah-friendly version in the supermarket.. Then we were in a Philadelphia a couple of years ago (a trip we like to call the democracy tour - we took in Boston, Philly, and New Hampshire) and had one of the best meals in a small neighbourhood Italian. It wasn't anything fancy, just outstanding gnocchi with a beautiful ragu, oh, and the restaurant was BYO too which is always a winner in our book. It was one of those meals you don't forget, we talk about it quite a lot really... Since then, we've been meaning to make our own gnocchi but it is only in the last few months that we've actually got round to it (small things like getting married seemed to get in the way!)

You may think it seems like quite a faff, but we can assure you it's totally worth it. We make two meals' worth at a time and freeze the rest, but you could probably do more. Starting with the potatoes, we've tried out a couple of varieties and have decided that Desiree is the best bet. Prick and slowly bake 1kg Desiree potatoes on a bed of rock salt at 190C. It should take about an hour and they should be completely cooked through. Once cooked, take them out and carefully peel them once they are cool enough to handle. The next step is slightly easier if you manage to peel them rather than scooping the flesh out of the skins. The next task is to grate the hot potato flesh. In our research for this post, a number of people suggested a potato ricer is the way to go. We've not done definitive testing but are very happy with the texture you get from grating so are sticking with that!

Next clear your worktop or kitchen table, heap 250g plain flour together with half a teaspoon salt onto the table together with the grated potato. Add in 2 beaten eggs and mix together adding more flour if necessary. Try to work the dough as little as possible, just do enough to bring it together. Flatten the dough out (sprinkling more flour as needed) and roll until about 2cm thick. Slice the dough into 2cm strips then roll each into a sausage. We found it was slightly more manageable to cut some of the longer pieces in half, but you'll work it out. Once you've got your sausages sorted, slice them into 1.5cm chunks and sprinkle with a little more flour. If you're feeling enthusiastic then you can style them using a fork. We liked this idea but were too tired by this point... They taste the same either way!

Check out the next post for a serving idea...

Gnocchi bake with butternut squash and other tasty things

2015-09-20T00:00:00+01:00

So you've make your gnocchi. Now what to do with them? The good new is, there's plenty of options!

We were feeling more experimental so thought have created a nice baked version using roasted butternut squash, spinach, and sundried tomatoes. Comfort food at its best, and nicely autumnal now that the nights are drawing in. This version serves two with a small amount leftover for lunch the next day (not really enough for two lunches, we tried but were pretty hungry).

To start, chop up one butternut squash and roast at 190C with 5 unpeeled cloves of garlic, a good glug of olive oil, salt, pepper and one teaspoon of dried sage. Roast for about an hour until the butternut squash is cooked. Once the butternut squash is cooked, remove from the oven and start making a white sauce (we use the more old-fashioned method, none of this all-in-one fuss... Check out how we do it here). Next, cook the gnocchi. Bring a pan of salted water to the boil and add 500g gnocchi in. As soon as they start to rise to the top of the pan, remove from the heat and drain. Stir in the white sauce, butternut squash, 200g spinach and 50g chopped sundried tomatoes. Top with 100g grated Lactofree mature cheese and place under the grill until the cheese starts to bubble.

Enjoy with a nice green salad and a good glass of wine!

Travels in Croatia

2015-09-09T19:52:00+01:00

So this is most definitely a food blog, well I like to think of it as more of a journal, a living recipe book (not sure I fully understand The Internet, but oh well...) That said, today I'm venturing into travel... and food!

We've just returned from a very long weekend in Croatia, spending one night inland at the Plitvice Lakes National Park before heading to the coast to stay in Split for four nights. From what we saw, it's a truly beautiful country with stunning scenery, friendly people and very tasty food! We spent a lot of time wandering around the Old Town in Split finding new coffee bars in different squares to sit and enjoy an espresso. This for me is one of the best bits of going on holiday (particularly in Europe) is the coffee culture - both the price and the quality of coffee makes me so happy! My other favourite thing is eating new and hopefully exciting food (some of which we even manage to recreate at home - see our salmorejo recipe from our recent Andalucian adventure). Croatia definitely didn't disappoint, we had some fantastic seafood and found wonderfully tasty ingredients.

In the heart of Split was a vibrant food market operating to some extent every day selling fruit, vegetables, delicious pastries and more meat than I've ever seen. We picked up some super fresh ingredients for lunches and dinner as well as discovering some dairy free pastry treats for breakfast, which was very exciting. The other exciting discovery was milk-free black chocolate ice cream, which we spotted and tested in a number of outlets in Split and on the island of Brac and was absolutely delicious. All in all an excellent trip!

Spicy prawn and aubergine stir-fry

2015-09-08T00:00:00+01:00

I had another evening to myself recently so, as has become the norm, I did some experimenting with fish. It's only me who likes seafood in this house so I have to take my opportunities when I get them! This time it was a spicy prawn and aubergine stir fry inspired by a number of different dishes including a pork and aubergine hot pot I tried recently at a tasty Chinese restaurant and something an old housemate of mine used to cook. It's a garlicky, gingery spicy dish of deliciousness with some of my very favourite ingredients; prawns and aubergines! This recipe is just for one, but can be easily scaled up if you've got more fans of fish in your house!

First of all cook half a cup of rice following your preferred method (me, I'm a fan of covering the rice with twice the volume of boiling water and a pinch of salt then cooking on a low heat for 12 minutes). For the stir-fry, start with half an aubergine, slice lengthwise into very thin slices then fry for 5 minutes in a little vegetable oil. Add in two crushed cloves of garlic and a 2cm piece of grated fresh ginger. Fry for a few more minutes then add in 10-12 halved cherry tomatoes and one chopped red chilli (or 1 teaspoon crushed chillies) you can vary this depending on how spicy you like things. Once the tomatoes have softened add in 1 tablespoon soy sauce and 1 teaspoon fish sauce then add in 75g cooked prawns. Before serving add in two chopped spring onions and a handful of chopped fresh coriander. Stir the rice through the stir-fry covering all the rice in the wonderfully sticky sauce.

The classic Hannah-friendly dinner party dish

2015-08-16T00:00:00+01:00

This one is a classic. I've been making this for more years than I care to remember. Even when back in my mother's kitchen (my love of cooking goes that far back!) this was a standard when people came round for dinner. This dish works particularly well for feeding a crowd, and, with a nice serving dish you can bring it straight to the table and let people help themselves - definitely my favourite kind of dinner party as my presentation is never usually up to much! Anyway, the quantities here work for about 4 people but it scales really easily (another massive advantage of this dish). Also, any leftover tomato sauce can easily be used for other things, we've had it on pizza before or thrown into a tomato sauce we're making for something else.

Start with a little oil in a large saucepan, crisp up 4 slices prosciutto crudo, frying for a minute or two on each side. Remove these from the pan and leave to one side, these will be a nice garnish once the dish is done (plus it gives a lovely flavour to the sauce). In the same saucepan, fry 3 crushed cloves of garlic before adding 4 chicken breasts. Brown the chicken for a few minutes on each side and sprinkle with a little salt and pepper. Add in one tin of tomatoes (we usually use whole tinned tomatoes so you get as much tomatoey goodness as possible) and about half a can of water, to make sure you get all the juice from the tin. Cook the chicken in the tomatoes for around 15 minutes, turning the chicken breasts over every now and again. Add in 1 tablespoon tomato puree and a pinch a salt then throw in 1 can cannellini beans and cook for a further 10-15 minutes or until the chicken is cooked through (keep turning the chicken breasts when you remember). Throw in a handful of halved cherry tomatoes about five minutes before serving, which should soften nicely. We like to serve this in a shallow dish surrounded by garlic-y ciabatta toasts (slices of ciabatta that have been grilled and then brushed with garlic butter) and scattered with basil leaves, which looks rather impressive!

Cranberry, coconut and lime drizzle cake

2015-08-15T10:14:00+01:00

My Big Nonna (that's great grandmother) was a bit of baker. Nothing fancy or experimental, just good, old-fashioned cakes. There was always a cake on the table at her house, you could just help yourself. My standard sponge cake recipe comes from her and it's that recipe that forms the basis of this offering. A slightly odd flavour combination possibly, and certainly not something that Nonna would have come up with (or endorsed) herself but I can assure you, it most definitely works! I do have a bit of a thing for coconut at the moment, which may have slightly influenced this cake. It just seems to find its way into most of my baking at the moment and it rarely fails. Anyway... I digress! Back to this cake. I had originally intended to make lemon drizzle cake, but we had no lemons just lots and lots of limes. Lime and coconut definitely appealed but I felt it was missing something. Dried cranberries are another favourite of mine at that moment, although they don't manage to make it into quite so many bakes!

Now, on to the recipe. My Nonna was an imperial baker, none of this metric nonsense. So for her, I keep this recipe in the old money - it just wouldn't be the same otherwise! So Nonna's sponge recipe was a 4:4:4:2 formation (that is ounces of self-raising flour: caster sugar: vitalite: eggs). So to that, I added 2oz dessicated coconut, 1oz dried cranberries and zest of 2 limes. Mix thoroughly and pour into a greased tin. Bake at 180C for 30 minutes until a skewer comes out clean. While the cake is cooling, heat the juice of 2 limes with 2oz caster sugar stirring until the sugar dissolves. Drizzle this over the hot cake and leave to cool. Serve with tea.

Pizza fiorentina

2015-08-14T21:04:00+01:00

So by now you probably know how much we love pizza. I mean, we really love pizza. Our latest pizza was a bit of an experiment. Now, one of the best pizza toppings without doubt has to be egg; the taste, the texture, the gooey runny yoke - there's just nothing better! So the obvious choice was pizza fiorentina, a wonderful combination of spinach, cheese and, best of all, egg. We were a little concerned that our fry-then-grill method wouldn't be up to the task but it was, and admirably so.

You can get our pizza dough recipe here. We did amend it slightly this time, using 200g strong bread flour which made enough dough for two full size pizzas with a wonderfully thin base. Make the dough well in advance, giving it plenty of time to prove. Then make up the tomato sauce, grate 150g Lactofree cheese in preparation, and have 50g fresh spinach on stand-by. Heat a frying pan and place a rolled out pizza base in it. Leave to cook for 3 or 4 minutes until the surface starts to bubble then smear with tomato sauce. Cover with raw spinach leaves, leaving space in the middle for the egg. Sprinkle generously with Lactofree cheese before finally cracking one egg carefully into the centre of the pizza. Leave to cook on the heat for a further 1-2 minutes then transfer to a pre-heated grill. Leave under the grill for 6 minutes until the egg is set and the cheese is bubbling.

Experimental ice-cream: orange and cointreau

2015-08-13T00:00:00+01:00

Making your own ice cream is great; it doesn't take very long, it's not difficult and you can make whatever flavour you like. We've been trying to test out this last point lately. One of the main downsides of not being able to digest dairy (apart from cheese) is no longer being able to eat exiting ice cream when you're out and about. However, since buying an ice cream maker a couple of years back, exciting ice cream can easily be made at home! All you need is to be creative with your flavours. We've made a lot of chocolate based ice cream in the last few weeks so were keen to try something without chocolate, maybe with a little fruit. So, to our normal ice cream recipe (see here for the custard base), we added 2 tablespoons orange juice and 2 tablespoons cointreau before putting in the machine together with 250ml Lactofree cream. This took slightly longer to freeze than normal, which we're putting down to the alcohol, but gives a lovely orange flavour with a little kick. Next time we try this recipe we'll infuse the milk with some orange zest for added zing but for now, we'll enjoy with maybe just a little chocolate sauce...

Smokey pork chilli enchilladas

2015-08-05T20:08:00+01:00

You know those evening where you just can't decide what to have for dinner? Well, this recipe was created on one of those evenings. You wouldn't really think that kind of mood would lend itself to creativity, but with on this occassion things seemed to work out for us! A bit of browsing the inter-web didn't help so we were left pondering. We like our Mexican food but always want to push the boat out a bit and try new things. So a new take on chilli, this time with pork mince and an even more Mexican twist than normal, served in homemade flour tortillas and topped with cheese. This recipe was enough for the two of us, no leftovers but we did feel pretty full.

Chilli

So down to business... finely dice 1 onion and 1 pepper and crush 2 cloves garlic. Gently fry this in a little oil until the onions are translucent and tender. Add in 500g pork mince and 50g cubed chorizo. Let the mince brown then add in 1 teaspon crushed chillies and 2 teaspoons smoked paprika along with 1 can tomatoes (we prefer the whole variety rather than chopped, and not just because it's fun to squish the tomatoes with a spoon in the pan, they taste better!) and 3 teaspoons chipotle paste. Cook for 10 minutes then add in 2 teaspoons tomato puree, 1 tin black beans and 1 teaspoon salt. Leave this to cook for another 15 minutes, tasting and seasoning as necessary.

Tortillas

While the chilli cooks down, it's time to turn your attention to the tortillas. Now you can use the ones you buy in the supermarket, that's fine and you won't really know any different. Once you start making your own, however, you'll realise that those tortillas just aren't up to much. And it's so easy to make your own at home! This makes 4 tortillas which is enough for this recipe (and leaves you with some chilli leftover for lunch the following day). Take 110g plain flour and add in 1 teaspoon salt and 3/4 teaspoon baking powder. Rub 25g hard yellow fat (we use the Sainsbury's baking block) into the flour and add in 75ml warm water and quickly bring together into a soft dough, kneading as little as possible. Wrap the dough in cling film and leave to sit for 15 minutes. Divide into four and roll each piece into a thin round. Heat a frying pan then fry each tortilla for about a minute on each side, flipping as soon as bubbles start to appear.

Anyway, once you've made tortillas and the chilli is ready to go, stir a generous handful of chopped coriander through the chilli. Load each tortilla up with chilli, fold into a parcel then place into an oven proof dish. Scatter the top with 100g grated Lactofree mature cheese and place under a hot grill until the cheese bubbles. We served this with our homemade guacamole - delish!

Salami and aubergine pizza

2015-07-31T19:52:00+01:00

Who doesn't love pizza? Since discovering a rather exciting and slightly different method for recreating pizza-oven pizza (see our previous post for more details), we've really branched out with toppings. Our latest combination is salami and aubergine with Lactofree cheese, a definite winner as as we're concerned!

The last pizza post will give you the recipe for our pizza dough (top tip: the longer you leave it to prove, the better it gets! We usually leave it for at least 8 hours, so we'll knock up some dough before going off to work) as well as the low down on the Franco Manca, fry then grill methodology. Trust us, you'll never have had homemade pizza quite like this before. Anyway, once you've got your dough ready to go, and have made a nice light tomato sauce fry some thinly sliced aubergine (around half an aubergine will do nicely, in 8-10 slices) in a little olive oil. So, now it's down to business. Heat your frying pan and, once hot, toss in your rolled out pizza base (yes, this sounds a little crazy but bear with us, it really is amazing!). Leave the base to cook for 3-4 minutes then add the toppings; the tomato sauce, the fried aubergine slices and some thinly sliced salami (we prefer napoli salami for this, and we ask the deli counter to slice it nice and thin), then a slightly obscene amount of grated Lactofree cheese. Leave on the hob for a few more minutes and then put your pizza under a heated grill until the cheese starts to bubble. Simply outstanding!

In our last pizza post, we said we were trying to make our own mozzarella. We've not given up on this, but have not yet been successful. We've tried a couple of times but think the heavily-pasteurised milk is standing in our way. It's back to the drawing board for us, but we've not given up!

Chocolate and hazlenut (nutella-ish...) ice cream

2015-07-27T00:00:00+01:00

We recently discovered how easy it is to make your own nut butters and, most importantly, chocolate flavoured hazlenut butter (commercially known as Nutella) at home. All this got us thinking about translating this into ice cream - well, why wouldn't you? This recipe is very similar to our mocha ice-cream (which you can find here).

Make the custard as in the mocha ice cream recipe. Then, in a bowl placed over a pan of simmering water, melt 100g 70% cocoa solids chocolate and 100g 40% cocoa solids chocolate with 250ml Lactofree cream, stirring continuously to produce a smooth liquid. Leave the custard and the chocolate cream to cool in the fridge. Meanwhile, roast 125g whole hazlenuts in the oven (at 190C) for 6-8 minutes. Place the roasted hazlenuts in a tea towel and rub the hazlenuts until the skins fall off. Remove as many of the skins as possible, there will no doubt be a few stubborn ones that don't come off but that's fine. Whiz the nuts in a food processer until finely chopped (you can also do this using a plastic bag and a rolling pin, it just takes a bit longer!) Once the custard and cream mixtures are cool stir together with the chopped hazlenuts then throw it all into your ice cream maker and churn (following your machine's instructions) until frozen.

Roasted butternut squash and feta salad

2015-07-27T00:00:00+01:00

It's always a challenge to come up with interesting lunch box ideas week after week. Sandwiches just don't cut it and soup never feels right during the summer. We've been on a mission to try out new and exciting salads over the last few months and this recipe is a new favourite. We've only recently discovered bulgar wheat in the Hannah friendly kitchen (who knows why it's taken us quite so long!) but we are now big fans. This recipe pairs it with some of our other favourite foods; butternut squash, feta and a basil vinaigrette. We like to make up salads that will last most of the week, so this is quite a sizeable amount of salad, enough for 6-8 lunches depending on how hungry you are!

Let's start with the butternut squash. Peel, de-seed and cube one large butternut squash and place in a baking tray, drizzle with olive oil, a little salt, and throw in 5 or 6 cloves of garlic, unpeeled. Roast in at 200C for 40 minutes or so, until the butternut squash is cooked but not too crispy then leave to cool.

Now to put the salad together, we typically make it up day-by-day so nothing gets too soggy! Firstly, cook the bulgar wheat. We use 30g of bulgar wheat per serving, place in a bowl and cover with boiling water. Place a lid over it and leave for 5 minutes. While the bulgar wheat is cooking, make up your vinaigrette. Place a handful of basil leaves into a pestle and mortar, crush together with a clove of garlic then add in a pinch of salt, 3tbsp olive oil and 1tbsp white wine vinegar. Drain the bulgar wheat and stir in the vinaigrette. Add in the roasted butternut squash, crumbled feta, a handful of dried cranberries and a couple of chopped spring onions. By lunch time, the flavours are fabulous. Enjoy at your desk or in the park, it's really delicious!

Melon granita

2015-07-15T17:29:00+01:00

So by now you should have worked out that we love making our own ice cream. This obviously works out pretty well for me, as there aren't too many choices when it comes to Hannah friendly ice cream in the supermarkets. We have occassionally (but not always successfully) dabbled in sorbets but this weekend thought we'd try out granita. Granita is slightly different to sorbet, typically it has larger ice crystals and therefore a chunkier texture. We were inspired by some leftover melon in our fridge that was a bit too ripe to eat but we felt bad throwing it away. We were really pleased with the results, lovely refreshing granita with a perfectly melon-y taste. We had it at the weekend with some prosciutto, a slight variant on the classic for it worked really nicely. Our recipe only uses half a melon as that's what we had to hand but this can be easily scaled up if you have more fruit.

Take half Canteloupe melon, remove the seeds and scoop out all the flesh. Blitz in a liquidiser with 50g caster sugar. Put this into a freezer-proof container and place in the freezer. Leave for about an hour, then take out of the freezer and stir, breaking up any frozen bits around the edges. Repeat this every hour for the next 5-6 hours until the granita is mostly frozen. Remove the granita from the freezer about 30 minutes before serving and stir again, breaking up the granita, return to the freezer until you are ready to serve.

Spicy salmon fishcakes

2015-07-14T20:25:00+01:00

I haven't had fishcakes in ages and, as I was home alone this evening, I thought I'd try my hand at making some. After umm-ing and ahh-ing over whether to stick to something traditional or be a little more experimental, I settled on a Thai-themed spicy salmon fishcake. I'm pleased to say the results were incredibly tasty and I even have some leftovers to put in the freezer for another day. This recipe made 8 fishcakes which should serve 4 (unless they're super hungry).

Peel and cube 1 large sweet potato (around 650g) and boil until soft. While the potato chunks are boiling, grate 1 courgette and 4cm piece of ginger, slice 1 red chilli (you can reduce this depending on how spicy you like things). Gently fry the courgette, giner and chilli in a little oil until cooked through. Put around 200ml of you favourite lactose free milk into a small saucepan and bring to the boil before adding about 250g salmon, cook for 7 or 8 minutes then drain and flake into small pieces. Drain and mash the sweet potatoes and stir in the courgette and fish. Add in 3 sliced spring onions and 7 tbsp breadcrumbs and mix well. If the mixture still looks wet then add another tablespoon or two of breadcrumbs. Leave the mixture to cool until you can shape it into 8 patties. As you roll and flatten each fishcake, coat in flour and leave to chill for around 30 minutes. Gently fry in a small amount of vegetable oil for 4-5 minutes on each side. We served with sweet chilli mayonnaise and salad.

Something from our latest Spanish adventure

2015-07-11T15:25:00+01:00

So we're recently back from Spain, a country of great food and fabulous wine. Our latest travels took us to the south of Spain where it's currently super hot. We like to try out new foods on holiday, especially local delicacies, and this is a special one. Salmorejo Cordobes is a thick, creamy tomato soup served cold - a bit like gazpacho, originally from Cordoba but eaten throughout Spain. It's a wonderfully refreshing treat that we had to recreate as soon as we got home. We've tried this out a few times already - it's so good and incredibly simple to make!

Take 600g fresh tomatoes, vine tomatoes or similar are best, slice in half and remove the seeds saving as much liquid from them as possible. The purists say you should peel the tomatoes before using but we don't think this is necessary and it's a lot of effort from little improvement in the final product. Place the tomatoes into a liquidiser. Add 65g slightly stale bread to the blender, just the insides though not the crusts. In addition, add in 2 small or 1 large clove of garlic, 1 tbsp red wine vinegar, 1.5 tsp salt and 5 tbsp good quality olive oil. Blend for 3-5 minutes until smooth and chill for at least 3 hours before serving. Traditionally salmorejo is served with chopped hard-boiled egg and Spanish ham on top but still tastes good without it.

Banana, oat and cinnamon muffins

2015-07-10T11:29:00+01:00

We always seem to have a surplus of bananas in our fruit bowl at the end of the week (we're just a little optimistic about our fruit consumption). Fresh ideas for things to do with spare bananas are always appreciated, we have a nice banana and chocolate cake as well as a handful of smoothy recipes. This one came as a bit of a bolt out of the blue, but a welcome one! With the oats and cinnamon, these muffins could work well for breakfast as well as later in the day with a cup of tea. This is based on a recipe from Hummingbird Bakery for banana muffins but with a couple of adjustments and substitutes.

Put 275g plain flour, 75g rolled oats, 160g caster sugar, 1.5 tsp baking powder, 0.5 tsp bicarbonate of soda, and 2 tsp cinnamon into a bowl with a pinch of salt. Mix to combine.

Make up some buttermilk by adding 1 tbsp vinegar to 375ml of your favourite lactose free milk. I used soya milk to make this which worked really well but any milk substitute should do. Stir then leave this to stand for 10 minutes until it starts to thicken. Add 1 egg once the buttermilk has thickened and pour into the flour mixture. Stir in 400g mashed banana and 70g melted Vitalite then divide into 12 muffin cases. In a small bowl mix together 1 tsp cinnamon, 2 tsp caster sugar, and 1 tbsp oats. Sprinkle this mixture over the muffins before putting then in the oven. Bake at 180C for 20-25 minutes.

Wedding chicken

2015-07-05T18:24:00+01:00

This is a very special recipe for us as it was the meal we thought up for our wedding breakfast last year. We spent ages trying to come up with a dish that was fit for the occasion and suitable for all our guests, but this is it: mediterrean-stuffed chicken.

Let's start with the stuffing, blend 150g sundried tomatoes with one bunch fresh basil and add a little salt and pepper if you think it needs it. There should be enough oil in the sundried tomatoes to make a smooth paste but add extra olive oil if it seems a little dry.

Next take 2 chicken breasts, wrap them in cling-film then bash with a rolling pin until they are about 1cm thick. Now comes the fiddly bit, stuffing and rolling. Layer 3 or 4 slices pancetta on to a piece of cling-film and lay one chicken breast on top of it. Spread the chicken breast with the tomato and basil paste then tightly roll and secure with wooden skewers. Heat a frying pan with a little oil in it and seal the chicken on all sides until golden. Put in the oven and cook for 20-30 minutes at 200C until cooked through. We like to serve this with roasted new potatoes and green beans. This is a special meal for us so we hope you enjoy it too!

Epic breakfast on a well-earned day off

2015-05-26T09:30:00+01:00

There's nothing like the satisfaction of a well-earned day off, and we're convinced that the breakfast you have on that day is even tastier than on other days. Just to make sure that's true, we put some extra effort into our breakfast this morning (it is the most important meal of the day afterall) as we come to the end of a five-day weekend!

Today it's pancakes - big, fluffy (not to mention lactose free) American pancakes. These are so easy to whip up there's really no excuse not to. This recipe makes enough for 4 pancakes which is just enough for two people but easily doubled if you're feeling hungry or feeding a crowd. We served with bananas gently fried in butter sprinkled with cinnamon and doused with maple syrup at the last moment.

For the pancakes you'll need 100g self-raising flour, 1 teaspoon baking powder, one egg, and 100ml Lactofree milk. Beat all the ingredients together for a couple of minutes (we usually do this in a jug so it's a bit faster and less messy but a bowl works too). Heat a large frying pan with a splash of vegetable oil (or butter if you're feeling extravagant), then spoon in the pancake batter in four even scoops (you may need more than one batch depending on the size of frying pan), make sure the pancakes aren't touching as they will expand slightly. The trick to these pancakes is slow and steady cooking, so keep the heat low! Cook the pancakes for 4-5 minutes until bubbles start forming and popping on top then gently turn them over and cook for another 3-4 minutes, with the heat still very low.

While the pancakes are cooking, melt some butter or margarine in a separate, small frying pan. Gently add in one chopped banana and sprinkle with cinnamon, fry on a low heat for about a minute then gently turn and sprinkle with more cinnamon. When the bananas are ready to serve drizzle with a couple of teaspoons of maple syrup.

Pile up your pancakes, spread with a little (lactose free) butter and then pour over your maple-cinnamon bananas. We serve with a strawberry and blueberry smoothie just to feel extra smug!

Sweet potato fries

2015-05-16T21:04:00+01:00

This one's just a quick update, barely a recipe really but we had to report back on our latest discovery. We've been experiencing a sweet potato obsession for quite a while now, we can't get enough of them; in the oven, in salads, in curries. Well, sweet potato chips have long been a part of our culinary repertoire, we decided to take it up a notch this evening and deep fry them instead. This was partly necessitated by time (our oven takes forever to heat up and we were seriously hungry) but we've often felt that while our sweet potato chips were tasty, they often lacked something that our regular chips did not.

We par-boiled our sweet potatoes (cut into chips) before frying in batches in vegetable oil. The results were divine, although a deep-fat fryer may be a more efficient (and safer way) to make sweet potato fries. We had our fries with a home-made burger (what else, we'll post the recipe for this soon, once we've finished perfecting it), topped with avocado and bacon. Delish!

Indian-spiced salmon

2015-05-12T20:34:00+01:00

You'll not find much fish on this blog, we don't tend to eat all that much of it as someone (ahem, mentioning no names..) isn't that keen. I found myself home alone for dinner the other night so my mind immediately turned to thoughts of fish for dinner. I've not made this particular dish in ages, but it's a firm favourite (with me at least) and, as a bonus, super speedy. I can't remember now where the original inspiration came from, I think I saw an article in a magazine but I've made a few changes as the years have gone by.

I normally cook this for one so I've provided quantities for me. As I said, this dish is so very easy and so scales very nicely. Start with one salmon fillet, skin and chop into medium-sized chunks. In a bowl mix 1tsp garam marsala with a good glug of vegetable oil. This should make a nice paste. Add in a 1cm piece of fresh ginger, grated and stir. Mix in the salmon, cover and chill for as long as you have (10 minutes is good but 60 is better!) Cook the salmon for 10 minutes at 180C, alternatively you can grill it, turning occasionally for around 8-10 minutes.

I usually serve with rice and stir-fried vegetables. This time a made a rather tasty raita to go with it mixing 100ml plain soya yogurt, juice half a lime, a handful chopped fresh coriander, 2 chopped spring onions, some black pepper and a pinch of sumac. Make this up when you're preparing the salmon and chill until you're ready to use it.

Tiramisu like you've never had it before!

2015-05-04T17:29:00+01:00

Here's something you've never tried before, in fact something that we'd never considered until some friends of ours suggested it. They'd made too much Tiramisu for a party once (who knew such a thing was possible) and tried throwing the leftovers into their ice-cream maker. We had to try it! We whipped one up (see our Lactofree version of the Nigella classic here), added 250ml Lactofree cream, stirred it altogether and tossed into the ice cream maker churning for 30 minutes (or whatever your ice cream maker suggests). The results were pretty spectacular, and rather popular! Any suggestions for your favourite desserts turned into ice cream then let us know, we'll certainly be trying this one again!

Mint stracciatella ice cream

2015-04-26T20:10:00+01:00

Our take on the classic mint chocolate chip! It's the taste of childhood (well, for us at least) and is something we've been fiddling about with the recipe for a little while and now we've finally cracked it. We've opted for more of a chocolate swirl rather than chocolate chips.

So, by now you're familiar with our custard base for ice cream. No? Well, it's here. Make that first and chill it. Once cold, add in 250ml of Lactofree cream and 50ml sirope de menthe (we picked this up on our honeymoon in France but it turns out you can also buy it in Waitrose. Churn in ice cream maker as per its instructions. While it's churning, whip up a little chocolate sauce. Melt together chocolate, Vitalite, golden syrup and some milk (Lactofree or soya, both are good). Once the ice cream has churned, transfer into a container to freeze but as you spoon it in, layer with chocolate sauce. Then freeze and enjoy.

Melanzane parmigiana - just like nonna makes!

2015-04-25T20:08:00+01:00

This meal is a serious contender for our favourite food of all time (and not the kind of contender that changes depending on what mood we're in or what food we happen to be eating - this is serious!) Aubergine (that is, melanzane or mul-an-yarn as it has been anglicised in our family at least) is one of our favourite vegetables and once you add cheese and tomato it just gets better and better. This is a regular feature at Hannah's Nonna's Sunday lunch and no matter how hard we try we just can't beat it! This recipe is as close as we get, although that still is pretty damn tasty. Given all the frying involved, it's probably not the healthiest of dishes, despite being vegetarian, but still makes for a great meat-free treat. This recipe serves two for dinner (with salad and garlic bread) but would serve more as part of a larger, longer Sunday lunch at Nonna's.

Carefully and thinly slice two aubergines - either into rings or cut in half and then slice each half lengthways, it doesn't affect the taste! Lightly fry these slices in olive oil, you'll need to do this in several batches and will need a reasonable amount of oil as the aubergines tend to soak up quite a lot. Remove the aubergines once they have a little colour on each side, and let them rest on some kitchen towel. Beat two eggs in a bowl, dip each slice of aubergine in the egg and then fry lightly on each side.

While you are frying off the aubergines, prepare your tomato sauce. We like to keep this nice and light so it doesn't detract too much from the aubergine. Crush two cloves of garlic and gently fry in a small saucepan. Add in one tin of tomatoes and half a tin of water and gently reduce by half, adding in one teaspoon sugar and salt to taste.

Once the tomato sauce is ready, layer up your melanzane; a layer of aubergine and then a layer of tomato. Top with grated Lactofree cheese and a little pecorino then bake for 20-25 minutes at 180C. We serve with salad and garlic bread but it could easily form part of a larger lunch. Can you come up with anything tastier than that?

Liquid gold - peanut butter and chocolate fondants

2015-04-19T21:30:00+01:00

We're always up for trying new things and improving old recipes and today was no exception. Chocolate fondants (we've previously blogged about them here) are very much a favourite of ours, super chocolatey and very indulgant. So, we've been thinking, how could improve this even further? Then it came to us... add in some peanut butter for the great reveal! Open up the fondant and what do you find? A golden river of peanutty goodness flowing out. It doesn't get much better than that.

And best of all, it's really quite straightforward to make. Follow our previous post for the fondant recipe. Then, when it comes to putting the mixture into the molds, half fill each ramekin with chocolate mixture, add a teaspoon of smooth peanut butter into the centre then cover with chocolate mixture. Bake in the oven for the same amount of time, then enjoy!

Summer is here - blueberry, lemon and almond muffins

2015-04-12T00:00:00+01:00

Summer, or at least spring, does seem to have finally arrived in South London, which has been reflected in this week's baked goods offering. Nothing says spring like lemons and they work really well with the blueberries. The almonds were a bit of a last minute addition as we had some toasted flaked almonds left over for something else so they were ground and added to the mix but, you know what, it really works! A cracking flavour combination. The recipe has been adapted from our Dorling Kindesly baking bible.

So, down to the recipe... Melt 60g Vitalite in a pan and leave to cool. Meanwhile, sift 280g plain flour together with 1tbsp baking powder and a pinch of salt in a separate bowl. Add in 190g caster sugar making a well in the centre. In a different bowl beat 1 egg before adding in the melted Vitalite, zest of 1 lemon, 250ml Lactofree milk (you could use soya instead, but use half milk and half water). Slowly mix the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients making a smooth batter. Gently fold in 225g blueberries and 50g toasted flaked, then ground almonds and distribute the mixture amongst your muffin tins. It should make about 12. Bake at 220C for 15-20 minutes until golden.

Once the muffins are out of the oven, let them cool slightly. While they are cooling, mix together the juice of 1 lemon with 2tbsp caster sugar. Stir until the sugar is dissolved. Dip the top of the muffins into the lemon mix and there you have it - enjoy!

Chocolate peanut-butter ice cream

2015-03-09T21:36:00+00:00

We've been trying to branch out in our ice cream flavours recently, so this will be the first of (hopefully) many posts about all things ice cream. We've posted our mocha ice cream already, which is our go-to flavour but obviously there are many, many more flavours to try. As ever, our recipe is lactose-free making good use of Lactofree products but if this isn't a constraint for you go ahead and use regular milk!

Anyway, as I think we probably mentioned before, we like the custard approach of making ice cream. Bring 250ml Lactofree milk just to the boil, and then remove from the heat. Mix 3 egg yolks with 75g caster sugar in a large bowl. Add the milk to the yolks and sugar and then return the combined mixture to the heat but do not boil. Stir continuously for 5 minutes while the custard thickens. Put the custard in the fridge to cool.

In a bowl placed over a pan of simmering water melt 100g 70% cocoa solids chocolate and 100g 40% cocoa solids chocolate and then gradually add 250ml Lactofree cream, stirring continuously to produce a smooth liquid. Once you have added all of the cream stir in 4 tablespoons peanut butter. As this recipe is hot off the press, we haven't done a lot of experimenting with different types or mixes of peanut butter. We used an even mix of smooth and crunchy peanut butter which gives a nice but not too overpowering crunch. Anyway, stir until nicely combined with the chocolate and cream.

Once the chocolate mixture cools, combine with the custard and churn in an ice cream maker following the normal instructions.

Celebratory coffee and walnut cake

2015-02-28T17:30:00+00:00

Time for a bit of birthday baking... not for us you understand but my lovely sister (and designer of our fantastic sheep logo) Serena! It was her birthday a few days ago so we thought we should celebrate with cake. While not a fan of chocolate, she does love coffee-flavoured anything so this was the perfect opportunity to try out a little coffee and walnut number. We've based our recipe on this one from Nigella but with a few tweaks.

Mix 225g caster sugar, 225g vitalite, 200g plain flour, 2.5 tsp baking powder, 0.5 tsp bicarbonate of soda, and 4 eggs together in a bowl. Make up some coffee, we used a 3-cup moka pot which gave one espresso cup for the cake, one for the icing, and one for the baker who was feeling a little sleepy... Once your cake mixture is a nice smooth batter, add in an espresso cup of cooled coffee and mix in. Stir in 60g of walnut pieces tossed in a little plain flour. Divide between two 20cm round tins and bake in a preheated oven (180C) for 25 minutes or until a knife comes out clean.

Once the cakes are cool you can begin icing! We used roughly 50g vitalite, 250g sifted icing sugar, and one espresso cup of cooled coffee. Butter icing is fairly versatile however, so keep adding in icing sugar until you have the consistency you require. We decided to pipe swirls onto the top of the cake so wanted quite a stiff buttercream for this. We should add that, as Vitalite is quite soft, you typically need more icing sugar that recipes needing butter. Anyway, using an electric whisk, beat your icing ingredients together until they reach the consistency you're after. Smear a couple of tablespoons of icing onto one the cakes to sandwich them together, then use the rest to be creative on the top of the cake. We used a piping bag to create swirls on the top then decorated with walnut pieces.

Creamy salmon pasta

2015-02-19T19:16:00+00:00

Thursday night is always tricky, with extra-curricula activities (orchestra) often getting in the way of a tasty dinner. Tonight's meal, however, was both quick and tasty, taking only as long as it takes to boil pasta. That's a win as far as we're concerned!

For two people you will need about 200g pasta (unless you're seriously hungry). Cook the pasta to packet instructions. For the sauce, gently fry 1 chopped clove of garlic together with 1 small onion finely diced in a frying pan. After a couple of minutes add in 1/2 courgette that's been ribboned using a vegetable peeler. Once the courgette is cooked throw in up to 100g smoked salmon (the amount really depends on how much we have left, and we've used both trimmings or chopped slices). Stir for about a minute until the salmon is warm and a lighter shade of pink. Add in 100ml Lactofree cream and simmer for a few more minutes until the cream has thickened slightly. Once the pasta is cooked, drain and add to the sauce. You can stir in a handful of capers at this point if you wish. They cut through the creaminess quite nicely but not everyone enjoys them!

Shrove Tuesday

2015-02-16T21:16:00+00:00

So tomorrow is Shrove Tuesday or, as it is better known, pancake day. We thought we'd get in early with our tips for the perfect pancake. Our recipe is pretty flexible - it can withstand extra milk and/or flour to stretch for just one or maybe two more pancakes! We use soya milk as this recipe pre-dates our discovery of the Lactofree products, but usually use a 50/50 mix of soya milk and water to replace regular milk. We usually get 6 or 7 pancakes from one egg, just to give an idea of the quantities.

There are several schools of thought when it comes to making pancakes, we follow the throw-it-all-in-and-blend-til-smooth approach. Put 150g plain flour in a bowl with 2 eggs and 250ml soya milk/water. Blend until smooth. That was pretty straightforward, wasn't it? We've experimented with stick blenders and electric hand whisks. Both give good results but the electric hand whisk is better for large batches (we've lost a few stick blenders over the years to very large batches of pancake batter...)

Anyway, on to the cooking. Heat your chosen frying pan and add a small amount of vegetable oil (under 1 teaspoon, but it will depend on your size of chosen frying pan). Heat the pan until very hot then add in a ladle-full of batter. The trick is not to put too much batter in, you want a thin coating over the pan. As you are pouring in the batter, start tipping the pan from side to side in order to fully coat the pan in batter. Once you have an even coating, leave the pancake alone! Seriously, don't be tempted to poke it. It should take about 30 seconds to cook the first side - you should see the edges will be start to curl up. Then, and only then, can you flip it. Either show-stopper style or with a palette knife or fish-slice. Another 30 seconds on the other side and you are good to go.

We like a variety of toppings, you can't go wrong with lemon and sugar or maybe some chocolate and/or jam. We're aiming to be a little more adventurous tomorrow and so will be trying out a banana and maple cream but we haven't fully worked out the recipe yet... we'll report back!

A new discovery: chocolate ravioli!

2015-02-15T17:31:00+00:00

We had pie for dinner (previously blogged about here). Now, you may not feel that's especially relevant but there's always a question about what to do with the leftover pastry. It's never enough to think about freezing it but too much just to throw away. Well, our latest experiment answers that question once and for all. Chocolate ravioli.

The concept is simple, really. Puff pastry for the pasta and chocolate for the meat or cheese filling. Roll whatever pastry you have left after pie making until it is quite thin (definitely less than 1cm). Break some dark chocolate (today we were using Lidl's red-wrapped version) into squares. Place your chocolate squares evenly across half the pastry leaving space in between each to seal and cut your ravioli. Brush around each chocolate square with milk or water then fold over the remaining half of the pastry. Gently press down around each square then either use a knife or a small cookie cutter so separate. Gently press down the edges of each ravioli further and place on baking paper on a tray. Brush with milk and cook for 10-15 minutes at 200C until golden. We served with strawberries and whipped Lactofree cream. Delicious.

Stuffed peppers for a meat-free Monday

2015-02-09T21:31:00+00:00

Too much meat at the weekend? We've been there... in fact we are there! So stuffed peppers for a meat-free Monday. We use one pepper per person but try to mix up the colours a bit, because who doesn't like a colourful meal!

Slice your peppers in half through the stalk and carefully remove the seeds leaving the stalk in situ (this isn't essential but looks more impressive!) Roast in the oven at 200C for about 20 minutes or until the peppers are browning and soft. While the peppers are in the oven it's time to get working on the stuffing. Fry 2 cloves garlic and one finely chopped onion off in a little oil. We like to add one grated carrot and whatever other vegetables are in the fridge too but these are the essentials. Once the vegetables are soft, add in one teaspoon chilli powder and one tin chopped tomatoes. Cook for 15 minutes adding in a squeeze tomato puree and some salt halfway through. Next, boil the kettle and make up some cous cous, around 50g should do it, although this may leave you with a bit leftover (it's tasty the next day). Add the cous cous to the tomato sauce, you can stir in some goats cheese if you wish. Once the peppers are browned take them out of the oven and fill with the stuffing (pile it high, you can't have too much!) then sprinkle with breadcrumbs and grated Lactofree mature cheese. Return to the oven for another 15 minutes or until the cheese is bubbling.

We serve with salad and chips (any excuse!)

Celebrating National Breakfast Week - croissants!

2015-01-28T22:19:00+00:00

Now, this took a few attempts but we're now pretty confident we've cracked Hannah-friendly croissant. Lots of recipes tell you it's all in the rolling and the folding. This is true but we've found that allowing plenty of time for the dough to prove is critical. While making croissants does take some time, the good news is this recipe should make 10-12 croissants but you can freeze them once shaped and then cook them straight from frozen.

First, make a dough with 300g strong white bread flour, 2 teaspoons salt, 30g caster sugar and 2.5 teaspoons dried yeast. Combine with enough warm water to form a soft dough. Knead the dough and it becomes elastic. Cover and chill for 30 minutes to an hour.

Flatten a block of baking fat (we use Sainsbury's or Lidl own-brand, occassionally Stork if we can't get the others). Roll out the dough into a rectangle, place the butter into the centre and fold the dough over it. Chill for 30 minutes to an hour.

Next roll the dough out and fold again, placing the right third ot the centre then the left third. Chill for 30 minutes to an hour again. Repeat this as many times as you can before going to bed.

Leave the dough to prove overnight in the fridge, we would recommend at least 15 hours and anything up to about 36. 24 is about optimum though.

Take the dough out of the fridge and roll out. Fold into thirds and roll out a few more times. Cut the dough into triangles (between 10 and 12, depending on the size of croissant you want), we prefer isosceles triangles here to right-angle triangles as it makes a nicer shape when it comes to rolling. For each croissant, holding the longest edge roll towards you and curve into a crescent shape. You can also make chocolate croissant by placing chocolate chunks along the longest edge before rolling up. One final prove (about an hour, until doubled in size) and then you're ready to cook.

Glaze the oven-ready croissants using Lactofree milk or egg. Cook at 190C for 10 minutes before reducing the temperature to 170C for another 15 minutes. Alternatively, put in the freezer until you are ready to eat then pop into the oven from frozen (allowing slightly longer to cook, about 35 minutes in total).

Et voila!

Moussaka

2015-01-25T13:04:00+00:00

We haven't made moussaka for a far too long, and have decided it is time to fix that. We've played around with a few different recipes and formats over the years, but this is the one that we're happiest with. Moussaka is often associated with lamb, but we usually have some beef mince in the freezer, and The Internet doesn't seem to think it criminal to use beef so there you go!

Firstly, thinly slice and oven roast two aubergines with a little oil and salt - this takes about 30 minutes but be careful to make sure they don't turn into crisps!

Next make your meat sauce. We fry two cloves of garlic with a finely chopped onion until soft. Then add 500g beef or lamb mince and brown together with 2tsps cinnamon. Throw in one tin of tomatoes, a squirt of tomato puree and maybe a splash of red wine if you've got some to hand (entirely optional though) and leave to simmer for as long as you have.

Make a white sauce (you can find our recipe in our lasagne post) and then you're ready to layer up. Our structure was aubergine-meat-aubergine-meat-aubergine-white sauce-cheese which we found worked quite well and wasn't overly rich. We then put in the over at 180C for about 20-25 minutes, or until the cheese is bubbling.

Serve with salad and garlic bread (we promise to post that recipe soon, honest!)

Midweek pick-me-up: tiramisu!

2015-01-13T20:04:00+00:00

Now here's a recipe that took a few tries to get right but is wonderfully simple now we've cracked it! Tiramisu - the Italian pick-me-up - a combination of coffee and alcohol, the perfect after-dinner treat. We've used a Nigella recipe as our basis but have made a few tweaks. This recipe will serve 4-6 people depending on how generous/hungry you are feeling, but can easily be doubled.

First, make some strong coffee. We used a cafetiere but a stronger brew than normal. You'll need about 100ml of this. Mix this together with 50ml Marsala (we used a medium sweet) and a splash of dark rum (not strictly necessary, but we had some in the cupboard). This is what you'll use to dip the sponge fingers into. You'll need just under a 175g packet for this recipe, although the exact amount will vary depending on the size of dish you use. We used Sainsbury's sponge fingers (although there's nothing to stop you making your own), which are Hannah friendly. We haven't done extensive testing of other brands though, so check the packets!

For the custard, separate one egg. Whisk the yolk together with 35g caster sugar until pale, thick and creamy then throw in another splash of Marsala and 200g Lactofree cream cheese and beat into a mousse-like mixture. Whisk the egg white until fairly thick then fold half of it into the egg yolk mixture (the other half isn't needed, but it's easier to only use half once it's whisked).

Now to construct your tiramisu. Soak the sponge fingers in the Marsala/coffee mixtuer for a few seconds on each side then cover the base of your dish with a layer of soaked biscuits. Pour over half of the cream cheese mixture. Then add another layer of soaked biscuits and top with the remaining cream cheese mixture. Leave in the fridge to settle overnight. Before serving, sprinkle with cocoa powder and there you go!

Tasty Tapas - Chorizo and bean dip

2015-01-11T23:04:00+00:00

Last night we just couldn't decide what to have for dinner, so we went with a selection of our favourites - a sort-of tapas, if you will. It was a feast and perfectly suited our indecision. We had five small plates in the end; roasted sweet potato with aioli, meatballs in a spicy tomato sauce, chorizo and black bean dip, roasted vegetables, and aubergine with honey. We won't share all the recipes right now (that might take a while!) just the chorizo and black bean dip.

Now, dip might give the wrong impression as it's not the easiest thing to scoop onto a crisp. We find it suits a range of occasions, we've served it at parties with tortilla chips but we've also had it as part of a meal. The recipe is quite straightforward. Fry 225g chorizo cut into small chunks in a little oil until crisp. Remove from the pan but leave the juices behind. In the same pan cook off an onion and a carrot both finely chopped. Cook these for about 8 minutes until soft then add in 2 crushed cloves garlic and 1 finely chopped red pepper. Cook for another two minutes then remove from the heat. Stir in 1tbsp honey and 1tsp smoked paprika and leave for a moment. Crush a can of black beans (we use a potato masher on a chopping board) then stir this into your vegetables along with the chorizo and about 100g grated Lactofree mature cheese. Transfer into an oven-proof dish, cover, and cook at 180C for around 25 minutes. Serve with fresh coriander and more grated cheese if you like.

Oh, while we're at it, the aubergines with honey are a real treat! It sounds a little odd but works so well, we discovered them last year on a menu in Richmond, South London and just had to give them a go. Thinly slice 1 aubergine and coat in flour. Lightly fry (this will require a reasonable amount of oil) then drizzle with honey. Eat quickly while they are still hot, they taste amazing!

Happy Christmas from our lactose-free kitchen!

2014-12-25T17:04:00+00:00

Our festive offering to top off a lactose-free Christmas - our blackforest log. This is a nice, chocolate-y alternative (or addition, we won't judge!) to Christmas pudding. The inspiration for this came from a Sainsbury's recipe last year, we've tried a couple of different recipes for the sponge but have decided the Sainsbury's one is the best, and no substitutes are needed there! Once the sponge is cooked, turn it out of its tin, cover in fresh baking parchment and roll up into a roulade (albeit without the filling) while it's still warm. This will make filling and rolling much easier when it's cool. For the filling we whip up some Lactofree cream as well as fresh cherries soaked overnight in Amaretto.

Enjoy! Maybe with a cheeky Espresso martini if you're having a grown-up Christmas (ask us later, we'll post a recipe after Christmas). Otherwise, a nice cup of tea will do the trick.

Outrageously chocolately fondants

2014-12-24T20:17:00+00:00

These were quite a find, outrageously chocolately and oh-so simple to make. We use Nigella's recipe (here) substituting in Vitalite for butter and using some very dark chocolate. Make up the batter, prepare the tins as instructed (can't stress how important this is), and bake for about 10 minutes.

We serve this with home-made vanilla ice cream, although Lactofree cream or Swedish Glace ice cream also work well.

Veggie pasta bake

2014-12-19T20:04:00+00:00

This is a popular Friday night treat in our household and is super flexible, you can adjust it for whatever you happen to have in the fridge! We like to go with roasted vegetables, this is usually courgettes, onions, and aubergines but has been known to include carrots and butternut squash.

For two people (and some cheeky leftovers!), we use 1 large courgette, 1 aubergine, and a couple of onions roasted in the oven with some garlic and olive oil for about 30 minutes. While these are roasting, make a light tomato sauce using a couple of cloves of garlic, a tin of tomatoes and some tomato purree. Also boil some pasta, around 50g per person. Once all these pieces of the puzzle are ready, combine in a large oven-proof dish together with some goats cheese. Sprinkle some grated Lactofree mature cheese over the top and bake at 180C for around 30 minutes.

We serve with salad and garlic bread.

Midweek curry

2014-12-09T20:53:00+00:00

This was a super tasty dinner and a bit of an experiment. However, despite a reminder or two, we didn't write down the recipe as we created our chicken tikka massala. Disaster! We're posting it anyway though, to remind ourselves just how tasty it was and to encourage us to try again.

We served our curry with rice and home-made garlic and coriander flatbread.

Warming winter pie

2014-12-06T18:42:00+00:00

As the cold nights draw in, we need something warming in the evenings. Last night, it was pie but no ordinary pie - it was chicken, bacon and leek pie.

We like puff pastry for our pies and, thankfully, supermarket block puff pastry is Hannah friendly! This saves a lot of time. For four portions (two for dinner and two for lunch the next day), we use two chicken breasts, four rashers of bacon, and a leek. Chop these into bitesize pieces and fry these off. Once cooked, use the same pan (for the juices) to make a white sauce. We use the roux method - see our post on lasagne for more details. Mix in the rest of the filling then assemble your pie. Glaze and bake at around 180°C for 30 minutes. We serve with garlic potatoes and green vegetables.

Steak Sunday

2014-11-30T18:42:00+00:00

Ever the fans of epic food weekends, this Sunday was steak Sunday in our house. This is fairly self-explanatory... buy steak, then eat it with other tasty food. What we have recently discovered though is homemade peppercorn sauce. This is a really nice addition to an already tasty meal and pretty straightforward.

We like our steak quite rare so usually start the sauce at the same time as cooking the steak. For two people, finely chop two shallots and cook off in a knob of butter (well, Vitalite in our case) and grind in several tablespoons of peppercorns, the exact amount will depend on just how peppery you like it, you can always add more! After a few minutes add some beef stock (maybe around 100ml made with half a stock cube), we've also tried adding a splash of port but this is not essential. Once that has reduced, stir in some Lactofree cream (about 100ml) and reduce a bit further. Taste at this point and check the pepper levels.

We serve with homemade chips and green beans. Enjoy!

Real ice cream

2014-11-23T21:31:00+00:00

We love ice cream - who doesn't? There are a few tasty alternatives to proper diary ice cream (most notably the chocolate sorbet from Gelupo), but sometimes we crave the real thing. Fortunately, thanks to Lactofree it is now possible to make your own lactose free diary ice cream.

Our current favourite is mocha flavour. You will need an ice cream maker, but you can pick up a simple one reasonably cheaply, and it is definitely worth the money.

First make a custard. Bring 250ml Lactofree milk just to the boil, and then remove from the heat. Mix 3 egg yolks with 75g caster sugar in a large bowl. Add the milk to the yolks and sugar and then return the combined mixture to the heat but do not boil. Stir continuously for 5 minutes while the custard thickens. Put the custard in the fridge to cool.

In a bowl placed over a pan of simmering water melt 100g 70% cocoa solids chocolate and 100g 50% cocoa solids chocolate into 250ml Lactofree cream, stirring continuously to produce a smooth liquid.

Make a 3-cup moka pot worth of espresso, and then reduce the liquid slightly in a pan. We have also tried this using instant, a couple of tablespoons should do the trick. Add the coffee to the chocolate and then put in the fridge to cool.

Once the custard and chocolate have cooled, mix and then follow your ice cream maker's instructions to make the ice cream.

Lasagne for lunch

2014-11-16T16:37:00+00:00

Sunday lunch and lasagne was on the menu. This is a favourite of ours and a recipe we've been fiddling about with for a while, although it is fairly straightforward to make it Hannah-friendly!

We normally make enough for four portions (2 for dinner and 2 for lunch during the week). You'll need to make some bolognese sauce. Our current recipe adds chopped bacon, a splash of red wine (if we've a bottle open), and a beef stock cube to the usual garlic, onion, beef mince and tomatoes to make it that little bit more epic! If you want to get some more veg into the meal, you can grate some carrot and cook it with the onion and garlic - no one will ever know!

For the white sauce, we've adapted our recipe from Delia's "classic" rather than the "all-in-one" method. It's been a while since we measured the ingredients out, we usually start with a lump of butter and work from there. We also skip the bit infusing various flavours into the milk, and substitute in Vitalite and either soya or Lactofree milk. We'll use whichever milk is open but can't really taste much of a difference between the two.

Right, now time to layer up! We're not entirely sure how many different methods there are, but we like a bolognese, pasta, white sauce ordering. We try to fit in as many layers as possible (which is usually four), sprinkling the top with a mixture of Lactofree cheese and pecorino (an Italian sheep's cheese, tasting like parmesan). Cook at 190C for 30 minutes.

We serve with salad and garlic bread - we'll post this recipe separately, it's worth waiting for!

Peanut butter and chocolate cookies

2014-11-09T21:13:00+00:00

We do love our baked treats. For this week, our lunchboxes will contain peanut butter and chocolate cookies. The recipe is taken from our Hummingbird Bakery cookbook but we’ve made a few simple swaps to make it Hannah-friendly. We also tend to make a half-batch of the Hummingbird recipe as that keeps us going for the week.

Mix 115g Vitalite with 100g caster sugar and 100g light brown sugar. Then beat in one egg, followed by a few drops of vanilla extract (only when we have it in the cupboard though!) Then add 120g crunchy peanut butter and 170g plain flour. Add in one teaspoon bicarbonate of soda and a pinch of salt. Finally stir in 100g chocolate chunks (at the moment we’re using Lidl’s dark chocolate but Sainsbury’s dark chocolate or Cadbury’s Bournville also work well) and there you have it! Dollop onto lined baking trays and bake at 180C for between 10 and 15 minutes depending where on the chewy to crunchy scale you prefer your cookies (we go for somewhere around 11 minutes).

Profiteroles!

2014-11-09T17:13:00+00:00

Pudding this Sunday was profiteroles; a surprisingly quick and easy dessert. We use the Delia recipe (with a few swaps, obviously). Melt 50g block fat (we usually Stork or Sainsbury’s ‘baking block’) with 150ml cold water, but don’t let it boil. Quickly stir in 60g strong plain flour and beat until it forms a thick paste - this can take a few minutes. Leave this paste to cool for around 10 minutes. Once cooler, gradually mix in two beaten eggs.

Next, prepare a few baking trays but sprinkling cold water on some baking parchment to cover the trays. Spoon the mixture onto the trays. It’s supposed to make about 30 choux buns, we never quite manage that many. Don't make them too big though as they don’t always rise so well. Place in an oven preheated to 200C for 10 minutes, before turning up to 220C for a further 15 minutes. Take the buns out of the oven and pierce with a skewer or knife to release the steam and stop them going soggy. Put back in the oven for a few minutes.

Now comes the fun bit! Whip up some Lactofree cream (usually a whole carton, we like cream!). Either pipe into the buns using the holes you made to release the steam or slice in half and use the cream to sandwich the two halves together. Then drizzle in chocolate sauce. We make our sauce using dark chocolate, Vitalite, golden syrup, and a splash of soya or Lactofree milk. Scrumptious but impossible to eat elegantly!

Eggy bread

2014-11-09T09:13:00+00:00

They say breakfast is the most important meal of the day, and we are inclined to agree - especially at the weekend! We are quite partial to a poached egg or two in the morning, but every now and again we get the urge for something slightly sweeter. Eggy bread is quick and easy to make, but is a tasty way to start the day.

To make enough for two, you will need 4 slices of white bread, 3 eggs, 1 tsp ground cinnamon, icing sugar, maple syrup and 4 slices of bacon. I usually prefer brown bread but find the white works better for eggy bread.

Beat the eggs with the ground cinnamon and then pour half of the mixture onto a dinner plate. Place a slice of bread on the plate, and press with a fork to soak the mixture into one side and then turn the slice over and repeat wth the other side. Heat a teaspoon of butter in a pan (Vitalite or vegetable oil is fine instead), and fry each side until slightly crispy. Repeat until all of the egg mixture is used up, which should make 4-5 slices.

We served ours dusted with icing sugar and with bacon (grilled or fried), then drizzled with maple syrup.

Friday night is pizza night!

2014-10-24T19:31:00+01:00

There’s nothing quite like pizza on a Friday night (maybe pizza on any other night...), and this week was no exception. Whether it’s a spicy meat feast or a vegetarian special, few things can beat it. We’ve recently discovered a new method for cooking pizza (taken from Franco Manca’s Artesian Pizza book) which has taken our pizza making to a whole new level! We’ve explained our approach to a few people now, which is often met with rather bemused looks but would urge you to try it for yourselves.

First things first, the pizza base. We make our own and leave to prove for at least 4 hours, although preferably more like 24 hours. We are not entirely sure of the science behind this, but Franco Manca recommend it, and it seems to give a really good texture to the base, although it does require a little extra planning. For the two of us, we usually use about 200g strong bread flour mixed with 5-7g dried yeast, a pinch each of salt and sugar, and then enough warm water to make a not-too-sticky dough. Knead this for 5 minutes until the dough is springy to the touch then cover and leave to prove for however long you have.

Nearer dinner time, start your tomato sauce. We keep this pretty basic. One tin of tomatoes (we prefer the whole variety, not pre-chopped) and some garlic, simmered for a while (this tends to vary with the amount of time available) with some tomato puree and salt if necessary.

Now, for the assembly – this is where the magic happens! Heat a heavy-based frying pan until it’s hot. Franco Manca recommend an iron-based one, we don’t have one of those so just use a reasonably serious, non-stick frying pan. Stretch out your dough to fit the pan then toss it in. That’s right, fry the pizza base! It sounds crazy, but it works. Once the base has begun to crisp underneath (it will still be doughy on top) add your toppings. Leave to cook for a few minutes on the hob, then place under a pre-heated grill to finish off.

Our current favourite is spinach, sliced red onion, sun-blushed tomatoes, and goat's cheese. But we’ve also tried chorizo, red pepper and Lactofree mature cheese.

Our next step will be to try to make our own mozzarella. Some Google-ing suggests this is possible but we are still trying to track down the requisite ingredients... We’ll keep you posted on that one.