Betty's Bakewell Tart

Everyone in the world needs a Betty. If you could bottle her spirit it would be the best tonic in the world! I'm talking about my friend Betty Wilson. When trying to think of how to describe what she does I'm at a loss to find the words. Yes, she used to do tarot readings, yes, she speaks with spirit and yes over the years of her life she has helped many people dead and alive but to me she is so much more than a clairvoyant, medium or psychic. She has been a rock, a guide and a guardian angel! My life has had many ups and downs and I've often felt very different to everyone I meet, that was up untiI I met Betty. She gave me a reading years ago and it was full of lovely things that were coming my way, low and behold it all turned out to be true. I'm happily married now with 3 children and 2 step-children. Thanks to the wisdom, guidance and a general shoulder to cry on that Betty offered over the last few years, I truly believe I have grown more as a person than I had in my life before she was in it. I do things now, that I wouldn't have dared or even imagined I could do, all because she tells me I can. She has been such a rock to me and never asks anything in return, as all she tells me is she gets all the happiness from seeing how I grow. The one thing she loves is a bakewell tart and I promised her I would make her one, it's the least I can do. She is a true friend, a real life angel and my guiding star so Betty's tart is my tribute to her.

For the pastry:

200g plain flour

100g unsalted cold cubed butter

100g icing sugar

30ml milk

Place all the ingredients in a bowl.

Run your hands under the cold tap for a minute as this helps with the rubbing process.

When you have dried your hands rub the butter into the flour until there are no lumps left and the mixture resembles crumbs.

At this point pour in the milk and stir with a blunt knife for roughly a couple of minutes until the dough forms a ball.

Knead the dough on a floured surface and make a smooth ball.

Clingfilm and pop into the freezer while you make the filling.

For the filling:

100g unsalted softened butter

100g sugar

100g ground almonds

Tsp almond essence

2 egg yolk

2 tbsp jam mixed until runny

Flaked almonds to top.

Beat the butter until it is soft and add the sugar.

Mix until fluffy and add the ground almonds, almond essence and egg yolks and combine.

Roll out your firm pastry ball until nice and thin.            

                                       

Carefully draping the pastry over your rolling pin place your dish underneath and trim the edges.

Spread your runny jam over the base.

Spoon in your filling and spread evenly and preheat the oven to 200.

As I had enough pastry left I rolled a long rectangle and cut out some lengths to make a lattice topping for the tart. Before assembling the top sprinkle on the flaked almonds.

Bake for 15 minutes at 200 then turn the oven down to 150 for a further 10-15 minutes.

Dust with icing sugar, serve with a fresh cup of coffee and say a little thank you to Betty Wilson for this fine treat!

Cheap Chicken Fajitas

We love a Mexican night in our house. It certainly helps with the decision of what to have for tea. As with my Banging Bargain Burritos, I wanted to show you with the same few spices you can make the fajitas without buying the kits. Don't forget to buy the wraps from the bread aisle, not the section near the Mexican food kits they do cost more. These are so tasty and can be altered to almost anybody's liking. Like B.B.Q fajitas? Use half B.B.Q sauce and half passata. Like them hot? Throw in some jalapenos or up the heat of the chilli powder. Play around with food and make it your own, experiment with flavours and involve the family. Have a themed night each week to help with tea ideas, we tried Mexican Monday, Meat free Wednesday and Fish Friday!

For the fajitas:

3 chicken fillets cut into strips

3 peppers sliced

2 red onions sliced

300ml passata 

3 tsp cumin

3 tsp garlic powder

3 tsp paprika

3 tsp mild chilli powder

Tbsp oil

Wraps

After you cut the chicken shake all the spices onto the meat to marinate for 30 minutes or more covered in the fridge.

In a frying pan with the oil fry off the chicken for 15 minutes.

Add the peppers, onions and passata and cook for a further 15 minutes until the sauce reduces.

Spoon the mixture into a warm serving dish and take to the table with the wraps, salad and trimmings for everyone to make their own.

Cheese...and cake?.....Am I hearing you right?

This has got to be my all time favourite dessert and since I made my first one, no shop bought cheesecake has been good enough since. I've been a lot busier since starting this blog. Keeping my shopping bill down to a minimum, does incur a bit more effort in the kitchen, but who can moan when the end results are a raspberry ripple cheesecake. The only downside is you will become really popular all of a sudden, people will want to travel from miles to share it! I had to share this one with 6 family members. My hubby hates it and is very vocal to announce his disgust when people come for dinner. The recipe/method here is for a basic raspberry cheesecake. You can do anything you like to make it your own. Swap the digestives for chocolate biscuits, gingernuts or even oaty biscuits make a nice crunchy base. Add flavours to the filling, chocolate, vanilla, lemon curd...anything let your imagination run wild! The decorating is the best part, and it really isn't hard to make a cheesecake look pretty. It's a bit like putting make-up on Miss World, she's already stunning but with that extra help...wow! Yes, I just compared a cheesecake to Miss World. It really is that good.

For the base:

250g biscuits

100g butter

For the filling:

400g cream cheese

80g icing sugar 

200ml double cream

Grease a 23cm flan dish

In a food processor (or in a plastic bag with a rolling pin) place the biscuits and blitz/bash into crumbs

Melt the butter and mix with the sandy crumbs

Line the base of your greased dish with the buttery biscuitness (I sometimes get possessed by Nigella sorry..) and pack it down with a spoon until firm.

Place in the freezer while you make the filling to set.

                                                     
In a mixer (or a bowl with some elbow grease) Place all the filling ingredients and mix until combined and fluffy At this stage if you were adding something else to the filling put it in now

Now for the best part. Take the base out of the freezer and put the filling on top all that's left is to decorate.

Unfortunately when I did this part there were no kids around and I had to lick the bowl clean (the sacrifices I make)

After decorating mine, there were a few too many raspberries so I made a coulis (raspberry sauce)

Push the raspberries through a sieve and add some icing sugar to taste

I simply dropped some blobs on top of the cheesecake and used some to smear artistically on the plates, nobody actually cared about this and I was left somewhat disappointed....

            

Simple steak and ale pie

I actually thought I had already blogged this, my memory is terrible at the moment, something I'm blaming on the kids. I just have to walk through a door and my memory is wiped clean. So my steak and ale pie is a delicious winter warmer, don't forget it is actually still winter put those salads away!! As with the beef bourguignon, it really doesn't matter what beer you use. For mine I used the cheapest bottle I could get my hands on, Golden goose 90p from Lidl and it tasted yummy! Perfect served with mashed sweet potato and some greens.

350g diced stewing steak

250g mushrooms chopped
Onion chopped
500ml bottle ale/beer/stout whichever you like
Tbsp tomato puree (leave it out if you have none it doesn't matter)
Flour tbsp
Oil tbsp
Puff pastry

Coat the meat in flour and pepper
On a high heat brown the meat in the oil
When the meat's browned place into a large pan and pour over the beer, add some water if not covered
In the frying pan cook the mushrooms and onions for 5 minutes and add to the pan with the meat
Stir in the tomato puree and place on a medium heat until simmering
Turn down low and leave for a couple of hours remembering to stir so it doesn't burn
If the liquid is not as thick as you want it after it's been cooking then add some gravy granules
Pour the mixture into an oven proof dish and top with puff pastry
Cook in a preheated oven at 200 for 25-35 minutes or until pastry is golden

Triple choc chip cookies

Don't you just love those cookies you get in the supermarkets. The ones in the paper bags, all gooey and chewy. They usually have a named sweet in them like Rolo or Smarties. Well I made some last night that tasted as good, if not better than those! They were a chocoholics dream. Triple chocolate cookies, verging on the consistency of a brownie in the middle and crispy on the outside, generously filled with chocolate chips. If you want to recreate the supermarket ones then replace the chocolate chips in the recipe for your chosen sweet, I can't wait to experiment! I'm going to try replacing the chocolate I used for chocolate orange for my next batch. Throw some nuts or oats in for a different texture, whatever you decide on let me know on my Facebook page How to be hard up and happy! I'd love to see your results.

150g plain flour sifted
100g chocolate melted (whichever you want)
200g chocolate chips or whatever chocolate sweets you want (from the fridge)
30g cocoa powder sifted
120g butter softened
75g brown sugar
50g white sugar
1/2 tsp bicarbinate of soda
1/2 tsp salt
Large egg beaten (from the fridge)

Preheat the oven to 170
In a bowl combine the flour, cocoa, salt and bicarbinate of soda
With a mixer if you have one (by hand is fine too it will give your arms a good workout!) cream together the butter and both sugars until light and fluffy (or until your arm feels like it's going to drop off) then add the melted chocolate and mix again until combined
Beat in the cold egg and add the dry ingredients
Fold in first, so the flour mix doesn't go everywhere, then mix

Once mixed stir in the chocolate chips/ sweets you are using

Using an ice-cream scoop or a spoon if you don't have one, dollop large amounts onto a greaseproof lined tray

                                  

No need to shape them just dollop and bake for 18 minutes

They will seem undercooked but I promise you they're ready 

Leave to cool for 5 minutes, this is the hardest part, it takes real willpower after smelling the chocolate wafting through the house

All that's left is to enjoy them with an ice cold glass of milk, or ice-cream, or cream, or.....just enjoy them

Here's my son Chase enjoying his this morning

Christmas bomb

Don't like Christmas pudding? Like rocky road? Try this for dessert on Christmas day. You can put what you want in it, it's entirely up to you. I had some mini marshmallows and bits of chocolate left from our hot chocolate bar the other week and my daughter gave me (not even begrudgingly) a couple of her mini Mars bars to throw in too. The last time I made this I made my own honeycomb (You-tube tutorial to follow soon!) but you could try fruit or nuts, anything at all. You start with plain old vanilla ice-cream, again, you could use a different flavour, and basically add to it what you want. I poured melted white chocolate over mine to look like white sauce on a Christmas pudding but you could use any chocolate and any swiss roll for that matter! But if you want to recreate mine here's what I used.

Chocolate swiss roll

3/4 litre vanilla ice-cream

Mini marshmallows

2 mini Mars bars sliced

50g white chocolate broken

50g milk chocolate broken

100g white chocolate melted for top

                                       

Slice the swiss roll into slices 1 cm thick and line a bowl with cling film 

                                     
Get a child (any will do) to bash up the chocolate into pieces (works even better if they're in a mood)                                      
Place the slices of swiss roll into the bowl
                                     
Place the ice-cream, marshmallows, chocolate and Mars pieces into a bowl (or mixer) and combine                                          
Scoop the ice-cream mix into the swiss roll lined bowl and tighten the cling film around the top
Place into the freezer preferably with a side plate on top with something weighing it down

After at least 2 hours turn it out onto a plate pour on the melted white chocolate, decorate and serve

A wow factor for any Christmas party!

'Tis the season to be a wally

Advent day 11 it's getting closer!! I'm excited anyway....So yesterday our advent 'surprise' was to decorate the Christmas cookie tree together. Most of the advent surprises end with together as that's what it's all about. Getting us all together, even if it's just for ten minutes before my husband rushes off to work. The other night we sang Christmas songs together (good job our neighbours live away most of the time they may have thought a cat was getting strangled!) It was hilarious and my son Chase who's nearly two thought we had all gone mad, although he danced and screamed "Yay!!!" at the end, so we must have done well. Anyway, here's my cookie tree recipe, don't worry if you haven't got the star cutters they're £4.99 on-line from Lakeland or you could always try cutting freehand stars, or even different sized circles to stack. This recipe gives you enough dough for twenty large to small cookies.

600g sifted plain flour
300g butter
300g sugar
Tsp vanilla extract
2 eggs beaten
Kg pack of ready roll icing (I got mine in Lidl)
Decorations (Again Lidl had some decent decorations, or the Pound shop)
Tbsp jam

In a bowl (or mixer if you have one) cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy (as shown above)

Add the beaten eggs and vanilla and mix 

Add the flour gradually until a dough is formed divide into two balls, wrap in cling film and chill for an hour

                                                 

Roll out the dough to around 3-4mm thick and cut two of each size cookie re-rolling and cutting with the leftover scraps

Place cookies onto greaseproof lined baking trays and place in a pre heated oven at 180 for 12 minutes or until firm then place on a wire rack to cool

                            

Knead and roll out the icing until it's as thick as you like to top the cookies 

Cut two lots of each size for the icing too

Brush each cookie with some jam to stick the fondant icing in place

Let the children assemble the stack starting from the largest to the smallest (cookie not child)

                                               
We had loads of fun decorating the tree but not as much fun as we all had eating it      
                                               

Chris's teacake n butter pudding

As promised last night on my new Facebook page (shameless plug please do like, follow the link above!) here's my, okay it's not mine it's actually a lady called Chris from Marton court's, recipe for teacake n butter pudding. A different take on the old classic and very yummy. With it's spices and fruits already in the teacakes half the prep work is done for you. I really enjoyed my time talking with the people from Marton court and will be going back soon for more old school recipes and tips so watch this space. There are a few variations to this recipe you could try, marmalade spread on the teacakes, or chocolate chips scattered in between layers, have fun with it but most importantly let me know how you get on!

6 teacakes halved
2 tbsp sugar (white or brown)
3/4 pint milk
2 eggs beaten
Butter for spreading

In a greased ovenproof dish layer the halves spread with butter to line the bottom of the dish 

Sprinkle them with half of the sugar 

Layer again repeating the process but face the butter side down this time

Sprinkle the rest of the sugar on the top

In a jug mix the egg and milk

Pour over the teacakes and leave to stand for half an hour 

Preheat the oven to 200 and bake for 20-30 minutes until the top is crispy and the middle will be nice and gooey  

                               

                                 

Serve with custard or cream