Turn your Pe-can’t into a Pecan…pie that is!

So an American themed dinner party has encouraged me to attempt this pie! Really struggled to get a recipe that was in grams and not American cup measurements so this is a hybrid pie of my Internet research!

I did cheat the pastry but I can make a short crust so I didn’t feel bad for long and I was in a rush.

You will need:
a pack and a half of pecans halves (100g bags)
4 eggs
85g golden syrup
1 tsp vanilla essence
2 tbsp dark rum
50g butter, melted and cooled
85g light muscovado sugar

Basically roll out your pastry to cover a pie dish ,12inchs is fine or you could do little ones it would make about 6 mini 10cm pies!

Chill pastry in fridge whilst beating all the ingredients together, apart from the pecans. When all the ingredients are combined stir in the majority of the pecans.

NOTE ABOUT PECANS
You could chop them all roughly and put them in the pie OR save some (1/3) for decoration like I did!

Then add to the chilled pastry case and bake for aprox 30/40 ( keep an eye out after 30) at 180 degrees!

A few other notes;
Use a metal pie dish if possible I used a ceramic one which meant the party wasn’t a crisp as I would have liked!
It will look very raised out of the oven but will deflate!

Leave to cool serve with ice cream or cream!

Happy pie making!

Anna x

Oreo cupcakes

href=”https://annasspagblog.files.wordpress.com/2013/08/20130813-114251.jpg”>

So, saw Oreos were on offer in the shop and decided to concur a recipe for a cupcake version.

Really really easy the cupcake base is a Victoria sponge recipe but adapted for chocolate:

6oz(225g) caster sugar, self raising flour, marg/butter
3 eggs

The chocolate adaptation is to swap 2 tablespoons of flour for 2 tablespoons of coco powder.

The great thing about this recipe is you can put all the ingredients together using a food processor, upright mixer or a hand whisk and its perfect every time.

The icing is more fun.

You will need
1/2 pack of Oreos
6oz (225g) Butter
12oz (450g) Icing sugar

I blended up 1/2 a pack of Oreos until it was like soil (you’ll see what I mean) then took that out of the food processor (I used my mothers kenwood)

Next step is to blend the butter until whipped and softish then add half the icing sugar and all the Oreo soil to the butter and keep blending until combined.

Finally add the remaining icing sugar.

I decorated in a rather unglamorous fashion having remembered my piping bag but did finish each cake with a half an Oreo ( surprisingly easy to cut in half!)

Happy baking

Anna x

Cookies!

As part of deciding to become better at biscuits I’ve adapted a recipe for oat cookies.

175g self raising flour
75g porridge oats (jumbo or Scott’s)
175g granulated sugar
1tsp baking powder
175g butter
2 tablespoons golden syrup

So the recipe is simple measure all the dry ingredients into a bowl. Heat the butter and syrup on the hob until melted then add to the dry mix and stir!

I added 40g of dried cranberries for extra chew!

Divide into 14 dough balls place 7 on each tray and flatten a little before baking at 180 for 12/15 mins. Take out when they are golden brown and a bit darker on the sides…. Leave to cool on a wire rack. They might be a bit soft when you first take them out but they won’t be when they cool!

Happy baking!

Anna

Dinosaur biscuits

These fun little monsters are part of my mission to be able to make decent biscuits!!

They are adapted from a gingerbread man recipe but the recipe and timings still need to be sorted as they are not quite perfect! They do look fun (icing not my strong point!).

Happy baking,
Anna

Pavlova (tropical)

EKAC

Once upon a time when I was young and 17 me and a group of friends decided that instead of baking cakes and bringing them to parties we would create a bowl of sweets that everyone could share…we gave them the novel name of Ekac (cake spelt backwards).

Occasionally we bring back the Ekac for special occasions and is weekend was my friend Elise’s birthday. Elise is one of the founding members of the Ekac club and we made her an extra special one, layered with loads of sweets and chocolate, we even found a special seal tight vessel so it was portable!

Very fun and very easy to make!

Happy Ekac making.

Pie!

I’ve been meaning to create a really simple chicken pie recipe for a while now! Managed to create this. Cheated the white sauce by mixing some chicken soup with chicken stock and cheated with the pastry too!

The basic mix comprises of chicken, leek, mushrooms and onions in the sauce and sprinkled with some dried parsley and garlic and topped with puff pastry.

It makes a really simple relatively quick dinner I shall post the recipe when I have finished experimenting with the recipe!

Happy baking!