Good start to a Sunday

Hope you're all having a lovely relaxing start to your Sunday. The weather has turned a bit grey today it seems, none of the lovely sunshine yesterday *fingers crossed it comes back soon*.
I woke up quite early this morning, drank a big glass of water, 40mins of yoga and then sat down to watch cookery programs on tv with one of my favourite weekend breakfasts. A scone! Yey!

Today's scone (meant to be heart shaped but they always turn out a bit wonky when baked and end up looking triangular) is made with organic spelt flour, sweet sultanas, nutty ground flax seeds and goji berries. Did you know goji berries are also called wolfberries? What a cool name?!
I topped my warm scone with my all time favourite jam - Spanish peach. Amazing! And of course had to have a big cup of tea to enjoy it with it (flowery mug is optional but highly recommended).

- Side Note - Do you like my new plate? I picked up a couple of them the other day and am in love!

I'm going food shopping in a bit so I think I'll make a post on what I buy for the week. Nice to have a nose in other people's trollies don't you think? Hope you all enjoy the rest of your Sunday!

Soft Coconut and Oat Cookies

Wah-hey! You made it through Monday, you deserve a treat for that! How does a soft and chewy coconut and oat cookie with a glass of milk sound? Oh yes! And you know what? You can totally tell yourself they're not too bad for you, they have no butter and contain a heart health fat. So enjoy!!

This a great little recipe that I picked up from a very cute blog (the pictures they have are way prettier than mine) and these were a huge success all round! For my 1st attempt I halved the recipe and I did fiddle around with quantities just a tad, but other than that I stuck pretty close to the recipe. I've had this jar of lovely organic coconut oil for a while and I wanted to put it to use for something other than just cooking (using it instead of olive oil etc.), so I was really excited to find a baking recipe with it. My coconut oil had solidified so I scooped it out into a measuring cup and let it melt in a bath of hot water until it was totally liquified.

So you start off with your dry ingredients in a large bowl; dessicated coconut, jumbo organic oats, organic white spelt flour, pinch of salt, baking powder and soft light brown sugar (set aside in a separate bowl). Then you have your wet ingredients; the melted coconut oil, a large organic free range egg and vanilla extract.



You start off by whisking together your wet ingredients along with the light soft brown sugar (I added a good bit less of this than the recipe stated, 100g was more than enough sweetness for me, but if you try this recipe out yourself maybe put in the full amount of sugar suggested first and then use less the next time if you'd prefer them less sweet), until the mixture is lighter in colour and fluffy. Slowly then add in your dry ingredients and combine. Don't over work the mixture as you don't want to lose all the air you just built up as the cookies won't have the right texture when finished. The half mixture made about 8 large cookies.

Dollop spoonfuls onto a baking tray and cook for 10-12 mins. I think mine took 11 minutes exactly and should just a tiny bit brown around the edges, but they're meant to be pale so don't worry if they look under done, they're not. You have to leave them for 10-15 mins on the tray as they are super soft and would just mush up if you tried to move them. After they've cooled a bit, move them to a wire rack until totally cool. These stored really well for 3 days in an airtight box and were so delicious! A great afternoon treat or a bit of after dinner indulgence.

Health Food Haul

I picked up a few new items to put into the pantry recently and thought I'd blog about them. Some are things I buy quite regularly and a couple are brand new to me and can't wait to try them out.

Myself and my mum popped into a Supervalu the other day (we were getting our car NCTs done and had a half hour to kill) and just as we were leaving I spotted this for just €1! Organic millet flakes cereal. This would be a brilliant alternative to porridge for those who can't eat gluten (although I have started to see gluten free oats around) but even if you can they'd be a lovely change. You can cook it the exact same way as you would porridge or make lovely granola, muesli or flap jacks with it, even add it into smoothies.

Keeping on the cereal theme, I love adding milled seeds to my breakfast it's a great way of adding extra nutrients to a meal. These lovely milled linseeds (also known as flax seeds), are filled with omega 3 fatty acids which help maintain a healthy brain, heart, joints and immune system. They're also full of fiber and research has shown links to preventing cancers. Most importantly they have a lovely nutty taste and you can pick them up pretty cheap in health food shops and supermarkets.

Aren't noodles delicious? My favourite I think have to be soba noodles. This brand you can find in a few big supermarkets (my local Superquinn stocks them) but you should be able to find them in Asian markets too. These lovely organic ones cook in about 3/4 minutes and are perfect in pretty much any Japanese inspired dish (I'm a little addicted to these with homemade teriyaki at the moment)!

Pastes like this one from Biona Organic are so handy to have on stand-by in the cupboard. When you don't know what to cook for dinner just add some of this to a stock with veg and tofu or with a dash of coconut milk to make delicious soups or sauces. This one has a really great kick of chilli to it and is perfect when you're not up for creating your own thai paste from scratch! I'd say you get 4-6 meals out of one tube, but I guess it depends how strong you want the final dish to come out but it's a great little item to have when you're just not sure what to make.

I know I post about it a lot, but I love making breads!! But of course to do so you need a constant supply of flour, one of my favourite (and easily available) brands of flour is Dove's Farm organic flours, in particular their strong bread flour and their white and wholegrain spelt flours. You do need to shop around and see where the best value is, I've seen the same flour range in price from about the €2.50 mark up to €4.50, and when you always need to buy more it really pays to get the best price. I was recently in Avoca in Monkstown to grab a bit of lunch when I spotted they stocked Dove's Farm Einkorn flour, I'd seen it on their website but couldn't find it in any shops I'd been in to, so of course I had to buy it. It's the earliest form of wheat as we know it and was first cultivated over 20,000 years ago, isn't that amazing?!! I think that's incredible. The flour is yellow in colour and I can't wait to bake a lovely loaf with it.

And last but not least in a MASSIVE bottle of agave syrup. I've normally only seen this sold in small bottles, so it was great to find one twice the size and for a good price. It's a really sweet syrup and has a lovely mild flavour, that you can use as a substitute for sugar or honey in desserts, coffee or for breakfast. I use agave all the time so I'm really happy I've such a huge bottle that will last me ages!

Let me know if you've tried out any of these items or if you have suggestions of what I should pick up next!

Homemade Hot Cross Buns

I'd been eyeing up this lovely looking recipe for a while and couldn't resist trying out the recipe the other day. Again it's from Paul Hollywood's latest book and although they do take a long time to make and have a few stages to them they taste absolutely gorgeous and are well worth the effort!

Now..I do have to make a confession, in my eagerness to get these lovely buns into the oven and fill the house with the scent of cinnamon, orange and lemon, I did in fact leave a step out (quite an important one actually), so the final result wasn't perfect but they still tasted delicious. But hey, we all make baking mistakes from time to time right? I forgot the leave the buns rise for a 3rd time before piping the flour and water mixture and putting them into the oven, so the finished bun was a bit denser and tighter in texture than it should have been. A schoolgirl error you could say? Nonetheless, the flavour of them was absolutely gorgeous, and I can't wait to make them again.

Hope you enjoy the long weekend and eat lots of yummy hot cross buns, I know I will! Yum!

Banana Bread

I find banana bread so comforting and cosy. It's not really a bread but it's not really cake either, it's somewhere in the delicious middle. A slice or two works great for a weekend breakfast with a big mug of tea, an afternoon nibble with a coffee or an post dinner treat on the sofa. I love eating it still a little warm from the oven, just as it is. My dad likes to eat banana bread with butter, which I find slightly sacrilege, but each to their own I guess! This is the Avoca recipe from their 1st cookbook, which I love and peruse through all the time. I only slightly adapted to the recipe to suit my taste, I use an organic wholegrain spelt flour and lessen the amount of sugar specified because if your bananas have been sitting on the kitchen table and getting very dark for quite a while the natural sugars will give plenty of sweetness.

This is a really simple recipe to put together and is can easily be adapted to your taste. To make it a bit more decadent you could add in some chopped nuts, walnuts or pecans would work really well, or maybe some chocolate chips or even peanut butter chips (my sister has recently become obsessed with these). You could also add in more spices if you liked, nutmeg and clove would be gorgeous along side the cinnamon.

I would really recommend using a wholegrain flour (I like spelt best but regular wholegrain is delicious too) instead of plain flour as it gives the loaf a nutty flavour, nicer texture and also makes it a bit healthier. I like to reserve a spoonful of sugar from the recipe to sprinkle on top of the loaf before it goes into the oven so it gets a lovely crunchy top. Although you may not associate banana bread with spring, with the awful weather Ireland is getting at the moment (rain, hail and snow storms in March!) it makes a gloomy day a bit brighter.

Birthday Festivities & Rustic Stone Dinner

Last weekend was my 24th birthday (Eep!! I still feel like I'm 19, 24 sounds so grown up!). I've had a few disastrous birthdays over the last few years, so I don't like making a big deal of it, however my family and Isaac made this birthday very special for me. It was also mother's day this year, and although I joked that my mum was stealing my thunder, I really liked that we got to share the day.

I've said this before in previous posts, but I'm really not a very good baker of sweet things (cakes, muffins, cookies etc), so I didn't want to take any chances by making a cake! Instead Isaac took a trip to the Blackrock Market where Pure have a shop, all of their products are gluten free (brilliant for any celiacs!) and they have many wheat free, dairy free, yeast free and sugar free options available too. Isaac bought their carrot cake (how cute is the little carrot!!) which was absolutely delicious and went down very well with a glass or two of bubbles.

It is full of lovely bits of carrot, is super moist and has a lovely light texture, and alright it's not a "healthy" cake but hey..it was my birthday and a teeny bit of indulgence is ok isn't it? Everyone had a slice and loved it!
That evening Isaac treated me even more and had booked us a table at the Rustic Stone. I've wanted to eat here for ages but never got around to it. They have a really large menu with lots of lovely things for veggies and non-veggies alike. We started with a cocktail each, Isaac went with a classic mojito and I went with one of their specials, a pineapple and rosemary martini, both were perfectly balanced and a lovely way to wet our appetites!

For starters Isaac picked the Asian quail with grilled on a stick with radish, mango and coriander. The presentation was great, showing off the ingredients well and had a lovely balance of flavours (sorry the picture is so blurry). The only small critique Isaac had was that it was a bit fiddley when trying to get the meat off the bone, but it really wasn't a major issue. For my starter I picked the crunchy salad hearts, perfectly crisp leaves each filled with a delicious fillings like tzatziki, courgette and marjoram compote, aubergine caviar and homemade chutneys. This was served with lovely sourdough bread and a thin and perfectly crunchy grissino. It was absolutely lovely, however it's definitely more of a summer dish, on a snowy March night I could have done with something a bit more warming!

For main course, Isaac went with one of their "Off the Stone" burgers, the rustic lamb burger with pickled red pepper and crispy lamb fillet. This was HUGE and came with a side of chunky pesto chips. Isaac loved this, it was definitely a big manly burger, filled with delicious condiments and served on a sesame bun. Isaac asked for it medium-rare and said it was perfect. I chose the courgette linguini, which was served beautifully, a yellow courgette "poached with thyme and garlic then roasted,  filled with tomato and basil and linguini rolled in chives, capers, yogurt, with baby marinated tomato more torn basil." It was absolutely delicious, all of the flavours worked perfectly together and the pasta was perfectly cooked. Although it wasn't a huge portion (in comparison to Isaac's burger anyway) I was left full and satisfied. 

It was a perfect way to finish off a lovely birthday and I feel so thankful to have such amazing people in my life to share it with. Here's to a great year!

Sourdough Bread: Start to Finish

Sourdough bread..what can I say about it? Just...YUM! Big air bubbles, tangy flavour, great crust and amazing toasted with just about everything! I've loved sourdough for years but have always bought it in shops, never really knowing much about the process of it, other than it not using fresh or dried yeast. So I was having a look through Paul Hollywood's How To Bake book at home and thought "Why not give it a go? How hard can it be?" The answer...not at all!

Sourdough has probably been made using the same techniques for thousands of years, possibly as far back as the ancient Egyptians, how amazing?! It requires naturally occurring (usually air born) wild yeasts and lactobacilli coming in contact with flour and water and over a few days fermenting into a bubbly runny mixture, called a starter. This fermentation causes the lovely slightly sour taste associated with sourdough bread. You have to cultivate the starter by "feeding" it more flour and water every few days to keep it alive and mature the starter's flavour. Once it's ready you add some of the starter to your bread mix, leave it rise, shape it, bake it and voilà you have sourdough bread!

 
I actually never knew how many different ways you can make a sourdough starter, a quick google search will show loads of ways to do it. The usual and most common way is to leave a container of flour and water uncovered for a few days to let the wild yeasts fall into it. However the method that Paul Hollywood suggests is to use an organic apple to start the process. I'd never heard of this method but it worked out amazingly. It does take time (at least a week before you can use your starter) but it is so worth it! 

I will start at the very beginning. In a large mixing bowl measure out 500g of flour (I just used regular bread flour, but I intend to start adding in other types of flour to create different flavours and textures), 360ml of tepid water and 1 organic apple, finely grated. Mix these all together, put into a container and leave for 3 days to ferment (I left it in my bedroom wardrobe!) 

After 3 days it should have risen up by at least double and be all bubbly (very exciting!). Once you open the jar it will make a big "whoosh" noise and smell a bit like cider, I really like this smell!! You then have to feed it, so throw half away and in a bowl add the rest of it to another 500g of flour and about 170ml of water. Yum yum! Put it back into the container and leave for another 2 days.

After the 2 days it should have loads of bubbles and risen by a lot. Mine rose and fell, which is fine, meaning it was very active! If however it falls and gets kind of watery looking on top it means it's over active and needs more flour and has to be left for another 2 days.

But if all is well, once again, remove half and add 250g of flour and about 200ml of water, so it's all sloppy and soft looking (like a very think pancake batter). This feel of it at this stage is so lovely to mix in your hands. Then back into the container it goes and has a little rest only for 24 hours this time. It will have risen up again and is now ready to use..yey! 

 
The recipe that Hollywood uses makes 2 large loaves. You need 750g of bread flour (plus extra), 500g of the lovely starter, 15g of salt, 350-450ml of tepid water and a little olive oil for kneading.
Put all the ingredients (expect the oil) into a bowl and mix until it has formed a soft ball of dough. Knead for 5-10 mins with a little oil on the work surface so it doesn't stick and becomes smooth and uniform in texture. Leave the dough to rise in a slightly oiled bowl, covered with cling film in a warm place (the day I have a proving drawer in my kitchen I will be a very happy girl indeed!). This will take a long time to rise, possibly up to 5 hours, or until it is at least double in size.

Once it is risen, take it out of the bowl and knock it back until it is almost back to it's original size. You will then need 2 proving baskets quite heavily dusted with flour. Divide the dough in half and place a ball into each basket and leave to rise again. The recipe says that the 2nd rise should take 10-13 hours!!!! However I found that after 3-4 hours the dough had risen all the way up the sides of the proving basket and was ready to go into the oven. Tip the dough out of the baskets and onto floured baking trays and pop them into a preheated oven at 200C for 30-40 mins.

The bread will sound hollow inside when you tap the bottom of the loaf and be beautiful and golden. Don't forget that you need to feed your starter again, another 500g of flour and about 170ml of water. You'll have to do this about every 3 days or as often as you make a loaf of bread. I know that this looks like a lot of work, but really it's less than an hour every few days and the end result is so worth it. Making your own bread is so rewarding and seeing the whole process start to finish is fantastic! Once you start making your own bread you'll never look back and never want to buy a loaf of bread again!