Nutty Pear Crumble with Haagen-Dazs Honey, Walnut and Cream

I love crumbles - they are very wintery puddings, aren't they? Often served with cream, custard or ice cream, apple crumble is one of my favourite desserts.

When I was sent a voucher to try out a new flavour of Haagen-Dazs ice cream - Honey, Walnut and Cream - I thought a crumble would be a lovely thing to make to serve with it. I decided to try something a bit different and use pear instead of apple, and mirror one of the flavours of the ice cream by adding some nuts.

The ice cream is very creamy with a swirl of honey in the middle for an added hit of sweetness. The walnuts add a nice crunch and you get a different mixture of flavours in every spoonful. It's really good on its own, and works really well with desserts as it wouldn't overpower the flavour of the pudding you serve it with.

I remembered a Weightwatchers recipe for crumble I'd once made, that used rolled or porridge oats in the topping as well as flour and sugar as a way to use less of the latter two ingredients; I decided to add some oats and some chopped nuts into my crumble topping for a filling, warming winter crunch.

To serve 2, you need:
2 pears
1 tbsp. artificial sweetener (optional)
50g low fat spread
50g plain flour
25g caster sugar
25g chopped mixed nuts
25g rolled or porridge oats
Haagen-Dazs Honey, Walnut and Cream ice cream, to serve

 

Preheat oven to 180C (it's good to make this while you already have the oven on to make dinner - it's lovely after a roast!). Peel and slice the pears and place in a saucepan with 100ml water. Bring to the boil, cover and simmer until the water has evaporated and the pe
ars have softened. Add sweetener if desired.

Spoon the pears into an ovenproof dish and set aside.

Rub the low-fat spread and flour together in a bowl to make a breadcrumb texture then stir in the sugar, nuts and oats. Scatter over the dish with the pears and bake in the oven for 30 minutes until browned and crisp.

 

Serve warm, with Haagen-Dazs Honey, Walnut and Cream.

5 Easy Lunchbox Salads you can take to work for lunch

I've been eating a lot of salads lately, and taking one in to work every day for my lunch. It's cheaper than going out and buying one every day and this way I can put exactly what I want into it. Sometimes I get into a bit of a rut eating the same salads every day and end up looking around the internet for inspiration so I thought I'd share my current top five.

Please excuse the simple presentation - this is literally how I take the salads into work for lunch!
First up is really easy - any types of lettuce that you like, topped with feta cheese and chunks of fresh watermelon. A light vinaigrette dressing goes well with this. I usually eat this salad with a packet of ready cooked chicken pieces for protein and to make it more filling.

This salad is my latest addiction: pear, blue cheese and walnut. Again you can use any type of lettuce as a base, and if you like things like cucumber add it in (I don't). I used gorgonzola - I was going to use Roquefort but couldn't get any, but this worked really well. Top with peeled and sliced pear and a handful of walnuts. This goes well with a blue cheese dressing.

 

A different type of cheese for this salad: goat's cheese with bacon lardons (you need to cook the lardons first then let them go cold before adding to the salad). Use on a bed of your favourite lettuce. This goes well with a wine vinegar and Dijon mustard dressing.

 

 

 

This one takes a little longer to make but is good if you want something more substantial for lunch or to take on a picnic. Cook some pasta and drain; while it's still warm, toss through some green pesto from a jar, add some crayfish or prawns (I used crayfish here) and some pine nuts. You can serve this hot or cold.

Finally a bulgur wheat-based salad. This one does take a bit of preparation but you can make a larger quantity in one go. Put the bulgur wheat in a bowl and cover with water; leave for 15 minutes and then drain. Bring a pan of water to the boil - you need roughly three cups water to one cup bulgur wheat. Simmer for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove from the heat and leave to stand for 5 minutes and drain off any excess water.

I used cubes of roasted butternut squash in this salad; sweet potato works really well. If you don't have time to cook, you can buy tubs of roasted sweet potato, butternut squash and carrot to add to salads from Tesco. I've also added feta cheese and some fresh parsley.

 

 

I've certainly got no excuse to have the same thing every day for lunch now!

Slow Food: Braised Lamb in Cider with Apple and Pear



This is a recipe I was asked to create as part of a campaign around “living slow”. This campaign couldn’t have come at a better time as I really do need to take time to slow down.

 

I’m always busy at work – my workload has at least doubled in the past year for various reasons -  I have a long and stressful commute (thank you, Southern Trains) and when I’m at home I'm running the house. I’m lucky to be able to afford a cleaner but between meal planning food shopping, cooking, tidying up, laundry, dishwasher, and all the little things – sending someone a birthday card, replying to emails, choosing a restaurant to go out to etc – I never seem to have any time to relax. On top of all that we are planning a wedding (there are so many additional things for the bride to think about than the groom!)- and linked to that, I’m now getting up even earlier before work to go for a run as I’m trying to lose weight for the wedding.

 

I’ve also found out recently that I have high blood pressure – some days it’s been extremely high. So I’m looking into ways to deal with that (including possibly medication) – but one thing that I know is important to reduce high blood pressure is to eat healthily, in particular eating less salt, and to do more exercise.

 

I took part in a ‘mindfulness’ session recently which was very relaxing – mindfulness has been shown to reduce stress and even mean employees take fewer sick days off work. But since then I haven’t felt like I’ve got the time to sit down and be mindful, even just for ten minutes – I am literally constantly on the go, and even when I am watching TV in the evening with my fiancé I am multi-tasking replying to emails or cutting out paper hearts for our wedding.

 

So before I keel over from stress I think it definitely is time that I ‘slow down and smell the roses’. I was asked by Simply Beef and Lamb to create a recipe for either beef or lamb, on the theme of ‘live slow’. You might already be familiar with their Red Tractor logo, which means you can find quality assured beef and lamb in the supermarket.

This doesn’t simply mean cooking something in a slow cooker – as well as being easy, one pot meals, it should be value for money and affordable, and reflect the ethos of ‘live slow’: stop living life in the fast lane and take it slow for a change.

 

That can relate to all aspects of our lives, whether that’s not rushing around trying to fit a million things in; spending time in nature or with friends; working on something handcrafted; travelling closer to home and enjoying the journey itself; sewing to repair or make your own clothing or being creative; and even spending your money wisely on things that really matter.

 

When I do feel able to push the ‘to do’ list to one side, I love to handmake greeting cards. I think (or hope) people really appreciate receiving something handmade as they know time and effort has gone into it. I also find it helps me switch off as I’m focused on cutting or stamping, and I enjoy feeling creative.

 

I also travel by train a lot – to work as I already mentioned, and when I’m lucky enough to get a seat I always read. Losing yourself in a good book is a great way to start the day or unwind after a day of work. I’m still a relatively new and pretty nervous driver, so when I have to travel longer distances on my own, I prefer to take the train. So again that gives me a lot of time to read; mobile reception is sometimes patchy so I resist the temptation to go on Facebook or reply to emails and instead pick up a decent-sized book I’ve been meaning to read but don’t want to carry on my daily commute (I do have a Kindle as well, but prefer actual books!). Recently I’ve been going to Salisbury by train a lot as it’s where my family live and also the nearest station to our wedding venue, and I always feel happy and relaxed to see the rolling Wiltshire countryside and the lovely views as we pull into Salisbury station. I’m sure that does help my blood pressure!

What does #slowliving mean to you and your family and what do you do to relax?

 

So finally onto the recipe. I was thinking about what slow living might mean in terms of cooking and came across the Slow Food movement, which promotes using local produce and eating less but better quality meat.

 

Thinking about what was local, I started with my own garden. I’m hoping to get a small vegetable patch started (I was growing peppers last year but slugs ate them all) but at the moment don’t have anything other than herbs. But what a good starting point for a recipe – I have rosemary and a lot of mint, and mint is of course well known as a pairing for lamb.

 

So that was my starting point: making a recipe with lamb and mint. I decided to braise the lamb, as that is a slow method of cooking that is fuss-free, but obviously there had to be more to it than that. Apples are abundant in a lot of areas – my late grandmother had apple and pear trees in her garden – and cider is very English (and to some, slow living might mean relaxing in the garden with a beer or cider…). Apple and mint does apparently go together – I found several mojito recipes online using those flavours! So my recipe was starting to take shape: spring lamb, mint, rosemary, apples and pears, cider. I used Pear cider in this recipe, and decided that because lamb is quite expensive I would go with a cheaper, bulking out ingredient: pearl barley. So you don't even need to serve this with potatoes as it's really filling and tasty.

Making the apples and pears at the start takes a little while but you don't need to do much; then you bung everything else into one casserole dish, put it in the oven and that's it - leaving you more time to relax and take it easy! This is what I came up with: I hope you enjoy it.

Braised lamb in cider with apple and pear - an original recipe by Caroline Makes

To serve 2, you need:

1 tbsp. butter
2 apples, peeled and chopped
1 large or 2 small pears, peeled and chopped
3 tbsp. sugar
3 tbsp. raisins or sultanas

4 lamb rump steaks
500ml cider
half an onion, peeled and cut into chunks
100g pearl barley
half a leek, trimmed and sliced
sprig of fresh rosemary
handful of fresh mint

First make the apple and pear accompaniment and pre-heat the oven to 180C. Melt the butter in a pan, add the apple and stir. Cook for 5 minutes until it has started to soften then add the pear and the raisins. Add the sugar and 50ml water; stew, stirring occasionally, until the water has evaporated and the fruit has softened. This can be made in advance and kept in the fridge or made at the same time as the meal.

Rub the bottom of a casserole dish with a little oil and place the lamb in the dish. Cover with cider and add the onion and leek, pearl barley and herbs. Put the lid on the casserole dish and put in the oven for 1-1.5 hours, until the liquid has been absorbed and the lamb is cooked through.

Serve with the apple and pear mixture on the side.

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The apple, pear and raisin mixture



The ingredients for the casserole

Ready to go in the oven

Just cooked



Close-up

Served with the apple and pear on the side

 

Fruity Yogurt Brulee Two Ways

The letter for this month's Alphabakes is Y, never an easy one - I've already managed to enter my Yule Log I made after Christmas that I hadn't blogged about until now. I also wanted to make something else, but with wedding planning (four months to go and counting!) I've been far too busy to bake.

So instead I decided to go for an easy dessert involving yogurt. I found a recipe in The Fairtrade Everyday Cookbook for a yogurt fruit brûlée - passion fruit on the bottom topped with Greek yogurt, which you mix with a little pomegranate juice, then top with brown sugar which you caramelise with a cook's blowtorch or under the grill.

I had some pomegranate to use up so didn't want to buy passion fruit as well - I'm terrible at buying fruit and not using it before it goes off. I did have the pomegranate juice as I had just been sent vouchers to buy some POM Wonderful pomegranate juice to review. It's made from 100% pomegranate (made from concentrate) - did you know that pomegranates are a good source of all of these?:

Vitamin C

Vitamin K

Fiber

Potassium

Folate

Copper

I mixed a dash of pomegranate juice with fat free Greek style yogurt and spooned it into a ramekin on top of some pomegranate seeds.

I sprinkled a generous coating of brown sugar on the top but using my blowtorch didn't make the sugar caramelise, just burn in places- as you can see it was literally on fire at one point!

Once I'd stopped and scraped off the burnt bits, and added some more pomegranate seeds on top, it did taste quite good, but I decided I needed to make this again using caster sugar, which I know does caramelise properly with a blowtorch.

This time I cut up a ripe pear and placed pieces of it in the bottom of a ramekin and topped it with some flavoured yogurt - Onken's mango, papaya and passion fruit flavour.



I sprinkled caster sugar on top and caramelised it - properly this time - with my cook's blowtorch. It tasted delicious and would be great as a dessert or even breakfast!

I'm sharing my yogurt brûlée with Alphabakes, the challenge I co-host with Ros of The More Than Occasional Baker, as the letter this month is Y.

Chocolate, Toffee and Pear Mug Cake and Fruit Bow Review

The Dot Com Gift Shop is one of my favourite online retailers as they have such a broad range of gifts and so many of them are themed around cooking, baking and kitchenware - I have a few gifts earmarked to purchase this Christmas!

They recently sent me a fruit bowl to review, that I think would make a great Christmas gift. It comes in two parts but it's very easy to screw on the base - you don't even need a screwdriver. It's a large bowl so would be good for people with families or who eat a lot of fruit - though it's also a good way to encourage people to get their five a day!

I love the design; the white wire work would fit in almost any kitchen décor and it looks both modern and a bit vintage at the same time, if such a thing is possible! It costs £19.95 which I think is a good price for the size and quality.

I filled my fruit bowl as soon as I received it, leaving me to wonder afterwards what to do with all the fruit! I recently came across a lovely little cookery book called Mug Cakes by Mima Sinclair - I knew you could make cakes in a microwave as I remembered a girl called Kate doing it at university as we didn't have an oven in halls - and a while back I made my own chocolate mug cake. It never occurred to me there could be a whole book of recipes dedicated to microwaving cakes in a mug or that so many flavours and ingredients would work!

I love pears and bought a few for my fruit bowl so when I saw a recipe for chocolate, ginger and pear cake in a mug I decided to try it. I changed it though as I left out the ginger and added toffee sauce instead; the original recipes uses both ground and stem ginger but I had all the other ingredients in the house and liked the idea of just throwing the cake together from what I had. I also used milk chocolate instead of plain which I think gave a more fudgy taste. So this is what I did:

You need:
1 tbsp. softened butter
20g milk chocolate, finely chopped
1/2 an egg, lightly beaten
1 tbsp. semi-skimmed milk
2 tbsp. caster sugar
2 tbsp. self-raising flour
pinch of salt
1 ripe pear, peeled
1 tbsp. toffee sauce

You need to make sure your mug is big enough - the recipe book recommends a 350ml mug. The easiest way to check is to fill a measuring jug with water, pour it into the mug and you will see if it holds 350ml!

Place the butter and chocolate in the mug and microwave for 10-20 seconds until melted.

Add the egg and milk and beat together with a fork.

Add the sugar, flour and salt and mix carefully with the fork until smooth.

Slice the base off the pear so it will sit in the mug and press down gently so it is in the middle of the cake mixture.

Microwave for between 1.5 and 2 minutes depending on the power of your microwave (2 mins for 700 watts, 1 min 50 seconds for 800 watt, 1 min 40 for 900 watt etc). Leave to cool before you eat! To serve, spoon a little toffee sauce over the top - I used a jar of ready made toffee sauce I found in Lidl or you could use the squeezy toffee sauce you can buy to go over ice cream, or Carnation caramel, or make your own.

I wasn't expecting  much from a cake made in a mug in a microwave but this was amazing. The cake was just the right consistency and the pear softened beautifully; the flavours worked well together and this is definitely something I would make again.

 

 

I'm sending this to Cook Blog Share, hosted by Lucy at Supergoldenbakes.

Pork Fillet with Saffron Bread Sauce and Pears

This recipe is based pn one from Leith's Easy Dinner Parties. To serve two, you need:

approx 350g pork fillet

1/2 tbsp oil

100ml apple juice

100ml chicken stock

15g butter

1 ripe pear, peeled, cored and quartered

1/2 tsp arrowroot

for the saffron bread sauce:

100ml milk

1/2 onion, cut into large chunks

1 bay leaf

pinch of saffron strands

25g fresh white breadcrumbs

20g butter

Preheat oven to 200C. Heat the oil in a large frying pan and brown the pork fillet on each side.

Place the pork fillet in a roasting tin lined with foil with the apple juice and stock and season. Cook in the oven for about 25-30 minutes until tender.

Meanwhile make the bread sauce. Heat the milk in a small pan with the onion, bay leaf and saffron and simmer gently for five minutes. Remove the onion and bay leaf and add the breadcrumbs to the pan and stir in. Add the butter and season.

 Heat a little butter in a clean frying pan and gently fry the pears. Then when the pork is cooked, remove from the pan and pour the cooking liquid into a small pan and add the arrowroot. Bring to the boil and stir until thickened.

To serve, slice the pork fillet and serve with the pears and bread sauce and pour the sauce over the top.

Two-Tone Superfoods Smoothie

I know, it's green... but it's good for you! And I'm sure even picky children would find this fun to drink with the two-tone colour and the different fruits in each layer.

I was recently sent two cartons of Blue Diamond Almond Breeze almond milk, with the challenge of creating a new breakfast smoothie. Obviously I know that most people are in a hurry in the mornings and want something they can drink on the go, but this can be partly made the night before - and in any case, the challenge asked for an "original and interesting smoothie recipe" - and mine is certainly that!

A year or so ago I'd never drunk any sort of dairy-free alternative to milk, but now thanks to a friend who has turned vegan, there is often a carton of soya milk in my fridge. I hadn't tried almond milk before and I can say I definitely enjoyed it - it has a more subtle taste than some dairy-free alternatives I've tried, and most importantly doesn't turn my cup of tea a funny colour like some seem to!

Almond Breeze is vegan and also low-calorie; the unsweetened variety has 60% fewer calories than even skimmed milk, while it is still a good source of calcium. It also comes in original and chocolate flavour. For more information visit www.almondbreeze.co.uk

I thought of several different smoothie flavour combinations but none of them seemed original enough for this challenge. As I was finding it hard to choose between my ideas, I decided to combine the two and make a two-layer smoothie!

Here are the ingredients I used. You can obviously adapt this and swap out any ingredients you want, but this is the recipe I used (of my own creation):
For the bottom layer:
1 banana
1 kiwi
1 tsp Matcha Green tea powder
1 tbsp agave nectar
1 cup Almond Breeze

For the top layer:
1 large slice melon
1 pear
1 tsp agave nectar
1 tsp hemp
1/2 cup Almond Breeze

First to make the bottom layer, I chopped a banana, kiwi and added a spoonful of Matcha Green Tea Powder. This is finely-milled green tea that can be made into a drink or used to flavour foods. It has all sorts of health benefits including being an anti-oxidant, boosting metabolism and reducing cholesterol. However, it's not to everyone's taste so if you were making this for children I might suggest leaving this ingredient out.

I whizzed it up in my blender with a cup of Almond Breeze and a spoonful of agave nectar - I could have used honey, but since Almond Breeze is suitable for vegans, I wanted to make sure the whole recipe was.

Transfer to a small tub that is suitable for freezing and place in the freezer for at least 4 hours or overnight.

When you are ready to drink the smoothie, prepare the top layer. I cut a large slice of melon

And also chopped up a pear

Continuing on the superfoods theme, I added a spoonful of hemp. You can get this in health food shops; I bought a small box from Holland & Barrett that contained different seeds in small sachets (such as flax) so you can try them all and see what you like. Hemp is a seed that is high in protein, magnesium and iron, and the health benefits are numerous. You can add it onto porridge or museli or stir it into yogurt, or as I did, blend it into your smoothie.

I also added some agave nectar

 

Finally half a cup of Almond Breeze

Whizz it in the blender

If you have frozen the bottom layer of the smoothie overnight, you will need to allow it to come to room temperature so you can crush it up (similar to waiting for ice cream to soften enough to serve). If you have frozen it for a few hours it should be the right consistency - a bit like a slushy, so it's not entirely liquid, but you can still drink it through a straw.

Scoop a few spoonfuls into the bottom of a glass

Now pour the top layer of the smoothie on top; it will sit on top nicely.

I accessorized with a slice of kiwi and a straw. It's actually quite fun to drink one layer at a time or you can mix them both up. I think even though this is green and might put some picky children off, the fun of reaching the bottom layer should hopefully make them drink up!

You can check out the other entries in the Almond Breeze smoothie challenge here.