Banana scotch pancakes!

This simple recipe can make a filling and fun to make breakfast!
Scotch pancakes (also known as drop scones) are North American and the raising agent is baking powder.

These pancakes have such a wide variety of toppings to choose from! But the classic is lemon and sugar, or for scotch pancakes banana and honey!
Some other ideas for toppings for toppings are:

• Fruit and cream
• Blueberries (jam or compote) 
• Ice cream
• Chocolate sauce
• Caramelized bacon

Ingredients for Scotch Pancakes 

1. 200g of plain flour
2. 1 level tsp of Bicarbonate of soda
3. 2 level tsp of cream of tartar
4. 50 grams of castor sugar
5. 1 egg
6. 250 ml milk
7. 50 block butter or margarine

Method

1. Put flour, bicarbonate of soda and cream of tar tar into a measuring jug
2. Add in sugar, egg and milk
3. Using a stick blender, blend the mixture until smooth. Make sure all the mixture has been mixed in
4. Warm up a frying pan and wipe with the butter or margarine
5. When the fat begins to smoke, drop a spoonful (or more if you would prefer) onto the pan
6. When the top begins to show bubbles flip and the under side should be a nice golden brown
7. Put onto a plate and add your chosen topping!

Winter soup

For this tasty soup you will need:

6 floury potatoes

1 turnip

6 carrots

1 large onion

chicken stock cube

3 cups of water

salt and pepper to taste

herbs to flavour

2 tbsp of extra virgin olive oil

 

 

 

Handy Cheese biscuits

These 'handy' biscuits are very simple and  desirable for the cheese lover! They recipe is also very simple: 120g plain flour, 120g cheese (grated) and 120g of butter. Mix all the ingrediants together and roll into a ball and roll out and cut into shapes. Bake for 10 - 20 minutes. You can add some more cheese on top if you want and even cheesier bake!

 

Seville

Recently in the half term break I went to Seville. Our hotel was very near the bull fighting ring. I couldn't stand going and watching it - the building was very grand to look at and the horses were also magnificent with thier riders. In most restaurants I went to thier were bulls heads from previous fights. The heads are treated as almost trophies from when the Matador kills the bull.

 

In Seville they are more excited about Tapas than Paella. I mostly enjoyed the anchovies on toast (tostadas anchovie) and the garlic prawns (gambas al ajillo). The really good Tapas places are on the outskirts of town. The family run ones produce wonderful home cooking at reasonable prices. In one bar I went to it had a big, long breakfast bar where you ordered you food and they called your name and you went up to collect it. You could see the kitchen in the back and it was about a metre square - yet producing such wonderful food!

 

Trying different cuisines

 

Eating different types of cuisines can improve your tastes and ideas for cooking! Even just going to your local Chinese takeaway can help you to taste other ideas of cooking.

Or if your taste buds are really tingling you can go to the true cuisine then you could go to the country, Italy for pasta and pizza, Spain for Paella, India for the smells of pungent currey or England from fish and chips and a good old roast dinner!

 

I wanted to try an Asian fusion dish so I took myself off to Wagamamas and tasted a mini ramen. A simple salty broth with sweet corn, bbq chicken, noodles, carott and wild water cress. It's a really simple meal you could make yourself or to just have it in the restaurant!

The dish as it came to me.

France - Le Crotoy

My summer travels took me to France this year. We stayed in Le Crotoy which is in the region of Picarde. The Somme was not far from our house, just a bike ride away! You had to catch the tide at the right moment as it comes in and out very fast! We classicaly ate moules and frittes in a restaurant that over looked the wide stretch of river. You had to mind your toes as there are crabs in the water. We bought a shrimp net and went shrimping hoping to find some for our dinner (they are lovely boiled with a knob of butter) some generous fisherman kepy giving us buckets full of shrimps as they saw we were struggling to catch our own! A few crabs found thier way into the bucket but we put them back as they are not for eating!

Lots of beautiful yet abandoned house are along the streets of Le Crotoy - they make wonderful photgraphs!

From this photo you can see how far the water can go out as it is barely visible from where the photo was took! Some days the beach is full of families building sandcastles and having fun in the water and others it is just empty, despite the weather being magical!

The restaurant which served such wonderful food and drink, a perfect combination with that lovely view!

We travelled accross the island to the other side called Saint Valerie. Charming roof tops and houses light up during the wonderful sun set! You are very lucky to catch it when the sun set is out!

                    

Friendly Bake Off

 

Recently a friend and I were inspired by the british bake off and decided to have a small go at the invention test. We were given 4 oz flour, 4 oz sugar, 4oz butter and 1 egg. This is what one of our bakes looked like! In the center there is home made red current jam!

 

Cheerily Cheesey Scones

 

 

 

This after noon the weather wasn't so pleasant so I thought I would create a scrumptious blog post for you to enjoy!

These simple cheese scones are a great bake as they need so few ingredients! When cool (or if you enjoy them warm) they go down very well with a cup of tea or coffee as an afternoon snack, and are also great as cheesey rolls for sandwiches. This recipe was from the BBC food section. Their recipes are simple and fun to do with friends! Here is the link for the web page: http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/ 

Try to make these and send me a photo to tell me how your's went!

 

 

 

Indian Wedding

I recently attended an Indian wedding in North Yorkshire. The colours and smells made  feel as though I was actually in India. I felt so simple and plain in my blue patterned dress when everyone else was in beautiful saris. I enjoyed tasting the indian menu to. The menu was extremely grand and I was stuck for choice. In the end I didn't need to make a decision as all the food came per course! It was so filling just to look at it.

The Bride looked wonderful in her hot pink sari encrusted with gold. It was so different to the normal white cake -like dresses we are used to!

Enjoy some of these photos from my experience!