Irish Soda Bread

So this is it.  I love soda bread and would happily eat a soda cake to myself with just butter.  Add a bit of homemade jam and my tastebuds are in ecstasy.

 I found it hard to get the recipe right but turns out I had just been over-complicating it.  The basic recipe comes from one of my co-workers Rob's Dad who makes bread every evening for 3 generations of the family.  

This will freeze well so you can make this in advance and defrost overnight. I double the recipe but make three loaves at a time because I add my own seed mix to it (see variations).

250g Stoneground Wholewheat Flour
250g Plain Flour
1 tsp Salt
1 tsp Baking Soda
500ml Buttermilk

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 190C (reduce to 175C when the bread goes in)
2. Stir together the dry ingredients and make a well in the middle pour in the buttermilk.  Mix until combined well but dont overmix.
3. Grease and Flour a loaf tin and empty the dough into it.  Cut a slit with a sharp knife down the length of it to let out the steam.
4. Bake for approx 1 hour.  If you're not sure test the bread to see if its done.
5. Take out the bread and wrap in a clean tea towel (this will prevent the crust from getting too hard)

Variations

I like nutty tasting bread so I mix together linseed pumpkin seed sunflower seed sesame seed and a fistful of oatmeal which makes it very rich in fibre

A love song to the Chelsea Bun

So, for most things baking related I'm pretty much up for anything.  There are a few things that still give me the heeby-jeebyz and working with yeast is one of them.  This is a little ironic that in my youth I worked in a pizzeria making bin loads of dough from fresh yeast - happy as a clam sitting on a mixer while stretching and kneading dough until they fired my ass and, well, that's another story for another day!

This recipe is loosely based on the one that comes in the Kenwood cookbook; it's the wunderkind of a cinnamon bun and a Chelsea bun. It's simple to make, but takes time, it is worth it though.  I have included suggestions for making the drawn out process as lazy as possible.

There are variations where you use fruit soaked in tea or whiskey overnight and I'll update this after I make my Christmas cakes when I will be soaking the fruit in Jameson anyway. 

Equipment notes;

You will need to use your 8" tin (which I usually use for my Christmas cake) for putting the rolls in. I use a silicone brush for brushing the dough and the glaze.

Be warned this recipe makes twelve and they are that good warm that you may attempt to eat them all so make sure you have enough mouths.

Dry ingredients

500g Strong White Flour

1 tsp Salt

2 sachets of dried fast action yeast

75g sugar

50g butter

Wet ingredients

225g lukewarm milk*

1 egg

Filling

Light muscovado sugar

A fistful of sultanas or two

Mixed spice

Cinnamon

30g Butter melted

Glaze:

40g Sugar

4tbsp water

1. Dry ingredients into a stand mixer with a dough hook. Turn it onto it's lowest setting and let the butter mix in properly. 
2. Mix the wet ingredients together and pour into the dry ingredients and leave the machine to knead for 5 mins.
3. Take the dough off the hook and leave it in the bowl covered with clingfilm (saran wrap) that has been oiled on the inside. Put it in a warm place for an hour or until it has doubled in size. (Note: how I do this is put the bowl near a radiator turn on the heating and watch a couple of half hour shows on netflix when they're over move to step four.
4. Peel off the cling film carefully you'll be using it again shortly.  Knock the air out of the dough by putting the bowl back into the stand mixer with the dough hook and turning it on for 1 min.
5. Grease your 8" tin
6. Roll out the dough till its about a foot square.  Brush it generously with melted butter sprinkle a good fistful of muscovado sugar in an even layer and the sprinkle the spices on top about a level tsp of each for me works for me and then finally the dried fruit evenly over the dough.
7. Roll it up like a big old swiss roll.  Cut it in half, then cut those halves in half to make four even pieces which are finally each divided in three.  Place the rolls cut side up in the prepared tin and cover with the cling film again.  Place them in the warm place again for 30-40mins. (Note: This time you make yourself a cup of tea or coffee and turn on the oven to 200c before you sit down to watch another episode of something and when it's over pop the buns in the oven).
8. Bake for 20-25 mins.  Take them out of the oven but leave them in the tin. 
9. To make the glaze: put sugar and water in the pot and dissolve over a medium. Dont bother with a spoon just swirl it to mix. Once the sugar has been dissolved let the glaze boil for a minute or two until it becomes syrupy. Brush it on the buns and allow to cool.

*How to know if your milk is lukewarm (the right temperature)

Pop the milk in the microwave for 20 seconds, stick a washed finger knuckle in and ask yourself this does it feel nice and warm but you wouldn't describe it as warm enough to be hot. If you still feel I'm being a little wishy washy try this pour equal quantities of boiling water and tap water together and stick your finger in the cup. That's how it should feel but you needn't be too exacting.

Sweet Potato Muffins

 I had a load of sweet potatoes in the fridge peeled, chopped and bobbing in a bowl of water, leftovers from a red onion parmentier thingy and I figured I would use them up. 

These are more breakfast type muffins, healthier than those that you get at service stations etc and super moist.   I am on a bit of a breakfast muffin kick at the moment and I stockpile them in the freezer and have them in work for breakfast.  At the moment I have these, banana muffins, and apple muffins which taste lovely but there are a few tweaks needed in the recipe before I post it.

The measurements are in cups and I've left them that way because it's a very straightforward recipe using cups.  The recipe I originially used didn't include either nuts or sultanas but I like bits in my muffins.  I found these a little bitter to be honest and I would be inclined to up the soft brown sugar to a cupful of packed soft brown sugar.  The other thing I did was to perforate them and pour over a little maple syrup while they were still warm so that they would soak it up.  The original recipe also said that it was for 12 muffins which I filled but then I also filled 10 bun cases too because I ran out of muffin tins.

Two things I mentioned before with regards to muffins but they are quite useful so I'll say 'em again.
First up: in order to measure out even quantities use an ice-cream scoop it's one of those things that's so easy but makes life so much easier when you're making muffins.  Secondly preheat the oven as hot as you can get it and when you put your muffins in reduce down to 170-180c; it will give you well risen muffins.

The dry ingredients:
2 cups of Self Raising Flour
1/2tsp ground cinnamon (or more if you like)
1/2tsp ground nutmeg
1 cup of soft brown sugar
a handful of pecans and sultanas
The wet ingredients
1 cup milk
2 eggs
1 cup vegtable oil
1 tsp Vanilla
1 cup sweet potato cooked and mashed.

1. Preheat the oven as per instructions above and slip the muffins cases into their tins.
2. In the first bowl whisk together the dry ingredients and make a little hole in the middle.
3. Mix the wet ingredients together (you can probably use the whisk again for this just make sure the ingredients are well mixed)
4. Pour the wet ingredient into the dry and mix well.
5. Scoop into the cases, pop into the oven and reduce the temp.  15-20mins later they should spring back to the touch and if you stick a skewer in them they should be done.

Low fat Mini Banana Pancakes

This recipe is from Gina's Skinny Recipes.  I've translated some of the terms into but these are really nice little pancakes that aren't bad for you. I believe the original plan was banana fritter but I they're too close to pancakes to call them anything else.  If you haven't got spray oil put some sunflower, rape seed or other vegetable oil without a strong flavour into a saucer take some wadded up kitchen roll and oil the frying pan between each batch of but be very careful of your fingers.  If you want the full fat version put some oil in the pan and add butter, allow to melt and heat up before making these delightful mini pancakes.  If you just use butter it tends to burn.  They're quite lovely as they are but even better with butter and maple syrup at which point forget what I said about Low fat.


Low Fat Banana Fritters 
Gina's Weight Watcher Recipes
Servings: 6 • Size: 4 pancakes 1 tbsp each • Old Points: 2.5 pts • Points+: 3 pts
Calories: 124.8 • Fat: 3.0 g • Protein: 3.2 g • Carb: 22.7 g • Fiber: 1.5 g
 
3 medium very ripe bananas
2 tbsp sugar
2 large eggs, beaten
3 tbsp flour
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
spray oil
1/2 tsp cinnamon plus more to sprinkle on top
1 tsp Icing sugar


Method

1. Mix Cinnamon and flour together.
2. Mash the bananas.  Add the Sugar, Eggs, Vanilla and Flour (in that order mixing after each ingredient).
3. If you're using the spray oil, spray a layer of oil over the frying pan and heat to a gentle heat.  If you're using the oil and kitchen roll technique preheat the pan then oil it.
4. Using a tablespoon make little pancakes and fry on each side for a minute or two

Waffles

These freeze really well and can be reheated by popping them in the toaster.

Dry ingredients
200g Plain Flour
50g Caster Sugar
1 tsp salt

Wet ingredients
300ml Milk
2 Eggs
100g Butter melted
Makes 8 waffles

1. Make a well in the middle of the dry ingredients.
2. Loosely mix wet ingredients together and pour into the well. Mix well
3. Preheat waffle iron. When its hot enough ladle the mixture onto the waffle iron. Cook until the steam subsides

Cinnamon Waffles with fried Bramley Apples and toasted flaked almonds.
You can add 2 tsp of cinnamon to the mix and serve the waffles. Apples peeled cored and cut into wedges, fried in butter with some maple sugar. Toast the almonds in a dry pan and serve on top.