let's cook: mince pies

Our final cooking challenge of 2017 was mince pies. It was just me and my mum competing in this one, and we decided to make them ready in time for a group taste test on Christmas day. Pictured above is a sample pie from each of our batches. My mum's is on the left, and mine is on the right.

As there were a lot of vegans in the group at Christmas, we both opted for vegan recipes so everyone could taste test both pies. In fact, we both ended up choosing the same recipe - this one from BBC Good Food. Ben and I got the BBC Good Food Vegetarian Christmas magazine and cooked a load of stuff from that over the festive period - it had a great selection of recipes.

My mum did really well and followed the recipe pretty closely, whereas I struggled to find any black cherries in kirsch so supplemented for some extra dried fruit and a dash of Christmas pudding flavoured liqueur - that's the same kind of thing, right? I also substituted the hazelnuts for walnuts.

Oh, and I don't actually have any circular pastry cutters (something I should have asked Santa for!) so I had to use a couple of glasses to try and cut my pastry out in the right size. You can see how much wonkier my pies are than my mums as a result...





I like the star shapes my mum used on her pies - they look much neater than my single holly leaves. For presentation alone, my mum's were definitely the best.

When it came to the judging we served everyone up half a pie each (one each would've been too much after our huge Christmas dinner), and did some taste testing.

Around the room most people seemed to favour my mum's filling (probably because I tampered with mine) whereas my pastry got the biggest thumbs up, as it was a bit flakier. The scores were quite similar too, with a few sevens and eights. In the end we settled on 8/10 each which seemed pretty fair, although I think my mum should probably get a little higher based on the appearance of her pies.





It worked out quite well for me and Ben as we were left with a tin of mince pies to work our way through in the couple of weeks following Christmas. A good snack for the first week back at work.

Our next cooking challenge (the first of 2018) is going to be pretzels. Wish us luck!

let's cook: carrot cake

We managed to do six cooking challenges in 2017, and our fifth was carrot cake.

It's great that we've had more participants this past year and we had three entries again for this one; me, my mum and Audrey (photos above in the same order). Unfortunately I don't have that many photos of this challenge, which is often the way in the autumn and winter, when it's dark outside.


The cakes

Audrey made her cake first, and actually made two different versions, both as birthday cakes for Ben's dad, John. One had cooked and pureed carrots mixed with walnuts and coconuts and the other had raw grated carrots with sultanas and orange zest. She took them along to their Ramblers meeting and said she got some favourable comments! Her only slight disappointment was that the cream cheese frosting went a bit runny out of the fridge.

My mum went next, and used a Mary Berry recipe. She said it was nice and moist, which she thought was probably because the recipe used oil rather than butter in the mixture. She also went for a cream cheese icing, topped with walnuts, which she said was really delicious.

Also, look at this artistic photo she sent through for me to use... bonus points deserved maybe?

I was a bit slow off the mark this time and actually had to have two attempts at my cake. I used the same recipe both times, from this 'Easy Vegan' book my mum shared with me. On my first attempt I think I took it out of the oven a bit too soon, so it was beyond moist and more like a soft sponge pudding than a cake (better with a spoon than fingers). 

Ben actually really liked my first attempt, but I don't think it was quite cakey enough, so I didn't bother icing it and decided to try again. 

My second attempt had a much better consistency and was more cake-like, although still nice and moist. I decorated it with a lemony non-dairy butter frosting and chopped pistachios, which was delicious but very sweet. I'm actually not normally a big fan of carrot cake or the cream cheese frosting and it wouldn't be my cake of choice but I did enjoy this one, although perhaps one slice was enough for me.

The results

The scores awarded were as follows...

• Audrey's carrot cake was scored 8/10 by John - a very good score!
• Ben tried to give my first failed attempt a 10, but I overruled him, and he gave my second attempt a solid 9/10.
• My mum was the star baker this time and was awarded an excellent 10/10 by my brother, who called out the icing as the best bit.

What a successful challenge! I feel like we've had a pretty good run of them this year.

Our final challenge of 2017 was festive themed and we decided to do mince pies this year, with a combined judging held on Christmas Day.

Write up to follow soon....

let's cook: gazpacho and bread rolls

Our summer cooking challenge was gazpacho and bread rolls. My attempt is shown on the left and my mum's is on the right. Audrey also joined in with this challenge, but unfortunately I don't have a photo to share.

I think the trickiest part of this challenge was the bread as the gazpacho is pretty quick to make (as it doesn't involve any cooking of course!). For my rolls I followed this recipe from The Comfort Kitchen for no-knead crusty rolls.

I liked the sound of no-knead, and these rolls were easy to make, bearing in mind that you need a few hours in between mixing and baking for the mixture to prove. I made the mixture one day and left it overnight to prove.

When I came to bake them I did find the mixture a bit sticky and think I might have knocked a lot of the air out of the dough when transferring them to the baking tray as they didn't rise as much as I'd hoped. The flavour was delicious though and fresh from the oven they were nice and crusty.





I think I'll try making these rolls again one day as they are so easy that the mixture can be cobbled together one night, and then baked the next evening after work. Hopefully they'll rise a bit better next time too.

For my gazpacho I followed a recipe from an allotment gardening cookbook we have. As expected it was super quick to make. We picked the perfect time of year for this challenge as it was just around the time that our allotment greenhouse tomatoes were fruiting and I was able to harvest enough homegrown tomatoes for the recipe. What a treat!





As I made quite a big batch of the gazpacho I tried out a couple of different consistencies when serving.

For the first portion I used our food processor to blend the mixture so it was a slightly chunky consistency. Ben really liked this texture, but I wasn't convinced (particularly by the appearance).





When we had the gazpacho the next day I used the blender to make a smoother consistency and I think this looked a bit more like traditional gazpacho. It tasted good too!





My mum unfortunately didn't enjoy her gazpacho and thinks it's an acquired taste. She said she's never had 'cold soup' before.

Luckily she wasn't judging, and my brother and dad were. Her gazpacho looks good to me, and the poppy seed rolls look delicious, although I've heard reports that they were a little on the hard side (super crusty!?)





Audrey also made her gazpacho with homegrown tomatoes (bonus points?) and John made a loaf of rustic Spanish bread to accompany it. They were really successful with both, and have since made it again for a dinner party.

It's great that these cooking challenges can lead us to discover new things that we want to make over and over again! My mum might not agree on the gazpacho front, mind.


The scores

Ben was very happy with the gazpacho and the rolls and tried to give me 9/10 for this challenge, but I don't agree as the consistency of my bread rolls wasn't right. They tasted delicious, but were a bit flat, so I docked myself a mark and am going to settle with 8/10.

The review from my dad on my mum's gazpacho was that is was as good as he's had when eating out before, and the flavour and texture deserved 9+. Great score!

However, although the rolls looked good, both him and my brother said that they were a bit too tough to eat, and were probably around a 6/10, so overall they gave my mum 7.5/10. 

Audrey and John both enjoyed their gazpacho and bread and collectively gave themselves a 10/10 - a very successful result!

We all did pretty well this time round.


Next up

My mum has demanded we make something sweet next time as we've done a couple of savoury things in a row now, so we're going for carrot cake.

I've never made a carrot cake before and am on the hunt for a good vegan recipe.

let's ALL cook: hot cross buns

You'll have to forgive me for being so behind with documenting our cooking challenges. We've actually completed two more this year since the quiche, so expect another post to follow shortly.

This time, the challenge was hot cross buns! Seasonal at the time - not so much now. This was another group effort resulting in four different batches of buns:




Clockwise from top left: Ben's mini vegan hot cross buns // My mum's traditional hot cross buns // Audrey's chocolate orange hot cross buns // My vegan hot cross buns


Don't they all look great? All recognisably hot cross buns - good batch baking!

Ben and I actually used the same recipe from Vegan Life magazine for our buns. It was really easy to follow.

Unfortunately Ben had a bit of an issue as his buns didn't really rise and ended up quite small and dense - he thinks he might have heated the milk through too much and killed the yeast. I had a little more luck though as my buns doubled in size whilst proving.





I really liked making the crosses. Having never made hot cross buns before I assumed that the crosses were always piped onto the buns (like shop bought ones) but our recipe called for thin pastry crosses instead. I like how thin Ben made his! They look really cute.

My mum and Audrey both went for the piped method instead. My mum found it a bit messy I think - she reckons she made the dough too thick, so it was hard to pipe.

In the end I was really happy with my buns, they came out of the oven looking lovely and brown and the flavour of the recipe was spot on. I would definitely make them again instead of buying them - a lovely toasted snack for the spring months.





The scores

Ben made his buns first and although the flavour was delicious, the fact that they didn't rise meant that they had a very doughy and dense texture. I tried to give him a 5 but he argued me down to 4/10.

As my buns followed the same recipe, but I had the advantage of not killing my yeast, I got a very high score of 9.5/10 from Ben. The half mark was docked because some the crosses were a bit hard and some bits fell off when cutting. I think piped crosses might be a less fragile approach.

Audrey's hot cross buns looked brilliant (just like the photo in the recipe!) and the chocolate/orange combo sounded like a winner, but unfortunately they didn't pass the taste test, scoring a 4/10 on taste and texture. She's instead going to opt for a traditional recipe next year as the chocolate and orange was a disappointment.

My mum was awarded a 9/10. The taste and texture of hers were highly praised, but I think one mark may have been knocked off because of the slightly hard and messy crosses. I'm tempted to give her back a mark for her improved food photography though.





So, overall a mixed result this time, but it was nice to do another seasonal challenge.

Next up, we're making a Mexican feast, which must include some homemade tortillas and a minimum of two side dishes (salsa, guacamole, etc).

We've already finished this challenge so I'll share the results soon!

let's ALL cook: quiche

The cooking challenge is off to a good start this year, with a record number of entries to our quiche cook-off. Thanks to the enthusiasm drummed-up in the Chrismas stollen challenge.

Here are the quiches:



Clockwise from top left: Derek's red pepper, leek & broccoli vegan quiche // Audrey's roasted tomato & parmesan quiche // My mum's cheddar, bacon, tomato & chive quiche // My roasted tomato, spinach & pine nut vegan quiche.

They all look pretty good - no baking disasters this time! It's impressive to have two vegan entries too - especially as quiche is so traditionally egg-based.

Derek made his filling using tofu and tahini, whereas I found a recipe which called for a filling mixture of soy cream, chickpea flour and ground cashews.

Here's the recipe I followed. I added basil and pine nuts to the ingredients too as they're my favourites.





The pastry was really easy to make, and simply substituted butter for olive spread to make it vegan. I decided to blind bake it first to make sure it was extra crispy and didn't go soggy once the filling was added.

The recipe actually made enough pastry and mixture to fill my quiche tin, with some left over for an extra mini quiche. Lucky us.






I was super pleased with how they both came out. The pastry was crisp, and the filling was firm. I really like the way the roasted tomatoes look too - it's quite a pretty quiche.

And luckily I made enough so that Ben and I could enjoy it cold for lunches throughout the week too.





The scores

Derek's was the first entry to come in. He had to self-judge his one, and he gave it a 7/10, docking himself points for adding too much filling (he said he was greedy).

I made mine next - it was a bit of a challenge as Ben normally doesn't like quiche that much due to the egg giving him tummy ache (hence the vegan approach). It paid off though as he said it was one of the best quiches he has ever had, and he didn't get a tummy ache either. He scored me 10/10 - success!

Audrey (Ben's mum) made hers next, and scored a very respectable 8/10 for her quiche. John (Ben's dad) later said that he would have given her an extra point if there had been bacon included too, which sounds very similar to my dad's approach to judging.

My mum made hers last, with my dad as the judge (luckily there was bacon!). He said he couldn't fault it and gave it full marks with 10/10. Well done mother!





This felt like quite a competitive one as there were so many of us taking part, so it's great that we all did so well.

I really enjoyed the quiche I made (especially when it was cold) and it was great for lunches at work, so I definitely think I'll make it again sometime soon. Good picnic food too!





Our next challenge is hot cross buns, and is scheduled to be completed by Easter.

I'm looking forward to this one as I love hot cross buns. Although at the moment I have no idea about how to do the cross. I'd better do some research...

let's cook: stollen

We decided to schedule in a festive cooking challenge this Christmas, partly because my mum was stalling with her sushi, and partly because it would be an opportunity for a side by side taste test as we would all be together in the same place.

The one shown on the left above was my stollen, and my mum's is on the right. My mum's definitely looks the most stollen-like.

The recipe I chose was this one, which was described as 'Nigel Slater's version of the perfect Christmas stollen'. I'm not sure where I went wrong, but I would say mine turned out far from perfect.

We hosted Christmas at our house this year, so Ben and I took to the kitchen on Christmas eve for a bit of a cooking session. A good day to bake a traditional German fruit bread too!





The ingredients list for the filling of Nigel Slater's stollen was definitely a winner: cardamoms, cherries, mixed peel, sultanas, ground cinnamon, flaked almonds and marzipan. It smelt delicious when it was all mixed together in a bowl.

Well, apart from the cardamoms, as I accidentally left them in the pestle and mortar and we only discovered them on boxing day - oops! I must have got distracted by the gravy/nut loaf/mushroom stuffing.

However, I think it was the construction where things started to go wrong for me. The filling was rolled up in the centre of the dough, rather than being mixed in, which meant it ended up as sort of filled tube of plain bread, rather than a lovely moist fruit loaf.






My mum seemed to get on better with her recipe. She followed a Delia Smith one she found in a newspaper (it might be this one). Hers had a long stick of marzipan running through the centre of the mixed-fruit dough, possibly more in line with the traditional Stollen.

It looks good!






So, to the judging...

We did the taste testing after a boxing day stroll and were lucky enough to have five judges presiding over this one. 

I think both of ours fell down for being a bit dense and not as moist as they should be. Although they were both a few days old when we did the testing - especially my mum's, who made hers a couple of days before Christmas.

I would be the first to admit mine wasn't a winning bake and was very pleased to receive a collective mark of 6/10 for my loaf. I think it might have been a bit generous actually.

My mum did much better and got a score of 8/10 for her stollen - success! It definitely did look the nicest.

For the next challenge, we've decided on making a quiche.

And we had a couple of new sign-ups to the challenge on boxing day so this one might be more of a group bake-off. Things are going to get competitive!

let's cook: swiss rolls

I was tempted to change the title of this post to 'let's fail to cook: swiss rolls' as I'm afraid this challenge wasn't our finest hour. We actually completed this bake-off way back in April, but I've been holding off posting about it as it was such a disappointment.

Here goes though...promise not to laugh too much.



All I can say is that swiss rolls are harder than they look.

My effort is shown on the left (no amount of icing sugar can cover up that sorry mess), and my mum's is on the right.

I actually had two attempts here and this is the best of the two, which is really saying something. With my first effort I attempted a cake with no refined sugar but boy was that a mistake. The recipe used stevia as a substitute which I found out after baking has an aftertaste that will make you need to scrub your tongue (I actually had to do this).

Ignoring the taste, my first sponge came out pretty nice and fluffy. It cracked a bit while rolling but wasn't a complete disaster. But of course I had to start again, because of the stevia. I used a more traditional cake recipe for my second attempt, but think I rushed the whisking part and didn't get enough air in the mixture as my cake came out of the oven very flat and rubbery (with a distinct eggy aroma). Awful!

I also failed with my filling as I was aiming for something tropical, yoghurty and light, which instead ended up sloppy, oozy and gross. Oh well! You can't succeed at everything.



My mum's sponge actually looked ok, although she also reported a slightly eggy taste when freshly baked. I think her troubles were caused by baking for slightly too long, leading to this interesting geometric swiss roll.

You can't go wrong with a traditional jam filling though - sometimes it pays to play it safe!

We actually had an extra entry into the challenge this time. My brother Tim decided to take part too, and just look what he came up with:



A rather perfect looking swiss roll, which rather steals the show.

It totally looks the part, although both him and my mum confirmed that it was a bit dense and eggy too. Why are swiss rolls so hard?

And to the results...

Ben was very sweet and tried to give me a score of 2/10 but I've overruled that and awarded myself 0 marks as we had to throw the whole thing in the bin.

If I remember correctly my mum was awarded a 3/10 for her effort, and of course Tim came in first, although still with a fairly low score of 5/10.

I think we'll all have to give them another go one day, once the disappointment has worn off.

Next time we'll be making sushi. I'm looking forward to this one!
We can't do much worse...

I'm back, seedjack.

I've been going through a bit of a creative dry spell lately, with very little time spent making, drawing or crafting outside of work. I'm not sure why, but I think I need to rediscover some creative energy.

The only area where I am finding motivation, and enjoying making things, is in the kitchen. I've been setting time aside most weekends to do a spot of baking and Ben and I have been trying new recipes non-stop during the week. It's been a good time for our tummies!

I thought I'd share a little recipe for something I made at the weekend, as it was a successful baking experiment, inspired by a tasty seedy snack one of my work pals shared with me last week.





Savoury seedjacks 
(Makes approximately 12)


Ingredients
150g rolled oats

50g mixed seeds (plus extra for sprinkling)

100g grated cheddar cheese

50g mozzarella cheese

1tbsp melted butter

3 eggs

Small bunch of fresh chives (or other herbs)

Salt & pepper

Method

Preheat the oven to 190ºC and line a 20 x 20cm baking tin with parchment.

Mix the oats, seeds, cheddar, mozzarella, butter, eggs and herbs in a bowl and season with salt and pepper.

Put the mix in your lined tin and ensure it is evenly distributed right to the corners. At this stage I sprinkled the top of my mixture with a small handful of linseeds. 

Put in the oven and bake for 25-30 mins, until golden brown on top.

Transfer to a rack to cool, and then slice into flapjack pieces.

So easy! Now enjoy...

They're perfect for a mid-morning work snack. Lovely and cheesy. I think I'm going to make another batch this weekend, with extra seeds.

Let me know if you try this recipe out as I'd love to hear how you get on!

A week in new recipes

I've started to think much more about the food we eat at home recently and am trying to make a conscious effort to be more healthy and sustainable in our food choices.

On the whole we are already a pretty healthy household - our diet is mostly vegetarian (with the occasional foray into seafood) and we prepare nearly all our meals from scratch - apart from the occasional shop bought pizza! However, I'm a sucker for sweet snacks and want to try and wean myself away from the refined sugar and onto more healthy snacks.

I'm also keen to cut down on both gluten and dairy, both because I think it will probably improve my day-to-day health, and for environmental reasons. I've watched a couple of documentaries about the food industry recently, including Cowspiracy, and it's hard not to want to make a change after listening to some of the facts about how the food we eat impacts the environment.

I've also recently been inspired by Rachel's 365 Recipes project. She cooks delicious and healthy plant-based food and her feed is a feast for the eyes. While I can't commit to trying a new recipe every day like Rachel does, I would love to boost the number of new recipes I try and experiment with using less processed ingredients in our meals.

So...I'm going to try and post a bit more regularly about our food choices and some of the recipes we try in an aim to capture the recipes for future reference, and encourage myself to keep cooking new things and move gradually to a better way of eating.

Here are some of the things we've been eating in the past week or two...

Clockwise from top left: Parmesan, parsley & paprika biscuits // Pea pancakes // Chocolate shortbread // Banana & blueberry bread

Parmesan, Parsley & Paprika biscuits
These were based on the Parmesan biscuits recipe from this book. Although not the healthiest of snacks we needed a savoury snack to counteract the leftover Easter chocolate. I added parsley to the cookie dough, but if making again I'd probably increase the quantities of parsley & paprika for more of a flavour boost.



Pea pancakes with roasted tomatoes, houmous & homemade ketchup
This recipe was very pleasing for me. The pancakes were from a recipe in this allotment cookbook and while we first had these a couple of weeks ago with roasted asparagus & feta there was enough mixture left over to freeze and use another day. Today was that day, and I enjoyed a delicious late brunch in the spring sunshine - the pancakes are delicious, and a great colour too!

Ben made the ketchup from a recipe found in this Hemsley & Hemsley book (a recommendation from Rachel) and it complimented the pancakes really well, especially when topped with lots of roasted seeds.

Chocolate shortbread
Ok, I know I said I was trying to be healthy and eat less sweet snacks, but this shortbread recipe is pretty low on sugar (let's not mention the butter) and I was making them to share with friends. Another one from the Cookie Magic book - it has a great variety of sweet & savoury biscuits!

Hemsley & Hemsley banana bread (with added blueberries)
Another one from The Art of Eating Well - this gluten free loaf uses natural sweeteners (maple syrup) and will make a perfect early morning snack for us to take to work for the next few days. The temptation to reach for shop-bought cereal bars in the morning needs to be curbed.

I really like the texture and taste of this bread, and will definitely be making it again!


Other recipes cooked but lacking photos include:

• Hemsley & Hemsley Asparagus & Pea Quinoa risotto with mint & parsley oil (turned into Quinoa risotto balls the following day)
• Hemsley & Hemsley Feta & Black bean burgers (cooked by Ben and served with Courgette Fries & Homemade tomato ketchup)
• River Cottage quinoa salad with courgettes & onions

I hope to share more soon. I'm enjoying spending my evenings browsing recipe books at the moment. Tonight, we eat macaroni peas!

let's cook: bakewell tarts

Our second cooking challenge of the year is complete! Bakewell tarts was the test this time, and it was like a proper bake-off (in that both of our recipes came from the Great British Bake Off).

I went down the Mr.Kipling route with an iced bakewell tart, and my mum went a bit more rustic, with a scattered almond and icing topping.

I was pretty impressed with how mine turned out actually - I thought it might be a challenge too far to get the pastry, frangipane AND icing to turn out right, but I think I did ok - and I enjoyed making it a lot.



The recipe I used was by GBBO contestent Luis Troyano, and I'm pleased to say my tart looks pretty similar to the photo used on the recipe - a visual success!

I enjoyed working with the sweet shortcrust pastry - I managed to roll it out nice and thin, and ended up with a pretty neat looking tart case after the blind bake.

And I haven't made a frangipane filling before so I wasn't really sure what to expect. When I first added it to the tart case it looked like I hadn't made quite enough (and I actually made a little more than the recipe required) but after baking it had risen quite a bit and I wasn't left with a sunken looking tart like I'd been worrying about.

Here's what it looked like post baking - not too shabby!



I thought the icing might be my downfall so I really concentrated on getting a neat and smooth layer, without getting any crumbs mixed in, which has been an issue in the past. I ended up with a pretty even coverage - right to the edges too!



And the stripes were super easy. I'm pleased it didn't matter that I had slightly wobbly hands at the time.



Pretty!

My mum found her recipe in one of the Bake Off books. She said she struggled a bit with the pastry and she had to do a couple of patch up jobs prior to baking. It looks like she had more than enough frangipane though, as it ended up taller than the pastry.

I quite like her approach to a topping - a scatter of almonds with just a drizzle of icing. A good option for the less sweet-toothed among us as the fully iced tarts are definitely super sweet.



So, how did they taste? 

Overall I found my tart pretty tasty, although admit it was a bit of a sugar overload. I worried at first that I'd spread the jam too thinly on the base, but think it was the right amount in the end - the filling was nice and moist, in contrast to the crisp pastry.

My mum has reported that hers was very tasty too, although she thinks she used too much jam on the base, and she said her pastry was a little uneven. It looks good though!



And the scores...

I made my tart the same weekend as my mum and dad came to visit so for the first time in a while we had the same judge to make a direct comparison.

Both my parents and Ben gave my bakewell tart a 9/10, with my mum and dad deducting a point because of the sweetness, and Ben deducting a point for the lack of cherry on each slice (!) I gave him another slice with a cherry on the following day so he was happy in the end.

My dad, it turns out, is quite a fan of bakewell tarts and was generous with his voting across the board, giving my mum a 9/10 too. However, my mum insisted I reduce this to an 8 as she wasn't pleased with the technical side of her bake.

Personally, I think she should take the high marks while she can, as she never knows what my dad is going to refuse to eat.



On the whole, I think we both did really good this time round.

Next time we'll be making filled pasta - I'm thinking ravioli.
I hope it doesn't matter that we don't have pasta machines...

let's cook: stuffed bread

Our cooking challenge is off to a strong start this year - with both of us making our stuffed breads in the first week of January. Last year we had four different cook-offs: dips, tart tatin, gnocchi and jam & scones. Let's see if we can better that this year!

I think this one was a good challenge - neither of us have done much bread-making before so it was a bit of a skill test - but also a creative one in terms of deciding on a filling and shaping the bread.

I made a couple of Mediterranean style pesto and sundried tomato mini plaited loaves, and my mum went made a giant plaited bread ring with a Moroccan filling: olives, goats cheese and a spicy onion mixture. Sounds tasty to me.



I used this great recipe from Mediterranealicious as a basis for my bread but made my own pesto for the filling and added some sundried tomatoes. The pesto was super quick. Here's the recipe if you want to try it out.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Super speedy basil pesto

Ingredients

2 packed cups of fresh basil leaves
½ cup extra virgin olive oil
½ cup grated parmesan
¼ cup pine nuts
2 crushed garlic cloves

Instructions

Put all the ingredients in a food processor and mix.

Season with salt and pepper to taste.



The recipe above makes enough pesto for the bread, with some left over to use another day (we had it with linguine the following day and it was delicious!)

When it came to making the bread I ran into a bit of difficulty as the dried yeast I had in the cupboard had expired I think - I tried twice and it just would not activate, and my first two batches of dough refused to rise.

I went out and bought some instant yeast sachets though and that did the trick. I left the dough for an hour in a warm place and it rose enough that I was sure the yeast was doing it's job. From the sound of it, my mum's yeast was super active as she said her dough kept growing and growing!

Once the dough and the pesto were ready I rolled out the bread mixture into an A3 sized piece, covered with the pesto and some chopped sundried tomatoes, then rolled it lengthways to create a long tube. I strayed from the recipe instructions here and chopped my rolled up dough in half to make two smaller loaves.

The fun bit was cutting the rolled dough in half lengthways to reveal the filling, then twisting the two halves around each other to make the plait.



I thought it might untwist itself as it baked in the oven, but luckily it came out looking the same shape as when it went in. I really like the outcome here - the shape is really nice and the fact that there is so much filling on display makes it look pretty tempting.




My mum said she got on quite well with her recipe too - which was from a Bake Off book. I think she was a bit suprised by how big it turned out, but it looks like a successful bit of baking, and the flavours sound great!

So....to the scores:

We both ended up eating the bread warm from the oven with some baked Camembert (great minds!) Judging by the picture my mum and brother enjoyed theirs over a game of Scrabble.



It's lucky my mum had my brother there as a judge as my dad had two bites and decided he didn't like the flavours (typical!) My mum scored a generous 9/10 from Tim though, with the score being bumped up to 10 because it was served with cheese.

Ben also gave me a very generous mark of 10. I'm wondering now if this is possibly partially due to the cheese too? Either way it was a great result all round - full marks for us both!

Maybe one of the most successful cooking challenges to date?



Next time we'll be making Bakewell tarts.
I think I might do an iced one. Yummy.