This week I made Pain au Chocolat!

Bake off season has began!!  (Begunn??)

So.  Every wednesday I go to see my brother Stuart, my sister-in-law, Carrie, and my wee 2 year-old nephew, Finlay.  Last year we would have tea then watch GBBO with a cup of tea, and it was lovely.

This year we've cranked it up a notch.

This year I've challenged myself (for I've, read Carrie's) to make the same thing they make on the programme each week, so we really feel like we're there. Week 1 was cake week, and Caarrie requested red velvet cake, which was fine!  Week 2 was biscuit week and Carrie requested viennese whirls.  They were lovely.

But week 3 was bread week.  I'm not very experienced when it comes to making bread, but we decided that I would attempt to make chocolate croissants.

Pain au chocolat, if you will!!  Je m'appelle Shona n'that!!

Now.  These take some doing.  I found a recipe online that didn't look too awkward, which wasn't easy, let me tell you!  But find one I did!  Bread flour, salt, yeast, sugar, water and a shit load of butter!!  Ooh and some chocolate to pop in too.

I mixed the dry stuff and added the water adn kneaded until I could knead no more.  Well.  10 minutes anyway.  It's murder on the wrists!  Once I'd kneaded I took the butter out the fridge and battered it flat witih a rolling pin.

Butter is not easy to roll.  And it melts really quickly!  But I perservered.

The butter sheet goes onto the rolled dough and you fold it like an envelope.

I knew how to do that cos I'd seen it on the bake off :)

Then I proved. And then folded adn rolled out.  The proved and folded adn rolled out. Then proved adn folded and rolled and proved adn folded and rolled out.  4 times  like I was told to do.  Then I cut them out anf folded a wee bit of chocolate into each of them.  Then I popped them into the fridge for an hour (it said overnight but I was right impatient plus I wanted to test them out!).  Oven on at 200c and in they went.

They fucking worked!!!

I'm so unbelievably chuffed with myself it's embarrassing haha!!  I took a selfie with them!!

I'd been viber-ing Stuart and Carrie all night and they were dead excited too.

They came out all crispy and buttery, and chocolatey and they tasted bloody delicious!!  I ttok them up to my brother's the next night and they were demolished.

Next week is batter week...  Churros!!

Shit.

Tonight I'm going to yoga fir the first time...

Wish me luck 😕

This morning I'm posting an update.

Just to let you know, the beany chilli was brilliant and the pulled pork is pretty damn awesome!

Chuffed!

And eating my words. Sorry Nikki lol

Xx

This weekend i've been back cooking again!

Well.

For the last wee while I've not really been making much, a mixture of being not arsed and being bloody knackered. However, last week i done my usual fir this time of year (this is the third year, anyway) and rejoined slimming world.  The last 2 years I've joined a local group bit I've decided this year to join online and go it alone. No more paying a fiver ti get told I'm fat- at least this way i can pay way in advance and clap myself every week  (or eat shit loads of chocolate and drink shit loads of wine if it's a shit week lol).

Anyway, i digress!!

I knuckled down this weekend and went mad on cooking. Well. That's maybe a bit of an exaggeration, but i cooked more than i have in a while.

It started with chilli. Now. Normally i use lean mince (5% fat) but i felt a bit saucy and got turkey breast mince instead! Ooh! So mince, tomatoes, peppers, onions, spring onions, chillis, green beans (only cos they were there and out of date) and shit loads of cumin, paprika and chilli powder.

It tasted of nothing. I don't know what i done wrong. I did, however, use to much chilli so it burnt the mouth off me. My lips were tingling (oo-er). I put a pic on instagram (as one does) and my pal nikki (who we take the piss out of for putting baked beans in her chilli) suggested i put beans in it. So i have. I've not tried it the again yet to test it but ive warned her if it's shit then shes broon breed 

Then there was soup. I had baby plum tomatoes in the fridge that had a bbe of 3rd feb. I thought well, it's only the 7th so fuck it! Tomatoes, carrot, onion, ham stock, chilli and basil. Bloody amazing. Except, you'd think I'd learn, i put too much chilli in it. Near took the tongue off   me!!

Then, after looking at recipes on the slimming world website, i decided to make pulled pork! 1.8kg of pork shoulder and passata, Worcester sauce, balsamic vinegar, mustard powder and sugar to boil while searing the pork (it was a bloody big bit of meat to handle ).  It looks ok so far but tomorrow morning well be the tell.

*sings* how do you pull your pork in the morning... 

Come back next time when i try and make something called cloud bread!

Fuck knows!

turkey chilli

turkey chilli with beans

tomato soup

pulled pork sauce

Searin the meat!

pulled pork prepared :)

Tonight I've been experimenting with scones.

Tonight i decided to make some scones, and also that i wanted to be fancy. So i set about the kitchen and got my mixing bowls out (new colourful ones that Andrews sister got me for my birthday- right fancy!) and got mixing!

When i said i wasn't making plain ones, Andrews face fell, so i started with them. Start simple and get more complicated, i thought.

It turns out my lack of imagination stretches further than being shit at choosing Christmas presents.

As soon as I'd mixed my scone mix, i had absolutely no idea what to put in.  I searched my cupboards for ideas and eventually found some chocolate that i bought for making hot chocolate (ho cho, i heard recently).  Game on,  i thought. Chocolate scones!

They worked!

So, feeling a wee bit more confident, i decided to make a savoury mixture (I thought this would be really complicated,  then realised all i had to do was leave out the sugar haha). 

Cheese! Cheese was calling me!

Ooooh and chilli powder!

So cheese and chilli went in next!

Then i got all fancy when i found one of those wee portions of blue cheese you get in pick n mix cheese counters! I decided to make it even more fancy by putting salt and pepper on top! Get me!!!

I'm not entirely sure what happened, but they resemble snails. They rose a bit funny...

The last batch, i decided to split and make half sweet and half savoury, because i am now a scone queen and know how to do that shit!!  Another rake of the cupboards found half a bar of white chocolate, so in it went!

Finally, i chopped up some ham and chucked it into the last lot and mixed up a mustard glaze for the top!

Oh yes! Fucking mustard-glazed ham scones!

Once i take them into work tomorrow and force my Easties to try them I'll see about future experiments...

Today i used a chocolate transfer sheet.

Last week my lovely mother-in-law (more or less, although I'm not actually married) gave me a chocolate transfer sheet! I had no idea what this was so, after a lot of googling discovered that if you put melted chocolate on it, the transfer pattern ends up on the choc! !!! Brilliant!!

I always wondered how fancy shops got the pattern on, and now i know :-)

Anyway, i made a couple of muffins and while they were cooling spooned wee drops of choc on the transfer,and chucked it in the fridge. I was sceptical. I don't trust this kind of wizardry normally.

But it bloody worked!

I cut a wee hole in each of the muffins and shoved a bit of starry chocolate it!

Chuffed!

This week my boss gave me apples.

My lovely boss, Tracy, shouted over the office to ask if anyone wanted any cookers. I got quite excited as this was around the same time as my oven broke, but then i realised she meant apples. She's had quite the crop this year! So i took some and they've been sitting in my kitchen for a wee while now.

I'm sure you'll have seen the thing going round t'internet just now about apple roses. I did and thought "I'm sure i could make those!". So tonight i did :-) Well. Kind of.  I didn't have any jam that the recipe asks for, so i done it without.  Except for one, which i used peanut butter in. Turns out that makes it mingin so i dint really recommend it.

I'd bought puff pastry at aldi at my last shop and its been in the freezer for a few weeks, so i defrosted it overnight so it was ready to use tonight. Turns out its right hard to roll, so i got a bit fed up and ended up halving it which meant less roses. Never mind! I ended up with 4 and, know what- they're actually not too bad looking!!!! A bit burnt round the edges, but ive come to expect that these days!

But what to do with the other apples and pastry. I got Mary Berry out and asked her, and she said-you have some butter and sugar, why not make a tart tatin?

Why not indeed!

So i got slicing some more and boiled my butter and sugar, and got a square tin  (square, not round - get me, I'm a rebel) and assembled. I shoved the edges of the pastry down and popped it in the oven and hoped for the best!

Well, it bloody worked!

I put a plate over the top and closed my eyes as i flipped the whole thing over, and it came out in one piece!!!!! I had a bit syrup spillage, but nothing major! How chuffed am i!!!

I've had a wee corner off out and it tastes fairly good! I've not really got anything to compare it to (i would never order tart tatin for pudding, i don't actually think i know anyone who would-especially if there's chocolate cake or cheesecake on the same menu! ) but it tastes nice for what it is!

I've still got a few apples left so christ knows what will end up happening to them :-)