Recipe | New Years Eve - Scotch Pancakes

With New Years Eve just around the corner, it’s likely that a lot of you are making a New Years Resolution. But before you start your healthy diet, I’d say you deserve to indulge for just one more day. 

I’ve never really enjoyed breakfast but when having these scotch pancakes it gives me a good reason to love breakfast, especially being a big lover of pancakes! 

This recipe for scotch pancakes roughly make 18 small pancakes and about 12 medium sized pancakes. So they are great if you are hosting a breakfast or have friends and family over and want to make something other than cereal and toast. 

To make the scotch pancakes you’ll need:

• 200 grams plain flour
• Pinch of salt 
• 1 tablespoon of baking power 
• 1 tablespoon caster sugar
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon (optional)
• 1 large egg
• 300 ml milk

You can also add any other optional ingredients to your pancakes like blueberries and chocolate chips, but I kept mine plain. 

Method:

1. Add dry ingredients into a bowl
2. Beat egg and milk into dry mixture
3. Heat frying pan to medium heat and add oil
4. Fry a ladleful of batter until golden on both sides 

To serve these pancakes I fried some smoky bacon  and served this along side some maple syrup! 

I hope you had a lovely Christmas and have a lovely New Years!

Annie xx

Recipe | Made in a minute mince pies

So this is only a small post but I just thought I’d give you a quick and simple way to make yummy homemade mince pies!

So let’s face it, we’ve all been there! Running around last minute making sure everything is in place for when the guests come for Christmas dinner and then suddenly you realise… You have no mince pies...

But don’t worry I’ve got a quick solution!

To make these delicious mince pies all you’ll need is mince meat and ready to roll shortcrust pastry – don’t have any in the house? Don’t worry you can easily whip up some fresh by rubbing together  100 grams butter and 200 grams flour then adding 2-3 tbsp of water until the mixture forms a firm dough. 

Using two cutters, cut out a base (that’ll fit your cupcake tray) and a lid (that’ll fit on top of the base). Fill the bases with a teaspoon of mincemeat then water the sides and places the lid on top, before placing in the oven glaze with egg wash then bake for 15-20 minutes at 200C until golden brown. 

Hope you have a wonderful Christmas!

Annie xx

Christmas Cupcakes

So it's december and you know what that means... It's almost Christmas!

Every year for Christmas I make a selection of treats for guests and this year I didn’t fail to do so. This year I made the classic mince pies as well as a few other Christmas themed cupcakes.

To make the cupcakes I used:

• 100g caster sugar
• 100g self raising flour
• 100g unsalted butter (room temperature)
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

To make the buttercream frosting I used:

• 150g icing sugar
• 75g unsalted butter (room temperature)
• 1-2 tablespoons milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 tablespoons cocoa powder (if making the reindeer cupcakes)

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 180 C / Gas Mark 4. Line a 12 hole cupcake tin with paper cases (I used Halloween ones)
2. Put the flour, sugar, butter, eggs, vanilla extract into a large mixing bowl.
3. Beat the mixture by hand or using an electric whisk until you get a creamy consistency. Spoon the mixture into the cases.
4. Bake in the oven for 12-15 minutes or until golden brown.
5. Leave to cool while you prepare the butter icing
6. To make the buttercream, beat the butter in a medium sized mixing bowl until soft.
7. Add half of the icing sugar and beat until smooth.
8. Add the remaining icing sugar and one tablespoon of milk and beat the mixture until creamy and smooth. Beat in the milk and the vanilla extract.
9. Then add a few drops of Dr Oetker black gel food colouring until you get a grey coloured buttercream.
   Once the cakes have cooled, use a piping bag to pipe on the buttercream.

To make the melting snowman cupcakes you will need:

• white marshmallows
• writing icing (orange and a colour for the eyes)

To make the reindeer cupcakes you will need:

• salted pretzels (halved to make antler shapes)
• white chocolate buttons
• milk chocolate buttons
• red smarties or red writing icing
• a coloured writing of choice for the eyes

To decorate the christmas themed cupcakes I used a quadruple sprinkle set.

I hope you all have a lovely christmas and I hope these cupcake ideas are useful if you have to make a last minute treat as they are so easy to make!

Annie xx

Garden Barn - Cotesbatch

Happy Sunday!

First of all I’d like to apologies for the lack of posts but I’ve been extremely busy with school work and as a result am now suffering from the dreaded cold! But I just had to tell you about a cafe I went to recently!

Last weekend we had some family friends over and on the Sunday of their stay we went to a barn – which holds a cafe and shop – not too far away from my hometown. The place was called The Garden Barn and it was lovely! Surrounded by fields and in the middle of country side the place had a really nice atmosphere and aside from the rubbish weather we had a lovely visit.

The barn was originally bought by the Posser family in 1963 and was a dairy farm up until 1991. The barn which now holds the shop was built in 1975. As you walk in to the building the first thing you see is the shop – full of one of a kind ornaments and lovely garden decorations it really is a place to visit. Due to it being December there were or course a lot of christmas decorations – to my delight – and all of which were beautiful! i spent a long time admiring all of the tree decorations they had on sale as well as the other Christmas themed gifts they sold, I ended up buying a little sign that i can hang in my room which says ‘Silent night, Holy night, all is calm, all is bright’.

After we all had a good look around we ordered some nice warm drinks to warm us up, and I – being the chocolate lover I am – ordered the hot chocolate deluxe. Once ordering we made our way upstairs to where the seating area is and sat ourselves next a large window which, although the weather was bad, had a lovely view.

Above is the view I had from my seat and although it looks dark and miserable I actually found it very calming and surrounded by people I love I had a pleasant experience. Below you’ll find a picture of the hot chocolate I had which I’d give a 10/10 for! Filled with rich warm cocoa a giant marshmallow topped off with a load of whipped cream, a flake and chocolate sprinkles it definitely tasted like heaven in a cup!

So if you are ever in the Leicestershire area and fancy a relaxing setting I’d highly recommend going here! Although some prices are a little high, especially some of the items sold in the shop, it is definitely worth the visit!!

Annie xx

P.s. I am hoping there will be a few more updates within the month of december especially with school holidays just around the corner and now that we are in the run up for CHRISTMAS I am hoping to do a few more christmassy bakes that I will be sharing with you! But for now I hope you are well and that you enjoyed this brief update and I hope to speak to you all soon.