Easter Emergencies - A Hodgepodge …

… aka a mess. I just love to be able to pull ingredients for a speedy sweet straight from the store cupboard/pantry and freezer and serve a dessert worthy of the extra calories! Like I said a girl needs to be prepared - what follows is a series of recipe ideas and variations - the components of which can either be made ahead and frozen or can be part of your store cupboard/pantry.

Without further ado here's my most recent creation :

Hazelnut Hodgepodge

Serves 1

3 meringue kisses, crushed

1 scoop of vanilla ice cream

A sprinkle of toasted, chopped hazelnuts – 25g approx

30g frozen raspberries – defrosted – do not sweeten

1 tbsp sticky toffee sauce – loosen in microwave for

15 secs on medium

Assembly

A glass bowl or sundae dish makes this

dessert stand out, layer as follows :

crushed kisses

scoop of ice cream

sprinkle of hazelnuts

raspberries but reserve the juices

drizzle of sticky toffee sauce

drizzle of raspberry juices

Add a final sprinkle of hazelnuts

Here is the result :

Feedback from the Chief Taster – yum and is there enough for tomorrow?!

My quest …

for the ultimate burger – a meat free version that is – has taken a positive turn of late.

I came across “Fun in a bun” (Spicy corn and chickpea burgers with smoky sweet potato wedges) by Jamie Oliver in the Sunday Times Magazine.

Here's my variation – the first prototype!

Burgers

1 x 400g can chickpeas – shucked

1 x 340g sweetcorn drained and placed on

a tray lined with kitchen roll – pat dry

½ tsp each of ground coriander, cumin, sumac

and salt

3 tbsp plain flour

extra flour to dust

cling film

Place the chickpeas and sweetcorn in a food processor and pulse – keep some texture in the mixture :

Tip the mixture into a mixing bowl and then add the spices and salt. Divide your mixture into a size that suits – as a rough guide I made 5 :

Spoon your divided mixture straight onto the cling film and gather firmly into a ball. You can weigh your mixture if you want to be precise. Tip the ball onto your floured board and form gently into a burger shape. Your mixture is quite fragile and requires gentle handling. When formed place the burgers on a tray and “fridge” for 30 minutes.

Heat a glug of rapeseed oil in a frying pan to a medium heat. Add the burgers and cook gently for 5 minutes each side until golden brown.

Here they are :

What the recipe doesn't say

The mixture is very sticky and if you don't use the cling film method I've included above then you'll finish up with more of it on your hands than anywhere else – by using the cling film you're not handling the mixture until it is formed into a ball - ready to roll into flour to form your burger shape.

Use the best quality of sweetcorn you can afford – it's worth it.

I would not recommend adding your spices and seasoning directly into your food processor - you'll run the risk of tainting the bowl, hence transferring to a mixing bowl.

I'm difficult to please having sampled lots of rubbish vegetarian food over the years, but this first version is good to go – here's what I served – to myself!

The burger in a toasted brioche bun with a side of Coronation Coleslaw. The recipe for the slaw and the second prototype of the burger are coming soon!

OCC!

I cannot deny it – I am definitely OCC – an obsessive compulsive cook – my hope is that the bits and pieces that irritate me irritate you too!

For example - are a devotee of chick peas but don't like the outer husk which is not terribly pleasant to eat.

Here's my answer – shuck your chick peas. You can do it the old fashioned way – sit with two bowls and do it using the “pea” by “pea” method if you prefer – if not, then drain and rinse the chick peas and lay them on a tray lined with two sheets of kitchen roll - cover with another two sheets. Gently roll your hand over the top sheets three or four times. Remove the top layer of kitchen roll and this is what it looks like :

You can see the husks - they are easy to remove and discard. Repeat the process and this is what you finish up with :

It's strangely therapeutic – like taking the outer casings from broad beans.

The reason I did this in the first place was because I'd come across a recipe for a vegetarian burger that I quite liked the look of – with appropriate tweaking of course – that contained chick peas.

Guess what's coming next?!

The final flourish!

Fondant Glaze

75g icing sugar

1-2 tsps boiling water

Pour the boiling water slowly over the icing sugar in a small bowl while stirring the mixture with a wooden spoon. Pour in only enough water to make a creamy mixture that has the consistency of pancake batter. Cool. You need to make sure the mixture isn't too stiff – you need to be able to drizzle the glaze over the pastries.

A trick or two

Everyone wants to get as good a finish as possible - particularly with fondant - quite honestly it has a mind of its own. You can, if you feel brave enough dip a fork into the glaze and scatter it over your pastries and hope – I know I've said it before - “unleash your inner Jackson Pollock”!

If you'd like a safer option, you might like this idea – use a disposable piping bag and line a plastic jug. Cut off any excess – turn the bag over the edge of the jug :

You then have control of the fondant, transfer it from the bowl into the piping bag. Gather up the bag and ease the fondant to the bottom, ready to pipe. Use a clip-it to secure the top of the bag :

Snip the tiniest end from the bag and drizzle the icing over the pastries – easy peasy.

In a final flourish, decorate your pastries with the flaked almonds and half a glacé cherry.

Your very own miniature Belgian buns!

Easter Emergencies – perfect products

Call me old fashioned but I always like to have the wherewithal to produce a little something from my pantry and/or the freezer when visitors turn up unexpectedly. I know that this can happen any time but it's more likely when we've an Easter weekend and we all have more time.

My first contender in the “perfect product” list is the puff pastry sheet. A good life span from supermarket chiller to your fridge and even longer if you freeze.

With this in mind, here are :

Mini Belgian Buns

1 sheet of frozen puff pastry, thawed in fridge (375g)

15g butter, melted

50g dark chocolate drops (or finely chopped)

25g ground almonds

50g sultanas

1 egg, lightly beaten with 1 tbsp milk

Fondant Glaze

75g icing sugar

1-2 tsps boiling water

50g flaked almonds and 6 glacé cherries cut in half

to decorate

Preheat your oven 180c fan/200c/Gas 6. Line a baking tray with greaseproof paper or similar. Unroll the pastry sheet and lay with the short sides either side - you are going to roll to form a log.

Brush the surface of the pastry and melted butter then scatter the chocolate and ground almonds leaving a border at the top end of the pastry to enable you to “glue” the log when rolled. Then scatter the sultanas over the chocolate and almonds. Carefully roll up from one of the shortest sides as tightly as you can forming a log.

Using a sharp knife, cut the log into 12 even slices. Place on the baking tray and brush with the remaining butter, then the beaten egg mixture. Bake for 15-20 minutes until puffed and golden.

Here's the photo story so far folks!

Hey a girl needs to be prepared – I like to know that I can produce food quickly – if, on the other hand, the unexpected visitors don't materialise there's no harm done and your store cupboard/pantry is brimming with stuff which won't spoil!

Read on for the final flourish ...

Make it your own

There's nothing quite like giving a gift that you've made. These days it's easier because there are so many bits and pieces you can buy, inexpensively, to make it special.

I had this dim and distant childhood memory of when you were able to buy small slabs toffee in a foil tray with a tiny hammer to break it – very posh. That size of tray would be perfect for personal gifts of Rocky Road. Here are the results of my research :

The foil trays are by a company called Queen of Cakes via Amazon and measure 7” x 4.5” in old money or if you prefer 18cms x 11.5cms. The cellophane bags came from Lakeland Plastics and the Easter “pegs” came from Home Bargains, as did the tiny Easter buckets.

Design your own Rocky Road

Traditionally Rocky Road is made using Brazil nuts,

glacé cherries and marshmallow.

Rules are meant to be broken - take a look at the

list below and if you'd like to design your own

Rocky Road swap any or all of the three

ingredients in the original recipe for the

same weight

(or may be four if you want to stay true

to Rocky Road and include the mini marshmallows)

Cashew

Peanut

Pistachio

Pecan

Hazelnut

Glacé cherry

Dried sour cherries

Cranberry

Apricot

Banana chips

Pineapple

Sultanas

Nougat

Turkish Delight

Fudge

Toblerone

Praline

Salted Caramel

Mini Marshmallow

Popping Candy

My latest versions are :

Pecans with dark cherries and vanilla fudge

Pistachios, apricots and Turkish Delight

Easter rocks!

I realise that this is not a traditional Easter Egg but hey does it really matter so long as it's chocolate?! What I love about this treat is it's easy and makes heaps so whilst it sounds like it could be expensive if you've lots of treats to give then you'll find it's great value too.

Rocky Road

250g dark chocolate

150g milk chocolate

175g soft butter, unsalted

4 x 15ml tbsp golden syrup

200g hobnobs

*150g shelled Brazil nuts

*150g red glace cherries

*125g mini marshmallows

Put the biscuits into a freezer bag and roll with a rolling pin until you get a mixture of rubble.

Chop the Brazil nuts into different sizes.

Chop both sorts of chocolate into small pieces, or use chocolate buttons made for melting and then put them into a heavy-based saucepan to melt with the butter and syrup over a gentle heat.

Take the pan off the heat and add the biscuit and nuts, cherries and mini marshmallows. Turn carefully so that all the ingredients are coated with the syrupy chocolate.

Tip into a foil try (I use a tray bake size), smoothing the top as best you can, although it is meant to be uneven.

Refrigerate until firm enough to cut, which will take about 1½-2 hours. Take the set block out of the tray. With the long side in front of you cut 6 slices down and 4 across so that you have 24 squares.

Original recipe was taken and tweaked from “Nigella Christmas”.

This is the basic Rocky Road recipe. The three ingredients marked “*” can be swapped to suit your own personal taste. You can choose any of the ingredients given on your “Design your own Rocky Road” sheet attached.

Make ahead tip:

Make the Rocky Road and refrigerate to set, cut into bars or bite size pieces and then store in an airtight container in a cool place for up to 1 week.

Freeze for up to 1 month.

Read on … and think outside the Easter Egg box!