Chilli and Garlic Bubble and Squeak Cakes

This week I got cabbage in my veg box, I really like cabbage, but it's not very inspiring. So I couldn't really decide what to do with it. I asked a few people at work and the results were to put it in mashed potato or stir fry it with chili and garlic. I really wanted both of these things, so I decided to combine them together and make bubble and squeak cakes with chilli and garlic. My brother was hanging around the kitchen while I was making them, telling me how disgusting they sounded, (this is the usual reaction to whatever I'm cooking) but then decided that he actually wanted some too after smelling them cooking. So we both had them on a bed of wilted spinach, topped with hollandaise sauce and a poached egg. This is my new favourite dinner. I've had it twice this week and already want to make it again!

Serves 2:

300g new potatoes
A small knob of butter
100g cabbage, shredded
1 small chili
1 small clove of garlic
A little bit of flour for dusting
Spinach, a poached egg and hollandaise to serve

1. Wash your new potatoes, them pop them in to a pan with boiling water and leave to boil for 20 minutes. 
2. Melt the butter in a separate pan, then add the cabbage, chili and garlic and stir fry on a medium heat for around 10 minutes.
3. When the potatoes are lovely and soft, drain off all of the water and mash up the potatoes, add the cooked cabbage mixture and mix up well. 
4. Leave the mixture to cool, until its cool enough to handle then mold them in to 4 burger shapes and pop on to a floured plate. 
5. You can now either pop them in to the oven on a low heat while you prepare your toppings, or stick them straight in to a frying pan with hot oil and fry until golden brown on each side. 
6. Serve with spinach, poached egg and hollandaise sauce, or whatever else you fancy.

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Vegan Cherry Bakewell Tarts

Last week one of my recipes was in the Guardian. I was very, very excited about it. So excited that I got up ridiculously early and was quite possibly the first person in the shop in the morning to buy it. Not only was it super awesome that my recipe was in it, but it also had loads of other awesome vegan recipes in it. Including this recipe for vanilla cupcakes, which I was dying to try out. There's a few vegans at work and I wanted to make them something yummy, but we also have a nut free girl at work so I decided to make almond and dairy free cherry bakewell tarts. The sponge recipe is incredible and especially yummy with proper cherry jam and pastry. They went down well with vegans and non vegans alike and are perfect for a little summer treat!

For 24 you will need:

A little bit of vegan marg
All of the ingredients for the vanilla cupcakes
1 pack of vegan shortcrust pastry
a jar of cherry jam
100g icing sugar
12 glace cherries chopped in half

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees and prepare 2 cupcake tins by greasing them with vegan margarine.
2. Roll out the pastry and use a cutter a little bigger than the cake tin holes to cut out 24 circles, then press them in to the cake tin holes.  
3. Put a teaspoon of cherry jam in to each case and pop to one side.
4. Make up the vanilla cupcake mixture, then pop 1-2 teaspoons for the mixture on top of the jam in the pastry cases. 
5. Pop them in to the oven for 15-20 minutes, until they are golden brown and springy to the touch, then remove from the oven and leave to cool in the tin. 
6. Once cool, add a little water to the icing sugar and ice all of the tarts, topping them all with half a cherry. 
7. And enjoy! 

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Summer Baking

I swear the weather is never nice on my days off, it will be sunny all week and then when I have a day off, bam, it's raining. It's just not fair! This week was no exception! I am forever optimistic, so even though it was pouring down on the Tuesday, I still managed to fit in some summer baking in anticipation of a beautiful summer picnic on the Wednesday. I checked out some delicious picnic recipes and decided to make some caramelised onion and feta tarts (what's more summery than a lovely tart!) and some good old scones, I made some simple buttermilk scones and there are more scone recipes at bakingmad.com. 

     

Unfortunately Wednesday wasn't as optimistic as me and the weather didn't turn out too well. None the less, I decided not to let it dampen my spirits and enjoy my picnic from the comfort of my own home, with my glamourous assistant mike. A homemade picnic is the best kind of picnic and I can't wait to have a day off in the sun and bake even more picnic goodies! 

If you're feeling bad for my lack of sunshine, don't worry too much, the weather was nice enough for me to take Monty (my mum's friends tiny baby pug) out for a walk.

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High Tea, The Bedruthan Steps Hotel

The worst part of a holiday is having to leave, after a week of relaxing, body boarding, cliff walking and a lot of sleeping, returning to reality seriously sucks. So to make the most of the last day of our holiday, Mr Hef and I didn't actually go home (we went to Devon to see his family instead) and went for an epic walk along the cliffs to Bedruthan Steps and then back to Mawgan Porth for a High Tea at the Bedruthan Steps Hotel.

It really was the perfect end to a perfect holiday, Bedruthan Steps is absolutely breath taking and absolutely worth nearly getting blown off the top of a cliff to see. And the high tea at the Bedruthan Steps Hotel was incredible, you get a selection of sandwiches (both Mr hef and I went for Davistowe cheddar and Red Stuff chutney) and cakes (Mr Hef had a fruit tart and I had a lemon meringue tart as well as some kind of yummy fruit and pistachio sponge) and of course a fresh warm scone with clotted cream and jam. It was just beautiful!

If you're ever in this area of Cornwall, I highly recommend checking out both of them!

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