4 DAYS UNTIL EASTER

Bunny Buns

Time taken: Half an hour

Ingredients: 150g Cornflakes, 50g butter, 200g marshmallows, 12 Bunny Jelly Babies.

Hi readers,

So, I blogged a few days ago and casually mentioned that it was raining here. I was in really quite low spirits about the rain, readers. And today, on Wednesday, IT IS STILL RAINING. Unbelievable! It’s like… WHY??! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGGHHHH MAKE IT STOPPP. Damn you all to heck, raindrops.

Literally, that’s where I’m at with the weather. That’s where we’re all at in Sheffield. We’re sat indoors cursing the rain. Yesterday? It hailed several times. Tomorrow? Snow is forecast. Meanwhile… rain. And more rain. Raaaaaaaaaain.

BUT I’m not letting it get me down anymore, readers. It’s incredible how big an impact the weather can have on people’s moods! And when you’re living in northern England… that’s really quite dangerous. Because the weather here, readers, is frequently shit. And often it’s utterly shocking.

But… let’s be positive now. What’s cool about being stuck indoors?

A) That’s where all the food is. And the TV and your bed.
B) Where family are (if you haven’t killed them already this week).
&C) If you’re shut in the house you’re basically required to bake!

So, this recipe here is something new for you to try. It is VERY easy and simple. And super cheap. See the 4 ingredients listed at the top of the page? There’s only 4 of them! Win! And, also, this recipe is very Easteryyyy whoooooooo!

So, readers, I’ve been doing Lent now for 5 ½ weeks I believe. I gave up chocolate and it’s been a loooooooong haul. A very long haul. I miss chocolate BADLY right now. Really this week I’m terrible and think about chocolate allllllll the time. I miss chocolate bars and chocolate cake and chocolate biscuits and chocolate mousse. And hot chocolate.

I think that my coffee consumption’s increased dramatically on account of me being off the hot chocolate. And the coffee’s making me more anxious about not being allowed any chocolate. So really it’s a negative spiral I’m in. Very negative.

Buttttttttt I STAY STRONG. Do you, readers? Have you given anything up for Lent?? I’d love to hear what it is and how you’ve been getting on! Share your Lent stories! Have there been any slip ups or any really tough moments?? A week or so ago I came very close to eating the chocolate filling at the centre of my cousin’s 21^st birthday cake. Big drama. I was THIS CLOSE to eating it. But I dutifully ate around it. Offered it away. Cried inside. Has anyone else had such a low point??

Because Lent is TOUGH. We only have 4 days to go but I bet they’re going to be killer! Knowing you’re near the end makes it harrrrrrrrrrrd. Sigh. And, sadly, my efforts to not eat chocolate have pushed me back over the edge with gelatine. I’m being the worst vegetarian ever. Last week, I had a bag of Rowntree’s Randoms and, today, this recipe involves both marshmallows and Jelly Babies. Scandalous.

Readers, I feel bad. I want all animals to keep their hooves. I really don’t support the eating of hooves! My friend Floss doesn’t like it when I sometimes eat sweets with hooves in. But, for the love of god, if I can’t eat chocolate I need something in my life. For my sanity. And in 4 days I will go back to eating chocolate and not gelatine. So allow me this slip up, everyone. Please don’t think badly of me (especially you, Floss).

And on with the recipe! Here I’ve BASICALLY taken the recipe for Easter buns (Cornflakes stuck together with chocolate, with Mini Eggs on top) and merged it with the recipe for SnapCracklePop buns (Rice Krispies stuck together with marshmallow, with popping candy on top) TO CREATE SOMETHING NEW. Something that those of us not eating chocolate can eat. This could be the recipe to carry us to the end of Lent! Stay strong everyone!

Here’s how to throw together a batch of Bunny Buns, in just ten easy steps:

1. Line a bun tray with 12 fairy cake cases.

2. Measure out 50g of butter and pop this in a saucepan, heated on a low heat.

3. Tip a 200g bag of marshmallows into the pan.

4. Weight out 150g of Cornflakes and pop these into a mixing bowl.

5. As the contents of your pan begin to melt, stir it up!

ChefBeHere Top Tip: Keep everything on the move. Marshmallow is quick to burn and you don’t want that to happen! Stir stir stir.

6. When the mix in your pan is smooth, pour it over the Cornflakes in your bowl.

7. Using a wooden spoon, mix together your Cornflakes and marshmallow goo!

8. When your Cornflakes are mostly coasted in marshmallow and they’re sticking together, begin to spoon them into your fairy cases.

ChefBeHere Top Tip: Avoid letting the mix touch you. This isn’t because it’s poisoned or explosive upon contact, it’s just insanely sticky. Like, you will struggle to get it off you. Steer clear.

9. Fill each fairy case with your sticky Cornflake mix.

ChefBeHere Top Tip: Fill your bowl and your pan with warm water ASAP and leave them to soak. Otherwise, that marshmallow is going to bind to them for all an eternity, believe me.

10. Top each bun with a Bunny Jelly Baby and leave your Bunny Buns to set a little while in their cases. Then devour!

And hey presto… BUNNY BUNS!!

Aren’t they adorable? Readers, this is a recipe designed for children. It’s so simple it’s crazy. But adults can make Bunny Buns, too! And so they should! These are a simple, delicious way to celebrate Easter without chocolate, and they’re a recipe that everyone can have a go at. No prior skill required! You don’t even bake them. Bunny Buns are the bomb I promise you – they taste very sweet and sugary. Basically, like childhood. And you’re going to be wearing them on your face, without a doubt! There’s everything to love about them.

So, get your apron on this Easter, and while the rains pour down have a crack at mixing up some Bunny Buns! Do you have a friend that’s given up chocolate for Lent? Feed them Bunny Buns! Basically, anyone that’s given up a food for Lent which isn’t butter, marshmallow, Cornflakes or Jelly Babies, and who seems to be struggling a little with the last few days to go… FEED THEM BUNNY BUNS. I insist. Go. Now.

And shelter safely,

Hayley

TRIUMPHANT TEABREAD

Bara Brith

Time taken: Ten minutes, then ten minutes, then a long bake in the oven.

Ingredients: 175g currants, 175g sultanas, 225g light brown sugar, 300ml strong hot tea & an egg.

Hi Readers,

It’s Friday time! At last, Friday has come!! Everything is going to be A-OK now. A few hours left at work for most… and then you’re free. :) The sun’s shining outside and you could do anything with your weekend! The world is your oyster!

Is it just me or has everyone been incredibly productive this week?? It seems like everyone has been getting things done… and then more and more things! There’s been no stopping people! So, this week, my flatmate Godica journeyed down to London for a big interview aaaaaand… she’s scored herself an offer to study for a postgrad nursing diploma at South Bank Uni! Which she can defer for a year so that she can travel around Australia with my flatmate Brummanie!! Such great news! She was really nervous and so we’re all really proud of her. :) Also, Godica found out today that she's got a summer job at Buckingham Palace to help her save some cash for travels! Rubbing shoulders with royalty! Best news EVER.

ALSO my flatmate Dr Davies took a trip to London too (apparently, it’s the THING to have been doing this week). She also had big interviews for further study after uni… and she’s been invited to join a lab down in the capital city to study for her PhD!!! Dr Davies is ACTUALLY going to be a doctor. It’s terrifying! I don’t know quite where she’s been made an offer, and don’t at all understand what it is she’ll be doing her PhD on, but she’s doing one!

Such an exciting time. In Newcastle, me and Brummanie and Tiddy, we haven’t exactly been scoring ourselves big career offers this week. Not quite. BUT we battled through 2 ½ days without hot water for showers after Northumbria Water had a bloody disaster with a pipe nearby, which is achievement enough for me.

And this week I wrote a full draft of my dissertation. I actually wrote it. And yesterday I printed it. All 126 pages of it, complete with 97 figures and 107 references. My baby. So, this weekend, I’m taking a few days off to clear my mind and have a rest. Then on Monday I’m whipping the dissertation back out again for a big read through, and after final edits I can have it bound and submitted! This is very scary.

But the prospect of a few days break from my work is wonderful. It’s all winding down now. On Wednesday night, Woody took me out for pizza and to see Kingsmen (definitely a lads film) at the cinema, complete with back row seats and vegetarian sweets! Then, last night, I had my geography friends Floss and Fizz over for a dinner party. Two glasses of wine went straight to my head! But I still managed to pull together a veggie Thai green curry, with fruit salad for dessert. The girls were most complimentary. :)

And today… my Father Bear is driving up to Newcastle to visit! I’m so excited! Especially, to see me my dad’s taken a day off work and he’s embarking on a long drive up the country to Newcastle. I’m so lucky! Today, if the sunshine holds on, we’re going to take a big walk around the Quayside of Newcastle and hopefully find some cask ale bars to pay a visit to. And, for my dad’s arrival, I’ve got my bake on!

This morning, I’ve baked a Bara Brith Teabread. Mmm. Bara Brith is a reeeally fruity, traditionally Welsh teabread. My flatmate Dr Davies is half-Welsh and so she has introduced us to this! To make Bara Brith you soak fruit overnight in tea, before you bake this bread, and so it’s suuuper moist. Some fruit cakes can be quite dry and tough – this is not one of them.

Hopefully, this will be a good reward for my dad when he gets here after his long drive! I wanted to bake something for him coming up and, for once, give something other than banana bread a whirl. I’m not eating chocolate due to Lent and so my options were limited. But Bara Brith was the perfect solution! I can report that the teabread has baked superbly and now the house smells like a DREAM. Sooo homely.

To make your Bara Brith, which EVERYONE needs to do, follow these 10 easy steps…

1. Boil the kettle and then pour 300ml hot water into a measuring jug.

2. Chuck 3 teabags into your water and leave your tea to brew for 5 minutes or so.

3. Meanwhile, measure 175g sultanas, 175g currants and 225g light brown sugar into a mixing bowl.

ChefBeHere Top Tip: This recipe comes from my Mary Berry ‘100 Cakes and Bakes’ book. In the book, Mary calls for you to use light muscovado sugar. I found some of this sugar in the baking cupboard, but there was only about 50g of it left. So, the rest I made up with just light brown sugar. I have to report that both sugars look EXACTLY THE SAME to me. And the teabread seems to have turned out fine without all of the muscovado sugar that was requested. So I don’t think it’s all that essential. Just any light brown sugar you can find, that should do the job.

4. Remove your teabags from your tea and then pour it over your fruit and sugar. Cover the bowl with clingfilm and leave your fruit to soak overnight.

5. The next day, heat your oven to 150˚C.

6. Measure out 275g self-raising flour. Sift this over your bowl of fruit and then crack an egg into the bowl, too.

7. Mix it up!

8. Grease a loaf tin and line this with baking paper. Then spoon your mix into the prepared tin.

9. Safely transport into the oven to bake for 90 minutes.

ChefBeHere Top Tip: Leave your kitchen door open and the smell of this lovely bread should seep through your whole house. Literally, it’s like you’ve lit ten scented candles.

10. When your bread is well-risen, firm to touch and a knife jabbed in the middle comes out clean, then your teabread has baked! Leave it to cool in its tin for ten minutes, before you tip your teabread out onto a cooling rack. Job done!

ChefBeHere Top Tip: Slice and butter your teabread, and serve warm or when cooled. Enjoy!

Here’s my wonderful Bara Brith…

So, this recipe is wonderfully simple. There are only six ingredients! And one of them is a brew! It’s very easy to bake. Plus, you can bake this recipe at incredibly little cost, and it only really requires twenty minutes of your time in the kitchen, so you don’t have to dedicate heaps of your work/study/relaxation hours to your teabread.

ALSO there’s fruit in Bara Brith. So it scores points for health in my books! And your house will smell, and your bread will taste, as if you’re in a country cottage in rural Wales. It’s the best.

I feel that everyone, each and every one of you, deserves Bara Brith this weekend. We’ve all worked hard this week and so a light spot of baking is most deserved. I hope you have a chilled, sunny weekend, readers. And that you have a wonderful start to March. And that my dad likes Bara Brith!!

Brew safely,

Hayley

PERFECTION IN SIMPLICITY

Peach Muggler

 

Time taken: Quarter of an hour

Ingredients: 6 peach slices, 4 tablespoons of plain flour, 2 tablespoons of white sugar, 1 tablespoon of butter, half a teaspoon of baking powder, a splash of milk and a dash of cinnamon! (Optional: a handful of pecan nuts).

Hi readers,

I hope you’re all well on this wonderful, sunny start to our weekend. I came upon a quote yesterday on Instagram, which read:

“Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away. It is easy to forget that a perfect morning is only three ingredients away: coffee, pups and sunshine. Find perfection in simplicity.”
(groundsandhounds, Instagram).

 

I think this is so true!! At a time when everyone is stressed and rushed and overrun with work… I advocate just sacking it off at the weekend. Keep things simple! Take some time to yourself and be kinder to yourself than maybe you normally would be. That bath you considered? That magazine you almost bought? That new music album you really want to listen to?? Put the other things on hold and treat yourself!

 

Another way to treat yourself is, of course, with food! One of my friends this week, Ville, her life was changed while eating out at a restaurant this week by a Peach Cobbler. She got in touch specifically to tell me that I need to…

a) Eat Peach Cobbler, and

b) Figure out how to make it at home so she can eat it all the time.

 

And you can’t say no to a face like that! I’ve never eaten Peach Cobbler before so I was MOST intrigued, readers. Butttt I looked online and a lot of the recipes made big baking dishfuls of Cobbler that feed a family. I’m only one person. And I didn’t know whether I was going to like this dish. Also, I’m a person that HAS had a lot on her plate this week. So, when I happened upon a recipe for Peach Cobbler for one, a recipe that you can make in a mug using the microwave… I was sold.

 

Here readers, without further ado, is the secret to throwing together a cheat’s version of this pudding, Peach Muggler, in ten easy steps…

1. Arm yourself with 2 (yes… 2!) mugs.

2. In one mug spoon a decent table spoon of butter.

3. Pop this in the microwave for up to a minute until the butter melts.

4. Add 2 tablespoons of water and a splash of milk (optional) to this mug, and stir in with the butter.

5. In your second mug (preferably, a big one) spoon 4 tablespoons of plain flour.

6. Add 2 tablespoons of white sugar, half a teaspoon of baking powder and a dash of cinnamon.

7. Stir together all the dry ingredients that are in Mug 2. Then, add them to Mug 1 and stir it ALL into one mix.

ChefBeHere Top Tip: If you happen to have been MOST irresponsible with your money while you were in the supermarket and, as a result, you have pecan nuts in your cupboard (I’m guilty) then chop a handful of them up and add them to your batter. They add some crunch to your Muggler!

8. Take a tin of slices peaches and drain it. Tip most into a Tupperware and pop them in the fridge to eat another time.

9. Save about 6 peach slices. Lay these in a square of kitchen roll and try to dab them dry using the roll, so that they won’t soggy up your Muggler with peach juice.

10. Finally, add your peaches to the mug (either sit them on top of your cake or stir them in). Microwave for one minute. Leave to rest for maybe half a minute. Then, microwave for another minute. AND FEAST.

ChefBeHere Top Tip: The reason for the rest half way through microwaving is that, if the same thing happens to you as it did to me, your Muggler mix might froth a little in the microwave. Like a science experiment! I think maybe the peaches react with the batter?? Who knows! Anyway, the froth tastes amazingly sweet, but just watch for it overtopping the mug while your Muggler warms.

And you just made Peach Muggler :)

 

This makes for a VERY sweet, extreeemely indulgent mugful of cake to treat yourself to in an evening. I love it. This recipe is super easy to make, with cheap, simple and really basic ingredients. PLUS there’s fruit in Peach Muggler… so it scores points for health in my books.

 

 

And it just tastes wonderful! It’s frothy and sugary and cinammony. Everything you need in life! Please, please… be kind to yourself, readers, and go bring Peach Muggler into your life. Keep things simple this weekend.

Froth safely,

Hayley

LEMONY LOVE

Lemon Drizzle Muffins

 

Time taken: An hour

Ingredients: 350g of self-raising flour, half a teaspoon of baking powder, a pinch of salt, 75g of light brown sugar, a lemon, 75g of butter, 2 eggs, 300ml of milk and 75g of icing sugar.

 

 

 

Hi readers,

We’ve made it through another Monday! Hurray!! Every week, I feel that this shouldn’t be taken for granted. I would like to know if more people die on Mondays than on other days of the week. It can’t be just me that feels like this could actually be true?? Mondays are tough going!

 

Today, I’ve had a rubbish one. There’s a mystery illness brewing within and it’s threatening to take me down. Symptoms: dry throat, feeling hot/cold and I have a bit of a headache. Nothing awful. But I sense a storm brewing. This definitely does not bode well.

 

But I’ve been proactive! I shuffled to the shop this morning for foods full of vitamins. Ate well. Then I holed up inside out of the cold and decided today was to be a restful day. I baked and invited Woody over with the promise of a muffin. He cheered me up!

 

As someone that panics when I’m not doing ten things at once, it’s good to speak to someone who takes a more relaxed approach to how to fill their days… this makes me feel ok about taking a day off uni work. Sort of.

 

And my muffins seem to have made lots of other people feel good! These are Lemon Drizzle Muffins and the recipe for them I found on the shift calendar at work this weekend, of all places. The calendar has a recipe for each month of the year, and this January at the airport we’re being urged to bake Lemon Drizzle Muffins. To which I say… alright!

 

Here’s how you go about baking your very own Lemon Drizzle Muffins. Of course, in ten easy steps…

1. Heat your oven to 200˚C.

2. Line a muffin tray with 12 muffin cases, and melt your butter in a small saucepan.

3. In a large mixing bowl, add your flour, baking powder, salt and sugar.

4. Grate the rind of your lemon into the bowl. And mix it all up!

ChefBeHere Top Tip: Don’t throw away your lemon! You need this later on.

5. Add your melted butter, eggs and milk to the bowl, then fold the mix together until it is smooth.

 

 

6. Spoon your mix evenly out into the muffin cases you’ve prepared and transport the tray safely into the oven, to bake for twenty minutes. 

ChefBeHere Top Tip: I filled my cases almost to the top and then some of my muffins rose so much that they overtopped their cases a little, while they baked in the oven. It was dramatic. When the muffins had baked, I had to chop off the overspill bits of muffin and feed them to my flatmates. To avoid this happening: only fill your cases until they’re about two-thirds full.

 

7. Take your muffins out of the oven when they're well-risen and golden brown.

 

8. Sift your icing sugar into a bowl and add the juice of your lemon.

9. Stir this briskly until you have a smooth, lemony mix.

10. Drizzle it over your muffins and serve them up!

Like these babies here

 

And, hey presto, you have before you a wonderful batch of muffins. These are your weapons with which to spread happiness! For you and your loved ones. These muffins are lemony gifts of love. They’re delicious!

 

So, I lost patience somewhat with my sieving and, as a result, the drizzle on my muffins is a little lumpy. Also, I don’t really know why, but my batch of muffins all seem to be very attached to their muffin cases. They don’t come out of them very easily! My flatmates have all been licking out their cases to get the last bits of muffin. And me too!

 

Does anyone out there know how to stop this from happening? It’s no real hardship having a muffin stuck to its case, of course, but you do end up with sticky fingers and crumbs on your nose!

 

If anyone has any suggestions for how to avoid this, please send them over. And do enjoy your muffins, everyone. Ready… set… BAKE!!!

Sift safely,

Hayley