ALL LOVED UP!

It's that time of year again - and I was trying to remember my most romantic meal.  Hands down it has to be breakfast in bed, the fact that your loved one is willing to leave the warm nest extra early to make you feel cherished - what can be better??

What foods do I associate with romance? Chocolate, berries, cream and for some strange reason lavender (go figure!!) all come to mind.  I decided to stick with the first three on my list (and actually replaced the cream (not so good first thing) with some luscious greek yogurt.  So how do I get my chocolate fix at breakfast time?  Well I'm perfectly capable of diving into a chocolate cake at any time of the day or night, but I imagine that there are more normal people than me out there (?),  so I decided to experiment with my favourite pancakes; I added some cocoa powder to the batter (yuk!), then some chocolate chips went in (see the hardships I go through?!) but the texture wasn't wonderful, then the trusty Nutella came out - and yummmmmm, perhaps not the prettiest thing to come out of the kitchen, but man oh man were they delicious!  And how romantic to delicately nibble (yeah right) some chocolate pancakes, oozing with creamy yogurt and tangy raspberries - just a pity you have to get up and bring the kids to school!

I am of course linking this with the lovely Kate and Karen's Tea Time Treats Challenge because pancakes aren't just for breakfast!!

Loved Up Pancakes

Make up one batch of this pancake batter
Add one large tbsp of Nutella (I had to heat mine, the kitchen was very chilly that early in the morning!)
Fry in butter.
Cut into heart shapes, if you are so inclined.
Serve with a dollop of greek yogurt and your favourite berries.
If it's not a driving day throw a bottle of fizz in there too :-)))


Happy St. Valentine's Day.

TIME FOR A TEA TIME TREAT

There's a new challenge on the blogging block, and I love a good challenge, so I was delighted when two exceptional bloggers came together to invite us to tea .... well to Tea Time Treats, and this month Karen has invited us to prepare something delicious using ginger, happy days - my all time favourite ingredient (along with all my other favourite ingredients!!!), not so happy days - I am really trying to cut down on the goodies so I can really pig out in December!!!!

So now my challenge was to make something delicious containing ginger BUT also something that I wouldn't devour (yes, that is the state of my will power these days) ........... it had to be dried fruit, loved by all the family but not by me!!!

I turned to Lilly Higgins' Make Bake Love (it's just so pretty) and decided to play around with her Tea Brack recipe, obviously adding some ginger in there, but I also simplified it by using a luxury fruit mix rather than the individual fruits she suggested - it went down a treat, and was just the stop gap needed before the Christmas Pudding Season started (the consumption of Christmas puddings in this house is a story for another day!).

Tea Brack
adapted from Lilly Higgins' Make Bake Love

300ml           hot strong tea
360g             luxury fruit mix
100g             chopped stoned dried dates
1                   egg
225g             self raising flour
150g             brown sugar
3 tbsp           Cointreau or your favourite alcohol
1 1/2 tsp       mixed spice
1 tsp             ginger
2                   knobs of crystallised ginger

Preferably the day before, but for as long as possible -  soak the fruit in the tea.

Preheat oven to 180 C
Line a loaf tin with parchment paper or butter it.

Add the ginger, beaten egg, flour and sugar to the fruit and mix well.
Add the Cointreau and spices and mix again.
Spoon into the prepared tin and bake for 1 - 1 1/2 hours - until a skewer (or stick of dry spaghetti) comes out clean.
When perfect remove from the oven and allow to cool in the tin for 5 minutes.
Remove from tin and cool on a wire rack.

Enjoy

Thanks to Kate and Karen for this fun idea.

For my Irish readers - I was invited to this years Taste of Christmas, a huge improvement on last year's event, plenty of stalls, delicious food from some excellent restaurants, including the wonderful Bon Appetite (where I did the masterclass!!).  I went to the first of the Masterchef shows and although it had a few glitches, and a bit of nervousness it was quite good.  It would have been very good had the audience been given copies of the recipes being cooked and if Nick had lightened up on plugging his book and restaurant!!
Well worth a visit, to get you in the Christmas mood.