Honey Tea Loaf – Monday Made

“There is no trouble so great or grave that cannot be much diminished by a nice cup of tea.” ~Bernard-Paul Heroux

It’s nearly the end of Monday and no post yet!!

I have had a lovely afternoon of tea drinking and chatting while small people played. I did mention to the double trouble that we could bake but they were so wound up in their own imaginary world that it didn’t even register.

The baking did eventually happen. My dinner was taking much longer to cook that I thought it would and I found myself with a couple of cranky toddlers who needed entertaining.

Honey Tea Loaf is very entertaining. I saw this recipe on a kids’ cooking show called I Can Cook. It looked like a bit of fun, possibly yummy and, as an added bonus, it is dairy free.

I used French Earl Grey tea to make this, the recipe just said “decaf tea”. I don’t think there is enough caffeine in it to cause an issue. The recipe originally called for mixed fruit, but I only had sultanas. I think a little bit of orange rind would have gone nicely, though.

What you need:

• 100g sultanas
• 70ml warm tea
• 1 1/2 tbsp  honey
• 1 egg
• 150g plain flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp mixed spice

What to do:

1. Preheat oven to 180 degreesC (160 fan forced)
2. In a small bowl mix the tea and sultanas together and set aside.
3. Mix together the dry ingredients then at the eggs, sultana mix and honey until just combined.
4. Bake in a lined loaf tin for about 25 minutes and enjoy the insanely good smell coming out of your oven.
5. Allow to cool before slicing and serve with butter or Nutlex (or whatever your butter alternative of choice may be…..)

Autumnal Goodness – Monday made

This is not a Luci friendly item!! It has lashings of butter and cream!!

It is, however, gluten-free.
Made it last night for a dinner party and I was impressed! No photos though…got gobbled up too quickly.

**Made it again a week later. Just a half batch in a slightly smaller mould so it looks a little thin**

I have always been a little bit skeptical of pumpkin pie. Usually I look at the recipe and see Maple Syrup and change my mind, but this one was delightfully free of it!
Not that I don’t like Maple Syrup, I just find that it dominates, and I really like to taste pumpkin if it is in something.

This recipe is a slightly modified version of Sweet Mary’s (http://sweetmary.typepad.com/my_weblog/2010/10/pumpkin-chocolate-tart.html), but in true me style, I added more cocoa and melted the butter (because I am a bit lazy when it some to waiting for butter to soften). I also made pumpkin puree by steaming it in the microwave and then puree-ing in the food processor, we don’t have canned pumpkin puree down here in the antipodes!

ENJOY the wickedness.

Pumpkin Chocolate Pie

Chocolate Pie Case

1 cup gluten-free flour (I use Orgran)

1/4 cup sugar (heaped)

1/2 cup cocoa

1/2 tsp mixed spices

1/2 cup (approx 125g) melted salted butter

1 large egg

Preheat oven to 180 C (160 if fan forced).

Combine the flour, sugar, cocoa and spices. Add the butter and egg. Mix for a couple of minutes. It is looks really too wet to be pressed into the tart mould, then add a little bit more flour until it become crumbly.

Press the mixture into the bottom and up the sides of the tart mould. You could try and roll out the dough if you wanted to make it really even and maybe trim the edges to make it pretty. Put it in the fridge for 30 minutes.

Bake the shell until it is firm, about 15 minutes.

Pumpkin Custardy Filling

1 1/2 cups (maybe a little less) pumpkin puree

3/4 cup packed brown sugar

225ml double cream

3 large eggs

3 tsp mixed spice

Mix it all together in a food processor to make it nice and smooooooooth.

Fill pie case up to the top (doesn’t expand very much) and bake at 180 C (160 fan forced) for about 40 minutes. It should be firm around the edges and have a slight wibble in the middle.

Let it cool in the pie mould before removing.

Tastes best at room temperature with a bit of cream……..

Gluten & Dairy Free Coconut Cupcakes – Monday Made

More gluten-free stuff. My daughter seems to have out-grown her egg allergy, so there is one item off the banned list, but she still can’t tolerate gluten, dairy and soy. Soy is definitely the real killer here. It’s in all the gluten free breads and bread mixes. I HATE YOU SOY!!!

Not true, I love soy milk and tofu and soy sauce and miso paste and all kinds of soy products. I just wish Luci could too!!!

BACK ON TOPIC: This recipe is a pimped-out version of the Vanillla Muffins on the Orgran website (www.orgran.com). I use Orgran All Purpose GF flour, but I’m sure other GF flours would be just as good. I prefer vanilla extract to vanilla essence. It packs more of a punch. I would even suggest vanilla paste for even more vanilla punch!

The water measurements are a bit vague as the recipe really needs 500ml of liquids- that being made up of margarine, eggs, vanilla, coconut powder and warm water. The eggs are an unknown quantity, so I just want the entire lot to add up to 500ml. This requires you to use a measure jug with a capacity of at least 500ml and put in the melted butter, vanilla extract, eggs, coconut powder and THEN add some water to make it up to 500ml. You could leave the coconut powder out and use coconut cream instead of water, but I like the powder form as you can get a really intense coconut hit without adding lots of liquids.

I also added about 1/2 cup of craisens (you know, dried cranberries) to the batter and put a few on top for decoration. You could leave those out, or use other things. You could even put a little bit of jam in the middle and make a little jammy surprise centre!

Please check that ALL your ingredients are gluten free. You wouldn’t believe the places gluten can be hidden. In particular, check your cornflour, icing sugar and baking powder.

My buttery icing is only a guide, I’m guessing on the icing sugar amounts as I always add little bits more here and there to get the taste right for ME. If dairy is not a problem, I would use cream cheese instead of margarine.

Finally, I imagine this would make more than 12 regular cupcakes. Fill the cases 2/3, otherwise you will get overflow. I used a mixture of mini-cupcakes and slightly larger cupcake papers that stand alone without the tray. I don’t recommend these big ones. Well. Not filled right up, anyway. Ruins the cake to icing ration, if you ask me. Enjoy!

 

Dry ingredients

1 1/2 cups GF all purpose flour

4 tbs of cornflour

3 tbs of coconut milk powder

4 tsp baking powder

3/4 cup raw sugar

3 tbsp desiccated coconut

Wet ingredients

4 tbs melted dairy-free margarine (I use Nutlex)

2 eggs 1 generous tsp vanilla extract

2 tbs coconut milk powder

1 1/4 cups warm water (APPROXIMATELY)

“Buttery” Icing

2 cup or so Icing sugar

3 tbs Dairy-free margarine

3 tbs Coconut milk powder

2 tbs Lightly toasted desiccated (or shredded) coconut

Splash of water.

Dash of vanilla.

Pre-heat oven to 180 degrees C (160 degrees C for fan forced)

Sift all flours, baking powder and coconut milk powder into a bowl with the sugar and desiccated coconut.

In a jug, mix the eggs, melted butter, vanilla and coconut powder then add warm water to make it up to 500ml.

Briefly mix the liquids and dry ingredients together (try not to beat for too long or too vigorously otherwise the rising agent will do it’s party trick before you go to bake!!) then spoon into cupcake patties.

Bake for 15-18 minutes or until they spring back at touch.

Cool, ice and decorate as you please!!