Foody things from 2013

Once again, i've got a backlog of posts from the last few years that i've neglected to actual post.

This last year I've found a few things food related which don't really need a whole post to themselves and have kind of ended up straggling as a non-entity. So there are a couple of posts coming about some of the slightly random bit of food stuff I've found in the last year. I might make it a regular thing for those bits that don't fit anywhere else.

As a regular at Costco, I've many times sampled their in store hot dog and soda for lunch. For £1.50 it's a bargain and you can refill the cup after while you wander about, or leave, either way.

Recently (read sometime in autumn '13) the Reading branch started doing a chili-cheese dog. 50p extra per topping, so in essence still a bargain, but with great toppings, come great problems.

Sometimes, they can get a little more generous then usual, not that i'm one to turn down a plentiful meal, but it does sometimes become tricky to hold. Even when cut in half, napkins are required.

In the same vein as before, both of these are from imgur posts and by extension of that, reddit. but imgur is where I found them, so that can have the credit.

The first was pretty simple, why dunk oreo's in milk, when you could just have a bowl of oreo's and milk, like you would cereal. they do soak up pretty fast and in fairness they do also make an oreo's cereal. But as that's hardly widely available in the UK, this is an acceptable, and delicious substitute.

The next is somewhat more radical. Sweet potato fries, and Nutella. Yes, that's right, read it again if you need to, I'll wait.

It works, it sounds a bit mad, but it really does work well, my parents were skeptical too, then we made it, and once the Nutella melted slightly and was more dippable it worked even better.

The potato was sliced fairly thinly into chips, shallow fried in the pan (they probably need more time to crispen next time) and then have a good sized teaspoon of Nutella dropped on top. The picture was taken about half way through the bowl. Like I said, they were good!

I'll probably do a proper write up on these sometime this year, there were a few things I'd change if/when I do it again.

And finally, Showing just how long ago this was (I've moved twice since I had this kitchen). What do you do when you've got a load of odd bits and pieces of lunch and snack food. Have all of it!

Granted this was for 3 of us (I think) and it was good. Plus it's actually pretty healthy, at least in comparison to the last few things i've posted. Probably worth doing again

Not Quite the Healthy New Year

It's a new year, and I should probably make another effort to keep updates coming more regularly. So what with New Years being all about healthy eating, here's something that's not, on pintrest. 

One sheet of ready made puff pastry, because new years eve is no time for making pastry when you could be doing anything else at all. Roll it out just over a foot square, ish. Or more or less, whatever, i'm not a cop.

The original has a large bar of chocolate, but it seemed like a much better idea to use Cadbury's Caramel, but the bar is a bit smaller than the one in the video, so...

...Improvise! Splitting the bar into three strips filled out the pastry much better, but then what to do about the large gaps? Marshmallows. Always marshmallows.

Cut in at an angle and fold the ends over to hopefully stop the contents leaking everywhere.

Slice the sides in strips and fold over in a lattice, alternate sides, then egg wash the pastry.

Bake it for 10-15 minutes at 180C and then see how it looks, if it's not golden yet, give it a bit longer.

Impressively very little leaked out, although it was fairly fragile, getting it from the tray to the plate was a bit trickier than imagined, but it survived.

It was everything I wanted it to be, and the caramel and marshmallows were the right decision, as expected.

Would I make this again, yes, would I probably die early as a result, yes. Would it be worth it? Yes.

Baked Alaskan Rasberry and Chocolate Chunk Brownies with Chambord

Whilst making this cheesecake for Norway Day we had to go to Tesco to get some supplies (namely food colouring). While wandering about the home baking section I had an idea to use up some remaining raspberries which has been frozen. While i didnt plan on making it tonight, when we got back form Tesco I had a couple drinks and half midnight seemed like a perfectly reasonable idea while I waited for the cheesecake to bake.

So heres the mix,m again, its premade, but i'm going to make it better.

The remaining pot of raspberries, delicious and defrosted.

The dry mix didnt look to have many chunks, so I improvised and found some Dairy Milk minatures in the chocolate tin. You used to be able to get a dispensing machine for kids to play with for these. Mine took 2p coins and dropped out a bar for each one. You could load half a box at a time and it made it last a bit longer, until you worked out how to unload all the coins again and just run them through or take the back off. But thats no fun.

Half a pack of those chopped into thirds made a nice pile of decent sized chunks.

Again, the mix needed and egg, some oil, and some water. Instead of water I added what was left of the chambord (just over a shot) and the raspberry mess

The mix was a bit thin due to the extra liquid from the fruit, so a few teaspoons of flour were added to bulk it out. Forgetting to use the sieve was probably an error...

... But part 1 of the instructions saved the day

The cheesecake had to be cooked in a hot water bath, and the only tin I had was an oversize cake tin. This turned out to be cakemix tight, but not water tight, so the pan I intended on using for the brownies was acting as a drip tray to stop the bottom of the oven being covered in water. As it happened the leaks were far from bad and what little escaped evaporated pretty fast.

Because of this, while I was waiting to get the pan back I had more free time, and what seemed like a good idea was to use the two egg whites left over from the cheese cake and try and make a meringue. Having never done so, and it being 1AM, i elected not to use the mixer and just put in some elbow grease.

First it got whisked to a foam and then gradually added caster sugar so as not to make it collapse. After about half an hour, heres the results. Firm enough to stand the whisk in and forming soft, but fluffy peaks. First attempt and making a meringue, first success.

In the mean time of finishing the whisking to end all whisking the cheesecake stopped leaking enough to retrieve the pan and line it with baking paper. The mix went in and hid under the other try catching the drips so it didnt get wet and would crisp nicely. After 20 minutes the brownie tray came out and I decided to put a layer of the meringue on the top as they were a bit thin at the edge.

There was just enough form the two egg whites to cover it.

Finally it went back in the oven to turn the outside a golden brown.