Sunday 20 December 2009

Espresso Ice Cream Pie

This is so ridiculously tasty and so easy to do, becouse you dont have to bake or whisk anything really, you just make the base in a foodprossessor, spread the softened ice cream over and pour the fudge on top. You can flavor and change this pie however you like and the possibilities are endless. You can use whatever flavor ice cream you like for example coffie, chocolate, strawberry, caramell......you get the idea . And you can flavor the fudge with cardomom or brandy or espresso coffie or or.......or or or....Cover the pie with clingfilm film and a double layer of foil and the pie will hold for 6 months in the freezer.

375g digestive biscuits
75g soft unsalted butter
50g dark chocolate
50g milk chocolate

1 1/2 L vanilla ice cream
2 shots espresso, cooled
300g golden syrup
100g brown sugar sugar
pinch of sea salt
75g butter
125ml double cream

Process the biscuits with the butter and chocolate until it forms a damp but still crumb-like clump. Press into a 23cm pie plate or flan dish. Form a lip of biscuit a little higher than the plate or dish if you can. This process takes patience as you need ideally to form a smooth even layer….. Sorry. Freeze this biscuit-lined layer for about an hour so it gets really hard.
In the meantime, let your ice cream soften in the fridge, then stir in the cooled espresso. Spread the ice cream into the hard-biscuit-lined dish to form a layer. Then cover in clingfilm and replace in the freezer.

Put the syrup, sugar, salt and butter into a saucepan and let it melt over a low to medium heat, before turning it up and boiling for 5 minutes, then turn off the heat and add the bourbon, letting it hiss in the pan. Add the cream and stir to mix into a sauce, then leave to cool. Once the sauce is cool pour it over the pie to cover the ice cream layer and then put it back in the freezer. Once frozen, cover with clingfilm again.

When ready to serve, remove from the freezer, take the whole pie out of its dish and cut into slices.

Sunday 13 December 2009

Gingerbread Hotcake


150g flour
100g light muscovado sugar, plus 200g extra
1 teaspoon baking powder
2 teaspoons ground ginger
2 teaspoons mixed spice
125ml full-fat milk
60ml vegetable oil
1 egg
6 teaspoons butter
500ml boiling water


1.Preheat oven to 220°C and place a baking sheet on the shelf. Put water on to boil.
2.Mix together the flour, 100g of the sugar, the baking powder, 1 teaspoon of the ground ginger, 1 teaspoon of the mixed spice, and the milk, oil and egg.
3.Put into a greased baking dish
4.In another bowl, mix together the remaining 200g of sugar with the remaining teaspoons each of mixed spice and ground ginger, and sprinkle over the batter in its baking dish. Dot the butter on top and pour the boiling water over the mixture.......I know it´s strange but it works:)
5.Put the dish on the baking sheet in the oven for 30 minutes. Let stand for 10 minutes before serving, and make sure you scoop out the sauce beneath the sponge in the dish.

Sunday 6 December 2009

Christmas Florentines

Why not give something you made yourself for christmas this year, like these christmas florentines. I think it´s always a special thing when you get something from someone that has put in some effort and creativity into a present. You could make some homemade vanilla sugar like i gave my mom and dad last cristmas where you pulse 4 vanillapods with 1kg of sugar in a foodprocessor, some red wine chocolate truffles which I will do this christmas or saffran pears in a jar where you add 0.5g of saffran to 1 can of pears and put it in a nice jar wich everybody would like to eat with some vanilla ice cream.

100g special K cornflakes, bashed into fine crumbs
90g flaked almonds
50g dried blueberries
50g dried apricot, chopped
397g condensed milk
300g milk chocolate
60g dessicated coconut


Heat the oven to 180˚C and line a baking tray with a sheet of baking parchment. Put the crushed cornflakes, almonds, blueberries and apricots in a bowl and mix well together. Stir in the condensed milk until all the ingredients are sticky. Spoon tablespoons of the mixture onto the sheet and leave some room for spreading. Flatten each spoonful with the back of the spoon and bake for 10-12 minutes until golden brown.

Melt the chocolate over simmering water. When the cookies are cool, spoon or brush the base of the cookies with the melted chocolate and dip in the dessicated coconut. Leave until the chocolate has set and serve or put in a box as presents. Will keep for 5 days in a airtight container.