American style banana pancakes

I have much love for pancakes and believe their consumption shouldn’t be confined purely to Shrove Tuesday. Both American hotcakes and crepes make a fine pudding as well as a weekend-worthy breakfast and are actually very quick to make.

This recipe was the result of listening to Jack Johnson’s Chasing Dreams album. In one of the songs he sings about banana pancakes, and, as this was shortly after my experimental foray into making banana bread (one of the most heavenly cakes ever devised) and Nick had decided that bananas weren’t actually public enemy number one after all, I whipped up a batch American-style and was pleasantly surprised!

You can make these and stack them on a plate under tin foil to keep warm so that you don’t have to gobble them straight from the pan (unless you want to of course!) they wont stick together. All you need is lots of maple syrup, maybe some chocolate ice cream too if you’re having them for pudding.

Ingredients:

• 2 eggs
• 300ml milk (any kind)
• 2tsp baking powder
• 250gms plain flour
• 1tsp caster sugar
• 2tbsp butter, plus 2tsp for frying
• 1 very ripe banana (even black ones are fine)
• Toppings of your choice

Method

1. Put all the ingredients except the 2 tsp butter in a blender and blitz until smooth.
2. Heat a heavy bottom frying pan on the hob until very hot and get a plate and some foil ready to receive the pancakes.
3. Add 1 tsp butter, roll around the pan and dollop on 2-3tbsp of batter per pancake- you should be able to cook two or three in the pan at the same time, see photos.
4. When the batter starts to bubble and looks golden underneath flip the pancakes over with a spatula and cook for 1 minute on the other side. They will cook a lot faster as the pan gets hotter so be vigilant or they will burn!
5. Once cooked, transfer to the plate and cover with foil to keep hot. Repeat until all the batter has been used. You will probably get 15 pancakes from these ingredients.
6. Smother with toppings and eat while hot!

kitchen garden (up the road)

I have just acquired a lovely garden to grow my own fruit and veg via the Landshare scheme website http://www.landshare.net/ I plan to get digging this weekend and will add a "whats growing" page to my blog as soon as its up and running

The perfect cupcake

My mum has used this recipe for making cupcakes/ fairycakes and sponge cakes for as long as I can remember. I think she may have got it from the recipe book which came with our old food processor. She inherited both from my grandmother Barbara in the late 80s early 90s and from what I can understand Barbara also had the book and machine at least 10 years so it’s a miracle it wasn’t lost at some point really (we only got rid of the processor two years ago when it finally packed up!)

Still, the recipe has endured, and it's really very easy to remember- I can make it off by heart now, as can my sister Nikki. It makes approximately 12-16 cupcakes depending on how generous you are with the batter and the quantities can be doubled to make a Victoria sponge or 30 cupcakes if you like.

A lot of people balk when I say that the recipe uses margarine instead of butter- do not fear!!- The margarine is lighter than butter and has less saturated fat which gives the cakes a melt-in-your-mouth ethereal quality. I promise you will never taste a lighter or fluffier cake. I have always used Flora (just the normal stuff) but I know Nikki has used supermarket own brand marg before and had perfect results.

You can either make these in a food processor, in which case you will have a perfect bowl of cake batter in literally 5 minutes- just add the ingredients in the same order as below, processing and scraping round the edges with each addition, or you can do it by hand using a spoon, or with a hand mixer which takes a few minutes longer but works just as well.

Either way, make sure you scrape the bowl and lick the spoon once its empty, it’s the best bit!

Ingredients

• 4oz/ 200gms self raising flour
• 4oz margarine
• 4oz caster sugar (don’t use granulated it just doesn’t work)
• 2 large eggs
• 2 tsp vanilla extract/ essence
• If you would rather make chocolate cakes replace 1-1.5oz flour with cocoa powder
• Cupcake cases

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees C, or175 degrees C if you have a fan oven, or gas mark 5-6 if you have a gas oven.
2. Get a baking tray ready and lay out your cupcake cases. You can either use a tray with hollows for the cakes to sit in like those used for Yorkshire puddings, in which case just use one case for each cake, or if you’re using a flat baking tray double up on the cake cases to avoid spillages- I have ended up with a big cake puddle in the past!
3. In a large bowl cream together the caster sugar and margarine until pale and fluffy, this will take a few minutes, start slow until they’re well incorporated or the sugar will go everywhere, you can beat harder once there’s no loose sugar in the bowl.
4. Add the eggs one by one, beating hard, don’t worry if it starts to look a bit like curdling at this point once the flour’s in it will all be ok.
5. Fold in the flour using a big metal spoon. Do this in a figure of eight, running the spoon around the edge of the bowl occasionally until it looks well mixed and smooth. This is the part where you are getting lots of air in to the mixture so don’t be tempted to beat the batter or over mix it or your cakes will sink and go soggy during baking.
6. Fold in the vanilla essence and divide the mixture between the cases. I would suggest 1 ½ tsps of mixture for each case so you don’t end up with giant hefalumps of cakes. You may need to fill 12 cases then bake a batch before retrieving the tray and putting the other four into bake- this is fine the batter will keep ok for ½ hour. If you’re using two trays and baking the cakes on separate shelves in the oven, be aware that those higher up will cook faster, you may need to rotate them halfway through cooking.
7. Bake for 12-15mins until golden and springy to touch. If in doubt, poke a knife into a cake (you will just have to eat this one yourself) - it will come out clean if it’s cooked. If not give them a few more minutes.
8. Cool on a wire rack and ice with buttercream icing or icing sugar (made up according to instructions on the packet) and sprinkle with your choice of decorations while still wet.

p.s. im afraid i cant take credit for the beauties in the picture above, but this recipe will make ones almost identical- i will post my own pics very soon

Cannellini bean salad with lemon and tuna

Another packed lunch hero! I found this recipe, albeit a slightly different version, in Jo Pratt’s book “In the mood for food”. It’s a really excellent read (it will make you hungry though!) and the recipes work perfectly.

I added a few changes: swapping the cherry tomatoes for sundried, omitting the rocket, changing the dressing a little… it’s not far from the original, just adapted to my taste, as I’d advise you to do. It makes enough for three lunches and keeps very well.

The nice thing about this recipe is that if you can’t find a particular ingredient or if you want to add extras you can. There’s been a few occasions when I couldn’t find cannellini beans and so substituted butter beans or kidney beans (it was Sunday night and there was nothing else in the cupboard!) and they worked surprisingly well.

You can use pretty much any flavour olives you like- black or green- just not those hideous, flavourless little rings of olives in brine that you get from a jar- urgh! I’ve also forgotten to buy a lemon before and added a handful of finely chopped coriander instead (see photo) and it was still good.

Ingredients:

• 1 can of cannellini beans (normal sized can)
• 1 small can of tuna chunks in sunflower oil
• 8-10 sundried tomatoes (the kind that come in a jar in oil- sometimes labelled antipasti)
• ¼ of a cucumber
• Handful olives, stones removed (any kind you like)
• 1 lemon
• 3-4 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• Salt and pepper to taste

Method

1. Open the cans and, using a sieve, drain the tuna and beans (you can chuck them both in together it doesn’t matter)
2. Chop the cucumber in to quarters lengthways and dice
3. Remove the tomatoes from the oil and chop in to bit sized pieces
4. Throw all in to a big bowl with the olives and mix!
5. Dress with the oil and season to taste (go easy on the salt). Grate in the zest of the lemon then slice it in half and squeeze out the juice in to the salad
6. Mix and check it tastes nice. Divide between three lunchboxes and refrigerate until needed.

Salad version of the chicken tagine

I loved the chicken tagine so much that I decided to make a salad version of it for my lunch box!

I am on the never ending quest to find interesting things for lunch, and having spent most of my school years with sandwiches (plain tuna mayonnaise please, no butter) in my Forever Friends packed lunch box I have somewhat gone off of them- there are some very nice ones out there and I certainly wouldn’t say no to an M&S special occasionally- but sandwiches are fairly low down my list of preferred lunch time meals.

The result is that I usually end up carting in leftovers to work from dinner the night before, or whip up a salad from whatever’s hanging about in the fridge. I also resent having to spend ages of an evening making things for lunch the next day and so tend to make food in batches. It does mean that I end up eating the same thing two or three days in a row, but if it’s tasty enough this can be a bonus!

With this in mind I’ve given quantities which will make approximately three servings. I keep those little plastic tubs that Chinese takeaways come in, dishwasher them then use them to carry food for lunch, so it will make you about three of those.

There’s also no garlic in this recipe as I didn’t want to breathe it all over my colleagues but, as always, the addition is your choice! Just put a finely chopped clove in at the roasting phase should the urge take you. Some olives would also be nice.

Ingredients

• 2 large chicken thighs, skin on or off- whatever you prefer
• 1 bulb fennel
• 2 small onions
• 2 preserved lemons (deseeded and finely chopped)
• Small bunch of fresh coriander finely chopped
• Salt and pepper
• 3 tbsp olive oil
• 200gms couscous
• 250ml chicken stock at boiling temperature

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 175-200 degrees C depending on the ferocity of your particular model.
2. Chop the fennel bulb in to eights lengthways then in to bite size chunks if any pieces are too large. Peel and quarter the onions and place all the veg in to a roasting tin.
3. Place the chicken thighs on top, season well and drizzle with a little olive oil.
4. Bake in the oven for 40-45mins or until the juices run clear when you pierce the chicken. Leave to cool completely (you can leave it overnight if this helps and assemble the salad the next morning, just make sure to cover the food with a clean cloth while its cooling)
5. Put the couscous in to a bowl, pour over the boiling chicken stock and cover with some clingfilm or a plate for 10 mins. Then give the couscous a stir to fluff it up and leave to get cold.
6. Mix the fennel, onions, lemons and coriander in to the couscous. Pull all the meat from the chicken thighs in to bite sized pieces and add in.
7. Have a taste, season if necessary and drizzle over the remainder of the oil. Put in to pots and refrigerate until required (mine kept in the fridge for four days)