Giant Lamington

It is totally amazing the effect the weather can have on your mood, blue skies equals birds singing in the sun and beers on the beach with tanned beautiful people (the first of these days is okay; and then bikini …

Super Simple Sticky Toffee Pudding

This is just the most simple thing you may ever make. I feel like this pudding actually gives back more than you put in, the saint of puddings if you will, it’s there for you when you need it most. With the weather the way it is now though (30 degrees in Adelaide!) this probably isn’t what you are day dreaming about eating, but trust me on this.

This should be on man vs. food, it is ridiculously rich; in a good way. I like to coat mine in custard, but then I’ll pretty much coat anything in custard; I may or may not have eaten the remaining custard on its own the next day. Heated of course.

I am looking into buying a digital SLR camera, if you have any suggestions of brands let me know!

Nigella’s Easy Sticky Toffee Pudding

Ingredients – Pudding

• 100g dark muscovado sugar
• 175g self-raising flour
• 125ml full-fat milk
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 50g unsalted butter, melted
• 200g chopped, rolled dates, I would suggest dicing these really finely as they soften more whilst smaller.

Ingredients – Sauce

• 200g dark muscovado sugar
• Approx. 25g unsalted butter in little blobs
• 500ml boiling water

Recipe

Serves: 6-8.

1. Preheat the oven to 190°C and butter a 11/2-litre capacity pudding dish.
2. Combine the 100g dark muscovado sugar with the flour in a large bowl. Pour the milk into a measuring jug, beat in the egg, vanilla and melted butter and then pour this mixture over the sugar and flour, stirring – just with a wooden spoon – to combine. Fold in the dates then scrape into the prepared pudding dish. Don’t worry if it doesn’t look very full: it will do by the time it cooks.
3. Sprinkle over the 200g dark muscovado sugar and dot with the butter. Pour over the boiling water (yes really!) and transfer to the oven. Set the timer for 45 minutes, though you might find the pudding needs 5 or 10 minutes more. The top of the pudding should be springy and spongy when it’s cooked; underneath, the butter, dark muscovado sugar and boiling water will have turned into a rich, sticky sauce. Serve with vanilla ice cream, crème fraîche, double or single cream as you wish.

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Strawberry Coconut Ice

Okay, I’ll admit it. I honestly didn’t know coconut ice was even a thing before last Thursday. Apparently it’s a thing, like a childhood thing. I totes missed that thing.

But it is super fun to make, and easy! Which is good, because at the moment my life looks a lot like this.

So this recipe used fun things like a deepish square pan, and baking paper!

And icing sugar – Sifted of course

And of course coconuts, I’m still working on a coconut pun.

Don’t tell me my hand looks fat, stop nodding your head in agreement! You know the saying, chubby hands…warm heart.

Then you mix it all up, and divide into 2, one of them gets vanillafied. And the second gets strawberried.

Clearly the whole situation got too much for my camera, as the photos I took have been lost forever, but you layer it up and throw (place) in the fridge!

Recipe adapted from Not Quite Nigella:

• 320g/2 cups icing sugar mixture, sifted
• 315g/3.5 cups desiccated coconut
• 395g can condensed milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• a few drops pink colouring
• 4 tablespoons strawberry sauce or strawberry purée
• A few drops strawberry extract

Grease a fairly deep pan, (smaller sizes work best) and line with baking paper.

Mix the coconut, icing sugar and condensed milk together in a bowl.

Divide mixture into two bowls.

Into the first bowl add the vanilla extract and mix, this mixture is thick, really get in there, use clean hands if necessary.

Into the second bowl mix in the purée, extract and colouring, if this gets too liquid add icing sugar and coconut in small tiny doses until this mixture has the same consistency as the first.

Then layer the prepared pan with the vanilla mix first then the strawberry mix.

Put in the fridge to set for at least 3 hours. Cut with a hot knife (run metal knife under hot water) for the best looking results.

Next post is most definitely going to be Halloween(y)(ie)? Get ready to be spoooked!