Cheese and Chilli Whorls

Today was a 'make it' day... with not much time.  The oven was on and we needed some savoury snacks for the weekend.

A fridge audit revealed some Silly Yak pastry and grated mature cheddar... and an idea was forming.

Using half a pack of Silly Yak gluten free puff pastry, it was rolled out into a rectangle (about 3mm thick). 

The cheese was mixed with a Tablespoonful of paprika and smoked paprika, and a 'generous' sprinkle of chilli flakes.  These were then spread over the pastry, patted down and the pastry was rolled from one of the long sides... into a swiss roll shape.

Cutting the pastry roll into slices about 1.5cm thick, they were placed on a non-stick baking sheet and then put in a pre-heated hot oven (180C) for 10 minutes; they were checked and cooked for another 2 minutes until crisp and bubbling. 

Cooling them on the baking tray for a few minutes, they were removed and allowed to cool completely. 

A delicious, simple and spicy savoury treat.  Prepared and baked in 20 minutes - that's my type of cooking!

Speedy Choco Nut Rolls

Using half a pack of Silly Yak Foods gluten free puff pastry, these speedy pastries were made.

Ingredients were -

Half a pack of puff pastry
Tablespoon of Nutella, warmed
Heaped tablespoon of macadamia nuts, roughly chopped (hazelnuts could be used instead)

On a floured silicone sheet, we rolled out the puff pastry to approximately 25cm by 20cm.

Next the warmed Nutella was spread over the pastry.

The chopped nuts were sprinkled over.


Finally, using the silicone sheet to assist, the pastry sheet was rolled (from the long edge) into a long

tube.

This roll was then sliced into 8 pieces and these were placed on a non-stick baking sheet, cut side down.

The baking sheet was put in a pre-heated oven (175ºC fan) and baked for 12-17mins (check for browning and ensure pastry is cooked)

We allowed the rolls to rest on the baking sheet for about 5 minutes once out of the over.  They were then removed to a cooling rack to completely cool.

A tasty and speedy treat... which won't last long but if you need to store them, make sure they're in an airtight container. 

Rule of Crumb Garlic Bread

We'd been keeping an eye out for Rule of Crumb part-baked bread for some time... finally found it at Ocado and ordered some (it came frozen - £2.75 a loaf)

Yesterday was the day to try it... as we were having a "pasta based evening meal". 

The bread comes in a cook-in-the-bag wrapper.

It was then baked according to the pack instructions (hot oven for 15 mins) and was smelling great by the time it was removed... noting the packing is HOT when baking's done, we took care in releasing from the wrapper.

The garlic bread is pre-cut and filled with butter lengthwise.  It was lovely and crunchy and there was the perfect amount of garlic butter for our tastes.

We cut it into three chunks and shared it between us.  It was a really great accompaniment to our pasta meals and, best of all, Sous Chef J loved every crumb... even eating the crust.  We'll be re-stocking asap to have as a freezer standby!

Speedy "Danish" Pastries

Having bought some Silly Yak ready made Gluten Free puff pastry, and looking for some breakfast ideas to tempt Sous Chef J, I hit on the idea of a sort-of Danish pastry.  We've also been blackberry picking this week and had made some stewed Blackberry and Apple... a plan formed.  A very SIMPLE plan.

Ingredients -

Silly Yak Gluten Free puff pastry (half a pack)
Four tablespoons of stewed fruit
a little beaten egg

To decorate/drizzle - two tablespoons of icing sugar and a small amount of warm water (make this as thick or runny as you like... it's your choice!)

Starting with the pastry block, it was rolled out to about 5mm thickness (we do this on a silicone sheet dusted with gluten free flour). 

The pastry was then cut into four squares.

An Lshaped cut was made to opposite sides of the square, the inner square's edges were brushed with egg and the cut section was carefully folded to line up with the inner square.

The pastry shapes were then put onto a non-stick baking sheet, brushed with egg and put in the fridge to chill whilst the oven reached baking temperature.

Once chilled, about a tablespoon of the stewed fruit mix was placed in the middle of each pastry.



Baking the pastries in a preheated oven at 180ºC for 8-10minutes, we checked them and turned the sheet, baking for a further 2 minutes before removing and cooling on the baking sheet.














The pastries were then drizzled with icing as decoration, just before serving. 

Summery Sausage Salad

We heard from Sainsbury's that their Taste the Difference sausages are now all gluten free and were asked if we'd like to try some.  Of course, we said YES, please!  

Having gone into store, it was easy to see the great new packaging for the TTD sausages and made a selection of the ones Sous Chef J will eat (thin ones... aka chipolatas or cocktail sausages).

As it was a sunny weekend, we decided an 'all-in-one' sausage salad dish would be a good meal to create. Pairing the sausages with some freshly cooked charlotte potatoes, a few salad onions and a homemade dressing/sauce, we thought we'd have a simple and tasty meal for eating outdoors.

The dressing was made using store cupboard standbys -

2 Tablespoons tomato ketchup
2 Tablespoons cider vinegar
1 Tablespoon grainy mustard
1 Tablespoon honey

All this was mixed together and half of the sliced salad onions were added.

The sausages were separated and added to a hot frying pan to cook through.

Adding half of the sauce to the sausages and cooking to make it sticky...

.... whilst the sausages were cooking, the charlotte potatoes were boiled.  Once cooked and drained, the potatoes were put in a bowl and the remainder of the sauce was poured over and stirred through.

Finally, the sausage and sauce mix was added to the potatoes, stirred and the remaining onions were sprinkled over.

The sausage salad was delicious!

We'll definitely be adding TTD Sausages to our shopping list... and particularly liked the "snap and keep" packaging - allowing half the sausages to be saved for another day/frozen.

DISCLOSURE - we were sent a gift card by Sainsbury's to be used for buying sausages and ingredients for this recipe.  The recipe and opinions in this post are our own.

Pizza Express Cook at Home Margherita Pizza

We were very excited when we learnt that Pizza Express were finally bringing out a Gluten Free pizza to be sold alongside their other chiller cabinet offering... admittedly, only being stocked in Sainsbury's at the moment. 

The pizzas were launched in certain stores last week and our Saturday supermarket shop revealed a disappointingly empty 'slot' for the product.  Not to be dissuaded, we went to another store on Monday and were successful in locating stock... trying to be reasonable,  and leave some for others, we bought three pizzas (selling at £4 each).

Sous Chef J was delighted when he was shown the packs... and requested a 'speedy taste test'... which was easy to deliver!

We checked the cooking instructions, pre-heated the oven to 200ºC, unpackaged the pizzas and cooked them for 7 minutes.  Checking them we decided they needed a little longer to brown and set the timer for a further 2 minutes.

Removing them from the oven there was the 'classic' Pizza Express aroma and it wasn't long before SCJ was happily diving in and getting his hands dirty....

The pizza is about 10" in diameter.

VERDICT: Just like in the restaurant, the topping is tasty, the base is thin and crispy and the pizza didn't last long!  Perfect for a quick and easy teatime.

We sincerely hope Sainsbury's are able to keep the pizzas in stock in the chillers... and that we aren't disappointed by poor reliability of availability.  We'll definitely buy again and will stock our freezer next time.

Marks and Spencer's Made Without Wheat 2016

Marks and Spencer have a much larger range of "Made Without" products... and many of them are Made Without Wheat (MWW).  The aim of this blogpose is to provide details about a few that have made Sous Chef J ask for "more, please!", as well as others.

There are NEW chiller cabinet items - including pasta ready meals - supplementing the range. We have now tried the Macaroni Cheese, Spaghetti Bolgnese and Lasagne.   They are all tasty and we choose to oven cook our ready meals (SCJ asked what a ready meal was - which indicates how rare such an item is in this household)

Sous Chef J particularly "LOVED" the Rhubarb Crumble and also the Strawberry Trifle (which he will devour at one sitting, given the chance).

Servings of crumble and trifle tend not to last long... 

Also in the MWW range, there is a lovely Apple Pie and a New York Cheesecake... don't be fooled by the size of the cheesecake - each morsel is packed with calories and we struggled to eat the (small sized) cake between three of us.


Picnic items are also in evidence - with a Quiche Lorraine and a Cheese and Onion Quiche.  Sous Chef J doesn't like the Scotch Eggs but we do... and we've tried the Sausage Rolls too.
 

Always a favourite are the Salmon Fishcakes and the Chicken (and mushroom - don't tell SCJ) crispbakes.  These are often on offer at two packs (of 2) for £3.

In the ambient section, there's a good offering of cakes and bread (mostly).  Crumpets and cake mixes, plus pasta are also stocked.





SCJ favours the MWW White Boule and will eat the lot... we had to try the MWW Brown Bloomer (£3 for 6 slices - eye watering!) but he wasn't keen... even dressed up with cheese and chutney as sarnies.

Overall, we appreciate the increased range very much but still make a plea for "RELIABILITY OF AVAILABILITY"... without this it's difficult to rely on being able to buy products (in ALL M&S food halls)... after all, we can't spend our money on items if the goods aren't on the shelves!

PS In addition to the MWW range, there are still plenty of 'mainstream' products marked with a glutenfree symbol - the grill range and tortilla chips are go-to items for us too.  We love M&S for this!