Cheese & Onion Loaf

We saw on twitter that the Box Bakery were selling #GlutenFree mixed packs containing bread and chocolate cake. Always on the look out for simple bakes, particularly bread, we placed an order. It was speedily delivered and the contents seemed tempting... and more importantly, required just warm water to be added!

Looking at the bread options, we decided to try the white bread mix. We thought that it would be nice tweaked with the addition of cheese and onion. 

To make the onion, a medium red onion was sliced thinly and fried in oil until it was starting to look transparent. It was then taken off the heat and left to cool. The cheese (we used Red Fox vintage red leicester) was grated.  

The instructions on the Box Bakery packaging were then followed. 

Opening the box on the corner, the lukewarm water was added. Having shaken the box as instructed, the lid was carefully peeled off and a fork was used to ensure the mix was fully combined.

At this point the onion and cheese was stirred into the dough and mixed through. The top of the loaf was brushed with olive oil. 

Following the instructions, the loaf was placed, in its box, in a cold oven with the temperature set for 50C, then cooking for 25minutes (a little longer than stated in the instructions to allow for the additional ingredients included in the loaf)

The oven temperature was then increased to 210C (fan) and the loaf was baked for 50 minutes.  It was checked after this time and the oven was turned off, leaving the loaf in the hot oven for a further 10 minutes. 

Taking the loaf out of the oven, it was left to cool.

Finally, it was removed from the box and sliced... 

We thoroughly enjoyed the bread and it was very good toasted as well. The concept of Bake in the Box is very good for easy, cupboard options...and also for those who aren’t #GlutenFree but want to offer pals who are a home baked and SAFE bread! I will be making sure my mum has a box for our next trip to see her 😉

Pear and Honey Polenta Cake

A while back (early 2011 I think), when Something for the Weekend was on BBC2 on a Sunday morning, we watched Simon Rimmer make this cake... and, ever vigilant for all items Gluten Free, we noticed there was no gluten in the recipe. Yippee! Another cake for us to try.

The first time this was made, we stuck to the recipe to the letter (a rarity in this kitchen) and the resultant cake was HUGE.  Also, the pear prep was "a bit of a faff" so, being lazy, we now came up with an alternative.  We also only make half the quantity that's listed in Simon's recipe... I would link to it on the BBC website but it seems to have disappeared (perhaps at the same time as the show?)  Instead we've taken a pic of the sheet we printed off and, hopefully, it's legible.

In case not, here are the ingredients in Simon's recipe:-
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450g/1lb pears, peeled and chopped

500g/4oz unsalted butter

50ml/1¾fl oz honey

450g/1lb caster sugar

450g/1lb ground almonds

6 free-range eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 lemon, zest only

225g/8oz polenta

pinch salt

1½ tsp baking powder

As is the routine, we set about getting all the ingredients out.  You will see we have a tin of pears in the line up.  This is one of the 'tweaks' to Simon's recipe we now use.  One tin of pears, drained, contains the amount needed for the half recipe we make up.  Much easier than using fresh pears and we get consistent results too.

Remember, we make HALF the quantity shown in the ingredients list above.  If you make the full amount you will need a BIG mixing bowl or stand mixer.

Having allowed the butter to reach room temperature, it was creamed with the sugar until it became lighter in colour.  Whilst this was happening, the tinned pears were drained and put in a small pan with the honey and 25g of the butter and heated through.  They were then mashed and left to one side to cool a little.

Once the butter and sugar were combined, the ground almonds were added and mixed.  This is the point where our ancient electric hand mixer starts to groan about nearing retirement age.  The mix at this stage is like a stiff porridge and adding the beaten eggs, one at a time does loosen it slightly.  Then the polenta, baking powder, salt, lemon zest and vanilla extract were incorporated... we use a silicone spatula for this.  After this, the mashed pear mix was added and mixed through.

Finally, it was time to share the mix between 3 individual mini loaf tins and 14 cupcake/muffin cases.  They were then baked in a preheated (160ªC) oven and checked after 25 minutes (using a skewer), returned to the oven and checked again 5 minutes later.  It's quite a wet mix and the moisture content of the pears does vary, so checking regularly rather than relying on set times works best with this recipe.

Once today's baked cakes were declared 'done' by Sous Chef J (having inspected the skewer prodding process) they were left to cool, in their baking tins, on a wire rack.

Simon's recipe uses a 2lb loaf tin and says to cook for 45-55 minutes but the first time we made the cake, it took well over an hour to be baked through.  And, as you can see, we used a round cake tin so perhaps that was the reason why?!

Lemon Drizzle Loaf

Inspired by seeing a tweet from @utterlyscrummy about her baking and looking at her blogpost, we decided to give the recipe she posted a try with gluten free flour.

The recipe calls for the following ingredients -
200g softened butter
200g caster sugar
200g self raising flour, sifted (we used Dove's Farm Gluten Free Self Raising flour)
3 free range eggs (we used medium eggs)
finely grated zest of 1 lemon
for the lemon drizzle:
Juice of the zested lemon
50g of sugar  (add 5g more if you used a rather large lemon)

After gathering the above ingredients, Sous Chef J set about creaming the butter and sugar... for once, he was happy to give it a go with our electric hand mixer (this may have something to do with the promise of "cook's reward" of licking the beaters at the end of mixing).  He made a good effort and managed to handle the mixer quite well.

He then grated the zest of the lemon and mixed this into the creamed butter and sugar.

Next we added in the flour - about one third at a time, with one of the eggs - and mixed some more.  By the end of this time, the mix was quite firm so Sous Chef J had swapped back to being photographer.





Finally, the cake mix was dolloped into a pre-lined (we use the ready made loaf tin liners) tin. the mix was evened out before the loaf was put into a warm oven (170C fan) for 40 minutes. It was checked with a knife at this point but was still very batter-like so it was left in the oven for a further 10minutes (obviously this stage depends on your cooker and the ingredients/tin you've used so you need to keep an eye on it).  After this time, we turned the oven off but left the loaf in for a further five minutes.  It was then removed to cool slightly in the tin.

The lemon drizzle mix was prepared using the juice of the lemon and sugar.  It was poured over the warm cake which we'd 'stabbed' all over.  Then we had to be patient and let it cool a little more before we could eat it!

Having waited as long as we could, we cut a slice of cake each and were delighted at the light, lemony lusciousness we were rewarded with!  Sous Chef J did comment that "we've used too much baking powder" having seen that the middle had sunk... however, this will have been the result of our frugal oven use as we also cooked 2 pizzas and a tray of coconut biscuits so the oven door was opened a few times.  Anyway, to use a favourite phrase of Sous Chef J ""it all goes the same in your tummy; YUM." So we weren't put off by the saggy bit... in fact it absorbed the drizzle very well indeed.

Banana Bread

Sous Chef J was delighted to get a SUSTRANS leaflet through the post about Free Range Kids.  In it he quickly spotted a Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall recipe for Banana Bread and, eyeing up the spotty bananas on the windowsill, he asked if we could bake it.  Taking a look at the ingredients, I agreed, although we did have to swap the apricots in the recipe for dates... and, of course, the self raising flour was substituted by Dove's Farm Gluten Free Self Raising Flour.

With Sous Chef J firmly in charge, preparation commenced.  He got the ingredients together and weighed out the things that were needed. So, we assembled 75g sultanas, one lemon, 100g soft unsalted butter, 125g sugar (recipe says caster, we had granulated), 2 large eggs, 3 large ripe bananas, 200g self raising flour (we used Dove's Farm Gluten Free Self Raising) and 75g dried dates (although recipe says ready to eat apricots!).

Then Sous Chef J moved onto the task of making the dates the same size as sultanas... but was surprisingly adept at the task and completed it without a moan!




The sultanas and dates were placed into little pots (a la MasterChef) and I was told to cream the butter and sugar.  Next an egg was added to the butter/sugar mix and combined well before repeating with the remaining egg.  At this point, the dried fruit and lemon zest were added and mixed in.

Sous Chef J then mashed the three bananas and added them to the mix.  Finally, the sifted Gluten Free Self Raising flour was carefully combined using a metal spoon. 

Next, the whole lot was added to the lined loaf tin and placed in the pre-heated oven.  As we were cooking other things in the oven, the temperature was higher (at 180ºC) than the recipe's stated 160ºC so we have a rather more brown outer loaf than would be expected!

Mmmmm... lovely Banana Bread

We checked it after 50 minutes but returned it for another 15 minutes as the inserted knife came out with cake mix on... then checked again, repeating until the knife blade came out clean.  In the end it was baked for about an hour and a quarter.  It was cooled in the tin for 15 minutes, then turned onto a wire cooling rack.

Delicious!  And well worth the wait.

Update - 7 October

Today we found ourselves with three VERY ripe bananas so Sous Chef J thought another batch of Banana Bread would be a good way to use them up.  I had other ideas and convinced him to try making muffins instead.  So, we agreed on a mix of muffins and mini muffins. The mix was shared between 12 muffin cases and 6 mini muffin cases.  The mini muffins were cooked for about 10 minutes, whereas the muffins took around 20 minutes.  Here are some pictures to show the results.

 

These are some ready to be frozen as we like to be prepared with Gluten Free goodies!