Slow Cooker Jacket Potatoes

 One of Sous Chef J's favourite meals is jacket potatoes and we wondered whether we could use our slow cooker to make them... so we gave it a try.

First of all, we placed a little scrunched up tin foil in the base of the cooker then arranged six mid sized potatoes around the slow cooker.  The lid was placed on (it needs to be a snug fit to stop water/heat escaping.)

The cooker was set to high... and, as we needed the potatoes for lunchtime, we left them on high for about four hours and they were done.

This is what the cooker looked like at during cooking... you can see that there is quite a lot of moisture inside the cooker. Some has also escaped out.



Here is what the potatoes looked like after cooking.  They are moist and soft.  The points where the potatoes touched the ceramic pot were crisp.

The pot was switched off at this stage and care was taken removing the potatoes as they are hot and very soft.  We found some tongs worked well.

A good amount of butter and some freshly ground black pepper were added and our meal was ready.

We have tried this when going out for the afternoon - starting the cooking off on high for about an hour and then reducing to low for the remainder of the cooking time.  We find 4-5 hours will cook the potatoes through but, obviously, that depends on their size and also the power of the cooker.  Ours is a very basic, 3 litre cooker with settings labelled as High, Low and Warm.

Christmas Chocolate Stirrers

We came across some chocolate stirrers in a shop whilst out Christmas shopping and Sous Chef J wanted to make some of his own.  Luckily, we already had a silicone ice cube tray with a festive theme so we wondered if we would be able to make use of it.

It was important to source some white chocolate that was actually meant to melt.  Having looked closely at the offerings in the cake decorating aisle at the supermarket, we went for some chocolate chips from Silverspoon.  The packet mentioned melting and gave directions so that was a start, at least!

Having put the choc chips into ceramic bowls, we placed them into a container of hot (not boiling) water and used a spatula to stir them.  Miracle of miracles, they melted.

Next it was onto filling the silicone tray with the melted chocolate.  We did the white chocolate snowmen and snowflakes first.  Then moved onto the dark chocolate for the stockings, trees and bells.

We then added cake pop sticks... this was a delicate task as we needed to make sure the chocolate was firm enough to take the sticks without being too hard to get them in.

Whilst we waited for the chocolate to set fully, we sorted out which sprinkles would be used to decorate our stirrers.  Sugar stars and sugar strands from Morrisons as well as Dr Oetker chocolate stars were what Sous Chef J chose.

 This is what the fully cooled chocolates looked like.






We then warmed them over hot water and placed them in the decorations before being placed in paper petit four cases.  To make individual gifts for Sous Chef J's pals, the chocolate stirrers were put in a cellophane bag which was tied with Christmas themed ribbon.

 

Rudolph Cupcakes

Feeling in festive mood we decided to make an attempt at some cupcake decorating.

To get started we made a batch of Dove's Farm victoria sponge cake (our blog about this is here) This mix was then divided between 12 bun cases and baked at 170ºC for about 15-20 minutes.   Once the cakes had cooled thoroughly, they were topped with some chocolate icing.  

Then, some antlers were prepared by cutting curly wurly bars.


Then the decorating began - we used chocolate vermicelli and other suitable cake decorations to create our Rudolphs.

We made some with our visitors and then they were given a special (recycled) pot to take their creations home with them!

It was a lovely activity that, with a little forward planning, resulted in some pretty handsome looking Rudolph cakes!