Chocolate Hazelnut and Coconut Spread

Ingredients:
* 100g dark chocolate
* 300g hazelnuts
* 50g desiccated coconut
* 1 tbsp vanilla paste
* 1/2 tsp salt

Instructions:
Preheat the oven to 180c. Weigh out your hazelnuts, evenly spread them on a baking tray and pop in the oven to roast for 10-12 minutes. Once they're done, place them on a tea towel to cool slightly. To get the skins off of the nuts, fold over the tea towel over the nuts and roll around to try and get the skins off! (This should happen quite easily, but if you need to, use your fingers!) It doesn't need to be perfect, but removing the skins will make the spread smoother!

Pop the hazelnuts in the food processor and process until you have formed a hazelnut butter - this can take a while but it is so worth it! Once you have a smooth butter, melt the chocolate and add to the processor. Also add the vanilla paste (you can use extract if you don't have paste!), desiccated coconut and salt and blitz up together until everything is properly combined. Pop it in a clean jar and store at room temperature - this should last for 2-3 weeks!

#TaDah

We made sausage rolls

Last week Scoff released a video on their channel with Richard Burr (last years Great British Bake Off finalist) where he shared his recipe for homemade sausage rolls. You can watch the recipe here.

Straight away we loved the sound of these, they looked really simple to make. The next weekend, we were heading to a 1st birthday party, and thought it would be the perfect opportunity to try them out.

Matthew made them, and they turned out brilliantly. We were missing harissa paste, but we attempted to make our own into the mix with dried coriander, garlic and a little extra chilli flakes (forgetting to add some balsamic vinegar). After the baking they were a little spicy, it was quite a nice edge to them. But that's what you get with homemade creations, something unique.

Some behind the scenes

At the party everyone loved them, even after we explained they could be a little spicy, no one had complaints. Just lots of compliments. A total winner! We will definitely make these again.

It seems sausage rolls are a big thing at the moment in the food world, noticing the lads over at Sortedfood making them own gourmet version, and the big man Jamie Oliver had a batch in an issue of Time Out.

If you want to try out the batch we made then watch the recipe on Scoff that we mentioned earlier. Click here.

Sortedfood's Gourmet Sausage Rolls

Lemon Curd Cupcakes

Ingredients (Makes 30):
* 240g caster sugar
* 240g unsalted butter
* 240g self raising flour
* 4 eggs
* Zest of 2 lemons
* Half a lemon's juice
* Half a jar of lemon curd
* Icing sugar

Instructions:
Preheat your oven to 200c. Pop the sugar in a large bowl and add the butter in small chunks, using a electric whisk to mix until combined. Sift in the flour, add the eggs and mix together until fully combined. Add the lemon zest and lemon juice and mix together.

Line a baking tray with cupcake cases. Spoon a teaspoon of the cake mixture into the case, make a little well using the end of the teaspoon, and then add half a teaspoon of lemon curd. Top this with another teaspoon of cake mixture, and smooth over so the curd is all covered. Repeat this until all are done (we had to do several batches as we made so many!)

Bake for 15 minutes, until the tops are pale golden brown. Once cooled, dust with a little icing sugar.

#TaDah

Strawberry Picking @ Garsons, Esher

A couple of weeks ago, we realised that neither of us have ever gone strawberry picking! We soon corrected that with a trip to Garsons in Esher. Garsons is a garden centre that also has a 'Pick Your Own' farm, with over 150 acres of land, where you can pick anything from berries, to carrots and even sunflowers!

We started off by heading over to the strawberry fields. After learning how to pick the proper way, we made a start on collecting a punnet full of lovely strawberries. It was so nice to see all the strawberries of all different sizes and shapes - quite different to the uniform ones you see in the supermarket! While we were there, we decided to also go and pick some raspberries and blackcurrants. We were expecting the stash that we'd picked to cost quite a bit but we were very impressed with how reasonable it was - we actually spent just over £5!

We froze half our strawberries, along with the raspberries and blackcurrants to make some smoothies with, and used the other half to make our strawberry and apple crumbles!

Individual Strawberry + Apple Crumbles

Ingredients (Makes 2):
For the top:
* 80g plain flour
* 55g unsalted butter
* 40g golden caster sugar
* pinch of salt
* 1 tbsp vanilla extract

For the filling:
* 1 medium cooking apple
* 2 handfuls of strawberries
* 25g golden caster sugar
* 1 tbsp vanilla extract
* 1 tsp ground cinnamon
* juice of half a lemon

Instructions:

Peel and slice the cooking apple into chunks. Add to a saucepan and stir over the heat to soften. Add the golden caster sugar, lemon juice, cinnamon and vanilla extract to the saucepan and mix together.

While the apple is softening, add the flour, butter, sugar, vanilla extract and salt to a bowl to make the crumble topping. Mix this together with your fingers to create a breadcrumb effect. Do this until all is mixed together.

Wash and chop your strawberries and add to the saucepan once the apple is soft. Stir together until the fruit is soft and the sauce is thicker. Add half of the mixture to each ramekin. Top with the crumble topping and pop into the over for 30 minutes at 180c. (you might want to pop the crumbles on a baking tray - it can get messy!!)

Your crumble will be ready when the top is golden. Serve with cream, ice cream or creme fraiche. (We chose the latter!)

#TaDah

Homemade Oat Milk

The other week, Matthew watched a video from The Happy Pear, where they made a simple oat milk chocolate shake. We were amazed at how easy oat milk is to make, and were inspired to make our own.

Our batch was just 1 part standard oats (we bought a bag of porridge oats for £1) and 3 parts water, and then a heaped tablespoon of honey to give an added sweetness. The Happy Pear suggested to leave it over night, which we did, and like they said it made it taste extra sweet. After the overnight soak, we simply blended the mixture together and sieved through into a separate bowl.

Overnight it does separate, but blending a good shake sorts that

blending / sieving the oats / the left over result

We were so surprised at how great this tasted, it was so sweet. Basically tasted like soya milk, and more surprisingly quite thick. The perfect milk to go into a smoothie, so most mornings we've been making our Breakfast Smoothie.

This one batch, made about 6 smoothies between us, which is amazing, considering how cheap and easy it was to make. We'll definitely be making this more often!

Homemade Iced Coffee

Ingredients (Makes 2):
* 100ml boiled water
* 300ml milk
* 2 tbsp instant coffee
* 2 tsp vanilla extract
* 1 tbsp honey
* 1 tsp sugar
* 1 tumbler of ice cubes

Instructions:
Combine 2 tbsp of instant coffee granules and 100ml boiled water and mix together until all dissolved. Add the sugar, honey and vanilla extract and stir.

Add 300ml milk to the coffee mixture. Give it a stir and then add a tumbler of ice. Blend up until smooth.

#TaDah

Three salad dressing ideas

Salad Dressing 1:
* 1 tbsp mayonnaise
* 1 tsp dijon mustard
* splash of white wine vinegar
* 1 tsp dill
* 1 tsp chives
* pinch of salt
* splash of water

Salad Dressing 2
*  Large 1 tbsp cream cheese
* 1 tbsp dill
* 1 tbsp chives
* 1 tsp mint
* 3 tbsp olive oil
* 1 tbsp white wine vinegar

Salad Dressing 3
* 3 tbsp olive oil
* 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
* Few dashes of worcester sauce
* 1/2 tsp chilli flakes

Instructions:

Choose your dressing and chuck all into a container and mix it all up.

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