PASTY PIE

I always find making pie's a rather satisfying.  It's such a homely comforting thing to do and I get a real sense of achievement from doing it. This recipe is not a particularly christmassy one but it's good to have in reserve over the festive season.  You can make it ahead and have it in the freezer for those days when you've been too busy because you're out christmas shopping or hung over from the works doo and can't face having to think about what to cook.  It's great hot or cold so you could also have it as part of your boxing day splatter or in the summer on a picnic.

I've made one giant one here, in fact, I doubled up the recipe and made two so I'd have another in reserve.  You could of course make the more traditional individual pasties if you wanted.

Heat  the oven to 160c fan.  Make your pastry with 300g Plain Flour.  Rub in 100g Butter/Margarine and 50g white fat like Cookeen.  This gives you a shorter more crisp pastry.  When you have the bread crumb finish, add enough cold water to bring it together to a dough.  Tip in onto a floured surface and knead slightly till it's smooth.

Now line am 8/9" cake tin with the pastry leaving a bit of an over hanging edge.  When you add your filling the pastry will draw in slightly so leaving an overhang ensures you have enough for your crimping.  

Next prepare your filling.  Thinly slice 3 medium potatoes and 200g swede.  Slicing them thinly means they will cook with ease.   Season 500g steak mince with 1 tbsp black pepper, 1/4 tsp mace 1/2 tsp salt and add 1 large onion finely chopped.  Now layer your filling into the lined tin starting with 1/3 of the potato and swede then 1/3 of the meat.  Repeat the layers till all your filling is in.  To finish your pie, trim the overhanging edge and brush it with a little water.  Top the pie with a pastry lid,  pressing the edges together.  Give it a lovely crimp and any other embellishments you like, personally I can't resist a bit of lettering, then brush with beaten egg and make a couple of steam holes with a knife.

The pie should take about 1hr 30 mins to bake, individual pasties will be around 45mins.

HOLLY'S STILTON, POTATO & CARAMELISED ONION PIE

It's not always easy to come up with a good meat free dinner that all the family will enjoy, especially when you have three children with varying views on vegetables.

I remember on pie week of GBBO Holly made a vegetarian pie which she said always went down well with her meat loving husband.  So I decided on her version of a cheese and potato pie.

It uses 3 different cheeses and is topped with puff pastry - which I have to admit I bought from the supermarket.  I still maintain life is too short to make puff pastry when you can get perfectly good stuff ready made. (It's important to know when to cheat!)

It was a dream to put together, just adding layers of the various ingredients it was assembled in a jiffy then in the oven for 30 minutes.  It went very well with baked beans and no-one missed the meat.  Cheers Holly.

The recipe calls for weights of ingredients that would leave me with oddments of stuff left over so I just made a little extra to use everything up and made a small one for another day.  I didn't have any of the onion left for this one though so used Branston Pickle as a substitute making it a sort of Ploughmans Pie.

You can find the full recipe in the pie section of The Great British Bake Off  How to Bake Book.

Real Men Do Eat Quiche

We love quiche in this house.  You can have it hot or cold, it's easily transportable for picnics and packed lunches and you can stick anything in it, great for using up left over bits from the bottom of the fridge.

These two were exactly that, I had some bacon, halloumi and sweet potato's in the fridge and came up with these two: Bacon & Samphire and Sweet Potato & Halloumi. 

SAMPHIRE & BACON

200g Plain Flour

100g Margarine

Iced Water to mix

250g Bacon
90g Samphire

Knob of Butter

1 Clove Garlic

3 Eggs

3/4 pt Milk

Black Pepper

Samphire is a vegetable that grows wild in marshy areas or close to the sea.  It's a bit like very fine asparagus and very salty.  I love the flavour and vibrant colour which it doesn't lose when you cook it.  If you're not lucky enough the be able to pick it fresh yourself, Asda sell it as one of their 'Extra Special' ingredients.

Make the pastry.  Rub the margarine into the flour, you can use a food processor or a free standing mixer for this.  When it looks like fine bread crumbs add enough water to form a dough.  Line your quiche tin and pop it into the freezer for 15 minutes while you pre-heat the oven to 160 C.

You need to bake the pastry shell blind so line it with some parchment and fill it with baking beans.  You can use rice or dried pulses instead if you don't have ceramic beans, they work just as well.

Bake it for 15 minutes then remove the beans and parchment and bake for a further 5-10 minutes till it's cooked and lightly browned.

While this is finishing snip your bacon into bite size pieces and cook till browned.  Remove the bacon from the pan and tip in the samphire with the butter and garlic.  Cook this for 2-3 minutes to soften it.

When your shell is baked put the bacon into the base and top with the samphire.  Add some freshly ground black pepper, I like lots especially with this, both the bacon and samphire are very salty so don't add any more salt.

Mix your eggs and milk together and pour over your filling.  Bake for 30-40 minutes till it's set and browned.

SWEET POTATO & HALLOUMI

200g Plain Flour

100g Margarine

Iced Water to mix

300g Sweet Potato

1 tblsp Oil

250g Block of Halloumi

3 Sprigs of Fresh Thyme

3 Eggs

3/4 pt Milk

Black Pepper

Make your pastry shell as before.  While it's baking cook your sweet potato.  Peel and cut it into small cubes about 1cm square.  Put them in a pan, coat with the oil and add the thyme leaves.  Cover with a lid and cook over a medium heat till soft and lightly browned.  It should take about 20-25 minutes and you'll need to stir it from time to time to stop it sticking.

When the potato is cooked, remove it from the pan.  Cut the halloumi the same size as the potato and cook in the same pan.  It will only take about 5 minutes for the cheese to brown so keep your eye on it.

Add the potato and halloumi to the shell and pour over your egg and milk mixture.  Bake for 25-30 minutes.

There was even a little pastry left over to make  a couple of mini quiches with some salami and manchego I found, see what I mean about leftovers!

Birthday Cup Cakes 'Gluten Free'

I discovered the best book on baking gluten free cakes last summer, 'Red Velvet Chocolate Heartache' by Harry Eastwood.  She uses rice flour, ground almonds and vegetables like swede and butternut squash to substitute wheat flours.

Usually gluten free cakes can be either a bit stodgy and don't rise or just very dry - these are not!  They are beautifully soft and light.

These cup cakes were baked with a little help from my daughter as a birthday gift for my mother-in-law.  Luckily there were a few extra for us.

We baked Cappuccino Cup Cakes with sweet potato and Lavender Cup Cakes with courgette.  Both have a mascarpone frosting.