Quick and Easy Macaroni Cheese & Easy Christmas Cake



Pacific Pie


A childhood favourite, loved by kids and almost impossible not to have all the ingredients making it a good standby supper……..

Ingredients for 4

3 large floury potatoes
3 tbsp milk
1 tbsp butter
450g tinned tuna (keep the oil)
2 medium onions
400g tin chopped tomatoes
1tsp sugar
1tsp red or white wine vinegar
300g frozen peas (thawed)
1 pkt ready salted crips, smashed up
Salt and pepper to taste

Method:

  • Boil the potatoes until tender, then drain.
  • Mash with milk and butter.
  • Preheat oven to 200c or mark 6.
  • Heat oil from tuna and fry with onions until tender, don’t let them brown.
  • Add tomatoes, sugar and vinegar and season to make the tuna sauce.
  • Transfer tuna sauce to bottom of baking tray and cover with mashed potato like a shepherds pie.
  • Cook for 30 mins and sprinkle crisps on top just before serving.
  • Serve with mayo or tomato ketchup!!

 



Nutty Carrot Cake Traybake


Using a combination of granulated sweetener and muscovado sugar helps to reduce the sugar in this yummy tray bake!

Ingredients:

150g plain flour

3tsp baking powder

40g light brown muscovado sugar

10 tsp table top sweetener

60g walnuts, chopped roughly

120g carrots, grated

2 medium eggs,

50g low fat spread, melted

2 tsp ground cinammon

30g sultanas

Method:

  • Preheat oven to 180 degrees.
  • Line a tin approx 20cm by 20cm with baking paper.
  • Sift together dry ingredients into a bowl, flour, baking powder, sugar, sweetener and cinnamon.
  • In another bowl beat 2 eggs and add the melted low fat spread.
  • Stir the flour mixture into the egg mixture, then add the carrots, walnuts and sultanas, fold and don’t over work mixture.
  • Pour into lined tin and bake for 30-35 mins, using skewer to check centre which should come out clean when cooked

 



 

Sausage and Mash Pie & Moist Ginger Cake

 



As the weather turns, and the nights draw in, we’re in the mood for warming comfort food to see us through the chilly evenings. Some favourites to try


Sausage and Mash Pie


Ingredients

75g butter

6 pork sausages, roughly chopped

2 leeks, sliced

2 carrots, roughly chopped

2 celery sticks, roughly chopped

3 tbsp. onion gravy granules

200g frozen peas

500g floury potatoes, peeled and roughly chopped

2 tbsp. wholegrain mustard

Method:- Preheat oven to 200°C (180°C fan) Mark 6. Melt 25g butter in a medium casserole dish over medium-high heat. Add the sausage pieces, leeks, carrots and celery and cook for 10-15 mins, stirring occasionally, until the sausages are golden. Stir in the gravy granules, 300ml water and plenty of seasoning. Bring to the boil and simmer for 2mins, stirring until the sauce thickens. Remove from heat and stir in the peas. Make the mash. Put the potatoes into a large pan and cover with cold water. Bring to the boil over high heat and simmer for 10-15 mins, or until tender. Drain, reserving a cupful of the starchy cooking water. Leave the potatoes to steam dry for 5 mins. Return potatoes to the empty pan and mash. Mix in the remaining butter, season and a small splash of the reserved cooking water (add more if mash is dry). Stir in the mustard. Top the sausage mixture with the mash. Cook in the oven for 25mins, or until golden and bubbling.



Moist Ginger Cake


Ingredients

350g golden syrup

125g block butter

250g plain flour, sifted

½ level teaspoon salt

1 ¾ level teaspoons bicarbonate of soda

1 level teaspoon ground ginger

½ level teaspoon mixed spice

1 large egg

275ml milk 

Method: –  Pre – heat the oven to 180°C (160°C fan)  gas mark 4. Weigh a saucepan on the scales and  weigh the syrup into it. Then add the butter to the  saucepan and melt the two together over a gentle  heat. Measure the dry ingredients into a bowl, then  gradually pour in the syrup mixture, mix well. Beat  the egg and milk together in a separate basin then  add that bit by bit, again mixing thoroughly. The  cake batter will seem very liquid at this stage but  that ’ s OK so don ’ t worry, just pour it into the  prepared oblong tin, well buttered and with a liner.  Bake near the centre of the oven for about 45 – 50  minutes or until the centre is springy. Cool in the tin  for 5 minutes before turning out onto a wire tray to  cool. When it ’ s cold, cut it into squares .



 

1 2 3