Cheat's Cherry Crumble Pie

I love any form of crumble. This is one I made this weekend for after Sunday lunch. I made it in a pie base as cherries can be a bit messy and don't hold their shape as well as some other fruits.


Cheats Cherry Crumble Pie

Serves 6

You will need a 20cm (ish) tin or dish and baking beans or rice.

Ingredients:

400g can of Cherry Pie filling

250g readymade shortcrust pastry (I use Jus Rol or Sainsbury’s all butter) at room temperature

100g plain flour,

50g ground almonds

125g unsalted butter - chilled and cut into chunks

70g caster sugar

(You can omit the almonds if you want to and use 150g plain flour. I just like the combination of cherry and almond)

1. Preheat oven to 180/ Gas 4-5. Grease your tin or dish, dust with flour and set aside.
2. Roll out pastry to about just under ½ cm thickess. Use to line your tin or dish. Leave a little pastry to overhang as you can trim that off afterwards. If you do it before you may find your pastry base will shrink too much. Prick the base of the pastry case with a fork. Put a layer of baking parchment inside and pour in some baking beans or rice.
3. Bake in the oven for about 10 minutes until very lightly golden. Remove beans/ rice and parchment and return to the oven for 5 minutes until golden. Once cooked trim the excess pastry off. Meanwhile gently heat the cherries up and make the crumble topping.
4. For the crumble rub the butter into the flour until it resembles breadcrumbs you can do this in a food processor if you want to, but I quite like it to look a bit rougher. Add the sugar and almonds and combine.
5. Pour your cherry filling into the pastry case. Sprinkle over your crumble topping. Bake for about 20 minutes until golden and bubbling. Let stand for a few minutes before serving or you’ll likely burn your mouth! I serve it with custard, but cream, ice cream works – whatever takes your fancy!

 

*** It will work for any  fruit combination you fancy. You can also omit the pastry and just have the traditional crumble. If you want to use other fruit  just chop your fruit up and heat in a pan with sugar to taste until a little soft and use that as your filling. Or cheat with pie filling because sometimes you just want it the easy way!

Spaghetti Bolognese

Since I was a child one of my all time favourite foods has been Spaghetti Bolognese. In my eyes it is the ultimate comfort food, especially when covered with gooey cheese! It always makes me feel better. Over the years I’ve tweaked my recipe and although it’s not an authentic Italian ragu it always goes down well. So I hope you enjoy it and do let me know if you tweak it yourself as I am always interested to hear what people do with my recipes to suit their own tastes.

Spaghetti Bolognese
 

Serves 4 -6 (depending on how hungry you are!)
 

Ingredients

500g Beef Mince (or for extra flavour 250g Beef Mince and 250g Pork Mince);

5 slices Smokey Streaky Bacon or Pancetta – roughly chopped;

Large glass of red wine;

400g Can Plum Tomatoes;

Large handful mushrooms –washed and sliced;

Large Onion (white or red-to your own taste) – finely diced;

2 Carrots – peeled and finely diced;

2tbsp Tomato Puree;

1tsp Garlic puree or 2 finely chopped garlic cloves;

Beef Stock Cube;
Small glug of Olive Oil or a tsp butter;

1tbsp mixed herbs;

1tbsp sugar;

A dash of milk;

Spaghetti or your favourite pasta and some grated cheese of your choice to serve.

1.            Brown off the mince in batches in a large pan, drain and set aside.

2.            Pour into the same pan you have just used a little olive oil or a tsp butter. Once heated add onion, carrot and garlic. Gently fry until onion is soft and translucent. Add bacon/ pancetta. Fry for a few minutes.

3.            Add mince back to the pan. Pour in the wine and crumble over stock cube. Simmer until wine has been absorbed (about 10 minutes);

4.            Add tomato puree and combine till all the meat is coated. Add the herbs and mushrooms. Pour in the plum tomatoes and break up with the back of a spoon. Swill out the empty can with a little water and pour into the pan.

5.            Sprinkle over sugar and add a splash of milk. Mix till combined. Simmer for a further 30 minutes. It shouldn’t be a runny sauce. Serve with grated cheese and pasta of your choice.

 

*** I prefer to make mine the day before needed as it gives the flavours more time to marinate and tastes even better!

               

Angel Delight “Cheesecake”

When my brother and I were kids one of our favourite puddings for some reason was Angel Delight. Our mum used to come up with ways to make it a bit more exciting rather than just always having it on its own. Various concoctions followed with fruit cream, pastry... But the one that I loved the most was with a biscuit base - a bit like a cheesecake.

It was a quick and easy pudding that always went down well, so having a lazy weekend to myself I decided to make it up myself. It’s not the prettiest of puddings, but it still tasted as good as it did 20 plus years ago!

 

Angel Delight “Cheesecake”

 

 

Serves 3 – 4

Ingredients:

 

 

1 Packet of Angel Delight made up to instructions with milk

Approx 200g Biscuits –crushed

3oz Butter or Margarine -melted

 

1. Grease and line a tin or dish. Combine the melted butter and crushed biscuits in a bowl.
2. Tip into the prepared tin/ dish and spread out. Push down slightly. Pop in the fridge for 15 -20 minutes to harden slightly.
3. Make the Angel Delight up to packet instructions.
4. Pour the Angel Delight over the biscuit base and place in the fridge for about 20 minutes to set.
5. Serve – yummy!

  

 

 

 

 

This particular time made the base with ginger nuts and used the chocolate Angel Delight. But you could do any combo you want.

Some suggestions below:

Digestive biscuit base topped with Banana, then covered with butterscotch Angel Delight,

Bourbon biscuit base with strawberry Angel Delight,

Custard cream biscuit base with chocolate Angel Delight,

Oreo biscuit base with chocolate Angel Delight,

Bacon, Onion and Tomato Suet Roll

Now this particular dish is a bit of a “I’ve no food in the cupboard what do I eat” dish. Bear with me, it's not a showstopper, but it is actually really nice! It was something I remember my mum making when we were kids just before she was due to go food shopping. So I guess even then it was a store cupboard staples dish. I’ve adapted it slightly to my tastes. I go old school and serve with baked beans and mash potato. Seriously try it before you judge it!

 

Bacon, Onion and Tomato Suet Roll

Serves 4

Ingredients:

200g Tin Chopped Tomatoes

1 Small Onion – chopped

Packet of Bacon (Streaky, Back, Smoked, Unsmoked – whatever you prefer) – chopped

1tsp Mixed Herbs

A dash of oil

Salt and Pepper

4oz Suet (I use Vegetable, but use the meat one if it’s what you have)

8oz Self Raising Flour – sifted

Enough water or milk to make pliable dough (4tbsp ish)

***I tend to steam the roll in a steamer for about 30 minutes. But I’ve included the oven way too.

1. Set up steamer or preheat oven to 180/ Gas 4 – 5.
2. Combine the suet and the flour. Add a pinch of salt. Gradually add milk or water to get a pliable, slightly sticky dough. Tip onto a floured surface and knead to combine completely. Wrap in cling film and set aside in the fridge while you make the filling.
3. In a pan fry the onion and bacon till soft. Add herbs and season with salt and pepper. Sieve the tomatoes to get rid of excess juices and add to the pan with the onions and bacon. Heat gently.
4. Roll out pastry to 0.5cm thickness – in a rectangle type shape. Spread the tomato mixture over the pastry leaving a 1cm border.
5. Roll up the pastry like a Swiss roll. Seal the edges by brushing with milk or egg. Press to seal.
6. Wrap roll loosely in baking parchment or tinfoil. Place in steamer for approx 30 - 45 minutes or in the oven a baking tray for about 45 minutes. You can check to see if it’s cooked by gently cutting through the pastry. It will be a soft rather than crumbly pastry, but shouldn’t be sticky if cooked.

Pesto and Crème Fraiche Pasta

Just a quick and easy lunch recipe for you. Plain and simple, but yummy. Add some cooked chicken if you want to bulk it up a bit.

Pesto, Crème Fraiche Pasta

Serves 1

Ingredients:

Approx 75g Dried Pasta

1heaped tsp Pesto (Red or Green)

1tbsp Low Fat Creme Fraiche

Parmesan – grated

1tbsp Sunflower or Pumpkin Seeds (optional)

1. Cook pasta according to instructions. Drain.
2. Mix pasta with the pesto and crème fraiche.
3. Grate over some parmesan to taste and combine.
4. Sprinkle over chosen seeds if using.

Chocolate and Cherry Birthday Cake

For a friend's birthday this year I decided to bake a cake containing 2 of their favourite foods – chocolate and cherries. The cake resulted in him eating a bit too much of it and not being able to move. He then attempted to eat some for breakfast until I stopped him. So I’ll take that as a good sign!

Chocolate and Cherry Birthday Cake

Makes 1 x 20 cm cake – I used a springform tin for ease and I greased and lined it with baking parchment.

Ingredients

Cake:

2 tablespoons cocoa

3 tablespoons boiling water

227g margarine

227g caster sugar

4 eggs

227g self-raising flour

2 tsps baking powder

A jar of Morello cherries in syrup

3 Packets of Milk Chocolate Fingers

 

Icing:

150g plain or semi-sweet chocolate, broken into pieces

75g unsalted butter, diced

2 tbsp milk

3 egg yolks

150g icing sugar, sifted

 

Topping:

Large Handful of fresh cherries - destoned

75g White Chocolate – melted and slightly cooled

75g Dark Chocolate – melted and slightly cooled

(Set aside a chunk of each chocolate to grate over)

Method

Cake:

1. Pre-heat the over to 180C/350F/Gas 4. Grease cake tin.
2. Blend the cocoa and water in a mixing bowl then leave to cool slightly. Beat    margarine and sugar till fluffy. Add eggs one at a time and best till combined. Sift in flour and baking powder beat until thoroughly blended. Add the cocoa and mix well. Pour into tin and level out.
3. Bake for about 25 minutes or until well risen. Leave to cool in tin for a few minutes before turning out.
4. When cooled slice cake in half.

Icing:

1. Put the chocolate, butter and milk in a medium heatproof bowl.
2. Place over a pan of just-simmering water until the chocolate and butter have melted – the mixture should be warm but not hot. Remove from the heat and beat until smooth.
3. Add the egg yolks, one at a time, beating until well combined. Add the sugar, a third at a time, beating to a thick, smooth spreading consistency. If you need to add more sugar to thicken do it a spoonful at a time.

To Assemble:

1. Drizzle cherry syrup from the jar over base layer of sponge (Use the half of the cake which has a slight upward bump. It would have been the top of the cake initially. Save the flattest layer for the top of the cake for ease of icing).
2. Spread a third the icing over base.
3. Cover with a layer of the cherries from the jar and place top half of cake on top.
4. Using remaining icing cover top and sides of cake.
5. Working quickly place chocolate fingers vertically around the cake using the icing as a glue. Push them in slightly to seal well.
6. Trim stalks off the cherries and dip half in the melted white chocolate and half in the melted dark chocolate.
7. Arrange cherries on top of cake. Drizzle over any remaining melted chocolate. Sprinkle over grated chocolate. Leave to set and then serve.