Cheesy Cottage Pie

The humble cottage pie isn't the most glamourous of dishes, but it is the perfect antidote to a miserable Sunday evening. Mash potato is the ultimate comfort food, add melted cheese and juicy beef into the mix and you've got yourself a delicious dinner!

Serves 4-6

500g beef mince

1 onion, chopped

1 carrot, peeled and chopped

4 garlic cloves, crushed

2 tbsps tomato puree

250ml red wine

500ml beef stock

1 tbsp plain flour

A couple of bay leaves

Worcestershire sauce

For the topping:

900g floury potatoes

Butter

Milk

100g cheddar, grated

1. Fry the beef in a little oil for 10 minutes until it has begun to brown. Add the onions, garlic and carrot and cook for a further 10 minutes until softened. Add the flour and fry for a few minutes, next add the red wine. Bubble away until most of the liquid has evaporated. Add the beef stock, tomato puree and bay leaves. Turn the heat down, cover and simmer for 1 hour. Taste and add the Worcestershire sauce and seasoning
2. At this point you want the sauce to be nice and thick, so that mash can sit on top of it rather than just melting in. If you need to reduce it further, remove the meat & vegetables with a slotted spoon, you can discard the bay leaves at this point. Then put the gravy over a reasonably high heat and simmer until it has thickened
3. Meanwhile, boil the potatoes for 20 minutes or until soft. Mash with the butter and milk and season. Pour the meat and gravy into a large dish and top with the mash - make sure you rough the mash up with a fork so it goes nice and crispy. Grate the cheese over the top and bake for 45 minutes. Serve with your vegetable of choice, I went for stir fried cabbage with caraway seeds

Chocolate Birthday Cake!

It was lovely Chris' birthday last weekend, so I made him the most chocolaty of chocolate cakes. I don't actually like icing so this cake is perfect, as the topping is basically just melted chocolate. As far as I'm concerned it's the best chocolate cake recipe EVER! I'm not sure where it was originally printed, but it's a hand me down from my madre. Anyway, I command you to make this cake:

For the cake:

165g self-raising flour

165g caster sugar

165g soft margarine

3 large eggs, beaten

1.5 level tsp baking powder

1.5 tbsp milk

2 rounded tbsp of cocoa powder

1. Butter the cake tins and line the bottom with baking parchment. Put the oven on to preheat to 170 degrees
2. In a large bowl blend all the ingredients with a hand mixer until smooth, but do not over mix
3. Divide into the prepared sandwich tins and bake for 25-30 min until a knife comes out from the middle clean

For the topping:

One small tin carnation evaporated milk

115g light muscovado sugar

115g chocolate broken into pieces

55g soft butter

Few drops vanilla essence

1. Combine the sugar and evaporated milk in a small heavy based pan and heat gently until the sugar has dissolved, stirring often
2. When dissolved bring to the boil and then turn down and simmer for 5 minutes without stirring
3. Take off the heat and add the remaining ingredients. Stir briskly until it all becomes smooth and glossy
4. Leave to cool (but not chill) before spreading on the cakes

 Cakes cooling:

Chocolate topping:

Finished cake for Creed:

Eggy Crumpets with Bacon

Inspired by the great easyteas recipe blog, Chris and I decided to make eggy crumpets for breakfast during our long weekend in Bath. At the weekend there’s nothing better than spending a good hour drinking coffee, reading the paper (preferably the magazine section, real news is far too stressful for the weekend) and eating something tasty. This really is a great recipe; it’s suitably unhealthy and filling to help you recover from a hangover and more importantly it tastes delicious!

You can find Matt’s original recipe here. 

Serves 2

4 crumpets

2 medium eggs

Dash of milk

Butter for frying

Plenty of seasoning

1. Break the eggs into a bowl, add the milk & seasoning and whisk
2. Heat a pan with a knob of butter in, dip the crumpets in the egg to coat thoroughly. Fry on each side for 3 minutes, until the egg is cooked through
3. Meanwhile prepare your accompaniments, we had bacon and mushroom, but this would be great with any breakfasty toppings

Nom nom:

White Chocolate Panna Cotta with Berry Compote

After eating salad for dinner on Saturday evening, it only seemed right to have something outrageously unhealthy for dessert. The main ingredients for panna cotta are double cream, chocolate and sugar, so there really isn't anything healthy about it!

The recipe is one of my mum’s, I’m not really sure where she first read it, but a lot of her favorite recipe’s come from Good Food. It’s super easy to make and only takes a moment to dish up which is perfect after a few glasses of wine. With 2 pots of double cream, it’s quite heavy, but the sharpness of the berries cuts through the richness.

Serves 8

100g Green & Blacks white chocolate, broken up into squares

600ml double cream

200ml semi-skimmed milk

50g caster sugar

4 gelatin sheets

For the berry compote:

500g bag frozen summer fruit, defrosted

2 tbsp water

2 tbsp caster sugar

1. Add the cream, milk, sugar and chocolate to a pan, put on a low heat until the chocolate has melted. Meanwhile soak the gelatin in cold water
2. Take the mixture off the heat and add the gelatin, stir until it has melted, this shouldn’t take more than a few minutes
3. Pour the mixture into individual ramekins and leave to set in the fridge for at least 4 hours
4. To make the compote, add half the fruit to a pan with the water and sugar. Simmer until the berries have begun to burst, add to the rest of the fruit and serve with the panna cotta 

Panna cotta: