Tag Archives: Great British Bake-Off

Week Ninety One – Mary Berry’s Honey Glazed Walnut Bread & Glazed Lemon Tart

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Week ninety one and I obviously had a bit of a “glazed” feel to this weeks bakes! I dipped into Mary Berry’s Baking Bible and was inspired to try another bread recipe after watching the efforts on The Great British Bake Off for bread week.  The honey glazed walnut bread sounded scrummy and Mary assures you in the recipe that it also makes fantastic toast (If it lasts that long- take note please chief tasters!!) I added all the ingredients into a bowl, added the dough hooks to my mixer and set it off. Mary says allow five minutes mixing/kneading for a machine or 10 minutes by hand. This is where it was all going so well….until plumes of smoke were coming off my machine! The dough was too much and the motor had burnt out so the machine went to the electrical scrap heap in the sky and I finished the kneading by hand. I left the dough to prove and set about getting the other recipe bits together.

Mary Berry's Honey Glazed Walnut Bread

The proving time was done and I put the bread into the oven to bake, the recipe makes 2 good sized loaves. 25 minutes later, they were done and had that hollow sound when tapped on the bottom!

Kim's Honey Glazed Walnut Loaf

The second recipe was the glazed lemon tart. Firstly Mary asks you to make the pate sucree pastry- its a sweet shortcrust pastry. Then line a flan tin with it and chill while making the topping. Add the other ingredients together and beat well. ( with no mixer, I developed muscles I didn’t know I had!) Pour the mix into the pastry case and bake until brown and set.

Mary Berry's Glazed Lemon Tart Recipe

While this is cooling- and Mary says you can eat it like this if you like, thinly slice a lemon, remove any pips, boils some water and sugar, add the lemon slices to this, boil again and leave in a bowl to cool for 2 hours. Then drain the lemons, arrange them on the tart, and glaze with some apricot jam that has been warmed through.

Kim's Glazed Lemon Tart

This looks and smells lovely and we will be eating some after dinner later!

There have been some strange goings on in my garden lately. It has all become a little overgrown with the bamboo I had planted some years ago, pretty much taking over the garden and with the recent rain, you could barely see up my garden through it all. I looked from my kitchen up the garden recently and found that the local wildlife had diversified somewhat from the native species! I know who to thank for this and will ensure that your garden enjoys a similar experience!
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I was also sad to say goodbye to my trusty mixer- it was the best of both worlds, I could detach the mixer and use it as a hand mixer or attach it to the stand and use with the bowl  which could rotate if I needed it to.

 

Breville Stand mixerI threw it in the chief taster’s trailer to go to the tip ( yes- it went in dirty- it’s going to the tip!) and waved it goodbye.

RIP

 

Eek – I think my fairy god mother is looking after me…..I was telling the sorrowful tale of my mixer and with BIG thanks to one of my chief taster’s. I have a new mixer on the way- YAY!! xxx

 

Week Ninety – Mary Berry’s Pecan Pie & Walnut & Apricot Sandwich Bars

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Week ninety and things had settled a little at home so I settled to this week’s bake with a little less stress than last week. The first bake I chose from Mary Berry’s Baking Bible was Mary’s Pecan Pie. This recipe involved making a shortcrust pastry, allow it to chill in the fridge for a while, roll it out and line a flan tin with it and line the pastry with foil, add beans and blind bake for about 20 minutes, then remove the foil and beans and then bake for another 15 minutes.

Mary Berry's Pecan Pie Recipe

To prepare the topping, lay the pecan nuts in the pastry case and add the other topping ingredients into a saucepan and heat through until mixed, then pour into the pastry case and allow to cool and set. I thought this was a rather yummy pudding but hubby wouldn’t try it as he doesn’t like pecans…..or walnuts…..or most other nuts!

Kim's Pecan Pie

The second recipe was Mary’s walnut and apricot sandwich bars, firstly you need to cut up the apricots and boil them in some water and sugar until soft and squishy (technical baking term!) and then mix together the other ingredients, mainly, butter flour , oats and syrup. Add half the mixture to the square tin and flatten down, add the apricots and again, flatten down and finally the remainder of the mixture and flatten for the last time.

Mary Berry's Apricot & Walnut Sandwich Bars Recipe

Bake in the oven and when ready, cut into bar shapes while cooling. I have eaten various breakfast bars in my life and found these to be quite stodgy, I think it was adding the flour to the mix that did this. They weren’t overly popular in our house and the remainder ended up in the food recycling bin.

Kim's Apricot & Walnut Sandwich Bars

I have been watching the Great British Bake Off with interest and now am showing interest in two or three of the contestants- I like Martha, the young girl who seems to have no fear or nerves, Like Luis the star baker of the week and I Like Nancy….lets see if one of these wins, I liked Frances from the beginning last year-and she won!

 

Week Eighty Nine, Mary Berry’s Almond & Cherry Tray Bake & Florentines

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Week 89 took over where week 88 left off, halfway through managing hubby’s leg burn and various trips to hospital for leg dressings and caring for him at home. I used Mary Berry’s Baking Bible as a bit of respite and my challenge as an excuse to do something normal for an hour or two. I chose Mary’s almond and cherry tray bake and the Florentine biscuits. I had caught up on the Great British Bake Off and saw that they contestants would be making Florentine biscuits so thought I would give them a go as they were in the bible and I hadn’t done them yet.

I started with the tray bake which is the usual Mary’s easy recipe of throw all the ingredients in a bowl and mix and pour! I put the tray bake in the oven and sat and read the Florentine recipe carefully.

Mary Berry's Almond and Cherry tray bake

The tray bake baked well and smelt amazing. I left it to cool while getting on with the biscuits.

Kim's almond & cherry tray bake

Mary’s Florentine recipe asks you to put the sugar, butter and golden syrup into a pan and heat gently, allowing it all to melt. Allow to cool slightly and add the rest of the ingredients and stir well.

Mary Berry's Florentine recipe

Add spoonfuls of the mix to the baking trays and bake. Watch the biscuits carefully as they can go from under baked and a bit soft to burnt very quickly- this didn’t happen to me thankfully but Mary adds this warning to her recipe! Once bakes, allow to cool slightly and transfer to a baking tray. Then melt some dark chocolate and spread over the back and make a zig zag pattern with a fork in the chocolate.

Kim's Florentines

I watched the Great British Bake Off this week and thought that they all did a cracking job with the technical challenge of Florentines and was pleased that mine had gone well- the only downside was that hubby and I didn’t like them very much!

 

Week Eight Three – Mary Berry’s Double Orange Cake, Chocolate Victoria Sandwich Cake & Almond & Chocolate Chip Cake!

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Week eighty three and a mega bake this week. On Friday, I got home from work, all hot and bothered because of the heat and a hectic week and dove into Mary Berry’s Baking Bible for inspiration. On Saturday, hubby and I were going to see some friends who had recently moved house and thought a couple of cakes would make a nice house warming present.

So with that in mind, I chose the double orange cake which was the usual put all the ingredients in a bowl and mix well.When all blended well, pour into a deep round tin and bake for about half an hour until risen and golden.

Mary Berry's Double Orange Cake

Once the cake was cooked, Mary asks you to heat some apricot jam and spread over the top then mix some icing sugar with some orange juice and pour over the cake. Then finely grate some orange zest to decorate.

Kim's double orange cake

The second recipe for the house warming was Mary’s chocolate sandwich cake. Again Mary asks you to put all the ingredients together and mix well, then divide equally between 2 sandwich tins and bake.

Mary Berry's Chocolate Victoria Sandwich Cake

Once the cakes were risen and brown, allow to cool and then make Mary’s white butter cream and use this to make the filling and topping and then sprinkle with chocolate bits.

Kim's chocolate sandwich cake

Once my two house warming cakes were done, I then thought ahead to Sunday, it would be father’s day and as my chief taster is my other dad, i thought he might be upset at missing out on a cake this week so I made him the almond and chocolate chip cake.

Mary asks you to mix the ingredients together and then pour into a deep round tin. This is where i got a little creative. i had recently bought a giant cupcake tin -one of my bargain buys. I decided to use this to make this cake in and divided it equally between the two sections and baked it. Once it was baked, I put the two halves in a tin to decorate on Sunday to give it to my chief taster with his other Father’s day bits.

giant-cupcake-tin

Off we went to see our friends who had recently moved and we had a tour of the house and garden. We met these friends when we got our first hairy hoolie after losing my old girl and have been good friends since- and we got our second hairy hoolie from them a few years later. We helped our friends to take down a tree in their garden but unfortunately at the end, a rather large branch hit my wrist when it came down and a rather large egg shaped lump came up almost immediately on it and it was painful. Luckily after a trip to the Urgent Care Centre to get it looked at, it isn’t broken, just soft tissue trauma but sore!

hurt arm

Sunday came and I wasn’t sure how I was going to decorate my chief taster’s cake with such a sore wrist and it’s on my left wrist and I am left handed. I managed with the help of my lovely hubby to mix together a vanilla butter cream and put this as the filling and topping, sprinkling flaked almonds and chocolate bits on the top. I then put some coloured cellophane around the base to make it look like a cup cake case. Not quite how I wanted it to be but hopefully it looked ok.

Kim's almond & chocolate chip cake

The chief taster was pleased with his cake and we all sat on their patio with the chimnea lit and his other gift of an axe to chop his logs!

Chief Taster's father's day gift!

Happy father’s day to my other dad and as always, my thoughts are with my Dad who passed away on Father’s day eight years ago, gone but always in my thoughts.

me and dad

I know I always go on about The Great British Bake off but I was so excited to see the adverts telling me that the series is back this summer- yippee!  Oh, and I really laughed at the World Cup advert that Mary did with the rest of TGBBO team- so so funny! If you haven’t seen it, you can see it here.

Oh and the countdown? 101 left to go……

Week Eighty Two – Mary Berry’s Little Gems & Oat & Sunflower Squares

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Week 82 and time flies when you are having such fun! I delved into Mary Berry’s Baking Bible and found the little gems and oat & sunflower squares. The first recipe of the little gems was really simple, it’s one of Mary’s throw all the ingredients in the bowl and mix.

Mary Berry's Little Gems

Then put roughly a teaspoon of the mix into tiny cases and bake! Once cooked, the cakes become risen and golden. Allow them to cool on a rack and when cool, mix some lemon juice with some icing sugar and top the cakes with a little icing and a sweet to decorate.

Kim's Little Gems

The second recipe of oat & sunflower squares was not all that difficult either. Mary asks you to heat the butter and golden syrup together and add the large oats and sunflower seeds and mix well.

Mary Berry's Oat & Sunflower Squares

Mary suggests using a 7″ square tin but I found that my mix wouldn’t even cover half the bottom of this so I put mine in a smaller tin which was better.

Kim's Oat & Sunflower Squares

The squares are very crumbly and I would suggest keeping them in the fridge as in this warm weather , they just fall apart.

I was pleased to read a news article this week about Mary Berry being awarded the Freedom of Bath. Bath city officials said she had “always been an exemplary ambassador” and was a deserving recipient of the the city’s highest and most prestigious award. I was really pleased for her as she was born and raised in Bath so a lovely honour for her.

I have missed The Great British Bake Off so imagine my surprise when I found a repeat of I think the very first series on free view which I hadn’t seen before, and no bake off tent in site. It looked a little different then. It was the final and the contestants were asked to bake for an English tea party for family, friends and former contestants who had been knocked out earlier. They each had to bake white and brown bread, make 40 finger sandwiched with these, bake 40 scones, 40 tarts and 40 choux pastries- no mean feat! I was gobsmacked at the pressure they were under and did so well.

I am pleased that Celebrity Master Chef is on tonight, I am especially looking forward to seeing if Todd Carty can bake better than he can ice skate!

Week Seventy Seven – Mary Berry’s Iced Gingerbread with Stem Ginger & Fork Biscuits

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Week seventy seven and what a week it has been! I had returned to work on half days and was thoroughly exhausted and hubby had a rather unpleasant encounter with a hot kettle! Plenty of wet towels, an ambulance ride and a six hour wait in A&E and we eventually got home. Not the ideal evening I had planned curled up on the sofa with painkillers and my trusty hot water bottle but needs must. I am now a dab hand with Jelonet and  latex-free bandages…more skills to add to my repertoire!

Evil Kettle

I picked up Mary Berry’s Baking Bible with a heavy heart this week given the recent events and the fact that I seem to be eternally tired while I continue to recover from my op. I scoured through Mary’s recipes trying to summon up some enthusiasm and having given up on that, settled on gingerbread and fork biscuits. The gingerbread recipe was quite simple and was one of her ( I am eternally grateful) throw everything pretty much in a bowl and mix. The only variance to this was adding the bicarb and milk to the mix and beating it in. I then poured the mix into my prepared tin and into the oven it went. I had to set the timer for an hour and then after an hour, turn the oven down and bake for a further half an hour.

Mary Berry's Iced Gingerbread with Stem Ginger

I think my oven is getting old and temperamental as from the time the gingerbread went in to the time it came out, the oven door was not opened once yet the cake sank in the middle….and no, I didn’t open the door, even the tiniest bit to check it! I looked through the window with the light on. So I turn the cake out and ice it upside down so all the icing doesn’t pool in the middle of the cake! Oh and thanks to hubby, I didn’t add the chopped up stem ginger to the icing as he “wasn’t keen”!!!!

Kim's Gingerbread Kim's Iced Gingerbread

The second recipe had to wait until the gingerbread had cooked as it required a hotter oven. It was Mary’s fork biscuit recipe which looked quick and simple and I used her suggestion at the bottom of making them citrusy by adding some grated orange peel. The recipe was again quite simple, mix the four ingredients together, and form a dough. Divide the dough into approximately 16 walnut size balls and use a fork to flatten the biscuits. Bake for about 15 minutes.

Mary Berry's Fork Biscuits

The resulting biscuits didn’t spread out as much as Mary suggests they do but they were light and quite tasty. I am keen on the Mary philosophy that they don’t all need to be the same size either to taste okay!  I might consider doing these again.

Kim's Fork Biscuits

I am missing all my favourite programmes at the moment- no more Great British Bake Off, no more Mary Berry Cooks and no more Dr Who at the moment. Having been off for a few weeks recovering though, I have watched an awful lot of TV lately and when I list what I have watched and enjoyed recently, you will get an insight into my TV tastes…lol….so here we go…..Haven, The Mentalist, The new Ironside, Hawaii Five O, The Following, Revolution, About a Boy, Grimm……see no soap operas in sight …..

Week Sixy Four – Mary Berry’s Potato Scones

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When I delved into Mary Berry’s Baking Bible this week, I must admit that after the relative gluttony of Christmas food, I couldn’t face two recipes this week but mindful that I want to complete this challenge this year, I will aim to try harder next week!

Mary Berry's Potato Scones

Potato scones sounded unusual and it was nice to try something savoury for a change. The recipe is like Mary’s usual scone recipe except that you get to add some fresh mashed potato to it! Mary claims that you can make 12 scones out of this dough batch. Well I managed that but they were thinner than I would have liked so if I make these again or you decide to have a go, then roll the dough thicker if you like a deeper scone.

Kim's Potato Scones

They tasted very yummy when split and eaten with a dash of butter while still warm from the oven.

I was very excited to see that The Great Sport Relief Bake Off is coming tomorrow. I have already set all four episodes to record and will sit and watch each one avidly!  I have greatly missed The Great British Bake Off with Mary Berry’s kind words and Paul Hollywood’s stern looks.

Week Sixty Three – Mary Berry’s Date & Cherry Butter Bars

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After a few weeks of not baking for my challenge of baking every recipe in Mary Berry‘s Baking Bible, it felt a little strange to get her book out again and look for something easy to ease myself back into this. This recipe is one of her tray bakes and as I had cherries and dates left over from Christmas baking , it seemed like a good one to re start the challenge.

Mary Berry's Date & Cherry Butter Bars

Mary asks you to rub the butter into the flour to make breadcrumb like texture, then add the chopped cherries and dates, some caster sugar and an egg. Bring it all together into a dough like ball and press it into a tray bake tin. Place it in a pre warmed oven for about 10 minutes. After 10 minutes, mark it into bars with a sharp knife and return it to the oven for another 10 minutes or until the bars are a lovely golden colour. Score through the bars again and allow to cool in the tin.

Kim's Date & Cherry Butter Bars

Once cool, keep in an airtight tin.

A quick and easy to get me back in the Mary Berry challenge saddle!

Week Fifty Nine – Mary Berry’s Iced Apricot Fruit Loaf & Double Chocolate Cookies

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Week fifty nine and I am beginning to wonder where the time goes in between the bakes…it just seems to gallop along! I had quite a sweet tooth craving this week and decided upon Mary Berry‘s iced apricot fruit loaf first. Mary’s recipe from her Baking Bible is the usual “add everything to a bowl and mix” which is really easy when you have so much else to fit in at the weekend. I mixed it and poured it into a loaf tin and put it in the pre heated oven for an hour and ten minutes.

Mary Berry's Iced Apricot Fruit Loaf

I began to get the lovely baking aromas in the kitchen about half way through it baking and it began to make my tummy rumble. Soon enough, the timer pinged sounded and I got my trusty skewer to check it was done- yep, all done, Mary recommends you leave it to cool in the tin for about 10 minutes before tipping it onto a cooling rack. It seemed to take forever to cool and be ready for the icing topping. Mary asks you to combine some water and apricot jam, heat both together to combine and then add icing sugar. It makes a tangy apricot icing. Mary then recommends finely cutting two apricots and sprinkling them down the middle. I decided to slice mine so it had more of a Mohican look!

Kim's Iced Apricot Fruit Loaf

Mary’s second recipe was double chocolate cookies. This involved melting some dark chocolate with some butter then adding a tin of condensed milk– I could see this was going to be a usual slim line Mary recipe! Once the chocolate had melted and the condensed milk added, you needed to leave the mix to cool then add to the dry ingredients. This then had to be chilled until it was easy to handle. Mary asks you to grease some baking trays and add teaspoons of the mixture in regular intervals, leaving space for expansion.

Mary Berry's Double Chocolate Cookies

The cookies only take about 10-15 minutes to bake, they are quick and easy to make and seemed to go down well with hubby which is always a bonus!

Kim's Double Chocolate Cookies

Well I have been having withdrawal symptoms from The Great British Bake Off finishing but I am bolstered this week by the 50th Anniversary episode of Dr Who – I am a true Whovian! I am also looking forward to watching the antics of the celebrities in I’m a Celebrity…….

Week Fifty Eight – Mary Berry’s Banoffee Pie & Banana Loaf

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Week fifty eight and this week was quite unusual. I went to see my mum and family this weekend and took advantage of the fact that hubby wasn’t with me to bake 2 banana based recipes- you see I can’t bake these at home as hubby is allergic to bananas and I don’t want to risk him having a serious reaction for the sake of this challenge. Mary Berry‘s Baking Bible has a few banana recipes in it and I hoped to be able to adapt the recipes or swap the ingredients where possible but these 2 recipes would not be the same without bananas.

Mary Berry's Banoffee Pie

The first recipe was banoffee pie and I was always under the impression that the banana and toffee was mixed together but in Mary’s recipe, there is no banana in the toffee layer, just sliced into the cream on the topping. The base was ginger biscuits crushed and added to melted butter to make the base. Then Mary asks you to heat the butter sugar and TWO cans of condensed milk until it thickens. I think I didn’t spend long enough on this and although I thought it had thickened enough, when I chilled it, it still remained quite gloopy and didn’t cut cleanly. I topped it with slices of banana and covered it with whipped cream and chocolate sprinkles. My “volunteer” tasters didn’t look overly keen with their scoop of sloppy pie but they did assure me that it tasted better than it looked!

Kim's Banoffee Pie

The second recipe was a banana loaf. I took a loaf tin liner with me. Mary’s recipe asks you to add all the ingredients into a bowl and mix well, pour into the loaf tin and bake in the over for around an hour.

Mary Berry's Banana Loaf

When it was done, there was a lovely smell in the kitchen- one that my home will never have- of a scrummy banana loaf- and the smell of bananas was strong so I was pleased I chose to bake it at my mum’s. A few slices were eaten before I left and It seemed to go down well.

Kim's Banana Loaf

The evening was capped off with an invitation to a Halloween party- and my first I have to admit. I did have fun with choosing something to wear, I went as a vampire and found the most amazing fangs to wear! I found I got into character quite quickly!

Kim the Vamp!

I have also just finished watching the last Great British Bake Off master classes and some of Mary’s recipes that she did were one’s from her book and I was pleased to see that so far, I have managed fairly well, but am sad that there is no more GBBO until next year now……sigh…..