Spring Double Bill

It's a double-post of baking goodness! I've been setting up for people over later and I love using my friends as guinea pigs for my kitchen/lab experiments.

The two following recipes aren't just my normal alterations of substituting flours or adding nuts. The two below have turned into two different recipes from what inspired me.

The first was a reason to use up a box of chocolates that M's aunt gave us. The chocolates were nice but we just don't eat enough chocolate to keep it around. So I took a whole grain chocolate chip recipe and amended it to fit the Mint Crisps I wanted to use. Turned into lovely after-dinner type cookies. If you wish to use the recipe without mint chocolate, just take out the peppermint extract and use regular chocolate.

With the grated chocolate, try to find something complimentary to the chopped chocolate you're using. If you're using dark, grate some dark. If you're using milk or white, use milk.

One of my work guinea pigs, R, suggested using chocolate orange segments with orange extract or orange zest instead of the peppermint extract. Really want to try those now!

Whole Wheat Mint Chocolate Chip Cookies

115g softened butter

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup granualted sugar

1 egg

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 tsp peppermint extract

1 cup whole wheat flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp baking soda

1 1/4 cup oats

1 cup chopped chocolate (dark, light or flavoured is your fancy)

2oz grated chocolate

Process the oats in a blender or food processor until fine, like oat flour. If you aren't able to do this, substitute 1 cup of oats for any type of flour and use 1/4 cup oats whole.

Whisk flours, baking powder, salt, baking soda, and oats together. Set aside. Cream butter with both sugars for 3 minutes, until fluffy. Beat in egg and extracts. Stir in grated chocolate.

Gradually beat in dry mix to sugar mix. Toward the end, you'll need to switch to a wooden spoon. Fold in chopped chocolate.

Place 2in spoonfulls 2in apart on baking sheet. Bake at 375/gas 5 for 12 minutes or until the bottoms are slightly golden. Let cool 2 minutes on baking sheet. Transfer to wire rack to cool completly.

The second recipe was something I found on the Vegetarian Times website. They often have some interesting recipes using very different ingredients, which always piques my interest (if you can't tell by now!) And who doesn't love cheese? So I turned these into cornbread style scones because I had a craving for cornbread and some cornmeal in the cupboard. I sprinkled tabasco sauce on the tops before putting them in the oven. This is optional (I love spicy) but I couldn't taste it enough to warrent being in the recipe. M says he can so maybe I've just spicy-ed off my tastebuds from years of putting tabasco sauce in my morning eggs.

Cheddar Sweetcorn Scones

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 cup plain flour

1 cup cornmeal

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

2oz chilled butter

2oz grated mature cheese

1/2 cup corn kernals

1/2 cup buttermilk (see note)

1 egg

Preheat oven to 400F/gas 6

Whisk baking soda, flour, cornmeal, baking powder and salt. Stir in cheese. Transfer to a food processer and blend in butter until the mix looks like breadcrumbs. Alternatively you can rub the butter into flour by hand.

Stir in buttermilk and egg until a dough forms. fold in corn. Pour onto floured surface and pat into rectangle 1/2in thick. Cut out into rounds like scones.

Brush tops with milk or egg wash. Bake 12-15 minutes or until lightly golden.

Add juice of 1/2 lemon to the milk and let sit 5 minutes to get buttermilk. Or you can use plain yogurt.

Cracked Black Pepper Oatmeal Crackers

This recipe is inspired, as a lot of mine are, by Heidi at 101cookbooks.com. I altered some of the ingredients and played with the flour a bit to get this lovely creation. The pepper is perfect and mixed with the touch of sugar, the sweet and the savoury, the topping possibilities are endless. Personally, I loved them with some leftover Christmas cranberry chutney but I think a hearty mature cheddar would be just as perfect.

Homemade crackers are tricky, especially with our little Beko-POS-oven. The most difficult part is rolling the dough out thinly enough to get a crispy cracker, rather than a cakey biscuit. It took a lot of flour and a lot of elbow grease but I think mine came out right.

Either way, I did something right. I brought a batch to work and they were gone by lunch! Normally I have cakes sitting out on my desk all day and have to either bring the remaining home, or force them on people but not today. I'll have to bring in the rest tomorrow.

I think the rye flour is key here. It adds the savoury to the sweet of the oats and mixes well with the pepper. I used a mix of spelt flour and buckwheat instead of wholemeal but when I rolled the dough out, I floured the surface with wholemeal. Go with what you have in the cupboard. Plain would work just as well.

1 cup oats

360ml milk, heated to boiling

55g softened butter

4tbsp demerara sugar

3 tsp baking powder

2 tsp crushed black peppercorns

1/2 tsp sea salt

155g rye flour

190g wholemeal flour
salt to sprinkle

Mix oats with boiling milk. Let cool (you can put it in the freezer if you're short on time)

Stir in all wholemeal flour when the oats have cooled. Mix together well. Add wholemeal flour until a dough forms (you may need more or less than what's called for).

Pour the dough out onto a floured surface. Knead until the dough is uniform.

Preheat the oven to 425F/245C/gas 8-9. Roll out the dough as thinly as you can. Cut into shapes of your choice. Sprinkle with salt Big flaky salt is better but go with what you have.

Bake about 9 minutes or until the bottom is just golden. Turn over and bake another 5 minutes or until crisper and golden.

Let cool to crisp up even more.

They were perfect spread with jams/chutneys/nut butter and a cup of Redbush tea for some sunday afternoon blogging!