hashtag prune week

Ok, so it all started when I was gifted a ginormous tin of prunes. We're talking 2.7kg of prunes, which is almost 6lb of them.  Well actually, it says drained weight is 1.7kg of prunes, so there's a fair amount of syrup too, but its still a lot.

Not to be someone who does things by halves, I came up with the concept of prune week. I post all about prunes on facebook, and share recipes that I've tried out and stuff like that, and then if anyone else wants to do it too, they can use my #pruneweek to label their posts, and that way they can be searched and found (probably by me, but anyone else who is interested too!)

So today kicks off the start of prune week with a prune cake.  I like the idea of this recipe because it contains no extra sugar. Because I'm using prunes in syrup rather than dried, I adjusted the recipe by using 100ml of water and 100ml of syrup and that made the batter wet enough.

It's just cooked through (checked and the knife came out clean) and is cooling on the side, verdict to follow in the next prune week post!


Edited to add verdict - we weren't impressed, I'll admit. Also, although a skewer pulled out clean, it still managed to not be cooked through in the middle. It was ok cake, but I think the prune taste was too strong for the kids.
We shared some cake and prunes with our lovely neighbours. 

31 days - day twelve

The tale of Anna and Gill's apples.

Anna, a friend from school, who I'd reconnected with on Facebook, posted on facebook she had apples from her tree if anyone would like them - she wanted to spread some love and kindness and such like.

I'm a sucker for free stuff, and I thought it would be interesting to see Anna again after all this time (about 17 years on!) so I asked, may I have some?

Anna said, sure, come over, so we did.  JJ loved playing with Anna's son's train set. Anna and I had a lovely time chatting and I definitely plan to see her again.  One person loved and blessed.

I gave some apples to my mummy. Two people loved and blessed.

My neighbour brought round some pears they grew in her garden, I gave her some of Anna's apples.
Three people.

Gill popped round with bags of apples.  I was blessed again.

I asked on facebook if any friends wanted to come eat leftover party food and help me process apples from Anna (and lots from Gill). Good times working and talking together. Three more adults plus three babies/children loved and blessed. And I was blessed again by their help.

In my freezer there are several bags of peeled and chopped apples. I will use them to make jam, cake, and crumbles.  Many more people the apples will be shared with, loved and blessed.

A tale of a bag of apples. Friendships rekindled, friendships strengthened, people fed, people loved, people blessed.

Chocolate pumpkin and banana muffins

1 and 1/2 cups wholemeal flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 tablespoon cocoa
1/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup pumpkin puree
2 mashed bananas
1/3 cup applesauce
1/3 cup milk (we used skimmed)

Mix flour, baking powder, cocoa and sugar in a bowl.
Mix all the other ingredients in another bowl.
Mix wet and dry ingredients together.
Spoon into mini muffin cases and bake at 180C/350F/gas mark 4 for 25 minutes until they stop singing!
Cool on a cooling rack. Consume.

I used up my self-raising flour in the last recipe, so this time we just used plain.

Again, the applesauce is a replacement for oil and could be replaced back again!

Since the last recipe wasn't that sweet, I decided to experiment with a quarter cup of sugar in this recipe. I expect it could be substituted for honey, although you make need to adjust other liquid levels.

Ok, so they're done. They're slightly odd in that they've puffed up and the outside is crispy, and the inside is a bit gooey on some of them. The ones we've tried we've just sort of squished flat in order to eat them.

Soph thought they were delicious, mind you she would have eaten all the mixture if I'd let her!

Overall, they're quite banana-y and chocolate-y and pretty yummy really. And they've gotta be pretty healthy too!

Courgette, Carrot and Sultana Muffins

1 (generous) cup of self raising wholemeal flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/3 cup grated carrot
1/3 cup grated courgette
1/4 cup sultanas
1 egg
1/2 cup applesauce (I used home cooked from scratch)
1/2 cup milk (I used skimmed)

Mix together dry ingredients (inc carrot, courgette and sultanas)
Mix together wet ingredients
Mix wet and dry together
Spoon into mini muffin tins or cases (we used mini muffin silicone cases)
Cook at 180C/350F/gas mark 4 for about 20 minutes. (Carefully) listen to see if they are still making noise, cook a little longer until they're quiet, or test with a skewer or toothpick and cook until it comes out clean. We made 28 mini muffins

As you can see, there's no fat and no sugar, with the applesauce replacing them both. Some of these turned out a little bit dough-y in the middle, think I needed to cook them just a little bit more. They weren't very sweet at all. I think a couple of tablespoons of sugar or honey would probably make them more appealing.

I think they'd be better cooked slightly longer, and with a little more sweetener.

Sophia says she doesn't like the carrot ones, but I pointed out a couple that I said didn't have carrot and she wolfed them down. Ok, so that was a lie, but I was pretty sure it was her hatrid of carrot that was colouring her judgement! While I've written this I'm pretty sure she's had at least one more (hence my reason for doing mini ones!), so I think they've gone down well.

If you don't have applesauce, I'd suggest perhaps use 1/4 cup of oil and 1/4 cup sugar or honey, less if you're happy with a less sweet version.

I took photos, but will have to add them later

Mega muffin bake up

My sister Hannah shared with me her (or that she'd acquired) recipe for beetroot, sweetcorn and carrot muffins. She absolutely loves them. Sophia loved them for the first 2 that she ate, but after that she said that she absolutely did not want to eat them (thank goodness for the freezer, anyway!)

Anyway, all that inspired me, along with a muffin 'formula' I found in The Tightwad Gazette, to attempt to create some fruit and veg muffins of my own (with the intention that they be healthy ish snacks and would sneak some fruit and veg into my daughter!)

And the day for that grand bake up is TODAY.

I intend to share my recipes, and our reactions to them!