To tempt Hansel and Gretel

For years I have been saying that I will make a gingerbread house from scratch and I've never quite got round to it.  However, this was the year I actually found the time to do it! Rather than using one of my few days off in December to chill out, I (perhaps foolishly) decided to spend the entire day in the kitchen baking gingerbread, making copious amounts of icing, and constructing a gingerbread house.

I followed Mary Berry's gingerbread house recipe and in true Mary Berry style it was easy to follow and make.  Unlike in the shop-bought kits you can get, when you make the gingerbread yourself it turns out sturdy enough to build the house, but still enjoyably soft and tasty.  I made a few alterations to the recipe as my dough came out incredibly dry, meaning I had to add quite a bit of water to make it soft enough and stick together enough to roll and cut out.  I also decided to keep the windows square and as I didn't have a small enough star cutter I left out that part of the design too.

One part I was determined to try was the stained-glass windows made out of boiled sweets.  Simply crush up some boiled sweets (I used rosy apples to get the mottled effect) and when the gingerbread is nearly baked remove it from the oven, sprinkle the crushed sweets into the window gaps and return to the oven.  The sweets should melt and form a thin window pane.

Before assembling the house use icing to stick giant chocolate buttons onto the roof panels to create a tiled effect.  For a house of this size I needed two packets of giant chocolate buttons.  I don't have any photos of the assembly process as I was too preoccupied trying to hold all the components together until the icing was dry enough to do the job on its own.

As well as the buttons and the boiled sweets I also used some silver sugar balls and honeycomb to decorate the house and as I'd already made rather too much icing I used the extra as added snow around the joints on the house.  I also had extra gingerbread which I rolled out and cut out into stars before baking and icing.

New Beginnings

With the craziness of December over and a somewhat more relaxed January to look forward to I've finally found some time to get back to blogging.  In this post I've decided to take a look back over my year, it's had its ups and downs but here are some of the highlights.

My year began with the discovery of one of my now all-time favourite cafes Afternoon Tease. This is a gorgeous little Cambridge-based cafe, perfect for a cuppa and a slice of what must be the best cake in town (my personal favourite is the chocolate Guinness cake).

Having received a subscription to the BBC Good Food Magazine for Christmas I was keen to try out new recipes each month and in February I made the perfect meal for two - pan-fried trout with mixed salad, bacon, almonds and beetroot.  This made the perfect Valentine's day meal and went really well with a bottle of Bacchus from the Chapel Down Winery followed by a favourite dessert wine of mine, Royal Tokaji .

March saw me on the road again heading back to Bamberg to revisit some of my favourite places and take a much-needed break from work.  I spent my free time over the Easter holidays cooking, of course brunch featured along with some Easter-themed creations.  In April I also managed to finish my Beekeeper's quilt after months of hard work.

 

With exams looming I didn't manage to do as much cooking as I would have liked in May and June but that didn't stop me from having some foodie fun.  In between writing essays and revising I managed to fit in trips to the first ever Cambridge street food market (Food Park is now a regular feature on the streets of Cambridge) and the main Eat Cambridge event.  This was also when I discovered the best burger I have ever had, courtesy of Steak and Honour.

Despite graduating I couldn't stay away from Cambridge for long and in July I returned just in time to try some of Cambridge Smokeworks incredible slow food done fast.

After an amazing few weeks spent in Disneyland and Vegas, August saw me back in the kitchen and creating some of my best food of the year (even if I do say so myself). My first ever attempts at home-made scotch eggs and macaroons turned out beautifully, as did my rendition of a traditional French tian. 

With the prospect of leaving home looming on the horizon I spent some time in September learning some essentials from my mum, including how to cook a traditional roast dinner.  Moving to Southampton has been eventful.  In just four months I moved house four times and D and I still haven't managed to move into our more permanent home (here's hoping we'll be settled by February).  What with moving and starting a new job blogging has taken a bit of a back seat.

My blog celebrated it's first birthday in October and I celebrated in style (albeit a little late) with an awesome Halloween-themed fondue.

I may not have found the time to blog in December but that didn't mean I had completely abandoned the kitchen.  Hopefully I'll now have a bit more time to actually write some posts about what I got up to in December but for now here's a sneaky peak.

Apple and Cinnamon Cake

Red Velvet Cake

Gingerbread House

So, a new year, a new job, a new home in a new city, here's to new beginnings and a year as good as the last.

Ready...set..bake!

Now that I'm a little more settled I've finally found some time to get down to some baking, something I've really missed doing while being at university.  I had a good think and realised that I'd never actually baked a lemon drizzle cake before, so I decided it was high time I gave one a go.

The lemon drizzle cake

I wanted to keep things relatively simple so I used Mary Berry's all-in-one method.  As you could possibly guess from the title of this post, I'm a massive Bake Off fan and I especially love Mary Berry.  Her recipes are simple and reliable, perfect for home cooking as you know if you follow the recipe it will turn out exactly as you expect.

The ingredients

For this lemon drizzle cake you simply add the self-raising flour, softened butter, caster sugar, eggs, baking powder, milk and grated lemon rind to a bowl, then mix until you have a smooth batter.  Pre-heat the oven, grease a baking tray and bake the tray bake in the oven for 35-40 minutes until it is brown and risen.

The finished product

For the glaze you just need to mix lemon juice with granulated sugar and drizzle over the cake while it's still warm.  Cut into squares and enjoy with a nice cup of coffee (I acquired this habit while in Germany where 'Kaffee und Kuchen' - coffee and cake - is very popular).

Well-risen, a nice crumb and not a soggy bottom in sight!

Halloween Fondue

You're probably wondering what makes this fondue particular to Halloween.  Well, rather than using a fondue set or a bowl I decided to use a pumpkin!  Not only does this dish look really cool, it tastes awesome too!

The ingredients

Once you've carved a lid off the pumpkin and scooped out the centre, put the lid back on, place the pumpkin on a baking tray and bake in a pre-heated oven.  As my pumpkin was reasonably large it needed 1 and 1/2 hours in the oven, but baking times will vary.


While the pumpkin baked I peeled and chopped up the potatoes, par-boiled them for twenty minutes and heated some olive oil in a roasting tin in the oven.  When the pumpkin had fifteen minutes left I put the roast potatoes into the bottom of the oven.  I then turned them and transferred them to the top of the oven when I removed the pumpkin.

If, like mine, liquid has gathered in the bottom of your pumpkin scoop as much out as you can before adding the cheese and creme fraiche. I used cheddar, emmental and comte (but gruyere would work too).  I also added a crushed clove of garlic and a finely chopped shallot.  I also recommend adding a couple of tablespoons of white wine to give it a little something extra.  I used a white Rioja but most dry white wines would work well.



Return the pumpkin to the oven and bake it for another 30 minutes, until the cheese is melted and bubbling.  Remove the pumpkin and the potatoes from the oven, season the cheese, grab some slices of some nice crusty bread and dig in!

The fondue

One Year On

I know it's been a while but I'm still here and still cooking!  The last month has been a little hectic and I just haven't found the time to write a post.  I guess I'm writing this post to update you and give you a snapshot of my life at the moment.  At the moment I'm sitting in my living room overlooking Southampton water, a beautiful view except for the odd passing container ship.

I can't quite believe that my blog is now a year old, the time has gone so quickly and so much has happened.  I've not only graduated but in the last month I've got a job, moved to Southampton and started work.  I'm still moving around a bit, but hopefully I'll have sorted out a more permanent home by Christmas.

Now that I'm no longer in Cambridge I debated whether to change the name of my blog, but after much consideration I've decided to keep it.  For one thing 'Little Southampton Kitchen' doesn't have quite the same ring to it! For another, by keeping the same name it will always remind me of where I started.  Since I now have the luxury of an oven, a grill and more than one hob I'm going to start attempting some more adventurous recipes which I couldn't really have made before and where possible I'll suggest simplifications.

In the last month I have become a huge fan of 'Jamie's 15 Minute Meals' as they are perfect weeknight meals.  I generally get home between 7 and 8 and the last thing I want to do is spend ages cooking, so these meals are perfect as they really are super quick (if not quite manageable in 15 minutes).  They normally take between 15 minutes and half an hour to prepare (especially the first time you try a recipe), but they are simple to follow and you end up with delicious and healthy food.

My only criticism would be that the portions are a little on the small side (especially as my job is quite active and the days are long), so if you're cooking for 4 as the recipes suggest you may want to bulk up the portions with a little extra pasta if you can.  I tend to cook the full amount, which tends to make 2 good portions for our evening meal and leaves enough for a couple of smaller lunches to take to work later in the week.

I've tried quite a variety of the recipes from this book, so the photos below are just a snapshot of the meals I've prepared over the last few weeks.

Prawn Linguine

This is a great dish, seriously simple, yet delicious.  I especially love the use of saffron and cinnamon in the seasoning.

British Burgers with salad pickles "and things"

I love Jamie's burgers so much I've made them twice!  The burgers themselves are so simple to make and taste heaps better than anything you can buy pre-made in a supermarket.

The "and things" refer to the tomatoes, pickles and yoghurt dressing.  Having spent a year in Germany I am a massive fan of pickles, so any recipe that includes them is a winner with me!  As for the yoghurt and Worcestershire sauce, it makes a lovely change from the usual ketchup or mayo.

Next up is a chicken caesar salad.  This is possibly my favourite style of salad and I love making the dressing myself as it is always tastier than the ready-made sauces you can buy.  I didn't stick to the recipe on this one as I had some bits and pieces to use up but it actually worked out quite well.  I thoroughly recommend the addition of some roasted red peppers to the salad.

Chicken Caesar Salad

The final dish I've got to show you is the falafel wraps with grilled veg and salsa.  People often think that vegetarian cooking is boring or not filling enough, this recipe proves them wrong.  It's super tasty, really filling and there's no meat in sight!  While Jamie says the pickled red cabbage is optional I would highly recommend getting hold of some as it really is the perfect thing to top off this excellent dish.

Falafel Wraps, Grilled Veg and Salsa

To top it all off - pickled red cabbage!

I think this post has pretty much summed up my life at the moment.  I'll try and write another post soon but I'm not making any promises.  I really want to get back into baking, something I haven't done nearly enough of recently.  I've got a few Halloween-themed ideas but any suggestions from you guys are very welcome.  Keep an eye out for my next post, until then Tschüss!