Pastry Cakey Christmas Mince Pies
You know when you were little and your Mum used to make stuff that you liked so much it stuck in your memory? With me Mam, it was Sunday lunch – well, not so much the actual lunch as the pudding, which could be proper steamed treacle or jam sponge, or a yummy rice pudding that she used to bake slowly in the oven…mmmmm.
Anyhoo, digressing. Apparently when Hubby was little, his Ma used to make these things that they called pastry-jammy-cakey-things (I know, imaginative title). These were basically jam tarts with a sponge top. Hubby and I were chatting last night over a cup of tea (oh yes, after the spectacular failure of the every other day AFD, alcohol has been banned on week nights – it’s nearly killing us) about such things and Hubby came up with a spectacular idea – ‘ooh, I know’, he said ‘what about pastry-jammy-cakey-mince pies?’
So I had a fiddle, and here they are. Beware, they are severely moreish.
Pastry Mincey Cakey Pie Things
For the pastry:
9 oz plain flour
5 oz cold butter, cubed
3 oz caster sugar
1 egg, beaten
First, mix the flour, butter and caster sugar in a food processor, slowly adding the egg until it comes together (actually, this is a total lie – I just bung it all in, then add the whole egg and hope for the best). Or to do it the old fashioned way, rub the butter in to the flour, add the sugar and bring together with the egg. Squish your pastry into a flat lump and cool in the fridge for half an hour (or however long – it’ll keep in there).
Then, when you’re ready, take half the pastry (save half for another day), roll out quite thinly (pound coin width isn’t it?) and cut with a cutter into discs to match your muffin tin (best with a nice deep one). Line each little hole with a disc of pastry and blind bake them in a 200 degree oven for about 5 minutes. You can do all that baking bean stuff but frankly I can’t be arsed. Then take them out and let them cool while you whip up a boring old cake mix:
4 oz butter
4 oz caster sugar
4 oz self raising flour
2 eggs
Cream the butter and the sugar, then add the eggs one at a time and finally the flour until you have a nice smooth mixture.
Take about half a jar of mincemeat and mix with a splosh of Morgan’s Spiced Rum (optional, but fabulous). Dollop a teaspoonful of mincemeat into each little pastry case and cover with a tablespoon of cake mix. Back into the oven for about 12 – 15 minutes until risen and golden (watch carefully for the last few minutes) and there you go. They’re ridiculously difficult to get out of the tin, but they taste divine so who cares?
As to the name, well, they can’t be pastry-jammy-cakey-things any more as they contain no jam, but pastry-mincey-cakey-things doesn’t sound right. So how about Christmas Mince Pie Cakes? Ooh, or how about just Christmas Pies? Pah, whatever.
Tamarind Chicken Noodles
So you’ll like this one. Hubby, being a bit weird, can’t eat pasta at all – makes him gag, apparently (oh the drama). But he loves noodles, which as far as I’m concerned are exactly the same as pasta so I just substitute one for the other. When he comes home late from work I often put some noodles on as they’re quick and knock this chicken up, or sometimes I just do the chicken and mix it with a supermarket bag of leaves. I’ve messed about with it an awful lot but I reckon it’s just right now and last time I made it I managed to remember to write it down. Oh, and regarding the tamarind, give it a go. I had baked sea bass with tamarind in a Thai restaurant and really loved it so I bought a little jar and I’m quite addicted now. It’s an odd, sweet/sour sort of flavour, but really tastes nice in this:
1 pack fine egg noodles
2 chicken breasts or some leftover chicken, shredded
1 pack Pak Choi, sliced and washed (can be gritty)
Couple of spring onions, sliced
Marinade:
2 cloves garlic, grated
1 red chilli, deseeded and finely chopped, or 1 tsp chilli flakes
Juice of ½ lime
1 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp fish sauce (Nam Pla)
1 tbsp brown sugar or honey
2 tbsp oil
1 tsp tamarind paste
So slice up a couple of chicken breasts into strips, mix all the marinade ingredients together in a bowl and add the chicken, turning it over so it’s all combined. Leave to one side while you boil a saucepan of water, salt it and bung in your noodles.
Heat a wok or large saucepan and throw in the chicken together with all the marinade (it’s got oil in so you shouldn’t need any more) and the spring onions. Stir fry until the chicken’s cooked, it doesn’t take long. Add your chopped Pak Choi near the end – this really needs to just be warmed through, it’s horrible if it’s soggy – and toss together.
Drain your noodles and tip them into the wok, mixing them all in with the chicken and the sauce. Serve sprinkled with chopped salted peanuts and some coriander.
By the way, if you want to make this more like chicken noodle soup, boil the noodles in 1 litre of made-up chicken stock, cook the chicken separately, then add it all in to the noodles at the end. Spoon into bowls and eat it making shameless slurping noises in front of the telly.
Chaos and Carbonara
#2 has a friend to stay this weekend. The house is in chaos: this being Saturday there’s the usual festering rugby kits humming by the back door, and now there’s running sucker-gun battles in the hall (thanks for those by the way, Dad) and the lounge is a sea of lego. We’ve already had arguments over whose turn it is on Star Wars and over who is James Bond. My nerves are completely frazzled and the dog and her lampshade are gibbering quietly to themselves under the kitchen table. Cheery texts from Hubby who is coincidentally very busy today at work have been met with a veritable smorgasbord of expletives. Salvation has appeared in the unlikely form of son #2 himself, who being a bit of a budding Gordon Ramsey has decided to take charge on the catering front, which is fine with me. He’s quite keen that I post his recipe for your delectation, and measuring not being his strong point, we’re working in handfuls and..er..sploshes, so here goes:
#2 son’s kid-friendly spaghetti carbonara
1 pack streaky bacon
1 pack spaghetti
Frozen peas
2 eggs
Splash of milk
Boil a big pan of salted water, then add your spaghetti and a couple of handfuls of frozen peas. Meanwhile, snip the bacon into strips and fry. Crack the eggs into a bowl, add a good slug of milk and whisk.
When pasta is cooked and bacon is crispy, drain the pasta then quickly bung in the egg mix and the bacon. Mix up so the eggs cook, then serve with loads of grated cheddar.
For an adult version, I would use cream instead of the milk, parmesan instead of cheddar and maybe even pancetta instead of the bacon. Yummy whichever way you do it though. Now all I need to do is find the kitchen again under all the pans, packets and utensils. Happy days..
