Porridge Pancakes

Well, not really anything to do with porridge, except for the containing oats bit. These are more a cross between Pikelets (yeasted pancakes) and Staffordshire oatcakes.

We had sweet toppings today, but they also work really well with savoury toppings too.

I topped mine with fresh peach, frozen berries, coconut milk yogurt and chocolate sauce.

L went for the classic lemon and sugar, M drowned his in maple syrup. 

1 1/2 Cups Gluten Free Plain Flour (I used Dove's Farm White Bread Flour, you may need to adjust fluid for different blends)

1 cup Gluten Free Oats

1tsp Dried Yeast

3 Cups Milk Substitute (plus 1/4 cup)

Put dry ingredients in a bowl.

Mix in milk substitute with a balloon whisk.

Cover and leave in fridge over night.

Stir in extra milk substitute.

Heat a lightly oiled skillet or frying pan on medium heat.

Pour in 1/2 cup of mix and leave until bubbles formed and top beginning to set.

Flip over and brown lightly on other side.

Repeat until all mix used up. Mine made 8 about 6 inches across.

Sticky Gooey Chocolate Marshmallow Sandwiches - Smores(ish)

After a recent trip to Scotland where I introduced the boys to the joy of toasting marshmallows over a fire, we've been using more at home.

L, whose never been bothered by his allergies before, came home from Cubs a bit upset as they'd made Smores one evening. Had they told me in advance I would have sent in safe biscuits, chocolate and marshmallows so he could be included, but when he'd joined a few weeks earlier, they told me they don't do a snack while the boys are there. I've asked them to let me know when there are exceptions again!

Having just come home to an empty biscuit tin after a chilly winter walk, I thought I'd try our own variation...

Cinnamon Cookies (You could skip this step and use any suitable biscuits, I would have used Free From digestives but have run out)

100g Dairy and Soya Free Spread

100g Soft Brown Sugar

1tbsp Golden Syrup

1tsp Vanilla Paste (or extract)

1 tsp Ground Cinnamon

150g Gluten Free Self Raising Flour

*Apologies for lack of images, my App crashed overtime I tried to upload more

Whisk all ingredients, except flour, together until light and fluffy.

Add flour and whisk again until well combined.

Place scoops of mixture onto a lined baking sheet.

Bake at 180ºC for 12mins.

Leave on tray to cool for a few minuted before moving as very soft.

Cool until easy to handle

Assembly

Top the base of a cookie with marshmallows (I used sliced giant ones) and suitable chocolate.

Repeat for number you are making.

Put back in oven for 1-2minutes, until chocolate is melted (but still holding it's shape) and marshmallows squishy.

Top with another cookie.

Leave to cool slightly or warm cookie will crumble.

Serve on a plate to grateful children...

Flapjack Fingers

My usual packed lunch flapjacks are low in fat and sugar and have loads of fresh fruit added, but spotted this recipe yesterday and thought I'd make something a little different for the holidays (I'm also taking advantage of being able to add nuts, but these are optional). I hate shop bought pre packed flapjacks that are soft and doughy, almost like uncooked mix. To me, they should be crispy and taste like the ones I grew up with.

These have 30g of Nutribrex too as I didn't quite have enough oats left!

I sort of followed this recipe, but made a smaller quantity and reduced the sugar a little, oh, and cooked them for longer, because 20 minutes was never going to be enough!

150g Dairy and Soya Free margarine

80g Soft Brown Sugar

90g Golden Syrup

300g Oats

nuts/seeds/dried fruit/chocolate chips

Melt margarine, sugar and syrup together in a bowl in the microwave.

Stir in oats and fruit, seeds etc.

Tip into a lined tin (mine is 25cm x 18cm)

Press down with the back of a spoon.

Bake at 180ºc for 30-35 mins.

Cut into 16 fingers while still warm and leave to cool in the tin.

Waffle Biscuits

I like to keep recipes as simple as possible for people who are new to baking, so I've stripped down my usual waffle recipe even further to make these crunchy, crispy biscuits. Perfect with ice cream or as a snack on their own.

I've been after a proper cast iron Krumkake pan for years, but second hand ones are rare and new they are only available in Scandanavia/Holland and are expensive to ship. When I spotted this in Lakeland a few weeks ago at quarter of the price I had seen them at before, I couldn't resist.

I added spices to these, but it can easily be left out for a plainer biscuit. I might try a savour cracker too.

Made 24

1 Cup Gluten Free Self Raising Flour (or plain flour, plus 1tsp Baking Powder)

1tbsp Caster Sugar

1 1/2tbsp Vegetable Oil

1/2tsp Vanilla Paste (or extract)

1/2 - 1tsp Mixed Spice (optional)

1 Cup Milk Substitute

Heat waffle press on a medium heat.

Put flour, sugar, oil, vanilla and spice in a bowl.

Pour in the milk substitute.

Gradually mix to a smooth batter with a balloon whisk.

Place 1 tablespoon of batter into the centre of a hot waffle cone press.

Close lid to flatten. Flip pan over after 1-2 minutes.

After a minute on the other side open to check colour.

Keep turning frequently until desired colour reached and crisp when removed.

If they colour too quickly, turn down the heat.

Leave to cool (unless, like me you have boys eating them as soon as they go on the plate!)

Will stay crisp in a tin for upto a week (I only know this as one of the cones I made last week got forgotten about, then we went away and Mini Monster found it still crispy last night!).

Rhubarb and Polenta Cake

Flicking through this month's Waitrose Food Magazine, I spotted a recipe for Sticky Rhubarb and Semolina Skillet Cake. I'd just bought some new season English rhubarb and scanning through the recipe, thought it looked an easy (ish) one to adapt for MEWS free. 

My Free From version on top of the magazine picture

I can't find an online recipe to give you a link, but I swapped the semolina for polenta, butter for dairy free margarine, yogurt for dairy free yogurt, and did a straight swap to gluten free flour. The only problem I could see being the eggs. I've never successfully replaced more than 1 egg in a recipe, even with egg replacer, and this needed 2! I didn't want it to taste of banana, so tried a combination of pear puree, egg replacer and flax egg. Seemed to work, might try without the egg replacer next time.

I think this might be the longest list of ingredients I've ever posted in a recipe (I usually try to keep it simple), but don't let that put you off.

Syrup

Juice of 1 Orange (Zest it first to add to cake)

125g Caster Sugar

125mls Water

Cake

40g Dairy and Soya Free Margarine

75g Caster Sugar

10 Cardamom Pods (seeds removed and crushed)

400g Rhubarb (cut into 4-5cm pieces)

225g Dairy and Soya Free Yogurt or Creme Fraiche

100mls Olive oil

100g Pear Puree

1tbsp Ground Flax Seed mixed with 2tbsp Water

45mls Milk Substitute

Zest of 1 Organge

160g Polenta

80g Gluten Free Self Raising Flour

1tsp Baking Powder

2tsp Egg Replacer

50g Ground Almonds

50g Caster Sugar (I'm pretty sure I forgot to add this)

30g Pistachio Nuts (Roughly Chopped)

Put the orange juice, water and caster sugar in a small pan. Stir then bring to the boil. Simmer for 5 minutes then set aside to cool (I decided mine was still too runny so put it back on and forgot about it… It had reduced to about half volume and was nice and syrupy by the time I realised).

Melt the margarine in a heavy based, oven proof, frying pan (I new there was a reason to keep the one the handle came off a few months ago!).

Add the sugar and cook for 2-3 minutes. Sprinkle on the cardamom and top with the rhubarb.

Put the yogurt, oil, pear puree, flax seed mixture, milk substitute and orange zest in a jug or bowl and mix.

In a large bowl, weigh out the flour, polenta, ground almonds, sugar, baking powder and egg replacer. Mix together.

Pour in the liquid and mix well. 

Spoon onto the rhubarb and spread evenly over the top.

Bake on the oven at 180ºc for 40-50mins.

Remove from oven, pierce top with a skewer and pour over the syrup. Leave to cool for 5 minutes.

Turn out onto a plate to cool and top with the pistachio nuts.

Delicious served warm with custard.

Chocolate Caramel Fingers

I'm not very good at doing nothing. After a weekend of being unwell and mostly neglecting my children, I wanted to make them a treat on the Monday. Still not feeling great, I didn't really want to bake. I got this idea, in a round about way, from a fellow judge from the Free From Food Awards. She'd tried a chocolate bar last week that had puffed amaranth in and said it tasted like a Blue Riband. 

I tried puffing some, slightly out of date, amaranth I had in the cupboard, in the same way I would pop corn. That didn't work. Then I found a box of gluten free crispbreads in the  snack box and thought of making chocolate wafer bars.

Sort of followed this for a toffee recipe but the 'cream' you use may affect the hardness at this temperature. I used about half this quantity, but it made far too much so I used the rest for making pecan toffees. 

Makes 10

200g Dairy & Soya Free Chocolate

10 Gluten Free Crispbreads (I used Amisa, but Le Pain de Fleurs have a large variety & would work too)

1/2 cup (100g) Dairy & Soya Free Margarine

1 cup (plus a bit more) (160g) Soft Light Brown Sugar

1/2 cup (150g) Golden Syrup

1 cup (225mls) Dairy & Soya Free Cream (or milk substitute)

1/2 tsp Vanilla Paste or extract

Make the toffee according to the above instructions.

Line a tin with foil and grease well.

Lay out wafers in the base of the tin.

Pour over toffee to form a thin layer, spread evenly to edges if necessary.

When set, but still slightly warm, cut crispbreads along centre to form two rows. Stack one on top of the other to form a double layer. 

Put another layer of greased foil over the top and press down with another tin to flatten and stick the layers together.

Cut into fingers with a sharp knife.

Coat each one in melted chocolate and leave to set on greaseproof paper.

Decorate by marking with a fork. 

Or drizzle with melted white dairy & soya free chocolate.

Boys were home in time to help with the decorating,
just didn't like waiting for chocolate to set!

Blueberry & Lemon Muffins

Needed a quick second breakfast before swimming this morning, so knocked up a batch of these with some slightly wrinkly blueberries from the fridge!

350g Gluten Free Self Raising Flour (I used Orgran today, so needed the higher volume of fluid)

100g Sugar

75mls Vegetable Oil (or melted dairy free spread)

350-400mls Milk Substitute (some flour blends are more 'thirsty' than others)

Vanilla Paste

Zest & Juice of 1 lemon

160g Blueberries

Weigh flour and sugar into a large bowl.

Add oil, milk substitute, lemon & vanilla and mix to a smooth dropping consistency. If it's too thick, add a little more milk substitute.

Stir in the blueberries.

Spoon into a greased muffin tin.

Bake at 190ºc for 25-30mins.