Simple Summer Breakfast

Hello! I'm so sorry for being MIA recently - finals are life-consuming and I've literally been living in books and essays for the last two months. I haven't even been cooking (I've been home and Mum's been looking after me), so there hasn't been much to blog anyway... BUT, I have discovered a super yummy breakfast, that's quick and easy to make and provides good work-fuel to boot. RHUBARB.

Rhubarb is one of my favourite summer fruits, and at the moment you can buy it everywhere (if you're in Egham, we also sell it at the fruit and veg market on Tuesdays). It takes all of five minutes to cook, and then you can use it with anything.

Ingredients:
- 4 sticks rhubarb
- 2tbsp caster sugar, or to taste (the general rule is half sugar to rhubarb sticks)
- natural yoghurt, to serve

1. Wash your rhubarb and cut into inch long pieces. Place in a microwaveable bowl with the sugar, then microwave for 5 minutes. Stir, then cook for a further minute or so ('til it's as soft as you like it to be). Voila! You now have stewed rhubarb.
2. Serve with natural yoghurt for a brilliant breakfast. If you have some around you can also grate over some nutmeg, or even add your own granola for an added crunch. The rhubarb will keep for a few days, so you can make enough to keep you going for a while.

My last essay's due on Friday, so after that it'll be back to regular posting while we run around in the sun and do lots of cooking. Enjoy, and to anyone else doing finals, good luck!

Lemon Yoghurt Cupcakes. For days when the weather is horrendous.

Thursday's hail

The weather has been absolutely horrendous lately.

Since that St. Jude's Storm back at the end of October, it feels like there's been no let up with all the wind, the rain, the hail (pictured above) and the flooding. Here in Egham, the flooding has been pretty bad - I've never been more grateful for Egham Hill, but our thoughts are definitely with those affected.

On a much much lighter note, I made lemon yoghurt cake yesterday. I was definitely in need of a pick me up, and as last night's storm began to kick off, cake was made. 

This is a Mary Berry recipe, which I've made before as Bryony's birthday cake, and it's seriously good cake. The first time I made it my flatmate Victor chewed the cake tin liners like chewing gum because apparently he reaaallly liked the cake. This time I made cupcakes, because my favourite thing about this cake was the crunchy, sugary, slightly caramelised surface that forms as it bakes, and cupcakes have more surface area.

I used Dove's Farm gluten free self raising flour, because that stuff makes life worth living for anyone who can't eat gluten. It's wonderful. Also I'm a big fan of baking with yoghurt, mainly because of these EPIC Blueberry Muffins. They're awesome.

Here's what you need:

300g caster sugar

50g softened butter (I use salted, because it adds a very slight savoury undertone to the sweetness)

3 large eggs, separated

225g Greek yoghurt

Grated rind of one lemon

175g self raising flour

For the icing: 

100g sifted icing sugar
About 1½ tbsp of lemon juice

1. Preheat the oven to 180C. I now have a gas oven (IT HAS FIRE AT THE BACK, what is that even about?!) so for me, that's gas mark four.

2. Beat the sugar, butter, and egg yolks together in a bowl. Add in the lemon and the yoghurt, and beat until smooth. 

3. In a separate bowl, whisk the egg whites together to a soft peak, then tip into the mixture. Fold it in carefully and slowly, aiming to keep as much air in the mix as possible.

4. Tip into a deep cake tin (with the base lined with greaseproof paper or baking parchment), or if you're baking cupcakes, distribute the mix evenly between cupcake cases. I ended up making about twenty cupcakes from this mix (two of which I dropped as soon as they came out of the oven. Whoops. I ate them anyway - this cake is really good). 

5. Place in the oven. The cake will take between an hour to an hour and a fifteen minutes. The cupcakes will take around twenty minutes. The cake is done when top goes an even biscuity brown colour, and if you poke a skewer in it should come out clean. 

6. For the icing, mix the sifted icing sugar and the lemon juice together, and when the cake(s) are cooled, pour over the top(s). I then topped my cupcakes with popping candy and some curls of lemon zest. Definitely ate these for breakfast today...

Bryony (dressed as Tilly from Tots TV) and I (dressed as Little Red Riding Hood) eat the cake in Bryony's kitchen. We're looking surprised at how good it tastes. It's SERIOUSLY good cake.

The Infamous Blueberry Muffins

Last August I baked some rather lovely blueberry muffins. I took some photographs and they all got eaten but I didn’t get around to blogging about them. And that would have been the whole story, had I not uploaded this photograph to Facebook...

Cue Bryony’s obsession with the blueberry muffins.

I have lost count of the number of times she’s asked me to blog the blueberry muffins. And today I flicked through the photos and thought hey, those blueberry muffins look super nice. I should make blueberry muffins again... So after yet another library day, I came home tonight and made blueberry muffins.

This is based on a recipe from a cookbook I picked up in a charity shop last summer for about £2. I went on a bit of a charity shop rampage and bought about four cookbooks for a tenner. Not too shabby. I’ve made a few of the recipes in this one and they’ve been a little hit and miss but this one definitely worked. I used Yeo Valley Blueberry Yoghurt with a hint of Lime. Mainly because of their ridiculous but awesome 

farmer-boyband advert from a couple of years ago.

So yes, to make 12 muffins, here's what you need:

225g plain flour

1 teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda

½ teaspoon of salt

1 teaspoon of allspice

115g caster sugar

3 large egg whites

3 tablespoons of margarine. Or softened butter. I used butter. Naturally.

5 tablespoons of blueberry yoghurt

1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

100g of fresh blueberries

And here’s what you do:

1.  Preheat the oven to 190 degrees and put 12 paper cases in a muffin tin.

2. Sift the flour, bicarb, salt and half the allspice into a large mixing bowl. Add 8 tablespoons of the sugar and mix it all together well.

3. In a separate bowl, whisk together the egg whites. Add the margarine/butter, the yoghurt and the vanilla extract and mix it all together properly. Stir in the blueberries, then add this mixture to the dry ingredients. Stir until just combined - the cookbook says to make sure it’s not “over mixed.”

4. Spoon the mixture into the muffin tins. Mix the remaining sugar with the remaining allspice and sprinkle all over the muffins.

5. Place in oven and bake for 25 minutes, or until they’re golden and risen.

 And just in case you'd forgotten, here are the Yeo Valley Farmers. HA.