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!

Super Seedy Flapjacks

Revision is mind numbing. 

But only two more weeks of drowning in post-it notes and going over things I've already done, and then it's summer, so can't really complain....

 

All this work hasn't made it particularly easy to get much cooking done, let alone blogging. I've been living off freezer food, toast and takeaways. 

The most exciting thing that's happened in my kitchen this term was Alex managing to set fire to some butter in the microwave. Apparently that's possible... I think it was the fact he put it in there still wrapped in metallic foil. Oh dear.

I did manage to bake myself some revision fuel though: 

Super seedy energy boosting flapjacks.

I made mine with gluten free oats, but you can use ordinary ones as well. This recipe is incredibly easy and very quick - you could probably make this in around an hour's revision break.

Here's what you need:

150g Rolled Oats

50g Pumpkin Seeds

50g Sunflower Seeds

100g Sultanas

3 tablespoons Golden Syrup

100g Butter

2 Bananas, peeled and chopped

75g Dark Chocolate, broken or chopped into small pieces

1. Preheat the oven to 180C and use greaseproof paper to line a small roasting tray, or a square baking tin, or even a round cake tin if you don’t have anything square.

2. Weigh out the oats, the pumpkin seeds, the sunflower seeds and the sultanas, and mix them together in a bowl along with the sliced bananas.

3. Melt butter and golden syrup in a saucepan over a low heat – make sure it doesn’t boil or burn – until the butter is all melted and the mixture is completely combined. Turn off the heat.

4. Tip the bowl full of mixed ingredients into the saucepan and stir until they’re covered in the syrup-butter mixture.

5. Put the flapjack mixture into the lined tin and bake in the oven for 20-25 minutes, until golden on top. Take it out of the oven and set aside to cool.

6. Now its time to melt the chocolate. I do this by putting a small amount of water in a small saucepan, placing a ceramic (non meltable) bowl on top, and placing the chocolate in the bowl. As the water starts to boil, the bowl heats up and the chocolate melts. Make sure the water doesn't boil too much or the water will boil over. 

7. Once the chocolate is melted, use a spoon to scatter the melted chocolate artistically over the flapjack (you can tell from the photos I’m really bad at this. But who doesn’t love big chunks of chocolate?) Leave the flapjack to cool completely, then cut it into even sized bars. Enjoy!