Kids' roaring dinosaur cake - perfect for the hols!

Today's blog is about cooking for fun, which in my opinion is what cooking should always be about. And one of the most enjoyable experiences in the kitchen is baking with your son, daughter, sister, brother, niece, nephew or grandchild.

You can lick the mixing spoon without any guilt, splatter cake batter everywhere, and there's no pressure at all for a perfect result, just a sugary one that gets the kids running wild.
This is my friend Carla's little boy Mason, who is four and starting school in September. He is dinosaur mad! At two-and-half years old he knew all the dinosaur names and pronounced them perfectly, and he has more dinosaur toys in his bedroom than in Jurassic Park.
Carla used a basic chocolate Victoria sandwich recipe to make a roaring dinosaur-shaped cake during a recent baking session with Mason, without the butter cream filling. And you can adapt this sponge recipe for any occasion and any style of cake as long as you have the right mould.
Mason started by greasing the mould and preparing the cake mixture, with some help from his mum, before baking it in the dinosaur tin and covering the finished cake in green, dinosaur skin-coloured icing. Carla very kindly sent me pictures of Mason baking (see below) and a copy of the recipe (see below) but unfortunately failed to send me any cake! Stay behind after class Carla and write me 100 lines: "must save cake for Sarah, must save cake for Sarah, must save cake for Sarah..."

Ingredients
200g softened butter
200g caster sugar
4 medium eggs
175g self-raising flour
25g cocoa powder


Method
Preheat the oven to 180 degrees. Grease and line a dinosaur cake tin (or any tin of your choice).
In a mixing bowl cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
Beat in the eggs one at a time and if the mixture begins to curdle, add a tablespoon of flour.
Sieve the flour and cocoa then fold into the mixture with a metal spoon.
Put the mixture into your tin and smooth out with a knife. (For a traditional sandwich cake, split the mixture between two 20cm tins).
Bake for about 25 to 30 minutes until the cake is golden and bounces when lightly touched.
When cooled, cover with green butter icing and decorate to look like a dinosaur. (Or for the traditional version, sandwich cakes together with chocolate butter cream and dust with icing sugar.) 

My Moroccan lamb and squash tagine with couscous

This is my cheat’s Moroccan lamb and squash tagine – it’s a cheat because it’s done like a casserole as I don’t own a tagine, and I don’t know many people who do, so the recipe is one everyone can try. It’s best done in a slow cooker if you have one so the lamb stays really tender.

The recipe uses butternut squash to give it sweetness and texture, and it makes it a healthier option too. Plus it looks pretty and colourful! Forgot to take a photo again!

Squash is coming into season now so it’s the best time to use it, or wait a few weeks and pick up a pumpkin instead – a perfect way to use them up after Halloween!   

If you have a slow cooker you can put it together in the morning and leave it for a good eight hours or more so the lamb is tender and delicious.

The best thing about these slow-cooked recipes is that you can prepare them early, stick them in the oven, tidy up and still have a couple of hours free to spend how you wish.

I decided to do this in the oven as I didn’t have time to plan ahead for the slow cooker version, and I definitely noticed the difference, the lamb wasn’t as tender. It was still very tasty though and the meat wasn't tough. Maybe I browned it for too long? If anyone has any tips, or their own tried and tested recipe, please let me know and I’ll give it a go!

I served the dish with herby lemon couscous, hummus and warm pitta breads.

It’s a recipe I’ve done before, and too be honest it changes every time! It’s one you can adapt to suit what’s in your fridge as long as you keep the basic spices the same.

This is the recipe I used…

Ingredients

Tagine

2 tbsp olive oil

500g lean lamb, diced

1 medium onion, chopped

1 tsp cumin

1 tsp paprika

1 tsp ground coriander

½ chilli powder (for easier option: use Asda’s Moroccan ‘Reason to Season’)

230g chopped tomatoes

300g butternut squash (or pumpkin), diced

350ml beef stock

50g sultanas

50g dried apricots

1 tbsp cornflour

Couscous

250g/9oz couscous

Juice of one lemon

350ml hot vegetable stock

1 tbsp freshly chopped flat-leaf parsley

1 tbsp freshly chopped mint

Method

Preheat the oven to 170 degrees (fan assisted), or use slow cooker.

Slightly brown the lamb with the oil in a frying pan then set aside.

Add the rest of the oil to the pan and lightly fry the onion. Add the spices then tomatoes and cook until simmering. Put into a casserole dish or slow cooker along with the stock and squash. (Scoop out seeds from the squash, peel and cut into 2cm dices).

Cook in oven for about 2 ½ hours or slow cooker for several hours.

About 30 minutes from the end of cooking time, stir in the sultanas and apricots. Five minutes from the end, stir in the cornflour (mixed with a little water) and cook to thicken.

Put the couscous in a bowl and add lemon juice and stock. Cover with clingfilm and set aside for 5 minutes. Uncover and fluff with a fork. Season and stir in the fresh herbs.

Serve with hummus and pitta breads. (Drizzle olive over breads, season, wrap in foil and put in oven for 10 minutes.)

When all is gloomy do not fear, instead turn to your favourite foods for comfort

Well what a crazy week it’s been... we’ve had violent riots and looting across the UK, debt crisis in America and the halting of the French economy.
The weather has been miserable here in the North West of England, as I’m sure it has across the country, making a lot of people quite frankly rather glum.
And when it’s dark and gloomy, one of the nicest comforts we have is food... whether it be a hearty Sunday supper with the family, a box of choccies on the sofa or a naughty McDonalds, nothing beats a good old tingle of the taste-buds to lift our spirits. (Failing that, a few gin and tonics usually do the trick!)
I have to confess, I’ve barely cooked this week due to busy week at work and getting home feeling shattered. Plus, when my other half cooks up a Thai green chicken curry from scratch one night then a classic spaghetti bolognese the next, why bother?
Probably the tastiest thing I’ve had this week (Paul’s dishes aside) was a fresh Pea and Mint soup from Marks and Spencers, with chunks of my homemade soda bread and butter dunked in. It was think and creamy with a rich flavour but not too heavy, and jam-packed with tender sweet peas, making it the perfect lunchtime meal and a healthy option too.
In fact, it inspired me to think about trying some new soup ideas, particularly as the weather is getting cooler.
On Simon Hopkinson’s The Good Cook last night on BBC1 (which was filmed in Bury, Lancashire, just 15 minutes from my hometown), the writer and restaurateur made a potato soup. It sounded a little bland to be honest, but reminded me of my favourite soup, leek and potato.
I’ve yet to attempt to make a version myself, but I will endeavour to do so, just as soon as I can find a spare hour! And of course, I will report back!

Argghhhhh I need a bigger kitchen!

Today I baked soda bread, which would have been easy-peasey if it wasn’t for our pixie-sized kitchen. It’s probably the simplest bread recipe I’ve come across but you knead (ha ha… Okay lame I know) a lot of surface space for stretching it out, and unfortunately we lack that here in our little Leigh palace. Anyway, back to the bread… For those who don’t know (and I didn’t until recently) the soda in the name comes from the bicarbonate of soda. I’m a bread-making virgin and I nicked this recipe from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall on Ch4’s River Cottage. (I chose it as opposed to normal bread because I don’t eat yeast.) It’s just three ingredients: bicarb., buttermilk (or live yoghurt) and plain flour. And it’s super quick to prepare, but be warned it’s a messy affair. The dough is extremely sticky so it’s best to use one hand if you can and keep the other free. This being my first time, I went in double-handed and got completely covered in gloop, at one point looking like I’d been attacked by Slimer from Ghostbusters.
But with a sprinkle of flour it seemed to come together okay and I got it in the oven. To be honest cleaning the kitchen down was the hardest part, as the flour and dough had got everywhere. It takes 40-45 minutes in the oven and then you have to wait patiently whilst the top cools and crusts before you can dive it. It looks pretty average and I didn’t do the cross deep enough, but it smells fabulous and I can’t wait to tear some off and top it generously with butter and jam for breakfast yum yum!

If you want to have a go, here’s the recipe. Let me know how you get on!

500g plain flour
2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 tsp ground sea salt
Approx 400ml buttermilk of live yoghurt
A splash of milk

Preheat oven to 200 degrees (fan-assisted). Sift the flour and bicarbonate of soda into a large mixing bowl and stir in the salt. Make a well in the centre and pour in the buttermilk, stirring as you go. To bring the mixture together, add a tablespoon of milk. (It should form a sticky dough).

Tip it out onto a lightly floured work surface and knead lightly for about a minute to pull it together into a loose ball. Put the round of dough on a lightly floured baking sheet and dust generously with flour. Mark a deep cross in it with a sharp, serrated knife, cutting about two-thirds of the way through the loaf. Bake in oven for 40-45 minutes, until the loaf sounds hollow when you tap it underneath.

Cool on a wire rack for a crunchy crust, or wrap in a clean tea towel for a softer topping.