Category Archives: snack

Sweet potato crisps

Posted on February 25, 2013 by TheGingerbreadMum

Who doesn’t like crisps? If your hand’s up, I don’t believe you!

Hubby is a big fan of vegetable crisps. So when I came across Yelena’s Orange Sweet Potato Crisps with Thyme (on her Melangery food blog) I thought both hubby and Nicholas would like them. Take a look at Yelena’s gorgeous photos and try not to drool.

The additional flavours of orange (zest) and thyme work delightfully with the sweet potato (I’m thinking of adding them when I next make sweet potato mash). But if you wanted plainer or easier crisps, you could leave them out.

If you don’t have a mandoline slicer, just make sure you slice the sweet potato as thinly as you can. I always struggle with my mandoline slicer and never get the lovely quick sliding action I see others use on cooking shows. If anyone has any tips for using them, please share!

You need to eat these fairly quickly after cooking them otherwise they’ll start losing their lovely crispiness. Although, I’m sure sticking them back into the oven for a few minutes would crisp them up again.

SWEET POTATO CRISPS

Prep time: 10-15 mins
Cook time: 40 mins
Makes 2 servings

1 medium sweet potato, scrubbed and sliced as thinly as possible into rounds
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp orange zest
1 tsp thyme
salt and pepper

Preheat your oven to 160C. Line two oven trays with baking paper.

Mix the olive oil and orange zest together in a small bowl.

Using a pastry brush, brush the trays with about half of the orange oil mixture.

Lay the sweet potato slices on the tray in a single layer and brush with the remaining orange oil.

Sprinkle over the thyme, and salt and pepper.

Bake one tray at a time for about 20 mins until the edges are starting to curl up, and the centre is dry to the touch and golden brown (I let mine cook a bit too long).

Put the tray on a wire rack for the crisps to cool. After a few minutes they’ll become crisp.

Repeat with your second tray of sweet potato slices.

Eat immediately!

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Posted in family, recipe, snack, toddler and tagged crisps, family, finger food, Melangery, recipe, snack, sweet potato, thyme, toddler, vegan, vegetable crisps, vegetarian. Bookmark the permalink.

Dairy-free banana bread

Posted on February 6, 2013 by TheGingerbreadMum

I didn’t realise how much I used bananas in cooking until I started writing this blog! There’s banana muffins, banana teething biscuits, banana chips, banana icecream, banana pikelets, banana and butternut squash loaf, and they’re also my ‘secret’ sweetener in my sugar-free flapjacks. And these are just the recipes I’ve blogged!

Banana is commonly one of the first solid foods a baby experiences, and I think I probably just tried different things with them as Nicholas always loves them. I also pretty much constantly have some very ripe ones in the freezer waiting to be turned into something yummy.

I’ve tried many banana bread recipes over the years with varying degrees of success. Most of the time I prefer mine to be light and fluffy like a sponge, rather than heavy and moist. And while I adore cream cheese frosting, for me this banana bread is much better without it distracting your taste buds. It also means I feel less guilt when eating it for breakfast.

Banana bread recipes are quite similar overall with a different tweak here and there. My recipe isn’t anything new, but it’s evolved from combining recipes I’ve come across and experimenting until I was happy.

One thing you might want to experiment with is the texture of the mashed banana. Some cooks puree it with a blender while others leave it quite chunky. Supposedly pureeing it gives a richer banana flavour to the finished product. I mash my bananas with a fork, but mash about half of them until they’re very smooth and the remainder I only mash a little so you find the occasional chunk in the finished bread.

There’s quite a bit of banana in this recipe, but you can easily get away with less; even two smallish bananas would work fine (you want at least 175g of it unpeeled).

DAIRY-FREE BANANA BREAD

Prep time: 10-15 mins
Cook time: 40-45 mins
Freezable

175g self-raising flour
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
175g golden caster sugar
2 eggs
1/4 cup vegetable oil
2 1/2 medium bananas, mashed
50g walnuts (or pecans), chopped

Preheat the oven to 160C. Line a loaf tin with baking paper.

Whisk the sugar, eggs and oil together at a medium speed using a handheld beater or in an electric mixer. Whisk for a few minutes until it’s pale and fluffy.

Sift in the flour and baking powder, add the mashed banana, and mix until combined using a low speed. Gently stir through the walnuts.

Pour into your prepared tin and bake for 40-45 minutes until a skewer comes out clean.

Variations:

Make individual muffins instead of a loaf (easier to freeze if you’re not going to eat all of it)
Dust with icing sugar
Top with cream cheese frosting for a more decadent loaf

I’m linking up this recipe to the One Ingredient Challenge hosted by Franglais Kitchen and How to Cook Good Food. Why not enter your own banana recipe and join the linky party? Read the rules here.

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Posted in cooking with toddlers, dessert, family, recipe, snack, toddler and tagged banana, banana bread, banana cake, breakfast, dairy-free, dessert, family, finger food, Franglais Kitchen, freezable, How to Cook Good Food, One Ingredient Challenge, recipe, snack, toddler. Bookmark the permalink.

Lemon slice

Posted on February 1, 2013 by TheGingerbreadMum

This is an indulgent recipe, perfect to make for the weekend ahead when everyone needs a bit of pampering and food love.

I’m not sure if this is Australian, but I’ve never seen it outside of Oz (please correct me if I’m wrong!). It’s one of the many foodie things I forget about not living there, and my reaction is always ‘I haven’t eaten that in so long! Why did I forget it when it’s so delicious?!?’

This time around it was the mum of my dearest and oldest friend who made it, and I without any embarrassment or shame (surprisingly for me), ate piece after piece after piece (it was better that I didn’t keep count!).

This has to be one of the simplest recipes possible. It involves no cooking, just crushing and mixing the few ingredients in a food processor then pressing into a tin. I let Nicholas push the button on the food processor for his very first time making this slice. He leaned towards the safety of mum during its loud bursts, a bit unsure, but he also loved pushing that button!

If you’re making this with kids, instead of using a food processor, you can get them to crush the biscuits in a secure and clean plastic bag with a rolling pin (lots of fun!), then mix in the rest of the ingredients by hand.

Try it, but I take absolutely no responsibility for how many pieces you’ll be eating 😉

LEMON SLICE

Prep time: 20 mins
Cook time: 0 mins 🙂
Makes about 20 slices

250g plain sweet biscuits
1/2 tin (about 200g) condensed milk
125g butter, melted and cooled
1 cup desiccated coconut
1 lemon, zested and juiced
1 cup icing sugar

Line a square or rectangular cake or slice tin (mine is 20 x 20cm) with baking paper.

Crush the biscuits in a food processor until there aren’t any big chunks left. Add the condensed milk, melted butter, coconut and lemon zest. Pulse to combine.

Press the mixture into the tin using the back of a spoon to spread it evenly. Put into the fridge to set for at least a couple of hours.

To make the icing, stir 1 tsp of lemon juice into the icing sugar, adding more lemon juice a tiny bit at a time until the mixture coats the back of the spoon. Pour over the base and let it set in the fridge for another hour or so.

Cut into squares and devour.

Variations:

use orange zest and juice instead of lemon to make a sweeter citrus slice
if you’re not a big fan of coconut, you can leave it out in the base
if you are a big fan of coconut you can sprinkle some extra over the icing
ice with chocolate icing instead
use ginger biscuits for a tangy lemon slice

Tip: a lazy way to make the lemon icing is to put the icing sugar and 1 tsp of lemon juice in a saucepan with 1 tbsp butter. Stir over a low heat until it’s smooth. Add more lemon juice if it’s too thick.

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Posted in cooking with toddlers, dessert, family, recipe, snack, toddler and tagged Australia, indulgence, lemon, lemon slice, lemon zest, no cook recipe, recipe, slice. Bookmark the permalink.

Courgette (zucchini) soup

Posted on January 30, 2013 by TheGingerbreadMum

Yes, another soup recipe! Since returning to the cold weather of the UK I’ve been making soup at least once a week. It really is (for me anyway) an easy way of getting more vegetables into Nicholas’ diet. We’ve even sometimes been having a small mug of soup for an afternoon snack (often with a straw just for fun!).

Making soup is generally quick, only requiring a bit of chopping, a bit of stirring, usually followed by some blending. Then it’s ready and waiting in the fridge for the next few days. Any leftovers go in the freezer for another day.

As with all cooking, the fresher your ingredients the better the end taste will be. And with soup, although stock made from a stock cube (preferably low-salt if cooking for little ones) is absolutely fine, if you use a better quality stock (either bought or homemade) you will taste the difference.

You don’t need great knife skills when making blended soups. However, the smaller you chop the vegetables (especially the potatoes), the quicker they’ll take to cook.

COURGETTE (ZUCCHINI) SOUP

Prep time: 10 mins
Cook time: 15-20 mins
Makes 4 adult servings
Freezable

2 large or 3 medium-sized courgettes (zucchini), diced
1 onion, diced
1 medium-sized potato, diced
1 tbsp olive oil (or butter)
500ml hot vegetable or chicken stock
salt and pepper

Heat the olive oil in a medium-sized pot over a medium heat. Add the courgettes, onion and potato, and sauté for 5 minutes without letting the vegetables brown (turn the heat down if they do start to brown).

Pour in the stock, bring to the boil then turn the heat down to low and simmer until the vegetables are soft (about 10 minutes if you’ve diced them into small pieces).

Remove from the heat and purée until smooth. Add salt and pepper if needed.

To make it more special, serve with a dollop of yoghurt or cream and a sprinkling of chives.

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Posted in baby, dinner, family, lunch, recipe, snack, toddler and tagged baby, courgette, dinner, family, freezable, lunch, recipe, soup, toddler, vegetable soup, vegetarian, zucchini. Bookmark the permalink.

Spiced carrot muffins

Posted on January 28, 2013 by TheGingerbreadMum

Nicholas loves making and eating ‘muffles’ (that’s muffins to you and I!). I’m not sure he understands that what he’s stuffing into his mouth are the fruits of his zealous stirring and pouring, but that doesn’t matter; we both like eating them.

While these muffins aren’t sugar-free, I have reduced the sugar a lot. With the healthy carrot, seeds and sweet raisins inside, as well as some wholemeal flour, I think the amount of sugar is ok. And adding a pinch of extra sugar on the top makes them seem much sweeter than they are 😉

You can easily leave out the seeds, but I like the different texture they add to the muffins. I also like sprinking a few more over the tops before baking.

SPICED CARROT MUFFINS

Prep time: 10-15 mins
Cook time: 18-20 mins
Makes 12 regular-sized muffins
Freezable

150g white self-raising flour
100g wholemeal self-raising flour
75g golden caster sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp nutmeg
30g raisins
20g pumpkin seeds
20g sunflower seeds
125ml vegetable oil
125ml milk
1 egg
1 large carrot, grated
Extra golden caster sugar for sprinkling

Preheat the oven to 180C and grease your muffin tin with a little oil or cooking spray (or line your tin with paper cases to avoid washing the tin).

In a medium-sized bowl, mix the white and wholemeal flours, the caster sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg. Stir in the raisins, pumpkin seeds and sunflower seeds, until evenly distributed.

In a jug or another bowl, whisk the oil, milk and egg together. Squeeze the excess liquid from the grated carrot and stir it through the milk mixture.

Pour the milk mixture into the dry ingredients and mix until just combined (mixing too much will make your muffins heavy and dense).

Pour into prepared tin and bake for 18-20 mins until golden on top and cooked through when tested with a skewer.

Variations:

add chopped walnuts or pecans instead of the pumpkin and sunflower seeds

Tip: soak the raisins in hot water for about 10 minutes beforehand to become plumper and avoid them drying out while cooking.

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Posted in breakfast, cooking with toddlers, family, recipe, snack, toddler and tagged breakfast, carrot, carrot muffins, cooking with kids, family, finger food, low-sugar, muffins, pumpkin seeds, recipe, snack, sunflower seeds, toddler, vegetarian, wholemeal flour. Bookmark the permalink.

Happy 2013 (and how to use up Christmas candy canes)

Posted on January 14, 2013 by TheGingerbreadMum

During our lovely long and sunny holiday on the other side of the world, I enjoyed being relatively technology free. Forgive me if it takes me a little while to get back into the swing of things. Going from hot days at the beach to waking up this morning to a fine layer of snow is difficult!

If, like me, you’re struggling to go back to your routine, why not hold on to some Christmas cheer for just a bit more by making my Christmas candy cane balls. You probably have some candy canes left over and these are a great way to use them up (and they taste yummy too, even if I do say so myself!). There’s no cooking involved, have only three main ingredients (plus some coconut for rolling them in) and kids will love bashing up the candy canes.

My recipe is over at Mindful Mum.

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Posted in cooking with toddlers, dessert, family, recipe, snack, toddler and tagged candy canes, Christmas food, condensed milk, cooking with kids, dessert, finger food, Mindful Mum, no cook recipe, recipe, snack. Bookmark the permalink.

Christmas food inspiration

Posted on December 21, 2012 by TheGingerbreadMum

Christmas is almost here. If you’re still in need of inspiration, maybe these very cute ideas can help get your creative juices flowing.

Santa Cookies by My Poppet
I love how simple yet effective Cintia’s biscuits are – two colours of dough, some white icing, some raisins and voila, little santas!