Yes, we have no bananas!

There are times towards the end of the week that the fruit bowl starts to be ignored. Gone are the shiny apples, tart oranges and ripe pears and all that is left are a few over ripe blackening bananas. No one wants to eat them as they slowly darken and shrivel. Time for banana bread me thinks. But where to find a recipe?

Who to trust, possibly the WI but I don't have a cook book from them so next best thing, the Good Housekeeping Cookery book and it's recipe for banana and honey bread.

Luckily I had 450g of over ripe bananas for this recipe but if I hadn't had I could have substituted less ripe ones as they do need to be mashed well for this recipe.


The recipe doesn't cream the sugar and butter but rubs in the fat to the flour which was unusual but it worked well. The mix is very sweet as it contains both sugar and honey and this did lead to my having to cover the cake half way through the cooking time as the sugars were catching.



I did'nt have a 3 pint loaf tin but the 2 pint worked just as well but I did have to lengthen the cooking time a little.

The cake is lovely and moist with a crunchy top. Given the quantity of sugar already in the cake I didn't add the crushed sugar cubes and honey to the top of the cake whilst it was warm as I thought it might be guilding the lily a touch and I am fearful of the sugar police knocking on my door.

My daughter happily went off with this in her packed lunch today so it seems to be a success.

Kebabs but no chilli sauce

There are times on a Friday evening when only a kebab will do. Today is one of those Friday's. By the time I have run around shuttling various offspring and sometimes also partner to a vide range of sporting and social activites the last thing I have time for is cooking a complex meal. Something grilled and a salad is often the order of the day. Usually I make this but the Kebab shop does a really good line in meat on skewers even if they almost insist you buy chips to go with!

This week the urge for a kebab has come on me again but today, with the help of Madhur Jaffrey's ultimate curry bible I am making my own.
Toasting the chickpea flour is new to me but smells wonderful. It is a pity that once you have toasted it and left it to cool there is no further reference to it in the recipe. I assumed it had to be added to the kebab mix as a thickening agent so that is what I did. This mix without a thickener would not work as the tomatoes and onions make it quite wet.

The mix is easy to handle and shapes up well to produce six good sized patties. The mix is not intended to be impailed on skewers but left as very sophisticated burgers. The suggestion is to use naan to wrap the kebabs and that is what we did.

The kebabs stayed together as they cooked and the spicing came through well. The mix of fresh and dried coriander along with the cumin gave an almost North African feel to this. If you used lamb mince and left out the birds eye chilis then this would be fantastic served with cous cous.

The chili heat makes a yogurt dressing really important for the less asbestos tongued of us. I found just plain yogurt to be the best as it didn't interrupt with the subtlety of the spicing.

There is no mixture left which is a testament to it's popularity. I have already had a request to use this book to cook the nation's favourite dish.... Chicken tikka masala.... So watch and return to see if it lives up to my daughter's expectations

Let them eat cake.

After the joy and indigestion brought on by all that bread making and consuming time for a change. Jamie's recipe was such a success who to choose next? Should it be Delia or Elizabeth David? No I decided on another icon and gastroporn heroine Nigella. In the true spirit of books for looking and not cooking I have three Nigella tomes and have never cooked from any of them so here goes.

It is a bank holiday weekend so we deserve a treat, lets do what Nigella does best and be indulgent. Something that allows us to pour liquids messily and lick our fingers provocatively. Ah yes, Chocolate peanut squares From "Forever Summer" by Nigella Lawson. That should do nicely.

This is as Nigella says an "elaboration of Millionaire's shortbread". Now I have made chocolate caramel shortbread before and have found a recipe that is so good the thought of it will make your fillings ache so will this one be as good or even better? The secret ingredient here is 250 g of dry roasted peanuts.

Nigella assumes we all have food processors and microwaves, I don't as I can't be bothered with the fiddling about assembling the processor and washing it up and the microwave was only used as a glorified plate warmer. I have an electric whisk and a stick blender and some very sharp knives instead.

The shortbread mix came together easily and quickly even though I used my hands in a bowl and not on the pulse of the processor. I don't have a 23cm sq tin but my 27cm x 17cm tin worked just as well. Not too crumbly or too sticky and cooked to golden brown in 40 mins in my oven. Lining the tin with parchment paper really helped later when cutting the squares.

Making the caramel Nigella's way in the microwave seems fraught with danger as I for one do not want to take volcano hot caramel from the microwave every few minutes to stir it and then carry the same back to heat up again to magma like temperatures. I used the thick bottomed pan and wooden spoon method and that worked easily and safely for me. It actually took less time than microwaving without the fear of 3rd degree burns. The caramel didn't catch or burn and cooled quite quickly to enable me to add the peanuts.
Lots of caramel to give a deep chewy layer consequently the peanuts don't sink or float as the viscosity of the caramel holds them firm.

The caramel layer took an age to cool so don't think you can make this in the morning for the afternoon. It really needs to set up over night to allow the textures to firm up.

Depth of chocolate is up to you but the quantities suggested give a goodly layer of chocolate. Don't worry too much about using the very expensive chocolate suggested as this is after all just a Snicker's bar on steroids. The only problem now is how to ration myself to just one piece at a time.

Do not make this if you are likely to be home alone. This is strictly for sharing unless you want to become very familiar with the magazines in your Dentist's waiting room.

One interesting footnote to this episode. As I had the book open and a steak in the fridge for the Barbie I tapped into Nigella's book for her "Black and blue beef" marinade recipe and jolly good it is too. The meat was tender and the red rags were both salty and sweet. The children came back for seconds!

Jamie's basic bread recipe

Finally got it together to cook and have a camera ready all at the same time. This bread recipe is very simple although I have not been able to fine semolina flour. Is it the same as semolina? Wasn't prepared to take the risk so followed the recipe and used plain flour instead.




Easy to follow text. It does seem to contain a huge amount of salt and I for one can't abide weighing honey, spoon measures all the time for the sticky stuff please. No flunkies to do my washing up here! There are no timings for cooking the basic bread recipe once you have made the dough. Jamie assumes you will make the bread up to stage 8 and then turn it into beer bread, foccaccia or a pizza base etc etc. I just wanted a basic loaf of white bread so that was a bit of a problem. I used the beer bread timings for my loaf and also the idea of using a cake tin for the bread shape.



Success, lovely crusty bread with a light slightly yeasty interior. One problem I do have is that the loaf is quite large and my bread knife although a standard size is not long enough to cut the loaf cleanly. Perhaps when the loaf is older it will be easier but the speed with which the children are devouring it I doubt I will find that out.

Cook this recipe, it really works well, tastes delicious and is frankly very easy. Not as easy as popping to the shops for a cheap loaf but home made fresh bread is in another league. Try it and let me know what you think.

Where to begin?

Do cook books help or hinder?
Do they improve your skills or make you feel inadequate?
Do we buy books to learn from them or are they simply gastroporn ?

Join me in an attempt to cook the books and see. But where to begin?

Bread seems to be a good place to start. It crosses cultures and is the staff of life. Even if you are avoiding carbs at all costs there is nothing more comforting than hot buttered toast or crumpets. In the same way that bacon sandwiches can convert a vegetarian to fully paid up member of the nose to tail eating club the smell of fresh bread can tempt many a carbophobe to take the lid off the butter dish.

Bread making is percieved as a form of alchemy and often the excuse is that if you can buy a loaf for 18p why bother making your own?

Taste, taste and taste are just three reasons. Yes it can be fiddly, yes it does take time but is it possible to follow a simple recipe and be successful?

Can I find a recipe in a book that works well and allows me a keen but untrained home cook to produce a loaf my children will eat?

I'm off to try and will let you know how I get on and there will be photographic evidence of my successes or failures.

Wish me luck, I promise to follow the recipes to the letter. Wish the recipe writers luck too, I hope they tested their recipes carefully. We are about to find out!

The first recipe I'm off to try is the Basic bread recipe from Jamie Oliver, The Naked Chef.

Come back and see how I got on.