Sweet Potato Fondant

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This can be made easily with either sweet potato or normal potatoes, but I really love the added flavour that sweet potatoes bring to a meal and cooked this way is certainly no exception.  It’s incredibly simple and incredibly tasty too.

15ml Rapeseed Oil (I recommend Farrington’s Mellow Yellow)
50g Butter
1 large Sweet potato (enough for one or two slices per person)
1 Knorr Chicken stock pot, dissolved in
75ml Boiling water
Salt and Pepper to taste

1. Peel the sweet potato.
2. Cut in to 2cm (1″) thick rounds.
3. Heat the oil and the butter in a pan until the butter is foaming.
4. Add the sweet potatoes to the pan, flat side down and cook for 2-3 minutes each side until golden brown in colour.
5. Carefully add the stock to the pan (it may spit a little, so be careful).
6. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
7. Cover the pan and simmer gently for 10-15 minutes until tender and cooked through.
8. Serve with some of the cooking liquid spooned over the top.

To add a decorative element to your plate, why not try cutting the potatoes with a shaped metal cookie cutter?  Hearts and flowers for your loved one, or into a character for your children to make mealtimes interesting whilst still giving them one of their 5 a day.

This is the perfect vegetable accompaniment to so many meals and goes beautifully with my Valentine’s Day menu of Fillet Steak in a Worcestershire Cream Sauce.

Enjoy! x

Potato Dauphinoise

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I’d find it difficult to completely cut carbohydrates from my diet and my own personal philosophy in life is a little bit of everything (that you’re not severely allergic to) can’t do you any harm.  I find it sad that so many people profess to be allergic or intolerant to so many foods when really they just don’t know for sure and are just guessing at what is upsetting their digestion.  I can speak from experience here as I was advised that I was wheat intolerant for over 5 years, removed it from my diet completely, but still suffered.  Only upon proper medical food allergy testing did they actually find out that my demon food was to be egg white, and on cutting that out of my diet, my life and health improved significantly.  But I digress, this is about a recipe not me on a soapbox, so here it is…

Serves 4

Little knob of butter to grease your dish
200ml Double cream
250ml Milk
2.5ml Nutmeg, freshly grated
1 Garlic clove, peeled and flattened (not crushed)
4 Large potatoes
100g Gruyere or Cheddar cheese, grated

1. Heat the oven to 190℃.
2. Butter the inside of a 20cm deep square dish.
3. Add the cream, milk, nutmeg and garlic clove into a large saucepan until boiling.
4. Meanwhile peel the potatoes, and using a mandolin (I thoroughly recommend the Oxo Good Grips Hand Held Mandoline), slice into 3-4mm thicknesses.
5. Reduce the heat under the cream and milk to a simmer and add the sliced potatoes.
6. Simmer gently for 3-4 minutes, gently stirring occasionally to prevent the slices sticking together or catching on the bottom of the pan.
7. Remove the potato slices with a slotted spoon to the buttered dish to create a relatively level surface covering the whole of the dish.
8. Remove and discard the crushed garlic clove.
9. Pour the milk and cream mixture over the potatoes.
10. Sprinkle with cheese.
11. Bake for 30 minutes until golden brown on top and the potatoes are cooked.
12. Serve sliced into portions.

A wonderful, creamy and rich vegetable dish to serve with so many meals.  If you’re watching you calories, then reduce the cream and replace this with milk, but be prepared to lose some of the taste if you do!

Serve this with my Fillet Steak in a Worcestershire Cream Sauce recipe for a decadent meal.

Review – Go Ahead bars

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When you’re out and about and need a quick energy boost that’s going to see you through longer than the next 20 minutes of a high calorie, high octane sugar rush from a chocolate bar,  you can do so much worse than to grab yourself a pack of Go Ahead bars from United Biscuits.

These outer packs of 5 Crispy Slice deliciousness come handily wrapped in packs of three slices, contain only 57 calories per slice and come in a variety of flavours which currently include Strawberry, Blueberry, Orange, Red Cherry, Apple, Forest Fruit and Raspberry.  You’ll find plenty of fruit enclosed within a crisp baked biscuity layer. They provide the texture and crunch of a biscuit with the satisfying sustainability of the generous fruity fillings.  Perfect for a quick pick me up boost of energy!

Also in the range are their Yogurt Breaks.  They have a higher calorie content of 73 calories per slice as each fruit filled biscuit slice comes enrobed in a delicious yoghurt topping.  These are packed as two per individual packet serving and currently the range includes Strawberry, Forest Fruit, Raspberry and Red Cherry.  These are great if you’re in a rush and have had to miss breakfast, as we all know that breakfast is the most important meal of the day.  However, in the busy lives that we all lead, sometimes, no matter how hard we try, there are days when we have to eat on the go, and one of these little packs is surely a much better option than a chocolate bar or an energy drink as we dash about our business.

They’re great to pop into the kids lunch boxes in place of a chocolate biscuit, as their cannily disguised fruit fillings ensure that they’re getting at least one extra bit of fruit goodness into their diets without you having to try to hard to get them to eat it.

I was sent two packs of the Crispy Slices and a pack of the Yogurt Bars free of charge to try, however, we do regularly purchase and enjoy these as an alternative to a chocolate biscuits or other sugary snacks.