ready steady cook!

A lively and excited group of 8 Year 6 pupils from St. Michael's arrived at Nelson Thomlinson School ready for a taste of cooking, secondary school style. All had chosen their own recipes, including a main dish and a sweet. Dressed in pinnies they looked ready to take on the likes of Gregg Wallace and John Torode. Not daunted, these inexperienced cooks sweated away over hot stoves for a couple of hours and served up a yummy lunch of home made pizza, traditional lasagne, pasta with peas and pancetta with a New York caesar salad, stir-fried chicken and noodles, meringues, chocolate pots with hot chocolate fudge sauce, flapjack, butterfly cakes and a chocolate layer cake. For some of these youngsters it was the first time they had spent so much time in the kitchen and they really enjoyed the experience.

Click on the pictures to enlarge them.

Stir-fried chicken and noodles

Melt in the mouth meringues

Truly irresistible pasta with peas and pancetta

Sumptuous chocolate layer cake

Traditional lasagne

These butterfly buns had all gone by the time I went for one!

One of two delicious and very tasty pizzas.
I know that's saying the same thing twice,
but there were two of them!

Crumbly flapjack

Caesar salad with home made croutons fit for a Roman emperor!

You can see the high standard of cooking in these pictures. As for me I tried everything they made, just to be fair, and could not eat any tea when I got home!

Well done, everyone!

lemon drizzle cake

Mmm ... juicy, zesty lemons and cake. A fine combination. I had never made it until this morning - probably because I tend to bake without planning in advance so usually do not have the required number of lemons in the house. This cake was planned and it was so simple to make I wanted to post it on here.

Put 300g self-raising flour, 2 tsp baking powder and 150g caster sugar in a large mixing bowl. Add 125g melted butter and the grated rind of 2 lemons. Gradually mix in 3 beaten eggs and 150ml milk until you have a soft spoonable mixture. Spoon the mixture into a greased and lined baking tin. I used a 12 x 8 inch tray, but a loaf tin or a deeper tin would do just as well. Bake at 160 C (325 F), Gas Mark 3, for 45 - 55 minutes. It should be golden brown with a cracked top and a skewer inserted into the cake should come out clean.

Pare the rind of 1 lemon, then cut into fine strips. Put it into a small saucepan with the juice of 2 lemons, 100g caster sugar and 60 ml water. Simmer gently for  minutes until the lemon rind is clear and the liquid syrupy.

When the cake is cooked remove frm the tin and peel off the greaseproof paper. Prick the top of the cake with a skewer, then pour over the lemony syrup and rind. Some of the syrup will just drizzle straight off the cake and this part can be messy. I placed the cake and cooling rack over the baking tin and collected the syrup in the tin and poured it back over the cake. Leave to cool.

We are having friends tonight. Until then the cake is out of bounds!

canadian canoeing

It was such a hot afternoon today. I'd planned to go down to Ullswater and have a good walk in the sunshine. After about 5 minutes of walking we were pretty tired so when we came across a boat house hiring out rowing boats and Canadian canoes we jumped at the chance to cool down. Wearing  life jackets probably had the opposite effect, but we all enjoyed paddling around on the lake for an hour. Luckily Sam didn't hear the nice lady warning us that the canoes capsize quite easily, or realise the significance of the waterproof bag I was asked to put my rucksack in.