Bedford Biscuits

This is a recipe that I remember my mum baking every week. During school holidays, I would love to help her make these. She used to make them very small and very thin, so I’ve adapted the recipe to make bigger thicker biscuits.

Once when she had made some for sale at the Christmas Fair and bagged them, she was told they would have to be labelled as Bedford Cookies. Apparently biscuits sold in a packet have to be all a uniform weight and size. How crazy is that!

Bedford Biscuits

Ingredients (makes about 15)

75g butter
75g granulated sugar
75g) plain flour
1/2 tsp vanilla essence
1/2 tsp Bicarbonate of soda
1 tbsp hot water
2 tbsp golden syrup
175g oats

Method

Preheat fan oven to 170 degree C.
Grease 2 baking sheets.
Cream together butter and sugar.
Mix in the flour.
Dissolve bicarbonate of soda in the hot water.
Add syrup, vanilla essence and soda.
Mix in the oats.
Roll out the mixture to 1/2 cm thickness.
Cut into circles.
Place on greased baking sheets and bake in preheated oven for about 10-15 minutes until golden.
Serve and enjoy.

Very tasty but I have no idea how these biscuits got their name. I assume it is a regional recipe that originated in Bedfordshire. If anyone knows, then please do tell me.

Do you have a recipe handed down through the generations?

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Welsh Cakes

Time to share one of my favourite teatime treats. Welsh cakes, a great regional recipe for afternoon tea.

Welsh Cakes

Ingredients (makes 15)

225g self raising flour
1/2 teasp mixed spice
85g granulated sugar
100g margarine
50g currants
1 large egg
lard (for frying)
extra sugar

Method

Add mixed spice and sugar to a large mixing bowl.
Rub in the margarine.
Sieve in the flour.
Mix in the egg.
Add the currants.
Draw the mixture into 2 balls.
Flatten to about 5mm on a floured board.
Cut out fluted rounds.
Meanwhile melt knob of lard in frying pan.
Add 5 rounds to the pan.
Cook for about 3 minutes until golden brown on underneath.
Turn and cook for about a further 3 minutes.
Place a layer of kitchen roll on a cooling rack.
Turn out the welsh cakes onto the cooling rack.
Dust with extra sugar.
Turn and dust on the reverse.
Melt additional lard in the frying pan if required and repeat twice until all welsh cakes are cooked.
Allow to cool.
Serve and enjoy.

I’d love to hear your favourite baking treats?

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Chocolate Chip Shortbread

We all love tasty treats in our household. Shortbread is a firm favourite and simple to bake. By dividing the mixture in half, you can make some original and some choc chip shortbread.

Ingredients (makes 14 fingers)

180g plain flour
55g caster sugar
125g butter
30g chocolate chips

Method

Preheat fan oven to 170 deg C.
Cream the butter and sugar together.
Mix in the flour.
Draw half the mixture into a ball and put aside.
Add the chocolate chips to the remainder of the mixture.
Draw this mixture togther into a ball.
Turn one ball onto a floured board.
Roll to a rectangle, about 1cm thick.
Lift onto a greased baking sheet.
Repeat last three steps for second ball.
Dust with extra caster sugar.
Mark the rectangles into 7 fingers each by cutting about halfway down.
Prick a pattern on the fingers.
Bake in the middle of the oven for about 15 minutes until golden brown.
Cool on a wire rack.
Cut fully into fingers.
Serve and enjoy.

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My favourite flavour is almond

Foodies100 have challenged bloggers to share a story or memory of their favourite flavour. The Schwartz Flavour Forecast has inspired me to tell you that my favourite flavour is of almonds. I’m not bothered about the texture of the nuts one way or the other. But I absolutely love almond flavoured cakes and marzipan even more.

I have happy memories from childhood of my mum buying Mr Kipling bakewell slices and battenberg cake. And Christmas tea was one of my favourite parts of Christmas, as not only did we have a Christmas cake, but my Gran would always make a cherry cake topped with a thick layer of marzipan.

My husband is not keen on the flavour of almond, but luckily my boys have taken after me and both like the flavour, so I have an excuse to bake almond flavoured goodies. I posted my fruit and almond cake recipe a few months ago. And now I’m sharing my bakewell tart recipe, which my boys and I enjoy. Although I do cheat by using a ready baked pastry case. Okay almonds are not a Schwartz flavour, but my recipe does have a pinch of mixed spice.

Bakewell Tart

Ingredients

1 sweet pastry case
2 tbsp raspberry jam
75g margarine
75g sugar
2 large eggs
50g self raising flour
few drops of almond essence
50g ground almonds
pinch of mixed spice

Method

Leave pastry case in foil tray and place on baking sheet.
Spread jam over base of pastry case.
Cream margarine and sugar.
Beat in the eggs.
Sieve and fold in the flour.
Add almond essence and mixed spice.
Fold in the ground almonds.
Spoon mixture over the jam.
Cook in preheated fan oven at 160deg for 30 – 40 minutes until golden.
Cool on wire rack.
Serve and enjoy.

Bakewell tart

And at Christmas time, my boys love making homemade treats for their grandparents. So two of the things we always make are marzipan stuffed dates and marzipan fruit petit fours.

Making marzipan apples

You can share your own flavour stories via the Flavour of Together Schwartz website or Facebook page. For every story shared on Schwartz’s website and Facebook page or any of McCormick’s websites or social channels, Schwartz and McCormick together will donate $1, up to $1.25 million to United Way and their partners’ organisations. In the UK, Schwartz will support Focus on Food, a charitable food education programme and partner of United Way Worldwide, that champions cooking as an essential ingredient for healthy, happy lifestyles.

This post is an entry into the Foodies100/Schwartz Flavour of Together challenge.

Tuna and Cheese Floddie

For those of you who are wondering what on earth is a Floddie, it is fried grated potato. My mum used to frequently serve it as the “potato” part of many meat and 2 veg meals when I was a child.  It is a traditional North East regional recipe from where she grew up in County Durham. Also sometimes spelt as Floddy.

I have adapted the recipe into a main meal.  I’m sharing my tuna and cheese version here, but I’ve also cooked other versions such as egg, bacon, mushroom or sausage.

I’m using Maris Piper potatoes, but it works well with other varieties of potato too.

Ingredients (serves 2 adults and 2 children)

500-600g Maris Piper potatoes
100g cheddar
1 medium onion
185g tin of tuna
mixed herbs
salt and pepper
1 tablespoon of olive oil

Method

Open and drain the tin of tuna.
Chop the onion.
Grate the cheese.
Peel and grate the potatoes.
Add a tablespoonful of olive oil to a wok and heat.
Add the onion.
Once the onion has softened, add the grated potato.
Keep turning the mixture, to avoid the potato sticking.
Season with herbs, salt and pepper.
Add the tuna.
Add the grated cheese.
Serve and enjoy.

Add the onion

Add the grated potato

Add the tuna

Add the cheese

Serve and enjoy

This post is an entry for #MarisPiperBritMums Linky Challenge sponsored by Potato Council for Potato Week 7 – 13 October, celebrating the varieties of potatoes and how we like to eat them. Learn more and find recipes at www.lovepotatoes.co.uk.

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