Freckled Kirsty

Hi friends, To celebrate National Cream Tea day (what an amazing day to celebrate!!) I have whipped up this batch of cherry and raisin scones. They are nice and crumbly, and I have made mini scones so you can have two or three without feeling too guilty! The nice thing about scones is you can make them sweet or savoury – I prefer the sweet versions but you can literally throw any flavour you like in them! Ingredients: 75g fruit - I have used cherries and raisins 75g cold butter, diced 250g self raising flour 1 tsp baking powder 1 egg 4 tbsp milk, and extra for brushing Pinch of salt Method: Preheat your oven to 200C/ 180C fan assisted. Line a baking tray with parchment. In a bowl mix together the butter, flour and baking powder. With your hands, rub the butter into the flour until it becomes crumb like. Add in the egg and milk and salt, and mix until combined. You don’t want to over work the dough at this point – the less you work it the mor

Hello friends, So with all good intentions I buy bananas and try to have one a day. Sometimes however I work long hours away from home and the fruit sits there getting soft. Now I like my bananas at the pre-brown spot stage, so when I realised this weekend that I had five very soft bananas what pops into my head - BANANA BREAD!!! I like banana bread a lot, it is very moist and moreish, and the last one I baked was a healthy version. This is the opposite as it is full of butter sugar and chocolate, yum! Ingredients: 110g butter softened 120g caster sugar 80g milk chocolate melted 2 eggs 120g self raising flour 1 tsp baking powder 2 mashed bananas Method: Preheat your oven to 180C/ 160C and line a loaf tin with parchment. In a bowl, beat together the butter and sugar until  light and fluffy then add in the two eggs. Beat with a wooden spoon and pour in the melted chocolate. Mix well and add the rests of the dry ingredients, folding them in  making sure everythin

Hello friends, New cookie recipe time! These delightful peanut flavoured cookies have no flour or added butter (there is enough of that in the peanut) so I am going to class these as almost a healthy alternative. They have only 7 simple ingredients and just need to be beaten together and baked, it is as easy as that! The cookies are only baked for 8 - 10 minutes and produce a fudgey brownie type cookie, which will satisfy any sweet craving. I also videoed myself baking these treats, so why not pop over and take a look here: http://youtu.be/GPb8Vwdaspk Ingredients: Makes 10 cookies 250g peanut butter 1 egg 20g cocoa powder 70g light muscovado sugar 1 tsp baking powder 1/2 tsp vanilla extract Reese's Pieces for extra peanut Method: Preheat over to 180C/ 160C fan assisted, and line two baking trays. Put all ingredients into a bowl and beat well. Using a tablespoon scoop the dough into balls onto the prepared trays.  Put into the oven and bake

Hello summer friends, With the holiday season upon us, I am sure many of you like me are feeling a little self concious about our bikini bodies. Although I am fairly fit and muscular at the moment, having spent months preparing for my Tough Mudder, I have very stubborn tummy wobble which won't go away.  Now I know the reason for this, pure and simple I love food! And nothing will make me give up my sweet treats. So to compromise I have been doing some research on making my elevenses and mid afternoon snacks slightly healthier. Instead of reaching for a biscuit or a chunk of Dairy Milk I have experimented with two different type of healthy truffles - one flavoured with mint and the other chocolate brownie. They have only a few ingredients and are very easy to throw together, so I challenge you to give them a go and make this small swap and step towards healthier snacks. This first blog post will be for the mint truffles, part two will be the chocolate brownie truffles, and

Hello summery friends, With the weather being lovely at the moment my thoughts turn to fun things such as picnics, and the fabulous food that can be cooked in advance and eaten outside.   Pretty near the top of my picnic baking list is a delicious quiche, and one of my favourites is onion and bacon. This recipe can be made either with your own handmade shortcrust pastry, or the shops sell great pre-made packets which just need to be baked before being filled, and the beauty of this is it can be made in advance and eaten cold, or rustled up in an evening for a light supper.   Ingredients: Pastry: 225g plain flour 100g cold butter diced Or, a packet of ready made shortcrust. For the filling: 20g butter 3 small onions finely sliced 4 rashers of bacon, cut into strips  4 eggs 284ml pot of double cream 120g cheddar Method: If you are making your pastry this should be done first. Rub together the flour and pastry, keeping the mixture as cool as possible. When this

Hello friends, So part two of my baking at the weekend was to use up some fruit I had in the fridge, and what says summer more that a pavlova! This recipe is for a strawberry and raspberry pavlova, however you can throw in any type of fruit you fancy - why not try blueberries and blackberries, or maybe go for a Caribbean pineapple and cherry combo? I also added a little bit of colour to the meringue using pink food dye swirled on a cocktail stick, to make it look extra special: Ingredients: 150g egg whites (approx 3 eggs) 300g caster sugar 350ml double cream, whipped to stiff peaks Chopped strawberries and raspberries, or other fruit as you fancy Method: Preheat your oven to 100C, and line a baking tray with parchment. Put the sugar in a heatproof bowl and put into the oven. In a clean bowl beat the egg whites, firstly at a slow speed until small bubbles for (which will stabilise the mixture) and then at a faster speed until they form stiff peaks. You can test this

Hello everyone, This weekend was a rather socially busy one, and I had two very fun days. Saturday was one of my oldest and dearest friends birthday BBQ, so I took the opportunity to take on a new challenge, the rainbow cake. This was a 5 layer white chocolate sponge, in some of the colours of the rainbow. To make it I used a set of Wilton pans from Lakeland (http://www.lakeland.co.uk/19499/Wilton-Easy-Layer-Cake-Pan-Set) - they take one normal size cake mix, which means your end bake isn't too huge! A little tip I have is use gel colouring as I find these give a brighter colour when the bake comes out: Ingredients: 200g soft butter 100g chopped white chocolate 4 eggs 200g caster sugar 200g self raising flour Five food colourings - I used blue, green, red, pink and yellow 200g white chocolate 250ml double cream If the icing is too liquid like, add in icing powder until thick enough. Method: Heat the oven to 180C/ 160C fan assisted. Grease five

Hello friends, So it is June, how did that happen! Half way through 2015 already, and I swear I still feel like it is February. Fortunately, another month passing means another Birchbox delivery hurrah! I follow Birchbox on Twitter, and saw that it was dispatch day, and was very happy when lunchtime the next day my box arrived - very prompt service. This months box with a collaboration with French Sole, and as part of the partnership you could chose from three different box designs - either Floral Daze, Pick 'n' mix or my choice of From Paris with Love. Inside the box was also a matching shoe bag as a little bonus.  I have also done a review on YouTube, if you want to take a peak here is the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VDESmnzrcUY   Products inside this months box: 1 - STYLondon transfer tattoos RRP £7.99 I am obsessed with these temporary tattoos, they are silver and gold and a pretty combination of feathers and bands. Transferring onto your skin is

Hello friends, I haven't done any baking for a while, and the main reason for this is because for most of May I was eating very healthily prior to my Tough Mudder event. Now that is done, I am back in the kitchen again, and today's treat are these deliciously decadent Cherry Bakewell Cupcakes.  This recipe makes 12 cupcakes. Ingredients: 150g soft butter 150g caster sugar 100g self raising flour 50g ground almonds 1tsp baking powder A dash of milk 3 eggs Raspberry jam  200g icing sugar 3 tbsp lemon juice 12 glace cherries Method: Preheat the oven to 180 degrees, and line a 12 muffin hole tin. In a large bowl cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add in the flour, almonds, baking powder, milk and eggs and mix well. Spoon the mixture into the cupcake cases, and place in the oven. Bake for around 15-20 minutes, until golden and a skewer comes out clean when tested.  Remove from the oven and allow to cool. Whilst the cakes are c

Hello friends, I am very proud to say that on the 31 st May I completed my first ever Tough Mudder event. This was 11.2 miles and 24 obstacles of fun (although during the event I did question why I was doing it a couple of times). We faced everything from freezing cold water, huge heights and tight confined spaces to crawl through and then the last hurdle, before getting that coveted headband and finisher’s beer, the electroshock! This is a sprint through dangling wires which give you electric shocks of varying levels – I got through with a few shocks, but a team mate took  ended up face planting into the mud! All good fun!! Before the event I found a lot of useful information online about how to prepare, what to wear and what to do on the day, so I thought I would reflect on my experience and give my Tough Mudder Top Tips. So you have decided to take on the challenge, what are the best ways to prepare? 1.       Firstly, it is worth saying that on the course were a hu