Peach Loaf Cake

I went on a bit of a peach bender.

Making peach ice lollies, blending them into my morning smoothie (more on that obsession later...), revelling in their thick ripe smell when walking into the kitchen...

...and baking them into soft peach loaves.

Ingredients

150gr butter
125gr golden caster sugar
2 eggs
25ml almond liqueur
160gr self raising flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
Small pinch of salt
2 peaches, stoned and chopped into chunks around 2cm squared

Method

1, Line a small loaf tin (I used this one - medium sized) with parchment paper and preheat your oven to 160o/c.
2, In a large mixing bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until pale and fluffy.
3, Beat in the eggs, liqueur and a tablespoon of the flour to prevent curdling.
4, Fold in the rest of the flour gently until you have a smooth batter.
5, Fold in the chopped peaches and spoon the batter into the prepared loaf tin.
6, Bake for 45-55 minutes until lightly coloured and an inserted skewer comes out clean.
7, Cool completely before serving.

Earl Grey Iced Tea

I turned our purple picnic bench back upright today. Spread my papers all over it and got down to some serious business.

I lasted less than 15minutes.

It's bad when you take a mouthful of hot diet coke. A mix of sun tan lotion and sweat smudges all your ink. Then your cat sinks her paw right into the ice filled glass of water you just got yourself. Lovely.

A glass of this made it all better.

Ingredients

2 Earl Grey Tea bags
750ml boiling water
1 lemon, sliced
50gr granulated sugar
250ml cold water
Ice
Fresh mint to garnish (optional)

Method

1, Pour in boiling water onto the tea bags and half the lemon slices in a large heatproof bowls or jug and stir well.
2, Stir in the sugar until it has dissolved and add in 250ml of cold water and a couple of large handfuls of ice.
3, Cover and set aside until cool.
4, Pour into a large jug filled with the remaining lemon slices, plenty of ice and mint to garnish. Decant into tumblers.

Granola Almond Milk Cookies

I have a love/hate relationship with granola.

It tries and wheedle its way into my life with lures of "I'm good for you" and "I'll fill you up until lunchtime" and "If I go a bit soft, you can re-crisp me in the oven" and "I'm much healthier than a Twix".

My normal response is "Go away, granola. You've caused me nothing but harm*, you take ages to chew and don’t hate on my love of a good Twix".

But every now and then a bag gets into the house and half of it gets eaten. Then the rest sits there. I scowl at the bag whenever I dip into the cupboard for tea bags.

With so much focus on food waste, it was high time someone took action against unwanted granola and some leftover almond milk.

Ingredients

100gr granola
200ml almond milk
2 tbsp maple syrup

Makes 15 cookies

Method

1, Mix the granola, almond milk and maple syrup together in a shallow bowl, cover with cling film and refrigerate for a minimum of four hours or until the granola has soaked up all the almond milk. It'll look quite mushy and unappealable but stick with me.
2, Preheat your oven to 150o/c and line two baking sheets with parchment paper.
3, Spoon tablespoons of the gloppy granola onto the lined sheets and then flatten slightly into rounds just under a centimetre high.
4, Bake for 35-45minutes until dry and crunchy.

(N.B - Depending on your granola - nut to oat ratio/age/crispiness/etc - you might need more or less almond milk. My granola wasnt anything fancy, so it had a higher oat ratio to anything else. Bear this in mind. You could also stir through extra nuts/chocolate chips/dried or fruit before Step 3)

(*I chewed into a mouthful of granola once, which contained a whole almond. Which promptly smashed off one of my brand spanking, newly fitted porcelain crowns. And although I got it fixed the same day, I haven’t got over this. I don’t think I ever will.)

Peach Bellini Lollies

Or, as I like to call them:-

"Tasty Champagne Chillers"

or

"Instant Peach Bellinis"

They're pretty good on their own too.

Ingredients

3 ripe and juicy peaches

1tbsp lemon juice

1tsbp vodka

1tsbp caster sugar

Method

1, Remove the stones from the peaches and blend them along with the rest of the ingredients in a blender until you have a thick, aerated fruit purée.

2, Pour into ice lolly moulds and add sticks.

3, Freeze until solid.

4, De-mould by rising under warm water and pop into a glass of champagne.

I'm entering these into Kavey's Bloggers Scream for Ice Cream challenge - an ice lolly spectacular!

I'm also entering this into Working London Mummy's One Ingredient Peaches Challenge

We Should Cocoa: Kentish Cherry Fondant Cake

This month's We Should Cocoa, the brainchild of Choclette and Chele is guest hosted by Janice of Famersgirl Kitchen. She has challenged us to come up with a chocolatey concoction using cherries. Last month's blackcurrant round up can be found here.

Cherries flood back memories.

The faux cream marble work top. Eye high. Corners cut off the edge.

A dull, gun grey pairing knife blade. Dented with age. Scuffed by sharpening. Tip slightly curved. A green bakelite handle. Chipped.

A small wooden punnet of fat, glistening, darkly brooding cherries. Deft, wrinkled, bird like, papery fingers reach in. A weathered solid gold wedding band warms in colour in the sunlight. A double one plucked from the punnet.

Gently slipped over my ear. I could already hear my giggling. "Like an earring" she said. A gap toothed smile. 

Ingredients

100gr dark chocolate (72% or higher if you're braver than me)
100gr butter
130gr caster sugar
2 eggs

Small pinch of sea salt
2tbsp ground almonds
2tbsp plain flour

1tsp cocoa powder
125gr cherries, pitted and chopped (I left some in half and some quartered)

Method

1, Preheat your oven to 180 o/c and line and grease a 7inch round shallow cake tin.
2, Melt the butter and chocolate together in a small saucepan over a low heat and set to one side to cool slightly.
3, Beat the eggs, sugar and salt together until pale and fluffy.
4, Fold the cooled butter and chocolate through the eggs and sugar. Sift in the almonds, plain flour and cocoa powder and fold through gently as well.  The chocolate will sink right to the bottom so make sure you scoop deep into the bowl. When the batter is uniformly chocolatey and there are no lumps, pour into your prepared tin.
5, Scatter the cherries evenly over the surface of the cake and bake for 30-35minutes or until the edges are gently springy to the touch and the centre is just a tiny bit gooey.
6, Remove from the oven and lift the cake out of the tin. Place on a cooling rack and cool completely before serving.