Scary treats for Halloween

Scary Halloween Cakes

31 October is an ideal time to get children learning how to bake. Grandma’s recipes for biscuits and cakes make a perfect base to make simple, tasty Halloween treats. At this time of year, I love baking with ginger with its warm Autumn colour. Grandma's recipe for Ginger Buns/Cakes are perfect for decorating with scary jelly or white chocolate monsters.

Ginger buns

50g/2 oz butter

2 dsps treacle

50g/2 oz sugar

4 oz plain flour

1 tsp ginger

1 tsp baking powder

1 egg

A little milk to mix

Spread 12 bun cases in a baking tray.  Melt the butter in a pan over a low heat and add the treacle and sugar until blended.   Mix together the dry ingredients - flour, ginger, baking powder.  Mix together the egg and the milk and add to the other liquid when slightly cooled. Make a well in the centre of the dry ingredients and add the liquid. Mix well.  Fill the bun cases with the mixture. Bake in a moderate oven for 15-20 minutes. (350F, Mark 4, 180 C)

You could make these as smaller cupcakes or larger buns in muffin cases but allow another 8 to 10 minutes cooking time for the larger ones. Children can let their imagination run wild and decorate with owl eye balls, ghostly monsters or spidery webs. 

Scary Ginger Biscuits

If you are planning an evening of ghoulish delight on 31 October, get scary with Grandma's recipes and enjoy a Halloween treat! 

Bake at half term

Chocolate Coconut Tray Bake

Here's an easy recipe to bake at half term with the kids. My friend’s children, aged 7 and 9, love messing in the kitchen and will devour anything with chocolate. I tried out this recipe on them for Chocolate Coconut Tray Bake. They emailed me later to say ‘We just wanted you to know that the chocolate coconut thing was the BEST EVER!!!!!!!  Praise indeed. Here’s the recipe :

Chocolate Coconut Tray Bake

150g/5oz butter

50g/2oz demerara sugar

2 tbsps cocoa

175g/6oz self raising flour

100g/4oz (dark) chocolate

Melt the butter and sugar in saucepan over a low heat. Mix the flour, cocoa and coconut together and add the mixture to the melted butter and sugar. Spread the mixture in a shallow tin and bake in a moderate oven (Mark 4, 180C, 350F) for around 20 minutes. Leave to cool. Melt the chocolate in a bowl in a saucepan over hot water. Spread the chocolate over the top of the Chocolate Coconut Bake and leave until set. Cut into pieces as required.

Grandma has lots of ideas for ‘baking with kids’ as her recipes as so simple. Her mantra was 'Start them young and get hooked on baking!'  

Enjoy baking at half term and let me know what you bake!

It’s Apple day!

Pommes en pate

It’s Apple day on 21 October! This is a relatively new custom which began in 1990 in Covent Garden, London. You can make whatever dish you like, as long as you use apples.

Grandma's favourite apple recipes was Apple Pie but here's one of my favourite French recipes, Pommes en Pate from Normandy. It has ground almonds and a splash of Calvados to bring out the taste of the apples. Grandma loved this one too. 

I use Grandma’s recipe for Shortcrust Pastry and Bramley cooking apples as I prefer their sharper flavour. If the apples are large then you’ll want to serve a half or even a quarter of the dish as it is very filling!

Ingredients

4 apples (peeled and cored)

3 oz/75g ground almonds

2 oz/50g brown sugar (I usually omit the sugar)

1 tsp cinnamon

1oz/25g butter

2 tbsps Calvados (Optional)

Shortcrust pastry

Beaten egg (I brush the pastry to ensure a golden crust)

Peel and core the apples

Place each one in the centre of a 8 inch/20 cm round of pastry. Mix together the ground almonds, sugar (if used) and cinnamon. Fill the hole of each apple with the ground almond mixture, add a splash of Calvados and place a small knob of butter at the top of the hollowed core. 

Wrap the pastry around the apple to cover completely. Cover the join at the top with a leaf shape cut out of spare pastry. Brush the pastry with beaten egg. Place on a baking tray and bake in a pre heated oven at 180C, Mark 4, 350F for 30 minutes. A larger apple may require longer cooking time to make sure it is soft. Serve with ice cream, crème fraiche or custard (crème anglaise!) 

Delicieux!

Enjoy Apple Day! What's your favourite?

Getting the best ingredients

Tim and Jane at their stall

Grandma always made sure she sourced good products for her baking and the local Coop stocked most of the things she needed. These days we have a huge choice at local markets, supermarkets, grocery stores and online but there's a real gem of a stall on Doncaster Market called Tim and Jane’s Tasty Flavours for baking ingredients. The stall is in the famous indoor international food hall and rivals anywhere in the world. In fact, Doncaster Market has won many awards and has been the heart of the town since 1194.

Tim and Jane’s Tasty Flavours 

Tim and Jane have been working on the market for over 25 years including 18 years in the indoor market selling high quality fresh fruit and vegetables in season as well as a vast array of cooking and baking products. They have over 1100 products from edible nuts, dried fruits, teas, dried herbs and spices, gluten free pastas, dried beans and pulses. Tim predicts what people want and need at different times of the year so from September onwards, he stocks up on all the ingredients for Christmas cakes and vinegars for pickling. When it’s cooler, more dried beans and pulses are sold. He often gets requests for unusual products when people come back from holidays especially Spain or Greece or following TV cookery programmes which mention out of the ordinary ingredients. Tim encourages people to use fresh produce all year round in their cooking and baking.

Nigel on the fish stall 

What Tim likes best about Doncaster Market is the diversity of products available right across the market indoors and out. It really is a brilliant place for fruit, vegetables, fish and meat and everything that’s best for baking – we don’t know how lucky we are!

And a final word ....

P.S. This is the Wedding Cake  I made from Grandma's recipe with ingredients from Tim and Jane's stall. Many thanks also to Chris Chambers who is an amazing wedding photographer. He took these wonderful pictures of their wedding cake in all its glory!

Putting the icing on the cake!

The excitement is mounting as we’re putting the final touches to the wedding preparations for my daughter and her partner. 

Almond Paste 

My big task has been to make sure I got the cake ready. Last week, I covered the cakes with Almond Paste, and this week with fondant icing, wrapping maroon ribbon to match the colour of the bridesmaids' dresses around each of the 3 tiers. 

Kay assembling the wedding cake at Hodsock Priory

Kay at Flowers by Kay came up with some incredibly realistic cream roses and assembled the cake at Hodsock Priory  

The bride and groom have chosen a travel theme for their wedding as they've done a fair amount of travelling around the world together. The table plan is a world map, the table headers are postcards from places they have visited and the place names for the guests are luggage labels. They’ve even chosen ‘One more step along the world I go’ to sing at the wedding service.

We’re all looking forward to a fabulous day. All our fondest wishes and congratulations to our lovely couple. Grandma Abson would be very proud that her family baking legacy lives on!                              

Grandma’s spreading the word

Marmalade spice cake

I’m passionate about sharing Grandma’s skills and expertise which she passed on with the legacy of her delectable collection of 200 recipes in Grandma Abson's Traditional Baking so I’m doing talks, book signings and demonstrations about Grandma’s baking. Read about them on my Events page.

The first  of these was at Furlong Road Methodist Church in Bolton on Dearne, South Yorkshire where Grandma spent most of her life. It was brilliant to talk to the group about Grandma’s life in the village. It all set them reminiscing and quite a few of them remembered Grandma and her baking. I took along the Marmalade Spice Cake which they loved. We talked about ways of helping the next generation learn how to use simple ingredients to make good food for their families. Grandma’s baking has lots to offer as her skills were honed over the twentieth century often in times of shortage during rationing in the first and second world wars and the depression in the 1930s.  

John Foster of Fosters Bakery in Barnsley says that what he loves about Grandma’s book is that her appeal is not just about yesterday but it's for today and tomorrow. Grandma’s recipes celebrate our baking heritage and are highly relevant for us now and in the future with increases in the prices of foodstuffs and energy. He is very clear that we need to make tasty food with simple ingredients once again.

Last weekend, I was signing books and sharing cakes with the customers at Waterstones, which was great fun. Everyone tells me an anecdote about their Grandma’s baking so I'm starting Grandma’s traditional baking revolution!

A special wedding gift

A special wedding gift

 A few months ago, I made a special Wedding Cake  and gave a copy of Grandma Abson's Traditional Baking book for a family friend to take as a wedding gift for a famous couple, Justine Thornton and Ed Miliband. Ed is the local MP in Doncaster.  I decorated the cake with red ribbon and put a spray of delicate white Yorkshire roses, tied up with a horseshoe.

I was delighted to get a lovely message back from Justine with a lovely thank you card saying ‘We've started eating the cake and it is fantastic!’  I hope they are doing plenty of Grandma Abson’s baking in the Miliband household.

We’re all getting excited about my daughter’s wedding next month and yet another outing for Grandma Abson’s Celebration Fruit Cake recipe. As you need to prepare a wedding fruit cake in advance, I've baked the three tiers and these are now maturing. Once a week, I prick the tops of the cakes and pour a few teaspoonsful of brandy to help the maturing process. During the next couple of weeks, I’ll need to cover the cakes with home made almond paste/marzipan.

How to make Almond Paste

½ lb ground almonds

¾ lb caster sugar

4 tablespoonfuls of lemon juice and 2 tablespoonsful of water

Mix the almonds and sugar together. Add sufficient liquid to make a stiff  paste. You can also add a 1 tablespoon of sherry instead of 1 of the water. You can also substitute half of the caster sugar with icing sugar.

Almond paste ready to put on the cake

Grandma’s baking is a hit with the hens

Afternoon tea with the hens

I don’t remember Grandma ever saying she had been to a 'hen do'. My daughter’s bridesmaids had organised a secret weekend away to celebrate her final weeks of singledom. The destination was a farmhouse on the outskirts of Bath - an idyllic venue for a hen party!

On the first evening, we got dressed up in our best togs for dinner with a glass or two or fizz. After the meal, I got out my saxophone for the girls sang along. It was a great success and one of the girls said that this was the first hen do she been to with a family band!

I’m not quite sure what Grandma would have made of the next day, as we set off to do Burlesque Dancing. The hens got dressed up appropriately with basques, black stockings and suspenders and with teacher, Rachelle’s encouragement learnt the steps to become dazzling Dancing Divas. 

After lunch, it was back to the farmhouse and another occasion to celebrate - my niece’s birthday; we'd made a couple of traditional cakes from Grandma’s book : Victoria Sponge and Chocolate Cake and had afternoon tea around the farmhouse kitchen table. 

Blowing the birthday candles out!

I left for the drive home while the girls got ready for their evening’s partying with a cocktail making session, tapas and the Bath nightclubs. So, huge thanks to my daughter for asking me along and to all the girls for being so welcoming. I’m really looking forward to the big day soon. Now to get cracking with the wedding cake!

Let’s hear it for lemons

Tangy Lemon Loaf

Lemons are pretty underestimated in the baking world. When I was sorting through the recipes Grandma had cut out from magazines, I found one for a really tangy Lemon Loaf. I’m not sure which magazine it came from but Grandma Abson was an avid reader of Woman's Weekly. Once the Monday washing had been done, she would treat herself to a sit-down to catch up on the romantic serials as well as the more practical knitting patterns – we had a whole wardrobe of hand knitted woollen jumpers, gloves, hats and scarves.  The recipes would be cut out and saved to try out later.

Tangy Lemon Loaf

110g/4 oz butter

175g/6 oz castor sugar

Grated rind and juice 2 lemons

2 eggs (beaten)

175g/6 oz self raising flour

Milk to mix

50g/2 oz granulated sugar

Cream the butter, castor sugar and lemon rind until pale and fluffy. Gradually beat in the eggs. Mix in the flour and a little milk to soften the mixture so it drops off the spoon. Grease a 1kg/2lb loaf tin. Bake in a moderate oven (Mark 4, 350F, 180C) for 45 minutes until risen and firm on top. Prepare the lemon syrup by heating the lemon juice and granulated sugar until the sugar is dissolved. Once the cake is out of the oven, pierce the top with a cake skewer and pour over the lemon syrup. Leave the cake in the tin until cool.

This is a great recipe to serve with a bowl of blueberries and raspberries. The lemon syrup gives it really tangy and intense flavour - just the thing for a late summer’s afternoon. 

And here’s another great recipe for Lemon Biscuits. 

Have you got a Lemon recipe to shout out?

Afternoon Tea in London

Afternoon tea in London - what a spread!

Never mind tea at the Ritz, Grandma Abson’s Afternoon tea was served up last weekend in London to the delight of family and friends. The sun put its hat on and came out to shine as we sat in the garden.

Jane's delectable cucumber sandwiches

It was a combined effort to prepare a wide variety of delicious cakes, scones, teabreads and biscuits. My son’s neighbour, Jane, crowned our efforts with fabulous cucumber sandwiches on beautiful trays and brought out her gorgeous cake stands to display Grandma's cakes superbly. 

It’s always fascinating to see which cakes are the most popular when we do these parties. Grandma's Bridlington Cake is a lemon cake which takes everyone by storm, wherever it’s served up. It’s not a standard sponge cake and not made by creaming, rubbing-in or melting methods but the texture is somewhere between a sponge and a meringue. It’s also a versatile cake to decorate. This time, I used homemade lemon curd and a meringue topping with amazing results. I’ve decorated it before with lemon butter cream and glace icing or feather icing. 

There was much talk amongst the guests of the delights of afternoon tea as an alternative to dinner parties. Grandma’s baking recipes are easy to make and leave the host plenty of time to have a leisurely chat with guests. 

Serious debate about Grandma's afternoon tea!

Going for gold

Apple Pie with golden pastry

One of my favourite pastimes is gardening and it suit all moods, whether it’s hacking away at an overgrown shrub, growing fruit and vegetables or simply taking pleasure in a colourful display of flowers in spring and summer. It lifts my spirits when I get out into the garden.

Grandma let someone else take the strain of gardening but she did take full advantage of their efforts, and knew what to do with gluts of fruits and vegetables. Grandma Abson's Traditional Baking has recipes for jams and chutneys as well as fruit puddings and pies. My favourite  is Apple Pie made with her mouth watering perfect Shortcrust pastry.

Last September with much trepidation, I entered the annual competition for our local Gardeners' Association - in the baking section. I baked a Fruit pie, made from Grandma’s tried and trusted recipe. I was over the moon to win gold first prize and collect my winning certificate – this was my first baking competition! Not quite #GBBO but it felt like it - and I hope Grandma would have been proud of me!

1^st Prize for Home made Fruit Pie

Plums a plenty

Clafoutis de prunes : Superbe!

We’re enjoying a vast array of delectable fruits from the local market. One of my favourite summer desserts is the French ‘Clafoutis’. You can make it with cherries but I really like this recipe made with plums called ‘Clafoutis de prunes’. This sounds confusing but I promise that you don’t make it with prunes. You can use Yorkshire Pudding batter for ‘Clafoutis’. 

Here’s the recipe from my French friend, Florence. Grandma liked this as it's a recipe based on a ‘cup’ measurement. No worrying about metric or imperial - gs or ozs. Just make sure you use the same cup for the ingredients!

Clafoutis de prunes

¾ cup plain flour

2 eggs

¼ cup sugar

Pinch of salt

1 full cup of milk

4-5 plums cut into slices

Mix the eggs and flour as for a pancake batter. Beat in the sugar, salt and milk. Butter an oven dish and line with the plums. Cover these with the mixture and cook in a moderate oven for about 45 minutes (Mark 4, 350F, 180C).

Grandma’s tips for YorkshirePudding apply to this dish. Switch to a conventional heat setting rather than a fan oven setting to ensure it comes out light and airy!

Grandma’s on the wireless

Marmalade Spice Cake

Grandma listened to all sorts of radio programmes while she was knitting or sewing - plays and news on ‘The Home’ service, now Radio 4, and music on ‘The Light’ programme, which is a bit like Radio 2 - and she called it the 'wireless'.

This week, I’ve been interviewed on BBC Radio Sheffield and been sharing recipes from Grandma book. Rony Robinson, the presenter asked me about being brought up by Grandma and life on the Railway Station at Bolton on Dearne and of course about Grandma’s recipes and why I was passionate about home baking.

I made Marmalade Spice Cake for the BBC people to try and they told me it was 'Yum Yum'. Here's the recipe :

8oz/225g self raising flour

3oz/75g margarine or butter

5oz/150g marmalade

6oz/175g golden syrup

2 tsps ginger

1 tsp cinnamon

2 tbsps hot water

1 egg (beaten) 

Pre heat the oven to 325F, Mark 3, 170 C. Grease and line a loaf tin. Melt the margarine (or butter) in the golden syrup in a pan. Mix the flour, ginger and cinnamon. Add the liquid from the pan gradually. Add the marmalade and beaten egg and stir in the hot water. Bake in a warm oven for ¾ hour. 

The recipe is one from Grandma’s daughter-in-law, Nellie.  I love this recipe as the ginger gives it a real tang. I make it regularly with Grandma Pat’s homemadeMarmalade although any good quality marmalade will do.

Grandma Abson’s Traditional Baking recipes are going far and wide!