My gluten free rock salt and olive oil bread

So there i was knee deep in cupcakes last Friday and a selection of them were gluten free, and just incase I wasn't going to be under pressure with making 50 cupcakes for a baby shower I had this notion that id give making gluten free bread a go, had never made it before but I had seemed to be on this gluten free buzz for the past few weeks as I had made gluten free meat loaf the week before for my other blog "2 girls with a blog".

So as I'm whisking my cupcake batter( and must mention my beloved machine stops twirling, so I've to hand twirl my bowl on the machine as the whisks go 90)and all the while in my head I'm conjuring up flavor friends, and I look up for a moment and there in front of me is a bottle of extra virgin olive oil....boom goes my brain why not use olive oil and rock salt that's a guaranteed marriage of flavours.

For this recipe you will need:
390ml skimmed milk
420g gluten free flour
150 ml extra virgin olive oil
1teaspoon of rock salt

Firstly in a bowl add your flour and whisk gently to remove all the lumpy bumps, next pour in your skimmed milk and 90 Mls of your oil and combine well this will take a few moments to combine evenly.

Coat your 2 lb loaf tin liberally with some of the left over olive oil not to use it all as the remainder is for drizzling over the top.

Pour in your bread mixture note that this mixture is an extremely wet consistency but the outcome will be a very light airy loaf.

Drizzle the last of the olive oil over the batter before sprinkling with your rock salt. Pop it in the oven @160' for 45 minutes. It will rise super quick and a fab golden color will appear sooner than you think don't panic it's all part of the process.

For me this bread was YUM the crunchy rock salt on top and the unique tang of the olive oil was just so more'ish, so more'ish infant that I nearly ate the whole bloody thing haha...

Enjoy
Rebecca

My apple & black berry crumble

So while I'm down the path of luscious desserts my grandad Jackie used to adore this next one is a given.

He used to love equal measures of apple tart to cream and I'd say when my gran "Nanos" made the apple tart for him she'd be lucky to get at least One slice from it.

So with all things sweet iv put a little twist to his apple tart and invited along some crowd pleasers . For this recipe you will need:

Crust:
175g flour
25g icing sugar
100g diced cold butter
1 egg yolk
1 tablespoon of water

Filling:
7 small apples peeled and sliced thinly
1 punnet of blackberries
Zest of 1 orange

Crumble
100g of light brown muscavado sugar
100g of butter
200g of flour

So lets get started get your pastry dough made wrapped in cling film and then pop in the fridge this will keep the butter cold which will prevent it from shrinking away from the sides of the flan tin.

Blind bake @190' for 10 mins remove the foil and bake for a further 8 mins. With apples and blackberries comes lots of moisture so this will prevent a soggy bottom!!!

In a uniform pattern place the apple slices on the pastry. once all the slices are down pop the gorgeous blackberries evenly over the apples .

Next get started on your crumble. In a bowl pour in your flour and sugar and combine. Then add your cubed butter and rub them all together until you get a crumb like consistency.

Sprinkle this liberally over your apples and blackberries and pop it in the oven @ 180' for at least 30 minutes, by the time your crumble has goldened your fruit has softened nicely and the glorious purple tones from the blackberries have mingled with your apple slices...

I kept true to jackies tradition and teamed this crumble with whipped cream more of a 70/30 ratio than his 50/50...(",)

Enjoy
Rebecca

A cranberry & cherry orange loaf

My grandad Jackie had the sweetest tooth known to man, he had porridge for breakfast which without fail was coated liberally with sugar.

One of my favourite foody memories of Jackie was seeing him sitting at his kitchen table with an unusually big dessert spoon eating trifle straight out of the trifle dish, there obviously was no time to put it in a bowl lol...

So when ever they used to come and stay with us down in the sticks my mam would have a few weeks worth of desserts made in anticipation of this love affair with all things sweet.

One dish that sticks out in my head is an orange loaf, just the smell of fresh oranges triggers that food memory for me.
So here is a twist on that very orange loaf..for this you will need;

2 cups plain flour
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of baking powder
2 tablespoons of oil
1 cup orange juice
Zest of 1 orange
1 egg
1/4 cup of caster sugar
100g of glacé cherries
160g of dried cranberries

In a bowl pop in the chopped cherries and cranberries, the zest and juice of the orange. Give this a good mix then sprinkle in the sugar. Set aside for minimum 1/2 hour this will give the cranberries a chance to get nice and plump from the juice.

In a separate bowl sift in all your dry ingredients, once that's done pour in your oil and a whisked egg and combine.

Next mix the two bowls together with a wooden spoon, this is a wet mixture which in turn will give you a fab moist loaf.

You will pour your mixture into a pre lined 2lb loaf tin and pop into your oven which will be pre heated @180' for 30 minutes.

For this loaf you want to check and check again with your skewer that it has baked fully as there are a lot of wet elements to it.

Pop on the kettle and cut your self a few slices and enjoy Sooooo good.

Rebecca