Peanut Butter Cookies

Peanut butter has definitely been a food item that has grown on my over the past year. I never really liked it at all, in actual fact, I used to hate anything that tasted like nuts. However, since I found some in the kitchen cupboard and started experimenting with what it goes with, I figured that the spread literally goes with anything from apple slices to a piece of toast. I've also already done a few other blog posts based on peanut butter which are: Peanut Butter Granola Bars and Chocolate Chip Peanut Butter Blondies. 

I'm excited to share this recipe with you as these cookies almost remind me of the kind that you'd imagine to have with a glass of milk as a kid, or the kind that you'd leave out for Santa Claus on Christmas eve.

You can make this recipe flour free if you wrap the dough up and put it in the fridge over night. This will make the dough go harder because the sugar soaks up all the wet ingredients. However, if you can't be bothered to wait that long for some cookies, you can add in around 125 grams of flour.

Ingredients..

- 1 large egg

- 200g peanut butter

- 150g brown sugar

- 50g granulated sugar

- 2 tsp vanilla extract

- 1/2 tsp baking powder

- 125g flour

Let's do this!...
1) Preheat the oven to gas mark 4.
2) Combine all the ingredients in a large mixing bowl.
3) Using your hands, roll out 8 golf ball sized cookies and place them on a lined baking tray. 
4) Bake in the oven for 8 minutes, until they begin to turn golden brown and are firm on the edges. 
5) Allow the cookies to cool for about 10 minutes on the tray before removing. 

I hope you enjoyed this baking post, be sure to stay around for another next week! :) 

Becky x

Oat Cookies

I'm coming to you from my bed, full of cold, with a recipe which I came up with for oat cookies!

Oat foods definitely remind me of the cold autumn and winter weather, especially hot porridge on a freezing morning. This recipe is very versatile and you can add any flavourings or extras as you please. Have fun experimenting! 

What you'll need...

- 75g  self raising flour

- 75g porridge oats

- 75g brown sugar

-75g butter

- 1 tbsp honey

- 1 tbsp milk

To start with I set my oven to gas mark 4 and I weighed out the flour, sugar and oats and put them into a mixing bowl.

The next step involves weighing out your 75g of butter, honey and milk and melting it on a low heat in a saucepan.

The melted butter combination then goes into the dry mixture. 

Then combine this all together using a wooden spoon in your mixing bowl.

I found it much less messy using a spoon to shape the cookies before putting them onto a lined baking tray ready to be put in the preheated oven.

I only did this to half of the mixture and then added in some walnut pieces to the remaining mixture in the bowl and combined it together. 

I popped these in the oven for about 15 minutes because they were quite large. If you make them slightly smaller, they probably won't take as long and vise versa. I knew that these were done because they had become partly golden brown, hardened a little and expanded slightly.

I recommend leaving these to cool for a while so that they become set and less flimsy.

I hope you enjoyed this post, look out for more in the future! :) 

Becky x

Pancake Day: How to make the perfect pancakes

It's the 17th of February; in other words pancake day! How is it already February? I'm definitely not going to complain though because who doesn't love eating pancakes for breakfast? Or even as lunch or dinner? I definitely do! So I've decided to share my favourite pancake recipe with you which I regularly enjoy to make.

I know that eating tonnes of these pancakes will definitely not help you to be healthy, however they are very tasty and easy to make once you've got the hang of cooking them. This recipe usually makes around 7-8 pancakes depending on how thick or thin you make them.

All you need for this recipe is:

100g Plain flour

2 Eggs

300ml Milk

Pinch of salt (Optional)

A splash of oil and extra for frying

Method:

1. To start with I measure the milk out into a large jug and then pour the milk into a separate glass.

2. Next I weigh out the flour.

3. I then put the flour in the large jug, add the two eggs and about a quarter of the milk.

4. Using a fork, I begin to whisk the mixture until smooth and then add more milk bit by bit until the mixture is smooth and slightly, but not too runny.

5. At this point I add the oil and salt and then combine them with the mixture, once again, using the fork.

6. Now that the pancake mixture is ready, I go ahead and heat some oil in a frying pan.

7. Once the pan is hot enough, I turn down the heat and put it on medium. Then I add a small amount of the mixture and tilt the frying pan around until the mixture fills it. I then wait for the bottom side of the pancake to cook and then flip it with a spatula (if you're brave you can flip it in the air).

8. Finally you can put your pancake onto a plate and top it with a topping of your choice. 

Here are some of my favourite pancake toppings...

I hoped you enjoyed this recipe and be sure to stick around for more posts in the future! :) 

Becky x