AWSOME MAC n GARLIC BUTTER GRILLED CHEESE SANDWICH WITH TOMATO AND MARSCAPONE DIP

What To Do With Left Over Mac n Cheese

This is sooo good make sure no one else is around to pinch it!  If so make extras as they just will not be able to help themselves!  The rich nutty buttery crispy grilled Mac n cheese crust is brilliant with the creamy tomato soup dip, a perfect after school snack.

 

Ingredients 

Left over Mac n cheese

2 slices bread

2 tbsp butter (garlic optional)

1 tin tomatoes

1 tbsp butter and olive oil

1 small onion fined chopped

1 clove garlic finely chopped

1-2 tbsp marscapone 

Sea salt

White pepper

First get the tomato soup going, place the butter and olive oil in a pan and on a medium heat soften the onions and garlic for about ten minutes, add the tomatoes and leave to gently simmer for another ten minutes, then blitz to a smooth soup, place back on the heat and add the marscapone and stir until melted and fully combined, leave ticking over on a low heat why you made the grilled Mac n cheese.

Place 1 tbsp of the butter in your skillet on a medium heat, butter all sides of the bread generously fill you sandwich with you Mac n cheese and then place the sandwich in the skillet and toast each side until golden crispy brown.  The butter adds a nutty richness to the grilled cheese crust.

Serve in secret with you rich creamy tomato soup dip and enjoy.

AWESOME MAC n CHEESE

I am stateside again in Florida USA😃 and I am cooking Ree Drummond The Pioneer Woman's 4 cheese Mac n Cheese, this is an AWESOME recipe and converted my Nan who likes her Mac n Cheese as it is.  What's even better is I also turned the left overs into a grilled Mac n Cheese, this too Nan devoured, which makes me very pleased, that's the whole reason to cook.

 

Ingredients 

(Serves 4-6)

1 stick (4T) butter

4T all purpose flour

700ml approx milk

1-2 cups heavy cream

Sea salt and white pepper

100g crumbled goats cheese

200g fontina

200g pecorino 

100g Parmesan 

1 box macaroni elbows

First put a large pan of lightly salted water on and bring to a rolling boil, add the pasta and cook according to the instructions, usually around 8-10 minutes, drain keeping back a cup of the cooking water.

Meanwhile make the roux, melt the butter and stir in the flour, on a low heat cook the roux for five minutes, stirring occasionally, then start to add in the milk a good glug at a time stirring in each time until you have a smooth roux before adding the next glut of milk, once all the milk is added pour in the cream and leave on a low heat to cook out the flour flavour for five minutes, you want a medium thick sauce you can adjust your sauce if too thick just by adding more milk or cream to your likin! 

Next add all your grated cheeses and stir in well, once melted taste and season with sea salt and white pepper to your taste, add the macaroni to the cheese sauce and stir in well, add some of the cooking water if needed, pour in to a large casserole dish and top with some xtra grated Parmesan, I now pop that under the grill to brown off and for that gorgeous gooey cheese crust, you can also bake the Mac n Cheese but I find it dries out the sauce a little more than I like!  

I like to serve this with crusty garlic bread or crackers and a spoon! 

MY CRAZY PEANUT BUTTER HONEYCOMB AND M&M's COOKIES

These are soooo awesome they will become a family favourite, I will have to bake another batch for a better photo as dad has eaten all the pretty ones!  I make enough cookie dough for several batches as it is only dad that cane at them and this cookie dough freezes really well, so I can knock up a batch real easy without to much effort.

Prep time 10 minutes / Cooking time 10-12 minutes

 

Ingredients

(Makes Approx 30)

 11/2 cups light brown sugar

1 cup soften butter

2 1/2 cups self raising flour

1 tsp sea salt

2 eggs beaten

2 tbsp smooth peanut butter

1 tbsp vanilla bean paste 

2 large packs M&M's

2 honeycomb bars bashed

1 handful marshmallows 

This is a really nice and easy recipe to do, place the sugar and butter in a large bowl and cream together, add the eggs and a handful of the flour and beat in to the butter, next beat in the vanilla and peanut butter, now fold in the flour and salt and finally fold through the candy.  Pre-heat your oven to 180 F / 356 C.

Scoop out small golf ball size pieces of cookie dough and place 6-8 at a time on your baking sheet, they will spread out while cooking, press down a little to slightly flatten cookies balls.  Pop in the oven to cook for 10-12 minutes until they are golden.  That's it, place on a cooling rack and try to keep sticky fingers from pinching them before you get a photo! 

 

Found a lonely cookie in the biscuit tin that dad had missed !!!

  

CUSTARD TARTS

Old fashioned sweet pastry set vanilla custard tarts, these are one of my dad's favourite cakes, they are really simple to make and deliver a sumptuous rich creamy custard pudding in it's own sweet case.

I love that I can just wheel out in to the garden and down to the chicken house and collect fresh eggs when I need them and at the moment my hens are laying too many eggs which dad likes as I have to keep making more of these custard tarts! 

Prep time 10 mins / Pastry chill time 30 mins / Cooking time 30 minutes

It is one of my jobs to collect the hens eggs with my dad, I am sure it's so dad can hint he wants more cakes ! 

  

I have different breeds of chickens that lay all different colour eggs, Amelia and Earhart are my home breed cream legbars that lay blue eggs, then black bob a black sussex lays dark brown speckled eggs, my two home breed large white sussex lay perfect peach coloured eggs and finally my skylines lay almost white eggs and one of them does lay a blue egg, they are a cross of cream leg bars.

How do I know this...I got dad to collect the eggs every time one was layed, this was easy as my chickens like to shout about the fact the just layed an egg, so we were able to collect the eggs with the proud chicken shouting about it.

 

Ingredients

(Makes 4)

Sweet Pastry

350g flour

100g icing sugar

150g soft butter

2 eggs beaten

1 pinch sea salt

Custard Filling

5 egg yolks

70g caster sugar

333ml double cream 

1 tsp vanilla bean paste

1/4 tsp grated nutmeg

First make the sweet pastry, place the butter and icing sugar in a large bowl and suing your fingers mash together, next add the egg yolk and mix in, add the salt to the flour and then add to the mix and using your fingers in a pecking action, (tap your fingers to your thumb, and see how that looks like a pecking motion now do that incorporating the butter mix in to the flour).  Once you have a pastry ball, flatten a bit, wrap in parchment paper and chill in the fridge for 30 minutes.

Take your pastry out, divide into four balls, roll out in to circles and line your tart tins with the pastry, line the pastry with a piece of baking paper and fill with baking beans, pop in the pre-heated oven for 10 minutes, then remove the baking beans and paper and cook for a further 5 minutes, remove from the oven and turn the oven down to 120 C / 240 F.

Place the egg yolks in a large jug, add the sugar and whisk until light and fluffy and pale in colour, stir in the vanilla and cream, pour in to your pastry cases, grate a little nutmeg over the top and pop bake in the oven to bake for Approx 20-25 minutes until there is a set wobble in the center.  Remove leave to cool if you can before eating! 

AWESOME JUICY LUCY CHEESE STUFFED BURGER

One of the best burgers ever...The Juicy Lucy is awesome, I did lots of research and that I spend a lot of time in the states helped with this most awesome recipe.  There is a real science to creating the best burger, something over here in the UK that is rather neglected...

I had all my mates over for a Oscar's Speak Easy Build Your Own Burger Party which was fabulous, so I started with the meat for the burger...

20% fat to 80% meat ratio is the key to the most flavoursome burger.  Don't use high grade meat this will achieve a melting texture but not flavour, the best cuts for your burger are, chuck, flank, sirloin and skirt.  For me I used chuck, the shoulder of beef and I asked my butcher to grind it for me medium fine and seasoned the mince with lots of sea salt and black pepper.

Prep Time 10 minutes / Cooking Time 10 minutes

 

Ingredients

(makes 4)

The Burger

1 kg minced chuck steak

1 tsp coconut oil

1 onion finely chopped

1 tsp sea salt

1/2 tsp ground black pepper

4 burger buns

The Juicy Lucy Stuffing's

12 slices Monterrey jack cheese

1 iceberg lettuce torn

2 tomatoes sliced

Optional 

4 tbsp pickled jalapenos

First heat a frying pan or skillet to a medium heat add the coconut oil and then the onion and soften for around five minutes, take off the heat and add to a large bowl.  Add the chuck mince, sea salt and pepper and mix well.

I used a burger press to make my burgers, if you don' have one just use a plate.  Divide the mince in to 8 equal pattie balls, place a burger ball on some baking paper, cover with another piece of baking paper and using a plate or burger press, press down and flatten the mince to around the thickness of a pound coin.  Repeat with the rest of the patties.

Line up four burgers and place your juicy Lucy stuffing's in the centre of the burger, then place the other burgers on top and then pinch the edges together to form a flying saucer shape sealed burger.  It is important that you create a good seal.

Heat your griddle and toast your buns, then place the burgers on a medium hot heat and cook for around 4 minutes on each side, if you want a well done burger just cook a little longer.

Place a slice of Monterrey jack cheese on top of your burger and allow to melt then place the burger on the bottom bun, top with iceberg lettuce, fresh sliced seasoned tomatoes, that's it enjoy.

Warning...The Cheese in the Centre Can Be Extremely Hot...

 

ALL BUTTER SHORTBREAD

HOW COOL IS THIS...

How awesome is this!  I've got a cookie rolling pin that prints "Made by Chef Oscar" all over the biscuit / cookie dough, I just love this and can't stop baking cookies for all my friends and family, this is so AWESOME...

                                   

Ingredients

(makes approx 30)

250g plain flour

150g cold butter grated

1 tiny pinch of salt

125g sugar

I have a little extra butter in my recipe than others and this is a family tradition, when my mum was my age and taking cooking classes at school, when she told her dad my grandad that she would be making shortbread that day he told her to add extra butter to the recipe, so that is exactly what I am doing so that grandad will love them too.

This is super easy to make and best done by hand. Place the flour and butter in a large bowl and rub the butter in to the flour until you have breadcrumbs, keep going and bring the ingredients together until you have a ball of dough.

FUN FACT

This is called shortbread because it is short !  Short meaning tight in USA and translating to lack of fluid in a recipe, this does make the dough a little harder to work with but is well worth the extra effort because a short shortbread will give you the lightest most crumblest melt in your mouth buttery biscuit ever!  If your are struggling you can add a egg yolk to help you bind, but this will make the end biscuit a little more bouncy rather than a snap.

                                  

Roll out your biscuit (cookie) dough to around the thickness of a pound coin and then using what ever cookie cutter you like cut out your cookies.

Pre heat your oven to 160 degrees C / 320 F.  Place the shortbreads on a baking tray lined with baking paper and pop in the oven to cook for around 8 minutes, the trick with shortbread is that it should not brown, there should be no colour, otherwise they are over baked.

That is it, place on a cooling rack to cool and then enjoy. 

AWESOME THAI LEMONGRASS AND CHILLI SWEET POTATO CRAB CAKES

These are brilliant, I changed the recipe half way through and what a Winner Dinner, I was making a lemon and dill sweet potato crab cake, but mum was in the kitchen making dad some red Thai curry paste, Mum needs dads muscles for the 15 minutes of pounding the spices together!!!

So I took some lemongrass, chilli,  lime zest and fresh coriander and added it to my crab cake mix and this mum says is the Best Ever Crab Cake...

I served the crab cakes with a home made cornichon and dill lemon mayonnaise, on a bed of rocket and coriander salad with cornichons and a belly of lime.

Prep time 10 minutes /  Cooking time 20 minutes including making the mash

Ingredients

(made 4 large crab cakes)

Crab Cakes

1 whole crab or 300g fresh white crab meat

1 egg beaten

1 lrg handful fresh breadcrumbs

2 sweet potatoes, boiled and mashed

1/2 stick lemongrass bashed and finely minced

1 red chilli finely minced

2 glugs olive oil

1 clove garlic finely minced

1 shallot finely minced

1/2 lemon juiced

1/2 lime zested

good pinch sea salt and white pepper

The Mayo

1 egg yolk

300ml olive oil

1 tsp white wine vinegar

1/2 tsp Dijon mustard

1 cornichon finely finely minced

2 sprigs of dill chopped

1/2 juice of a lemon

good pinch sea salt and white pepper

First I got mum to heat a glug of olive oil in a pan and soften the onions and garlic, meanwhile I placed all the other crab cake ingredients in a large bowl and mixed together, seasoned with some sea salt and white pepper then added in the softened onions and garlic and mixed some more.

The mixture should be quite moist and just sticking together, form four large patties.  Heat the other glug of oil in a frying pan or skillet and when medium hot add your crab cakes, fry for approx 3 minutes on each side until golden, the mixture is already cooked so you just want to heat them so that the cakes are piping hot in the middle,

To make the mayonnaise this is something I do every week for my family and I am rather good with the whisk, place the egg yolk in a large bowl with the white wine vinegar, start to whisk and slowly drizzle in the oil, very slowly at first, one the egg yolk has started to combine with the oil you can add the oil a little faster until you have a lovely thick mayonnaise, this takes me around 1-2 minutes, then add the mustard, sea salt, white pepper, lemon juice, cornichon and dill and taste, season some more if needed.  Serve drizzled over your crab cakes on a bed of herby salad.