It's been a while since I last posted (sorry!), but you know how life sometimes always seems to run away from you and you never end up getting the time to do anything you want to do.
Also I have been house/ cat sitting for a friend this week so haven't had my full cupboard of baking goodies to play with. A week of not cooking /baking ended up with Isabel and I overloading on food at the weekend, waistbands beware!
If any one has been watching Jamie's 30 Minutes Meals then you will know that he has been cooking up a storm in record timing. Now from watching these shows I am incredibly dubious that these meals can be done in 30 minutes without a helper to prepare everthing for you and a blender! So we decided to make his Steak Indian Style as a test of whether we could get it done plus we had never made naan bread before and this was a little personal test for both of us. As the title of this post suggests it actually took us the best part of 2 hours...record timing I know...but we did also make ice cream and two types of cookies in between!
I'm not going to post the recipe for the steak as you can find it on the link above, it was really quite good and I will definitely be making it again. Just a note about cooking the steak; if you like it medium rare cook it for about 8 minutes turning it on each side approximately every minute, for medium to well done about 12 minutes and for well done 15-20 minutes depending on how well done you like it.
Below is the recipe for the Naan and for the Salted Caramel Cookies (which are fast becoming my favourite EVER cookie!) You can see the recipe for the Malted Whopper cookies on Isabel's blog Rolling Pins and Needles here.
Naan Bread
(adapted from Manju Malhi's recipe on BBC Food here)
Ingredients
1 tsp dried active yeast
1 tsp sugar
1 1/2 tbsp warm water
200g (7oz) plain flour (plus more for kneading)
1 tsp black onion seeds (nigella seeds)
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tbsp vegetable oil
2 tbsp plain yogurt
2 tbsp milk
Method
1. Preheat the oven to 140C (275F). In a small bowl, mix the yeast with the warm water. Stir in the sugar and leave it in a warm place until frothy.
2. Mix together the flour, onion seeds, salt and pepper and baking powder. Stir in the oil, yoghurt and milk, then stir in the yeast mixture.
3. Knead the dough for about 10 minutes until it is soft and pliable. NB. Our dough never really became that soft and pliable and also didn't look like enough to feed 3 (greedy) people but it makes very well sized individual naans.
Cover the dough with clingfilm and leave it in a warm place to rise for 10-15 minutes.
4. Divide the dough into 3 balls and place on a floured surface and roll each ball into a naan-esque shape. Don't roll them too thinly or they will turn out too crispy.
5. Place them on a greased baking tray and rub with some cut garlic and butter, and cook for about 10-15 minutes on each side. They should be soft but with a crispy outside.
Salted Caramel Chocolate Cookies
(from two peas and their pod)
Ingredients
1 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
¼ tspn bicarbonate soda
1/4 tspn salt
5 tblspn butter
7 tblspn cocoa powder
2/3 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup packed brown sugar
1/3 cup plain yogurt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Caramels (we used Werthers Original Soft Caramels)
Sea salt
Method
1. Preheat the oven to 180C (350F); line baking sheets with grease proof paper.
2. Sift together in a bowl the flour, bicarbonate of soda and salt, set aside.
3. Melt the butter in a saucepan over a medium heat or in the microwave on a low setting. Stir the cocoa powder and sugars into the butter, mixing well. Add the yogurt and vanilla and combine. Add the flour mixture to the chocolate mixture and stir well until its all combined. NB. we added a bit more flour at this point as the mixture looked too wet but it should still be easy enough to use.
(from two peas and their pod)
Ingredients
1 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
¼ tspn bicarbonate soda
1/4 tspn salt
5 tblspn butter
7 tblspn cocoa powder
2/3 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup packed brown sugar
1/3 cup plain yogurt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Caramels (we used Werthers Original Soft Caramels)
Sea salt
Method
1. Preheat the oven to 180C (350F); line baking sheets with grease proof paper.
2. Sift together in a bowl the flour, bicarbonate of soda and salt, set aside.
3. Melt the butter in a saucepan over a medium heat or in the microwave on a low setting. Stir the cocoa powder and sugars into the butter, mixing well. Add the yogurt and vanilla and combine. Add the flour mixture to the chocolate mixture and stir well until its all combined. NB. we added a bit more flour at this point as the mixture looked too wet but it should still be easy enough to use.
4. Wrap the dough around the caramels (try not to eat as much of the mixture as I did...) and place of the baking sheets. Bake for 10-12 minutes. Cool and then remove the cookies onto a wire rack.
These cookies are seriously moreish and stay really lovely and moist for days after making. So that the caramel doesn't break your teeth once they are cool, warm them for a couple of seconds in the microwave to soften.
Ps. Thanks to Isabel for taking pictures for me this week!
That naan bread was da bomb!
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