Christmas Fruit Punch (Non-Alcoholic Mulled Wine)

Each Christmas I try to make something new to add to my list of Christmas recipes, this year I have a few things in mind and this is the first.

I love a good mulled wine so I mustered up the courage to give this recipe a go and decided to go for a non-alcoholic version seeing as it would be being served to people of various ages.. This recipe is adapted from a recipe I was given by a friend, you have to love recipes shared by friends! One problem I had, which isn't even a problem is that the punch looked rather brown when all done, so I added in a few drops of red food colouring to correct.

There is also two ways to prepare this punch - on the hob or in the slow cooker (aka crock pot).

Christmas Fruit Punch (Non-Alcoholic Mulled Wine) 
Makes around 25 servings


Ingredients
2 litres orange juice
1.5 litres apple juice
1 litre cranberry juice
1.5 litres water
500g caster sugar
4 sachets of mulled wine spice
1 large orange studded with around 30-40 whole cloves
2 cinnamon sticks
(Few drops of red food colouring - optional)
1 orange cubed
1 apple cubed


Recipe
ON THE HOB
1. Mix all ingredients (except food colouring, cubed orange and cubed apple) in a large stock pot, bring to the boil and simmer for 30 minutes.
2. Leave overnight for flavours to infuse.
3. Remove spice sachets, orange and cinnamon sticks (may need to pass through a sieve to filter out cloves and cinnamon stick shards). Can be stored in the fridge for up to one week. Add the food colouring if desired.
4. Add apple and orange cubes and reheat gently, then serve.

IN THE SLOW COOKER/CROCK POT

1. Mix all ingredients (except food colouring, cubed orange and cubed apple) in the slow cooker, set on high and leave for 3 hours.

2. Turn off and leave overnight for flavours to infuse.

3. Remove spice sachets, orange and cinnamon sticks (may need to pass through a sieve to filter out cloves and cinnamon stick shards). Can be stored in the fridge for up to one week. Add the food colouring if desired.

4. Add apple and orange cubes and reheat on low for 2 hours or high for 1 hour, then serve.

Tate & Lyle Sugar - Banana Bread

Banana Bread

Ingredients
145g caster sugar
1 egg
100g mashed banana
140g flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp ground cinnamon
70g melted butter

Recipe
1. Preheat oven to 170˚C
2. Beat sugar and eggs together
3. Mix in the mashed banana
4. Mix in the dry ingredients, then stir in the butter.
5. Bake in the oven for 45 minutes.

Thanks to Tate & Lyle for the fairtrade sugar used in this recipe. There's lots of recipe ideas for each type of sugar on their website

Lemony cupcakes

It's been such a loooong winter here, which seems to have disappeared like a flick of a switch when we moved from February to March. I made these last week when I was longing for a little sunshine again and they did the trick. I love citrusy flavours for sunny days but I'll have to remember to enjoy citrusy things to encourage the sun to come back too now!

I've based this on a recipe here from Deeba at Passionate about Baking who got it from CoffeeGrounded who got it from the Martha Stewart website. So thanks Martha!

Lemony cupcakes

Makes about 12-18 cupcakes or 6-9 muffins

Ingredients
Cupcakes
100g unsalted butter (room temp)
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup low-fat buttermilk (room temp)
1 teaspoon vanilla (I used the insides of a vanilla bean)
Zest of one lemon, finely grated, plus juice
1 cup granulated sugar

Icing
1 cup icing sugar
a drop of yellow food colouring
2-3 tbsp lemon juice
1 tbsp water

Recipe
1. Preheat your oven to 170˚C and prepare your bun/muffin cases on your baking tray.
2. In one bowl mix together the four, baking powder and salt. In another bowl whisk together the butermilk, vanilla, lemon juice and zest.
3. Beat the butter until smooth, then beat in the sugar.
4. Beat in the eggs one at a time
5. Mix in a third of the flour mix, then half the buttermilk mix, another third of the flour, the rest of the buttermilk and the last of the flour mix.
6. Divide the batter amongst the bun/muffin cases and bake for 20-25 minutes.
7. Leave to cool on a rack before frosting.



8. Mix together the icing sugar and food colouring , then gradually beat in a little lemon juice at a time until all the sugar is mixed in and the mixture is thick (not too runny). Use to decorate your cupcakes.

Naan Pizza

Nigella published this idea before me but I had the idea before coming across it so I think I'm due a book deal and tv show of my own for that.

Today is international pizza day so it seems right to enjoy some in celebration of this dish that is a favourite worldwide. My nod to the pizza is one made with naan bread instead of dough, this idea is a great quick dinner and simple too. While I love it with tikka chicken and chunky tomato sauce, today was a frugal one with some leftovers acting as toppings - ham, fresh pineapple, sweetcorn and mozzarella.