Perfect Gluten Free Pastry!

Hi all, hope you all had a fantastic Christmas. What vegan delights did you cook up for Christmas dinner? Feel free to share in the comments, I love to hear what people had for their festive feasts.

I cooked up a tasty pie filled with wild and chestnut mushrooms, grated carrots, cranberries, onions, chestnuts and vegan cream cheese.

The pie was pretty lush but the thing I most impressed myself with was the pastry! I used to make my short crust pastry by eye, I tried this with the gluten free flour and, let's just say, it did not work! Soooo, using actual measurement this time, I made my first edible, short and melty shortcrust pastry. Exciting!!

The recipe for the pastry is as follows;
230g Doves Farm plain flour
1/2tsp xanthan gum
60g dairy free spread (I used Vitalite)
60g vegetable shortening (I used Trex)
2tbsp cold water
Mix the flour and xanthan gum in a food processor, add in the spread and shortening a bit at a time, then add the water and pulse until it clumps together. You can of course do this by hand but I am a big fan of using kitchen gadgets wherever humanly possible. Then knead the dough together for a couple of minutes, wrap in clingfilm and put in the fridge for an hour or so, I made mine the night before. When you're ready to use it, grease an 8" tin, roll out the pastry, you can roll it out between two sheets of clingfilm if the dough sticks to your rolling pin but mine was fine with just a little flour, roll no thinner than 5mm and line your tin. Then you can just fill and bake!

The stuffing in the background was just blended mushrooms, walnuts, cashews, seasoning, sage and onion baked in the oven, easy peasy!

Hope you all have a fabulous and prosperous new year, I will be getting back on cake wagon so I'll be posting lots of cake decorating tips and tutorials, some help on the business side and hopefully some more recipes. Whether you're staying in tonight or off out partying, I hope you all enjoy some delicious vegan yummies and a nice glass of bubbly.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Festive Spiced Chocolate Orange Cupcakes!

One of the groups my sons go to were having a belated solstice celebration and we were asked to bring along a warming seasonal dish so I opted for some spicy festive flavours in some cupcakes. The flavours I used tasted divine but, baking both vegan AND gluten free, is fairly new to me and I don't generally do cupcakes so I was a bit disappointed to find that, not only do my my icing swirls leave a lot to be desired, but the texture of the cupcakes was not brilliant once cooled (cupcakes rarely reach that stage in my house). I need to put in some practice working with gluten free flour on bitesize pieces, larger cakes I have down but my biscuits and cupcakes need work.

If anyone has any tips or advice they'd like to share, please feel free to leave a comment!

Recipe

For the cupcakes. Makes 12
280g Doves Farm plain flour
225g caster Sugar
40g cocoa powder
1 tsp baking Powder
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of Soda
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
3/4 tsp xanthan gum
280ml nut, rice or soya milk
125ml sunflower oil
1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
1 tsp vanilla

For the frosting
100g vegetable shortening (I use Trex)
75g dairy free spread (I use Vitalite)
the juice of 3 oranges and the zest of two oranges
750g Tate and Lyle icing sugar

Method
To make the cupcakes, preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Mix the dry ingredients in a bowl and mix the wet ingredients in a jug. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry whilst using a mixer until combined. Spoon into twelve cupcake cases in a cupcake tin and bake for 15 minutes or until a knife comes out clean when tested. Remove from the tin and leave to cool completely on a wire rack

To make the frosting, beat together the vegetable shortening, non dairy spread and orange juice until they are as combined as possible. Add in the the icing sugar one spoonful at a time beating slowly. If the buttercream is too loose, add more icing sugar one spoon at a time. Add in the orange zest and beat on high until light and fluffy.

When the cupcakes are completely cooled, pipe on the buttercream frosting.

Jamie's Clementine Jelly Veganised!

So watching Jamie Oliver's festive cooking thing the other night I was inspired by the simplicity of his jelly desert and I also realised that I don't think I've ever actually tried making vegan jelly yet. 

Ok, so it's not strictly clementine jelly since I only had eight clementines but I did have a whole pineapple that really needed using up so it's really a clementine and pineapple jelly. So not so much a festive jelly as a summery jelly but obviously it would be amazing made with just clementines. 

I picked up some vege gel from the supermarket. Last time I did this the sachet just contained Agar Agar and I assumed that the sachet I picked up this time was the same. When I looked at the packet it contained carrageenans and all sorts of strange things which was really disappointing. I figured I'd give it a whirl anyway but I'll definitely have to give this a try with the more natural stuff to see if it comes out as good. This sachet also says on the packet that it 'may contain milk and eggs' so not really suitable for allergy sufferers. 

I've added syrup and sugar to the recipe though I didn't use either. The cream was on the bland side without sugar but the texture was amazing and the jelly was super zingy but I liked it. Tate and Lyle icing sugar is gluten free and fair trade. Make sure you check the ingredients on your coconut cream as they can vary.

The makeup of the vege gel may vary so do follow the instructions for the proportions on the packet.

8 Clementines

1 large pineapple

1 tablespoon maple syrup or agave nectar

70ml water

1 tsp ground ginger

1 sachet vege gel

Can of coconut cream

2tbsp of icing sugar

Kinnerton dark chocolate

Juice up the clementines and pineapple, I left the pulp in but you can sieve it out if you prefer. Stir in the ginger (I only used ground ginger because that's all I had, If you have fresh ginger, juice some of that with your fruit instead) and syrup then add the water to make the liquid up to 570ml and pour into a saucepan.

Sprinkle in the vege gel while the liquid is cold and stir until dissolved. Then heat over the hob until it just begins to boil. Let cool slightly before pouring into glasses, then leave to set in the fridge for at least an hour. 

Open a can of rich coconut cream and scoop off the cream from the top, do not shake the tin or mix the cream and water together, whisk that together with the icing sugar and spoon a dollop into the glasses, then grate some chocolate over the top to finish.

So simple! 

Introduction

Hi all!
Welcome to my new blog. I'm just setting everything up at the moment so this is a sort of test post. I've been working on a new Facebook page and Website too as well as setting up my Etsy shop. I hope you'll find lots of interesting tips and ideas here. I will be posting up some tasty festive recipes very soon and will also be posting links to various tutorials and and supplies to help you to produce delicious and beautiful vegan and gluten free cakes and more! I also look forward to answering questions and learning new things from my readers too

So please do watch this space. In the mean time, take a look at my vegan and gluten free recipe card available from my Etsy store! xxx

Vegan, gluten free vanilla recipe card