With Christmas fast approaching we decided to make mince pies with a difference. Buying ready made puff pastry made it quick and easy to prepare and cook within the hour we had, but you could make your own pastry either shortcrust or flaky pastry see below for the links to these recipes. We also used ready made mincemeat but you can make your own by following the link for this quick easy to make mincemeat. We added our own selection of fruit and nuts, including cherries, apricots, apple, orange, lemon and lime and orange juice and zest and walnuts to a jar of ready prepared mincemeat. Each student decided what to add to their own individual mince pie which we cooked in a flan dish to take home.

http://www.be-ro.com/f_insp.htm follow this link for shortcrust pastry recipe

http://www.be-ro.com/f_insp.htm follow this link for flaky pastry recipe

http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/4829/sandham-family-mincemeat.jsp follow this link to make homemade mincemeat

We were joined by our two lovely tasters who really enjoyed the mince pie!

Take a look our newly prepared cookie video so you can follow step by step instructions to make nice healthy cookies or if you want to add some chocolate chips. Take a look and please leave a comment so we know if we should do this with other recipes.

A great night was had by all with our two special guests Mr Horsley and his team making two different types of scones, Mrs Phillips and her team making banana custard.

Mr Horsley

Mrs Phillips

Click on the picture to see more pictures of our wonderful night see if you can see two tasters who joined us to try the scones and banana custard.


Recipes for you to try at home

Raisin, apple and cinnamon scones

8oz self raising flour
4oz margarine
2oz sugar (save little to sprinkle on top of scones)
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 large apple or 2 small apples (peeled and finely chopped)
2oz raisins
2 eggs

Orange and ginger scones

Replace cinnamon with 1 teaspoon of ginger
Replace apple with 1 large orange or 2 small oranges (peeled and finely chopped)

1. Pre-heat oven to 220, gas mark
2. Rub flour, sugar, cinnamon and margarine together
3. Add apple and raisins
4. Bind with eggs to a nice soft dough
5. Place on a floured board gently pat to an even size
6. Cut with scone cutter
7. Brush tops of scones with milk and sprinkle with sugar
8. Place in oven and cook for 10 minutes or until nice golden colour

Nice enough to eat on their own or with butter and jam.

Cook It Club members asked if they could make cookies so tonight that is what they made, using dried fruit, cranberry mix with coconut or for a special treat chocolate chips, some decided to add hazelnuts to give it a different taste. We were having such fun that photos were only taken at the end when all the cookies had been made so take a look at the photos below:-

Chocolate Chip or Fruit Cookies
Makes 18

100 g (4 oz) margarine
75 g (3 oz) soft light brown sugar
2 x 15 ml spoon (2 tbsp) syrup
175 g (6 oz) Self Raising Flour
100 g (4 oz) chocolate chips or dried fruit or mixture of both
2 x 15 ml spoon (2 tbsp)milk


1 Heat oven to 180ºC, 350ºF, Gas Mark 4. Grease two baking trays or line with greaseproof paper.
2 Beat the margarine until soft, add the sugar and cream together until light and fluffy.
3 Stir in the syrup, flour, chocolate chips, dried fruit, nuts and milk and mix well.
4 Place spoonfuls of the mixture on the prepared trays and bake for 8-10 minutes. Remove from the tray immediately and place on a wire rack to cool. And enjoy



Next week we have the pleasure of cooking with Mrs Phillips and Mr Horsley who will be creating some exciting food for the students to eat.