No Yeast Pizza Dough - Recipe Review

 
Good afternoon all!

Well today is a bit of a different post for me, but one I hope to make a regular on here.

See, I like to bake. I like to cook. I like filling my freezer with both! Im not terribly fantastic at it, but I am a regular mamma with a large family that need to eat. So I thought I'd share my kitchen adventures. The good, the bad, and the often ugly, because hey, not everyone can pipe out perfect icing!

Today I noticed I had a large lot of capsicum (red peppers) and onion. What to do, what to do! Mini pizza's, absolutely. Now I am all for quick and easy so I wanted to find a dough that didn't involve me having to rub in butter and that didn't mean waiting an hour for yeast to do its thing. A bit of searching online and I found THIS no yeast pizza dough recipe over on cooks.com. Sounded like a winner to me so off I went!

First up, this dough, it is OH so easy. Like seriously easy. You just throw all the ingredients at the bowl and mix it up. Simples! Now because I had a LOT of ingredients in the fridge to use up I ended up making 2 double batches of dough. Once made I pulled the dough into blobs that were roughly golf ball sized and then rolled them out to palm sized. I wasn't overly fussed about them being round, we're more for taste then presentation in this mamma house! The dough was enough to make 52 mini pizza's in total. Some of which Hubby and I ate quality controlled at a time that just happened to be around lunch.

I was very impressed with the dough. It cooked wonderfully, browned ever so slightly and tasted fantastic! A big win in my book, and something I will be adding to the make again list for sure! Once topped, the pizza's were baked in a 180c oven for 10 minutes each. Interested to know what I used for toppings? Well, here is a list!

Salami
Ham
Bacon
Leftover chicken breast
Pineapple
Mushroom
Onion
Capsicum
Cheese (all the leftover "bits" from cheddar to smoked, it got grated and chucked on!)
Tomato pizza paste
BBQ pizza paste

The result? YUM. Super YUM!

I do think next time I make some I might shake it up a little by mixing some cheese and herbs into the dough itself to see how that goes, and as for toppings again it will likely be whatever is in the fridge that needs using. I don't have hopes of these lasting that long, the girls love adding them to their school lunches!

Product Review - 6 Flowers Icing Images

Good morning lovlies!

Today I have something just a little bit different for you all. My very first non crochet product review! I was lucky enough to receive a trial sheet of cupcake toppers from the amazing gals over at 6 Flowers Icing Images to have a play with.

So let's start with the facts. The icing sheets from 6 Flowers are gluten free, egg free, dairy free AND vegan friendly. That's a whole bunch of safe right there, straight up making them great for parties.

The sheets themselves, providing they are stored in a ziplock/airtight dark environment will last for a whole year. That makes planning ahead a whole heap easier! Big win there that's for sure!

I started off with some basic vanilla cupcakes. I actually used a new recipe for them that I hadn't previously tried, and while they didn't rise quite as much as other batters, still tasted great.

We then topped them off with a basic butter icing with a soft pink tint to it.

Then comes the toppers! Right up these were super easy to remove from the sheets, they came right out without fuss, no ripping or effort needed. I was pretty impressed with that. Even the kids got in on the action and helped put them on the cupcakes.

The colour of the images is fantastic, like really fantastic. They are bright and vibrant, even after sitting in the fridge. No running or bubbling either which is great.

I guess the big thing here is the taste! I am happy to say they also taste great. None of that paperish taste that the edible images you get with premix box cakes has. All 3 kids really enjoyed them, and I'd call that a huge winner right there.

 All in all I am absolutely thrilled with these, and I can't wait to place an order for Christmas ones. If you are in Tas (Or Aus, as they will have posting abilities soon enough) then I can't recommend these enough. Especially if you are wanting a quick and easy way to make a fantastic looking cake for a party and have zero decorating skills. It could not be easier and at only $10 for a sheet of 15, a great price as well. They also do full sized round cake toppers and will be adding A3 ability to their range soon and can even print out your very own photos. Yummo! Pop on over and check them out on Facebook at 6 Flowers Icing Images

Recipe - Choc Nana Muffins

Good morning people!

Today's recipe is for a rich chocolate banana muffin. Its a nice solid yet moist muffin that packs a chocolatey punch!

Ingredients:
1 and a 1/2 cups of SR flour
1/4 cup milk
1 egg, beaten
1/2 cup butter, melted and cooled
1/2 cup brown sugar
2TBS cocoa powder
2 small to medium bananas

1. Mash the banana and the brown sugar together and set aside.
2. Add the flour and cocoa powder to a bowl and mix.
3. Add egg, milk and butter to the dry mix and stir to combine.
4. Add the banana mix and fold in gently.
Place spoonfuls into prepared muffin trays (I use silicone ones) and bake for 15 minutes at 180c or until a skewer comes out clean.

These taste great both warm and cold so if you can't resist waiting, by all means eat one warm.
For a less in your face chocolate hit cut the cocoa powder back to 1 tablespoon. I got 18 large muffins from this mix.

Recipe - Packet mix to tropical cupcakes

Hello hello!

Today's post is a little easy trick and recipe. We'll use a basic vanilla cake mix and add some zaazaazoom to make it into delectable tropical cupcakes!

I use super basic super cheap mixes when Im running short on time and just want to hurl things at a bowl without too much worry. These types of recipes are also great starting points for anyone thats a beginner or not quite so confident in the kitchen.
I use Coles homebrand vanilla buttercake packet mix. Its 99 cents. You can't beat that!

Yes, yes that IS a Christmas tray. I should probably invest in some non christmasy ones!

You will need:
1 small lemon - Zest and juice
1 small orange - Zest and juice
1 vanilla cake mix + the ingredients it says to add.

Icing:
yellow and red food colourings
1/2 tsp coconut essence
2 TBS coconut
40g butter or margarine
100g icing sugar

Mix the packet mix as per the directions. Grate the rind off of both the lemon and orange, and then squeeze the juice from each into the batter. Stir well. Spoon into patty cases (Mine come from Shiploads, $1.90 a pack)
Bake as per instructions on the pack, which is usually about 25-30 minutes on 180c. You'll know they are done when a skewer comes out clean.
Let cool completely before icing.

In a bowl put the margarine and icing sugar. Beat with a blender. Add 3-4 drops of yellow food colouring, 2 drops of red food colouring, the coconut essence. Beat it a little more, if it is too thick add a slight amount of water, 1/2 tsp at a time, too thin, some more icing sugar, 1tbs at a time. I aim for an almost butterlike consistency.
Spread the icing on top of the cupcake and sprinkle with a little coconut.

Thats it! You just turned a boring 99cent cakemix into a tasty tropical mouthsplosion! Yum!

The flavours you can make with a packet mix are endless, try some other combinations!

Recipe - Mixed Berry Muffins

Hello!

Well, today I have something completely different from my normal posts and I hope you'll enjoy this. I've been playing around in the kitchen working on some recipes!

I LOVELOVE to bake, I always have. I usually throw things together without paying too much attention to writing anything down. Its either a hit, or a miss. Basically anything that gives me a min of 3 thumbs up from the kids and my partner is a winner. I thought I'd start sharing these with you guys.

Todays recipe, and indeed my first to share, is for some mixed berry muffins. I use a tin of mixed berries for this. Its just at the end of winter here in Aus, so no fresh berries yet.

Ingredients:
1 egg
1/3 cup milk
2 cups SR flour
1/2 TBS baking powder
60g butter, melted
pinch of salt
3/4 cup berries and 2/3 cup juice from the can of mixed berries

Preheat oven to 180c
Makes roughly 18 muffins.

1. Add all the dry ingredients to a bowl and mix them together.
2. Add all wet ingredients except the berries and mix until just combine.
3. Add in the mixed berries and gently combine so you don't break the berries up too much.
4. Spoon into a greased silicone muffin tray (or patty cases or a metal muffin tray. I prefer silicone-ware) and bake at 180c for about 20 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean.

Turn onto a cooling rack and let sit until completely cooled before putting them away.

Thats it. The mix itself will look kinda gooey and slimy but thats fine. If you think the mix is too moist just add a little more flour, a tablespoon at a time.

Make your own candy the easy way

This year for Christmas, I made baskets of home made goodness for friends. Amongst the yums was some jubies (or gummies, whichever you choose to call them) and I thought I might add a quick tutorial on how to make them. They are very simple, really fast and aside from the heat factor, your kids can make them with you!

You will need:

Plain gelatin in powder form 

a pack of jelly (jello) crystals. Any flavour is fine. I have Aeroplane jelly in lime and creaming soda, Ive also used cheap no name brand jelly and while it works the same the flavour isn't as intense.

Silicone moulds. Mine are chocolate/Icecube ones so quite small. You can use more solid ones but I find the silicone the easiest to get the finished product out of.

Glad (cling) wrap

A solid glass bowl

A saucepan the bowl will fit inside

a spoon for stirring

I have a mini ladle for scooping the liquid into the moulds, a soup ladle would work fine

1/2 cup and a tablespoon for measuring

Into the glass bowl put 1/2 cup cold water

Sprinkle 4 Tablespoons of plain gelatin over the water.

Tip the packet of jelly crystals in too

Stir it all up, it will have a consistency similar to clag paste

Cover the bowl with cling wrap and let is stand for 10 minutes

Heat a pot of water to simmering, once it is place the glass bowl inside and remove the cling wrap. Melt the Jello mush.

When there are no solid parts left and the mixture is runny remove from heat and let sit for a minute (Warning: Glass will be HOT) 

Scoop the liquid into the silicone moulds. Don't worry too much about making a mess

Place the moulds in the freezer for 10 minutes, then move them to the fridge for a further 10 minutes

CLEANING TIP: Let whats left in the bowl set, then you can just peel it off the bowl before washing it. Makes for a much less sticky mess.

Once your jubies are turned out let them sit and reach room temperature before packaging them, providing they last that long and you don't nomnom nom them!

Told you it was easy!! Make them in many flavours for some mixed jube fun!

Chocolate Coke Microwave Cake

Beware, scary "flash on auto" photographs are in this blog, EEP!

So, sitting in class the other day, someone mentioned that they saw a post from a friend of a friend on Facebook about a cake made with only one cake mix, and one can of coke. Now I'm always a little interested by the whole microwave cooking thing. Last year I roasted a chicken in the microwave just to "see if it works" and hot dang it did! So of course I HAD to test out this cake idea!

I bought 1 can of coke which is 375ml here in Aus, and one chocolate cake mix, a Greens one. Nothing special about it, just an ordinary cake mix.

Added the cake mix and the coke to a bowl and gently gave it a stir to make sure it was well combined. Poured the entire mix into a round silicone cake pan (omg silicone bake ware is AMAZING) and put it in the microwave for 8 minutes on high.

HOLY BANANAPHONE BATMAN! WE HAVE CAKE!

I know in the images it looks dark. It was about 9 at night, in a poorly lit kitchen and Im sure the coke made it darker too but it wasn't burnt at all. In fact, it would have to be one of the most moist cakes I have ever eaten!
I didn't bother to ice it, oh no, I sliced and served it hot with a hunk of ice cream. The kiddos took the rest to school today in their lunches and they enjoyed it as well. So there we have it. Awesome cake from nothing more then a cake mix and a can of coke! I have to say this will be amazing when summer rolls around again and I'm after a cake fix but don't want to have the added heat from the oven. Ahh who am I kidding, this is perfect for all the time! YAY CAKE!