A little home baking makes a difference at a party, and reduces the junk food factor, writes Domini Kemp
MY DAUGHTER AND I both turn another year older today. In some ways, it's kind of cute but as she gets older and wiser, it becomes increasingly obvious that she isn't too crazy about sharing the celebrations.
I'll admit, the year of the bouncy castle (combined with too much wine) wasn't so good for the reputation of me and my sis. We nearly hurtled to our deaths, while children looked on with a bored sense of familiarity. They were well-used to stupid adults "having a quick go" on the bouncy castle with no sense of party etiquette. Adults are prone to queue-barging, castle-hogging and stealing all the good crisps. Adults think they're hilarious and down with the kids. Adults are deluded.
The bouncy castle people should think about installing some sort of security warning that's much stricter than the A4 page of instructions they hand you, once they've taken your cash. The moment grown-ups climb into the castle, a screeching voice should shout out, "Hey fatso, get off my castle!" That would surely stop us in our tracks.
But I feel we've matured somewhat since then (my sister and I, that is) and I'm hoping today goes swell. Inevitably, there will be tonnes of sweets, crisps and sodas that will keep the children illuminated for hours. Every once in a while, it's grand to indulge in a bit of rubbish so I'll try to leave them to it. To balance out the junk indulgence, I'm doing a bit of baking.
The following two recipes are like chalk and cheese. The first one is for ridiculously sweet biscuits that I tasted during a fabulous bake-off competition which I judged last year. The cookies won first prize in their category, and the winner very kindly gave me the recipe.
They go a horrid raspberry colour when they're raw and they don't look like they'll ever go golden brown, but they eventually do. My oven is a bit wonky and when their time was up, they looked rather bland in colour and a bit soft all over, but as they cooled, they crisped up perfectly. They are sickly sweet, but very more-ish.
The second is a very easy and wholesome brown bread recipe from one of the chefs in the Cliff House Hotel. It is almost cakey because of all the eggs and sugar in it.
Raspberry and white chocolate cookies
170 g plain flour
½ tsp bicarbonate of soda
Pinch of salt
85g caster sugar
110g softened butter
1 egg yolk
5 tbsp raspberry jam (about half of a 340g jar)
2 x 100g bars of white chocolate in small chunks
Preheat the oven to 150°C/gas mark two. Sift the flour, bicarbonate of soda and salt. Cream the sugar and butter, then add the egg, followed by the jam. Fold in the dry ingredients and roughly chop the chocolate into small chunks and stir them in. Drop large-teaspoon-sized amounts onto a non-stick baking tray about four centimetres apart. Bake for 20 minutes until they are golden brown. Makes approximately 15 cookies.
Grandmother McGrath's Soda Bread
I managed to extract this recipe from the Cliff House Hotel which serves a lovely crab salad on top. I tweaked it just a little bit, as I found it a bit too dry when mixing it. So apologies to Granny McGrath for veering from the original, ever so slightly.
350g coarse ground wholewheat flour
150g cream flour
100g wheat germ
100g porridge oats
100g brown sugar
100g bran
Pinch salt
1 tbsp bread soda
2 large eggs
900ml buttermilk
Generous squeeze of honey
Preheat the oven to 170°C/gas mark three.
Put all the dry ingredients into a large mixing bowl. Whisk the eggs and mix with the buttermilk and the honey. Add to the dry ingredients. Mix really well, making sure all the flour blends fully with the wet ingredients. Grease a large baking tin with butter and pour the bread mix in.
Place the tin on a baking sheet and bake for at least 60 minutes. Remove from the oven, cool for a little while and then remove the bread from the tin. Place the loaf on to the baking sheet and put it back into the oven for another 10 minutes. Remove, and allow to cool slightly before slicing.