More Sweet Treats

For those of you with a sweet tooth, here are some more recipes. Apologies if you are on a health kick, and I promise I will be blogging some more veggie-based, healthier recipes again soon. I'll also be trying gluten-free alternatives to these ones. Enjoy J

Oatmeal Cookies

Ingredients

100g/3½oz plain flour

½ tsp baking powder

large pinch of salt

125g/4oz soya spread

175g/6oz soft brown sugar

1tsp xanthan gum

1tsp vanilla essence

175g/6oz organic porridge oats

50g/2oz chocolate chips (These are optional. Obviously, regular chocolate chips contain dairy, but you can buy vegan alternatives. The cookies still taste great even if you miss them out altogether)

1. Preheat the oven to Gas 4/180ºc/Fan 160ºc.
2. Combine the flour, baking powder and salt in a medium mixing bowl and set aside.
3. Beat together the soya spread, sugar and vanilla essence until smooth. Stir in the flour mixture and then beat for another 2 minutes. Add the oats and chocolate chips (if using them) and stir to mix through. Finally, add the xanthan gum and quickly mix in.
4. Line 2 baking sheets with non-stick baking paper. Drop a heaped tbsp of the dough onto a baking sheet and press down to flatten, then repeat it 11 times – you should be able to fit 12 cookies onto each sheet.
5. Bake for 8 minutes until golden but still slightly soft in the middle. Allow to sit on the baking sheet for 2 minutes and then transfer onto a wire rack to cool.

It took me a long time and many attempts to find a cookie recipe as good as this one. Previous recipes that I tried all tasted really dry, but what makes the difference with this one is the porridge oats. They keep the cookies nice and moist.

　

Flapjack

If anyone ever tells you they can’t bake, pass this recipe on to them. It only uses 3 ingredients, is really easy and makes the best home-made flapjack I have ever found.

To avoid any language barriers, what we call a flapjack in the UK is known as a muesli bar in Australasia and totally different to what is classed as a flapjack in the States. For anyone reading this in the USA, the best was I can describe it is as an oat bar. Please see the photo above.

Ingredients

4½oz/6tbsp golden syrup or corn syrup (Please note: I’m not sure why, but golden syrup from a tin works better than the squeezy bottles)

200g soya spread

12oz/330g organic porridge oats

1. Preheat the oven to 350ºf/180ºc/Gas 4.
2. Grease a 9"x13"/23cm x 33cm tin and line the base with baking paper.
3. Place the syrup and soya spread into a large saucepan and heat gently until the spread has melted into the syrup. Stir well.
4. Put the porridge oats into a large mixing bowl, add a pinch of salt (optional – I usually forget!) then pour the soya spread and syrup mixture over the oats and stir until they are all coated well.
5. Pour the mixture into the prepared tin, flatten down well with the back of a metal spoon, and bake for 20 minutes or until golden brown. Remove from the oven while the flapjack is still slightly soft.
6. Place the tin on a wire cooling rack and cut the flapjack into squares. Leave in the tin until completely cool.