Smokey Chipotle Carrot and Butterbean Soup

Isolation time means more cooking and baking (of course), and I got my two children to help me out with this, and served it with some home made cheese scones. It's a relative quick and easy recipe. If you don't have chipotle paste to hand, you can substitute with a mixture of tomato paste and spices (see recipe notes below).

Cranberry and Lady Grey Hot Cross Buns (in the bread maker)

Resurrecting this blog for my yearly Easter hot cross buns recipe! This year I chose a tea-infused bun with mixed peel, cranberries, and mixed raisins. My dried fruit was quite old and needed using up, so I soaked them in hot (just boiled) water for 20 minutes before draining them. Whereas for last years buns I did the Delia Smith method of cutting strips of dough and placing them on top for the crosses, this year I made a smooth dough mixture and piped it on. It turned out really well, so I definitely recommend piping them on if you can.

Breadmaker Earl Grey Hot Cross Buns

After a very long hiatus from blogging, I couldn't resist doing an Easter special blog post... Bread maker Earl Grey hot cross buns! This recipe leans very heavily on one on the Delia Smith website for normal hot cross buns. If you're not sure about the Earl Grey addition, check out her original recipe here.

Banana Fudge Cupcakes with Chocolate Buttercream Icing

I made these for a BBQ last weekend and they went down a treat. I had some leftover chocolate buttercream icing in the freezer which I used so have somewhat guesstimated quantities - you may end up with more buttercream than you need! However, this accounts for eating whilst making it, which will definitely happen because it's the most amazing buttercream of all time, ever.

One Pot Chipotle Bean and Potato Stew

This stew uses chipotle chillies to add smokiness, but they aren't necessary if you don't have any to hand. You can substitute for liquid smoke or extra smoked paprika. Make sure you cook the potatoes in the stock before you add the passata, as the acidity of the tomato sauce means the potatoes will take much longer to cook once it is added to the dish. We ate this dish by itself but if you wanted more carb you could serve with crusty bread.

Chickpea and Feta Tomato Pasta Sauce

I recently saw an interesting recipe for chicken and feta tomato pasta sauce and decided to modify it to be vegetarian. I'm not a fan of fake meat substitutes so I tend to substitute pulses for meat; I use chickpeas here, which I'm not normally in the habit of eating with pasta, and it worked really well.

Ginger and Soy Baked Tofu

A relatively simply dish of marinated baked tofu; I wrap the tofu in foil to retain the moisture but you could just lay the tofu out on a baking sheet. The only 'unusual' ingredient in this is the mirin, which is a type of rice wine easily found in any Asian supermarket. However, you could substitute for it with a dry white wine or leave it out entirely.

I rarely eat tofu, despite really enjoying it, because it is such a pain to prepare properly i.e. pressing it and dry frying it. However, you could probably skip the pressing of the tofu and dry frying in this recipe if you're short on time, and I expect it would turn out fine, although you would need to be careful not to break the tofu when stirring the marinade in.