Here’s a festive recipe to keep you busy in the kitchen this December from Somerset hospitality student Kira Crossfield
Baked Christmas Trees
Ingredients for the brownie base:
315g unsalted butter, softened
510g caster sugar
6 eggs
120g plain chocolate
3 tsp instant coffee granules
6 tbsp warm water
3 tsp baking bowder
165g plain flour
165g cocoa powder
3 tsp vanilla extract or 2 vanilla pods
Green butter icing:
Green colouring (amount depends on how bright/dark you wish to have the icing)
300g butter, softened
350g icing sugar
Christmas tree:
2 punnets of strawberries
White and red sprinkles/ gold and silver balls
Golden stars
Gold edible glitter
Method for the brownie base:
1. Preheat the oven to 180C/ 350F/gas mark 4.
2. Prepare cupcake tins.
3. In a clean bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until pale and fluffy. Beat in the eggs, one at a time.
4. Chop the chocolate and fold into the butter and egg mixture. Then add the vanilla pod/extract.
5. Dissolve the coffee granules in two tablespoons of warm water and add to the mixture and mix well.
6. Add baking powder, then sift in flour and cocoa powder. Mix well.
7. Spoon/pipe brownie mixture into the cupcake holders half way.
8. Bake in the oven for 10-12 mins. Allow to cool before putting on a
wire rack.
Green butter icing:
1. Whisk butter and icing sugar together until it is pale and fluffy.
2. Then add green colouring. Mix well.
Christmas tree:
1. Place a strawberry on top of the brownie.
2. Pipe the butter icing with a star nozzle all over the strawberry, until all is covered resembling a Christmas tree.
3. Decorate the trees with white and red sprinkles/ balls. Place gold star on top.
4. To finish, spray gold glitter over the trees and tie a red ribbon around the bottom. Kira Crossfield is 17 years old and a hospitality student at The Combe, the training restaurant based at the Skills & Enterprise Centre at West Somerset College, Minehead. Her dream is to become a patisserie chef.
Food & Drink News
A pieminister christmas
Waitrose is stocking a range of Pieminister Christmas pies again this festive season. Mistle Moo is a British beef steak and Long Clawson stilton pie with chestnuts, free range British bacon and port and Christingle is a roast parsnip, chestnut and West Country Cheddar pie from the Bristol company. Deer Santa is a wild British venison, free range British dry cured bacon, red wine and green lentil pie and Three Kings is an open top, free range British Kelly Bronze turkey pie with free range British smoked bacon, parsnip and cranberry. We think we’ll be spoilt for choice.
And a few
more things we have seen:
Michelin star for hotel
The Bath Priory has retained its Michelin star following the release of the Michelin Guide 2016. Executive Chef Sam Moody, who joined The Bath Priory in 2009, was awarded a Michelin star for the first time in 2013, aged just 28, and the latest announcement marks four continuous years for the hotel to hold the award.
A starring role
Thatchers Cider has been featuring in a new BBC Two series of Harvest 2015. In three episodes presenters Gregg Wallace, Philippa Forrester and James Manning, a 28-year-old dairy farmer from North Herefordshire, met farmers from across Britain, including three generations of the cidermaking Thatcher family in the heart of Somerset. They met John Thatcher, his son Martin, and Martin’s children, Eleanor and Peter. Filming for the series has been taking place at Thatchers Myrtle Farm since January, following, in detail, the cidermaking year, including planting of new orchards, through to harvesting the apples and crafting the cider.
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules here