Pumpkin Treacle Tart Recipe

Hello lovely people.  Well it just feels like summer again here.  The last few days have been gloriously warm.  I spent the whole day yesterday with little T at our allotment garden.  It was so lovely to just sit and watch the bees buzzing around and listen to the birds singing.  There is nothing more beautiful than the sound of British bird song.  We got quite a bit of work done too, dug up some more potatoes, a bit of weeding, harvested all of our corn (something had totally stripped a few of the cobs, rats maybe?  So thought it had better be harvested before they got the lot).  Little T planted some cabbage and Kale seedlings and some onions and garlic in his garden too...

We harvested our largest pumpkin last week even though it wasn't completely ripe (something had been nibbling it).  It was quite a beauty we tried to weigh it and got an EEEE message, too heavy for the kitchen scales.  Tried the bathroom ones next and it came in at just over 2 stone.  Not bad for our first attempt at growing them.  I chopped it into large pieces and roasted it in the oven for about 40 mins.  When it was cool I peeled and chopped it and then divided it up into roughly 400g portions to freeze.  We have had 2 pumpkin pies so far (which little T loves) and some pumpkin pancakes for breakfast this morning.  They were also very tasty.  Both recipes are by Chef John from Food Wishes and you can try them out here

Chef John's Pumpkin Pie...

and Pumpkin Pancakes.

Now the pancake recipe only used around half of my freezer bag portion of pumpkin, so I needed to find something else to make with the leftovers.  I also had some stale bread lying around and half a tin of golden syrup that has been sitting at the back of my cupboard for who knows how long, so I wondered if I could make something between a pumpkin pie and a treacle tart.  So here we have my Pumpkin Treacle Tart recipe...

Pumpkin Treacle Tart

Ingredients:

250g ready made short crust pastry

200g pumpkin puree

4 slices of stale bread (blitzed into breadcrumbs)

1 egg

1/2 tsp mixed spice

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1 tsp cinnamon

4 tbsp golden syrup  

2 tbsp melted butter

First you need to preheat your oven to 200 c (you may need to adjust for fan ovens), then roll out your pastry and line an 8 inch cake tin or pie dish or whatever you can find that's the right size and shape.  Next you simply combine all the other ingredients, it couldn't be easier.  Pour your yummy syrupy, pumpkiny, spicy mixture into the pie case (this smells sooo delicious), if you have any left over pastry you can create a lattice over your pie but this is optional.  Pop into the oven for 20 minsand then turn your oven down to 180 c and cook for a further 20 minutes.  Your treacle tart should look lovely and golden brown.  Leave in the tin for 5-10 mins before turning out.  

You can eat this either hot or cold, but really who can wait that long?  Perfect with just a dollop of cream or you can go with custard or some lovely vanilla ice cream and of course the obligatory cup of tea...

Enjoy!

x

Will My Courgettes Ever Stop Growing?

Well hello everyone.  It's been a long time again (I know I promised).  This year has just been super busy.  Lot's of blankets selling in my shop and lot's of time spent in our allotment garden.  

It has been amazing having a green space for little T to play outside in and also a great bonus being able to eat what we have been growing...  Which to be completely honest, was mostly courgettes (zucchini to those of you across the pond). 

 Apparently 4 courgette plants is enough to keep a large family going all summer.  We had 11.  Suffice it to say they were coming out of our ears... and they are still growing.  We have had them roasted, stir fried, steamed, we have had courgette soup, courgette pasta, courgette risotto, courgette pizza, courgette fritatta, courgette bread, courgette cake and far too many other things to list.  I even tried making jam with them (it was OK...but not the greatest jam I have ever made).

The potatoes also did really well.  I still have a couple of rows left that need digging up.  We also harvested 1 giant pumpkin, which I cooked and froze into pumpkin pie sized portions (12 bags from just 1 pumpkin).  This was little T's first ever taste of pumpkin pie and he loved it.  We also have a ton of butternut squash still waiting to be harvested.

Autumn is definitely here now though. The mornings are chilly and the leaves on the trees are turning the most beautiful russet and gold.  There are still a few flowers dotted here and there and the odd bee buzzing around.  

Even though the weather is getting colder and the nights are drawing in, there is still time for some more planting.  In the mini green house we have some turnips, swede, kohl rabi, cabbages and kale seedlings growing that we will overwinter... 

...and little T now has his own patch of garden.  I made him a small 4 by 4 square foot garden, that I will talk about more in another post.

I will just leave you with a few of our favourite courgette recipes, so that if you too have a glut next year, you will know what to make with them...

By for now

Catherine

x

Tomato and Courgette Risotto

Courgette and Tomato Chutney

Frosted Courgette and Lemon Cake

Courgette and Cheddar Soda Bread

For daily posts and lots of crochet, please take the time to visit my Facebook page..

Apologies for Being AWOL!

Hello everyone.  I must start this post with an apology for being away for so long...  I have been caught up with my Facebook page (I try to post daily there...) and have also been super busy with blanket orders.  I thought it was about time I shared with you all, some of the things I have been up to over the last few months...

Now that the weather is warming up, little T and I have been spending more and more time at our allotment.  We even have some plants growing there now.  It's so exciting.  I cannot tell you how happy it makes me feel just being there and watching my "piece of earth" changing from a bare patch to something green and growing.  You can see the photos I took when we first got our allotment in this post here...

We have an amazing neighbour who has been very kind and helpful, who generously gave us some onion sets, broad beans, strawberry runners and some rhubarb plants from his plot.  We planted them late last year when we first moved in and now they are really starting to grow.  Last week we took some rhubarb home and I made the most delicious crumble with it and today we noticed the first flowers on our strawberry plants.  Little T was so excited, "we're going to get some strawberries mummy" he said with a big smile on his face.  

Onions...

strawberries...

...and broad beans, along with a few weeds.  They seem to grow faster than the plants.

Now I couldn't make a post without some crochet.  So I have been very busy here with custom orders and my shop has been doing really well.  There are too many blankets to put into one post, so I will share with you some of my favourites...

I have always loved ombre colour schemes and feeling very inspired by the Paintbox Blanket by Heather Leal over at The Patchwork Heart, I decided to play around with my yarn stash.  Instead of making one large blanket, I took Heather's idea and used it to make individual baby blankets and was very pleased with the results...

Red and pink

Purple and pink

Orange and yellow...

... all with stripes of silver in between the colour changes.

Most recently I have been having a Cath Kidston phase.  Taking my inspiration from her gorgeous designs.

Granny Flowers...

Patchwork...

and one for the boys...

...had to do a little research to find some boys colours.  I found a really cute pair of baby joggers on her website which you can see here... 

Well that's all for now, it's nice to be back and I promise to add some photos of the allotment when I can.  I will try not to leave it so long next time.

Please head over to my Facebook Page for daily posts.

Ta ta for now

Catherine

x