Apple and Cheddar Cheese Scones

Poster designed by Marju Randmer of Tassike.ee

My local farmers market, Viimsi Taluturg, hosts a big apple feast tomorrow, called Ubinapäev. If I remember it correctly, its the third year in a row. And for the second year in a row, a group of local foodbloggers, including yours truly, sets up a apple cake stand, Toidublogijate õunakoogikohvik. There are five of us, just like last year, and as last year was lots of fun and a great success (we sold all the cakes within 2 hours or so), we're more than happy to participate this year as well. So all of you who are in Tallinn or Viimsi tomorrow, are most welcome to come by and have some apple cake. But come early :)

Today's recipe is for apple and Cheddar cheese scones. The ones on the picture were made exactly a year ago, and come highly recommended. If it weren't for the prohibitive cost of Cheddar cheese over here, I'd make these for the apple cake stand tomorrow. These are excellent - slightly sweet, slightly savory, full of roasted apples and strong-flavoured cheese - a great snack first thing in the morning or with your afternoon cup of tea.

The original recipe appeared in Melissa Clark's "The Perfect Finish" (2010, Apple and White Cheddar Scones), but I've played with the amounts and ingredients a little. Smitten Kitchen and Leite's Culinaria have blogged about the same recipe from the same book (these are helpful when you're looking for US measurements). And a search for apple cheddar scones gives numerous results on the FoodBlogSearch, if you're looking for something slightly different.

Apple and Cheddar Cheese Scones
(Õuna-juustukakud)
Makes 6 large scones


3 to 4 large apples (about 450 g/1 pound in total)
200 g all-purpose flour
4 Tbsp + 1.5 Tbsp caster sugar
0.5 Tbsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
85 g cold butter, cut into cubes
100 g strong/mature Cheddar cheese, coarsely grated
4 Tbsp (1/4 cup) fresh cream (single or double)
2 large eggs, divided

Line a baking sheet with a parchment paper. Peel the apples, remove the cores and cut apples into thin sectors. Place on the baking sheet on an even layer, and bake at 180 C/350 F for about 20 minutes.
Remove from the oven, let cool.

  

Mix the dry ingredients (flour, 4 Tbsp of sugar, baking powder and salt). Place the cubed cold butter into your food processor. Add the apples, grated cheese, fresh cream and 1 egg. Scatter the dry mix on top. Using the slowest setting, quickly mix the dough until it just comes together.

 

Line a baking sheet with a clean parchment paper.

Place the scone mixture onto a lightly floured table, sprinkle some flour on top as well. Gently roll  it into a round disk, about 3.5 cm high. Cut into 6 sectors and transfer these onto the baking sheet, leaving some space between the scones.

Whisk the remaining  egg with a pinch of salt. Brush the scones with the egg wash, then sprinkle with the rest of the sugar.

Bake in the middle of a preheated 180 C oven for about 30 minutes, until the scones are lovely golden brown.

Let cool a little, then transfer onto a metal rack to cool for 5 to 10 minutes before serving.

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Sorelle Alcohol Free Wine

Recently I was sent a bottle of Sorelle alcohol free wine to try. It couldn't have come at a better time as I have recently found out that one of my lovely friends is expecting a baby and another of my friends had just given birth to a beautiful baby girl. As they are newly pregnant or just given birth the are understandably off the alcohol but I think it is a nice touch to be able to toast their new additions.

Sorelle's brand new 0% alcohol wine has an authentic wine taste but without obviously with out the alcohol. It is available in two flavours -  a Sauvignon Blanc and a Rosé. Sorelle can be found in the wine aisle priced at £3.49 at Tesco stores.

Even celebrities like Tamzin Outwaite love Sorelle and finds time to enjoy a glass every now and then.

There are only 24 calories per 100ml glass which is 65% less than a standard wine, and a great drink that is ideal if your watching your weight but still want to have a glass or 3 of wine on an evening. Sorelle is also the perfect drink for people who enjoy the taste of wine but doesn't like alcohol or for people who can't drink alcohol like my friends who are pregnant or breast feeding. I will certainly be making sure I have a couple of bottles in my bag for the baby shower next month.

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Ravensburger Augmented Reality Jigsaw Puzzle

Every month the boys are sent a puzzle to review from Ravensburger, however this month I was asked if I would like to review a puzzle as well. I jumped at the chance as its not very often that I get things like this to review and to be honest its not very often (unless with the boys) that I sit and work on a puzzle.

The puzzle I was sent had 1000 pieces, the picture is a scene from under the sea. This size of puzzle is for people aged 14 years and up. What I love about Ravensburger puzzles is that they are made up of totally unique pieces and no two pieces are the same.

When the puzzle first arrived I though it looked quite easy, I honestly thought it wouldn't be a challenge at all, little did I know how quickly my thoughts would change. As the puzzle is an underwater scene there are lots of the same looking pieces. It took me a week to put the puzzle together but this was juggling the boys, school runs and the running of the house so I don't think I did too badly especially as I don't usually spend time doing them.

However once the puzzle is finished this is when the real fun begins, if you have an iPad 2 or an iPhone you can download an app from the appstore, this literally takes a minute and is free. Once the app has downloaded and you've opened it up you need to select which of the augmented reality puzzles you have completed. This is the first time a puzzle has incorporated technology of this kind and really does and a new dimension to the puzzle. I was really eager to see what it would be like.

Once you have selected your puzzle on the app, this is what happens, James thought it was great and loved seeing what happens on the ipad and loved trying to find the fishes from the puzzle.

I really enjoyed this puzzle even if it was a little frustrating at times (lets face it its 1000 pieces it wasn't meant to be easy) and at £14.99 I think it is worth every penny especially with the little added extra at the end, it would make an excellent gift for any jigsaw puzzle and technology fan.

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No porcini mushrooms? Make sautéed aubergine/eggplants (Melanzane al funghetto)

The silver-haired Amalfi-born and England-based Antonio Carluccio is known in the United Kingdom as the godfather of Italian gastronomy. This lovely dish is based on his recipe. Gently sautéed cubed aubergines/eggplants with garlic indeed have a flavour reminiscent of porcini/penny bun/cep mushrooms (Boletus edulis in Latin) - hence the title of this post :) A handy recipe to have when you crave mushrooms but cannot get hold of good ones, or when you want to please somebody who cannot eat mushrooms for whatever reason..

Antonio Carluccio recommends this as a side dish to veal chops or Wienerschnitzler, but it's lovely as a vegetarian main with some crusty white bread as well. 

Choose nice and firm aubergines for this.

Melanzane al funghetto  
(Praetud pommud e. melanzane al funghetto)
Serves four

500 g aubergine/eggplant
2 garlic cloves
8 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 tsp seal salt
freshly ground black pepper
2 Tbsp finely chopped fresh parsley

Peel the aubergines (not compulsory, I actually prefer them unpeeled) and cut into neat 1,5-2 cm cubes. Slice the garlic.
Heat oil on a large skillet over moderate heat. Add the aubergine and garlic and sauté for about 10 minutes, stirring every now and then, until the aubergine softens.
Stir in the parsely, season with salt and pepper.
Serve hot or leave to cool before serving.

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Nelson's Mummy First Aid Must Haves

As  a mum of 3 small (ish) children I find that I can never be too prepared. James I have to admit is the most accident prone out of the 3 and has had us rushing to A & E twice already in his 3 and a bit years, Callum and Nathan so far (and I'm touching wood as I type) haven't had us up there yet.

All parents should have first aid kits at home in my opinion, we certainly have and we have one in the car too, they are both full of essential bits, plasters, bandages and other bits and pieces that we may or may not need. Recently I was asked to review Nelsons Arnicare Kids Stick and Nelsons Tea Tree Natural First Aid Antiseptic Cream. I think that they both would make excellent additions to any First Aid kit.

The Nelsons Arnicare, Arnica Kids Stick is a fun, fast-absorbing formulation and is specially formulated for the delicate skin of children, it also helps to keep it soft and supple. The brightly coloured balm simply glides on, is non-greasy and fuss-free. Arnica is used to heal bruises and ease tender spots. You can use the balm on unbroken skin. The balm comes in a pocket-sized container and is paraben-free, Nelsons Arnicare Arnica Kids Stick would also make a excellent handbag essential, it is suitable for children aged 3 years and over. It has a RRP of £5.35 for 7g.

The Nelsons Tea Tree Natural First Aid Antiseptic Cream is a soothing cream using the finest, purest tea tree oil from Australia. It can be used on cuts and grazes to help keep them clean and stop infection before they start. The cream is available to buy in a 30g tube with an RRP of £4.85. 

These two will definitely be added to our first aid kits - you never know when you may need them, especially when you have young children about or ones that are as accident prone as my little James.

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Trash Pack Scum Drum Review

Over the last two weeks Callum has been trying out a new toy which I'm almost positive will be massive this year for boys of all ages. He has been playing with the Trash Pack Scum Drum from Flair.

What on earth is a Scum Drum I hear you ask? and what in the world are the Trash Pack? two very good questions that I will try and answer for you. The Scum Drum is a game where you can play against your friends with "trashies". The Scum Drum is where you can play with your Trashies, it is also in the shape of an oil can. The Trash Pack or Trashies as they are known are a collection of foul looking rubbery toys. There are 6 different gangs of  Trashies to collect, each one representing something you would find in the bottom of your rubbish bin - nice!! So now you know.

Here are the four Trashies that came with our Scum Drum, as you can see they are delightfully gross.

Each Trashie has a gruesome name of its own and Callum found this really funny, he told me this was one of his favourite bits about them. He thinks that "Spew - Ghetti" and "Bum - Bug" have the best names - I can't imagine why he'd think this but I suppose he is now at the age where he finds anything that mentions the words bum, poo, spew etc funny.

The Scum Drum is aimed at boys aged 6 - 11years old but both James and Nathan also enjoyed playing with Callum. The Scum Drum has a RRP of £24.99 and is available from all good toy retailers, you can also top up your Trashie collection and add other accessories too as there are over 100 trashies to collect.

The good thing about the Scum Drum is that there are 6 different games you can play with it, some of the games you can play on your own others need at least 2 players, but there is plenty to keep little boys entertained thats for sure. Callum said he loved playing with the Scum Drum and wants to collect even more of the gross little dudes so that he has even more to play with. Yet again I can see his list to Santa getting longer and longer.

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Zucchini and Parmesan Tart

What's your favourite zucchini/courgette dish this year?

I'm still harvesting a good-sized zucchini or two every few days, and here's my favourite zucchini dish of 2012 (another recent favourite is this courgette/zucchini cake with lemon frosting, but as one is sweet and the other savoury, I believe I'm allowed to have two favourites :)). I spotted this idea in the May 2009 issue of the British food magazine Olive, but there was too little cheese and too much zucchini in the original recipe, so I've been playing around with it quite a lot. The tart has been a real hit with everybody who has tried it (just look at the number of comments on my Estonian site), and I can see why - the cheese, garlic and courgettes work together immensely well.

Use a slim and crisp zucchini for this - both for the looks and the texture.

Courgette and Parmesan Tart
(Parmesani-suvikõrvitsapirukas)
Serves about 8 to 10

500 g puff pastry
ca 500 g zucchini/courgette
2 large garlic cloves
extra virgin olive oil
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
fresh herbs of your choice (oregano, thyme - optional)
150 g cream cheese
75-100 g finely grated Parmesan cheese

Preheat the oven to 200 C/400 F. Line an oven sheet with a parchment paper. 

Slice the courgette thinly (I use my Benriner Japanese kitchen mandoline for this), peel the garlic cloves and slice thinly as well. Place into a bowl, season generously with salt and pepper and herbs (if using), drizzle with olive oil. Toss gently to combine and leave to macerate for 10-15 minutes.
 

Roll out the puff pastry. Using a sharp knife, score a border about 1-1.5 cm from the edge of the pastry. Transfer the puff pastry onto the baking shet.
Mix the cream cheese with half of the grated Parmesan cheese, spread the cheese mixture onto the puff pastry (stay withing the cut you made).

 

Layer the zucchini slices neatly on top of the cheese mixture, overlapping them as you go.

 

Bake for 15 minutes at the pre-heated oven.
Take the tart out of the oven, sprinkle the rest of the Parmesan cheese on top, and return to the oven. Bake for another 15 minutes or until the tart is lovely golden brown on top.

Cool a little and cut into small squares. 


 

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Rug Doctor Review

Recently I was asked to review a Rug Doctor rental. You can hire a rug doctor machine from many places, supermarkets such as Morrisons or from home stores like B&Q and Homebase. We hired the machine from our local B&Q store. You can check where your local hire store is here. A rental costs around £25 and is usually for 24 hours although you can hire them for longer if needed. You also get attachments with your Rug Doctor machine so you can clean your upholstery too if needed.

The review couldn't have come at a better time either. We are still in the middle of house training Penny and potty training James. Both are doing extremely well but when they first started they had a fair few accidents between them. Although any accidents were cleaned up straightaway and no marks were left I still had the feeling that my hallway carpet wasn't as clean as it should be. There was already some marks on the carpet where mud had been walked in and where a drink had been spilt and stained the carpet badly.

The rug doctor is extremely easy to use and takes very little time to set up. you are given full instructions with the machine but you can also access them from the Rug Doctor website should you need further help. We cleaned our hallway, landing and three bedrooms and it took us about an hour and a half maybe even less. When you hire out the Rug Doctor you also get some Rug Doctor cleaning solution, you cant use anything but this solution in the machine.

I have to admit that I love the Rug Doctor and if I had the room for one I would own one. They are the best carpet cleaners in the world. They work really well and for the price of a rental they really are worth hiring, they  make your carpets look 1000% better than they did. We thought our carpets were beyond cleaning as one of the stains was really bad and really noticeable

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Back to Normality....

All over the country I can hear many mothers like myself rejoicing at the fact that their delightful bundles of joy have been packed back off to school. Now don't get me wrong I love my children, more than anything else in the world but six weeks of being cooped up in the same house has driven them demented and has made them awfully (for want of a better word) bitchy with each other, they have griped at the slightest of thing, they have hit each other for no reason and they have basically tormented each other for the last two weeks. I have played referee more times than I can remember and I should have had a recording of me saving, "stop hitting your brother", "don't be nasty to your brother", "say sorry" and "please try and be quiet as Daddy is in bed" (Matthew has been on the night shifts this last fortnight - I have no idea how he could sleep through the noise) I'm sure when I was a child my siblings and I never behaved like that or wound each other up so much either. I also feel that the six weeks holidays never felt as long either.

Today Callum has gone off for his first day as a Junior. I am of course upset that he is no longer classed as an infant (something he told me hes not ages ago) and I am fully aware of how quickly they grow up and become independent.

I still have Nathan and James at home with me... well until 17th September when Nathan starts full time school and James goes to Nursery - my babies are definitely growing up and I best make sure I have the tissues at the ready as I'm pretty sure they will be needed - I'm not sure I'm ready to let them all go no matter how pleased I am that I will finally get some well deserved me time.

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Mike The Knight Mini Memory Game

As most of our regular readers will know we at Here Comes Trouble love Ravensburger and their puzzles. So when we were asked to review the  Mike the Knight Mini Memory game to review we couldn't wait.

The game consists of 48 cards which makes 24 pairs. The cards are a good size so that little hands can easily pick them up and so that each picture can be seen clearly.

The Mini Memory game is aimed at children aged 3 years +, it can be played with as little as two players or as many as 6,  all 3 of the boys decided that they could play together. The aim of the game is to match pairs, all 3 of the boys really enjoyed the game although it took us ages to play as they couldn't remember where any of the matching cards were. I think in future we will make sure we use less of the cards to make the game play faster.

Overall the boys enjoyed the game, James liked finding the pairs and got really excited when he eventually found ones that matched. I think this would be a perfect additition to any Mike Knight fan's collection.

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CuddleUppet Review

My boys have always had a favourite blanket and a favourite toy each. These were bought or made for them when they were first born. They are so attached to them that if they don't have them they can't sleep without them. I have spent many a night looking high and low for misplaced toys and blankets,  I was just the same when I was younger, I had my favourite teddy (a panda named Squeaky - who didn't actually squeak!) and I also used to have a pillow case that I used to shove under my nose and twiddle between my fingers whilst sucking my thumb (I grew out of this when I was a teenager) I no longer have my pillowcase but my Squeaky still lives under my bed. My only stipulation in regards to the boys being attached to their toys was that they never go anywhere with us unless we stay away overnight as I didn't want them losing them and never getting them replaced.

Recently we were asked to review a CuddleUppet! I had never heard of them before so quite looking forward to seeing what one was. CuddleUppets are unique, they are a cross between a cuddly blanket and a hand puppet. They are really cute too.

We were sent the Brown Bear CuddleUppet. James loves it and has called him Bob - Bob the builder is his favourite TV programme at the minute and loves singing the theme tune. So meet Bob the Bear.

The CuddleUppets are priced at £19.99, there are 5 different CuddleUppets to choose from, so plenty of choice for any little one and there are designs to suit both boys and girls these include a pink poodle and a green monkey. They are aimed at children aged 3 - 5 years old. They are 71 x 99 cm so plenty big enough for small children. James is above average for his age in height and he can comfortably sit with the blanket wrapped around him. He loved putting his hand in its mouth and making it talk and make funny sounds. He made it talk to his brothers and some of his other favourite toys. 

A CuddleUppet is ideal for travelling or for just sitting and snuggling whilst watching TV. I think they would be fab for when a child is feeling under the weather and wanting comfort from a toy, blanket or both, as they don't take up much room they would be perfect, there has been many a time in our house where I've been squeezed off the sofa in replace of a teddy wanting to watch TV too. They are a great product to get a child into an established routine especially for bedtime as they will feel comfortable and relaxed with something that is their own. 

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