Do we have anything for pudding?

That's one of my housemate's favourite questions after we've had dinner and sitting around in a vain attempt to put off work/washing up for as long as possible. And normally my answer is sadly 'no' but when we have more time, we do like to make a pudding - it can't get much cosier than sitting around with your friends with a hot baked pudding and lashing of custard! 


So here's one of my favourite puddings to make on a cold winter's day - apples with vanilla sponge over the top and a golden syrup sauce. You could also use pears in this as well if you want. It also tastes even better if you make one of your housemates run to the shops for milk to make custard when it's nearing 0'C outside :P (thanks Lucy! :D)

For the sponge:


5 eating apples, peeled, cored and cut into chunks (any apples will do)
1 tsp ground cinnamon (optional)
250g butter, at room temperature
250g sugar
3 eggs
250g plain flour
1 tsp baking powder


For the sauce:


6 Tbsp golden syrup
200ml water


1. Preheat the oven to 200'C. Lay the apples in a baking dish/pie dish and if you like spicy apples, sprinkle the cinnamon over the apples and toss to cover all the chunks.
2. In a big bowl, beat the soft butter with the sugar until creamy and pale with a wooden spoon. Crack in the eggs one at a time and mix until it's all incorporated. Add the flour and baking powder and lightly mix it in until you have a smooth batter (but try not to over-mix). Spoon the batter over the apples and smooth the top with a knife.
3. Put the golden syrup and water for the sauce in a little saucepan and stir over a medium heat until the syrup is runny and warm. Pour over the batter (ok, it might not look so pretty now with the sauce floating on top of the batter but it'll look and taste delicious later!).
4. Bake for 25-30 minutes (you might want to put some foil over the dish if the top browns too fast as it might because of the golden syrup) and serve whilst still fairly hot but be warned, the golden syrup is very hot so you might want to cool it a bit before eating if you can resist the temptation! Whip up some custard whilst you're waiting! 

Not so dull pasta!

So we're students. And hence poor. Therefore pasta and rice is cheap, filling and easy so we have that a lot (at least we do in our house!). But last term we probably had pasta a bit too much and we seemed to have it the same way every time - with a tomato sauce. And that got dull pretty quickly. 


And so I started doing pasta bakes that are kinda like macaroni cheese but with added veg so it wasn't just stodgy pasta but had vibrant colours and different textures. Also it's a prime way of sneakily getting some of your five a days in! I used frozen veg - it's cheap and very convenient, it makes the whole cooking process much faster since you don't have to stand around prepping veg for 20 minutes. Of course, if you're not a broccoli fan, then add whatever veg takes your fancy - carrots, celery, peas, mushrooms, sweetcorn... 

For the cheese sauce:


50g butter
50g plain flour
Pint/600ml milk
However much cheese you can handle without getting nightmares
Salt and pepper


For the pasta:


100g pasta per person
Whatever veg (if using big veg like frozen broccoli, then defrost it in the microwave before adding it to the sauce but small veg like sweetcorn you can just add straight to the pan)


1. Make the cheese sauce - melt the butter in a pan, add the flour and stir until it's all combined. Add the milk a little by little and stir with a wooden spoon until it's all absorbed (if you add too much milk in one go, then you'll probably get a lumpy sauce). It'll be quite thick at the beginning but it'll get there, don't worry! 


2. While you're doing this, boil the pasta until just done and drain. Preheat the oven to 200'C.


3. Once all the milk has been added to the cheese sauce, stir in the cheese and seasoning until it's all melted. Add the veg you're using and tip in the cooked pasta. Stir it all together and tip it into a big baking dish (or even several big plates if you don't have a baking dish). Grate some more cheese over the top and bake for about 15 minutes.


We had this with garlic bread (one of your favourite foods!) and some fresh rocket because it was on offer in Tesco's and because my friend eats it in an amusing way like a rabbit. 

Want pizza but Domino's too slow/too expensive/too greasy?

Hello again! Not a recipe this time but I thought I'd share an amazing food discovery, which is not only cheap but makes you feel you're eating posh gourmet food that's incredibly nom! 

So I was coming back hungry and tired one evening and I passed a wood fired pizza van called 'Pizza Artisan'. That's right, wood fired pizza in a kebab van-style van (but many times cleaner and nicer!) in the middle of Oxford. Outside the main gates of Christ Church on St Aldates, opposite G&Ds to be precise (you'll smell the wood smoke when you draw near - it's irresistible like a bonfire). Anyway, I had passed this several times last term on my bike but had always been either going out to have dinner or had already eaten so never had the opportunity to try one of these pizzas but this night I was determined to try one and I conveniently 'forgot' the fact that my lovely housemates were cooking for when I got back home (but it was so worth it and now I got my housemates hooked as well!). And crazily inside this van there's a little wood fired oven and there's a guy rolling out the dough there and then by hand and putting pizzas in the oven with one of those big shovel-paddle things and another very friendly chap who's happy to have a chat while you wait for your pizza to cook (I forgot to ask his name but I will next time, which I think will be quite soon!). 

There's a few veggie options which is good and lots of meaty ones for the lovers of salami and, in any case, you can add extra toppings for just £1 which is pretty nice. And not only do you get a wood fired pizza but for free they throw in some rocket and spinach just so you can kid yourself that you're having a 'healthy' dinner, parmesan and a selection of flavoured oils (the chilli is a favourite of mine). So what's not to love? The base is soft and chewy with a few crispy bits, and never soggy, plenty of cheese and a generous amount of toppings. Awesome.

So hop along down to St Aldates for a nice chat and proper Italian pizza - they're normally there from 7pm-ish so just in time for dinner or maybe a post-pub snack. Trust me - try it once and you won't look back! Dominos, out of the way - Pizza Artisan has arrived!

Winter comfort dinner of sausages, mash and Yorkshire puds!

Hello and welcome to the first post of Baked Beans on Toast! I had planned to start this earlier but then life kinda got in the way. But here we are and for the first post, I thought I'd share what my housemates and I had for dinner yesterday when we needed warm comforting food since we had to cycle in the rain and cold. We cook and eat dinner together every night but we sometimes we get stuck in a pasta/rice rut and needless to say, it got a little boring. 


So this term, we're expanding our foody horizons and last night we ventured to the exotic land of Yorkshire. Yes, yes, I can already hear some purists shouting that Yorkshire puddings should only really go with roast, and roast beef at that, but they're yummy, they're easy, they go nicely with sausages so why not? If you don't have an oven, I'm sorry for the tragic loss in your life but you can just do the sausages, mash and gravy which is awesome in itself :D Oh and I did little Yorkshire puddings in a muffin pan because we don't have a roasting try and it turned out fine!

For the Yorkshire puddings: (serves 6 hungry people, about 2/3 each)


300g plain flour
1 egg
About 300ml milk
About 100ml water
Salt and pepper


1. Put about a tablespoon of oil (I used veggie oil) into each hole of a muffin pan and put it in a oven preheated to 220'C - the oil needs to be really hot before you put the batter in. 
2. Put the flour into a bowl, make a little well in the middle and crack in the egg. Mix with a whisk if you have one or just a wooden spoon as I did. Add the milk and water slowly, stirring all the time until it forms a smooth batter that's runny as double cream (basically pourable). The amount of liquid is quite rough - just keep adding until it's fairly runny!
3. When the oil is hot, add two tablespoons of batter in each hole of the pan and then return it to then oven for 15 minutes. They should be crispy and golden when they're done! 


For the sausages:


2/3 sausages per person 


1. Put a little bit of oil in a frying pan (not too much otherwise the sausages will spit at you and that, as we learnt the hard way, is not fun). Fry the sausages on a low-ish heat so they cook all the way through, about 10 minutes. If you cut one open, there should be no pink meat if it's done. 


(I'm vegetarian now so I used veggie sausages and that takes much shorter time than meat sausages - just fry them in a pan until golden and they're done!)


For the mash: (my favourite bit!)


2 potatoes per person
Knob of butter
Few splashes of milk
Salt and pepper


1. I baked the potatoes in the oven for an hour because, although it takes longer than boiling, is much easier since you don't have to stand over the hob in a hot and steamy kitchen watching potatoes boil which is on a par with watching paint dry. This way I can shove the potatoes in, go and do some work for an hour (so she says...) and then start cooking properly! So pierce the potatoes with a knife in a few places and put them in an oven preheated to 220'C and bake for an hour (and also this way you have the oven nice and hot for the Yorkshire puds later!).
2. When they're done, cut them in half, scoop out the middle with a spoon into a bowl. Add the butter, milk, salt and pepper and mash (if you don't have a potato masher, a fork works just as well). You could add some grated cheese at this point if, like us, you're cheesy mash fans!

I hope you enjoy this wonderfully warming meal (and the nice break from pasta!) and come back for more recipes/meal ideas soon :)