Fruity honey rock cakes

Today was the day of the AFL (football) grand final so we decided to make something yummy, so we honey and apricot rock cakes it was. These little fruit and spice cakes are typically perfect for a tea break but for us, they are perfect for an all the time break! 

We found the idea of this recipe in the Women's Weekly Cook book but changed it around a bit to match our tastes. As we are lovers of fruit, so therefore dried fruit, so dried apricot and sultanas were a significant component of these little cakes.

Chopping up the fruit

They were actually more like scones than cakes because they are not particularly sweet but abundance of fruit helps to create a great balance. Also, a great serving suggestion is jam and cream, which is known to be great for scones, so this will assist in flavour development for those who have a particularly sweet tooth :) And if you're one of those people who just need it to be even more sweet (we think it is good as it and we have a BIG sweet tooth), you can add extra sugar and honey than the recipe suggests. 

When mixing in the butter with the dry ingredients, use your fingers to make sure every bit of flour is covered in some butter.

Rubbing in the butter

These little cakes are a perfect snack and quite healthy too so that's always a bonus! Maddy and I can't stop going to the fridge and sneaking them into our pockets!!! 

Honey fruity rock cakes

Ingredients

2 cups wholemeal self-raising flour

¼ cup caster sugar

½ teaspoon ground cinnamon

90g butter, chopped*

¾ cup chopped dried apricots 

½ sultanas 

1 egg

2 tbsp honey

1/3 cup milk

Method

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Line two baking trays with baking paper.

2. Sift dry ingredients into a large bowel and rub in butter. Add apricots and sultanas. Combine egg and honey in a small bowel and stir into mixture with milk. 

3. Place large tablespoonfuls of the mixture in rough heaps onto trays. Bake, uncovered for about 15 minutes. 

4. Allow to cool on trays before eating (we failed at this) and enjoy!

The ingredients in a bowl

Mixing the ingredients together

Tablespoon size scoops of batter

The rock cakes ready to be cooked

*Instead of using butter, coconut oil will also work work well and you can use what ever dried fruit you want. 

We hope you enjoyed these little treats! Keep cooking, twins in the kitchen.

Hoisin pork noodle salad

This dish took only 10 minutes to make and tasted delicious so it is definitely worth a try. We decided to make this for our lunch because we had some spare time since it is holidays. None of the ingredients for this recipe are too expensive which is good because we had to buy them ourselves.

This dish sounds very similar to the other pork noodle dish that we made but it is actually very different.

This dish is definitely a step up from the regular sandwich that Emily and I usually have in our lunch because it is very flavoursome and yummy!! Variations of this recipe include adding more or less than the recommended amount of hoisin sauce, using a different type of noodle and using chicken or beef mince instead of pork. We did not have any fresh ginger in the pantry so we had to use bottled ginger, but this still was ok in terms of flavour for the pork.

If you like this recipe then leave a comment below to tell us what you think or if you have any feedback for us J

Pork noodle salad

Ingredients:

200g (7oz) thick rice noodles

1 tbs peanut oil

2 tablespoons shredded ginger

500g pork mince

¼ cup hoisin sauce

½ chicken stock

½ coriander (cilantro), diced

¾ cup basil, shredded

Method:

1. Cook rice noodles in a pot of boiling water until tender. Drain and cool.

2. Heat peanut oil in a frying pan. Add ginger and pork mince and cook for 6 minutes or until fully brown.

3. Add hoisin sauce and chicken stock and cook for a further two minutes. Remove from heat and leave to cool.

4. Add the cooked rice noodles, coriander and basil to the pork mix in the frypan and stir until combined.

5. Serve into bowls with a dash of lemon juice and enjoy!!

Cooking the noodles

Cooking the pork mince

Chopping the herbs

Mixing all ingredients together

So there you go, after 5 simple steps you could have your own yummy pork noodle salad!

Keep cooking, Twins in the Kitchen

Chocolate Cupcakes

Today is our good friend's birthday from pole vault so we decided to make her cupcakes! Even though they are still yummy, we decided vanilla cupcakes were a tad boring so chocolate it was! These cupcakes are actually SO easy so they are perfect if you need to make a friend a birthday treat with not much time. They are moist and absolutely delicious and go perfectly well with the icing we put together too :)

You can embellish them however you want, but we decided some colour against the brown would look good so we went with some baking bling (sprinkle sort of things) ;) We were going to use M&Ms but of course we found out our brother Tom had eaten them all!! 

Our batter looked a bit separated which we thought was a problem but the cupcakes still turned out fantastic so don't worry if this happens to you! 

When filling the cupcake patty pans with batter, make sure you fill them about three quarters of the way full. This is essential as under-filling will result in dry and overdone cupcakes, and over-filling will result in the surface cracking with a huge pointed peak and the need for more time in the oven to cook. 

Chocolate Cupcakes 

Ingredients 

Cupcakes

¾ cup plain flour

¼ cup cocoa 

½ cup caster sugar

2 teaspoons baking powder

80g butter  

2 eggs

½ cup milk

Icing

60g butter, softened 
1 ¼ cup icing sugar, sifted
1 tbsp cocoa 
2 tbsp milk 

Method

Cupcakes

1. Preheat oven to 160 degrees Celsius. Prepare 12 hole muffin tins with patty pans. 

2. Sift all dry ingredients into a mixing bowel.

3. Make a well in the centre and add the rest of the dry ingredients. Beat on low speed until just combined, then increase the speed to medium speed for about two minutes. 

4. Fill patty pans until they are three-quarters of the way full. Bake for 15-18 minutes. 

5. Wait until cooled completely before icing. Add decorations to make your cupcakes look beautiful!

Icing

1. Sift dry ingredients into a mixing bowel and add butter and milk. 

2. Mix until light and fluffy.

3. Apply to cupcakes :)

Sifting dry ingredients into mixing bowel

Cracking an egg!

The right consistency of the batter

Cupcakes out of the oven

Ready to be iced

Icing

Placing Icing into our homemade piping bag

Start in the centre...

...and work your way around

And that's all it is! Told you it was easy didn't I? 

Keep cooking, twins in the kitchen :) 

Choc Peanut Butter Oat Bars

As we are currently baking and peanut butter obsessed, Maddy and I were craving a peanut butter type of thing that we could snack on over the holidays. We also LOVE chocolate and dried fruit, so they were both a must! And also, considering we have porridge every school morning, this was just the perfect snack to make! 

The great thing is, peanut butter is a terrific substitute for pure butter and it is much healthier too! If you are not a fan of peanut butter, almond butter, apple butter or even coconut butter would work too. 

We added a crazy amount of choc chips so I would recommend using a little less than suggested as there is chocolate garnish on the top of the bars too but if you really love chocolate like we do, go ahead and use even more than we suggested if you want! The add ins we used are our favourites but feel free to add whatever you want such as white choc bit, nuts, peanut butter bits, seeds, or any other dried fruit you like!

We felt the amount of sugar added was perfect and it worked well with the amount of chocolate added, so feel free to add more if you are dodging the chocolate, or if you are wanting to edge off the sugar a drizzle of honey would create a healthier, but still yummy sweetness. After all, peanut butter and honey work so well together!!! Make sure you taste the dough before putting it in the oven so you can play around the sweetness if necessary. 

If you are like to snack, these are perfect because you won't feel guilty, and they would even compliment any meal -breakfast, lunch or dinner- quite nicely. They are soft and moist and the fact that they are so easy with very little amounts of ingredients just top off how great they are!

Choc Peanut Butter Oat Bars

Ingredients 

1/2 cup brown sugar
1 cup peanut butter
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup old fashioned oats
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup milk
1/2 choc chips 
1/2 cup sultanas 

Method

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius and line a 15x15cm baking dish with baking paper.
2. Beat the brown sugar and peanut butter with an electric mixer for approximately 3 minutes, until light and fluffy. Then, mix in the vanilla. Be sure to scrape down the sides of the bowel if necessary. 
3.  On medium speed, add flour, baking soda, oats and salt. Don't worry that the dough is thick and clumpy as it will come together! Gradually add the milk in one go until a dough forms. Fold in chocolate chips and sultanas- you will probably need to use your hands!
4. Once dough is combined, press it into the baking dish using a hard object such as a spatula to create a evenly leveled surface. Back for 20-25 minutes or until the bars and lightly golden and set. Allow to cool completely before cutting into squares.*

*If you want you can melt some chocolate and drizzle over the top! 

So you have learnt another thing about us: we LOVE peanut butter and CHOCOLATE!

Keep cooking, Twins in the kitchen :)

Honey-seared salmon with coriander noodles

Personally, Emily and I LOVE noodle dishes and we also love salmon, and so when we found a recipe for a salmon noodle dish in one of Donna Hay’s cookbooks, we knew we had to give it a go!

For how yummy it is, this dish is actually surprisingly easy! It also isn’t very time-consuming which is another reason why it is an amazing dish!! We made this meal for dinner for our family and since we all like to eat a lot in our house, we made 1 and a half times what the recipe said, but I will just post the recipe that serves four people. We also doubled the amount of sauce to go with the noodles because after making the recommended portion, we decided it wasn’t enough – and this was defiantly the right decision.

This dish is called Honey-seared salmon with coriander noodles and is will definitely be made again in our house!!

Honey-seared salmon with coriander noodles

Serves: 4

Ingredients:

550g salmon fillet

2 tbs honey

Cracked black pepper (optional)

Coriander noodles

200g egg noodles

½ cup coriander leaves

1/3 cup shredded mint leaves

1/3 cup basil leaves, halved

2 zucchini, shredded

1 tbs lime juice

2 tbs soy sauce

2 tbs honey

Method:

1. To make the coriander noodles, cook the noodles in boiling water for 3-5 minutes or until soft. Drain and rinse under cold running water until cool. Drain again.

2. Combine the noodles with the coriander, mint, basil, zucchini, lime juice, soy and honey.

3. Cut the salmon into 2cm wide strips and toss with the honey and the pepper. Be very careful not to break apart the salmon in this step.

4. Heat a non-stick frying pan over high heat. Cook the salmon for 1 minute on each side or until the honey is golden.

5. To serve, place the noodles on serving plates, top with the salmon and enjoy!!!

Preparing the ingredients

Slicing the salmon

Cooking the noodles

All ingredients prepared 

Cooking the salmon

Tossing the noodles

This recipe is soooooooooooooooo good and would have to be in my top 10!! We had leftovers and both Emily and I have been unable to stop ourselves from going back to the fridge to get some more!! We would highly recommend it to anyone who loves a good meal.

Keep cooking, Twins in the Kitchen.