Recipe- Guiness Gingerbread

I've been meaning to make this for a while as I got Nigella Kitchen: Recipes from the Heart of the Home for Christmas but hadn't yet got round to it. I think I bought the bottle og Guinness for it in January!

Anyway this recipe is amazing in my opinion. I don't think I'll make gingerbread any other way now. It's nice and moist and keeps for a week if you wrap in baking paper and cling film. Anyway on to the recipe.

Nigella's Guinness Gingerbread

Makes about 16-20 squares

Ingredients:

150g butter
300g golden syrup
200g dark muscavado sugar
250ml Guinness
2tsp grounder ginger
2tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves (I didn't have this so used a little All Spice which worked fine)
300g plain flour
2tsp bicarbonate of soda
300ml sour cream
2 large eggs

Baking tin/tray lined with greaseproof paper. Grease the tin with a little butter first.

Method: 

1. Preheat oven to 170c
2. Put the butter, syrup, muscavado sugar, Guinness, ginger, cinnamon and ground cloves into a pam and melt gently over a low heat.
3. Take off the heat and whisk in the flour and bicarb. You will need to be patient and whisk thoroughly to get rid of any lumps.
4. Whisk the sour cream and eggs together in a measuring jug and then beat into the gingerbread mixture, whisking again to get a smooth batter.
5. Pour into your lined square tin, or foil tray, and bake for about 45 minutes; when it’s ready it will be gleamingly risen at the centre, and coming away from the tin at the sides.
6. Let the gingerbread cool before cutting into slices or squares (I must admit I did not wait!)

Jess xx

Spanish Chicken with Chorizo and Potatoes

We have this a good few times a month as it's super easy, using only one pan and is fairly cheap to make. This is from Nigella's "Kitchen". I use less ingredients as it's for 2 of us and i've also used lemon zest if I haven't got an orange and it still works great.

INGREDIENTS

2 x 15ml tablespoons regular olive oil

12 chicken thighs (bone in, with skin)

750g chorizo sausages, whole if baby ones, or cut into 4cm chunks if regular-sized

1kg new potatoes, halved

2 red onions, peeled and roughly chopped

2 teaspoons dried oregano grated

zest 1 orange

METHOD

Preheat the oven to 220°C/gas mark 7. Put the oil in the bottom of 2 shallow roasting tins, 1 tablespoon in each. Rub the skin of the chicken in the oil, then turn skin-side up, 6 pieces in each tin.

Divide the chorizo sausages and the new potatoes between the 2 tins. Sprinkle the onion and the oregano over, then grate the orange zest over the contents of the 2 tins.

Cook for 1 hour, but after 30 minutes, swap the top tray with the bottom tray in the oven and baste the contents with the orange-coloured juices.

Serves: 6