My Awesome Omniblend!

When I was at the Cake and Bake show in London this year, I saw an Omniblend being demonstrated.  I love kitchen gadgets and at the demonstration I thought it was really great as it made smoothies, sorbets and soups so quickly.  I had seen Blendtec and Vitamix blenders on the TV that work in a similar way but are more expensive.

I was really excited when OmniblendUK said they would give me one! What an amazing early Christmas present from OmniblendUK!

It arrived last week, I unwrapped it really quickly.  I washed it up quickly - in the picture above you can see I have put some water and a tiny bit of washing up liquid in the jug and then I turned it on, rinsed it out and it was ready.  I looked in the fridge and decided to make a smoothie and then make a soup. As I like making up my own recipes, I just put together some things that I thought would taste nice.

 Here's how I made a banana and strawberry smoothie

• I mixed 4 bananas, a handful of strawberries and two dessert spoons of my own homemade strawberry jam
• And then I filled the jug to quarter full with milk.
• Then i whizzed it up all together for a few seconds to make a smoothie that was delicious.

Here's how I made some mixed vegetable soup:

• I put 3 large tomatoes , 2 whole parsnips, 2 carrots, almonds (a handful} two handfuls of spinach and a yellow pepper and cold water in the jug. With this great machine you can put vegetables like parsnips in whole and it blitzes them in seconds.
• Then I whizzed it up for five minutes
• The soup was hot and tasted great.  I had it in a flask for my lunch the next day.

 

Since then I have been experimenting with lots of different foods and flavours.  Today I made a mango and persmimmon thick shake with cream which was also delicious.  I have also made a chocolate and banana smoothie and a mango sorbet.  Over Christmas I will be writing up some more of my creations.

There are lots of recipes on YouTube which I hope to have a look at to give me some more ideas to try.  I already have lots of things I want to make! I have even found a recipe for fudge!

I am really enjoying my machine from OmniblendUK as it makes so many delicious and healthy treats.  I will be making my family and friends lots of lovely things in my machine over the holidays.

Thank you again to OmniblendUK for giving me a fantastic Christmas present.

Have a look on the OmniblendUK website if you would like to know more www.omniblendkitchenblenders.co.uk
 

 

World Bread Awards Winner

After winning the young section of the World Marmalade Awards, and World Jampionships, I decided to top it off with a trio and entered the World Bread Awards ....and I won!

My bread was called "Me and my sister: what boys and girls are made of"
In my face I put garlic, olives and herbs and made a snail to put on the top.
In my sister's face I put raisins, currants and cinnamon and topped it with plaits and bows.

I used a basic bread recipe and added in the flavours I thought would be tasty.  I also made an Indian sizzling sun bread which had very special spicy flavours in.  My brother entered two other breads and my sister entered a rabbit bread.


I went to the World Bread Awards ceremony on 7 October 2014 at St John's, Hyde Park.  The atmosphere was nice because all the people were happy. I was able to talk to lots of interesting people who have promised me opportunities to see bakers at work.  The food was really tasty.  I especially liked the sunflower bread from "Flour Power".



There were lots of food experts and celebrities there including the Baker Brothers, Francis Quinn, Emmanuel Hadjiandreou and Stephen Hallam.

 

 

 

 

At the ceremony I met the Baker Brothers who I have seen on TV.  Tom Herbert sat down with me and we created a special sourdough recipe called "St John's" as the awards ceremony as at St John's, Hyde Park.  He also offered me the chance to go to help in his bakery. Tom gave me a Hobbs Bakery dough scraper which will be great for bread making.

I talked for a long time to  Emmanuel Hadjiandreou because we have been trying out recipes in his book "Making Bread Together".  Me and my brother have both made Emmanuel's  Black Forest chocolate stollen bread.  My brother entered a chocolate stollen bread inspired by his book.  I have also tried his giraffe bread recipe. 


At the awards I also met Fiona Hamilton-Fairley from the  Kids Cookery School and found out about her charity that helps young people to cook and I hope to visit her soon. 

I also talked to Stephen Hallam, from The Olde Pork Pie Shoppe in Melton Mowbray who has also invited me to learn how to make pork pies.

I have always dreamt of having a Kitchenaid  so was very excited that I won that as one of my prizes, along with a slate trophy and some lovely "Merangz".  I even had the choice of colour of the Kitchenaid  and chose electric blue.

My dream is to write a children's cookery book using all the skills in bread, cake, pastry, jam and marmalade making that I have learnt over the last few years to get other children cooking. If anyone reading my blog can help me to make this happen, please let me know!

I would like to thank all these people for helping me with my bread making so far: Dan Lepard, Emmanuel Hadjiandreou    Baker Mike and (at the Cake and Bake Show)  Richard Bertinet.

At the end of the evening, all the winners had their photo taken.  It was an amazing evening I will never forget.  Thank you to Tiptree and all at the World Bread Awards.

Pumpkin Invasion

Today is the day I harvested my massive 6.7kg pumpkin to make jam, bread and chutney with!

growing the pumpkin

after picking the pumpkin



slicing the pumpkin 





Brilliant Blackberries!

 Yesterday me and Mum went to pick some blackberries for our Blackberry and a SECRET INGREDIENT JAM! ( I will tell you about that later.)
It was unusual to find so many blackberries as its only July. Mum told me,"Why are there few elderberries?"
I didn't know. Then she said, "Because we've been picking all the elder flowers for our cordial!"( Which is below in our blog) There was about 4 or 5 elder berry bunches. The Secret ingredient is... is... not to be revealed until the world jampionships!

My recipe:

450g of Secret Ingredients
450g of blackberries
900g of sugar
Juice of 1 lemon
100ml of water

1. Cook the blackberries and the secret Ingredients in 100ml of water and lemon juice.
2.Mix in the sugar and boil until set at about 104.5 degrees
3.Pour into warm jars and put the lids on straight away.

Top Tips:
1. Be kind and give some to someone special.
2. To check if the jam is set, get some out with a teaspoon. and put in dots on a cold plate that has been in the fridge .Put the plate back in the fridge for 2 min. Push a jam dot with your finger.  If it wrinkles it is set.


-xxx-
Jammy Baker 3

Excellent Elderflower Cordial!

  We saw lots of elder flowers growing behind our house, and it inspired us to go out into the fields to pick some. We followed a Vivien Lloyd recipe for elderflower cordial. http://www.vivienlloyd.com/elderflower-easy-preserve-bake/686/

All we needed was...

Sugar
Elder flowers
Boiling Water
Citric Acid
Lemons
Oranges
Some times if we have any limes, we use them as well as lemon and orange.( The 3 citrus fruits!)

Top Tips:

1. Make sure you leave it for 2 days to get a good flavour.

2. If you have picked a little flower head, see if you can find another little flower head to create a whole.

3. Don't pick anywhere where there's lots of cars because of pollution, and you might get hurt.

4. Give the elder flower heads a little shake after you've picked them, other wise you'll get bugs in your cordial! Yuck!

5. Be careful that you don't have hay fever when you go picking, because the pollen might upset you.

Ta daaaaaaa! Here is the result!






Written by Jammy baker 3

Herby Chicken Nuggets (with no junk!) for the Organix No Junk Challenge Blog Hop - Runner's up entry

Jammy Bakers number 3 has joined in the Organix No Junk Challenge with their own recipe with simple ingredients and free from junk. The Jammy Bakers make their cakes and pastries from simple ingredients like flour, sugar, butter and eggs. She won runners up prize for her simple recipe and received a yummy hamper of Organix goodies.

Here is a quick and easy recipe using a few ingredients.    It is healthy and scrummy!
It took 10 mins to prepare and 30 mins to cook

YOU WILL NEED:

3 chicken breasts
3 slices of bread (we used up three crusts)
2 teaspoons of herbs (we used Herbes De Provence)
Half a teaspoon of garlic granules
35 grams of melted butter

1. Slice up the chicken breast into small pieces








2.  Blend the bread into fine breadcrumbs in a food mixer or food mill

 3. Add 2 teaspoons of herbs and half a teaspoon of garlic granules to the breadcrumbs and mix well.

 4. Dip the chicken into the butter then into the breadcrumbs.

5. Put in the the chicken nuggets onto a teflon liner on the baking tray. Bake in the oven at Gas Mark 6  for 25-30 minutes until golden brown.

 
6. When cooked, serve with a nice, healthy salad.

7. Enjoy!


Top tips: Serve with cream cheese dip or any healthy dip of your choice!




Recipe made and written by Jammy Baker 3 (with a little help from mum!)

Children's Winners at the World's Original Marmalade Awards

Our winning entry

Big news - our "Blushing Blood Marmalade" wins the Children's Section of the World's Original Marmalade Awards! We scored 20/20 and it was described by judges as "excellent in every way" This means that we take the title off our big brother, but he doesn't mind!

Christopher also scored 20/20 and got a gold in the Merry Marmalade category with his Blood Orange with Grandad's cider marmalade!

We had lots of sticky red fun squeezing our oranges, slicing peel then turning all of this into the winning marmalade.  If you haven't tried blood orange marmalade it is a must! It is sweeter and rosier than seville marmalade. We make our marmalade using a secret recipe. However this will all be revealed next year in a section of the WI Kitchen Stories book.  For photos and a write up on the sticky fun we had during our marmalade workshop for Jessica and Louise see http://wikitchenstories.co.uk/marmalade-makers/


For more on the World Marmalade Awards see www.dalemainmarmaladeawards.co.uk.

Lovely blood oranges bursting with red juice

Champagne Marmalade Pancakes from the Jammy Bakers

  

Warm some and put it on pancakes - yum!

Take one pot of marmalade

The Jammy Bakers are taking part in a March Mackays blogging challenge.  Jammy Baker No 1 tasted this marmalade for the first time at the World's Original Marmalade Awards when he won the Children's section in 2013.  He got a taste for this marmalade and so when Mackays set a blogging challenge, he requested some of this to cook with!  We have been making lots of other recipes with marmalade we will share with you

Jammy Baker No 2 tasted the pancakes and thought they tasted fantastic and Jammy Baker No 3 has written the blog this time. 

For Shrove Tuesday,we made pancakes and decided that Mackays Orange Marmalade with Champagne made the perfect sauce to go with them. Here are the instructions:

Ingredients
5 tablespoons of Mackays Orange Marmalade with Champagne
250g (8oz) Plain Flour
3 eggs, lightly beaten
250ml (8fl oz) milk
250ml (8fl oz) water
75ml (21/2 oz) sunflower oil, plus
extra for frying

1. Make your pancakes.
Put flour, eggs, milk, water, and sunflower oil  in a big jug and whisk up quickly
Warm some sunflower oil in a pan
Cook your pancakes one at a time
  
2. Roll them up individually, Put two on each plate.

3. Put 5 tablespoons of Mackays Orange Marmalade with Champagne in the pan and warm until bubbling.

4. Pour a little over  the pancakes.     

Enjoy!:)


  Top Tips:
Serve with ice cream or cream!

Some of the Jammy Bakers' top bakes

Victoria Sandwich Garden cake

We all love baking, here are some of Christopher's top bakes

My first swiss roll oozing with our homemade jam

Award winning Cheese and chive hedgehog loaf 

Gluten Free Easter cakes and biscuits for a special Auntie

King Cake for Epiphany made for Church 

Thank you cake for our local butcher

Birthday cake for a friend

Mount Baker Meringue for school project

Musical Christmas Cake

Marmalade cake covered with honey icing for Clandestine Cake Club

Cheesy Herby Sausage Plait

Personalised boat biscuits for a friend's birthday

Professional looking cakes made on a visit to a local bakers

50th wedding anniversary cake

Biscuits for Seth's 1st birthday

Jungle themed cakes and biscuits