Easy Pizza Recipe | Food

I mean, easy pizza recipe, like what more could you want? To be honest ever since I moved back from Italy I have wanted to make a pizza and the other week I was in Tesco and saw these little pizza dough packets and thought "yep, me and the geek are making one this week"  obviously you can make it from scratch which is quite easy anyway but if you just wanted to do something quick then these little pizza base mix bags are quite handy!

So let's get started with all the essentials you'll need for a perfect pizza...

Ingredients

• Two bags of pizza mix - one bag makes about an 8in pizza
• 200ml lukewarm water - 100ml per bag 
• Pepper
• Onion 
• Mushrooms 
• Mozzarella 
• Pancetta 
• Prosciutto 
• Salami

But obviously add whatever you want, that really is the best bit...

Method

Before you get started just whack the oven on so it's nice and ready. Throw the pizza base mix into a bowl and add the water until it because a large sticky ball. The on a floured surface you can start to really work the dough and sorry but you're gonna have to knead it for around 5 minutes. After all the kneading, you need to shape it, we went for a more rectangular shape because it would fit in the over a little easier, once you have it shaped you need to put in in a warm place for around 10 minutes. 

Whilst the dough is resting then cut up all your veggies and cheese so you have that all prepared. We decided to cook the pancetta before adding it to the pizza just to make sure it was cooked properly really. Things to consider are the types of meat you use, you have to remember that salami and chorizo is an oily/fatty sausage so you don't want to use too much! 

Once the dough has rested, we added pasata which I prefer to use rather than tomato puree just for the taste, it's runny though so you don't need to be too liberal with it. We then added some italian herbs then went for the mozzarella, meats, veggies and sprinkled the pancetta on last. You then put it in the oven  for 20 mins and you're done! 

Buon Appetito! 

There we have it, a super easy pizza recipe! 

What are your favourite pizza toppings?

Moroccan Lamb Shepherd's Pie | Food

I thought I would share with you guys this utterly delicious Gousto recipe for Moroccan Lamb Shepherd's Pie that I selected for my box the other week. I selected 2 recipes but the shepherd's pie was easily my favourite and one I will definitely be making again! 

There are so many things that make this recipe very different from you standard but I love the fact the topping is sweet potato mash, I am obsessed with the stuff! It probably takes about 40mins to cook but It's totally worth it, a great dinner to have on a Sunday if you are looking for something that isn't a traditional Sunday Dinner!! 

Ingredients:- 

• 1 Chicken stock cube 
• 200g lamb mince
• 3 garlic cloves 
• 30g saltanas 
• 1 tbsp baharat
• 1 tbsp flour
• Mint
• 1 onion

• 1tsp sumac
• 30g pank breadcrumbs (personally I think this is too much, you'd be fine with just 15g) 
• 300g sweet potato

• 1tbsp balsamic vinegar 
• Lambs Lettuce 

As you can see I have grouped the ingredients, the meat and gravy kinda stuff, the topping and the side dish! 

Method:- 
This food should all cook together, once you have chopped up the chunks of sweet potato add them to boiling kettle water and leave them to boil on a medium heat. 

Whilst the sweet potato is doing it's thang, that's when you have to chop up the onion and garlic and start cooking the mince. Get the mince started first before adding the onion and garlic then once they have been cooking together you can add the baharat and crumble in the stock cube. Then after a couple of minutes you need to add the sultanas and 200ml of boiling water and the mint then leave it to thicken up. 

Move back over to the sweet potatoes which should now be a bit soft, you should be able to get a fork through them, when ready you drain the water then get mashing, add a little bit of salt and pepper in. Once that's ready your mince and gravy should have thickened up which means you can add it to a dish, then put the mash on top and spread it out a bit. Now you simply sprinkle some of the breadcrumbs on top with the sumac and it's ready for the over which only takes 15mins! 

For the side dish, just when you have taken the shepherd's pie out of the oven, simply toss the lambs lettuce with the balsamic vinegar and a little oil (to taste) and you are ready to eat it!! 

I loved this Morccan lamb shepherd's pie and will definitely be making it again! 

Are you a fan of shepherd's pie? 

Hot Cross Bun Recipe | Lifestyle

This wasn't originally what I had planned to be posted today but this Hot Cross Bun recipe just fits so perfect with Easter I thought I'd to it today. 

These Hot Cross Buns may not be the prettiest - I kinda lost the crosses because they were too runny, however it was a first attempt so I don't think it went too bad. I got the recipe from BBC Good Food  where I get quite a lot of my recipes from but I didn't realise how hard this one would be. Next time I'd definitely have a look around at some different recipes because this one took forever and I wasn't too happy with them, but the family were which I guess is the main thing. 

Let's start with the ingredients for the buns:- 

• 300ml full-fat milk, plus 2 tbsp more - I used skimmed milk I don't know why you'd need to use full fat
• 50g butter
• 500g strong bread flour
• 1 tsp salt
• 75g caster sugar
• 1 tbsp sunflower oil
• 7g sachet fast-action or easy-blend yeast
• 1 egg, beaten
• 75g sultanas
• 50g mixed peel
• zest 1 orange
• 1 apple, peeled, cored and finely chopped - I grated it instead
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 75g of glace cherries - I decided to add these

For the cross

• 75g plain flour, plus extra for dusting

Method

The BBC Good Food website suggest you've gotta boil the milk and them add the butter but then you have to wait for the milk to cool to hand temperature which bloody takes forever. I think next time I'd melt the butter and add it to the milk which would heat it up a bit but not a massive amount. 

Add the caster sugar, yeast, flour and salt in a bowl together, once you have your "hand temperature" buttery milk add it little by little to the dry ingredients. Keep all the fruit in a separate bowl for later.  I say add the milk little by little because I added the whole lot in the bowl and it was an utter nightmare because there was too much liquid, I couldn't knead the dough properly. Once you have kneaded it put it back in the bowl and cover over with some oiled clingfilm in a warm place for an hour.

Once it has risen, add all the fruit into the bowl and knead again to make sure the fruit is evenly distributed. I added glace cherries because I saw an M&S advert which had them in their hot cross buns so I just had to add them too. I must admit they make a lovely addition. Once all mixed put it back in the bowl and leave to prove for another hour

Then you can separate the dough into 15 little buns - leave to prove for another (!) hour, then add the crosses on them. I really would advise adding the water to the flour in very small amounts because if it's too runny the crosses just disappear, as you can see. Then pop them in the oven at gas mark 7 for 15-20 mins and you're done. You can add the apricot jam but I didn't actually think it added anything extra and made it incredibly messy to eat. 

The end result 

Have you got any other hot cross bun recipes that are slightly easier?

Flourless Muffin Recipe | Lifestyle

I haven't done a baking post for quite sometime have I? I'm going to try and make sure I do one a month like I was last year. As you may know, I'm eating super well now so cutting out the rubbish but still allowing myself little treats here and there.

I was on Pinterest recently and found this recipe for flourless peanut butter and chocolate chip muffins on Averie Cooks and it just sounded so easy to make I had to try it out. 


Ingredients:-

In true Honeypot Blogs style, I have changed the recipe slightly because I wanted to add less chocolate chips  and less peanut butter it does cut down on the calories a little too, so these muffins are under 100 cals.  I would always go for the best quality ingredients so peanut butter with no added sugar only naturally occurring stuff and dark chocolate chips etc.

• One large egg, 
• One medium banana 
• Creamy peanut butter - 4 tbsp
• Honey - 3 tbsp 
• Chocolate Chips - a handful
• Vanilla
• Baking soda - tea spoon

Method:-

This is the best bit you literally just blend everything together whack them in a muffin tray, pop them in the over for about 10-12mins and they're done! My recipe actually made about 9 medium sized muffins but because I altered the quantities I still believe each one should be around the 100 cals mark. 

The end result

They were super fluffy actually which I was surprised about but they are quite nice. Personally I couldn't taste the banana at all, which is great because I hate the taste of it.  

Have you got any super healthy recipes? Or have you tried this one out?

Double Chocolate Muffins | Recipe

Need I say more than Double Chocolate Muffins?

I'm going to share with you this incredibly yummy double chocolate muffin recipe but again I must state this is not my own, I found it online from the Dr Oetker website, so I am merely sharing the recipe love because it is good. 

A little while ago you may have seen my Fruit Burst Muffin recipe, those muffins were pretty damn healthy. But I had the devil in me today and wanted something massively indulgent so I opted to bake these Double Chocolate Muffins.

They look good don't they?

I just fancied something really sweet and I already had most of the ingredients anyway in my little baking cupboard so I thought I would take an hour to just faff around and bake. Now lets move onto the important stuff to bake these gorgeous treats. 

Ingredients

• 275 g Plain Flour 
• Baking Powder - 4 tsp
• 60 g Cocoa Powder 
• 75 g Caster Sugar 
• Medium Eggs x 2
• 225 ml Milk 
• 110 g Butter 
• Vanilla Extract -1 tsp

I know what you're thinking, I haven't added how much chocolate chips to add and this is where I get a bit creative, I don't like those store bought pre-made chocolate chips, I like chunks of real chocolate. So I bought two large bars of chocolate one white and one milk and used about half a bar of each and just chopped them up into chunks. I don't always like sticking to a recipe rigidly I like to improvise a little and add a little twist. I also used soft brown sugar in my recipe. 

Method

Sieve the flour, baking powder a cocoa powder into one bowl. Then in a separate bowl mix together, eggs, milk, sugar, butter and vanilla extract. There is quite a lot of milk in this recipe so I would advise adding the wet ingredients slowly to the powdered ingredients. The mix should be really gooey and a bit lumpy then add the chocolate chunks. 

Put into muffin cases in a muffin tray and whack it in the oven for around 20-25 mins on gas mark 7. 

Then Enjoy!

This recipe makes 9 really nice muffins, they're actually surprising very light not too dense and a little spongy which is really nice.  I actually added a little extra to the ingredients so that I could make 12 muffins. The reason I use chocolate bars because I love the taste of my favourite chocolate in the muffin, most chocolate cooks fine even if it isn't cooking chocolate so I always bake with good quality chocolate.

I really love baking and I don't do it enough, I'm going to try and make sure I bake at least once a month. 

Let me know if you have any great cake/muffin recipes for me to try next month?

Fruit burst Muffins | Recipe

This is a recipe that I found on the BBC Good Food Cake app, this isn't my own recipe I just love it so much I though I would share it with you guys! 

I tend to go through phases where I love to bake, usually it's when I'm feeling a bit down it takes my mind off of things. 

I've been trying to eat better because I'm just snacking on utter rubbish. In work we have a snack table that is filled to the top with very naughty treats so I've started bringing in my muffins. 

I found this recipe a couple of years ago and loved it because they are actually pretty healthy, or at least a healthier version of muffins. Has no sugar, minimal butter and lots of yummy fruit... 

Don't they look good?! 

Now the fun bit, the recipe... 

•225g plain flour

•2 tsp baking powder 

•2 large eggs

•50g melted butter 

•175ml skimmed milk 

•100ml clear honey 

•140g fresh blueberries

•85g dried cranberries 

•140g raisins 

•140g apricots (chopped)

•1 tsp orange zest 

•1tsp cinnamon 

Literally mix it all the wet ingredients together including the flour then pour the yummy fruit in. The mixture is quite sticky, so don't worry, you don't want it runny anyway. 

Simply put it in your muffin tin (with muffin cases) and whack it in the oven for 20-25mins on gas mark 6 and you're done. 

Sometimes I don't add honey, sometimes I don't add orange zest it really depends on what's in my cupboard and what I fancy at that time. They really are so nice. 

Let me know if you bake some of these muffins!!