Yesterday was Thanksgiving and I wanted Squidge to know that it’s a special day. Thanksgiving is my all time favorite holiday and I want to pass on that love to Squidge. I remember my mom saying years and years ago it was her favorite holiday. Back then I was like are you crazy woman? Better than Christmas?? Woman is on crack! Now I’m just like her. Oooh how I wished growing up that I wouldn’t turn into my mother and here I am just.like.her. (and happy I am about that too!)

I chatted to Squidge about the meaning of Thanksgiving and how we should spend some time thinking about what we are thankful for. She’s thankful for her friends. that is all.  I am thankful for many many things. I’m thankful for my wonderful family who have stopped giving me a hard time when I don’t call them often enough. I’m thankful for Wal and his love and friendship. I’m thankful for the friends I have. I’m thankful (mostly) for my fixer upper of a house.

Because it was Thanksgiving I thought I would bake some Thanksgiving inspired cookies and send them off to school. The plan was for Squidge to talk a little bit about thanksgiving but I think the rush to eat the cookies was great and well no thanks were given beforehand although there were lots of thanks afterwards.

Pumpkin Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

Equipment
baking sheets
2 mixing bowls

Ingredients
110 grams plain flour
120 grams rolled oats
1 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

375 grams sugar
158 mililiters canola oil
2 tbs black treacle
212 grams (1 cup) canned pumpkin, or cooked pureed pumpkin
1 tsp vanilla
100 grams raisins
optional:
212 grams (1 cup) walnuts, finely chopped

Directions
Preheat oven to 180. Have ready 2 greased baking sheets.

Mix together flour, oats, baking soda, salt and spices.

In a seperate bowl, mix together sugar, oil, molasses, pumpkin and vanilla until very well combined. Add dry ingredients to wet in 3 batches, folding to combine. Fold in raisins.

Drop by tablespoons onto greased cookie sheets. They don’t spread very much so they can be placed only an inch apart. Flatten the tops of the cookies with a fork or with your fingers, to press into cookie shape. Bake for 16 minutes at 180. If you are using two sheets of cookies on 2 levels of your oven, rotate the sheets halfway through for even baking. You’ll have enough batter for 4 trays.

Remove from oven and get cookies onto a wire rack to cool. These taste best when they’ve had some time to cool and set. They taste even better the next day!

These cookies are 6 pro points each.

I posted a picture of my pan on twitter with a message saying dinner and pan ruined. The amazing people on twitter came to my rescue with all sorts of things for me to try. My friend Vic said use Bicarbonate of Soda, another friend said soak it overnight w/ laundry tab then simmer for an hour to soften. Someone else sent me a link to a post that said use full strength cola. So I tried them all.

The first one I tried was soaking overnight w/ a laundry tab (or three) and then simmering it for an hour (or longer). I got this result. Not bad. It got rid of about 1/2 the burned on stew.

I then tried the bicarbonate of soda and boiling hot water. This one worked the best. As soon as the hot water hit the pan flakes of burnt stew started to float to the surface. I used a wooden spoon the scrape at the burnt bits and it really did work well. Wal used a butter knife to work a bit more of the stew off.

This was the result of the bicarb and some scrubbing. A pretty usable pan I think.

I then tried the cola as someone said it gets rid of those black bits on pans. They had used it on a stainless steel pan and it worked wonders for them. For the enameled Le Creuset pan it didn’t really do much.

So this is the end result. I’m pretty happy with is as it was well and truly burnt to a crisp. I think it helped that I didn’t scrape with anything metal unless I had to and when I did I was very very careful. The real test will be when I use it– if it starts to stick I’ll know if we were really successful.

I also have a paste I picked up at the shops that is supposed to help removed burned food to pans/oven/hob tops and I’ll do a follow up to this post once I’ve tried it.

So my recommendation on how to remove burned on food from a Le Creuset pan is use bicarbonate of soda, boiling water on the hob w/ the flame on low and scrape away with a wooden spoon. It took me about 3 hours total to get the pan this clean but worth it in the end. What do you guys think? Anyone else have any tips on how to clean burned food from a pan?

Ingredients:

1 package of Jus-Rol croissants 54pp per package
25 g of strawberry jam 2pp
4 oz light cream cheese, room temperature 1pp
25 g of icing sugar 5pp
1 egg left this out to save the points! (HA!)
1/2 tsp vanilla extract 0pp
1 egg + 1 tsp of water for egg wash see above!

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 375° and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

In a mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, mix cream cheese, sugar, egg, and vanilla. Cream until there are no lumps.

Unroll each crescent roll. On the fattest part of the triangle place 1 tsp on cream cheese mixture and one tsp of jam. Roll into a croissant shape.

Whisk together egg and water for egg wash and brush over each croissant.

Bake for 8–10 minutes until croissants are golden brown and inside is no longer doughy. Dust with powdered sugar if desired.

I found I had to bake them for longer than 10 minutes. The first one I took tried was still “raw” w/ the dough uncooked.  I think I left it in for another 10 minutes. I would suggest that checking every 2 minutes until you get it as you like it.

62pp divided by 6 makes them out to be 10pp each.  I found them to be just alright.  Definitely not worth 10 pro points! If you want a nice brunch item for guests then I would make this as it took no time at all to make and it was tasty.  If you’re on WW and want something sweet but low points avoid at all costs… but then I knew that from the beginning!

LEMON CHEESECAKE INGREDIENTS

FOR THE BASE

• 225g digestive biscuits
• 100g butter , melted

FOR THE CAKE

• 250g tub mascarpone
• 600g soft cheese
• 2 eggs , plus 2 yolks
• zest 3 lemon , juice of 1
• 4 tbsp plain flour
• 175g caster sugar

FOR THE TOPPING

• ½ a 284ml pot soured cream
• 3 tbsp lemon curd

Heat oven to 180C/fan 160C/gas 4. Line the bottom of a 23cm springform tin with greaseproof paper. Tip the biscuits and melted butter into a food processor, then blitz to make fine crumbs.

Whisk all the other ingredients in a large bowl until completely combined.

pour into the tin

then bake for 35–40 mins until the cheesecake has a uniform wobble, turn off the oven and leave the cake inside until cool.

When it is completely cooled, remove from the tin and top with soured cream. Swirl lemon curd over the top

eat.

This was the first time I’ve ever made a baked cheesecake and only my second cheesecake ever.  I learned with my last cheesecake(it was a no bake one) that I like baked cheesecakes and have been looking for a cheesecake recipe.  This one is super easy. I love that all the ingredients (minus the biscuit base) are combined in one go.

*the recipe was adapted from a BBC Good Food recipe.

Take left over sausages and broccoli and place it in small cake/pie pan. (I used individual pie pans but you can probably make it in a muffin pan).

take 2 eggs, beat it, add a little milk (optional), 1/4 tsp of baking powder and season with salt and pepper. Add egg mixture to the pan. Grate some fresh pecorino or parmesan cheese over the top.

bake in the oven at about 180C for about 20 minutes. You’ll know it’s ready when it’s firm yet spongy at the touch.

my only mistake was that I didn’t grease the pan well enough and it was very tricky to remove from the pan.

eat and enjoy!