Home-made croissants

I embarked on an adventure this weekend and attempted to make croissants from scratch. I had lots of fun making the pastry - definitely the thing to do on a cold rainy weekend. Except it was a hot, sunny weekend so I missed out on the good weather! I didn't mind - what could be more fun than going back to the kitchen every few hours to do something more to progress the pastry?

I found that the proving step is very important (otherwise they're heavy and doughy, much like bread if you don't prove it), and it's important to keep it as cold as possible, as with other pastries.

I inadvertently made mini croissants because I hadn't quite worked out how long the triangles have to be to make ones of normal size. However, they were very cute and my colleagues certainly enjoyed sampling them!

I used the instructions from here. Annoyingly, the ingredients are on the first page and the instructions on the other pages, so had to keep going back to refer to the ingredients. Apart from that, I don't think I can improve upon the recipe, so I'll just leave you with a couple of photos.

Banana nutmeg waffles

The waffle story began, rather unexpectedly, in Iceland. Hubbie and I went there on holiday to look at geysers and the blue lagoon. When we awoke in our hotel on the first morning and went downstairs for breakfast, the smell of waffles wafted (I wonder if the smell of waffles has anything to do with the word "wafted"?!) up the stairs. We were very pleased to see a waffle iron and batter and made ourselves some waffles - we've been talking about them ever since and Hubbie bought me a waffle-iron for Christmas (romantic isn't he?). This morning I made banana waffles. It is a failsafe recipe and we always have bananas in the house.

Banana nutmeg waffles 

Makes 4 waffles. This recipe came from here and is in American cup measurements, but all you have to do is go and buy cup measurers, and it opens up a world of possibilities! I modified it slightly by adding wholemeal flour – I think it adds sweetness.


3/4 cup wholemeal flour
1/2 cups plain flour
3 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 pinch ground nutmeg
1 cup semi-skimmed milk
1 egg
2 ripe bananas, sliced


Preheat waffle iron. In a large mixing bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, salt and nutmeg. Pour milk into a jug or bowl and add the egg and sliced bananas. Mash the bananas into the milk using a fork and mix the egg. Add the wet ingredients to the dry and stir to combine. The mixture is much thicker than normal pancake batter so don't be tempted to add more liquid.


Spray preheated waffle iron with cooking spray. Pour two tablespoons of the waffle batter onto the hot waffle iron.  Cook until golden brown (about 2 minutes in my electric waffle iron). Serve hot with fruit and syrup.

Wholemeal blueberry pancakes

I fancied eating some yummy pancakes on Saturday and I had some leftover blueberries so I made wholemeal, American-style pancakes and ate them with leftover strawberries and golden syrup - yum!

I actually ended up making half this amount, because I'm trying not to be greedy at the moment. I did manage to use half an egg... Sadly, the other half was wasted, but at least it didn't go on my waist (haha!).

Wholemeal blueberry pancakes

This recipe is adapted from the BBC Good Food website.

200g wholemeal flour

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

1 egg

300 ml milk

Blueberries (as many as you like! within reason...)

oil for the pan

Mix together the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda and a pinch of salt in a large bowl. Beat the egg with the milk, make a well in the centre of the dry ingredients and whisk in the milk to make a thick smooth batter. Gently stir in half the blueberries

Heat a teaspoon of oil in a large non-stick frying pan. Drop a large tablespoonful of the batter per pancake into the pan to make pancakes about 4 inches across. Make three or four pancakes at a time. Cook for about 3 minutes over a medium heat until small bubbles appear on the surface of each pancake, then turn and cook another 2-3 minutes until golden.