Category: Homemade Recipes

Recipe for Classic American Southern Creamed Chicken

I have a recipe book called The Complete Southern Cookbook which I have been dying to use since I got it several months ago. I kept delaying its christening because we haven’t bought a deep fat fryer yet. I mean what’s the point of attempting any soul food if I don’t have no deep fat fryer!?

But alas, our search for a deep fat fryer that’s not in puke beige plastic has not been successful. Couldn’t wait no more, so I poured through the book to find something that didn’t need deep frying. Classic Creamed Chicken. Perfect.

# – Classic southern creamed chicken.

The ingredients:

  • 2 tablespoon of butter
  • 1 can of button mushrooms, sliced
  • 1 onion, chopped
  • 4 garlic cloves, minced
  • 1/4 cup of dry white wine
  • 500 grams of skinless chicken breasts, cut into large dice
  • 1 teaspoon of salt
  • 3/4 teaspoon of black pepper
  • 1/2 teaspoon of paprika
  • 1 can of cream of mushroom soup
  • 220 grams of sour cream (I substituted with yogurt though, healthier & cheaper :D)

    • # – First, open the can of cream of mushroom soup and pour into the sour cream (or yogurt in my case).

    # – Whisk until combined. Then, set aside.

    # – Melt the two tablespoon of butter in a large pan.

    # – Add the mushroom, onions and garlic into the butter and fry until fragrant.

    # – Pour in the diced chicken.

    # – Followed by the white wine.

    # – Add salt, black pepper and paprika. Stir well.

    # – Lastly, pour in the creamed of mushroom soup + yogurt mixture.

    # – Stir until combined and simmer for 5-6 minutes more.

    # – Classic southern creamed chicken, DONE! Serve with homemade cornbread or toasts if you want.

    Creamy, delicious and addictive. Definitely soul food! Will post up the recipe for homemade cornbread soon, it’s really easy to make and goes so well with the creamed chicken.

    Happy cooking!

    The awesome healthy(ier) sticky date pudding.

    I want to write something funny and engaging to accompany this recipe but sorry, I can’t.

    I am currently in a situation of what you would call, “being in a rut”, where I self-loath and watch a lot of America’s Next Top Model, subsequently hating myself even more due to the inability to stop myself from watching such a pointless, vapid show.

    Tyra Banks in a white leotard speaking in robot voice to welcome her new recruits. Yeap.

    Anyway, this is a recipe for a sort of healthy sticky date pudding. I say “sort of”, because while there’s no cream there are still loads of sugar involved and hence the puddings are ridiculously tasty.

    # – The awesome healthy(ier) sticky date pudding.

    The black treacle and yogurt give the pudding a depth of flavour that you can’t find in ordinary sticky date puddings.

    Here’s the recipe!

    For the pudding:

  • 200g pitted whole dates
  • 175ml of boiling water
  • 75ml of cooking oil (plus some for oiling ramekins)
  • 175g of flour, plus some for dusting
  • 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
  • 1 teaspoon of black treacle
  • 2 eggs, lightly beaten
  • 1 teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda
  • 100g of brown sugar
  • 100g of plain yogurt



    • For the toffee sauce:

  • 100g of brown sugar
  • 25g of butter, cut into pieces
  • 1.5 teaspoon of black treacle
  • 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla extract
  • 100g of plain yogurt

    • # – First pour 175ml of boiling water over the chopped pitted dates. Leave to cool for 30 minutes.

    # – In the meantime, oil the ramekins with a paper towel and dust with flour.

    # – When the dates have cooled down, add vanilla extract. Followed by black treacle. Mash with a fork to form a rough puree.

    # – In a bowl, mix brown sugar and oil together with a wooden spoon.

    # – Add beaten eggs to the mixture and stir to combine.

    # – In a different bowl, add the bicarb soda to the flour and mix with a spoon.

    # – Pour 1/2 the flour into the sugar mixture and stir lightly to combine.

    # – Followed by 100 grams of plain yogurt. Also stir to combine.

    # – Next, tip the rest of the flour into the mixture and fold until combined. Don’t overmix!

    # – Now, pour in the date puree into the mixture and stir until combined.

    # – Divide the mixture into 6 oiled/floured ramekins.

    # – Bake in a preheated oven at 180 degrees celcius for 20-25 minutes.

    # – While waiting for the puddings to bake, get on with making the toffee sauce. First, heat up the brown sugar and butter in a saucepan over medium heat, constantly stirring.

    # – When the sugar has completely melted, add vanilla essence. Followed by black treacle. Stir to combine.

    # – Remove the saucepan from heat. Then, stir in the yogurt. Toffee sauce is now done :)

    # – Remove puddings from the oven.

    # – Serve in a bowl with the toffee sauce drizzled all over.

    # – Awesome healthy(ier) sticky date pudding, DONE!

    The pudding tasted absolutely sticky, luxurious and delicious. It’s also much lighter than it looks.

    They freeze well too! When you have a craving, just pop it back into a ramekin, cover with clingfilm (but making sure pudding doesn’t touch the clingfilm) and nuke for 3 minutes at Medium High.

    # – So glad I have a box of pitted dates right now in my fridge cause I need to make more!!!

    Homemade jaffa cakes recipe.

    One of my favourite British snacks, besides pork scratchings, is jaffa cake. The half biscuit half cake chocolatey orangey combo is addictive, perfect with a milky mug of hot tea. If you’re the sort of person that likes chocolate and orange together, you’d LOVE jaffa cakes.

    # – Jaffa cakes!

    Here, I get my jaffa cakes fix from Marks & Spencer but they are just mini jaffa cakes so they finish really quickly :(

    # – Mini jaffa cakes from M&S. Picture from pievcake.wordpress.com.

    They’ve recently started selling regular sized jaffa cakes but the price is a bit hard to justify so I decided to make my own jaffa cakes!

    For the cakes:

  • 2 eggs
  • 50g of caster sugar
  • 50g of plain flour, sieved



    • For the filling:

  • 1 packet of good quality orange jelly powder
  • 1 tablespoon of orange marmalade
  • 125ml of boiling water
  • 200g of good quality dark chocolate, minimum 70 per cent cocoa solids, broken into pieces

    • # – First pour the orang jelly powder mixture into a measuring jug.

    # – Pour the boiling water into it. Stir till powder is all dissolve. Mixture will be very thick, it is normal.

    # – Add the orange marmalade and stir again till combined.

    # – Pour the jelly mixture into a tray.

    # – Chill it in the fridge for a minimum of 4 hours.

    # – In the meantime, simmer some water in a pot and put a heat proof bowl over it, making sure the water doesn’t touch base of bowl. Beat the sugar and eggs in the bowl until pale and fluffy. It will take about 4-5 minutes.

    # – Then, gradually add the sifted flour while still beating the mixture.

    # – Pour the batter into a non-stick 12 hole muffin tin, each to about 0.5cm thick. If you don’t have non-stick, make sure the tin’s properly greased and coated with a light dusting of flour.

    # – Bake at a preheated temperature of 180 degrees celcius for 8-10 minutes.

    # – After baking, allow to cool slightly and remove the cakes with a rubber spatula.

    # – Leave them on a rack to cool down completely.

    # – When ready to assemble the jaffa cakes, melt the chocolate in a microwave at medium heat for 30 seconds. The chocolate will still look quite solid after you take them out of the microwave but as soon as you stir it, it will become gooey & glossy :)

    # – Scoop up some jelly that you’ve made earlier and spread it onto the cakes.

    # – Like this.

    # – Then, pour the melted chocolate all over the cakes. Chill in the fridge till the chocolate set, about 1/2 hour will do.

    # – Eat the jaffa cake.

    Obviously, these taste much better than the store-bought stuff. At first I thought 12 were too little, but they lasted between two of us for about a week. You can just eat one and be very satisfied :) Otherwise, multiply the recipe to your liking…hehe.