Chipolatas with chocolate glaze and Hasselback potatoes (#UnileverHalloween)

After a long walk at Cogges earlier today we had a quick platter lunch - just sandwiches and fruit. For dinner I wanted to try a recipe for sausages with chocolate glaze. An original recipe appeared in one of those seasonal Waitrose booklets a year or two ago. I have snipped a page out of the booklet, and recently came across it, while sorting through my magazine clippings. I couldn't find any venison sausages, and got beef chipolatas instead. I have also slightly adapted the recipe, by changing some ingredients, and also served the sausages with Hasselback potatoes. I have added juniper berries, Knorr beef stock pot and a dash of red wine.

Chipolatas with chocolate glaze and Hasselback potatoes
Ingredients:
a pack of beef chipolatas (340g)
2 tbsp olive oil
1 onion
a pinch of caster sugar
1/3 tsp ground cinnamon
2tbsp balsamic vinegar (I used Maille balsamic vinegar)
1 Knorr beef stock pot
15 dried juniper berries
a dash of red wine
1 1/2 tbsp grated dark chocolate (like Lindt dark cooking chocolate)
for potatoes:
2 medium potatoes
2tbsp olive oil
1/2 Mexican flavour pot


Start by slicing the potatoes thinly across without going all the way down. The potatoes should still hold together. Mix olive oil with the Mexican seasoning and using hands, smear the mix all over the potatoes. Put the potatoes in a small ceramic dish or roasting tin, and in the oven preheated to 200C. Cook for about 40+ minutes. Check with a wooden skewer if they're cooked.

Fry the chipolatas in the oil, turning frequently until evenly browned on all sides. Transfer them to a plate. Slice an onion in half, and then slice thinly each half. Cook in the oil left from sausages. Add a pinch of caster sugar and cinnamon, stir for about 5 minutes. Add the vinegar and juniper berries, stir well and cook for another 5 minutes. Dissolve the beef stock pot in 120ml of boiling water. Pour over the onion, add the sausages and simmer for 5 minutes. Grate the chocolate and sprinkle over the sausages, stir well. Simmer for another 5 minutes.

Don't worry about chocolate making the sausages sweet. As it is a dark chocolate, it only adds richness and depth to the glaze. These sausages will be lovely served on the Bonfire night.

In this recipe I used two Knorr products: Beef Stock Pot and Mexican Flavour Pot. Mexican Flavour Pot is a new product from Knorr range of flavour pots. This is a seasoning paste made from red pepper, herbs (oregano, coriander), cayenne pepper, smoked chili powder, garlic, onion, cumin, black and white pepper and other ingredients.

For two potatoes I used 1/2 pot, and that was quite hot for us. If you enjoy spicy hot food, you might want to use the whole pot, but for me that was quite enough. The flavours of Mexican seasoning work very well with roasted potatoes. I think it would be lovely with roast vegetables like sweet peppers, fennel, tomatoes and other.

This is my second recipe for #UnileverHalloween culinary challenge.
I received a hamper of Unilever products to create a recipe suitable for Halloween and Bonfire.

See my Spiced Pumpkin Cupcakes for Halloween.

Spiced pumpkin cupcakes for #UnileverHalloween

My little man has been off school today, as he is not feeling well. He spent most of the day in bed, watching the CBeebies and sleeping. To cheer him up, I baked a batch of spiced pumpkin cupcakes, though it is still two weeks until Halloween.
The weather has been ghastly for the last few days, and baking cakes is always a good way of spending day indoors.
I love culinary challenges, and was thrilled to be invited by Unilever Kitchen to join in a Halloween and Bonfire night challenge, testing my cooking skills - spooky style.
They said:
"Now, we much prefer the ‘treat’ to the ‘trick’ here at Unilever kitchen , so we’d like to challenge you to whip up some ‘treat’ snacks and dishes to keep the family warm during the Halloween and Bonfire season. The most inventive dish will then be awarded the top place, with the creator receiving tickets to the London Dungeon Experience for four people.

To help you on your spooky challenge we’ll provide you with a delicious foodie Halloween and autumn themed hamper, full of mouth-watering seasonal treats, Unilever products as well as some Halloween inspired surprises. Whether it’s ghostly cupcakes, banging stews or frighteningly good soups, the choice is yours!"

Since the hamper arrived, my son Eddie kept asking me when I was going to bake the spooky cupcakes.

Earlier today I had a delivery of glorious pumpkins from Abel & Cole, and just had to use some of them in baking.

Spiced pumpkin cupcakes (makes 20+)
Ingredients:
140 g cooked pumpkin
1/3 tsp ground nutmeg
1/2tsp ground ginger
1/3 tsp ground cloves
1 tsp ground cinnamon
2 tsp baking powder
3 medium eggs
200g caster sugar
100ml olive oil
135g yogurt
1tbsp molasses
1tbsp golden syrup
240g plain flour
210g cornflour
80+ ml water
Start by cutting a small sized pumpkin into big chunks and scoop out the seeds. Slightly brush with oil and roast at 180C for half an hour. I used 3 pieces of pumpkin for the cupcakes ( the rest I served for dinner with venison steaks).

Remove the skin from the pumpkin pieces and mash with a fork in a big mixing bowl. Add all the spices, sugar and mix well. Add the olive oil, yogurt, molasses and golden syrup, and mix well again. Finally add the flour and cornflour. At this point the cake mix will be very thick. Add water a little bit at a time, until you have a smoother consistency, which is easier to ladle into the muffin cases.
Place the muffin cases in a big muffin tin and pour the cake mix leaving 1cm at the top.
I also used a silicone cupcake mold, as my son Eddie was very eager to try fancy-shaped cupcakes.
Bake the muffins/cupcakes at 180C until the wooden skewer comes clean (about 20+ minutes).

Let the cupcakes cool completely before decorating with the glace frosting.
For the frosting mix 250g icing sugar with 4tbsp lemon juice and 2tbsp coconut oil. You might want to add a little bit of water, to make it easier to spread over the cupcakes. Also add a bit of food colouring. The actual frosting is much more orange in real life than in the photos, but the light is abysmal today, and I couldn't get it right when I took the photos.
I used Dr Oetker icing writing pens to add a few touches.

We also did some ghostie cupcakes by adding the marshmallows on top of the frosting and painting faces with Dr Oetker icing pens.

Baking with veggies is this month's theme for Tea Time Treats hosted by Lavender and Lovage and The Hedgecombers.