A Year In Redwood

This year two major factors – lack of finance and being snowed in – have contributed to the fact that friends will be getting home-made edible gifts this Christmas.

So, as this month’s Irish Foodies Cookalong coincided with my birthday and I was having dinner cooked for me, I thought I would contribute to the Cookalong in a slightly different way!  I started experimenting with my Christmas gifts!

So far I have made 3 different things – all from the Irish Times Magazine of a couple of weeks back.  Each and every one has been a success so far!

I’ve made the Mulled Wine Sachets as per Lilly Higgins.

I’ve made the Mendiants as per Marie-Claire Digby – my favourites!

And I’ve made the Sweet & Salty Crunchy nut bars a la Roisin Ingle – I was out-voted 2 to 1 and these were voted as favourites by my tasters!

Rather than make this a really long blog, I thought I’d share the no. 1 recipe with you tonight – that is the Sweet & Salty Crunchy nut bars.

These are so easy to make…

Ingredients:

• 200 g Milk Chocolate
• 100 g Dark Chocolate
• 125 g butter
• 1 x 15 ml tbsp Golden Syrup
• 250 g Ordinary Salted Peanuts
• 2 x 80 g Crunchie Bars

Method:

Line a medium-sized tin. Melt butter and golden syrup in a heavy-based saucepan.  Break up chocolate and add to saucepan.

Put peanuts into a medium bowl and break and crumble in the crunchie bars.

When chocolate mix has melted, pour over nuts and honeycomb.  Mix well.

Pour into tin, spread out and flatten.

Cover and refrigerate for a few hours before cutting into squares.

Eh voila!

Roisin recommends them with a glass of wine…. I can vouch for this recommendation! 🙂