Common Magazine

COMMON VOLUME ONE

IN THIS ISSUE: BUTTER, MILK, GREGGS, CAKE.

COMMON MAGAZINE

VOLUME ONE: PERSONAL

FEED YOUR SOUL

WELCOME

We all have stories. We all have our pasts, our hates, our fears.

We have our own unique laugh, and our own way of crying.

We are all individual and yet we can all unite over one thing, food. The common denominator in our lives is always food.

It has caused friendships and breakups and everything in between. The food that we love is personal to us. In times of sorrow, food is always there. On my worst days there is nothing I want more than to curl up on the sofa (under mountains of blankets) with a hot bowl of creamy mashed potato laced with little jewels of cold butter while I watch Bridget Jones for the millionth time and just let all of my troubles evaporate away. Of course at some point I will need to deal with the problems that life is throwing at me but in that moment I am safe. Everyone has their ‘mashed potato’ – their own little bowl or plate of comfort. But in 21st Century life, our relationship with food is constantly changing.

Personal. Adj. 1. Belonging to or affecting a particular person rather than anyone else.

2. Of or concerning one’s private life, relationships, and emotions rather than one’s career or public life.

3. Relating to a person’s body

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GAGGED BUTTER CAKE VEGAN MILK GREGGS HASHTAG RECIPES A two-part poem bringing into question our perception of situations.

A discussion on whether butter is really as bad as it’s made out to be.

A triptych of photography celebrating cake and naked bodies.

A think piece on how modern veganism is ruining it for everyone.

A personal account and photo series exploring lactose intolerance.

A confessional in ode to the northern favourite that is Greggs.

An exploration into how Instagram has changed the way we eat.

Recipes based on the articles from Common, Volume One: Personal.

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The following two-part poem brings into question our perception of situations and how it can alter the way we perceive what is happening. Everyday situations can sound like hallowing experience if we give into our primitive, animalistic senses – especially within the context of food – and shows that both genders are equally as predatory.

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A silent glance. An empty stare.

Seductively laid, legs spread.

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I’ve played your games before, joyless amusement.

You draw me in.

Tempting. Enticing. Expressionless.

Silence.

Darkness casts a shadow, an enigmatic undertone.

Luring like wolves, Howling for your presence.

One step.

Two steps.

Closer. Faster. Nearer.

I’m coming for you.

Hearts beating. The anticipation.

Thud.

I’m next to you.

Do you still want to play this game?

Cold to the touch.

The warmth evaporated.

Images of the past stir in my mind, TIED will you live up to the rest?

I clasp your breast.

You don’t flinch.

Moist.

I tear your skin.

Would you like me to be gentle?

Juice drips.

Flesh pulled away.

I strip you.

You lay there. Bare.

Just a carcass.

I reminisce picking you.

It was dark. Cold night.

You stared at me.

I knew you were the one.

Gasps from the next room.

They’re waiting for you.

You’re the star today, sweetie.

I carry you through as the family applaud.

We feast.

A poultry paradise.

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AND GAGGED.

Predator.

That’s how they describe the opposite sex, but they haven’t met me.

I use my femininity to my advantage.

Do I entice you, soothe you?

I waited.

Bid my time.

Don’t worry, I will take it slow, I wouldn’t want to emasculate you now, would I? You’re nothing but a dumb lump of meat.

My little plaything, waiting for my touch.

I am your Mistress.

My Subordinate.

GAGGED AND TIED.

I will get my way, I always do.

Tied up, waiting.

Laid there, waiting.

I’m in control.

I have the oils ready.

An anointment of sin.

You glisten in the soft orange hue.

Now it’s my turn to wait.

The silence – exhilarating.

The wait, arousing.

Scissors cut through the ropes, Can you feel the blade cold against your skin?

It slithers up your back.

My smile beams down, like an all seeing god, as I slowly grasp the knife.

It glides through your flesh so easily.

Cut after cut.

Slice after slice.

Yet you don’t make a sound.

The silent martyr.

Sunday’s finest joint.

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Is butter really the Bad Guy?

Butter is a fundamental staple in my household. I use it like a seasoning. Bacon happily sizzling away on the stove? Add butter. A juicy whole chicken delicately roasting in the oven?

Add butter. Onions sweating away? Add extra butter. The thought of it has me salivating.

There is nothing that can’t be improved by the injection of a big knob of butter, its thick creamy substance oozing over what ever ingredient is lucky enough to have been chosen to receive it. But despite it being a gift from whatever gods preside above us, butter has been given a bad name.

Butter is always getting the bad press. If it were a person it would be Prince Harry, you love him dearly but he just can not seem to do anything right. You know he has the best intentions, but next thing you know you’ve got a block of churned dairy dressed as a Nazi on your kitchen counter.

The main argument here is that butter is worse for us than margarine. It contains saturated fats where as margarine contain unsaturated fats. Recently a study published by Harvard found that if you were to replace the saturates in your diet with unsaturated fat, you can lower your risk of heart disease. While that seems a simple enough answer there is much more to it. When comparing the ingredients of both, butter comes off far better with only milk and salt being used to create it. Margarine however contains an average of 16 different ingredients, including preservatives and colouring. It doesn’t take a scientist to work out that using an all natural product is much better for you than a man-made one. Furthermore, another study published in the British Medical Journal found that linoleic acid (which is found in many margarines) in fact increases the odds of getting heart disease.

It was Paracelsus that said “the dose makes the poison.” Too much of any one thing is surely to give you health problems down the line. The key to butter is moderation - a slightly hypocritical point for me to make considering I use butter in such amounts even Paula Deen would judge. It’s full of natural vitamins A, E, D and K to help keep us fit and fighting ready. And lets not forget it incomparably tastes better, its rich creaminess bursts with waves of euphoria in every mouthful. If both are supposedly giving you heart disease you may as well enjoy the taste, right?

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THE

CAKE CHRONICLES A TRIPTYCH

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Cake. An item of soft sweet food made from a mixture of flour, fat, eggs, sugar, and other ingredients, baked and sometimes iced or decorated.

Much like our bodies, cakes can be thin, lumpy or pale. Our decorations are not icing and sprinkles but tattoos and piercings. In a way we are just like cake, our skin tones are various flavours, our personalities are fillings. Loved by some and hated by others, you cannot truly have your cake and eat it too.

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ACT I 22

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ACT II 25

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ACT III 26

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Vegans don’t eat meat or use animal products. It’s a simple concept. It’s a life choice, and it’s one I made many moons ago. What isn’t simple are these ‘new wave’ vegans. They’re the topic of our discussion here. The social media obsessed, image concerned millennials who are giving up meat for the wrong reasons.

You will have surely met them. Their lives are full of contradictions. Firstly, they escaped to Thailand to find themselves, telling the man he can stick it while simultaneously recording their whole adventure on their iPhone and sharing it though their social media just to let everyone know how free they are. Since returning to the U.K, they have declared themselves vegan and have condemned capitalism in the same day as ordering a new leather ASOS jacket from their MacBook Pro. For them it is a fad, something that can set them apart from the meat loving crowd who are ‘too blinded to see the real picture’ – their words, not mine. It is a way for them to champion themselves above everyone else and become a voice amongst a million others. Often though, it is a spiteful and vindictive voice that spits out hate as often as it hashtags #vegan on its Instagram account. They create covens in which they brew their abhorrence denouncing vegetarians as failures, start hate campaigns on Tumblr and once a month burn a ‘dirty meat eater’ as sacrifice to their gods in return for a good quinoa harvest. (Okay, the last one isn’t true but you get the picture).

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They utilise their social media and hijack hashtags to create their toxic subculture where they attack anyone who isn’t dying as a martyr for the cause. It becomes less about helping the animals and more about their own egos. They must tell people about how well they’re doing at being vegan, as if by not mentioning it they are not actually doing their duty. Veganism can be a fulfilling and rewarding lifestyle choice if done right, but in a decade were we feel the need to shove our beliefs down the throats of everyone we meet, it has been less about our values and more about how we are perceived.

Through broadcasting their daily plight as if they’re some sort of modern day Rosa Parks, they only alienate themselves further. No one wants to join a cause if they think everyday is going to be a struggle and no one wants to associate themselves with Emily from Norfolk, a 21-year-old white girl who thinks her dietary choices are as important as the equality of the races. The affect of this ‘new wave’ veganism is damaging. ‘Vegan’ has become - for many - a dirty word as if it is something to be ashamed of. Their extreme actions alienate anyone who is thinking about converting and has created a clique out of the personal choice on whether they want to eat a pig.

Of course, there are many vegans who are nice, normal members of society peacefully getting on with their day without batting an eyelid. In a world that’s currently filled with so much hostility, why add to it by shaming people over their dietary choices? If you want to eat meat that’s cool. If not eating meat makes you feel better about yourself that’s also cool, but why make such a song and dance about it? Life is too short to be angry about the little things like this. Use your voices for something more productive. Campaign for equal pay or gay rights or whatever is wrong in the country, but just let people enjoy the food they want without you screaming in their faces.

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Why I still drink dairy.

“Hi, my name is Jack, I am lactose intolerant and it has been 2 hours since my last drink of dairy.” That’s what I would say if Lactose Anonymous was actually a thing. But it’s not.

So I have never said that. But for someone that shouldn’t be consuming dairy, I do it. A lot.

Lactose intolerance is where the body can not breakdown and digest the lactose within dairy.

In layman’s terms, I drink milk then fart a lot and cry. It’s quite a sad existence if I am honest.

If I want a bowl of cereal, I have to calculate where I will be when the cramps hit. Of course we live in an age now where I have the choice to not eat diary. There is soya milk in every shop, Freefrom ranges in every supermarket and restaurants offer a much more diverse range of dishes. There has truly never been a better time to be inflicted with an intolerance. But despite this I just cannot stop myself from chugging that white stuff.

Part of it is the rebellious teenager that still lives inside of me. He never truly got to express himself all those years ago so now he’s taking that anger out on my bowels. But mainly it is the stubborn old man in me. I refuse to deny myself the pleasures of a full fat dairy experience just because my body doesn’t want to digest it. Why should I have to miss out on all the great foods that our world has to offer? Have you ever tried diary free ice-cream?

It is a sad, sad excuse for the real thing. It’s a joyless bowl of cold sludge that doesn’t make the calories worthwhile.

Likewise, I’ve never been one to watch what I eat. I have never restricted myself because I’ve already had my quota of sugar for the day, or denied that extra slice of pie because my personal trainer has said no. It is just inherently not who I am. I come from a family of feeders. We like to make sure everyone is eating and if they’re not eating we will constantly offer until they cave in and accept. My mother is a woman, who even though I no longer live at home, will stock the fridge with my favourite foods on the off chance I pop round just so she can feed me. So to have to stop and painstakingly check the ingredients list of everything I want to put in my mouth just seems like a laborious task that – frankly – I am not willing to commit to. Food is all about pleasure, so if I have to deal with the pain to enjoy myself then why not?

I often find great comfort in times of crisis from the wise words of everyone’s favourite erotic novelist E.L. James: “There’s a very fine line between pleasure and pain,” whilst I cry.

On the toilet.

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Milk explores the personal relationship between food and humans, reflecting both the intimacy and the vulnerability that having a food intolerance can have. Through the use of the naked form, this photographic series asks us to open up to our own flaws as the subject has with his and invites us into an intimate circle of personal exploration and self discovery.

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I pretend to be a culinary connoisseur but there is nothing I love more than a Greggs.

Ask me a question about food and I will retort with some degree of a response. It will not necessarily be the right answer but you won’t know that. The trick to being knowledgeable in a subject is to first gain enough understanding. Secondly be so completely sure of yourself. And thirdly, blag the rest. It is a fine skill I have learnt in the last two decades as a restaurant critic.

It is an industry that has transformed dramatically. Partly this is due to the fall of the traditional newspaper. Gone are the days where the reader would cling onto your every word like you were some sort of Shakespearian deity. Now it is significantly harder to swindle a free meal out of paper in return for 500 words of the latest abysmal monstrosity that has released itself on the Big Smoke. But alas I am still one of the fortunate few tasked with it.

Now I didn’t pen this piece to gloat. It is a confessional. You see I spend my days writing deep pieces about how chia seeds are the new messiah of health food, or how the *latest* hipster eatery’s take on traditional West African cuisine is an innovation. But as I sit there tasting yet another restaurant’s incarnation of risotto (come on people, there is only so many ways you can improve it) all I truly yearn for is a Greggs. There is currently only 4 in Central London - that’s a Tory government for you - but any other high street is littered with them.

It is not hard to see why. They tap into what we as a nation love: carbohydrates. And believe me they do it proficiently. They know their market inside and out. There is something so familiar and comforting with a Greggs. You’re in safe hands. The greasy yet crisp pastry gives way to a promised land of elation that one wouldn’t expect to find in anything that cost less than £1.50. It’s expertly crafted and integrally British.

The pasties are unapologetic. They are very much aware of who they are. They don’t try to be something that they’re not. In a time where the culinary elite constantly aspires to be lavishly abstract, it is refreshing to digest something so grounded in realism. Not every meal requires an adventure, navigating the grain-fed beef puree and columns of deconstructed blanched carrots just to be greeted with an insignificant skid mark of a steak. Sometimes you just want to bloody eat. And that my dear friends is the simplistic beauty of a Greggs.

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The sun is beaming down to everyone’s joy except mine. I’m hunched over a table on a busy street trying to get that perfect shot. ‘Can I get some shade around here’ I snarl to the imaginary assistant as if I’m a formidable high profile photographer working toward an upcoming deadline. In reality, I’m sat outside a local breakfast joint making a spectacle of myself in front of early morning shoppers as I endeavour to get that golden Instagram photo. What it must be like to eat warm food.

It is something we are all guilty of in one form or another. From snapping your daily latte to that engagement meal with your significant other (while threatening them with abstinence if they dare to touch their plate before you have managed to encapsulate the moment). But has our obsession with immortalising meals changed our relationship with food?

Every time I bake - without fail - I will post a picture. Maybe it’s a form of vanity, maybe it’s a cry for attention or maybe its some need for praise stemming from an isolated incident in my childhood. I’m sure if Freud were still alive he would have a theory based around cakes representing our mums so we bake through an envy of not being the matriarch (or alternatively we just want to fuck cakes, because it’s Freud). But it is not just me, with over 102 million posts using the hashtag ‘#foodporn’ on Instagram, we have become a society obsessed with uploading our lunch.

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Food and sharing are deeply entwined with one another. The mother bird will share a worm with her young, the lioness will hunt prey and share it with the rest of the pride and as humans we will often share our food amongst our friends. There is that deep satisfaction in hosting a dinner party, your nearest and dearest gathered around, constantly congratulating you on every course that comes out a success. So it seems only natural this idea of sharing would transpire digitally as well. Why not tease your friends with a 30 second video of cheese bubbling on top of a carb-rich lasagne still cooking in the oven, or let them look at a decadently moist triple-layered chocolate cake you baked with your own fair hands? It is nothing but pure unadulterated filth and as a nation: We. Love. It. Of course for the person who uploads the post it’s as much about how they are perceived as it is about sharing. It gives them the chance to convey something about their lives to us, their humble followers who eat it up so easily. But like much of social media, just because they post it doesn’t mean its real. I know countless friends that will try on something in a changing room just for the Instagram picture and it’s much the same with food. I, myself, am guilty of cooking something just so I can take a photo of it, or plating it up a meal in little stacks and in sets of three for the aesthetic purposes instead of just piling it all on and lounging in front of the TV. One might say it is the millennials that are having all the fun, fanning the fad, and while it is true to a certain extent - (with 18-25s five times more likely to snap their sandwiches) – it’s not strictly a generation game anymore. It has reached across all ages, with dads asserting their dominance by proudly showing off their Sunday roast beef and mums using their soy vanilla lattes to let us know they’re still getting out the house. But what is truly fascinating about this phenomenon is the way it creates trends.

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Take for example the bagel, America’s sweetheart alongside apple pies and loving your ‘mom’. On the surface it is nothing special, just an alternative to a sandwich, but as of recent the bagel has managed to transcend beyond its own capability. A single bakery in Brooklyn, N.Y. found itself being shot into the limelight after Jonathan Cheban snapped their now famous Rainbow Bagel for all the world to see. Jump forward 6 months and there are countless spinoffs and #bagel has over 900,000 posts as they become en vogue once again. This is not strictly just for our carb-ringed friends either. Pizza, avocados and slow roasted chia seed topped oats have all become stars in their own right, building rich fan bases in the online world.

The movement is all about celebrating food, whether it is homemade or bought. It is giving people the chance to be able to show off their skills and create talking points with each other while becoming part of an online community (mainly) full of positivity. As a nation we are proud foodies so of course it only seems natural to want to gloat, and if at the same time it helps to boost your self confidence, then surely its for the greater good? Just remember every once in a while to put down the phone and let yourself enjoy the food while it’s still hot.

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RECIPES Whole chicken in a slow cooker By the Little Kitchen For the rub 4 tsp salt 2 tsp paprika 1 tsp cayenne pepper 1 tsp onion powder 1 tsp thyme 1 tsp white pepper 1/2 tsp garlic powder 1/2 tsp black pepper For the crockpot 1 onion, chopped 4 carrots, halved 4 celery stalks, cut in thirds 2 garlic cloves, peeled and smashed 1 whole lemon quartered 4 1/2 lbs whole chicken The rub Combine rub ingredients in a small bowl and set aside.Rub garlic all over outside of the chicken and then put the garlic inside the chicken.

Massage the rub all over the outside and inside the chicken. Add quartered lemon to the inside of the chicken.

The crockpot Prep the vegetables and place inside the slow 62

cooker. Place chicken on top of the vegetables.

Cover slow cooker and cook chicken on low for 6 hours. Cook until the internal temperature of the leg is at 70 degrees C. Remove chicken and place in a ceramic baking dish. Place baking dish in the oven under the broiler for about 4-5 minutes.

Allow chicken to rest after removing it from the broiler for 5-10 minutes.

Mother’s bread and butter pudding

By Mary Berry For the pudding 150g Mixed sultanas and raisins 75g caster sugar 1 orange, zested ½ tsp mixed spice 8 slices white bread, crustless 100g butter, melted For the custard 2 eggs 300ml double cream 150ml milk 2 tbsp demerara sugar The pudding Preheat the oven to 180C and use some of the melted butter to grease the dish. Combine the dried

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RECIPES fruit, sugar, lemon zest and spice together in a bowl and toss to mix well. Cut each bread slice into three strips. Take sufficient slices to cover the base of the dish and dip one side of each one in melted butter.

Lay them in the dish, buttered-side down. Sprinkle with half the dried fruit mixture. Repeat the layering, laying the bread strips buttered-side up.

Lay the third and final layer of bread strips on top, buttered-side up. For the custard, beat together the eggs, cream and milk in a bowl and pour it over the pudding. Sprinkle with demerara sugar, and then leave to stand for about one hour if time allows.

Bake for about 30-40 minutes, or until the top is golden-brown and crisp and the pudding slightly puffed up.

Homemade Butter

By Darina Allen For the butter 2.4 litres double cream, room temperature 2 tsp dairy salt, optional The butter Pour the double cream into a cold, sterilised mixing bowl. Whisk the cream at a medium speed in a food mixer until it is thick. First it will be softly whipped, then stiffly whipped. Continue until the whipped cream collapses and separates into butterfat globules. The buttermilk will separate

from the butter and slosh around the bowl. Turn the mixture into a cold, clean sieve and drain well.

The butter remains in the sieve while the buttermilk drains into the bowl. The buttermilk can be used to make soda bread or as a thirst-quenching drink (it will not taste sour). Put the butter back into a clean bowl and beat with the whisk for a further 30 seconds to 1 minute to expel more buttermilk.

Remove and sieve as before.

Unsalted butter should be eaten within a few days, but the addition of salt will preserve it for two to three weeks. Makes about 1kg butter and 1 litre buttermilk Variations If you wish to add salt you will need ¼ teaspoon of plain dairy salt for every 110g of butter. Before shaping the butter, spread it out in a thin layer and sprinkle evenly with dairy salt. Mix thoroughly using the butter pats, then weigh into slabs as before.

For maitre d’hotel butter 110g (4oz) butter 2 tbsp finely chopped parsley Few drops of freshly squeezed lemon juice The maitre d’hotel butter Cream the butter, then add in the parsley and a few drops of lemon juice at a time. Roll into butter 63

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RECIPES pats or form into a roll and wrap in greaseproof paper or tin foil, screwing each end so that it looks like a cracker. Refrigerate to harden. For different variations substitute the parsley with a variety of different herbs.

Red velvet cupcakes

By Nigella Lawson For the cupcakes 250g plain flour 2 tbsp cocoa powder, sifted 2 tsp baking powder ½ tsp bicarbonate of soda 100g soft unsalted butter 200g caster sugar 1 tbsp red paste food colouring, heaped 2 tsp vanilla extract 2 large eggs 175ml buttermilk 1 tsp cider vinegar For cream cheese frosting 500g icing sugar 125g cream cheese 125g soft unsalted butter 1 tsp cider vinegar (or lemon juice) Red sugar for decoration The cupcakes 64

Preheat the oven to 170°C, and line 2 muffin tins with paper cases. Combine the flour, cocoa, baking powder and bicarbonate of soda in a bowl. In another bowl, cream the butter and sugar and add the food colouring and the vanilla. Next add 1 spoonful of the dried ingredients, then 1 egg, followed by some more dried ingredients, then the other egg, followed by the rest of the dried ingredients. Finally beat in the buttermilk and the vinegar and divide between the 24 cases. Bake in the oven for about 20 minutes.

Leave to cool on a wire rack and do not ice with the frosting till absolutely cold.

The frosting Put the icing sugar into a processor and whizz to remove lumps. Add the cream cheese and butter and process to mix. Pour in the cider vinegar (or lemon juice) and process again to make a smooth icing. Ice each cupcake, using a teaspoon or small spatula. Decorate with chocolate sprinkles and red sugar, or as desired.

Slow-roast pork rolls with apple chilli chutney

By Sarah Cook

For the roast 2½ kg pork shoulder joint, scored and tied 2 tsp thyme leaves

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RECIPES 1 tsp fennel seed 1 tbsp olive oil To serve, soft bread rolls, buttered For the apple chilli chutney 1 tbsp olive oil 2 onions, 1-2 red chillies, deseeded 4 eating apples, diced 4 tbsp cider vinegar 4 tbsp caster sugar 1 thyme sprig, leaves picked The roast Heat the oven to 240C/220C fan. Sit the pork in a large roasting tin. Mix together the thyme, fennel seeds, oil, salt and pepper. Rub over the top and ends of the pork. Roast for 30 minutes, then cover with foil, reduce the oven temperature to 140C/120C fan and return the pork to the oven for a further 5 hours. Take the pork from the oven and increase the temperature to 240C/220C fan.

Discard the foil and put the pork back in for 30 minutes to crisp up the skin. For really crisp crackling, remove the skin from the meat, wrap the meat in foil to keep warm, and return only the skin to the oven for 30 minutes. Use forks to shred the pork from the joint.

The chutney Heat the oil in a large saucepan. Soften the onion

and chilli together for 10-15 minutes. Once soft, stir in the apple chunks, vinegar and sugar with 50ml water. Cover and cook over a low heat for 15-20 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the apple is very soft. Blitz half the apple mixture with a hand blender or food processor, before stirring back into the pan with the leaves from the thyme sprig.

To serve Sandwich in soft buttered rolls with apple chilli chutney, warm or at room temperature, with pieces of crisp crackling on the side.

Chicken pasties By the Hairy Bikers For the pastry 4.5kg plain flour 3 tbsp salt 2.25kg lard, diced 1.2 litres cold water For the filling 3kg chicken thighs, bone and skinless 150g plain flour 1.5kg onion, finely chopped 1.5kg swede, finely chopped 4.5kg potato, finely chopped 10 eggs 65

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RECIPES The pastry Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas 4. Blend the flour, salt, and lard in a large mixer until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs. With the motor still running, gradually add the water in a thin stream until the mixture comes together as a dough. If you don’t have a large enough mixer, rub the fat into the flour in a large bowl or clean bucket. Wrap the pastry in cling film and chill in the fridge for 30 minutes.

The filling Place the chopped chicken and flour in a large bowl and mix until the meat is coated in the flour.

Season to taste with salt and freshly ground black pepper.

The pasties When the pastry has chilled, divide it into 40 pieces of equal weight. Roll out each piece of pastry onto a lightly floured work surface until it is just larger than the diameter of a dinner plate. Make sure you do not tear the pastry. Using a dinner plate as a template, trim the edges of each piece of pastry to form a disc. Spoon some of the chopped potato onto one half of each pastry disc, leaving 1.5cm free at the edges. Spoon some of the chopped swede on top of the layer of potato, and then spoon some of the chopped onion on top of the layer of swede.

Finally, spoon over some of the chicken. Brush the edges of the pastry discs lightly all over with a little of the beaten egg. Fold the empty half of 66

the pastry disc over the filled half and either press the edges together with a fork, or twist the edges to seal. Brush the top of each pasty with more beaten egg. Using a sharp knife, cut a small cross shape in the top of the pasties through which the steam can escape. Place the pasties onto greased baking trays and transfer to the oven. Bake for 45-50 minutes, or until the pastry is crisp and golden-brown and the filling is cooked through and piping hot. When the pasties are cooked, remove them from the oven and set aside to rest for 5-10 minutes before serving.

No-churn ice cream

By Tessa Arias For the ice cream ½ a 397g can sweetened condensed milk 600ml pot double cream 1 tsp vanilla extract The ice cream Put the condensed milk, cream and vanilla into a large bowl. Beat with an electric whisk until thick and quite stiff, a bit like clotted cream. Scrape into a freezer container or a large loaf tin, cover with cling film and freeze until solid.

Variations Creating variations with this recipe is easy, simply pick your favourite flavours and experiment. Here

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RECIPES are a few examples of what you could do. Unless stated, mix the ingredients in with the basic mixture before putting it in the freezer to set.

Chocolate peanut butter 150g cocoa powder 150g chocolate, melted and cooled 4 tbsp peanut butter Mint choc chip 1 tsp peppermint extract 250g chocolate chips Green food colouring, optional Cinnamon roll 3 tbsp melted butter ½ tsp cinnamon

freezer. Midway through stir in broken chocolate orange segments.

Blueberry swirl 400g blueberries 3 tbsp sugar 2 tbsp lemon juice Heat in a small saucepan for 10 minutes until the fruit bursts. Cool then swirl into ice cream as it has partly set.

Cookies and cream 500g oreos, chopped 150g white chocolate Add the oreos into the original mixture, and swirl the melted white chocolate through after the mixture has started to set.

Rocky road 300g chocolate sauce 250g mini marshmallows 250g toasted almonds Mix all the extra ingredients in after the mixture in after it has started to set.

Chocolate orange 1 tsp orange extract 400g chocolate, melted and cooled chocolate orange segments, for decoration Beforehand melt the chocolate and add the orange extract. Add to the ice cream mix and place in 67