In honor of my impending departure from these lush and green lands, I thought I would make a Nova Scotia recipe for us all to enjoy. Nova Scotia is the province in Canada that I am from and where I am returning.

Known for it's great beauty and humble people the early settlers christened it after their home land. New Scotland.  I expect it reminded them very much of Scotland. Having been to Scotland now myself, I can see many similarities.

 

 

The dough for these is a very simple make, and involves the use of very simple ingredients.  Flour, old fashioned rolled oats, salt, butter, brown sugar and some baking powder.

You can add a touch of vanilla. I used a smidgen of vanilla paste as I am trying to use it up before I need to pack everything away. I don't think I can bring much in the way of food with me when I go, if anything at all. (I am so hoping I don't have to give everything up.)

You roll the dough out into a rectangle with a rolling pin.  I love my beechwood rolling pin. I have never had such a beauty before in my life, and it is probably one of the best rolling pins I have ever had.

It is nice and heavy and does a great job of rolling things out. You will need a rectangle about 5 inches by 11 inches in size and about 1/4 inch in thickness.

Once that is done you need to cut them. They should be cut into rectangles.  I did a long cut down the centre of the length, cutting it in half that way.

Then I made six evenly spaced cuts the other way. This creates 12 nicely sized oat cakes.

Place them onto a parchment lined baking sheet.  I used a spatula to do this so I didn't risk them breaking apart.

You don't really need to leave a lot of space between.  Just enough for the air to circulate so that the edges can get nice and crisp.

 

They do puff up a bit in the oven.  But they are lovely and crisp and will crisp up even more when they cool down.

Perfect for dunking. In a hot cuppa. In a glass of milk.  In a hot cocoa. In a horlicks. In an Ovaltine. In anything.  I bet if you were a hot toddy kind of a person they would even be great dunked in that!

You don't have to cut them apart prior to baking. You can just score the dough with a sharp knife into 12 rectangles right on the tray. 

Don't cut all the way through.  This will result in softer oat cakes.  Its all dependant on the result you wish for.

Soft and a bit chew, or short and crisp. In all truth delicious both ways. I am a crisp cookie/biscuit lover. So I am.

I am actually really looking forward to my move. To seeing family again and being near my babies and grandbabies.  To be able to spend some time with my pa before he goes to be with my ma.  He is 86 now and will be 87 in January.

 I pray every day that he lives long enough for me to be there and to have some time to spend with him. We do speak often on facetime, which is nice, but the real thing will be so much better.

I am looking forward to baking with my grandchildren given the chance. We might even bake these.  I have 8 grandchildren. 7 boys and one girl.

 

I have never gotten to spend any time when them when they were wee babies. I am hoping and praying that I will be able to spend some time with this last one before he gets out of the baby stage.

There is something lovely about wee babies. Those little noises they make, the way they snuggle into your neck.  The smell of their little heads.

I just can't wait.  I have high hopes and I hope they are not dashed.  Wish me luck! 

I am hoping to be gone from here by the end of November. I will have to isolate for two weeks before I can be with anyone.  I am a bit slow at getting things started, but expect that things will go pretty quickly once everything is set in motion.

 

Nova Scotia Oat Cakes

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Yield: Makes 12 cakes

Author: Marie Rayner

prep time: 10 Mincook time: 15 Mintotal time: 25 Min

Buttery, crisply moreish oaten biscuits. Incredibly delicious with a hot cuppa.

Ingredients

• 1 cup (90g) old fashioned oats (rolled/large flake)
• 3/4 cup (115g) plain flour
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp fine sea salt
• 1/2 cup (115g) butter, at room temperature
• 1/2 cup packed (100g) soft light brown sugar
• 1/4 tsp vanilla extract

Instructions

1. Line a baking tray with baking parchment and set aside. Preheat the oven to 180*C/350*F/ gas mark 4.
2. Whisk the oats, flour, salt and baking powder together in a bowl. Set aside.
3. Using an electric whisk, cream the butter until light and fluffy.  Add the brown sugar and vanilla. Beat for a further 2 minutes until well creamed and smooth.  Add the dry ingredients a bit at a time, until all have been amalgamated and the dough is beginning to clump together.  Knead for a few turns to bring it completely together.
4. Turn out onto a lightly floured board. Pat into a rectangle shape and then roll out with a rolling pin  to a 5 by 11 inch rectangle. Using a sharp knife cut into 12 evenly sized rectangles. (One cut down horizontally and six across.)
5. Carefully transfer to the baking sheet.
6. Bake in the preheated oven for 13 to 15 minutes until perfectly set, and the edges are golden brown. Place the pan onto a wire rack to cool completely. 
7. They will crisp up more as they cool. Store in an airtight container.

notes:

These are great with a hot cup of tea. You can also lightly butter them. Fabulous with slices of good cheddar cheese, fruit, lemon curd, jam, etc.

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The oats cakes from the mainland tend to be a bit thicker and softer. These ones are more like the ones from Cake Breton Island which tend to be crisper. Both a delicious, however I hold a certain fondness for anything that is crisp and buttery. 

 I have always loved Brownies. When it comes to baked chocolate goodies, brownies are probably one of my favourite ones. Having said that however, in thinking about chocolate cake, I think brownies are second to chocolate cake. 

I do have several very good from scratch brownie recipes on here. I think as I get older I am a lot less into things like this than I was when I was younger. I think perhaps when you get older you get a bit choosier about how often you indulge and what you choose to indulge in. 

 

I have used a brownie mix for these brownies today. I used the Ghiradelli Triple Chocolate Brownie mix that you can buy in Costco. It comes with three bags of mix in the box. 

They are incredibly rich and moist. My friend Tina buys them all the time so her wee grandson Freddie can help her bake. He just stirs the mix up and he thinks he has done something really special! 

 

You will also need some flaked almonds. They get scattered around each dollop of the pie filling prior to baking as well. 

That's it in a nutshell really. Other than that all you will need is what the boxed Brownie mix calls for. In this case it was oil, water and an egg. 

 

 

 

 

If you wanted to really make it authentic to the Black Forest, you could stir some Kirsch into the pie filling. Or, once baked, poke some holes into the brownies here and there and drizzle in some Kirsch.  

About 18 years ago we took one of our first holidays together into the Black Forest and I treated myself to a slice of Black Forest Cake one day when we were out and about. 

It is a cake that the Black Forest is very famous for.   Can I be honest here? 

Why not! I always am!  Either it was a very bad cake or Black Forest Cake is not all it is cracked up to be. I just didn't get the appeal. 

The lovely hot chocolate I enjoyed along side of it more than made up for it however. All was not lost!  

Have any of you had the experience of enjoying a slice of Black Forest Cake in Germany? I had really hyped myself up to enjoy this cake and it was really quite a disappointment! 

 

Black Forest Brownies

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Yield: 16 squares

Author: Marie Rayner

prep time: 10 Mincook time: 35 Mintotal time: 45 Min

You couldn't get much easier than this. These rich and delcious bars use a boxed brownie mix and a tin of cherry pie filling.

Ingredients

• 1 box of brownie mix (I used the Costco Ghiradelli triple chocolate brownie mix)
• Ingredients needed according to the brownie mix
• 1 tin of cherry fruit pie filling
• flaked almonds
• icing sugar to dust (optional)

Instructions

1. Prepare your brownie mix according to the package directions, preheating the oven to the correct temperature and buttering and lining a 9 inch square baking pan.
2. Spread the brownie batter into the baking dish. Mark it into 16 squares as best as you can. Pop a TBS of the cherry pie filling into the centre of each square. Sprinkle the almonds around the edges of each square.
3. Bake according to the package directions.
4. Cool completely.  Dust lightly with icing sugar, remove from the pan and cut into squares to serve.

notes:

These are delicious served warm with ice cream or whipped cream.

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So what are you favourite kinds of brownies? Do you use a Brownie mix ever? Do you like it? What is your favourite brand?  I normally make them from scratch and I am sure this would also work with a scratch brownie recipe. Here is my favourite Brownie Recipe. 

I have long said that my favourite potato is the humble potato.  That seems kind of fitting I suppose, seeing as I was born on Prince Edward Island, which is the potato capital of Canada! They grow a lot of potatoes on PEI! 

How could anyone resist these really, when it comes right down to it???  I love snickerdoodles.  I love gingersnaps/crinkles.  

The two together in one moreish biscuit/cookie? I'm in!  All in! I can't think of anyone who wouldn't be all in! If they aren't, they're not human. Just my thoughts on that matter!

Snickerdoodles are a vanilla cinnamon sugar type of cookie. The dough is rolled into balls and they are rolled in a mix of cinnamon sugar prior to baking.  You can find my recipe for those here. 

Gingersnaps/Crinkles are a ginger cookie, made with molasses and warm baking spices. They are rolled into balls and rolled in a mix of plain sugar prior to baking. I can't believe I have never shared my recipe for those with you! 

 

Once you have done that you mix some molasses and baking spices into half of the dough. You will also need to add a bit more flour so that the dough is not too sticky or loose. Because molasses is a liquid ingredient this is necessary.

If you are here in the UK, it can be very difficult to get molasses. I have always found that a suitable substitute is to mix together half golden syrup and half dark treacle. This works well.

Dark treacle on its own has far too strong a flavour.  Funny story. I know how you like them. Or at least I hope that you do! (Don't burst my bubble!) 

When I first moved here to Chester from Canada back in the year 2000, I was somewhat of an oddity. People were very curious about Canada, the wild West, the colonies. My accent was unusual as were my ways.

I had not lived here long when I was asked by the Relief Society of my church Ward would I do a presentation for the ladies on all things Canadian.  It would be a great way for me to get to know them and them to get to know me! 

I was very much still finding my way around ingredients here in the UK. I decided to make my Canadian MIL's gingersnaps for them. You didn't get much more Canadian than that!  Or Eastern Canadian for that matter.

 They were always deliciously crisp and moreish.  I spent all day making them, and I used what is called dark treacle over here in the UK. I thought it was the same thing as molasses. I couldn't have been more wrong! 

I dutifully mixed everything up and baked them, only to discover they were inedible.  Dark Treacle is so strong in flavour and just like eating smoke to my tastebuds. Thank goodness I had also made Nanaimo bars and a few other bits which helped to soften the blow of inedible cookies!

And because I hadn't actually had time to try one myself during the day, I hadn't tasted them before I served them. I was just taking for granted that they were going to be as delicious as they had always been. 😂😂 

There was a young sister in our Ward who was a bit simple minded and the look of disgust on her face when she bit into one was priceless. You know people like that are always very honest in their delivery of things and opinions.   

"These are awful!" She said. "I don't like them!"  Lesson learnt!  And then of course I despaired. How was I ever going to live without Molasses!

I come from a place where there is a Molasses jug on every dinner table. We have it for breakfast, lunch and supper and everything in-between! It's enjoyed on our pancakes, our biscuits, our breads and in many of our foods! 

Thank goodness I was able to find some (however over inflated price wise) at an American supply shop eventually. I also discovered that if you mixed treacle and golden syrup you came up with a very edible substitute!

Anyways, back to the Gingerdoodles.  The only fiddly part about making these is twisting the two doughs together.  Just do the best you can, roll them into balls and then drop the balls into the sugar.

Onto the baking sheets, and Bob's your Uncle!  Voila.  Delicious cookies that are a beautiful mix of two fabulous flavours!

 

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Yield: 4 dozen

Author: Marie Rayner

prep time: 10 Mincook time: 10 Mininactive time: 5 Mintotal time: 25 Min

This delicious cookie combines the classic Snickerdoodle with Ginger Crinkles into a fabulously moreish teatime delight!

Ingredients

Cinnamon Dough:

• 1 1/2 cups (250g) sugar
• 1 cup (120g) butter, softened
• 2 large free range eggs
• 2 3/4 cup (385g) all purpose flour
• 2 tsp cream of tartar
• 1 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1/4 tsp salt

Ginger Dough

• 3 TBS mild molasses (can use half golden syrup and half dark treacle in the UK)
• 1/4 cup (35g) all purpose flour
• 1/2 tsp ground ginger
• 1/2 tsp ground cloves

You will also need:

• 1/3 cup (65g) of granulated sugar

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 200*C/400*F/ gas mark 6. Line several baking sheets with baking parchment.
2. Combine all of the ingredients for the cinnamon dough in a bowl. Beat at low speed with an electric mixer, scraping the bowl frequently, until everything is well mixed. 
3. Divide the dough, placing half into another bowl.  To that half, beat in the molasses, flour and spices for the ginger dough, until well combined.
4. Put the granulatd sugar into a bowl.
5. Twist 3/4 inch pieces of each of the doughs together, and roll into a ball. Roll into the sugar and then place spaced 3 inches apart on the baking sheets.
6. Bake in the preheated oven for 8 to 10 minutes.
7. Let cool on the baking sheet for five minutes before scooping off to a wire rack to cool.  Repeat until all the dough is used up.  Any leftover of any one dough can be shaped and baked as above. Store in an airtight container.

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