Ain't that peachy? The Labor Day Peach Pie Challenge

I must say, I have neglected my blog somewhat of late but there's nothing like a good old blogger challenge to get you back in the game! To celebrate the release of their new film Labor Day, Paramount Pictures invited a group of bloggers to take part in a baking challenge and I was lucky enough to be involved.

The Film

Based on the Joyce Maynard novel,  Labor Day tells the story of a depressed single mother Adele (played by Kate Winslet) and her son Henry (Gattlin Griffith) who end up sheltering injured escaped convict Frank (Josh Brolin). A story of love, passion, and betrayal, it's narrated from the point of view of the teenage boy. Frank turns out to be a decent fugitive and a dab hand around the house when it comes to doing repairs, repairing the car and making peach pie in the most iconic scene of the book and film.

You can catch Labor Day out in cinemas now and head to their Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/LaborDayFilm to find out more:  Though if you're like me, you'll come out craving a piece of juicy peach pie - luckily, here's one I made earlier....

The Challenge

Paramount asked us bake our own version of the Peach Pie based on the film recipe but with a twist. 

I'd decided I wanted to use Disaronno in my pie but to avoid it being too sweet, I decided to also include stem ginger and ginger syrup with a dash of cinnamon. Please note all measurements are approximate - I've picked up my mum's way of baking which is to eye things up and estimate! The pie has a short crust base and a puff pastry top.

The Ginger, Amaretto & Peach Pie

        For the base

• 125g of plain flour
• pinch of salt
• 55g of butter 
• 2-3 tbsp cold water
  
  
  The filling
  
  
  • 10 medium sized fresh peaches
  • 6 large pieces of stem ginger (chopped)
  • Approx 100ml of ginger syrup
  • Approx 60-80ml of Disaronno amaretto liquor
  • 130g caster sugar
  • 30g of cornflour
  • A dash of ground cinnamon 
  
  
  The crust 
  
  
  • After accidentally dropping my first attempt, I was a bit naughty and used Sainsbury's puff pastry for the lid - sssh!
  • 1 beaten egg
  
  
  Ready Steady Bake!
  
  
  
   
  
  • Put the flour, salt and butter in a large bowl and use your fingers to rub the butter into the flour until it looks like breadcrumbs.
  • Add the water in small amounts until the dough binds together.
  • Wrap the dough in clingfilm and pop in the fridge for 10-15 minute.
  • Pre-heat the oven to 200 degrees C 
  • Wash, stone, peel and slice all the peaches. Add the sugar, cinnamon, Disaronno, stem ginger and ginger syrup to a large bowl and mix together with your hands. Set aside and leave to marinate for 30 minutes.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  • Roll the pastry out and line the pie dish.  I use ceramic baking beans to blind bake the pastry for 8 minutes. Pop your feet up and have a cuppa whilst waiting for the peaches!
   
  
  
  
  • Drain the peaches with a coriander over a bowl to collect the juices and return the peaches to the mixing bowl.
  
  
   
  
  
  • Pop the juices in a small saucepan, bring to the boil and then simmer over a low heat until the juices become a thick syrup. Add the syrup to the peaches and mix together again.
    
  • Add the filling to pie crust and roll out the puff pastry. I use a funnel to help the steam escape from the pie, you'll need to cut a slit in the pastry where you want it to come through. Brush the pastry with the egg.
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
  • Pop in the oven and bake for about 30 minutes - I just kept checking on it until it was a golden as I liked. 
  
  
  
  
  
  Allow to cool and serve! The pie should serve about 8 -10 people. It works really well with creme fraiche, custard or the blackberry Frozen Fruit! (You can read about those here)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
   

Perk!er Gluten Free Breakfast Range

I promised myself I would try to be healthier this year and part of that challenge was trying out new foods. I'm luckily not intolerant to any type of food but having spent time with people who are and who have often struggled to find delicious food that was suitable for them, when Perkier Foods got in touch via SpamellaB, I decided to "take one for the team" so to speak.

The founders of Perk!er, Ann Perkins and her partner, Steve Turner, set up the brand in 2012 after Ann was diagnosed with coeliac disease.  Frustrated by the lack of gluten-free foods available, the pair decided to launch a brand to offer tasty alternatives and bring enjoyment back to gluten free food.

A few emails later and a selection of gluten free goodies were en route to Manchester for me to get stuck into. They certainly piqued the curiosity of my cats when they arrived!

 

 

The first thing you notice is how colourful, fun and exciting all the packaging looks - the gluten free options I've normally seen in the supermarkets are often in very muted colours of green and grey - hardly appealing!

The Porridge Pots

I popped these into my bag for work - their size makes them perfect if you're in a bit of a rush and need a quick breakfast on the go to get you set up for the day ahead. Made from gluten-free oats and skimmed milk powder, the pots come in Apple, Raisin & Cinnamon and Fruity Berry varieties containing natural sweetener, xylitol, whilst the Golden Syrup one contains sugar and natural flavourings.

They're really easy to make. Just fill them up to the marker line with boiling water, pop the lid back on and leave for 2 minutes. Any longer and unfortunately the consistency does become quite stodgy but this is an issues you'd find with other varieties in pots. I was expecting the Golden Syrup one to be very sweet but it was actually more of a subtle taste. The real winner here for me was the Apple Cinnamon & Raisin variety. It really bursts with flavour and I'll definitely be taking these with me on my travels.

Their size and sturdy design (especially the lids) mean they can get bumped around in your bag or suitcase without spilling everywhere, so you've always go a healthy, filling breakfast on the go. These would be great if you were staying somewhere that might not offer a gluten free breakfast option or wanted a decent breakfast on the train, plane or on the road.

 The Porridge Range

These were my favourite products from the whole selection, especially the Gingerbread & Raisin variety - I was pinching bits of the gingerbread straight out of the box! The porridge is really quick and simple to make - simply pop 4 heaped dessert spoons into a pan or microwavable bowl, pour in approx 175ml of water or milk and cook for about 2 minutes. Simples!

I'd definitely like to see more of the Gingerbread & Raisin across the other products, particularly the little pots so I can take it everywhere with me!

The Red Berry Flakes

I'm not a huge cereal eater and if I do, it's usually Weetabix with pure sugar poured on top with full fat milk! Perkier's Red Berry Flakes are made up of wholegrain flakes made from organic brown rice flour, organic buckwheat flour, freeze dried strawberry and raspberry pieces and have half the amount of sugar as the leading brand of Red Berry cereals - uh oh!

It took me a while to get into this - the first few mouthfuls tasted very bland to me. Personally, I felt it would benefit from a slightly better ratio of fruit to flake. The flavours together were really nice but there wasn't enough burst of flavour in every mouthful for me. The Perk!er guys recommend adding extra fresh fruit to the flakes - this is definitely something I'll be trying next time.

Get Creative

There are various recipes and tips on how to jazz up the Perkier range - I'm not much of a baker but I'll definitely be having a go at making the crumble and chocolate flake cakes - they look delicious and it's a perfect way for me to indulge my sweet tooth whilst still being semi-healthy!

You can find the full recipe range HERE

The range does include a Treats section for those of you with a sweet tooth as bad as mine and all their products can be found in Sainsburys, Tescos & Asda as well as other wholesalers - see all stockists.

A must have range for coeliacs, vegans, vegetarians or anyone just trying to eat healthier without compromising on taste!

In troth, there's wondrous things spoke of him – Coriolanus Review

I’m a huge Shakespeare fan. I’ve seen performances at the Royal Exchange, at the RSC in Stratford and literally squealed with delight when Black Milk produced Hamlet and Romeo & Juliet manuscript leggings (more please!)

When it came to my attention via the Guardian that the Donmar Warehouse was staging a production of Coriolanus starring Tom Hiddleston, Deborah Findlay & Mark Gatiss as part of a starry ensemble, I immediately tried to get tickets. Predictably it was sold out, but thanks to a new scheme – Barclays Front Row – limited front row tickets were available at a reduced price of £10 every week for future performances.

The Donmar is a space not too dissimilar to the Royal Exchange in Manchester. Intimate and small, it has the feel of the studio space you find in many large theatres today. Our seats were so close to the stage my friend and I could (and did) pop our feet up onto it.

I’d heard tales of fangirls filming and giggling through the performances but lucky for us, we seemed to have landed a good crowd, there to appreciate the Shakespeare and quality of the cast as a whole rather than fluster themselves over a single actor.

As with other Shakespearian Roman epics, I expected blood, guts, drama and big battles. With a bare stage, a brick wall and a lone ladder leading to the rafters, I was intrigued to see how Josie Rourke’s production would stand up to the last Shakespeare I had seen in minimal settings – the Manchester International Festival production of Macbeth, staged in abandoned churched with the audience sat in pews.

The brick wall is used to great effect providing a canvas for graffiti and castle walls to be scaled. The play is neither set in a contemporary era nor original Shakespearean, the costumes muted shades of grey, green, violet and black. The battle scenes, skilfully using the chairs on stage and explosions of fire, debris and smoke, provided a suitably convincing impression of a castle under siege. I also picked up that several aspects of the play had been cut and blow me, were those lines from other plays being slipped in? Whilst I understand a need to appeal a modern audience and crunch down the running time to fit in multiple performances, it did pain me a little and the play was a little worse for it.

We are first introduced to Caius Martius as a true war hero, resistant to bribery and a glorious victor for Rome but after he is bestowed his new title, Coriolanus, came the inevitable shower scene that had be banded about on the internet. My initial thoughts was it was merely to titillate the fans - although in a interview with Italian Vogue, Hiddleston claims it was to display the wounds to the audience that he will later refuse to show to as part of his politician duties thus proving their physical existence. Yet as Coriolanus washes the blood from his body, we see him for nothing but a man. Unfortunately, I think it could have been played more subtly for impact – Hiddleston’s dramatic cries and thrashing about, splattering the front row with stage blood and water, was too much. (At least at Macbeth, we were giving warning that various fluids would be projected and everyone in the front rows sensibly wore black)

Photo by Johan Persson

What is good about Hiddleston's portrayal is he captures Coriolanus’s inner turmoil brilliantly, a soldier thrown into politics and grappling with his anguish, disdain and anger and ultimately, his own destruction. Times of peace have no place for a war hero and the arrogance and pride conditioned through warfare prove only to be his downfall as a politician as the people of Rome shun him, provoked by the scheming magistrates (Elliot Levey & Helen Schlesinger) His relationship with his mother (the wonderful Deborah Findlay) borders on being almost Oedipus-like, with her constant adulation leaving him perilously close to having a hubris complex. For me, Deborah’s performance of Volumnia was the stand out of the show and I would find myself holding my breath without even realising as she spoke.

Photo by Johan Persson

Fans of Danish drama Borgen's will have spotted Birgitte Hjort Sorensen cast as Coriolanus's wife. Whilst the character itself is nothing to shout home about, I did feel an actress of her talent was slightly wasted in a role that involves little other than weeping or seducing her husband.The seriously overblown homoerotic tension culminating in a kiss between Hadley Fraser as Aufidius & Coriolanus also felt as though Rourke’s production had missed the mark on how Shakespeare intended the relationship to be portrayed.

Photo by Johan Persson

For me personally, alongside Deborah Findlay and Hiddleston, it is Mark Gatiss who deserve special mention, providing much needed comedy relief in his outstanding portrayal of Menenius. I was moved close to tears as he begged to see his best friend and is brought low, shell shocked, betrayed and rejected when Coriolanus sends him away with a single gesture of his hand. 

Photo by Johan Persson

The final scenes, in which a sorrowful Coriolanus, moved by his mother’s pleas, ceases his halt on Rome and ultimately sacrifices itself provided calm relief to the heighten atmosphere carried throughout most of the production. Only to be shattered with a brutal and bloody execution, stabbed whilst strung upside down in chains by his ankles, flooding the stage and Aufidius with blood and leaving the audience shocked and thrilled.

Overall the play did a good job of pleasing those there to enjoy Shakespeare and those who came for its leading man. Unfortunately, the play ends its run this week and tickets are no longer available but due to popular demand, several cinemas will be broadcasting the production again on 13^th February, 3^rd of March & 11^th of March.

Search on the National Theatre Live website to find out which of your local cinemas is showing it and on which date. I strongly suggest you catch one of these as currently there are no plans to release the production on DVD.

A performance not to be missed.

The Curse of CGI

Whilst being interviewed on BBC Breakfast this morning, Gary Oldman stated that he disliked CGI (ironic for someone who is currently doing the rounds for the new Robocop). He touted Lord Of The Rings and Thor as examples.

Lord of the Rings is one of my all-time favourite trilogy of films but I do agree with Gary Oldham to a point. The use of CGI as you move through each separate film, gets heavier and heavier until it's completely over the top by Return of the King. When you compare Fellowship and Two Towers, the special effects enhance the story and there is lavish use of expertly made up extras and to scale models. Return of the King throws all its money at CGI and it is the weakest film of the trilogy for it.

As for The Hobbit? Seriously, Peter Jackson? I love those films but you've got a fuck tonne of money to play with,more than you had for LOTR and you're wasting most of it on CGI. Not even good CGI. You couldn't even be bothered to get actors or extras to play Orcs anymore? In the audio commentary for the first Hobbit film, Peter Jackson states:

“You're going see more of it in the second and third movies, but I've kind of been using less prosthetic orcs and more digital orcs, and I'm really happy. I'm doing what I wished I could have done 12 years ago where we didn't really have the means or the technology to do it properly back then, but we do now. So I think our Orcs, certainly coming up in the next two films, are going to be pretty formidable and scary creatures compared to what we have done
in the past."

No, no, no, no. Is it he even watching his own films back any more? Lurtz was the scariest orc out there! (Or Uruk-hai to be more accurate). Look at the scary bastard. I had nightmares about him and I wasn't even a small child, I was 14!

The prosthetics made those films. It made those characters real, tangible and a hell sight more believable than the shoddy orcs we’ve seen in his later films (though props go to detail spent on Smaug). 

Personally I’m a huge fan of an early 90s films that were just getting to grips with CGI, using it sparingly (James Bond: Goldeneye) and still making good use of animatronics (Jurassic Park) or to scale models and reconstructions to minute detail interior sets to balance it out (Titanic). Those films are timeless and memorable – could we say that about some of cinema’s recent offerings? *cough* Superman Returns *cough*. 

Digital technology is moving forward and directors/producers continue to want to play with 43 fps, 3D and other emerging technologies but as a viewer, I find there are few films where this actually seems to work to effect and enhance the film experience (Avatar is a notable example of it working well). Some of the most mindboggling special effects in recent films are still done the old fashion way without the use of CGI – Inception? Yep, they really threw a gallons of water over Leonardo Dicaprio. 

The Joseph Gorden Levitt fight?

Christopher Nolan had his team build a rotating hallway.  

I’m heading to see the new Robocop film this weekend (though based on the reactions on Twitter, I’m not holding out much hope). CGI has to ability to make or break a film these days – perhaps it’s time to go back to the basics?

Time for a cuppa - FruitBroo Review!

Recently I came across an intriguing brand via one of my fellow Black Milk lovers (known as Sharkies), called FruitBroo. A brand new range of seriously tasty juicy fruit drinks specially blended to be served hot. 100% natural with no caffeine, gluten or dairy and only 15 calories a cup! It sounded WAY too good to be true.

I’m a huge fan of Twining’s herbal teas so was curious to see how these little fellas matched up! After nipping to a local Sainsburys to grab one, I gave it a go! The contents of this little bottles is a concentrated intensely fruity syrup that you simply add hot water to create a steamy hot mug of goodness! 

Yum!

Got to at least try giving the healthy thing a shot!

I took to Twitter to express my delight at this new discovery immediately and got chatting to the FruitBroo guys. They very kindly sent a box of the entire range winging its way up to Manchester the very same day! The day they arrived, it was chucking it down – the perfect situation to settle down with a hot beverage!

The packaging is brilliant – appealing, colourful and fun, which was no surprise when I later found out FruitBroo is the brainchild of Mike Brehme, the man behind Clipper teas! The FruitBroo guys claim you can get 15 cups out of their 100ml bottle and recommend using two teaspoons full. However after testing this method in the office at work, it didn’t go down too well – there was a resounding reaction of “too weak”.

So when I gave it a bash at home, I went a little wild and simply poured it from the bottle enough to cover the bottom of the mug! I tend to like things pretty strong! The first thing you notice upon opening each bottle is the fantastic smell that hits you. It literally makes your mouth water and I couldn’t wait to get stuck in. 

Apple and Ginger Spice

I’m a sucker for anything with ginger in but the ginger flavour isn’t particularly overwhelming with this mix. It’s got a very wintery scent to it but it actually tastes very sweet – the only way I can really think to describe it is Christmas in a mug!  Certainly a favourite for me and took me straight back to memories of the recent Christmas Markets in Manchester.

Elderflower and Lime

The delicateness of the elderflower gives this tea a very subtle taste and the tartness of the lime gives it a little kick to stop it from being completely bland. Personally not a fan as a hot brew but I do think, it would make an extremely pleasant cool drink in hot weather. I’ll definitely be giving it a go when if the weather perks up  - brewing it up, then leaving it to cool and adding ice and possibly a dash of sparkling water!

Honey and Lemon

This was my least favourite out of the range. Whilst you can smell the honey when opening the bottle, when transferred into tea form, it was completely overwhelmed by the lemon flavour. Unfortunately this one was definitely a thumbs down – I think I’d still prefer to make my own honey and lemon with actual ingredients instead.

Lemon and Ginger

Totally swinging the other way, this was another one of my favourites. The scent of gingerbread hit me the minute I took the lid off and I wasn't disappointed with the flavour. Warming, beautifully aromatic and tingling all my taste buds (and it seemed to help nip my cold in the bud), I've already polished off the whole bottle! Oops! (FYI, I only got 6 cups out of it but they are pretty big mugs!)

Peach, Pear and Honey

This is a really difficult one to put my finger on! The blend of flavours is very sweet, with pear probably being the most prominent but it’s quite hard to describe – a truly fruity blend! Emily, from my office, described it as 'Hubba Hubba after the flavour has gone!". Think the jury's still out on this one.....

Rhubarb, Apple and Cinnamon

I actually hate rhubarb. I don’t eat the stuff, I don’t like anything that has rhubarb flavouring and generally avoid it like the plague. So I was apprehensive of trying this particular flavour. Yet once again, I was pleasantly surprised. The apple and cinnamon flavour provides a perfect antidote and whilst it wouldn't be my first choice of flavour, I certainly didn't dislike it. It tastes a little bit like apple pie!

The Verdict

I’ve got to say my personal favourites were the Lemon and Ginger and Apple, Ginger and Spice (I clearly have some sort of ginger issues going on here!). I tend to find with fruit teas, I have to leave the tea bag in to get an intense enough flavour and it can often tip over into tasting TOO strong. Not so with these bad boys – you add as much or a little as you like and enjoy the perfect fruit brew!

The dinky little bottles mean these could make really cute little presents and they are currently retailing at £2.50 a bottle. What I’d really like to see from them in the future is a pack where you can get all the flavours together and perhaps a 250ml bottle for those of us who like them a bit stronger *wink wink*.

You can find FruitBroo in your local Sainsbury’s store in the speciality tea aisle or just order via the FruitBroo Website (free delivery if you order over 10). 

Follow Fruit Broo on Facebook/ Follow @FruitBroo on Twitter