Gingerbread Men

Ingredients

125g butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup golden syrup
2 1/2 cups flour
3 tsp ground ginger
1tsp bicarb of soda

chocolate chips
tubes of writing icing

1. Preheat oven to190 degrees celsius
2. beat butter and sugar until pale.
3. sift dry ingredients into bowl containing butter and sugar mixture
4. Add golden syrup
5. mix to form a dough
6. roll dough out between 2 sheets of baking paper to about 8mm in thickness
7. place in fridge for 10 minutes
8. Remove from fridge and roll out to a thickness of 5mm
9. using a gingerbread man shaped cutter, cut out the shapes and place on baking paper lined baking trays
10. decorate with chocolate chips
11. place in oven and bake for about 8 minutes or until golden
12. cool on trays and then paint faces on with writing icing gel.

These are a favourite for a bake-up! Caitie can do most things other than rolling out the dough and using the oven. We use a bench-top mixer and Caitie can put all the ingredients in the bowl. Her FAVOURITE parts are cutting out the shapes and decorating the men. Although eating them is a favourite past time of hers as well! 10/10! We love cooking these!

spinach and ricotta parcels

Ingredients

1 pack filo pastry
500g Fresh Ricotta Cheese
1 pack frozen spinach, thawed
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1 tbs dried basil
1 tsp nutmeg
1/4 cup grated cheese


1. Pre-heat oven to 190 degrees celsius
2. combine ricotta, spinach, eggs, basil, nutmeg and grated cheese in a large mixing bowl
3. layer several sheets of filo pastry, brushing lightly with oil between sheets
4. place desired amount of filling on filo sheets and fold into a parcel
5. repeat until filling or pastry has gone.
6. brush parcels lightly with oil and bake in oven for 20 minutes or until golden in colour.

Caitie LOVED making these! She could tip all the ingredients into the bowl and mush everything around with her fingers. She 'painted' the oil on the pastry and put big spoonfuls of mixture onto the pastry. She was then able to fold the pastry over (I had to seal it) an brush the parcels.
All in all, it was a better recipe to cook together than I thought it would be. I would have preferred to have used fresh spinach and basil but didn't have any on hand at the time but I always keep a couple of frozen packs of spinach in the freezer. Quick, easy and delicious! 9/10 for cooking with the kids!