Friday, 14 February 2014

Easy Valentines Day dinner.

Sometimes just a little effort pays off big time! 

 Last night I combined easy and cheating to make a sweet and yummy Valentines Day dinner. It had been a long week of extreme heat followed by extreme rain... ie seven inches in 48 hours. Seriously it has been a shocker. But I know in the UK and US they are having a terrible time and I appreciate even our weather isn't as bad as that.

 I made Baked Camembert, which is delicious, and a little salad. For anyone who loves cheese this is a winner! 

I just used puff pastry. All you do is set your camembert on pastry and cover the top with cranberry sauce or a few dried cranberries then sprinkle over chopped walnuts...


Being Valentines Day I cut the camembert into heart shapes with a large biscuit cutter. The left over bits will go on a pizza this weekend!

Then wrap your cheese in pastry. Now you want no joins around the bottom or your camembert will leak out when it's runny. Don't ask me how I know this.

Have a pre heated oven and bake them until just golden. Then you want to let them cool for half an hour at least to firm up. If you serve straight away they are just runny. Being warm here mine took about an hour to cool. You want them JUST warm. 

My salad was pear and rocket. Pear goes so nicely with cheese, this just works. 

It was delicious! You could make these ahead and just microwave warm them for 30 seconds. Also they would be beautiful on a picnic. You could also bake a huge camembert and slice it for a dinner party.

For desert I cheated even more. I bought a small mud cake and cut it into hearts. It was a good gooey cake too. Then I used strawberries to make it look like an arrow had pierced the heart... maybe if you squint!


Well, it was all a success and seemed special. I followed my own advice and wrote Andy a card that he just thought was beautiful and read repeatedly. 

I want everyone to believe you don't have to spend big for things to be special. You don't have to spend hours in the kitchen either. Sometimes you can and might want to but normally who has surplus money or time!?

Have a lovely weekend that includes some rest and restore time! xxx
at

1 comment:

  1. Little Moo15 February 2014 at 23:18

    Annabel, this looks gorgeous,, I'm sure Andy appreciated it!

    I also took your advice and wrote my DH a note on special paper, 10 sheets of which cost be about the same as some Valentine's cards, but I got to say what I wanted to say.

    Thanks again for a lovely thought.

    Lisa

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