"Fast and Dirty" Sticky Toffee Pudding.

This is not the finest Sticky Toffee Pudding you will ever taste; but it is still very yummy indeed, and is without question the easiest, fastest, Sticky Toffee Pudding you will ever make; and you may even have the ingredients to hand. The Cake itself may be a little on the bland side, but the sauce is soooo good that when you pair the two, you'll have a delicious pudding.

UPDATED!!!!
The sauce just got even easier!

FOR THE CAKE:
4oz Dark Brown Sugar
4oz Self Raising Flour
4oz Salted Butter
2 large Eggs

FOR THE SAUCE:
(Quantities are minimum - you'll probably want more)
1 Cup* Dark Brown Sugar, packed
1 Cup* Double Cream
1 Knob Salted Butter

(*Just grab a teacup, I don't care what size)

1. Preheat an oven to 180C
2. Throw all of Cake ingredients into a bowl an beat or whisk together until the mix goes a shade paler (Yes, this is a victoria sponge, but with dark sugar)
3. Split the Mixture into 4 Cup-Cake Moulds and bake for 20 mins until a wooden skewer pushed into the centre of a cake comes out clean.
4. Meanwhile throw all of the sauce ingredients into a non stick pan, and bring it to a vigorous boil, then remove it from  the heat  - it will look too runny, but it's also to hot to eat right now, once it cools to eating temperature it'll be the right consistency.
5. If it's dessert time once the cakes come out of the oven, just pop the sauce back on the heat and warm it through (no need to re-boil). 
6. If it's for later, let the cakes cool and store them in an airtight tub - same for the sauce.When ready to serve, microwave first the sauce, then the cakes (be careful not to over nuke baked goods, you will make them go stale). 
7. Pop each cake in a bowl and pour over 1/2 a cup of the sauce.
8. Serve with a scoop of vanilla ice-cream, or some of the left over double cream.

(For those who are interested, the sauce originally had a cup of water in it, that got reduced out - I had thought that this would stop the cream from burning... turns out it doesn't burn anyway!)

Free Soup

Summer seems like an odd time for soup recipes, but with a little planning, a summer's worth of cooking can yield several meals worth of free soup for the winter!

You'll need a ziplock bag (actually more than one over time, but you'll start with one) to keep in your freezer, and you're going to be bagging things that you would otherwise have thrown away.

Everything needs chopping up into pieces up to an inch or so - but any smaller bits are fine.

When you cook meals all summer (all year even) bear in mind the following:

• Using broccoli or cauliflower?, chop up the stalks and leaves and throw them in the bag.
• Fresh peas? Pods get cut up and go in the bag.
• Cooked too much veg? Bag it.
• Too many potatoes (boiled, mashed or roast)? Bag. 
• Topped and tailed carrots or celery? - The ends go in the bag.
• Kept some veg a bit too long and it's "use it or bin it" day? if you don't have a use for it today, then chop it and bag it!
• That bit at the end of the onion that you just can't slice properly? - Chop it roughly and stick it in the bag.

Before too long you'll have bagfuls of frozen veg bits - when you want soup, fill a pot (or even better, slow cooker) with them, add boiling water (not quite enough to cover everything; It'll boil down), bring it to the boil and then simmer the life out of it! Once everything is soft, just blast it with a blender;

Free Soup!

If it's a bit low on flavor, you can upgrade from free soup to very cheap soup by stirring in some chicken  or vegetable bullion.

Season with salt, pepper, an (optionally) chilli flakes.

Orange and Mint Salad Dressing

1/3 Cup Olive Oil
2/3 Cup Orange Juice
1/2 Tsp Mint sauce
1/2 Tsp Honey (optional)

Just slap everything in a jar, put on the lid, and give it a good hard shake.