We don't do Valentines in this house but if we did....

Me and Paul have never celebrated Valentine's day, apart from the cheesiness of it all, the anniversary of our first meeting is the week after so in true cheapskate fashion we love to buy cut priced flowers, eat in crowd free restaurants, and get to choose from all the leftover bargains! 

Yesterday, Paul had a raging hangover thanks to Mr Gaze and spent the day on the sofa. Not one to miss an opportunity to do nothing I thought I'd waste a day in the kitchen making something different.  Now my baking is usually fast, filling and not too expensive, a habit that started when I worked full time and had 4 lunch boxes to fill and the girl's friends to feed. But I'd been looking through Ruth Clemens Valentine baking recommendations and decided to try my hand as some of them.  She's a self confessed girly glam rebel, I'm not... so I thought it would be a bit of a challenge... my attention span isn't all that good!!!!

I decided to made a batch of these Vanilla Sugar Cookies They were quite time consuming, what with chill time and rolling them between greaseproof paper etc... but I stuck with it, cut them into heart shapes, pricked them all round with a fork, and they turned out quite well!

They are a bit sweet for my liking but looked pretty, had a lovely vanilla flavour (Thanks Caroline!) and a great crunch. So, what to do with all these cookies?  I decided to give some away to friends at church who make my working life that little bit easier. They've all been so supportive over the last couple of months. Working in a parish is definitely a team job, lots of people give their time to make it all run smoothly, this in turn makes my job easier... so thank you... I think they turned out lovely!  I made little boxes made out of old copies of Good Food Magazines and lined them with pink tissue!

After I'd completed these I thought I'd do a few for Paul... as I said we're not your regular romantic couple!!!

His tasty Valentine treat!!

Chocolate Chip Cookies

See more photos here

Very versatile, you can play around with the flavours, add smarties, nuts, plain chocolate chips, white chips and they all turn out just fine.

 

3/4 cup butter
3/4 cup sugar
1 1/2 tbsp golden syrup (use a Pampered Chef measure all to get the quantity correct!)
1 cup Self raising flour (make it a heaped cup!)
1/2 cup chocolate chips

1. Pre heat oven to 180c.
2. Beat butter and sugar together until creamy
3. Beat in golden syrup.
4. mix in half the flour
5. Stir in chocolate chips *
6. Mix in remaining flour
7. Work dough together with your hands then divide into 14 balls.
8. Place well apart on a medium sheet pan – don’t flatten **.
9. Cook for 12 minutes
10. Cool on the tray first then on a wire rack.

*Variations:.
Plain chocolate chip and orange zest.
White chocolate chip and raspberries / cranberries.
Chocolate chips and nuts.
Raisins.

 

** At this stage you can open freeze them, then cook from frozen for 14 minutes.

The recipe double very easily. I triple the recipe then