Recipe: Orange & Almond Tray Cake

This orange cake is a delicious treat served for afternoon tea,  or as a dessert with dairy free icecream, cream or custard. It can be baked in a cake tin, or in a tray, as we have done here. 

Ingredients:

- 1/2 cup of (soft) butter substitute

- 1/4 cup of soy milk, or any milk substitute you prefer

- 1/4 cup of freshly squeezed orange juice

- The equivalent of 2 eggs made with egg replacer

- 3/4 of a cup of caster sugar

- 1 teaspoon of vanilla essence

- 1 1/2 cups of self raising flour. This recipe can be made gluten free however you may require extra flour to achieve the same consistency as gluten free flours can be lighter

- 1 tablespoon of orange zest, or the zest of one orange

- Slivered almonds to decorate

Method: 

- Using a mixer, cream the soft butter and sugar.

 - Add the egg substitute and vanilla and continue to beat.

- Add the orange juice and zest. Beat some more.

- Now add half of the flour and half of the milk and beat, then the remainder of the flour and milk and continue to beat the batter.

- Line your tray with baking paper and pour the batter in. Sprinkle the slivered almonds on top.

- Bake at 180 C for around 40 minutes and check with a skewer to ensure the cake is cooked through.

 

Recipe: Apple and Walnut Soft Cookies

 

This recipe makes a delicious soft cookie. You can also substitute ingredients if you prefer other flavours, such as pear, berries, sultanas or almonds.

Ingredients

- 3/4 of a cup of vegan butter substitute

- 1/2 cup of white sugar

- 1/2 cup of brown sugar (packed down)

- The equivalent of 2 eggs using an egg replacer

- 1 teaspoon of vanilla

- 2 cups of plain flour. This recipe can be made gluten free. You may find you need extra flour to achieve a cookie consistency as gluten free flour is often lighter than plain flour

- 1 teaspoon of soda

- 1/2 teaspoon of baking powder

- 1/2 teaspoon of salt

- two small finely chopped granny smith apples

- walnuts - some chopped to stir through the cookie batter and some whole to decorate the tops of the cookies

Method:

- Using an electric mixer, cream the butter and two sugars.

- Add the egg replacer and vanilla.

- Mix through the baking powder, salt and soda.

- Now use a wooden spoon to stir through the flour. 

- Finally, stir through the chopped walnuts and apples.

- Line a tray with baking paper and place spoons of the batter on the lined tray. We made larger cookies by using two tablespoons of batter for each cookie.  Place a walnut half on the top of each cookie.

- Bake the cookies for 12 to 18 minutes at 180 to 200 degrees, depending on the heat of your oven and how dark you would like the cookies to be. 

- Note that you should check the cookies during baking and see if they have spread out on the tray.  If so, wait until they are around three quarters cooked and use two spoons to re-shape them into higher rounds to be more cookie shaped. Continue to bake them.

 

Bat Walk in the Valley

 

A big thank you to Kelly Sheldrick from the WA Bat Network for hosting an incredibly interesting and informative event at the Sanctuary on Sunday the 15th of September.

We were excited to identify four different bat species on our walk in the Valley’s forest using bat detectors, and learn so much about bat ecology and conservation.

 

 

 

 The bat species recorded in the Sanctuary forest were:

- white striped freetail bat (this is the one you can hear without a detector)

- southern forest bat

- Gould’s wattled bat

- a long eared bat species (it could be one of three species, but difficult to separate acoustically)

 

Be sure to head to the WA Bat Network Facebook page to learn about the importance of bats and what you can do to help our bat friends! 

https://www.facebook.com/share/g/2RzVSD5x25Dh869w/?mibextid=K35XfP