Great Big Green Week Afternoon Coffee
18 – 26 September 2021 marks The Great Big Green Week - an initiative started by The Climate Coalition to celebrate action on climate change. This year, we in the UK have a huge opportunity to raise the ambition of plans to tackle climate change at home and abroad. The UK is hosting a major UN climate summit, known as COP26, in Glasgow this November. This means that getting involved with climate action focussed events throughout The Great Big Green Week shows the world that our community cares and wants to be heard.
As part of our celebrations for the week, as well as sharing our team’s favourite green spaces in Nottingham and highlighting interesting tools such as Let’s Go Eco to help you do your bit at home, we held a coffee afternoon.
Our team and stall at the Great Big Green Week Afternoon Coffee
Our Great Big Green Week Afternoon Coffee took place from 2-5pm, on 23th Sept 2021 at the Queens Walk Recreation Grounds Pavilion. The local community group NEMTRA (New Meadows Tenants and Residents Association) kindly gave us access to set up a stall, where we shared free tea, coffee and cakes with the Meadows residents. The key element of our stall highlighting the small climate actions you can make in your daily life was making our afternoon offerings plant-based and zero-waste. The creation of plant-based foods has a considerably lower impact on our planet, making it a step in the right direction for our planet (keep scrolling for the useful reads section for more information). Also, just about every piece of rubbish generated from the afternoon was recycled (cake labels) or popped into our compost (tea bags, wooden forks, napkins). Plus, our re-usable bamboo cups kindly gifted by the NET tram team meant that everyone who asked for a hot drink came home with a cup they can use again and again for years to come.
Just some of our cakes at the Great Big Green Week Afternoon Coffee
Recipes
BISCOFF ROCKY ROAD
LEMON DRIZZLE CAKE
HAZELNUT CHOCOLATE CAKE
STRAWBERRY COMPOTE YOGHURT CAKE
SEEDY APRICOT FLAPJACK
Did you try one of our recipes? Did you switch to plant alternatives such as soy milk, soy yoghurt or oil for your bakes? What did you think?
BISCOFF ROCKY ROAD
Ingredients:
400 grams White Chocolate (We recommend The Free From Kitchen White Choc Bar)
50 grams Plant-based Margarine
125 grams Biscoff Spread
150 grams Mini Marshmallows (we recommend Freedom Mallows Vegan Mini Pink & White Vanilla Marshmallows)
125 grams Lotus Biscoff Biscuits (chopped)
125 grams McVities digestive biscuits (chopped)
Instructions:
Line a 8/9″ Square tin with Parchment paper and leave to the side (you can buy reusable parchment paper in places like Lakeland)
In a Large bowl, add in the Chocolate and Margarine – melt on a low heat over a Double Boiler (a larger glass bowl, over a pan of simmer water, make sure the water doesnt touch the bowl), or in the Microwave on short bursts until fully melted – stir till smooth!
In a separate bowl, melt the Biscoff Spread in the microwave for 30 seconds or so or until runny, beat into the melted white chocolate mix.
Once its melted and combined, add in the Marshmallows and chopped Biscoff Biscuits and fold together – pour into the tin and spread till its even.
If you want the extra Biscoff kick, melt some extra Biscoff, then spread and drizzle over the top of the Rocky Road and sprinkle with some more Biscoff Biscuits, and refrigerate until set!
Notes:
You can easily half the recipe for less, and set it in a smaller tin, or multiply it up if you want even more!
These will last for a week in the fridge!
LEMON DRIZZLE CAKE
Ingredients:
For the cake:
100ml vegetable oil
275g self-raising flour
200g caster sugar
1 tsp baking powder
170ml plant-based milk (oat, soya, etc)
1 lemon, zested
1/2 lemon juiced
For the drizzle:
50g caster sugar
1/2 lemon, juiced
Instructions:
Heat oven to 200C/180C fan/gas 6. Oil the loaf tin with vegetable oil and cover with baking paper. Mix all the ingredients together in a bowl (flour, sugar, baking powder, lemon juice and lemon zest). Add the oil and plant-based milk and mix until smooth. If you don’t have any plant-based milk you can also use water!
Pour the mixture into the tin. Bake for 30 mins and then stick a knife through the centre to check it is baked through. If the knife comes out clean, it’s ready!
Cool for 10 mins in the tine, then remove from the tin and leave to cool on a rack (I use one of the grills from the oven as a make-shift cooling rack).
For the drizzle, boil down the lemon juice and sugar.
Use a toothpick to make deep holes in the cake so the drizzle will evenly soak the sponge.
Carefully pour the drizzle over the cake. I usually put the cake back into the tin for this, so none of the drizzle goes to waste!
STRAWBERRY COMPOTE YOGHURT CAKE
Coming soon
HAZELNUT CHOCOLATE CAKE
Ingredients:
225 grams plain flour
1½ teaspoons bicarbonate of soda
½ teaspoon fine sea salt
1½ teaspoons instant espresso powder
75 grams cocoa
250 grams soft dark brown sugar
375 millilitres hot water from a recently boiled kettle
90ml of vegetable oil
1½ teaspoons cider vinegar/white wine vinegar
icing of your choice (we recommend Betty Crocker’s Fudgy Chocolate & Hazelnut icing if you’re short on time)
Instructions:
You will need a 20cm/8in round springform cake tin.
Preheat the oven to 180°C/160°C Fan/350°F/gas mark 4 and pop in a baking sheet at the same time.
Line the bottom of your springform cake tin (you will need a good, leakproof one as this is a very wet batter) with baking parchment.
Put the flour, bicarb, salt and instant espresso and cocoa in a bowl and fork to mix.
Mix together the sugar, water, oil and vinegar until the coconut oil has melted, and stir into the dry ingredients, then pour into the prepared tin and bake for 35 minutes. Though do check at the 30-minute mark to see if it is already done.
When it's ready, the cake will be coming away from the edges of the tin and a cake tester will come out clean, apart from a few crumbs. This is a fudgy cake and you don't want to overdo it.
Once the cake is cooked, transfer the tin to a wire rack and let the cake cool in its tin.
Pop your icing on - fresh strawberries go well with this one!
SEEDY APRICOT FLAPJACK
Ingredients:
4 tbsp oil or plant-based margarine, plus extra for greasing
200g golden syrup or maple syrup
300g porridge oats
1 tsp ground cinnamon or mixed spice
70g sunflower seeds (or other seeds)
30g pumpkin seeds (or other seeds)
200g dried apricots (or other dried fruit), roughly chopped
Instructions:
Preheat the oven to 210C/190C Fan/Gas 6½. Lightly grease a deep 20cm/8in square cake tin.
If using margarine, melt it in a pan. Add the syrup to the melted margarine or oil. Mix in all the remaining ingredients.
Spoon into the baking tin and flatten with a spoon or spatula.
Bake in the centre of the oven for 15-20 minutes, or until golden and starting to firm at the edges. Remove from the oven and allow to cool.
Cut into 10 squares.
Our team and stall at the Great Big Green Week Afternoon Coffee
Our team and stall at the Great Big Green Week Afternoon Coffee
Useful reading
Foodprints for the future by Earth Day
The plant-based transition by The Ecologist