It is the New Year, we are all sugared out on chocolate and sweets are we not? So what better way to start 2019 than with savoury baked goods for you to enjoy. This is the idea behind my Friday Treat Box this week and possibly next week as I don’t feel I do enough savoury treats and I want a break from the sweet stuff too.
So today’s Friday Treat Box will contain Cheese Scones, Corned Beef Pie and Macaroni Cheese Tarts. However, these won’t be just any savoury bakes – oh no!. These will be baked by Love-to-bake so you know they will be baked with love. (so corny but I had to do it).
Let’s start with the Cheese Scones. I am giving you the choice of Cheese Scones or Cheese Scones “with a bite” in that there will be chutney of some sort added into the recipe. Believe me when I say that the scones with the chutney added to the dough are just fabulous and you really do have to try them. 🙂
Now let me tell you about chutney. OMG I have never tried to make my own chutney but I am going to soon when the weather turns warmer as I just love chutneys. I eat gallons of the stuff with everything. You see I am a savoury girl at heart so this is my guilty pleasure. I love trying new chutneys so when I visited Aldi yesterday to stock up on a few bits I found the chutneys and decided to buy a couple to try. I really do want to bake with them but that will have to wait as I am going to use what I have open first.
At Aldi I bought two new jars of chutney Beetroot and Horseradish Chutney and the Tomato and Chilli Chutney. They both sound intriguing, so much so, that I have already opened both of them just to have a quick try. My daughter saw the Tomato and Chilli Chutney found the Brie and has taken a liking to it. Converted she is converted to chutneys and I didn’t have to twist her arm to try it. 🙂
For the Corned Beef Pies and Macaroni Cheese Tarts I decided to go mini as they will fit in the box and I had a few foil tins to use up. Both the fillings are family recipes which I use a lot.
Mini Macaroni Cheese Tarts 
Mini Corned Beef Pies
The Corned Beef filling is from a recipe which my mother taught me when I was a teenager. This recipe was never written down just remembered in my head for years until I started baking Corned Beef Pies for my market stall many years ago.
The Macaroni Cheese Tarts are my version of a lovely Scottish tradition – or at least I think it is as I have only ever seen these sort of pies/tarts in Scotland. I have made Macaroni Cheese many times for my own children as they love it but over the years I have changed it as I hate all the washing up afterwards so now I make it all in one pan – less mess and cleaning up. Win, win don’t you think?
As for the shortcrust pastry which is a standard recipe with my own little twist because I don’t use lard in the recipe mainly as I am a vegetarian. Instead I make my pastry with Trex or vegetable shortening and the resultant pastry is just as good if not better than pastry made using lard.
I have loved baking these savoury treats today and I can’t wait for the next time I concentrate on savoury bites.