Latest news with #EloiseHead
The Independent
04-03-2025
- General
- The Independent
Flipping the script: Two new pancake recipes for Shrove Tuesday
Arguably you can't go too wrong with the classics on Shrove Tuesday. Golden, lacy-edged pancakes doused in sugar and lemon are, of course, simple and delicious. Come 4 March, most of us will be whisking together 100g plain flour with two eggs, 300ml whole milk, a decent pinch of salt and a tablespoon of vegetable oil, then resting the batter for half an hour before popping ladlefuls into a hot buttery pan. But sometimes, you just want to mix things up. Maybe you fancy a change. Maybe you don't want to have to deal with the drama of the flip going wrong and dinner ending up stuck to the floor. Maybe you don't want to just eat a tonne of pure batter and sugar for supper (no judgement). So, whether you're looking for a savoury pancake option that'll actually fill you up, or you want (whisper it) an American-style pancake you can just chuck in the air fryer, we have the recipes for you. Sweet: Blueberry pancakes done in the air fryer 'These pancakes are super thick and fluffy and so easy to make. They're bursting with sweet, juicy blueberries, and they're absolutely delicious,' says Eloise Head, author of Fitwaffle's Easy Airfryer. Makes: 6 Special equipment: Six 10cm silicone moulds Ingredients: 80g (5tbsp) full-fat (5%) Greek yoghurt 150ml semi-skimmed or skimmed milk 1 medium egg 15g salted butter, melted 1 tbsp maple syrup 120g plain flour 1 tbsp caster sugar ½ tsp baking powder ½ tsp bicarbonate of soda Good pinch of salt 100g fresh blueberries Cooking oil spray To serve (optional): Fresh berries Whipped cream Maple syrup, for drizzling Method: 1. In a large bowl, using a balloon whisk, mix together the Greek yogurt and milk until combined, then add the egg, melted butter and maple syrup and whisk until smooth. 2. Add all the dry ingredients and fold in until smooth and lump-free, then fold in the blueberries. Leave the batter to rest for 15 minutes. 3. Preheat the air fryer to 160C (320F). 4. Spray the silicone moulds with oil making sure the base and edges are coated so the pancakes don't stick. 5. Scoop half a cup of batter into each mould and smooth it out evenly. 6. Air fry for eight to 10 minutes, then carefully flip them over out of their moulds and cook for another three to four minutes until golden brown and cooked through. 7. Serve straight away with your favourite toppings, if using. I love to use berries, whipped cream and maple syrup. Enjoy! Recipe from 'Fitwaffle's Easy Airfryer' by Eloise Head (Ebury Press, £22). Savoury: Vegetable pancakes with a chilli crisp egg 'This vegetable pancake has its origin in Korea (where they're known as yachaejeon) and is the perfect dish to use up odds and ends of any vegetables you have lying around,' says Eleanor Wilkinson, author of One Pot, One Portion. 'Cabbage, spring onions, carrots and courgettes work really well and provide a nice balance of moisture and crunch, but peppers, potatoes, mushrooms or leafy greens are good alternatives. Depending on the vegetables you use, you may need more or less water to make the light batter so adjust as necessary.' Makes: 1 Ingredients: 200g vegetables (eg 50g carrot, 50g spring onion, 50g cabbage, 50g courgette), sliced into matchstick-size pieces 60g plain flour 2 tsp sesame seeds 1 tsp soy sauce 1 tsp rice wine vinegar Big pinch of salt At least 60g water 2 tbsp sesame oil 2 tsp chilli oil 1 egg To serve: Sriracha, sweet chilli sauce or soy sauce and rice wine vinegar mix Method: 1. Add the vegetables to a bowl along with the flour, sesame seeds, soy sauce, rice wine vinegar, salt and the water. Stir this all together until well combined. You are looking for every piece of vegetable to be lightly coated in batter, so if any are looking a bit dry you can add some more water. This will depend on the vegetables you use and how much moisture they have. 2. Grab a large frying pan and add the sesame oil. Let this heat gently over a medium heat, then add in the vegetable mixture. Press it down into a flat layer in the pan and let it cook for five minutes on one side. After five minutes, it should be golden brown and crisp on the bottom, so take a spatula and quickly but confidently flip the pancake over. Cook for another five minutes on the other side until it's also golden and crisp. 3. Once cooked, tip or flip the pancake onto a plate and put the frying pan back on the heat. The pancake will crisp slightly as it cools. 4. Meanwhile, add the chilli oil to the pan and crack the egg on top. 5. Fry for a few minutes until cooked to your liking, then place on top of the pancake. 6. You can finish this with sriracha or sweet chilli sauce, or make a dipping sauce with equal parts of soy sauce and rice wine vinegar.
Telegraph
22-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
I enjoy chocolate or cake every day and still live a healthy lifestyle – here's how you can too
At first glance, Eloise Head's kitchen looks disappointingly bare. Behind the spotless facade however lurks a vast array of baking goodies. A drawer full of giant marshmallows. Another of flour. And one bursting with packets of Oreos, Kinder chocolate, Cadbury's, Maltesers, and her personal favourite, Guylian. It is a fitting metaphor for Head herself who, with her wasp waist, looks the very opposite of someone with an extremely sweet tooth. That dichotomy is at the heart of the 30-year-old's extremely popular social media channels where she posts under the name Fitwaffle. Scroll through the images of gooey brownies, molten lava puds and squidgey cookies on her Fitwafflekitchen page on YouTube (3.2 million followers) and Instagram (2.6 million followers) and it would appear that you truly can have your cake and eat it. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Fitwaffle Kitchen | Eloise (@fitwafflekitchen) Five years of sharing the ways she satisfies her sweet tooth online – and the sheer sugary joy of it all – has seen her amass an enormous following: a total of 16 million followers across all her online platforms and over 160,000 books sold worldwide. Head is one of the UK's most successful cookbook authors and content creators, but you've probably never heard of her. But in America, Australia, Germany and the Netherlands, they've all fallen for her brand of British charm; goofy but gorgeous. I am at the Surrey flat she shares with her husband Bernie ahead of the release of her fifth book, Fitwaffle's Easy Air Fryer: 100 of my best bakes, quick desserts and simple meals (Ebury, £22). Despite the huge lights and filming equipment hiding in corners, neither of them has a background in film and video production, and both still seem genuinely shocked by how successful Fitwaffle is. It was in lockdown that the former personal trainer's account took off; a post for three-ingredient Oreo fudge ended up with 39 million views. 'It was a super simple, low-ingredient recipe at a time when people were struggling to get eggs and flour. All you needed was white chocolate, condensed milk and Oreos,' recalls Head. Low effort, easy bakes have been her thing ever since. It's a style that has become popular online, which some label 'junk baking'. With rising obesity levels and debate about the prevalence of ultra-processed foods (UPFs) in our diets, Head's output at first salivating glance looks like part of the problem. She takes a different view. 'Sometimes people comment about the high sugar content or that we're using UPFs, but as someone who has had a bad relationship with food, for me that's not a very positive way to look at it,' says Head. 'You don't have to totally eliminate something. You can put it in your diet alongside your more nutritious foods and still live a perfectly healthy and balanced lifestyle.' Her past dysfunctional relationship with food is something she readily talks about on her platforms. Growing up in Lymington, Hampshire, Head and her sister spent a lot of time with their great aunt while their parents were at work. 'She had a passion for cooking and had been a school dinner lady. We'd make cookies and fairy cakes. But we'd also do proper cooking, like chicken and vegetables.' Aged 18, her relationship with food became difficult. Ahead of a girls' holiday, Head decided she needed to be skinnier. 'At that point I cut out everything that I thought was 'bad'. It was really crazy stuff, like I wouldn't let myself eat white potatoes but I'd eat sweet potatoes. I thought carbohydrates made you fat. There was no logic behind it, it was what I'd read online.' She recalls eating a slice of cake at her grandma's insistence and going straight to the gym afterwards and weighing herself. 'I thought one slice could make you fat. But really it's about how much you eat, and your energy output. It definitely took a long time to unlearn all these ideas I had and to trust my body,' says Head. She credits her college course in personal training, which also covered nutrition, for pulling her out of a difficult relationship with food. 'It took time. I definitely had a bit of body dysmorphia when I was younger. The logical side of your brain is telling you that a slice of cake isn't going to harm you, but then you look in the mirror and dislike what you see.' Objectively, Head is clearly very slim. Indeed the top question she gets asked is, how is she able to eat as she does on her social posts and still look the way she does? 'I always need to tell people that what I post online isn't a food diary. It's a baking and cooking inspiration page. Yes, I enjoy something sweet every single day, but that could be a hot chocolate or a slice of cake. Otherwise I prioritise protein and vegetables,' she says. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Fitwaffle Kitchen | Eloise (@fitwafflekitchen) Head works out at the gym four times a week – she's lifted weights for the past 10 years and was an early adopter of wanting to look strong rather than skinny. Her intention had always been to post about her fitness as well – hence the name Fitwaffle – but ultimately she enjoyed the food side more. Given her own experience as a teenager, Head says: 'The last thing I want to do is to contribute to diet culture and the negativity around food on social media. So if I can be a positive light in the food space, that is really my goal.' Her style of baking might not be for everyone, but she prides herself on the fact that absolutely everyone can do it. 'I've felt some of the snobbery towards my food because I use very basic ingredients. People think it almost should be complicated to be worthy. I don't think we need that. Baking to me should be fun and enjoyable.' Five years on and she's faithful to her core message of being accessible so that her recipes work for children or beginner adults. 'We don't use a stand mixer. A lot of beginner bakers don't have stand mixers. I try to stick to as basic tools and utensils as possible,' says Head. She won't even do a bake with her beloved Guylian. 'Sometimes people will suggest I make Guylian chocolate brownies, but I know a pack of these is at least £6.50, and once you add all the other ingredients that cost might put people off. The same with Ferrero Rocher. So sometimes I do hold back on the decorations from a cost point of view. I want to keep it relatable.' Eloise's baking cheats Cookies To get perfectly round cookies, place a cookie cutter over them as soon as they come out of the oven and make a circle motion to push it into place. Salt Salt in baking is really important. It enhances the flavour of chocolatey bakes like brownies and cookies and makes them taste better. I always use a nice flaky salt. Air Fryers Not really a cheat, but make sure your air fryer is at the right temperature before you put your dish in to cook. So many people don't preheat their air fryer but it's really important with baking. Melting chocolate Melting chocolate in the microwave is easier than using a bain-marie, and safer if you're baking with kids. Put the chocolate in a microwave-safe bowl on a low to medium heat and stir it every minute. If you're melting only a small quantity, or you're using white chocolate then check every 30 seconds. Ganache A chocolate ganache can make anything look perfect. For an expensive looking cheesecake with minimum effort, mix equal quantities of melted chocolate and double cream. For a glossy finish, let it cool slightly then pour it over your cheesecake – it's one of the easiest things to do because it smooths itself out. Reviving old cookies To make stale cookies taste freshly baked, revive them with a couple of minutes in the air fryer. It works especially well with thick cookies that should have a gooey centre. Hot chocolate I love Knoops's hot chocolate. I bought some to use at home and it's just chocolate flakes. I thought immediately, well I can do that! Now I cut up about 25 grams of chocolate, heat it in hot milk with a little sea salt and it makes an incredible creamy hot chocolate. Brownies For thick, dense fudgey brownies, with cracked edges and a gooey centre, take them out of the oven and leave to cool, then put them in the fridge for a few hours or, ideally, overnight. Let them come to room temperature – you'll get a nice clean cut and a slight wobble in the middle. Food colouring Food colouring is one thing I wouldn't skimp on – in fact, I would pay extra. You need to use so much supermarket colouring in something like a red velvet that you end up changing the taste and texture of your cake. Gels are highly concentrated, so you don't have to use much and you will get the colour that you want. I buy mine from Wilton (£2.50 for 28g, The Cake Decorating Company) and Sugarflair (£2.35 for 25g, Craft Company).
