I found a new passion very recently. Since I can’t seem to stop baking, I have decided to include a new component to my recipes. My thinking is that if I add fruit, veggies or protein to the dish then maybe it will negate the fattening properties and be a little bit healthier. Yeah, I’m probably delusional and I don’t know how long I can keep it up but lets just have a look and see .

We have the great priviledge of living close to the Faircape Dairy and we buy our milk, cream and yogurts there every week. They often sell 2l of milk that has reached its best before date for R8 and my husband was very interested in taking advantage of this special offer but the only way we could use it up before it went sour was to start making our own yogurts and then eventually cheeses. I bought a probiotic yogurt kit to get us started from YuppieChef and we have been making our own yogurt ever since. Last night we took things to a new level by also making our own ricotta cheese. I got the recipe here and it is unbelievably simple. I just used 1l of 2% milk and left out the cream and it turned out well. It only yielded about a cup of cheese but it was perfect for what I had in mind.

Now since the ricotta will only last about 3 days in the fridge it was the perfect opportunity to make ricotta flapjacks.

250ml ricotta cheese

200ml milk

3 eggs, separated

5ml vanilla essence

200ml cake flour

pinch of salt

2.5ml baking powder

Mix egg yolks, cheese, milk and vanilla essence in a bowl. In another bowl sift together the flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside. Beat egg white in a large bowl until stiff. Combine flour and milk mixture and stir until well blended. Take a spoonful of the stiff egg whites and add to the batter to help loosen things up. Add the rest of the egg whites to the batter and fold in gently until combined. Heat a frying pan with a bit of butter/oil until sizzling and fry off 2 flapjacks at a time. Watch for bubbles to form and make holes in the flapjack before flipping it over onto the other side.

Note: I used my 60ml measuring cup to scoop the batter into the pan and it made nice, even sized flapjack. Make sure to give it enough space to spread.