Bake-rella

TWD: Chocolate Chip Cookies!

2010-02-23T09:45:00.001-08:00

Having just looked around I see that I got my weeks mixed up! I had thought I was making these the right week, but seems I'm behind. In any case these are some delicious cookies! No they are not tollhouse in all its perfection- but still a very strong contender an soon there will be no more trace of them in our house!

So if you haven't already made them last week- get these in.. very nice chewy chocolate chip cookie!

TWD: Brownies for Julia

2010-02-09T01:36:00.000-08:00

Hello again!

Well after a hiatus of eons I've finally managed to bake something! I'm really glad I made these brownies as they are delicious fudgy and super chocolatey!

I remember the last dorie brownie recipe I made was a dud in comparison to my old standby one bowl brownies and while these are not a new favorite they were a good change.

I wasn't sure just how gooey they should be out of the oven so I cut a small corner- while the top was done it almost completely filled up again with seeping brownie goo.. So I put it in for another 10 minutes which seemed to do the trick.

TWD: Cafe Volcano Cookies

2009-12-15T00:15:00.000-08:00

This recipe was one that I had my doubts about.. i thought- surely a meringue cookie must need to have whipped egg whites?! I cast my doubts aside and followed Dorie's recipe and found that ah ha.. the volcano action is in the oven - where my little scoop of sticky nuts turns into hot lava and finally solid rock.. i mean cookie.

I had high hopes for these cookies to become my new 'what do I do with all these egg white leftovers' recipe- but alas neither I nor the husband thought them all that great- as further testified by the neglected jar of cookies for over a week (usually 2-3 days is max for baked goods around here!)
However perhaps its just us- the cracky, dry, chock full o nuts cookie is against are usually chewy, moist, chocolaty likes...

Wedding Cake (and Pics!)

2009-12-14T09:08:00.000-08:00

Holy S*&T! Did We make that?!

When I was greeted with the above upon arrival.. I was thrilled! It really all came together- The cake topper I made, the Wood slice cake stand from etsy, and the just married sign my Maid of Honor made! (not to mention the fact it was there at the venue assembled- -when as I left for the ceremony it was still in my aunt's fridge)

The coordinator even found some nifty up lights which gave it a really professional feel on the night. We got so many compliments and people went bake to try and taste all the flavors with the most compliments going to the pumpkin chocolate chip cake.

It was a sweet end to a great day!

ps if you want me to post more wedding pics- just leave some comments.. (I've only got like 940 from the photographer!)

Daring Cooks: Vegetable en Croute

2009-12-14T00:00:00.000-08:00

The 2009 Daring Cooks challenge was hosted by Simone of Junglefrog Cooking. Simone chose Salmon en Croute (or alternative recipes for Beef Wellington or Vegetable en Croute) from Good Food Online.

To be honest for a vegetarian- this recipe needed alot more help! It was really bland- no seasonings in the spinach and just a few thyme leaves in the crust did not save it! I suppose I should of realized this as I was going along but i blithely followed the recipe- hoping that some stilton would be strong in the end... it wasn't- in fact the layering technique was very bad for me hardly room for any cheese- not knowing how big to cut the base circle (we were just instructed 2 circles- one 10cm larger than the other ((which seemed excessive at the end)) left me wondering. I did get it all together though and it looked pretty- it just was not very tasty... bland in fact

Oh well- lets just hope next month is more 'daring' and tastes better!

Wedding Cake pt 2

2009-12-13T08:44:00.000-08:00

Part 2. This thing done yet?!

After a full day of cake assembly its now crunch time = drafting in the bridesmaids. as you can see this intruded on the beer drinking time, but was necessary. Here are my to lovely L &L bridesmaids getting down on melting the chocolate for the panels. My other BM B has at this point run to the grocery to buy yet more white chocolate for our too runny ganache.

Note the stress level here I tried to tell them off for too much stirring... yes of chocolate.. i know.. but then I was one day until the wedding and the guests were coming in a few hours for the welcome dance!

So here I am putting the wood graining tool into action. Using the nicely melted chocolate and some overhead transparency films cut to size (if any one actually knows where you can buy acetate sheets I'm all ears as that's what you're supposed to use!)

First goes on the chocolate coat.. i made 2 tiers with dark grain and white background and the middle tier with white grain and dark background. After applying the chocolate grain I let them set up anywhere I can either on the counter or in the fridge..

BM B having returned from the grocery with more white chocolate I can now get to filling in these white grain with dark chocolate planks. We eventually finish and I run from the kitchen to my rehearsal which takes way longer than planned and leaves me throwing on my party clothes and arriving late to my own party! But its a good time for all.

My cake fairy, L finishes the cakes while I am rehearsing and after I explain cake stacking with straws she agrees to come back in the morning while I'm at my 9am hair/makeup appointment to put any finishing touches on them, prepare them for stacking and put them in their boxes ready for the caterer to assemble at the reception venue! Whoo!

Saturday morning I wake up before anyone else in the house (I'm at my aunties to keep with tradition of not seeing the groom..) and I investigate the chocolate planks- which I remove from their acetate and make into foil packets for each tier of the cake....

Fast forward to.. my parents and I are waiting for the carriage to come back from taking the BMs up to the chapel... when we notice that the cake is still boxed and in the fridge.... (everyone's at the chapel already but us!)

now.. i could leave this a cliffhanger.. but . i won't.. suffice to say wedding vendors and having good ones are really important!

My mom made a panicky phone call to the caterer- gave them directions (it was only 3 blocks away) and stay tuned for the final chapter to see what happened next!

The Wedding and Cake! pt one

2009-12-11T00:00:00.000-08:00

Making your own wedding cake....

First let me say is well worth it if you normally take pride in making cake for your family, yourself, friends etc.
Also let me qualify that with its not to be undertaken lightly! As I live in UK and got married in USA I couldn't bake the layers and freeze them ahead of time as I did with the trial wedding cake this spring.. so with much pleading, photo sharing and phone calls- I convinced my mother that yes she could whip up 9 layers no problem.. which after all this is the woman responsible for my cooking/baking love- she did.. and it was fabulous! BUT.. there is still a lot more to wedding cake than baking the cake. And it does mean you have a bit less chill out time- but perhaps I would of spent that stressing about something else silly.. at least this was a real challenge to worry about!

We got married on a Saturday, so all of Friday was devoted to 'assembly'! My mom and I had make the tricky Praline Silk Meringue Buttercream on Tuesday so we would have one last thing to worry about and everything had been coming to room temperature since Thursday night.

Cue the miracle worker..the wife of one of the groomsmen- she makes my cake making hobby look like mud pies in the back yard. almost completely self taught she loves making cakes- so much so she was tickled pink to get to ditch her kids and be put to work basically all day until the evening dinner on Friday.. so here she is in action...

Here I am trying my best to reassure her that yes I do want her to stack my cakes as I know that without her ingenious leveling I will get a sloped saggy masterpiece!

Witness here our fridge full of partially completed cakes and white chocolate ganache- see those bits on the corners of the top cake.. i would have never done that... but she did and I have level layers to show for it!

Note its the bottom tier on the bottom of the fridge (a 12' chocolate butter cake with silk praline meringue buttercream) and the middle tier on top with waiting bowls of chocolate ganache and white chocolate! (a 10" vanilla buttermilk cake with homemade raspberry jam and white chocolate ganache)

At this point I thought.. hooray we're almost done.. then remembered I still had to make all the chocolate faux bois coverings.. and there was still one more tier to assemble and it needed its filling made too.. and we had a rehearsal to get to, party dresses to change into and a party to go to!

part 2 coming soon!

TWD:Sables

2009-12-08T03:00:00.000-08:00

This month I've made a pledge to get back on track! It also helps that I'm in a cookie making mood and the two recipes that are cookies this month go hand in hand (this one needs 2 egg yolks- next one 2 egg whites!)

These were really simple to make and tasted just like a shortbread cookie to me. I seem to have some issues with rolling a log and not having crevasses in the middle- but thankfully that doesn't seem to have any impact on the taste! Plus putting them on our new wedding dishware seems to make everything more photogenic!

TWD:Sugar Topped Molasses Spice Cookies

2009-12-08T00:14:00.000-08:00

Oh Dear.. it seems that November completely got away from me.. The first month of life post wedding was such a transition for me that I barely even made it into the kitchen! Let alone posting a wedding/ wedding cake recap!

somehow I did manage to make these in Novemeber- before Thanksgiving.. but then never managed to post until now!... These are delicious.. really make them now- they are very similar to a cookie I grew up making with my mom called molasses crinkles from that much loved 'cookie book'. I ran out of molasses but substituted the last of my treacle.. if anyone can tell me how those two are different.. i'm all ears cause they seem to work interchangably!

I try and get a wedding cake post up soon!

TWD: Chocolate crunched caramel tart

2009-09-28T14:48:00.000-07:00

It was a bit hard to get this weeks TWD recipe out. Not for any sane reason, like not wanting to make the recipe.. because believe me that picture looked so good and chocolaty, I knew I wanted to make this one! The real problem you see is that this is the last week before we leave for the USA and get MARRIED! Yup so sorry if this is a kinda lonely blog for awhile but pretty much all of October is wedding and honeymoon.. so come 10/10 you know I'll be digging into my own wedding cake that me and my mom have made- with a little help from some bridesmaids!

As you can see this is pure deliciousness and for once I had no issues with making caramel! Hooray! A quick press in (i love not having to roll it out) cookie tart dough- breezy caramel and super simple ganache and you have something that looks beautiful, tastes like the best candy bar you've ever had and definitely impresses! Make sure to check out the rest of the TWD blogroll tarts!

Daring Bakers: Vol au Vents

2009-09-27T00:00:00.000-07:00

The September 2009 Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Steph of A Whisk and a Spoon. She chose the French treat, Vols-au-Vent based on the Puff Pastry recipe by Michel Richard from the cookbook Baking With Julia by Dorie Greenspan.

I was pretty excited to make my own puff pastry this month. I remember doing it once as a kid with my mom so I thought I'd see how tough it could be on my own. I must admit I found this pretty straight forward. I spent one Saturday doing errands and then coming in and doing a turn of the dough before starting something else and returning.

The result was a nice crispy, golden, flakey form ready for me to fill! I had some leftover black bean hot pot that was fantastic in these!

Be sure and see the rest of the Daring Bakers posts this month!

TWD: Cottage Cheese Pufflets

2009-09-22T00:00:00.000-07:00

We have had a bumper crop of plums this year- so I thought this would be a good excuse for using up some of the jars of jam in the fridge that didn't seal properly.

These were very simple to make and the cottage cheese added an interesting tanginess to things. I think perhaps they might of needed a bit more time in the oven to get flakier, but they were delicious even slightly underdone!

Yum!

Be sure to check out the rest of the TWD blogroll today.

Daring Cooks: Indian Dosa

2009-09-14T02:59:00.000-07:00

This months daring cooks is a great choice for me as I am vegetarian and the past couple have been pretty meat/fish heavy. While this 3 piece recipe seemed daunting at first the filling came together quite easily.

I then moved on to making the sauce- and I think there must be some sort of misprint in the instructions as it ended up tasting too stocky.. kinda like gravy (not so curry inspired) I doubled the coconut milk- but it was still a sort of gravy taste..

For me I think the biggest challege was the dosa themselves- getting these pancakes to turn out took some time figuringout the right amout of oil in the pan and the right heat. I got there in the end though!

These were pretty good- but I did find the recipe too reliant on curry powder- i guess living in the curry capital of the UK this was just a bit too 'translated' for me to really taste anything like the dosa I can get in Bradford!

Daring Bakers: Dobos Torta

2009-08-27T07:57:00.000-07:00

The August 2009 Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Angela of A Spoonfulof Sugar and Lorraine of Not Quite Nigella. They chose the spectacular DobosTorte based on a recipe from Rick Rodgers' cookbook Kaffeehaus: ExquisiteDesserts from the Classic Caffés of Vienna, Budapest, and Prague.

This was pretty easy to make but perhaps not so interesting to taste.. I must admit I had some trouble with the carmel always tasting like lemon and never really hitting a dark amber color.. So I called it after what seemed a very long time! and the result was crisp- uncut/edible topping that on the second day became moist again.

On the whole I thought this tasted like pancakes with nutella... not worth the effort... but pretty when cut!

TWD:Creamiest Lime Meringue Pie

2009-08-04T11:53:00.000-07:00

This weeks recipe is a play on lemon meringue or key lime pie as it is topped with meringue in my family recipe. This was a fantastic pie! The ginger really was subtle, but helped to ramp up the lime flavor.

There was a bit of me that was shocked at the amount of butter added to the lime cream and if I make it in future I might just go for the straight lime cream as I thought it was fantastic!

I used a cookie crust- mostly as I knew I wouldn't have enough butter otherwise! Make sure you try this recipe its a very yummy one!

TWD:Bananna Bundt

2009-08-04T11:51:00.000-07:00

This weeks recipe was very tasty. A notch up from regular bananna bread it was the perfect thing to slice up for morning tea breaks while also being a pretty damn fine dessert!

This batter was dead simple to throw together and even forgave me for not having quite enough bananna.

However as you can see I had a bit of sticking problems in my supposedly non-stick silicone pan!

Oh well- this left me with a top crust less cake- not going to win any beauty contests, but still fabulous to eat!

Be sure and check out all the rest of the fabulous Dorie bakers this week!

TWD :Va-Lavender Ice Cream

2009-07-28T00:36:00.000-07:00

Lavender Honey Ice cream (spicing up the Vanilla!)

This weeks recipe is a great one- so great in fact I had already made the plain jane vanilla and let me tell you it is good! So to make things more interesting I decided to harvest some of the lavender buds from the plants outside and also follow dori's suggestions for a Honey variant (though I did choose a less strong flavored honey this time).

Basically I only changed the recipe by letting the hot cream and milk steep in about 1/3-2/3 cups of lavender buds for approximately 3o minutes before moving on to straining and making the custard.

The taste of the ice cream is fantastic- rich and cream from the custard base- but then amazing floral/lavender taste with just a tiny bouquet of honey. Its good..folks- very sophisticated!

Next time I will have to make mint chip after reading all the glowing reviews!
Thanks to Lynne of Cafe LynnyLu who chose Vanilla Ice Cream as this weeks recipe!

Daring Bakers: Mallow cookies

2009-07-27T13:41:00.000-07:00

Yum! This months challenge was to create 'mallow' cookies or Milano's- both I think are homemade versions of Pepperidge farms cookies( which my mother never bought for us as she said they were too expensive!) I had planed to go right in to the milano's as I'm vegetarian and marshmallows have gelatin in them.. but I decided to be daring and make veggie marshmallows and I am so glad I did!

The July Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Nicole at Sweet Tooth. She chose Chocolate Covered Marshmallow Cookies and Milan Cookies from pastry chef Gale Gand of the Food Network.

The cookies were very easy to make, if a bit of a crumbly dough.. next time I will follow the instructions better and make them thinner and smaller- part of the problem was that I didn't have small enough cutters to hand...

So I hunted around on the Internet for a good veggie marshmallow recipe and came across this little collection mentioned in the alternative daring baker forum! and low and behold it works! I was too scared to try and actually pipe the suckers onto the cookies. Here are the leftovers in their various shapes..

Ingredients:
• 60 mL water• pinch of cream of tartar• 255 g sugar, granulated• 255 g light corn syrup• ½ vanilla bean• 85 g egg whites (about 3 egg whites)• 5 g xanthan (0.76%)

Ground xanthan with a tablespoon of sugar. Set aside. Heat water, cream of tartar, remaining sugar, corn syrup and vanilla to 120ºC. Discard vanilla bean. Whisk egg whites for about 2 min until still soft. Continue whipping egg whites at slow speed while adding syrup slowly. Sprinkle xanthan mix while still whipping. Turn speed up and continue mixing for 2-3 min or until meringue pulls away from sides. Sprinkle a pan or baking sheet generously with cornstarch and spread out the meringue. Sprinkle top with cornstarch, cover with plastic and leave to set for 4 hours in a refrigerator. Cut marshmallows into desired shapes and dip cut surfaces in cornstarch.

After a few hours in the fridge or maybe more like one hour cause i was so curious to see how it would work i attempted to cut smaller circles of marshmallow out of the total blob.. as you can see these won't win any 'cute' awards but they are coming together.

Finally I dipped them in chocolate and I must say I thought these would just be ok.. but no.. they are fantastic! what are you waiting for go make some!

Mallows(Chocolate Covered Marshmallow Cookies)Recipe courtesy Gale Gand, from Food Network websitePrep Time: 10 minInactive Prep Time: 5 minCook Time: 10 minServes: about 2 dozen cookies
• 3 cups (375grams/13.23oz) all purpose flour• 1/2 cup (112.5grams/3.97oz) white sugar• 1/2 teaspoon salt• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder• 3/8 teaspoon baking soda• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon• 12 tablespoons (170grams/ 6 oz) unsalted butter• 3 eggs, whisked together• Homemade marshmallows, recipe follows• Chocolate glaze, recipe follows
1. In a mixer with the paddle attachment, blend the dry ingredients.2. On low speed, add the butter and mix until sandy.3. Add the eggs and mix until combine.4. Form the dough into a disk, wrap with clingfilm or parchment and refrigerate at least 1 hour and up to 3 days.5. When ready to bake, grease a cookie sheet or line it with parchment paper or a silicon mat.6. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.7. Roll out the dough to 1/8-inch thickness, on a lightly floured surface. Use a 1 to 1 1/2 inches cookie cutter to cut out small rounds of dough.8. Transfer to the prepared pan and bake for 10 minutes or until light golden brown. Let cool to room temperature.9. Pipe a “kiss” of marshmallow onto each cookie. Let set at room temperature for 2 hours.10. Line a cookie sheet with parchment or silicon mat.11. One at a time, gently drop the marshmallow-topped cookies into the hot chocolate glaze.12. Lift out with a fork and let excess chocolate drip back into the bowl.13. Place on the prepared pan and let set at room temperature until the coating is firm, about 1 to 2 hours.
Note: if you don’t want to make your own marshmallows, you can cut a large marshmallow in half and place on the cookie base. Heat in a preheated 350-degree oven to slump the marshmallow slightly, it will expand and brown a little. Let cool, then proceed with the chocolate dipping.
Homemade marshmallows:• 1/4 cup water• 1/4 cup light corn syrup• 3/4 cup (168.76 grams/5.95oz) sugar• 1 tablespoon powdered gelatin• 2 tablespoons cold water• 2 egg whites , room temperature• 1/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1. In a saucepan, combine the water, corn syrup, and sugar, bring to a boil until “soft-ball” stage, or 235 degrees on a candy thermometer.2. Sprinkle the gelatin over the cold water and let dissolve.3. Remove the syrup from the heat, add the gelatin, and mix.4. Whip the whites until soft peaks form and pour the syrup into the whites.5. Add the vanilla and continue whipping until stiff.6. Transfer to a pastry bag.
Chocolate glaze:• 12 ounces semisweet chocolate• 2 ounces cocoa butter or vegetable oil
1. Melt the 2 ingredients together in the top of a double boiler or a bowl set over barely simmering water.

TWD: Tribute to Katherine Hepburn Brownies

2009-07-07T01:00:00.000-07:00

I was happy to see a bit of an easier, simple recipe this week as a choice. I admit when flipping through the cookbook I had noted this recipe with interest, purely given the name and anticdotes. I was happy to find this an easy one bowl (saucepan) recipe!

I ommited the nuts as I've never been a fan, but used some of my stash of beligan chocolate which made delicious gooey globs of chocolate! As you can see they cooked up with a nice texture with just the barest of crust- think normal brownies underbaked. I loved them the cinnamon and coffee really heightened the flavor of the chocolate for me. (Fiance also gives them 2 thumbs up!)

Make sure you bake these soon!

TWD: Perfect Party Cake

2009-06-30T01:24:00.000-07:00

This is one aptly named recipe! I made Dorie's perfect party cake for a dinner party a few weeks back and it became the best one I've ever thrown! People who hadn't met before stayed chatting until nearly 2am- despite having been stuffed full of a huge smorgasboard of different recipes I had wanted to try!

It baked up pretty well- though I was at first worried about how small my layers were going to be with cutting in half- but this was no problem as in the end the fillings to cake ratio was divine!

If you haven't made this already get going! It is an incredibly forgiving cake! I discovered the best strawberry jam when making this (yes it really was worth spending £1more for it- Duchy organics if you're curious)
and the final dusting of coconut (unsweetened as its impossible to find sweetened in theUK) gives it a flawless finish that my icing would not have made-- *(why is it that I never have enough left from recipes to give a really good final coat?!)*

In any case this was a perfect party on the tongue slight lemon strawberry fluffy white cake with a nice texture of coconut to finish!
What are you waiting for?! check out the rest of the TWD blogroll and make this yourself!

ps this went pretty nicely with the peach honey ice cream!

Daring Bakers: Bakewell tart

2009-06-27T08:05:00.000-07:00

Wow, I almost forgot this month's daring bakers challenge. The bakewell tart- having lived in the UK for 3+ years now I can say before making this I'd never had any interest in those icing sugar covered mc donald looking cherry pies from Kiplings.

This recipe thankfully produced nothing like that. First off I must give it lots of points for being very quick to put together! (I was reading though some of my fav. blogs and noticed lots of postings!)

The recipe was pretty foolproof and tasted great. The June Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Jasmine of Confessions of a Cardamom Addict and Annemarie of Ambrosia and Nectar. They chose a Traditional (UK) Bakewell Tart... er... pudding that was inspired by a rich baking history dating back to the 1800's in England.

Be sure to check out the rest of the Daring Bakers tarts!

TWD: Honey Peach Ice cream

2009-06-16T03:30:00.000-07:00

Honey Peach Ice Cream

Please ignore that slab of cake and focus on the glorious peachy ice cream.

I recently got the ice cream attachment for my Kenwood Chef and man is it ever my favorite toy now! Making your own ice cream is pretty easy- just need to give things time to cool down and then chuck into the machine for a good freeze churn. I really liked this recipe. The honey taste was super strong - more so than the peach, perhaps due to icky British no properly ripe peaches or maybe due to the recipe putting half of the peaches in as frozen chunks. While this was good I probably wouldn't make it again, but if I did all the peaches would be pureed.

Be sure to check out the rest of the TWD blogroll!

TWD: Cinnamon Squares

2009-06-02T03:08:00.000-07:00

TWD:Cinnamon Squares

I was so glad that this recipe was chosen this month. I've had a marker in this page ever since first buying the book and thought if it came round to it I would choose it myself. This was really simple to bake up and a delicious easy cake to go well with coffee. I highly recommend it!

Be sure to check out the rest of the TWD blogroll and see all these yummy cakes!

TWD: Chipster Brownie

2009-05-26T05:21:00.000-07:00

TWD:Chipster Brownie

Ah.. a recipe that seeks to meld a concentrated dose of good ole American favorites into baked harmony. It made me wonder if I could just cobble together my favorite one bowl brownies and cowboy cookies as well-- but then that would be a dangerously large pan of calories for which I'm sure I would have no will power for. But what am I saying the below is a very dangerous pan of calories for which I have no will power for!- Which is why I'm pawning it off on the cello section at orchestra tonight.

This was pretty straight forward to make- especially if you (like most of us?) have made cc cookies and brownies dozens of times since you were old enough to spread flour from one end of the counter top to another.. i mean bake...

I used the fan assist setting on my oven- which might have made for a bit of a dry cookie top? or its the recipe (which seemed very sugary)

In any case a winner.. a dangerous tasty recipe from Dorie!

Be sure to check out the rest of the TWD blogroll!

Rhubarb- not in a crumble!

2009-05-18T05:21:00.001-07:00

Our garden is awash in rhubarb these days- practically a jungle of inherited crowns that produce a bumper crop- so I was searching for a non dessert way to eat this and stumbled across this recipe which I adapted to feature tofu instead of pork. this is a fantastic marinade full of flavors. Be aware it serves a very large amount for 4!

Hot and sour rhubarb and crispy tofu with noodles- adapted from Jamie Oliver (Jamie at Home)

serves 4

Mix up your marinade

400g rhubarb

4T honey

4T soy sauce (I used tamari)

4 garlic cloves peeled

2 fresh red Chiles halved and deseeded

1 heaped teaspoon 5spice

1 thumb sized piece of ginger peeled and chopped

Combine all of the above in a blender and whizz until smooth.

Rest of the ingredients:

500-1 kg tofu cut into 3-4 cm cubes

375g medium egg noodles

4 spring onions, chopped

1 fresh red chili, deseeded and sliced

a few bags of interesting cress (i used rocked and spinach as that's all i could find!)

2 limes (I forgot this and it tasted fine)

Place the tofu pieces on a roasting tray and pour marinade over-- if you marinade seems dry add a wine glass full of water to loosen. (I let this sit overnight in fridge but feel free to experiment) Cover with foil and roast in 180C oven for approx 45 min. (just till the tofu gets a bit of color).

Pull the tofu out of the marinade and heat a wok or similar with veg oil. fry the tofu until golden. the marinade should be a nice thick sauce now- if not simmer until consistency of ketchup- put to one side. while frying the tofu- boil water and cook noodle according to package directions.

Divide noodles into 4 warmed bowls and spoon over each a good amount of the rhubarb sauce an the tofu, add a good sprinkling of spring onions chili, cresses and coriander.. finish each with half a lime to squeeze over.!

Delicious!

Daring Cooks: Ricotta Gnocchi

2009-05-14T05:19:00.000-07:00

Zuni Ricotta Gnocchi!

The inaugural May 2009 Daring Cooks' Challenge was brought to us by Ivonne of Creampuffs in Venice and Lis of La Mia Cucina. I admit at first read I didn't think this recipe would be so interesting.. I'd made gnocchi before and usually find the overly starchy balls of potato well just not so interesting. This view held out for me until I popped the first 'test' gnocchi in my mouth. It was a pillow of heaven that landed on my tongue.

Eagerly I declared to my fiance that he was about to have some of the most delicious dinner yet! The trick seems to be 2 days of draining and paper towel changing on the ricotta to try and get it as dry as possible- then add a couple fresh eggs and a smidgen of Parmesan and ever so lightly roll little gnocchi-lets in flour. I had a bit of trouble with sticking. After I rolled them all out and placed on floured silicone mat they were a bit hard to remove intact! but I persevered and served them with a lovely fresh sage burned butter sauce!

TWD: Tartest Lemon Tart

2009-05-12T02:53:00.000-07:00

Tartest Lemon Tart

This month's recipe was always going to be a winner in my house- as we both love lemony hings. It was a shame therefore that I was only making 1/4 of the recipe- which you can see is still too much crust!). I'm getting serious now about losing weight before the wedding and now that our birthdays are out of the way (and their cakes and dinners out) I've got to keep such deliciousness away!

Other than dividing the recipe into 4ths- this was a cinch to make and I'd gladly make it again.

Be sure to check out how the rest of the TWD blogroll made their tart tarts too!

My Birthday cake.. attempt/year 2

2009-05-11T02:58:00.000-07:00

Strawberry Mousse Cake

When I was a teenager one year my birthday fell on the same day as an orchestra dress rehearsal- so my crafty mother ordered cake for all of us from a local bakery- it was a big delicious surprise and their strawberry mousse cake from then on became my cake. What I would want every year. I've since been long away from said bakery and over the years have made a strawberry and whipped cream cake. But it was always missing that great layer of strawberry mousse.
Now as a vegetarian getting the strawberry mousse layer to work without gelatin continues to be a problem-- the neat cake you see here is frozen!

Basically I baked up a nice vanilla butter cake- then trimmed it and split for 3 thin layers of cake. I then found a Moosewood recipe for strawberry mousse- to which I added some agar/vege gel to try and make it firmer. A few sliced strawberries in the first layer as well. While it tastes lovely its just not right and once left to room temperature a bit too oozy to take center stage. So I suppose its handy that this year (my 30th) there was no party or candle/singing to go with the cake.

I topped it off with some leftover white chocolate ganache (from the wedding trial cake) and a few strawberries. It didn't look have bad (when still firmly frozen!) I suppose next year I can have another attempt- but first I need to perfect a standing strawberry mousse!

TWD: Chocolate creme pie

2009-04-28T00:00:00.000-07:00

Chocolate Creme Pie

This weeks recipe is almost the exact same as what we did earlier in the month for banana creme pie. I think I can almost safely say I've now got the hang of custard making. The flavor on this was incredibly rich and I think if I had to do it again, I would go with a plain crust just for a (dare I say it) respite from the chocolate attack.. don't get me wrong I freaking love chocolate- but not when its battling on my fork.

Sorry for the terrible pictures, I must of been hurrying to eat this! I made two 4" pies from a half recipe.. they were gobbled up immediately! Be sure to check out the rest of the TWD blogroll for other great pies!

Daring Bakers: Cheescake

2009-04-27T04:21:00.000-07:00

The April 2009 challenge is hosted by Jenny from Jenny Bakes. She has chosen Abbey's Infamous Cheesecake as the challenge.

I'm not a huge fan of cheesecake- while I do enjoy it, its never something I order when out and the last time I made it was by request. I found this one to be a bit too cooked for my taste (perhaps my own cooking time error?) but see other pictures showing not a silken filling but curdling looking center. I adapted the recipe by only making one third. The crust is made with a crushed ginger cookie and I added ginger marmalade, ginger, cinnamon and nutmeg to the filling.

The end result was nice, but not better than the last one I made from Nigella's cookbook!

Abbey's Infamous Cheesecake:

crust:2 cups / 180 g graham cracker crumbs1 stick / 4 oz butter, melted2 tbsp. / 24 g sugar1 tsp. vanilla extract
cheesecake:3 sticks of cream cheese, 8 oz each (total of 24 oz) room temperature1 cup / 210 g sugar3 large eggs1 cup / 8 oz heavy cream1 tbsp. lemon juice1 tbsp. vanilla extract (or the innards of a vanilla bean)1 tbsp liqueur, optional, but choose what will work well with your cheesecake
DIRECTIONS:1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (Gas Mark 4 = 180C = Moderate heat). Begin to boil a large pot of water for the water bath.
2. Mix together the crust ingredients and press into your preferred pan. You can press the crust just into the bottom, or up the sides of the pan too - baker's choice. Set crust aside.
3. Combine cream cheese and sugar in the bowl of a stand-mixer (or in a large bowl if using a hand-mixer) and cream together until smooth. Add eggs, one at a time, fully incorporating each before adding the next. Make sure to scrape down the bowl in between each egg. Add heavy cream, vanilla, lemon juice, and alcohol and blend until smooth and creamy.
4. Pour batter into prepared crust and tap the pan on the counter a few times to bring all air bubbles to the surface. Place pan into a larger pan and pour boiling water into the larger pan until halfway up the side of the cheesecake pan. If cheesecake pan is not airtight, cover bottom securely with foil before adding water.
5. Bake 45 to 55 minutes, until it is almost done - this can be hard to judge, but you're looking for the cake to hold together, but still have a lot of jiggle to it in the center. You don't want it to be completely firm at this stage. Close the oven door, turn the heat off, and let rest in the cooling oven for one hour. This lets the cake finish cooking and cool down gently enough so that it won't crack on the top. After one hour, remove cheesecake from oven and lift carefully out of water bath. Let it finish cooling on the counter, and then cover and put in the fridge to chill. Once fully chilled, it is ready to serve.
Pan note: The creator of this recipe used to use a springform pan, but no matter how well she wrapped the thing in tin foil, water would always seep in and make the crust soggy. Now she uses one of those 1-use foil "casserole" shaped pans from the grocery store. They're 8 or 9 inches wide and really deep, and best of all, water-tight. When it comes time to serve, just cut the foil away.

I love chicks (and the rest of my menagerie)

2009-04-20T09:00:00.000-07:00

This Easter we were in Brussels visiting some friends, taking the train, and enjoying the chocolate. We had some lovely Easter chocolate hens.. I'm a bit chicken crazy sometimes..

Here is the lovely dark chocolate hen I got.. She's sitting on some eggs...

Ta da! good thing our chickens aren't tied together with a string, that we have to untie to collect the eggs! Reminds me of a children's story where the woman's head is held on by a ribbon around her neck.

Michael had the milk chocolate one.. i keep trying to teach him about proper chocolate but he likes to scoff it down quickly...

This was a cute white chocolate rubber ducky.. they it became crazy chick.

Our real Easter chicks came this Sunday ( I suppose they are orthodox Easter chicks)

Our bantam hen, Greta went broody and has spent the last 5 weeks like this..

But by yesterday afternoon, when I went to give her some food she had company.. these two adorable chicks!

They were so cute the dog and cat decided to remind me that they are also cute!

But alas I think the competition is too stiff there guys.. these little chicks they even have feathered feet! sigh....

Masters of the Universe!

2009-04-20T08:47:00.000-07:00

Ahhh 80's cartoons... how many hours have I sat and watched thee over a bowl of after school mac and cheese...
I made this He-Man cake for my Fiance as it was his Birthday on Saturday. He really seemed to enjoy it.. even though it has that sickeningly sweet- crystal sugar icing on it. Oh well I did enjoy devouring his golden locks and his impressive pecs.. maybe now I too will have super powers..

These Wilton pans are very easy to do, the main problem being how tired my hand gets after an hour of squeezing little stars! But that said if they made a she-ra pan I'd be all over that for my birthday in 8 days time!

TWD Bananna Cream Pie

2009-04-07T11:29:00.000-07:00

This weeks recipe, Bananna Cream Pie. Now I've never made one of these before, and typically its not something I'd go for. But because of this, I thought I would make it- as often homemade versions of things are so much better. This was quite easy to make and has me looking forward to the chocolate version coming up later this month!

Be sure and check out the rest of the TWD blogroll for all the yummy pies!

Daring Bakers: Lasagna!

2009-03-27T01:00:00.000-07:00

Lasagna

The March 2009 challenge is hosted by Mary of Beans and Caviar, Melinda of Melbourne Larder and Enza of Io Da Grande. They have chosen Lasagne of Emilia-Romagna from The Splendid Table by Lynne Rossetto Kasper as the challenge.

We got to make our own spinach pasta (a first for me!) choose a tomato sauce (as i am veggie and the posted recipe seemed to have about 6 kinds of meat in it (slight exageration)

So first the pasta- I ended up using quite a few eggs as the measurements were tricky - in total about 4 bantam eggs, then i ended up adding more flour as well as things weren't coming together correctly. I made all my dough in the kenwood chef, as yes, I'm a bit lazy and that's what the machine is for!

Rolling out it seemed very hard to get to translucent, and I'm pleased with the final product, (not sure if it was too thick or not)

In any case I was very inventive in my pasta drying rack as you can see in the pics below!

Trying to show the translucence here. Ok yeah making your own pasta and sauce and bechmel isin't alot of work if you are only making one that day, but all three and it truly is daring!

I had to make some extra bechemel sauce as mine didn't last to make a nice topping but other than that the recipes were pretty easy to follow.

For my ragu, I made a modified version of this (for what I had on hand)

puy lentil and mushroom ragu (serves 8-10)
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 carrots, finely chopped
2 onions, finely chopped
300g chestnut mushrooms, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
250g puy lentils - I just dropped in the last~100g of green lentils I had
150ml red wine
1 tablespoon tomato puree
800g tin of chopped tomatoes
1 litre vegetable stock (i make mine with marigold bouillon powder)
1 bay leaf
1 teaspoon dried oregano
salt & pepper
2 tablespoons chopped basil
heat the olive oil in a large pan and gently fry the carrot and onion until they begin to soften. add the mushrooms and garlic, cooking until the mushrooms are cooked through and starting to release their liquid.
add the puy lentils, red wine and tomato puree. stir well and let it simmer for a few minutes. add the tinned tomatoes, stock and herbs and simmer for 25-35 minutes, until the lentils are cooked and your ragu is nice and thick (you may need to add extra stock/ boil away any excess depending how long it takes the lentils to soften). season to taste and add the fresh basil.

This was delicious and really made for a special dinner (and lunch and dinner and lunch) for the two of us! I relaly reccommend trying it out yourself!

Assembly of the Cake!

2009-03-26T00:00:00.000-07:00

The Wedding Cake!!(Trial run)

Ah.. its a sigh of relief I have now that I have finished the trial wedding cake. I got loads of compliments and I've decided that yes I will make my own. I will have my mother and at least one bridesmaid (who are equally competent as me in the kitchen) to help and a solid 4 days before the friday night rehearsal to get things done. Here are my pics and comments on the process. I baked the final tier on thursday night and made the fillings and assembled the cake during the day friday to take to my orchestra rehearsal friday night.

First things I took the cakes out of the freezer the night before, leaving them in their plastic wrap to come to room temperature.

Here you can see the freshly baked (night before) pumpkin chocolate chip top tier layers (which I didn't have room to freeze)

I also made all the chocolate faux bois planks the night before. My wood grain came out much better this time and I also reversed the colors to make one white chocolate cover for the vanilla/middle tier.

I had a bit of a problem with some of the largest 12" planks being a bit warped and cracking, but otherwise it was pretty simple!-- next time I will have to make some extra to replace any breakages.

I started out filling and icing the bottom tier (chocolate with praline) I didn't really have enough icing, only making a 1/2 recipe (6 cups), so next time I will make the full recipe so I have enough to do a crumb and then final coat.

I just barely managed to squeeze this 12" tier into my little British fridge!

Next up I needed to make the frosting for the top tier. I decided on a cream cheese frosting to go with the pumpkin. Unfortunately the recipe I choose from the sky high cakes book just did not perform. I had to stick it in the freezer to get a consistency unlike cake batter! It started out well with a separate mixture of butter, cream cheese and icing sugar.

This was then added to a very similar egg white, sugar syrup akin to the Italian Meringue in the Silk Praline buttercream.

Unfortunately the end result looked like cake batter and did not hold up at all! Here it is in the fridge, look how thin it is covering this cake (and its not because I ran out of frosting!) this was another time I was happy that all the outside of the cake will be covered with chocolate faux bois so not really an issue.-- Anyone have a good stiff cream cheese frosting recipe for me?

I next moved on to the final filling, white chocolate ganche for the middle tier of vanilla butter cake. Look at all the white chocolate here its about 1400g!

The ganache was simple to make and my biggest mistake was being impatient in waiting for the ganache to set up, so the filling is not quite as thick as I'd like it (oh yeah there is also some raspberry jam between the layers!

Here is the middle tier covered with white ganache, in its box with the above tier supports (straws) to take the top pumpkin layer cake tier.-- mental note to get cake boxes that are slightly bigger than the cake, so the sides don't touch/mess up the frosting!

Here's another view of the final cake assembled. I served it to my 60 person orchestra (I'm going for 80 guests) and cut extremely large slices. I had tons left so I'm thinking to perhaps scale back the size of the layers. (12-9 and 6?)

I also realized that its good to have a bit more straw poking above the surface of the cake, as most of the top of the bottom tier was stuck to the board below! (didn't happen on the middle tier though..)

And finally I wasn't happy with the size of the planks, true if I had been in a kitchen, or had more time to check I could of taken a hot knife or something to cut them to the size of the cake!

Project Wedding Cake: Silk Merangue Praline buttercream (for tier 1)

2009-03-18T00:00:00.000-07:00

Silk Meringue Praline Buttercream - From the Cake Bible, Rose Levy Beranbaum (Makes 13 cups)

This delicious buttercream is so light and at the same time rich that it pairs brilliantly with chocolate butter cake. As with most things that taste unbeliveably good its complex to make with a first step for creme anglaise (custard), then italian merangue

So for the creme anglaise you need:

3/4 c sugar

15 egg yolks

3 large vanilla pods (split lengthwise)

12 fluid ounces of milk

In a medium saucepan compine the sugar, yoks and vanilla pod. In a small sauce pan bring the milk to boilingn point. Add 2 1/2 fluid ounces to the yolk mixture, stirring constantly. Gradually add the remaining milk, stirring and cook over med low heat stirring constantly until just before boiling point. The temp will be 170F and with steam slightly. Do not go past this or you will get disgusting scrambled eggs and not custard (I did this the first time!) Immediately pour this
mixture into seive over a bowl scraping any clinging to the pan. Put in the fridge to cool while you start the Italian Merangue.

Italian Meringue:

1 cup + 5 T sugar

2.5 fluid ounces water

6 eggwhites

3/4 tsp cream of tartar

In a mixing bowl beat the egg whites in a bowl until foamy, then add the cream of tartar until soft peaks form. Gradually beat in the 5 T sugar until stiff peaks form.

In a small heavy saucepan stir together 1 cup sugar and water. Heat stirring constantly, until the sugar dissolves and the syrup is bubbling. Boil until the temperture is 248 to 250F. With the mixer on high speed, beat the syrup into the whites in a steady stream. Do not allow the syrup to fall on the beaters of it will spin on to the sides of the bowl. Beat at low speed until cool.

To assemble the butter cream you need 6 cups/ 1360g unsalted butter and 1.5 cups of praline paste (I ordered mine online from a chocolate supply shop)

Place the buttter in a large mixing bowl and beat on medium speed for 30 seconds. Gradually beat in the creame anglasi and praline paste until smooth (add vanilla extract now if using instead of pods)

Add the Italian meringue in four batches, beating breifly until just incorportated. If the mixture looks curdeld instead of silken smooth it is too cold.

This can be kept up to a week refrigerator (allow to come to room temperture-- i left mine out overnight) before rebeating. Keeps 6 hours at room temp.

Velvety smooth and ohhhh sooo yummy!

TWD:French Yogurt Cake with Marmelade Glaze

2009-03-17T01:00:00.000-07:00

I just barely made this weeks TWD in time (for my yogurt that is) seems the stuff was ready to go off! I'm knee deep in cake making for my trial wedding cake at the moment, but as this seemed so nice and my fiance has been looking very hurt at all the baking and no cake for him to eat ;) I decide to give this a go!.

It was a cinch to make, but I was worried about the darkness of the top. Well despite its color it was not crisp or burned tasting. I found my cooking time was almost an additional 15 minutes the max recommended

I had no trouble finding some lemon marmelade to use for the glaze and it was delicious! I also increased the lemon in the batter with a good tsp of lemon extract in addition to the zest.

Be sure to check out the rest of the TWD blogroll to see how everyone else got on with their cakes!

Wedding Cake: tier 1 and 2

2009-03-16T05:49:00.000-07:00

Project Wedding Cake: It starts!

If you have read my blog before you'll know I somewhat foolishly? decided to bake my own wedding cake. I'm doing a full trial run before committing to do this for the wedding and decided that the only place I could possibly offload that much cake would be my next orchestra dress rehearsal (how's that for a Friday night surprise!). This deadline sort of snuck up on me and last Friday I realized I needed to get busy baking.

I've decided on 3 tiers and the largest 12" will be chocolate ,then 10" vanilla then 8" pumpkin chocolate chip.

I started with the chocolate. I've never made a 12" cake. I learned alot the hard way such as:

dividing the recipe into at least 2 batches for my mixer

making and using my own homemade cake/magic strips really makes a difference

the idea of a transformer, bake multiple sizes from one pan is a good, one but batter does tend to leak through (see vanilla cake pic) -- and no magic strips around that configuration unless I chop them to fit especially

make sure you have something larger than 12" (preferably two somethings) to help turn out the cakes!

substituting cake flour for AP less 2 TBs plus 2 TBS cornflower seems to work fine

a carrier bag makes a great disposable mixer bowl cover for those tricky moments when you first add liquid and they want to slosh all out of the bowl and onto the window, the egg rack etc etc

Here are the remnants of the first layer of the first tier of chocolate cake.. i tried to invert it from its pan and hold together two (too small) cooling racks... they of course split and chopped the cake as I inverted.. leaving crumbs.. BOO!

An action shot of me mixing up the vanilla cake batter

Below you see my pan with my 'homemade' magic strips..

A final parting shot.. one of these cakes was not baked with magic strips.. wonder which it could be?!

I've now got to wait to make the last tier as there isin't anymore room in my freezer! I've already make the most complicated frosting on Sunday so that just leaves the top tier, cream cheese frosting, white ganache and all the chocolate plank coverings!

Oh yeah and figuring out how to transport it and set it up..(at the moment I thinking I can fill and ice each tier and put into separate cake boxes.. have the planks ready and maybe make a little bit of chocolate ganache adhesive to stick on!

I also thought perhaps I could mark out (using outlines of pans) where each tier should go on the one below it and pre-drill/place my straws to support
All suggestions and tips welcome!

Daring Bakers: Chocolate Armagnac Cake

2009-03-03T01:00:00.000-08:00

Chocolate Amagnac Cake.. aka the cake that got Dori Fired!

I almost didn't make this weeks recipe as we are not really fans of alcohol-ly desserts (and a bottle of Armagnac was £15!), but with some friends leaving town and donating their cooking Brandy to the cause I gave it a try. I mean this cake got someone fired so it must be a wicked little piece of cake.

I've never flambe anything before either, so being the pyro that I am I was psyched to get to light things on fire in the house!

I tried to get some pics of the flaming prunes, but alas you can just see some wierd red halo on the pic below. I was really suprised just how long these flamed for!

The cake baked up just perfect for the minimum stated time. I've had quite a few baking flops recently so it was nice that this one came out so pretty! (no sinking or undercooked middle!)

I must of taken the chocolate glaze off the heat too soon, as mine was always a frosting consistency. But it was damn tasty and it almost looks as pretty as the one in the book!

This was a very sophisticated chocolate cake. Very moist with a complex flavor (should be for using so many mixing bowls!). If I made it again the only change I'd make to the recipe is to sift the confectioners sugar before adding as it gave some tiny lumps!

YUM! Be sure to check out the rest of the TWD bloggers efforts!

Daring bakers: Flourless Chocolate Cake

2009-02-28T01:00:00.000-08:00

The February 2009 challenge is hosted by Wendy of WMPE's blog and Dharm of Dad ~ Baker & Chef. We have chosen a Chocolate Valentino cake by Chef Wan; a Vanilla Ice Cream recipe from Dharm and a Vanilla Ice Cream recipe from Wendy as the challenge. February’s challenge is a Flourless Chocolate Cake, Chocolate Valentino, inspired by Malaysia’s “most flamboyant food ambassador”, Chef Wan. Recipe comes from Sweet Treats by Chef Wan

I started out this recipe and things were looking good. I was using Tesco Finest dark choclate and I will never use it again. It didn't taste so great plain, I just hoped it would bake up better with other things in the mix..

Here it is ready to go in the oven.. it had a slightly strange foamy texture.

It came out of the oven with alot of oil or something percolating around it but after resting a few minutes it turned out of its pan fine. But it was terrible this cake was crumbly with a terrible taste. I threw the rest away.. obviously I did something wrong or it was poisioned by tesco chocolate....

TWD: Caramel Crunch Bars

2009-02-24T01:00:00.000-08:00

This Weeks recipe looked very good as ice cream bars, so I decided to go with that. I always thought that Heath bars were very english, yet here i am in England and the only thing I could find with toffee were very large thorntons chocolate covered toffee bits. you can see them there sorta not melted on top. Lets just say they made for very good jaw calisthenics!

Once they were made into ice cream bars it was very tasty, but just too much! the cookie/shortbread bit was super hard (I kinda felt like my dog trying to get at the marrow of a bone) Full marks for taste on this one, but maybe not so pratical as an ice cream bar.

Be sure to check out the TWD blog roll to see how everyone else got on!

Practicing the Wedding cake Covering

2009-02-21T01:00:00.000-08:00

As you might know I've got high hopes to make my own wedding cake. I was inspired by a Martha Stewart idea where instead of messing about with trying to get smooth buttercream or putting on horrible tasting fondant. In this recipe you make a sort of choclate wood grain siding. This is my second attempt at it and while making a plank is easy getting the wood grain clear is a bit trickier. This was made with white chocolate ganache and then dark chocolate. I unfortunately dropped some water on it (from the bottom of the double boiler) as I was putting on the layers so the top one you can see the shape of 3 drops dissolving the wood grain.

I've obviously still got some work to do to get it perfect. But even at this state (only my 2nd try) I'm sure I can make something very lovely and impressive!

A Valentines sleep in Omelette..

2009-02-20T10:25:00.000-08:00

For Valentines Day last Saturday I wanted to make my fiance a nice breakfast in bed- but I also wasn't interested in having to do a whole lot of cooking that morning either. I was searching for something that uses alot of eggs (as our hens seem very happy at the moment) and came across one of Pioneer Woman's recipes that used 10 eggs!--Jackpot--

I love to read Ree's blog its like if I could of had my horsey dream life that I wanted from 7-14 I'd be there in heaven on the ranch.. (though some days I do think it might be fun.. except for the meat eating.) If you don't already read it do go check it out- or at least get into her love story "black heels to tractor wheels"-- its a page turner!

But back to food- I've used Ree's standard American (I grew up in the Midwest, so making her recipes reminds me of being a kid/family functions etc) recipes to pull off my first Thanksgiving here in England and it was a great success. So I choose the sleepin in omelet for valentines day.

It was fannnnnntastic I'll definitely be making it again, but with half the butter!

The shite I do in cake class

2009-02-13T13:36:00.000-08:00

Isin't it lovely?! I signed up for a cake class hoping it would help me out in doin the wedding cake. But instead we make this sort of tat..
Its so kitch I have no idea what I would do with it. We spend all this time to make 'edible' flowers that no one would actually want to eat, and that probably take more effort than just getting some fresh ones from the florist.. i don't get it but here is my first attempt at a floral spray..

Barefood Bloggers: Not so real meatballs and spaghetti

2009-02-13T13:32:00.000-08:00

Since I'm a vegetarian I can't really pull off eating meatballs, so I picked up some grassington farms ones and gave them a good fry up. The sauce was really tasty (despite me using white wine-- as I had no red in house). It was simple to put together and made a very tasty Friday night quick dinner. I suppose for me it was more a nostalgia meal as typically I have more roasted veggie type pasta these days.
Feel free to check out the recipe yourself at barefoot bloggers!

TWD: Floating Islands

2009-02-10T00:00:00.000-08:00

This weeks recipe was not something I'd usually pick of the 4. I mean I have been dying to make the cover cake since getting the book. Strangely I'm going to NOT make it as I think a) i don't need any additional cake around as I try and slim down before our wedding and b) If I am making cake its going to be trial wedding cake. So since the fiance loves custard I thought this would be a great choice. The creme anglaise was no problem (mine was quite a bit yellower than the picture in the book, but very tasty)
However the islands were a huge disappointment. Basically they resembeled poached egg whites and were not appetizing. After putting them in the fridge to cool I googled a few other recipes for the islands and there were the key words. beat until stiff. Dori only mentions satiny glossyness. Thats when I stopped and well yeah it was more like floating rubber life rings than islands.
I thought about re making the islands but time as always was an issue so I hoped the caramel would help.
Here they are looking all rubbery

Now with some decorative carmel?!

Oh well its actually a good thing that the dessert doesn't make me want to eat more of it!

Be sure to check out the rest of the TWD group and see there (probably more successful) attempts at this dessert.

Daring Baker's Tuiles!

2009-01-29T04:56:00.000-08:00

Chocolate Tuiles

This month's challenge is brought to us by Karen of Bake My Day! and Zorra of 1x umrühren bitte aka Kochtopf. They have chosen Tuiles from The Chocolate Book by Angélique Schmeink and Nougatine and Chocolate Tuiles from Michel Roux.

Here's my mom measuring out the almonds... she was promoted to daring sous chef.. but soon demoted when we discovered that the first toasting of almonds was rather black! haha just kidding!

Here's another action shot of my mom spreading the tuiles out. We just used a silicon baking sheet and that went fine.

After a busy week of wedding dress shopping, I've just managed to squeeze in making these Tuiles. Keeping that in mind, I choose the chocolate ones, as the 15 min cooking time really appealed. They were nice but basically still a chocolate bar with toasted almond.

Barefoot Bloggers: Bananna sour cream pancakes

2009-01-22T05:09:00.000-08:00

Bananna Sour Cream Pancakes!

Karen of Something Sweet by Karen has chosen Banana Sour Cream Pancakes. I realized that I've posted in the wrong order this month! oh well i suppose that mixed up is better than not at all!

These were pretty easy to put together and made a very tasty lemony/vanilla batter that bubbled up nicely in my christmas present (to myself) orange pouring/mixing bowl. I had earmarked this precisely for pancakes so it was pretty cool to break it in with these special pancakes as opposed to the usual bisquick.

I found this great griddle with cheater pancake rings so I buttered it up and got ready. These were really easy to make and while I'm not a huge fan of bananna I did really like the addition of lemon zest and vanilla

YUM!

TWD:Berry Surprise Cake

2009-01-20T05:26:00.000-08:00

Berry Surprise Cake

Mary Ann of Meet Me in the Kitchen chose Berry Surprise Cake. I choose it because I'm entertaining ideas of making my own wedding cake and since that means some practice with chocolate cake it nixed making next weeks chocoalte gingerbread which was really really enticing.

A lot of people had troubles with the batter as Genoise cake is basically some sort of play on whole egg meraingue. and trust me i was pretty nervious about the whole folding thing as i seem to always whip up some great stuff then mess it up with my bad folding skills!

The only thing i can think might make a difference is fresh eggs. Since we have our own hens the eggs are rarely older than 7 days maximum (depending on how many omlets we've been eating!)

I made this in a 9" springform as I didn't have the 8" required. As you can see it still baked up pretty tall. I was lucky as well in that the top sliced off nicely so all I had to do was put it back together and ice!

While not the prettiest thing when cut it was a lovely cake (perhaps better suited to summer/spring as at this time of year i used thawed frozen berries which i was not about to try and display on top of the cake!)

Be sure to check out the rest of the TWD bakers efforts and if you're looking for nice cake reminescent of strawberry shortcake and oh so light try this one!

Barefoot Bloggers: Easy Sticky Buns

2009-01-13T12:07:00.000-08:00

Posting a bit behind for this recipe- but I'm glad i did get around to it, as these were very easy to make and pretty tasty as well!

Its really as easy as the picture shows; unroll some puff pastry sprinkle sugar, cinammon and raisins; roll up and cut and bake

and then eat!

TWD: Savory Corn and Pepper muffins

2009-01-13T11:36:00.000-08:00

This weeks recipe was choosen by another blogger that I often read and follow with excitement, Rebecca of Ezra Pound Cake. These muffins barely got made in time for me.. but a quick trip to the store had me sorted out. These are fantastic.. spicy and light. I must admit I did cut the sugar in half as I don't like

sweet with my hot and spicy!

Be sure to check out the rest of the TWD blogroll!

World Peace for New Year

2008-12-31T06:00:00.000-08:00

World Peace Cookies

Yes.. what better thing then some optomistic, positive baking to ring in the New Year... so I choose this recipe from Baking with Dorie. they have been oh so blogged about many a time and I was really curious to see how they would rock my tastebuds.. i must admit, i didn't get it, perhaps I had the wrong salt size? i dunno but they just tasted like chocolate, chocolate chip cookies to me (albeit it damn good ones!)

Here is the recipe
1¼ cups all-purpose flour
1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
½ tsp baking soda
155g unsalted butter, at room temperature
2/3 cup (packed) light brown sugar
¼ cup sugar
½ tsp fleur de sel or ¼ tsp fine sea salt
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
140g bittersweet chocolate, chopped into chips, or a generous ¾ cup mini chocolate chips

Sift the flour, cocoa and baking powder together.Beat the butter until soft and creamy.Add both sugars, the salt and vanilla extract and beat for 2 minutes more.
Pour in the dry ingredients and mix just until the flour disappears into the dough- for the best texture, work the dough as little as possible once the flour is added, and don’t be concerned if the dough looks a little crumbly.
Toss in the chocolate pieces and mix only to incorporate.Turn the dough out onto t a work surface, gather it together and divide it in half.Working with one half at a time, shape the dough into logs that are 4cm in diameter.
Wrap the logs in plastic wrap and refrigerate them for at least 3 hours. (The dough can be refrigerated for up to 3 days or frozen for up to 2 months. If you’ve frozen the dough, you needn’t defrost it before making- bake for 1 minute longer.)

Preheat oven to 160˚C.Line two baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone mats.Using a sharp knife, slice the logs into rounds that are 1 cm thick. Yikes.. don't slice it on your silicone mat, or you'll have a shreded mat!

(The rounds are likely to crack as you’re cutting them- don’t be concerned, just squeeze the bits back onto each cookie.)Arrange the rounds on the baking sheets, leaving about 3cm between them.Bake the cookies on sheet at a time for 12 minutes- they won’t look done, nor will they be firm, but that’s just the way they should be.Transfer the baking sheet to a cooling rack and the cookies rest until they are only just warm, at which point you can serve them or let them reach room temperature.

STORING: Packed airtight, the cookies will keep at room temperature for up to 3 days; they can be frozen for up to 2 months.

Daring Bakers: Yule Log!

2008-12-28T06:00:00.000-08:00

This month's challenge is brought to us by the adventurous Hilda from Saffron and Blueberry and Marion from Il en Faut Peu Pour Etre Heureux.They have chosen a French Yule Log by Flore from Florilege Gourmand
Now let me tell you i have always wanted to make a yule log.. however i had no idea there was more than one (aka the rolled up cake one). So yes seeing this recipe which has no fewer that 6 subparts seemed like a lot of faffing about.. and a hell of alot of chocolate.. and i love chcoclate, so i choose to make my final icing white and my fuiellet.. aka rice crispies with white chocolate too! All in all it was a great success, minus the pate a bomb sugar syurp burn on my hand! here is the photo progression...

First the Daquaise.. i made the regular almond meal variety

Then the Creme Brulee.. wow what a difference a vanilla pod makes.. first time using one they are amazing!

Here's my pate a bomb.. i m always worried about these, i'm not too comfortable with sugar syrup yet and think there was still some stuck to the side of the bowl, but it managed to get pretty fluffy.. (we have our own hens, so the yolks are so vibrant they are really hard to make white!

Ouch! my burn from a drop of sugar syrup on my hand...

Here's the log ready for its icing! in hindsight I'd probably even off the sides to make the icing have an easier time.
Finally the finished Yule Log! It was delicious, though next time I'd make more layers not chocolate as it could be over powering that mousse! I'd also probably run the rice krispies through a food processor as my layer was pretty much un cuttable!

Also 30 min. in the fridge was not nearly long enough to thaw this out.. the creme brulee layer still tasted icy. (even after an hour at room temp) i left the leftovers in the fridge overnight and had after lunch and then all the layers were perfect!

TWD: Buttery Jam Cookies

2008-12-16T06:00:00.000-08:00

This weeks recipe is picked by Heather of Randomosity and the Girl. She chose Buttery Jam Cookies on page 80. These were a cinch to make and baked up easy with a nice classic domed shape. However I wouldn't make them again. While there was nothing wrong per se with the cookie, it didn't really make much of an impact. So while it was included in this year's cookie giveaway.. it probably won't get a seat next year!

Be sure to check out the rest of the cookies on the TWD blog roll!

Lussekatter-- Happy St. Lucia Day

2008-12-13T06:00:00.000-08:00

Happy Lucia day!

I spent a year and a half in Sweden and it was there I finally leared to work with yeast.. or at least finally had success with yeast actually doing what its supposed to do. One of the wonderful baked goods from Sweden are these Lussekatts (lucie-cats) Which are prepared for St. Lucia celbrations..

They are a nice slightly sweet (ok barely) soft saffron bread with a couple of raisins. Usually paired with Glogg, I tend to eat them anytime I can, so am not limited to nightime.. find them perfect at breakfast..lunch.. dinner.. snack.. etc etc

Sorry mine are in a bread box, but it was for their own protection as I got busy baking 5 batches of Christmas cookies!

Lussekatter
50g fresh yeast (or use 3 1/2oz sachets)
200g butter
1/2 Liter milk
1/2 t salt
1 egg
1 packet saffron=6 threads broken
1 deciliter sugar
15deciliter flour

Melt butter in saucepan, then add milk.. let sit until fingerwarm
if using fresh yeast crumble into large bowl, then add cooled milk mixture (if using dry I tend to put in mix with flour etc.. its up to you)
add saffron, salt, suker, egg and some of the flour (i use a whisk at this stage to get a pancake batter consistency, then switch to dough hook, or wooden spoon to add the rest of the flour. You are going for a soft consistency here, not dry or tough.
Let rest for 30 minutes or until doubled
knead dough and divide so its easier to work with. roll out snakes to desired width (I go for pointer finger- pinky finger width)
coil in any shape... traditional is a s shape.
Add raisins into center of spirals (or for eyes, etc whatever you want)
let these raise for about 30 minutes or until passes finger test (aka you touch them and there is a mark made cause they've risen again)
Put on sheets lined with baking paper .
in 250celsius oven for about 30 minutes or until just golden (these will spread when baked so give em room!

When done, leave to cool on sheet/rack under a kitchen towl
Enjoy!

TWD:Grandma's Sugar Cookies

2008-12-09T06:00:00.000-08:00

This Week's recipe was choosen by Ulrike of Küchenlatein. She chose Grandma’s All-Occasion Sugar Cookies on pages 146-147. These were just what you would expect, easy and tasty either with adornement or not. I made these as part of my christmas cookies to give away this year and while I had planned for some nice frosting, I was just cookied out by the time I made it round!
Here they are all packed up ready to be given to a lucky person! They are very tasty and I found the dough easy to work with. Perhas this was beause I had made them the day before, so they had a good rest in the fridge! Be sure to check out the rest of the TWD ers fabulous cookies this week!

Thanksgiving rewind!

2008-12-08T11:07:00.000-08:00

This Year I decided to throw a Thanksgiving pary.. living in the UK, means that if I want an American specific holiday then I have to orchestrate it into some sort of new package. So Thanksgiving dinner party it was. We had 14 people and a 22lb turkey which amazingly was all eaten! Unfortunately I don't have a single picture of said bird, as I got busy at the time it was finally done. But I must say even the butcher exclaimed the virtues of this particular 'goregous' bird.. Personally as a Vegetarian I had my own ideas for turkey. Including making a Pumpking cake turkey (using a 70's Wilton cake pan) and a vegetarian seitan/Stuffing/Puff Pastry 'turkey'-- When the recipie said use scraps to decorate.. i decided to be a bit funny and build a backbone.. and from there :)

Pretty funny stuff!

Daring Bakers Carmel Cake

2008-11-29T02:42:00.000-08:00

This is my first challenge as a daring baker and luckily coincided with a birthday party, so while that caramel cake was really lovely.. I didn't have to eat it for days!

This month's recipe comes from Shauna Fish Lyndon and can be found here. Read all about her cake here. Her co-hosts this month( Alex (http://blondieandbrownie.blogspot.com/) and Jenny (http://forayintofood.blogspot.com/) have also contributed some caramels, which I chose not to make as I'm not really a huge fan, but do check that out as well!

The cake baked up pretty straightforward.. perhaps if anything taking a little bit longer than expected.

The Carmel sauce was not so easy.. the first time I made it I followed the directions for 'dark amber/smoking'... i was ready for splatters but I think all of the sauce ended up on the tile surround and i was left with a thin water that tasted like burnt sugar.. i didn't want that taint in the cake and frosting so I tried again.. This time remembering the pointers for Dori's carmel pnut brownie cake I took the carmel off earlier and then whisked in the water.. the result as you can see if a very thin maple syrup for pancakes liquid.. but it definately gave things a carmel flavor. The butter cream came out easily and I did add salt to taste.. just enough to highten the flavor.

It was somewhat of a not so pretty cake- no doubt due to my own poor skills as icing (which is something we are not taught in cake decorating class.. apparently in the UK.. all buttercream/torting is considered confectionary!!!) So I ran a toothed icing comb over it and drizzled some of the remaining caramel syrup.

since the cake was going to a b-day party I don't have any pictures of it cut, but it was delicious and got many compliments!.. I stopped it off with a stensil in cocoa powder

TWD Aborio Rice Pudding

2008-11-18T08:22:00.000-08:00

Well Well.. This recipe was one I immediately thought I'd skip.. see i hate foods with undecided texture... i'm into my texture and the thought of a dessert that was neither smooth, nor solid puts me off.. but not so my Fiance (sorry I just have to keep trying out the word to remind myself) he was pretty excited about the prospect when I showed him Nov.'s picks... so that and the fact that I didn't have a kugelhofpt pan, and thought I'd be really way too busy with celebrating thanksgiving.. I decided to make it..

Thankfully I did read the comments and upped the rice to a scant half cup.. however i should of paid attention about the scorching! i went to watch some tv and came back to boiled over..

however sacraficing the burnt on bottom, the remainder was fine. and perhaps it loosing a bit of liquid to boiling over helped the final consistency? I made choc and vanilla!

Be sure to check out this recipe's host blog here.. and all of the rest of the TWD blog roll!

Barefoot bakers: Herb- Roasted Onions

2008-11-17T01:41:00.000-08:00

I actually had the fiance make this one, as I was trying to get the rest of dinner (some yummy polenta) done.

I actually made these in time for Thursday.. but then completely forgot/got way too busy with thinking about weddings and such to complete the posting but there they are! Check out the host

Kelly from Baking with the Boys to see her onions and recipe.

There is no picture of my finished product, but suffice to say they were excellent and the dressing would be very nice on a whole host of other veggies/salad as well!

Sorry for the Downtime!

2008-11-14T02:37:00.000-08:00

I haven't posted anything for awhile here.. but I have a good excuse really...

I got engaged 2 weeks ago and what with my head in the clouds haven't seen any need for eating or baking!... but now that winter is starting to rear up and its cold outside I will get back to it!

/Bake-rella

Rugelach TWD

2008-11-04T07:36:00.000-08:00

This was my first time ever eating (let alone making) rugelach. Its nice.. a solid 7/10 excellent coffee time treat!

I read a few comments and decided Iwanted to mix up the filling a bit, so I made one circle per the recipe while the other was coated in nutella, dulce de leche and pecans (it was my favorite)

I had no idea what decorators sugar was, so used some swedish rock sugar.. these were good and pretty easy to put together!

Check out the rest of the blog roll and get the recipe here!

Pies with that- Apple Pie a La Mode!

2008-11-02T06:57:00.000-08:00

I struggled for a bit thinking about how to make a fashionable pie... lots of meringue? a fancy top crust design? modern fusion ingredient combinations.. and then it hit me.. some things never go out of fashion.. Apple pie..

and to top it off.. i make it a la mode- literally meaning in the fashion.. So here is my entry for this month.. apple pie a la mode.

oh yeah its even low cal!

crust:

1 cup ap flour

3 T sugar

1/2 t baking powder

1/4t salk

3 T cold butter cut into 6 pieces

1 large egg

1 T cold water

Combine all dry ingredients in food processor (or stand mixer) to mix. Add butter and mix until combined. Add egg and water and and mix until dough forms a ball. Turn out , form disc and let rest wrappen in plastic in fridge for 2 hours -3 days. Roll out on floured surface and press into tart pan.

apple filling:

3 large apples

2 T sugar

1/2t cinamon

peal apples, halve and core them and cut into 1/4inch slices. arrange around outside edge, leaving one apple for center. mix sugar and cinammon together and sprinkle over apples

bake 40-45 minutes at 350 F until crust is baked and apples bubbling

cool in pan on rack.

apricot glaze:

1/2 cup apricot preserves

2T water

above heated and strained if needed until thick. paint glaze over apples. unmold tart and serve with your favorite ice cream!

Be sure to check out the other Pies with That entries and vote for your favorite!

BB vegetable pot pie

2008-10-23T11:28:00.000-07:00

I'd never made or eaten a pot pie before.. yup im one of those... but i was exicited to make this (even with its licorce ness)
I only made half the recipe of filling and dough and had enough for 3 portions so there is still one pie sitting in the fridge. i was amazed at how creamy this was despite having no cheese.. yum!

TWD Pumpkin muffins

2008-10-21T03:19:00.000-07:00

This week i felt a bit more like pumpkin cupcakes, so I omited the raisins and nuts and frosted them with some ginger cream cheese icing.. fabulous.

These baked up really easy and I even used my own pumpkin puree (it seems impossible to find it in cans in the UK!)

TWD Lenox Almond Biscotti

2008-10-15T06:58:00.000-07:00

This week's recipe was delayed as my oven decided to explode during the self cleaning cycle! Glass was replaced today and I decided.. or rather was spurred on by the fact that I had no almond extract to make two different flavors to the recipe a lemon poppyseed (where I added 2 tsp lemon extract and 1 T poppyseeds.

The second flavour was 'Christmas' themed.. with dried cranberries, 1 t orange extract, chocolate chips, and pistachios

In both flavors I put flaked almonds.

I dipped some of the lemon poppy seed ones in white chocolate.. they were great!

I found my dough mix very stiff, like proper cookie dough, and the cornmeal was hardly tastable.. maybe people who found it too grainy had very coarse grind??

I had mine with chai tea.. Yum!

Finishing the cake

2008-10-12T09:32:00.000-07:00

The finished product was a lot of time in making! After making the cake on friday night I decided to make a basic buttercream from the Cake bible and try and play around with some white chocolate buttercream and making a kiwi buttercream..

First off the 'basic' buttercream. This recipe was based on egg yolks and since we have our own hens it was a really bright yellow crumb coat.. I did puree and sieve a bit of kiwi and mixed that into enough to put in between one of the layers (I torted my two cakes) so with four layers I ended up with 2 plain butter cream, 1 white chocolate and 1 kiwi buttercream (I wasn't so sure kiwi was so great.. maybe I should be 'experiementing' in cupcake sizes.. not 9"!!)

The white chcolate buttercream came from the cake bible as well and was a very easy recipe with only 2 ingredients, however required some substancial messign about with whisking and chilling and taking off chill.... needless to say the first attempt went from thick liquid to whisk stuck solid in reformed chocolate... Whoops! so i tried again and with the aid of a hand mixer (my wrist couldn't hold out much longer) finally got it made, but once on the cake realized it was only going to cover the top and 1/2 way down the sides!.. i should of taken a picture of this, but was so stressed out with a hairdryer trying to get it all to come together!

I left it there until today and made some 'simple' buttercream which i tinted very pale green (for kiwi) and did a baskeweave and cornelli with a 'message'. my first time for both...

I'll let you know how it tastes! ---Its Delicious.. rich like a wedding cake!

White Chocolate Craving

2008-10-10T13:29:00.000-07:00

i was eating a kiwi earlier this week and thinking wow, this would be so good as a layer of filling in a cake.. a white chocolate cake. So turning to the Cake Bible (really its called that!) I picked out velvet white choclate cake or something titled like that.. I'm still debating the icing, filling etc, but that's all for tomorrow!
Here's some pics of the baking of the cake. The batter started out quite chunky, but then...

TWD: Carmel Peanut Topped Brownie Cake

2008-10-10T13:21:00.000-07:00

I've just joined Tuesdays with Dorie and missed this weeks entry as I didn't get my book from Amazon until Wed. Neither I or my BF were particually excited about the carmel peanut cake, but I decided to make it Thursday night anyway.. I'm really glad I did!

I decided to only make a third of the recipie for both cake and carmel topping. I baked it in a deep 4 inch pan and got a nice slim layer of brownie.

This was my first time making caramel and I was a bit afraid of what might happen reading other's comments. I'm not sure what happened but I made this perfect the first time! Maybe it was my smaller amount of ingredients in a big 2 qt saucepan, or maybe it was just the fact i had the sugar and water /corn syrup sitting in the pan ready to go while the cake baked and cooled.. I dunno but carmel is cool. I think I would name this candy bar cake, while the BF says its a Snickers cake.. in anycase it was good, but i'm glad I only made a 1/3 as I'm already onto another baking project!

Re- Kindling childhood

2008-10-02T11:43:00.000-07:00

The Last time I got excited about things it was the idea that I could re-live some of my childhood by tracking down and making the character cakes I had as a kid. I remember there was a lady in our neighbourhood that did cakes on the side and each year we would pick them up and the sheer impact to see all that color on a cake.. and a cake that was whatever my current favorite toy as well.. sheer bliss!

here is my first re-creation.... Any guesses?!

My First attempt at cake decorating

2008-09-30T15:35:00.000-07:00

I checked a book out from the library and followed the istructions.. My first experience of chocolate Ganache.. yummy! Not quite picture perfect though.. but I suppose that's why I've enrolled in a cake decorating course. Currently we're on sugarpaste roses.. I don't think I quite understand all the effort put into making edible flowers when they are not really for eating anyway!

Joining Tuesday baking club

2008-09-30T06:45:00.000-07:00

Right.. So I've started this blog as a way to show my baking home schooling if you will.. Stay tuned for more!