Salted Caramel Macarons

My first three attempts at macarons were pretty disastrous. Even looking back at the photos is making me cringe at how bad they were! My first go at a recipe from the Ottolenghi cookbook also entered into the "FAIL" category. I saw a few other blogs having success with the Ottolenghi macaron recipes, so I decided to remedy two fails with one baking session.

I had some egg whites already aging in the fridge, but I enjoyed weighing out 60g of them. I love doing everything by weight, mainly because I can't be bothered to get jugs and spoons out and create extra washing up. I don't know how Americans cope with cups. Have you ever tried scraping out peanut butter from the corners of a measuring cup so you can use it to scoop out another ingredient? It's lame. Buy a scale! Then you can just dump everything in one bowl!

A major problem with my last bunch of macarons was the lumpy mixture. They tasted ok, but macarons are meant to look a little bit pretty too. I don't have a food processor, so I gave the ground almonds and some of the icing sugar a bit of a bash around in a pestle and mortar before sifting them through a fine sieve.

I was also more confident about what the batter was meant to look like. It should be sturdy enough to pipe without running in to one big puddle, but soft enough that it will smooth down in to domes when left. After very carefully folding the sugar and almonds in to the whipped egg whites, it was obvious that the mixture was too stiff, so I got to give it a couple of good beats to get it down to a softer consistency.

After I'd piped all the macarons and topped them with some chopped peanuts, they sat by the radiator for a bit to form a skin while the oven preheated. In they went for 8 minutes, when I checked them to see if they were browning too fast.

Salted caramel and peanut macarons

YAY! While they were still underdone, every single macaron had a smooth topped dome, and some impressive looking feet. Another 4 minutes in the oven had the shells nicely starting to brown, and me dancing around the kitchen in triumph.

Finally with feet and smoothness!

Although I think that cooking is about making something that tastes good, there is always an element of presentation that I've struggled with. I don't have the patience to spend hours making things look perfect when all I want to do is eat them! So although my macarons had good feet and smooth tops, some of them were more ovoid that circular, so not a complete success, but good enough for me.

Once the shells were cool, I sandwiched them together with dulce de leche spiked with crushed peanuts and sea salt. I should have chopped the peanuts smaller and thickened the caramel more, as it was a bit oozy, and some of the larger peanuts made the macarons sit wonkily.

The smell when I opened the tin I'd stored them in was amazing, although I was a little disappointed that the peanut flavour wasn't that strong when it came time to taste them. However, after leaving them for 48 hours the flavours intensified, but the macarons lost a bit of their crunchiness. I would probably use more peanut next time to get the flavour and the texture.

The recipe is copied out here for your delectation.

Chocolate Brownies with Chestnuts & Figs

The only cookbook I got for Christmas was Ottolenghi. This was good, as my cookbook shelf is full, and I didn't want the usual semi-novelty cookbooks I usually seem to receive ('101 Biscuit Recipes' anyone?)

I had a packet of chestnuts in the cupboard leftover, so I decided to make Khalid's Chestnut & Chocolate Bars.

The digestive base was easy enough, and the chocolate mix for the top was also very simple, with the most strenuous part being chopping a large pile of chestnuts, figs and white chocolate. It went in the oven, and came out very, very, very wobbly. So it went back in the oven for another 10 minutes and was still wobbly. The recipe said it wouldn't be totally cooked, but I didn't expect it to basically look the same as when it went in. I put it in the fridge to see if that would harden it up. Maybe the chocolate would set solid.

A few hours later, it was still way too wobbly. I tried to turn it out of the tin (luckily I'd used a silicone one) but it was obviously going to end in disaster. I gave it another 10 minutes in the oven, but it was STILL wobbly! I shoved it back in the fridge as I was not in the mood to deal with a massive pile of fail goo at that moment.

The next day I was immersed in the domestic bliss that is the life of the self/un-employed. After warming up with bouts of bed making, laundry and sweeping, I decided to deal with the fail. I thought I might spoon some over ice cream and bin the rest.

It had set! I was not expecting that at all. A bit of a push and it popped out of the tin in one lovely firm lump, and sliced up with a crisp finish that is just so satisfying.

After all the abuse I'd put it through, I wondered whether it would taste any good. The chocolate mix was flourless, so although it was firmer than it should have been, it was still moist, almost like a giant truffle. The chestnut and the figs were there, but weren't as overpowering as I'd worried they might be, but not really that flavourful either.

Chestnut & Fig Brownie Bars

I guess I'll have to give this another go before I reject the recipe altogether, but I wasn't that impressed. It was just digestives with a eggy ganache on top, with no stand out flavours or textures. Not offensive, but just not that amazing either.

Madeleines

Last Christmas, I got a madeleine tin. I was excited to have such a one-purpose piece of kitchenalia, but there was a problem. The problem was, I had never really "got" madeleines.

Everyone else seems to be a madeleine fan, judging by how often I see them perched by tills in cafes, and they've cropped up at numerous markets I've been to lately. It's not that I didn't like them, but they always seemed a bit bland and lacking. I did take some comfort that Proust had to dip his in tea to get excited about them (and he wasn't really even getting excited about the madeleine itself, it was the memories it brought back. To me, madeleines remind me of going to my friend's house after school and having to feed her cats as she didn't like the smell of tuna.)

I felt bad about the pan though. It lived in a dresser with some wrapping paper and spare toiletries, before being upgraded to the middle shelf of the baking cupboard, albeit at the back. So, after making the Korova cookies the other day, I flipped forward a few pages in "Paris Sweets" and made some madeleines.

The recipe itself is fairly simple, and I upped the vanilla and lemon to squeeze a bit more flavour in to the madeleines. After resting the batter in the fridge, I carefully spooned 12 dollops of batter in to the shell holes on the tray, and put it in the oven for 12 minutes.

Fresh Madeleines

I was surprised at how high the madeleines rose (the left over batter, which I baked 2 days later, rose even higher. It was almost obscene). The rise was just enough to mirror the scalloping on the other side, so the madeleines were nicely symmetrical.

So now for the tasting. Had I just been eating bad madeleines all these years?

Well, yes and no. Madeleines straight out of the oven were a revelation. The inside was still soft, cakey, and a tad bland, but now it was paired with a crispy crust that was utterly moreish. The ones that managed to survive until the next day were not so great, with the crispy crust now replaced by a slightly chewier bit of bland cakeyness.

As the batter can last for several days in the fridge, I think from now on I'll be baking small batches to eat immediately. The recipe also has a couple of suggestions for different flavours, the Earl Gray variation certainly sounds intriguing!

Korova Cookies

This is a bit of a landmark here - my 100th post! Although really two of them don't count as the introduction and links should be on pages rather than posts... but anyway. I have filled this blogger text box out 100 times. Who knew I was that dedicated!?

T's brother and his girlfriend are visiting us this weekend. I have a bit of a reputation amongst T's family for being a baker, so I knew I had to make something to welcome them, but at the same time I didn't want to do anything too crazy that they would feel obliged to eat. I settled on Dorie Greenspan's Korova cookies (sometimes also known as "world peace" cookies - the idea being that if these were handed out there would be no more need for war). How could anyone resist buttery chocolate biscuits studded with chunks of dark chocolate?

Korova Cookies

I made the dough for these the night before, and left it to rest overnight. It was hard to resist baking some of them straight away for a midnight snack. In between cleaning the flat, I sliced off 12 rounds and baked them. Within minutes, the flat smelt like melting chocolate. Obviously I had to check they were ok, and had eaten 2 while they were still warm. By the time T had picked up his brother from the station, I'd eaten 7 of the of the 12 I'd baked. In the introduction, Dorie warns you not to make them when you are alone, and she is right. They are dangerously addictive.

Crumbly and crispy

So I baked another batch, and it came out of the oven just as T and his brother came through the door. They are crispy and just chewy when cool, but when they are warm, the crumbly biscuit and the gooey chocolate are sublime. The hint of salt and the dark chocolate also make them a little more grown up than your average cookie.

If you like the sound of these, Deb of Smitten Kitchen has already typed the recipe up rather well.

Cappuccino Cupcakes

I decided that making the millionaire shortbread from "Red Velvet & Chocolate Heartache" was not a good test of the book, as it is about the only recipe in there that doesn't use some kind of vegetable in place of butter. The anthropomorphic descriptions in the book are not particularly useful, so it took me a while to decide on the cappuccino cupcakes with sweet potato.

Cappuccino Cupcakes (with Sweet Potato)

After creaming eggs and sugar, finely grated sweet potato is mixed in. The other main difference between this recipe and a standard cake is that the flour is replaced by rice flour and ground almonds, making this gluten free as well as fat free (I know there are fats in nuts, eggs and sugar, but there isn't the massive hunk of butter that starts off most cake recipes).

Before baking, the batter tasted more like carrot cake than coffee cake. Even though I'd added more coffee essence than the recipe suggested, the flavour was quite weak. After baking, I tried one of the cakes without any icing. Although the coffee flavour was still weak, the cake was moist and fluffy, and the sweet potato had melted away. I was quite impressed that such a healthy set of ingredients could produce such a good example of cake.

The suggested icing was a modified buttercream - 1 part butter, 1 part mascarpone and 4 parts icing sugar. Again I put in a bit more coffee essence than recommended to ensure that the icing made up for the lack of coffee flavour in the cake. While I like the creamier texture that mascarpone adds, I find that it produces quite a loose icing, which doesn't pipe as well as plain buttercream. I tried to practice icing roses on the top of these cakes, but as the mixture wasn't stiff enough they collapsed a little. I think my technique is improving though.

Cappuccino Cupcake with "Rose" Icing Pattern

I am generally not a fan of "fun-free" food, but these were quite impressive. I don't think I'd make them regularly for myself, but as I know a few people who are watching their weight or gluten intolerant, it's good to have a recipe to suit them too.

Cappuccino Cupcakes (Harry Eastwood - Red Velvet & Chocolate Heartache)
Makes 12

2 eggs
160g caster sugar
200g peeled and grated sweet potato
100g rice flour
100g ground almonds
2tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
3tbsp coffee essence

Icing
50g unsalted butter
200g icing sugar
50g mascarpone
2tsp coffee essence

1) Preheat the oven to 180C, and line the muffin tray with paper cases.
2) Whisk the eggs and sugar until pale and fluffy. Whisk in the sweet potato, followed by the rice flour, grated almonds, baking powder and salt. Finally stir through the coffee essence.
3) Fill the cases and bake for 20 minutes. The cakes may look a bit like muffins at this point but don't worry.
4) While the cakes cool, whisk the butter for the icing until it is smooth. Then add 100g of the icing sugar and beat in to the butter to form a thick paste. Whisk for longer than you think you need as it is vital the butter and sugar are properly combined.
5) Add the mascarpone, coffee essence and remaining 100g of icing sugar. Mix with a spoon until you get a smooth icing (don't use the electric whisk here, it'll destroy the texture of the mascarpone.) Keep the icing in the fridge until you are ready to use it.
6) Once the cakes are cool, top them with the icing.

I'm keeping my cakes in the fridge, as the mascarpone won't survive at room temperature very long. However, if you plan to eat these within a day or so, they should be fine to store in a normal cake box.

Millionaire Shortbread with Salted Caramel

When I was at primary school, my class was selected for an academic survey. We had to fill out a questionnaire detailing our parents' level of education and various other lifestyle questions. I guess this was then correlated with our academic achievement to see if certain households were more likely to produce academically successful children than others. The reason I still remember this is that we had to write down how many books were in our house. I lost count after about 250.

My mum loves books, and sometimes buys random books just because she likes the look of them. She also has a magic ability to find books on special offer or discounted, and she recently sent me Harry Eastwood's "Red Velvet & Chocolate Heartache" as she was concerned that I eat too much cake!

Chocolate And Salted Caramel Squillionaire

There were quite a few recipes that appealed, but as I had a tub of caramel sitting in the fridge already, I decided to make the "Chocolate and Salted Caramel Squillionaire", which I then realised was the only recipe in the book that didn't contain vegetables. Oh well.

The addition of golden syrup to the biscuit base gave it a nice toffee flavour, and baking the base before adding the caramel and chocolate made it super crispy. I did think there was a bit too much biscuit base though, next time I would probably only use 250g instead of 300g of digestives.

I also liked using the salted caramel and really dark chocolate topping, as it counteracted the sweetness of the caramel and the base. They're a little bit more grown up than the usual millionaire's shortbread. Although the recipe says it makes 12, I cut mine in to 16 and they are still a decent size.

So yummy they make me lose focus...

I'm really excited to try some of the other recipes, although I agree with this review that the descriptions of the recipes can be rather annoyingly cutesy...

They don't last long.

Chocolate and Salted Caramel Squillionaire (Harry Eastwood - Red Velvet & Chocolate Heartache)
Serves 12

397g tin of condensed milk
100g unsalted butter (melted)
3 tbsp golden syrup
300g digestive biscuits
pinch of sea salt
150g very dark chocolate

1) Preheat the oven to 180C, and line a 22cm square brownie tin with baking paper.
2) In a large and sturdy pan, put the (unopened) can of condensed milk. Fill the pan with boiling water so the tin is completely covered. Boil for one hour, topping up the water as needed.
3) Meanwhile, put the melted butter and golden syrup in a bowl, and put it in the oven or in the microwave to melt the syrup and butter together. (Make sure the bowl is oven/microwave proof!) It won't take long, 5 minutes in the oven or 1 minute in the microwave.
4) Crush the biscuits, either with a food processor or by putting them in a plastic bag and whacking it with a rolling pin. Get them really crushed, so the mixture looks like fine sand.
5) Mix in the hot butter and syrup with the biscuits. It should now look like wet sand!
6) Push the biscuit mixture in to the tin, squashing it down with your hand or the back of a spoon. Prick the surface with a fork to let out any air bubbles, and then bake for 20 minutes until golden. Leave it to cool while the caramel finishes it's bath.
7) Carefully remove the tin from the boiling water, and open it. Mix in a pinch of salt, and then pour it over the biscuit base, making sure it spreads out to cover the whole base. Put it in the freezer to cool down for at least 20 minutes as you need the caramel to be set when you pour the chocolate over.
8) Melt the chocolate in a bowl over a saucepan of simmering water. Once it is thoroughly melted, pour it over the frozen caramel and biscuit base. Put it in the fridge to chill.
9) After the chocolate has hardened, cut in to portions and serve!

Strawberry Baked Cheesecake

I knew this day would come. "Bake" has finally let me down.

While moving in to the new flat, we somehow acquired a pack of coconut biscuits. As neither T nor I are particular fans, I decided to use the biscuits to make a cheesecake base. I found a recipe in "Bake" for a blueberry cheesecake, and set to work.

The base was easy enough, and was the usual mix of crushed biscuits and melted butter. On to that, I arranged plenty of chopped strawberries, as the blueberries in the shops were ridiculously expensive.

Next up was the cheesecake mix. Cream cheese, vanilla, sugar and eggs were whisked until smooth and creamy. Although I know you are not meant to eat raw eggs I couldn't resist a spoonful of mix, just to test it was alright... As it was delicious I poured the mixture over the strawberries and put it in to the oven.

It might be a tad unfair of me to totally blame Rachel Allen for my cheesecake fail. It was my first time cooking with the new oven, which is a combined oven and grill. I had an oven thermometer in there to see how accurate the oven was. Despite turning the oven up to full blast, it seemed unable to get hotter that 170C. Since the cheesecake wanted to be at 180C, I thought this was close enough and ploughed on regardless. It was only after the top of the cheesecake started burning after 5 minutes that I realised I had set the dial to grill instead of oven. In my defence, both symbols had a fan on them, and the only difference was a slightly thicker black line at the bottom!

I switched it over to oven mode, and kept an eye on the oven thermometer (which E, my old flatmate, once described as "a gadget for calling your oven's bullshit") so the temperature stayed around 180C the whole time. After 40 minutes, the cheesecake was mostly golden (except the burnt patch) and wobbled pleasingly.

Baked Strawberry Cheesecake

After chilling in the fridge, and topping it off with a strawberry and white wine syrup, it was time to eat. Although the strawberry flavour was good, the texture was a little too eggy in places. Instead of being smooth and custard like, it was granular and coarse. I can't decide if this was my complete inability to work an oven or just the wrong ratio of cream cheese and eggs.

The texture wasn't bad enough to scrap the cheesecake totally, and I've been working my way through it over the past few days. The flavours have matured nicely, and it does seem a little less granular after a few days in the fridge.

Strawberry Cheesecake - slightly granular

Hopefully now I have mastered how the new oven works, I can start making up with "Bake".

Snickerdoodles

The other day, I realised I hadn't baked anything for at least a week. Plus my flatmate L was coming back to Edinburgh to move out of the flat, so baked goods were absolutely required.

Snickerdoodles are something that I'd seen a few recipes for, but never actually tried them in real life. I noticed a recipe for the them in Rachel Allen's "Bake", so it was time to give them a go.

The recipe itself is pretty easy, and you can find the Rachel Allen version already typed out here. "Bake" is fast shaping up to be one of the most reliable cook books I own, and my snickerdoodles came out very similar to Maria's.

Snickerdoodles, from "Bake" by Rachel Allen

I was possibly a bit generous with the nutmeg, but this mixed with the creaminess of the butter to create something very reminiscent of an egg custard tart in biscuit form. I wasn't entirely sold on the crispy outside with a cakey centre, but I can see its appeal. I liked the spiciness, and these are very "autumnal". I'd probably remake these as little Christmas presents to give out randomly, but make the spicing a bit more subtle and try to make them a bit thinner and crispier. Although that might move them too far to the realm of gingerbread, but anyway.

I've just discovered now that they are also pretty tasty dunked in tea and coffee, and they're strong enough not to crumble too much either.

Grandmother's Chicken Fried Rice

T is a big fan of Chinese food, and if I'm not around at the weekend, he'll often treat himself to a take away. He'd watched a few TV shows about Chinese food, but didn't really have the know-how to cook it at home beyond basic stir-fries. When I saw Chinese Food Made Easy on special offer, I picked up a copy for T. (I am angling for a Girlfriend-of-the-Year Award...)

Even though we don't move to our new flat together (eeek!) until September, already we've begun the process of sorting through our possessions and getting rid of things. Yesterday was the turn of my old PC (I'm a Mac-girl now) so T had spent the day dismantling it and adding the best bits on to his PC to create an uber-PC. I'd spent the day clearing up the casing and getting rid of all the dust that had collected in it over the years! We decided to start off the book with Grandmother's Chicken Fried Rice, as we just wanted something fairly straightforward and quick to have for dinner after a busy day. T also gets this dish a fair bit from the take-away, so he was interested to see how it compared.

We had most of the ingredients already, as I had some rice wine (I decided that Japanese is close enough to Chinese in this case) from making sushi ages ago, so all that was required was a quick trip to the Chinese supermarket I recently discovered to get some dried shiitakes* and some glutinous rice.

As I chopped up the shallots, and grated the ginger, I soaked the mushrooms and cooked the rice. T's flat doesn't have scales, so I had to guess how much rice and how much water to use. After about 10 minutes, there was a horrible burning smell and a rice pancake burnt on the bottom of the pan! Luckily as it was non-stick it just flopped out in one lump straight in to the bin. The second attempt I used a lot more water and a lower heat. This one didn't burn on to the pan, but was very glutinous indeed! It stuck together in a big ball and it was only once I started stir-frying it that it began to separate into the grains.

Second attempt at glutinous rice

After I'd managed to cook the rice, the rest of the recipe was very easy and simple. After briefly frying the garlic, shallots and dried shiitakes, diced chicken was added. Then five spice and rice wine, followed by dark soy sauce. Finally, the rice and peanuts are added, warmed through, and then served seasoned with light soy sauce, toasted sesame oil and spring onion.

Grandmother's Chicken Fried Rice

The dish was really tasty, and I liked how the crunchy peanuts contrasted with the soft chicken and rubbery mushrooms. My main criticism of this dish was the lack of vegetables. Normally I would put in lots of veg and only 1 chicken breast, but I used 2 breasts for this. It felt very meat heavy, I guess I have got used to a less meaty diet lately. The book does have a large vegetarian section, and it seems that a lot of the dishes are meant to be served in conjunction with each other, so if I was to make this again I'd make a bit less and serve a veggie side dish too.

*I don't know why the recipe specifies dried shiitakes over fresh ones, perhaps it is because fresh ones aren't that widely available in parts of the UK? Anyone got a better suggestions?

Tonkatsu with Japanese-ish Salad

In my handbag I have a red notebook. In the notebook are various scrawls and doodles that categorise my life at any given time. The current notebook has a few shopping lists, a pictorial representation of our holiday in Florence, and a record of how far I ran in January. It also has a list of hard-to-find ingredients I am always on the lookout for.

The two items that refused to be knocked off the list were freeze-dried raspberries (Ideally powdered, but I'll take whole. I would also be tempted by freeze-dried strawberries.) and panko breadcrumbs. I'd tried the Thai store in Bruntsfield, but to no avail (they did have kaffir lime leaves though, so that got crossed off the list). Lupe Pintos was also lacking on this occasion.

The area of Edinburgh I live in is apparently the "Chinatown" area, although you wouldn't know it. The only clue is Hot Hot Chinese, an advice centre for elderly Chinese, and the Chinese service at the local church. The evidence is there, but there are no dragon arches and bilingual signs like some of the more established Chinatowns around the world. I came to the conclusion that if I was to find panko, it would probably be available within a 10 minute walk. Googling around, I found there was a Chinese supermarket hidden on Lauriston Place at the junction with Tollcross.

I headed down there the next day. Within a minute I'd found not one, but two varieties of panko. Yay! I went for the one that was cheaper, I think because it didn't have English instructions on the packet. There were loads of other weird ingredients in there, plus a good selection of utensils and woks. There was also a large section dedicated to nearly every brand of pre-made stir-fry sauce you can get. I have never seen so many varieties of Blue Dragon and Sharwoods in one place.

So... On to the actual post!

I had some pork chops in the freezer that I wanted to use, and the only recipe in the Wagamama cookbook that used them was tonkatsu. I've never had this, so I thought I'd give it a go. I promised T "crispy Japanese pork" for dinner, but conveniently forgot to tell him that it would be served on a salad.

Tonkatsu: Slightly out of focus as I was impatient to eat

Overall, I don't think this dish really worked. The tonkatsu was pretty tasty (and it's the first time I've breadcrumbed something where the breadcrumbs stayed mostly on the meat and not in a pile in the pan) and I quite liked the crispiness of the salad too. It's also the first dish on here to feature a mangetout! However, I wasn't convinced by the recommended sauce, a mixture of ketchup and Worcester sauce, although it did taste weirdly Asian given the total Britishness of the two component ingredients.

The main failing was pairing the salad with the pork. Although Wikipedia has just told me tonkatsu can be eaten cold, it felt strange having a lukewarm piece of meat on a freezing salad (all the ingredients except the spinach were kept in iced water to ensure their crispiness).

T was not interested in the salad at all, and I struggled to finish mine. I would probably make it all again, but have it on different plates. The tonkatsu would be really tasty with some stir-fried vegetables or on a ramen soup, while the salad would be better accessorized with some smoked fish and lots of dressing.

I now have a fridge full of daikon, spinach and bamboo shoots and a cupboard full of panko... more Japanese food to come soon I guess!

Japanese Style Salad (adapted from Wagamama Cookbook)
Serves 4 as a side dish, or 2 veg lovers.

2 small carrots, julienned
4 inch chunk of daikon (mooli), julienned
25g mangetout, thinly sliced diagonally
1 green chilli, finely diced
8-9 spring onions, thinly sliced diagonally
a handful of alfafa sprouts
3 handfuls of spinach

1) Once all the vegetables have been washed and chopped, place everything but the spinach in a bowl of ice water for an hour to ensure their crispiness.
2) Using the spinach as a base, artfully arrange the drained vegetables on top.
3) Add the toppings and dressings of your choice.

Dorie Greenspan's Croq-Tele (TV Snacks)

The quest to work my way through the whole of "Paris Sweets" continues with Patisserie Arnaud Larher's Croq-Teles. The name translates as "TV crunches", as they are an ideal substitute for popcorn or crisps. I made the hazelnut version, with ready ground nuts as I don't have a food processor.

Croq-Teles

These little biscuits were deliciously moreish, and the recipe introduction promised "up-front saltiness". However, I found them only a tad salty, and should have added much more salt to get that sweet-savoury taste. I don't know if this is because I have a mild salt addiction, or just the European habit of putting salt in everything! I find "Paris Sweets" an interesting book because Dorie Greenspan often comments on recipes from an American viewpoint. Sometimes I agree with her, and sometimes her comments seem so strange to me! I guess that is as close as I will get to proof that I am more at home in Europe than in the special relationship.

The dough is incredibly dry and crumbly, and reminded me a lot of making shortbread. The mixture barely holds together, so you have to squish it quite hard to get the balls to form.

A Stack of TV Snacks

Croq-Tele (adapted from Dorie Greenspan's Paris Sweets)

75g ground almonds
25g ground hazelnuts
100g sugar
1tsp vanilla sea salt
140g plain flour
100g unsalted butter, cubed

1) Preheat the oven to 180c, and line a large baking sheet.
2) Mix the ground nuts, sugar and salt together in a bowl, making sure there are no lumps.
3) In another bowl, crumble the flour and butter together, either using your fingertips or a pastry blender. The mixture should look like breadcrumbs.
4) Add the nut-sugar mixture, and combine. The dough should come together but be quite fragile. Tip it on to the worktop and squidge it together to form one lump.
5) Pinch of small pieces of dough and form in to rough balls. You should be able to get about 50 cookies from the mixture, so each ball should be about the size of a cherry.
6) If you have a large baking tray, you might be able to fit all of the cookies on, otherwise you'll need to do two batches. They don't spread much in the oven, so they'll only need 1.5-2cm gaps between them.

7) Bake the cookies for between 10-15 minutes. They should be set but not browned.
8) Cool them on the baking tray for 3 minutes, if you pick them up too early they'll crumble.
9) Once hardened, transfer them to a cooling rack. Try not to eat them all immediately!

EDIT: Just found the original recipe and commentary online.

Eat Food. Not Too Much. Mostly Plants.

While frantically trying to find a book on Middle Eastern trade regulations in the uni library for an essay a couple of months back, I spied Michael Pollan's "In Defense of Food" on a nearby shelf. I was way too busy to read it then, but I made a mental note to come back to it once exams and essays were over.

As I checked the book out last week, a note flashed up on screen saying that my library card expired soon. So soon, that instead of having the book for a month, I could only have it for 6 days. Is it a little ironic that the first time I ever find a book in the library that I actually want to read, my library card decides to die?

Anyway, I became determined that I would read all 200-odd pages in those 6 days. I know it took me the best part of a year to read "The God Delusion", but I was feeling optimistic. In the end, it only took me about 3 days to read the book. It's the stuff of undergraduate dreams: interesting, informative and well written. (The version I was reading also had a really sexy typeface. Oh yeh!)

Pollan sums up his argument as "Eat food, not too much, mostly plants". He questions the idea that we can be more healthy just by eating more nutrients, saying that fortified cereals and omega 3 diet bars are actually worse for us than just eating simple ingredients containing naturally occurring vitamins and minerals. We also eat too much because we stop when our plate is clean, not when we feel full, and lack a traditional food culture. Lastly, although animal products contain unique nutrients, like B12, we can obtain most of our dietary requirements more efficiently, cheaply and greenly in the form of vegetation.

For a long time, I have being trying to eat more healthily. I have chosen cereal bars over a piece of chocolate, and tried to resist the overwhelming desire to bake stuff. However, in the last year of so, my views have changed. Instead, I have shunned processed goods. I can't remember the last time I ate in McDonalds or Burger King, and don't think I have eaten a ready meal since first year. T recently made me a spaghetti bolognese using a ready made sauce, and it was so bland I wondered what the point was. Why spend £1.50 on Ragu/Dolmio/etc when you could buy a tin of tomatoes and some dried herbs for under a quid? Although I won't touch a ready meal, I'll happily have a big slice of homemade cake and some pork crackling. If the French can eat fatty, delicious food, why can't I?

Reading Pollan's work further convinced me. I had never questioned the idea of nutrition, and had taken vitamin supplements in the past. The idea that processed products are less nutritional makes sense, and going round a supermarket since, I was shocked at how little on the shelves was "food" in the purest form. While I cook most of my meals from scratch anyway, I have since started checking packets to see how processed things like mayonnaise and bread are. After all, the human race has survived for years without vitamin supplements, omega 3 milk and iron enriched water.

Sometimes I wish I could just stand in the supermarket and be evangelical. Tell people picking up ready meals that they are damaging their health, their wallet and the planet by buying it. Bin all the sugary chemical sweets in favour of some really good chocolates and toffees. I would love to turn back the clock and have an independent grocer, fishmonger, butcher and general store nearby. I think the food culture in Britain is burgeoning, but maybe I have a biased view as I actively seek information about food quality and origin?

Pollan's book is not without flaws. Many of his sources are quoted repeatedly, suggesting that some of his ideas don't yet have the diverse range of proof they need. He recommends a traditional diet, but doesn't specify what this means. Do you have to pick the traditional diet of one region and stick to it? Or can I have a roast dinner one night, then a curry, then a stir fry? Although there were a few passages that didn't entirely convince, on the whole I found that Pollan's theories fitted well with common sense. We should enjoy food as a pleasure, not as a fuel to be consumed quickly, alone with the television.

If I had the space, I would plant my own vegetable patch after reading this book. As I don't, I think I'll probably sign up for a vegetable box instead. I'm sick of going to the supermarket and seeing Thai asparagus for sale, when the grocers two doors down has British stuff in fresh.

Most of all, I'd recommend this book to everyone who is suffering at the hands of the Western diet. Anyone who is obese, diabetic, with high cholesterol and blood pressure, or on the brink of heart disease or stroke. I'd also recommend it to those of you who buy the diet range of ready meals, or who eat a special K bar for lunch in the hope that it will help you stay thin. It won't. Enjoy a nice ham and cheese salad and be happy instead.

Red Velvet Cake

Fluffy

I think my big downfall as a cook is that I don't revisit recipes enough. I'm always distracted by something new and shiny, and don't spend time getting a small selection of recipes right.

So when I decided to bake a cake for this weekend, I didn't go for an old favourite, I went for Red Velvet Cake.

I'd never really heard of this cake until recently. A lot of the blogs I frequent are American, and it pops up fairly frequently. I found it strange that a basic chocolate cake could get people so excited, seemingly just because it had food colouring in. When I found a recipe for it in "Bake" by Rachel Allen, I had to see what the fuss was about.

It was fairly complicated to make, as cakes go, as it involved alternating between wet and dry ingredients. While I managed to find buttermilk in a local deli, I couldn't find cream of tartar anywhere, except for in the Co-op, where I found a ticket for it on the shelf, but they'd sold out. As it was just in the icing to make the mixture more acidic, I replaced it with a few drops of lemon juice.

The cake took me quite a while to make, as my flatmates were watching tv and I didn't want to use the noisy electric whisk. This is one of the many joys of living a shared flat with a kitchen diner instead of a proper living room! I used a spatula to cream the butter and sugar, which took a while, then fold in the other ingredients. There was also a bit more mixture than I was expecting, so the mixing bowl threatened to overflow towards the end!

I turned the sandwich pans after 20 minutes in the oven, and at this stage they were noticeably wobbly in the centre. They rose quite a lot, but sunk as they cooled so they were only slightly domed, although if I was making this for a special occasion I would probably level them off so they looked a bit neater and more professional. As it was, I just filled in the gaps with the icing.

The icing was easy to make, although I've never made a meringue based icing before. I wasn't sure how much the icing was meant to be heated, but it seemed to come together ok. This is another problem with trying new things - I often don't know what result I'm aiming for! On eating, the mouthfeel was a little grainy. I think I probably should have heated it more, but I was worried that the eggs would be overwhipped and collapse. I iced it once with a thin layer to catch the crumbs and then thickly with little flicked peaks.

My cake looked quite similar to the one in the book, so I think I got it right. My American flatmate was the only one in the flat who had tasted red velvet before, and he confirmed that it tasted as it was supposed to.

Very red

It was pretty nice, with the only flaw being the slightly grainy icing where the sugar hadn't dissolved fully. However, I just don't get the appeal of red velvet cake. The cake was moist and soft, with a definite chocolate flavour, but I didn't like the icing though, and found it sickly. I thought it would have been much better with a chocolate icing. The red colouring impressed my flatmate H, and the red and white contrast looked good, but I think the novelty would wear off quickly. (H also said that syphilis was known as "French velvet" during the 18th Century so her opinions may be slightly skewed.)

A piece of cake...(I'm hilarious)

In terms of revisiting this recipe, I think I will make the cake again, but not bother with the food colouring or the icing. Instead I might try a chocolate fudge icing or a ganache. I guess you could also dye it other colours for special occasions, although I can't think of any right now... maybe green for St Patricks? Blue velvet?

Ice Cream

A late Christmas present turned up last month, and it was the Ben & Jerry's Homemade Ice Cream and Dessert Book. It's a bit of a tricky one, as as well as having American measurements, it has lots of American ingredients. I had to google what a Heath Bar was.

I made ice cream once before (apple crumble flavour) and I made it with a custard base. I had the impression that good ice cream was made with a custard base, but none of the Ben & Jerry's recipes follow this. A quick look in Leiths revealed there were three methods: custard base, mousse base, and all in one. The Ben & Jerry's recipes seem to mostly all in one, but there are a few mousse ones too. I decided to see how a custard base stood up to an all in one base, and whether there would be any difference in taste.

Before starting, the only difference between the recipes seemed to be that B&J used whole eggs, whereas Leiths only used the yolks. Leiths didn't have a custard-based vanilla recipe, so I went for a hybrid version of a coffee ice-cream and creme-anglais recipe. B&J also wanted me to use extract, but I wanted to use vanilla beans, so I adapted that recipe a bit too.

Ben & Jerry's

I made this using the Sweet Cream Base that appears frequently throughout the book. I infused the double cream with a split vanilla pod, and used vanilla sugar instead of plain. After whipping the eggs and the sugar, I added whole milk and the cream. The mixture was very runny, and produced a much larger amount than I expected. I put half in the freezer and half in the fridge to use as a base for another flavour.

When I went back 30 minutes later to whisk out any ice crystals, it had already frozen quite well. I was a little worried when the lumps didn't seem to whisk out as easily as I'd hoped, but when I tasted one, it was smooth, not icy.

Leiths

I began by infusing scalded milk with a vanilla pod, and then whisked an egg yolk with a small amount of vanilla sugar. Once the milk had infused, I added in the egg mixture and stirred for a full 25 minutes before the custard thickened. I actually managed to get twinges in my tendons from the intense stirring!

Then I mixed in a little double cream to loosen the custard, and froze it. Again it was quite lumpy after the first couple of whiskings, but when I tasted the lumps they were obviously icy unlike the B&J mixture. After a few whiskings, it was less icy.


As you can see from the picture, the ice cream looked very similar, although the custard based one was frozen harder than the Ben & Jerry, which was almost soft scoop.

I prefer a firmer ice cream, so I was instantly more excited about trying the custard base. Tasting the mixes before and during the freezing process, I had preferred the custard base as it was richer and creamier.

However, when faced with a whole scoop rather than a teaspoon-full, the Ben and Jerry mix won over. The custard base was too rich to eat lots of, and had a slightly unpleasantly "eggy" taste that didn't seem right. Also, the vanilla flavour was very intense, almost chemical. The Ben & Jerry's was still rich, but the vanilla taste was more subtle. Both had small ice crystals, but I suspect this was due to me going out for a few hours instead of staying home and churning them as I should have!

I suspect that either of these ice creams would go well with a dessert, but the B&J is more suitable for eating on its own than the custard one. I think it would be very difficult to tell the difference between the two methods if you tasted the ice creams separately. It was only tasting them back to back that the differences became clear.

The left-over B&J base is going to become rhubarb and custard flavour over the weekend, and now that I am sure that I can produce a decent all-in-one ice cream without a churning machine, I can't wait to try some of the other recipes in the book!

EDIT: Custard base went very well with the Breadwinner Banana Tatins.

Still ill and ongoing guilt

I have been ill for the past 6 weeks, and it is making things very difficult. I am feeling a bit better lately but I'm still not completely over it. I have an extension on my dissertation and coursework, but as I am still ill it still isn't moving as fast as I would like.

As I lost my appetite, I have barely cooked anything over the past few weeks, plus I didn't want to bake anything sharable in case I spread my germs around.

At the weekend I had a craving for custard, so ended up with 6 egg whites leftover. I'd noticed in "Paris Sweets" that there was a recipe for financiers, which only used egg whites.

The main problem with living in a flat share is that ingredients disappear. I had bought enough butter to make these specially, but when I came to make it, there was only 150g left. I used this to make beurre noisette and topped it up to 180g with vegetable oil. That was the only real mishap, and the rest of the recipe went smoothly, although I used muffin tins rather than the traditional ingot shapes.

I am not a massive fan of almonds, but was pleasantly surprised by the way they turned out. They had a similar taste to madeleines, but the texture was the best part. Outside was crispy and a touch chewy, but inside was soft and fluffy. I have some egg whites in T's freezer, so I will defrost them to make this again soon. I saw a variation on the internet that used ground hazlenuts instead of almonds, which is a very intriguing prospect. I managed to find some ground hazlenuts at the local health food shop, so will be giving this another go sometime soon.

I was also very excited to see Falko making a baumkuchen on "Rachel Allen's Bake" tv show on Saturday. It was cooked on a spit!

Peanut Butter and White Chocolate Blondies

I finally got round to making the Peanut Butter and White Chocolate Blondies I'd bookmarked in Rachel Allen's "Bake" over a month ago.

I changed the recipe slightly as I used unsalted butter and added a little sprinkle of vanilla salt at the end.

Mixing the blondies

As I'd left the butter and peanut butter at room temperature, it was soft enough to mix with a spoon rather than get the electric-whisk out. As I didn't want to make it too bread-like, I was also keen not to over-process the flour too much.

Fresh out the oven

Blondies are like brownies but without cocoa powder or chocolate to make them dark. I baked them for 30 minutes, but I think on reflection they were a bit biscuity around the edges. Next time I'd go for 22-25 minutes so they go fudgey instead.

The other problem with them was the white chocolate. I'd chopped it to a medium size but it melted away and you didn't get the discernible chunks that I wanted. I'd make it with bigger chunks next time, perhaps just breaking the bar in to squares and then halving them.

Finished product

I served these at a dinner party held by my flatmate, and they would have been great with some ice cream on the side. Unfortunately it was a bit of a last minute thing so we hadn't stocked up on ice cream and other goodies. I saved a few to have to myself, and fed some to T when he came round to do some DIY for me. They tasted best warm straight out of the oven, but they held up pretty well stored in some tupperware for a couple of days. I really liked the crunch of the peanuts compared to the soft cake, and it would have been better with some creamy bits of white chocolate thrown in there too!

As I'd made my own vanilla salt from sea salt crystals and an vanilla bean, there was an occasional crunch of salt too. I am a big fan of the salty/sweet combo so I really liked this element, although as the peanut butter had salt in it I only put a little in as I was scared of making it too salty. I'm sure you can get low-salt peanut butter at the health food store so next time I might buy this and control the salt myself.

They are probably pretty unhealthy but they were tasty so I don't feel too bad...

Jerusalem Artichoke and Carrot Soup

I have become slightly addicted to the Oxfam bookshop, and frequently go in to the one by uni to check out the cookery book selection. The one in Morningside has a better selection of fancy books though, I guess because the people of Morningside have a bit more cash to splash and will give away books that are still pretty current and in good condition. The other day I nabbed the Green & Blacks' Chocolate book for £1.50!

About a year ago I got the New Covent Garden Soup book. My dad has it and I had been trying to decide whether to buy it or just steal my dad's copy, but it was in Oxfam for £2 so I went for it. I've been trying to work my way through but I've probably only done about 10% of the book so far.

I got some Jerusalem artichokes at the famers' market on Saturday, and I'd never eaten them before, so I didn't really know what to expect. As I was making the soup, I sneaked a piece out and tried it. It had the texture of a potato, but a nuttier taste. I still have a couple left so I might make them in to a mash or a mixed vegetable gratin.

I have had mixed results with the NCG book, with some being totally delicious (Chicken, lemon and tarragon) and some being quite disappointing (pappa al pomodoro). This one was quite successful, and I liked the flavour of the Jerusalem artichokes sweetened with the carrot. It also uses milk so it wasn't overwhelmingly creamy.

Recipe (adapted from New Covent Garden Soup Co's Book of Soups)

25g unsalted butter
1 small onion
1 clove of garlic
400g Jerusalem artichokes, peeled
240g carrots, sliced
50g carrots, finely grated
1l chicken stock
110ml milk
salt and pepper

Saute the onion and garlic in the butter on a low heat for 5 minutes until soft, but do not colour them. Add the chopped artichokes and carrots, and give it all a good stir.

After a couple of minutes, add the stock (I used the chicken stock I'd frozen earlier, I used 600ml stock and 400ml water as the stock was quite strong) and simmer for 20 minutes.

Blend it all up, and then add the milk. Stir in the grated carrot to add to the texture. Season the soup to taste.

Et voila!

I found this made about 5 smallish portions, but mine was quite thick, so you could probably water it down a bit if you prefer a thinner texture or need more portions.

Punitions

Punitions

This week I finally got to do some baking from Dorie Greenspan's "Paris Sweets". I'd got the book for my birthday, but the craziness of Christmas and New Year meant that I'd only been able to read through the recipes, and hadn't tried any out yet.

I didn't have much time, so I did the very first recipe in the book, butter biscuits from the Poilane bakery (home of the famous pain Poilane sour dough loaf). They are called "punishments" as a bit of a joke, as the blurb leading up to the recipe explains. I even attempted to make them in the same way Greenspan describes Lionel Poilane making them, in a flour fountain. I got the dough together eventually, but the counter in our kitchen is too small to get a proper sized fountain going.

I baked these in T's gas oven, which I am beginning to think is a little cooler than the dial suggests, so I was worried that they weren't throughly cooked. I have frozen half the dough though, so I can test the other half in my oven which is electric and a bit more predictable than T's.

From the perspective of a resident of Scotland, where shortbread is pratically a staple food (and as someone who also managed to acquire 500 sticks of shortbread last summer after a charity raffle gone wrong) I found the texture of these a bit odd. The addition of an egg meant that they weren't as "short" as shortbread, but they were some how crispy yet soft at the same time. Reading the post by Greenspan on her blog, I am intrigued by the idea of butter tasting. I used Country Life (unsalted) to make these, but they didn't taste that buttery to me. I have been eyeing up some Italian cream butter, buerre d'Isigny, Bridel Sea Salted butter and goat butter in Waitrose recently. I think next time I have some spare money (and have been to the gym lots) I shall spend an afternoon eating bread and butter and seeing which one I think is best.

Star Shaped

Having delved in to "Paris Sweets" my opinion is now slightly altered from my first look at it nearly a month ago. Although most of the measurements are in American cups, there are gram measurements next to it, so that makes life a bit easier. The annoying element now is that most of the recipes are based around using a stand mixer, which I don't have. I'm sure most Parisian pastry chefs didn't have stand mixers until recently either, so it's a bit of a pain to reconvert the recipe back to something that can be done by hand. My initial assessment that it was a book for special occasions also has changed, and I can see myself attempting most recipes in this book at one time or another.

(I also charged the batteries on my dSLR so prepare for slightly better pictures from now on!)

Birthday Food Presents

For my birthday, I got a lot of food related items. Maybe I talk about food too much instead of confining it all to here! I though I would review all the books initially and then review again once I have actually used them. I find buying cookbooks can be a bit overwhelming as they look good when you buy them, but when you try to use them they aren't always clear.

Rachel Allen: "Bake"
This has some nice pictures about how things are meant to end up, always useful! The tips section at the back also had some stuff that I didn't already know about, so I think it could be a fairly comprehensive guide. I also think it is interesting that it has sweet, savoury and meal items, not just cakes and biscuits. Some of the pies look very good. I have book marked the white chocolate blondies and the chocolate lava cakes to make when I get back to Edinburgh after Christmas.

Dorie Greenspan: "Paris Sweets: Great Desserts from the City's Best Pastry Shops"
This doesn't have any photos, just illustrations, so there is more need for your own presentation skills and creative thinking with this book. Another problem is that a lot of the measurements are in American units, although I have measuring cups so this is not so much of a problem. I also like that the book is interspersed with anecdotes and histories of the dishes, so you get a feel for the culture as well as just the baking. I made the Opera cake from this book a while back, as I found the recipe online, and it was pretty spectacular. I think this is probably more of a special occasion book than "Bake", but I might try out some of the recipes for D's wedding cake in the summer.

Heston Blumenthal: "Further Adventures In Search of Perfection"
In terms of practicality, this is probably the worst cook book ever! One of the recipes involves digging a pit in the back garden. However there are a couple that wouldn't require too much extra equipment, as I am planning to get a temperature probe after Christmas, and this seems to get used in every recipe. The really great thing about this book is that each recipe has 10-20 pages explaining every single method, ingredient and technique, and why it is done. For example, when investigating how to make the perfect chicken tikka masala, Blumenthal uses an MRI scanner to test different marinades, and to work out which is the best way to get flavour in to the meat. Although it is not a practical cook book in many ways, it is fascinating to find out the science behind a lot of food, and how minor alterations can make a big difference to the final taste.