Glazed Maple Pecan Shortbread Recipe

Shortbread:

40g pecans, finely chopped

125g unsalted butter, softened

60g caster sugar

1 tbsp maple syrup

150g plain flour

30g corn flour

Topping:

40g pecans, finely chopped

1tbsp maple syrup

Pinch sea salt

Glaze:

1 tbsp unsalted butter, melted

110g icing sugar

Up to 100ml maple syrup

– First, prepare your pecans either by finely chopping by hand or by pulsing gently in a food processor. (My stick blender came with a small chopper attachment, which is perfect for these kind of jobs when you just need a small amount of something.)

– In a mixing bowl, cream together the butter sugar and maple syrup.

– Add the flour and pecans and mix to combine. At first it will not come together but you can bring it together easily with your hands at the end.

– Shape the dough into a flat disk and wrap and place in the fridge for 30 minutes to chill.

– Prepare the pecans by roughly chopping them, leave a few bits that are chunkier.

– put the pecans in an oven proof dish and mix with the maple syrup.

– Sprinkle the sea salt on top.

– Bake in the oven for 10 minutes at 170°. (You can do this at the same time as your first batch of biscuits.)

– Roll out your chilled dough to a thickness of 5 mm between two silicon sheets. (By using the silicon sheets instead of extra flour your dough will not get too dry. But if you don’t have these just sprinkle the worksurface and rolling pin with flour and work quickly to stop it sticking).

– Cut out your shapes, I prefer a maple leaf but they can be any shape you like, and place on a lined baking tray.

– Put the tray in the fridge to chill for at least 10 minutes. This will stop the biscuits from spreading when you bake them so if you’re not using a delicate shape and don’t mind this then you can skip that step.

– Re-roll your dough, but if it gets too sticky you may have to put it back in the fridge for a few minutes to solidify again.

– Heat the oven to 170°C and bake each tray for 10 minutes until just starting to turn golden brown then remove the tray From the oven and leave the biscuits to cool on the tray.

– To prepare the glaze mix together the icing sugar and melted butter in a small bowl. Gradually out of the maple syrup until you get a fairly thick but runny consistency. You may have to add a little more icing sugar or maple syrup to get the consistency you want. It wants to be somewhat like Greek yoghurt, not too thick but not so runny that it slides off your biscuit.

– Once your biscuits are cool, dip each one top down into the glaze then gently shake it back and forth so that the excess glaze falls back into the bowl. Then place back onto the baking tray and sprinkle with your pecan topping mix.

– Repeat for all of your biscuits then leave the glaze to set before serving or putting in an airtight box to store.

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Black Forest Loaf Cake

150g unsalted butter

150g golden caster sugar

3 eggs

1 tap vanilla extract

130g self raising flour

40g cocoa powder

3 tbsp milk

1 cup cherries (You can use fresh, frozen or tinned cherries here. I forgot to weigh them but about a cups worth went in, measure it with your heart!)

6tbsp Cherry liqueur

300ml double cream

3tbsp icing sugar

1/4 cup cherries + 1 tbsp cherry liqueur (leave to marinate for a while)

1tbsp grated chocolate

– Heat the oven to 180°C and grease and line a loaf tin.

– Cream together the butter and sugar in a large mixing bowl.

– Beat in one egg at a time.

– Mix in the vanilla.

– Fold in the flour and cocoa powder.

– Fold in the cherries.

– Scrape the mix into your prepared tin.

– Bake in the middle of the oven for 1 hour, turning it halfway through.

– Remove from the oven and pour the cherry liqueur over the hot cake. (If using frozen or tinned cherries you can use the juices.)

-Leave to cool in the tin.

– In a small mixing bowl whip the cream and sugar until it forms stiff peaks.

– Lightly fold in the cherries. (Barely fold them at all, you want the pink to ripple, not make the whole thing pink.) Retain three good looking cherries.

– Untin the cake and place on serving dish.

– Spread the cream evenly over the top of the cake.

– Garnish with your reserved cherries and grated chocolate.

– Store covered in the fridge for up to three days.

Pommes Anna Recipe

For a dish that bears my name this took me an embarrassingly long time to get right. I would have potatoes swimming in butter or too crisp to eat without worrying about your fillings. These little stacked Pommes Anna finally hit that sweet spot between buttery and crispy and look fab for what is actually minimal effort. You can do a lot of the prep beforehand in assembling the stacks in the muffin tin if you want to prepare these in advance and then just pop them in the oven when ready so good for dinner parties!

6-8 new potatoes (waxy)

125g unsalted butter

1 clove garlic, crushed

1/2 tsp sea salt

Cracked black pepper

Fresh thyme sprigs

– Heat the oven to gas mark 6.

– Use a mandolin or very sharp knife to slice the potatoes into 1/8” slices. Put in a small mixing bowl.

– Melt the butter in a small saucepan.

– Brush the insides of six muffin tins with melted butter.

– Place a small sprig of thyme in the bottom of each muffin cup.

– Add the garlic to the melted butter and remove the leaves from the remaining thyme sprigs and add those too.

– Gently heat until fragrant.

– Pour the butter over the potatoes. Add salt and pepper to season and toss gently.

– Place the sliced potatoes carefully in the muffin tins. You want to arrange them so that they will look good when turned out. Press down firmly in the centre.

– Pour the remaining butter over the potatoes.

– Cover the muffin tray with foil and bake in the oven for 35 minutes.

– Place a large oven dish over the muffin tin and carefully flip over so that the potato stacks come out intact. If any fall apart you can push them back into shape.

– Place the oven dish back in the oven and bake for another 10 minutes until the stacks look nice and crispy on the edges.

– Serve hot.

Pavlova Recipe

4 egg whites

250g caster sugar

1 tsp cornflour

1 tsp white (wine) vinegar

600ml cream

6 tbsp icing sugar

Assorted summer fruits

– Heat the oven to gas mark 4/180°C and live and baking tray.

– In a clean glass bowl whisk the egg whites until full and satiny.

– Add the sugar a spoonful at a time, continuing to whisk until the mixture is stiff and shiny.

– Fold in the cornflour and vinegar.

– Scoop our onto the prepared tray and smooth to create a well in the centre.

– Put the baking tray in the oven and immediately turn the temperature down to gas mark 2/140°C.

– Bake for an hour and a half. Leave to cool in the oven, if using an electric oven open the door a bit.

– When the meringue is cooled prepare your fruit.

– Add the cream and icing sugar to a large mixing bowl and whisk until stiff.

– Split the cream in half and stir chopped fruits through one half.

– Spread the cream with fruit over the meringue.

– Top the fruity cream with the remaining whipped cream. (Doing this means that you get a clean, white topping with no bleed through from the fruits. Feel free to skip this design if you prefer.)

– Decorate the top with good looking fruits.

Rhubarb and Orange Frangipane Tart

The last of the home grown rhubarb is coming this month, after that you need to let the plants rest and regroup.  So I whipped up this Rhubarb and Orange Frangipane Tart to make the most of it while it’s still with us!

The later season rhubarb isn’t as vibrantly coloured as the younger forced rhubarb you get at the beginning of the year, if you made it with that then this would really be a pink showstopper!  However, the regimented rows of rhubarb are very pleasing to me and the taste is amazing!

The natural tartness of the rhubarb and the sweetness of the orange frangipane go together so well and make a wonderfully refreshing tart that’s full of flavour.

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Makes 1 rectangular tart

One sheet ready rolled sweet shortcrust pastry (or make your own but I was short on time!)
~4 sticks rhubarb
85g butter, softened
85g caster sugar
1 egg
85g ground almonds
zest of one large orange, finely grated
1 tbsp caster sugar

• Heat the oven to gas mark 7 and grease your loose bottomed rectangular tart tin well.
• Shape and roll the pastry to fit (I had to trim a bit off the sides to make an extension, the scraps then went for jam tarts!)
• Press the pastry into the tin carefully, leaving a small overhang around the edge.
• Slice your rhubarb into batons the width of the inside of the pastry shell.
• In a small mixing bowl combine the butter, sugar, egg, ground almonds and orange zest and beat until well combined and smooth.
• Scrape the frangipane mixture into the pastry.
• Place the rhubarb on top of the frangipane evenly.
• Sprinkle with the remaining 1 tbsp sugar.
• Bake for 30 minutes until the top of the frangipane is golden brown and the pastry an even colour.
• Remove from the oven and trim away the excess pastry from the edges with a sharp knife.
• Leave to cool completely in the tin then carefully unmould.
• Serve with fresh clotted cream for a delightful afternoon treat!

NB – if making in the round tart tin double the frangipane mixture.

 

 

Mini Breakfast Bites

These mini breakfast bites were one of the first things I invented for myself in 3rd year food tech!  They are now a staple tradition in our household and I couldn’t imagine Christmas without them!

Makes 24

24 slices of white bread (2 meduim sliced loaves)
1/2 cup sunflower oil
24 quails eggs
12 rashers streaky bacon or pancetta
24 tiny button mushrooms (or 6 small mushrooms cut into quarters)

• Heat the oven to gas mark 7.
• Get out 2x 12 hole bun tins, I prefer the rounded ones but the straighter ones work just fine.
• Use a large round cookie cutter, checking that it is slightly bigger than the bun tins you are using,   to cut out a large round from the centre of each slice of bread.  (leftover crusts can be used to make bread sauce, or breadcrumbs to freeze for later use)
• Brush both sides of each round of bread and gently press into the bun tins.
• Bake in the oven for 10 minutes, until just turning crisp and golden.
• Take out the tins (being careful coz it’s hot!) and crack a quails egg carefully into each one.  (I use a sharp knife to pierce the shells)
• Return to the oven for ~5 minutes until the eggs are just setting.
• Prepare your bacon/pancetta rolls by slicing each rasher in half then rolling up.
• Take the tins out of the oven again and add your bacon rolls and mushrooms.
• Cook for another 5-7 minutes until the bacon is cooked through.
• Serve immediately while hot and make sure you get some too because these will disappear fast!
• 

Blackberry and Apple Lattice Pie

The nights are drawing in, the mornings are full of mist.  It’s definitely Autumn!  So that definitely means pie in my book!  This Blackberry and Apple Lattice Pie uses the copious quantities of British Apples and wild blackberries available to us at this time of year.

I am lucky in that I have an apple tree in my garden and a fantastic blackberry patch at the end of my road so there’s nothing to stop me whipping up one of these as the mood strikes!

The Lattice is a more fiddly option but firstly, it looks fantastic and secondly it allows the steam to escape more easily from the pie thus minimising the risk of a “soggy bottom”!

You can be very precise with the Lattice but I prefer a more rustic, cottagey pie.  I just throw it together and am happy to enjoy the fruits of my labours without needing it to look like haute cuisine!

Makes 1 20cm pie

1/2 batch Shortcrust Pastry (Or make a whole batch and freeze half for impromptu pastry needs!)

3 apples, sliced (leave the skin on though, that’s where all the vitamins live!)
2 tbsp cornflour
5 tbsp sugar
~150g blackberries (Or whatever amount you pick!)

1 egg, beaten
1 tbsp demerera sugar

• Heat the oven to gas mark 5 with a flat baking sheet on the middle shelf and prepare a 20cm loose bottomed tart tin.
• Mix the apples, cornflour and sugar together in a mixing bowl.
• Gently add the blackberries.
• Roll out 2/3 of the pastry to a thickness of a £1 coin (~3mm) and large enough to completely cover the tin with a few cm extra (keep the remaining 1/3 to the side for a minute).
• Gently pick up the pastry using the rolling pin and drape it into the tin.
• Gently press the pastry into the edges of the tin making sure not to leave any air bubbles underneath.
• Tip the apples and blackberry mixture into the pie.
• Roll out the remaining pastry into a rectangle wider than your tin and cut even* strips about 1.5cm wide.   (* Do as I say, not as I do!)
• Form a lattice on top of the pie, leaving the strips hanging over the edge.
  There are a few ways to do this: You can assemble the lattice on a piece of baking paper and then slide it on top of the pie or you can place the vertical strips on first and weave the horizontal strips over it one at a time.
• Trim away the excess pastry from around the edge of the pie, erring more towards leaving a little extra overhand rather than cutting too neatly as it will shrink slightly.
• Brush the egg over the top of the pastry and sprinkle with sugar.
• Bake for 30-45 minutes on the preheated baking sheet until the pastry is golden brown and crisp on top.  You want to cook this for as long as possible but remove it from the oven before the top starts to catch.  Golden brown is good, blackened is bad! THe filling should be bubbly and quite liquid but it will set as it cools.
• Allow the pie to cool for a 20 minutes (don’t be hasty, you’ll burn your tongue!) and then serve with cold cream or ice cream!

 

 

 

Ombré Birthday Cake

For my Birthday BBQ I made a 3 Layer Pink Ombre Cake and a dozen cupcakes as favours too!

I’m really happy with how it turned out!  I’ve never tried anything like it before but I was pleased to see how my technique worked out!  I wanted to minimise waste and washing up so I came up with my own way of creating this cake effect.

Everyone seemed to enjoy it anyway, there was barely any left by the end of the evening!

I made a huge batch of cake mixture…

…And about 2kg of buttercream!

The colours worked wonderfully!  Nice and vibrant!

I tried to keep things nice and tidy, having assembled the layers I then piped round to fill in the gaps.

Which meant that I had a smooth surface to spread the rest of the icing over.

So here’s how I did it:

Makes 1 x 3 layer 7″ Layer Cake and 12 Cupcakes

500g unsalted butter, softened
500g golden caster sugar
8 eggs
1 tbsp vanilla extract
500g self raising flour
3 tbsp milk
pink gel good colouring*  (I have that awful salmon pink one so you need to add violet to make it a nicer colour!)
grape violet gel food colouring*

500g unsalted butter, softened
1 kg icing sugar
1 tbsp vanilla extract
2 tbsp milk

1 jar seedless raspberry jam

– Heat the oven to gas mark 4.  Prepare 3 7″ sandwich tins (I use silicone as they come out flatter and are easier to turn out.) Line 12 muffin holes with paper cases.
– Cream together the butter and sugar in a LARGE mixing bowl until light and fluffy.
– Add one egg at a time, mixing well between additions.
– Add the vanilla extract and mix well.
– Fold in the flour until all combined with the wet ingredients.
– Add the 3 tbsp milk and mix well.
– Fill each cupcake case to halfway with cake batter.
– Put 1/3 of the remaining white batter in the first greased cake tin.
– Add a bit of the pink colouring about the size of a sweetcorn kernel along with a slightly smaller amount of the grape violet and mix thoroughly into the batter to achieve a light pink colour.  * If using nicer food colouring then use your judgement on the blend you want.
– Put 1/2 this mixture in the second cake tin.
– Add more pink colouring and more violet colouring and mix well to get a really deep colour.
– Put this remaining cake batter in the final tin.
– Put everything in the oven and bake for 25 minutes until golden brown on top and a skewer inserted in the centre comes out clean.
– Turn out your cakes upside down onto cooling racks and take the cupcakes out of the tin to cool.

– Put the butter, icing sugar, vanilla and milk in a LARGE mixing bowl and beat until thoroughly combined, light and airy.

To assemble the cakes:

– Trim any domes from your cake layers to give you flat cakes.
– Put a smear of buttercream on the base of the cake stand or plate.
– Place the darkest layer flat bottom up on the cake stand or plate.
– Spread with an even layer of buttercream.
– Spread raspberry jam on the top of the lighter layer.
– Place the jam side on top of the buttercream.
– Spread another layer of buttercream over the flat bottom of the lighter layer.
– Spread raspberry jam over the top of the white layer.
– Place the jam side on top of the buttercream.
– Fill a piping bag with white buttercream and make a 1/2″ hole to pipe from.
– Pipe around the cake between the layers to fill in any dips or gaps between the cakes layers.
– Smooth round this with a palette knife to make a smooth sided cake.
– Spread a good amount of white buttercream over the top of the cake and down over the edges using a palette knife to spread a smooth even layer of white buttercream over the whole cake.
– Now take about a cup of buttercream from the main mixture and put it in a separate bowl.
– Add pink and grape violet food colouring to acheive a nice deep raspberry pink colour.
– Put it in a piping bag with a 1/2″ hole.
– Pipe a ring of pink buttercream around the base of the cake.
– Now take a pallette knife and spread the pink buttercream up the side of the cake in small swirling circles so the dark pink melds with the white to give that faded ombre effect.  Don’t swirl all the way to the top, only go about 2/3 up and leave a nice band of clean white buttercream at the top.

– Take some raspberry jam and put it in a squeezy bottle with a cone tip.
– Inject jam into the centre of each cupcake.
– Take the remaining buttercream and put it in a piping bag with a large star tip.
– Ice each cupcake with a swirl of buttercream covering the jam hole in the centre.
– Add sprinkles white the buttercream is wet.

 

 

 

Aspara-bacon Quiche

Ah, Quiche!  The poor quiche has a bit of a bad rep simple because it has a bit of a funny sounding name!  But we should not mock the quiche for it is delicious!  Throughout the summer months I will frequently have one in the fridge just waiting to be grabbed for causal lunches, a picnic, a light supper.  It’s a very versatile dish and once you have the basics down you can whip one up in no time!

This little quiche is an asparabacon quiche.  Asparabacon is one of the finest flavour combinations so adding it to a quiche seemed like a brilliantly obvious step!

I’m not going to lie though, I think I’ve had it with pastry!  I CAN make pastry, sure.  It’s not that hard… but I hate it.  It’s just one of those fiddly jobs that I just don’t really enjoy.  I think that these days you can get some good ready made pastry at a decent price in any supermarket so I may just throw the towel in and go for an easy life!  We shall see!

There’s an entire bundle of asparagus in this small quiche, which is a lot, yes, but ASPARAGUS! Fresh, British Asparagus too!  If you want to dial back the asparagus that’s cool, but why not indulge yourself a bit?

 

Serves 4 / Makes 1x 8″ quiche

150g plain flour
50g butter
25g trex (or just 75g butter)
1-2 tbsp cold water

6 large eggs
200 ml milk
1/4 tsp salt
fresh ground black pepper
1 bungle asparagus spears, trimmed of the woody end
125g smoked bacon lardons
25g grated cheese

– Put the flour, butter and trex in a mixing bowl and rub together with your hands until it forms a breadcrumb consistency.
– Add the water a little at a time mixing until it comes together into a dough.
– Shape into a flat round, wrap in clingfilm and chill for 30 minutes.
– Heat the oven to gas mark 5.
– Roll out the pastry on a floured worksurface into a rough circle.  It should be about the thickness of a £1 coin and large enough to cover an 8″ sandwich tin with a little overhang.
– Gently pick the dough up using the rolling pin and drape it gently into the 8″ sandwich tin, lightly press down into the edges and smooth up the sides and over the lip making sure there are no trapped air bubbles.
– Cover the pastry with foil and fill with baking beans.
– Place on a baking tray and bake for 15 minutes.
– Remove from the oven and gently remove the foil and baking beans.  If it won’t release evenly put it back in the oven for 5 minutes.
– Bake uncovered for a further 5-10 minutes until the pastry is just cooked and has lost that sickly pale look!
-Prepare your filling: Whisk the eggs, milk, salt and pepper together in a jug.
– Scatter the bacon and asparagus evenly over the pastry shell.
– Pour the egg mixture into the pastry shell.  If you’ve got it right and there are no holes this is where your filling should stay.  If you’ve got it wrong, well, that why it’s on a baking tray!
– Scatter the grated cheese on top.
– Pop it back into the oven (if it’s leaking get it back in as quickly as you can so that egg seals the hole!)
– Bake at gas mark 5 for 45 minutes until the egg is set in the centre and the top is a golden brown.
– Leave to cool completely before running a sharp knife around the edge of the tin to loosen the pastry.
– Place the bottom on a sturdy bowl smaller than the tin and press down evenly to unmould it.
– Run a sharp knife between the pastry and the tin base to separate it.
– Serve and enjoy!

Ricotta Veggie Lasagna Rolls

Next up we have these Ricotta Veggie Lasagna Rolls using your home made Ricotta!  These make a really nice lunch or light supper for 2.  I like variety so I made 2 different kinds.  Green Pesto and Courgette and Red Pesto and Red Pepper.

I think that my favourite kind were the Green Pesto and Courgette but that’s probably because I am crazy about anything with courgette in.  I love it!

These are a little bit tricky to make but only in the sense of lots of little steps.  It doesn’t take long to prep or assemble these! You can even make them ahead and then refrigerate until you are ready to cook them if you’d rather get the prep done at a quieter time.

Serves 2

4 sheets lasagna pasta
1/2 courgette
2 cups fresh spinach
1 roasted bell pepper (I keep the lightly pickled jars of them as a store cupboard staple)
1 ramekin Ricotta (Your yield will vary, I used all of mine)
1 tbsp green pesto
1 tbsp red pesto
Tomato pasta sauce (Awesome Sauce is a good one but if you use a jar I won’t tell!)*
1/2 cup grated cheese

– Heat your oven to gas mark 6 or so.
– Bring a large pan of water to the boil and add your pasta sheets.  Cook for 10 minutes (or according to packet instructions).
– Carefully remove the pasta from the water (keep the water!) and lay flat on a plate or chopping board.
– Take your courgette and very thinly slice it lengthways so you have slices about 1/8″.  I used a mandolin but with a steady hand you can do this by hand.
– Place your courgette in a sieve and lower the sieve into the boiling water, balancing it on the side of the pan.  Cook for 2 minutes then lift the sieve and drain.
– Put your spinach in the sieve and lower it into the boiling water.  It should wilt in less than a minute, then remove and drain.
– Split your ricotta in two and mix the green pesto in to one and the red pesto in to the other.
– Take a sheet of lasagna, spread a layer of the ricotta on it, leaving a good 1″ gap at the end.
– Layer over your spinach and then your courgette or pepper.
– Lightly spray your baking dish with oil.
– Carefully roll the lasagna sheet towards the gap.  The filling will move with the roll and start to fill the gap, it may even squish out a little.  This is ok!
– Carefully lift the roll into the baking dish.
– When they are all ready pour over the pasta sauce and sprinkle with cheese.
– You can pause here if you like and finish cooking later.
– Put into the oven and cook for about 20 -30 minutes until the cheese is nice and melted and everything is piping hot.

* But really, make the Awesome Sauce.  It is actually AWESOME!