Third Time Lucky!

I’ve been a  bit quiet on here of late, mostly down to the fact that I’ve been busy getting ready for the Regional Final of Future Chef 2013 and haven’t had time to make much other than my dishes…or at least haven’t had the time to blog about them.

Chocolate Swirl Brioches

It’s ridiculous that I’m saying this on 27th January but; Happy New Year! It’s getting to that time of the month where Christmas and New Year are distant memories and New Years Resolutions have long been forgotten- my unofficial one was to blog more often: the fact I’m writing my first post of 2013 today shows how well that one’s going and is why I never make New Years Resolutions.

Very Berry Crumble Snacks

These are perfect as little fruity snacks, they don’t take long to make and aren’t difficult either. Alternatively though, they can be served with cream or ice cream as a dessert. I liking making them as individual ones but you could make one big one. If you make individual ones, they can be cling-filmed and kept in the fridge uncooked for a couple of days ready to go in the oven when you fancy one.

In terms of berries, I normally use 75g of frozen summer berries and then fresh strawberries but that’s purely because I always have those in the freezer so I can make it when the mood takes me but fresh berries work just the same.

Ingredients

75g flour

25g butter

25g caster sugar

20g rolled oats

50g blueberries, blackberries or blackcurrants

50g strawberries

25g raspberries

Makes about 5 individual snacks or one large crumble

Method

1.  Place the butter and flour in a mixer and mix until it comes together and resembles breadcrumbs, add the sugar and rolled oats and continue mixing until well combined.
2. Chop the strawberries into  smaller pieces then add a few to each ramekin. Divide the other fruits between the ramekins. Once you’ve done so, mix the fruit in each ramekin around slightly so it’s evenly dispersed then top with the crumble mix.
3. Cook at 180° for 8-12 minutes.
4. Eat!

Stewed Fruit Rice Pudding

This is, in my opinion, the ultimate comfort food which if we’re being honest, with the ‘summer’ we’re getting here at the moment is exactly what we need. There’s just something nice about sitting with a bowl of warm, creamy, fruity loveliness while the rain pours down and you have to turn up the heat, in July. That last bit is maybe not so lovely but still.

I hadn’t actually ever had rice pudding until this March because my Mum has a thing about remembering it as some horrible stodgy mess of a school dinner that was enough to put her off for a lifetime so when I tried it, I decided I had some catching up to do and now want to eat it all the time, the only thing is, I’m not normally patient enough to wait for it to cook which means a) I don’t have it or b) I eat it half raw. I’m working on a quicker way to make it though so keep your eye out if you’re just as impatient as me.

Ingredients

50g pudding rice

35g caster sugar

350ml semi-skimmed milk

pinch grated nutmeg

1 rhubarb stem

5 raspberries

5 strawberries

Method

1.  Preheat the oven to 150°. Butter a heatproof baking dish and tip in the rice and 25g of the sugar before stirring in the milk. Sprinkle the nutmeg over and top. Cook for about 1 and a half hours or until it resembles a creamy risotto.
2.  Slice the rhubarb and half the strawberries before putting them in a pan with the remaining sugar and cooking over a low heat, stirring occasionally, until soft and stewed.
3.  Put the fruit into a bowl and top with the rice pudding.
4. Eat!

LG x

Chocolate Ice Cream

I promised some ice cream recipes, so here’s the first one and I feel a bit stupid as the weather has now decided we’re going back to winter but hey, there’s no problem with eating it inside with the heating on! And maybe next week I’ll bring out the minestrone soup recipe that I decided to save for another time when the sun came out a few weeks ago.

Anyway, I’ve picked chocolate as my first ice cream recipe because no matter how many times we go to Italy and no matter how many ice cream parlours I go to, I can never quite bring myself to step away from chocolate and try something new. And if I do, I go for two scoops and get a safety scoop of chocolate!

I love home-made ice cream and my ice cream machine, it tastes so much better than the brought stuff and I’m verrryyy close to getting that authentic Italian gelato flavour. The only problem with it, is that because it’s home-made and has nothing added to it, when it freezes, it really does freeze. I suggest you take it out about 20minutes before you plan on eating it or get a hot ice cream scoop and be prepared for a bit of a battle!

Ingredients

1 quantity of custard, cooled slightly (Recipe here)

150g Dark Chocolate

25g Caster Sugar

300ml Double cream

1tbspn cocoa powder

Method

1. Break the chocolate into a bowl and place over a pan of simmering water with the sugar, stirring often until it has melted.
2. Meanwhile, stir the cocoa into the custard- this is why it’s better if it’s only slightly cooled as the powder will dissolve better if however, you want to pre-make the custard then it’ll be fine to leave out the powder and replace with and extra 50g of chocolate- until dissolved and evenly mixed.
3. Once melted, add the chocolate mixture to the custard and whisk to ensure it’s well incorporated.
4. Whisk the cream into the custard mixture. Once it’s all the same colour, it’s mixed evenly and can be frozen, this can be done two ways: Churn in an ice cream machine according to instructions (Mine takes about an hour but each machine is different) or, if you don’t have a machine then place in an ice cream tub in the freezer, removing every half hour or so and mixing it. This will imitate the churning of an ice cream machine, repeat until it’s frozen.
5. Eat!

LG x

The Custard Challenge

Custard is one of those basic things that’s really useful to be able to make. I know these days, most people think of custard as that yellow powder that comes out of those blue and red Bird’s Custard tins, right? But I think that’s such a shame because that’s not how it should be. I think everybody should try making custard from scratch, at least once because:

• It tastes better… I think this is true about most home-made things and custard’s definitely one of them. Let’s be honest, how can egg custard taste like egg custard when there’s no egg in it?
• It’s better for you… Again, true of most things you make yourself and certainly true for custard. In custard powder, there’s; salt, cornflour, flavouring and colouring so not only are you eating stuff that should not be in custard, you’re not getting any of the goodness from the eggs.
• It’s easy… I think custard’s  one of those things that people are under the impressions is super hard to make, will take hours and should only be made by professional chefs but none of those things are true. It takes about two minutes longer than it does to make it with powder and it’s not that hard, mine worked when I made it the for the first time when I was about ten and we now have a redundant tin of powder lurking in the back of our cupboards, I promise, once you’ve made it once, there’ll be no turning back.

One other thing that I think puts people off is having whites left over from the eggs you use for it but I’ll be posting some recipes in the coming days/weeks to use those up and solve that problem so, keep an eye out (Or subscribe to receive e-mail updates about new posts on the right hand side of the blog).

With the summer just around the corner (We hope!) I’ve also got tonnes of ice-cream recipes that use this same basic custard recipe coming soon too but for now, take the custard challenge, have a go at making it and see for yourself how easy and delicious it is…

Ingredients

4 egg yolks

300 ml milk *

75g caster sugar

Optional: Vanilla pod, a little grated nutmeg or ground cinnamon

1. 1. In a bowl, beat the egg yolks and sugar together until smooth and well mixed.
2. Put the milk in a heavy based saucepan and heat gradually- if you put it on a high heat straight away the milk will burn on the bottom of the pan an it is not fun to wash up!- until almost at the boil, don’t let it boil though! (If you’re using vanilla, split the pod, take out the seeds and the pod and seeds to the milk before you heat it. Remove the pod before step 3)
3. Pour the milk over the egg mixture, stirring well.
4. Pour the mixture back into the saucepan- it must be clean so it there’s some milk that’s cooked slightly or burnt on the bottom then use a clean one.
5. Cook over a gentle heat, stirring continuously with a wooden spoon until  the mixture has thickened will coat the back of a spoon. If you prefer it thicker, continue cooking it to your preferred consistency but do not let it boil or it will become lumpy. (Add the cinnamon or nutmeg).
6. Enjoy on your favourite dessert, cake, on it’s own or use to make ice cream (If you’re making ice cream, transfer to a bowl and leave to cool slightly at this point), Creme Brulee, Queen of Puddings or one of the many other recipes using custard! 

LG x

*Whole is best but I’ve made it with semi and skimmed milk and it’s fine, it will  come out a little thinner so if you want a ticker constancy I’d suggest you use about 275ml semi-skimmed of 250ml skimmed. 

Hot Cross Bun Bread and Butter Pudding

This is a great recipe for if you have a few hot cross buns left over but I actually thought it was better than them themselves. The spices from the hot cross buns make it that bit more interesting and the melted chocolate is amazing. And by adding the mini eggs to the top while it’s still warm, the chocolate in the middle melts a little so when you bit through the crunchy shell you’re greeted with this amazing smooth, warm, chocolate-y loveliness. I made a little one yesterday with a view of trying it to make sure I was happy enough with it to write this post then giving it away to my family but I ended up eating the entire thing. I think that says all you need to know.

My eggs went in a little nest to make it look that bit more Easter-y, I haven’t put the nest in the recipe but it’s really easy to make: I took some of the left over white dough that I used for the crosses on the hot cross buns and mixed a little cocoa powder into it until I was happy with the colour. Then I spiralled it up into a nest shape and cooked it for about five minutes.

Oh and I also thought they looked quite cute in glasses and that was how I originally wanted them but the photos made them look a bit messy. Just scoop them out of the ramekins carefully and drop into a galss (mine took two ramekins worth) then finish with the eggs, see picture at the bottom of this post.

Anyway, here’s the recipe…

Chocolate Cheesecake

I’ve had a pretty busy week and though I’ve been on my work experience and been in a kitchen everyday, bar some blueberry muffins with some ridiculously sour blueberries, I haven’t made much at home this week so I had a look through the photos on my camera- I rather depressingly can’t take any more photos with it ’till I get my charger back in 3 weeks but, I found this chocolate cheesecake that I’ve made about a million times and have loved each time so thought I’d post up the recipe and reminisce about how nice it was while  I try to shake off the Sunday night fear… School- and particularly an hour of poetry,yawn!- tomorrow looks even less appealing after a week of doing work I actually like.

Anyway it’s super quick and easy to make and delicious too so here’s the recipe…

Ingredients

250g Mascarpone

100g Dark Chocolate

6 digestive biscuits

50g butter

Tsp Cinnamon

Optional: Tablespoon Orange Juice or Rum, zest of 1 orange

Hey there sunshine, it’s Berry Trifle time.

I didn’t even mean for that to rhyme…

When I woke up on Saturday, I did what all English people do on the first day that the sun comes out to say hi: Put shorts on, got my sunglasses out, planned to spend as much time outside as possible. And then I set about thinking of weather appropriate food to make, I wanted a BBQ but unfortunately, that idea was rejected by my family so I decided to make a spring-y/summer-y dessert.

Summer berry trifle is what I settled on. Of course seeing as I did, like everyone, get way over excited and start acting like it was summer, I overlooked the fact that berries are not actually in season yet. I realised that when I got to the supermarket to find they were going to cost me a fortune, were from South America and didn’t look very nice so I thought I’d try the frozen section and found some mixed summer berries that were just what I needed. They did the job perfectly but of course this will be a great dessert to make in the summer when you can get fresh berries.

One last thing, I did want to make this with PIMMs to give it an extra summery taste we didn’t have any though so I went with sherry but I think PIMMs would work great, so give it a try and be sure to let me know how it was if you do.

Ingredients

Sponge cake (Recipe here)

250g Mascarpone

1 egg

Pecan Pie

I mentioned in my Thanksgiving post that I’d been wanted to make some Pecan Pie and I finally did so here’s the post I promised about it.I’ve had a good week of cooking, my lamb casserole was so nice, not blowing my own trumpet or anything but it is the perfect winter dinner. And I made and tried dumplings for the first time, I’m not sure how I feel about them, any fans out there? Yesterday we got a bit festive and had a turkey risotto which I really enjoyed. My brother thought he’d take charge of making some French beans to go with it and managed to blow them up… No one’s worked out how to use our new space age microwave yet.

Today I’ve been busy practising for my competition which is creeping up on me pretty fast now but, my dishes are going well and I’m really proud that they’re something I’ve created. Pictures are on their way but not till the first round’s done, I don’t want to give too much away!

And last but my favourite creation of the week, Pecan and Maple muffins. Again, not to blow my own trumpet but there were ama-zing. I’ll definitely be posting them in the near future.

Anyway back to the Pecan Pie, I used the Hummingbird Bakery recipe and I it was brill, the pie disappeared pretty quick so it’s safe to say everyone liked it.