Chocolate macarons are my most favourite macaron. They’re so beautifully rich, and the osmotic-like absorption of the ganache’s flavour from the shell makes them so much more delectable. But they’re also incredibly simple to make… once you’ve got the technique. After I made the macarons for the second time, I knew the recipe and what to do off by heart. It’s not the recipe itself that’s difficult; it’s just keeping an eye on the consistency of the batter (i.e. knowing what to look for), and getting to know your oven!

Perhaps I’ve finally mastered the recipe and got to grips with my oven?! Or perhaps not… just because I’ve made decent looking macarons a couple of times doesn’t mean a thing! Especially as on a more recent attempt, they failed completely.

I ran out of icing sugar, and used desiccated coconut in place of the almonds. When I baked the cookies, they developed no foot at all, and had a completely different texture to regular macaron shells. However, I still sandwiched them with the chocolate ganache and put them forward in the badminton league buffet. I did get compliments though, as they were quite tasty, although nothing like the macaron I was hoping for!

There are many variations of making macarons posted all over the internet; some people try it and have great success, while others try and have little. Sometimes it’s just that the instructions can be quite ambiguous. When a recipe states something along the lines of “now, incorporate the almonds and icing sugar with the egg whites, being sure not to over mix. You know that you’ve over mixed when the batter is dull,” it can mean anything! But for me, the most important part of making macarons was the “macaronage,” which some people use to refer to the part where the almonds and icing sugar are incorporated into the egg whites, and the right amount of air is knocked out of the whites. If the batter is over mixed it will become very runny, and won’t be able to hold its shape when piped. However, if it’s under mixed, you won’t get a perfectly smooth shell and too many air bubbles inside. The piped macaron shells are then left on the worktop for about an hour to air-dry. This helps to create a hard shell, so that when the air inside of the macaron shell expands in the oven, the shell is forced upwards thus creating the “foot” at the bottom. If the shell isn’t tough enough, then it’ll crack and no foot will develop. I have read on a few other blogs that leaving them out to “air-dry” wasn’t a necessity for them, but in my experience, is it a necessity for me!

The following video is a great instructional video on how to make macarons. The part about knocking the air out of the egg whites was what I found the most helpful: if you plop some of your batter onto a plate before baking, and the peak slowly disappears, then you’ve got the perfect batter. It should have a “magma” like consistency. I found that to be a top tip!

I use a roasting tin with parchment paper to bake my macarons, because it doesn’t distort with the heat of the oven, therefore giving lopsided shells. Also, I place the roasting pan on top of a broiler pan in the lower part of my oven. This stops the heat from the bottom of the oven being too harsh on the shells, and also keeps the macarons perfectly at mid/lower-level in my oven! However, I can only bake about a maximum of 12 shells at a time. So macaron baking requires patience!

The temperature at which people bake their macarons is also a hot topic. Too low or too high temperatures result in undesirable consequences, which is why it’s important to “get-to-know” your oven. A further note is that the size of the macaron shell I believe is entirely of your choice, as I’ve seen and bought macarons of varying sizes. Some like them rather large but other prefer them bite-size. Personally, I prefer slightly larger maracons, that require two or three minute bites. But that’s just me.

And finally, macarons do taste better with time, which probably goes against almost all rules of French pâtisserie! But I suppose that as macarons aren’t pastry, the rules of pastry don’t apply. It takes time for the shells to absorb the flavour of the ganache, which gives them a very soft and flavourful interior. Some people recommend eating them after 2 days, but the ones that I bought from Zürich airport (along with other sources) suggested up to 5 days for maximum flavour. In fact, the blog Not So Humble Pie suggests that if you’re leaning towards either over or under-baking your macarons, go towards over-baking them, because if they’re a little too dry, the moistness from the ganache can help to rectify the issue after a few days of mingling!

A great trouble-shooting guide, as well as other tips and discussions, can be found here.

Macarons au Chocolat
Adapted from: Not So Humble Pie and Kokken 69
Makes 8-10 shells (4-5 macarons)

Ingredients
For the shells:
• lemon juice
• 40g ground almonds
• 57g icing sugar
• 10g cocoa powder (or replace with icing sugar and add some vanilla essence instead)
• 35g egg whites
• 11g granulated sugar

For the ganache: (enough for about 15-20 macarons!)
• 200g dark chocolate, broken into pieces
• 200g double cream
• 70g butter, at room temperature

Preparation
For the shells:
Add a splash of lemon juice to a very clean bowl together with the egg whites. Whisk for about 30-60 seconds until very frothy. Sprinkle in the granulated sugar, and continue to whisk until stiff, glossy peaks form (the kind where you can hold the bowl upside down over your head!).

Then sieve in the icing sugar, cocoa powder and ground almonds together over the egg white peaks. Now, this is the part some people refer to as “macaronage” (i.e. macaron-ing). Use a wooden spoon or pastry scraper to knock the air out of the batter. Use the spoon to scoop the batter around the outer edges of the interior of the bowl and then almost scrape the batter down the middle of the bowl in a zig-zag pattern until the final consistency is similar to that of magma. A useful video to watch can be found here.

A test to see if the batter is of the appropriate magma-like consistency is to take a clean plate, and dollop a spoonful in the middle. If the peak slowly disappears into itself, then the batter is ready. If it’s still visible after about 30 seconds or so, then it needs some more air knocking out! If the batter is too runny, then you’ve over mixed!

Prepare a heavy-duty baking sheet with baking parchment. Spoon the batter into your piping bag (or icing syringe, etc.), and dollop macarons onto the parchment paper, leaving at least an inch worth of space between each shell. This depends entirely on how large you want your macarons.

Bash the tray on the surface of the worktop 4 times, rotating each time. This forces air bubbles in the macaron batter to rise to the top. Use a toothpick to pop any large ones. Leave the macarons on the side for an hour to air dry, so that they’re not sticky or tacky to a light touch.

Preheat the oven to 155◦C, ensuring that you do not use fan assist. Pop the tray into the lower half of the oven for 16-18 minutes.

Leave to cool completely before peeling the shells off the parchment.

For the ganache:
Melt the chocolate and cream over a low heat in a saucepan; allow to cool to around 50^◦C. Cut up the butter in a bowl, pour over the chocolate sauce, and whip until smooth. Pop into the fridge until thick enough to pipe. Before piping, leave the bowl out of the fridge for a while to bring the ganache up to room temperature.

Assembling the macaron:
Fill an icing syringe or piping bag with the ganache, and dollop a splodge into the centre of a macaron shell; not too much or too little. It takes a little practice to get the right amount, so that when the two shells are sandwiched together, the ganache spreads to the edges of the shell but no father, and so that there’s a smooth, unblemished edge around the ganache. Pop in the fridge for anywhere between 2-5 days before taking out of the fridge to bring it up to room temperature before devouring.

Bon appétit!!

Shells baked: 19.12.2011, shells filled: 20.12.2011.

I’ve been dying to try and make some macarons for a long long time now. But before I attempted, I would like to try them first. A few weeks ago, my PhD led me to Switzerland to visit my sponsor company for a couple of days. I was certain that Zurich airport would have macarons… and indeed they did! I ended up purchasing a box of 6 of these fairly expensive Lindt macarons from their “Délice” selection,” while my supervisor bought some Swiss chocolate for his family/friends. So finally, I get to taste Swiss macarons! I’m sure they’re the same as the French ones.

And as a side note, Zurich airport is the best airport I’ve ever been to. The security is such a pleasure to go through. That’s probably because they had security stations for groups of gates, rather than one large security area for loads of people. It made everything to much quicker and relaxed. Also, every time I see the recent Lindt advert on TV with Roger Federer, I think to myself “woo, Switzerland!” I much prefer the normal-TV version to the extended one:

However, I just found it quite funny though when, about two weeks later, my mum went to a supermarket and found mini macarons on sale for a fraction of the price of the Lindt ones… I’ll have to decide if they rival those of Lindt when I get home this weekend!

Now that I have finally tried macarons, I had no excuse to attempt to bake my own. I have to admit, I was terrified that something would go horribly wrong after hearing how difficult they are to get perfect, how you have to become accustomed to your own oven and all of these Swiss and French meringue methods. But I think that my macarons are ok! Sure, they look a little homemade (I think it’s partly to do with using too small a nozzle on my piping bag – so it’s difficult to pipe smooth circle – but then again I still think my batter is too under mixed, after reading this post by Brave Tart).

Light in new place difficult for photography as it only comes from one angle and is so depepdent on the day.

My first attempt at macarons this week were lavender shells. However I think that the batter I used was severely under mixed (due to my fear of over mixing the batter, after hearing dreaded things about that!), as the shells were so thin and crumbly. Although when they were in the oven, I did get excited when I started to see the “feet” developing and even thought to myself “perhaps I’ve got this macaron stuff down!” Of course, I hadn’t. The only good thing about these ones was that they had fairly bump-free tops (most probably as a result of under mixing and the batter being too runny).

The second attempt weren’t too bad. I think that the feet were good! I did get a little impatient though and sandwiched the white chocolate ganache between the banana flavoured shells before it had completely cooled. But they tasted ok and weren’t too bad!

I was quite pleased with the coffee and Nutella macarons I made on my third attempt, but was very disappointed that there seemed to be no feet.

I’m going to attempt one more time this week using a slightly different method I’ve found during my readings of macaron baking. And seeing as it’s nearly 4pm on a Friday afternoon, I only have a few hours of the day left to get cracking…

These little desserts are really easy to make! They’re quite rich though, and difficult to tell when they’re done as the cake was so dark I couldn’t tell if it was cooked or not! I think I overcooked mine a little, but they still tasted ok! If you use a milky and smooth cocoa powder you’ll get a lighter coloured dessert. I used Green & Black’s cocoa powder and it was incredibly rich and black! If all of the ingredients were in one large mug I think it would have come out better and a little softer in the middle rather than putting it all in individual ramekins. But nevertheless, still a nice little treat.

Nutella “Mug” Cake
Adapted from: Babble
Serves 4

Ingredients
• 4 tbsp/75g self-raising flour
• 4 tbsp/75g sugar
• 1 x egg
• 3 tbsp/40g cocoa powder (I used Green & Black’s)
• 3 tbsp Nutella
• 3 tbsp milk
• 3 tbsp olive oil

Preparation
Combine all ingredients in a large coffee mug or a small bowl. Whisk well with a fork until smooth. Divide into 4 ramekins. Microwave on high for 1½ – 3 minutes. (Time depends on microwave wattage. Mine took 2 minutes on 700W). Top with whipped cream and a little chocolate sauce if desired.

Enjoy

Enjoyed: 18.06.2011

For Father’s Day, I asked dad what I could cook for him as a ‘gift.’ He asked for Thai Green Curry and Spotted Dick.

This recipe I found called for a strawberry and rhubarb rather than cherries. I was going for blueberries, but there weren’t any in the fridge, even though I swear that there were! So I opted for cherries! It would have been nice to have had more (so I doubled the amount that I used in the recipe below), as mine only just managed to cover the top.

Ours was with a vanilla bean custard, which was extremely good! But I made mine ahead and reheated it later, but unfortunately it was a little lumpy and not too attractive to the eye. However it still tasted delicious.

Here’s a nice image of dad and his mum on Mother’s Day in 2008. And a handsome image of Tim, just thrown into the mix

Spotted Dick with Cherry Compote
Adapted from: There’s A Newf in My Soup
Serves 16

Ingredients
For the cherry compote:
• 300g cherries, pitted
• 1 tbsp sugar
• 1 x sachet gelatine
• 2 tbsp brandy
• 2 tbsp lemon juice

For the spotted dick:
• butter and flour, for greasing
• 10 tbsp/170g butter or suet
• 1¼ cups/300g sugar
• 4 x eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 2¾ cups/340g self-raising flour
• 3 tablespoons milk
• 1 cup/150g dried fruit

Preparation
For the cherry compote:
Mix the sugar and gelatine in a bowl. Then add the cherries, lemon juice and brandy, and simmer over low heat until thick and syrupy – about 15 minutes.

In the meantime, butter a cake tin, then dust with flour (knocking the excess out).

Pour the syrup in the bottom of the tin, arranging the cherries (without burning yourself!) in a pretty fashion. Leave to cool at room temp. until set.

For the spotted dick:
Trace a circle on parchment paper slightly larger than the cake tin, and cut out.

Melt the butter in a large bowl, add the sugar, and cream with a wooden spoon until pale and smooth. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the vanilla and mix well.

Sift the flour into the mixture, and beat until well combined. Then add the milk and beat, also. Dollop the mixture on top of the cherry compote, and flatten out.

Fill a large, shallow pan with water, and put some metal cookie cutters or something in the bottom to create a platform on which to place the cake tin, about 1” above the water. Bring the water to a boil, and then turn the heat down so it simmers.

Put the cake tin on top of the platform, cover the tin with the parchment paper, and put the lod on the pan. Steam for about 1 ¼ – 1 ½ hours. If using little ramekins, it will be about 1 hour.

The spotted dick will puff up a lot. I used a bread knife to even the bottom of mine before I inverted it onto a plate, and sliced it, and served it with homemade vanilla custard.

Vanilla Bean Custard
Adapted from: Bite My Thumb
Serves 4-6

Ingredients
• 3 x egg yolks
• 1 cup/250ml double cream
• 1/2 vanilla bean, seeds scraped out (1 tsp vanilla essence)
• 3 tbsp sugar

Preparation
Boil water in a small saucepan.

Whisk the cream and egg yolks in a Pyrex bowl until smooth throughout. Then add the vanilla bean seeds (or vanilla essence) and sugar, and whisk until homogeneous.

Place the bowl over the simmering water (this is known as a bain-marie), and whisk continuously so no lumps form. The mixture should be whisked for about 10 minutes, or until the mixture thickens and forms a custard like colour and consistency.

Remove the bowl from the pan and pour over your dessert, and enjoy

Enjoy

Enjoyed: 19.06.2011

After seeing Kung Fu Panda 2 on Friday, I really thought I should try and make these bao, especially as I had some in China a few times when I was there in 2008! The things is, the two recipes I referred to made 40 odd dumpling skins from 400g flour, but I only made 15! Perhaps they rolled their dough out a lot thinner (whereas I kept mine thick to make sure that they didn’t split!), and theirs might have been smaller. But in Kung Fu Panda (and other anime, etc.), the dumplings are so large they’re like a tennis ball in the palm’s of people’s hand! And they were of a similar size when I sampled some in China. So I decided to make them large (plus they’re just a lot easier to handle when they’re big!).

Kung Fu Panda 2…well, I thought it was good, although I did prefer the first one. The second one was just a little far fetched, and I don’t think it’s something I would really watch again unless it was with a few friends for fun. But anything with lots of Chinese tradition, kung fu, cool graphics, awesome cinematography, and a great sense of adventure I’ll automatically fall in love with anyway!

When I started making these, I didn’t think they’d turn out well. I think one reason as to why I made my dough a little thicker was because I’d made Japanese gyouza before, and I made those skins so thin that they broke almost immediately when I handled and cooked them.

After the second batch was cooked, I couldn’t wait any longer and had to try one (especially as I was really hungry!), and so I bit into one, thinking it wouldn’t be too hot, but the aspic inside burnt my lip. Totally worth it though!

When I made the first few dumplings, the aspic was so running it made it difficult to pleat them as the dough wouldn’t stick. That’s when I decided to sieve the chicken of the liquid. There was still plenty of aspic left, and it still made a lovely soup stock when the dumpling was steamed, which I burnt my lip on! Even mum said “hmm, what’s this liquid?” They were very pleasant, and were beautiful with a little soy sauce!

Will definitely be making these again at some point! I think I’ll always have pains au chocolat and these baozi in my freezer to pop on for myself or visitors at any time!

Oh, and one final note, once they’ve been cooked, keep them off of the paper towels, otherwise they’ll stick like nobody’s business!

A good video on how to pleat these dumplings can be found here.

My first bao :’3

小笼包 (Xiǎo Lóng Bāo)
Adapted from: Steamy Kitchen and The Cooking of Joy
Makes 14-16 large bao

Ingredients
For the aspic:
• 1 x vegetable/chicken stock cube
• 2 cups/500ml water
• 1 x sachet gelatine

For the filling:
• 245g chicken, diced
• 2 x spring onions
• 1 tsp sugar
• ½ tsp salt
• ½ tsp pepper
• ½ tsp freshly grated ginger
• 1 tsp white wine vinegar
• ¼ tsp toasted sesame oil

For the dough:
• 335g plain flour
• ¾ cups hot water
• ¼ cup cold water
• 1 tbsp olive oil

Preparation
For the aspic:
The stock was dissolved in 2 cups of hot water, and the gelatine was mixed in. The liquid was left to cool, then placed in the fridge to set overnight.

For the filling:
Mix all ingredients together. Run a form through the aspic to break it all up into pieces, and add about 1 ½ cups worth of aspic. Sieve the mixture to remove the liquid. Refrigerate until ready to use.

To assemble:
Break up your chocolate into little pieces, and spread across the top of a rectangle. Roll the pastry down to engulf the chocolate. Break up more chocolate pieces, and spread it across the rectangle immediately below the first roll of chocolate. Then use the rest of the pastry to roll up the second chocolate line. Continue to do this with the rest of the pastry rectangles.

For the dough:
Put about 90% of the flour in a large bowl, and put about a third of the hot water in with the flour. Use a tablespoon to mix vigorously as the hot water partially cooks the dough and forms gluten. Keep on adding the hot water and mixing until the dough starts to form. Add the cold water and oil, and mix until you can’t mix it anymore (i.e. it’s one large lump of dough).

Use the remaining flour to dusk the worktop. Turn the dough onto the counter and knead for 8 minutes, using the remaining flour as necessary, until it becomes soft and elastic. Cover with cling film, and let sit for 30 minutes.

Divide the dough into 4 equal pieces. Take one (wrap the other three up), and roll into a thick log about 1” in diameter (doesn’t really matter). Chop into 4 equal pieces (using a pastry cutter). Roll each piece to form a ball and flatten out into your hand. Use a rolling pin to make a a circular disk (mine were about 6“ in diameter for large dumplings, 3” for smaller).

Hold the disc in the palm of one of your hands, and spoon a little filling into the middle. Use your finger and the thumb and finger of your other hand to pleat the dough. Twist to finish it off and create a nice pleated dumpling look.

Pop onto a piece of wet kitchen roll until all of the dumplings have been prepared. Once they have been prepared, they can be frozen, and steamed at a later date (but for a couple of minutes longer straight from frozen).

Line a steamer with a wet piece of kitchen roll, and place dumplings onto it, ensuring that there’s at least 1 ½“ of space between them. Steam on high for about 12 minutes.

This may have to be done in batches. I keep any that I don’t eat (but plan to eat soon!) in the fridge wrapped in plastic wrap. To reheat, they can be steamed again for 5-8 minutes, or they can be popped on a plate wrapped in wet kitchen roll and microwaved for about 30 seconds.

Enjoy with lots of soy sauce.

好好享用！

Steamed 13.06.2011

Pains au chocolat! Or chocolatines as they’re known in south western France. I’m so pleased with how this puff pastry turned out; buttery, flaky and crispy goodness…mmm. I even made a white chocolate one especially for mum… I wish I made more! It was a lot sweeter, which complemented the neutral flavoured buttery puff pastry. I only made one with white chocolate because I thought “well, if they’re not in the shops, then they can’t be that good.” But oh, did I think wrong! It was beautiful!

I think that the only thing I would have done differently was to make them about 2/3s of the size that they were, which means there would have been 16 chocolate breads in total. But they’re nice, either way. The only positive thing about them being fairly large, is that if you’re feeling like a pig you can have a big one, or have half fresh from the oven hot, and the other half later cold (i.e. saves on reheating the oven each time you want one/want to heat only one!).

Photo-guide: how to fold them (another useful link for how to make puff pastry and pains au chocolat can be found here:

Pains au Chocolat
Adapted from: Les Gourmandises d’Isa
Makes 12-16

Ingredients
For the pâte (dough):
• 7g sachet dried active yeast
• 200ml milk
• ½ cup/100g sugar
• 1 cup/165g plain flour
• 1 ½ tsp vanilla essence
• 2 x eggs, beated
• 2 ¼/365g cups flour
• 1 tsp salt

For the beurrage (butter block):
• 250g unsalted butter
• ¼ cup/45g flour

To assemble:
• 400g chocolate

To brown:
• 1 x egg, beated
• 2 tbsp milk

Preparation
For the pâte:
Put the milk in a large bowl, and microwave it on high for 30 seconds (until warm/lukewarm). Add the yeast and mix, then leave to stand for a couple of minutes. Weigh 100g/measure ½ cup of sugar, and from that take 2 tbsp and put it in with the milk. Then sieve in the flour and mix well with a spoon.

In a large separate bowl, beat the 2 eggs, add the vanilla essence, remaining sugar, and sieve in the rest of the flour. Mix well by hand (or with a mixer fitted with a dough hook). Add the yeast mixture in, and knead for 5-8 minutes until the dough is smooth and elastic.

Transfer the dough to a lightly oiled bowl, and cover with clingfilm. Leave at room temperature for 2 hours, and then place in the fridge overnight.

For the beurrage:
Use the flour throughout the rest of the process to flour the work surface. Roll the dough into a large rectangle (35 x 30 x 0.5cm or 18 x 13 x ¼ “). Spread the butter on 2/3 of the dough (the right and middle portions). Fold the dough in 3 (fold the left flap over the middle, then the right flap over the rest). If it’s not perfectly rectangular, fold the bottoms and top slightly over the make it so. Wrap in cling film and refrigerate for 30 minutes.

Then take the dough out of the fridge, and put it back on the counter as it was. Turn it a ¼ to your left (so it’s now facing you lengthways, not widthways), and roll the dough again until it’s a rectangle of the same size as before. As before, fold the dough into 3. Return to the fridge for 30 minutes wrapped in cling film.

Repeat the above step one last time, and refrigerate for 30 minutes.

Roll the dough into a rectangle of about 60 x 33 x 0.5cm (25 x 15 x ¼ “), and cut into 8-12 rectangles of the same/similar size.

To assemble:
Break up your chocolate into little pieces, and spread across the top of a rectangle. Roll the pastry down to engulf the chocolate. Break up more chocolate pieces, and spread it across the rectangle immediately below the first roll of chocolate. Then use the rest of the pastry to roll up the second chocolate line. Continue to do this with the rest of the pastry rectangles.

To bake:
Beat an egg with a fork, and add 2 tbsps milk. Use a pastry brush to light brush the egg across the the whole pain au chocolat. Put on a baking sheet, cover with plastic wrap, and let rise for 2 hours at room temperature.

Bake in an oven preheated at 180◦C for 20 minutes, until the tops are browned and crisp. Serve fresh from the oven.

Bon appétit!!

Baked 12.06.2011

Spanish omelette…where do I start? The first time I had a proper Spanish omelette was in Morocco last year (I think I had one in Spain when I was younger, but I don’t remember the taste too well), and it was absolutely beautiful. The potatoes were soft, fluffy and perfectly cooked. And that was just a plain one! You could easily jam it up a little more with the addition of ham, bacon, chorizo, cheese, herbs, etc. However, the Spanish omelette is infamous for:
1) the insane amount of olive oil used, and
2) the difficulty of flipping the omelette without it breaking.

I tried to make one of these at the beginning of my final year at university, and it was an absolute disaster! I knew I wouldn’t be able to keep it in a perfectly round shape (because of the shape of my pan and the fact that I HATE cooking in dirty kitchens, and I always get quite conscious cooking in front of others), but I didn’t realise that it wouldn’t taste that great, either. But to be honest, I didn’t know how to cook. It’s only in the last 9 months that my cooking (and photography, I like to think!) has really started to take.

Anyway, this Spanish omelette came out perfectly, and I used as little olive oil as possible! I think, however, that I slightly overcooked one side of it…oops. I’d love to do this again when I’ve learnt more about photography…watch this space!

Tortilla Española (Spanish Omelette)
Adapted from: Trissalicious
Serves 4 as a main meal, or 8 as a side/snack.

Ingredients
• 750g potatoes, peeled and finely sliced
• 2 x onions, finely diced
• 8 x eggs, beaten
• 2 tsp dried thyme or parsley
• salt and pepper, to taste
• 13 tbsp olive oil

Preparation
Peel and slice the potatoes very thinly. Dice the onions. Heat 1 tbsp olive oil in a large skillet, then lower the heat to the lowest setting. Layer some potatoes over the bottom, a sprinkle of onion and a dash of salt and pepper (and thyme is desired). The add 2 tbsp olive oil. Continue until all of the potatoes and onions have been used.

Turn the heat up a little and cook the potatoes, using a spatula to turn everything over. Cook them for about 15 minutes until the potatoes are soft (not browned), so that there’s no resistance when pricked with a fork.

Once the potatoes are cooked, either leave them in the pan until cooled (about 30 minutes).

Crack the eggs into a large bowl, and use a fork to whisk. Season with a little salt and pepper. Then add the potato mixture into the eggs, mixing together, and leave the mixture to rest for 10 minutes.

In the skillet, heat 2 more tbsp olive oil until very hot, and add the potato and egg mixture, using a spatula to even out the top. Reduce the heat to low-medium, and use the spatula to unstuck the mixture from the edges, and continually shake the omelette so that it doesn’t stick to the bottom. I shook it so that the mixture actually rotated around the pan in a perfect circle!

Continue to cook for 10 minutes or so, remembering to make sure the mixture doesn’t stick! Then, when the top isn’t too runny, place a large plate over the top of the pan and tip it over. The omelette should be perfectly round and browned.

Heat 2 more tbsp olive oil on high heat in the pan, and slide the omelette, being extremely careful not to break it, back into the pan. Reduce the heat to low-medium, and brown the other side for about 5 minutes.

Flipping the omelette 2 or 3 more times allows you to help keep the omelette’s shape and to make sure it doesn’t brown too much.

Again, put a plate over the top and invert the skillet. And voila! You have a beautiful Spanish omelette!

Buen provecho!

Baked 01.06.2011

Firstly, I would like to say “Happy Graduation, Mum!” Mum finally graduated on Saturday with a BA (Hon) in Social Sciences! She’s just got one more module to go, before she gets a BSc (Hons)! She made me so proud, and gave me that extra motivation I needed to keep on revising and to do well in my final year exams.

Secondly, tonight is the last match of the 2010/11 season. It’s pretty sad, but I’m quite looking forward to tonight; win or lose, they’re going to be tough games! We’re playing against Derriford, and last time we played against them, they were tough! Perhaps some tart might slow them down? Hehe…

I wanted to make something special, but easy to make. This didn’t take very long, but I think the results look as though it did!

For those of you who are familiar with Mr. Kipling’s delicious, but very naughty, Cherry Bakewells, then you might find that these are quite different. I really want to try next time to make cherry bakewells just like Mr. Kipling’s, but I stuck with this recipe I found, first.

I always thought Bakewells involved frangipane, but I think it’s just depends on what recipe you use. According to Wikipedia, a Bakewell tart is a shortcrust pastry with a layer of jam and almond sponge filling, which is then covered with a layer of fondant (which sounds quite similar to the Cherry Bakewells by Mr. Kipling). Whereas the Bakewell pudding is flaky pastry with a layer of jam and an egg and almond filling. Apparently, they’re both quite different with regards to appearance, flavour and texture, but I’ve yet to try a Bakewell pudding. Right, that’s the next things on my “To Make” list!

The colour of the tart doesn’t look too appetising, but that’s because I mixed the raspberries in with the sponge; perhaps I should have scattered them across the pastry base first, but I didn’t: oh well!

I also found that the pastry shrank a little when I pre-cooked it. I think next time I’ll make sure there’s a little hanging over the sides, as once it’s cooked, you can always cut it off afterwards. And I used my mum’s trusty silicon moulds; not only are they non-stick, but they let you remove your pie with ease, and they’re great to clean!

Bakewell Tart
Adapted from: BBC Good Food
Yields 2 x 8″ tarts

Ingredients
For the shortcrust pastry (source: Serial Cooking):
• 225g plain flour
• 30g sugar
• ½ tsp salt
• 110g buter, melted
• 2 x egg yolks
• ½ tsp almond or vanilla extract (optional)
• 1-2 tbsp water

For the ‘base:’
• 5 x heaped tbsp raspberry jam
• 100g frozen raspberries, just thawed

For the sponge:
• 100g ground almonds
• 100g self-raising flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 200g butter, melted
• 200g golden caster sugar (I used 20g of Hermesetas sweetener)
• ½ tsp almond extract
• 4 x eggs, beaten
• 4 x heaped tbsp apricot jam

To decorate:
• 25g almonds, slithered

Preparation
For the shortcrust pastry:
Sift the flour in a bowl, and add the sugar and salt. Melt the butter, ensuring that it’s all liquid, and tip into the flour whilst mixing and combining with a wooden spoon. Add the egg yolks and extract, and use the spoon to being it all together. Add the water if necessary, just enough to form a cohesive and slightly sticky dough with your hands. Form the dough into two discs, wrap with clingfilm and pop into the fridge for 30 minutes.

For the tart:
Preheat the oven to 190◦C. Roll out the pastry and line two 8” tart tins (I used silicon moulds; they’re very useful as there’s no need to butter the dish!). When rolling the dough out, it’s best to make sure it’s as cold as possible, and be generous with the flour when flouring the work surfaces. Also, make sure that the pastry hangs over the sides a little.

Pop the pastry into the oven for 8-10 minutes until it’s cooked, but not too coloured. Turn the oven down to 160◦C. Spread the raspberry jam across the bottom of the tart bases, and scatter the raspberries across.

Put the flour, sugar, ground almonds, butter, eggs, extract, baking powder and apricot jam into a bowl and mix until homogenous. Dollop into the pie dishes and sprinkle with flaked/slithered almonds. Bake for 35-40 minutes until golden and firm, and leave to cool.

These will freeze for up to 3 months, and can be served hot or cold!

Enjoy your Bakewell tart!

I have never made anything with puff pastry before; I’ve been fearful of it after having heard such horrifying things about puff pastry going wrong. However, after having handed in my dissertation and having another badminton league match, I decided to give these Danish pastries a go; something that I simply cannot resist. Well, seeing as this was my first time, perhaps I should have followed a recipe that was in English, not Spanish…but I think it all turned out OK in the end!

There were tonnes of these pastries wherever I went in Buenos Aires. The residence I stayed in gave a choice of pastries for breakfast, from which we were allowed up to three each, every Monday, Wednesday and Friday! Me being me, I always got as much as I could get, and saved some for breakfast the next day, or for dessert, or for the weekends. There would be some delicious pastry horns filled with dulce de leche (which were a favourite of mine!), croissants (or “medialunas”), or Danish pastries with jam and a sort of custard design on top. To be honest, all three we delicious. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, we would get two or three small slices of toast on either white or brown bread, with a choice of butter, jam and/or dulce de leche. Or on each day, you could choose to have cereal instead, with juice (“jugo” in Latin America), tea or coffee.

I gave two of these to Ed, ate about 5 throughout the day (eep!), left about 10 at home for the rest of the family, and took the rest to the badminton -> they were all gone (and I didn’t have any there, but there were two matches being played that night so twice the amount of people!). At first, from a distance, they thought they were the Argentinian “pasties” (empanadas) that I made for the match before, but everyone was complimenting them and saying that they tasted really nice! Not only that, but…. we are now Division 1 players for the ladies league! How cool is that? We’ve been promoted!

When making puff pastry, there are two key elements: the détrempe (which is a mixture of flour and water), and the beurrage (or “butter block”). What you have to do, is simply roll out the détrempe, and use it to enclose a sheet or block or butter (the beurrage). Then it gets folded over and rolled, over and over again, to form layers of détrempe and beurrage.

I made the pastry the day before, and left it in the fridge overnight, before rolling it out and baking them in time for the league match the same evening. However, before I made the pastry, I watched the video below; even if you can’t understand anything, it’s incredibly useful to watch:

I’m not afraid of puff pastry anymore! Well, I still am, a little: When I was rolling the dough, it got to a point where I felt like slinging it out the window because it became incredibly sticky and impossible to roll. I think these tips when rolling out the dough will make it easier, as it definitely helped me:

And finally, keep to dough as cold as possible. All of that butter, when it starts to get to room temperature, makes it incredibly difficult to handle.

Although my pastries do look like a 10 year old child constructed them, I definitely want to tackle puff pastry again. This weekend I wanted to make a pear, apple and raisin strudel, but because of the amount of work I have to do I’ll give it a miss and reward myself perhaps the week after. It’s just, this weekend my nanny’s down from London, we’re meeting up with my other nanny on Sunday and my boyfriend is coming to my house on Monday. So if I made a large strudel this weekend, then we could all have it for dessert on Sunday and Monday. Oh well, there will be other times. Perhaps for next week’s match (the last one of the season ) I can try croissants or pains aux chocolate.

Next time I make these, I’ll definitely be filling them up with dulce de leche! So please give this a go, keeping this little tips in mind:

Be persistent and take your time.

Raspberry, Almond & Cream Cheese Danish Pastries
Source: Food and Cook
I made 37 oddly shaped pastries

Ingredients
Détrempe (& beurrage):
• 200ml cold water
• 1 tsp salt
• 150g strong white flour
• 250g plain flour
• 500g butter, at room temp. (the beurrage)

Crema de almendra (almond cream): (taken from Cuinant)
• 100g ground almonds
• 100g sugar (I used 10g of Hermesetas sweetener)
• 60g butter, melted
• 2 x small eggs
• 15g cornflour

Filling:
• crema de almendra (above)
• 120g cream cheese
• 60g icing sugar
• 1 tbsp vanilla essence
• 1 x egg, separated
• almonds, slithered
• 1 x jar of raspberry jam

For the glaze:
• milk
• icing sugar

Preparation
For the détrempe & beurrage:
Measure out the cold water in a jug, and put in the salt, letting is dissolve slowly. Melt 75g butter in a large bowl (set aside the rest of the butter and keep it at room temp.). Sieve the flour into the butter, and add the cold water/salt solution. Mix with a wooden spoon until smooth and evenly combined.

Use your hands to form a ball, and score two deep cuts in the dough to form a cross with a knife. Wrap in clingfilm and pop into the fridge for 2 hours.

Remove from the fridge and leave for about 10 minutes to bring the dough back up to room temp. (this will make it easier to handle). Then, roll out the dough, trying to form a sort of cross, suing the scores you made earlier as a guide. It doesn’t have to be neat, just make sure the middle is thicker than the rest of the dough.

Place the remainder of the butter as a large block in the middle of the dough, and wrap the dough around the butter, like a package. Make sure the butter isn’t too warm; otherwise it’ll make the dough greasy.

Then, use a rolling pin and bash the dough down to flatten it out. Fold the dough over, and bash it down again, whilst turning it over. Then fold it once more and bash it down. Do this a couple more times, before folding it over, wrapping it in clingfilm and putting it in the fridge for another two hours. Don’t worry if it isn’t 100% homogenous at this stage.

Then repeat the above step twice or three times more, including leaving it in the fridge for two hours. By this time, the dough should be fairly homogenous throughout. The dough should be fairly springy when pressed with a finger, and can be frozen or kept in the fridge for up to 2 days.

For the filling:
To make the crema de almendra: Melt the butter in a large bowl, and mix in the ground almonds with a wooden spoon. Add the sugar and cornflour, and mix well. Add each egg, one by one, and the vanilla essence and mix again.

For the filling, mix the egg yolk (reserving the egg white for later), in a bowl with the almond cream, cream cheese, vanilla essence and icing sugar until smooth.

Remove the dough from the fridge; roughly roll it out so that you can use a pastry cutter to cut it into 4 pieces. Then, wrap each one individually and put back into the fridge. Keep one out so that you can work with it. It’s a lot easier to handle the dough when it’s as cold as possible. You can keep the dough in the fridge for up to two days, or up to a month in the freezer.

Assembling the pastries:
Use a rolling pin (and plenty of flour) to roll out the dough to about a ¼“ thick, then use the pastry cutter to cut the dough into 10cm x 10cm squares.

Spread a tablespoon of the almond cream filling diagonally from one corner to one the other in a line over the pastry square. Then place a small teaspoon of raspberry jam and mash that across with the other filling, too. Try to keep only a thin layer in the corners, otherwise the filling will spill out in the oven.

Sprinkle the filling with slithered almonds, and brush the rest of the pastry with egg white. Wrap the two other corners (without filling) over the centre of the pastry square, and brush the outside with egg white, and sprinkle a few more slithered almonds on.

Do this for with the next dough piece, and continue until all has been used.

Baking the puff pastry:
When ready, preheat the oven to 180◦C, and pop all pastries on a baking tray, giving each one ample room as they do puff up. You will probably have to do this in batches. Leave them in the oven until the pastry turns golden brown in colour.

Final touches:
Let the pastries cool. Mix together a little milk and a little bit of icing sugar to form a smooth and slightly runny consistency, which can then be drizzled on top of the pastries to decorate.

Bon Appétit!!

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My parents have really got me into enjoying the sitcoms/soaps Everybody Loves Raymond and King of Queens. There’s one episode of King of Queens, however, that I can directly relate to this post (season 6, episode 15). Basically, Carrie ends up meeting and becoming good friends with this girl called Trish, who also turns out to be a girl Doug used to date! But in the end, Trish really gets on everyone’s nerves with her annoying habits (like saying “literally” all the time), and Carrie only stays friends with her so she can get cheap clothes.

Anyway, Trish came over to Carrie’s for lunch one day, and Carrie invited another girl called Holly just so she didn’t have to be alone with Trish! Trish brought with her some empanadas, and asked Holly if she’d been to Argentina. After Holly indicated that she hadn’t, Trish immediately exclaimed “You haven’t been to Argentina? Seriously, you have to go to Argentina. It’s literally the best. Go to Argentina.” Ok, so it’s not that funny reading it, but if you’re a fan of the series you’ll know what I’m talking about!

So, empanadas are little pastries filled with meat and/or vegetables, and very similar to Cornish pasties. They can be sweet, too.

Last summer I went on placement in Buenos Aires. The residencia I stayed in was situated in San Telmo, the old part of the city. In this residence I met some people from all over the world! Quite a lot were from France, as they were on internships and placements with the same company. I met people from China, Brazil, Sweden, and Finland, and they were all really cool, not to mention could speak many languages! I felt like the average Englishman; only able to speak English, and Spanish not so well.

One night, within the first couple of weeks I arrived, some of us made empanadas for our supper one evening. There were so many that I had 5! I saved my leftover ones for lunch and supper the following day.

The bottom left is La Casa Rosada; the President’s house.

So, I decided to give empanadas a go for the badminton league match we played against University B team last night. I often get asked why I play against the university I attend; well, I didn’t attend the university badminton club because it was too overcrowded, and found another club where they asked me to play for them. I went to the university badminton club at the beginning of this year, and they asked me to play for them too. But I couldn’t play for more than one team in the same league, so I kept my loyalty to the Mayflower Wednesday Badminton Club instead.

According to Laylita, empanadas Mendocinas (Empanadas from Mendoza, Argentina) are distinctly different from other styles of empanadas because:

The dough is made with milk, which makes it softer and creamier than the standard empanada.

I have to say actually, that my empanadas did have a slightly red/orangey tint to it; partly because of the free-range egg yolk I used (from our next-door-neighbour’s chickens), which instantly turned the flour yellow, and also because of the paprika. The dough is extremely beautiful to handle, especially when it’s warm from the milk! It’s one of the easiest pastry doughs I’ve handled. It’s not sticky at all, and I managed to roll it out on a surface without any extra flour.

A good way to roll dough thinly without ripping it and to get an even thickness is to do it in sections. It does take longer, but the results are worth it: when you’ve rolled the dough and have come to the point where it’s not stretching out any further, that’s the time to flip the dough and roll it on the other side. It really works, and you continuously flip the dough until you have reached the desired thickness.

Here’s a another tip that’s particularly useful: if you accidentally break some egg shell in your egg, use the rest of the egg shell to remove it. It’s a lot easier than using a spoon or your fingers, as the egg shell seems to repel these. And when separating eggs, it’s a lot easier to break the egg, and then use the two halves of the shell to transfer the yolk backwards and forwards, letting the whites drip into a bowl. It really works!

On a final note: it was really time consuming to make these. The dough and beef filling didn’t take long to prepare and cook at all; it was the rolling, cutting, filling, folding, brushing and baking of the empanadas that took ages! But, the love showed through and I got compliments all around! I have to say so myself, they were pretty darn good!

Empanadas Argentinas
Source: Laylita’s Recipes
Makes 20-30 empanadas (I made 27)

Ingredients
Masa de empanada (dough):
• 3 cups (~520g) flour
• 1 x egg yolk
• ½ cup (~115g) butter
• ¾ cup (160ml) warm milk
• ½ tsp salt

Relleno de picadillo de vacuno (beef picadillo filling):
• 500g ground/minced beef
• 2 x onions, diced
• 2 tbsp butter
• 2 tbsp paprika
• 1 tbsp hot chilli powder
• 1 tbsp dried crushed chillies
• 1 tbsp oregano
• ½ tbsp ground coriander
• 1 bunch spring onions
• 3 x hard boiled eggs
• ¼ cup (~50g) green olives, diced
• salt and pepper, to taste
• 1 x egg, separated

Preparation
For the dough:
Sieve the flour into a large wooden bowl and add the salt. Give a quick stir with a wooden spoon, and add the melted butter. Mix well with the wooden spoon until it starts to form lumps.

Add the egg yolk and the milk, and give a mix until it all comes together and is nice and homogeneous. Then use your hands to knead it for a couple of minutes before separating into two discs, wrapping in foil and popping into the fridge for half an hour.

For the beef filling:
In the meantime, put 2 tablespoons of butter into a large heavy-bottomed dish, and pop over medium heat. Add the onions and sauté until soft and translucent. Then pop in the paprika, chilli powder, oregano, coriander and crushed chillies, and mix in the beef.

Cook until the meat is finished (make sure there’s no pink left at all), mixing it every now and then.

Leave the mixture to cool a bit. Slice the spring onions and olives, then mix in the with beef.

Assembling the empanadas:
Take the dough out of the fridge and roll it out thinly. Use a sharp knife to trace around a small bowl as a template for the empanada discs. Make sure they’re not too thin; approximately 1/8″ thin.

Pop a tablespoonful of mixture onto each disc, and then a piece of egg on each. Brush a thin layer of egg white around the edges of the disc (this glues them together naturally), and then use your fingers to fold the disc in half and to press down on the edges to seal the beef inside. Then fold the edges over slightly, and press down with a fork.

Baking the empanadas:
Preheat the oven to 200°C. Whisk the egg yolk in a small bowl, and brush over the top of the empanadas. Make sure it’s a thin layer, as you don’t want baked egg on top of them! The thin layer of egg yolk makes them turn brown in the oven. Bake them for approximately 25 minutes, and serve warm with chimichurri.

¡Buen Provecho!

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