Learning To Chocolate...

While browsing food blogs, I stumbled over a website of a sugarcraft supplier that also offers a variety of courses, among others a Chocolate Day. Basically it said, bring a cake and we'll teach you to decorate it. So how could I resist, I've been looking for chocolate courses for some time without any luck.

So last Saturday was a very longed for day. The cake recipe arrived in an e-mail and I made the cake on Thursday evening.

Rich Chocolate Cake

Ingredients

65 g cocoa powder
250 ml boiling water
a little grapeseed oil
125 g unsalted butter
275 g caster sugar
200 g plain flour
0.5 tsp bicarbonate of soda
0.25 tsp baking powder
2 eggs

Method

1. Mix the cocoa powder with the boiling water well, then allow to cool completely.


2. Pre-heat the oven to 160 degrees C. Brush lightly a 5 in (13 cm) square cake tin with grapeseed oil, both sides and bottom. Then line it with baking paper - first cut a 15 cm wide and 52 cm long strip. Fold one of the long sides at 2 cm in from the edge, then snip this strip at 2 cm intervals. Place this strip along the sides of the cake tin so the folded part is at the bottom of the tin. Then cut a square piece and place at the bottom of the tin.


3. Cream the butter and the sugar until light and fluffy.


4. Sift together the flour, bicarbonate of soda and baking powder.


5. Crack the eggs into a small bowl and whisk them together with a fork a little.


6. Add alternatively a little of the eggs and a little of the flour mixture into the creamed butter and sugar. Once the eggs are in, continue with the cocoa mixture and mix thoroughly until everything has been well incorporated and has an even colour.


7. Pour in the mixture into the cake tin and bake until ready, about 1 h 15 minutes. Check with a skewer - it should come out clean.


8. Take out the cake and let it cool down in the tin for 40 minutes.
   
   Then remove it from the tin, if there is damp on the baking paper, wipe it, then wrap the cake, along with the baking paper, tightly with cling film or put in a bag and seal so that it is airtight and allow to cool completely.

I didn't quite follow the instructions, by the time I had the cake batter ready, it looked like it would be way too much for a 5 inch cake, so I ripped everything up and rigged up for a 6 inch cake. Indeed, the batter filled up the 6 inch tin to just above the middle.

The instructions said bake at 180 degrees C. When I checked the cake after 40 minutes, very little appeared to have happened, then at 1 h, the cake had risen like volcano, which I believe means it's baked at too hot temperature. Thus I state 160 degrees C above. As there is such a small amount of rising agents, this cake won't rise much and the 5 inch square is enough.

Now here comes the interesting bits. Unwrap the clingfilm and remove the baking paper from the side of the cake, but leave the bottom one on.

Slicing the cake. There are several ways to get the cake layers. If using a knife, try to keep the cutting hand and arm as steady as possible and gently make a sawing movement. With the other hand, turn the cake around in a circle, so that the knife makes a shallow cut around the cake at the chosen level. As you turn the cake, make the cut a little deeper and continue turning until the cake has been sliced. This way, a cleaner cut will be achieved overall. But a knife has two surfaces, which generate friction when the cake is cut. This makes it a bit harder to cut and increases the risk of creating crumbles in the cake. So it may be worth investing in a cake slicer, which has a wire. This means very much smaller surface to generate friction, and so much easier to cut, in addition to resulting in even cake layers. I suppose using a long filleting knife with some sort of spacers on either side of the cake should also give even layers. I removed the peak at the top of the cake, then sliced it in 3.

We were given chocolate butter cream to use as filling and the first thing to do is to place a little in the middle of the cake board and spread it thinly with a palette knife. To have a nice stable base for the cake, the middle cake slice should be used. The butter cream on the board will ensure that the cake won't move around while decorating it.

Next I added a layer of butter cream, not too much, as butter cream can be quite rich. Use the top cake slice for the second cake layer, if it is a little uneven due to baking, this can be levelled out with butter cream. I then added a further layer of butter cream and finished with the bottom slice of the cake, making sure to keep the bottom with the baking paper on top of course.

Now it is time to cover the sides and then the top with a thin layer of butter cream. This works as glue for the final covering and also allows getting a nice, even and regular shape. So, remove the final piece of the baking paper, then spread butter cream on the sides. The idea is that you can place your hand on the top while you do this. Finally do the same with the top of the cake. Try to get everything as smooth as possible.



For the icing we would use 2 parts of a Belgian covering paste (also known as chocolat plastique or modelling chocolate) and 1 part of chocolate regal ice. The reason for this is that the modelling chocolate tastes better, but can be a bit hard to work with, so adding some chocolate regal ice makes it more pliable. First knead through each of the two, then put together and knead until they are well blended.

Using a little corn flour on a clean table, roll out the covering. And here is a new trick I learned. Always roll away and towards yourself, this ensures that both hands will exert an even pressure on the rolling pin. Never be tempted to roll diagonally or sideways, then one arm will invariably press harder on the pin and the covering will become uneven. This of course means that the covering piece will need to be rotated regularly in order to roll it out into a roundish shape. This also serves the purpose of avoiding the situation when the covering is nicely rolled out and is stuck to the table. The corn flour doesn't soak in like icing sugar would do, but it is still important to use as little as possible, but whenever needed, rather than loads at the start. And be careful not to get any corn flour on the top surface, as it will leave stains. When turning the covering, use the rolling pin and flap one part of the mass over the pin, then lift the pin up and make the turn. Aim for a thickness of just under half a centimeter and make sure that the piece of covering will cover the cake, the sides and out to the edges of the cake board.

Again lift the covering with the help of the rolling pin, make sure that the clean side is on top. Then carefully, starting from the edge of the cake board, carefully place the covering over the cake. Start by making sure that the covering fits the top of the cake, then carefully make sure that the covering fits over the edges and then the sides. This takes some rubbing and wiggling. Finally smooth out the covering over the cake board. Trim along the board edge with a sharp knife, then use an icing smoother to get a nice finish. Because this is a chocolate covering, rubbing with the hands means that some of the cocoa butter will melt and give a nice shine on the surface, but careful not to over-do it and melt the covering.



Here is a good point to take a break.

Dinner Party

To celebrate that I am back in the UK and frankly to thank our dear neighbours who have been so kind to take care of Lundulph in my absence and have him over for dinner on several occasions, we invited them over to a dinner last Saturday.



Dinner parties are great - you get to clean the house thoroughly and put away the various bits and pieces that invariably lie around and you get to cook something fancier than the normal stuff to eat in front of the TV.

Not to mention that last Saturday was finally PYO premiere for asparagus. It is a bad year this year, the asparaguses are some 2 weeks late, but as I saw the announcement of the grand opening on the PYO web site, I decided on the steamed asparagus with the Bavarian egg sauce I've made before. I read the recipe before I started and opted for the second version. But instead of adding everything together and blending, I put together the dry ingredients (i. e. everything except the oil and vinegar) in the food processor and whizzed until things were chopped relatively finely, but where you could still make out the different bit - eggs, something nut-like and some green stuff. Only then did I add the olive oil and balsamic vinegar and ended up with something that looked a bit like coarse mustard. But it was sort of dip-able and still had some texture to it. Super!

But the main thing was the dessert - New York Cheese Cake, something I've wanted to do for a long time. The original recipe is here.

Ingredients

Base
85 g melted butter + a little more to brush the cake tin
140 g digestive biscuits
1 tbsp caster sugar
50 g toasted chopped hazelnuts

Filling
900 g full fat Philadelphia cheese
250 g caster sugar
3 tbsp plain flour
1 pinch salt
1.5 tsp vanilla extract
zest from 1 lemon, finely grated, about 2 tsp
1.5 tsp lemon juice
3 medium eggs + 1 yolk
200 ml sourcream

Glazing
225 ml sourcream
1 tbsp caster sugar
2 tsp lemon juice

Method

1. Line the bottom of a 23 cm springform with baking paper and pre-heat the oven to 180 degrees C.


2. Melt the butter on a gentle heat, just enough to melt it, not to boil.


3. Place the digestive biscuits in a food processor and blitz until they are down to fine crumb.


4. Remove the cutting blade from the processor, then stir in the sugar and hazelnuts.


5. Work the melted butter into the dry mixture, then press the blend into the bottom of the springform, then smooth out, so that the layer is as even as possible. This will be about half a cm thick.


6. Bake for 10 minutes, then take out and let cool. Turn up the heat to 240 degrees C.
   
   


7. Using a mixer and a big bowl, first soften up the Philadelphia cheese. This may require stopping and clearing the mixer whisks a few times.


8. On low speed, gradually add the sugar, flour and salt. Make sure they are well incorporated.


9. Continue with adding the vanilla extract, lemon zest and juice.


10. Add the eggs and yolk, one at a time and mix them well in.


11. Finally add the sourcream. The filling should be smooth and light and not too airy.


12. Brush the sides of the springform with a little melted butter, then pour in the cheese filling.


13. Place in the oven for 10 minutes, then turn down the heat to 150 degrees C and bake for a further 25 minutes. If you shake the springform a little, the cake should wobble in the middle.


14. Turn off the oven and allow the cake to cool down inside for a couple of hours. The surface may crack on top, that's not a problem.


15. When the cheesecake is completely cooled down, stir together the final sourcream, sugar and lemon, then pour the glazing over the cake and with a spatula spread it all the way out to the edges.


16. Cover and chill the cake in the fridge for at least 8 h before serving.

I thought to compensate for adding hazelnuts and used 100 g of butter, this turned out to be an extremely bad idea, as I had butter oozing out while the cake was baking and it kept oozing out afterwards as well, despite that I tried to soak up as much as I could with kitchen tissue. I have a bad feeling that even if I used 85 g, it would still have oozed out.

I also didn't use a springform, but my adjustable cake ring placed on top of a baking sheet lined with baking paper. This meant that not only did the surplus butter ooze out, but also some of the cheese filling, a lot more than I would have liked in fact.

But it baked OK and took a bit longer than 2 h to cool down completely. But I'm proud to say that the surface didn't crack.

I poured the glaze over the cake and spread it to the edges and into the fridge the cake went for its designated 8 h of chilling.

Although one of the neighbours blatantly declared that pudding was not for him, he was not able to resist having a piece. Lundulph had two, before I confessed that there was Philadelphia in the cake. So needless to say, the cake was fantastic, so creamy, not too sweet and with a lovely tinge of lemon and the sourness of the cream. The texture was quite fantastic too, I'm thinking it might be suitable to use for macaroons.

And I'm very proud of thinking of adding toasted hazelnuts to the biscuit mixture, it added an extra dimension to the cheesecake.

The Third Card...

The third card I picked out from the Ye Olde Recipe Collection was Slow Cooked Venison with Red Wine and Rosemary. In the past I generally have been successful when cooking with wine and this dish read simple enough, so why not?

An early hurdle was to get hold of venison. Sadly neither of the local supermarkets had any, nor did I manage to get to the butcher's before they closed to ask. Thus the Chantenay carrots and huge button mushrooms got to sit in the fridge for a few days on their own, until Lundulph suggested we use the moose roast we had in the freezer. One of the trophies I brought home from Sweden, Lundulph had not been able to think of a way to cook it. And it's game too and it's a fairly near relative of the deer that provide venison.

Said and done, moose was thawed and the casserole finally cooked last Friday. Against instructions on the card, I kept the carrots whole (that's why I bought Chantenay) and I added mushrooms, since only carrots and onions would not be enough.

Ingredients

1 kg moose roast cut in 3 cm chunks
3 tbsp olive oil
500 g Chantenay carrots
1 large onion, coarsely cut in 2 cm pieces
300 g large button mushrooms, peeled and quartered
75 cl (1 bottle) red wine
5 dl chicken stock
the leaves of 3 sprigs of fresh rosemary, chopped
4 tbsp tomato puree
Salt and pepper

Method

1. Pat the meat chunks dry, then heat up the olive oil on high heat in a large pan.


2. Brown the meat chunks in the olive oil, in 2 - 3 batches, so that they don't crowd each other in the pan. Turn now and then so they get a nice colour all over and remove when done to a large casserole dish with a lid.


3. When all the meat is done, add the carrots, onions and mushrooms to the pan. Fry until they start to soften a little. Remember to stir from time to time.


4. Transfer the vegetables to the casserole dish as well and stir in to mix with the meat.


5. Add the wine, chicken stock, rosemary and tomato puree and bring to the boil.


6. Cover the casserole and let simmer on low heat for 1.5 h. Stir a couple of times.


7. Remove the lid and let the casserole simmer a further 30 minutes to reduce the liquids.


8. Finally add salt and pepper to taste.


9. Before serving, use the stirring spoon to shred the meat a little.

The casserole looked pretty and smelt very nice, but when we tasted it, it tasted very strongly of tomato and was very sweet, so we were disappointed. In general it could have done with more herbs and spices, the way it was, it felt like there were gaps in the overall flavour palette.

The meat on the other hand was fabulously tender and shredded very nicely.

The above amounts should be enough for 6 people. Looking at the comments people have left on the Waitrose website, I think that it would do better with mashed or boiled potatoes, rather than pasta.

So not a recipe to keep, in fact I think Lundulph may already have tidied it away to the recycling bin.

I didn't take any pictures either, though given that we didn't like this dish much, it's not a big deal.

Lundulph's Surprise

Heading for the early May Bank Holiday, I thought I would make a nice surprise for Lundulph by making Scotch Eggs.

Normally he will go quite poetic about these things and we always buy a pack for various family outings and I've long been thinking about trying my hand at them. I wouldn't dream of eating shop-bought ones, they just look scary to me. Would I brave trying the ones I made myself?

So I went for Heston's Scotch Eggs, the second card I picked out from Ye Olde Recipe Collection, in my latest search for food inspiration.

Swapped out ingredient is the chives, I skipped them, since I had a perfectly nice bunch of salad onions at home ready to be eaten.

Ingredients

2 fat salad onions
450 g pork sausagemeat stuffing
1 heaped tsp of dried thyme
45 g French's mustard
0.5 tsp cayenne pepper
2 tbsp water
salt and pepper
10 medium eggs
50 ml milk
4 tbsp plain flour
125 g dry large breadcrumbs
grapeseed oil for frying

Method

1. Slice and then finely chop the salad onions.


2. Mix the onions together with the sausagemeat stuffing, thyme, mustard, cayenne pepper, salt and pepper and water thoroughly, then weigh the lot and divide into 8 equal patties.
   
   Cover with cling film and chill for 20 minutes.


3. Place 8 of the eggs in a saucepan, cover up to 2 cm above with water and place on a high heat and bring to the boil.


4. As soon as the water boils, set a timer for 1 minute 45 seconds. Once the timer runs out, remove the saucepan from the heat, pour out the hot water and pour cold water over the eggs. Let it pour for a few minutes until they have cooled down enough to handle.


5. Carefully tap the eggs with a knife to break up the shells, then peel off. Rinse the eggs to remove any small pieces of shell sticking to them, then pat dry.


6. Break the remaining two eggs in a bowl and gently whisk together with the milk. Place the plain flour in a second bowl and the bread crumbs in a third bowl.
   
   Line up flour, then eggs, then breadcrumbs. Season the flour with salt and pepper.


7. Pour the oil in the saucepan and heat up on medium high heat. The idea is to simulate a deep fryer, so there should be oil to about 3 cm depth. Heat up the oil on medium-high.


8. Prepare a grill pan with a rack, by placing aluminium foil at the bottom, then several layers of kitchen tissues and the rack on top of the tissue.


9. Prepare a small bowl of water, then take out the meat patties from the fridge. Wet your hands, then take a patty at a time and flatten it along the palm of a hand.


10. Place one egg in the mince mixture, then close the hand to cover the egg. Gently and carefully keep moving the mince so that the egg is completely covered with it.
    
    Don't be tempted to roll between the palms of the hands like with buns or meatballs, this will only break up the coating.


11. Now, roll the first Scotch egg in the flour, then in the egg mixture and finally in the breadcrumbs, then carefully place in the small saucepan to fry.


12. The oil should be very hot and start bubbling as the Scotch egg goes in. With a slotted spoon, carefully maneuver the egg around so that it fries all around.


13. Fry only until the egg gets a nice golden brown colour all over, shouldn't be more than a minute.


14. Take out with the slotted spoon and let drip off as much as possible over the saucepan, then place on the rack of the grill pan. The kitchen tissue will soak up any leftover fat drips.


15. Repeat with the other Scotch eggs. The dipping procedure is quite messy, so try to do it with only one hand, leaving the other one clean for the frying.


16. If you need to top up on the oil, do so, but wait until it has heated up well before resuming the frying.


17. When all 8 Scotch eggs are done, clean off your hand, then remove the kitchen tissue from under the roasting rack.
    
    


18. Replace the roasting rack in the roasting tin, then put the eggs in the oven to finish cooking, about 10 minutes.

The idea is to serve these hot and freshly cooked and hopefully with the yolks still a little runny. This didn't quite work out for me, next time I might try a different approach to boiling the eggs - not from cold, but from hot, that is place the eggs in the saucepan and pour boiling water on them from the kettle.

I served with boiled Jersey Royals which are now in season, some lovely wine ripened tomatoes and mini pickled gherkins, the last of which worked particularly well with the Scotch eggs. Yes, this is definitely a keeper as recipes go, though given the amount of fat required, I won't be making it too often. Possibly I can get away with even less fat than I used too. The trick of using a small saucepan and doing one at a time was quite good. I was just about able to prepare the next egg, while one was frying.

I had some flour, eggs and breadcrumbs left over afterwards and mixed them all together, then dripped into the fat, while it was still on the hob. Then I kept stirring for a couple of minutes, before removing onto more kitchen tissue. This was just an experiment, since I would be throwing away both the fat and the dipping bits. And a good thing I did too, it turned out rather nice, though it remained quite pale. With the seasoning I had something that can be compared to savoury French toast in the shape of popcorn. It could make an alternative to croutons in a salad or just as a snack. Well, I liked the taste of it anyway. Health-obsessed Lundulph just tut-tut-ed at me.

Back in the UK

So, after a year and a half in Sweden, I have returned to the UK. Not really how I had planned it, but things don't really go that way anyway.

On the plus side, I get to work from home and I thought this would mean I get a bit more time to cook.

After 3 weeks, I can tell you, this is not the case, I work also during the time I would have used for travel to and from the office. And developing a new routine, I haven't felt any inspiration in the kitchen at all. Just remembering my old ropes takes an effort and stopping Lundulph from behaving like he's still living on his own requires overtime.

Thus, to kick-start things, I thought why not go through Ye Olde Recipe Collection? And I did, picked out 3 cards and went shopping.

The first card I selected was Sliced Oriental Duck with pomegranate sauce.

Now, I'm a bit divided when it comes to duck - I've had both good and bad experience with it, but it would make a difference to our regular staple protein source. Being an old recipe card, the duck pieces listed in the recipe were not in stock, I went for the duck breast and with skin.

There was a new spice involved - Sichuan pepper, very exciting!

And of course, I doubled the recipe, so that I wouldn't have to cook again in the next couple of days.

Ingredients
2 fresh pomegranates
2 tbsp redcurrant sauce with port
4 duck breasts
2 tsp Sichuan Pepper
2 tsp Chinese Five Spice powder
2 tsp caster sugar
4 tsp olive oil
200 g fresh thin rice noodles

Method

1. Cut the pomegranates in half, then carefully tease out the seeds, discarding the pith and membranes. Careful, they are full of bright red juice that happily squirts a lot further than is necessary and that stains even more.


2. Save a handful of the seeds for decoration and place the rest in a food processor or blender and whizz for a couple of minutes.


3. Place a sieve over a small saucepan and pour the pomegranate pulp into the sieve. Using a spoon, stir the pulp and push through as much of the juice as possible and discard the rest.


4. Pre-heat the oven to 200 degrees C and place a small roasting tin inside to heat up as well.


5. Remove the skin and the fatty layer from the duck breasts, this should be relatively easy, if a bit icky. Then place thee meat on a plate.


6. Crush the Sichuan pepper in a mortar and pestle or grind coarsely in a spice grinder, then mix with the Chinese Five Spice and caster sugar. Rub into the duck breasts.


7. Heat up the olive oil in a frying pan, that's large enough so the duck breasts aren't crowded. Brown the duck breasts for a couple of minutes on each side, to get a nice colour and to seal the meat.


8. Place the duck breasts in the pre-heated roasting tin and let roast in the oven for 20 - 25 minutes, depending on how done you want them.


9. In the mean time, bring the pomegranate juice to the boil and let it simmer down to a syrup, about 10 minutes.


10. Place the rice noodles in another saucepan, boil up water in the kettle, then pour over the noodles to cover. Simmer gently for a few minutes to warm through.


11. Clean, trim and slice the onions, use also the green parts, they are just as tasty and will add nice colour to the dish.


12. When the pomegranate syrup has formed, add 2 tbsp of the redcurrant sauce and stir in well and let simmer for a further 2-3 minutes.


13. When the duck breasts are ready, take out of the oven and let rest for 5 minutes.


14. Pour off the water from the rice noodles and lay up as base on four plates.


15. When the duck breasts are rested, slice each thinly and layer over the noodles. Drizzle pomegranate sauce over and sprinkle the spring onions and pomegranate seeds and serve.

To be honest, this didn't quite work for me and Lundulph. On the whole the combination of fruit and meat is tricky, unless it is something sour and tannic like cranberries or lingonberries. So I don't think this will be a repeat recipe.

In repeat meals, I poured the jus from the duck into the sauce, I think that may have helped a little, but still the whole thing was too sweet. Maybe it was because of the redcurrant sauce, who knows.

The Sichuan pepper was interesting - it smelt quite strongly in the jar, though not unpleasant. It seemed very dry, but was quite difficult to crush with the mortar and pestle, I added the caster sugar to help with that, but it didn't seem to make much difference.

I also over-cooked the duck I think, it wasn't as pink as I would have liked it, but I followed the original recipe, and started with the duck breasts first and the sauce later, so all of the roasting time was wasted on dismantling the pomegranates.

I recommend using pomegranates as a sweet snack in front of the TV. Just cut a lid off at the "crown" end and place in a large bowl lined with kitchen tissue. Then you can sit and watch a movie while slowly peeling the outer skin and prising off the seeds one or two at a time.

Last of the lamb

I'm sad to say that last week-end we used up the final bits of the lamb I bought just before Christmas. Where did it all go?

But Lundulph was coming to Sweden, so I thought we could make something rather festive. The bit that was left was the saddle and it didn't look like it would be enough for 5 people, so my Mum also dug out a steak of some sort.

I decided to make an old but very tasty recipe.

But being part of Ye Olde Recipe Collection, it had some very shop-specific ingredients, that I was not able to get hold of. Like Chinese Five Spice Paste.

So I researched it on the internet a bit and found out the ingredients. Based on that, I looked around for recipes for the paste and found many useful suggestions. Basically start with Chinese Five Spice dry mixture and mix with some wet ingredients into a paste. I managed to get hold of a jar ready mixed at the English Shop in Stockholm. Yes, there really is such a thing!

Chinese Five Spice paste
Ingredients
4 tsp Chinese Five Spice powder
0.5 tsp salt
1 tsp smoked paprika
1.5 tsp chilli powder
1 tsp rapeseed oil
4 tbsp tomato puree

Method
Carefully mix all the ingredients the night before the paste is needed. Cover and keep refrigerated. The above makes about 1 dl. Then just follow the recipe. This way you can be a bit more generous when coating the lamb too.

That Old Sourdough...

Well, you can imagine my surprise and joy when I found out that one of the supermarkets has started selling ready made sourdough. Not just that, it also claimed to be ready to use. Interesting!

So at the first opportunity I went to get some - they had two types, wheat sourdough and rye sourdough.

Since I'd not worked with rye sourdough before, and it's been a while with the wheat one too, I opted to try the wheat first.

Reading the instructions on the lid, it said "add yeast". Well, what's the point in using sourdough then, eh?!? But thinking things through, it occurred to me that the sourdough was just for flavouring. Would this mean that it wouldn't be alive? The best before date was several weeks in the future, that's a bit suspicious, even if sourdough can survive a long time, how would it be "ready to use" at any point in time up until that date?

So, I went for what I've done in the past with Monty - I fed it. As I opened it, it was runny like Bulgarian boza. It also smelt rather weird. Oh well, in with water, in with flour. I didn't measure very thoroughly either, but just tried to obtain a very thick batter consistency. Then in the oven it went, the oven was still a little warm after a previous bake. And off I went shopping.

I came back several hours later and noticed that there had been a rise to the double in the jar, but it had sank back to the original amount.

Maybe here I made my mistake - I fed it again. This time it smelt a bit more like Monty used to do, and it was bubbly, so I thought everything was fine and let it stand for a further few hours.

Sadly, there was no further rise at all after the second feed. I had thickened it further, to reach the regular consistency of Monty. So there was plenty of food for the wild yeasts. It still bubbled, but didn't rise.

But I had lost patience and made the dough anyway, and let it rise in the oven again, though this time I set the oven to 30 degrees C to help it out. This seemed to do a trick, because the dough did rise nicely.

I took it out and shaped it into 3 small loaves and left it to proof overnight in cool room temperature, about 18 degrees C.

The next morning, I looked at it and it hadn't moved a bit. Dang! Well, never mind, into the oven it'll go.

So I baked it and it did make a heroic attempt at oven spring, but in the end my loaves remained the same size as when they were raw.

And when I cut it, I had the texture of marzipan.



Flavour-wise, it was very good, I'd mixed in sesame and poppy seeds, but this wasn't bread and I had 3 brick-like loaves of it. Bah!

On the plus side, heated up a bit in the microwave and dipped in kyopoolu was totally fab.

I won't be doing anything with the rye sourdough, I'm leaving it to my Mum to play with. The reason for this is that I'm moving back to the UK and my lovely hubby Lundulph at the beginning of April. Quite looking forward to that and getting on with more cooking and baking. I have so many new ideas that I've noted down on various bits of paper, hopefully I won't lose any of them.

Vanilla Macarons

At my Glögg Party last year, Dr Cutie gave me a book on macarons.

Not only did it have lovely photos of those fab sweets, it also had some very useful advice on how to succeed.

For starters, it recommends that the ground almonds and icing sugar are mixed together and run in a blender in order to get it as finely ground as possible.

Another useful tip is to fold in the dry mixture in three parts, I think this allows for a bit more control over the whole thing. It also said that after the last part has been incorporated, the meringue mixture will likely be quite stiff, so one should just continue to fold until it loosens up a little and is ready when the mixture runs down in a thick ribbon from the spatula into the bowl, where it will stay in shape for about half a minute or so.

The most crucial piece of advice is that once the macarons have been piped and banged/dropped to flatten, they must be rested for about 30 minutes. I had this instruction in my patisserie master class, but I failed to realise why this part is so important and I haven't come across this explained elsewhere. The reason is that during this rest, the macaron surface will start drying out and form a skin. Once it can be touched without sticking to the finger, the macarons can go in the oven. This will help form the crunchy surface and force any steam trying to escape to go out through the edges and thus form the curly bit on the sides.



And of course the recommendation of doing a few batches to understand how one's oven works and find the right temperature and baking time.

I guess I also have gained some experience in working with meringue to have a better feel for the whole thing too.

So yesterday, Bip and I made the first recipe in the book - classic vanilla macarons.

Ingredients

1.75 dl finely ground almonds
2.5 dl icing sugar
2 medium egg whites
0.5 dl caster sugar
0.5 tsp vanilla extract

Method

1. Put the almonds and icing sugar in a blender and process for no more than half a minute.


2. Sift the mixture into a bowl. Return any large pieces to the blender and blend again and sift.


3. In a large glass or metal bowl, whisk the egg whites to soft peaks. Then while whisking slowly add the caster sugar until stiff peaks and a glossy meringue forms. Add the vanilla extract at the very end, whisking just enough so it is mixed in. I demonstrated to Bip that you're supposed to turn the bowl upside-down over your head as a test.


4. Now carefully add one third of the dry mixture and use a spatula to fold into the meringue. Once fully incorporated, add the second third etc.


5. Once all dry mixture is fully mixed in and the meringue is just a little runny, prepare a piping bag with a round nozzle and transfer the meringue into it.


6. Line two baking sheets with clean baking paper and pipe small blobs onto them. They should spread out on their own.


7. Once all the mixture has been piped, either pick up the whole baking sheet some 5 cm over the worktop and drop it down or bang the baking sheet with the palm of your hand, so that trapped air bubbles come up to the surface of the macarons.


8. Pop these gently with a needle, so they don't bake into the macarons later.


9. Now leave the macarons to stand for about 30 minutes so that they form a skin. It should be possible to touch them without getting meringue mixture onto your fingers.


10. Pre-heat the oven to 150 degrees (or 130 degrees if fan assisted), then bake one sheet at a time for 10 - 15 minutes (fan assisted will be around 10 minutes).


11. Take out of the oven and leave to cool for 10 minutes, then carefully remove to a wire rack to cool completely. If the top and bottom separate, the macarons can go into the oven for a couple of more minutes.

The recipe recommended to use a vanilla flavoured butter cream, but Bip and I opted for chocolate mousse of the Angel Delight type.

I was so happy when the macarons turned out like they were supposed to! Although next time I won't use the large piping tip, it was too big and my macarons ended up just a little too large to be eaten in one bite and with the filling so soft, they were hard to eat. A smaller tip will allow more control.

I also need to take more care when sifting the ground almonds, it was still not sufficiently fine and I had a few lumps here and there. I did use the blender to grind whole blanched almonds. The problem is that if you run the blender for too long, the almond fat melts and forms a paste rather than flour like substance. Next time I'll try using the coffee grinder, that might give better results.

But I feel very proud to have sussed the trick, leaving only a couple of minor adjustments to do in order to get things perfect.

There are 29 more recipes in the book and the quantities are all based on 2 egg whites, which result in about 20 complete macarons.

Myskväll

Yesterday my Mum casually mentioned that there are loads of avocados in the house that needed to be eaten fairly urgently, so I suggested we make guacamole.



I've never done this before and have wanted to try my hand at it. My friend Boncey has quite a knack for it, so I have a very high watermark to hit.

What I have noticed is that avocados sold in Sweden are tiny in comparison to the ones you get in the UK. I'm not sure why, but such is the case, at least at the shops which I've been to. So I decided that two Swedish avocados would count as one. This means I had 4 big avocados to use up (or 8 tiny ones).

A quick google on the food pages of the BBC gave several interesting results. The one I settled on is from The Hairy Bikers. They have proven reliable to me in the past and I do quite like them. And once again, I was not able to follow a new recipe to the dot, so here is my take on it. The original recipe can be found here.

Ingredients

1 small very hot dry chilli, seeds removed, then crushed
2 handfulls of fresh coriander, chopped
4 ripe plum tomatoes, diced
2 small red onions, coarsely diced
2 tbsp lime juice
3 tbsp water
salt
4 large ripe avocados

Method

1. Place everything except the avocados in a blender and process until a pulp, though not entirely smooth.
   
   


2. In a serving bowl, scoop out the avocados and mash with a fork.
   
   


3. Pour in the tomato mixture and stir in to combine. It is now ready to serve.

The amount of salt depends on what the guacamole will be used for - we were going to have a "myskväll", which means a cosy evening, mostly in front of the TV. And my Mum had bought tortilla chips to dip. Thus I didn't put much salt in it.

We ended up with a really large bowl. As it turned out, there was no need to worry that we wouldn't be able to eat it - we managed to put away about two-thirds of it straight away. We being me, Mum and my Sister. In fact, Bip was well impressed with how tasty it is - she does guacamole, but generally uses spice mixes which she stirs into the mashed avocado and that is of course a bit different to what we did yesterday.

Although I did not get anywhere near Boncey's wonderful guacamole, this is definitely a repeat recipe, and I'll try to use fresh chillies next time. Mum thought it had too much coriander, though I thought it was OK. But I will reduce the amount of tomatoes, they were too prominant for me.

Semla Pops

Yes, it is once again Fat Tuesday and while toying with the idea of baking semlas, and weighing against the fact that I had lots of the buns left over from last year, the lovely ladies at HR (where I work) went ahead and ordered several crates for the whole office to celebrate.

So my mind went on spinning - moving down to a smaller scale, maybe on a lolly stick, hm?



And so I got the idea of a semla pop. And I googled it, there was nothing of the kind.

But of course semla buns are from yeast dough, there is no way I could get them that small. And then be able to scoop out the crumb in the middle in order to fill with marzipan etc.

Then it struck me - choux buns! They pretty much have a hole in them per definition. And I wouldn't be fiddling with marzipan, crumbs and milk etc for the filling, just push in a small pinch of marzipan, squirt a little whipped cream, put the lid on and dust with icing sugar. The whipped cream, was just that - whipped cream with a couple of tsp of icing sugar added to it.

And that's precisely what I did and even my parents liked them, to the point that we put away the 9 pops I made straight away, leaving barely enough time for photos.

So this is what I did. One batch of choux buns of previously tried and tested recipe. It ended up a bit runnier than I expected, not sure why and as I piped slightly smaller blobs, I ended up with about 75 of them.

Once they had cooled completely, I carefully cut off the tops of a few as the semla lids.

Into the cavity I placed some marzipan, about the size of a hazelnut and pushed a lolly stick through.



As you can see this time I had polystyrene pieces, which I saved after the candles on Falbala's latest birthday cake. A little Blu-Tack worked a treat.

It occurred to me that I should have cut the lids into triangles, but with my Mum and Dad standing next to me and not really succeeding in waiting for me to finish constructing my little semla pops, I didn't bother.

On further thought, the lolly sticks aren't really necessary, the mini-semlas work quite nicely as bite-sized treats and as it turned out, survived a night in the fridge without problems, which was a massive bonus. I decided not to take the risk of a second night in that cold place and ate the few remaining survivors for breakfast the next day.

My original plan was to make the whole lot into semla pops and take to work, sadly I fell the victim of this year's heavy duty flu and ended up working from home most of last week, so as only bonus I got to keep all the little semlas.

As for the flu, I've mostly kicked it, it seems, but according to the Swedish news, it's the worst epidemic in 20 years.