Wednesday, 30 September 2015

Triple Chocolate Chunk Muffins

29th September 2015

Its chocolate week and semi-finals! Only two weeks of gluten free baking to go! I went for something small and individual rather than yet another large bake this week. And muffins are always fun!

The ingredients list in this recipe was not in the same order in which they were used which caused a bit of confusion when starting. So after a bit of looking back and forth at the book for a while, I began by melting the butter in the old fashioned way whilst weighing out the sugar - I used a mix of light muscovado and soft light brown sugar due to the first running out. The melted butter was beaten into the sugar and the eggs and crème fraîche (in place of soured cream), ((I think its pretty similar...)), were beaten in next.


I decided to melt the bulk of the chocolate to try and keep peak moisture in the bake, and this too was done the old fashioned way. Boy, I miss having a microwave!


The flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda (yes, lots of raising agent..), and white and dark chocolate chips were weighed out and mixed together.


In went the melted chocolate first, followed by the dry ingredients. I was worried the batter was a bit dry already so I added a bit more crème fraîche to keep it wet. This was beaten just for a short time until it was stiff but not overworked.


This was spooned generously into the cupcake cases and popped into the oven for 15 minutes. There was even some mixture left over which I'm still debating just eating rather than baking some extra muffins later...


I tried one warm and they were delicious. I think I might eat the rest slightly warmed as this seems to keep them moist in the middle and very tasty.


Tuesday, 29 September 2015

Snickerdoodles

23rd September 2015

There was no way I was attempting patisserie week. For a start its not easily kept if made the day before, and it would certainly not travel well on the walk to my friend's house. So I decided to do something quick and simple: snickerdoodles.

I've made these before (obviously), so I'll just share the link for the method. But I took a few more pictures this time to illustrate the process. Its ridiculously easy and I recommend everyone try it!




The gluten free flour made this batch a lot stickier than usual, so rolling the balls was a bit of a challenge. Lots of yummy fingers to lick afterwards. The bake didn't dry out as much as I feared either. They were crumblier but quite light and fluffy.


Tuesday, 22 September 2015

Brussel Sprouts and Tofu

21st September 2015

To start I made the marinade, consisting of sweet chilli sauce, soy sauce, sesame oil, cider vinegar (instead of rice vinegar), and maple syrup. Instead of tofu I used paneer cheese.  I like both but one is more reliable than the other. The recipe suggested a very specific type and brand of tofu as the easiest to use but I couldn't even find that in my local supermarkets. Tofu is something that I really enjoy in a Thai restaurant, probably prepared, but I can never make it that good and it always ends up being disappointed. So I tried the leftover panner I had from a curry night. Its has a similar sort of use in vegetarian cooking - soak up all the spices and flavours and provide texture amongst the veg. I diced up the paneer and left it to marinade for half an hour.



It was only when I started to chop and prepare the sprouts that I realised I hadn't bought enough. They were sliced into three each and fried one side down in the oil and salt until appearing slightly burnt. Next went in the spring onions for another couple of minutes until cooked.



The mushrooms were cut into quartered and fried in chilli powder and oil. I inhaled the powder as it hit the oil and ended up choking for the next little while! The mushrooms were fried until golden brown and added to the bowl with the other veg.


A little more oil was added to the pan, the paneer was taken out of the marinade and fried one side down until crispy and brown and then flipped for the same treatment on the other side.


This was all then mixed together with some of the remaining marinade and served with rice. It was really delicious and the extra salt really brought out the flavour of the veg. It definitely worked with paneer rather than tofu, but I'm keen to crack the secret of the perfect tofu dish!



Friday, 18 September 2015

Vegetarian Casserole

14th September 2015

I decided I wanted something warm and wholesome for dinner this week and I found a nice lentil casserole website on BBC Good Food website.



This began with a lot of chopping. First the onion was sautéed until transparent and soft. Then the garlic paste, garam masala, paprika and mixed herbs went in along with the celery and carrots. This fried for a few minutes before adding the peppers, courgette and chopped tomatoes and allowed this to simmer for a while while I mixed the vegetable stock up.


I used dried split lentils, so I added this with the stock. This meant I needed an overflow pan to reduce some of the liquid down while. The stew simmered for 25 minutes on the hob, until the lentils were tender. This actually split down into five individual portions, enough to feed me for the entire week with very few calories!





Cider Cake

15th September 2015

This little gem is one of my all time favourites from an old Farmhouse cookbook of my parent's. I have been making this since I needed some baking therapy through my exams at school, for my mum's tennis teas and my own pleasure. And its very easy to make. I chose to do this during Victorian baking week as its fairly similar to a fruit cake. But tastier!

It does, however, require a bit or forethought - the sultanas and raisins have to be soaked overnight covered in cider. Any cider works, and I usually just use cheap cider.


The next day, we begin by creaming the butter and brown sugar together until fluffy. The eggs are added one at a time and beaten into the mixture. Next goes in the dried fruit, now fully plumped up with cider goodness. The recipe strictly speaking says to drain off the additional cider but I always find it tastes better and remains more moist if the extra cider is added to the mixture. And for a gluten free cake it stops the bake from drying out and becoming crumbly.


The gluten free flour and mixed spice were added gradually to the mixture and beaten in until smooth. The trick is to not over work the gluten free flour. This mixture was poured into a prepared cake tin and baked in the oven.


I let the cake cool and mature over night and it was perfectly fruity and moist the next evening for Bake Off. Even after being carted around London in the rain beforehand. It really is one of my favourite cakes.


Sunday, 6 September 2015

Apricot and Almond Frangipane Tart

6th September 2015

Pastry week! I decided to challenge myself and make the pastry from scratch, which I've not done for about 10 years. Frangipane is one of the challenges on this week's Bake Off and I've never tried it before so this was extra incentive to have a go. I chose a recipe from Little Pod this time to mix things up a bit.

The first instruction was to put a tablespoon of water into the fridge. This sounded pretty odd. To make the dough I used the mixer to make breadcrumbs out of the gluten free flour, salt, butter, icing sugar, and lemon zest. Then went in an egg yolk and the cold water to knead into a dough. This was an incredibly wet consistency so I made slightly more of the breadcrumb mixture to make it more doughy rather than cakey. This worked to an extent. I wrapped this in a bowl with clingfilm and left in the fridge to chill for an hour.



Meanwhile I made the frangipane filling. This was done by mixing ground almonds, an absolute tonne of butter, icing sugar, and eggs. This resulted in quite a wet mixture again, whereas the recipe suggested it should be more breadcrumby. I added a bit more flour to make up the difference where I hadn't bought enough almonds, and this seemed to give it a slightly better texture. I covered this over and waited for the pastry to chill.



The pastry dough did in fact stiffen up a bit whilst in the fridge which made me feel a bit more confident. On a lightly (and later heavily) floured surface I attempted to roll out the pastry until it was thin and use it to line two sandwich tins. Gluten free pastry dough is incredibly crumbly and every time I tried to pick it up or turn it, it just fell apart. So in the end I rolled it out thin and just patched all the crumbled bits together using the back of a spoon. This made it quite uneven in places but it did the job. This was popped back into the fridge for another half an hour to chill.


As I don't own any baking beans (still) I used a couple of small dishes to sit on top of a sheet of baking paper in each tin to blind bake the pastry for 20 minutes, although I took them out a bit early as they looked quite brown. This is probably due to my patchwork effort. I didn't bake any extra without the weight as it looked ready to crumble.


Finally, a layer of apricot jam was spread onto the base (I tried to use it as glue to stick the pastry back together...) and then the cases were filled up with the frangipane filling. This was topped with some flaked almonds and baked in the oven until golden brown and the toothpick came out clean.


I was actually really pleased with these overall, despite the pastry being crumbly. The lemon zest really gave flavour to the pastry and I found I really enjoy frangipane filling. I made two tarts, one for the house and one for Bake Off night. My housemate told me it was so bad she should take it to her room to dispose of it ;)