Wednesday 17 September 2014

The Great Blogger Bake Off: Week 7 - Rhubarb and Custard Mille Feuille




I am so flippin' proud of myself this week. Not only did I pull of making puff pastry from scratch, but creme patissiere too. I think I've been playing it safe with my bakes up until now, sticking to things I know I can manage, so I decided this week to push myself a little bit further, and tackle Mille Feuille. 

It was really difficult recipe wise, considering most recipes tell you to use shop bought pastry, and whipped cream instead of creme patissiere. I was also expecting such a wide range of flavour combos when I was searching for some inspiration, considering mille feuille is only sweet pastry and cream/custard, but kept stumbling across boring old strawberries and rasberries, so I decided to wing it and do one of my all-time fave flavour duos. Nothing can beat good ol' rhubarb and custard. 

If I was to do this again, just from a presentation point of view, I would use raw rhubarb and stew it myself to maintain the pink colouring, because the green of the tinned rhubarb really isn't that appealing. 

Taste-wise though it was spot on. The sugar that's sprinkled over the pastry before it's baked adds just the right level of sweetness, and the tartness of the rhubarb combats any added sweetness that comes from the creme patissiere. It actually tasted like rhubarb and custard sweets. 

Despite having to piece together multiple recipes to create my own, this was actually a really easy bake to pull off, and I thoroughly enjoyed learning two brand new skills. 

So if you've ever been a bit intimidated by this multi-layered treat and are a sucker for old school penny sweets, why not give it a go!


Ingredients

Puff Pastry
250g strong plain flour 
1tsp fine sea salt 
3 tbsp caster sugar
250g butter, at room temperature, but not soft
about 150ml cold water
Creme Patissiere 
4 medium egg yolks 
65g caster sugar
15g plain flour
15g cornflour
350 ml whole milk 1/2 tsp vanilla bean paste 
icing sugar, for dusting. 
Filling
1 245g tin of rhubarb chunks in light syrup. 
Icing sugar to decorate. 



Method

1) Heat the oven to 200C / 180C fan / gas 6. 

2) Sift the flour and salt into a large bowl. Roughly break the butter in small chunks, add them to the bowl and rub them in loosely. You need to see bits of butter. 



3) Make a well in the bowl and pour in about two-thirds of the cold water, mixing until you have a firm rough dough adding extra water if needed. Cover with cling film and leave to rest for 20 mins in the fridge. 


4) Turn out onto a lightly floured board, knead gently and form into a smooth rectangle. Roll the dough in one direction only, until 3 times the width, about 20 x 50cm. Keep edges straight and even. Don't overwork the butter streaks. You should have a marbled effect. 


5) Fold the top third down to the centre, then the bottom third up and over that. Give the dough a quarter turn (to the left or right) and roll out again to three times the length. Fold as before, cover with cling film and chill for another 20 mins in the fridge. 

6) On a lightly floured surface scattered with a little sugar, roll out the pastry to a rectangle slightly larger than 28 x 30cm. Line a large baking tray with parchment and scatter with more sugar. Use the rolling pin to lift the pastry onto the baking parchment. 



7) Scatter more sugar over the pastry and cover with another sheet of baking parchment. Lay another heavy baking tray (or a heavy oven dish) on top and bake for 25-30 mins until the pastry is golden and crisp, then set aside to cool. 


8) To make the creme patissiere, whisk together the eggs and sugar in a large mixing bowl until they turn a pale golden colour. Whisk in the flour and cornflour and set aside. 





9) Place the milk and vanilla bean paste in a heavy-bottomed saucepan, bring to a gentle simmer, stirring frequently. Remove the pan from the heat and let cool for 30 seconds.


10) Slowly pour half of the hot milk onto the egg mixture, whisking all the time, then return the mixture to the remaining milk in the pan. It is important to slowly pour the hot milk onto the cold eggs before you return the mixture to the pan to prevent the eggs from scrambling. 



11) Bring the mixture back to the boil and simmer for one minute, whisking continuously, or until smooth. 


12) Pour the cream into a clean bowl and dust with icing sugar to prevent a skin forming. Cool as quickly as possible, by sitting the bowl of pastry cream in another large bowl of ice water. Leave to cool for 20 minutes. 

13) Using a ruler and a sharp knife, carve 10 x 6cm rectangles out of the pastry. You should be able to carve out 12 rectangles. 




14) Tip the cooled cream into a piping bag or a standard sandwhich / freezer bag, and snip off a tiny corner with a pair of scissors. Practice piping on some kitchen role to make sure the hole is the right size and the cream is at the right consistency. 

15) Drain the rhubarb. If it's too wet, it will make the rhubarb soggy. The best way to prevent this is to dry each individual piece of rhubarb before cutting it on some kitchen roll. 



16) Take your first rectangle, placing it horizontally in front of you, and pipe a thick line of the cream from the top to the bottom. Take two chunks of rhubarb, cut them in half and place them next to the the cream. Continue to alternate the cream and rhubarb until the pastry is covered. 

17) Place a piece of pastry on top of this and repeat the cream and rhubarb process, maybe alternating with the below layers so as to create a checkerboard effect. 

18) Place another layer of pastry on top of this to complete one mille feuille, and dust with icing sugar. 




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Wednesday 27 August 2014

The Great Blogger Bake Off: Week 4 - Tiramisu Trifle


DESSERT TIME. Before this week, I'd been eating pretty healthy but when I realised I had to make a dessert I looked through all my recipe books for inspiration and thought stuff it, this week I'm going all out. So I have decided to combine two of my favourite desserts: Tiramisu and the classic trifle. 

I'm a dairy addict, particularly when it comes to cream. The creamier the better (getting on the Bake Off innuendo band wagon). I don't think you can get more decadent than this dessert. It contains everything from coffee and chocolate to liqueur and lashings of mascarpone and custard. The brilliance of this recipe is that instead of sticking to traditional trifle layering, the custard is combined with mascarpone to make more of a Zabaione. 

Ingredients
175g sponge fingers
4 1/2 tbsp coffee 
12 tbsp boiling water
6 tbsp Amaretto liqueur
3 medium eggs seperated
50g golden caster sugar
500g mascarpone
1 tsp almond extract
50g dark chocolate
4 tbsp toasted slivered almonds
A handful of cob nuts (if you can get them) 

Method
1) Select a suitable trifle bowl or serving dish. 
3)Take a handful of sponge fingers and chop them in half. This allows for an easier fit in the bowl. Line the bottom half of the bowl. This is just to figure out how many fingers you need for the first layer. 
2) In a tupperware container, pour 4 tbsp of boiling water and add 1 1/2 tbsp of coffee and 2 tbsp Amaretto liqueur. 
3) Add the halved sponge fingers to the coffee and liqueur mixture. Make sure both sides are coated, then re-line the bottom of your bowl. 
4) In a mixing bowl, whisk the egg yolks and sugar until combined, then beat in the mascarpone and almond extract until completely smooth. 
5) Whip the egg whites until stiff using an electric whisk, and fold into the mascarpone mixture in two goes. The texture of the mix should be a thick mousse texture. 
6) Smooth half of this mixture over the coffee soaked sponges. 
7) Repeat step 2, using the same measurements, but this time place the sponges on top of the mascarpone mixture. 
8) Grate 33g of the dark chocolate on top of the 2nd layer of sponges. 
9) Pour the second half of the mascarpone mixture on top of the chocolate, and smooth with a spatula. 10)Leave in the fridge for two hours or overnight to set. 






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Wednesday 13 August 2014

The Great Blogger Bake Off: Week 2 - Biscuits

   


 
So it's week two of the Great British Bake Off, and therefore week 2 of the Blogger Bake Off. On the last episode, it was mentioned that this week's theme would be biscuits. Now I don't have a very good track record with biscuits - I always manage to over-do them, so as you can imagine I was pretty nervous about baking this week. It's bad enough baking for the family and getting it wrong, but when I'm sharing it with you guys, there's an added pressure. It's a good job I'm not on the actual show really - just one disapproving head shake from Mary Berry and I'd crumble like my over-baked biscuits. 

Luckily though, I'm quite pleased with my bakes this week. I chose to make Florentines, because after looking at the recipe, the likelihood of over-baking them seemed pretty low. They are so cute and delicate and ridiculously easy to make (although I did create an awful mess). 

Ingredients
85g unsalted butter
85g golden syrup
30g plain flour
30g chopped almonds
30g chopped mixed peel
60g sultanas and crystalized fruits
60g glace cherries, chopped
110g plain or white chocolate, or some of each, melted
2 baking sheets lined with non-stick baking parchment. 

Method
1) Put the butter and golden syrup in a medium, heavy-based saucepan and heat until melted. Stir in the remaining ingredients except the chocolate. 
2) Put teaspoons of the mixture onto the prepared baking sheets, spacing them well apart. Flatten lightly with the back of a spoon. Bake in a preheated oven at 180°C (350°F) Gas 4 for 7-8 minutes until light golden brown. 
3)Remove from the oven and let cool for 1-2 minutes, or until firm enough to transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. 
4)When cool, coat the flat underside of each Florentine with melted chocolate and, using a serrated icing spatula or a fork, make a wavy pattern in the chocolate. Leave to set, chocolate side up. Store in a cool place in an airtight container and eat within 1 week. 

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Wednesday 6 August 2014

The Great Blogger Bake Off: Week 1 - Cakes



Evening all. 

This post is very different to what I usually write about, but this is something I couldn't resist doing. 
Now if you're an avid baker you're probably more than aware that the Great British Bake Off starts tonight. 
So in homage to this mouth-wateringly addictive show, the lovely Lawra over at I Love Crafty has organised a Great Blogger Bake Off, where once a week, alongside the show, bloggers bake something inline with the theme of that week's show. 

Now I love any excuse to bake, however I only found out about the whole thing this morning. I didn't want to miss out on the first post though. Now in true Come Dine With Me style, I'm going to come clean and say I didn't bake this today. However, this was a very recent bake of mine that was dedicated to the using up of my homegrown harvest of redcurrents, tayberries and blackcurrents. 

I'd never worked with these berries before and had no idea what to do with them, but was determined to make a cake. After a bit of research, I found this Good Food recipe. Alas, still no use of my berries, so I had to adapt it a little. 

First off, I didn't have a loaf tin so used a normal, round spring-form tin. Apart from that the majority of the recipe is pretty much the same. I had to add a bit more sugar than the recipe states when reducing the berries with the lemon juice, simply because my selection of berries were a lot more sour tasting compared to those in the recipe.  

I can only apologise for this very lackluster first post to what I would love to have been an icing fueled, bowl licking extravaganza. 

I do solemnly swear that my next post will contain more dedication. 

Enjoy the first show of this Great British Bake Off season!!

(Would still recommend this cake though, a great use of a homegrown harvest, and can really be applied to any berries you have lying around.) 




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