Tag Archives: Almonds

Savage stuff

09 Wednesday Jan 2013

Posted by in Recipe

≈ 71 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , , , ,

IMG_1085Paprika is a savage red, and though it might sound strange, I like a bit of savagery. I went to the Museum of Contemporary Art in downtown LA yesterday where there was a lot of visual angst on display. Cavernous warehouses full of ripped metal and brown swaddling, swirling red daubs and matted roadkill. The colours were rust and grey and dried blood. Nothing had a frame, the frame was no longer needed. The only room I liked was the one housing the permanent collection, the ones always there: Rothko, Willem de Kooning, Jasper Johns.

But it was a small, angry picture, the first one I saw as I entered, that held my attention. It was by Dubuffet, and it was called Le Havre. It was a map of sorts and the colours were wild and fierce. There was little attempt at verisimilitude. The painter’s quote next to it caught my eye. It said “Personally, I believe very much in values of savagery; I mean: instinct, passion, mood, violence, madness.”

IMG_1107

The paprika in the photo was in a bowl, powdery like pigment, along with other spices and teas in a stall at the farmers’ market. You were allowed to lift up a spoon of it and smell, and this helped because the one above was smoky and the other paprika was not. But the colour was the reason I bought. It made me want to stick a finger in the middle. It was an angry red, savage, mad and violent.

Just so you know, paprika is the dried and ground flesh of peppers (cayenne pepper comes from dried and ground chillis – it’s easy to get confused). The peppers are dried from the oven, sun or smoke (the best over oak fires) and used mainly in Spanish and Hungarian dishes. Paprika can be sweet, smoky or hot with a huge variation both in flavour and colour. Try not to put the powder over direct heat or it will scorch and taste bitter. It has an affinity with coriander and cumin and potatoes, as well as chickpeas and dusted over halloumi. I tried it with Jerusalem artichokes to very good effect. The roasted almonds with paprika recipe is a Spanish one and smoked paprika is recommended.

Roast almonds with paprika and rosemary

Adapted from Sam and Sam Clark, Moro

250g whole blanched almonds

2 tsps of olive oil

1 tsp of smoked sweet paprika

1½ tsps of flaky sea salt, like Maldon

2 sprigs of rosemary, chopped finely without any wood

Preheat the oven to 150C/300F. Place the almonds on a baking tray and dry-roast in the top of the oven for about 10 minutes or until starting to turn golden. Remove and stir in the olive oil, paprika, salt and rosemary. Return to the oven for around 10-15 minutes. Everything should be sizzling and fragrant. If you would like to crisp everything up a little more, give the nuts a shake in a dry frying pan/skillet at the end. Remove and cool before eating.

Jerusalem artichokes with garlic and paprika

Adapted from Nigel Slater, Real Cooking

Serves 2

500g Jerusalem artichokes (3 or 4 big handfuls)

Butter, about 75g

6-8 cloves of garlic

A couple of bay leaves

1 heaped tsp of paprika

Peel the artichokes and slice them into rounds. Melt the butter in a shallow pan, one which has a lid. Drop the garlic cloves, whole and unpeeled, the bay leaves and the paprika into the butter and whirl it around with a wooden spoon. Add the artichokes and cook over a moderate heat until the chokes and garlic are slightly golden. Take care not to let the butter burn. Pour in a small glug of olive oil if it looks that way. Turn the heat down so the butter is lightly bubbling, cover with a lid and cook for about ten minutes. Shake the pan as they cook. Remove the lid, turn up the heat and continue cooking until the artichokes are tender, golden and crusty. Eat with the smashed open garlic pearls.IMG_1022

Persimmons

18 Tuesday Dec 2012

Posted by in Recipe

≈ 9 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , ,

IMG_0857

Fuyu or Sharon persimmon

There are two kinds of persimmon. The first, the Fuyu, looks like a tomato and is eaten like an apple or sliced into a salad. Although they are supposed to be crisp when eaten, I find they are more flavourful when properly ripe, which is to say, bulbous and crepey and as if about to burst their banks. They look so beautiful it almost doesn’t matter about the rest.

The Hachiya, like the quince and medlar fruit, can only be eaten when fully ‘bletted’ – almost rotten, with most of their astringency gone. They look pretty miserable; bruised and bloated with a long chin. They taste stunning, if occasionally slightly furry. The inside of a Hachiya is the kind of orange I have only ever seen in a Howard Hodgkin painting. It is floating and jelly-like to eat – if you can imagine a mouthful of the best jelly at the finest children’s birthday party you have ever been to.

IMG_0868

Hachiya persimmon

In California, there is much talk of persimmon pies, purees, tarts, butters and such. This might be because there is often a glut of them in winter. But sometimes between fruit and pudding falls the shadow. So much of their beauty is lost once you interfere. It’s true that wild persimmon, Diospyros virginiana, was cooked by the early American settlers until they were “baked and sodden,” so ubiquitous was the fruit. We are unlikely ever to be in their shoes again.

With the Hachiya, simply slice off the ‘lid’ (with its fawn-coloured calyx) and proceed as you would a soft-boiled egg. A spoon and some deep yellow cream is all you need. And even that might be pushing it. With the Fuyu, peel off the skin which can be tough, and then slice it as you would a tomato – horizontally. Serve with some toasted nuts, some sea salt, lemon and nut oil and perhaps some hard cheese. Treat it as you would melon; as a nice clean starter. Alternatively, if you’re in a rush or frankly can’t be arsed, then eat it as is.

IMG_0872

Hoshigaki

Hoshigaki is the name for Hachiya persimmons that are dried and massaged daily for six weeks until the flesh is leathery but soft and covered in the fruit’s natural sugars. It’s laborious and the results can vary hugely. At the Santa Monica farmers’ market, it was like eating the world’s largest date, a huge fudgy teardrop that caved at the slightest pressure. The ones above were tougher, more like dried banana. The woman whose job it was to massage them professed it made her feel a bit pervy (I’m paraphrasing). It’s a bit like milking a cow, apparently.

Fuyu or Sharon persimmon with sea salt, toasted nuts and hard cheese

Adapted from Deborah Madison, Seasonal Fruit Desserts

Slice the fruit into sections or cut it horizontally into thinnish rounds. Arrange the slices on a plate; add some crunchy sea salt (fleur de sel), some chopped, toasted nuts (hazelnuts are nice here), and a few drops of nut oil. Add some slices of a hard, sharp cheese.

IMG_0897

Write me down

As one who loved poetry,

And persimmons.

Shiki

Fuyu is also known as Sharon fruit – persimmon developed by Israelis in the Sharon valley.

Apple and sultana cake

18 Tuesday Sep 2012

Posted by in Recipe

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , , ,

IMG_2585

And now back to cake. This recipe belongs to my cousin, Lucas Hollweg, and you can find it in his book Good Things to Eat, which I think should be re-titled Fricken Amazin Things to Eat. Buttery and brisk, this cake is, and full of sharp and sweet delights. The apples are soft and fluffy and there is a lovely lemony sourness running throughout. The spices and sultanas make me think of Christmas and long, cold nights. Lucas calls the flavours “strudelish,” which I tried out on our recent German guests. Thinking they wouldn’t understand the “ish” I simply said “strudel” and spent the rest of the conversation backtracking. “It’s cake!” I said, finally, and we were all happy with that.

So to apples. My very first apple I do remember, because my dad knocked it out of the tree with a hoe. I think I told people we had “an orchard,” when actually it was two trees in the corner of our garden. It was also around this time that I invented a sister called Melanie which, you can imagine, took a lot more effort to conceal. Melanie was away a lot. Or she was sleeping. Then she died, which was a relief. But my love of apples only increased.

This first apple was my downfall. It was pale green, almost dun in appearance, and smooth and dry to the touch. This was what made the biting of it so exciting, because inside, once my teeth pierced the skin and those first droplets formed on my lips, was the sweet ivory flesh, full of crunch and juice. The bitter mahogany pips, the toughened core was something to work around, gnaw at until almost nothing remained; a little twig dangling from my stubby fingers. I discovered apple shampoo while on a French campsite a year or two later, and I marvelled at how they could have captured the fragrance so perfectly. There was probably not a single natural ingredient in the bottle, but to me it was like having a frothing orchard in my hair. So, apples remind me of being young, and of ‘firsts.’ And how I launched myself at things like a missile.

This cake takes me back to that first, and best ever, apple. It’s incredibly easy to make, yet rich and plump and gorgeous. It’s a happy cake. I left it out for the German girls for breakfast and asked afterwards if they liked it. One nodded a lot, and made a gasping sound. Her eyes also widened, which I took to be a good sign. The other one spoke for her. “We’re in heaven,” she said.

IMG_0146

Just so you know, I have also made this cake with quince compote, left over from the quince paste I made, and it was wonderfully aromatic. I have also used plumped-up (soaked) raisins in place of sultanas, which are trickier to find in LA. As to Bramleys – there is no real substitute. Look for sour and tart apples that cook down well.

Apple and Sultana Cake

Lucas Hollweg, Good Things to Eat

For 4-6

125g (4½ oz) butter, plus extra for greasing

125g (4½ oz) light brown or light muscovado sugar

125g (4½ oz) self-raising flour

1 medium egg

200g (7 oz) Bramley apples (1-2 depending on size)

2 handfuls of sultanas

Finely grated zest of 1 small lemon

½ tsp ground cinnamon

Fresh nutmeg

A handful of flaked almonds

“Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas Mark 4. Grease an 18cm (7in) cake tin and line the bottom with a circle of baking parchment. Put the butter and 100g (3½ oz) sugar in a saucepan and stir over a gentle heat until the butter has melted and the sugar dissolved. Quickly stir in the flour and beat in the egg. You’ll end up with something that looks like what it is – flour mixed with melted butter – rather than normal cake mixture. Don’t worry, it’s meant to look like that.

Spread half the mixture over the bottom of the cake tin, then arrange the apple slices on top. Scatter with 3 tablespoons sugar, then add the sultanas, lemon zest and spices (you want to grate in about one-eighth of a whole nutmeg). Spread the remaining cake mixture over the top, smoothing it out as best you can. Scatter with the flaked almonds and put the tin in the oven for 35-40 minutes, or until it’s a deep gold and firm to the touch.

Have a look after 30 minutes and cover the top with a bit of foil if it’s browning too quickly. Remove from the oven, and leave to stand in the tin for 10 minutes, then turn out and cool on a rack for at least quarter of an hour. It’s best while still just warm.”

 

A good nut butter

05 Wednesday Sep 2012

Posted by in Recipe

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , ,

IMG_9939

There is nothing like a good nut butter. Consistency is all; it must be smooth and almost – but not quite – runny. It must seize on the spoon, as if afraid to jump. At its best, it is reminiscent of set honey about to liquefy. Thickness is important. The test is whether you can speak afterwards. If you can, it’s not thick enough. At least five minutes should go by before you can unglue your tongue from the roof of your mouth.

I first tried simmering the nuts in milk, which softens them, but renders them too lactic for my taste. The result had a milky, cereal-like texture and the nut got buried (thanks, Thomas Keller). I was afraid that in their hard and whole state they would behave like ball-bearings in the blender, but the paste soon comes.

Supermarket shelves here (in LA) groan with nut butters of every description and every possible combination. The truly hideous gingerbread concoction Speculoos is currently doing the rounds, but of course peanut butter wins hands down. Most commercial ones are full of sugar, the nuts themselves having been stripped of any nutritional value by the time they are potted. They’ve done an amazing job at marketing something that takes seconds to make at home; I too have been wedded to shop-bought jars since childhood.

I remember eating peanut butter sandwiches (with butter, of course) while reading the adventures of Milly Molly Mandy. When I found a copy many years later, most of the pages were soldered together with thick, brown goo. I remember my muddy fingers on the edges of the print, the silence and muffled chomping. I revisited the stories of my heroine and her little-friend-Susan endlessly. Their decisions and errands, counting their pennies, visiting the haberdashers, growing mustard and cress. I always read and ate alone, and later slipped the plate under the bed to join the rest of the crockery and unwanted crusts. I forgo bread these days in favour of eating it straight from the spoon, and treat it as a dip. Actually, I treat it as I did then: as something clandestine but comforting.

I chose almonds for this recipe because the state of California is essentially Almond Central, and also because I think it can be the most disappointing of all the butters to buy. Virtuous ingredient list and folksy labels notwithstanding, almond butter tends to look murky, and taste granular and mealy; brown sludge surrounded by a moat of oil. This version is a real departure. The trick is, when blitzing, to go beyond gravel, beyond sand, to the shimmering, oily depths.

You can use whole, raw almonds, with the skin on, or blanched, slivered/flaked, spiced, what you will. Skin-on will be meatier, richer, and roasting them beforehand makes them sing. Marcona almonds are a Spanish import – fatter, softer and rounder than the Californian variety, and often toasted with olive oil, spices and herbs. Their naturally high oil content and sweetness puts them closer to macadamias. Worth a try if you can find them.

Almond butter (or any nut)

I haven’t given amounts here because it’s all feel, as far as I’m concerned. For what it’s worth, I always use blanched almonds, and if I’m feeling very virtuous I buy whole almonds which I put in boiling water and then slide off their skins. It is tedious and irritating and only occasionally meditative, but I find skin-on almonds harder to digest. I also prefer the blonde colour of the butter.

Whole almonds (blanched or skin-on)

Sea salt

Sterilised jar or glass to store but not essential

Method

Toast the almonds – spread out in one layer – in a frying pan or large saucepan over a gentle heat until they start to smell nutty and look slightly burnished. They burn very easily, so stick around and be prepared to take them off the heat immediately. Whizz them in a grinder for approx 30 seconds to one minute, or until the almonds are finely ground. Taste and watch; some like their nut butter on the dry side, others like it sloppier. The longer you grind the looser the mixture will become. You can add melted coconut oil if you like, for lubrication, but it isn’t necessary.

I make my own peanut butter as well as cashew butter and have occasionally been known to grind macadamias. It is criminally simple – the only caveat is they need to be roasted and salted beforehand (as in, buy a packet). Store in a sterilized jar or simply eat the stuff, still warm, with a cup of tea, as I do. What is not to love?

Peach cake

10 Tuesday Jul 2012

Posted by in Recipe

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , , ,

Continuing the cake inventory I started last week, I think this may be The Best Cake I’ve Ever Made. This expression gets bandied about a lot, I admit, and often I make pronouncements that later have to be revised, such as my adolescent belief that Five Star (a pop combo from Romford who all looked like versions of Michael Jackson) were “brilliant.”

That said, I think this is one of the best cakes I’ve made so far, and I take no credit for it at all. It’s all Nigel Slater, except for the almond extract and a redeployment of the blueberries. I’ve always been a fan of almonds – the only drawback being that an excess of ground almonds in a cake can make all the ingredients collapse into a kind of almond-induced stupor. I love moist, but I don’t really want a cake to drip. The almond’s strength is that it mitigates against the dryness of flour. Whenever I’ve made an all-flour cake, a few hours after it’s cooled it’s like eating hunks of stale bread. And dry cake is always disappointing, no matter how much you try to bury it beneath an avalanche of icing. Too much ground almond though, and it’s wet sand, so balance is all. This recipe captures the perfect ratio of crumbly and cakey with an almond-rich warmth.

Now to the idea of peaches and sponge – it feels as if the textures would be at war with one another. However, the peaches hang in the cake, discrete, plump and surprising. And because stone fruit and almonds are related (they belong to the Drupe family), the flavours speak sympathetically to each other. Of course, most of the fruit falls to the bottom of the cake – I would love to know how to prevent this: maybe make the pieces smaller – but apart from this one aesthetic gripe, it is a thing of gentle, rustic beauty and our guests ate it in silence. Always a good sign. The smell is wondrous, it is the pale golden-brown of a wheat field and icebergs of peach are still visible through the sponge.

In Nigel Slater’s version, the blueberries and peaches are all jumbled up together, but the blueberry needs its own stage, I feel. It is the colour of midnight, a sombre, ink-blue (Robert Frost said “I taste in them sometimes the flavour of soot”), and I don’t want it to have to share the limelight. Its true home is the American cobbler, and it seems happiest when it can seep and bubble, turning a deep, hot, liquid pink. I’ve used it here as a compote to douse the ice cream. Many feel it lacks the acidic surge, the sheer clout of other berries, and it can underwhelm. I have added lemon juice and bay leaves to the compote to counter this. It is very fine.

Peach Cake

Adapted from Nigel Slater, Summer Cake Recipes, The Observer

Serves 8-10

175g butter, softened

175g golden caster sugar

225g ripe peaches

2 large eggs at room temperature

175g self-raising flour (or 1 tsp baking powder for every 125g of plain flour)

100g ground almonds

1 tsp grated orange zest

a few drops of almond extract

150g blueberries (optional)

Method

Butter and line the base of a 20cm (8 in) loose-bottomed cake tin with baking paper. Set the oven at 170C/350F.

Cream the butter and sugar together until pale and fluffy. Peel, halve, stone and roughly chop the peaches. If the peaches are very ripe, the skin will peel off easily. Otherwise, scald them in boiling water, lift out using a slotted spoon, and peel off the skin when it has cooled slightly. Beat the eggs lightly then add, a little at a time, to the creamed butter and sugar. If there is any sign of curdling, stir in a tablespoon of the flour.

Mix the flour and almonds together and fold into the mixture, in two or three separate lots. Add the orange zest and almond extract, and once they are incorporated add the chopped peaches and blueberries (if using).

Scrape the mixture into the cake tin and bake for about 1 hour. Test with a skewer – if it comes out relatively clean, then the cake is done. Leave the cake to cool for 10 minutes or so in the tin, run a palette knife around the edge, then slide out on to a plate, decorating as the fancy takes you; fresh berries, fruit compote, ice cream, thin single cream, the possibilities are endless. This is also lovely for breakfast.

Blueberry Compote

Adapted from Jane’s Grigson’s Fruit Book

1lb blueberries

Grated zest and juice of a lemon

¼ tsp ground cinnamon or 1 cinnamon stick

¼ tsp freshly grated nutmeg

Pinch of salt

60g/2oz/¼ cup cane sugar or maple sugar

2 bay leaves

1 tsp cornstarch or arrowroot

Method

Put sugar, spices, cornstarch, salt and bay leaves into a heavy saucepan, and mix together with 150ml (5 fl oz/⅔ cup) water. When smooth, put in the blueberries and set over a moderate heat. Stir until the liquid clears and thickens. Add extra water if you want a runnier consistency. Stir in the zest and lemon juice gradually to taste. Let it cool. Keep chilled. The flavours will intensify over time.

Addendum added 20/7/12

This blueberry compote also makes a glorious jam. Place it over a medium high heat and reduce until the liquid is about half. A couple of splashes of balsamic vinegar and a sprig of basil or tarragon also lifts the flavours and makes the blueberry sparkle. Pot it up and keep in the fridge.

 

Floury fingers – in memory of cake

03 Tuesday Jul 2012

Posted by in Recipe

≈ 7 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , , , ,

IMG_8809

I recently read about a three year old French child who bakes her own cupcakes. I imagine she needs help putting them in the oven, but apart from that she’s her own pastry chef. Much has been written recently about the difference between French and American children, and the way the French like to ignore their offspring.

I remember teaching English to a Parisian lady (and mother) who told me outright that she found ‘pre-language’ children uninteresting. They were simply beneath her until they could find the right words to keep her in the room. So the idea of a small child not just able to feed herself, but preparing baked goods was interesting to me. The French idea is that children should learn to be self-sufficient from a young age, resourceful and able to deal with periods of boredom and frustration – periods of aloneness, without setting fire to themselves or the house.

I too have memories of long, starchy afternoons, when time would linger and there was nothing much to do and no one around. This was before the days of constant adult supervision –  or in the words of the late, great Nora Ephron, before parenting became “a participle.” My refuge was reading, and making concoctions from scrag ends of food and my mother’s baking chocolate, which was like snacking on tar. It wasn’t just unsweet, but rock hard, greasy and impossible to either bite into or break off. I think she got it from a wholesaler called Norman’s in Budleigh Salterton. I don’t remember it ever being employed in a cake, but perversely for something inedible, she always hid it so it could only ever be accessed by balancing on a stool, hoisting myself up onto the counter and rummaging through packets of dessicated coconut and paprika until my hand landed on a wrapped lump the texture and weight of a horse-shoe. I cut my gums on it.

My nana from Australia sent me my first cook books. Floury Fingers by Celia Hinde did interesting things with fondant, but left me with a lifelong suspicion of cup sizes. The second book, though, became my friend, babysitter and an endless source of material both for my cooking life and beyond.

It was called the Kids’ Own Book of Stories and Things to Do. It was an absolute treasure trove. I think it was seasonal because one section was all about ice lollies and then another one had pictures of snow and mittens. There were stories of betrayal, wallabies, children of different ethnic backgrounds, slides, kites and all sorts. I loved the recipes the best and returned year after year to try them out. I rarely had the right ingredients. Sugar was banned in our house, except for muscovado that turned tea to treacle, though it was nice on porridge. We kept goats, whose warm (and occasionally hairy) milk softened our cornflakes in a way that I can only describe as off-putting. Raspberries were picked fresh from the bush for breakfast. There was ratatoullie and lambs’ brains. I wasn’t particularly appreciative.

What I wanted was cake. Preferably with thick slopes of icing and cut into giant-sized wedges. I do remember being terribly sick but still managing to swallow a few slabs of chocolate cake at another child’s birthday party, the sweat beading across my brow, twin flares of fiery red on each cheek. So slabs it must be here – as an homage to what I would have baked had I had the requisite ingredients. I did my best. I made chocolate logs that my dad said looked like dog turds, and rock cakes that lived up to their name. Had I not had huge swathes of time to explore, I probably would not have made them at all, so I’m grateful I was allowed to get on with the business of childhood without too many interruptions.

I am still in search of the perfect cake, even now. Something you can eat for breakfast (toasted, with butter), for elevenses, or brunch, for afternoon tea, and of course, for pudding. Beginning with this cherry-almond loaf cake, the cataloguing has officially begun.

Now’s the time for cherries – the Bing variety has that deep, glossy coat, almost mahogany in hue, but any cherry can be made into a decent compote. The trick is no water, only a little sugar and a splash of balsamic vinegar. The cherries should keep their shape and not be overcooked. If you already have a jar of such things, or you have some (preferably undyed) glacé cherries, you can skip this bit.

Cherry compote

Adapted from Lindsey Shere, Chez Panisse Desserts

1lb ripe cherries

2 tbs sugar

2 tsp balsamic vinegar

Method

Put the cherries, stems and all, in a colander, pick out any bad ones, rinse and pat dry. Put them in one layer in a pan. Sprinkle the fruit with sugar and shake over a medium high heat for about 5-10 minutes. The sugar will melt and the cherries will feel soft to the touch. Don’t go to mush.  Sprinkle with the balsamic vinegar, and shake for a minute or so more. Scrape the cherries, together with their juice, into a container and let them cool before chilling. You can serve them as they are (they love ice cream), or stone and stem them for use in the cake.

Cherry-almond loaf cake

Adapted from Nigella Lawson, How To Be a Domestic Goddess

Here, I’ve reverted to grams; going back to my roots.

200g cherries (stoned, stemmed and halved)

250g self-raising flour

(or add 1tsp of baking powder to every 125g/4oz of plain flour)

225g softened butter

175g cane sugar

3 large eggs, beaten

2-3 drops of almond extract

100g ground almonds

6tbs milk

9x5ins or 23x13x7cm loaf tin, lined and buttered

Method

Preheat the oven to 325F/170C. Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Gradually add the beaten eggs and almond extract, alternating with the flour and ground almonds until it’s all one. Fold in the cherries, and then the milk and spoon the thick mixture into the loaf tin. Bake for ¾ – 1 hour, or until a skewer comes out clean. Leave in the pan on a wire rack until completely cooled. Makes 8-10 slabs.

p.s I read about the cupcake-baking three year old in The New Yorker. Here’s the whole article if you want to read on.

Muffins

26 Thursday Apr 2012

Posted by in Recipe

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

, , , , , ,

IMG_7234

I came late to the American muffin. It was too close to the cupcake for comfort, architecturally at least. And the last shop-bought muffin I tried was like eating my own washcloth. There was also a disconcerting bounce to it, no doubt the result of all the preservatives required to keep it ‘fresh’.

The craggily homemade version is much nicer; unprecious, easy, malleable. It’s a great one for using up left-overs, marmalade bits, old cranberries, stewed this and that, collapsed bananas and it’s good for experimenting. I like the deliberate under-mixing, and then watching it rise into smooth little balls through the smoky glass. It also absorbs and holds onto the essential flavour of things in interesting ways, like ginger nubbins, dates, vanilla and cinnamon. The botanically named ‘flavedo’ of citrus zest comes through startling well. It’s honest fare; simple, good, true, the workhorse of the kitchen. Wet into dry is the only rule, and then it likes to be left alone. But breaking it open, and getting a headful of that steamy, sweet interior, the texture reminiscent of soft, hot bread is lovely. And it has that essential lick-the-bowl-clean component, central to all great baking expeditions.

Muffins are what is known in the trade as ‘quick bread.’ Bread that uses yeast – ‘slow bread,’ you could say – has a long fermentation period, whereas quick breads use chemical leaveners such as bicarbonate of soda and baking powder and need to go straight in the oven. Muffins favour the casual, almost sloppy cook. A few desultory swipes with a spatula is all you need for the mixture to be ready – any more and the gluten will start to work, and the result will be tough and dense. Keeping a light hand also creates all the nooks and crannies for the butter and jam to fall into later, and hopefully – if the muffin is still warm – liquefy and dance around your mouth in a delightful way.

IMG_7252

This recipe can be made as a loaf or as individual muffins, and you can substitute the raisins for a cup of something else (prunes would be nice). Fennel is an acquired taste, I admit, being the Marmite of flavourings, but the liquorice warmth balances the sweetness here. Play around with spices though, and see what takes your fancy. I have added ground almonds to the mix because I believe that the muffin’s downfall is its tendency to dryness which almonds will mitigate. If you are less catholic in your muffin persuasion, and want to keep things simple, stick to two cups (250g) of flour.

Fennel, orange and raisin quick bread

Adapted from Nick Malgieri’s The Modern Baker

1 cup (160g) raisins

1¼ cups (150g) plain flour

¾ cup (90g) ground almonds

⅔ cup (130g) sugar

2 tsp baking powder

½ tsp baking soda

1 tbs fennel seeds

Pinch of salt

¾ stick (6 tbs/3 oz) butter

Finely grated zest of 2 oranges

⅔ cup (160 ml) buttermilk

(or make up 1 cup/250 ml of milk and add 1 tbs of lemon juice.  Let this stand for 5 minutes and use the required amount)

2 large eggs, at room temperature

Method

Put the raisins and about 75 ml (5 tbs) of water in a small saucepan and bring to the boil. Remove from the heat, cover, and leave until the raisins have absorbed most of the liquid. You don’t have to do this but it makes the raisins very plump and juicy. Drain and leave to one side. Heat a dry frying pan/skillet over a medium heat and add the fennel seeds, shaking the pan so they toast evenly. They are ready when they start to release their fragrance and are beginning to brown; then whizz them in a spice or coffee grinder for a few seconds.

Preheat the oven to 400F. Lightly coat the muffin pan or loaf tin with butter. Put the flour, ground almonds, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, blitzed fennel seeds and salt in a medium-sized bowl and combine well. In a saucepan, melt the butter gently with the orange zest. Turn off the heat and add the buttermilk to the melted butter and let it sit for a few minutes, until it’s tepid. Pour the melted butter mixture into a bowl and add the eggs and whisk until well blended.

Add the wet ingredients to the dry and stir gently with a wooden spoon or spatula. Mix until just blended. Gently fold in the raisins. Use an ice cream scoop or a spoon to pile the batter into the muffin cups (fill to the top if you want a billowing ‘crown’), or simply pour into the loaf tin. Bake the individual muffins for 18 – 20 minutes and the loaf for about 35 – 40 minutes. The top should feel firm and a skewer will come out cleanish when it’s ready. Leave the tin to cool for five minutes and then prise the loaf/muffins out using a thin knife and leave on the rack until okay to handle, but still tender and steaming. Eat very soon.

Some things to remember: All the liquid ingredients must be brought to room temperature before beginning. If, when you whisk the milk, eggs and butter together, the milk or the eggs are chilled, the butter will congeal and won’t blend well. Always add any zest to the melted butter rather than to the dry ingredients, as this releases the essential oils. Stop mixing the batter as soon as you can see no streaks of flour or liquid; don’t worry about lumps, they’ll even out during baking. Just get the darn thing in the oven.

These muffins, unlike their commercial counterparts, have a shorter shelf-life. After a day, they need a zap in the oven to bring them back to life, but by day three it’s all over. Freeze them once they’ve cooled on the rack, if you want to keep them for a while; they freeze for up to a month, wrapped and sealed in a freezer bag. When you’re ready to eat them, thaw for 30 minutes and then reheat. Alternatively, prepare the dry and wet ingredients, cover and store them separately until the morning (keep the wet in the fridge), and then whip them together and bung in the oven.

You can put the batter into squares of parchment paper, which then sit in the muffin tray, as pictured below. Though it looks quite pretty, the downside is the paper’s tendency to cling to the muffin, thus tearing it asunder. This makes it easier to eat though – doing the job of fingers. 

Lemon drizzly

06 Tuesday Mar 2012

Posted by in Recipe

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , , , ,

IMG_1525

I’m aware I might be going overdrawn on my ‘lemon’ account with this recipe, but this really is sublime. It also works equally well with limes, if you want something more piercing. In either case, the loaf cake is made doubly moist, first with the addition of ground almonds and then with the soaking it gets from the lemon/lime syrup. It keeps for ages.

I used thyme here too; it is one of those shrubby herbs you can be quite flagrant with, unlike sage or rosemary. Whenever I’ve been tentative, it looks as though a couple of green flies have fallen into the mixture and need fishing out. It should look deliberate, so be generous. Thyme adds a resinous, woodland warmth, and tempers the sweetness. It goes particularly well with lemon; both are part of the Mediterranean palate, and with some light roughing up over heat, the smell can quickly conjure up memories of scorched earth, sea air and the sigh of singed, crackling wood over flame. Needless to say, you can leave it out.

This cake is based on a Nigel Slater recipe, a food writer with the soul of a gardener in my view. I decided on the thinnest layer of lemon icing on top; it has never felt too much and it makes the cake less gooey to handle. Anyway, that’s my excuse. Candied lemons are a good standby.

IMG_1519

Lemon loaf cake

Adapted from Nigel Slater, Crumbs of Comfort, The Observer

At the risk of appearing slightly hysterical, this is the best lemon loaf cake I’ve ever eaten/made. It is simplicity itself and yet tastes quite amazing. People will think you’re professionally trained. 

For the cake:

200g butter, softened

200g caster sugar

3 large free range eggs at room temperature

80g plain flour (rice flour works well here too)

100g ground almonds

2 teaspoons of thyme leaves (optional)

Grated zest of 1 whole lemon (reserve the juice for the syrup)

Half a teaspoon of baking powder

Pinch of salt

1 loaf tin (8″ x 5″)

For the syrup:

4 tbsp sugar

Juice of 1 large lemon (see above)

For the candied lemons (optional)

3 lemons, thinly sliced

100g caster sugar

100ml water

Pre-heat the oven to 350F/175C. Butter and line the loaf tin with baking parchment. Sift the baking powder, salt and flour together. Cream the butter and sugar till they are pale and fluffy. Gradually beat in the eggs, alternating with the flour mixture to stop it curdling. Grate the lemon zest and mash it with the thyme leaves, if using, in a pestle and mortar or with the base of a jar; tearing the leaves helps release their essential oils. Or just add the lemon zest to the cake mixture, along with the ground almonds. Fold the mixture into the lined tin and bake for approximately 40 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean.

While the cake is baking, dissolve the sugar in the lemon juice over a low heat – taste as you go and add more sugar if need be. Remove from the heat and steep for 20 minutes. When the cake comes out of the oven, pierce it all over with a skewer and pour over the syrup. Allow to cool.

If you want to go a bit ‘Elvis’ with it, as I did, add a thin shell of lemon icing on top of the tacky-dry syrup; wet 6 heaped tablespoons of sifted icing sugar with 2 generous tablespoons of lemon juice and spread over the cake, letting it drip down the sides. Keep the cake wrapped tightly in foil for a few days to moisten if you can.

For the candied lemons, bring a pan of water to the boil and blanch the sliced lemons by putting them in the boiling water for five minutes. Drain and set aside. In another pan, bring the sugar and water to the boil, add the lemons and simmer for about 10-15 minutes, or until the white pith turns translucent. The lemon slices will go sticky and shiny. Allow them to cool on greaseproof paper. Store in an airtight container, or place on top of the cake for a pleasant finish. They’re quite chewy.

Optional extra: Add crushed cardamom from 1½ tbsp green cardamom pods (put the seeds in a pestle and mortar and crush to a coarse powder) to the butter/sugar before creaming. I think it gives the cake a slightly mystical, smoky flavour. Shout out to Good Things to Eat by (my cousin) Lucas Hollweg for this lovely addition to a lemon cake.