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Recipe For Rich Apple Cake

Friday, October 8th, 2010

The idea for this cake comes from the wonderful cook book “European Peasant Cookery” by Elisabeth Luard; it is her recipe for Apple Cake or Æblekage, which comes from Denmark.  “European Peasant Cookery” is one of those great cookbooks that is packed with recipes that will inspire you and has no pretty pictures to beguile you and get in the way of the cookery.

A Slice Of Rich Apple Cake

A Slice Of Rich Apple Cake

I have changed it quite a lot, switching self rasing flour for plain and increasing the number of eggs used, but the underlying concept remains the same – a rich, moist apple cake.  The result came out as a rich and fulsome apple cake that can be eaten hot or cold, as a cake or a pudding with custard or cream.  It is a delicious balance between the sweetness of the cake with the tart freshness of the cooking apples; it reminds me of Zwetschgendatschi, which is one of my favourite flavour memories buried deep in my soul from holidays spent in Bavaria around the Chiemsee.

Axel’s Apple Cake

500g / 1lb cooking apples, thinly sliced
Juice of 1 lemon
2 pinches of organic Fairtrade mixed spice
1tbsp Fairtrade caster sugar, or flavoured sugar like cinnamon or lemon sugar (if using cinnamon sugar, drop the mixed spice)
225g / 8oz unsalted butter, at room temperature and chopped into cubes
195g / 6¾ oz Fairtrade caster sugar
6 large eggs, at room temperature and whisked gently
1 tsp natural vanilla extract
195g / 6¾ oz organic plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
¾ tsp sea salt
½ tsp organic Fairtrade cinnamon powder
75g / 2½ oz organic ground almonds

Preheat the oven to 160C/325F.  Take a 23cm / 9 inch cake tin and lightly oil the tin, remove any excess oil, then line the base with baking paper.

Windfall Apples From The Garden

Windfall Apples From The Garden

Go pick your apples, peel and core them, then slice thinly.  Place in a bowl and sprinkle the lemon juice over them all, then sprinkle with the caster sugar and a couple of pinches of mixed spice.  Thoroughly mix it up to make sure all slices are nicely coated with sugar and spice.  Leave until later.

Grind the ground almonds in a food processor to make them finer – I know it sounds weird but they are usually just too coarse.  Put to the side for use later in the recipe.

Cream the butter and the sugar together until light and fluffy.  Add the eggs and Steenbergs vanilla extract and whisk up fully.  Sieve together the flour, baking powder, sea salt and cinnamon powder.  Add the flour mix into the cake batter and throughly mix up, then add the ground almonds and mix into the batter.

Sugar And Butter Ready For Mixing

Sugar And Butter Ready For Mixing

Cream The Sugar And Butter

Cream The Sugar And Butter

Mix In The Eggs And Flour Mix

Mix In The Eggs And Flour Mix

Pour half the cake batter into the cake tin, then layer over half the apple slices.  Cover with rest of cake mixture and then layer rest of apple slices over the top of the cake. 

Layer The Apples On The Cake Batter

Layer The Apples On The Cake Batter

Bake in the oven for 1 hour and 15 minutes.  At around 1 hour, sprinkle the top of the cake with 1 tablespoon of sugar and start looking and checking the cake to ensure you catch it just when it is cooked.  Remove from the oven and leave to cool in tin for about 10 minutes then turn out and cool on a wire rack.

Home Made Apple Cake

Home Made Apple Cake

Serve warm with custard or whipped cream, or cold as a cake with double cream or on its own.

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Interesting Food Blogs In September 2010 (Part 1)

Tuesday, October 5th, 2010

September has been a busy month for food bloggers.  I think that is partly as many have had a holiday in August and recharged their batteries, but also it is harvest time and so there’s a huge amount of culinary stimulation in the fields, gardens, markets and shops.  For me, harvest time is perhaps the most wonderful time of year as the earth’s bounty repays the effort you have put into the soil; perhaps not as light and joyful as spring and as full of promise, but fulsome.

At A Slice Of Cherry Pie run by Julia Parsons, there are a couple of a nice and simple looking recipes – Autumnal Welsh Lamb Steaks With Butter Beans and Baked Figs With Maple Syrup.

At Cannelle et Vanille (how come the photos are just so beautiful – it is just not fair as mine look like an amateur has snapped them however hard I try), Aran has been still enjoying her vacation in here native Basque region in Spain and wrote a beautiful piece about apples and an apple cake, which puts my efforts on apples to shame; I must try Aran’s recipe as I am on a quest for a decent apple cake at the moment.   Also, I love her post about mushroom picking with her father as my mum enjoys her mushroom foraging at this time of year, which earths her back to the soil; I am so pleased that the mushrooms were cooked in a simple risotto dish as good food should be simple and natural and not overfussy.  Finally, the Leek, Butternut Squash and Potato Soup with the Apple and Gruyere Muffins have a delectable, autumnal feel about them, but with the amount of apples I have got at home an apple soup recipe would have been welcomed with open arms.

At Chocolate And Zucchini, there is a really useful post called Tomato Burger Buns, which sounds intriguing as a title.  What interested me the most was the links into an article in the New York Times about the perfect hamburger.  So I feel minded to rekindle my quest for the perfect burger, which can restart now that the nights are drawing in and I have some inspiration for the buns’ component, which was where I had been struggling for a way forward.

At Chubby Hubby, he and his wife flew off to Bangkok to eat at David Thompson’s new restaurant and has shared the recipe for Grilled Pork Neck With A Spicy Sour Sauce, which has that wonderfully Thai feel to it.  This links in nicely to a pre-press viewing at Delicious Days of David Thompson’s up and coming book on Thai street food – David Thompson’s Pork Skewers; they also do not seem too hot so would be great as children’s food.

At CookSister, there is a fabulous round up of braai recipes in celebration of national (South African) barbecue day; I like the sticky pork ribs from Simply Delicious and a Kudu Potjie which is a really traditional South African type of pot cooked casserole and Cooksister’s own Whole Leg Of Lamb Barbecue and later her Lamb Sosaties.  There is a definite autumnal, harvest-like feel to Stuffed Courgettes and inspires me to cook up our marrows from the garden.

David Lebovitz has been busy travelling to Ireland and showing folks around Paris on a chocolate tour.  In amongst it all, he has included some great recipes – a recipe for a brown soda bread inspired by his trip to Ireland and a lovely post about making butter in Cork, as well as a perfect sounding Plum And Rhubarb Crumble cooked by the lovely Rachel Allen, who is one of my favourite cooks.

Helen at Fuss Free Flavours has cooked a healthy and wholesome courgette and red lentil dhal and a Four Seed Tapenade that would be excellent on pasta, plus a Harissa Lentil Salad With Lettuce which (I must declare an interest here) uses my Harissa With Rose Seasoning.  I like the idea of the Polenta Bread that uses this corn meal staple within the bread; with Helen Best-Shaw and David Lebovitz baking bread, I reckon this winter is going to involve experiments with bread making, something which has been hold for a couple of years now.

…continues in part 2 [lots of activity in blogosphere this month]…

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Recipe For Fruit Teabread Revisited

Saturday, October 2nd, 2010

For whatever reasons, I have not been quite happy with the original teabread recipe that I created and posted a few weeks back, so I have been playing around with the recipe now and baking away.  Now several teabreads and a family of very happy tasters later, I think I have cracked it.

The key is still in the tea – the better the tea, the more interesting the tea, the better and more interesting the end result.  I have now made it with breakfast tea, Assam tea, Christmas chai tea and Redbush Chai tea and they all come out with slightly different flavours, but they are all great.  The tea should always be made with loose leaf tea as you lose that fustiness from the tea bag, plus why use good ingredients then spoil their subtleties with the imperfection of the flavour from a bag.  The other addition that I have made is I have substituted buttermilk for the butter, which adds a different richness to the cake that was not completely right beforehand, however you can either substitute this for a full fat milk or omit this ingredient but then add extra tea to compensate, otherwise the teabread loses some of its moistness, which is part of the joy and vital to the texture.

The other part that I have played with is to work on variations of the steeping of the fruits.  Firstly, I think it is better to boil the fruit for 10 – 15 minutes, then to leave the fruit to cool and steep in the brewed tea ideally overnight, but certainly until the fruit has cooled to a warm to the touch temperature.  The alternative of steeping in freshly brewed tea did not seem as successful, although fine; perhaps the initial boiling softens up and gets the fruit more receptive to taking up the flavours of the tea.

Finally, I have upped the quantities, the better to fit my loaf tin.  The end result is moist, rich and moreish, tasting great with butter.

Revised Ingredients And Recipe For Axel’s Teabread

175g / 6 oz / 1 cup sultanas
125g / 4½ oz / ¾ cup raisins
50g / 2oz / ¼ cup currants
175g / 6 oz / ¾ cup light brown muscovado sugar
250ml / 8 fl oz / 1 cup strong, freshly brewed tea
1 egg free-range, at room temperature and lightly beaten
50 ml / 3½ tbsp buttermilk
230g / 8 oz / 1 cups plain white flour
1½ tsp baking powder
½ tsp Fairtrade cinnamon powder
½ tsp Fairtrade nutmeg powder

Preheat the oven to 180C/ 350F.  Line a loaf tin with baking paper.

Place the dried fruit and muscovado sugar into a heavy bottomed saucepan, then add the strong tea, heat and simmer for 10 – 15 minutes until the fruit has plumped up.  Leave to cool in the pan, ideally overnight.

Sieve together the plain flour, baking powder, Fairtrade cinnamon and nutmeg powders.  Make a well in the centre of the flour, then add in the egg and stir thoroughly with a spatula.  Add the buttermilk and stir until you have a soft dough.  Add the fruits and throughly beat together with the silicone spatula.

Stirring Up The Fruit Bread Mix

Stirring Up The Fruit Bread Mix

Pour the fruit teabread mixture into the prepared loaf tin.  Bake for 1 hour 10 minutes, remove from the oven then leave to stand in the tin for about 10 minutes, before turning out and leaving to cool on wire rack.  Start checking the consistency of the teabread towards the end – when it is springy to a light touch on the surface of the teabread, it is done.

Yorkshire Teabread

Yorkshire Teabread

You do not need to leave this to cool down completely as it is lovely eaten warm.

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Recipe For Traditional Gingerbread

Tuesday, September 28th, 2010
A Slice Of Homemade Gingerbread

A Slice Of Homemade Gingerbread

I seem to be on a journey that includes loads of different traditional British cakes, which noone at home is complaining about at all.  Perhaps, it is the nostalgic air of early autumn creeping into the air.

What is great about these sorts of cakes are that they get better with a bit of ageing, so there is none of this lightness that morphs into dryness overnight.  There’s also an old fashioned solidity to them that makes them a meal in their own right rather than a light, frolicky piece of fancy that seems to be just a burst of sweetness without any substance.

They all make an interesting use of spice flavours and work well with different types of liquid.  In this gingerbread recipe that I have been playing with, I use buttermilk which imparts a richness to the gingerbread that milk does not quite match.  And while there is definitely some ginger taste in this cake, it is not overpowering and is balanced by the sweetness of the cinnamon powder (note: cinnamon not cassia or baker’s cinnamon), while the molasses flavours from the black treacle and muscovado are kept down through using relatively little treacle and a light muscovado rather than a dark one.  You can tweak these quantities and ingredients to suit your household’s tastes – these match our own as Jay really loves this cake.

I, also, recommend wrapping up the cake and leaving it for a day as the cake becomes moister, which is much tastier and the texture is more correct than eating it fresh from the oven.

How To Make Traditional Gingerbread

280g / 10 oz / 2½ cups organic plain flour (I am using Gilchester’s white flour at the moment)
2tsp organic ginger powder
1½tsp baking powder
¾tsp bicarbonate of soda
¾tsp organic cinnamon powder
125g / 4½ oz / generous ½ cup light muscovado sugar
115g / 4 oz / ½ cup butter (lightly salted is fine)
125g / 4½ oz / scant ½ cup golden syrup (corn syrup)
50g / 2 oz / 3tbsp black treacle
200ml / 7fl oz / 7/8 cup buttermilk (or full fat milk)
1 large sized egg, at room temperature and lightly beaten

Set the oven to 160C / 325F.  Line a large loaf tin with baking parchment (dimensions: 12 x 19cm; 4½ x 7½ inches).

Sieve the plain flour, ginger, cinnamon powder, baking powder and bicarbonate of soda together into a large mixing bowl.

Sieve Together The Flour And Spices

Sieve Together The Flour And Spices

Cut the butter into small pieces and put into a pan, then add the golden syrup, muscovado sugar and black treacle to this and warm over a gentle heat until the sugar has melted.

Butter, Sugars And Sweet Things

Butter, Sugars And Sweet Things

Make a well in the dry ingredients and pour in the sugars.  Mix it all up with a silicone spatula or hand whisk.  Add the buttermilk and egg and mix up thoroughly. 

Mix Together The Wet And Dry Ingredients

Mix Together The Wet And Dry Ingredients

Stir In The Buttermilk

Stir In The Buttermilk

Pour Ginger Batter Into Loaf Tin

Pour Ginger Batter Into Loaf Tin

Pour the ginger batter into the prepared loaf tin.  Put into the centre of the warmed oven and bake for about an hour.  As the hour comes up, start checking the gingerbread by gently pressing the top in the centre to feel whether it feels springy and spongy rather than liquidy; when done a skewer should come out without any dampness on it.

Leave to stand for 10 minutes, then turn out of loaf tin, remove the baking paper and allow to cool on a wire rack.  When cool, wrap in clingfilm and leave for a day before eating; you can start eating it straight away but this is really a cake that tastes better the day afterwards. 

Homemade Gingerbread Cooling Down

Homemade Gingerbread Cooling Down

Enjoy on its own or spread with a generous coating of good butter.  Delicious and so, so easy.

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Apples, Bloody Apples And An Apple Cake Recipe

Sunday, September 26th, 2010

We only have three apple trees in our garden, but they have been massively fruitful this year.  In fact, they have produced so many apples I cannot even hope to use them all, even with friends and family taking them.  Nature has been so very fecund that even the quince bush outside of our front door has fruited; in the last 10 years, I reckon we have had had one quince on the bush in total, whereas this year there are seven.  It must be nature’s response to two harsh winters – up the reproduction and spread more seeds to survive.

Fruitful Apple Trees In Garden

Fruitful Apple Trees In Garden

Apples Picked From the Garden

Apples Picked From the Garden

Windfall Chutney 2010

Windfall Chutney 2010

So over the last two weekends, we have peeled for hours, then: picked and stored the eaters for later this year rather than chomp on out-of-season, flown in fruits from some high street chain; made apple puree, which has been frozen to lighten the fruitless days in the depths of winter; eaten baked apples using up leftover mincemeat for last Christmas that is now gorgeously matured and very boozy; made two types of chutney – General Gordon’s chutney and Windfall Chutney; and still made no dent in the apple harvest.

I love the plenty of harvest time, but I hate to see the waste when there is such an excess, while I know that in February/March I will be longing for fresh fruit in the knowledge that I was so wasteful in September.  And we have so little fresh fruit in this part of Northern England.

I have, also, cobbled together several different versions of apple cake, which both have a charmingly spiced, old world flavour to them.

Apple Puree Cake

Apple Puree Cake

Apple Puree Cake

Ingredients:

175g / 6 oz / 1 cup apple puree – cooking apples, stewed, pureed then sieved
110g / 4 oz / 2/3 cup sultanas
1tbsp currants
1 mug strong black tea (optional)
200g / 7 oz / 1 cup Fairtrade organic caster sugar
225g / 8 oz / 1 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
3 large eggs at room temperature, lightly whisked
340g / 12 oz  / 3 cups plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
Pinch of sea salt
½ tsp nutmeg powder
½ tsp cinnamon powder

Preheat the oven to 180C / 350F.  Prepare a 22cm / 9 inch cake tin by lightly buttering it and lining the base.

If you have not got any pre-made apple puree, peel some cooking apples then core and quarter them (weight will be more than the 175g / 6 oz but you can eat the balance with some sugar, while cooking the rest of the cake).  Place in a pan and put lid on; heat under a medium heat until hot, then reduce heat to a low heat and let the apples stew until soft.  Squash them through a sieve to give you your apple puree.

This next bit is optional and involves preparing the dried fruit.  I put the dried fruit into a pan, then brewed a strong mug of black tea.  The black tea was then poured over the fruit and I boiled the fruit for about 10 minutes until nice and plump.  Sieve off the excess tea and leave to cool.  You can ignore this stage and simply use the dried fruit, but I like doing this as it reduces that jaw-aching, chewiness of dried fruit, while adding another flavour dimension to your baking.

Sieve together the organic plain flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, sea salt, nutmeg and cinnamon.

Cream together the butter and caster sugar.  Add the eggs – half at first, followed by a tablespoon of the flour mix, then add the remainder.  Now add in the cooled apple puree and mix thoroughly.  Add the rest of the flour mix and mix together.  Finally add the sultanas and currants and make sure it is mixed well.

Pour the cake batter into the prepared cake tin and bake for 50 minutes.  Towards the end start checking the consistency of the cake, by gently touching the top and feeling whether it is springy rather than liquidy.  If it is cooking too slowly reduce the temperature to 160C / 320F and cook for another 5 – 10 minutes.

Leave to cool in tin for about 5 minutes, then remove from the cake tin and let cool completely on a wire rack.

For the second apple cake recipe, this will be in my next blog…

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Recipe For Pears In Rooibos With Vanilla And Saffron

Wednesday, September 22nd, 2010

One of the classics of British cuisine is to poach pears in red wine or syrup.  As a variation on this, I sometimes create a sweet spicy syrup to poach the pears in, then reduce these to a thick, sweet sauce.  Recently, however, I have been thinking about how to use teas and infusions in my cooking, as well as the impact of different liquids such as beer versus wine and even different beers, to add extra depth to the flavour of your food without bringing in too much extra complexity.

That’s a rather geeky way of saying the liquids you use in cooking can alter subtly the flavour of the meal and they are something we all tend to ignore when cooking, focusing on the big ingredients like the meat or the vegetables or the mix of spices, then just pouring in tap water or “red wine” when we should be screaming hard or soft water, bottled water, fizzy and which red wine, wine from where, as it makes a huge difference.

So as an experiment, I brewed up a large pot of Red Chai Tea, which I make with an organic rooibos tea from South Africa and my own flavour combination of spices.  I left this to steep for a bit then filtered out the sweet, orangey-red tea that is coloured like an amazing African sunset.  Next, you add a mix of ginger powder, saffron and Madagascan vanilla and a light muscovado sugar to the tea; in my usual recipe, I add lemon zest but not here as there is lemongrass in the chai spice mix.  This is the base flavour for the pears and the sweet sauce, which you then use to poach some pears.

At this time of the year, pears are deliciously ripe but you can use this recipe even on the most flavourless brick of a pear in mid winter and get some flavour into them and soften them up, so it is good for your five-a-day.  The result are perfectly soft and succulent sweet pears in a sweet sauce that has a richly luxuriant saffron-vanilla flavour.  Sometimes, I finish my normal versions of this recipe with a vanilla whipped cream, but that really is almost too decadent and I did not have any cream the other night.  Eating with a knife and fork, the knife just glides through the soft flesh of the pear and the taste is heavenly with the characteristic sweetness of the pears perfectly offset by the chocolately, creaminess of the vanilla.

It does take a bit of time to make, but not much effort.  And simple is often the best thing in life.

How To Make Pears In Rooibos With Vanilla And Saffron

4 pears (choose the nicest you can find, but they should still be hard)
500ml normally brewed rooibos tea or Red Chai tea
125g Fairtrade light muscovado sugar
1 organic Fairtrade vanilla pod
½ pinch organic saffron
¼ tsp organic Fairtrade ginger
125ml double or whipping cream (optional)
1 organic Fairtrade vanilla pod (optional)

Peel the pears leaving the stalk, then cut a small slice off the base of the pear to enable them to stand upright in the pan and on the plate.  Find a heavy bottomed pan that is tall enough to accomodate the full height of the pears with the pan lid over the top.  Leave the pears on a plate to the side for the moment.

In a family sized tea pot, brew the rooibos tea.  It is best to use loose leaf tea as the tea bag imparts a dusty, foisty flavour to the tea, but a teabag will do for convenience.  Brew as normal based on equivalent of 1 teaspoon per person so that is 4 heaped teaspoons into the pot, using freshly drawn water that has been brought to the boil, then steeped for 5 minutes; strain and pour into the pan.

Brew Your Rooibos Tea

Brew Your Rooibos Tea

Add the light muscovado sugar, saffron and ginger.  For the vanilla, slice this lengthways and scrape out the vanilla seeds into the rooibos tea, then place the whole bean into the liquid for good measure.

Place the pears upright into the pan, put the lid carefully over the pears slightly off the rim.  Bring to the boil, then reduce heat to a gentle simmer and poach for 45 minutes until the pears are perfectly soft; you may need to adjust the cooking time depending on the ripeness of the pears.  Take the pears out of the sauce, put on a plate and leave to cool fully.

Strain the sugar syrup to remove the saffron and any bits.  Return the pan to the hob and heat to a vigorous boil and reduce the syrup to about 150ml.  Leave the syrup to cool.

To make the vanilla cream: pour 125ml of cream into a bowl; slice a vanilla bean lengthways and scrape the seeds into the cream; using an electric or hand whisk, whisk to a thick, whipped cream.  Place in fridge while the pears and sauce are cooling to allow the vanilla flavours to infuse the cream.

Poached Pears In Rooibos Tea, Vanilla And Saffron

Poached Pears In Rooibos Tea, Vanilla And Saffron

Place the pears onto individual plates and pour over some of the sauce.  Add a tablespoon of vanilla whipped cream on the side of each plate.

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Vanilla – A Beautiful And Sensual Spice

Wednesday, September 15th, 2010
Vanilla comes from the vanilla orchid, called Vanilla planifolia, which is native to Mexico, but is now indigenous in many tropical parts of the world, for example Madagascar and surrounding islands.  There is a second vanilla orchid called Vanilla tahitensis, which is native to Tahiti and Papua New Guinea, and has a slightly different flavour profile.  The vanilla orchid flower is a pretty, delicate light green colour.
Vanilla Orchid Flower

Vanilla Orchid Flower

In the wild, vanilla flowers are pollinated by the melipona bee, whereas outside of Mexico, it is pollinated by hand with a small wooden skewer to move the male pollen to the female stigma.  This process is sometimes called la marriage de vanille, or fécondation.
Fertilising The Vanilla Flowers

Fertilising The Vanilla Flowers

It is then a long careful process to tend the vines as they trail along little wires from post to post.  This tending period takes about 9 months.

Tending The Vanilla Vine

Tending The Vanilla Vine

Green Vanilla On The Vine

Green Vanilla On The Vine

After about 9 months, the green vanilla beans are picked and taken to the nearest vanilla processing centre.  At this stage, the vanilla beans looks like French or runner beans.  The first thing to do is to “kill” the beans, which basically denatures the enzymes that would simply make the vanilla rot, but allows the enzymes that result in the curing process to start.

Killing The Green Vanilla Beans

Killing The Green Vanilla Beans

The curing process then takes  several weeks before the raw green beans have turned a deep, dark brown. The pods are laid out on mats in the sun to heat up for the hoursduring the day, where the workers handle the beans and turn them over.  Late in the afternoon, the baking hot beans are collected and wrapped in blankets and straw mats, then placed into air-tight wooden containers to “sweat” overnight.

Collecting Vanilla Beans For Sweating

Collecting Vanilla Beans For Sweating

The head curer checks the progress of the curing every day and assesses when the time is right to stop this curing stage.

Checking On Curing Process In Karnataka In Southern India

Checking On Curing Process In Karnataka In Southern India

Quality Control On Curing Vanilla Beans In Madagascar

Quality Control On Curing Vanilla Beans In Madagascar

The next stage is the conditioning phase when the vanilla pods are held in storage for 3 months to let the flavours develop and run through.  During this conditioning stage, the beans are handled regularly, softening and shaping them – in the Madagascar, they roll the beans between their fingers and so resulting in a rounded shape, while in India, they tend to flatten them between their fingers giving a flatter, longer shape.

Madagascan Vanilla With Their Individual Markings

Madagascan Vanilla With Their Individual Markings

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Axel’s Raspberry Cheesecake Recipe

Thursday, August 19th, 2010

My sister and her family came to visit at the weekend, so I was scrabbling around trying to come up with a summery pudding to create, while the rain was gushing down outside in torrents.  I decided that roast chicken with all the trimmings, followed by a cheesecake was the answer, but with some summer fruits inside the cheesecake and a bright red coulis drizzled over it. 

I toyed with the idea of making the raspberry coulis first, then mixing that into the cream and making a pink cheesecake, which would have gone down a storm with the girls, but wimped out as I preferred the idea of getting bites of tart raspberry in clusters of flavour and differing textures, running through the smoothness of the cream cheese filling. 

Cheesecakes are remarkably easy to make and seem to be generally popular with children, and homemade ones are much tastier than shop bought versions that always seem really heavy, then sit like a lump inside your tummy like a lead weight for hours afterwards. You do not need to use raspberries and can substitute them for other summer fruits, like blackcurrants, blackberries or strawberries, so adjust the recipe accordingly.  Similarly, you do not need the coulis and could just serve it naked and pure, or with a nice scoop of vanilla ice cream. 

Axel Steenberg’s Summer Fruit Cheesecake Recipe

For the base:

150g / 5½ oz digestive biscuits (or in US, Graham cracker or Nilla wafer)
30g / 1oz pecan nuts
75g / 3oz unsalted butter
1 tsp Steenbergs organic Fairtrade pure vanilla extract (that’s the sales pitch done; or any other good quality vanilla extract)

For the cream cheese filling:

350g / 11oz full fat cream cheese
100g / 3½ oz soured cream
150g / 5oz caster sugar
4 medium eggs
1tsp pure natural vanilla extract
Juice from ½ lemon (rest is used in making raspberry coulis)
Zest from 1 lemon

Good sized handful of fresh raspberries
4 pinches of Steenbergs organic mixed spice

For the raspberry coulis
350g / 12oz fresh raspberries, picked over and washed
45g / 1½ oz granulated sugar
Juice from ½ lemon
70ml / 2½ oz water

1.  Preheat the oven to 180oC / 350oF.

2.  Lightly grease and line the base of a 20cm / 8 inch round sandwich tin, that has a springform surround.  Place into a fridge to chill, whilst you prepare the biscuit crumb base.

3.  Place the biscuits and pecan nuts into a food processor and whizz until they reach a smallish crumb.  Take from the food processor, place into a bowl and then add the organic Fairtrade vanilla extract and melted butter.  Mix well until all the crumbs are decently coated with liquid – I use a knife for this stage.

Ingredients for cheesecake base

Ingredients for cheesecake base

Pour the melted butter into the crumb mix

Pour the melted butter into the crumb mix

4.  Get the lined cake tin from the fridge.  Tip the crumb mixture into the pan, then press the mix into the base and all the corners until even and nicely pressed down.  Put the lined tin into the fridge to harden.

Pressing cheesecake crumb mix into cake tin

Pressing cheesecake crumb mix into cake tin

5.  Now measure out all the ingredients for the filling except the raspberries or other fruit.  Put all of these into a mixing bowl or processor and mix/process until smooth and well mixed together.  It is worth scraping down the sides a couple of times with a spatula to make sure that everything has mixed thoroughly.

Ingredients for cheesecake filling

Ingredients for cheesecake filling

6.  Go and get the crumb base from the fridge, then evenly place a handful of fresh raspberries over the biscuity base.  Now pour over the cream cheese mix gently.  Afterwards, I then go over the raspberries to try and even them out a bit; do not overdo this tidying up, but you do not want someone to get all the raspberries, while someone else goes without – that would be really bad form.  Sprinkle delicately 4 pinches of mixed spice over the top of the cheesecake filling.

Pouring the cheesecake mix over crumb base and raspberries

Pouring the cheesecake mix over crumb base and raspberries

Cheesecake ready for baking with mixed spice sprinkled on top

Cheesecake ready for baking with mixed spice sprinkled on top

7.  Put centrally into the oven and bake for 25 – 30 minutes until just set.  Remove from oven and leave to cool completely, then remove the springform outside ring of the cake and place the cake (still on its base) into the fridge to chill through.

Baked cheesecake just out of oven

Baked cheesecake just out of oven

8.  While it is cooling, it is time to make the raspberry coulis.  Place the raspberries into a pan, together with the lemon juice, water and sugar.  Bring to the boil and simmer with the lid on for 10 minutes.  Leave to cool thoroughly.  While it is cooling, check the sweetness of the raspberries and adjust sugar level if necessary as they can be really tart.

Ingredients for raspberry coulis

Ingredients for raspberry coulis

Lovely cooked raspberries

Lovely cooked raspberries

9.  Process the raspberries throughly to a smooth paste either with a hand held processor or in a larger processor.  Now sieve the raspberry paste into a jug or bowl to remove the seeds.  You will need to squish the juice through with a tablespoon.  Put into the fridge to cool.

Sieving raspberries for raspberry coulis

Sieving raspberries for raspberry coulis

10.  Before serving remove from the fridge to warm up a little.  Cut into smallish slices and place onto a plate, then drizzle over some of the raspberry coulis.  I served the cheesecake with some homemade shortbread for added texture.

Raspberry Cheesecake With Raspberry Coulis

Raspberry Cheesecake With Raspberry Coulis

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A Recipe For Meatballs In Tomato And Red Pepper Sauce

Monday, August 16th, 2010

Cooking at home differs from fancy cuisine in restaurants in that it is about compromise.  While a top notch chef does not need to compromise on ingredients and quality, at home you need to juggle your precious time with what you have got available in your storecupboard and can find in the shops.  Also, you need to take into account what your family will and won’t eat; in a restaurant, the customer can chose his/her own menu to suit their mood and likes/dislikes from the menu, you have got to make one meal that satisfies everyone.

This recipe came out of that need to compromise.  My sister’s two girls do not really like potatoes and will eat pasta forever, while Jay wanted meatballs.  So I came up with meatballs in tomato sauce with spaghetti.  While everyone ate the pasta, some ignored the meatballs but enjoyed the tomato and red pepper sauce that they had been cooked in.  Success all round.

Ingredients For The Tomato And Red Pepper Sauce:

1tbsp cold pressed organic olive oil
1 medium sized onion, roughly chopped
1 garlic clove, roughly chopped
1 red pepper, topped and tailed, deseeded and roughly chopped
½ tsp natural sea salt
½ tsp coarsely ground organic black pepper
2 bay leaves (I used fresh from garden)
1 tsp finely chopped fresh thyme leaves (I used fresh from garden; if using dry use ½ tsp)
2 tins / 800g / 1lb 12oz chopped organic tomatoes (near enough 2lbs)
2tbsp white wine (optional)
1tbsp soured cream

Ingredients For The Meatballs:

500g / 1lb 2oz minced beef steak (organic and locally sourced, if possible)
1 small onion, finely chopped (or even minced to hide from fussy kids)
50g /  2 oz breadcrumbs (ideally use bread that’s gone slightly over rather than fresh, as they are more flavoursome plus it’s less wasteful)
1 egg
½ tsp organic nutmeg powder
½ tsp organic mace powder
½ tsp natural sea salt
½ tsp freshly fine ground organic white pepper
1tbsp organic sunflower oil

Ingredients For Tomato Sauce

Ingredients For Tomato Sauce

1.  In a decent sized pan, add the organic olive oil and heat under a medium heat.  Add the chopped onion and garlic and cook gently for 5 minutes, then add the chopped red pepper and cook, stirring regularly for another 3 minutes.

2.  Add the herb and spice flavours – sea salt, organic ground black pepper, thyme and bay leaves.  Stir and cook for another 1 minute.

Frying Base Ingredients For Tomato And Red Pepper Sauce

Frying Base Ingredients For Tomato And Red Pepper Sauce

3.  Add the white wine and chopped tomatoes, mix together, cover with a lid, then raise temperature until tomatoes just start boiling.  Reduce heat and allow to simmer with the lid on for about 15 minutes.  Leave to cool.  While cooling, taste and adjust flavourings if you feel it is needed.

4.  Remove the bay leaves.  Then using a food processor or hand held blender, chop the sauce to a fine puree.  Stir in the soured cream until thoroughly mixed through.

Pureed Tomato And Red Pepper Sauce

Pureed Tomato And Red Pepper Sauce

5.  The best time to start making the meatballs is while the tomatoes are hubbling away for 15 minutes.  Put all the ingredients into a large mixing bowl and mixed through completely.  Cover and put into fridge for about 30 minutes to let the flavours flow through.

Mixture For Meat Balls

Mixture For Meatballs

6.  Take from fridge and scoop out dessert spoon sized amounts of meatball mix and roll into balls and put onto a plate.  You can then put these into the fridge to cool again for 30 minutes which will make the meatballs firmer and less likely to collapse while cooking, but this is not necessary.

Shaped Meat Balls

Shaped Meat Balls

7.  Warm an oven to 100oC  / 212oF.  Bring the tomato sauce to the boil and allow to simmer. 

8.  In a heavy bottomed frying pan, tip the organic sunflower oil and heat until hot.  Lightly fry all the meatballs until golden brown and cooked through.  Put the cooked meatballs on a baking tray in the oven to keep warm while you are cooking the others.

Frying The Meat Balls

Frying The Meat Balls

9.  Put the meatballs delicately into the tomato sauce and cook in the sauce for 15 minutes.

Meatballs In Tomato And Red Pepper Sauce

Meatballs In Tomato And Red Pepper Sauce

10.  Serve with pasta or rice and, perhaps, garnished with a little finely chopped parsley.

Meatballs In Tomato And Red Pepper Sauce With Spaghetti

Meatballs In Tomato And Red Pepper Sauce With Spaghetti

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Of Ice Cream In Dumfries and Galloway

Saturday, July 31st, 2010

My blog posts about Dumfries and Galloway would not be complete without talking about Cream O’Galloway, an ice cream producer between Gatehouse of Fleet and Kirkcudbright.  We seem to spend much of our family holiday centred around their farm at Rainton, where they have developed a tasteful and sustainable attraction around the Cream O’Galloway ice cream factory experience.

Cream O'Galloway Visitor Centre

Cream O'Galloway Visitor Centre

There are indoor wooden play areas for under 6s and older children, as well as outdoor climbing areas in the woods pitched at varying degrees of skill, athleticism, ranging from the simple to the hard work – I am no longer as agile as I once was so Level 4 is too much bending down, twisting and turning and scrabbling through tunnels for me; I actually do think it is easier for people below 4 foot in height as that’s the level of the holes and obstacles have been built for.  Then there are tracks for mountain biking past the wind turbine, zip wires, chutes, and a race track for go-carts, as well as nature trails and gentle ambles. 

Cream O’Galloway also have farm tours, pond dipping, ice cream making sessions (my third year in a row and this year we made vanilla, honeycomb and chocolate chip flavour ice cream) and ice cream tasting sessions as well as other nature tours later in the year when the tourists and holiday-makers become less evident.  In 2009, we bought a year’s pass and this year (2010) we got a week pass for the second week, which are both really good value and are worth it if you will be visiting more than about 4 and 2 times, respectively. 

Karting At Cream O'Galloway

Karting At Cream O'Galloway

The kids love it so we love it.  The tea could be better and after one week an alternative to burgers would be great, but we did discover the veggie burger this year which was a welcome break for meat, meat and meat.  My favourite burger is the double Mexican burger; most of their burgers I think are better as singles, but with the Mexican you can put a dollop of spicy guacamole, tomato salsa and soured cream in the middle, which is totally fabulous.  As I have already said, it is worth a trip out of your way to track down their organic, 21 day matured steaks that you can get in the cafe area before going into the main attraction.

Then, their ice cream is, also, worth a special detour to taste and savour.  Oh and everything is organic and some is also Fairtrade.

Cream O’Galloway is a really successful farmer’s diversification scheme.  The farm, Rainton Farm, is a dairy farm with a smallish herd of Ayrshire kine.  The farm went organic with the Soil Association many years ago and is at the forefront of ethical, organic dairy farming, so for example they are currently building a new milking parlour and anearobic digester, while they are the only commercial dairy herd that keeps the mother and calf together for the first 6+ months and milks the mother only once a day rather than twice a day.  The milk is delicious as it comes from a grass fed cows and an ocean air pasture, so the milk is the dairy equivalent of salt marsh lamb.  Most of the milk gets sold into one of the dairy groups, so finding its way into the major supermarkets, mixed in with other milks.

Rainton Farm Herd At Cream O'Galloway

Rainton Farm Herd At Cream O'Galloway

Dairy At Rainton For Cream O'Galloway

Dairy At Rainton For Cream O'Galloway

Some of the fresh, unpasteurised milk is taken every morning after the morning milking to the ice cream factory which is just in a small converted threshing barn.  In fact, it is remarkably small and compact, full of gleaming stainless steel machines and vats; the milk is pasteurised before it goes into the vats and ice cream machines as part of the manufacturing process.

The ice cream is tasty and there is a great range of flavours, with all of it using their organic milk (but not all certified as organic) and some of it Fairtrade as well.  Our family’s favourite flavours are:

You can get quite a lot of their flavours in some of the supermarkets in Scotland, such as Morrisons and Tesco and then loads of independent stores – use their stockist finder to locate your nearest one.

We still rank the Cream O’Galloway centre in our family top ice cream parlours as in an earlier blog.

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