Peaches and Cream Fairy Cakes

I have to say that I'm not a fan of the American type cupcakes with lots of sickly icing on top, but these are upmarket fairy cakes.
 Peaches were on offer in the local supermarket, so thought I'd try using them in a small cake for a change. The recipe makes 20 cakes.


You need 2x12 hole greased  bun tins [not muffin tins- you need the ones you make jam tarts or mince pies in] or you can cook 2 batches of the cakes. You need 2 ripe peaches with stones taken out and cut into 40 thin slices - you need a good sharp knife!


Preheat oven 180C/gas4       You can use paper cases in the tins if you want.


Beat 225g soft butter with 225g caster sugar using a hand beater, till nice and creamy.
Add 4 eggs a bit at a time, then fold in 250g sr flour; add 3 tbspn sour cream or crème fraiche [and 2 tbspn peach or apricot jam if you want a more fruity flavour] and mix in. Spoon into the cases or tins and put 2 peach slices on top of each cake and bake for 15-20 mins till golden and firm.


Put cakes on a wire rack. Heat 1 tbspn peach or apricot jam with 1 tbspn lemon juice in a pan till the jam's melted, then brush this over the top of each cake while they're still warm. Let them cool on the rack.

A nice treat for my grandsons yesterday. The creme fraiche made them nice and moist, and the peach slices were soft but not too sweet. The original recipe had some jam added in with the cream, but I decided to just use some to brush over the tops.

Rhubarb and Cinnamon Muffins

A quick post as I'm off to my daughter in London till Sunday.

I made these muffins to use up the last sticks of rhubarb in the garden. I usually use oil instead of butter, but thought I'd give these a try. The recipe is from a tatty book I picked up in a charity shop, called '100 Muffins' , but it doesn't have the writer's name in it. 

150g caster sugar
280g plain flour
21/2 tspns baking powder
1 tspn cinnamon
1/2 tspn bicarb.
1/2 tpsn salt
250ml creme fraiche 
110g melted butter
2 eggs
1 tspn vanilla
150g diced rhubarb
Topping:
3 tbspn caster sugar
1/2 tspn cinnamon

Preheat oven 200C/gas6             Grease a 12 hole muffin tin.

Combine flour, baking powder, sugar, cinnamon, salt and bicarb together in a bowl. In another bowl whisk together the creme fraiche, eggs, butter and vanilla to a smooth batter. Stir the wet mixture into the dry one, but don't over mix. Stir in the rhubarb. 
Spoon the batter into the muffin tin.
 Mix the cinnamon and caster sugar and sprinkle over the muffins.
Bake for about 20 mins till golden. Cool on a wire rack.

They're very tasty - like the contrast of the crunchy top. A good use for a small amount of rhubarb.

ps thought the muffin looked good against the bright green pvc tablecloth I bought in France for the garden table!

Asparagus Tart

I'm making the most of the British asparagus season [hence the clafoutis in my previous post] so decided to make a tart. I wanted the asparagus to be the main feature, so no tomatoes nor other veg. Creme fraiche and eggs makes a good savoury custard, so that's what I used.
To add some flavour I chopped up a spring onion [oh, I did say no other veg, but these aren't a strong flavour] and it needed some kind of herb, so I used some finely chopped thyme.
I made some shortcrust pastry for the case.

So, for the pastry: Put 200g plain flour and 120g butter in the food processor and blitz to breadcrumbs, then add 1 medium beaten egg mixed with 1 dspn water. Put it in the fridge in a polybag for 30 mins, then roll it out into a 20cm loose-bottomed flan tin. There was some pastry left over, so I put it in the freezer. I think this amount of pastry would be just right for a 22-23 cm tin, but I don't have one.
 Bake the pastry blind, plus baking beans, in oven preheated  to 190C/gas5 , then take out beans and cook it for 5 more mins.
Reduce the heat to 160C/gas3.

I used 8 stalks of asparagus, and put them in boiling water for 30 secs, then ran cold water over them till they were cold.

For the filling, Beat 2 eggs with 200ml of creme fraiche, then add a finely chopped spring onion and 1 tbspn of chopped thyme. Grate 75g of gruyere cheese and add half to the mixture. Pour the mixture into the pastry case, add the asparagus and sprinkle the other half of the cheese on top. Bake for 30 mins or till the filling is set and the top is golden.

We enjoyed the tart with some watercress, and OH had some Jersey potatoes, but I would have liked a stronger cheese flavour. Perhaps i should have used 100g or maybe a good strong Cheddar would have been better.

Again, a versatile recipe you could make with other veg.

Walnut Caramel Tart

I’ve made a lot of cakes lately, large and small, and decided I wanted to make a tart. I bought a large bag of walnut halves last week, so decided they were just what I needed. My lovely friend who runs a cake shop gave me a few more of her recipes when we met up recently, and this tart is one of hers.

You can use shop bought short crust pastry or make your own – enough for a 25cm tart tin, so it’s quite a good sized tart. I made 12oz /350g of pastry – that is 350g of flour and 175g of fat, and I used a mixture of sunflower margarine and Trex, but you could use all butter for a very short pastry. This was just the right amount for the tin.

The tart’s made in 2 stages, the baked part with the eggs, sugar, butter and finely chopped walnuts and the topping with the walnut halves topped with caramel. So if you like walnuts, this is the tart for you!

Preheat oven 180C/gas4      You need a 25cm tart tin [with sides at least 2.5 cms]

You beat 2 eggs and 100g of caster sugar together till pale and fluffy using an electric beater or a stand mixer. Add 100g of finely chopped walnuts and 60g of melted butter and gently mix together.

Roll out your pastry to fit the tin and spoon the mixture in.

Bake for about 30 mins till golden

 

For the caramel – melt 150g of caster sugar in a pan till brown then pour in 100ml of very hot crème fraiche and mix. Boil this till it’s not grainy then add 20g of warm melted butter and stir together.

Decorate your tart with 100g of walnut halves and pour over the caramel and leave to set.

Quite a sweet tart with a really nutty flavour. The caramel topping finishes it off.

Almondy Apple Dessert Cake

I'm always looking for new ways to use apples, and I found this recipe on Mary Berry's site. She calls it 'The very best Apple Dessert Cake'.
 It's a sponge cake mixture with an added tspn of almond extract, and you put half of the mixture in the bottom of a 20cm springform or loose bottomed cake tin, lined, then you put a layer of thickly sliced apples then the rest of the cake mixture. You sprinkle the top with flaked almonds and bake for about 45 mins.

You'll find the recipe here .

It's got a great almond flavour and a lovely moist sponge; I like the contrast between the cake and the apple layer, then the crunch of the almonds on top. We ate ours with some creme fraiche. I liked it cold, but my OH preferred it warm.

Savoury tartlets

Something savoury for a change.

 I recently bought myself a deep fluted tartlet tin from our excellent local family 'everything you'll ever need' store, so for New Year's Eve, I made some tartlets to have as part of the buffet.
I suppose they're like little quiches, as they have an egg filling.

I made 2 types -  bacon and cheese and mushroom and garlic.

I used the HB's recipe from their 'Perfect Pies' book, but used my deep tin instead of making them in mini muffin tins. I made 18 tartlets. I can't find the recipe online so this is what you'll need.

The pastry is a shortcrust one with a little grated cheese added, rolled and and cut out to fit your tin.

The egg custard type filling is enough for the 18, and it's just eggs, creme fraiche, some chopped parsley, s&p.

For the bacon and cheese you need a little onion fried with the bacon, put into the pastry case and top up with some egg custard. Sprinkle some grated cheese on top.

Mushroom and garlic filling is just chopped up mushrooms fried with sliced Spring onions and crushed garlic. Again you put the filling into the pastry case, top up with egg filling.

Bake them at 200C/gas 6 for about 20 mins till nice and brown and the filling is set.

I froze the cooked tartlets and then reheated them from frozen.

These are the bacon ones topped with cheese

The mushroom and garlic ones

I preferred the bacon and cheese ones - good flavours, soft texture, but not too soft.  I also liked the pastry with some added cheese. OH preferred the mushroom ones, as he's not too keen on cooked cheese. He liked the texture of them, especially the little hit of garlic.

Plum tart

As I said in a recent post, plums are one of my favourite fruit. I love making crumbles and tarts with them, but wanted to find something different to try.
This recipe is from a Woman's Weekly magazine; it's one of the hundreds of recipes I have to sort out in my cuttings folder!
I bought a punnet of plums from the supermarket which were marked as seconds, and they were really hard. Anyway I thought I'd use them in my new recipe, and they turned out soft and juicy.

250g plain flour
170g chopped up butter
1 egg yolk

I used my processor to make the pastry, putting in the flour, butter and egg yolk and adding a tbspn of water and blitzing till the pastry started to come together. Roll out and line the flan tin and chill for 30 mins. it's a very short pastry and breaks easily, but is easily patched up.

Filling:
1 tspn cinnamon
2 tbspns soft brown sugar
750g plums, stoned and quartered

Topping:
1 egg + a yolk
125g creme fraiche
45g soft brown sugar

Preheat oven 200C/gas6
Grease a 28cm shallow flan tin

Remove flan tin from the fridge; mix the cinnamon and sugar together and sprinkle over the pastry base.

Arrange the plums, cut side up and pack them together. If there's any left over, put them skin side up on top in a pattern. I just about had enough fruit to fill the tin.

Mix the ingredients of the topping together and spoon over the plums.

Bake for 25-30 mins till lightly browned.

I really like the flavour of the tart; the cinnamon and sugar come through in the background and the texture of the creme fraiche topping is creamy and not too sweet [for my taste anyway]. I'll certainly make this again, and it would work with other fruit like apples, cherries etc.

Apple sour cream cake

We love apple cakes, and as there were a few wrinkly apples to use up, I found this recipe in my binder; it's one I've not tried before.
Anything with cinnamon is a winner with me, and if it's easy to make, it's a double winner! The other good thing about this cake is that it freezes well [or so the recipe says].

2 large apples, peeled and cored [ I used 3 Royal Gala]
125g butter or margarine, softened
125g caster sugar
2 eggs
1 tspn vanilla extract
200g plain flour
11/2 tspn baking powder
1 tspn cinnamon
100g sour cream or creme fraiche - I used creme fraiche
1 tbspn apricot jam

Preheat oven 180C/gas4
Grease and line a 23cm tin.

Beat the butter and sugar together till white and fluffy, then beat in the eggs.
Add the baking powder and cinnamon to the flour and fold into the mixture, then add the vanilla and sour cream or creme fraiche. Mix together gently till smooth.
Chop 1 of the apples into chunks and add to the mixture. Slice the other one.
Spoon the mixture into the tin and smooth. Arrange the apple slices on top.
Bake for 35-45 mins till golden.
Cool on a wire rack.
Heat the apricot jam gently then brush onto the cooled cake.

We're having some of this as a dessert tonight, then I'm going to freeze the rest as we're away for the weekend.