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.

Chocolate meringue log

A very Happy New Year! Here's to lots of great baking.

After the success of the meringue on Christmas Day, I thought I'd try a variation as a dessert for New Year's Eve. I hunted through my cookbooks and folders and found a recipe for a meringue log in a Home and Freezer Christmas book. Anyone remember Home and Freezer magazines, littles ones which were always in racks by the checkouts?
Anyway I thought it sounded ideal, although it has a fewextra ingredients in it, like mini marshmallows.
You could use a chocolate sauce as the filling instead of the spread if you wanted, as this what was in the original recipe. I thought the spread would be more substantial when rolling up the log. I had visions of the sauce running out of the sides of the log! I know there's hazelnuts in the spread, but I don't think this will change the taste of the log very much.


5 egg whites, beaten
150g icing sugar, plus 1 tbsp extra
2 tsp cornflour, sieved
 1 tbsp cocoa powder
400ml double cream
1 vanilla pod, seeds scraped out
chocolate spread such as Nutella - or use chocolate sauce if you prefer
50g raspberries and a few redcurrants of you can find them
100g mini marshmallows

to decorate
extra icing sugar and cocoa powder, to dust
*chocolate sauce and raspberries or any red berries

Preheat oven to 150C/gas 1. In a clean bowl beat the egg whites until soft peaks form. Gradually add the icing sugar, beating till the mixture is creamy and gooey. Then whisk in the cornflour and cocoa.
Spoon the mixture onto a Swiss roll tin lined with baking paper. Bake the meringue for 1 hour then set aside to cool.
In a bowl whisk the double cream with icing sugar and vanilla seeds till it's thickened.
Sieve some icing sugar and cocoa powder onto a large piece of parchment paper then turn the meringue out onto the paper.
Spread the chocolate spread on top , followed by the whipped cream, then dot with raspberries and mini marshmallows.
Carefully roll up the log, using the parchment paper to help you, and dust with more icing sugar and cocoa. Serve with some *chocolate sauce and raspberries. I had some recurrants in the freezer, so added a few of those.

* I made a simple chocolate sauce using double cream and melted chocolate.

It was delicious. A lovely combination of flavours - the only thing I wasn't sure about were the marshmallows -they weren't really necessary to the filling, a bit chewy. The chocolate sauce gave it another kick of chocolate - you can never have too much chocolate imho, but again, it isn't absolutely necessary to the log.

Chococlate and raspberries are always a good combo, and this is a log I'll certainly make again.

Matchmaker cookies with White Chocolate Ganache

Christmas Baking 5

I didn't get time before Christmas to post this biscuit recipe. It's yet another variation on the basic cookie recipe I posted a while ago.
I made up a hamper for my aunt and wanted to make her some special biscuits. There was a box of Matchmaker chocolates and a bar of white chocolate hanging round, good Christmas flavours, so how could I use these? I came up with the idea of a double cookie - 2 cookies with the Matchmakers chopped up in them, sandwiched together with a white chocolate ganache. A real Christmas treat for my aunt.
I thought they'd be fiddly to make, but they weren't.

I made 15 double cookies from this recipe - 30 cookies

Basic recipe:
225g butter [soft]
240g caster sugar
1 egg yolk [beaten]
2 tspn vanilla essence280g plain flour
pinch salt
Extras:
100g Matchmakers [or any mint chocolate sticks] chopped up finely
icing sugar

Filling:
2 tbspn double cream
100g white chocolate, broken up

Preheat oven 190C/gas5
Line baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone sheets

Beat butter and sugar together, then add egg yolk and vanilla extract and beat in. Stir flour and salt together nd add to the mixture. Then add the chopped up Matchmakers and stir thoroughly. Divide the dough in 2 and wrap in clingfilm and put in fridge for an hour.
Take out androll out between 2 sheets of cligfilm or baking paper.
Cur out cookies using a 6cm fluted cutter. Space them out well on the baking sheet and bake for 10-15 mins till golden.
Cool on a wire rack.
Por the cream into a pan, add the chocolate and melt over a low heat, stirring from time to time till smooth.
Take off heat and let ganache cool. Chill in fridge till it has a spreadable consistency.
Spread ganache over half the cookies and top with the rest. Dust with some icing sugar.

My daughter was the tester and loved them. She said what she liked best was the contrast between the crunchie choc mint cookie and the soft white chocolate filling. I had to make a second batch for her to take home and to work, and used some After Eight type mints I'd been given instead of the sticks, and they worked fine.

I also made some Angel Cookies using just the basic recipe and cutting out angel shapes. I iced them with  thick white glace icing and sprinkled the tops of their heads with some edible silver glitter.

Merry Christmas

                                   Merry Christmas and a very Happy and Healthy New Year.

Caribbean cake

This is a cake I was asked to make by a friend . I'm not a coconut lover, nor do I like pineapple, so not really my kind of cake. Anyway, I learned something by making it - how not to burn deccicated coconut when toasting it! Pineapple jam was new to me, but my OH loved it. This is the recipe I was given, tweaked a little bit, as I didn't add any coconut flavouring as suggested. Enough is enough!

225g butter, softened
225g vanilla/caster sugar
4 medium eggs
225g self raising flour
splash of milk
50g desiccated coconut, toasted *
5 tbsp pineapple jam - or more if you're feeling generous
*Sprinkle the coconut on a baking tray, pop in the preheated oven for 4-6 mins until toasted to a nice brown colour, and the smell is wonderful [of coconut!]. Keep and eye on it as it burns easily - as I found out!


Malibu Buttercream
400g icing sugar
250g unsalted butter
4 tbsp Malibu, simmered in a small pan until reduced to 2 tbsp

Preheat the oven to 180C/gas4. Grease and line 3 x18cm sandwich tins with baking parchment.

Cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each one, then fold in the flour, milk, and 20g of the toasted desiccated coconut. Mix until light and fluffy, then divide equally among the tins.
Bake for 20-25 minutes until light golden and springs back when the surface is lightly pressed with your finger. Turn out on to a wire rack to cool.

For the buttercream, beat the icing sugar and butter with a stand mixer or electric beater till light and fluffy. While the beaters are still mixing, add the hot simmered down Malibu. Mix well again.
Put a cooled sponge on a plate. Spoon some of the jam over the sponge. Use as little or as much as you like. Sprinkle over some of your remaining toasted coconut. Gently spread some of the buttercream over the jam. I made a mess doing this! Put another sponge on top, and repeat. Top with the final sponge, then spread the rest of the buttercream over the top and finish with a sprinkling of toasted coconut.

I asked my friend to tell me what she thought of it. She said the texture was lovely and soft, and she especially liked the filling and topping with the added Malibu. I was pleased with the end result as I've not made many three tiered cakes. So if you're a coconut fan, this is the cake for you!

Little pecan tartlets

Most of the supermarkets seem to have nuts on offer at the moment, so I've stocked up and now need to use some of them.
I love pecan pie, but it can be very sweet and rich. These tarts are little versions, but still give you that lovely pecan fix. The recipe comes from a magazine supplement on 'Nuts', from Woman's Weekly, I think.
As it's Thanksgiving Day today, pecans seem appropriate.


Recipe makes 18 tartlets, so you need 2 x 12 bun tins.

I love this pastry as it uses ground almonds as well as flour, which gives it a soft texture.

You need:

Pastry:
150g plain flour
25g caster sugar [golden's best]
50g ground almonds
85g butter, cubed
1 medium beaten egg
2 tspns lemon juice

Filling:
70g melted butter
50g light muscovado sugar
2 medium beaten eggs
2 tbspns golden syrup
juice of 1/2 lemon
100g pecan nuts, chopped but not finely

The pastry is easy to make as you put the flour, sugar, almonds and butter into a food processor and whizz it quickly, or of course you can rub the butter in by hand. Then you add the egg and the lemon juice and a quick whizz again then bring the dough together with your hands.
Wrap in clingfilm and put in fridge for 15 mins.
Roll the pastry out thinly on a floured surface and cut out 18 circles with a 7-8 cm cutter, fluted or plain.
Put into the tins, pressing them in gently. Prick the bottom of each with a fork and chill for about 2 hours or leave overnight in the fridge.

Preheat oven 190C/gas 5

Beat together all the filling ingredients except the pecans, then add the nuts. Put some of this mixture into each pastry case and bake for 15-20 mins till golden. Leave them to cool in the tin for about 10 mins then put onto a wire rack.

I love the filling - not too sweet [for my taste anyway] and with a nice crunchy texture from the pecans. Have already said that the almonds in the pastry give it a great soft texture, a nice contrast to the nutty filling.

Norfolk apple cake

I love apple cakes and am always very happy to find a new recipe. It's a very country looking cake with little chunks of apple and dried fruit. Nothing refined about it, but the taste is good. I love spices and this one has cinnamon and mixed spice.
It's made using the rubbing in method, and I found it difficult to get all the ingredients together. I didn't think I'd mixed it properly, but it came out fine. There's a lot of mixture for 1 egg!

400g apple chopped into dice
125g mixed fruit
125g brown sugar
125g butter
1 large egg
1 tspn cinnamon and 1 tspn mixed spice

Preheat oven 180C/gas4

Grease and line a 20cm springform tin.

Rub together the butter and flour till it looks like breadcrumbs.
Add the egg, sugar and spices and mix together.
Then add the apple and mixed fruit.
Bake for about 35 mins till the middle feels firm when you touch it.

I didn't have any mixed fruit so used raisins. You can see that the apple stayed in little chunks; it's very moist from the apples. It's more of a dessert cake than one to have with a cuppa; we had some with creme fraiche. I like it's chunky look and spicy flavour, and it's a cake I'll make again.

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.

Aberffraw cakes

These were mentioned recently on the GBBO, so I thought I'd find out more about them. They're made on the Isle of Anglesey and are a traditional biscuit really, not a cake. They're served sprinkled with sugar and even with cream and jam, like a scone.
The bit I liked was that a scallop shell is pressed into the top to give it a shell-like pattern. Nowadays, a lot of the Aberffraw cakes have the pattern put on with a knife. I have a bag of scallop shells, brought back from France so I used a genuine one to make my pattern.
The recipe is a 3.2.1  - quite common for biscuits. This means 3 parts flour to 2 parts fat to 1 part sugar.

175g flour
110g butter
55g caster sugar
a little milk
more caster sugar for sprinkling over

Preheat oven 190C/gas5.
Grease a baking sheet.

I used a processor to make my dough.

Put flour and sugar in a bowl and rub in the butter. Bind together with a litle milk to make a soft dough.
Roll out and cut out circles. I used a 7cm cutter and made 12 cakes.
Use a scallop shell to press the scallop pattern onto the top, or cut the pattern with the back of a knife.

Put the cakes to cool on a wire rack and sprinkle with sugar. You can eat them served with cream and jam, but they're delicious as they are.

They have a nice crunchy texture, and the butter gives them a rich flavour.

Swedish orange cake

I love citrus cakes so had to try this one; the recipe was given to me by a church friend whose son is married to a Swedish girl. This is Anneke's family recipe, and she calls it a teabread and serves it as a dessert with some fruit salad. It's lovely as a cake with your afternoon cuppa.
 Another easy cake for my repertoire.

150g butter
120g caster sugar
3 eggs
greated zest of a lemon
60ml fresh orange juice
orange essence [opt]
250g plain flour with 2 tspn baking powder added
breadcrumbs to coat the tin

topping:
80g icing sugar
orange juice - 1-2 tbspn

Preheat oven 175C/gas4
Grease a 900g loaf tin and sprinkle with breadcrumbs

Beat butter and sugar together till fluffy.
Whisk the eggs in one at a time then mix in the rind, juice and flour. Blend together.
Pour into the tin and bake for about an hour.
Remove from the tin and leave to cool under the upturned tin!

Mix the icing sugar with enough juice to make it the consistency you want; make sure it's smooth, then spread over the cake.

I decided to drizzle the icing over, not easy when the cake has risen considerably. Not very pretty, but the cake is really delicious. It's nice to have an orange cake for a change.

It has a lovely fresh flavour and is light and airy. I enhanced the orange flavour with a few drops of orange essence and used an orange glace icing. I didn't put any breadcrumbs into the tin; am not sure why they're there!

Apricot-banana-cranberry teabread

This addition to my teabread recipe collection comes from a book I bought in a charity shop called 'The complete book of baking'. It really is a very quick bread to make, and is very moist. Another recipe with oil instead of butter must be good!

175g plain flour
11/2 tspn baking powder
1/2tspn grated nutmeg
6-g rolled oats
250g light brown sugar
60g dried cranberries
60g dried apricots
2 eggs
120ml sunflower oil
1 tspn vanilla essence
2 ripe bananas, mashed

Preheat oven 180C/gas 4
Grease a 900g loaf tin

Put flour, baking powder and nutmeg in a bowl and add the oats, sugar and dried fruit. Mix together till blended. make a well in the middle.
In another bowl beat the bananas, eggs, oil and vanilla essence together with an electric mixer.
Add this to the flour mixture and combine together.
Pour into the tin and bake for 45mins- an hour till well risen and golden. Cool on a wire rack.
Dust the top with icing sugar if you want.

I served this to friends with a compote of cranberries and apricots, which really accentuated the flavours in the teabread. Have the compote recipe if anyone wants it.

There's an awful lot of sugar in the recipe so I'm going to play around with using something else for sweetness, and also going to try just reducing the amount of sugar and see if the recipe still works. I love the combination of flavours.

German apple cake

I love apple cakes, and this is a recipe from my lovely German dil. She makes really delicious cakes; when she married our son, she, her Mother and Grandmother made over 40 cakes to have with a glass of wine or beer after the ceremony. The variety was awe inspiring. I have to say that she's a qualified pastry chef and now works for Suffolk school dinners!

This is an unusual apple cake as it has 3 layers. It's not the prettiest of cakes, but the flavour's really good. It's not a huge cake, but it's nice eaten warm as a pudd. or cold as a cake with your afternoon cuppa.

100g butter
100g caster sugar
200g sr flour
1 large egg
pinch salt
500g cooking apples
55g sultanas
1 tspn cinnamon
55g demerara sugar

Preheat oven 190C/gas 5.
Grease and line a 20cm springform tin.

Melt butter in microwave or pan. Remove and add the sugar, flour, egg and salt. Mix to a stiff dough.
Put 2/3 of the dough in the bootom of the cake tin, pressing it to cover the base.
Mix the rest of the ingredients together and then put on top of the dough.
Put the 1/3 of the dough on top in pieces, tearing it and gently pressing it down. It won't cover the apple mixture.
Bake for about 50 mins till golden, but cover with some foil for about the last 10 mins to stop the top burning.
Cool in the tin then put on a plate and serve warm or cold.

It's not burnt! I used dark demerara sugar mixed with the cinnamon and apple.

I love the apple layer with the sultanas, sugar and cinnamon. It's a nice mixture of textures - the cake bottom, the apple layer and the almost cobbler topping.