Monthly Archives: May 2012

Rhubarb Meringue Pie

Posted on May 31, 2012 by thesweetestbrunch

I have to quickly upload this post before May is over!

When I started this blog, the idea was to blog four times a month and ever since I’ve started my new busy job this has become somewhat difficult. But I would like to at least keep posting three times a month – and this is the third one for May.

As it’s still rhubarb time but almost over I have to share one more rhubarb recipe. This one is for rhubarb meringue pie – the same one my mom has made for years!

It’s a rather typical German cake that you will find across all good Cafes and ‘Konditoreien’ this time of the year and so far my mom’s cake has proven to be very popular with other nations such as the English, French, Lithuanians, Greeks and others alike! So without further ado…

For one cake you’ll need:

an oiled 26cm spring cake tin
300g flour
200g unsalted butter or margarine
80g (+2tbsps extra) caster sugar
2 egg yolks
800g rhubarb, washed and cut in to 2cm long pieces
3 egg whites
150g icing sugar

Preheat the over to gas mark 4.

For the cake base mix the flour, butter, sugar and egg yolks with the kneading paddles of your food processor or handheld whisk. It will be quite a crumbly mixture at first and then become one smooth mass. At this stage, take the dough out at this point and form a ball with your hands and press it on the base of the spring tin.

Bake the base for 25 minutes or until it gets a golden colour.

In the meantime bring 125ml water to the boil, add the rhubarb pieces and gently poach them until they become soft but not too long that they turn to mush (there will always be a few that start falling apart too quickly but that’s ok). Once they are soft tip them in to a sieve to drain.

Now add the rhubarb to the pre-baked cake base and sprinkle the 2 tablespoons of sugar on top.

Whisk the egg whites – adding the icing sugar in 3 separate parts as you whisk – until it forms stiff peaks (if you add all the sugar at the same time, this cannot happen so don’t rush it).

Spread the meringue on top of the rhubarb and bake again for another 20-30 minutes at gas mark 3 until the top becomes golden brown. Take out of the oven and after 10 minutes, take the cake out of the tin and leave to cool completely, which will take a few hours.

Blueberry and Cottage Cheese Pancakes

Posted on May 27, 2012 by thesweetestbrunch

I fear that all these sweet brunches start showing on my hips soon and with summer just around the corner this is not good news! The good news though is that this concern made me look for recipes with less calories, less fat and less sugar and I shall share some with you.

As my favourite brunch dish is probably still a pancake I started experimenting with some healthier pancake receipes I found. Winning this experiment were these blueberry cottage cheese pancakes!

It may sound a bit strange to have cottage cheese in your pancake batter but as I had already successfully made pancakes with Quark in the past (see Quark Pancakes with Spiced Apples), another almost fat free cheese, cottage cheese seemed like another good option for making ‘skinnier’ pancakes.

Cottage Cheese has hardly any fat, yet is full of protein and it gives the pancakes subsistence, texture and height. Admittedly, on it’s own, the pancakes are a bit too ‘healthy’ tasting due to the cottage cheese.

That’s why I decided to add some blueberries – they add a fruity sweetness to the slightly tart/tangy pancakes. Adding them to the batter, rather than just served aside the cooked pancakes, allows the blueberries to warm through as the pancakes are being cooked, until the juices start bursting out.

Do keep a few berries aside for serving though – along with a drizzle of Maple Syrup or maybe Agave Nectar, which apparently is the healthier sweetener!

For 2 portions you’ll need:

3 eggs 
¾ cup low fat cottage cheese 
¼ cup flour
ca 150g blueberries (a small punnet)
a little low cal spray oil for cooking, if you want to keep the fat low (otherwise you can use vegetable oil or any other fat, such as butter)

Separate the eggs and whisk the egg whites stiff.

In another bowl whisk the egg yolks until they become thick and paler, and then stir in the cottage cheese, followed by the flour. Then fold the egg whites under and add as many of your blueberries as you like (I added two thirds of a small punnet and kept the rest aside).

Heat a pan and spray a little low cal spray oil, then use a big serving spoon to make some circles from the batter and cook the pancakes until the border of them starts to show bubbles. Flip carefully over and continue cooking for about 3-5 minutes, careful not to burn the pancakes.

Serve with more blueberries and syrup of your choice!

Peanut Butter Brownie Bites

Posted on May 10, 2012 by thesweetestbrunch

This is all a bit of a cheat…

To start with, these mini cakes are not even really brownie bites but rather little brownie based mini cupcakes. Furthermore, even I wouldn’t really eat these kind of sweet treats for breakfast or brunch – they are just too small! No, of course not. In fact, they are this small for a reason – if they were any bigger, their sweet, rich and gooey taste would just be too much.

So, to be honest, I made them as little afternoon treats for my office but they turned out so well that I wanted to share the recipe on my brunch blog with you.

The recipe is also a bit of a cheat’s recipe, as it requires you to use a packet brownie mix. I know it’s not the proper way, using a packet mix, but it was quicker and cheaper to grab a ready mixed brownie box from the supermarket shelf rather than picking up the separate ingredients.

If you really can’t bring yourself to get a little help from Betty Crocker, I’d suggest using the brownie recipe from Mary Berry, which is my trusty go-to for brownies and which I will feature here in due time (in the meantime you may have to do a Google search).

For the topping I used a smooth peanut butter with a hint of chocolate, suitably called ‘YUM YUM’, which I brought over from South Africa. I’m sure any smooth peanut butter will work but it may be best to stick with plain ones as any more than a hint of chocolate will be too sweet – you want the salty peanut taste to balance the sweet brownie mix.

If you like peanut butter, you have to try these…

This recipe is adapted from Baked Perfection http://www.bakedperfection.com/2009/07/peanut-butter-cup-brownies.html

For 24 mini brownie bites/ cupcakes you need:

1 box of store bought brownie mix, such as Betty Crocker’s and the ingredients required on the box (usually an egg, some oil and some water)
1/3 cup peanut butter chips
1/3 cup dark chocolate chips
1/3 cup creamy peanut butter

Preheat the oven to gas mark 4 and line a mini muffin tray with mini muffin cases (I tried just oiling a supposedly non-stick tray and would highly recommend using muffin liners instead for these are sticky little things!).

Prepare the boxed brownie mix as directed and spoon the batter evenly into the muffin cups, each will take about 1½ teaspoons.

Bake the cakes for 13-15 minutes or until they have risen and the top is set but the inside is still ever so slightly moist.

Get the tray out of the oven and wait 3-5 minutes before pushing a little dent into the centre of the muffin tops – either with back of a teaspoon – or if you’re not too heat sensitive, with your fingers. You want a little, shallow dent for the peanut butter to go in to.

Place the peanut butter in a small microwave-safe dish and warm it up in the microwave for circa 30 seconds, so it becomes more spreadable. Then, while the cakes are still warm, add about half a teaspoon of peanut butter on each cake and sprinkle on a mix of the peanut butter and the dark chocolate chips. They will start to melt but only ever so slightly, just enough to keep everything together when they are fully cooled down.

Leave to cool completely and enjoy!

The Sweetest Brunch

Monthly Archives: May 2012

Rhubarb Meringue Pie

Blueberry and Cottage Cheese Pancakes

Peanut Butter Brownie Bites

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