Category Archives: Other

Apple and Marzipan Swirls

Posted on May 23, 2013 by thesweetestbrunch

I love baking but at the same time, I have a little fear of baking with yeast.
My fear is that the dough will not rise enough and that all the waiting for it to rise and rise again, was a waste of time. But I also love baked goods made with fresh yeast, so I have decided to overcome this fear.

A chance to do so, offered itself when I had some fresh yeast left over (from the waffles) and cake sale coming up at work. I decided to try out these Apple Marzipan Swirls, knowing that they would be a good treat for my brunch blog. They are great fresh from the oven, first thing in the morning but all the work has to be done the night before.

They proved a success - so much so that they all sold out within the first few minutes!

For 12 swirls you’ll need

450g flour (plus extra for the work surface)
20g fresh yeast
ca 250ml milk
2 Tbsp sugar
a pinch of salt
400g apples
150g good quality marzipan
2 Tbsp lemon juice
100g apricot jam

Start with the dough the night before baking:
As this is a fresh yeast dough, you’ll have to make a ‘pre-dough’ (I’m not actually sure of that is the real English term for this or just a direct translation from German but let’s just go with it). Tip the flower into a big bowl and make a little well in the middle of it in which you crumble the yeast, along with about 3-4 tablespoons of lukewarm milk and a pinch of sugar. Dust this with a little flour from the sides and leave, covered under cling film, in a warm corner for 15 minutes. I covered my bowl under my duvet (!) and also put a hot water bottle underneath.

Add the rest of the milk and sugar as well as the salt and knead the ingredients together in the bowl – be warned, it’s a very sticky business!

Dust a work surface with flour and tip the dough onto it. Knead for at least 5 minutes until the dough is smooth and no longer sticky. Now put it back in the bowl, cover with cling film again and bring it back to the warm corner to leave it to rise some more – this time, until it rises to double its size. This will take 30 – 60 minutes (when checking on this, just look through the cling film – don’t lift it).

While you wait for the dough to rise, make the apple marzipan filling:
Peel and core the apples and cut them in to small pieces and when I say small, I’m talking little tiny squares of about 1-2 square cm. Follow suit with the marzipan by cutting it in pieces of a similar size. Mix both together with the lemon juice and set aside until the dough is ready for the next step.

When the dough has doubled in its size, roll it out on a flour-dusted surface, to a rectangle of about 50 x 25 cm. Pour the apple-marzipan mix on to it and roll it up, from the longer side, so you end up with a long roll. Cut the roll in 12 pieces and put those on two non-stick baking trays. You will need to spread them out as much as possible as they will rise again. Cover the trays with cling film and leave to rest in the fridge for the night.

The next morning, the swirls will have risen again. Take them out of the fridge and let them come back to room temperature while you preheat the oven to 200 degrees.

Bake the swirls – one tray at a time – for 25 minutes. Heat the apricot jam in the microwave so it becomes fluid and spread the rolls with it, as soon as they come out of the oven. Leave to cool but then enjoy as soon as possible!

Baked Rhubarb Custard Pots

Posted on May 5, 2013 by thesweetestbrunch

A few weeks ago, I got very excited when, for the first time this year, I found a cart full of pink and green bunches of tender springtime rhubarb at my local farmers market.

That same weekend was also the first time this year that we had a proper sunny Sunday, which meant it was time for my first brunch on my balcony.

The dish for this was meant to showcase my newly purchased rhubarb stalks, so I decided to make a quick and easy custard bake, which is a ‘clafoutis’ like dish that can be made easily with all the ingredients that you probably already have at home…except the rhubarb!

For about 6 portions – depending on the size of your dishes – you will need:

300g thin stalks of rhubarb
100g butter, melted and cooled
140g – plus an extra 6 Tbsp – sugar
pinch of salt
2 eggs
2 egg yolks
185ml milk
60g flour

Preheat the oven to 180-degrees/-gas mark 4.
Butter 6 pudding or brulee dishes.

Wash and cut the rhubarb into the length of your pudding/brulee dish diameter and line the base of the dishes with a layer of it. On top of the first layer, add another layer in the opposite direction, so you have a kind of overlapping lattice.

In a jug, whisk the butter, sugar, salt, eggs and egg yolks together. Add the milk and flour and whisk again, so that there are no lumps. Pour over the rhubarb until they are just covered with some pieces still poking out, if you wish.

Sprinkle with the 6 tablespoons of sugar and bake for about 25 minutes until the top is golden and a little crispy and the rest of the custard set. Leave to cool before serving.

Easter Cookies

Posted on March 25, 2013 by thesweetestbrunch

It’s hard to believe it’s almost Easter, thanks to the ongoing sub-zero temperatures and snow in front of my window, that makes it feel more like Christmas.

That’s no reason though, to not try to get into a more spring like mood, at least indoors, for example with the help of some springtime decorations. And when it comes to decorations, why not go for edible ones, such as these Easter cookies. You won’t even need special Easter cookie cutters for them, any round cookie cutter can – with the help of icing – make some cute Easter chicks…

For about 24 cookies you’ll need:

90g unsalted butter (at room temperature)
100g caster sugar
1 egg
½ tsp almond OR vanilla extract
200g flour (plus extra for rolling out the dough)
½ tsp baking powder
½ tsp salt
250g icing sugar
1 egg white
2 tbsp lemon juice
1 tube of ready-made black icing

Mix the flour with the baking powder and salt. In another bowl, whisk the butter and sugar together until the mix is fluffy and pale in colour. Add the egg and almond or vanilla extract and whisk again, then mix the dry ingredients in to the wet.

Using your hands bring the dough together to form a ball. Wrap it in clingfilm and rest in the fridge for at least 1 hour.

Preheat the oven to 180C/ gas mark 4 and line two baking sheets with baking parchment.

Sprinkle your work surface with flour, flatten the dough ball on it and dust it’s surface with flour as well before rolling it out to the thickness of about half a centimeter. Using a round cookie cutter of around 6cm cut the cookies out and transfer them to the baking sheets. Bake for 10 – 12 minutes (one sheet at the time) until the cookies are lightly golden.

Cool on a rack whilst making the icing by mixing the icing sugar, egg white and lemon juice (do this slowly with a fork, or the icing sugar will fly everywhere). Set 2 tablespoons of the icing aside, which will be used for the eyes.

Add yellow food colouring to the rest of the icing. Then set 2 tablespoons of the yellow icing aside and mix that with some red food colouring to make some orange icing for the peak and feet.

Using a (palette) knife ice all cookies with the yellow icing and let it dry, before piping on the white eyes, followed by the orange peak and feet. If you don’t have a piping bag with a fine tip, you can fold some baking parchment into a cone, leaving a small opening at the pointy end of it. Finally, add black pupils on to the white eyes, with the ready-made black icing and there you have it: a bunch of spring chickens – Happy Easter!

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Posted in Other and tagged afternoon tea, biscuit, breakfast, brunch, cookies, delicious, easy, easy recipe, eggs, fancy, frosting, pretty, quick recipe, super easy, sweet, tasty, treat. Bookmark the permalink.

Yoghurt Mousse and Frozen Berry Pots

Posted on March 19, 2013 by thesweetestbrunch

Defrosting my freezer the other night, I came across some raspberries, which I needed to use up.

Not that this is a hard thing to do. I always like to have some frozen berries, when fresh ones are not in season so that I can still have berries with my breakfast – or at any other time of the day for that matter. They are great just as an accompaniment for pancakes, stirred in porridge or with yoghurt and granola.

In this easy receipe they make up a fruity layer between yoghurt mousse, which sits on a biscuit base, similar to the base of some cheesecakes. The little pots of this combo make a great brunch dessert, enjoyed after some Eggs Benedict or such likes. Of course, you could always also just go straight to dessert…

For 8 small pots you’ll need:

40g butter
100g plus another 2 -3 for the topping, crunchy oat biscuits (Hobnobs work best in the UK)
400g plain yoghurt
3-4 Tbsp honey
3-4 Tbsp vanilla infused sugar (if you don’t have that you can go for the same amount of sugar and add 1 tsp vanilla essence)
200g whipping cream
300g frozen raspberries
4 Tbsp crushed hazelnuts (optional)

For the biscuit base, crush the biscuits until you have fine crumbs. I find the best way to do this is to put the biscuits in a freezer bag and bash that bag with a rolling pin.

Melt the butter on the hob, then stir in the biscuit crumbs and spread the mixture between your 8 dessert pots/glasses and press it down with the back of a teaspoon. Leave to set in the fridge for half an hour.

For the mousse, start by whipping up the cream so it holds it’s shape. Now, in a larger bowl, whisk the honey and vanilla sugar into the yoghurt. If you have a sweet tooth go for 4 tablespoons of each, the honey as well as the sugar – otherwise start with 3 tablespoons and add more if desired.

Carefully fold the whipped cream under the sweetened yoghurt and using a piping bag, pipe half of the mousse on top of your cooled down biscuit bases. Add a layer of frozen berries and then pipe on the rest of the mousse to cover the berries.

Break the extra biscuits down to crumbs and sprinkle those on top of the mousse. And/or, for extra crunch, roast small hazelnut pieces in a non-stick pan for a few minutes and, once they have cooled down, add them to the crumbs, as a final finishing touch.

You can eat the desserts straight away “semi-freddo style” (though I’d suggest even then to wait about an hour for the raspberries to defrost a little) or transfer the pots back to the fridge, where they will keep for up to 24 hours.

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Posted in Other and tagged breakfast, brunch, delicious, dessert, easy, easy recipe, healthy, pretty, quick recipe, recipe, recipe with oats, super easy, sweet, tasty, treat. Bookmark the permalink.

Drop Scones with White Chocolate & Summer Berries

Posted on February 21, 2013 by thesweetestbrunch

Near my office, there’s a new bakery that I often walk past in the mornings. The other day I stopped to get myself a little something sweet and the “Strawberry and White Chocolate Drop Scones” caught my eye and what a good choice that was! Sweet white chocolate drops and juicy strawberries liven up a chewy on the inside but crispy on the outside scone. It only took one and I was addicted. And rather than spending £2 a scone at said bakery on this new habit of mine, I decided to see if I could make them myself and I am glad to say, I can.

The receipe is easy, quick to do and doesn’t even require many ingredients. The resulting scones might not win a beauty contest but I can ensure you, that there will still be plenty of people who will happily eat them out of your hands…

For 12 scones you’ll need:

1 cup plain flour
½ cup wholemeal flour (or plain if you prefer)
¼ cup sugar
1 ½ cup frozen summer berries
½ cup white chocolate chips
2 tsp baking powder 
a pinch of salt 
1 cup heavy cream 
2 tbsp butter, melted 
2 tbsp (preferably granulated) sugar

Preheat the oven to gas mark 5 and prepare a baking sheet by lightly greasing it or lining it with baking parchment.

In a bowl, combine the flours, baking powder, sugar and salt, then add the chocolate chips.
Mix the frozen berries in, followed by the cream.

If you find that everything is nicely mixed already, then you can just drop 12 big spoonfuls of the dough on a your tray. Most likely though, it is not, in which case turn the dough out on to a lightly floured surface and knead everything together by hand. This should happen quickly as it is only to combine all ingredients. Shape the dough into 2 rolls and cut each in 6 pieces, which you then spread out on your tray.

Brush each scone with some melted butter and sprinkle them with the sugar and bake for 15 – 20 minutes until the scones start to brown.

Leave them to cool – first on the tray, then on a wire rack – and eat them the same day.

The Sweetest Brunch

Category Archives: Other

Apple and Marzipan Swirls

Baked Rhubarb Custard Pots

Easter Cookies

Yoghurt Mousse and Frozen Berry Pots

Drop Scones with White Chocolate & Summer Berries

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