Breakfast Scones

Posted on by

scones_1a_web

I have just come back from a place where dates grow – no, not the Middle East but the Californian dessert. Dates are a big deal over there and you get them at all the markets and they feature in some dishes – and even milkshakes! I had the tastiest date milkshake at the Hadley Fruit Orchard shop near Palm Springs and would go out of my way for another one of those…

I also had a great brunch of French Toast with dates while I was there and will try to re-create and feature it here soon but I have to play around with it a bit more, so for now I have opted for something else – date and pistachio scones which I also call breakfast scones. They’re very much like English scones with some additional ingredients but for a change I have cut them in triangles rather than used scone cutters but it doesn’t make a difference to the end result.

You’ll need:

  • 315g flour
  • ½ tsp baking powder
  • 50 g sugar
  • ½ tsp salt
  • grated rind of one lemon
  • 125g butter (cold)
  • 80ml milk
  • 1 tsp treacle (or syrup)
  • 1 egg
  • 55g pistachios
  • 120g dates

Roast the pistachios in a pan and set them aside to cool, then cut them into chunks. Chop the dates into rough pieces as well and set both aside.

Preheat the over to gas mark 5.

Mix the flour, baking powder, sugar, salt and lemon rind in a bowl. Now cut the butter into small pieces, straight over it and rub the butter pieces into the flour mix with your hands to make crumbs similar to a crumble topping.

In a jar, combine the milk, treacle and egg with a little whisk and pour this liquid mix in the crumbs and, using a fork, lightly incorporate it so that all is just combined (don’t overwork the dough). Now add the date and pistachio pieces.

Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface and flatten to about 2cm – if you start with a round dough ball you will get a flat disk, which can then easily be cut into 8 triangles, just like a cake. Alternatively, you can alternatively, cut smaller triangles or cut out round pieces, just keep in mind that the smaller the scones the shorter the baking time.

Bake for about 18 – 22 minutes until they get a little brown
In my case of 8 big cake sized triangles they needed the full 22 minutes.

Cool them down on a wire rack and serve with apricot jam and if you want to treat yourself butter too!

scones_14web

Swedish Chocolate Cake ‘Kladkakka’

Posted on by

kladkakka_11w

As I’m off on holiday tomorrow, I should probably be packing right now rather than blogging but I got a new receipe yesterday that I wanted to try out straight away. 

I have been after for a while as it’s one of my favourite treats at a Swedish Café that I go to a lot and I’m very excited about the fact that I can now make the cake at home too. I am talking about a very simple store cupboard ingredient chocolate cake from Sweden, called Kladdkaka.

Apparently, it’s the cake every Swede knows and can quickly rustle up, as it only contains a handful of ingredients that you are likely to have at home at any point in time. It’s also really easy to make and if you don’t want to eat it like a normal slice of cake, it makes just as good a pudding, served with whipped cream.

This receipe here is from the Scandinavian Kitchen, which is one of my favourite lunchtime/coffeee spots in London (see http://www.scandikitchen.co.uk/) and goes like this:

You’ll need:

  • 100g unsalted butter
  • 2 medium eggs
  • 200g caster sugar
  • 150g plain flour
  • 4 tbsp good quality cocoa powder
  • 1tbsp vanilla sugar (or extract)
  • a pinch of salt
  • (optional some icing sugar)

Preheat the over to 180 degrees and line a small, round cake tin (18cm).

Melt the butter and leave to cool slightly.
Whisk the eggs and sugar together until the mixture is light, fluffy and pale.

Mix all dry ingredients in another bowl and sift them into the egg and sugar mixture, folding them in until all is incorporated, then fold in the melted butter until you have a smooth and even cake mix. Pour this in the lined cake tin.

Bake for around 20 minutes until the crust needs a bit of pressure to crack – a perfect Kladkakka is very soft in the middle but not runny.

Leave to cool in the cake tin for at least an hour and serve with whipped cream or ice cream.

kladkakka_close_1w

 

 

Cheese Blintzes

Posted on by

Blintzes_web

Next week is pancake day in England!
This reminded me that it’s about time I put up another pancake receipe and here you are.

As I was looking through my fridge to see what kind of pancakes I could make, I found some ricotta and decided I would use it to make some cheese blintzes – thin, crepe style, pancakes filled with ricotta (or quark or cream cheese) and served with a berry sauce, for which I always have some berries in the freezer. 

Cheese wise you don’t have to use ricotta, quark works very well too. And if you want a creamier texture, cream cheese will work just as well – see which cheese filling you like the most…

For the crepes:

  • 3 eggs
  • ½ tsp salt
  • 110g flour
  • 1 tbsp oil
  • 325ml milk
  • extra oil for the pan

For the filling:

  • 500g ricotta (or quark or cream cheese)
  • 1 egg
  • 60g sugar
  • 30g flour
  • ½ tsp salt
  • 1 tsp vanilla essence

For the raspberry sauce:

  • 500g raspberries (fresh or frozen)
  • 1 tbsp lemon juice
  • 75g sugar

Start by making the raspberry sauce, which requires nothing more than adding all ingredients to a pot and slowly bringing it to a boil, stirring the sauce occasionally as you do so. Keep it simmering on a low heat for around 5 minutes then turn off the heat and leave aside to cool.

For the crepes, whisk the eggs, flour, salt and oil together and then slowly add the milk, so that you don’t get lumps in the batter.

Heat a frying pan and add some oil, before baking the crepes, which should be really thin, so be careful not to add too much batter in one go. Depending on the size of your pan you will probably need around 6 tbsps of batter per crepe.

As soon as you pour the batter in the pan, swirl it around so the pan base is covered by one thin layer of batter. Once the edges of the crepe are getting brown, take it out on a tea towel covered plate, with the baked crepe side facing up (the unbaked side gets more baked once the blintz is filled). Keep baking all the crepes before you move on to the next step.

For the filling, Mix all the ingredients together and spoon a table spoon it in the middle of the bottom third of each crepe. Fold the bottom edge over it, followed by the sides and finally the top edge, so you end up with a little parcel. Continue you filling the rest of the crepes like this.

Heat some more oil in a pan and bake the filled crepe parcels in it for a few minutes until they go crispy and start to brown, when they are ready to be turned over and baked on the other side.

Serve with a serving of the raspberry sauce…which will also keep for a few days in the fridge, if you have any left, just as any uneaten blintzes will and which can be re-heated in the microwave!

Snow Day Cookies

Posted on by

SnowDayCookies_12

Ok, I admit it. Spending the winter in London means that I don’t actually have Snow Days (let alone snow, it seems). But seeing so many of my friend’s Facebook updates and Instagram photos about them recently made we wish I did and I wondered what I would do if I would have a snowed in, stay at home, day.

First of all I would probably get up and bake a load of cookies and then snuggle up under a duvet, on the sofa, watching old black and white movies while munching my way through the cookies and warming myself with a vast pot of hot chocolate!

The cookies I would make are these ‘throw it all in’ ones, as you don’t need a set of specific ingredients but can use whatever you find in your store cupboard which is kind of important if you are snowed in. You can add any kind of chocolate, nuts, dried fruit – even sweets and pretzel pieces – to this basic cookie dough. Just make sure all is small or chopped down and the total amount makes 200g.

I had Brazil nuts, cranberries, peanut butter chips and a few white chocolate chips lying about so chucked those in and it was a great combo – but go crazy with your own ideas…

  • 200g unsalted butter (softened)
  • 150g caster sugar
  • 150g light brown sugar
  • 1 egg
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • 325g self-raising flour
  • 1 tsp of salt
  • 200g mix of dark/white/milk chocolate chips or chunks/ chopped nuts of any kind / dried fruit such as cranberries or apricots or whatever else you fancy 

Cream the butter and all the sugar together until light and fluffy – it’s easiest to use an electric whisk for this. Add the egg and vanilla extract and beat again until combined.

Tip the flour along with the salt in and mix until all is well incorporated, then throw in your personal favourite mix of nuts/chocolate/dried fruit etc. and knead or stir it all together.

Cover with cling film and chill for at least 1 hour, so that the cookie dough firms up again. You can chill the dough overnight (or even up to 3 days) instead if you wish, apparently the longer chilling deepens the flavour.

Preheat the oven to gas mark 4 and line a baking sheet with baking paper. Using an ice cream scoop, form little balls of the cookie dough and place them on the baking sheet – with space in between as the cookies spread when they bake. You will therefore need to bake them in batches.

Bake for 15 minutes and transfer them straight to a cooling rack – but do this carefully as they will be soft. They will harden as they cool down but should stay a little chewy in the middle!

Blueberry Muffins

Posted on by

bluebchocmuffins_3webc

The simple blueberry muffin.

Everyone should have a receipe for it in their repertoire.

They don’t take long to make and are easy to make. Unless you over mix the ingredients you can’t really go much wrong with such a straight forward receipe.

And, as you can make them with fresh or frozen blueberries, you can enjoy these muffins all year round, such as now in the cold January when a few summer berries from the freezer can brighten up the dreary days…

For 12 small muffins you’ll need:

  • 2 1/2 cups plain flour
  • 1 1/2 tsps baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
  • 3/4 cup caster sugar
  • 1/4 tsp salt
  • 1 cup buttermilk
  • 1/2 sunflower or canola oil
  • 1 1/2 cups blueberries (fresh or frozen)
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract

Line a 12 hole muffin tin with muffin cases and preheat the oven to gas mark 6.

Sift the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, caster sugar and salt into a bowl and combine.

In another bowl – or jug – whisk the eggs, buttermilk and oil together and pour them in the flour mix. Mix all ingredients together quickly, ideally with a wooden spoon or fork. Then fold the blueberries in.

Spoon the batter into the muffin cases and bake for about  20 – 25 minutes (toothpick test!).