Rhubarb and Orange Sorbet

My neighbour kindly passed me some rhubarb over the garden fence a couple of days ago.

I do love rhubarb. It makes awesome crumbles and jams and I also love it roasted or stewed alongside greek yoghurt. The last couple of days finally the weather has started to get a bit warmer. It's humid and over cast and trying to rain - I don't think it will be too long before we get a thunderstorm.

It's been a rather wet summer - could do with a little less rain so the local farmers can get their hay crops in.

Anyway, I decided to have a go with the ice cream machine attachment that came with my new KitchenAid mixer. There is a recipe book that comes with it which has a few basic recipes for ice creams and sorbets. Using it as a guide, I came up with this recipe of my own

500g rhubarb

90ml water

zest of an orange

300ml of stock syrup*

Put these three items in a pan and simmer with the lid on until soft and pulpy.

Remove the zest pieces and then strain the juices from the pulp using a sieve.

To the resulting juice, add the juice of a fresh orange, to take the volume to 450ml and then add 300ml of stock syrup. Allow to cool and then refrigerate overnight until nice and cold.

*to make the stock syrup, boil 200g of sugar and 200g of water together for 5 minutes and allow to cool.

Remove your ice cream drum from the freezer - this needs to be in your freezer for at least 15 hours before use.

Fit to the mixer and turn on to the lowest setting. Slowly pour in your rhubarb and orange mix. It needs to churn for around 20 minutes. It will be a bit on the soft side.

Transfer into a plastic 2litre tub or into cells of a silicone bakeware mould and freeze for at least 3 hours or until required.

Serve and eat immediately !

 Sarah-Jane - www.siliconemoulds.com

Nacho Baked Chicken Breast and Salsa Salad

It's not often I blog about normal meals - generally just about baking ! 

However, this looked so bright and summery I thought I would share it - even if the photo wasn't so good.

I was rather bored with chicken and decided to oomph it up a bit for an evening meal.

Ingredients

chicken breast fillets

chorizo

cheese

Tortilla chips (I used Cheesy Doritios)

egg

for the salsa salad

cherry tomatoes 

a red onion

a green bell pepper

some salt

chilli oil

a lime

First of all , put the cheese and chorizo on top of the chicken breasts. Add some jalapenos if you like.

Smash up (in a plastic bag) 1 good big handfull of tortilla chips per person

Dip the bottom of the chicken breast in some beaten egg and then onto the bashed up tortillas. Brush some beaten egg over the top and cover with more bashed up tortilla chips.

Put on a baking tray and bake at about 180deg C fan oven for 25 mins.

Serve with a salsa salad of green bell pepper, red onion and cherry tomatoes dressed with chilli oil and lime on the side. 

Easy Peasy !

Hot Chocolate with Cinnamon / Chocolate / Vanilla Marshmallows and Chocolate Spoons

Typically, I'm cooking out of season. Then again, my entire world revolves backwards. The best working time of day for me is about 10pm until 4am. I get a lot of email done at home and it's also the quiet time for doing website work and prototyping for new silicone bakeware mould development.

Despite getting up around 7.45am, I'm practically dead to the world until just after 10am. I have a couple of quality hours with Oliver and then it's off to work again (though in the office this time rather than my desk at home) when I drop him off at nursery at noon. I collect Oliver again at 6pm, tend to the horses and chickens... get dinner ready, family fed.... sometimes doze for an hour.

It's that time of night once everyone else is in bed, that I like to get creative in the kitchen (if time allows). Am I the only one that makes marshmallows at 2am ?

I made my marshmallows in two different silicone moulds. I used a Tray Bake Swiss rectangular silicone bakeware mould and I also used this floral and fancy silicone mold - which is ideal for tiny cakelets and large filled chocolates.

Marshmallow is THE stickiest stuff ever. Lightly (but thoroughly - don't miss any bits !) oil the inside of your silicone mould before use. Alternatively, you can use cake release spray.  You don't need much - just enough to give a film coating. Too much and the oil will pool on the inside. If you over do it, remove any excess with DO NOT dust the inside with cornflour / icing sugar. Trust me - for this, it's easier if you don't

RECIPE

Adapted from River Cottage

2 egg whites

500g white granulated sugar

25g gelatine granules (or 2 sachets Dr Oeteker brand)

1/3 cup of cocoa powder

1 tsp vanilla extract

cake release spray - or a tiny amount of flavourless oil
1tsp ground cinnamon

2 tablespoons each of icing sugar, cornflour and cocoa powder, sifted together

Soak the gelatine granules in 125mls of cold water.

Put the 500g of granulated sugar and 250g . Bring to the boil When temperature reaches 110deg C, put the egg whites in a stand mixer and whisk to stiff peak.

When the sugar syrup reaches 125deg C, take off the heat. Stir in gelatine granules.

With mixer set to low speed, slowly pour in the sugar syrup / gelatine mixture. Once incorporated, add the cocoa powder, vanilla and cinnamon. Turn back up to full speed and whisk until cooled and thickened (though still pourable) - approx 7 to 8 mins.

Pour into your moulds and allow to set for a few hours. DO NOT refrigerate.

On removing from the moulds, cut into pieces, roll in the cornflour / icing sugar cocoa mix and store in a tupperware box. These keep nicely for about 3 days (if they last that long !)

Serve a handful on top of piping hot chocolate with a Belgian Chocolate spoon or two !

This is a new registered mould design by Sarah-Jane Nash and will be available from the end of July.

Sunday 17th June 2012 - Father's Day in the UK.

After visiting the Transport Museum near Lowestoft and having loads of rides on Trams, Trolley Buses and a little train, we all went a walk to Somerleyton Windmill .....

Oliver and Steve took photos and watched the sun go down. I took the photos of them on this blog entry with my mobile.

Once they were finished, we went to the pub at Reedham Ferry for a meal before heading home with a very tired but sleepy little boy.

Happy Father's Day to all the UK daddies !

Reflecting on Raspberry Macarons.....

This batch of raspberry macarons surprised me. They didn't behave the way I thought they would...

I've read so many times in various books that fruit juice can only be incorporated into macaron shells if in powdered form. I once decided to try making the syrup with apple juice rather than water. My batch was a flop ... cakey type shells that were very very cracked and distorted. I only ever had that one go to incorporate fruit juice and then gave up.

More recently, I actually found fruit juice powder (freeze dried raspberry, mango and pomegranate) and thought I'd have a go incorporating it into macaron shells.

Well..... I used a 1/4 cup / 60ml dry measure of the raspberry powder and incorporated this into my macaronage. The mixture had a lovely pale pink hue. I guessed if I baked it at a lower temperature than normal, I should be able to preserve the beautiful pale pink colour without the need for food colouring.

I GUESSED WRONG.

On opening the oven door, all I could do was STARE. The shiny smooth shells in front of me were not at all as I had imaged .... They'd turned out a caramel / toffee colour !!! 

Had I baked chocolate macarons or toffee .... or coffee - I'd have been as happy as a pig in mud BUT raspberry macarons just don't look right that colour !

Don't get me wrong, they smelled like raspberry and tasted like raspberry, they just didn't look raspberry. My attempts at salvation were in decoration. A (new) artists brush dipped in a little gel paste colouring with a couple of drops of alcohol allowed me to brush a pretty pattern on the tops and I filled the centres with some buttercream with added powdered raspberry juice. I don't know. They tasted good - but the macaron purist in me says they still aren't raspberry. I'll let you decide. The recipe is below.

200g ground almonds

200g icing sugar

2 x 90g egg whites

60g raspberry juice powder 

200g caster sugar

80g water

Blitz the ground almonds and icing sugar together until a very fine power. 

Put the ground almonds, icing sugar, raspberry powder and one lot of egg whites in a bowl. Mix to combine.

Boil the caster sugar and water until a temperature of 110deg C is reached. At this point, start whipping the whites to stiff peak. At 118deg C, remove the syrup from the heat. Slowly add it to the second batch of egg whites whilst beating at high speed.

When cooled, add to the sugar / almond / raspberry juice paste mix and fold in.

Pipe on to a Revolutionary Double Sided Macaron Mat. This volume did 50 of the large shells (25 large 2" / 50mm ) macarons and about 20 or so on the small side. Bake at 160deg C with the door open for 5 minutes, then a further 20mins with the door closed.

Wait until fully cooled before removing from mat. Fill with normal buttercream, with raspberry juice powder added to taste.

For full instructions on making macarons, see my YOUTUBE TUTORIAL

These photos were simply taken on a mirror in the garden, so the blue background is the sky.

Sarah-Jane Nash., June 2010 - www.siliconemoulds.com 

Bran Breakfast Muffins - So Moist and Full of Flavour ! - FoodBuzz no 2

Ok - so you read the title and almost passed on by. Curiosity got the better of you. BRAN muffins ? How can anything made of bran taste good ?

Well - I remember my grandmother buying bran muffins when I was a little girl. When Gran had those, we'd get a biscuit out the tin. You see, Gran told us those bran muffins were to help her tummy work better - but weren't very nice.

One day when we were visiting, my grandfather gave us 1/2 a bran muffin each whilst my gran was out somewhere. I knew then that she just wanted to keep them for herself - those bran muffins were SO good !

It's been a long long time since I ate a bran muffin. Many years in fact. Yesterday, I picked up some stoneground flour and bran from Letheringsett Watermill and it was a perfect excuse to make some tasty bran muffins.

These bran muffins were absolutely delicious and are packed full of fibre. Oliver had one for breakfast and another late afternoon today. He reckons that these and the chocolate cupcakes  are his all time favourites. Given the way he wolfed these down, I think that's true !

BE WARNED - Bran is an effective and natural laxative effect as does molasses / black treacle, so don't overdose on muffins !?! More than one certainly gets things moving !

RECIPE (makes 10) - EASY

75g wheat bran (normal bran - not breakfast cereal !)

225g wholemeal flour (you can substitute with normal white flour)

1 cup / 250ml  of whole milk

1 tsp lemon juice

1/2 cup of raisins (optional)

1/2 cup of tea (optional)

3tsp baking powder

4 tablespoons black treacle

1/2tsp salt

1 egg

150g soft brown sugar

100ml sunflower or vegetable oil

2tsp ground cinnamon (optional)

1tsp ground ginger (optional)

First, make a cup of black tea ! Soak 1/2 a cup of raisins or sultanas in 1/2 a cup of hot tea for about 20 mins to plump them up.

Heat the oven to 180deg C Fan and line a 12 hole silicone muffin mould or tin with paper cake cases.

You will need two bowls.

In the first bowl, put the bran, milk, lemon juice, oil, egg, sugar and black treacle. Mix well to combine. Drain the tea and add the raisins to this bowl. Set aside for at least 10 minutes

In another bowl, mix the flour, spices, salt, baking powder together. Add the bowl of wet ingredients and stir to combine. Stop as soon as dry ingredients can no longer be seen.

Spoon into your prepared muffin mould or tin. This doesn't rise a lot, so the cases will appear rather full.

Bake for approx 20 minutes until a cocktail stick comes out clean (mine were done in bang on 20mins).

Remove from the oven and brush the tops with some warm honey to glaze.

I know - they don't exactly look exciting....but make them once, and they'll stay in your recipe book forever.

Couldn't resist sharing this photo from earlier this month. I was in the city, and took Oliver into Bella Italia for something to eat. He had chosen cod goujons, then changed his mind and opted for spaghetti and meatballs.

My heart sank as realisation sank in that my child would shortly turn into a tomato sauce covered spaghetti monster..... and that's exactly what happened next.....

Little Viennese Whirl Cookies / Biscuits

These are so adorably small and something that would not look out of place on a cake stand when serving afternoon tea.

I've always been a fan of viennese whirls. They're buttery and melt in your mouth.

Recipe is adapted from Olive Magazine (May 2012)

Made 17 cookies (34 pieces)

175g soft salted butter

90g icing sugar

1 tsp rosewater

175g plain flour

80g cornflour

50ml water

Beat together the butter, icing sugar and rose water. Mix in the rest of the ingredients to form a smooth, paste like dough. Mix it enough to combine, but work as little as possible.

Put in a piping bag with a small star nozzle and pipe whirls of approx 2" / 50mm diameter.

As you can see, I piped mine on to the large side of my red double sided macaron mat. Yes - these are great for baking cookies too ! The recipe was enough to make 36 pieces / 17 cookies when filled. The benefit is that all your cookies end up the same size and the markings are already on the mat so you can space evenly and get lots on one tray.

Bake at 150 > 160deg fan for approx 10 minutes until just beginning to get a little colour, but still pale.

Allow to cool for 3 or 4 minutes, then remove and place on a wire rack until fully cooled.

FILLING

To fill, I used most of a jar of warmed and sieved strawberry jam. I them boiled it for a few minutes to thicken a bit more.

I spread some of the jam on  the back of one biscuit, and some buttercream on the other and sandwiched together. Yum !

Cookie Jar Envy ? Button Sugar Cookies.

 

Okay. I admit it. I get cookie jar envy.

All these gorgeous cookies I see on other people's blogs make me seriously envious. I want to make cookies that look just like those. The only thing is, I'm not REALLY a cookie fan..... but they look so darn good.

The only cookies Oliver likes are the seriously chocolatey cookies I make. Those and the pistachio ones (never blogged those yet) are the only type we really like.

I must say though, after making and photographing these, I'm ENVIOUS of my OWN cookies ! Not that they are mine really..... I sent them to my mum. But they are so pretty I felt like cuddling them :-)

How sad is that.... !

I made the button cookies in our GREAT BIG BUTTONS silicone bakeware mold. This button style mould has proved extremely popular in the smaller size for making chocolate buttons and for cupcake toppers.

This mould is ideal for great big chocolate buttons, cookies, boiled sugar candies, beeswax, hand soaps etc.

Don't they look cute ?

I also made this EDIBLE gift tag from Belgian Chocolate. Yes - I can up with two different new mould designs to make edible gift tags. One mould makes large edible tags (like big luggage labels) and the other one makes two sizes of smaller edible gift tags suitable for smaller gifts or to put on top of cupcakes.

There are a range of different sentiments in each cavity, and some blank ones for icing / piping your own message.

I so WANT it. Why can't someone send this to me ? Doubt that will ever happen. Maybe I should make some more. Steve, roll over. I want to cuddle the cookie jar.... haha - maybe just a bit too far....

This is some resin pieces made in the same mould. I later turned these into hair slides, but they would make awesome zip pulls or mobile phone charms too.

  

The biggest button cookie is 2" / 50mm diameter and the smaller one is 1.3/8" / 35mm diameter.

The large tag is 4" / 100mm long. The smaller tags are 55mm and 35mm long. The mold even makes the hole in the tag for you to thread your ribbon!  I did a blog post recently about tempering chocolate which you may find helpful.

Here is the sugar cookie recipe I used :

225g salted butter

225g white granulated sugar
480g plain flour

1 large egg, plus a yolk

1/2 tsp baking powder

2tsp vanilla extract

Cream butter and sugar. Mix in egg and yolk. Add flour and baking powder, then bring together to a dough.

As you are baking this in a mould, there is no need to refrigerate the dough prior to baking (stops it spreading)  as when in the mould, it has nowhere to go !

Preheat the oven to 160deg C fan.

Pinch off pieces of the dough and press into the cavities. I baked the large ones first and the smaller ones separately. It you want to be exact, I used 18g for the large cells and 7g for the small cells. Actually, I found it  really quick to pre-weight loads of little pieces of dough and squish them in rather than trying to remove excess by overfilling.

Bake for approx 10 mins until just starting to colour. Remove from oven and tip out the cookies on to the baking tray. I then popped them back into the oven - approx 5 mins for the large ones and 3 mins for the small ones just to finish off the other side. Of course, you could bake the full time in the mould, I'm probably being over picky !

Go forth, bake cookies and be happy :-)