Coconut Sugar Shortbread

I only wish I could take full credit for this recipe. Alas, this is a very slight modification of a delicious, tender, crumbly, more-ish recipe that my friend Cathy gave me. I subbed in coconut sugar for regular sugar. It definitely deserves to be shared.

I’ve chosen to make sweet little linzer cookies from the dough, but you could use any shaped cutter or even roll it a little thicker and bake as a slab.

Ingredients
9oz / 260g all purpose flour
1 1/2 oz / 40g rice flour
3 1/2 oz / 100g coconut sugar or regular sugar
7oz / 200g butter at room temperature
Raspberry jam

Pre heat the oven to 300 degrees Fahrenheit.
Put all of the ingredients into the bowl of a kitchen aid and mix together. You may need to finish by squeezing it together with your hands.
The dough is a little sticky so roll it out on a silicone mat with some plastic wrap on top or between two pieces of plastic wrap.
Roll to a thinness of 1/8″.
Chill in the fridge for 20 minutes.
Cut out desired shapes. I used a heart shape linzer cookie cutter and got 18 top and 18 bottoms from my initial roll. I formed the scraps into a ball and stuck back in the fridge for another day.
Bake in the oven for 10-15 minutes on the bottom rack.
Remove and cool on a wire rack.
When completely cold, invert the bottom cookie, spread 1tsp of jam on each cookie and pop the top on.
Repeat for each cookie and then dust with a sprinkling of icing sugar.

Share with your loves and enjoy. F

Aqua Addiction

If you’ve been following the blog for a while, I’m sure you have noticed my affinity for the color aqua. I really do love all colors, but aqua is a color that always makes me smile. Its bright, cheerful and happy.

My day job gives its employees a generous extra discount on merchandise this time of year. Do you remember the miracle of the Le Creuset pot a few years back? Last week I took advantage of it in a big way. Originally I had a white KitchenAid mixer because I wanted to buy one using my discount at work, but the color selection was really limited. White, black or grey. Yawn!  This spring, however, that changed! We had aqua (KitchenAid calls it Sky Blue)!  I quickly found a buyer for my white mixer, cause, ya know, I really can’t justify TWO mixers. lol  Then this happened… Isn’t she lovely? I’m a very happy girl. She matches the Le Creuset nicely, don’t you think? 🙂 I have happy little pops of the Caribbean in my kitchen. First up on deck today is a batch of Great Grandma Legault’s Banana Bread. I finally have enough black bananas in the freezer to do a batch justice. Then maybe another batch of Nigella’s Gingerbread? Its going to be a cheerful holiday baking season at the flat.  -Marie

Chocolate Cupcakes with White Chocolate Swiss Meringue Buttercream

Despite the long title these are simple, and quick to make and most of all sumptuous!

Makes 12

4oz Unsalted butter – room temperature

4oz Sugar

1oz 80% cocoa chocolate

2 Large cold eggs

1/2 tsp Vanilla extract

3 1/2 oz All purpose flour

1/2 Cocoa powder

1/2 tsp Baking soda

1/2 tsp Baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

100ml (1/3 cup) Heavy cream

Pre heat the over to 330 degrees F. Line a 12 hole muffin pan with cupcake liners. I like the use the fluted brioche papers. I think  they provide some extra support to the batter in the oven.

Cut the butter into cubes and put in the bowl of a stand mixer.

Add in the sugar and cream together on medium until fluffy.

Melt the chocolate, and mix into the butter and sugar.

Crack the 2 eggs into a cup and beat a little, measure the vanilla extract and mix in with the eggs. Add this to the main bowl and beat on high until smooth.

In a separate bowl combine the flour, baking soda, baking powder, cocoa and salt. Sift these into the mixer bowl. With the mixer on low beat until the dry ingredients are only just combined.

Pour in the cream and mix until the batter has an even consistency.

Using an ice cream scoop, scoop the batter into the liners. Do not over fill the liners, a slightly heaped scoop is all you need. Ensure all the batter is out of the scoop and in the liner before moving on to the next cupcake.

Place on the bottom shelf of the oven and set the timer for 22 minutes, they may need a little longer, but keep a close eye on them

Leave to cool and then ice and decorate.

Someone’s Happy. Nom nom nom.

Swiss Meringue Buttercream

5 Eggs

8oz sugar

Pinch of salt

12oz unsalted butter room temperature

3oz White chocolate

Bring a small pan with a little water to a boil over medium heat.

In the meantime, separate the eggs very carefully. You need to measure 1/4 pint of egg whites. There may be some left over, don’t be tempted to just chuck this in with the rest. Save them or discard them.

Combine the egg whites, sugar and salt in a bowl of an electric mixer.

Place the bowl on top of the pan of boiling water and stir with a whip until the egg whites are ot and the sugar has dissolved. Scrape down any sugar around the side of the bowl. Keep stirring if you don’t  the egg whites will settle and start to cook like an omlette.

Remove and attach to the mixer. Beat on slow until cold.

When the meringue is cold add the butter a little at a time.  Beating until it’s incorporated.

Increase the speed a little and beat until smooth.

Melt the chocolate and steadily pour in, beating until incorporated.

You’ll have enough to cover about 24 cupcakes. The remainder of the icing will keep in the fridge for a while.

Enjoy, f.

Blueberry Galette

I found another reason to turn on my oven the other day.  I love a quick and easy dessert recipe, and this is one that I turn to regularly, especially in the fall and winter. Its easy to assemble before you begin dinner, then you pop it into the fridge to chill while you cook. Just before you sit down to eat you put it in a hot oven and it bakes while you enjoy your supper, it cools as you relax and digest and just when you’re ready to eat a little something sweet for dessert, its ready too.  This also is a great recipe for figs, apples, cherries… you get the idea. I use a boxed pie crust that comes with two crusts individually wrapped. Pie crust is my kryptonite (’cause I have hot hands). This recipe uses one, so I have a second crust waiting for me for another time.  But by all means, if you aren’t as lazy and inept as me, of course you can make your favorite pie crust from scratch.

Blueberry Galette

1 boxed pie crust, chilled

1 pint fresh blueberries

1/2 cup graham cracker crumbs

1 tbsp butter

1 tbsp brown sugar

zest of half a lemon

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

On a cookie or baking sheet lay pie crust flat. Sprinkle graham crackers, brown sugar, lemon zest and blueberries in the middle. Cut up cold butter into little pieces and sprinkle evenly over fruit.

Fold edges of pie crust over and pinch together to create a pie. Sometimes I’ll do an egg wash and sprinkle with sugar, but its not necessary. Bake for 25-30 minutes until crust is golden and fruit is bubbly.  For easy cleanup bake on a piece of foil or parchment paper.  Cool for at least 15-20 minutes. Its extra yummy with vanilla ice cream on the side.

-Marie

Last of Summer Peach Crumble

I was making some teeny peach pies for a friend who requested them, and I ended up with a bunch of leftover peachy bits, so I decided to make a scrummy yummy crumble for dessert that night.   I’m absolutely useless when it comes to making pie crust from scratch (I can hear Florrie rolling her eyes at me as she reads this lol) I have hot little hands and I nearly always overwork and over melt the butter and it comes out hard and tough. No bueno. So when I’m not in the mood for masochism, I usually go to my good friend the Pillsbury dough boy and get the pre-made stuff.

For my crumble:  To the peeled and diced peaches I added a tablespoon of white sugar, a heaping tablespoon of brown sugar, a pinch of salt and the zest of half a lemon. I stirred it up well and left the fruit to sit and macerate a bit. The peaches were really ripe and fragrant I felt like they didn’t need any other seasoning. After a few minutes it had a lovely dark, thick juice.  For the mini pies I bought  a pack of pre-made graham cracker pie crusts for the mini tins. I took the graham crust out and used the regular pie crust.

In an oven proof glass dish I added the peach mixture, I crumbled up the graham from the pie tins and sprinkled it on top.  I pulled the leftover pie crust into bits and layered that with cut up bits of cold butter, then I popped it into a 350 degree oven for about 25 minutes, until the top was golden brown and the fruit was bubbly.

It was really delicious… I wish i had had some vanilla ice cream to eat with it. Oh well… next time.  -Marie

The Most Sublime Gingerbread, Evah.

Don’t you just love Nigella?

Don’t you just love Nigella? Well I have another reason why you should, as if we needed one more reason. It is within the pages of this book:

Its my go-to baking book. Everything I have ever made from it has been wonderful. On page 236 is a deceptively simple sounding recipe for gingerbread. Florrie was making this last Christmas and raved about it, she served it with creme fraiche ice cream… oh my, sounds like heaven.  I only made it myself this past Thanksgiving.  I needed to bring a few things to my boyfriend’s mum’s house and I wanted to bring a dessert.  This gingerbread is cake-like, moist and possibly the most tender cake I have ever eaten. Its dark and delicious.

I was a little skeptical about the lemon glaze… but it really makes the cake!  We’re doing a charity bake-sale at work next week, and I plan on making this recipe as mini loaves to sell. I will have to exercise a lot of self-control not to gobble it all up myself! -m