Summer Fruits

Summer holidays mean fruit picking and this year our local PYO is looking pretty good. All that sunshine we've been having and the soggy year last year seems to have provided a pretty good crop so far!

I spent a lovely hour in the late afternoon sunshine picking blackcurrants and strawberries to bring home for some summer jam making.

I picked a kilogram of each and once I'd got them home I washed them and took out all of the stems (I'll be honest I didn't pick all of the bits off the blackcurrants because I'm lazy and... someone told me it would simply add to the rustic taste....great advice!).

To make jam you need the same weight of fruit to preserving sugar and knowing I had 2kg of fruit I knew I'd need 2kg of sugar... However, when I came to weigh the fruit, just for the purposes of double checking, I didn't quite have enough... I've since heard this is a common mystery that occurs when living with other people, food just disappears....

The first step is to soften the fruit over a low heat in 125ml of lemon juice (if you're using 2kg of fruit/sugar). Once the fruit is soft and the amount of juice has more than doubled in the pan you can add the sugar. Keep stirring until all of the sugar has dissolved. Once it has, you can bring the fruit to the boil for around 15 - 20 minutes then test it to see whether it has set. If you don't have a jam thermometer there are a few other ways to test for the setting point. I recommend trying both the first time then in future you can use the one that worked the best for you. Here is a good video demonstration of the saucer test. The other method is the flake test.

I did these tests and thought my jam was set but once it had time to cool in the jar it was still a little runny. BUT TASTES AMAZING!

Jam making was actually much easier than I thought and I'm definitely going to do it again. It is so satisfying making something for yourself that you can then enjoy throughout the year (my batch made about 9 jars!) and I'm certain it tastes better than bought jam just because I made it myself!

Easter is on its way....

I've never made hot cross buns before but these were PERFECT and oh so very tasty. They won't be around for long!

Weekend Round Up 23rd-24th

I've had so much fun this weekend, getting messy and spreading my projects throughout the house like I did when I was in uni! I'm working on a project from Mollie Makes and have been dying some fabric to get the perfect shade of green I wanted, so the bathroom became my official drying space.

I then spent today mixing up the dye for my final pieces of fabric and while they were drying I played around with a new wooden stamp I'm hoping to use to add an extra unique detail to the project.

Hot chocolate in a colour coordinated mug was a must.

All pieces cut out, ironed and ready for printing then sewing!

It wouldn't be the weekend without home made pizzas, candles and girly movies with friends either!

Not to forget, home made (unconventionally shaped) Churros, cinnamon sugar, dipping chocolate and cream.... definitely overindulging!

Weekend Round Up 16th/17th

It's been a busy weekend, baking, cups of tea with friends, theatre trips, unexpected snow, more baking, more tea, more friends, more baking, evening films with family. I couldn't have planned a better weekend if I'd tried. So much happened I'm not even going to describe, I'll just let the pictures do the talking.....

The snow was totally unexpected today and it was all gone by this evening, but it made for a fun day playing and a good excuse to stay inside baking! Yes we are 7 years old and we used every colour food colouring we had. p.s pie for dinner was WAY more tasty than it looks in the dish, I'm by no means a tidy chef!

Delayed Weekend Round Up!

Spring has finally begun to appear.....

I've had a pretty lazy weekend (and week in general) once again, all this cold grey weather has really slowed me down this week. The sofa, blankets and cups have tea have really occupied most of my time. This weekend however it was sunny... I mean I actually saw the sun. It gave me enough energy to go for a run, do some baking, and crack on with some sewing projects. All in all a lovely relaxed weekend which I thoroughly needed.

I wont show you the pictures of the bagels I made... they taste delicious but looks wise.... well, there is certainly room for improvement! The blueberry muffins however were certainly a success...

Weekend Round Up 24.02.13

This weekend has been all about food....

I made individual quiches for everyone's  lunch today in our Christmas Le Creuset pots. They are amazing and the quiches were yummy too!!

We had cheese and pesto, cheese and leek and cheese and chorizo, all a big success!

From Desserts d'antan I made Soufflé glacé au Grand Marnier which was the most bizarre recipe! It was a soufflé baked over a bain-marie then put into pots and frozen! So it was more like a  super sugary ice cream! We also substituted the Grand Marnier for Cointreau as we seemed to have run out of the former! Either way.. it too was delicious! Along with yesterdays Madeleines we seem to have had a rather indulgent weekend... I don't hear any complaints however....

Les Madeleines de Berthe

So I'm still not doing very well on resolution number 1 as my weekly cooking is rather limited to... well whenever I seem to be bothered but today I began catching up on recipes again! This time, Madeleines, French cakes baked in scallop shaped tins. The recipe was different from other Madeleine recipes I've come across before as it wanted yeast, but it worked out ok! My baking skills are notoriously inconsistent so regardless of the recipe things often turn out slightly different! I added extra lemon juice to the mixture then drizzled lemon icing over the top. A success (with room to improve of course) but tasty nonetheless!

I also sang this the entire time I was baking, as I always do when I simply think about Madeleines...

Weekend Round Up 17.02.13

So this week I've been working on a new sketch book, covered with an old map of Swansea I used to use whilst running when I still lived there. A lovely little reminder of Swansea every time I use it.

I made some fresh pesto which has gone down a storm, I made two batches and this second batch is even better than the first. So good for snacks, pasta dishes and lunches.

I bought some lovely fabrics which match my stash of ric-rac. I'll be using them for some projects I've got lined up that may go on sale in the future so keep you eyes on the lookout for  anything made with stripes!

All in all it's been a lovely half term, I was seriously busy at the beginning of the week, and have quite enjoyed some lazier days this weekend. I also bought myself a brand new camera so watch this space for even more photography!! Usually I edit my pictures but I think I might have a few non-edited posts to practice my picture taking skills.

Hope you all had a lovely weekend too.

So Sweet It Hurts...

I've been a little lazy when it comes to my NYR to bake every week but here is the most recent attempt! A Blackberry Jam and mixed fruit tart. It was SO easy to make, a simple sweet pastry, jam and some mixed berries!

The final product. A big hit with the whole family but my goodness was it sweet! One small slice and I think I'm sugared out for the rest of the week. Definitely a recipe I'll repeat, so simple, so quick and SO tasty served with a very generous portion of cream...

Pasta perfection

Dinner parties with friends are some of the best possible fun. There's wonderful food, copious amounts of wine and hours and hours of mindless chatter and catching up with each others' lives. The most magical thing about them is that even though they happen so irregularly, when the company is right it is always as if you've hardly been apart. To make a magical dinner party even more perfect, this time we made ALL our food from scratch especially the pasta....

Cooking a fresh meal is satisfying on its own but hand making pasta was something else! I won't lie it was a long process (and due to certain guests insisting the wine be opened before we started, it certainly took even longer than planned!) but it really was so much fun! Combining flour and eggs is all there is to it, then there is lots of kneading to be done and having many hands makes that a quicker process.

Then there's the rolling.... a pasta machine makes this an easy process but again a long one! Rolling pasta however is not only great fun, involving everyone in the kitchen as each chunk of dough gets stretched out to be about 2 metres long, its a lovely thing to play with. It feels like soft leather in your hands, it is so thin in the end, but still it feels strong and almost waxy.

On our first attempt at slicing the pasta we rolled the dough up and just roughly chopped it then tried unrolling it. This wasn't so successful as it all stuck together....it also didn't produce the most beautiful pasta! It certainly looked home made!

Our more successful attempts used the tagliatelle cutter on the pasta machine and this produced such beautifully even strips of pasta that we continued to use it for the final chunks of dough. All the pasta was then hung up on the drying rack to crisp up before cooking.. a hilarious sight to see in the middle of the kitchen!

Most importantly.... the taste. Fresh pasta is amazing, I'd never had it before but it is so light, fresh and juicy I really would recommend making your own! If you don't have a pasta roller, you could easily make ravioli rolled with a rolling pin and chopped up with something tasty inside. Our beautiful pasta was served up with a lovely home made tomato sauce, goats cheese and meatballs. Simple. Delicious.

Brioche Success!

The second instalment from my French cookery extravaganza was La brioche aux praline de Josephine and my goodness was it a success!

It rose beautifully, baked well and tasted amazing. I've never made a brioche cake/bread before and I was pleasantly surprised how well this attempt turned out. It wasn't a quick process, once the dough was made, its spent a day and a night in the fridge in the end (it should have only had a night), then it was rolled out, folded and re-rolled a few times. Next the filling was added and the dough was  rolled into a sausage, chopped up then left for a further 3-4 hours to rise somewhere warm. But it was totally worth it...

For the filling I used a bar of dark chocolate with fruit and nuts in which I crushed up then sprinkled on the flat dough before rolling it into a sausage, this was a lovely almost-healthy-filling..... The recipe asked for pralines however I couldn't find a translation that really explained what this was so we improvised with chocolate!

Most importantly... the bake was so good there wasn't a soggy bottom in sight and with friends round for dinner it also didn't last long.

Baking The Unknown

So here is my first foray into French pudding baking! Taste wise, a total success, everyone enjoyed this recipe Les tuiles aux amandes (Almond tuiles). However, this cookery book has no pictures whatsoever.... so those final preparation and presentation points are all left to guess work!

I've never made/seen tuiles before so I wasn't sure how they should look and my first attempt saw me trying to wrap them up too tight (around a wooden spoon) rather than merely curling them (over a big rolling pin) so shape wise, in the end I just left them as flat biscuits!

The sneaky technique of giving them a lovely dusting with icing sugar did however cover all manner of sins and finished of a lovely dessert. I'll definitely bake this one again and next time I might make a tasty little sauce to drizzle on the top too.....