The Genial Hearth
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Archive for Baking
February 5, 2010 at 5:17 pm · Filed under Baking, Domestic Life, Food, Recipes
For years, I’ve made Friands. I love the recipe—it’s really easy, it’s very scaleable, and it’s easy to change flavours:-) I’ve been trying to be consistent about Fine Art Friday, and Afternoon Tea, so today, I decided to make these:-)
Friands
Makes 6 (although, I made them a little smaller, and made 8… so all of us got a pair:-) )
12 grams flour
20 grams almond meal
40 grams sugar, icing
30 grams butter, melted
1 egg, white, lightly beaten
1 teaspoons flavouring (today it was grated lemon zest)
1 tablespoon flavouring (today it was sultanas)
Sift flour and icing sugar into a bowl, add ground almonds and flavourings, and mix well.
Stir in butter and egg whites and beat with a wooden spoon until smooth.
Spoon mixture into mini-muffin tins and bake at 200°C for 15 minutes or until golden and firm to the touch. Cool in tins for 5 minutes before turning out on a wire rack to cool. (I’ve had trouble turning these out of late… if appearance is going to matter, you might want to put them in patty pans).
They will keep in an airtight container for up to 3 days (but I’ve never had them last that long! If I put some out of reach, I can usually keep a couple for Paddington—but only until a couple of hours later! They just go.)
Serve dusted with icing sugar.
February 4, 2010 at 4:49 pm · Filed under Baking, Domestic Life, Food, Recipes
Further to my experiments yesterday, I attempted a new muffin today:-) I based them on the recipe here. I halved the sugar, and they were still probably sweeter than they needed to be! I also did them in mini-muffin tins (I like that size for the kids:-) ), but forgot that when I cooked them… so they were a touch too cooked. But still, they were quite acceptable:-) I’ve also learnt that it’s not worth cutting carrot sticks to eat for lunch, chunks are better! That way if they don’t eat them, they’re easier to grate:-)
Carrot and Sultana Muffins
Makes 24
¼ cup sultana
¼ cup water, boiling
½ cup sugar, caster
⅔ cup oil
2 egg
1 ½ teaspoons vanilla
½ cup flour, whole wheat
1 cup flour, plain
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon bicarb soda
¼ teaspoon salt
¾ teaspoon cinnamon, ground
½ teaspoon nutmeg, ground (I had run out of nutmeg, so I just used some mixed spice… I think it would have been better to just stick with the cinnamon)
Oil mini muffin pans. Add the sultanas to the boiling water.
In a mixing bowl, beat sugar, oil, eggs, and vanilla until well blended. Combine the dry ingredients and add to first mixture, mixing just until ingredients are moistened. Drain sultanas and fold into the batter with the grated carrots.
Fill muffin cups about 2/3 full; bake in preheated 190°C oven for 15 minutes, or until the muffins bounce back when lightly touched with a finger. Allow to cool slightly, and then remove.
February 3, 2010 at 2:57 pm · Filed under Baking, Domestic Life, Food, Recipes
Cygnet woke early this morning… and I had meant to make muffins (or something) to take to co-op today (I was leaning towards muffins because we had yummy muffins at a friend’s place yesterday:-) ). So I searched online, and finally found these. I did fail to read the comments before I began though, and I should have made a couple more changes than I did (they were a touch dry—although I did intend to add some more milk, as the wholemeal flour is likely to have that effect… and the 10 minutes advised was definitely insufficient. I think they’d also be better with more cheese:-) Below is what I intend to try next time.)
Cheese and Chutney Muffins
⅔ cup flour, whole wheat
1 ⅓ cup flour, plain
5 teaspoons baking powder
¾ cup milk, (needs a bit more… 2 or 3 tablespoons?)
½ cup oil, olive
2 egg, lightly beaten
1 cup parmesan, finely grated (could possibly do with more)
pepper, freshly ground
2 tablespoons tomato chutney
Preheat oven to 190°C. Spray 2 mini muffin trays with a little oil spray. Set aside.
Combine flours and baking powder into a large bowl, stir through grated cheese and pepper. In a separate bowl, combine milk, olive oil and eggs and add to the flour mixture. Be sure not to over stir.
Place a spoonful of mixture in each muffin hole, coming about 3/4 of the way up the side of each hole. Make a little well in the centre of each muffin hole and divide tomato chutney between each hole. Using a skewer, gently swirl the chutney into the muffin mixture.
Bake for 30 minutes or until golden and cooked through. Turn out onto a wire rack to cool.
They were pretty good:-) Certainly worth repeating with a few changes. They haven’t all gone, but the kids ate them cheerfully—although Puggle did tell me he ‘liked them, but didn’t like them!’:-)
January 1, 2010 at 2:41 pm · Filed under Baking, Domestic Life, Food, For the Future, Organisation, Plans, Season
I’m sticking quite close to the resolutions of the past couple of years. They haven’t been resounding successes (probably because they’re not SMART:-) ), but I am still referencing them.
So, in 2010, I plan to Make More Music, and Play More Games. In some ways, these both get easier as the kids get older:-)
I plan to add Make More (interesting) Bread. (I do a couple of loaves a week, but they’re a pretty standard loaf. I have a few specialist loaves I’ve been meaning to experiment with, so i reckon one every couple of months would be a good effort. Turkish Bread, Ciabatta, Naan, Pita… I have a feeling there was another I was considering [Paddington has suggested Parathas:-) ]. Basically though, if I can master the first two, I’ll count it as a successful year:-) )
I need to Drink More Water, and I really do need to do something to get more fit (hmm… I didn’t even deign to capitalise that… that says a lot!)
I’m hoping to start reading (well, if we’re doing Don Quixote, I’ll be listening!) through some Great Books with another Home Schooling mum:-) We’ve been talking about it… but maybe it’s a good time to start:-)
That’s quite a bit! So a good place to stop:-)
December 25, 2009 at 11:06 pm · Filed under Advent, Baking, Bilby, Christmas, Craft, Cygnet, Domestic Life, Family, Food, Organisation, Puggle, Reflection, Season, Sewing, Woodwork
A couple of years ago, the Advent season was when I started blogging daily (or nearly so). I maintained it until probably May-ish last year, and then a few times a week for about another 12 months. This year? I think I managed a couple of Food Posts through Advent, and that’s about it.
Mind you, this Advent has been lacking in a lot of my usual preparations! I have Ice Cream Plum Pudding in the house, because that’s essentially what I was doing for our family Christmas dinner. I have Gingerbread Dough in the freezer, because I made a double quantity when we made gingerbread houses at Halloween. I have the makings of Fruit Mince Pies (pre-rolled pastry in the freezer and a bottle of mince). We’ve read a pile of Christmas books. We made an Advent Chain. But that’s about as far as any similarity to previous Christmasses goes.
Before I get too disappointed though, I should point out that we have made quite a few presents this year! There should (I hope!) be several individual posts, once I download photos, but Puggle and I have been woodworking, and Bilby and I have sewn. Puggle made a small wooden boat for Cygnet, and a set of stilts for Bilby (as well as a pair of stilts for his Secret Santa, and he helped to sew an apron for Cygnet’s Secret Santa). Bilby made a woodworking apron for Puggle, five balloon juggling balls and a grab bag for her Secret Santa, and some Chocolate Coated Almonds for her grandparents. Me? I have finally finished the Pink Tower and (almost! still have to put the finish on) the Brown Stair. I’ve made (with some help from Puggle) several sets of Tree Blocks for some of the smaller children of our acquaintance. I have made three Bench Hooks (two to suit western saws, and one for japanese saws). And I’ve made a wooden forest (barring the dye-ing and finishing) (like blocks, but shaped like trees, rather than trees made from tree branches). I’ve sewn bags for the tree blocks (I still have one more to go, and a similar bag for the wooden forest), and three apron/chef’s hat sets… with accompanying bag. I’ve also been painting the IKEA abacus we got for Cygnet, to match the colours of the Right Start one:-) We did also make jam as part of our Christmas preparation.
I’m still anticipating doing our usual family calendar, and I’m hoping we’ll get to the cards—but obviously that won’t be happening by Christmas time!
So, a bit of a hit and miss. I keep reminding myself though, we can’t do everything! And we have been doing a lot of French during this time:-) Reminding me of more posts I have been meaning to write!
Hope your Christmasses were all lovely, and that the rest of your Festive Season is safe and joyous!
October 25, 2009 at 12:47 pm · Filed under Baking, Bilby, Birthdays, Craft, Domestic Life, Family, Food, Season
Bilby is now three. She had been insistent for nearly a year that she wanted a train cake.
A couple of weeks ago though, she decided that she wanted a ‘hammer cake, like Dada’s… and a Humpty’ (I made Paddington a pinata cake for his birthday, and she was quite taken with it, she’d also been looking through some of our cake books, and come across a couple of Humpty cakes).
I was very pleased with the end result—even if we couldn’t find the hammer! We ended up using a softish mallet, that made no headway on Humpty (until we turned him side on:-) He was much easier to crack through his seam! )
July 17, 2009 at 10:53 am · Filed under Baking, Domestic Life, Food, Menu
Friday: Gnocchi with Oven Roasted Tomato and Capsicum Sauce, Cinnamon Toffee Apple Wedges
Saturday: Roast Beef with Roast Vegetables
Sunday: Chickpea Tagine with Figs
Monday: Dinner with Granny and Grandpa
Tuesday: Toad in the Hole with Tomato and Rosemary, Green Beans and Lentil Salad (Vanilla Slice for supper)
Wednesday: Dinner with Grandma and Grandad
Thursday: Moroccan Beef Soup with Jewelled Couscous
May 10, 2009 at 8:04 pm · Filed under Baking, Domestic Life, Food, Recipes
For Mother’s Day, we took this (one of my favourite Afternoon Tea treats:-) ) to my Mum’s.
Jam Roll from Gourmet Traveller March 2006
3 eggs, separated
110 grams sugar, caster
110 grams flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon golden syrup
1 tablespoon water, boiling
75 grams sugar, caster
200 grams jam, strawberry, raspberry or plum
Using an electric mixer, whisk eggwhites until soft peaks form, then gradually add sugar and whisk until firm peaks form and mixture is stiff and glossy. Add egg yolks one at a time, whisking until just combined.
Sift flour, salt and baking powder into a bowl, then repeat twice more. Mix golden syrup with boiling water and add to egg mixture. Add the flour and using a large metal spoon, gently fold in until just combined. Spoon mixture into a baking paper lined 26×32 centimetre swiss roll tin, gently smooth top, then bake at 180˚C for 12 minutes or until top springs back when pressed (it really is just this long… test it).
Scatter remaining sugar 1 centimetre from the end of a clean tea towel to cover an area a little larger than the cake tin, then carefully invert cake over sugar and peel away base paper. (To turn out, line it up with the sugar (over it), hold the paper at the top, and tip.) Using a serrated knife, trim short ends of hot cake, then, using towel as a guide, roll up from a short side and leave to cool, wrapped in the towel.
Carefully unroll cake, spread with (warmed) jam leaving a 1 centimetre border.
Re-roll, and place seam-side down on a plate. Serve cake cut into slices. Jam roll with keep in an airtight container for up to two days.
May 3, 2009 at 12:54 pm · Filed under Baking, Birthdays, Craft, Domestic Life, Food, Puggle, Season
So this year, Puggle chose another Tipper Truck for his birthday cake! It was different from last year’s though (and easier:-) ), so I was happy to oblige:-)
April 26, 2009 at 1:39 am · Filed under Baking, Domestic Life, Food, Recipes
These are one of Paddington’s favourites:-) They’re really simple—and if it weren’t for the lack of uniformity in shape, you wouldn’t be able to tell them apart from the packet ones we know and love:-)
Ginger Nut Biscuits from The West Australian, Extra Liftout : Saturday November 29, 2003
60 grams butter
1 ½ cups sugar
1 egg
¼ cup treacle
⅓ cup golden syrup
2 cups flour (I made these with wholemeal flour today… they were fine, a few flecks on the surface, but they worked just as well)
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 tablespoon ginger, ground
Combine butter with caster sugar.
Mix in egg, treacle and golden syrup.
Sift together flour, baking powder and ground ginger.
Mix this through the butter mixture until well combined.
Place neatly heaped teaspoonfuls of mixture on a tray lined with baking paper, leaving plenty of room for them to expand. Press down a bit with the floured back of a wooden spoon.
Bake in a 200°C oven for about 12 minutes or until they are well browned.
Leave them to cool on a tray and store in an airtight container.
Notes:
If you prefer them to be soft, store in an airtight container before they are fully cooled. If you prefer your ginger-nuts hard, make sure that they are completely cool before storing.
(I’ll add a picture when I connect the camera tomorrow.)
April 25, 2009 at 10:13 pm · Filed under Baking, Domestic Life, Food, Organisation
That’s the way you’re meant to use an oven:-)
Tonight’s roast and vegetables in the oven. While they’re cooking, do lots of preparation around the house for tomorrow’s gardening extravaganza. Then, begin the Boiled Fruit Cake (boil up the fruit and spice and butter and sugar then leave to cool). Make a Simplicity Chocolate Cake and put it in the oven when the roast comes out. While the meat is resting, and then being carved (thanks Paddington!) begin a batch of Gingernuts. Eat dinner, and finish making the gingernuts. Put them in the oven when the chocolate cake comes out. Load the bread machine with a loaf. (Rotate the trays of gingernuts as they’re cooked). Finish making the boiled fruit cake. When the gingernuts are finished, turn down the oven temperature a bit. Put the fruit cake in the oven to cook (it takes a while). Take it out of the oven as the bread machine finishes making the dough. Shape the loaf and leave above the oven to rise a bit (turn the oven back up).
In about five more minutes I’ll put the bread in the oven to cook. When it finishes I’ll turn off the oven:-) The roast was for dinner tonight, the bread is for breakfast tomorrow. The two cakes and the gingernuts are for morning/afternoon teas tomorrow. The Gulaschsuppe was made, and today I made the Pumpkin Soup (not tomato, slight miscalculation:-) ) for lunch tomorrow. Now I can begin to relax:-)
April 20, 2009 at 10:03 am · Filed under Baking, Domestic Life, Food, Menu, Recipes
A couple of weeks ago, we had peaches needing to be used, and friends coming to dinner, which reminded me that I hadn’t made this in quite some time:-)
Peach and Vanilla Pie from Australian Gourmet Traveller, March 2005
350 grams flour, plain, (2 1/3 cups)
60 grams almond meal
½ teaspoon salt, sea
50 grams sugar, caster
250 grams butter, unsalted, finely chopped
¼ cup water, iced
1.2 kilograms peaches, (about 6)
40 grams tapioca, (or sago)
60 grams sugar, caster
1 bean vanilla, seeds only
1 egg, white
sugar, caster, extra, to sprinkle
For the pastry, process flour, almond meal, sugar, salt and butter until it looks like breadcrumbs. Add the iced water and process until the mixture just comes together (with pastry remember that less working is better for the end result).
Divide the pastry into two slightly uneven pieces. Form each into a disc, wrap in gladwrap and refrigerate for 2 hours.
If you are concerned about the skin on the peaches (some are tougher than others), put peaches in boiling water for 30 seconds (two or three at a time), remove and plunge into iced water, then peel. Halve and remove the stones, then segment further.
Process the tapioca in a small processor (I have never succeeded with the mortar and pestle!) until it’s finely ground. Place in a bowl with the sugar and vanilla seeds.
Preheat the oven to 200˚C.
Roll out the larger piece of pastry until about 3 millimetres thick (I did it on my tupperware pastry sheet, and it was actually possible to see the blue lines through the pastry!) and line a greased 23 centimetre (4 centimetre deep) metal pie dish, then refrigerate while you roll out the second piece of dough.
Add the peaches to the tapioca and sugar mixture and toss gently. Spoon these into the pastry. Brush the edge with a little egg white, then cover the pie with the second piece of pastry. Trim the excess and crimp edge with a fork. Cut a 2 centimetre slit in the top of the pastry, brush the top of the pie with egg white and sprinkle with the extra caster sugar.
Place the pie on an oven tray, and put into the preheated oven for 20 minutes. Reduce to 180˚C and bake for another 30 minutes or until golden.
Remove the pie from the oven, place on a wire rack and cool for two hours or until room temperature (it is nice when cool, but really? Who can wait!) Serve cut into slices with thick cream.
April 3, 2009 at 10:34 pm · Filed under Baking, Domestic Life, Easter, Food, Recipes, Season
I made these last year, and failed to blog them. I did make a number of notes in MacGourmet though:-)
I tried them again this year. I didn’t manage to take a photo, but I thought I should actually put them up:-) I was pretty pleased with the way this worked out, although it’s not quite right yet. Last year I had found the spices a bit lacking, that was better, but the texture of the bread is a bit dry. Last year I had planned to make Hot Buns a few more times to get it right—we’ll see if I manage it this year:-)
Hot Cross Buns from Times Online
450 grams flour, (strong bread)
1 teaspoon salt
3 teaspoons cinnamon, ground
3 teaspoons allspice, ground
7 grams yeast
75 grams sultanas
75 grams currants
60 grams mixed peel
110 grams caster sugar
50 grams unsalted butter
2 grams vanilla extract
250 mls milk
1 egg, beaten
40 grams plain flour
1 tablespoon sugar
50 millilitres water
2 tablespoons brown sugar
3 tablespoon milk
Sift flour, salt and spices into a large bowl and mix in the yeast, fruit, rind and sugar. Melt butter, stir in milk and vanilla extract and heat until tepid. Whisk into egg, add to flour mixture, form a dough and knead on a floured surface for 10 minutes until smooth and elastic (be sure not to add too much flour as you knead). Divide into 12 buns, cover with a damp tea towel and leave in a warm place for about 90 minutes, till doubled in size.
Mix a paste of the plain flour, sugar and water, bung it in a piping bag (or a plastic freezer bag with one corner snipped off… just don’t mix it in the bag, even though it means a little less washing up!) and pipe a cross on each bun. Bake at 180˚C for 10 minute, reduce the heat to 150˚C and bake for a further 15 minute. Lightly brush with the glaze (brown sugar and milk) and cool on a rack.
January 28, 2009 at 10:06 pm · Filed under Baking, Domestic Life, Food, Recipes
(…in a breadmaker.)
I’m pretty happy with how my loaves are turning out now, although, I may still experiment with more grains—and also with my own grain mix. But for now, this is what I’m making:-)
55 grams mixed grains (at this stage, I’m using the grain mix from All About Bread)
320 millilitres water
450 grams wholemeal flour
50 grams gluten flour
1 teaspoon yeast
1 dessertspoon brown sugar
1 dessertspoon olive oil
1 teaspoon salt
If you think of it in time, set the grain to soak in the water (I started by soaking it in 120 milliliters of the water in another bowl, and adding it to the top of the machine, but now, I put the grains with all the water in the bottom of the mixer).
When you’re ready to begin, add the remaining ingredients in the order listed and set on the dough cycle.
Shape into a loaf, and leave to rise for about half an hour. Bake at 180˚C for about half an hour.
Leave in the tin for at least ten minutes, and it should turn out quite easily.
December 22, 2008 at 11:34 am · Filed under Advent, Baking, Blogging, Domestic Life, Food, Puggle, Season
Three dozen Fruit Mince Tarts made:-)
I haven’t actually made them in years, so this is a nice change:-)
I didn’t make my own Fruit Mince this year (maybe next year, I reckon Puggle may well be able to do it himself by then), but I still had home-made Fruit Mince, thanks to Lizzy_bbb. I did fail to check I had enough Shortcrust pastry (I had already decided to just use ready-rolled sheets, to simplify matters), so we did the rest with Puff pastry… They’re not as good (they don’t look right:-( ), but they’ll taste fine:-)
No recipe this year, basically circles of shortcrust pastry, place them in a tin, add a teaspoon of fruit mince and top with a cross or some other decoration out of the leftover shortcrust. Bake for about 15-20 minutes in a moderate/hot oven.
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