Nov 14 2010

Plum, Toblerone White & Cinnamon Muffins

I have something to announce. No, I’ve not got a boyfriend, or gotten a car, or won a courtesy/good citizen award or struck the lottery. Really, nothing fancy at all. I’ve merely started running. Yes, around the neighbourhood huff and puff and sweat and go red like a beetroot I go. Truly, I’m exuding glamour and thoroughly enjoying it, NOT. But for health and fitness reasons I have decided to put my running shoes back on. For the sanity of my clothes, belt buckles and zippers, out of kindness to my poor mirror, I’ve made this big decision.

And then guess what happened after a week of running? The soles of my running shoes fell off. Right off, cleanly. And then my black and white spotted dog (one of out 5 hungry buggers) thought it would be fun to pounce on it and rip it to shreds. The story of my life. What did I think then? Ah what a joke. Even the world is bent on getting me fat!

fresh out of the oven

The pair of destroyed shoes are by now probably on its way to the recycling dump or something. No hard feelings. I’m moving on to my mama’s running shoes and let’s see if those get destroyed by my out-of-these-world feet. On the lighter side of life, I ventured into the kitchen and baked. Whoever needs rubber soles and running shoes when I can equip myself better with wooden spoons and mixing bowls? Let’s get to that then…

Ottolenghi has some serious reputation in London. And although I lived in the Hoxton/Shoreditch area, it was just too easy to wander up to Islington for a takeaway of Ottolenghi cakes, a lunch with friends or a special candlelit dinner with visiting family. I don’t think anyone ever has anything bad to say about Ottolenghi – the food is clean, honest, simple, modern and utterly delicious. I am a fan. And I know many others who are too.

Similarly, anything that comes from the Ottolenghi cookbook is rumoured to be good and never a letdown. Out of the recipes I’ve tried, it’s so far been beyond good: great, brilliant, sublime, mindblowingly reliable, success rate 100% and also fairly idiot-proof. Moreover, most of their simple baked treats can double up as a dessert course in both the looks and taste department, as this one proves with a sexy compote topping. I love getting the best of both worlds. Maybe I didn’t win the lottery, but I felt like I’d pulled out trays of sweetened gold from my oven.

I especially love making things that produce deep, dark shades of red like a good Chanel lipstick. This compote had me charmed completely. The amount of baking time for it will depend on the ripeness of your fruit. Mine was just ready to eat, firm to bite and slightly tart. Hence, I added another 15 mins to the bake time. On second thought, I should also have increased the amount of sugar for the compote as it was a little too tart for some. Nevertheless, these muffins were gone within a day.

Food in our house either gets left over forever with a poltergeist of unwillingness to eat it lingering in the house, or it disappears in a flash. Thankfully, these muffins belong to the latter group, compliments to Ottolenghi.

a plum compote that simply smells like Christmas!

And the only thing it’s missing is a lovely cuppa tea. If you’re a tea lover and fancy some good leaves, or wish to try your luck at winning a flowering tea diva set from JING Tea, don’t forget to check out my previous post here.

The original recipe calls for marzipan rather than white chocolate but I overestimated my local supermarket and the state of our pantry cupboard. The substitute of Toblerone White chocolate wasn’t so bad and it meant the muffins weren’t as sweet as I was worried they would turn out to be.

Yields 10-12 regular sized muffins.

Plum, Toblerone White (Marzipan) & Cinnamon Muffins
(Original recipe from Ottolenghi Cookbook)
Ingredients

    For the muffins:
    480g plain flour
    1 tsp baking powder
    1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
    1 tsp ground cinnamon
    a pinch of salt
    200g caster sugar
    2 free range eggs
    110g unsalted butter, melted and cooled
    280ml milk
    grated zest of 2 oranges
    120g Toblerone White (marzipan)
    icing sugar, for dusting
    Plum Compote:
    700g ripe dark red plums, stoned and cut into quarters
    60g caster sugar
    1 cinnamon stick (or 2 short ones)

Make the plum compote first. Preheat oven to 170d Celsius. Place plums in a shallow baking dish and add the sugar and cinnamon stick to it. Mix together. Place in the oven and bake for 10-20 minutes, until the plums are soft and their skin starts to separate from the flesh. Cooking time will vary significantly, depending on the ripeness of the fruit.

When cooked, remove from oven and set aside to cool. (MY NOTE: The plums might still appear fairly whole and of their initial raw colour. Mix it around and ensure that it is coated in its juices. The process of cooling will cause the plums to break down further into a compote and deepen in colour)

For the muffins:
Sift the flour, baking powder, bicarb, cinnamon and salt into a bowl.

Place the sugar and eggs in a large mixing bowl and whisk together. Add the milk and cooled melted butter. Whisk to combine.

Grate the marzipan or chop the Toblerone and add this to the batter, together with the orange zest. Now add 80g of plum compote (pulp & juices) and stir together. Set the rest of the compote aside for later.

Using a rubber spatula, gently fold the flour mixture into the wet ingredients until just combined. A lumpy mixture with pockets of flour is ideal.

Line your muffin tray with paper cases and spoon in the batter, filling them all the way to the top. Bake for 25-30 minutse, until a skewer inserted comes out clean. When cool enough to handle, take the muffins out of the tins and leave on a wire rack to cool completely.

Just before serving, dust with icing sugar and top with plum compote.

17 comments | posted in chocolate, cinnamon, muffins, orange, plum, sweets

Sep 2 2009

Pear and Cranberry Upside-Down Cake

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The pear is a particularly humble fruit often forgotten in my house or outshone by the more appealing apple,the milkshake-worthy banana, the stunning golden kiwi or the refreshing watermelon. If it were a game of ball, the pear would be the last to be picked onto the team. It may be its delicate flavour, subtle sweetness and generally modest but spotty complexion that causes it to be overlooked, to fade into the background of other more colourful, juicy, sweet and tangy fruit. Nevertheless, I have a special fondness for this bottom-heavy fruit, especially the conference and packham variety; I love them on its own, in salads or poached and served with cream or custard. They’re quite the versatile fruit and cooking them releases its delicate honeyed flavour all the more.

The last upside-down cake I made (years ago, geez) was a recipe from Bill Granger and I remember using heckloads of maple syrup in it. I’d used bananas in the base and so the cake was pretty rich and intensely sweet. Mindblowingly so in fact. I believe the post-cake sugar high lasted for bout half an hour or so, which isn’t quite a good thing for sugar-maniacs like me. But this recipe – Bill Granger’s Banana Maple Upside Down Cake from Bill’s Open Kitchen – is still gorgeous if you aren’t too calorie or sugar-conscious. Instead of using this same Granger recipe, however, I wanted a recipe that wouldn’t have too many flavours working in the syrupy base so as not to overpower the pears. I found one from Ottolenghi and was really excited to give it a go since many have raved about Ottolenghi. Because I have yet to taste their gorgeous food for myself, I simply cannot wait to be in London next year to taste Ottolenghi amongst other equally, if not more, amazing restaurants like Maze, Nobu and dans le noir?. Reckon I should start organizing a list of restaurants to visit with my future flatmate (if she’s nice and amiable!). Someone pass me my diary please…Diva’s got an important restaurant visit-list to note down! Figures I’ll have to work doubly hard to earn a wage that’ll support my shopping, my desire for shoes and that insatiable hunger for yum yummy food.

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I’m really pleased with this recipe. I admit it’s a lot of work since you’ve got to poach the pears, make the caramel topping from scratch and basically make sure nothing burns and that you don’t burn yourself, but the results were fantastic. The recipe uses cranberries which I thought would be quite a wonderful marriage with pears, giving it a sweetness boost and a light touch of tanginess. The cake batter incorporates lemon and orange zest amidst spices like ground star anise, cinnamon and nutmeg. The ground almonds also gave it a lovely fluffy texture. Any recipe that uses ground almonds I love. Something about ground almonds that gives all baked goods a special x-factor. So anyway, this is sort of an autumnal cake which I found delightful especially since September is finally here and we’ve gotta say goodbye to summer. I might add a little more cinnamon and nutmeg to the batter in the future as I quite like a bit more spice in cakes like these. The pears which were poached in lemon zest, lemon juice, sugar and spices tasted wonderful with the caramel topping and cranberries soaked in the pear poaching water. Together with the cake, served warm, it was lush! I loved the lemoniness and laces of orange together with the cinnamon-sweetness of the pears and cranberries. I’m not that great at describing how good food tastes to me but honestly, this was good. Moist, very tasty and not overly sweet such that you couldn’t even taste the pear.

Gorgeous.

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One problem I had with the recipe, aside from all my kitchen accidents which I’ll get to in a bit, was the baking time. The recipe states that you bake it for 35 mins but I had to bake mine in the oven for nearly 50 mins. I’m not too sure why that was and I have a nagging suspicion that my oven wasn’t preheated long enough to get to the right temperature for baking the cake and thus, required a longer cooking time than advised in the recipe. Any ideas?

I chose not to glaze the cake with jam a little watered down in a saucepan as I felt the caramel topping was sufficient and the cake moist and pretty enough. Like I’d mentioned before, I wanted to keep the recipe simple so I’d stay true to the pears. Any other jam, apricot, strawberry or marmalade would just be unhelpful.  

Right, so some of you might be wondering about those kitchen accidents and if you’ve kept up with me on Twitter, you’d have some idea of the silly things I’d done to myself. I guess today’s just one of those days where hand-eye coordination totally fails you. On days like that, I usually ruin everything and by the end of the day, I feel exhausted and emotionally drained. Ie., I feel like a failure. The upside down cake gave me hope but the process of making it was utterly chaotic. Whilst preparing the lemon zest, I’d grated my thumb into the zest as well. Quite a mess I created with the blood streaked across the white sink. Yes. My kitchen’s got a white, dark brown and silver theme to it. All the table tops are marble white and mum loves to keep it absolutely spotless. She’s anal. And I’m OCD-ed. Great. Picture me freaking out and washing away all the blood, picking out the bad zest and all – don’t worry. It didn’t really get onto the lemon but totally irked me out. 

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So what happened next? Yes, there’s more. The caramel was a successful event. As I stirred the butter into the melted sugar, the itchy-fingered bit of me suddenly stuck a finger into the beautifully browning (and still, bubbling) mixture. Yep. I burnt my finger through and through. It’s now red, sore and still throbbing. To top it off with the cherry on the icing, I’ve got a bulbous white blister on the tip of my finger that really gets in the way of typing, washing my hair, etc. 

Wally brain in the kitchen. Stay away.

I’d like to stop here and end your pain. I mean, seriously, you can hurl me some verbal abuse and I wouldn’t mind. Haha. Getting my cake out of the oven was interesting as well. As I’d placed my cake tin on a cookie tray to prevent any accidental spillage, I had to get the cake out of the oven with oven mitts by grabbing the cookie tray and pulling it out. I gather my brain had executed complete shutdown or just decided a simple act like this didn’t require complex thinking – I turned 90 degrees to my left without moving my right arm away from the oven and seared the flesh of my upper right arm with the cookie tray. WOW. The skin’s kinda like welded down where I’ve burned it. A burn line of about 1.5 inches. If anyone asks, I’ll just say I was in a fight or something. My life’s way cooler than ‘Whoops. I burned myself with a cookie tray.’ Oh no. I can already imagine the looks on their faces when they find out the truth. Scarred for life I am, pun not intended.

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Right. But the cake was good so I’m a happy chappy. Off to go reap the rewards of my efforts today. If you’re looking for that recipe, check it out over at Ottolenghi’s website. They’ve got loads of other cool recipes as well.

24 comments | posted in cakes, cinnamon, cranberries, jam, lemon, nutmeg, nuts, orange, pears, spices, vanilla

Feb 12 2009

Clementine Salad Bowl with Wild Crayfish Tails, Fresh Basil, Raisins & Walnuts

On campus, we have a limited choice of greasy, boring places to eat. I’m not really complaining since there’s a place we usually stop by on Mondays after our lecture for yummy jackpots, aka jacket potatoes or pots. Whatever weird combo you fancy (eg. tuna and cheese, sweet thai chicken and beetroot, etc.) they are more than willing to cater to your odds and ends for a jackpot topping. In terms of healthy eating, we’ve even got a little healthy snack bar under the University Centre that offers gluten free soup, salads, a range of vegan and organic sandwiches, drinks, fresh fruit and a range of rice & corn crisps and snacks. Thing is, to get your money’s worth, you’d order a Salad & Protein which offers you 5 salad choices and 1 protein from £2.45. Your choice of protein can be anything from feta cheese & sundried tomatoes to a chicken breast to shrimp to marinated chicken breast to poached salmon. If you’re the type who can’t go without a salad dressing, the lady behind the salad counter is more than happy to squirt a ridiculous amount of mayo, vinaigrette, soy sauce and other weird sorts of liquids on your salad. Fresh salad, tasty, generous portions, affordable.

Sounds good so far, don’t you think? The downside of this is the long queues, the slow service, the lack-lustre expressions of the salad people. You’d think healthy eating could be made more ‘healthy’ with healthy, chirpy people offering the food. No. You’ve got druggee-types, grumpy types, dazed types, clueless types. Honestly! Also, if you happen to go into the snack bar with a 10 pound note, about 90% of the time you’ll have the salad lady fretting about chatting with her mate about not having enough change, etc. etc. It can get très annoying if you’re a pretty impatient-from-hunger type of person.

It’s cold. I’m hungry. Don’t piss me off. Now, give me my food dammit.

So anyhow, ranting done. I have realized that the saying ‘If you wanna get it right, do it yourself’ rings true. Salads are dead easy. Salads are quick to make. Prepare a massive bowl in the morning and you’ve got a satisfying lunch to bring with you to work, to a picnic – it’s great! You can throw anything in it so use up that almost-rotting vegetable at the back of the fridge quick! This said, why am I getting frustrated in a healthy snack bar when I can whip up something even better for less, minus the frustration and the queueing?

Diva has been silly. From now on, I’ll be taking a packed lunch with me to university. Probably will start getting up early and bento it up as well. Oh, I’m getting little eager shivers just thinking about how the others will watch and envy my adorable little lunch sets. Haha!

Clementine Salad Bowl with Wild Crayfish Tails, Fresh Basil, Raisins & Walnuts
Ingredients

1 serving your favourite mix of salad leaves
1/3 cup wild crayfish tails, ready to eat
5 large fresh basil leaves, roughly shredded and broken up
2 tbs raisins
2 tbs walnuts
drizzle on your favourite vinaigrette, or some lemon/orange juice

Salads are easy. Put it all in a large bowl. Mix together. Drizzle on your dressing. You don’t need much dressing for this as sweet clementines make up for all the flavour! Now toss wildly. Serve.

I’ve served mine in a lousy glass casserole dish out in the cold on ice or melting snow…Eccentric huh?

16 comments | posted in English, carrots, nuts, orange, raisins, salad, seafood, vegetables