The Modern Housewife Series Vol. I

Baked red cabbage and mushroom spring rolls

Makes red cabbage tasty. Taken from The Millenium cookbook

Princess cake

It was Jonathan's birthday last week. He requested lasagne as per usual. He also got some mini princess cakes.

Princess cake is a sponge cake covered in whipped cream and then wrapped in marzipan. The marzipan is usually green but I just got uncoloured marzipan. As we are only two, cupcakes seemed much more appropriate than one large cake. Jonathan's favourite cake is princess cake because of the marzipan so I put lots on his, probably 100g. Turned out to be a little too much. I'd never had princess cake before and I've got some practicing to do but I still enjoyed it. Maybe I'll have perfected it by the time Jonathan turns 40. Apparently the last week in September is princess cake week so I'll maybe make some more this year. Next time I'd like to make a large flat cake and cut out circles. I think the cake recipe for these petits fours would work nicely.

lemon banana loaf

It's somewhere inbetween a cake and a loaf. The outside is crisp and the inside tender but a bit denser than cake.

2 bananas, mashed

100g  Sunflower oil

175g light muscovado sugar (although caster it fine)

Zest and juice of a lemon

225g Self raising flour (sieved)

1 tsp baking powder

Preheat oven to 180C and line a loaf tin

Cream bananas, oil, sugar and lemon (zest and juice) together.

Fold in the flour and baking powder and put in lined loaf tin.

Bake for 1 hour but check after 45 minutes. A skewer should come out clean.

Cool before slicing.

(Freezes well either whole or in slices and can happily be doubled up for batch baking)

Lasagne

Next days lasagne made using a frozen sauce with peppers, mushrooms, radishes and spinach cooked in and a quick white sauce

crumble

If pastry making scares you then crumble is the place to start. It involves the beginnings of making a shortcrust pastry without the terror of making a dough. You get to practice crumbling the fat and flour together without being too concerned about whether you're being too hamfisted.

All your ingredients should be cold, the fat should be cut into diced pieces and rubbing the fat and flour together involves just the tips of your fingers. You shouldn't ever be squeezing or squishing the fat and flour together.

I prefer to use self raising flour in my crumble topping and if I don't have any will stir in a teaspoon of baking powder. I have no explanation as to why I do this, I just do. Plain flour would be fine.

For my fruit base I just use whatever I have to hand: apples, pears, frozen fruits (defrosted) etc. Just put them in your dish and sprinkle enough sugar on them so your lips don't pucker.

Crumble topping

200g flour (self raising or plain)

125g margarine (good quality, good tasting)

60g caster sugar

Rub the flour and maragrine together until it looks like rough breadcrumbs then stir in the sugar. 

(Variations:
Topping: replace some of the flour with ground almonds or any other type of crushed nut (pecan or hazelnut spring to mind). 

Can also be used for: sprinkling on/covering top of cakes and cupcakes.

Freeze? Yes. The crumble topping can be kept in bags/containers in the freezer)

my oven runneth over

Pepper stuffed with this sunflower seed, lentil roast mix stuff, one of last years leeks from garden mixed into stuffing. Served with Cat's potatoes au gratin and a salad of green leaves and beetroot.

I put the potatoes in the oven first and forgot about them, but all turned out well in the end...everything was delicious and I had to clean the oven which would never have happened otherwise...

Kolakakor or caramel biscuits

I came home to a sweetly scented flat today. It smelt like that sweet microwaveable popcorn which was very confusing as we never buy microwaveable popcorn and Jonathan hates sweet popcorn. It turned out that he felt that I hadn't been pulling my weight on the blog so did some baking on my behalf. I'm not going to complain about freshly baked biscuits. They were delicious! Buttery, caramelly and fairly crunchy but a little chewy in the centre. They are very easy to munch down, before you know it you've eaten 10. 

Jonathan used this recipe from recepten.se which he assures me was very easy. Even if you don't speak Swedish it's worth checking out the original as there are pictures of each step. In Swedish recipes, vanilla sugar is usually used instead of vanilla extract. The shop bought vanilla sugar in Sweden is a mixture of icing sugar, vanilla/vanilla flavourings and potato starch and tastes a bit funny. I would just use vanilla extract or paste in it's place. If you are adventurous you could try other flavours such as almond.

Caramel biscuits

Recipe from http://www.recepten.se/recept/sirapskakor.html?cid=1255669. 

Makes about 50 biscuits which can be frozen for up to 3 months.

• 200 g margarine at room temperature
• 1.75 dl (about 160 g) sugar
• 1.5 tablespoons vanilla sugar (or about 1 tsp vanilla extract)
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 2 tablespoons golden syrup
• 5 dl (310 g) flour

Preheat oven to 175°C and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

Whisk margarine and sugar together with an electric whisk until well combined then whisk in the vanilla, baking powder and syrup.

Add the flour and mix for about 1-2 minutes until the mixture forms large clumps then press the dough into a ball with your fingers (see pictures 5-9).

Lay the dough on the work surface and knead it a little until it is smooth and lump-free. Divide into four pieces.

Roll each piece into a long snake about 40 cm long and lay them on your baking tray. Make sure they are spaced out as the dough will spread.

Bake in the middle of the oven for 18-20 minutes until golden.

Allow to cool on the baking sheet for about two minutes then cut into squinty slices and allow them to cool completely under a clean tea towel.

Store in plastic bags or airtight tubs.

To eat, dip into black coffee. I do not like black coffee but this was gooood.

Potatoes au gratin

Part of an over the top mid week meal. Thinly sliced potatoes cooked at 160C in a mixture of soya cream and vegetable stock, salt, pepper and garlic. It was covered until the potatoes were tender and then allowed to colour on top.

two cakes

Two cakes, both alike in dignity, in fair Verona where we lay our scene.

Sorry. They are on a balcony though... both orange cakes, one topped with chocolate, one with icing sugar mixed with a little orange juice.

A rose by any other name... is in fact, cherry blossom :)

One recipe Three ways: Cookies

Tweak a recipe and it's possible to go from one to three recipes fairly quickly. They don't always work out as planned but that's part of the fun of baking!

The original recipe: Raisin oatmeal chocolate chip cookies

¾ cup caster sugar

½ cup sunflower oil

½ cup margarine

1 tsp Vanilla

1 ¾ cups plain flour

½ cup oatmeal

1 tsp bicarbonate of soda

1 tsp salt

Up to 1 ½ cups mix of chocolate chips/raisins/ walnuts 

Heat oven to 180C.

Cream sugar, oil, margarine and vanilla together. Mix in oatmeal, flour, bicarb and salt. Fold in your choice of chocolate chips etc.

Spoon on to baking trays (makes about 16-18) and bake for 8-12 minutes

Verdict: Always good! sweet but slightly salt, crispy but tender inside. Very good!

 Version 2: Peanut butter, chocolate chip and raisin

 

¾ cup caster sugar

½ cup sunflower oil

½ cup peanut butter

1 ¾ cups plain flour

½ cup oatmeal

1 tsp bicarbonate of soda

Up to 1 ½ cups mix of chocolate chips and raisins 

Heat oven to 180C.

Cream sugar, oil and peanut butter  together. Mix in cocoa oatmeal, flour and bicarb. Fold in your chocolate chips and raisins.

Spoon on to baking trays (makes about 16-18) and bake for 8-12 minutes

 

Verdict: Very tasty but they don't spread out and are very delicate probably from altering the fat content. I should rename them peanut butter mounds and then they'll be just fine. Will make again.

 Version 3: Orange chocolate chocolate chip

¾ cup caster sugar

½ cup sunflower oil

½ cup margarine

2 tsp grated orange zest

1 tsp instant coffee powder

1 ¾ cups plain flour

½ cup cocoa powder

1 tsp bicarbonate of soda

1 tsp salt

Up to 1 ½ cups of chocolate chips 

Heat oven to 180C.

Cream sugar, oil, margarine, coffee powder and orange zest together. Mix in cocoa powder, flour, bicarb and salt. Fold in your choice of chocolate chips etc.

Spoon on to baking trays (makes about 16-18) and bake for 8-12 minutes

 Verdict: OK. Not as chocolatey as I hoped and the cocoa powder really dried up the mix (absorbs more liquid than flour) so the end result was a very crisp biscuit rather than a moister cookie.