Baking stones and other things

My First Carrot

Rosemary Cake

As requested by a recent taster, the Good Housekeeping recipe for Rosemary Cake.

3 tender rosemary sprigs
175g unsalted butter (I use soy Marg)
175g caster sugar
10ml (2 tsp) vanilla essence
3 large eggs, beaten
225g self-raising White flour
30ml milk (I use soy)

Grease and line a 15cm round tin. Preheat the oven to 180^C.
Finely chop the rosemary leaves and put half in a bowl with the butter and sugar - beat until pale and fluffy.
Gradually beat in the eggs, a little at a time, adding a little flour to prevent curdling. Sift the remainder of the flour into the bowl, add the milk and fold in.
Turn into the prepared tin and level the surface. Bake for 50 minutes to an hour until firm and a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.
I never do this bit, but this is for a glaze:
Put remaining chopped rosemary in a small saucepan with 2 tbsp water. Heat gently for 2 minutes to infuse; leave to cool.
Sift 225g icing sugar into a bowl and add zest of 1/2 orange and 1 tbsp orange juice. Strain the rosemary juice into the bowl and mix to the consistency of pouring cream, adding a little water if necessary.
Leave the cake to cool for 5 minutes, then run a knife between the cake and the lining paper. Pour the icing over the cake and leave to cool completely before removing the paper.
Decorate the cake with rosemary sprigs to serve.

Strawberries and Raspberries

Just sitting peacefully in the house when a loudspeaker disturbed the peace and quiet.. so naturally I opened the window to try to work out what was going on.  Strawberries!  That's what it was... a man with a van full of strawberries for sale, so I veritably skipped down the stairs to go out and get some.  And heading there bumped into a neighbour from the other side of the street who Jonathan has spoken to but I've never chatted with so after 2 years I finally spoke to him!  And we even decided to split a tray of strawberries between us, both wanting lots but not too many (although for a moment I did consider making jam, but decided against it at 40 weeks and 5 days of pregnancy..). 
It was a very nice neighbourly moment!

Even more exciting though, was our first bit of 2011's harvest from the garden last night - a grand total of 2, yes 2, yellow raspberries from our tiny, but obviously very happy raspberry plant.  Delicious!

Orange cake

With thanks to The Vicar's Wife for this recipe, a deliciously full of vitamins orange cake.  Very tasty and almost dairy free - you just need soya marg instead of butter.  It's so nice!

Ingredients

1 orange, including the skin
180g melted butter or soft marg
3 eggs
1 cup/220g caster sugar
1½ cups/210g self-raising flour

Put the marg in a microwave or on the stove to gently melt. Whilst that’s on, blitz the orange in a blender, having chopped it first so you can remove the pips and that white pith in the middle. I use the mini chopper that came with my stick blender.

Put the melted marg and the pureed orange in a mixing bowl and stir in all the other ingredients to make quite a sloppy batter. Pop in a greased and/or lined 8″ cake tin and bake for 40-45 minutes at 180°C (Gas 4).  With attempt 1, I didn't get enough air into the mixture, so I think some serious beating is called for at this stage.

The original recipe came with an icing made with icing sugar, orange juice and zest and melted butter...

South African Nana's Chocolate Cake

Thanks to Olivia's nan for this great recipe!

Sift together in a bowl:

3 cups flour
2 cups sugar
1/3 cup cocoa powder
1 tsp bicarb
4 tsp baking powder
a pinch of salt

In another bowl, mix together:

2 cups of boiling water
1 cup of vegetable oil
50 ml white vinegar
5 ml vanilla essence

Add the liquid mixture to the dry mixture and mix well.

Pour into a prepared tin (20x30cm) and bake at 180 C for more or less 30 minutes.

Ice while hot with a chocolate butter icing, or simply shower with icing sugar to keep it dairy free.

NB: This recipe can easily be halved - use half all ingredients except for the cocoa powder to keep it nice and chocolatey!

Dairy-free baking

A friend asked me recently for ideas of what to bake when I came to visit as I am dairy (and refined sugar) free (as much as possible).  So I thought I'd add a few recipes from time to time which are easy to adapt to a dairy-free diet.  And have been road tested!

Most of the time I simply switch the butter for soya margerine and sugar for cane sugar (fake sugar doesn't work with the same amounts and it does funny things to my intestines if I eat too much!), I find that eggs in cakes don't affect me (but I can't eat meringue), so it's all a bit of trial and error, but the recipes I will put up are tried and tested and very very tasty!

Why I love Monday nights in Brussels

Even rainy ones..

 

All this for 8 euros and it's all organic.  And Julienne.be provides employment for long-term unemployed workers.  So good news all round!

Baking cauliflowers

Last night's dinner

Stage one:

Stage two:

Stage three:

 

yum!
 

Meat Free Mondays

Thanks to Gwyneth Paltrow's blog, I just discovered the Meat Free Monday campaign launched by Paul McCartney.

Sir Paul has been a vegetarian for over 30 years; and believing not only that it's better for animals (obviously!) but also better for the planet, he's now trying to encourage people to eat vegetarian just once a week.  A little change at a time..

I think we might try it at home - not least as we try to only eat organic meat and it's not easy to get hold of, except at Jack O'Shea's and that is a little expensive for everyday meat..  delicious though!

Discovering Brussels

Even after more than 13 years living in this city I'm still discovering new things...

On Friday night Jonathan and I went to one of the 'Nuits Botaniques' concerts at the Botanique (Botanic Gardens) in Brussels.  It's a series of concerts that happens every year - loads of bands playing over about 10 days.  Every year I've thought about going and finally did - we saw the Archie Bronson Outfit supported by Peggy Sue.  I felt old, particularly listening to the ABO, as it just sounded like noise... but it was fun to be out doing and hearing something different.  In a way it was like the start of the summer - the first of the myriad of festivals in Belgium over the season.

On Saturday morning I met up with a friend for a naughty hot chocolate at Frederic Blondeel at St Catherine - it's well worth a visit, the chocolate is delicious.

Sunday lunchtime Jonathan and I tried to eat at Café Modèle by the canal, near the Petit Chateau, but unless you want the brunch it's not great.. on other days the menu is much more extensive.  A relaxed place for a tasty snack.