Food Archives - Page 7 of 9 - Conversations through the middle

Baking class – pizza

June 23, 2012

In a change to what I was planning on cooking today, I’ve decided to cook homemade pizza. I was completely bowled over by Gino D’Acampo who was the start guest at a Poggenpohl Kitchens event that I attended on Thursday (more of that to come next week.) He demonstrated how to make pizza and I had no idea it was that simple. I bought his book, Italian Home Baking, as it was being sold to raise funds for CLIC Sargent, a charity that works with sick children and their families. The photo above shows the pizza Gino prepared – unfortunately he was unable to cook it, I don’t think the ovens had been wired up. I will add my own photos once I’ve actually cooked the pizzas (this blog is one I prepared earlier, as they say.)

Classica Margherita

Makes 2 pizzas

200g strong white flour and extra for dusting
7g fast-action dried yeast
Pinch salt
140ml water, warm
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil and extra for brushing

For the topping:
200g passata
2 mozzarella balls, drained and cut into little cubes (not buffalo mozzarella)
4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
8 fresh basil leaves
Salt and pepper to taste

1 Prepare two baking trays by pouring 1 tablespoon of oil on each and spreading it with your fingers or a pastry brush. Brush the inside of a large bowl with oil.

2 To prepare the dough, put the flour, yeast and salt into a large bowl, make a well in the centre and pour in the water with one tablespoon of oil. Use a wooden spoon to mix everything together to create a wet dough.

3 Turn out the dough onto a well-floured surface and work it with your hands for about five minutes until smooth and elastic. Place in the oiled bowl, brush the top with oil and cover with clingfilm. Leave to rest at room temperature for 25 minutes.

4 Preheat the oven to 200°C/ gas mark 6.

5 Once rested, turn out the dough onto a well-floured surface and divide it in two. Use your hands to push each one out from the centre to create two round disks, about 25cm in diameter. Place the pizza bases on the oiled baking trays.

6 Spread the passata evenly over the top of the bases using the back of a tablespoon. Season with salt and pepper.

7 Divide the mozzarella between the two pizzas and drizzle each one with two tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil.

8 Cook in the middle of the oven for 18 minutes until golden brown.

9 Two minutes before the end of the cooking, scatter over the basil, then continue to cook.

10 Serve hot.

Baking class – chocolate muffins (the best ever)

June 16, 2012

So I’m up early today baking muffins for the village summer fete. It’s a combined village/school fete this year, partly because of the Jubilee and also I think because of building work going on to extend the primary school. The fete is held in the village hall and of course Dot brought an empty cake box home on Thursday, which loosely translated means ‘please donate cakes to the tea shop so we can sell them back to you’.

My contribution was a batch of chocolate muffins which are ever so simple to make but taste delicious. Usually they are darker than than the ones pictured above, but I didn’t put in so much cocoa this time as I knew children would be eating them. I added dark chocolate chips to most of them, except the couple I was saving for Dot, which also have white chocolate chips as you can see. I advise against white chocolate chips for cakes you’re going to give for events or as gifts, as they toast and can look quite brown and burned, making them look less appealing. Dot loves them like that though so no problem for home eating.

I wish I could take credit for the recipe but I can’t. It’s from Muffins: Fast and Fantastic by Susan Reimer and it is the recipe I use the most as it comes out brilliant every time.

255g self-raising flour
1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
110-170g caster sugar
3-5 tablespoons cocoa powder
1 egg
240-260ml milk
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
90ml vegetable oil
Chocolate chips for decorating

1. Heat the oven to 190-200°C , 170-190°C fan, or gas mark 5-6. Prepare muffin tin.

2. Sift together the flour, bicarbonate of soda, salt, caster sugar and cocoa powder.

3. In a separate bowl, beat the egg, then add the milk, vanilla essence and oil, and stir.

4. Pour the wet mixture into the dry ingredients. Stir until just combined and there are no dry bits of mixture left. Do not overmix or the muffins will be tough. The batter might be lumpy but don’t worry about it.

5. Fill the muffin cases with mixture, about three quarters full. Sprinkle chocolate chips over the muffins. Place in oven and bake for 20-25 minutes. When cooked, the tops should be slightly springy and the insides moist and just cake-like.

This recipe is so simple and I don’t think there’s anyway it can go wrong. For me, it has always worked beautifully and the muffins taste better than any I’ve bought in the shops. I’m sure you’ll be converted after trying them but let me know what you think!

Happy Birthday Dot – cake anyone?

June 9, 2012

I don’t do a lot of cooking, but I do like to bake. It’s a throwback to watching my mam making lots of lovely cakes, pies and scones in the days before mass produced supermarket offerings, and home economic lessons at school. I don’t do it as often as I would like or as often as I should, but I promised Dot I would make her a birthday cake for when she returned from her first school camp.

You see, for the first time since she came into our lives, she wasn’t with us on her birthday. School camp in year 6 is a little like a rite of passage, giving the children due to go to high school in September a chance to be independent, without parents for five days, having to look after themselves. She was worried before leaving, I was worried all the time she was away, she loved it. She came home and that first evening back she missed camp!

But I made her a cake and she also loved that. In Dot’s words ‘what’s not to like’? Cake, cream and jam – yum. It’s a heart shape because that’s specifically what she asked for. I also baked chocolate brownies, you can just see them in the back of the photo, but they were too chocalatey for me. I need to find a less chocolatey recipe that is also delicious – help me out if you can.

Anyway, here’s the recipe. In a way this is also a throwback to my childhood as the recipe comes from the Be-Ro book, which was the baking bible in our house when I was little.

Ingredients:

100g butter
100g caster sugar
2 medium eggs
100g self raising flour

Method:

Heat the oven to 180°C/ gas mark 4.

Grease a round cake tin or two shallow cake tins.

Cream the butter and sugar together until pale and fluffy.

Beat the eggs, then beat into the butter and sugar a little at a time, with a little flour.

Fold in the remaining flour.

Pour into the tin or tins and bake in the over for around 40 minutes (one tine), or 20-25 minutes (two tins).

Turn out onto a wire rack to cool.

Fill cake with jam, cream or both! Dust with icing sugar or as here, cover with cream and grated chocolate and decorate with fresh berries.

* I found that because my heart cake tin was so big I had to make two cakes, but they looked (and tasted) all the better for it.

I hope to make this a regular Saturday feature – the regular recipe so to speak. What do you think?

Sit on it or eat it?

May 15, 2012

These seats are weird but individual – they would certainly be a talking point if you had them in your home. I think Dot would like them for her bedroom but starting at £530 for the mini muffin I don’t think she’ll be getting them.

Shown in leather the muffins from Babatude Boutique can be customised as to colour, finish and flavour – blueberry, banana, pistachio, white chocolate and more. They remind me of that scene in the Young Ones where one of the three horsemen of the Apocalypse drops a sandwich, which lands in the students’ living room during a party. “Italian furniture designers are so uncompromising these days,” says Dawn French or Jennifer Saunders, as they sit on the sandwich sofa. Classic.