COOKBOOKS GALORE

 This is one of our family favourites and is so easy to make.  It's  lovely mixture of chocolate, mascarpone with a hint of coffee, all in a pastry case. Doesn't need much cooking - just the pastry case. You need: a pack of shortcrust pastry [or of course make your own] 200g dark chocolate 250g mascarpone 1 dspn instant Espresso coffee 3 egg whites pinch salt 80g caster sugar chocolate shavings to decorate [opt] Preheat oven 180C/gas4                     Grease a 21cm tart tin/dish Roll pastry out to fit the tin, prick with a fork and bake blind for 10 mins. Break chocolate up and put into a pan; sprinkle a little water over and melt on a low heat. Once it's melted, take off the heat and add half the mascarpone and 1 dspn of instant Espresso coffee powder and mix well. Take the pastry out of the oven, cool then add the chocolate mixture. Put in fridge for an hour. Whisk the egg whites to peaks with the salt then add the re...

 Now that the English strawberries are good value, I thought I'd make a cheesecake. I had a pot of mascarpone to use, so used it with some cream cheese [such as Philly]. This is very easy to make when you don't feel like cooking! You need: 60g icing sugar, 200g digestive biscuits [or other biscuits of your choice], 50g butter [melted], 1 lemon, 250g mascarpone, 100g soft cheese [Philly] and 1tspn vanilla extract, few mint leaves Blitz the biscuits in a food processor or blender. Add the melted butter and mix together. Press into the base of a 23cm flan tin, pushing the crumbs slightly up the sides. Beat the mascarpone with the cream cheese, icing sugar, vanilla extract and lemon zest. Spoon into the tin on top of the crumb base. Smooth with a spatula. Cut the washed strawberries into 2 [or 4 if large] and put the on top of the cream mixture, cut side down. Cut the washed strawberries into 2 and put the on top of the cream mixture, cut side  Top with a few mint leaves and put i...

 I've written the title in French because moelleux is a difficult word to translate. It means soft or tender or moist. This cake is soft and moist and simple to make.  It's another recipe passed on by my French friend [who is my school penfriend from when we were 11!] and is a useful recipe to have, as it can easily be adapted. You need; 150g flour and 1 tspn baking powder, 50ml vegetable oil [I use rapeseed], 150g caster sugar, 2 eggs, 125g mascarpone cheese, and either the zest of a lemon or a few drops of lemon oil, icing sugar to dust Preheat oven 180C/gas4                         You need a ring mould, greased Beat the eggs and sugar till light and fluffy. Add the mascarpone, oil, flour and baking powder and lastly the lemon zest or lemon oil. Mix well. Spoon into the tin and bake for 30 mins. Leave to cool in the tin for 5 mins before turning our onto a wire rack. A dusting of icing sugar is all it needs. ...

This is the cake I  decided to make for a get together of the helpers in our Toddlers’ group. It’s just a coffee Victoria sandwich, and I used espresso powder to give it a better coffee flavour. I now find that buttercream is a bit sweet for me. Guess your tastes change as you get older. I used mascarpone flavoured with espresso. So it’s the usual mixture - 225g each of butter, caster sugar and sr flour, 1 tspn baking powder, 4 eggs and 2 dspn espresso coffee powder. Filling and topping : 250g tub of mascarpone, 1 dspn espresso powder, 1 dspn sifted icing sugar Preheat oven 180C                    Grease and line 2x20cm sandwich tins. For the cakes - dissolve the coffee powder in the eggs. Put all the ingredients in a bowl of a stand mixer or use an electric hand mixer. Beat together till smooth. Spoon into the tins and bake for about 25mins. Turn onto a wire rack to cool. For the icing- beat the mascarpone, icing sugar...

The friend I've mentioned before on here, who owns a tea shop, came over at the weekend and brought me some strawberries grown locally. I wanted to make a tart with some of them, so found a French recipe in a folder for this one. The pastry is 'une pâte sablée', a rich sweetened shortcrust, but it's made in a processor or mixer. The filling is just a mixture of mascarpone, ricotta and icing sugar and the whole is topped with sliced strawberries. For the pastry - 1 egg, 200g flour, 125g butter, 75g caster sugar, 50g ground almonds, 1 tspn almond essence [opt], pinch salt. For the cream - 250g each of mascarpone and ricotta and 100g icing sugar Topping - punnet of strawberries, sliced Preheat oven 200c/gas6          You need a 23cm tart tin Put all the ingredients for the pastry in a blender and mix till blended. Bring together into a ball, cover with clingfilm and put in the fridge for at least half an hour. Mix the cheeses and icing sugar together ...

I'm not a great fan of cupcakes as I find the topping too sweet, and I prefer muffins or our British fairy cakes. I was asked to make some for a special tea, so decided to make lemon ones, to use up 2 lemons which just happened to fall off my tree! The topping is a bit different as I used mascarpone.  You need a muffin tin with paper muffin or cupcake cases.  Preheat oven 180C/gas4 80g flour 1 tspn baking powder pinch bicarb. 40g ground almonds 75g caster sugar 3 eggs 100g melted butter zest of 1 lemon Icing: 250g mascarpone juice and zest of 1 lemon 50g icing sugar yellow colouring Beat eggs and caster sugar together till white and fluffy. Add the baking powder and bicarb to the flour and add to the mixture together with the ground almonds, butter and lemon zest. Mix together till a smooth batter. Put the paper cases in the muffin tin and fill them 3/4 full with the batter. Bake 15 mins till golden, then take out if tin and cool on a wire rack. Beat th...

My family came yesterday and they love desserts, especially anything with lemon. I wanted to make something different from my usual lemon meringue or tart, so as I had a large packet of boudoir biscuits in the cupboard, decided to try and make a lemon tiramisu. I found a recipe online, but it wasn't exactly what I wanted. I used both fresh lemons [from my tree in the greenhouse ] and lemon curd to give a good lemony flavour, as well as the small amount of Limoncello that was left in the bottle! I used: 250g boudoir biscuits, 250g mascarpone, 2 lemons, 3 eggs, 100g caster sugar, 20cl whipping cream, 3 tbspn lemon curd and 4 tbspn Limoncello. Cut one lemon in half and squeeze out the juice; mix this with 50g of the sugar and the Limoncello. Zest the other lemon finely. Whip the cream till it gets thick.  Separate the eggs and beat the whites till firm peaks, then beat the yolks with the other 50g of sugar till the mixture is white. Add the mascarpone, lemon curd ...

Some kind of Chocolate Log is a Christmas tradition in our house, Sometimes I cheat and buy a 'good' one, but this year decided to make it. The cake is a chocolate Genoise sponge and the filling has salted caramel in it - one of my favourite things - and it's covered with a great chocolate icing/ganache. For the Genoise sponge:  Preheat oven 200C/gas6                   Grease and line a swiss roll tin with baking paper. Separate 4 eggs. Beat the yolks with 100g of caster sugar till pale and fluffy. In another bowl sieve together 120g plain flour, 4 tbspn cocoa powder and 1 tspn baking powder and fold into the batter. Beat the egg whites till stiff then fold them gently into the cake batter. Spoon into the tin and level the top. Bake for 10 mins. Take out of the oven and roll the sponge up using the baking paper to help you. Leave it on a rack to cool. For the Caramel Cream: In a bowl mix together 200...

I needed a dessert to take to a family lunch, so decided on a tart. This is one of my stand by recipes, so I know it tastes good; everyone likes chocolate! It's  lovely mixture of chocolate, mascarpone with a hint of coffee, all in a pastry case. Doesn't need much cooking - just the pastry case. You need: a pack of shortcrust pastry [or of course make your own] 200g dark chocolate 250g mascarpone 1 dspn instant Espresso coffee 3 egg whites pinch salt 80g caster sugar chocolate shavings to decorate [opt] Preheat oven 180C/gas4                     Grease a 21cm tart tin Roll pastry out to fit the tin, prick with a fork and bake blind for 10 mins. Break chocolate up and put into a pan; sprinkle a little water over and melt on a low heat. Once it's melted, take off the heat and add half the mascarpone and 1 dspn of instant Espresso coffee powder and mix well. Take the pastry out of the oven, cool then add the choc...

As we had family coming for lunch yesterday, I decided to follow this week's GBBO theme and make a cheesecake. I'm not a great fan of the usual biscuit bases, so decided to make mine like a chocolate crumble mixture. I also wanted a thicker base layer, so would make a decent amount of the crumble. I love the flavours of chocolate and orange together, so the topping would be orange flavoured. I used a 23cm springform tin, so it made about 12 good sized slices. Preheat oven 180C/gas4 and line the 23 cm springform tin with some baking parchment. For the base: Cut 175g of chilled butter into cubes, then melt another 50g of butter and put aside. Put the butter cubes into a processor with 150g light muscovado sugar, 3 tbspn cocoa powder and 250g plain flour. Blitz till it becomes breadcrumbs. Pour in the melted butter and pulse till it's mixed. Spoon into the bottom of the tin and smooth the top using the back of a spoon. Bake for about 35 mins till risen a bit, but don...

This is an unusual American recipe as it has a pastry/dough layer, then jam, then fruit and finally a cream topping. It's a good way of using the strawberries that are around in the shops. I think a good quality jam makes a difference to the finished taste - I bought some from a local WI market. Preheat oven 180C/gas4 and grease a  large rectangular tin, about 23 x 30cm and line it with a long strip of foil with the ends hanging over the short edges;  this is to get the cake out of the tin more easily. Using an electric hand beater or a stand mixer, beat together 200g butter and 50g light brown sugar, mixing together for about a minute. Add 280g plain flour and mix together on a low speed. Turn the speed up a bit and beat together till you have a dough. Press the dough roughly in a layer in the foil lined tin. Bake the dough for about 20 mins till it's just starting to puff up. Take it out of the oven and cool while you get on with the rest of the cake. Leave the oven o...

Having got back from our Lake District break on Saturday, my friend J asked if I'd make something a bit special for her sister's birthday. I know her sister loves anything with lemon in it, and I'd recently seen this recipe in an old French magazine. Also I had just enough Limoncello in the bottle. and it needed using. I seemed to have used an awful lot of bowls! I've never been a great fan of tiramisu, but I like the idea of a lemon one.  I used a small square loose-bottomed tin with deep sides to put the dessert together. Juice and zest a lemon and in a bowl mix the juice with 50g of caster sugar and 4 tbspns of Limoncello. Keep the zest for later. Separate 3 eggs and beat the whites into stiff peaks. In another bowl whip 20cl of whipping  cream till thick - the cream needs to be very cold to do this. In yet another bowl mix together 50g caster sugar, 250g mascarpone cheese, the 3 egg yolks, and most of the lemon zest. Add the whipped cream and ...

                                      Merry Christmas and a very Happy and Healthy New Year. These are a nice treat to have if anyone pops in for a coffee or a hot chocolate over the festive period. The recipe makes about 14 cookies. The biscuits have a chocolate filling with a coffee mascarpone topping. Preheat oven 200C/gas6 and line 2 baking trays with baking paper or silicone sheets. For the biscuits you cream together 60g of softened butter with 90g of caster sugar till nice and fluffy. Add 1 beaten egg and mix in, then fold in 60g of plain flour. Spoon the mixture into a piping bag with a 1cm plain nozzle and pipe 28 blobs on the baking paper, spacing them a bit apart. Bake for 6-8 mins till firm in the middle and beginning to go brown at the edges. For the filling - put 150g mascarpone cheese in a bowl; stir 1/2 tspn of instant coffee powder into 1 tbspn of dark rum and st...

I'm on a quest to find the perfect scone. I've tried recipes from various people - Delia, Mary Berry, Nigella etc but still haven't found one that really makes me feel - yes, that's it! Trying out yet another recipe today, one I've made before, I decided to try using some mascarpone as well as milk to make it more moist. I also used soft light brown sugar instead of my usual caster sugar. Would this be my perfect scone? Here's my adapted recipe: 340g sr flour 1 tspn baking powder 80g butter in pieces 2 tbpsn soft light brown sugar 80g mascarpone 90ml milk 1 beaten egg to glaze the tops Preheat oven 190C/gas 6-7 I used a silicone mat on my baking sheet, but a dusting of flour on a sheet would be fine. Put the flour, baking powder, butter and sugar in a food processor and blitz till breadcrumbs. Add the mascarpone and blitz for a couple of seconds. If you don't want to use a processor just rub the fat into the flour and sugar then rub in the mas...

The title is not quite correct because I couldn't find any Key limes! I've made this cake before using oranges, which were the fruit used in the original recipe.It's  from Woman's Weekly magazine, but when I don't know, as it's in my recipe folder. I thought I'd try it with limes, and it turned out well. It's a thick layer of mousse, and it's definitely a dessert cake, rather than a cake to have with a cuppa. I haven't used the original cake recipe either this time, as I wanted to make a Victoria sandwich. 175g butter 400g caster sugar- 175g for the cake 3 eggs 175g sr flour 1 tspn baking powder 400ml double cream 250g mascarpone cheese juice and rind of 5 limes juice of a small orange 1 tbspn gelatine powder icing sugar to dust if you want the filling really green, you can use a few drops of green colouring, which I did. Preheat oven 160C/gas 3 Grease and line a 23cm springform tin. Beat the butter and 175g of the sugar togethe...

There are several very similar recipes for this cake - Nigella has one, Claudia Roden has one and I'm sure there are many more. This one comes from Diana Henry in her lovely book 'Crazy Water Pickled Lemons.' I love Moroccan food and there are some great recipes in this book. A good tip I've learnt from a cyber friend is that instead of boiling the orange for an hour as stipulated in the recipe, you can cook it in the microwave and speed up the whole process. You prick the skin of the orange and microwave it on high for about 8 minutes, turning the orange around after a few minutes, just as you would a potato. Saves a lot of time and energy. cake: 1 orange 3 eggs 250g caster sugar 55g plain flour 1tsp baking powder 200g ground almonds icing sugar for dusting for the cream: 55g fine-shred orange marmalade 125g  mascarpone cheese 30ml (2 tbsp) Greek yoghurt icing sugar to taste 5ml (1 tsp) orange flower water Preheat oven to 180˚C (350˚F) Gas Mark 4...