COOKBOOKS GALORE

A very easy, quick dessert. My younger daughter came yesterday. She is a chocaholic, so dessert had to be something chocolate. Recently I was given a bar of pistachio nougat so decided to use this with the tart, but any nougat would work as it's only the topping. I made a sweet pastry using 200g of flour, 120g butter and 70g of caster sugar, binding it together with a beaten egg. Put in the fridge for 30 mins. Preheat oven 190C/gas5 and grease a tart tin or flan dish. Roll the pastry out to fit the tin/dish and bake blind in the oven for 20 mins. leave to cool. Grate 200g of dark chocolate finely. Bring 20cl of single cream to the boil, take off the heat and add the chocolate. Carefully mix together and leave to cool. Spread it over the pastry case and smooth it out. Put in the fridge for about 20 mins.  Chop up 100g of nougat and use it to sprinkle over the chocolate tart. Sorry, am still having problems with my camera, so photo is a bit blurred! It's an ...

                                      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 made this as my dessert contribution to my OH's family's Christmas get together. I had a couple of bars of white chocolate in my baking cupboard, so these were the basis for the cake. I wanted to make a chocolate sponge base with a light topping, and I'd made a similar topping for a cake before, only using a 50% dark chocolate. It's a bit of a faff to make, as it uses gelatine [not my favourite ingredient], but the results are worth the effort. Hope you think so too! Preheat oven 180C/gas4 Grease and line a 20cm springform cake tin with baking paper. To make the sponge base, whisk 2 eggs with 60g of caster sugar till thick and creamy. Add 60g plain flour and 1 tbspn cocoa powder into the batter and fold in. Gently add 30g of melted butter and mix together. Spoon or pour into the tin and bake for 20-25mins till firm to touch. For the topping, sprinkle an 11gm sachet of gelatine over 3 tbspns of cold water and leave to sponge. Melt 200g of white chocolate car...

This is such an easy recipe, but I like the holly decoration on the top. It's a bit fiddly to do, but I think they look Christmassy and a bit different from other Christmas biscuits. The basic biscuit recipe is one I've had for years, and I saw the holly and berries idea in a baker's shop window. I went in and bought some bread and asked about the holly biscuits and the kind lady explained how they were done. So easy, and adaptable to other designs and cutters. The recipe makes about 12 biscuits. 75g butter 50g icing sugar grated rind of a lemon 1 egg yolk 175g plain flour pinch of salt Decoration: 2 egg yolks red and green food colouring Preheat oven 190C/gas5 Lightly grease 2 baking trays. Beat the butter, sugar and zest together till fluffy; beat in the egg yolk and add the flour and salt. Mix to a smooth dough. Wrap in clingfilm and put in the fridge for about half and hour. Roll the dough out on a floured surface to about 3mm thick, then using a 6cm...

My friend came for tea yesterday and she loves anything with almonds, so I made this cake for her. It's simple but delicious. The recipe comes from my friend who has the little cake shop, so has been well tested! 240g ground almonds 120g caster sugar 6 eggs 50g of plain flour the juice of 2 medium oranges zest of 1 of the oranges 1 tspn baking powder pinch of salt 20g butter icing sugar to decorate Preheat oven 180C/gas4 Grease a 23cm springform tin well, and line the base. Mix the flour and baking powder together in a large bowl. Separate the egg yolks and whites, then beat the yolks with the caster sugar until white and fluffy. Gently fold in the flour. Add a pinch of salt to the whites then beat them into stiff peaks with a beater. Add the ground almonds to the batter mixture and stir in gently, then pour in the orange juice and zest. Add the egg whites little by little very gently till it's all mixed in, trying to keep the air in the whites. Spoon into...

I was inspired by a recent post on the excellent Strong as Soup blog           http://asstrongassoup.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/black-sticky-gingerbread-random-recipe.html    to look for a recipe my neighbour gave me for a gingerbread made with honey. This is a very different gingerbread from the dark moist one on Phil's blog. The method is unusual in that you put the dry ingredients into a bowl, then heat the honey and pour it over. It's got a good spicy flavour and as Phil said in his post, gingerbread is great for taking on an Autumn walk, or with your afternoon cuppa, or even as a dessert with some custard. The original French recipe used 'quatre epices' but I don't think there's much difference between that and our mixed spice, and I found some ground aniseed in a local deli, but you could leave it out if you don't like it. 250g runny honey 250g plain flour 100g caster sugar 1 tspn baking powder 1 tbspn vanilla sugar 1 tspn ground anis...

We have a houseful for Christmas this year, including 2 lovely people from Poland, so thought I'd try out a few family biscuit recipes from the French friend I mentioned recently. The first one is spiced Christmas trees. G's paternal family live in Alsace, so she's grown up with the lovely spicy biscuits and bakes they make at Christmas. I'm going to try out a few and have my grandsons help me, and then they can choose their favourites [as they're going to be here for Christmas anyway]. My daughter and dog came up for the weekend, so we roped her into helping us. She loves decorating cakes and biscuits, so she helped the boys with their trees, and the photo is of her creations. The boys didn't want their efforts put on here, so they ate them! I expect every family in Alsace has their own recipe for Christmas biscuits, but this is the translated Ruff family one, but the decoration is the boys' idea - they wanted garlands on the trees and baubles! 100g b...

We love plums, but despite this being a bumper year for fruit, I've only managed to find 3 lots of British plums. Victoria's are my favourite and I wish we had the room for a tree in our small garden. I succumbed to a BOGOF offer in the supermarket and bought some Italian plums. I decided to make a cake, one with a crumbly topping and use them as a layer in the cake. The idea for the recipe came from this  recipe on the Good Food site, but I used bits from several recipes in my folder to make the final cake. If the plums aren't very ripe, I like to roast them first to add to their flavour. Put 450g of plums cut side up in a tin, sprinkle with 2 tsbps of granulated sugar and bake them in oven 180C/gas4 for about 20 mins till they've become soft. Take out, but leave the oven on. You need a 20cm springform tin lined with baking paper. It's an all in one cake, so put 175g soft brown sugar. 175g butter or margarine, 175g sr flour, 2 eggs, 1/2 tspn baking powder ...

My friend gave me some pears from her tree, so I had to use the ripe ones quickly. Pears are one of my favourite fruit, but there seems to be such a short time between being unripe, ripe and too ripe. Another flavour we love is almond, and pear and almond go well together. When living in France I went on several cookery courses, and the lady who ran them became a friend. Her recipes were family ones, and she's kindly let me use any of her recipes on my blog. This is one of them. It always impresses guests because it looks like something you'd buy in a patisserie [at least I hope mine does too!], but is easy to make. I've used British cake tins and temperatures and translated her recipe. Grease and line a 20cm springform tin and preheat oven 180C/gas4 Cream together 175g butter and 175g caster sugar and 1 tspn vanilla extract till nice and fluffy, then beat in 3 eggs. In a bowl add 175g sr flour, 50g ground almonds and 1/2 tspn baking powder. Mix together then add to ...

This is a very plain looking cake, but it's full of flavour. It comes from Indonesia and has been influenced by the spice traders who passed through during the centuries. I love spices, but haven't made a cake with nutmeg before - the odd grated bit in a cake, but this one has 2 tspns of it. It's made by the rubbing-in method and a half the crumbs are put into the base of the cake tin then covered with the rest of the crumbs which has been mixed into a batter mixture. The recipe has been adapted from one I found in 'Bake Your Cake', a book I borrowed from the library a while ago. It's by an Australian author, but I forgot to write down her name! 250g plain flour 250g brown sugar 1 tbspn mixed spice 2 tspns baking powder 130g butter 1 tspn bicarbonate of soda 1 egg 2 tspns nutmeg 150ml milk 2 tbspns caster sugar Preheat oven 180C/gas4 Grease the sides of a 20cm spring form tin then line the bottom with baking paper. Mix the flour, brown sugar, ...

Haven't been well lately, so no baking. Had some family coming today so thought I'd better make and effort and make this cake. It's one I've made many times, using many different toppings, but as I had a lot of uneaten bananas thought I'd use them for a change. It's quite a big cake, made in a 26cm tin ,and served warm, makes a great dessert. The original recipe was in a French magazine I bought when we lived there, but it's been adapted so many times that I'm going to claim it as mine! If you like upside down cakes, this is one with a difference. You make the topping first. Melt 80g of butter in a heavy pan then sprinkle over 200g caster sugar and 100g brown sugar; add the juice of a lemon and 2 tbspns of boiling water. Bring this to the boil then simmer for 10 mins till a golden colour and like caramel. Then slice 5 small ripe bananas into thick slices and add these to the pan with 100g pecans and 100g raisins. Cook for 3 mins over a high heat ...

Because we're now just 2 of us most of the time, I've decided not to join in any more challenges. I felt I was baking just for the challenges, and then we had to eat it. I know challenges are meant to do just that, but unless it's something that will fit in with us, I'm not going to join in. So there will only be 'fancy' cakes as my Mum would say, when we have the children or visitors. But looking through my cookery books and great files of recipes, there are many simpler cakes I've never baked which we'd enjoy, so that's a challenge! This cake came about because I found a packet of ground hazelnuts in my baking cupboard, and they needed using up. I've made this recipe before just using ground almonds, and replacing these with half ground hazelnuts worked fine; it made a slightly nutty cake. The filling is not the usual one for this recipe;T It's a bit extravagant, but delicious. It's such an easy recipe to do, and takes very little ti...

I went to a farmer's market yesterday and couldn't resist buying yet more apples. It's the time of the year for them, for pies, cakes, chutney, jam. What could I do with them that would be something different? I remembered some apple recipes I'd cut out of a magazines ages ago, so I looked through them and found this one. I'm sure there are many recipes for regional Harvest Cakes, but my being Welsh, this recipe seemed very appropriate, and it's not long since we had Harvest.The countryside around us has been buzzing with combines and tractors. It's an unusual cake because the fruit is put in in middle like a sandwich filling, and it seems as if there's much too much fruit for the batter. But have faith, all will be well! Preheat oven 180C/gas4 and grease and line a 18cm cake tin Melt 175g butter with 175g soft brown sugar - don't worry if it's not all dissolved, but stir it. Cool for a bit then add 2 beaten eggs. Sift 225g sr flour together...

My grandsons came for the weekend, and as the weather wasn't very kind, I wanted to find something to do with them. They enjoy cooking, so we made some cookies. The original recipe had walnuts in it, but I needed to use up the last of my pecans. We found the recipe in an old Blue Peter book, which had belonged to the boys' Dad. They were then called biscuits, but cookies sounded more modern. They all took a turn beating the mixture, adding ingredients and making the cookies into balls. I have to own up that I drizzled the chocolate over the ones in the photo - their efforts had the chocolate mainly over the worktop! They proudly took the finished cookies [well most of them!] home for their Mum, and wanted to take some in their lunch boxes. We made 15 cookies. Preheat oven 190C/gas5 and grease 2 baking trays. Put 125g butter, 70g soft brown sugar and 70g caster sugar in a bowl and beat together till nice and creamy. Add 1 beaten egg and beat into the mixture. Fold in 200g...

Another simple but delicious apple cake. Many years ago I entered a competition in a small magazine called 'Home and Freezer Digest'. You had to send in your favourite apple recipe, and the best 100 would be published. I did get a recipe [called 'Nutty Apples'] in the book, and I won a copy of the book [100 Best Apple Recipes] and a year's worth of the magazine. Why am I saying all this, well I found the rather tatty book in the loft recently, and it has some great apple recipes in it. I still had a few of the windfall apples left so decided top make an apple and ginger cake from the book. It's a small cake, so perfect for the 2 of us. It's unusual because the apple puree is mixed into the cake mixture rather than being a layer in the middle of the cake. This gives the cake a good flavour. It could be used as a pudding with some custard - ideal for this colder weather. Preheat oven 180C/gas4 and grease and line a 20cm cake tin. You need: 225g of app...

This is my kind of cake - a nice simple apple loaf cake - just right for using up some apple windfalls which a friend gave me. Have been busy making chutney and trying apple butter [delicious]. I made some apple muffins and scones for my children to take, and this loaf for us. It's also nice as a dessert. You preheat oven 170C/gas3 and line a 900g loaf tin with some baking parchment. Using an electric mixer, beat 175g caster sugar and  175g butter together till nice and fluffy then add 3 eggs, one at a time. Add a tspn of vanilla extract and mix in. In another bowl mix 225g of plain flour together with a tspn of baking powder, a tspn of ginger and a tspn of cinnamon. Add this to the batter and fold in. Then add about 25ml milk to make a soft batter. Peel and core about 3 small apples - chop most of it into small pieces, but leave a few pieces to slice for the top of the loaf. Mix the apple pieces into the batter. Spoon the batter into the tin and arrange the slices along...

I love crumbles of any kind, but this one has become my new love. Pears are one of my favourite fruit, so this recipe was a must try. It came from my French friend, as 'les crumbles' are very fashionable in France too. She likes trying out new flavour combinations and the ones she uses here are very different. When cooked, pears always seem to go mushy, but cooked in this way, they seem to hold their texture. It's also a new way of making a crumble - sprinkling it onto pear halves, instead of onto sliced or quartered pears. You need: for the crumble: 100g flour 80g soft brown sugar 1/2 tspn ginger 80g butter + about 20g to grease the dish 1 tspn soluble coffee for the rest: 4 pears 50g sultanas or raisins 30g butter Preheat oven 180C/gas 4 Put the sultanas or raisins in a bowl of warm water and leave them to soak for about 2 hours. To make the crumble - put the flour in a bowl, add the ginger, sugar, coffee and the butter cut into pieces. Rub the butter...

I love Sticky Toffee pudding, so having it in a cake form is my idea of heaven. The ingredients are virtually the same, just baked instead of steamed. Icing replaces the toffee sauce, but again you use almost the same ingredients. The recipe was given to me by a friend who runs a small cake shop, and this cake is one she makes regularly for her shop, and it's a best seller. So, first preheat your oven to 180C/gas4. Grease and line a 28x18cm tin. You need 225g of dates which you cut into pieces and put in a pan of water and bring to the boil. You boil them uncovered for about 10 mins till the dates are soft. Then take them off the heat and stir in 1 tspn of bicarbonate of soda, and leave to cool. Cream together 175g of soft brown sugar and 115g of butter of margarine; add a tspn of vanilla extract. gradually beat in 2 eggs and fold in the dates and 175g sr flour. Spoon this mixture into your tin and bake for about 35 mins till nicely risen. If you need to, cover the cake...

I haven't made a loaf cake for a while, but having a sort out of my baking cupboard, I found some wholemeal flour, stem ginger and a bag of dried apricots that needed using. Thought they'd make a good combination in a loaf cake. I find using just wholemeal flour make cakes too heavy for my taste, so I always do half wholemeal and half white. It's a quick loaf to make - preheat your oven to 180C/gas 4 and grease a 900g loaf tin. Put 115g wholemeal flour and 115g plain flour in a bowl with 11/2 tspns of baking powder. Add 150g soft light brown sugar, 115g butter, 2 eggs, zest of a lemon and 2 tbspn of milk. Beat together using an electric mixer for about 2 mins then fold in 175g of dried apricots [not the ones you have to soak] which have been chopped. Finely chop 3 pieces of stem ginger and you need 4 tbspns of the syrup from the jar, Add these to the cake mixture. Thinly slice 1 more piece of stem ginger. Spoon the mixture into the loaf tin and level the top, then arra...

Have been trying to unravel the difference between various American words used in desserts - slump, grunt, cobbler and buckle. I've made a cobbler a few times, cutting out scone-like cobbles to put on top of the fruit but what's a grunt or a slump? Great words, and what  pictures they conjure up. I found a recipe in an American book I bought from 'The Works' years ago, for a Blueberry Buckle. This sounded intriguing so I had to make one. What is it? It's a cake mixture with the fruit added which is put into the bottom of the cake tin, and a streusel type mixture is spooned on top. The name Buckle is supposed to have been used because the top of the baked dessert looks like it's buckled under the heat  - it does, so maybe there's some truth in this idea. I altered some of the amounts in the recipe, as there seemed to be too much flour in the cake part. I'll certainly make the recipe again, but I'd use less sugar in the topping as it was way to...

This is a really quick dessert I did to use up some plums which were going soft. It was in a supplement in Woman's Weekly magazine ages ago, and I've made it with various fruit - apricots, pears, apples as well as the original plums. I add cinnamon as we love it. It uses bought puff pastry and store cupboard ingredients, plus the fruit. You need 500g puff pastry, 10 plums which you halve and stone, 4tbspn ground almonds, 1 tbspn icing sugar, 1 tbspn vegetable oil, a tspn cinnamon, about 55g flaked almonds, 2 tbspn honey and milk or beaten egg to brush around the edges of the pastry. You can also use 100g marzipan which you grate, but I didn't use any. You preheat oven 190C/gas5 and you need a baking sheet. Roll the pastry out to a 30x20cm rectangle. Score it 2cm in from the edge all the way round, but don't cut it through. Put the ground almonds, icing sugar and oil in a blender a make into a paste. I used a little more than 1 tbspn oil as my paste wouldn't ...

When living in France, I loved the homely cakes my French neighbours baked, as opposed to the great patisserie you buy in the specialist shops. We took it in turns to make a traditional cake to have with coffee or tea. If it was with tea, it was always a fruit flavoured one or a tisane, never our black tea [except in our house]. This is one my next door neighbour made regularly; it's her grandmother's recipe, and she called it a 'Gateau au chocolat a l'ancienne'. I make it in a loaf tin instead of in the usual 'moule a manque', the traditional round French cake tin. It's great with an afternoon cuppa, or as a dessert with some ice cream or creme anglaise. It's normally made using cooking or dessert chocolate [of which there are many good makes in France], but I use dark chocolate from a supermarket, not an expensive bar. Here's the recipe - it's so easy to make and is delicious. 150g dessert or plain chocolate 3 eggs 100g caster sugar 6...

I wanted to make something different and this recipe fitted the bill. It was given to one of our friends when they were staying in an hotel in Mumbai and is supposed to be a good ending to a spicy meal. I've made yoghurt cake before, such as the one using a yoghurt pot as a measure, but this is completely different; for one thing it uses ghee, clarified butter. There's a big Indian community locally so I was able to find it in one of the Indian shops, but I think I've also seen it in the supermarket.You can make your own - heat double the amount of butter you need and pour it into a dish. Allow it to cool for 15mins then carefully pour off the clear golden liquid on top - this is the ghee. You don't need the milk solids underneath. The cake has an icing made with sour cream and icing sugar. I made a few changes to the recipe as I don't like dessicated coconut, which was used to coat the sides of the cake tin after they'd been greased. The leftovers were added ...

My friend Jenny came to stay recently, and as usual, brought me a few recipes she thought I'd like. We've always exchanged recipes, and her cheesecake is legendary in my family. I have to say that I cheated a bit, as I used tinned peaches because I couldn't find any ripe ones in the shops; it still tasted great. It's very simple - peaches in frangipane. You can use bought pastry too. Jenny said that it tastes better if you grind whole almonds, instead of buying ground almonds ready done. It didn't take long to whizz them in the food processor.                              400g shortcrust pastry [can use butter JusRol if you're feeling lazy]                             200g whole blanched almonds                             150g caster sugar       ...

A few photos from my tiny urban garden. We've tried to pack a lot into it, and our veg are doing well in Grow Bags in the greenhouse. This year we're growing 5 different types of tomatoes, French beans, peppers  various types of salad, peppers and chillies. My OH has built 2 large planters and one is full of herbs with a climbing rose growing up the bag on trellis, and the other has flowers, with another rose climbing at the back.                              We have lots of pots around, and this one has a pretty azalea I bought earlier this year. The climbing rose was here when we moved in, so we planted a clematis and this year it's been beautiful, growing up into the rose. This rose is our farewell gift from our lovely French neighbours. We planted it in a pot, and now it's still in its pot but we've cut out the base so its roots can go down into the ground. It has a wonderful p...

We had some friends for a few days and it was G's birthday, so I wanted to make a nice dessert instead of a cake. He loves ginger, and I had a large jar of ginger confit bought on our last French trip. This could give the cheesecake a good ginger flavour, and be the decoration on the top. I read somewhere recently that ricotta makes a good cheesecake, so decided to use half ricotta and half my usual Philly. I used digestive biscuits, but could have used something with chocolate in them. 180g biscuits 250g ricotta 250g Philadelphia cheese 200g dark chocolate 2 eggs and 1 yolk 80g caster sugar 80g candied ginger and 50g for the decoration 60g butter Icing sugar for top Preheat oven 150C/gas2 You need a 23cm springform tin. Blitz the biscuits in a food processor or bash them with a rolling pin. Melt the butter and mix with the biscuits crumbs. Use your fingers to press it into the base of the tin, then put in the fridge. Melt the broken up chocolat...

We love tea breads and loaf cakes, or anything with fruit in really. I found this recipe in my cuttings folder, and I think it originally came from 'Woman's Weekly' magazine a few years ago. I adapted it to suit our tastes, as the original recipe used prunes, apple and pecans. It also used wholemeal flour, but I'd run out, so used white. I added some cinnamon, which is always good with apples, imho, and I didn't toast the pecans, as suggested. So here's my adapted recipe: 1 apple [about 175g - I used a granny Smith with its skin on] 175g dried apricots 175g pecans 11/2 tspns baking powder 220g plain flour 110g butter or margarine 175g light demerara sugar 2 beaten eggs 3 tbspn milk Preheat oven 180C/gas4 Grease and bottom line a 900g loaf tin. Add the baking powder and cinnamon to the flour and sieve into a bowl. Then add the other ingredients, except the fruit and nuts, and beat together with an electric hand mixer. If the mixture seems to thic...