Savoury Forest Cake

When the French use the word 'cake' they usually mean a savoury cake. My friend has quite a repertoire of recipes for them, and passed some on to me.

 I made two of them last weekend as part of a buffet in our local church hall.  They made a change from quiche, and people seemed to like them.

This recipe used mushrooms, shallots and smoked bacon pieces and is made in a 900g loaf tin.

Preheat oven 200C/gas6 and grease and line the loaf tin.

Clean and slice 300g mushrooms [I used chestnut ones but the choice is yours].
Chop 2 shallots finely and add to a non stick pan with 50g smoked lardons and the mushrooms.
Cook gently till all their water has gone. Leave them to cool.

Beat 150g butter and add 3 eggs one at a time. Add 5 cl of milk and 200g plain flour with 2 tspn of baking powder added.

Spoon in the mushroom mixture and add salt and pepper - careful with the salt - taste, as there's salt in the lardons.

Put into the tin and bake for about 40 mins till golden. Check it's cooked. remove from tin and cool on a wire rack.




A variation on the cake which we love is a Burgundy version. The savoury mixture is 150g tiny onions, 300g white mushrooms and 50g lardons. Cook in pan for 3-4 mins then add 20cl Burgundy red wine and cook till the liquid has totally evaporated. Make the cake mixture using the same measurements as above.

I love the textures in the Forest cake - soft mushrooms, tasty bites of bacon, little hits of shallots and then the cake holding it all together.




Comments

I've never really understood how 'cake' came to mean savoury cake in French but there's a lot I don't understand about the French language so that's no surprise. This sounds just perfect alongside a glass of something chilled on a summer's evening.
I love this idea. I'm a huge frittata fan but this is one to give a go.
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