COOKBOOKS GALORE

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 gold...

Something savoury for a change.  I recently bought myself a deep fluted tartlet tin from our excellent local family 'everything you'll ever need' store, so for New Year's Eve, I made some tartlets to have as part of the buffet. I suppose they're like little quiches, as they have an egg filling. I made 2 types -  bacon and cheese and mushroom and garlic. I used the HB's recipe from their 'Perfect Pies' book, but used my deep tin instead of making them in mini muffin tins. I made 18 tartlets. I can't find the recipe online so this is what you'll need. The pastry is a shortcrust one with a little grated cheese added, rolled and and cut out to fit your tin. The egg custard type filling is enough for the 18, and it's just eggs, creme fraiche, some chopped parsley, s&p. For the bacon and cheese you need a little onion fried with the bacon, put into the pastry case and top up with some egg custard. Sprinkle some grated cheese on ...