Millionaire’s Shortbread

I mentioned last time how I had my eye on this dessert. Not strictly true – the ingredients were already in the cupboard. It was only a matter of time…

Some things, I’ll only bake once in a very long while. Sometimes, something is so sinfully delicious it is simply too bad for the hips and too good for the lips to be made repeatedly. Such as in the case of this Millionaire Shortbread.
The name for this shortbread is totally right: forget fit for a king, fit for a millionaire is the best. Millionaires shortbread is basically a layer of shortbread (shocker!) topped with a thick caramel layer, all finished with a chocolate topping. Mmm!

The recipe is not too hard to make, but there are a few point it could go wrong. You need to be careful that you don’t overcook the caramel or it will get either too hard to cut (and you’ll lose the wonderful squidgyness) or it will come out with a slightly burnt flavour, no good to anyone. You can make this with a cheesecake-style base of crushed biscuits, but then I feel its not millionaire’s shortbread is it? Overall, this shortbread was oh-so good. And it disappears far too quickly for our liking – the reason its only made rarely. My minor grumbles would be in trying to stretch out the layers to fill the tin, they layers turned out pretty thin (particularly the chocolate) and you lose something about the decadence of the thing! I’d prefer to have thicker layers and smaller richer pieces at a go!

Millionaires Shortbread
Shortbread: 9oz plain flour
6oz butter
3oz sugar
Cut the butter into the flour and sugar, either quickly in a food processor or by hand. Rub the butter in until it resembles breadcrumbs, and then begin to pull and “squish” the dough together. Press into a tin, and bake for around 15minutes at 150’C. Leave to cool.
Caramel Layer: 150g butter
150g sugar
4tbsp golden syrup
307g tin of condensed milk
Melt all the ingredients together in a large saucepan. Stir absolutely constantly – making sure the mixture doesn’t catch on the sides or base of the pan. Its all about the colour change – from pale and white to a deep golden (takes about fifteen minutes). However stop as soon as it over thickens or lots of black bits appear. Pour onto the cooled shortbread and let set softly.
Chocolate Layer: 200g chocolate
Gently melt chocolate in a bowl over a saucepan of simmering water, or in the microwave. When completely melted – spread onto caramel. Leave to cool and set before slicing into tall soft slices!

Passion-fruit and Lemon Cheesecake

This cheesecake shouts pure summer to me. Currently, the rain and low temperatures outside my window shout pure winter. Strange contrast really, a slight “in your face” to the weather. But the main point is, this is a mighty fine cheesecake.
Why such a mighty fine cheesecake? Lets go through. Crumbly, buttery biscuit base: classic good cheesecake. Thick, rich, creamy middle with very strong lemon “tang”. All topped off with big tropical flavour from juicy fresh passion-fruit. Plus the best bit: So Very Simple To Make!
  The recipe was sent to me from my Mum, and she found it on the Carnation Nestle website. Celebrity chef Phil Vickery has created loads and loads of recipes using all the Nestle products (condensed milk and soft caramel) and not only put all the recipes on the website, but also turned loads of them into “Pudcasts“ (videos of him making the creations): my new favourite thing. Its amazing the variety of dishes he’s thought up using these ingredients: from cookies and truffles to sundaes and mini treats to pies and tarts. And this lovely cheesecake!

The clever thing Phil Vickery discovered is that when condensed milk reacts with lemon juice, the mixture thickens dramatically. That's how this cheesecake is so simple: you don’t need to bake it or add gelatine to thicken it, the reaction has already occurred when you mix the lemon juice into the mascarpone and condensed milk mix. After a few hours in the fridge: voila! Creamy gorgeousness at your service. Then its just a simple matter of spooning over the passion-fruit. However, in the original recipe, Phil fills the cheesecake with a blueberry compote, something I chose to leave out. I thought it might overpower the passion-fruit, so I added the juice and zest of a couple of extra lemons so that there were complimenting bright flavours rather than overpowering ones. Also, the original recipe states to use 4 passion-fruit, but to get a decent covering like I had below I used 6. If anyone tries it with the blueberry, then do tell me how it went! You can find the recipe (and have a happy time browsing all the others) here. I personally have my eye on the Millionaire’s Shortbread….Enjoy!

Aldeburgh Food Festival

Almost a month ago now, at the end of September, I was lucky enough to go with my Mum to the Aldeburgh Food Festival in Suffolk. Whilst called the Aldeburgh festival, the main show is in the lovely Snape Maltings. The Aldeburgh Food Festival is massive, as the whole of the county gets involved in mini events across the weekend festival. The festival celebrates all the fantastic food and foodie businesses in Suffolk so they were all there showing their yummy produce (I love tasters!) There were also big marquees with a few celeb chefs showing off the local produce in some recipes. Here are my pictures from the day I went – enjoy!
^ Food writer and critic Matthew Fort (left) did a great show with celebrity chef Tom Parker-Bowles. They are good friends and were fun to watch – especially as they had not planned what to cook but gone around all the stalls before hand to gather inspiration and ingredients.
^ Ah, the beauty of front row seats! Restaurateur Mark Hix (left) and friend Marcus Verbene, head chef at the Browns Hotel in Mayfair also did a show but it was not as entertaining. They did however make some interesting game dishes, with lots of ingredients I've never used before. ^ Winner of the Suffolk Raised Pie competition, judged by Matthew Forte. Beauty!
^ High House Farm apple juice – this stuff is nectar! Wonderfully fresh and sharp tasting – mmm!

^ I hadn’t heard of this company before but I did buy a bottle of this: it had a strong kick from both piles of ginger and the chilli addition – it was a great combination.


^ I want this van. Its a mobile chocolate business, Choc Star, and above is their amazing menu. I repeat, I want this van.



^ Failing that, I would happily LIVE in this above van, the Creperie, perhaps purely for the bunting… :)

^ This Chilli con carne van was pretty cool too!

^ Alder Tree is an ice cream company in Suffolk and their ice creams are gorgeous! I have tried the Toffee Apple which has scrumptious pieces of toffee swirled in, and the Tayberry, which is a berry like a cross between loganberries and raspberries, and totally sublime.

I had a lovely day the festival, and enjoyed seeing all the brilliant business ideas and fun companies the people ran. I was very envious of some of their lives (and vans..)! The festival also proved to me how much I want to do something foodie when I grow up. Hope you enjoyed!

Fruity Bread

Yup, I’ve made rather a lot of loaf cakes on this blog. All different, I hasten to add, but still all loaf cakes. I never really think I like them that much, but with beauties like these I always prove myself wrong! And this little cake was no exception :)

The recipe was from the brilliant blog, English Mum In Ireland. This bake is, just like English Mum says, the perfect cake for the afternoon (4pm) lull when something sweet should just hit the spot. A thick slice of this and a big old cup of tea – perfect! Except, I’m 14 and don’t like tea so p’raps just a big slice of this for me :)

Look at the top of this marvel! Chock-a-block with sultanas, raisins, cherries, dried pineapple: one beauty of this cake is how you can adapt it to suit what you like or what you have in the cupboards – it doesn’t always have to be the same. Also, after a day or so this cake is one of those fantastic bakes that morphs into a very rich teabread – even better with a slather of butter on a slice. So, for a simple bake to fill up your tummy in the afternoons – head to English Mum and find the recipe here.

Lemon Loveliness

There are a lot of times in winter, like I touched on a while ago, when I crave warm comforting dinners. A bowl of stew or fat “wodge” of crumble is always going to make a chilly night all cosy and delicious! But as you leave autumn and edge towards winter, there are times when I also crave something light, refreshing and zingy: just to wake me out of the dark winter stupor. This little dessert does just that…

It is a light lemon mousse with little lemon madeleines! I’ve found that I tend to just make a cookie, or a cake, rather than say a pie with a fancy sauce or something, you know? Such as in restuarants – they do fancy things such as “Textures of Strawberry” where you get a strawberry donut, strawberry milkshake, chocolate strawberry and little strawberry tart all as one dessert. Whilst I’m not about to start bringing out foams and emulsions any time soon – I think it is nice to have two little treats accompanying each other for pudding: its sort of the difference between a pudding and a dessert!

Ooh, I do like a little bit of lemon! In fact, lemon is the second most popular flavour of things I have baked on this blog, just behind chocolate. Can’t go wrong with a bit of citrus :) Although saying that, this mousse didn’t turn out quite as delicious as hoped. The comments on it were, “a bit too sweet” and “slightly curdled tasting” – not perfect but sadly true! I can’t pinpoint exactly where or why this mousse turned out wrong, but there was just something wrong! It didn’t have the texture of lovely smooth tangy mousse, just very fluffy and eggy. I’ve given the recipe at the bottom anyway as maybe some people like their mousse like that (?) or maybe one clever blogger knows why it wasn’t good. Thankfully, the madeleines were a different story!

The madeleines were light, zesty, full of lemon flavour – yum :) My one problem with these was, in the picture they turned a pretty golden brown when they were cooked. Once these were cooked nicely – they still hadn’t changed colour! Still, nothing a pretty coating of icing sugar cannot hide.

Both the mousse and the madeleines were from the most gorgeous book – Bills Food by Bill Granger. I so recommend this book. The photos are stunning, and most pages in here just make you want to move to sunny Australia! Plus, the recipes aren’t half bad – another one from this book coming up shortly! I’ve given the recipe for both the mousse and madeleines, but I honestly would not give the mousse a go :S !

Oaty Raspberry Muffins

There are times, rare times, when I want to bake, but also mind about being that li-ittle bit healthier. But just because thinks are healthier, doesn’t mean they are going to be baked any less tasty! One ingredient that could always make me feel healthier, even if surrounded by kilos and kilos of chocolate – would be oats.

See, as soon as you throw a handful or two of oats into a muffin (or anything baked!) I can feel just that bit better about having a second helping. And once you’ve added some yummy juicy fruit (in this case raspberries) – why stop at two helpings? After all, muffins are best on the day they are made ;)

The recipe for these Raspberry and Oat muffins came from the lovely must-read Bibliocook blog, where the muffins are originally made with blueberries. Having none of these available, I substituted for frozen raspberries, and added a few minutes onto the cooking time. Ooh, these were delicious! The raspberry juices stained the muffin a pretty light pink inside – and they smelled divine! Mmm :) If you’re a muffin fan, then these are most definitely for you. You can find the recipe here. Until next time!

Sticky Ginger Cake

One of my teachers, Miss B, knows I love cooking and was proud to tell me that over the summer she had won six prizes for her baking. One of those award winning recipes, was this ginger cake.

After tasting a slice of her loaf, I knew I wanted to bake it, so I asked “is this your secret recipe?” Thankfully she replied no, it was from the Tesco website. And so, it was made and enjoyed. Twice :)

This cake is quite simple to bake, you’d think, all though the first time I made it, it was slightly undercooked. Whilst this didn’t stop us from liking and eating it, it was certainly better the second time! This loaf cake is the sort of bake that gets better (ie stickier!) after a week or so: but in our family this is unlikely to happen! It turned out moist and sticky, with a lovely warmth from the spices (I upped the amount of ginger and added cinnamon for more depth). Its also the sort of cake which you cut, eat and walk away from, just to want to go back for more. Its sturdiness makes it brilliant for picnics too! Now, after that effusive list of positives I’m just left to say: its pretty much an all rounder cake – enjoyed by everyone, its deservedly award winning, and just generally delicious :)

Blackberry & Apple Turnovers

Here in the UK, it’s that time of year where we experience the shift between the sunny days of summer and the rapidly cooling days of autumn. For me, the difference is most noticeable with the gathering of new stationery and uniform: and the inevitable return to school. But food wise, the change is also quietly happening. Instead of feasting on fresh strawberries, I enjoy blackberries. Instead of juicy nectarines and peaches, there are big, crunchy apples. Instead of cooling ice-creams and frozen mousse, I turn on the oven, bake and use pastry...

Blackberry and apple turnovers. Just delicious. They don’t claim to be fancy, they don’t take up your time and patience to make or sit proudly in Michelin-starred restaurants. They’re just there, quietly, humbly, for when you get in from a walk, or as a reward when you’ve finished homework. Going back to school is never going to be a hugely joyful occasion, but the addition of a juicy turnover will be guaranteed to make it that little bit better.

Other than the simplicity of them, another reason I enjoyed these turnovers so much was because of the ingredients. I made these whilst in our cottage in Suffolk, where the abundance of fresh fruit was great. We have a huge apple tree in the garden there, so the apples were all our own. And the lanes all around us were edged thickly with the thick wild brambles full of big blackberries. Baking is all the more fun when the ingredients are your own and free!

There is no recipe needed, really, as you just need puff pastry and glorious fresh fruit. Once the pasty is rolled, use an extra large cookie cutter (I just cut round a small bowl) to get large circles of the pastry. Pile your fruit of choice on one half of the pastry, and carefully fold the other half over the top, trying to avoid sharp chopped-apple corners! Crimp the edges together really well – otherwise they’ll all split open, as some of mine did, and you’ll lose all the lovely juices. Then just bake for about 10-15minutes until the pastry is golden brown and puffed. Its best to eat on the day they are made or the pastry goes a bit soggy – but I doubt this will be much of a hardship!
Till next time, :) XX