Broccoli and Cauliflower Soup

I love soups. As far as I am concerned, they warm the sould as well as the belly so this is why I am particularly pleased with this broccoli and cauliflower soup as it does both of those things and then some. Now there is an added bonus to this soup and that is .... it is very low calorie. This is wonderful for those days, and we all have them, when you need to cut back and take a little fat off the belly. This soup is a way of filling your belly but not adding inches to it.

Let me tell you that you will love this enough to make it any time not just on the days when you want to reduce. Serve with hot buttered toast for a wonderful not skinny treat.

I worked out that this soup in total has only about 300 calories so that's just 75 calories per serving.

You will need?

400g of broccoli and cauliflower florettes. I tend to buy the ready prepared packs in the supermarket,
1 onion (about 100g)
1 medium carrot
1 stalk of celery
1 knorr stock cube
100ml milk
water
salt and pepper to taste

Basically all that you need to do is put all of the above ingredients except the milk into a saucepan. Cover with water. Just cover is best as you can adjust the liquid later.
Bring to the boil and simmer until all of the vegetables are really soft.
Blitz with a stick blender.
Add the milk and enough water to bring the quantity up to 1200ml. This will give you enough for 4 mugs full of soup. Reheat and serve.

Hunger pangs will be staved off and you will not feel at all guilty. Now where's the toast?

Boston Cream Pie with a twist

I just love Boston Cream Pie. It's soft sponge is filled with creamy custard that melts in your mouth. If this is not good enough this flavour overload is enhanced by a topping of fabulous chocolate ganach. It is a cake of dreams and begs to be eaten alone so that you can sigh over every mouthful.

The twist? Use rum to flavour the cream.

To start you will make a light crumbly sponge. There are two possibilities for this cake: a Victorial sponge or a genoise. I chose to make the genoise as it is the lighter of the two. Also, as this cake needs to be stored in the fridge, the lower butter content of the genoise stops the sponge from firming up.

So start by making your cake.

Heat your oven to C 180.
Have a 23cm or 9 inch tin ready. Grease and flour it in readiness for your sponge.

I used 3 large free range eggs which were at room temperature.
100g caster sugar
100g SR flour
30g butter melted
a pinch of salt
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

Start by breaking the eggs into a very clean and grease free bowl that is large enough to allow the eggs to expand when they have been beaten. Using a hand held whisk, beat the eggs until they are foamy.

The next step is to add the sugar. I was once told to heat the sugar before adding it to the eggs as this helps to create volume in the whisked eggs. I have always used this method when possible. It means that you don't have to have the eggs over  boiling water and to my mind this is no bad thing. Boiling water and electricity are not always good bed fellows. Whist the sugar and eggs together until they reach the ribbon stage. This will take about 10 minutes.

Now fold the sifted flour into the mix and then fold in the melted butter. Make sure that there are no streaks of flour or butter left. Be careful not to over mix as the sponge will not rise.

Cook in your preheated oven until golden and the sponge springs back when touched gently with your finger tip.  I did say gently. This is what it should look like when turned out onto a cooling rack.

NB I used a silicone baking form. I greased and floured it first as there is so little fat in the songe that I didn't want it to stick. As you see, it didn't.

I left the cake upside down as it gave a better surface to ice later on.

Allow your sponge to cool. Then transfer to a serving plate. Do it before you fill it an ice it. You will find that it is too soft to do it later. You will thank me for this advice.

While it's cooling make the pastry cream.

2 large egg yolks.

2 heaped tablespoons of sugar

1 heaped tablespoon of cornflour

1 teaspoon of vanilla or, for a real treat, 2 tbsp dark rum. Yumm

200ml whole milk

In a large mixing bowl, mix together the eggs and sugar until they are well blended. Beat in the flour and cornflour and set aside. Add the vanilla essence.

Bring the milk to the boil. I did mine in the microwave. Slowly pour half of the hot milk onto the egg mixture, whisking all the time, then add the remaining milk.

Bring the mixture back to the boil and simmer for one minute, whisking continuously, or until smooth.

Pour the cream into a clean bowl and top with cling film to prevent a skin forming.  Cool as quickly as possible. When cooled, refrigerate until needed.

So by this tile your cake will be well and truly cooled. Cut through the middle horizontally and fill the bottom half with the cooled pastry cream. Plese remember that the cream sets as it cools so if you put it on too soon it can run out and spoil the effect of the cake. As you can see, mine is fairly thick. If you have stouble setting your custard I have found a quick cheat. Mix half of the custard with some instant custard (about a tbs will usually do the trick) and heat in the microwave until thick. Then add to the remaining custard and leave to cool. Works a treat.

Put the top of the cake over the cream.

Now you can ice the cake with the chocolate ganach.

50 g dark chocolate of your choice chopped
75 ml double cream
1 teaspoon of oil.

This is simplicite itself.

Bring your cream to just below the boil. Add the chopped chocolate and oil and mix well. The chocolate will melt in the hot cream and will not need to be reheated. Allow to cool to a point where the ganach is still pourable but not so liquid that it will run straight off the sides of the cake.
Allow to set and then get a knife and dive in. You won't be disappointed.

A plea for a recipe

In February I bought the Waitrose Kitchen Magazine, February 2013. from it I made a pear, caramel and peacan crumble tart. My husband said that it was one of the best tarts that I had ever made. My grandaughter thought it look so good that I must have bought it. 

Well what's the problem?

I lost the magazine....

Can anyone help?

Please!!

Crispy Chick Pea and Mackeral Croquettes

This is another in the series of 'Simple Supper' recipes even though I actually ate it for lunch.

The name of this post is quite a mouthful but the croquettes themselves are small, flavoursome and beautiful. I made them, gulp, because now is the time to reduce the tummy fat and these are low gi food. They are tasty though. So you won't feel hard done by for eating healthily.

So, Simply take:

1 tin of chickpeas
1 small tin of mackerel fillets.
1 tbsp capers
1 small egg. If your egg is large, then don't use it all as the croquettes will be too soft
Oil for frying.
A salad to serve.

All I did:

Put the drained chick peas in the bowl of the food processor with the entire contents of the tin of mackerel fillets. No need to drain the oil. Pulse until semi smooth.
Add the capers and the egg and pulse again, This will  break up the capers and mix in the egg.
Turn out into a bowl and refrigerate for about 30 mins.
Fry large spoonsful until crisp on both sides and cooked through.
Serve with a dresses salad.

Simply Supper - Take 1 tin ot Tuna

Do you remember that many years ago there were adverts for Sainsburys that started with "Simply take...?" Well, this is my take on that. (Pardon the pun).

This recipe will serve 2 hungry people.

Simply take

1 tin ot tuna
1 dessertspoon on chopped capers
10 cherry tomatoes, quartered
2 tbsp of olive oil
250 g of dry tagliatelle. Don't waste your money o the so called fresh stuff.

Put a large pan of salted water on to boil. When it has come to a good rolling boil throw in the pasta. stir and simmer gently until the pasta is cooked.

While the water is coming to a boil, warm some olive oil in a largish pan and add the chopped capers and quartered tomatoes. When they are warm through add the tuna that you have broken up slightly. Make sure that the sauce only heats rather than boils. This way you will retail the tase of the olive oil.

By this time the pasta should be cooked. Strain and add to the sauce. Toss ot all together and serve. Yum.

Simple Supper - Ham and Potato Soup

I thought that I would start a series of simple suppers for those days when you really don't know what to cooka nd it's a question of looking in the fridge and making quick decisions. However, like all quick decisions, there has to be some sort of planning beforehand. To this end, when you boil a piece of ham, keep the stock. It will keep for a few days in  the fridge or ages in the freezer.

This recipe is not precise, a bit like Nigel Slater's recipes at the moment, so make more or less according to how many people you are feeding and how much stock you have. I had about a pint of stock left in the fridge. So this made enough for 2.

Simply take

ham stock (there was onion and celery in the stock already)

1 carrot, chopped

about 8 small new potatoes, peeled and chopped into bite size pieces.

a fistful of ham chopped into bite size cubes

about 50g of frozen peas

Add the carrots to the stock and bring it to the boil. When the carrots and potatoes are cooked throw in the chopped ham and the peas. Simmer until the peas are cooked. Add about a teacup of milk and adjust seasoning. Enjoy.

Not only did i enjoy this soup, but it also gave me the opportunity to play around with photoshop too. The lighter edges are the result of this rather than light leekage in the camera.

New adventures in Panettone

Panettone is one of the breads that has become more and more popular in the UK. If you have visited Italy in the weeks preceding Christmas you will have seen that the windows of bakers shops are full of lovely artisan panettone. They are piled in mounds and their look of plenty characterises the abundant  season perfectly. Sadly the artisan panettone is not easily found in the UK. So, with this in mind I have decided to embark on a panettone adventure. Silly I know. I have enough to do, but I love a challenge.

I have read copiously on this subject. and there is a very good blog post on

http://www.wildyeastblog.com/2012/12/18/panettone-recipe/

Where you can learn a lot of very good info about the making of panettone and why it takes so long to get it right.

However, and there often is an however with me, I have made a few changes as some of the ingredients that she uses do not fall readily from the supermarket shelves.

The panettone, like Rome,  is not made in a day. So, first and foremost give yourself at least 24 hours. That does not include the cooling time which is as important as every other stage. Doing a rough count on these figures, It will take a day and a half to make a panettone.

Next important point to remember: The first raising takes about 12 hours. So, if you can possibly manage it, make the panettone in the evening and then your panettone will be ready to cook in the late afternoon of the next day. This will allow you to cool the loaf and, if all is well, you can eat your panettone for breakfast the next day. Yumm.

If you want to have the characteristic shape, it is good to have high sided tins for making panettone. I bought two from Lakeland. This recipe will make two panettone. I bought 18cm x 7.5cm tins.

The panettone dough is made in two stages.

First  Ingredients:

• 350 grams flour I used 250g strong flour and 100g plain flour. (Italians tend not to use flour that is too high in gluten. The use of the 'mother dough' will help to develop gluten and keep the crumb soft.
• 190 grams water
• 20g fresh yeast.Thank you Tesco for the yeast.
• 83 grams sugar
• 3 medium egg yolks. I used British eggs but as I always I am disappointed with the colour. Only in Italy are the eggs bright yellow. Oh to be there.
• 83 grams unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 86 grams lievito madre. See my other posts on making this prized beauty that I keep alive in my fridge.

Put all of these ingredients in the bowl of a stand mixer with a dough hook.  Allow to mix on a low speed until the mixture becomes pliable and the gluten has developed into long strands. All that I can say about this is that if you pull the dough it should be about 24 to 30 inches long before it breaks. It truly is magical when this happens. I had to call my husband to show off. Well, why not. Cover. leave at room temperature overnight.

Back tomorrow

Well tomorrow took rather a few more days than anticipated as my daughter was ill and we had to go and look after her. 

So here'e the next stage:

Second Set of Ingredients: Again this deviated from wild yeast as her addition of water made the dough far, far too wet.

• all of the first dough
• 150 grams flour
• 5 grams (7/8 teaspoon) salt
• 2 egg yolks
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract or paste
• zest of half a medium orange
• 80 grams sugar
• 125 grams unsalted butter, at room temperature (pliable)
• 20 grams honey
• 150 grams raisins
• 126 grams candied orange peel... I made my own.... See below   

Put the first dough in the mixing bowl and add the egg yolks, honey, sugar, salt, vanilla orange peel. Mix until combined. If you think that the mixture is too still add about a tablespoon of water.

Now add half of the flour at a time, combine well between each addition.

Cut the butter into cubes and, while the mixer is on low speed, drop a few chunks in at a time. Make sure that all is well combined and the mixture has become fairly sticky. Don't add water now.

Add the candid fruit and raisins and mix until all is combined. 

Divide the mixture in half. It will be quite sticky and long strands of gluten will cling to your fingers while you try to do this. This is what you want.

Lightly flour your work board and oil your fingers. Now fold the dough from underneath into the centre a few times. This is essential as it will strengthen the gluten and help the panettone to keep its shape while rising and cooking. Drop into the oiled tin or papers. Cover with a clean carrier bag or a shower cap and leave in a warm place to rise.