Category Archives: Baking

Ginger loaf cake

Posted on 2 January, 2011 | Comments Off

I’ve been loving the ginger loaf cake that Starbucks have for their Christmas period but alas it will soon be no more. I thought I’d have a go at my own instead.

This beauty has stem ginger, sticky black treacle and orange zest in it. I’ve topped it with cream cheese icing. It was inspired by this version over at BBC Good Food.

I love January for being quiet. I get my time to clean and cook back. Too much of that and I get bored but I love the shift in balance and my liver loves the lack of alcohol. Expect many more baking posts this month!

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Macarons Part 2

Posted on 21 November, 2010 | Comments Off

I made these today with my newly found skills. They are raspberry. The basic recipe is taken from this amazing book.

Three main tricks:

  1. The egg whites need to be at room temperature before you start.
  2. Be very careful when you fold in the almonds and icing sugar. Cut the mixture in half with a spatula and then sweep underneath the mixture then turn the bowl.
  3. Draw circles on the baking paper to act as a guide to make your piping neater.

These went a little bit wrong but not as much as the ones before. Next time, the oven needs to be cooler. I reckon 140C will be about right. Still – they are a second attempt I can be proud of.

I feel a category dedicated to macrons will be in order soon.

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Macrons Part 1

Posted on 21 November, 2010 | Comments Off

I went to a macron making class yesterday. It was a 2 hour session at L’Atelier des Chefs and it was given to me by my ex-colleagues at Tangent as a leaving gift (as a happy aside I’m now at Iris).

It was the absolute perfect gift as I’ve tried so many times to make these but failed miserably. It turns out that sucess is mostly determined by the consistency of the meringue mixture. The picture below is of the compeleted chocolate and coconut macarons.

A very heartening first attempt and a massive improvement on all previous attempts. Watch this space.

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