Luumua ja mantelia - Plum and almond

 Eilen töiden jälkeen nappasin pussillisen luumuja kaupasta sen kummemmin miettimättä mitä niillä tekisin, mutta tänään tuli himo tehdä luumu-mantelipiirakkaa johon Englannissa asuessani rakastuin. Yleensä kun yhdistää kaksi rakastamaansa ruoka-ainesta on lopputuloskin tuplasti rakastettava, tässä tapauksessa ehkä vielä enemmän.Tätä tulen ihan varmasti tekemään uudelleen ja uudelleen ja uudelleen...  Ohjetta jouduin hetken etsiskelemään ja lopulta päädyin helpoimpaan ja kauneimpaan reseptiin joka löytyi blogista jota voin muutoinkin suuresti suositella, ihana Cannelle et Vanille. Noin hienoihin ruokakuviin haluan minäkin pyrkiä!

After work yesterday I grabbed a bag of plums from the shop without thinking, but today I had a epiphany - I needed to make a plum and almond tart! I fell in love with this dessert in England. This recipe combines two ingredients that I love so I double-love the recipe, if not a little more even. I'm sure I will make this again and again and again... After some searching I ended up with the easiest and prettiest recipe that I could find, at the wonderful blog Cannelle et Vanille. I recommend this blog to anyone, the photography is something to aspire to!

 Luumu-mantelipiirakka
 Ohjeesta saa yhden suuren piirakan tai kaksi pienempää, kuten minä tein. (Luumut ei siis ole jättiläislajiketta!)

150 gr kananmunan valkuaista
155 gr sokeria
70 gr vehnäjauhoja
65 gr mantelijauhoja
190 gr suolaamatonta voita, sulatettuna ja viilennettynä
Pussillinen luumuja

1. Vatkaa valkuaiset ja sokeri kevyeksi vaahdoksi.
2. Lisää vehnäjauho ja mantelijauho, sekoita.
3. Lisää sulatettu voi varovasti kunnes taikina on tasaista.
(4. Alkuperäisessä ohjeessa kehoitettiin pitämään taikina yön yli jääkaapissa, minä kärsimättömänä laitoin piirakan uuniin noin tunnin jäähdyttelyn jälkeen ja hyvää tuli!)
5. Levitä taikina voideltuun piirakkavuokaan, täytä noin puoliväliin. Asettele puolikkaat luumut taikinan pinnalle leikkauspinta ylöspäin, upota
6. Paista 175 asteessa noin puoli tuntia kunnes taikinan pinta on kullanruskea ja reunat mukavan rapeat. Tarjoile vaniljajäätelön tai -kastikkeen kanssa

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------.
Plum and Almond Tart
This recipe will make one large or two small tarts (I made small ones, those are not giant plums!)

150 gr egg whites
155 gr sugar
70 gr flour
65 gr almond flour
190 gr unsalted butter, melted and cooled

1. Whisk together the egg whites and the sugar into a light foam. 
2. Add the flour and almond flour, mix. 
3. Slowly add the melted and cooled butter until the batter is smooth. 
(4. According to the original recipe you should leave the batter in the fridge overnight. I'm a rebel (And impatient) so I didn't and think my tart was still fantastic. Up to you what you decide to do!)
5. Spread the batter onto a buttered tart pan. Fill the pan about half way up. Top with the halved plums.
6. Bake in 175 degrees celsius in the oven  for about 30 minutes until the pastry is golden brown and nice and crisp on the sides. Serve with vanilla ice cream or custard.

Death by chocolate cake

Ehem,here is where I say how busy it's been and blah blah blah, except I'm not gonna. Let's just accept that this blog is not updated daily, not weekly, sometimes not even monthly. Such is life.

Anyhows, here finally comes the recipe for the amazingly rich dark chocolate cake, originally found at Suolaa & hunajaa . I have made it twice, for my other half's birthday (/our engagement party) and for my sister-in-law's birthday. Same cake, different fillings. Many of the pics on this post were taken by Kate, thank you!!

Chocolateeee...

 Death by chocolate cake

Sponge

200g good quality dark chocolate

6 eggs (separate whites and yolks)

2 dl caster sugar

120g almond flour

50g butter

0,5 dl flour

1. Melt the chocolate and butter over boiling water.

2. Whip egg yolks and sugar until fluffy. Whip the egg whites separately into a firm foam.

3. Add the melted chocolate-butter into the egg yolks.

4. Add flour and almond flour.

5. Gently mix in the egg whites.

6. Bake for about 30 minutes in 180 degrees celsius. The time depends on the oven, just be careful not to overcook to avoid the cake from being too dry. 

7. Allow to cool before filling.

Filling

The original recipe had a chocolate mousse filling but I thought that would have been a bit too much, because the cake is also iced with chocolate. I made a fresh lemony filling instead.

1/2 jar of Lemon curd

1 tub of mascarpone

1. Mix the lemon curd with the mascarpone until smooth. Taste and and add lemon curd to desired amount. I prefer plenty of lemon! Next time I would like to make my own lemon curd so I could make it more sour.

2. Cut the sponge and fill. Moistening the sponge first with juice or booze optional. I think I splashed some Coientreau on it...

Chocolate icing

180g dark chocolate

1,5 dl cream

1. Melt the chocolate over boiling water.

2. Bring the cream to boil.

3. Mix the cream to the chocolate until smooth.

4. Spread on the cake and allow to set. Decorate to taste. I had candied violet petals that we found in a little epicerie in Paris, as well as chocolates.

The other version had lemon quark as the filling and groundcherries on top.

Lemon....

Idiotic "I made a cake" grin!

Can I have some cake please? with puppy eyes

May you bake this cake and eat it too! I know I will make this one many more times...

Pomegranate & Blood Orange

Cut segments out of a couple of blood oranges, add a little grenadine for colour, place at the bottom of a bowl.
Mix some rich Turkish yoghurt with crushed macadamia nuts and grated white chocolate, season with cinnamon and a little brown sugar. Place on top of the oranges.
Chop a pomegranate in half and remove the seeds. Spoon a generous amount on top of the yoghurt and finish with a little more white chocolate. Voilà!

Homemade Lavender and Dark Chocolate Macarons

I can't resist macarons.
If I see them at a bakery, I must have one of every flavour.
When my boyfriend asked me what I wanted for my birthday last year, I wished for macarons.
Instead of a pretty box from a patisserie I got a book, Parisian macarons by Sylvie Aït-Ali. (You can find a great tutorial video on the book's webpages) "Make them yourself." Food porn at it's best, dozens of colourful variations of the pretty little biscuit.

I found a recipe for a chili chocolate macaron but made own adaptation with lavender instead of chilli. I tried to make them a lavender colour but I was too afraid to muck the marenque up and didn't add enough colouring. It was also a challenge to find the right temperature and time for them but the last batch of four oven trays was close to a success. I will be making more macarons in the future and will post a recipe when I have perfected it. Meanwhile, enjoy some pictures!

I spy with my little eye...

Thai Fishcakes

...some recipes with spices that just need blogging!

Have been occupied with studies, work, cold (weatherwise and healthwise) and just an all round lack of motivation. Tonight's meal will not be blogged, ever ; it was a very politically incorrect pizza made from a base of a Mexican tortilla. Have to say it was deliciously thin and crispy without a trace of sogginess, for once being able to not go overboard with the toppings, opting for a simple margherita. But I just could not face any Italian reading about a tortilla pizza. Although I do have an Italian friend who tells me it's ok to have french fries on pizza... Hmmm.

While eating the horrendously delicious cheesy pizza I enjoyed watching Julie and Julia, which all the other food bloggers have all most likely gone to see in the cinema ages ago. I loved the characters and the two stories intertwining, and really it was a nice movie to watch after a day of writing uni reports in a cold. A feel good movie. Also inspiring if you're writing a blog and have kind of forgotten to post anything for a while. Naturally I share many of the feelings of Julie about blogging but I have very different aspirations from those of hers regarding to blogging. The movie is based on a true story a few years back from now, and five years ago food blogging was still a new thing. Getting people to read your blog was probably a lot easier. I definately feel like a drop in the ocean and feel like no-one is reading this. Feel free to introduce yourself if you are!

To the recipes, then. I have a couple of dishes that Andy cooked a couple of weeks ago. It seems that recently I haven't really been cooking much, it has mostly been Andy. He cooks better, I write better, so I guess it kind of works. Although he cooks better than I write, I guess.
Both recipes have spices so if you have a cold like we do, these will open up your sinuses for sure.


Thai Fishcakes
Recipe from Olive magazine, February 2010. Original recipe used prawns but we had some bland frozen white fish lying around so used that. Swap for something else if you like!

Serves two

Ginger, 1 tsp, finely grated
Fresh Coriander, handfull, chopped
Shallot,1, finely sliced
Red chilli,1, seeded and diced
White fish, 400g
Lime, zested
Fish sauce, 1 tbsp
Oil

Put ginger, coriander, chilli and shallot in a food processor and blend until fine. Add rest of the ingredients and mix until chunky. Season with black pepper and form into six flat cakes. Place on baking paper, brush both sides with a little bit of vegetable oil. Grill in the oven at 200 degrees for 3 minutes on each side.

Serve with a salad, rice or noodles if you like. We also had a way too hot chilli sauce, won't be posting that!


Pineapple with Star Anise and Cinnamon Caramel a la Andy

Brown granulated sugar, 100 g
Pineapple, fresh or tinned, in slices, 200g
Star anise, 2
Ground cinnamon, 1/2 tsp
Unsalted butter, 20 g
Dark rum, to taste... depends how much you like alcohol. We had 5 cl or so.

Vanilla ice cream to serve

Make the caramel by putting sugar in a frying pan on high heat. Don't stir. When it gets to a light caramel colour, add the spices and the pineapple. Once the caramel is darker and coats the pineapple, add the butter. Once butter is melted, add the rum and cook for a minute or so until the alcohol of the rum has evaporated. Serve with your favourite vanilla ice cream!

Finnish Food Icon : Laskiaispulla

Yesterday was Valentine's Day as everyone on this planet probably knows, but this year in Finland the winter festival of Laskiainen or Shrove Sunday fell on the same date. Both are celebrated, but I think Laskiainen is still more popular in Finland, and not least for the Finnish food icon I'm about to introduce. In a nutshell Laskiainen is an orthodox celebration before the lent season, and the idea is to eat lots of fat and sugar before the lent. In the UK it is known as the Pancake day, but the pancakes were far less visible in my opinion when I was living in the UK for three years. Laskiaispullat or Shrove buns are everywhere in Finland around this time of the year!

Laskiainen has been around since the 1800s, and was a joyful peasant holiday involving sledding down the snowy hills and making wishes for a good crops in the coming year. Sledding is still very much involved in the celebration of Laskiainen, after all it is only healthy to burn off those bun calories somehow. I have to confess I haven't yet been sledding this year, but I hope I'll get a chance to make it to the hills! The snow doesn't seem to be going nowhere so I'm really not worried.

Laskiaispulla is basically a sweet bun, cut in half and filled with either jam or almond paste, but always with whipped cream. A heavenly creation combining all things bad for you, but oh still so good. Best enjoyed with a class of cold milk or alternatively with hot chocolate to bring the sweetness of the treat to a whole new level. Another traditional Shrove delicacy is pea and ham soup but I am saving that for Shrove Tuesday.

I got the recipe from Helsingin Sanomat (Helsinki newspaper) Food section, and it worked well for me. I just swapped the regular jam to a sugar free puree of strawberries and wild raspberries that I had available in my freezer. I know, it still doesn't make them one bit healthy but every little helps, right?

Laskiaispulla

Makes 16 buns
Dough:
2,5 dl Milk
25 g Fresh Yeast
100 g Butter
1 Egg
1 tsp Cardamom
1 dl sugar
7 dl All-purpose flour
Pinch of salt

To top:
1 egg
Flaked almond or sugar drops

Filling:
Jam (or berry puree!)
OR
Almond paste
AND
Whipped cream

Warm the milk to body temperature, combine with fresh yeast.
Add egg, sugar, cardamom and salt. Start adding flour with a whisk, and when the dough thickens, knead with hands. Add the butter, which should be softened to room temperature.
Knead the dough until it's even and springy and comes off the bowl easily.

Allow to rise in a warm place for around 40 mins. - I have learned from my mother to fill the kitchen sink with warm water and place the bowl with the dough in the sink to rise. Works!

Once risen, tip the dough onto a floured surface and knead the air off. Form a long "sausage" (lol) shapeand cut into 16 pieces. Make little buns and place on baking paper on an oven tray. Let rise for another 30 mins under a tea towel in a warm place.

Break the egg in a small bowl and brush over the buns. Top with flaked almond or sugar drops. Bake in 225 degrees for 10- 15 minutes. Once ready and cooled, cut in half and fill with jam/ almond paste and whipped cream and put the top back on. Then have a bun party and go sledding or skiing!