Monthly Archives: July 2016

Made in Poland

Buchty drozdzowe, steamed yeasty buns.

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There are dishes from my Mum’s repertoire that I sometimes crave so badly, I give her a call straight away and ask for a recipe.  While reading the 5th installment of “Jezycjada” I came across buchty and I knew the yeast in my fridge will be put to work today.  Mum gave me the method, I reduced everything by half, as only cooking for myself and Izzie this week- the head of our family is in America, dining on a rather different type of food.

So for 9 of the buns I used 200 g of plain flour, 12 g of fresh yeast, 125 ml of warm milk and a pinch of salt- all that quickly worked in KA and left to prove for 15-20 minutes. An egg yolk whipped with 25 g of sugar( half and half with vanilla sugar, smells great), this added to the risen dough alongside 25 g of melted butter. KA worked the dough for a further few minutes, then it went to the oven for about 50 minutes. When I say to the oven, I tend to use it as a proving drawer too, 30 degrees.

After the dough doubled in size I knocked it down and rolled out on a floured surface, then cut out small balls and left those to prove again in a warm oven. Procedure a bit like doughnuts. Then I prepared a large saucepan with a linen cloth on it, a shoestring helped to make sure it does the job. I steamed the risen buns for about 6 minutes. Served them like Mum does- with lightly whipped cream and berries. When in Poland and in season, wild blueberries are money for this dish, I had to do with fruit from Co Op.

Izzie said “cake !” when she was served the bun, but ate it all, her mum destroyed 7. A dupa rosnie! 🙂

Baking

Michel Roux’s Macaroons.

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Florek bought me a book by Michel  Roux called “Eggs”, a nice little book that changes my idea of what a good crepe should be, how to posh up scrambled eggs, a few good desserts that I’ll surely try etc.  And a recipe for macaroons,  which was about a quarter of the length of the one I normally use. I read it with disbelief, I thought it was far too simple; no Italian meringue, an ordinary one instead. No drying time. No weighing egg whites. But for scientific purposes I had to give it a go, especially having some leftover blackcurrant curd. So I did. It was a refreshing method, but I’ll be sticking with more fancy Italian meringue. It seems to make the mixture a lot more stable and the texture of a ready macaroon thicker, more enjoyable to eat. Not to mention that the absolute majority of them cracked in the oven, while with another method it’s a sad few that do it.  Having said that, we’ve just had 5 between us with Izzie, who now says “more cake please”, so they will certainly not go to waste.

I used 180 g of icing sugar, 100 g of ground almonds, 3 egg whites which I whipped with 40 g of sugar, added food colouring and that was all.  Piped them onto the trays and shoved into the oven warmed up to 160 degrees. Michel recommends baking them for 7 minutes, mine were not baked after 7 minutes, mine took about 11.

Nice little experiment, but next time back to fancy stuff. 🙂

Dessert

Blackcurrant mousse cake.

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The genius, that is Dorota, the creator of mojewypieki.com has hit again. Sometimes she posts stuff that I have one look at and I know I must make it. Her Delice Au Cassis was one of them. I love blackcurrants and I happen to have quite a stash of them in the freezer, so there was no excuse, had to make it.

Genoise sponge to start with; 2 whole eggs in room temperature beaten into pale fluffiness with 62 g of sugar, 13 g of melted and cooled butter added slowly alongside 62 g of plain flour. All combined gently and baked for about 25 minutes in 175 degrees. When cooled, sliced in half horizontally and moistened with creme de cassis liqueur.

The mousse. So good, so light, fruity and intense, I love it. 200 g of blackcurrants quickly cooked with a splash of water, passed through a sieve. 3 gelatine leaves soaked well and then added to the sieved puree, that needed warming up in order to make gelatine work.

Then Italian meringue, like for the macaroons. 95 g of sugar with 20 ml of water made me a nice sugar syrup, that cooked until in reached 118 degrees, then it was slowly added to a meringue made in the KA out of 2 egg whites and 15 g of sugar. The meringue was worked for about 5 minutes until cool, then the puree+ gelatine went in and also 75 ml of whipped cream.  All this onto the sponge and into the fridge.

The final, stunning, touch, was a cassis jelly. 75 ml of creme de cassis gently warmed up, 1 soaked gelatine leaf added, 15 g of sugar and that’s that. Once cold and about to start setting- onto the set mousse.

Absolutely love it. Five stars! 🙂

Dessert

Summer mousse cake.

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Another great one from mojewypieki.com. Not too complicated, a little patience essential though, with all the waiting to layers to set. But I managed, in spite of being famous for my lack of this very virtue. Lisa and Andy came for dinner, it was eaten, enjoyed and will be made again.

First,  a nice chocolate sponge. 50 g of dark chocolate, melted, 2  eggs, whites whipped well, yolks waiting on the side. 50 g of soft butter creamed with 50 g of sugar. Chocolate poured in, yolks one by one added. A touch of salt, 50 g of plain flour, 1/2 tsp of baking powder all in. It baked in 180 degrees for about 12 minutes in my super clean oven- a lovely chap came over on Friday and for 50 quid turned my oven into a shiny, sparkling beauty. 🙂

The white chocolate mousse part is the one for the patient people. 180 ml of milk warmed up with vanilla paste, 300 g of broken white chocolate in, all stirred till dissolved. 2,5 gelatine leaves to keep it together. I didn’t wait long enough for it all to set enough to be poured out, so I ended up pouring what escaped from the tin onto the plate back, sounds complicated, yes, but it is doable. Once that’s done and safely setting, the strawberry layer goes on top. About 600-700 g of strawberries blitzed and warmed up, so that a strawberry jelly, dry, as in the packet could nicely dissolve. Once cooled, strawberry mixture goes on top and rests in the fridge till the next day.

It’s a great looking dessert, tastes fresh and lovely, eats easily, in spite of 300 g of white chocolate. Very happy with it.