I saw this recipe somewhere on the internet long time ago, copied it and resisted making it due to the size of my waist. I’ve been trying to eat less after Christmas, definitely drink less and snack as little as possible, so butter cookies were not urgent to make, shall we say.

Today I decided to give them a go, the weather is really cold, while at home it’s warm, clean, cosy and lovely and now it also smells with matcha.

I used 240g of plain flour and 20g of matcha. 170g of soft butter got creamed together with 120g of icing sugar and a pinch of salt. 2 egg yolks added, then the flour and matcha combo, slowly, bit by bit. 50g of chopped white chocolate, but also a generous handful of unsalted pistachios, not in the recipe, but I had some, I love them, so why not.

Once all nicely combined I rolled the dough into a couple of sausages with the help of cling film, chilled them in the fridge for over an hour and then sliced and baked in 180 degrees for about 15 minutes. I’m pleased to say they are not overly sweet, Florek says they would benefit from some more white chocolate, I like them a lot. I recently chucked my Wilton food colourants, as they were out of date and not used in a long, long time. My palate has changed a lot, those days of indulging in macaroons and baking a couple of times a week are long gone. These days I’d always choose some cheese and another glass of wine instead of a sweet treat.

Second coffee of the day is on the horizon, alongside a cookie or two. 🙂

Last day of the year, there were plans of a fairly large party this evening with Steve, Ale and their friends and Casellas. But the location intended for the party turned out not available, so we split the party up and we’re heading to Casa Casella later tonight, 6 of us, not 17. I’ve made a cheesecake and it’s a good thing it will not have to be divided between 17 people. It really is rather good, I must say. After a comfortable rest in the fridge I have portioned it and tried it and there will be no shame, shall we say! 🙂

It was all baked yesterday. For the base I used 150 g of Biscoff biscuits, crushed in the food processor. Nigella recommended digestive biscuits, but there was only a chocolate version in Esselunga. This blitzed with 70 g of melted and cooled butter was pressed into the lined round tin.

700g of Philadelhia cheese, 3 eggs, 3 yolks ( my cholesterol levels are rising just by typing this), gently combined together by KA. 150 g sugar added, some of it vanilla. A big fat drop of vanilla paste. Good squeeze of lemon juice. A bit of my candied orange peel. All this poured into the tin and baked in 180 degrees, in bain marie, for 50 minutes. Then a quick topping of sour cream, about 150 ml, some icing sugar and more vanilla paste added to the top, another 10 minutes and out of the oven. Left to cool completely, into the fridge for the night.

Obviously in Nigella’s book it looks stunning, my top layer wasn’t glamorous enough, so I grated a bit of dark chocolate on top and a few flaked almonds.

It is super moist and creamy. And delicious. And it will be the last thing we’ll eat this year. 🙂

Some very sad pears were sitting in the fruit bowl, so I looked up Giallo Zafferano and turned them into a lovely, light and moist cake. Unusual for me, to bake without butter, but instead I used a tub of ricotta.

First thing, the pears were peeled and chopped into small cubes, drizzled with some lemon juice and set aside. KA was busy whipping 250 tub of ricotta together with 130g of sugar, plus some vanilla sugar( we’re off to Poland in 2 days, will be stocking up on essentials!), to this went 3 whole eggs, one by one, a generous amount of lemon zest, 16g pack of powdered yeast and finally 220 g of flour. All this nicely combined together, pears in and into the lined baking tray. It baked in 180 degrees for over an hour. Once baked, finished with icing sugar. Might take a chunk over to the neighbours. 🙂

Yesterday after school I have succeeded in making the impossible happen- I convinced Florek to purchase 2 pairs of new shoes for himself. One of the baits was a promise of chocolate and cherry muffins. Florek hates clothes and shoe shopping, but we got through it. And now there is a tray of warm, delicious muffins on the kitchen top and they are delightful.

I used the recipe from mojewypieki.com, nice and simple, but I added some of the posh cherries we first tried when Molly brought over her cheesecake.

I used 450 g of ripe bananas, the wight before removing the skin, mashed them in the blender, plus 2 eggs. 225 g of plain flour, 3 tbsps of cocoa, 80g of brown sugar, 1 tsp of bicarb soda, 125ml of veg oil and also some chopped dark chocolate, because why not, indeed? Cherries, though quite small were chopped in halves. All nicely combined together, baked in 170 degrees for about 20 minutes.

They are light, moist and seriously delicious.

Recipe from moje wypieki.com, found while looking for something sweet to take to LauDe tomorrow. Something, that would look good next to the lovely bottle of Amarone that is waiting to go too.

They need to be started the day before, the almond dough rests in the fridge overnight for the flavour to develop.

2 egg whites get whipped stiff with a pinch of salt. To this I added 1 tsp of lemon juice, 1 tbsp of freshly grated orange rind and some of my candied orange too( not in the recipe). Some vanilla paste, 160 g of icing sugar – 200 g in the original recipe- and 200 g of ground almonds. I skipped almond extract, yuk! All this nicely combined waited until today.

More icing sugar was needed to roll out, generously dust and roll them out, like gnocchi,shaped roughly like diamonds, then placed on the baking paper and into the oven at 150 degrees. After 6 mins the temperature goes up to 170, then after 6 minutes again down to 150. Mine baked for 20 minutes in total, developed a nice skin, cracked nicely and did not brown up at all.

I like them, in spite of the huge amount of sugar, but I’d probably crank up orange flavour, maybe with Grand Marnier if I had it? Now must put some away for LauDe, before Florek sees them. 🙂

So, after my initial, not very impressive starter, I have wrapped my sourdough equipment and left it in the pantry for a few months. Having chatted with Steve Jaye lately, about food, what else, he suggested he’d send me some of his excellent, 8 month old starter and that I should try again. It took 2 weeks for Royal Mail and Poste Italiane to deliver the parcel, but it got here last week. Amazingly.

I have immediately fed Steve’s starter with 150 g of strong flour and 150 ml of water and left in room temperature for a day. The next day it has more than doubled, I had to take a break from painting the garderoba and get on with baking.

The following is Steve’s method, which has worked in my kitchen twice so far.

500g of strong flour, plus 2 tsps of salt and 2 tsps of brown sugar, combined, plus 300 g of the starter, which has been mixed prior to use, 250ml of warm water. All this into the bowl of kitchen aid and then mixed on very slow speed for 2 minutes, then left to autolyse for an hour, covered. After an hour it needs to be folded and beaten for about 5 minutes, kneaded in kitchen aid for a few more, until smooth with well developed gluten. Then bulk proved for 6-10 hours in room temperature, covered.

Once doubled in size, its formed into a nice ball, handled carefully, so as not to lose any of the rise, placed into a round banneton and it goes to the fridge overnight to develop a flavour.

In the morning the oven gets preheated to 230 degrees with a deep ceramic dish with a lid in my case, or a Dutch oven in Steve’s, or a posh cloche in Ken’s kitchen. I will be treating myself to expensive toys once I get a bit more confident in this field. The ball of dough from the fridge goes onto the floured ring of baking paper, into the preheated dish and into the oven, covered, for 20 minutes. After 20 minutes the lid comes off and a beautiful view like this happens

2 small details not to be forgotten: the loaf needs to be slashed before baking and it needs to be sprayed with water to help form the crust. Also, a tray with boiling water underneath the bread will help.

After 40 minutes there is a beautiful, homemade sourdough. What Florek called- the best homemade bread here yet. This loaf made Florek and Steve talk for the first time in weeks, after business differences kept them quiet recently.

The starter is back in the fridge, I have the taste for much, much more!

Last weekend Molly and Enrico came over for dinner, Molly brought a chocolate cake, which she advertised as ” almost gluten free”. The cake was a hit, we loved it, the kids loved it, I asked for the recipe, though I’m not massive on chocolate cake normally. What was left of the one Molly brought was devoured the next day and both Bankses urged me to get on with it and bake another one, pronto!

Some help from Molly was required, as the recipe was her mum’s and I had no idea how much ” 2 sticks of butter” were, but we got there in the end and yesterday I took out of the oven a well risen, moist, light, great cake. A keeper and not at all complicated.

While the oven was warming up to 160 degrees I got the cake tin ready with baking paper all around, 230 g of butter and 280 g of good quality dark chocolate melted together in bain marie. 5 eggs were beaten whole with 200g of sugar, I did half and half caster and brown. All treated with the whisks of kitchen aid until they were light and fluffy. To this 5 tbsps of plain flour went it, alongside 1, 1/2 tsp of baking powder ( Ewa has just sorted me out with good English baking powder and soda for baking!). Chocolate and butter combo went in, all nicely combined together.

The cake was in the oven for about 1 hour, I kept checking till the stick came out dry; about half way though I covered it with alu foil to make sure it bakes inside, but stays fairly moist on top.

A dusting of vanilla icing sugar completed the picture. Superb cake!

Dessert was needed for a Sunday lunch with The Blackmore’s yesterday, mojewypieki.com were consulted and the result made us all happy.

The base- 270g of plain flour, 100g of ground almonds, 150 g of cold butter, 80g of icing sugar, a touch of baking powder and then 4 egg yolks, all combined and chilled for an hour, before rolling out onto the lined baking tray. It baked for about 20 mins in 180 degrees, during which I have pitted the plums and dusted them with some cornstarch and cinnamon. For the meringue I used 4 egg whites, a pinch of salt, 150 g of sugar, towards the end 1 tsp of cornstarch. The plums went onto the still warm base, meringue on top, some flaked almonds and immediately after the cake went in, I dropped the temperature down to 140 degrees. An hour of slow baking, then the heat off and I allowed it to cool in the oven.

Lovely, light, summery cake.

One of those things that make me so grateful we get to live in this stunning country and enjoy its wonderful produce in abundance. Clementines from Calabria I buy in Esselunga for about 1.80 per kilo, lovely and juicy, sweet, today were…boiled and then put in a cake. With a great result. Mojewypieki.com flashed it at me, originally Nigella’s recipe. I made half a portion to see if really that good as the reviews say, I reckon it won’t be long before it’s made again. A flourless cake, rare thing for me, but for a small cake today 175 g of ground almonds did the job. First however 4 medium clementines were washed and cooked under the lid for about 1,5 hours, water needed to be topped up. once very soft and mushy they were double checked for pips and then blitzed into pulp, with skins and all. 3 whole eggs. 110 g sugar, some of it vanilla ( when in Poland I restocked!) and then 0,5 tsp of baking powder, plus a bit of more candied orange peel. All blitzed together, poured into a round tray and baked for about 40 mins in 170 degrees. Finished with icing sugar, though apparently creme fraiche also a good idea. Yum!

Izzie asked this morning if she could have a treat from the local bakery after school. Gingerbread men and iced buns are what she normally goes for, so once I got home having dropped her off, I quickly flipped through mojewypieki.com and found exactly what I needed. A cross between sweet buns, a muffin, but made of yeasty dough, like for doughnuts.

I used 250 g of plain flour, 12 g of fresh yeast crumbled in, 50 g of sugar and vanilla sugar and a pinch of salt. 125 ml of warm milk, 2 large egg yolks, a zest of half a lemon. All this was working nicely in the kitchen aid, I then added 25 g of melted and slightly cooled butter and continued until the dough was smooth and lovely. Left to prove on the front window sill for about 2 hours and proceeded to pack my daily amount of boxes. 17 degrees today, scorching British summer, but not to worry, we have less than a month and there will be no more complaints about summer being rubbish!

Once the dough more than doubled in size I have flattened it and divided in 12 pieces, formed into balls, each with a spoonfull of good jam inside. Placed each in a muffin case and left to prove again.

Finally it was time to bake them, 180 degrees, less than 14 minutes. Sticky orange glaze completed the job. Floro and I destroyed a couple between us, the head judge will come home in a hour, we shall see. For me a definite keeper of a recipe.