Raymond Blanc winter menu features one of those. But as I’m broke and squeaking and I can’t really go to the Brasserie and give it a taste, I made my own. I soaked the raisins in Baccardi, some dark rum would have been better, but then again, not sure if Izzie would approve me feeding her  strong, dark rum through the umbilical cord, doubt it.

I used the usual recipe, 300 ml of double cream, 75 ml of milk, a bit less than 100 g sugar, 1,5 gelatine leaves. Just to make sure the flavour is there, I added about 6 tsps of the rum from the raisins. Ended up with a very pleasant, quite light dessert, the rum not too strong, raisins nice and soft, simple strawberry compote on top. 4 more small ones in the fridge.

From the recently discovered foodnetwork.uk. Not that I actually followed the recipe, that called for Frangelico, for instance. I didn’t have any and didn’t fancy spending 18 quid for a bottle, but I had some excellent Polish Soplica Orzechowa vodka,excellent for cocktails, , which I mixed with espresso( tiramisu without coffee is not a tiramisu, so I used some). Also, the biscuits were slightly different, it made the dessert look like a cake rather than a layered dessert, but I’m pleased with the result.

The cream, dietetic, as I do nearly always, prawda, whipped cream with sugar and cinnamon; mascarpone, just slightly beaten into submission and then mixed into the cream. Bottom layer- biscuits saked in coffee and hazelnut vodka, the cream, scattered with chopped hazelnuts. Second layer was soaked in a lemon syrup, just juice of half a lemon, some water and sugar boiled for about 2 minutes and cooled. Then the cream again, hazelnuts and cocoa. Chilled in the fridge for the afternoon, 4-5 hours. Pleasant.

It’s not often that I applaud myself in the kitchen and call myself a fecking talent, but today, when I released the cakes from their rings, I did. 🙂

I had some ricotta in the fridge, had some strawberries, so I baked the bases with mostly digestive biscuits, but also amaretti and melted butter. I made some flakes of white chocolate bar, before melting the rest with some cream, 2 gelatine leaves and milk. I whipped about 150 ml of cream, added most of the ricotta tub, still whipping, added the melted chocolate and flavoured the whole thing with vanilla paste and icing sugar. Then threw some quite finely chopped strawberries and filled the rings with chilled biscuit base. They lounged in the fridge for about 4 hours and right before serving I topped them with chocolate flakes and a strawberry, plus a bit of coulis on the side. Standing ovation. 🙂

I managed to convince myself for a long time, that I can’t make custard.  I think I’m retarded. Of course I can make custard. I’ve made perfect custard this evening, haven’t measured a thing and succeeded. Still had some energy in spite of waking up at 6.30 this morning ( the bastards behind the wall get up early and think everybody else has to as well). I’ve made chicken and leeks pie and then pear crumble. Pear was not an amazing choice, bramley apples would have done better, but, as Florek said, the custard made up for it.  All it took was 2 egg yolks, whipped with some sugar and – a tip!!- a touch of cornflour beaten through to help stabilise them- while an equal amount of milk and cream was warming up with a generous amount of vanilla bean paste. I LOVE vanilla bean paste as much as I love Catena chardonnay. As I love salmon sashimi. As I love coriander.

Yeah. Errrm, when the milk/ cream combo was nearly boiling, I started pouring it into the eggs slowly, while whisking, then returned it all to the pan and stirred till thickened. Utter success.

My only complaint would be the fact that I’m not able to take a good photo of a custard. 2 glasses of Dog Point might have something to do with it. 🙂

The idea came from Jana, whose colleague brought one of those to work and then revealed the recipe. Which very recipe was then forwarded to me by Jana, but I found it a bit too unnecessarily complicated and calling for margarine, a very Polish thing, my Mum tends to abuse it as well. I’m with the French on that, I’m all for butter.

I googled the Raffaello cake and found a nice, simple, BUTTERY recipe, which I tried and I’m very pleased with it. It is even better the day after, when the biscuits soaked up the cream and the coconut flavour.

For the cream I used one vanilla budyn, 250 ml of milk, half of which I brought to the boil, in the other half I mixed in the budyn with 3 tbsp of sugar and cooked together until nice and thick.Left it to cool and then, with the help of my lovely Kitchen Aid, I whizzed it with half a 125 g of soft butter and 100g of desiccated coconut. Then I used the same technique like with the trifle, I lined a narrow baking tray with a cling film, generously spread some coconut on the bottom, some cream and then the biscuits. I used Swedish Anna’s cappucino ones. And layer the whole thing up a couple of times. Then cuddled it tightly with the cling film and left in the fridge until the evening. Like I mentioned, even better the next day.