White chocolate + raspberry blondies

When there’s something I have in my head that I want to make but I’m not quite sure exactly how to do it, I start with some research.

I look in recipe books and I google and google and google, reading all the recipes that grab my attention and that look like the thing I have in mind. As I’m reading them I’m just know what I think sounds right and, often, what I just think, ‘oh no, I don’t that’s going to work’.

Then I give it a go, mixing different things I’ve read and seen and seeing how it works out, making notes so I remember what I did and what I thought worked.

And then, some days later, I try it again.

And always, always, I try to simplify wherever I can.

For this recipe, I’ve simplified everything so the quantities are easy to remember.

It’s also really simple to make - basically everything is just mixed in one big bowl and poured into a baking tray to cook.

I absolutely love the combination of white chocolate and raspberries - so summery.

I don’t have a sweet tooth at all and these are undeniably quite sweet!

But every now and then I just really fancy something sweet with a cup of tea so I’ll make these and eat one …. and then give the others away to neighbours and friends …

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To make probably around 12 squares, you’ll need:

150g butter, melted

a little knob of butter for greasing the tin

200g demerara sugar

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1 medium egg

200g plain flour

150g raspberries (I used fresh but frozen would work too)

150g white chocolate pieces - I used white chocolate buttons but that was only because there wasn’t a bar of white chocolate in the shop - otherwise I do rather like smashing it up in its packaging with a rolling pin and having lovely uneven little chunks of chocolate. But the buttons were good too).

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Put the oven on to heat up. I always forget to mention this bit as I have a gas oven and you don’t need to pre-heat them.

I put mine onto Gas Mark 6 so just a nice sort of medium heat. I’ve looked it up and this should be equal to around 200C or 400F - but you know your oven so do what feels right to you.

And now to get everything ready and weighed out, with the butter put straight into a little pan over a low heat to melt gently.

While it’s doing so, butter a square tin (or whatever shape you like really) and then put a piece of greaseproof paper/baking paper on top and so the ends hang off each side and then tuck in if you can.

I’m sure it would also be perfectly fine with just the buttered tin, but the paper does make it really simple to take out once cooked so is worth doing if you have some.

Tip the sugar into a big mixing bowl and pour in the melted butter and stir until it’s all combined.

Add the vanilla extract and stir in.

Then crack in the egg and stir again thoroughly so it’s all mixed in.

Tip in the flour a bit at a time and stir until mixed before adding some more. Continue until all the flour is completely mixed in and you have a lovely sort of batter.

Next stir in the chips or chunks or buttons of white chocolate, and then add the raspberries and stir those in too.

I just love the colours and flavours of the raspberry and white chocolate combination (and have of course already eaten several raspberries and chocolate buttons from the bowls).

Of course.

Pour the batter into the tin and smooth down so it’s evenly spread.

Put into the oven on the middle shelf to cook.

Now I don’t know about you but pretty much every time I try to bake something it takes much longer than the recipe says.

So what I do is check it after 15 minutes and also then take the opportunity to turn the tin around, just to make sure it’s cooking evenly.

I put the timer on for another 15 minutes and then check again … still not done, so I turn the tin again and give it another 15 minutes.

This time I think it’s done as it’s nicely golden brown, especially around the edges.

You also need to stick a skewer or knife into the centre and it should come out clean without lots of cake mix stuck to it.

You can also see I’m not very confident at this as I have clearly stabbed my cake several times to make sure!

It’s not totally coming out clean but then I do also want my blondies to be soft and fudgey so I don’t want it completely cooked ‘til dry.

It’ll continue cooking anyway in the warm baking tray so I think it’s the right time to take it out and turn the oven off.

Cool the blondies in the tray and then cut into squares, ready to share and eat ….

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Thai-style dip for fruit

When I lived in Thailand, I had a huge mango tree.  

We used to sit under the mango tree on the decking and watch the fruit grow.  When ripe, there were too many flies.  Also, there was too much fruit - imagine having so many mangoes you asked everyone you knew to take a bag away with them!

My favourite stage of the mangoes was when they were green and very sour.  My Thai friends leapt on them and picked them then and I soon understood why.  Slices of very sour green mango is utterly delicious with a fermented fish sauce, chilli, spicy, sweet and sour sauce. Dip in and eat.

So, so good. Much, much better than expected too.  (I soon got over seeing the fish heads and bits of crab etc in the bag of sauce. Plus I'm not remotely squeamish!).

This is a very much toned-down version of the same principle and works with sweet fruit as well as tart.

The flavours of sweet and slightly salty and a little bit spicy work so well with a tart green apple like a Granny Smith, but also with sweet fruits like pineapple, strawberries or kiwi fruits.

I just like to make things feel special, so putting a little of this dip in a bowl and taking a few minutes to slice my fruit and put it all on a plate just makes me enjoy it even more.

I'm having this as a snack as part of my Tiniest Thai diet ... more on that to come in future posts.

So - here's how you make it: 

1/2 cup white sugar (I used caster sugar as it was all I had but I think granulated better if you have it)

2 teaspoons salt

1 heaped teaspoon dried chilli flakes

Stir it all together! 

Then pour a little out into a dipping bowl to have with fruit.

Don't dip the fruit straight into the dip in the jar! Throw any used dip away and store the rest in the fridge for a month or so.

Hope you like this as much as I do!

Foodies Agenda's Citrus Yogurt Cake

This is the cake recipe that Kate from foodies agenda shared with me when we talked recently, and I'm glad for many reasons that she chose this.

I don't have a sweet tooth, to start, but I do have a citrus tooth! I absolutely love citrus flavours, to eat, to look at, to smell.  

Grapefruit and Wild Orange are two of my favourite essential oils (to put in the diffiuser or for my morning 'detox shower') and I always have a big bowl of limes as I use so many.  

And of course, they just look so pretty with their gorgeous colours.

I'm also glad she chose this because I very, very rarely bake ... so whilst I'm usually confident cooking and can trust my sense of taste, baking feels very different.  It always makes me nervous when I put the cake or pastry or whatever it is in the oven without feeling like I quite know what's going to come out! 

This recipe is delicious - the cake is made with coconut oil and is very moist.  It isn't too sweet and the flavours are fresh. I think it's a really elegant cake too.

There are only a couple of cakes I've ever made that I've then made again, and this has joined them.

I will definitely be making this one again! 

If you're  in Australia or the US, then I'd suggest you go straight to the original recipe as it's really simple and you'll be using measuring cups.  

Here's the recipe on foodies agenda.

But I managed to get myself confused over a few things ... because I don't ever bake.

I also never use measuring cups - I had thought it was only an American measure.

Turns out (I did a bit of googling) that American cups are 240ml and Australian cups are 250ml.  So not enough difference to affect the recipe and if you use either American or Australian measuring cups then just go ahead and make it.

I also found out that apparently we do have measuring cups in the UK and ours contain 220ml. The things I was reading then got way too technical for me and were advising how to convert volume to weight. Yes, exactly. 

So what I did was measure out 250ml water and thought I'd pour it in a mug and just use roughly where it came up to for each measure.  But then the water exactly filled a little teacup and so this little teacup is forever more going to be my Aus/US measuring cup.

My other concern was that - you guessed it - I've never used my coconut oil for baking and it's set completely solid and I imagine it needs to be liquid to measure it in a cup. 

Problem solved by just putting the jar in some hot water for about ten minutes - coconut oil has a pretty low melting temperature. 

All ready to go with my new-found knowledge of measuring cups and how to melt solid coconut oil!

Just sharing all this in case there's anyone else out there as unknowledgeable about baking as me.  

Most people will have skipped over all this and already have cooked and be eating their cake by now I expect ... 

On to the recipe itself, which is incredibly simple, especially as none of that off-putting creaming butter and sugar together - you just pour in coconut oil! 

What you'll need:

1 cup demerera sugar

2 medium free range eggs

2 lemons, the zest of both + 2 tablespoons of juice

1 orange, the zest of half (I put in a little more than half) + 1 tablespoon of juice

1 pinch of salt

2 cups of self raising flour, sifted

1 cup of natural or Greek yogurt

3/4 cup coconut oil

Preheat the oven to 180 / Gas 4

In a large mixing bowl whisk together the eggs and sugar until light and airy and the sugar has dissolved. I used my electric whisk and it was done in seconds ... 

Then you throw in the lemon and orange zest and juice (quantities in the ingredients list), followed by a pinch of salt and the sifted self-raising flour. 

Fold in the yogurt.  I'm never sure about folding but do know to be gentle with the mixture and only folding/combining the ingredients without over-mixing to try to keep the end result light.

Then gradually pour in the coconut oil little by little, again gently combining to keep the air in.

When it's all combined, Kate's instructions are to: 

'Grease a 22cm springform cake tin or line with baking paper'.

Oops! Another non-baker's problem.  I don't have a round or springform cake tin.  So my choice was from a loaf tin and a 22cm square tin.  I went with the square tin as think the loaf tin might have made the cake too dense and the middle might not have been cooked.  So I greased that with a little butter and poured in the cake batter.

When I first read through the recipe, I'd been a bit worried that my cake batter wouldn't look right, but batter is exactly what it looked like! Started feeling quite excited about this, especially as the batter on it's own was delicious (yep, I scraped the bowl out).

Put the cake on the middle shelf and then the recipe says to bake for 30-35 mins until cooked all the way through and golden brown. 

I don't know whether it's me or my oven (shouldn't be the oven which is a lovely steady-temperature-holding gas oven) but whenever I do bake a cake it always takes a LOT longer than the recipes say.

I tested it after 30 minutes by putting a sharp knife in, but it came out with batter still on the knife. And I kept testing it until 20 minutes later than the recommended time when I decided it was probably done. 

Take the cake out of the oven and allow to cool a little before releasing from the tin - or tipping it out.  You can see all the stab marks where I kept testing to see if was done!

But I didn't burn it and it came out of the tin so well, all in one lovely piece. 

(Yes my 'cooling rack' is the grill pan)!

Next time I make it I'll cook it for even longer as mine was lovely on the outer sides but the middle was still a little doughy (although it still tasted really good).

Dust with icing sugar and grate over a little more zest before slicing and serving. 

I'm really pleased with this! Perfect with a mid-morning coffee I'd say.

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Simplest jam

Saturday was hot, beautifully sun-bathingly hot.

And I really needed a good blast of Vit D and to take in some sun-goodness and re-charge those empty batteries so I loved it.

But the forecast was for rain on Sunday so I thought I'd better get blackberry-picking before the rain got to them.  And they are pretty much perfect right now and the bushes are full of berries although - as always (why is this?) - it feels that the most perfect ones are just out of reach.  

Returned home with scratched legs, sunburnt shoulders and a tub of lovely ripe blackberries. 

It was much too hot to even think about cooking yesterday - plus the sunshine and my roof were calling me back - so the blackberries oozed in the weighing scales overnight waiting for the rainy hours on Sunday before they were made into jam.

And this is the easiest jam recipe ever!

Use any fruit really - peaches, nectarines, plums, all berries, apples, and combinations of them all. I've heard that less ripe fruit sets better but to be honest I just use what there is when I notice there's fruit that needs picking.

First, put a saucer in the fridge as you want it cold for testing when the jam is set.

You'll also need to get your jam jars sterilised - either use them hot straight from the dishwasher for those who have dishwashers, or if you don't (like me), wash them in hot water and put in a very very low oven (I used Gas Mark 1) for about 15 minutes.

Then it's onto the jam making. 

Weigh the fruit and put it in a preserving pan or stainless steel saucepan with an equal quantity of sugar.  

I decided to add a couple of apples that I brought back from my dad's garden last weekend, but didn't then add any more sugar too - there's quite enough in there already I think!

Put the pan over a very low heat and heat gently, stirring now and then, until the sugar has dissolved. 

Turn up the heat and boil fairy rapidly, for 20-30 minutes.

Stir occasionally and also skim off some of the foam that appears at the start of the boiling time.

Test after 20 minutes by dropping a teaspoon of the boiling jam onto the saucer that you have in the fridge and after perhaps 30 seconds it will be setting and a sort of 'skin' wrinkle across the top of the jam blob. 

If it's not quite ready, put the saucer back in the fridge, continue boiling the jam and try again in a couple of minutes.

To be honest, I'm not all that good at judging this and often leave it just a little too long and it sets quite hard.  But it still tastes good.  This time I decided it was ready after 25 minutes. 

If you have any tips for getting this part right every time, I'd love to hear them so please comment and share! 

Pour the jam into the hot jars straight away - I transferred it to a pyrex measuring jug first but still managed to spill a little. 

One and three quarter jars filled, and a few hours later when it was cool, a slice of toast and jam to test of course (with a cup of tea - and I very very very rarely drink tea - it was nice). 

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