Apple, Rye and Ginger Teacake

Recently, Frank Camorra of Movida fame published a recipe in The Age for an Apple, Rye and Ginger Teacake.  It looked really good, with an apple layer in the middle of the cake as well as on top.  However, I didn't have any rye flour.

Fate played into my hands when my colleague Swee and I went to a health food store, which lo and behold, sold rye flour (rather pricey at $7.50 for a 1kg bag, compared with 75 cents for a bag of plain flour at the supermarket).

I had apples at home, so a cake was born:   

I am with Frank, who says in his opening comments that:

When making a cake at home I look for one thing: ease. Nothing puts me off more than fiddly, time-consuming recipes.

Amen to that.

 

This cake was moist from the apple and all round delicious.  It's a definite keeper.

 

I also bought these gorgeous cupcakes from Sophisticakes, who were represented at a food and wine event in the bottom of my office building: 

Flavours were passionfruit, lemon, red velvet, white chocolate and strawberry, white chocolate and raspberry and salted caramel.  I shared them with my friends and colleagues, but these tasty little cakes were a steal at $2.50 each.  The lemon one (bright green) had a heart on top, but I later found it underneath the strawberry one (butterfly) - probably just as well, as I gave the lemon cake to my boss.

Have a great week!

Angelo's House Restaurant, Toowoomba

Last weekend was my Mum's birthday, and I made the trek to Toowoomba to see her.  When I asked Mum where she wanted to go for dinner, she chose Angelo's House.  As its name suggests, Angelo's is situated in a large old weatherboard house, with tongue and groove internal panelling.  There is a lounge by the bar where you can have a quiet drink while waiting to go to your table, and a fireplace that looks like it would be warm and inviting on a cold winters day.

The food has a strong Italian bent.   We decided to go for a main course and a dessert each.  We started with the garlic bread ($9) - basically a toasted baguette spread with garlic butter, and nothing to get excited about.

For main, Mum chose the  Beef, Thyme and Kipfler Potato Pie served with mashed potato and broccolini ($25.90):

Mum enjoyed this pick, and I have to say that it looked delicious.

I chose the main sized serving of Spaghetti Bolognese ($25.90):

It was a very generous serving, and was rich and flavoursome.  I thought I might not get through it, but it was so good, I had no worries polishing it off.

My brother chose the herb marinated chicken breast with bacon, mushroom, port wine and cream sauce, kipfler potatoes and green beans ($29.90):

He enjoyed this dish, and as he is a very fussy eater, Angelo's created a winner in my eyes.

Mum was going to skip dessert because she thought it was too expensive.  I said nonsense to that, and she was glad, as Mum enjoyed the dessert very much.  I chose the pistachio and lemon cake, made from semolina, almond meal and polenta, and served with honeyed yoghurt and Persian fairy floss ($11.50):

This was a gorgeous cake - it was beautifully moist from the lemon syrup, and the tangy yoghurt accompaniment complimented the flavours nicely.

Both Mum and my brother chose the Apple and Raisin Crumble, with macadamias and coconut, and accompanied by vanilla bean gelato and custard ($11.50):

Mum was not overly keen on the gelato, but found the crumble to be beautiful, and she was especially impressed by the macadamia nuts in the crumble topping.

The front of house service was excellent.  Our waiter did the job but did not match the excellence of front of house, but we did get a lovely, friendly waitress for the dessert course.

We all enjoyed Angelo's House, and there will definitely be a repeat visit.

Angelo's House Restaurant

210 Herries St

Toowoomba QLD 4350

Ph: +61 7 4659 9200 

Lemon Meringue Pie - Great British Book of Baking

It had been ages since I made a lemon meringue pie.  I love the fluffy meringue top and tart, toothsome filling, but with so many other things to make, I had overlooked this old-fashioned favourite for a while.

When my colleague, Collette, asked me did I make lemon meringue pie, I decided to prove that I do by making one.

I ended up using Dorie Greenspan's Good for Almost Everything Pie Dough for the base, and for the filling, I used the recipe from p168 of The Great British Book of Baking by Linda Collister:

You need to blind bake your pastry shell in a 9" tart pan, and let it cool.  Then you make the filling, as follows:

Lemon Filling

3 medium lemons
40g cornflour
300ml boiling water
3 egg yolks
85g sugar
50g butter

Meringue topping

4 egg whites (I used just 3)
200g sugar

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees Celsius.

Grate the zest from the lemons into a heatproof bowl, then add the juice and cornflour and stir to make a smooth paste. Add the boiling water and mix to combine, then empty into a saucepan and cook, stirring constantly until it boils and thickens, then reduce the heat and simmer for a minute.

Remove the pan from the heat and add the yolks, then mix in the butter and sugar.  (I then put the mixture in the pan back on the stove and heated it until it thickened a little more because it seemed quite runny and I was worried it wouldn't set.)   Pour the lemon filling into the baked pastry shell. 

Whisk the egg whites until soft peaks form, then add the sugar and whisk until it forms a glossy smooth meringue. Spoon the meringue on top of the filling, spreading it right to the edges and completely covering the filling.

Bake the pie in the oven for 20 minutes until the meringue is golden brown.  Allow the pie to cool before serving.  While the recipe says to serve the pie at room temperature, I liked it best chilled.

FFWD - French Lentils

In the words of Mary, we are the Ladies of the Lentils Brigade this week, as our FFWD recipe is French Lentils. 

I wasn't prepared to spring the $6 for lentils du Puy, and I already had some ordinary green lentils, so that is what I used.  I used chicken stock to cook everything up, and I decided to keep the veges and chop them up rather than discard them to make a more complete dish.

And the verdict?  These were pretty good.  I would definitely make them again.

To see what the other Ladies of the Lentils thought, visit the LYL section of the FFWD website.

Du Nord, Little Bourke St, Melbourne

On a recent lunchtime walk, I discovered Du Nord, a Scandinavian restaurant, and had a hankering to go there ever since.  My boss introduced me to Scandi food at Dansk, and I was keen to see how Du Nord compared.

The decor varies between the bar, which is all dark and mysterious, and the restaurant, which is all light coloured timber.  It's less Ikea and more Scandinavian forest than Dansk.

We decide to start with the Frites ($8) - after all, who can resist a good bowl of chips? 

This one is huge - it took us aback (in a good way) with its size. The chips come with garlic aioli on the side.   These were very good chips - I recommend these on their own with a pint of Scandi beer.

For main, Tim ordered the duck breast in chocolate, lingonberry and blood jus with potato stones and foraged leaves ($28):

The potatoes were a mystery - inside, they were just like ordinary boiled potatoes, but I couldn't work out what the white coating was on the outside.  Delicious though! The duck was prettily decorated with edible flowers. 

I ordered the mackerel ($27): 

It seemed to be on a bed of mashed potato with foraged leaves and a very pretty sauce of what I think was tomato.  (Online, it says it comes comes with winter cabbage and crisp bread branches - I don't think that was the case here.)  It was quite good, but I am not sure it was worth the price tag, as the piece of fish was quite small and there was not much else on the plate.

It was just as well that my meal was small, as when we combined the frites with this impressive plate of roasted winter vegetables with juniper berry ($13):

there really wasn't any room left for more food.  Don't you love the edible flowers decorating the veges?

You can book online at Du Nord, which is a bonus.  It makes booking a cinch, and if you have to change or cancel your booking for any reason, you can do so easily.  I recommend booking, as Du Nord gets very busy, and our walk-in attempt a couple of weeks before failed. 

The service at Du Nord was prompt and friendly, and the food was good.  However, on a return visit, I'd skip the mains and stick with the sides and starters, which are better value for money. 

Du Nord

367 Little Bourke St, Melbourne VIC 3000

Ph: +61 3 9642 0052

WWDH - Cauliflower Mac and Cheese

This week, Chaya has chosen Donna's Cauliflower Mac and Cheese for our Wednesday with Donna Hay group.  The recipe is online here.

This recipe is pretty simple to make, and s quite tasty, although next time I would leave out the garlic in the crust.  I used all milk and no cream, and used only one variety of cheese, but I don't think it harmed the end result.  Sure, it may not have been as indulgent as the original, but it was still good.

To see what Chaya, Sarah and Margaret thought of this recipe, check out their blogs.

Donna Hay's Carrot Cake

Last week, I asked Justine what kind of cake she would like, and she nominated carrot cake.  Super!  I hadn't made carrot cake for a while, so was glad to oblige.

I don't like repeating recipes I have already made, so I headed to my cookbooks for a new carrot cake recipe.  I came up with a carrot cake from Donna Hay's Modern Classic 2.   Donna rarely lets me down, so that is what I went with.

The end result was a moist, delicious carrot cake, that was good to the last crumb.  The cream cheese frosting recipe was a bit so so, as I found that I needed way more icing sugar than Donna quotes to get the icing thick enough to stay on the cake.   However, if you ignore that, it really is a super cake, and well worth making.

The recipe is as follows:

1 1/4 cups brown sugar
3/4 cup vegetable oil
3 eggs
1 1/2 cups plain flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ginger
2 1/2 cups grated carrot (~3 medium carrots)
1/2 cup chopped pecan nuts (I substituted walnuts)
1/2 cup sultanas  (I substituted raisins)

Preheat your oven to 180°C and grease and line a 9" round cake tin. Place the sugar and oil in the bowl of an electric mixer and beat for 2-3 minutes, then add the eggs and beat well. Sift the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, cinnamon and ginger over the sugar mixture and beat until just combined.

Add the carrots, nuts and sultanas and mix until just combined. Pour the mixture into the prepared cake tin and bake for 55-60 minutes or until cooked through.

Allow the cake to cool completely before spreading with cream cheese frosting.

Cream Cheese Frosting

Process 250g softened cream cheese in a food processor until smooth. Add 1/3 cup sifted icing sugar and 1 1/2 tablespoons lemon juice and process until smooth. (As stated above, I used significantly more icing sugar - I found the icing was too runny with just 1/3 cup icing sugar.)