*Blueberry, Lime & Coconut Friands*
Makes 9
These lovely little cakes are very simple to make and oh so moreish. Almost dangerously so!
75g plain flour (1/2 cup +1 TBS)
200g icing sugar (1 1/2 cups +2 tsp)
125g ground almonds (scant 1 1/2 cups)
50g dessicated coconut, unsweetened (2/3 cup)
the grated zest of one lime
5 egg whites
175g butter, melted (3/4 cup)
fresh blueberries
icing sugar to dust
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Proof positive here in The English Kitchen today that I don't always cook hedonistic, unhealthy food. I actually cook/prepare a lot of healthy food. Healthy doesn't necessarily have to be blah. This salad is light and delicious with a fabulous rich creamy dressing, and yes, you CAN have your bacon and eat it too!
Two things I really love about the month of June are all of the roses which are blooming profusely in our garden at the moment and all the fresh strawberries we grow and enjoy. The roses in these photos are some of our wild roses, which are just so beautiful.
When you look at the beauty and perfection of these two things, its pretty hard not to be grateful that we are blessed to live with such abundance. Some of our berries are very tiny, almost as small as the wild strawberries that I remember from my childhood. The smaller the berry the sweeter and more concentrated the flavour. I decided to use some of these smaller berries today and make some delicious Strawberry Eclairs for us to enjoy! I had also been sent some lovely new cake sprinkles and so rather than simply dusting them with icing sugar, I glazed them with a light pink icing and sprinkled them with some of the Dr. Oetker Unicorn Confetti . . . just the name of these sprinkles automatically puts a smile on my face.
Dr. Oetker has just launched an exciting new range of sprinkles that will make even beginner bakers look good!
Sprinkles have always been a firm favourite for cake decoration, so Dr. Oetker are launching three new pots that will cover your entire cake with sprinkles.
From dazzling strands and metallic stars to brightly coloured spheres and orbs, the Ultimate Sprinkles Range turns ordinary bakes into showstopping instagramable cakes.
The Glamour & Sparkle Jar – scatter metallic stars and dazzling strands to get your cakes looking red-carpet ready.
The Unicorn Confetti Jar– be a part of the unicorn craze and shower your cake with bright coloured strands and spheres.
The Midnight Magic Jar – sprinkle a few shiny stars, orbs and strands for an out of this world cake.
I really love all of these new sprinkles, not only are the colours rich and beautiful, but I also really like the new sleeker look of the container and that lovely larger hole in the flip-top cap for ease of sprinkling!!
I used some of the gel colouring to tint the glaze a light pink also, almost the shade of the pretty petals on those roses . . .
They turned out lovely and oh-so-pretty . . . I think this was the perfect use for these smaller strawberries that might get lost amongst the larger ones. If you don't have smaller strawberries to use, by all means use larger ones, even if you have to cut them into smaller pieces, or you can use raspberries, which are also delicious.
I was really pleased with the way my choux pastry for the eclairs turned out. I am not the best piper in the world, so don't judge, lol. The art of finesse has never been one of my strengths . . .
I can draw just about anything, but don't ask me to draw a straight line . . . likewise piping. I can't pipe a straight line for love or money. Never mind . . . I was still really pleased with the results.
My pastry was perfect . . . crisp and golden brown . . . without any doughy centres. They were as light as air. Check out my tips to see how yours can be too!
*Strawberry Eclairs*
Makes 12
The
strawberries in these lovely June treats can be replaced with whatever
fruit or berries you wish at any other time of year. Light as air,
crisp and delicious!
55g butter, cubed (1/4 cup)
150ml cold water (5.2 fluid ounces or 10 TBS)
70g strong flour, sieved (1/2 cup bread flour)
2 large free range eggs, lightly beaten
To fill:
240ml double cream (1 cup)
2 TBS icing sugar plus extra for dusting
110g berries (3/4 cup)
Preheat the oven to 200*C/400*f/ gas mark 6. Lightly oil a large
baking sheet and line with greaseproof paper. Spritz the paper with a
little water.
Beat in the flour with a wooden spoon, beating until the mixture leaves the sides of the pan and forms a smooth ball of pastry.
Done properly you should be able to stand your spoon up in the ball of dough.
(Don't laugh too hard at my lousy piping skills, lol.)
Transfer to a wire rack to cool, cutting a slice down the side of
each one with a serrated knife so that the steam can escape. Allow to
cool completely before proceeding.
Whip the
cream with he icing sugar until thick. Spoon onto the bottom of the
eclairs and top with some fresh berries. Dust the tops with some icing
sugar prior to serving.
Note - I chose to glaze the tops of mine with a thin icing
drizzle and sprinkle with cake sprinkles, tinting the glaze with a bit
of pink gel colouring. Simply measure a quantity of icing sugar into a
bowl, add a drop of colouring and whisk in enough water to give you a
thinnish consistency drizzle icing. Dribble over the eclairs and
sprinkle on the cake sprinkles. Let set prior to serving.
TIPS FOR CHOUX PASTE PERFECTION:
- Gently heat water and butter until butter has melted and then bring to the boil.
- Once boiling quickly shoot in the flour.
- Using a wooden spoon, beat vigorously together until the mixture is well combined and leaves the sides of the pan.
- Cool to hand temperature and GRADUALLY beat in only enough egg to give you a smooth dough, with a somewhat reluctant dropping texture. (Not stiff but not too loose.)
- Once piped, wet your finger and press down any peaks.
I fell in love with Friands a few years ago when I discovered a fabulous recipe on What Katie Ate. It is the single recipe which inspired me to want to buy her cookbook, and I have to say, I fell in love at first bite!!
This recipe today I am showing is inspired by one I found in the Hamlyn book 200 cakes and bakes for a raspberry and coconut version.
It only makes 9 versus 18 and is every bit as delicious as Katie's. I chose it because not only does it make fewer which is much more realistic in my tiny kitchen/home/family.
It also uses fewer egg whites, which means I have fewer egg yolks to dispose of. (Spaghetti carbonara is the perfect way to use these up by the way!)
Some of you may be wondering what exactly a friand is. A friand is a
small almond and butter cake, usually containing fruit of some kind, and
is closely related to the French Financier cake.
Meant to be just a few
bites, they are fabulously delicious and quite popular cakes in Oz and
NZ.
Today I have decided to use blueberries in the cakes, as well as finely grated lime zest . . .
Blueberries, coconut and lime are a beautiful trinity of flavours and textures.
These cakes are just gorgeous . . . delicious flavours . . . and the texture of the cake is just beautiful . . . with crisp buttery edges . . . and a light crumb that almost floats away . . .
But again, that is not all as they are also a tiny bit chewy . . . almost in a macaroon kind of a way, if you know what I mean.
I also think they are very pretty, and would work well on the tea table . . . impossible to resist . . .
In that case, I would also add ground cardamom, just a pinch and leave out the lime zest.
No need to worry if you don't have a friand pan. A friand pan is a baking tin like a muffin tin except that the holes are oval in shape, which gives you the traditional oval cakes . . . but if you don't have one, feel free to use a medium muffin tin. They will still bake up beautifully. My friand tin only has six holes and I always use 3 muffin cups to make up the lot. Not a problem.
These cakes are so beautiful and light they almost float . . . like an angel's wings . . .
I really think you are going to also fall in love . . . really . . .
Preheat the oven to 200*C/400*F/ gas mark 6. Butter your friand tins (or muffin tins) well and set aside.
Sift
together the flour and icing sugar. Stir in the almonds, coconut and
lime zest. Beat the egg whites until stiff. Fold into the flour
mixture. Stir in the melted butter until thoroughly combined. Divide
the mixture evenly between the prepared friand tin cups/muffin cups.
Top each with a few blueberries.
My brain is going a mile a minute here this morning thinking of other flavour combinations. Chopped fresh pear with candied or preserved ginger. Cubed apples and cinnamon. The sky is really the limit! Bon Appetit and Happy Weekend!
I am a huge fan of pasta salads. For one thing you have a multitude of shapes and sizes of pasta available to use in them. Secondly, unlike potatoes, you simply boil pasta and drain it. There is no peeling or chopping involved. Just boil, drain and add to your dressing or whatever. Cooked pasta makes a fabulous base for a multitude of flavours and textures!
I do confess that I am rather lazy when it comes to cooking. If I can find an easier or quicker way to do something I will find it.
I also like to use as few an amount of dishes that I can when it comes to cooking. Lets face it, washing up is not really anyone's favourite way to pass the time. That is why I love sheet pan cooking!
Dishes like this lemon herb chicken thighs, baked all on one sheet and sized for just two fit the bill perfectly!
Sheet pan cooking really lends itself to cooking for the smaller family. Really you can easily adapt any sheet pan recipe to cooking for more or less, by using two baking sheets, or a smaller baking sheet.
I sure wish I knew about this type cooking when my family was growing up. With five growing children, it would have come in quite handy!!
This recipe today is sized perfectly for just two people. As empty-nesters, I cook mainly for two people.
I have become somewhat of an expert at sizing things down, as I hate waste. You can very easily double this recipe however if you need to serve more!
You begin by cutting new potatoes into wedges and tossing them with melted butter and seasonings and roasting them on a rimmed baking tray for about 15 minutes.
I don't know about you, but I really love, LOVE roast potatoes of any kind. As you know the potato is one of my favourite vegetables and just look at those golden edges!
At the end of that time period, you add some boneless skinless chicken thighs, and asparagus cuts, which have also been tossed with a bit of melted butter and seasoning. At our local shop you can pick up "Wonky" vegetables.
I often buy them. There is nothing wrong with them. They are just "odd" shaped when compared with the perfection we usually see.
I am okay with "odd" shaped vegetables, especially when you are using them in a dish like this where they are going to be cut up and roasted. Both my asparagus and potatoes were "wonky" and I bet you can't tell!
A tsp of honey is spread on each chicken thigh, and then I like to top them with a spring of fresh thyme and a slice of lemon.
Honey, lemon and thyme, a triune of beautiful flavours that go wonderfully well with chicken cuts of any kind. A bit of chicken heaven.
Bang the tray back into the oven for a further 17 to 20 minutes and Bob's your uncle! Dinner is done!
You really can't get much better than that! Dinner in 20 minutes? Count me in!!
With perfectly cooked vegetables and tender flavourful chicken with tangy lemon, honey and buttery juices to spoon over top . . . and a slight touch of herbiness.
All you need on the side is perhaps a tossed mixed salad and some crusty bread if you so desire!
*Simple Lemon & Herb Chicken*
Serves 2
I
love sheet pan dinners. Not only are they fairly simple to create and
delicious, but they are pretty much no fuss no muss with very little
clean up afterwards, especially if you line your baking sheet with
aluminium foil.
2 TBS butter
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp black pepper
1/4 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tsp sweet paprika
1/2 pound new potatoes, unpeeled and quartered into wedges
4 boneless, skinless chicken thighs
1/2 pound asparagus, washed trimmed and cut into pieces
4 tsp honey
1/2 lemon, thinly sliced (Plus additional wedges for squeezing, optional)
a few sprigs of fresh thyme
Preheat the oven to 220*C/425*F/ gas mark 7. Line a
baking tray with sides with aluminium foil and spray the foil lightly
with low fat cooking spray.
Melt 1 TBS of the
butter in a bowl in the microwave. Add your potatoes along with the 1/4
tsp each of the salt & pepper, the garlic powder and paprika. Add
the potatoes and coat them in the mixture. Spread out on the baking
sheet, skin sides down, in a single layer. Roast in the preheated oven
for 15 to 20 minutes.
Melt the remaining butter in the same bowl in the microwave. Add
the asparagus cuts and the chicken pieces, along with the remaining salt
and pepper. Lay them out amongst the potatoes, opening up the chicken
and scattering the asparagus evenly in the pan. Spread 1 tsp of honey
over each piece of chicken. Top each with a sprig of thyme. Top with a
lemon slice. Scatter any remaining thyme over the vegetables.
This is so delicious I am always glad that it serves only two people because if I made any more of it, I would be temped to eat the lot, glutton that I am. I do hope you will give it a go! Bon Appetit!
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We eat a lot of chicken in our house and I am always looking for new things to do with it so that it doesn't get boring. I don't think that I, personally, could ever get bored of it, but my husband sure could! (Men!) I do like to please him if I can, so I am always doing different things with it to keep him happy about eating it!
Chicken is such a versatile ingredient. You can do so much with it and it easily adapts itself to a large variety of different flavours and textures. Today Todd brought home a rotisserie chicken from Costco for us to have for our tea.
I had seen a recipe on the TABLESPOON site for Thai Chicken Salad Wraps that ticked all of my boxes and that I was very keen to try and so I decided to adapt the recipe to what I had in the house and give them a go.
I didn't have any full size tortilla wraps, so I made do with smaller ones and made them as cones. This worked really well for me. I also cut the recipe in half as there are only two of us.
The original recipe used bagged coleslaw mix. I have never seen that over here, but that is not a problem because I have never minded shredding my own. I prefer to shred by hand as grating it would make it far too fine a texture for this purpose. I did grate my carrot.
The original recipe also called for using raw chicken breasts that you poach and cube, which you could certainly easily do. I had already cooked chicken, so I skipped this step!
I love chicken salad and I love Thai flavours, so this seemed like a win/win combination for me. I also love wraps.
The dressing for this salad is really delicious. It is a creamy peanut sauce, with sesame, soy, lime and coriander flavours, along with a bit of heat from some chili flakes. It uses soft light brown sugar, but as I am a diabetic, I used Sukrin Gold brown sugar substitute which worked fine.
Its actually pretty low carb, with the wraps so I would say fairly Diabetic friendly, with plenty of crunch from the vegetables and some from the peanuts, which (although high in fat) are a great source of additional protein.
They were really, really good, although if I make them again (and I really think I will as they are fabulously tasty) I will cut down a bit on the sauce/dressing as it was a bit too much for our liking. Overall however, I would call this a winner/winner chicken dinner!
*Thai Chicken Salad Roll Ups*
Serves 4
These tasty roll ups make a change from the usual chicken salad sandwich! Quick and easy to make as well as being delicious!
375g shredded cooked chicken (3 cups)
150g hand shredded cabbage (I use a mix of white and red) (1 1/2 cups)
1 small carrot, peeled and shredded
3 spring onions, thinly sliced
3 TBS chopped fresh coriander leaf (cilantro)
3 TBS coarsely chopped dry roasted peanuts
3 TBS creamy smooth peanut butter
3 TBS soy sauce
3 TBS lime juice
3 TBS soft light brown sugar (I use a brown sugar substitute)
3 TBS light sesame oil
1 1/2 tsp minced fresh garlic
pinch hot pepper flakes
salt and black pepper to taste
lettuce leaves ( I like baby cos)
8 (6-inch) flour tortillas
Place the chicken in a large bowl. Add the cabbage,
carrot, spring onions, coriander leaf and chopped peanuts. Whisk
together the peanut butter, soy sauce, lime juice, brown sugar, sesame
oil, garlic, hot pepper flakes and salt and pepper to taste, until
smooth. Pour over the chicken and vegetables and toss to coat
completely.
These are so delicious and very easy to throw together. I just loved them and I think you will too!! Bon Appetit!
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