Simple For Recipe: September 2019

Monday, 30 September 2019

Fig and Prosciutto Puff Pastry Tart

Bring a standard everyday salad to life with this beautifully balanced tart that combines sweet, juicy figs with salty proscuitto on top of flaky golden puff pastry. With figs in season, there's no better time to try this simple recipe. Drizzle with a fig or raspberry balsamic syrup for an explosion of flavours. Use other greens, like baby arugula or watercress instead of lamb's lettuce if you like. It is perfect for a light lunch or as an appetizer of a dinner party.

275 g Puff pastry sheet
60 g Lamb's lettuce or baby Rocket
1 Belgian endive, leaves separated
3-4 Ripe figs, cut into wedges
6 slice Prosciutto, coarsely torn
1 tbsp Fig or raspberry balsamic glaze
1 tbsp Fresh dill for garnishing

Preheat the oven to 200C/400F. Take your sheet of puff pastry and unroll. Using a sharp knife carefully score a border about 2cm thick around the edges of the pastry making sure you don’t cut all the way through. This will act as a frame and help to hold the filling in while baking.
Using a fork carefully prick the centre part of the pastry to encourage it not to rise too much. Bake for 20-25 mins or until golden brown and puffed.
Place the pastry on a large serving platter. Top with the lamb's lettuce, Belgian endive, fig wedges, and torn prosciutto. Drizzle with balsamic glaze and garnish with fresh dill.

Labels: Fruit, Pastries and Pies, pork

Thursday, 26 September 2019

Chinese Xiaolongbao (Soup-filled Dumplings)

Xiaolongbao, literally "Little Basket Buns",are traditionally filled with broth and pork, but beef, seafood, and vegetables are very often used as fillings. The broth inside is made by using some meat jelly inside the dumpling before steaming. Gelatin melts when steamed. Xiaolongbao always have soup, otherwise they are just Jiaozi / dumplings.

Filling	Wrapper
300 g Ground pork 2 g Salt 8 g Sugar 6 g Maggi sauce 1/4 tsp White pepper powder 1 stalk Spring onion, cut into sections 20 g Ginger root 150 ml Water 2 tsp Sesame oil 300 g Broth jelly	350 g German #1050 flour / unbleached bread flour 5 g Salt 165 ml Cold water

Use a heavy knife to smashed the ginger root. Place them in a bowl. Add in spring onion and water. Squeeze the mixture to release the juice from the ginger and onion. Strain. Season the ground pork with salt, sugar, Maggi sauce and pepper. Mix well. Gradually add in the prepared ginger-onion liquid and mix until all the liquid is absorbed and the mixture forms a firm and cohesive mass. Drizzle in the sesame oil and combine well. Dice the jelly and blend together with meat mixture. Cover with a plastic wrap and store in the fridge while prepare the wrappers.
Whisk the flour and salt together in a mixing bowl. Add in water and start mixing by hand. Once the dough has come together, turn onto a floured work surface and knead dough until it becomes a smooth, elastic ball. Cover the dough with a plastic wrap and allow it to rest for at least half an hour.
Half the dough lengthwise. On a floured surface roll each dough with palms back and forth to form a long rope of dough of even thickness. Portion the roll into 10-gram pieces and flatten each piece with the bottom of your palm. Use a rolling pin to roll the dough out forming a disk of 7cm with the edges thinner than the center. Hold a wrapper in your left hand and raise fingers up to form a recess. Place 2 teaspoons of filling in the middle of the wrapper. Carefully fold the edges of the wrapper together in a pleated fashion with the right hand. Pinch edges together to close the wrapper.
Soak cheese cloth in hot water, wring out water and lay in a steamer. Besides cheesecloth, cabbages, carrot slices, and parchment paper are a good source of lining the steamers too. Put in the dumplings and set the steamer over a pan filled with boiling water. Close the lid and steam for 8 minutes over strong heat. Serve with a sauce dish of thinly shredded ginger and black rice vinegar.

Labels: Chinese, Dimsum and Snacks, Pasta Rice and Dumplings, pork, Poultry

Saturday, 21 September 2019

Vegetable Ribbon Tart with Pesto and Ricotta

This delicious vegetable tart is filled with a layer of homemade pesto and ricotta and top with a spiral of thinly sliced ribbons of zucchini and carrots. Spelt flour gives the pastry a nutty flavour which works so well with the pesto filling. This vegetable tart is lovely for either lunch or as an appetizer.

Crust	Filling
100 g White spelt flour 100 g Whole spelt flour 1/4 tsp Black salt 100 g Cold butter, cubed 20 g Gruyere, finely grated 30 ml Buttermilk	350 g Carrots 400 g Zucchini 150 g Homemade pesto 100 g Ricotta 1-2 tbsp Avocado oil Black salt and freshly ground black pepper

Tip the flours into a bowl with black salt. Add the butter and rub in using your fingertips until it resembles breadcrumbs. Stir through the cheese with a knife. Drizzle over buttermilk, then use the knife to stir it in until clumps of dough start to form. Turn out onto a work surface and bring the dough together with your hands into a smooth ball. Alternatively, you can make the pastry in a food processor. Shape into a disc, wrap in cling film and chill for at least 30 minutes.
Use a vegetable peeler or mandolin to thinly slice carrots and zucchini lengthways into long thin ribbons. Stir together the pesto and ricotta. Season with salt and pepper.
Preheat oven to 200C/400F. Lightly grease the base and sides of an 22cm tart pan with removable base. Roll pastry between 2 sheets baking paper until 3mm thick and large enough to line prepared pan. Press pastry into the pan. Trim edges. Line pastry with baking paper. Fill with pastry weights or rice. Bake for 10 minutes. Remove paper and weights or rice. Bake for a further 5 minutes or until light golden and just crisp.
Remove the tart shell from the oven and reduce oven to 180C/350F. Spoon the prepared filling into pastry case, pressing down gently with back of spoon to level.
Starting from the outside, arrange the vegetable ribbons to form concentric circles to fill the shell. Brush all over with the avocado oil, and sprinkle with freshly milled salt and pepper to taste. Return it to the oven and bake for 35-40 minutes until the vegetables are cooked through. Sprinkle some extra pine nuts over if desired. Slice into wedges to serve.

Labels: Cheese, Pastries and Pies, Vegetables

Three-Ingredient Peach Sherbet

My peach tree had SO many peaches this year and I was able to share a bunch with friends and family and I still had plenty left to use for some sweet treats. Last weekend, I made two different kinds of peach ice cream. I made this sherbet recipe, which only has three-ingredients and then I made another recipe that had a lot of ingredients and required cooking, chilling and freezing in an ice cream maker.

AND, this three-ingredient, no-churn, recipe was better than that labor-intensive recipe that had no peach flavor. Can you believe that?

This sherbet is my current obsession. It has so much peach flavor and it's the easiest recipe to make. All you need is ripe, delicious, peaches and a can of sweetened condensed milk. I also like to add a little vanilla for added flavor, but that's optional. Anyway, peel and slice the peaches, freeze until firm, then throw them in a powerful blender or food processor and blend with the sweetened condensed milk until smooth and creamy. You can either eat it right away and it will be like soft-serve or you can freeze until firm. I made another batch of this last night, because I love it so much.

You might also like:

Peach Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

Peach Pie Sheet Cake Bars

Peach Jam with Less Sugar

Peach Bread with Cinnamon Streusel Topping

Three-Ingredient Peach Sherbet
adapted from: Martha Stewart
(Printable Recipe)

6-7 large ripe peaches
1 (14 oz.) can sweetened condensed milk
1 tsp. vanilla extract

Peel and slice the peaches; freeze until firm. Blend frozen peaches, sweetened condensed milk and vanilla in a powerful blender or food processor until smooth and creamy. Serve immediately for soft-serve ice cream or pour into a freezer-safe container and freeze until firm.

Labels: Dessert, Ice Cream

Wednesday, 18 September 2019

Yin Yang Butter Cookies

Two different flavours of cookies, orange and chocolate, put together in perfect harmony to create this playful, slice-and-bake yin-yang cookie.

The Yin-Yang is one of the most famous symbols represented in Taoism--a Chinese religion and philosophy.

Butter Cookies	Chocolate Cookies
90 g Unsalted butter, at room temperature 35 g Caster sugar 1/2 tsp Orange extract angiesrecipes 1 tbsp Egg yolk 85 g German #405 flour	90 g German #405 flour 10 g Dutch processed cocoa powder Pinch of salt 60 g Unsalted butter, at room temperature 50 g Caster sugar 1 Egg yolk 1/2 tsp Rum extract angiesrecipes

Cut the butter into smaller pieces and place them in a mixing bowl. Add caster sugar gradually at the side of the bowl while mixing, beating thoroughly after each addition. Switch to medium speed to beat sugar and butter until the mixture fluffy and pale. Scrape the bowl down to make sure everything is thoroughly combined. Beat in egg yolk and orange extract until smooth. Add in the flour and fold to combine. Wrap up the cookie dough and chill for 1 hour.
Whisk together the flour, cocoa powder and salt in a bowl. Set aside. Cut the butter into smaller pieces and place them in another mixing bowl. Add caster sugar gradually at the side of the bowl while mixing, beating thoroughly after each addition. Switch to medium speed to beat sugar and butter until the mixture fluffy and pale. Scrape the bowl down to make sure everything is thoroughly combined. Beat in egg yolk and rum extract until smooth. Add in the cocoa flour mixture and fold to combine. Wrap up the chocolate cookie dough and chill for 1 hour.
Divide each dough into 4 logs, about 1 inch in diameter, and reserve about 10 grams of each dough to make the dots. Press one side of each log with your thumb to make a comma shape. Cover and chill 1 hour until firm.
Dust a work surface lightly with flour. Place one orange dough log with round side down on the work surface. Brush the side lightly with water and turn the chocolate dough log on top of the orange dough, creating the yin-yang pattern. Gently roll the log until round. Repeat with the remaining logs. Wrap and chill 1-2 hours until firm.
Preheat the oven to 175C/350F. Cut the cookie logs into 5mm thick slices. Arrange the cookies on a parchment paper lined baking pan, about an inch apart. Pinch a bit of reserved chocolate dough, and roll it into a small round ball. Gently press it into the orange part of the cookies. Do the same with the reserved orange dough and press them into the chocolate part of the cookies. Bake in the center of preheated oven for about 12 minutes. Cool the cookies on the rack.

Labels: Chocolate, Cookies and Bars

Tuesday, 17 September 2019

Applesauce Loaf

Applesauce Loaf (Source: Maida Heatter's Cakes (Andrews & McMeel Publishing, 2011 ed., pg. 255).

This recipe is very similar to the one I just posted - the Blueberry Applesauce Loaf. Since I wasn't too happy with the taste of that one, I decided to eliminate the whole wheat flour and use all-purpose flour (so I used 2 cups of all-purpose flour and no whole wheat flour). This is a matter of personal preference. I thought it tasted much better without using the whole wheat but using either method will work fine for the recipe.

I still have applesauce left from the Chunky Applesauce I made earlier so I'm still using that. I was looking through her books again last night and noticed that I haven't made the Chocolate Applesauce Cake yet! A serious omission and one that I must do soon!

1 cup raisins
1 cup sifted all-purpose white flour (or 2 cups if you want to use instead of the whole wheat flour)
1 cup sifted all-purpose whole wheat flour
1 1/2 cups walnuts, halves or large pieces
1/2 tsp. salt
1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. powdered instant expresso or coffee
4 oz. unsalted butter
3/4 cup light or dark brown sugar, firmly packed
2 large eggs
1 1/4 cups sweetened or unsweetened applesauce

Preheat oven to 350. Butter (or spray) a 8 cup capacity loaf pan and dust with fine, dry bread crumbs (or flour).

Add two tablespoons of white flour (reserving the rest) and toss it with the raisins and nuts. Set aside.

Sift the reserved flour with the salt, cinnamon, baking powder, baking soda and powdered instant coffee.

Beat the butter until soft, add the sugar and and eggs and mix well.

Add the applesauce.

On low speed, add the whole-wheat flour (or do like I did and use white flour).

Remove the mixer bowl and stir in the raisins and nuts.

Transfer the mixture to the prepared pan and smooth the top. With the spatula, form a shallow trench down the middle lenghtwise. This will keep it from rising too high in the middle.

Bake for 50 -60 minutes until a tester comes out the center clean. Cool in the pan for 10 minutes, then remove from the pan and cool completely on a wire rack. Refrigerate for a few hours or overnight before slicing.

Labels: cakes

Sunday, 15 September 2019

Blueberry Applesauce Loaf

Blueberry Applesauce Loaf (Source: Maida Heatter's Cakes (Andrews & McMeel Publishing, 2011 ed., pg. 270).

I wanted to make something with the applesauce that I just made so I decided to try the Blueberry Applesauce Loaf since I had some blueberries in the freezer. I have to say that this was far from my favorite. I believe that it is the whole wheat flour that I did not like. The cake is very dense and bakes beautifully. The blueberry flavor is very nice and intense but the flavor of the cake was lacking. I plan to make the Applesauce Loaf (a very similar recipe but without the blueberries) next and I'm going to use all-purpose flour and omit the wheat flour and see how it turns out. Tune in later for that!

1 1/2 cups pecan pieces, toasted
2 cups fresh blueberries
2 cups sifted all-purpose flour
1 cup sifted all-purpose wheat flour
1 TBS baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp mace
2 eggs
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 cup plus 2 TBS sugar
1 cup unsweetened applesauce
2 tsp. lemon juice

Preheat the oven to 350. Butter (or spray) 2 loaf pans that have a 4 or 5 cup capacity.

Wash the berries and let them drain.