Tag: food

Baking | Empanada Gallega … Daring Bakers at their best!

“I celebrate food every day, it’s sustains us and forms who we are.”
John-Bryan Hopkins

Empanada Gallega It was the 27th and my mind was singing Empanada Gallega … only that procrastinating got the better of me this time around. It’s the Daring Baker time of the month, and this time I got deluged with work. Not that I didn’t do the challenge; I didn’t draft the post in time. From Filled Pate a Choux Swans last month to savoury pies in September, the journey gets more delicious every month.

Patri of the blog, Asi Son Los Cosas, was our September 2012 Daring Bakers’ hostess and she decided to tempt us with one of her family’s favorite recipes for Empanadas! We were given two dough recipes to choose from and encouraged to fill our Empanadas as creatively as we wished!

I was instantly attracted to the origin and inspiration behind these charming little pies. The story so beautifully and poetically narrated by Patri, it played in my mind as a film. In her words …

“My grandparents lived in a country house that my great-grandfather built a hundred years ago. It is in the northwest of Spain, right on top of Portugal, in the region called Galicia. Back in the 70s, the kitchen was the place of gathering, talking, reading… and there was always something cooking on the iron stove, be it a pot of caldo (a hearty soup), or a stew, or a cake in the oven. When I think back to those days, I can smell the sweetness of burnt wood or coal, the almost “chocolate” scent that rose up to your nostrils when you opened the door, the warmth of the air when coming in from a cool, windy and wet August morning…“

I knew instantly that I would be making these! The dough was ready in next to no time. I made the whole recipe for dough and have to say there was a LOT of dough! {I substituted a little bit of plain flour with whole wheat}. You can make one large pie, or many small ones. The dough lasted 3 days {keeps well in the fridge}. On day three I made Turkish pizzas with it. Wonderful stuff!

An empanada{or empada, in Portuguese} is a stuffed bread or pastry baked or fried in many countries in Western Europe, Latin America, and parts of Southeast Asia. The name comes from the Galician, Portuguese and Spanish verb empanar, meaning to wrap or coat in bread.

It’s an easy dough to use, and the recipe is interesting. You roll out the dough and use it like a pastry dough for pie, a larger portion for the bottom. Place it in your baking dish with a rim {step by step here}. Top with filling and cover with a smaller portion of rolled out dough and seam the edges. The amount of dough you use it up to you entirely. Since I’m trying {read desperately} to cut back on carbs these days, I rolled the dough really thin. It worked like a charm!As Patri says, Empanada is the kind of food that makes one go back to childhood. A bread-like dough that surrounds a vegetable frittata with anything you can imagine, from sardines to beef. Or filled with sugar, butter and fruit. Warm or cold, it was simple, pretty, and delicious.The amazing thing is that almost every region in the world has an empanada sort of preparation whether it be the curry puff from Malaysia, samosa and  gujiya from India, calzones from Italy, meat pies from Ghana, börek from Turkey, kibbeh from Lebanon … and plenty more! {‘Plenty’ reminds me of Ottolenghis new book ‘Jerusalem‘ that Shulie just shouted out about! Another winner, another cookbook on the wishlist. Sigh} I made a portion of lamb filled empanada galettas  as well {with the same lamb filling from the Lamb Purslane Pides aka Turkish pizza}. This is a handy basic empanada recipe and makes for great food on the go. Make one large empanada galletta or small ones, even petit work well in a muffin tray maybe, or in ramekins.

Do stop by here and check out some the amazing empanada galletas that will make you instantly crave pie! Thank you Patri for sharing your delicious childhood memories and recipe with us. Thank you as always Lisa of La Mia Cucina and Ivonne of Cream Puffs in Venice for hosting this fab kitchen!!

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Recipe: Empanada Gallega

Summary: A bread-like dough that surrounds a filling with just about anything you can imagine, from mushrooms, mince and cheese. Or filled with sugar, butter and fruit. Warm or cold, it’s simple, pretty, and delicious.

Servings: 10 {makes a 40cmx30cm square empanada / a 35cm diameter round empanada or 8-10 4″ round pies like I made.} Minimally adapted from here

Prep Time: 15 minutes
Total Time: 40 minutes
Ingredients:

  • Empanada Gallega Dough
  • 650g plain flour
  • 100g whole wheat flour
  • 480ml lukewarm water
  • 17g / 1 1/4 tbsp instant yeast
  • 10g / 2tsp salt
  • 60ml oil
  • 1 large egg for wash
  • Filling
  • 500g chicken mince
  • 100g / 1 onion, finely chopped
  • 6 cloves garlic, chopped fine
  • 1-2 tbsp dried herbs , or fresh
  • 1 tsp chili flakes
  • 4 small eggplants, chopped fine
  • 200g mushrooms, chopped fine
  • 1tbsp Worcestershire sauce
  • Salt and pepper to taste
  • 200gm mozzarella, grated
  • 2 tsp olive oil

Method:

  1. Empanada Gallega Dough
  2. Sift both flour into a big bowl and make a well in the middle. Rub the yeast in with your fingers.
  3. In a small bowl, mix the water and the salt.
  4. Now, using your fingers or a wooden spoon, start adding the water and mixing it with the flour-yeast mixture. Keep on working with your fingers or spoon until you have added enough water and all the flour has been incorporated and you have a messy ball of dough.
  5. On a clean counter top, knead the dough for approximately 10 minutes
  6. Stand mixer
  7. Mix the ingredients with the paddle attachment until mixed and then switch to a dough hook and knead on low for about 6 minutes.
  8. Thermomix
  9. Place all ingredients in TM bowl and mix on speed 6 for 30 seconds, then knead for 5 minutes.
  10. Clean and oil the big bowl you used for mixing and place the kneaded dough in it. Cover it with a napkin or piece of linen and keep it in a warm, draught-free place for approximately 40 to 50 minutes.
  11. Once risen, turn the dough back into a floured counter and cut it in half. Cover one half with the napkin to prevent drying.
  12. Spread the other half of the dough using a rolling pin. You can use a piece of wax paper over the counter, it will make it easier to move the dough around. Depending on the shape of your oven pan or cookie sheet, you will make a rectangle or a round.
  13. Now, the thinness of the dough will depend on your choice of filling and how much bread you like in every bite. For your first time, make it about 3mm thin (about 1/10th of an inch) and then adjust from that in the next ones you make.
  14. Sprinkle a little grated cheese over the bottom. Place the filling, making sure it is cold and that all the base is covered. Sprinkle a wee bit more cheese if you like. {Using a hot filling will make the bottom layer of the empanada become soggy. Be careful to avoid adding too much oil from the filling, try to make it as “dry” as possible.}
  15. Start preheating your oven to moderate 180ºC.
  16. I lined the bases on my ramekins with parchment paper to be on the safer side.
  17. Take the other half of the dough and spread it out to the same or less thinness of the base. You can use a piece of wax paper for this too. Take into account that this “top” dough needs to be smaller around than the bottom, as it only needs to cover the filling.
  18. If not using wax paper, move carefully the top to cover the filling. If using wax paper, transfer the dough, turn upside down, cover the filling and gently peel off the wax paper.
  19. Using your fingers, join bottom and top dough, when you have gone all the way around, start pinching top and bottom together with your thumb and index finger and turning them half way in, that way you end up with a rope-like border.
  20. When you are finished, make a 1 inch hole in the middle of the top layer, {or stamp out shapes with a tiny cookie cutter}. This will help hot air exit the empanada while it’s baking without breaking the cover.
  21. In a small bowl, beat an egg and add a tbsp of cold water. With the pastry brush, paint the top of the empanada with the egg wash.
  22. Place the empanada in the oven and bake for about 25 minutes for small pies and 45 minutes for a large one. Check that the bottom part is done.
  23. Let the pies cool on a cooling rack for about 20-30 minutes before trying to dislodge from pie tins/ramekins. Gently run a butterknife along the edges to ease them out.
  24. Filling
  25. Heat the olive oil in a wok and add the onions, garlic and red chili flakes {and dried herbs if using}. Sauté  over low heat until the garlic is fragrant.
  26. Add the chicken mince and roast on high flame till the mince its light golden, no longer pink {5-7 minutes}.
  27. Next add the chopped eggplant and mushrooms and sauté again over high heat until most the liquid has disappeared and the mince is quite dry.
  28. Season with salt and pepper, drizzle in the Worcestershire sauce and add fresh herbs if using. Give it all a good stir, stir until quite dry so the pastry doesn’t get soggy.  Cool completely before using as filling.
  29. Note: This makes a good chicken mince samosa filling too.

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Almond Chocolate Chip Cupcakes … and getting featured on Femina

“A good cupcake and a good life have many of the same ingredients – good timing, sugar, and spice.”
Evelyn Beilenson

Almond Chocolate Chip Cupcakes, my current favourites! A recent visit to the cupcake factory led me to hop back onto the cupcake trail after quite a long hiatus. Much to the teens delight, these little babies are beginning to show up more frequently now … dressed in butter cream and often  ‘undressed‘ too!Either way, they go like hot cakes. There is something endearing about a freshly baked cupcake! Of course, given the choice, the call is always for the ones lavished with butter cream. For school snack boxes though, the plain ones work great as it’s still quite warm here in North India.So when one of India’s most popular magazines Femina {first published in 1959} asked to interview me, with a photo shoot at home to follow, I wanted to bake something ‘nice‘, something original and something that was ‘me‘!

Femina is a magazine, published fortnightly in India. It is owned by Worldwide Media, a 50:50 joint venture between BBC Worldwide and The Times Group. It is primarily a women’s magazine and features articles on relationships, beauty and fashion,travels,women fight back, cuisine, and health and fitness. It also features articles on celebrities and cultural facets of Indian women.

The Almond Chocolate Chip Cupcakes were what I baked! A natural choice because these are my current ‘cupcakes on the go‘, healthy, requested quite often, good with frosting and good even without. You can play around with the pairings as you like. Just plain almond meal is nice and carries frosting well. Roasted chopped almonds would pair well with a chocolate ganache, or maybe hazelnuts with a Nutella frosting {YUM}. I like the texture that almond meal adds. It’s a nice feeling to throw whole almonds into your processor with a little sugar and soon have ‘healthy nut meal’. I continue to use ‘raw sugar‘ in my baking and that has worked well so far. It’s marginally better than processed sugar. The good thing is that you don’t need to grind it as it has a nice, fine grain. I’ve even begun using it in butter cream instead of icing sugar. Works a charm, and is cheaper too!!The Borgonovo Bottle Indro from Urban Dazzle has my home made pure vanilla extract that is now ready. The polka dot cupcake liners are ones that my sweet friend Bina sent me from the US quite a while ago. I use them very sparingly Bina because I really like them, and they remind me of you.  When I’m in a more rustic frame of mind, I like to line the muffin tray with parchment paper squares. It gives them a rough, earthy look!

[print_this]Recipe: Almond Chocolate Chip Cupcakes

Summary: ‘Cupcakes on the go‘, healthy, requested quite often, good with frosting and good even without. The almond meal adds interesting texture and taste to them. Makes 12

Prep Time: 15 minutes
Total Time: 40 minutes
Ingredients:

  • Cupcakes
  • 180g plain flour
  • 85g whole almonds
  • 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
  • pinch salt
  • 150g raw sugar
  • 100g butter
  • 2 eggs, room temperature
  • 1/2 vanilla bean
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1/4 tsp almond extract
  • 220ml 2% fat milk
  • 100g dark chocolate chips
  • Flaked almonds, optional
  • Buttercream
  • 100g unsalted butter, room temperature {not too soft}
  • 50ml low fat cream, chilled
  • 75-100g raw sugar {to taste}

Method:

  1. Preheat the oven to 180C. Line a 12 cup muffin tray with liners.
  2. Run the whole almonds in the processor with 30gm raw sugar in short spurts until you end up with a fine meal. Don’t over process else you might have almond paste! {Thermomix Speed 10, 10 seconds, repeat as required}
  3. Put in the flour, baking powder and salt and process briefly to mix. {Thermomix Speed 10, 20 seconds}
  4. Beat the butter and remaining sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, vanilla bean and vanilla extract and beat again for 30 seconds. {Thermomix Speed 4, butterfly attachment, 4 minutes for butter, and 2 minutes with egg. Remove butterfly.}
  5. Alternatively add the flour/almond meal mix with milk until just uniformly mixed. Donot over mix. {Thermomix: Add the milk and flour/almond meal mix and mix on reverse speed for 30 seconds, scraping sides once or twice}. Fold in the chocolate chips, and sprinkle over with flaked almonds if desired.
  6. Divide between liners and bake for 20 minutes/until risen and golden brown. Cool completely before frosting.
  7. Buttercream frosting
  8. Beat all ingredients until smooth and firm. taste and adjust sugar if required. {I keep the butter on the cooler side, almost firm, as it is still warm-ish here
  9. Place into a piping fat fitted with a star nozzle and pipe onto cupcakes.

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Petite Iced Cakes … Coffee Cream, Raspberry Cream & Chocolate Cream

“I loved their home. Everything smelled older, worn but safe; the food aroma had baked itself into the furniture.”
Susan Strasberg

Petite Iced Cakes for an event I enjoyed creating for. I had a blast making these, experimenting with different flavours and layering mini cakes.  Had I the time, I would have made a second batch because the first one turned out to be such fun! The event? An Interflora challenge for the baking blogger community to create a delicious treat for ‘Grandparents’ Day Baking Challenge’ on Sunday 7th October.It’s got a nice feel to it . All you need to do is bake a recipe that’s been handed down to you from generation to generation, or something you have fond memories of baking with your grandma in the kitchen or simply a delicious sweet treat to celebrate the occasion. Bake it, blog about it and mail a link to these good florists in London who are hosting the challenge. A public vote will decide the winner!I have a confession to make. My Grandma never baked, an oven in a remote Indian house unheard of at the time. She cooked a LOT, my paternal grandma that is. I still remember her sitting all hunched up in a brick and stone kitchen, cooking over a low wood fire, blowing air through an iron pipe when the flame needed some help! The aromas from that almost extinct Indian kitchen still dance in my head, and come alive each time I smell a wood fire oven!So much for connect and food memories. She even had a dark room where she stored HUGE jars of Indian pickles and preserves, the room kept locked to keep pesky kids from sticking their fingers in. We visited once every year as my father was in the Air Force and we were always posted far away. The little dark room was always open for us, much to the other kids chagrin!Thankfully my mother did bake ‘some’, in the sense that she baked an annual Christmas Fruit Cake {with garam masala} that we waited for eagerly every December, the high point of our curious little lives. The funny thing is that it always got so late that in many ways it became a New Years Fruit Cake! I’ve blogged about her Garam Masala Chritmas Cake  and am thankful the kids can remember her as baking something, anything! She used to bake a mean roast once upon a time … about 30 years ago!

So here we go … I have created little somethings to help spread the awareness about Grandparents day, a day to recognise the contribution that the older generation gave to their families and wider society. These little iced cakes may not look perfect but they hold something for everyone! There’s Coffee Cream {my personal favourite}, there’s Chocolate Cream that everyone loves, and there’s Raspberry Cream, reminiscent of the favourite British Victoria sandwich cake.Once again ingredients laid out, the mind began experimenting. I had a genoise sponge in mind, using melted butter in the batter. Thoughts of the Del Monte contest on IndiBlogger made me reach out for Del Monte Olive Oil instead! The sponge came out moist and pillowy soft! The petite iced cakes are on their way to WorldFoody as there is some raspberry fruit filling from Del Monte in one of them too.

When I started off I had just  a layered coffee cream cake in mind. As I mixed the batter, my mind went towards many little cakes, and then the possibilities exploded in my mind. I was a baker in a hurry! I narrowed down to Coffee Cream, Raspberry Cream and Peaches ‘n’ Cream.  Then ‘normal life happened’. While one terrible teen demanded to be dropped to a friends place, the other had to be picked up, some more deadlines had to be met … blah blah blah! The peaches lived happily ever after in their tin, and I made a Chocolate Cream cake instead as I had a small portion of chocolate pastry cream in the fridge. So come, put your best baking skills forward and bake something sweet to celebrate Grandparents Day … a desert that might be a family speciality, a dessert that might be just the thing to bring a smile to their face, or one that you can surprise them with. When I looked at these little almost crooked cakes,  I heard the junior teens voice deep in my head, ” Why does Nana always keep laughing so loudly at everything, I mean EVERYTHING?”

To enter the competition simply email your photos, recipe and a link to your blog article to blog@interflora.co.uk by Friday 21st September.The winner will receive a luxury arrangement of flowers of their choice plus a Grandparents’ Day Gift Basket which will be delivered to your chosen recipient in time for Grandparents’ Day. 5 runners up will also receive a Grandparents’ Day Gift Basket for their nominated grandparent.

[print_this]Recipe: Petite Iced Cakes

Summary: Dainty little iced cakes lavished with a vanilla buttercream. Each good to serve four, they are made with different flavours – coffee, chocolate & raspberry. The flavour possibilities are endless … and the fun, infinite!

Prep Time: 1 hour
Total Time: 1hour 30 minutes
Ingredients:

  • Sponge
  • 3 eggs, room temperature
  • 60g {1/2 cup} all purpose flour
  • 110g {1/2 cup} raw sugar {or Castor}
  • 20g {1/4 cup} almond meal
  • 1tsp baking powder
  • pinch of salt
  • 10gm / 2 tsp Del Monte Extra Virgin Olive Oil
  • 1.5tsp 2% fat mil
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla bean powder {or 1 tsp pure vanilla extract}
  • Classic Vanilla Buttercream
  • 100gm unsalted butter, not too soft
  • 40ml low fat cream {Amul}, chilled
  • 150gm icing sugar {it was a little oversweet for me, but fine with the kids}
  • pinch salt
  • 1/2 vanilla bean scraped
  • Flavourings
  • 1 tsp coffee for the coffee cake
  • Dark chocolate ganache, chocolate chips
  • Del Monte Raspberry Fruit Filling

Method:

  1. Sponge
  2. Line the bottoms and sides of three small 4″ baking tins. Preheat oven to 180C.
  3. Sift the flour, almond meal, baking powder and salt together. Reserve.
  4. Mix the olive oil and milk in a small bowl Reserve.
  5. Beat the eggs and sugar over simmering water on high speed for about 10 minutes until the mixtures becomes thick and mousse like, tripling in quantity {Thermomix, Speed 4, Butterfly insert, 37C, 10 minutes or more}
  6. Take off water and continue beating for 3-4 minutes until it cools down a bit. {Thermomix, Speed 4, Butterfly insert, 3-4 minutes}
  7. Gently fold in the flour mixture in 3-4 goes. {Thermomix, Reverse Speed 2}, followed by the olive oil and milk mixture. Blend in gently but uniformly, divide batter between tins and bake for 20-25 minutes until the sponge springs back when touched lightly, ora tester comes out clean.
  8. Cool on racks for 5 minutes, remove from tins and cool completely.
  9. Classic Vanilla Buttercream
  10. Beat the ingredients together until smooth and light. Taste and adjust sugar if required.
  11. Assembling
  12. Reserve a little buttercream for piping on top if desired.
  13. Cut the little cakes horizontally into 2-3 layers each. Sandwich one with the buttercream, add a few chocolate chips within if desired, and top with a chocolate ganache. Pipe some plain buttercream if desired.
  14. Sandwich the second with some buttercream and raspberry fruit filling, topping that cake with some buttercream and a dollop of filling.
  15. Whi the remaining buttercream with 1 tsp of coffee and sandwich and frost the little cake with it. Pipe some plain vanilla rosettes if desired and add a chocolate lace border if you have the time and/or inclination!
  16. Chill until ready to serve.
  17. ENJOY

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French Fougasse with Roasted Red Bell Pepper, Garlic, Walnut & Mozarella … #fortheloveofbread

“If thou tastest a crust of bread, thou tastest all the stars and all the heavens.”
Robert Browning

Bread we love! French Fougasse with Roasted Red Bell Pepper & Garlic, Walnut & Mozarella … one of the most satisfying, indulgent and ‘would sell like hot cakes’ breads I’ve made ever since I’ve got back into bread baking mode! There’s been a bread baking frenzy of sorts and the net seems  knee deep in dough!I switched into bread baking mode with wonderful wonderful Ottolenghis focaccia and there’s been little looking back. That was a most excellent bread to bake … deep, rustic, complex flavours. The stamp of Ottolenghis culinary brilliance!! It must have been more than a coincidence to find Jamie in Nantes baking focaccia too … whihc is how I walked into the Twelve Loves Challenge. What is that? Simply said, an event  ‘for the love of bread‘!

I missed their August challenge but looks like carbs all the way this month and the bread monster is alive and kicking yeast on PAB! The September Twelve Loaves Challenge calls for Bread with Cheese; for me it meant baking French Fougasse stuffed with cheesy goodness, a bread we LOVE at home.

In French cuisine, fougasse is a type of bread typically associated with Provence but found (with variations) in other regions. Some versions are sculpted or slashed into a pattern resembling an ear of wheat.

I’ve baked this often, always with fresh yeast and plain flour. This time though, with carbs threatening an overdose, I did a tiny substitution with whole wheat flour and used instant yeast. I also literally stuffed the dough, almost making it a more like a baked sandwich than bread. It was delicious … and disappeared soon! I didn’t have Gouda so used mozzarella instead. Any cheese is good and mozzarella was great … warm, stringy, flavourful, cheesily indulgent.You could always halve the cheese but mine had a good dose ‘For the Love of Bread’ of course! Bread with Cheese Twelve Loaves is kneadlessly hosted by my sweet baker friends – Jamie @ Life’s a Feast, Lora @ Cake Duchess and Barb @ Creative Culinary. They are immensely talented ladies, inspirational too.Along side, the very viral FB group on CAL took off and we voted for a bread baking event … it was time to Tame The Yeast Beast. A lot of bread talk took place – dough ‘mentoring‘, recipe swaps, inspirations across the board, ideas exchanged, meals virtually dug into … The flour and yeast industry must be feeling the upswing these days with home bakers doing bread from scratch across the globe!Never has it been a better time to ‘break bread’ together. There’s been plenty of bread talk, FAQs, fresh yeast vs instant yeast vs sourdough {sourdough bread above}, why the yeast won’t rise, the brand of flour, the temperature etc. I’m no expert but have found that more often than never it’s the quality of the yeast which plays spoilsport and gives rise to beastly failure!This week, I also baked my maiden sourdough bread thanks to Sangeeta who shared some sourdough with us at Veda. My bread didn’t come out looking too good, and the recipe needs some further experimenting. Sangeeta’s posted a wonderful sourdough FAQ on her blog and I now know my bread was pleasantly sour because it was proofed for 3 days. The kids loved the flavour … {Sorry about the photographs. All done in a rainy day hurry}Those loaves too disappeared pretty soon… some with lunch, and the rest as sandwiches for dinner. Will tweak the recipe and get sourdough confident soon. I want to make a San Francisco Sourdough bread one day … have you made one yet? Until then, here is one of my favourite meal breads for you, a  French Fougasse, almost a meal in itself. Serve alongside a light salad {I did a chickpea salad}, steamed French beans or char grilled broccoli, maybe a soup.

[print_this]Recipe: Bread – French Fougasse with Roasted Red Bell Pepper & Garlic, Walnut & Mozarella

Summary: Bread we love! With carbs threatening an overdose, did a tiny substitution with whole wheat flour and used instant yeast. I literally stuffed it, almost making it a more like a baked sandwich than bread! Any cheese is good here and mozzarella was great. {Recipe adapted from The Practical Encyclopedia of Baking}. Makes 2 breads {each serves 4}

Prep Time: 15 minutes
Total Time: 60 minutes {plus rising time}
Ingredients:

  • 350g all purpose flour
  • 100g wholewheat flour
  • 300ml warm water {divided 250ml + 50ml}
  • 1tbsp instant yeast
  • 30g olive oil + 15g for garlic
  • 10g /1.5tsp salt
  • 1 red bell pepper, roasted, skinned, chopped
  • 1 head of garlic, roasted
  • 200g mozzarella, chopped {can decrease if desired. Can use Gouda, cheddar, well drained ricotta etc}
  • 100g walnuts, chopped
  • Extra olive oil for brushing
  • Sea salt for sprinkling

Method:

  1. Squeeze out the roasted head of garlic and mash with 15g /1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil. Reserve in a small bowl.
  2. Take 50ml of water {lukewarm} & dissolve the yeast into it. Stir the salt and 30ml of olive oil into the remaining water.
  3. Mix both flours, make a well in the centre and pour the yeast/water mixture into it.
  4. Knead to a dough, kneading further on a floured surface for 8-10 minutes, till  smooth & elastic.
  5. Thermomix: Place both flours, salt and yeast in bowl of TM and whiz for 5 seconds on speed 10. Add the water and olive oil and mix on Speed 6 for 30 seconds, then knead in closed position for 5-6 minutes.
  6. Place in an oiled bowl, cover the bowl with cling wrap & leave in a warm place for about an hour until doubled.
  7. Punch down & divide into 2.
  8. Roll one half out to about an 12″ oval, spread half the roasted garlic olive oil mixture on the base, sprinkle over half the bell pepper and half the walnuts. Season lightly salt and freshly ground pepper. Roll up gently like a swiss roll.
  9. Fold over the dough 2-3 times on itself to incorporate the stuffing.
  10. Shape each back into a flattish ball, then fold the bottom third up, & top third down to make an oblong.
  11. Roll into ovals with a flat base, cut slits diagonally, three on each side. Pull slightly to open the cuts. {Repeat with the other half.}
  12. Place on parchment lined baking sheets. Cover with cling wrap & leave to double for 35-40 minutes while you preheat the oven.
  13. Preheat the oven to 220C, brush the loaves with olive oil, sprinkle over sea salt and bake for approximately 25-30 minutes till golden brown. Brush with more olive oil as they come out of the oven. Cool on racks. Serve warm {that’s how we love it} or at room temperature.

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Baking| Ottolenghis Brilliant Focaccia … doesn’t get better than this!

“The smell of good bread baking, like the sound of lightly flowing water, is indescribable in its evocation of innocence and delight.”
M.F.K. Fisher

It was bread baking day. Sometime days are like that, now rather rare, and with a relatively ‘free’ day comes the urge to make bread. Chatting with Sangeeta on FB, she was sipping her morning tea, me already on my second coffee and the laundry whirring annoyingly, I was hit with a ‘bread baking feeling‘ . By afternoon I had a brilliant Focaccia bursting with flavour yelling to get out of the oven!The bread recipe caught me by surprise. In my head I had a slightly quicker bread, something which would just do a single rise, yeast & all. I turned to one of my all time favourite books, Ottolenghi, The Cookbook but didn’t read the recipe thoroughly though …I always heel ‘happy’ when I read the book – so much quality food, fresh produce holding the key to the end result, recipes from the heart, colours and flavours that leap out of the pages … and photographs that tantalise the tastebuds! Even if I don’t cook / bake out of it, it keeps me strangely satisfied! I weighed the ingredients, added the water … and took a double take! This was just the starter, or a preferment! There was going to be LOTS of bread! For some reason the elder teen rejects bread these days because of her diet, cutting back carbs etc, yet the rainy weather had me in a bread baking frame of mind!! I wanted to bake real bread, slow bread … not a quick, non yeast bread! Thankfully the trusted Thermomix is always at hand and takes the work out of kneading. There was plenty of rising to happen. First the preferment, then the 1st rise, then some folding {almost like rough puff pastry}, then some more rise. All this folding and rising resulted in a delightfully nice dough… and in turn, a delightfully nice bread!I baked half on day one and punched down the other half and refrigerated it for day two. NICE!! It was even better the next day with a third slow rise in the fridge … and ‘bubbly and squeaky‘ as Dorie Greenspan would call it! It’s a beautiful dough to have in the fridge. Both days the bread didn’t last long… quite an addictive bake!Even the dieting diva loved it and couldn’t stop nibbling. It’s no nice and chewy she declared! That’s the beauty of Ottolenghis recipes…they ALWAYS deliver. The kids had focaccia sandwiches for dinner that night with chicken salami, homemade pesto and mozzarella. The verdict – ♥♥♥!The dehydrated tomatoes from Fab India were SO disappointing; I’m not going back there in a hurry! On the other hand, the queen olives stuffed with pimento from Leonardo are absolute winners. That jar’s not safe once it’s open … you cannot keep away from it … delectable! So is the Leonardo Gold Olive Oil that I slathered on top … it just made the bread sing!!It’s a bread I am going to make often. I like that it baked even better the next day, so maybe the next time I leave it in the fridge for a slow overnight rise. Bread baking days are here again … and I’m loving it!! I am also excited as I have a sourdough starter from Sangeeta on my counter {it’s alive and bubbling I think} and I can see more bread in the coming days!

Other recipes from Ottolenghi on PAB

Ricotta and Spinach Roulade
Dried Cranberry & Walnut Bread
Chargrilled Broccoli Salad
Carrot Walnut Cake with Mascarpone Frosting
Olive Oil Crackers
Preserved Limes
Milled Nut Flour Macarons with Dark Chocolate Ganache
Individual Cherry & Plum Clafoutis

[print_this]Recipe: NAME

Summary: Bursting with flavour, chewy focaccia with great flavour and texture. Another winner from Ottolenghi {minimally adpted from Ottolenghi, The Cookbook}

Prep Time: 15 minutes
Total Time: 45 minutes {plus rising time}
Ingredients:

  • Dough
  • 330g plain flour
  • 1 tsp light brown sugar
  • 2 tbsp olive oil
  • 1 tbsp coarse sea salt
  • 8-10 cloves garlic, sliced {can reduce if you like}
  • 50g pitted queen olives with pimento {I use Leonardo}
  • Fresh basil, black olives, sundried tomatoes
  • Starter
  • 1 1/2 tsp active dried yeast
  • 420ml luke warm water
  • 300g plain flour
  • 30g vital gluten

Method:

  1. Starter/Preferment
  2. For the starter put the yeast and water in a large mixing bowl and stir until the yeast dissolves. Add the flour and stir until there is a porridge like consistency. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and leave somewhere warm for about an hour until it has doubled in size. {will take longer in winter}.
  3. Thermomix: Place starter ingredients in bowl of TM, mix at Speed 6 for 30seconds. Cover and leave in a warm place until doubled in size.
  4. Dough
  5. Mix the starter with the flour, sugar and olive oil. Knead for about six minutes, then add the salt and knead further until the salt is mixed through.
  6. Thermomix: Place starter and remaining dough ingredients in bowl of TM, mix at Speed 6 for 30seconds, then knead for 4 minutes.
  7. Brush a large bowl with oil, place the dough in it and brush the surface of the dough with more oil. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and leave in a warm place for one hour or until the dough has again doubled in size.
  8. Turn the dough on to a floured bench and stretch and flatten it into a rectangle. Take one of the short ends of the rectangle and fold it into the centre, take the other end and fold it over the first one to form three layers of dough.{I added olives and lots of garlic into the layers too}
  9. Brush a heavy baking tray {around 30cm x 40cm} with oil. Lift the dough on to the tray and flatten it by pressing hard with your hands. Cover with cling film and leave to rise for another hour. During this time check on the dough a couple of times and press it down, spreading it to the edges of the tray.
  10. Preheat the oven to 220C. Press the olives and rosemary into the top of the focaccia and sprinkle with sea salt. Bake in the oven for 10 mins and then reduce the heat to 190C and continue for 15-20 mins or until golden. When it is out of the oven and still hot brush with plenty of olive oil.

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Also find me on The Rabid Baker, The Times of India

Filled Pate a Choux Swans – Daring Bakers, Ugly Ducklings and Swans

“I believe that every human has a finite number of heartbeats and I don’t intend to waste any of mine.”
Neil Armstrong

When the pastry turned from ugly ducklings into swans it was definitely an ‘almost missed a heartbeat’ moment!  Ever since I got these gorgeous glasses from Urban Dazzle, I thought coffee filled pate-a-choux drizzled with melted chocolate would look beautiful in them! Fancy getting to the Daring Bakers rather late this month, and finding one of the easiest pastries ever but with a delightful challenge woven in –  Filled Pate a Choux Swans!

Kat of The Bobwhites was our August 2012 Daring Baker hostess who inspired us to have fun in creating pate a choux shapes, filled with crème patisserie or Chantilly cream. We were encouraged to create swans or any shape we wanted and to go crazy with filling flavors allowing our creativity to go wild!

 It was a strange coincidence that I’d been thinking choux pastry the last few weeks and knew I HAD to make the swans even though they did look a little formidable. My only concern was the pastry creme filling, given the hot and humid weather these days. However, the month passed in a heartbeat {what is it with time these days?} and the challenge got left behind!Then 2 days ago at Veda for a Delhi Bloggers Table meet, the very talented and sweet {wickedly so if I may add} food blogger and fellow Daring Baker Ruchira fished out a pastry bag clandestinely and whispered, “Have got these. How much do I snip to get the necks right? Mine are just not piping OK!”You need a trigger sometimes … sometimes stronger than Mr PABs persistent prod when he doesn’t see a show stopper by the 25th of any month. This was it! The next evening it was choux pastry time, done in minutes by the ever efficient Thermomix! The weather has been REALLY drippy and wet the past week, and all of last night too {the pic above is from this morning}. Humidity is HIGH … and crisp pastry proved elusive.The arty daughter decided to pipe a few swan necks too, and got the one that looks the best! See…Made the pastry cream last night {Thermomix again, 7 minutes and done} … and just as my DB alarm rings out loud on my phone, I am hitting the keyboard while the pictures download! Breathless as always, so much to do and so little time … but I got there! Thank you for the inspiration Ruchira @ Cookaroo!I loved the way these came out … whimsical, charming, romantic like a fairytale! Much like the ugly duckling story we read when we were little. I would have liked to whip some home made mascarpone that I had left over into the pastry cream, but there was no time!Pate a choux is one of the simplest and lightest pastries to make – think chooclate eclairs, think Croquembouche, think profiteroles, think cream, puffs or think gougères. One delightful, light as air, crisp golden puff and so much variety. I love that you need very basic ingredients, a strong arm and you are good to go!The Thermomix Cookbook had a choux recipe in there, so my work was easy! The tough part was the waiting to see if the necks came out good, if the piped out ‘poopy‘ shapes made the ugly ducklings into swans, if the crème patisserie  would hold. Worked a charm! The swans remind me of Tchaikovskys Ugly Duckling … a ballet we attached on TV several times as kids; the LP would play forever at home!

Thank you Kat, and thank you as always Lisa of La Mia Cucina and Ivonne of Cream Puffs in Venice for hosting this fab kitchen!! Do stop by here and check out some more fabulous swan songs!!!

[print_this]Recipe: Filled Pate a Choux Swans

Summary: Light as air p’pate a choux swans filled with a crème patisserie. Choux recipe source: Good Housekeeping Illustrated Guide to Cooking, 1980 edition. Crème patisserie recipe source adapted from Thermomix Cookbook

Prep Time: 15 minutes
Total Time: 1 hour {plus cooling time}
Ingredients:

  • Pate a choux (cannot be doubled)
  • ½ cup (120 ml) (115 gm) (4 oz) butter
  •  1 cup (240 ml) water
  •  ¼ teaspoon (1½ gm) salt
  •  1 cup (240 ml) (140 gm) (5 oz) all-purpose flour
  •  4 large eggs
  • Crème patisserie
  • 75g raw sugar {or granulated
  • 1/2 vanilla bean, scraped
  • 200ml low fat cream
  • 300ml 2% milk
  • 4 eggs
  • 40g cornflour

Method:

  1. Pate a choux
  2. Line at least two baking sheets with silicone mats or parchment paper, or grease pans well.
  3. Preheat oven to moderately hot 190°C.
  4. In a small saucepan, combine butter, water, and salt. Heat over until butter melts, then remove from stove.
  5. Add flour all at once and beat, beat, beat the mixture until the dough pulls away from the sides of the pot.
  6. Add one egg, and beat until well combined. Add remaining eggs individually, beating vigorously after each addition. Resulting mixture should be somewhat glossy, very smooth, and somewhat thick.
  7. Thermomix Recipe
  8. Place water, salt, sugar and butter in TM bowl and cook at 100C /Speed 2 for 10 minutes.
    Add the flour and mix for 30 seconds on speed 4. Allow to cool for around 10 minutes.
    Once cool, add eggs to the mix by dropping one egg at a time onto rotating blades for 30-40 seconds each on speed 5.
  9. … the choux swans
  10. Using a ¼” (6 mm) tip on a pastry bag, pipe out about 36 swan heads. You’re aiming for something between a numeral 2 and a question mark, with a little beak if you’re skilled and/or lucky.
  11. Remove the tip from the bag and pipe out 36 swan bodies{ I got about 28}. These will be about 1.5” (40 mm) long, and about 1” (25 mm) wide. One end should be a bit narrower than the other.
  12. Bake the heads and bodies until golden and puffy. {I baked the heads and bodies in separate lots}. The heads will be done a few minutes before the bodies, so keep a close eye on the baking process.
  13. Remove the pastries to a cooling rack, and let cool completely before filling
  14. Crème patisserie
  15. In the meantime, whisk the egg yolks and sugar with a wooden spoon in a big bowl until the mixture becomes pale and light. Stir in the flour slowly until it is thoroughly mixed with the egg mixture.
  16. Pour the boiling milk into the mixture a little by little while whisking continuously to avoid curdling. And then stir in the rest of the milk until the mixture is well combined.
  17. Transfer the whole mixture into a pot, with the seeds scraped from the vanilla bean, and heat it under low setting. Stir it constantly with the wooden spoon or spatula scraping the sides and bottom until it has thickened.
  18. Once the custard has thickened, take it off the heat, and strain / pour it into a clean bowl.
  19. Thermomix Recipe
  20. Place sugar and vanilla bean in TM bowl, and process for 30seconds on speed 10.
  21. Add remaining ingrdeints, plus vanilla bean shell and cook on 90C/Speed 4 for 7 minutes {until thick}. Strain into a bowl immediately to cool. I chilled it overnight.
  22. Assembling
  23. Take a swan body and use a very sharp knife to cut off the top 1/3rd to ½. Cut the removed top down the center to make two wings.
  24. Dollop a bit of filling into the body, insert head, and then add wings. {I used some pastry cream to secure the wings too}.
  25. Your first attempt will probably not look like much, but the more you make, the more your bevy of swans will become a beautiful work of swan art.

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Also find me on The Rabid Baker, The Times of India
Thank you Sparkah for including Passionate About Baking in this list –  Top 100 Food Bloggers You Should Cater To And Treat to Expensive Pu Ehr Tea.

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