Strawberry Meringue Nests

As I had used four egg yolks to make the sweet pastry for the glazed tartlets, I thought I would use the whites to make some meringues.
This recipe, as opposed to some of the other meringue recipes that I have made, involved whisking the mixture over simmering water. It also used icing sugar rather than caster.
I made about 12 medium sized nests. The recipe suggested 6, but they would have been really quite big.
I baked them for about 40 mins. They turned out to be crumbly on the outside and chewy on the inside, which in our house is the sign of a good meringue.
They went very quickly at our street gathering, and we gave them 9.0. Although it was a bit more awkward mixing over a hot pan, and it mean't that I couldn't use my mixer, the icing sugar was added all at once rather than a spoon at a time, so that was good. Also, as you can see from the picture, the meringues remained fairly white, which is always a nice surprise.

Glazed Fruit Tartlets

 Yesterday, we had a street get together. Following the street party last year for the jubilee, and the setting up of a Residents association, we decided that it would be good to have a yearly get together.
Some of the neighbours kindly had it in their back garden, and a good time was had by all.
Of course I took along desserts! I had planned to make one of the more complicated recipes - I realise that there are definitely some that I am putting off - but the time of the event was moved to earlier in the day, in order to avoid the heavy downpours. I decided that this was not the day to try a three page recipe!

I decided upon these glazed fruit tartlets, which I was really pleased with. I also made some little lime tarts with the extra pastry. At the pampered chef evening we had been shown how to make lime cheesecakes, so I just used the same filling - philidelphia, lime juice and icing sugar.
Pate sucree (sweet pastry), continues to be difficult to work with, and was certainly no easier in warm weather, however, at least they were only small tarts, and therefore it was easier to transfer the pastry to the tins.
I would definitely make these again, and they seemed to go down very well. 9.0

Cheese Straws & Dorchester Biscuits

For the pampered chef evening, I thought I would make some savoury biscuits as I have not really made any before.
The cheese straws were very straight forward and all got eaten, so I take that as the sign of a successful bake - mind you, Nathan had about 5!
The Dorchester biscuits were less popular, in fact I still have some, and that is never a good sign four days later! I chose to put cashew nuts on top, rather than chopped mixed nuts. They were easy to make, but they didn't look particularly special.
The cheese straws get 8.5, the dorchester biscuits 7.0.

Chocolate Chip and Vanilla Marble Cake

I like making traybakes, and I discovered this recipe hidden amongst the bakes for children.
It was very straight forward and I liked the addition of chocolate chips to the chocolate mixture.
My only criticism would be the topping which is just plain and white chocolate. If I made it again, I would make the icing from the chocolate traybake, and streak it with white chocolate, and draw a knife through it to give the marbled effect on top.
It needed a drink with it, but it was very tasty. 8.0

Carrot Cake

I have done a lot of baking this week, so I am trying to catch up on my blogs. I think I have 6 to do!
I made this on Thursday as I had a pampered chef evening at my house. The evening went really well, and I trust everyone enjoyed it. As it turned out, I think the only person who tried this on Thursday night was Ben - he tried everything!
We tried it properly this weekend, and I have to say that it is not nearly as tasty as the tray bake that I made the other week. The banana flavour was rather over powering. It is still nice, we are just getting rather fussy, having had so many delicious recipes! We gave it 7.5

Jumbles

Today, Ben and Nathan break up from school, in fact I am picking them up very shortly, so I thought I would fit this in quickly.
This recipe is in the kids section and it says that although traditionally the shape for "jumbles" is an S, you can make it into any letters you want. I decided it would be a bit of fun to spell out a message for the boys for when they got home. I don't suppose the message will stay in tact for long!
Have not tasted them yet, will let you know, but they were very easy to make if they are nice.
Not sure how much baking I will do in the holidays, it could go either way really! Watch this space!

Profiteroles

Apologies for the blurry photo. Unfortunately, when I realised that the picture was no good, the profiteroles had all gone!
We had friends for a BBQ on Sunday so, knowing that we were going to be out all day on Saturday, I made the choux pastry rolls earlier in the week, and put them in the freezer.
To defrost them, on Sunday morning I put them in the oven for a couple of minutes, left them to cool and then filled them with cream.
Not much to say about them really - it was just like making the chocolate eclairs. A word of advice though, make sure your baking trays are well greased. I left it to someone else in our family - who shall remain nameless, and lets just say that some of the rolls did not need cutting open to fill with cream as there was a big hole in the bottom of them - the remaining bits being on the baking sheet! Still, it didn't affect the taste. They were lovely - 9.0.
I was going to make a key lime pie, but there was enough pudding left over from Saturday for me to bring some home - phew!

American Cheesecake

The second pudding that I made for our family do was this American cheesecake. I thought I would go for something fairly safe.
It was straight forward and tasty - the yoghurt added a nice flavour to it.
Next time, I would not bother with the redcurrant jelly as it just looked rather messy, having said that, I was finishing this off after I had made the chocolate cake, and I was not feeling at my most patient!
My brother said it was really nice, which is high praise indeed. Not sure what score it got, but I should think a good 8.5

Recipe Number 100 - Chocolate Mousse Cake

 On Saturday, we had a family get together, which was really lovely. I took two puddings along. As I was up to recipe number 100, I thought I had better do something more challenging - this definitely fit the bill!!
I had made the sponge earlier in the week and put it in the freezer - so far so good. On Friday I made the chocolate mousse and sandwiched it in between the sponges - also fairly straight forward.
On Saturday morning, I thought to myself, it won't take long to cover the cake in cream and make the chocolate caraque - wrong!
Although the weather was not as hot on Saturday as it has been in recent days, it was still very hot, and I would not recommend making chocolate curls on a hot day. When I looked at the "rising to the berry " blog, she had just covered hers in grated curls which would have been so much easier. This method involved melting the chocolate, spreading it over a flat surface and then cooling. When cooled sufficiently I had to use a flexible knife to scrape up the curls.
The problem was that no sooner had I started scraping, the chocolate started melting, and as I picked up the curls to put on the cake, there was more left on my hand than the cake.
My biggest moan about this caraque was that it seemed quite wasteful, and a lot ended up in the bin. Having said that, as I scraped what was remaining into the bin, I think I finally mastered the technique  to making the curls!!!
The main thing, however was that everyone thought that the cake was delicious, and someone even gave it a 10. I think I would give it 9.5. I would probably make it again, but would find an alternative way to decorate it!

Mini Cakes

 You would be forgiven for thinking that you had seen these cakes before on my blog. They are almost exactly the same as the "Little gem" cakes that Ellie made with her friends.
Last Thursday I was looking for something quick and easy to make for Ben's leavers disco, and discovered these cakes. The recipe is very similar to the little gem one, but it doesn't contain milk, and the icing does not contain lemon. If I were choosing between them, I think the little gems are nicer, but there is not much difference.
The recipe says it makes 32 cakes, using petit four cases. I only have some mini muffin cases, so I used them, and made 20 cakes. The icing suggested was not nearly enough, and probably needs doubling if you  want a decent blob on your cake. We gave them 7.5.
Ben enjoyed the disco. He actually breaks up today, and finishes his time at primary school - how the time flies!

English Madeleines

Yesterday I started baking a baking a chocolate mousse cake - watch this space!. We are having a family get together on Saturday at my Mum and Dad's house, so of course I have offered to bring a couple of desserts. I made the sponge as Mary said you could then freeze it. This all went well, and having put me in the mood for baking, I decided to make these madeleines.
Now, the recipe says that you need dariole moulds. I do not own these, and am not planning on buying them either, so I thought I would have a go at using some silicone cupcake moulds that I have. I realised that the shape would not be quite the same - the dariole moulds make the cakes taller and thinner, but I thought I would give it a go and see what happened. As you can see by the picture, dariole moulds are not essential! I was very pleased with my efforts. Basically this is a fairy cake mixture, but made to look more appealing with the jam and coconut.
This was a fun recipe to make, and I was sorry that the kids were not with me to make them. They were pretty tasty too - 8.0
I am now up to 98 recipes, so with lots of baking to do for this weekend, I should make it to 100 very soon!

Coffee Victoria Sandwich

 We had a church meeting on Sunday, so I thought that I would take along a treat. I think every meeting can be improved by cake!
This was really easy to make and went down very well. Several people commented that coffee cake was a favourite with them.
Personally I prefer to have walnuts in a coffee cake, but nevertheless this was tasty, and received a score of 8.0

Quick Granary Rolls

 On Saturday morning, I decided that it would be nice to have some rolls for lunch, so I got Nathan to help me make them. As you may remember from previous blogs, Nathan is very good at kneading. He must have done a great job because these were delicious.
They are described as "quick" because you only have to knead the mixture once, then divide them into 12 rolls and leave them to  expand in a warm place. We put them in the conservatory, which as you can imagine did the job very nicely!
My only comment on the recipe is that it says to add "about 450ml each of tepid milk and water mixed. This is not very clear, but it is actually a total of 450ml, made up of half water and half milk. If you added 450ml of each of them the mixture would be far too wet.
We gave these rolls 8.75 Well done Nathan!

Lime Lattice Cookies

I made these on Friday with help from Ben. We had some limes in the fruit bowl, as I was going to make the key lime pie, but then we had a change of plan. These were very easy to make and fairly tasty. We gave them 7.5. The only thing to add is to say that the recipe says to make 16 balls out of the dough and then to "use a skewer to create a lattice pattern on the top of the biscuit". I would add that the balls need to be slightly flattened first before making the pattern. Other than that, very straight forward.

American Spiced Carrot Traybake

I didn't have any particular reason to make this, other than I fancied trying it!
It turned out to be a great decision, and was another winner - good old Mary!
I would describe this as carrot cake for the masses. The recipe is fairly similar to the ordinary carrot cake one, although this one doesn't have banana in it, and there are more spices, which add to the flavour.
There are nuts in this, but even Tom overlooked these, and polished off quite a few pieces. I did make a small concession to him, and left the nuts off of the top of some pieces!
This scored 9.5, and will go down as one to make again. It's got to be the best way of eating carrots!

Special Fruit Scones

Last Tuesday it was Nathan's last piano lesson of the term, so I decided to treat his teacher to some scones, strawberries and cream. She was very grateful, and I trust she enjoyed them.
I didn't actually get to taste them, although the kids did, and said they were very nice.
One thing I would say about the recipe is that if you add all the egg and milk mixture, it makes the dough rather sticky. It's probably best not to add it all at once like I did. I had to add more flour in order to make it workable.
They probably got a score of about 8.0!

Hazelnut Meringue Cake

This was delicious! Last Saturday, having been out to Grenwich and enjoyed the glorious sunshine, we came home to a BBQ. I served this up for desert (having made the meringues in the morning).
The recipe requires you to toast the hazelnuts before adding them to the meringue mixture. You will be pleased to hear that I did do as I was told this week, but this was  because the only hazelnuts I had in the cupboard were whole ones that needed the skins removing.
It was a simple process, but I am not sure what the benefit is over using ordinary chopped hazelnuts. I probably will try baking it one day without toasting the hazelnuts, as this is definitely a dessert that I will bake again. Apart from all that, it was fairly straight forward to make, although once again, I was very grateful for my mixer which enabled me to add the sugar slowly. If you only have a hand mixer, make sure you have someone with a strong arm who can mix while you add the sugar!
It went down extremely well, and we gave it 9.25!

Lemon Yoghurt Cake

I made this cake last Friday evening as we were going out for the day on Saturday and I thought we ought to have some cake for the picnic!
It was straight forward to make, but it rather divided opinion. The general consensus was that there was too much sponge and not enough  icing. If the cake was half as thick, or if it had a layer of icing running through it, it would have been better.
The texture of the cake is more dense that some of the other lemon cake recipes, and you have to keep it in the fridge.
We gave it an average 7.0. There are definitely better lemon cake recipes in the book.

Chocolate Eclairs

On Tuesday night, I got together with a couple of friends to watch  "Les Miserables". I had wanted to see it at the cinema, but didn't get round to it, so got it out on DVD instead.
Of course, I offered to bring something sweet along to our evening, and in keeping with the french theme, I made these chocolate eclairs.
These were delicious! Although choux pastry is not particularly straight forward, with my mixer it was so much easier. I think the hardest part is adding the egg slowly and mixing in between.
They were very satisfying to make, and I was especially pleased that they looked as good as Mary's ones in the book. I think mine were slightly bigger as I only made 10 instead of 12.
The kids and Ad all got to have one, and everyone agreed that they got a 9.75 score!
Les Mis, was very good, but tissues are a must!

Lemon Swiss Roll

On Monday, friends of ours became grandparents for the first time. They have a beautiful little grandson called Teddie. You may remember that I painted a mural in the nursery for little Teddie, well, he is finally here.
To help them celebrate, I made them this lemon swiss roll, as I know that Teddie's mum likes lemon - unfortunately I have discovered since that his dad doesn't - sorry Phil!
I can't tell you what it tasted like, as I didn't try any. I think that is actually a first, which is quite scary! However, when I popped round yesterday to see Teddie, apparently the cake had all gone, and they said it was delicious.
As with the previous swiss roll, this was very simple, and speedy  to make. Mary says to put lemon curd for the filling, but as you can see from the picture, I put some whipped cream in as well - I thought I'd push the boat out a bit!!