Desperate Reader

Well my birthday came and went - not a very bookish one this year but it bought plenty of other good things, and then it was back to work and after two days of Christmas mayhem (no we don't sell an alcohol free mulled wine, and if you consider adding this sachet of spices to fruit juice and heating it up too much trouble I really can't help you... No, I know we don't have it in stock, my climbing four flights of stairs to get to the store room and having another look won't change that... And I'm sorry madam I don't know where you bought that wine, but you didn't buy it here, or indeed anywhere in the last decade, so I'm not going to replace it for you no matter how much you try and tell me you got it here a week ago - and if you don't like my attitude try and imagine how I feel about yours...) it's like it never happened.

At least I finished work at a very reasonable 5 o'clock tonight and so have had the chance to decorate my Christmas cake, I'm not quite as pleased with it as I was last years effort but had fun with the stamp thingys making snowflakes and the liberal sprinkling of glitter the kitchen has acquired is very festive.  

I am nothing if not persistent and hate to be beaten by a recipe, a couple of weeks back I mentioned being defeated by Dan Lepard's Brown Sugar Chocolate Cake. I duly bought more ingredients and had another go - the results was another disaster, so bad that I wish I'd taken a picture, if not of the cake than at least of the mess it left behind. Both times the problem was that it erupted out of the (carefully measured with an actual ruler to check it was the size specified in the book) tin, pouring in a cascade of increasingly crispy sponge onto the tray I had carefully placed beneath it against just such an emergency.

The second time round I attempted to make some cupcakes assuming that less mix in the tin would help. I clearly didn't divide off enough mix because it still escaped, this time mostly managing to miss the tray. I found the results - which quite honestly looked like dog shit - some days later. Also I had forgotten about the cupcakes so they were also crispy. Had only the excess mix escaped it might not have been so bad, but once the cake started to go it totally overwhelmed it's ruff of grease proof paper and just kept on pouring so what little was left in the tin might kindly be described as sunken.

Clearing out my fridge at the weekend I found the bowl of left over condensed milk from that last bake. It was miraculously mould free, I also had just enough glycerine and chocolate left as well as the more usual eggs, flour, and sugar so thought I'd see if the third time might actually be the charm. I chose a bigger tin, a much bigger tin, and the results were - excellent. I don't know why I had so much trouble using the smaller size but it doesn't matter now. I much prefer this as a round cake - they always feel more generous and last longer. I also found some apricot jam at the back of the fridge (again mould free which was another happy surprise) so used that in the middle. 

As for the cake itself - well it's rich, but not to heavy, chocolatey, has a lovely moist crumb, and will probably be my chocolate cake of choice from now on. The persistence paid off.

Grease and flour a deep sided 20 cm ROUND baking tin. Stir 25g of cocoa with 50ml of cold water in a smallish bowl before adding 100ml of boiling water, 50 g of plain chocolate broken into chunks, and 1/2 a teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda. Stir and leave to melt. Meanwhile get another bowl and mix 175g of muscovado sugar, 125g of condensed milk (you weigh it rather than measure it) and 100g of soft unsalted butter and whisk together until very smooth, then beat in 2 eggs and 2 teaspoons of glycerine. Stir together 200g of plain flour and 2 teaspoons of baking powder and tip half into the eggs and sugar mix. Beat thoroughly then add the chocolate, and finally beat in the last of the flour. Bake at 180 degrees/ gas mark 5 for about 50 mins or until cooked. 

This is the latest river cottage handbook and today it’s had a proper outing from the shelf. I’ve been stuck indoors waiting for a courier to deliver my new passport (photo marginally less hideous than the last one which is quite exciting) and to make being housebound on that British rarity, a sunny day off, I thought baking might be in order. (I should have done housework and could have read but baking and looking for stuff on the internet has been more appealing.)

I wasn’t sure how much I needed this book but wanted it (so was very pleased when Bloomsbury let me have a copy rendering it entirely guilt free). I already have enough baking related material to see me through any conceivable situation or occasion but I do like these handbooks and for the past few months ‘River Cottage Everyday’ has been the source for a fair bit of excellent cake, more of the same sort of thing can’t be a bad idea.

A couple of weeks ago I really wanted rock cakes only to find that I didn’t have a recipe in any of the many books to hand which shocked me a bit, perhaps the assumption is that people just know how to make them and judging by the tweeted and facebooked instructions I got the moment I started complaining about this lack in my life most people I know do know. Anyway ‘Cakes’ has a rock cake recipe in it so that’s a mark in its favour already. In fact it’s an excellent book for the basics and something that I find interesting is that everything actually looks homemade with all the minor imperfections that implies, after Fiona Cairns and Annie Rigg this is actually quite a relief. Don’t get me wrong, Corbin’s cakes look brilliant it’s just that she makes it look easy and uncomplicated (although this is slightly deceptive.)

The cake I’ve wanted to make since I first saw it is the toffee apple cake which I tried today, (The caramel topping refered to is one tin of boiled condensed milk, but you can buy it pre made now which saves hours and electricity) I won’t show you a picture because it transpires that flipping a delicate cake covered in squidgy caramelised apples onto a toffee topped equally apple-y base is really flipping difficult to do without sending toffee spread everywhere and cracking the top of the cake. No prizes for guessing what happened to me, my cake tins were also possibly a bit shallow so the cake developed a muffin top. It’s a delicious cake but the way I made it, it isn’t a pretty cake. (The apples for the base are coated in brown sugar and are amazing but the dulce de leche filling was too much for me. I’m making this again but as a plain apple cake, or possibly the marmalade variation that Corbin gives.)

I’m not sure how many more River Cottage handbooks are in the pipeline, I know one on fruit is coming later this year and I’m hopeful for a Game related one in the future, cheese making would be fun too (I have no idea how practical home cheese making is but I’d love to give it a go). The more I see of them the more I like them and the more indispensable they seem, several titles have gone away with me as holiday reading before, and ‘Cakes’ will be just the thing to take with me the next time I head to the Borders (or any other self catering destination). It would also have been a brilliant book to have had at university when I finally got a flat with more than a toaster in the kitchen. Big glossy cookbooks are fine but it’s nice to have something you can throw in a pocket or bag to browse through at odd moments (It can’t just be me who likes to read cook books like this.) it’s also good to have a book that really looks like it’s meant to be used and won’t object to getting a bit dirty, ‘Cakes’ is also a worthy stable mate for ‘Preserves’ (where my River Cottage handbook obsession began) and I can’t think of any higher praise for it.

Back in February I had a good sort through my cook books and cleared some out with half an eye to making space for some new things on the shelf (a small flat imposes some sort of control on my book acquiring habits). One book I’d been looking at since before Christmas and have since got my hands on is Annie Rigg’s ‘Gifts From the Kitchen’. Annie Rigg’s C.V. is fascinating she’s been a food stylist for all sorts of magazines as well as on tour cook for the likes of Pink Floyd and The Rolling Stones, I can’t help but wonder if she did heart shaped pastel sugar cubes for them as well.

I like the idea of making things for people although in real life juggling the time to create with how long perishable items can be kept, or how long they need to mature – well I think you can see where this is going. It’s at least one of the reasons that I’m always looking out for new/usable ideas. At first glance ‘Gifts From the Kitchen’ looked like a lot of confectionary and some pretty cakes (I can’t tell you how much I want to make marshmallows or how impractical it looks - they don’t keep and I don’t feel up to organising a sufficient number of marshmallow eaters as well as production on a single day.) However there’s more than just cake in here. Lots of chutneys, pickles, liquors, preserves, spicy nuts, even pasta (and okay so it’s sweet but how to make your own Nutella style chocolate spread – now that I can do) all sorts of good things in fact, and for all conceivable occasions.

What really sets this book apart though is the styling. Give or take a couple of things (mostly that chocolate spread recipe, but there are a couple of others I’m very pleased to have to hand) I could probably find most the things in here somewhere else in my extensive assortment of cookbooks but – and it’s a big but as my other new cookbook (Pam Corbin’s ‘Cakes’) highlights - styling is what turns something ordinary but delicious into an extraordinary present. Some of it’s simple enough stuff – toffee would make a nice enough gift, but toffee still in its baking tin tied up with ribbon and a little hammer... Or perhaps homemade herbal tea bags with hand printed labels and a vintage teapot?

I see a trip to tk maxx coming up and a good scour round the market for ribbons and the like, I will be prepared for Christmas this year (a ‘career’ in retail will make you think April = Christmas planning, by August it needs to be locked down). The blonde, my sister, and the Scottish one all have birthdays coming up soon so perhaps there will be some dry runs first. I did think at one point that this might be a good way to save money as well as doing something nice, the saving money thing doesn’t add up, but the more thought I give it the more I like the idea of making instead of buying. On the other hand it’s entirely conceivable that ‘Gifts from the Kitchen’ will be the staple birthday present of the year from me and I’ll just hope to receive the fruits of other people’s labours.

Because like it or not I’ve reached a point in my life where Friday nights are about baking (if I have the energy) blogging (if I have the energy) and staring at the television (requires no energy – happens a lot). Anyway tonight I had a few bits and pieces (including rhubarb that I bought at the beginning of the week in a fit of optimism) that needed using and a new book; Pam Corbin’s ‘Cakes’. Could the two come together in a glorious pudding-y collision?

Well as it happens not quite – the rhubarb has gone into a cake but it’s a version of the apple pudding cake from ‘River Cottage Everyday’ (rhubarb instead of apple, no cinnamon, bit of extra sugar on top for crunch and sweetness, tea spoon of almond essence) although there has been help from Niki Segnit’s ‘The Flavour Thesaurus’ which assured me that rhubarb and almond have an affinity for each other. Somehow this isn’t a combination which struck me as obvious but I now have a slightly burnt tongue that assures me that it is indeed so.

‘Cakes’ came in handy with an instruction to toss the rhubarb in a scant tablespoon of self raising flour – apparently this helps stop the fruit from sinking to the bottom, and it’s worked so I feel like I’ve learned something worth knowing. I also learnt that tipping the rest of the flour on top of the rhubarb when I emptied the dish means you just get a little lump of flour on top of the rhubarb at the end of the process, another valuable lesson for me.

I had meant this post to be all about ‘Cakes’ rather than all about cake but blogging and the scent of fresh baking are incompatible bedfellows; my mind will keep wandering back to the edible so a proper write up of this book will have to wait until I have the attention span to do it justice... And now as bed time approaches; the washing up has yet to be turned into drying up, ironing needs to be done, all Wednesdays books are still on the floor, and worst of all my census form still needs filling in – it seems some things about Friday (or me) never change.

So why I wonder am I procrastinating in front of the television again? Okay so the answer to that is I’m a sucker for a hospital drama and ridiculously easily distracted at times. Ridiculously easily distracted on Sunday at any rate – I set off into town in search of another Gladys Mitchell. It wasn’t available (poor show on behalf of the high streets only remaining dedicated bookseller) but they did – and still do – have the penguin decade’s series in a three for two offer which changed my dilemma from the normal ‘can only find two books’ to the still overly familiar one of ‘too much choice’.

I was sorely tempted by a Julia Childe cookbook until I worked out (by reading the cover, but it took a lot longer than might reasonably be expected) that it was volume 2. No volume 1 being available I went back to the penguins and dithered for a very long time. Choice finally made I set off for home again full of good intentions regarding ironing and hovering, and then got waylaid by a bench with an attractive view. In my defence I don’t have a garden of my own, and the park is on the way home, and it was far too nice and sunny to be doing housework anyway.

In the park (okay in park number two – it’s a leafy area) I was utterly sidetracked by a huge quantity of wild garlic, I’ve seen it every year for the last five years and every year swear I’m going to pick and cook some – it’s taking such a long time because I want to identify a patch which hasn’t been visited by dogs/cats/foxes/tramps and a time when passing youth won’t laugh. Sunday afternoon wasn’t quite the time. Besides which why do when you can read about doing? (A lot of good answers to that question which I will probably be ignoring.) So it was home for a good browse on things to do with wild garlic – at this point I had every intention of going back to gather some but ended up distracted by something in River Cottage Everyday... Apple and Almond Pudding Cake. It was very good, and yet again I ended up going to bed wondering how it is that I do so few of the things I mean to do on a day off. I still need to hoover.

3 or 4 good sized apples

25g unsalted butter

1 heaped tablespoon granulated sugar (I prefer golden sugars for apples)

¼ teaspoon of cinnamon

150g soft butter

125g sugar (I mixed golden castor sugar with a spoon of muscavado – because I could!)

1 teaspoon of Almond extract

75g of self raising flour

75g of ground almonds

2 eggs

20cm springform tin, lined and greased

Peel core and cut the apples into chunky slices, melt the butter and sugar, add the cinnamon and cook for about five mins until the apples are getting just soft. Put to one side and heat the oven to 170°C gas 3

Mix the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, add 1 egg and beat some more, add egg 2 along with the almond extract and a spoon of flour to stop it curdling. Fold in the rest of the flour and the ground nuts and spread onto the bottom of the tin. Arrange the apples, complete with any juices, on top of the cake and bake for 45 mins. Good hot or cold – that Hugh knows his cakes.

This book was a case of love at first sight – I got it a week ago as an early Easter present (any excuse) after a rotten day, and after another rotten day I have turned to it again to be cheered up. I had meant to bake something from it as a treat for the Scottish one but the afternoon is passing fast so I'm going to write about it instead (hopefully he’ll be happy with a cream egg).

It is a truly lovely book to look at even with the addition of the sort of sparkly lettering that I normally view askance, and is full of pretty, pretty, cakes. I’m a fan of the concept of tea time even if it’s the sort of thing that I never get round to doing quite as formally as I would like. We (me, my Scottish friend and my mother) like a bit of ceremony around the place, especially if it involves well pressed linen and some spiffy china (my mother really likes her china and we’we've spent many a January day in Stoke-on-Trent to prove the point).

Cook books are a weak spot for me, not I think a surprise for any regular readers here, but even I've got to the point where I have to seriously question if I need another one – it has to offer something special, and honestly I think this one does. As it's all sparkly I couldn't help but notice Fiona Cairns name on the front and she sort of interests me as she’s vaguely local; I knew she’d started a business baking cakes at her kitchen table, and now sells to Fortnum and Mason’s and Waitrose amongst others which seems impressively industrious and inspirational to me. That’s what made me pick the book up.

I kept dropping heavy hints about it because of the contents (not just the pictures either). The recipe’s look good (not tried any yet but there’s nothing there to raise the suspicions of the regular baker, or to put them off either) white chocolate and cardamom rosewater sponge anyone? And that’s not even the best looking cake in there... I wouldn't say there’s anything ground breaking, but rather a really good repertoire of usable things, the tips and hints section strikes me as particularly good, but again probably all stuff I could find elsewhere. What I like is the structure of the book; hints followed by the bake part, and then the decorate section. Decorating is broken up, like the recipes into large cakes, small, and biscuits.

All manner of impressively cool but simple things are shown; pretty things with crystallised flowers and ribbon, child friendly (not perhaps if it’s your own child that’s going to be hopped up on sugar) things heaped with candy's, decadently expensive looking things involving gold leaf (which I might one day use – but not before a pay rise or two). It’s all very inspiring, and really appeals to the magpie instinct within. I am adding a square cake tin to my kitchen wish list, where it will join the long desired aspic cutters, and I'm after some black viola’s for candying purposes to make something very sophisticated in the birthday cake line.