A recipe for the weekend.

A recipe I brought back from California, I would never forget the fist Peach Cobbler I tasted there: a huge portion still warm, with vanilla ice cream melting on the top.... hummm... delicious....
I am doing one for the weekend, with apples too.
Have a relaxing time!

Ingredients:

Peach filling

1/2 cup sugar

1 tbsp cornstarch

1/2 tsp cinnamon

4 cups sliced fresh peeled peaches (about 6-8)

1 tsp. lemon juice

Biscuit Topping

1 cup flour

1 tbsp sugar

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

3 tbsp butter

1/2 cup milk

Instructions

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.  Blend 1/2 cup sugar and the cornstarch in medium saucepan.  Stir in peaches and lemon juice.  Cook, stirring constantly, until mixture thickens and boils.  Boil and stir one minutes.  Pour into ungreased 2 quart casserole dish.  Keep fruit mixture hot in oven while preparing biscuit topping.

Measure flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt into bowl.  Add butter and milk.  Cut through butter six times (the more you mix, the tougher the biscuit topping gets too tough).  Mix until dough forms a ball.  Drop dough by six spoonfuls onto hot pie filling.  Bake 25-30 minutes or until biscuit topping is golden brown.

6 servings.

Things I have made recently.

"La croquande" freshly baked for the country market this morning, something new for the new year. Merci maman, je n'y avais pas pensé, elles sont parties comme des p'tits pains :)
"happy birthday", one of my last creation on the letterpress A. Do you like it?

 

 

A new recipe.

Exhausted! Finally sitting down... pfff. A busy day, finishing more orders this morning, then sourcing some nice paper in town, and back to prepare stuff for the country market tomorrow.

I also experienced a new recipe today. Last week, at the reception I worked for, a lady asked me if I could bake for her and her family a Chocolate Yule Log... but a Vegan version... wow, I want to try that, so here we go! I baked my first vegan cake and I am quite impressed with what we can do without milk, eggs and butter. I was a bit worried to do the sponge biscuit without eggs, but the combination of soda bicarbonate and vinegar worked perfectly! amazing! you just have to be quick and run to put everything in the oven :) I am quite pleased nobody sees me when I am cooking and running at the same time...

Source

For the Sponge:

• 1 1/2 cups plain flour
• 1 cup caster sugar
• 1/3 cup cocoa powder
• 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1/2 cup soy milk
• 1/2 cup orange juice
• 1 tsp vanilla extract and 1 tsp almond extract
• 2 tbsp vinegar

1. Preheat the oven to 180C and line a large baking tray with greaseproof paper.
2. Sift the dry ingredients into a mixing bowl.
3. Mix together the wet ingredients, except the vinegar and mix into the dry.
4. Stir in the vinegar, pour into the tray and put into the oven as quickly as possible.
5. Bake for 25 minutes.
6. As soon as the cake comes out of the oven, use the parchment paper to roll the sponge up. Set it to one side until it has cooled down completely. Don't stress over any cracks.

For the Frosting:

• 1/4 cup shortening (known as cookeen or trex in the UK)
• 1/4 cup soy butter
• 1/2 cup cocoa powder, sifted
• 2 1/2 cups icing sugar
• 1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 3 tbsp soy milk.

1. Mix it all together until you have a thick and creamy frosting. Set aside until the cake is ready.

For the chocolate topping:

• 1/2 cup soy milk
• 8 ounces dark chocolate
• 4 tbsp maple syrup

1. Heat the soy milk in a pan until its nearly boiling.
2. Take off the heat, add the chocolate and maple syrup and stir until dissolved.
3. Set aside until cool and really thick.

To assemble the rest of the cake:

• When cool, unroll the cake carefully and evenly slap the icing all over it.
• Roll the cake off the parchment and onto a plate before covering with the chocolate topping. If there's any cracks you can just fill them all with icing.
• Cover with decorations if you're feeling fancy and serve!

Le goût du pain retrouvé.

After a sunny saturday, I decided yesterday to try to solve one of the major problem in the UK: Bread! There are a lot of good things about Great Britain, but when they talk about bread... well they don't know what is good bread at all, an authentic one like we have in South-West France, with a nice yeast smell and a proper crust.

So, because I do not want to end up only with square slices or the best alternative I found so far, the Polish Bread "Chleb", I am recently experimenting on baking bread! And tadaaaa, that was yesterday's result: a French baguette! I could leave it a bit longer to bake, but I am quite pleased :) and my freshly made bread became the main part of our meal last night with a lot of relish, pickles and cheeses on the table, a vegetable soup, a glass of wine! enjoy and chill while listening to this beautiful song... Have a nice week everybody.

 

 

The country market today.

This morning was the country market at the town hall. It's small, quick but so busy and popular. I am still impressed!! I would love to post pictures about it but I am not sure the people there would be really confortable to have that new girl making photographs of their "ordinary life" (which make it even more fascinating, it's what is all about - I know).
Well, so instead I can let you know what I brought there today in my basket: Irish Soda Bread, Treacle Tart, Big and Baby Xmas Cakes, Rich fruit cakes, Banana and Chocolate muffins, Poppy seeds and Lemon cake, and finally Crunchy Peanut Butter muffins.
And yes, you are lucky today, I'm giving you the recipe just after the pictures. I love Peanut butter recently, I did know it without to really know it... a new addiction :) Did you know it's rich in protein? 

...and the pretty good thing, I came back with an empty basket, only B. won't be happy ;)

 

Crunchy Peanut Butter Muffins

12 Muffins
280gr  flour
1 tbsp baking powder
1/8 tsp salt
115g soft dark brown sugar
2 medium eggs
175ml  milk
6 tbsp sunflower oil
175gr crunchy peanut butter

Topping
50g chopped unsalted peanuts
3 tbsp brown sugar

Make the topping first. It’s really simple. Chop your peanuts if all you have is whole peanuts. (Chopping peanuts is fun!) Then, in a small bowl, mix the peanuts and brown sugar together. Set aside and start preheating your oven to 200°C

For the muffins, mix together the dry ingredients in a bowl. In a separate bowl, whisk together the wet ingredients. Make a well in the middle of the dry ingredients and pour the wet ingredients into the well. Mix, but don’t overmix. If you overmix, the texture of the muffins will be off. So, just mix until the dry ingredients are wet. It will all clump together a bit in the bowl. This isn’t really a wet muffin batter, so don’t be too concerned if your mixture isn’t fully mixed and you feel like you might be overmixing. You probably aren’t.

Spoon the batter into a greased or lined muffin tin. Sprinkle with the topping and pop into the oven for 20 minutes.

Enjoy!

Reception.

A nice lady I met at the country market on the Thursdays, asked me if I could help her with the organisation of a reception and a part of the food. The brunch was today and it went perfectly to plan :)

I think the guests had a good time and enjoyed the food diversity from the different caterers.

Here are a few pictures of what I made, all needed to be vegetarian and vegan.

On my menu: "Le Pastis du Lot" apple speciality from South-West France, a Pissaladière ( a success! :) which is a red onion and black olive pie with olive oil, home-made Irish soda bread in slices with brie/crandberry and soft cheese/red pepper topping, stilton/crème fraîche profiteroles and spinach & nutmeg muffins (but I used a madeleine tin for an interesting shape, picture 2)

 

 

 

I really enjoyed the day too. I like organising parties and meals. Tired but happy :)

Packing.

Late. Going to sleep now, all ready for tomorrow.
Have a cosy weekend.

Douce nuit...

 

The Market Preparation.

For a couple month now, I joined the Country Market in our town where we sell every thursday our goods all together on a big table. The market is tiny, the size of a room, but is really popular and quite well-know. It was a good way for me to meet people (up to 92 years old) and make my "addiction" for baking useful.

This week is a special one as the Christmas Market is starting in town for a month and our little Country Market will take place there too this weekend... so I am baking, a lot!

I am nearly there with my mini Christmas cakes, I just have to try the packaching now ;).... yummy....

Recently made.

Yesterday, I baked my first Lemon drizzle muffins - here is the recipe if you want to taste something sweet this weekend. I didn't know them, I like the sweet/sour mix with an indulgent touch. The recipe is for a cake but I like muffins, I find them practical to freeze, to take one or two when needed ;)

Today, I finished the portraits of two little brothers, wrapped it and sent it.

Just a few hours to go and the weekend will be there. I wish you a great one. See you!

 

 

 

Le mystère du croissant.

Between two drawings, today I had a break, another passion: baking!

I had a challenge in my mind for a couple years... When I was around 10, friends offered me a baking cookbook. I heard so many times that the French speciality "les croissants" were difficult to make at home and to look like the gorgeous ones from the baker... so, I tried... and well... no really what I was expecting... So alright, perhaps it was true, only the baker could bake them!

A few days ago, I was browsing recipes and was again in front of that mysterious "croissant".
Why not to try again almost 20 years after?
Carefully, I followed the steps, looked at them rising slowly... and tadaa!!! My little success of the day: my home-made "croissants"! They are big, light and fluffy... and they taste.... hummmm..... yummy

I had to tell you  ;)

I come back tomorrow with my office/studio makeover! Have a great cosy evening.