Summer strawberry and avocado salad

The Culinary Consultant is out and about for the weekend, and I am enjoying the rare treat of having the house all by myself. Which is great, except in the night when there are lots of weird noises and the house seems strangely big. Which is silly but I heard some noises from the neighbour's driveway last night, but it sounded like they were in our driveway, so I had to get up and close the window to feel safe. Of course closing the window would protect me from anything bad happening. And I get to watch as many romcoms as I like. Not a single movie with any shooting or violence. I'm burning through Netflix. Note to self though, I should probably learn to use the Xbox so I could watch my movies on the TV instead of the computer. Oh well, first world problems, eh?

One major benefit of being home alone is I can make all the salads I want. Today I made a summery strawberry and avocado salad for lunch. I have been going through punnets of strawberries as if there is no tomorrow. For dinner I have an idea for something vegetarian, which you will hear all about if it turns out reasonable. And tomorrow there will be another lunch salad! I probably should not mention the half tub of Ben & Jerry's I had for dessert after lunch...

Strawberry and avocado salad (for 1):
a handful of mixed greens (I like to include spinach)
cucumber
1/2 avocado
4-5 strawberries
1 tbsp finely crumbled feta
2-3 tbsp balsamic vinegar

The howto:
Prepare the balsamic reduction. In a small saucepan, bring the balsamic vinegar to a medium heat making sure it doesn't boil, and keep on the hob until reduced to about half of the original volume and slightly syrup-y. While the balsamic is reducing, slice the cucumber and cut the strawberries into quarters. Place the ingredients on a plate, and drizzle with the balsamic reduction. Enjoy with a slice of fresh bread.

The verdict:
This is such a quick and easy lunch, and it's ridiculously delicious. It only takes a few minutes to throw together so it's perfect to maximise your time out in the wonderful summer sun. The salty feta, soft avocado and sweet strawberries just go so well together. And the balsamic reduction is perfection! 

Magic custard cake with summer fruit

 

I'm not sure I completely get the thing with custard. I mean, it's not bad, I wouldn't spit in a bowl of custard, but at the same time it's everywhere. The Culinary Consultant loves his custard, I'm sure he would be happy just eating it out of the tub with a spoon. If we have pudding with custard I know the pudding is there just for show, and the correct custard to pudding ratio is at least 3:1. And it seems like my Culinary Consultant is not the only British male who likes his custard. The Toddster, who is the Culinary Consultant equivalent on the lovely blog The English Kitchen, also seems to love his custard. So when I saw the recipe for this Custard Cake on the blog and read about how the Toddster loves his custard, I had to laugh out loud and obviously also decided I need to bake this cake for the Culinary Consultant. 

It's a very simple cake to put together, but you don't quite get away with doing it in one bowl as you need another bowl for whipping the egg whites. And it uses only basic ingredients you should have at hand at any time. It doesn't take many minutes to prepare. The hard thing is to wait for the necessary three hours while the cake cools. And as the original recipe says, please be aware that the batter is very runny and you will think this won't work at all and that you have done something wrong. You haven't. It will work. But don't use a springform pan!

Magic custard cake (serves 8):
4 eggs at room temperature
2 tbsp water
150 g caster sugar
2 tsp vanilla extract (I used the equivalent amount of vanilla paste)
125 g butter, melted
115 g all purpose flour
500 ml milk
To serve:
icing sugar
berries or fruit (I used strawberries and rhubarb compote)

The howto:
Preheat the oven to 160 degrees C. Carefully butter a cake tin (8 inches in diameter). I used a silicone cake tin and didn't prepare it in any way, and had no problems with sticking. 

Separate eggs into two bowls. Beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form. Add water, sugar and vanilla to the egg yolks and beat until light and fluffy. Add the melted butter and keep whisking. Add the flour and milk, and whisk until a smooth batter forms. Gently fold in the egg whites. Bake for 1 hour, or until golden brown. Let cool for at least 3 hours before dusting with icing sugar and serving with fruit or berries.

The verdict:
This is what it says on the tin, custard cake. It tastes like custard, but it's a cake. You won't believe it will ever become an actual cake when you pour the runny batter into the cake tin, but somehow magically it will turn into a cake after all. I think mine could have done with just a few minutes less in the oven, as the middle of the cake turned quite solid whereas the pictures on the blog with the original recipe it looked like the middle stays just a little bit gooey. But it was really yummy especially with rhubarb and strawberries on top. Definitely a summer dessert I will try again, I think this would be a great alternative for a cheesecake for a BBQ or other summer get-together.

Crumbly strawberry pie

No-one ever pops over unannounced these days. You know, the way they used to do back in 'the old days'. Whenever that was. I can imagine it, a small countryside village, and in the afternoon your neighbour knocks on your door, just to say hi and hear how you are. Well, at least that's how it goes in my imagination. Then of course you invite them in and sit down with a cup of tea, some ginger cookies, scones, tea cakes, jam and clotted cream. Unhurriedly you enjoy the tea and gossip about what has been going on in the village. That just doesn't happen anymore. Obviously most of the time I'm actually glad that doesn't happen, imagine someone coming over to gossip just as you are about to leave for the gym. Or just got back from work and all you want to do is turn on the telly and switch off your brain. As long as I have lived here, I don't think anyone has just knocked on my door unannounced. Well, obviously no-one has knocked on my door as they wouldn't get into the building in the first place. What I meant was no-one has buzzed my door buzzer unannounced. Except from time to time the drunk people leaving the club downstairs at 3am in the morning who find it funny to just press every door buzzer. However, today my door buzzer went off unannounced. I didn't answer as I expected it to be a salesman or TV licence inspector or whatever (just to be clear, I don't have a TV so I don't need a licence!!). Then right after that my phone beeps. 'Is you in?". It wasn't just some random door buzz, it was actually someone I was happy to see. And even more lucky, I had happened to bake these great crumbly strawberry pies right before my surprise visitor appeared. Maybe I should just start baking more often, as it seems to attract surprise visitors!

So the inspiration for the strawberry pies was leftover pie crust from my apple pies I made a while ago (sometimes my blog posts wait for quite a while to get published, don't worry, I haven't stored my pie crust for a month). A strawberry tart recipe on Pinterest has been haunting me for ages, so the leftover pie crust with some leftover strawberries that was my perfect excuse. Given that I already had the crust ready made, my strawberry tart is not exactly like the one in the recipe above, but I thought any strawberry tart or pie would calm my craving a bit. First, I was planning to do a classic tart with custard and fresh berries. But then I remembered how wonderful roasted strawberries taste like, so I thought I would do a baked strawberry tart. I only had enough dough to do the crusts, but I was worried the strawberries would burn without a crust on top as well. So, inspired by another recipe on Pinterest, I decided to put a crumble on top. I mean, who doesn't love a good crumble? Well, at least I do. I love oats, and mixing them with butter and sugar can only make it better. So voila, there it was, my crumble strawberry pie. Funnily enough, when I was doing my grocery order online the other day, it turned out Green&Black vanilla ice cream was on sale. I love Green&Black white chocolate, so I thought I should give the ice cream a try. But of course, only because it happened to be on sale. All these coincidences came together beautifully not only to create a delicious dessert but to top that all up, this was all on the day I had my unexpected surprise visitor.

The pie crust dough I had left over were from my apple pie baking antics the other day, and if you can recall, I actually made two different types of dough. One was a buttermilk and butter crust, whereas the other one had part of the flour replaced with almond flour. There was only a little bit left of the almond one, so I made one crust out of that and the three other using the buttermilk one. As you will see from the pictures below, only one was playing nice...

Crumbly strawberry pie (makes 4 individual sized crumbles):

Almond flour crust (the recipe actually makes enough for at least eight small pies, so you can freeze half for later)

Filling:
200 g strawberries
1 1/2 tbsp light muscovado sugar
1 tbsp cornstarch
1 tbsp poppy seeds
1 tsp vanilla paste
1/2 tsp ground cardamom

Crumble:
3 tbsp (40 g) butter
3 tbsp (26 g) whole wheat flour
3 tbsp (26 g) light muscovado sugar
4 tbsp (26 g) oats 
1/2 tsp ground cardamom

The crusts before baking. The one on the
top right is the almond flour one.

The crusts after baking. Only the almond flour
one kept it's shape, the rest ended up on the 
bottom of the pastry tins. Not sure if it the dough
doesn't like to be in the fridge over night, or if it 
was just from baking them without weighing 
down the pastry.

The howto:
Prepare the crust ahead of time, so that it can rest in the fridge for at least an hour, preferably over night. Preheat the oven to 175 degrees. Roll the crust and put into pie tins, prebake for 10 minutes. If you want to do things correctly, you should line the crust with parchment paper and use baking beans to weigh it down. Obviously, I couldn't be bothered to do that, but I think the crust turned out quite nicely despite me being lazy. Well it did for the almond flour dough, whereas the buttermilk dough just didn't keep it's shape in the tin and melted together to a disc at the bottom of the tin (see picture below).  For the filling, hull the strawberries and cut into slices. Mix with the rest of the ingredients. For the crumble, combine all ingredients, and use a food processor to pulse a few times to form a crumbly mixture. Scoop filling into the pre-baked crusts, top with crumble and bake for another 20-25 minutes. Serve with ice cream or whipped cream.

The verdict:
The amount of vanilla in this recipe is rather generous. For me that worked out perfectly as I love the taste of vanilla and think that if it's the only spice, it should be quite strong. The poppy seeds also bring nice taste and texture to the filling. Baked strawberries just get a great lovely sweet flavour, and the scent coming out of the oven if just amazing. In the summer there is no better way to enjoy strawberries than fresh in a tart, but when it's not prime strawberry season anymore, you get so much more flavour into the strawberries by baking them. And the strong flavour of vanilla is just amazing, with the soft flavour of cardamom to complement the vanilla and strawberries.

I had two types of pastry for the pies, as I wanted to try two different pastries when I was baking my apple pies earlier. One was made with almond flour whereas the other was a buttermilk and all wheat flour pastry. As you can see from the photos, only the almond flour pastry dough behaved nicely, so I recommend you use that one, or some other pastry you know will bake nicely without melting into an unaesthetic mess on the bottom of the pie tin. Not that eating the ugly pies was all too horribly traumatising, they were still good. But the almond flour one made a beautiful pastry which kept the strawberry juices inside the pie. The crumble on top was a nice finishing touch to the pies, and the wholemeal flour and oats nicely complement the soft strawberry filling and vanilla flavour and the crumbly pastry crust. All this served warm, with melting vanilla ice cream on top was quite a treat, and given that my pastry was ready made, very quick to prepare. Fast food to fulfil a sweet tooth craving.

Yoghurt oatmeal

Things usually are clichés for a reason. Take the saying "Breakfast is the most important meal of the day". Everyone keeps saying that. Is it really? I have been reading up quite a bit on intermittent fasting, which is basically the idea that you should only have a 6-8 hour feeding window each day, have three meals during that window, which is built around your workout, and the fast for the rest of the day. There is a rather good blog called Leangains, which is written by a guy who is a personal trainer and nutritional consultant. And based on the photos of him, I would say he is definitely doing something right, he looks absolutely amazing and is able to keep to at a very low body fat using intermittent fasting. The conventional wisdom is you neet to constantly eat small meals to keep your metabolism going, but it's clear from looking at this guy, there are several approaches to food and nutrition which will work. I am a strong believer in trying out different approaches and doing what feels right for you. My approach to weight loss was built around strict calorie restriction, four meals spread evenly across the day and very strictly keeping away from starch carbs. However, I did try the intermittent fasting for a while as well, as I thought it really sounds quite sensible. And I don't believe your body will actually care very much whether you eat one big meal a day, or five or six really small ones. It's all about psychology, and what will work for you. Well, let me tell you, the intermittent fasting did not work for me. In theory it sounded very good, and it did allow me to have quite a big meal in the evening, which I really love. Evenings after workout is when I crave food the most, and when I stray off the nutrition plan (which has been embarrassingly often lately) it's always in the evening. So I thought by restricting my eating in the morning and day, when I'm at work and can't sneak away to the fridge, I would be able to eat more in the evening, thus hopefully reducing the risk of slipping onto that slippery path of having treats. First I tried a feeding pattern with pre-workout lunch at 3 or 4pm and then a big dinner post workout. It was a horrible pain to go from 9pm to 3pm the next day without eating. It was totally horrible. Especially on days when I bike to work, I thought I would die of hunger by 9am, and then still had 6 more hours to go. So I changed it up to brekkie at noon, then lunch at 3pm and a post-workout dinner. But I have to say, as much as I really wanted that to work, my preferred distribution of meals is brekkie post-workout in the morning, then a snack at noon, lunch at 3pm and dinner post workout in the evening. I have changed things around thanks to the intermittent fasting experiments as I used to have lunch at noon and a snack at 3pm, but it seems to work out better for me the other way around. The moral of the (disturbingly long) story is that you should be open in trying different things, and see what works for you. So for me, the cliché about breakfast being the day's most important meal is true. And this is when we finally come to the point of this post! (Yes, I can see the relief on your faces).

Once again we have Pinterest to thank for a great idea. I saw this pin with no-cook oatmeal in a variety of flavours, and immediately had to try it out. Technically, oats are not part of my nutrition plan. Neither is dairy. But hey, neither was that jar of Marshmallow fluff I stuffed my face with earlier this week, so on the grand scheme of things, I don't think this oatmeal will be why my ass is constantly in an outward expanding motion. I will try to cut down on sugar. And eventually other carbs as well. But until then, I really wanted to try this out. And I love the idea, basically a combination of oatmeal and muesli. Great to eat quickly before heading off to the gym in the morning, a good fix of carbs with some protein added from the yoghurt and chia seeds. And easy to take along to work or wherever. Works as a snack as well, would probably work as a pre workout snack in the afternoon quite well. Easy and so convenient to pre-make for the whole week at once! And endless options to vary the flavourings, only your imagination is the limit. 

The basic recipe:
25 g (1/4 cup) porridge oats (or other cereal, I use about 1/3 millet flakes and 2/3 oats)
70 g (1/4 cup) yoghurt (full fat Greek is my favourite)
80 ml (1/3 cup) milk, rice milk, coconut milk or other liquid (like left over whey from making cheese)
1-2 tbsp chia seeds (or flax seeds or maybe some other seeds)

things for flavouring, like berries, fruit, maple syrup etc. I made one with blueberries and unsweetened strawberry jam, and another with strawberries, raspberries and vanilla extract.

The howto:
Mix everything but berries and/or fruit in a jar, close lid, give a good shake, add the berries/and or fruit and give another shake. Pop in the fridge at least over night, or up to a few days. The original recipe says she used half pint (one cup) mason jars, whereas I used empty marshmallow fluff jars which are much bigger, I would guess at least a pint or so. At least there is room for more berries that way, and stirring the ingredients is easier when the jar doesn't get too full.

The verdict:
Yet another genius food idea which is fast, easy, affordable and only needs a couple of ingredients. And I really loved both the taste and the texture. I'm a big fan of oatmeal as well, so that might partly explain it. But I would say that even if you don't like oatmeal you should give this a try, as it tastes quite different. Somehow the combination of oats and yoghurt has a good harmony. I have only kept mine in the fridge over night and the oats (I am currently using Tesco Organic oats, which are the hugest oat flakes I have ever seen in my life) have been a very nice texture, soft but with some chew left in them. I don't know if keeping the oatmeal in the fridge for more than one night would make them softer. The chia seeds are very neutral in flavour, basically just consider them a nutritional add on, they don't bring much to the flavour or texture. Also, you might need to experiment a bit with the amount of liquid depending on type of cereal and type of yoghurt used. And on your preference of how solid or runny you like your oatmeal. I used the same basic recipe for my blueberry flavoured batch as well as my strawberry and raspberry one. The strawberry and raspberry oatmeal turned out much runnier, partly I think this is because I used a lighter yoghurt (goat's milk yoghurt versus full fat Greek in the first batch) but also because both berries did release quite a bit of liquid during the night. So with softer berries, I would decrease the amount of liquid or use a heavier yoghurt. But experimenting with these things is half the fun, and both batches did end up tasting really good anyways, so don't be scared, just jump in there and trust your gut. Both for measuring the ingredients and for sampling the results!

The options on how to flavour the oatmeal are endless, this is a perfect time to use your imagination. I have actually gone so far as to consider quite disturbing flavour combos, like throwing in some bacon. I mean, choc chip and bacon muffins or pancakes sound absolutely delish, so why not choc chip and bacon oatmeal? You can swap millet for some other favourite cereal, use your favourite seeds, use any yoghurt (or liquid, I guess you could substitute things like orange juice here as well) you prefer, and the combination of flavourings in endless. There are some brilliant ideas in the post where I originally discovered the idea (from The Yummy Life) and there are more ideas here. The flavour combinations mentioned in those two posts are:

• mango, honey and almond extract
• blueberries and maple syrup
• unsweetened apple sauce, cinnamon and honey
• banana, cocoa powder and honey
• banana, peanut butter and honey
• raspberries, raspberry jam and vanilla extract
• canned mandarine, orange marmelade and honey
• cherries, chopped dark chocolate, vanilla extract and honey
• cocoa powder, espresso powder and honey
• coconut milk (to replace the regular milk), pineapple and honey
• pumpkin puree, pumpkin pie spice, maple syrup (ok, can you get more American than that??? well maybe if you added peanut butter)
• chopped peaches, raspberry jam and vanilla extract
• chopped pecans, cranberry sauce, honey and nutmeg
• dried apricots, crystallised ginger and almond extract

That should be enough to give you some ideas. Basically any fruit or berry you can think of, with something sweet (if you fancy that, although with berries and fruit, I personally don't think it needs any other sweetener than the fruit sugars. I like the slightly sour flavour of the yoghurt to come through). For some reason making this in a jar instead of on a plate (which you can do of course) makes it much more fun to eat. My jars are quite big, so they fit a lot of fruits/berries, it's of course up to you (and your tolerance for added calories) how much you want to add to the basic cereal mix. I can't wait to try more flavours, I bet the banana ones are going to be awesome. I also have some raw chocolate and sesame seed paste which I haven't been able to find any use for, I think it would go great with some banana. I think that will be the next one I try.

On strawberries, french toast, pinning and being a bit of a geek

I woke up at 5.45 yesterday, and thought that was bad. Before heading off to the gym at 9.30 I had already cleaned up my kitchen, including washing the dishes from pretty much all of last week (yes, I'm horrible at doing any cleaning during the week, and yes it's disgusting, but what can you do). Well, I was looking forward to sleeping in today. I woke up at around four am. I did manage to fall asleep again, but only slept in short intervals, and finally gave up and got out of bed at 7.30. It's almost midsummer, so it's as light as it gets, and the sunrise is around 4am, so I guess my body is just reacting to all the light. But I bet come Monday, I will sleep like a log when my alarm clock goes off at 5.45.

The good thing about getting up early is of course having ample time to prepare a great Sunday brunch. And today, I decided to try something I stumbled upon on Pinterest the other day. I'm totally obsessed with Pinterest these days. I haven't much used it before, but on my sick-day the other day I was browsing the Pinterest board of one of my favourite food bloggers, Annalise from Completely Delicious. And many many others as well, and got inspired to set up my own Pins as well. So now the Unicorn is on Pinterest too! It's still very much a work in progress, and I will update as I have time. The problem of course is not finding things to pin on there, it's just that I tend to get a bit overwhelmed when I start to browse baking blogs and pictures... I can spend hours and hours just browsing. I'm an incurable carboholic, and need help.

The point  of this rant was that I stumbled upon this amazing recipe for roasted strawberries on a great blog I've never seen before, called A Cosy Kitchen. And now, I did it again, I got totally distracted from writing this. I was supposed to just test that the link I added to the blog works. And of course I couldn't resist browsing a bit more on the blog. And I ran into yet another recipe I just have to try, avocado hummus. How genius is that, I love hummus, I love guacamole, and this kind of combines those two loves in what looks like a really great and delicious way. Good thing I have an avocado in the fridge, and was planning to make hummus for my afternoon snack on Tuesday anyways. Yay!

And again, after my distraction, back to today's brunch. So I found this recipe for roasted strawberries. And had to try it straight away. I would never have thought of making roasted strawberries myself. I just eat them fresh, right out of the box. At most, I toss them into my breakfast smoothie. But to cook them? The thought has never crossed my mind. Good thing I had strawberries at home. I actually have half a fridge full of strawberries, as they were really cheap this week when I went for my Friday evening grocery shopping trip (one of the highlights of my week, going grocery shopping. I know, my life is very, very sad). Another fact, that is almost too geeky to admit is that ever since the start of the year, I have kept an Excel sheet of all the food I buy from the grocery store. I was inspired to do this when I read that the average American buys over a thousand kilograms of food a year. To me that sounded crazy, so I had to see how I compare. I realize only keeping track of the food I buy from the grocery store will be a bit of an underestimation as it won't account for the times when I eat out. But I actually eat out very little, I prepare pretty much all of my food myself, so I think it will give a nice overview of what it is I'm eating. Anyways, the point I was making, is that the Excel sheet tells me that so far this year I've bought 11kg (!) of strawberries. And strawberry season is only just starting, so I will be increasing my consumption as prices drop. I just love strawberries. Love, love, love. Back home, I never used to eat strawberries in the winter, maybe some frozen ones from time to time, but the fresh ones were way too expensive. Here, although admittedly a bit pricy in the winter, I still buy a pack or two almost every week through the year, just because they are available and semi-affordable. The imported ones don't much resemble real strawberries taste wise, but even bad strawberries are better than no strawberries!

A while ago, I made some chocolate and rum raisin French toast bread pudding for breakfast, and still had one piece of it left in the freezer to enjoy with the strawberries. So after a long rant, this week's Sunday brunch is French toast bread pudding with roasted strawberries.

French toast pudding (serves 4):

4 hot cross buns (I used the chocolate and orange ones...) or some other bread

5 eggs

180ml (3/4 cup) milk

1tbsp vanilla extract

1/4 tsp baking powder

1cup (2.5dl) raisins

dark rum

100g (1/2 cup) light muscovado sugar

1tbsp cinnamon

50g dark chocolate chips

The howto:

Start preparing the the french toast the evening before, or at least several hours ahead. Mix eggs, milk, baking powder and vanilla extract. Cut bread into slices or the buns in half. Pour mixture over bread, and let soak for a minimum of a few hours, preferably over night in the fridge. Turn over the bread over once while it's soaking. Also, pour a generous helping of rum over the raisins, and marinate over night in the fridge.

Preheat oven to 225 degrees C. Sprinkle chocolate chips, raisins, cinnamon and the muscovado sugar on the bottom of a greased oven proof dish, and add the bread on top. Cook for 20-25 minutes until golden brown, and let cool for 15 minutes before serving. Serve with butter, whipped cream, ice cream or the world's most amazing roasted strawberries. 

Roasted strawberries:

225g strawberries

2tbsp maple syrup

1tbsp olive oil (I used lemon infused rapeseed oil)

1/2 tbsp balsamic vinegar (I used my fancy 12 year old pomegranate flavoured vinegar)

1/4tsp salt

1/4tsp black pepper

The howto:

Preheat oven to 180 degrees C. Hull strawberries and cut in half or quarters if big. Combine all the other ingredients, pour over berries and lightly toss to cover. Cook in the middle of the oven for about 40 minutes, until the juices have started to caramelise but not burn. While still warm, scrape berries and caramelised juices off the pan into a small bowl. If you can resist putting them straight into your mouth that is.

The verdict:

 The roasted strawberries come with a warning. And please, take this seriously. If you cook them, you will never view strawberries the same, ever again. It is without a doubt one of the most delicious things I have ever cooked. And I don't say that lightly, I mean I bake a lot of stuff and I say it's good, or really good (because it usually is). But this. I'm speechless. As soon as they came out of the oven, I could have just scraped it all off the pan and eaten in 10 seconds. Having to wait the one minute it took to heat up the French toast in the microwave was torture. Lessons to learn is that the single serving of the recipe is not nearly enough, next time I'm making it at least double. And that's only if I'm cooking for myself. Triple or quadruple if I'm serving for someone else as well. On my death bed I will dream of these strawberries. Oh and the French toast is nice too. But did I mention the strawberries?

 

Strawberry daiquiri festival cake

My friend has made a tradition of throwing a start-of-summer BBQ party, which this year coincided perfectly with the Jubilee weekend. The theme for the party is essentially to celebrate the summer by ingesting way too many strawberry daiquiris, to me the Queen of all drinks. This year, I wanted to make a dessert that would go with the theme, and ended up with this strawberry daiquiri cheesecake.


This is partially inspired by several different recipes I have browsed online (including this one from Kinuskikissa), but essentially is something I threw together myself. The recipe contains strawberry vinegar, as I bought a bottle of it from a lovely little shop in York called The Hairy Fig. If you don't have any, just leave it out. I think it brings a nice little tangy addition to the recipe, but I'm sure it won't change the flavour too much if you leave it out.


Strawberry daiquiri cheese cake (serves about 8-12):
150g (about 10) Digestive biscuits
50g butter

300ml double cream
250g mascarpone
150g white chocolate
2tsp vanilla paste
3tbsp strawberry vinegar

400g strawberries
Juice from 1 lime
White rum to taste
2tbsp strawberry vinegar
3 tbsp icing sugar
26g (2 sachets) gelatin

The howto:
Crush the biscuits (I used a food processor), melt the butter and mix. Press the mixture onto the bottom of a 24cm circular cake tin. Put in the fridge to set while making the filling.
Whip cream until soft and fluffy, melt chocolate. Mix all ingredients, and spoon on top of the crust. Use a spoon or a spatula to smooth the top and make it as even as possible. Let set for several hours or over night.

To make the strawberry daiquiri topping, use a handheld mixer to puree the strawberries. Add lime juice, strawberry vinegar, icing sugar, mix. Add rum to taste (I added quite a few tablespoons, I wanted the rum taste to come through to go with the drinks we would be having). In a saucepan, mix about 100ml of water with a few tbsps of the strawberry mix, heat until boiling, take off the stove, and mix in gelatin. Mix until all of the gelatin has melted, add to the rest of the strawberry daiquiri mix. Cool the strawberry mix in a cold water bath until it starts to get thick, then pour onto the top of the cake and let set for several hours in the fridge (or in an emergency, about an hour in the freezer).

The verdict:
When you create your own recipes, you often have a very clear picture in your head what they are supposed to taste like. To me, this didn't quite go as planned, the flavours were just a bit too mild. The good thing was that the cake was definitely not too sweet, and it got good feedback from others eating it, so I guess it didn't turn out too bad. I would probably change it a bit next time, throw in more chocolate, and maybe switch from mascarpone to Philadelphia. However, the cheese layer was now very light (in texture if not calorie content) thanks to the mascarpone and whipped cream, with Philly it would probably be a bit more like "traditional cheesecake". The reason I wanted to use mascarpone here was that the previous cheese cakes I experimented with (and should finish the post so that I can get it online) were made from Philadelphia and turned out a bit too rich for me. Thinking about it, a mix of Philly and mascarpone might be the best option. Also, the nice thing of this cake is that the white chocolate in the cheese cake layer makes it firm up nicely, so you don't need to add gelatin to set the cheese cake layer.

One thing I definitely had problems with was getting the strawberry layer to set. Well, actually the problem was just my timing. I recommend you make the cake one day ahead, making the crust and cheesecake layer in the morning, letting it cool all day, then making the strawberry layer in the evening and letting it set all night. I made the cheesecake layer the night before, and only had a few hours to let the strawberry layer to set and had to take the cake over to a friend's house to let it set in the freezer (my own freezer is not big enough to fit a cake...). But all is well that ends well, the cake set just in time.

 

Friday quickie

To celebrate the fact that nothing too bad has happened to me on this Friday the 13th, I decided to whip up some quickie comfort foods and curl up on the sofa to enjoy them (yes, I do lead such an exciting life...). For me, Friday food has to be something quick and simple, with only a few ingredients and not too much fuss, but it also has to be something yummy. Funnily enough, it also seems to contain cumin very frequently.


I had a cauliflower lying around in my fridge which needed to be used up, so I decided to make roasted cauliflower with yoghurt and pomegranate, a recipe I stumbled upon at Epicurious and have made semi-regularly. Mint is one of my favourite herbs, but I hardly ever use it for some strange reason. Here, I love the freshness of the mint and yoghurt combined with the warm softness of the cauliflower. And it's really quick to prepare (apart from seeding the pomegranate, which is a bit of a messy task, but well worth it when you taste the result).


I also wanted something sweet for dessert (I *will* get back to my "no sugar, no wheat, no dairy" nutrition plan next week, I promise...). The perfect excuse to make this dessert was that I wanted to use up the last quark and cream which were left over from my Easter baking bonanza. This quark dessert is something I can remember all the way back from my childhood, so it truly counts in the category of comfort food. 

Quark is a soured milk product, basically a type of soft and velvety cheese. The taste is very mild, a bit like cream cheese, but a bit more sour and fresh. Back home you can buy all sorts of flavoured quarks, which is something I really miss. Berry quark, vanilla quark, white chocolate and lime quark and many more. In the UK, it seems like you can only get fat free, natural (i.e. non-flavoured) quark. Quark makes a nice, fresh and not too sweet dessert which is great on it's own like served here, or amazing served on meringue nests with a bit of chocolate sauce. There are endless variations you can make by substituting other berries or fruits. A great mix is strawberries, raspberries and blueberries, or mango and banana. If you want to make it more healthy you can completely leave out the whipped cream and mix quark with berries or fruits and maybe a drollop of honey.

And finally, the actual recipe for the roasted cauliflower (serves 2):
1 large cauliflower
1 tbsp rapeseed oil
1 tsp cumin seeds
sea salt flakes, pepper
100 g organic, natural, full fat yoghurt (I prefer Greek yoghurt)
1 pomegranate
a few mint leaves


The howto:
Preheat oven to 200 C. Break the cauliflower up into florets, toss with oil, cumin, salt and pepper. Roast for about 30 minutes, or until the florets look a bit darkened and crispy. Meanwhile, deseed the pomegranate, and mix pomegranate seeds with yoghurt, a pinch of salt and pepper and finely chopped mint. 


One serving contains approximately 280 kcal (13.6g fat, 35.5g total carbs and 9.6g protein). I use MyFitnessPal to estimate nutritional content, and take no responsibility for the accuracy of the estimates.

Ingredients for quark dessert (serves 3-4):
250 g quark 
150 ml double cream
40 g Whittard Rhubarb White Hot Chocolate (or 3 tbsp sugar and 1 tbsp vanilla extract)
200 g strawberries
100 g raspberries

Quark howto:
Mix cream and hot chocolate (or sugar and vanilla extract) and beat until peaks form (the quark is pretty thick so don't overwhip the cream to get a nice smooth texture of the dessert). Mix cream with quark, and add berries. Try to refrain from eating the whole batch in one sitting. Or just overindulge...


One serving (a third of the whole recipe) contains 400 kcal (28g fat, 23.6g total carbs, 13.5g protein).


The verdict:
Cauliflower: yummy. Quark: yummy. Could I have some more, please?