Carrot Almond cake

After the success of the spiced apple almond cake, I decided to add my own twist to the recipe and turn it into a carrot cake. I did and the cake was as divine. I hardly ever like eating more than one slice of a cake, but I would dive into this one. This is definitely my kind of cake. I essentially swapped the apples for a large carrot and kept everything else together.

Recipe: Adapted from Luckynuts:

Ingredients
1 large carrot
100g unsalted butter, softened, plus extra for greasing cake pan
90g caster sugar
2 eggs
1½ tablespoons rice flour
1½ tablespoons maize cornflour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon cinnamon
100g (1 cup) LUCKY ALMOND MEAL WITH CHIA
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Flaked almonds
1 tablespoon apricot jam, mixed with some warm water

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 170°C. Grease and line base of a 20cm round tin.
2. Cut apples into quarters and remove core. Peel and cut one quarter into thin slices and reserve. Coarsely grate enough of the remaining apple to measure 11/4 cups.
3. Using an electric mixer cream the butter and sugar in a large bowl until pale and creamy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.
4. Sift flours, baking powder and spices together over a bowl. Stir in the Almond Meal with Chia to combine well. Fold the dry ingredients into the creamed mixture. Stir in the vanilla and grated apple to combine well. Spread cake batter into prepared cake pan. Arrange the reserved apple slices over the surface.
5. Bake in oven for 40-45 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean when inserted in the center.

                                                                                     

Spiced Chunky Apple and Almond Cake

Almond meal with chia. It's like the world is revolving around superfoods nowadays. In a way, we are involuntarily forced to immerse ourselves into these kind of nutritious ingredients for several reasons. First, it is everywhere- cooking books, magazines, tv, internet, chemists and food aisle- you just can't go past. Secondly, with our busy daily life (or is it only me who feels that our days seems to have shortened), we need to sustain our body with enough energy quickly. The best and quickest way is to, of course, include some super foods into our regular meals. Thirdly, with our food having lower nutritional values due to pollution and overproduction, we need to compensate for this deficiency and here comes superfood again. Well superfoods do not have to come under fancy names since we have plenty of vegetables which are super nutritious such as sweet potatoes or kale. We also have fish like sardines and what not.  

Anyway, I had this almond meal with chia in my pantry and was not too sure what to make of it. There was one recipe on the back of the packaging. As such, decided to look up for more recipes on Luckynut's website and I came across this spiced apple and almond cake. I was instantly sold since the cake is flourless and I knew that it would taste good with reference to the list of ingredients. I didn't have all the spices required, but I compensated with more cinnamon- I do like cinnamon flavour so much now. I also topped the cake with some flaked almonds and glazed the latter with some apricot jam. The cake was perfectly moist with the right amount of sweetness. I served it with some icecream since it is so warm right now; I was taken to cloud nine.

Recipe: Adapted from Luckynuts:

• Ingredients
• 3 medium Granny Smith 
• 100g unsalted butter, softened, plus extra for greasing cake pan
• ½100g caster sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1½ tablespoons rice flour
• 1½ tablespoons maize cornflour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 100g (1 cup) LUCKY ALMOND MEAL WITH CHIA
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• Flaked almonds
• 1 tablespoon apricot jam, mixed with some warm water

Directions

• 1. Preheat oven to 170°C. Grease and line base of a 20cm round tin.
• 2. Cut apples into quarters and remove core. Peel and cut one quarter into thin slices and reserve. Coarsely grate enough of the remaining apple to measure 11/4 cups.
• 3. Using an electric mixer cream the butter and sugar in a large bowl until pale and creamy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.
• 4. Sift flours, baking powder and spices together over a bowl. Stir in the Almond Meal with Chia to combine well. Fold the dry ingredients into the creamed mixture. Stir in the vanilla and grated apple to combine well. Spread cake batter into prepared cake pan. Arrange the reserved apple slices over the surface.
• 5. Bake in oven for 40-45 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean when inserted in the center.

Frangipane Tart (Recipe)

I love frangipane filling. It is similar to crème pâtissière, but made with almond instead for the custard.
Lots of almonds used in this recipe for a very tasty tart. It has to be my favourite tart.

Recipe:

For the tart base:
250g AP flour
125g butter
A few drops of cold water

For the filling:
75g sugar
100g softened butter,
125g almond meal (ground almonds)
2 eggs
1tsp almond essence
1tbs AP flour
A dollop of cream (about 2 tbs)

For the topping:
1 cup of flaked almonds

For the glaze:
2tbs of apricot jam with 2tbs of warm water

Method:
Prepare the tart base by mixing butter and flour, until resemble crumbs, add water little by little until it forms a dough.
Cover with cling film and put in the fridge to rest.

Prepare the filling by creaming butter and sugar. Then add the remaining ingredients and mix.

Roll out dough from the fridge into your tart mould and prick with a fork. Blind bake for about 15 minutes at 180C in a preheated oven.

Pour filling on to the crust, top with the flaked almonds, and then bake for another 25 minutes, until set.

Once out of the oven, brush with the apricot glaze and enjoy.

Apple Frangipane Tart

Quick snap of my first home-made tart ever. An apple frangipane tart. I made my own sweet shortcut pastry and frangipane filling. It decided to top the tart with some sliced apples (I'm not quite an expert on placing fruits/ decorating yet but we'll get there *fingers crossed*). It turned out well considering it was my first. I will definitely make my own tart in the future. Though it is quite time consuming to make, I think it's worth it.

 

Almond Meal

Since this year I'm into trying new dishes, then why not create your own ingredients as well (alright, maybe this doesn't make sense). What I'm referring to is to make your own -say- almond meal which I did to make my frangipane filling and this was so incredulously simple that I cannot believe it myself (for all I know). Anyway I use a coffee grinder to ground the almonds (appliance that was sitting in the cupboard, getting old and waiting one day to be used- and I guess 2014 was the year!). Right, so all I did is put the raw almond in the machine and pulse a few times and ta-da (magic), I had ground almond before me. There was a few bit and pieces that remain, so you have re-ground them a few times again and again...but is so worth it.

Tips: Do not pulse continuously for it will create almond butter.

Galette des Rois/ King Cake

For Epiphany I made the traditional galette des rois. Normally a bean is place in the cake, so that whoever finds it in his share is crowned king for the year. A tradition you will understand by the birth of Jesus Christ when the three kings went their way to find him accompanied with gifts. It is basically a cake-ish dessert made with puff pastry and almond filling. It is really delicious. You have that crunchiness on the outside and the sweet almond filling in the inside: great combo. Have a look here at the photo below and for the recipe click here  (it's a step by step process, very easy to follow).

Strawberry almond muffin

I was wondering...has my photo-taking improved? Never mind.
Still of me. I am finally up to date. Today I made strawberry almond muffins. I saw the recipe in this month's Woolworths magazine (click here for recipe) and coincidentally we have all the required ingredients. So I was like what are you waiting for. I made it and they taste awesome. If I make it next time I will maybe put in more strawberries, because we quite lost the flavour in the baking process. The recipe calls for roasted strawberries (here the recipe).

 

 

 

Just when I am talking about photography skills, here we have this landscape/portrait problem with my pictures. Seriously. I have not yet figure out how to fix this. To be continued.

Macaron with vanilla buttercream

There is nothing better than home made food. I finally made up my mind to try French macarons . I wanted to make those since a long time ago because I really like eating these yummy cakes (and they are quite expensive). I have watch countless videos on how to make them, so they would end up perfect. Mine were not perfect but I give credit to the taste. They tasted just like the ones you buy from the shop Obviously it was my first at doing those, so I did not expect them to be the perfect shape. Anyway they look decent and I was happy with them.
I use the recipe from Donna Hay. Click here for recipe.

 

Right the colour did change during the baking process. I really do not know why but I would say that it is the taste that counts the most. Also, I might have left them in the oven for a lil too long. What I like is that they had feet. I mean for a first time, it was great.