Remembering Patan

So a few weeks ago I mentioned a print by an artist, Chitra Merchant, that I have bought it for my living room. 

One of the reasons I loved the print so much was that it reminded me of my last night in Nepal, in Bhaktapur, Patan square, Kathmandu. Today I woke up to the awful news that Kathmandu had been hit by a huge earthquake and one of my favourite places, Patan/Durbar square was effectively gone. The friend we had gone out to visit is still out there and was actually living in Patan at the time the earthquake hit so the pictures of the flattened square really scared me. She was ok, she’s with her family. I know that many many people are have been hurt and killed and still more are missing so all my thoughts are there with them. 

 

Patan was one of the most beautiful places I have ever been and now, with who knows what damage done and some heritage lost forever, my photos and memories are all the more important to me. Here are just a few of my favourites, I’m going to keep hoping that we’ve seen the worst of the damage and the death toll doesn’t get any higher.

Sunday bakes - 'More sunshine please' madeleines

This week I'm making an attempt at one of my favourites, madeleines. I've never made them before, and I know they can be tricky so I was a bit nervous about giving them a go.  It's important that they are light and fluffy so I was extra careful to beat in as much air as possible and be gentle with the mixture.

Ingredients

2 eggs

100g/3.5oz caster sugar

100g/3.5oz plain flour

100g/3.5oz butter, melted and cooled slightly

juice and zest of one lemon

3/4 tsp baking powder

Method

Whisk up the eggs with the sugar until light and frothy and then gently whisk in the rest of the ingredients. 

Leave the mixture to sit for 20 minutes. 

Heat the oven to 200 and then brush a little extra melted butter into the madeleine moulds and sprinkle a little extra plain flour as well. Tap out any excess and spoon the mixture into the moulds gently. 

Bake for 10 minutes until the madeleines are golden brown and cooked all the way through. 

 

 

 

Now to sit in the sunshine, with a glass of something, a good book and a plate of fresh madeleines.

Sunday bakes - 'They don't make egg-shaped moulds' easter cake

For Easter sunday I wanted to make a 'show stopper' and what better shape for Easter than an egg. But unfortunately they don't seem sell egg shaped cake moulds, so I had  improvise with a pudding dish. 
Whilst this cake lasted long enough to eat, the bottom half was starting to look a little bulbous, I think there is a good reason why there aren't egg-shaped cakes. 
So make this cake if you are planning on eating is quickly (in the next few days).

Ingredients
Cake mix - make 2 batches, each with the following:
120g/4.5oz Self-raising flour
140g/5oz Caster sugar
pinch of salt
40g/1.5oz stork/butter
120ml milk
1 egg
1/4 tsp flavouring
Marzipan
Fondant icing
Icing lace powder
Black cherry jam

Method
For each of the cake halves beat the sugar and butter togegther until light and fluffy, then add the egg and beat again. Sift in the flour and mix gently at first, then gradually add the milk, salt, and the flavouring, beat togegther to make a light sponge batter. For the top layer I added vanilla flavour but for the bottom I added almond, to go with the cherry jam and marzipan.

Pour one batch of cake mix into a pudding dish, lined with buttered tin foil and cover with some more tin foil with a pleat in. Put into a roasting tin half filled with water and bake on a low heat until it is cooked all the way through (use the skewer test to check). Take the tin foil off the top for the last 10 minutes of cooking to crisp up the top, it will help keep the structure of the cake strong. Do this for both halves of the cake.

Once the cake has cooled tip them out onto a plate, put one small side down on the plate, cover with jam and then invert the other side and place on top. The pudding dish will have had a flat bottom so this should balance.

Cover the now egg-shaped cake in jam, then a thin layer of marzipan before putting on the fondant icing. I've found that rolling out the marzipan and fondant onto cling film will make transferring the rolled out icing onto the cake much easier and the surface much smoother. You can also rub down the surface to smooth out any folds without getting too sticky. 

I have a collection of the powdered icing paints, but you can mix them with water to make icing paints. I mixed up three colours and painted them over the surface to make a bright watercolour effect. 

You can buy the silicone mould for the icing lace online as well as the special icing sugar. you mix up the powder with water and spread over the mould, taking care to scrape off as much excess as possible. 

It will dry out overnight or over a few hours but you can speed up the process by placing in a very cool oven. Don't leave in the oven for too long because it will become brittle. 

Peel out of the mould and lay over the cake. I ran pieces of wire down one of the pieces and folded up to make a bow to sit on top. 

Happy Easter bakers!

Sunday bakes – ‘Making out’ meringues

There is nothing sweeter that those first few kisses with someone you have really liked for a while and in the baking world there is nothing sweeter than meringues. These little cherry flavoured meringue kisses are light and crumble sweetly in your mouth from the first touch. 

Ingredients

4 egg whites

225g caster sugar

1tsp cornflour

½ tsp white wine vinegar

1 cup of cherries

Method

Heat the cherries in a saucepan until they start to split then mash them against the side of pan. Once the juices are reduced to a syrup, sift them and set aside the juice for later.

Whisk the egg whites up and a very clean bowl until they hold stiff peak. Gradually sift in half the sugar whisking as you go. The mixture should thicken and get shiny. Add in the cornflour and vinegar to give your meringues that gooey marshmallow centre and whisk in the rest of the sugar.  

Pour in the juice but do not mix. Spoon the mixture into a piping bag with a large star shaped nozzle.

The oven should be heated to about 140°. Pipe the meringues onto a greased paper. To make cute little meringue kisses hold the nozzle perfectly straight above the paper and pipe in a steady stream. The juices should make a pretty ripple pattern throughout. 

Cook gently on a low heat to dry and create that lovely crunch when you bite into each of these kisses. 

Sunday bakes - 'Crappy week at work' carrot cake

This was a tough week at work so today I wound down with a little baking before it starts up again tomorrow. This recipe is actually from a cookbook that I have, you can buy a copy of it here. 

Ingredients

225g self-raising flour

1tsp baking powder

2 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp ginger

1 tsp nutmeg

150ml sunflower oil

3 eggs

200g light soft brown sugar

400g grated carrots

Zest 1 orange

60g roasted chopped pistachios – plus extra for topping

Frosting

200g cream cheese

75g icing sugar

1.5 tsp lemon juice

Zest 1 lemon

Method

Sift the flour, baking powder and spices in together before beating the oil sugar and eggs separately and combining the two sets of ingredients.

Add the rest of the ingredients. Pour into a lined 20cm cake tin and bake at 180° for an hour or until the skewer comes out clean.

Beat the ingredients for the icing together until light and fluffy and then spread over the cake with a palette knife, sprinkle the pistachio nuts over the top and eat it all in front of friends with a vase full of sunny daffodils to yourself to make your week a bit better. 

Sunday bakes - 'Mothers' day' macaroons

Mothers' day is a lovely day, we get to spend it with our family, do family-friendly activities and there are copious amounts of spring flowers.

This year my mum, my godmother and I had a picnic at Standen, one of my favourite national trust properties. As a child I had a friend that lived in one of the on-site cottages so we used to play in the beautiful gardens.

I made a big picnic and slightly over did it on the baked goods but one of the things I made that went down the best was the raspberry ripple macaroons. 

Ingredients

6oz icing sugar

5.5 oz ground almonds

120 ml egg whites – about 4 eggs

5.5 oz granulated sugar

1 tbsp raspberry puree

50ml water

Filling

4 oz butter

8oz icing sugar

A few drops of raspberry ripple cupcake flavouring

Food colouring -  add to your desired colour level

Method

Sift the ground almonds to get out any large lumps and put it into a food blender with half of the egg whites and the icing sugar. Blitz with about 15 pulses.

Put the water in a saucepan and add the granulated sugar, heat until it reaches a gentle boil. Use a sugar thermometer to measure and it will be ready when it reaches 110°. Whisk up the rest of the egg whites in a clean bowl. It would be easier to do this with a kitchen aid style mixer because once the egg whites are beaten to soft peaks slowly start to add in the sugar syrup, with the whisk on high. The mix will become smooth and glossy, keep whisking until it is cool.

Fold in the almond mixture, take care not to over fold. A pattern of mixture poured over the top should sink back into the rest of the mixture within 30 seconds. Fold in the raspberry puree at the same time. The mixture will turn a dusky pink but add in more food colouring if you want a darker colour.

Fill a piping bag with the mixture and pipe onto sheets of baking paper. I found the technique that works the best is to draw a circle of about 2cm diameter and then hold the bag in the centre and squeeze out a dome of mixture. This seemed to be the best way to make sure the circles are even. 

Leave the mixture out for at least 30 minutes at room temperature so that the circles form a skin then bake at 170° for 14 minutes. 

 Whisk the butter and the icing sugar to make the butter cream and add the flavouring and colouring to taste.

Sandwich two of the cooled macaroons together with the buttercream filling and serve with a cup of tea and family laughs.

Thank you Mum for another wonderful year.