PYREX REJUVENATION

Something very peculiar happened in the oven the other day.

Well truthfully, not my oven but my sister-in-law's.

She uses her forty year old Pyrex mixing bowl every time she bakes and after washing it she normally puts it in the warm oven (turned off after baking) to dry.  

One day last week she turned on the oven to a fairly high heat, 190° - 200°C she said, and after a few minutes remembered that the Pyrex bowl was still in there.  She grabbed the oven gloves and pulled the bowl out to find what she said was a kind of gooey, gluey puddle of a clear substance in the bottom of it.

Fearing the worst she dashed outside with the bowl and left it to cool down, thinking that she had had this bowl as a wedding present and would be sad to see the end of it.  A few minutes later, it looked like the picture above.

The goo had solidified so she gingerly lifted it out and to her surprise discovered that the bowl, which was very scratched and worn, now appeared to be in immaculate, like new, condition.  The substance she lifted out was a kind of solid ring of something that felt much like plastic.

I'm tempted to buy one of those worn out Pyrex bowls that are for nuppence in the local charity shops and try it myself to see if I can rejuvenate it in the same way.  She says she tried it with her pudding basin but it didn't work because she thinks the oven wasn't hot enough.  

I wouldn't recommend trying this at home yourself but any explanations would be welcome !!

LEMON AND SULTANA BUNDT CAKE, an early birthday present and a bit of a rant about the Bake Off!

We watched the final of the Great British Bake Off last week, rather grudgingly I might add - but more of that later.  I was shocked and saddened to see the tribute to a former contestant, Luis Troyano, appear in the credits at the end.  I instantly remembered who he was, a gentle giant of a man who produced exceptionally good bread during bread week.  He was a finalist in series five in 2014 and was only 48 when he died of cancer just a few weeks ago.

As so many of the contestants do, he produced a book after that series finished and I bought it a while ago.  Until now the only thing in the book I have made is his pumpkin pie, which was, in fact, divine.  You can see that if you go here. 

48 is no age at all.  Amidst all the trials and tribulations that this year has thrown at us, the perpetual fear of impending doom, the worry, the isolation, the pandemic waistline and brain fog, the intense longing for normality, it's frightening to realise that all the other things that normally get us are still out there as well.

A sense of my own mortality set in and with gay abandon I took up Nick's offer of an early birthday present.  My birthday is only a couple of weeks away anyway but what if I didn't make it that far?  You just never know.  

I already own a Kenwood Chef which resides in France.  I took it there thinking that that's where I would do most baking and for a few years that was the case.  Oh but how I have missed it this year!  And how thrilled I am to now have this retro styled baby Kenwood!  I christened it without delay by baking my own little tribute to Luis, the recipe for a lemon and sultana Bundt cake that's in his book.

There was too much mixture for this particular Bundt tin and remembering that I read somewhere that you shouldn't fill them by more than three quarters I used the excess to make four muffins.  Bundt tins do vary in volume depending on the design so in a different tin the quantity of mixture would probably have been perfect.  (This design is called "elegant party".)

The baking time was given as one hour but after exactly an hour I would say that mine was, to quote Paul Hollywood, slightly over baked.  The top (or the bottom of the cake) had a distinctly dark appearance so next time I would check after 50 minutes.  (On re-reading the recipe it seems I overlooked the part about covering with foil to prevent burning after 45 minutes!)

And now for my little rant about the Bake Off.  Jump to the recipe if you're not interested!

The contest was in its hey day when Luis was a contestant.  The wonderful Mary Berry was one of the  judges, Paul Hollywood (the Craig Revel Horwood of baking competitions) was the other and Mel and Sue were joint hosts.  Mel and Sue were a class act, providing intelligent humour, support and comfort to the contestants and an all round feel good feeling.

When the show moved to Channel 4 and all but Paul Hollywood quit, I thought it would never be as good.  However, I quickly took to Pru Leith.  Paul was just the same old Paul but we also had that nincompoop, Noel Fielding to contend with.  His puerile sense of humour was somewhat compensated for by the clever and witty Sandy Toksvig whose silly japes I didn't mind so much, but now that she has left and Matt Lucas came along instead things went rapidly downhill IMHO.

We have found the series almost unwatchable, the inane fifth form common room jokes and pranks intensely irritating and cringe worthy.  In order to stop ourselves from throwing things at the TV we have recorded programmes and watched later so that we could whizz through most of the waffle.  I don't know what Channel 4 are aiming for but it's not the quality programme it used to be with that pair of idiots cruising round and hassling the contestants while they're having a meltdown over their crème pat.  Rant over.

So this cake was my tribute to the gentle and talented Luis Troyano.  There are lots of other really lovely recipes in his book which I highly recommend.  I shall bake my way through a few more and no doubt write about them.

His recipe for this particular cake includes a glaze made with limoncello but I thought the cake looked quite beautiful without it and turned out to be amply lemony enough as it was.  Definitely a cake I shall be making again.  R.I.P. Luis.

Ingredients

225g softened butter (I used Tesco Butterpak Spreadable)

500g caster sugar

4 large eggs

380g plain flour

1 tblsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

120ml buttermilk

120ml lemonjuice

170g sultanas (tossed in a little flour to prevent sinking)

zest of 2 lemons, finely grated

Method

Prepare your Bundt tin by buttering generously and dusting with flour or using this method here.  Preheat the oven to 190 C / 170 fan / gas mk 5.

Using your brand new Kenwood mixer (ahem!) or a hand held electric mixer, beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

Add and beat in the eggs one at a time along with a spoonful of the flour to prevent curdling.

Add all the other ingredients and beat until well combined.  Pour into the tin and level the top, remembering not to fill by more than three quarters.  Give the tin a few sharp taps on the worktop to ensure there are no air gaps and bake for about one hour.  Cover with foil after 45 minutes and check for doneness after 50 minutes.

Cool in the tin for 10 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack to cool completely.

Depending on the design of your tin, cuts into 15-20 slices.

NEWS FROM ABROAD

 

We have now been back in France for two weeks and what a joy it is to be here.

I haven't posted about any baking for a while but that doesn't mean it hasn't been going on!

 

 

Just before we left for France I made a smoked sausage, pea, tomato and goat's cheese quiche.

It was delicious and used up bits and pieces from the fridge.  You can see the general method for this kind of quiche here.

 

 

I also made a mango and raspberry upside down cake using this method here.

I used tinned mango slices for it and they worked really well, making a change from the more traditional pineapple upside down cake with cherries.

 

 

I made it again for a lunch party we hosted chez nous which you can read about here.  I also served a raspberry trifle and a plateful of raspberry puffs which you can see here.

 

Also, just before we left for France I used some rhubarb from our flourishing rhubarb patch and some strawberries that needed eating up to make a rhubarb and strawberry jumblefruit pie.

It's essentially fruit sprinkled with sugar to taste and covered with a layer of pastry trimmings frozen from all the quiches that have been made!  You can see the general idea here.

 

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However, I'm not sure how much baking will be going on in the near future.  During lockdown I have definitely acquired a "lockdown waistline" due to spending too much time in the garden during the fine weather, drowning my sorrows with rosé wine and home made cake!  (I had no idea before this that the Italians made such a delicious Pinot Grigio rosé!)

 

On arriving here and meeting up with friends after what seems like forever it's noticeable that several of them have spent their time much more sensibly and lost a serious amount of weight.  Five of them have lost one and a half stone each - as opposed to the half stone I have gained, which I could ill afford to gain as I had intended to spend the winter losing weight, not gaining it!  Then along came something that turned our world upside down - a simple virus.  (It's probably a very complex virus for all I know but what havoc it has wrought.)   What with the virus, Brexit, and my elderly father to worry about I went in for stress eating and drinking big style.  I can forgive myself for it in some ways but on the other hand am kicking myself for not getting to grips, knuckling down and "taking back control" of my calorie intake.

 

"The time has come" as the walrus said and there may be fewer baking posts for a while!

HOW TO REMOVE KNIFE MARKS FROM YOUR CROCKERY

Knife marks on my Denby plate.

We are not the kind of people who have a best dinner service.  We tend to have one and use it all the time*.  About ten years ago, when our crockery was getting a bit tatty and it was becoming harder to replace broken items we decided to lash out on a Denby set, gradually building up the pieces over time.

I was disappointed to find that fairly soon some of the items were looking scratched and grey due to knife marks, especially the things we use every day such as the dinner plates.  Some were so bad that I considered throwing out the plates and buying new ones.  Instead I did a bit of internet research and tried various suggestions for removing them.  Rubbing them with household cleaners such as Cif had no effect at all.  Rubbing with a paste made of bicarbonate of soda lightened some of the marks with a lot of effort but in the end I gave up and decided to put up with the marks, occasionally apologising to visitors and pointing out that the plates were really cleaner than they looked!

If only I had known at the outset that what you really need is this stuff.

BAR KEEPERS FRIEND – POWER CREAM.

Marks now gone after a gentle wipe.

I casually enquired at my nearest Lakeland store if they had any ideas and the young male assistant suggested this product.  It worked!

In fact it worked beautifully.  With just a blob of the cream and barely more than a gentle wipe with a damp cloth all the marks came off almost instantly.  My Denby plates look brand new again.

It also removed more stubborn metal marks on plates and dishes caused by metal pet food bowls rubbing against them in the dishwasher.  This did require a bit more rubbing but they also now look pristine.

There is a range of Bar Keepers Friend products so it’s important to choose the right one for this job.  Of course the marks will return with use but it’s good to know that with one wipe they can be removed.  Marvellous !!


*The truth is that we now have two more dinner services but I plead mitigating circumstances.  The Denby is our everyday crockery from the house in the UK.  We have an Ikea dinner service that came from our first house in France and then here.  I also have my old Blue Denmark set from the 1980's which Nick disliked so it was boxed up and put away.  After almost eighteen months in our "new" French house nearly everything is unpacked and I rediscovered it and put it lovingly in the sideboard, for occasional use.  My cup runneth over!
Of course we still have a small house in the UK and that has a small dinner service too, the one that was my mum's, also bought in the 80's and 90's when she felt she could afford to replace her old, chipped and cracked hotch potch of cups, plates an saucers.  I cherish that one more than any.