COURGETTE, LIME AND COCONUT CAKE

 

I made this cake recently for a friend's birthday.

 

It's an adaptation of a recipe which I've used before and you can see here.  On that occasion (two years ago) I was using up a glut of courgettes but this year we have none at all, which is very sad indeed.

 

Last year's wasn't a great harvest either, largely because during a spring storm the wind blew over two of our four plants, the green ones, and broke the tops off.  Luckily the other two plants gave a reasonable supply of small yellow courgettes.  This year we were in the UK drowning our sorrows in Italian rosé wine at the time when we should have been planting courgette plants in our French garden.

 

Fortunately we have friends who have some to give away so we're not going entirely without courgettes this year. 

 

Unfortunately I wasn't able to taste the cake after I had given it away.  Good for my lockdown waistline but it would have been nice to be able to verify that it tasted as good as my friend said.  It may seem odd to post about a cake that I haven't actually tasted but it wouldn't be the first time!  The main reason is that so I can remember how I made it for next time.  It's a further adaptation of Nigella Lawson's recipe for "Flora's courgette cake", adding some coconut instead of the dried fruit.

 

I made the cake again, just to check it was good.

 

 It was!

 

Ingredients

 

250g courgettes, unpeeled

2 large eggs

125ml sunflower oil

150g caster sugar

225g self raising flour

½ tsp bicarbonate of soda
½ tsp baking powder
50g desiccated coconut
zest of 1 lime*

For the topping and filling

2-3 tblsp lemon curd**
zest and juice of 1 lime*
100g cream cheese
50g butter, softened
50g icing sugar

Method

Grease and line the bases of two 20cm sponge tins.  Preheat the oven to 180C / 160 fan / gas mk 4.

 

Wipe the courgettes clean with damp kitchen paper and grate them, unpeeled, using the course side of a box grater.  Squeeze small handfuls of the grated courgettes and place in a sieve over a bowl to allow any more liquid to drip out.

 

In a large bowl, beat the eggs, oil and sugar with an electric whisk until light and creamy.  Sieve in the flour, baking powder and bicarb and beat again to combine.  Stir in the courgettes, coconut and lime zest until well blended.

 

Divide the mixture evenly between the two tins and bake for 30 minutes until firm and golden brown.  Cool in the tin for five minutes then turn out onto a wire rack to finish cooling.

 

While the cakes are cooling, put the lemon curd into a small bowl and mix well with a dash of lime juice to sharpen it if needed**.  Set aside.

 

In another bowl, beat the cream cheese until smooth, beat in the butter and icing sugar and a dash of lime juice to taste.  Refrigerate until needed.

 

When the cakes are cold, place one of them on a plate or stand and spread with the lemon curd.  Place the other on top and spread with the cream cheese topping.  Sprinkle a few strands of lime zest over to decorate.  Add a few edible flowers for decoration if you like.

 

Cuts into 8-10 slices.

 

*the unused lime juice can be used to make margaritas which would go well with a slice of this cake!

**the jar of lemon curd I used, French from SuperU, seemed already quite sharp to me so I didn't add any lime juice to it.

PLUM CRUMBLE CAKE AND FIG UPSIDE DOWN CAKE.

 

I know what I said in the previous post but.....when visitors come for lunch one has to provide a dessert!  This plum crumble cake was made using this recipe here.

 

 

On another occasion I made a fig upside down cake using this recipe here.

 

Both of these cakes are fast becoming my equal favourites for entertaining.

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.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

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!

RUSTIC PLUM AND APPLE PIE

I hadn't made one of these in a while but I had a pack of ready made, ready rolled pastry in stock.  I fancied a fruit pie for pudding.

 

 

This kind of pastry comes supplied as an oblong in the UK, which is great for an oblong tart or quiche but not easy to use for a double crust pie in a round pie dish.  I then remembered this recipe for an open kind of pie, sometimes called a galette.  (Although to me a galette in France is a kind of savoury filled pancake made with buckwheat flour.)

 

You don't really need a recipe as such for this, just a guide. 

 

It's a sheet of ready made shortcrust pastry, placed on a baking sheet lined with baking paper and topped with two apples, peeled and sliced, three plums and a couple of nectarines, stoned and sliced. 

Scatter the fruit evenly over the pastry leaving about a 2" margin all the way round. 

Sprinkle with a couple of tablespoons of sugar (I used demerara) and fold the pastry over the fruit, pleating the edges so they stick together to form an almost complete lid.

Brush the pastry with milk and sprinkle with another tablespoon of sugar.

Bake at 200C / 180 fan for 30-40 minutes until the pastry is golden brown and the fruit cooked and bubbling slightly.

 

Delicious served warm or cool with whatever you fancy - custard, ice cream, cream, crème fraîche.

STRAWBERRY, ALMOND AND NECTARINE CAKE

Internet shopping for groceries has been a bit of a learning curve and there's definitely a knack to it.  We frequently tend to over shop.  In part it's stocking up a little more than usual in case next week we're ill and self isolating or if there are no click and collect slots available.  It's also partly because you never know how much of what you order is actually going to be supplied.  After one or two strange surprises we now allow no substitutions and instead order other alternatives in addition ourselves.  The upshot of all this is that our fridge is constantly well stocked and we have never eaten so well in our lives.  Hence the "lockdown waistline"  situation.

So, with some fruit to use up before the next lot arrived I decided to make a cake that I had seen on a fellow blogger's blog, "What do you make of my cake?".  In it Jo posted about a BBC Good Food recipe for a raspberry Bakewell cake which she adapted to use up some rhubarb as you can see here.  I adapted it even further to make this cake, using some strawberries and a nectarine. 

I used almond extract instead of vanilla and just for the sake of it mixed in about a tablespoon of Amaretto as well for extra almondyness. 

It was moist and delicious.  We had a slice of it with a cup of tea, another slice with a glass of rosé, some as pudding with cream and a few extra strawberries on the side and, last of all, some as pudding with my new found delight, instant custard.  Deplorable habit but it is what it is!

This is definitely a cake to add to my repertoire of favourite cakes that can be adapted to whatever you have in the house, my kind of recipe.  Thanks to Jo for introducing me to the cake in the first place and you can see the original here.

Ingredients

140g ground almonds

140g butter, softened (I used Country Life Spreadable straight from the fridge)

140g golden caster sugar

140g SR flour

2 eggs

½ tsp almond extract
1 tblsp Amaretto liqueur
a handful of strawberries, halved
1 nectarine, chopped
2 tblsp flaked almonds

Method

Butter and base line a 20cm round, deep, loose bottomed or springform tin.  Preheat the oven to 180 C / 160 fan / gas mk 4.

Put all the ingredients except the fruit and flaked almonds into a food processor and blitz until well combined.  (I used a hand held mixer to do the job instead of a food processor.)

Spread roughly half of the mixture into the tin and scatter the fruit on top.  Dollop the remaining mixture over the fruit and carefully spread out  as evenly as you can using the back of a spoon or by hand.  Scatter the flaked almonds over the top of the cake.

Bake for 50 minutes until done and cool in the tin. 

Dust with icing sugar before serving.

Cuts into 10-12 slices.

RASPBERRY TURNOVERS

 

I was dying to try making these cute and tasty little puffs as soon as my roll of ready made, ready rolled puff pastry arrived in my "click and collect" supermarket order.

 

 

They are incredibly simple to make but absolutely delicious.  The raspberry flavour packs a punch and the sprinkling of crunchy demerara sugar on top is just right.  Ideal for a picnic or afternoon tea. 

 

The recipe comes from a delightful French blog called "Chic Chic Chocolat" which is full of gorgeous recipes.  Having a bit of O'level French or some experience of French ingredients would help with some of them but this one is so straightforward that you could have a go with the use of a dictionary if need be.  You can see the original here. In it the author uses a circular sheet of pastry and shows how to cut it to make the puffs.  In the UK ready rolled pastry tends to be in an oblong sheet which makes it easier although the shape ends up slightly different.  Puff pastry is also available as an oblong in French supermarkets but if your pastry is circular just follow the pictures on the original blog post.

I reckon you could also make these in exactly the same way using strawberries, blueberries, blackberries or even cooked apple or rhubarb.  Maybe even chopped plums, cherries or apricots.  In the comment section of the original post someone suggests using apple compôte and apple slices, which sounds delicious!

I shall experiment and report back!

Ingredients

1 pack of ready made, ready rolled puff pastry
1 jar of raspberry jam - you won't need a whole jar (I used Bonne Maman which has a wonderfully intense flavour)
1 punnet of fresh raspberries - you won't need a whole punnet (I dare say frozen would also work)
milk and demerara sugar to finish
icing sugar to decorate (optional)

Method

Take the pastry out of the fridge and allow to come to room temperature well before using, at least half an hour.  Pastry that is still chilled will crack when you unroll it.

Preheat the oven to 200C / 180 fan.  Line two baking sheets with baking paper.

Unroll the pastry and cut in half along its length.  Cut each half into six squares of equal size.

Put a teaspoon of jam and one or two raspberries on a square, slightly off centre.  Dampen the edges of the square and fold it diagonally over the off centre filling to form a triangle.  Press the edges together then seal by pressing a fork into the pastry along the edge.  Repeat with the rest of the squares and make three small slashes in the top of each triangle.

Brush each puff with milk and sprinkle with demerara sugar.  Divide the puffs between the two baking sheets and bake for 15-20 minutes until golden brown.  The jam will leak out a bit but this adds to the charm of the puffs!

Serve as they are, slightly warm or cold, or dusted with icing sugar or decorated with a zig zag of icing made with lemon juice and icing sugar if you like.

Makes 12 turnovers (or puffs, however you want to call them!)

APRICOT AND BLUEBERRY CRUMBLE CAKE

This cake was made using a recipe that I said at the time was probably one of the nicest cakes I have ever made.  This time I made it using chopped apricots and blueberries. 

I really like recipes like this, that can be adapted to whatever you have in the house.  On this occasion I happened to have a few blueberries, left over from the daily sprinkling on our porridge, and some apricots. 

The apricots had been part of our "click and collect" shop from Asda.  They weren't great. 

We have tried the "click and collect" service from a few supermarkets and on the whole have found Asda to be very good.  One thing we have learned is not to allow substitutions for certain things.  For example, in our local Tesco, observing the youngsters trundling the trolleys of trays around the store you can imagine how a bean is just a bean to someone who might not be familiar with the difference between a green bean from Africa And the delicious and short season British broad bean. 

Having said that, I remain immensely grateful to each and every one of them for keeping us fed and safe during a truly horrible and trying time.

The great thing about "click and collect" is that you avoid the risk of being in the vicinity of other people.  One of the downsides is that it takes ages to navigate the supermarket website and you can make mistakes in ordering.  This is how I found a packet of instant custard in my shopping.  I have no idea how it got there but I confess that I am now hooked...….Mary Berry eat your heart out.

The other is that you end up with stuff that you would never in a million years have bought if you had seen it for yourself in the store.  The cauliflower that was only the size of a large apple was one of them and these apricots were another.  I could somehow tell from the package that they would be tasteless and nothing at all like the wonderful, juicy, tasty and fragrant apricots that were given to me in France last year (which you can read about here).

However, disappointing fruit often benefits from cooking and they worked really well in this cake.  It was, like the first time I made it, utterly delicious.  You can see the recipe here.