Cherries galore and a hodge-podge recipe

Oooooh... cherries are in season again! So I just had to get some for myself. They're really precious. I mean REALLY precious as we don't grow cherries here in Malaysia. They need to be imported in from the United States. This lot cost me a ridiculous RM45.70. That's a lot in a country where you can get a whole comb of sunny yellow bananas for RM5.00.

We get two types of cherries sold here during the season. The deep, dark Bing cherries and these blushingly lovely Rainier cherries. As you can probably tell, it's the Rainier cherries that are my personal favourite. Its' salmon-pink-beige skin and juicy-sweet flesh always keeps me coming back for more, year after year.

I got greedy with this bounty of cherries. I wanted to eat them fresh, straight out of hand BUT I also wanted to eat them in a tart. I wanted so badly to try Pierre Herme's Cherry Pistachio Tart but not that badly to go looking for pistachios.

So this is what I did. I took three different recipes, altered them a little and made a tart that's completely my own. I'm christening it the Cherry Streusel Tart. The original recipes for the base, frangipane and streusel can be found at Coco & Me, Joy of Baking and Dorie Greenspan.

CHERRY STREUSEL TART

Base

55g Butter

32g Icing Sugar

1 large Egg

15g Ground Almonds

100g Plain Flour

1/2 teaspoon Vanilla Essence

Preheat oven at 140 Celsius and get a 23cm diameter tart/pie tin ready. 

Cream Butter, Sugar and Vanilla until light and fluffy. Beat in the Egg until well combined. Fold in Flour and Almonds gently until just mixed through. Bring the soft dough together into a ball. Clingfilm and rest in the fridge for about 3 hours. Roll dough between two plastic sheets to fit the tart tin. Lift plastic sheet and overturn dough into the tin. Trim edges and even-out dough with fingers if necessary. Place the dough-lined tin into the fridge to rest for about 1 hour. Remove tin from the fridge, prick well and bake at 160 Celsius for about 25 - 30 minutes until it turns a light golden colour. Remove from oven and let it cool.

Frangipane
50g Butter
50g Caster Sugar
1 large Egg
1/2 teaspoon Vanilla Essence
45g Ground Almonds
12g Plain Flour

Cream Butter, Sugar and Vanilla until light and fluffy. Beat in the Egg until well combined. Fold in Flour and Almonds gently until just mixed through. Set aside.

Streusel
50g Butter
50g Caster Sugar
50g Ground Almonds
50g Plain Flour
Pinch of Nutmeg
Pinch of Sea Salt

Cream Butter and Sugar until  light and fluffy. Fold in Flour, Ground Almonds, Nutmeg and Sea Salt. At this point, use your fingers to bring the Streusel together and break it into clumps. Set aside.

300g Rainier Cherries (halved and stoned)
4 tablespoons Greengadge conserve - or any tart jam you prefer

Assembly
Spread the Greengadge conserve on the bottom of the cooled base. Spoon the Frangipane over the Jam and spread to cover. Place the Cherry halves over the Frangipane and press in slightly. Sprinkle the clumps of Streusel over the Cherries. Bake tart at 160 Celsuis for about 45 minutes to an hour, until the top has browned and a skewer inserted into the Frangipane comes out clean. Serve slightly warm on its own or with unsweetened Whipped Cream on the side.

Thank you Daisy, for popping by at the right time to help stone the cherries while providing great conversation and a hungry-for-cherry-tart-stomach!

I'm back... with the perfect cake for afternoon tea!

Okay, so I've been away for awhile. I've been to London, Paris, Dubai and come home to unpleasant news and a broken heart.

I baked my heart out for quite awhile but am all better now. It took seven loaves of bread, three types of brownies, four types of chocolate chip cookies, chewy toffee cookies, lemon sables, korova cookies and little 'punishments' to chase the blues away.

Unfortunately, I did not stop to take pictures and blog of the lovely things I made during the whirlwind of mending my heart.

Now, I am back to baking and cooking for sheer pleasure. As we speak, there is a lovely Lemon-Orange Loaf in the oven quietly baking away, just in time for the hungry mouths that await it at tea time.

(My aunt got this recipe from one of our local newspapers recently. She can't remember which one, so you'll have to forgive me for not posting it here. We have also left out the icing recipe which came together with that of the cake to keep it simple, less sweet and perfect for Saturday afternoon tea.)

LEMON ORANGE LOAF

130g Butter

110g Caster Sugar

1 tsp Vanilla Essence

2 Eggs

Grated rind of 1 Orange

Grated rind of 1 Lemon

240g Self-Raising Flour, sifted

50ml UHT Milk

30ml Orange Juice

30 ml Lemon Juice

Preheat oven to 170 Celsius. Grease and flour a 9 inch loaf tin.

Cream Butter, Sugar and Essence until light and fluffy. Then add the Eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in Orange and Lemon rind. Fold in sifted Flour alternating it with combined Milk and fruit Juice. Should the batter begin to curdle, sprinkle in a little Flour. You should begin and end with Flour.

Transfer mixture to the prepared cake tin and bake for 35 - 40 minutes or until cake is cooked through when tested with a skewer. Leave the cake in the tin for about 10 minutes then turn out onto a wire rack to cool.

Uncle

I have been wanting to write this for awhile now, but it's been very difficult. Each time I start, tears are shed. He would have been 51 on 25 February this year, instead he left us on the 8th.

I have made some of my most beautiful cupcakes for his birthday and I regret not being able to do it once again this year. I really will miss him and so will many others whose life he touched.

Here's an excerpt from his favourite book The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery. It describes our relationship, which started off very simply as 'my friend's husband' and then took on that of a dear friend and secret-keeper.

'What does "tame" mean?'

'Something that is frequently neglected,' said the fox. 'It means "to create ties".'

'To create ties?'

'Precisely,' said the fox. 'To me, you are still only a small boy, just like a hundred thousand other small boys. And I have no need of you. And you in turn have no need of me. To you, I'm just a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But if you tame me, then we shall need each other. To me, you shall be unique in the world. To you, I shall be unique in the world.'

I shall miss you.

An Affair with Fondant - 1st Date

A truly remarkable experience! My first-ever fondant cake. It turned out so pretty... perfect for the Ruby Wedding Anniversary it was intended for.

I made a lovely Sugee Cake to go underneath the snowy white fondant. My mother's recipe. I'll post it soon, so look out for it if you are a sugee-loving soul.

Not in a million years would I have thought that fondant was easy and strangely, therapeutic. It is a cheat's cake really. I bought Bakels ready-rolled fondant, used gum paste Rubrum Lillies from Cake Connection and some ribbon.

The cake not only looked good on the outside, but was also moist and just right inside. It cut beautifully and my sister-in-law has a tupperware full of cake pieces to devour as she pleases!

Aaaahh... the simple pleasures of life...

Pate Sucree... beautiful pastry...

I finally got around to making the Pate Sucree recipe from Fanny of Foodbeam's website. It turned out beautifully and I am very pleased with the results. It has a lovely flavour and nice 'short' texture to keep me in pastry heaven for a long time. I did, however, make slight adjustments to suit my vanilla-loving tastebuds.

With the bounty of oranges and lemons sitting in the fruit basket, I made a St. Clements Curd to go with the pastry. Okay, okay... so it was orginally intended to be an Orange Curd, but halfway through (after a taste or two) I thought it lacked a certain depth. So, in went the juice of two lemons and an extra orange. I used the previous Lemon Curd recipe as a guide, but decided to go with two whole eggs instead of four egg yolks. (I already have 6 egg whites sitting in the fridge, so adding to that was not an option)

PATE SUCREE

300g Butter

160g Icing Sugar

Seeds from 1 Vanilla Pod

1 tsp Vanilla Essence

2 Eggs

500g Plain Flour

60g Ground Almonds

1/2 tsp Salt

Sieve Plain Flour, Almonds and Salt together. Keep aside.

Cream Butter and Icing sugar until light and fluffy. Add in Eggs one by one, beating well for 5 - 6 seconds after each addition. Add in Seeds from the Vanilla Pod and Essence. Beat for 5 - 6 seconds until incorporated. Gently fold in the Flour mixture until just combined.

*At this point, you can clingfilm and freeze any additional dough for use another time. This recipe makes enough dough to line about four 7 inch tart tins.

*As with any pastry, rest it for about 2 hours in/outside the fridge before using. I usually just leave it on the countertop before using so the dough just rests and does not harden, as it will in the fridge.

Pat dough into a 7 inch tart tin. Prick well and chill for at least half an hour. Remove from fridge, prick again and bake the tart shell blind for about 25 minutes on 150 Celsius. (If pastry starts swelling after 10 minutes, open the oven door and prick all over againto deflate it.) Cool baked tart shell in tin.

ST. CLEMENTS CURD

100ml Orange Juice, plus zest of 1 Orange

Juice of 2 Lemons

150g Caster Sugar

2 whole Eggs

70g Butter, cubed

Grated rind of 1 Orange

2 drops of Vanilla Essence

Beat Eggs, Sugar and Vanilla until sugar dissolves completely. Keep aside. Put juice, rind and Butter into a heavy-based saucepan. Pour in Egg/Sugar mixture into the saucepan. Over low heat stir the mixture carefully, but quickly with a wooden spoon. Continue to beat as mixture reaches boiling point. At this point, the mixture will start thickening quickly. When mixture just starts becoming a thick custard, take it off the heat, give it a good beating and let it cool.

Assembly

Pour Curd into the tart shell and put it back into the oven at 140 Celsius. Watch the tart carefully until the Curd just starts bubbling. Remove the tart from the oven and let it cool completely. Place in the fridge to set.

My First Macarons

It was a rainy day in Singapore. My brother S and I were trying to get back to my aunt's without getting wet. We stuck very close to the wall of a particular building, which turned out to be Shaw Centre.

I turned a corner, and guess what? I saw the most beautiful window display ever. It was full of luscious cakes, sugary designs and iced delights in gorgeous pastels. I simply had to go in. With poor S in tow, I searched for the entrance and almost banged my nose against the glass window in my excitement.

My excitement increased when we finally found the entrance and I was greeted by a stupendous display of rainbow-coloured confections. I was speechless! I had finally found them. I finally found French Macarons in Canele. After gazing at them longingly over the internet and in magazines, here they were sitting pretty, divided by flavour and colour.

A quick check at the price revealed an exorbitant figure. I looked away and into the eyes of the salesperson on the other side of the counter and said in a hurry "A dozen, please!".

We took them home to share and had them with black tea. Simply magical. Here they are all colourful and pretty in their box.

Soeren's Chic Babycakes

Mmmmm... some yummy Vanilla Cupcakes to celebrate our dear uncle's birthday. Bought and presented to him by his lovely wife... who had first gobble of one of these babies even BEFORE the birthday boy!