Geri's Food

Tag: Desserts

  • Apricot Frangipane Cake

    Apricot Frangipane Cake

    It is a Belgian summer. Tender, tempered and capricious. One day bursting with sunshine, brightness and delight with temperatures warming the land in their near 30C. The next day, cooly sofisticated greyness showers the smiling plants with temperatures declining to no more then 16C. Yet, we love it all and we learn how to arrange our outdoor agendas in accordance with the weather.

    There may be no golden sunshine in our Belgian sky today, yet we still choose to celebrate the summer with this beautifully golden Apricot Frangipane cake. Such a family favourite treat and so simple and easy to make. Delicious crust pastry soften with aromatic home made apricot jam and light and nutty almond sponge, finished with a bite of perfect, sugar powdered almond flake topping.

    Golden brown oven delight – who needs another sunshine?

    Ingredients

    For the crust pastry
    • 250g flour
    • 75g butter
    • 90g sugar
    • 1 Vanilla essence sugar package (Dr. Oetker)
    • 1 egg
    • 1 pinch of salt
    For the frangipane filling
    • 200g butter
    • 125g sugar
    • 2 eggs
    • 130g almond powder
    • 180g flour
    • 125ml milk
    • 50g almond flakes
    • 125g powder sugar
    •  3-4 tbsp Apricot jam

     

    Method

    1. Make the crust pastry: Add the soft butter, sugar, salt and vanilla together and whisk with a mixer until the texture becomes soft, pale and fluffy. Add the egg and continue mixing for a few additional minutes. Add the flour and mix until all comes together in a ball. Knead the dough on a lightly floured surface until the mixture comes together. Wrap the crust pastry mixture in a cling film and leave in the fridge for one hour to become firm.

    2. Prepare the cake form by laying a cylinder shaped baking paper at the base of the form. Take the crust pastry out of the fridge and on a lightly floured surface roll the pastry into a thin disk. Cut a round disk just broad enough to cover the base of the cake form. Place the crust pastry into the form by pressing gently to the bottom and the sides of the form. Cut off the excess pastry out of the edge of the form. Place the form with the crust pastry into the fridge to chill.

    3. Pre-heat the oven to 160C. Place a round backing paper on top of the pastry and fill it in with baking pearls. Place the cake form in the oven and let it bake for 30 minutes.

    4. Take the baking form out of the oven, remove the baking pearls and let it cool slightly.

    5. Make the frangipane filling: In a large bowl whisk together with an electric mixer the softened butter and the crystal sugar. Continuing to mix, add the eggs and then the almond power and then gradually add the milk and the flour.

    6. Cover the base of the crust pastry with a few handfuls of apricot jam forming a thick layer. Spoon on top of it the frangipane filling, and smooth the surface so the jam remains underneath but the top is covered evenly with filling. Scatter generously on top almond flakes.

    7. Bake the cake: Place the cake in the oven and let it bake for an additional 30 minutes on 160C.

    8. Once baked, take the cake out of the oven and let it cool completely before removing from the form.

    9. Before serving, dust the cake with powder sugar.

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  • French Macaron

    French Macaron

    Who is the real inventor of the French macaron, remains a secret, clouded in mystery since the first references of this delicious dessert start to appear in the medieval centuries.

    There are several versions of its origines, all sounding plausibly true. Some scholars believe that the invention of this heavenly delight could be credited to the kitchens of women’t convent in Cormery, France. Others, link its origin with the arrival of Catherine de’Medici’s Italian pastry chef in 1533 in France on the occasion of her marriage to the king of France Henry II.

    The exact origin of the French macaron may remain a mystery, but the exact recipe luckily for us is hardly so.

    My first attempt for intimacy with this delicate dessert could not be described more flattering then a real failure. My husband, seeing my desperation after hours of frustrated attempts in the kitchen has surprised me on the following day with a gift of a digital balance to correctly measure all ingredients, whispering softly “Don’t give up”. At my second attempt, the whole kitchen seemed to have exploded in pink sticky meringue and even before the macarons were ready to enter the oven, my dearest one standing at the door frame was asking “Are you ready, yet? Can I start cleaning?”. The third attempt, worked like magic, and here they are rosy perfect, delicate and crispy round, my first ever successful French macarons.

    What has made them right, I literally don’t know. Perhaps more patience, more practice, or indeed really not giving up? I will be delighted to discover more when I attempt to re-create them ones again.

     

    Ingredients

    For the macarons
    • 150g slivered almonds
    • 200g powdered sugar
    • 115g egg whites at room temperature
    • Pinch of salt
    • 25g granulated sugar
    • Food coloring optional
    For the filling
    • 150g Mascarpone
    • 50g powdered sugar

     

    Method

    1. Pre-heat the oven to 180 degrees.

    2. Pulse confectioners’ sugar and almond flour in a food processor until combined. Sift mixture 2 times.

    3. Whisk whites with a mixer on medium speed until foamy. Reduce speed to low, then add superfine sugar. Increase speed to high, and whisk until stiff peaks form, about 8 minutes. Sift flour mixture over whites, and fold until mixture is smooth and shiny.

    4. Transfer batter to a pastry bag fitted with a 1/2-inch plain round tip, and pipe 3/4-inch rounds 1 inch apart on parchment-lined baking sheets, dragging pastry tip to the side of rounds rather than forming peaks. Tap bottom of each sheet on work surface to release trapped air. Let stand at room temperature for 15 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 150 degrees. Bake 1 sheet at a time, rotating halfway through, until macarons are crisp and firm, about 10 minutes. After each batch, increase oven temperature to 180 degrees, heat for 5 minutes, then reduce to 150 degrees.

    5. Let macarons cool on sheets for 2 to 3 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack. (If macarons stick, spray water underneath parchment on hot sheet. The steam will help release macarons.)

    6. Prepare the filling my mixing together the Mascarpone and the powder sugar. Fill the mixture in a piping bag and place an equal amount on one shell, toping it with other and pressing lightly to glue together.

    7. Store in an airtight container for a couple of days.

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  • Upside-down Pear Cake

    Upside-down Pear Cake

    Sweet and velvety caramel and soft and melting pears. Yes, its official. This is indeed a marriage made in heaven.

    {Original recipe from Delicious Magazine.}

    Nutritional info
Per serving: 708kcals, 30g fat (18.7g saturated), 4.3g protein, 106.2g carbs (83.5g sugars), 0.8g salt, 4.3g fibre

     

    Ingredients

    • 375g caster sugar
    • 150g butter, softened
    • 200g self-raising flour
    • 2 large free-range eggs
    • 4 pears, peeled, halved and cored

     

     Method

    1. Preheat the oven to 170°C/fan150°C/gas 3½. Put 200g of the sugar and 125ml water into an ovenproof 25cm sauté or frying pan. Stir over a medium heat until the sugar dissolves, then turn up the heat and cook without stirring until the syrup caramelizes to a golden brown, swirling the pan to even it out if necessary.

    2. Meanwhile, watching the caramel, put the butter, the remaining sugar and flour into the bowl of an electric food processor, whizz for a couple of seconds, then add the eggs and stop as soon as the mix comes together. (If you don’t have a food processor, cream the butter and sugar by hand, adding the eggs one by one, then mix in the flour.)

    3. Take the caramel off the heat and carefully arrange the pears cut-side down in a single layer over the caramel (this will be the top of the cake when it’s cooked).

    4. Spread the cake mixture in an even layer over the pears in the pan, then bake in the preheated oven for 40-45 minutes. The centre should be firm to the touch, the edges should have shrunk a little from the sides of the pan and a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake will come out clean.

    5. Run a knife around the edges to make sure it hasn’t stuck anywhere. Leave it to sit for 2 minutes before turning out.

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  • Apple Cake

    Apple Cake

    If our home should have a name of a dish, this would be Apple Cake. Apple cake, is not just apple cake. It is our symbol for love, cosiness and care. It graces our table almost every weekend, and once the freshly backed apple cake aromas come out of the oven they whisper “Home” and “I love you”.

    The recipe remains the same, but from time to time we either make one cake or split the mixture into mini cakes.

     

    Ingredients

    • 250g self-raizing flour
    • 220g butter
    • 250g caster sugar
    • 2 vanillas
    • 4 eggs
    • 20g brown sugar
    • 1 apple
    • 1 tsp of cinnamon

     

    Method

    1. Melt the butter.

    2. Whisk the melted butter, the sugar and the vanilla. Gradually, one by one, add the eggs continuously whisking. Whisk in the flour adding a little bit at a time.

    3. Peal the apple and cut it into thin slices.

    4. Grease and flour the backing dish. Sprinkle half of the brow sugar at the bottom of the backing dish and carefully arrange the slices of apple over. Sprinkle with the remaining brown sugar and the cinnamon. Poor over the apple cake mixture.

    5. Bake in the oven for 50 minutes on 175C. When ready, take the cake out of the oven and let it rest for 2min in the form, then take it and turn it upside down on a plate. Serve warm with a spoon of vanilla ice cream, or cold.

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