Foodie Pen Pal Parcel - Flourless Chocolate Chilli Cake

So it’s foodie pen pal time again and as another month of exciting gourmet post passes I find myself getting increasingly excited about the whole process. This month I had a bit of a challenge sending a gluten free vegan parcel to Nicky at kabochafashionista, but the challenge suited my blog perfectly and I had great fun sourcing suitable snacks for Nicky as well as making some spiced ginger biscuits she could enjoy (recipe to follow shortly). I then received my parcel from another Nikki and look at the delights I received….

A Mauritian Curry Kit – well I love a curry, but haven’t tried a Mauritian variety before so am looking forward to trying this one.

Peppersmith fresh mints – Nikki chose these because the unusual but refreshing lemon and mint combination and I have to agree that they really are amazingly refreshing (and come in such a cute box too!).

Dried mango – One of my favourite fruits and fair trade too so a great choice with this one.

Corn Snacks – Nikki had tried something similar in Ecuador and I have certainly enjoyed munching on these.

Sweet ‘n’ Salty popcorn – I have to admit that I am normally a salty popcorn fan and avoid the sweet stuff but this provided the perfect balance of the two flavours and was seriously moreish.

Rainbow Drops – This was a proper throw back to my childhood, I used to love these things…woot for the crazy colours.

Dried chillies – These were actually bought in by Nikki in Spain last year, so super exciting to get a continental addition to the parcel!

So thanks Nikki for all of the exciting goodies….I have a feeling I may have developed a new addiction to sweet ‘n’ salty popcorn!!

I also took some inspiration from the chillies and decided to make a flourless chocolate chilli cake. Although flour isn’t directly used in this recipe it isn’t actually wheat or gluten free because it does contain breadcrumbs!! But using breadcrumbs does provide a slightly different texture from a normal sponge cake and the very slight chilli flavour combines perfectly with the dark chocolate in this recipe.

INGREDIENTS

1 dried chilli

½ teaspoon cayenne pepper

1 tablespoon warm water

100g dark chocolate
4 large eggs
100g  caster sugar
Pinch of sea salt
30g cocoa powder
40ml crème fraiche

80g white bread crumbs

Pre-heat the oven to 180 deg C / 350 deg F

Line a small loaf tin with lightly buttered greaseproof paper.

Split the chilli in half and remove the seeds. Then chop finely and blitz in a food processor along with the cayenne pepper and a tablespoon of warm water to form a paste. Pass the paste through a fine sieve to remove any large bits of the chilli and put to one side.

Break the chocolate into a heat proof bowl and place the bowl over a pan of simmering water, making sure that the bottom of the bowl does not touch the water in the pan. When the chocolate begins to melt stir occasionally until lump free and glossy.

Once melted remove the chocolate from the heat, allow to cool slightly and then mix in the chilli paste and crème fraiche until well combined.

Separate the eggs into 2 bowls.

Whisk 50g of the sugar with the egg yolks until thick and creamy, then fold in the melted chocolate and chilli mix, salt, cocoa powder and breadcrumbs.

In a separate bowl whisk the egg whites until stiff and then gradually whisk in the remaining 50g sugar until glossy.

Then gradually add the egg whites to the chocolate mix gently folding the two mixtures together.  When folding the egg whites into the chocolate mixture add a spoonful at a time gently turning the mixture over so that the two sets of ingredients become combined without losing all of the air from the egg whites.

Spoon the mixture into the cake tin and cook in the centre of the oven for 35-40 minutes until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.

Remove from the oven and leave in the tin to cool before loosening the edges with a knife and turn out the cake.

Dust liberally in cocoa powder before serving, great served with a dollop of any  crème fraiche you may have left over!

Celeriac Farls

I think I firstly need to apologise for my lack of blog activity lately. I seem to have been distracted by the sudden appearance of the sun and also by my mum coming to visit…so yes I might just blame my absence from the blogging world on my mum!!! But whilst she was visiting we were out enjoying eating food prepared by other people rather than spending time in the kitchen ourselves.

We enjoyed a particularly delightful dinner at the bistro at Balloo House, a pub and restaurant to the west of Strangford Lough in Northern Ireland. Whilst my mum enjoyed a triple helping of duck for her main, a duck breast served with duck egg and gorgeously light and crispy chips fried in duck fat (well it was her birthday), I tucked into Dexter beef served on a wonderfully smooth truffle mash which definitely beats my best efforts despite the my recent investment of a potato ricer. I then enjoyed a buttermilk panna cotta which displayed the perfect amount of wobble and sat plumply on the plate next to gingerbread ice cream and rhubarb…mmmmm. All the food was beautiful and the service and atmosphere were great but I think both myself and my mum had the greatest pleasure eating the petit fours we ordered to accompany our coffee. There was a wonderfully light melt in the mouth shortbread, a delicate and zesty mini wee lemon tart, a chewy bite of chocolate brownie and then a perfect cube of glossy, smooth and rich chocolate truffle with a delectably devine gooey centre!! I think I might be starting to get a little bit carried away and am at serious risk of drooling on my keyboard so now onto some of my own food (but if you get the chance I would highly recommend a visit to Balloo).

I thought now that I have been living in Northern Ireland for 3 months it was about time that I posted an Irish themed recipe…with a twist of course. Potato farls are a staple over here and an obligatory part of any respectable Ulster fry. Affectionately referred to as ‘tatty bread’ by my dad this classic Irish recipe is a great way to use up any leftover mash. But rather than using the traditional potato I decided to use mashed celeriac instead…possibly a little controversial but a great excuse to use my potato ricer again!!!

INGREDIENTS

200g mashed celeriac

100g plain flour

Salt

Pepper

Makes 2 farls

Take 200g of cooled mashed celeriac.

To make the mash peel and chop roughly half of a medium celeriac and boil in water until tender. Drain the celeriac and leave it for a few minutes to allow excess moisture to steam off before passing it through a potato ricer. Then stir in a good knob of butter and add a generous pinch of salt and pepper.

Mix the mash together with the flour.

Take half of the mash mixture, form it into a rough ball shape and place on a work surface that has been generously dusted with flour. Don’t worry if the mixture seems a bit sticky and wet at this point.

Dust the top of the ball with more flour and use a rolling pin to roll it out into a circular shape.

Place a frying pan on a medium heat and add a little cooking oil to lightly grease the pan. Transfer the farl to the pan and cook for 2-3 minutes before carefully flipping over the cook the other side for another 2-3 minutes. If a little more colour is needed cook for another minute or two on each side.

Turn the farl out of the pan and cut into quarters and then repeat the above process with the remaining mixture.

The farls are best eaten warm although they can be frozen and then popped into a toaster to heat up when required.

Boston Baked Beans

I mentioned a little while back that my current housemate is allergic to tomatoes. I still can’t get my head around how anyone can live without this wondrous fruit/vegetable. After a quick audit of the contents of my cupboards and fridge I discovered I had at least 5 varieties of tomato based products (in case you are interested this included fresh tomatoes, tinned tomatoes, sundried tomatoes, tomato puree and tomato ketchup). And that doesn’t even include the things that contain a bit of tomato. It was at this point that I realised that baked beans contain tomatoes. Now I don’t eat loads of baked beans but sometimes the simple meal of beans on toast just can’t be beaten, I think it has to be counted as one of life’s little pleasures (small things and all that). But this got me thinking on how I could create a tomoatoless baked bean recipe that myself and my housemate could both enjoy. After a bit of interweb surfing I discovered that a traditional Boston baked bean recipe is already tomatoless. And so I went about creating a recipe based on this American classic (although I did deviate slightly from the traditional recipe by adding some chorizo that needed to be used up, but I think this helped to enhance the smoky flavour of this campfire classic)!

Also I cooked this recipe in a slow cooker but it could just be cooked in a casserole dish in an oven at a low temperature to achieve the same results.

Serves 4 hungry people

INGREDIENTS

300g dried cannellini beans

150g streaky bacon

100g chorizo

½ red onion

35g soft brown sugar

35g molasses

1 tablespoon English mustard

2 bay leaves

Soak the beans in water overnight

Chop the bacon and chorizo into small chunks and finely dice the red onion.

Place half of the bacon, chorizo and onion in the bottom of the slow cooker, drain the beans and put these on top of the bacon mixture and then sprinkle the rest of the meat and onion on top.

Mix the molasses, mustard and brown sugar together with 200ml of hot water and stir until the sugar has dissolved and a thick syrupy liquid has formed. Pour this over the bean mix.

Depending on the size of your slow cooker you will probably need to add more water to the mix to ensure the beans are completely covered in liquid, so add more hot water as necessary.

Add the bay leaves and then put the lid on the slow cooker, set to a medium heat and leave to slowly bubble away for the next 8 hours.

After 8 hours give the mixture a good stir. If the sauce seems a little runny at this point remove the lid from the slow cooker and allow the mixture to reduce a little.

Then serve simply on toast or as a jacket potato filling.

Gluten Free Earl Grey Biscuits

Following up from my last 'foodie pen pal parcel post' I thought I would post the recipe that I made to send to my pen pal Kathryn last month. I wanted to include something home made in my parcel but wanted something that would survive a journey across the Irish Sea courtesy of Royal Mail. Of course it had to be a recipe in keeping with my blog and have something missing. Biscuits seemed the obvious choice for something that might survive the trip and as a mad fan of a good old cup of tea I had been wanting to try adding earl grey to a baked treat for a while. And so gluten free earl grey tea biscuits seemed the obvious choice!

INGREDIENTS

120g butter

140g icing sugar

1 egg

150g brown rice flour

75g potato flour

120g wheat-free flour blend

2 earl grey tea bags

½ vanilla pod

½ teaspoon cream of tartar

Pre-heat the oven to 190 deg C / 370 deg F

Beat the sugar and butter together until light and fluffy.

Add the egg and beat until well combined.

Add the flours, the contents of the 2 tea bags, the cream of tartar and the seeds scrapped out of the vanilla pod and mix until combined.

Turn the mixture out onto a (gluten-free) floured surface and roll into a log shape approximately 5cm in diameter (don’t worry if it still seems a little bit sticky and lose at this stage), wrap in cling film and refrigerate for an hour.

After an hour remove from the fridge and using a sharp knife slice the dough into 1cm thick discs.

Arrange the biscuits on a lined baking sheet leaving a small gap between each and bake for 10-12 minutes until lightly golden in colour.

Allow to cool and enjoy…or as I did melt 50g of milk and white chocolate in 2 small bowls in the microwave (I started zapping them for 30 seconds then for another 10 seconds as necessary to avoid over melting and cooking the chocolate) then dip the biscuits into the melted chocolate, transfer to a wire cooling rack and allow to set before tucking in!

Recipe adapted from Gluten Free Cooking

Foodie Pen Pal Parcel – Chocolate Orange Bites

If you regularly peek at my blog you will have seen that last month I took part in foodie pen pal parcel scheme where foodie bloggers from around the UK (and now the rest of Europe) send each other parcels filled with wonderful foodie delights. We then all receive parcels from someone else in the pen pal parcel chain, get incredibly excited when we open them and then share our delight by blogging about what we got.

This month I was lucky enough to receive a wonderful parcel from Jen @lifestarts. As can be seen in the photos my parcel came in a personalised ‘Something’s MISSING!’ box…such a lovely touch which increased my excitement before I even broke into the box.

But the contents were just as exciting;

Apple rings…a natural fruity crisp that I enjoyed munching on at the cinema this weekend proving a great alternative to popcorn. Jen also challenged me to create my own version of these…I haven’t had time to experiment yet but definitely will give it a go soon!

Vita coco…as instructed I enjoyed this chilled after a rather hectic game of squash and it proved to be nicely refreshing.

Halva…mmmmmmm, I adore all things sesame.

Popcorn tea…this was really good, it didn’t taste of popcorn but had a toasted nutty flavour that complimented the green tea really rather well.

Kaffir Lime Leaves…I love Thai food so these will definitely be used up quickly.

Seaweed peanuts…I have had these before and knew that I loved them so tucked into these first (they didn’t last long!)

Caribbean cocktail…a really nice selection of tropical dried fruit

Nakd Bar…This is one of Jen’s favourite healthy snack bars. I had never come across them before but this was absolutely delicious.

It is gluten and wheat free just containing dates, cashews, raisins and cocoa with a little orange flavouring and tasted divine with a rich chocolaty orange flavour...definitely a great alternative to a normal chocolate bar when you are in need of a sweet fix. In fact I enjoyed it so much that I decided to attempt my own version of this raw food bar. I had a slightly different selection of dried fruits and nuts in my cupboard at home so went for a cherry and almond version but was quite chuffed with my final result.

So thanks Jen for my lovely box of goodies and for the inspiration for the following recipe.

INGREDIENTS

60g flaked almonds

85g dates

40g dried cherries

15g cocoa

1 tsp. orange juice

½ teaspoon orange blossom water

Makes 8 bites

Place the flaked almonds in a food processor and blitz until ground up (it may just be easier to use ground almonds but I didn’t have any at the time!) then transfer the almonds to a bowl.

Roughly chop the dates and cherries and put into the food processor with the orange juice and orange blossom water. Blitz until well combined and then transfer to the bowl with the almonds.

Add the cocoa to the bowl and mix until well combined. After initially mixing with a spoon I found it easier to get stuck in with my hands to thoroughly mix the ingredients together.

Then divide the mixture into 8 little balls and pat each down to form little disks and decorate with a flaked almond slice.

Store in an air tight container until you are ready to munch!

Flourless citrus drizzle cake....with mashed potato!

I recently became the incredibly proud owner of a potato ricer. I have been meaning to purchase one of these kitchen gadgets for ages and finally got around to adding one to my ever growing selection of culinary paraphernalia thanks to a Lakeland voucher received as a leaving present when I left my old job back in February. So along with a tagine (will also be experimenting with that one soon) and some rather sharp knives (yup the use of these has already resulted in a need of raiding the first aid kit for plasters!) I bought a potato ricer. Once it arrived I immediately went out and bought a rather large bag of spuds and started producing beautifully smooth and creamy mashed potato as well as copious amounts of gnocchi. But despite my best efforts the potatoes I had purchased didn't really seem to be running down so I started to look for alternative potato recipes and came across a flourless lemon drizzle cake that uses mash which I couldn't resist trying. The result is a nicely moist and zesty cake which is gluten free and which doesn't taste of potato…always a good thing in a cake I think!

INGREDIENTS

200g butter

200g caster sugar

4 eggs

100g polenta

100g ground almonds

250g cold mashed potato

Zest from 2 lemons and 2 limes

2 teaspoons of gluten free baking powder

FOR THE DRIZZLE

Juice from 1 lemon

Juice from 1 lime

75g caster sugar                          

FOR THE BUTTER CREAM

150g butter

300g icing sugar

Juice from half a lime

A couple of drops of food colouring

Makes approx 18 cup cakes

Pre-heat oven to 180 deg C / 350 deg F

Beat the sugar and butter together until light and fluffy.

Add the eggs one at a time to the sugar and butter, mixing thoroughly.

Fold in the almonds, polenta, mashed potato (mashed with a potato ricer or just good old potato masher, but ensure it is just plain mashed potato and isn’t seasoned or has milk of butter added when mashing), lemon and lime zest and baking powder.

Divide the mixture between 18 cupcake cases placed in a cup cake baking tray and place in the oven.

Cook for 25 to 30 minutes until lightly golden in colour and firm to the touch.

Once cooked remove the cakes from the oven and use a sharp knife to make a couple of slits in each of the cupcakes.

Mix the sugar and juice from the lemon and lime for the drizzle in a small bowl and stir until the sugar has dissolved. Then spoon a little of the mixture over each of the cupcakes allowing the syrup to soak into each of the cakes. Then allow the cakes to cool fully.

Once cool the cakes can be decorated with butter cream. Beat together the softened butter and icing sugar until smooth. Add the lime juice, adding a little more icing sugar if necessary to prevent the mixture from becoming to runny. I then split the butter cream between 2 bowls and coloured one with yellow food colouring and one with green, then spread the icing onto each cake.

The citrus drizzle cakes are now ready to enjoy!

Recipe adapted from Good Food Gluten Free Lemon Drizzle Cake  

Vegan Almond and Cherry Ice Cream

On a recent trip to my local supermarket I was instantly drawn towards a special offer on almond milk. I had never tried almond milk before but as it is a dairy free alternative to the usual ‘white stuff’ and because of its promotional price I bunged it in the trolley with the aim of combining it into something for the blog. Once home however I wasn’t exactly sure what to create but after a quick taste testing session and a trawl through my cupboards for complimentary ingredients (cherry jam being the obvious first choice) I decided I had to try and make almond ice cream. Ice cream is often made using a custard base so I went for a complete cheat on this one and used Bird’s custard powder. But after examining the ingredients list I discovered that Bird’s traditional custard powder is vegan friendly so the resulting ice-cream is vegan friendly too!

INGREDIENTS

1 litre almond milk

60g Bird’s traditional custard powder (not the instant stuff)

50g caster sugar

½ vanilla pod

100g good quality cherry jam

Put the almond milk and sugar into a large saucepan and add the seeds scraped from the vanilla pod (I also add the pod for extra flavour). Place the saucepan over a gently heat and very slowly bring to the boil allowing the vanilla flavours to infuse into the milk.

Whilst the milk is heating up but the custard powder into a large bowl and add a tablespoon of water. Mix until a smooth paste is formed (adding a drop more water if needed).

Once the milk begins to boil remove from the heat, fish out the vanilla pod and pour into the bowl containing the custard powder paste ensuring that you continually stir the mixture as you add the milk as the mixture should instantly being to thicken. Keep stirring the mixture until thickened and smooth.

Allow the mixture to cool and then transfer to an ice cream maker if you are lucky enough to have one (I still haven’t got around to that purchase!)…

…or alternatively put the mixture into a freezer proof container and stick into the freezer. After a couple of hours transfer the mixture into a food processor and blitz until you have a smooth, creamy consistency. Transfer the mixture back to your freezable container and stick the mixture back into the freezer. Leave for another couple of hours and then remove and blitz in the food processor again. Repeat this process again after another couple of hours, blitzing the mixture for a third time, this should break up the ice crystals in the mixture enough to prevent the ice cream turning into one large ice cube, producing an easily scoopable result.

After the final blitz in the liquidizer (or at the end of the ice-cream machine churning period) take the cherry jam and swirl into the mixture. Then stick the mixture back into the freezer and after a couple of hours it will be ready for you to enjoy.