Farmersgirl Kitchen

Wednesday, 22 October 2014

Chocolate Popcorn, Spooky Cakes, Pumpkin Soup and Pie-tatoes for Halloween

Food is such an integral part of every festival and Halloween is no exception. My memories of Halloween feature the Brownie Guide Fancy Dress Party for which we all had to carve a 'Turnip' lantern. There were no pumpkins in 1960s Scotland, so we used turnips/swedes, it was really hard work carving them and many a spoon was bent in the process.

At the party there would be large dishes of buttery mashed potato and others of peppery, mashed 'neeps' the inside of those turnip lanterns cooked and mashed! We also had 'Treacle Scones', girdle scones dangling on strings that you had to try to take a bite from as someone swung the string so you got covered in sticky treacle. That was soon washed off with the 'Dookin' for Apples', the only way to be sure of getting your apple was to stick your head right down to the bottom of the bowl and bite hard into the apple, you got soaked but it worked. I always hated it when, at some parties, they made you drop forks into the bowl, it was not nearly as effective.

There were none of the fancy themed sweets and cakes to be bought in the shops, but I think it is much more fun to make your Halloween treats at home.

Chocolate Popcorn Triangles are a really fun and simple treat to make with your kids, you don't really need a recipe, just melt some chocolate in a bowl over a pan of just simmering water and add ready made popcorn until it is all covered in chocolate, then press it into a brownie pan lined with non stick paper and place in the fridge until set. I decorated mine with some lines of white chocolate. I have a neat little trick for melting chocolate for piping (see below).

I'm entering the Chocolate Popcorn Triangles for Family Foodies the blogger challenge run by Eat your Veg and Bangers and Mash, as they are really easy to make with little ones.

All you do it put your chocolate, I used Hadleigh Maid white chocolate buttons, into a disposable piping bag, pop it in the microwave for 30 seconds or until the chocolate has melted, then snip off the end of the bag and pipe lines over the chocolate popcorn in lines. Leave to set in the fridge again, then once set, cut into squares or triangles.

For some rather more spooky cakes, a Halloween themed silicon cake mould is ideal for a bit of impact, especially if you top them with chocolate set in the same moulds.

I coloured white chocolate with orange food colouring to make the pumkin colour and it wasn't too difficult to make the two coloured witchy pumpkin with milk chocolate for the hat.

Spooky Halloween Cakes

175g Flora Buttery
175g golden caster sugar
300g self raising flour, sieved
3 medium eggs
5 tbsp semi-skimmed milk
100g cooked pumpkin or butternut squash, mashed
zest of an orange

150g white chocolate
100g milk chocolate
orange food gel

Spooky silicon cake mould and 6 muffin cases in a muffin tray (if no cake mould then 12 muffin cases)

1. Place the muffin cases into a muffin tray.
2. Place the first five ingredients in a bowl and beat with a wooden spoon until the mixture is smooth.
3. Stir in pumpkin mash and orange zest and divide between the paper cases.
4. Bake in a pre-heated oven for 20-25 minutes at 200C, 180C (fan), Gas mark 6 for 20-25 minutes.

Leave the cakes to cook and then unmould. The shapes don't come out too well with the soft sponge cake but they are the perfect shape to top with the chocolate shapes.

Making the chocolate shapes is easy, simply melt the white chocolate and pour it in a thin layer in the base of the moulds for the ghost and the skull. Add the orange colouring to the remaining white chocolate, pour this into into the pumpkin moulds, being careful to avoid the witches hat, leave to set in the fridge. Once set, melt the milk chocolate and pour in a thin layer in the bat mould and then carefully into the witches hat, using a small spoon to make sure the chocolate gets into all the corners. Once set, unmould and then remelt any remaining chocolate and use to stick the toppers to the cakes.

Decorate the remaining muffins with a little chocolate on top and some spooky sprinkles.

Eat and enjoy!

It's not just sweet treats that are needed at Halloween. You need something warm to eat before going out trick or treating. Knorr have some great recipes which will hit the spot, how about a bowl of warming Pumpkin and Butterbean Broth from a recipe created by Marco Pierre White? Or the perfect individual 'Sheperd's Pie-tatoes' a variation on Marco's Shepherd's Pie.

Shepherd's Pie-tatoes (or Shepherd's Potato Pies)
makes 8 Pie-tatoes

4 large baking potatoes

1 tbsp olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
1 garlic clove, chopped
500g minced lamb
10g plain flour
1tbsp Worcestershire sauce
1tbsp tomato puree
1 Knorr Beef Stock Pot
500ml water
1 sprig of thyme
1/4 of a pumpkin or butternut squash, peeled, diced
1 large carrot, peeled, diced
Butter, milk and 1 egg yolk, (optional) for the mash

The Potatoes
Bake the potatoes until tender (I did mine in the microwave first, then finished them off in the oven to get a crispy skin) Cut the potatoes in half while still warm, scoop out the baked potato and mash with the butter, milk and egg yolk

Make the filling
1. Heat the olive oil in a large casserole dish. Add in the onion and garlic and fry, stirring, for 2–3 minutes until lightly coloured.

2. Add in the minced lamb and mix it into the onion mixture. Cook the lamb, stirring to break it up, for a good 10–15 minutes to cook off the moisture inside the lamb. This intensifies the flavour of the meat.
3. Once the water has been cooked off, the lamb should crackle as the fat renders. Add the carrot and pumpkin and cook for 5 minutes. Add in the flour and work it in thoroughly. Season with Worcestershire sauce and mix in. Add in the Knorr Beef Stock Pot, pour in the water and add in the thyme.
4. Bring to the boil, cover, reduce the heat and simmer for an hour.
5. Pre-heat the oven to 220°C.
6. Fill the scooped out potato halves with the mince, then top roughly with the mashed potato.

7. Bake in the pre-heated oven for 30 minutes until a lovely golden-brown. Serve.

These were really tasty and would be perfect served in a napkin at Bonfire Night too.

There are lot's more great recipes and cooking inspiration on the Knorr and Flora websites.

I was provided with a hamper of ingredients from Unilever/Knorr/Flora to make these Halloween Treats and Eats. I was not paid and all opinions are my own.

Labels: bonfire night, cakes, chocolate, Flora Buttery, Halloween, Knorr, Marco Pierre White, Popcorn, Pumpkin Soup, shepherd's pie

Tuesday, 15 October 2013

Chelsea Buns and The World's Best Cakes Review

I've never made Chelsea Buns before but was not daunted by the sweet dough after making the Kugelhopf which turned out so well. I'd also been watching the contestants on the 'Great British Bake Off' making sweet doughs the other week and it reminded me that I should make something like this again.

The opportunity came in the form of The World's Best Cakes by Roger Pizey, one of the finest pastry chef's in Britain, according to Marco Pierre White.

About the Author
Roger Pizey is a celebrated baker and patissier with over twenty five years experience at the cutting edge of cooking. He trained for two years with Albert Roux at Le Gavroche in London before joining the charismatic Marco Pierre White as his Chef Patissier.

About the Book
The World's Best Cakes is a collection of globally inspired classic bakes from national favourites such as American Boston Cream Pie and British Chelsea Buns to exquisite small treats including Russian Tea Cakes and French Madeleines.

The book is a Masterclass in baking, regular readers will know that I own many baking books and, over the past year, I have reviewed quite a few books on cakes and baking. All I can say is GET THIS BOOK ON YOUR CHRISTMAS LIST.

Roger Pizey takes you through all the Basic Techniques you will need. shown in step by step pictures. Every recipe is accompanied by stunning photographs, often two for each bake, the whole cake and a slice, or a variation e.g. Victoria Sponge and Fairy Cakes.

The recipes themselves are clearly laid out with the ingredients and each instruction in the process clearly numbered. There is also a paragraph about the recipe and some recipes have variations too.

Another feature of the book is the pages on 'Where to Eat Cake' in various cities around the world.

For me, the standout recipes in this book were the Raspberry Angel Cake, Willie Harcourt-Cooze's Cloud Forest Chocolate Cake, Pastel de Chocolate Mexicano (A Chilli Chooclate cake), Espresso Marble Cake, Olive Oil Cake with Peaches, Richard Corrigan's More Stout Than Treacle Cake, Basbousa (a Semolina cake), Banana Cheesecake, Mustikkapiiraat (Finnish Blueberry Buns), Cinnamon Bear Claws and Christopher Farrugia's Maltese Prinjolata.

Are you getting the picture? I could go on and on because every cake looks fantastic and fascinating and so, so delicious that I want to make them all.

Pros
Well written recipes, beautiful pictures, lots of cakes I've never even heard of, let alone made, before. The step by step basic techniques is easy to follow and there is also a section at the end of the book called 'Baking Basics' which includes recipes for Creme Anglaise, Creme Patissiere Royal Icing, Chocolate Ganache etc.

Cons
Not really a book for a beginner baker, the recipes are clear enough but there are many which demand more technique, fine if you have a little experience of baking and want to expand your repertoire.

The Verdict
I'm sure you have gathered that I like the book and I would certainly recommend it, plenty of inspiration for all those baking challenges. And it's not just me who is impresssed:

@FarmersgirlCook I bought the world's best cakes book as u said its gd. Wow. It is one of the best bks I have seen. Simply stunning.
— Deon van Schalkwyk (@dvans88) October 18, 2013

Chelsea Buns
Makes 12
For the yeast starter:
15g (1/2 oz) caster sugar
85g (3oz) strong flour
300ml (10floz) full-fat milk, slightly warmed
25g (1oz) fresh yeast

For the dough:
675g (1lb 8 3/4 oz) strong flour
a pinch of nutmeg
140g (5oz) butter, cubed
1 egg
85g (3oz) caster sugar, plus extra for sprinkling
finely grated zest of 1 lemon

For the decoration
50g (1 3/4 oz) butter, melted
50g (1 3/4 oz) caster sugar
2 tsp ground cinnamon
50g (1 3/4 oz) currants
65ml (2 1/2 fl oz) Stock Syrup

For the Stock Syrup
Makes 65ml (2 1/2 fl oz)
65ml (2 1/2 fl oz) water
65g (2 1/4 oz) caster sugar

1. To make the yeasty mix, stir the sugar and flour into the milk in a pan, then add the years. Keep it warm until it froths up and then drops.
2. To make the dough, sift the four and nutmeg together in a bowl then rub in the butter until it resembles breadcrumbs. Next make a well in the centre of this dry mixture.
3. Whisk the egg, sugar and lemon zest into the yeasty mixture then tip this into the well and mix until the dough is smooth, silky and slightly elastic. Allow it to rest for 1 hour wrapped in clingfilm.
4. Grease and line a baking sheet with baking parchment.
5. on a lightly floured surface roll out the dough to a square shape about 4 cm (1 1/2 in) thick, then brush with melted butter, Sprinkle sugar, cinnamon and currants over the surface.

6. Roll up the dough (think swiss roll), then brush the outside of the roll with more of the melted butter.

7. Cut the roll into pieces about 4cm (1 1/2in) wide and place cut side down on the prepared baking sheet. Make sure that you place them evenly in rows so they can batch together during their proving time, 45-60 minutes. They are ready to bake when they have doubled in size. and all the buns are touching each other.

8. Meanwhile pre-heat the oven to 190C/375F/Gas 5 and make the stock syrup by placing the water and sugar in a pan until the liquid becomes syrupy. Pass through a sieve then remove from the heat and leave to cool.

9. Bake in a preheated oven for 8-12 minutes until golden brown.

10. Remove from the oven, brush with the stock syrup, sprinkle with caster sugar, remove from the baking parchment and transfer to a wire rack to cool.

Of course, I cheated! I didn't have any fresh yeast, so used Fast Action Yeast, put all the dough ingredients and the starter ingredients, substituting the dried for fresh yeast, into the bread maker and put it onto the dough programme. You could use your stand mixer with a dough hook, or just place it all in a bowl and mix by hand. The dough still came out silky smooth and the buns were well risen and tasted great.

The World's Best Cakes by Roger Pizey
Published by Jacqui Small LLP
RRP £30
Available for £15-16 at online retailers

I'm entering these Chelsea Buns for Tea Time Treats, the blog challenge run by Karen at Lavender and Lovage and Kate at What Kate Baked. The theme this month is Sweet Breads and Yeast Breads, so my Chelsea Buns fit perfectly and, believe me, they are a treat!

Labels: cakes, Chelsea Buns, Cinnamon, dough, Roger Pizey, sweet bread, Tea Time Treats, World's Best Cakes

Wednesday, 17 April 2013

Fresh Cherry Crumble Cake with Glamour Cherries

Fresh Cherry Crumble Cake with Cherry Frozen Yogurt and Fresh Glamour Cherries

What a pleasure it was to receive a box of Cherries Glamour with four little punnets of delicious dark red cherries sent all the the way from Spain! I know that's not an 'eat local' thing, but Scotland isn't a noted cherry growing country so I don't feel too bad.

We ate some of the cherries raw and they are really soft, sweet and juicy unlike some of the cherries that are imported into the supermarkets. The Glamour cherry is an early variety and the only available cherry in the World from March 15^th to April 25th. The cherry, also called red ¨gold¨ because it has a first class taste and is only available in small quantities. It just has been released in gourmet shops and selected sections of Harrods and M&S

As I had so many cherries, I thought it would be nice to make a cake with some of them, so I had a bit of a search online and found a recipe for Fresh Cherry Cake with a hint of cinnamon at the BBC Good Food website

The cake is easy to make as it uses a batter-type mixture made with melted butter rather than creaming. The cherries go on top of the batter, as I don't have a cherry stoner, I halved the cherries and removed the stones with a knife.

The cherries are then topped with a crumble mixture. I found the recipe was rather heavy on butter and light on flour so added a bit more so I could get it to the correct crumble consistency (like breadcrumbs) I used spelt flour for the crumble as I love the added flavour and texture that it provides.

You don't get a lot of rise with the cake, probably due to the moisture in the fruit, the cake is not over sweet and I would say it is more suitable for dessert rather than as a slice of cake, but we did eat, and enjoy it as both.

About Cherries Glamour

The company's production philosophy is based on integrated production, GLOBAL GAP and the use of ecological cultivation techniques. The cherries are picked daily, at the point of having ripened to perfection, and are dispatched on that same day so that the client receives a fresh product with all its freshness and flavor.

S.A.T. EDOA “Cherries Glamour” is a Spanish company located in the Ebro valley near the Pyrenees in the province of Lleida that specialises in the production and marketing of cherries in March, the first and only company in the world to do so. Follow Cherries Glamour on Facebook.

I received a box of Cherries Glamour to review, I was not paid for this review and all views are my own.

Labels: baking, cakes, cherries, review

Sunday, 31 March 2013

Easter Nest Cupcakes

Happy Easter to you. I know it is nearly all over, but we still have Easter Monday Bank Holiday ahead of us and, I'm certainly glad of that additional day to get over the clock change and recover from the over-eating.

It wouldn't be Easter without some Easter baking. I've been away on holiday in the run up to Easter so there has been nothing to show. But as I had family coming round today, I whipped up some basic cupcakes/fairy cakes/ buns using Jo Wheatley's recipe in 'A Passion for Baking'. It's a rich cake mixture with 200g of butter, flour and sugar and three eggs. The bigger cakes turned out well, but some of the mini cakes went a bit oily which was a shame. I would probably go back to my Mary Berry - Fast Cakes recipe in future when doing the little buns.

I used Mary's recipe for chocolate buttercream, a simple one of butter, icing sugar and cocoa powder whipped up together in my Kenwood Chef. A bit of swirly piping with a Wilton 1M nozzle and some mini eggs for decoration.

I'm entering this for Calendar Cakes the baking challenge run by Dolly Bakes and Laura Loves Cakes
the theme for March is Easter Bakes.

Labels: A Passion for Baking, baking, cakes, Calendar Cakes, cupcakes, Dolly Bakes, Easter, Jo Wheatley, Kenwood Chef, Laura Loves Cakes, Wilton 1M

Thursday, 25 October 2012

Vintage Cakes: Review and Giveaway

Polenta Cake on my Great Grandmother's vintage china

Vintage Cakes

Tremendously good cakes for sharing and giving

It doesn’t take much to encourage me to make cakes. Currently, the market is flooded with baking books, some written by professional bakers and others by well known ‘professional’ home bakers like Mary Berry. And then there is a whole shelf of baking books written by Great British Bake Off finalists like Jo Wheatley, Edd Kimber and Ruth Clemens. I already have a lot of baking books but I wasn't going pass on the chance to review another book about cakes.

Jane Brocket, the author of Vintage Cakes, is also the successful author of 'The Gentle Art of Domesticity' and 'Cherry Cake and Ginger Beer'. Both books include recipes for favourite family treats and old fashioned cakes.

Starting out

The book starts with some 'essential' chapters. Essential ingredients; this provides a comprehensive guide to the most common ingredients used in baking. This is followed by an equally comprehensive chapter about Essential equipment. This isn’t a huge list of expensive kit, it’s a useful checklist with a caveat that you can ‘use what you have’ and adapt! In Essential techniques the author covers everything from oven temperature, through sifting, and testing for doneness. These are a real boon for new or inexperienced bakers and even experienced bakers can learn from the information in these three chapters.

The Recipes

The chapters are organised by the type of cake, I think this is really useful as most bakers have a purpose in mind when they want to bake. There is an index at the back if you are looking for something in particular.

cake-tin cakes includes Marmalade Cake, Sticky Date Cake, Parkin, Gingerbread, Plum Streusel

everyday cakes includes Victoria Sandwich, Welsh Cakes, Sour Cherry Muffins, Genoa Cake, Swedish Tosca Cake

little cakes includes Lamingtons, Fat Rascals, Eccles Cakes, Maids of Honour, Orange Teacakes

posh cakes includes Lemon Chiffon Cake, Sacher Torte, Coconut Cake, Marble Bundt Cake, Black Forest Gateau

fancies and frivolities includes Fondant Fancies, French Madeleines and English Madeleines, Sponge Kisses

celebration cakes includes Simnel cake, Jewelled Christmas Cake, Buche de Noel, Stollen, Red Velvet Cake

*This represents only a selection of the recipes, there are many more.*

Who is Vintage Cakes for?

This is a book for home bakers who want recipes that have been perfected over time. All the recipes can all be made with basic baking skills, so it is ideal for someone who is new to baking or for someone who has a little experience and wants to make a range of homely comforting bakes.

Pros

The introductory chapters are well written and full of useful information.

Each recipe starts with a short descriptive paragraph including information about the history of the cake

The recipes are well organised and clearly written with excellent photographs

There are cook’s tips throughout the book and each recipe has information about how to store the cake and how long it is likely to keep.

There are enough ‘different’ recipes to keep an experienced baker interested.

Cons

Experienced bakers are likely to have recipes for about two thirds of the recipes in the book

If you baked your way through every recipe in this book, you would cover wide range of techniques and have a repertoire of cakes that would make your Granny proud! Even with 40 years of experience of baking, I found recipes I would like to bake and some I would like to revisit.

Polenta Cake

Makes 1 medium – large cake (serves 8-10)

For the cake

Finely grated zest of 3 lemons (unwaxed or well washed)

Juice of ½ a lemon

225g soft butter, plus extra for greasing

225g caster sugar

3 eggs

200g ground almonds

110g polenta

1 level teaspoon baking powder

a pinch of salt

You will need

A 23cm springform tin or round loose-bottomed cake tin, greased with butter and base lined with baking parchment.

Preheat the oven to 160C (gas mark 3)

Start by zesting the 3 lemons, and squeezing one to obtain half its juice. Set aside until needed.

Put the butter and sugar in a large mixing bowl. With a wooden spoon or an electric whisk, cream them together until they are pale and fluffy. Add the eggs one by one, beating well after each addition.

Add the ground almonds, polenta, baking powder, salt and lemon juice and zest. With a large metal spoon or flexible spatula, mix well until all the ingredients are combined. Spoon into the prepared tin and level the surface with the back of the spoon or spatula.

Bake in the preheated oven for 45-50 minutes until the cake is golden brown and pulling away from the sides of the tin and a metal skewer or sharp knife inserted into the centre comes out clean.

Transfer to a wire rack and leave to cool for 10 minutes before turning out of the tin. Serve with creamy yogurt or mascarpone, and a glass of something nice and chilled. Polenta cake is also delicious with a light tea such as Darjeeling.

STORAGE: Polenta cake keeps well for up to 3 days if wrapped in aluminium foil and stored in an airtight tin in a cool place.

What a fantastic cake, it's moist, with a lemony tang and a lovely grainy texture from the almonds and polenta. I have no doubt I will make this cake again. I didn't want to make a big cake, so halved the ingredients and made it in a small pie tin, it behaved beautifully. I sliced it up and froze most of it, so it will be interesting to see what it is like when it thaws. It would make a great dessert cake, served warm with cream or ice cream.

GIVEAWAY

I have one copy of Vintage Cakes by Jane Brocket to giveaway. To enter this giveaway, please leave a comment on this post telling me which cake evokes warm and comforting memories of your childhood. So I am able to contact you, should you win, can you please also leave contact details e.g. farmersgirlkitchen at gmail dot com OR your Twitter name e.g. @serialcrafter
The giveaway will close at 7pm on Saturday 3rd November 2012.

This giveaway is open to those with a UK residence address only.

The winner will be chosen by Random Number Generator and the blog owner's decision will be final.

Disclosure: This is a sponsored giveaway, Vintage Cakes and the giveaway copy was supplied by Jacqui Small LLP an Imprint of Arum Press

And the Winner is...LynB

Congratulations!

I'm entering the Polenta Cake for the October Random Recipe Challenge. Dom at Belleau Kitchen challenged us to put our hands in the cupboard and pull out something we hadn't used, then look through some cookbooks till we found one which had a recipe for that ingredient and to make it.

My ingredient was Polenta, I bought the pack in the summer, but have never got around to making anything with it. I took a pile of cookbooks including those I had been sent for review and, hey presto, Polenta Cake!

Vintage Cakes is published by Jacui Small LLP
RRP - £25
Popular online book store: £13.50

Labels: cakes, Cook book review, giveaway, Jane Brocket, old fashioned cakes, Polenta Cake, prize, Vintage Cakes, win

Thursday, 18 October 2012

Cookies, Cookies and More Cookies - a Review

Now the Great British Bake Off has reached it's finale, thousands of fans are wondering just what they are going to do without Paul, Mary, Sue, Mel and the brave bakers. The answer, of course, is to get into the kitchen and BAKE!

To help you along you might want to get yourself a copy of Cookies, Cookies and more Cookies! by Lilach German. The book begins with a little history of cookies with the theory that the first cookie was actually a 'test' for a cake recipe. This introduction is followed by a chapter on tools and another on ingredients, it's full of really good tips and information. As this is an American book, it's really worth reading about the ingredients to be sure you are reading the recipes correctly.

I loved the Basic Recipes chapter, which has a range of cookie recipes that you could adapt yourself, including a dairy free recipe.

After the basic Recipes we get into the main chapters, there are more than 75 recipes to choose from covering Classic Cookies, Cookies for Kids, Cookies for Occasions, Cookies for the Health Conscious, Cookies for Chocolate Lovers and Cookies for the Connoisseur.

Put a smile on a child’s face with a Sprinkled Chocolate Ball or Nutella Thumbprint. Enjoy classic temptations like Madeleines and Linzer Sables, or decadent brownies and truffles. Satisfy the most discerning palate with icing-filled macaroons, lady fingers, or Scottish shortbread. Even the health-conscious will find yummy options, including energy bars and Oatmeal and Cranberry Cookies. Many of the recipes produce large batches, perfect for sharing with family and friends. Includes instructions for whipping up basic types of dough, icing, and meringue.

The book concludes with a useful page of conversion charts which I really appreciated.

I decided to make some Madeleines, I wouldn't really consider these to be cookies, more little sponge cakes, but they are in the book so I gave it a go. One of the reasons I wanted to make them was to try out my silicon madeleine mould I bought from Sew White. I'd really recommend visiting her website, as there are lots of unusual baking items and the customer service is excellent.

Madeleine Cookies

3 eggs

1/4 cup/ 48g sugar

1 tbsp honey

1/4 cup/ 60ml milk

2 tablespoons vanilla extract (I only used one and it was enough)

1 1/2 sticks butter/200g butter, melted

1 1/2 cups/210g all purpose (plain) flour

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

Madeleine Pan Mould

1. Using a mixer fitted with a whisk attachment, mix together the eggs and sugar for about 5 minutes, until light fluffy. Add the honey, milk, vanilla extract and butter, and whisk until all ingredients are combined. In a separate bowl, sift together the flour and baking powder.

2. Gradually add the flour to the wet mixture and whisk until the mixture is smooth.

3. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes before baking.

4. Preheat the oven to 350F. Generously butter a Madeleine pan mould. (if using a silicon mould, there is no need to butter, really?)

5. Pour the chilled batter into the pan mould, filling each mould to the very top. Bake for 15 minutes, until a toothpick, placed in the centre, come out dry.

6. Allow to chill to room temperature before serving.

7. Cookies can be stored in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 1 week.

In true Bake Off Style I had a bit of a disaster...

Yes, the madeleines stuck to the silicon mould, so I lost the shell like definition. I think I will probably butter them a little next time. You can just about see what it would have been like on the closest madeleine.

Fortunately I had more batter than would fit in the mould, so I made some madeleines in muffin cases and they turned out perfectly. If the madeleine recipe is anything to go by, this is an excellent addition to any bakers bookshelf, I can't wait to make some more cookies.

Taste Test!

One of the advantages of the madeleines in the mould not turning out right, is that there are plenty of 'bits' of cake to test. I was really pleased with the light texture and buttery flavour of the madeleines, the 30 minute chilling time for the batter was very interesting, as it came out decidedly thicker and bubbling slightly. I'll report back on my next trial with the silicon baking mould.

Cookies, Cookies and more Cookies is written by Lilach German, the founder of Lilach: Food and Design, a successful gourmet catering company. Her sophisticated sense of style shines through clearly in the colourful photographs. Lilach studied at the prestigious Le Cordon Bleu School in Paris.

Published by Charlesbridge, RRP £8.99

Also available through a popular online bookshop for £5.39

Labels: Book Reviews, buns, cakes, cookies, Great British Bake Off, madeleines, Muffins