Tag: Sub Featured

Rosemary and Thyme Focaccia

Last week, we went for lunch at Benugo in the BFI. I had a very nice veal burger but I couldn’t finish it. Why? Because of the lovely focaccia bread I filled up on before the mains arrived. Shame on me so I decided to make some myself the next day. Here’s what I came up with.

Recipe: Rosemary and Thyme Focaccia

Ingredients

  • 160 ml water
  • 2 tbs (7 g) dry yeast
  • 500 g strong white flour
  • 2 tsb salt
  • 80 ml olive oil (plus extra for coating after baking)
  • 80 ml white wine
  • 2 tbsp chopped rosemary
  • 1 tbsp thyme leaves
  • flaky sea salt

Instructions

  1. Whisk yeast into about 100 ml of the water and let it stand for 5 minutes
  2. Mix the flour and salt in a large bowl, make a well in the middle
  3. Pour yeast/water mix in the well and with a spoon stir it until enough flour is pulled in to form soft paste
  4. Let it stand for 20 minutes, this starts the yeast
  5. Add wine, olive oil and 2/3 of rosemary and thyme, mix until you have a nice sticky dough. Add more water if necessary
  6. Either knead for 10-15 minutes or mix using a food processor with dough hook for 5 minutes. When using a processor, I then finish it by kneading another 3 minutes.
  7. Leave the dough in a large bowl to rise for an hour or until at least doubled in size.
  8. Knock it back and place into a cake tin so it covers the base all the way to the edges. I use one that’s 24 cm in diameter.
  9. Let it prove for about 1 1/2 – 2 hours
  10. Sprinkle the remaining rosemary and thyme on top with some flaky sea salt
  11. Bake in 200°C for 30 minutes
  12. Straight after the bread comes out, sprinkle it with plenty of olive oil and let it cool down.

Preparation time: 30 minute(s)

Cooking time: 30 minute(s)

 

Crazy Good Chocolate Chip Cookies


This is an old time classic recipe my mum makes all the time. You can easily use this as a base for your other type of cookies, too. If you like your cookies with raisins, throw some in. If you like them with white chocolate, find another website.

Anyhow, try this out, it’s fail safe and super tasty!

Recipe: My Mums Chocolate Chip Cookies

Summary: Quick and easy to make, delicious chocolate chip cookies.

Ingredients

  • 125 g butter
  • 85 g sugar
  • 70 g soft brown sugar
  • 1 egg
  • 150 g dark chocolate
  • 200 g plain flour
  • 1 tsb baking powder
  • 1 level tsb vanilla extract

Instructions

  1. turn your oven to 200°C
  2. With an electric hand whisk, mix butter and both sugars
  3. Once properly mixed, add egg
  4. Whisk until slightly frothy
  5. Mix in flour and baking powder little by little continuously mixing
  6. Chop up the chocolate and fold it in the mix
  7. Let the dough rest in the fridge for an hour
  8. Lay large spoonfulls of dough on baking paper
  9. Bake at 200°C for 10 minutes

Variations

You can replace about 1/4 of the flour with porridge oats for extra chunk.

Preparation time: 15 minute(s), idle 1 hour

Cooking time: 10 minutes

Number of servings (yield): 12

Kristian’s Fluffy Top Apple Pie

This cake was my entry to the 2011 Salehurst/Manwood Road Street Party. I had never made the cake before, just thought about it long and hard. It turned out fine, in fact, it won the first price. Result.

Here’s how to make it.

Ingredients:

Pie base
30 cl plain flour
10 cl sugar
1 tsp baking powder
150 g cold butter
1/2 egg

Filling
4-5 apples
2 tbs sugar
1 tsp cardamom
1 tsp cinnamon

Meringue topping
3 egg whites
150 g sugar
handful of strawberries

Method:

Turn your oven on to 170°C (gas mark n).

‘Pinch’ or mix the flour, sugar and baking powder with the butter. Do this as quickly as possible so the butter doesn’t start melting. Then mix in half an egg. Put the dough in to a fridge till it’s cool again.

Slice and dice the apples, mix in sugar, cardamom and cinnamon. Blast these in a microwave for a few minutes and drain the juices in to a cup. You’ll need this later.

Once your dough is cooled down press it against the sides of a pie tin (about ∅ 25 cm) and fill with your apples. Cover with tin foil and bake for about 30-35 minutes. Once done, let the pie cool down completely.

Meringue top

Pre-heat your oven to 150°C.

Whisk your egg whites till they hold a peak. While continuing to whisk briskly, mix in the sugar table spoon at a time. Once it’s all in and the mixture is smooth, almost has a metallic gloss to it, gently fold in the chopped up strawberries.

Put a sheet of non-stick parchment paper on your baking tray and draw a circle the size of your pie tin. Spread the meringue so it barely fits inside that circle. I like to then cover up the strawberries that show with a bit of mixture so from the outside, it looks like there isn’t any strawberries. Bake for about 60 minutes. (I know this sounds like long but it turns out meringue takes a while to bake)

Once done, carefully remove it off of the baking paper and place on top of your pie.