Category Archives: Uncategorized

21/06/2013 · 10:55 am

Yoghurt, lime and pistachio cake with rosewater and lime drizzle…

My love of festivals (of the music variety) has been well documented on this blog as has my tradition of festival baking (here, here and here). I managed to get the first of this year’s festivals under my belt pretty early on when I headed to Meadowlands in East Sussex at the end of May. It wasn’t just the festival we were going for, it was also my friend Georgie’s ‘Hen Don’t’. As you may have surmised from the name, she’d stressed to her Bridesmaids that she didn’t want a traditional hen do, which was totally fine with me. The thought of having to walk around in sparkly feather boas and sashes (and the rest…) fills me with dread. It kind of goes against my festival morals but we had decided to ‘glamp’, which involved turning up at the car park, having our bags carried for us, being housed in a lovely bell tent with jute flooring and sleeping on an air bed clad in lovely soft duvets and bedding…but I’m not going to lie to you…it was amazing!

I’m getting a bit waylaid here…back to cake!

A few of us were asked to bring some baked goods with us so that we could have a little afternoon tea on Saturday afternoon. I’d had a bit of a busy week in the run up to the festival but I try to grab every opportunity I can to test some of the recipes that I find in cook books, rip out of magazines, find online and take photos of. I’m continually hoarding these recipe snippets in a ‘must try’ pile, and here was my chance to give a couple a go. I went for a yoghurt, lime and pistachio cake with rosewater and lime drizzle (if you’ve had enough of my wittering you can just scroll to the bottom of the post for the recipe)…

and a white chocolate, almond and blueberry blondie…

Please forgive me for the rubbish standard of the photos…I’m using the excuse that all I had to cut the cakes with was a blunt butter knife and…I was in the middle of a field! 🙂

Along with some delicious Malteaser fridge cake and squidgy brownies we had a pretty good spread…

It went some way to lining our stomachs and powering our dancing later on that evening!

After getting home and recovering from the weekend of festival excess it wasn’t long before I made the yoghurt, lime and pistachio cake again. This time I managed to take a much better photo…

It’s a pretty unassuming looking cake but the fragrant flavours all work really well together and the drizzle, together with the inclusion of ground almonds makes it exceptionally moist. It benefits from being wrapped up and kept in the fridge for a day or two, which is handy if you need to make it in advance as long as you can refrain from pilfering a slice in the middle of the night Nigella stylee!

I found the recipe in Rachel Allen’s ‘Bake‘ book and made a couple of tweaks.

To make it you’ll need…

225g self-raising flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 pinch salt

75g ground almonds

100g caster sugar

2 eggs

1 generous tbsp or 50g runny honey

250ml natural yogurt

150ml sunflower oil

Grated zest of 1 lime

100g pistachios, roughly chopped

For the syrup

150ml water

100g caster sugar

Juice of 1 lime

1-2 tsp rose water (this depends on your taste and the strength of your rosewater. I use Star Kay White Rose Extract, which you can find in Lakeland. It really packs a punch and you’ll only need a small amount i.e. 1-2tsp. Whereas this Natural Essence of Rosewater from The English Provender is a lot weaker so you may want to add more.)

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C and grease and line a 20cm cake tin with greaseproof paper.

Sift the flour, baking powder and salt into a large bowl and stir in the ground almonds and caster sugar.

Mix the eggs, honey, yogurt, sunflower oil and lime zest together in another bowl.

Make a well in the middle of your dry ingredients and slowly pour in the wet ingredients. Use a whisk to bring them together until they’re just combined. Finally stir in the chopped pistachios before pouring the mixture into the tin you prepared earlier.

Pop it in the oven for 50 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean.

You need to leave the cake to cool in the tin for about 20 minutes, which gives you plenty of time to make your lime and rosewater syrup for drizzling.

Simply boil the water and sugar in a small saucepan for about 5 minutes until it has reduced by half. Then add the lime juice and leave to boil for another 2 minutes. Take it off the heat and leave it to cool before adding your rosewater. Take heed of my notes above regarding the strength of your rosewater…add a little, then have a slurp, if you want it stronger then add a little more to suit your own taste. If you’re too heavy handed with the rosewater at this stage your cake might end up tasting like a bar of soap…be warned!

Use a skewer to make holes all over the top of the warm cake. Spoon over the syrup making sure every bit of it sees some of the syrupy action.

I finished the cake off by scattering a few more pistachios on top and dusting it with icing sugar just before serving.

We ate it on its own but I think it’d be delicious with a dollop of natural yoghurt or creme fraiche on the side (festival optional).

Enjoy!

Plate Lickers is 1…our birthday party!

Last Saturday saw us celebrate the first birthday of Plate Lickers Supper Club!

It’s really hard to believe that it’s been a whole year since Ivana and I joined forces, came up with a name, found a venue, concocted a menu, filled a room with 30 hungry people and….fed them! From that day forward Plate Lickers has been going strong and with the amazing support of our guests has sold out everytime (sometimes in as little as an hour). We still love every minute of preparing for and hosting our supper clubs (ok maybe we don’t like the sleepless nights beforehand) and have met so many lovely people in our 12 month existence. We wanted to mark our anniversary event with a special Birthday party, the menu for which remained secret until the plates were put in front of our guests!

We had decided to return to one of our favourite venues, St Pauls on Hills Road where we had also held our Middle Eastern and the 2nd of our Childhood Memories events…

We welcomed our guests with a retro classic, a snowball, made with Advocaat, lime juice & lemonade…

Everyone helped themselves to a paper bag of olive oil roasted chickpeas and were given a choice of 4 flavoured salts to salt ‘n’ shake into their bags…

Some mingling happened…

And then we took to the floor to say hello and introduce the first course…

British asparagus, from Peter Elliott, who sells it from the roadside on the A10 near Hauxton, served with purple sprouting broccoli (or ‘psb’ as I like to call it ;)) and a drizzle of homemade hollandaise sauce…

We called on Delia’s expertise for the hollandaise and it worked a treat, although we both agreed that we could have gone a tad easier on the lemon.

We decided to pop out and chat a bit about the main course before we served it up as it’s always quite a rush to get the hot food in front of our guests at this point in a supper club and we don’t feel we get to give it the full attention and description is deserves…

We were really proud of this dish, our take on ham, egg and chips…

We used Dingley Dell gammon, smoked in-house by our favourite local butchers Northrops, who also deserve a special mention (especially Martin) for giving us consistently good advice. On this occassion we wanted to boil the gammon instead of baking it, on seeing just how big a 7kg joint of gammon was, I realised there was no way I was going to fit it in my fridge to soak overnight, so I lugged a huuuge saucepan along to Martin and he very kindly soaked it for me. The next day, we popped back in with a bag of chopped up carrots, celery, onions, a few peppercorns and bay leaves, which Martin placed around the joint of meat before vac packing it for us! We were essentially going to boil our gammon in a bag (or cook it ‘sous vide’ if you want to be posh about it :)) for 5 hours…there’s no way we could end up with anything but the moistest of meat!

We’d decided that we wanted to really push the boat out and challenge ourselves for this event, how better to do that than to poach 36 eggs! Until about a year ago, I had never poached an egg, but a sure fire way to get good at something is to do it en masse! My technique was to get a pan of water to a very light simmer (very small bubbles just breaking the surface), crack an egg into a small bowl or teacup, then using a balloon whisk, spin the water, creating a vortex. Gently pour the egg into the centre and DO NOT TOUCH! just let the vortex work it’s magic for 3 whole minutes. The success of your poached egg has a lot to do with it’s freshness but sometimes, I reckon you just get a stubborn one! All I can say is….persevere 🙂

The ‘chips’ part of our main course was based on the American dish ‘home fries‘, which we made by parboiling, then crushing new potatoes and roasting them in the oven with butter and onions.

We served it all up with our homemade ketchup and not so homemade mustard…

I love the moment when we place the last main course in front of a guest and Ivana & I can take a deep breath and watch everyone tuck in!

The next course was the one that got people chatting the most…peanut butter and jelly popsicles…

A layer of chocolate ganache mixed with salted peanuts and a sandwich of peanut butter swirled vanilla ice cream and blitzed raspberries…

After a quick party game of musical chairs to mix things up a bit and to get everyone chatting to people they may not have met yet, we rolled out the piece de resistance!…our giant 12 inch, fade, orange drizzle Birthday cake, which we sandwiched with homemade orange curd and iced with dark chocolate ganache and literally hundreds and thousands of hundreds and thousands…

This is what it looked like naked…

and here’s the finished article before it was wolfed down…

We offered our guests the choice to eat it now or to have a slice packed away in their party bags :)…

and those who ate all of their dinner were awarded a special badge…

I think I say it every single time but THIS Plate Lickers was my favourite yet…so much fun! We couldn’t do it without guests who ‘get’ what we’re trying to do and come with an open mind, a sense of fun and are ready to be fed…for that I thank you all!

There’s no stopping us now, we’ll be announcing a June supper club in the next couple of weeks so if you would like to hear about it first, and you haven’t done so already, click here and join our mailing list and follow our #platelickers chatter on Twitter.

Thanks to Ozzy for the lovely photo’s. The full set can be seen here.

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Tagged as birthday, birthday cake, British asparagus, cake, cambridge, delia, hollandaise, Miss Igs, plate lickers, Plate Lickers Anonymous, Supper Club

01/05/2013 · 10:56 am

Rhubarb and custard cake…

Rhubarb season has been very fruitful for me this year (apologies for such early pun usage). I’m lucky enough to know a lot of people who have been growing their own and I even discovered a little crop of my very own in the garden! I often make a delicious sticky rhubarb and ginger cake, which is a complete winner but I stumbled across this recipe on the BBC Good Food website for a rhubarb and custard cake and couldn’t resist having a go, with a couple of Afternoon Tease twists. Now is no time for modesty, I am happy to report that it turned out to be the most delicious cake, and fickle as I am, has overtaken all others as my current favourite! Behold my rhubarb and custard cake made with locally grown rhubarb and homemade custard…

Now, I can tell, you’re going to scroll down, see the length of the recipe and decide it’s far too much hard work, panic not! There are basically 3 main sections to prepare…rhubarb, custard and cake but they are all pretty simple and I guarantee you, it’s totally worth it. Although this may not be the quickest bake, it’s a great cake for a lazy afternoon’s baking! So without further ado…

For the rhubarb you need…

400g rhubarb

50g caster sugar

For the custard you need…

1 vanilla pod or 1 tsp vanilla extract

275ml double cream

3 egg yolks

1 tsp cornflour

25g caster sugar

For the cake you need…

250g butter, softened,

150g custard (either use my recipe for homemade custard or if you’d rather, you can use a shop bought variety such as Ambrosia)

250g self-raising flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

4 eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract

250g caster sugar

icing sugar , for dusting

So, to start, you need to prepare the rhubarb element of the cake by heating the oven to 180 degrees (fan). Rinse the rhubarb and cut it into finger sized pieces. Lay them in a shallow oven proof dish. It needs to be big enough for the rhubarb to lie out in one single layer or you will have an issue with some pieces cooking faster than others (mine was a little small in hindsight, I learnt the hard way). Sprinkle over the 50g caster sugar and shake the dish until all of the rhubarb is coated…

Cover with foil and pop in the oven to roast. After 15 minutes remove the dish from the oven, have a peek and a little shake and pop it back in for another 5 minutes. You’re aiming for the rhubarb to be tender (but not a mushy pulp) and the juices to be syrupy. If it’s not quite there yet, just put it back in the oven and check every 5 minutes until you’re happy that the rhubarb is cooked. Then set it aside to cool.

For the custard…

You can use shop bought custard (Ambrosia for example) but I swear by Delia’s custard, which Miss Igs and I christened ‘crack custard’ due to its addictive qualities, after making it for one of our Plate Lickers Supper Clubs 🙂

Photograph by @photolotte for Cambridge Edition

If you are splashing out and using a vanilla pod, start by splitting it lengthways down the middle and scraping out the seeds. Then place the pod and the seeds (or vanilla extract) in a small saucepan, with the cream. Heat gently until it’s just below simmering point.

Whilst the cream is heating, you can whisk the egg yolks, cornflour and sugar together in a bowl.

Once your cream is ready, remove the vanilla pod (if using) and gradually add the cream to your egg yolk mixture in a steady stream, whisking constantly. When all of the cream has been added and it’s well mixed, pour the whole lot back into the saucepan and return to the hob over a gentle heat. You need to stir it constantly to make sure none of it gets stuck to the bottom of the pan. You can use a rubber spatula or a whisk at this stage. It will start to thicken gradually, if it begins to look a little lumpy, don’t panic! just get whisking and it will soon become thick and smooth. Delia also advises…

‘If you do overheat it and it looks grainy, don’t worry, just transfer it to a jug or bowl and continue to whisk until it becomes smooth again.’

When you’re happy with the consistency of your custard (it should be thick enough to coat the back of a spoon without running straight off), pour it into a bowl and cover the surface with clingfilm so that it doesn’t form a skin. Now try not to eat too much of it before leaving it to cool for later!

The good news is that this recipes makes nearly double the quantity of custard you need for the cake! So once you’ve measured out 150g of your custard…you can do whatever you wish with the leftovers! I recommend grabbing a spoon and eating it straight from the bowl 🙂

Once the rhubarb and custard have cooled, you are ready for the cake making. This may all feel a bit long winded but bear with it…I promise that it’s worth every single second of prep!

So, for the cake…

Grease and line a 20cm (or 23cm) loose-bottomed or springform cake tin and heat the oven to 160 degrees (fan).

Save 3 tbsp of the 150g custard in a separate bowl for later. Put the rest of the custard in a large bowl with the butter, flour, baking powder, eggs, vanilla and sugar and beat until creamy and smooth.

Now for the assembly. Spoon 1/3 of the cake mix into the tin, add 1/3 of the rhubarb, then dot with another 1/3 of the cake mix and spread it out as well as you can. Top with another 1/3 of the rhubarb, then spoon over the remaining cake mix, don’t worry about being too neat about it. Scatter the rest of the rhubarb over the batter, then drip the reserved custard on top…

The original recipe said to bake it for 40 mins until risen and golden, then to cover the tin with foil and bake it for 15-20 mins more. Mine took quite a bit longer than this and after testing it by inserting a skewer into the middle (when it’s ready the skewer will come out clean) I actually cooked it for a further 30 minutes (so 1hour 30mins in total). After the intial hour of cooking, you need to use your judgement…just remember, if the skewer doesn’t come out clean, it isn’t ready, so just pop it back in for 5 minutes or so at a time and then check again. Bear in mind that the cooking time also varies depending on the size of the tin you use…a 20cm tin will need slightly longer than a 23cm tin. However, you can be safe in the knowledge that when it is ready it’s going to look and smell fantastic…

Leave the cake to cool in the tin and when completely cool, sprinkle liberally with icing sugar and serve…

If you can resist polishing it off straight away, this cake keeps well for a couple of days and would be delicious served with leftover custard (if you have any).

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17/04/2013 · 3:08 pm

A round up of Sweeteasy #2…

Last Friday I hosted my 2nd Sweeteasy at Hot Numbers. Once the doors of the cafe closed for the day I got busy transforming it into a prohibition era style drinking den, where I would be serving a set menu of cake inspired cocktails and cocktail inspired cakes and sweets. At dusk my guests started arriving accompanied by the sound of tinkling ivories courtesy of the very talented Adam, co-host of The First Rule Supper Club…

Some guests had really got into the 1920’s spirit and were looking gorgeously glam…

I’m so bad at keeping exciting things to myself but I had somehow managed to keep the menu totally secret and really enjoyed watching and listening to my guests reactions to its unveiling…

First up was Turkish delight martinis in teacups made with gin, a splash of brandy and homemade rose syrup and served with a square of homemade Turkish delight…

Followed closely by eggnog custard tarts…puff pastry with brandy custard and nutmeg…

The next drink was definitely my favourite and something I’d been dreaming up for a while…behold my rhubarb crumble martini…

The seed of the idea for the rhubarb crumble martini was planted by Aoife Maxwell who is the font of all knowledge on booze and who along with her friend Rachel writes the Gastronomic Girls blog. I’d seen her blog about making rhubarb vodka and she very kindly presented me with a sample secreted in a brown paper bag at my first Sweeteasy event :). It was absolutely divine so I decided to make my own, which was surprisingly easy and very rewarding. You can find Aoife’s rhubarb vodka recipe here.

I loved the process and was amazed to watch all of the colour gradually drain out of the rhubarb and transfer itself to the vodka…magic!

I knew very early on that what I wanted to do with my rhubarb vodka was to create a rhubarb crumble in liquid form and after much taste testing (it’s a hardship I know) decided on the following recipe…

3 parts homemade rhubarb vodka

1 part amaretto (I used Disaronno)

Simply shake with ice before straining into a glass.

However, what is a crumble without the yummy topping? hence the addition of the piece de resistance…the crumble topping rim! I made a basic crumble topping by blitzing 50g butter with 100g flour in the food processor (this can also be done by rubbing the butter into the flour by hand) before stirring in 50g sugar. I baked it on a tray at 180 degrees until golden brown and left it to cool. To make it stick to the rim of the glass I used a simple sugar syrup, which is sooo easy to make. Simply dissolve 1 cup of sugar in 1/2 cup water over a low heat and leave to cool.

Finally to assemble the rhubarb crumble martini, I poured some sugar syrup onto a shallow dish and tipped some of the crumble topping onto a similar receptacle. Then dipped the rim of the glass in the syrup, allowing any excess to drip off before dipping in in the crumble topping…tadaaa…

Then it was time to pour in the rhubarb vodka and amaretto concoction…

I was so chuffed with the creation of my dream drink…rhubarb crumble in a glass!

It was closely followed by my White Russian 3 milk cake, based on a traditional Mexican Tres Leches cake but with added Kahlua…

The 3rd and final cocktail was a chocolate and spiced rum old fashioned made using 70% dark chocolate liqueur, Sailor Jerrys spiced rum, angostura bitters and a dash of sugar syrup, stirred with a couple of cubes of ice, potent but divine…

When I was taste testing this beauty I felt that it really needed to be paired with something chocolatey, hence the rum and raisin slice made using rum soaked raisins and 70% dark chocolate and I couldn’t resist throwing in a retro classic, my pina colada coconut ice made using homemade pineapple jam…

And that, ladies and gentlemen is, as they say, a wrap! The evening sadly had to come to an end but it turns out my guests are people of great taste as I ended up bumping into most of them afterwards in 196 on Mill Road, a very fine local cocktail establishment!

Another thoroughly enjoyable evening, thankyou to all who came, to Adam for being an amazing piano man and to Sarah and Val for letting me use use some of their photos for this blog and to Tom and Carri for being my glamorous assistants for the night!

I’m already plotting the next Sweeteasy, the date is in the diary but in true Afternoon Tease fashion, I’m going to keep you waiting a bit longer before I divulge the details! 🙂 But if you’d like to sign up to my new mailing list you’ll be amongst the first to be in the know.

You can read more about Sweeteasy from the guests perspective in these lovely blogs from Miss Sue Flay of The Secluded Tea Party and from Heidi on The Moving Foodie Blog.

Sweeteasy is back on Friday 12th April…

On Friday 12th April February Hot Numbers will once again be transformed into a high class drinking den with a twist, hosted by me, Jo Kruczynska of Afternoon Tease…

I have been busy dreaming up exciting ideas and throughout the night will serve a brand new, carefully concocted menu of 3 Prohibition era and cake inspired cocktails…along with an array of cocktail inspired cakes.

The evening will commence under the cover of (semi) darkness at 7.30pm.

Ticket price £25.

Places for ‘Sweeteasy’ are limited and sold out super quickly last time, so to secure yours, email info@afternoontease.co.uk and I’ll get back to you as soon as possible to confirm.

You can read my blog about the inaugural Sweeteasy here and if you’re on Twitter feel free to follow me @afternoontease and join in the #sweeteasy chatter.

Cheers!

Tea tasting with Kandula and a recipe for leek and smoked Camembert filo tarts…

After a strenuously indulgent weekend as part of my annual family ‘Easter Eat Fest’, I thought it was the perfect time to finish off a well overdue blog post about an event I did as part of the EAT Cambridge festival at the beginning of March. I was invited by Liz from local boutique B&B, Duke House and local tea company, Kandula to come up with an afternoon tea menu to complement 5 teas from their range for a tasting event for a lucky few guests at Duke House. It was a great chance for me to experiment with new dishes and cakes and to (hopefully) come up with the perfect match for the teas that had been chosen. I spoke at length with the Gail and Jane from Kandula, and they advised me of the flavours that would bring the best out in their teas. The final menu looked like this…

With the Ebony Ceylon I matched homemade wholemeal and white soda bread scones topped with delicate cream cheese and cucumber and smoked salmon, creme fraiche and dill. It’s a delicate tea that needed a delicate but savoury food to set it off perfectly…

The guests really got into the event and spent time (in between mouthfuls) discussing how successful they felt each food and tea combination was…

Next up we matched the English Breakfast with a new invention of mine…leek and smoked Camembert filo tarts. I was told that the English Breakfast tea was robust enough for a more strongly flavoured savoury dish and had recently been introduced to the existence of smoked Camembert so decided this was the perfect chance to put it into action. The combination of a light filo tart, leek, a creamy filling and melted, lightly smoked Camembert was an absolute winner! (see below for the recipe)…

Kandula’s signature tea is their Pink Ceylon, a unique green tea with a beautiful pink colour, which won a gold star in the Great taste Awards 2011. It’s a wondefully delicate tea, perfect with Portuguese style custard tarts…

The next tea, was definitely my favourite, the Earl Grey, which is complemented by anything fruity or citrussy. I had opted for my lemon drizzle cakes topped with lemon curd cream and blueberries…

and finally we matched the spicy Ebony Chai with my ginger chocolate shortbread topped with dark chocolate ganache and cristallized ginger…

It was a real treat for me to work on this event and in such a lovely location. I hope to do more in the future.

Now, without further ado, here’s the recipe for my delicious leek and smoked Camembert filo tarts…

You will need…

1 tbsp vegetable oil

2 leeks, finely sliced (I always make sure I wash them well in a colander once sliced in case there is any dirt or grit trapped between the layers. Be sure to pat them dry with some kitchen towel though or your tarts will be soggy)

1 garlic clove, crushed

2 fresh thyme sprigs, leaves only

3 free range medium eggs

200ml double cream

100ml milk

1 packet ready made filo pastry

60g butter, melted

1 smoked Camembert* (you won’t need all of this but it’s so delicious I’m sure there are many other ways you can find to enjoy it! 🙂

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees.

This recipe will make 12 small tarts using a 12 hole muffin tin but it can also be used to make 1 large tart using a 20cm (8inch) pie tin.

To make the filling…

Heat the oil in a large frying pan and cook the leeks over a medium heat for 10 minutes until soft (but not too brown). Then add the garlic and thyme and cook for a few more minutes before removing from the heat and setting aside for later.

Mix together the eggs, cream and milk in a jug and season with salt and pepper.

Now to prepare the filo cases for the filling…

Brush each hole of the muffin tin with a thin coating of melted butter.

Take the filo pastry out of it’s wrapping and cut it into squares large enough to fit into the hole of a muffin tin and come right up the sides. Once you have a stack of small squares of pastry, take 1, brush it with melted butter and lay another square on top of it at a 45 degree angle. Repeat this again with another sheet and another until you have 4 squares lying on top of each other but slightly offset to create a spiky edge. Gently take the stack of pastry and push it into a hole of the muffin tin, being careful to push it into the edges without ripping it. Do this until you have filled all 12 holes.

Spoon some of the leek mixture into the bottom of each pastry case and then divide the liquid mixture between the tarts. Finally place a small square of smoked Camembert on top of each one and pop them in the oven for 25-30 minutes, keeping an eye on them to make sure the pastry doesn’t burn.

When they are done the pastry should be golden brown and the egg mixture set. Remove them from the oven. These can be enjoyed straight away or can be left to cool for a few minutes before removing them from the tin and leaving them to cool completely on a wire rack so they can be eaten cold…the perfect picnic food! I decided to warm mine through slightly just before serving.

*A quick note on smoked Camembert…if you’re Cambridge based, I know you can get smoked Camembert from River Farm Smokery, it’s also stocked in The Larder at Burwash Manor. If you are unable to find smoked, them normal Camembert would be delicious too or perhaps some Dolcelatte or Gorgonzola if you like a cheese that packs a punch!

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24/03/2013 · 10:42 am

My Afternoon Tease Cake Mobile…

I’ve spent the last week recovering from the fun and excitement, not to mention hard work, that was EAT Cambridge, hence the delay in this blog post…I’m hoping the ‘better late than never’ rule applies!

I thought it was time to reveal the identity of the mystery cake wagon for those of you who didn’t manage to make it down for a visit or see one of the #caketracker tweets. I’d already revealed my route (blog post here) and had been busy building up to my pop up cake shop on the penultimate day of the festival with great excitement. At 5am on the Saturday morning whilst making dough and frying 60 doughnuts the nerves finally kicked in!

But bang on schedule, at 10.30am, in the pouring rain, my Dad arrived in the cake mobile, we loaded it up with tasty treats and a menu (of course)…

and set off…

We parked up at my 1st stop, Riverside, and set up shop…

For those of you more into cars than cakes…he’s a 1960 Buick Invicta, shipped over from the States and he makes the perfect cake wagon! don’t you think?

Despite the less than perfect weather conditions, the cake lovers of Cambridge arrived for their fix…

The goodies on offer were (left to right) chocolate Guinness cake with cream cheese icing, paczki (Polish doughnuts with plum jam in the middle and a sugar glaze), peanut butter and white chocolate blondies, chocolate brownies and maple and pecan cake with maple syrup buttercream icing…

Bang on schedule we packed up shop and moved onto our 2nd location…the Gog Magog Hills Farm Shop. The weather had taken a turn for the worse but the lovely team at the Gogs let us pull up under the cover of their barn…

After another hour, and a quick pit stop for one of their gorgeous sausage rolls, we left the Gogs and headed to stop 3 in Hope Street Yard pulling up opposite Romsey Retro. By this time we’d had some practice and were pretty slick at setting up shop…

The pictures don’t show it but the sun even came out for us just before we moved onto our final stop in Newnham at the start of the walk across the fields to Grantchester Meadows.

It was an absolutely fantastic day and I’d like to say a huge thankyou to everyone who braved the weather, came and said hello and bought cake…it was great to meet so many cake lovers!

Another massive thankyou goes to my parents…my Dad, AKA my chauffeur for the day, Buick owner and amazing cake shop assistant paid purely in cake 🙂

And my Mum, who was called on for doughnut shaping and frying duty! It was a slightly fraught and emotional process but we nailed it together! 🙂

Also I’d like to thank the Gog Magog Hills Farm Shop team for letting me infiltrate their car park and Warren at Hope Street Yard for housing the cake mobile.

Finally, the biggest shout out goes to the coolest cake mobile in town…

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Tagged as baking, cake, cambridge, chocolate guinness cake, EAT Cambridge, pop up, pop up cake shop

10/03/2013 · 6:30 pm

Afternoon Tease pop-up cake shop on Saturday 16th March…locations revealed!

This year, March is all about one thing for me…EAT Cambridge, the new and very exciting food and drink festival has finally come to town! What’s not to love about a festival showcasing local, talented producers and independent cafes and restaurants, run by a team of people who are passionate about all of the above!?

Yesterday saw the Guildhall packed to the rafters with Cambridge’s food loving public and Miss Igs and I were lucky enough to feed 60 of them at our special Plate Lickers brunch…

EAT Cambridge has also given me the opportunity to put my thinking cap on and get chatting to people about how we could work together to get involved. I’m a complete glutton for punishment and when I get a chance to put some of the ideas that fizz around my head into action, there’s no stopping me, even if it looks like I may need to summon up some superhuman powers to get everything done 🙂

One such idea that I’ve been dying to unleash for a while is an Afternoon Tease pop up cake shop! The time has come to bring it to fruition and on Saturday 16th March I will be roaming the city, selling my tasty wares in a very special vehicle that will remain secret for the time being :).

I have, however, decided to share my route for the day with you, so that you can come and find me, say hello and enjoy some cake…a secret cake stall that’s so secret that it can’t be found would be rubbish wouldn’t it!?

So, without further ado, here is my route map for the day…

11am-12pm – First stop will be in the Riverside/Stourbridge common area.

12.30pm – 1.30pm – Next up the lovely team at the Gog Magog Hills Farm Shop are letting me infiltrate their car park.

2pm – 3pm – I will then be making a pit stop in Hope Street Yard on Mill Road.

3.30pm – 4.30pm – and finally I’ll be in Newnham, in the vicinity of Grantchester Meadows.

As you may know, I’m a complete social media addict and in the run up to Saturday (16th March – get it in your diaries) I will be tweeting and posting teasers of the treats that will be on sale. On the day I’ll be shouting out my exact location and leaking hints as to the true identity of my magic cake wagon :). You can follow me on Twitter @AfternoonTease and track me down by following the hashtag #caketracker or find me on Facebook here to receive updates.

I can’t wait for next weekend but for the time being here are a few treats to whet your appetite…

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27/02/2013 · 10:44 am

Rich chocolate, lemon and ginger baked cheesecake…

So, I have a few shocking admissions to make in this blog post…

I have never made a baked cheesecake (with the exception of my family favourite…Sernik na kruchym spodzie)
Not all of my cakes turn out well and I have a couple of ‘failed’ ones stashed in my freezer
I have a sister who doesn’t like cake! (I know, I know, how is that possible!)

All of the above are very relevant to the recipe that I am about to share with you. It’s one that was shared with me by my friend Adam and is one of his family favourites. I took a photo of the recipe about 2 years ago and it has been sitting on my computer just waiting to be given a whirl. My big sister just happened to have a birthday coming up, which gave me the perfect opportunity, because although she’s not a cake fan, she loves a good cheesecake!

So, here it is, a very rich, chocolate, lemon and ginger cheesecake…

I think the reason that I took so long to try it was that I’d got it into my head that it was a bit high maintenance as it needed baking in a bain marie and leaving in the fridge overnight. I was, however mistaken, and with the exception of having to be organised enough to make it the day before you need it, it was pretty darn simple!

To make chocolate, lemon & ginger cheesecake you will need…

For the base…

250g chocolate cake (my friend uses shop bought chocolate muffins)

100g unsalted butter, softened

For the cheesecake…

50g unsalted butter, softened

400g dark chocolate (I used 70%)

600g full fat cream cheese

160g caster sugar

1 tbsp vanilla sugar (if you have it, if not add a splash of vanilla extract and add an extra tbsp of normal sugar)

4 eggs

1 x 2/3cm piece of stem ginger, peeled and chopped finely

Zest of 1 lemon

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees and grease and line the bottom of a 20cm cake tin (a springform tin would be best but any tin with a removable base will do).

This is where I can elaborate more on point 2 above :). I recently set about making a red velvet cake and not having been able to find concentrated food colouring had opted for a supermarket own brand red food colouring (I don’t recommend this!). I ended up with a great tasting, but very brown, red velvet cake :(. I hate throwing perfectly good food away so I popped it in the freezer, hoping to re-use it in some way and this was my perfect opportunity.

To make the base, crumble the chocolate sponge into a large bowl. Mix the butter into the cake crumbs until it forms a paste. Then push it into the bottom of your prepared cake tin and level it out…

At this point you need to waterproof your tin as you will be cooking it in a tray of water. Simply wrap a single piece of foil (with no holes in 😉 around the base of your tin. It doesn’t need to come all the way up the sides just an inch or so.

Now for the filling. Break the chocolate into a glass bowl along with the butter and place over a saucepan of simmering water to melt.

Put the cream cheese, sugar(s) and eggs into a large bowl and beat until light and aerated. I used an electric hand mixer but a whisk and some good old elbow grease would work just as well.

Stir in the melted chocolate mixture, the chopped ginger and the lemon zest and stir until thoroughly incorporated…

Pour into the tin on top of your cake base and place on a baking tray. Pour some water into the baking tray making sure that the level of water doesn’t go above your foil waterproofing (1/2 cm is plenty) and carry to the oven very carefully, trying not to cause a tidal wave…if you’re more sensible than me, you should probably place the tin in the oven first and pour some water from your kettle into the tray 🙂

Bake for 1 hour. Don’t worry if it doesn’t look totally set, it’s meant to still be a bit wobbly in the centre.

Put it straight in the fridge (this stops the top cracking) and leave it there overnight. When you’re ready to serve, carefully remove it from the tin. I found that running a pallette knife lightly around the outside worked a treat.

And there you have it, chocolate, lemon and ginger baked cheesecake…

It was delicious and went down very well with my family and the birthday girl but everyone agreed that it was exceptionally rich and a small slice was definitely enough!

No birthday cake would be complete without a candle and I thought this one was particularly suitable…

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18/02/2013 · 9:21 am

Ma Barnard’s lemon drizzle loaf…

Last year my great friends Nic & Will got married (blog here) and as is the wont of mothers all over the world, Nic’s Mum turned up at the venue laden with a plethora of goodies that she’d been baking and freezing for months in preparation. It was safe to say that no one would be going hungry and I that I would be one very happy camper with that much cake around! 🙂 One of these home baked treats was an amazing tangy lemon drizzle loaf. I just couldn’t get enough of it and think I even managed a slice for breakfast. She was kind enough to share the recipe with me and now, to me, it will forever be called Ma Barnard’s lemon drizzle loaf…

It appears that I’m a bit of a butter purist and was a bit unsure about using marg, but having tasted the cake myself I knew that it worked very well in this recipe. On doing a little butter vs margerine research on t’internet I discovered this statement from Delia, the baking goddess herself…

Fats Flavour-wise it is said you can’t beat butter in baking. And certainly for purists that’s probably true – I see one leading chain store proudly advertises ‘made with all butter’ on its wrappings! My own opinion is that margarine – now it has improved so much in flavour – is very good for baking, and with the advent of soft margarine and the all-in-one method of making sponges I actually hardly ever use butter for baking. Very occasionally I use lard. Fats should usually be at room temperature for cake-making. Allow 1 hour to soften butter, block margarine and lard. Soft or whipped margarine can be used straight from the fridge (although in practice I usually allow half an hour at room temperature), but it is vital that any margarine that is high in polyunsaturated fats is always used straight from the fridge.

So with Delia’s words to reassure you, just give it a try and see what you think. But now over to the other baking goddess and in the words of Heather Barnard herself…

It is extremely easy to make, the most difficult part being grating the lemon! When the recipe says ‘put in a cold oven’ it means it! A warm oven will spoil it.

To make Ma Barnard’s lemon drizzle loaf you will need…

170g (6oz) Self Raising Flour

114g (4oz) Soft margarine

170g (6oz) Castor sugar

2 Eggs

4 tbsp Milk

Grated zest of 1 lemon

Topping: 114g (4oz) Icing sugar. Mixed well with the juice of the lemon

Simply…

Place all the ingredients in a bowl and mix well.

Put the mixture into a 2 lb loaf tin and place in a COLD oven on middle shelf. (Heather uses a liner for the tin, as she says it looks better and it allows the lemon topping to soak in more. I didn’t have a loaf tin liner so I greased and lined my with greaseproof paper).

Switch the oven on at 190 degrees (10 degrees less for a fan oven) and cook for approx. 50 mins. Test the loaf by inserting a skewer into the middle, if it comes out clean, it’s ready.

When you’re happy that it’s cooked to perfection, remove it from the oven and prick the top all over with a skewer.

Pour the topping slowly all over the cake, making sure that it goes down all the cracks and holes, and leave in the tin until cold. This not only acts as the delicious gooey ‘drizzle’ element of the cake but also leaves a gorgeous crunchy layer on top!…

Heather also told me that you can vary the recipe by using an orange or limes, but lemon is a firm fave in her house. She suggests making two at a time as they keep for up to a week and will freeze well. The ones at the wedding had previously been frozen and were delicious! I have been making this cake a lot recently and it works like a dream every single time!

Thank you Heather (AKA Ma Barnard)!