Roasted fresh figs can be used with a range of “creamy” desserts:
- Panna cotta
- Yoghurt
- Rice milk pudding
- Ice cream
or simply with a plain cake. The figs are beautiful, but so is the syrup they cooked in.
Feel welcome to add a liquor at the end of the roasting process. You could even consider doing a flambee!
In the photo, they are placed on top of a cake (we had eaten all the panna cottas), I prepared a new batch of figs the next day before taking the photos.
Ingredients
- A dozen of figs
- 50 g of butter (I use salted butter)
- 1 tbsp of honey
- ¼ cup of balsamic vinegar
Method
- Cut the figs in half from lengthway
- Melt the butter in a non-stick fry-pan.
- Place all the figs side to side face down.
- After one minute, add the honey over the figs and the balsamic vinegar
- Spoon the juice over the top
- Switch off the fire when the figs are tender and most of the liquid has evaporated.
Note: if you want to flamber the figs, this is just now! Pour about half a cup of a strong alcohol to the pan (white rhum for example), with the heat of the fry-pan, it will be warm almost instantly. Use a match to set on fire the pan (or your gas stove if you like it that way!).
Make this peach and frangipane tart before the peaches disappear for 10 month! I know, I often say so, but it is true: it is another classy easy to make dessert.
Small warning: use a bit of intuition on this recipe as I made the tart up on the moment and my quantities may need slight (not big) adjustments. I will try to do it again soon and will edit as required.
Serves 8.
Ingredients
Pastry:
- 120 g of plain white flour
- 50 g of melted butter (I use salted butter)
- ½ cup of cold water
Frangipane custard
- 3 eggs whole
- ½ L of milk
- 50 g of plain flour
- 30 g of white sugar
- 1 to 1 ½ cup of almond meal
Note: the amount of sugar may seem small to you, it is by design. We don’t want the frangipane custard to overpower the sweetness of the peaches. The peaches are the heroes of the dish!
Tart assembly
- 5 peaches cut in small quarters (roughly 12 pieces per peach), skin on
- A handful of rosemary leaves
- ½ cup of good quality apricot jam.
Method
Shortcrust pastry:
- Place all ingredients together and combine. You need to be careful here not to mix and not to work the dough but only to combine it all. Add a few drops of water at the time if necessary. Make a ball, cover loosely for ½ hour, let it rest. If the dough is too sticky add a spoon of flour or two.
- When the dough has rested, roll the dough to the size of the tart shell you are using. Transfer the dough to the tart shell. Roll the rolling pin over the edge to trim excesses. With a fork, make marks over the whole bottom and blind bake until slightly golden. You can use blind baking balls if you have some (don’t forget to place a piece of baking paper between the dough and the baking stones, I forgot once and learnt a lesson!).
Frangipane custard:
Basically a custard with added almond meal.
Heat up the sugar and milk until almost boiling, in the meanwhile beat the eggs and flour together. When the milk is hot, insert while mixing to the egg mix and return to the stove until it thickens. Make sure the mix does not boil. It should take up to 5 minutes (depending how hot is the heat). Once you have obtained a thick custard remove from the heat and add the almond meal. You want a thick spreadable consistency but not runny. It will thicken a little more when cooling down.
Tart assembly:
In the blind baked shell, place the frangipane custard at the bottom. Then, starting by the outer ring, place peaches pieces in a circle. Depending on your tin diameter and the size of the peaches, you may be able to do a full second ring or use the peaches in the other direction for the inner ring (as in the photo).
Bake on 180°C until the pastry is well golden. Once the peach and frangipane tart has cooled down, transfer to the serving dish. Heat up the jam and with a brush “paint” jam all over the peaches and exposed custard an on the inner part of the pastry shell. Place the rosemary leaves randomly over the tart.
A 4 minute chocolate mousse cake?
Yes! This is a chocolate mousse cake baked in 4 minutes in a traditionnal oven (fan-forced). It is rather strong in chocolate, so you don’t need much, but the first mouthful was Waho! I would not do it too often because it is rather strong, but will definitely do it again.
I rediscovered this recipe in some magazine clips I had not touched for a while. My clip does not say where it comes from.
You need 10 minutes to prepare and 4 minutes to bake it!
Ingredients:
- 180 g of dark cooking chocolate 60 % cocoa minimum
- 50 g butter
- 30 g flour
- 30 g caster sugar
- 3 eggs separated
Choose a mould not too wide, mine is about 18 cm diameter, closer to 15 cm would be better aesthetically.
Method:
- First, preheat the oven to 240°C
- Melt the chocolate together with the butter either in bain marie or in the microwave
- In the meanwhile, beat with a large whisk the egg yolks and sugar until light and moussy
- Add the melted chocolate and butter
- Then, add the flour
- Bring the eggwhite to snow and fold in carefully.
- Butter and flour the tin. Pour the mix in gently. Bake for 4 minutes. You want a thin crust on the outside and a moist middle. By the way, the recipe says, do not bake for more than an extra minute, the oven does not make so much difference.
- Cool down in the tin before unmoulding and placing on a plate.
- Dust with cocoa and/or icing sugar
- Serve with cream.
This is my recipe of the cherry clafoutis. I tried a few recipes to get there: too sweet, too thin, too bland, too much juice lost…The “traditional” clafoutis recipe contains milk, egg, sugar and flour and critically cherries with pits ON!!!
My version is slightly different to the “traditional recipe” in that I have added a little tanginess (yoghurt) to pair with the taste of the cherry. I also choose to keep the pits (this is subject to many discussions in the cooking world. Check my post if you want to know more!
Before we start, a few tips:
Tip: Plan a dish in which your batter will be 4 to 5 cm thick when pouring the preparation over the fruits (or you don’t get that moist middle)
Tip: the clafoutis rises during baking, so have a couple of centimetres of free board (it will deflate when taken out of the oven).
Serves 4
For info, my dish was 17 x 17 cm
Ingredients:
- 300 g of fresh cherries,with pits and stems (remove the stems if you do not fancy them)
- 2 large eggs
- 40 g white sugar
- 50 g plain flour
- 1/2 tsp vanilla essence
- 1/4 cup of milk (50 cl)
- 1/4 cup of cream (60 g)
- 1/2 cup of plain greek yogurt (120 g)
- a nut of butter (for the dish)
Method:
- Butter and flour your dish
- Preheat the oven on 170°C.
- Place the fruits (with pits and stems) at the bottom of the dish.
- Mix the eggs and sugar together, ass the milk, cream, vanilla and yogurt. Combine
- Add the flour
- Poiur the batter over the fruits trying to keep the stems going upwards
- Bake for 30 minutes or until golden brown.
- Remove from the oven and allow to cool until serving wrm or cold.
It keeps well at room temperature or in the fridge for a couple days.
This chocolate version of the galette des rois works a wonder. Kids and adults love it and it is so easy to make. Seriously! (as my 7 y. o says all the time).
The principle is the same than the traditional creme frangipane one: 2 layers of puff pastry with an almond base cream filling (creme frangipane) in the midle and a little “feve” (a piece of ceramic about 1 cm long) hidden in the filling.
I know, it looks I bought it at the bakery! No, I needed somewhere to store it safely and had some spare boxes.
Serves 8
Ingredients:
- 400 g of puff pastry (better if butter puff pastry, in Australia, Careme provides a ready-made one and can be found in deli shops, if you want a recipe, here is my puff pastry recipe, I make it all the time now!
- 100 g of caster sugar
- 150 g of good quality dark cooking chocolate
- 1 egg
- 100 g of almond meal
- 25 g of butter, melted
- 2 tablespoon of milk
- 1 egg yolk
- 1 feve (if you don’t have any, use a large ceramic button or a shell)
Method:
- For the filling: melt the chocolate with 2 tablespoon of milk. Once melted, add the egg, sugar, almond meal and melted butter. Mix well.
- Preheat the oven to 170ºC
- In a small bowl, mix the egg yolk with 2 tablespoon of milk or water to make an eggwash, you will use it to assemble the galette and brush it before baking.
- Divide the pastry in the pieces and using a rolling pin and a little flour, prepare two disks of 25 cm diameter.
- Cover a baking sheet with baking paper and place the first disk on it. Pour the filling and spread evenly leaving a 1.5 cm border all around. Place the feve in the garnish but not right in the middle (or you will for sure cut right through it when serving)
- Using a small sharp knife, score the exposed pastry and brush with eggwash. Place the second disk over the top. With your thumb press the two disks edges together regularly moving your thumb around the edges. Use the sharp knife to score the top with lines making diamond shape or square shape patterns. Brush generously with eggwash and bake until golden brown for about 30 minutes. Remove from the oven and cool down. It can be eaten slightly wam or at room temperature. Do not place in the fridge!
And by the way the one with the feve in its piece is the king/queen and has to choose a queen/king!
Think how refreshing lime and yoghurt can be on a hot day. Combine the two in a cheesecake and this is it, or almost. This recipe is inspired from a recipe given to me by a Japanese flatmate in Bondi Beach years ago! I have changed it to adapt to what I had available handy when I made it as it was cot planned at all.
You need to make it a day ahead. You will need a 20 cm diameter springform mould. This recipe is quite versatile and you an adapt it to your taste (more or less lime, less sugar, another coulis, more yogurt and less cream, a pistachio crumb base…). I did not make the coulis on purpose, it is more like I was trying to empty the freezer and I had a container of frozen strawberry coulis in my freezer.
Serves 8
Preparation – 20 min
Settling in fridge – 15 h +
Ingredients:
The base
- 100 g of lady’s finger biscuits (also called savoiardi – the same as for tiramisu)
- 70 g of butter – soft
- 1/2 teaspoon of salt
- no need for sugar, there is already some in the biscuits, it is sufficient
The top
- 5 g of powder gelatin (1 heaped teaspoon)
- 4 limes
- 60 g caster sugar
- 250 g yogurt
- 150 mL of cream
- 1 cup of milk
Method:
- Grate the limes, squeeze the juice.
- Heat up 1 cup of milk (don’t boil) and dissolved the powdered getatin in it (let it dissolved then stir until fully dissolved).
- In a large bowl, combine yogurt, cream, lime, sugar, lime rind.
- Add milk with gelatin and remaining milk to the mix. Cool down at room temperature.
- In the meanwhile, butter and line with baking paper the bottom of your tin making sure the baking paper sticks out between the base and wall of the tin (it helps when removing the cheesecake, feel free to use another method if you prefer),
- Using a food processor, bring the lady finger biscuits to crumbs, mix with the soft butter and the salt.
- Spread all over the base and with your hand press firmly to form a uniform base for your cheesecake. No walls needed here.
- Pour the liquid mix in the tin.
- Cover with cell wrap and place in the fridge for a minimum of 12 hours.
- Before serving, unmould and place the cheesecake in a large serving dish. Spoon a couple of spoons of the coulis on the top then gently pour around the cake the bright coloured coulis. Add further lime rind (optional).
This raspberry and lime Christmas log (or buche de Noel) is a light and refreshing dessert for the Christmas period. Perfect for Christmas under the sun! Bookmark the recipe for the bavarois recipe which you can do on its own served with red berries.
The bavarois of this recipe must be prepared a day ahead.
Concept
- A core of raspeberry bavarois
- A blanket of mascarpone&lime
- A macadamia crumble
Ingredients
For the bavarois:
- 300 g of frozen raspberry
- 3 small egg yolks
- 250 ml of milk
- 130 ml of cream
- 110 g of caster sugar
- 4 gelatine leaves (I used the ones from the supermarket)
For the m and lime blanket:
- 500 g of mascarpone
- 100 ml of cream
- rind of 1 lime
- juice of 1 lime
- 1/2 cup icing sugar
- 2 egg yolks
For the nut crumble:
- 10 macadamia (raw)
- 30 g soft butter
- 1 pinch of salt if the butter is unsalted (otherwise, omit)
- 2 generous tbsp plain flour
- 1 tbsp white sugar
Method:
Raspberry Bavarois
- Prepare your mould. I used a cake loaf as a general support, buttered and blanketed in cell wrap, a sheet of flexible cardboard (buttered and covered in cell wrap) and curved as a semi-cylinder.
- Mix sugar and egg yolks until pale and creamy, add a little of the milk to make slightly more liquid.
- Place the gelatine leaves in a bowl of cold water.
- In the meanwhile, heat up the rest of the milk to boiling point.
- While the milk is warming up, place the frozen raspberry in the microwave for 1 minute (full power), then blend in the blender to obtain a juice. The raspberry juice will still be cold.
- While whisking, add the hot milk to the egg-sugar mix, mix well. Transfer to the saucepan and on a medium heat, mix continuously until it thickens. The custard MUST NOT boil.
- Remove from the fire and transfer in a bowl
- Squeeze the water out of the gelatine and mix the gelatine until fully dissolved with the warm custard.
- Add the raspberry juice, mix well.
- Whip the cream to soft peaks and mix in gently to the custard mix either using a large
wisk or a silicone spatula.
- Pour into the tin, cover with cell wrap and place in the fridge at least 15 h prior to decorating.
Tip: For the custard, you will know it is ready when a spoon placed in the saucepan comes out with the custard covering/blanketing the back of a spoon (not runny).
Mascarpone & lime blanket
- Place all the ingredient in a stand mixer or large bowl.
- Whisk until smooth and fluffy.
Nut crumble:
- Whiz all ingredients in a small food processor.
- Place on a piece of baking paper on a baking tray.
- Toast under the oven grill until lightly coloured, toss around, place again under the grill until you get a nice brown colour. Be carefull, when it starts toasting, the colour changes quickly.
- Remove from the oven, cool down, and store in a bowl or airtight container until required.
Assembly:
- Unmold the bavarois by turning it straight onto the serving dish.
- Prepare the lime & mascarpone blanket and using a spatula, gently spread on the sides and ends. Using a fork, make patterns.
- Dust more lime rind all over, place a few mint leaves and some cocoa nibs.
- Place the crumble all around.
- Keep in the fridge until ready to serve.
This recipe for dark chocolate and salted caramel truffles is adapted from the Larousse du Chocolat (Pierre Herme).
Makes about 80 truffles
Ingredients:
- 480 g of dark cooking chocolate (55 % cocoa minimum)
- 260 mL of thickened cream (or plain cream, i.e. you don’t want the ones with the gelatin in them)
- For the caramel: 190 g of caster sugar and 40 g of salted butter
- Dutch cocoa for dusting
Method:
- Cut the chocolate in small pieces with a large knife (not required if using drops or small pellets)and place in a large bowl.
- In a thick bottom saucepan, heat up the sugar with 1 tablespoon of water. When the sugar starts to melt (and anytime through the caramel making process), do not stir with a spoon, whisk or any tool. Shake the saucepan if you want to distribute the colouring process.
- In the meanwhile, bring the cream to the boil (stop it at the first sign of boiling).
- When the caramel has reached a dark and rich colour, add the butter. From now on you can use a whisk or wooden spoon. Be very careful of splashing, caramel can burn a lot. Add the cream, mix for a minute of so.
- Pour over the chocolate and mix until you obtain a smooth ganache.
- Transfer in a container (rectangular take away boxes are pretty good for that) over a thickness of 1.5 cm. You may need 2 boxes.
- Close the box and refrigerate for 3-4 hours or until firm.
- Turn the box and unmold over a chopping board. Cut strips 1.5 cm apart, then in the other direction.
- Roll each cube in a ball using your fingers and palms of your hands
- Roll in dutch cocoa. Store in an airtight container in the fridge until serving. The truffles can stay at room temperature or a few hours.
These kids chocolate truffles is a must try (and adopt!). Chocolate truffles can be a bit bitter for children when coated with cocoa. Well, just change the coating! Here we used 100s & 1000s. Great result! My daughter initiated it for the school end of year class party.
Making chocolate truffles is a great activity for kids and they can pretty much do it all on their own. Oh yes, they will love getting their hands dirty for rolling the chocolate in small balls! You may need a few “no licking the fingers” rules there!
This recipe makes about 30.
Ingredients
Use a good quality chocolate, a couverture chocolate is even better but you can also use a compound dark cooking chocolate, it will still be delicious.
- 330 g of dark chocolate 70% cocoa
- 25 cl (250 ml) of cream
- 50 g of good quality soft butter (real butter please, no substitute here)
- a pack of hundreds&thousands or other small size sugar coloured decoration.
Tip: you can always use the mortar or food processor to further reduce the size of the pieces if to long.
Method:
- Cut the chocolate in small pieces with a large knife, place in a bowl.
- Boil the cream in a saucepan
- Pour the cream on top of the chocolate, cover for one minute then mix well until all the chocolate is melted.
- Add the butter, mix well. Place in a shallow container (aim at 1.5 cm thickness of chocolate) and refrigerate for 2 hours minimum until firm.
- When ready to shape the truffles, you have 2 options:
- Either use a teaspoon, scoop out the equivalent of a macadamia nut (for those who don’t know macadamia, it is between a walnut and a hazelnut). Roll in your hands to form a ball
- Reverse the chocolate preparation on a chopping board, cut stripes 1.5 cm thick, repeat in the other directions to obtain cubes and roll each cube in a ball
- Transfer the balls to a large based plate with 100 & 1000s and roll them until coated (different techniques below).
7. Transfer to a storage box and keep in the fridge until you ready to serve. The truffles can remain at room temperature for some time, it all depends on the temperature.
This recipe makes about 50 truffles. The name refers to the likeness to the highly prized truffles grown in the earth and used in refined cooking. Those chocolate truffles are easy to make and just delicious. They keep for a couple of weeks. Make sure you use a good quality chocolate,
Ingredients:
- 330 g of dark chocolate 70% cocoa
- 25 cl (250 ml) of cream
- 50 g of good quality soft butter (real butter please, no substitute here)
- Cocoa for rolling (I like using dutch cocoa)
Method
- Cut the chocolate in small pieces with a large knife, place in a bowl.
- Boil the cream in a saucepan
- Pour the cream on top of the chocolate, cover for one minute then mix well until all the chocolate is melted.
- Add the butter, mix well. Place in a shallow container and refrigerate for 2 hours minimum until firm.
- When ready to shape the truffles, put a tablespoon of cocoa in a soup plate or large bottom bowl. With a teaspoon, scoop out the equivalent of a macadamia nut (for those who don’t know macadamia, it is between a walnut and an hazelnut). Roll in your hands to form a ball, then place in the cocoa and move the bowl around or roll the truffles with your finger tips.
- Transfer to a serving plate or storage container.
This recipe of truffles does not have eggs, it will keep in the fridge for over a week. You may find they disappear before!
Tip: If you are using couverture chocolate, you need to be a bit more careful when doing the ganache to prevent splitting when adding the butter. you may want to melt 2/3 of the chocolate first, then the next 1/3 to the mix. If the ganache splits, warm it up slowly mixing until it comes back together.
A chocolate and raspberry tart! Miam! It also has a balsamic vinegar finish. The raspberries are not only on top but also mixed with chocolate.
This recipe is one from Pierre Herme’s book “Le Larousse du Chocolat”. Recipes in the book are not necessarily Pierre Herme’s own recipes but have been selected by him across his professional and personal network.
This is the case for this one, it comes from a Patisserie in Strasbourg, in Eastern France, and is by Thierry Mulhaupt.
Ingredients:
For the pastry:
- 1/2 tsp vanilla powder
- 150 g soft butter
- 95 g icing sugar
- 250 g of flour
- 2 pinch of salt (except if using salted butter)
- 1 egg
- 30 g of almond meal
This will make 600 g of pastry. You only need a bit more than half. Keep the rest for another dessert, it will keep in the fridge a few days.
For the filling:
- 20 cl of thickened cream or liquid creme fraiche
- 250 g of raspberries
- 270 g of dark cooking chocolate (64%)
- 70 g of soft (NOT MELTED!!) butter
For the garnishing:
- 150 g of raspberries (fresh)
- balsamic vinegar
Method
- Mix all the pastry ingredients without working the dough. That is combined them quickly. Place in cell wrap and rest in the fridge for at least 2 hours.
- Use a 22 cm diameter tart tin. Butter it. Roll the pastry about 4 mm thick. transfer to the tin. Trim the edges. Pick the bottom of the pastry with a fork (this prevent air bubbles forming during cooking).
- Place the dish (with the pastry ready to bake) in the fridge for half an hour before baking. Preheat the oven to 180°C.
- Place a piece of baking paper at the bottom of your tart, add baking stones (or beans or rice). Bake for 17 minutes or so (depending on the oven). Remove from the oven and remove the baking stones. Cool down the tart base on a cooling rack (handle gently, it is fragile).
- To prepare the garnishing, juice the raspberry through a sieve. Cut the chocolate in small chunks. Heat up the juice, heat up the cream to boiling point. Place hot cream and juice on top of the chocolate. Mix until melted. Add the soft butter and mix until fully incorporated.
- Place your tart shell on the serving plate. Pour in the chocolate mix, it will level on its own.
- Use the garnishing raspberries to place on top pushing a few down, little hole up.
- Fill those raspberries with balsamic vinegar using a little spoon.
The gateau au chocolat de Suzy takes its name from the woman who created this chocolate cake, called “Suzanne”. The recipe was published in the “Larousse du Chocolat” from Pierre Herme.
This recipe is pretty easy. There is not need to know how to separate and fold eggwhites, really simple! The cake is delicious and quite chocolaty but not so much that children cannot have it.
Difficulty: Easy
Preparation time: 10 min
Cooking: 30 min
Serves 8
Ingredients:
- 250 g of dark cooking chocolate at 60-64 % (or a combination of 70% and 50% or just go for 70%)
- 250 g of salted butter + a little bit to prepare the mould
- 4 eggs
- 220 g of caster sugar
- 70 g of plain flour + a little more for the mould
Note: The ingredients include butter and flour to prepare the mould, which works really well with this cake. If you prefer lining your mould with baking paper (sometimes much safer), you will not need the extra flour. If you are using a silicone mould, there is no need to butter and flour your tin or to line it.
Tip: you must use a good chocolate, in Australia you can find the Nestle Plaistowe in about all supermarkets (they have 50 % and 70%).
Method:
- Preheat the oven on 180°C
- Break the chocolate in pieces and melt with the butter over a bain marie or other method of your choice. You can microwave full power on 1 minute and then per 30 seconds if not sufficient.
- In a bowl, whisk the eggs and sugar together until pale and fluffy. Make sure you give a good whisking, you can even get out your kitchenAid or similar here.Tip: if using a whisk, use a large one, it will be much easier and quicker to get a fluffy pale creamy mix.
- Add the melted chocolate-butter mix. Mix in the flour.
- Butter and flour a 22 cm round tin (or similar size). Alternatively, you can choose to line the tin with baking paper on the base and butter&flour the sides.
- Pour the batter in the tin and bake for about 30 min (this will change slightly depending on the oven and the diameter of your tin). The cake is cooked when a skewer inserted through the center comes out dry (there may be bit of chocolate on it, the cake is cooked as long as it is not liquid) or when there is no more wobble when you place your hand over the center of the cake and gently move the top.
- Cool down on a grid: slide it if you are using a pull apart tin or turn it over twice gently so the bottom part is on the grid. If you are using a silicone mould, leave it to cool in it.
