Honeycomb Crunchies

I found the recipe for these in a Good Food magazine I was reading at my mother-in-laws house last week during a few days holiday back home in Devon. I liked the look of them and found the recipe on line on the BBC website which you can find here (it's a Mary Berry one from the Great British Bake Off for Comic Relief). I've never made honeycomb before and was a little apprehensive to say the least. I didn't fancy ruining any of our saucepans! It was actually surprisingly easy especially as I received a sugar thermometer in the post yesterday as a birthday present (thanks Dot and Martin!) which would help with getting the mixture to the right temperature. They have a crunchy texture and my husband has just given them his seal of approval so I would definitely recommend.

Some tips on making the honeycomb...
There are lots of different recipes around online for making honeycomb including a Nigella Lawson one (she calls hers Hokey Pokey). The most useful one I found was a blog post by Ruth Clemens (of Great British Bake Off fame) which you can read here. If you don't follow or read her blog 'The Pink Whisk' I would highly recommend checking it out. Ruth takes you through the process step by step. The most useful pieces of advice I found were to use a cardboard box to set your honeycomb (the cardboard allows it to cool more quickly) and to make sure you use a good quality silicone coated baking paper rather than greaseproof paper (I used Tesco's). Also make sure that when you pour your honeycomb into your box you don't use a spoon or spatula as this will knock the air out of it and you will lose the bubbles. A final word of advice - make sure you soak your pan quickly as otherwise you will end up with honeycomb stuck to your saucepan. If you do get any bits left over, boil a kettle and pour this over and you should be able to remove any stubborn bits.

Ingredients

For the honeycomb
1 tsp bicarboante of soda
75g caster sugar
2 tbsp golden syrup

To assemble
250g dark or milk chocolate, or a mixture (I used dark)
100g unsalted butter
2 tbsp golden syrup
150g digestive biscuits

Method
1) Begin by preparing your cereal box (you can use a shoe box or cereal packet - I used a cereal packet). Cut off one of the large sides and tape together the corners to make sure it holds together. Line it with a double layer of non-stick baking paper, making sure you have a good overhang along the long edges.

2) Measure and sieve the bicarbonate of soda into a dish ready for when you will need it. Make sure you have a wire whisk ready as well. Put the sugar and golden syrup into a saucepan and set it on a very low heat. Warm gently ready for 10 minutes until all the sugar has melted, stirring occasionally with a wooden spoon. (I found I needed to add a couple of tablespoons of water to help the sugar melt). You'll know when it's dissolved as you won't be able to feel the grains of sugar in the bottom of the pan with your spoon.
3) When the sugar is completely melted, turn the heat up to medium. Once the mixture has started to boil, leave to bubble without stirring. If your using a sugar thermometer the mixture needs to reach 145C - if you're not you will need to leave it for around 10 minutes until it turns golden-brown.
4) Turn off the heat under the pan. Add the bicarbonate of soda and quickly whisk it in for a couple of seconds until it is fully incorporated. The mixture will froth up - take care as it is extremely hot!
5) Quickly pour it into the middle of your lined cardboard box. Don't touch it or spread it out on the tray. Leave it to cool and harden, which will take about 30 minutes.

6) Line a square 20.5cm tin with baking paper. Break the chocolate into small pieces. Put them in a heatproof bowl and add the butter and golden syrup. Melt gently, over a pan of hot water, stirring it occasionally. When the chocolate mixture is smooth, carefully lift the bowl of the pan and place on a heatproof surface.
7) Put the biscuits into a plastic food bag and use the rolling pic to break them up into chunks the size of your thumbnail. (We didn't have any food bags so I put the biscuits in a bowl). Break the honeycomb into chunks roughly the same size (I found a rolling pin didn't really work so did this by hand).

8) Add the biscuits and honeycomb to the melted chocolate and mix well so all the chunks are coated.

9) Scoop the mixture into your lined tine and spread it evenly, right into the corners. Cover with cling film, then chill in the fridge for about two hours, or until firm and set.

 10) Cut into 16 squares with a sharp knife. Store, tightly covered, in the fridge and eat within two days.

Enjoy! Happy baking! 

Pav-tastic - Mary Berry's Lemon Pavlova

We were invited to Sunday lunch today at our friend's house (thanks Simon and Louisa!) and I offered to make dessert. I'm normally a cheesecake kinda girl but decided to opt for something a little bit different. I'd seen a Mary Berry recipe for a lemon pavlova that featured on the Easter Great British Bake Off Masterclass special. Now I will admit that despite my love of baking I have:
a) Never made a Mary Berry recipe (shocking I know)
b) Never made a pavlova or anything remotely meringue based
so I have to say I was a little worried yesterday afternoon that it would all go a little bit pear-shaped but I'm happy to say it was all OK in the end.

You can find the recipe here. It's meant to be an Easter pavlova but I decided to leave out the chocolate mini eggs as we're now past the Easter weekend.

The ingredients are pretty basic:

For the meringue:
6 free-range egg whites
350g caster sugar
2 tsp white wine vinegar (I didn't have any so improvised with 2 tsp of lemon juice)
2 level tsp cornflour

For the lemon curd filling:
6 free-range egg yolks
350g caster sugar
4 lemons (I only used 3 and it still tasted lemony enough)
225g butter
450ml double cream (I only used 300ml and found this to be plenty)

For the candied lemon peel:
100g caster sugar (plus extra for coating)
4 lemons, zest only (in long thin strips - as above I only used 3)

Method: 
1. Preheat the oven to 160C/325F/Gas 3. Lay a piece of baking paper on a baking tray and draw a 25cm/10in circle on it.
2. Put the egg whites into a bowl and whisk on the fastest speed with an electric hand-whisk or in a free-standing mixer until stiff (it takes a while and you need to be patient. I wouldn't recommend whisking by hand!) Gradually, still whisking on maximum speed, add generous teaspoons of sugar until the mixture is stiff and shiny and stands in peaks.
3. Blend the vinegar and cornflour together (as I mentioned in the ingredients I used 2 tsp of lemon juice instead) in a cup and mix until smooth. Stir this into the meringue mixture. Your mixture should then look a little bit like this:

4. Spread half the meringue mixture onto the paper to fit the 25cm/10in circle. Fill a piping bag, fitted with a rose nozzle, with the rest of the meringue mixture. Carefully pipe about 10 separate little nests positioned equally around the edge of the circle (I only piped 8 and as I wasn't going to use the eggs I went for peaks rather than nests. It should then look a little bit like this...

5. Slide the meringue into the middle of the oven, turn the heat down to 150C/300F/Gas 2 and bake for 1 1/2 - 2 hours (checking after one hour), or until it easily comes off the paper (mine only needed 1 1/4 hours). The pavlova will be a pale creamy colour rather than white (something a little bit like this...)

As you can see I had some major cracking issues - but as this is the first time I've made a pavlova it's something for me to work on!

6. Meanwhile you need to make the lemon curd for the filling. In theory and according to the recipe you are meant to place a heatproof bowl over a pan of hot water that is simmering gently on a stove/hob. You add the egg yolks, sugar and lemon juice to the bowl and whisk. Gradually add the butter, whisking continually until it starts to thicken. It should coat the back of a spoon when it reaches the correct consistency and will firm up further once cooled. This is how it looks before heating...

Now this is where it all went wrong. After half an hour of whisking my lemon curd was still the same consistency as at the start and was not looking like it was going to thicken at any point. After a little Internet research I decided to give microwaving a go. I'd read that 1 minute intervals followed by whisking was recommended. After about 4 minutes in the microwave I eventually had something that resembled lemon curd (in hindsight I think I underestimated just how much it would thicken and could probably only have microwaved it for 3 minutes.)

7. Whisk the double cream in a large bowl, until thickened, then swirl it through the cooled lemon curd. (I failed here too - my lemon curd thickened beyond belief so instead of swirling I had to mix it altogether so lost any swirling effect. I'm sure it still has the same taste!) I also didn't use all the lemon curd as it makes a lot. Instead I will be enjoying it on toast for my breakfast!

8. Spoon the lemon curd and cream mixture into the middle of the pavlova and spread over the base of the meringue nest.

9. To make the candied lemon peel for the top you put 100ml water and the caster sugar in a pan. Bring to the boil, stirring. Add the zest and boil for 2-3 minutes, or until syrupy. Drain on parchment paper, roll in extra caster sugar and leave to dry in a warm place for a couple of hours, or overnight.

My finished pavlova ended up looking like this...(as you can see the cracks ended up getting a lot worse!) I can highly recommend it - despite looking a bit monstrous it was in fact surprisingly light.

I will definitely try making another pavlova in the future.

Happy baking!