Dulce & banana cake

I received Lorraine Pascale's 'Fast, Fresh and Easy Food' as a Christmas present from Mr Birdie. One of the recipes that caught my eye was this 'Dulce & banana cake' which is an upside down banana cake with a sticky toffee topping. I am a big fan of banana cake and had been keen to try making it. This weekend gave me the opportunity to try it out as we had a training day at work today and I thought it would make a good break time snack. It was definitely well received and kept our brains going. It works well cold as a cake or warm as a dessert with cream or ice cream. You can find the recipe here on the BBC website. You will need a 20cm square tin.

Ingredients:

Sticky topping
50g butter
50g soft light brown sugar

Sponge
50g pecan nuts (optional)
150g butter (softened)
175g soft brown sugar
4 medium eggs (at room temperature)
1/2 vanilla pod (I used a couple of drops of vanilla extract)
100g self-raising flour
75g wholemeal flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
3 teaspoons ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 tablespoon treacle
Pinch of salt

2 small bananas (firm)
1 tablespoon Calvados (optional - I didn't have any so didn't use this)

Method:
1) Preheat the oven to 180C/160C Fan/350F/Gas 4. Grease and line a 20cm square tin with baking parchment and grease again.
2) Start by making the sticky topping. Place the butter and soft light brown sugar in a small pan over a medium heat. Once the butter has melted, turn up the heat and let the mixture bubble away for a few minutes until it starts to thicken. Make sure you stir it frequently so it doesn't catch.

Pour the mixture into the bottom of your lined tin and tip it back and forth so that the mixture spreads out. (You need to do this now as the mixture will solidify.)

3) If using the pecan nuts, tip them onto a baking tray and toast them in the oven. After 5 minutes remove them from the oven and set aside to cool.

4) To make the sponge mixture, cream together the butter and sugar in a large bowl using a hand-held whisk or freestanding mixer until the mixture becomes lighter in colour.

Add the eggs one at a time, beating well between each addition.

If using the vanilla pod, split it open, scrape the seeds out and add (or alternatively add the vanilla extract).Then fold in both flours, the baking powder, ginger, cinnamon, treacle and salt and set aside.

5) Slice the bananas into 5mm thick pieces. Arrange them in a single layer in the bottom of the tin (I lined mine up but you can arrange them however you want.) Pack them in tightly and drizzle over the Calvados if using.

6) Roughly chop the pecans and stir them through the cake mix.

7) Carefully dollop the cake mix over the bananas and gently spread it out with the back of a spoon or a palette knife, levelling the top. Then place in the oven and cook for 35-45 minutes.

8) After the cake has been cooking for 35 minutes, remove it from the oven and insert a metal skewer into the centre. It should come out clean, if not put back in for another 5 minutes until cooked.
9) Once the cake is cooked, remove it from the oven and leave it to cool for 10 minutes.

Then put a large flat plate over the top of the tin, and holding the tin and the plate, flip the whole lot over so that the tin is now upside down. Gently remove the tin and peel off the baking parchment to reveal the cake.

10) Cut into squares and serve warm or cold. Enjoy with your choice of accompaniment (crème anglaise, softly whipped cream or ice cream.)

Mixed Berry Plaited Pie

I will start today's post with a confession. I am a hoarder. I find it difficult to throw things away. In the process of moving I have had to address this (well I like to think I have addressed it!) Whilst packing I have had to sort through many food magazines. At various points over the last few years I have had subscriptions to Delicious, Good Food and Olive and had kept them all. My husband was not going to let me pack up and move boxes of magazines but I didn't want to throw them away. The solution to my reluctance to throw these away - to rip out all the recipes I liked the look of or thought I might like to make one day in the future. I now have a lever arch folder fit to burst with recipes. It was when I was ripping and filing that I spotted this recipe. I am a bit obsessed with blackberry recipes at the moment and this not only contained blackberries but also looked pretty impressive.

This is an Olive recipe that you can find on the BBC Good Food website here. It is a cross between a pie (it has a pastry base and pastry twists on top) and a cake. It is very easy to prepare as you make both the base and filling in a food processor (I didn't even bother washing it out!)

Ingredients:

100g butter (softened)
2 tablespoons golden caster sugar (plus extra for dusting)
200g plain flour
1 egg (beaten)
1 x 375g pack ready-rolled shortcrust pastry
plain flour (for dusting)

Filling:
150g butter (softened)
150g golden caster sugar
50g ground almonds
3 eggs
150g self-raising flour
250g mixed berries (I used raspberries, blueberries and blackberries)

Method:
1) Heat the oven to 180C/Fan 160C/Gas 4 and line the base of a brownie tin approximately 20cm x 30cm (I used a roasting tin slightly larger than this and it was fine). In a food processor whizz together the butter, sugar and flour until it resembles fine breadcrumbs.

Add the egg and whizz until it looks like coarse breadcrumbs.

Tip into the tin and press firmly to make an even layer (I struggled at this point - so much so my husband said I would never survive on the Great British Bake Off! It was difficult to press the pastry so I had to take the paper out of the tin and roll the pastry using a rolling pin to roughly the right size before putting the paper back in the tin.)

Chill the pastry base while you make the filling.
2)  Whizz the butter and sugar in a food processor until combined.

Add the ground almonds, eggs and flour until smooth. Pour over the base and spread with the back of a spoon.
3) Scatter over the mixed berries to cover the top.

4) On a lightly dusted surface unroll the pastry and cut into 18 lengths (short strips rather than long).

Arrange half, spaced out on top of the fruit, twisting each strand on the diagonal. Then repeat with the remaining lengths but in the opposite direction. Trim the overhanging pastry. Sprinkle with extra sugar, about 2 tablespoons.

5) Bake for 40 minutes until light golden. Cool a little before removing from the tin. Serve warm.

Yee-ha! - Texas Sheet Cake

As I've mentioned previously most of my previous baking has revolved around cupcakes. I am trying to be a little bit more adventurous and so when I saw a recipe for 'Texas sheet cake' in this month's Olive magazine I decided to give it a go. It's a chocolate tray bake with a frosted topping. It looked good in the picture and it's going to be a looooooong week at work so I thought I'd make some to give my colleagues a much needed sugar boost!

The ingredients are usual baking staples: butter, golden caster sugar, light muscavado sugar, self-raising flour, cocoa, baking powder, eggs, soured cream and mini marshmallows (these are optional).

You start by melting the butter together with the sugars and some water in a pan. It ends up looking a little bit strange but don't be put off!

You then mix in the flour, cocoa powder and baking powder before adding the marshmallows. 

After baking for approximately 30 minutes it comes out looking a little bit like this...

Then it's time to make the frosting using butter, cocoa, soured cream, milk chocolate and icing sugar. 

You melt the butter and cocoa together and then add the soured cream and milk chocolate. The butter separates leaving it looking anything but icing (never fear it all comes together in the end!)

After leaving the icing mixture to cool you then need to beat it using an electric beater. As if by magic it turns into a pale and fluffy icing ready to be spread over the cooled cake. After a sprinkling of cocoa powder it's ready to eat. I can highly recommend it - it's moist and the frosting is yummy! 

Hopefully my colleagues (and husband!) will enjoy and the sugar will keep us all going. When I was investigating the recipe I came across a cupcake version which I will have to try in the near future. The recipe is here ... http://www.sixsistersstuff.com/2012/07/texas-sheet-cake-cupcakes.html

Dil :-)