The Whoopie Pie Book Review

I've been meaning to try out whoopie pies for a while. Though they aren't quite as pretty as cupcakes they are cute and I'm never one to turn down cake! I don't think they'll ever overtake cupcakes as was predicted but they are a nice addition.

I tried to resist buying an entire book on whoopie pies but yet again the lure of a Book People bargain was far too much for little 'ole me. The front cover is so cute! It's a really well put together book and oh, there are photos for every recipe! Amazing! I can't say I'd ever heard of the Violet bakery before but a quick google threw up a rather beautiful sounding shop in London. Her cupcake flavours sound amazing: Candied Violet, Salted Caramel, French Apricot and Fragolina Grape amongst others. http://www.violetcakes.com/

The range of recipes are just as large as they would be for cupcakes, everything sounds completely edible. There are 6 chapters including Simple and Sweet Whoopie Pies, Topped and Drizzled, Frozen and Chilled and A Few Other Sweet Treats. There are different fillings for each pie, it's really great to have such varied recipes for buttercreams and other creams.


So I decided not to do things by halves and tackled this book with the necessary equipment: a whoopie pie cake tin from Lakeland. Not completely needed but I loved the idea of getting even circles rather than relying on how the cake mixture spread in the oven. The downside to the tin as some people have commented on is that the recipes make 9 pies but the tin only allows you to make 6. Not an issue for me as I usually halve quantites anyway. I decided to make the Salty Caramel Whoopies - combining 2 trends in 1 - salted caramel and whoopie pies!!

As you can see, half of the mixture still made 6 rather than 4 and a bit but it all fitted beautifully into my tin without any wastage. The mixture was really easy to make and it was then put in the fridge to chill for 30 minutes. The mixture took on an unexpected texture after 30 minutes, it was almost like a mousse with loads of air bubbles in it. I was hoping that it was right! But it made it easy to divide up and only took 12 minutes or so in the oven.

They were possibly the most successful sponges I've made, something usually happens to make them fail but these were light and a great texture. I'd say they were more solid than a cupcake but I expected this as they need to hold the filling in the middle.

The suggested filling to go with these pies was the Caramel Swiss Buttercream. I fear buttercream but I followed the recipe and huzzah - it was a success!! This made me love this book! It was quite involved though, I had to make some caramel, then whip up some butter. Next I had to whisk some egg white and sugar over some water on the stove for around 10-15 minutes which was the point where I wasn't quite sure if I was doing it right. It was supposed to be 'fluffy' but it didn't seem like it to me. But, as if by magic, adding the butter and then the caramel I had myself some buttercream! Very happy! It was worth the faff!

I thought they looked pretty good and looked like they did in the photo (maybe a little more even due to the wonder tin). They were a good size, any bigger and they'd be pretty sickly. They held together very well and I'm looking forward to trying out a lot more of the recipes.

I thought I'd try something other than the pies too and made the Prize Peach Cobbler. I always thought a cobbler was more like a crumble but formed into scone shapes but looking at various recipes it seems it can be like that or with a batter as mine was. It was really simple to make and took about an hour to cook.

To make the recipe cheaper I used tinned peaches instead of fresh but I think it worked well. I'd call it more of a clafoutis but it was delicious and didn't last for very long! I will definitely be trying this again and experimenting with different fruits.

I was very pleased with this book and am looking forward to making more from it. The Peanut Butter Sandwich Cookies look yummy and I haven't even touched on the frozen pies such as Chocolate Mint Whoopies and Key Lime Whoopies. Amazing. It's really inspiring and I think these would be really brilliant for a party or as a more relaxed dessert. Kids would love sandwiching them together themselves and with the vast array of flavours there's something to appeal to everyone. Who could resist a Chocolate Whoopie with Homemade Fluffy Marshmallow filling or a Carrot Cake Whoopie with Orange Mascarpone Cream? I know I can't!

Ballymaloe Cookery Course Cookbook Review

I bought Darina Allen's Ballymaloe Cookery Course cookbook on a whim. I was buying some cookery books I really wanted from The Book People (which I seem to be somewhat obsessed with!) and I came across this book and thought I'd give it a go. Turns out it was a very good choice.


It says on the front that it's 'the cook's bible' and I'd have to agree. There are 28 index pages altogether, that's an awful lot of recipes! Darina Allen is the mother-in-law of Rachel Allen and the founder of the Ballymaloe Cookery School in County Cork. This cookery book is an updated version that was originally released in 2001 and aims to teach the kinds of recipes that Daria teachers in her school. There are a whopping 24 chapters as well as a comprehensive introduction which includes kitchen safety, store cupboard basics and using the freezer. There is also a conversion chart and a great glossary.

As this is such a huge cookbook there isn't room for a photo per recipe, sometimes there are 5 or 6 recipes per 2 pages as well as variations; but there some lovely photos of how to perform certain tasks just as rolling spring rolls or how to line tartlet cases.

Each chapter starts with some background to the ingredients and how to source the best items you can. The Fish and Seafood chapter for example explains how to buy fresh fish and shellfish, even how to pick up lobsters and crabs so they don't pinch you. She then gives you guidance on how to prepare a whole salmon, how to fillet flat fish or skin Dover Sole. Throughout the book there are master recipes which would give anyone a great range of basic recipes to build on, then there are hundreds of variations and other recipe ideas.

Granted I know how to make Tabouleh but I thought I'd follow the recipe from this book and it didn't disappoint. I've been craving tabouleh recently, it must be as it's warmer weather - or maybe I just need to compensate for all the cakes I tried in France! I added some feta cubes to make it a little more substantial.

I picked up some pigs cheeks from the supermarket the other week and then froze them, not quite sure what to do with them! We cook a lot of pork shoulder in our house, usually in cider, so I guessed a slow-cooked piece of pork would no doubt be delicious, no matter the cut. There was a recipe for Pork Cheeks with Savoy Cabbage cooked with cider but I wanted to try something different so I took the cooking method and applied it to the Carbonnade of Pork with Mushrooms. Pork fillet was the specified cut but it worked extremely well with the pork cheeks. The sauce was absolutely delicious, a mix of onion, white wine, chicken stock and sour cream with a dash of lemon juice. I cooked it for 2 hours so the pork cheeks melted. The were a richer flavour than the other pork cuts I've tried but they make a really make an excellent and great value meal.

Chicken thighs are always useful things to have in the freezer. Here I made the Chicken Thighs with Honey and Mustard from the barbeque section - but I cooked it in the oven instead as this particular day it was raining hard. Shame! It was sticky and sweet which is always a win, I think I'll put more mustard in it next time though as I couldn't really taste it and I love Dijon mustard. This is a great standby dish when you're not quite what to have, goes great with saute potatoes and salad.

Overall this is a fabulous book, especially if you can get it cheaper like I did. I don't think you could ever get bored with so many recipes to choose from. It would be a great gift for someone starting out in cooking, as well as for someone who has been cooking for a while as it has some great tips as well as some delicious sounding recipes. Nothing is too fussy but you could find recipes to suit dinner parties as well as everyday meals. Don't expect just Irish or traditional foods either, there are recipe examples from across the world. If I believed in minimalism I'm not sure I'd need many other recipe books. That's so not me though!

Check out some of Ballymaloe's recipes here:
http://www.cookingisfun.ie/pages/recipes/

France Easter Holiday In Food

I went to France over Easter to visit my mum's family. My grandparents live in Saint Etienne so we stayed there for a few days - some really great boutiques popping up and a stunning new patisserie. I bought a few new plates for the blog! I could have come home with loads more if luggage allowed! I also got a few cookery books and magazines. Foams, savoury cappuccinos and all manners of whipped items seem to be the fashion at the moment. If you don't have a siphon then you're just not on the cutting edge of French cuisine!

We then went to the South of France for a week over Easter weekend to a place called Le-Grau-Du-Roi. We've been going for a few years now to a self-catering apartment which is great as we can make the most of local ingredients and indulge.

Here is my attempt at art on the beach when I wasn't eating!

But first back to Saint Etienne, and I had to include a photo of the well-known Cournand shop. They are famous for their pasta, especially their ravioli. They sell the best of the best and their windows are always beautifully decorated.

But what I got ridiculously excited about was a new Patisserie in town called Patisserie Montcoudiol. It is run by Bruno Montcoudiol who is a world champion in patisserie and it certainly shows. I would have been quite happy to cuddle the window for hours to admire the pretty cakes and macarons. Really good value too compared to cupcakes here. As you can see they didn't travel terribly well, there was more shopping to do, jewellery to buy and clothes to try. Ah well, they still look pretty.

We shared each small cake between four of us! Wasn't easy to cut but you can see how much work goes into each cake. It was really, really hard to pick just 4 cakes and I was hoping to go back to try some more but we never made it back. Boo. So we went for a Violina which was a white chocolate bavaroise with a blackcurrant and violet cream and a lemon and almond genoise sponge. Then at the top is the Framboisine which was vanilla bavaroise with raspberry coulis, lemon genoise and a cute mini macaron on top. Then a Pur Velay which was a vervaine diplomate (the liqueur is very local), blackberry cream, almond sponge and a sable made from Puy lentil flour (again, extremely local). All amazing. I love all the colours.

The mini macarons were beautiful and perfectly formed, resting on small squares of chocolate.

Lastly an Amandriotte which was almond, pistachio cream, cherry coulis and the most crumbly, buttery pastry I've ever tasted. This was my favourite, not the most impressive to look at but so delicious. Check out the shop's website here: http://www.patisserie-montcoudiol.fr/ There is a fantastic video which shows off some of the cakes, his macarons, chocolates and a quick look at how he makes some of the items.

To celebrate my Grandparent's wedding anniversary (as we found out later!) we went to a restaurant in the Pilat called La Fondue Chez L'Pere Charles. Alas no-one was eating fondue and they had to be shared between two. I would have eaten one myself, I love a fondue! There were 4 different menus to choose from, I went for one of the cheaper menus as I fancied it the most. Above is my mum's starter - duck ham, fried foie gras and salad. Lovely.

I had one of my favourite things - a plate of great charcuterie. Rillettes, saucisson, dry cured ham, dried fruit bread and some onion jam. Simple but a winner everytime.

My main was red mullet with 3 kinds of tagliatelle with a creamy sauce. Absolutely delicious and something I want to make myself. The 2 other kinds of tagliatelle were strips of courgette and carrot which was a lovely idea.

There were so many different types of cheese to choose from, here is a selection of solely goats cheese!

My mum's dessert was so pretty, carpaccio of pineapple with rum and raisin ice cream. A good end to a filling meal.

I had 3 kinds of ice cream, a little boring but I loved the way it was presented. I want to take inspiration from this when I try to make ice cream this summer. http://www.lafonduechezleperecharles.fr/index.php

One of my favourite places to eat is in a supermarket! But this is no ordinary supermarket cafe - this is a French one! Casino started in Saint Etienne and this is a massive one which sells everything you could hope for. I got some great silicone baking moulds for 4 euros each and a couple of recipe books (plus some amazing skull and crossbones towels!! I love skulls so much!). But, most importantly, they have a brilliant cafeteria. A few stations with starters, salad bar, desserts, cheeses and a fruit salad bar; then different areas for your main meals. There are various pasta dishes, pizza, tagine, then meats and fish dishes. You help yourself to whatever veg you want.

There was a new verrine I wanted to try with yogurt, cucumber, tomato and raw cubed salmon. There was loads of lemon juice in it and it was yummy and really simple to make yourself.

Then it was a given, steak hache and half rice/half chips! I do look at other things but I always come back to this! When I was little we always had to wait ages for the steak to be cooked as I ate it well cooked, a notion which is slightly fluid in France! I often stuck it in the provided microwaves to cook it a little more once we'd paid! Now as an adult I don't mind a little blood and this is just delicious. Half chips as it's law to have chips with your beef and half rice as it's really buttery and lovely. A lovely tomato sauce to go with it.

Finally on the menu - one of my all-time favourite desserts: Oeufs A La Neige (or Floating Island). Edible even when you've had tons to eat as the meringue is so light and fluffy and the custard is beautiful and fragrant. I've tried to make this at home and it's quite tricky to get the meringue right but I'm quite willing to try again.

Once in the south of France I headed straight for the cakes! Here we have two kinds of rum baba, one with cream and one with custard (mine!), a pine nut tart and a choux bun.

Here are gorgeous bunches of white asparagus on Grau Du Roi market. They were very tasty indeed. I just wish you could find more white aspargus in this country.

Amazing purple potatoes. No difference in taste but oooo, pretty!

A Camargue speciality, guardiane with bull meat. This is a favourite with my family. Unfortunately we bought this from a different shop so the meat didn't melt as it should. I've made some nice versions of this dish. You just need onions, carrots, diced beef, herbs, red wine and black olives. Cooked for a few hours it's scrummy.

Another super impressive patisserie, which I don't actually know the name of! This was a rich chocolate mousse surrounded by chocolate meringue.

This dessert was a chestnut bacarois with a spong base and a vanilla cream in the middle, topped with a candied chesnut, walnut and a vanilla pod.

Next a blackcurrant and pear charlotte. It looked so beautiful with all the colours painted on the side.

There were pieces of pear at the bottom with a pear cream and a blackcurrant mousse in the middle.

My choice was a large lemon, date and ginger macaron. I thought it sounded quite unusual and needed to try it!

It was a little odd at first and the ginger was very strong but I really liked it, the tart lemon cut through the ginger and sticky date well. We went back to get more cakes a couple of days later but we were too late and most of the cakes had already gone. Oh no!

These cakes were from a sweet tea room, La Toison d'Or. Some nice photos of the shop are here: http://www.vasy-annuaire.fr/4618-Patisserie-La-Grande-Motte-1.html There was a religieuse filled with chocolate custard and a raspberry bombe which was filled with raspberry coulis.

Here are what my mum calls Bugnes but in the South of France, near Montpellier, are called Oreillettes. They traditionally have orange flower water but the patisserie also made them with lemon which was a nice twist. Incredibly unhealthy as it's just deep fried batter but when did that ever stop me?! They were slightly chalky which was a shame, they should have been crispier. My mum used to eat these freshly made with her grandmother as a child, scoffing them as quickly as they came out of the oil!

And lastly, HUGE prawns. Very fresh and delicious with plenty of mayonnaise.

Back next week with a new cookbook review.

The National Cookbook Review

This week I'm reviewing The National Cookbook: Recipes from the National Dining Rooms at The National Gallery by Oliver Peyton.

Quite excitingly this one is signed! I bought it from the National Gallery gift shop last year but it wasn't until this February that I ate there - and it inspired me actually pick my copy up and cook from it. There are quite a few dishes I recognised from the menu and it is all hearty, British food. The book is split into the four seasons and each season contains recipes for starters, mains, desserts and drinks. There are pictures for each recipe but not always of the food, there is a lot of the art work from the National Gallery which ties it in well with the museum. Ok, I like a photo of the food but I also appreciate the paintings and the small description included. Who says you can't be cultured while you're cooking?!


The book is really nice quality and is a good size. The recipes aren't intimidating and there an awful lot of recipes I'd want to make. That's why I've made a few more dishes than usual from this book, which in itself is a good sign!

The first I made was the Manx Kipper Pate from the summer starters. I didn't find Manx Kippers in the supermarket so I got ordinary smoked kippers. This recipe was a revelation and I will be making it again and again. I didn't have any clear whiskey so I just left it out but it had enough punch from the tabasco, cayenne pepper and plenty of lemon juice. It doesn't look particularly exciting but it is completely delicious. I made it with mackerel for my Mother's Day Afternoon Tea last week and I'll be trying it with salmon, and then trout, and anything else I can mush up with butter!

Next up was the Pork Belly with Black Pudding and Apple. Pork belly is really good value and very tasty, plus I was up for the challenge of making my first lot of crackling! The instructions were spot on and the meat cooked beautifully, though I did put it under the grill a little at the end to really crisp up the top but that's because our oven is rubbish!

The black pudding and apple was easy to fry together and made a lovely accompaniment. I was highly impressed by this recipe, it would be great to serve to guests as it looks impressive but requires no stress!

The Pumpkin, Spinach and Mushroom Wellington was the trickiest dish for me to make, and also the most disappointing which was a shame. I've never made a beef wellington before but liked the combination of flavours in this version. I made my pancakes, roasted the butternut squash as I didn't have pumpkin, blanched the spinach and cooked the mushrooms and onions. I was already a bit fed up with the dish!

It was ok but a little bland, even with everything in it. If it hadn't been the goats cheese I don't think there would have been enough flavour. I think it would have been ok without the pastry - not quite the point of a Wellington but perfectly acceptable. My pancakes certainly weren't fine enough but it was all ok, but just ok.

Lastly I made the Beetroot and Red Onion Tart with Wensleydale Cheese. I cheated and used ready cooked beetroot, allowed I'm sure! The tart itself was quick to make, I just made the onion jam in advance. It was really nice and the cheese counteracted the sweetness really well, with the beetroot balancing everything out. Again, I think this would be great food for friends with a nice salad.

All in all I was really happy with everything I'd made (bar the faff of the Wellington!) and I'm very glad I own the book and it's a great representative of the National Dining Rooms.

I won't be blogging for a couple of weeks as I'm off on my holidays, going to visit my Grandparents in France. I'm really hoping it'll stay sunny but it'll probably do what it alway s does and we'll be told by everyone "oh, it was lovely last week!"

Mother's Day Afternoon Tea

Like last year I thought I'd make La Mama an afternoon tea for Mother's Day this year, as well as a few lovely presents. A model child! I scoured my books to see what I fancied making a few weeks in advance. I'm prone to stressing out and with a few elements to make I needed to be organised! I think it turned out pretty well, it's a great excuse to get my nice cake stand out! I wish we had room so I could keep it out but alas it only comes out on special occasions! Keeps it safe I suppose. It went down extremely well and there were enough leftovers to feed us for a few days - what a shame it meant eating cakes and scones for days!!

My savoury section was a Smoked Mackerel Pate, an adapted recipe from the National Cookbook by Oliver Peyton (review to come next week). The original recipe was a kipper pate which I made and was completely delicious so I decided to make it with mackerel. It's super easy, completely ridiculously easy so I thought it would be a good choice when I had other things to make. Certainly a lot simplier than a ham terrine like I made last year. The recipe is just smoked fish, softened butter (though not half the amount stated - no need if the fish is moist), cayenne pepper, tabasco, Worcestershire sauce and plenty of lemon juice. I will make this pate again and again, delicious. Served on toasted ciabatta with cornichons - the king of all pickles!

The next element was Hazelnut Blondies from the Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook. I made some peanut butter blondies the week before from Eric Lanlard's Home Bake (again, review to come soon) and the result was quite different but both very tasty. I changed the pecans stated to hazelnuts and made only half the amount. They ended up pretty thin but this wasn't a problem. The white chocolate was melted in with the butter so it made the blondies pretty sweet and squidgy which was a nice contrast with the crushed, crunchy hazelnuts. I'd had hazelnut blondies from Marks and Spencer in their Valentine's meal deal this year and they came with some salted caramel so I decided to do the same thing. Really added another dimension to the flavour. I didn't make the caramel - it came in a jar from Marks. It's very tempting just to grab a spoonful of it every time you're in the kitchen!

My rosewater choux buns. These started out in my head as rosewater eclairs with pretty pink icing, things didn't quite go to plan. I knew I had to buy rosewater but I could have sworn we had red food colouring in the house. It was too late when I found out we didn't! Then it turned out we didn't have the right nozzle on the piping bag so I decided to make choux buns instead. Oh well! My icing had rosewater in it, it was a little too liquid but it kept my coloured sugars, heart and glitter on the top so it was fine. I also put rosewater in the whipped cream. It was quite a subtle flavour - I didn't want it to taste like perfume - but it worked well. Not as impressive as I had imagined it but still quite nice. I had to add glitter to something!

I used Raymond Blanc's recipe from his new Kitchen Secrets book. The recipe was great and made lovely choux pastry. They were a little bit greasy but they had a good flavour.

Lastly I made the Brown Sugar and Mascarpone Scones from Lorraine Pascale's Baking Made Easy which I reviewed last week. I was so happy with this scones. They were really light and rose beautifully. They weren't overly sweet as I thought they might be and they were the perfect foil for some jam and cream.

They were simple to make, I did it by hand rather than in a food processor and the mixture was made in about 5 minutes. I have lots of mascarpone left so I think I'll make a pasta dish with the remainder but I think I'll have to start buying mascarpone regularly as these scones were so yummy.

The food was all washed down with some jasmine tea. I love my Celia Birtwell mug, a great find from TK Maxx. Roll on the next afternoon tea! I have many more recipes that can be tried out!

After all those cakes I feel I need this gorgeous domed cake stand in my life. So pretty and an amazing price. A trip to Ikea is now on the cards! I don't actually cook big cakes but that's not the point! If not I could get this mini cake stand instead. Aw!