Easy Berry Sauce

I found this quick and easy recipe for a berry sauce whilst flicking through my many and varied cookery books for dinner party dessert inspiration. The sauce was an accompaniment to a blackberry buttermilk sponge and I did consider making this for my dessert (with raspberries rather than blackberries, given the season). However, I then came across Mary Berry's lemon tart and decided to make that instead. However, I love berries with lemon tart and so decided to adapt the recipe to make this sauce to complement my tart. 

The original sauce was made with 150g each of blackberries and raspberries but I had blueberries and strawberries in the fridge and some frozen raspberries, so I decided to use these instead. 

This sauce is incredibly simple to make and tastes fantastic! It went brilliantly with the lemon tart, but would also be fantastic with ice cream, meringues, pancakes and lots of other desserts! I used the leftover sauce on my yoghurt and granola for breakfast!

Easy berry sauce
Ingredients

1. 300g berries (I used 100g each of blueberries, raspberries and strawberries)
2. 2 tsp cornflour
3. 2 tblsp caster sugar

Method

1. Put all of the ingredients in a medium-sized pan and mix gently with a wooden spoon so that all of the berries are coated with sugar and cornflour.
2. Set the pan on a low heat and stir frequently until the juices start to run.
3. Increase the heat slightly and simmer gently, stirring regularly, until the fruit has softened and the juices have thickened to make a sauce.
4. Taste the sauce and add more sugar if required.
5. Add a splash of water if the sauce is too thick. 
6. Serve hot, warm or cold. 

Chocolate and raspberry gateau

As part of a friend’s vintage/retro themed hen party, we had all been asked to bring a contribution to an afternoon tea party. In order to avoid hundreds of cupcakes / bottles of sparkly, we’d been allocated an item to bring. I mentioned that I was happy to bake and so was allocated chocolate cake. Except, I’ve never really made chocolate cake! As I think I’ve mentioned before, I’m not really a fan of chocolate or of chocolate cake and so I just don’t tend to make it!

Having scanned through my ever-reliable source of inspiration – Flickr – I’d been inspired by impressive looking Kitkat-surrounded gateaux and made the decision to have a go at one of these. Next decision – which of the many thousand chocolate cake recipes to follow? A few friends recommended Nigella’s Chocolate Fudge Cake and so I decided to go with my own amended version of that. As I’m not really into rich chocolate cake, I decided to add raspberries, strawberries and fresh cream to add a bit of tartness and lightness. If you wanted to stick with the very traditional chocolate fudge cake, you could fill the cake with a caramel-fudge sauce and top with a mixture of fudges and chocolate truffles – which could look equally impressive.  

Finding a bottle of raspberry liqueur in the cupboard, I decided to use that in the recipe in place of some of the water, and to omit the vanilla essence suggested. To keep the cake slightly lighter and more of a gateau than a rich chocolate fudge cake, I filled the cake with jam and fresh cream, rather than more of the (very rich) topping. For a bit of an indulgent twist, I watered the jam down with more of the raspberry liqueur, which also helped the filling soak into the sponge to keep it moist and full of flavour.

The great thing about adding the Kitkats to the edge of this cake is that you don’t need to worry about making the icing that neat – the Kitkats hide any imperfections brilliantly. You don’t have to dip the strawberries in chocolate to go on top, but I do think it adds a lovely touch!

I was feeling rather impressed with myself once the cake was complete – it looked fairly spectacular! Impressed, that is, until I arrived at my friend’s house only to find that I was a week early – the party isn’t until next week! Gutted. Anyone want a slice of chocolate cake …?

Edit - 2 June 2013

So - what happened to the cake? I was a bit worried as I made the cake on the Friday and neither of us were at work until Tuesday, and most of the local friends I would usually give cake to, were away for the long weekend! I checked the cream and its use-by was Wednesday - so figured the cake would be ok until Tuesday as long as it was kept in the fridge. I did take all the fruit off (as it would have gone off slightly by the Tuesday) and we ate this for dessert over the weekend. 

EHH and I cracked into the cake on the Sunday and it was actually really tasty! The texture was great - really moist and delicious and the raspberry filling really complemented the chocolate cake: the liqueur added a nice kick of flavour without overpowering. The only thing I wasn't that keen on was the chocolate icing - I found it a little over-sweet and actually not that chocolatey! EHH took the rest of the cake into his work on the Tuesday and was demolished fairly quickly! (Although there were a few complaints from my work that I hadn't taken it there!)

Chocolate and raspberry gateau

Ingredients

For the cake

1. 400 grams plain flour
2. 250 grams golden caster sugar
3. 100 grams light brown muscovado sugar
4. 50 grams best-quality cocoa powder
5. 2 teaspoons baking powder
6. 1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
7. ½ teaspoon salt
8. 3 large eggs
9. 142 ml sour cream (1 small tub)
10. 175 grams unsalted butter
11. 125 ml corn oil
12. 200 ml chilled water
13. 100ml raspberry liqueur

For the icing

1. 175 grams dark chocolate (minimum 70% cocoa solids)
2. 250 grams unsalted butter (softened)
3. 275 grams icing sugar (sifted)
4. 1 tblsp raspberry liqueur

To fill

1. 300ml double cream, whisked until spreadable
2. 200g raspberry jam
3. 4 tblsp raspberry liqueur

To decorate

1. 21 double Kitkat chocolate bars
2. 200g raspberries
3. 400g strawberries
4. 100g dark chocolate
5. 100g white chocolate

Method

1. Place butter in a microwaveable bowl and microwave until melted (alternatively, melt in a saucepan over the hob). Set aside to cool.
2. Put the water and raspberry liqueur in a jug and place in the fridge to cool.
3. Preheat the oven to 180°C/gas mark 4.
4. Butter and line the bottom of two 20cm sandwich tins.
5. In a large bowl, mix together the flour, sugars, cocoa, baking powder, bicarb and salt.
6. In another bowl or wide-necked measuring jug whisk together the eggs and sour cream until blended.
7. Beat together the melted butter and corn oil until just blended, then beat in the water mixture.
8. Add the dry ingredients all at once and mix together on a slow speed.
9. Add the egg mixture, and mix again until everything is blended and then pour into the prepared tins.
10. Bake the cakes for 50-55 minutes, or until a cake-tester comes out clean.
11. Cool the cakes in their tins on a wire rack for 15 minutes, and then turn the cakes out onto the rack to cool completely.

 Preparing the chocolate dipped strawberries

1. While the cakes are baking, melt the dark chocolate in a glass bowl over a saucepan of simmering water.
2. Melt the white chocolate in the same way.
3. Dip some of the strawberries in the chocolate and set aside on a sheet of baking parchment.
4. Place the remaining chocolate in a disposable piping bag and snip off the end of the bag.
5. Pipe drizzles of chocolate onto some of the remaining strawberries and add these to the sheet of baking parchment.
6. Leave some strawberries plain.
7. Allow the chocolate to set and then pipe drizzles of the alternative chocolate onto both the dipped and the drizzled strawberries.
8. Use any remaining chocolate to pipe chocolate shapes onto parchment paper

Assembling, icing and decorating the cake

1. Place the jam in a bowl and mix with the liqueur.
2. Cut each of the cooled cakes in half (easiest done with a cake levelling tool).
3. Cover three of the cake halves with cream and then with jam.
4. Place each cake half carefully on top of the others, finishing with the plain cake.
5. Place the cake in the fridge to cool and set for at least 30 minutes.  
6. While the cake is in  the fridge, make up the icing.
7. Melt the chocolate in a glass bowl sitting over a pan of simmering water, and let cool slightly.
8. In another bowl, beat the butter until it's soft and creamy.
9. Add the sieved icing sugar and beat again until light and fluffy.
10. Add the raspberry liqueur and chocolate and mix together until everything is glossy and smooth. 
11. When the cake is set and fairly firm, ice the top and sides, spreading and smoothing with a rubber spatula or palette knife.
12. Separate the Kitkats into single bars and press firmly around the edge of the iced cake.
13. Place in fridge again to set for at least 30 minutes.
14. Once set, top with the raspberries, chocolate dipped strawberries, remaining strawberries and chocolate shapes.

Strawberry and white chocolate macaroons

Wow – ok, first post of 2013!  Start of this year has been a bit manic and so I’m a bit behind on writing things up. Hopefully things have calmed down a bit now!

Last week was a friend’s birthday and I wanted to do a few fab things for her.  I decided that I hadn’t made macaroons in absolutely ages so fancied giving them a go again. My friend has always loved the apple cakes that I have made in the past so decided to also make a batch of apple and cinnamon cupcakes – recipe and photos to follow in next blog post.

As mentioned, I haven’t made macaroons in months and months.  I first made them just over a year ago – fancying a challenge.  They are quite fiddly and you do need to be very precise - but they are definitely worth the effort for a special occasion. I did loads of research and ended up going with Brave Tart’s recipe and suggestions – partly because she uses a KitchenAid.  She has loads of great suggestions on how to make macaroons – which tips are essential and which are purely myths.  Although I have to admit that I do stick with a few things she says aren’t essential – here's my version.

Macaroons

Ingredients

1. 115g ground almonds
2. 230g icing sugar*
3. 144g egg whites (about 4 large eggs), at room temperature
4. 72g granulated sugar
5. 1/2 tsp salt
6. Small amount paste food colouring

Method

1. Trace out 3.5 guide-circles (at least 3cm apart) onto baking parchment and then flip it over, ink side down.  I use one of my large piping tips, but a small cookie cutter or large bottle lid could also work.
2. Prepare a large piping bag, fitted with a medium round  tip.
3. Line two  baking trays lined with the prepared baking parchment.
4. Sieve the icing sugar into a bowl.
5. Sieve the ground almonds into the same bowl – discard any bits that don’t go through the sieve (make sure that you have the correct weight in the bowl after sieving).
6. Combine the egg whites, sugar and salt in the bowl of a stand mixer.
7. Turn the mixer to medium (4 on a Kitchen Aid) and whisk for 3 minutes. The mix will not seem especially foamy at that point.
8. Increase the speed to medium-high (7 on a Kitchen Aid) and whisk another 3 minutes, then crank the speed to 8 for go another 3 minutes. You should have a very stiff, dry meringue.  If the meringue has not become stiff enough to clump inside the whisk, continue beating for another minute, or until it does so.
9. Add in a small amount of the food colouring and whisk for a final minute on the highest speed  Don’t worry if it deflates a little at this stage – I find adding the colour can make this happen.
10. Remove the bowl from the mixer.
11. Add the dry ingredients all at once and fold them in with a rubber spatula. Use both a folding motion (to incorporate the dry ingredients) and a rubbing/smearing motion, to deflate the meringue against the side of the bowl. This is called macaronage - it is about deflating the whites: you want to knock the air out of the meringue.
12. Count each fold carefully. After about 25 folds, the mixture will still have a quite lumpy and stiff texture. You probably want to do another 15 or so folds.
13. To test when the batter is ready, spoon some of the mix out and dollop it on top. Count to 30 – the dolloped mix should gradually incorporate back into the rest of the mixture. If it doesn’t incorporate, fold again. Keep testing to make sure that you don’t go too far. Overmixed macaroon batter has a runny, pancake batter-like texture. It will ooze continuously. I don’t know of anything to save it at this point so don’t go too far!
14. Transfer about half the batter to a piping bag.
15. Pipe the batter into the pre-traced circles on the baking parchment lined trays.  Stop piping just before the circle of batter reaches the borders of the drawn circle, as the batter will continue to spread just a bit.
16. When the piping bag is nearly empty, re-fill with batter and continue to pipe. 
17. After piping your macaroons, lift the baking tray and bang it hard on your worktop. Turn the tray ninety degrees and bang twice more. This will dislodge any large air bubbles that might cause your macaroons to crack
18. Turn the oven on to preheat at 150C
19. Leave your piped macaroons to rest on the worktop for at least 20 minutes while the oven heats up. 
20. Bake for about 18 - 25 minutes. To test if they are baked, gently peel the baking parchment  away from a macaroon at the edge of the tray.  If, the top comes off, leaving the bottom on the parchment, they need to go back in the oven.  The macaroon should gently peel off, but don’t worry if it sticks a little – the macaroons will continue to bake a little and firm up on the tray whilst cooling.  
21. When the macaroons have baked, remove from the oven and cool thoroughly on the pans, before peeling the cooled macaroons from the parchment.
22. Once cool, fill a piping bag with buttercream of your choice and pipe into half of the shells. Add any other fillings then sandwich them with plain halves.

White chocolate and strawberry filling

This is the filling I made for the pictured macaroons. It tasted great straight away as the slightly sharp strawberry puree contrasts well with the very sweet white chocolate buttercream. However, the puree was too runny and spurted out of the back of the macaroons! After a day, this problem resolved as the strawberry puree soaked into the macaroons. However, I then found them too sweet as you lost the sharpness of the fresh strawberry.  I think if I were to try them again, I would have a go at sticking a sheet of gelatine in the puree to set it a little.

White chocolate buttercream

Ingredients

1. 60g butter, at room temperature
2. 250g icing sugar
3. ½ tsp vanilla extract
4. 2 tblsp milk
5. 3 tblsp double cream
6. 100g good quality white chocolate

Method

1. Place the white chocolate in a glass bowl and set the bowl over a saucepan of gently simmering water.
2. Stir until melted.
3. Remove the bowl from the saucepan and set aside to cool slightly.
4. Place the butter, vanilla extract, milk and half of the icing sugar in a bowl and whisk (preferably with an electric or stand mixer, although I start with a wooden spoon so that the icing sugar doesn’t form huge clouds!) until smooth and creamy.
5. Add the rest of the icing sugar and mix again until smooth.
6. Add in the double cream and cooled white chocolate and mix again.

Strawberry puree

1. Place approximately 10 strawberries in a blender and blend until smooth.

Verdict

This is a really reliable recipe for macaroons - but I'm quite tempted to give another one a go - when I have some time to experiment. Although this recipe does result in a little "foot" and domed, shiny top, they don't rise quite as much as I would like. The pictures on Brave Tart's website suggests that she doesn't get much more rise. 

The filling needs refining - I like the idea of strawberry and white chocolate but need to work out how to make it work a little better. I have also made macaroons before with a passionfruit buttercream and they were delicious! As a warning, recipes do suggest that you can flavour the actual macaroon - this has always ended up killing the meringue for me - so I don't bother - the filling provides plenty of flavour!