The chilli sauce was infact Harissa. I have fallen in love with this fiery sauce since then and have so far tried it in  burgers and as a rub on fish. This sauce is not native to Morocco, but was introduced to this region by the neighbouring Tunisia and Algeria. It is a hot dried chilli paste with added flavours of garlic, cumin and coriander. I am trying to find some Africal dried chillis and then will aim to post the recipe of home-made Harissa paste soon.

Lamb filo cigars

This recipe is adapted from The Food of Morocco featuring a good doze of Moroccon food history and beautiful pictures. The recipes are very authentic as well. 

I would think this is the same as Dulce de Leche or Confiture de Lait, but I am quite challenged in linguistics department, specially when it comes to French, so please correct me if I am wrong. This caramel sauce (or jam) is slightly salted as well so it is in keeping with the latest salted caramel craze. Remember that Nigella's picture covered in this lovely stuff which caused quite a stir.

Now I had to come up with a recipe quick to stop my self and specially my other half from polishing the whole jar, with nothing but a teaspoon. Something that I used to do quite often with peanut butter as a child.

Chocolate, caramel and pistachio tartlets

The recipe I've chosen is an alteration from Martha Stewart's book Pies and Tarts. This book is  another one of my favourites by her, but it is not featured as much on the blog as I don't really trust my cup measuring skills, and I am afraid that unless I measure every thing meticulously in grams and mil litres,the recipe might turn out to be a disaster for anyone who tries it. Here I have tried to measure everything before using it but I bet there is an easier and more reliable way to do this conversion business. 

Union Jack Jubilee cake:

This recipe is adapted from the BBC Goodfood website. It is basically a Victoria sponge coloured blue and then cut and layered with butter icing and a good quality jam. I have used a 4 large eggs recipe instead of the original 3 eggs as suggested in the recipe. As I have used the all in one method, I also added one teaspoon of baking powder.

Tips: 

• The best tip is to freeze the cake between cutting and layering it into triangles as otherwise you would be left with a lot of cake mess and crumbs.

•  This cake uses a lot of colour so it is best to use the concentrated paste. I have used the Wilton Royal blue mixed with a little purple to make a darker shade of blue. 

• Wear gloves when using colour paste! 

Method:

First line a 20cm square tin with baking paper  and preheat the oven to 180C (fan 160).

I used all in one method and ended up using 2 teaspoon of blue colour and 1/2 tsp of purple.

Bake the cake for 25 minutes and let it cool in the tin. When the cake is cooled, wrap it well in double layers of baking paper and freeze overnight or at least 4 hours.

Divide the cake in half and layer one piece on top of the other and trim the edges.

Separate the two layers and cut them in half again.

Cut each long rectangular piece into triangles. If the cake starts to become soft in-between cuttings then chill them in freezer again. I did this on a very hot day and had to chill it twice. 

Prepare your favourite buttercream recipe and slightly warm a good quality jam.

Spread each triangle with buttercream and one layer with jam as well.

Sandwich them together. Join two squares with another layer of buttercream-jam-buttercream, keeping the Union Jack pattern in mind.

Chill the two rectangular layers in the fridge for at least half and hour.

Spread the bottom rectangle with the buttercream then jam and one side of the top layer with buttercream and sandwich them together. Align them as best as you can, wrap in cling film and chill to let the buttercream set for at least 1 hour.

Roll sugar paste into a rectangle long enough to cover the battenburg. Spread a little jam on all four sides of the assembled cake and place it on the sugar paste. Join the seams at the bottom and spread some sprinkles on top.

Here's what it will look like once you have sliced the edges:

Challenge:

I'm entering this into Homemade by Fleur Jubilee bake competition which is sponsored by the Appliances online. Check out the link for some gorgeous entries.

Also look at this lovely battenburg which resembles a Union Jack more closely and is just perfect:

Cafe retro's blog http://caferetro.wordpress.com/2012/05/16/jubilee-union-jack-battenberg/

Your feedback, good or bad is always welcome.

“Name the greatest of all inventors. Accident.” 

Mark Twain

The legend has it that in 1860, Mrs Graeves of Rutland Arms (formely known as the White Horse Inn), ordered her cook to make a strawberry tart.The inexperienced cook's error resulted in the origin of this delicious treat. I am not quite sure what the error was. Did the cook forget to put the jam on  the top and spread it at the bottom or forget to use the eggs and almonds in the pastry and hence spread that on the top? In any case, which ever legend or version you believe, I would have liked to know this anonymous person's name, and rightly attribute the recipe to this cook. 

Then there is Bakewell pudding and Bakewell tart. As far as I have learnt, the tart is made with short crust pastry and the pudding with puff pastry.

Needless to say the origin is disputed, although most sources point to Egypt where it is also called Ta'amia. It is a popular street food that is made with chickpeas and fava/broad beans. The recipes differ from region to region and include different proportions of fava beans and chickpeas, or just chickpeas.

 There is nothing better than a warm Rhubarb crumble to beat these blustery rainy days....Or is there?

I was in a mood to cook something that also involved a bit of experimenting, and hence picked up some rhubarb while shopping. Crumble would have been a good idea, considering the weather we've had lately but I was in the mood for some cake. Googling rhubarb cake recipes led me to BBC goodfood website and this amazing recipe with currently 88 ratings and five stars. Now surely, that can't be bad.

Now the experimenting part.....

I wish my stove came with a Save As button like Word has. That way I could experiment with my cooking and not fear ruining my dinner. Jarod Kintz

So how do I take this recipe to another level? The Flavour Thesaurus and the constant thought of warm crumble helped me come up with a crumble topping including almonds;and substituting the sugar whilst cooking rhubarb with rose syrup gave it an additional depth of flavour.

The base is a plain chocolate cake from the BBC Good Food 2012 calendar but the top layer is my version of the refrigerator cake (or tiffin cake) layer with maltesers, walnuts, digestives and ofcourse chocolate. 

T

Cupcakes

I have used a basic cupcake recipe from Mich Turner's Cake Masterclass book, although I am still in search for a good basic cupcake recipe. These cupcakes are easy to bake but I don't like the fact that they collapse quite a bit after baking. Nevertheless, the texture and taste was good.

Passion fruit curd

I have come up with this recipe after trying 3 different ones. I like this one because of the combination of egg yolk and eggs for some more richness. Adding butter at the end also keeps the buttery taste well and truly intact. 

Introducing.....my favourite icing!

This White chocolate frosting is Rose Levy Beranbaum's brainchild which combines white chocolate, crème fraiche and cream cheese for that sweet tangy taste which goes quite well with this cupcake. The sweetness comes from the white chocolate and hence no icing sugar is required. Do buy the best white chocolate you can afford.