Strawberry Charlotte with Roses de Reims Biscuits for La Fete National!

For La Fete Nationale , or Bastille Day as we English speakers call it,  I made a Strawberry Biscuit Roses de Reims Charlotte with Glaceed Angelica gifted to me most generously by Isabelle White at Histoire Sucree - the most divine place to buy beautiful and exquisite French confections - nougat, calissons, marrons glace, the list goes on and deliciously on.

A beautiful pink boite de biscuits and gorgeous glaceed angelica.

 

A close up of the candied angelica, technically known as Angelica Archangelica - what a cool name!! - I thought to myself as I beheld this delight - it reminds me of celery - and it has the stringy ribs like celery and sure enough, now I did some research, I find it is indeed called wild celery - it is a medicinal plant and is used to flavour various liqueurs including Chartreuse. The flavour is hard to describe but it is distinct and tastes particularly good when eaten with whipped cream - the combination somehow transcends the sum of the two parts. 

It is not hard to make this celebratory dessert but it is time consuming and preferably you should make it one day ahead to allow the strawberry mousse to set up nicely - I had quite the palaver making mine as the weather was atrociously humid causing great concern over fluffing of meringue/marshmallow and curdling of creams but I prevailed and everything turned out well as you can see.

To begin with you should have Roses de Reims biscuits available and if you don't have them to hand Ladyfingers will suffice in a trice - if you don't happen to have angelica either any candied fruit would be nice - whatever you think would taste well with strawberry mousse.

Let's make the cake first - just a small 6" thin disk to help be the foundation of our Charlotte - this should be made the day before to harden a little overnight and develop flavour the way cake does so well.

CAKE: Enough for one 6" shallow cake which should be buttered and floured ready for use - pre-heat oven to 350F

2oz/half a stick soft butter

2oz/ 1/2 cup white flour

2oz /scant 1/3 cup sugar

1 egg whisked lightly 

2 tablespoons cocoa powder sifted with the flour

1. Cream butter and sugar together until fluffy and light.

2. Add egg in 3 goes and beat well between each addition.

3. Resift flour and cocoa powder into the batter and fold until blended.

4. Put batter into prepared pan and smooth.

5. Bake for about 20 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean.

6. Allow to cool completely and put in a tin overnight.

STRAWBERRY SAUCE:

1lb strawberries - the best you can find - sliced 

1oz/ 1/8 cup sugar

Toss strawberries with sugar - then cook for about 20 minutes until the juices run and they start to thicken - allow to cool and then liquidize to a nice vivid red sauce.

STRAWBERRY MOUSSE:

4oz / 1/2 cup strawberry puree

3 tablespoons/ 1 1/2 ozs butter 

In the top of a double boiler melt these 2 ingredients together - allow to cool - set aside

2 egg yolks

1oz/ 1/8 cup sugar

In the top of a double boiler whisk these together until they resemble thick mayonnaise - take off the heat and continue whisking until cool - set aside

2 egg whites
 

5 ozs/ heaped 1/3 cup sugar
 

large pinch cream of tartar
 

  4 tablespoons hot water.

1. Put all 4 ingredients in a large bowl set over a pan of lightly simmering water - don't let the bottom of the bowl touch the water or the eggs will cook.

2. Whisk like crazy until the mixture forms soft peaks, and at this point it should be quite hot to the touch making your eggs safe if you are using commercial eggs.

3. Take the bowl off the heat and keep whisking until cool and about this thick:

Whip 4 fl ozs heavy/double cream with 2 tablespoons sugar
 

TO ASSEMBLE MOUSSE: Fold the strawberry puree very gently into the whipped cream, then fold in the whipped egg yolks and finally the whisked egg whites - I didn't add any gelatin as I don't like to use it but it could have done with some kind of thickening agent like gelatin or agar agar, which is much trickier to use especially with dairy ingredients - I packet of unflavoured gelatin used as per manufacturers instructions would work for this amount of strawberry mousse.
 

THE CHARLOTTE:

6oz chocolate chips melted in the top of a double boiler.

1. Place the chocolate cake on your presentation plate and cover with the strawberry sauce you didn't use in the mousse.

Now dip the bottoms of the Roses de Reims biscuits or Ladyfingers one by one in the chocolate and stand smartly around the chocolate cake thus:

Ahhh...my little Stonehenge dessert :) I forgot to take a photo but I now strew some of the glaceed angelica cut into small pieces atop the puree...

Allow chocolate to cool completely - you may need to do some stone mason work to help the biscuits stand and hold the mousse thus:

When the chocolate is cooled - by the way - don't cool the chocolate in the fridge or it will cloud and look unattractive! 

Now gently pour the mousse into the centre of the roses de Reims ring you have created:

At this point I would allow the mousse to sit and gel for at least 4 hours and preferably overnight.

And now for the fun cream furbelows and decorations - whip up some more sweetened cream and decorate to your hearts content, then add angelica, or glaceed/candied fruit of your choice in a pleasing pattern, and finally some nice, genteel dollops of the remaining strawberry puree - I would have added some sliced fresh strawberries too but with the humidity we have had lately the strawberries did not look good enough for decoration - the season seemed awfully short this year!!

ET VOILA!!!!!

Bonne fete mes amis Francais - s'il vous plaît excusez mon mauvais Français - from Maine, which is named after the French province of Maine 
and home to Acadian culture

 Merci beaucoup Isabelle - Patricia

Strawberries and Cream times two - Victoria Sponge Cake and a new fabric design!!

Strawberries and Cream two ways:

 ...as a classic Victoria Sponge filled with whipped cream and macerated strawberries and:

...as the newest textile design for my Spoonflower shop.

To the cake first - always cake first!!

A Victoria Sponge or Sandwich is a classic British cake named in honour of - you guessed it - Queen Victoria who relished the new fangled craze for tea parties in mid to late 1800's England.

In 1855 the invention of baking powder meant the cake could rise without the need for hours (literally) of egg whisking with a FORK!!! - I have seen old recipes that call for 3 hours of egg beating with a FORK as the whisk hadn't yet been invented in the US - roll on that invention, my arms would fall off beating for that long!! PHEW!! Technically speaking a sponge cake is fatless and demands much whisking and beating and frothing of egg yolks and whites separately and sounds too much like a genoise with which I have had very little luck in the past, but a sandwich has added butter resulting in a more substantial cake that can last for a day or two - not in our house but maybe in that of others!!

Now my oven was on the fritz so I ended up making my miniature sponge cakes in a countertop electric one with more than passable results but I did have to bake them in a ceramic dish instead of metal tins so I will give times and temps for both in case you decide to go the mini route too.

First you must macerate your strawberries, start this a couple of hours before you are ready to bake your cake. I use local when they are available but they're not ready yet - Maine lags behind in the growing season - so I chose Driscolls Organic Strawberries which have a good and consistent flavour - and I used a pound punnet. I sliced the strawberries and sprinkled three tablespoons of sugar on them and then tossed occasionally - leave for about 2 hours at room temperature and let the juices run - aren't they pretty - they look like lots of little hearts - awww!!

Now that the strawberry juices have flowed you are ready to bake your cake - my recipe is from

"Ritz Afternoon Tea" by Helen Simpson

This amount gave me two 4" diameter cakes - it is supposed to be for two 7" cake pans but I have a hard time believing you would get enough batter for two 7" pans so if you are going for a regular sized cake I would double this recipe for a decent sized cake!! 

For metal pans put your oven at 350F for ceramic as I did mine put your oven at 325F 

For either pan you choose butter lightly and line with greaseproof paper and butter again - makes it so much easier to get this cake out after baking.

INGREDIENTS:

For filling:

1lb strawberries macerated as above

1/2 pint whipped double/heavy cream with a couple of tablespoons of sugar added and some almond extract/essence of you like

Toasted almond slices if you so desire

For cake:

(I always weigh my ingredients for a more consistent result and have them all at room temperature which makes for  easier creaming and amalgamation of the eggs into the butter and sugar mix)

4oz butter - I always use Kate's from Maine - it has such a deep flavour

4oz plain flour sifted with 1 teaspoon baking powder - or 4oz self raising flour

4oz sugar - caster if you have it otherwise just regular white sugar

2 eggs beaten well

I added one teaspoon of almond essence/extract to the eggs as I like a light almond flavour with my strawberries.

METHOD:

1. Cream butter and sugar together until light in colour and texture.

2. Slowly add the beaten eggs and beat until well mixed between additions.

3. Fold flour and baking powder into the creamed mix with a metal spoon - I just looked up why a metal spoon for this as I was wondering and here is the answer I found - "Once the butter and sugar is creamed, change to a big metal spoon to mix in the eggs and fold in the flour. This keeps the air from escaping through the wood grain." - I did not know this - you learn something new everyday don't you?

 4. Turn the cake batter into your preferred pans - smooth the top and bob into the oven - bake for about 20 minutes - test to check for doneness  - cake will be springy in the middle if you press lightly and will spring back - they should also have pulled away from the sides of the pan too.

5. Remove from oven, allow to cool for 10 minutes or so and then remove from pans and out on cooling rack - cool completely!

While the cake is cooling whip your heavy/double cream to soft peaks - when the beaters are removed, soft peaks curl over and droop rather than stand straight up which is the definition of stiff peaks.

My cakes browned too much - because of the silly oven I was using - yours in a regular oven should be OK but if they're not you can just turn them upside down and put the brown on the bottom as I did!! My cakes were tall enough that I cut them in half laterally - if you do yours in 2 7" tins then place one on a plate and strew strawberries hither and yon across the surface and then pour the juices over as well - can you see someone lurking quietly in the background here hoping desperately for just a little taste, hopeful Eleanor!!

Now add the whipped cream - I did mine with a piping bag because I like the way it looks but you can just spoon and mound yours as you like - this is somewhat rustic because as soon as you cut it everything squishes out anyways!! For the finished cake as at the top I also strew - strewed?? - toasted almond slices around willy nilly - just for a bit of a crunch and that lovely nutty flavour too.

Yum I say YUM!!! If you can stand to wait an hour or so before you have your cake and eat it too - then the flavours will have married some, the juices will have soaked into the sponge and the cake tastes even better. 

Many people in the UK make the cake and then just sandwich it together with strawberry jam - which is really good too but with strawberries and cream - how can you go wrong?

And now for my latest fabric design - I had mentioned on my Facebook page earlier this week that I was working on a new design for my Spoonflower shop - based on the design I had created in the round which was used as a dinnerware pattern by PTS America a few years ago:

 In my head I had imagined this as an allover print with no direction - but this is how it ended up as a stripe with two directions:

  - honestly you just never know where your designs will lead you! The print isn't available yet from Spoonflower as I haven't received my sample to approve but I'll let you know when it is!

...and please let me know if you make the cake. Here's to a happy and delicious summer for us all full of strawberries and cream - Patricia 

HAPPY BAKING!!!!

Cornish Strawberry Puffs or Toffee Strawberry Half Moons

Wallowing luxuriously in a pool of delicious organic cream are simple Sweet Cornish Pasties. Cornish Pasties are usually savoury with a meat and potato filling but here they have been transformed into a little bite of heaven filled with fresh strawberries and baked in a caramelly sauce that coats the pasty with crunchy deliciouness only found in your dreams!!!

I have been eyeballing this recipe for many a year. It was published aeons ago in an issue of Australian Vogue Food...a wonderful magazine that I can't find in Maine anymore...boo hoo!!

Pre-heat your oven to 450F...nice and toasty
INGREDIENTS: Makes three PUFFS
PASTRY
2oz/2 tablespoons butter
1 cup/4oz of unbleached white flour
1 egg beaten
a little milk
Fresh Strawberries
SYRUP
2 cups/16 fl oz water
1 cup sugar
1 oz/1 tbsp butter
METHOD:
1. Rub the butter into the flour.
2. Add the beaten egg.
3. Add a little milk, a very little milk in my case, to help form a soft dough.
4. Roll out the dough, it will be sticky so have a lot of extra flour on hand to help unstick, to about 7" circles as above.
5. Place a few slices, about 7, of strawberries as above on one half of the circle...put a dabbling of milk around that semi circle of the dough and fold over the strawberries and gently press to stick
8. For the syrup...boil water, sugar and butter together for about 7 minutes until it begins to thicken.
9. Pour the syrup into cast iron pan or other metal receptacle, and put into your 450F oven until it is bubbling happily.
10. Remove carefully from the oven...boiling syrup is a horror to get on your skin!!!...gently place your three pasties into their caramel bath and return to the oven.
11. In 10 minutes baste the pasties with caramel.
12. In another 10 minutes baste again...and then another 10 minutes you should be done, the caramel should have greatly reduced and be bubbling like Billy-o.

The first batch I did the caramel got to the hard crack stage and was really good, the second batch I took them out too early and they were at the chewy stage but I think that may also have had a lot to do with the extremely humid weather we were having then....so it is a bit finicky knowing when to remove them just don't let the caramel BURN...so long as it is not burnt the pasties will be GREAT!!!

You can eat them hot bathing in a pool of heavy/double cream or wait 'til they are cool and crunchy...they are literally toffee covered pasties with a little delight of strawberries in their centre!!! YUMMMMM!!! I have not seen a recipe like this before where you bake in basically simple syrup but I have to tell you I really like it.
Happy Baking!!!

Easy Peasy Strawberry and Almond Scrunch!! YUMM!!

Here is a very delightful and super easy summer recipe that resembles an English trifle but is less fussy and much quicker to put together...get the best flavoured strawberries you can...I use Driscolls Organic Strawberries from California and they're delicious!!
This recipe is adapted from "The Food for Thought Cookbook" by Guy Garrett and Kit Norman.
Food for Thought is a famous vegetarian restaurant in Covent Garden London
THE RECIPE:
1lb strawberries...washed, sliced and sprinkled with sugar...do this first to allow strawberries to macerate and give up some of their juices
Scrunch:
3oz butter
4ozs/1 1/2 cups rolled oats
2ozs/ 1/2 cup wholewheat flour or I do mostly white flour and some ground flax seeds to make up the difference...for a more nutty flavour
3ozs/ 1/3 cup sugar...brown or white your choice.
1ozs/1/4 cup toasted sliced almonds crumbled up
Creamy Part:
1/2 teaspoon almond essence/extract
5 fl ozs plain yoghourt (preferably drained in a cheese cloth for a couple of hours to get rid of some of the whey and make the yog. a little thicker...or you could use Greek Yoghourt)
10 fl ozs whipped double/heavy cream....to soft peaks...still needs to be a little loose.
2 tablespoons clear honey....I use a nice strong flavoured one from Maine...Swann's Wildflower Honey....delish!!
Extra 1oz toasted almond slices for top of dessert/pudding.

METHOD:
1. To make Scrunch: Pre-heat oven to 375F
2. Place all ingredients into a mixing bowl and rub butter into the other ingredients until thoroughly distributed.
3. Press gently into a flan/pie ring with a removable bottom...mine was about 9" diameter.
4. Bake for about 20 minutes until golden brown, remove from the oven and allow to cool.
Here is the Scrunch when cooled....

5. Mix honey into yoghourt with almond essence/extract.
6. Gently blend/fold honey and yog with whipped cream.
Now assemble your Scrunch....break up Scrunch base into smallish pieces and cover bottom of chosen bowl with such, strew half of strawberries and their juices over, cover this with half of the creamy bit...then repeat again finishing with cream mixture but saving a few strawbs. for the top. Sprinkle finished piece de resistance with reserved strawberries and toasted almonds.

Ta dah...allow to sit for a short while before serving so the strawberry juices can meld with the cream, yog. and scrunch. YUMMM!!!
Happy Strawberry season!

Butterflies and strawberries

Here is a picture of the latest illustration design I just added to my Cafe Press Store. I spent most of the day yesterday going goggle eyed uploading this image to various and sundry items on Cafe Press because we only have dial-up where we are in the wilds of very slightly inland Maine, James likes to say we have propane powered e-mail which always makes me laugh but is not far off from being true. One day we may be able to figure out how to join the rest of you in the 21st century, until then...........

HAPPY JULY 4TH!!!