let's cook: bakewell tarts

Our second cooking challenge of the year is complete! Bakewell tarts was the test this time, and it was like a proper bake-off (in that both of our recipes came from the Great British Bake Off).

I went down the Mr.Kipling route with an iced bakewell tart, and my mum went a bit more rustic, with a scattered almond and icing topping.

I was pretty impressed with how mine turned out actually - I thought it might be a challenge too far to get the pastry, frangipane AND icing to turn out right, but I think I did ok - and I enjoyed making it a lot.



The recipe I used was by GBBO contestent Luis Troyano, and I'm pleased to say my tart looks pretty similar to the photo used on the recipe - a visual success!

I enjoyed working with the sweet shortcrust pastry - I managed to roll it out nice and thin, and ended up with a pretty neat looking tart case after the blind bake.

And I haven't made a frangipane filling before so I wasn't really sure what to expect. When I first added it to the tart case it looked like I hadn't made quite enough (and I actually made a little more than the recipe required) but after baking it had risen quite a bit and I wasn't left with a sunken looking tart like I'd been worrying about.

Here's what it looked like post baking - not too shabby!



I thought the icing might be my downfall so I really concentrated on getting a neat and smooth layer, without getting any crumbs mixed in, which has been an issue in the past. I ended up with a pretty even coverage - right to the edges too!



And the stripes were super easy. I'm pleased it didn't matter that I had slightly wobbly hands at the time.



Pretty!

My mum found her recipe in one of the Bake Off books. She said she struggled a bit with the pastry and she had to do a couple of patch up jobs prior to baking. It looks like she had more than enough frangipane though, as it ended up taller than the pastry.

I quite like her approach to a topping - a scatter of almonds with just a drizzle of icing. A good option for the less sweet-toothed among us as the fully iced tarts are definitely super sweet.



So, how did they taste? 

Overall I found my tart pretty tasty, although admit it was a bit of a sugar overload. I worried at first that I'd spread the jam too thinly on the base, but think it was the right amount in the end - the filling was nice and moist, in contrast to the crisp pastry.

My mum has reported that hers was very tasty too, although she thinks she used too much jam on the base, and she said her pastry was a little uneven. It looks good though!



And the scores...

I made my tart the same weekend as my mum and dad came to visit so for the first time in a while we had the same judge to make a direct comparison.

Both my parents and Ben gave my bakewell tart a 9/10, with my mum and dad deducting a point because of the sweetness, and Ben deducting a point for the lack of cherry on each slice (!) I gave him another slice with a cherry on the following day so he was happy in the end.

My dad, it turns out, is quite a fan of bakewell tarts and was generous with his voting across the board, giving my mum a 9/10 too. However, my mum insisted I reduce this to an 8 as she wasn't pleased with the technical side of her bake.

Personally, I think she should take the high marks while she can, as she never knows what my dad is going to refuse to eat.



On the whole, I think we both did really good this time round.

Next time we'll be making filled pasta - I'm thinking ravioli.
I hope it doesn't matter that we don't have pasta machines...

let's cook: tart tatin

We're on a roll!
I think that's the shortest amount of time between cooking challenges to date.

This time we made tart tatin - our choice of topping. My mum went for apple from this book by her namesake, and I chose to use some of the beetroot we got in our veg box this week.

Here are the outcomes...



My mum served her apple tart with custard and I've heard from my dad that it went down very well.

I followed this recipe from Simply Delicious which paired the tart with a goats cheese cream (my favourite!) The only difference in my method was that I used fresh beetroot so boiled it for about an hour first, before allowing to cool and removing the skin. Also, I didn't have an ovenproof frying pan so I transferred the beetroot to a shallow ovenproof dish before topping with pastry.

It was quite a simple recipe to follow with only a few ingredients, although I think the real test in this challenge was trying not to get myself and the kitchen completely covered in purple - and I succeeded, just.




It came out such a nice colour, and was lovely and caramelised, if a little rough around the edges.

Ben made up a delicious Ottolenghi salad to accompany the tart, and the goats cheese cream complimented the sweetness of the beetroot really well I think.

I will definitely be making this again if we get another big load of beetroot.



Now, to the scoring...

Ben gave me an 8/10 (not too shabby) - his main complaint being that he had to make the salad, and that it was beetroot alone. Although I think it was also partly due to the fact that I made him wait to eat it while I took some photos.

It turns out my dad likes tarts more than he likes dips so my mum was onto a winner. He gave it 9/10. Really good. Well done Mum!



Next time we'll be making gnocchi. As suggested by Rhian and Rosie.

I fear it's easy to get it wrong so it might be a tricky one.
Wish us luck!

blueberry and apple

Continuing with my domestic weekend, I decided to bake some puff pastry tarts for a barbecue I attended last night.

I based them on this recipe but added more blueberries and cinnamon to suit my taste buds.





They were especially tasty when eaten with some thick vanilla cream, and I even have a few left over to accompany a sunday evening Grand prix roast dinner. With custard tonight I think.

rhubarb rhubarb

Sometimes it's easier to talk about nonsense than to say what you actually think.
And sometimes it's easier to make things instead:


Yumi & I had some further adventures in the kitchen on Wednesday, and cooked dinner for the men who had been out at work all day (it's a hard life).

Thank you kindly to Matt for the donation of rhubarb from his allotment - very very tasty!