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Tarte Tropézienne aka Laskiaispulla – Sweet bun for Shrove Tuesday

Feb 28th, 2012 by

What’s common with Finnish winter and Saint-Tropez? It’s Tarte Tropézienne. I know it does not make sense. When I first saw that giant brioche filled with French pastry cream and berries I could not help but thinking of our Finnish Laskiaspulla, a sweet briochelike bun.


In Finland we bake sweet buns filled with almond paste and whipped cream to celebrate something we call mid-winter sliding festival called “Laskiainen” in Finnish. This year Laskiais Tuesday was 21st of February. Traditionally in Finland, Shrove Tuesday or “Laskiainen” is the day when kids go out to play with their sled or “pulkka” to slide on snowy downhill. Going to slide on the hill is what we call “pulkkamäki”.

The original purpose of Shrove Tuesday, Laskiainen, was to get ready for fasting before Eastern, the last festive day to eat heavy and prepare for Lent. Besides laskiaispulla there’s pea soup (called “hernekeitto” in Finnish) eaten too on Laskiainen. I dare to say that Laskiainen has unreligious meaning for most of the Finns, therefore mid-winter sliding festival works well as a name of this winter feast.

Back to the giant Brioche….According to the traditional recipe, a Tropézienne is prepared with brioche, French pastry cream (crème patissière) and butter cream. The ingredients which compose this pastry are simple: eggs, flour, powdered milk and butter. A modern recipe of the Tarte Tropézienne includes berries in the pastry cream which composes the cake.

Look at the video clip: At Gérard’s Café preparing of genuine Tarte Tropézienne

It took me to come to Dubai to get to know this delicatesse of French Riviera. I went to make Tarte Tropézienne to Gerard’s Cafe beside Burj Khalifa on January with Saba Wahid and Monsieur Gérard. I had no idea what kind of cake it is, but wanted to know how to make it. I first got to know Gérard’s Cafe at Jumeirah, when I got a tip that we have a real French patisserie around corner near my house. They are baking authentic Galette des Rois, puff pastry with almond paste filling. Traditionally, the Galette Des Rois is made to celebrate Epiphany, which falls on the 6th of January, twelve days after Christmas. They say that the cake is eaten in celebration of the arrival of the three kings who have traveled from afar with gifts for the newborn baby. In practice, people eat galette throughout January. Little I knew about that relation to religious tradition, I wanted to taste it for rather unreligious reasons and was so late on March when I visited Gerard’s Cafe. They were kind enough to make it for me, even out of season, and yes I loved it, oven fresh still warm when I picked the cake up….. Oups back to Tarte Tropézienne.

Here I’m sharing with you the Tropézienne recipe of Chef Gérard. He said it definitely needs to be baked with fresh yeast, I dared to use dry one and got a brioche which is exactly as Finnish sweet bun, Laskiaispulla. Hence the round shape and the filling being softer than pastry cream. Custard for a Tropézienne needs to be thick. If you like to challenge yourself, here’s the link to homemade custard recipe, just make it very very thick.

Tarte Tropézienne recipe a la Gérard’s Café

Ingredients
For the brioche pastry:
500 g all-purpose flour
1 tsp salt
75 g sugar
25 g milk powder
25 g fresh yeast (11 g dry yeast)
125 g softened butter
125 ml water
4-5 eggs
Stone sugar for decoration
Almond flakes for decoration
Icing sugar for dusting
For the cream:
Sugar syrup (boil five parts of water and two parts of sugar, use after its cool. Use few drops of lemon or orange juice for flavor)
Custard cream (mix custard powder according to directions on tin, double the powder to get thick consistency)
Whipping cream without sugar

Step 1
Mix flour, salt, sugar, milk powder. Add fresh yeast and butter. Add the water and three of the eggs, beaten, and mix in a food processor with pastry hook for 15-20 minutes until elastic and soft. Let the dough rest for an hour, in a bowl covered with a napkin, to allow the pastry dough to rise.

Step 2
On floured surface, cut the dough in half and shape into balls. Let it rest again for 15 minutes. (Or you can freeze one of the halves to make another tarte or brioche).

Step 3
On a flat surface roll the dough to 1 cm thick flat round shape. Place on a baking tray and leave to rise for another hour or when it’s 2,5 cm (1 inch) thick. Once dough has risen, gently use a pastry brush and spread the top of the risen dough with beaten egg, taking care not to press too hard. Sprinkle with stone sugar (or with regular sugar) and almond flakes. Bake at 160 degrees Celsius for 15-20 minutes until golden brown.

Step 4
Let the baked brioche cool and slice into half horizontally (to fill with cream) with serrated knife. Spread sugar syrup on the inside of lower half.

Step 5
Mix equal quantity of custard cream (prepared with custard powder) and whipped cream until you get light yellow cream. Spread with spatula over the lower half of brioche, leaving a dome in the middle.
Punch the berries in the pastry cream and replace the top layer of brioche over and chill. Before serving decorate with icing sugar.

Voilà

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Be My Valentine – Marianne Cake with Chocolate, Peppermint candies and Strawberries

Feb 5th, 2012 by

Be My Valentine! It’s time for red and time for hearts. In Finland we call it modestly Friends Day, Ystävänpäivä. It’s a day to remember your friends, not only your loved one.

I got invitation from Very Good Recipes to be one of the ten judges in Be My Valentine Challenge. I am so excited to see what entries we get. Check the challenge website and send your recipe with photo. The condition is to have red in your recipe.
Yalla! Let’s Go!

Be My Valentine Challenge
on Very Good Recipes

I wanted to make a special Finnish cheese cake to celebrate Valentines day. My cake is a fake Marianne cake, I have cheated with candies. Errr.. Mari what, you might think. The original recipe is definitely from Finland, it calls for candy named Marianne. This “old” Finnish sweet is chocolate candy covered with peppermint, made by Fazer Bakeries & Confectionery founded 1891. Fazer is basically synonym for chocolate in Finland. I am not crazy about chocolate, but their chocolate is worth of trying. Available in Dubai Tax Free by the way, same as Marianne candies. Hah…this is not paid ad, but my honest opinion. Try Fazer Milk chocolate, called Fazer Blue and let me know your opinion.

Do you have candy canes left over from your Christmas tree decoration, here’s idea where to crush them. I have been planning to try this Marianne cake ever since I pumped in to the recipe in Fazer website. When I saw candy canes in my supermarket I knew instantly where to use them. I made substitude of Marianne candy crush from scratch, with candy canes and dark chocolate by giving them a couple of spins with coffee /spice grinder. It was just perfect result, candy became almost powder, so did dark chocolate, but it worked really well in this recipe.

Happy Valentine! Hyvää Ystävänpäivää!

Recipe:
Marianne Cake – with Strawberry, Chocolate and Peppermint candies

Base:
200 g chocolate cookies (I used Oreo without filling)
75 g butter or margarine

Filling:
300 ml whipping cream
200 g cream cheese (like Philadelphia)
Red food coloring (optional)
5 sheets of gelatin (= 2 table spoon of Davis Gelatin, New Zealand)
100 ml water
75 g dark chocolate
60 g peppermint candies, I used 4 small candy canes (optional)
(Or 120 g Marianne crush)

Strawberry jelly cover:
4 sheets of gelatin (1 – 1 1/4 table spoon of Davis Gelatin)
400 g strawberries swirled with blender to liquid consistency
70 g sugar (or more if you like sweet)
100 ml water or red juice
Red food coloring (optional)

1. Cover the bottom of 24 cm spring form pan with baking paper and wipe insides with oil or cover with fling foil, cake will come out smoothly after it’s settled.
2. Crush chocolate cookies with spin roll or mixer. Smelt the butter and add to crushed cookies, pulse couple of times until mixed well. Press the cookie butter mixture on the bottom of cake pan
3. Whip the cream until soft peaks forms add some powder sugar for your taste.
4. Stir cream cheese (and add 1 ts of red food coloring) and add to whipped cream and vanilla.
5. Boil the 100 ml water and add/sprinkle gelatin, mix well, make sure gelatin is all dissolved and add gelatin liquid to cream-cheese mixture. (I added it through fine strainer)
6. Pour over the cookie mix and let settle in fridge (abt. 3 hours)

7. Make the strawberry jelly cover: Swirl strawberries and sugar with blender to liquid consistency. Heat 100 ml of water/juice and add 1 generous table spoon of gelatin, mix well. And add to smooth strawberry mix. (Note from amateur chef, do not use blender to mix gelatin to strawberry mixture, it makes bubbles, see photo of top layer, not exactly best outlook, does not spoil the taste though)
Pour over the cheesecake which is already settled in fridge. Let stand in fridge until cover layer is settled, about 2-3 hours

8. Remove cake from spring form cake pan gently on to a serving plate and decorate.

Tip: Use cookie cutter as template to cut shapes. I pressed heart shape cookie cutter in the cake and cut it with knife.


Valentine Hearts by Very Good Recipes
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Baked Eggs with Rucola,Yoghurt and Chili-Sage butter – Turkish Breakfast

Jan 29th, 2012 by

A perfect start for the day, lovely oven baked eggs on a rucola bed with thick yoghurt and sprinkled with chili-sage butter. Is there anything better loaded with proteins than this Turkish breakfast? Naah….

When I first saw this recipe in one of the Finnish women magazines, it was love at first sight. The full page photo of delish looking eggs and yoghurt can’t go wrong. Clip Clip.. it went to my recipe folder.
In Finland I would make it only at summer when we have fresh rucola available, all imported veggies are rather expensive. Here in Dubai you can crow rucola (Gharghir جرجير) year around, even in balcony, well if you are green finger. In case you are not, supermarkets and fresh food markets offer it year around and it is not expensive, 10 dirhams per box (2 EUR). Here’s a photo of my rucola garden, as you see, not ready yet to harvest, so I took mine from market around the corner.

My Little Herb Garden

Here’s how to make it:

Turkish Baked Eggs with Rucola, Yoghurt and Chili-Sage Butter
300 g rucola
2 teaspoon olive oil
4 eggs
150 g Turkish yoghurt or Labneh
1 garlic clove
50 g butter (salted)
½ teaspoon chili flakes
6 sage leaves
Salt

1. Heat the oven to 150°C

2. Rinse rucola leaves and heat the oil in frying pan add rucola and cook over medium heat for 5 minutes or until most of the liquid has evaporated.

3. Spread the slightly cooked rucola on oven proof dish. Make 4 hollows in the rucola and crack in each an egg.

4. Bake in the oven for 10 to 15 minutes until the egg whites set.

5. While eggs are in oven combine the yoghurt with the garlic and salt to taste and leave at room temperature.

6. Melt the butter in a small pan and add the chili flakes, cook until the butter foams and color changes to golden brown, add finely chopped sage, and move out from stove.

7. Take the eggs out from oven and spoon over dollops of yoghurt and chili-sage butter. Serve straight when hot with the bread.


There’s no cooking if I did not twisted the recipe somehow. I did not have thick Turkish yoghurt; instead I used normal low fat yoghurt which I filtered with cheese cloth on metallic colander. Works well also thru paper kitchen towels or paper coffee filter. It takes some time, but consistency is very nice.

To get mild garlic flavor smash the clove, let soak in yoghurt and just before serving collect the smashed clove off. Gives hint of garlic taste without ruining the day of your colleagues or neighbors in the lift when you breathe your Good Morning wishes. I did not use garlic at all and taste did not suffer.

Try to bake eggs in individual oven dishes, ramekins, no fuss on serving.

It hit only when I wrote this blog post that I should have used my favorite Turkish Labneh from Pinar. Why didn’t I get it earlier, no worries, now I have to make it for next Friday brunch again.

Submitted to Breakfasts of the World Challange by Very Good Recipes.
Sahtain! Afiyet olsun!

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Flatbread from Savonia – Savolainen Pannurieska for Breakfast

Jan 28th, 2012 by


What in the earth is harrish?! I found 2 kilos of grains in my kitchen cupboard and was wondering why have I bought it and what could I do with it. It turned out that it is harees(هريس) and not harrish as written in English on bag. I asked around, googled and find out it is whole wheat grains, which is locally used here in Dubai for a stew or porridge with meat. That dish is called Harees or Harisah, a specialty of Ramadan.

 

 

Well…. back to the Finnish flatbread. We Finns love all kind of breads and porridges, anything from grains which are cultivated in homeland, like oats, barley, wheat and rye. The bread is at its best when fresh and straight from oven, only butter spread on it. That’s the way authentic Finnish bread is eaten and served

I have got this Finnish Savonian flatbread recipe from my mother, her family is from Upper Savonia in Finland.  The original recipe calls for whole or cracked barley, I have cheated and replaced barley with harees and it worked well.

 

The Original Savonian Flatbread – Savolainen Pannurieska recipe

1 liter buttermilk or curdled milk (=add 100 ml of buttermilk to lukewarm milk and let stand 2 hrs in room temperature)

1 cup whole barley grains (boil about 10 minutes)

2 cups rolled oats

1-2 eggs

1 tsp salt

 

1.         Mix curdled milk or buttermilk and barley and let stand in fridge overnight

2.         Add rolled oats on the morning and let stand another 3 hours in fridge

3.         Add eggs and salt just  before baking

4.         Cover baking pan with baking paper and smelt 25-50 g of butter  on it, pour the bread dough on smelted butter and bake at 225-250°C about 30 minutes

The recipe is really easy and makes wholesome flatbread, no worries about rising dough. I twisted the recipe totally because I did not have buttermilk or laban as it’s called in Dubai, and replaced barley with whole wheat called harees.

I used low fat milk and cream to make full fat milk. Instead of laban I used yoghurt to curdle the milk.  My mother uses also cracked barley and buttermilk and mixes 50 ml oil with eggs and oats next day, no need to put butter on baking sheet if oil is used in dough.

Give it a try to this healthy flatbread, called pannurieska in Finnish.  Something you have to taste yourself, soft and sourish but creamy, just knife some salted butter on it and you are well fed.

Pour  a class of cold fresh milk and enjoy with hot buttered Savonian Pannurieska. That’s what I call a traditional Finnish breakfast.  Submitted to Breakfasts of the World Challenge by Very Good Recipes.

 

 

 
 

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Muffinbreads with Dried Tomato, Basil and Cottage Cheese

Jan 2nd, 2012 by

There’s nothing which beats fresh hot bread with salted butter melting on it. Baking a bread have never been my cup of tea, too much hand work required, but I got inspiration from blog of La Mere Culinaire. She wrote so nice and funny story about visit in farm here in UAE…yes we do have here also “real life”, not everything is bling bling or sandy lands…..


I changed ingredients to what I had in my kitchen and what I cannot live without, perfect marriage of flavors of basil and tomato and lovely, grainy cottage cheese.
Check the original recipe shared by La Mere Culinaire

Muffinbreads with Dried Tomato, Basil and Cottage Cheese

Ingredients
3 tablespoons warm water
2 ½ teaspoons dry yeast
3 tablespoons sugar
110 g unsalted butter
1 cup milk
2 cups bread flour (wholemeal flour)
1 ½ teaspoons salt
1 ½ cups allpurpose flour
½ – 1 cups sun dried tomato chopped in small pieces
1 tablespoon dried basil
1 tub of cottage cheese (ax 200 g)
1 egg, lightly beaten with 2 teaspoons water (for egg wash)
Toasted sesame seeds for sprinkling (mine were not toasted)

Dough:
Stir together warm water, yeast and sugar in a small bowl until yeast is dissolved,
let stand until yeast foams.
Melt 75 g butter in a small saucepan, add milk and heat to lukewarm.
Stir together yeast mixture, butter-milk mixture, 2 cups bread flour and salt.
Add 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (use your hands after dough gets thick), sundried tomatos, basil and cottage cheese. (I used brand name Jocca, which is available in Dubai supermarkets and is not that creamy)

Butter a large bowl. Knead dough on a lightly floured surface, until smooth and elastic,
about 10 minutes dough should be slightly sticky. Or use your kicthen machine with dough hook.
Form dough into a ball and put in buttered bowl. Let dough rise, bowl covered tightly with plastic wrap, in warm room temperature until doubled in size, about 1 hour.

Make rolls:
Butter 18 muffin/cupcake cups with butter or cooking spray.

Turn out dough onto a lightly floured surface and divide into thirds.
Cut off small pieces of dough and form into balls, remember they’ll double in size when rosen
Put 3 balls into each buttered muffin cup.
Let rolls rise, loosely covered with a kitchen towel until almost doubled in size, around 40 minutes.

While rolls rise, put oven rack in middle position and preheat oven to 200C.
Brush rolls lightly with egg wash and sprinkle with toasted sesame seeds. Bake until golden, 15 to 20 minutes. (link to recipe from La Mere Culinaire)

I have got a new bread baker from Lakelands and tried how it makes bread, hence the flat shape. Hmmm…planning foccacia and ciabatta bakes already.

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Happy New Year!
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White Chocolate and Gingerbread Cheesecake – White Christmas Theme

Dec 26th, 2011 by

I have been looking for ideas for festive cake with the twist. I flipped through some Finnish magazines,  made internet search and find out that after leaving Finland six years ago there’s been hype in Finnish food magazines of glögg cheese cake with gingerbread crust. Yes I know,  most of you might think, what in the earth glögg is. It’s a popular and very traditional Finnish (Scandinavian) spiced winter drink. We enjoy it steaming hot when winter weather gives its best; cool and snow. Read about glögg in my other post via link here.

 

Traditionally glögg is ruby red, so my cake should be red, but I wanted to make a white cake specially to take White Christmas Challenge from Very Good Recipes, hence the white theme here. ……Look at the cake!
It’s in fact yellow, in celebration of golden sandy dunes in Dubai desert.

Let me tell about gelatin. It took me a good hour or more to read and understand the beauty of converting gelatin sheets to equal quantity of gelatin powder. After all, I don’t want yello cake. And what about secret or discovery of Davis Gelatin. Why it reads edible gelatin on package, is there also other kind of gelatin on sale in grocery shops?! It reads also clear and unflavored, what about that weird smell of this gelatin. It says halal, but honestly,  I almost quit making the cake because this odor. I am use to gelatin sheets which are odorless.

After several double checks, I came up with gelatin measures like this 1 tablespoon gelatin powder = 3 sheets. In case you might want to do your own research,  here’s the link.

If someone knows pure vegetarian gelatin sold in supermarket in Dubai, leave me a comment please. Above mentioned is from Spinney’s.

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White Chocolate and Gingerbread Cheesecake recipe

Base:
200 g Gingerbread cookies
75 g butter or margarine

Filling:
6 sheets of gelatin (= 2 table spoon of Davis Gelatin, New Zealand)
400 ml whipping cream
200 g white chocolate
400 g cream cheese like Philadelphia
50 ml water
200 g lingonberries or cranberries (optional)

Glaze:
3 sheets of gelatin (1 table spoon of Davis Gelatin)
350 ml of white glögg (Finnish spicy winter drink)

 

  1. Cover 24 cm spring form pan with baking paper and wipe insides with oil or cover with fling foil, cake will come out smoothly after it’s settled.
  2. Crush gingerbread cookies with spin roll or mixer. Smelt the butter and add to crushed cookies, pulse couple of times until mixed well. Press the cookie butter mixture on the bottom of cake pan
  3. Whip the cream until soft peaks forms add some powder sugar.
  4. Smelt the white chocolate over a hot-water bath
  5. Mix white chocolate smelt with cream cheese and add to whipped cream and vanilla.
  6. Boil the 50 ml water and add/sprinkle gelatin, mix well, make sure gelatin is all dissolved and add gelatin liquid to cream-cheese mixture. (I added it through fine strainer)
  7. If you use berries, fold them into cream and cheese mixture last. Note berries have to be soft and juicy.
  8. Pour over the cookie mix and let settle in fridge (abt. 3 hours)
  9. Make the glaze: heat half of the juice/ glögg and add 1 table spoon of gelatin mix well and add rest of the juice/ glögg. Pour over the cheesecake which is already settled in fridge. Let stand in fridge until glaze is settled, about 1 hour.
  10. Remove cake from spring form cake pan gently on to a serving plate and decorate with white chocolate chips

 

Note from baker: I have used cranberries, since the best option, lingon berry is not available here in Dubai.  Cranberries need to get some frost to get soft. Let them stand overnight in freezer and use them when thawed thoroughly. If  you use cranberries you might really need to use that optional sugar.

 

 

Wishing you a white white winter or sandy winter like we have here in Dubai!

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White Glögg – Spiced Finnish Christmas Drink

Dec 26th, 2011 by

The amazing smell of cinnamon and spices is surrounding my house inside out. It’s time to warm up with nice cup of glögg, a traditional Finnish winter drink called glögi in Finnish.

When weather starts to get cooler, on November in Finland, this spicy drink is just so lovely warmer. The most popular glögg is traditionally made by heating up blackcurrant juice with spices like cinnamon, cloves, allspice, nutmeg, mace, cardamom, orange peel, ginger.

I am making it to get the wonderful smell of festive spices into my house. I miss the snow and coldness of Finnish winter, this drink brings me back to my homeland whenever where ever I smell or drink it.

Glögg is available everywhere in Finland from November to January. You can get the readymade mixture and tune it for your liking with some almonds and raisins, which you have to spoon after or during drinking of it.

Modern winter drink glögg has its roots in the ancient Swedish mulled wine punch called glödgat vin, which literally means “glow wine”.  My version is non-alcoholic, but in mainstream Finnish families, part of the juice is replaced with red wine, and a dash of stronger spirit, like vodka, punsch, brandy, calvados or gin may be added to it. I have made white glögg from apple juice. Nowadays this white version has become popular, made with white wine or cider, or fruit juices like apple, pear or white grape juice.

On Christmas dinner, glögg can be served first as a welcome drink or last with the dessert, or instead of coffee and tea.

White glögg recipe

 

1 liter apple juice (I used cloudy apple juice, any kind of goes)

1-2 teaspoons cloves (whole)

1-2 teaspoons cardamom seeds roughly grounded

2 sticks of cinnamon

Pinch of ginger powder

Sugar (optional)

 

Cook half of the juice with spices about ½ hour with low heat. Strain and add rest of the juice and heat until hot again. Add sugar for your liking.

Glögg is served from tea glasses or mugs, mixed with a few blanched almonds and raisins.

Season Greetings!

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Cranberry Upside Down Cake with Toffee – Cranberry madness continue

Dec 4th, 2011 by

What’s with the cranberries! I have fell in love with them on this season. I promise this is the last cake or bake with cranberries, well ….almost, I had something in my mind, I’d love to share later. This is the season after all.

Everyone knows Pineapple upside down cake, but have you ever tried to make cake upside down with cranberries.
I like the flavor of brown sugar with cranberries, they match together so well with hint of cinnamon, which I left out this time, because my dear cake-taster doesn’t like cinnamon. I left out butter from topping and drizzled the cake with toffee sauce and few flakes of coconut.

 

Cranberry Upside Down Cake recipe

Ingredients

Cake:
1 1/2 cups flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
120 g butter, softened
1/2 cups granulated sugar
1/2 cup light brown sugar, packed
2 eggs
3/4 cup sour cream
1 teaspoon vanilla sugar

Topping:
4 cups cranberries, rinsed, get rid of bad cranberries, and at room temperature (just a bit less than a 350 g bag of cranberries).
50 g butter
1/2 cups sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon (optional)

Preparation method

1. Sift together flour, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.

2. Beat butter and sugars on medium speed until smooth and fluffy, about 1 minute.
a. Add eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition.
b. On low speed add half the flour mixture then mix to combine.
c. Add sour cream and vanilla. Mix to combine.
d. Add remaining flour mixture and mix until smooth.

3. Butter a 18 cm (9″) cake pan and sprinkle evenly ½ cups sugar mixed
with one teaspoon cinnamon on bottom, add cranberries and bits of butter here and there.

4. Spread batter evenly over the cranberries in the cake pan.

5. Bake at 180 – 200°C until golden brown, edges begin to pull away from the side of the pan, and toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 45 to 50 minutes.

Cool on rack for 10 minutes. Run knife around edge to loosen cake. Invert onto plate.

Note: When you pull out cake of the oven to test, it might appear liquid. The cake is like moving on top of the layer of cranberries. The large amount of butter and shifting cranberries made an almost liquid layer on the bottom of the cake. It will come together when cake cools, the cake is at best on next day when it’s settled.

Toffee sauce

Ingredients

120g light brown sugar
120g butter
100ml cream or full cream milk

Preparation method

1. Melt the butter and sugar in a saucepan over a low heat until the sugar is dissolved but not burned.
2. Stir in the cream or milk and heat gently until bubbling, stirring continually until thickened (about 10 minutes). Remove from heat and serve warm.

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Surprise your loved ones, friends and neigbors with lovely home made gift. I did two cakes with this recipe and used two 15 cm cake tins. Wishing you very happy festive season!

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Cranberry Custard Dessert – Monthly Custard Mingle

Nov 30th, 2011 by

I took the challange of November Monthly Mingle hosted by Sally @ My Custard Pie

I was thinking this is piece of cake, well it kind of was, it just made me very productive. I have made Finnish gingerbread cookies and cranberry jam and finally I prepared very first time in my life crème anglaise from the scratch. Phew…that was a heart pumping experience, and yes, it curdled, maybe because I forgot to put on Coldplay’s Yellow….but I revived it with Sally’s instructions. And in case worse would have gone worst, I had my store bought custard powder arm length waiting to rescue me. I did not need it!

All you need is very nice homemade custard aka crème anglaise, cranberry relish or cranberry jam and some creative decoration, anything edible, what you have at home will go. I chose gingerbread cookies, because it’s a must have festive cookie in Finland around Christmas time. Same as cranberries, or lingon berries actually in Finland would be even more easily available at this time of the year and might be slightly more affordable.
Here in Dubai it’s cranberry time.

Custard Recipe from My Custard Pie

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Compilation of Cranberry Custard Dessert

Take the best dessert serving bowl you have, layer cranberry relish or jam and custard, finish with sprinkle of cookie crumbs and decorate with sugarcoated cranberries and gingerbread cookies. Voilà, Aux Canneberges avec Crème anglaise!

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I have linked you to my previous posts and recipes of Finnish Gingerbread Cookies, Easy Beasy Cranberry Jam and really refreshing, crisp Fresh Cranberry Relish. I really recommend this humble relish to side of your juicy turkey plate.

Happy Holidays!

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Fresh Cranberry Relish

Nov 30th, 2011 by

A dear child has many names is a Finnish proverb and will apply to Cranberry, one of the superfoods, as well. Did you know its Vaccinium oxycoccos, sounds funny. Or mossberry, fenberry, bearberry, what about Sassamanash. In Finnish its Karpalo, how it sounds.

This relish does not need cooking, but food processor or blender. It’s all natural, easy and healthy.
I catch this recipe years ago from Gulf News for having something with turkey dinner. It really works with many dishes as condiment.


Fresh Cranberry Relish

Ingredients:
340 g fresh cranberries
1 orange washed, cut in quarters and deseeded
1 lemon washed, cut in quarters and deseeded
1 lime washed, cut in quarters and deseeded
Sugar to taste

Preparation:
1. Wash cranberries and take bad ones away, pulse with food processor or blender until very coarsely chopped.
2. Put lemon, orange and lime with peels in food processor and pulse until relish consistency.
3. Add sugar and blend few more seconds. Adjust sweetness. Store in fridge.

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