Victoria Sponge with Hazelnut Crunch Buttercream

And now for something completely different...


Yes, there are a *lot* more photos from Vanuatu to share, but I thought I'd change it up a little. Remember my blog's 5th birthday? I wanted to make a a very funky cake to celebrate, and having just received my copy of Warren Brown's Cake Love to review for The Gastronomer's Bookshelf, I decided to try a recipe from there.

One of the first blog posts I ever wrote, back in 2004 (can you believe it?!) was about the Cake Love bakery in Washington DC. I saw the bakery featured on Tyler's Ultimate, and was inspired by the story of its owner, Warren Brown, the one-time lawyer-turned cake baker. What an inspiration!

My review of Cake Love has been published at The Gastronomer's Bookshelf, so I will just talk about the cake! After much reading and indecision, I chose to make a Yellow Buttercake, filled with Hazelnut Crunch Buttercream.

Let's start with the buttercream. I realised it's a German-buttercream, which means it is a crème pâtissière, with cubes of butter whipped through. Intense stuff.

To get the hazelnut flavour, you heat hazelnuts in hot milk, and let it steep for 10 minutes. The drained, hazelnutty milk is then used to make the crème pâtissière, as below.

Once it's thick enough, you turn it into a mixer, add some other flavourings and whisk until room temperature.

Then you add cubes of room-temperature butter, one by one, whisking all the while. Then something quite magic happens...

WOW. Check out that cream! I have no idea how adding butter to custard results in something that looks and feels like a cloud, but there you go.

The recipe calls for you to crush the hazelnuts and fold them back through the buttercream, (hence hazelnut-CRUNCH buttercream), but a very vocal contingent in my house wanted smooth filling, so I saved the hazelnuts and toasted them in sugar to decorate the top.



Now, the cake. I'm not sure if it was the American measurements that I'm not used to, or Brown's super-wordy, highly detailed recipe, but something went wrong. Look below:
Argh! What the hell is that?! Check out all the creepy vertical air hole tunnels! It was so dense and heavy, and it took forever to cook through (about twice the time stated in the recipe). I think it could have hurt someone if I threw it at them. Very disappointing, but I couldn't bear to let all that buttercream go to waste. Instead, I whipped up a Victoria sponge in 2 sandwich tins.

Humped, but reliably delicious.

I flipped the cakes so the flat sides were outermost, and filled them with the buttercream...


...topped it with ganache....

... and spread it out smoothly with an offset spatula.

A crown of sugared hazelnuts (with a few judiciously taste-tested first!), a little candle, and my birthday-blog cake was done!

I was very pleased with this cake, and we ate it happily over the next few days. The hazelnut flavour was very delicate, and went well with the buttery Vic sponge. The ganache was made with dark chocolate, and a little too intense for the cake, actually. I thought choc and hazelnut would go well together, but I didn't realise how delicate the hazelnut flavour would be.


If I were to make this cake again (any takers?), I'd pare it down a little, and just layer up the cake with thick swathes of hazelnut buttercream. Heaven on a plate!

Vanuatu: Port Vila Market

Port Vila Market is a rather wonderful place. Located smack-bang in the centre of town, it sells an eye-popping array of local fruit and vegetables, flowers, delicious meals, laplap and other Ni-Vanuatu dishes. Business starts at 7am on Monday mornings, then continues around-the-clock until midday on Saturday. Yes peoples, that means it is a 24-hour market! Prices are clearly marked, there is no haggling, and no-one hassles you to buy anything. It is awesome.





And now for some close-ups of the produce...

Flowers, Stove Charcoal stoves

Coconuts; Eggplants and Capsicums
Papayas; Ginger
Guavas; Local Nuts
Woven baskets of yams; Taro and banana chips (oh yeah!)

Only 200VT for a whole punnet? Yes please!!!

These wild raspberries were gorgeous! I read that the season ends at the start of November, so we were lucky to find them. They were a little tart, the drupes were a lot finer than regular raspberries (it's a real word, look it up here), and they were also a lot firmer. (Most of them survived the day in a plastic bag in my backpack, without a proper container).
Lettuce and other veggies; some sort of root vegetable
Bananas; Pomelos with the prices written in marker pen


The LapLap Stands


Laplap, as I will have told you before, is the national dish of Vanuatu - a doughy paste of different root vegetables, wrapped in local cabbage and banana leaves and cooked in an underground oven. They will usually be cooked with coconut milk, and possibly a small piece of meat. A lot of work if you were doing it yourself, but luckily for us they can also be purchased for 200VT at the market. There is a whole row of tables selling various types of laplap, lined with banana leaves, and staffed by ladies wearing the traditional Mother Hubbard dresses and hairnets.

Laplap with chicken wing

Mixed root veggies with one chicken wing

CORN!

Laplap with island cabbage and chicken wing - that's the one I chose!

I was very keen to try one, but also a bit nervous about eating them in front of the locals. What if I didn't like it? Or couldn't finish it? Or just made a douche of myself eating it the wrong way? In the end I took mine down to the nearby park to eat in relative privacy.

Here is the lady wrapping up my laplap:


And here it is!

I opened it up on my lap, and tore small pieces of it with my fingers to eat. This left my hands terribly sticky, and I later realised that you're supposed to wrap the banana leaf around the dough, like a pocket, and take bites off the side, like a sandwich or a souvlaki. D'oh! The dough had a slightly grainy texture, which reminded me of one of the kuih my mum makes with grated taro in it. It also had coconut milk soaked into it - delicious!

The dough, as you can imagine, was very dense. I could only get through about half of it before I admitted defeat. I have come to the conclusion that the Ni-Vans can do serious carbs.


The Food Stalls

Towards the back of the market are several hot food stands, with long benches and communal tables. We weren't quite sure at first how it all worked, as there are no signs or menus. We discreetly asked some Aussie tourists what to do. Each stall sells something different, just ask what's on offer and sit down! It was usually meat or fish, with gravy and rice, 350VT for a plate. (And if anyone is wondering, yes, this is the same price that the locals are charged - I looked!)


Please, please don't be like the snobby old couple we met on a kayaking tour. When we asked them, rather enthusiastically, "Have you eaten at the market yet?", the lady scrunched up her face in disgust and said, "Oh goodness, no!"

I don't get why you would go on holiday just to eat restaurant meals at your five-star resort. I mean, I know we don't all have iron stomachs like me (heheh), and it's important to be careful, but seriously, live a little! Or at least don't look so disgusted at what the locals eat. Sheesh. That lady does not know what she is missing.

On our first lunch-time visit, we went to this guy's stall, for veal chops.
I know, how good does that look! One plate was more than enough for 2 of us to share, and had meltingly soft veal chops, onions, deeply flavoured gravy and a starchy vegetable. (Possibly white sweet potato?) It was extremely tasty and comforting.

I loved his giant pot of stew, and thought it looked so cool! I was overcome with a sudden desire to wave a 1000VT note in his face and scream "ME ME ME!!!!", but I restrained myself, haha!! Anyway, he was super friendly, and letting us know that if we wanted any more rice or gravy, all we had to do was ask.

We noticed that the locals' plates looked a bit different from ours - for locals, he just plonked the rice and stew on the plate, but for us he made it all pretty, with the rice in an upended bowl shape and the stew arranged around it. How sweet!

Next time, we tried the food at this lovely lady's stall.


Her name is Malena, and we discovered that she makes the BEST steak. During our trip, we came back twice more!

She also has some pretty kick-ass chilli...

The top picture is Malena's chicken, with veggies and rice. She said she didn't have enough chicken to make up a full plate, so added some beef. (I'm not sure what part of the beef it was, I'm thinking it was something like knuckle - heaps of gelatinous bits and soft, soft meat). Below is her steak - one large thin piece of beef, with a delicious savoury sauce. Malena also served pickled veggies with her meals, which were delicious.

Like our first guy, Malena was really nice, offering us extra rice and gravy if we wanted it. She also made our plates pretty too, and sat down and had a chat with us. I've been to some countries where you get treated pretty shabbily if you're a tourist or foreigner, and I thought it was just lovely that these guys at the market were so friendly.

Another thing we tried was peanut butter bread. Odd, I know, but seeing those stalls just really reminded me of Penang and I had to try some. For 100VT you get 2 massive slices of bread with margarine and peanut butter (or jam), and a stein of (instant) coffee. Very simple, yes, but it made my heart sing.


Two massive pieces of bread after slicing.

The stein - you can see the stall in the background.


Coconuts

Coconuts are everywhere in Vanuatu, and super-duper cheap at the market! Depending on the size, they range from 20VT to approx 60VT.

These ones below are drinking coconuts. They're a bit older than the green "fresh coconut" we get in Penang, and you can't scoop out the insides with a spoon. They are, however, full of delicious coconut water!


If you ask, they will cut a hole in the top so you can drink it straight away.

This young dude, below, didn't cut our coconut, but I just had to share this picture with you. He was preparing coconuts. See that massive knife he's wielding? I was absolutely petrified that he'd cut his fingers, but of course, no such thing occurred. I'm in awe of his skill!

We couldn't finish the whole coconut at once, so we took it back to our resort, and Steve the barman very kindly cut it open for us. He split it in half along the middle, and cut the flesh into a big spiral shape. I wish I had that kind of dexterity!

Of course, we poured the rest of the coconut water into a glass first.

We took the coconut back to our room and ate it on the porch, watching the waves come in.
Very juicy, sweet coconut.

No thick brown skin on the flesh!

I miss the market now that I'm home!

Vanuatu: Breakas

Yes, that is where we ate breakfast, one fine Vanuatu morning. I'll pause so you can appreciate the gorgeousness of that setting...

Breakas Beach Resort & Villas
Pango Road
Port Vila, Vanuatu
Ph: +678 23670
Website



Breakas is a gorgeous little resort about 5 minutes out of town, located on a strip of lovely beach with a coral reef and surfable waves. There is a wide range of accommodation in Port Vila, from the big hotels and resorts, small apartments, motels and more. We chose Breakas partly on the recommendation of our travel-agent friend who stayed there once (Hi Danny!!!), but mainly after seeing the amazing photo of its infinity pool on the website. I know, WOW. The fact that it had a swim-up bar and a no-kid policy sealed the deal. When we got there, the pool bar was closed for renovations, but everything else was just as wonderful as we hoped it would be.


The Rooms

The bulk of the rooms are these cute little individual bungalow-huts. They also have larger, self-sufficient villas with 2 levels, their own pools and more amenities, if that's your kind of thing. Our little bungalow was beach front, which meant beautiful views!

Beautiful flower/water box thing for washing sand off your feet before you enter your bungalow.

The huts were beautiful and simple - just 2 rooms. There was a fan but no air-con, but luckily it never was that hot at night anyway.
A mosquito net counts as very exotic for me.

Funky semi-outdoor bathroom!
The coral walls made it feel appealingly 'village', and you could see the sky from the shower! Lovely when its sunny, apparently not that good when it's raining. We were lucky not to encounter any great rain on our trip. I found the hot water supply to be a little erratic sometimes, but it wasn't a huge problem. The open ceiling, however, does mean you can occasionally get little 'friends' coming in. I found a small crab in our sink one morning, which, I'm not too embarrassed to admit, sent me screaming out of the hut. One of the lovely staff members got rid of it for us. (And I'm pretty sure laughed at me - the crab was less than 10cm across, haha).


The Food

The resort's restaurant, right next to the pool, is in the centre of the resort. It is where breakfast is served, and where you can purchase bar meals or dinner. (We never got around to doing the bar meal thing, as there were too many great options in town. The only time we could try a bar meal, they were doing a buffet lunch instead. Oh well!)

Breakfasts (included in our deal) were a small but satisfying buffet of fresh fruits, juices, toast, cereals, muffins, some pastries, tea and coffee.


Hot breakfasts were available, but you had to order and pay for them separately. You could purchase espresso coffee too, but I don't see why you'd do that when there's perfectly good, reliable, consistent filter coffee available. (Espresso coffees, on the other hand, are notoriously difficult to get right). We tried the hot breakfasts in the morning before a rather active kayak trip, for extra sustenance.


Eggs Benedict with roasted tomatoes, toast and "pancetta" - 950VT

Eggs Benedict in the South Pacific - could it get any more James Bond than this?

Banana Crepes - 750VT

I really liked the crepes - why does the fruit in Vanuatu taste so much sweeter?


We had dinner at the restaurant twice.

Looks a bit different at night, eh?

Champagne always equals celebration and good times.

Garlic bread - 500VT

Malekula Oysters with watercress - 1500VT

The oysters were very fresh tasty, but I wasn't a fan of the species - they were very thin and flat, and very difficult to get out of the shells.

Grilled whole poulet fish served with roast potatoes - 2400VT

This poulet fish was, unbelievably, not ordered by me, but by "she who does not eat fish or seafood". I know!! It wasn't filleted or deep-fried or anything! She even finished most of it. Very proud of you, Sandra! Before our trip, we'd read about Vanuatu's native poulet fish, so called because it apparently tastes like chicken, and Sandra really wanted to try it. (I ate it many times over the holiday, as it is served everywhere). I wouldn't say it tastes exactly like chicken, but it was very mild in taste, and meaty in texture.

Scotch fillet with prawn sauce, served with fries and salad - 2900VT

Yes, yes yes. Amazing steak, fresh prawns and creamy chive sauce. The beef in Vanuatu is amazing! It's so tender, and has the most wonderful taste, even when cooked well done. (Don't gasp, I always have my steak rare!) Vanuatu has happy organic Carolais and Limousin cows grazing in its gorgeous islands. *Sigh* I love that all the food we ate was locally grown and sourced.

Lobster - 3200VT

You can see how delicious that lobster was. Enough said.

Eaten but not photographed was a "Penang chicken curry" for 2000VT. It didn't taste like anything I've eaten back home in Penang, but it still tasted good!

Crème brûlée - 1200VT

The caramel atop the custard was a little too thick for my liking, but the custard itself had a wonderful deep vanilla flavour.


The Melanesian Feast

Every Wednesday night Breakas does a Melanesian feast. Lots of resorts, restaurants and tour operators offer similar feasts, but we got a free feast included in our accommodation package so we tried the one at Breakas. From memory it was 3500VT to pay for it separately.

The Melanesian feast commences with Kava tasting...


Kava is a drink made from the root of an island plant, which is drunk for its sedative and relaxing effect. Traditionally the liquid was extracted by getting virgin boys to chew the pulp and spit it out, but Jonathan, the customer relations manager, assured us that ours was ground by machine, hehe. It looks like dirty dish water, and doesn't taste much better. This is why you can see the plate of papaya chasers in the above photo. If freshly cut fruit aren't available, Sprite is a good substitute.

Kava bars are very popular on Efate island, designated with a red light outside the building. Lots of the local guys we met drink it almost every night. Traditionally women aren't allowed to drink it, but you shouldn't have a problem finding it in Port Vila. We even bought powdered to bring home, and my bro seems to like it a lot. He loves reggae too, what an Island boy!

There was a cultural band too. I loved the Foival piano and big box bass. These guys represent Vanuatu in cultural exhibitions around the world!


Now, the food.
Top: Baked fish
Bottom: Beef skewers, Chicken wings

Top: Amazing beef curry, Baked cassava stuffed with mince
Bottom: Baked banana laplap, Baked root vegetables

Snake beans stuffed with mince, Island cabbage stuffed with banana

Also on offer were a creamy pumpkin soup, Tahitian fish salad, potato salad, coleslaw, green bean salad and rice. Dessert was a simple mixed fruit salad.

The food was delicious, and I thought that the Melanesian feast was a great way for us tourists to introduce ourselves to 'exotic' Vanuatu food. Baked cassava, island cabbage and the national dish of laplap - a doughy mix of root vegetables cooked in banana leaves on charcoal - are all wonderful, but can definitely be an acquired taste for Western palates.


The Bar

Breakas has a bar with a small yet well-rounded cocktail list and selection of spirits. When we were there, the new F&B manager Ross was in the middle of revising and expanding the list, so if any of you guys end up going, I hope you will enjoy it!


Tusker is, of course, on the menu (550VT), and all the cocktails are pretty and island-themed - little umbrellas, fruit wedges and flowers galore!

Can't remember what this cocktail was called - Island Dream or something like that.

I'm pretty sure they can do all the standards too (Long Island Ice Teas, Toblerones etc). If the lovely barman Steve is there, ask for one of his special off-the-menu creations - delicious.


The Views and the Water

The 2-storey villas, on the other side of the restaurant/pool/reception from our hut. Check out the clear clear water.

And at night...

The infinity pool, with ocean on the right, and the (under-construction) pool bar. Breakfast/dinner tables on the left.

And at night...

The infinity pool falling into the Pacific Ocean...

Breakas is right in front of a coral reef, so it's a great spot for snorkelling, especially during high tide. We could borrow gear for free and went a couple of times, spotting lots of blue starfish and heaps of other fish. It's possible to surf further out, but I think you need to bring your own gear, as I vaguely recall reading somewhere that there are no places to hire surfing gear on Port Vila.


The Conclusion

I absolutely loved Breakas. We did visit a couple of other resorts during our holiday, to have dinner and drinks, but I am so glad we chose Breakas to stay. It's a little smaller than the big resorts (Iririki, Le Lagon etc), but I loved its friendly, intimate vibe. The staff were so nice and friendly! For example, one time we were standing outside the resort waiting for a bus at night, and the owner spotted us on his way out, and gave us a lift into town! How nice! I can't imagine a manager at a Westin/Hyatt/Shangri-La doing that; it's just a totally different style. We had a chat with him in the car, and he said he purposely keeps the resort small to maintain the atmosphere. (Technically it's 3 stars, but it feels so much more luxurious).

The accommodation package we bought was pretty good, and had lots of inclusions, like a free bottle of champagne, village tour, breakfasts, massages, the Melanesian feast and more. I assume these deals change frequently, so probably best to contact the resort or your travel agent if you're interested.

And don't forget that view...

Vanuatu

Port Vila - amazingly sparkly clear blue water, even in Vanuatu's busiest city.

Hi everybody! We just got back from a wonderful 10-day holiday in gorgeous Vanuatu. The weather was great, the people were so friendly and the kids were super-duper cute! I am suffering a bit from the post-holiday blues, but I shan't let that get in the way of blogging! There was lots of sun, lots of swimming, and of course, a lot of good food! We ended up taking 9GB of pics (come on, don't act surprised!), so this is going to be spread out over a few posts. First up, an introduction to the lovely country of Vanuatu, and its capital, Port Vila.

Before I went, I knew very very little about Vanuatu - in fact, I chose this holiday destination quite impulsively, after seeing a Vanuatu tourism ad on the back of a bus which featured a gorgeous beach. I have always wanted to visit the south Pacific, and with flights being so cheap right now and the Aussie dollar being so high (wahoo for eBay!!!), it was the perfect time to go. Because I wanted to have a totally relaxing holiday, we spent the whole time in the capital city of Port Vila on the island of Efate, rather than travelling around the islands. We stayed in a wonderful resort 5 minutes out of town - blogpost to come!

Streets of Port Vila. The Fung Kwan Chee shop reminded me a lot of Penang, and proves my theory that no matter where you go, there will always be a little shop run by a Chinese dude.

Port Vila was a lot smaller than I expected, the main part of town being situated on a 1 kilometre long stretch of Lini Highway. The rest of the island that we saw was mainly jungle, hills, villages and bumpy bumpy roads.

During my pre-travel research and whilst on holiday, I quickly learnt that Vanuatu is made up of 83 different islands, with only 2 main cities - Port Vila on Efate, and Luganville on Espiritu Santo. The majority of the population still live in villages, and there is a lot of beautiful and contrasting countryside that can be explored - waterfalls, beaches, rivers, volcanoes and more.

Above: Post office. Below: Street.

Between Vanuatu's 83 islands the different villages speak over 115 separate languages (not dialects), making Vanuatu one of the most culturally diverse countries on earth. This doesn't include the English and French languages brought by the colonisers. Understandably, this makes communication difficult, and over the years, the official language of Bislama was developed so that everyone can communicate with each other. It is a form of pidgin English, and to English speakers it can look quite funny. For example...

Sign up to Digicel and get your Fri Tok!

Whilst Bislama is the official language, pretty much everyone we met also spoke English (and sometimes French) - the Ni-Vanuatu learn both at school - so there was no problem for us Aussies getting around. (And pretty much ALL the tourists there are Aussie!) Because I love languages though, I did buy a book about Bislama - "Evry samting yu wantem save long Bislama be yu fraet tumas blong askem".

Apart from languages, another thing I love is beer! Tusker is the local brew and it was deliciously refreshing and available everywhere. 550VT at our resort, 450VT at most cafes, 200VT at the supermarkets. (You can google what the exact exchange rate is, but when we were there, 550VT was approximately $6 Aussie dollars).

Tusker blong yumi! Me wantem Tusker!

I'm not quite sure why I've got my elbows pointed out so far - either to get more sun, or because I was about to try and lift that giant beer, haha. Does anybody know where I can get Tusker in Australia?

Getting around town was really easy, as the bus system in Port Vila is awesome. The buses are just minivans with a "B" at the start of the licence plate, and they are everywhere.

Just hail one down and tell them where you want to go. There is no fixed route, and they just drop passengers off at their chosen destinations. It may take a while with a few diversions, but you'll get there in the end. Most rides cost 150VT, although it'll cost more if you want to go somewhere far out of town. If you're worried about getting charged too much (very, very unlikely - all the bus drivers we met, and the Ni-Van people in general, are super-nice!), just check how much the ride will be before you get on the bus. It's not like you'd have to wait long for the next one!

Some buses look new and sparkly!
Don't forget: Pem nomo ol seken we yu toktok!

But most buses are quite run down, some without any perceivable suspension, and with alarming (but still usable) doors without interior panel...


We never had a problem getting a bus even late at night, and our drivers were friendly and knew the city really well. Most played reggae or island-ified pop songs as they drove.

Speaking of reggae, this Lucky Dube guy was everywhere! (Well, not literally, he passed away a few years ago). I'd never heard of him, but he was really popular and there were posters of him everywhere. In the shops there were more of his CD's than Bob Marley! I bought one of his albums for my bro, who is a bit of a reggae fan.


Although we ate mainly at restaurants and did our food shopping at the breathtakingly wonderful Port Vila market (so wonderful it gets its own post), we did visit the Au Bon Marché supermarket, right next to the market. I can't go overseas without visiting a local supermarket - I find them so fascinating.

There were heaps of expensive imported goods - the top right picture looks like any Australian supermarket shelf. I couldn't resist buying the Hansel biscuits. They are soo hot right now.

One of our favourite finds was the Olympic Take Away, on Lini Highway, right behind El Gecko restaurant. This locally-run joint was one of the few places open on Sunday, and makes the best cheeseburger ever. Whoda thunk it?

Above: Wahoo with chips, 750VT. Below: Cheeseburger, 550VT. (Chips cost extra, approx 200VT).

I wasn't enthused about going to a takeaway joint for lunch, but most places were closed and we were hungry. However, this place was great and we were sooo impressed! The wahoo fish was super-fresh, the chips were hand cut, and the cheeseburger was dee-licious. (We were soon to find out that *all* the beef and seafood in Vanuatu is super-fresh and local). Juicy patty, finely grated proper cheese, crusty bun. Wow. We came back twice.

Between Lini highway and the water is a nice strip of parkland, where many locals (and some tourists) sit and chillaxify.


I totally want to borrow this little guy's boat-bike thing.

Local guys playing ball game (balls, bocce?)

In this area is the very cool Nambawan Cafe and marketplace. The cafe is popular with tourists, having a good range of pizzas, juices and smoothies, and free wireless!



It also has a great view.


The little marketplace next to the cafe sells the usual touristy stuff - sarongs, wooden souvenirs, hair braiding and so on. But please, don't get your hair braided if you don't have proper Islander hair - you'll just look like a douche.


More Vanuatu posts to come!

Butter - Part 3

Petits Sablés - recipe and description below.

Some time ago, you may recall, I received a generous sample of wonderful Ardenne butter from @Kirkfood. It has been some months, but I have finally used it all (I know, what a chore, haha!), and would like to share the results with you.

The first time I tried it, I slathered it on no-knead bread with fleur de sel, and later I used it to make puff pastry. The puff pastry, in turn, became mille feuille and winter vegetable strudel.

When I had my friends Thanh and An over for lunch, I wanted a butter-friendly meal. I made Nigella's delicious Irish stew, which is supposed to be served with lots of bread and butter. I tried the no-knead bread again, and made a gateau Breton for dessert.


Because I was feeling especially creative and dorky, I shaped the butter into a dinky little heart shape.
Heart-shaped, topped with Murray river salt.

The no-knead bread, made in a smaller pot.

That bread is totally addictive! I explained to An how to make it, and apparently he's been baking bread himself back in Canberra. Yay!


Gateau Breton, or Brittany Cake, is a very rich and buttery affair. Nigella's version (How to be a Domestic Goddess) contains 4 simple ingredients - butter, sugar, flour and egg yolks. I thought it would be a fantastic way to try out more of that butter! Looking at the picture in Nigella's book, I thought these would be crisp and short, and I was surprised that it turned out soft and dense.


I quite liked this, but wasn't blown away, probably I was hoping for something more biscuit-like. It goes well with tea or coffee, and apparently it tastes just like German Christmas cookies! So there you go.
Diamonds of golden Gateau Breton - Thanh and I were trying to figure out ways to arrange them artistically, hehe.

The next thing I made with the butter (a few weeks later) was American-style cookies! I used the dough from this recipe, omitting the chocolate and nuts. I split the dough into two, adding chopped milk chocolate to one half.


I left the other half plain, formed them into balls, and rolled them in a mixture of castor sugar and cinnamon. My inspiration was the dee-licious cinnamon-sugar cookies from Mrs. Fields.

Sweet balls (ooer!). They have to be squished flat before baking.

The chocolate cookies turned out like this...
Does this look familiar? Just look up at my header!

And these are the cinnamon-sugar cookies!

I was very, very pleased with both the chocolate and cinnamon cookies! The flavour of the butter really came through, and the cookies had a tiny touch of salt, which really brought out the flavours. My only issue with the cookies is that they were quite cakey, and not as crispy as I like, especially the next day. I think this is because the water content in the butter makes the finished cookies soft. Apparently, replacing some of the butter in cookies with vegetable shortening can improve its texture, but that is an experiment for another day. (Whatever you do, don't do what one recipe online suggested and replace the butter with butter-flavoured Crisco. Yurgh!!!!)

The final (and perhaps best!) thing I made with the butter were petits sablés, aka little French shortbreads. I adapted a recipe I got from Duncan, who himself paraphrased the original recipe - taken from La Bonne Cuisine by Madame E. Saint-Ange and translated by Paul Aratow. What a complicated provenance for such a simple recipe!


Petits Sablés

Into a food processor, tip 25g flour, 100g butter at room temperature, 60g caster sugar, 1 egg yolk and the seeds of 1 vanilla pod.
Whizz to combine. Gradually add 1 tbs of cool water and process briefly until the mixture comes together. Tip onto a floured surface (I used glad wrap)...

... and form into a disc.

Wrap the dough up in glad wrap and chill for 30 mins.

Roll the dough into a log...

...and slice into pieces about 5mm thick. (This is easier than rolling and cutting out shapes, and excess dough can't be reworked to the same quality).

Place the biscuits onto a lined baking tray, sprinkle with extra castor sugar, and bake at 180C for 10-15 minutes. The dough should not colour more than a "nice golden tint".


Slide the biscuits onto a rack to cool. Be careful as the dough is very fragile when warm.

Ta-dah! Look how cute these little light golden coins are!

I served these to some friends for afternoon tea (with the cardamom and cinnamon buns, actually), and they went down a treat. I brought leftovers to a bloggers' dinner that night, and people seemed to like them! I was told they taste like those Danish butter cookies you get in the blue tins. I *love* those cookies, and I loved these too. I'll be making them again at Christmas! Thank-you to Duncan for the awesome recipe.

And that is what I did with the butter. Big thank-you to Kirkfood for the great butter!

Post-Detox Treat

Thanks to everyone who commented on my detox post! Managed to get through a Monday without coffee, so that sets me up well for the rest of the week. Just a quick post today - I wanted to share with you my Saturday-night post-detox reward dinner, made up of food I'd been craving all week.

1. Pepper Steak
2. Baked Potato
3. Creamed Spinach

I splashed out on an organic piece of porterhouse, and cooked it using the recipe from Nigella's How to Eat, (previously made here). The sauce was made by deglazing the pan with some marsala and a tiny knob of butter. I topped the baked potato with a small amount of butter, some grated cheddar cheese, light sour cream (as if it made a difference - hah!) and chives. For the creamed spinach I just cooked some chopped onion, added defrosted frozen spinach, some flour and a dash of cream.

No wine because I rarely crave it, and it usually doesn't bother me whether I drink or not. But that meal, just by itself, was the perfect weekend indulgence.

Detox

Hello everybody!! Those of you who follow me on Twitter will know that I have been on detox this week, from Monday-Friday. (Ceremoniously ended at midnight last night by the digging of spoons into tubs of Ben & Jerry's ice-cream, hehe.)

I had been feeling a bit sluggish, and wanted to kick-start some proper healthy eating - to get out of the habit of eating salami/cheese toasties for lunch at work, guzzling down coffee, or inhaling oven chips for dinner after a tiring week.

We decided on the following diet based on our existing knowledge of diet/nutrition and other bits and pieces we heard from friends and researched ourselves.

It should go without saying, but I'll say it anyway:

I am NOT a nutritionist. This is a detox I designed for personal use and does not take into account your own nutritional needs and circumstances. This post is deigned to provide information and ideas on healthy eating, not to be a prescriptive diet. If you plan to do a diet or go on detox, do your own research and consult your relevant healthcare professional.

Haha, how much do I sound like a bank employee!

For my detox, I had no caffeine, alcohol, excess fat, meat, dairy, eggs, white rice, potatoes or flour. I also decided to go low-wheat, and still eat fish (it's good for you and I hardly eat it at all these days). When I told my friends I was doing this, the most common response was, "Well what CAN you eat?"

I present you the answer, in blog-form.

For BREAKFASTS I had smoothies made of soymilk and fruit (e.g. mango, banana, frozen berries, kiwi fruit), or black rye sourdough toast with tahini. (The black rye toast has some wheat flour in it, but this didn't bother me as I was going "low-wheat", not "no-wheat".)

As an ALTERNATIVE TO COFFEE/TEA, I drank chamomile / rooibos tea. I also drank heaps of water.

For SNACKS I ate fruit, tinned tuna (Sirena rocks!) or small soy smoothies.

Preparing LUNCHES and DINNERS is where I got to exercise some culinary creativity. I didn't cut out salt or sugar completely (you will see honey popping up here and there). I thought, perhaps optimistically, that if I wasn't going out to restaurants or getting take-away during the week that I'd be cutting down my salt intake a lot anyway. I also made larger quantities of the evening meals, so I could take leftovers to work the next day for lunch.

The first thing I made was Nigella's caramelised onion and lentil pilaf, substituting brown rice for the basmati she suggests.

The spices...

The rice and lentils...

The pilaf...

Ta-dah!

The recipe made enough for me to take a bowl to work for Monday's lunch, and to share it with my family as an accompaniment for dinner later that night.

For dinner that night we had the pilaf, with Bill Granger's watercress and green bean salad (Every Day), and roast pumpkin and red onion with honey dressing.

The salad was stunning - so simple! It's just cooked beans with watercress, lemon juice, olive oil, salt and pepper. I'd love to eat this any night of the week, detox or no.

I wasn't too sure if honey was bad for detox, so I only used a scant amount of the dressing. I've made this before for dinner parties, and it always goes down a treat.

The next night I made a fabulous baingan bharta (eggplant curry) that I saw on Cindy & Michael's blog last year, and have been itching to make ever since.

As much as I adore eggplant, it can often be very greasy and definitely not detox-friendly. No such danger here, as the eggplant is cooked until mooshy in the oven. No huge amounts of oil required!

The recipe is linked to on Cindy & Michael's blog, so I'll just give a brief rundown. You cook up onion, garlic and ginger, (I only used a tiny amount of oil), then add spices, a chopped chilli and tomato. The recipe uses yoghurt, but I omitted it as I was going dairy free.

Then you add your eggplant mush and cook for a bit longer.


I thought this curry was amazing! I absolutely loved it, and it just seemed to get better over the next few days. I ate it with plain brown rice, but during more relaxed times, I think basmati rice or naan would be perfect.

Other dinners we ate but didn't photograph include Bill Granger's puy lentil soup, and a mixed veggie & tofu stir-fry (again with brown rice).

Now, WORK LUNCHES. Apart from leftovers, I made some lunches specially. They had to be tasty and filling so that I wouldn't get tempted by the vending machine!

Below we have a cold soba-noodle salad with tinned tuna. The soba recipe comes from Nigella's Forever Summer, and consists of cooked and cooled soba, with spring onions, coriander and toasted sesame seeds. The dressing contains soy sauce, sesame oil, a drop of honey and some rice wine vinegar.
It was, of course, delicious, but I was surprised by how filling this was. I'll definitely be repeating this recipe for future lunches.

This salad contains watercress, cherry tomatoes, avocado, cucumber, lemon juice, olive oil and finely chopped chives and red onion. Chives are brilliant for adding low-fat flavour!!! I ate this one with a small tin of Sirena tuna.
So many nutrients.

Next up is a sandwich (I slapped the other slice of bread on after taking the photo). More of that dark rye bread, some avocado, the remainder of the watercress and some sliced tomato.

So, how did it go??

It actually went really, really well! I did find myself craving sweets (cookies especially!), but giving up everything else wasn't too bad. I think it helps that I actually like soy milk and brown rice. I was scared I'd get caffeine-withdrawal headaches and be exhausted, because I do love my coffee! (Those who have been following my blog for a long time might remember I tried a stricter detox some years back and gave up shortly after). But I was actually fine! I had slight headaches on the first evening, and was exhausted on Monday night, but I felt much better for the rest of the week. I got tired on my early morning starts at work, but managed to push on through, and I found that I had heaps more energy overall! Couldn't believe it. I'm not sure if it was the caffeine or the fact that I was eating lighter food in general, but I felt great.

Because it made me feel so much better, I've decided to keep up eating healthy food, especially during the working week, and use the weekends to enjoy myself a bit. I also plan to dramatically reduce the amount of coffee I drink. (The coffee in my building SUCKS anyway!) This way I can really enjoy great coffees when I go out to cafes, rather than just guzzling it down to stay awake.