Tuesdays with Dorie - Earl Grey Madeleines

Well it's officially the last month of Tuesdays with Dorie. I haven't actually posted a TWD recipe for a while although I have been quietly baking along at home. Now we're really on the home stretch I couldn't miss out and will be baking and posting everything for this month in spite of the craziness that is December!

This week Nicole of Bakeologie chose Dorie's Earl Grey Madeleines. (I will be baking the Honey Fig Tart in a few weeks time for an early Christmas lunch).

You'll notice from my photo that I haven't used a Madeleine pan, basically because I don't have one and couldn't justify splurging on a pan I will only use very occasionally (ha! look at me all grown up and responsible now that I have 2 little mouths to feed!). I used a patty cake pan instead and I think they look lovely.

While I quite enjoy Earl Grey tea I decided to use a tea I picked up at T2 on my recent trip to Melbourne. T2 is a chain of specialist tea stores with the most divine range of teas and associated paraphernalia. I bought a couple of vareties but by far my favourite was the Ginger Spice, a black tea flavoured with ginger, cinnamon, orange and vanilla. Really yummy and fragrant and just perfect for these little cakes.

Photo from www.t2tea.com

I let the batter rest overnight in the pan so it was ready to put straight in the oven the next morning. I thought being so cold it would need an extra few minutes baking but actually these were done (overdone in fact) at the 10 minute mark. Still really tasty and with a lovely perfume from the tea, just slightly drier than they should be. Pity.

I'm sure they won't last long though. I will pop the rest in the freezer and can see myself grabbing one for a yummy snack with my afternoon cuppa. Thanks for a great pick Nicole! You can find the recipe on Bakeologie under today's date.

Charlie turns 1

Hard to believe but on 8th November my baby Charlie turned 1! Which means Oscar is now 2 and a half. Which makes me ... well never mind!

Charlie has brought us so much happiness over the past 12 months. All those wonderful firsts - smiles, laughs, rolling over, sitting, standing and just in the last week, those amazing first steps. He's such a different little personality from his brother too, much more independant and a real daddy's boy.

Hubs and I are both only-children so we had no idea what to expect with 2 little ones. While we are certainly busier now and a for a while got a lot less sleep, having 2 kids is awesome. Can't wait to see what the next year brings for both my little men.


Here are a few photos of the birthday boy and his cakes (yep, cakes plural)!

A basic chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream icing and decorated with white chocolate buttons. I made this for his actual birthday.

First ever taste of cake. Yum! Just watch the sugar coma setting in ...

Finger licking good!

The kite cake from p11 of the Women's Weekly Kids' Birthday Cakes cookbook. A basic buttercake with buttercream icing tinted in red, leaf green, violet and lemon yellow. A little rough around the edges but with 2 birthday cakes a year from now on, there's plenty of chance to practice!

At his birthday party in the park.
'whaddya mean no more cake till next year?!'

I'm still here! ... and gluten free chocolate chip cookies

Wow, so it's been a whole 5 months since my last post. I have to say 2011 has completely gotten away from me and now it's nearly Christmas! After a few years of regular baking and blogging I guess I just needed a break. I know my waistline and bank account did too! But with TWD soon coming to an end it's definitely time I checked back into the bloggy world.

We've had a few health hiccups this year and a forray into food intolerances. The boys and I have all seen an allergist and had skin prick tests done. The boys were all clear (which is good and not so good since I am convinced that Oscar has a few food sensitivies that maybe will never show up on a test) and I am only allergic to dust, pollen and cats.

Regardless I am baking with a few more alternative ingredients and trying out some gluten-free and lactose-free products. I made these chocolate chip cookies a few weeks ago and they were absolutely to die for! Hubby had no idea they were gluten free until I told him and honestly they disappeared so fast I had to grab a photo of the lowly last one. Enjoy!


Gluten Free Chocolate Chip Cookies
Adapted from a recipe on Nellbe's Gluten Free Kitchen Table

115g melted butter, cooled
1 egg
1 ts vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups gluten free flour
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 cup chocolate chips

Preheat over to 180 degrees C. Line 2 baking trays with baking paper.

Whisk together melted butter with egg and vanilla extract until combined. Combine gluten free flour, sugar and choc bits in a large mixing bowl. Add butter mixture and mix well. Press mixture, 1 tbsp at a time, into balls. Place on tray and allow room for spreading. Press each cookie down slightly and cook 12-15 mins until golden. Cool on trays for 5 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack to cool completely.

These were fabulous warm out of the oven. Once cooled they settled into crispy-around-the-edges-but-still-chewy-in-the-middle deliciousness.

Next post - Charlie turns 1!

TWD - Date Loaf

This week Mary of Popsicles and Sandy Feet (love that name!) chose Date-Nut Loaf. I was intrigued by how this would turn out as it is not the date loaf that I know and love.

I made a half recipe and left out the nuts to make it kid friendly. Oscar adores dates and he scoffed quite a few while helping me whip this up. If you have kids you'll know that his 'help' resulted in a whole lot of cleaning up afterwards!

The date loaf I am used to is rich and dark. The dates are soaked in hot water and bicarb soda which essentially turns them to mush, they are then folded through the batter rather than just being dotted throughout.

To me this was more like a pound cake that just happened to have dates in it. Not that there is anything wrong with that! The cake was moist and buttery and I had a piece warm from the oven with custard. Definitely nothing wrong with that!

This was nice for a change and is a perfect snack cake. Thanks to Mary for her pick this week! You can find the recipe on Popsicles and Sandy Feet under today's date.

TWD - Blueberry-Brown Sugar Plain Cake

It may be Thursday not Tuesday but I am so glad I decided not to skip this one. Cindy of Everyday Insanity chose Dorie's Blueberry-Brown Sugar Plain Cake and it was sensational!

In my opinion there is nothing 'plain' about this moist cake flavoured with brown sugar and studded with juicy blueberries. I didn't even bother with a dusting of icing sugar over the top. I think my tin was a little big because this looked more like a slice than a cake but it cooked in barely 25 minutes and I loved the dimply top.

We are having some really chilly weather here at the moment and this was perfect with a hot cup of tea. Now if you'll excuse me I'm going to grab another cuppa and curl up under the doona until the boys wake up!

Make sure you check out Cindy's blog for the recipe. This one's a keeper!

TWD - Caramel Pots de Creme

Well after my disastrous plastic-wrap-filled Chocolate Pots de Creme I knew I had to come through with the caramel version chosen by Peggy the Baker.

We definitely didn't need 8 of these sitting around so I adjusted the recipe to make 2 x /2 cup serves using 1/2 cup cream, 1/4 cup milk, 2 egg yolks and 2 tbs sugar.

I loved Cakelaw's idea of turning them out so I used metal dariole moulds and sprayed them with olive oil spray before filling. I also used alfoil instead of plastic wrap to prevent a repeat of last time.

The taste test ...

Very rich and very caramel with a touch of bitterness that came from taking my sugar right to a deep amber before adding the cream and milk. I served it with a dollop of unsweetened whipped cream and some crushed honey-roasted cashews. This little bit of crunch was the perfect addition. We really enjoyed these but I have to admit I rushed to brush my teeth afterwards from all that sugar.

Thanks for a great pick Peggy! I am well and truly over my fear of caramel now and it was great to have another opportunity to play around with it. Make sure you visit Peggy the Baker for the recipe.

TWD - Oatmeal Nutmeg Scones

Whoops, better make that Wednesday with Dorie! These pesky Tuesdays are coming around so quickly these days. I do love a scone though so I wasn't going to pass on these Oatmeal Nutmeg Scones chosen by Patricia from Life With a Whisk.

I've discovered my best scones come with the help of the food processor so that's what I did again. I use the plastic dough blade and am very careful not to overmix. The dough here was very sticky but I resisted the urge to dump in some more flour. I made them exactly as per the recipe and was not disappointed.

The taste test...

Just as Dorie says, sweet but not too sweet and just how I like them. Oats and nutmeg seem to be a perfect match and these were just delicious. I ate 2 straight out of the oven (it was my lunch so don't judge me!) and then another one this morning. My 2yo taste tester also approved. The rest are stashed in the freezer.

Thanks for a great pick Patricia! You can find the recipe on her blog.

TWD - Basic Marbled Loaf

We've just had a lovely long weekend here but I have to admit it has messed me up a bit. With 2 short weeks in a row I never seem to know what day it is anymore! Luckily I remembered it was Tuesday today and that means it's TWD time.

This week Carol from The Bake More chose Dorie's Basic Marbled Loaf Cake. Rather than use the playing around suggestions I decided to take a trip down memory lane and make a neapolitan cake. These were everywhere when I was a child and mimic the colours of neapolitan icecream which had chocolate, strawberry and vanilla flavours side by side. In my house the vanilla always got left till last!

I split my batter into 3 lots keeping one plain, adding melted chocolate to the second and healthy dose of pink food colouring to the third. I have to admit I was pretty pleased with the result as my cake was not only pretty but moist and yummy.

We've had a fair bit of cake around here recently because of Oscar's birthday and he's taken to asking for 'more birthday' (meaing cake). Very cute!

Thanks to Carol for a great pick! You can find the recipe on her blog under today's date.

TWD - A Tourtely Apple Tart

This week Jeanette of The Whimsical Cupcake chose Dorie's Tourtely Apple Tart. I took a few shortcuts with the recipe so not surprisingly I didn't end up with the slim and elegant tart Dorie describes in the book!

Basically the filling for this tart is apples cooked down with brown sugar, nutmeg and apple cider with a little browned butter thrown in for good measure. I didn't have enough apples on hand so I threw in a couple of pears as well. I used apple juice instead of apple cider, a sour cream pastry rather than Dorie's always awesome sweet tart dough and left out both the raisins and almonds.

The verdict? Fabulous. While I'm sure the original is even better this was delicious. But then again I love apple pie of any variety. With a scoop of icecream on top it was the perfect comfort food on a cool and wet day. My apologies for the awful photo. It was late and dark and this was the best of a truly terrible bunch.

Thanks to Jeanette for a great pick this week. Make sure you check out her blog for the recipe and the TWD blogroll to see how everyone else did.

On another note, my big boy is turning 2 tomorrow! Watch this space for some birthday pics including what I hope will be an awesome birthday cake!

TWD Catchup

Hello? Is anyone still out there?? I'm embarrassed to say it's been over 6 weeks since I last blogged. That's not to say I haven't been baking along at home but life has well and truly gotten in the way of blogging recently. So it's time for another catchup post and another promise to do better this month!

For the 15th of March Lauryn of Bella Baker chose Citrus Currant Sunshine Muffins. Love citrus, love currants, love muffins and love Lauryn! These were really tasty and I have a little stash of them in the freezer.


For the 22nd of March Suzy of Suzy Homemaker chose Honey Nut Brownies. I really wasn't sure about these. I like honey on crumpets and in stir fries but that's about it. Still, my MIL gave me a bottle of roasted hazelnut honey which was perfect for this recipe. These had the texture of a chewy gingerbread rather than a brownie but they were pretty tasty and even better on the second day.



On the 5th of April Jessica of Domestic Deep Thought of the Day chose Coffee Ice Cream Tart. Sold! We weren't huge fans of the crust which set rock solid in the freezer but it tasted great. Next time I would just use a crumb crust and go crazy with different filling combinations. Yum!


For the 12th of April Sarah of Teapots and Cakestands chose Strawberry Rhubarb Double Crisp. I've never actually tried rhubarb and strawberries together before but have been intrigued after seeing it around. The verdict? Delicious! I should have just made a half batch but we ate it for breakfast and dessert over about 3 days and loved it. Definitely a keeper!

So that's it! At this stage I intend to post my Tourtely Apple Tart on Tuesday (gasp!) but as I haven't made it yet we'll just have to wait and see.

Tuesdays with Dorie: (Fail) Chocolate Pots de Creme

So these didn't quite work for me. I knew it was a bad idea to use cling wrap in the oven and I should have followed my gut. Seeing as I don't like eating melted plastic and I ran out of time and ingredients to make more, there were no Chocolate Pots de Creme in our house.

Hopefully Christine of BlackCatCooking had more success! Please visit her blog for the recipe.