Sweet potato tartlets

Tonight was the first night in ages I tried to cook something new and a bit different. I have been very busy up to last week. I have only started to think about new recipes over the last few days. In the same way, I started reordering organic veg baskets two weeks ago now that I have time to adapt to the "needs" of the basket. This week, there was only one sweet potato in the veg basket and I had been wondering what to do with it when I remembered that I had bought puff pastry and it was sitting in the fridge. The thing about puff pastry is that, until a couple of months ago, it was very difficult to find real butter puff pastry in Ireland. And now, I keep buying some whether I need it or not, hoping that if I keep buying some, the shop will keep stocking it!
So, that's how the idea of making sweet potato tartlets came to me. And they are really lovely!

Sweet potato tartlets

Ingredients:
- puff pastry (made with butter, not margarine)
- 1 sweet potato
- 1 egg beaten
- 3 tsp of crème fraîche
- some goat's cheese
- thyme
- a small bunch of basil
- 1 garlic clove
- olive oil
- some red onion marmalade (optional)




1. Preheat the oven at 180ºC. Then, roast the sweet potato for 30-40 minutes in the oven with the skin on. Once roasted, cool. 
2. Cut your puff pastry into large slices. Brush the slices with the beaten egg. Then, spread one teaspoon of crème fraîche on each slice. 
3. Peel the sweet potato, slice into 3mm thick slices, layer them on each slice.
4. Season and sprinkle the thyme and bits of goat's cheese on each slice.
5. Bake in the oven for 20-30 minutes until the pastry is cooked. 
6. While the slices are baking, put the basil, garlic and some seasoning into a bowl. Use a mixer and blitz everything together. Then, add about 10 tbsp of olive oil slowly while blitzing everything.
7. When the tartlets are ready, add some of the basil oil on top and some red onion marmalade.


Bon appétit! 

New poll

Hey guys,
Here is a new poll to give me inspiration for the next post!

To dessert or not to dessert? Double chocolate muffins with praline

I haven't blogged in a few months. I have been very busy at work and I haven't had to write more articles for work until... you guessed it, today!
So here I went again today; I dusted, hoovered, mopped, scrubbed the house from top to bottom and vice-versa. Then I decided to cook something to motivate me to finish writing that article. I chose Double chocolate muffins with praline. Something very moreish to make me feel guilty so I would be redempted by doing my work. At first, the chocolatey - and I mean really chocolatey - muffins made me sleepy but hey, in the end, the treats did work a treat! I did finish the article! And there are even some muffins left!
They are very easy and fast to make, which, depending on the way you look at it can be either good or bad! Good: hassle free baking; bad: well, I think I am going to make these more often now!
So, here is the recipe.

Ingredients:
Mix 1:
100 gr dark chocolate, in chunks
100 gr white chocolate, in chunks
75 gr praline, in chunks (if you can't find praline, use some hazelnut milk chocolate)
250 gr plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
2 tbsp good cocoa powder

Mix 2:
85 gr unsalted butter, melted
75 gr muscovado sugar
1-2 tsp honey (depending on how sweet you like things!)
2 beaten eggs
280 ml of soured cream (although I didn't have any so I used buttermilk)

Method
1. Preheat the oven at 200ºC.
2. Prepare Mix 1.
3. Prepare Mix 2.
4. Combine Mix 1 and 2 together but don't overdo it. This is very important overwise the muffins won't rise. So mix them enough that the ingredients are combined but that is it.
5. Pour the mix into muffin cases. Bake in the oven for 20 min and then, let them rest in the cases for 15 min after that.
Et voilà! They are as good hot as they are when they are cold! I should now...

Autumnal treat... Plum and almond tart

My post today is about one of my favourite desserts, plum and almond tart. I have always loved desserts with fruits in them. They are usually very moist, most of them are easy to make and they take the guilt away from eating dessert! After all, eating a fruit tart is a way of getting one of your 5 a day!
The thing about this particular plum tart is that it's very easy to make, takes little time and is really succulent. The only problem about it is that it usually disappears fast enough. That is just an excuse to make another one then!
The great thing about making this tart now is that all-butter puff pastry has finally reached Ireland, so it's even easier to make. I used to make my own puff pastry before that. Obviously, I did not make plum tarts that often then as it is rather time consuming to make puff pastry from scratch. The thing though, is that puff pastry made out of anything else but better is rather horrible and insipid. So you really need to get an all-butter puff pastry. In most Irish shops, this is now stored in the frozen food section. That way, I always pick a few spare packs of frozen puff pastry in my freezer. They do come in handy for any type of pies, tarts...etc. So here is my recipe for plum and almond tart.

Plum and almond tart

Ingredients:
- A pack of frozen or even better fresh all-butter puff pastry
- About 8-10 plums (the dark ones are nicer), stoned and cut in half
- About 100gr of ground almonds
- One egg
- The juice of half a lemon
- About 100gr of sugar + a little extra
- Some flaked almonds

Method:
1. Preheat the oven at 180°C. Roll out the puff pastry on a tray or tart dish. Prick the inside with a fork to stop it from rising in the oven.
2. In a bowl, mix the egg, ground almonds, sugar and lemon juice. Spread that mix evenly on the pastry.
3. Put the plum halves on the tart.
4. Sprinkle a little more sugar on the plums and some flaked almonds.
5. Bake for 20-30 minutes, until the edges of the pastry are golden and the plums are soft.

Et voilà!

Another cheesy night in!

It's this time of the year again, we can feel the winter coming already. Although, to be honest, it's felt like winter all summer long... Still, the days are getting shorter, the trees are losing their leaves and it's time to light the fire again.
I subscribe to a veg basket. And recently I have received one cauliflower a week. I have to admit that cauliflower is not on my favourite veg list. So for the past few weeks, the cauliflowers have been piling up in my fridge. I mean I took four of them and a romanesco (mix between broccoli and cauliflower) out of the fridge this evening! How ridiculous is that. So I decided to tackle my cauliflower problem.
The thing about cauliflower is that I couldn't think of any recipes apart from the obvious cauliflower cheese. So, I set upon making the cauliflower cheese dish.
I remembered that a while back, in the same way, I had attempted to get rid of a glut of cauliflowers already. I made cauliflower cheese but with some really pungent French cheese, freshly brought back from France. And to my surprise, it was beautiful. The pungent cheese, once melted, was actually a little nutty and sweet and was perfect to counterbalance the bitterness of cauliflowers. It reminded me of lovely days spent in the Alps skiing... and eating melted cheese dishes!
So, I decided to try that recipe again, just to be sure my finding wasn't just a one off chance. And guess what, it was absolutely delicious, I think I ate the equivalent of a full cauliflower by myself this evening. That and a slice of crusty sourdough bread and a nice tangy salad... Cheesy heaven!!!

So here is my recipe for  Cauliflower cheese.

Cauliflower Cheese

Ingredients:
- 4 medium cauliflowers
- 1 romanesco
- 500 ml of milk
- 50 gr of butter
- 50 gr of plain flour
- 100 gr of grated Swiss Gruyère or other pungent cheese (don't worry, once melted it doesn't smell any more!), ask your cheesemonger's. Be brave, it really is worth it!
- Pinch of nutmeg
- Good pinch of salt
- Some black pepper

1. Preheat the oven at 200°C.
2. Remove the outer leaves of the cauliflowers and the romanesco, keep them whole though and steam them for 8-10 minutes.
3. In the meantime, melt the butter in a saucepan, once melted, add the flour and whisk until you get a kind of paste.
4. Then, add the milk, salt, nutmeg and black pepper. Keep whisking on the heat until the sauce thickens. Remove from the heat once thickened.
5. By now, your cauliflower and romanesco should be ready. Remove them from the pan and carefully cut them into florets (use a tea-towel to protect your fingers from the heat) into a baking dish.
6. Cover with the sauce, add the grated cheese on top. Bake for about 30 minutes or until golden.

I served mine with a green salad with a mustard dressing and crusty sourdough bread to mop up that cheesy sauce!

Bon appétit!

Answer to the previous poll... at last

Hello all,

I have been quite busy recently and unable to blog as much as I wanted. The good thing, though, is that I am now going to be able to blog again! Not sure whether this is such a good thing or not.
Anyway, the other reason I have not been able to blog is that the last poll I posted was about dessert and I was asked to post an easy and/or chocolate recipe. The problem is that, as I am mostly on my own, I tend not to cook desserts and especially chocolate dessert. If I do, I end up eating chocolate for the rest of the week. Now that the winter is on our doorstep again, I don't mind so much. I need the calories! And on top of that, I thought of an idea to make a dessert that lasts for a while. I decided to make ice-cream!
So, I did make that easy chocolate dessert two days ago: I made white chocolate ice-cream.

White chocolate ice-cream

Ingredients:
- 250 ml of cream
- 250 ml of full-fat milk
- 6 egg yolks
- 75 gr caster sugar
- The seeds of a vanilla pod

- 100 gr of good quality white chocolate, cut into squares
- White chocolate drops


Procedure:
1. Heat up the milk and the cream in a saucepan until very hot (do not boil).
2. Whisk the egg yolks with the sugar together.
3. Pour the milk-cream mixture into the egg-sugar mix whisking.
4. Pour the mixture into a saucepan with the vanilla and heat up slowly until the mix coats the back of a wooden spoon.
5. Take the mixture off the heat when it's reached the proper consistency. Put the white chocolate squares into it and mix well until melted. Let the mixture cool. Once cooled, add the white chocolate drops into it.
6. Pour into an ice-cream maker or a plastic box and freeze.

Et voilà!


Serving suggestions:
As you can see on the picture, I served the white chocolate ice-cream with praline crumbs and dark chocolate sauce.
This evening, we had some of the ice-cream with fresh strawberries, strawberry coulis and meringue. It was gorgeous!

Next poll

Hey all,

I am not sure whether many people follow this blog but I will post a dessert recipe next and I need help choosing. Please vote in the poll section of the blog!