Yoghurt can be fancy if you want it to be.
Eat your yoghurt from a martini glass, rather than a bowl.
It will definitely make your morning more fancy (and put your unloved martini glasses to good use).
I like my yoghurt topped with rolled oats and chopped, roasted almonds.
Think of it as breakfast trifle! (it's a real thing...)
This idea was stolen from Shutterbean and Joy The Baker's idea of serving sundae toppings in martini glasses. Now there's a good idea!
Every birthday deserves cake. It just wouldn't be the same otherwise.
This cake was for my friend Kirby's birthday.
It's full of chocolate and almonds and even more chocolate.
But when you turn 23, you don't get candles or singing on your birthday. Especially not in a lovely cafe when you're eating lunch.
We had a lovely lunch at Jam Jar, and there was sav blanc and lovely ladies and warm winter salads.
After lunch, there were more drinks, and more friends, and cocktails that came in bear-shaped jars.
The rest of the night looked like this, dark and a little bit blurry.
(I'm not even sure that I'm allowed to call Kirby 'turdy'. I don't know where the nickname came from, and I don't know if people still call her that. But it kinda just happened on the cake bunting and so we'll just go with it.)
Chocolate & Almond Cake: Slightly adapted from Julia Child's "Mastering the art of French cooking"
I doubled Julia's original recipe to make the layer cake above. But if you just want to make this to bring to a nice family dinner, halve the recipe back down. Although, it won't look quite as impressive that way...
200g dark chocolate
250g butter, softened
300g sugar
6 eggs
pinch salt
2 tbsp sugar
2/3 cup almond meal
1/2 tsp almond extract
1 cup plain flour
Preheat oven to 170C. Grease two 20cm springform pans.
Melt the chocolate in a metal bowl set over a pot of simmering water. Don't let the water touch the bowl. When melted, take of the heat and set aside.
Separate the eggs, placing the whites in a large bowl.
Beat the egg whites with a pinch of salt, until soft peaks form (about 1-2 mins). Sprinkle the sugar over and continue beating on high until stiff peaks are formed (another few minutes). Set aside.
Beat the butter, sugar and egg yolks in a large bowl, until pale.
Stir the melted sugar into the butter mixture. Stir in the almond meal and extract.
Quickly stir in a quarter of the egg whites.
Fold in a third of the remaining whites. When partially incorporated, add a third of the flour and continue folding.
Continue alternating between adding eggs and flour, until all ingredients are incorporated.
Divide the batter between the two pans.
Bake for 25 mins, until the edges are cooked, but the middle is not quite set. A skewer should come out clean around the edge, but be slightly oily in the middle.
Leave to cool for at least 2 hours before icing.
Chocolate ganache: Slightly adapted from Julia Child
200g dark chocolate
100g butter
1 tsp vanilla essence
Place all ingredients in a metal bowl set over a pot of simmering water. Don't let the bowl touch the water.
Allow the mixture the melt before stirring until smooth.
Plunge the bowl into a larger bowl of ice cold water, and quickly whisk with a spoon until the mixture has cooled and thickened.
You have to work really fast with the icing, because once it has begun to set, it hardens very quickly and becomes difficult to work with.
Use a spoon/knife dipped in hot water to spread the icing onto the cakes, and sandwich them together. Continue dipping the spoon into hot water to smooth the icing.
Decorate with roasted almonds.
You know what's embarrassing? You're at the supermarket buying toilet paper. You reach up to grab a pack off the top shelf. They're precariously stacked on the shelf, and as you pull your packet down, all the packages of toilet paper fall off the shelf and onto your head.
You know what isn't embarrassing? Making a perfect cake. So perfect that people ask you for the recipe. And after my last cake debacle, I needed to bake something that made me feel better about my skillz.
This cake definitely did that. It was dotted with cherries and perfectly risen. Dusted with icing sugar, it was the perfect dessert to share with family. You could probably sub something in for the cherries if you can't find these, like some nice seasonal berry (they're not in season here. Yet.). I think a splash of almond extract would bring out the flavour of the almond meal, but it isn't necessary, because the cake is perfect. Just as it is.
Cherry & almond cake:
Slightly adapted from 'Sweet Food'
125g unsalted butter, at room temp
185g sugar
2 eggs
95g (1 cup) almond meal
185g plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 cup milk
1 jar (680g) morello cherries
Drain the cherries in a colander/sieve (reserve the juice for yummy drinks later).
Preheat the oven to 180C, and grease a 20cm fluted tin.
Cream butter and sugar.
Add eggs one at a time, beating after each addition.
Stir in the almond meal.
Fold in half the flour and baking powder, then all the milk, the remaining flour/baking powder.
Gently fold in the cherries.
Scrape the mix into the prepared tin.
Bake for 45-50 mins, until cake tester comes out clean.
Leave to cool in the pan for 10 mins, before turning out onto a wire rack to cool completely.
