Chocolate & almond cake.

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.

Eclairs au chocolat.

Some days, I wish I had gone to pâtisserie school, rather than to teacher school. I seriously considered it, before deciding that I would have to get up too early in the morning if I was going to be a pâtissier.
Which, really, is a dumb reason to have changed my mind.

I'm not sure that making pastries for a living would be as much fun as doing it at home. 

I definitely get an enormous sense of satisfaction from making something like eclairs without any help at all (except from Julia Child, of course). 

I get this satisfaction even though eclairs aren't as difficult as I'd imagined them to be. 

I've wanted to make choux pastry ever since I saw the Croquembouche on Masterchef, but I always thought it was going to be outrageously difficult. But they lied. It isn't that difficult to make. 

And after being in Sydney last week and eating far too many chocolate eclairs, I decided it was about time that I made some myself. 

I'm glad that I did.

Despite these actually looking like profiteroles, I'm going to call them eclairs. But we don't need to argue about this. Just eat them.
I gave some of these to my family, and took some of them into work.
They were very well received, and for good reason, too. They are impressively tasty, if I do say so myself.




Chocolate Eclairs.
Adapted, ever so slightly, from Julia Child's 'Mastering the Art of French Cooking'.
Using these amounts, I made 17 puffs: all of different sizes. I did this because I wanted to see which size I preferred (the smaller ones were better). I'm going to say that the choux mix would make roughly 20 puffs measuring 10cm across (once cooked). I actually didn't have quite enough custard to fill all the puffs, but the ones I did fill had a bit too much custard. You could either double the custard quantities and have some left over so that each puff got filled with a large amount of custard. Or use this amount and fill each puff a bit less, to make sure that each puff gets filled. Or you could just fill the remaining puffs with icecream.


For the choux pastry:
1 cup water
85g butter (3 oz)
pinch salt
1 tsp sugar
3/4 cup plain flour
4 eggs

In a large saucepan, bring water, butter, salt and sugar to the boil, until butter has melted.
Take off the heat and add the flour. Stir vigorously with a wooden spoon until thoroughly mixed.
Place over a medium heat and continue beating until mix leaves the sides of the pan and forms a mass.
Remove from heat. Make a well in the centre and crack in one egg. Beat thoroughly until mixed. At this point, it looks almost like the eggs won't incorporate, but just keep mixing. I promise it will all come together!
Continue mixing in the eggs, one at a time. Beating thoroughly after each one.
Preheat the oven to 210C.
Spoon the mix into a pastry bag and pipe onto a lined baking tray, either into circles or oblongs. The dough will double in size as it cooks, so take this into consideration when piping them. Leave a decent space between each puff.
Alternatively, use two teaspoons to scoop balls of dough onto the trays. (This is what I did, but the piping bag method is neater).
Paint beaten egg or milk onto the tops of the puffs, flattening them down slightly.
Bake for 20 mins. They will be brown and crispy and doubled in size when ready.
Take the trays out of the oven and spike each puff with a sharp knife to release the steam (Otherwise they go soggy). Place back on the tray and leave in the turned off oven for ten minutes with the door ajar, before removing to a rack to cool completely.


For the chocolate custard:
1/2 cup white sugar
1 egg yolk
1 egg
1/4 cup flour
1 cup boiling milk
80g dark chocolate, chopped very, very small
1 tsp vanilla essence

In a medium bowl, whisk the eggs.
Gradually beat in the sugar using a whisk. Once all incorporated, continue beating until eggs are pale and thick (about 3 mins).
Mix in the flour.
Gradually mix in the milk, beating continuously.
Pour the mix into a saucepan and set over moderate heat.
Continue stirring until mixture boils. It will start to become lumpy, but it'll smooth out as you keep beating.
Turn the heat down to moderately-low and cook for 2-3 minutes, making sure the mix doesn't scorch on the bottom of the pan.
Add the chopped chocolate and stir until chocolate is melted.


For the glaze:
90g dark chocolate, broken into pieces
70g unsalted butter, diced

Place the chocolate and butter in a metal bowl set over a pan of simmering water. Make sure the water doesn't touch the bottom of the bowl.
When the butter has melted and the chocolate is mostly, but not completely, melted take the bowl off the pan and stir until the chocolate has melted and the mix is smooth.

To assemble:
Fill a piping bag with custard.
Take a cooled puff and stick the nozzle of the piping bag into the slit you made in the side of the puff.
Fill with custard.
Top the puff with chocolate glaze.
Leave to cool before eating.

Julia Child's Boeuf Bourguignon

There's a certain feeling in the air. Have you noticed? The music in the shops has changed. The flags up around the city are sporting a different colour that only comes out at this time of year. People have smiles on their faces, for no reason at all.

All around the place, people are rushing. They're going about their Christmassy ways, trying to buy all their santa presents before the kids finish school. I went into town today, and there were more people there than I've seen all year. There were kids wearing santa hats, posties covered in tinsel, and shop assistants everywhere asking how your christmas shopping is going.

But people seem to be too busy with their Christmas things that they've forgotten that they have interests that don't revolve around this special time of year. No other holiday changes people as much as Christmas does. No other holiday divides them. Not nearly as much. Everyone likes the chocolate at Easter. And if they don't like the chocolate, they at least like the week off work. But not Christmas. Oh no. You can't be a fence sitter with Christmas. You either like it, or you don't. There's not two ways about it, Christmas changes you. It could put a spring in your step, or a frown on your face. Personally, I'm of the former camp. But I do know people who belong to the latter.

So this food post is for those latter people who don't like Christmas and don't want anything to do with it. This food post has nothing to do with Christmas at all.

A while ago, I told you about a certain Sunday dinner we had. At the time, I had planned to post all the recipes that I made. But things happen, and you don't always end up doing the things you plan to. So here's the recipe for the boeuf bourguignon I made at that dinner party. It came from Julia Child's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" that Kirby and Arie gave me for my birthday.

Boeuf bourguignon is a bit of an involved dish, but it is super tasty. You have to cook the beef in a nice bottle of red wine for 2 or 3 hours, and while that's cooking, you have to cook mushrooms and onions in an indecent amount of butter. But it's all for the best. Trust me.

Julia Child's Boeuf a la Bourguignonne:

170g bacon slices, chopped
1 kg lean stewing beef, cut into cubes
1 carrot, sliced
1 big brown onion, sliced
2 tbsp flour
3 cups good red wine
2-3 cups beef stock
1 tbsp tomato paste
2 garlic cloves, minced
1/2 tsp thyme or oregano
20 french shallots, brown braised in stock*
500g mushrooms, sauteed in butter*

Preheat oven to 230C.
Saute bacon in olive oil in a cast iron, heavy bottom pot to brown slightly. Remove from pan.
Dry the beef in paper towels (according to Julia, the beef doesn't brown properly if it is damp).
Saute in batches in the bacon fat until brown all over. When a batch is done, add it to the bacon.
Brown the sliced vegetables in the pot, and then remove to a side dish.
Pour out the fat from the pot, and then wipe the pot clean.
Return the beef and bacon to the pot and season with salt and pepper. Sprinkle on the flour and toss to coat.
Put casserole in the oven for 5 minutes, toss the meat, and return to the oven for 5 mins more.
Remove casserole and turn down oven to 160C
Pour in the wine and enough stock so that the beef is just covered. Add the tomato paste, garlic and herbs.
Bring to a simmer on top of the stove, then cover and place in the oven.
Cook for 2 1/2 to 3 hours. The meat is done when tender.
*While the meat is cooking, prepare the onions and mushrooms.
When the meat is done, pour the liquid into a small saucepan, simmer, skimming off any fat, until you have 2 1/2 cups liquid.
Arrange the vegetables over the meat in the pot and then pour over the liquid.
Cover the casserole and simmer on the stove top for 2-3 minutes, basting the meat and vegetables with the sauce.
The dish can be served with boiled potatoes or buttered noodles or rice or whatever you like!

French apple tart & Sunday dinner.

I've always wanted to host a dinner party. Always. In my Ideal Dinner Party Situation, everything would be perfect. The wine would be good, the table would be set in a fancy design, there'd be lots of people in lovely dresses/suits, the food would be amazing, and I would play the perfect hostess. Instead, we don't live in a house big enough to host a dinner party, so alas, I'll have to keep dreaming about the perfect dinner party. One day. It'll happen one day.

But in the meantime, I can have dinner with as many people as can fit in our lounge room, and around the tiny table that I borrowed from my Dad. That makes a total of four whole people. So there was Brent, Me, Brent's sister Kirby, and her boyfriend, Arie. We squished around this table that I set up (at the time, it didn't look like the one above. I didn't take any good photo's at the time, because I was embarrassed, I've never had people watch me take photos like that before, so I re-set the table when I was cleaning up this morning. Sneaky. In an Ideal World, my table setting would have looked [like this]), and ate this huge meal in the space of an hour, because we decided to catch a movie after. We had a simple tomato Bruschetta, Beouf Bourguignon (Julia Child's recipe, of course), and French Apple Tart (also Julia Child's). I could tell you about all the bad things about the meal, but let's focus on the positive, shall we? The tomato Bruschetta was nice, the tomato/fetta/red onion combination never fails. The sauce for the Bourguignon was really rich from the wine and tasted really good, but I think the mushrooms and the onions (which had been cooked in an indecent amount of butter) were my favourite bits. The apple tart looked really pretty, if I may say so myself, I was super proud of my lovely apple-pattern on the top. The apple sauce mixture underneath was really tasty and spiced just the right amount (it was even good for breakfast this morning with some yoghurt and some homemade granola). I'll give you the other recipes at a later date, but we'll start with the apple tart. As my Mum always says, eat dessert first. So that's what we'll do.

The apple tart wasn't hard to make, it was just time consuming: making the pastry, peeling/coring/slicing all the apples, making the apple sauce. But I think it's worth it, especially for a special occasion. It makes you feel very domestic-goddess, being able to produce something like this from your very own kitchen.

French Apple Tart:

From Julia Child's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking."

Makes one 25-26cm tart.

For the Pastry:

2 cups pastry flour ("00" flour)

1/4 tsp salt

3 tbsp white sugar

200g cold butter, chopped into bits

1/2 cup iced water

Mix flour, salt, sugar and butter in a big bowl. Rub the flour and butter together with the tips of your fingers until the mix resembles crumbs. Don't over mix, you don't want the butter to get too warm.

Add the water and quickly mix in with one hand. Add a few more drops of water if the mix hasn't come together. The dough should hold together without being sticky.

Turn the dough out onto a floured board. With the heel, not the palm, of your hand, knead the dough to blend it together. Sprinkle it lightly with flour and wrap in baking paper and place in the fridge for 2 hours or overnight before using.

When ready to use, place the dough on a floured board. Roll out into a thin circle bigger than your baking tin. Lift the dough off the board and lay over your greased tin. Press the dough into the tin and prick all around with a fork. Cover with a square of baking paper and then pour in rice, dried beans or baking weights. Blind bake in a 200C preheated oven for 8-10 minutes until base is set. Remove the paper and weights and bake for another 3-5 minutes until pastry starts to colour.

For the Apple topping:

2 kg apples (I used golden delicious and fuji's)

1/3 cup apricot jam

2/3 cup white sugar

3 tbsp butter

1/2 tsp cinnamon

zest of 1 lemon

Peel, core and quarter the apples (You might like to have a sit on the couch whilst you're doing this). Cut enough of the apples into thin lengthwise slices to make 3 cups. Toss them with 1 tsp lemon juice and 2 tbsp sugar. (for the top of the tart).

Cut the remaining apples into chunks, about 8 cups, and place in a pan with 3 tbsp water. Cook, covered, over a low heat for 20 mins, stirring occasionally. The apples should be tender.

Mix in the remaining ingredients. Bring to the boil and cook until the apples have turned into a thick sauce.

Preheat oven to 190C.

Spread the applesauce on the blind baked pastry shell. Arrange the apple slices on top of the sauce.

Bake for 30 mins, or until apples have browned and are tender.

Spread an apricot glaze (1/2 cup apricot jam mixed with 2 tbsp sugar heated until just simmering) over the top of the apples.

The tart can be served either hot or cold.

Poulet en Cocotte Bonne Femme.

It was my birthday this week and I got some excellent presents. A Chasseur cast-iron pot, the Julia Child cookbooks and a set of knives were the main ones. I feel so spoilt! I've been trying to cook things in my new pot and chop lots of things with my new knives and I'm in heaven. But the knives are so sharp that I keep cutting myself. It's the kind of sharp that means you don't realise you've cut yourself until you see the blood dripping down your fingers onto whatever you're chopping. I must've cut my finger pretty deep the other day, because it won't stop bleeding. When it does, if I even touch my finger on anything, it bleeds again.

It did stop bleeding long enough, though, for me to cook dinner. Out of the hundreds of recipes in the Julia Child book, I chose this one because it had Bonne Femme in the title. Really, though, it's just chicken in a casserole with bacon, potatoes and onions - my favourite kind of dish. I know that not everyone likes their dinner to be covered in butter, but I do. Everything tastes better with butter. If you don't like your chicken and potatoes swimming in butter, you should just turn away now, this is definitely not a calorie-friendly meal. Then again, you have to splurge sometimes, so you may as well go all out.

To be honest, I did expect this dish to be a bit more... wow. It was basically just a roast chicken with butter and bacon to make it special. Don't get me wrong, it was super tasty, and cooking chicken in a cast-iron pot is my new favourite past time, but I think it could benefit from something else. I'm not sure what... Actually, I didn't have the right amount of bacon, so that might've made a difference. Doesn't matter though, I'll definitely make this dish again.

Julia Child says to use a 1/2 pound chunk of bacon, which you then have to cut up into lardons. This seemed like to much hassle for me, so I just used 4 strips of bacon, which probably wasn't enough, but, whatever, I do what I want. She also says to use 15-25 white onions. I imagine she's talking about those little onions that you use for pickling, but really, that's a bit outrageous. I used 2 big brown onions instead.

Poulet en Cocotte Bonne Femme:
Adapted from Julia Child's "Mastering The Art of French Cooking"

Oven- 180C

5 rashers of bacon, sliced
4 tbsp butter
1 chicken
2 big brown onions, cut in half with the skins off
4-5 medium potatoes, peeled, quartered
1/4 tsp salt
herb bouquet

Cover the potatoes in cold, salted water and bring to the boil. A couple of minutes before the water starts to boil, drop the onions in. As soon as it's boiled, drain everything.
Saute the bacon in 1 tbsp of butter in the cast-iron pot for 4-5 mins on the stove top. Take out and put aside.
Brown the chicken in the pot, until browned on all sides, be careful not to break the skin of the chicken.
Remove the chicken from the pot and keep aside. Pour out the butter from the casserole.
Put the last 3 tbsp butter in the pot and heat until foaming.
Add the potatoes to the pot, rolling them around to "evaporate their moisture."
While the pot is still on the stove, spread the potatoes around the edge of the dish and put the chicken back in, breast side up.
Salt the chicken.
Put the onions around the chicken and scatter the bacon on top.
Add the herb bouquet.
Baste everything with the butter at the bottom of the pan.
Cover the chicken with alfoil, and put the lid on.
Roast for 1 hour 10-20 mins until the chicken is done.
Serve the chicken with the butter sauce from the pot.