cobnut, apple & cinnamon cake

i used my cobnuts to make an apple and cinnamon cake. the recipe i used was a nigel slater one for moist plum cake (see here for a cherry & almond version, including the recipe which you can adapt if you fancy giving this a try) which uses a mix of flour and ground almonds.

i blitzed the cobnuts in my food processor and used this in the place of the almonds. a teaspoon of cinnamon into the mix and pieces of apples on top of the cake mix and that’s it. the cobnuts added an extra depth of flavour, similar to hazelnut. because i used the nuts fresh they were quite coarse which added a really nice crunch to the cake texture.

rosewater meringues with pistachio

aren't they pretty? i added a couple of teapoons of rosewater and a few drops of pink food colouring to my meringue mix then dusted them with pistachio crumbs before baking. we ate these with berries and cream. a real taste of summer.

roasted jerusalem artichokes with goat’s cheese, roasted tomatoes and agresto

 

i loved skye gyngell’s first recipe book and am now working my way through her second, finding many, many recipes which make my toes curl with pleasure.

my absolute favourite so far has been this roasted jerusalem artichokes with goat’s cheese, roasted tomatoes and agresto. as ever there are many layers of flavour – pungent garlic, the nutty sweetness of roasted artichokes, the tang of the tomatoes and wow, wow, wow, the magic that is agresto.

in skye’s words, “agresto is a soft, rounded pounded paste made with very fresh young creamy walnuts” but it also so much more. the walnuts (it’s too late in the year for wet walnuts but this was fine made with older fresh walnuts) are combined with anchovy, garlic, lemon, chilli, parsley and olive oil and result in a wonderfully fresh zingy paste with the base flavours of anchovy and nuts.

we ate this two days running and it is a serious contender for any festive meal which needs a starter. i am also really excited about trying the agresto in different forms. i love the idea of tossing it with pasta, perhaps replacing the anchovies with crumbled blue cheese.

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daring bakers: almond gateau with praline buttercream

 

another month and another daring bakers challenge. chosen by chris from mele cotte (it means baked apples in case you’re wondering) this month we’ve all been baking nut gateaux with praline buttercream.

swiss buttercream to be more precise. uh oh, that was not a good thing to see – last time a recipe called for a meringue buttercream (which used a similar technique to this swiss buttercream) i had a disaster and had to use an alternative icing. however, i decided this was an opportunity to get it right so i planned a day of baking and got stuck in.

this is a complex recipe which has many different components:

• nut genoise – i chose almonds and orange as my flavouring, rather than the suggested hazelnuts and lemon
• sugar syrup – i flavoured this with orange flower water
• whipped cream
• praline buttercream – again i used almonds to flavour my praline
• fruit glaze – i used raspberry jam
• chocolate ganache

so, how did i get on?

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almond brittle

 

making nut brittle is incredibly easy and if you’re after a nice homemade sweet to give someone as a gift, or just to have around to indulge yourself, it’s a great alternative to homemade chocolates. this is especially true if you’re likely to be sharing them with vegans or people who can’t eat dairy.

i used flaked almonds but you could choose any nut. just think about how big the nuts are and how easy it’ll be to break up the brittle/ put it in your mouth and eat it! this almond brittle was part of a larger recipe, more of which later…

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