18 Feb 2012

Hestia...tries a spot of baking

I spotted this Claudia Roden recipe over at Faux Fuchsia's place.  She's so together and tidy and gorgeous and funny and effortlessly well-groomed and posts the most lovely food photos of her creations too.  I thought I'd give it a go, and hoped that some of Faux's magic would rub off on me.

Stop laughing at the back there.....

I began one Monday morning, looking out all the ingredients, carefully buttering the cake tin and even cutting a greaseproof paper circle to fit in the bottom....and set to, all the while listening to Radio 2 and pretending that I was a Real Grown Up.  I was wearing make up and perfume and nice trousers.  I hope you're impressed.





There are only a handful of ingredients for this cake - originally made with oranges - and there's no fat and no flour.  I know. An Atkins' fan's DREAM.  And I was determined not to lay into the cake mixture.  I was, after all, an adult who would not be caught DEAD in kitchen with a mixture-spattered wooden spoon clamped between her lips in manner of dog-caught-stealing-sausages.

Faux Fuchsia's recipe involved lemons instead of oranges and so I carefully boiled my three lemons until they were soft.  I even made myself a coffee while I waited for them to cool down.  This being a Grown Up Thing is strangely soothing right enough, I thought to myself (mental state:  Serene).

The lemons were duly halved, pips removed and whizzed to a sharp pulp....carefully stirred it into the rest of the ingredients and then tipped artfully into my well-prepared cake tin.

I smoothed the surface and congratulated myself on a job well-done (mental state: smug)

I licked the spoon.

Absolutely vile.  Really.  I sincerely doubted that this was how it was supposed to taste.  I hurried back to the computer and checked the ingredients again - eggs (six) 250g of ground almonds and sugar.  SUGAR.  I had put the sugar on the work surface but failed to decant any into the mixture.

Back to the kitchen.... (mental state: furious with self)

The mixture was tipped BACK into the mixing bowl and the sugar added.  Still determined to Do It Right I cleaned the remnants of unsugary mixture out in lashings of hot water (even used my rubber gloves).......dried it, rebuttered, relined and tipped the mixture once again into the cake tin.  By this time I was feeling less charitably inclined towards the state of Grown Upineness.

Slammed it into my PREHEATED oven (yes, I even had the oven on in advance) and started making soup.

By this time the Jeremy Vine show was on and I stood shouting at the radio as I chopped up my broccoli florets and leeks.  Must have been something about social security benefits or something that equally rattles the bars of my cage.  Mental state: somewhere to the right of Adolf Hitler.

The soup was put on timer for 30 minutes and I swanned off to the mac to brag about being A Grown Up on Facebook.

Thirty minutes later I returned to the kitchen and saw, with my own disbelieving eyes, at least half the broccoli still lying on the chopping board in its virgin state.  A rant at Jeremy Vine too far, clearly.  I am absolutely CRAP at being an Adult, I decided, scraping the abandoned broccoli into the soup pan and setting the dinger to go in another 30 minutes.  By which time any nutrition in the veg would have been boiled to usefulness of wet cardboard.  Mental state:  Utterly pissed off.

The cake was removed from the oven - overcooked.  It looked like this:



Somewhat shiny for some reason, and a bit over-done around the edges, but it tasted DIVINE and Sonshine and I ate it all in three days.

Determined to make it FABULOUS, I looked out alllllll the ingredients the following weekend.  But this time I opted for a smaller cake tin (to make a thicker cake) and YES I remembered the sugar.

The deep cake tin turned out to be a mistake - it was well-burned on the outside, but still wobbled when you shook the tin. The arrival of visitors in the crucial last 10 minutes of baking resulted in it being VERY dark around the edges. But inside was soft, golden, moist and lemony.  Forgot to take a photo of it :-(

Sonshine and I ate it all in three days.

Last weekend, I was absolutely fucking determined that THIS CAKE WOULD NOT BEAT ME and I added my six eggs, the sugar, the ground almonds.....microwaved the 3 lemons (fed up with the boiling which takes aaaaages).... and put the whole lot back into the FIRST cake tin..... but THIS time I forgot to add the greaseproof paper base.

Cake baked to correct colour, but could not get arse out of pan. And the damn thing was burned again.

I had to poke at it with a plastic fish slice and tried to prize it out - but only suceeded in cutting about a centimetre off the base of the bloomin' thing.  Mental state: Where's the gin?

This is the base of the cake pan with the bottom of my cake still stuck to it.......*cue much sweary grumbling*


But, it tasted lovely.  We ate in 3 days.

This little cake experiment has resulted in Sonshine and I eating 18 eggs in 3 weeks.  I am now shovelling Movecol into me at the rate of a sachet per day.  I have the Anusol at the ready.

I have decided that I will never amount to even a hundredth of the woman that is the seriously lovely Faux Fuchsia and I have reverted back to my semi-feral state.


33 comments:

  1. Well, I am very impressed that you have provided a coeliac friendly cake recipe - thank you! There is, of course, not a chance in the world that I will ever make it.

    I stayed in my jarmies until 3pm today... ate half a pack of rice crackers for lunch and a banana and three frozen yoghurts for dinner.

    And thank you for making me google Movecol and Anusol. Now I know and I am the wiser for it. Mental state (self satisfied).

    You are hilarious. Sarah xxx

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    1. Sarah - it is a REALLY tasty cake - you can google the recipe - Claudia Roden Orange and Almond cake. Despite my feeble attempts, there's not a lot to get wrong :-D

      Sorry about the movecol and anusol things....I am a martyr to my innards :-D

      Ali x

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  2. sounds delish! how long did you nuke the lemons for?

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    1. Think it was about 10 minutes. Honestly, despite the burnt bits on it EVERY time I made it. Vanished like snow off a dyke as we say in this part of the world. Although what snow is doing on a lesbian is anyone's guess.... ;-)

      Ali x

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  3. Ali -

    Someone else went to the same cooking school that I did! My problem cake is Angelfood - I sometimes buy one from the store, just in case min is too bad, because I only make it for my mother's birthday! ;-)

    Blessings,
    Bonnie

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    1. What is this Angelfood of which you speak, Bonnie? I fancy trying that! *goes off to explore the marvel of the intertubes*

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  4. Nice post dear Ali. I can understand all of the little mishaps, exceptleaving the broccoli on the chopping board. Wasn't it just a teeny-weeny bit obvious?

    My problem is that my Beloved is a superb cook and baker. She's just finished another batch of glorious cheese scones (so good they don't even need butter)
    The problem is that she uses my mild diabetes as an excuse to stop me eating ANY of her baking, and she gives it all away to neighbours and friends.*sob*

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    1. TSB - see if you can get your hands on a book called Say No To Diabetes by Patrick Holford, a British nutritionist. He claims that he can get people off medication within 6 weeks (if late onset diabetes) or at the very least reduce the amount of medication required.

      I need to watch out for late onset diabetes - my dad and his mother both developed it and I keep a weather-eye on it. I know. Hard to believe when you see the amount of crap that I eat. But really, it's about using food as medication and eliminating the big spikes and dips in sugar consumption and eating stuff that wakens up the keys that take the glucose out of the bloodstream - or something.

      Re the broccoli - no - I had cut up half of it and tipped that half into the pot. Then stirred it and wandered off, totally forgetting about the other half lying behind me. If it had all been in front of me, I would have seen it and put it in, but it was behind. So I didn't. I'm blaming Jeremy Vine.

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    2. Thanks for the tip Ali, I'll look for the book. At the moment my Type II is well controlled, no medication, and I think I just have to be careful regarding my carbohydrate consumption. I still want some fresh cheese scones though.

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  5. Hi Ali,

    18 eggs between you over 3 weeks is only 3 eggs each a week - not that bad, surely. And on the up side - three delicious cakes! Iz impressed :)

    Cxx

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    1. *whispers* Don't tell anyone but I might try it again today because it really is a marvellous cake. It seems to get more moist as the days go on - miraculous!!!

      Ali x

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  6. Dear Alison, Ms FF is truly divine and an inspiration to us lesser mortals! Two things I find essential to baking are an oven thermometer (put exactly where the tin is supposed to go) and a very loud kitchen timer. But the proof is in the tasting and who cares about the details when it tastes delicious! I have only tried the orange one but imagine the lemon one would be lovely. love Lindaxxx

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    1. Lemon is lovely - can thoroughly recommend it Linda. And yes she is Divine. I've never seen such neat folding and deterimined decluttering. I realised that we had quite a lot in common. Her household help is called Consuela - which is, of course, the name of Tartarus's FICTITIOUS Mexican wife....we both have Kitchenaids. Except mine is more a kitchen ornament. There the similarities end, sadly!

      Kitchen timer - yes, having cloth-ears is a problem. I am often dependent on small boys running through the kitchen to hide from each other to come and tell me that the Dinger Is Dinging!

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  7. I wonder why the smaller cake tin didn't work..perhaps you could reduce the oven temp slightly or you could cover the top of the tin with a couple of layers of greaseproof.also if you double line the tin with greaseproof it will stop the burning.
    I made myself a gluten free Christmas cake this year and ate the whole lot over the course of three weeks so though I'm tempted to make this cake it's probably not a good idea from a thigh point of view.
    Re the make up and nice trousers,I watched Rachel Allen on tv last week and was heartily annoyed that she was cooking with a large flower in her hair.It's just not cricket is it?

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    1. A FLOWER?! I do believe that we should wear flowers more often. But in the kitchen? The cake is delish, NS. I am going to try the cake again.....and will do both the double lining and the temperature down thing - thank you!

      Ali x

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  8. Yes, perhaps your oven is a little ...quirky. Move the cake down a shelf, or turn the heat down and leave it in slightly longer.

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    1. I will do this very thing - turn the oven down. And watch it like a hawk instead of fannying around on FAcebook :-D

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  9. I am totally pissing myself at this post, hysterical at your bloody uselessness woman! I bet the cake was delicious, I would have ate the lot! Mental State - Pig.

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    1. Physical state was a trifle constipated. Two words that should never be in the same sentence - trifle and constipated :-)

      My uselessness seems to grow in direct proportion to the effort that I put in to actually trying hard. strange. And depressing!

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  10. Do not judge a cake by it's outside is my number one rule. My other one is cut the burnt bits off with a slightly smaller tin or coat the fucker with icing.

    I am very impressed you tried three times!

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    1. Sonshine was VERY keen for me to coat the whole thing in icing, but I felt that there was sufficient sugar in it. Given that it was only going to be himself and me that ate the damned thing!

      And it was tasty!

      Ali x

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  11. Dear Ali, this post is fabulous, I laughed and laughed and groaned with recognition; much of my cooking episodes start and end like this, going from grown upiness to demented of Bucks in quite short space of time; the cake does sound yum though so I would not care what it looks like. xxxx

    ReplyDelete
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    1. I think when one knows the loveliness of FF and how she just throws the most amazing food together....my efforts seem particularly shit. And I was REALLY trying.....:-)

      'Demented of Bucks'. I like that.

      Ali x

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  12. Well, you know, it's not all about LOOKS in life. If the 3 cakes tasted good, that's the main thing. This is from someone who isn't big on presentation, as you might have guessed...
    My baking is hit and miss. And I swear I do the ame things every time, follow the recipe and everything, it's just sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. Perhaps baking is hormonally influenced.
    Anyway - well done for trying. And hope the innards survive the egg onslaught! xx

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    1. You are quite right - it's not all about looks - if you're a person, but if you're a CAKE it's damn near everything lol! But taste was good. I think I agree with you re the hormone influence. I may try it when my biorhythms are all on a high!

      And you ALWAYS look great - no problems with YOUR presentation, Mrs PC!

      Ali x

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  13. That cake sound amazing, mine are not always pretty but if they taste good I am happy. :)

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    1. I may have to be content with tasting lovely but looking like a charred brick!

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  14. Hi AliX, sorry to butt in, but I came across this guy's blog. He's a Scot living in Aussie who's into Tarot, so I thought you might want a look.
    http://thescottishscribbler.blogspot.co.nz/2012/02/horribly-busy-day.html

    BTW, How's the bright red food mixer working? My Beloved is dropping hints that she wants one soon.

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    1. TSB - imagine you remembering that I was a weirdy Tarot bod! Thank you - I'll go and check him out immediately :-)

      Bright red food mixer is more of a kitchen ornament than a bit of working apparatus to be honest. But I still kiss it most days :-) Just get her one, she'll love you forever!

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  15. That made me laugh Hestia - I've had so many cake failures like that, where youy're DETERMINED to get it right. Years and years and years I have tried to do a good Genoese sponge. It's so difficult.

    I'd agree with Northern Snippet - somehting wrong with your oven? It seems to be browing very unevenly. Maybe try lowering the temperatuyre and turning it round a couple of times?

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    1. Looby - I must make a note NEVER to try a Genoese sponge lol! I think my oven is just plain tetchy through years of misuse. It's fan assisted and probably I need to be more careful about where and when I bang cakey stuff in. I'll put cake lower in oven, at lower setting and yes, turning it around a couple of times :-)

      Might have a go on Friday again.

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  16. aaaagh.....good effort though.....I really like cutting out the paper circle and putting it in the tin, makes me feel immensely grown up .... even just buying grease proof paper gives me a Celia Johnson buzz!!x

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    1. I was VERY impressed myself with the paper circle...when I remembered to use it!

      Ali x

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