Pete Fred

Lemon tart... This is the tarte au citron that was popularised by the Roux brothers in the UK forty-odd years ago, and went on to grace the menus of many fancy restaurants in the following years. Rather than the lemon tarts made with curd (i.e. with butter) that you'll find in every patisserie and bakery in France, this one has a lemon custard that is ethereally light and intensely lemony. Because of the way it's made, there's always a residual bit of pale foam on the surface which looks a little unsightly. The Rouxs dusted theirs with icing sugar to cover it up, and then Marco Pierre White took to brûlée-ing it, which I think looks nicer... I have a neighbour whose favourite is tarte au citron. I'll be interested to see what she makes of this.

I should point out that this is perhaps more of a restaurant tart than the regular bakery kind. It's quite light and creamy. If your memory is of something a little more dense or sticky, then this might not be what you're looking for.

It's a Nathan Outlaw recipe. Be warned: the method is poorly written, but hopefully you can make sense of it. (I scaled up the filling by 1.3333... to fill a 20 x 3.5 cm tart shell.)

My bakes of late seem to be mostly... brown. Treacle tart. I'm not sure anything could be more brown... In an effort to lessen the overwhelming sense of brown, I thought a sprinkling of icing sugar might help... But it was still mostly brown.

Continuing to futz around with la tarte des demoiselles Tatin, I wondered how far I could push the caramelisation. The answer, it would seem, is "too far"... 😬 The lighting makes it look worse than it was, but not by much. It was pretty carbonised and some of the apples caught on the pan. I started this one on the hob, perhaps a little too aggressively... Lesson learned. So I reined myself in somewhat, and was a touch more conservative with the next one... No pan shaking this time; the apples held their shape and released nicely... The black flecks are from homemade vanilla sugar (caster sugar blitzed with spent vanilla pods) and this was an excellent addition. I'll be doing that again. So that's my Tatin curiosity satisfied for the time being. (Although I've never made one with a shortcrust pastry base, so I might see what that's like, just for giggles.)

I thought I was doing an OK job keeping mine clean(ish), but yours is spotless! 😮

It's about 33 (L) x 26 (W) cm (13" x 10"). I can only really do one thing at a time, otherwise the temperature drops too rapidly or the item is too close to the exposed elements for even cooking. So it's one tray of cookies or a 23 cm (9") cake, and no more. But despite its limitations, I'd heartily recommend one to anyone who thinks it might suit their needs.

I couldn't find one designed to fit a smaller oven, so I just took an angle grinder to a regular sized one... But it wasn't particularly successful. The oven's not that powerful so the stone took an age to get hot, and with the current energy prices in Europe I couldn't justify the additional expense of preheating it.

Circumstance dictated that I start using one. Fifty bucks from Lidl... Having never used one before, I thought it was gonna be rubbish. But I was wrong; it does the job admirably. You live and learn.

Staff note: This post and responses to it have been moved from the Your Daily Sweets: What Are You Making and Baking? (2017 – ) discussion, to maintain topic focus. My oven is just the small, tabletop toaster variety, so it's a constant battle of wills between me and it to get decent results. If you could come up with a theory of how I get a better one, that'd be great. 😉

I was reading a chef's feed recently and he said that when making Tarte Tatin they just assemble it uncooked in the pan and whack it in the oven. Ninety minutes later, job done. I've always started it on the hob first to get the caramel going, so I figured I'd give it a go and see if I could skip a step. There didn't seem much point in making my own puff pastry for a test, so I just used the stuff from the supermarket... I was encouraged. The apples held their shape nicely, but they were far too anaemic for my liking. With Tatins, I prefer mahogany over beechwood. So another trolley-dash for apples and puff, and a couple of oven and timing adjustments later... Better, but still not quite right. I was disappointed that the apples lost their shape in places and turned a bit mushy, but I think that was my fault. I was worried they might stick, so I regularly gave the pan a swirl and a shake to loosen. I think the jiggling made them collapse, and if I'd just left them alone they'd have been fine.

I made a couple of loaves of brioche the other day... One of them got turned into Bostock... It's similar to an almond croissant, a way for bakeries to use up unsold brioche: soak slices with a simple syrup (orange flower water in this instance), spread with almond cream, top with flaked almonds, and bake until golden. It's a combination of crispy, toasty edges, with a soft and cakey topping, and a moist, buttery inside... It's one of my favourite things to make and eat. I don't see it too often in French bakeries. Almond croissants, yes; bostock, no. I suppose I'll just have to carry on making my own.

I took my go-to Cherry Coconut Pistachio Cake to a lunch get-together at the weekend. It was a hit. I was hoping there'd be leftovers, but no such luck. Thankfully, I'd recently stockpiled enough cherries to ride out a nuclear winter... So I elected not to deprive myself... I give most of my bakes away, but this one earns its place in the freezer.

Hmmm, good question. I'm not sure. To me, a mousse contains eggs in some form. In this particular instance, Hervé This' original description of 'chocolate chantilly' seems correct. I think Heston called it a mousse because, as well as the mousse-like texture, English-speakers would know the term, whereas chantilly is a little less familiar.

I've made chocolate chantilly a few times and thought it was quite good. I'm curious why you don't whisk it into a foam, though, as that airiness is what makes it a mousse. You seem to be making a water ganache instead. You may have seen these already, but this and this contain more information. 👍

I had a half bottle of kefir to use up, so swapped it for the buttermilk in the Swirled Jam Cake from Snacking Cakes (Yossy Arefi)... As you can see, the jam mostly sank to the bottom... But it's my own fault. I had similar issues a few months back with another of her cakes and that was fixed by using Greek yoghurt as the substitute (and adding ground almonds). But, hey, can't throw away €1.07 worth of kefir! Anyway, this used my plum and tonka jam, plus a hint of ground cardamom. Overall, it's a nicely textured cake, and I'd make it again with the necessary adjustments. (Although I agree with @Katie Meadowand @ElsieD about the jam stinginess.)

I made the loaf cake version... It was pleasant. In retrospect, it would have been better as a square or round cake so that each mouthful had peanut. Despite most of the peanut butter going into the batter, I couldn't taste it in the actual cake, just cocoa.

I used up the last of my caraway stash on the previously mentioned seed cake... I've never seen caraway in a supermarket here. Hopefully the spice lady at the Saturday market will have some, and I can re-up. 🤞

As the season transitions to Autumn, I made a couple crumbles this week. The first one used up the last dozen or so figs from my tree... The second was apple. I've no idea which variety my trees are, but they were great for eating out-of-hand, and also cooked down nicely... The figs might be finished for another year, but their leaves made another delicious batch of toasted fig leaf ice cream to go with the crumble. I've only recently started making ice cream since picking up a machine for twenty bucks in Lidl, and this week I used a commercial stabiliser for the first time. The results were a bit of a revelation: it really improves the texture and mouthfeel. I was less enamoured of this Apple and Caraway Loaf Cake... The texture wasn't great. Maybe I should've grated the apple more finely. But the distinct lack of apple-y-ness was the most disappointing aspect. It did, however, remind me that caraway seeds are put to much better use in a traditional English seed cake. I've not made one of those in a while, so that's going on the to-do list.

Another bake from Snacking Cakes by Yossy Arefi. This time it's the Salty Caramel Peanut Butter Cake... I didn't think much to this one. The cake itself was ok, if a little dry, but the fudgy caramel icing was not at all to my liking. I'll scrape it off and bin it, and we will never speak of it again.

Not when I woke up this morning I hadn't. However... It was 35C/95F today, so rolling and cutting the dough was an absolute nightmare, hence the rather shonky portioning. Plus my pan was a little smaller than called for, resulting in a snug fit. But no big deal once the buns were turned out. It was a relatively lean dough, but the tangzhong worked well, producing a nice soft bun, and the glaze didn't overly soak into it. I didn't have dark corn syrup so I substituted golden syrup cut with a little black treacle. I've no idea if it tastes the same but I liked the slight bitterness. It was a little gritty in places, though, where the sugar hadn't dissolved well. I'm not sure if that was down to my substitution or maybe differences in sugar. I'll have a think about how to fix that. Next time, as well as tweaking the glaze, I'll alter the process slightly and chill the dough for easier handling. But these sticky buns were good. I much preferred them to Chang's.

Wouldn't you know it, @oli, but we've been here before ... I never did make them again, though. Here's the recipe (I swapped in a brioche-style dough). I must have been on a Sticky Bun quest around that time because a little further up that page are some not too dissimilar Chelsea Buns. I also found a picture on my computer of these Stella Parks Double-Caramel Sticky Buns from a few months previous... I never wrote up the recipe, so I can't have been too impressed. Maybe it's the proofing and cooking of the buns in the sticky glaze (like the Chang buns) that I don't care for. Baking the buns then drowning them in sticky glaze seems to be more my thing.

Joanne Chang's Sticky Sticky Buns (YouTube)... Like me, you may be thinking "ooooooh, they look good".... ...and "can't wait to dive in"... Sadly, they didn't live up to the hype. The brioche dough wasn't as enriched as my usual one, so we were off to a bad start. Then there was so much "goo" that the bottoms (tops) turned more mushy than sticky. And they were achingly sweet and a bit sickly. But apart from that... So, not for me this time. More like Sickly Mushy Buns.

I've such a surplus of plums at the moment, it's ridiculous. It's a bit of a contest between me and the wasps as to who can get more; I may be winning. I check a couple of times a day. Yesterday morning there was about three kilos lying on the ground... I made some plum and tonka jam, and some plum ice cream, then gave the rest to neighbours. A few of today's bounty went into a Plum and Cornmeal Upside-down Cake adapted from a Yossy Arefi recipe (Snacking Cakes)... The fruit is nestled in a sort of caramel, hence the mushy top. In retrospect I should've anticipated the gaps between the plums and pressed in some berries (there's literally an infinite supply of blackberries in the fields around here). I had it with some of the aforementioned ice cream... It was pleasant. The cake was also an opportunity to dip into a bag of fine yellow cornmeal that's been hanging around for a few months since I made this lot... Mexican Sweet Corn Cake on Milk Street. Double-corn Tea Cake by Dorie Greenspan. Cornmeal Buttermilk (Loaf) Cake also by Dorie Greenspan. Hazelnut Chocolate Corn Cake by ?????. (This was probably just a way of polishing off some ricotta and a bag of ground hazelnuts.) I can't remember much about them now. I suspect they were all at least "pleasant" or I wouldn't have bothered writing them up. I think the Milk Street one was the best of the bunch and worth making again, but the recipe seems to be behind a paywall. Anyway, I thought I'd retrospectively post them in case anyone's interested. Finally for today, my fig tree that delivered exactly one (perfect) fig last year has outdone itself this time around. I've had about a dozen fantastic figs so far. They're huge... The half-dozen I grabbed today were perfectly soft and ripe, the skins just starting to split and ooze their sticky juices... There didn't seem much point in messing around incorporating them into anything else, so I simply chopped 'em up with a dollop of Armagnac whipped cream and a drizzle of chestnut honey... Several notches above "pleasant", this one.

A Tom Kerridge recipe for Sticky Toffee Pudding caught my eye in the paper yesterday, mainly because it uses suet, and I'm a sucker for anything suet (obviously eschewing the vegetable kind for the beef variety). Most STPs have baking powder so I was looking forward to a denser sponge, including the generous spike of booze. It was a good cake. However, as you can see, I made a schoolboy error when adding the toffee sauce... Far too little. Quickly remedied, though... More is more in this part of France, so... I would've killed for a scoop of vanilla ice cream but had to make do with crème fraîche instead. First-world problems, and all that. It's a good, fuss-free STP. If you don't have access to suet, there's a very similar one that uses butter.