Pete Fred

This thread gets a mention in the Guardian's "How to make the perfect..." series.

A slab of the meringue brittle from 'Sweet' by Ottolenghi/Goh... It had a nice crunch with a hint of coconut, and, perhaps most importantly, it's another way to use up surplus egg whites! The book suggests coating the base with white or dark chocolate. I tried one with dark, but thought it too overpowering. I might try white next time, or just leave well alone. (A couple of takes here and here.)

I'm a sucker for a good almond croissant. The ones at my local bakeries are a bit disappointing, unfortunately. But from time to time one of them will have a bag of discounted croissants, so I make my own... I punch up the almond flavour by toasting the almonds and not being shy with the bitter almond extract; a good dunk in rum syrup gives the base a pleasant crunchy chew; and overfilling the cream means the overspill caramelises nicely on the tray. Miam-miam, as they say over here.

Individual steamed sponge pudding... The topping was from the seemingly infinite stash of plum caramel that I made last year ("freeze up to 3 months"?... pffft!), and the custard was extra-thick from using cream instead of milk.

To yesterday's leftover leek and onions, I added some chicken and dried mushrooms, and popped a lid on top... This was the first time I've baked a suet pie crust in the oven. I liked the more defined crunchy top that yields to the soft, squidgy pastry that soaks up the filling.

Individual steamed allium pudding... The basic filling is leeks, shallots and onion. As a bit of an experiment I zhuzhed it up with caraway seeds, za'atar, and a splash of Worcestershire sauce... The leek/caraway combo was a good 'un. I'll have to remember that one.

Today is La Chandeleur (Candlemas) when the French go crazy for crêpes, so I thought I'd join in with an orange and vanilla gâteau de crêpes (or mille-crêpe cake in franglais)...

Until recently, I never knew that croissant butter was a thing... I went all in on the Frenchiness and smeared it on a warm baguette... It's tasty stuff - how could caramelized, butter-soaked croissant purée not be! - but very rich. User discretion is advised.

@TdeV My neighbour said it reminded her of an implant. I didn't like to ask if she was speaking from personal experience.

Listening to The Go-To Food Podcast interview with Tim Hayward, formerly a host of this parrish, and he mentions eGullet a couple of times, albeit briefly. Thought I'd mention it in case anyone remembers the name and is interested. Or YouTube.

For anyone who likes a good wobble, caramelized cream panna cotta... It was good; light and delicate, barely set. If I'd have had any muslin I could've strained out the bits for a clean look.

@oli Don't let my equivocation put you off. I like Italian-style almond cookies; it was only the flavouring here that underwhelmed. A bit of orange or lemon zest in the dough livens things up no end, and more almond extract would help. Whether it's worth doing the rum-butter glaze in addition, I'm not so sure, although it might help with the colour.

Rum-buttered Almond Cookies from last year's NYT Cookie Week... They were fine, but the expected buttered-rum deliciousness didn't really come through, despite a good bath in the stuff. A handsome cookie, no doubt, and simple enough to make, so probably worth chucking into a selection for the visual appeal.

I mentioned it last summer when I had a super-abundance of plums. If you don't have Dana Cree's book*, she says that it's from a Chez Panisse recipe. But if this is it then it's not quite the same (although at the end of the day it really is just puréed fruit mixed with caramel). @ElsieD tried it with peaches and liked it. *PM me and I can give you some pointers.

It's around freezing here at the moment, so a hot, steamed pudding seemed like a good idea. Plus I was looking for an excuse to christen my newly acquired individual moulds... With Bird's custard, naturally; and a blob of plum caramel because it was just sitting in the freezer not doing much.

My thoughts, too. So I made some more with a generous dose of almond extract replacing the cinnamon... The raw dough smelled and tasted almondy - almost too almondy, in that artificial way. But they baked up surprisingly muted. Go figure. No worries. I imagine it will be fine with vanilla, cardamom, tonka, etc...

I was browsing some of the baking recipes over the weekend on the Glen and Friends YouTube channel. It was a good watch. I made the Almond Slices from a 1936 book promoting an aluminium (al-yoo-min-ee-um 😉) cookware company... Calling them almond slices is a bit misleading. It's really just a visual thing; they don't in any way taste of almonds, just cinnamon. But the texture was spot-on with that perfect biscuity crunch. I'll make them again and switch up the flavourings.

Inspired by this Ultimate Tiramisu Recipe from James Hoffmann, I've been on a tirami-soon-to-be-400lbs odyssey the last couple of days. I wasn't too fussed about the speciality coffee part, but was mainly intrigued by the sous vide eggs in the cream. Unfortunately I don't have a sous vide machine, so had to MacGyver it instead... Stood swirling a probe and finessing a gas burner is certainly one way to kill half an hour. Anyway, I figured it was best to do a comparison so ended up making three... (l) Hoffmann; (m) same recipe but raw egg; (r) my usual tiramisu (by Pierre Hermé). I'm not sure if it was just my shonky sous vide setup letting me down, but the mascarpone cream in the Hoffmann version didn't quite hold soft peaks and was a little ooze-y... The raw version held it's shape better... My regular tiramisu is a slightly different beast in that an Italian meringue is folded into the mascarpone cream, resulting in a lighter, mousse-like texture... If you're interested in Hoffmann's tiramisu journey, there's a handful of videos on YouTube. So, that's my tiramisu allowance for 2025 blown in the first week of January. For whatever reason, I'm not feeling the sous vide eggs, so it's a thanks but no thanks. If I want a very light, less rich tiramisu then Monsieur Hermé does the job. But I found I actually preferred the raw egg version, which is itself just the "official" tiramisu recipe from Le Beccherie with the sugar reduced to 100g...

After making the tipsy cake the other day there was leftover brioche, so I made half a dozen little bouchons. Today they got turned into rum babas... It was mainly a test to see how saturated with syrup to make the cakes, but what started out with the intention to poke, squeeze and nibble a little here and there ended up with me eating all six! By the end, guilt led me to throw in a slice of poached quince in an effort to distract from the sheer decadence of it all.

God-level punnery in the comments below a video about French toast...

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For anyone looking to kill half an hour, the HyperFixed podcast took a (superficial) look at this.

@rotuts It's towards the end of that post.

A couple of recent low-fuss efforts. Nigella Lawson's Apple and Almond Cake... It's just apple purée, egg, sugar and almonds blitzed in a food processor. I wouldn't go as far as to recommend it, but I guess it works as a cake-like substance and is surprisingly buttery. Brian Levy's One Bowl Lemon and Olive Oil Cake (NYT gift link in article)... I had issues with this bake. The texture was a bit spongey, with weird tunnelling and gummy streaks... I'm not entirely sure what happened. It might've been down to my Arctic-like kitchen and the white chocolate not incorporating properly with the other ingredients (despite the batter seeming smooth enough). Or maybe it's just American and French ingredients tripping me up again. Otherwise, it was actually a very pleasant cake, nice and lemony with a creamy/fruity background note. I'll probably take another run at it out of curiosity when the temperature ticks up.

That's in the KP recipe, which is different. I used Heston's recipe and adapted it to the method used in the KP post, i.e. scaled down slightly and made as a large cake for sharing. Feel free to PM me if you have other questions.