Mary Berry's Chocolate Roulade

I finally got to make this chocolate roulade, a little belated but who cares! I've loved it since I saw it on GBBO this year and immediately wanted to master it. However I thought I would save it for a special time, and as it looks quite festive Christmas was the obvious choice.

As I was away I kept it to make for our belated Christmas dinner at home with some family after we arrived back as we still have ALL of the Christmas food left over! We had eight for dinner so it seemed a perfect choice.

The morning of this dinner started badly, I've mislaid the adjustable tin I got for my birthday and I really wanted to use it for this bake. I spent an hour looking for it with no success, it's no annoying when you KNOW something is in your house but - you - just - can't - find - it!! After an hour I gave up and used a deep baking tray...luckily it worked perfectly, I wasn't happy about the idea of going out to buy a ready made dessert last minute.

So I finally managed to get started. I tried to remember what I learned from the GBBO and studying the book furiously. I've never made a cake that needs to be rolled before so I really wasn't sure how it was meant to look at various stages.

Luckily, and somehow miraculously it all kind of went ...perfect! I was also very excited to use my brand new mixer, and got to do a classic mixer shot photo (yes it is a little sad I'm exited about that :D!)

I found rolling it strangely easy too...much easier than I expected and would really recommend anyone who is worried about it to definitely give it a try!

Ingredients:

1. 175g dark chocolate (39% cocoa solids), finely chopped
2. 6 large free-range eggs, at room temperature
3. 175g caster sugar
4. 2 tablespoons cocoa powder 
5.  For the filling and finishing
6. 300ml pourable double cream
7. Icing sugar, for dusting
8. You will need
9. 1 x 33 x 23cm swiss roll tin, greased with butter
10. Non-stick baking paper

Method:

Line the base and sides of the buttered tin with non-stick baking paper. If you make a small diagonal snip in each corner of the paper, it will help fit the paper snugly into the corners of the tin.

Put the chocolate in a heatproof bowl and set it over a pan of steaming hot but not boiling water (don't let the base of the bowl touch the hot water). Leave to melt, stirring occasionally.

Remove the bowl from the pan of water and stir until the chocolate is smooth, then leave to cool for about 15 minutes or until just warm. Preheat the oven to 180ºC/350ºF/gas 4.

Separate the eggs, putting the whites in one large mixing bowl and the yolks in another; set the yolks aside. Whisk the egg whites with an electric mixer on high speed until they stand in stiff peaks. If you turn the bowl upside down, the whites should be stiff enough not to fall out.

Put the sugar into the bowl with the egg yolks and whisk using the electric mixer (no need to wash it) on high speed for 2 to 3 minutes or until very thick and pale in colour, and the mixture leaves a ribbonlike trail on itself when the whisk is lifted out.

- I whisked the these in a seperate bowl and changing with the stand mixer is a bit of work for just one bowl so I used my scary old brown mixer. -

Pour the cooled chocolate into the yolk and sugar mixture and gently fold in with a wooden spoon to blend evenly. Add 2 large spoonfuls of the whisked egg whites to the chocolate mixture and stir in gently to loosen the mix, then fold in the remaining egg whites using a large metal spoon. Take care not to knock out the air you have just whisked in.

Sift the cocoa powder over the top and lightly but thoroughly fold it in with the metal spoon. Pour the mixture into the prepared tin and gently move the tin around on the worktop so the mixture finds its own level. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes or until risen and the top feels firm and slightly crisp when pressed gently with a finger. Remove from the oven and leave to cool in the tin; the sponge will fall and crack a little as it cools.

Lay a large piece of non-stick baking paper on the worktop and dust it lightly with icing sugar. Turn the sponge out onto the paper, then carefully peel off the lining paper. Whip the cream for the filling until it just holds its shape.

- As you can see I absolutely COVERED my surface with icing sugar causing my kitchen...and myself to get completely engulfed in it! It also did fill up a few of the cracks which is a shame as I did want a couple more to be visible.  -

Spread the whipped cream over the sponge, leaving a clear edge of about 2cm on all sides. Using a sharp knife, make a shallow cut along one of the short edges.

Roll this cut edge over tightly to start. Use the sugar-dusted paper to help continue the tight rolling by pulling it away from you as you roll. Finish with the join underneath, then lift the roulade onto a serving plate or board using a large wide spatula or 2 fish slices.

- I'm really happy with how mine rolled, making the first shallow cut to help with the roll really helped. I really needed the baking paper to help roll it up which worked perfectly. Everyone commented on how light the roulade was and even though we were all stuffed, there was none left over. Success! -

Nom!

Recipe adapted from Mary's Berry's BBC Recipe.

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Limoncello and White Choclate Croquembouche

Until I watched The Great British Bake Off on tuesday I will be honest and say I hadn't heard of a croquembouche before...profiteroles sure, but done like this? Never. And instantly I just knew I HAD to make one.

Luckily my lovely mother had bought me the latest GBBO book 'How To Bake'. Last season's book, which I baked my Somerset Apple Cider Cake from was brilliant, like a bible. This one is more Mary Berry inspired and very girl which is great. It's gives great step by step guides and shows you in pictures how to do things and what it's supposed to look like which is a godsend. Full of pastel colours and gorgeous photography,  I was so happy to see they featured one of the croquembouches from the show inside, so this was the one I decided I had to make, with limoncello and white chocolate. I could post the whole recipe from start to finish but then it would turn into an essay and I don't want to bore you - so I'll post the limcello and white chocolate bit, as while the choux pastry recipe was good, I think it's just as good any recipe I've used before so I'm sure you can find another in one of your cookbooks or online.

I hadn't made profiteroles before, only eclairs, which are similar but I still had only done those a couple of times but I love choux pastry so I was determined to do it right. It's not as lengthy as you imagine in itself but all in all it did take a few hours from start to finish as you have to let bits cool and stand for a while so it all added up, trust me though it is worth it. I know it's a bit of an extravagant recipe to just decide to do for fun, but I did downsize it to about a quarter of the size of what they did on the show, so it was ok :)

You do need a croquembouche cone, though I didn't have one and I've heard they're quite expensive, so I made mine with a left over cake box lid and some foil. I wrapped the foil over the card and twisted it into a wide cone shape and taped it all up together and leveled it so it stood straight. Voila, and costs next to nothing. I did it with foil rather than baking paper as I was worried the baknig paper would tear on the caramel which would be gutting in the end stage!

The hard part for me was the caramel, I hadn't made it like this before so I didn't really know what to expect and stupidly thought it would be easy as there were only two ingredients...wrong! It took me three attempts, nearly a kilo of sugar, and after number two I had run out of saucepans after filling up the dishwasher and my patient grew thin when realising how fickle sugar is! But I managed to rustle up another saucepan, a bigger one this time and I think that was part of the trick. I burned it the last two times and kept on cooking it. This time when I got to the right temperature and it hadn't quite lots all of the massive sugar clumps that had formed, I turned it down and kept the correct temperature whilst actually stirring it (even though they told you to NEVER do that on the show) and third time lucky it turned out beautifully. So do be patient with it and give it a bit more time than you may expect. The only thing I think I would change would be to add some more double cream to the filling as it was a little loose and kinda spilled out everywhere when you tore a bit off to eat so it could have down with being a bit thicker.

Right enough waffling here's the recipe:

Limoncello and White Chocolate Croquembouche

Ingredients:

• 2 recipe quantities of profiteroles
  (about 96)
• 300g caster sugar for the caramel
• caster sugar for the spun sugar

Filling:

• 4 large egg yolks
• 75g caster sugar
• 25g plain flour
• finely grated zest of one lemon
• 250ml full fat milk
• 150g white chocolate
• 1 tablespoon limoncello
• Sugar flowers to decorate (optional - I didn't use them)

You will also need a piping bag with a 0.5cm plain tube, cake board (I just used a plate) a sugar thermometer,  croquembouche con.

Method:

1. To make the filling, whisk the egg yolks in a bowl with the sugar, flour, lemon zest and one-third of the milk until smooth. Heat the rest of the milk in a medium pan until almost boiling, then pour onto the yolk mixture, stirring constantly. Return to the pan and cook, whisking constantly, until the mixture boils and thickens. Simmer for one minute, whisking, cooking out the flour taste and cool until lukewarm.
2. Meanwhile, gently melt the chocolate in a heatproof bowl set over a pan of steaming hot water but not boiling water (don't let the baste of the bowl touch the water). Cool until lukewarm, then whisk the chocolate into the custard, followed by the limoncello. Cover and chill for at least an hour before folding in the whipped cream.
3. When ready to assemble the croquembouche, spoon the filling into the piping bag. Pipe into the cool profiteroles through the steam hole, taking care not to overfill (to avoid leaking).
4. To make the caramel, dissolve the sugar in 4 tablespoons of water in a medium pan, stirring occasionally (again this is odd as they did say to never actually stir it, so I mainly just swirled it around).  Once the has sugar has dissolved bring to the boil and boil rapidly to a light caramel (160 degrees celcius / 320 Fahrenheit) Immediately plunge the base of the pan into cold water for 20 seconds to halt the cooking.
5. Place your cake board on the worktop. Working quickly, dip one side of each profiterole in the hot caramel (be careful not to burn yourself it's crazy hot)  and stick them together inside the cone. You can also just freestyle it into a pyramid. If the caramel 'glue' starts to set you can loosen it up again by heating it gently.  Leave the croquembouche in a cool to set. This shouldn't really take to long.
6. For the spun sugar you can make the caramel again, but I had some left over so I used that, after it's been in the cold water for 20 seconds let it settle for 5 minutes. Hold a couple of forks in one hand, dip the tines in the caramel and lift them out and flick strands of caramel over the assembled croquembouche. Stop as soon as the caramel starts to set and becomes thick. Decorate with sugar flowers if you would like.
7. Destroy and eat! Nom!

I hope you all made it through the recipe I know it's lengthy -
so you can see why I didn't want to write up the choux pastry recipe too!

1. Place your cake

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This Week's Best Baking Buys

So I've been very good with my baking spending recently, but I'm afraid with The Great British Bake Off showcasing some seriously sexy items I have not been able to resist.

Of course the KitchenAid mixer is something that is always catching my eye, and if I could buy their little individual kitchens they all have then I'd even put one in my bedroom believe me. But both of those things are out of reach.

There were a couple of things within easy each though, I loved the look of the heavy duty baking sheet, I was saying only last week how I needed one without a lip, mainly for when I'm baking my giant cupcakes as sometimes I need to do two in one night and it would be handy to be able to put two in the oven at the same time. Luckily, Tesco has everything, of course, and I found this one there for £8.25 which I didn't think was too bad, sometimes you shouldn't always get the cheapest. It's also great because it was such a large surface area the baking possibilities will be endless!

I was also really intrigued by their piping bags, I go through so many it's actually a little ridiculous, I use them do much they end up splitting at the seams but find it hard to find one to fit my large icing nozzles and you can't exactly measure them first as none of the bags say what size they are. then ofcourse The Great British Bake Off contestants were using disposable blue ones, which fit for any nozzles as all you have to do it cut them to fit! Perfect, and they're biodegradable so you can use them guilt free. I my blue Savoy bags from eBay, but these are exactly the same from The Craft Company, 10 for £3.12. I'll do another post when I've given them a go, I'm always after the perfect swirls.

In October I have a weeding cupcake order for 150 cupcakes and a top tier with a pink and butterfly theme, which I love as it's my favourite theme to do! We're meeting up next week to discuss the details but I went ahead any ordered these butterfly plungers, I've wanted them for ages and saves me having to buy ready made butterflies in the future. These will be great for girly cakes and I can't wait to give them ago, I'm thinking pinks, glitter and shimmer! The plungers are veined too so they give off a bit more detail, I already have the leaf design one and they work great. They come in a pack of three, various sizes for £7.99 from The Cake Decorating Company.

I can't wait to give all of these a go at the weekend, I also have my eye on one of the loose bottomed pie dishes....I think I might be trying out some pastry at the weekend...and maybe some cupcakes! Pin It Now!

Somerset Apple Cider Cake

Recently I've been doing a lot of Victoria Sponge cakes, or chocolate sponges etc, one thing I never bake is a cake that has fruit it in, I'm not usually a big fan. I think the fear comes from Christmas fruit cake which I cannot stand, I'm on of those people do that 'yuck face' whenever any time of fruit cake is mentioned.

So I thought it was time to change this, it was really cold yesterday when I got in from work and it actually felt a bit wintery, so naturally I needed to bake to fill the house with heat and a yummy smell. So to break my no-fruit baking streak I went through one of my favourite recipe books 'The Great British Book of Baking' that came out with last year's series of The Great British Bake Off (which I also love! and unfortunately failed to get passed the audition stage, but if someone is going to brutally kill your bread it may as well be Paul Hollywood!) anyway, I love this book! It features many from the series and lots other British classics with stunning photography, history and great techniques. This is where I found this Somerset Apple Cider Recipe, I changed it a little for preference when it came to apples and sugar but that's about it. I loved the idea of putting cider in a cake, this helped ease the thought process of putting fruit it in too!

This cake only took me 30 minutes to make before putting it in the oven, it also recommends you bake it for an hour as I did this too, came out perfect! I also nearly never have right right size actual tins so I often end up baking them in my biscuit/cake tins!

Ingredients: for a 23cm spring form tin (greased and lined)

• 175 unsalted butter, softened
• 175g light brown muscovado sugar (I used Tate & Lyle soft brown sugar- gorgeous!)
• 3 free range eggs, room temperature, lightly beaten
• 250g self raising flour (I always use plain and add baking powder)
• 100ml Cider, choose a well flavoured apple one so the taste really comes through, I used Henry Westons 2010 Vintage
• 500s tart eating apples, peeled, cored and diced (I used cooking apples for the stronger flavour, and kept them in segments rather than dicing)
• 2 tablespoons demerara sugar to sprinkle with (again I used the soft brown sugar)

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 160 degrees celcius/325 Fahrenheit/gas mark.
2. Beat together sugar and butter until light and fluffy.
3. Gradually add the eggs, beating well after each one.
4. Sift the flour on to the mixure and gently fold in with a large metal spoon, when partially mixed in add the apples and cider before fully combining.
5. Spread the mixture evenly into the tin, sprinkle with the sugar and bake for an hour, until a toothpick comes out clean.
6. Eat warm for full nom!

While I would still say I would always choose chocolate or lemon over fruit, I did enjoy this cake, you could actually taste the cider and the apples weren't as mushy as I thought they would be. It was really moist and hasn't dried out despite being cut all day. The sugar on top once it has caramelised was simply gorgeous - it really made the cake I think! I will continue trying to convert myself into cakes like these....what to try next? Pin It Now!