2nd January 2014
For those of you who don’t know IMK, Celia curates an ever growing list of lovely bloggers who share things happening in their kitchens across the world. Click on the link to go to Celia @ FIgjamandlimecordial.com to find out more. I don’t have lots of wild and exotic things to show you that arrived for Christmas as I spent Christmas on the beach but you might like to see these photos anyway from my Bristol kitchen.
My current favourite thing to do with dough is to make the date syrup kefir dough with a healthy scoop or two of stoneground wholemeal in the mix and then shape it into a loaf and a tray of rolls. I am somewhat enamoured of rolling the rolls in sesame seeds before leaving them for their final prove as I love the taste that sesame seeds add to the dough and it makes a change from the usual floury tops I tend to make. These rolls use about 85 – 100 g of dough and bake on a tray in about 20 minutes at 210-220º C. They freeze well and are very good for slicing for emergency toast, for a lunch as here, and perfect stuffed with salami for a picnic.
I also continue to bake the semolina BBQ buns (aka duvet bread) from Dan Lepard’s recipe even though it is not BBQ time of year, here we had them with grilled halloumi, avocado salsa and home made coleslaw and they were pretty good.
I made a couple of batches of biscuits from this old Dutch mould lent to me by my father. I had often looked at it hanging on the wall and wondered how it worked so when I read this recipe for speculaas on the Dutch Weekend Bakery site, I thought I would like to have a crack at it. I was very pleased with how they came out. We put lots of white pepper in our spice mix so they had quite a kick!
Before Christmas I ordered a new bundt tin on a whim and it finally arrived a few days ago – it has sat there saying, ‘Go on, bake a cake, I need my potential to be fulfilled’ – (these New Age cake tins have been reading all together too many self-help books over Christmas) but there was some truth in what the tin said, what was the point of it just sitting there, in the same way as those biscuit boards hung on a wall for decoration.
Yesterday I picked a random bundt recipe from the first page of my search results which was this one for a chocolate almond bundt cake from the BBC Good Food site and this was the result.
It reminds me vividly of a cake I ate as a child; the Mandorle Dolce flavouring from Bakery Bits (incredibly strong, you need less if you make this recipe and use this for the almond essence) and slightly grainy texture that ground almonds give to a cake, the bits of chocolate chips, the flavour of cocoa. It is always fun to try and make a marble cake, though you do end up with alarming numbers of bowls to wash up.
Anyway, the sighs of relief when the cake popped out on to the cooling rack were audible. It works well as an afternoon tea cake and it has been requested as a repeat bake. I don’t think I have quite got the marbling technique right, but I am easily pleased. Any tips from you expert marblers out there would be welcome!
I baked it for the lower end of the recommended time 40 minutes in a fan oven at 160 C.
Finally a photo of a surprise light show, nothing to do with cakes but I wanted to show you this. I came downstairs and on the table my old Rorstrand Bla Eld (Blue Fire) fruit bowl had this extraordinary halo of light all around it. It is a reflection caused by the sun being so low in the sky and hitting the slightly embossed glazed pattern on the outside of the bowl (which is a stylized ear of wheat pattern). I was entranced – I hope you like it too!
Zeb Bakes 
The last photo conquered my heart!\
Loved everything, and of course, I am in awe with the bundt cake, you know how I feel about all creatures cake…
A wonderful New Year for you, dear!
That cake required two of us to read the recipe and even then at the end I managed to drag the end of teaspoon through the batter the wrong way, a bit like the way I always end up in the cleaner’s cupboard in the motorway services, I am sure I have mentioned that before. If there is a wrong way to do something, I like to explore that thoroughly first :) :) Fortunately the sun does all the work in my kitchen at this time of year in particular and constantly surprises me with its inventiveness, I hope you have a wonderful new year too Sally xx
I love the pattern on (in?) the bundt tin, and the little biscuits look fun too!
Thankyou, I was very pleased with how it turned out (and the fact that it turned out!) the biscuits are great fun to make too :)
We were lucky enough to have been invited to taste the bundt cake and I can honestly say it was absolutely gorgeous. I love the taste of almonds and Kevin loves chocolate so it was a match made in heaven! Thank you so much:)
Loved the last photo – mesmerising.
You are the best guests – you will have to come again soon so I have an excuse to make more cake xx
Reblogged this on Linda's wildlife garden and commented:
very yummy
Thank you Linda :)
Just as you are enamoured with the beach, I am besotted with those sesame encrusted rolls. I’ll trade you some Danish dark rye bread that just came out of the oven, although you’ll have to wait a day because it doesn’t like slicing until day 2 or day 3. :) xx
You can do this with any dough that you use to make rolls, talk to Sedrick about it one of these days xx
Lovely dishes. I used to have a Bundt Tin but it was a Springform one and didn’t have such definite fluting. It must have been lost in a move at some stage ~ or I lent it and forgot to get it back.
I’m definitely going to look at the semolina buns. We seem to have a lot of sandwiches at lunch time and ringing the changes can become an issue.
Thanks for sharing.
This is one of the Nordicware ones, worth looking out for in sales and on special offers as they are quite pricey otherwise but they do give wonderful definition to a cake and then you don’t have to ice them because they are so pretty just as they are ! I can’t recommend the semolina bun recipe too highly, it really is a good one and you can easily freeze the buns and use them on another occasion. Thanks for reading Pat and Happy New Year !
That looks so good!
Thank you! Happy New Year to you!
Wow, all those breads and pastries look so beautiful, Joanna! You are definitely off on a good foot for 2014.
That’s very kind of you Karin – I think I am going to have to be more experimental this year and try some new things :)
I love your Bundt tin, I have a few but not that one! Have a good new year, Joanna.
If they weren’t so heavy we could lend them out to each other Jeannette! They are good fun aren’t they? Happy New Year to you too !
You’re marbling looks perfect to me Joanna – not that I am any expert. Suelle is the one for that. Your speculaas moulds are delightful. What material is it made of? Do you cook the biscuits in it? I’m now off to check out your date syrup kefir.
Happy New Year
Thank you Choc! The mould is made of wood and is hand carved. I dust it with a mix of wheat and rice flour and brush it round with a pastry brush before making the shapes the way the Ed and Marieke describe in their post and I was doing one at a time, not the whole mould in one go. You don’t bake in it, just use the mould to shape and imprint the biscuits.
I love the light show! That bundt cake looks amazing and what a gorgeous tin. I’m afraid I can be of no help to you when it comes to marbling – a learner myself! I would have audibly gasped when it came out of the tin so perfectly too. I love your father’s speculaas mould – would love to make some as I’ve always enjoyed those pretty biscuits xx
Thank you Charlie, I am getting all encouraged to make more cakes, which of course is not what one should really be doing in January but as I had a fairly lean holiday time, maybe I can make another one, and I have a friend’s birthday coming up as an excuse :)
I love your light show – I can spend a lot of time watching reflections in the kitchen and dining room! Your rolls always look so fine, and how brilliant are you to be able to get the dough out of the speculaas mould – I’ve have never, ever been able to achieve that. I’m going to check out the Dutch bakery link next! Could I please come over for a slice of bundt cake? I could think of nothing nicer than sitting with you in your lovely light-filled room and sipping tea and trying to make pictures from the shapes in the marbling.. xxx
Morning Celia! The sun squeezes into the kitchen at this time of year for a couple of hours in the morning and it isn’t every day but when it does it is always such a treat. You are always welcome for cake and tea. I looked around for moulds like your Marmoul ones but haven’t tracked any down over here yet so I begged to borrow this one from the Amsterdam flea markets off the wall at Dad’s and he was kind enough to lend it to me :)
Ah, that speculaas mould. I love it!
Thank you for reading Francesca, happy new year to you!
What glorious baking, in awe of that bundt cake. I’m defininitely more of a rustic cook but loving admiring your beautiful creations.
Hi Andrea, the tin itself does the work with its sharp ridges, they are very cleverly designed, but thank you so much!
I was watching a light show today too as I packed the Xmas decorations away, the reflected lights were dancing on the ceiling. Loving the bundt cake, never been brave enough to try a marble cake, maybe I should…… !
Light shows are wonderful things aren’t they? One morning it had been raining (again) and then as it stopped and the sun came out it picked up a whole lot of hanging rain drops on a bare birch tree and it looked just like christmas lights, or maybe that should be the other way round? Go on try a marble cake one day….. :)
Joanna- you have been busy baking!
My favorite photo is the last one- I love the wheat design shared by the sun. You must be fairly sunny in the UK- here there is snow and darkness all around- for the last week or so. :(
Your biscuits look perfect- I have some molds hanging up on the wall- I should try the recipe you shared. And your rolls look fantastic- I wish I had the energy to try them- although I did make two loaves of rye today and a loaf of french bread yesterday- Loaves are quicker and not so fiddley.
Morning Heidi, it looks all condensed put into one post doesn’t it? We have sunny days and rainy days and windy days at the moment, there is snow in the North but not here yet, the south-westerly gales usually bring rain not snow to the UK, and it is beginning to get lighter in the evenings. I tend not to take that many photos of the rain, though I have one where I tried to take the woodpigeon sitting half asleep in the birdbath in the rain but only succeeded in photographing the wet windowglass, very Surreal. I guess I just like rolls, we are only two of us here most of the time and I can tuck them into small corners of the freezer and then am always delighted when I think I have run out of bread and come across them. The speculaas dough works best with a well dusted mould and if it is fairly cold, once it warms up again I put it back in the fridge, it isn’t a fast process making those biscuits, definitely something to do as a project rather than an everyday biscuit.
I am always in awe of your baking Joanna – the bread looks so perfect (I recently got into an awful mess thinking that I could fly solo and use a fair bit of rye flour) and I don’t think my feet would touch the floor for a fortnight if I managed to turn out something like the Bundt cake. I do love cakes with almond meal in them. The speculaas mold is quite beautiful and must be more special because it is old and of family. The light show is very beautiful – I do love watching refracted light, they’re little passing gems that give happiness. I did laugh at your “cleaner’s cupboard” comment – we have friends who live in a ground floor unit and we’ve been visiting them for years, but I have only just recently stopped trying to exit their floor through the fire cupboard door:)
That’s the word I couldn’t think what it was, refracted light, thank you! What happened with the rye loaves? The mould is a bit of a challenge but it deserved an outing and it kind of stretched my imagination to use a different technique from the ones I know for biscuit making. We also had a go at making Celia’s vanilla biscuit press cookies back in November last year and broke the press, which Clive our plumbing friend then fixed while he was here. I should have another go with it soon. I am a great believer in large signs on doors saying exit here, I always look for signs otherwise I end up in the Gents or as you say the fire cupboard… Happy New Year Jan!
Happy New Year to you too Joanna, I hope the storms aren’t as bad where you are as they sound and that your not lashed to the oven, wearing trawler-style wet weather gear, complete with oil skin hat low on your brow and buckets of water coming from off stage left:) My rye bread: well, I knew the dough was wetter than usual (I used 500 white and 250 dark rye and approx 500mls water and, I think, about 350gms of starter which was 50/50), but I managed two lots of fold and turn ‘kneading’. The next time I came to fold and turn and this time shape it – it had turned into the creature from the bog. It was almost billowing out of the bowl and was an horrendously sticky sponge like creature which made me panic. With the help of Peter I ‘follollopped’ it into the tin and left it – it rose very quickly, I didn’t dare try slashing it and then it sat and glowered at me in the oven. The cooked texture really wasn’t so bad, but it was very unlovely to look at:( And, yes, I’ve ended up in the gents before now – hard to make a dignified, nonchalant exit from!
I haven’t got one of those rakish sou’westers (though I quite fancy one having read your description!) and I haven’t had an oilskin since I was a small child when I had a white one which I wore to feed the swans by Putney Bridge. But I do have a very fetching pair of new neoprene wellies from B, and other items of weatherproof kit, and the dogs have minimal coats – their heads and ears get very soggy and flattened in the rain but they still want to go out unless it gets lashingly grim.
What a badly behaved dough! Was it a hot day? No consolation now but I have had similar things happen, partic with ciabatta ! xx jo
G’day Joanna! Happy New Year, true!
Love your molds and your marble cake and wish I could try some now through the screen too!
Thanks also for this month’s kitchen view!
Cheers! Joanne
‘Morning Joanne! Wish we could all share a bit more besides photos but it is fun to do this once in a while and push cake at the screen! Happy New Year to you too and all the best !
What a lovely bright post for winter :). I love the look of that gorgeous bundt cake. I have a bundt pan that has a love affair with each and every cake that bakes in it. It hugs them tightly to itself and refuses to let them go…sigh… My non-dairy kefir is still chuffing along nicely without refreshing it in regular milk so I think I may have converted it (it’s been 4 months now since it last had a regular milk bath). I am using it to culture all kinds of things including hummus and have added Kombucha to my list of cultures and might have a go at making a sourdough starter with Kombucha. Isn’t it great fun to mess around with cultures? :) I love being able to make things myself. I wonder if that gorgeous almond cake would benefit from a splosh of kefir? Cheers for all of the scrumptious linkies. I am going to make myself a big batch of speculaas and see if I cant veganise them as I adore them with a passion and haven’t had them since I went vegan a long LONG time ago :). Hope the weather isn’t too foul. Its just starting to heat up here and poor Sydney had 47C today!
I am pleased to hear your non dairy kefir has converted so well, I am very impressed. There are cakes which use a sourdough starter so I imagine they would be just as good with a kefir starter. I wonder how the kefir would cope with a dough full of eggs and butter as well as sugar, we know it can deal with date sugar… I have retired the Kombucha jars for the time being though there is a mother sitting in the garage growing layers which I came across yesterday, we don’t drink so much of it in the winter. I made cheese scones with the kefir the other day instead of regular soured milk and they were really good. The weather is pretty ‘changeable’ here, there were severe flood warnings for this morning, a very high tide in the Bristol Channel and big winds, I haven’t looked at the news yet. We live quite high up so are not directly affected but the city along the river and higher up the Severn … Enjoy your hot weather and think of us in our slippers xxx
I am in my slippers as well so its a world wide slipper party ;). I think that the kefir would cope well with eggs and butter. I have used it to make butter cakes (instead of the milk) and it adds a lot of oomph to the mix. I think that people who say that you have to be very careful working with kefir, not to kill it, are just trying to elevate it to “too hard” status to make themselves feel special because they have it and its “hard core” when in actuality, it really loves to be alive and tries hard to survive even the most abject neglect. I have to say that it doesn’t grow much now so I figure it is more like water kefir than regular milk kefir. I have some grains stored in milk powder in the fridge as a back up but these non-dairy converts are happy as pigs in muck so long a I provide them with enough date paste in the mix. I learned that it isn’t the medium so much as it is the amount of sugar that they have access to that keeps them thriving. Maybe I might have to write an e-book about my experiments. We are learning to make e-books this year in our course. I might develop a page on the blog and populate it with e-books to share with my dear constant readers and anyone else who is interested. I like the idea of sharing for free. So many bloggers these days are all about the payoff. I am all about the sharing of the love and learning to make e-books will allow me to share the love with anyone who wants to know :). We live on a hill as well so the river can rise quite a bit before we get twitchy and if it ever rose to become a problem, most of Tasmania would be under water! ;). I love reading about your kefir and ferment experiments. Steve found a large jar at a local discount store with a tap on it. He didn’t buy one but they have a lot of them and after he told me about it (he did our fortnightly shop yesterday), I started to think about constant fermentation of Kombucha…removing what you want and pouring more tea/sugar mix in the top. I have a few saved PDF’s (from people who freely share the love :) ) that show how to do this so I might use the next mother that I remove from my SCOBY to play around with. I have yet to use the discarded SCOBY’s for anything other than enriching my compost heap. I might try making some SCOBY candy or jerky. I did try a bit of one but it felt strangely like eating my own skin…same texture! I read about a lady who makes faux leather jackets out of them and when I read about it I thought “that would take AGES to get enough tanned” but now I have a Kombucha SCOBY I know how fast they produce baby SCOBY’s and it doesn’t seem like a step too far. How amazing would a SCOBY leather chair be?!!! Vegan to the max! ;)
Those Kombucha scoby clothes have one key drawback – they dissolve when they get wet, but other than that and losing your bathtub to grow the material, go for it! My goats milk kefir is remarkably tough and tolerant and just grows away whether it is in the fridge or out on the worktop. In many ways it is far less fussy thsn the sourdough culture – I have become very fond of its white and slippery self and its abilities. I look forward to your e- book Narf xx
Oh my, Joanna, your bundt cakes and speculaas look divine! Happy cooking and may 2014 bring good things to your kitchen!
Thank you Lizzy! All best wishes to you too for 2014!
I’ve been meaning to try my grandparents’ Dutch moulds by making some speculaas. Love the look of these – great job – and the bundt cake looks fantastic :)
Thank you! I was pretty pleased with my first attempts with the mould, they aren’t the easiest thing in the world to use, but I suspect that it gets easier the more you do, like so many things, the bundt cake tin is definitely easier :)
That’s partially my hesitation – I can see myself winding up with a lot of scraped out bits of biscuit dough haha. Still, never know until you try. What did you use to coat them before pressing in the dough? My instinct would be icing sugar but I’m not sure :/
I used a mix of fine white flour and rice flour in the mould itself which I dusted in and round with a pastry brush and then followed the method that Marieke describes in her post of pressing a big chunk of dough well into the mould and then using a very sharp knife, to slice the excess away parallel to the top. I think part of the secret is to have the dough cold and also to get the dusting up the sides of the mould, it is one of those too much flour and the dough moves around in the mould while you slice the top and too little and it sticks a bit. I had a few fails along the way and had to pick the dough out with a knife and start again. I used a piece of dryish flour and water dough to clean out the mould’s little corners. I don’t know if icing sugar would work, it might go sticky, maybe ask Marieke if she thinks it might work? Best of luck AJ :)
White flour and rice flour is actually what I use to line my bread baskets for proving so that sounds really good. I think you’re right, it might be about adding enough for it not to stick without it becoming a floury mess. Thanks very much for the advice!
right! You’ve prompted my bundt making again (new-old tin I’ve claimed from my mum’s kitchen recently) and speculaas…damn it, I will conquer you! Your mould is beautiful Joanna, what a lovely thing to have. I tried doing my windmills again this year and while it was better than previous attempts, it still looses it’s form after I’ve baked them. Will try again!
and indeed beautiful light. xxx
I think bundts are occasion cakes in my house, they are quite big so unless I plan to eat cake everyday for a week then I don’t make them that often unless they are for something particular. I talked to Marieke about the form thing and it is really a trade off between texture and looks a lot of the time. For a light crisp speculaas you need a bit more baking powder as in her recipe, but the form blurs a bit as it rises more. I am going to try again with a low bp version and see if they come out sharper, though I think they will also come out harder if you know what I mean. I am not someone who bakes batch after batch to get something just so, so often there is a long long gap between me thinking about doing something and then finally doing it. Happy New Year to you and Mr Chocolate and the three Monkeys! xxx
Yes, I certainly know what you mean. I did a cluster bake off of the speculaas initially trying to get it right, two years break and then tried again. Lucky I had the blog with how I had changed things otherwise I would have been right back to square one.
This is like a build-up post! First, the date syrup kefir bread (coincidentally I was just thinking about this bread of yours yesterday!) rolled in sesame seeds (don’t they just smell wonderful in the oven?), then that Dan Lepard semolina bun you and others seem to like so much and which I’ve yet to get round to trying. Then speculaas, aaaahhhh… I just love spiced biscuits. White pepper, did you say you added? That’s quite unusual, isn’t? I find white pepper, at least the type I know, very distinctive, and I use it sparingly, mostly in Chinese food. Maybe I should take your cue and start adding it to spiced cakes?? And then, that Chocolate, Almond, Bundt cake. Almond, almond essence, chocolate…enough said :) I’ve been tempted on many occasions to buy these Nordicware bundt tins, they have a certain heft to them that I like. You must have buttered and floured the tin religiously to have the cake come out with such sharp, well-defined edges. I have even less experience with marbled cakes but I’ve read somewhere that you should drop the dough in two layers, alternating the colors, then starting with a different color for the top layer, so if it’s the chocolate dough on the bottom, it should be the plain dough on top. Then to swirl but not too much. In any case, I wouldn’t complain if I had your cake!
He he, it is in the style of Celia’s IMK kitchen meme, which I participate in from time to time because I love her. Brian made the spice mix and the pepper was absolutely gorgeous in there. I used one of those spray on non stick products on the tin this time, made by Dr O I think, but I know you can also make your own from a mix of fat and flour, I don’t use oil as it slides and pools in the crevices in my experience, but a hard fat like unsalted butter. And you can have some of my cake anytime, I would be delighted!
here i found the link: http://www.thekitchn.com/how-to-make-marble-cake-cooking-lessons-from-the-kitchn-191768
Thanks!
Hi there,
I forgot to eat before I came here and I’m ravenous so I’m drooling, no kidding. The date syrup kefir bread is now on hubby’s list and I want some Canadian back bacon with it.
May your New Year be full of love and laughter, Joanna.
Happy New Year to you too and your hubby! Always a mistake to read foodie blogs when you are hungry :) :) xx
How nice to visit your kitchen – love the light show. I am most impressed by the bundt cake – terrifying things to turn out. The speculaas moulds are lovely – I haven’t got any but I do have shortbread moulds and dust them with cornflour which seems to work well. I’m also a great fan of sesame seeds on and in bread and those rolls are making me hungry.. You’ve reminded me to make some of Dan’s semolina buns again – duvet bread is a great name for them!
I once turned one out, I think it was a white chocolate one, and it all stuck here there and everywhere and I covered it in yet more dribbly white chocolate and stuck smarties on it and it looked like the surface of a Dalek, pocked and nobbly and a bit gross. So yes I agree, terrifying! but then cakes are a bit like that aren’t they, sort of all or nothing, where a loaf of bread is at liberty to burst becomingly somewhere or have one end rounded and the other oval, we have a much higher expectation of what a cake should turn out like, one of the many reasons I find bread baking easier on the nerves!
Of course we love your speculaasjes! And your bundt cake is simply stunning. It is such a joyous moment when it comes out of the pan in one perfect piece.
Greetings from Holland!
Hi Marieke! I made some for my father as well and he was so impressed that I managed to get the mould to work. Thank you for all your help and advice on making them and Happy New Year to you both!
Joanna, the speculaas look amazing, such a great pic I can almost smell them.
cheers
Jason
Hello Jason, thank you! Maybe I should make some more today and fill the biscuit tin, though they might not hang around very long!
Hi Joanna, Your speculaas look very professional. I am so glad you took the mould down off the wall and used it for what it was made …. and that cake, what can I say? It is jaw dropping magnificent.
Thankyou for the compliments Glenda, it was great fun playing with the mould, even if I did get flour everywhere. Hope the New Year is goimg well for you xx
I love using date syrup in bread baking. Your bundt cake is amazing – really sculptural.
Hi Sally, i ran out of my preferred brand with my last bake and trekked across town to get some more from Bristol Sweet Mart in Easton where it is GBP 1.99 for a 450g jar. I keep meaning to offer the kefir some barley malt syrup to try as well as i am sure it would like it too.
i was reading about the history of those bundt tins which are American design, inspired by the older kugelhopf tins from Europe. They are good for people like me who want to make pretty cakes without too much fuss :)
Joanna, I saw the light in your sesame roll photo and loved it; then you shared the last photo. (So beautiful… thank you.) Smiling, too, about that “hold your breath moment” before a Bundt cake releases. Yours turned out perfectly!
Thankyou for your kind words Kim, nice to meet you !
Oh my! What scrumptious photos! I am certain I have stumbled on to a wonderful blog!!
How nice to hear that – thankyou! I was just admiring your fashion photos and all the energy in there, beautiful!
I don’t know about that Blue Fire bowl but the pattern on the bundt cake made my eyes go swirly! I’m so envious of that speculaas mold. Thanks for tip about adding the pepper – great idea! I look forward to reading throughout 2014.
Thankyou – wish we could all lend and share our moulds and tins – it would be such fun xx
I would like everything please..the buns the biscuits the bundt cake etc…..
xxxxCarla
You can have them all, what is mine is yours …. xx