Chocolate and Guinness Cake

A colleague from work celebrated his 40th birthday last (Saturday) night. The man loves chocolate, and is married to an Irish lady, so I thought it would be nice to give him a fusion of something which represents each of them. So chocolate and something very Irish... what could be more Irish than Guinness?

Hence I researched chocolate and guinness cake recipes. It seems that one of the best recipes is Nigella's version. There was a lot of rave reviews about how moist and really tasty her cake turned out to be. I managed to do only minor tweaks - after all, the basic ingredients made perfect sense - the bubbles in the beer and eggs would give an the cake a lift, but not so much so I can imagine how dense it would be...the butter and sour cream is a great tandem to ensure it is moist, and chocolate+Guinness=enough said!

I followed the recipe from Nigella's website except I added two handfuls of bitter sweet chocolate chips to the beer mixture while melting the butter. The cake batter almost reached the top of my springform tin, and gradually rised beyond the tin, but eventually puffed down after just 55 minutes of baking.

The only other change was that I sprinkled chocolate shavings over the frosting to further highlight the 'chocolatiness'!

Guinness + butter + chocolate chips melting over medium heat

chocolate plus sour cream art 

cooling in tin 

finished product

The cake was a huge success - it was served during the party, and I watched a lot of people (most of them I've just met that night) wolf down the slices. Empty plates with telltale crumbs and happy faces said it all - it was a rewarding experience for something that was a gift to someone else in the first place!

Before and After

Before :

After ! 

** Winged creature not included in 'before' photo :p

These broad beans were succulent and went straight to the pot for a quick blanch before it was tossed into a salad. It is amazing how tasty fresh picked veggies are compared to store bought ones (or perhaps it's just all in the mind!) -  a really good motivation to keep it going!

This is also what happens when you let a dwarf white cauliflower simmer in the veggie patch - it becomes a mutant stemmed edible floral arrangement!

Sourdough Starter Experiment - results!

And one week later, here's the result of the sourdough starter experiment :

I think I can officially say that we have new pet, and we've decided to name it Bublé, because it is bubbly. :)

The 'essence of wild yeast' now resides in a wide mouthed bottle covered with cling film and a modest rubber band, and left in the fridge, and now I can feed it once a week only. For the past few days I have been religiously removing half of the mixture and adding 3 heaped tablespoonfuls of plain flour and almost half a cup of warm water to help propagate those wonderful microorganisms that would help me make wonderful (artisan?!) breads later!

This shows a bit of the 'hooch' forming on top of the mixture. Hooch is like beer - fermented liquid, basically. except i don't think it's suitable for drinking :p it also smells beery. I like to think that it's the booze for my pet! (we all gotta have our share don't we?!)

One last photo pose before it went to the fridge!

There is a lot of information about making sourdough starter but I find that this this link summarizes it quite succinctly. Check it out if you would like to make your own!

Harvest

Just backtracking on a previous harvest of silverbeet and watercress! I made these veggies into a fritata of sorts - which I'm sure I took of photo of, but just can't remember where I saved it!

He is now clearing the rest of the watercress to make way for new crop. Unfortunately it seems that the insects which could have been 'raping' the watercress have now moved on to the remaining silverbeet.

We pay expensive tax to these creatures! We've chosen an organic way to grow our veggies, so no chemicals or insecticides. I've googled some homemade sprays that might help (like a chili spray, or white oil) so we just need to get those going!

Princess

This post is actually just to check if Mobile Uploads really works - and it does!!

This photo is to remember the 3 books I've finished sometime back. I've now returned them to their owner!

Next book is the Hades Factor by Robert Ludlum - a $1 purchase from a Fete in the neighborhood. It was a spring time Fete which led us to some brilliant (and cheap) finds. A new favorite :D

Sourdough Starter Experiment

After a burst of inspiration from watching Hugh-Fearnley Whittingstall as he taught a bunch of mums on how to make bread, I set of to create his sourdough starter recipe. It is very simple - 2 tablespoons wholewheat flour, same amount of white flour, enough warm water to make a thick batter which has the consistency of double cream. The batter is whisked and fingers are crossed such that some wild yeast gets incorporated into the mixture to create the magic. He added a small slice of rhubarb, which is supposed to make it work. I didn't have any rhubarb handy, so I'll just keep my fingers crossed :D

I covered it with clingfilm and left it in the kitchen counter where it could get warm for the most part of the afternoon. Hopefully overnight it would leave some telltale signs of activity (foam, bubbles?). As it will be a living matter, it should be constantly fed with flour and water for a week. In every home there is wild yeast naturally occurring, and I hope that this starter catches a good dose of this wild yeast!

Those bubbles are from whisking though :)
If this succeeds I will have my first sourdough starter :) so wish me luck!

Making sourdough breads would be a great addition to  my usual soda breads, focaccia, pan de sal... I am really looking  forward to it! I'm still reading about starters and how to feed them. After leaving this overnight I'm supposed to discard half and topup lukewarm water and flour. Discarding half of it makes the mixture keeps the acid levels of the mixture on a good level, as it ferments more. It is an interesting chemistry experiment, just like the ones we had in school, except this time I am slightly more keen to enjoy the practical applications.. so watch this space!

Here's one of the episodes about sourdough starter from the River Cottage TV series.

Yes, I am a fan :)

Orange and Lemon Poppy Seed Cake

In keeping with the flavor of the season (lemon, that is, due to the very fruitful tree at the backyard!) I whipped up an orange and lemon poppy seed cake one afternoon despite being slightly groggy from cough syrup and drugs - I somehow managed to succumb to the office virus and have been out of commission for the past 3 days due to a bad cough, but that didn't stop me from baking. Rest assured the best possible standards for cleanliness have been observed to make this baked goodie. :p

I rarely get sick but when I get a cough, I get it bad. Despite having everything with lemon to amp up on vitamin C, I still have a lot of lemons left to use for everything else!


To make this cake I used
1/3 cup poppy seeds soaked in 1/4 cup milk
1 cup caster sugar
125 g butter, softened
3 eggs
zest of 1 orange and 1 lemon
1/2 cup milk
1/4 cup orange juice

2 cups self raising flour

Soak the poppy seeds and set aside.

Grease a bundt tin and preheat oven to 160C.

Cream butter and sugar together. Add one egg at a time, ensuring it is well incorporated before the next addition. Beat in zest. Fold in flour, orange juice, poppy seed mixture and milk; mix until combined.

Pour onto prepared tin and bake for 45-55 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean when cake is poked.

Frost if desired. I used a thin glaze made of lemon juice, icing sugar and orange zest and decorated with fresh mint leaves.

This one's another cake for someone's farewell by the way... at the rate at which people are leaving our current workplace, I could have made a couple of hundred dollars if I sold these babies! :) But I'd rather not... I just hope they appreciate the thought... most of them seem to, so all is good :D