Tres Leches {Three Milk} Cake

Lets talk about milk.

A nutritional collection of butterfat globules extracted from cows. We chug down 5 billion litre’s every year in the UK and apparently, that’s nuffin’ compared to India, the biggest consumers on the planet.

I hate milk. It makes me feel sick, before I knew that milk and me had issues, I used to think I was carrying a 10-year-old invisible fetus that just wouldn’t give. Three milk cake made by a milk misogynist? I’ll be damned if this bitch thinks its okay to keep on blogging.

Genuine reason people: my sister moved out last week, so she had first call on which cake was coming out of the oven. You know, the one that she was never gonna cook fish fingers in ever again. Big, big changes.

Tres Leches, she insisted. What the crap is that? A few pins later and I am partially informed about the cakes of the world and wanting to know how those all around the globe utilize their milk. 

This cake is an authentic, Mexican after dinner dessert, pure tradition at its height. Tres Leches simply means three milks, a plain light sponge is soaked (DRENCHED) in all three of these milks with a touch of vanilla. The cake is then coated in sweet cream. Tres leches cake has lactose written all over it, as well as sweetness, and apparently, it’s the best cake ever.

This cake can be turned on its head, flavour wise. Think coconut. Think chocolate tres leches. Think espresso or pumpkin for the autumn, ginger and cinnamon on Christmas day and a berry coulis filling next week. I think my sister was mostly excited about the milky goodness, so I stuck with authenticity. I didn’t taste it, how could I?

Tres Leches {Three Milk} Cake

Adapted from Patis Mexican Table's Pastel de Tres Leches

Ingredients

For the cake

• 9 eggs, separated 
• 1 cup caster sugar
• 1 tbsp vanilla extract
• 2 cups plain flour

For the milk syrup

• 3/4 tin (340g) evaporated milk
• 1 tin (397g) sweetened condensed milk
• 1 cup semi skim milk
• 1 tbsp vanilla extract

Topping:

• 1200ml double cream
• A bunch of pretty roses: I used roses on the cake purely for decoration. If you wanted, though, you could make them edible by crystallising with egg whites and sugar.

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180 C. Line two 6 inch cake tins with parchment paper.
2. Pour all of the egg whites into the bowl of a freestanding mixer fixed with a whisk, or in a large bowl with an electric mixer, and whisk on high speed for 4 minutes until stiff peaks form. Whilst whisking, slowly add all of the sugar until the mixture is glossy.
3. If using a stand mixer, transfer the whites into a large bowl and set aside. Add the egg yolks to the used mixer bowl and whisk on high speed for 3 minutes until fluffy and pale. Pour in the vanilla and whisk to combine. Carefully fold the egg yolks into the egg white mixture, then fold in the flour until well combined.
4. Pour the batter into the prepared cake tins and bake for 22 - 25 minutes, or until a skewer inserted comes out clean. Turn the cakes out of the pan and leave to cool on a wire rack, then transfer each cake on a large plate.
5. In a large jug, stir together the evaporated, condensed, and liquid milk. Slice both cakes horizontally to make four layers. Pierce the cakes in several places with a fork and slowly pour the milk over each cake. Wait a couple of minutes after each pour, the cakes will hold all of the milk so keep pouring! Refrigerate the cakes for at least 2 hours to set.
6. Whip the cream until soft peaks form using an electric whisk or freestanding mixer.
7. Add 3 large tablespoons of cream between each layer and spread to the sides, then place cakes on top of each other. Cover the sides with cream and decorate with pretty roses then serve. Store in the fridge, the cake will keep for 3 days.

It's finally August! Where are we all going on holiday?! My cookbook giveaway ends in 5 days, head over here if you fancy entering! 

PS. It was so, sosososososo hot when I photographed this badboy - hence the extremely obvious stains on the doily, hellooooo milky drippings.

Love Em xx

I am really sorry but all comments for this post have been lost in Blogger's system/archive/brain somewhere and I cant retrieve them! Please forgive me x

Brioche au Chocolat

I’m clueless and confused when it comes to bread. Honestly now, why do people eat toast all the time? 

Sliced Hovis with a slither of butter, maybe some chopped mild cheddar tossed on top to make it dull as dishwater. Seriously, what’s the deal with the toasted fortified bread?!

Its my family’s morning fuel, but I usually settle for milk chocolate cooking chips. The weekly shop is few and far between at home , but the instant coffee, milk and sliced bread never runs low. *

I wish the amenities had a bit more excitement injected into them. I wish my home was in Belgium and my made up brother would panic whenever we had a shortage of chocolate, resulting in him popping to the off license to pick up a slab for our brioche au chocolat in the morning. Obviously there would always be proofing brioche dough in the fridge without fail. 

Can you imagine? Chocolate custard savoury bread for breakfast. All-the-time. 

People wish for a lot of things, sometimes I wish I were an elf serving Santa all year round– this is probably more likely than brioche au chocolat becoming an amenity in suburban London.

To bide the time between now and my wish becoming reality, I have made this brioche as a one off. For one day (which went far too quickly) we had brioche au chocolat for lunch and dinner; the ‘pastries’ are the perfect balance of sweet and savoury. 

The brioche is rich and crumbly and far from cakey. The custard adds softness to the texture, but the sugar hit will mainly stem from the chocolate – which is dark – making this the ultimate ‘must eat’ (everyday). 

Lets all agree to make brioche the best thing since sliced bread.

* My sister walked through the kitchen after I wrote this post and said "Hmmm what should I have on my peasant toast?"  She admitted that she thought it sounded 'uppety'. As in: snobby. As in: who the hell eats brioche everyday? If I offended anyone in this post, sorry! I simply hate toast, I dont have anything against anyone who chows down on the stuff! 

The Recipe: Brioche Au Chocolate

Adapted from Joanne Chang's Spectacular Recipes from Boston's Flour Bakery

For the brioche:
315g plain flour
340g bread flour
28g active dried yeast
82g sugar (granulated or caster)
1 tbsp salt
120g cold water
310g unsalted butter, softened and cut into cubes
5 medium eggs + 1 for egg wash

Note: This recipe will make 2 lots of dough, Chang strongly suggests not halving the recipe as you wont have enough in the mixer to get the appropriate incorporation when mixing. See the method notes for what to do with the 2nd half of brioche dough.

Note II : I dont think you can make successful brioche without a stand mixer, unless you fancy a dead arm. I think it could work in a bread maker by setting to 'knead' each time.

For the pastry cream:
300g milk
100g sugar
10g plain flour
20g cornflour
4 egg yolks
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp salt

150g dark chocolate, roughly chopped

The Method:

Note: Read this recipe through before diving in, just to get an idea of timings: I made the brioche and custard at night, then I let the brioche prove overnight and the custard set in the fridge. Then, in the morning I put together the prepared pastries then set them aside to prove again. I had fresh brioche at 5pm that day. 

The Brioche:
Weigh out all of the dry ingredients in a freestanding mixer with a dough hook attached. Mix the ingredients together until everything is combined. Add the eggs and beat on low speed for 4 minutes. Stop the mixer and scrape down the sides of the bowl, then carry on mixing for 4 minutes (dough will be stiff and dry). 

With the mixer on low, add a cube of butter at a time, mixing after each piece so that it combines with the dough. Continue to mix on low for 10 minutes, stopping the mixer occasionally to scrape down the bottom and sides of the bowl. If necessary, break the dough up with your hands to help incorporate the butter - there are some places the mixer can't reach!

Once the butter is all mixed in, turn the mixer up to medium speed and beat for 15 minutes. The dough will become shiny and soft. Then turn the mixer up to medium-high speed and beat for one minute. The dough should 'slap' the sides of the bowl at this point, and when you pull it, it will stretch. If not, add a couple tablespoons bread flour and continue to beat for a few minutes longer.

Place the dough in a bowl and cover the surface with clingfilm. Let the dough proof in the fridge for 6 hours/overnight.

The Pastry Cream:
In a medium saucepan, bring the milk up to just boiling and then remove from the heat.

In a small bowl, stir together the salt, flour, cornflour and sugar.

In a large bowl, whisk the egg yolks until well blended. Slowly whisk in the flour mixture until a thick paste forms.

Very slowly add the hot milk to the paste, whisking constantly to make sure the egg doesn't scramble. 

Return the new mixture to the saucepan (on medium heat) and whisk constantly for 3 minutes, or until the mixture thickens and starts to boil. As soon as it starts to boil, whisk for 10 seconds and immediately take off the heat.

Pass the custard through a fine sieve directly into a bowl. Gently stir in vanilla extract. 

Cover the surface of the custard with clingfilm. Once cooled, set aside in the fridge. 

Brioche au Chocolat: 

Line 2 baking trays with baking parchment.

Remove the dough from the fridge and divide in two pieces. Place the second half in the freezer - where it will keep for one week. *

On a floured surfaced, roll the dough out into a rectangle that is about 20 x 10 inches, with the long side facing you.

Spread the pastry cream over the entire surface of the dough. Sprinkle the chopped chocolate over the bottom half.

Carefully fold the top half of the dough over the bottom half and gently seal the edges together using your fingertips.

Using a sharp knife cut the dough into 2 x 10 inch rectangles. To do this, make a small incision at the top of the dough every 2 inches, so you know where to cut. You should end up with 10/12 pastries.

Using both hands, transfer each pastry to the baking trays, spacing them 4 cm apart. Lightly cover with clingfilm and leave to prove for 2 hours in a warm spot.

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C.

In a small bowl or cup whisk together the remaining egg. Take a pastry brush and lightly coat each pastry with the egg.

Bake in the oven for 35/40 minutes. Let cool on the trays for 20 minutes. They are best served within four hours of baking and will stay fresh for one day.

*For the unused half of dough, you can simply defrost, place in a loaf tin, let proof for 2 hours & bake for 35 minutes for a brioche loaf.

Delicious brioche aside, its damn hot in London at the moment. Me and my boyfriend took a last minute trip to Camber Sands to escape the stodgy city air. The beach was completely untouched, so natural that I had to share it with you. How have you been coping with the heat? 

Love Em xx

I am really sorry but all comments for this post have been lost in Blogger's system/archive/brain somewhere and I cant retrieve them! Please forgive me x

Violet Macaroons

Violet Cakes' Macaroons

Ever since that afternoon I spent at Violet Cakes however long ago I have been besotted, foolishly besotted, by a macaroon.

Everything else of that afternoon seems distant in my memory now, apart from that golden, crispy, syrupy rounded mound of baked coconut.

Before my near death experience involving sugar, my only knowledge of a macaroon (the real deal, not the contemporaneous meringue kind, I’m talking about the poor macaroon that was overshadowed by that) came from a packet of 4 overly chewy macaroons commonly found in my aunts, or even dating back 10 years ago, my late nan’s flat – where there would always almost certainly be a packet of chocolate dipped store bought macaroons. But hey, I knew no better, and I still ate the whole bloody packet.

Who says the coconut cant be desiccated?! 

The recipe for Violet’s delicate, perfectly proportioned macaroon can thankfully be found in Leon’s Baking &Pudding’s book – I will take this moment to mention how lucky we are that Ptak & the founder of Leon live in the same neighbourhood. Leon is one of the best food chains in England, but truthfully, I bought their book for the macaroon recipe but I’m sure I will be dipping myself into some more recipes such as the Lemon Bars fairly soon (as should the poor soul reading this). 

What really sets this recipe apart from the rest is the addition of honey; it makes the world of difference through extra subtle sweet flavours on top of that already coming from the caster sugar (trust me, it works). It also makes the macaroons extra sticky, so sticky you will need to keep your paper towels well away until its time to wipe the stickiness from your fingers - licking is totally acceptable btw. 

The Recipe: Violet Macaroons

Adapted from Leon Baking & Puddings: Coconut Macaroons 

150g desiccated coconut 

150g caster sugar 

3 egg whites

3 heaped tbsp honey of your choice 

1 tsp vanilla extract 

Makes 6 large macaroons 

Equipment

Deep, medium sized saucepan 

Ice cream scoop

The Method:

Place all the ingredients except vanilla into the saucepan and stir on medium heat until the sugar has dissolved and the bottom of the pan leaves bubbles when scraped across - about 7 minutes. 

Take off heat and leave to cool completely, about 15 minutes.

Preheat oven to 180 C. 

Place baking parchment over a baking tray. 

Scoop level amounts of mixture straight onto the baking tray making sure they are slightly spaced apart. I used an ice cream scoop to get uniform macaroons. 

Bake for 30 minutes, until golden brown. 

Leave the macaroons to cool completely before removing from the parchment. This allows the macaroons to crisp up. 

The macaroons will lose their crispiness if stored in an airtight environment, so try to eat them ALL on the day of baking! 

So, here's the big question that's playing on both our minds - do you plunge yours in chocolate or leave them raw?

Love Em xx 

Sweet 'n' Salty Popcorn Chocolate Chip Cookies

Jealousy  is never a wonderful thing. Im lookin’ at you foodie, I know you’re also jealous of that ever talented food blogger with the enticing food photos constructed by someone with an incredibly skilled eye for colour schemes.

So you just gotta make do with what you’ve got and visit the timber yard every once in a while for cheap bits of scrap wood. Or go to your boyfriend’s house and rape every inch of their marble worktops with your semi-professional camera that you hardly know how to use. Thank you boyfriend’s family.

Now think about how jealous the person sitting next to you in a real slash fantasised setting will be when they catch you crunching (and then chewing) on this abnormally good cookie. You will bite into this and it will taste odd, thankfully you won’t be able to stop. 

If you ever wanted to sneak your own popcorn into a cinema, this is the perfect way to do it – crush and cram them into a concealable cookie; one that slides perfectly into that tiny zip pocket in your hand/man bag and viola, George Clooney has never appeared so sensational.  

Lastly, I would recommend doubling the recipe in case you felt like saving at least 2 for yourself. 

Heap your quarter cup

Chocolate and Vanilla will never make you thinner.

The Recipe

Adapted from Joy The Bakers Buttered Popcorn Chocolate Chip Cookies 

1/2 cup sweet 'n' salty popcorn
1/2 cup unsalted butter, at room temp
1/2 cup light brown sugar
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 + 1/4 cup plain flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup chopped dark chocolate

Makes 20 large cookies

The Method

Preheat the oven to 180 C and line two baking trays with parchment paper.

Cream the butter and both sugars either with a freestanding mixer or electric whisk, until pale and fluffy - 4 minutes.

Add egg and vanilla.

Add the flour, salt and baking soda and mix on low until just incorporated.

Using a metal spoon or spatula, fold the popcorn into the mixture. Dont worry if the popcorn breaks apart in the mixture, let this happen!

Lastly, fold in the chocolate.

Using an ice cream scoop take a level amount of dough and plop onto the baking sheet, making sure the dough is spaced 5cm apart. Or take a tablespoon and scoop out a heaped amount of dough onto the sheet.

Bake for 10 minutes, leave for a couple minutes longer if the cookies are not yet golden.

Leave to rest for 5 minutes, eat warm or leave to cool. Cookies will last up to 3 days.

Love Emxx