Partial to a little holiday fun with food, I dedicated this vacation eating challenge to the Basque Cake. The fun here is to try one of the dedicated local specialities in everyplace available (in Biarritz the Basque Cake with its custard or almond creme filled golden flakey buttery crust made sense). So each morning we set out in the direction of a different patisserie for their version of our bakery litmus test, each of us declaring our favourite on our final day. Fear not, we left each beautiful butter filled shop with our arms full of more than just Basque cakes, but they were our control for the exercise. We still managed to sample our body weight in macarons, chocolates finanicers, palmiers, ice cream and tarts.
Now I’m home, here are some of my latest Summer recipes that I am making on repeat and I hope you do to.
No Churn Maple Roasted Banana Tahini Ice Cream
For many years now I’ve tried to come up with recipes that I can easily make in fantasy AirBNB kitchens. You know, for those holiday moments where you are somewhere with fabulous ingredients and none of your regular kitchen kit, but still want to make something memorable.
I spend a lot of time in this fantasy world, pondering different ways of making a favourite recipe without X, Y or Z. Truth be told some of my best getaways were spent in poorly equipped beautiful rentals where I’ve tinkered in the kitchen to my hearts content. creating a little magic along the way. And, when in a staycation location, I always stuff the car with some key bits of kit – a cast iron pan, a good knife (and a bread knife for all those local loaves of crispy sourdough), a microplane, my blender, good parmesan, rubber spatula, the list goes on. Much to the dismay of my family, these trips always call for a sacrifice of clothing for my utensil essentials in the boot of my mini (a story for another time).
No churn ice cream is one of those equipment light kitchen gifts – no ice cream maker required but with almost soft serve texture (don’t ask me how, just trust me on this one). When at home, I make this using in my stand mixer to whip the cream, but that’s out of sheer laziness. A whisk is all you actually need for this little arm workout and the rest takes care of itself. The perfect solution for an everyday or holiday dessert sensation.
The condensed milk & cream base here deviates from the tradition churned custard ice cream version found in most of the books on my shelves. If you really want to make a simple version, simply add some vanilla extract and call it a day. This maple roasted banana version with a good slug of tahini thrown in just rocked my world and is officially my summer solution for over ripe bananas when I don’t want to make banana bread. I have also made a coffee version with cardamom and cinnamon (an ode to cold brew), pistachio with a good quality paste, maple roast pecan (with those nuts that I keep on hand on repeat for emergency), tahini with cacao nibs, the list goes on.
Just make it and celebrate this whole alternative world of ice cream, no machine required.
Cook Once Eat Twice
I generally operate a cook once, eat twice philosophy in my kitchen. Mainly because I love a fridge forage leftover for lunch, but also, because doesn’t it just make life so much easier?
So I thought I should start sharing a little series of recipes that I make in abundance and use in a variety of ways to make life and meals both that much more effortless and interesting. A good jumping off point to illustrate a very simple way to do this is with ingredients from recent recipes that I literally have on hand all the time right now for precisely such occasions.
Remember the whipped feta & tomatoes last month? Well, its become a summer fridge basic and I now always have some stashed in a tupperware in the fridge ready for an emergency salad base, a dip for when friends pop in, or here as a superb sandwich base.
Here are a few suggestions for sandwiches using that whipped feta, one with those honey thyme roasted apricots from the recent crumble bars and another as a tomato sandwich version of the salad. These might just make the perfect Summer breakfast, brunch or lunch, picnic or sunset snack. I now have a dedicated “cook once eat twice” selection on YouTube which I will be updating regularly over the coming months so keep an eye out for some more ideas about how to cook less often, more creatively and of course more delicously.
In the next newsletter I will be releasing my Autumn class dates with some exciting new recipes. I can’t wait to welcome you back into the kitchen. As always, it is such a pleasure to be here with you.