marble loaf

If you’ve ever cut into a cake, and lamented that it was just a single boring colour, then this recipe is for you. Even if you haven’t wishedfor a double-colour cake, just sit there and think about if for a moment. Now imagine that the cake is two colours because one part is chocolate, and another is vanilla. Exactly. Genius, isn’t it?

Ingredients

• 70g butter
• 85g caster sugar
• 115g self-raising flour
• 1 egg, beaten
• 3 tbsp cold milk
• 55g plain chocolate and 1 tsp vanilla extract, to flavour each part of the cake!
• 3 tbsps natural Greek yoghurt
• ½ tsp baking powder

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 170 degrees. Line a loaf tin with baking paper or a baking paper case.
2. Melt the chocolate using a bain-marie: in a small saucepan, bring water to the boil, then reduce the heat. Place a glass bowl over the water, ensuring that the bottom of the bowl does not touch the water. In the bowl, place the chocolate and pour in the milk. The chocolate and milk melt because of the steam rising from the water in the saucepan.
3. Once melted, remove the bowl from the saucepan, and remove the saucepan from the heat.
4. Cream together the sugar and butter until light and fluffy. Add the beaten egg, and beat in the Greek yoghurt. Sift the flour and baking powder over the mixture, then fold lightly into the mixture.
5. Spoon half the cake mixture into a separate bowl. In one bowl, stir in the melted chocolate. In the other, add the vanilla extract.
6. Spoon a layer of the chocolate cake mix into the loaf tin, to form a ‘bottom layer’. Then, add a layer of vanilla mixture on top, swirling lightly with a spoon for a ‘marbled’ effect. Continue to layer the cake mixes until they run out, finishing with vanilla. They don’t have to be even!
7. Bake in the oven for 40 – 45 minutes, until well risen and cooked through.
8. Cool in the tin for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a cooling rack.

easter chocolate mousse

Happy Easter Weekend! The long weekend is only just beginning, with a well-deserved rest ahead of us all. Whether or not you gave up chocolate for Lent, Easter Sunday is around the corner: I won’t deny an opportunity for special food! What could better mark the occasion than homemade chocolate mousse? These little pots are a winner – just look at the air bubbles! Serve them in egg cups, for a cute Easter feel.

my chicken egg cup is from the GDR museum in Berlin. I knew it’d be handy one day!

Give these a go on Sunday! You’ll be making them forever after.

Ingredients

• 100g plain cooking chocolate (or dark chocolate)
• 2 – 2 ½ tbsps Demerara brown sugar
• 2 eggs, separated into yolk and whites
• 50ml cold water and a splash of lemon juice

Method

1. Place the water and chocolate into a saucepan. Melt the two together gently, stirring to combine. Do not allow to boil!
2. Remove the melted chocolate from the hob and mix well. Add the egg yolks to the chocolate and water mix one by one. Beat the yolks into the chocolate, ensuring they are totally broken up. This should give the chocolate a nice shiny appearance.
3. In a large, clean bowl, place the egg whites. Add the splash of lemon juice. Whisk to soft peaks – you can use either an electric or hand held whisk. Then, begin to gradually add the sugar. Continue to beat well until the sugar is combined and stiff peaks are formed. Be careful not to overbeat!
4. Then, add the egg whites to the chocolate mixture. Do this in stages – gently fold a third of the egg whites into the chocolate mix, being careful to keep the mixture aerated. Repeat until the whites are totally combined with the chocolate. Give a final gentle stir, and then pour into egg cups for an Easter feel!
5. Pop in the fridge for 2 hours, then serve.

chocolate, pear and cinnamon swirls

autumnal associations: sweet pears alongside cinnamon, complemented by dark, indulgent chocolate

• 2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 2 tbsp brown sugar
• 1 tsp cold milk
• 3 sheets of ready-rolled puff pastry
• Unsalted butter
• 2 large, or 4 small, pears, stalks removed and cut into small cubes
• Crumbled dark chocolate, to taste (roughly a ratio of 1 large square of chocolate to 1 pear)

I stumbled across this recipe in a food magazine from last month, and I thought it’d be the perfect way to use up the remaining pastry from the salmon and leek parcels. Although the original recipe looked delicious, I decided to make some very simple changes, allowing me to incorporate other, perhaps less usual ingredients seen in cinnamon swirls, and therefore lead the taste in another direction, developing what is already good into something even better.

In my opinion, pears are one of the best autumnal fruits. When ripe, there is nothing sweeter than its juice, bursting with every bite – they are a joy to eat, and perfect to cook with. Paired with chocolate, the refreshing juice of the fruit offsets the richness of the chocolate brilliantly, leaving an impression of indulgence with each mouthful. The benefit of using dark chocolate in this recipe in preference to milk is that the final flavour of the swirls is not sickly, but sweet and tasty – the chocolate complements the pastry itself, rather than making it too heavy to enjoy. The flavour of the cinnamon, however, is kept: having a smell and taste very often associated with the colder months, most notably Christmas, its inclusion enhances the autumnal feel of these pastries, complementing the pears. Simple to make; impressive results! To the oven…

Method

1. Begin by crumbling the chocolate. Using a large knife, slice the chocolate into thin strips lengthways. Gather the chocolate strips, and slice them widthways. Repeat until you have tiny squares of chocolate.
2. Heat the oven to 200 degrees and line a baking sheet with baking paper. In a small bowl, mix the cinnamon and sugar, and set aside.
3. Divide the pastry into three even strips, and lay the first sheet down onto a clean, and where possible floured, surface. Spread a third of the butter over the pastry, and dust with a third of the cinnamon and sugar mixture.
4. Place the second piece of pastry on top of the first, and repeat the butter and cinnamon sugar process; layering the third sheet over the second, repeat the process again.
5. On the third sheet, begin adding the pear and chocolate. It is important to distribute the pear evenly here, to ensure that it does not fall out as the pastry is rolled up in the next stage, causing you to lose the main flavour staple! Sprinkle chocolate over the pears, and fill in any gaps with smaller chunks of pear.
6. Roll the pastry from right to left into a long sausage shape. Using a sharp non-serrated knife, slice the roll into as many even sections as possible, roughly of 2-3cm thicknesses.
7. Lay the pastry circles flat on the baking tray, and brush with the cold milk. Top each pastry swirl with a little more cinnamon sugar, and place in the oven to bake for 15 to 20 minutes, or until golden and well-risen.
8. Remove the pastries from the oven, and allow to cool before storing or eating, as this will ensure the chocolate hardens to keep the pastry as one entity!