Tarte Tatin success

My 1st Tarte Tatin

Three weeks ago, I had not even heard of tarte tatin.   There was a competition on twitter with Galvin Restaurants to make tarte tatin and thought it would be fun to try.  I found a  recipe by Galvin Restaurants and tried it. I sent in a photo of my first attempt and they selected me for the finals in London

My entry at the #GalvinTarteTatin competition

The attempt I took to the final was my third time I had made a tarte tatin......The pastry was much crispier than my first attempt and the apples were much more caramelised because I cooked it longer. It is very tricky to get just the right colour.

Winning third prize

Receiving judges feedback

I was really excited to find I had come third. I was given some great prizes including a Galvin cook book, restaurant gift vouchers and a bottle of wine.


I was really pleased to speak to the judges who gave me great feedback on how to improve my tarte tatin for next time. The judges liked the colour and taste of my apples and the crispness of my homemade puff pastry. I was pleased to meet William Curley, who makes amazing chocolates and patisserie, and he also gave me some good feedback.

William Curley

With the Galvin Brothers

I was encouraged to try the Galvin Tarte Tartin competition again next year, which I hope to do.  In the meantime for now, I am busy making elderflower cordial, rhubarb chutney, rhubarb jam and sourdough

My Vegan Chocolate Valentine Cake by Charlotte

200g plain flour
200g granulated sugar
4 tablespoons cocoa powder
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon cider vinegar
6 tablespoons vegetable oil
250ml water

7 Bean & Pod Strawberry Cream Chocolate Hearts
Heart-shaped sprinkles
100g Icing Sugar
Plus hot water to mix

How I Made It:

Preheat oven to 180 degrees C / Gas Mark 4
Mix flour, sugar, salt, bicarbonate of soda and cocoa together in a large mixing bowl.
Make three wells/holes.
Pour oil into one, vinegar into the second one, and vanilla into the last.
Pour water over the top and stir all together.
Put the mixture into the tin then bake for 30 to 40 minutes, or until a skewer inserted comes out clean.
Decorate with glacé icing and top with the Bean & Pod Strawberry Cream Chocolate Hearts and sprinkles.

This was a delicious, moist cake enjoyed by all of the family.
The cake can be eaten by anybody as it does not contain animal products.
It's ideal for fun events and parties!

The Bean & Pod Strawberry Cream Chocolate Hearts added extra flavour; a sweet, creamy taste and also made the cake more attractive!
I used a flower cake tin but any cake tin works just as well.

Evening Trip to Sri Lanka with The Spice Pioneer

We were very excited to be chosen to taste test some new products through "Tried and Tested" and was sent an interesting box from The Spice Pioneer to try. If you sign up to the Spice Pioneer they will give you opportunities to try dishes from all other the world and send you recipes and information for you to experience the food from each country.  Each box is themed for a different country.

We are known in our family for our jams, marmalade and baking and for adding extra spices and flavours to make them more interesting.  So we were really pleased and excited to try a meal idea from The Spice Pioneer.

We opened it up and found a postcard from The Spice Pioneer  who had visited Sri Lanka  and told us of the visit to the market in Columbo "where frying spices filled the air"and how they washed elephant calves at an elephant orphanage.  The idea then was for us to try some recipes that The Spice Pioneer had tried on the visit. Inside the box was all the spices we would need to make the 3 dishes along with full instructions.  The dishes included beetroot curry, Sri Lankan monkfish curry with basmati rice, spicy green beans and black mustard seeds.

The spices included cinnamon, fenugreek seeds, coriander, different curry powders, curry leaves,tamarind paste, black mustard seeds.  These were all measured out ready for our recipe.  We had never used fenugreek, curry leaves or tamarind before so we were excited to find out what it tasted like.

We chose to make the meal after school.  We are a busy family and had 1 hour 30 minutes before we were due to go out.  We were able to prepare the meal in about one hour and then had time to relax and enjoy it.

The kitchen was soon filled with unfamiliar smells of spices we had never tried before.  As we only had a relatively short time, my Mum and I decided to make the meal together.  This also meant that everything could be cooked at the same time.  All three dishes included onions so we chopped those all up first, then prepared the garlic, chilli and ginger.

Our first dish to be made was the beetroot curry.  This was very easy to make and we could not stop tasting this.  It had a caramelised, sweet spicy taste which everyone loved.  Then it was on to the curry dish and the beans while we cooked the rice.  The instructions were very easy to follow.  There was just one little mistake on the leaflet as for each 3 dishes it said to use half a pot of curry leaves so we did not have enough.  We decided to leave them out to the spicy green beans as that dish was already spicy.  We also decided not to add the chilli to this dish.

As we made the meal and ate the meal we played the Sri Lankan music that was suggested and downloaded from The Spice Pioneer website, that created a nice atmosphere to make a Sri Lankan experience more realistic.


Everyone in the family enjoyed the meal.  The beetroot curry was amazing and is a lovely dish that would be easy to re-create another day.  We loved the Sri Lankan curry and decided to use prawns rather than monkfish as we thought everyone would like this more.  This curry was spicy and creamy and full of taste.  We saved some of our curry for the next night as we felt there was already enough to eat.    We found the Spicy green beans quite spicy and was glad we had not added the curry leaves and chilli as these were hot enough for us.The basmati rice was a good balance to the spices.

We loved making this meal and it was a special treat for us.  The recipes were easy to prepare and it was good to cook them together. This was our first experience of Sri Lankan food and we would love to try more recipes from Sri Lanka.  It was also the first time we had tried The Spice Pioneer and we think it gave us a lovely family experience of the sights, smells, and sounds of Sri Lanka.  We would recommend the Spice Pioneer box as a fun present for a family or for someone who would like to entertain 4 people for a fun and tasty meal.

The subscription to The Spice Pioneer costs £27 for 3 months and you can choose 3 months, 6 months (£52.50) or a year (£99).

Reviewed by Christopher and his Mum

Festive Chocolate Brownie

Here is a bake I have made especially for Christmas.  I took Will Torrent's recipe for the Mince Pie Brownie from his book Afternoon Tea at Home and added some of my special marmalade (made with Ave Maria Seville Oranges) to the brownie for a tang.  I topped it with a special chocolate topper.  This is made by pouring chocolate on a chocolate transfer sheet. I am going to make this for my family over Christmas.

I have entered in a Bako/ Callebaut competition so if you like this, please would you vote for me.  If you would like to vote for me, you just need to click on this voting link find my picture of the Festive Chocolate Brownie at the bottom of the page and vote

The prize is a hamper for lots of lovely Callebaut chocolate which would be great to experiment with




Many thanks!

French Patisserie at the Cookery School, London

I had an enjoyable morning at the The Cookery School in London on the French Patisserie Course.  We were taught by Ghalid Assyb an experienced baker who had previously worked with Ottolenghi,the London bakery.

 Ghalid gave tips throughout the morning and answered questions from those on the course.

Throughout the three hours we used dough that has been made earlier to shape croissants, pain au chocolat, pain au raisin and brioche.

Here I am shaping the croissants, rolling up firmly from a triangle shape:

Here I am with some of the bakes we made together in The Cookery School








We were able to sample our bakes at the end of the morning and they were delicious. We also made some dough which we took home.  I made croissants with mine and all my family enjoyed them.



The half day course went very quickly and was good for building my confidence with french patisserie.  I have been sent recipes to try again at home.

Thank you to the Cookery School for kindly inviting me to attend one of their courses

Thoughtful baking at the Thoughtful Bread Company

I entered a competition at Easter, run by Kenwood, to make hot cross buns.  The prize was for two people to attend a course at The Thoughtful Bread Company  I  entered a photo of my jumbo family sized hot cross bun and was really excited to win the prize as I always wanted to go on a course at The Thoughtful Bread Company, especially after having met Duncan, the owner of the bakery at The World Bread Awards.

People who have watched the BBC Victorian Bakers programme will know that Duncan was one of the bakers who went back in time to experience what it was like to bake in Victorian times.

There was a choice of two courses at The Thoughtful Bread Company: a beginners one and a sourdough one.  I chose the beginners one as I liked the range of bakes planned for the day. I was really pleased to go on this course this month.

I had a great day learning about lots of tips and techniques to improve my bread baking.  I really liked learning about the science of baking.  I was interested to learn about the action of yeast and how important it is to allow enough, and not too much time for proving to allow the yeast to continue to work in your loaf in the oven. I also gained confidence in the window pane test which tells you about the extent of gluten development

Duncan is very keen to use local produce, and support local traders when baking.  He has a bartering scheme where local residents can bring in their surplus of produce in exchange for bread.  We used local produce in two of our bakes.

Duncan also told us about the Real Bread Campaign, and how important it is to use natural ingredients in bread, and how using good ingredients, with slower fermentation times removes the need for using chemical bread improvers. I am a member of the Real Bread Campaign and I was featured in a recent edition of its magazine "True Loaf"

The cookery school is well equipped with NEFF ovens which were originally from the set of the Great British Bake Off.  It was great to think that we were baking in ovens used by GBBO stars.
 
The bakery is under the shop and we were lucky to get a behind the scenes tour to see where each bake is made, and we found out again how the ingredients used in all the bakes are carefully and thoughtfully chosen: organic, local, sustainable ingredients are important.



The shop was amazing and sold unique products.  We had delicious foods throughout the day including an almond croissant along with lovely coffee to start the day with, an amazing spread of local meats, cheeses, pickles and bread for lunch and tasty cakes for afternoon tea.  If you come on a course do not book dinner as you will be full by the end of the day.

During the day we made a range of bakes including a white loaf, which we shaped and proved in a bowl; savoury bread whirls packed with local cheese and vegetables, savoury soda muffins and panettone.  We made the bread by hand. We used the Kenwood stand mixers for the panettone which was an enriched dough and a much stickier mixture.

 I was able to put my shaping technique to practice that I had learnt at Swifts Bakery, this is so important to shape the bread properly to allow it to take a good shape.

We left with lots of baking to share with our family, a goodie bag including Duncan's book packed with brilliant recipes, a couche cloth, dough scraper, blades, various discount vouchers,and a massive bag of  Shipton Mill flour each.

My family enjoyed the baking I took home and they especially loved the pannetone which I will be baking for Christmas.

The day was a really enjoyable day, and I was really pleased to learn lots of things to help to improve my baking.  Thank you to Duncan, the staff at the Thoughtful Bread Company and to Kenwood for a great opportunity.

An amazing October

Craft Bakers and Butchers Extravaganza:

I am the youngest member of the Craft Bakers Association.  I joined two years ago after I read one of their leaflets in my goody bag from The World Bread Awards.

I like to follow what is happening in bakeries across the country.  I have been fortunate to visit a few bakeries which are members of the Craft Bakers Association.  This had included visits to Dunn's Bakery in London and Slattery's in London.

I was very excited when I saw that there was a CBA event in Harrogate that I could attend and was really pleased that I would be able to do one of the demonstrations.

Because I love making marmalade, as well as cakes and bread,I decided to demonstrate a marmalade cake with my own special homemade marmalade made from Ave Maria organic sevilles.  I talked through my process of making marmalade as I made my cake.  I was really pleased as lots of people came along to my demonstration including a number of other members of the Craft Bakers Association and the Worshipful Company of Bakers.  I handed out samples of my marmalade, and my marmalade cake.  I added some California Walnuts to my bake as I had been given some that morning and thought they added a nice texture to my cake.

I was really pleased and surprised to be presented with a copy of the Craft Bakers Association Book of Breadmaking" which will be really useful to work through.  George Fuller, Chair of the association really encouraged me and said that the Craft Bakers Association would be there to help me.

Afterwards I had a chat with John Foster MBE who told me lots of interesting things about bread and who has invited me to his bakery.

I talked to lots of other people who have offered opportunities to visit their bakeries.  I will organise this during the next year in my holidays.  I love to see how different bakeries work and the processes they use in baking.

The World Bread Awards:

I entered the World Bread Awards for the third time. I created three loaves of bread, A Fruit and Nut Challah bread with Persian spices, Scrumptious Saffron bread and a Goat's Cheese and Herb Cornbread.  I adapted a basic cornbread loaf for my cornbread recipe, I adapted a challah bread recipe with my own Persian twist - and used Edd Kimber's saffron bread rolls recipe to make my own creation. I got some great feedback for my breads and was complimented on the creativity, elegance and attractiveness of my loaves. I got runner up this year.

 At the awards ceremony it was great to catch up with a lot of people who have helped me with my baking, and others who have offered further opportunities to help me. I'm hoping to encourage more childrens entries next year.

 A day with John Swift:

Yesterday I spent a day in Swifts Bakery in Clee Hill, Shropshire. John Swift starred on the brilliant programme "Victorian Bakers" and he is a fifth generation baker.

I thoroughly enjoyed learning a different perspective to baking bread. John taught me how to shape which I have been struggling with ever since day one. I shaped lots of different things including butter buns, chelsea buns and a variety of loaves. I was really impressed with how much bread is made in the bakery each day.

Thankyou so much to everyone at Swifts for making such a great day for me!

Getting ready for the World Bread Awards

I love taking part in the World Bread Awards as I love trying experimenting with new breads and getting expert feedback on them.  I have fantastic news....I am a finalist again so will be off to the awards ceremony to find out what the judges made of my bread.

Here are the breads I made:

1.  Goats Cheese and herb cornbread

I saw cornbread for the first time at a food festival.  I loved the colour and flavour and so decided to put my twist on a basic recipe I found on the internet.  I added local smoked goats cheese, and my own home grown herbs.  I decided to use a 6-stranded plait which I learnt from following YouTube.  I found the plait easy to do with the video.

2.  Fruit and Nut Challah with Persian Flavours

I have been inspired by Persian Flavours after trying some white chocolate with Persian spices at Paul A Young Chocolatiers.  I love the combination of pistachio and rose as it looks pretty and tastes good.  I mixed up my own Persian Spice mix by combining lots of different spices.  It was difficult to grind the rose petals so I added a little granulated sugar and it blended down.  I tried this bread several times, adding different amounts of spice and fruit.  I also tried rings and straight plaits. The bread has a nice combination of flavours and textures.

3.  Saint Lucia Saffron Buns

I have always wanted to bake with saffron, and decided to use a Edd Kimber recipe for St Lucia Saffron Buns .  Instead of doing single buns, I decided to shape them into a ring.  I also added a little cardamon for extra flavour.  The smell of the bread was amazing, and I was pleased with the colour of the buns.

I had lots of fun trying out these new shapes and flavours.  I am looking forward to hearing what the judges think of them.

This month I am very excited to feature in the Real Bread Campaign's True Loaf publication.  Here is my article.  You can read the whole magazine when you join the Real Bread Campaign and keep up to date with news about the Real Bread Campaign 

Cake and Chocolate Fun at Squires Kitchen Exhibition

I arrived on Saturday, to take in my entry for the Children's cupcake category.  As I was one of the first 100 arrivals, I was given a Squires Kitchen goody bag with lots of useful equipment in it. 

On the way in I was really impressed with the other entries that were already displayed, especially the wedding cakes that looked like works of art. While I was looking around, I was pleased to meet Charlotte White who was busy taking photos of the cakes.  To see some of these amazing creations follow this link to her blog on Restoration Cake.  Also on her website there are lots of nice recipes and we definitely recommend the vegan chocolate cupcake one!

My cupcake entry was The Three Little Pigs and the Big Bad Wolf.  It took me three days to make the models, fitting it around my school and homework was tricky but I was pleased with the result. 

I had a little look around the exhibition and then met Mark Tilling and talked about different things I had been involved in over the last few months.

I spent some time looking at the programme and decided to go to all Mark's talks and also Carlo Lischetti talks. Carlo's models were amazing as he added so much expression to the faces.

I really liked Mark's talks as he took us through his demonstrations step by step and explained things about chocolate as he was demonstrating. I learnt how to use chocolate transfer sheets to make lovely chocolate pots, how to colour chocolate and use it for Easter eggs, how to make chocolate flowers and mirror glaze cakes.  I can't wait to try some of these things. I am looking forward to buying Mark's book called Mastering Chocolate that is coming out soon and will work my way through the recipes.  Before we left we bought some chocolate moulds and colour powders ready to make some chocolate Easter Eggs at home.

Photo by Squires Kitchen

On Sunday morning I was really pleased to find out that I had won my section of the children's category and had been awarded "Gold".  Later when I met the judges: Mark Tilling and Jan Clement-May, they said that they really liked my cakes, and especially all the added detail like the trowel, spider and axe.  I also picked up some tips on how to add character to facial expressions.  At the prize giving I was presented with my certificates and a book, sugarpaste and colour pastes which will all be really useful.

I really enjoyed my first visit to the Squires Kitchen Exhibition and hope to come back another year to learn even more skills and be inspired by some brilliant sugarcraft.

Chef success

I have taken part in lots of competitions with bakes and preserves I have made at home and I decided to take a step into the chef's world in January with not only one competition but four in one month!

First I took part in the local finals of the Springboard Future Chef competition in Peterborough.  I had to cook a two course meal in 90 minutes.  It was tricky cooking in a different kitchen to my own.  The judges were really pleased with my dishes and said that I was very brave as I had aimed to do a lot in my 90 minutes.  They said I was very creative with the taste of my dishes and one said "there needs to be more Christophers in the world".  I was also encouraged to try to be a little more organised in the kitchen, as there were marks for this too.  I was pleased to be runner up.

My second competition was at the school heat of the Rotary Young Chef Competition.  I cooked 3 dishes in 2 hours.  I tried hard to remember what the judges said before, being much more organised.  Nearly everything ran to plan and I changed the presentation of my main course to make it look more creative.  I was really happy at the end to be chosen as winner of the school heat and will be representing my school at the next stage of the competition.


The third competition of the month was amazing.  It was the Teflon Diamond Standard Awards at Waitrose Cookery School.  There were 1500 entries for this competition so I was really pleased to be chosen as a national finalist.  It was a great opportunity to put all my new skills into practice.  As I love to make sausage plaits, I decided to do my own twist on a sausage plait.  I had tasted a special pasty at Gunn's Bakery in Bedford that had a sweet and savoury end.  I decided to make my sausage plait with a sweet and savoury end.  I used sausage, chestnuts, bacon and my own cranberry sauce at one end, and at the sweet end I used my own mincemeat and apples.  I even went to our local butchers a few days before and made the sausage meat to go in the plait.


When we arrived, we were given a full set of chef's whites and soon got set up.  There were children aged 13-16 years from all across the country and all were doing very different bakes.  It was really busy in the kitchen as there were lots of children in the same cooking area, but we all had own workstation and it was very well equipped. 

Everything went to plan with my bake.  The timing was good and the plait was well baked underneath.  I even had chance to pipe some brandy sauce and make a sugarcraft robin to decorate the side of the bake.  I was pleased with the robin as I had never made one before but thought it would look fun.  Throughout the cooking I tried really hard again to be organised and at the end was praised for this, Lesley Waters also said that I scored very high for the "skills" section.  The judges really liked how I had flavoured the sausages and commented on my cranberry and port sauce.

When we had finished cooking we were able to watch a lovely food demonstration led by Lesley Waters who was the head judge of the competition.  She said the standard of the dishes were very high and looking at the dishes, it was amazing to see what everyone had done.

The winners and runners up were presented with their prizes and all the other national finalists received certificates and a goody bag with bakeware in it.  I am really looking forward to putting it to good use.  It was a really good day and I learnt lots again.

My final competition was lots of fun.  It was a competition called Ready Steady Cook.  I was in a team representing my scout group.  We had to cook three courses on a hob top.  Two of the recipes were what I had made up myself.  We did panfried mushrooms as a starter, then coconut chicken curry as a main course, with flatbread and then a trifle for dessert.  We got very good feedback and an excellent score which meant we were able to bring the trophy home for our scout group.  I really enjoyed working as part of a team, and we will be cooking the dishes again at our next scout camp!

 

 

 

 

 

Chocolate fun with the Children's Air Ambulance

On the 26th of October me and my family went to a chocolate event hosted by Paul A Young, it was very fun. It was at Venue One, Marylebone, London. This event was a Gala launch of a new chocolate recipe book called Sensational Chocolate which is fundraising for the Children's Air Ambulance.  The recipe book is a collection of recipes from lots of celebrities including Emma Thompson, Brian Blessed, Nigella Lawson, Fay Ripley, John Whaite and Kimberley Wilson.

The first recipe is in the book is a recipe that me and my Mum submitted using my award winning marmalade.  I love making marmalade and have won the Children's category of the World Marmalade Awards and have also received Golds for two of my entries.  The recipe called Marmalade and Prune Chocolate Cake was a winner with a Children's Air Ambulance recipe competition.

At the launch we saw lots of celebrities including Linda Robson, Dame Kelly Holmes and Lesley Joseph.  We also watched Rosemary Shrager, John Whaite and Paul A Young in a competition to decorate the best chocolate cake.  It was interesting to see the different ways they decorated their cakes. The cakes were auctioned off at the end and made lots of money for charity.

We also were entertained by the wonderful Anna Pancaldi and particularly enjoyed hearing her new songs. 

At the event we were able to try Paul A Young's salted caramel truffles which were so delicious and melted in the mouth.

At the event I talked to Kimberley Wilson about marmalade and the Tiptree World Bread Awards.  We had met there last year for the first time, when I won the Young Baker category.  

I also chatted to Roger Pizey who mentored Paul A Young.  He was very pleased to hear about all that I had done, and encouraged me to keep going.  




I talked to Jay Rayner who said to keep on doing what makes me happy. It was amazing to meet Dame Kelly Holmes who signed my book and said "Follow your dreams" which is a real encouragement for the future.

It was an amazing night and I loved meeting lots of interesting people.

 Since attending this event, I have been trying lots of chocolate recipes from the book. Emma Thompson's salted caramel brownie was the most amazing pudding I have ever tasted.  Nigella's chocolate biscuit recipe was delicious. Having made Nigella's recipe once I decided to add even more chocolate and some Camp Coffee to make some mocha biscuits that everyone loved. Paul A Young's hot chocolate recipe was perfect to warm ourselves up after fireworks.  I am looking forward to working my way through the book.  I am hoping to make Eric Lanlard's recipe next.  If you follow me on @JammyBakers you can keep up to date with the recipes I have tried

I would recommend this book to anyone who loves chocolate. There are so many recipes to try, and lots of these are quick and easy to make.  You can buy it from the Children's Air Ambulance website.  The charity is trying to fundraise for a second Children's Air Ambulance to cover the whole country






If you would like to try some recipes while you are waiting for the book to arrive try these Sensational Chocolate recipes including our Marmalade and Prune Chocolate cake and Emma Thompson's Salted Caramel Brownie

I have also been making some chocolate fun of my own. Two years ago I went on the One Show with my firework themed cake which featured chocolate fireworks.  I decided to make these this year with my church youth group this week and led an activity to do this.  Here is what they looked like.  

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