Flourless chocolate cake with lemon creme fraiche

Chocolate chocolate chocolate! I know there's other types of cakes out there but despite my best efforts to cook something else, chocolate beats everything for me, (unless it's coffee-chocolate in which case, I go into a frenzy of caffeine and need to be stopped.)
This cake is rich, grown-up dessert. It's low in sugar, wheat-free and gluten-free, and extremely quick to make requiring only 15 minutes in the oven! And the filling is a very smooth process as well, requiring no icing sugar.
It's a squidgy, moussey, truffley dream with a consistency that means you will leave teeth marks in, which I love. It might need a bit more sugar to make it palatable to everyone, but if you are a fan of dark, bitter cocoa flavours then give it a shot unchanged. The most challenging part of making this is seperating the eggs - so it is a cinch! It also survived going to a picnic in Hampstead Heath without any trouble, as even if it gets a bit squished, it's still just fine. It's even nicer, if I dare say it...

Ready to be baked

Flourless chocolate cake with lemon creme fraiche

• 8 medium eggs
• 400g chocolate (the more cocoa the better, 70% is suggested)
• 150g butter
• 2 tbsp caster sugar
• 300ml creme fraiche
• 1 lemon (zested)
• Pinch of sea salt

Mine never looks as good as the picture :(

You're going to eventually mix everything in the bowl that you melt the chocolate in, so bear this in mind when mixing and cracking.
Pre-heat your oven to 180C and line the base of your cake tins with greaseproof paper. I have to stress this - greasing is good too, but importantly the lining will save you a disaster with a cake like this. Separate your eggs into two clean bowls, with yolks in one and whites in another, and quickly whisk the yolks with the salt. Meanwhile, put a heatproof bowl over some simmering water and melt the chocolate and the butter together. If you're careful, you can just do this directly in the pan, but I think the double-boiler method is better. Be wary of the chocolate burning - stir often and don't forget about it, then take off the head and leave to cool (or transfer to a cooler mixing bowl if melted directly in the pot.)
While it's cooling down, beat the egg whites with an electric whisk until stiff, then fold in the sugar. You can double or even triple the amount you use to make the cake sweeter, depending on who you're cooking for. Then fold the egg yolks into the chocolate and butter mix, followed by the egg whites. 
And you're done! Divide the mixture into a large cake tin, or two or three smaller ones. The original recipe suggests 2x18cm. I did 3x14cm I think. Put in your oven, and take out after 15 minutes or so, or when cooked through. To make the filling, put the creme fraiche and lemon zest and mix, using it to sandwich the cakes together when cool. Finally, If you feel fancy, cut out a shape in paper and scatter icing sugar over so it leaves a nice picture on top. 

Mmm, HEALTHY

Credit: Leon - Naturally Fast Food (Book 2)

Butternut squash, pomegranate, feta and mint salad with pine nuts

Now HERE is a salad that will bring a smile to your face on a sunny summer's day, and just in time for the London heatwave. I came across it in an issue of the Sunday Times Style supplement, which I normally never read.
Admittedly this is soooo North London, and the very fact that I am able to waltz into my local supermarket and pick up a pomegranate year round is a serious luxury, and one which I don't take lightly.
That said, the original recipe has said that you can happily replace this one ingredient with another sharp, sweet fruit, like a handful of juicy black cherries is what. I also think slices of orange could work.
It is a fantastic mixture of flavours - deep earthy spices roasted, then tempered with creamy feta and sharp, sweet pomegranate, rounded off with the refreshing mint, with the texture of the squash delivering a lovely big bite. It works well with some nice crusty bread, and I think couscous would be equally nice. It's also a nice counter to the more traditional tomato-cucumber-rocket-leaf. It also looks divine, and when we brought it to a picnic last weekend, it was one of the first things to get finished! Yum, yum, yum.

Butternut squash, pomegranate, feta and mint salad with pine nuts (serves four people)

• 1/2 to 3/4 of a large butternut squash
• 2 tbsp crushed chilli flakes (less if you like it with a milder kick)
• 2 tbsp coriander seeds
• 2 tbsp cumin seeds
• 2 tbsp pine nuts (dry toasted)
• 150g feta cheese
• 1 pomegranate
• Bunch of fresh mint

For the dressing:

• 1/2 tbsp balsamic vinegar
• 1 tbsp lemon juice
• A good pinch of caster sugar
• Leftover pomegranate juice (1-2tbsp, taste as you go)
• A small pinch of cinnamon
• 2 tbsp olive oil

Grinding spices

As always, pre-heat your oven. Something in the region of 200C is good. Next, peel your butternut squash, and chop into semi-circle slices (carefully, squash is very slippery and can be tough to chop!) about 1/2 a cm thick. 

Grind your spices in a pestle and mortar with a decent pinch of rock salt and ground black pepper. The mix doesn't have to be perfectly ground into the same texture, mostly just try to crush the coriander seeds. I sadly don't own a pestle and mortar, so I put whatever I'm crushing into a small plastic bowl, and use a rolling pin. It largely works but the spices tend to fly out everywhere. 

Spread the butternut squash across two roasting trays - you don't want to crowd them too much, so do use two trays, and drizzle with about 1 tbsp oil for each tray. Then divide over your spice mix, and use your hands  to make sure it gets a nice coating. Then put it in the oven for about 25 minutes, and check in every now and then, agitating the tray so it doesn't stick and maybe flipping the squash over so they brown on both sides. 

Meanwhile, you can dry toast your pine nuts. Keep an eye on as they don't sizzle, so you forget about them more easily than you think! You can also start picking your seeds out the pomegranate. The best way to do this, I find, is to slice the fruit cleanly in half, then over a bowl, use your hands to break each half apart, and use your fingers to root out the pockets of seeds. Try to save as much juice as possible for the dressing (and don't wear anything white while you're doing it.)

When the squash is done, remove from the oven. It should look somewhat like the below, and not too dried out. 

Butternut squash, ready to come out of the oven

To make a dressing, the original recipe invites you to use that most North-London of all ingredients, pomegranate molasses. I had no such thing, so into a jar I put the juice of the pomegranate that was reserved in the bowl (crushing seeds with a teaspoon if I needed more juice, around 1 or 2 tbsp), 1/2 tbsp balsamic vinegar,  1 tbsp lemon juice, and a small pinch of cinnamon. To add some sweetness, a pinch or two of caster sugar did the job, then top up with 2 or so tbsps of olive oil, and shake or whisk well.

Next, take your squash, scatter over a large plate, then crumble over the feta, leaving decent sized chunks. Add the pine nuts, and top with the mint and pomegranate. Drizzle dressing over just before service, and enjoy outside in the lovely sunshine (if possible!)

Pomegranate seeds, so pretty

Credit where credit is due: Modified from recipe by Gizzi Erskine in the Sunday Times

Strawberry pavlova with chocolate cream

Strawberries could easily be considered to be heavily overdone in terms of summer puddings, and initially, this pavlova might sound no different to your standard Eton mess fare, or even strawberries and cream. But there's a reason for that - they're utterly delicious and beloved by almost all. And for a make-ahead dessert, what goes more perfectly together than crispy, chewy meringue, leaving-teeth-marks-in-it-so-thick cold chocolate cream, and juicy sweet strawberries? This is also heavenly when leftovers are rescued from the fridge then crammed into a tupperware box then carried by bike to Regent's Park to be eaten with greed by friends sharing forks. Lovely for posh picnics.  Plus I hear it's going to be a bumper year for straws, so you might as well!

This is a wonderful summer dessert for whenever you're entertaining, again - I've fed my whole family on this during my graduation in 2009, when I cooked a huge vegetable lasagna, with leftovers. So don't make if it's just the two of you - for health-related reasons!
The original recipe suggests raspberries, my absolute favourite food. But I've always gone into the shop intending to buy but flinch at the last minute at the cost. The recipe also calls for the meringue base to be rolled up into a roulade, which I've never managed - this is basically Nancy's meringue pie with a chocolate cream filling and strawberry topping. And good god it looks seriously impressive. 


Strawberry pavlova with chocolate cream
Serves about 6 to 8 people

• 250g strawberries
• 2 tbsp caster sugar
• 150g plain chocolate
• 400ml double cream
• 5 egg whites
• 275g caster sugar
• Mint, optional garnish

Avoid doing this too much while cooking

Before you begin, 'mascerate' your strawberries. Cut off the green, and any other bits that would inhibit you from eating them whole, slice them all in half or quarters, then scatter over the 2 tbsp caster sugar. This will really bring out the flavour of the strawberries, and ensure that the fruit is gloriously sweet.
Meanwhile, get to making your meringue. Pre-heat your oven to 200C and line one of your biggest baking trays with greaseproof paper (suggest 33cm by 23cm swiss roll tin.) 
Whatever plastic mixing bowl you have knocking about in the back of your cupboard, rewash it with a non-skimpy amount of detergent to get any grease off and dry it with a clean tea towel. Carefully seperate your eggs - I like to have three bowls on  the counter. A mug to catch the white, one to catch the yolk, and then the bowl to tip the white into - meaning if you balls up one seperation, you don't lose contaminate most of your egg whites with yolk. 
Now, the whisking - get your electric whisk (and how I feel for you if you don't have one) and whisk on high until the peaks of the egg white are standing up stiff. Turn the setting on the whisk to low, and gradually add the caster sugar, stirring all the while until the mixture is nice and glossy. 

Fresh out the oven

Carefully spread the meringue mixture in the tin, and try to make as even as possible, then pop in the oven for 8 minutes. Don't forget! After this time lower the oven temperature to 160C for another 15 minutes, or until golden and firm on top. When it's done, take it out the oven, flip it over then peel off the backing paper, then put right-side-up again.
Chocolate cream time (you can do this while the meringue is cooking.) Whisk the cream now (avoid eating TOO many strawberries dipped in them), until it's a nice thick consistency. Meanwhile, melt your chocolate using a double boiler method, or if you're lazy like me, put it into a pan on a low heat and stir frantically until melted. Pour the now-melted chocolate off into a cold bowl and leave to cool down for ten minutes or so, so it doesn't curdle when you mix it. Fold the chocolate into cream (then sigh heavily at how gorgeous this looks), reserving a little chocolate for drizzling. 

Then it's just assembly: when the meringue is cooled off, use a big spoon to smear the lovely cream all over the meringue, then arrange the strawberries on top. Use a little teaspoon to flicky-flick little dribbles of dark chocolate all over the top for a nice effect, add a sprig of mint if you're using, then put it in the fridge until you're ready to serve it big indulgent slices to happy people. 
Credit where credit is due - Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall in The Guardian

Spicy pancetta pasta, Penne Amatriciana

Blogger unhelpfully ate this post, with the comments too. Thankfully, I had a cache of it, so here it is again. 

To take a bit of a departure from my usual "oh so good, yet so healthy, plus vegetarian!" shpiel, here is a fatty, gorgeous, meaty pancetta pasta, Penne Amatriciana, which has such deep flavours, that even though I've made it countless times, I always go "oh god" everytime I take my first mouthful. It's the incredibly simple ingredients that make it, red onion with pancetta being a winner, plus some red wine, rosemary and chilli.
This one is a real crowd pleaser as well. If you're ever trying to get people round for a non-fussy Italian-style dinner with some garlic bread and salad and 5 bottles of red, this is a perfect, utterly PERFECT main.
I first saw the recipe, I think, on Saturday Morning Kitchen when I was a student, and I can't remember where I scribbled down my version from, but I've used it ever since four years ago and time and time again it's been perfect. The original invited you to let the sauce thicken for 40 minutes. 40 minutes!! That's way too long! This version is much quicker and still insanely delicious. Seriously, invite your friends round for dinner, make this, be popular. I recommend it.


Penne Amatriciana (serves 2)
Just double the quantities for 4, etc.

• 200g penne pasta
• Half a pack of pancetta from a supermarket (100g), or lardons or even a few rashers of smoked bacon chopped
• 1 large red onion or 1.5 small ones (peeled and chopped)
• One tin of chopped or plum tomatoes
• 1 tbsp (ish) of dried chilli flakes
• 2 tbsp dried rosemary
• A handful of grated Parmesan cheese (or two handfuls if you like it extra cheesy-creamy)
• A good few glugs of red wine

Note - I understand completely if you don't feel like buying a bottle of wine just to make a meal, but honestly, the difference it makes, plus having some wine to drink while eating this makes it outstanding for a simple plate of pasta. However, I've made this several times without and it's still wonderful.
Heat up a pan on a fairly high heat, and chuck in your pancetta dry. The fattiness of the meat, as it melts, will mean that there's more than enough oil in your pan to cook your onions later. Cook it for a while and don't be impatient, this is as crisp as the pancetta will get, so you may as well let it get quite well cooked. What you're looking for is the golden edging appearing around the outside of the chunks.

Once that's done, turn down your heat to medium and add the onions. Keep an eye on them at first, see if they're looking like they might burn, adjust the heat accordingly and then stir every now and then over the next few minutes until wonderfully soft and approaching translucent.

Mix in your chilli flakes next - depending on how spicy you like it, obviously, you can add less or more. I use the amount shown in the picture for two and it's just about right. Not too hot, but not too bland either. Awesome stuff.This is the part I really screwed up the first time I made this - so be ready! Have your tin of tomatoes open, and ready, so you don't have to fuss with opening it up. Then turn the heat up super high, add your glugs of wine, and it should hiss as it goes into the pan. Stir rapidly with a spoon and you can see the alcohol evaporating off, which is what we want, and make the sauce quite liquidy. After a short period, 30 seconds, although you can judge yourself, quickly add the tomatoes, give a good stir, and turn down the heat so the sauce simmers briefly.
Add rosemary - quite a lot, maybe double the amount of chilli that you used. The pungent rosemary is one of the main flavours in this, so don't be afraid to add a lot. Then stir. Now, bring the sauce up to boiling point, then turn down and let thicken. The thickening is really crucial, it's the sticky oily goodness that makes this sauce which you can't appreciate if the tomatoes are still watery and runny.

I put my pasta on at this point, in well salted water, and let boil. You can grate your Parmesan now if you like. When the sauce has thickened enough, add the parmsean, then mix through with the pasta. Serve with some red wine, and if you're feeling like being fancy you can garnish with some parsley or basil.

As you can see it goes down a treat. The wine bottles in the background have candles in them - promise!

Bulghar wheat and spinach pilaf

This is a perfectly gorgeous dinner - an onion-y, chilli tomato-ey delicious platter of grains you can scoop and scoop and scoop from. It's also brilliant for entertaining - just up the quantities. This would also work extremely well at a picnic or barbecue, is still delicious cold, and is easy to prepare in advance. It's also a very straightforward thing to make, it's almost a salad - almost, but SO much more fantastic. This is a brilliant one for summer, so if you've been enjoying the sunshine, bookmark this one as a nice warm weather lunch or dinner.

The only unusual ingredient in this, with the exception of Harissa used on the tomatoes (any Mediterranean shop - I get mine in Phoenicia in Kentish Town), is bulghar wheat. This is available from my local supermarket, and is a quick-cooking form of wheat which has been parboiled. It looks like Demerara sugar - don't put it in your coffee - and has a slightly nutty but wonderfully versatile flavour. It is an absolute doddle to make - simmer, then leave to soak, 25 minutes start to finish. And it's rich in fibre, low in fat, and a popular staple in Middle Eastern food. A little research also turned up that it's really rich in minerals, - iron, phosphorus and zinc (the most common nutritional deficiency) to name a few. 

I feel like many people my age really neglect the sheer amount of variety  on offer, especially when it comes to grains. Couscous was a massive discovery for me when I was a student, and most people I know have never heard of bulghar wheat.  That said, I'm fortunate enough to live in a place where I'm frequently baffled by the sheer expanse of ingredients on offer in my local supermarket, even, let alone if I was to take the bus into Soho. However,  you can substitute couscous for bulghar wheat, if you like, and still enjoy the deeply refreshing and satisfying pilaf. And healthy to boot, seriously. This is a dream food. My new aim for the summer is to make this and bring it to the park to be eaten with maximum joy.

Bulghar wheat and spinach pilaf (serves 4-ish)

To make things easier, and following the original recipe's lead, I've kept the ingredients separated into sections. 

Tomatoes

10 to 12 plum tomatoes (sliced into segments)

4 tbsp olive oil

2 tbsp balsamic vinegar

1.5 tsp Harissa paste (or a sprinkle of chilli flakes if you don't have it.)

2 tsp Muscavado/soft, dark sugar 

Pilaf

170g bulghar wheat

295ml vegetable stock 

1 onion (finely chopped)

2 cloves of garlic (peeled and sliced)

300g spinach

Decent handful of mint (chopped)

4 tbsp olive oil

Feta cheese 

Onions (which get scattered on top)

2 onions, (thinly sliced into semi-circles)

2 tbsp olive oil

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1.5 tsp Muscavado/soft, dark sugar 

1/2 lemon (juiced)

Pre-heat your oven to 200C and start with your tomatoes as they'll take around 30 minutes. I've already used this method in the breakfast recipe with soda farls - sometimes chilli tomatoes are just what the doctor ordered to perk your morning up. But slice the tomatoes, and in a small bowl, mix the olive oil, Harissa and balsamic. Put the tomatoes in a roasting tin and pour over the sauce, using your hands to ensure a nice even coverage, then sprinkle over the sugar to result in some delicious caramelised tomatoes.

Tomatoes roasted in Harissa, balsamic and olive oil 

These can be hot or cold when the pilaf is served - and they are DELICIOUS. Sweet and chewy with a fantastic chilli kick to offset the sugar. Cooks perks deem, in my view,  you definitely get to have a snack on one or two of these lovely tomatoes of them before dinner is served. 

Meanwhile, start on your pilaf. Put the chopped onion in 2tbsp of olive oil in a nice big pot (that you have a lid for) and fry for a few minutes until softened, then add the garlic and let that soften as well. With your 295ml (I'm sure 300ml would be fine...) stock at the ready, tip in the bulghar wheat on top of the onions, stir, and quickly pour over the stock. Bring to boiling, then turn the heat right down to a low simmer for around 15 minutes - I like to give it an occasional stir . After this time, you can turn off the heat completely, put the lid on and let it sit for 10 minutes or so. You can chop your mint now, if you haven't already. 

While this is happening, you can get on with your spinach. Probably do this in two goes, as I get spinach everywhere when I try to do 300g in one go.

Spinach prior to frying - this is about as soggy as I let it go. If you have a few unwilted leaves left, it's nice to have a mix. 

Rapidly rinse the spinach then use your hands to shake the water off it. Put it into a big pan on a high heat and let it wilt slightly then drain into the sink and let it sit for a few minutes until it's cool enough that you can squeeze out some of the excess water. I don't like the spinach to lose too much of its shape, and I think it tastes much nicer when its closer to raw than completely steamed and bitter. Roughly chop chop chop on a chopping board, then throw it into a frying pan, or the pot you used to wilt it if it's dry enough in 2tbsp of olive oil. Fry very briefly, then add to the pilaf. I usually don't wait for the pilaf to be fully done before adding. Put it in, give it a stir, replace the lid.

Now you just have to do your onions, which are rapidly fried until crispy. On a high heat, add the onions and stir frequently, and right when they are getting good and crispy, add the cinnamon (just a pinch!) and the sugar, then take off the heat.

Onions, crisping up

To assemble, on your nicest, biggest plate (if you have one), tip out the bulghar and spinach. Then scatter over the mint. Then add the tomatoes and finally the crispy onions. Take a good handful of feta and crumble over, then tip over your lemon juice.

Serve with whatever you like - I find hummus is a lovely thing to put with it, and if you want to make sure your guests are damn well fed, you can also make up some falafel and an olivey-Greek salad to go with it!

Falafel, Greek salad and the bulghar wheat pilaf on its way to the table.

Credit where credit is due: 101 Cookbooks