Tag Archives: gift

Mini Candy Apples

22 Dec

I think I might have candy on my mind! Actually, I kind of do … I am devising a Yee Sang Cake for O’Gourmet Food Hall, and I have been looking at innocuous and innocent fruits with an evil candy-ing glint in my eye. Heheh. I love the candied caramelised oranges I made yesterday, and today, I decided to try another route – candied apples. But not just any apples, mind you, sweet, succulent, fragile miniature apples from Japan. These little babies are just so beautiful – perfect in miniature – that I could not bear to cut them up and cook them.

I remembered growing up in the US, one of the greatest fall and winter pleasures were  candied apples we would get from farm stalls. These candies are the stuff of memory – and the taste of them conjures up cold, crisp weather, puffs of breath, that clean smoky scent in the air, sky blue (or white with coming snow) and immeasurably beautiful. I adore candy apples – for the memory and the joy they represent.

These candy apples – large or small – would make lovely home-made Christmas presents. They are quick and relatively easy, they transport grownups back to the innocent pleasures of childhood, and they can be decorated in all sorts of ways – double dip these candy apples in ground nuts, bits of chocolate, crushed candy cane … let your imagination go wild! Or, serve them as part of a Christmas buffet or dinner. Such pretty pleasures.

Candy apples are not that difficult to make, but you really need a sugar thermometer to evaluate exactly where your candy is going. And you need to be brave (hot sugar is very dangerous), and have a sure hand. Work quickly, surely and have everything at the ready. I love how the hot candy clings to the apple skin – and lightly softens the apple flesh. When you bite into one of these gorgeous beauties, you get crackling shards of cinnamon candy, and then soft yielding apple. Lovely!

Makes 8 – 10 large or 12 – 16 small candy apples

  • 12 – 16 small apples (or 8 – 10 large) – try and get the small ones if you can, but if not, a strong red skinned apple is fine
  • 2 cups sugar
  • 1/2 cup light corn syrup
  • 1/2 cup water
  • 1 tsp cinnamon
  • 1 tsp vanilla (optional)
  • A few drops red food colouring (optional – I used India Tree natural food colour)

Line a baking pan or jelly roll tin with parchment or wax paper.

Wash the apples extremely well. I placed all the apples in a large bowl, squirted in some fruit and vegetable cleaner, and covered with water. I let the apples sit for about five minutes before draining and drying the apples very well.

Place the completely dried apples onto the prepared tin, and piece each apple with a skewer. For the tiny apples, I used double toothpicks.

Set the apples aside.

In a medium saucepan, combine the sugar, corn syrup and water. Stir well to ensure that everything is combined.

Place the saucepan over medium high heat, and bring the sugar/water mixture to a boil, swirling the pan a few times to make sure everything is mixed well. Dont stir – sugar crystals will form, and this is not a great final candy look. Use your candy thermometer, and allow the sugar syrup to come to 149C (300F).

Take off the heat, and have everything at the ready. Sprinkle on the cinnamon, and mix well (a silicone spatula is fine). Add the vanilla and red food colouring (stand back as it will bubble up), and stir well again.

Using an oven mit, pick up the saucepan, and tilt it so that the candy forms a deep well in one side. Pick up an apple by the toothpick, or skewer, and submerge the apple as completely as possible in the candy. As you remove the apple from the candy, twirl it, and place it back onto the parchment paper.

If you are adding another topping, dip immediately before placing back on the parchment paper.

Repeat with the rest of the apples, and allow to air dry for at least a few hours.

Remove the skewers or toothpicks, and serve as is or wrap in parchment paper to give as lovely gifts.

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Pretty Gingersnap Cookies

14 Nov

Gingersnaps!Today was a day of birthdays! My beloved nephew turned 21 (yeah, I cant quite believe it myself!) and dear friends celebrated their, and their children’s, birthdays with a huge bash this afternoon. I wanted to contribute something, and so I made cookies! About 200 Starry Starry Night Cookies (4 batches) and about 200 of these gorgeous decorated gingersnap cookies. I was going to make sugar cookies, as I did for my sayang niece’s 1st birthday, but I thought I would try something different – and I do love a good, crisp ginger cookie. These make fantastic gingerbread people, and they last for ages (no eggs, so they dont go soft quickly) – you could poke hole in them (with a straw or chopstick) and use them as stunningly pretty decorations on a tree for Christmas.

I used Royal Icing for the cookies, and it set hard, and gorgeous. And because it was a children’s party, I used IndiaTree natural food colours – they were the loveliest shades of pastel – pink, robin’s egg blue, violet and spring green. Before the icing set, I decorated them with tiny silver and gold dragees, hearts, sparkle sugar, and colourful hard sugar confetti. They looked luscious, and they tasted pretty great too!

The other thing I loved about these cookies were they were a snap (hehe) to make – but you need to be really organised and focused. I made 2 batches of dough, each divided into 4. Rolled out, and frozen overnight, and then cut with small and large shapes. I stuck with hearts and circles, but you could make animals, letters, stars… anything actually that you can find as a cookie cutter. They take about 10 – 15 minutes to bake. Decorating can take a bit longer!

If you prefer chewy cookies, roll out a bit thicker, and cut and bake until the centres are just firm. Either way, involve the young people in your life in the decoration. You will be overjoyed by their creativity, and your cookies will be uniquely beautiful.

Makes about 20 – 25 gingerbread people or 80 – 100 gingersnap cookies (depending on the size of your cookie cutter). Any leftover can be frozen, rolled out, for later use.

  • 3 cups all purpose flour
  • 3/4 cup dark brown sugar (use dark brown, not light brown – you will taste the difference here. The dark brown sugar really deepens the flavour of the cookie)
  • 1 tbsp cinnamon
  • 1 tbsp ginger
  • 1/2 tsp all spice or mixed spice
  • 1/2 tsp nutmeg
  • 1/2 tsp cloves
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 3/4 tsp baking soda
  • 1 1/2 sticks (3/4 cup – 12 tbsp) butter
  • 3/4 cup molasses
  • 2 tbsp milk

In a large stand mixer, or large bowl if youre using a handheld mixer, combine the flour, sugar, cinnamon, ginger, all spice, nutmeg, cloves, salt and baking soda. Mix briefly so all are combined well.

Add the butter, cut into large chunks, and mix again. The butter will “cut” into the flour mixture, and will become coated with it – and the bowl will look like it contains a sandy mixture of small dark pellets.

Add the molasses and mix again. The dough will start coming together with the addition of the molasses.

I usually add the milk to the measuring cup which held the molasses, and stir it around a bit to capture any molasses that was left behind. Add the milk, and mix just briefly.

You will have a very very soft dough. Turn out onto a sheet of wax paper, and divide into four even pieces. Working quickly, form a disc with each piece, wrap tightly in individual pieces of wax paper, and transfer to the fridge to firm up for about 30 minutes or so.

Once the dough has firmed (it will still be pliable, but will just be a little easier to work with), place a piece of wax paper on your working surface, then a disc of dough, and cover with a second piece of wax paper. Roll out quite thinly and evenly. You now need to freeze the dough for about half an hour (and even overnight if you wish) – you could also refrigerate it, but I find it works quite well coming out of the freezer. Given that this is the tropics, frozen dough is much easier to work with.

Once you have frozen or refrigerated the dough, and are ready to bake, prepare your oven. Preheat to 160C (325F).

Remove one sheet of dough from the freezer. Peel the top layer of wax paper off the dough, and then replace it onto the dough sheet (this helps in making the dough easy to remove once its been cut). Flip the sheet over, and remove the (now) top layer of wax paper. I used this wax paper to line my baking sheets.

Cut out shapes and patterns to your heart’s content, and place on a baking sheet lined with wax paper.

Bake in the hot oven for about 10 – 15 minutes, or until the cookies have puffed (from the baking soda), and deflated, have darkened just a bit, and are firm in the centre to your touch.

Remove and allow cookies to cool for about 5 minutes on the baking sheet, and then transfer to a rack (or even a plate – they should be pretty cool and hardy by now). Repeat with the remaining dough.

Decorate as you like, or have them perfectly naked – a spicy wonderful happy making gingersnap.

Any scraps can be gathered together, formed into a disc, refrigerated, rolled out, frozen and re-cut.

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Cinnamon Sugar Cookies

11 Aug

perfect happy memoryI wrote in an earlier post about my late father’s love of white buttered toaste with a sprinkle of sugar. He ate it as a treat, even though he could have most any gourmet food he wished. This taught me that food is about memory as much as it is about taste… And one of my earliest memories is staying over at an Aunt’s house, one sharp sparkling autumn day, with my sister. We woke up in the morning, and she offered us cinnamon toast. We had never had it before (I think I was probably 6 to my sisters 4 years), and eagerly accepted.

What a taste. What an amazing combination. White toast, crispy and warm, melting butter, crackling sugar … and cinnamon. Its a dark scent, almost woody and powdery. Hits of spiciness, sweetness, flowers. Its not a description that comes easily, but when you taste cinnamon, especially for the first time, its as if your taste buds wake up. I have always loved the scent and taste of cinnamon, and its warming fragrance brings memory of autumn, cider, Christmas. When I sat down to write about the actual taste of cinnamon, I realised this is another taste which is intricately wrapped in memory for me.

So today, on the first day of the Ramadan, after an exceedingly hot, busy day, I wanted comfort. Food that is a combination of memory and laughter, and wonderful easy taste. I turned to this recipe for cinnamon sugar cookies which I think I have been making as long as I can remember cooking. These cookies are really delicious, quick to put together, and delightful to give away. The recipe makes a very soft dough. Dont over beat it or you will get tough cookies. Just let it sit, in its creamy buttery sugary-ness, and handle with care when you dip in cinnamon sugar.

Enjoy with much love, and the memory of warmth during the cold…

Makes about 32 cookies, depending on how big or small you want them!

  • 3 tbsp fine granulated white sugar
  • 1 – 2 tbsp cinnamon (depending on how deeply cinnamon you like your cookies – I always use 2 tbsp!)
  • 1 1/2 cups sugar – a mix of dark brown, light brown, and white (I use 1/2 cup of each)
  • 1 cup / 2 sticks butter, slightly softened
  • 2 eggs
  • 1 1/2 tbsp vanilla extract
  • 2 1/2 cups pastry flour
  • 1 scant tsp baking soda
  • 1/2 tsp salt

Preheat your oven to 160C.

Mix the 3 tbsp sugar and cinnamon in a little bowl, and set aside. Make sure you combine thoroughly – the sugar will be a dark brown when done. You will roll the cookie dough in this just before baking.

In a stand mixer bowl, combine your three sugars. I usually beat the sugars together to ensure they are combined well. If you dont have a stand mixture, use electric beaters.

Once the sugars are combined, add the butter, cut into chunks. Let your mixer beat the sugar and butter together until very well combined. This could take a few minutes. Just have some patience.

Add the eggs and vanilla, and beat until completely combined. The mixture will be a little soft and fluid. Let it sit for a few minutes minutes. This gives the butter and sugars time to melt into each other.

Combine flour, baking soda and salt in a separate bowl, and little by little, mix into the butter sugar mixture. I use a spoon or spatula at this point as I dont want to over mix the cookies! A tender cookie is one which is allowed to come together of its own accord! Again, let sit for a few minutes before moving on to the next step.

Line baking trays with greaseproof paper.

Using a tablespoon, measure out spoon sized pieces of dough (you can make bigger or smaller, according to your preference – this is just how I like to do it!). I usually get about 8 cookies to a sheet.

Using your thumb, drop the dough straight into the sugar/cinnamon mixture, and gently roll it around to coat it completely. Place on baking tray, and pat down gently, so it is not a ball shape, but a little flatter.

Bake for about 15 – 18 minutes. The cookies will rise, and then fall. They are done when they have turned a slightly darker shade of brown.

Let cool in trays for at least 5 minutes before cooling completely on racks.

You will have a wonderfully soft cookie with a crispy crunchy crust. Perfect balance.

Share! These are too good not to – and you can make sure other people will make wonderful cinnamon memories too 🙂

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Raspberry Curd

21 Jul

Pure Raspberry TasteThese last few weeks, I seem to be inspired by my conversations with people online. Articles, notes, photographs, comments … all these things make me think of different foods and ideas. And of course, eating – Nathalie’s Gourmet Studio last night was a veritable treasure trove of inspiration, and reading about other people’s favourite meals makes me think of different connections and ideas. I was chatting with my dear friend, Floating Lemons, and she mentioned that she was hoping for raspberries picked from her garden. I dreamed of raspberries that night! They are such a perfectly gorgeous fruit – and most of the time, they need no adornment. Well, may be a little cream, but thats totally optional. At the same time, I was reading Tamasin Day-Lewis’ cookbook, Kitchen Classics, and in it, she had a raspberry curd tart…

It looked so dramatic and so gorgeous, but what really intrigued me was the raspberry curd. When I first encountered lemon curd, I could not imagine the alchemy needed to produce this tart sweet creamy fondant. It was like lemon candy, but softer; jam, but creamier; pudding, but clearer. Fruit curd was always one of those things that terrified me – I was sure I would try and cook it and it would turn into an almighty mess, coating me and my kitchen with drippy gloopy failure. Well, I stand here before you to tell you that fruit curd is unspeakably easy to make. It does take effort, dont get me wrong, but the benefit outweighs the pain. Home made fruit curd trumps anything you can get in the markets – especially if you are vigilant and use all organic ingredients.

Making fruit curd is, for me, a deep and intense meditation on the fruit. It is extremely relaxing because you really need to focus only on the ingredients in front of you, and how they come together to create something so different, yet so essentially the same as their individual parts. Butter, eggs, egg yolks, fine sugar and fruit. Thats it. Whisk it constantly over a low, slow heat and watch magic happen – literally. It will come together and thicken, and deepen in flavour, but it wont over cook as long as you keep the heat low and slow. You will come away with a thick jammy (but not jam) mix, that literally trembles when you serve it so delicate it is, that is the esesnce of the ripe fresh fruit.

I have made loads of different curds, but this one feels very exotic in a way. May be someone in Europe would feel the same about a pineapple curd, but the deep fuchsia colour and the bright raspberry taste make this unique and special to me.

I have made this two ways – in a tart a la Tamasin Day-Lewis, and rippled into a warm rice pudding. The first is rather dramatic and stark, but pretty sensational. The second is comforting and yet sophisticated all at the same time. However, dont be constrained. Use it as a spread for breakfast, stir it into yogurt, or eat it by the spoonful for the sheer joy of it. Its a wonderful present too. People are astonished that you can make it, but they are also so pleased with something so out of the ordinary.

This recipe makes about 3 1/2 cups of finished raspberry curd. If you want to keep it or give it away, please follow jam bottling protocols. I used all mine up, so there wasnt much to save but there was a whole lot to savour 😉 I will give the recipes for the tart and the rice pudding separately.

  • 450 g / 1 lb fresh raspberries (about 1 1/2 cups after sieving)
  • 2 eggs + 3 egg yolks (I use organic for this)
  • 1 cup superfine brown sugar (see below)
  • 1 cup / 8 tbsp butter

I use an immersion blender in two places in this recipe. It makes things very easy, and it also enables you to liquidise and refine in your cooking bowls, rather than have to transfer from a blender or food processor. It simplifies things, but if you dont have one, use a blender or processor and adjust accordingly.

In a bowl, using an immersion blender, liquidise the raspberries. They should be pretty much a thick bright pinky red puree – no berry or flesh left whole.

Over the top of another bowl, place a sieve. I use a nylon sieve that sits on top of the bowl – this is very useful for jobs like this because it will take a lot of liquid all at once. Pour out the raspberries into the sieve, and using a spatula or wooden spoon, coax the juice and flesh through the sieve into the second bowl. This can take a while, and I usually like to do it slowly and thoughtfully. Its part of the process 😉

Once the sieve holds nothing more than tons of raspberry seeds, lift it off the bowl, and using your spatula, scrape the thick juices that cling to the bottom of the sieve. Measure off your pureed fruit and you should get about 1 1/2 – 2 cups. Set aside.

Whisk your eggs, egg yolks and sugar together.  I use light brown organic sugar in this recipe, but I was concerned about its fineness. I used the immersion blender to pulverise the sugar so that it was super-fine (not quite powder, but no large granules either). If you have super-fine sugar, skip this bit but its quite fun! If you do grind it fine, then just add the sugar to the eggs and whisk well. You want a light yellow thick ribbony mixture.

Prepare a bain marie (water bath) on your stove top. I have already written about how I dont use double boilers. A medium sized saucepan, filled about 1/3rd with boiling water, and a large metal bowl set atop, do it for me. If you have a double boiler, go for it! Basically, you never want the mixture to boil. You want to keep it at a very low heat for at least 15 – 20 minutes.

In your metal bowl, set over the saucepan, melt the butter. Once the butter is completely melted, whisk in the egg mixture and the raspberry puree. And now, just keep whisking. It may take you 10 minutes or longer (it usually takes me about 20 minutes of constant whisking) but eventually, this very syrupy thin concoction of butter, eggs, sugar and fruit will start to thicken. For me, this process is all about faith! And bravery to be honest. First time I made it, I was scared I was going to scramble the eggs, but if you keep the temperature very low (the water does not have to be at a boil – a simmer will do), and keep whisking whisking whisking, it will turn out beautifully.

You are looking for a soft whipped cream consistency, so that as you whisk, you see the tracks of your whisk in the curd. When it gets to this point, and it may take a while, your curd is done. Take it off the heat, pour and scrape it into a clean, cool bowl, and cover with a cloth. Let it sit and cool, and solidify, for at least an hour or more and then refrigerate. It will deepen in colour and become thicker, so that it stands up on a spoon.

Bottle, or use in desserts, spread on toast or scones, and delight in the taste of summer.

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