As promised, here is the link to the second recipe I developed for the Peppermongers – a recipe for Moroccan-inspired mincemeat using Cubeb Pepper. I am clearly a fan of giving mincemeat my own unique twist and this version is inspired by Moroccan Tagines that I so adore and that often include dried fruits like prunes or dried apricots. The mincemeat gets a bit of kick from a generous pinch of cubeb pepper – a key ingredient in Morocco’s famous Ras el hanout spice mix and whose woody ‘Christmas tree’ aroma lends wonderful warmth to the mincemeat. For our first batch of mince pies this year, I made a rich almond and orange zest pastry filled with this spicy mincemeat and served it with a dollop of crème fraiche flavoured which I had flavoured with orange blossom water. This is also the mincemeat which made its way into copious batches of mincemeat scones, another delicious way of using up a glut of
Recipes
German Peppernuts with Indonesian Long Pepper
If you have been reading my blog for a while now, you will have noticed that I am a big fan of bold and unusual flavours and that I don’t shy away from baking with ingredients we typically associate more with savoury preparations. So it was only ever going to be a matter of time before I started playing around with all the wonderful and different types of pepper. In fact I have been playing with pepper quite a lot over the recent months as I have been developing some recipes for the Peppermongers using their incredible range of different types of pepper, including lesser known varieties like Indonesian long pepper and cubeb pepper. I first came across the Peppermongers when I read their interview in CEREAL magazine last Christmas and it was that interview which really sparked my interest in creating sweets with pepper and kick-started what is still an incredible learning experience. Armed with Christine McFadden‘s Pepper bible and a whole plethora of different types
Marzipankartoffeln
Sunday was 1 December and Christmas is now a mere three weeks away (well, for me at least, most
Quince and Saffron Mince Pies
While I still struggle to understand how my dad can eat almost an entire christmas pudding by himself each year
Liquorice and Orange Madeleines
Fennel, orange and black olives. A simple salad typically eaten during the winter in Italy. Simple yet intriguing – there
Coffee and Toast … a dacquoise fit for breakfast
Dacquoise. A French cake traditionally made from three disks of nut-studded meringue, filled and frosted with a coffee custard mousse and decorated with chocolate ganache, clusters of caramelised hazelnuts and crushed hazelnut praline. I had been meaning to bake a dacquoise for a while but kept on putting it off because it sounded like a lot of faff. But a combination of seeing how manageable it actually is thanks to the Great British Bake-Off and just wanting to finally give it a go had me start this on a Tuesday night the other week, assembling the various components on Wednesday night, just in time to have a dessert to follow homemade pumpkin ravioli (another one of those recipes I had put off too long until I was desperate for pumpkin recipes to use up a monster of a pumpkin in my fridge). Someone’s tweet about breakfast (Coffee! Toast!) is what ultimately decided I was going to use breadcrumbs instead of
Roasted Quince and Honey Scones
Nigel Slater writes that you have to wait until the clocks go up to buy quinces. He does not say
Spiced Pumpkin Yoghurt Cake
While summer could not come early enough this year thanks to a rather rainy spring, these days I long for
Cacao Nib and Raspberry Meringue
I am a walker, like my mother. We walk places, whether at home or abroad. We like to watch people
Ciambelline al Vino
Leftover wine is not really a problem I have to deal with regularly but even so these small doughnut-shaped Italian
REAL SIMPLE FOOD 