Classy comfort food.

The week before last was a bad week.  Last week was worse.  My kids and dog were threatened with a firearm, then I discovered my daughter was the victim of some hate email, my dad had a bad round of chemo, but hey, we all laagered-up (that’s gathered around in a protective circle for you non-South Africans, and not lagered-up as in Castle Lager) and we dealt with it.  Or so I thought.  Obviously some of us are better at dealing than others and the residual fallout inevitably splashed over into the rest of my week.

In my heart of hearts I’ve always had this vision of myself as an elegantly clad Greta Garbo type.  Bizarrely, my husband has this same image.  And I say bizarrely because this elegant, organised alter-ego is diametrically opposed to the reality of my life.  I’m actually more Goldie Hawn than Greta Garbo, more Commedia del’arte than Film Noir.

I won’t go into all the sordid details, I’ll just hit you with the highlights.  Sunday afternoon, packed Deli, one of our regular customers happens to be sitting in the window overlooking the busy road.  He quietly informs me that there’s a bit of an odd situation going on with the parked cars.  A car alarm is going off and they have just seen someone disappearing into the car.  They think he could be hotwiring it.  Okay, I say, and I step outside to take a look.  So far this is all in the realms of possibility.  This is South Africa we are talking about.  I’m just going to check it out so I can ask around the deli if it is anyone’s car.  ‘Oh fudge!’  I murmer very quietly (not) ‘That’s my dad’s car!’  and I promptly abandon the shop and take off running up the road.  Now I’m not really very fond of running, and halfway there common sense starts to rear its unwelcome head.  What am I going to do if someone is trying to steal my dad’s car? 

I arrive on the scene and slightly apprehensively, peer into the car only to find one of our kp’s on his knees with a dustpan and broom in his hands, cleaning out the car for my dad.  ‘Oh, it’s you Alex’  I say, to which inane comment I get a perfectly reasonable blank look.  I turn around to go back to work, only to find the entire human contents of the deli on the pavement, with one socially minded gent running up the road behind me, ready to back me up.  Needless to say, his coffee went on my tab, and yes, I’m still blushing.

Monday was no less harrowing as we had to put our 15 year old siamese cat to sleep.  We were all still reeling, and after such a long week at the deli no-one had had time to go shopping for home.  The kids got home from school, we dug a grave next to our other cat in the garden and interred him with due ceremony and one of his favourite shortbread biscuits for the journey.  Then I got busy scrounging through a very bare larder in the effort to cobble together some sort of supper.  1 cup of jasmine rice, a few bits of salad, a small box of frozen shrimp and a package of frozen marinara mix.  Unusual finds really as we generally don’t eat frozen shrimp and/or marinara mix.  Still, neccessity is the mother of invention.  I picked some lemon thyme from my mom’s pot at the front door, heated some butter, put the rice on to cook and flung the contents of the freezer into the buttery pan. 

‘Oh fudge!’ I murmered genteely (again not!) ‘Look at this!  This is shocking!  There’s a massive rusty fishhoek in this marinara mix!  I can’t believe this!’  All wrapped up with a tracer (I think that’s what it’s called, I’m a cook, not a fisherman) and loads of fishing line.  My genteel murmer must have been reaching concert level decibals because my mom heard me from upstairs. 

‘What are you cooking?’  she called down to me.  ‘Don’t use the stuff in the freezer, that’s Tud’s bait!’

You can always rely on your family to back you up in a crisis.  But clearly mine didn’t fully appreciate how close to the edge I was.  Amidst their gales of laughter I flung ’supper’ in the bin, stuck a few stale slices of sourdough in the toaster, and opened an emergency tin of pilchards in tomato sauce, before stomping downstairs to sulk. 

My sister has been dining out on this story all week, but I have only just managed to bring myself to repeat it, perhaps so you will understand why I completely and utterly failed to send in my entry for Johanna’s round of WTSIM… Bistro Food event.  She mentioned the dearth of desserts in the event, but the roundup was full of fabulous dishes so pop on over and check it out.  And anyway, although this is a French apple flan recipe, I’m not entirely sure it is Bistro Food.  It’s certainly the comfortingly country French version of a great British pub Apple Pie, and served while still warm with lashings of whipped cream, made me feel better, even after the fortnight from hell!

The recipe is posted to the sidebar (as usual), so enjoy.

French Apple Flan

This tart is really quick and easy.  It uses one of my favourite pastries, one that is quite biscuity which really compliments the comforting bland juiciness of the apples.  Feel free to use as much sugar and spice for the filling as you require.  The best tarts are always tailor made.

For the pastry:

work

• 260 g unsalted butter into
• 350 g of plain (cake) flour
• 180ml caster sugar
• and a pinch of salt.

until it resembles breadcrumbs.  Continue to knead until the pastry comes together.

Chill for an hour, then line a buttered and floured pastry case by pressing the pastry in with your hands.

For the filling:

• Peel and core 8-10 apples (or however many you may need to fill your pastry base, bearing in mind that they will reduce in size as they cook.
• Slice the apples and braise them in a little butter with several tablespoons of brown sugar and some spices.  I use pimento spices with cinnamon, cardamom and cloves.
• When the apples are slightly translucent drain them and add
• 2 Tbspns of grated lemon zest
• 1/2 cup of ground almonds
• 1 tspn of vanilla

Toss to mix, then fill the pastry case and top up with

• 1 – 2 cups of double cream or creme fraiche

Sprinkle lavishly with demmerrara sugar and bake @ 180*C for 45 minutes to an hour.  Your pastry should be biscuity and browned, and the apples should be soft and juicy.

Serve warm with loads of freshly whipped cream , mascarpone or more creme fraiche.

healthy nuts and oats hiding inside a child's dream

When you finally realise your dream and open a deli / coffee shop / bakery what is it you are really hoping for?  Time to do lots of baking ?  Loads of manolo-clad ( or ugg-booted, as it’s winter) feet stomping, shuffling and striding over your threshhold?  Someone else to do the washing up? 

All of the above would be my answer, but the reality is that loads of feet striding over your threshold inevitably means selling out of all the artisan baked goodies you’ve slaved and laboured over for hours.  But that’s good, right?  Sigh!  I think I really understand how my mom’s bakers felt for all those years when 15 waiters had already sold all the scones and cheesecake that they kept churning out all day, even before they were out of the oven.  Some times you just want to be able to bask in your domestic goddessness for awhile.  Some days, like today, in between giving thanks for the steady stream of oohing and aahing custom, you barely have time to curse the person who bought the last 10 chocolate brownies. 

I mean, I know they’re good.  I baked them.  But who can eat 10 chocolate brownies?  And more to the point, how do I stop to bake another double batch in between orders of espresso hot chocolates, free range beef burgers with all the trimmings, avocado, rocket and sundried tomato bruschetta and French toast with Parma ham and verjuice syrup?  Ever the dreamer, even I have to admit that I can’t.  Once they’re gone, that’s it.  No more until tomorrow.

  But every good baker has a secret weapon or 6 tucked inside their floury apron pocket.  These giant cookies are one of ours.  They take literally minutes to throw together, less than ten in the oven, and the smell sells them before people have even seen them.  The most difficult thing will be convincing your guests to wait until they’ve cooled before they eat them.  And kids of all ages can’t resist them.  Even the most hardened chocaholic can be persuaded to ignore the empty chocolate brownie plate when gently tempted with a giant peanut, oat and smartie cookie that takes up both hands.  Try them and you’ll see what I mean.

For the recipe, click here, (as usual I’ve posted it straight to the sidebar for easy access), and please excuse me, I’m off to bake a quadruple batch of chocolate brownies for tomorrow’s ugg-booted, baked goods addicts!  Bless them one and all…

peanuts, oats and chocolate candy…

Preheat your oven to 180*C and line a baking sheet with baking parchment.

Cream:

• 225g granulated sugar
• 175g brown sugar
• 225g butter

Add:

• 2 eggs, lighlty beaten
• 1Tablespoon vanilla extract

and beat until light and fluffy.

Sift:

• 300g plain (cake) flour
• 5 ml bicarbonate of soda

Add to egg mix together with

• 125g rolled oats
• 1/2 cup of peanuts

Spoon 1/4 cup of mix onto your baking sheet at a time.  I usually get four cookies to one large sheet.  Make sure you leave plenty of space for them to spread out.

Poke your smarties (or chocolate m&m’s ) into the top of the cookie, and bake for 8-10 minutes (or until lightly browned).

The cookies will still be soft and you need to let them harden for a few minutes before transferring them to a rack to cool.  Try and wait until they are cooled completely to enjoy them at their best.

i heart cupcakes

Actually, we call them fairycakes.  And from the pics below you would be forgiven for thinking my love goes beyond normal into the realms of obsession.  Not true, although I do know of some complete cupcake queens. (Cupcakes take the cake, cupcaketastic, Cupcake Bakeshop by Chockylit  , to name but a few). 

We just make them a lot in the deli, which gives us plenty of time to play with the decorations, and I do love photographing them.  Somehow, they always look just right in our old-fashioned, shabby chic, seaside deli.  And although the actual cupcakes and the buttercream icing are all organic, the colouring isn’t. 

Yet, it seems to be the colouring that silently beckons to the inner child, whispering: ‘pick me up.  I’m yours’.  And they do.  I’ve know grown men to go weak at the knees when eating one of our cupcakes, and last week, at the end of the day when I only had one pink fairycake left, a surfer fought his girlfriend for it.  Clearly no problems with getting in touch with his feminine side.  (It was really PINK).

It’s not just the grownups who are drawn to these fairytale creations.  Kids adore them, and between the cupcakes and the giant oat, peanut and smartie (like chocolate m&ms) cookies, children entering our cafe seem to wear permanently glazed looks.  We have made boxes and platters of these for parties, press shoots, kitchen teas, and I filled a pink, three tiered stand with mini cupcakes for my daughter’s birthday cake this year.  They were, as requested, multi-coloured, topped with handpainted icing berries, hearts, leaves and bees.  It’s like edible crafting, such fun!

Some of the dedicated cupcake blogs have some amazing cupcake combos, which are truly inspiring.  At the deli we like to keep it simple.  We make giant cupcakes with a foolproof victoria sponge batter, then we top it off with the perfect buttercream.  Mostly it’s just really good butter and organic vanilla, but sometimes it’s orange, lemon, rose or coffee.  Simplicity is the key here.  And these fairycakes make for a shot of pure nostalgia.

Don’t forget to click here for the recipe, and have  a look at some other cupcake blogs for more inspiration.  Or just visit the deli and we’ll happily ply you with ours along with a cup of All -African organic coffee.  In fact, I think I’m just off to have one now…