I'm sittin' in the railway station, got a ticket for my destination | panforte for christmas

I'm not sitting in a railway station, but I am sitting in an airport with a ticket to my destination. It almost didn't happen - when you wake up, disoriented and groggy and look at your phone to see it showing 5.45am - the same time the shuttle is supposed to pick you up: well, let's just say I'm thankful I didn't decide to "finish packing in the morning" at 3.30am. Everyone in the shuttle says 'congratulations, you made it!' and it's a bit much when you've (literally) woken up 10 minutes before. As fate would have it, my flight ended up being delayed by a couple of hours so the airline gave us vouchers for breakfast and happily, Dunedin airport recently (finally) joined the 21st century and got itself a bit of free wifi, so this long overdue blog post might actually make it to the blog!

December has been a social month - I think it always is. Everyone wants to catch up before the end of the year - and while it can make you a little weary, it's also really lovely to catch up with everyone, all happy with summer holiday anticipation. December has seen some epic Maitland dinners, celebrations involving decorated cakes "for no reason in particular", farewelling H's seven years living in Dunedin with a pretty epic return to late night dancing of more youthful days, countless beers at Albar or at the beach, ciders in the Maitland courtyard to make the most of the long evenings...

We ended this December social season with a "festive cheers" last night. L, J and I teamed up again to create a pretty colourful array; complemented by broken heart gin and empire tonic - with a slice of cucumber and a wedge of lime, we decided this is the classiest g & t - and all NZ-made ingredients! Despite J and my best efforts to be organised, we neglected to get the sourdough underway in time for it to rise, and so in lieu of a loaf of sourdough, we made flat bread instead. S called it pain perdu which traditionally refers to French toast made from the forgotten end of a baguette; but seems appropriate in this situation also.

But it isn't the festive season without something delicious and rich, involving dried fruit and nuts. I remember spending this time of year travelling around India a couple of years ago, eating dal and chappati, Christmas spent in the desert with three camels and our guide for company. Just before the end of the year, in a different city, we came across a German cake shop. Devouring plate after plate of dark, alcoholic plum cake (it is amazing how much you can eat when you've been living off curried vegetables) - then it truly felt like Christmas.

This year we made panforte, and raspberry and ginger beer cake for our 'festive cheers'. The panforte was a last minute decision when we were trying to think of something sweet, gluten free, and delicious. Panforte is an ideal cake to make gluten free because it isn't meant to rise very much anyway.

panforte

1 cup almonds

1 cup hazelnuts

150 g flour - to make this gluten free, we used 75 g brown rice flour and 75 g buckwheat flour plus 1 tsp guar gum. 

100 g dried cranberries

50 g dried figs

50 g dried apple

50 g dried apricots

50 g dates

3/4 cup liquid honey

200 g dark chocolate

1/2 cup brown sugar

Roast the almonds and hazelnuts in a 200ºC oven. They will take 10-15 minutes. When they're done, vaguely bash them up or 'gently' blitz them in a food processor. I like them to be very roughly chopped, not too small.

Chop all the dried fruit. This is a somewhat arduous task but, bear with me, it's completely worth it. The fruit you use is also interchangeable - our recipe called for mixed peel but we decided to use apple instead. Raisins would be a good addition, as would prunes.. You can't go wrong with all these delicious ingredients. J also suggested a small amount of chilli which I think would be completely amazing but have not tried first hand.

Mix the nuts, flour, and fruit together in a large bowl. Melt the chocolate, honey and sugar over a gentle heat - you don't want the chocolate to seize up. When all the chocolate is melted, pour over the fruit and stir. Don't wait around too much, the warmer the chocolate/honey mix is, the easier it is to stir. Your arm might feel like it will fall off but it should come together in a really thick, sticky dough consistency. If not, add a very small amount of hot water.

Press into a round cake tin. The recipe called for one that had a 30cm diameter, but we used a 20cm one and it was thicker than usual but wonderful just the same. Bake at 180ºC for 40 - 60 minutes. It should be firm to press the top, and darker around the edges. Remove from tin and if you lined the tin with baking paper, remove as soon as possible - if it cools in the paper you will never get it off prettily. Try (but not too hard) to not eat all of it at once, although it's pretty amazing to eat warm. It's dairy free, gluten free (if you choose), and vegan (apart from the honey) so it's able to be enjoyed by people of all different dietary persuasions, and it's also quite good for you. Personally, I am taking panforte next time I go on a climbing/tramping weekend.

And now it's three days later since I sat in the airport and wrote the above in a sleep deprived state. It's good to be home, very very good as it always is to spend time at Mum and Dad's, spend time with my siblings, missing the other brother S who won't make it home this year (hi, love you!), spend time with Wellington-based friends, and being thankful for all the good surrounding us all. Hope you and yours have a merry and bright festive season. Thank you for reading these somewhat sporadic posts, and see you in 2014!

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title from simon & garfunkel - homeward bound

but I still say we're too old for clichés | chocolate guinness cake

It's always difficult to get back to blogging after an unexpected hiatus. It seems like my 'voice' fades away amidst the other things that can fill up a life, and I come back here and realise it's been a whole month since I've shared a recipe here.

Cake is one of those excellent things in life that are always unfailingly good. Many of my favourite memories centre around cake - of course, birthday cakes, and my grandma's famous pumpkin cake, my Dad's favourite - pink lady cake, the time me and my brother flooded the bathroom and we ate his birthday cake surrounded by shampoo bottles and wet cabinetry, apology cakes and numerous other cakes made at the infamous Flat F ..

This weekend has been an unexpectedly eventful one. I awoke to discover that my trusty bike had been stolen, but my luck turned when I just happened to meet a guy going to a sold out gig with an extra ticket, so I got to see the phoenix foundation. And such is the nature of Dunedin, I ended up in the front row dancing between two friends anyway.

So, whatever the reason: a "sorry your bike was stolen cake", an apology cake, a celebratory cake, this recipe fits the bill. It's a classy cake - not too sweet, and an interesting bitter chocolate flavour. An added bonus - your house will smell amazing as its baking. It's originally a Nigella recipe, so of course it's a classy cake. She's a classy lady.

chocolate guinness cake

250g butter

250mL dark beer - guinness if you like, or an interesting stout. The darker the better!

75g cocoa (preferably fair trade)

200g dark muscovado sugar

150g demerara sugar (or just white sugar if that's what you've got)

2 eggs

1 cup plain, unsweetened yoghurt or sour cream

1 teaspoon vanilla extract (I always forget this, and it's still delicious).

275g plain flour

2.5 teaspoons baking soda

250g cream cheese

1-2 cups icing sugar

lemon juice

Melt the butter and the beer in a saucepan on a gentle heat. Add the cocoa and both sugars - you could use 350g of plain white sugar but I like the taste of a really dark muscovado sugar better. Whisk the eggs with the sour cream/yoghurt and vanilla extract. If the butter is not too hot, mix in the eggs/yoghurt. In a separate bowl, mix the flour and baking soda. Make a well in the middle and gently mix the liquid a little at a time. Don't be tempted to save on dishes and add the flour to the saucepan. You will end up with lumps that are impossible to remove - I speak from experience.

Bake at 180ºC (350ºF) for between 40 minutes - 1 hour. The top will look a bit shiny but when it's done, you'll be able to prick the cake with a skewer and remove it clean. Let it cool before icing.

The icing is really just mixing the three ingredients together until you have a good consistency. The sweetness is the perfect match to the cake - but equally it's a delicious cake uniced. This cake freezes well, should you ever need to freeze it. I've taken it to potlucks before and I'm yet to find someone who dislikes it. 

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title from wilco - open mind

rollin' down the track again | jam drops for autumn

By no means am I the creator of this recipe I'm going to share with you today. Jam drops are something I'm sure my grandmothers would've made, something my own Mum made lots growing up, something I have that instinctual, familiar love of. Sometimes you have to question instinctual love - in the case of jam drops, you do not!

I made my first ever jam, using leftover redcurrants - the ones too squishy to use in this loaf - and raspberries. It made one large jar of sweet jelly-jam. It dripped off toast and was rather sweet - but it was good in unsweetened yoghurt. On the phone to Wellington, I told Mum about it. "Why don't you make jam drops," she said, "I'll send you the recipe." So, courtesy of Mum, potentially from the piece of paper I wrote the recipe out on as a 12 year old .. here's the recipe.

jam drops

200g butter

1/4 cup icing sugar

1 tsp vanilla

1 and 3/4 cups plain flour

1/4 cup cornflour

about 1/4 cup jam - I like berry flavours but I've made them with apricot jam before too.

Preheat oven to 170ºC fan bake.

Cream butter and icing sugar until pale and fluffy, then beat in vanilla. Add sifted flour and cornflour and mix until the mixture comes together. Mould dough into a soft ball and chill for 10-15 minutes.

Roll mixture into teaspoonful sized balls and place on a lined baking tray. Press an indent in the centre and fill with jam. Bake for 12-15 minutes until pale golden and set.

Note -

One of the key things with jam drops and other buttery biscuits is that you don't make them on a hot day or you try and keep the mixture cold. I made these on a day that felt freezing after summery temperatures - the butter was hard on the bench and the olive oil was going a bit cloudy (as it does when it's cold).

Another is to not fill the indents completely. A smaller amount of jam than you think will be sufficient! They will not look perfect but they will look rustically beautiful.

Our oven does not have fan bake and is usually cooler than what it says - so mine took longer to cook. We did 20 minutes at 180ºC and then 5 minutes at 200ºC.

This recipe made 16, but in retrospect I would make them smaller. They disappeared very quickly - and that was excellent, as with the amount of butter in the recipe makes these a definite treat food! 

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Hope you and yours have a happy weeekend! Around these parts I'm looking forward to a quiet Saturday night in, possibly involving scrubbing the bath. Sometimes I can be introverted like that - I think it's good to be a little introverted now and then.

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title from neil young - see the sky about to rain.