Supermalt Cupcakes

/in , , , , , , /by

A recent blog post by friend Yoruba Girl Dancing about white people’s lack of love for Supermalt got me thinking. I love the taste of malt thanks to growing up with Veda bread and working in a diner as a teenager making malted milkshakes, so I don’t really mind Supermalt, although I do find it teeth-itchingly sweet. But having never sampled it until I moved to Brixton, it’s not really part of my repetoire and I would never buy it to quench my thirst. What about cooking with it instead?

I made these Coca-Cola cupcakes for my friend G’s birthday party a few weeks ago and was impressed by how easy they were to make and how incredibly moist and brownie-esque they were. I could see no reason why they wouldn’t work with Supermalt instead of Coke. Hopefully they’d be as moist as the Coca-Cola ones, but more like a cake crossed with Soreen…

The slight risk that they might just be disgusting meant I decided to make them over the weekend for a birthday party where I knew my friend C would be bringing some of her legendary lemon and blueberry cupcakes which would take the taste away if my baking experiment went awry!

The trickiest part of this recipe was finding a small enough amount of Supermalt. It tends to come in six packs and I had to go to several shops before I could get my hands on a single can of the stuff. Mission accomplished, I got cracking on the recipe. It is best to melt the butter, cocoa powder and Supermalt together first to allow it to cool slightly to minimise the chances of the egg curdling when you mix everything together. Out of interest, the amount of Supermalt (or Coke) required comes to about 2/3 of a normal can…

The Supermalt mixes takes about 5 minutes to melt and measuring out the rest of the ingredients does the same. Then you simply mix everything together, watching the batter going from thick and fudgy to soft and smooth by the time it is all mixed and combined. It’s one of the easiest cake recipes I know and it’s difficult to over-mix this batter so it’s a good one to do with kids. It’s also nice and thick for spooning into cases so great even if you’re a bit clumsy.

I used some new square cases from Ikea that are a cross between a bun and muffin case in size (and a rather fetching print to boot) and each one took two full dessertspoons of batter. Don’t overfill your cases with these cakes as they rise a fair bit and look better not overspilling the cases. Even with the slightly bigger cases, I got 18 cakes from this batter before popping them in the oven for about 25 minutes or until I remembered what was making the lovely baked smell in my flat…

While they were cooling, I turned my attention to making a frosting for the cakes. Last time I used the Coca-Cola buttercream suggested and found it to be incredibly sweet and a bit sickly even with a fizzy Cola Bottle for a touch of tanginess. This time I thought a cream cheese frosting would go down better. I combined two packs of full fat cream cheese with a splash of leftover Supermalt and two tablespoons of cocoa powder and found I had gone too much the other way and the frosting wasn’t sweet enough. In fact it had a bitter aftertaste that jarred somewhat. I abandoned the idea of adding more Supermalt and put a teaspoon of vanilla extract and about a tablespoon of icing sugar to sweeten it slightly and this time it was perfect. Light, creamy, slightly sharp and not at all cloying.

I left the cupcakes wrapped in a teatowel overnight and then my friend C very kindly frosted them for me the next day before I added a an extra blast of sharpness with some pomegranate seeds on top before serving them up to ravenous guests. And they went down a storm! I think they were much better with the Supermalt than the Coca Cola as they were less sweet and firmer and tasted more grown up with a bite of dark chocolate, but without losing the fudgy finish that sets these aside from the average chocolate cupcake.

If you manage to have any of these fabulous cupcakes left (I only had three) they also keep amazingly well wrapped in a teatowel to protect the frosting. They ultimately didn’t taste anything like Soreen cake, but were so good I’m glad I have a second spare can of Supermalt in the fridge to make these due to popular demand! Especially if I don’t have to go camping with them!

Beetroot and Cobnut Pesto

/in , , , /by

This weekend saw September’s Invisible Food Walk and the beautiful autumnal day brought much seasonal foodie inspiration. I eyed up some crabapples for a chili infused jam, noted where the sloes are in Brixton, marvelled at the abundance of elderberries and sampled some amazing vegan food at the post walk picnic.

One of these dishes was a vegan pesto made with beetroot greens and cashew nuts. I was too busy stuffing my face with it to ask what the umami element was since it definitely wasn’t parmesan. Whatever it was it was delicious and I lost out on seconds to a couple of the kids who were very taken with the colour and the flavour…

So when I picked my first crop of beetroot from the garden the next day to accompany the grouse Mister North and I roasted, I made sure to keep the lovely young tender leaves, stems and teeny tiny baby beets that hadn’t really reached full potential. I planned to pick up some pine nuts next day and make a pesto with them when I remembered Mister North had picked up some fresh Kentish cobnuts at the Farmers’ Market earlier that day. Why not use these seasonal treats to make the pesto instead of the more traditional pine nuts?

While the grouse was roasting, we stripped the outer husks and then popped the cobnuts in the oven at 180°C for about 20 minutes to roast them lightly before shelling them. This was trickier than it sounds. The shells are quite tough and the nuts quite soft and buttery in texture so it was almost impossible to get them out intact. Obviously this wasn’t a problem for pesto, but might have been if you wanted to serve them as nibbles.

Once the cobnuts were shelled (using a cleaver, chopping board and metal skewer), I blitzed them in the food processor along with the chopped beetroot leaves and stems and some rapeseed oil to get a chopped but well bound texture. Olive oil would of course work beautifully here, but I had run out and had to improvise a bit, although the rapeseed oil made this an even more fantastically seasonal British dish! I then added in some grated parmesan and a good grinding of black pepper to finish. Feeling very domesticated I put some of this gorgeously vibrant pesto into a pot for Mister North to take home and the rest in the fridge for me.

We both ate the pesto the next day. He served his stirred through fresh pasta for dinner and I had mine on oatcakes with a sliver or two of Pexommier cheese for lunch and we both loved it. Sweet and earthy, it tasted deliciously fresh compared to traditional basil pesto and the light smooth texture of the cobnuts made it especially creamy and quite light. It needed some extra pepper to lift it completely, but this was otherwise a real seasonal delight!


There’s no excuse to waste any beetroot tops you might have around, and don’t worry if you can’t get cobnuts. Pine nuts or walnuts would be equally lovely. Think pink this week when you’re picking up veg from the garden or the farmers’ market and make this fab pesto for a quick and easy meal!

In a pickle…

/in , , /by

Anyone who knows me in real life knows I have a bit of a gherkin habit. I am more than slightly obsessed by these nobbly bobbly warty little cucumbers spiked with a mouth puckering hit of vinegar and hopefully a lingering hit of dill. My idea of a treat is a jar of Krakus Pickled Dill Cucumbers and a fork in front of the TV of an evening. I suffer envy as green as a gherkin at the fact all sandwiches and burgers come with a pickle in the USA while we lag behind here. In extreme cases (ie: a hangover), I have been known to go to McDonalds and buy a double cheeseburger just for the gherkins, rather than the burger. It was therefore inevitable that I would have to try growing my own this year…

I got some Gherkin National seeds off Ebay since this is supposed to be an easy to grow variety that is perfect for pickling and planted five of the ten seeds in one of my raised beds in about mid May. I probably should have sprouted them indoors where it was warmer and less challenging for them as only one plant came up. It became quite tall quite quickly and drank up huge amounts of water but seemed to do very little in the way of producing fruit until one day last week when I looked at it again and discovered one little spiny gherkin nestled in under the leaves! I harvested it with intense pride and wondered how feasible it was to pickle one cucumber?

The famous gherkin!

Luckily though I brought it back over to Ireland with me to show off to my mum (and anyone else around) and discovered that she had picked some other smallish cucumbers at a friend’s house (along with the marrow) and it was a bit more worthwhile trying my hand at pickling a job lot of cukes. Being fairly new to this pickling malarkey and somewhat impatient to try the fruits of my labour while I was still in Belfast, I eschewed more traditional recipes that take around a month to mature and went for an overnight recipe I had picked up from a fellow commenter on an American website I read.

To make your own quick pickles, you can follow this recipe. Even with the cup measurements, it is very easy!

2 cups sugar
1 cup vinegar
1 tablespoon salt
1 teaspoon celery salt
1 teaspoon dill seed
8 cups cucumbers, sliced but not peeled. (This is approx. 4 large cucumbers, in my experience)
1 cup onion, sliced

1. Stir sugar in the vinegar until dissolved. Add salt, celery salt, and dill seed, mixing together.
2. Pour over cucumbers and onions.
3. Stir and push under liquid
4. Let stand for 24 hours, covered at room temperature
5. Put in jars and refrigerate.
6. No need to can, just keep in refrigerator. They will keep indefinitely.

NOTE: Even though it seems like you don’t have enough liquid at first, in several hours you will have enough liquid to cover the cucumbers!

In keeping with the pioneer spirit of making this most American of side dishes, I went off recipe a bit. My mum didn’t have any fennel or dill seeds in the house, so I used caraway and coriander seed instead for a similar flavour. There was no type of vinegar specified, so I used 2/3 cider vinegar and 1/3 malt vinegar to stop the pickles being too sharp. I also used a few shallots rather than an onion. They would also take crushed garlic or chili peppers very well if you fancy that.

It took about five minutes to chop, measure and stir everything together in a large plastic mixing bowl. I then covered them with a teatowel and a plate and literally forgot about them for two days while I was preoccupied with other things. When I came across them again they had released lots of liquid and were very well covered. The cucumbers looked more the texture of pickles than something served in an English sandwich and I was very pleased with the excellent looking results for such minimal efforts.

I bottled the majority of them in the leftover sterilised jars from the quince jelly and served those that were left over with a rather good steak sandwich using minute steak from The Well Hung Meat Company. And even if I do say so myself, the pickles were spectacular. Firm and juicy with an excellent crunch, they are quite a sweet pickle and the hint of caraway worked beautifully with the sugar. Accompanied by rare steak and black pepper they were perfect. Sweet, but sour at the same time and absolutely packed with flavour without the overpowering vinegariness that some commercial gherkins have. We loved them and have served them three or four times since with cold meats and cheese.

These are the easiest thing in the world to do and if you happen to have a few jars knocking about and access to some small homegrown cucumbers, preferably the warty knobbly less watery ones than you see in a supermarket, then you’d be a fool not to whip a batch of these up! Apparently they keep very well, but I doubt the rest are even going to see the weekend with me around. See you all at Gherkins Anonymous!

To-marrow never comes…

/in , /by

My courgette plants have been a disappointment, maybe even an embarrassment, this year with only four or five fruit to the same number of plants. All the recipes I collected to deal with my impending glut have languished unused. So I was beyond thrilled to visit the house of a friend of my mum’s this week and come home with two marrows instead! Two big bruisers of the vegetable patch, these mighty marrows cried out for a bit of retro style chic and simply demanded to be stuffed…

I decided that the thing that would rescue this dish from memories of soggy school dinners and rationing recipes was to use strong flavours and plenty of spicing. The sight of some leftover roast local lamb in the fridge from the previous night piqued my interest and I almost instantly decided on a sort of Middle Eastern inspired lamb, tomato and spiced couscous stuffing for my marrow. The possibility for strong flavours here made it unlikely that this stuffed marrow would be bland!

While the couscous was soaking, I stripped the remaining lamb from the bone, diced it and coated it in sumac for some zesty flavour. I added some cardamom, ras el hanout and anchovy sauce to the couscous along with a hefty grind of fresh black pepper and turned my attention to the marrow itself.

Unleash the beast!

This monster of the garden weighed about 2.4 kilos in total and took some serious wrangling to chop in half lengthways. I then hollowed out the seeds in the centre with a handy ice-cream scoop and trimmed the ends to make sure it fitted in my roasting tin before stuffing it full of the delightfully spiced couscous, studded with fresh tomatoes and juicy lamb. The tray was then wrapped in foil and popped in the oven at 200°C for around 35 minutes while I relaxed with a lovely glass of Sancerre.

Around half an hour later, I looked in the oven and realised that the marrow was nowhere cooked. In fact 35 minutes in the oven was a drop in the ocean for this behemoth. To help it along, I added two cups of water into the tin to help the marrow steam and bake at the same time and put it back in the oven for another 45 minutes.

Another glass of wine later and around 40 minutes after the marrow went back in, it was perfectly cooked. The skin was still firm, but the flesh inside was soft and easy to serve with a spoon without being watery or mushy. The couscous was slightly golden and crispy on the top and it all smelled delicious, but there was still the worry in my mind that even this extravagantly spiced mega-marrow would be as dull as this vegetable’s uneviable reputation.

First taste told me that my worries were were unfounded. The marrow itself was actually quite flavoursome, a bit like a slightly more tasty courgette. The texture was similar to swede (or what we Northern Irish and many Scots call turnip) with a firm but fibrous feel. It was less watery than turnip and a sweeter flavour, which worked well with the hints of rose petal and citrus in the couscous and was well complimented by the kick from the cloves and the black pepper. We ate one half of the marrow very quickly and both of us were happy to have seconds and thirds to finish it all up. My mum had been slightly sceptical about the forthcoming marrow-fest while it had been cooking as she remembered less than enjoyable marrow and ginger jam from childhood, but she seemed more than taken with this modern take on such a traditional veg.

So if your courgette glut gets out of hand and you end up with a massive marrow, don’t just dismiss them or bung them on the compost heap. Turn the oven on and stuff it to your heart’s content. I think lentils and fresh tomatoes would make a tremendous stuffing for this blank canvas of a courgette. Keep it veggie or add some coarse crumbled sausage meat if you fancy some porky goodness if you so prefer. Just don’t simply dismiss the marrow as something to be entered in a garden fete competition for oversized garden produce!

Baked eggs

/in , /by

Egg-tastic!

Miss South is doing some visiting for the next few days and rather than leave her housesitter* with a miserable looking selection of vegetable ends and a half empty egg box in the fridge, I decided to use up the various bits and bobs therein and make baked eggs and kale for dinner the night before departure.

The iron rich goodness of kale accompanies eggs just as well as spinach does in the classic eggs Florentine and this dish is like a more hearty, less tricky version of that classic. A bit of Googling to get the timings and temperature right on the eggs led me to this Jamie Oliver recipe with smoked fish and cream which would succesfully fill an egg and spinach shaped hole in your life if you can’t be bothered to make hollandaise. Being incredibly lazy after a day’s packing and cleaning, I opted to completely omit the creamy portion of the dish completely and stick to the basics of kale, eggs and anchovies to make a simple supper.

I sweated the kale down slightly with some butter and two or three chopped anchovy fillets until it was slightly softened, then added some tomatoes from the garden that needed using up to soften them a bit too. I then cracked the three remaining Burford Brown eggs from the fridge into the pan and popped the open pan into the oven at 180° for about 10 minutes…

I got slightly sidetracked for about an extra four minutes thanks to some high drama on Coronation Street, but when I got to the oven, the contents of the pan looked perfectly happy. The kale underneath the eggs was soft and tender, the tomatoes were just cooked enough to have the juice bursting out, but not enough to collapse. The kale on top was slightly crispy more like the wonder that are kale chips and the eggs were neatly swaddled by these lovely leaves, looking just perfectly set.

I scooped the whole panful out onto a plate, seasoned it well with pepper, but skipped the salt due to the anchovies and tucked in. It was delicious, light crispy kale tinged with salty savoury umami anchovies and soft creamy eggs merging together in sheer loveliness. The eggs were slightly less runny than I would have liked, but it was my own fault that they ended up a tad overdone. I’ll stick to no more than ten minutes in the oven in future.

Even with the slightly overdone eggs, this was a fantastic dinner. Quick, easy, cheap and only one pan of washing up to boot! It would be terrific with a bit of chorizo thrown in or some sausages or the smoked fish in the above recipe. In fact, it is just a fantastically adaptable recipe for any evening when you can’t quite be bothered to cook, but there’s a rather long queue in Sainsbury’s to buy a ready meal…

*the housesitter got left with two bottles of wine instead!