rainbow cupcakes!

if you've been on pinterest at all in recent months, you know that rainbow cakes and cupcakes are all the rage. since it's sabin's 11th birthday tomorrow, i just had to jump on the rainbow bandwagon. today, we baked rainbow cupcakes to share with her class (thank goodness in denmark, it's still ok and even encouraged to bring homemade treats to school) and with our friends at the riding club. sabin's best riding buddy actually shares the same birthday, so it's even better!

i had been dutifully pinning rainbow cakes for some time, but was a little shocked to find that most of them called for a box cake (oh the horror!). i guess that would make it slightly easier, but honestly, when a scratch cake is as easy as it is, why on earth settle for box?

i found this recipe and modified it (of course) to fit my local ingredient availability (there's no such thing as self-raising flour in denmark) and the size of the eggs my chickens produce. it's also a remarkably small recipe, so i not only doubled it, i ended up making FOUR batches of the doubled version. i give you my revised rainbow cake here:

rainbow cupcakes

250 grams butter (i always used salted, but you can go with unsalted if you like)

1 cup of sugar (fill your 250ml measuring cup to the top, my metric friends)

5 medium eggs (fresh from under the hen if you can get 'em)

1 generous glug (that would be the technical term) of vanilla

2 cups flour (again, fill your 250ml measuring cup to the top if you're doing metric)

1/2 C (120ml) milk

2 tsp. baking powder

pinch of salt

cream the butter in your mixer, then add the sugar and further cream until it's smooth and light yellow. add your eggs, one at a time and then the vanilla. then add flour (+ baking powder and salt) and milk, alternating until they're well mixed.

separate into 5 smaller bowls to make red, yellow, green, blue and purple - i actually used two full batches for this, to have a good amount of each color and because i was making a lot of cupcakes. because i was making 60 cupcakes in total, i actually made four batches of the above recipe in total - but my cupcakes are pretty tall, so you could get more out of this recipe by putting less of each color in each cupcake.  but i started with combining two batches to get started. then, as we worked and realized it wouldn't be enough, we made another batch of batter and added to our existing colors - twice.

the original recipe gives how many drops you should add of food coloring. with the liquid food colorings that are available in denmark, these amounts were FAR too little. and adding red and blue together did not result in purple, but to our horror, an awful shade of grey. luckily, i had a stash of wilton paste colors and we got the beautiful vibrant hues you see here (only slightly enhanced by instagram on my iPhone). i HIGHLY recommend using the proper wilton colors - you only do a rainbow once in awhile, so go all out.  it's not THAT poisonous. :-)

once you've got five colors - put a spoonful of each into your cupcake papers. i started with purple on the bottom, tho' we experimented and tried it on top once, but it goes awfully dark and doesn't show how prettily purple it really is if it's exposed to the heat on top. my color order was purple, blue, green, yellow, pink. we also tried with yellow on top, but then they look a bit like an ordinary cupcake.  bake them 10-12 minutes at 180°C/350°F.

see how in the heat of the oven, the colors even out? tho' you can make them as messy as you like, it's really up to you. i really think you can't go wrong with this recipe.

as i write this, i haven't frosted them yet. but when i do, i will use my best and favorite white buttercream - the one that started with a cooked milk/flour combo and ends up a bit lighter than regular buttercream. sprinkles (rainbow of course) on top and we'll be good to go. i expect when i get home, it will be with an empty tray and a whole lot of these....

new nordic inspiration

"we do not stop the world when we eat, we go into it a little more deeply." - olafur eliasson

dandelion, nasturtium, seakale fruit and yellow beetroots

noma is the world's top restaurant. i've been reading their beautiful cookbook published by phaidon - NOMA: Time and Place in Nordic Cuisine by René Redzepi. (it's so wonderful that i actually had to use capital letters.) :-) i'm not sure i'll actually try make any of the beautifully photographed recipes, as they are very advanced and some require special equipment (liquid nitrogen, smokers), but i will be using some of the raw ingredients they use. and i simply i can't remember the last time i got so much pleasure and inspiration from a cookbook. it's completely sumptuous and very thought-provoking.

truffle dessert

noma is a combination of two danish words "nordisk" and "mad" - nordic food. they use only fresh, seasonal ingredients from scandinavia and the book explores the early days of the thinking behind the restaurant. rené and claus meyer (another purveyor of new nordic cuisine) went on a voyage of discovery around scandinavia - from the farøe islands to iceland to greenland to norway, sweden and back to denmark - to put together the thinking and the menu. the cookbook includes excerpts from rené's diaries of the trip and is an inspiration.

radishes in a pot

the notion that our diet should be composed of things that are available and seasonal in our surroundings is at once both retro and revolutionary. our ancestors surely ate like that, but we've become accustomed to the availability of tomatoes and strawberries year-round. we can have what we like, whenever we like, because it's there on our grocery store shelves. but what if we returned to seasonal eating? what we ate more root vegetables and cabbage in the winter and only ate tomatoes in the summer? what if we used wild plants from our forests and ditches? what if we ate more game? more fish? what if we were more closely bound to our surroundings in our diet?

pork neck, bulrushes, violets and malt

i heard on the radio that there's a study going on that's focused on new nordic cuisine and tho' they aren't finished yet, one early result has been that those participating have lost 3-6 kilos, which wasn't one of the goals - but more wild, lean meat like venison and more vegetables from the area instead of pasta and rice have had an effect.

dessert of flowers

it might initially seem that to use only seasonal, local ingredients is limiting, but once you start looking around, there is a bounty all around us. and we are left feeling more connected the world that we inhabit. as olafur elliason says in his introduction to the book, "Whether we like it or not, what we eat affects how the world looks. And that affects the way we understand it. When we look at a  plate of food, we should see the greater ecosystem too. If we find out where the food comes from and where it goes to, maybe this knowledge can be made into a different kind of flavor-enhancer. ... Food can be political. Food can be about responsibility, sustainability, geography and culture."

if you get the chance, at least borrow this book from your local library.

egg-cellent

i never really saw myself as a chicken person - oh yes, i eat it, but i never thought i'd have chickens myself. i remember being a little bit surprised when i visited bee and found she had chickens, tho' they were posh, with fancy feathery feet, so i decided it fit quite well with her home in the english countryside. but me? have chickens? no way. fast forward nearly two years and we have 12 - 3 proud little roosters and 9 hens. and they've begun to lay eggs (well, the hens have anyway). and now i think i won't ever be without chickens again. the pleasure of going out and gathering the eggs (we're getting 2-3 a day, as they've just begun) and even just watching them is not to be underestimated. chickens are funny little characters. and the eggs, oh the eggs. they're just about the most magical cooking ingredient of all, aren't they?

squash, sage & bacon soufflé

despite that they only lay 2-3 eggs a day, that rather quickly ends up being a lot of eggs. so i've embarked on making soufflés and other egg-related dishes (we already eat an omelette at least once a week because they're so easy on a busy schedule). i was a little worried the first time, but already with the second one, i started to get a bit creative.  and i can tell you that soufflés aren't nearly as temperamental as you've heard.

the first one i made, i used molly wizenberg's classic cheese soufflé recipe, which she adapted from one by julia child, following it pretty much to the letter.  it came out perfectly and gave me the confidence i needed - it didn't even threaten to fall, it was light and gorgeous and even stayed up after we had taken it out a bit early, spooned into it, discovered it wasn't quite done, and put it back in the oven. a very forgiving soufflé. and a great base recipe, which i gave an autumn twist last night.

cheesy sage and squash soufflé

2 T finely grated parmesan

1 C whole milk

2 1/2 T butter

3 T flour

1 C baked squash

1 small package of bacon, diced and fried to crispy perfection

4-5 fresh sage leaves, sliced into ribbons

6 eggs, separated

1 C grated cheese (gruyère or something similarly meltable is perfect)

salt and pepper to taste

cut a small squash in half and de-seed it. bake it in the oven with a lump of butter in the cavity, until it's soft and done. allow it to cool and spoon it out. i used a hokkaido squash and it resulted in about a cup (metric folks, just fill a 250ml measuring cup) of squash.  if your squash is larger, safe the rest for another purpose (an autumn soup perhaps?).

dice your bacon and fry it to crispy perfection, set it aside. just before it's done, throw the ribbons of sage into the bacon fat and allow the heat to crisp them and release the sagey goodness.  grate your cheese and set it aside.

separate your eggs. my eggs are still very small, so i used 6, if yours are the jumbo size from the grocery store, you can probably do with 3 or 4. molly's recipe calls for 4 egg yolks and 5 egg whites, but i used all of all 6 eggs with good result (and no waste). set your kitchen mixer to whipping the egg whites until they're glossy and have high peaks. reserve the yolks.

preheat your oven to 200°C/400°F. butter a ceramic soufflé dish and coat the buttered edges with the grated parmesan. this makes the most lovely outside crust, so don't skip this step. gently warm the milk in a pan.

in a heavy saucepan, melt the butter and add the flour, whisking to make a roux. cook it 2-3 minutes, stirring constantly, taking care not to let it brown, but getting rid of that raw flour-y taste. remove from the heat and allow it to stand for a minute. return it to the heat, add the warm milk and keep whisking it over the heat until it's very thick - this should again take 2-3 minutes. remove from the heat and whisk in the squash and the bacon and sage. whisking constantly, add the yolks one at a time. set the mixture somewhere to cool to room temperature. season with salt and pepper to taste.

once the mixture is cooled, fold in a good-sized dollop of the egg whites and gently mix it to lighten up the yolk mixture. then gently fold in the rest of the whites and the grated cheese. transfer immediately to your prepared soufflé dish and pop it into the oven immediately. bake it for 25-30 minutes, taking care not to open the oven during at least the first 20 minutes. it's done when it's golden brown on top and has just the slightest jiggle visible in the middle. serve it immediately with a simple salad.

our salad consisted of a box of mixed leaves, diced cucumber, some of the last of the garden tomatoes, diced and the popping, ruby seeds of half a pomegranate. i made a simple creme fraîche dressing to accompany both the soufflé and the salad - just with a bit of chopped, fresh sage and some garlic pepper. it didn't last long, as you can see.

be adventurous, make a soufflé for dinner tonight. i guarantee it will impress your family and friends.

a berry good year

red currants (and proof that there was the occasional bit of sunshine this summer)

our rainy, cool weather this year was a boon for the berries. our strawberry season lasted a month and the red and black currant bushes were loaded with berries that i made into bottles and bottles of cordial for the winter. the blackcurrant cordial might be the best one of them all, tho' the more recent one i've made of elderberries is a close second.

blackcurrants

berry cordials

4 cups (1 kilo) of berries (red currants, blackcurrants, strawberries, raspberries, gooseberries, elderberries)

2 cups sugar

if you want to give it some zip, add some slices of fresh ginger root, or throw in a vanilla bean. i also mixed them occasionally - red and black currants together. strawberry and rhubarb (it's a classic), tho' i kept raspberries and elderberries alone, because they're so outstanding on their own. the elderberries have the faintest undertone of their spring version - the elderflower, but with layers of autumn on top. mixed with hot water and a dash of vanilla vodka (see below), they make a gorgeous, warming drink, for a nippy but clear autumn day.  i made several batches using honey instead of sugar, since we've also got our own bees and i had a lot of honey on hand - the result was a deeper, more complex cordial. 

autumn raspberries - they produced from august - october!

elderberries

"rumtopf" - with vodka, red currants, black currants, strawberries and sugar

i've been throwing a handful of whatever berry is in season into this jar and topping it up with vodka all summer  - it will make a lovely fruity tipple come christmas time - filled with the echoes of summer during that dark time of year. all you do is take a cup of organic sugar, all the berries you have at hand and keep them covered with vodka. whenever you add more berries, if they're not submerged, add more vodka. this one was started in june and i added the last berries in october (photo from the beginning). you can also use rum (hence the name - rumtopf), but we're vodka drinkers around here, so that's what we used.

black currant cordial

the cordials can be mixed with fizzy water for a sparkling drink. they're great with white wine or a dash of vanilla vodka. they can be quite tasty with lemon schweppes. they're also just fine with plain water - hot or cold, depending on your weather.  the limits are only those of imagination.

thanks to my buddy chris, who is a co-contributor over on the sustainable life blog, i ventured into making my own vanilla vodka. she was making vanilla extract and i've got a batch of that going as well, but decided to make some vanilla vodka for drinking as well - it tastes more natural than the absolut version. it's a very nice companion when you're using these cordials as the base for a cocktail. if you check eBay, you can find great prices on vanilla pods in bulk - i got 30+ for €11 including shipping. speaking of which, it's time to order them again, in preparation for winter baking.

green hummus and a garden bounty pasta

the garden is winding down, but it has been a bountiful summer - borlotti beans (that's the red pods here), tomatoes, small delectable aubergines, tasty cucumbers (so much more flavor than the store-bought kind), artichokes (none visible in this photo), small succulent squash, broad beans and autumn raspberries coming out of our ears for more than a month. the bounty from the garden has been so good that it's almost turned us vegetarian without any effort (tho' we haven't given up bacon - can one be a bacon-tarian?).

with tomatoes and cucumbers as plentiful as they've been, we've tossed them together with feta or mozzarella and a bit of olive oil and balsamic vinegar and some fresh, chopped parsley (it's been a good year for parsley with all of the rain we've had) or sometimes mint for salads nearly every night.

but the real revelation has been a nigel slater-inspired broad bean hummus. we've experienced the entire spectrum of the broad bean...from tiny little green and nearly pealike ones, to the large mature kind that you have to boil and then peel away the grey outer husk before pureeing them into a delicious green hummus.

green hummus

20-25 large broad bean pods (these may be called favas in the US or hestebønner in denmark)

2 cloves garlic

1 big spoonful of tahini

salt & freshly-ground pepper

olive oil

handful of parsley or mint

shell the broad beans - it should result in a generous cup or so (you don't have to be that exact), boil them in salted water until they're tender (about 20 minutes). drain the water, allow them to cool and remove the greyish outer covering (it comes off easily after boiling). throw the beans into your food processor with the garlic, tahini (nigel doesn't use tahini in his, but i liked it better with tahini - it gives it that hummus kick that it otherwise lacks) and the herb of your choice (sometimes we wanted the freshness of mint, sometimes the brightness of parsley - use whichever, according to your mood), add a generous sprinkle of salt and a good glug of olive oil. whirr it up in the food processor. if it doesn't go smooth, add more olive oil until it's a smooth, hummus-like consistency. serve it with freshly-baked bread. 

if you make a simple chopped tomato, garlic, basil mixture with a bit of olive oil and balsamic for bruschetta, you'll have a meal with simple ingredients from the garden paired with a loaf of bread lovingly baked. 

i made this at least once a week, all summer long. the beans give you the protein you need so you don't have to eat meat. it refrigerates well and tastes even better the next day, once the garlic and tahini have melded with the broad beans. 

*  *  *

very often this summer, i would wander out to the garden around 5:30 or so, with nothing much in mind for dinner. the day i gathered the veggies you see above, i brought them in, washed them and just started chopping, not sure where it would take me. 

garden bounty pasta

handful of borlotti beans

125g bacon

1 small onion, diced

2 cloves of garlic, minced

1 small aubergine, diced

1 small zucchini/courgette, diced

handful of swiss chard leaves, chopped

2-3 small/medium tomatoes, diced

salt & pepper

chili (optional)

chopped, fresh parsley (or oregano or marjoram or basil if you have it)

1 package linguini (or spaghetti or shells or whatever pasta you like).

freshly grated parmesan to garnish

boiled up the pretty pink-spotted borlotti beans and crisped up some chopped bacon with some onion and garlic while they were boiling. add the diced aubergine and zucchini (courgette) squash. when the beans are done, drain them and turn them in the bacon and veggie mixture. boil up some fresh linguini noodles, or whatever pasta you have on hand would be fine. once the pasta is nearly done, add some chopped tomatoes and chopped swiss chard to the vegetable mix at the last minute, so that the tomatoes are just warmed, but keep their structure and the chard wilted, but retains its green brilliance. salt and pepper to taste and it is ready to serve over the pasta. garnish with freshly chopped parsley and fresh parmesan. you could also sprinkle some toasted pine nuts on top if you had some on hand. 

this became a fast favorite and has also been on our table, with slight adjustments for what veggies were ready, for much of the summer.

if you don't have a garden, just visit your local farmer's market or the fruit and vegetable counter of your local grocery store, and see what's in season.

baking for bunnies (and horses)

somehow, we've ended up with four pet rabbits at our house.  and it occurred to me that i was spending a small fortune keeping them in bunny treats. and then one day, i tried to read the ingredient list on the bunny treats i've been buying in the pet store and i got a little concerned when i saw vague words like "cereals" and "derivatives of vegetable origin" not to mention a big list of preservatives. i realized that i was paying a premium for something that probably wasn't all that great for our bunnies.  so i decided to try making some treats for them myself.

whole grains, lots of nuts and plenty of fresh carrot, with a bit of honey and some sunflower oil were thrown together in my mixer and baked. the first batch i made was a bit more cookie-like in form. before i could tell him they were for the bunnies, husband accidentally ate one, thinking they were healthy cookies. they're a bit boring to humans, since i kept the honey minimal not to make them too sweet for bunnies. for the second batch, i decided to make them smaller and more treat-shaped. and i also realized that our horse would love them, since they're full of things she likes too - oats and carrots. i will not be buying the iffy and expensive kind in the pet store anymore. 

bunny/horse treats

2 cups oatmeal
1/2 cup honey (from our own bees, of course)
1 cup graham flour
1 cup plain white flour
2 large carrots, grated
1/2 sunflower oil
1/3 cup flaxseeds
1/3 cup sunflower seeds

mix it all together in the mixer and add enough water to bring it to a thick cookie-type consistency (i'm not sure how much water i added, as i didn't measure that...maybe about a 1/2 cup).

spread it out in a baking pan and bake it at 180°C/350°F for 20 minutes (not all the way). remove it from the oven and slice it into "treat size", then pop them onto a cookie sheet and into the oven and bake another 20 minutes or so.  voila. happy bunnies and horses.

our pets mean a lot to us, so it only makes sense to me to give them quality food, just like i would my family.

marshmallows & nutella: homemade stylie

it's been raining this week (again, again) and watching the news this week has been positively depressing - riots all over england, stock markets down, people starving in africa. i found myself in need of comfort. escape. something sweet.

so i decided to make nutella. and when that didn't feel like enough, i also made marshmallows. the nutella is good, but not yet The Business, but the marshmallows? fluffy clouds of heaven, i tell you.  i found the nutella recipe via instructables.com, but strangely, the site is down as i write this, so i can't give you the original link. and, as usual, i didn't entirely follow it anyway, so i'll give you what i did and you can check instructables later (i'm sure it's temporarily down).

chocolate-hazelnut spread (ala nutella) - take 1

250 grams hazelnuts (about 1 cup)

250 grams good quality dark chocolate (i actually used a combo of dark and milk because a certain someone in this household doesn't like dark chocolate and she's the primary consumer of this in this house)

1 can of sweetened condensed milk

a pinch of salt

a drizzle of good quality sunflower oil

toast the hazelnuts in the oven for about 10 minutes at 180°C/350°F (watch them, as you don't want them to burn). put them in the food processor and whiz them up as fine as you can get them. add a drizzle of sunflower oil to help it out. this is where i think the recipe i followed was off...i found it very difficult to get the hazelnuts ground finely enough in my food processor - next time, i might try a coffee grinder.  but my advice is, grind them longer than you think.

while they're grinding, place the chocolate in a double-boiler and melt it over medium heat. once it's melted, stir in the salt and the sweetened condensed milk and mix it well. once they're smooth and the nuts are as finely ground as you can get them, tip the chocolate into the nuts and whizz it up in your food processor until it's smooth and creamy. if you think the texture isn't quite right, you can add a drizzle of sunflower oil. 

this made two and a half half liter jars. i sterilized them, but am keeping them in the refrigerator, as i'm not sure about how well they'll keep. they taste delicious, but the texture isn't exactly nutella-like. it's not smooth enough. on the other hand, it has a much more hazelnutty depth to it and i actually like it quite a lot better than the real thing. i'm not done, tho' i'm trying to perfect this, so expect me back with further experiments on this front.

and now onto the marshmallows, which worked far beyond expectations. my recipe comes from karen solomon's jam it, pickle it, cure it, tho', of course, i adjusted the gelatin because it comes in leaves here and not in powdered packets.

marshmallows

2/3 cup of water

6 leaves of gelatin (or 3 envelopes unflavored gelatin)

1 cup of sugar

1 cup of light syrup

pinch of salt

1 tsp vanilla extract

confectioner's (powdered) sugar

coat a medium-sized pan (8x8 or 9x6) in vegetable oil and generously coat with powdered sugar.

combine the gelatin and 1/3 cup of water in the bowl of your stand mixer.

meanwhile, mix the other 1/3 cup of water with the sugar and light syrup in a medium saucepan. whisk them until they the sugar is nearly dissolved. place it over a medium heat and without stirring (this is the bit i couldn't believe, but it's really true) heat it up to 115°C/240°F. use a candy thermometer. it takes about ten minutes. don't be tempted to stir, the bubbles will effectively stir it as it begins to boil. 

once it reaches the correct temperature, remove from the heat and pour it carefully into the gelatin mixture in your mixer. turn it up to medium-high, add vanilla and mix until it becomes fluffy white and stiff. this takes about 10-12 minutes (tho' if it's humid, it could take longer).

pour them into the prepared pan and allow them to set for at least an hour. then slice them into bite-sized squares and roll them in powdered sugar (or cocoa or flaked coconut) and enjoy. our weather is a bit humid and i'm keeping them in the fridge, as they seemed a bit soft. i think in normal, dry weather conditions, they'd stay firm and lovely and you'd even be able to toast them over the coals like you would a store-bought marshmallow. but actually, they're just perfect as they are...sweet, fluffy, light and melt-in-your mouth. i will definitely be making them again.