feature: la fête nationale - vanilla brûlée tart

There's only one thing that could make a crème brûlée more desirable. Crisp, golden pastry. Thanks once again to Bourke Street Bakery, I've found something I was previously lacking in my life, without even realising it.  This heavenly creation takes the concept of the classic French dessert, and enhances the experience by a delicious, dark and flaky pâte brisée, with a hit of tart strawberry puree. If you can't visit one of their bakeries to try the real thing, re-creating it at home is the next best thing.

Similar to their flourless chocolate cake, Bourke Street deliver a quite involved recipe. The benefit of this is in the results-- if you follow this recipe down to each detail, you really will come so close to their gorgeous creation, it will surprise you. It's not difficult, but takes patience and is really best if you start this more than 24 hours before.

Ingredients (makes 20)
Recipe adapted from Bourke Street Bakery: The Ultimate Baking Companion


For strawberry puree:
250 gms strawberries, washed and hulled
120 gms caster sugar
For crème brûlée:
720 mls pouring cream
1 vanilla bean, split lengthways
10 egg yolks
80 gms caster sugar

extra caster sugar, for burning

1 quantity pâte brisée (see recipe in BSB), used to line 20 8cm round fluted loose-based tart tins.

To make the srawberry puree, put the strawberries and sugar in a food processor and process until smooth. Transfer to a bowl, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate until needed.

To make the crème brûlée custard, put the cream into a saucepan. Scrape the seeds of the vanilla bean into the cream and add the bean. Bring to the boil over a high heat. As soon as it boils, remove from the heat and set aside to infuse to ten minutes.

Place the egg yolks in a large stainless steel bowl and use a whisk to combine. Add the sugar and continue whisking for about 30 seconds or until sugar has dissolved.

Pour the slightly cooled cream through a fine sieve, discarding the vanilla bean, the pour cream into the egg mixture, stirring well to combine.

Put the bowl over a saucepan of simmering water, making sure the base of the bowl does not touch the water, and continue stirring with a whisk for about 10 - 15 mins, or until the mixture is smooth and thick, scraping down the bowl regularly with a rubber spatula. It is important to keep stirring at all times or the mixture will curdle.

Remove the bowl from the heat and whisk briskly for about 2 mins to cool it quickly. Over the next hour, whisk mixture every ten mins until cooled.

Use a rubber spatula to clean the sides of the bowl thoroughly and place plastic wrap directly on the surface of the mixture, to prevent a skin from forming. Refrigerate overnight to set.

Follow direction in Bourke Street Bakery: The Ultimate cooking companion to prepare and bake 20 pastry cases.

To assemble tarts, spoon about 3/4 tsp of strawberry puree in the centre of the base of each tart shell. Pipe the custard into each shell with a piping bag fitted with a plain 1cm tip. You should slightly overfill each. With a small palette knife, scrape the custard to sit flush with the top of the tart shell. Refrigerate for 4 hours.

Sprinkle 1 tsp caster sugar onto the top of the custard and burn with a culinary blowtorch until caramelised.

I caramelised half of my tarts, saving the rest of the filled tarts in an airtight container in the fridge until needed, leaving them up to a few days. The pastry will soften but is still utterly delicious. If you caramelise all of the tarts at once, it's best to eat them fresh as the lovely crack of the brûlée will soften in the fridge over time.

You'll also have a hole lot of strawberry puree remaining, so you can half the quantity if you like, but it tastes delicious on just about anything and is a very handy thing to have in the fridge. You could also freeze and use for later, if you like.

Recommended baking soundtrack: Coralie Clément - Toystore.

feature: la fête nationale - french toast cupcakes

As much as I hate the term 'francophile', I love all things French, both stereotypical and otherwise. So, in celebration of Bastille Day this Wednesday 14 July, I'll be filling my button cake with a week's worth of french-inspired recipes! By saying 'french-inspired' I'm obviously leaving myself room to bastardise traditional signature dishes and avoid criticism about not being truly authentic. Please forgive me!

My first entry is definitely a perfect example of me disappointing the French, with a recipe that technically has little to do with France aside from its name. But with a name like 'french toast cupcakes' can you honestly blame me?

This recipe is adapted from a fantastic book by Xanthe Milton, otherwise known as Cookiegirl. 'Eat Me!: The Stupendous, Self-raising World of Cupcakes and Bakes According to Cookie Girl' features some positively original recipes, divided by season, for beautiful cupcakes and cookies-- her Halloween ideas are truly inspiration.

Ingredients (makes 12)
Recipe adapted from 'Eat Me!'

For cakes:
170 gms plain flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp salt
110 gms unsalted butter
225 gms granulated sugar
2 eggs
2 tsps vanilla bean paste
2 tsps maple syrup
50 mls milk

For cream cheese frosting:
165 gms butter, softened
165 gms cream cheese, softened
675 gms icing sugar, sifted
1/2 tsp cinnamon (or more, if you like)
brown food colouring

For french toast hearts:
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1 tsp vanilla
2 tbsps pouring cream
30 gms unsalted butter
4 thick slices brioche

ground cinnamon and icing sugar, to dust

Preheat oven to 180C. Place 12 paper cases into a 12 capacity cupcake tin.

Sift the flour, baking powder, cinnamon and salt into a bowl. Melt the butter and let it cool slightly.
In a large bowl, whisk the sugar and eggs together, then add the melted butter. Mix the vanilla, maple syrup and milk in a separate bowl. Stir the flour mixture into the egg mixture. Add milk mixture, and beat until well combined.

Divide the mixture evenly amongst the paper cases, filling each to be about three-quarters full. Bake for 20 mins until a skewer inserted into the middle of cakes comes out clean. Remove cakes from the cupcake tin immediately and allow to cool completely on a wire rack.

 To make the icing, beat the butter and cream cheese in the bowl of an electric mixer until smooth. Add the icing sugar, a third at a time, beating thoroughly after each addition. Add the cinnamon with the last of the icing sugar, and tint icing with brown food colouring to be a subtle, warm brown.

Using a piping bag fitted with a plain 1cm tip, pipe icing onto cakes.

For french toast, beat the eggs together with the vanilla and cream. Heat the butter in a non-stick frypan over a medium heat. When butter is sizzling, dip the brioche slices in egg mixture, the place in the pan. Cook the brioche for 2 mins on each side, or until golden and crispy. Dust with cinnamon.

Using a small cutter (I used a 4cm heart shape), cut 12 shapes from french toast. Place on each cupcake, and dust with icing sugar.

I intended to make my little french toast toppers into toast shapes, but this proved far too fiddly without a cutter.  Even without the french toast to top, these cupcakes still have a surprisingly beautiful french toast flavour. Best eaten as soon as possible, obviously!

Thank you to my dear friend Nicole for introducing me to this recipe.

Recommended baking soundtrack - Moriarty - Gee Whiz But This is a Lonely Town. 

bourke street bakery's flourless chocolate cake

Between my eleven co-workers, there are seven dietary requirements. Because of this, I'm always on the lookout for a good gluten free dessert recipe. Most of the time this means I'm relying on gluten-free flour, which though blows my options sky high, just doesn't work with all cake recipes; Layer cakes crumble too much when cutting, recipes with a heavy batter need a little something extra to hold it together, and those without a great deal of other flavourings or fillings have a slightly unexplainable aftertaste.

It seems my recent adventures in baking have been addressing some of my culinary fears. I find the idea of flourless chocolate cakes so much lovelier than they ever turn out to be. In theory, they perfectly address my need for a workplace-worthy dessert; Rich, wonderful either warm or at room temperature, and a decent shelf-life. But, I like my cakes high and proud, with perfect edges and a beautiful plateaued surface. The potential of a slightly sad, flat, shriveled and concave cake has always meant I steer well clear of flourless cake varieties. But seeing and reading about Bourke Street's recipe, and having tasted and baked a safe number of their other sweet treats, I had to give this a shot. Since then, I've made this cake twice in a mere week.

Ingredients (serves 12, generously)
Recipe from Bourke Street Bakery: The Ultimate Baking Companion

260 gms dark chocolate (55% cocoa), finely chopped
135 mls milk
40 gms full-fat yoghurt
4 eggs
105 gms caster sugar, for eggs
4 egg whites
160 gms caster sugar, for egg whites
135 ml (4 1/2 fl oz) pouring (whipping) cream (35% fat)
55 g (2 oz) unsweetened cocoa powder, sifted

Preheat the oven to 150C. Grease a 20 cm springform cake tin and line the base and sides with baking paper - the paper should come about 2.5 cm above the tin.

Put the chocolate in a large stainless steel bowl and set over a saucepan of simmering water, making sure the base of the bowl does not touch the water - the bowl must be large enough to hold the whole cake mix. Allow chocolate to sit over simmering water without stirring until almost melted. Remove from heat, mix until smooth.

Put the milk and yoghurt in a saucepan over medium-high heat and bring to the boil. Remove from heat. Don't worry, you should have a curdled milk mixture.

Put the eggs and the sugar for the eggs in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a whisk attachment. Whisk the eggs at medium speed for about 10 minutes, or until the mixture is very light and has doubled in volume. Set aside.

In another very clean and dry bowl of an electric mixer, whisk the egg whites to soft peaks, then slowly add the sugar for the whites, whisking until soft peaks form a shinny meringue. Be careful not to overwhisk. Refrigerate until needed.

Whisk the cream until soft peaks form. Refrigerate until needed.

You should now separate bowls of melted chocolate, curdled milk, whipped eggs, meringue, whipped cream and cocoa powder. Pour the curdled milk into the chocolate and use a whisk to mix it in, then add the cocoa and whisk to completely incorporate. Fold in the whipped eggs in three batches, making sure you completely incorporate the first batch before adding more. Don't be too concerned if you can still see streaks of eggs with the following batches. Lightly fold the meringue into the whipped cream, taking care not to knock out too much air. Fold this into the chocolate mix in three batches, making sure you incorporate the first batch before adding more.

Using a spatula, scoop the cake batter into the prepared tin and tap it twice gently on the bench to even out the mix. Bake for 1 hour 15 minutes to 1 hour 30 minutes.

Do not disturb the cake for the first 45 minutes of cooking, after which time you should rotate it to ensure even cooking. You may need to cover the top of the cake with baking paper and lower the oven temperature if the top of the cake is starting to brown, but it didn't come to this for me. Test to see if the cake is baked by gently placing your hand on top of it and wobbling it a little, you should feel that the cake has set through. Remove from the oven the allow to cool for about 30 minutes in the tin before removing the sides. When completely cool, slide the cake onto a serving plate, to serve. I finished it with a dusting of cocoa.

It is best to use a sharp fine-bladed knife to cut this cake. Have a jug of very hot water, dip the knife in, and leave for about 10 seconds to warm the blade through. Dry the knife on a tea towel before slicing. Repeat this process after every slice for a perfectly clean cut.

The cake can be kept at room temperature  in an airtight container for a couple of days, or in the fridge for up to five days. I usually prefer all chocolate cakes warm, but this one is honestly as good at room temperature. It can be freshened up by placing it in a 150C oven for about ten minutes. Best eaten with double cream.

So this cake isn't picture perfect. It's cracked and slightly weak at the knees, but I find its ugly character utterly charming. It doesn't hurt that it tastes like heaven, of course.

And please don't let the length of this recipe intimidate you. All techniques used are simple, you just have to be organised, with plenty of bowls and a patience for strictly sticking to the recipe.

Recommended baking soundtrack: Peter & the Wolf - Lightness.