Thursday 28 July 2011

No bake Plazma Cake

You need:
250 g butter + 3 Tablespoons of sugar, 600g Plazma Biscuits (ground), 200g ground almonds, 100g ground hazelnuts, 4 eggs, 1 can of Fanta (room temperature)

Optional for the top: slivered almonds (like in the photo) or you can cover it with whipped cream.

Mix the butter and sugar till it’s pale and airy, and set aside. Beat the eggs with a mixer, and then start folding them into the butter mix. Start adding the Fanta, bit by bit, as well as all the nuts and biscuits, till you get a firm mixture which you can shape with a spatula, (you may find you will not need to use all of the Fanta).

Turn the mixture onto a serving plate and shape it into a cake form. Finish it with the almonds if desired, and refrigerate for at least 4 h before serving. Alternately, serve cold with cream and a good coffee.


Plazma biscuits are an award-winning product of Serbia, and are an institution unto themselves! They are as Serbian to the Serbs as Vegemite is to the Aussies. They really can't be substituted for other biscuits as they have a distinct toasted flavour.
Plazma are also known as Lane biscuits in export markets.

Fortunately, you can find them in continental specialty food stores, or online
here at Amazon.com.


Tuesday 26 July 2011

Marshmallow Salad



This has to be one of the simplest desserts, which is great in summer but proves to be a crowd-pleaser all year round. It can be made the same day, or a day ahead.

Ingredients:

500g tub of Sour Cream (use "Lite" if preferred)
1 or 2 large bags of marshmallows
1 small can mandarin segments, drained
1 medium sized can crushed pineapple, drained.

Method:

Tear all the marshmallows in half and dump in a large bowl. Empty the sour cream into the bowl, along with the can of drained mandarin segments, and crushed pineapple.

Mix well, and cover with cling film and refrigerate. When chilled, spoon into small bowls, glasses or rammakins, and serve.

For best results, refrigerate overnight, so the marshmallows become soft, fluffy and mousse-like in consistency.

Enjoy!

Sunday 24 July 2011

Banana Cake

Cake Ingredients:
125g butter, 175g sugar, 2 eggs, 2 soft and mashed banana's, 1 tsp bic. soda, 2 tbsp boiling milk, 1 tsp baking powder and 225g flour.

Cream the butter & sugar, add eggs and mashed banana's and set aside.
Bring milk to boil and add bic. soda and add it to the creamed butter/sugar mix.

Add flour and baking powder, mix all, and pour in the cake tin. Bake on 180 C for 20 min. Cut the cake through the middle horizontally and fill with cream and sliced banana.

Icing:
50g butter, 1/4 cup of cream cheese, 1/4 tsp vanilla essence, 1 cup of icing sugar and juice of 1 lemon.
Mix all ingredients together and ice the cake on top, I also use icing in the middle of the cake instead of cream as an alternative to cream.

And here is now why I am not making this cake. We are living in Perth and due to the flood or cyclone in Australia the prices of bananas are huge!!!
So here is the photo of how much you have to pay minimum for bananas in Perth $12-18 or 9-14 Euros!!
No cake for us!!


Thursday 21 July 2011

BLUEBERRY MUFFINS

1/2 c. Butter (or 113g), 1 cup of sugar, 2 eggs, 1 tsp. vanilla, 1 cup of sour cream

2 cup of all purpose flour, 1 tsp. baking powder, 1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. nutmeg, 1/4 tsp. salt, 2 cups of blueberries, 3/4 cups of chopped nuts

1/8 tsp. more nutmeg & 2 tbsp. sugar to sprinkle on top.


Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Cream butter and gradually add the cup of sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs and vanilla. Fold in the sour cream.


Combine the dry ingredients and gradually blend into creamed mixture. Fold in blueberries and nuts. Fill 2 1/2 inch paper-lined muffin cups half full.


Combine the 2 tablespoons sugar and 1/8 teaspoon nutmeg, sprinkle over the batter in the muffin cups. Bake 20-25 minutes.

Wednesday 9 March 2011

Raspberry chocolate tiramisu

YOU WILL NEED:


250g good-quality milk chocolate, broken into pieces
3 punnets (450g) raspberries
2 tbs icing sugar
1/3 cup (80ml) Frangelico(optional)
4 eggs, separated, plus 1 extra eggwhite
125g caster sugar
250g mascarpone cheese
2 cups (250-450ml) strong black coffee
3 large sponges or savoiardi fingers
Cocoa powder, to dust

Place chocolate in a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water (don't let bowl touch the water) until chocolate melts, then remove bowl and stir chocolate until smooth. Cool slightly.

Set aside a quarter of raspberries, then place remainder in a bowl with icing sugar and 2 tbs frangelico (or similar - this is optional). Leave to macerate until needed.

Using electric beaters, beat egg yolks and caster sugar in a large bowl until pale and thick. Beat in the mascarpone, followed by the cooled chocolate. Using a clean bowl and beaters, beat eggwhites to stiff peaks, then fold into chocolate mix.

Place coffee in a dish and dip half the sponge fingers (or sponge cake) briefly in mixture, then layer in a cake tin or (if you use saviardi) then 2-litre (8-cup) dish, trimming to fit in a single layer. Spread half the chocolate mixture over sponge, then top with macerated berries. Dip remaining sponge in coffee mixture, then layer on top of berries, followed by remaining chocolate. Cover and chill for 4 hours.

Dust liberally with cocoa and garnish with reserved raspberries to serve.


Monday 15 February 2010

Making No-Knead Bread

This is my favourite way of making bread. Its very simple, and reminds me of when I was a kid and my grandmother would bake them in the outside oven (pizza oven) and always make 6-10 at a time. The bread is soft and moist inside but crusty on the outside. You can see on the video what they use, but I just adjusted the recipe to my conditions and I just baked it in a normal pot with a lid. Here on the photo you can see my bread.


















YOU WILL NEED:
Baking flour, fresh yeast, salt, water.

METHOD:

Original recipe on youtube:


Hope you will like it.