The question is then, what have I been up to? The answer, lots and lots of cooking! The weekend following my diploma finishing, my family had our annual August Bank Holiday barbecue. Dad handles the meat and fire (me man, me make fire, me cook...) and I handle the sweeter side of things. However, this time, I used my newly found baking skills and made a variety of breads including a rosemary and sea salt focaccia, white baguettes and a wholemeal bloomer.
They certainly went down well! With every barbecue/large food event such as Christmas and Easter, I strive to make a smorgasbord of orgasmic puddings. As many as possible. Plus then, Mum and I enjoy pigging out on the left-overs the next day. I made a total of eight puddings for about thirty people. They all went apart from a little bit! I made a white chocolate and honeycomb surprise cheesecake, elderflower and sparkling white wine summer fruit jelly, white chocolate parfait, refreshing fruit salad, plain and sultana scones, peach tart tatin, lemon tart and a sumer fruit pavlova. Unfortunately, my lemon tart cracked and looked more like the Grand Canyon than a tart. Boohoo! I overcooked it a little bit and it cracked horrifically. It tasted lovely though!
The next day, my friend Katie came over and we had a left over lunch, including a home-made pizza topped with mountains of cheese, torn beef burger, olives and rocket. The top of it was a little soggy- I like it like that, but it needed to be cooked a bit more. However, it was delicious! I still need to master my pizza cooking skills, but I hope that will come with practice.
I've also been tackling a key lime pie. I used a Jamie Oliver recipe which was quite good. Not as good as another recipe I've tried, but this one wasn't bad.
My friend Davey T came down to visit for a couple of days a few weeks ago and we showcased our cooking skills. We made a Hairy Bikers' recipe- Somerset Chicken which is not for those on a diet as it contains cider, a lot of cream and even more cheese! Absolutely delicious though. We tackled a baked alaska using jamaica ginger cake (one of my favourite sweet things to eat yum yum), vanilla ice cream, fresh fruit, an Italian meringue and a caramel sauce. It was fabulous, but the caramel sauce was just a little too sweet.
Davey T found a recipe online for 'sticky lemon rolls with a lemon cream cheese glaze' and we set out about making them for breakfast. The fundamentals of creating them are similar to chelsea buns which I was used to, as I made them at school, but with a little lemon zest added in. The rolling of the dough log to then be cut into rolls proved tricky as the filling was very wet. But we managed it. After letting them prove, we lovingly baked them. Once risen and golden, we drizzled the cream cheese on top, sprinkled on some lemon zest and then devoured them. They were absolutely delicious! The sticky filling had oozed down to the bottom of the tray and had been soaked up by the rolls as they baked so that when you bit into them you got an intense hit of lemony goodness. Fantastic! Not the healthiest thing to have for breakfast, but your taste-buds certainly won't be disappointed!
Cinnamon rolls with sultanas and a cinnamon icing
It was recently my 23rd birthday, so I decided to celebrate by making some calorific treats! I made a heart attack cake- a rich chocolate cake with a chocolate ganache icing with flakes, assorted Terry's chocolate orange segments and Thornton's chocolates. You could only have a small piece though as it was so rich, but oh so yummy. I also made some cinnamon rolls with a cinnamon icing for breakfast. I improvised with the recipe, using the lemon roll recipe and working around it. The experimental rolls weren't bad- needed to be a little gooey-er, but satisfying and tasty.
Then a few days later, it was my cousin's birthday, so I made him some orange birthday cupcakes with an orange buttercream icing and some decorated gingerbread men. Considering I've never made gingerbread before, they turned out pretty well.
So now what? I'm going to get moving and try and crack into the cooking world. Or at least become employed. I'm going to try and get some experience in a professional kitchen and see if I like it or not. From then I'll be able to decide what to do next. Maybe start out as a Commis chef? I'd love to package my own product. Hannah's puddings?! Maybe not that name but we'll see! Watch this space...
