2014 A to Z Blogging Challenge - E is for Elderflowers - Elderflower cordial recipe & elderflower recipe roundup

I look forward to the new elderflower season like some look forward to the new football season!

Elderflower haul - last of the season 2007

Round here there are elderflowers growing everywhere from May - June: such a short season. But if you're clever the season extends - if you know the microclimates. Within a 20 mile radius the season changes by a few weeks depending on microclimate & land height. There's a secret place I picked the ones above when all the others everywhere had finished.
Don't pick directly after rain
Same as berries don't pick directly after rain - it takes away all the flavour and because they're wet they go off much faster. As I was driving to pick these I was beating the rain clouds in the distance. It just started raining as I was finishing picking, so I walked back in the rain. Tell you what though - smelled so amazing as I drove back - nature's perfume! Another time I stopped in the middle of a road near Bath at 11pm at night with the van lights lighting the elderflower crop that I was harvesting... not sure what the odd driver that went past must have thought!......

Discolouration
Elderflowers discolour (go brown) with age & also when cooking. Add lemon as I did with the elderflower liqueur below or citric acid to avoid the discolouration.

Storage
The elderflower season is so short! That's why we make cordial, liqueur, sorbet, etc. But you can also make the elderflower poaching liquor that I use for the elderflower poached chicken & salmon below and freeze that in batches to use over the following summer months.

Elderflower liqueur - you can use gin or vodka as a base. Go on try it! 

Elderflower cordial recipe

This is a ancient recipe from my friend's recipe vault - many times tested and approved!

20 Elderflower heads

2 kg Sugar

1 litre boiling water

80g Citric acid

2 lemons & 1 orange zested and sliced

1. Add sugar to the boiling water and stir till dissolved.

2. Add lemon and orange zest and slices.

3. Place elderflowers into a deep container. Pour over the sugar/ lemon/ orange mix.

4. Cover and leave for at least 12 hours.

5. Sieve and strain through muslin bag to clarify. Pour into sterilised bottle. 

6. Place in a very safe place that nobody else knows about - or they won't last long!

Elderflower roundup

Elderflower turkish delight

Use the elderflower cordial above to make this turkish delight. But put the cordial in at the beginning not the end like the first time I made it - it sets firmer this way!

Chicken poached in elderflower - a Broadway classic from 2007. We have also often done a similar version with salmon. 

Elderflower and prosecco jelly

A popular choice on the assiette of dessert:

Assiette of desserts from 8 days ago with elderflower and prosecco jelly centre stage

Elderflower liqueur 

This particular one was a 2009 vintage - definitely time to make it again!

Elderflower fritters! 
Here's a link to these. I made them at one of her supper clubs I was helping at - literally walked out of the front door to pick the elderflowers and back in the kitchen to fry them off - couldn't be fresher!

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2014 A to Z Blogging Challenge - C is for Caffè Affogato & Carrot and orange cake

"Is there a dessert deli round the corner or something?" asked one of the guests at the Italian themed birthday dinner I cooked for last Saturday near Fossebridge. They couldn't understand how so much can come from one kitchen in such a short time while I was cooking and serving on my own. Magic.

Assiette of desserts with caffee affogato (left), prosecco and berry jelly (middle), tirimisu (right), then 2 non-Italian style desserts (it was their choice after all!) apple tarte tatin (hiding at the back and millionaires shortbread at the front.

Affogato al caffè to be precise. Affogato means drowned in Italian, so this is literally vanilla ice cream drowned in coffee. Now I'm thinking how good would this be with Baileys ice cream? Or whisky and honey ice cream?








Ice cream recipe - vanilla

Need an ice cream recipe for the affogato? Try this one (re-posted from the recent pistachio ice cream)

There are 2 routes you can go down with ice cream - the custard based route or the Phildelphia style (without egg - not because it contains Philadelphia cheese) route. I much prefer the Philadelphia version for my events - saves so may problems with pregnant guests, who, although I would use pasteurised egg still are wary of eating it.  Better safe than sorry!
I use the Philadelphia ice cream recipe from the book (now fallen apart at the spine) that I got in '95 - the summer I'd finished A levels and tested many of the recipes during that summer with the fruit from our garden - Ices: The Definitive Guide.
These days you can use vanilla paste (see rigtht) rather than infusing & scraping vanilla beans - faster & cheaper & tastes very good! Make your own vanilla essence is coming up on the A to Z letter 'T'.

To make another type of ice cream you can miss out the vanilla and add something else using the same recipe - fruit puree for example or another of my favourites is a ginger version - add ginger wine (about 150 ml) and chopped stem ginger.

375ml   Milk
50g      Caster sugar
125ml  Condensed milk
250ml  Double cream
Pinch of salt
1/4 - 1/2 tsp vanilla paste to taste.

1. Heat a small bit of the milk in a pan with the sugar till the sugar melts, then take it off the heat to cool. No point putting all the milk in - just takes longer to cool down, so longer time till you can start making ice cream. 

2. Add all  the remaining ingredients with the sugar/ milk and mix together till combined. 

3. Churn in the ice cream machine. If you don't have an ice cream machine there is a link to still freezing method here. 

Should make 1 litre. 

Italian meat and cheese sharing platter starter at the Italian themed birthday meal near Fossebridge

Had to use this board they had at the house for the feta and grape  foccacia

C is also for Carrot and orange cake. Another recipe I purloined for one of our lunch parties from The Ginger Bread Lad's blog - see recipe here. I left Shawn icing this & grating zest on top while I was doing something else.... think he got carried away. Sure tasted of orange though!  

Related posts:

Caramel (Millionaires) shortbread

Tarte tatin

Other cakes we have made

Pineapple tarte tatin

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Blueberry and passionfruit cheesecake

So as I was looking through old food pics for the April A to Z challenge I found this from 26 November 2011. Nice biscuit base, blueberry and white chocolate filling and passion fruit topping. The topping on a cheesecake can change anything!

Passionfruit cheesecake

I use my basic recipe here - but with this one leave out the lemon zest - orange zest might go well though. You can change the cottage cheese for quark, marscapone etc. You can also add in white chocolate - in which case reduce the amount of cornflour.

For the jelly topping:

Scoop out 3 passionfruit
Mix with c. 200 mls passionfruit juice
Heat.
Soften 3 leaves gelatine in cold water. Add to warmed passionfruit and allow to melt. Stir and pour on top of cooked & chilled cheesecake. Set in fridge - needs to be absolutely level or it can end up with some patchy bits not covered, while other parts have thick jelly. This can rectified by making another jelly topping and setting a second layer on top.

Related posts

Amaretti and milk chocolate cheesecake
White and dark chocolate marbled cheesecake
Black forest cheesecake
Goats cheese cheesecake with strawberry granita
Raspberry and ricotta cheesecake
Strawberry and mango cheesecake

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Pimms jelly (trial)

When you have extra pimms jelly..... try out another way of serving (above). Would look quite good once it's dressed up. Makes a difference to the shot glass version which is popular for a summer assiette of desserts...

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Elderflower and prosecco jelly.

Apparently I made these 518 days ago - a lifetime ago, but only if you measure in terms of food.......

Amazing the amount of food you can make in the space of a few years - had completely forgotten these - has to go on the assiette of desserts menu!


Just been sifting through the old twitpics while I'm doing a few quotes and turned up so many things I'd forgotten about. It gets so busy so much never makes it to the blog. Anway - used this recipe - something the clients for that party had asked for specifically. I'd kept seeing it on blogs - like this one, so it was good to actually make it (with my own homemade cordial naturally!)

Related posts

Homemade elderflower liqueur

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1001 Kitchen Tips #67 - Mulled wine tips

Hey look at the time - it's mulled wine o'clock!

Mulled wine - is there anything better to warm you up on a winter's day. Well ok maybe hot chocolate with brandy - but that's another story.

Here's some mulled wine tips I've learned from the expert:

• Numero uno - don't buy those mulled wine spice packs - waste of money. A small amount of spices which you've most likey already got in your store cupboard and an extportionate price because they're brought for presents. Also the spices in the 'mulled spice packs' are normally quite dull in flavour - just use the whole spices in your cupboard.
• Sugar - Mulled wine must contain sugar for complete cold weather salvation. I've often tasted some that other people have made - too sour. It should be warming - like sweet tea. Demerara sugar is best  - bit more flavour than white sugar. Alternatively add honey.
• Secret ingredients? Add a few glasses (or more) of port to your mulled wine. Not only deepens the colour, but also the richness. Gives your mulled wine much more life. 
• Additions - it's all about the additions! We're talking additions of the spirit variety here. Brandy is a starting point - adds a kick. Or calvados adds a similar kick but appley flavour. Also sloe gin gives it another great dynamic. The one I made above contained Cointreau and Creme de cassis. I tried another version with ginger wine last year - very good. 
• Never boil mulled wine - apart from boiling of the alcohol you also dull the flavours - and that's what it should be about
• Tastes even better the day after! If you can manage to leave it alone overnight, cover with cling film and let it infuse. Warm up the next day and it has even more flavour.
• Don't through the fruit away! If you've simmered apples & oranges in the mulled wine to give it flavour let them infuse in it overnight. The next day they make a great dessert with greek yogurt.

Mulled wine recipe - well this is the one I made yesterday at least. Next time probably different.

Red wine - I used 1 1/2 bottles

Port - I used about 1/4 bottle?

Cointreau - few generous glugs

Creme de cassis - few generous glugs

3 Satsumas chopped - didn't have oranges

1 Lemon chopped

Whole cloves - about 6

Whole cinnamon sticks broken up a bit - 2

Generous grating of nutmeg

4 Whole allspice crushed

4 Peppercorns (go easy!)

4 Bay leaves (preferably fresh)

Demerara sugar - to taste. 

Mulled wine jelly - Add 1 sachet of gelatine (or 6 leaves) per pint.

Related

See other 1001 kitchen tips

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Childrens party food delivery in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire

Edit 03/03/13

To see more from another children's party we did recently click on the picture above.

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You know me - turn my hand to anything (bar celebration/ wedding cakes - one day I'll go on a course). Childrens food? No problem. Great fun to make actually - it had been a while.

This was a delivery I did to Cheltenham at the begining of July - this took care of the morning, then in the afternoon it was off to Ross on Wye to start the 8 day breakfast, lunch and dinner holiday chef job - never like to do things by halves.

As well as the requisite finger sandwiches (marmite, jam & egg - though not all together) we did a few Home Farm sausages made into cocktail size on sticks, chicken goujons and sausage rolls. And mini cheese and tomato pizzas:
and cheese and pineapple aka Mr & Mrs Prickles.

Raspberry jelly
Cupcakes - how can a childrens party be complete without cupcakes at the moment?

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Bookmarked Recipes #53

Here’s this week's round up of Bookmarked Recipes and this week we have some more great recipes from some more great bloggers. This week’s round up is being hosted by James at The Cotswold Food Year


You're wondering what to eat for lunch? You're wondering what to eat for dinner? Don't worry - we've got it taken care of at Bookmarked Recipes this week.



Lunch City Girl (who likes to blog anon) of City Girl Lifestyle finds a great way to chill out on a hot day with this Cucumber watermelon cooler which her husband bookmarked from My Spicy Kitchen. And as yesterday was Mother's Day in the US, Canada and Australia, it would have made a great addition to your Mother's Day celebrations.



Ning at Heart and Hearth has been baking, and shares her easy beer bread from an original recipe from Dog Hill Kitchen. Easy because it contains no yeast, so there's no need to knead - how good is that! You may remember this from a previous Bookmarked Recipes. It's been on my to-make list ever since then. With 2 recommendations now it has to be good! With such wonderful bread, you need the perfect accompaniment. Something like this hot artichoke dip from Patsy at Family, Friends and Food. The recipe, originally from Sweetnicks, was ideal for the monthly Bunko night, and luckily her sons are good at stirring, if they could just remember whose turn it was to stir..... Dinner


Shhh! Can you keep a secret? The secret of the Secret-Secret Geography Club. This time Kindra of The Meal Planner turned the club's attention on the cooking of France and made this decadent dish of Coq au vin. She wanted a recipe that would knock her guests socks off, and found one by Emeril Lagasse on the Food Network. The only problem being, when her guests came to go home they realised they didn't have any socks left.....
P.S. I also know from Foodie at 15 that a Dutch Oven in the US is what we call a casserole dish in the UK. You guys have some funny words.



For dessert you might try making this rhubarb jelly which I found from Keiko at Nordljus and made from the rhubarb growing in my garden. She sets the jelly on top of pistachio mousse, but back on the Cotswold Food Year, I set it in a container and diced it as a garnish for my rhubarb crumble tart. If you adjusted amount of sugar you could use any fruit instead of the rhubarb. Except kiwi of course - the acid content is too high for the gelatine. Thanks everyone for your submissions!!! It's always exciting to see what people have been making and recreating as well as meeting some new bloggers. Next week’s round up will be hosted by Divya at Dil Se…



That's it for this week. Remember if you want to take part here's all you have to do....



1. Pick a recipe from a book/magazine/blog/website/tv show and make it. (Note you can only submit 1 recipe per week)

2. Blog about it - include where you got the recipe in your blog post (including a link to their website if possible) - include a link to this post or this blog in your blog post - include the logo (see above) for Bookmarked Recipes in your blog post - include a photo of your recreation on your blog post

3. Email bookmarkedrecipes[AT]gmail[DOT]com with the following information: - Your name - The name of your blog - The URL of your blog - The permalink for your entry - A photo of your entry - A note of where you got your recipe from

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Rhubarb crumble tart with crème anglaise and rhubarb jelly

The rhubarb I planted in my garden 2 years ago is now looking really healthy and abundant. It was time to make the rhubarb crumble tart, and I was thinking about a garnish when I came accross this recipe for rhubarb jelly from Keiko at Nordljus. I liked the idea of serving it in a glass with the pistachio mousse underneath, but instead poured the jelly into a container and diced it below to serve with the crumble tart:
It would be just nice to eat as it is though. If you adjust the amount of sugar you use any other type of fruit to make a jelly like this - strawberries, blackberries, plums.


It has been bookmarked for anyone else who wants to try it on the virtual recipe drawer that is Bookmarked Recipes - your one-

stop shop for tried and tested recipes from the food blogger community updated every Monday which I am hosting this week.

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