Margaret Fulton's Apple Crumble Muffins

Guess who is now officially on holidays! That's right, yesterday was the last day of uni for this semester. You'd think I'd be out there partying like an animal and getting inebriated, but the embarrassing truth is that my idea of the perfect end-of-semester celebration is watching random Youtube videos in my "slob" clothes while mindlessly chowing down on Lindt Excellence 85% dark chocolate. And reading cookbooks! I am currently making my way through one of Margaret Fulton's, and indeed, this was where I got the recipe for these awesome Apple Crumble Muffins from.

The recipe looked so promising that I simply could not wait till the holidays started to try it out. Which was how I ended up lugging more than a dozen muffins to share amongst my colleagues in the middle of the week. From the way they rapidly disappeared, I'm confident to pronounce these a success. The sour cream (which the recipe calls for in lieu of milk) and the ample amount of apple chunks in the batter made these muffins extremely moist. The crumble on top was crunchy like a cookie, and deliciously buttery.

There are so many recipes in Margaret Fulton Baking that I want to try over these holidays, including the sour cream chocolate cake, and the Bienenstich (German bee sting) cake. I went on a cookbook shopping binge a few weeks ago, and came home with an impressive array of texts:

Whee, fun times ahead!

The apple crumble muffins are extremely easy to make; no need to get out the electric beaters or mixers. In fact, you don't even need to leave the butter out to soften in advance. The beauty of making muffins is that you can pretty much dump all the ingredients in one bowl (although some texts recommend mixing the dry ones together first, the wet ones in another bowl, and then combining the two). The butter can be melted in the microwave, and then stirred in. The most time-consuming part was chopping the apple into chunks, but even that didn't take very long. The crumble requires that you work fast in order not to melt the butter with your hot little hands while you rub it into the dry ingredients (ala. making a shortcrust pastry dough).

The muffins before baking, with the crumble mixture sprinkled on top.

The muffins can be eaten hot, straight out of the oven (or with a few minutes to cool out of consideration for your tongue), with a scoop of vanilla ice cream on the side. Unsurprisingly, it tastes like an apple crumble xD However, I would recommend you to allow them to cool, and then store them in an airtight container at room temperature for a day in order to allow the flavours to develop. And then if you want to have it hot, just zap it in the microwave for 20 seconds. Instant pudding!

The muffins, fresh out of the oven.

Apple Crumble Muffins

Makes 12 muffins

Ingredients

For the muffin batter:

1 1/4 cups (185g) plain flour

1/2 cup (110g) white granulated sugar

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon ground allspice

1/4 teaspoon salt

2 large eggs

1 cup sour cream

60g butter, melted

2 large Granny Smith apples, roughly chopped to 1cm chunks

For the crumble topping:

3 tablespoons sugar

2 tablespoons plain flour

2 tablespoons cold butter, diced

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Method

1. Preheat oven to 190 degrees Celsius (375 degrees Fahrenheit). Line muffin tin with grease-proof cupcake liners.

2. Into a large bowl, stir together the flour, sugar, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, cinnamon, allspice and salt.

3. In another bowl, whisk together the eggs, sour cream,  and melted butter until blended. Stir in the apple chunks.

4. Pour the wet mixture into the dry ingredients and fold until combined, but do not over-mix. Fill the lined muffin tin.

5. To make the topping, put all the ingredients into a bowl and rub in the butter until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Sprinkle the crumble mixture over the muffin batter, dividing the crumble mixture evenly between the 12 muffins.

6. Bake for 20-25 minutes, or until browned. Cool on wire racks, or eat it warm with ice cream!

Whipped cream black tea @ Meet Fresh

Who knew something so simple could be so good? As I made my way towards Central Station in the semi-darkness of dusk, I felt compelled to duck into Meet Fresh on the corner of Dixon Street for a little something to warm myself up. Most of the items are available as hot or cold options, but in my haste I didn't check if what I'd ordered was available hot. I left the store clutching an icy cup of sweetened black tea, topped with a thick layer of foamy whipped cream:

Oh well. At least it tasted good. Very, very good. Swish the cup around gently to mix the whipped cream with the tea, but do leave some unblended so that, once you're done with the liquid, you can eat the tea-tinged cream with a spoon. Two desserts in one!

(For my previous post on Meet Fresh, click here)


Meet Fresh

13 Goulburn Street Haymarket 2000
(Corner of Goulburn Street & Dixon Street in China Town)

Crumbed lambs' brains with herb sauce

I should probably issue a warning right now that this post contains GRAPHIC IMAGES of...BRAINS.

Lambs' brains, that is. As opposed to, say, human brains. [Insert your fave Hannibal Lector joke here]. Although, human brains would probably be easier to come by. I remember a time when my grandmother would habitually boil up some lambs' brains with star anise and Sichuan pepper every few weeks, and serve that for dinner. My favourite way of eating the brains was to smush it up on a piece of toasted white bread, put a slice of processed/plastic cheese on top, and microwave it until the whole thing was one, gooey mess. Gosh, I was a disgusting kid.

These days, lambs' brains are much harder to come by. When I spotted some frozen ones at Bush's Meats at the Miranda Westfield, I immediately bought a box for $10 without any idea of what I would do with them. And so they stayed in the freezer for the next few months; out of sight, but constantly on my mind (pun intended! xD)

As Fate would have it, a recipe requiring lambs' brains appeared in a recent issue of the Australian Gourmet Traveller magazine. The photo of the dish looked really good, and the name sounded quite delectable: "Crumbed lambs' brains with piquant herb sauce". I assembled the ingredients, and made it for dinner that night.

The onion, celery and carrot is for boiling the brains in, while the parsley, dill and mint is for the herb sauce. You really only need around a tablespoon each of the dill and mint, and around 2/3 cup of the parsley. I don't use fresh herbs much in cooking, relying on the dried stuff as it keeps much better, but I really should incorporate more fresh ingredients into my meals because you simply get so much more flavour out of it! For the sauce, you basically melt some butter, chuck in the herbs, capers and mustard, and it's done within a minute.

Making the 'piquant' herb sauce.

The brains have to be soaked in iced water for an hour to draw out some of the blood, and then boiled alongside the onion, carrot and celery for 5 minutes, until just cooked.

Boiling the lambs' brains.

The just-cooked brains are then chilled in the fridge for an hour, before they're coated with flour, egg, and breadcrumbs:

Onto the frying! As always, I got a grandparent to help with this stage because working with hot oil still freaks the shit out of me. I'm sure I've already shared with you the story of how a flying bit of oil got me on the right cheek, and I ended up with cellulitis. If I haven't...well, I just did, so take heed and do be careful when you fry stuff!

I guess crumbing and frying in oil makes anything taste good, but the gorgeously oozy texture of the brains made eating this a sensory delight. A sprinkle of salt, and they can be eaten just as they are, but I reckon it's well worth the effort to make the herb sauce.

Crumbed lambs' brains with herb sauce

Adapted from Australian Gourmet Traveller

Ingredients

6 lambs' brains, brainstem removed and lobes carefully separated

1 each of carrot, celery stalk and onion, diced

2 dried bay leaves

1 tsp apple cider vinegar

1 tsp black peppercorns

Vegetable oil for pan-frying

Plain flour, for dusting

2 eggs, lightly beaten

150g bread crumbs

Coarse salt for seasoning

For the herb sauce:

50g butter

40g of baby capers, rinsed if preserved in salt or vinegar

2/3 cup of finely chopped flat-leaf parsley

1 tbsp each finely chopped mint and dill

1 tbsp 'provence herb mustard' (Dijon mustard is fine)

Method

1. Soak brains in a bowl of iced water for an hour. Drain, and set aside.

2. Bring 1 litre of water to the boil with the carrot, celery, onion, bay leaves, vinegar and peppercorns. Add brains, and simmer gently over low heat until just cooked through (4-5 minutes). Remove brains with a slotted spoon onto a plate and refrigerate to cool (around 1 hour).

3. Heat around 3 tablespoons of vegetable oil in a fry-pan. To test whether the oil is hot enough, drop in some bread crumbs. If it starts sizzling, you're good to go. Coat brains first with flour, then egg, then bread crumbs. Pan-fry in batches, turning occasionally, until golden and crisp. Drain on absorbent paper, then season to taste with coarse salt.

4. To make the sauce: Heat butter in the fry-pan over high heat until foaming. Add the capers, parsley, mint, dill and mustard. Stir to combine, then take off heat and spoon over the brains, or serve separately for dipping.

Gelato Messina, Part II

Ever had salsa and corn chips mixed in with your gelato before?

This, Ladies and Gentlemen, is the 'Nacho Libre' gelato. It's exactly what it sounds like, consisting of avocado gelato, sweet tomato salsa, and corn chips. Even if I hadn't mentioned it in the title, the very nature of this concoction should alert you to its origins. I guess the only place crazy enough to make a nacho-flavoured gelato is Gelato Messina. I ordered it more for the novelty factor than the taste; I had a tiny bit to try beforehand and it didn't have that 'wow factor', like some of the other specials on offer that day: Baklava, Dr. Evil, etc. But I really, really wanted to brag over Facebook that I just had Nachos in gelato form xD

Can you spot the Nacho Libre? Back row, second from right.

After lunching at Mizuya, my lady friends and I took a leisurely stroll down Oxford St, and eventually navigated our way to Gelato Messina in Darlinghurst. Sadly, there was no peanut butter-based gelato on offer today. I'm a PB addict in general (the Kraft Crunchy on soft white bread is like crack to me), but peanut butter in gelato simply elevates my favourite spread to a whole new level. During a previous visit, I had the fortune of trying the "Gooey" flavour - peanut butter gelato with gooey peanut praline:

I was awash with sadness after the last bite.

To make up for the absence of peanut butter gelato, I ordered three scoops on this visit. In addition to the Nacho Libre, I had one scoop each of the pandan & coconut, and salted caramel and white chocolate.

The salted caramel gelato...oh wow. Smooth, rich caramel gelato, the sweetness tempered by the salty edge, with HUGE chunks of white chocolate and streaks of white chocolate ganache dispersed throughout. Two of my friends also ordered this, and they appeared to enjoy it as much as I did. The pandan and coconut flavour was also very, very good - a refreshing contrast to the richness of the caramel gelato!

Don't judge...yep, I didn't just stop at three scoops of gelato. I also shared a small gelato cake with one of my friends. This is the 'Mini Me'. The mushroom cap is made of chocolate fondant gelato streaked with dulce de leche and peanut butter cookie. You can't see it from this angle, but the mushroom had a stalk of vanilla gelato. The green stuff tasted like the chocolate crackles from my childhood. Indeed, the "grass" literally crackled...from the popping candy mixed in!

And there you have it: another memorable visit to Gelato Messina!

(For my first post on Gelato Messina, click here).


Gelato Messina

Darlinghurst Store
Shop 1/241 Victoria St, Darlinghurst NSW 2010

Super Moist Carrot Cake

Could it be that "retro" is making a comeback in the baking world? Maybe it's the influence of a recent delightful visit to The Tea Parlour for a friend's 21st (review soon to follow, hopefully!), but lately, I've been craving simple tea cakes, scones, and slices - basically, the stuff you find in a Australian Women's Weekly cookbook. And so it was in the spirit of "everything old is new again" that I made this delicious and super moist carrot cake.

The carrot cake and I go waaay back. In fact, it was the first cake that I baked from scratch, as the final assessment for a Design and Technology course in Year 8. I remember that class very clearly. In the weeks leading up to it, we'd been put through the paces in basic cookery with various old-school Aussie favourites: chocolate chip cookies, butterfly cakes, etc. For our assessment, we were given an hour and a half to complete a recipe of our choice, working in groups of threes. Come to think of it, it was kinda like a Masterchef team challenge!

Anyway, the carrot cake turned out fantastically, and the cream cheese frosting left so deep an impression on my naive palate that it remains my favourite type of frosting to this day. My fellow team members and I proudly presented a generous slice of cake to the lovely ladies down at reception. The rest we split between the three of us. As I recall, it was a GINORMOUS cake that we made, and my share lasted for days.

And so I have very fond memories of the carrot cake. This particular one wasn't frosted due to time constraints, but I imagine that the maple cream cheese frosting I made for my browned butter apple pound cake a while back would have been perfect for this. The recipe I used for this carrot cake utilised ghee instead of the usual vegetable oil. I do believe that either choice would be fine in the cake. I would describe the texture of this cake as extremely moist; almost pudding like. I was worried that it would be too sweet when I tasted the batter (raw eggs don't scare me! xD), but the baked cake was not very sweet at all. Which means that you can pile on the cream cheese frosting extra thick!

Recipe for a Super Moist Carrot Cake

Adapted from Guilty Kitchen

Recipe yields one 22cm x 12cm loaf AND 7 cupcakes, OR one 9-inch two-layer cake

Ingredients

2 cups cake flour
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated white sugar
2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
1/4 tsp powdered ginger
1 tsp salt
4 eggs
1 cup ghee, melted
1/3 cup buttermilk (or 1/3 cup whole milk + 1 tsp apple cider vinegar)
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp vanilla bean paste
2 1/2 cups finely grated carrot (I used five carrots)

Method

1. Preheat oven to 175 degrees Celsius (or 350 degrees Fahrenheit). Grease and flour a 22cm x 12cm loaf tin, or line it with aluminium foil. You can reserve leftover batter for another thinner loaf, or make cupcakes out of it.

2. In a bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda, and baking powder. Stir in the brown sugar, white sugar, ground cinnamon, ground nutmeg, powdered ginger and salt. Use the back of the spoon to break up any lumps formed by the brown sugar.

3. In a separate bowl, whisk the eggs into the melted ghee, one by one. Whisk in the buttermilk, vanilla extract and vanilla bean paste. Stir in the grated carrots.

4. Combine the dry and wet ingredients, and mix until incorporated and smooth. Be careful not to overmix.

5. Pour the batter into the loaf tin, filling it 3/4 full.

6. Bake in preheated oven for 1 hour, or until skewer inserted into centre of the loaf comes out clean. If the top of your cake gets too brown, cover the cake loosely with a piece of foil for the final 10 minutes of baking.

7. Once done baking, remove from oven and allow cake to cool in tin for 10 minutes. Remove from tin, and let cake finish cooling off on a cooling rack.

To make cupcakes:


1. Preheat oven to 175 degrees Celsius (or 350 degrees Fahrenheit).

2. Line muffin tray with cupcake liners.

3. Fill liners 3/4 full with batter.

4. Bake in preheated oven for 20 minutes.

5. Allow cupcakes to cool in tray for 10 minutes, before attempting to move them onto cooling racks.

Braided Challah (Daring Bakers Challenge, May 2012)

Here's the brief for this challenge: "May's Daring Bakers' Challenge was pretty twisted - Ruth from The Crafts of Mommyhood challenged us to make challah! Using recipes from all over, and tips from "A Taste of Challah," by Tamar Ansh, she encouraged us to bake beautifully braided breads."

With free time being so scarce these days, I like to put 150% effort into the baking projects that I take on. This particular recipe held special significance for me because it was my first Daring Bakers Challenge. I was hesitant at first to join the Daring Bakers, because I knew for sure that I would not be able to dedicate much time to this blog this year because of a massive uni workload. However, seeing other bloggers proudly showing off their masterpieces on each month's reveal date filled me with such senses of envy and longing that I caved, and signed up at the end of April. And behold - I have completed my very first challenge - a raisin and cinnamon swirl challah!

The Challah is a braided loaf traditionally eaten on Sabbath and other Jewish holidays. The bread is made with a yeasted dough enriched with eggs, sugar and oil. Ruth from The Crafts of Mommyhood, who is our host for this challenge, provided us with various recipes for the dough (including her own "go-to" whole wheat version), as well as helpful tips on braiding the loaf. After a little bit of research, I settled on Maggie Glezer's Chernowitzer Challah recipe, after seeing it being used by Lisa for her 'Chocolate Cinnamon Raisin Swirl Challah'. If that description alone isn't enough to get you salivating...you must be made of stone.

Cinnamon rolls are one of my very favourite carby treats, and I can pretty much eat raisins as my daily servings of fruit for the rest of my life. And so I followed in Lisa's footsteps, and made my Challah a cinnamon and raisin swirl one, without the chocolate. I was worried that it might be too much of a good thing, and anyway, I live with a bunch of mutants who don't like chocolate. The swirl pattern didn't come out at all. I think it was because the filling lacked a binding agent, which was what the chocolate did in Lisa's recipe.

This is actually my second attempt at making this recipe. The first time, I allowed the dough to rise for far too long (I think it was over 4 hours) because I'd slept right through my alarm. Whilst the bread still tasted all right, it was visually unappealing - sorta flattened and pathetic-looking. That was lesson number 1: don't over-proof your dough. Lesson number 2 was to cover the bread with foil 20 or 30 minutes into the baking, to stop the surface of the bread from browning too much. I'm in love with the burnished hue of my second loaf, but my first loaf honestly looked like poo, if you'll pardon my bluntness.

 

I really like the colour of my second loaf!

So, how did it taste? Allow me to divulge some embarrassing info about myself. For a while, I tried to convince myself that I hated the taste of bread. That it was basically a tasteless lump of gluten, and in addition to being so bad for my waistline, was terrible for my health and I would do well to avoid it for the rest of my life. Let me say now that, oh man, I was totally bullsh*tting myself. Who was I trying to kid? I LOVE bread. If I could be like my naturally super-skinny friend who habitually downs plates of pasta, I would happily eat bread for all three meals, plus snacks. 

Unfortunately, cruel fate has gifted a carb-lover like myself with the metabolism of a tortoise, and consequently, I limit myself to breadstuff only occasionally. This loaf was totally worth the carb-overload. Calling it "raisin toast" would be the ultimate insult. It's a dense, heavy loaf, and although the crumb may feel dry to the touch, it actually tastes very moist. The raisins have become all plump and juicy from absorbing the liquid from the surrounding dough, and despite all the sugar I stuffed into the dough, it is not too sweet to make a sandwich out of. In fact, I think it would go quite well with a sharp, salty cheddar. The only thing I would change is to increase the amount of cinnamon, as I couldn't really taste it.

  

Here's a walkthrough of the recipe, with accompanying pictures. I really do apologise for not posting more frequently. I truly appreciate the time you have taken to read through my humble blog. I do hope you give this Challah recipe a go, because it is fantastic and completely worthy of a Daring Bakers Challenge! :D

Recipe tutorial: Raisin and Cinnamon Swirl Challah

Makes one 950g loaf; adapted from Maggie Glezer's recipe

Ingredients

For the dough:

7g instant yeast

500g bread flour (+ extra in case your dough is too wet)

170g warm water

2 large eggs + 1 for glazing

110g vegetable oil (I used corn oil)

1.5tsp (8g) salt

55g white granulated sugar

 

Warm water not pictured

Baked cinnamon sugar doughnuts

Hello again! It's been a while, hasn't it? It's the same deal as before: my studies have picked up pace, leaving little to no time for leisure. Which simply means that I make time for it anyway, at the expense of not immersing myself completely in the academia. It does bring up feelings of guilt, but I think I'm getting by well enough, and anyway, it takes only a baked cinnamon sugar doughnut or two to make the uneasiness go away.

Gosh, it almost sounds like a case of substance abuse. Well, you know what they say about sugar addiction - it's a real phenomenon! Don't be fooled by the fact that these are "baked"; just because there wasn't any deep-frying involved does not make these a health food xD No, these are simply doughnut-shaped mini cakes, dusted all over with a layer of crunchy, cinnamon sugar. Sounds good, right?

These cuties measure around 2 inches in diameter each, meaning that even if you were to scoff three or four at once *raises hand in shame*, you'd only look like a mini 'nutter instead of a regular-sized one. Hoho, you like or doughnut like my joke? Okay, okay, I'll stop. You'll need a special baking tin for these; I purchased mine from Victoria's Basement. The tin's not much good for anything else, but I reckon if you rock up to a party with two dozens of these, you'll earn yourself a hole heap of praise so it's worth it. 'Hole', geddit? Doh!

Recipe for Baked Cinnamon Sugar Doughnuts

Makes 22-24 mini doughnuts


Ingredients

For the batter:
1 1/4 cups cake flour (regular plain flour is okay)
1/2 cup granulated white sugar
1 1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 large egg
1 1/2 tablespoon melted butter

For the cinnamon sugar coating:
Around 3/4 cup granulated white sugar
1 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Method

1. Preheat your oven to 220 degrees Celsius (or 425 degrees Fahrenheit).
2. Grease your specialty mini doughnut pan with oil or butter.
3. Sift together the flour, sugar, baking powder, nutmeg and salt.
4. In a separate bowl, combine melted butter, buttermilk and eggs, and beat well.
5. Combine dry and wet ingredients, and mix gently until just incorporated. Do not over-mix.
6. Fill each doughnut mold only half full.
7. Bake for 4-6 minutes, or until doughnut is springy to the touch.
8. Trying not to burn your fingers, pry doughnuts out of the molds while they are still relatively hot, and roll them around in the cinnamon sugar coating mixture. The coating will only stick while doughnuts are hot. If you find that it's not sticking, brush some melted butter onto the surface of the doughnut before dredging it in the sugar.