Passionfruit Fromage Blanc Bavarian

I'd say I'm roughly 50% calm and 50% nervous.

My hands are calm as they carefully tuck yet another batch of pastry into a tart tin or as they guide a piping bag around now-familiar lines. My brain is calm as I write and re-write quantities and methods, stashing them in my memory.

My eye is nervous, flickering from lack of sleep. My stomach is nervous, intermittently releasing a butterfly.

This week marks my first set of exams at Le Cordon Bleu.

On Tuesday I have my practical exam. There are three exam dishes - I will have to pick an unseen token when I enter the room, which will tell me which dish I make. The possibilities are: the tarte aux citron, the coffee eclairs, the raspberry genoise. Now I tend to think about them in terms of my fears: the shrinking tart case, the fondant topping, underfolding my genoise and finding flour pockets.

On Friday I have my technical exam. I haven't really started learning for it as it's only 10% of my overall mark (compared to 45% on the practical exam - the other 45% has been the continual assessment in my practicals). By Wednesday morning I'll be squirreling away sugar temperatures, fat contents and more recipes.

Whatever happens in my exams, I've learnt a lot this term. I hadn't realised how much I've changed until I went home last weekend and made a few things for mum. I've picked up a lot of good habits, tips and techniques. I've also got far too used to having a kitchen porter to do my washing up...

In the past few weeks we've made a few bavarian creams to fill charlottes and so on. I thought I would try out a slightly modernized version I found in Tartine. My presentation wouldn't work at school but I fancied a casual look.

It's a subtle, light dessert and would be perfect for after a heavy meal. It's creamy but not rich. There's only a touch of sweetness so it feels almost refreshing - the best word I can think of to describe it is pure.

Passionfruit Fromage Blanc Bavarian
(adapted from Tartine by Elisabeth M. Prueitt and Chad Robertson)

50g pistachios, finely chopped
60ml cold water
50g granulated sugar
4 egg yolks
2 1/2 tsp powdered gelatine
30ml hot water
300g fromage blanc
375ml double cream
10ml lemon juice*
3 passionfruit
1 tbsp icing sugar (approx)

Line the sides of a 6" loose-bottomed tin with cling film (you could also use a wider tin, such as 7 or 8", and I would have used acetate to line if I had any so that it was totally smooth). Spread the pistachios in the bottom of the tin in an even layer.

Place 60ml of the water and the sugar into a small pan and heat until the sugar dissolves and you have a syrup. Pour into a round-bottomed bowl and leave to cool. Set a pan on the heat with a few inches of water that the bowl with the syrup will fit into without touching the water. Sprinkle the gelatine over 30ml of hot (not boiling) water to soften.

Add the egg yolks to the syrup and combine. Place over the pan and whisk until thick and foamy (the ribbon stage - if you take the whisk out, the drips should stay on the surface before merging again) - this takes about 5-10 minutes. Once ready, whisk in the dissolved gelatine. Set the bowl into an ice bath (or sink of cold water) to cool, whisking every now and again (you need to be fairly quick with the next two tasks and keep an eye on it).

In another bowl, combine the fromage blanc and 75ml of the cream, whisking until smooth. Whisk the remaining 300ml of cream up to soft peaks.

Once the yolk mixture is starting to set, combine 1/3 of the yolks into the smooth fromage blanc mixture to lighten it. Fold the rest of the yolks in carefully. Fold in the lemon. Finally gently fold the cream into the mixture in two goes. Transfer to the prepared tin. Smooth the top and cover with cling film. Place into the fridge. Chill for at least 4 hours - overnight is best.

When you're ready to serve, scoop the passionfruit seeds out into a small saucepan. Add the icing sugar and warm slightly to dissolve the sugar. Test to see if you need more sugar.

Take the bavarian out of the fridge and unwrap the cling film. Ease it out of the tin (or snap open the springform) and peel away the plastic. Slide off the bottom onto a serving plate. Top with the passionfruit glaze.

*If you would like a stronger citrus flavour, add the zest of half a lemon or 1/4 of an orange - I wanted mine simple.

(Serves 10-12)

Honey Roast Pistachio Ice Cream

About ten days ago, I decided that I should make one last ice cream before I left Switzerland and therefore my summer holiday. As I've probably adapted way too many of David Lebovitz's amazing recipes, I thought I'd try something new. Enter Jeni Britton Bauer and her unusual recipe involving corn flour, cream cheese and corn syrup (or golden syrup for me). The final product has a slightly different texture I can't quite describe and a complex flavour.

While I was making it, I couldn't stop eating the pistachios, depleting the store in my bowl almost as quickly as I shelled them. Just to make things worse I roasted what was left with butter and honey. Even more addictive. You lose a bit of colour but it's worth it.

Afterwards I posted on twitter saying that if I could only ever bake with one nut, it would have to be pistachio. My desert island nut.

I hadn't expected the deluge of replies I would get. We made ourselves hungry brainstorming on the things you can do with various nuts. Pecans were a big hit after realising I had forgotten them (pecan & maple, pecan & brown butter, pecan & plum, pecan & butterscotch, pecan & chocolate (brownies!), praline... hungry yet?).

There were advocates for cashews, peanuts, almonds, hazelnuts, pine nuts, walnuts and macadamias. What nut would you hate to be without?

Honey Roast Pistachio Ice Cream
(Ice cream adapted from Jeni Britton Bauer via Food and Wine)

For the pistachio ice cream:
115g shelled pistachios
550ml whole milk
1 tbsp + 1 tsp corn flour (cornstarch)
45g cream cheese
340ml double cream
150g caster sugar
1.5 tbsp golden syrup or light corn syrup

For the honey roast pistachios:
100g shelled pistachios
1 tbsp runny honey
10g unsalted butter

Whizz the pistachios in a food processor until fine. Prepare an ice bath. Whisk 2 tablespoons of milk with the cornflour in a small bowl to create a slurry. In a big bowl whisk the cream cheese until smooth. Put the milk, cream, caster sugar and golden syrup into a medium saucepan and bring it to the boil.

Take off the heat then pour some of the hot milk onto the cornflour slurry and whisk in. Pour back into the pan and whisk to combine. Bring back to the boil and cook until thickened - about one minute. Pour a little onto the cream cheese and whisk till smooth, then add the rest of the milk mix. Stir in the pistachios and sit in the water bath to chill.

When cold, cover with cling film and place in the fridge for at least four hours or overnight. Churn according to your machine's instructions.

Preheat the oven to 150C. Place a piece of parchment paper on a baking sheet. Rub the pistachios to try and remove any excess skin. Melt the butter and honey together in small pan. Remove from the heat and add the pistachios, mixing until they're all totally covered. Tip out onto the parchment paper and spread out. Place into the oven and roast for five minutes. Remove from the oven and stir. Leave to cool. They keep in an airtight container for at least a few days.

(Makes 1 ltr)

Rose and Pistachio Layer Cake

Roses are my favourite flowers. I love all sorts of flowers (peonies, sunflowers, lilac, wisteria, lilies, freesias etc etc) but I always come back to roses.

Oddly, though, I don't like red roses. They've always meant bad luck to me. My favourite colour is pinky-orange, though I'm also a big fan of all the pinks, oranges, yellows and whites.

My great-grandmother loved roses. She planted a beautiful rose garden when she lived in the house I grew up in as a little girl. I think that was when I started loving roses.

I've made sugared rose petals to decorate a cake before - an Espresso, White Chocolate and Rose Cake. They're so simple but striking. As it involves raw egg white you need to be quite careful. I want to try some tests of using other things to sugar them so they're safe for everyone.

I felt the need to make a layer cake the other day. No reason or occasion.

Pistachios are so amazing. I love the complexity, the colour.

Swiss meringue buttercream just felt right with this breezy, romantic cake.  It's so light.  I didn't add much rose water to it - just a hint, a quiet note.

After all the chaos in the world and particularly the UK this week, this cake felt innocent and peaceful. Just like the days I spent as a toddler sitting in my great-grandmother's rose garden.

Rose and Pistachio Layer Cake
(buttercream adapted from Annie's Eats)

For the pistachio layers:
90g unsalted butter
110g caster sugar
100g plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
2 eggs
20g ground pistachios

For the rose buttercream:
75g egg white (2-3 eggs worth)
110g granulated sugar
125g unsalted butter, at room temperature
2 tsp rose water

To assemble & decorate :
1 unsprayed rose
1 egg white
50g caster sugar
20g ground pistachios


Preheat the oven to 170C. Grease two 5" round tins. Beat the butter and sugar until pale and fluffy. Sift the flour and baking powder into the bowl and add the eggs and pistachios. Beat to combine. Divide between the two tins. Bake for 20-25 minutes until a skewer can be removed cleanly from the centre. Cool in the tins for 5 minutes then remove to a wire rack until cool.

To make the sugared petals, carefully pull the petals off the rose. Discard any bruised or brown petals. Separate an egg and put in a small pot. Put the sugar in a small bowl/pot. Using a paintbrush or pastry brush, lightly cover a rose petal in the egg white. Either carefully press the petal into the sugar or sprinkle it on. Put to dry on a sheet. Repeat for all your petals. Leave to dry for about 30 minutes or until fairly hard before using. 

If you're nervous about making the buttercream, look at Whisk Kid's tutorial first. When you're ready and have all your ingredients set out, combine the whites and sugar in a medium heatproof bowl and place it over a pan of simmering water. Whisk until the temperature hits 70C/160F and the mixture is smooth (check by rubbing a little between your fingers).

Transfer to a stand mixer (or just use a hand whisk with the same bowl) and start whipping on medium-high. Whip for about 8 minutes - it should be really thick and glossy and gorgeous. Check that it is room temperature - if not leave it for another minute or two slowly whisking. Turn the speed back up to medium/high and add a piece of butter (should be about tbsp sized pieces). Whisk until totally incorporated, then add another. Repeat until all the butter is used.

At this point if it looks soupy and thin, pop it in the fridge. If not, keep whipping until it is thick and luxurious again - this can take quite a while. When ready, whip in the rose water teaspoon by teaspoon, checking after each addition for taste.

Split each of the cakes into two. Place four strips of greaseproof paper on your cake plate and then place one of the layers on top. Remove 1/3 of the butter cream to another bowl and fold in the pistachios. Spread a 1/3 of this pistachio buttercream over a layer. Repeat with the rest of the layers.

Use some of the remaining plain rose buttercream to smooth a thin layer of icing over the cake - a crumb coat. Place in the fridge for 10 minutes. Finally use the remaining butter cream to put a final coat of icing on top of the crumb coat. Arrange the rose petals on top of the cake and sprinkle with a few remaining pistachio crumbs if desired.

(Serves 5-6)

Raspberry and Pistachio Baked Cheesecake

Every now and again I get a sudden craving to make something really colourful. While shades of gold and brown can mean very good things (pastry, chocolate, peanut butter, brown sugar, breads...) sometimes it's nice to have something vibrant to photograph and eat. 

I know raspberries are horribly out of season. I just couldn't help myself. 

Although I love making unbaked cheesecakes, I've only made one baked one before - a Simple Baked Cheesecake. It was nice, but not a patch on the unbaked type.

A few months ago I came across this recipe from The SoNo Baking Company Cookbook online and quickly bookmarked it (so quickly, in fact, that it's down as 'Radpberry and pistachip Cheesecake'...). Finally a few days ago I found the bookmark again and decided I had to give it a try. 

Thankfully it didn't crack and behaved perfectly (see above for weirdly-lit-but-look-no-cracks!-and-isn't-apricot-jam-awfully-orange photo). 

My friend Sam had his birthday party last night and this came along with me (as did another dessert you will hear about soon...). Hence no inside photos. It seemed to go down really well - there's nothing like eating cheesecake with your fingers off a paper napkin. 

I loved the combination of flavours - the pistachio and raspberry go brilliantly. The cheesecake itself was so much better than I thought it could be - light, fluffy, not grainy at all and had a wonderful delicate flavour. 

Definitely a recipe to make again. 

Raspberry and Pistachio Baked Cheesecake

(adapted from SoNo Baking Company Cookbook, see here)

For the base:

30g shelled pistachios

30g light brown sugar

pinch of salt

65g digestive biscuits (or graham crackers)

40g butter

Before you begin, grease a 5" loose-bottom tall tin with a little butter. Get two bigs squares of tin foil and wrap the tin in them, one over the other.  Melt the 40g butter either in a small pan or in the microwave the put aside. In a food processor, pulse the pistachios until fairly fine. Roughly break up the biscuits and put into the processor with the salt and sugar. Pulse until combined and well mixed. Add the butter to the bowl and stir until well coated. Tip into the tin and press down to form an even layer. Put into the fridge to chill. 

For the filling:

450g cream cheese, out of fridge for 6 hours or so

150g golden caster sugar

1/4 tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 tsp vanilla paste

2.5 eggs, beaten *

90ml sour cream

Preheat the oven to 150C/300F. Place the chilled and wrapped tin into a roasting tray. Boil the kettle. In the bowl of your stand mixer (with the paddle attached) beat the cream cheese until smooth. Add the sugar, salt, vanilla extract and vanilla paste and beat for a few minutes until smooth. Turn down to a lower speed and add the egg in three stages, beating to combine between each addition. Scrape down the sides regularly. Finally, add the sour cream and beat to combine. Pour into the prepared tin - it will come up nearly to the top. Place the tray into the oven then pour the boiling water from the kettle into the tin until it comes about 1/3 of the way up the tin. Bake for 45- 50 minutes until set but still wobbly in the middle. Take out of the oven and remove the tin to a wire rack. Place a piece of foil over the top and leave for ten minutes then run a knife around the edge of the tin. Replace the foil and leave to cool down. When totally cool remove the foil and mop up any condensation with some kitchen towel. Cover with cling film and put into the fridge overnight or for 6 hours.  

*For advice on halving eggs, see my guide. 

To decorate:

1 punnet fresh raspberries

3 tbsp apricot jam

60g pistachios

In a food processor, pulse the pistachios until fairly fine with a mixture of smaller and larger pieces. Take the cheesecake out of the fridge, run a knife around the edge of the tin again then remove to a serving plate with strips of parchment paper around the sides. Put the jam into a small saucepan and heat until liquid. Pour through a strainer to take out any lumps. Brush the top and sides of the cheesecake with the jam. Arrange the raspberries on top. Thin down the remaining jam with 1 tbsp boiling water (more if needed) then glaze the raspberries. Finally take handfuls of the pistachios and press to the side. Clear away any excess pistachios and remove the parchment strips. Return to the fridge to set for 1 hour. 

(Serves 8-10)

Apricot and Pistachio Crumbles with Vanilla Ice Cream

Although I typically think of crumbles as winter desserts, these apricot and pistachio crumbles are serious contenders for my favourite summer pudding. I can't stop making them. Or eating them.

Mum came back with a load of fresh apricots from the market the other day. Apricots are big business in our valley - there are dozens of farms that line the bottom and sell their produce in little stalls by the road.  They're gorgeous. I love seeing all the fruit trees on the mountain side, sharing with the wine vines, heavy with bright fruit.

Apricot crumble seemed like a great way to use some of them up. The combination with pistachios is wonderful, so I incorporated them into the topping (which is divine in itself).

Of course you cannot have crumble without ice cream. I like vanilla with most of mine - this is a light 'Philidelphia' style ice cream that's perfect for summer. In the autumn I want to try cinnamon ice cream with apple crumble.

I discovered that a melon baller makes perfect little portions for individual ramekins - cute, eh.



I also make a bigger one each time (I've made this recipe twice in the past ten days... who is for lunch-pudding and supper-pudding?). Because I can't get enough. You could do the whole recipe in one bigger dish, too.

The apricots go gooey and sweet and keep their stunning colour. The pistachios meld beautifully with the flavour of the apricots and the ice cream is light, full of vanilla and just completes the picture.



Apricot and Pistachio Crumble
(heavily adapted from Delia's Complete Cookery)

10 apricots
75g plain flour
40g butter
40g brown sugar
40g pistachios
1/2 tsp baking powder
pinch of fleur de sel

Preheat the oven to 180C/360F. Put the plain flour and baking powder into a bowl and mix them up. Add the butter and rub it in until it looks like crumbs. Stir in the brown sugar and salt. Roughly chop up the pistachios and stir them in too. Get your dishes together and slice up the apricots and arrange them in the dishes. Sprinkle a tablespoon or so of sugar over them, or more they're a bit sour. Spoon over the topping evenly. Put into the oven and bake for about 45 minutes or until golden brown and bubbling around the edges.

(Serves 6 - easily doubled)


Vanilla Ice Cream
(from Lebovitz's The Perfect Scoop)

500ml double cream
250ml whole milk
150g caster sugar
pinch of salt
1 vanilla pod
3/4 tsp vanilla extract

Pour half the cream and the milk into a saucepan with the sugar and salt. Scape the vanilla seeds from the pod and add them, along with the pod itself. Warm until the sugar has completely dissolved. Take off the heat and stir in the other half of the cream and the vanilla extract. Pour into a jug and chill throughly (overnight if possible). Just before churning, give it a good stir and remove the vanilla pod (you can rinse and dry it for another use, such as vanilla sugar). Freeze according to your maker instructions.

(Makes about 1 litre)

Little Pistachio and Orange Blossom Water Cakes

For me, spring is all about perfumes. I recognise the turning of the season by the delicate scents it brings. The first snowdrops are a winter flower - a simple green and white and lacking in scent. When the narcissi and hyacinths start arriving - then spring is 'in the air'. I always try to get a potted hyacinth for my room at this time of year but this time I made do with some cut stems. The scent perfumed our entire flat. 

Spring is also about the first colours - the first green grass breaking through from beneath the snow, the regeneration of tiny new leaves.  The yellow of the daffodils, the purple of the crocuses, the blue of the hyacinths. There's something so bright about spring colours - they're so fresh and new. A yellow daffodil is definitely bright, not the mellow gold of the sunflower in summer. 

 I came back to Switzerland to stay with my mum for the holidays a few days ago and she's filled our flat with spring flowers and bulbs from IKEA. Without buying them you miss the spring entirely until the snow melts and the tiny flowers break out on the mountain side. At the end of April the valley fills with bright yellow dandelions - we used to drive away after winter among carpeted fields. 

In this way, pistachios remind me of spring: delicately but intensely scented with that lovely pale waxy green. Orange blossom water has a similarly springlike smell - like my hyacinth, it fills the room. They seemed like the perfect combination to put together to make little cakes in my new moulds. 

I bought my bag of shelled pistachios in Oxford before I left. They were pretty expensive and so grinding them up felt quite scary - whatever I made had to work with my crushed gold.

I put together a planned recipe - I couldn't find anything online or in my books. The batter tasted good and smelled pretty great too. But then I baked them and realised I had totally miscalculated how much flour I would need to balance out the oiliness of the nuts. They came out chewy on top and greasy on the bottom and didn't de-mould properly. With a quarter of my precious pistachios gone I felt quite upset and annoyed at myself.

Then I decided I wasn't going to be defeated. So I started over again with a half-batch of my adapted recipe so as to not use too many extra nuts and thankfully the second time they came out beautifully. They have that wonderful scent of both the nuts and orange blossom water and the texture is lovely. They're somehow both plain and intensely exotic. 

I reckon they would be nice with a bit of icing too - but I like them with just a sprinkling of icing sugar. 

Little Pistachio and Orange Blossom Water Cakes

110g butter

40g soft brown sugar

70g caster sugar

2 eggs

50g whole blanched almonds

50g whole shelled pistachios

110g plain flour

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp orange blossom water

Preheat the oven to 170C. Put the nuts into a food processor and blend till fine but with a few slightly bigger lumps. In a mixer cream the butter and sugar. Add an egg with a few tablespoons of the flour and blend, followed by the other egg and some more flour.  Sieve in the rest of the flour and the baking powder then add in the ground nuts and the orange blossom water. Fold in till combined. Divide between the moulds and and bake for about 15 minutes or until browned on top and cooked through. Leave to cool in the moulds for five minutes then pop out. Dust with icing sugar to serve. 

Makes about 10.