May 3, 2008
You say tomatoe (just imagine the yankee accent 
) I say tomato (and a brit one here). The same could go for cupcakes or as us Brits call them fairy cakes. I was doing some research for my next cookery class. The theme is cupcakes which is all the rage in Paris and I found a few interesting titbits…
According to the “The Oxford Encyclopedia of Food and Drink in America”, cupcakes were originally just small cakes minus the icing, that came in the 1950s. The “cup” derived from two origins:
1. The switch from weighing to using cup measurements in the 19th century American households.
2. The practice of baking in small containers or cups. Large cakes were often burnt in the the hearth ovens.
Brits use the term “fairy cakes”, as you normally scoop out the top, fill that with buttercream and jam and then cut the top into two wings which you place on top. Hence them looking slightly fairy like. I would normally call those butterfly cakes and all the plain iced cakes, fairy cakes.
Anyway, at the end of the day they taste delicious and bring back memories of sticky little fingers at birthday parties (well, that is if you had an anglophone childhood).
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Posted in Cake, Dulce de leche, Food events, Going out, La Cocotte, Paris | Tagged cupcakes, fairy cakes, pimp my cupcake | 9 Comments »
April 23, 2008
Right now I’m busy prepping for my first cookery class @ La Cocotte this Thursday. I’ve been busy researching, testing, tasting, doing all things muffiny…so much so I think I’m actually becoming a muffin. I found out the word muffin comes from the old french term “moufflet” (=soft). And that the American muffins did originate from the English ones but quickly developed their own style.
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Posted in Food, Food events, Going out, La Cocotte, Other, Paris, Savoury, recipe, snack | Tagged muffins | 8 Comments »
April 13, 2008
I realised after I shot* this, that the raspberry coulis looked rather “blood like” and I even subconsiously made bloodlike splatters.
* Shoot/blood = Hmmmmmmm, maybe I have murder on my mind
I also made a lychee version of this for an event at La Cocotte. I chopped up tinned lychees and placed them at the bottom of the ramekins, poured the panna cotta on top.
Almond milk panna cotta
3 gelatine leaves
250ml almond milk
250ml double cream
2 tsp almond essence
25g sugar
4 ramekins
Soak the gelatine in cold water until soft. Heat the all the other ingredients in a pan until it comes to the boil. Take off the heat. Squeeze out the water from the gelatine, add to the cream mixture. Stir well until all the gelatine is disolved. Pour into ramekins and leave to cool. Once cool put into the fridge and chill for at least 4 hours (or overnight).
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Posted in Dessert | Tagged Panna cotta | 10 Comments »
April 8, 2008
“When the going gets tough, the tough gets going!” Everyone has some phrase or another for times which are trying. I’ve been hearing a lot of them recently. And I think the saying above is great way of handling things. So I went on a bit of a mission this weekend. Sleeping was definetly not on the menu. Discovering new things, places and lots of dancing (I love dancing = instant happiness for me). On Saturday I came across a new blog which described an exhibition in Paris I just had to go to. I instantly rang to make a reservation, crossing my fingers they would have some spaces free.
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Posted in Food blog events, Food events, French blogs, Going out, Other, Paris | Tagged café ephermere, DMBLGIT award, E is for excellent award, gallery | 3 Comments »
April 1, 2008
Like peas & carrots, cookies & milk or fish & chips,
clotted cream and scones are a match made in heaven and essential for a proper English teatime. The closest thing to clotted cream is probably mascarpone, although it’s a lot whiter in colour and less heavier.
I smuggled some back from the UK last week. So in between coding for my new site I found some time to whip up some scones for Sunday tea time (to my friends delight).
They’re best eaten warm with lashings of clotted cream and jam and not to forget TEA! If you eat them the next day, warm them up in the oven as they tend to turn a bit brick hard when cold.
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Posted in Cake, Food, Sweets, recipe | Tagged clotted cream, scones, Teatime | 15 Comments »
