Chocolate Drizzle Cake

It's about time I get back to posting regularly. This is attempt #1. 

Since my husband started cooking almost daily with me, I have found less of a need to share.

This does not suit food blogging. The purpose is to share, Sarah. So here we go. We've got chocolate cake. It's good. It's airy. It feels like it has no calories in it. It does. Many calories. And pockets of chocolate. Pray for your hips. 

Chocolate Drizzle Cake

You'll need: 

200 grams of unsalted butter, softened

200 grams of caster sugar

80 grams of melted milk chocolate

1 tablespoon of milk

140 grams of all-purpose flour

60 grams of cocoa powder

2 teaspoons of baking powder

4 large eggs, separated

A pinch of salt

2 drops of vinegar

Begin by preheating your oven to 180 degrees Celsius.

Grease a 20 cm round baking tin and line it with baking paper. 

Sift the flour, baking powder and cocoa together and set aside. 

In a large bowl, cream your butter and sugar together until light and fluffy using a stand mixer or electric beater. 

Add the egg yolks and milk and mix until combined.

Mix in the combined dry ingredients then the melted chocolate. 

Whip your egg whites in a sepatate bowl with a pinch of salt.*

Start whisking the egg whites on low speed at first to get smaller and more stable bubbles in your foam. 

Add the vinegar and continue to beat the egg whites continuously until you get stiff peaks. 

Fold the egg whites into the cake mixture carefully. Don't fold too much or you'll end up with a deflated batter. 

Pour your cake batter into the baking tin and bake for 30-40 minutes or until a skewer inserted in the middle comes out clean. Leave to cool then remove from the baking tin.

*Make sure your egg whites are at room temperature. Make sure your bowl and utensils are clean and oil-free. 

For the ganache:
1 cup of heavy cream
1 ½ cup of chocolate chips

To prepare the ganache, heat the heavy cream in a saucepan over medium heat until it comes to a boil. Remove from heat and pour in the chocolate chips. Stir until completely combined and glossy. Allow the ganache to cool before pouring over cake.

Boiled Cranberry Raisin Cake

 So I haven't updated in a long time. I have not attempted to write in as long but have continued to cook, explore and battle with my mood swings, myself. I shot the first season of a grilling show for a local cooking channel with my husband and it has aired. People every so often stop to ask us for quick recipes, for tips. They smile broadly and we smile back. We pose for pictures we'll never see after being asked if we're really married to ensure that they're not falling for some television stunt. It is awkward and while I am thankful I'm excited to be back in my space, where I can sit in mismatched clothes and eat food that will not be judged.

Today's recipe is a boiled cranberry and raisin cake - a coffee cake that doesn't take long to throw together and doesn't need much effort. You can freeze this, take it to a gathering or eat it all alone dripping excess caramel on your chin between bites. It's difficult to muck this one up. Next time I'm adding walnuts. 

Boiled Cranberry Raisin Cake
(Adapted from Allrecipes.com)
You'll need:
1 cup of dried cranberries
1 cup of raisins
2 cups of warm water + 1 cup of cold water
50 grams of butter
2 tablespoons of maple syrup
1/2 cup of vegetable oil
2 cups of white sugar
4 cups of all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon of ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon of ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon of nutmeg
1 teaspoon of baking soda
1 egg, beaten
1/2 teaspoon of salt

Preheat your oven to 175 degrees Celsius.
Boil raisins and cranberries in 2 cups of warm water along with the butter and maple syrup for 15 minutes then remove from the heat.
Add 1 cup of cold water and the vegetable oil to the boiled raisins.
In a large bowl, mix together the sugar, flour, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, salt and baking
soda.
Add the raisin mixture to the flour mixture then add the beaten egg. Stir until mixed.
Pour into a large rectangular baking pan and bake for around 1 hour. Serve with homemade caramel sauce.

Zebra Cake Turned Biscotti

I seem to fall into a pattern; one that I try to come to terms with, adjust to. It starts off with a quick job that drives me to run for an amount of time on what seems like the positive energy of this world compounded. Work happens in the midst of this; success comes in bursts. Later as it ends, I become harsher, a cracked heel. It is over and in some way, I too am over and worn out. I will sleep for days, read for hours, approach my kitchen out of necessity and watch food shows out of habit but no particular interest.  

A while later, I return after my hips have stretched and I have inhaled a large but untold number of biscuits, store-bought and homemade (not our home but another maybe mother or mother in law). Then when they are all gone I become biscuit-desperate, I make my own. Only then do I realize that I missed what I do. I missed my kitchen. I missed me.    

 Zebra Biscotti
(Adapted from BBC Food)

You'll need:
butter, to grease
4 large eggs
250 grams of granulated sugar
100 ml of milk
250 ml of sunflower oil
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
475 grams of self-raising flour
1 teaspoon of baking powder
25 grams of cocoa powder

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Butter a 23 cm cake tin. Crack your eggs and pour your sugar into a large mixing bowl. Pour in the milk, oil and vanilla extract and mix with a handheld electric whisk for a minute. Add 175 grams of your self-raising flour and whisk again until smooth. 

In a separate bowl, pour half of your mixture. Whisk in 1/2 a teaspoon of baking powder and 175 grams of flour and set aside. In the other bowl (the first bowl), mix in the cocoa powder, 125 grams of flour and the other 1/2 teaspoon of baking powder. 

In your cake tin, spoon two tablespoons of plain cake mix into the center then spoon two tablespoons of the chocolate mixture in the center and on top of the plain cake mix. Continue to do this until both cake mixes have been used up. You'll end up with alternate rings of cake mix in the tin. 

Bake in your oven for 40 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean. Remove from the oven, turn the cake out onto a wire rack and cool. Once cool, have a slice then place the cake onto a chopping board. Cut the cake into thick straight slices and arrange the soft cake, one side down, onto a baking sheet. Bake for around 15 minutes in a 190 degree Celsius preheated oven until they reach a light golden color. Transfer the biscotti onto a wire rack and cool completely before storing in an airtight container. 

Monday's Rough Recipe: Sticky Chicken

As featured in The Egypt Monocle

I can forgive a chef for a mediocre day in the kitchen. I may not have enjoyed the meal but if I’m comfortable in my space, haven’t gotten ill and am greeted with pleasant efficient service, I will readily come back to give the place another try and order something different on the menu.

Eating out at any of the new hip places littering Zamalek and Maadi doesn’t come cheap and so it would be assumed that service must be procedure and detail oriented. After several visits to those that call themselves gourmet and to those boastful of their interiors and branding but not their food, I was curious to know: are the wait staff receiving any training or are they told to dive, each with his own style, into the unknown? Why is a seamless dining experience elusive to many of our restaurateurs? Have they never had one themselves? These days in Cairo, I’d get better service at a fast food chain.

It doesn’t matter if you have a kids’ corner, library or an ingredient made or grown especially for you, people will eventually tire of bad restaurant service, the face of dining out, and move on to the next new and trendy restaurant.

As a customer, your waiter should be able to lay your table cutlery correctly without the need for you to shift your weight. Self-awareness of personal hygiene is crucial and so is an eye for detail. If the diner before me used the salt shaker on their sandwich eaten by hand, I don’t want to be the one to feel the grease on my fingertips later. If the flowers in the vase are dying, who knows what else is decomposing in the kitchen?

A good waiter will have been trained to be appropriately attentive. Staff that hover around the table incessantly are just as inexperienced and nerve grating as those who wait fifteen minutes to slip a menu into your hands in an empty restaurant while they stand around picking at a groove in their gum with a toothpick.

Instead of not tipping, complain first. Usually action is taken to improve service if only for that occasion. The more you reward bad service, the more likely you will be faced with it again. Remember that polite and courteous service is not a gift that waiters have to lavishly hand out as they please; these are your restaurant rights, use them.

Of course, you too as a customer must play your part — say please and thank you, act civilized, be nice and honor your reservations. Remember that these people are working a job that is not highly regarded by many in their country and they know it. To them, it is a way to make ends meet and few consider it a serious career choice. If you’re treating them like slave children, everybody loses. We might have a lot to learn but it won’t happen with the swish of a wand. If all else fails, stay home and make chicken.

Sticky Orange Mustard Chicken
You’ll need:
2 chickens, quartered
3 tablespoons of olive oil
2 tablespoons of whole grain mustard
2½ teaspoons of fresh thyme leaves
1 long sprig of fresh rosemary
2 tablespoon of honey
Zest of 1 orange
1 large orange, sliced
3 cloves of garlic
1/2 cup of unsweetened orange juice
4 teaspoons of Worcestershire sauce
1 tablespoon of hot sauce

Sea salt and freshly ground pepper

With the back of your knife crush the garlic cloves and toss them with the rosemary into a baking dish large enough to fit the chicken. Place the chicken into the baking dish. They should not overlap. You can use two separate dishes, which is what I did to prepare this but make sure to spread the marinade equally on both.

In a bowl, add the whole grain mustard, fresh thyme leaves, orange zest and honey then pour in the olive oil, orange juice, Worcestershire sauce and hot sauce. Whisk together then pour half of it onto the chicken reserving the other half for later.

Heat your oven to 200 degrees Celsius. Use your hands to massage the marinade into the chicken making sure not to tear the skin. Arrange the slices of orange above and below the chicken then season with freshly ground pepper and coarse sea salt. Pop the loaded baking dish into the heated oven and roast, basting with the reserved marinade and the hot chicken fat at the bottom of your pan every 15 minutes. The chicken will be done when the juices run clear if pierced with a knife. This should take around 45 minutes for each chicken.