A round vegan custard slice, step by step

Thanks to my friend Ray I have recently discovered these sweet Spanish Ines Rosales' tortas (there is also a savoury version). And noticing that they are vegan I thought of making a quick dessert, a bit like a custard slice, which I love, with them!

For the custard I used oat milk (barista style).

Ingredients:

1 tbsp flour

2 tbsp sugar

250 ml oat milk

a few drops of vanilla essence

2 sweet Ines Rosales pastries

Amarena cherries (optional)

Icing sugar to sprinkle

Fresh Fruit to serve (optional)

Mix the first three ingredients together and bring to a simmer, stirring constantly. Add the vanilla at the end. You should cook this custard until it is quite thick, and then keep stirring after cooking until it is lukewarm and no more steam comes out. Make sure that is thick, not runny!

Pile the custard on one of the pastry

I had some amarena cherries so I though of adding 4 to the custard, but any fresh or preserved fruit would work too. Just don't add too much 'juice'.

Place the second pastry on top and press lightly, smoothing the custard on the sides with a small spoon, if necessary. Sprinkle with icing sugar and refrigerate for a few hours.

This actually served three people, and we had fresh cherries on the side. I'll definitely make it again, probably with berries or with fruit preserved in alcohol! Yum! A real treat!

 Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

And now some flowers for my Pinterest board!

 Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

 

Ricciarelli di Siena, and homemade/recycled Christmas decorations

Ricciarelli are delicious Italian (Tuscan) almond sweets, apparently originated in the XIV century.

Making them in New Zealand is quite special, as they really give Xmas an Italian flair. Bitter almonds are one of the ingredients though, and I have not found them here, so I added just a few apricot kernels (be careful, they are poisonous so you just need a tiny amount, and they MUST be blanched). Of course this is optional, you will get great results just with regular almonds.

200 gr of almonds

about 6 to 10 apricot kernels

200 gr of sugar

2 egg whites

zest of an orange or a tbsp of candied mix citrus peels

Possibly some more ground almond if the mixture is too wet

plenty of icing sugar to roll and dust

Blanch the almond and the apricot kernels separately in hot water and remove the skin. 

Place them in the food processor with the sugar and grind to a powder. Do this in two lots, on pulse, making sure that the mixture doesn't heat or becomes a paste.

Lightly whip the egg whites, just gently, they don't have to be stiff like for a meringue, just starting to be white. Add the ground almonds and the orange zest or candied citrus peels. Mix well, if it feels too soft add a little ground almond. Cover and place in the fridge overnight.

The day after flour a board or working surface with icing sugar and roll the paste into thin rolls, about 2-3 cm thick. Cut and shape into biscuits, about 1.5-2 cm high. the traditional shape is like a grain of wheat, with two pointed ends. 

Place on a oven tray lined with baking paper and sprinkle with more icing sugar. Bake at 150C for 15 minutes or until the edges start to be golden. Ricciarelli should not be overcooked! Let them cool down completely before removing them from the baking tray. They keep well for a couple of weeks in a biscuits tin. 

All the decoration on this Xmas tree are homemade or recycled.

I recycled small bottles fro Italian fruit juices and crochet around them to make lights. I used recycled old wool for the crochet, and also made a few balls and little doilies. I foraged and painted the pine cones, and also spray painted some dried hydrangeas flowers. And then my usual sugar decorations, made with fondant, all white this year! Finally I recycled the crystal drops from a broken chandelier, they look classy on the tree!

 Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Banana blossom and carrot salad

 

I usually just have the banana blossom 'heart' for salads, but this time I have included a few of the little flowers that are found under the Petals. Cut the banana blossom from the bunch of bananas (leave them on the tree if they are still green) and peel off the outer pink petals, collecting the little blossoms and dropping them in cold water and lemon juice (I added some to the sink). 

Prepare another bowl with water and lemon juice and cut the banana 'heart' into small slices, dropping them quickly into the lemon water so that they don't brown. If you want to add the flowers you will need to remove the style and stigma, and the papery outer part of the flower. This takes a long time and this is why I only do it for a few of the most tender flowers. The more central flowers, which are completely white (no pink) can be eaten whole.

Rinse well and drain, then place in a bowl and add lemon or lime juice, about 2 tbsp, soy sauce, about 1 tbsp, and half a tsp of grated ginger. Press down with a plate or a second bowl and place a weigh on top (you can find an image in this recipe here). Leave overnight, or even a couple of days (like I did, it was perfectly fine!), then rinse under cold water, shake well and place in a clean bowl. Grate one large carrot and dress with lemon juice, salt and olive oil, then fold in the banana flowers. Mix well, taste for salt, and scoop into the banana petals for serving. I also decorated mine with Vietnamese mint flowers. 

It was very good, but next time, if I have the patience and time to clean all the little flowers, I'll tray to cook them. The 'heart' is definitely much nicer! 

 Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Soft baked cheesecake, "Japanese style"

One thing that I loved about living in Japan were the cakes, both Japanese and Western style. In fact the Western style cakes not only are of an incredible high quality, but they also seem lighter and less sweet that what we have here in New Zealand. The baked cheesecake has always been one of my favourites, I do find it a little 'eggy' perhaps, but every now and then it is fun to make!

Ingredients

1 x 250g pack of cream cheese (I used Philadelphia) 

50g butter (I used salted butter, follow instructions if you use unsalted butter)

150ml cream

50 sugar

5 eggs (large)

80g self rising flour

lemon zest and juice

Apricot jam for the topping (optional)

Cube the cream cheese and butter and place into a mixing bowl with the cream and sugar. If you use unsalted butter add a very small pinch of salt too. Place the bowl on a pot with boiling water (Bain Marie)  and mix well until all the ingredients are melted. Make sure that there are no lumps of cream cheese! Remove from the heat and then add the egg yolks, one by one, mixing well.  In the meantime whip the egg whites to a stiff peak, and also heat the oven to 180C. Add flour to the main mixture, then lemon zest (1 lemon) and lemon juice (one or two tbsp, depending on your lemon - Mayer lemons are sweet so you need more, if you use a more acidic lemon one tbsp will suffice). Fold in the egg whites little by little. Pour into a 18cm round baking tin lined with buttered baking paper (on the bottom and side of the tin - I butter both the tin and the baking paper). Place the tin on a larger baking pan filled with 30-40cm of hot water and place into the oven. The cake will also bake at Bain Marie. Turn the heat down to 160C and bake for about one hour. Turn the oven off but do not remove the cheesecake: leave it to cool down in the oven with the oven door slightly open. Sadly it will drop a bit in heigh while cooling, but this is normal. I am not sure what kind of stabilisers commercial bakeries use to keep their baked cheesecakes super high, but this is more about taste, and the homemade does taste better! When the cheesecake has cooled down remove from the baking tin and if you like brush the top with a little apricot jam thinned with hot water. 

I particularly like this cheesecake because it is so soft and not so sweet, so I can have it for breakfast with my coffee. For dessert instead I like to add some Italian amarena cherries in syrup, or some berries, fresh or frozen, marinated with a little sugar and lemon juice, to give it a bit more sweetness and flavour.

And now some flowers for my Pinterest 

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Pumpkin Coconut Curry (and pumpkin soup for the day after)

 

Bake the whole pumpkin in the oven and then slice and remove the outer peel and centre, slice and set aside. Chop two shallots and one green pepper and sauté with a little vegetable oil,  then add red curry paste (as much as your taste buds suggest) and a can of coconut cream, plus the water from rinsing out the can. Bring to a simmer, then add the sliced pumpkin and some Vietnamese mint leaves and flowers, cover and cook for 20 minutes. Top with fresh Vietnamese mint flowers, and also chopped coriander and Thai or lemon basil. Serve with rice, it is delicious!

If you have made a lot you can also blend it into a soup, easy as!

  Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

How to make ciabatta bread at home

 

This is my recipe for a simple yet foolproof ciabatta bread loaf, one of my favourite loaves! The recipe is straight from my book Savour (now available as an ebook from Kobo and from Barnes & Noble, and also from Amazon for Kindle), where there are many more bread recipes, and more. In the meantime enjoy this one!

  

Ciabatta 

Ingredients

300ml warm water

2 teaspoons active yeast granules

14⁄teaspoon sugar

300g high-grade flour, plus extra for dusting

pinch of salt 

Makes 1 loaf

Place the warm water in a large bowl, add the yeast and sugar and set aside for 5 minutes. When the yeast starts to bubble, add the flour and salt and work into a dough for about 5 minutes using your fingers. This dough will be too sticky to roll on the bench or table so knead it in the bowl (although it feels more like mixing). Cover the bowl with a damp tea towel and leave to rise for about 2 hours. Line a large baking tray with baking paper and turn out the risen dough onto the tray bottom-side up. The dough will be sticky so you will need to scrape it from the sides of the bowl; it is also likely to be runny – prop up the outside edges of the baking paper with a couple of small ovenproof ramekins to avoid ending up with an extremely large flat loaf (the ramekins can be filled with water to create a steam oven effect - image 1)). Dust the top of the loaf with the extra flour. Bake in a preheated 180 ̊C (350 ̊F) oven for 25–30 minutes.

 Remove the bread from the oven, wrap in a tea towel, then place in a plastic bag and seal. Leave the bread in the bag for 30 minutes so that the steam will cook it further and make it soft and deliciously chewy. If you prefer a ciabatta with a crunchy crust, eat it while it’s still warm – yum!

 

 

Tips and variations

Although some recipes add 1–2 tablespoons of olive oil to the dough, I prefer an oil-free version so I can drizzle olive oil on it when it is freshly cut and ready to eat. I also like to dip ciabatta slices in a little oil flavoured with crushed cumin seeds and salt or basil leaves.

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Gnocchi di ricotta con fiori eduli - Ricotta gnocchi with edible flowers

 

 

Start by mixing 500 g of ricotta with a few flowers and petals (I used cornflower, verbena and calendula). Add salt to taste and white pepper if you like.

Add 100 g of flour and mix well.

Shape into balls, no bigger than a golf ball, and flatten lightly.

Bring the water to boil, add salt, then lower to a simmer. Add the gnocchi a few at the time, moving them lightly in the water as they cook. Be gentle! When the gnocchi rise let them float for a minute or so and lift out with a slotted spoon and transfer into a pot with melted butter and sage.

Continue until all the gnocchi are cooked. Keep the the pot with the butter warm and turn over the gnocchi just once, very delicately. Dish and top with the melted butter, Parmigiano Reggiano, and some more edible flowers.

Photos and recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Learn to make bread, pizza, pastries, savoury tarts and pies, frittata.... and more: Savour is now an ebook!

Exciting news! Savour, my second book with over 100 recipes (mostly family and Italian recipes) is now available as an ebook:

 from Kobo, worldwide. Click here to find out more!

Or for Amazon for Kindle

Also From Barnes & Noble