alice’s posterous

First you need about 140g hazelnuts. I didn't toast them but I finely chopped them in a food processor.

I then added 140g self-raising flour and 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda (and I completely forgot to add 140g sugar!).

I whisked 3 egg whites until stiff, then I quickly stirred 140g butter melted, 75ml milk and the 3 egg yolks into the dry ingredients.
When the mixture was smooth, I stirred in one-third of the egg whites, then I gently folded in the rest. My son wanted to give me a hand :)

I poured the mixture into a tin,  and baked it for 40-50 mins until the cake was golden and springy to touch.

Whilst the cake was baking, I prepared the dark chocolate filling. I microwaved 100g dark chocolate with a bit of water and 1 tbsp clear honey and mixed it well to obtain a smooth consistency.
When the cake was out of the oven and had cooled down a bit, I splitted the sponge in half. I gently spooned the chocolate filling over the first half.

To finish, I put the other half of the cake back on top to obtain this delicious torte (even without sugar!).

In my previous post, I mentioned that pumpkins were in season (well, at least on the stalls on the market place next to where I live!). So I bought half of an enormous pumpkin and of course I had to carve it, cut it and peel it! I used part of it in small chunks for my creamy mushroomy chicken casserole. The easiest was for me to first scoop out the stringy insides and seeds, then cut the pumpkin into medium chunks and to peel each chunk. The outer skin is so though, I think it is too difficult to peel everything at once.

With the other part of half of my pumpkin (which results to a quarter of a pumpkin!), I decided to go for a pumpkin pie without the crust, so this basically became a pumpkin flan! It was a bit flat but still very tasty!

For the recipe, I more or less followed the guidelines from the video below, except I added a bit of ginger and vanilla essence and instead of the milk or cream, I added quark (cream cheese). You can find more details about the ingredients and how to carve a pumpkin here.

What about you? What is your favourite pumpkin recipe?

I had a few ripe nectarines so I decided to bake this yummy cake for dessert.
I followed this recipe but took a shortcut: instead of melting the butter and the brown sugar in a pan, I greased a tin with the butter and sprinkled it with the brown sugar. I then layered the nectarines on top of it and finally added the batter. It was quicker and saved me on cleaning a pan!
My one year old son loved it and had a quarter of the cake! He loves his food so much!

June means strawberry time!!! They are delicious eaten on their own but also in cakes and tarts.
This recipe is good when you have strawberries that are past their best.

Enjoy ;)

I looove blueberries!!!
My favourite recipe is blueberry pancakes with lot of marple syrup on top!

But I also like this recipe with soured cream or yogurt for the healthier version. It is simply delicious! I tried with and without the cheesecake frosting and both are good, although being French I prefer the one without the frosting ;)

 

My dad (@jfayel on Twitter) bought a huge box of strawberries so me and my mum ( @nanouk on Twitter) decided to make a strawberry tart using mascarpone as the filling.