Peach Melba Cheesecake for a summer party

 

 

Cheesecake seems to be my default dessert in the summer as it's light and creamy, and you can add all sorts of flavours - my husband prefers chocolate desserts but I don't want to cook with chocolate that much when the weather is hot!

Last weekend we went to his aunt and uncle's house for a family party and I was asked if I could make a dessert. Cheesecake is usually popular and easy to make, so I chose a peach melba cheesecake recipe from a book called Cheesecake by Hannah Miles.

I was buying the ingredients several days in advance and have found fresh raspberries go mouldy very quickly before, so decided to use tinned; I also had tinned peaches in the cupboard so decided to use those instead of fresh. Finally I decided not to make the glaze to go on top - so here's what I did.

for the base
300g malted milk biscuits
150g butter, melted
300g tin of raspberries in syrup, drained - reserve a few for the decoration

for the filling
4 sheets leaf gelatine
410g tin of peach slices in juice or syrup, drained
100g caster sugar
200g cream cheese
250g ricotta
150ml double cream

for the topping
half a 410g tin of peach slices in juice or syrup, drained
a few raspberries to decorate

I didn't make the glaze to go on the top partly due to lack of time but partly as I didn't think I fancied it - it looked like a thin layer of jelly essentially. If you want to find out how to do that part have a look at the book.

Crush the biscuits in a blender in a few batches.

Melt the butter in a small pan or in a microwave-proof bowl in the microwave and stir in the biscuits.

Press into the bottom of a loose-bottomed cake or tart tin, pressing some of the biscuit up the sides to form a crust. Spread the raspberries over the biscuit base.

Soften the gelatine leaves in a bowl of water for 5 minutes or according to pack instructions.

Meanwhile puree the peaches in a food processor and set aside.

Mix the sugar, cream cheese and ricotta in a large bowl until creamy.

Heat the cream in a small pan until it is just warm. Squeeze the water out of the gelatine leaves and stir into the cream, mixing until all the gelatine has dissolved. Whisk into the cheese mixture in the bowl and then fold in the peach puree.

Pour onto the prepared base and leave overnight in the fridge to set.

Just before you want to serve, decorate the top of the cheesecake with the peach slices and reserved raspberries.

This cheesecake was really light and creamy, with a nice flavour from the peaches and a burst of raspberry on the base. It disappeared quite quickly at our family lunch!

I'm sending this to Baking Crumbs hosted by Only Crumbs Remain
 and  CookBlogShare hosted by Glutarama

Giant Cupcake - Raspberry Flavour

Here is a giant raspberry cupcake I made for my mum's birthday, using candy melts to make a cupcake case - a great technique that I will explain below.

I created the recipe myself though it is fairly straightforward.

Giant Raspberry Cupcake - an original recipe by Caroline Makes

225g caster sugar

225g butter, softened

200g self-raising flour

3 eggs

150g fresh raspberries

For the buttercream:

100g butter, softened

200g icing sugar

pink food colouring

For the cupcake case:

200g candy melts in red or pink - I used Renshaw

 It's a good idea to make the candy melt shell first as it needs time to set in the fridge. Melt the candy melts in the microwave according to pack instructions. Use a spoon to spread around the inside of the bottom part of the giant cupcake mould - this is why a silicon mould is much better than a metal tin for this recipe. When you have an even layer around the inside of the mould, making sure you have not left any gaps, place in the fridge for 30 mins- 1 hour to set. Remove from the fridge, melt the rest of the candy melts in the microwave again and spread another layer inside the cake mould and return to the fridge. When that layer has set, carefully peel off the silicon cake mould by turning it slowly inside out until you are left with the candy melt shell (see further down for a photo).

Preheat the oven to 175C. Cream the butter and the sugar then beat in the eggs. Fold in the flour, then the raspberries. I used my Kitchenaid so the raspberries were broken up but not completely blended.

I bought this giant cupcake pan ages ago but hadn't gotten around to using it, after an earlier not particularly successful attempt at a giant cupcake in a metal Wilton tin (which was down to the recipe that I used). I decided to give it a go, so sprayed both parts of the pan with Cake Release, stood it in a roasting tin and poured in the cake batter. I left plenty of room for the cake to rise.

Bake in the preheated oven for 35-40 minutes; test the cake with a skewer or cake tester to make sure it is cooked in the middle. Allow to cool in the silicon mould then turn out onto a wire rack.

You will need to trim the bottom part of the cake a little to fit inside the candy melt shell, as you can see below. You can also see the raspberries in the cake!

Place the trimmed cake inside the candy melt shell. It looks great!

To make the icing, cream the softened butter and icing sugar and add the food colouring. My butter was a bit too soft which meant my icing wasn't stiff enough to pipe, meaning I couldn't pipe the swirls that I wanted to (and I was in a bit of a hurry).

Instead I spread the icing on with a palette knife; I think it looks fine like this.

Dr. Oetker sent me some wafer butterflies recently, and they have also sent me wafer daisies in the past. I think these are brilliant - when you don't have time for fancy decorations on a cake, you can just pop on a couple of these and they will totally transform your cake. The butterflies are particularly pretty in my opinion, though I have to admit I haven't been able to find them in any of the supermarkets I shop at yet!

Here's the finished giant cupcake, decorated with butterflies and wafer flowers.
 The cake tasted very nice but most of all I was pleased by how it looked.

 The letter we have chosen for this month's Alphabakes is R so I am including this raspberry cake. The challenge is hosted by Ros at The More Than Occasional Baker this month.

Raspberries are in season so I am sending this to Simple and In Season, hosted by Ren Behan.

Shaheen at Allotment2Kitchen has launched a new blog challenge, the Vegetable Palette. This month she is asking for recipes made with any red fruit or vegetable.

I am also entering this in the Bakespiration challenge run by Stuck In The Tree, click on the link to check it out - their site is all about having fun online and off.

Peach and Raspberry Breakfast Pot

I'm always trying to think of different things I can have for breakfast, as I try not to have cereal or toast for breakfast if I am having a sandwich for lunch (part of the idea of the Slimming World plan). So it also has to be something healthy, and preferably something that is quick to prepare and eat or that I can take to work and eat at my desk. I bought some peaches and had some raspberries left over from this recipe so decided to use them as the basis for a breakfast pot.

First I poured a few spoonfuls of Special K into a dessert glass; you could also use muesli.

Next add a couple of spoonfuls of fat free Greek style plain yogurt, and a little sweetener such as Splenda, or honey or agave nectar if you prefer.

Swirl in some raspberries or raspberry puree. I preferred to whiz the raspberries in a blender to make into a puree which I then stirred through the yogurt.

Slice a peach and layer the slices on top

As my boyfriend has had a kidney stone I've been thinking about foods that are high in fibre. I previously bought a packet of hemp seeds from a health food store for a smoothie I made and had a lot left, so I sprinkled a teaspoonful on top of the peaches.

I thought putting it on top would give a satisfying crunchy topping though you could also mix it in with the muesli layer.

Here's a side view of the breakfast pot; I also made one in a plastic container to take to work and eat straight from the pot. It was delicious and really filling, I wasn't hungry again until lunchtime.

I'm sending this to Breakfast Club, hosted this month by Elizabeth's Kitchen as the theme for June is high fibre. I'm looking forward to seeing what other ideas people come up with! The challenge was created by Helen of Fuss Free Flavours.

This used up leftover fruit and cereal from a packet I already had open, so it was actually a quite thrifty breakfast. For that reason I'm sending it to Credit Crunch Munch, hosted by Helen at Fuss Free Flavours and Camilla at Fab Food 4 All. This month it is guest hosted by Anneli at Delicieux.

Raspberries are the ingredient for this month's One Ingredient Challenge, hosted by Nazima at Franglais Kitchen and Laura at How To Cook Good Food.

Raspberry Macarons

I've never found making macarons easy - and while I managed to make them as part of a group lesson, I had rather less success when trying to make them at home. I'd even tried making them from an expensive packet mix, which cost £7.50, so when I saw that Sainsbury's had introduced a new macaron packet mix costing only £2, I knew I had to try it.

The instructions are very easy to follow and you only need a couple of ingredients beside what is included in the packet - they even give you a piping bag. First you have to whisk two egg whites to stiff peaks.

Here are the two packets of mixture, one for the macarons and one for the filling.

Simply mix the macaron packet mix into the whisked egg whites. It's a very bright pink colour and has a zingy raspberry taste but is also quite sweet.

The instructions say to pipe the macarons onto a piece of greaseproof paper on a baking tray but I decided to use my macaron mat. It has two sizes of circles marked out (on the back and front) to use as a guide and is made of silicon so it's easy to peel the macarons off when they are cooked.

There's a paper piping bag included in the box. I was a bit dubious but stood the bag in a tall glass so I could fill it, and snipped off a little piece at the bottom. I was pleased to find that the macaron mixture was quite thick so didn't start running out of the piping bag until I was ready.

 

I found it quite easy to pipe the macarons onto the marked circles - definitely easier than the last time I made macarons where my discs were all shapes and sizes (even using the mat, as my mixture was quite runny).

Bake in the oven- the instructions say to put the macarons into a cold oven and turn it to 50C for 20 minutes, then turn the oven up to 150C ( I think - don't quote me on that) for another 15 mins. That was different to how I've made them before; I also put my silicon mat onto a baking tray to keep it flat, and banged it on the worktop a few times to eliminate any bubbles, something that wasn't in the instructions but I've been taught to do.

They came off the macaron mat very easily and many were almost perfect circles with only a few that had spread.

To make the filling, I whisked the packet mixture together with some butter. It's pink and has a zesty raspberry taste; it's also a good consistency - not too thick, not too thin.

However, I didn't quite have enough to sandwich all the macarons together (and I don't think I was particularly heavy handed with the filling). I had some leftover raspberry puree I had made from a punnet of raspberries that I have been eating in a breakfast fruit pot I've made so I mixed this with some icing sugar to make some more filling for the macarons.

The homemade filling

It was very easy to sandwich the macarons together and the filling stayed put and did not run out. For some reason though the macarons had lost their pink colour and turned more brown on the outside - mine always seem to do that, I wonder why?

The inside is a lovely bright pink though!

I decided to package these up in a small box and send to a friend for his birthday. I hope they made it in the post OK!

I'm sending these raspberry macarons to Alphabakes, the challenge I co-host with Ros from The More Than Occasional Baker, as the letter we have randomly chosen this month is R.

Raspberries are the ingredient for this month's One Ingredient Challenge, hosted by Nazima from Franglais Kitchen and Laura from How To Cook Good Food.