Tag Archives: Felicity Cloake

The Guardian’s Bakewell Traybake

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I recently deleted the old Mary Berry Bakewell recipe that I had on ‘Pining’. Someone called Emma was incensed that it didn’t work out for her which I found quite amusing as if you are an experienced baker you know that you can do a recipe fifty times with no problems but sometimes it just fails for no good reason. When that happens Jack says there were ‘too many clouds in the sky’ – it’s a thing that scientists say about failed experiments! Anyway, as I had stopped doing the Mary Berry version, I thought it was about time that I shared what I think is the Felicity Cloake version from The Guardian, which although I’m fairly sure must be more calorific due to the ground almonds, is much tastier in my opinion.

Bakewell Pudding

For the base:

100g (1/2 a cup) soft unsalted butter
50g (1/4 cup) sugar
100g (1/2 cup) plain flour
pinch of salt

For the filling:

150g ground almonds
50g (1/4 cup) plain flour
150g soft unsalted butter
150g sugar
3 medium eggs
a few drops of almond extract (optional)
1/2 a jar (or more) of raspberry jam
15-20g flaked almonds
150g fresh raspberries
icing sugar, to serve

Heat the oven to 170C//335F/gas mark 3 and lightly grease an 18cmx25cm baking tin.

To make the base, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, sift in the flour and salt, and work to a crumbly mixture. Press into the base of the tin, don’t worry if there are a few gaps, it will spread out as it cooks) and bake for 20 minutes until golden brown. Remove and turn the oven to 180C/350F/gas mark 4.

For the filling, combine the ground almonds and flour and set aside.
Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
Gradually beat in the eggs one at a time, adding a spoonful of almond mix with each egg.
Fold in the remaining almond/flour mixture, and almond extract if using.

Spread the jam thickly over the cooled base and spread the almond/flour mixture evenly on top. Stud with the raspberries, pressing them in gently, and scatter with flaked almonds.
Bake for 35-40 minutes, until golden brown. Leave to cool, then dust with icing sugar and cut into squares.

I tried to convert the weights into US cups but I’m not confident they’re correct as according to some sites it depends which ingredients you are measuring. Honestly it’s a lot easier using scales.

Bakewell Pudding Sliced

As with many recipes I use them as a starting point and do my own thing. When I baked this batch a few weeks ago I had a jar of homemade jam that needed to be used up. I had made it last autumn and just called it autumn jam as it was a mixture of plums, pears and brambles/blackberries. It was really delicious as it tasted sort of Christmas spicy, despite having no such spice in it, I think it might have been the type of pears I used. I hope I can replicate it this autumn. Anyway, I used up the whole of the jar of jam in this batch. As raspberry season was over I didn’t add the raspberries, and it was still delicious, I also skipped the icing sugar and flaked almonds – well I am trying to eat healthily! However, as you can see, I cut the slices into rectangles, not squares!

Welsh Rarebit – a Felicity Cloake recipe

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Welsh Rarebit

Welsh Rarebit Again

Yesterday I decided to cook something a bit different for lunch, using a recipe from Felicity Cloake’s book. I had never cooked Welsh rarebit before – or Welsh rabbit as it is sometimes known, although I have eaten it before of course. It’s really easy to make and was absolutely delicious although as you can see, despite the fact that we used three bits of bread between us, the mixture still overflowed a lot, next time I’ll use four bits of bread. This is just posh cheese on toast. We used a wholemeal loaf which Jack cut thick slices from.

We didn’t have any stout but I used Newcastle Brown Ale instead, Jack was happy to finish the rest of it, I am not a fan of beer although it is tasty in this recipe.

You can read the Guardian article which appears in the book along with the recipe here.

Christmas books

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This Christmas I got far fewer books than usual due to not being able to travel around and visit bookshops where in normal years from the autumn onwards I would just ask Jack to put any book purchases away and wrap them up for Christmas for me.

More Christmas Books

Christmas Books

I was lucky enough to be given a copy of Completely Perfect by Felicity Cloake. She’s a cookery writer who features in The Guardian, I really like her as any recipes of hers that I’ve tried in the past have worked out well, and you can’t say that for all food writers. The blurb on the front says: ‘A gift for anyone who is learning to cook’. I’ve been cooking for over 45 years but I’m sure I can improve using these recipes which are all classics.

During a brief lifting of lockdown I visited a favourite rake-around upcyle shop near Perth, they’re always so much more interesting than ordinary shops as you just never know what might turn up. This time I bought three lovely wee Alison Uttley books to add to my own collection of children’s books. Squirrel Goes Skating, Moldy Warp the Mole and Little Grey Rabbit’s Party.

It’s lovely to think that they’ll be in use again at some point in the future. I hope my granddaughter will grow up liking books! They’re illustrated by Margaret Tempest and I think the endpapers are beautiful. These editions date from the early 1970s.

After reading my first book by the Scottish author Dorita Fairlie Bruce I decided I would have to resort to the internet to get some more. So I opted to begin the Dimsie series:

Dimsie Goes to School
Dimsie Moves Up
Dimsie Moves Up Again.

These books date from the 1930s. I’ve ony read one book by her before and that was from her Springdale series, set in Scotland, so I hope I enjoy these ones as much, although I believe the setting of the school is England. The very first page has endeared me already though:

The mail train from the north roared its way towards London down the long bleak incline of the Chap Fells, and Dimsie curled up in her corner seat, regarded the green rounded hills with a certain contempt; the Scottish mountains to which she belonged, were made of altogether sterner stuff, and already she was begining to feel a little bit lonely without them. Ben Lomond – the Cobbler and his Wife – they had all been as living friends to Dimsie through the ten short years of a life that had not known many human friends.

If you look at my header photo of Dumbarton, the town I grew up in, you can just make out Ben Lomond in the distance.

Did you get some lovely Christmas books this year?

Millionaire’s Shortbread – Felicity Cloake’s recipe

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It’s a long time since I posted a recipe on Pining, but one day last week Jack said that there was a tin of condensed milk in the cupboard which was coming up to its use by date, he likes to keep track of things like that. Anyway it was a perfect excuse to use it either to make some highly calorific Scottish Tablet or Millionaire’s Shortbread. As I had made and scoffed tablet the week before I opted for the even more calorific recipe. The recipe I use is Felicity Cloake’s from The Guardian, you can see it here.

Millionaire's shortbread , Felicity Cloake

I used a good quality milk chocolate for the topping. This recipe makes a really weighty amount, in fact I weighed the whole thing and it came out at over 3.5 lbs including the tin which isn’t that heavy. I think the whole thing must add up to about 3,000 calories! We don’t have much left now, it’s just far too moreish!

Millionaire's shortbread

Vegetarian Haggis

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It’s coming up to that time of the year again – Burns Night, and the maker of my favourite vegetarian haggis seems to have given up making them, I can only find their normal haggis in the supermarkets. I tried another maker and it was not a good experience, it had red kidney beans in it and they were really hard – a bit of a worry as they didn’t seem to have cooked.

I intended making up my own recipe but in today’s Guardian I spotted a recipe for vegetarian haggis and it’s more or less what I was going to do anyway, although I must admit that I wouldn’t have thought of putting black treacle into it.

Anyway, if you are also looking for a vegetarian haggis recipe, have a look here.

In the accompanying article Felicity Cloake says that the main flavour in haggis is offal, I don’t agree, in any haggis I have had the main flavour has been the pepper/spices. That’s why I decided long ago to stick to the veggie type as the flavour is very similar and you don’t feel squeamish at the thought of what is inside it!