Brown Bread Ice-Cream

This recipe is fantastic. If you balk at the idea of ‘brown bread’ ice cream, I urge you to give it a try … I promise you’ll be converted. The bread in question is made into breadcrumbs and toasted with brown sugar giving the ice-cream a deep fudgy caramel taste which is so moorish. The other great thing about this recipe is you need no special kit to make it, just a hand whisk and a lidded tupperware type box. Enjoy!

Louise x

Louise’s Brown Bread Ice-Cream

Ingredients
Serves 6.
85g/3oz brown breadcrumbs
85g/3oz soft dark brown sugar
2 large eggs, separated
Half a tablespoon of dark rum [optional]
300ml / Half a pint of double cream
85g/3oz sifted icing sugar

1. Mix the breadcrumbs with the brown sugar and pop under a moderate grill for 8 – 10 mins. You need to keep a watchful eye on this and stir it frequently. You want the breadcrumbs and sugar to caramelise, not burn. Once cool break up with a fork.

2. Whisk the egg whites until stiff. Mix the egg yolks with rum, if using, and fold into the egg white mixture.

3. Whisk the cream and icing sugar together in another bowl until floppy. Then fold this into your egg mixture along with the breadcrumbs.

4. Pour into a shallow freezer container and freeze for 4 hrs. When ready to serve, allow it to soften slightly before scooping out.

Roasted Pepper, Onion & Garlic Soup

After a few weeks of zero activity on the blog front, I am posting a couple of recipes for you from My Kitchen. Both were a result of needing to knock up a quick lunch that satisfied on every level. The weather was deceptively cold, but full of promise with bright sunshine. Hence a combo of a bowl of rich soup and a [smaller bowl] of ice cream was on the menu. Both of these recipes were made from what I had in the kitchen cupboards, fridge and freezer. Often the best dishes are those that are cobbled together on a whim. Below is my recipe for the soup, tune in right after for my brown bread [yep you heard right] ice cream recipe!

Happy Cooking,

Louise x

Roasted Pepper, Garlic and Onion Soup

Ingredients
5 – 6 Pepper [red, yellow or orange]
Onion
3 – 4 Cloves of Garlic [adjust to your own taste]
Fresh Thyme [you can other herbs such as parsley, basil and sage or dried herbs if you don't have fresh to hand]
2 tins of chopped tomatoes
A splash of balsamic vinegar or red wine vinegar
Olive Oil
Vegetable Stock

This really is a make-it-up-as-you-go-along recipe, so quantities and ingredients are but a rough guide – follow your instincts!

1. Preheat your oven to 200C. Remove the plinth and seeds from the peppers and chop into large pieces and place in a large roasting tray. Add to this a roughly chopped onion and 3 – 4 unpeeled garlic cloves. Add your herbs and then drizzle with enough olive oil to coat the vegetables.

2. Place this in the oven for 25 – 35 minutes. Check on your vegetables a few times whilst they are roasting, they will benefit from a gentle stir every now and then. You want to cook them until they are soft and just starting to char in places. Squeeze your roasted garlic cloves into your vegetables and discard the papery casing.

3. Next add the contents of your roasting tray, including and juices, to a large saucepan, add your tinned tomatoes and cover with vegetable stock.

4. Blitz with a blending stick or in batches in a blender. Add more or less stock depending on how thick you’d like you finished soup to be. Heat through and then serve, garnishing with a teaspoon of cream and a drizzle of olive oil if desired.

A suitable cake for a mother-to-be

This weekend we had a couple of old friends over; Duncan and Reena. We had a lovely time together catching up. It's exciting times as Reena is expecting their first child later this summer. So with that in mind I decided to make a cake that would be suitable for the delicate stomach that trouble most expectant mothers in that first trimester. The result was a Chocolate & Ginger Cake. I adapted a regular favourite of mine, the Nigella Lawson Store-Cupboard Chocolate-Orange Cake, replacing the orange marmalade with ginger preserve. Served with a dollop of creme fraiche it was perfect, just like the company.

My Big Cake Weekend.

Apologies to any one who may have looked upon this blog recently and thought I may had given it up. You can be forgiven for thinking so. The fact is I've just been too busy to post as frequently as I would like. With two hungry children (and a husband) to cook for food is often prepared in a hurry and eaten before it could be photographed and I do have a terrible time photographing in winter light in my kitchen.

Anyhow, I am back with a bang, or a christening cake to be precise. I was delighted to receive an order on recommendation for a cake for such a special occasion. I was lucky enough to be granted creative to freedom on the design of the cake, so long as it was pretty and girly in some way. So after a bit of email correspondence with my customer to find out likes and dislikes, I created the above 3 cakes, which fed 60 hungry guest and still had a few slices left over for my customers lunch box this week. Each cake has four layers of two different sponges. The darker sponge is plain chocolate and coffee and the light sponge is white chocolate and vanilla. The layers are sandwiched together and topped with a white chocolate cream frosting. Then I've done my thing with flowers, herbs and fruits. I became quite nervous as I delivered and set up the cakes at the venue yesterday morning (saturday night my sleep was full of cake anxiety dreams), worried how the cake would go down in looks as well as taste. My nerves were calmmed with a phone call later that afternoon from the customer who said that she was absolutely thrilled with the cake and that everyone admired it and enjoyed every mouthful ...

Back in the Kitchen

It's official I'm back in the Kitchen. I took an unscheduled 'holiday' from my blog during December due to all the baking I undertook for Brighton's Artists Open Houses and other festive events taking over. But now I'm back and I'm also back as of Friday with my recipe posts for http://thebeatthatmyheartskipped.co.uk

Well it certainly is January out of my kitchen window - snow, ice, slush, and colourless grey skies. The warm festivities of Christmas feels like an age ago now and Spring is very much still out of reach. So, we must try to lift the positive things out of the month - take a hot bath in the evening, light some pretty candles, wrap yourself up in your warmest blanket when lounging on your sofa and of course warm your soul with some comfort food!
With the recent excess of Christmas, I like to turn my cooking to simple, warming 'good-for-you' foods. Not a limp 'diet' salad, but robust stews, soups and pies featuring seasonal veg, spices, and hearty herbs ... hot food!
Breakfast, for me, is the reason to get up on a cold morning and in January I will start my day with a bowl of porridge. I love porridge and could in fact eat it at anytime of the day .... I been known to have a bowl in the evening when the days events have overrun and it becomes to late to cook a 'proper' dinner.

I love to have porridge with apricots, honey and creme fraiche. You simply poach a handful of dried apricots (the dark organic ones are far superior to the bright orange ones!) in 250ml of pure orange juice for 5 mins. Then make your porridge as usual and top with the apricots, honey and a good dollop of creme fraiche. Give it a try .....

The first of three weekends at Artists Open Houses

As the weekend comes to close, so does Louise's Kitchen's first weekend in residence at the very stylish and very christmassy 33 Coventry Street in Brighton. This house along with over 70 opens its doors to the public for three consecutive weekends selling all sorts of wares from local artists and designers - it's a great alternative to the High Street for Christmas shopping. Amongst the stylish lampshades, cushions, jewellery, clothing and artwork, Louise's Kitchen offered up plates of home-baked goodies - vanilla, chocolate and red velvet cupcakes, brownies, giant vanilla snowflake cookies, boxes of chocolate cookies and festive cranberry muffins. The plates have not much left on them aside for a few crumbs, so it's back to the kitchen to bake a fresh new batch for next weekend. If you're in the area please do pop in!

Come on over!

Louise’s Kitchen will be selling a selection of freshly baked cupcakes, brownies, cookies and muffins at Brighton’s Artists Open Houses Christmas 2009 event. For three weekends, 28/29 Nov, 5/6 Dec and 12/13 Dec, these sweet treats will be on sale at 33 Coventry Street, Brighton, BN1 5PP, 11.00 - 18.00. As well as sampling the baked goodies, you can get your christmas shopping underway as the house will be filled with a wide variety of christmas gifts to buy. Host of the event, the wonderful Madeliene of Mibo (www.mibo.co.uk) will be selling her charming christmas creatures along side plenty of other bargins and samples. Lee Baker will be there with his exquisite Japanese influenced screen prints, Ricore will be showcasing delicate Art-Deco inspired jewellery, Organic Stereo will be selling their chic organic clothing and
Sarah Carlisle has the perfect christmas plant gifts from just £5.00.

Browsing the Artists Open Houses with a glass of mulled wine, signals the start of the Brighton Christmas social calendar. This year over 70 houses will be open over the 3 weekends filled with almost every kind of Christmas gift you could wish for. As well as paintings, prints and sculpture, many houses offer ceramics, textiles, lighting, home furnishings, cards and a variety of Christmas decorations.

Many of the houses are clustered together within easy walking distance of one another, so it is easy to spend an enjoyable afternoon visiting them. You can chat to the artists and makers about their work as you browse and when you find the perfect gift you can buy direct from the artists.
You can find out more about Artists Open Houses Christmas 2009 at www.aoh.og.uk