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Borough Market London – Foodie Heaven!

Posted on February 7, 2017 by The quirk and the cool

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The Borough Market in Southwark, London, was a destination I was really looking forward to when visiting the UK in December.

I’m a huge fan of markets, enjoying visiting local farmers’ markets in country New South Wales, as well as the city equivalent in Sydney. Orange Grove Market, mentioned in other  posts, is a great Saturday excursion to pick up organic fruit and veg, hot smoked fish, French cheese, farmers’ free range eggs and pastry and bread galore!

I’ve been following the Borough Market online for a while to prepare for the visit. I went twice, on a Saturday a couple of weeks before Christmas and a week or so later midweek. Saturday was buzzing, busy, and a bit tricky to navigate, but still heaps of fun! The next visit was a pleasant stroll and I got to see much more of the market’s delights.

The Borough Market is a little bit of old world London in that sophisticated metropolis. Arches and passageways, nooks and crannies, keep you guessing at what comes next, as you make your way around the market. After my two visits I finally got the hang of the geography. The charm of the Market lies in the mix of the old world with a plethora of multi cultural cuisines.

There is so much produce! I was bowled over by cheese vendor upon cheese vendor! And then the patisseries and bread stalls, fresh fruit and vegetables, meat of every kind, sausages and stews and curries.

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I liberally sampled the baked goods, filled focaccia, croissants, large sticky buns, packed full of fruit, that looked like miniature Christmas puddings, and real muffins.

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I found a little stall selling dried fruit and nuts, and wonderful candied fruit. Whole candied clementines were a great Christmas treat! Another stall sold home made fudge, of every conceivable flavour, which you could pick and mix yourself.

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Two highlights  – a salted caramel milkshake with Bath milk, and robust, fragrant Colombian coffee, much appreciated by this writer, who had been craving really good coffee since my arrival in London.

It was fun to be at the Market at Christmas – there was a buzzy, gregarious mood, and everyone seemed to be having fun shopping for the festive season.

 

 

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Chocolate Chunk Fudge Cookies with Raspberry and Rhubarb Jam

Posted on May 5, 2014 by The quirk and the cool
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Chocolate Chunk Fudge Cookies
 
This recipe was featured in the May 2014 delicious. magazine.
It originates from the Sydney cooking school BakeClub:
http://www.bakeclub.com.au/recipes/chocolate-chunk-fudge-cookies.aspx
The cookie mixture is particularly rich because of the amount of melted chocolate stirred through it.
I used a mixture of dark and milk chocolate, although the original recipe specifies dark chocolate only.
The short cooking time plus the chocolate base give this cookie a fudgy centre. Quite delicious!

Ingredients

450g good-quality dark chocolate, coarsely chopped or a mixture of dark and milk chocolate

125g butter, softened

125g firmly packed brown sugar

2 free range eggs, at room temperature

225g  plain flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

Method

Preheat the oven to 180°C.

Put 300g of the chocolate (dark) in a heatproof bowl over a saucepan of simmering water, making sure the base of the bowl doesn’t touch the water. Stir over low heat until the chocolate is melted and smooth. Remove from the heat and set aside, stirring occasionally until cooled to room temperature. Or alternatively melt very carefully in a microwave.

Beat the butter and sugar until well creamed.  Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition until well combined. Add the cooled chocolate and beat until combined.

Sift the flour and baking powder together over the cookie mixture. Add the remaining 150g of chopped dark, or dark and milk chocolate. Stir gently to combine.

Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and place in the fridge for up to an hour or until the mixture is firm enough to roll into balls. I found the mixture firmed up after half an hour.

Line a large baking tray with non-stick baking paper.

Roll heaped tablespoonfuls of the cookie mixture into balls and place about 5cm apart on the tray. Place any remaining dough back in the fridge. Use your hands to flatten the balls slightly, to about 4cm in diameter.  Bake in the preheated oven for 10-12 minutes or until they are still slightly soft to the touch.

Remove the cookies from the oven and cool completely on the tray. Repeat with the remaining dough.

The cookies are great solo but also go well sandwiched with homemade raspberry and rhubarb jam.IMG_1190
Raspberry and Rhubarb Jam

Ingredients

500g frozen raspberries
150g lightly cooked rhubarb
400g sugar
Juice of 1 lemon

Method

Put the raspberries into a china or plastic basin (not metal).  Cover with the sugar and leave for several hours or overnight.

Add lemon juice and gently stir the mixture to make sure all the sugar is dissolved. Add the cooked rhubarb.

Transfer to a large saucepan and boil briskly, testing for setting point regularly. When setting point* is reached – about 15  minutes, remove pan from the stove. Ladle carefully into sterilised jars and leave to cool.

Note: use a wooden spoon and do not stir vigorously so that the berries are kept mostly intact.

*Testing for setting point
While the jam is cooking, place a small saucer in the freezer to thoroughly chill (about 5 minutes). When you think the jam may have reached setting point, remove the saucer form the freezer, place a teaspoonful of jam on it, put back in the freezer for 3 or 4 minutes. If the jam has a jelly-like consistency or a crinkly skin has formed on the sample, the jam is ready.

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Posted in Biscuits and Slices, Jams, Marmalades, Conserves and Chutneys, Small Baked Things, Sweet Food and tagged , , , . Bookmark the permalink.

White Chocolate and Caramel Pecan Cookies with Sea Salt

Posted on May 21, 2013 by The quirk and the cool

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Take a basic cookie dough and add white chocolate chunks, caramel sugared pecans, add a piece of two of caramel or vanilla fudge, bake, and finish with sea salt.
This is my tweaking of the classic chocolate chip recipe to satisfy my current obsession with salted caramel!
The resulting cookie has a lovely caramel flavour created from the melting of the white chocolate during baking.

Ingredients
150 gms butter
1 cup dark muscovado sugar or dark brown sugar
1 egg
I/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup plain flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
Pinch of sea salt
100 gms white chocolate chopped into chunks
1 or 2 small pieces of caramel or vanilla fudge, roughly chopped
Caramel Pecans
1 tablespoon white sugar
50 gms pecans
Pinch sea salt

Method
Cream butter and sugar in a food processor until light and fluffy. Add egg and vanilla extract, process swell. Sift flour, baking powder and salt and add to mixture, processing until smooth.
Stir in white chocolate chunks and fudge chunks.
Make caramel pecans by heating the sugar in a small frying pan until dissolved. Add pecans and cook until sugar syrup just starts to turn a golden caramel colour. Remove the pecans from the pan, scatter with sea salt. When cool roughly chop and add to cookie mixture.
Drop rounded spoonfuls onto baking trays lined with baking paper.  Sprinkle sea salt to taste over the top of each cookie. Bake for 15- 20 minutes depending on the size of the cookies.

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Hugh Fearnley-Whitingstall’s Vanilla Fudge

Posted on April 28, 2013 by The quirk and the cool

A fantastic, easy and virtually full-proof recipe!

Ingredients

300 gms caster sugar

1 tbsp golden syrup

100 gms unsalted butter

100 mls double cream

1 tsp vanilla extract or paste

Method

Using a few drops of sunflower oil on a piece of kitchen paper, lightly oil a 15x22cm baking dish, or similar small dish.

Put the sugar, syrup, butter and cream in a saucepan, making sure it’s not more than a third full as the mixture will bubble when it boils. Heat gently, stirring all the time, until the sugar has completely dissolved – tip the pan to make sure there are no crystal still visible on the base.

Stop stirring. Put a sugar thermometer in the pan and turn up the heat. Let the mixture boil hard until it reaches 116 degrees C (soft ball stage). This may happen quite fast or could take up to 15 minutes or more, so keep a sharp eye on the thermometer.  I found that the fudge reached that temperature in under 10 minutes.

Take the pan off the heat and leave to stand for 10 minutes.

Add the vanilla and beat vigorously until the mixture thickens, becomes slightly grainy and starts to come away from the base of the pan. This can take up to 10 minutes. Again, I found that the mixture took only a couple of minutes to get to this stage.

Tip into the prepared dish, smooth and leave to cool.

Mark into squares with a sharp knife while it’s still slightly soft. Leave for 2 to 4 hours to firm up completely and then remove from the dish.

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