Pesto and Prawn Sandwich

Sandwiches are something that I make on daily basis for the husband to take to work. He prefers sandwiches and easy-to-eat, fuss free, smell-free meals as he can have it on the go, rather than having to sit and indulge in a heavy meal during his work. Plus, he claims Indian food has strong smell, which I too agree, and the smell spreads the whole place. It is easy to whip up a sandwich in the morning with any leftover meat or prawns if you have them. And it is a better way to use up the left over meat as well.

On one of our holidays to the Lake District, we had our lunch at an Italian Restaurant. It was lovely, small restaurant and we were late for the lunch. So there were just few options from which we could choose our food from. I love pesto and pesto prawn sandwich was one they had, which we could order. I was not sure how I would like the taste and I ordered it all at my risk.  When the food arrived, it was a mount of prawns slathered in thick, creamy pesto sauce sandwiched between ciabatta breads. It was literally a heaven on plate, and tasted just great.  

Here we get shelled and cooked prawns which makes the job very easy.  Even though it comes cooked and you could mix it up straightaway with other ingredients, I usually boil it with a pinch of salt and lemon for few minutes and the wash off the prawns again. I am over obsessed when it comes to cleaning and cooking food and I need to clean them many times. But, it is not necessary. 

  

I usually serve pesto prawns in a seeded bread, but any kind of bread could go with it, especially ciabatta. You could toast them, or  just have them plain, which is what we prefet. You could add few rocket leaves, and play around the ingredients to suit your palette. Here is how I make it, and this is one of the several sandwiches that I made for the son’s b’day party last year and got rave reviews about.

Pesto and Prawn Sandwich

Preparation time: 5-10 minutes

Makes 2-4 Sandwiches

Ingredients:

320g cooked prawns (2 cups)

4-5 tbsp mayonnaise, you may use low fat, or full fat

2 tbsp pesto

¼ cup sweet corn

a pinch of salt of necessary

½ tsp crushed pepper or chilli flakes (optional)

Bread to serve

Preparation:

1. Mix all the ingredients in a bowl thoroughly(To get rid of the smell from prawns, just marinate them in lemon juice for about 10 minutes and wash it off).

2. Spread the mixture heavily on one slice, and sandwich with another. If you wish, you can use toasted bread as well.

You can make upto four large sandwiches depending on how well you fill your sandwich.

Pistachio Macarons with Pistachio and White Chocolate Ganache

During December my kitchen saw many baked goodies mostly macarons, some cakes and  few desserts. Most of them were given away as gifts, some shared and some, we indulged at home when friends came over during the Christmas holidays. And my horrendous baking has started showing effects on my waistlines too. So this year, I am thinking of diverting my cooking slightly into another direction, from baking desserts and cakes, to more of curries and savoury stuffs. That’s not me, but that’s what my family need. I am not going to bake any more of those massive cakes for my men to nibble on, and leaving the whole lot for me unless there is an occasion to celebrate. That’s what I am thinking of doing this year and I have kept that deal so far. I hope it stays longer.

Pistachio macaron would probably be the first macarons that I ever wanted to try. Shelled pistachios don’t come cheap, so I thought I will wait for a special occasion to give it a shot and not on those moments where spur of macaron temptation sprouts. I was confused with what filling to go in as I thought some sort of citrusy filling or cardamom based filling would go the best. But since the gifts were going out for the son’s teachers and my neighbour friends who are all white, I dint know how they would like the flavour of cardamom as that would be something quite unusual for them. So I settled myself with some thing simple, and added ground pistachios to the white chocolate Ganache for a bite. It went down so well with all who had it and I was even told to make them again. 

The basic recipe is Ottolenghi’s. I have been wowed by my friend Finla’s amazing macarons and I thought I had to give her recipe a shot, and I am so glad I did. The recipe is perfect with all good characteristics of a perfect macaron and it tasted just awesome. I thought it was slightly less sweet than mine, but fantastic! I am so going to stick to the recipe and try different flavours using the same, which I did already around last Christmas.

When I bake macarons to give away, I always bake 3-4 flavours at the same time as I love to see the colourful combination of different macarons wrapped in a beautiful gift box. It is an eye candy and would wow anyone who haven’t had macarons before. This pistachio macaron adds to my favourite list of macarons.

Pistachio Macarons with Pistachio and White Chocolate Ganache

Makes 20-22 medium size sanwiched cookies

Ingredients:

60g aged egg whites

30g shelled pistachios

30g almond meal or blanched almonds, you can use whole almonds as well

40g caster sugar

100g icing sugar

Few drops of bruce green colour (optional)

For pistachio-white chocolate Ganache

150 mls double cream

125 g white choc

¼ cup pistachio kernals, 30g

2 tbsp caster sugar

Preparation (shells):

**For an elaborate macaron post with my tips and links to other helpful sources, check out my first macaron post here.  

1.For ageing egg whites: Place egg whites in a clean bowl. Cover it with a cling cover and poke few holes in the film. Keep it in your kitchen counter for 24-48 hours or in fridge for up to 5 days. This ageing of egg whites helps to reduce the moisture content in the egg whites and make firmer shells. Fresh egg whites make fragile cookies which may break off as you try to lift them off the baking paper.

2. Powder the nuts and icing sugar together in a food processor or a grinder into flour-like fine powder. Transfer them to a large bowl and sieve 1-2 times to break up the lumps. Transfer them to a large mixing bowl and keep aside while you work with meringue and prepare your baking sheet and piping bag.

3. Line your baking sheets with baking paper or silpat. Fit your piping bag with a plain round tip and place it in a tall glass or a jar to make the job easier while scooping the batter in.

4. For making meringue, using an electric blender, whisk egg whites in a squeaky clean bowl (preferably metallic bowl as it is difficult to maintain a plastic/glass bowl grease free) on high until it starts to form soft peaks. Add in caster sugar and beat until stiff peaks form. It should be like a smooth, glossy shaving cream like form. If adding any colour, add once stiff peaks are formed and then beat again to stiff peaks incorporating the food colour. Make sure it is not over beaten and dry, which would result in dry shells.

5. Add the dry mixture to meringue in 2-3 portions and start folding it until everything is just combined and no more of dry mixture could be seen. Use a flexible spatula for this and mix until you get a smooth, shiny batter that ruggedly drips down the spoon once you lift it. DO NOT over mix once you have reached that thick batter stage. For testing, place a teaspoon of batter in a plate and you see it spreading flat slowly, then the batter should be ready. If it has a peak on top, give couple more folds and check again. Keep checking the batter at each stage by placing a spoon of batter in the plate to judge the consistency.

6. Pour the macaron batter into the piping bag. Once the batter is all poured in, twist the ends of piping bag tight to seal the batter in. Pipe out small rounds of about 2 cm diameter on your baking paper leaving about 2 inches in between. The macaron batter will spread and then join hands with the next one if they are piped too close, so make sure leave at least 2 inches between them. Rap the baking sheet few times on a table to remove any bubbles trapped in the batter. (To help you with the round shape, you can use this template).

7. Let the macarons sit to dry for as long as it forms a thin skin on top or is dry and leaves no indentation once touched or the batter doesn’t stick to hands once touched. It depends from place to place depending on the weather and humidity. In a humid place it will take as long as 2-3 hours whereas here it takes under 30 minutes, but I leave for a bit more.

8. Preheat the oven to 140 degress Celcius. Bake the macaron for 12-14 minutes. Do not open the oven until they are completely done. Take them out and let them cool down for

30 minutes. Peel the baking paper off the shells gently, and sort them out with same size shells. Fill them with Ganache and leave it in fridge to mature for a 2-3 days two to get maximum flavour out of it.

It is very important to mature the cookies as that filling will steep into the shells and the flavours blend well. Unfilled shells can be frozen.

For the filling:

Preparation:

1. Bring double cream to scalding (steaming) point in a heavy base pan or in microwave. Once you start seeing small bubbles appearing along the sides, turn the heat off and add chopped chocolates into it. Leave it for couple of minutes and then stir well until combined.

2. Grind pista into fine powder with caster sugar and mix it well into the Ganache.

3. Leave it in fridge until it the mixture is really cold. Then whip it up to form stiff peaksfirms up enough to pipe or spoon. It should not be runny and should be stiff and easy to spread. White chocolate may take few hours to harden, but if it gets too stiff, place in the microwave and warm for few seconds until spreadable. you can also whip the Ganache once the mixture is really cold.

Date and Carrot Cake

It’s already 2013 and how quickly did 2012 fly by! Have you made any New Year resolutions? Do you keep yourself up to those resolutions when you make them? I make New Year resolutions every year and in blink of an eye, the year just passes by without fulfilling the resolutions taken. So this year for a change, I thought I would stay away from this resolution agenda, but keeping some good motives for the year. Wishing you all a wonderful New Year. Let this year be better than yesteryear for all of you wonderful people out there.

The past few weeks have been a like a rollercoaster ride for me with whirlwind of things happening one after the other that tied me up entirely and saving me no time for blogging. The kid’s school was closing for Christmas; so I spent lot of time making edible gifts for his teachers. Also, we had our friends  over for Christmas, the husband’s annual leave, the New Year party, all kept me well occupied.

Here is a recipe that I wanted to share long back and has been sitting in my drafts for few years now. And this recipe was supposed to be posted few weeks back, much before Christmas, so that someone who doesn’t really like traditional fruit cakes can bake it. It dint work according to plan and this recipe had to come late. It is the cake that you see on my header, that I baked couple of years back when I visited my family back in UAE. It was passed down to me by my sister who took it off her sister in law. A perfect cake by all means - taste and texture. It is soft, moist and perfectly balanced.

It is a little time consuming, but there is no way you could go wrong. The first time I made this cake, I had no hope of success as it used different method of preparation and initial stage of mixing sugar and oil seemed a bit suspicious. And until halfway through the preparation, batter is a bit thick for  a cake batter and only after the addition of carrots and dates it starts to thin out a bit. But at the end it all comes together and bakes to a perfect cake. I have given the step by step pictures here. As they were taken at night, they are not great, but you could have an idea of how it is done. It is a huge cake, packed with goodness of carrots, dates and nuts and use minimal fat, the factor that I love most about this cake. Preparation wise, it is much different from our butter based cakes where usual creaming of butter, sugar and eggs are involved. You could eat them just after it comes out of the oven, but the flavour intensifies as it sits for couple of days or more.

Date and Carrot Cake

Preparation time:20-30 minutes

Bake time 1 hour- 1 hour 20 minutes

Cuts into 12 large pieces

Ingredients:

1 cup plain flour

½ tsp soda Bi-carbonate (Baking soda)

½ cup semolina/farina/sooji

Spices:

1 1” piece cinnamon stick

6 cloves

6 green cardamoms

¼ piece of nutmeg

Others:

2 cups , 350g finely chopped dates

½ tsp baking soda

¼ cup hot water

2 cups, 2 large,220g finely grated carrot

100g mix of chopped nuts like almonds and cashew nuts

2 tsp vanilla essence

Juice and zest of an orange

1 tbsp lime juice

1 ½ cup caster sugar *

¼ cup vegetable oil

3 large eggs,separated

Preparation:

1. In a small bowl place chopped dates, ½ tsp baking soda and water and mix well. Leave it aside for an hour.

2. Grind the spices into fine powder by adding 1 tbsp of sugar from the 1 ½ cup sugar. Mix it with flour, ½ tsp of baking soda and the semolina. Sieve it once to distribute the ingredients.

3. In a clean bowl, using an electric beater whisk the egg whites until soft peaks are formed.

4. Take another large bowl. Add in oil and caster sugar and using a wire whisk or an electric beater beat for 2 minutes. The sugar will just get wet at this point.

5. Into this sugar-oil mix, add egg yolks one by one, mixing well after each addition.

6. Into this, add soaked dates, chopped nuts and carrots. Mix well.

7. Add vanilla essence, orange juice, orange zest, lime juice and mix well again using a wooden spoon.

8. Add the flour mix into the wet mixture in 2-3 batches and gently fold until well incorporated.

9. Whisk the whites again just to break up and gently fold it into the batter without knocking out the air bubbles.

10. Bake it at 170ºC/150ºC fan oven for about 1 hour and 20 minutes  or until a skewer inserted in the centre comes clean without any crumbs clinging on to it or it springs back gently when touched in the centre. The baking time may depend from oven to oven and it can get cooked faster. Check for doneness around 50 minutes to ensure it is fully baked by inserting a skewer in the middle of the cake. At times, the dates could cling onto the skewer, so you may try poking onto different places on the cake or press gently on top to see if it springs back to see if it is done.

* If the sugar crystals are big, please grind them before using.