Chocolate truffle tart

This is nothing fancy. Just something simple, quick, but delicious. If you're struggling to find time to bake, then this may be the perfect recipe for you. On top of the ingredients, you will also require a 9 inch tart tin and baking beans as well. You can make it even faster by buying the shortcrust pastry instead of making it.

Ingredients

• 150g plain flour
• 20g icing sugar
• 70g + 25g unsalted butter
• Flour, icing sugar and 70g unsalted butter may be omitted if you are using shop bought shortcrust pastry
• 1 whole egg
• 2 eggs, yolk and white separated 
• 180g double cream
• 120g milk (full fat or semi skim)
• 220g dark chocolate (70% coco), or if you prefer something sweeter replace 40g of dark chocolate with milk chocolate
• small pinch of salt

If you are using shop bought pastry, just roll it out until the desired thickness (about 2-4mm normally). If you are making the pastry yourself, then start with the following:

1. Mix flour, icing sugar together and combine with a metal spoon
2. Cut 70g butter into small cubes and put them into the flour, icing sugar mixture
3. Rub the butter into the flour with your finger tip until the butter has been incorporated into the mixture and that the final product resembles breadcrumb in texture
4. Beat 1 whole egg and add half of the egg into the mixture and combine, if it is not incorporating completely, add a little bit more egg until the pastry is smooth and no longer sticks to your hand (try not to overwork the pastry though). At this stage, if the pastry is very soft and messy, put it into the fridge and chill for 20-30 minutes. If not, continue
5. Lightly dust work surface with plain flour 
6. Roll out the pastry to about 2-4mm thick 
7. Put the pastry into the tart tin, if you accidentally ripped the pastry, don't worry, you can patch it up with leftover pastry
8. Prick the base of pastry with a fork multiple times to allow air to escape from the pastry when it is baked and prevent it from rising
9. Chill pastry in tart tin in the fridge for 30 minutes, pre-heat oven now to 200 degrees C (175 fan)
10. Lay a large piece of parchment paper on the pastry and fill with baking beans
11. Bake with baking beans on top for 10-15 minutes, or until the base is relatively dry
12. Take off baking beans and parchment paper
13. Lightly brush the pastry with bean egg white, you don't need all the egg white, so you will have quite a lot of leftovers
14. Put pastry back in the oven and bake for another 5-7 minutes, it should turn golden quite quickly
15. Take tart base out of oven
16. Reduce oven temperature to 170 degrees C (150 fan)
17. Break chocolate into small pieces in a large bowl
18. Prepare filling by heating cream and milk together until it just starts to bubble, take it off the heat and let it cool down for one minute
19. Pour hot cream onto chocolate and stir until the chocolate has completely melted
20. Add the egg yolk, butter and pinch of salt to the chocolate and whisk until everything has been incorporated and is smooth
21. Pour the chocolate into the tart base and return the whole tart to the oven and bake for 10-15 minutes (oven dependent)
22. The side of the filling should be set and middle will wobble a little bit (if the middle doesn't  wobble, then it is over baked and the sides will likely shrink away from the edges of the tart when it is cooled)

Lime and mint chiffon cake

So it's getting a bit hot in the UK (and I've got quite a few limes filling up the fridge that I had to use up), so I've decided to get put this together.

Ingredients

• 150g self raising flour
• 200g caster sugar
• 4 large eggs, separated
• 50g mint (stalk and leaves)
• 80ml vegetable oil
• 5 limes
• 50ml water
• 400ml double cream
• 80g icing sugar
• Blueberries and raspberries for decoration

1. Pre-heat oven to 170degrees C (150 fan)
2. Mix flour and 100g caster sugar together 
3. Boil mint stalks in 50ml water for 15-20 minutes over low heat
4. Remove stalks from water and let the water cool down to room temperature
5. Add vegetable oil, zest and juice from 3 limes, water and 4 egg yolks to the dry ingredients and mix well
6. Whisk egg white until foamy and gradually add 100g caster sugar to the egg white one tablespoon at a time until all the sugar has been added and the egg white forms stiff peaks
7. Add 1/3 of egg white to the cake batter and mix it in
8. Add the remaining egg white to the cake batter and very gently fold it in
9. Gently pour cake mix to an 18cm round cake tin
10. Bake for 50-70 minutes, the cake should rise well. Test with skewer and it should come out completely clean if the cake is cooked
11. Cool the cake upside down for 1 hour
12. Prepare filling by mixing cream with zest and juice from 1 lime and whisk until the cream is thick
13. Slice cake horizontally into 3 equal layers
14. Spread the cream between each layer and on the exterior of the cake
15. Decorate with the remaining lime, berries and leftover mint leaves

Lemon and passion fruit chiffon cake

Ingredients (cake, mousse line, 

• 3 lemons
• 180g self raising flour
• 1/2 tbsp baking powder
• 250g + 90g+50g caster sugar
• pinch of salt
• 100ml vegetable oil
• 8 large eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 300ml milk
• 400ml double cream
• 40g icing sugar
• 2 passion fruits
• 50g corn flour
• 70g + 80g unsalted butter

Cake

1. Preheat oven to 170 degrees (150 fan)
2. Combine flour, baking powder, salt together in a large mixing bowl
3. Add vegetable oil, vanilla extract, juice and zest from 2 lemons and 5 egg yolks into the dry ingredients and mix until well combined (should be dropping consistency, if not, add 10-20ml of water and mix again)
4. Beat 6 egg white with electric whisk until foamy and add 1 tbsp of caster sugar at a time to the egg white until 250g has been added, whisk until stiff peak
5. Add 1/3 of egg white to the rest of the cake batter and very gently fold it in. Repeat until all egg white has been added 
6. Pour cake mix into a 23cm round bundt cake tin (without greasing or baking paper), or if you don't have a bundt tin, use a normal 23cm round tin and roll up a piece of foil to place in the middle of the tin, so the cake mixture can cling to it and climb up and also reduces the middle from dropping when taken out of the oven. 
7. Baking time of this cake is very variable. Bake for 45-70 minutes and keep a very close eye on the cake. Test with skewer after 35 minutes and use your own judgement from there. The cake should rise and increase in volume 
8. Cool the cake upside down over wired rack to prevent it from collapsing (hence no greasing or baking paper, or the whole cake will fall out). If cake has risen higher than cake tin, place 2 glass cups on either side of the cake tin and let the glasses hold the cake tin from the side
9. Let the cake cool for at least 1 hour

Mousseline

1. Beat 1 egg yolk and 1 whole egg together with 90g of caster sugar
2. Beat in 50g corn flour and zest from 1 lemon 
3. Heat 300ml of milk in saucepan until warm and add to the egg/sugar/cornflour mixture and whisk continuously 
4. Return the entire mixture to the saucepan over low-medium heat
5. Whisk mixture continuously until it thickens 
6. Remove from heat and stir in 70g butter until it has completed melted and incorporated into the mousseline
7. Let it cool completely 

Lemon and passionfruit curd

1. Beat 1 whole egg with 50g caster sugar 
2. Whisk in lemon juice from half a lemon
3. Put mixture over medium heat and stirring continously with wooden spoon
4. Reduce the volume down slightly and add 80g unsalted butter
5. Mix until melted and let it cool for 30 minutes
6. Add the passion fruit to the curd and mix well and cool in the fridge 

Assemble the cake

1. Cut cake horizontally in half
2. Place mousse line into the middle of the 2 halves
3. Whisk double cream with icing sugar until it forms stiff peak
4. Pipe or spread cream over the cake
5. Place the lemon and passion fruit curd over the top of the cake 

Pain au chocolat

Unfortunately, I don't have a photo to share this time. But I swear I'll upload one as soon as I make this again. Essentially, this is very similar to my pain au raisins recipe, but I'm uploading this separately due to popular requests.

Ingredients

• 160g + 30g plain flour
• 170 bread flour
• 45g + 100g caster sugar
• 2g salt
• 4 whole eggs + 4 egg yolks
• 60g water (more accurate than 120ml, as 1ml=1g of water)
• 14g instant dry yeast (about 2 sachets)
• 150g unsalted  butter (important!!! room temperature and very soft)
• 300ml milk (full fat or semi-skimmed)
• 100g dark chocolate
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

1. Combine 160g plain flour, 170g bread flour and 45g caster sugar together and mix 
2. Add salt to one side of the dry ingredients and yeast to the other side of the flour. Do not mix them, as it will kill the yeast
3. Make a well in the middle of the mixing bowl, add water and 3 whole eggs into the mix and mix with dough hook on your mixer for 2-3 minutes on low speed until ingredients have combined
4. Cut butter into 10-15 small cubes and add 1 cube at a time to the mix. Continue the mixer on low-medium speed
5. Once all the butter has been incorporated, keep mixer on medium for another 15 minutes, the dough should become sticky and shiny
6. Turn mixer speed up to medium high for another 2 minutes. You should hear the dough slapping against the side of the mixer at this stage. If the dough looks loose and wet, add 1 tbsp of plain flour and beat for another two minutes
7. Seal mixing bowl with cling film and let it rise either at room temperature for 2-3 hours or in the fridge overnight. The dough should double to triple in size 
8. Whilst the dough is rising, make the pastry cream (creme patissiere). Beat the egg yolks, 100g sugar together really well
9. Add plain flour and mix again until it thickens
10. Heat milk to simmering point and pour into the egg yolk mix, whisking continuously!!! 
11. Pour all the contents back into the saucepan and keep it on medium heat and whisk continuously until it thickens (it's NOT going to go REALLY thick)
12. Add vanilla extract to that pastry cream once it is thick 
13. Let it cool to room temperature (will take about an hour)
14. Place a layer of cling film on table surface and lightly dust with plain flour
15. Roll out the dough to a rectangle on cling film (approximately 50cm x 25cm)
16. Spread the pastry cream evenly on the dough
17. Break up the chocolate and sprinkle evenly over the dough and pastry cream
18. Use the cling film to help roll up the dough, so the pastry cream and chocolate are inside
19. Tuck in the sides, so the pastry cream and chocolate are not going to spill out
20. Place a piece of baking paper on baking tray and layer your bread on it
21. Seal the baking tray with cling film and let it rise again for another 90 minutes and it should increase in volume again
22. After about 60-70 minutes of rising, pre-heat oven to 190 degrees C (170 fan) and place a small tray of water on the bottom of the oven (about 300ml), to reduce the bread from forming a hard crust surface as it bakes 
23. Remove cling film and beat 1 whole egg and brush egg wash on the dough
24. Bake in the oven for 30-40 minutes, but water carefully, depending on your oven, it may take as little as 25 minutes
25. Take out of the oven and let it cool for a couple of hours and slice into 10-12 pieces to serve 

Double chocolate and strawberry cheesecake

This is NOT a baked cheesecake, but it is vegetarian (but NOT vegan) friendly. Low fat cream cheese  and cream may be used to substitute the full fat if you want (honestly, I can't tell the difference between full and low fat when it's chocolate flavoured). 

Ingredients

• 150g digestive biscuits
• 60g butter melted
• 2x200g cream cheese 
• 100g icing sugar
• 100g dark chocolate (50-70%)
• 100g white chocolate
• 280ml double cream 
• 250g strawberries

1. Crush biscuits and stir in the melted butter
2. Press biscuit firmly into the bottom of a 20cm round baking tin (preferably spring form, so you can take it out easier)
3. Melt dark chocolate in microwave (careful with power setting as it will burn if heated at high power) and leave it to cool
4. Meanwhile, beat the double cream until it forms stiff peaks
5. Beat icing sugar into 200g cream cheese 
6. Mix in dark chocolate and half of the whisked cream
7. Layer the cheesecake filling on top of the biscuits and chill for 30-60 minutes in the fridge
8. Wash, drain and slice strawberries in halves and layer on the dark chocolate cheese filling
9. Melt white chocolate in microwave (again, be careful with microwave power setting) and let it cool for 5 minutes
10. Mix in white chocolate and the remaining cream into 200g of cream cheese and put it on the dark chocolate layer and chill for at least an hour before serving