Everyone loves a macaron...

I normally make big things. A big, rustic loaf of bread. A big joint of beef. A big mess... you get the idea. I thought I'd go for refinement this week though and knock up a batch of macarons. 

I adore macarons - I've been fortunate enough to go to Laduree on the Champs Elysee to sample them and could literally wolf down a dozen of the chewy, crispy morsels in one go if it wouldn't cripple my wallet. I've never made them though but have seen dozens of people do them on TV so thought I'd have a go. 

175g icing sugar

125g ground almonds

3 large free range egg whites

75g caster sugar

1) Preheat the oven to 160°C/fan140°C/gas 3. Sift the icing sugar and almonds into a bowl.

2) In a separate bowl, whisk the egg whites with a pinch of salt to soft peaks, then gradually whisk in the caster sugar until thick and glossy. I also added some food colouring and cherry flavouring - you can add almost any flavour, just remember to avoid oil based flavourings as this will destroy the integrity of the meringue.

3) Fold half the almond and icing sugar mixture into the meringue and mix well. Add the remaining half, and fold the mixture until it is shiny and has a thick, ribbon-like consistency as it falls from the spatula. Spoon into a piping bag fitted with a 1cm plain nozzle.

4) Line 2 baking sheets with baking paper. Pipe small rounds of the macaroon mixture, about 3cm across (I drew round a pot of bicarb to give me guide lines to pipe to), onto the baking sheets. Give the baking sheets a sharp tap on the work surface to get rid of any air bubbles. Leave to stand at room temperature for 20-30 minutes to form a slight skin. Bake for 15 minutes. Remove from the oven and cool.

5) Fill the macarons and sandwich together - I use passionfruit and lemon curd but you could use buttercream, jam or ganache

For a first effort they turned out pretty well - crispy and chewy, although I wasn't too pleased with the colour. However, winging their way to me is a set of Wilton colour pastes so I can get a really intense colour next time. (That's a mini cake stand in the pic, I haven't made giant macarons!)

I've only gone and bloody done it!

Yesterday saw the very first loaf from my sourdough starter! I'll be honest, I thought I had a dismal failure on my hands as my starter went from bubbling and yeasty to smelling like vomit. I wasn't prepared for this! I took the clingfilm off and the whole kitchen (and lounge) filled with an awful, milky, sourish sweet smell which can only be described as Eau de la Baby Puke. I thought the starter had died and started frantically googling to be met with a mixed bag of results. Some said the bad smell was the result of the starter being contaminated and to throw it out and start again. Others said that this was the smell of the bad bacteria being beaten by the good and to keep at it. I decided to keep at it for a few more days and that if it still stank in a week I'd chuck it. I'm so pleased that I didn't.

After a couple of days, the vomit smelled turned into a paint thinner smell and then mellowed significantly and is back to being yeasty and boozy but definitely bread like. The first loaf turned out great, and not very sour as I didn't let the dough rise for very long. Am now planning to give out lots of bits of starter to friends and get them into making their own bread :)

Peas = Peace?

As mentioned in the previous entry, I'm a total foodie. I love cooking for friends and family but it's a relatively new hobby. I've 'cooked' since I was a student but have only started honing my skills in the last few years or so. Student food was relatively simple - toad in the hole, pasta bakes and the ingenious one tray roasts which, I'll be honest, could probably have scraped a C+ in home economics, but not much else. I didn't realise garlic, salt and pepper could change a chicken so much until Nigella draped herself across my television screen. Nowadays I'm pretty confident in the kitchen and can hold my own in a tarragon vs oregano conversation but I will happily profess that I've still got a long way to go before I can call myself a master-chef.

My love of food comes from my entire family. My dad has been known to hotfoot it down to Chinatown in the middle of the night in his younger days to slurp up a bowl of noodles and my mother looks like she's won the lottery several times over every time she cracks a new recipe. My brother just has fun eating the products of everyone's labour... However, the primary reason I love food (I think) is because I find food = peace. And here, dear ones, is why.

I have grown up in a noisy, emotionally charged family who all lack a sense of tact and see no reason to hold back criticism even though taking it themselves is impossible so you may be forgiven for thinking that I mean peace as silence. In some ways I do but silence is normally the added bonus. The peace I mean is a truce.

Throughout my youth I was involved in countless shouting matches with both my parents and even now, they pull the, 'I'm-not-having-a-go-at-you-because-I-enjoy-it' card, adding a pinch of, 'I-know-I-said-I-wouldn't-mention-it-again-but-I've-got-to-say-something...' along the way but everything always seemed to come together peacefully at the dinner table as if someone had stationed a white flag above the centrepiece of steaming dishes. Dad would spoon things on to my plate - normally things with a lot of sauce that I would otherwise decorate the table mats pebble-dash style with and Mum would push the near empty bowl of broth towards me at the end of the meal telling me to drink it. Ed would eye the last piece of meat sat in the centre of its serving dish and put on a show of humble gratefulness when we all said he could and should finish it. Criticism would be forgotten and instead reassurances that the toyu pork had enough chilli in or that the stuffed tofu was tasty would take precedance.

Even when my parents had one of their huge arguements resulting in radio silence on both sides of for weeks, if we kids were at home, dinner was always served around the table. A swift jerk of the head from Mum towards the lounge where Dad can normally be found, lost in a programme about extreme fishing or silently committing how to build a set of collapsible, rotating shelves out of old floorboards, cotton wool and belly button fluff to memory, is the signal for one of us to alert him to the fact that dinner was ready and he should come and play happy families. It wasn't the most natural of circumstances but everyone always seemed to be quiet, and more importantly, happier when we were all eating together.

I cook now for Si, but I cook to show him I love him and want to take care of him and eventually, our family. I often grumble because he doesn't eat fish and he tells me to cook it for myself and he'll have something else but it's not something I'm happy doing. I don't want to be one of those families with three different meals on the go because it's disjointed and doesn't signify togetherness. I hope that I can distance myself from my family's method of using food as some form of truce and place more emphasis on the connection to love and happiness. So I hope that with further blog entries that I will share particular recipes or meals that conjour fantastic memories of love and laughter not just for me, but for anyone who reads this.

And for one girl, peas definitely don't equal peace. I can't stand the bloody things.