OK so I am not very good at food photos. To be honest I do not usually cook cakes with polenta either but I do seem to blog about it. Possibly cos its an experiment so I find that interesting.
Not yet anyway. Its not really something I decided to aim for but this was so nice in taste I decided to share it. Its up to you if you fancy making it. Sorry we ate half before I decided to blog about it!
We grow gooseberries and every year I struggle to find ways to use them. I make gooseberry chilli jam, gooseberry sweet jam, gooseberry wine and this year I intend to have ago at Gooseberry beer and my other half is currently using some to flavour gin though not to make liqueur because we still have loads of damson liqueur which we made for Christmas last year and do not drink it due to the sweetness and soon we will have this years crop of damsons to deal with too! I still have some of last years crop in the freezer!
So I made gooseberry jam/ pie filling. This is the bottom bit and when it cooked the jammy bit has risen up the charlotte to mix a bit so maybe next time I need to make the jam and then add some whole uncooked goosberries? Or maybe apple pieces? Something with more structure and less jammyness.
I used some of this jam to make icecream (might tell you about that if it works!) and some for the base of this charlotte. The top of the charlotte is polenta cake similar to the one I made last year but I forgot the lemon. To be honest I thought it was lemon juice makes it rise but since I forgot it and it still rose it must simply be the bicarb. I will have to try a lemon version and take better photos - before we eat it!
It does taste good tho despite the rubbish photos and my decision to use gritty polenta. In all fairness I think its better with just the fine type of polenta!
Heres the recipe for the charlotte topping:
Dry igredients
175g of a 50:50 mix of fine polenta and gritty polenta
175g of plain flour
2 tea spoons of bicarbonate of soda
1/2 cup of vanilla sugar - I make my own but a bought sort would do or just use ordinary granulated or caster sugar
Wet Ingredients
1 cup of sunflour oil
1 cup of soya milk
Other optional ingredients
2 lemons - zest and juice - which I forgot!!!!
1 generous tablespoon of dessicated coconut
Mix all dry ingredients first including dessicated coconut if using. Mix wet and dry ingredients vigourously with a wooden spoon until well mixed.
I cooked the base which is just gooseberries and sugar in the microwave. It was bubbling hot and jamlike then I added spoonfulls of the mix over the top while it was still hot and cooked again for about 5 minutes letting it stand for a few minutes half way through the cooking. You will need to adjust the timing depending on your own microwave. I checked it was cooked by using a sharp pointed knife and it came out clean. If its not quite cooked the knife will not come out clean and will have smudges of mix on it so cook a couple of minutes longer.
Serve with (vegan) whipped cream or custard or just eat as it is.
Enjoy!
Bracken
No comments:
Post a Comment