Coffee and biscotti

Last weekend, I finally got to relive one of my favourite childhood shopping moments! When we were living in Thoiry, we did our big shop over the border in Meyrin (Switzerland) where they had a huge Migros! I rememeber isles of chocolate, loads of fishtanks with a vast array of fish and crustaceans and a checkout as far as the eye coud see (probably slightly exaggerated due to my little size at the time).

But the real treat would come after the checkout if mum had bought coffee. This was bought in beans and then either my brother or I would get to put the beans into the machine, place the bag into the hold and move the lever...then after a few seconds a loud bbbzzzrrr would sound and out came wonderful ground coffee. Even though it still took me a long time to drink coffee, I always loved this smell. So as my parents bought me a lovely coffeemaker for my birthday and my first jar of pre-ground coffee was empty I went to the shop. After selecting this lovely yellow bag, I went through the checkout and walked over to the machine. There, I started the familiar procedure and a few bbbzzzrrrs later I had my bag of lovely smelling coffee. To enjoy this to the fullest, I baked some biscotti to go with it from a recipe I got from my Norwegian friend Anne. She is an amazing baker and this recipe was no different as it delivered on all fronts. The biscotti were very easy to make, crunchy and packed lots of flavours that came out even more when dunked into the fresh coffee. I can't wait for the next bag (of both!!)

Biscotti Toscani
1/2 cup whole almonds
1/3 cup butter
3/4 cup sugar
2 eggs
1tsp vanilla extract
1/4 tsp almond essence
2tsp grated orange zest
2 1/4 cup flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/8 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp salt

Roast the almonds at 160°C for 8-10 min, leave to cool. Cream together the butter and sugar, then add the eggs, vanilla and almond extract and the orange zest. Combine the dry ingredients and add this to the wet mix. Finally, cut the almonds in half and fold them in. The dough is quite sticky but divide it in half and shape it into logs on floured baking trays. Bake at 160°C for 25 min or until golden brown. Place on a rack to cool for 5 min, cut them at a 45 degree angle about 2.5 cm thick. Lay slices flat on the baking sheet and return to the oven for 10 min turning them over midway. Cool on a rack or eat while still warm.

Easy peasy lemon squeezey

It's very easy to squeeze lemons, but what to do with them afterwards....The warm weekend (20C on our balcony!) brought the promise of late summer evenings sitting outside, enjoying good food and company. One of the things I love drinking at these times is limonchello. I made some last year which was very successful so I decided to try again, this time using this recipe. Even making half the amount, I still ended up with 8 lemons so what to do with them? I went a bit mad and decided to try all the lemon recipes I've been wanting to try for a long time. First we made a lemon tart with meringue. As I was lazy I used puff pastry for the base which was fine, but I think it would have been much nicer with a proper crust. It was still very tasty though and a good oportunity to use Barry's new favourite toy - the blowtorch.

As I really liked the filling, I decided to make some lemon curd, which is similar and can be used as a filling for pastry cases. I adapted this recipe as I was intrigued by the use of almonds. However, I didnt have any zest left, and I wasnt about to use more lemons, I just increased the amount of juice. I also reduced the amount of sugar as I often find lemon curd too sweet. The curd was great, at first I wasn't so sure about the almond powder but as we had brunch on our balcony in the sunshine it really began to grow on me. It gives a little "je ne sais quoi" to the curd, somehow it becomes more velvety and soft.

As the ground almonds I had were fairly mixed, I had to sieve them to get the fine stuff for the curd, with the rest, I made another recipe from this site for lemon fleur de sel cookies (again without zest and with slightly more juice). I was keen to try some fleur de sel de guerande that barry's uncle and aunt had kindly given to me. Tasting the dough initially, I didn't really taste so much salt but once they were baked, you would run into little salty bits. These are really nice with a cup of tea and a good book, plus they look great in my new cookie tin. This was a present from a Dutch friend from a shop in Amsterdam and they are a modern take on Delft Blue. They're very pretty and if you want, you can get your products customized for you.

Finally with the last dregs of the juice I made some blood orange marmalade which looks beautiful. Unfortunatly, when I poured it into the jars, all the skinny bits floated to the top. It still tastes good but not quite as pretty. Does anyone have any ideas/tips about this??

So a busy weekend in the kitchen but it actually wasn't so bad. All the recipes are very easy and straightforward, they dont't take much time to make (fair enought the marmalade takes long but doesn't need much attention) are all very tasty.