Paris Pastry Club: A collection of cakes, tarts, pastries and other indulgent recipes (14 page)
Read Paris Pastry Club: A collection of cakes, tarts, pastries and other indulgent recipes Online
Authors: Fanny Zanotti
Tags: #ebook
I have wonderful memories of my childhood summer holidays. A happy mess packed into our camping-car; cat and dog included. We would stop in the wild and make a barbecue. In the afternoons we would explore little villages and their café terraces.
One summer, the only ice cream I would have would be pêche melba. Three scoops of vanilla ice-cream, of the almost-melted kind, marbled with a tangy raspberry coulis; a yellow peach, poached to perfection; all happily topped with fresh raspberries, practically begging to be eaten with fingers. More than one of these coupes glacées tinted my lips and fingers pink that summer.
Nowadays, I don’t often eat pêche melba. But every summer, it has become a tradition for me to make a Charlotte with the flavours of my childhood favourite.
Serves 10 – 12
FOR THE POACHED PEACHES
8 ripe yellow peaches
1 kg (2 lb 3 oz) water
450 g (1 lb) caster (superfine) sugar
10 mint leaves
FOR THE RASPBERRY PURÉE
1 kg (2 lb 3 oz) raspberries
100 g (3½ oz) icing (confectioner’s) sugar
FOR THE BISCUIT CUILLÈRE
5 eggs, separated
150 g (5 oz) caster (superfine) sugar
150 g (5 oz) plain (all-purpose) flour, sieved
50 g (1¾ oz) icing (confectioner’s) sugar, to decorate
FOR THE RASPBERRY MOUSSE
9 gelatine leaves
400 g (14 oz)
Raspberry Purée
160 g (5½ oz) caster (superfine) sugar
400 g (14 oz) whipping cream
TO SERVE
250 g (9 oz) raspberries
Bring a large pan of water to the boil and fill a bowl with cold water and ice cubes.
Halve the peaches and remove the stones. When the water is boiling, plunge in the fruits for 15 seconds then remove using a slotted spoon and immediately place into the iced water bowl for a few minutes. Gently peel the skin away from the peach cheeks and keep in cold water until needed.
In the meantime, make a syrup. Bring the water, sugar and mint leaves to the boil in a medium pan.
Put the peach halves in the boiling syrup, cover with a cartouche (
making a cartouche
), and simmer for 5 minutes. Remove from the heat and cool down at room temperature, then chill in the fridge.
While the peaches are chilling, make the raspberry purée. Blitz the raspberries and icing sugar in a blender for 5 minutes, then pass through a fine-mesh sieve. You should get around 500 g (1 lb 2 oz) of purée. Cover the surface with clingfilm and chill in the fridge until needed.
Line a small baking tray that can fit in your freezer with baking paper and place a 20 cm (8 in) metal ring on top.
Once the peaches have cooled down, chop 6 halves into cubes and mix with 100 g (3½ oz) of the raspberry purée. Spread this into the prepared ring, covering the base. Freeze for at least 4 hours or overnight.
When the peach ring is frozen make the biscuit cuillère. Preheat the oven to 170°C (340°F).
Cut 2 large pieces of baking paper and draw one 18 cm (7 in) wide circle on one and three 8 x 30 cm (3 x 12 in) rectangles on the other, spacing them by at least 4 cm. Place the papers upside-down on 2 baking trays and set aside until needed.
Whisk the egg yolks and half the sugar in a large bowl for 5 minutes or until light and fluffy. In another bowl, whisk the egg whites until frothy, then add the remaining sugar – whisking as you do so – in small batches, and whisk to stiff peaks.
Add one third of the meringue to the egg yolks and stir with a spatula to loosen the mixture. Then gently fold in the remaining meringue until just combined.
Add the flour and fold in until there are no more lumps.
Scrape the mixture into a piping bag fitted with a 10 mm (½ in) nozzle and pipe four dots underneath each corner of each piece of baking paper to stick the paper to the prepared trays.
Pipe a spiral of mixture inside the drawn circle, starting from the centre and spiralling out. This will form the base of your charlotte.
On the second tray, fill each drawn rectangle with 8-cm (3-in) long piped ‘fingers’ to create 3 solid biscuit ‘strips’. These strips will join together to line the tin and form the outer wall of the charlotte. Pipe at a 45° angle, with the fingers touching, and aligning them to the edges of the drawn rectangles.
Dust the circle and the 3 strips with icing sugar. Leave for 10 minutes, then dust again and bake for 12 minutes, or until golden-brown and springy to the touch. Leave to cool completely. When cold, invert all the cooled biscuits onto a clean, dry work surface and peel off the baking paper.
To assemble the charlotte, place a 22 cm (9½ in) metal ring on a large plate. Position the biscuit circle in the base of the metal ring.
Use a sharp knife to straighten the short ends of each of the biscuit strips. Now trim along the long edges, if necessary, so that each strip will be the same height, when positioned in the metal ring.
Lift one of the strips into the ring, with the sugared side facing out,
and nestle it to fit snugly against the side of the ring. Arrange another biscuit strip inside the ring so that they join snugly. Roughly measure the length of the remaining gap and trim the third biscuit so that it is just slightly longer. Ease it into the gap so that you form a tight-fitting biscuit border around the inside of the ring. Set aside while you make the mousse.
Soak the gelatine leaves in ice-cold water for about 20 minutes.
Pour 400 g (14 oz) of the chilled raspberry purée into a large bowl.
Put the remaining purée and sugar in a pan, and cook over a low heat until the sugar is melted. Squeeze the gelatine leaves and add to the hot purée. Stir until just dissolved.
Pour onto the cold raspberry purée, whisking as you do so. Allow to cool slightly.
Whip the cream to soft peaks in a large cold bowl. Scoop a third of the whipped cream into the purée and whisk it in to loosen the mixture. Gently fold in the remaining whipped cream, at first with a whisk, then with a spatula, until just combined. Pour half into the biscuit-lined ring.
Take the frozen peach ring out of the freezer, remove the metal ring and peel off the paper. Gently sit the peach ring on the raspberry mousse. Top with the remaining mousse, leaving a 1 cm (½ in) gap on top.
Loosely cover with clingfilm and chill in the fridge for at least 6 hours or overnight.
When you are ready to serve, gently remove the ring, then arrange the raspberries and remaining peach halves, cut into quarters, on top of the mousse. Serve cold on its own or with a big scoop of vanilla ice-cream.
ALMOST-INSTANT
CHOCOLATE
FONDANT CAKE
When it is hard to find time to make a cake – and really, a birthday can’t be without a cake – this fondant cake is here for you. It takes less than an hour from start to finish.
In my notebook, I’ve called it ‘perfect chocolate cake’. And it is, trust me. A crisp, almost brittle, crust and a rich and dark crumb.
It’s also pretty great for random days when chocolate is needed. Just saying …
Serves 12
100 g (3½ oz) 70% dark chocolate,
chopped into chunks
120 g (4¼ oz) butter, cubed
4 eggs
200 g (7 oz) caster (superfine) sugar
60 g (2 oz) plain (all-purpose) flour
Preheat the oven to 170°C (340°F) and generously butter a 20 cm (8 in) cake tin.
Melt the chocolate and butter together in a pan over a low heat, stirring every now and then with a spatula.
Whisk the eggs and sugar in a heatproof bowl set over a pan of simmering water for a few minutes. The aim is to bring the mixture to slightly above room temperature.
Remove from the heat, pour the chocolate over the egg mixture and fold in with a spatula.
Sprinkle the flour in and gently incorporate it until just smooth.
Pour the batter into the prepared tin and bake for 20–25 minutes until just set in the centre. Allow to cool slightly. Cut into wedges and serve with ice-cream – big fat scoops – and as many candles as you can fit.
I can’t talk about this dish without an anything-but-subtle hint of delight in my voice. It is one of my favourite recipes ever. As you must have guessed from its name, it comes from my grandmother. An incredibly smooth batter enfolds pieces of slightly sour cherries. I usually make it on the very first days of June when the cherries turn into bright-red jewels waiting to be picked.
It’s a bit of a bore to pit them and in fact there is a great debate in France whether the cherries used in a clafoutis should be pitted or not. But I use a small paring knife to pit them for easier eating. You could also use other fruits depending on the season. And if you want to know one of my best-kept secrets, finely sliced apples work like a charm in autumn.
I like to eat clafoutis at any time of the day, but it does make a lovely dessert when served with some sharp yoghurt ice-cream or a dollop of crème fraiche.
Serves 10
200 g (7 oz) plain (all-purpose) flour
120 g (4 oz) caster (superfine) sugar
a pinch of salt
3 eggs
80 g (2¾ oz) butter, melted
400 g (14 oz) whole milk
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) cherries, pitted
Preheat the oven to 200°C (400°F) and generously butter a 30 cm (12 in) tart dish.
Combine the flour, sugar and salt in a large bowl. Add the eggs, one at the time, beating well after each addition. When the batter is smooth, mix in the melted butter. Then gradually add the milk, mixing well so no lumps form. If you’re not fully confident it is lump-free, strain the batter through a sieve.
Scatter the pitted cherries into the prepared dish and gently pour the batter over. Bake for 30 minutes or until golden and quite firm. It can be slightly wobbly in the centre but a skewer inserted in the middle of the clafoutis should come out clean.
Allow to cool and serve in thick wedges.
