Ponderoma Pancakes

A recipe inspired by the Ponderoma - the strange, shadowy servants who inhabit Castle Zarcalat

It's Pancake Day tomorrow. Yay! 

I do love a pancake. 

Junior and I got busy this evening and knocked up a few delicious, fluffy pancakes for supper. Not the large, thin kind but the chunkier crumpet variety. 

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Served with a hefty squirt of lemon juice and lashings of runny Maple syrup, they were absolutely stunning.

In Bree McCready and the Half Heart Locket Bree, Sandy and Honey find themselves trapped in a medieval castle. They meet a man called Don Daines who takes them into the castle kitchen and it's here where they see the Ponderoma for the first time.

 "As soon as they opened the door they were met by the sounds of clattering dishes and sizzling hotplates. Inside was a large well-lit kitchen where an army of cloaked people were so busy stirring, tossing and kneading that they did not even look up. The scent of herbs and spices mingled with the heavy aroma of food frying. Fresh fruit and vegetables were lined out on a long wooden table and great billows of steam rose up from huge black cauldrons hanging over raging fires. Loaves were turning brown in an open furnace, filling the air with their mouth-watering aroma. Huge chunks of raw meat were being rolled in crystal salt before being strung up on metal hooks.

The strange, shadowy servants scuttled to and fro, carrying dishes and platters. Bree could see that their hands were red and blistered. Cavernous hoods concealed their faces, making the floor length robes look empty, as though they were floating around the kitchen like canvas ghosts.

Don glided over to a huge stove where two Ponderoma were using a giant spoon to stir a thick batter. The smell of hot fat filled the air as they watched a servant pouring a ladleful onto a gridle. It instantly started to bubble, eventually solidifying into a plump round pancake."

Want to make those plump round pancakes? Here's what you'll  need:

1 and a half cups of plain flour

A quarter of a cup of sugar

3 teaspoons of baking powder

A pinch of salt

1 egg

1 and a half cups of milk

3 tablespoons of butter

Measure out the butter and melt it in the microwave for 20 seconds. Keep a close eye on it, you don't want it to burn.

Set the melted butter aside while you prepare the other ingredients.

 Measure out the flour and add it to a large mixing bowl.

Sprinkle in the baking powder and a good pinch of salt.

Measure out the sugar. You don't need much as the Maple syrup topping will offer much sticky sweetness.

So, you now have all your dry ingredients in the mixing bowl. Now it's time to prepare the wet stuff.

Crack an egg in a small mixing bowl and whisk

Add the milk and melted butter to the beaten egg and whisk together with a fork. Make a well in the centre of the flour mixture and pour in the egg mixture.

Whisk!

The batter should be slightly thick and lumpy

Now that the batter is ready let it sit for a few moments while you heat the frying pan. You'll need a fairly high heat and a knob of butter for each pancake. Heat the butter until it's frothy and sizzling.

 

Use a ladle to get equal sized pancakes

I always find the first pancake is a little wonky. Is that just me? Still tastes good but it usually takes the second or third attempt to get things perfect. Perhaps it takes that long for the frying pan to get to the correct temperature? One of life's little mysteries I suppose.

Cook on one side for around two to three minutes. You'll know when it's ready to turn when little bubbles appear on the top. Turn it over using a fish slice and cook for a further two/three minutes. The pancake should be nice a brown with a slightly crispy edge.

A bit like this

 Now for the fun part!

Ready, steady...

FLIP!!

My recipe made 8 large pancakes.

There could only be one topping

Lashings of Maple Syrup. Yumalicious.

A squeeze of lemon

Tuck in

Have a flippin' fantastic Pancake Day. 

See you again soon!

Firework Goodies

The days are slipping past at a rate of knots. One minute it's Halloween and the next it's Bonfire Night! Before we know it it'll be Christmas.

Here are some simple ideas for tomorrow night. Remember, remember the 5th of November!

I'll be back around the middle of November with a more structured blog post - I'm thinking Chocolate Ferris Wheel as it's still a 'Realm of the Lost' theme until we move onto the more Christmassy recipes that accompany 'Bree McCready and the Half Heart Locket'. 

It's Junior's birthday soon and he is a Nutella freak so I'm thinking his birthday cake will be a less traditional cheescake affair this year. You'll have to wait and see. Until then wrap up and have fun!

Chocolate Catherine Wheels

Mmm. I wonder what I'll do with that extra Flake?...

I used ready rolled shortcrust pastry

Crush the Flakes inside their wrapper then sprinkle over

Crispy and sweet

Chocolate Banana Skyrockets

These go in the freezer and are delicious - like chocolate covered ice-cream

Chocolate Sparklers

Orange sparkly Matchmakers dipped in white chocolate and sprinkled with sugar strands

Marshmallow Missiles

Preparation - Marshmallows on sticks & melted chocolate

Decorated with Popping Candy and coloured confetti

Stay safe!

Toffee Apple Yum Yums

A recipe inspired by Sandy's toffee apple in Bree McCready and the Realm of the Lost

The clocks went back last night. British Summer is officially over, although it has felt that way for some time now. We won't see lighter nights again in Scotland until March 27th 2016. Many people will be groaning at the very thought of that, pulling their duvets up around their heads and hibernating for the next 5 months. Not me! We have entered my favourite time of year and I keep getting ideas for delicious recipes for the Bake With Bree blog. There are too many to name!

When I think of Halloween and Bonfire night I think of Hot Chocolate, toasted marshmallows, Space Dust, Pumpkin Pie and eating crispy skinned baked potatoes from tinfoil. But nothing beats the crunch of a toffee apple on a crisp Autumnal evening while  watching fireworks bursting in the night sky.

"Nothing is more scary than Halloween without Toffee Apples"

I have literally hundreds of Toffee Apple recipe ideas but I thought it would be nice to do one I hadn't tried before. I had a basic idea for baked doughnuts which involved using vanilla yoghurt but I thought I could tweak the recipe, using Apple Sauce as a substitute for the yoghurt. 

I can honestly say my Yum Yums turned out to be the tastiest cakes I have made in ages. I have put a big asterisk beside the recipe which, like all my recipes,  I have written into my Bake With Bree journal. 

This is to remind me to MAKE THESE AGAIN. Not that I need much reminding! I just had one of these little beauties with my mid morning coffee. A naughty little 'elevenses' treat...even though, as a result of the clocks being put back an hour, it is really only 10am. Oh well, you only live once.

These are so moist and sweet. The sharp apple filling compliments the sweet toffee glaze, which seems to have soaked into the sponge overnight, making it even more delicious the second day round. All the flavours of Halloween are in there, including a distinct taste of Puff Candy. I honestly can't rate these highly enough.

Here's what you'll need to make them:

Ingredients for the cakes

150g of self-raising flour

1 teaspoon of baking powder

1 teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda

A pinch of salt

1 egg (beaten)

120g of apple sauce

50g of Creme Fraiche

1 tablespoon of vegetable oil

The juice of half a lemon

3 tablespoons of Maple Syrup

For the toffee glaze icing

200g of icing sugar

2 tablespoons of toffee syrup 

4 tablespoons of milk

Preheat your oven to 180oC

Weigh out 150g of self-raising flour.

Add 1 teaspoon each of these and a pinch of salt.

Now, in a separate bowl, combine all the wet ingredients - the beaten egg, the apple sauce (I found a tasty jar in the sauce aisle of the supermarket but you could make your own stewed apples if you'd prefer), the Creme Fraiche, the oil, the lemon juice and the maple syrup.

Whisk it all together...

..until it resembles pancake batter.

Now make a well in the centre of the flour mixture...

 

 ...and add the batter mix.

Fold it in until everything is combined. The mixture should look airy and fluffy when it's ready, a bit like porridge.

Full of little bubbles.

Grease a six holed doughnut tray. I thought about using a simple muffin tray but then had the genius brainwave that the doughnut baking tin would create the perfect hole in the centre of the cakes in which to put the apple filling. 

Fill each of the holes in the tray with the batter mix. Like this...

 

I had the perfect amount of mixture for six large cakes

Bake at 180oC.

These don't take long to bake. I started off with the timer set at 10 minutes. I turned the tray 180 degrees halfway through as my oven is hotter at the back and I like to get an even bake. 

I took the Yum Yums out after ten minutes. They were baked and golden brown on top but still needed further cooking. So I flipped them out onto a flat baking tray and popped them back into the hot oven for a further 8 minutes (again turning the tray halfway).

See the hole in the centre? Perfect!!

By now the kitchen smelled divine and my tummy was rumbling. But I had to be patient. The Yum Yums had to cool before I could glaze them. Using a teaspoon I dropped a little apple sauce into the centre of each of the cakes, pressing it down with the back of the spoon.

Now I prepared the toffee glaze.

Three ingredients create a topping to die for

 

In a large bowl...

Weigh out 200g of icing sugar.

Add 4 tablespoons of toffee sauce. I used Askey's which I found in the ice-cream/dessert aisle of the supermarket. You could use honey if you want.

Add 4 tablespoons of milk. 

If you look closely you will see a little Halloween ghost in my picture. See him? Don't worry, he's friendly :)

Stir everything together until smooth and lump free. It should be quite runny. Remember this is a glaze and not a thick icing.

My advice for the final stage of decorating would be to slide a sheet of tinfoil underneath the cooling rack. The process of glazing the cakes is rather messy and having the tinfoil there will save a huge amount of cleaning up.

 

Prepare the Halloween/Bonfire night decorations. I used Honeycomb pieces, Butterscotch pieces and mini fudge cubes.

Drizzle the glaze over the tops of the cakes, allowing it to run down the sides. The messier the better.

Scatter the decorations over the top.

Put the cakes in the fridge to harden. 

Enjoy!

Happy Halloween!

 

Cut in half to reveal the moist apple centre. Perfect with the crunchy honeycomb

My next post (which I'll put up here on Friday 30th October) will include some basic Halloween goodies. I'll be dishing them out to the local kids who come round guising (that's the Scottish version of Trick or Treat). My treats will be simple and won't involve any baking. They're fun and tasty which is perfect for Halloween. 

Stay tuned!