I teamed up with Twinings Tea to bake these two delicious afternoon tea delights – Royal Wedding Blend of White Earl Grey & Rose Victoria Sponge, and Twinings Royal Wedding Blend of White Earl Grey and Rose, Rhubarb Cupcakes with a White Chocolate Frosting, to celebrate Kate and William’s special day.

These recipes are perfect if you plan to host a traditional British street party. Here at the British Larder Suffolk we will definitely be baking both recipes and will serve them with this delicious Royal Wedding Commemorative Blend. My objective was to create two interesting recipes using the Royal Wedding Tea Blend, combining it with a traditional recipe with a slight British Larder twist.

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All credit for the images and videos goes to Twinings Tea Shop and I would like to thank Twinings for this fantastic opportunity to bake with this wonderful Royal Wedding Commemorative Blend Tea.

Before our arrival we had the privilege to have meet with Mark and Paul Hayward from Dingley Dell Pig farm, two men on a serious mission. Their pork is welfare friendly and they rear happy pigs producing great tasting pork. We know that all too well, as the Dingley Dell Pork Belly dish is the best selling main course dish at the British Larder Suffolk to date. We are very fortunate as the pigs are reared 2 miles from us.

On our mission to meet and find Suffolk producers we came across Emmet’s of Peasenhall. It’s a beautifully presented delicatessen selling and producing the most delicious Suffolk black hams and sweet cured bacon. We visited Emmet’s the Saturday before we received the keys to the pub. It was a lovely day and a lovely discovery too. We met with Mark Thomas the owner who handed over the keys to his shed in the back yard inviting us to go and have a look how he cures his bacon and hams. Ross took the keys eagerly and I must say, you could smell the wonderful sweet marinade from outside the locked door. When Ross unlocked the shed door the most wonderful array of cured meats was lying in wait to be discovered in a marvellous Aladdin’s cave of cured pork.

Of course we bought some of the black ham and made a wonderful filling to go with warm freshly baked bread for a late afternoon snack, and also the sweet cured bacon which we used to make this delicious smoked bacon, artichoke and hens egg tart. I had a few of the cooked baby artichokes left in the fridge from the previous week, and I have to say, the combination of the smoked sweet cured bacon and the artichokes is for me a luxurious bit of foodie heaven - in fact it’s my idea of a delicacy.

Preparing artichokes is not the easiest thing to do. It has tested my patience as a chef over the years but intriguingly, it’s one of the most satisfying and gratifying jobs to do. Bizarrely, I cannot put my finger on it. It’s hard work and if your’e not careful you could easily get stabbed by the sharp spikes at the tops of the leaves, and yes, you end up with stained, sticky hands. I do not really like wearing gloves but for this task I highly recommend that one does!

As I said it’s a complicated job, so there are a few rules you must remember:

1. Work as quick as you possibly can.

2. Be organised – prepare as much as possible in advance before you make the first cut. The reason for this is because the artichokes start to oxidise as soon as you cut into them.

3. Prepare a large bowl of ice cold water with plenty of lemon juice beforehand, to submerge the artichokes in while you are preparing the rest.

4. Look after the cooked chokes, they keep well in the fridge for up to 5 days in the cooking liquid.

5. Most importantly, enjoy every single one!

I have prepared a slideshow of how to turn baby artichokes – hopefully it will make the process easier to understand and follow.

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This tart makes a delicious light lunch option on our menu. It could be served either warm or at room temperature, either way it’s delicious.

I came across this video of  USA baking legend Peter Reinhart and I must say he confirmed my feelings for baking bread. His passion together with his simplistic and humorous manner of explaining how to make the perfect dough, what happens during the “making” process and all things  technical  is just simply perfect!

If you have a  spare 16 minutes watch this video as it definitely clarified any remaining issues as to why I still sometimes bake bricks! Baking bread is the radical transformation of taking wheat or flour and making it into a tasty loaf, it’s a tricky process and the fate of your loaf lies in your hands. The baker makes the ultimate decisions on which flour or ingredients to use but a small fluctuation in temperature and timing  will effect the final outcome of your loaf.

In short you cannot fast track the process and without the true understanding and knowledge it’s a daunting task. Anyone can bake bread but armed with the knowledge and know how, it’s an even more interesting and exciting process.

Peter talks about the 12 stages of bread baking and explains the Bakers Mission of extracting flavour from wheat or flour:

1. Mis-en-place – weighing ingredients and getting everything ready
2. Mixing – developing the gluten to give the dough the strength to grow and activates the yeast
3. Fermentation – developing flavour – this is the stage  where the yeast ‘eats’ the sugars and starts to ferment by creating carbon dioxide and alcohol- in Peters words the yeast “burps” and “sweats”
4. Dividing – the dough into smaller pieces which makes it easier to handle
5. Shaping – Shape the dough into required shapes such as loaves, rolls, sticks etc..
6. Resting
7. Final Shaping
8. Panning – transferring the dough to suitable tins and baking vessel such as baskets, loaf tins or baking trays
9. Final Fermentation also known as proving stage
10. Baking – Three transformations take place: 1. the sugars caramelise and forms a crust; 2. proteins coagulate at 160°C, this forms the crumb of the loaf; 3. gelatinisation takes place when the dough reaches 180°C, all the moisture is absorbed and the yeast bubbles bursts and all the flavours are transferred to the bread
11. Cooling
12. Eating!

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The culinary world has gone into a macaron frenzy. It’s macarons wherever you turn your head. So it’s time that I jumped on the macaron band wagon and give it a whirl.

My recent visit to Pierre Hermé’s exclusive macaron boutique at Selfridges confirmed what a true master he is with funky flavour combination’s. My favourite must be the wasabi and strawberry.

I am also addicted to all pretty things in life, so my aim is not only to make my macarons as pretty as possible but also give it the professional look.

I achieved this with my macarons by using a garnish of  freeze dried raspberries, black sesame seeds and chopped pistachio nuts. I made one batch of macaron mixture, coloured it with one colour, used different garnishes and flavoured fillings. I made my own version of wasabi and white chocolate butter cream as well as a toasted black sesame seed butter cream and for the third flavour combination I used a strawberry and rose jam as a filling.

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You might think that the wasabi flavouring is a weird combination, honestly I though the same but all I can say is WOW! The wasabi has acidic and citrus undertones and combined with a really good quality white chocolate, I chose one with floral notes,to provide an  absolute dream flavour explosion. It surpassed all my expectations. I even think it tasted more fragrant than the wasabi and strawberry one I bought at Selfridges. (Hope no one takes any offence to me saying that.)  You have to add the wasabi to suit your taste, I suggest you start with a little  and mix it very well. I used a butter cream made from unsalted butter as my carrier for the wasabi. I also used wasabi paste and not powder, it’s entirely your choice. If you only have powder then I suggest that you should first make it into a paste and then add, to taste, to the butter cream.

To add a bit of glamour and sparkle to your baked macarons dust with edible glitter. You can get all sorts of funky shades and colours.

What I love  most about macarons is that you can make as many interesting colour and flavour combination’s as you wish. I have listed only a very few in the recipe below. I hope this short video will also give every macaron lover the confidence to give it a go and crack the art of making macarons.

This cheesecake is not a traditional recipe using cream cheese but is a mixture of mascarpone cheese and crème fraîche. I had some ingredients in the fridge and did not want them go to waste so I made a cheesecake. I made the base by mixing hobnob biscuits with a good helping of my home made Seville orange marmalade and melted butter. You might think I’m a cheat for using hobnob biscuits, perhaps I am but time was not quite on my side. I had to get it baked and cooled in daylight so I had the right conditions to take a photograph.The  reason  being is that this cheesecake would not have seen dusk as Mr.P would never be able to keep his hands off and it would have been a divorce situation.

I was right, there was only an hour between baking the cheesecake, completing the decoration, allowing it to cool and taking the photographs and eating our first slice. It was still slightly warm…… mmmmm, delicious! Tummy ache heaven! It was interesting how different yet delicious it was both warm or cold.

Mr.P has a very sweet tooth and has a special affinity for crunchy chocolate bars so when the opportunity arose to play and recreate one of his favourites he was ready and rearing to go.

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This method of making honeycomb was a trick they taught us at catering college. When the teachers demonstrated this, we all went ooh, wow and aah as it’s almost like magic. I remember the vigorous bubbling hot caramel reacting with the bicarbonate of soda, it expands and froths like a caramel monster, almost like a scene out of Harry Potter. It is very dangerous though and it’s incredibly important to have all the items you need ready to hand. The most important  are a heat resistant pot rest, a wooden or heat resistant plastic spoon and a lined baking tray in which to decant the hot honeycomb. All of this must be done in close proximity to the cooker as you should not move about too much with hot caramel as it can cause serious and very painful burns. Now you are aware of all the precautions it’s time have fun and make honeycomb.

The honeycomb makes a great garnish for this baked cheesecake, the textures works well together and with the final touch of the melted chocolate it’s a dream for all any cheesecake connoisseurs.

If I can make one comment or perhaps a request to his publishers, I would have loved it if the book had at least 10 attached permanent book markers. The reason is I do not read this book as you would nomally by starting  on page one and continuing to the last page. I pick a subject, lets say pork buns, read the chapter, put the book down, go back, re-read a few paragraphs again and then set off to the kitchen to cook from the book. After all it’s a cook book and I like to have a few chapters on the go simultaneously. I was reading the egg  and the pork bun chapters at around the same time and therefore need a few resident book markers so I can flick backwards and forward. I know I’m weird…BUT it works for me.

David Chang not only made me laugh but also transported me back to memory lane to when I was a chef working in restaurants. He achieved this as well as being a very good business adviser all in one book. I think his ability to take humble food and make it interesting by breaking the monotonous mould and perceived stigma  has enabled him to  turn his business into the big success it is today. He tells the story in the most honest way and it is remarkable that he had a near failure but then managed to salvage  the business by shelving what he thought was a great idea and change his vision and direction to make his business work financially. I commend him for all of those things, he’s inspired me to seriously think about my future.

The book is full of gritty words just as cookery  was finally shaking off the stigma that chefs are uneducated creatures and can only communicate by f-ing and blinding in the kitchen. I think I can forgive Chang for his  choice of  crude words as he’s a great cook that truly understands food.

I also think that David Chang has put the cat amongst the pigeons with his fantastic restaurant group, lets face it a chain of restaurants are normally pretty restricted and nothing more than average. Not Momofuku, this restaurant chain is the one that everyone talks about. They do not need white pressed table cloths with waiters that have swallowed broomsticks or even fancy glassware, no it’s simple and humble and serves honest good and ground breaking food. His name is on every chef’s lips. I first heard about David Chang from Sat Bains and honestly did not know who he was talking about but he rated this chef highly. Then when Mr.P went to El Bulli and saw that Ferran Adria was reading the book we thought we better wake up, buy the book and read it.

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When the book arrived we both could not contain ourselves and fought over who was going to open the box and then once inside….we were both disappointed…looked at it, paged through and then went ohh what’s the fuss about?? However I did not give up and a few days later I picked it up and started reading the book as described above, then it all started to  make sense and I really got into the whole vibe! Now the saying  “do not judge a book by it’s cover” seriously made sense to me!

After reading the pork bun chapter a couple of times and re-visiting a few of the paragraphs, we set to work to make these famous pork buns that everyone allegedly was talking about. Unlike Chang I made my own steamed buns from beginning to end and even cooked the pork sous-vide,which is not Chang’s method of  oven cooking the pork belly. David stated that he bought in the steamed pork buns in when he first opened up but there is nothing wrong with this as his kitchen was too small. But this is a leaf I’m seriously taking out of Chang’s book; that he was not going to jeopardize the success of the business due to wanting to make everything himself. He resorted to purchase a perfectly good product made by someone else, there is a real trust between him and his suppliers. All these pieces makes this brilliant puzzle even more interesting, I bet now that they have moved to a larger premises he would be making his own steamed buns…..perhaps….or perhaps not.

I had to adapt the recipe slightly as I’m in the UK and our flour reacts slightly differently, I had to add a bit more water and I used fresh yeast. It’s a lengthy process as you make the dough, leave it to prove for about 1 and half hour, knock it back, shape the balls, prove the balls for 30 minutes, shape the buns, prove them for 30 minutes and then finally steam them for 10 minutes. I’m so pleased that I persisted and made them as they are outstandingly delicious and light as a feather!

We even made the quick salted pickles from the book, I think next time I’m going to try one of the three other pickle methods, how great is this three different methods! Outrageous!

This is not generally the kind of thing we would have made, certainly not Mr.P but after stuffing his face with 7 pork buns in a row (felt sick as a consequence!) he agreed that this one was a winner! We will be making these buns in the future at every cocktail event, they are a stunning party piece!

I loved Merill Streeps performance and thought that she managed to capture Julia’s personality and accent to perfection.

When I launched The British Larder site I was blissfully unaware of the interesting and very active but almost secret world of food bloggers. At first I did not accept that I was a food blogger because I’m a professional chef and was offering a free online recipe service.

As The British Larder progressed and just like Julie, once I had received my very first comment I realised that people actually read what I had written, I came to terms with the fact that I am a food blogger and started to take it very seriously. Now I’m completely addicted and love the memories that it brings back , it’s as if I am now only starting to appreciate my life and achievements, it’s brilliant.

We watched the movie and with open mouths and gulped  more than once as there were scenes that  mirrored our lives. I realised I’m living Julie Powell’s life , in my own way, without even knowing that she existed. I do not really believe that I’m a writer as such but a chef yes. Writing is something, unlike Julie, I had to learn to do. For me writing in this way is a new skill and I do not always get it right, where as Julie is a writer but not a cook. I can cook and that comes naturally to me, however Julie had to learn to cook and she had the master Julia at the helm. Do you understand the similarities in our lives? It’s a little bit freaky when watching the movie and see your life in motion.

I watched the you tube video of Julia

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When the challenge arose to make Julia’s one minute omelette, it brought back my own memories of omelettes. I remember as if  it was yesterday, when Dustin Hoffman came into one of the restaurants where I worked. He entered the kitchen to show us how to make his egg white omelette. Apart from being completely star struck I was also very big headed as it was my section and Dustin stood right next to me as we were making this omelette “together”. I was striding around like the cat that got all the cream. My colleagues where a bit jealous but is soon faded as Snoop Dog came in for dinner that evening, to be honest I did not know who Snoop Dog was but then I’m talking about an event that took place 13 years ago! I’m a bit older and wiser now and a bit more clued up.

In the true British Larder fashion I have added thyme and girolles to make my omelette a seasonal favourite. You see Julia did all the hard work in figuring out how to make the omelette and it’s upto us individuals to add our own fancies and twists on this classic. I saute the girolles before adding them to the middle of my omelette just before it’s tipped out of the pan. You can add your own seasonal favourite ingredient. It’s the perfect breakfast or brunch dish whipped up in less than a minute! Enjoy!

Walking up to the coop we saw the bantam birds laying their eggs; Priscilla, Lee and Thistle the three old birds were pecking around the garden like ladies at lunch and Mr. Punch was strutting around like he owned the place. It was a fantastic sight and meeting Kim and Graham who are both so passionate about their chickens was a great experience. They were telling us how Mr.Punch was hatched from egg and raised in their sons pyjama pocket. Suddenly I envied him as I think that if I ever could have chosen how I was brought up then this is it. The thought of experiencing the hatching of an egg and giving a characterful bird like Mr.Punch a good home is wonderful and something I think that only a handful of people would experience in life.

I went home armed with a box of fresh eggs and Kim’s lemon drizzle cake recipe. All the way home I tried to persuade Mr.P that we should invest in a chicken coop for our back yard, well the answer was a blunt no as we do not exactly have the space for it.

I had to bake a lemon drizzle cake for a presentation that Mr.P had the following day. I was very pleased that Kim gave me this recipe as it’s easy and super yummy. I baked miniature lemon drizzles but it will make a perfect 1lb loaf.

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I was chatting to Alex on the phone a while back and she was telling me about how she finally perfected her lemon drizzle recipe. A  friend had recommended that she should add a dash of gin to the frosting. So Alex this part of this recipe belongs to you!  I was a bit naughty as I made this slight adjustment to the glaze, I hope Kim will forgive me.

If you are intrigued like I was then you better have a peep at this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZgOJxlHrKU!

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Cherries still have a truly special meaning for me. When Mum visited four years ago, the British cherry season was in full flow. She still reminisces about the day trip to Kent and buying fresh cherries at a roadside stall. It’s four years on and Mum is visiting again, to celebrate the occasion I developed this special baked cherry and almond cupcakes with mascarpone frosting. I hope that the fond cherry memories will live on and that this visit  will happily be added to the list of anecdotes.

I am also fond of almonds and will find almost any possible way to add them to my cooking. For this recipe I have used marzipan to add the almond yumminess to my cupcakes. By roasting the cherries with a hint of ground cinnamon adds a complete mystery level of flavour to my cupcakes. I double the cherry quantities and serve the baked cherries for breakfast with natural yoghurt or add a spoon full over Bircher muesli.

Finding a good quality marzipan is not easy. I always look for a 60% almond content; try to avoid the very yellow artificial looking marzipan that is widely available. A good quality marzipan is expensive and you will find it at superior food stores or delicatessens.

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These cupcakes are just as yummy, without the mascarpone frosting, served as a pudding slightly warm with an extra helping of the baked cherries on the side and perhaps a spoon of crème fraîche.

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