Party Buffet

This was some time ago, but there should at least be some pictures, I think. The recipes will follow one by one. At least from the stuff I made, which are the cakes and pâtés.

Preparing some stuff for the cakes...
 

 My first two tries at a pâté. Ham with eggs and broccoli.

 And salmon, carrot, peas...

 

Mustard dill dip

A vegetable tart...

Almond and red currant cake

A white chocolate cardamom cake 

Vanilla-strawberry chequerboard cake... With fondant flowers... 

The obligatory pumpkin pie, plus some pumpkin pastries. 

 Chocolate-marzipan cake.

 

 Pumpkin and mascarpone... No cake included ;) Oh, well, the cookies...

 

And some pictures from the buffet. 

That's it :)

Simple Cheesecake

It was my mother in law's birthday and she wished for a cheesecake. Well, who'd say no to that? 

Instead of my usual 26cm pan, I used a 30cm one, so the cake was a bit larger and so were the amounts of everything.

First thing to do: the shell. All you need is:

300 g flour
75 g sugar
150 g butter
2 eggs
2 sachets vanilla sugar

Place all the ingredients in a bowl and knead into a dough. Refrigerate for half an hour. Grease and flour the pan. Roll half the dough into a circle of 30 cm and place into the pan. Out of the remaining half form sausages and place them on the edge of the dough circle. Press/pull them up, so that they become the shell for the cake. (Just look at the picture and you will know what I mean...) Some dough should remain, which you can roll out very thin. Then, cut out shapes to decorate your cake with. I used little flowers and petals.

While you prepare the filling, the shell should rest in the refrigerator.

What you need to prepare the filling:

1,5 kg curd cheese
100 g sugar
2 sachets vanilla sugar
6 eggs
2 sachets vanilla custard powder

First, cream the cheese until it forms an even mass. Then, add the sugars and mix until incorporated. Do likewise with the eggs, one by one.

Finally, stir in the custard powder. Make sure that it is well incorporated because it is this ingredient that gives the cheese mass the desired firmness. Decorate with the cut out shapes (The dough, you remember?)

Bake in the preheated oven on 170°C for about 45-55 minutes. The cake will still be a bit jiggly, when taken out of the oven. 

I pre-baked the cake for about 20 minutes before placing the decoration onto it, that is why it is so pale. So, next time, I will certainly decorate the cake directly. 

9th of December

Yeah, only ten days behind... :)

This tea is called Arabian Nights and contains green and black tea, flavours, rose blossoms, jasmine blossoms and sunflower blossoms. It smells and tastes quite flowery, which is obvious, regarding the ingredients ;) 

Yummie :) Oh, and 100°C, 2 minutes.  

Cardamom Plum-filled Cookies

As you might have realized by now, I love spices. Especially cardamom. So, for this year's Christmas cookies, I searched for cardamom cookies as well, and found those 'moons'. They are filled with plum preserves, but since I did not have enough of it, I filled the remaining cookies with black currant jelly. I think, you can fill them with what jelly or preserve you like. Yay, experiments :)

 

All you need for this treat is:

300 g flour

1/2 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. salts of hartshorn

100 g sugar

1 pinch salt

1 1/2 tsp. ground cardamom

150 g butter

2 eggs

300 g plum preserve

Knead all ingredients except for the plum preserve until they form a dough. I usually start with the blender, but then go to knead it with my hands because then I can feel the texture of the dough, whether it is too dry or too sticky. 

Refrigerate for at least two hours. 

Then, roll out on a thoroughly floured surface (you will need quite a lot of flour) to a thickness of about 3 mm and cut out circles that are 6 cm in diameter. I used a dumpling form, as you can see in the next few pictures. Fill a small amount of preserve onto the circle and press it closed (see pictures). If you do not have such a form, just use a glass to cut out the circles and press the edges together with a fork.

 Place them on a lined baking tray, about 2 cm of space in between. Brush them with milk and then bake on 200°C for about 10 minutes.

They might look simple, but they are really tasty. Love them :)

Orange-frosted Sugar Cookies

Sugar cookies are the most simple cookies to make, but that means, that you can frost them with whatever frosting you like without disturbing the taste of the cookies themselves :) I chose a very simple orange frosting.

What you need for the cookies (another Peggy Porschen recipe):

200 g butter
200 g sugar
1 egg
400 g flour

Beat butter and sugar until just combined. Add the egg and beat again. Slowly add the flour and mix. Wrap the dough in cling foil and refrigerate for one hour. Then, roll out to the thickness of 5 mm and cut out cookies. Chill again for half an hour. Preheat the oven to 180°C and bake for about 8-12 minutes, depending on the size of your cookies. 

When the cookies have had several hours to completely cool down, you can prepare the frosting:

powdered sugar

grated orange peel

orange juice

Place sifted powdered sugar and orange peel in a bowl and add one teaspoon of orange juice. Stir. Add sugar or juice until you have the desired texture to spread it onto the cookies. As you can see on the pictures, my frosting was rather liquid, so that I could spread it very thinly, which I liked. If you want it to be 'more', well, add more sugar, so that it becomes thicker. :)

As long as the frosting is not hardened, you can decorate the cookies with sprinkles, if you like.

Pinwheel Cookies

Here are my first (but certainly not last) pinwheel cookies. They are easy to make, yummie and they really look good :)

What you need is:

2 cups flour
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
2/3 cup powdered sugar
1/4 cup sugar
2 1/2 sticks butter
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 tsp. strawberry (or other) extract
some drops red food colouring
1 1/2 cups sugar sprinkles

Put flour, baking powder, salt and sugar into a bowl and mix. Add the butter, cut into pieces, and vanilla and mix again until all the dry ingredients stick to the butter. 

Divide the dough in two and add strawberry extract and food colouring and two additional tablespoons of flour to one half. Mix until the whole half of the dough is red. Put both into the fridge for two hours.

Roll out each dough into a rectangle of about 32 cm x 22 cm. Brush the vanilla dough with a very little amount of water and place the strawberry dough on top. Press them lightly together. Pour the sugar sprinkles into a shallow rectangular plate or pan. Trim the edges, if desired. 

With the long side, roll the combined doughs up into a log. Place the log onto the sprinkles and roll, until it is completely coated (or as much, as you like it to be). Wrap in cling foil and refrigerate until it is firm enough to be cut into slices.

Preheat the oven to 160°C. Cut the logs into slices of about 4-5mm thickness. Bake on a lined baking tray for about 15-17 minutes.

8th of December

Next...

Today, it's Sencha :) As I said, I love green tea. This one almost smells like Matcha. And it tastes divine! Best Sencha I have ever drunk! I could drink it all day long. 90°C, 1 minute.