One of the first things that came to my mind was rhubarb doughnuts! Someone at my work had actually tried to make rhubarb and custard doughnuts before, but the acidity in the rhubarb jam he made caused the cream to curdle. Ever since then, I’ve always thought that if I were to do it, I would turn the rhubarb into a curd instead, as it would prevent any curdling. After all, you can mix lemon curd with cream and it’s fine – and lemon is even more acidic!

So I went back to my tried and true recipe for crème patissière, which is the same recipe I use for making lemon curd! I simply swap the milk amount for lemon juice and add as much zest as the amount of lemons I juice. I figured I could do the same with rhubarb purée! However, once I had stewed the rhubarb, and blitzed it – it wouldn’t press through a sieve like raspberry or some other kind of puree. Too much fibre. In the end, I didn’t see it and simply reduced the amount of cornstarch in the recipe to account for how thick the puree is to start with. I figured that the rhubarb purée was about halfway between how thin milk is, and how thick I wanted the final curd – so I halved the amount of thickener (cornstarch) to just 10g.

The rhubarb taste is there, but subtler than I was expecting. I’m debating trying to make these without the custard next time. I would double the amount of rhubarb puree, and just flavour the whipping cream with vanilla and fold them together. I think the flavour would be amazing – but then I love rhubarb, and it might be too strong for some. But even without the strong rhubarb flavour – these still taste great!

For the doughnut itself, I used the same recipe from Justin Gellatly’s book Bread, Cake, Doughnut, Pudding, that I used in the paska doughnuts. Except, as these weren’t paska doughnuts, I used his traditional recipe with water instead of citrus juice. If you want a few tips on how to fry them, check out the paska recipe! My key tip is always to prove the doughnuts on parchment paper, rather than trying to lift them off a floured surface. You can even pre-cut the squares before shaping so that you don’t have to try and cut around the doughnuts once proven.

When I was trying to decide how to garnish these (all doughnuts need a garnish, IMHO), I was torn between poached rhubarb and rhubarb curls! In the end, I think the poached stuff works better, as it looks more like rhubarb at first glance. It is a better colour. However, the fact that you can make ribbons out of rhubarb is always fun. I used this recipe to make them.

Which garnish do you think looks better?

Either way, if you happen to have a glut of rhubarb from your garden or just love doughnuts, why not try these? You could even try reducing the amount of creme patisserie in the recipe to see if the stronger flavour is better? Taste is always a personal preference. Or, you can just eat the rhubarb curd straight – ha! Pipe it into tart shells, or make a rhubarb meringue pie! Enjoy!

I could get all sciencey about it, but it’s similar to how yoghurt is made. Except, instead of having bacteria eating the sugars (lactose) and producing lactic acid, you add the acid yourself! The acid lowers the ph of the cream, which changes the structure of the protein strands, allowing them to hold more water. Originally, I was taught that possets require citrus to set (lemons, limes, oranges, grapefruit…), but there are other fruits with a similar ph to citrus.

My original recipe idea, was to make an orange posset, flavoured with pomegranate (mostly because I just wanted the pink/peach colour). But as I was making the first batch I was having a hard time. Possets need the citric acid to set, so I couldn’t substitute pomegranate juice for orange juice. I could only add a tablespoon or so for flavour. Now, pomegranate isn’t as strong a taste as the orange, so it wasn’t coming through. Then, as I was tasting things, I wondered to myself if the bitter pomegranate juice might be acidic? Turns out, pomegranate has a lower ph than oranges, and is closer to that of lemons! That made me realize you could use pomegranate juice all on its own!

So I went back to the store for more cream and set about making three different possets – one solely orange, one 50/50 orange and pomegranate, and one solely pomegranate. I was curious about the different colours and flavours, and couldn’t settle on just one. The result? Well, the pomegranate one didn’t really taste pomegranate – it’s too delicate a flavour. I used pomegranate juice though, so maybe freshly squeezed would come through? With the 50/50 one you couldn’t really taste the pomegranate, as again, it’s too delicate. The orange one was the best, as the flavour really cut through the cream.

In my opinion, the best possets use the most sour flavours – like lemon and lime. They really come through the heaviness of the cream, unlike subtler flavours. Perhaps next time, I’ll try one with lime and ginger… doesn’t that sound nice?

So if you want to make a posset, experiment with flavours. Lemon is perfect, but you can also infuse things in the milk before you make the posset. Simply add whatever you want to infuse as you first simmer the cream. Then take it off the heat, cover with a lid (to prevent too much evaporation) and steep for 30 minutes. Bring it back to a simmer and continue with the recipe as before. You could infuse all kinds of spices, herbs, tea… just use your imagination!

Honestly, possets are so easy! My only advice would be to serve these in small dishes, as they are very very creamy… you don’t want to serve people too much. A double-shot of posset is all you really need!

Nanaimo Bars recipe | Hello Victoria

I’m starting to realize that I can’t do everything by hand. And I don’t mean that in the sense of handmade… but that sometimes, you just need machine power when baking. Case in point – these Nanaimo Bars.

When I was studying pastry in Vancouver, our course had us doing almost everything by hand. Whether that was whipping cream, or making meringue, there were a few things that we did with our Kitchenaid mixers. One of the few things we did with a machine was an Italian meringue – and I resigned myself to not making them while living in this tiny flat. (I also resigned myself to not making marshmallows while here, as it’s pretty much the same process.)

As I couldn’t bring my Kitchenaid mixer from Canada, and had no room to put one here even if I did, I didn’t bother to buy a hand mixer. Maybe it’s because once you go to Kitchenaid you never go back? Or perhaps my hand mixing at school had made me cocky? Bah ha ha, you puny machines – look at the strength of my arms!!! Mwah ah ah…

But seriously – if I could whip cream by hand, and make meringues (just not Italian), why did I need a hand mixer? Well folks, creaming butter, that’s why! It is easy to do when you’re just softening it for cookie dough, but trying to incorporate air and make it fluffy?! My upper body strength has its limits. So the next time I need to make a fluffy layer, I may just review my aversion to hand mixers.

For anyone not already aware, Nanaimo bars are something from the West Coast of Canada (named after the city of Nanaimo). They are so ubiquitous that as a child I thought they were as common as chocolate chip cookies. It’s a crust of digestive/coconut/nut/chocolate, covered with a buttery custard layer, and topped with more chocolate. Normally the crust contains graham crackers, but over here I substituted them with digestive biscuits.

I personally was never the biggest eater of Nanaimo bars, as I found them too sweet/rich as a child, but homesickness has crept in. Either then or my new Canadian coworker, lamenting the lack of these delectable bars, persuaded me to break out the old wooden spoon.

Maybe you will too? Or do you have one of those fancy hand mixers?

A while back, while hunting for Danish inspiration photos on Pinterest, I stumbled across a beautiful recipe on Hint of Vanilla for a Rhubarb Danish (check out her blog, not only is it amazing, but she’s Canadian!). The shape of the Danish was unique, and the piping of the cream with the St. Honoré tip was beautiful. Quite frankly, her danishes (what is the plural of Danish?) look so good you might as well stop reading this now, and just head over to her blog – trust me, it’s better!

I’ve been wanting to try her recipe, or at least a variation of it, ever since. As I was buying rhubarb for my skillet cake (as well as to infuse some gin, like our sloe gin) I decided to buy a whole kilo and experiment. Since I was sending these with Richard to his work, I knew I couldn’t pipe cream on top, like the original recipe. So I decided to add creaminess with a pastry cream, piped under the rhubarb, flavored with blood orange and vanilla! After all, orange is a great complement to rhubarb, and I was buying them anyway for other recipes.

As I was making this recipe on my two days off, and was trying to cram like 8 recipes in those days, I tried to go the lazy route. I had seen puff pastry and pie dough in the grocery stores and assumed that you could probably buy ready-to-roll croissants or Danish dough. Wrong… wrong, wrong, wrong. I had hoped to spend my days off doing so many things and didn’t want to make Danish dough. It’s not hard, just time-consuming.

So because I already had my other ingredients, I decided to just suck it up and make the dough. Except I misread my recipe twice and had to make the dough three times (!!) before I got it right (that is what happens when I rush things). Then, of course, I was trying to rush my turns, and was freezing the dough in between to chill it quickly… and forgot about it between the first and second turn. When I tried to roll it out, it was still too cold and I broke the butter sheet… gah! So please, don’t look too closely at the dough in the photos, and do what I say, not what I did.

The layers weren’t very nice in the end, but the flavor is still there. These two days weren’t my best because I was trying to do too much. I ended up not doing everything as well as I should have.

I made a half-batch recipe, which makes about 7 proper Danish, with scrap left over. The full recipe makes 15 Danish, and the excess can be used to make the little mini bite-sized ones.

If you find that you have extra pastry cream left over – don’t worry! It tastes amazing and you could pretty much just eat it with a spoon… or dip fruit in it… or pipe it into tart shells and top with fresh fruit! It’s pretty versatile.

Mmmmm… now I want to make these again, but take my time to do the dough properly! If you’re feeling up to it, Danish dough isn’t really hard, just takes a good couple of hours to make. However, if your shop has it for sale, you might want to take the easy route! This recipe looks long and daunting, but trust me, these aren’t as hard as they look!