Cream Butter Scones

Sunday Morning.

Time for fresh baked scones. mmmmmm

These scones are fluffy and flakey and best served warm. Serve with Devonshire Cream,  our Strawberry Lemon Jam, Cinnamon Honey butter, or a dab of plain butter.. or.. plain.

Ingredients

(Makes 10 –14 scones depending how big you cut them)

Make sure all ingredients are cold

2 cups all purpose flour

1/4 cup granulated white sugar

2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

1/3 cup cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces

1 large egg, slightly beaten

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 cup heavy cream

 

Preparation:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F and place the rack in the middle of the oven.  Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.

In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Cut the butter into small pieces and blend into the flour mixture with a pastry blender or two knives. The mixture should look like coarse crumbs. In a small measuring cup combine the whipping cream, beaten egg and vanilla. Add this mixture to the flour mixture. Stir just until combined. Do not over mix.

Knead dough gently four or five times and then pat the dough into a circle that is about 7 inches (18 cm) round.  Then, using a 2-1/2 inch round cookie cutter or glass top, cut the dough into rounds.  Place the rounds on the prepared cookie sheet, spacing a couple of inches apart.  Brush the tops of the scones with a little cream.  This helps to brown the tops during baking.

Bake for about 15 - 18 minutes or until nicely browned and a toothpick inserted into the center of a scone comes out clean. Remove from oven and transfer to a wire rack to cool.  Top with your favorite butter or jam.

Scones freeze very well.

 

 

Enjoy !

Shopaholic Cake

(Sorry Mom)

I made this cake for my mothers birthday this past weekend. 

Let’s just say… she likes to shop~!

This time the  cake was made from scratch (see Simple Butter Cake recipe) as I wanted a heavier cake to support some of the fondant figures.

The cake is a very simple butter cake with a cream cheese cinnamon filling.

This cake was large.  I used 2 cakes, both in a 12” x 2” deep pan.

I made  my own buttercream icing to crumb coat the cake.

For the decoration, I wanted to show an exhausted shopper after a fulfilling day of shopping.

I started with a comfy chair. This was made out of fondant only.

And of course some shopping bags.  The cake was also covered in pink fondant.

And now for our shopper ( or my mother )

Her hair was put through the garlic press.   Her eyes were holes filled with white fondant. 

But to me, they looked a little too wide open for an over-fatigued shopper, so I fixed that. (hehe)

The half-mast eyelids and gaping mouth pretty much says it all.

Since I was on my own making this cake and it took me hours, there are no more during pictures… so here is the finished cake.

 

Happy Birthday Mom

Risotto with Peas

Autumn and winter spells warm comfort foods.

Risotto is perhaps one of my favorite comfort foods.  It is also a basic recipe that you can embellish with any of your other favorite foods.

Use this basic recipe and add sundried tomatoes, broccoli, mushrooms, asparagus, or any other delicious addition.  This time I’m adding peas.

Ingredients

(makes 4 servings)

2 tablespoons butter

1 medium onion, chopped

1 clove garlic, minced

1 cup Arborio Italian Rice, uncooked

1/3 cup dry white wine (optional)

2 cups chicken broth, heated

1/3 cup grated parmesan or romano cheese

1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley (optional)

1 cup cooked frozen peas (optional)

 

Preparation

Melt butter in medium saucepan on medium heat.  Add onion and garlic.  Cook 2 to 3 minutes or until crisp-tender, stirring frequently.

Stir in rice, cook 2 minutes stirring constantly.  Add wine, cook and stir until absorbed.

Stir in 1/2 cup of the hot broth.  Reduce heat to medium-low, cook until most of the broth is absorbed, stirring constantly. Repeat process until all of the broth has been added.  (Rice should be tender but firm.) If necessary add a small amount of additional broth or water and continue to cook until rice is done.

Add cheese, stir until blended .  Sprinkle with parsley.  Add cooked peas.  Serve immediately.

 

 

Enjoy !

 

Chef’s Coat Cake

My daughter Nadia saw the Maple Leaf Cake that I had just finished and asked me if I would

make a cake for her boyfriends father who was turning 55. 

Soooooo… a day after my 8 hour stint with that cake, I had another project.  I didn’t mind, they’re wonderful people, and Nadia was a great help all day.  Frank is a terrific chef and we thought this would be fitting for his birthday.  

Pressed for time yet again I found myself using boxed cakes. ( I’m not going through all that, you guys know what to do.)

I have to admit, we were really on the clock for this one, so I didn’t have a lot of time for tons of pictures.

So lets start on a cleaver.  We mixed up some grey fondant and shaped it.

Some black fondant for the handles.

When you brush the fondant with a small amount of shortening it gives off a shine.

Next, onto our cake.  Cover a 2 layered cake, (that has already been crumb coated) with white fondant.

Decorate with the necessary elements.

A few more accessories.  We needed those buttons to SHINE!

Of course we couldn’t give Frank a cake without a little Frank to go along with it.

This truly was the fun part.

We put Frank’s hair through the garlic press.

We used white confetti candy and blue edible ink for his eyes.

He really started taking shape.

I have NO idea what kind of shoes Chefs wear, but I like little clean white ones.

Here’s Frank getting fitted for his new shoes.

Everything put together.

I don’t think I captured the detail here, but his name badge has stitching marks around it.

Just in case you were wondering…

 

Happy Birthday Frank!

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