Lemon Drizzle Cake - gluten free

I used to make lemon drizzle cake a lot for a cafe, but discovered I had never written it up so when I wanted to make on I had to do an Internet hunt.  I based this cake on the BBC Good Food recipe.  Making this cake marks a sad moment for me as it is the last day of my glass course at the excellent shop/training/studio at the Creative Glass Guild in Bristol.  My teacher, Jen, is fantastic, full of expertise and very kind to over-enthusiastic novices. I asked what type of cake to bring and she requested lemon drizzle, so her wishes trump the other students' please for ginger, parkin.....

Slight problem in that I have given away so much flour recently for people to test my bread recipe that I have run out of tapioca.  I thought I had a whole box left - lots of urid and lots of brown rice but no tapioca, and no store in Worcester sells it. I also ran out of baking powder and then forgot to get it when I went into town, so not the best start.  By using the tapioca I keep plain for thickening sauces or making tapioca gloop for flatbreads I managed to make 225g flour, which the recipe called for, but that seemed a bit stingy for thirteen hungry artisans.  Another 75g of almond flour makes this cake more substantial.  I forgot to increase the sugar and had no more butter, so this is a cake which is tangy and not very sweet.  However, my regular taster, who has a very sweet tooth, declared it to be perfect.

Ingredients:
225 g self raising flour (I use urid, 40%, tapioca 40% and rice 20%, with 1 tsp baking powder for 100g flour to make self raising four)
75g almond flour/meal
225 g butter, soft
225 g sugar for cake
5 eggs
Zest and juice of 2-3 lemons depending on how tangy you like your cake.  I used 2.5
100g sugar for topping

Set oven at 175C fan

Beat the butter until light and fluffy, add sugar and beat until fluffy.  Mix in eggs a little at a time, then add the lemon zest (not the juice) and flours, a little at a time, beating well between each addition.

Spoon the batter into a greased/lined baking tin.  I used a square tin as I wanted lots of shallow pieces to make them easier to eat without plates or cutlery.

Bake for 40-50 minutes until the top springs back when lightly pressed and a knife comes out clean.

Leave in tin to cool.  Mix the lemon juice with the remaining 100g of sugar.  Pierce the cake with a fork and slowly pour the lemony sugar over the cake.  Leave in tin to cool completely

The lemon sinks in and the sugar makes a fine crust on the surface.

gluten free lemon rosemary foccaccia

I got an email with recipe suggestions - most of these I ignore, but this one caught my eye.  Foccacia strewn with rosemary and slices of lemon.  They should be a specific type of lemon, not just old tired ones from the bottom of the fridge.  Comments on the original recipe were things like ' looking out of my kitchen window at the lemons on the tree....' but hey, any lemon is better than no lemon.

I have started keeping a batch of yeast dough in the fridge, so I can take scoops for pizza or flatbreads anytime.  It is so easy and produces good results.  I just mixed 500g of my flour (40%urid, 40% tapioca and 20% cornmeal) with two teaspoons of yeast which I mixed with about 600ml warm water and a pinch of sugar, stirring the whole load together once the yeast starts fermenting.  Easy blend yeast would be simpler - just stir into the flour and add water.

Keep this in a large lidded bowl in the fridge for up to a week.

Take a good scoop of the dough and spread on your baking tray.  I use my crepe pan for most of my flatbreads as I can crisp the bottom on the hob if I want to. If your baking tray isn't a good non-stick one I suggest spreading the dough on some baking parchment.

Topping
One lemon, sliced thinly and pips removed.
1 tsp olive oil - I used rosemary and chili infused oil
1/4 tsp sugar
pinch seasalt
tsp rosemary leaves

Spread the lemon slices on the dough, sprinkle remaining ingredients on top.  Let it sit for a little while if you have time for the dough to start rising a bit more.  Place in a cold oven, set to 180C, and bake for about twenty five minutes, until crisp and browning.  If you put it in a hot oven just reduce the time.

This is amazing, the heat and tartness and the zap of sweet give an astonishing flavour - but not, I suspect, if you aren't a lemon fan.  Those unfortunate people could eat the bits between the lemon slices.

Boozy cranberry and lemon gluten free cookies

I bought a bottle of sherry for a visit from my brother-in-law but it turns out he only drinks one variety.  What to do with a bottle of sherry?  What to do with the diminishing but still present stash of dried cranberries?  What to do for the Writer's Group party this evening?  Boozy cranberry and lemon cookies seemed the thing to try.  I soaked the cranberries in sherry so that they were plump and juicy. As I had run out of eggs these are an egg-free cookie.  The result?  A crunchy cookie with succulent berries and a good bit of zing.

200g flour (40% urid, 40% tapioca, 20% cornmeal)
2 tsp baking powder
80g butter
115g sugar
juice 2 lemons
rind 1 lemon
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp mixed spice
100g cranberries - soaked in alcohol (or juice) of choice

Mix dry ingredients including zest
rub in butter (or stir in soft margarine if used)
Stir in lemon juice and cranberries.  Add more juice if needed to make the dough hold together.

Place dollops on a baking sheet or roll between your palms for a smoother shape. Makes about 40 cookies.

Bake for about twelve minutes at 180C fan.  Let them cool slightly on the baking sheet or baking parchment to make them easier to handle before sliding them onto a cooling rack.  If you want them crisper put back in the oven at a lower temperature - the same way you would make biscotti.

Lemon, ginger and cranberry gluten free cookies

I woke up with a sore throat this morning.  Best cure I know for feeling a bit glum is to bake something scrumptious.  I have a stash of dried cranberries that need using, so had a quick look to see if I could find some crunchy cookies using these.  The first few recipes were oats with cranberries and didn't look that interesting.  Then I found these lemon ginger and cranberry cookies.  Lemon and ginger sounds like a cold remedy...so why not a cookie based on these.

The lemon flavour is the strongest when these cookies are freshly made.  I expect the ginger flavour will develop later - at the moment the ginger is just a lingering hint in the mouth after the cookie has been eaten. The cookie is crisp on the outside, slightly crumbly in the middle, and the juicy cranberries give a lovely contrast.  The whole house smells delicious - a bit of aromatherapy as well as the occupational therapy.

For people without a flour grinder, I recently asked the company I buy my urid lentils from whether their urid lentil flour still came with an advisory that it was milled in a factory that also handles wheat.  This no longer appears on the packaging so this should mean that they are safe for even those with extreme sensitivity.

The original recipe uses the creaming method.  I rarely plan ahead so don't have room temperature butter.  I rubbed in the butter to the flour by hand, but if you have a food processor just whizz until mixed into the dry ingredients.


200g flour (40% urid, 40% tapioca, 20% cornmeal)
2tsp baking powder (this is the mix I use as my standard self raising flour)
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ginger
80g sugar (add a bit more if you like extra sweet cookies)
80g butter
30g fresh ginger, grated
1 lemon, rind grated and juiced
2 eggs
100g dried cranberries

Set oven to 175C fan.  Line cookie sheets with baking parchment or use ungreased.

Mix all dry ingredients except the dried cranberries.  Mix in butter - rub in if cold, beat in if soft, or whizz in food processor.
Add in the eggs, beat, add in lemon juice and grated ginger.  Stir in dried cranberries.

Place on baking sheet in dollops.  I used two desert spoons for this, which gives  20 cookies about 7cm/3inches across.

Bake for 12-15 minutes until the edges are browning.  If you like very crisp cookies you can bake for longer at a lower temperature.

These are really good cookies, and will be part of my standard repertoire from now on.

seriously lemony easy lemon surprise pudding - gluten free

A while ago I tried to make a lemon pudding where the top is cake and the bottom a sauce.  It wasn't very good, being a rather gluey mix all the way through.  I think I put too much flour in.  Tonight's pudding looked revolting in the making but was delicious to eat.  I made it very tangy with three lemons.  If you like a milder pudding use two lemons.  It took me about five minutes to assemble.

3 lemons, juice, and zest of one lemon
30g fat - I used cholesterol-reducing margarine
125 g sugar
2 eggs, separated
30g my gf flour mix (40%urid, 40%tapioca, 20%cornmeal)
50g rice milk

Mix fat and sugar together
add lemon zest, egg yolk and flour and mix
add rice or other milk
whip egg white until fluffy but not stiff and fold into the mix.

Pour into a greased baking dish.  Place in a larger dish and add water to about half way up the pudding dish.  Bake in a 170C oven for about 35minutes.

This produces a light crisp top with a great puddle of zingy sauce underneath.  I did find that there were some bits that seemed to be half way between the two that I didn't like so much, from around the edge of the dish, so I just didn't eat those bits.

When I made mine I was being lazy and stupid and put the sugar in with the lemon juice and then added the fat - this made a revolting looking mess but I just added the rest of the ingredients and stirred until it was evenly lumpy, then folded in the egg white. This completely unappetising looking mess produced a good pudding, so the recipe is clearly quite robust and would be hard to ruin.

Serve with something creamy if people want to tone down the flavour.

Gluten-free Lemon Surprise Pudding

Years ago I had a pudding which was cake on top and lemony sauce underneath.  I had a go at the recipe, using  a recipe from UKTV as a start.  The BBC recipe needed more lemons than I had, and I thought it would be possible to test the structural qualities of the cake with the first recipe.

Recipe

55g butter, softened
115g sugar
zest and juice of one lemon - I would definitely use at least two next time as very mild flavour
2 large eggs, separated
65g flour (recipe called for 55 but the mix was so sloppy I added 10g)
1 tsp baking powder
285g milk


Cream butter, sugar and zest until light
Add egg yolk, lemon juice, flour and baking powder and mix
add milk
whip egg white until stiff and fold into batter

Place in a buttered dish and bake in a 180C (fan) oven for 40mins.  Place the dish into a roasting pan and half fill with water to produce a gentler cooking environment.

This produced a pleasant, mildly lemon-flavoured, soft fluffy pudding.  It didn't really produce the separate sauce at the bottom that I remember.  I'll have to try it with less flour even though the batter looks as if it would never make a cake of any sort!  Two lemons with the same amount of the other ingredients may well be sufficient to give a zingy flavour.

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Luscious gluten free strawberry lemon tarts

gluten free strawberry lemon tarts

One of the blogs I follow had some delicious looking strawberry lemon bars strawberry lemon bars.  This blog has some exquisite photography, so if you want ideas on how to portray food this would be a good place to look.

Starting with his recipe, which uses wheat and measuring cups, I made my own version.  I didn't make any attempt to do an accurate copy, especially since he was making a showcase of a particular type of lemon.


I made two small tarts, using fluted tins with removable bottoms.  This would serve four generously.


Crust
100g flour (40% urid, 40% tapioca, 20% cornmeal)
50g ground almonds
50g butter
50g sugar
40ml water


Whizz crust ingredients (except water) in food mixer or rub in by hand.  When like fine crumbs, mix in the water.  Add as much as you need to get the dough to hold together without crumbling or being claggy.  This will vary a bit depending on the weather, your  almonds etc so use your judgment.

Press into the tart tins.

press crust into tin

Bake at 180C for about 12 minutes, until just tinged with brown.

Turn the oven down to 140C when you take the tarts out.

Filling
75g strawberries,
1 tsp sugar

2 eggs
50g sugar
10g flour
juice and rind of a lemon

Slice strawberries and sprinkle tsp sugar on to sweeten and draw juices.
Mix the rest of the filling ingredients

When pie crust is ready, lay strawberries in the bottom, add any juice to the filling, and pour carefully over strawberries.

Cook filled tarts for 15 minutes until set but still slightly wobbly in the centre.

Cool.  Sprinkle with icing sugar before serving if wanted.

If you have a loose bottomed tart the easiest way to get the tart un-moulded is to rest it on a narrow glass and gently easy rim down.   Then carefully run a knife under the base crust if needed.

getting the tart out of the tin

luscious lemony filling, strawberries and rich almondy crust

This tart is very delicious.  The crust is tender and rich, the filling luscious and lemony but bursts of bright strawberry.  Definitely one to make again.