Tag: Dried Fruits

Placek with Dried Fruits

  • Placek is a thin flat cake.
  • Dried fruits are called bakalie in Polish – fruit from the Balkans.
  • If this were a loaf shaped fruit cake it would be called a “keks” – however it works better in this thin version.
  • Dried apricots are used, which is a bit different.
  • The apricots are soaked overnight in brandy – so you have to start the cake the night before.

INGREDIENTS

  • 175 dried apricots – chopped
  • 3 tablespoons of brandy
  • 175g butter
  • 175g granulated sugar
  • 4 eggs beaten
  • 175g plain flour
  • 225g raisins
  • 225g currants
  • 225g cherries*
  • *
  • *Or a mixture of cherries and mixed peel if you are short of cherries

METHOD

  • Put the apricots and brandy in a small bowl.
  • Cover and leave overnight.
  • *
  • Pre the oven to GM3 – 160°C
  • Line 3 sides of a 32 x 22 baking tin.
  • Mix the apricots with the other dried fruit.
  • Cream the sugar and the butter.
  • Add the eggs and beat together.
  • Mix in all the dried fruit.
  • Fold in the flour.
  • Spread the cake mixture into the tin.
  • *
  • Bake for 50  –  60 minutes.

Mincemeat Buns

  • I could have called these babeczki – little cakes – however the main ingredients fruit mincemeat is not something you would find in Poland.
  • I still had a half a large jar of mincemeat left from last Christmas and was thinking ahead to making more for this Christmas.
  • I decided to make some small buns based on the ingredients for keks – using mincemeat.
  • They were voted a huge hit!

Ingredients

  • 150g butter
  • 100g granulated sugar
  • 225g plain flour
  • 2 teaspoons of baking powder
  • 50g sultanas or raisins
  • 25g mixed peel
  • 400g of mincemeat (exact amount is not that critical
  • 3 eggs

Method

  • Pre-heat the oven to GM3 – 160°C.
  • Lightly cream the butter and sugar.
  • Beat in the eggs, one by one
  • Stir in the mincemeat and the dried fruit until it is an even consistency.
  • Mix the flour with the baking powder
  • Stir the flour into the cake mixture.
  • Use bun cases in a bun/muffin tray.
  • Place around 1 ½ –  2 tablespoons of mixture into each case.
  • I made 16 but could have made a few fewer.
  • Bake for around 20 minutes
  • Leave to cool in the tin.

Cake Plate by Heathcote – Made in England

Semi-Steamed Fruit Cake

  • I came across this recipe the other day in a Christmas magazine.
  • It is different in many ways from other fruit cakes (keks) that I have made in several ways.
  • The dried fruits included apricots and dates.
  • All the dried fruits were left overnight in apple juice.
  • Butter and Sunflower oil were used.
  • When baking the tin was covered for some off the time – which resulted in the cake being more steamed than baked.
  • Then the lid or foil was removed and the cake was baked for the rest of the time.
  • *
  • I adjusted a few of the ingredients so that this fruit cake – could be more easily made.
  • I halved the original quantities.
  • A large circular dish was originally used – I tried a 26x20cm tin.
  • Rectangular or square cakes are much easier to slice up than circular ones.
  • *
  • The result was a very lovely moist fruit cake, which I will be making often.

Note – you start this cake the evening before

INGREDIENTS

  • 150g raisins
  • 75g dried apricots – chopped
  • 40g mixed peel
  • 75g glacé cherries – chopped
  • 90g dates – chopped
  • 125ml apple juice
  • *
  • 55g butter – softened
  • 90g granulated sugar
  • 60ml sunflower oil
  • 1½ tablespoons of runny honey
  • *
  • pinch of salt
  • ¼ teaspoon baking powder
  • ¼ teaspoon ground ginger
  • ¼ teaspoon freshly ground nutmeg
  • ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
  •  *
  • 2 eggs
  • 100g plain flour
  • *
  • 45g chopped walnuts – optional

METHOD

  • The evening before baking put all the fruits into a saucepan and add the apple juice.
  • Mix well over a low heat until all the fruits are covered.
  • Cover the pan and leave this until the next day.
  • *
  • Pre-heat oven to GM3 – 160°C
  • Grease and line base and 2 sides of a 26×20 cm baking tin.
  • Cream the butter and sugar together.
  • Add the sunflower oil and mix well.
  • Add the salt and spices and mix well.
  • Add the eggs one at a time and mix well.
  • Add the fruit mixture.
  • Add the walnuts and stir until everything is evenly mixed.
  • *
  • Pour the mixture into the tin and smooth the top.
  • Cover the tin with aluminium foil.
  • Bake for 65 -75 minutes until the top is set.
  • Remove the foil and bake for 25 – 30 minutes.
  • *
  • Leave to cool on a wire rack.
  • Cut into squares or rectangles to serve.

Royal Standard – Lynsdale tea plate

Option – not tested

  • Use a round pyrex dish with a lid for the first part of the baking.
  • Then remove the lid for the final part.

Half Size – Mama’s Never too Late Christmas Cake

  • Because of not being able to see many friends or family these last 3 years, I have not made an English style Christmas Cake for ages.
  • I have just been making one for my friend who is about to celebrate a significant birthday and loves fruit cake.
  • I found that the usual amount was quite a lot and I had forgotten how hard it was to mix it all up.
  • I thought that next time I would just make a half sized one.
  • Rather than halve the amounts ‘on the hoof’  I thought I would write this up with the half sized amount.
  • Decided it was better to do this now whilst things are fresh in my mind.
  • Of course I will not have the timings for baking but I can give estimates and check these later when I make this size of  cake.

  • It is a very moist cake and therefore it will only keep for about 2 months.

  • *
  • However if you want to add marzipan & icing then you should make it about 2- 3 weeks in advance, to give time for this to be done.

Ingredients

  • 450g mixture of currants, raisins & sultanas
  • 100g chopped mixed peel
  • 100g glacé cherries cut in half
  • Grated rind of 1 lemon & 1 orange
  • 1 medium cooking apple, peeled and coarse grated
  • 100g fine grated carrots
  • 1 tablespoon rum
  • 60 ml strong cold tea (I use a scented one like Earl Grey)
  • *
  • 175 g Butter
  • 175 g soft dark brown sugar
  • 2 tablespoons of black treacle
  • 3 large eggs – beaten
  • *
  • 200g plain flour – sieved
  • 1/4 level teaspoon salt
  • 3 level teaspoons mixed spice
  • ½ level teaspoon of cinnamon
  • ¼  grated nutmeg
  • ½ tablespoon cocoa  – yes cocoa! – sieved
  • 1 tablespoon ground almonds 

Method

  • Put all the fruit, rinds, carrots, rum & tea into large bowl,  mix and leave for 15 minutes.
  • Pre-heat the oven to Gas Mark 2 – 150oC.
  • Grease and line the cake tin – 20cm or 18cm square.
  • In another  large bowl, cream the margarine and sugar, beat in the treacle and eggs.
  • Mix all the dry ingredients together & fold them in using a large metal spoon.
  • Fold in the fruit mix using a large metal spoon
  • *
  • Put all the cake mixture into the tin to fill the shape and smooth the top.
  • 20 cm square – try 1hr 30mins
  • 18 cm square  -try 1hr 15 mins 
  • The above are guides as it does depend on your oven – you need to check earlier.
  • Leave to cool completely in the tin.
  • *
  • Wrap in several layers of foil to store.

Decorating the cake

  • It depends on who is coming and whether there are  lots of marzipan & icing lovers on how much I decorate the cake.
  • *
  • Sometimes I just dust the top with icing sugar.
  • See the full sized recipe for more details.
  • Cut down the amounts to suit the cake size.

Apple Mincemeat

  • This is a fresher tasting mincemeat than the classic English version.
  • It does not contain any fats.
  • Similar to Cranberry mincemeat – see previous post.
  • It will keep if kept in the fridge for up to a month.
  • Best to use this up quickly.

INGREDIENTS

  • 2 large Bramley apples – peeled, cored and chopped.
  • 100g granulated sugar
  • 2 oranges zest & juice or 3 large satsumas
  • 150g currants
  • 150g raisins
  • 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
  • 1 teaspoon ground ginger
  • ½ teaspoon ground cloves
  • 125ml sherry

METHOD

  • Have prepared 3- 4 sterilised jar jars.
  • Put the apples, sugar, zest and juice into a saucepan and heat till the fruit starts to soften.
  • Add the dried fruit and spices and continue heating and stirring for around 5 minutes.
  • Add the sherry and continue heating and stirring for another 5-10 minutes until you have a thick liquid free mixture.
  • Leave to go cold and pot up into cold sterilised jars.
  • Keep in the fridge and use within a month.

Keks – Carrot Fruit &Nut

This is a variation on the courgette keks – light fruit cake –  I posted a couple of years ago.

Ingredients – Cake

  • 150g plain flour
  • 1 teaspoon of baking powder
  • Pinch of salt
  • 1 tablespoon of vanilla sugar
  • 150g of light brown sugar
  • 1 teaspoon of cinnamon
  • 100g of raisins
  • 100g of currants
  • 100g dried apricots chopped fine
  • 80g of roasted and roughly chopped hazelnuts or almonds
  • 1 large coarse grated carrot
  • 2 eggs
  • 125ml of sunflower oil

Ingredients – Lemon Icing

  • Fine grated rind of 1 lemon
  • 2 tablespoons of lemon juice
  • 150g of icing sugar

Method – Cake

  • Pre-heat the oven to GM4 180°C
  • I used a continental style long loaf tin, greased it  and used a single sheet of grease proof paper  to line the long sides and the base.
  • Mix together the flour, baking powder, salt, sugars and cinnamon, making sure that any lumps in the brown sugar are all pressed out.
  • Mix together the raisin, currants, nuts and the carrot.
  • Lightly whisk the eggs and oil together.
  • Add the flour mixture to the egg mixture and mix thoroughly together with a wooden spoon.
  • Add the carrot and fruit and nut mixture and mix well in.
  • Place the cake mixture into the tin and smooth the top.
  • Bake for 50 – 55 minutes – check after 40 minutes and cover the top with greaseproof or foil if browning too much before it is baked through.
  • Leave to cool before icing.

Method – Icing

  • Place the icing sugar in a bowl and add the grated lemon zest.
  • Mix in the lemon juice until you have a thick icing.
  • You might have to adjust the thickness with  more lemon juice (or water) or with icing sugar.
  • Put the icing on the top of the cake and let it drip down the sides.
  • Tea Plate – Greenway by John Russell – 1960s

Note

  • Keep in an airtight container.
  • Keep in the container for at least a day before serving.

Plum Bread

This is an old English recipe which could easily be a keks recipe in Poland.

  • It can be called a tea bread as the dried fruits are soaked in tea.
  • Why is it called plum bread when there are no plums?
  • In England in the past, plum referred to all the different dried fruits.
  • The usage of the word plum to mean dried fruits has dropped out of usage.

Ingredients

  • 450g mix of currants, sultanas and raisins
  • 200ml of hot, strong Earl Grey tea
  • 170g soft brown sugar
  • 25g melted butter
  • 250g plain flour
  • 2 teaspoons of baking powder

Method

  • Put the dried fruit and sugar into a bowl.
  • Pour the tea over them and stir.
  • Leave overnight.
  • *
  • Pre-heat the oven to GM4 – 180°C.
  • Line a large loaf tin or use a cake liner.
  • Mix the flour with the baking powder.
  • Mix the flour mixture into the dried fruit mixture.
  • Stir in the melted butter.
  • Spoon into the tin and smooth the top.
  • Bake for 60 minutes – check after 50 minutes and cover with greaseproof  paper if necessary to prevent burning.
  • Leave to cool in the tin on a wire cake rack.

Served on Queen Anne, bone china tea plates

Cinnamon Fruit Yeast Buns

These  bułeczki – little yeast buns – are based on an English recipe for hot cross buns, which are made for Good Friday.

I love the addition of a chopped eating apple and grated orange rind.

These take most of the day to make – best done on a day you are in with other things to do in between.

Ingredients

  • 330ml of milk (might need a little more)
  • 50g butter
  • 500g strong bread flour
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 75g caster sugar
  • 7g sachet of dried yeast
  • 1 egg beaten
  • 75g sultanas
  • 50g mixed peel
  • Grated rind of an orange
  • 1 eating apple, peeled, cored and finely chopped
  • 1 + 1/2  teaspoons of cinnamon
  • *
  • For the glaze
  • 2 tablespoons of apricot jam

Method

  • Bring the milk to the boil.
  • Add the butter and leave till hand-warm.
  • Put the flour, salt, sugar and yeast into a bowl.
  • Make a well in the centre, add the milk and butter and then the egg.
  • Mix with a wooden spoon.
  • Bring the mixture together with your hands to form a sticky dough.
  • Knead the dough on a lightly floured surface for around 5 minutes.
  • Put the dough into an oiled bowl
  • Cover with a shower cap (very useful these!) or cloth.
  • Leave to rise until doubled in size.
  • *
  • In a bowl mix together the sultanas, mixed peel, orange rind, apple and cinnamon.
  • Add this mixture to the risen dough and knead until it is all well distributed.
  • Cover again and leave to rise until doubled in size.
  • *
  • Cover a large baking tray with greaseproof.
  • Divide the dough into 15 even pieces.
  • Roll each piece into a smooth ball on a lightly floured surface.
  • Arrange the balls on the baking tray with some room for expansion.
  • Cover loosely with a cloth and leave to prove – for around one hour.
  • *
  • Preheat the oven to GM7 – 220°C.
  • Bake for around 20 minutes until the buns are golden brown.
  • *
  • Gently heat the apricot jam in a small saucepan.
  • Brush the jam over the tops of the small buns.

Delicious on their own or buttered!

 

Soda Bread with Spelt

Having had success with soda bread recipes with rye flour,  I decided to try these out with the spelt flour I had bought recently.

Spelt –  Triticum spelta – is an older type of wheat known to have been used from around 5,000BC.

Modern wheat is Triticum sativum.

I use a yoghurt & whey mix, as I nearly always have these in when I make yoghurt cheese, but you can adapt by using a milk & water mix or buttermilk instead.

Ingredients

250g spelt flour

150g plain flour

1 teaspoon of salt

1 teaspoon of baking powder

200ml of yoghurt

150ml of whey

Spelt flour

Method

Pre-heat the oven to GM 6 – 200°C

Flour a baking tray.

Mix all the dry ingredients in a big bowl.

Mix the yoghurt and whey together in jug or bowl.

Add the yoghurt mixture to the dry ingredients, bit by bit, using a wooden spoon to mix it all together .

Use your floured hands to bring it all into a soft dough ball, trying to handle the dough as little as possible.

Place the ball onto the floured baking tray and flatten it slightly.

Using a sharp large knife cut a cross or star through most of the thickness

Bake for 30 – 35 minutes.

The base should sound hollow when the bread is cooked .

Leave to cool on a cooling rack.

Fruit Version

To the flours add a 100g of dried fruits – raisons, sultanas, dried apricots etc.

 

I love the taste of the apricots!

Note

As with all soda breads, they do tend to become stale very quickly,  however they are delicious toasted.

Drożdżówka – Yeast Cake

  • The Polish word for yeast is drożdże and drożdżówka is any sweet cake or bun made using yeast.
  • Often the cake is a large flat cake ( placek) made in a large roasting tin.
  • This yeast cake is made with plain flour not strong flour and the mixture is mixed with a wooden spoon to form a soft mixture and is not kneaded.
  • My late father has two cousins living in Białystok, North East Poland, they are both wonderful cooks.
  • This yeast cake is based on a recipe given to me by one of these aunties.
  • As with any recipe made with yeast, timings are so unpredictable depending on many variables including the room temperature.
  • I always bake with yeast when I am at home for most of the day with other activities to do whilst waiting for the dough to rise etc.

Ingredients

Yeast Cake

  • 400g plain flour
  • 250ml of tepid milk
  • 1 egg
  • 2 tablespoons of granulated sugar
  • 1 tablespoon of sunflower oil
  • 150g of raisins or sultanas
  • 10g of fresh yeast or 5g of dried yeast

Crumble Topping

  • 2 tablespoons of plain flour
  • 1 tablespoon of butter
  • 1 tablespoon of granulated sugar

Method

  • Mix the yeast with 2 tablespoons of the milk and 1 tablespoon of the sugar and leave this till it starts bubbling.
  • In a bowl whisk together the egg  and 1 tablespoon of the sugar.
  • Add the oil and whisk again.
  • Add the milk and the raisins or sultanas and mix well.
  • Add the flour and mix this all together with a wooden spoon to form a very loose, soft dough.
  • Cover the bowl with clingfilm or a cloth and leave in a warm place to rise.
  • Make the crumble topping by rubbing the butter into the flour until the mixture resembles bread crumbs and then stir in the sugar.
  • Grease and line a large roasting tin.
  • 25cm x 34 cm or 22cm x 32cm.
  • Put the risen dough into the tin – use a spatula to spread it out.
  • Sprinkle the crumble mixture over the top and leave to rise again.

 

 

  • Pre-heat the oven to  GM6 – 200°C.
  • Place the risen cake into the oven and bake for 15 minutes.
  • Then lower the temperature to GM5 – 190°C and bake for another 10 minutes – keeping an eye on this and cover with foil if it looks like it is burning.
  • You might want also want to move it down a shelf for the last 5  minutes.
  • Leave to cool in the tin for about 5 minutes then take it out and remove from the greaseproof paper – so it does not go soggy on the base.

 

Served on Sonnet by Royal Doulton, 1971 – 1998.

As with most yeast cakes this is best eaten as soon as possible as it will soon go stale – you might need to invite round lots of friends and family!

If all is not eaten on the day of baking, I cut the cake into slices and pack into a plastic container and freeze – these are then toasted and served with butter at a later date.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Toasted and buttered yeast cake served on Las Palmas by Aynsley from the 1960s.

Variations

The dried fruits added can be varied  and I have made this with raisins, mixed peel and 1 teaspoon of mixed spice.

 

 

 

 

Served on Counterpoint by Royal Doulton, 1973 – 1987.

Other dried fruit options can be used, such as apricots, cranberries, pears or prunes and so on,  chopping larger fruits into small pieces.

I made this with apricots, sultanas and a 1/4 teaspoon of vanilla essence.

 

The dried fruits add sweetness to the cake and I think the small amount of sugar works well – you can if you like add a few extra tablespoons of sugar.