sweet treats | Finding Feasts

Omenakakku – Mini Finnish Apple Cakes

Omenakakku – Mini Finnish Apple Cakes – Last weekend I found a bag of mixed apples in the fridge. Like a blank canvas the ideas started flowing. Maybe a crumble, crepes or a pie, I just couldn’t decide. Asking around I got strudel, apple sandwiches and crumble again. So many choices! Finally I decided to go back to my roots and whip up a Finnish Apple Cake.

The Finnish version doesn’t seem to be too different to a standard cake, maybe apart from the sour cream, but it certainly is a delicious treat and this particular recipe is now next to my Pulla recipe for sweet treat recipes to have on hand.

Overall, this isn’t an overly sweet dessert and the texture is soft, moist and dense without being too heavy.

Nauttia! Blondie

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Polish Stefanka cake – Honey cake

Looks good huh! It’s a Polish cake called Stefanka or Miodownik (honey cake) and yep, it’s pretty awesome.

Each school holidays Imogen and I do our usual girls road trip to Rosedale, a small holiday town on the NSW South Coast to visit Nanna and Pop. During one of my last visits I decided to make something Polish, sweet and slightly challenging, Stefanka cake it was.

Like all recipes there are many, many versions of this cake on the web, with altering ingredients, toppings and layers. The one that appealed to me the most was on my favourite Polish cooking website called, Kwestia Smaku.

The cake has the most amazing filling made from semolina, milk, butter, icing sugar and almond extract, almost a custard like texture. The chocolate topping isn’t bad either.

When I first read that it had semolina I ran a mile, you see in the cooler months mum used to make us eat a semolina style porridge as kids for breakfast and I HATED IT! No disrespect to you mum but it was bland, lumpy and gluggy, I still get shivers just thinking about it! Fast forward many, many years, add some sweetness and the semolina it is to die for! I only just had enough filling for the cake, most of it was eaten from the pot by me and Miss H.

Cake difficulty wise I would rank this about a 6 out of 10. The pressure point in this cake are the layers. The cake is meant to be quite soft and sponge like. I failed at the soft and sponge like bit, although in my defense I was using a foreign oven, so I over baked the cake layers. It was definitely 100% edible but would have been much better had the layers been a little softer, cloud like.

All in all, I am very chuffed at my first Stefanka attempt, if anything I have also learnt how to make a yummy semolina custard!

If there are any Polish fans reading this and you know where the cakes name originates from do drop me a line! I know that Stefanka or Stefania is a Polish female name, similar to Stephen in English however I am stumped why the cake has been named so!

Bella

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ANZAC Biscuits

ANZAC Day – 25 April, 2016

“They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning,
We will remember them”.

I’ve only been to one dawn service. It was in Melbourne, Victoria about 18 years ago and as miserable, cold and wet as it was, I found it heart warming that so many people turned out to pay their respects to service men and women, young and old and those gone but not forgotten.

As many of our service men and women prepare for todays ANZAC day marches around Australia I realised that I know absolutely very little about the humble ANZAC biscuit.

For those unfamiliar with Australian and New Zealand history, ANZAC day falls on the 25th of April each year. It is a national day of remembrance in Australia and New Zealand and commemorates the anniversary of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) landing in the Gallipoli Peninsula, Turkey during World War I. Nowadays, it is a day that goes beyond the anniversary of that landing and honors the service men and women both past and present.

The exact origins of the ANZAC biscuit are not so clear, it can however be traced back to the Scottish oat cakes. The original biscuit, used in soldiers ration packs was not sweet at all. According to the Australian War Memorial the ANZAC biscuit or Soldier’s biscuit was a hard or tile like wafer that the soldiers were given as part of their rations. The biscuit was given instead of bread due to its long shelf-life, however wasn’t said to be very palatable.

The current sweet version appeared in cook books during the 1920’s and was used at fete’s for fundraising for the troops overseas. With ingredients such as butter, flour, coconut, golden syrup and bi-carb soda it has also been suggested that the wives would make these biscuits to send to the troops overseas because of their long shelf life. Unlike traditional biscuits no eggs were required!

Miss H loves ANZAC biscuits, however with having a wobbly tooth these slightly more chewy biscuits are just the perfect treat to share with friends and family both young and old.

Bella

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Mini Pecan Tartlets

Pecan pies are like an old friend you haven’t seen for a while but have fond memories of the times you had together.

My first pecan pie memory is with my uncle. We had just traversed across to Kareela Hutte through an absolute blizzard from Antons at Thredbo ski resort, we couldn’t see the tips of our skis it was the worst snow conditions I had ever been in. We were frozen and sore from being on such an extreme incline for so long and just desperately trying not to get blown down the mountain. That pie was the best darn pie I had ever had… I don’t even remember what else I had for lunch that day, just that pie.

Although there are a thousand different recipes for Pecan Pie I have a couple of little differences in this recipe to a ‘standard’ one. Firstly the pastry is a cookie dough so you don’t need to blind bake the case but you still end up with a flaky, slightly crumbly texture, which we all love in a tart! Secondly, I use maple syrup instead of corn syrup – It may not be the healthiest dish but you may as well keep it as simple and clean as possible.

Reconnect with old friends… Blondie

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Gooey Dark Chocolate Brownies

Lets be honest, not all chocolate brownies are created equal. There are brownies which can be dry and crumbly, sometimes leaving you feeling like you have just consumed a cardboard box with some sugar added to it, or brownies that are rock hard which means that are not brownies at all, rather more of a biscuit, and then there are brownies which have just the right amount of chocolate / cocoa goodness, a soft like centre and melt in your mouth yumminess. These are MY Brownies!

My gooey dark chocolate brownies are made with 70% dark chocolate, cacao, salted butter, eggs and sugar. These simple ingredients all to come together to form a gooey and decadent dessert.

They are rich but not overly sweet so you can definitely come back for more. Bake the brownies for around 40 minutes for a soft and gooey brownie centre – nothing else compares!

Enjoy! Bella

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Nutella Puff Pastry Rolls

FinSki's Nutella Pastry Roll 1 — Click on image for recipe

Good coma! That is the only way that I can describe how I felt last night so making nutella puff pastry rolls was the last thing on my mind.

My day started yesterday with a lovely cup of my favourite Roobios and Vanilla bean tea which was enjoyed with a chocolate croissant. I really should have stopped there but three hours later it was out for lunch with work for our annual team birthday lunch at Jagos on Miller. Instead of celebrating a birthday a month, or in some cases a few birthdays in a week we take ourselves out once a year and celebrate everyone’s birthdays at the same time.

Jagos on Miller is a lovely little cafe/restaurant which does good basic meals. Their menu doesn’t really change much but why fix something when it’s not broken right? The service is quick and friendly, perfect for a work lunch, especially when you have to go back to the office. I had fish cakes with asian herb salad and sweet chilli sauce. A very substantial dish composed of two fish patties. I was adamant that it would end there but nope, the whole team was having desserts and as much as my tummy was saying no the left side of the brain took over. As soon as the waitress asked me to take my order I blurted out…yes please I will have the chocolate mousse tart which I have to say was pretty ahhhmazing!

I don’t have a photo to show you because it literally lasted only a few seconds on my plate!

Walking home at aerobic pace so that I could work off the brick in my tummy I promised myself that I would stay away from all food until the morning. I found myself however making these nutella puff pastry rolls for the teams morning tea! Sugar over load right!

I love nutella. We always keep a jar of it in the cupboard however as silly as it sounds it never occurred to me to make a dessert with nutella until a few months back when I came across these very delish but very filling nutella scrolls at our local coffee shop, Cafe Andiamo in North Sydney. They are so filling that when we get one at work, we share it amongst 4 staff members and two of them are blokes!

My nutella puff pastry rolls are what I call the lighter alternative, if there is such a thing with puff pastry and nutella! Quick and easy to make with literally only two ingredients needed. Three if you decide to count the icing sugar!

So as you can see, it definitely was a chocolate/sugar indulgent day, but as Blondie said to whilst I sipped my glass of wine…we are allowed to splurge now and again.

Bella 🙂

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