Greaster Feaster

Months ago my friend Soph told me she wanted to learn how to make Tsourekia before Greek Easter. Being the uneducated Greek cook that I am, I offered to help/learn with her. For all of you that don't know what Tsourekia is, it is basically Greek sweet bread made at Easter time. It feels like an odd time of the year to have Greek Easter (Sunday the 5th of May), but every year the date changes so it's not always this late. 

So on the Sunday before Easter we took off. My Yiayia warned me it would take at least half a day - and she was right. It didn't help that I had scribbled down Yiayia's recipe over the phone - with minimal instructions and measurements. We really just guessed as we went! But here it goes... 

Tsourekia

Approx 80g fresh yeast

1 ½ cups milk

2 ½ cups unsalted butter

8 cups plain flour

1 packet of vanilla sugar (or a couple of teaspoons) 

6 eggs (medium size and at room temperature)

1 ½ cups sugar

1 10g packet of Mahlepi (Greek spice)

A teaspoon of Mastihi (other Greek spice- can be substituted for orange rind)

1. Place the yeast in a small bowl of warm water with a teaspoon of sugar and stir until it dissolves. It is important to make sure the water is just warm. Not hot or else you can burn the yeast. Cover the bowl in a plastic bag and leave the yeast to rise (by rise I mean kind of froth up) for 15 minutes or so next to somewhere warm (we put it next to a heater). Towards the end of the 15 minutes we added maybe a couple of tablespoons of flour to help it rise for another 5 minutes.

2. Pour 7 cups of flour in a bowl (only 7 just in case 8 is too much) and 1 packet of the Mahlepi

   

3. In a mixer, place 6 eggs with 1 ½ cups sugar and stir until its mixed and frothy. Yiayia's tip was to do the egg yolks with sugar separately to the egg whites. Next time...

  

4. Warm the milk in a small bowl and add in the orange rind and vanilla sugar. 

5. Melt the butter.

6. Stir the milk into the egg mixture.

    

     

6. Pour the yeast into the flour and mix well. Then fold in the milk/egg mixture. Finally, fold in the butter and make sure it is last! Don't know why, I just listen to whatever Yiayia tells me to do. 

7. Mix the dough until it looks roughly like below. It is quite sticky and soft. Cover it with a towel and let it rise for an hour in a warm place. 

8. Once the dough has risen to double-tripe it's size, lightly knead it. 

9. Roll 3 portions into thick long rolls. 

10. Plait these rolls like you would on your hair and then place them on a cooking tray, in a warm place, to rise for another 15 minutes. 

11. After they have risen again, lightly brush on some egg yolk mixed with a little cream or milk. This will give it a shiny look when it is cooked. We used both egg yolk and egg white so it was shiny, but not as shiny as it could have been. 

Also sprinkle some sliced almonds on top or alternatively, sesame seeds. 

12. Cook at around 180 degrees for about 25-30 minutes or whenever they look brown on top and ready to eat. 

13. ENJOY. They are amazing when they are fresh out of the oven. You can even freeze them and eat them later. Best served with butter, cream or even sour cream. YUM 

Munch time: For the love of scones

"To master a piece on the piano, learn how to order a glass of wine in Italian, plant a herb garden or make a book case are not world-transforming achievements, in the big romantic sense. But they allow us to be active agents of beauty, grace and order." 

I read this quote the other day in an article about creativity and happiness and it really struck a cord inside. The reason why I made this blog is because it's one of my only creative outlets since finishing uni. I don't care if no one reads it, being creative is FUN and it makes me happy :) So there you go. 

Other things that make me happy include easy recipes and yummy food. These lemonade scones fit both of these criteria so happiness prevails! (Shout out to the lovely Carly for offering her kitchen) 

Would you like to know how to make scones? Well here you are: 

Ingredients 

Lemonade 

Self-raising flour 

Thickened cream 

That's it! Easy! I would give you measurements but in reality, you just guess. I followed a recipe on a website and the dough was too dry so I had to add more cream and lemonade. Just go for it, be creative!! 

How to make 

1. Preheat the oven at 225 degrees. Pour flour into a bowl (easy enough) 

2. Mix lemonade and cream together (still relative easy) 

3. Pour lemonade and cream into flour and mix together. Don't mix it too much though, just until it's all combined. It should be sticky and soft.

4. Lightly flour the bench and roll out the dough to about 3.5cm thick. 

5. Cut the dough into the desired scone shapes and place on a tray. SO I know scones are meant to be round but we didn't have a round cookie cutter. We just used a knife and cut them into squares/squircles.

TIP: Later that night, mum told me that she uses the top of a wine glass! So there you go. She's a thinker. 

6. Bake in the oven for 12-15 minutes at 225 degrees. 

7. Whip up the cream while you wait, open the jam, let the scones cool and then EAT as many as you want!!! They are delicious. 

FUN FACT: I eat my scones like a sandwich. Yes that is probably a bit odd but I guess that's the way I like it! How do you eat yours?

My first fail whale

Ahhh its times like these I never wish I had a blog about learning to cook. I guess that maybe starting this blog has made me think that I would be an amazing cook straight away. How wrong is was.

Anyways, I saw this lovely Coffee Banana Cake in the December issue of Frankie Magazine. I wanted to cook it for agggesss and thought a work afternoon tea would be the perfect time.

So I began.

125g soft butter
1 cup caster sugar
1/2 cup soft brown sugar
1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract (substituted with vanilla flavouring)
1 cup very strong coffee, cooled (2 tbsp of instant coffee in 1 cup boiling water)
2 eggs
3 large bananas, mashed
1/2 cup plain greek yoghurt
1 1/2 cups plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp of baking soda
3/4 cup of walnuts (if you want)

Cream butter and sugars together until light and fluffy.

Beat in the vanilla and two tbsp of the cooled coffee.

Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each.

Beat in the mashed banana a little bit at a time.

Stir in the yoghurt.

Sift in the baking powder, baking soda and flour then stir into the mixture (with walnuts if you want)

Pour into tin and bake for 50-60 minutes at 180 degrees. 



Let it cool and then ice the cake with delicious coffee/cream cheese icing (which consists of 3 cups icing sugar, 100g soft butter, 200g room temperature cream cheese, 3/4 tbsp of cooled coffee all beaten up)

End result: to be honest, not great. The cake didn't rise much and it was pretty mushy (i'm guessing too much banana?)

However, my dad pretty much demolished the cake. I had a piece and it was actually pretty yummy apart from the crappy look and total mushy-ness. It was super sweet too so maybe hold the vanilla or a bit of sugar?

Anyways, the first fail was bound to happen so here it is! If anyone else has a go let me know how it all turns out!

Here's to less failure and more success. 

HAPPY BAKING!