Limeys and Gingers

Yikes! I'm late!

My laptop cord was shooting sparks at me last night, and the battery in this thing has nearly no juice. So after I recovered from total panic at not being able to get access to my life, I found one of those awesome little computer places. You know the ones: they have a bare minimum store front in a light industrial area, and there's virtually nothing in there but a counter, some computer guts, and a couple of geeks. I love these geeks. They are gods of hardware, and now I am no longer waiting 5 - 7 business days for a part, I have one plugged in and charging my dried up old hag of a battery.

And that means that I can not only do schoolwork and maintain contact with the other humans, I can post recipes!

And since I was so late for this very important date, I'm offering up treats for tea.

"Tea" is an actual meal in some areas of the world, a light-ish lunch in the late afternoon that could be baked beans on toast, or fried eggs with chips. Me, I prefer the version that includes sweets and baked goods. Though, I do crave beans on toast, and egg and chips sometimes. My mom's family was from England, my step-dad is also from the UK, so to me things like Spotted Dick are perfectly normal.

And one of my favourite cooking shows will always be "Two Fat Ladies." Their regular calls for moah buttah, and moah crrrream (that's a rolled r, btw) are regularly repeated in my kitchen. Though it was amusing when I had to translate their pronunciation of "scones" to RecipeGuy, who, despite being somewhat gingery, is not a Limey.

Ginger Lime Scones

(totally forgot the pic of all the ingredients together, you'll have to use your imagination for the moment)

1/2 C. butter, cold
2 1/2 C. whole wheat pastry flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 C. sugar
1/2 C. candied ginger**, diced into 1/4″ pieces
1 tbsp lime zest
3/4 C. (6 oz.) plain yogurt
1 large egg

**you can get this in the bulk area of the grocery store, or make it yourself! I'll post the recipe soon.

In a large bowl, combine the flour, baking powder and baking soda.

Using a pastry cutter, cut in the butter until it looks like fine crumbs.

There should be no large chunks of butter, and if you squeeze and handful it should hold it’s shape, kinda like wet sand, but fall apart if you poke it.

Add candied ginger pieces, sugar and lime zest to the bowl and give it a stir.

Make a well in the middle of the mixture and pour in the yogurt/egg stuff that you’ve already mixed together... didn’t I mention that?

Oh, well, mix the egg and yogurt together (if you combine it in the measuring cup, you’ll have one less bowl to wash).

Gradually stir the flour/butter/ginger into the yogurt/egg. A soft sticky dough will eventually form.

Turn the dough out onto a floured counter, and sprinkle a little flour on top. DO NOT KNEAD. You’re making pastry, not dough. If you knead it, it will get tough. All you have to do is pat it. It’s a nice kitty... nice kitty... Pat the flour into the dough so you can work it, and pat the dough into a somewhat symmetrical shape.

Cut the shape in half.

Take half and pat it gently into a nice little disc about 6 inches in diameter and one inch thick.

Cut the disk into 6 wedges.

Do the same with the other half so you have 12 wedges.

Do your best to get them all onto one cookie sheet so you only have to bake one batch/wash one pan. If you hate washing pans, line the sheet with parchment.

If you don’t plan on icing or glazing them, now is when you should brush them with an egg wash (one egg and about a tablespoon of milk, beaten together) or with milk, and then sprinkle on a bit of sugar. I totally forgot to do this so I’m going to glaze them. Yeah, bummer, I have to put icing on something.

Bake them at 350 for about 20 minutes. The bottoms and sides should be golden, but not brown. These are delicate lady-like things. Just like me. Stop laughing.

Transfer them to a rack to cool before glazing. Yup, that’s an oven rack. My oven’s so small I can barely fit a cookie sheet in there, I have no idea why anyone thinks I’d need two racks, so I repurposed the second one for cooling.

And because I'm impatient (a very lady-like trait) I ate one.

So, for the glaze, I’m going to suggest you juice that lime you zested, and mix the juice with icing sugar until you’re happy with the consistency.

I’m not fond of pouring glaze and letting it run over the sides. It makes a mess (though, that piece of parchment you baked the scones on is handy for this) and then it never seems to set enough. And since these are going to be wrapped individually and frozen for breakfast and snacks for the next two weeks, I’m going with the glob and spread approach.

And since school is everpresent, tea time for me includes various and assorted kinds of math. Actually, most meals do. Too bad my calculator never picks up the tab. Sure would make it a better dinner date.

Dessert from the desert

So, it seems that over the past week recipes have not only specialized in having naughty words or phrases in the title, they've also been from the same general area.

Hummus and pita are pretty well known middle eastern / Mediterranean foods and make a great meal on their own, or on a platter with a few other nibbly things. Of course, at the end of dinner, there's always dessert. Baklava is the usual thing, yes, but never one to be normal, I decided to go for something a little different.

I've moved south into the area known in trashy romance novels as Persia. I write medievals mostly, and Iran was known as Persia until well into the 20th century. Persia was quite the superpower, and held its own against the Romans in ancient times. But its proximity to the east, bordering Pakistan, seems to have removed it not only from western culture, but also a bit from the rest of the middle east, at least in culinary terms. Spices that feature prominently in curries and other Indian dishes (curry is English yes, but the spices are Indian) appear regularly in Persian foods. Cardamom being one of my favourites.

Cardamom is what drew me to these little cakes. And then I saw the rose water. There is something exotic and luxurious about eating flowers and I will take any opportunity to do so. Put the two together and I am guaranteed to want to try the recipe.

LIke this one:

Yazdi Cakes

What you need:

2 eggs

1/2 cup white sugar

3/4 cup butter, melted

1/2 cup plain yogurt

1/4 teaspoon ground cardamom

3 teaspoons rose water

1 cup all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 c chopped pistachio nuts

What you gotta do:

Preheat the overn to 350.

Get a pan of water simmering on the stove.

Crack your eggs into a metal or glass bowl, add the sugar, and set the bowl over the pan of simmering water.

With a whisk (or electric mixer if you insist), beat them together until they look pale and creamy. It will take about 6 or 8 minutes, and you'll think at first that they're never going to change colour and thicken, but they will. And when they do, they'll look like this:

Srsly, there is nothing in that bowl but eggs and sugar. What you've basically made here is a the beginnings of a very light custard called zabaione. This is the Mediterranean influence.

Once you've decided that you do want to make cakes, and not veer off into the land of custard, remove the bowl from the heat, and keep whipping it until it's cooled a bit. Yes, I did this by hand with a whisk. No, I don't have forearms like Popeye, but I also don't have (or want) an electric mixer. I can make whipped cream by hand in less than 3 minutes.

Anyway, once it's cooled a bit, add the butter, yogurt, rosewater and cardamom. The last two are your more eastern ingredients.

See how thick and creamy that yogurt looks? That's because it has fat in it. I've managed to find a brand of yogurt with 10% milk fat. The typical complaint about yogurt is that it's unpallatably sour. Well, that's because most of what you find in the grocery has a mere 0 - 2% MF. It's watery and thin, bluish in colour, and virtually inedible unless it's loaded with sugar (or more commonly, artificial sweeteners). You want something with at least 5% MF. Even if you're using yogurt to decrease fat content, such as a replacement for sour cream, you're still ahead of the game since sour cream is usually 14% MF. And you know why it tastes good? Yeah, that's why 0% yogurt tastes like crap.

Once you've mixed in the butter, yogurt, cardamom and rosewater

sift the baking powder into the flour, add them to the batter, and switch to a wooden spoon (no mixer allowed here).

Mix until smooth, then fill 12 cupcake liners about 3/4 full.

Coarsly chop your pistachios, (the above pic is pistachio porn for Taneasha, who loves them) and sprinkle them on the top of the cakes.

Bake at 350 until they're golden, about 25 minutes.

The smell is divine. They have a decidedly exotic aroma, but that familiar and comforting cupcake shape. 

If it weren't for the pistachios on top, you'd probably want to put icing on these, but really, they're just not made for it. They're wonderfully rich and flavourful all on their own. The texture is dense, almost muffin like, which makes them a tempting breakfast. Particularly with a side of yogurt and berries.

If you absolutely insist that they need something on them, I recommend splitting them open like a muffin and topping them with butter, honey or rose petal jelly.

Yes, more roses. Have you ever eaten flowers?