Little Box Brownie

A Baking Blog from Melbourne, Australia

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Passion Fruit Tart

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Happy New Year! I hope your year has begun wonderfully. At the beginning of each New Year I take a look at my Yearly Horoscope, just to see what destiny has install for me. Last year was meant to be my year, the year of the Virgo, everything was suppose to happen last year. When I look back at it, it wasn’t, in fact the start of the year began very poorly indeed. I had to put loyal and dear friend of 18 years to sleep, my beloved Miss Kitty. Then I had a car accident and crashed my car into another car, my first car accident ever. I have been driving for 10 years, so really it didn’t begin well at all. Then the rest of the year was pretty ordinary. So I am quite sure the astrologists got it really wrong. This year again they speak of another wonderful year, though not so marvelous as last.
 So this brings me to the question, do you believe in destiny? Do you really believe that there is some laid out plan for each and everyone of us? or Do you think we make our own path in life? The world is such and amazing and complex place and that’s just the world, what about the universe. Each and everyone of us are only a speck of dust on the timeline of the world. Really we are not that significant in the big scheme of things. Are we just dropped here to paved our own yellow brick road or do we merely follow it?

In this next recipe the passion fruit was  mean’t for a pavlova, however destiny had other ideas and they ended up in a passion fruit tart.

Passion Fruit Tart
Author: Sophia Purvis
Prep time:
Cook time:
Total time:
Serves: 10
Ingredients
  • PASTRY
  • 150g butter
  • 1 2/3 cup flour
  • 1/3 cup sugar
  • FILLING
  • 4 passion fruits
  • 3/4 cup sugar
  • 4 eggs
  • 300ml thickened cream
Instructions
  1. Cube the butter then place in a food processor with the flour and sugar, pulse until it resembles find breadcrumbs. Then add the egg and pulse until a dough forms. Remove and press the mixture into a 35×13 cm tart tin and place refrigerator for an hour.
  2. Pre heat the oven to 160C
  3. Blind bake for 15 minutes, then remove from the oven.
  4. To make the filling place the passion fruit pulp, sugar, eggs and cream into a bowl and beat to combine, pour the mixture into the tart case and place back in the oven for 40 minutes or until cooked
  5. Serve with some whipped cream and passion fruit pulp

 

Gingerbread House

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I decided I would attempt to make a gingerbread house, I made one many years ago when I was very young, I was about 7 I think, and it was a bit of a disaster. The whole thing pretty much collapsed as soon as I made it. The icing I used was just icing sugar and water which naturally didn’t hold it together – you have to use some decent mortar. So now with years of baking behind me and a degree in Architecture I decided it was time to attempt a little gingerbread house again. So here she is, built strong with a royal icing. I have decorated it with m&m’s, lots of sour straps for the roof and shutters, white chocolate for the ground, some heated sugar for the windows, and some green butter cream icing for the trees, but feel free to use what ever takes your fancy.
I hope you all have a great day tomorrow.
Happy baking xxx
Sophia

Gingerbread House
Author: Sophia Purvis
Prep time:
Cook time:
Total time:
Serves: 4
Ingredients
  • COOKIE BASE
  • 200g butter
  • 4 cups plain flour
  • 2 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1 cup brown sugar
  • 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
  • 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
  • 1 teaspoon ground ginger
  • 1/2 cup golden syrup
  • 2 eggs
  • ROYAL ICING
  • 3 egg whites
  • 4 cups of icing sugar
Instructions
  1. To make a gingerbread house I first cut a template out with some cardboard to make sure it all fitted together, it also makes it easier to cut the gingerbread out as you have a guide.
  2. Place the butter, flour, baking powder, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger into a food processor and pulse until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs.
  3. Add the golden syrup and the eggs and pulse until a dough forms. Place the mixture in some cling-film and place in the fridge for 1 hour.
  4. Pre heat the oven to 180C
  5. Roll the gingerbread out on a floured surface and use the template to cut it out. Place the pieces on a baking tray and bake for 15-20 minutes. Leave to cool on the baking trays before icing.
  6. To make the icing, whisk the egg whites in and electric beater until stiff then slowly add the sugar while still whisking.
  7. Use a piping bag to pipe the icing on to the gingerbread, you may need to use a glass/cup to keep the gingerbread house together as the icing dried. Decorate with lots of candy and treats.

Magic fruit cake

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 Do you have a secret hiding place? A place where you keep all your little keep sakes, I’m not talking about all your gold and riches I’m talking about those little trinkets that remind you of where you have been and what you have done through out your life. The tickets to the opera or theatre, newspaper clippings, photos of treasured things, cards that people have given you, anything really that you want to keep but don’t really look at on a day to day basis. Well my Mum does, she likes to hid them in books, and not just her books, but my books too. She finds little things and puts them in a book.
The other day I was going through a very old cookbook that I have, in fact its so old and used it no longer has a cover, I would say it was very much loved. As I was making my way through this little book all sorts of little treasures where falling out at me, and then a recipe written in older style appeared, now I don’t know where it came from or who’s it was, but the little recipe written beautifully was called a ‘magic fruit cake’, well it had me at magic, I naturally had to make it.
On the back of the recipe it talks of people, their occupations, where they died and who they married. Because my Mum has been doing her family tree forest, I naturally presume she got talking to some one and they have written it down for her to give to me, and it has found its way into one of my many cookbooks waiting to be discovered and discovered it was.
It consists of five ingredients, apricot nectar (sounds like a drink from the gods, that had me too), brandy (a must in all good fruit cakes), fruit (wouldn’t be a fruit cake without it, would it?), and some flour and some spice (I used 2, nutmeg and some cinnamon).
So with these simple five ingredients, that fact it said magic and that it fell out at me just in time for christmas, I simply had to bake it. All signs lead to cake.
Magic Fruit Cake
 
1 kg fruit (I just used sultana’s) 
2 cups apricot nectar or 1/2 cup of brandy and 1 1/2 cups of nectar)
2 cups wholemeal flour
2 teaspoons of spice ( the choice is yours)
 
Place the fruit, nectar and brandy into a big bowl and set aside for 24 hours. 
 
Pre heat the oven to 160C
 
Sift the flour and spice together and stir through the fruit. It will look like there is to much flour and not enough liquid, but just keep stirring it in.
 
Pour the mixture into a lined round 23 cm cake tin and bake for 1 1/2 to 2 hours or until cooked.

Prune Brownies

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Deck the halls with boughs of holly, Fa la la la la, la la la la. It’s the season to be jolly. I hope your all getting your Christmas hats on, and starting some of that good old Christmas Baking. After all what would Christmas be without a baked good, or two, mmm, or three, or four? Well it just wouldn’t be Christmas now would it? No most certainly not. 

I kicked off my Christmas Baking with my Christmas pudding, which from what I’m told should be baked on the last Sunday in November, and thats exactly when I baked it. If I do say so myself it looks pretty dam divine. It’s sitting in the back of my pantry infusing with flavour and lugs of good old Christmas brandy. Just waiting for Christmas day. I love the traditions of Christmas.

This time, I have brought you another not so traditional Chrissy baked good, but what else would do but a sweet tempting little morsel of a brownie? Not any sort of brownie, a special prune brownie soaked in almond alcohol, is so soft and moist and just oozes Christmas tidings. I would sum it up as a Christmas cake brownie, mmm that sums it up nicely. 

This recipe is perfect for gift giving this season, if you want to make something homemade to give to friends and loved ones, this is it, or if you just need to take a plate to a party, who’s going to resist a brownie that screams Christmas.

So if this brownie is screaming to you, you better jot the recipe down quick smart and get to it.

Happy Baking xxx 

Prune Brownie soaked in Almond liqueur
 
20 prunes, stones removed
1 cup almond liqueur
375 g dark chocolate
300g butter
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
2 cups flour
1/3 cup cocoa powder
4 eggs
 
Place the prunes and liqueur into a saucepan and heat until the mixture starts to simmer. Remove from the heat and set aside.
 
Melt the chocolate and butter together in a double boiler until the chocolate has melted and the ingredients combined. Remove from the heat the stir through the sugar.
Sift the flour and cocoa powder together and then stir to combine, add the eggs one at a time beating after each addition. 
Add the prunes and combine. Pour into a 20x30cm brownie tin and bake for 45 minutes or until cooked. Cool on a wire rack then cut when cooled.