Category: Summer

Raspberry Walnut Frangipane Tart

go nuts for this tart

There is something very very right about raspberries and walnuts  – they seem to melt into the frangipane cream here and the combination is one of those where the tart is definitely more than the sum of its parts.  While its a delight to use raspberries in season, this smart tart can  be made just as well with frozen raspberries in case you need to create something impressive in colder months.  This recipe involves proper tart making ie making a crust before “Blind baking” and then filling and baking the filling.  Its not as fiddly or time consuming as you think and I for one just love the satisfaction of a properly made tart and easing it out of its case.

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Glorious Gazpachos

A cocktail of gazpachos

 

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For me gazpacho is summer in a glass and I make my Go To Tomato Gazpacho time and time again through the summer when tomatoes are sweet and juicy sometimes with yellow tomatoes to create a sunshine golden version and sometimes with red to be classic.  Gazpacho is a liquid salad so I am never very precise with quantities and adding bread is a personal preference – I like to as i like the creamier emulsified texture. I adore the very creamy Spanish “Salmorejo” which is a red tomato gazpacho with a higher amount of bread in it.  As the method is really only about blending its really all about the sweetest ripest ingredients and thats why going to the market yields the best results. Somehow the little cucumbers are sweeter, the onions stronger and the tomatoes richer in flavour.  Here you have a trio of new gazpacho recipes to try:

Avocado & Cucumber Gazpacho

Watermelon Gazpacho

Beetroot Gazpacho 

 

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Onion & Beer Confit

….because sometimes blonds do have more fun

Look at these white onions frolicking around with a happy hoppy blond beer, fronds of fresh thyme, a big dollop of butter and a dribble of honey.  For this is the basis of white onion and beer confit the paler perhaps more interesting cousin of red onion marmalade and definitely the fun one.   It is absolutely “the” relish to eat with a large slab of mountain cheese such as Gruyere, Emmental or the Carpathian “Trascau”, it makes quiches taste way better and it provides a magical base for an instant “pissaladière” …that gorgeous creation from the South of France that is sweet onions, anchovies and black olives on a bread or puff pastry base.  As if by magic here is one I made earlier…

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