Babeczki Kajmakowe (Kaymak Cupcakes)

A sweet treat for a picnic, surprise you beloved ones with heart-shaped kaymak cupcakes. Kaymak, originally from Middle East, is a sweet dairy product, similar to clotted cream. A walnut, covered under a dark chocolate coat, will add the cupcake a special character…

Prep time: 50 min, moderate

Cook time: 4 hours

Serves: 30

Ingredients:

Pastry shells

250g flour

150 g butter

1 egg

1 tablespoon milk

3 tablespoon powder sugar (icing sugar)

Pinch of salt

Kaymak

250 ml cream 36% (Ask in Polish Shops for ‘Smietana 36%’)

4 tablespoons sugar

Decoration

Walnuts

Dark Chocolate

Method:

Pastry shells

1.     Sift flour into a mixing bowl.

2.     Add chopped butter, salt, and sugar. Beat in the egg.

3.     Mix the ingredients with your fingers.

4.     Add some milk and cream the ingredients together.

5.     Shape the dough into a ball. Wrap in a kitchen foil and put into the fridge for about 30 minutes.

6.     Pre-heat the oven to 200C.

7.     Roll the dough so it’s about 3-4 mm thin. With a glass cut little circles of the dough, little bigger then your baking forms. I decided to use small heart-shape forms, but you can use any shape or size.

8.     Grease your baking forms and start putting the cut off circles into them. Smooth their edges with a knife. Prick the bottoms with a fork.

9.     Bake the pastry shells for about 25-30 so they’re gold.

10. Take them out of the oven and let them to cool down. Take the pastry shells out of the forms, very gently. They’re ready to filled in with kaymak now!

Kaymak (Simple Method)

1.     Boil the cream mixed with sugar, stirring occasionally. Boil it as long as it gets dense and golden, about 2 hours.

2.     Let kaymak to cool down.

Cupcake

1.     Fill in your pastry shapes with ready and cooled kaymak.

2.     Leave it to rest for about 20 minutes.

3.     Decorate cupcakes with walnuts.

4.     Melt dark chocolate and coat walnuts with it. Leave it to cool down.

5.     Serve your cupcakes on a plate, or put them into a box like a bonbon. Enjoy!

Strawberry Sponge Cake Roll

 

I was looking for some ideas to celebrate this year strawberry season, and I decided there is nothing better then a ‘Strawberry Roloda’ (Strawberry Sponge Cake Roll). The cake is light and sweet, and you can decorate it however you’d like, to pay a special tribute to strawberries. The cake is perfect for garden parties, casual teas with neighbours, or posh evening dinners. Delicious!

Prep time: 30 min, easy

Cook time: 10 min

Serves: 10

Ingredients:

Pastry

3 eggs

2 tablespoons powder sugar (icing sugar)

3 tablespoons wheat flour

2 tablespoons potato flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

2 tablespoon vanilla sugar

Cream

Large cup of double cream

1 tablespoon sugar

1 tablespoon gelatine

500 g strawberries

Lemon juice, shot of vodka or strawberry jam (to moisture the pastry)

Decoration 

7 small strawberries

100g dark chocolate

(We will also use some cream from above)

Method:

Pastry

1.     Beat egg whites. My trick is to add little salt to them, so they whist better.

2.     When egg whites are stiff, keep beating and gradually add sugar, then egg yolks. The consistency should be dropping.

3.     Sift some flour mixed with baking powder into the bowl. Cream all the ingredients.

4.     Pre-heat the oven to 190C. Put the mixture into a baking tin. The tin should be about 28 – 34 cm long, 20 – 25 cm wide. Bake on a baking paper or greased tin. Spread the mixture over the tin so it’s smooth. Bake for about 10 minutes.

5.     Take the pastry out of the oven and leave to cool down for a while.

6.     Spread some vanilla sugar over a clean, linen tea towel, and put the still warm pastry on it.

7.     Roll the pastry with the tea towel and leave it to cool down in this shape.

Cream

1.     Wash and peel strawberries. Pick up 7 small and prettiest ones for decoration and put them on a side. From the rest of them, take half and blend them. The other half chop into small cubes.

2.     Melt gelatine in ¼ cup of hot water and leave to cool down.

3.     Whip double cream so it’s stiff. Mix in some sugar.

4.     Take out 2-3 spoons for decoration, put it into the fridge.

5.     To the main cream, add blended strawberries and still warm gelatine. Mix them together.

Rolada

1.     Unfold the sponge pastry.

2.     Spread some lemon juice, vodka or strawberry jam over it to moisture the sponge. I used lemon juice this time, but the other options are very good too, and give your cake a special personality.

3.     Make a layer of chopped strawberries on the pastry.

4.     Spread some pink cream over the pastry. Make sure your layers are not too thick; otherwise it can be difficult to close the cake.

5.     When the layers are ready, start rolling the cake, in the tea towel. Roll it so it closes. Spoon out the excessive cream. Hold it for a while so it sticks together.

6.     Leave it to rest for a while. Cut the edges on both sides so they’re smooth.

7.     Now you can put your cake on a serving dish and decorate it! I used some melted dark chocolate to make a pattern on the top, and then put some of the leftover cream and decorated with strawberries. You can be really creative here!

8.     To serve, cut in slices. But make sure your guests can see the whole masterpiece first! Enjoy!

My Gyros Sandwiches

As I have mentioned in this blog already, Polish cuisine is in some degree influenced by Turkish one. The dishes are so much accommodated and adjusted by Polish kitchen, that sometimes we forget they are not Polish. Polish gyros is probably one of the examples of Polish-Turkish sandwiches. It’s also a popular take-away or a nice homemade BBQ dish.

Prep time: 20 min, easy

Cook time: 15 minutes

Serves: 6

Ingredients:

2 chicken breasts

1 small can sweet corn

Mixed leaf salad

1 large onion or purple onion

1 red pepper

1 courgette

2 tomatoes

200g olives

Optional: 100g Feta cheese

2-3 tablespoons tomato ketchup

2-3 tablespoons mayonnaise

Selection of Spices ‘Gyros’, ask in Polish Shops

6 tortilla wraps

1-2 tablespoon oil

Method:

1.     Wash chicken breasts, chop into small pieces and season them with 3 tablespoons of ‘Gyros’ spices.

2.     Pre-heat oil on a frying pan and fry meat pieces so they golden brown. If you prefer to BBQ them, don’t chop the fillets, but season them in whole pieces, grease with oil and grill them for about 40 minutes.

3.     Make a dressing: put ketchup, mayonnaise and 2 tablespoons of ‘Gyros’ selection, and mix them all together.

4.     Prepare all you vegetables and cheese: wash vegetables and chop them, chop cheese.

5.     Fry courgette and red pepper, or BBQ them. If you use white onion, I’d suggest you fry it too. Purple onion, which is less strong, can be served fresh.

6.     Spread the dressing over tortilla wraps.

7.     Put lettuce, chicken pieces, red pepper, sweet corn, olives, tomatoes, onion and cheese on the wrap.

8.     Fold wrap into half. You can wrap one of its edges in kitchen film, so the wrap holds together, for a take-away version. Or just served on a plate. If you put less amount of ingredients, you can role it. For  fun BBQ version, put all ingredients on a table so your guests can assemble it by themselves.

9.     Serve with Garlic Dressing.