Fig and Stilton Muffins #MuffinMonday

Not quite savory and not quite sweet, these fig and Stilton muffins are the perfect marriage of fruit and cheese in a fluffy quick bread. Serve for breakfast, tea time or as an accompaniment to a light lunch.

I adore fresh figs but they are so hard to come by. My stand in, soft dried figs, can’t replace them but they are so much better than no figs at all. I always assumed that they were dehydrated to the soft state I bought them in, but for the very first time, I actually read the package as I prepared to bake these muffins.

It says, and I quote: Partially rehydrated dried figs.

Which brought up a question for me. Why dry them out completely if you are going to add moisture back at a later date? I spent a couple of days down the rabbit hole of internet research. Who knew dried fig production was such a popular subject for scholarly papers! The best explanation I came up with was that dried figs have a longer shelf life but people want to buy them soft. Hence the two-step process.

The figs are picked when at optimal ripeness then dried completely. They are gently rehydrated which plumps them up and makes them edible again. If you’ve never tried them, they have a similar texture to dried apricots, in other words, they are chewy and sticky. Not hard at all except for the very end of the stems.

Fig and Stilton Muffins

If you don’t have access to Stilton, substitute your favorite strong flavored blue cheese that crumbles well. The sweet sticky figs are the perfect complement to a strong blue cheese.

Ingredients
2 cups or 250g all purpose flour
1/4 cup or 50g sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup or 180ml buttermilk
1/2 cup or 120ml canola or other light oil, plus extra for greasing pan
2 large eggs
5 1/3 oz or 150g soft dried figs (about 9-10 figs)
3 1/2 oz or 100g Stilton cheese

Method
Preheat oven to 350°F or 180°C and generously grease cups and top of 12-cup muffin pan with oil. The fig and cheese make these more likely to stick than other muffins.

In a large mixing bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt together.

Remove any hard stems on the figs with a sharp knife. Chop the figs roughly and set aside at least 12 pieces to pop on top of the muffins before baking.

Add the rest to the flour mixture and fold gently until they are coated with flour, separating any bits that are stuck together.

Trim any hard rind off of your cheese and discard. Crumble the rest with a fork.

In another bowl, whisk together buttermilk, canola and eggs.

Add all the wet mixture to the dry ingredients mixing bowl.

Fold just until dry ingredients are just moistened.  You may still see some flour.

Now fold in the crumbled Stilton, saving a little bit for topping each muffin.

Divide your batter relatively evenly between the 12 muffin cups.  Top with the reserved fig and Stilton pieces.

Bake 20-25 minutes or until muffins are golden.

Remove from oven and let cool a few minutes before removing muffins from the pan. I suggest running a dull knife around the sides of the muffin first to aid in removal.

Enjoy!

Check out the other great muffin recipes my Muffin Monday friends are sharing today! 

• Crumb Topped Peach Muffins from Palatable Pastime
• Fig and Stilton Muffins from Food Lust People Love
• Jerk Chicken Sausage and Cheese Muffins from Passion Kneaded
• Lemon Poppyseed Ricotta Muffins from Karen's Kitchen Stories
• Savory Cheese Muffins from A Day in the Life on the Farm

#MuffinMonday is a group of muffin loving bakers who get together once a month to bake muffins. You can see all of our lovely muffins by following our Pinterest board. Updated links for all of our past events and more information about Muffin Monday can be found on our home page.

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Roasted Rhubarb Upside Down Cake #BundtBakers

Orange almond cake batter is spooned onto sweet roasted rhubarb and baked to golden perfection for a beautiful dessert your whole family will adore. Drizzled with the sticky rhubarb syrup and topped with chopped pistachios for a hit of color and crunch, this roasted rhubarb upside down cake is our new favorite sweet treat.

Years ago, when I was growing up in Houston, Texas, our neighborhood by-laws didn’t permit garage sales, so a couple of times a year the civic association organized a white elephant sale in a nearby stadium parking lot. For a $10 fee, you could park your car and display your wares right behind it. For my mom and me, those sales were a highlight. We’d set up and sell stuff, but we also loved to browse for treasures, so we’d take turns manning our own “stall” and shopping.

Fast forward many years and I discovered that my favorite childhood event is a common thing in the United Kingdom. It’s called a car boot sale since car boot = car trunk. No prior registration is necessary – anyone can just rock up with a full car and pay a fee, typically £8 ($10) and sell their junk, I mean, treasures. Best of all, during the summer time, car boot sales happen Every Single Weekend!

Last weekend at the car boot sale here in Jersey, we bought two huge chancre crabs, four gorgeous hydrangeas in pots, a couple of books and a healthy bunch of homegrown rhubarb. For Father’s Day on Sunday, I wanted to make something special for my husband who adores rhubarb. This cake did not disappoint!

Roasted Rhubarb Upside Down Cake

As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, the recipe for the roasted rhubarb, I decided to publish that separately since it actually makes twice the rhubarb you need for this cake. You can follow those instructions and use half the amounts if you don’t want the extra sweet roasted rhubarb, but I promise it will be eaten, and promptly, if you do!

Ingredients
For the cake batter:
1/2 cup or 113g butter, softened, plus extra for the pan
1/2 cup or 100g caster sugar
2 eggs
1 cup or 125g plain flour, plus extra for the pan
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup or 75g polenta or fine cornmeal, plus a little extra for the pan
1/4 cup or 30g ground almonds
2 tablespoons or 30ml fresh orange or clementine juice
2 teaspoons orange or clementine zest

To assemble: 1/2 of the roasted rhubarb from this recipe: Sweet Roasted Rhubarb
To decorate: 1 tablespoon roughly chopped pistachios

Method
Follow the link in the ingredients list for instructions to roast your rhubarb and set aside to cool while you prepare the cake batter.

Generously grease and flour a 6-cup Bundt pan. Sprinkle an additional teaspoon of fine cornmeal on the bottom. This makes a bit of a thin crust so the rhubarb doesn’t stick to the pan.

Preheat the oven to 350°F or 180°C. (Or turn it down if it's still hot from roasting the rhubarb.)

Beat the butter and sugar in a bowl until pale and creamy. Add the eggs, one at a time, and beat well.

Sift in the flour, baking powder, soda and salt. Whisk to combine.

Fold in the fine cornmeal, ground almonds, orange juice and zest until well combined.

Line the bottom of your Bundt pan with roasted rhubarb, saving any excess to serve alongside it. I chose all of the prettiest pinker bits, another reason to roast more that you actually need!

Spoon the batter into the Bundt pan and smooth the top with a spatula.

Bake for 30-35 minutes until it is golden and a skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean. Remove from the oven but leave in the pan to cool for about 10 minutes. Any longer and it might end up sticking so do set a timer.

Turn the cake out onto a wire rack to cool completely. At this point, I used a dull knife to flick away some of the cornmeal "crust" on top to better reveal the beautiful rhubarb.

Drizzle or brush on some sticky syrup from the roasted rhubarb. Sprinkle with chopped pistachios with a little more syrup on top to help them stick.

Enjoy!

Many thanks to this month’s Bundt Bakers host, Sue from Palatable Pastime. We are sharing cakes that are perfect for picnics! Along with my little 6-cup Bundt which travels well, check out all the other great cakes we've baked for you.

• Cheerwine Bundt Cake from Palatable Pastime
• Elderflower and Blueberry Bundt - Bundt Cake Flor de Saúco y Arándanos from Merce's Cake
• Lemon and Pistachio Bundt Cake from Patyco Candybar
• Milk Chocolate and Caramel Popcorn Bundt Cake from All That's Left Are The Crumbs
• Pineapple Upside Down Bundt from Simply Inspired meals
• Roasted Rhubarb Upside Down Cake from Food Lust People Love
• Spiced Apple Streusel Cake from Sneha's Recipe

#BundtBakers is a group of Bundt loving bakers who get together once a month to bake Bundts with a common ingredient or theme. You can see all our of lovely Bundts by following our Pinterest board. We take turns hosting each month and choosing the theme/ingredient. Updated links for all of our past events and more information about BundtBakers, can be found on our home page.

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Sweet Roasted Rhubarb

Sweet roasted rhubarb with a hint of orange and vanilla makes the perfect accompaniment to ice cream, cake or yogurt. We also love it topped with double cream or baked in an upside down cake.

Tomorrow I’ll be sharing a small orange almond Bundt cake recipe that uses half of this recipe of sweet roasted rhubarb but the more I thought about it, the more convinced I was that the rhubarb deserved its own post.

It is super simple to make, keeps well for several days in the refrigerator and it can be eaten so many ways. Even though I was roasting the rhubarb specifically to make the cake, I roasted twice the amount needed because my husband is a huge rhubarb fan and I knew he’d love leftovers. Also, I must confess, I had another more selfish motive as well. I wanted to be able to choose the prettiest dark pink bits for the cake.

Sweet Roasted Rhubarb

I make vanilla sugar by adding 2-3 vanilla pods to about 2 cups or 400g white sugar in airtight container and setting it aside for a couple of weeks in a cool cupboard. The sugar takes on the vanilla flavor and is wonderful in all sorts of recipes, or even just in a cup of warm milk before bed. If you don’t have vanilla sugar, substitute normal sugar and add one teaspoon of vanilla extract to the orange juice instead.

Ingredients
14 oz or 400g rhubarb, cut into 2 in or 5cm lengths
1/4 cup or 50g vanilla sugar vanilla extract
2 tablespoons or 30ml fresh orange or clementine juice
Good pinch flakey sea salt

Method
Preheat the oven temperature to 400°F or 200°C. Trim the dried ends and brown bits off of the rhubarb. Cut it into 2 in or 5cm pieces.

Pile the rhubarb on a baking tray. Pour on the juice, add the vanilla sugar and toss to coat.

Spread the pieces of rhubarb out so they aren’t touching.

Roast for 15-20 minutes or until the rhubarb is fork tender. Set aside to cool.

Store the rhubarb and the syrupy juice in a covered container in the refrigerator. Serve cold or warmed with something creamy like yogurt, ice cream or cream. Enjoy!

If you are a fan of rhubarb, you might also enjoy these recipes:

• Rhubarb Sauce Cookies
• Apple Rhubarb Pie 
• Rhubarb Fool Cocktail

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Cranberry Pecan Quick Bread #BreadBakers

Made with jellied sauce, this cranberry pecan quick bread is full of tart cranberry flavor, rich nutty bits with just enough sweetness to be perfect with a cup of hot tea or coffee.

Last week I was tidying up the pantry. It’s such a great feeling to have all my cans in a row, organized by type. You know, beans together, tomato products side by side. Jalapeños in the back, along with the capers. Not such a great feeling was realizing that I had four, count them, four cans of jellied cranberry sauce. Part of expat life is buying seasonal items whenever you see them, because it’s likely that a holiday will roll around, and that special ingredient you must have will not be available.

But even I have to agree that keeping four cans of jellied cranberry sauce in stock is overkill, especially when pantry space is limited. Inspired by this recipe on the Ocean Spray website (because it uses an entire can - no one wants a half cup of leftover cranberry sauce in June), I am now down to three cans. I loved this cranberry pecan quick bread so much that can number three is earmarked for another loaf.

This is not in any way a sponsored post but I did use Ocean Spray Jellied Cranberry Sauce. Just so you know, in case you have a can or three lurking in your pantry.

Cranberry Pecan Quick Bread

The original recipe called for whole berry sauce but in our family it wouldn’t be Thanksgiving or Christmas without the jiggly slices, served straight from the can. In my adapted recipe, you need the moisture of the jellied cranberry sauce to balance the added oat bran.

Ingredients
2 cups or 250g flour
1/2 cup or 70g oat bran
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
2/3 cup or 132g brown sugar
1 large egg, lightly beaten
1 14-ounce or 397g can jellied cranberry sauce
1/2 cup or 120ml canola or other light vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup or 130g roughly chopped pecans

Method
Preheat your oven to 350ºF or 180°C. Prepare your loaf pan by greasing it or lining it with baking parchment.

Gently break up the jellied cranberry sauce with a fork, making sure to leave some of it in bigger pieces. Set aside a small handful of the pecans and a couple of tablespoons of the cranberry sauce for topping the batter with before baking.

Whisk together the flour, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt and cinnamon in a large mixing bowl.

In another smaller mixing bowl, gently mix together the beaten egg, cranberry sauce, oil and vanilla. You want to keep the cranberry chunks chunky, as much as possible.

Pour the wet ingredients into the bowl with the dry ingredients. Fold them together until just mixed.

Sprinkle on the pecans and fold again to distribute the pecans throughout the thick batter.

Spoon the batter evenly into prepared loaf pan. Top with the reserved jellied cranberry sauce and chopped pecans.

Bake until golden brown and a wooden skewer inserted into the center comes out clean, 50-55 minutes. If bread begins to brown too quickly, cover it loosely with foil and continue to bake until it is done.

Leave the loaf to cool in the pan on a wire rack for 15-20 minutes. Remove the loaf from the pan and transfer it to the wire rack. Cool completely before slicing.

Enjoy!

This month I am hosting our Bread Bakers event with the theme Quick Breads. Although quick breads can take many forms, they have in common the use of other leavening agents instead of yeast to get rise we want in a baked good. I challenged the bakers to bake in loaf pans, rather than making muffins or the like. Check out what a great job they did by clicking on the links below:

• Banana Nut Bread from Sneha's Recipe
• Cheddar Bacon Chive Quick Bread from Karen's Kitchen Stories
• Chocolate Quick Bread from Sara's Tasty Buds
• Coconut Sweet Bread from Passion Kneaded
• Cranberry Pecan Quick Bread from Food Lust People Love
• Espresso Banana Quick Bread with Espresso Streusel from All That's Left Are The Crumbs
• Irish Soda Bread from Anybody Can Bake
• Keto Low Carb Coconut Flour Bread from Cook With Renu
• Lady Grey Date Nut Bread from A Messy Kitchen
• Lemon Blueberry Bread from Palatable Pastime
• Lemon Pistachio Loaf from Ambrosia
• Summer Shandy Beer Bread from A Day in the Life on the Farm
• Zucchini Bread from Simply Inspired Meals

#BreadBakers is a group of bread loving bakers who get together once a month to bake bread with a common ingredient or theme. Follow our Pinterest board right here. Links are also updated each month on this home page.

We take turns hosting each month and choosing the theme/ingredient.

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Mini Fruit-topped Pavlovas #BakingBloggers

These mini fruit-topped pavlovas are the perfect dessert for a dinner party or potluck.  The meringue bases can be made ahead of time then all you need to do is whip the cream and pop the fruit on top. They are so easy but look impressive.

Who owns bragging rights to the creation of pavlova is a hotly contested subject between Australians and New Zealanders so sometimes it’s fun to bring it up if you have a few at your gathering. The best part is that once you’ve let them vie for ownership for a while, you can flummox them all with more current research.

Dr. Andrew Paul Wood, a New Zealander, and Australian Annabelle Utrech have traced the origins of pavlova as we know it back to the German-speaking Habsburgs who made a certain dessert, a confection of meringue and cream and fruit, that they had “borrowed” from Spain. They named it Spanische Windtorte, which translates to wind pie. Apt for a light and fluffy meringue, don't you think?

German immigrants brought that recipe and its cousin the schaum torte or foam cake to the United States, which eventually evolved into a recipe called Forgotten Cake. It was quite popular in the 1940s, and was so called because meringue is put into a hot oven, which is then turned off and is left for at least eight hours. Forgotten cakes were originally served with a fruit filling and cream on top, but eventually busy housewives started just topping them with cream and then fresh fruit. Much like the traditional pavlova.

So how did the recipe make its way to our friends in the southern hemisphere? Wood and Utrech discovered that an American cornstarch company began importing their product to New Zealand in the 1890s, with a pavlova-type recipe on the package. So it’s really sort of American, by way of Germany and Spain.

Mini Fruit-topped Pavlovas 

No matter how it got there, pavlova is still a quintessential Australian or New Zealand dessert. A traditional fruit topping down under is passion fruit pulp but you can use whatever fruit you have on hand. Serve the mini fruit-topped pavlovas shortly after topping them as the cream will soften the meringues.

Ingredients for 4 dozen mini pavs
4 large egg whites
1 pinch salt
1 cup or 225g caster sugar (I used golden caster sugar.)
2 teaspoons cornstarch
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon white vinegar

To serve:
1 3/4 cups or 414ml whipping cream
Selection of fresh fruit - I used 7 oz or 200g raspberries, 2 small mangoes and two kiwi fruit.

You will need 4 baking sheets, lined with parchment or silicone liners and a piping bag with a large hole tip.

Method
Preheat the oven to 350°F or 180°C. Whisk the egg whites with the salt until they're holding firm peaks but are not stiff.

Gently add in the sugar a spoonful at time, still beating, until you've got a bowl full of shiny, thick meringue. There should be no grittiness left when you rub the meringue between your thumb and finger.

Use a sieve or sifter to sprinkle in the cornstarch, add the vanilla and vinegar, then gently fold to combine.

If you are using parchment paper without guidelines, you can use permanent marker or pencil to draw small circles as guide. Mine are about 2 inches or 5cm wide. Turn the paper over so you will be adding the meringue on the clean side.

Put the meringue in a piping bag with a large tip. Start in the middle of your circles and pipe a solid base, finishing with one more circle of meringue on top of the very outside of the base.

Put the first two pans into the oven, turn it down to 300°F or 150°C and bake for 20 minutes. Turn the oven off and leave the meringues in for another 20 minutes, then take them out of the oven and put them in a cool dry place.

Once the first batch is out, preheat your oven again to 350°F or 180°C and repeat the process with the last two pans.

When you are ready to assemble the bite-sized pavlovas, whip the cream into soft peaks and peel and cut your fruit, if necessary. Small fruit, like raspberries, can be left whole.

Spoon a couple of teaspoons into the meringues then top with fruit.

Enjoy!

This month my Baking Blogger friends are sharing their favorite recipes with summer berries. Many thanks to our host Sue of Palatable Pastime for her behind the scenes work and this fun theme. Check out all the tasty berry recipes below.

• Bora Berry Tart by Sneha's Recipe
• Lattice Top Blackberry Pie by Palatable Pastime
• Brownie Berry Dessert Pizza by Simply Inspired Meals
• Make-Ahead Mixed Berries Baked Oatmeal by Hardly A Goddess
• Mini Fruit-topped Pavlovas by Food Lust People Love
• Mixed Berry Bubbly Pies by Sid's Sea Palm Cooking
• Mixed Berry Cheese Danish by Cookaholic Wife
• No Churn Roasted Strawberry Ice Cream by Caroline's Cooking
• Roasted Blackberry-Cherry Tomato Chutney on Venison Medallions by Culinary Adventures with Camilla
• Strawberry Crisp with Pepita & Chia Seed Topping by Faith, Hope, Love, & Luck Survive Despite a Whiskered Accomplice
• Strawberry Shortcake Bars by A Day in the Life on the Farm
• Strawberry Shortcake Cookies by Karen's Kitchen Stories
• Vegan Lemon Raspberry Layer Cake by The Baking Fairy

Baking Bloggers is a friendly group of food bloggers who vote on a shared theme and then post recipes to fit that theme one the second Monday of each month. If you are a food blogger interested in joining in, inquire at our Baking Bloggers Facebook group. We'd be honored if you would join us in our baking adventures.

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Potato Cake Grilled Cheese Nibbles #FoodieExtravaganza

These easy appetizers are perfect for cocktail time and plenty filling for your tapas party. Made with extra sharp cheddar and herby mashed potatoes, potato cake grilled cheese nibbles go down a treat.

Since 2016, the third Thursday in June has been designated World Tapas Day, a holiday I can completely get behind. After all, who doesn’t love little tasty nibbles? A snack is a snack but when you call it tapas, you are pretty much required to have a drink as well, which pushes us right into party territory.

If you agree, you might also like to check out some of my other tapas recipes. I'm particularly partial to my Garlicky Artichokes which are divine heaped on crusty bread, Spicy Squid with Bacon which also has a good hit of garlic, and the sweet and salty combination of these Chorizo Date Skewers topped with crumbled blue cheese. So good! I tasted that last one in a restaurant in Atlanta and could not wait to get home to make them again myself.

Potato Cake Grilled Cheese Nibbles

These fun little “sandwiches” can be made with your favorite herbs to flavor the potatoes but using green onion tops makes them taste like my favorite baked potatoes. In fact, sometimes I add crispy bacon to the mix. Everything’s better with bacon.

Ingredients
1 3/4 lbs or 790g waxy potatoes
Fine sea salt
Fresh ground black pepper
1 medium egg, lightly whisked
Herbs of your choice
3 oz or 85g extra sharp cheddar – or your favorite flavorful melty cheese

Method
Peel the potatoes and cut into them chunks. Boil them until just fork tender, then drain and leave to air dry in the hot pot for a few minutes, lid removed.

Mash the potatoes with a potato masher until smooth. Set aside to cool to room temperature. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Now mix in the egg and the chopped herbs until both are completely incorporated.

Use a scoop or a tablespoon to divide the potatoes into about 26 pieces. I used a 2-tablespoon cookie dough scoop and got 27.

Cover the potato balls with cling film and chill them for a couple of hours.

Wet your hands to avoid the potato sticking to them then form the balls of potato into little cakes. I like to use the edge of a rubber spatula to pat the cakes into square-ish shapes. This is totally unnecessary but I think it made them look more like toast. Which makes the potato cake grilled cheese nibbles look more like tiny sandwiches. Such fun!

Slice your cheese thinly and set aside.

Put a non-stick griddle to heat over a medium flame. If your griddle is on the older side (and not as non-stick as it used to be), you might want to drizzle on a little canola or olive oil. You don’t want the potato cakes to stick.

Put the cakes a few at time on the griddle, making sure to leave enough room to get a spatula in to turn them. Cook on the first side for several minutes or until the bottom is nicely browned.

Carefully turn the potato cakes over and cook the other side till browned.

At this point I take time out from our regularly scheduled, eat-right-now recipe to offer you a party plan version for making ahead.

PARTY PLAN MAKE AHEAD: Cook all the potato cakes and refrigerate until ready to serve. Reheat in a single layer in your oven, preheated to 375°F or 190°C for about 7-10 minutes or until heated through. Top half with the sliced cheese and pop back into the oven until the cheese just starts to melt. Remove from the oven and cover the cheesy potato cakes with a plain one. Serve!

Now back to our make them/eat them recipe:
Add the cheese to half of the potato cakes and put the other half on top to make a sandwich. Since the potato cakes are hot, it will take just a minute or so for the cheese to melt.

Remove them to a platter and add the next batch of potato cakes to the griddle. Repeat process until all the potato cake grilled cheese nibbles are done. Garnish with more chopped herbs.

Enjoy!

This month’s Foodie Extravaganza party is celebrating World Tapas Day. Created by Spain, the home country of tapas, it was first declared to commemorate of their favorite snacks in 2016. It's always the third Thursday so this year get ready to party on June 20th. We are here to help with several delicious recipes. Check out the links below. Many thanks to this month’s host, Juli from Pandemonium Noshery for choosing this excellent theme.

• Patatas Bravas with Tomato Aioli from Karen's Kitchen Stories
• Flamenquín from Pandemonium Noshery
• Ensaladilla Rusa from Sneha's Recipe
• Potato Cake Grilled Cheese Nibbles from Food Lust People Love
• Spiced Beef Kabobs from A Day in the Life on the Farm

Foodie Extravaganza celebrates obscure food holidays by posting delicious recipes your family will love. Posting day is always the first Wednesday of each month. If you are a blogger and would like to join our group and blog along with us, come join our Facebook page Foodie Extravaganza. We would love to have you! If you’re a home cook looking for tasty recipes, check out our Foodie Extravaganza Pinterest Board!

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