Gingerbread Skillet Pudding with Smoked Salted Toffee Sauce. A super decadent pudding, all warmly spiced and squidgy and totally delicious. The smoked salted toffee sauce takes it right over the top! It's incredibly easy too - you could have it made from start to finish in less than an hour!

Gingerbread Skillet Pudding with Smoked Salted Toffee Sauce

Gingerbread Skillet Pudding

Gingerbread Skillet Pudding

It's very easy to make - essentially you mix the wet ingredients together, and then whisk them into the dry ingredients before baking.

You can serve it plain as a cake, but I definitely liked the idea of serving it as a hot pudding with a toffee sauce. I used Mary's toffee sauce, but added some smoked salt. I bought smoked salt ages ago for Nigella's wonderful 5-Spice and Cider Bundt Cake with Smoky Salted Caramel Sauce from Simply Nigella, but regular old unsmoked salt flakes would still be good. The sauce is easy too - just put everything in a pot and boil for a couple of minutes. You can do it while the pudding is baking.

Gingerbread Skillet Pudding with Smoked Salted Toffee Sauce

And if that's not decadent enough, I served it with clotted cream. This one was imported from Cornwall (found it at a nearby gourmet shop), but I think any thick and rich cream would be great.

The pudding was so good! So moist, rich and spicy. It has a bit of a sticky date pudding vibe, especially with the rich toffee sauce. It's quick to make and uses primarily supermarket ingredients. I hope you give it a try!

Gingerbread Skillet Pudding with Smoked Salted Toffee Sauce

Gingerbread Skillet Pudding with Smoked Salted Toffee Sauce

Recipe adapted from Mary Berry

Ingredients

For the pudding

50 grams unsalted butter

100 grams light muscovado sugar or light brown sugar

1 large egg

75 grams treacle

125 millilitres whole milk

100 grams plain flour

1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon ground ginger

1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg

For the smoked salted toffee sauce

200 millilitres cream

50 grams butter

70 grams light muscovado sugar or light brown sugar

1/4-1/2 teaspoon smoked salt flakes

To serve, clotted cream or other thick rich cream

Method

To make the pudding, preheat the oven to 180C. Melt the butter in an 18 or 20 centimetre skillet, and then pour the butter into a mixing bowl. Use a pastry brush to coat the inside of the skillet evenly with the remaining melted butter.

To the mixing bowl with the melted butter, add the muscovado sugar, egg, treacle, and milk. Whisk until smooth.

Sieve the flour, bicarb, cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg into a second mixing bowl. Stir the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and beat until smooth.

Pour the mixture into the greased skillet. Bake for 20 minutes or until cooked when tested with a skewer. Allow to cool slightly before serving.

To make the smoked salted toffee sauce, place the cream, butter and sugar in a small saucepan and put over medium heat. Bring to the boil and allow to boil gently for 3-5 minutes. Remove from the heat and add the salt, whisk until dissolved.

Pour some warm sauce over the pudding. Place the remainder of the sauce in a jug, and put out the sauce and some thick cream for people to add as they wish.

Serves 6-8

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Kaya

The traditional kaya recipes, made by amahs back in the day, are notoriously labour intensive. They involve stirring. And stirring. And stirring. All day long. Eep. My uncle in Penang devised a less labour intensive method using a bain marie in the oven for the second half of cooking, but it still takes four hours from start to finish. (In fact, his "simplified" version is so laborious that he only does it in huge batches, 30 eggs and a litre of coconut milk at a time). I love kaya, but I do not have the energy for that!

These days, it seems most people use a shortcut recipe - mixing together eggs (sometimes whole eggs, sometimes just yolks), with white sugar, coconut milk / cream and pandan extract, then cooking it over a double boiler until thickened. (This method is similar to a crème anglaise, for those of you familiar with western cooking).

There are essentially two versions of kaya - plain pandan (which is a green colour), or kaya with a little caramelized sugar added (which goes a deep brown colour). I believe the addition of caramelised sugar to kaya is a hack to emulate the caramelisation that usually comes from the long slow cooking in the traditional method.

I tried two recipes, both shortcut method. The first one I tried was a caramel version, from my friend Charmaine's blog Wok & Skillet. It was a really good and easy recipe, but I personally found that the caramel flavour overwhelmed the pandan and coconut, and it was all that I could taste. (However, if you enjoy a deep caramel flavour, have at it!)

Caramel kaya

I much prefer a version without the caramelised sugar, as it allows the gentle pandan and coconut flavours to shine. After much research and comparisons, I used a recipe from Nyonya Cooking, which has the virtues of being simple and easy, and uses all whole eggs rather than just yolks. You'll see it's a muted green colour, more of a khaki than that lurid green you see in some pandan flavoured baked goods. I like the au naturel colour, but you could always add some green colouring if you want to emphasise the pandan! (No judgement from me).

Kaya

So, after that loooong introduction, let's talk about this kaya recipe in a bit more detail! You start by making some pandan extract - just whizz up some pandan leaves with water, then strain in a sieve. (I can find pandan leaves at Asian grocers - sometimes fresh leaves, more often in big packets in the freezer). I LOVE the fragrance!

Pandan juice

Then after that it's very easy - mix the pandan extract with eggs, tinned coconut milk, and white sugar, then cook in a double boiler, stirring all the while, until thickened. Some recipes say this takes ten minutes; I find it always takes longer, like thirty to forty minutes. Having said that, I do prefer a thicker kaya so am happy to keep going for a bit longer. And perhaps I'm a little timorous with the heat - still scarred from the great "custard curdling incident" of 2005.

Kaya

Let the kaya cool, then store in a sterilised jar! (I never properly sterilise jars, but just wash them in the dishwasher and let them steam dry before using. If you want to sterilise properly, there are hundreds of guides online). I've found that the kaya lasts for a couple of weeks in the fridge. (Always use clean and dry utensils to prevent it from going mouldy).

Ok and now that you know how to make kaya, here are some ideas on how to eat it! The traditional way is the simple kaya toast with half-boiled eggs.

Kaya toast with half boiled egg

Toast some white bread, slather with lots of butter and kaya and make a little sandwich. Cook some eggs, and add some soy sauce and white pepper. The quintessential Malaysian breakfast! (PS in parallel with my kaya adventures, I've been trying to learn how to make half-boiled eggs, and failing miserably. They always ended up over cooked, under cooked, or unevenly cooked, blaaaah. Well, my lovely wife got sick of me complaining about it and surprised me with a Malaysian half-boiled egg maker! It's a simple device - you put your eggs in the top, pour boiling water over, and once the water drips off, the eggs are perfectly half-boiled, creamy and runny and soft. It works really well. Yay!)

One of my favourite ways to eat kaya is spread between Ritz crackers. The salty sweet vibe is my jam!

Kaya with Ritz Cracker

And lastly, I went a bit OTT with this batch of kaya, and made some coconut and kaya scrolls for a brunch party the other week. They were awesome! I'll share the recipe for these soon.

Kaya and Coconut Scrolls

In the meantime, here's the kaya recipe! I hope you love it as much as I do!

Kaya
Recipe adapted from Nyonya Cooking

Ingredients
7 pandan leaves
50 millilitres water
5 eggs
150-200 grams sugar
250 millilitres coconut milk

Method
Roughly chop the pandan leaves and place in a small bowl with the water. Blend with a stick blender to a rough paste. Sieve the pandan leaves to make the pandan extract, pressing down with a spatula to extract the maximum green goodness.
Whisk together the eggs, sugar and coconut milk in a heatproof bowl. Whisk in the pandan extract.
Fill a saucepan with an inch or so of water, and bring to a simmer over a medium heat. Place the bowl over the saucepan. (Make sure the bowl fits snugly in the saucepan, and make sure that the water itself doesn't touch the base of the bowl).
Whisk the mixture over the heat until thickened. Many recipes say this takes 10 minutes; I find it always takes at least 30-40 minutes.
Allow to cool completely, then pour into a sterilized jar. Keep refrigerated.
It should last 1-2 weeks.

Have you made this recipe? Leave a comment below! Tag me on Instagram @sarahcooksblog and hashtag #sarahcooksblog

Hello hello! Hope you all had a fantastic Christmas and are enjoying this weird limbo holiday time between Christmas and New Year's. I for one, have lost track of the days and have been eating far too much leftover ham and mince pies. Here are my current obsessions, the summer edition!

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Kaya

Kaya

I briefly mentioned kaya in my last Obsessions post; let me expand on that a bit more now. I've always loved kaya (Malaysian coconut egg jam), and on my most recent trip to Europe in September, I brought a jar of kaya with me to give to Clarice so she could try it... but left it on the plane. D'oh! Shortly after I left Europe, she texted me saying that a local cafe in Paris had started serving kaya toast (on baguette, lol), so she could try it. Yay! That triggered a whole new level of kaya-obsession in me. I started a kaya toast series on Instagram: "A Kaya Toast a Day" sharing all the kaya toast photos I've taken over the last few years. I've made kaya a few times at home, using different recipes until I found the perfect one for me. I've been eating loads of kaya toast with half-boiled eggs. I even made some coconut kaya scrolls for a brunch party last week (you can see them at the top of this post). I'll be sharing the recipes for the kaya and the scrolls soon!

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Cats

Cats poster Image source: IMP awards

Cats. I saw the trailer for this when it first came out a few months ago, and I had QUESTIONS. Mainly: "Why?", "What the hell is this?", and "Whyyyy?"

The trailer showed this bizarre nightmare-scape full of weird realistic CGI cat-human hybrids belting out show tunes with LOTS of emotion. I knew I had to watch it. I love bad movies and anything camp. (Showgirls is another favourite). And I just needed to know more! I wouldn't shut up about it, and Sandra kindly took me to see it a couple of days ago. We were the only people in the cinema. It was a truly bizarre experience. I have no answers, only more questions.

How did they get such a stellar and diverse cast to appear in this film? (Judi Dench! Ian McKellen! Rebel Wilson! Idris Elba! Hyper-masculine Jason Derulo as Rum Tum Tugger, singing one of the campest songs I've ever heard!) Howwwwww?
Why is Judi Dench wearing a fur coat made of her own fur?
How on earth does Rebel Wilson unzip her fur to reveal - yet more fur and somehow a pink vest and shorts combination?
Why do the lady cats have boobs?
Why do some wear clothes?
Why do the cockroaches have faces?
Why any of this unholy nonsense?

I haven't seen the live action musical, but can only assume that the cat costumes make sense in the logic of the musical, and that theatre audiences expect to suspend disbelief. Importantly, the live action musical wouldn't have that terrifying uncanny realistic CGI thing going on.

A couple of positives: Taylor Swift's original song is beautiful (it plays over the end credits), and I've never wanted to stroke Dame Judi Dench more.

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Nusßmakronen / Hazelnut macaroons. Another Christmas recipe for you! These German cookies are soft and moist, and delightfully fragrant. They're quite luxurious but also quick to make, and easy to adapt to be gluten free. It's a great one to add to your Christmas cookie collection!

Nußmakronen

Nußmakronen ingredients

I found this recipe on The Daring Gourmet, a really great cooking blog with loads of German recipes! I've rewritten below, with my adaptions being to convert the measurements to metric and weights.

The ingredients are all supermarket staples, apart from the Back Oblaten, which we brought back from Germany when we were there for Christmas last year. Back Oblaten are German baking wafers, and are a standard ingredient over there. They're used as the base of Christmas cookies (and I suppose regular cookies too), and are almost tasteless - they remind me a bit of that edible rice paper that you sometimes see decorated in bright colours to top cupcakes.

I haven't seen Back Oblaten here on Australia, so I made sure to test a few macaroons without them. It works great without the Back Oblaten! So I'm happy to share the recipe here with you. Incidentally, the Back Oblaten contain wheat, and if you make these macaroons without them, they're gluten free.

Nusßmakronen mixture

The mixture is easy to make - just whisk the egg whites with salt until stiff, then gradually add sugar and cinnamon, before folding in some ground hazelnuts. You spoon the mixture out onto the wafers (or directly onto the baking paper if you're not using the Oblaten), press a little hazelnut into each one, and then bake.

Nußmakronen

Nußmakronen

The only added flavouring is a little dash of cinnamon, yet they somehow taste so complex and rich. I suppose it's the magic of the hazelnut meal! These keep quite well, so they're good to have in the cookie jar to pick at over a few days or even weeks.

Nußmakronen

Nußmakronen / Hazelnut Macaroons

Recipe adapted from The Daring Gourmet

Ingredients

3 egg whites

1/8 teaspoon salt

170 grams icing sugar, sifted

1/4 teaspoon cinnamon

250 grams hazelnut meal

24 x 50 millimetre Back Oblaten, optional

24 whole hazelnuts

Method

Preheat oven to 175C.

Whisk egg whites and salt until stiff. Gradually add icing sugar and cinnamon, while beating. Add hazelnut meal and fold in gently with a metal spoon.

If using the Backoblaten, arrange them on a lined baking sheet. Place approximately 2 teaspoons of mixture onto each Backoblaten.

If not using Backoblaten, spoon the mixture directly on a lined baking sheet.

Press a whole hazelnut into each macaroon.

Bake for 15 minutes, or until the outside is dry and the edges are starting to brown.

Remove from the oven and allow to cool before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely. Store in an airtight container.

Makes approx. 24

Mont Blanc. Crisp meringue, light-as-air vanilla-scented whipped cream, and gorgeous sweet chestnut purée. A real showstopper of a dessert that's surprisingly simple to make, and perfect for Christmas!

Jump to recipe

This year I really wanted to have a go making a proper Mont Blanc myself. Not only do I love them, but I was looking for a showstopping Christmas dessert that was free of both gluten and alcohol.

Mont Blancs can be presented lots of different ways - often at patisseries, the cream and chestnut are piled on top of a shortcrust pastry case filled with almond frangipane. Nigella has recipes for a large shareable Mont Blanc (How to be a Domestic Goddess) and individually portioned ones (the "quickly scaled" ones from How to Eat). For the former, she instructs you to pile chestnut puree over an upturned bowl (to help with the mountainous shape), then top it with whipped cream, meringues and grated chocolate. For her individually served ones, you simply place tinned chestnut purée in some glasses, and top it with a mixture of whipped cream, rum, sugar and crumbled meringues.

My favourite though, is the simple combo of crisp meringue, whipped cream and chestnut purée, just like at Angelina. That's what I made, and that's what's in the recipe below. I've suggested making one single dessert to share, as I do quite like the Massively Matriarchal Mono Mammary (to steal Nigella's turn of phrase). However you can really arrange and style the elements as you see fit. I also made a mini one on an individual saucer, and thought it was quite cute. The key thing I wanted to share in the recipe below are the actual recipes for the individual three elements (meringue, whipped cream, chestnut purée).

Mont Blanc and Mini Mont Blanc

Meringues and whipped cream are both simple (although I did use a gelatine-stablised whipped cream to help maintain the shape), but it took me absolutely ages to land on a suitable chestnut purée recipe. I wanted it to be as simple and reproducible as possible - so after much research and endless Pinteresting, ended up using tinned unsweetened chestnut purée, and simply processing it with sugar and vanilla, as per a recipe I found on Ricardo Cuisine. (You can also add rum if you're not avoiding alcohol). Super simple, and the results were delicious! (Roasting fresh chestnuts would have been way too much work, especially in Australian summer, and bought sweetened chestnut purées all have different textures and sweetness levels so would be too difficult to reproduce). Key tip: make sure you process the chestnuts until completely smooth, otherwise the chunks will get stuck in the piping bag nozzle.

I have a huge stash of egg whites in my freezer, so I made two meringue disks from scratch (plus a few mini meringues with excess mixture). But this is one case where I think you could definitely go for bought meringues, if it makes life easier, as you'll be covering them with whipped cream anyway. Ideally you want ones that are crisp all the way through, and again, you could make single-serve Mont Blancs on individual crisp meringue nests, or arrange a bunch of meringue nests together for a shared dessert.

The whipped cream has some vanilla and sugar in it, and I used gelatine to keep it stable. I don't think you strictly need to use gelatine (and doing it without gelatine means it would become suitable for vegetarians), but it does help to keep the shape and prevent it from collapsing over time. I personally enjoy the slightly jellied / moussey texture it brings as well.

So to assemble, I affixed a larger meringue disk to my serving plate with a little whipped cream, then topped it with more whipped cream, the smaller meringue disk, and then covered it completely in whipped cream to form the mountain.

Whipped cream mountain

And then it was a matter of piping the chestnut purée all over the mountain. I think there's definitely room for improvement with the presentation, and with practice I'll get more finessed at piping. But once it's was all done I was still super proud of it!

Mont Blanc

It's actually a super luxurious and elegant dessert - the smooth mealiness of the chestnut is so lovely against the light and airy cream, and the crisp meringue provides such a great contrast. Mont Blancs aren't that widely available here (compared to, say, France and Japan, where they're ubiquitous), so if it's a flavour you enjoy, I'd definitely suggest trying it at home!

Mont Blanc
A recipe by Sarah Cooks, Meringue from The Roux Brothers on Patisserie, stabilised whipped cream from Live Well Bake Often, Chestnut Purée from Ricardo Cuisine

Ingredients
For the meringue
2 egg whites (approx. 70 grams)
60 grams caster sugar
60 grams icing sugar, sifted
For the stabilised whipped cream
40 millilitres water
2 teaspoons powdered gelatine
500 millilitres whipping cream
60 grams icing sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
For the chestnut purée
1 x 435g can unsweetened chestnut purée
60 grams icing sugar
1 tablespoon dark rum (optional)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Method
To make the meringue, preheat the oven to 120C. Whisk the egg whites until soft peaks form. With the mixer running, add the caster sugar, a tablespoon at a time, and continue to beat for 5 minutes or until the mixture is firm and very smooth and shiny. Gradually sift in the icing sugar, folding it gently with a metal spoon.
Line two baking trays with baking paper. Pipe a 20cm circle and a 15cm circle, approx. 2.5 cm high. Pipe individual meringue kisses if you have any leftover meringue mixture and enjoy them as a snack.
Place the trays in the oven and immediately lower the oven temperature to 100C. Allow to cook for 90 minutes to 2 hours, or until the meringues are dry on the top and bottom. Remove from the oven and allow to cool completely before assembling.
To make the stabilised whipped cream, place the water in a small microwave safe bowl and sprinkle the gelatine evenly over. Microwave on high in 10 second bursts, stirring after each time, until the gelatine is dissolved. Set aside to cool.
Place the cream, sugar and vanilla extract in the bowl of an electric mixer and whisk until the mixture starts to thicken and soft peaks form. Turn the speed to low, and slowly pour in the gelatine mixture in a steady stream. Keep whisking until stiff peaks form. Set aside.
To make the chestnut purée, place the unsweetened chestnut purée, icing sugar, dark rum and vanilla extract in the bowl of a food processor. Whizz until completely smooth. (Be patient and keep going until it's completely smooth, otherwise you'll get chunks of chestnut stuck in the piping bag later!)
To assemble, place a small dollop of whipped cream on a serving platter, and gently press the largest meringue disk on top. Spoon the whipped cream over in a thick layer, then place the smaller meringue disk on top. Cover with more whipped cream and form into a big hill/mountain/dome shape. Smooth with an offset spatula. (You may not need all the cream).
Fit a piping bag with a 3mm plan nozzle. Fill with the chestnut purée. Pipe the purée in circles around the cream and meringue dome, until it is completely covered.
Refrigerate until it is time to serve, and dust generously with icing sugar just before serving.
Makes one big Mont Blanc, serves at least 8 people

Have you made this recipe? Leave a comment below! Tag me on Instagram @sarahcooksblog and hashtag #sarahcooksblog

Hi everybody! Can you believe Christmas is only ten days away? Aaaaaah! The year's gone by so quickly. I'm super excited for Christmas this year, and Christmas activities are already in full swing here in my house!

Christmas Cookies

Adventskranz - Christmas Wreath

Albert in the jungle

Weihnachtspyramide

Christmas Cookie Collection

Cut-out Cookies

Christmas Cookies 2

The next weekend I also baked Elisen Lebkuchen - they're a super luxe version of Lebkuchen (German gingerbread), moist and rich, and full of ground almonds and hazelnuts, Lebkuchen spice and citrus peel. I had them for the first time last year in Germany at Christmas (bought at a Christmas market) and fell in love with them. They're actually surprisingly easy to make and I'll share the recipe soon too!

Elisen Lebkuchen

Frikadellen, potato gratin, peas, carrots, gravy

Coles ham with crackling (not sponsored, just bloody delicious)

I'd never seen ham with crackling here in Australia, but they've recently started selling one at Coles and I was super curious to try. (This is not sponsored in any way, I just wanted to try it and I bought it). For the love of God I wonder why no one here has done it before. They have Pragerschinken in Germany which is ham with crackling, but Germans don’t really get the concept of crackling like Anglo cultures do, and it tends to be an accident or an afterthought, not fetishised or prized. In my extensive experience eating pork in Germany, crackling is meh or a bit soft or chewy with SOME crackly bits. Lappisch (or soft) is how I’d often describe it.

Anyway, long story short, the crackling ham from Coles was incredible. I loved it! It crackled up nice and easy and the flavour was great. Would buy again.

Serious Eats Hasselback potato gratin

For dessert I decided to push the boat out and made a Mont Blanc. There are lots of different ways this classic dessert can be made, but I followed the concept of my beloved Angelina Mont Blanc - just crunchy meringue, vanilla whipped cream, and chestnut purée. (This incidentally meant it was also gluten free and suitable for my coeliac friend).

Mont Blanc