Pastry Archives - Retro Food For Modern Times

Category: Pastry

11
Aug
2024

Crooked House – Tarte Tatin

categories: Apples, Dining With The Dame, France, Puff Pastry, Stand Alone, Tarts

Hello, crime readers and food lovers! Today’s Dining With The Dame delves into “Crooked House,” which is an absolute belter of a read! Typically, I prefer the Poirot or Marple novels, and standalone novels often fall short for me. However, this one is a delightful exception! The storyline is captivating, and Christie truly outdoes herself in crafting the villain.

Speaking of captivating, let’s transition to our culinary companion for this episode: Tarte Tatin. I selected this classic French dessert for a few reasons. Firstly, apples, a prominent motif in “Crooked House,” provided a thematic link. And, dare I say, there is a bad apple in the crooked house! Also, with the Paris Olympics in full swing, a touch of French flair seemed fitting. And finally, a well-executed Tarte Tatin is magnifique!

Crooked House – The Plot

“I think people more often kill those they love than those they hate . Possibly because only the people you love can really make life unendurable to you”

Agatha Christie – Crooked House

The plot of Crooked House is somewhat similar to Taken At The Flood which I covered last month. This time, we meet the Leonides family, the patriarch of which, Aristide Leonides has just been murdered. Someone, swapped his insulin for Eserine, a deadly poison contained in his eye medicine. Aristide had built up considerable wealth and members of his family stand to inherit a lot of money.

The family, and list of suspects include:

Brenda, Aristides young second wife, who may or may not be romatically involved with the tutor of his grandchildren, Laurence Brown
Roger and Clementine Leonides, one of Aristides brothers and his wife
Phillip Leonides and his wife, Magda West a (tryhard but largely unsuccessful actress played by Gillian Anderson in the 2017 adaptation)
Edith de Haviland, the sister of Aristides first wife who has lived with them since her sister’s death in order to take care of the children (played to perfection by Glenn Close in the 2017 adaptation)
Sophia Leonides, Aristides eldest grandchild and daughter of Phillip and Magda
Eustace Leonides the teenage son of Phillip and Magda
Josephine Leonides, the 12 year old daughter of Phillip and Magda
Laurence Brown, Eustace and Jospehine’s tutor

Charles Hayward, Sophia’s fiance is our amateur detective, working closely with Chief Inspecor Taverner and Detective Sergeant Lamb to find the killer.

Before we get there though, many things happen including

A missing will
Embezzlement
Josephine being attacked
Hidden love letters coming to light
The children’s nanny being poisoned by some deadly hot chocolate
The wrong people being arrested
A missing notebook that may hold the key to everything

It might not be a good thing that we have Charles trying to discover (as one of the covers below asks) who put the poison in the hypo. He is not, as they say, the sharpest tool in the shed. Despite the abundance of clues scattered throughout the text, he repeatedly overlooks them.

In fact, I found myself uncovering an unusual number of clues while reading “Crooked House,” far exceeding the usual number in Christie’s works. This abundance of hints led me to speculate on whether it was a deliberate strategy on Christie’s part. Given that “Crooked House” was published in 1949, I imagine the revelation of the villain must have been a truly shocking experience for readers of the time. It’s possible that Christie meticulously planted these clues to soften the impact of the eventual reveal for contemporary audiences. If you have read this, please let me know your thoughts on this!!!!

Crooked House – The Covers

I was very happy to be able to include a Greek cover here as the Leonides family are Greek in origin. I was also very glad to see that one of the covers featured an apple. This, vindicated my somewhat unusual choice of dish! There are lots of crooked houses which are to be expected, including one growing out of a ladies head, which is not. I don’t understand the rather scruffy looking chicken. And as for the creepy hell clown? No. Just no.

The Recipe: Tarte Tatin

There was no one in sight as we drove up to the front door. I paid the taxi and it drove away. I felt uncertain whether to ring the bell or to walk in. The front door was open. As I stood there hesitatiing I heard a sound behind me. I turned my head sharply. Josephine, her face partially obscured by a very large apple was standing in the opening of the yew hedge looking at me”

Agatha Christie – Crooked House

I broke off. Josephine had emerged from the door leading to the drawing room. She was eating the inevitable apple, and over its round rosiness her eyes sparkled with a kind of ghoulish enjoyment.

“Nannie’s been poisoned,” she said. “Just like grandfather. It’s awfully exciting, isn’t it?”

Agatha Christie – Crooked House

Links To The Christieverse

None that I picked up on – but please let me know if you found something!

Other Food & Drinks Mentioned in Taken At The Flood

Cocktails
Coffee x3
Whisky
Sweets
Wholesome nursery food
Queer rice dishes
Chocolate
Drinks
Scrambled eggs on toast
Apple x 2
Nourishing Soup
Cocoa
Ice Cream Soda

In September, we’re going Marple-ing. A Murder is Announced will be our next read.

Have a great week!

25
Sep
2021

Melktert

categories: 1970's recipes, Africa, Good Housekeeping World Cookery, Pastry, World Cooking

My recipe for Melktert comes from the South African chapter of Good Housekeeping’s World Cookery and it is a baked custard tart. It is called Melktert because the day before the recipe for the OG Milk Tart went to print, someone broke into the printing press and stole all bar one of the vowels.

Some people would tell you that it is a dish that originated in Holland and it kept the Dutch spelling when it came to South Africa. However, we at RFFMT prefer not to allow truth to get in the way of a good story. Besides the visual image of a never say die printer triumphantly adding e’s to where the i and a had been, humming a prototypical version of The Shamen’s 1992 hit Ebeneezer Goode as he did so was too good not to share.

I pondered whether in homage to the melktert, I should also write this post using the letter e as my only vowel.

That idea lasted all of about 5 seconds – I got as far as “Here. Melktert. Sweet” and gave up.

The Melktert was delicious! Just the right amount of sweetness and the almonds on top gave a nice crunch. There was a lot of the filling mix leftover so I think next time I make it I will try a deeper dish which would also mean there would be more of the slightly cinnamon-y custard which could only be s a good thing! The recipe does state a deep pie dish!

Melktert :The Recipe

That’s all folks, nothing much else to say except:

Melktert – Excellent? Yes!

Enjoy your weekend!

14
Jun
2020

Tackling Food Waste

categories: Curry, Pastry, Rice

One of my goals this year was to reduce food waste. One of the downfalls of blogging, and being in cookbook club, is that I often buy ingredients of which I only need a small amount. Add to this my penchants for stocking up when things are on sale and buying things well…just because. As a result, my freezer and pantry are jam-packed and I sometimes forget about fresh produce in the fridge until it is too far gone to use.

Last year, I stole an idea off Jenny from Silver Screen Suppers and implemented a dairy shelf in my fridge. All dairy items go onto it which means I can keep track of those items a bit better. To twist the old phrase around “In sight, in mind”.

Recently I have also (maybe also inspired by Jenny???) implemented a “Use By Shelf” that contains the items that need to be used in the near future. Again, I have found that keeping these items front of mind has helped me to ensure that they are used in a timely manner.

Fridge Freezer Pantry Week

My latest endeavour is Fridge, Freezer, Pantry week where one week a month I minimise my shopping and cook as much as possible from items in….wait for it…my fridge, freezer and pantry.

Bet you never saw that one coming given the ambiguous name of the challenge!

My aim for this week is to only buy fresh fruit and vegetables. Everything else has to come from you know where!

Here is how the first attempt at this went

Sunday Night – Baked Lobster!

Cos, you know, if you’re going to start something, start it with a bang!

I bought lobster tails at Christmas when they were on sale. They came from the freezer. Everything else came from the pantry.
The recipe called for fennel. I didn’t have any. Normally I would have bought some but this week? I had some dill leftover from the potato bake so I used that instead.
I also subbed in Worchestershire sauce for the anchovy essence the recipe demanded.

This was an okay dish. I think the white sauce dulled the flavour of the lobster a bit which prevented it from being a great dish. I would not make it again which is why I have not included the recipe. If you want it, let me know. I don’t know why you would but hey, you do you!

Monday Night – South American Chicken and Rice

This was amazing! Diana Henry’s from Oven to Table is our current Tasty Reads selection and so far every dish has been a winner.

This recipe used chicken from the freezer and rice and black beans from the pantry. The only things I bought specially to make this was a punnet of cherry tomatoes and some chicken stock.

I did not use fresh peppers, I had some in a jar which I used instead. There were also chillies and garlic in that jar so I added them in too.

There was a lot of this leftover and given I had the potato bake and some soup to eat for lunches I made little one-serving packages of this and popped in the freezer for future use.

Tuesday night – Pizza

Earlier in the week Mum dropped off a heat and eat pizza. Someone had given her two and we benefitted from her surplus. I had film club that night so this was a perfect night for the Fussiest eater in the World to pop something in the oven whilst I chatted about the pros and cons of Revolutionary Road with my friends.

It was ok. Not as good as pizza shop pizza but better than frozen / supermarket pizza.

Wednesday – Bacon, Halloumi and Vegetable Pasties

A little while back I made the veggie pasties from Jamie Oliver’s Veg. I had a LOT of the leftover vegetable mix so I popped it in the freezer. The halloumi and pastry also came from the freezer.

The bacon came from the use-by shelf. 😇

I bought nothing for this meal and it was delicious!!!! Believe me, the picture does this no justice!

Thursday and Friday – Lamb and Cashew Curry

Oh. Wow. This was AMAZING!!!!

I used Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall’s Lamb and Cashew Curry for this.

I had to buy cashew nuts and coriander for this but it was worth every cent! This was divine! The lamb was melt in the mouth tender and the cashew gravy was lick your plate clean good!

Oh! I intended to make some flatbreads for the curry but ended up just serving it with rice. I bought some oat bran for the flatbreads which I did not end up using. Grrrr. 😡

Saturday – Squid, Chorizo and Chickpea Salad

Yay! I got to use those chickpeas on the Use By shelf!

I bought some oregano for this. It was marked way down. TBH though, I would have been happy with the leftover coriander from the curry.

Oh lord, I dropped my recipe for this into the frying pan that had all the chorizo oil in it! Luckily I was able to find it here!

My favorite dishes…I tried so hard to come up with just one but it really was a tie between the curry, the pasties and the South American Chicken Rice!

The Positives

Eating out of the fridge, freezer, and pantry created some amazing meals. Having said that, I had a lot of things in those places that made it easy!
Pretty much everything on the use by shelf got eaten.
I spent WAY less money than in a ” normal” week of shopping
I also feel I threw out fewer items than usual.
It was really fun to build my menus around the items that needed using!
Being conscious of not wasting anything also made me more proactive about ensuring that the leftover South American Chicken and the soup I was having for lunch were also frozen up for future use.

The Negatives

On Saturday morning I had to throw out an untouched bunch of broccolini which I could have used in the pasties.
We also threw out a whole cucumber, some ratty-looking chives and some bean sprouts
I now have pretty much a whole punnet of oregano to use, which even though it was bought highly reduced I have no further use for and which I don’t think really worked in the salad for which it was bought.
I bought that oat bran I never ended up using. One more thing in the pantry….

The Learnings

Keep a much closer eye on the produce drawers
Don’t buy things for which you have only one use (even if they are on sale)
Keep using what I have
Try to shop more than once a week for fresh produce so that things do not languish in that produce drawer
Take tips from the experts.

Whilst a few things went into the freezer and a few things went into the bin, on the whole I was really happy with my first attempt at fridge, freezer pantry week. It made me conscious of things that I need to be doing all the time and of how I can make the best use of what I already have. More than that though, it inspired me to keep going and to really get my act together when it comes reducing the food I waste.

This is what the useby shelf looked like by the end of the week. The four containers at the back are three serves of a cottage pie the Fussiest Eater in the World made for his work dinners and the last of the pasties.

I didn’t quite get through all that hummus but resisted the urge to buy another tub when I went shopping this week.

The three new containers hold some of the leftover chorizo and chickpea salad, and half an onion and half a lemon that I used to make it. That oregano is also there…😣

My favorite dishes…I tried so hard to come up with just one but it really was a tie between the curry, the pasties and the South American Chcken Rice!

If anyone has any tips on what to do with it, please let me know!

Indeed if you have any tips on reducing food waste, food management, etc please send them through, I would love to hear how you meal plan and your ideas on how to reduce waste. I have only just started this journey and know I have a LONG way to go before I get this mastered, so any advice I can benefit from will be greatly appreciated!

Have a great week! Stay safe and reduce waste!

14
Jan
2020

Pasties (inspired by Cornwall)

categories: Cornwall, England, Pastry, Travel, United Kingdon, World Cooking

We have had a few wet days this week (not complaining if it will put out some of the fires that are burning out of control). But the rather damp summer weather reminded of being in England last year and most particularly our trip to Cornwall where it rained buckets for the first two days. Which in turn reminded me of that great staple of Cornish food, the pasty! These are everywhere in Cornwall, well all through England actually, but eating proper Cornish Pasties was the very first thing we did when we got to St Ives. BTW, the people of Cornwall are tremendously possessive of their pasties. It is for this reason that I am not calling my version Cornish Pasties. Mine are more Cornish-ish Pasties.

We had an odd discussion after I ordered our pasties at the bakery.

“What did you call them?” asked the fussiest eater in the world.

“Pasties” In Australia, we pronounce these with a long A. Pah-sties.

Apparently, the correct pronunciation is with a short” A” like in “pastel”.

I can’t get on board with this, even if it is technically correct. They will always, and only ever be, pah-sties to me. If you’re British or a pedant, knock yourself out with that short A. For those of you not familiar with pasties or pah-sties, just remember that it is never pronounced “Paste-ies”. They are what strippers put on their nips and not delicious beef and veg cooked to perfection in a pastry case!

The pasties in Cornwall are crimped to perfection, each one the exact replica of its neighbour. Mine were a little bit more….hmmmm…let’s call them individualistic.

The perfectly shaped pasty:

Mine:

Pasties came about as food for Cornish tin miners. Originally, the pastry was just to protect the meat and veg from the dirt inside the mines so I guess that a few misshapen pastry shells would not have mattered back in the day!

There is a great article from The Guardian about the history (and contents) of the pasty which you can read here. My favourite bit of that article is the legend that the Devil was scared to cross the River Tamar from Devon because the women of Cornwall were renown for putting anything and everything into their pasties. Imagine popping down to your local bakery for a Satan Pastie! Although actually not quite everything – the carrot – which you will see in many recipes for pasties is a big no-no in the traditional recipes. Potatoes, swedes and onions are the only veg your pasty needs! It also needs LOTS of pepper.

Swedes are such funny things! I only recently found out that the colour difference in the swede is due to the white part growing underground and the purple part growing above ground!

I pretty much followed the recipe given by the Cornish Pasty Association except that I used bought shortcrust pastry! Another legend says that the pastry needs to be solid enough to be dropped down a mineshaft (and land) without falling apart. Mine were going from the oven to my lunchbox so I didn’t have to worry about their structural integrity so much!

Let’s wrap this baby up and pop it in the oven. While it’s baking away, let’s have a look at some of pics of St Ives and Mont St Michel.

This would be a great hill to have a picnic on. Get some pasties to go and enjoy the view!

Here is another article from the Guardian about where and how to eat your pasties. I actually think they are great for picnics as the pastry holds in the heat of the filling for a while. As for condiments – ketchup and the more of it the better for me. Maybe a teeny splash of tabasco with it!

This is The Sloop Inn where we stayed in St Ives.

And here is St Michael’s Mount. You can only reach this at low tide otherwise the causeway is underwater!

Let’s take a peek at our pasties…ah perfectly done!!!

What always astonishes me with pasties is how the meat and veg cooks exactly at the same time as the pastry. You never get any hard lumps of raw potato. It truly is like magic!!!! Now, where’s that ketchup?

Cornwall is so beautiful. I was really happy to be reminded of the trip and all the delicious food we ate there!. I made these pasties way back in October and just writing about them has made me want to make them again. Let’s hope the weather stays bad so I can get baking!

And finally, if you can’t get enough of pasties, here are some more facts….oops! I just realised I crimped my pasties in the Devonshire way! Good thing I said right from the get-go that these were only Cornish-ish (Cornish adjacent?) pasties!!!!

Have a great week everyone!!!!

20
Aug
2019

Honey, I Shrunk the Pies!

categories: Cook A Long, Desserts, Pastry, Pastry Desserts, Pieathalon, Vintage Recipes

Happy Pieathalon People of the internet! Yep, it’s that special time of year when a group of bloggers get together and bake the good, the bad and the ugly of vintage pies! It’s also my birthday week so it’s double the celebrations for me! Pie and champagne! Life, my friends, is good indeed!😍

Let’s get down to it, shall we?

The Pie

Pie choice day is always exciting. What will that email from Yinzerella reveal? There is always a slight worry in the excitement – I am happy to have an odd pie – but not too odd. One of my favourite parts of Pieathalon is that I get to eat a pie so I always give a little silent prayer. “Please do not let this contain anything disgusting like offal or beetroot. Or sugary onions.” Speaking of the sugary onions, my recipe came from The Nostalgic Cook who sent Jenny the Sweet Onion Pie recipe last year!

Luckily the Gods, (and Kari and Yinzerella) smiled down on me. The pie I received was a gorgeous sounding Honey Cream Cheese Pie from Sunset’s New Kitchen Cabinet Cookbook from 1938. It is described as a “not-quite-so rich version of the very rich German Cheesecake. This Honey Cream Cheese Pie will be welcomed by everyone”. It was more than welcomed by me. I had most of the ingredients which is important when you are leaving the country for a month! I did not want to buy things only to have to throw away any leftovers because we were going away!

This book looks great. I love the little cartoony insets. The recipe page also had a v cute cartoon for a less than appealing sounding carrot mould.

Speaking of which…remember a few Pieathalons ago, when I made the Lime Jello Pie? I totally forgot that I had moved it to the fridge in the garage so the housesitters could use the main fridge. When I opened the garage fridge about a week after we got home, it was like I had just put it in there. It had not changed one iota in the month it had been in there.

Terrifying!!!!!

The Song

Every year I get a song stuck in my head at Pieathalon time. For my first Pieathalon it was Waterloo by Abba. For the lime jello pie I went a bit hair-metal and subbed in the words “Lime Jello Pie” into “Sweet Cherry Pie”

There were two contenders this year. The first was, of course “Sugar Pie Honey Bunch” by the Four Tops. But nah, too obvious. The song that stuck was “Honey Child, what can I do?” by The Ballad of The Broken Seas. Which became Honey Pie what can I do? Which then morphed into….no, we’ll get to that…

Ch…ch…changes

The recipe for the pie says that it is big! Enough for 8 which was way too big given our impending departure. There were three eggs in the original recipe and everything else was easily divisible by three so I decided to make a third of the original recipe. And also that small pies were going to be easier to distribute out if we didn’t eat them all. It might be weird to give the neighbours who are picking up our mail a half-eaten pie. But I think, perfectly acceptable to give them a few freshly baked tartlets as a pre-emptive thank you.

The Bake aka Honey Pie what did I do?

I baked my pies on Saturday afternoon where there was a LOT happening. We were still booking some accommodation so there was stuff happening on the internet, there were phone calls, there was washing and packing and I don’t know just a lot of things going on. I was also obsessing about the nutmeg. Personally, I don’t like it so was trying to decide if I used it on all of the pies, or none or some.

But the making of the pies went perfectly. There was enough mixture for the 6 small pies and some leftover. I had a little taste of the raw filling, it was really good!!! I nutmegged three of the six tarts, popped them in the oven and went to hang out the washing.

When I came back inside I noticed a jug of milk on the bench. And realised that I had totally left the milk out of the recipe!!!!

It was too late to do anything about it. I briefly contemplated pulling the pies out of the oven, scraping out the filling, adding the milk and refilling them but they were already a little bit too set for that.

So, there was nothing to do but to sit and wait to see how these milkless tarts would turn out.

My song quickly became “Honey pies what did I do?”

The Verdict

The honey cream cheese pies looked so gorgeous when they came out of the oven, gorgeous golden domes. The smell of the baking was divine. And they tasted delicious!

We had one each while they were still warm from the oven and they were like a cross between a cheesecake and a Portuguese tart. So tasty.

I don’t know what the milk would have done to these but they were so good without it that I will not add it in when I make these again, which I will definitely do!

We had no leftovers to give neighbours or anyone else! I ate the last one the following night as we waited for the Uber to take us to the airport. With a little glass of sparkling wine, it was the perfect end to Pieathalon 2019 and the start of the holiday!

Thanks as ever to the amazing Yinzerella who organises this whole shebang each year!

You can find her Pieathalon recipe over at Dinner is Served 1972 and check out all the other pieathletes per the links below. Why not start with Kelly over at the Velveteen Lounge who got my recipe for Angel Pie?

Here is the full list of this year’s participants. Some of the links will not be working yet, I will update later today as people post their recipes!

Battenburg Belle baked Betty Crocker’s Hawaiian Pie

Doctor Bobb made a Macaroon Pie

Camilla channeled Alf from Home and Away and made a Flaming peach pie!

Yinzeralla got surreal with a Dali Oasis Leek Pie

Greg got arty, but did not choke on his Artichoke pie

Jenny found her inner Italian with a spaghetti pie

Kaci at the Homicidal Homemaker bammed some berries and produced some Bamberry turnovers

Kari at The Nostalgic Cook, who provided my recipe got a bit saucy with a Cheese Applesauce Pie

Kelly, the angel over at Velveteen Lounge made my Angel Pie

Surly got a Salmon Custard Pie. Oh dear, I might be surly too….

Peter whipped up some low calorie goodness with a Weight Watchers Cherrie Pies…?

Poppy made Banana Split Pie…I do hope she didn’t fall on the peel!

SS got fidgety with a Huntingdon fidget pie

And finally, here is the musical accompaniment for this post!

Thanks again to Yinzerella for organising this and Kari for the fab recipe!

Have a great week!