Featured Recipe
Ras el Hanout Buttermilk Loaf Cake with Rose Icing
Tuesday, December 09, 2025| |
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The cake is beautifully moist, rich and super comforting and has a very earthy flavour thanks to the North African spice blend ras el hanout. The spice mix works surprisingly well in this sweet buttermilk cake and rose syrup icing complements the spiciness perfectly.
Ras el Hanout, meaning 'top of the shop', is a popular spice blend used in Moroccan, Tunisian, and Algerian cuisines. This vibrant, warm and comforting spice blend comes in many different varieties with different ingredients. Common ingredients include cardamom, saffron, cumin, clove, cinnamon, nutmeg, mace, allspice, dry ginger, chili peppers, rose buds, coriander seed, peppercorn, sweet and hot paprika, fenugreek, and dry turmeric, but ras el hanout can contain up to 100 spices. It is perfect for tagines, couscous & vegetables, as a marinade and much more.
Coconut and Grapefruit Bars
Monday, November 10, 2025| |
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A fun twist on a classic lemon bar, these coconut grapefruit bars come together quickly using sweet yet tangy fresh-squeezed grapefruit juice. Don’t use storebought grapefruit juice as it usually contains added sugar which masks the fruit's natural tanginess.
The combination of the citrusy grapefruit topping and the buttery coconuty base creates a delightful contrast that keeps you coming back for more! These are so easy to make and a perfect dessert for a party or potluck. If you’re a fan of citrus desserts, I’m sure you will enjoy these pretty pinky bars. Since grapefruits are naturally milder, so I have added some lemon juice to the curd, making it more tangy. But you can absolutely use just grapefruit juice.
Brush the buttery crust with two egg yolks after blind baking it before adding the topping. This extra step creates not only a more flavourful, glossy finish, but also a barrier that prevents the topping from making the crust soggy.
Fig Leaf Tahini Cake
Wednesday, October 29, 2025| |
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This is an easy autumnal dessert that infuses the subtle sweetness, earthy greenness and tropical aromas of humble fig leaves into a moist and flavourful cake with tahini for extra nuttiness and richness. It is a perfect teatime treat served with a dollop of whipped cream and extra fresh figs. The fig leaf serves as a natural and aromatic alternative to traditional parchment paper and imparts a subtle, aromatic flavour to baked goods. You can serve the cake either with fig slices or fig leaf facing up. Cashew butter or sunflower seed butter would be ideal substitutes for tahini.
Pumpkin Cheesecake Brownies
Monday, September 29, 2025| |
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Super chocolaty, moist and with a fine pumpkin cheesecake swirl: these pumpkin brownies literally melt in your mouth! Served with a hot cup of tea, they really put one in the mood for autumn.
Is there really pumpkin in there? DEFINITELY! The all-rounder Hokkaido is mixed into the brownie as a pumpkin cheesecake swirl. It not only gives the little chocolate cake a visual upgrade, but also a special juiciness and mild sweetness. Spices such as cinnamon, nutmeg and allspice are also included and make this autumnal treat perfect. If you like, you can also add a little ginger or simply use pumpkin pie spice blend. Fancy a little crunch? Then stir in some chopped nuts or pumpkin seeds to the batter.
Walnut Fig Quickbread
Tuesday, September 09, 2025| |
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This foolproof hearty quickbread is studded with rich, chewy figs and crunchy, earthy walnuts and lightly sweetened with erythritol, best served warm with some whipped ricotta, nut butter or honey. You can sub in olive oil, coconut oil, or butter for the walnut oil. I used white spelt flour, but a combination of whole and white flour would work lovely too. Perfect for breakfast or an afternoon treat.
Fig Spelt Galette with Goat Cheese
Sunday, September 07, 2025| |
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A rustic, freeform pastry made with spelt flour, filled with caramelised red onions, fresh figs, combined with goat cheese and refined with fresh rosemary. For the pastry, I used spelt flour, which goes particularly well with figs thanks to its nutty flavour. However, you can just as easily use regular wheat flour.
Whether as a starter, main course or party snack, the fig spelt galette is sure to be a real eye-catcher on any table. If time is tight, you can of course use ready-made dough from the supermarket for your galette.
Yeasted Honey Cornbread
Tuesday, August 12, 2025| |
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Level up your cornbread game with this tender, airy yeast-leavened honey cornbread, a great twist on the classic Southern staple. The bread has a light, airy texture with just right amount of chewiness. Serve it warm with a dollop of ricotta and a drizzle of honey for a simple treat. The bread makes wonderful toast in the morning and great sandwiches too.
Blueberry Rolls
Tuesday, July 15, 2025| |
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The creative yeast buns swirled with butter and blueberry jam, and topped with a lilac icing, are soft, tender and in a league of their own. In summer, the blueberry rolls are best baked with fresh blueberries, in winter you can use frozen fruit. This means you can enjoy these blueberry rolls all year round. Whether for breakfast or in the afternoon with coffee and tea: such wonderfully fluffy, tender buns always put you in a good mood.
Poppyseed Cake
Wednesday, June 25, 2025| |
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With a fun quilt pattern, this poppyseed cake with a cheesecake topping really makes a statement. Not only does it look great, but it also tastes fabulous. This cake recipe offers a little variety and a wow flavour experience that you don’t want to miss out. Schmand is German sour cream with a much higher fat content than regular sour cream. No Schmand, no problem, use crème fraîche instead. If you're feeling adventurous, swapping some homemade eggnog for the buttermilk. I have baked this cake for a few times with different ingredients and temperatures, and the first time I prepared the batter with eggnog and baked at 190C/375F for 50 minutes for a more golden topping. The cake was very tender on first day, and became slightly dry on the 2nd day, but still very good. Other times all with buttermilk and baked at 180C/350 for 45 minutes until lightly browned and it stayed very tender and soft even after 3rd day.
Raisin Muffins with Coconut Macaroon
Tuesday, June 17, 2025| |
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Are you on team muffins or team cupcakes? Personally I prefer unfrosted muffins with a classic domed muffin top to cupcakes, which can be quite sugary sweet and unhealthy, though much more decorative and prettier. You can add nuts, seeds, fruits or other mix-ins to make muffins really interesting and less guilty. The batter of these muffins come together really quickly. However, I decided to make these muffins with creaming method, so the texture is much more airy and lighter, and add a coconut macaroon top, just for fun and extra chew. If you want to use muffin-method (combine the dry and wet ingredients separately, then combine them), you definitely can.
Rosemary and Comté Madeleines
Friday, June 13, 2025| |
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These savory French madeleines are moist, tender, and filled with wonderful cheesy herbal flavour from nutty French Comté and fresh piney rosemary. They're best eaten warm from the oven, but will keep in an airtight container for up to two days. Enjoy it with a glass of Champagne.
If the madeleines didn't get the signature humps or bumps, it is likely that the batter wasn't cold enough. It is the heat shock of baking a cold cake batter on a very hot oven that creates the bumps. So make sure that you chill the batter for at least 2 hours. I left mine overnight. Don’t over fill the mould cavities, or the batter will overflow, and your madeleines will be flattened.
Tahini Raspberry Crumb Cake
Tuesday, June 10, 2025| |
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This nutty fruity crumb cake is perfect for brunch, as a dessert or an afternoon pick-me-up. They are scrumptious by themselves, with some clotted cream or a scoop of vanilla ice cream. Instead of butter, I used tahini to make the streusel, and sweetened the whole cake with a mix of date syrup and erythritol. If you want to make this gluten free, replace white spelt flour with oat flour.


