Pink Praline Shortbread

I had a massive craving for shortbread recently, it's one of my favourite biscuits and I try not to buy it very often as it doesn't last long enough. I love the crumbly butteryness of shortbread especially with strawberries and clotted cream in the summer. I also tend to restrict myself to how often I make my own shortbread as again I seem to munch my way through it too quickly. However I was having one of those days working at home where I didn't seem to be getting very far and the biscuit tin was empty. I didn't just want plain shortbread though so I went cupboard raiding. This is something I've been doing quite a bit lately in an effort to use up half empty packets and avoid having to go shopping again. My recent cranberry and cinnamon cupcakes with chocolate maple buttercream were a great success for cupboard raiding. For this cupboard excavation - my cupboards really aren't that big - I chanced upon a packet of pink pralines that I bought in France last year. I'd seen Michel Roux Jr make a pink praline tart on an episode of Master Chef ages ago and thought it looked very pretty. It didn't look overly complicated and I thought that maybe one day I might give it a try. Sadly after buying the pralines I realised that I didn't like them very much, they were tooth achingly sweet and had a weird after taste from all the food colouring. Even my boyfriend who has a very sweet tooth didn't like them so after only sampling a few they languished at the back of the cupboard and even moved house with us. They were quite expensive and I still had visions of making that tart so I kept hold of them. I checked the packet a couple of weeks ago and the best before date was January this year, but considering the nuts are enclosed in a thick casing of sugar I figured they'd still be OK.

To incorporate the pink pralines into the shortbread I whizzed them up in the food processor to a coarse powder. I will warn you now that if you give this a go it will make a terrible racket, the neighbours must have wondered what on Earth I was doing! The pralines need a good 5 minutes or so on full power to pulverise them, of course this depends on how powerful your machine is and the sharpness of the blade.  I still ended up with a few chunks but this is fine for a bit of extra texture.

The good news is that when baked into shortbread the pink pralines now taste good, the food colouring after taste is toned down by the biscuit dough and they come out a pretty pink colour. You don't need to go to France to buy pink pralines, there are several places selling them online. This is good news for me as I only have a few left in the packet and I want to make this shortbread again, and one day I will make the pink praline tart too.

Ingredients - makes around 24 depending on cutter size

150g pink pralines
100g caster sugar
200g butter
300g plain flour

• Preheat the oven to 180C
• In a food processor whizz the pink pralines to a coarse powder then transfer to a bowl
• Add the sugar, butter and flour to the processor and whizz until you get a sandy texture, return the pralines to the processor and keep processing until a dough ball forms. Turn of the processor and bring the dough together by hand. 
• Roll out on a lightly floured surface to just under 1cm thick and cut out shapes. I used a 7cm flower shaped cutter.
• Transfer to a non stick baking tray or a tray lined with greasproof paper and bake for 15 minutes until just firm to the touch. Cool on a wire rack.

I'm entering these into Tea Time Treat run by Karen (this month's host) and Kate where the theme this month is biscuit and cookies.

Green Mango & White Chocolate Blondies

When I found out that the theme for We Should Cocoa this month was mango I was initially stumped. It's not a combination I've tried before. Instead of using fresh mango I decided have a go at using dried green mango. If you haven't come across it before it's made from fully grown unripe or green mangoes. The fruit is prepared and then dried before being lightly sweetened with sugar. The flavour is quite tart and zingy and reminds me of those sour sweets I used to buy in pick and mix bags as a child. At first they taste sweet but then as the sugar dissolves on your tongue you get the sharp hit that is strangely addictive.  As the green mango is quite sharp I thought pairing it with sweet white chocolate would work well, to cut through the sweetness of the chocolate and to stop the mango from being too tart.

For these blondies I used the recipe from the Gü Chocolate Cookbook and added 75g of chopped dried green mango to the mixture. The blondies are made in the same way as brownies by melting together 100g unsalted butter, 40g honey and 280g white chocolate. To this molten mixture 4 eggs beaten together with 180g caster sugar are added along with 190g plain flour, 1/2 tsp of baking powder and the 75g dried green mango. The blondies are then baked at 170C for 20-25 minutes in a 20cm square tin until just golden on top but still soft and gooey in the middle. However I found that I needed to bake the blondies for longer than the recipe stated. They looked done after 25 minutes but as they were cooling and I had a sneaky sample and I realised the middle blondies were still raw so they went back in the oven. I got distracted by something and left them in a little too long so they ended up a bit caramelised. This is why I only have a couple of blondies for the photos, these were from the corners of the tin and didn't need to go back in the oven as they cooked through a bit quicker. Even though I overbaked the remaining blondies they were still very moreish and I will bake these again but will have to fiddle with the temperature on my oven so they bake properly next time.

I'm entering these into We Should Cocoa run by Choclette and Chele, this month's host is Shaheen from Allotment 2 Kitchen. I'm also entering these into Made With Love Mondays.

 

Review: Graviti Pro Electric Pepper Grinder by Ozeri

Freshly ground black pepper is an absolute essential in my kitchen, in fact one of the first things that I bought for my kitchen supplies when I moved into student halls nearly 8 years ago was a pepper grinder. I think I was the only one of us in our shared kitchen to have a pepper grinder. I still have that pepper grinder and it's served me well but I was given the opportunity to try a new type of electric pepper grinder so I thought I'd give it a go. The Graviti Pro electric pepper grinder is different from other models because it is operated by gravity. All you need to do is flip it over (after removing the lid and pressing the power button in the base) to get freshly ground pepper. The grinder is ceramic and there is a screw that can be adjusted to change the grind settings from coarse to fine, however I didn't find that there was much difference between them. That said, the pepper seems to come out at a medium grade which for me is fine. The grind settings are operated from the top so this prevents the mess that often comes out of the bottom of a manual grinder.

This is the first electric pepper grinder I've tried and so far I've been quite impressed with it. It's very easy to use once the batteries have been put in, I was a bit surprised to see that it needs 4 AA batteries but they are included. The fact that you can use the grinder in one hand is a great advantage when cooking a dish that requires regular stirring e.g. a risotto as using this grinder means you can keep on stirring the pot whilst seasoning at the same time. There is a handy light that turns on when the grinder is inverted so you can see exactly where the pepper is going, ideal for low light situations. It also has a fingerprint resistant grip, meaning that even if you use it with greasy or sticky hands whilst cooking, it won't look grubby. The only part that I was a bit disappointed with was the size of the pepper chamber, it doesn't hold very much which means it will need refilling more often, however for most people this probably wouldn't be a problem.

Ozeri are an established brand in the USA that began by supplying hotels with equipment and they are now looking to expand into the UK. A selection of their products including this grinder are available to buy from Amazon.

Disclaimer: I was sent the pepper grinder to review. All views and opinions are my own