Homemade yogurt in a family size pot!

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Love the flower shaped pot!

Deceptively simple and totally delicious…
Ingredients list:
1 litre of organic whole milk
1 pot of live yogurt (and subsequently some off your latest batch…)
Half the yogurt pot of sugar
One full pot of powdered milk
2 tsp of orange blossom water

Warm the milk to 50°C – check with a jam thermometer if possible or just the back of your hand: warm but not burning! Leave it for 5 min. then take it off the hob to add the other ingredients. I use the yogurt pot to measure everything else for ease. Add the powdered milk, the sugar and flavouring and put it back on the hob for 4 to 5 minutes until all is dissolved. Do not let it go too hot. Add the live yogurt and whisk briskly.

Pour into individual glass pots or jam jars or a large glass container as here. This recipe will make enough yogurt for a family for a few days- if you eat yogurt every day.

Put the pots in a slightly warm oven (50°) and leave them for 8 hours. I myself put it as I went to bed and woke up the next day after my 9 hours sleep with perfectly creamy yogurt to enjoy for breakfast – Bliss! The result was a set yogurt with an incredibly creamy consistency and the cleanest taste ever.


Tonight I shall do the same but this time I ‘ll leave the sugar out and use the zest of a bergamot I have purchased from Natoora… Pure luxury shopping! Can’t wait to taste my Earl Grey flavoured yogurt tomorrow…


This recipe was inspired by a lengthy search on the Internet and specifically by conversations going on the lovely illustrated site tambouille.fr.

Broccolis oat crumble

>I love a savoury crumble as much as a sweet one and this is a lovely warming dish for fencing off the chill!

2 broccolis

One tub of ricotta

One egg

Olive oil

Nutmeg

Salt and pepper

Some milk

1 cupfull of oats

Parsley

Wholemeal flour 50g

Butter 50g

Steam the broccolis florets then put them in a bowl and toss a tub of ricotta, one egg, a dash of olive oil, salt and pepper. Add a pinch of nutmeg and a spoonful of milk if the mix is a bit stiff. Be wary to use salt sparingly because the flavour enhancer here is nutmeg.

Spread into an oven-proof dish and set aside.

Now you are ready to make the topping:

Mix the oats, chopped parsley, more nutmeg, a bit of sea salt, some wholemeal flour and just enough butter to bind it all together. I add a tsp of wheat-germ for the healthy vitamins. You need to use the tip of your fingers to rub all the ingredients together until the feel is crumbly enough…

Sprinkle the topping over the broccolis until most of it is covered.

Put in a warm oven, grill on, for half hour.

Serve warm with some whipped yogurt.

Apple and blackberry crumble

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4 to 5 Bramley apples
A handful of frozen blackberries
A good cupful of rolled oats
A tsp of oats bran
Half a deck of cards of butter
A cup of brown granulated sugar
A Tsp of flour
A tsp of cornflour
A capful of orange blossom water

Mix the oats, bran, butter, sugar and flour in a bowl: Rub it between your fingers until it comes to a light and sandy texture.

Dice the fruit into a pie dish, add the frozen blackberries from last summer and dab with the orange blossom water. Dust with the cornflour, then sprinkle the topping generously until it covers most of it. This is not a neat recipe: no need to be prissy about it! The rougher, the better.

Bake at 180° for 45 min.
The crust needs to be golden and crunchy like a flapjack.

Eat warm with ice-cream.

This is such an iconic pudding it needs no introduction but the use of oats and bran instead of flour makes it a very healthy option because of the good fibre and the low sugar content.

My Gingerbread loaf

>My late paternal grandmother, a talented sculptor and a true eccentric, used to love this cake and I only ever baked it for her… But this week, I baked it in memory of her!

This is a very dark, moist and light gingerbread with a spicy and earthy fragrance. I love it with a bit of dark honey and a cup of Tchai latte.

Ingredients list:
Butter 200g
Brown sugar 200g
Treacle 2 or 3 tbsp (according to taste)
Self-raising flour 300g
Ginger 4 Tbsp
Cinnamon 3 Tbsp
Fresh crushed ginger 1 bite- if available
Eggs, 2 beaten
Buttermilk 300g
Bicarbonate of soda 2 tsp

In a small pan, warm the butter, sugar and treacle until all melts together. I like the strong liquorice taste of treacle so I put 3 generous tablespoonful into this cake but you can put less or more according to your own taste.

In a bowl, make a well with the flour then add the bicarbonate, the spices and melted syrup and the eggs in fine, just lightly whisked with a fork.

Add the buttermilk and mix well, turning and scraping at the sides. The buttermilk and baking soda make this a very light and airy batter but use whole milk if this is all you have. Pour into a lined cake tin and bake for 1 hour at 170℃. It will keep well in cling film and is best eaten the next day.

I was late for my Spanish conversation class last thursday and brought half the loaf with me to apologize to the group- Lesson number one: You should always bring cake when in trouble!

>charlotte du jour: Médecine à l’anglaise

>charlotte du jour: Médecine à l’anglaise

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