Cooking up a Storm

Last night was my flatmates birthday.

He turned 39.

I have only been living there a couple of months but know for a fact that his favourite soup is pumpkin soup and that he wanted a birthday cake- but wanted a cake made without butter as he hates butter so made him some fudgey type cupcakes - from a gluten free - dairy free recipe site.

If you have a look at the cupcakes you might notice that I have piped chocolated on to them. Flower shapes, hearts, and checkerboard, I was pretty pleased with the taste however they are very rich so one of these is more than enough.

Gluten Free Chocolate Cake

Cooking time: More than 1 hour

INGREDIENTS
300g dark chocolate

1 cup (250ml) orange juice

4 eggs -whites and yolks separated

¾ cup (165g) brown sugar

icing sugar, for dusting

METHOD
Preheat oven to 160°C or 140°C fan-forced. Grease and line 22cm cake tin.

Melt chocolate with orange juice over bain marie or in short bursts in the microwave until smooth.

Whisk egg yolks together with sugar till pale and doubled in volume. Fold in chocolate and orange juice mixture.

Whisk egg whites to soft peaks and fold into chocolate cake mixture.

Pour into prepared cake tin.

Place cake tin into a large baking dish and pour enough boiling water into the baking dish to come half way up the sides of the cake tin.

Bake for 50 minutes in preheated oven.

Remove from oven and refrigerate until cold.

Serve dusted with icing sugar.

This is a very rich truffle-style cake. It is not supposed to be light and fluffy, but very rich and unctuous. It will keep in an airtight container up to 1 week.

Roast Pumpkin and Sweet Potato soup with Lemon Thyme

INGREDIENTS

1 butternut pumpkin (aprox. 1 kg), seeds removed and cut into wedges

2 Large Sweet Potaoes

2 tablespoons olive oil

Sea salt and black pepper

3 sprigs of Lemon thyme, leaves only

1 tablespoon butter - If you don't like butter you can use margarine or extra olive oil

1 large red onion, chopped

1.5 litres of chicken stock - If you want it less watery add less stock

METHOD

Preheat oven to 200°C.

Place the pumpkin and sweet potato in a roasting dish and drizzle with a little of the olive oil, add the sprigs of Lemon Thyme and season with sea salt and black pepper.

Roast pumpkin and potato for 35- 40 minutes or until golden and cooked through.

Heat a large heavy based saucepan, add the remaining olive oil and butter and fry the onions until soft.

Add the pumpkin and potato and mash (If you like you can mash these seperately in a bowl, I used a stick blender and then added it to the browned onion).

Pour in the stock, bring to the boil and reduce the heat and simmer for 10- 12 minutes.

Blend again until smooth with a hand held blender or food processor. Return to the pan and reheat if necessary. Season to taste with Sea Salt and Black Pepper. If you like you could serve this with sour cream or greek yoghurt- I was being healthy so left out the yoghurt/sour cream and this recipe has been a big hit with my flatmate and workmates.