Dandelion 'Honey', Gingerbread Syrup and Chocolate Wine In My Kitchen

In my kitchen, I have some foraged cooking apples bestowed upon us by our neighbours.  We have good neighbours the only thing that makes me frown now and again is their barking mad Jack Russel.  The little thing is territorial and thinks that our front garden is his territory and the naughty little thing has even found his way into our back garden.   

When we bought the place a few years back, the previous owner who had a Sheep dog told us that the neighbours dog did not get on well with his dog, I did not think anything of it, but it concerns me a little now as one day we hope to adopt a dog of our own and this little beastie will make it nervous, but I guess we will cross that bridge when the time comes.  I am thankful for now to have good neighbours touch wood. 

I've made a few recipes with the foraged apples, obviously Apple Crumble and Dorset Apple Cake, Apple Scrump but one recipe I really want to make is Green Gourmet Giraffes popular Apple Slice.  

Last weekend we went into Cardiff to wander around the Christmas market and the shops, yes Christmas shopping has begun in earnest.  We walked passed some shops and picked up some turnips , a little damage, but its one of D's favourite vegetables so I picked up three.  I have only used one of them so far for Turnip and Potato Gratin.  I am still thinking about what to do with the other two.  

Parsnip and Violet Cake

I've been day dreaming and talking to some blogger friends about making this 'Parsnip and Violet Cake' for a long while.  I didn't think it was going to happen any time soon as I was waiting for an excuse to make it, such as a family get together, a party...  but nothing like that is happening around me at the moment, so with plenty of time on my hands I thought I'd just go ahead and make it for me and my husband, and maybe an unexpected guest or two.   

I'd like to call this cake a Celebratory Cake, but I've nothing to celebrate or shout loud about at the moment. Yet whilst I was making it, I was feeling rather pleased with myself - I don't know whether it was my big head feeling smug about my homely creation, or the gorgeous perfumery scent wafting from all the purple ingredients, but I was feeling rather cheery. So I am going to call this a 'A Cheer You Up Cake'. This is not a sugary, sweet cake.  The parsnips add moisture rather than flavour to the cake.  The flavour comes from the violet - all very subtle and the pecans give it that gentle crunch. 

A slice of Parsnip and Violet cake can only make you smile; and because I am feeling rather generous, I'd be happy to share some of this with you all, so if you wish your welcome to come on over, albeit virtually.

A few words on the ingredients for this Parsnip and Violet cake.  As a child I loved sucking on Parma Violets, the scent and the sherbety taste.  Over the past couple of years, I've been gathering all manner of edible violety to make sweet things such as Violet milkshake, Violet Sorbet, Violet Macaroon and Violet cake!  I got the Violet syrup from my trip to Brittany last year, the crystallised violet petals came from a supermarket, though I wish I was lucky to have some fresh violets to make my own.  Here is a link to my dear blogger friend Kaths blog The Ordinary Cook making some crystallised violet petals recently, and finally the edible cornflower petals came from a cook shop in Scotland.  When I was in Morecambe I also picked up some Sherbety Violet sweets from The Old Fashioned Sweet Shop, they are wonderfully perfumed, have a little crunch  and then melt in your mouth - sublime.

Parsnip and Violet Cake
Serves 8, maybe 12
Ingredients
175g butter, plus extra for greasing
200g caster sugar
100ml violet syrup
3 medium eggs
250g self-raising flour
2 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon cinnamon powder
250g parsnips , peeled and grated
60g pecans, roughly chopped
Optional: 1 teaspoon of crystallised violets; or Parma Violet Sherbet sweets, lightly crushed
Method
Preheat oven to Gas mark 4. Grease and line with baking parchment paper 2 x 8 inch sandwich tins. Melt the butter and sugar in a pan over gentle heat, then cool slightly and stir in the violet syrup. Gently whisk the eggs into the mixture, then stir in the flour, baking powder and cinnamon.  Follow this with the grated parsnips, pecans and violets if using. Divide the mixture between the tins, then bake for 30 - 35 minutes. Allow the cakes to cool before turning out onto a wire rack.

For the filling
1 tablespoon violet syrup
300ml double cream
For decoration
Edible crystallized Violet petals
Edible Cornflower petals

Method
Whip togehter the double cream and the violet syrup. Spread most of it over one cake and sandwich with the other. Then spread the top with the remaining violet flavoured double cream.

Scatter over some crystallised violets, fresh or dried violets, or edible cornflower petals in my case.

Enjoy a generous slice with a cup of good tea.

and marvel at the colours, flavour and textures.

Although it okay to eat a day or two later, this Parsnip and Violet cake is really best eaten on the day it is made, as the crystallised violets colour start to seep our and discolour the cream.

Versatile Guajillo Chile and Blackberry Syrup

Well I've eaten my fair share of sweet things recently, so didn't want to make another cake. So the question was what else could I do with the blackberries I had picked at my friends place, that were beginning to soften in the fridge. As always I flicked though my cookbooks, saw many recipes for cakes galore and other sweet things such as ice-cream and sorbets. As my teeth are a little sensitive at the moment, plus I've lost a filling - iced things were not an option either.
Then I went on the world wide web and did a search for a blackberry recipe, other than cake. I came across many, but the one that caught my attention was Heidi Swanson's recipe for Chile Blackberry Syrup. I remembered littleblackfox had sent me a couple of big guajillo chiles in the post a couple of months ago. In fact I have been rather spoiled this year, fellow blogger Ginny of Modern Homestead sent me this fabulous industrial mosaic hand crafted dragonfly (see side bar) for my garden. As it rains so bad in the West of Scotland; and is just too pretty it is hanging in my hallway rather than in the garden. I want to say a special heartfelt Thank you to them both for the kindness, affection and generosity they have both shown towards me. Please do take time to visit there blogs, you will also see that they have a keen sense of humour.

So with the two guajillo chiles described by littleblackfox as 'sweet, medium heat with a cherry flavour. Lovely with rice and in sauce'. I decided on making this syrup. It was a rather messy affair in the kitchen with lots of kitchen equipment being used, but also a little wiping down and mopping up was necessary. But the final resulting syrup was rather warming. The syrup certainly had a good spice kick.

Just in case you are wondering what on earth would I do with a spicy syrup, well it is actually very versatile. You can swirl it into yogurt, porridge, drizzled over waffles, pancakes and crepes and even drizzled over goat cheese salad. In fact the taste of this spiced sweet syrup reminded me of Moosewood's raspberry chipotle sauce that was served with scrambled tofu, so I can imagine it drizzled over savoury dishes too.

Guajillo Chile Blackberry Syrup
Makes 2 x 300g jars
Ingredients
2 dried guajillo peppers
170g dark Muscovado sugar or dark brown sugar
200 g organic sugar
355 ml water
Juice from 1 lemon
100g blackberries
Method
Trim the stems from the dried chiles. Tear or snip the chiles with scissors or a knife into pieces and drop with seeds into a medium saucepan. Stir in the sugars, water, and lemon juice, and bring the mixture to a boil over medium heat. Boil, stirring regularly, until the mixture has reduced to 475 ml, roughly 20 - 30 minutes.
In the meantime, puree the blackberries either with a hand blender in a small bowl or a blender. Force the berries through a fine-mesh strainer, and discard the seeds. Set the berry puree aside. Once the chile mixture has reduced, remove from heat, and puree it until smooth. Strain through a sieve into a heat-proof bowl. Press on the remaining solids in the strainer to squeeze out any syrup, and discard the remaining solids.
Whisk the berries into the chile syrup and set aside to cool. Place in a jar, or smaller jars, and refrigerate. The syrup keeps covered, and chilled for a few weeks. Adapted very slightly from Heidi Swanson's superb website 101 cookbooks, who in turn adapted the recipe from the September 2007 edition of Gourmet Magazine. Isn't it wonderful how recipes change from one cook to another?!