Rum & raisin cake

May 29-30, 2021

   

On Michael's birthday this year, Melbourne entered another pandemic lockdown. There were a couple of social arrangements to cancel, but we figured out some good takeaway food and cooking projects across the weekend to compensate (more to come!). I was also ready to bake his pick from Goh and Ottolenghi's Sweet: a rum and raisin cake.

This cake is intended to be baked in a bundt pan. The cookbook shows a decorative cake with the icing in motion, following the neat channels of the cake form. A springform cake tin is a plainer, easier alternative. The cake's preparation isn't complicated, though I had a couple hiccups - the morning was cold, the butter was cold, and my electric beater just wasn't up to the job.

The finished cake had a magnificent texture on the day of baking - crusty at its edge, soft all the way through and just a little fudgy right in the centre, with plenty of rum-soaked raisins scattered throughout. It settled into something firmer and more uniform over subsequent days. I only poured half of the icing over the cake, because the remainder looked likely to just spill onto the plate, and I kept the leftovers in a jar to spoon over one cake slice at a time. The icing has a lovely caramel and rum flavour, but I think I'd be just as happy not bothering with it, since the cake already carries these flavours well itself.

While this cake could certainly be veganised, we've actually got a ready-to-go vegan rum'n'raisin cake recipe on the blog already! Whichever way you bake it, it's a comfort during another locked-down winter.

   

Rum & raisin cake

(from Yotam Ottolenghi & Helen Goh's Sweet)

cake

200g raisins

120mL dark rum

300g plain flour, plus extra for dusting

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon salt

250g butter, at room temperature, plus extra for greasing

250g brown sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 eggs

200g sour cream

icing (I recommend halving the recipe, or even omitting it)

60g butter

80g brown sugar

3 tablespoons milk

1 tablespoon dark rum

100g icing sugar

A day in advance of baking the cake, mix together the raisins and rum in a shallow plastic container, cover them with a lid, and let them macerate overnight.

Preheat an oven to 190°C. If you have a 23cm bundt tin, grease and flour it. Instead, I used a ~23cm round springform pan, lining it with paper and greasing it.

In a medium-large bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, cinnamon and salt.

In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar with an electric beater. Beat in the vanilla and the eggs. With the beater on a low speed, add in spoonfuls of the flour mixture and sour cream in turns, until everything is well mixed. Mix in the raisins and rum until just mixed through the batter. Pour the cake batter into your tin and smooth over the top. Bake for 50-60 minutes, until a skewer comes out clean.

To make the icing, melt the butter in a small saucepan. Stir in the sugar until well-mixed. Add the milk and bring it to a boil. Turn off the heat, whisk in the rum, and let the mixture cool to room temperature. Sift in the icing sugar and whisk until smooth. Gently pour the icing over the top of the cake.

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Bush tomato-seasoned damper

May 23, 2021

   

I didn't leave it too long between batches of damper! For my second loaf, I veered slightly away from Nornie Bero's recipe and used her bush tomato seasoning as the featured spice. It's actually a spice blend, with the ground dried bush tomatoes backed up by other native and non-native ingredients such as mountain pepper and garlic. As you can see in the photo above, it lends the damper a light orange hue. The flavour reminded me of Barbecue Shapes, Pizza Shapes, and focaccia with sun-dried tomatoes... all things I'm very fond of.

As a colour and flavour contrast, we ate this damper alongside broccoli soup.

Gloria

Edit 30/01/2025: Gloria has now closed.

May 15 & 23, 2021

   

Gloria is hard to miss - it has a luminous pink shopfront on Sydney Rd, just a few shops south of Bunnings and Icecream Social. Within 15 minutes of entering Gloria, I was thinking: "I want to become a regular here." 

It starts with the cheery décor and friendly staff, and it's the all-vegan food that seals the deal. Two glass cabinets display numerous filled baguettes, sweet and savoury tarts, and slices. On top glass domes boast several magnificent layer cakes. The menu also includes two hot meals per day, available around lunch time.  

   

On our first visit, Michael and I arrived for a late breakfast and the hot meals weren't available yet, but the cabinet options were freshly prepared and plenty appetising. Michael ordered a huge baguette stuffed with scrambled tofu, dill mayo and roasted carrots ($14).

   

I carefully carved my way through a slice of mushroom quiche ($12), savouring the crumbly base, fluffy filling (I reckon it was based on a chickpea flour batter) and earthy herbed mushrooms. The bonus medley of roasted veges was a nice touch.

   

I could not leave without trying something sweet, so we shared a slice of coffee-flavoured layer cake ($9). It was a good cake and an exceptional vegan buttercream.

   

A week later, we timed our grocery shopping so that we could try Gloria's hot lunches. (Yes, I am following through on that vow to become a regular!) The meal of the day was a plate of Brazilian beans, garlic rice, roast cauliflower, pumpkin puree and beetroot salad ($22). It tasted homely and nourishing, but also just a little bit more special than what most of us can pull off at home most of the time. We especially liked the pickley edge to the beetroot.

   

If the meal of the day impressed, the winter special of mushroom congee ($16) positively blew our minds. I'm generally soup-agnostic, especially when it comes to the thin brothy variety, but this was an epiphany. The broth was so deeply flavoured with mushrooms and ginger, occasionally shot through with blended herb garnish, holding just enough rice to fill you up. I felt like it was curing a cold that I hadn't even caught.

On this second visit, we didn't have the stomach or bag space for more dessert but I'll definitely make up for that on future visits. I notice that Brazilian carrot cake is on regular rotation (something that I've made at home before!), and they're riffing on the peanut butter and jelly theme in a layer cake. Gloria are stuck in a reduced takeaway mode right now as Melbourne experiences its 4th lockdown - I reckon we'll pick up a little something on the weekend, and look forward to a near future where we can stop in again for a full hot lunch.

____________

Gloria

391 Sydney Rd, Brunswick

food, drinks

instagram page

Accessibility: Gloria has a very wide door and a shallow ramp on entry. Tables are reasonably well spaced with a mixture of backed and bench seating (see top photo). We ordered and paid at a low counter. The toilet is a single, relatively narrow, unisex cubicle located down a somewhat winding path. 

Chocolate-backed coconut macaroons

May 9, 2021

   

I've had this recipe physically filed away for years. It's written on a cute piece of stationery by my mate Tamsin; she'd baked these biscuits, I'd loved them, and she made time to scribble down the recipe for me before moving away from Melbourne.

It's a recipe I would have scrolled right past if I encountered it online, because: tofu. I'm a long-time fan of savoury tofu dishes, and I know that it can hide away well in some sweet ones. Very occasionally it's even a dessert's feature, but I did not like the idea of a soy-milk-scented macaroon. I think the almond extract works with the coconut here to mask it.

With that tofu binder secretly tucked away, there's a lot to like! The biscuit dough takes just one bowl, and doesn't require an electric beater. The biscuits are chewy inside and toasty-gold around the edges, with just enough chocolate to form a dark-cocoa contrast. They're not gluten-free, but I'm optimistic that some commercial gluten-free flour or almond meal would work. And for me, they're all the sweeter for reminding me of Tamsin each time I eat them.

Chocolate-backed coconut macaroons

(a recipe from Isa Chandra Moskowitz's Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar, 

which she has since published on her website)

85g silken tofu

1/3 cup neutral-flavoured oil

2 tablespoons non-dairy milk

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 teaspoon almond extract

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 cup plain flour

3/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 cups shredded coconut

3/4 cup chocolate

Preheat an oven to 180°C. Line some baking trays with paper.

Place the tofu, oil and milk in a food processor and churn them up until smooth. Pour it all into a large mixing bowl. Stir in the sugar, almond extract and vanilla extract. Sift over the flour, baking powder and salt, and mix well. Stir in the coconut. Drop generous tablespoons of the mixture onto the baking sheets. Bake for 12-14 minutes, until the bottoms of the macaroons are lightly browned and their tops have golden tips. Allow them to cool.

Gently melt the chocolate using your preferred method. Dunk the flat bottoms of the macaroons in the chocolate and put them back on the trays, chocolate side up this time, until the chocolate has hardened. You'll probably need to get a teaspoon into the chocolate and spread it around as your supply dwindles. Store the biscuits in the fridge.