Panforte

Panforte & Other Christmas Food Gifts

Panforte, the Sienese classic fruit cake

Spiced Nuts

I have for too many years crammed Christmas shopping into the last week, remonstrating with myself that next Christmas things will have to change. At last the annual berating has sunk in and this festive season I'm sparing myself the misery of shopping and everyone is getting food gifts.

All day I have baked panforte, Christmas biscotti, spiced nuts, chocolate dipped orange peel. And a vast improvement it was from the shopping streets of central London, I've had a delightful day imbuing the gifts with the good vibrations of happy cooking. No stress, lovely day. What took me so long...…?

The Panforte (strong bread) is a packed with all that is Christmas; fruit, nuts, sugar and spice. It pairs very well with cheese. For the last few years I have been making my spin on this Sienese classic. This year I am sharing the recipe, which up to now has been a secret. So here it is. Try serving this with cheese, a Parmesan works particularly well.

Try serving with a hard salty cheese

Panforte

• 100 gms hazelnuts roasted and roughly chopped
• 150 gms ground almonds
• 25 gms green pistachio roughly chopped
• 150 gms orange & lemon candied peel (so much nicer when you do homemade) chopped tiny
• 50 gms figs chopped small
• 100 gms glace cherries (leave whole but toss in the flour so they separate)
• zest of 1 unwaxed lemon
• 70 gms rice flour
• 150 gms soft brown sugar
• 30 gms butter
• 60 gms best quality honey (I used raw Norfolk honey)
• 1 tsp aniseed
• half tsp cinnamon
• quarter tsp ground cloves
• good pinch of fresh grated nutmeg
• a sheet of rice paper cut to the size of your cake tin.

You will need a 20cm loose bottomed cake tin.

Method

1. Line the cake tin with the rice paper.
2. Pre heat the oven to 160C.
3. Assemble all the nuts (chopped) and dried fruit which you have cut tiny. The cherries are best tossed in some of the rice flour so they don't clump together.
4. Combine the rice flour with the 4 spices and add to the nuts and fruit.
5. In a pan heat the butter, sugar and honey until it melts and just comes to the boil.
6. Quickly add the butter/sugar/honey mix with the fruit, nuts and spices and mix until thoroughly combined. It's hard work. You want to make sure its evenly mixed.
7. Press the mixture into the tin and work it down so the mixture is even. Bake in the oven for about 25 minutes. You are looking just to set it, so don't wait for it to turn dark, you want a light golden colour. As it cools, it will further set.

Spiced Nuts

2 recipes here for spicing mixed nuts, which makes a great gift. Almost impossible not to eat half of them as you cook.

Rosemary & Fennel

• 500gms of mixed nuts (I used macadamia, pecans, whole almond & cashews)
• 2 Tbsp fresh Rosemary leaves chopped
• 2 tsp fennel seeds
• 2 tsp sea salt flakes (Maldon or Cornish)
• 2 tsp golden caster sugar
• half tsp cayenne pepper
• 2 Tbsp sunflower or vegetable oil

Method

1. Pre heat oven to 180C
2. Mix the spices & herbs with the oil and coat the nuts thoroughly
3. Put on a baking sheet and bake for about 15 minutes, keeping a keen eye on it as the edges catch and burn quickly. Keep turning the nuts over until evenly golden.

Spiced Nuts

• 1 Tbsp sunflower or veg oil
• 1 Tbsp white sugar
• 1 tsp curry powder
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 1 tsp whole coriander seeds
• half tsp cayenne pepper
• 1 tsp sea salt flakes

Method as above.

Flax seed crackers

The resultant crispbread is a delight!

Take 250gms of flax seed and soak them in plenty of fresh cold water. The flax seeds will swell as the water is fully absorbed. In another bowl, take about 6 tomatoes cut up and an onion chopped which you blend to a pulp. Add the tomato and onion mix, mix well. I added a couple of chilis and a teaspoon of salt.

Spread the mix in a baking sheet and into a low oven (50C) for 18 hours.

This I did early evening and took out the next morning.

I mentioned a few weeks ago that I intended to dive into the world of preserving and almost immediately stumbled across Sandor Ellix Katz. wild fermentation workshop.

The caterers who provided lunch were a family run business called cultured probiotics. Amongst their delicious buffet was a flax seed crisp bread which was the most delicious new taste of the year. Sonia of Cultured Probiotics generously told me how she had made it. But like most natural cooks she just did it and doesn't measure and can't quite remember exactly what she did. So I have attempted to recreate hers. (It wasn't as good yours Sonia).

Note to self : Next time use every tray available so that you maximise the long haul.

Pumpkin Pancakes

These pumpkin pancakes are spiced up with the simple addition of the cumin, coriander and chili. They make a delicious snack especially served with a lavishly herby raita. The chestnut flour adds further autumnal tone. Make mini versions for a tasty canape.

• 250gms pureed pumpkin
• 100gms chestnut flour
• 200gms rice flour
• 4 finely chopped spring onions
• 1 tsp black mustard seeds
• 1 tsp coriander seeds lightly crushed (thank you Barbara Landell Mills - good advice)
• 1 tsp cumin seeds
• half tsp tumeric
• salt
• chopped green chilli
• handful of coriander
• 300ml of milk
• 3 eggs
• Sunflower oil

Method: Dry fry the spices and saute very briefly in some oil with the spring onions and reserve. In a separate bowl add the flours, eggs and milk. Blend the whole lot up and allow to rest for 30 minutes. Fry spoonfuls in hot veg oil.

Spicy Chickpea Fritters

At a recent lunch to the vibrant bijou salad bar Ottolenghi in Islington, I was reminded of my love of gram flour.  Gram or besan is chickpea flour.  It is used widely in India, Iran and Italy.  Cheap and plentiful, it is healthful and a very tolerant flour.  Tolerant in that it dosn't seem to mind if you put too much liquid in it, or not enough; it just still seems to do it's thing and always comes up trumps.

I favour this flour for pakoras, where a batter mixture of gram flour, salt, tumeric, ground coriander, cumin seeds, chili powder, salt and water to a thick pancake mixture consistency.  Then thinly slice whatever you want - potato, aubergine, onion, mushroom, cauliflower florets and so on, dip into the batter and deep fry.  Drain and serve.  Delicious with a raita.

In northern India they make a type of roti, called missi roti, which is gram flour with finely chopped green chili, tumeric, cumin, seasoning and maybe a bit of finely chopped onion, some melted ghee.  Water is added to a dough and then rolled to a pancake and fried in hot ghee.  

The other benefit of this flour is that it is gluten free.

Tonight I made fritters instead of the pakoras and I was carefully noting down my measurements tonight so can report the proportions as being the following, but I would recommend that you trust yourself and don't measure.   Especially as I said that gram flour is very forgiving.

Method

Serves 2

• 2 small courgette or 1 large grated
• 3 spring onions sliced small
• 1 large clove of garlic chopped
• small handful of chopped coriander leaves
• 50 gms gram flour
• 20 gms rice flour
• 1tsp salt
• half tsp corriander ground
• half tsp cumin seeds
• half tsp tumeric
• quarter tsp chili powder
• Sunflower oil for shallow frying
• Raita (plain yogurt, garlic, spring onion, fresh coriander, grated cucumber, seasoning).

1. Add the dry ingredients together.
2. Combine with the grated courgette, chopped spring onion, garlic and coriander.
3. Add water until it is thick and sticking together.
4. Heat the sunflower oil until hot and fry dessert spoonfuls until crispy each side.
5. Drain on kitchen paper and serve with raita and salad.