Tag: July

Balsamic strawberry galette with ricotta

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Balsamic strawberry galette with ricotta // The Dinner Bell

It’s April, and I sneeze at least five times every morning, right when I wake up. Pollen’s in the air. We’ve cracked out the light jackets. Summer is coming for us.

Summer is the time for falling in love: with cities, with food, with freezing cold showers. It’s suncream, hot tarmac, and that unmistakable smell of strawberries, an aroma that hit me unexpectedly a few weekends ago, giving just a hint of things to come, before the UK was once again blanketed in grey.

London has never been my home – I never yearned for the big city like other teenagers did, and for too long after I moved here I lived in a bubble, terrified that I just couldn’t do it and yet too stubborn to give in. At no point has it been love. London and I are like the married couple that stays together for the sake of the kids.

Balsamic strawberry galette with ricotta // The Dinner BellPeople still say, Ooh, London eh? Good place to live while you’re young. You must have so much fun. And every time, I smile and nod and think, Well, sort of. The economy is harsh, meeting people is difficult and honestly I would rather cook for my friends and pack them off, giggly and stumbling, with a fist full of cookies, than hit the nightlife. 

But just when I think it’s too much – the isolation, and the cost – something good happens. A gaggle of strangers offers to help a women with a buggy, or a museum visit turns out to be particularly good. In this case, it was a trip to a local grocery stall – the one that’s not part of a market, and where you get called “babe” as standard – that saw me laden with almost more fruit and vegetables than I could carry.

I’m still not in love, but it helps. It’s more bearable when you can go home and say, Okay, so a pint might bankrupt me but damn it, I can buy 750g of strawberries for a quid and I dare you to beat that. These are small pleasures, and it’s almost worth it. Summer is a little slice of sunshine breaking up the unrelenting grey, and I suppose this posh jam tart is my sunshine. Continue reading →

Raspberry & peach crumble tart

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“I’ve got a load of blackberries in the freezer, shall I make a crumble or a pie?” says mother.

“Crumble!”s and “Pie!”s are emitted from various corners of the house. We cannot decide. When the house is at its busiest, there are eight of us all pointing out the merits of pastry or sweet crumble topping. I’m pretty sure this scene plays out in every household on a regular basis – because how can you choose between a crumble and a pie?

And even if you manage it…it doesn’t necessarily stop there. Pastry on top or just the bottom, making it a tart? What goes into the crumble? A standard sugar, butter, and flour concoction is fine but I prefer my crumble topping to be like the lightly spiced lovechild of shortbread and flapjack.

In short, fruit-based puddings cause chaos. The easiest way to settle it is the crumble tart.

Much of the internet is alight with strawberry and rhubarb at the moment, to the point that I’ve had enough of that pairing despite having not yet eaten it. As much as I try to eat according to the seasons, I also like to cook with produce that’s available all year round – and often, it’s cheaper. With that in mind, this recipe uses frozen raspberries and tinned peaches, giving you a fruit hit without the extortionate prices. Served up with cream or Greek yoghurt and honey, it’s a fancy looking dessert without too much fuss. Perfect. Continue reading →

Strawberry & coconut cupcakes

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This time last year, I was in stress-central. I was just about finishing up at the student paper: kissing goodbye to long evenings of cabin fever and fussing over typefaces, trying to let go of the tiny frustrations that made up my final weeks in the insular world of student media.

Instead, I’d begun spending 9-5 in a badly lit room with grey-tinted windows, worrying about the projects that would decide what grade would be on that piece of paper I would receive in July. I thought back to being 18, sitting, terrified, in a local cupcake shop and conducting an interview for the first time as my voice wobbled with nerves. My dreams took on the form of the work I was doing during the day, and I’d wake disappointed that I’d spent all night working and yet had to do it all over again. Continue reading →