Charlotte Pike

Award-winning cookery writer, teacher and chef

Charlotte Pike

Wimborne Food Festival – Archive post

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Wimborne Food Festival – the recipe!

Well, we all had a fantastic time at Wimborne Food Festival at the weekend. Fortunately, the weather was kind, and the event was packed out as ever.  It was such a great opportunity to catch up with other interesting and inspiring food writers, particularly Josceline Dimbleby and Lucas Hollweg.

As it was National Baking Week, I just had to demonstrate a cake, and my cake of choice was a very tasty Chocolate & Pear cake using lovely local, seasonal conference pears. I was thrilled to hear that so many people in the audience went home and made this cake straight away, to great success. For those of you who wanted the recipe, it is below. Hope you like it!

Chocolate & Pear Cake


Ingredients:

·        85g butter
·        85g dark chocolate
·        85g caster sugar
·        1 tbsp brandy
·        3 eggs, separated
·        85g ground almonds or hazelnuts
·        4 very ripe pears, peeled, halved and cored

Method:

1)        Grease and line a 25cm springform tin
2)        Preheat the oven to 180 / Gas mark 4
3)        Melt the chocolate and butter together
4)        Stir the brandy and leave to cool
5)        Whisk the eggs and sugar in a large bowl until pale and thick.
6)        Fold the melted chocolate and hazelnuts into the egg and sugar mixture
7)        In a separate bowl, whisk the egg whites to soft peak
8)        Fold one tablespoon of egg whites into the chocolate mixture, followed by the rest of the mixture in two additions.
9)        Gently pour the mixture into the prepared tin
10)        Lay the pear halves into the mixture in the tin
11)        Bake for around 40 minutes
12)        You can dust with icing sugar and serve with crème fraiche

Feast of Dorset – the recipes

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Feast of Dorset- the recipes

We had a jam packed weekend at Feast of Dorset.
Although I was booked to cook there on the Sunday, we all decided to head down to Dean’s Court, the beautiful venue in my home town of Wimborne in Dorset, to see what was going on a day early on the Saturday. The site was packed and the sun was shining.
Dean’s Court is one of Dorset’s most idyllic private ancestral homes, dating back to the 11th Century. It is, in fact, set in the town centre itself, with a very discreet entrance. So much so that most people living in the town haven’t even realised that the estate even exists, let alone have visited it. Home to a wonderful apiary, well-stocked kitchen garden and a lovely orchard, it is the perfect foodie venue for the festival.
Having grown up in Dorset, I am clearly biased somewhat towards the county. However, I do think it is simply a matter of fact for me to state that there are some wonderful food producers and chefs in the county, and a great number of them support this festival. They include Anna del Conte, Lesley Waters, Mat Follas, Rose Prince, Jez Barfoot and many more. It was a great privilege for me to be part of the festival.
Our first port of call was to watch Rose Prince cook. I am such a great fan of Rose Prince’s cooking. I really admire her ethos of using great British produce where possible, and of her attitude towards sustainability. Rose cooked three lovely dishes; a chestnut and honey soup, John Dory with brown butter and fresh herbs and a grape strudel, all of which looked delicious, but sadly we were not allowed to taste the food once it was cooked. I was lucky enough to chat with her afterwards about her cookery books. I was pleased to hear that my favourite, The New English Kitchen is her favourite, too!
We then took a tour of the site, which was jam packed with food stalls selling takeaway food and produce. Spoilt for choice, I tried some Mackerel from a Weymouth based company, who have been involved in Hugh’s Fish Fight, which was very good. As the others went off to have a go at archery, I peeled off to go and inspect the glorious kitchen garden. I thoroughly enjoyed inspecting their bounty, wishing I could have a kitchen garden of my own. One of the highlights was this lovely apple stall, which displayed a huge number of apple varieties, which was fascinating.
We went home very happy and I spent Saturday night prepping for my demonstration on Sunday.
Sunday morning arrived and we awoke to the sound of heavy rain lashing down outside. It was a truly grim morning. Unperturbed, we set off to Dean’s Court arriving laden down with all my kit. Fortunately, the rain hadn’t put many people off and the tent was packed full for my demonstration, which is the first one I’ve ever done wearing my wellington boots!
For those of you who have asked, my recipes are below. So, thank you, Feast of Dorset, and look forward to next year!
Blackberry fool
A simple and seasonal dessert. It has a distinct autumnal flavour, yet is still light. Perfect for this time of year as we head into autumn.
Serves 4
400g blackberries (I prefer wild blackberries which you can find at this time of year for free)
3 tablespoons sifted icing sugar (although adjust to taste)
200ml double cream, whipped
200m whipping cream, whipped
Method
  1. Place the blackberries into a shallow bowl. Add the icing sugar and stir in.
  2. Then, mash the fruit until the fruit starts to break down. I like to leave some larger chunks of fruit though
  3. Whip the creams separately in individual bowls. Tip both creams into one bowl and add the blackberries and gently fold until it is roughly combined. I don’t like to over-mix this so as to retain as much air in the cream as possible. I also like to retain some purple streaks through the cream, which looks so pretty, so mix as little as possible to get this effect.
  4. Serve in glass bowls. You may wish to adjust the quantities of icing sugar and the ratio of cream to fruit to taste. I personally don’t like to add too much sugar as I don’t have a particularly sweet tooth and I love the flavour of the berries on their own, particularly as I use wild berries when I can which have a much more interesting flavour than supermarket berries.
Spiced plums
These spiced plums make such a delicious treat. Have them on their own or with yoghurt or porridge for breakfast, delicious in a plastic container taken for a packed lunch or an indulgent dessert served with ice cream and are completely gluten free and vegan. You could try a non dairy ice cream with this. But I like to serve them spooned onto my blackberry fool (recipe above)
Serves 4
500g plums. I use English plums at this time of year. I like Marjorie Seedling or Victoria, which are amongst the easily available varieties.
4 tablespoons caster sugar (again, to taste)
4 tablespoons water
2 whole star anise
1 vanilla pod, slit lengthways and seeds extracted
1 cinnamon stick
  1. Slice the plums into halves or quarters, removing the stones
  2. Sprinkle over the sugar and water
  3. Add the spices. Make sure the vanilla seeds are mixed into the water and add the vanilla pod for now
  4. Heat on the hob on a low heat until the fruit softens. This should take about 10 – 20 minutes. Try to ensure the temperature is not too high as the fruit will turn into a puree. I prefer for the fruit to remain as its shape and texture as much as possible
  5. Remove the whole spices before serving.

Welcome to Charlotte’s Kitchen Diary

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Food is where it starts and ends. This site encompasses my love for food, brings together my work in the food industry and tells the story of what’s going on in and out of my kitchen.

Some of you may know me from one or more of my areas of work in the food industry. I have a number of different projects on the go (you can read more in my About me) so I decided to create this blog to bring my work together in one place.The next few months are going to be incredibly exciting for me, so I hope to share news of this with you, as well as an assortment of recipes and food news. I will also be going on tour over the next few months, visiting a sensational selection of artisan food producers all over the UK to find out what they do.

I am an adventurous cook and gourmand. I particularly like great food which has been well produced.  I champion great British food producers/growers/farmers. I specialise in cooking “free from” recipes which I post on my Free From Kitchen blog. Most of all, I love simple, delicious, unpretentious food. The sort of thing you want to cook every day. One of my greatest passions is encouraging younger people to cook.

I also hope you might like to participate. I am looking for recipe testers and product testers for new products in the pipeline at Go Free Foods. I hope you will enjoy reading this blog, and I look forward to sharing the journey with you.

Charlotte x