Beef & Caramelised Onion Sausage Rolls with Blue Cheese Dipping Sauce

A savoury recipe! What in the world is going on? It must be opposites day. I was in a baking funk this weekend. There were about 10 bazillion different dessert ideas whizzing around my head but nothing was inspiring me enough to make it a reality. So I went in an entirely different direction and made some homemade sausage rolls. I find it hard to believe this was my first time making them at home. They are so easy and such a classic. You can't go wrong with a bit of meat wrapped in puff pastry, though it's not the most photogenic of dishes!

To mix things up a little, instead of serving them with tomato sauce (the default condiment for all sausage rolls) I got a little bit weird. I made these delicious beef and caramelised onion sausage rolls (my sweet tooth still manages to rear its ugly head) and served them with a blue cheese dipping sauce. Don't freak out. It totally works. I knew it would, because one of my favourite dinners is this grilled steak with onion-blue cheese sauce. Even people who don't usually like blue cheese enjoy it. So keep an open mind.

Sausage rolls might be one of the few times where I have no issues with using store-bought pastry. It's one of those crowd-pleasing party snacks that you want to be able to make on the day, and making puff pastry from scratch (as amazing as it tastes) can be quite time consuming. So this weekend I cheated and used the frozen stuff. Still deliciously buttery and flaky.

I would definitely urge you to try it with the blue cheese sauce at least once. The sausage rolls are actually not very salty on their own because of all those lovely caramelised onion bits, so it really needs the saltiness from the blue cheese to balance it out. If you can't bring yourself to do it, make sure you add extra salt or some cheese to the rolls themselves. Almost cruelly, the one weekend where I decided to make savoury baked goods for my dessert-averse husband, he suddenly had a craving for chocolate. Bugger.

Beef & Caramelised Onion Sausage Rolls with Blue Cheese Dipping Sauce

(adapted from this Taste recipe, makes 24 mini sausage rolls)

For the onions:

3 red or brown onions, peeled and thinly sliced

2 tbsp olive oil

15g (1 tbsp) salted butter

2 tbsp brown sugar

1 tbsp balsamic vinegar

Place butter and olive onion in a large frying pan or pot on medium heat until butter has melted. Add onions and stir regularly until softened and just starting to colour. Add sugar and balsamic vinegar and stir until combined. Continue cooking, stirring regularly until onions are a deep brown in colour, about 15 mins. Transfer to a dish and set aside to cool.

For the sausage rolls:

Caramelised onions, prepared above

500g (about 17.5 oz) beef mince

1 carrot, peeled and finely grated

1.5 tbsp finely chopped flat-leaf parsley

1 tbsp dried thyme

1.5 tbsp freshly cracked pepper  

Small pinch of sea salt

3 sheets butter puff pastry, partially thawed (if you have the time to make yours from scratch you can try the recipe at the bottom of this post and roll thin sheets approx 25x25cm)

Egg wash: 1 egg + 1 tbsp milk whisked together

Note: If not using the cheese dipping sauce, add a generous pinch of salt to the mixture or you can crumble some of the cheese to the mixture (the rolls are quite sweet without the cheese sauce)

Preheat oven to 220°C (430°F) and line 2-3 baking trays with baking paper. Place beef, carrot, parsley, thyme, pepper in a bowl and add the cooled onions. Mix until well combined. Cut pastry sheets in half. Prepare egg wash and brush egg wash along one long edge of each piece of pastry. On the opposite long edge, shape a 3cm diameter sausage of the beef mixture (about 1/6th of the whole mixture). Starting from the long edge with the beef, roll pastry up so that it seals along the edge with egg wash. Cut roll into four equal pieces and place equally spaced on the lined baking trays, seam side down. Brush tops with egg wash. Repeat with remaining pastry and beef mixture. Bake for 20-25 mins or until golden brown and puffed. (You can prepare the dipping sauce below while waiting for them to bake.) Don't worry if moisture/grease leaks out the sides a bit, it doesn't really affect it but you can mop some if it up with a paper towel if necessary. Remove from oven and use tongs to carefully transfers to a wire rack to cool. Best served while still warm and fresh from the oven, but can be refrigerated in an airtight container for several days reheated in the oven or microwave.

For the blue cheese dipping sauce:

250g (about 9oz) sour cream

100-120g (3.5-4oz) your favourite blue cheese, finely crumbled (adjust to taste)

1/4 cup flat-leaf parsley, chopped

Place sour cream and blue cheese in a large mixing bowl and whisk together until smooth then stir in parsley. You can adjust the amount of cheese to your liking, I used 120g because I like it strong-flavoured. You can also prepare this in a blender or food processor to save time and ensure smoothness. Serve together with sausage rolls, and extra celery sticks for any leftover dip.

Mickey & Minnie Mouse Macarons

You know how much I love a gimmicky macaron. This blog is full of them. They might horrify some of the macaron purists out there but I can't resist them. Macarons are still cookies and we shouldn't take them too seriously. Even so, I was planning to avoid making the cutesy animal faced ones for a while. They've been done. But then my super cute sister-in-law asked if I could make some macarons for her Disney-themed party (along with another one of these Sweet 16 cakes), and it was too fun an idea to pass up. Mickey Mouse macarons seemed like the perfect treat for a Disney party.

I made two batches; Milk Chocolate Mickey Mouse Macarons and Strawberry Minnie Mouse Macarons. I've gotta say that I love the Minnies just a little bit more with the little pink bow and the eyelashes. Plus the strawberry ganache is amazing. I wanted the strawberry flavour to be very obvious so I cheated a little and added some strawberry essence to the ganache even though it already has strawberry puree. It makes it taste just like the strawberry flavoured chocolate you can find in Asian supermarkets, which I have a serious soft spot for.

I had a quick look on Google, figuring that Mickey Mouse macarons would have been done to death by other bakers already since the round shapes make it pretty easy to pipe. Surprisingly there weren't many around, I thought these ones were particularly impressive but I wanted to make something a little less complicated. So I went with just a plain white shell with black ears and a nose, and drew on the faces with black food colouring after baking like I normally do. I found it really hard to get the eyes right, the first few I drew ended up looking more than pandas than Mickey or Minnie. But I think by the end I nearly got the hang of it.

As always, I'd recommend practicing with plain macaron shells until you're comfortable enough to give these a try. Splitting up the batter into two colours, the piping of the ears and nose, and  the sprinkles on top make this macaron very susceptible to cracking so they need to be dried for a bit longer than normal macs. Mine still cracked a little around the ears because I had to use liquid black food colouring instead of gel or powder, but the majority of them turned out pretty good. Just don't make my mistake of using soft sugar pearls on the bows instead of the cachous, they tend to disintegrate in the oven. The important thing was the birthday girl was stoked with them and I hear they disappeared pretty fast at the party.

Milk Chocolate Mickey Mouse Macarons and Strawberry Minnie Mouse Macarons

For one batch of 10-12 of macarons, double amounts if you are making two batches: (if you are a beginner with macarons, read up and practice plain macarons first. BraveTart has lots of useful advice and info on the subject)

100g egg whites, at room temperature

1/2 tsp salt

110g almond meal, at room temperature and well sifted

200g icing (confectioner's) sugar

50g sugar (I use caster/superfine)

Optional: 1 tsp powdered egg whites (available from The Essential Ingredient), helps to stabilise egg whites but is not necessary, black food colouring (preferably gel or powdered)

Line two baking trays with good quality baking paper. Place icing sugar in food processor and pulse for a minute to remove any lumps. Stir in almond meal and pulse for about 30 seconds to combine. (If you don’t have a processor just sift together with a fine sieve.) Sift into a large mixing bowl and set aside. Using an electric mixer, beat egg whites and salt (and egg white powder) in a medium mixing bowl until it reaches soft peaks. With the mixer on high speed, gradually add sugar and beat until it reaches stiff peaks.

Add meringue to your dry mixture and mix together with a spatula, quickly at first to break down the bubbles in the egg white (you really want to beat all the large bubbles out of the mixture, which is easily done by smearing the mixture on the bottom and side of the bowl with your spatula), (as it just starts to come together you can place about 1/3 of the mixture in a separate bowl and add black food colouring to it) then mix carefully as the dry mixture becomes incorporated and it starts to become shiny again. Take care not to overmix, the mixture should flow like lava and a streak of mixture spread over the surface of the rest of the mixture should disappear after about 30 seconds.

Place white mixture in a piping bag with a 1cm round piping tip. Pipe rounds about 2.5cm diameter on your prepared trays, leaving at least 3cm space around each one. Tap baking sheets carefully and firmly on the benchtop a couple times to remove any large bubbles. Place your black piping mixture in a bag with a narrow round piping tip (2-5mm) and pipe the ears ( you can pipe a small dot in the middle for the nose on half the shells, remember half will have faces and half will not). If you are decorating for Minnie Mouse macarons, use heart-shaped sprinkles and pink cachous to create a small pink bow decoration. Leave to dry for at least an hour, so that when you press the surface of one gently it does not break/stick to your finger. This will help prevent any cracking and help the feet to form on the macs.

Preheat your oven to 130-150°C (265-300°F), depending on your oven. You can place the sheet of piped shells on top of an upside-down roasting tray or another baking tray, for better heat distribution. Bake for 20-25 minutes, depending on the size of your shells. Carefully test if the base of the shell is ready by gently lifting one and if it’s still soft and sticking to the baking paper, then it needs to bake for a few minutes longer. Remove from the oven and cool on the tray for a few minutes, then gently remove from the sheet and place on a wire rack to cool. At this point you can use a wooden skewer dipped in black food colouring or an black edible ink pen to draw on the eyes and mouth on the shells that have noses. Leave to cool completely on rack.

For the milk chocolate ganache (for Mickey):

100g good quality milk chocolate, finely chopped

75ml pure/heavy cream (min 35% fat unthickened)

For the strawberry white chocolate ganache (for Minnie):

100g good quality white chocolate, finely chopped

75ml pure/heavy cream (min 35% fat unthickened)

60g (about 1/4 of a punnet) fresh/frozen strawberries, pureed

Optional: 1-2 tsp of strawberry essence

For both flavours of ganache, place chopped chocolate in a bowl and set aside. Heat cream in a small saucepan on medium-low heat until it just comes to the boil and then pour over the chocolate. Leave for about 3 minutes to allow chocolate to melt. Use a whisk to combine mixture until it is smooth. For the strawberry ganache, gradually whisk strawberry puree into the white chocolate ganache and then add strawberry essence to taste. Chill both ganaches, whisking it every 5 minutes to ensure it stays smooth, until the mixtures thicken but are still pipable. Place in small piping bags (ziplock bags with a corner snipped off are handy for this) and fill macaron shells, using the strawberry ganache for the Minnie Mouse macarons and chocolate ganache for the Mickey Mouse macarons.

Chocolate Raspberry Layer Cake with Macarons

I am pretty excited to share this post with you guys. Earlier this year I was contacted by the lovely Amanda from i am baker. That in itself was pretty exciting, her blog is a HUGE source of inspiration for me. I mean she made the original rose cake and heart-hidden-inside cake, just to mention a couple of the hugely creative ideas she has pioneered. Amazing. So when she proposed a food-styling challenge to me, I didn't even think twice before saying yes. Style a chocolate cake with a budget of $25 for props? It was on like Donkey Kong.

So the challenge was as follows; style a chocolate cake however you want and with any recipe you want but you only have $25 to spend on styling props (background not included). The cake was a no-brainer, you know how much I love to bake chocolate cakes these days. The budget was more than a little bit tricky. Those of you living in Sydney know how hard it is to find good, affordable homewares. I gave myself a little leeway, taking into account the exchange rate at the moment and stretching my budget to $AU27. Even then, I had to go to my one of my hidden away antique stores to find a few items that were special enough and still fit the price.

I managed to dig around and find this gorgeous silver serving tray for $20, a slightly cracked cake server for $3 and a lovely old lace doily for just $2. I'm particularly in love with the tray and the etchings on the surface, apparently quite a common item to find in antique stores which is why it wasn't too pricey. It also helped to have the lovely vintage door my husband gifted to me as an anniversary present, which has been my favourite photography surface for the last few weeks (in case you hadn't already noticed).

The cake layers are made from one of my favourite go-to recipes; David Lebovitz's Devil's Food Cake recipe. Love that guy, love this cake. I filled the rich chocolate cake layers with a white chocolate and raspberry ganache. It was preeeeeety. And tasted so great that it also made the perfect filling for some heart-shaped macarons. I could not resist topping the cake with more of these macarons, you know how much I love them. I just think that macarons make the perfect cake topper. I especially love how the colour of these ones offset all the glossy brown chocolate. And I splashed out and spent a fortune on fresh raspberries (totally not in season right now), because they are so photogenic on top of a chocolate cake. The cake itself was so pretty I didn't even need the props. But it was fun to play with them anyway.

The cake is covered in a rich layer of dark chocolate ganache and is best enjoyed in small portions. The finish is what we baking bloggers like to call 'rustic' (translation: I can't be bothered spending forever smoothing it out perfectly). I actually prefer it when chocolate ganache looks like this, the swirls of chocolate look so luscious and inviting. On a random note; I also picked up this lovely beat-up white enamel colander but it didn't fit into the budget for the challenge so the photo below is me totally cheating.

TIme to stop bombarding you with photos, there were so many that I liked that I couldn't edit them down! I just wanted to say a huge thank you to Amanda for letting me be a part of this challenge. It was SO MUCH FUN and hugely inspiring. It was really great to have a goal to focus on for my weekly baking and I managed to pick up a few props that I will definitely get plenty of use out of. As always, this recipe can be easily adapted from three layers to two, you can replace with filling with other flavours and you can top the cake with other fruits or toppings.

Chocolate Raspberry Layer Cake with Macarons

(Serves 12-16, Devil's Food Cake recipe from David Lebovitz)

For the cake:

9 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/2 cups (about 185g) cake flour (not self-raising, I just used plain flour and replaced 3 tbsp with cornflour/cornstarch, well-sifted together)

1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp bicarb/baking soda
1/4 tsp baking powder
115g (1 stick) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 1/3 cups (about 300g) caster/superfine sugar (white/granulated works too)
2 large eggs, at room temperature
1/2 cup water + 1/2 cup milk

Grease and line the base of a three 18cm cake tins (or two 20-22cm tins, if you only have one tin you can split up the batter and bake one layer of cake at a time in the same tin) and preheat oven to 180°C (350°F) (lower by 10°C for fan-forced). Sift together the cocoa powder, flour, salt, bicarb soda, and baking powder in a bowl. Using an electric mixer with a large mixing bowl, beat together the butter and sugar on high about 5 minutes until smooth and creamy. Add the eggs one at a time and beat until fully incorporated.

Mix together the water and milk. Stir half of the dry ingredients into the butter mixture, the add the milk mixture. Finally stir in the other half of the dry ingredients until smooth. Split batter mixture between the prepared tins. Bake for about 20-25 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean. Remove from the oven and cool in tin about 5 mins, then place on a wire rack and cool completely before icing. Cake can be baked the night before and stored in an airtight container overnight before assembly.

(Optional) For the macaron shells:

Prepare heart macarons as per these instructions, but instead of blue colouring and sprinkles I split the mixture in half and coloured half with pink food colouring.

For the raspberry ganache:

(makes enough to fill a three layer cake plus one batch of macarons, feel free to halve quantities if doing less layers or skipping macarons)
Note: Can be replaced with raspberry icing or raspberry buttercream

500g good quality white chocolate, finely chopped
300ml pure/heavy cream (min 35% fat unthickened)
125g (1 punnet) raspberries (fresh or frozen), pureed and strained

Place chocolate in a large mixing bowl. Heat cream over low-medium heat in saucepan until just boiling, pour over cream and set aside for 5 minutes. Use a whisk to combine mixture until smooth, then gradually add raspberry puree to taste. Chill until it thickens but is still pourable (take care not to leave too long or it will make it hard to spread). This mixture is prone to splitting as it cools, if this happens just reheat the bowl over a simmering saucepan of water and add a bit more cream. Place one layer of chocolate cake on your cake stand and cover with ganache. Sandwich second layer on top and repeat. Fill macarons with remaining ganache. It is best to chill your macarons overnight to allow the flavour to mature. I left both the cake and macarons in the fridge overnight before covering with the dark chocolate ganache on the day of serving.

For the chocolate ganache:

400g dark chocolate (I used semi-sweet), finely chopped

300ml pure/heavy cream (min 35% fat unthickened)

Optional: fresh raspberries, to decorate

Place chocolate in a large mixing bowl. Heat cream over low-medium heat in saucepan until just boiling, pour over cream and set aside for 5 minutes. Use a whisk to combine mixture until smooth. Chill until it thickens and just holds its shape but is still pourable. Use a spatula to spread over the outside of your cake. I used an offset spatula to smooth the surface. Place macarons around the border of the top of the cake. Decorate center of the cake with raspberries. Chill cake until ready to serve, remove from fridge at least 30 mins before serving.

Orange Tea Cake with Currants & Earl Grey Glaze

A slice of cake and a big cup of tea. That's what I need right now. And this really is the perfect kind of tea cake; a light and soft orange sponge cake, dotted with currants and drenched in Earl Grey-infused condensed milk. Not too heavy and not too sweet, just the way I love my cakes. I needed a piece to go along with the rant that is about to happen here. If you prefer to start your Monday with sunshine and puppies, now would be a VERY good time to click away from this post.

If you follow me on twitter you might have noticed my tweet about the striking similarities between my 2-year-old Tim Tam Cake and a 'Timtastic' Cake that is featured in an Australian food magazine and website this month. The recipes are slightly different and there is no copyright infringement of any sort.

I don't usually make a big deal about copycats. I am not a fan of dramaz on teh internetz. The internet is a very big place with a lot of incredibly creative people who are bound to come up with similar ideas every now and then. I'm sure that I've made recipes that other people have already written about, but I ALWAYS, ALWAYS put every effort into crediting the source of my recipes or inspirations. I know a lot of people suck at giving proper credit online, but I try my best.

Edit: Of course people are taking my rant out of context and kicking up drama, which I hate. I really don't want to spend any time defending myself for being sad about this. So I would just like to state the fact that I am in no way claiming ownership over the idea of a 'Tim Tam Cake'. I just think this particular version looked incredibly similar. It could just be a coincidence. I'll just leave it at that. Oh and I'll leave Molly up :)

Orange Sponge Cake with Currants and Earl-Grey Infused Condensed Milk Glaze

(adapted from this Taste of Home recipe, serves 8-10)

5 eggs, separated and at room temperature

160g (about 1 1/4 cups) plain/all-purpose flour

1/2 tsp salt

1/3 cup (75g) sugar + 1/2 cup (115g) sugar, preferably caster/superfine

Juice and grated zest of one orange

40g (about 3tbsp) butter, melted and cooled slightly

Optional: 1/2 cup currants

For the glaze: 1/2 cup sweetened condensed milk and 2 tsp (about 2 tea bags) Earl Grey Tea

Preheat oven to 180°C (350°F) (180°C (350°F)(you may need to adjust to 170°C (340° F) for fan-forced). Grease and line a 20-22cm round springform tin with baking paper. Sift flour and salt in a medium bowl and set aside. Place egg yolks in a large mixing bowl and beat with an electric mixer on high until slightly thickened. Gradually add 1/3 cup of sugar, beating well until thick and pale, about 10 minutes. Beat in juice and zest, then use a spatula to fold in flour mixture until just combined. In a separate mixing bowl, whisk egg whites on high with an electric mixer until soft peaks form, then gradually add 1/2 sugar and beat until thick and glossy stiff peaks form. Stir 1/4 of the egg white mixture into the egg yolk mixture, then fold the remaining egg white mixture in. Finally, fold in the melted butter until just combined. Pour mixture into prepared tin, you can cut through the batter with a knife to remove any large air bubbles, I also gave the tin a gently rap on the counter. Sprinkle currants over the top of the batter. Bake for 25-30 minutes or until the centre of the cake springs back quickly when lightly touched and the outside is golden brown. While cake is baking prepare the glaze; place condensed milk and loose tea leaves in a small saucepan over low heat and stir well for about 10 minutes, until condensed milk has been infused with the flavour of the tea. Strain mixture to remove the large tea leaves. When cake is ready, remove from oven and cool in tin for 5 minutes and then carefully turn out and cool on a wire rack. While cake is still warm, drizzle a thin layer of glaze over the top of the cake. This will stop the currants from going crunchy. Serve immediately or store in an airtight container at room temperature for several days.

Sweet 16 Cake

This cake really speaks for itself doesn't it?

A Sweet 16 cake for a very sweet sixteeth birthday for my lovely sister-in-law. The brief was simple; no berries, not cheesecake (a favourite of my other sis-in-law), butter cake please. And one of her favourite candies was Flake. I took it as an opportunity to try one of these candy-covered cakes that I've seen around so much, you know the ones with a border of KitKats around them? But with lots of mini-sized Flake chocolates instead! And I got to pull out my trusty old Australian Women's Weekly Birthday Cakes book (stolen off my Mum) to figure out how to cut the shapes of the 1 and 6. Oh, and SPRINKLES! Always sprinkles.

The cake was my favourite yellow cake, with the addition of a bit of vanilla bean to make it a little bit more special. I baked a huge lamington trays worth of cake, cut it up into the shape of a 16 and covered it in dulce de leche icing. That's right. Then SIX packets of treat-sized flakes and a whoooole lot of sprinkles later, this cake emerged. It was surprisingly easy to put together and had a great visual impact. And it tasted great. You could replace the Flake with any other of your favourite mini chocolate bars, and the sprinkles with anything else you want. Gummy bears are fun. This cake is an assured crowd-pleaser.

It's crazy to think that she was an itty-bitty 3 year old when I first met A. Time flies at such a scary pace. Anyway I think the birthday girl thoroughly enjoyed her cake because she has requested the same one for her big birthday bash in a few weeks. Time to stock up on a whole lotta Flakes!

Sweet 16 Flake Cake

(adapted from Le Cordon Bleu Complete Cooking Step-by-Step, serves approx 15)

For the cake:

355g (approx 2 & 3/4 cups) plain flour

1 tbsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

225ml (about 1 cup minus 1 tbsp) milk

2 tsp pure vanilla extract (or replace 1 tsp with the scraped seeds of 1 vanilla bean pod)

400g (approx 1 & 3/4 cups) white sugar (I used caster/superfine)

225g (approx 2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened

4 eggs, room temperature

Preheat oven to 180°C (350°F) and grease and line the base with baking paper a 24x32cm lamington tray (you can try to use individual tins but you will have to figure out the best sizes for the shapes that you need to cut out. Essentially you need three skinny rectangles and a large circle). Dust lined tin lightly with flour. Combine flour, baking powder and salt in a medium bowl and set aside. Mix milk and vanilla together in a measuring jug. Using an electric mixer on low speed, beat sugar and butter in a large bowl until blended. Increase speed to high and beat for 2 mins or until pale and creamy. Reduce speed to medium low, add eggs 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Alternately add flour mix and milk mixture, beginning and ending with flour mixture (I did it by adding 1/4 of of the dry mixture followed by 1/3 of the wet mixture at a time). Beat until smooth, occasionaly scraping bowl with a spatula. Pour batter into prepared tin and smooth with a spatula, then bake until golden and a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean (I think mine took approx 45-50 mins but oven times will vary). Cool in tin for 15 minutes and then carefully turn out on to a wire rack and cool completely. Can be baked the night before assembly, wrapped in clingfilm and refrigerated overnight. Cut your cake into pieces to form the shape of a 16 (you can sort of see what I did below, grab the AWW kids birthday cake book for clear instructions).

For the icing:

1 can (395g) of dulce de leche (instructions on how to make it here, or you can buy Nestle Top 'n' Fill Caramel)

250g salted butter, softened

2 cups (about 250g) icing sugar, sifted

To decorate: 6 packs treat-sized Flake chocolates or other mini chocolate bar, rainbow sprinkles

Place butter in a large mixing bowl and beat with an electric mixer on high until smooth and fluffy. Add dulce de leche and with the mixer on low, gradually add icing sugar until smooth and combined. You can adjust the icing sugar to achieve the desired icing consistency. You want it to be easy to spread but to hold its shape. Use a spatula to carefully cover the whole cake in a thin layer of icing. Place chocolate bars around the border of the cake and cover the top of the cake with rainbow sprinkles. Chill in the fridge until ready to serve, remove from fridge at least half an hour before serving.