I was worried that I wouldn't get a chance to cook in Italy while we were away, I shouldn't have worried!
Check out the kitchen that was in the villa that we were staying in for the week!
On the night before the wedding, it was the McCosker's family turn to cater everyone for dinner, which meant, dinner for 40! So Jane and I (Pete's eldest sister) set to menu planning and how we could possible pull this off!
Off to the local shops in Volterra we went, with our secret weapon Alan, who speaks a smattering of Italian! We got everything we needed on the list for the entree's and mains, but I struggled somewhat to find an electric handmixer which I needed to make the pavlova I was planning. Not being too keen to hand whisk 10 eggs until stiff peaks formed, I decided to change the plan. Without any recipes, I knew the recipe for sticky date pudding off by heart, so thought that that would be a pretty happy second choice.
It seems dates do not exist in Italy. Nor does self raising flour!
But, with prunes in hand and a few packets of what looked to be a vanilla cake (an extremely well-risen cake) in the trolley, we returned home.
I set to work making a very very large tiramisu and set that in the industrial sized freezer for half an hour to set.
I then started working on my sticky date pudding. After mixing 1/2 a kilo of butter with the sugar with the world's largest egg whisk, I added the eggs and cake mix. As I was mixing the cake mix through, I got a whiff of citrus in the air. Unfortunately, our secret weapon Al didn't find "lemone" on the side of the packet and there were no pictures of juicy lemons next to the cake, so we were none the wiser that I had just added 3 lemon cakes to the base of my sticky date pudding. Or should I say, sticky prune pudding.
Being the final thing to go wrong with my creation I decided to just go with it and created a lemon drizzle cake instead. Having never made one in my life, it was very much trial and error (the theme of the day!). The best part was skewering the cake when it was cooked and pouring the hot lemon syrup over it, which set into a delicious sugary crust.
If I had a clue what I ended up putting in this cake I would list it here, but I truly have no idea. All I know is that it was magnifico!
I am going to try and re-create it again, in English, with scales and a pen, so will do the second instalment some time in the next few weeks!!!
It seems the 40 guests might have liked the two desserts enough too...This was all that remained of the huge tiramisu and two lemon drizzle cakes...
I had such a great time cooking all afternoon with Jane and believe we could definitely run a catering business together! But, we would definitely need our trusty sous chefs, Pete and Ange!! Thanks for all the lemon zesting Pete!!
Looks as though it was well received,dollop cream a must this end.Oh that kitchen, you could certainly cook up a storm
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