We are at the verge of Autumn

Posted April 27th, 2013 in Food 1 Comment »

I haven’t written on Umeboss regularly for a long time and I feed bad 🙁 I used to write a post almost every day before, but now I don’t seem to be able to find the time to sit back and write what I want to write about. I don’t want to say it’s something/someone’s fault, it’s just that I’ve been busy doing other stuff. But I feel bad.

Here in Perth the Autumn has arrived and I’m enjoying the beautiful sky and temperature. …. It rains a lot, and I see lots of snails (gross!), but let’s think that all this is part of nature. 🙂

In my hometown, Japan, we get lots of delicious food in Autumn. Some fruits, fish, chestnuts, sweet potatoes, etc etc are the best to be eaten in Autumn. But here, I don’t see much Autumn fruits sold cheap at the shops. Grapes, pears, mandarines, persimmon – to name a few – are the Autumn fruits, but grapes are not really cheap! Maybe it’s still too early? I hope the price will drop in few weeks when we start to feel winter is just around the corner.

I baked walnut nougat slices last night. It’s a perfect sweet to munch on with a cup of hot tea. I found that roasted almond would have gone much better on the nougat rather than walnuts, so I will try making it with almond next time.

Here is the recipe:

* butter and egg should be at room temperature

* I used 20cm x 20cm oven pan, but you can use a bigger sized pan

~ the base ~

Unsalted Butter 150g
Granulated Sugar 100g
Egg 1
Plain Flour 300g

~ the topping ~

Unsalted Butter 30g
Granulated Sugar 80g
Cream (I used Whipping) 100ml
Honey 30g
Whole or chopped walnuts 150g

Roast walnuts in the oven or in the pan over stove. Leave to cool down.
Base – Add sugar to butter, and mix using a whisk. Beat egg, and gradually add to the butter mixture. Mix well.
Shift in flour, and mix using a spatula. (DO NOT over-mix) Once the dough comes together, wrap in plastic and rest it in the fridge for 3 hours +
Set oven at 180 ℃. Line baking sheet in an oven pan, and spread the dough over. Poke few times with fork. Bake in the oven for 15~20 minutes. Take it out of the oven and leave to cool.
Topping – Place all the ingredients except walnuts in a sauce pan. Over low heat, simmer to caramelize. To check it’s ready to take off the heat, simply drop the caramel into a cup of water – if the caramel forms small balls inside the water, then it is ready. Take it off the heat, and mix with walnuts.
Spread the nougat over the base. Level the surface. Bake in the oven at 180℃ for 20~30 minutes.
Slice into pieces before it’s completely cool.