… for the past few weeks we’ve had a little furry visitor to Belleau in the shape of a beautiful young feline. She’s quite skittish and is mostly seen darting off when spooked and to be honest I simply presumed that she was a local farm cat pushing the boundaries of her boundaries as it were… but this weekend it became clear that she was more than an occasional visitor and that she was in fact a stray and lost little puss. She’s been very lucky with the weather of late but hungry and tired she’s been visiting nearly all the 8 houses in the village and most of us have been feeding her and then finally on Sunday we invited her into the cottage for some love and a basket to sleep in. As most of you know we’re only at the cottage sporadically and our direct neighbours have two dogs so neither of us can truly adopt her but she’s clearly so young and loving that I feel as though she’d make such a wonderful pet…
… i’ve done all the right things such as registering her on a few websites and have told the local Cats Protection League plus I took her to the vet to see if she’s microchipped which she’s not (people tend not to bother with cats out here in the deepest darkest countryside) and it’s more than likely that she’s the progeny of some farmyard cat-love and she simply ran off to fend for herself… we’ve propped open our shed door and put a basket and water in there with her and she seems to have taken well to the shelter with the promise of the neighbours all taking turns to feeding her and maybe she’ll make a good village mascot outdoor cat but other than that I am at a loss as what to do… it breaks my heart to leave her to come back to London but I also don’t want her languishing in a cats home waiting for an adoption that may never come…
… she also needs a name… i’ve been calling her Geri, The Viking fancies calling her Fang, Tracey calls her Graham and my mum thinks she should be called Honey due to her gorgeous honey tones…
mini white chocolate and raspberry jam marble loaf cake with a white chocolate jam ganache
a simple cake was baked this weekend as we had some friends turn up out of the blue and I wanted to make something quick and sweet and a little bit naughty but you know when you really want a slice of homemade cake but you don’t want the nagging guilt of having the whole thing… I don’t know about you but I can never eat just one slice… so these mini loaf cakes are ideal. One is enough to serve 4 or 5 people for afternoon tea and the other one you can give to your guests as a leaving gift, one hundred percent guilt-free, with extra brownie-points as a bonus for doing a good deed and giving away cake… the ganache icing is particularly naughty and quick to make, it is literally jam stirred into melted chocolate and since my masterclass a few weeks back with master chocolatier Paul A Young I learnt that you can make ganache by adding any liquid to melted chocolate I have been doing exactly that ever since…
i’m using a method for baking
for the marble cake
3 large free-range eggs
220g white sugar
220g self-raising flour
220g butter – room temperature
vanilla essence
2 tablespoons raspberry jam
a little milk to slacken if needed
for the ganache
100g white chocolate
1 tablespoon raspberry jam
a little extra jam for swirling
I greased and lined two half pound loaf tins but you could use one large loaf tin or a 20cm springform cake tin
pre-heat the oven to 180C
using your hand-held or bowl mixer, beat together the eggs and the sugar until light and fluffy (roughly 3 mins) then add half the soft butter and beat again, then half the flour and beat again.
scrape down the side of the bowl, add the vanilla, the rest of the flour and butter and gently beat until well blended, you may need to add a tablespoon of milk to slacken off a bit
remove half the batter into another bowl and stir in the jam until well mixed then using a tablespoon, spoon randomly spaced dollops of the raspberry batter into the loaf tins, followed by dollops of the white batter until used up, then take a chopstick and swirl it through the batter to combine
bake for at least 35 minutes until golden and risen and a skewer inserted comes out cleanly then set aside to cool
make the ganache by gently melting the white chocolate, then when fully melted stir in the jam and spread it languidly on top and perhaps shimmy some more jam on top just for looks
this month the brilliant we should cocoa bloggers challenge, hosted by Choclette from the Chocolate Log Blog, is celebrating it’s 400th year in business and to celebrate we’ve all been challenged to bake with jam…
I will be writing up my experience with Paul A Young in an upcoming post and it will also appear on the Intel iQblog soon where I’ve recently had a series of articles published.
eat and of course, enjoy!
Mmmm, love it. I would be very happy to be sent away from visiting you with one of these. They look so pretty too. Incidentally, I quite like the name Fang for such an innocent looking beautiful cat 😉
Oh, these sound wonderful! Such a perfect little treat and I love the sound of that white chocolate and jam ganache – genius!
Oooo!!!This is awesome!! =)
The cake looks lovely, but the cat is a smasher – how about calling her Miss Marble?
I'm not a 'cat person' but your visitor looks pretty adorable. As does the cake – jam stirred into white chocolate – this I have to try! (and no – I can never have just one slice either…)
Love the cake- the flavours sound perfect! The ganache alone sounds like something I would gladly have an extra jar of to lick off. Also, I vote Fang!!
Just worked out how to leave a comment here whilst away. Coming away with cake is even more of an incentive to visit. Love the jammy ganache, great idea. Very envious of your Paul A Young experience, though I did, ahem, know about the liquid & choc issue. Fab cake & thanks for playing along with WSC. We had a big stray ginger turn up years ago. He slept in shed
(Cont) and kept the rabbits down. Owners kept him on after we left – he was gorgeous too. Choclette
Oh honey is such a lovely name, so soft and sweet. That marble cake is a winner too. Nice idea to give a gift of cake I always like that and then you are not tempted when the visitors have left.
What a beautiful pink and delicious loaf!
Happy Friday
Lovely looking cakes, but the cat is even prettier! I don't think she'd wait long before being rehomed if you did decide to take her to a shelter.
I hope you have not been enticing the cat into your house with the lure of cake! 🙂
What a very pretty cat….. So cute! The cake also looks divine (only upstaged by 'Fang')….. Brilliant tip about adding any liquid to melted chocolate to make ganache. I look forward to your Paul A Young write up with interest!
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Second attempt in English rather than iPad jibberish……….!
Oh no, definitely not Fang – that's a name for a Jack Russel! How about Florence, Flora or Shirley?
I was looking at a pair of those little loaf tins reduced in the supermarket the other day and wondered what I could need a set for….I picked them up and put them back down, now I wish I'd put them in my basket!
The cake looks wonderful and great tip about the ganache!
Aghhh! Just left a comment and it's gone!!! Wanted to say what a beautiful and inspirational autumn recipe this is – just gorgeous! I'm with your mum – Honey for me too!
That's such a heartwarming story of Geri/Fang Dom- well done you guys looking after a little hungry kitty. I haven't baked with my mini loaf tins for AGES- thank you for the reminder to dig em out wi these gorgeous cakes!
Dom, I love cats and always appreciate a nice cat story! Your lovely pie reminds me of when I was a little girl and my mum and grandmother (from the Lake District) would make steak and kidney pie for themselves and steak and mushroom for us “Americans” who weren't so keen on kidneys!
Oops! I see now I've read two posts as one and commented on this post about the pie in the other post!
What a beautiful cat, lovely story. I love the cake as well, lovely blend of colours
Thanks for the tip about adding any liquid to melted chocolate – love the idea of a jammy white chocolate ganache! The mini-marble cake looks so pretty.
What a sweet kitty! I hope she finds the home she's meant to have. I love the color of your jam ganache. I would never have thought to do that but I will now!