friederike's Reviews
6 recipe(s) reviewed. Showing 1 to 6Sort by: Title 
| Date | Rating
Marie Claire Fresh + Fast
By Michele Cranston
Murdoch Books - 2009
Fine Apple Tart : page 222
Very nice and very easy, just not very exciting. Also minuspoints for not browning well; in the end I placed them under the grill for a few minutes (which might be a good idea anyway to caramelize the sugar), but next time I would definitely also brush them with a little milk (or a very thin sugar syrup, come to think of it). It's a perfect midweek dessert, but I wouldn't serve it to impress anyone.
useful (1)
Ginger-spiced Oranges with Caramel Ice Cream : page 204
Very delicious, very easy, very subtle taste, but: you'll either have to serve this dish on a plate, with knife and fork, or cut the oranges in smaller parts (i.e. third) as you won't be able to eat them properly otherwise.
I think I would have liked the oranges better if they had been cooked slightly, as it was, they were infused with the ginger, but other than that it tasted like, well, ice cream with bits of orange, not like a prepared dish, if you understand what I mean. I think simmering it for only 5 minutes would do a lot to change that.
One thing I liked about this dessert is it's versatility - because of the ginger, you can easily serve it at the end of a Middle Eastern-themed dinner, but then it works just as well with a Western European menu.
We served it with walnut ice cream, which worked very well. Most kinds of non-fruit ice cream would probably be good choices.
Edited 24 January 2014:
We made this again twice. Once, I let it marinate for about an hour, then tasted. I still felt that the ginger was too subtle and the oranges hadn't really picked up the flavour. I then decided to bring the oranges and the juice to a very short simmer, then serve - this was so much better!
The second time, I brought the oranges and juices to a very short simmer, then let it cool and marinate for 24 hours, and served it cold - this time I actually liked it less because it didn't taste fresh anymore.
So, all in all, I would recommend to marinate it for not too long, then bring it to a short simmer. One thing I'd still be tempted to try is to add the juice of a second orange and then simmer until the juices a reduced.
useful (1)
Pizza Dough : page 241
Quite easy, not a lot of work, but I wasn't as happy with the result as with this pizza dough. It was soggy, heavy, and not very crisp.
useful (0)
It was very simple, and extremely fast to prepare (with an hour in the oven afterwards). On the chicken, you hardly tasted any of the ingredients other than the honey and perhaps the garlic, which always gets minus points from me, but it was nice enough, and the timing was perfect.
Apparently, though, figs and garlic seem to react - at least they turned blue and green were they 'met', and we also had to remove a few bits from the chicken to prevent it from looking extremeley unappetizing, but for the rest it was nice to see as well.
useful (1)
Salade Nicoise : page 69
A very delicious and satisfying lunch box dish - also well suited as a light meal on a picnic or the like. One caveat: DB thought is was quite garlicky, until he admitted that he might have used just a teeny weeny bit more than advised in the recipe. There you have it.
useful (0)
Zucchini, Tomato and Pesto Pizza : page 173
Not very good. The balance was totally off. I used only about 3/4 of the tomato sauce, and yet it was too much and too strong, too concentrated and too salty. The pesto (I used a commercial one) and the parmesan didn't help either. The parmesan wasn't noticeable, apart from adding more salt, so next time I would skip that. I only mixed half of the pesto through the tomato sauce and dotted the pizza with the rest. The zucchinis didn't do anything either; I wonder if using chargrilled zucchinis might change that. By the way, one zucchini was about 350-450g and more than enough - no way you'd need two zucchinis to get 250g.
The base wasn't nice either - next time I'll probably use this recipe again.
Edited 30 April 2013:
We made pizza again, using the other dough, the other tomato sauce, a chargrilled zucchini, mozzarella and fresh basil, and it was a lot better! Still slightly salty - you can probably skip the salt in the tomato sauce altogether, but very nice. The zucchini was better in taste, though I'd make the strips short next time, just for ease of eating.
useful (0)