Experiments in baking

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As you’ve probably realised I like cooking. And I like trying new things. And I hate to waste anything. And right now we have a lot of grapes literally raining down off the grapevine that covers our pergola. True, the vine is largely there to provide shade, and the birds do eat a lot of the grapes, but even they can’t manage them all and I don’t like to see them all drop off or go mouldy. In the past I have made wine, juice, jam, jelly, and chutney, and dried them to make raisins, as well as cooking with them (roasted cauliflower with grapes was something I enjoyed) and of course just eaten them as they are. This year they are not quite as sweet as usual (due to the lack of sunshine I guess) and the wet weather means they really need to be picked all at once before they rot, so there isn’t a lot of time to try a bit of this and that. I’ve given away bunches to friends and neighbours, and offered them on Freegle. I made a big batch of apple and grape chutney. I’ve picked lots off the stalks and frozen them to use later (grape and quince jelly is sounding appealing – we have a quince tree too!). Then I thought I would try something different. I have a good recipe for pear and cardamon upside-down cake which is delicious. That involves caramelising the pears first in butter and sugar, then pouring batter on top and baking. So I thought I would try the same idea, but I didn’t add any sugar to the grapes, just cooked them in butter until caramelised, then added cake batter with finely chopped rosemary instead of cardamon. (In the past I made grape jam using a recipe I found online and that was a mistake – the added sugar made the jam so sweet it was almost inedible! So I learnt my lesson from that!) The cake turned out well, I would definitely make again. As usual I forgot to take a photo of the cake until we had eaten half, but here’s a slice! All rights reserved. © Text and image copyright Fleur 2024.