Strawberry Lemon Bundt with Strawberry Jam Glaze for #BundtaMonth

Adding lemon juice to butter cake brightens whatever other flavor you’ve chosen and cuts through the richness, while increasing the rise as the juice interacts with the baking soda, creating a lighter crumb.  Whatever fruit or jam you decide to use, always add a bit of fresh lemon. 

This month’s BundtaMonth theme is a favorite of mine because it’s jam, something I always have in the cupboard or refrigerator.  Sometimes homemade, sometimes store bought but always at the ready to add variety and flavor to any baked good.  I started out with a simple pound cake recipe, switching milk and lemon juice for buttermilk and adding a filling of strawberries and jam.  The bottom of the Bundt didn’t brown very much in the oven I’m using, so I ended up leaving it right, as it baked in the pan, so you’ll notice a nice layer of filling at the bottom.  As it turned out, that balanced nicely with the jam on top so you had strawberries coming and going.  We took the cake out to play Pokeno a couple of nights ago, so the extra strawberries I meant to decorate it with didn’t happen.  I forgot them at home.  But, as my friend Gillian does say, “Small matter.”  The cake was just fine without them.

Ingredients
For the cake:
1/2 cup or 115g unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 cup or 225g sugar
2 eggs, at room temperature
2 cups or 250g flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup or 80ml milk
1/8 cup or 30ml fresh lemon juice
Zest 1 medium lemon
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

For the filling:
3/4 cup or 125g chopped strawberries
4 tablespoons good strawberry jam

For the glaze: 3-4 tablespoons good strawberry jam
Optional:  Extra sliced strawberries to decorate the top

Method
Preheat the oven to 350°F or 180°C.  Grease and flour your Bundt pan.

Zest your lemon and then juice it.  Add the lemon juice and vanilla to the milk and set aside.

In a medium bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and lemon zest.  Set aside.

In a large mixing bowl, beat the cream and butter until light and fluffy.

Add the eggs one at a time, beating well in between.

It might look like it’s curdling a little bit but don’t that alarm you.  That look will go away when you start adding the flour mixture.

Add the flour and milk mixtures alternately to the batter, in two lots, mixing in between.

In a small bowl, mix your chopped strawberries with the jam for the filling.

Put half of the batter in the bottom of the prepared pan and spread it around.

Spoon in the strawberry filling.

Spoon the balance of the batter on top of the filling and spread it out to cover the filling.

Bake for about 40-45 or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Allow to cool on a rack then turn out.

While it is still just a little warm, spoon the extra jam for glaze on the top of the cake (or on the bottom in the case of mine that didn’t brown) and spread it around with the spoon.

Enjoy!

For all fans of jammy cakes, we have a great round up of Bundts for you this month!

                                                       

Aloha Cake by Veronica at My Catholic Kitchen

Blueberry and Lemon Bundt by Holly at a A Baker’s House

Butter and Jam Bundt by Anne at From My Sweet Heart

Cranberry Pear Pumpkin Cake by Kate at Food Babbles

Crabapple Yogurt Bundt Cake by Alice at Hip Foodie Mom

Cream Cheese Black Cherry Bundt Cake by Anuradha at Baker Street

Cream Cheese Pound Cake with Blueberry Jam by Sandra at The Sweet Sensations

Guava Cream Cheese Bundt Cakeby Kathya at Basic N Delicious

Peachy Keen Spice Cake by Kim at Ninja Baking

Raspberry Jam Bundt with Peanut Butter Glaze by Lora at Cake Duchess

Spiced Bundt Cake with Berry Jam & Cream Cheese Swirl by Heather at Hezzi D’s Books and Cooks

Sticky Toffee Bundt Cake with Cranberry Jelly Glaze by Felice at All That’s Left are the Crumbs

Sticky Fig Bundt by Anita at Hungry Couple NYC

Strawberry Jam Glazed Spiced Pound Cake with Buttermilk and Orange by Laura atThe Spiced Life

Strawberry Lemon Bundt with Strawberry Jam Glaze by Stacy at Food Lust People Love

Triple Blackberry Bundt by Tara at Noshing with the Nolands

Here's how you can be a part of #BundtaMonth:

Simple rule: Bake us a bundt using your favorite jam.
Post it before November 30, 2013.
Use the #BundtaMonth hashtag in your title. (For ex: title could read – #BundtaMonth: Raspberry Jam Bundt with Peanut Butter Glaze
Add your entry to the Linky tool below.
Link back to our announcement posts.

Fresas con Crema - Strawberries and Mexican Cream

Fresas con Crema is a simple and delicious dessert made from strawberries and Mexican cream, known as crema, a rich store-bought dairy product prepared with two ingredients, heavy cream and buttermilk.

Crema is often used as a topping for savory dishes like tacos, chimichangas or as one of the fillings in burritos but it is also excellent in sweet dishes, like this one, or as a topping for fruit tarts. It’s quite rich and a little bit tangy but less tart than our sour cream, more like crème fraiche.

In Texas, just about every supermarket carries crema, sometimes even from a selection of producers, including a store brand. I've discovered that some are more tangy, even a bit salty, and some are more mild. I actually did that research looking for/hoping to find a crema that I could substitute for clotted cream. 

Some might have done okay but I was responsible for bringing said clotted cream to a bridal shower and, well, I didn't want to let the side down. After all, if you are putting clotted cream on a scone, it's right out there for everyone to judge. I ended up making my own which is a whole 'nother nightmare I might share with you some day. 

Fresas con Crema - Strawberries and Mexican Cream

If Mexican crema isn’t available in your local store, you can substitute clotted cream. You can also sub in sour cream or crème fraiche and skip or reduce the amount of lime, if desired. This may mean that your cream will need a little longer to “set” but it will still taste delicious. 

Ingredients to serve four

1 cup or 200g Mexican crema

1/2 cup or 120ml heavy cream

3 tablespoons sweetened condensed milk, plus extra for drizzling, if desired

1 tablespoon fresh lime juice 

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

3 cups or 440g (weight after hulling) chopped fresh strawberries, plus 4 more for garnish, if desired.

Method

Divide the chopped strawberries among 4 serving dishes or ramekins. 

In a small bowl, whisk the crema, heavy cream, sweetened condensed milk, lime juice and vanilla.

Top the strawberries with the cream mixture and quickly stir a little to mix it with some of the chopped strawberries. It starts to firm up immediately so do not tarry. 

To garnish with the extra strawberries, you can simple pop one on top each of the bowls, or carefully make slices in the berry, leaving the hull intact, then press gently down to fan the slices out. 

Drizzle the tops with a little more condensed milk, if desired. Serve immediately or keep chilled until ready to serve. 

Enjoy! 

It’s Sunday FunDay and today we are sharing recipes with strawberries! Many thanks to our host, Sue of Palatable Pastime. Check out the links below:

• Strawberry Breakfast Pastry from Palatable Pastime
• Strawberry Smoothie from A Day in the Life on the Farm
• Triple Berry Greek Yogurt Parfait from Amy's Cooking Adventures
• Strawberry Hazelnut Crostini from Mayuri’s Jikoni
• Homemade Strawberry Crush from Sneha's Recipe
• Fresas con Crema from Food Lust People Love
• Strawberry Cheesecake Bars from Karen's Kitchen Stories
• Strawberry Chia Seed Pudding from Cook with Renu

We are a group of food bloggers who believe that Sunday should be a family fun day, so every Sunday we share recipes that will help you to enjoy your day. If you're a blogger interested in joining us, just visit our Facebook group and request to join.

Pin these Fresas con Crema! 

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Sunny Scottish Strawberry Cake

When strawberries have been in the refrigerator a while and are "past their best," I always make this strawberry cake with ground almonds. It's beautiful with a glaze or just a sprinkling of powdered sugar. 

Every summer that I am able, since the year 2000, I have visited my friend, Jacky, in Aberdeen, Scotland.  I’ve missed the occasional year and, sadly, this is my second year in a row to miss this time.  Which makes me very sad.  Despite its usually gloomy weather, even in Summer, Aberdeen is one of my favorite places because Jacky is one of those upbeat people who radiate sunshine.   We met in 1996 when we were both living in the little oilfield town Macaé, Brazil and she confessed years later that I scared her initially and she thought to herself that she could never be friends with me.  I can be a bit overwhelming at first, it’s true, but I guess I didn’t turn out to be so frightening after all.  We’ve been fast friends ever since.

Way back in the Summer of 2005, I was sitting around in Jacky’s lovely warm kitchen, reading the daily newspaper, the Aberdeen Press and Journal, or the P&J as we (almost locals) like to call it, and found this recipe.  Scottish strawberries are some of the best in the world (my other Scottish friend, Gillian, says they are THE VERY BEST and I have learned not to argue with Gillian, who can also be a little scary at first.) during their short season so we had been buying them and eating them in a frankly prodigious manner.  This recipe for strawberry cake was supposedly the answer to what to do if you have some strawberries that haven’t been eaten but were getting “past their best.”   Of course, we had to go out and buy some more to bake this cake! 

Since then, I have made it with various berries in different stages of ripeness (read: over ripeness) always with great success.  The buttery crumb of the cake, heightened by the natural richness of the almond meal is superbly and perfectly complemented by a cup of tea or coffee or a glass of cold milk.  And, if you are using berries that are slightly past their best, you can feel virtuous for not wasting them. Win-win. 

Ingredients

3 tablespoons plain flour (for coating baking pan)

6.35 oz or 180g ground almonds

3/4 cup or 180g soft unsalted butter

3/4 cup or 180g caster sugar

1 1/2 cups or 180g self-raising flour (or the same amount of plain flour plus a scant 2 teaspoons of baking powder and a good pinch of salt)

2 medium eggs

2 tablespoons milk

14 oz or 400g strawberries, plus a few for decoration, if you like.

(Raspberries, blueberries, blackberries or a combination can be substituted for the strawberries.)

To serve: Icing or powdered sugar

Method

Preheat your oven to 350°F or 180°C.  Spray your baking pan of choice with non-stick spray or butter it well.  Tip in the plain flour and turn the pan all around, shaking carefully to make sure that it is well-coated with flour.  This is not as important in a regular, flat baking pan where just buttering would probably work as well, but in a Bundt pan, this is essential to get the cake to come out nicely, without leaving bits stuck to the pan.

Hull your strawberries with a sharp knife by cutting into the berry just under the green hull.  Press your thumb on the knife and the hull and pull the hull out of the strawberry.  This leaves more strawberry behind to eat that cutting the whole top off would do.  

Rinse the strawberries well and let them drain. Cut the berries into smaller pieces.   Set aside.

Place all the ingredients except the strawberries in a mixer and mix to combine.

Carefully stir the cut strawberries through the batter. 

Spoon the batter into the pan, leveling off the top.  

Place the tin in the middle of the oven for an hour, checking after 40 minutes and covering with tin foil if it is getting too brown.

Remove from the oven, cool slightly then loosen the edges with a knife and turn out onto a serving plate.  

Serve warm or cold, decorated with extra strawberries, if desired, or sprinkled with confectioner’s sugar.

Enjoy!

Grilled Lamb Skewers with Roasted Carrots

These grilled lamb skewers are made with tender marinated leg of lamb chunks, cooked over high heat in a grill pan, then left to rest on sweet roasted young spring carrots. A sprinkle of feta and mint lend even more flavor and just the right touch of saltiness to this flavorful dish.

 

A number of years ago, when we were living in Kuala Lumpur, I had a friend who would buy the organic new baby carrots, greens still attached, that would turn up on occasion in one of our grocery stores. They weren’t cheap but she said that they were worth the splurge. As much as I like carrots, I didn’t imagine that she could be correct. Who would pay that much – don’t remember the exact amount except that it seemed like a lot – for carrots? Not me. After all, how special could they be?

Last week I decided that a simple spring vegetable minestrone would be the perfect recipe to share on the Sunday Supper Movement website for today’s Welcome Spring event, and since it was for the website and not just this little blog, I did splurge. I bought freshly hulled peas, fine French beans, baby zucchini, baby leeks and tiny corn on the cob along with a large bunch of spring carrots, greens still attached. Such a pot of sweet wonderfulness.

I used just a couple of the carrots in the soup so I started looking for another recipe to show off the rest. My original plan for this post was simply spring lamb but when I came across a recipe on Bon Appétit for lamb skewers with carrots, it seemed like kismet. (Which comes from the Arabic word for fate, by the way.)

Of course, Bon Appétit being Bon Appétit, the dish was complicated with two marinades and then a dressing, so I simplified it down to one marinade for the lamb and a mere sprinkling of feta and mint for the finished dish. Ain’t nobody got time for all that. I can’t imagine how this could be improved upon. It was perfect in every way and the carrots were fabulous. Sweet, tender and with such wonderful flavor. Now I know what my friend was talking about! Next time I make this, I will double the carrots so I suggest you do too. I’ve already been back to the store and bought another bunch.

Ingredients to serve 2-3
For the spring lamb skewers:
1 lb 3oz or 540g leg lamb chunks

For the lamb marinade:
2 large garlic cloves
1 small red chili pepper
2-3 sprigs fresh rosemary
1/4 cup or 60ml dry white wine
1 teaspoon large grain sea salt
1 teaspoon sugar
1 tablespoon whole grain mustard
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/4 cup or 60ml olive oil

For the oven roasted spring carrots:
9 1/3 oz or 265g spring carrots
1-2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil (a good drizzle to coat)
Sea salt
Freshly ground black pepper

To serve:
8-10 fresh mint leaves
2 oz or 57g crumbled feta
Freshly ground black pepper

Method
Cut the lamb into bite-sized pieces and put them in a Ziploc bag.

Mince your garlic and red chili pepper. Strip the rosemary leaves off of the stems and chop them finely.

Add all the marinade ingredients into a mixing bowl up to and including the black pepper, then whisk in the olive oil until well blended.

Pour the marinade into the bag with the lamb. Mix it around until the lamb is well coated, then press all of the air out and seal. Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes but you can also make this early in the day and leave it marinating till you are ready to cook dinner. Mine marinated about three hours.

To roast the carrots, preheat your oven to 400°F or 200°C.

Scrub the carrots well and cut the long tops of the greens off. You can leave on a little bit for color, if desired. If some of the carrots are thicker than the others, cut them in half lengthwise.

Pile the carrots on a baking pan, drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle with salt and freshly ground black pepper. Then spread them out so they aren't touching each other.

Roast in the preheated oven until lovely and golden and caramelized, turning once in the middle of roasting time of about 20-25 minutes.

Thread your lamb onto wooden skewers cut to fit snugly in your grill pan. Discard the bag with the marinade.

Heat the pan over high heat. You’ll need to turn your extractor fan on or perhaps even open a window because this is going to smoke. But it’s going to be fast and worth it, I promise.

Once your pan is scorching hot, lay four of the lamb skewers in it, quickly searing one side. You don’t want to crowd the grill pan so don’t try to cook them all at once.

Cook for 2-3 minutes on that side, then turn and cook the other side for another 2-3 minutes.

This will leave your small bites of lamb still pink inside. If you want them done more, cook for another minute or two on each side. I encourage you to leave them pink inside though, because they will be more tender.

As you remove the cooked lamb from the grill pan, rest the skewers on the roasted carrots.

Continue until all of your lamb skewers are done and are resting on the carrots. Give the whole pan another few grinds of fresh black pepper.

Crumble the feta and rip the mint leaves onto the lamb and carrots.

Enjoy!

Who is ready to welcome spring with me? My Sunday Supper family sure is. Check out all the lovely spring recipes they are sharing today!

Breakfast:

• Chicken Sausage, Apple and Cheddar Breakfast Bake by Renee's Kitchen Adventures
• Chive and Cheese Quiche by An Appealing Plan
• Lavender Scones by Feeding Big and More
• Raspberry Lemon Baked Donuts by Grumpy's Honeybunch
• Matcha Donuts by The Ninja Baker
• Whole Wheat Lemon Berry Coffee Cake with Lemon Glaze by A Mindful Mom

Appetizers:

• Artichoke Lemon Hummus by Food Done Light
• Asparagus and Goat Cheese Tart by Baking Sense
• Butter Lettuce and Spring Radish Salad by Hardly A Goddess
• Ceviche with Potato and Pea Shoot Salad by Caroline's Cooking
• Roasted Strawberry Popsicles by Brunch-n-Bites
• Rustic Wrapped Tart with Ramps by Delaware Girl Eats

Beverages:

• An Unconventional Mojito by Monica's Table
• Caribbean Cream Cocktail by Cosmopolitan Cornbread
• Cucumber Grapefruit Basil Mojito by The Crumby Cupcake
• Limoncello Raspberry Sangria by Eat, Drink and Be Tracy
• Spiced Rhubarb Champagne Cocktail by Hezzi-D Books and Cooks
• Vanilla Lavender Limeade by The Tip Toe Fairy
• Very Berry Springtime Spritzer by Cindy's Recipes and Writings
• Violet Hour by Wholistic Woman

Main Dishes:

• Cheese Tortellini with Herbed Ricotta and Fava Beans by The Wimpy Vegetarian
• Gnocchi Primavera with Spring Asparagus and Peas by La Bella Vita Cucina
• Levantine Fattoush Salad by Curious Cuisiniere
• One Pan Spicy Lemon Chicken with Tomatoes by Fantastical Sharing of Recipes
• Orecchiette with Peas, Pecorino and Onions by Cooking Chat
• Pasta with Peas by Manu's Menu
• Pesto Shrimp and Zoodles Oh My! by My Imperfect Kitchen
• Ramp and Mushroom Frittata by Pies and Plots
• Spring Lamb Skewers with Roasted Baby Carrots by Food Lust People Love
• Spring Salad with Scallops and Strawberry Vinaigrette by My World Simplified
• Veggie Pasta Primavera by Momma’s Meals

Side Dishes:

• Asparagus, Goat Cheese, and Rhubarb Salad by The Texan New Yorker
• Green Peas with Onion and Bacon by Magnolia Days
• Minty Pea Farro Spring Salad by She Loves Biscotti
• Roasted Asparagus and Mushroom Quinoa Pilaf by Cupcakes and Kale Chips

Desserts:

• Amazing Coconut Cake by A Baking Legacy
• Berry and Honey Whipped Ricotta by Family Foodie
• Caramelized Black Figs and Walnuts with Mascarpone by Un Assaggio of Food, Wine & Marriage
• Carrot Oatmeal Raisin Cookies by What Smells So Good?
• Chocolate Covered Strawberry Cookies by A Kitchen Hoor's Adventures
• Colorado Crème by Cooking on the Ranch
• Honey Blossoms by Get the Good Stuff!
• Hot Milk Sponge Cake by Hey What’s for Dinner Mom?
• Lemon Scented Choux with Rhubarb Ginger Pastry Cream by The Finer Cookie
• Meyer Lemon Bars by The Chef Next Door
• No-Bake Berry Greek Yogurt Pie by An Italian in my Kitchen
• Rhubarb Meringue Pie by Jane’s Adventures in Dinner
• Spring Cookie Bouquet by The Freshman Cook
• Strawberry Cheesecake Puffs by Moore or Less Cooking
• Strawberry Cupcakes with Vanilla Buttercream by Tramplingrose
• Strawberry Moscato Sorbet by Seduction in the Kitchen
• The Black Beast by That Skinny Chick Can Bake

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