Easy peasy Cinnamon scrolls (yeast free!)

As you might know by reading this blog, I LOVE to cook.  I have no problems making things from scratch, taking the long way round so to speak, but sometimes, when there's an easier and faster way to get things into people's bellies and it works just as well, I don't mind taking that option!

These cinnamon scrolls are a case in point :)  Delicious, buttery goodness that leave the most amazing smell in your kitchen when making.  I was preparing them for Christmas brunch with friends and i wanted to have as many things ready to go straight from fridge to oven to hungry friends bellies in as quick a time as possible.  

When trawling the net, I discovered that the vast majority of the recipes involved yeast. In fact, I had no idea you could really make them without it.  But then I stumbled upon a recipe that used a soda bread/scone type dough, and suddenly my mind was filled with the soft, warm, buttery goodness that i love about scones, in a scroll form filled to the brim with cinnamon sugar and the decision was made!  

I must say, I actually prefer these to the ones using yeast.  They really are something you eat straight out of the oven, just like you would with scones.  The yeast ones are something I would make to eat straight away and then also have leftover to munch on when cold.  But I knew these wouldn't last, if I know myself and my friends! heheheh :D Additionally, unless i've been baking all day, my kitchen is quite cool, so the yeast would have taken a bit longer to rise... and i'm impatient! :D

Photo by a friend Sarah :) taken about 2 seconds before half of these were already down people's gullets :D

Anyway, they were really lovely!  I'll definitely be making this recipe again!! 

Ingredients for 12 mini ones, or 6 larger ones:

For the dough:

2 cups cake "00" flour (plain flour is fine too!) ***

2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

100g butter, unsalted, chopped

2/3 cup of milk

**If you have self-raising flour, use that, and omit the baking powder, and use only a pinch of salt.

For the filling:

120g butter, softened

4 tablespoons lightly packed soft brown sugar (i used light, but dark would be find too!)

1 heaped teaspoon cinnamon

Preheat oven to 190 degrees 

First, make the filling:

Put all ingredients into a small bowl and beat with a hand held electric mixer until the mixture is light and fluffy :)  Set aside.

Sift flour, baking powder and salt in to a large bowl, then add the chunks of butter, rubbing it into the flour with your fingertips.  Keep doing this until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. 

Make a well in the centre of this mix and add most of the milk (leave a couple of tablespoons).  Mix lightly using a flat bladed knife (i used my cake icing spatula) until it comes together to a soft, light, slightly sticky dough (add the rest of the milk if necessary).

Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead lightly and briefly until the dough is smooth.  

Roll out the dough into a rectangle, 25cm wide and as long as it comes (around 40cm in my case).  Roll it to around 1/2 cm thick.  

Using a long flat blade knife (like a cake icing spatula or a butterknife if you don't have), spread the mixture evenly over the dough, making sure you go right up to the edges.  

Roll up the dough (from the long side) to make a long sausage.  Wrap in cling and put it in the fridge to cool for about 20 minutes (this isn't necessary, but it makes cutting easier and more even).  You can also store it like this for up to a few days, ready to be whipped out, baked and served!

Take out of the fridge, and slice the sausage into 2-3cm slices (or simply slice into 6 equal slices for 6 larger ones). 

Place on a baking sheet lined with baking paper, cut side up.  Leave some space for them to spread and rise, they grow quite considerably in the oven!

Bake for 12-15 minutes (a little longer for the large ones) until they have risen well and are lightly golden.

If you want, you can also make an icing glaze, but to be honest, when just out of the oven, there is really no need! 

For a cinnamon icing glaze, mix 1 cup of sifted icing sugar, 1 scant teaspoon of cinnamon and 1 tablespoon of boiling water until smooth.  Drizzle this over the scrolls with a teaspoon.  

Unlike the yeast ones, I don't think these would be great the next day.   But seriously, the are so morish that this won't be an issue.

ENJOY! :D

Poached eggs! Finally!

I love poached eggs.  Every time I go out for breakfast in Melbourne, I would get excite about the prospect of a wobbly white "mozzarella-looking" egg, that explodes with liquid gold yolk at the slightest poke, so tasty, and such a pleasure to look at too. Naturally, I would try making them at home.  Watching my friend Jossie (a chef) making them at home seemed so easy!  Throw some water in a pan, add a tiny amount of vinegar, and they would be presented to me, beautiful and perfect.  Seems so easy right?  Well, apparently not.  I always ended up with a yolk, surrounded by strings of egg-white, looking more like a stringy stracciatella than a poached egg. BOO!

Until today.  Today, I managed! I was inspired by Miss Lolly, a fellow food blogger in Brisbane, who posted recently that she had never managed to make a proper one until recently.

I'm so proud of these eggs.

Where oh where can good coffee be?

Been thinking heaps about Melbourne today, and mostly because about 90% of the coffees i've bought in Malta are so damned shit! Milk boiling hot, coffee not strong enough, they have no idea how to steam it without obliterating it, they just add cold milk to hot and re-heat it, again and again, etc... etc..

Anyway I had a few places in Melbourne that I loved going to, but I think my favourite was Ray's Cafe on Victoria St in Brunswick. It's pretty much always full, serves delicious breakfast/brunch style food with a middle eastern/mediterranean twist, their poached eggs are always runny in the middle.. and their coffee is awesome :)

If you're ever on Sydney rd, there are plenty of places to have a great coffee, but Ray's is awesome.  Located off Sydney road :) 

Here is a pic of the last coffee I had from there, in mid May. Went out with Anji (my mate and ex-assistant/bitch) for a leisurely brunch. it was awesome, almost as awesome as she is :)


Anyway there are a couple of places that have decent coffee in Malta - I can think of a handful only: Actually before i start i should say that you can pretty much consistently get a decent espresso here. Don't bother asking for a double cos half the places give you a lungo (GHEY!) But yeah... decent caffe lattes are very hard to come by. Decent coffee (generally) at  "Mint" near the Gelateria in Sliema - run by a Kiwi and his Maltese partner. Cafe Ole (near muddy waters in St Julians) used to make a great one, I wonder if it's still that good. Had a decent one at Coffee garden on republic st in valletta. aaaaaaand there's the end of the list for me.

If anyone knows of places that make a GOOD coffee in Malta, please please do tell!

It needs to be the perfect temperature, very warm, but not hot, creamy on top, not foamy, strong, and nicely presented :) Ideally not served in those ridiculous glass things with handles, but either in an old fashioned tumbler (at least for a caffe latte), or in a proper cup (as above).