PaperChef June 2011: Rye bread toasts with chocolate, strawberries and lime

It's time for a Paper Chef, a food blogging event with pedigree (launched by Owen back in 2004, now co-hosted with Ilva and Mike. I'm embarrassed to admit that I've only participated twice before - #8 (spinach, olives, Cheddar cheese, potatoes/cream) and #15 (limes, beetroots, pears and aphrodisiac of your choice)), but with Ilva asking us all so nicely to participate, I couldn't say no :)

The ingredients this month - bread, berries, chocolate and lime. I won't dwell on the difference between bread ('leib') and white bread ('sai') in Estonian - suffice to say that even after living in an Anglophone country for seven years, I automatically thought of our dark Estonian rye bread when I spotted 'bread' in that list of ingredients. Only later did it occur to me that I could have gone the 'white bread' (aka 'wheat bread') route, perhaps with summer pudding with lime-macerated berries and white chocolate and mascarpone mousse? Mmmm...

The rules of Paper Chef do not say that you must restrict yourself to those four ingredients alone. However, I immediately remembered a little neat idea I had seen on the Finnish Herkut.net site a while ago - warm rye bread toasts with melted chocolate and sliced strawberries. I added some grated lime zest for, well, extra zest - and using just the four ingredients that were required - and loved the result! I can easily see serving this at one of the many patio parties or summer grill events that are about to follow.

A word of warning, however. While it's a dessert sure to please all the young ones, it's no S'Mores that you grab between your hands and eat without staining a thing (well, couple of cookie crumbs on the floor, perhaps). Our daughter Nora approached her warm rye bread with chocolate and strawberries with gusto, but in the process she managed to smear melted chocolate all over her :)



Rye bread toasts with chocolate, strawberries and lime zest
(Röstitud koorikleib šokolaadi ja maasikatega)

You can use any type of rye bread here - those flat rye breads, halved horizontally ('koorikleib') are ideal, or then thickly sliced naturally leavened rye bread. I used a recently introduced new product at the Estonian market - saib (sai+leib, get it?!) - tastes and looks like white bread, but it's made with 100% rye flour.



sliced rye bread
dark chocolate, coarsely chopped (I used Callebaut bittersweet chocolate couverture chips)
strawberries,
lime zest, thinly grated

Toast the bread until slightly golden and aromatic. Immediately top with chopped chocolate and strawberries, leave for a few minutes, until the chocolate melts.
Grate some lime zest over the strawberries.
Serve at once.

Strawberry and Almond Cake

Picture taken in July 2008

Do you use strawberries for anything else but various _cold and uncooked_ desserts and puddings? 

I realised that I _almost_ never cook strawberries, especially sun-ripened local ones. They're just too luscious and delicious as they are, and I usually run out of them before I manage to start thinking about including them in a cake (and in any case, my repeated attempts to include strawberries in a clafoutis have ended with a disaster). However, there is one baked strawberry cake that I've been making again and again over the years. The recipe is from an old issue of BBC Good Food, bylined by their previous editor Orlando Murrin. I've simplified the recipe a little over the years, and it's been on my early summer table at least one every year. It's delicious both warm or cold (I love it warm with a scoop of good vanilla ice cream).

I think I'll be baking one later tonight :Pc

Almond and Strawberry Cake
(Maasika-mandlikook)
Serves eight

175 g ground almonds
175 g unsalted butter, softened
175 g caster sugar
175 g all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp ground cinnamon
2 eggs, whisked
400 g strawberries
icing sugar/confectioner's sugar, for dusting

Preheat the oven to 180C. Line the base of a loose-bottomed 24 cm cake tin with greaseproof paper and butter the sides.
Mix almonds, butter, sugar, flour, cinnamon, baking powder and eggs in a food processor just until the ingredients are evenly combined.
Spread half the mixture over the base of the tin in a smooth layer. Lay the sliced strawberries on top. Spread the remaining cake mixture over the strawberries.
Bake for 45-50 minutes, until slightly risen and dark golden brown when cooked.
Cool in the tin slightly, then loosen the edges with a knife and remove from the tin.
Transfer onto a serving plate and dust with icing sugar.

Rhubarb and rye bread soup

Couple of years ago, when I blogged about Estonian rye bread soup, the idea of a 'sweet' bread soup seemed very unusual to most of my (non-Estonian) readers. But trust me - the rye bread soup is cheap (usually using stale rye bread) and cheerful, and very tasty. Here's a seasonal version of the soup, using pale pink rhubarb stalks. Whereas the rye bread soup isn't particularly sugary-sweet anyway, this late spring/early summer version is even lighter and with a slight and welcome tang.

Rhubarb and rye bread soup
(Leivasupp rabarbriga)
Serves six to eight



400 g rhubarb, cleaned
200 g rye bread
1 litre water
100 g caster sugar
a cinnamon stick
some vanilla extract

To serve:
sour cream or yoghurt (optional)

Break the rye bread into chunks, place into a pan with 1 litre of cold water. Leave to soften for a few hours.
Bring slowly into the boil.
Cut the rhubarb into thick slices, add to the pan with sugar and cinnamon stick. Simmer the soup for 15-20 minutes, or until the bread and rhubarb are soft and mushy.
Season with vanilla.
Cool before serving.