cakes and tarts
A collection of recipes selected by The Saturday Paper team
dessert November 18, 2017
Something sad has happened to some foods. They have suffered damnation for their ordinariness. Yet when cooked beautifully, they bring a warm smile to people’s faces and an oft-repeated request for “the recipe”, as if I have performed some feat...
baking June 17, 2017
I don’t know where the idea for upside-down things came from in the kitchen, but there is magic and theatre about it, inside out and upside down. I like the way you almost make something backwards and then it reveals itself at the end. You never...
baking February 28, 2015
This recipe has been in our family for some time. A while ago I adapted it slightly as a homage to an ever-popular chocolate bar – the Cherry Ripe. For the time poor, it can easily be made without the addition of chocolate and cherries....
baking June 6, 2020
Having too many carrots is not a problem I usually face. Like many growers and producers across the land, the coronavirus pandemic has thrown our ordered existence into chaos. I grow a lot of carrots. The earth that I farm is rich, deep, volcanic...
dessert September 5, 2015
Flourless chocolate torta caprese
This dish is named after the island of Capri, like the salad of tomatoes and mozzarella, or the mid-calf pants, or the shoes. The torta caprese is the original flourless chocolate cake. There are different stories about how this happened. One...
dessert January 30, 2021
I am not sure whether it is the mousse or the meringue that is the hero of this dish. They are delicious together but also wonderful apart. This type of meringue is known as a Swiss meringue, which is made when the egg whites and the...
dessert January 15, 2022
Andrew McConnell’s chocolate cake
Pierre Hermé is a fourth-generation pastry chef. Originally from Alsace, he is now chef patron of a series of Paris’s best pastry shops. No other people take their food as seriously as Parisians, and Hermé is food royalty to the French, a...
dessert September 10, 2016
Madeleines filled with lemon curd
Madeleines have many admirers. Take Proust, in the “episode of the madeleine” from his epic novel In Search of Lost Time: “No sooner had the warm liquid mixed with the crumbs touched my palate than a shudder ran through me and I...
baking July 18, 2020
Midwinter heralds the best of Australian oranges. They bring a lovely cheer to the drab, grey days. And for many, this certainly is a winter of discontent. Not only does Australia produce fantastic oranges – perfect as a healthy snack, as...
baking April 28, 2018
I have never been a fruit guy, but my girlfriend is a fruit bat – we have a fig tree in the backyard and she’s out there every morning. Now I really appreciate eating a fig that is ripened straight from the tree, which has never come in contact...
baking August 12, 2017
Blood orange fool and Madeira cake
I have to admit that I am a fool for English desserts. Or, as they would say, puddings. Maybe it’s the names. Fool. Syllabub. Posset. Crisp. Mess. Crumble. Not only are they simple, blunt titles, but almost to a tee they are simple to make....
