Monday 12 October 2009

Lemon Loveliness

There are a lot of times in winter, like I touched on a while ago, when I crave warm comforting dinners. A bowl of stew or fat “wodge” of crumble is always going to make a chilly night all cosy and delicious! But as you leave autumn and edge towards winter, there are times when I also crave something light, refreshing and zingy: just to wake me out of the dark winter stupor. This little dessert does just that…

general shizzle 104 It is a light lemon mousse with little lemon madeleines! I’ve found that I tend to just make a cookie, or a cake, rather than say a pie with a fancy sauce or something, you know? Such as in restuarants – they do fancy things such as “Textures of Strawberry” where you get a strawberry donut, strawberry milkshake, chocolate strawberry and little strawberry tart all as one dessert. Whilst I’m not about to start bringing out foams and emulsions any time soon – I think it is nice to have two little treats accompanying each other for pudding: its sort of the difference between a pudding and a dessert!

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Ooh, I do like a little bit of lemon! In fact, lemon is the second most popular flavour of things I have baked on this blog, just behind chocolate. Can’t go wrong with a bit of citrus :) Although saying that, this mousse didn’t turn out quite as delicious as hoped. The comments on it were, “a bit too sweet” and “slightly curdled tasting” – not perfect but sadly true! I can’t pinpoint exactly where or why this mousse turned out wrong, but there was just something wrong! It didn’t have the texture of lovely smooth tangy mousse, just very fluffy and eggy. I’ve given the recipe at the bottom anyway as maybe some people like their mousse like that (?) or maybe one clever blogger knows why it wasn’t good. Thankfully, the madeleines were a different story!

general shizzle 109 The madeleines were light, zesty, full of lemon flavour – yum :) My one problem with these was, in the picture they turned a pretty golden brown when they were cooked. Once these were cooked nicely – they still hadn’t changed colour! Still, nothing a pretty coating of icing sugar cannot hide.

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Both the mousse and the madeleines were from the most gorgeous book – Bills Food by Bill Granger. I so recommend this book. The photos are stunning, and most pages in here just make you want to move to sunny Australia! Plus, the recipes aren’t half bad – another one from this book coming up shortly! I’ve given the recipe for both the mousse and madeleines, but I honestly would not give the mousse a go :S !

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9 comments:

Rosa's Yummy Yums said...

Oh, lovely! I adore anything lemony! That mousse and those Madeleines look fantastic!

Cheers,

Rosa

Palidor said...

You definitely can't go wrong with lemon desserts! They're great all year round. Too bad about the mousse. It does seem like a strange recipe... doesn't mousse usually contain whole milk or cream?

Mini Baker said...

mmmm the madeleines look delish!
thanks for sharing!
-Mini Baker

Susan @ SGCC said...

I love all things lemon! It's my favorite flavor for all kinds of sweets. The mousse really looks lovely, but I agree that most recipes I've seen use cream. Maybe that's what made it more "eggy" The recipe looks almost like one for lemon curd.

Your madeleines are adorable! Sometimes they just don't get browned. That has happened to me before.

Ash said...

lemon and desserts are always a good choice.
You're little madeleine's are just perfection!

I also have 'Bill's Food' and a few others of his, I love the pics and the aussie sunny atmosphere they bring!

Lynne Daley said...

Lemon desserts are my favorite. Your madeleines look just as you describe them. Lovely post, too.

Rhiannon Bosse said...

Lucy darling you are awesome :) Your blog always makes me smile. And that's an amazing thing! I love lemons too :)

Pops De Milk said...

Hi! Thanks for visiting my blog :)
These look fantastic and I've been curious about making madeleines, they look so yummy. I'm going to try this recipe soon I hope. I'll definitely be adding your site to my blogroll, I can already see several recipes I like!

George@CulinaryTravels said...

Oh what a lovely fresh and zingy desert Lucy. Beautifully presented and photographed too :)