If you are looking for a connection with what you eat, then this book is for you. More than 200 straightforward recipes – from basic pantry items and essential dairy products to decadent cakes, tasty dips, crackers, ferments and drinks – will give you the confidence to leave industrialised packaged goods behind.
With From Scratch, Author Fiona Weir Walmsley paints a beautiful picture of life (and work) at Buena Vista Farm in Gerringong, NSW, and of the joy of making, sharing and enjoying things ‘from scratch’, no matter how busy you are. Sampling their recipes might be just what you need to find your happy place. Learn how to make her Passionfruit Shortcake below – happy cooking!
Makes: 8-10
Prep time: 15 minutes
Cooking time: 35 minutes
Shortcake is one of the things I don’t make. I don’t make it because my mum does. And man, she makes a good shortcake.
I think in every family somebody specialises in something, right? Maybe you are the excellent birthday cake–maker. Or the beloved scone-bringer. Maybe you’re known for your mimosas or champagne cocktails, or your perfect roast.
Mum has always made shortcake. Given that my aunts on my dad’s side also make it, I suspect it was my grandma’s recipe (she of the award-winning sponge – next).
Anyway, Mum makes a terrific passionfruit shortcake. She always has a passionfruit vine growing somewhere, always has frozen fruit in sealed bags in the freezer.
It’s the passionfruit shortcake she makes for her adored sons-in-law. And for Dad, for super-special treats (when she has a house-full and can be sure he’ll only get one piece, being diabetic and all that).
So, I really never make it. It’s her thing. Except when I happen to have fresh passionfruit because they just happened to arrive in our weekly fruit and veg box and we are going to a friend’s house for lunch, and no one needs to tell Mum, okay?
Ingredients
300 g (10½ oz/2 cups) Self-raising Flour (page 25)
220 g (8 oz/1 cup) white sugar, plus 2 teaspoons extra for sprinkling
125 g (4½ oz/½ cup) butter, cubed
1 free-range egg
Filling
125 g (4½ oz/1 cup) icing (confectioners’) sugar
60 g (2 oz/¼ cup) butter, softened
2 tablespoons fresh passionfruit pulp
Method
Mix the flour and sugar in a large bowl, then rub in the butter. Make a well in the centre and stir in the egg. It will feel really dry, but keep mixing until you can knead it well into a ball.
Push into a round 20 cm (8 in) cake tin, rough up the top with a fork and sprinkle with the extra white sugar. Cook at 160°C (320°F) for 35 minutes, or until golden. When cooled, split into two horizontally.
To make the filling, mix the icing sugar with the butter and passionfruit. (This works really well with finely chopped strawberries too.) Mix well to a cream, then spread onto one half of the shortcake and sandwich with the other half.
Slice, serve and enjoy!
—From Scratch by Fiona Weir Walmsley (Hardie Grant Books) is out now.
From Scratch
More than 200 handmade pantry essentials and other life-affirming kitchen miracles
From Scratch is a cheerful collection of recipes, and a simple guide to making your own food and staples, starting at the very beginning.
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