SBRISOLONA - ITALIAN CRUMBLY ALMOND TART

To make up for the Englishness of my last bakes I go back to Northern Italy with this one and it might be an Italian common feature but I’m also going back to hilarious names, see Panpapato.

Sbrisolona is dialect for ‘big crumbly thing’ and this thing is in fact quite big and very crumbly. It is also very delicious and it’s not the kind of tart that you slice and eat in a civilised way so unless you’re one of those people that eat an almond with a knife and fork you can break it into pieces as big as you like (or just jump to the next level and don’t even break it into pieces and eat the whole thing like an enormous biscuit. Don’t tell anyone I said that).

It's also perfect for nice weather. As in, if you eat three quarters of it over the sink you can go for a walk (crawl?) to Stoke Newington and you may even get tanned (if you're not me).

See? Happy days all around.

GOLDEN SYRUP BUNDT CAKE

Long weekend in Italia implies coming back to sunny (!!!) London with a tummy full of vegan piadina, a slightly lighter weight on my chest and a head full of ideas. It would be nice to sleep at night sometimes however dreams of cakes and biscuits and things made with buckwheat and sugar sprinkles and lupin flour (yes, flour shopping, yes) and clouds and kittens and seaweed do make me all excited and creative (oooh, creative). So whilst my to-do list of cakes grows and grows and the space in my flour cupboard (!) worryingly diminishes, here’s a recipe for the sweetest moistest cake you’ll ever taste, prepared and baked kind of as soon as I stepped out the plane this morning. It shouts ENGLAND all around because of the golden syrup, but oh well, it could be worse. It could be raining.

HOT CROSS BUNS

In just under a week’s time I’ll be in sunny Italy shovelling into my face monster portions of gnocchi and pizza and proper Easter eggs (sorry British Easter eggs) and chocolate of all sorts, and the 60 pence brick-sized flapjack from the corner shop by the Shard and the packs of Fruit Shortcake bought out of desperation from quality-checking too many videos in Khmer will only be a distant memory. However, lately during my semi-sleepless nights that I euphemistically like to call ‘recipe development sessions’ I’ve found myself pondering over British Easter cakes and treats. It may or may not be that I’ve spent the last four days in bed with a broken stomach, and survived on boiled rice and corn cakes only. Or that in this timeframe I’ve watched all of Mary Berry’s programs five million times, alternating them with Masterchef for sanity (?). 

But it did take me back to Easter time in good olde Shropshire, where Easter lunch is like, cucumber on toast but then you have four different cakes for pudding. And then you have tea with four more half an hour later. Well Simnel cake deserves an honorable mention because it looks so pretty and there’s like a half a kilo of delicious marzipan in it. But we all know marzipan is terribly misunderstood, so when I decided to pick one Easter treat to veganise, I went for my mates fluffy sticky hot cross buns. They’re really easy to make (even with a hot water bottle carefully positioned onto your stomach) and they’re filled with all nice sorts of things ranging from cinnamon and spices to dried fruit and peel and covered in apricot glaze. Best enjoyed between a bite of cucumber on toast and two of Simnel cake. Or you can use them as the bun for a chocolate egg sandwich. Who am I to judge. Hah.

OREO RICE KRISPY SQUARES

If it so happens that one evening you decide that sometimes there is beauty in the world surrounding you, you should wake up in the morning and celebrate with some noteworthy treats. Well it's this remarkable Rice Krispy square recipe that has brought me joy once again, this time via an upgrade. I know they're like the deities of all Rice Krispy squares, so where do you even start improving them one may say, but sometimes unexpected upgrades come to you like a deus ex machina plus this is Oreos we're talking about. Make sure you're fine with sugar rushes and cow exploitation in Oreo factories and go for it. At least no bees were blindfolded or earmuffed or tapped on the shoulder in the process.

WHITE CHOCOLATE CHESTNUT THUMBPRINT COOKIES

They say it’s all about the little things so I say, make a toast to Pret coffees on the house, pack your wardrobe with pretty summer dresses, buy Lego notebooks for your friends, read Italian patisserie recipe books until you feel the urge to bake enough crostata to feed an army, and if all this is still not enough to fill the hole in your heart, then go fill your stomach (it works just as well). May I suggest that you make chocolatey hazelnutty chestnut flour cookies that are so delicious and that you can share with the whole universe as they are vegan and gluten-free and no Oreo-manufacturing Scottish cows were harmed in the process.

At your service.

CAROB & VANILLA SWIRL LOAF

Here’s some lovely swirly bread that may or may not be a projection of the current state of my brain that is, not so lovely but very swirly. Make this and see if eating it helps you unswirl your brain like it did with me, thank you carob & vanilla swirl loaf for being so lovely and for your unswirling properties.

OREO CHEESECAKE

Sometimes you’re a walking seedbed of germs for a week and sometimes living by books and living by hope makes you a target for gunfire. But then you have badass Italian mates that have your back and you’re reminded it has to be business as usual. So go buy five million packs of Oreos (Oreos are also always there for you. I love you Oreos), get your apron out and apologise to fat-free cakes and low-calorie muffins. Make vegan Oreo cheesecake and there you go, you’re ready to face life again.