Baking It Lorraine's Fast, Fresh and Easy Food

I'm Lorraine Pascale and this is all about fast, fresh and easy food.

Delicious meals don't have to take a long time to make,

and for me, cooking from fresh ingredients is the way to go.

Great food can be fast and delicious with these effortless recipes

and a few simple shortcuts.

Follow my tips, and hopefully, you'll never want to reach

for a ready-made meal again.

Making quick, tasty food for everyday meals

and last-minute entertaining - it can all be so easy.

Tonight's show is all about baking.

For me, baking isn't just about gorgeous cakes and bakes,

but also about puddings and joints of meat that are quick to prepare

and just need a little bit of time in the oven.

Here's what's coming up -

a sweet and sticky banana upside down cake.

A one pound wonder. Slow baked, fast-prepped leg of lamb.

Tasty little jam and lemon curd tarts.

Scrumptious baked Asian barbecue chicken wings.

Oven roasted rum punch fruit.

Quick cook strawberry mini cakes,

for when you want to have your cake and eat it now.

And I pick up a few secrets to making fast, fresh food

at one of London's coolest street food markets.

But first, a simple loaf with a crunchy crust

that I call my crackle top bread.

OK, so it starts with...

some strong white bread flour.

And then a smidgen of strong wholemeal flour,

just to get it a slightly nutty taste.

Now, don't put too much of this in

because, otherwise, the loaf can become really heavy.

And then salt. You need a lot of salt.

Salt is so important in bread.

It makes the difference between a good loaf and a bad loaf.

So much of the flavour comes from the salt.

And then yeast. One sachet.

And then make a little hole in the centre and then water.

And this is warm water, because it really boosts the yeast.

What I'm looking for

is this wonderfully soft, smooth ball of dough.

Let's see, now.

See, it's soft, it's squidgy, it's not really hard.

And it's not too sticky.

And you just have to knead it for ten minutes by hand,

and you do want quite a lovely soft loaf,

because when it rises in the oven

it'll be beautiful and soft and pillowy.

Form into a neat, round shape, then cover with oiled clingfilm,

and leave to rise for around half an hour.

Now for the crackle topping, and it couldn't be simpler.

Teaspoon, roughly, of caster sugar and a teaspoon of oil.

A big tablespoon of rice flour.

That should do it.

Tablespoon of water and a pinch of yeast.

You make this paste,

and you spread this on the bread once it's risen

and then bake it off in the oven,

then the top will crackle beautifully.

This has been proving for about 45 minutes. It hasn't doubled in size.

It's kind of grown about 50% or 60%.

Just put this on top.

And then...

I'll just pop this into the oven.

Right. This goes in for about 25-30 minutes at 200 degrees.

I think the best way to serve a loaf that looks this good

is just whole at the table.

Mmm.

I think the thing I love most about baking is that transformation

that happens in the oven.

You put in some bread or a cake, go away and do something else,

and you come back, pull it out and it's just transformed.

And that's the beauty of baking.

From a few simple ingredients and just a little know-how...

you can make something really special.

Like this next dish that takes minutes to make

and only half an hour to bake.

My rum punch roast fruits.

Quarter two ripe pears and remove their core,

and place into a large roasting tin.

Half four ripe peaches and add, along with four quartered figs.

Drizzle over 250ml of dark rum.

Add three tablespoons of soft, light brown sugar.

And half a split vanilla pod.

Add a cinnamon stick and a couple of rosemary sprigs.

And the zest and juice of one orange.

Bake for 30 minutes at 200 degrees C.

Mix 250ml of creme fraiche with 50 grams of icing sugar

and the seeds of half a vanilla pod.

Serve the vanilla cream with the deliciously soft and sticky fruits.

# You'll find us chasing the sun

# Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh

# Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh

# Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh

# You'll find us chasing the sun. #

Now, this next dish doesn't require any fancy ingredients.

Just some everyday store cupboard items

and a little bit of time in the oven and you've got a delicious meal.

I'm going to start with about eight chicken wings and drumsticks there.

Glide those in.

And tomato ketchup. About six squidges of this.

Balsamic.

Soy sauce, drizzle that in there.

This is a real easy after work meal.

Very little preparation involved.

And then the all-important Chinese five spice.

You need about two tablespoons of this and it's packed with flavour.

Cloves, star anise, fennel, cinnamon, ginger. Beautiful.

A bit of honey to sweeten.

And then herbs. I've got thyme here.

And then garlic.

Salt and pepper, of course.

You don't need too much because the soy sauce is really quite salty.

And then stir it together.

A little drizzle of oil.

And then this, because it's being baked, goes into the roasting tin.

Just slide it in there.

Got all those lovely flavours all mixing together.

And then into the oven to bake.

Now for the slaw.

Slice the red cabbage.

Chop a red onion.

And a red chilli.

A handful of raisins.

A teaspoon of mustard powder.

Honey.

Natural yoghurt.

The juice of one lime.

A bit of salt and pepper.

And I've just mixed up some sweetcorn and coriander

with plain boiled rice for another simple side dish.

Right. This is ready. Mmm!

Baked barbecue chicken with a little bit of coriander on top.

And I just love to serve this with my red cabbage slaw

and my sweetcorn and coriander rice. Yummy.

I find it so satisfying to make something from scratch.

# Uh, oh, sometimes I get a good feeling... #

And you just can't beat the wonderful aromas...

..of freshly baked food.

# ..Oh, sometimes I get a good feeling. #

I'm all for cutting culinary corners when you're in a rush,

with, for instance, shop bought pastry, but with my pastry,

you just bung it all in the food processor, blitz it

and it's ready to go.

It's super quick and I'm using it to make my little jammy tarts

with brown sugar pastry.

This is a basic sweet pastry recipe,

only I'm using brown sugar to give it a lovely butterscotch flavour.

Mix plain flour with a couple of tablespoons of brown sugar,

measure out half the amount of butter to plain flour.

One egg.

And some salt.

Blitz.

Gather the mixture into a ball...

..and then place in the fridge to firm up for around 30 minutes.

Then, using a rolling pin,

roll the pastry onto a floured surface.

Cut out 12 circles of pastry.

Place in the holes of a greased muffin tin.

Prick the pastry with a fork to stop it from puffing up during cooking.

Spoon in a dollop of jam or lemon curd.

Then sit a pastry star on top of each tart.

Bake in the oven for 20 minutes at 180 degrees

until crisp and golden brown.

Then leave to cool slightly before eating,

as the jam inside will be piping hot.

Cup of tea, jam tart, and I'm just about sorted.

I'm really excited by Britain's thriving street food scene.

There seems to be something for everyone, from hot meals...

to sweet treats...

..and lots of gorgeous baked goodies.

And it kind of reminds me of when I first started.

I used to get up early in the morning, bake the cakes,

and deliver them to locations around London in my little van.

But today, I'm here to see Marco and Franz.

They're putting the food from their homeland, Austria, on the map.

I'm keen to taste the different foods that they have on offer.

-Hello, Marco.

-Hello, Lorraine.

-How are you?

-Very good, how are you?

-I'm good, thanks.

Going to tie my hair back, health and safety.

So, tell me what you've been doing. What's going on?

Basically, it's the traditional taste of Austria.

We have wienerschnitzel, which I think everyone knows.

We use English rare breed pork in breadcrumbs with lingonberries.

Our signature dish, it's Speckknoedel.

-Knoedel is dumpling, speck is cold, smoked bacon.

-Speckknoedel.

Speckknoedel, absolutely. Very good!

We make little balls of the bacon and encase it in a pastry dough

-and then serve it on sauerkraut.

-Mmm!

-Inside is delicious!

-It is very yummy.

I have obviously had my eye on this.

-Apple strudel.

-Strudel.

This is what I've come here for,

to learn the art of making Austria's classic pudding, strudel,

from a true master.

If you just want to shoot over to Franz,

-he will show you how to do the pastry.

-Fantastic.

-All right.

-Thank you.

-Thank you.

-Hey, there.

-Hello. How are you doing?

-How are you doing?

Franz has pre-made the dough

for the all-important wafer-thin pastry,

so it's had time to rest before we roll it out.

-What's in this dough then? Strong white flour?

-Strong white flour.

I've got one egg yolk for that amount, tiny shot of vinegar.

Just helps it to stretch.

And then a little bit of oil.

Now, the challenging part,

slowly stretching the dough without making too many holes in it.

In Austria you have to know how to do this before you can get married.

Slowly pull it outwards and just fold it over the edges.

-You need to be able to read your newspaper through this.

-Fantastic.

Look at that. So paper thin.

Don't worry about the little holes.

You're going to make the most traditional one,

which is the apple strudel,

and that's literally my grandma's recipe.

Franz drizzled clarified butter all over the pastry.

Then adds breadcrumbs.

And the apples cooked in sugar and cinnamon.

The only thing I changed to my grandma's recipe...

is raisins.

-Oh, OK.

-But, I soak my raisins for three days in rum.

I just got this waft of alcohol.

# Express yourself

# Oh, come on, now... #

With all the ingredients in, it's time to roll.

Now you're going to see why we put it on a table cloth.

Because as the pastry is still thin,

you would not be able to remove it from a normal table.

-It would just stick, wouldn't it?

-We just lift up the sheet...

..and then slowly...

-Slowly roll.

-There you go.

And then you just pull your sheet back again

and just keep rolling until the end.

-There you go. And that's it then.

-Does it take long to cook this?

I bake it at 175 degrees for 45 minutes.

-Thank you, that was really good to see.

-You're welcome.

OK, so that's the making of the strudel.

Street markets are great places to sample food from all over the world.

And it's not all about savoury dishes, as these boys have proven.

Simple sweets and brilliant baking goes down a storm too.

Mmm.

Mmm. Now, I really do love making cakes -

big ones, small ones, fancy ones - and at the moment,

I'm really into this upside down one called my dolce and banana cake,

and it's sticky and gingery and just plain yummy

and I really hope that you like it.

# I'm...

# Coming...out... #

First, make the caramel.

# ..I'm coming... #

Mix soft brown sugar into melted butter...

# ..Ten years from now we'll still be on top

# I thought I told you that we won't stop... #

Grease and line a square tin with parchment paper.

This will make it easier to remove the cake later.

For the sponge, combine softened butter...

..soft, light brown sugar...

..four eggs...

..wholemeal flour...

..vanilla extract...

..self-raising flour...

baking powder...

ground ginger...

ground cinnamon...

treacle and a pinch of salt.

Add some toasted pecans, slice two bananas,

arrange on top of the caramel.

Drizzle over the apple brandy.

Spread the cake mix evenly in the tin,

and bake for about 45 minutes at 180 degrees.

Leave to cool for around ten minutes, and there you have it,

a very delicious dolce and banana upside down cake.

# ..I don't know what they want from me... #

I love baking pastries and cakes as the results are so rewarding.

But one of the simplest and most pleasing things to bake

is a big joint of meat that you can just bung in the oven

and leave for hours.

Here's my slow roast, fast prep leg of lamb.

OK, I've got this beautiful piece of meat here, half leg of lamb.

Lots of salt and pepper.

And then...

..into the pot like that.

I've got these herbs.

Rosemary, bay and sage.

Just want to throw in about two branches of rosemary

and then two bay leaves and then sage.

Garlic.

I'm just going to use my hand to break it into cloves.

I'm not going to bother chopping them, just bash them,

so that the flavours release nicely as it cooks.

The only bit of chopping, for the lamb, are the onions.

So I've got two red onions and I want to chop them into quarters.

This is great for a Sunday roast,

because there's such little prep involved.

Good squidge of honey for some sweetness...

..and Chardonnay.

I do love an Aussie Chardonnay.

I know it's a bit 1985, but I still like it.

And it's great to cook with. Nice and oakey and woody.

Going to put about 500ml in here, about three quarters of a bottle.

Pop the lid on.

That goes into the oven for four hours at 150 degrees,

and I know it sounds like ages,

but that prep took what, five minutes if that?

Now for the roasties.

Halfway through cooking time,

pop the spuds into the oven to cook for the last two hours.

Four hours and everything is ready.

Little tatties...

..and the beautiful baked lamb.

I added some frozen peas to the dish ten minutes before the end

of cooking time, and now, a little parsley to finish.

This is ideal for lazy days when you want to throw something together

and leave it to cook.

A fuss free roast.

# You never say hey Or remember my name

# It's probably cos you think you're cooler than me. #

You just can't beat a great British strawberry.

This sweet and juicy fruit looks as good as it tastes.

And I love to use them in my baking to add a finishing flourish

to my perfect little mini cakes.

People often say to me, "I really love making cakes,

"but I don't have one of those fancy kitchen mixers at home

"and I really want to learn how to make a cake by hand,"

so this recipe, my strawberry and cream mini cakes, is for you.

It starts with a wooden spoon, a bowl and some scales.

And first, it's 250 grams of soft butter...

and then 250 grams of caster sugar.

And then I'm going to cream them together.

Now, a lot of recipes say, "Cream until light and fluffy,"

and it's very easy doing that with a mixer,

but by hand, it's a little harder.

You really smush it with the sugar to mix it all in.

Right. That's just about ready.

Nice and fluffy, a little bit lighter,

and it's all combined, so I'm going to add the eggs now.

So I'm going to add two at a time.

If you add too many all in one go,

they don't blend nicely when you're doing it by hand.

The most important thing

is to make sure that your eggs are room temperature.

Just keep beating it really hard and it will come together.

OK, so that's nice and smooth, and that's just what you want.

And I'll add the other two eggs.

Then beat it again, really hard.

It's the heat and the friction that will bring the mixture together

and make it nice and smooth.

Right. Now the flour.

250 grams of self-raising flour and a teaspoon of baking powder.

I just add baking powder even though I'm using self-raising flour,

just to give it an extra boost.

Nice and smooth.

Get right underneath it with any stubborn bits of flour.

Then it all combines nicely.

Then, vanilla pod.

Into the bowl.

Mix.

You just need to check that your cake mix

is of the right consistency, because sometimes you might need to add

just a tablespoon or so of milk or water.

To check, I put some on the end of my spoon,

and then just shake once and it should just flop off like that.

Now finally, one pinch of salt just to boost the flavour even more.

Just a little bit.

Couple of stirs, and now I'll fill my muffin cases.

Bake the cakes for 25 minutes at 180 degrees C.

So, chocolate is melting,

cakes are cooling, and now I'll get on with the cream.

I need 300ml of double cream.

There. 50 grams of icing sugar.

And then the seeds of a vanilla pod.

Then I need to whisk everything together.

Right.

If you can make sure that your double cream is nice and cold,

it'll whisk up much more easily.

Right.

I'm almost ready to fill the cakes, but first,

I just need to cut them in half.

# If you love it like I love it

# And you feel what I feel inside

# Is this love, is this love Is this love? #

For the finishing touch, pour the melted chocolate

into a small piping bag.

# ..Can you feeeeeeel the love?

# Can you feeeeeeel the love? #

Well, I hope I've inspired you to get baking.

Whether you fancy some meltingly tender roast lamb...

a gorgeous crunchy bread...

or some scrawny cakes and tarts,

baking really can be surprisingly quick and easy to do.

It's up to the oven to do all of the hard work.

So, next time you want to put something extra special

and impressive on the table, why not try baking?

It really is that simple.

Right, crew. Anyone want a cake?

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