There’s a TV show on in the UK at the moment called ‘The Great British Bake-off’ in which very ordinary people do some very extraordinary baking. It’s all very old-fashioned and ‘sandwiches and scones for tea’ – ish but it’s intense and compulsive viewing. The show is being described as a ‘surprise success’ but personally I don’t think it’s a surprise; there is something endlessly uplifting about seeing beige batters transformed, through the magic of heat, into luscious loaves and tumescent towers. Baking, like singing in choirs and chuckling, is one of those precious things that separates humans from animals.
And then there are people who elevate baking to a level that is actually, officially, super-human. One such baking Hercules is Will Torrent, who not only has a fabulous name (which sounds like something frightfully clever your computer does) but is also a superbly gifted patisserie chef. He learned his trade on his father’s knee –or should I say genou – in a French patisserie and has been perfecting his skills ever since, in no lesser places than Heston Blumenthal’s Fat Duck. His exquisite creations have been known to make grown men cry. Not to mention this lady.
Recently, he invented some new masterpieces using Nudo flavoured oils and we are extremely delighted to present three of them right here. Bake them and weep.
Will Torrent’s mandarin and basil chocolate cupcakes
Ingredients for 8-10 people
Plain flour – 250g/9oz
Demerara sugar – 350g/12.5oz
plain cocoa powder – 65g/2oz
baking powder – 1 tsp
dark chocolate – 100g/3.5oz
salt – 1 tsp
water – 250ml/8.4 fl oz
Nudo Mandarin Olive Oil – 250ml/8.4 fl oz
vanilla paste – 1 tsp
Preheat the oven to 180oC/GM4. Then in a large bowl stir together the flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking powder, dark chocolate and salt. Pour in water, Nudo mandarin olive oil and vanilla paste and mix it until it’s well blended. Place the mix into an 8” loose bottomed lined cake tin or individual cupcakes. Bake them for 45 minutes in the preheated oven, until the top is no longer shiny. Leave to cool before topping with the Basil ganache (preparation method to follow).
For the Basil Ganache:
Ingredients
whipping cream – 250g/9oz
Nudo Basil Olive Oil – 60ml/2 fl oz
honey – 2tsp
chocolate (45% cocoa solids) – 500g/18oz
Place the whipping cream, Nudo Basil Olive Oil and honey into a saucepan and slowly bring to the boil. Once boiled, carefully pour over the chocolate. Leave for 1 minute before carefully stirring it together to create a glossy, shiny emulsified ganache. Leave this to cool before piping it on top of the cooled cakes (alternatively you could use this to make truffles by piping it into balls and rolling it in tempered chocolate or cocoa).
Will Torrent’s chocolate and mandarin olive oil cake
Ingredients
plain flour – 250g/9oz
Demerara sugar – 350g/12.5oz
plain cocoa powder – 65g/2oz
baking powder – 1 tsp
salt – 1 tsp
water – 250ml/8.4 fl oz
Nudo Mandarin Olive Oil – 250ml/8.4 fl oz
dark chocolate – 100g/3.5oz
vanilla paste – 1 tsp
for the ganache topping;
whipping cream – 200ml/6.7 fl oz
Nudo Mandarin Olive Oil – 75g
milk chocolate – 350g/12.5oz
Preheat your oven to 180oC/GM4. Then in a large bowl stir together the flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking powder and salt. Pour in water, Nudo Mandarin Olive Oil and the vanilla paste; mix until well blended.
Place mixture into an 8” loose bottomed lined cake tin. Bake this for 45 minutes, until the top is no longer shiny. Then let it cool for at least 10 minutes.
To make the ganache topping, heat the cream and Nudo Mandarin Olive Oil together. Pour over the chocolate and whisk until glossy and smooth. Then drizzle this over the chocolate cake and leave it to set. Alternatively you could serve this as a warm pudding using the ganache as a sauce. Yum.
Will Torrent’s roasted apricot and butternut squash cake
Ingredients:
butternut squash – 500g/18oz
ready-to-eat dried apricots – 85g/3oz
honey
Nudo Thyme Olive Oil – 1 tbsp
eggs – 4 lightly beaten
Nudo Lemon olive oil – 60ml/2 fl oz
plain white flour – 225g/8oz
baking powder – 2 tsp
bicarbonate of soda – 1 tsp
cinnamon – 1 tsp
ground almonds – 225g/8oz
orange zest – from 1
ground mixed spice – 2 tsp
teaspoon salt – ½ tsp
golden caster sugar – 450g/16oz
apricot jam
Peel and cut the butternut squash into small cubes. Place the squash and apricots into a roasting tin and drizzle with honey and a tablespoon of the Nudo Thyme Olive Oil. Roast this in the oven for 30 mins. Meanwhile purée the apricots and roasted squash in a food processor or with a hand-held mixer until very smooth, adding the eggs and the Nudo Lemon Olive Oil. Preheeat the oven to 180oC/GM4. Place the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, cinnamon, ground almonds, orange zest, mixed spice and salt and sugar in a large mixing bowl and make a well in the centre. Add the eggs, oil, apricot and squash purée and mix until they are just combined.
Pour the mixture into the cake tin, smooth the tops, and bake for 30-35 minutes, rotating the tins half-way through, until the cakes have risen and a skewer comes out clean. When cooked heat some apricot jam and brush over to give a lovely shiny glaze
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