In fact, Tray Bakes are fast becoming one of my favourite breakfast food types, right up there with muffins. They are just as easy to make, although they do tend to take longer to bake than muffins (you're looking at about an hour or more with a tray bake, as compared to fifteen to thirty minutes with muffins), although they take about the same amount of time to prepare (about fifteen minutes from walking into the kitchen to popping them in the oven). Indeed, I suspect you could adapt most tray bake recipes to be muffins (although as many tray bakes are highly layered, this might be a bit fiddley to do for twelve muffins, where it isn't for one tray). Moreover, they taste like cake, but are perfectly acceptable to eat for breakfast. This Peach Melba tray bake is my second proper tray bake, following on from the Blackberry & Coconut Squares that I made the week before I went on holiday to the Peak District. And I promise I will blog about those as well. But at the moment I am nibbling on the Peach Melba Squares, so that's what I'm writing about them.
There is something wonderfully autumnal about these Peach Melba cake squares, which I can't quite work out. Something about the combination of peaches and almonds and raspberries just seems to ooze September. Perhaps it's the colours—the red of the melting raspberries and the different shades of gold from the almond cake and peach slices—which are so reminiscent of the turning colours of the leaves at this time of year. Indeed, although as I write this now on the second day of September it has been a surprisingly warm 25 C today (that's 77 F), autumn came early in London this year (it was supposedly the coldest summer in eighteen years) and the leaves have already been falling off the trees around where I live. But whatever the reason, this recipe just called out to me, reminding me that I had tentatively planned on making it for this week when I first discovered the recipe in early August. And what a reward it has been! I was simply transported when I first tasted this last night (I know, I know, I made it for breakfast, but I often forget to eat my breakfast until I get home from work; actually, on a school night that's when I prefer to eat "breakfast", as my afternoon/evening snack). I'd come home from my first training session to be a volunteer tour guide on the (later) Medieval Europe eyeOpener tour at the British Museum, and was rather disappointed that Alex was still at work and not home with me. However, having been a good girl and done all the ironing (while watching "The Simpsons"), I sat down, turned on "I Didn't Know I Was Pregnant" on the Discovery Home and Health Channel and began to munch on my Peach Melba Square. Suddenly, things seemed much more pleasant. Oh, and it went really well with Vita Coco's Coconut Water with Peach and Mango! Tonight, have bought various Spanish tapas dishes from M&S, so I don't have to cook (last night was ti-coloured pasta with sun dried tomato pesto, blue cheese, petit pois, parmesan and salad, yum!). Instead, I worked on postdoc applications (just imputting all the formal data like who my references are), watching the tele and again eating this far too delicious tray bake.
Here's what mine looked liked like before we started to wolf it down:
The recipe is straightforward and easy to follow—and I did follow it (with the exception of leaving of the confectioner's (i.e. "powdered") sugar off the top (I forgot, but I really don't think it needs it). And it is easy to make, I made mine while Alex took a quick shower. I was listening to the Broadway recording of Jane Eyre (I'm very excited about the new film coming out over here a week from today), and I don't think I got through more than a few songs at most. So do try these, and indeed, buy (buy in the USA or buy in the UK) the soundtrack for Jane Eyre as it is very good, and little known. As for the tray to use, I used a "brownie tray", but I suspect most rectangular trays would work (indeed, whatever you would bake brownies in should do). Also, I should add that I put the tray on the lower shelf of the oven and "borrowed" the top shelf of the oven to first cook garlic bread and then a frittata, and it still turned out magnificently (I can hardly take the credit for this being such a delightful recipe, so saying that isn't bragging), so it seems to be pretty foolproof.
No comments:
Post a Comment