Sunday 19 January 2014

Fresh fig update

Just an update on the fig post I did on the weekend as I just wanted to show anyone who is interested what I ended up making with the fresh figs from our trees.



After much searching I finally settled for Joy the Baker's Fresh Fig and Almond Breakfast Cake which I think found on a Pinterest search or a Google search. I thought I had all the ingredients apart from Buttermilk so bought a carton of that and then I got to work cooking the 'The Cake'. However, unfortunately I have a member of the household who gets into the pantry cupboard and moves all my cooking ingredients around and I couldn't find my baking powder or baking soda plus I didn't have almond extract and all the almond slices had been eaten .... so I had to use other ingredients to replace all this. Sigh!

The only self-raising flour I had was gluten free which I am not familiar with and only bought it in case I was tempted to cook something for our Simple Living Toowoomba morning teas as several of those who attend are gluten intolerant.  However, I have resisted the temptation so far as baking is not my favourite activity.

So I started making the batter but it ended up being very thick so I put in more buttermilk and then a bit more just in case....about a cup more than the recipe said. Oops! Then it was time to press the figs into the batter and add the almond slices. Well I did have some raw almonds instead of slices so I chopped them up quickly and popped it into the oven...presumably for 25 minutes as the recipe suggested.



Two hours later it looked like it had finally cooked and I took it out to survey the damage :-) Some of the batter had come up to the top of the cake but at least it was cooked so I had a taste while it was warm and it was quite nice. Any resemblance to the original was completely accidental by the way! The photo was taken at night so it's a bit dodgy. Sorry about that.

The next day however it was slightly gluggy so I am not sure if that was because of the gluten free flour. It mustn't have tasted too bad though because there is hardly any left and it has been eaten with custard.  I will try a different recipe with the next batch of figs if they don't get eaten before they arrive in the kitchen.


This photo (they are my husband's fingers by the way) is for J in the US who was asking about the hole that the ants get into and I am not sure if the hole is actually there because there is a problem with the fruit itself or whether the figs are normally like that. Someone may be able to let me know. They haven't had much water at all as we have had very low rainfall and extremely high temperatures at times since spring.


So now that we have 'saved the figs' this year my next project will be to 'save the guavas'.


I wonder how that will go down with the garden CEO. thinking-023 023.gif




6 comments:

  1. hi, we have figs but a different Variety as ours don't go that dark, there is a tiny hole but its not as pronounced in ours and not really visible in some of them at all. I have a picture in this post http://www.girlswearbluetoo.com/2014/01/jan-2014-kicks-off.html We dont water our massive tree but it is relatively close to one of our ponds and could possibly?? be getting water from there.

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  2. Tammy that hole may have looked a bit bigger than it is as I was using the macro setting on the camera. Still I think the ants would get in no matter how small the hole is if they wanted to. I would like to think they are a sign so rain coming but I doubt it.

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  3. Glad you posted the recipe as I got a big lot of figs today & have frozen some & made jam but have some left to make this cake

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  4. I think my Mother told me to look for the whole to know the fig was ripe. The flowers are actually inside the fig and I believe the whole allows insects to pollinate....I may have misremembered

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  5. Hi, I believe the hole at the bottom of the fig is to allow a particular wasp to get inside to get at the flowers which are actually contained inside the fruit. Next time you break open a fig have a close look at the pink flesh...it is all little flowers

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    Replies
    1. Thanks Duckedout. I will check that out when we have our next lot of figs.

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