MENU dorset issue 25 MENU25.dorset pdf issue 25.final | Page 53

Chef David Armstrong
is Crab Apple’s
puddings, pastry, bread
and wine expert.
LARDY CAKE
Pig out on the ultimate old-fashioned sticky cake with a
porcine twist, courtesy of Crab Apple Catering’s David Armstrong
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“Here at Crab Apple HQ we like nothing more than locally sourced, grown, reared
or foraged food and for those of you who haven’t been keeping up to date with our
ever-growing social media fan base you might not know that we recently hosted two
sold-out supper evenings down in sunny Swanage.
Entitled ‘Pig Out’ the events championed Emma’s home-reared pigs, nose-to-tail
style and a whole host of yummy, locally grown and sourced produce and finished in
style with Dave’s ul timately indulging lardy cake.
Now, wait a second, lard you say? Surely that’s a beef product? Well no, our ingenious chefs rendered all that lovely fatty
goodness from our porky products and carefully filtered it into a rich, melt-in-the-mouth baking ingredient worthy of the most
discerning of bakers out there! Of course, we could’ve used shop-bought lard, but where’s the fun in that!?
So here’s Dave’s recipe for a forgotten classic to help you avoid that swimsuit body you just don’t need!”
Ingredients Method
450g strong white flour
1 tsp salt
14g dried yeast
(28g fresh)
(Did you know you can
often get fresh yeast for
free at supermarkets?
Try asking at the bread
counter next time you
do a shop, it won’t be
enough to open the next
Greggs but it’ll get you
through this recipe.)
75g lard
(shop bought will do
just fine)
300ml water
75g butter
225g dried fruit
50g soft brown sugar
600g caster sugar
300g water
1. Mix together the flour, salt, yeast and lard in a mixing bowl (ideally using a cake mixer) and rub
together to form a breadcrumb consistency. Add 300ml water to form a dough – it will be slightly
sticky but persevere – once the bowl is ‘clean’ continue to knead the mixture (either in the machine or
by hand) for 10 minutes.
2. Place the dough in a warm place (roughly 30°c) for 2 hours to rise.
3. Beat back the dough, roll to a rough rectangle on a floured surface and sprinkle with roughly
a third of the brown sugar, fruit and butter, then fold in on itself to cocoon the ‘filling’ in the dough.
Gently roll out to a rectangle again and repeat with another third of the fillings, then again
until all fruit, butter and brown sugar is used up and you have a fat, lush-looking bready
loaf in front of you.
4. Place in a lined, high-sided baking tray or loaf tin… lets face it, even a spring-form
cake tin will do!
5. Allow to rise (at 30°c) for a further 30 minutes (enough time to do the
washing up and pour a G&T) then bake at 220°c for 30-35 minutes.
6. While this is going on, gently dissolve the 600g caster sugar in the
300g water to form a syrup – please be careful though, this will burn if
you get it on your skin and will stick like… well, it’ll be sticky if you spill it.
7. Once cooked, the loaf may not look pretty, it may not be evenly
browned, it can even be speckled and lumpy looking
but believe you me, some things are just worth closing
your eyes for… Place the whole tin somewhere it won’t
need to be moved for a while and pour the sugar syrup
all over the loaf, sprinkle with yet-more sugar until the
syrup can’t absorb any more and allow to cool for 15-20
minutes.
8. Eat straight away; warm and gooey!
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