This is the recipe for the cute little tartlets that I made & featured last week. I had these mini tart cases in the pantry for a good while now & was thinking of something fun to do with them. At first I thought that they would end up as miniature quiches but then my sweet tooth took hold & I altered an old recipe to fit. Because the recipe is so small I’ve measured everything out in grams. I used a handy electronic kitchen scale & the tare/zero function to measure everything out perfectly. I don’t have mad food-photography skills like Luxirare (mostly because my hands were covered on sugar) so without photos I hope my instructions are clear!

Coconut + Vanilla Tartlets with Lime

• 35 miniture pre-baked tartlets cases
• 30 grams dessicated coconut
• 30 grams softened butter
• 40 grams vanilla yoghurt
• 90 grams caster sugar
• 1 egg (at room temperature)
• 2 teaspoons lime juice
• 1 teaspoon lime zest
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla essence

Beat the butter & sugar together & then beat in the egg. Add the juice, zest, vanilla yoghurt & vanilla essence & mix well. Gently fold in the dessicated coconut & use a teaspoon to scoop into pre-baked miniature tartlet cases. Bake in a preheated oven at 180 degrees Celsius for fifteen minutes (or until puffed, golden & delicious). They will deflate a little when removed from the oven. Serve sprinkled with vanilla sugar. I think these are best eaten while warm from the oven but they will keep pretty well for a couple of days, provided you can resist them for that long!

Afternoon tea is one of my favourite indulgences. It’s one of those rituals that can be as simple or as complex as you want it to be. Do you like your tea in a mug & with a choc-chip cookie or with silver service & hand cut sandwiches? After water, tea is also the most widely consumed beverage on the planet. Here’s my guide to making the perfect cuppa. I’ve been making tea & coffee in cafes for five years now & it still gets confusing & freaks me out sometimes. Hopefully these tips will help.

The Tea Leaves

One of the first things to take into consideration is the tea itself. Tea is harvested from the Camellia plant & cured & oxidised to yield black tea, oxidised for green tea & left alone for white tea. Red tea (or Rooibos) is derived from an entirely different plant altogether. The quality of tea will also effect the taste of your end product. Good quality loose leaf tea free of artificial flavourings is best. If you drink decaffeinated tea make sure you buy a leaf that has been decaffeinated using CO2 rather than methylene chloride (or an acetate, both of which taste a bit off). If they don’t state which method used on the label then methylene chloride has most likely been used, so ditch it quick!

Tea bags are a convenient way to brew tea but not many people know that the tea contained in them is the tea-dust from the bottom of the shipping bins. The flavour & quality of loose leaf tea is superior & when combined with a tea-infuser or tea-egg is just a little more environmentally friendly; it cuts out all that excess packaging. When brewing tea in a pot the general rule of thumb is one teaspoon of tea per person plus an extra teaspoon of tea ‘for the pot’. From experience this works out nicely :)

Milk & Sugar?

White, green & herbal teas aren’t generally served with milk while black & red teas are. The tea I chose to make today is a beautiful loose leaf Earl Grey (those blue flecks are bits of dried cornflower, yum!); a black tea flavoured with Bergamot essential oil. Bergamot is a species of citrus & so it doesn’t make sense to serve a tea like this with milk. Traditionally Earl Grey is served with a thin slice of lemon.

If you like your beverages nice & sweet then by all means use sugar or honey. Sugar cubes are a really cute way of serving & displaying sugar with your tea set. Otherwise Demerara sugar is best for sweetening up your cup! I will add though, that the flavour of unsweetened tea is subtle & delicious & those of you with a constant sweet tooth should definitely try it out sometime!

Service

Traditionally all tea services were made out of porcelain. However these days you can buy tea pots, cups & saucers, milk jugs & sugar bowls in glass, ceramic, earthenware, wood, stainless steel & precious metals like silver & gold. I say variety is the spice of life - so go for whatever piques your interest.

Brewing Times

Each type of tea will require a different brewing time & if you’re really professional, different water temperatures.

• Black tea can be brewed for up to four minutes (at 100 degrees Celsius),
• Green tea for up to three minutes (at 70 degrees Celsius),
• White tea for up to six minutes (at 80 degrees Celsius)
• Red tea for up to five minutes (at 100 degrees Celsius).

How to Brew a Pot of Tea

1. Boil enough fresh, cold, filtered water for one pot of tea.
2. While you’re waiting for the water to boil, fill the tea pot with hot water form the tap & let sit. This keeps the tea pot nice & warm. Pour this out once your water has boiled.
3. Fill a tea-infuser or tea-egg & place in the pot. If you don’t mind tea-leaves in your cup then just spoon the loose leaves right on into the tea pot. This is great for tea leaf reading!
4. Pour the boiled water into the pot leaving about 2cm of room at the top. (The tea leaves will expand making an already full pot will overflow!)
5. Let the tea sit & brew. Relax. Eat a sandwich, have another tart or sing a song while you wait.
6. Pour into cups & enjoy!

1. Tree, 2. Balloons against the Sky, 3. Peppermint tea, 4. Old Vinyl, 5. more cardboard boxes, 6. Loft, 7. Baby Blue Bathroom, 8. My Life in Boxes, 9. Brushed Metal with Vinyl, 10. Paper Heart, 11. Bathtub on its way out, 12. Tea for the blues, 13. My friends in la Albufera

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• Peppermint tea! I love curling up with a good book & a big mug of hot peppermint tea. I’ve taken to carrying around peppermint teabags around in my bag for emergencies! At home though, nothing beats fresh mint & lots of boiled water. Sip it up! Yum!

• Keeping in touch with friends. Nothing beats good friends. A well timed message from a thoughtful pal puts a smile on my face every time. Its good to know that there are people out there who I can chat to. Make you feel all warm & fuzzy doesn’t it?!

• Organisation. Packing, cleaning, categorising. I’ve finally begun packing up my possessions & stashing them away in boxes. Not that I need half this stuff - I do have a bit of problem with hoarding books! It feels really good to get things out of the way though & have a bit of space; even if it is only desk space!

• Rediscovering old music. I went through some old, long forgotten tracks on the music player & had a blast! I danced around full of nostalgia & singing the lyrics. This stuff is awesome! Makes me wonder why I stopped listening to some of these artists to begin with.

• Bubble baths. Yup, a long soak in a tub full of hot water. It doesn’t get better than this! I like to swish lavender essential oil into the water & daydream.

• Lastly, having hope. I’ve noticed that I’ve started to look forward, instead of backward & it’s a wonderful feeling. Things may not the best they can be at the moment, but I’m not stressing out about it & I’m starting to see life picking up. Here’s to tomorrow!

What are you grateful for today?

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