Tortes de Acietes

My (super talented/gorgeous) friend Leanne put me onto the most glorious Spanish olive oil biscuits a few years ago.  Called Tortes de Acietes (cakes of oil!) they are made in a factory in a town in southern Spain according to the same recipe first used by a lady named Ines Rosales over 100 years ago.  In Melbourne, you can buy them at Casa Iberica, the Spanish grocers on Johnston St in Fitzroy for the cost of $8 for 6 biscuits.  

The thing to know about these biscuits is: they are so so simple.  Their incredibleness lies in the way they ABSOLUTELY NAIL the key elements of their simplicity.

1. Texture - they have this snap when you bite into them.  Flaky, crunchy, light yet with substance. The snap is very important indeed.
2. Just a hint of sweetness - They are extremely plain but dusted with sugar so that you get a hint of sweetness that isn't in anyway overpowering.  So you can eat heaps.
3. Fennel seed - I may have mentioned elsewhere on this blog my devotion to fennel and fennel-related things, with their subtle, aromotic aniseed.
4. They are JUST BRILLIANT with a cup of tea.

Today being my last day of holidays, I decided I need some to get me through my re-insertion to working life.  So I rode my bike to Casa Iberica.  But when I got there the man said they didn't have any deliveries over the holidays. Needless to say, I was totes devo.

So I decided to attempt them. This was no easy task, as there are few recipes around on the internets, and the original Ines Rosales recipe is fiercely guarded by those Spanish pixies who continue to work her magic.  After scouring various other bloggers' attempts, I found one I liked the look of and tweaked it very slightly.  And it more or less worked! Oh, fabrous day!  I have texted Leanne.  There shall be cups of tea aplenty.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups strong baking flour
• 3 tablespoons caster sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• pinch salt
• 100 ml extra virgin olive oil (plus extra for brushing on the tortes)
• 100ml orange juice (pulp free or strained through a sieve)
• orange rind
• fennel seeds
• raw sugar

Heat the oil over a low heat with the orange rind.  This will allow the orange oil to infuse in the oil.  Once the rind starts to brown remove it immediately, and turn off the heat.  Crush a teaspoon of the fennel seeds in a mortar and pestle and add to the cooling oil.  Once cool, add the orange juice to the mix.

While the oil is heating, sieve the flour, baking powder, sugar and salt in a large bowl.  Then add the wet mixture and mix into a dough.  Form into a bowl, cover with plastic wrap, and leave for 30 minutes.

Heat the oven to 225 degrees C.  On a lightly floured surface, take a small ball of the dough (about a walnut size) and press down.  Then, using a floured rolling pin, roll out until extremely thin (a millimetre or less).  Brush liberally with olive oil, sprinkle thoroughly with raw sugar and add a few fennel seeds.  Then place on a tray lined with baking paper and put in the oven.

These only need to bake for five or six minutes before they will start to brown at the edges and burning is around the corner, so stay vigilant! I discovered that the time to roll out three more tortes was the amount of time needed to bake one round.

Leave them to cool - this is when they will harden into that wonderful, cracking, snapping morsel you have been dreaming of all day.  Then eat them, one after the other, incessantly, because of how delicious they are and how greedy you are and it's the last day of holidays and you don't care what anyone thinks of you! You're free! FREE TO EAT TORTES!

Slow roasted tomatoes

I have been a pretty bad blogger lately.  I could tell you about lingering flues and essays and a seemingly endless number of birthdays and all manner of things that you don't care about, but suffice it to say I have been very negligent of this blog.  I didn't even post about the Parkville Ladies' and Gentlemen's Club.  I do want you to know that I made all those things, and they were all devoured.  Unfortunately I made most of them after midnight on work nights and completely forgot to take photos.

But never fear, I have a plan.  A plan to make up for it.  It involves a flurry of cooking this weekend, all of which I pledge to put up here.  And it starts with these: Slow roasted tomatoes.

Ingredients

• Vine ripened tomatoes, or any big juicy firm red variety 
• Good quality olive oil
• Balsamic vinegar
• Sea salt
• Cracked pepper 

Let's start by saying that this recipe is easy. Stupidly easy. All it requires is that you are about the house, because you want these suckers to cook for a loooooong time.  The longer and slower they cook, the more the flavours concentrate.  You can't really get this recipe wrong, but you can certainly get it right.  The most assured way to kick arse is to use really good quality ingredients.  Since all the flavours are concentrating during the slow roasting, this is one recipe where stand out ingredients will make a big difference.  So try to get extra virgin, cold press oil, a good vinegar, and good quality salt.  Let's face it, these things are all awesome to have around anyway.  The vinegar is the best bit.  It caramelises during the roasting and adds an extra sticky sweetness to the tomatoes.

So, heat your oven to 120 C.  Chop your tomatoes into quarters and place them in a large mixing bowl.  Pour a generous drizzle of oil and vinegar over them, and then add liberal quantities of salt and pepper.  Toss them in the bowl.  My preferred way to do this is to lift the bowl with both hands and swoosh it out quickly, away from my body and flicked upwards - the tomatoes will flip over themselves and coat themselves evenly in the mixture without bruising, and minimising the amount of oil used.  This is also a really good way to oil potatoes before roasting.

Place the tomatoes in lined pans and put them in the oven.  Leave them there for four or five hours. Done. Easy. Delicious. High five.

Use this little morsels in pasta sauces, risotto, on antipasto platters, in sandwiches.  I had some with Persian fetta on a fresh bagel for breakfast, and it was divine.  To store them, seal them in an air tight container and put them in the fridge.