Mary Berry’s Failsafe Recipe For The Best Paris-Brest

You may have seen bakers struggle to make the dreamy Paris-Brest dessert featured on this Tuesday’s Great British Bake-Off.

But if you’re anything like me, a delusional part of your brain probably also went: “That looks nice, I could do that.”

Well, if you want to attempt the precarious pastry, it turns out that none other than GBBO’s former judge Mary Berry has a timeless recipe.

Sharing her know-how on BBC’s site, the Cordon Bleu-trained chef said: “These decadent pastries filled with praline and cream are like giant profiteroles, perfect for sharing.”

How does Mary make ’em?

She says you’ll need”a food processor, a piping bag, a star nozzle and a silicone mat” to perfect her recipe, which offers two Paris-Brests (a pair if you will).

She preheats her oven to 220C/200C, lines a baking sheet with baking paper, and draws four 10cm-ish circles on it before flouring the parchment.

Then, she makes choux pastry by putting milk, salt, sugar, butter, and water into a pan, removing from the heat once it starts bubbling, and ― frankly ― beating the bejesus out of it “until it forms a dough that leaves the side of the pan clean.”

Then she places the mix back into the pan and heats it for five minutes or so.

Once cooled slightly, she beats eggs into the dough “until the dough is smooth and glossy,” and then place it in a piping bag.

She pipes four thick rings into the circles she drew earlier, then tops them with egg wash and almonds.

These should be baked for 10-15 minutes at full temp, and then a further 10 minutes at 180C/160C Fan/Gas 4; dry them out in an opened oven for three minutes afterwards.

Then, Mary makes a praline by spreading hazelnut-filled caramel onto a silicone mat, leaving it to cool, and whizzing it in a blender.

She also makes vanilla whipped cream for the filling.

“Sprinkle half the praline onto the bottom halves of the choux rings, then pipe a generous amount of cream over the praline. Sprinkle the remaining praline over the cream and place the pastry lids on top. Dust with icing sugar and serve,” Mary says.

Why is it called a Paris-Brest to begin with?

Per The New York Times, it was created by pastry chef Louis Durand.

It was named after a bike race that runs between Paris and Brest, a port city; it was even designed to look like a bike.

The New York Times advises making your praline first, in direct contradiction with Mary Berry’s advice (should we make them cycle a race to determine the winner?).

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Mary Berry’s Unexpected Secret To The Best Marmalade Cake

I don’t know about you, but the upcoming release of a new Paddington movie (Paddington In Peru, out November 8) has gotten marmalade on my mind.

So who else to turn to for a perfect marmalade cake recipe than Mary Berry, who’s penned the perfect orange jam-based traybake recipe?

The former Great British Bake-Off judge shared the cake in her book Mary’s Baking Bible, which home bakers like Mel and Alex of Tale of 2 Kitchens tried and loved.

Surprisingly, though, she has some counterintuitive advice to prevent the cake from “buckling,” or sinking in the middle.

Which is?

You shouldn’t put too much marmalade in your marmalade cake, the Cordon Bleu-trained chef revealed.

Baking site Cakes By MK explains that “When it comes to baking, balancing your ingredients is key.

“If you have too much liquid or too much fat in your cake batter, this can result in a cake with a weak structure which can cause it to sink in the middle.”

The starches and binders in the cake can’t do their strengthening job if their path is interrupted by too much liquid.

This, along with a too-small cake tin, opening the oven door too soon, under- or over-mixing your cake batter, or having an oven that’s too cold can also contribute to the sinking, the baking pro adds.

How does Mary make her marmalade cake?

She begins by lining a baking tray with parchment and preheating her oven to 180°C.

Then she whisks all of the ingredients ― sugar, flour, marmalade, butter, sultanas, baking powder, cherries, eggs and milk ― into a bowl and chucks the lot in the oven for 40-45 minutes.

Pretty simple, right? And if the reviews are to be believed, it’s delicious too ― “A lovely, soft and fluffy traybake, this is more like a sponge cake in a tray than the usual slice,” A Tale Of 2 Kitchens writes.

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I Can’t Un-Read Mary Berry’s Tomato-Less Tomato Soup Recipe From The 70s, So I’m Sharing It

Now, I am a Mary Berry STAN. I love her. I love her recipes, I love seeing her on TV and I stopped watching Bake Off when she left because, truly, what’s the point?

That being said, my vintage Mary Berry cookbook from the 70s is not always… perfect, shall we say.

Take, for example, the tomato soup that I found in there today. It’s a ‘summer’ tomato soup which means it’s eaten cold and not cooked but also… there are… no actual tomatoes that need to be chopped for this recipe?

I swear, I had to keep re-reading because I thought I’d missed a step but apparently I didn’t and neither did Mary herself because this is still an entire soup.

I can only put it down to the 70s being a little weird.

Mary Berry’s Tomato-Less Tomato Soup Recipe

So. If you’re feeling like a yoghurty gazpacho is on your bucket list, you may want to try this vintage recipe. It’s not for me personally but as Mary says in the recipe itself, “it’s very much a sophisticated taste” and what can I say? I’m an uncultured buffoon.

So, for this alternative tomato soup recipe, you’ll need:

  • 500ml of natural yoghurt
  • 500ml of tomato juice
  • The juice and grated rind of a lemon
  • 1/2 cucumber, cut into 5cm cubes
  • Salt
  • Ground black pepper
  • Worcester sauce
  • Cucumber slices for garnish

… Told you! No tomatoes! Juice tomato juice!

Then you simply:

  • Whisk together yoghurt and tomato juice
  • Stir in lemon juice, grated lemon rind and cucumber
  • Season well and add Worcester sauce
  • Serve chilled and garnished with thin slices of cucumber

This comes from a vintage cookbook of Mary’s from 1975: Beating The Cost Of Cooking and while I likely wouldn’t choose this meal, I’ll cherish this throwback cookbook forever.

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This Is How Mary Berry Levelled Up Her Scrambled Eggs In The 70s

The words ‘national treasure’ are thrown around far too lightly for my liking but when it comes to Mary Berry, they absolutely apply. First appearing on our screens in the 70′s, Mary has been teaching the nation to cook and bake for longer than I’ve been alive.

My first real exposure to her was obviously Great British Bake Off where her cheeky little smiles were a perfect sidekick to co-host Paul Hollywood’s gentle snark. Racing over to my friend’s after work, we’d tuck into some pasta, share a bottle of wine and talk about whether it was too late for Mary to adopt us as her granddaughters.

With all of this fangirling in mind, it’s probably not a surprise to learn that I forked out for a vintage cookbook of Mary’s from 1975: “Beating The Cost Of Cooking”. It’s yellowed, bent a little in the middle and perfect.

Mary Berry’s vintage scrambled eggs recipe

I bought this book mostly to learn how much not only Mary’s cooking has changed over almost 50 years but how much food trends have changed in general. It’s a great read but there are some that I’m glad stayed right where they belong. In the 70s.

Take for example, the ‘sweet corn scramble’. I don’t know if it’s because I hate sweetcorn or because the illustration is… vile, but this one really got my stomach turning.

Anyway, if sweetcorn isn’t an issue for you, you can try this vintage scrambled eggs recipe from Mary herself.

You’ll need:

  • 6 eggs
  • 6 tbsp milk
  • salt and pepper
  • 15g of butter
  • 175g of drained sweetcorn
  • toast

Then, simply beat your eggs in a bowl with milk, salt and pepper. Melt the butter in a pan and make scrambled eggs in your usual way. Just before the eggs are ready, stir in drained sweetcorn and cook until hot. Pile on toast and serve at once.

Despite this cursed illustration haunting my nightmares, I still love you Mary.

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Mary Berry’s Genius Potato Salad Addition Transforms It Into A Main

I can stand some Irish stereotypes; actually, yes, we do all know each other (more or less). And yep, we love potatoes ― what sane person wouldn’t?

I like mine baked, fried, chipped, boiled, mashed, and, uh, be-saladed (?). But It wasn’t until I read Mary Berry’s version of the dish that I started eating it on its own for lunch.

That’s because the Cordon Bleu-trained chef adds tasty (and omega 3 and protein-rich) salmon and prawns to her dish, not only making it more delicious but also turning it into a more balanced meal.

In fact, the dish is so tasty that it’s earned a five-star rating on its BBC page ― having tried it myself, I can understand why.

The dish also contains radishes

The tasty addition of radishes to the dish adds a crisp and peppery bite to the meal, balancing out the mushy spuds and tender fish.

It holds up well during storage, too ― in fact, all of this recipe does. “The potato salad can be made a day in advance and stored in the fridge, adding the radish, freshly cooked salmon and the prawns up to four hours ahead,” the BBC’s page suggests.

In order to hold up longer against refrigeration, Mary Berry recommends using thicker, middle-cut salmon from the centre of the fish, rather than the tail.

The result is a delicious, balanced dish with loads of contrasting texture and complex flavours ― way, way better than your standard spud salad.

What’s the recipe, then?

You’ll need three middle-cut salmon fillets, each weighing 125 grams or four and a half ounces, with their skin left on. Additionally, the recipe calls for one lemon and 16 cooked tiger prawns.

For the potato salad, you’ll need 500 grams of baby new potatoes, four tablespoons of olive oil, three tablespoons of Dijon mustard, one tablespoon of caster sugar, and three tablespoons of white wine vinegar.

You’ll also require six tablespoons of mayonnaise, one bunch of thinly sliced spring onions, 150 grams of thinly sliced radishes, four finely chopped celery sticks, one small bunch of finely chopped flatleaf parsley, salt, and freshly ground black pepper. This makes enough for six people.

Preheat the oven to 180°C/160°C Fan/Gas Mark 4, and line a baking tray with kitchen foil.

To prep the salad, place the potatoes in a saucepan of salted water and bring them to a boil. Allow them to cook for approximately 15 minutes or until they are tender ― once they’re cooked, drain them and then slice ’em into quarters.

While the potatoes are cooking, place the salmon fillets skin-side down on the foil-lined baking tray. Squeeze half of the lemon juice over them and season them with salt and pepper. Cover the fillets with foil, seal to make a parcel, and bake for about 15 minutes or until just cooked. Once that’s done, remove them from the oven and let them cool before removing the skin.

For the salad, combine oil, mustard, sugar, and vinegar in a large bowl. Add the hot potatoes, season with salt and pepper, and set aside to cool. After that, you can mix in the mayonnaise, spring onions, radishes, and celery. Adjust the seasoning to your taste and add the remaining lemon juice.

Gently flake the cooked salmon into large pieces and stir it into the salad with the prawns and half of the chopped parsley, ensuring you don’t accidentally mash any spuds. Serve sprinkled with the remaining parsley.

Voila ― you’ve got an elite potato salad that’s bulky and balanced enough to count as a full meal (at least, I’ve eaten it for dinner with a baguette twice this week).

Enjoy!

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Mary Berry’s Unexpected Secret Ingredient For The Best Shortbread

Marry Berry, unsurprisingly, has a lot of culinary tricks up her sleeve ― she adds muscovado sugar to her cottage pie, uses an extra yolk in her pancake, and even coats her roast spuds in semolina.

And now, it seems the Cordon Bleu-trained chef has a secret for shortbread, too.

In her recipe for the simple Scottish delicacy, Mary Berry goes beyond the typical sugar-flour-butter recipe we’d expect.

Instead, she adds another ingredient for extra crunch ― semolina (yup, like for her roast spuds).

Why semolina?

Semolina is a hard flour, the less finely-milled version of durum wheat (which is used for pasta).

It has more gluten and protein than all-purpose wheat four, as well as more flavour. And because it’s coarser, it doesn’t become soft and fluffy as easily as all-purpose flour ― meaning it’ll help to provide a structure and bite to your baked goods.

“I like to use semolina as well as flour to give the shortbread crunch, but you can use cornflour or ground rice instead,” Mary Berry says.

What’s Mary Berry’s shortbread recipe?

First, you should preheat your oven to 160°C/Fan 140°C/gas 3, and grease a 30cm x 23cm roasting or traybake tin.

You’ll need 225g (8oz) of plain flour, 100g (4oz) of semolina, 225g (8oz) of butter, 100g (4oz) of caster sugar, 50g (2oz) of flaked almonds (there aren’t mandatory), and 25g (1oz) of demerara sugar for dusting.

Combine the flour and semolina in a bowl or food processor. Incorporate the butter and sugar, then use your fingertips to rub them together until the mixture starts to come together. Gently knead the mixture until it forms a smooth dough.

Spread the dough into a baking tray and then press its top until even with a knife or spatula. Then, prick its surface with a fork, add your flaked almonds if you like, and store it in the fridge to chill until it’s firm.

After it’s chilled, bake it for 35 minutes or until lightly golden brown. Sprinkle it with demerara sugar after it leaves the oven. Then, after a few minutes, cut it into 30 fingers in the tin and leave those to cool further on a cooling rack.

Enjoy ― store any leftovers on a cooling rack (though I’d be amazed if you had any.)

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Lorraine Kelly, Joe Wicks And Marcus Rashford Among Stars On Queen’s Birthday Honours List

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Mary Berry ‘Overwhelmed’ To Receive Damehood In Queen’s Birthday Honours List

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  • Browsing and search activity while using Verizon Media websites and apps
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To enable Verizon Media and our partners to process your personal data select ‘I agree‘, or select ‘Manage settings‘ for more information and to manage your choices. You can change your choices at any time by visiting Your Privacy Controls.

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