A week or so ago John treated himself to a "lamington" when we went to Piopio's Fat Pigeon Cafe for afternoon tea after a trip to the local dump. I hadn't realised that John likes these, and had never really tried one myself. I'd assumed these were some sort of adopted British confection, but I was wrong.
It turns out "Lamingtons" are an Australian invention, attributed to a French chef who worked for Lord Lamington, the Governor of Queensland from 1896-1901. Find out more about their history here. They are made of sponge cake cubes, dipped in either a chocolate or raspberry sauce and then dusted with coconut. A variation has cream or jam sandwiched between two halves. I sampled a bit, and decided I should try to make them after finding a recipe for "Raspberry Lamingtons" in the NZ Herald's weekly "Bite" supplement that very next week.
The recipe indicates that you can either buy a sponge cake or make one, and (of course) I went to the effort of making my own. This was also something I hadn't done before, although I did grow up eating sponge cake as a child. (I suspect my mother used a mix.)
Once the cake was baked the plot thickened with this particular recipe. I must say I have more than one quibble about how it is written, and you know I bake and cook quite a bit. The recipe says to puree frozen raspberries in the food processor, then strain them through a sieve to remove the seeds. Have you ever tried to puree frozen raspberries? The product of that certainly can't be pressed through a sieve, at least until it's thawed or thawing. So that's what I did, and after about 30 minutes managed to get a paste without seeds through the sieve. This is then added to raspberry jelly crystals (jello) into which boiling water has been poured. This liquid then goes into the fridge for 45 minutes or so until it just starts to gel.
The sponge cake is then cut into cubes. My next quibble with this recipe is that it doesn't say to cut off the browned crust of the cake, which is something I thought needed to be done, so I did it. The cake cubes are soaked in the raspberry liquid, then dusted with coconut. (I didn't think the liquid would be absorbed at all well with the crust left on, but perhaps I am wrong on that.) Then they are left on wire racks to dry.
This was all very easy. The finishing touches for this recipe include a spot of whipped cream, fresh raspberry, and shaved white chocolate.
They were delicious! I will definitely make them again. Just wish people publishing recipes didn't assume that people making lamingtons know how to make lamingtons, and explained things properly. Yep, okay, being grumpy Karen.
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