CHOCOLATE BANANA SHORTCAKE

Press, Volume C, Issue 29635, 4 October 1961, Page 3

CHOCOLATE BANANA SHORTCAKE

Shortcake baked in thin layers is attractively sandwiched together with whipped cream, bananas, and chipped chocolate to make a quickly and easily made sweet with a personality all its own. This is one of the sweets to make beforehand if you have a house guest coming, or a busy time approaching, for the layers of shortcake may be stored until they are required. Assembling time is negligible. If cream is off the menu, make a chocolate custard for a substitute, or merely spread with bought ice-cream.

Ingredients: Boz flour 14 teaspoon salt 2oz butter 2oz lard 2oz sugar 1 egg . i 4 bananas % pint cream

2oz nut chocolate or plain

Method: Rub butter and lard into flour sifted with salt and sugar. Add egg and mix to a stiff paste. Turn on to a floured board and divide into three pieces. Roll each into a neat thin round, as even in size and shape as possible. Place on baking sheets, marking one distinctly into eight segments. Prick the others. Bake in a moderate oven--375 degrees—until goldep. Cut the marked one into segments as it comes from the oven, allowing to crisp a little on the tray before lifting off. Lift remaining Shortcakes off on to a wire tray to coot Mash three of the bananas. Whip cream. Spread some banana and a layer of cream on two layers of shortcake and place one on top of the other- Chip chocolate over the top of the short, cake. Stand cut segments up at an angle on one edge like blades of a fan and arrange banana rounds in the centre and round the edge.

Almanac Pudding When inspiration burns low and the. dinner hour looms ahead without a glimmer of thought on the pudding question, make an Almanac Pudding. It is as quickly beaten up as your favourite cake, bakes while the vegetables cook, and is a promising candidate for a Family Favourite. Dates and lemon peel fleck it. Make a light lemon sauce to accompany it, or serve it with cream. Any left over cuts up happily for the lunch boxes for it is cake as well as pudding. Ingredients: 3oz butter 3oz sugar 1 egg 2 tablespoons cold water l-Bth teaspoon salt 6oz flour 114 teaspoons baking powder 1 level teaspoon cinnamon 4oz dates 2oz chopped mixed peel - 12 almonds

Method: Butter an ovenglass casserole with a lid. Cream 3oz butter with 3oz sugar and beat in one egg. Sift in flour, cinnamon, salt and baking powder and add dates and chopped peek Mix with two. tablespoons cold water to dropping consistency. Turn into the prepared dish. Blanch and chop 12 almonds and sprinkle over the top. Cover with the lid and bake at 400 degrees for half an hour, then remove lid and brown top slightly. Turn out on to a hot dish and sprinkle - lightly with sugar. Serve with cream or lemon sauce.

Jelly Sweets > Curry meals being fashionable means that we are often looking for the perfect sweet to serve after. Something which looks refreshingly cool gives the appropriate contrast. For this nothing is more helpful than the ordinary packet jelly, which may be treated in so many different ways and made by even the busiest or veriest novice of a cook. Here are two suggestions, both simple to make, both decorative and delicious. ★ Apple, Pineapple Platter Ingredients: 1 packet lime jelly 1 large grated apple 1 large tin pineapple rings 1 tin apricots (or cooked dried apricots) Whipped cream Method: Make up lime jelly and pour over freshlygrated apple (grated on coarse grater). Turn into a mould and chill until firm. Unmould on to the centre of a pavlova or any large flat platter. Drain pineapple and apricot halves. Arrange the rings round the mould, an apricot half covering each hole. Fill the centres with whipped cream (topping with meringue caps if desired). Raspberry Bavarian Layer Ingredients: 1 tin raspberries 2 packets raspberry jelly *4 pint cream Boiling water Method: Dissolve jellies in two cups boiling water. Rub raspberries through .a sieve and add sufficient cold water to make 114 cups puree. Add to the jelly and pour onethird into the base of a large mould, allowing to set. Chill remaining jelly almost to setting point, then whisk until foamy. Whisk half the cream separately and fold two together. Turn in on top of the clear jelly and set. Turn out on to a flat plate and decorate with a spray Of cherry blossom.

Snow Cream Savouries Make your cocktail tray decorative to look at in this simple way. Any small cracker-type biscuits may be used as the bases. Home-made bases may be prepared from . cheese or shortcrust pastry, or even bread shapes fried in butter. Decorate the tops of the Snow Creams with small pieces of red and green cocktail onions, with darkly toasted almonds and with sliced stuffed olive for colour contrast, er . merely tip them with a touch of tomato and parsley. ■ ■ Ingredients: 14 cup and 2 tablespoons pineapple juice 2oz walnuts 1 teaspoon gelatine 6oz (114 packets) cream cheese V* teaspoon salt Method: Soak one teaspoon gelatine in two tablespoons pineapple juice. Stand in boiling water and stir until quite dissolved. Allow to cool. In a vitamiser place pineapple juice and cream cheese and blend until Smooth. Add salt and walnuts and blend until the walnuts are fairly finely chopped. Add cooled gelatine and blend in: Turn into a shallow dish and chill to set. It forms a snowy and delicious cream which may be used as a sandwich spread, or mounded into lettuce leaves to accompany salad as well as being a most popular cocktail savoury. Chopped red and green cocktail onions, chopped cooked bacon,, or chopped olives may be folded though the cream before serving if desired. To make the savouries, mound on to small bases and decorate as desired.