I bake for lots of reasons. Because I need to bring refreshments somewhere. Because I need to supply our cupboards more conveniently with emergency cake. And for comfort, of course, always for comfort. In a week in which David Bowie and Alan Rickman have both passed on unexpectedly, plus that avalanche earlier in the week and the shootings and explosions that seem to be business as usual, it feels like comfort is in short supply.
Baking doesn’t fix anything, of course, not really. But I think that any good thing adds to your personal stock of good things, and that the world could always use more cake and more kindness.
This afternoon, then, I baked the BBC Good Food’s raspberry and pine nut bars (recipe when you follow the link). They’re buttery flapjacks made squishier and more exciting by fresh raspberries in the middle and chopped nuts on top. I didn’t have pine nuts so used some leftover hazelnuts. It worked fine. Our kitchen is a little warmer and we’re a little happier, which is what Thursday needed to feel a little warmer and happier too.
Start with flour, porridge oats and softened butter, and mix it all up by hand. The recipe said you should end up with coarse crumbs, and mine looked more like oaty frogspawn. It’s all fine.
Put about two-thirds of the mixture at bottom of a 9″ square pan, and scatter raspberries on top. The raspberries don’t cover the whole thing, so I might chop or crush them a little next time. But you might prefer to keep them whole.
Then the rest of the oaty mixture goes on top, filling in the gaps. Press down, gently, and bake for 35-40 mins. I found baking them at the shorter end of that time scale was better: they will seem too squishy when you first get them out, but cut them into bars immediately and then let them cool in the tin, and they’ll harden just enough to keep together and be delicious.
Eat with a little clotted cream, if you like to live decadently. I always do.
