Weekend baking...orange and poppy seed friands

I had an enforced period at home on Saturday morning whilst waiting for a courier delivery so I decided to continue on with my weekend baking project.

This week I decided to try making friands. You rarely, if ever, see friands (financiers) here in the UK, but they are really popular in Sydney. When I worked in a hospital in Camperdown (Sydney) we had a fantastic coffee shop next door to our building which sold these amazing orange and poppy seed friands. Many a meeting was scheduled out of the department and into the coffee shop so that it could be accompanied by a friand and a latte.

I managed to find some proper friand trays on ebay (I think via an Australian importer), but muffin trays would work equally as well. I then perused several Australian recipe websites to find a recipe. The following is from about.com in the Australian/New Zealand food section.

Orange and Poppy Seed Friands
150 grams butter (plus extra for greasing the tins)
1/2 cup plain flour
1 cup icing sugar
Zest from two oranges, finely grated
150 grams almond meal (ground almonds)
3 tbsp poppy seeds
5 egg whites

Preheat oven to 200 degrees Celsius (400 Fahrenheit). Lightly butter 10 friand tins and set aside (I got 11 from my batch).

Melt the butter in a small saucepan over a medium-low heat. Simmer for 5 mins until golden brown, taking care not to burn it. Set aside to cool slightly.

Finely grate the zest. Mix the flour, sugar, almond meal, poppy seeds and zest together in a mixing bowl.

In a separate bowl, whisk the egg whites until frothy. Add the whites to the dry ingredients along with the butter. Whisk gently until just combined.

Spoon the batter into the tins. Bake until golden brown. Depending on the size of the tins this may take 10-15 mins (mine took 15 mins).

Store friands in an airtight container for up to 4 days.

This was another recipe I can certainly recommend...I might try it with lemon next time.

And in other news...

via

...Downton Abbey started back last night...and there was a wedding...and the anticipation was worth it!