Definitely a lemon!

Looked a mess - tasted fine!

I have made bread, scones, cakes and puddings successfully in our thermal cooker.

However, on each occasion the experiment has been conducted under stationary conditions, so last week I decided to try to cook a cake/pudding while in transit.  Lemon Drizzle Cake was chosen as the recipe.  There is slideshow on the link, demonstrating the method.  I didn't watch that prior to making the cake but have had a quick look now.

There are a couple of points I should make.  Our thermal cooker is an Aldi version.  At the time of purchase it was around a third the cost of a named brand.  It seemed identical in features and represented very good value.  We've had a lot of good use from it and when stationary there are no issues at all with it's performance.

When in transit, it doesn't work quite as well - mainly because the water is able to slosh between the two pots (if both are being used) and some is lost between the inner and outer pot.  I allow for these short-comings when cooking savoury dishes by adding a larger volume of dried ingredients to counter the expected water increase while traveling.  Of course, that solution is not an option for the cake/pudding cooking method.

I will also mention that we traveled down to Sydney in our small car, rather than using Elmer.  The red car is experiencing a few technical difficulties at the moment, so the ride was bumpier than it should have been and more water was lost as a result.  You can see in the bottom left pic how the cake looked upon opening the thermal cooker when we arrived.  Everything was still hot (five hours or so after leaving home) but the cake hadn't risen evenly and some water had obviously made its way into the pudding bowl.

The cake probably still could have been salvageable if I hadn't had a brain snap and inverted it onto a wire cake cooler, rather than a plate!  I was in hysterics as I watched my creation slowly sink into the cooler, which cut through rather like one of those wire gadgets used to slice eggs or avocado!  Further mess was created when I belatedly tipped the cake (and cake cooler) onto first one plate and then another, to recover the trivet (which had lodged about a third of the way into the cake)!

Given a traditional cake presentation was no longer an option, I artfully mounded the cake and decorated with a few strips of lemon peel.  The lemon syrup was poured over, so the end result was something akin to a lemon island amid a lemon sea - with icing sugar snow on top!  In spite of it's obvious aesthetic shortcoming, the "Lemon Mess" tasted quite good and I expect will feature in the future (when it can be cooked in a stationary thermal cooker)!

(You will note my trivet improvisation of a plastic dinosaur sandwich cutter was another brain snap moment)!

Thermal-cooked pudding

The Hamby Campers were very happy today!

The afternoon scone success inspired me to try another experiment, something else I had been thinking of trying for a while - a self-saucing pudding.  I found this video and decided the method could be adapted for one of my usual recipes.

These days chocolate and/or coffee give me an instant headache, so are best avoided - sadly!  (Of course, my faithful taste-testers have no aversion to chocolate but where's the fun in cheffing if the chef misses out on the sampling)?!

I spread the batter evenly into the top (greased) pot and arranged pear slices over the surface.  Our fridge is currently overflowing with pears, so I took the opportunity to reduce the stockpile - if only by one! 

The sauce was then poured over the batter, via the back of a spoon for more gentle distribution.  The large pot was about three-quarters full of water and had been simmering on a hotplate while I prepared the pudding.  I placed the top pot into the bottom pot, put the lid on and left the pudding to stand over the simmering water for about 20 minutes.  I then transferred both pots to the thermal cooker for a further 60 minutes, before "plating up" with custard.

Mmmmm - another success!