GBBO BLOGGERS 2018 - WEEK 10 final - Landscape Bake showstopper

So here we are at the end of GBBO 2018...and that means the final week of #GBBOBloggers2018. I'm so thrilled that I've managed to bake along every week this year. Although I nearly had to miss this final week as my back pain resulting from long-term JIA has really flared up for the past 3 days. Thankfully it is first thing in the morning that it is at its worst and luckily has eased through the morning.

I really really wanted to make Choux pastry at some point this year. It's a pastry that I don't often make but I really do love it and enjoy making it when I do get around to it. I have made some really great profiteroles in the past - beginners luck - without even knowing how they turned out so well.

So the only bake that could possibly lend itself to including Choux in the final this year was the showstopper. Yet my mind drew a blank about what landscape to attempt.

Then I bumped into a friend who had done a road trip this summer - a road trip to Iran (I have Iranian roots so have always wanted to go there) and they had visited the stunning Cappadocia in Turkey along the way.

I've seen photos of Cappadocia online in the past and it is a bucket list destination of mine - So I knew that is what I wanted to attempt. A Cappadocia-like landscape.

I knew it would have to have at least 3 elements to it so I decided upon Choux pastry profiteroles and 'structures' as the main element, shortbread as the base and surrounding the 'pool', with almond praline and a 'caramel' pool of water made from my own alternative version of Caramel. So 4 different elements.

So firstly I made the Choux pastry as follows:
Ingredients for choux pastry:
60g butter
95g flour
120ml water
1 teaspoon caster sugar
pinch of salt
2-3 eggs

To make the profiteroles, pre-heat the oven to 200C. Line a tray with baking paper.

Melt the butter in a pan with the salt, sugar and water. Once it is bubbling add the flour and stir vigorously. Keep on the heat for a minute or so longer whilst doing this. Then take off the heat and keep stirring it to cool it down.

Then the eggs can be added one at a time and beaten in well. I used two and a half eggs. I didn't want the mixture to be too runny.

Then I piped them onto the tray. I wasn't worried about flattening the tips down as I thought it would add to the effect of what I was aiming for if some of them were pointy. I also made a couple of longer ones which I would later stand up as taller structures.

I baked them in the oven at 200C for 15 minutes and opened the door to let steam out and then baked  for a further 15 minutes at 180C. Once cooked I slit the bottom of the profiteroles with a sharp knife and left them to cool slowly in the top oven (oven was off but a little warm).

Once cooled these can be filled either by cutting in half and filling with cream as I did previously or piped through making a little hole in the bottom as we did this time. I left some of them empty for display purposes as we were in a hurry to go out and I didn't have room in the fridge for storing all of the profiteroles once they were filled with cream.

While the profiteroles were cooking and cooling, I made the shortbread:
Ingredients for shortbread:
175g plain flour
175g butter
88g caster sugar
88g semolina

All blitzed together into a crumblike mixture (butter and flour first, then semolina and sugar) then pressed into a tin and cooked.

This ideally needs 30-35 minutes at 160C but as the oven was hotter whilst cooking profiteroles I reduced the cooking time to around 20 minutes.

To make my 'pool' I used a cheesecake ring to cut a circle into the shortbread and place it in the oven like this so it would cook with that ring in place.

My kitchen was a right mess by the time I'd finished - this is just one part of the production process!

Next I made the alternative caramel sauce. I love making a healthier version of caramel by heating together cashew nut butter with coconut oil and maple syrup but as I had some sunflower seed butter that I needed to use up, I decided to change the recipe to 50g sunflower seed butter, 30g coconut oil and 50g set honey. I found it tasted similar to halva so I made the almond praline to complement it.

The almond praline was made by heating coconut sugar until melted and mixed with roasted flaked almonds then left to cool (20g of each).

I wanted my backdrop to be made from edible ingredients too so I mixed together some icing with food colouring and made a backdrop of a sky filled with hot air balloons like so many of the photos of Cappadocia that I had seen online:

Cappadocia balloons; image from www.hurriyetdailynews.com

Finally it was assembly time. I've used a couple of cocktail sticks for the profiteroles but I was pleased that the two taller Choux towers were able to stand just using a little of my 'caramel' at the base to hold them in place.

The crumbs from the shortbread sprinkled on top helped add to the sandy-looking landscape too.

Linking up with Mummy Mishaps and Casa Costello for #GBBObloggers2018 and #GBBOBakeoftheweek:

My previous 2018 GBBO blogger bakes can be found as follows:
Week 1 - Biscuit Week - Cornish Fairings
Week 2 - Cake Week - Cardamom, Pear and Caramel Traybake
Week 3 - Bread Week - Lemon Marmalade Chelsea Buns
Week 4 - Dessert Week - Triple Raspberry Meringue Roulade
Week 5 - Spice Week - Ma'amool
Week 6 - Pastry Week - Sweet and Savoury Samosas
Week 7 - Vegan Week - Vegan Lemon and Poppyseed cake
Week 8 - Danish Week - Alternative Aebleskiver
Week 9 - Patisserie Week - Free from madeleines