Pizza snails

s’s birthday wish was to have his class from børnehave over to play. They do this sometimes for birthdays - the whole room of kids goes to the birthday boy/girl’s house for a few hours in the morning during børnehave time, with a pedagog or two. But we haven’t tried it before… 

Apparently pizza snails (pizza snegle) are required for such gatherings. Like overnight bread rolls, these seem to be something every Danish mum can whip up with her eyes closed.

I asked two different Danish mums about how to make pizza snegle, and both directed me to the same recipe, this one. So that seemed like a done deal. 

(makes about 30 medium snails - including some slightly small/awkward end ones - about 20 acceptably similar ones)

For the dough:

50 g fresh yeast

200 ml milk

150 ml plain yoghurt 

2 eggs 

1 tsp salt

1 tbsp honey

100 ml olive oil

250 g / 9 oz wholewheat flour

400 g / 14 1/2 oz plain flour

 

For the tomato sauce:

1 tbsp olive oil

1 onion, finely chopped

1 clove garlic, finely chopped

1 400 g tin tomatoes

2 tbsp tomato purée

2 tsp dried oregano

Salt+pepper

 

To finish:

125 g (one pack) fresh mozzarella, finely chopped

1 egg, lightly beaten - for brushing

 

Make the dough:

Mix yeast in a large bowl with the milk. Add oil, yoghurt, honey, egg, salt and wholewheat flour and mix well together.

 

Add plain flour a little at a time until the dough is nice and flexible (it was a bit sticky). Put in a warm place to rise, with a tea towel over it, for about an hour or until doubled in size.

 

Make the tomato sauce:

Heat olive oil in a pan and sauté onion and garlic until soft and translucent. Add tinned tomatoes, tomato purée, oregano, salt and pepper. Simmer c 20 min until thick. Let cool, and keep in fridge until needed, esp if making in advance.

 

Assembly:

Roll out half the dough on a floured surface until c 1/2 cm thick rectangle/square. Spread half the tomato sauce out evenly on top, except c. 4 cm from one end. Sprinkle with half the cheese. Roll into a long roll and cut snails about 2 cm thick with a sharp knife. Put on baking sheets lined with baking paper, with a few cm between them at least, and make round and neat with your hands. Repeat with the other half of the ingredients. Let rise on the sheets for 30 min. Brush with beaten egg. Bake 16-18 min at 180C, until golden brown.

 

They came out well and looked legit. They didn't go down all that well with the kids (they preferred melon, salty popcorn and coconut water), but there were no major complaints so think I got them about right.

5th birthday: Dragonfish cake

For the first time this year I had a birthday cake request from s (who was turning five! FIVE!). Dragonfish. Perhaps I was too ambitious last year and got his expectations up? It's nice to be believed in, and I thought I’d try… Request was for coconut and mango. And blue. 

Decided to do a coconut cake and mango icing. Needed to get a few details for it to be a dragonfish - mainly a light- up lure and long, sharp, multitudinous teeth. Then also big weird eyes, and some spikes and spots along a long, thin body.

Hard to find good pics of dragonfish, since it cannot live above deep sea level. But I am pretty sure s got the idea from wild kratts so I partly based the look on that.

Pretty much followed this recipe for the coconut cake - baked in one round springform tin and one loaf tin.

For the cake:

250 g / 9 oz butter, softened, plus extra for greasing

250 g / 9 oz sugar 

4 eggs, lightly beaten 

1 tsp vanilla 

250 g / 9oz flour 

3 tsp baking powder 

75 g / 2 ½ oz desiccated coconut 

4 tbsp coconut cream

 

For the icing:

6 oz butter

6 oz icing sugar

c. 3/4 cup mango purée made from dried unsweetened mango covered in hot water and soaked for a few hours, then blended up

3-4 tbsp ground desiccated coconut

Food colouring (should be blue)

 

For Features:

1 fresh ripe/brown coconut

1 pack marzipan

c. 30 g dark chocolate

Small white chocolate drops / buttons

Food colouring (blue, green)

Small bike light

Tape

Kitchen foil 

To make the cake:
Heat the oven to 180C. Grease tins and line the bases with buttered baking paper.

Cream the softened butter and sugar together for 3–4 min, or until pale and light – do this as much as possible, here is where I wish I had a mixer of some kind. Gradually add the eggs, mixing well between each addition. Add the vanilla and mix again. Sift the flour, baking powder and salt into the bowl, add the desiccated coconut and coconut cream, and beat again until the mixture is smooth and the ingredients are well combined.

Divide the mixture evenly between the prepared tins and bake for 25–30 min, or until the cakes are well-risen, golden-brown and a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean.

Leave the cakes to cool in the tins for 5 min, then carefully turn out onto a wire rack and leave to cool completely.

To make the icing:

Beat the butter until really pale and light. Gradually add the icing sugar, mixing well between each addition. Add the thick mango puree and ground desiccated coconut and mix again. Finally add the food colouring until desired colour is reached (nb I wanted it to be blue but it ended up more green - think the orange-yellow colour of the mango might have skewed it). Chill until needed.

To make the features:

Teeth + spikes - fresh coconut - cracked open and flesh removed in as big pieces as possible; then sliced into thin spikes. Tooth pieces left white; tail spike pieces coloured blue by mixing with food colouring.

Lure+spots - marzipan, food colouring, bike light, tape, foil - marzipan coloured with food colouring by kneading briefly together until colour consistent, then squished into spots; bike light taped into appropriate shape then wrapped with foil, then foil covered with coloured marzipan to make the part that attaches the lure to the fish's body.

Eyes - Melted dark chocolate with small white chocolate blobs in the middle. 

To assemble:

Carve the cakes into shape, sticking together with icing. I used a couple of toothpicks hidden at the back of its head as well, to keep the jaws open. When the shape is OK, cover the outside with icing. Then add the features in appropriate places.

I made the cakes, icing and most of the features two days before the birthday, then chilled overnight, then assembled the day before and kept in cool room overnight. Ideally you could do it all in one day, but... life... All the components should be chilled when assembling - and definitely not at all warm - think it makes everything easier if stuff is stiffer.

I wasn't completely happy with the colour, and the fish was a little dumpier than I would have liked, but on the whole it turned out like I wanted - recognisably a dragonfish!