Dairy Free Pastry Cream, otherwise known as Crème Pâtissière is a sticky sweet custard filling for eclairs, profiteroles, doughnuts, cakes and any other patisserie or bake you care to make! It's made with just eggs, dairy free milk, sugar and flour, which gives a lusciously silky sweet sauce to create a sweet treat or dessert for your friends and family.

Dairy Free Pastry Cream (Crème Pâtissière)

Gavin Wren Baking, Basic Ingredients, Dairy free baking, Recipes, Sauces

I’m tackling a patisserie basic today, luscious crème pâtissière, that thick, sweet, yellow cream found in the most amazing patisseries treats and tarts. This version here has undergone a lactose free tweak, making a dairy free pastry cream that everyone can enjoy.

“Krem pat”

Don’t worry, I’ve not adopted a peculiar language or speaking in tongues. It’s how I first heard crème pâtissière referred to during a croissant making workshop. The instructor was demonstrating other uses for the lovely, flaky, layered, enriched dough, working through pain au chocolat, before mentioning we could make pain au raisin.

He suddenly shouted across the kitchen to his assistant “Can I use some of your krem pat?”. She said “sure! It’s in the walk-in”. As I blankly wondered what the hell this krem pat was, he went on to explain crème pâtissière, or pastry cream as it’s also known.

I love…come and read more…

21 things about eggs lots of organic eggs

21 Things You Didn’t Know About Eggs

Gavin Wren Food Education, Writing

Eggs, beautiful eggs. We love eating them, we buy billions of them every year and all have an opinion on the best way to cook them. I’ve recently become an egg-spert on these fascinating storecupboard staples, having spent a few months researching far and wide into how the UK egg market operates on my Food Policy MSc course.

To celebrate the beautiful occasion of submitting this year’s final coursework, I want to share 21 things I discovered whilst writing my research. If you want to know more, just get in touch, there’s about 1001 things I know about eggs now.

21 Things You Didn’t Know About Eggs

1. The UK consumed nearly 12 billion eggs in 2014 and that’s increasing.
2. That’s 185 per person, per year.
3. In the 1960s, it was 250 per person, per year, but that figure slumped by the eighties.
4. 85% of UK egg consumption is produced

Low sugar dark chocolate spelt brownies made using dates to sweeten, providing a delicious rich brownie recipe with only a fraction of the sugar of most brownie recipes. These delicious brownies make a great treat if you're cutting out refined sugar or if you simply want to reduce your sugar intake without foregoing some delicious baked treats! Time to get baking!

Low Sugar Dark Chocolate Spelt Brownies

Gavin Wren Baking, No Added Sugar, Recipes, Spelt & ancient grains

Today’s recipe is low sugar dark chocolate spelt brownies, a rich and dark recipe sweetened with dates instead of mountains of refined sugar. Cakes with no refined sugar can present challenges to the baker, because sugar gives structure to cakes as it’s a solid once cooled. Luckily brownies are all the better for being thick, squidgy and gooey, which are boxes these spelt brownies comprehensively tick. Whether you’re simply wanting to cut down on your …

smoked mackerel horseradish omelette

Smoked mackerel omelette with horseradish

Gavin Wren Fish & Shellfish, Main Dishes, Recipes

I don’t really like roast dinners. I’m sure that’s heresy in some quarters, but it’s the truth. From a young age I eschewed gravy on any roast dinner (yes, I know, I’m a heathen), preferring to retain the integrity, structure and substance of my food, rather than reduce it to a plate of sloppy gruel that could be consumed via a straw. This doesn’t mean I like my food dry, I just favour the legion …

Roquefort and sun dried tomato omelette

Sun dried tomato and roquefort omelette with rocket

Gavin Wren Main Dishes, Recipes, Vegetarian

The recipe today is super quick, I’m not hanging around, I’ve got so little to do and so much time to do it in that I can’t just sit around being busy writing blog posts and editing photos. Capiche? Confusing eh? That’s the idea. My brain is in a fuzzle today, I had a strange dream last night where an old colleague of mine who I got on well with told me to “FUCK OFF” …

Brunch smoked salmon panzanella with poached egg

Brunch-style smoked salmon panzanella

Gavin Wren Breakfast, Fish & Shellfish, Main Dishes, Recipes

Yes, yes, I know it’s Monday, not Sunday, so why am I posting a Sunday brunch recipe? Well, firstly, because yesterday was Sunday, which was the day I cooked and photographed this, and secondly, because I wanted to give you plenty of time to wind this recipe into your weekly shopping, so that you can make it this coming weekend. It’s a lovely, easy one to make, a Sunday brunch special which can be quickly …