Bits ‘n Bites

Been a while since I had a chance to post here. The month of May was particularly nutty, so I had to skip the Opera Cake challenge. I was excited when I saw the June Challenge. The Danish braid was another opportunity to try my hand at flaky dough. We had done it once in cooking school and I was looking forward to trying it again. I read the recipe a couple of times, a little too quickly, I might add. It was not until last Sunday, the day I had set aside to make this recipe, that I realized the amount of time needed. I kinda missed the “5 hours, or overnight”, final resting period. So, I ended up doing it over two days.

The recipe, from Sherry Yard’s The Secrets of Baking, was relatively straight forward.  I used a mixed fruit filling instead of the apple one suggested. We had a choice, luckily, and I had these frozen berries I wanted to use. I did a simple jam, based on the recipe presented in the video, included as a reference by our hosts for the challenge, Kelly of Sass & Veracity, and Ben of What’s Cookin’? The video also included a demonstration by Beatrice Ojakangas of the braiding techniques. Despite that, and the fact that I carefully counted slats on each side, I think I came out short somehow. There was a bit of last minute tucking and hiding (grin). The smell that emanated during baking was just incredible. The combination of orange and cardamom is to die for.  I could barely wait long enough for it to cool before cutting a slice off. Turned out quite nicely. Another wonderful recipe added to the repertoire. Thanks again Daring Bakers for this opportunity!

BTW, Daring Bakers has moved to a new site and now offers a forum for non-members who wish to hang out with other bakers. The new site is here.  Of course, new members are always welcome. Details on how to join are available here

This month’s Daring Bakers Challenge, hosted by Morven (Food Art and Random Thoughts), was the “Perfect Party Cake”, taken from  Dorie Greenspan’s book Baking from my Home to Yours. This recipe called for plenty of lemons for the cake part, and enough butter all around to make Paula Dean proud. My mouth was watering just reading the instructions.

On a quiet Friday morning, I printed the recipe and jumped right in. My KitchenAid made the whole process pretty painless. Like pretty much every DB recipe, this one seemed more daunting than the actual process turned out to be. My cakes came out moist and light, despite not rising much (a step involving whisking the egg whites and the buttermilk had been left out inadvertedly in the instructions) and the buttercream was just divine. Give me a recipe I can just beat the living daylights out of, any day. The preserve used between the layers was left to us. I decided to make the Strawberry Preserves with Black Pepper and Balsamic Vinegar, found on the Food Network site. Turned out lovely and balanced well with the lemon flavour of the cake. Big success all around. Bonus: 8 egg yolks to make ice cream (chocolate and vanilla).

Can’t wait to see the April challenge!

One of the exhilarating aspects of being part of the bakerhood that is Daring Bakers, is knowing that you become a better baker after each new challenge. There is always a trick or two to pick up, a new way of looking at a process, a new direction to stretch your skills and comfort zone. This challenge proved this once more.

Hosted by  Breadchick Mary (The Sour Dough), and Sara (I like to cook), we were dared to bake French Bread, the Julia Child way. Well, I’ve baked a lot of bread from scratch, but I have to admit my jaw dropped when I read the instructions. How could a recipe with four (4) basic ingredients take so long!? Eight ( to nine (9) hours?! Whoa! The bread I usually bake entails one proof/rise, shaping and a second shorter rise. Total time from kneading to fragrant bread out of the oven: 2.5 hours. My curiosity was piqued. We had been warned so many times in cooking school not to let the bread over-rise, that I was a bit skeptical. Nonetheless, on a quiet Sunday, I got up early and plunged in.

I’ve always made bread the old fashion way, kneading by hand. Since the option to use an electric mixer was offered with this challenge, I decided to try it that way. Improvement #1: It’s a lot more efficient to make bread this way. The mixer bowl is ideal for the first proofing. A keeper. Next up? Using the oven, with the light on, as the rising chamber. Brilliant! Even better, wrapping the bowl in a towel. That’s how I’ll be rising bread from now on.

The whole process was pretty straightforward, just time consuming. I may have gotten a bit impatient at the end. My shaped bread (three ficelles) could have risen a little longer. Still, I was really happy with the final results. I’m not sure I’ll be repeating the whole process in the future, but I’m sure the tricks learned will make my regular method even tastier. Thanks for the challenge, Breadchick Mary and Sara!

The full recipe is available here.

Sometime in early December, as I was perusing the Daring Bakers website, I noticed an ad on the site for a chocolate competition hosted by Hotel Chocolat, a UK-based purveyor of fine chocolates. The deal was simple: Submit your favorite chocolate-based recipe and their panel would pick a winner.

My all-time favorite and most acclaimed recipe is for Santa Fe Brownies, an unctuous concoction of 12 ounces of chocolate (bittersweet and semi-sweet) and cream cheese. I can’t quite recall how I got hold of this recipe. I believe my mom gave it to me, but she can’t remember where she got it from. It took me all of 2 minutes to copy my recipe onto the site’s registration and to submit it. Needless to say, I was dumbfounded when I received an email, from the marketing company behind the contest, telling me I had won! :0

Shortly after Christmas, I received my prizes: a box of Pink Champagne Truffles and a copy of the 101 Best Loved  Chocolate Recipes Book. The truffles are to die for, and the book is chock-full of scrumptious recipes (chocolate pasta anyone?…). Thank you Hotel Chocolat! It was a very nice after-Christmas present.

I baked Santa Fe Brownies while at my mother’s over the holidays. Our guests at Christmas all got to take a slab home. That recipe is definitely a winner in everyone’s book. Here’s the recipe. It’s a little-time consuming, but well worth the effort.

Santa Fe Brownies
1 cup plus 1 teaspoon butter
6 squares (6 ounces) unsweetened chocolate coarsely chopped
6 squares (6 ounces) semisweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
1 _ cups all-purpose flour
1 _ teaspoons baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
5 large eggs
1 _ cups firmly packed brown sugar
1 1/4 cups granulated sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 _ cups walnuts, broken into large pieces

Cream Cheese Mixture
12 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
6 tablespoons butter, softened (no substitutions)
1 _ teaspoons vanilla extract
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3 large eggs

Instructions :
1.Preheat oven to 350 F. Line a 13x 9 inch baking pan with foil.   Melt 1 teaspoon of the
butter and brush the bottom and sides of the pan with it.  Melt the unsweetened
chocolate, semisweet chocolate, and the remaining 1 cup of butter in top of a double
boiler over simmering water.  Set mixture aside and cool slightly.

2.  Stir together the flour, baking powder, and salt in a medium bowl.  Beat the eggs in a
large mixing bowl at medium speed until just blended.  Add the brown sugar, granulated
sugar, and vanilla: beat just until smooth.  Beat in the chocolate mixture, then flour
mixture, at low speed just until combined.  Reserve 2 1/4 cups batter.  Stir the walnuts
into remaining batter in the mixing bowl.  Spread the batter in the prepared pan.

3.  For Cream Cheese Mixture, beat the cream cheese and butter in a clean mixing bowl
at medium speed until smooth.  Gradually beat in the vanilla and sugar until light and
fluffy.  Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition and beat just until
smooth.  Spoon the mixture over the chocolate batter in prepared pan, spreading to
edges to the pan.

4.Stir reserved chocolate batter to soften.  Spoon the batter over the cream cheese
layer.  With a knife, cut through batters in a zigzag pattern to marbleize slightly.  Bake 1
hour 15 minutes , until toothpick inserted in center comes out barely clean.  (If the top
browns too quickly during baking, cover the pan loosely with foil.)  Cool completely in the
pan on a wire rack.  Invert onto a cookie sheet; gently lift off pan and remove foil.  Invert
again, cover tightly with plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight.

5.  With a long, sharp knife, cut brownies into squares, then cut each quarter into 8
squares.  (Can also be cut into slabs and frozen.) Makes 32.

Enjoy!

As December rolls in, there are plenty of cooking/baking challenges to keep anyone busy. While mulling (dreading) over the Daring Baker monthly Challenge, I tackled the Retro Recipe Challenge #10 and the Novel Food Challenge #2. Both required using a book as the source of the recipe used.

Growing up in Québec, my early literary influences were naturally French. However, in the mid 1970’s, thanks to a French television series, this influence unexpectedly did a sharp 180 to the west of the English Channel into the Victorian foggy world of Baker Street. Arsène Lupin was a gentleman thief and womanizer plying his trade in late 1890’s, early 1990’s Paris. The literary creation of Maurice Leblanc, Lupin was a Gallic Robin Hood, doing good, on the wrong side of the law, usually with a very good looking woman on his arm. Portrayed by Georges Descrières, he was the consumate debonnair gentleman, drinking champagne, stealing jewellery and other priceless baubles while continuously evading the police (Inspecteur Ganimard, in particular). It wouldn’t be long before this character crossed swords with his English “counterpart” (1906). Following Arthur Conan Doyle’s protest of Leblanc using the Sherlock Holmes name, the author changed it to “Herlock Sholmes” for the detectives appearance in “The Adventures of Arsène Lupin and Herlock Sholmes” and “L’Aiguille creuse” (”The Hollow Needle”).

I became intrigued by the reed-thin detective from London and picked up one of the stories at my local library. Before long I had fallen in love with Conan Doyle’s writing and the Victorian world of gas lights, shady characters, hansom cabs, Inspector Lestrade, Mrs Hudson, the Baker Street Irregulars, Dr. Watson and, of course, the quirky and brilliant detective himself. It was a sad day when I realized I had just read the last of the original stories of The Cannon. The Granada series starring Jeremy Brett brought this world to life beautifully.

So, when I came across these two challenges, the source to turn to was pretty obvious. I had come across a collection of recipes inspired from the stories. Dining with Sherlock Holmes: A Baker Street cookbook, by Julia Carlson Rosenblatt and Frederic H. Sonnenschmidt, first published in 1978 by Thames and Hudson,…

“…was conceived when more than a hundred Holmes enthusiasts enjoyed a grand Sherlockian repast in Hyde Park, New York in 1973… every recipe in the book has its canonical raison d’être.”

I picked up this book in the early 1980’s. Flipping through it, I found a sweet recipe titled: Mrs. Hudson’s Biscuits. This is the one I chose for these challenges. I’m not sure what the origins are, if it actually pre-dates 1978, but it sure turned out really nice biscuits. Light and not too sweet, with the refreshing tang of lemon. They would be “spot on” with a nice cuppa’, sitting beside a blazing fireplace, listening to the strains of Holmes’ violin, as he ponders his latest case.

Mrs. Hudson’s Biscuits

125 g. butter
125 g icing sugar
2 tsp vanilla sugar or 2 tsp sugar with 2-3 drops of vanilla extract
1 egg
1 pinch of salt
juice and grated peel of 1/2 lemon
125 g. flour
125 g. cornflour
1 knife tip baking powder
butter to grease pan

Glaze
100 g. icing sugar
2 tbsps lemon juice

Whip the butter until it is fluffy, then slowly add the icing sugar;
Add the vanilla sugar, egg, salt, lemon juice and peel;
Add the flour, baking powder and cornflour slowly and mix well;
Grease a baking tray with butter;
Fill a pastry bag with the dough and press small biscuits onto the baking tray;
Bake in a preheated 400F oven for 10-15 minutes
Make the glaze by mixing the icing sugar and lemon juice. Brush biscuits with it, and let it dry.
Makes about 70 biscuits.

As reported earlier on this blog, Monday November 26th was International Onion Day. Zorra, from 1Xumrühren bitte invited food bloggers to join her on this day by cooking a dish featuring this every day staple. I took her up on it and decided to make onion rings, but not the common heavily-battered ones. My favorite onion rings are the one found at the ribs restaurant chain, Tony Roma’s. I first came across this chain in Florida, then discovered they had a restaurant here in Vancouver. That is, until they closed it last year.

Tony Roma’s onion rings come in a loaf, served with their signature BBQ sauce. A look around the web unearthed a recipe very much the replica. I found out the key ingredient to these rings was pancake mix! Also, these rings are not just fried, but baked as well. I followed the recipe and pretty much came out with my own loaf of this classic side dish. I used President’s Choice Smokin’ Habanero Barbecue Sauce on the side. Hum…hum…Another keepsake for my recipe chest. Thanks for the challenge, Zorra!

The Happy Sorceress allowed me to sneak in at the last minute. I received an email from her on Monday telling me that I had made to the party. I wasn’t sure what format this party was to take, but see for yourselves here. It’s a great concept, and I look forward to next month’s party. As an insider, I got an advanced notice as to the theme. Stay tuned for the results…

(the Lemon Ginger martini)

Checking up on the latest posts on the DB website, I found out that Monday November 26th is International Onion Day. What better way to celebrate this staple of cooking than with a cooking challenge. Onion lovers and enthusiasts are encouraged to cook a dish featuring onions on that day and blogging about it the next day. Details of the event can be found here. Thanks to Kochtopf for the heads-up!

(Image: Wikipedia Creative Commons. Courtesy of Fir0002)

(My recipe for International Onion Day - Tony Roma’s Onion Rings)

My first challenge as a Daring Baker was a take-off on my favorite cake and donut: Boston Cream Pie. I was a little surprised, I confess, at how complex the recipe first read. I had never done a chiffon cake before, and although I had made custard in the past, I had never done it with nine egg yolks!

Nonetheless, on a day off from work, I got everything ready and followed the directions. The orange chiffon cake came out really nice. Boy, that stuff is easy to eat…it’s so light. The custard didn’t turn out as well, though. I may have undercooked it, or the “heavy whipping cream”, the recipe called for, was not heavy enough. Still, all was not lost. It turned into a very nice, and slightly citrusy, ice cream.

I really enjoyed this challenge and can’t wait to see what’s in store for November.

For some history on Daring Bakers, please click over to Andrea’s article on this wonderful community. Andrea’s own blog can be found at Andrea’s Recipes.

Hallowe’en may conjure up thoughts of candies and cookies, but after doing three cooking challenges in a row involving sweets, I needed a break. Luckily the Weekend Cookbook Challenge #21, hosted by mlb of Je mange la ville blog this month, was pretty liberal in how we tie our recipe to Hallowe’en.

After flipping through countless pumpkin recipes, most involving breads or muffins, I finally found something interesting in The Whole Foods Market Cookbook: Toasted Pepita Dip. It had some of my favorite ingredients, namely, jalapeños, cilantro, cayenne, cumin and lime. A pleasant surprise with this recipe was how low in fat pepitas are compared to other seeds and nuts (eg: 1/3 cup: sunflower seeds: : 24 g. fat; almonds: 24 g. fat; cashews: 21 g. fat; pepitas: 4 g. fat. from Whole Foods Market website)

The results were a nice, spicy, crunchy and refreshing dip. A nice change from the usual cream cheese (though there is some sour cream here) and artichoke, crab or spinach dips. Another keeper. Thanks for the challenge MLB!