The Culinary Curio

Update: Site Transition

2011-04-26T13:36:00.000-07:00

This blog will be moving to a Wordpress format soon.

It's currently in progress of being set up and moved over.

My site will also have a new title, The Culinary Curio, as well as a new layout and its own domain! :)

Stay tuned...

Savory Explorations 1: Edamame Hummus

2011-03-29T01:17:00.000-07:00

First, I have to say that I'm one of those people who goes totally dumbmus over hummus.

It's something I can eat everyday with just about anything - vegetables, breads, meats, soups, salads, even by itself!

So whenever I get a chance to have some really good hummus, as you have to choose wisely as they aren't all made the same, I am always in for a savory treat.

Since I've been on a detox eating plan for the past week, I've been trying out all sorts of recipes and adding them into my culinary book of shadows. One of those random ideas popped into mind while I was munching on some lightly salted and warm edamame for a protein snack. I decided to not only make my own hummus at home for the first time, but to take my love for edamame and make...wait for it...

Edamame hummus! *cue in falling balloons and exploding confetti*

Hummus is traditionally made with chickpeas (or garbanzo) beans. But you can make hummus from some other legumes. Even lentils and red beans! Get as creative as you want with legume substitutions. They each will make for a distinctive-tasting, differently-colored hummus.

Living Tree Community Foods Tahini

Hummus is a Middle Eastern dip that is traditionally made with tahini (a sesame seed paste or butter), pureed chickpeas, garlic, lemon juice, salt, and olive oil. Those are the basic ingredients, but many eateries and culures put their own spin on it by adding in other ingredients or leaving out certain ingredients altogether.

For example, you can make a tahini-based hummus, a roasted garlic-based hummus, a cilantro/parsley-based hummus, a spicy hummus (roasted peppers or lots of cayenne), a yogurt-based hummus or a hummus that uses butter rather than olive oil. I've had many varieties of hummus and like them all, but I tend to prefer hummus with a good roasted garlic and tahini taste. I also love the flavor of olive oil (premium extra virgin olive oil). Additionally, you can substitute toasted sesame oil for tahini.

Edamame, which is a dish or snack of young soybeans encapsulated in pods (similar to pea pods) are a wonderful replacement for chickpeas in hummus. They are naturally rich and buttery in flavor, a great source of protein, and extremely healthy. You'll often see them served in Japanese restaurants, as an appetizer or entrée, with miso soup before a main course.

I pretty much winged this recipe based on what a traditional tahini has and according to my personal tastes.

Organic, shelled edamame

I purchased some organic, shelled edamame from Whole Foods Market (meaning without pods). These are precooked but they are frozen for freshness. You just need to boil them in water to thaw them.

I made a note of all of the ingredients going into my edamame hummus aside from the obvious (the edamame soybeans):

Tahini (between 1/8 - 1/4 cup; it's up to you, taste as you go)
Water (loosely 1/4 cup)
Lemon juice (1 lemon's worth)
Olive oil (3-4 tablespoons)
Cumin seeds (1 teaspoon)
Green onions (1/4 cup; I really like onions)
Cayenne pepper (a dash to sprinkle on top when the hummus is done)
Black sesame seeds (sprinkled liberally on top when the hummus is done)
Parsley (Italian) (1.5 tablespoons; you can also use cilantro)
Garam masala (half teaspoon)
Fennel seeds (1 teaspoon; I highly enjoy the flavor of these)
Sea salt (to taste)
Garlic (2-4 cloves; or to your taste)

Several of the ingredients I used in my hummus

Make sure you have all of your ingredients gathered around for ready-to-go access, and chop up the necessary ingredients.

Start off by pouring in 3 to 3.5 cups of water in a medium pot. Bring the water to a boil.

Drained edamame soybeans

When the water is boiling, add 1.5 cups to 2 cups of the frozen, shelled edamame. Let these boil for about 4-5 minutes, stirring them occasionally until tender and hot but NOT mushy. Taste one to test when 4-5 minutes has passed.

Take them off the stove and drain the water out.

Ready to process

Place the tender but firm edamame soybeans into a food processor along with the tahini, garlic, water, lemon juice, olive oil, cumin seeds, green onions, parsley, garam masala, fennel seeds (you can choose to add them now or later) and sea salt.

Pulse and blend until the mixture is very smooth. You can choose to have a more rustic edamame (textural) if you want, but I prefer it relatively smooth.

Smooth edamame hummus

Taste the hummus once you are done and decide whether or not you want to add more spices or salt...or anything else. It's up to you, really. Explore!

Take some vegetables of your choice (I chose organic baby carrots, celery, and red bell pepper) and cut and slice them up as necessary so that you can dip these into the hummus for a complete snack. I left the baby carrots as is, I deseeded and cut the red bell peppers into strips, and I cut and neatly sectioned the celery into small sticks.

I unplugged my food processor and poured and scraped out my hummus into a bowl and swirled it around to my liking. Then I drizzled in some more extra virgin olive oil into the crevices of the dip and sprinkled in my cayenne pepper, black sesame seeds, and a small pinch more of sea salt.

You can even add sprouted seeds (which I just discovered and am now immensely enjoying). Sprouted sesame seeds are absolutely yummy and go well on top of hummus, among many other things...

This dish made for a hearty lunch, and my adventure in making hummus at home was a successful and enjoyable one. I've since prepared this several more times and have experimented with other herbs and spices. I'd love to try red or black lentils next time!

What is your favorite kind of hummus? And what do you like in your hummus?

Dextox Journey: Pico de Gallo, Old World Pilaf, and Veggie Stir-Fry

2011-03-23T14:37:00.000-07:00

Pico de gallo, old world pilaf, and veggie stir-fry

This was day 2 of my detox, clean-eating journey. I wanted my dinner to be very filling, hearty, tasty, and nutritional, and I achieved established all those results!

I also knew I had to share what I prepared and ate for dinner with you guys.

So, what did I have for dinner? Well, let's take a look below:

1. Pico de Gallo - Organic lime juice from one lime, diced jalapeno pepper, cilantro, tomatoes, green onions, clove of garlic, white onions, sea salt, and cayenne pepper.

Did you know?: You can also use other ingredients such as mango, bell peppers, celery and so on. The basics of a pico de gallo are the peppers, tomatoes, cilantro, lime juice and onions. You can put your own spin on pico de gallo according to your tastes and your level of desire to explore with flavor. White onions can be replaced with red onions for a sweet taste, too. I adore onions, so as you can see I added both white and green onions.

2. Old World Pilaf - a mix of red rice, brown rice, black rice., red lentils, yellow lentils, black eyed peas and green lentils all cooked with red peppers, garlic, celery, and white onions. No salt needed.

Did you know?: Cooking lentils or beans with salt toughens them. If salt is added, it is best to add it after the beans or lentils are cooked.

3. Indian-spiced Vegetable Stir-fry - a bit of unsweetened, organic coconut milk, extra virgin olive oil, garam masala, sea salt, fennel seeds, eggplant, zucchini, 2 cloves of garlic, green onions, red bell peppers, baby bella mushrooms and celery

Inside info: I love smashing up garlic with the back of a wide knife or spatula to get to the cloves. So fun! Also, although a really high-quality garlic powder blend can make food delicious and is great to have in your spice collection, you simply can't compare it to the grand and lively taste of fresh, minced garlic cloves.

Everything in these three components was organic except for the jalapeno pepper. I couldn't find any organic jalapenos. Their season is in warmer periods (spring and summer), so I am not sure why it was rather difficult to track down some organic varieties, but I am more than fine with what I bought.

Pico de gallo

To make the pico de gallo, I chopped and diced up all of my aforementioned herbs and vegetables, sprinkled in my spices and fresh lime juice, and mixed well. It was as simple as that. Pico de gallo is very easy to make (and extremely healthy -- perfect for those who enjoy eating raw vegan foods), so one should not have any reason for going out and buying a pre-made supply of it. You can make a big quantity of it ahead of time and store it in the fridge for later use. It can be eaten with a large array of foods. I also enjoy it alone, sometimes. Think of it is as a sort of "ketchup," regarding it's wide appeal and culinary applications.

Grain and Legume Combination

I was able to get a lot of different organic grains and legumes from Whole Foods Market's. Whole Foods has a spectacular inventory of these ingredients in their bulk section, so there's lots to choose from. It's not often I come across black rice. It's got quite the distinctive taste, but it's nutty and flavorsome. I get excited about seeking out different rice varieties. There is so much to explore! So if you've never eaten anything beyond your everyday plain white rice, you are completely missing out!

The rices, beans, and lentils were placed in a medium pot and covered well with water, enough to where I knew the mix would not dry out but also not be mushy from way too much water left over after absorption. I left the mix without powdered spices or salt. As I mentioned above, salt toughens legumes when it is boiled with them. In order to add more flavor, I chopped up red bell pepper, white onion, a couple of cloves of garlic, and some celery, and placed it in the water with the rice, beans, and lentils.

Cooked old world pilaf

Once the old world pilaf was brought to a boil, I turned down the heat, placed a lid on the pot, and let the mixture cook for 25-30 minutes. Once that time was up, I completely cut the heat, kept the lid on, and let the hearty combination sit for 10 minutes to further cook in its steam.

Keep in mind that brown, black, and red rices will have a chewier texture and more visceral mouth feel than plain white rice has, which is one of the qualities I enjoy about eating them.

Vegetable Stir-fry

The vegetable stir-fry was also very facile. It was simply a matter of chopping up all of my selected vegetables, adding the garam masala, salt, and fennel seeds, heating up a pan with extra virgin olive oil, and placing everything in the pan.

As the vegetables cooked for a bit, I poured in some organic, unsweetened coconut milk. Not a lot, just enough to lightly coat the vegetables and stir it further in.

I love anything coconut. Coconut milk is also good for use in smoothies, vegetable soups, and fresh juice blends. It's a proper substitute for using dairy-based cream or dairy milk in certain recipes.

I cooked the vegetables until they were tender and still retained some of some of their crunch and texture. In fact, everything in the skillet could have been eaten raw, but I couldn't resist preparing a succulent stir-fry.

This meal, overall, was so fulfilling. I enjoyed every bit of it and went back for more of everything with food left over for tomorrow's lunch! With these sorts of recipes, you can eat a good amount and not be concerned about consuming too many calories (if that's what you're worried about). This meal was packed with tons of nutrients and had very little fat.

This also shows that if you wanted to become vegetarian or even vegan, you can do it and know that delectable meals and foods are quite easy to prepare. There's a lot of misinformation out there about vegetarian, and especially vegan eating. A lot of people assume there's not much to eat and choose from and that the food tastes unpleasant. That's simply not true. Vegetarian and vegan eating requires that you become far more intimate and educated about your health and food. You need to research properly, understand more about nutrients, and it's an excellent push to explore all sorts of ingredients, dishes, and ways to prepare foods that you probably never tried. As a fellow food explorer, that's never a bad thing.

I can't say that I'd ever see myself becoming exclusively vegan, although the idea intrigues me, because I enjoy eating poultry, dairy, and seafood once in awhile, but I love incorporating vegan eating into my diet.

Many vegan foods are also perfect for my detox eating regimen. The body digests and metabolizes these foods without a lot of strain and effort. That's got to feel better at the end of the day. I can already feel a difference and I am on day 3 of my detox journey. :)

If you've got any tips, advice or comments about vegetarian/vegan, raw food eating, or detox "dieting" in general, please feel free to share your thoughts! I'd love to hear!

Detox Journey - Clean Eating

2011-03-22T03:26:00.000-07:00

Today is my first day of detox eating or clean eating. I've been stewing over doing this for quite a while and finally took the plunge.

Why did I decide to put myself on a detox eating plan?

Well, I've been enjoying so many decadent and rich foods, lately, and I'd like to flush my body out by eating holistically. I'd simply like to become healthier inside and out.. I've been doing some research for the last several weeks to make sure that I know what I'm doing and what I'd like to do, specifically.

Although "diet" would be an appropriate word to use here, I hate using it because society has bastardized and corrupted the word. When most people think of the word "diet," they immediately start to think about weight-loss obsession, competitive social vanity, keeping up with the Joneses, constantly weighing on scales, starving oneself, madly counting calories, and the like - basically a series and complex of unhealthy and counter-intuitive behavior.

That's not what I want to do embark upon or nurture, at all. I simply need to restart my system and get back into a healthy way of eating with regular activity, so I can establish balance. Desserts and my usual fare of savory treats and delights certainly will not be permanently abandoned, but for the time being I am putting those indulges on hold.

Inside Info: I have a backlog of dessert recipes (as well as savory) I'll be posting, however. So look for those.

Now about a detox diet; when people think of detox, they normally associate that word with alcohol and drug addiction recovery, but detox can also refer to the way one approaches their diet in hopes of maximizing their health and well-being. A detox diet (or eating plan) cleanses and revitalizes the body...and mind.

There are all sorts of detox eating plans out there (Master Cleanse, raw food, Clean Diet, Diuretic Diet, Eat Stop Eat, Quantum Wellness and the list goes on), but I wanted to construct my own. I also didn't want to do anything gimmicky. I wanted it to be something I could follow organically through knowledge-seeking and a drive to simply take care of myself.

My detox eating plan looks pretty vegan, for the most part.

My rules are as follows:

A.

No dairy (eggs, butter, milk, cream, and the like)

No meat

No caffeine and alcohol (although red wine-based vinaigrette salad dressings are allowed)

No refined sugars, no added sugars or refined foods

No wheat/gluten

No preservatives (if I can help it)

B.

Lots of organic fruits and vegetables prepared in a number of creative and tasty ways (pressed juices, salads, hearty soups, stir-frys, steamed dishes, raw, and so on)

Organic legumes cooked in different ways (beans of various kinds, lentils, peas, etc.)

Whole grain rices (black, brown, etc.)

Nut and drupe milks (coconut milk, almond milk, cashew milk, etc.)

Lots of water (as usual) and naturally decaffeinated herbal teas

Frequent meals and snacking (3-4 a day)

Healthy and safe supplements ("Green" blends and cleansing, antioxidants nutrients)

Organic nuts and seeds (unsalted, but can be toasted beforehand or through my own effort)

I will also plan each day's eating in advance, not anally, but loosely. With this way of eating, I have to plan so that getting in 3-4 meals a day is easier and convenient.

This first week I'll spend concentrating on establishing this rhythm and the second week is when I bring back regular physical activity. I don't plan to do really hardcore or excessively strenuous exercise at this stage, but I do plan to get adequate sessions of physical activity in (at least 30-40 minutes). Again, I am trying to be as organic as I can. But I aim to get in 3-4 days of good physical activity a week (or more if I simply and organically feel up to it).

I have also banished scale-weighing and measurement-taking. I find these activities make me neurotic, and in this society, we've come to define ourselves by numbers far too much (age, weight, income, etc.). We've abandoned intuition and instinct. This is why the scale can decide what kind of day we'll be having as soon as we step onto it. That should never be the case. It's just a number (save for situations where people with serious or debilitating illnesses, that cause weight loss, need to have their weight monitored).

What we should pay attention to is how we feel and how we look with the aid of our own eyes and natural assessment.

I spent about two and a half hours at Whole Foods Market, today. Maybe more time than that as I kind of lost track but realized it was night once I stepped outside with my grocery bags. LOL Yes, that was a long while to stay in there, not only did I need to look around and carefully select, but I've always loved their stores and it's a pleasure to look around and figure out what I'll place in my shopping cart. It was even more intriguing to shop with this eating plan in mind. I made sure that nearly all of my items were organic and I had to become even more acquainted with label-reading than I usually am. Whole Foods' produce inventory is at least 65% organic and I think nearly everything else is at least locally grown and cultivated. I find that impressive.

I also find it strange and illogical...

Produce (and other items) should be organic by default. It shouldn't be this special category that we seek out. In fact, I'll even say that organic production should be mandatory law.

Anyway, as a result of shopping heavily organic, I spent quite the penny in there.

I also picked up some great supplements. I purchased:

ChlorOxygen Chlorophyll Concentrate

Vibrant Health: Green Vibrance

No placebo here, that's for sure. I felt a surge of energy not long after I took these supplements with plain water and/or with coconut water. It was that kind of energy surge that you get once a workout starts or the energetic sensation you might feel right after vigorous exercise. You sweat a bit more, feel slightly more hyper and refreshed, your pores feel more open, and you have a desire to move. I felt that about 15-20 minutes after taking both of these. So, although this is the first day, I do recommend trying these out and seeing for yourself. I made some pretty good choices, here.

I will share some recipes with you guys as I journey through this detox path. It is temporary, but I'm off to a very productive and exciting start and felt like my food blog was a great place to share my experiences since it's still all about the exploration of food!

The Exploration of Food and Dietary Habits

2011-02-25T18:06:00.000-08:00

A Medley of Nuts & Seeds - Photo by MeetaK

For the sake of creativity, an avid interest in food and drink, and knowledge and the sake of constantly seeking new ways to health and balance, I've tried all sorts of dietary regimens and foods, reasonably speaking.

No...still no exploring into an insect diet. Can't quite get myself to that realm of eating. But I hear that if one is able to push aside their culturally-conditioned aversion to eating bugs, that the fare can be quite tasty...and crunchy. LOL

At this this point, I just want to be healthy and holistic, so I'm not too keen on exclusivity in dietary habits anymore. I just like exploring good foods and whole and fresh ingredients. Nature provides us with so many delights that I don't understand how anyone can radically exclude most things, let alone be bored in their diets, unless there are allergies, health issues, and enzyme deficiencies to take into consideration..

If I like to eat lots of rice and consider it beyond thrilling to check out all sorts of rice varieties in local markets, why should I cut out eating rice because it's either a high complex carb or it requires boiling and cooking? Restrictions for the sake of restrictions aren't my thing and now I know that through much trial and error. This doesn't mean I can't respect religious and/or socio-political purposes behind certain dietary observations.

Inside Info: I use the word diet here as a way to simply refer to a -way- of eating. I am not using "diet" to specifically mean a way to control weight and body fat (example: "I am going on a diet"). A particular diet and set of habits can provide weight loss for someone, being the sole purpose and intent, but again I am just using diet to mean eating regimen and habits.

I used to be vegetarian for several years and then I became what is called a "pescetarian," someone who eats vegetarian but includes fish in their diet.

I just couldn't give up seafood! Especially sushi. I love the stuff. And it's good for you.

I no longer classify myself as a vegetarian, although I tend to naturally enjoy and eat far more grains, fruits, and vegetables over meats. But several times I have ventured into low-carb dieting in the past, which encouraged me to consume far more meat in my diet.

Photo by West of Persia

Lately, I find myself very intrigued by raw food eating and dieting. I've heard about raw food eating for some time but never really researched much about it. I assumed it was a diet exclusively of raw and fresh vegetables, nuts, and fruits. Well that is if you are a vegan/vegetarian raw foodist, as some raw foodists can and do eat meat, just fresh, uncooked meat such as sashimi or ceviche (seafood "cooked"/denatured and preserved naturally by citrus acids rather than heat).

I am definitely interested in learning more about raw food dieting. Because I don't like to be so exclusive when I eat, I don't see myself being a dedicated raw-foodist. But I'd like to enrich my diet with raw food eating habits and delicious raw food recipes, especailly for times where I'd love to naturally detox and rejuvenate my body and mind. I mean who can't use more fresh, raw, and whole foods in their diet? We all can.

I am also ready to start using my juicer more often. In fact, I consider a goof juicer a must-have in a kitchen. It's a wonderful kitchen toy and a worthwhile investment.

The amateur naturopath in me is also interested in exploring diets and foods because I find anything relating to the medicinal, nutritional, and functional properties of food to be captivating. I always want to research, learn about, read about, and experiment with all sorts of ingredients to open up my mind further on different and new ways of eating. I want to learn about foods and ingredients I am not only familiar with but stuff I've never tried or heard about.

I feel that eating should be fun and creative along with nutritive. We should delight in what bring to the table, shop for, and request in our favorite eateries. We should take more pleasures in preparing foods from scratch and respecting what the earth provides for us. We should be far more aware of how our foods are prepared and what goes into our bodies.

We should become more intuitive and mindful eaters. Eating with all of the senses.

Exploration leads to culinary adventure and enlightenment.

What sorts of foods and new ways of eating have you always wanted to try?
What kinds of foods do you like to eat the most?
What sorts of dietary ventures have you had negative experiences with?
Have you tried a raw food diet or are you a raw foodist? What are your experiences like? What would you like to share?

Over the Top About Bibimbap

2011-01-30T14:40:00.000-08:00

Bibimbap in Stone Pot - Photo by You Know Where You Are

Bibimbap! Bibimbap!! Bibimbap!!!

Such a fun word to say...even if you don't know how to say it!

How is it pronounced? Well from local Koreans, I've heard it pronounced as [pee-beem-bahp]. Sometimes the first syllable will be pronounced with a "b" sound, but I've been told that the latter pronunciation is proper.

So, what is bibimbap?

Traditional - Photo by Say Kimchi News

Bibimbap is one of my favorite Asian dishes. I could eat it every day. The dish is Korean and its name means “mixed meal.” It’s very hearty, healthy, filling, and tasty - a complete meal fixed with complex carbs and protein through a serving of various vegetables and select meats. The dish is also perfect to customize for vegetarians and vegans.

As far as some of the ingredients used, bibimbap can be prepared in a number of ways due to its diversity. It’s traditionally served in a hot stone pot, called a dolsot, in which the rice is cooked. The rice is considered the base of the dish and characteristically becomes crispy at the bottom of the dolsot. It's frequently flavored with sesame seed oil for taste and to help along the scorching of the rice as it cooks along the sides and bottom of the stone pot.

The rice is layered with generous but radially arranged and color-orchestrated helpings of fresh and sometimes seasoned vegetables and a select meat, such as bean sprouts, shiitake mushrooms, minched beef (usually) or slivers of salmon, carrot julienne, kimchi (yum!), and bok choy or spinach.

This vegetable-laden portion of the meal is referred to as namul (without the meat selection). Namul is a Korean term for a dish or serving filled with a variety of seasoned vegetables. It can be served on its own or as an accompaniment to or inclusion in a meal, such as bibimbap.

Bibimbap is fabulously topped with a fried egg. The egg can be fried or it can be raw or semi-cooked. When the dish is mixed together, the runny and slightly gelled yolk from a semi-cooked or raw egg provides a divine taste, although it might sound weird to some.

Gochujang - photo by Korean Food

A red pepper paste referred to as gochujang is usually added to the dish or served on the side in a small condiment vessel. Gochujang has a spicy and slightly sweet flavor that compliments bibimbap very well. It is meant to be mixed in with the rest of the ingredients, as bibimbap is eaten with a spoon rather with chopsticks or a fork.

Some people love to sprinkle sesame seeds, dried seaweed flakes or even dried bonito flakes over the bibimbap for added texture and flavor.

You can find bibimbap on the menu in most Korean restaurants. If you haven't had it, you should definitely give it a try! Korean food is delicious!

Spicy BBQ Chicken Bibimbap - Photo by Closet Cooking

I personally would love to try my hand at making this dish at home. It seems rather easy, requiring the freshest of ingredients.

I don't own any dolsots (stone bowls), but I am sure I could find such serving pots at local Korean grocery stores or ethnic food supply shops. Or bibimbap can made and served in a basic ceramic bowl such as the one shown in the above photo.

The World According to...Buttercream

2011-01-22T20:24:00.000-08:00

Classic buttercream icing

I dream, you dream, we all dream about buttercream!

I simply can't get enough of this stuff...on cakes, cupcakes, pettis fours, cookies, you name it, I love it!

This is the real creamy crack.

What can I say? Buttercream leads to sugar bliss! And any fan of buttercream knows they can have it in so many ways. That's THE icing on the cake!

What is buttercream, really? And what self-proclaimed sugar god or goddess decides what real buttercream is?

My macarons w/ hazelnut butter buttercream

I mean, who am I kidding here? A great deal of writing can be done on just this subject alone. Enough to compose a small book! Now only if the pages were made out of cake, that would be something truly special and most fitting!

Hmmm, well historically boiled icings, which were some of the first icings, were used on yeast cakes. Yeast cakes were popular before the introduction of baking powder. Boiled icings were similar to today's royal icing and they consisted mainly of sugar and egg whites boiled together with added flavorings. The icings would harden on the cakes and create a sugary, candy-like coating, but around the very early part of the 20th century, buttercream icings began to appear in cake recipes, and over time, many cultures adapted their own versions of buttercream icing for their pastries.

Today, classic buttercream is known to contain a sweet, short, and simple list of ingredients: definitely sugar, almost always butter, possibly eggs, and sometimes milk or cream.

Various versions of buttercream icing are created by using a combination of these ingredients in a multitude of ways.

Let's go down a stellar and fascinating list, shall we?

French Buttercream (aka pâte á bombe): This icing is made by making sugar syrup from boiled sugar and water and beating it into egg yolks until the mixture is very cooled, airy and creamy. Butter and any flavor extracts or oils are added to the creamed yolk batter to make the final result.
German Buttercream (pastry cream-based) : This icing base uses pastry cream (same filling used for choux pastry desserts such as profiteroles, eclairs, and cream puffs) or other custards. Butter is beaten into the pastry cream along with any additional flavors to create the icing. Extra sugar can be added to make the icing even sweeter.
Russian Buttercream: This is also a custard or pastry cream-based icing fused with soft butter, however it is further thickened with cornstarch or flour.
Roux Buttercream (aka Heirloom Icing): This is a flour-based buttercream icing. It is made by cooking milk and flour together (roux) and then cooling the roux. A creamed combination of sugar and butter are then added to the roux to make a roux buttercream.
French Meringue Buttercream: This is a meringue-based icing. Meringues icings are icings that incorporate egg whites. This icing is traditionally made by whipping egg whites, powdered sugar, and cream of tartar together to form a creamy meringue base. Butter and flavors are then beaten in to finalize the recipe. Some recipes call for the use of whole eggs.
Italian Meringue Buttercream: Italian meringue buttercream is made by adding hot sugar syrup to beaten egg whites. The sugar syrup's heat cooks the egg whites, and the mixture is then beaten until it cools down to 100 degrees (Fahrenheit). Butter is then added for completion.
Swiss Meringue Buttercream: Swiss meringue is somewhat similar to Italian meringue, however, sugar (can be brown or white sugar) is cooked with egg whites on a double boiler (bain marie). The mixture is taken off the stove and whipped into stiff peaks. Butter and other flavors are then added to create a Swiss meringue buttercream.
American Buttercream: American buttercream is also called classic or decorator's buttercream. It is one of the longest-lasting buttercreams, especially if shortening or margarine is used over butter. It's also the simplest to make and no cooking of the ingredients is required. It's made by mixing together butter and powdered sugar. Milk is often added to further cream the base, and buttermilk, cream, nut milks, coconut milk can be substitutes. Cornstarch is sometimes used to further stabilize the icing and in some cases, small amounts of whole eggs, egg yolks or egg whites are used to compliment the texture and taste. Some people still argue that American buttercream made with margarine, shortening or lard is not real buttercream.
Buttercream Fondant (also called Rolled Buttercream): This icing is great for topping cookies and for creating decorations on top of cakes, as the icing can be shaped and cut with cookie cutters. It is sometimes also used to cover cakes as a tastier, albeit shinier, alternative to traditional fondant. It is made by combining a very large amount of powdered sugar with vegetable shortening, glucose or corn syrup, and any flavors, to create an "icing dough,"which can be molded and kneaded.
Fruit-based Buttercream: This buttercreams is similar to classic or American buttercream and is sometimes best used as filling or spreads. The icing base is structured around a fruit juice, jam, puree, and the like. Fruit juice, butter, powdered sugar are creamed together to create a fruit buttercream with a strong fruit flavor. Jams, purees, and spreads give fruit buttercreams a fabulous texture. These are especially great used as filling in cake rolls.

Creamy Vanilla French Buttercream Icing
1 cup water
1 cup granulated sugar
4 egg yolks
1 whole egg
1/2 cup butter, cubed and cold (4 oz. / 1 stick)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract or vanilla bean paste

In a saucepan, pour in 1 cup of water and 1 cup of granulated sugar and bring to a boil for about 10-15 minutes or until sugar syrup is reduced by half and thickens.

Turn off heat for sugar syrup and set aside.

In a large bowl with a stand or hand mixer, beat 4 egg yolks until they are blended well. Beat on medium speed.

Add in 1 whole egg and continue to beat the eggs.

Take the hot sugar syrup in the saucepan and slowly pour it into the eggs as they are beaten. Beat approximately 10 minutes until the eggs and syrup mixture is cooled, creamy, and light.

Add in 1/2 cup of cubed, cold butter and continue to beat the buttercream into smoothness.

Include 1 tsp. of vanilla extract or vanilla bean paste and blend into the buttercream icing.

Use right away for cake, macarons, or cupcake icing or fillings. Store icing in the fridge if used for later. Also great for layers in sponge cake parfaits or trifles.

Photo of buttercream icing from Baking Bits & Bobs

As you can see, the world of buttercream has many citizens, and although what I listed covers most types of buttercreams, there are still more varieties out there to explore.

I, for one, am glad that buttercream fans have so many styles to choose from. Every person will come to have their favorite by trying different ones.

So, buttercream addicts, what's your favorite kind of buttercream?

Do you know of any other buttercreams that I haven't listened? I'd love to know!

7 Dessert Trends for 2011

2011-01-14T18:35:00.000-08:00

Allyson N. Jason ©

What will fall out of dessert heaven for 2011?

The is the hot topic right now.

I have my own predictions about what dessert trends will develop this year, and although some of these predictions might turn out to be wrong, it's still very fun to play Prediction Faery.

Let's take out my large, candy-colored, crystal, jawbreaker globe and talk about the sweetness of the near future.

Doughnuts from Doughnut Plant

1. Doughnuts - Doughnuts will come back into the fold. They never really left, but cupcakes took over and slapped doughnuts out of the spotlight. The low-carb diet craze that peaked during the early 2000s is also to blame, but that diet trend has long since died down, and sugar and dough addiction have come back in the game, full throttle.

I am specifically thinking of gourmet, artisanal, and wedding doughnuts. We'll probably see doughnuts in many novel shapes such as squares. Doughnut Plant, a stylish and popular doughnut shop in New York is creating a lot of buzz with their delish and large square-shaped doughnuts.

In doughnuts, we'll also see new and innovative glazes and fillings (think of doughnuts that resemble macarons!) and doughnuts that feature original and toothsome flavor profiles.

The doughnut will be redressed and embellished. People will become more creative with these classic treats and rediscover their greatness. Wedding and event planners will have a lot of leverage here in helping to bring back the fame of doughnuts across the nation. For weddings, cake doughnuts will bring more versatility for decoration and flavors.

Dessert Display by Amy Atlas

2. Dessert Tables - I know what you're thinking. Dessert tables are already commanding the scene, you say, but I feel that dessert tables will continue to soar in popularity, and we'll see even more edgy and imaginative concepts blossom.

Dessert table pioneers like Amy Atlas have shown how brilliant these displays can be. Dessert tables are dream vessels for many artists to showcase their professional skills and talents in the culinary and event planning society. They are a gateway for connecting numerous people from different industries with one another.

Desserts tables command the help of event planners, bakers and cake-makers, graphic designers of many stripes (including arts-and-crafters), illustrators, confectioners, food photographers, specialty food ware shop owners, even food writers, and more. So much goes into planning and setting up a dessert table for any event and the level of creativity that can go into constructing them presents endless imagineering possibilities.

photo by Cake Monkey Bakery

3. Bite-size Treats - We'll see more culinary artistry in the realm of bite-size or individual desserts. New bakeries such as Cake Monkey, which is known to specialize in small desserts with packaging that evokes childhood memories, are becoming more pervasive and trendy.

People love having something special made just for them in cute, little, custom, sugary packages.

Not everyone is always ready to buy an entire cake or a pie, so (big inhale) tartlets, macarons, cookies, cake balls, the ongoing fame of cupcakes, little muffins and teacakes, truffles, petits fours, puff pastry miniatures, chocolates, gourmet candies, parfait cups, and many more tiny delights will continue to present colossal appeal for the masses as they explore both old and new bakeshops while looking for their dessert fixes. (exhale).

Photo from Cook Your Dream

4. Artisan Desserts - There will be an increase of popularity in artisan desserts such as ice creams (big time!), gelatos, frozen yogurts and custards, pies, dessert breads (sweet rolls and sticky buns), chocolates, and other candies.

People everywhere are starting to appreciate more quality ingredients in the foods they consume. More artisan dessert shops and bakeries, such as Van Leeuwen Artisan Ice Cream, are opening up across the nation and they're becoming both more affordable and accessible to many large metropolitan locations, which promise bigger target audiences and opportunities for businesses to catch on and grow. The strong growing support of fresh local ingredients chiefly contributes to this growing trend.

I, for one, hope that it's a trend to stay. High quality should never be a fad.

Photo by Cannelle et Vanille

5. Seasonal Sweets - Many assume artisanal is interchangeable with seasonal. Although sometimes both terms go hand in hand, they are different. Therefore, I feel that seasonal desserts deserve mention in their own category.

Artisanal, to me, means handcrafted and made with natural rather than processed ingredients. However, seasonal desserts are made when ncessary ingredients are in season.. This means the ingredients will be at their best in texture and flavor, thus giving desserts a higher quality in taste when they are served. This also means that specific desserts and flavors won't always be available year round and their prices will be cheaper and fresher when they are season.

These days, more bakeries are offering seasonal desserts and customers are more than happy to wait around for their favorites. Customers also enjoy the diversity and intrigue of seasonally-based menus. Menus in such shops are switched up often and seasonal desserts are appreciated even more when they are finally featured again.

I must mention that fruit jams, jellies, spreads, and dessert relishes are becoming popular as seasonal items that are preserved for year-round purchase from small food shops and housemade dessert sellers. Blogs such as Punk Domestics are showcasing just how starchy this trend in preserved seasonal foods is becoming. I could even give canning and preserves a category of its own as a dessert trend prediction, but I'll keep my list of predictions to lucky number 7!

Chocolate fondue at The Melting Pot

6. Fondue Bars and Parlors - Fondue-centric restaurants and dessert bars will pick up in popularity.

I feel that in 2011, more people will have a desire to explore and seek out new dining experiences. Fondue bars and parlors offer patrons the ability to be super tasteers and entertain their palettes with mix-and-match flavor options..

This year is the best time to open up a fondue dessert bar or visit one in your local area, because the distinctive and fun dining style provided in most fondue places is catching on.

Fondue joints are not only known for providing places for people to uniquely socialize, they also provide a do-it-yourself eating experience for customers.

Usually diners in fondue restaurants are expected to cook their own foods at the table, but since we are discussing dessert, diners can expect to serve themselves from an array of fresh slices of fruits, pieces of chocolates, cubes of brioche breads, and various other sweet items such as marshmallows, with an assortment of stimulating dipping sauces. Menus are usually open and they vary from one fondue place to the next.

Popular sauces are caramel, chocolate, butterscotch, marshmallow cream, hot fruit glazes, and warm puddings, custards and creams. In fondue eateries, diners can be as creative and experimental as they wish to be with many possibilities of creating custom flavor combinations. Again, this is a tasteer's fantasy.

It might be hard to find a place in your neck of the woods that specializes in just fondue, but fondue restaurants such as The Melting Pot are giving people a chance to see what the fondue dining experience is all about.

Pie from Four and Twenty Blackbirds Pie Shop

7. Pies and Tarts - We've seen a lot of cupcake, doughnut, and ice cream, frozen yogurt, and gelato shops, but pie shops are becoming the new kids in dessert town.

These are bakeries completely or mostly dedicated to serving pies and tarts -- bakeries such as Four and Twenty Blackbirds Pie shop, located in Brooklyn, New York.

I like to call them "pieries" [PIE-uh-ries] or [PIE - rees]. Don't you just LOVE the way that word sounds? I do!

Some pieries serve pies based on seasonal ingredients, but most up-and-coming pie shops tend to be artisanal. This means that pies are handmade, served with fresh, quality ingredients and customers can either dine in and share a pie or large tart around a table in a gathering or order for take out or special events such as weddings and parties. Event planners are hearing more about weddings that request themed tarts and pies, rather than cake or cupcakes, as the dessert focus.

---

Well, my fellow sugar adventurers, this spells the end of my predictions for 2011 dessert trends. I based on my predictions on intuition, paying attention to what seems popular in the food and dining industry, lately, and on what I feel would be cool to see more of in this promising new year.

So, what do YOU think?

Do you have any dessert trend predictions for the New Year?

If so, do tell!

Baking Adventure 20: Old-fashioned Glazed Buttermilk Doughnuts

2011-01-07T17:11:00.000-08:00

Glazed Buttermilk Doughnuts!

First, I'd like to wish everyone a Happy New Year!

I hope everyone's year is getting off to a good start, as mine surely is.

It's been awhile since I've posted an update to my food blog. A lot has happened since my last entry in early December and I am feeling recharged and rejuvenated for 2011. There are lots of foods I'll be exploring, learning, and sharing, so I hope you guys are ready to continue this journey with me. :)

Although not technically a BAKING adventure, I finally got around to making doughnuts!

I love doughnuts, have always wanted to make them from scratch, and these days, it's hard to find a really good doughnut in most bakeries. Buttermilk doughnuts have always been my favorite amongst the vast assortment of doughnut types.

Doughnuts are as iconic as cupcakes, but the popularity of doughnuts has died down a bit in the last few years. Before the cupcake craze in North America, there was the doughnut craze, thanks to the influence of Krispy Kreme doughnuts and various other doughnut chains. Although Krispy Kreme was established in 1937 and doughnuts have long been enjoyed by so many, widespread and rabid consumption of doughnuts began in the late 1990s and peaked in the early 2000s.

There are a bunch of ways to prepare and make doughnuts, and many cultures have their own spin on doughnut-making techniques and doughnut flavors.

Cake doughnuts and yeast dough doughnuts are the two prominent categories of doughnut types. Cake doughnuts can be fried or baked, but traditionally doughnuts have been fried for the best of taste and texture. I personally enjoy fried doughnuts over baked, and yeast dough doughnuts over specialized cake batter doughnuts (although beignets in the U.S, which are French New Orleans doughnuts, are traditionally made from choux pastry dough like éclairs).

What Do You Know?: Canadians consume the most doughnuts and have the most doughnut shops and bakeries per capita, compared to other regions globally.

Doughnuts can be made with honey, various fruits, custard, and cream fillings, buttermilk, butter, shortening (animal or vegetable), maple syrup, brown sugar, and so on. The list seems endless.

Doughnuts also come in a variety of shapes but the most common and traditional shapes are:

rings (the most classic shape of all, round with a hole in the middle)
twists (think of crullers; ring-shaped doughnuts made from twisted dough)
rectangular bars (these resemble flattened éclairs and are sometimes called Long Johns)
rounded squares (with or without holes)
round, flattened spheres (usually made to inject with different fillings)
knots or bits (usually doughnut holes removed from the middle of ring-shaped doughnuts)

I personally feel that a good old-fashioned glazed doughnut can never go out of style. The taste and texture is classic and this is the first doughnut recipe I decided to try. I plan to go on a "great doughnut expedition" in the next month or so, trying out various recipes to document and compare.

So let's start talking about my adventure in making glazed buttermilk doughnuts.

The first step, of course was gathering all of the ingredients and equipment I needed, including a deep fryer (although using a deep skillet is a great alternative for frying your dough in). The ingredients were rather easy to obtain and you'll most likely find many of them already stashed away in your pantry.

Various things I needed for doughnut-making

In a large bowl, I placed 1 tablespoon of dry active yeast with 1/4 cup of warm water and let the yeast mixture sit for 5 minutes. You'll notice how peculiar the yeast smells as it reacts in the warm water. It's an acquired smell but one I've come to appreciate.

A standard pouch equals about 1 tablespoon of dry yeast (I used Fleischmann's).

After the yeast and water sat for 5 minutes, I added sugar (yeast feeds on sugar so that the dough can expand and rise), buttermilk, salt, some of the flour, baking powder, and melted shortening. I mixed the dough thoroughly, and gradually added more of the flour that remained as needed, until a soft dough formed and the mixture was no longer sticky and very wet to the touch.

I floured a suitable surface and kneaded and rolled out my dough on it a few times until it turned into the consistency similar to pizza though.

You don't want to overwork doughnut dough; you are looking more for a texture that is still somewhat tactile to the touch but that is smooth and pliable enough to handle, shape and cut into easily.

If you're dough sticks too much to the rolling pin or surface you're working on, you have not incorporated enough flour into it. If your dough cracks and crumbles a great deal, is very dry, and doesn't seem to come together well when you roll and knead it, then you've put too much flour.

Created my own "doughnut cutter" using two circle cookie cutters

I finally rolled the dough out to about half an inch. I have a large collection of cookie cutters in various shapes. I used two circle-shaped cookie cutters - one to create the ring of the doughnuts and one for neatly and evenly cutting out doughnut holes or centers.

I could have used the doughnut holes for making fried doughnut bits, but I decided to incorporate them back into the dough each time around to make more doughnuts.

Cutting out doughnuts

Doughnuts resting for a brief rising period

Once all of the doughnuts were cut out, I let them rise for about 45-50 minutes until they were puffier. I prepared my deep fryer by pouring in 2.5 to 3 standard-sized bottles of vegetable oil.

You can use a variety of oils to fry doughnuts in, such as corn, coconut, and peanut oil. Some people fry their doughnuts in shortening, and traditionally doughnuts were fried in animal fat or suet.

I prefer frying my doughnuts in vegetable or coconut oil (coconut oil is far more expensive of course but might give an interesting flavor and texture to the doughnuts).

I heated my deep fryer to 375 degrees Fahrenheit and dropped in 4-5 doughnuts in the fryer basket. Each doughnut took about 2 minutes to cook, one minute per side. I flipped the doughnuts once and aimed for a deep golden brown color and a crisp outer texture.

You have to keep a close watch on these or they'll burn before you know it. Also, doughnuts puff up a great deal when they fry, so they'll be even bigger once they're done.

All of this was so exciting to do and watch. I felt giddy the entire time making them and watching them come to life!

Doughnuts done on both sides

Doughnuts being lifted out of the fryer

My dough produced about 16 doughnuts. As the doughnuts rested on a rack after frying, I prepared the glaze to coat them in.

Most doughnut glazes (including poured fondants) are made from icing sugar (confectioners' sugar) and some form of dairy, usually milk, although cream can be substituted for a richer, thicker, and cloudier glaze.. Bakers can get quite creative with developing all sorts of glaze flavors and styles. I personally have many custom glaze recipes developed for all sorts of desserts so far.

For my first try, my glaze consisted of a mix of whole milk and confectioners' sugar. I worked the glaze into a a smooth, non-lumpy consistency that resembled a dipping sauce. Not too thick and not too thin that it was watery.

My doughnut glaze - simple first time around

A few of the fried buttermilk doughnuts waiting to be dressed with sweet coats of translucent glaze

I dipped each doughnut twice in the glaze. The glaze didn't take long to dry out to a signature flaky texture that complimented the crispy exterior of each doughnut, as you can see in the very first photo in this entry.

The texture on the inside of each doughnut came out beyond wonderful.

Light, airy, and moist with the quintessential taste of a great doughnut.

Since the first time making these doughnuts, I've made them a few more times and I feel I've established the perfect glazed buttermilk doughnut recipe.

I would love to share the finalized and enhanced recipe, but on the other hand, I plan to add doughnuts to my bakery menu very soon and sell them using this recipe (including glazes) that I've perfected.

Let's just say that each time I make these doughnuts, they disappear as quickly as the Cheshire cat, and the wide, delightful, but mischievous characteristic grin that it's known for is instead left on the faces of the eaters.

A Look Into Cupcake Camp LA 2010

2010-12-01T16:26:00.000-08:00

The closeup shot of the Cupcake Camp LA poster!

I finally attended my first local food event. Well not literally, but I mean in an industry-related sense -- an event totally related to food and for dessert lovers of the cupcake stripe.

There are so many food events going on annually but I haven't been able to afford some of them because many are out of state and even out of the country! The long distance of these events raises the financial investment of going where I'd be concerned about not only cost of admission, but hotel stay and airfare pricing. However, I am lucky in that Los Angeles, a food city in its own right, has so much going on food-wise.

Many of you have probably heard of Cupcake Camp, started by Ariel Waldman, Lynn, Marianne Masculino, and Cindy Li. The original and first Cupcake Camp started in San Francisco in 2009 (hard to believe it wasn't that long ago!). Since then, there are over 40 different locations that host Cupcake Camp events annually. Some of those hosting locations are even beyond North America.

Los Angeles finally had its first Cupcake Camp, produced by Bakespace.com and spearheaded by Babette Pepaj. I decided I was going to attend and I bought a VIP ticket through a club discount. I figured why not buy the best admission to get in and show my support for the sponsors and charities that helped make the event possible since it's charity-driven.

The sponsors and charities at the event were:

Bakespace.com

Scharffen Berger Chocolate Maker

Invisible People

Angel Acres Horse Haven Rescue

American Tortoise Rescue

Wilton

Groupon

HINT (their drinks were served at the second floor bar for free, of course!)

Jelly Belly

The event took place at the Music Box.

It was my first time going there, so I was excited about that, too. Just a few nights before, Blonde Redhead (a band I adore) was playing.

Although I know my way around LA reasonably well in various parts and I'm a native, sometimes I get tripped up with directions if I am looking out for a particular venue. As a result, my drive to the Music Box was kind of an adventure, driving all around West LA, and taking a sightseeing drive toward Hollywood. One I enjoyed and needed.

Anyway, I decided to leave home early to arrive early. I didn't know what kind of crowd I was in for, even though the weather was rainy and gray.

About halfway to the venue, I realized I forgot to buy new batteries for my camera AND I had forgotten my printed out tickets at home. There was no way I wasn't snapping photos for the event. I felt like such a cotton head but I felt assured that perhaps there was an admission list for backup at the entrance (there was).

Once I arrived, I saw that there weren't that many people there, yet.

Even parking was easy. I drove right into the public lot, paid a whopping 10 dollars for parking, and found a spot a bit further back.

This was my view standing in line, although I was originally in the wrong waiting line. The other side was for VIP attendants. The event looked as if it was going to be huge because a few news vans appeared on the scene:

I thought it was cute the way the entrance was decorated, although it wasn't baroque in detail. The cupcake vector illustration for the enlarged event posters was cute, as well as the hanging cupcake piñata (YES, that was an actual piñata shaped like a cupcake. I have no idea if it was ever used or even filled with any sweets.)

The starting of the event ran a little later than scheduled. There were two sessions for the cupcake tastings. The first session was from 12-2pm and the second session was from 3-5pm. I paid for the first session.

Each person was given a certain amount of raffle tickets for their admission ticket, a clear, plastic container or two to collect and hold cupcakes, as well as a special, whimsical-looking plastic bead. The bead was to be given to any attendant's choice of best baker and at the end of the event, each vendor counted their beads to see who won first, second and third place. The raffle tickets given for each admission ticket weren't for any raffles, but for cupcake vendors at tables. A raffle ticket would allow a participate to take a certain amount of cupcake samples. Some tables allowed one cupcake, others allowed several per raffle ticket.

If I had any gripes about the event, it was with the plastic cupcake containers passed out at the entrance. I just didn't think they were substantial enough to hold all of the cupcakes that most people winded up accumulating, and I certainly wasn't going to eat all of the cupcakes I got in one sitting to make room for more (well in a gluttonous fantasy, perhaps). I took home more than 2 dozen cupcakes!

I know next time to bring my own bakery box to the event. I took note that a few people actually did do this.

By way of online photos, I've also seen other cupcake camps either pass these out or recommend that participants bring large bakery boxes. The Cupcake Camp in Montreal did this. In the photos, everyone was walking around with these big white boxes.

I took several shots once I got in.

The Music Box is an awesome-looking venue and the event certainly utilized the space beautifully. Concert stage lights in vivid and electric pinks and purples cast surreal shots of color throughout the entire venue space as the floor was teeming with tons people, Loads of tables full of fragrant and decadent cupcakes of all sorts lined up in rows and columns creating a dessert maze for people to traverse through.

Music was playing and I heard intermittent "squees" of delight and a cacophony of elated conversations coming from the growing crowd of cupcake fans.

It was eye and mouth candy to the max. Definitely some kind of dessert toy land.

Vendors were eager to get you to try their edible wares. I felt like I was at a carnival show full of cupcake kings and queens looking to lure people in to their sugary side shows.

Originally, I had a hard time trying to figure out which table I wanted to visit first. There was so much to take in .

I was quite happy to be "Alice" here.

The first table on the left side of the room, as one entered, was the table hosting the dessert company Cake Pops LA.

This was my first time hearing of Cake Pops LA. Bakerella (blogger and author Angie Dudley) started the popularity of the cake pop concept so I am seeing more bakeshops churn out this idea in ridiculously adorable, tasty, and creative ways.

Most of the vendors were properly prepared for the event, too. Many had their business cards, menus, and discount coupons out on the table. Of course nothing was for sale at this event, since it was nearly an all-you-can-eat cupcake extravaganza, but discount coupons come in handy when you are visiting shops during their normal business hours, so smart businesses were on their toes offering these outright or in little decorate grab bags.

That's a great way to promote and one of many business promotional strategies I paid attention to.

"Cupcake Girl" in their puffy, candy-colored tutu skirts.

Some of the photos I took were taken when the floor was cleared toward the end of the cupcake tasting session. I felt that was a convenient time to get in clearer shots of the vendors who set up for the event.

The place became so crowded that it was difficult to work my way through the floor. I felt like Frogger in traffic. And I was afraid of being bumped into as my cupcake collection grew.

The place became so crowded that it was difficult to work my way through the floor. I felt like Frogger in traffic. And I was afraid of being bumped into as my cupcake collection grew in my two small containers.

I initially had one container, but had to go back and get one more, which was still inadequate.

Toward the very front of the floor, near the stage, I saw that Scharffen Berger had set up a table offering what seemed like unlimited samples of dense, rich, and intense-flavored mini chocolate cupcakes made from their delicious artisan chocolate, and small chocolate squares of semisweet, bittersweet, milk and dark chocolate wrapped in cute pastel-colored labels.

Attendants were encouraged to enter a prize give-away from Scharffen Berger

I took as many business cards as I could from each vendor. I had heard of some of these bakeshops from various sources, many from online contacts and others from random searches.

Some of these bakery owners were almost like local celebrities because they were so well-known in the city and online, and some of them were newer names to the baking business. People gathered around snapping photos of the bakers themselves with fans and admirers or at their tables in poses.

Among the many of the cupcake innovations were many alcohol-themed cupcakes. Some vendors were offering strawberry daiquiri cupcakes, Jack Daniels and coke cupcakes, tequila cupcakes, cupcakes made with beer, cupcakes infused with Baileys Original Irish Cream, and even cupcakes with vodka.

I even came across a cupcake from a table flavored like beignets with a light, creamy-green icing. I offered my plastic bead to that table because those beignet cupcakes were so incredibly good.

Sugar Babies Cupcakery (they sell by truck in LA; food trucks are all the rage, you know!)


Jack and Coke cupcakes (so good!)

The event featured a "bar" full of chocolate and vanilla frosting shots. They were replaced as they were taken, nonstop.

HINT water. No sugar, just water with fruit essence.

Cupcake carousel from Sweet Art cupcakes, including the Baileys Original Irish Cream and nutella cupcakes (YUM!)

Cupcake samples from various vendors, frosting bar, and cute, little dessert books that were passed out

Harry Potter themed table from, Parties & Cupcakes, the vendor that got my bead for their sensational beignet cupcakes seen right at the forefront.

Cupcakes loaded with caramel candy as well sweet, cream cheese icing and caramel sauce

The illustrious and unique LA baker, Heather Wong, of The Scootbaker!

Fitness and the Foodie

2010-10-17T01:13:00.000-07:00

"Never trust a skinny chef."

I've heard this phrase a thousand times and up until recently, didn't give it much thought. I think it's a cute and amusing phrase (still) that simply implies that the best cooks, chefs, and/or bakers are those who LOVE food so much that there's no way they could be skinny. They need to bring this zealous, culinary spirit into the kitchen when preparing foods so that flavors pop and perform, smells intoxicate and arouse, and the profound presentation of plates dramatically kidnap breath from many throats that can barely muster "ahhhh!"

Basically, the phrase says skinny chefs are those who restrain themselves far too much to enjoy and make good food.

Hmm...well...

Let's be honest. There's some truth to that, but it's not completely true.

I do believe that foodies are people who naturally and avidly enjoy all things food and drink, even given each of our various approaches and distinctive leanings toward particular cuisines and flavors, and our specific areas of focus in the realm of food mania. It's hard to be a strict disciplinarian with one's waistline when there's so much love going on here.

The love of food naturally spells out passion. That's obvious. Foodies don't just eat to function and to satisfy hunger. And, we often know that passion, in any form, should be unbridled and uninhibited. At least, that's what most of us think about passion when pondering over the nature of it. Passion is not passion unless it's intense, deep, and obsessive...and free.

Passion, like anything else that's exhilarating, can become warped and darkly baroque and lead to irresponsibility and addiction. There always has to be a checks and balances on most things, right? I shall say that food is certainly no area exempt from this supposition.

So, when it comes to the phrase "never trust a skinny chef," I think some foodies do realize that unchecked passion with food can lead to bad health over time. The body has its limits and we each should know our own. Every person is different.

I believe strongly in the philosophy of HAES (Health at Every Size). This acronym means that what is healthy for one person weight-wise might not be so healthy for another and that intuitive eating is the best way to achieve and maintain good health. The goal should not be to become skinny, but simply healthy, and a person can be healthy with extra weight given their unique body dynamics and limitations. This is fact.

It's only been recent that North America's body ideals have related to being at the lowest end possible of BMI. And let's face it, that BMI system itself is not so accurate for some. I'm one of those people.

So some bona fide foodies can indeed be "skinny." I think some people either have very fast metabolisms (although most people are average this way) or they find ways to incorporate a good degree of physical activity and balance in their eating into their lives to where they work off any excess weight, whatever the motivations are behind their actions. They allow themselves to eat whatever they want, but in moderation and sometimes perhaps with substitutions.

I do think that women in the food industry are under even more pressure than average to remain visually appealing, conventionally, and still exude this orgasmic attitude about food. Food is everywhere in the food biz, so there's more to watch out for if one doesn't want to fall out of popularity, given what they are known for.

Over time, as I've observed some of the most conventionally attractive celebrity chefs on Food Network and The Cooking Channel, I've seen there have been periods where they were a bit pudgier or heavier. Giada De Laurentiis' weight can fluctuate at times, I've noticed. She is very petite but she's been chunkier during certain seasons of her shows. This wasn't just when she was pregnant. The woman enjoys food and if she didn't work out to maintain her weight, I can easily seeing her being naturally chubby. In my book, she'd certainly still be cute as I am not at all fat-phobic like I used to be and as the average person tends to be, but I know viewers would give her tons of criticism for "letting herself go."

Some others chefs have even been criticized for their weight gain (Nigella Lawson comes to mind), but I notice that in this industry there's still a bit more acceptance towards plus-sized bodies than in others, overall.

To name a few...

Guy Fieri
Sunny Anderson
Anne Burrell
Ina Garten
Paula Deen
Emeril Lagasse
Nigella Lawson
Jeffrey Steingarten
Mario Batali
Rachael Ray (her weight fluctuates)
Alex Guarnaschelli

If you take a good look, all of the average-sized chefs have their chubby or pudgy moments as well. Not many are very thin naturally. You can tell most work out to keep up appearances. Even Bobby Flay has indeed been far more stockier than he is at the moment.

The reality and what viewers must realize is chefs and food hosts aren't on their shows showing America how to cook and how to masturbate at the same time. It's not meant to be any porn but food porn.

Also, who wants to see someone completely anorexic-looking cooking? Not me. You know that just doesn't look and seem right. I understand we want people to look somewhat attractive while they cook, even if that for some people means thinner, but seriously, these food channels aren't substitutes for the Playboy channel so I often find it incredibly ridiculous when certain food celebs are put down for any weight gain or any change in their physical appearance. It's often female hosts, too.

In the everyday life of a chef, it is best for chefs to be in shape. I am aware of this. Cooking in commercial kitchens in food establishments is hard work. You stand on your feet all day without many breaks, you are moving about doing a variety of chores and tasks, you are lifting and cleaning a lot of large-scale commercial equipment, you endure repetitive movements, and you must be quick, efficient, and agile. If you are out of shape, I can't see this kind of career being anything one would endure for long, if at all.

But, all foodies aren't commercial chefs and there are such people as fat chefs, cooks, and bakers who make magic in the kitchen and manage to hold their own very well.

I hear that bakers tend to be less lean than their savory cook counterparts. Not sure why this is or if this is really true. In some bakeries, activity can be quite hectic, especially if there are long lines and lots of little tasks to do with a multitude of pastries and desserts. I think some people might think that because baking is more exact in nature than cooking, standing for a longer time concentrating on the precision of design or a technique is far more common than in a savory kitchen. Point taken.

As a foodie, I realize that I need to keep a watch on my personal obsession with food, especially desserts.

Recently, I've gotten back into a daily gym schedule because as I bake often, I know that being around so much decadence is tempting. I have such a high tolerance for sweets and if I don't control myself, that passion turns topsy-turvy and like any good carousel ride, it's fun for the time being and you want to come back intermittently for the thrill, but you never want to stay on forever nonstop or find yourself strapped down on a candy-colored faux horse as the carousel moves into surreal warp speed until you are violently sick and put out commission completely.

OK...that was rather disturbing...

Well, anyway, what are your thoughts on the phrase: "Never Trust a Skinny Chef"?

Do you feel it has truth or merit?
Are you a foodie or a cook in any manner and if so, how do you personally relate to this phrase?

A Slow Roast Break

2010-10-06T13:42:00.000-07:00

What a wonderful idea for a cake...

In a week or so (hopefully a little less than a week), I will be back to regular posting, but I wanted to give you guys an official notice about my decision in taking a break. Don't worry, it's just a short one! So stay tuned, I will be back soon.

There are some family issues that I must tend to among other a few other things. While I am on break, I will certainly be planning more entries and future activities for this blog such as:

more documented baking adventures (I have lots of recipes in mind, also feel free to send me any ideas)
some cooking adventures (savory foods which you haven't seen here yet)
changes in layout and a possible move to Wordpress format
new site title and logo design (have a couple of names in mind)
creative, food-related info session and random thoughts entries
updates and reviews (ingredients, bakeries)

If you wish to contact me about anything, take a look at my contact page on my site menu, located on the left sidebar. :)

A Paperless Literary World

2010-09-28T07:01:00.000-07:00

Digital print: Completely replacing traditional publishing?

I've yet to get an iPad, a Kindle, or any of the other eBook readers or related gadgets that are out in stores. I don't have anything against them, personally, it's just a matter of what my fiances will allow nowadays, and not yet getting around to buying any of this stuff.

It's hard enough to keep track of the lightning fast changes happening in digital technology every minute, especially in the realm of publishing.

For dessert, food, and beverage magazines, I tend to prefer a traditional magazine format. Well, I tend to prefer a hard copy for most of my reading. There's something very rewarding and visceral about holding a copy of a book or magazine in one's hands. Additionally, I love the smell of the pages and the sounds of flipping them over.

In the last few years, more print magazines have either folded entirely or gone totally digital...or they continue to fund both digital and hard print format if they and their sponsors can continue to afford it and evolve with changing dynamics in their core audiences.

Gourmet Magazine comes to mind. Gourmet's print magazine was taken off the market by Conde Nast at the end of last year. Why did they fold? Rumor has it that they just could not compete well with a changing audience that reflected recent economic changes and with increasing digital print publishing demands. They simply became out of sync and a lot of their advertising support was also tied into newspaper publications, which were also going out of print.

I recently discovered that there is going to be a digital app called "Gourmet Live" for the now defunct print magazine. The application will be available for iPad and other mobile gadgets. These app will allow users to download digital content, view videos, read articles, browse menus, and look at tons of photos. So it seems that digital apps are another new tangent that magazines, both current and former, are looking into to transition from or broaden to hard print to soft.

So what do my purchasing trends reveal? Well let's just say I have such a huge collection of food and dessert magazines that it's mind-boggling. Stacks of magazines and books dominant a great deal of my closet space and book shelves. I especially love collecting special editions of select food and dessert magazines whenever they are released. I find them to be visual and text-laden treats to gawk at, study, savor, and share with others when I am out of the house and about. I also appreciate the combined technical skills, layout and editing artistry, and literary contributions that go into developing a print magazine. The process behind this creative mosaic of expressed efforts should not become a lost art. So, my purchasing power also reflects a personal desire to support.

One of the magazines I read is Desserts magazine, which is exclusively an online publication. It's a fascinating and very informative magazine with tons of eye candy featuring dessert trends and recipes from all over the world, but I wouldn't mind an actual hard print copy of each edition or certain ones that I've greatly enjoyed in particular.

Making it so that hard print versions are available for purchase is great for building a physical collection of magazines to thumb through anytime I want without having to log onto the computer.

With that said, of course there certainly are benefits to being paperless, too. No byproducts or waste, no clutter or ever-growing stacks of magazines taking up space in one's house or apartment, and magazines basically are non-destructible when they are in a virtual/digital format. You can get unlimited copies from an original soft copy source.

So, what do you think?

Do you prefer to read your culinary magazines or books on a Kindle, iPad or any other eReader?

Would you ever go out and buy any of those new apps for your mobile toy?

How do you feel about the changes that the publishing industry is going through? Should all reading eventually become paperless?

Baking Adventure 19: Nomtastic Chocolate Eclairs

2010-09-21T01:42:00.000-07:00

Photo of some of my chocolate eclairs with vanilla pastry cream

Who dares to say they don't like eclairs?

Not me!

I've totally developed a new-found appreciation for eclairs. I've always seen and had these lush French treats at gourmet bakeries, once in a blue moon. For that reason, up until recently, I regarded them as an exclusive treat, something I didn't get to have anytime I wanted, unless I was wiling to go out and search high and low for the best offerings of them around town.

So I thought to myself, how cool would it be to make these sweet pastry logs of decadence at home!

Eclair in French means "lightning," although no one is quite sure how the meaning ties into the dessert. (Maybe because they don't last very long on a platter or they always light up faces in a room when finally presented in full glory on a dessert tray? Just sayin'. LOL)

Eclairs are heavenly French pastries made with a choux pastry dough and are the cousins of cream puffs, beignets (which are fried rather than baked) and profiteroles, also made with choux paste. Choux paste is usually made with eggs, flour, butter, water and sugar (if it is for a dessert as choux pastries can be savory, too). The choux paste is piped out, through a pastry bag affixed with a large round tip, in long 4-6 inch strips on a baking sheet to make the characteristic hot dog bun shape of the eclairs. Eclairs are split in half lengthwise, hollowed out, or punctured at the end to make a filling hole and then they can be filled with puddings, custards, pastry creams, fruit preserves, whipped cream, mousses, curds and icings. *exhales* The tops of eclairs are usually dressed with a coat of chocolate ganache, chocolate glazes, chocolate poured fondant, chocolate icing and sometimes alternative toppings like caramel and butterscotch sauces. Yum!

Through my research, I found that eclairs are rather easy to make, but you must set them up in 3 stages or what I like to call "dessert scenes."

Little Pink Dictionary: Desserts scenes are distinctive parts or stages in a dessert recipe. They are different than merely steps. For example, basic butter cakes often have 2 dessert scenes -- the cake batter-making scene and the icing-making scene: two parts that come together as a whole to create an exhilarating dessert "cinematic" experience on the taste buds and in the mind. When you think of dessert scenes think of a movie totally made out of sugar, sweet spices, and sprinkles comprised of fun and sparkly dessert scenes.

The three dessert scenes for an eclair are the scene for the dough, a scene for the filling, traditionally a pastry cream, and a scene for the topping.

I began my chocolate eclair adventure by doing the dessert scenes in this order and I gathered up the initial ingredients for my choux paste.

Some ingredients here were used for making choux pastry dough

The first step was to create the choux paste. Now when you think of making a dough for anything, you normally don't think of doughs that are heated or boiled in any way, however, this dough is. Well, it starts off with heated ingredients.

I combined salted butter, sugar, and water in a saucepan and heated it all on the stove.

Next, I took the melted butter mixture off the stove, added flour to the saucepan, and stirred continuously for a couple of minutes until the bottom of the pan became dulled by a very light film of raw paste.

Once the paste was set in the pan, I transferred it into a larger bowl and beat the dough for a few minutes until it became firmer and began crumbling. Eggs were added, one at a time, to the paste and I continued to beat until I had a very smooth paste that resembled a texture between cake batter and cookie dough.

Finished choux paste ready to be bagged and piped into logs

Below, you can see that I piped out the choux paste into several 5 inch logs onto a baking pan lined with parchment paper. This part was very fun and I winded up going over some of the strips, so you'll notice that some of the logs have a rather "rustic" shape to them, which is kind of cool.

Loosely piped into 5 inch logs

After piping the choux paste and placing them in the oven to bake, I began making my pastry cream. The first step of the second dessert scene of this recipe (making the pastry cream) begins with milk. I prefer using whole milk for full, rich flavor. No other way to go, in my opinion. I also must mention that for the moment, I am out of vanilla beans. As a result, I used vanilla bean paste as an alternative to beans (love that paste retains the seeds over extract), added that to the whole milk in a saucepan, and brought the milk to a boil.

You can't see but there's vanilla bean paste in there with the cream

While the hot vanilla milk waited, I quickly whisked together my sugar, salt, and cake flour in a separate bowl and added in my egg and egg yolks. While I continued to whisk, I slowly added the hot vanilla milk and kept stirring constantly. Once the cream base fully came together, I poured everything back into the saucepan I used to heat the vanilla milk in and placed the pot back on the stove.

Pastry cream is in the custard family, so if you've made pudding, creme anglaise or custard before, it is very similar to making these sauces. and pastry cream, at this stage, begins to thicken quite a bit and "set." This is where it blossoms.

As the cream heated in the pan and came to a boil, I kept on stirring to keep the mixture from burning as it thickened.

For awhile, it will seem as if the cream is not thickening all that much, but you just wait as you'll suddenly start to see the cream thicken dramatically second by second. You'll feel very proud, even. LOL

Once the cream changed into a light pudding texture and the sound of heaven opening up faded away, I took it off the stove and continued to stir it on the countertop to thicken further. I stopped when I finally had a wonderfully true pudding texture.

I loved seeing the vanilla seeds throughout the pastry cream and when I tasted it, it had a very creamy, vanilla flavor. Pastry cream can totally be eaten by itself and placed as layers in a fruit parfait or a cookie trifle, by the way.

Now that the pastry cream had bloomed, I placed it all in a glass prep bowl and wrapped it with plastic wrap to chill in the refrigerator for at least half an hour.

The choux pastry logs for my eclairs were done at this point, so I took them out of the oven, and placed them on a cooling rack while my pastry cream continued to cool in the fridge.

When it was time to take my pastry cream out of the fridge, I needed to add one last step. I needed to make whipped cream from scratch (very easy and I always LOVE doing this) and fold the soft-peaked whipped cream into the pastry cream to create a richer, creamier and fuller texture. *ding! ding!*

The pastry cream was ready to place into the waiting eclairs. I cut the cooled eclairs lengthwise, so that they opened like little submarine sandwiches (back edges still intact) and stuffed generous amounts of pastry cream into the centers and closed them each back up.

Beautiful vanilla pastry cream

The last dessert scene involved making the chocolate glaze, used to grace the tops of the eclairs.

This was rather simple. I melted the chocolate over a double boiler set up (glass bowl over saucepan filled with boiling water). I used a mixture of dark chocolate and milk chocolate.

When the chocolate completely melted, I took it off the stove and stirred in a good helping of butter and let it dissolve and establish its enriching properties.

My cream-filled eclairs were finally ready for the last act, which was to top them handsomely with lots of delicious and satiny chocolate glaze.

Tray of Nomtastic chocolate eclairs. These were SOOOO good!

These eclairs did not last long and later down the road, they will be a part of my bakery menu, when it's feasible. Eclairs needs to be refrigerated, so for now, my bakery menu will only feature less environment-specific items. Eclairs are best eaten freshly made. It is not good to keep them too long. But then again, I don't see how they'd last that long anyway, posing such an unfathomable problem. Not in my household and not in my grasp!

Check out the recipe here for these tasty chocolate eclairs: Diana's Desserts - Chocolate Eclairs

As always, I encourage anyone to put their own little spin on things and experiment as I constantly love to do. This was my first time making eclairs, so I had fun just trying out the recipe in the link as is, with just a few differences. This was also a learning adventure!

Concepts: Pop-Up Bakeries & Bakery Crawls

2010-09-11T15:59:00.000-07:00

Bake sales have been going on for quite some time, so they are nothing new, but along with the recent explosion of food truck eateries and secret, closed-door restaurants, pop-up bakeries have become quite the trend.

What is a pop-up bakery?

A pop-up bakery is a temporary bakery, often featured as a scheduled "bake sale" event by an established bakery that either has a dedicated storefront (otherwise) or only presently caters and offers its products in various shops or online.

Some bakeries will host pop-up bakery events in random places to keep customers and fans guessing where the next bake sale will be. Others will host pop-up bakeries at special events, in a temporary space for an extended period of time, or at other eateries, such as restaurants or delis.

In LA, bakeries such as Cake Monkey Bakery and Platine Cookies have participated in pop-up bakery events. Cake Monkey opened up a pop-up bakery in Silver Lake a few months ago and scheduled bake sales on the weekend. Platine Cookies hosted a pop-up bakery with British fashion designer, Anya Hindmarch for a fund-raising benefit.

Although bake sales aren't known to rake in big bucks, they are great for cross-promoting and networking with other businesses, increasing exposure for bakeries, and expanding a shop's fan base by bringing in a larger local target audience. Overall, they bring excitement, engagement, and adventure to a company's profile.

As for bakery crawls, I'd like to think of bakery crawls as a gathering of pop-up bakeries, where various bakeries will show up at a mutually agreed upon spot or space (indoor or outdoor), within a collaboration, and all participate in offering their sugary wares to voraciously, sweet-toothed customers. Bakeries will sell for a few hours or until everything runs out. If a bakery has a dedicated storefront or a website, this is the best time for businesses to pass out business cards and stylish take-home menus (usually showing other goods that are for sale online or in their usual shop), and spread awareness in general.

Some people might consider bakery crawls in the exact same context they view pub crawls, which means that a bakery crawl can also simply be a themed outing for a group of people, in an area around a city where there's likely to be a string of bakeries in close proximity to one another that everyone can visit back to back. A lively social day out, basically.

That definitely sounds like my kind of fun.

Little Pink Dictionary: I have this term that I coined for a day filled with adventure and fun from very early in the day to late in the night: Candy Day. A candy day is a day where one continuously delights the senses by partaking in enriching, often soul-warming, and spirited, pleasurable activities. A candy day can be had alone, with a like-minded and equally enthusiastic romantic partner (my favorite), or a group of fun-loving friends and acquaintances.

Baking Adventure 18: Extreme Chocolate Cheesecake

2010-09-02T13:06:00.000-07:00

Half-view of Extreme Chocolate Cheesecake (click on all photos to enlarge)

How often do you book time for a chocolate vacation?

What's a chocolate vacation, you wonder?

A chocolate vacation can be literal, as there are many exotic and brilliant places to travel to in order to research and explore pure fine chocolates and fantastic chocolate dessert creations, but a chocolate vacation can certainly be a traveling-without-moving experience, too...and often is.

For those lucky people, chocolate induces a lush and addictive state of euphoria when consumed, placing them into a lulling chocolate coma which can last for hours. That's a chocolate vacation, my cacao cohorts.

Inside Info: Unfortunately, as much as I LOVE chocolate, I don't enjoy the effect it often has on my system. The darker and more concentrated the chocolate is with cacao, the stronger those effects are for me. There are others like myself who experience the same averse reactions from consuming chocolate and more research is coming out on this as I type. The rewarding, drug-like, euphoric effects only last a brief time for me, regardless of how much I adore the flavors of chocolate. After chocolate consumption, that short spurt of joy passes for me and my moods crash and send me into the land of chocolate nightmares or perhaps a down state worthy of being called "chocolate psychosis." I'll allow myself to have chocolate on a rare occasion knowing they'll be consequences, but that doesn't stop me from experimenting with chocolate desserts and recipes. OK, I am lying, those consumptive occasions aren't so rare. I can be hardheaded at times, you know...

So, let's move onto cheesecake and how it all ties in with the talk of chocolate...

For starters, I'll mention that I've had a weird love affair with cheesecake over the years. I used to be absolutely bonkers about cheesecake when I was a little girl. It was one of my favorite desserts, then by the time I entered my teenage years, my love for cheesecake waned. I could take it or leave it but, of course, never hated it. I just became picky.

I began to think that most cheesecake batters either created a peculiar flavor in the mouth the longer I kept a forkful on the tongue or left a weird aftertaste in the mouth that I didn't care for. As my mid-twenties approached, my love for cheesecake picked up again because I began exploring a variety of cheesecake flavors and styles in restaurants and deli bakeries and found types and batters I preferred more. Some cheesecakes definitely taste better than others depending on what is used in the batter.

♥ I'll have to do a info-focused cheesecake entry someday because there are so many different ways to make a traditional cheesecake according to custom and region and it's tremendously fascinating to learn about.

I've made cheesecakes before, but my play was limited and they were mostly no-bake cheesecakes or those made in pie crust pans without a really stable batter.

Vanilla Peach Cheesecake with fresh peach preserves

In the last couple of weeks, I've been busy experimenting with cheesecake-making again and after making a tasty vanilla peach cheesecake, I moved on to visions of "Cheesecake in Chocolate! Now playing at your local theatre!"

I love that cheesecakes can come in so many different colors and flavor profiles other than the traditional, plain, cream-colored variety. A hyper chocolate cheesecake made from chocolate through and through sounded superb and I couldn't wait to try it out.

I took it upon myself to research a lot of different recipes and come up with what I think is a good cheesecake recipe to experiment with as a base batter. Most of my research finds recommended baking cheesecakes in water baths for a smooth, evenly-baked, creamy consistency that didn't crack. This is something else I'd never done when making cheesecakes.

So, let's get started with exactly what I did to make my Extreme Chocolate Cheesecake.

Some of the ingredients used for my cheescake

The first step was to make and prepare my cheesecake crust. I wanted an opulent, buttery, chocolate crust that was very thick and much like a cookie crust. Shortbread was ideal. I love the way shortbread cookies taste and they give an excellent texture for crust in any pie or custard-based dessert.

I could have made my shortbread cookies from scratch and used those, but since cheesecake takes a longer time to make, I decided to go with yummy store-bought cookies. I prefer Keebler's Sandies Simply Shortbread cookies over Lorna Doone shortbread cookies, although I still enjoy the latter since they remind me of my childhood (They've certainly been around much longer than when I was a child, I might add!).

I used these cookies to create a custom chocolate shortbread cookie crust for my cheesecake. Starting on each photo row from left to right, you'll see the stages of which I prepared the crust.

Row 1 - I've gathered all of my dry ingredients in a bowl: cocoa powder, crushed shortbread cookies and flour. In another bowl, I've combined white sugar and salted butter (this is why I included no salt in the dry mix)
Row 2 - I began creaming the sugar and butter (room temperature) for several minutes until it was extremely creamy. I took my bowl of dry ingredients and added it to the creamed sugar and butter (maybe I should call this sugutter or buttugar? LOL)
Row 3 - I continued to mix the crust batter until well blended and then I added in a bit of vanilla bean paste to give the crust batter an extra dimension of warm flavor.
Row 4 - I patted down my crust batter into a springform pan, neat and evenly. I placed it in the oven to pre-bake for about 30 minutes on a low rack setting. This was going to be a thick crust, so it was important to bake it a little longer than I usually do. The crust came out beautifully and it was so fragrant. The entire house smelled like warm, chocolate cookie crust.

While my crust cooled down, I started on my chocolate cheesecake batter. I decided that the batter was going to be milk chocolate-based and the top layer of the cheesecake, a chocolate ganache, should be made from high quality dark chocolate. The chocolate in the batter (both cocoa powder and melted chocolate) were going to be added toward the end of the batter-making process.

Milk chocolate and dark chocolate

I took out my cream cheese and blended it in a bowl making sure all the lumps were out smoothed out and that it was pliable in texture.

2 cups of cream cheese waiting to be smoothed out

After creaming the cream cheese, I took three eggs and added them, one at a time, to the cream cheese until the batter was smooth again. At this stage, it is good to start making a habit of scraping down the sides of the bowl so there are no chunks of yolk (or unmixed batter) left around the edges.

Now, it was time to add in sugar and sour cream. You can experiment with other dairy sources, too, for different flavor profiles. Some people use heavy cream (I've used this before), yogurt and even buttermilk instead of sour cream. I find that sour cream gives a nice tangy flavor to cheesecakes and cuts down the strong bite from pure cream cheese, while complementing its taste.

Adding the sour cream was the last of the "creaming" process. So, it was time to prepare and add chocolate into my batter to truly make it a chocolate cheesecake. It is up to you to decide just how much chocolate you want to add to your batter. It's somewhat subjective, but it should be enough to create a strong and rich chocolate flavor. You also have to remember that as chocolate desserts bake, they will darken in color, so your chocolate cheesecake batter won't look as dark as you expect it to be initially.

Note that while I was adding ingredients to my cheesecake batter, I set up a glass prep bowl as a double boiler on the stove, to begin melting my milk chocolate. So my melted chocolate was already waiting and I wanted to get started on that earlier to give it time to cool down just a little. I predominately used milk chocolate but I also added semi-sweet chocolate chips (both Callebaut). I noticed the chips were somewhat stubborn and took a longer time to melt.

I measured in my cocoa powder and blended that into the cheesecake mixture and then I poured in my slightly warm melted chocolate and blended until the batter was very consistent and creamy, but not over-mixed. The photo with the cocoa powder looks so strange, doesn't it? Like a glaring eye with a penetrating chocolate pupil. It reminds me of the Eye of Sauron from The Lord of the Rings, except that the pupil is not a slit.

My chocolate crust was cool enough to begin pouring my chocolate cheesecake batter on top of it in the springform pan. I didn't have any problems with an even pour and I made sure to pour onto the cooled crust by starting from the center. You might want to very gently shake the pan a bit to settle it down further, if you need to.

Batter poured into crust-lined springform pan

It was time to place my cheesecake in the oven, but not by itself. I got out a large roasting pan to place the springform pan in. But first, I needed to boil some water on the stove. I pre-heated the oven and began foiling the bottom and sides of my springform pan 4 times. I was so busy with this part, making sure the pan was sealed well with foil to prevent water from seeping in and sogging up the crust, that I forgot to snap photos of this stage. I was extra careful in foiling because in making a cheesecake before, a bit of water got into my crust, although it was still a tasty cheesecake to eat, crust and all. A good tip is to make sure to use very wide and large sheets of foil so you can foil the pan evenly to prevent water from seeping in at the bottom.

Once my water was hot enough and I had foiled my pan well, I poured in a bit of the hot water into the large roast pan and carefully placed my springform pan into the hot water bath. I wanted the hot water to just reach halfway around the sides of the sprinform pan.

This water bath was going to ensure an evenly baked cheesecake with no splits or cracks and a creamy texture. It also took away the need to bake the cheesecake as long as other cheesecakes are baked, which is usually between 70-80 minutes, at least. My cheesecake baked no longer than 55 minutes and when it was done, I turned off the oven and let the cheesecake stay in the oven until the temperature lowered.

A cheesecake should still have somewhat of a wobbly center when it is done baking. It will firm up further and very nicely once it continues to set up in the refrigerator over night or within several hours.

Fully-baked cheesecake

My cheesecake was certainly not done after it had cooled down a bit on the counter top. I still needed to add my over-the-top chocolate finishing touch, which was my dark chocolate ganache layer. But my cheesecake needed to chill for a few hours in the refrigerator before spreading on the ganache.

When nearly 3 hours had passed, I started preparing my chocolate ganache, which is simply hot heavy cream and chocolate melded together.

I measured out some dark chocolate pistoles into a glass prep bowl and I heated heavy cream on a stove until it was hot, but not boiling, as you don't want it to burn or develop a skin. At this stage, you can also choose to steep your heavy cream with various ingredients for enriched flavor, such as lavender, vanilla beans or any other spices and herbs.

The dark chocolate was waiting to be embraced by hot cream, so I took the cream off the stove and poured it over the chocolate, making sure that all of the pieces were submerged in the cream. I let it sit for about 10-15 seconds and then I started to steadily but slowly stir the forming ganache until it turned into shiny and ambrosial chocolate cream. This is the part where you just want to take the bowl and greedily lap all of the ganache up, but I managed to practice Zen self-control.

I let the ganache cool for awhile and then I took out my chilled chocolate cheesecake and began generously slathering the ganache on top, from the center, leaving just a bit of cheesecake exposed around the edges. You can decide how much ganache you want on top of your cheesecake. It's a personal choice. My layer was going to be reasonably thick, for those who enjoy an attack of massive chocolate flavor in a dessert.

I placed my cheesecake back in the refrigerator for several hours to continue letting both the cheesecake and ganache layer firm up and set. The result below was absolute chocolate debauchery. This is a very full-bodied cheesecake so just one small slice goes a long way and this is coming from someone who can indulge in sweets (food in general) a great deal!

Extreme Chocolate Cheesecake Recipe

Crust

1 cup shortbread cookie crumbs (I prefer Keebler’s Sandies Simply Shortbread)
1 cup all-purpose flour
3/16 cup of cocoa powder (1/8 cup + 1/16 cup)
½ cup of sugar
2 sticks butter (room temperature; I used salted, but unsalted is fine)
1.5 Tbs vanilla bean extract or paste
Preheat oven to 350 degrees

Process or mash cookies into moderately and even fine crumbs and toss into a bowl with flour and cocoa powder

In a separate bowl, cream sugar and butter together for 4 minutes until extremely smooth and fluffy

Add in dry ingredients to the creamed butter and sugar and beat for 4-5 minutes until very smooth.

Toss in vanilla bean extract or paste (or your choice or any other extract flavor) and blend

Press crust batter evenly and neatly into a locked springform pan with a spoon, spatula or butter knife.

Place in the oven and bake for 25-30 minutes.

Let cool completely for cheesecake filling

Filling

2 cups cream cheese
3-4 eggs (I used 3)
1 cup white sugar
2 cups sour cream
½ Tbs vanilla bean extract or paste
6 oz. milk chocolate (high quality)
1/8 cup cocoa powder

Pre-heat oven to 325

In a bowl, beat cream cheese until very smooth and free of lumps

Beat in 3-4 eggs, one at a time, into cream cheese until also smooth, for a few minutes (occasionally scrape down sides of bowl from now on)

Add in sugar and sour cream and continue to mix batter (but don’t over mix)

Add in cocoa powder and blend

Add in cooled melted milk chocolate (melted by double boiler method) and continue to blend the cream cream cheese batter until fully incorporated (again refrain from over mixing)

Pour batter onto cooled crust in springform pan

Tightly line outside of springform pan evenly with foil (you can triple-foil the pan for extra security) to seal the sides and bottom from water

Prepare a small-medium pot of boiled water and pour into a large roast pan to create a water bath

Place foiled springform pan into the water bath (water should reach halfway up the springform pan) and place entire roast pan into the heated oven for 45-50 minutes.

Once cheesecake is done, turn oven off and let it sit in the oven for about 15 minutes with the door cracked. The cheesecake should be wobbly in the center.

Take cheesecake out of the oven and the water bath, remove the foil and let it sit on a counter in the springform pan for 30-40 minutes before placing in the refrigerator to set.

Ganache

1 cup of heavy cream
6 oz. of dark Chocolate discs, pieces, or pistoles (high quality; your choice of chocolate)

Your cheesecake must be chilled for at least 3 hours prior to adding this layer.

Heat cream in a saucepan on medium heat and watch carefully until hot, but not boiling. Stir occasionally. (Option: you can steep herbs and spices at this stage for flavor and strain them from the hot cream when done heating)

Measure out chocolate in a glass bowl and pour hot cream onto chocolate pieces until fully submerged.

Let stand for 10-15 seconds

Begin slowly and steadily stirring cream and chocolate until smooth, shiny, and dark

Cool for awhile on the counter and then spread generously on top of chilled cheesecake from the center, leaving some of the cheesecake edge exposed around.

Continue to chill entire cheesecake in the springform pan in the refrigerator for several hours so that the ganache can firm up and set.

Once cheesecake cake is set and is ready to be served, immediately and carefully remove from springform pan by delicately smoothing a hot knife around the sides of the cheesecake. Release the springform mold and transfer the entire cheesecake to a cake stand on top of a 10 inch cake round or board.

Keeping a cheesecake for a long time on a metal springform pan plate will give the cheesecake a nasty metallic taste. Some people buy springform pans with glass bottoms in order to prevent this problem when storing a cheesecake. If you transfer the cheesecake, make sure to choose a storage container that can be easily stored back into the refrigerator to keep the cheesecake fresh and chilled over several days.

Cake caddies with securable lids are good options.

The Business of Breakfast

2010-08-20T21:19:00.000-07:00

I've never been much of a breakfast foods person, but I do love that there is a distinct category of foods deemed ideal for early morn eating.

The tradition of breakfast has been around for a long time all across the globe and each culture has their own brand of established "breakfast foods." Over time, I think each culture has come to see certain foods as customary for breakfast based on influences such as physical labor patterns, accessible native ingredients and crops, nutrition beliefs, and family customs. Breakfast is still considered the most important meal of the day, second to dinner, because it's a starter to a full day which usually involves a work schedule and some form of long-standing labor in most societies. In the past, fueling up during breakfast was far more crucial because a lot of work consisted of physical labor over modernity's trend of desk/office labor.

For North America, our breakfast culture is hugely inspired by English traditions. Yes, we have a mosaic of other cultural influences on breakfast eating, but by large, the influence seems to be English. The English would traditionally eat full meals (meaning involving several courses in one) during mornings (in some regions, meaning only weekend mornings) consisting of foods and drinks such as biscuits, porridge, tea, bacon, potatoes, grilled tomatoes, sausage, eggs, toast, black pudding and even baked beans. Occasionally, fish would be on the morning menu. This could possibly explain the tradition of fish and grits developing in southern U.S. states over time, although I am not entirely sure of the origins of eating grits with some type of fish (shrimp and grits is popular, too!). Grits and fish together might also have mixed influences from African and Native American cultures, since grits (similar to English porridge) are Native American in origin.

Breakfast, regardless of cultural variation and style, universally brings about tradition, community and...memories.

I might not care for the typical breakfast sausage, side of bacon, bowl of grits or fried egg saucer/plate-display, but the smell of breakfast undeniably reminds me of my childhood -- of being young, being around my family, and simplicity.

I remember those times when my mom would wake me up to get ready for school and she'd have a plate of grits, bacon. and fried eggs ready for breakfast with a large, tall, glass of pulpy orange juice. I would always arrive to school either smelling like a mix of peppered and salted fried eggs and fried cured meats or the sweet smell of faux-maple syrup (because most American syrups are really corn syrup concoctions with little to no actual maple syrup in it) and pancakes. On luckier days, I'd see a fresh plate of waffles and I'd douse them generously with butter, syrup and whipped cream. Sometimes, I'd show up to school with faint oatmeal breath and some overlooked drops of brightly colored fruit juice splattered on my school dress or shirt. The smell of breakfast was always tied to routine, starting the day, morning, and family.

Other nostalgic mornings, usually weekends or weekdays I'd stay home from school sick, would involve waking up early to catch my favorite morning cartoons. Saturday morning cartoons were the best, in particular. I loved cartoons back then and I love them madly today, but watching them during my childhood brought about the most special and cherished moments. You just can't mimic those times --true innocence, the world seeming larger than ever, and hopes and dreams totally laden with charming, sweet, and quixotic naïveté.

The smell of breakfast foods brings all of that back for me. This is why I cherish continually cultivating the tradition of breakfast, although I find myself being quite picky over what I'll have, especially given my mood. I sometimes go "maverick" and have foods normally considered proper for lunch or dinner, such as salads, hot and savory soups, noodle dishes and stir fry meals. I occasionally get comments from others telling me how strange my choices of foods are for mornings. I mean who eats a spicy, three-cheese burrito for breakfast? Who considers sushi and sashimi in the morning? Who wants that leftover penne pasta with homemade pesto sauce from last night for breakfast? Who in their right mind eats a heavy slice of cheesecake drenched in caramel sauce for breakfast?

I raise my hand and casually answer "me" to all of those questions amid bewildered looks of distaste and odd gag-enriched reactions. In an effort to defend myself, while still holding pride in my choice to be so "unique and daring," I must say I don't eat those things often for breakfast, but yes I do jump off the breakfast foods train once in awhile to go and "explore the wild bustling city." Sometimes, I don't board any train at all and I just stay inside my lone, quaint cabin with a growling protesting stomach until evening sets. Yes, I know, I can be very bad and *gasp* skip breakfast.

I think skipping breakfast naturally comes with being such a night owl. I know breakfast is important to start the day and it is never my intention to not eat a good starter meal, but if you're nocturnal, nothing about your schedule (and the details involved in defining it) is normal to begin with.

With all of this breakfast talk, I am actually inspired to go and get a new waffle iron . My old one is long gone and even if I knew where it was, its condition would be too far gone for proper use. I hear that pizzelles are all the rage now, so someday I'll try my hand at preparing those. Pizzelles seem like a sophisticated way to have waffles for those romantic, European-inspired bed and breakfast goers who want something special. As with so many things, they are on my culinary to-do list, too.

What do you enjoy having for breakfast and what kind of associations does breakfast bring about for you?

"Are the Cameras Rolling Yet?"

2010-08-18T00:07:00.000-07:00

A set of cooking utensils in a commercial kitchen at Surfas

What does it take to have one's own cooking show? Would it be an easy thing to do? Have you ever thought about it?

I sure have! I've always wondered what it would be like to have my own cooking show. Online media has expanded and developed so much, that now it's very possible for just about anyone to build an online presence in so many ways. Video presentation is exploding and the trend is not one that seems like any fad. I think sites like YouTube have truly revolutionized the way that people browse, socialize, and tune in online. Anyone can have a voice.

I've daydreamed about having a cooking show for a long time. I think if I were to really analyze my strengths and weaknesses objectively, with the right resources and much practice, I'd be great at such a venture.

In workshop with Clemence teaching her baking workshop with macarons and being filmed for a local Asian channel

The reality? I don't feel I am in any current position to start such a venture, at least not adequately, but as inferred, it's long been on my to-do list. The steps I am taking now are all building up to that particular plan. I started an entry a while back on wanting to set up a food-based site with all things I do related to food featured on the site. Well, I am still working on that behind the scenes and it will take awhile because, at times, it can actually feel like a daunting task. Doable, but lots of work. The vision is there but there's so much content that I have to build and work on in order to make sure the site has substance. It might be that I'll have my site up with everything else and plan to incorporate the video section later, when I am ready.

I haven't even come up with a title for the site or even my persona. Do I go by my own name or do I create something very catchy and stylish? If it's the latter, then it must be something that captures the essence of my voice and personality. That's one of the harder things to do.

So where does a cooking show fit in with all of this? Well, it's one section I'd be thrilled to have on my food site. I'd want viewers to be able to learn from things I discover and feel passionate about. I'd want viewers to be able to get to know me in an intimate but professionally down-to-earth sense. When you put an actual voice and face to an online presence, you get multidimensionality and that's what I'd like to offer eventually.

So what would be needed to start my own cooking show? I've taken time to think about this and these are some necessities that stand out right away:

First and foremost, a solid plan which addresses cooking show angle and theme, title of the show, filming schedules, recipe line up, tutorial set-ups, target audience, budget, and so forth; basically the entire vision detailed in all of its glory.
A reasonably authoritative knowledge in food (whether it is with desserts or savory cooking or some subset of either of these two broad categories or both. One doesn't need to be Alton Brown, but a cook show host should certainly know what they are doing and talking about in order to build plausibility and a good reputation)
An authentic personal style in front of the camera; a unique voice and point of view
A dedicated kitchen or any other related filming location that will be steadily used for filming of the show
Video recording equipment and film editing software (definitely something like Final Cut Pro), props, and lighting. (Good thing I do know Final Cut Pro, After Effects, Flash, LiveType and the like; a bit rusty in some of these, but the knowledge foundation is there)
Weekly rehearsals and practice sessions in front of the camera before final filming
Good short scriptwriting or storyboard skills
A lack of inhibition, or a willingness to overcome performance and social inhibitions over time.
Assistants and small, accessible work crew; people who can help film, set up, prep during cooking edits, and cue (can't do everything on one's own; well maybe, but why make things harder?)
A marketing and social platform to upload videos and promote the show online in a viral fashion
Friends who enjoy food, both cooking and eating it. (It's great to have people on the show as guests or as other personalities to mix the viewing platform up a bit)

These are just some of the things I can think of that are must-haves for starting a cooking show.

As for the inhibition item, I think that's quite important to consider. I certainly have my own inhibitions and I look forward to a chance to overcome them and to grow. It's part of getting to know yourself and to see how you thrive. I feel you can't truly find your place and footing unless you stick your neck out there like a turtle and take a risk. All of those cooking personalities we see on TV had to overcome a lot of uncertainties and shyness.

I think it is also good to network with a bunch of people in the food industry. The more people I know, the more I'd be able to do video interviews, which people love watching. I naturally enjoy asking people questions about their motivations, their backgrounds, their passions, and their interests. I would certainly have fun doing some videos like that.

Not all of the videos would have to be cooking show tutorials or how-to's. Some of them, as already mentioned, could be interview sessions with various restaurants owners or bakeshop entrepreneurs. Some videos could be simple info-sessions about the nature of a particular ingredient or culinary travel location. I think it would be quite entertaining to feature and film a small dinner party or get-together around a table. Everyone could bring food they've cooked to feature on the show. The video would capture comments on food around the table, entertaining chit-chat, lively interaction and basic interpersonal chemistry between everyone at the food gathering. We see a bit of this in Giada at Home, and with certain episodes from Barefoot Contessa when Ina cooks for friends and her husband.

I was thinking a few months ago that if I had the means, I'd fancy having a get-together that involved a few people in a mock-Chopped competition. The rest of the gathering would be a mix of judging and watching but two to three guests would be chosen for competition in the kitchen with randomly matched ingredients in a box. I guess the challenge of such a video would be that, unlike on the set for Chopped, each competitor wouldn't experience the luxury of having their own cooking station, so that everyone could cook simultaneously and effectively.

There are a bunch of platforms for uploading videos and creating viewing channels for them. Vimeo is still going strong, but YouTube is most popular. I really dig iTunes because of the video podcast (or vodcast) sphere it provides. There's an insane amount to discover in podcasting. I think once you get used to video subscriptions for anything food-related, you just don't go back to simple voice. I think it makes sense, in most cases, to provide something visual for the audience for a podcast cooking show.

Who wants to learn about roasting a turkey without seeing anything? Doesn't make much sense and I bid any subscriber trying to painstakingly learn from that, a hefty dose of good luck. LOL

But if someone were to provide a show merely about food triva, food-related commentary, or food facts, video might not be so necessary. It still never hurts, though.

I am not sure when I'll be able to accomplish such a goal: creating my own cooking show. But I'm working on it and building up to that point. I am getting all of my ducks in a row so they can begin quacking in harmony and in beautiful rounds.

Baking Adventure 17: Chocolate Cream Tart with Rum

2010-08-16T02:59:00.000-07:00

Ebony and ivory, black and white, yin and yang, dark and light...

Sounds like the beginning of some arcane magical spell being chanted out in a fragrant, misty forest amid a dark, indigo-blue, midnight sky full of bright, pulsating stars and a surrounding crowd of tall, wondrous trees...

OK, you get the picture here. What can I say? Cream goes wonderfully well with chocolate. They're not opposites, but together they honor the dark and light contrasting theme in a sentimental way.

I originally wanted to do a salted chocolate tart. We often see salted tarts with caramel fillings (which are mighty good, too), but salt, in the right amount can add so much to the flavor of certain chocolate-based desserts whether you are adding the salt granules themselves or using salted butter...

Since I was on a self-learning tart kick recently, I included making a chocolate tart on my agenda using salted butter, although it veered from the original plan. I concocted my own recipe from a couple of recipes I saw online, with lots of tweaking here and there through innovation, and came out with something decadent, unique, and tasty.

I will be providing links to both recipes as well as talking about what I did differently to make a custom recipe overall.

The first step was in making a chocolate crust for the tart. I was excited about this part because I've never made a rich, dark-brown chocolate crust from scratch and it just reminds me of the fact that there are so many intriguing ways to prepare and flavor crusts for tarts, pies, cobblers, buckles, brambles, crunches, crisps, and grunts (to name a few in the crusted dessert family).

I began by taking butter that I browned and chilled in the refrigerator and added it to brown sugar to begin creaming both together. Then, I beat a large egg and added that to the creamed sugar and butter. The recipe calls for white sugar, but I felt that brown sugar, as well as the brown butter, would enrich the crust with a wealthy flavor. The brown sugar changed things up a bit, but I'll explain that a bit later...

After preparing the base of the chocolate crust mixture (I know some people hate this word, but it applies so well here because we have a composite blend), I added it to a waiting container of dry ingredients which consisted of:

All purpose flour
Valrhona unsweetened cocoa powder
Baking powder

Whisking dry ingredients

Adding creamed mixture to dry ingredients

Texture of crust batter after dry and wet are combined a bit more

When I merged the dry and wet ingredients, I found that the combination was a little dry. By substituting brown sugar for white sugar in the creaming process, I think I missed out on carefully packing in the brown sugar within the measuring cup. I might have had less brown sugar than needed. Brown sugar adds more moisture to recipes than white sugar, so you'd think I wouldn't have this problem with dryness, but I can't think of any other reason why the crust batter came out so dry.

I had to find a way to alleviate this problem. I had already creamed my sugar and butter and added an egg. This aerating process was done, so I thought, "Why not add a bit of heavy cream to the batter?" This is exactly what I did. I loosely added about 1/8 cup of heavy cream and at that point I begin to see the dough come into place so I could sort it out into a pliable, round mound of deep, dark, chocolate dough:

Beautiful chocolate mound

At this point, I flattened the dough mound into a round disc, embraced it with plastic wrap and let it rest in the refrigerator for an hour and a half.

After 90 minutes, it was time to take out the cold, chocolate dough and roll it out so that I could crust my tart pan.

I should have snapped more photos of the process here, but I didn't, since I had so many pensive but good thoughts on my mind while making this crust. I guess this is where absentmindedness is not so criminal.

Anyway, I was able to get a very good fit of the crust into the pan as you can see below:

This pie crust certainly needed to be pre-baked because the filling I used was not a cooked filling. It just needed to set and chilled in the refrigerator atop the crust.

Info: For pies with ready-fillings that do not require any cooking, such as custards, mousses, firm puddings, cream cheeses and the like, you need to have a fully baked pie crust before adding your filling. Some fruit pies are also best prepared with a crust that is pre-baked but not necessarily fully baked. Sometimes, if the crust is not pre-baked in a fruit pie, the bottom crust will come out slightly raw, while the top crust is baked all the way through. This incongruity will prevent the option of placing the pie back into the oven so that the bottom crust can bake all the way through, without burning the top crust. If the bottom crust is slightly raw in a pie with two crusts, it can still be eaten but you won't have a crust recipe that was executed very well.

I poked a few holes with a fork into my crust after fitting the crust in the tart pan. Because the crust was dark, I knew it was going to be hard to tell whether or not it was done. Furthermore, I was using a pile of pinto beans as my pie weights. I fitted the crust with a sheet of parchment paper and poured in a lot of pinto beans. This was going to make checking on the crust's "doneness" a little more "wild-style." LOL

"A little help from my friends..."

I figured I'd just keep checking on the crust after 20 minutes. I didn't want a burnt crust after all of this work and time. I prodded my pie crust a few times with a fork during the baking. Each time I had to remove the beans and parchment paper carefully in order to prod underneath. My cerebral, curious-induced brand of neuroticism paid off and my crust came out perfectly as a result. It was very much like a chocolate cookie crust and I could see that it was also flaky. The smell emanating from the tart pan was deliciously provocative. I removed my bean pals and parchment paper, which now had a beige tint to it, resembling an old and worn book page from an ancient book.

Fully baked chocolate pie crust with proper fork holes

I let the pie crust completely cool before adding in my fillings. The main filling was a chocolate ganache infused with a bit of dark rum and the top layer (slightly thinner) was a sweet cream cheese filling.

To prepare the chocolate ganache I used these ingredients:

Callebaut bittersweet chocolate callets
Callebaut milk chocolate pistoles
Salted butter
Brown rice syrup (I learned this is best for replacing corn syrup)
Rum
Heavy cream

I didn't get a shot of the heavy cream heating on the stove, but after including everything into the glass bowl, I poured the hot heavy cream over the ingredients and stirred very steadily but not too fast. I wanted the ingredients to blend nicely and for the chocolate ganache to be smooth rather than clumpy.

The ganache was poured over my cooled chocolate crust.

I let the tart set in the refrigerator for an hour so that the chocolate ganache filling could firm up in order to bear the top cream cheese layer.

The cream cheese layer simply consisted of:

cream cheese
white sugar
a few capfuls of rum
heavy cream
a dash of cocoa powder for a slight marbling effect, visually

I blended the first four ingredients well and spread the cream cheese filling over the firm chocolate ganache filling. I then added the cocoa powder and begin to marble the cocoa powder into the whiteness of the cream cheese blend. I let the entire tart set in the refrigerator for 3 hours before trying out a slice.

This first slice below was mine and I enjoyed every bit of it. Truly indulgent. The recipes that inspired this baking adventure can be found through the links I've listed below.

Crust inspiration (find the crust section of the recipe): LINK

Filling inspiration (check out the section for filling): LINK

As you can see, although I really get a kick of learning a recipe that's already been established, I tremendously enjoy innovating and throwing in my own ideas. This makes me feel a lot more involved and expressive with the experimentation. It gives me a creative voice while I happily learn.

Please, feel free to ask me any questions about this adventure or any other, for that matter. I'm always happy to hear any feedback!

The Future Tastes Good

2010-08-09T23:11:00.000-07:00

Some examples of food illustrations I've done

It is often said that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. I agree with this statement in some instances and one of those is through the art of illustration, particularly food illustration.

I have a background in illustration and graphic design and a long love affair with anything art-related. As I've worked on developing my skills in the areas of baking and cooking, food writing, and food knowledge, lately, I'll admit to neglecting keeping up with illustration projects and continuous skill development. And it certainly is time to update and expand my design and illustration portfolio.

Faux ad for bowl of mashed potatoes

Faux ad for a dessert deli

One realm of illustration that I've always enjoyed working in is drawing food. It only seems natural that I would, because of my intense passion for anything involving food. I feel so excited and carefree when I illustrate food whether I am doing something very realistic or completely from my imagination. Drawing food allows me to become intimate in the visual acknowledgment with food. Drawing food is a sensual act in itself. I think even the most enthused of foodies might have a hard to recalling the details of what exactly makes honey look viscous and shiny in that unique way that such liquids often look, no matter how often they cook with, see or use this ingredient. The average person takes for granted what they see so frequently. We know objects when we see it. We understand the quality of what we see, but we rarely need or have to recall it visually in the form of art. This requires a constant application of skill and development of what I call the "visual third eye".

Maybe food photographers are a bit more keen with the details most people take for granted in food. They need to understand how food appears in a photo because, although they are literally drawing the scene, they have to be able to recognize what makes a great food scene and which food objects are best in a particular visual scenario in certain compositions. Light hitting directly on thick hot fudge sauce atop a sundae from a certain angle might be the best way to capture that distinctive shine of the decadent chocolate sauce so many people lust over. So a keen artistic eye is crucial to have and to continuously develop.

At some point, I'll be expanding this blog and part of that is to develop a website that is completely dedicated to all things I do further, professional and personally, with food . My website will contain the usual parts such as an about me, contact and reference section, but I'll have areas such as a recipe box (collection of favorite and signature recipes), a link to my online bakery (Sweet Curiosities), a large gallery of all food-oriented design work (menu design food illustration, business promo stuff), a seamless integration of my blog, a description of my writing services professionally, and eventually (hopefully) videos and a podcast link.

Some tentative promo work for my online bakery

As for what the name of my site will be? I don't know yet. I'll either use my name to reference the site and domain or I'll come up with a catchy title that clicks perfectly...and that hasn't happened yet. The name must be something that completely captures my sense of style and way of seeing things.

Some menu designs from the past

So, yes, I'd like to bring my design and illustration skills into my plans and activities with food. I want food to be a big part of my future in a creative and innovative way. Integrating these skills into the world of food would be ideal and perfect, truly allowing me to work with so many things that excite me and fill my life with passion!

Baking Adventure 16: Golden Velvet Tart

2010-08-07T10:58:00.000-07:00

A slice of my golden velvet tart

You're probably wondering, "What the heck is a golden velvet tart?"

Yeah, I know. You've most likely never heard the name as any established dessert title. Sure, there's red velvet cake and many creative spins on that traditional recipe such as blue velvet and the like, but the title of my dessert is not only a tart, but a custom cute nickname that I felt was appropriate.

My dessert is a butternut squash tart but with extra ingredients that give it a distinctive flavor presence. So, it's not a simple and plain butternut squash filling...although that's still good :p

I've enjoyed butternut squash for years and it's one of my favorite vegetables. In the past, I've made creamy, aromatic soups with it, but I never used it for cakes, pies or anything else sweet. This doesn't mean that the idea didn't cross my mind...many times. Like with many culinary projects, I just never got around to it.

So...finally...I have. *confetti and balloons suddenly appear with a cheesy baritone-voiced interviewer*

Info: Butternut squashes come in two shapes: vase and bell. It is a one of the best squashes to use in recipes because it can be found year round in most supermarkets, so it's rather accessible and affordable. The flesh is sweet, creamy and non-stringy when baked. The skin is sturdy and not so easy to peel away when the squash is raw, which is why most people find it easier to bake or steam the squash and then remove the tenderized skin, which comes off easily. This squash can be baked, grilled, fried, boiled, or steamed. To get the best flavor out of the vegetable, baking or toasting (in the oven) is best. Butternut squash is ripe when it feels heavy for it's size and when tapping on the squash produces a hollow sound. Make sure the stem of the squash is intact, the skin looks matte and smooth, and avoid squash with lots of blemishes, dark spots and slashed skin. As mentioned before, the skin is known to be tough when raw, so a healthy squash should not be easy to scar with a fingernail alone.

This would also be the first time I am using a tart pan I recently purchased from Surfas. I've been waiting to break it in. Originally, my first tart dessert was going to be a salted chocolate tart (although I've since made a chocolate rum tart I'll be blogging about soon). I am in love with bake ware, especially tart pans. The traditional shape and size is round and 9 inches in diameter, but there are so many shapes and sizes. I've seen rectangles, huge circles, small circles, equilateral squares, non-crinkle, and even custom shapes like hearts, wide apples, and wavy rectangles. I get googly-eyed when I see tart pans on store shelves in what seems like endless stacks of different heights.

So, let's talk about what I did, shall we?

For starters, I halved (with careful effort) a butternut squash and removed the seeds and strings around them. The smell of the vegetable was intensely dewy, sweet, and pungent with a deep buttery note. The odor was reminiscent of a melon, yam, and a pumpkin, but in fusion. The flesh was very orange and lively in color

I baked it in the oven until the flesh was very tender and the skin easily slipped away. The next step was taking the flesh and blending it into a beautiful puree.

As you can see, I was able to puree the pulp into a lush blend. I can see why so many people find it ideal for baby food or soups. Once you get it to this state, you can do so many cool things with it. I tasted the puree and found that it was quite sweet on its own, and I don't mean in that acquired sense. Most people would agree that ripe squash puree is very sweet, making it a great base for desserts...or perhaps even a dessert on its own.

I referred to the ingredients I had arranged on the counter, and began adding them in to convert the squash puree into velvet gold.

In this order, I enriched the puree by adding, while still very warm: butter, brown sugar, vanilla bean paste, spices (nutmeg, ginger and clove), heavy cream, cream cheese, one egg and some flour.

The flavor of the batter was opulent, to say the least. Very decadent and flavorful. The color turned from vivid orange to a matte gold. The texture was indeed velvety and creamy.

Now that my filling was complete, it was time to begin making the dough for my tart crust. I've described this process a bit in my entry for my cherry pie. However, I took more photos of the dough-making for this baking adventure.

The first step was taking the butter, browning it and infusing it with a vanilla bean. After the butter browned, I placed it in a glass prep bowl, with vanilla bean still intact, for chilling in the refrigerator. Below, I've included some photos of the brown butter while hot in both the saucepan and in a Pyrex prep bowl and after it solidified in the fridge.

The smell of the butter would drive anyone into a state of mad euphoria. It truly is exhilarating. Seriously, there should be a gourmand perfume based on the smell of brown butter and vanilla. I'd buy that in a heartbeat and add it to my collection of edible scents. If there ever is a scent like this released, remember, you heard it here first, people! LOL

So after my butter was set, I began the flour work.

Laying out flour

Adding in the cold browned butter and breaking it down in the flour

Added water, shaped the dough into a round clump and wrapped it for half hour refrigeration

After refrigeration, it was time to take the dough out and begin what truly is the magical part - the stage that gives the pie the defining texture once it has baked, and allows the butter to do what it does best in the flour.

Rolling out

I call this process "layering and stacking" and I do it many times over. I roll the dough out, stack the edges on both sides, roll it out again and restack. As I do this, I build layers within the foundation of the dough -- layers of butter that will create a very flaky pie crust when the dough is baked. Take a look and see what I mean by the layers that are created within. I snapped a good photo of the result when I cut the stacked dough in half to get a cross section view, once I was done with several rounds of layering and stacking.

The dough was placed back in the fridge (I halved the dough as I doubled up the recipe for leftover) and after another half hour, rolled out for fitting into a tart pan.

Nice and smooth but with layers of butter within

Eggwashed


Filling poured in and "dressed" with light sprinkles of nutmeg

Final result (including the slice presented in the entry)

What I'd like to do is buy more tart pans...but in different sizes and shapes. A square tart would be so cute. I can see making a strawberry tart of some kind in a square or heart pan. That's certainly on my baking to-do list.

I hope you enjoyed peeking into the process of making this golden velvet tart. I had a great deal of fun making it, enjoying the experience from beginning to end. The taste results were exquisite. Somewhat similar to sweet potato pie and pumpkin pie but with a style all its own that deserves distinction. This would be an ideal dessert for the holiday season because of the spiced flavor, but for me, it's good anytime!

Baking Adventure 15: Spiced Double Cherry-Vanilla Pie

2010-07-30T21:20:00.000-07:00

Have you ever gone a few days or more with a childhood nursery rhyme or folk song stuck in your head?

Well, I have.

The song was "Billy Boy". It just popped up out of nowhere and made itself a sturdy guest vacationing in my head like my mind was a well-needed motel, spotted by a weary traveler, off the side of a dust-ridden, barren road.

No doubt the earworm was inspired because of the business of baking a cherry pie. I couldn't get the song out of my head if someone paid me a million dollars. That's how insistent it became...and a bit amusing.

Anyway, I indeed baked a cherry pie a few days ago, completely from scratch. The only thing I didn't do was grow the cherries myself, make the butter from cream via ownership of a cow, and so forth. Ha!

The idea originally started with a entry I read on the blog, Chez Pim: The One Pie Dough to Rule Them All

Now, I've made pies in the past, but I always purchased my pie crusts and started from there. I hadn't made a pie crust from scratch until I decided to try the simple recipe listed in that entry. However, as usual, I did put my own spin on the recipe.

How so? Well...

If you've been reading my blog for awhile, you know how I've gone completely mad for the smell, use and taste of brown butter. As a result, I figured I'd employ the use of brown butter in this pie dough recipe. It's commonly said that in order to get a very flaky pie crust, cold butter must be used and kneaded into flour. We know that butter that is browned is heated, so in order to execute my idea of using brown butter, I browned the butter, infused it with a split vanilla bean and its seeds, to give it a very warm, nutty, vanilla aroma and taste, and I chilled the beurre noisette (French term for brown butter meaning "hazelnut butter") in the refrigerator. I left the vanilla bean in the butter, too, so that it could continue to work it's fragrant-setting magic. I made sure that the butter was chilled to become very cold and solid, the way butter is right out of store-bought packaging, otherwise.

When brown butter is chilled, it still keeps that wonderful nutty smell it's known for. I also kept the dark milk solids that separate out in the melted butter, for deeper flavor.

Anyway, here are some pictures of the process and my result (click images for larger view):

^Chunks of cold vanilla bean-infused brown butter (you can see the aromatic dark milk solids mixed in)

^Further mixing in the cold brown butter so that it's evenly dispersed throughout the flour

^Added water and worked the dough further into a large dough clump, which was wrapped and chilled for half an hour, to keep the dough cool to work with

^Dough taken out of the fridge, rolled out and folded onto itself stacked layers. Process repeated several times. This creates "layers" of solid butter pieces within the dough so that the crust comes out very flaky

^Dough was separated into two balls. One for top crust and the other for bottom crust. The second photo shows the bottom crust fitted into the glass pie baking pan. I coated it with eggwash.

The inside of the pie was filled with a spiced cherry filling, which contained two kinds of cherries: Rainier cherries and Bing cherries. The filling also contained sugar, freshly squeezed lemon juice, cornstarch (as a thickener), nutmeg, cinnamon, clove and ginger.

The top crust was placed over the pie and radial-patterned slits were cut into the pie. It was also eggwashed. I sprinkled a generous amount of cane sugar over the top. The granules were coarse, beige, and raw. Just the kind of sugar needed for the top crust. The slits cut into the pie certainly result in oozing of the filling during the baking stage. I had to clean the oven out later because some of the filling dripped onto oven floor. I tell you, that's not very easy to clean out. But, I was so happy with my results that I didn't care. I accepted it as part of the process. Kind of like a rite of passage, if you will. LOL

Finished result. The smell (and taste) of the crust strongly resembled those classic Royal Dansk Butter Cookies in a tin container, especially the pretzel ones that are heavily crusted with sugar. The brown butter idea is a winner for pie crust. It really makes the crust something quite special.

The recipe for the pie filling is also from Chez Pim: Spiced Cherry Pie.

Again, I strayed by using two kinds of cherries. I was fascianted by the light coloring of the rainier cherries, as well as their sweet and creamy texture and taste, and figured they'd look and be very lovely mixed in with the dark, red hues of the Bing cherries.

I must mention that this pie was gone the next day. It did not last long at all and there were many comments on how outrageously tasty the crust was. I decided to make the pie again, just a day later, and add dark rum in the cherry pie filling. Again, another one of my own takes. I knew that by the taste and smell of the cherry filling, dark rum would be a perfect addition to the flavor profile.

Indeed it was!

The second pie also didn't last long. The day I baked the cherry pie again and added rum, I also baked a second pie because I had many fresh blueberries (and red currants just purchased from Pavilions) in my fridge and I doubled up the pie crust recipe (again using my take on it with brown butter and vanilla). I baked a blueberry pie (my own version) and will be posting my results in a baking adventure update soon.

^A slice of the spiced double cherry-vanilla pie, but with rum.

Baking Adventure 14: "Quagmire" Cookies

2010-07-22T04:47:00.000-07:00

Quagmire.

Merriam-Webster dictionary defines the word as:

quag·mire
Pronunciation: \ˈkwag-ˌmī(-ə)r, ˈkwäg-\

Function: noun

1 : soft miry land that shakes or yields under the foot
2 : a difficult, precarious, or entrapping position : predicament

The word quagmire sounds intriguing doesn't it? It's always been one of my favorite words. I love the way it sounds, the way it looks, and the way it feels. As someone who is a full-blown synesthete with the condition synesthesia, outside of the word's denotative meaning, I get my own associations and feelings from the word. I get a strong sensation of a custom blend of colors and shapes that the word triggers through its spelling and arrangement of letters. Dark blue-purple or deep indigo is one of the prominent colors or color overlays that the word conjures up for me.

Quagmire also sounds like it could be the perfect name for:

an epically intense, mysterious, medieval-fantasy film
an introspective, darkly-cerebral music track on a breakthrough album titled the same
an addictive and unique adventure-strategy console role playing game with complex quests and compelling characters
a high logic board game for serious thinkers with quirky and puckish imaginations

The name is also great for a sweet treat. So, I decided to use the name for a cookie recipe I concocted in the kitchen a couple of days ago because of the look and texture of the cookies, and because of their enslaving complex flavor.

I haven't started on my mock Twix bar experiment because I've yet to purchase a new supply of quality chocolate to practice tempering with. In the meantime, I wanted to come up with a tasty cookie recipe using some of my favorite ingredients in the kitchen...and share it here. :)

The cookies have a distinctive texture with circular streak patterns on the surface. This is because I piped the cookie dough using a large 2-inch star tip. The photo below shows the first batch of piped cookie dough. Later I manually placed small bittersweet chocolate chips within the swirled recesses to make a spiral pattern. Spiral as a shape, reminds me of addiction, entrapment, and complexity. Also note a modest appearance of the small plastic container of those chocolate chips in the upper right corner of the photo.

When I baked the cookies, they spread out very evenly into generously-sized, peculiar-looking circles with a definitive pattern and characteristic texture. The texture of the cookies is chewy, soft, highly moist (due to the heavy brown butter content), and lush against the tongue with each bite indulgently swooshed around in the mouth. You get layers or swirls of flavor. First you note vanilla-infused brown butter, then almond richness, next brown sugar enrapturement and last, curious, slight hints of bittersweet chocolate as they dissolve with the masticated medley of flavors.

These cookies contain egg yolks, golden brown sugar, flour, almond meal/flour, heavy cream, brown butter (beurre noisette), and vanilla bean essence. Rich, dense and decadent, they certainly are.

Here is my recipe for these cookies. It was an experiment but the results are very successful. I definitely took down notes and placed it in my culinary "book of shadows".

Quagmire Cookies

2 sticks (8 oz.) of butter (browned)

1 vanilla bean

1 and 1/4 cup of brown sugar

3 egg yolks

1/4 cup of heavy cream

2 cups of flour

1/2 cup of almond meal/flour

1 teaspoon of baking soda

1/2 teaspoon of cream of tartar

Brown the butter in a saucepan. Halfway through the process, carefully slice open a vanilla bean and place it into the browning butter to infuse vanilla flavor.
Preheat the oven to 300-350 degrees (ovens vary) and line 2-3 baking pans (depending on size of piped dough) with parchment paper
While leaving in the vanilla bean and also retaining the butter solids, slightly chill the brown butter in the refrigerator in a small bowl, until it is near room temperature.
Cream the vanilla brown butter and brown sugar in a bowl until smooth
Add in the egg yolks and blend well
Stir in the heavy cream
In a separate bowl, mix the dry ingredients together thoroughly: cream of tartar, baking soda, flour, almond flour
Add the dry ingredient mixture into the wet ingredients (yolks, sugar, butter) and stir (manually or with paddle attachment on a stand mixer)
Using a plastic pastry bag and a 1/2 inch - 2-inch star tip, evenly pipe out swirls of cookie dough onto parchment-lined baking bans
Bake each batch for 8-12 minutes depending on your oven settings or until light golden brown. (Watch cookies carefully)
Use wide spatula to remove cookies from the baking pan onto a cookie rack for cooling.
Cookies should be somewhat delicate but not flimsy when done, but firm up further as they cool, while retaining a chewy, softy, dense texture throughout.

These cookies are sweetened well by brown sugar, but they have a savory appeal, in a sense, due to the deep nutty, brown butter flavor and the almond flour inclusion. Think of just the amount of sweetness that Animal Crackers, well-known childhood cookies, have...or shortbread cookies. These are full-bodied cookies.

Sugar Notions: Candy Bar Cloning

2010-07-15T13:25:00.000-07:00

(click to enlarge photos: Taken at Granville Island public market in Vancouver, BC. BELOW-

Taken at Knott's Berry Farm)

Everyone loves candy. More or less, that is.

I personally enthuse over candy a great deal, but I don't have it often. Retail shops (including many of the small mom and pop stores in quaint areas) like Dylan's Candy Bar, Sweet Factory, Candy Warehouse, Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory, and The Swiss Colony give me a complete sugar rush emotionally. I'm literally THE kid in the candy store when I either browse online or walk into one of these places.

However, when I go to my local supermarket and walk down the aisles and one of them happens to be the candy aisle, I almost always slow down a bit to browse what's there -- to see all of the enticing, sugary delights displayed in assortments of colorful and blithe packaging styles. These days, from supermarkets, I rarely drop any candy into my basket.

Picky, I am. Candies are edible opiates, all with different properties, and each proper for consuming during a particular mood. More often, I find myself gravitating toward gourmet and homemade pastries and confections over the refined stuff, but once in awhile, when I get a desire for something commercial and sweet, I go for Twix candy bars.

Without sounding like a commercial, I must say that Twix bars have this undeniably addictive texture. It's quite easy to engorge on several of these candied cookie sticks. When you first bite into a Twix candy bar, your tongue experiences a thin, delicate, and luxe milk chocolate coating. Then your teeth plunge into and your taste buds begin to experience a gooey second layer of rich, elastic, buttery caramel that envelops around your tongue. Last, you get a satisfying crunch of a crisp, cookie biscuit. Altogether, these sacchariferous textures create a decadent, full-bodied, velvety experience that leaves you wanting residual fixes.

So, I got to thinking, "What if I tried making mock Twix bars at home?" I've never made anything like this and there are so many ways to approach such an honorary recipe. I know I'd have a lot of fun trying, regardless of my results. It'll be my time to play mad sugar scientist.

For the recipe, I'd need:

a milk chocolate ganache for the coating

a chewy, but frim caramel sauce or nougat for the middle

a nice crunchy, stiff, sweet cookie or biscuit layer for the core

For the ganache, I'd need to incorporate just enough cream into the milk chocolate, so that it is ideal for dipping, and firming up at room temperature. The caramel sauce recipe would also have to be one where the caramel solidifies enough at room temperature but keeps a malleable and chewy texture, like a traditional caramel square or chew that comes in a customary candy wrapper. A hard shortbread or butter cookie recipe would be perfect for the innermost layer. I've seen some people use dessert or club crackers, but I prefer a cookie recipe. I normally go for chewy cookies with crispy edges, but this kind of texture would not be best for what Twix candy bar rendition. Having that finishing crunch texture is important as the last but integrating sensation. Plus, this cookie dough would have a mellowed, salty sweetness to balance the uber sweetness of the chocolate and caramel..

When I make the cookie dough, I'll try shaping the cookies into small sticks or logs, either by hand or with an appropriately-shaped cookie cutter. If I purchased some lollipop sticks, it might be a good strategy to place them halfway into the center of each cookie stick once they are taken right out of the oven, which is when they are still pliable. Not sure if this would work, as I might not be able to remove the sticks later, after using them as dipping aids. As the cookies cool down, they might become firmly fixed. I guess I'll have to see what happens. I don't have the luxury of factory grade machines that effortlessly and seamlessly coat candies all over.

If this works, then when each cookie is cooled, I can begin dipping each stick into a warm caramel sauce. Once that layer is firm and room temperature, the last task would be to dip each caramel-coated cookie stick into a waiting pool of milk chocolate ganache.

Hopefully, all of these steps will lead to a successful result that pays at least somewhat of a respectful homage to the original Twix candy bar. If not, I'm still going to be swinging like a candy-coated, chocolate monkey on a peppermint bark tree...with a lab coat on donning pink cotton candy insignia.

Stay tuned...

Baking Adventure 13: Vanilla Macarons With Beurre Noisette Buttercream

2010-07-11T00:03:00.000-07:00

Did you know that I was able to hear the pitter-patter of little feet today? That's right! My raw, infant macaron circlets quickly graduated to toddler status once a little bit of time and heat love was applied to them.

I took the plunge and finally made macarons at home. I've made them several times in workshops, but this was my first domestic try. I think many bakers, whether they are seasoned, somewhat experienced, professional, or brand-spanking new to the game, fear making these small, wondrous, French treats. The recipe is oh so simple, but a number of things can go wrong in the preparation stage, especially if the recipe calls for a more complex flavor profile.

Chocolate macarons, for example, are notoriously moody and said to be the hardest to make. They crack often, oven doors must be propped open so that they develop just right, and many people often burn them because of the camouflage nature of their dark coloring.

Macarons are quite the expensive sweet fare in bakeshops all across the globe. In North America, macarons individually range from $1.40 to $3.00, depending on extra special ingredients added to them, and their size -- from mini, to standard, to big round whoppers that resemble miniature pastry hamburgers with creamy dessert "patties."

Almond flour is the main ingredient in macarons that makes these treats pricey, regardless of the inclusion of any other specialty ingredients. I also think the price is adjusted for the level of elegant precision that goes into making them. After all, making perfect-looking macarons is a science and an art.

There are so many parfums (flavors) that I can make macarons in, but I decided to stick with a basic flavor in my baking adventure. That was vanilla. They are the simplest to make and are great paired with any filling flavor. At first I was going to make salted caramel filling because I love the stuff, but I decided to hold off and use my own beurre noisette (meaning "hazelnut butter" in French because of the toasty nutty aroma) buttercream as a filler. You can't go wrong pairing the addictive, nutty flavor of browned butter with the intensity of natural vanilla.

I am in need of a new food processor AND an electronic digital scale, so that increased the apprehension that I felt about making these. So many people have emphasized that they need to be made with sharp precision. Alas...using Pyrex measuring cups and whisking the dry mixture by hand was going to be as precise as I could be this night.

I found space challenging while making these. I needed enough room to pipe out several sheets of macarons and let them stick around on my kitchen island and counters for drying out, and I say this with a kitchen on the larger side. You can't just leave macaron batter sitting in a bowl for a long time. The meringue's weight will collapse onto itself, this taking away the batter's texture quality, so it all needs to be piped onto parchment sheets or silmats right away.

The first batch had some cracked results, but they came out with a great flavor and I had absolutely no problem with any of the batches sticking to my parchment paper. They came off effortlessly and cleanly. I guess I can be proud of such an outcome since stickiness is a common complaint for many domestic, would-be macaron masters.

Anyway, the following batches were smoother results with clean tops and a nice eggshell coloring that varied only slightly between each macaron coque (coque is the word for the macaron shells). In utter baker's joy, I was able to see the development of little feet on each macaron and they all had that distinctive texture combination of crispy outer shell and chewy, rich center. That's just how I like them.

I will be making more macarons this weekend as I had tons of fun making these and my addiction for them has increased (if you can believe it), so there will be more photos. The batches I made are already gone! Everyone loved them.

Here is the recipe for the vanilla macarons:

Vanilla Macarons with Beurre Noisette Buttercream

adapted from Gourmandise Desserts / Clemence De Lutz Gossett

2 cups of almond flour

2 cups of powdered sugar

6 egg whites (room temperature)

1 cup of baker's sugar (super fine white sugar)

1 tablespoon of vanilla bean paste / vanilla extract

Crack 6 eggs and separate the whites. Leave egg whites out to reach room temperature. They can be left out just until they reach room temp., overnight, or for a day. Keep them covered if they are left out for a longer time period.
Blend the almond flour and powdered sugar into a food processor for a few pulses or use a whisk by hand in a bowl. (I did the latter until there were no clumps and disparate spots in the dry mix)

Use a metal or glass bowl to begin beating your egg whites. Beat until soft peak stage and then slowly add in the baker's sugar.

Add the vanilla bean paste or extract and continue to beat the egg whites until the meringue forms stiff peaks.
Fold the dry almond-sugar mixture in 3 parts into the meringue. Fold just until the macaron batter resembles a thick magma-looking texture and can form "ribbons" by letting the batter drop back into itself with a spatula spoon. However, make sure the almond-sugar mixture is loosely but thoroughly incorporated but not over-folded into the meringue (Yeah, this is an area where you can screw up by not getting the proper texture. You can wind up over-folding or under-folding rather easily).

Take out parchment paper and fit sheets onto a large baking tray and begin piping out the meringue mixture into even circles (I eyed as I piped, but you can be more precise by creating circle templates and marking your parchment paper on the reverse side).
Let the circlets sit out for 30 minutes to an hour so that a soft "skin" can develop on top.

Pre-heat the oven to 325. Turn the oven down to 300 after the macarons are in for a few minutes. Let them bake for a total of 12-15 minutes. Keep a watch on them as they bake quickly, so that they don't burn. Good luck on seeing any feet develop!
Take them out and let them cool for 10 minutes and begin filling them with any kind of filling you desire. The best fillings are ganaches, buttercreams, jams, and caramels.

Beurre Noisette Buttercream

4 cups of powdered sugar

5 oz. of butter

1 vanilla bean or 2.5 teaspoons of vanilla bean paste *

6 Tablespoons of heavy cream

Brown the butter in a saucepan. (*You can slice open a vanilla bean, scrape out the seeds and place the entire pod in the browning butter to infuse a strong vanilla flavor)
In a bowl combine your sugar and cream. If you chose brown the butter by itself, then add the vanilla bean paste or extract with the sugar and cream.
Pour the hot browned butter into sugar-cream mixture and beat until a smooth consistency.
Spoon dabs of buttercream onto macarons.


Cocktail-inspired cupcakes from Sweets & Treats. It was definitely happy hour!