Ipso Fatto

Happy Chinese New Year!: Green-Tea Fortune Cookies

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 13:46:00 +0000

Earlier this week, I saw that Shelley at Franish Nonspeaker had great results with Joanne Chang's recipe for Green-Tea Fortune Cookies. About ten years ago, I tried a recipe for fortune cookies that was a colossal disaster -- the almond cookies were not even edible, much less foldable into the distinctive fortune cookie shape. Reading about the green tea recipe got me interested in fortune cookies again, as well as giving me a sudden wave of guilt about not doing anything to observe the Chinese New Year. It dawned on me that it's a little odd that I bake for Rosh Hashanah, even though I'm not Jewish, and yet don't bake for the Chinese New Year, even though I am Asian. I didn't feel too bad about the fact that fortune cookies aren't actually a Chinese food -- after all, Asians don't exactly have a strong tradition of baked goods, so there isn't really a large repertoire of desserts to choose from.

It only takes a couple of minutes to make the batter for these cookies -- you just whisk together egg whites, sugar, melted butter, flour, and matcha powder. You chill the batter for an hour, after which it has a lovely thick texture such that it is not runny at all, but easily spreadable. I used a #30 scoop (roughly 2 tablespoons) to drop the batter on a silpat, and then used an offset spatula to spread it into 6-inch diameter circles. This was pretty easy to do freehand. However, since the circles of batter were so large, I could only fit three on a cookie sheet. I baked the cookies for 12 minutes, after which I used a large offset spatula to free the cookies from the silpat, folded them in half, and made the crease in the middle by pulling the cookies over the rim of a coffee mug. It took me about 3 or 4 tries to get the technique down, but after that, I was surprised at how easy it was to make beautiful-looking fortune cookies.

One problem I encountered when folding the cookies is that they cooled very quickly. So much so that if I pulled a pan of three cookies out of the oven, in the few seconds that it took me to remove the first cookie and fold it, the other two remaining cookies would have already started to harden and thus would crack at the edges by the time I got around to folding them. The workaround I developed was to take only one cookie off of the silpat at a time, and then immediately return the sheet with the remaining cookies back to the oven so that they would stay warm and pliable until I could get to them. While this ended up working out just fine, it was time consuming -- given the baking and folding time, I could only make three fortune cookies about every 14 minutes or so.

Given that you start out with a 6-inch diameter cookie, the folded fortune cookie is much larger than what you encounter in a Chinese restaurant. I placed the freshly folded cookies in a muffin tin to help hold their shape until they cooled -- and as you can see in the above picture, they are huge (that's a standard-size muffin tin). I thought that these cookies were fabulous. Sweet, crispy, delicate, with a lovely (but not overpowering) green tea flavor. Tom said that the green color made them look like "hippie" fortune cookies, and that I could make a killing selling them in Santa Cruz or Berkeley if I filled them with hippie fortunes.

I did not have time to actually compose and print out fortunes to insert into the cookies, so unfortunately, they were empty. I personally love the little thrill of cracking open a fortune cookie to read the message inside. In my life, I have received two fortunes that I think were truly perfect for me. The first was in college, when I was a coxswain for the crew team. The night before our first regatta, I went out for Chinese food with some other girls from the crew team and received the fortune, "Your place in the path of life is in the driver's seat." And the second, which is actually quite absurd in its specificity, but nonetheless my favorite of all time, is pictured below:

Needless to say, I know that that there will be a nice cake somewhere in my near future. Happy Chinese New Year!

Recipe: "Green-Tea Fortune Cookies," by Joanne Chang of Flour Bakery, available from Food and Wine.

My Cake Has a New Set of Clothes: Grasshopper Cake

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 13:55:00 +0000

While trying to pick a cake to make for my friend Dorothy's birthday, I was browsing through Baked: New Frontiers in Baking, and I came across a recipe that looked awfully familiar. The cookbook's "Grasshopper Cake" is a chocolate layer cake with mint chocolate ganache and mint buttercream. I immediately recognized that the chocolate cake is the same cake in the "Chocolate Coffee Cake with Dark Chocolate Ganache" recipe from Baked Explorations: Classic American Desserts Reinvented -- because I just made the chocolate coffee cake (a chocolate layer cake filled and frosted with coffee buttercream and topped off with a layer of dark chocolate ganache and some chocolate-covered espresso beans) a couple of weeks ago.

I thought the chocolate coffee cake was fantastic, and was eager to see how the cake would taste when paired with mint instead of coffee. At Baked Bakery, the grasshopper cake is a seasonal cake that is available only in the spring and summer -- but it seemed appropriate to enjoy the cool flavor of mint in the dead of winter (and the bakery does, after all, sell a similar "Wintermint" chocolate cake in the winter).

The chocolate cakes from the two recipes are exactly the same. They are made with butter, shortening, sugar, dark brown sugar, eggs, vanilla, flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cocoa powder, sour cream, and hot water. Even the buttercream recipes for the two cakes are almost identical -- a cooked base of flour, sugar, milk, and cream to which you add butter and flavoring. The only difference is that to make the coffee buttercream, you flavor the frosting with vanilla and coffee extract; to make the mint buttercream for the grasshopper cake, you use mint extract and creme de menthe instead. I happen to have a bottle of clear creme de menthe instead of the mouthwash-green variety (I bought it to make the grasshopper bars from Baked Explorations), and while I briefly considered using artificial coloring to make the buttercream a light green color, I just left it alone.

This cake is filled not only with the mint buttercream, but also a bit of mint chocolate ganache (made from dark chocolate, cream, mint extract, and creme de menthe). To assemble the cake, you level the layers, place the first layer on a serving platter, spread on a little ganache, briefly refrigerate the cake until the ganache sets, and then spread on some buttercream before adding the next layer. You repeat the process with the second layer, and then add the final layer and frost the entire thing in buttercream.

The mint buttercream recipe for this cake is actually 1.5 times the recipe for the coffee buttercream in the chocolate coffee cake, because you are supposed to use the extra buttercream to fill eight chocolate sandwich cookies and use them to decorate the cake. No recipe is provided for the chocolate wafer cookies -- the cookbook suggests Newman's Own, Nabisco, or homemade. I happened to have some unfilled faux-reo cookies in the freezer (I baked a batch a couple of weeks ago to make the cookie crust for a chocolate caramel cheesecake, and I froze the leftovers), so I filled them with mint buttercream. But the size of my mint faux-reos was a little large in proportion to the diameter of the cake, and I decided that putting them on the cake would look awkward. I ended up just serving the cookies on the side.

Instead, I garnished the cake with the leftover mint chocolate ganache. Because I applied the ganache with a pastry bag and star tip, from a distance, the cake looked like it was decorated with chocolate chips. I had plenty of ganache to write "Happy Birthday Dorothy" on the cake, but my cake writing skills are terrible. I decided I should not even attempt putting on a message, lest I mess up the otherwise attractive cake.

Since I left the buttercream its natural off-white color, I decided to use light green candles as an indication of the cake flavor. It's a good looking cake. It's a good tasting cake. I personally prefer the coffee buttercream version of this cake, but the mint was refreshing, and the buttercream and ganache did not taste boozy at all. However, I don't think the ganache used between the layers added much to the cake, either taste-wise, or visually (although I do think the color contrast provided by the ganache using for decorating was nice).

I wish I could say this cake was enjoyed by all, but if you look closely at the photo above, that blurry boy behind the cake is Dorothy's five-year old son Alexander, who didn't like the cake or mint faux-reos at all and was a bit nonplussed that his honorary aunt bought over desserts that he didn't want to eat. I should mention that Alexander's little brother Liam had no such hangups, and he quickly devoured his tiny piece of cake and persistently asked for more; Alexander had dried apricots for dessert instead. Ah, Alexander -- the boy who likes whitefish salad and vegetables but doesn't like cake, frosting, or chocolate. He's definitely my toughest customer, but I will continue to try to win him over!

Recipe: "Grasshopper Cake," from Baked: New Frontiers in Baking, by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito.

Previous Posts:

"My New Cake Crush: Chocolate Coffee Cake with Dark Chocolate Ganache," January 14, 2012.
"Baked Sunday Mornings: Grasshopper Bars," August 14, 2011.

I Liked It and I Put a Ring on It: Chocolate Bavarian Torte

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 13:36:00 +0000

My friend Jim and I have had lunch together almost every week for the last ten years. We have a pretty set routine; there are only three restaurants in our regular rotation, and our lunch orders are fairly predictable. But last week was Restaurant Week in D.C., and so we did something we almost never do at lunch -- we ordered dessert. Jim, being the chocolate cake fan that he is, ordered a double fudge cake. It was one of the worst chocolate cakes that I've ever tasted, completely lacking flavor. Since Jim and his wife Colleen were kind enough to invite us over to their house for dinner a few days later, I decided that I should make them a nice chocolate cake.

I had the perfect cake in mind. Last week as I was browsing recipes to select some cakes for a retirement party, I became interested in making the recipe for "Chocolate Bavarian Torte" from The SoNo Baking Company Cookbook. However, I was missing a critical piece of equipment -- an 8-inch cake ring. The cake ring I ordered from Amazon.com arrived too late for the retirement party, but just in time to make the torte for Jim and Colleen!

The reason I wanted to make this torte is because it's just gorgeous. There are two full-page photos in the cookbook showcasing this sophisticated three-layer chocolate cake, filled and covered with chocolate mousse, topped with a thin sheet of chocolate ganache. You need a cake ring to make this recipe because there is a layer of mousse not just between each layer of cake, but also all the way around the sides of the torte.

You bake the chocolate sponge cake recipe (flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt, eggs, vanilla, melted butter, buttermilk, and brewed coffee) in two 9-inch round pans. Even though the recipe makes two 9-inch cakes, you are supposed to only need one for the torte, split into three layers. I had a problem with my cakes coming out slightly underdone, even though I baked them a little beyond the specified time range. As a result, the top portion of each cake was unusable; the top of each undercooked cake stuck and came off when I unmolded and inverted the cakes to cool. So having an extra cake came in pretty handy, as I had to cut my three layers from what remained of the two cakes.

You use the 8-inch cake ring like a big cookie cutter to stamp out a circle of cake from one of the 9-inch diameter layers. You cut the other two cake layers into 7-inch circles (easy if you happen to have a 7-inch cake ring as well). After you cut the rounds of cake and make a chocolate mousse (from water, gelatin, egg yolks, sugar, milk, vanilla bean, chocolate, cocoa, salt, and heavy cream), you are ready to assemble the torte.

To put the torte together, you put an 8-inch cardboard cake circle into the bottom of the cake ring and then put the 8-inch round layer of cake on top of it. You pour a layer of chocolate mousse over the cake. Then you center a 7-inch layer of cake on top of the mousse, and pour more mousse on top of and around the layer. You follow with the final 7-inch cake layer and more mousse, and then freeze the torte overnight. Once it's frozen, you spread on a thin layer of chocolate ganache (chocolate, heavy cream, honey, salt, and vanilla), which sets immediately on the frozen layer of mousse underneath. You remove the torte from the cake ring by wetting a kitchen towel with hot water, wringing it out, and wrapping it around the cake ring to warm up the mousse... and voila! You get a torte with a layer of chocolate cake on the bottom, only smooth chocolate mousse visible all around the sides, and chocolate ganache on top.

The torte pictured in the cookbook has some additional ganache piped onto the top using a pastry bag and a star tip, but I didn't have a lot of ganache left over, and this step just seemed unnecessary -- it still looks quite professional even without any additional decoration. When it came time to transport the torte to Jim and Colleen's house, I wasn't quite sure how I could do this without having the sides of the torte smash into a cake carrier or cake box. I eventually figured out that I could drop the torte into the bottom of a 10-inch diameter pie pan (the flat portion of the pie pan was the perfect size to fit the 8-inch torte), so that the sloped sides of the pan acted like a spacer that would keep the sides of the torte from touching the sides of the cake carrier.

The torte sliced cleanly, and the cut slices were even more beautiful than I had envisioned. The layers of cake and mousse were even and level, and the ganache was flawless. This torte was quite tasty. I used only 72% chocolate for the mousse and ganache, because that's all I had on hand, and the torte overall was not very sweet. The cake itself was very chocolatey and moist, although it was quite dense. I think that I prefer the lighter texture of the cake from the Baked Explorations Chocolate Coffee Cake -- although I appreciate that this torte is likely more manageable (in terms of assembly) if you have a firmer cake, since the layers are so thin. While the cake and mousse are quite satisfying, I think the real reason to make this torte is to admire the its good looks! This is definitely a dessert that will impress.

Recipe: "Chocolate Bavarian Torte," from The SoNo Baking Company Cookbook: The Best Sweet and Savory Recipes for Every Occasion, by John Barricelli.

Baked Sunday Mornings: Pecan Tassies

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 06:37:00 +0000

This week's assignment for Baked Sunday Mornings is Pecan Tassies. Let me say up front that I am not the right person to evaluate this recipe. As I have noted before, pecan pie happens to be my absolute least favorite kind of pie. I like pecans, but I just can't stand the gooey filling in pecan pie. The flavor, the texture, the cloying sweetness... I don't find any part of it appealing. Needless to say, I didn't have high hopes for this recipe, since a pecan tassie is just a tiny pecan pie.

At least the recipe was very simple, especially for one from Baked Explorations. The crust is simply a mixture of butter, cream cheese, sugar, and flour. The filling is a mixture of eggs, brown sugar, vanilla, salt and pecans. You just press the crust into miniature muffin tins, sprinkle in a few pecans, pour in the pie filling, and bake.

Not surprisingly, I did not enjoy these at all. The crust was fine, but I did not care for the filling. I also was not a fan of the messy crust that resulted from pressing the dough into the muffin tins -- the tassies did not have a uniform or neat appearance, and that is the kind of thing that bothers a Type A person like me.

But as I said before, I cannot fairly judge a pecan tassie. Someone who is a fan of pecan pie might really enjoy these -- and they certainly are quick and easy to make. So I wouldn't try to discourage anyone else from giving the recipe a try!

Recipe: "Pecan Tassies," from Baked Explorations: Classic American Desserts Reinvented, by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito, recipe available here at Baked Sunday Mornings.

My New Cake Crush: Chocolate Coffee Cake with Dark Chocolate Ganache

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 19:58:00 +0000

Earlier this week I made a few cakes for a retirement party, and out of the three new cake recipes I tried, one truly blew me away -- the three-tiered beauty of a chocolate cake with coffee buttercream and chocolate ganache from Baked Explorations. One of the the party organizers had asked me to make a sheet cake, but I decided to go the layer cake route, since I always think that layer cakes are more festive. Maybe it's just me, but when I see a sheet cake, I think "grocery store bakery," but when I see a layer cake, I think "special occasion."

The "classic chocolate cake" for the recipe is made with butter, shortening, sugar, dark brown sugar, eggs, vanilla, flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cocoa powder, sour cream, and water. You divide the batter into three 8-inch pans for baking. When the cake is cooled, you level the layers and then fill and frost the cake with a coffee buttercream. This buttercream is typical of those from Baked; the base is made from flour, sugar, cream, and milk that you heat on the stove until the mixture boils and thickens. You beat the resulting mixture until it's cooled, and then incorporate softened butter and flavoring (in this case, vanilla extract and coffee extract). The buttercream ended up the light brown color of a latte, due to the large amount (3 tablespoons) of coffee extract.

After you frost the cake, you top it off with a layer of chocolate ganache, made from dark chocolate, butter, and corn syrup. The recipe makes a lot of ganache, such that even though I poured on several coats, letting drips fall over the sides (the method specified in the recipe), I had more than I could possibly have used. The final touches were a ring of chocolate-covered espresso beans on top and some chocolate sprinkles around the bottom outer edge.

Even though it's only eight inches in diameter, this cake is huge. Like the Baked Explorations Caramel Apple Cake, the fact that it's three layers makes it very tall -- about 5 and 1/4 inches with the espresso beans, which means it won't quite fit into one of my standard cake boxes, which are only 5-inches tall. The cake was also quite heavy. Out of curiosity, I put the finished cake on a scale, and it came in at 5 lbs., 14.75 ounces.

I really wish I had a picture of the sliced cake; it was just gorgeous. And this cake tastes every bit as good as it looks. The chocolate cake is insanely good -- very moist, tender, and light, yet deeply chocolatey. Since the cake has a lot of cocoa powder in it (3/4 cup) and I used a mix of dutch and black cocoa that has a very dark color, the cake was also very dark, essentially the same color as the chocolate ganache on top. And the buttercream? Awesome. I was surprised at how the coffee flavor was so lovely and didn't overwhelm the cake at all. The cooked Baked buttercreams have a lusciously rich, yet perfectly smooth and non-greasy texture that is absolute perfection. And the flavor combination of the chocolate cake with the coffee buttercream was heavenly. The chocolate ganache on top was not necessary, but a nice bonus.

As one of the party guests so aptly put it, the cake is "killer." It's also on the Baked Sunday Mornings schedule for March 25, 2012 -- but I don't think I'm going to wait that long before making this glorious cake again!

Recipe: "Chocolate Coffee Cake with Dark Chocolate Ganache," from Baked Explorations: Classic American Desserts Reinvented, by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito.

Blunt Force Chocolate: Mocha Cookies

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 01:32:00 +0000

After taking a couple of weeks off from baking after our holiday party, I decided to kick off my 2012 baking with a recipe for Mocha Cookies from Euro Pane Bakery that was featured in the Los Angeles Times' last Culinary SOS column of 2011.

I could tell just from reading the recipe that these cookies would be over-the-top chocolate. I made a double batch, which required almost four pounds (!) of chocolate, and only one cup of flour. The recipe ratios and method reminded me quite a bit of a Bon Appetit recipe for Giant Chocolate-Toffee Cookies that is a favorite of mine, since it produces marvelously chewy cookies.

Anyway, back to the mocha cookies. These are actually quite easy to make. You start by melting together butter and chocolate, and then setting the mixture aside to cool a bit. Meanwhile, you beat eggs, add sugar, add the melted chocolate and some brewed espresso, incorporate the dry ingredients (pastry flour, baking soda, salt), and then fold in dark chocolate chunks. I melted 72% chocolate for the batter, and chopped 54% chocolate for the chunks. I don't keep pastry flour on hand, so I used a 50-50 mixture of cake flour and White Lily all purpose flour. You chill the batter until it's firm enough to scoop. I used a #24 scoop and got exactly 72 cookies from the double batch of dough. The cookies puffed and cracked during baking, and some of the cookies ended up with a hollow space inside.

Not surprisingly, these cookies are chocolatey. Very chocolatey. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I thought they were too chocolatey. I wish I hadn't used 72% chocolate for the batter; I think I should have used something around 60% instead. Eating this cookie is a bit like getting clubbed over the head with chocolate. Apparently, a lot of people enjoy this sensation, as these cookies were very well received. However, I just thought that the flavor was disappointingly flat, even with the espresso flavor in the background. Also, while the cookies were crisp on the outside and moist on the inside, they did not have the uber-chewy texture of the giant chocolate-toffee cookie that I love so much. (As a side note, the flaky quality of the cookie's outer crust creates lots and lots of crumbs. You definitely need a plate to eat one of these.) Especially given how much chocolate this recipe requires, I don't imagine that I'll be making these cookies again.

Recipe: "Mocha cookies" from Euro Pane Bakery, recipe featured in the December 29, 2011, Los Angeles Times.

Previous Post: "A Cookie For the Road," June 22, 2008.

Baked Sunday Mornings: Stump de Noël

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 05:27:00 +0000

I am a bit embarrassed to say that I have never made a bûche de noël before, so I was a little nervous about trying the Stump de Noël recipe from Baked Explorations. The recipe looked a bit involved, and I decided to make the cake for our holiday party. I take a couple days off from work to do all of the party prep work, so that provided me with some extra time to devote to the project.

First, I made the buttercream frostings, since they must be chilled before the cake is assembled. To make the base buttercream, you whisk egg whites and sugar in a bowl set over simmering water until the sugar dissolves. Then you whip the mixture along with vanilla until glossy, and slowly incorporate room temperature butter. You mix a portion of the buttercream with some melted chocolate to make chocolate buttercream, and incorporate malt powder and crushed malt balls into the remainder to make malt buttercream.

The chocolate cake is made from egg yolks, sugar, melted chocolate, espresso powder dissolved in hot water, vanilla, egg whites beaten with cream of tartar, melted butter, flour, cocoa, and salt. You divide the cake batter between two large jelly roll pans and bake. Once the cakes are baked and cooled, you turn them out of the pans, frost each cake with malt buttercream, and then cut each cake in half lengthwise. You take one of the long strips of cake and roll it up, and continue adding on the additional strips of cake and rolling until you have a quite sizable 6-inch-tall roll (if you use the prescribed 12-inch by 17-inch cake pans, you will have 68 total inches of cake wrapped up in your finished cake roll!). I wish that I had trimmed the edges off of the cake, as they were a bit dry and cracked during rolling. During the rolling process, long vertical cracks appeared on the cake's surface, such that the outside of the cake roll bore a striking resemblance to the rough and furrowed texture of tree bark even before I frosted it. I frosted around the outside of the entire roll with the chocolate buttercream (but not the top, so the spiral would still be visible); there was just enough frosting to get the job done.

I meant to make the meringue mushrooms to go along with my stump, I really did... But I just got bogged down with all the other baking and cooking I had to do in advance of our holiday party and I ran out of time. I thought that the stump looked a little naked on the cake stand without any sort of adornment, so I sprinkled some extra walnut toffee crunch I had on hand around the base of the stump (I made the crunch for this frozen pumpkin mousse recipe). I thought it would more or less resemble dirt, and I was happy with the way the stump looked when I served it.

Party guests oohed and aahed over how pretty the cake was. I love the fact that the stump continues to look like a tree after it is sliced (the vertical stripes of frosting between the layers look like tree rings), and the slices of cake are absolutely beautiful -- neat layers of chocolate cake interspersed by thin lines of the malt buttercream frosting. (Okay, the picture above is not particularly neat, but I let my party guests serve themselves and they were not as concerned with cutting perfect slices to produce the ideal photo for my blog.) The best part is that the cake tasted as good as it looked! The chocolate cake was very moist and tender, with a rich chocolate flavor strongly accented with espresso. I thought that the chocolate and malt buttercreams were also very good, although I was a little surprised that it was difficult to detect the malt flavor -- perhaps this was because the layer of malt buttercream was so thin.

I liked this cake so much that I am planning to make it throughout the year, and not just at Christmastime. The stump is something truly special, and people who tasted it (or even just saw it) at our holiday party were still talking to me about it days afterwards. If you're looking for a showstopper holiday dessert, look no further!

Recipe: "Stump de Noël" from Baked Explorations: Classic American Desserts Reinvented, by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito, recipe available here at Baked Sunday Mornings.

Creamy Cold Chocolate: Frozen Chocolate Mousse Truffles

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 16:14:00 +0000

I decided to make several frozen items for our holiday party this year, mostly so I could cut down on the amount of baking work I would have to do. One of the items on the frozen menu was a frozen chocolate mousse truffle, a recipe I chose because it could be made up to a month in advance.

The centers of these truffles are essentially a frozen custard. You whisk hot cream into a mixture of sugar and egg yolks, heat the mixture until it's thickened, and then incorporate chocolate and amaretto. You freeze the mixture for several hours, until it is firm enough to shape. When it's firm, you shape the truffle centers (I used a #60 scoop) and roll them in chopped toasted almonds.

I was delighted at how well these kept in the freezer. The centers have the dense but creamy texture of a good chocolate gelato, and they were not too hard to eat, even straight out of the freezer. They also maintained their shape well, and could be kept at room temperature for a decent amount of time without melting. The flavor of the center was a lusciously rich chocolate, with a touch of amaretto. The toasted almonds on the outside added the perfect bit of crunch.

These truffles are quite easy to make, and it's amazing to me that the centers have such a wonderfully creamy texture without the need to turn the custard in an ice cream maker. To me, these truffles are better than a comparable non-frozen chocolate truffle, because of the beautiful texture of the centers. Plus, you can't beat a recipe that can be made well in advance and stored in the freezer, so that you can just pull out some truffles whenever company stops by... or whenever you're in the mood for a cold creamy treat!

Recipe: "Frozen Chocolate Mousse Truffles," from epicurious.com.

More Bacon Makes Everything Better: Bacon and Cashew Caramel Corn

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Sat, 24 Dec 2011 06:24:00 +0000

As I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, I tried out quite a few caramel popcorn recipes to decide which variety I would serve at our holiday party. In the end, the choice was easy -- Colt & Gray's recipe for Bacon and Cashew Caramel Corn earned rave reviews, and I love the fact that it offers something different from a standard caramel corn recipe.

To make this caramel corn, you cook some chopped bacon, drain and cool it, and toss the bacon along with the popcorn, cashews, salt, and cayenne pepper. You then pour on some caramel that is made from sugar, water, corn syrup, cream, and oolong tea (you basically steep an oolong tea bag in the cream before adding the cream to the caramel). After a little time in the oven and some stirring to make sure that all of the popcorn is nicely coated, you cool the caramel corn and break it up into chunks.

I've made this caramel corn a few times, with several minor adjustments to the recipe. First, based on comments in several of the recipe reviews, I doubled the amounts of both the bacon and the cashews, and I also used toasted cashews instead of raw nuts. The first time I made the caramel corn, I decided that there wasn't enough caramel to coat all of the popcorn, and for subsequent batches I made 150% of the caramel recipe. Finally, through all of my caramel corn making experiences, I have discovered that no matter which recipe I'm working with, it's much easier to put the popcorn (and whatever other ingredients are required) directly into my large nonstick turkey roasting pan, and to pour the caramel over the popcorn in the pan. The high sides of the roasting pan make it easy to deal with a lot of popcorn (I can make double batches of this recipe, for instance), and the nonstick surface makes it unnecessary to line the pan with parchment or foil.

This caramel corn is awesome. The cayenne gives it a strong spicy kick, and the bacon and cashews contribute loads of flavor and texture. In particular, when the bacon is coated with the caramel, it is a crunchy bit of candied salty-sweet heaven. I seriously considered skipping the popcorn and just serving candied bacon at our party, because it is so tasty. Founding Farmers restaurant in D.C. offers cinnamon-brown sugar glazed "bacon lollies" as an appetizer; I think the caramel-covered bacon in this popcorn is even better.

This caramel corn definitely has a more adult flavor profile than the run-of-the-mill variety, especially because of the spice from the cayenne. I know some people feel that bacon is becoming overly trendy these days, but its contribution to this caramel corn is nothing short of inspired.

Recipe: "Bacon and Cashew Caramel Corn," from Colt & Gray, available on epicurious.com.

Previous Post: "Break Out the Holiday Tins: Caramel Popcorn with Peanuts and Chocolate," December 10, 2011.

Ipso Fatto Instant Photos and Update: Springerle

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 13:33:00 +0000

After my first attempt at making springerle last month turned out to be a success, I made another batch with some smaller (and more practical) molds I bought from House on the Hill, an "Oval Lilly of the Valley" mold (I also bought a custom oval cutter so that I wouldn't have to cut out ovals freehand!), and a rectangular elephant mold. I painted the elephants with some gold luster dust, and was quite pleased with the way that both turned out.

Tom and I also just tried the lemon springerle I baked over six weeks ago and had stashed away so I could see how they would taste after they aged a bit. Springerle are supposed to improve with age, and in fact, many recipes specify that an aging period is required before the springerle are edible. Right after baking, I thought that the springerle were delicious -- firm, but not overly dry, and I loved the strong lemon flavor. After six weeks, I didn't like the cookies at all. They were much, much drier (it took considerable effort to break off a piece of cookie to taste, which was not a problem I had when they were freshly baked), and the bright lemon flavor had faded considerably. Tom, on the other hand, said that he really liked the aged cookies and preferred their drier texture.

I'm just going to have to disagree with Tom on this one. I think I will stick to serving these springerle freshly made, or at least within a week or two of baking.

Recipe: "Nini's Perfection Springerle Cookies" from House on the Hill.

Previous Post: "The Wait Is Just Beginning: Springerle," November 13, 2011.

This Dessert is a Ball: Pistachio Marzipan Truffles

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 04:07:00 +0000

I'm happy to report that the menu Tom and I came up with for our holiday party last weekend worked out wonderfully! I took the easy route with baked goods, limiting the baking mostly to familiar recipes that I have made many times before -- snickerdoodles, salted chocolate chip cookies, salted caramel brownies, ginger chip cookies, and faux-reos. (I did make one new cake recipe, but I'll post about that later!) Keeping the baking responsibilities simple gave me enough time to try out a bunch of new recipes for the party, including some hot hors d'oeuvres (bacon bites and sausage and feta phyllo triangles for the meat eaters; Dorie Greenspan's easy mustard batons for the vegetarians), a selection of frozen sweets (frozen chocolate mousse truffles, frozen pumpkin mousse with walnut-toffee crunch, and frozen mocha rum parfaits), and a recipe I picked out from Nick Maglieri's Chocolate cookbook: pistachio marzipan truffles.

I chose this recipe not only because the truffles can be made up to a week in advance and stored at room temperature (refrigerator and freezer space are valuable commodities in the days leading up to and during the party), but also because the headnote describes the truffles as a "pared-down version of a rich Viennese confection called a Mozartkugel." I love Mozartkugel. Eleven years ago when I first started working as a lawyer in D.C., my co-workers introduced me to Cafe Mozart, located just a block away from our office. The deli associated with the restaurant stocks an excellent selection of German chocolate, including Mozartkugel ("Mozart ball") by Reber.

The Reber Mozartkugel I am accustomed to (there are other companies that manufacture Mozartkugel, with varying recipes) is described on the company's website as a confection "filled with pistachio marzipan made out of fresh green pistachios, almonds and hazelnut nougat enrobed with delicious milk chocolate and plain chocolate." The Nick Maglieri stripped-down version is a chocolate ganache center, surrounded by pistachio marzipan, coated in chocolate, rolled in chopped pistachios.

The chocolate ganache center is made by bringing whipping cream to a boil, whisking it into chopped chocolate, and then adding almond extract, butter, and corn syrup. You cool the mixture to 80 degrees, or until thickened. For the pistachio marzipan, you grind pistachios in the food processor until reduced to a paste, and then add in almond paste, powdered sugar, and corn syrup; you knead the resulting dough until smooth. You divide the marzipan into several pieces, form each piece into a long rope that you flatten to about 2 inches wide, pipe a strip of chocolate ganache along the length of the marzipan, and then bring the edges of the marzipan up around the chocolate and pinch it closed so that you end up with a long tube of marzipan with ganache in the center. You cut the tube into pieces, roll each piece into a ball, and then dip the truffle centers into chocolate and roll them in chopped pistachios.

I had significant difficulty working with the marzipan -- it was dry and quite crumbly, so it required a lot of brute force to enclose the ganache in the middle. The centers of these truffles ended up being more of a mottled mixture of ganache and marzipan, instead of a chocolate center neatly surrounded by marzipan. But no matter, once I dipped the truffles in chocolate and coated them in pistachios, all imperfections were hidden from view. These truffles kept beautifully at room temperature.

I loved these. If you're a fan of pistachios and almonds and chocolate, there's nothing not to like. The truffles are rich, flavorful, and have a wonderful mix of textures - smooth ganache, chewy marzipan, firm chocolate coating, and crunchy pistachios. They did end up being much more work than I had anticipated, due to the difficulty of working with the marzipan. But it was worth it!

Recipe: "Pistachio Marzipan Truffles," from Chocolate: From Simple Cookies to Extravagant Showstoppers, by Nick Maglieri.

Previous Post: "The Best Things Come in Small Packages: Chocolate-Pistachio Marzipan Spirals," November 1, 2010.

Baked Sunday Mornings: Buckeyes

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Sun, 18 Dec 2011 14:23:00 +0000

This week's assignment for Baked Sunday Mornings is a recipe that I made a few months ago and didn't have time to make again -- buckeyes. You can read my prior post about them here. The bottom line is that I thought they were pretty terrific.

Recipe: "Buckeyes," from Baked Explorations: Classic American Desserts Reinvented, by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito, recipe available here at Baked Sunday Mornings.

Previous Post: "Long Live Peanut Butter and Chocolate!: My Own Buckeye Battle Cry," May 19, 2011.

Break Out the Holiday Tins: Caramel Popcorn with Peanuts and Chocolate

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Sun, 11 Dec 2011 00:04:00 +0000

A few weeks ago, I got the idea to serve caramel popcorn at our upcoming holiday party; it seemed like it would be festive addition to the menu. I'm not sure when or why caramel popcorn became such a popular holiday gift, but when I was growing up, I used to love the ubiquitous holiday tins of popcorn -- usually divided into thirds, with buttered, cheese, and caramel popcorn -- that materialized at our house each Christmas. I've never made caramel popcorn before, so I bought a hot air popper and some popcorn, and lined up a few recipes to try.

I've tried five caramel corn recipes in the last week (and unfortunately I have the caramel burns to prove it). Three were relatively straightforward, and while they all produced tasty caramel corn, I wouldn't say that they were anything to write home about: this recipe from the 1991 Los Angeles Times (which the newspaper declared one of its top ten recipes for 1991); a Gourmet recipe for caramel corn clusters; and a Gourmet recipe for maple caramel corn (as this recipe requires 12 oz. of maple syrup for every eight cups of popcorn, making the quantities of popcorn I would require for our party would be insanely expensive). However, two other caramel corn recipes were particularly noteworthy, one of which was the recipe for "Caramel Popcorn with Peanuts and Chocolate" from Baked Explorations.

This recipe is scaled to produce a lot of popcorn -- 24 cups! -- but I happen to think that's fantastic. To make the caramel, you heat butter, dark brown sugar, corn syrup, and molasses on the stove until it reaches 240 degrees. Then you take it off the heat, stir in salt, baking soda, and vanilla, and pour the hot syrup over the popcorn in a large roasting pan (I've found my large nonstick turkey roasting pan to be hugely helpful in caramel popcorn production), add in some peanuts, and stir to coat the popcorn and peanuts with the caramel. You bake the popcorn at 250 degrees for 15 minutes, stir it to make sure it's evenly coated, bake it for another 20 minutes, and then take it out and spread the popcorn on lined sheet pans to cool for a bit. Then you drizzle over tempered chocolate (you are supposed to use both milk chocolate and dark chocolate, but I went for dark only), and once the chocolate sets, you can break up the popcorn into chunks.

This popcorn is beautiful and very tasty -- sweet, nutty, chocolately, crunchy -- and the chocolate makes it positively decadent. Also, I tasted the popcorn before I drizzled on the chocolate, and the caramel in this recipe is outstanding. It was deeply flavorful, and it definitely stood out from the caramel in the other popcorn recipes I mentioned above.

However, having to temper the chocolate is a huge, time-consuming pain. Plus, the chocolate melts onto your fingers while you eat it, making it a bit messy (I couldn't help having visions of little kids wiping their chocolate-stained fingers all over my living room furniture). So, while this popcorn would make a fantastic holiday gift and I would happily make it again, I don't think it's the right recipe for our holiday party. And as I alluded to above, I found another caramel corn recipe that is quite special... stay tuned, I hope to post about it next week!

Recipe: "Caramel Popcorn with Peanuts and Chocolate," from Baked Explorations: Classic American Desserts Reinvented, by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito.

Baked Sunday Mornings: Baked French Toast

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 16:17:00 +0000

A few weeks ago when we were in Shenandoah, it was the perfect opportunity to make the baked French toast from Baked Explorations -- since folks tend to sleep late when we're at the cabin, it's great that you can make this recipe the night before and just pop it in the oven in the morning. I doubled the recipe and made it in a 9-inch by 13-inch pan, using challah. You arrange slices of bread in a buttered pan, and then pour over a mixture of eggs, half-and-half, milk, vanilla, and cinnamon, letting the mixture soak overnight. The recipe says that in the morning, you should turn over each slice of bread to make sure that it's fully coated in the liquid. But my soaked challah was so soft that it was too fragile to turn. So, I just put the pan in the oven (skipping the step of adding sliced almonds because of a nut allergy), and baked it for 35 minutes.

While the French toast was in the oven, I made the raspberry sauce, which is simply raspberries cooked with sugar until they break down, strained, with a little bit of fresh lemon juice added in. I drizzled all of the sauce and some fresh raspberries over the pan of French toast before serving.

My slices of challah were all stuck together after baking, so instead of trying to separate out the individual slices for serving, I just cut the pan into rectangular slices, like it was a cake. The slices came out of the pan cleanly, with no sticking. I thought that this French toast was delicious. It was ultra creamy and had a lovely soft, custardy texture. Also, the raspberry sauce was outstanding, beautifully tart-sweet and brightly flavorful. No need for maple syrup here!

Best of all, this baked French toast was much easier to make than the pan-fried variety, and being able to assemble it the night before was a huge benefit. I would happily make this again, anytime!

Recipe: "Baked French Toast," from Baked Explorations: Classic American Desserts Reinvented, by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito, recipe available here at Baked Sunday Mornings.

Homey and Old-Fashioned: Applesauce Spice Bars

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 13:32:00 +0000

I have been trying to put together a menu for the annual holiday open house that Tom and I host each December -- it's coming up in a few short weeks and it takes a lot of planning to figure out what we should serve in light of all of the limiting variables: oven space, refrigerator space, freezer space, and most importantly, time, both before and during the party. So I've been reading through a lot of cookbooks lately looking for inspiration. In the process of doing this, I happened to flip by the recipe for "Applesauce Spice Bars" in Dorie Greenspan's Baking: From My Home to Yours. It so happens that just last week I was cleaning out the fridge and I debated whether or not the throw out a half-empty jar of unsweetened applesauce (still perfectly good, but we don't really eat applesauce -- I bought the jar for one of my attempts at making grapefruit jellies). I ended up saving it, and decided to put it to good use.

There is a photo of these bars in the cookbook, and to be honest, they don't look all that interesting. However, Dorie's headnote says, "Don't pass these up because they seem too simple and old-fashioned. They are homey, true, but they're also irresistibly good, the kind of sweet you can serve to both little kids and know-it-all adults."

Both the batter and glaze for these bars are made in a pot on the stove. To make the cake, you melt butter, add in brown sugar and stir until melted and smooth, and then remove the pan from the heat. Then you add in eggs, applesauce, vanilla, and liquor (optional -- I skipped it), fold in the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, allspice, and salt), and incorporate a chopped baking apple, pecans, and raisins (I used golden). You bake the bars, and while they cool, you make the glaze by cooking heavy cream, brown sugar, butter, and corn syrup on the stove, simmering the mixture (no thermometer needed) until it reduces to a thick caramel-like consistency. Then you add vanilla, and spread the glaze on the bars.

I liked the shiny appearance of the glaze, which was easy to spread while it was hot -- but I had to work fast to spread it in a thin layer before it cooled. The glaze was stiff enough that it did not drip, but it did not set hard enough that I could stack the bars.

I didn't love these bars -- they had the soft consistency of cake, which seemed odd, given that these aren't supposed to be a "cake." I guess I expect a "bar" to have a chewier texture. Also, I wasn't thrilled with the spice mix; I was hoping these would taste like apple pie, but they definitely did not. Finally, I thought that the glaze was a little too sweet. I did appreciate the different textures of the mix-ins, especially the raisins, which were my favorite part. Even though these bars were well received, I don't think I'll be making them again.

Recipe: "Applesauce Spice Bars," from Baking: From My Home to Yours, by Dorie Greenspan, available here on amazon.com.

Layer Cake Redemption: Black-and-White Chocolate Cake

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Wed, 23 Nov 2011 16:06:00 +0000

Just a few days after my only semi-successful effort at making the Baked Explorations Boston Cream Pie Cake, I needed to bake a cake for a birthday dinner. I looked in the "Celebration Cakes" section of Dorie Greenspan's Baking: From My Home to Yours, and I immediately noticed the photo of the "Black-and-White Chocolate Cake," because it reminded me of the Boston Cream Pie Cake. While the Boston Cream Pie Cake is supposed to be four layers of sponge cake filled with alternating layers of chocolate and vanilla pastry cream, the Black-and-White Chocolate Cake is four layers of yellow cake filled with alternating layers of chocolate pastry cream and white chocolate whipped cream.

Because the entire Black-and-White Chocolate Cake is frosted with white chocolate whipped cream, the cake structure from bottom up is as follows: cake, chocolate cream, cake, whipped cream, cake, chocolate cream, cake, whipped cream. Greenspan notes that "When the cake is cut, its look is simple and symmetrical." I debated whether this cake would be appealing to children (as there would be five children ages five and younger at the birthday dinner), but the decision was easy when I read the recipe headnote: "It would be hard to imagine a time, place, or an audience for which this cake wouldn't be right."

The cake is a yellow buttermilk cake, made from butter, sugar, eggs, vanilla, buttermilk, cake flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. You divide the batter between two 9-inch pans to bake, and I was highly alarmed when I took my cakes out of the oven and it looked like they had hardly risen at all. Each of my cakes was only 7/8 of an inch tall. I had a problem with the sponge cakes for my Boston Cream Pie Cake not rising sufficiently, and I was wondering if I was still trapped in some sort of flat layer cake purgatory. I debated whether I should even try dividing the layers, or if I should just bake another two cakes. My panic was interrupted by a moment of clarity as I studied the photo of the cake in the cookbook. In the pictured slice, the cake layers are exactly the same height as the filling layers. The recipe's directions for assembling the cake state that you only need about 1 cup of chocolate cream between layers. Since one cup of chocolate cream is not going to be very thick when spread across a 9-inch diameter cake, I realized that the cake layers must be very short if they are going to be the same height as the filling layers. So I decided to solider on, and I split my short cakes into even shorter cakes.

The chocolate pastry cream for this recipe is absolutely delicious -- decadently chocolately and lusciously thick, basically the best chocolate pudding I've ever had. It's made from milk, egg yolks, sugar, cornstarch, sugar, bittersweet chocolate, and butter. (Note: it's definitely tastier than the chocolate pastry cream from the Boston Cream Pie Cake recipe.)

To make the white chocolate whipping cream, you melt some white chocolate, add cream, and let the mixture cool completely. Then you whip more cream in a mixer and add the white chocolate mixture all at once, whipping until the mixture holds firm peaks. At least that's what you're supposed to do. My whipping cream broke, and it was not salvageable. I didn't have any more white chocolate on hand, so I couldn't make another attempt at the white chocolate whipping cream (even if I had had more chocolate, I wouldn't have had enough time to make another batch; the finished whipping cream is supposed to be chilled for at least 2 hours before filling and frosting the cake, and then the entire assembled cake is supposed to be refrigerated for at least 3 hours before serving). I debated what other frosting I might be able to substitute, and then I realized that since I had some King Arthur whipped cream stabilizer on hand, I could just whip another pint of heavy cream with some sugar, vanilla, and stabilizer. I knew that it would hold up just fine as a filling and frosting, without the need for additional chilling first.

Once I had my thin cake layers, pastry cream, and whipped cream ready, I assembled the cake easily enough. The only thing was that it looked awfully boring since it was simply covered in whipped cream. The recipe suggests decorating with dark and white chocolate shavings or curls, and I made dark chocolate cones. It was amazing how this small bit of decoration completely elevated the appearance of this cake to make it scream, "I'm special!!"

The profile of my sliced cake doesn't look anywhere near as nice as the slice pictured in the cookbook (Greenspan's is immaculately devoid of crumbs), but I was happy with the way the cake turned out, even with the failure of the white chocolate whipped cream. I tasted each component of the cake separately and thought that they were all terrific. To be honest, when eating the thin layers of cake, pastry cream, and whipped cream together, I thought that the flavors became slightly muddled. The amazing flavor of the pastry cream got a little lost, and this might be the odd case where the whole is less than the sum of its parts.

I also have to point out that my little friend Alexander took one bite of the cake, said he didn't like it, and then proceeded to eat oranges for dessert instead. However, at all of five years old, Alexander is probably the toughest baked goods customer I know, and everyone else -- kids and adults alike -- really enjoyed the cake. I'm going to chalk this one up in the win column. Especially coming off of a disappointing experience with my last layer cake, I do feel that this cake earned me at least some measure of layer cake redemption.

Recipe: "Black-and-White Chocolate Cake," from Baking: From My Home to Yours, by Dorie Greenspan.

Baked Sunday Mornings: Boston Cream Pie Cake

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Sun, 20 Nov 2011 15:28:00 +0000

This week's assignment for Baked Sunday Mornings is the "Boston Cream Pie Cake" -- a recipe with a name that is simultaneously both redundant (since a "Boston cream pie" is by definition a cake) and clarifying (since the "pie" part of the title might otherwise be misleading to someone who doesn't know that a Boston cream pie isn't actually a pie). The "Boston cream" formulation of a cake or doughnut with cream filling and chocolate frosting is so iconic that once when I was at a doughnut shop in Guadalajara, Mexico, I made a point of trying to describe -- in Spanish -- to the man behind the counter that I wanted the doughnut with cream filling and chocolate frosting, and he looked at me in confusion and said -- in English -- "Boston cream?"

The Baked boys have put a small twist on this classic, by adding some chocolate filling to the traditional vanilla filling. The recipe is intended to make a four layer cake, filled with alternating layers of chocolate and vanilla pastry cream filling, and topped with chocolate glaze. The cake is a hot milk sponge, made by whipping together eggs, sugar, and vanilla, folding in sifted dry ingredients (cake flour, baking powder, salt), and then incorporating a mixture of milk and butter that have been heated until the butter melts.

You divide the batter into two 8-inch cake pans and bake. Whenever I make layer cakes, I always weigh the pans before baking to make sure that I have divided the batter equally between the pans. So I know that I had precisely the same amount of batter in my two pans (well, plus or minus 5 grams, since my scale only measures in 5-gram increments). I must not have done a good job mixing the batter, because one of my cakes rose about 50% higher than the other one. Also, on the bottom of the short cake, there was a small milky layer (probably about 3mm) that looked like it didn't have enough flour incorporated into it, and I had to trim it off. You are supposed to divide each cake in half to create four layers for the final cake. I ended up splitting my tall cake into two layers, and trimming my short cake to match the height of the other two split layers -- so I only ended up only with a three-layer cake instead of four layers.

You have to make the vanilla and chocolate pastry creams in advance of making the cake, since they need to be refrigerated for at least four hours before using them. You make the vanilla pastry cream from egg yolks, sugar, salt, cornstarch, butter, and vanilla (you are supposed to add rum as well, but I skipped it). To make the chocolate pasty cream, you just mix melted dark chocolate into a portion of the vanilla cream. My pastry cream was very thick and set up quite firm almost immediately. After refrigerating it overnight, it kept the shape of the bowl it was in, and I had to whisk it pretty vigorously to get it to a spreading consistency. I'm not sure if adding the rum might have helped maintain a creamier texture, but at least the cream was so thick that I didn't have to worry about the it leaking out of the sides of the cake.

The chocolate glaze for the top of the cake is made from dark chocolate, cocoa powder, corn syrup, sugar, cream, salt, vanilla, and butter. My glaze set up quite nicely, such that it kept the shape of the design I swirled into the top. You are supposed to spread the glaze to the edges of the cake so that it drips down the sides, but mine was so thick that it was hard to get it to go down the sides. In retrospect, I wish I had just covered the top and forgotten about the sides.

By the time I finally got around to assembling the cake, I wasn't feeling particularly optimistic about it -- after all, I had clearly done something wrong mixing the sponge cake batter, and I was missing a whole layer. However, I was pleasantly surprised that this cake was pretty darn tasty. While the sponge cake was moist and had a nice tight crumb, it didn't have much flavor. Nonetheless, when eaten with the vanilla and chocolate pastry creams and chocolate glaze, the cake overall was delicious and very favorably received. The one thing I would change is to use a sweeter chocolate for the glaze. I used Ghiradelli 72% for both the pastry cream and glaze (the recipe specifies 60%-72%), and I thought that the glaze was a bit on the bitter side.

I would like to try making this cake again to see if I could actually get four cake layers and smoother pastry cream. But I was happy with my cake, even with all of its imperfections!

Recipe: "Boston Cream Pie Cake," from Baked Explorations: Classic American Desserts Reinvented, by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito, recipe available here at Baked Sunday Mornings.

Jim Says Goodbye to His Mid-Thirties: Devil's Food White-Out Cake

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 14:07:00 +0000

Tom and I spent last weekend in Shenandoah, on our annual cabin trip in honor of our friend Jim's birthday. Tom and I were responsible for making dinner on Saturday night -- which happened to be Jim's actual birthday, so of course I had to make a birthday cake. I wanted to bake a cake in advance and take it with us to the cabin, because I don't like having to do any serious baking anywhere other than my own kitchen, where I have all of my own familiar equipment. As I was browsing cake recipes, I saw that Dorie Greenspan's Devil's Food White-Out Cake can be made up to two days in advance. Plus, the cake is pictured on the cover of Greenspan's cookbook Baking: From My Home to Yours, so I have been interested in trying the recipe since I bought the cookbook several years ago.

The devil's food cake is made from butter, brown sugar, sugar, vanilla, melted bittersweet chocolate, buttermilk or whole milk, flour, cooca powder, baking soda, baking powder, salt, boiling water, and miniature chocolate chips. You divide the batter into two 8-inch pans, and after you bake and cool the cakes, you divide each cake into two layers. My cakes domed during baking, and after I leveled them, each cake was only 1.25 inches tall -- so after I divided the layers in half, they were quite thin. You only need three layers for the cake; the fourth layer is smushed into crumbs used to decorate the cake. (In retrospect, I could have made a four-layer cake, because the amount of cake I trimmed off to level the layers would have been sufficient to provide the crumbs for decorating.)

The cake is filled and frosted with a marshmallow frosting made by whipping egg whites, adding hot sugar syrup (sugar, water, and cream of tartar heated to 235 degrees) and vanilla, and running the mixer until the frosting is cool. After filling and frosting the cake, you press the crumbs into the frosting. At least I didn't have to worry about doing a crumb coat on this cake, since I knew that I would just be putting crumbs on the frosting anyway! Greenspan says that she prefers this cake at room temperature, but notes that some people prefer it cold, when the texture is more fudgy. I made the cake one day in advance, kept it chilled, and brought it to room temperature before serving.

This cake certainly is pretty, and it definitely has "celebration cake" written all over it. I appreciated the classic snack cake flavor combination of devil's food cake and marshmallow. However, I wasn't thrilled about the cake itself -- it was not as tender as I would have hoped (perhaps the cake texture would have been better if I had used buttermilk instead of milk to make to batter). Also, I personally did not like the miniature chocolate chips in the cake layers, but other people commented favorably on them.

I liked this cake and thought it was fitting for Jim's birthday celebration, but it wasn't a favorite. I couldn't help comparing this cake to the Baked Whiteout Cake, since they share the same name -- although the similarity ends there. Instead of Dorie's devil's food cake with marshmallow frosting combination, the Baked Whiteout Cake is vanilla cake with white chocolate frosting. I have to say that I prefer the Baked white-on-white version, although it obviously doesn't have the visual impact of the white-on-black devil's food variety.

In any case, many thanks to our friends Jim and Colleen for organizing the annual cabin trip and inviting us to be a part of it; Tom and I look forward to it all year. Colleen summed up the tradition perfectly: "Good Friends, Good Wine, Good Food, Good Times."

Recipe: "Devil's Food White-Out Cake," from Baking: From My Home to Yours, by Dorie Greenspan.

Previous Posts:

"Thank God for Vegetarians: Tomato and Onion Tart," November 14, 2010.
"White and Vanilla but Far from Ordinary: The Whiteout Cake," August 23, 2010.
"What I Learned at the Cabin This Year... Butternut Squash Tart = Good. Candles + Soufflé = Bad," November 9, 2009.
"Jim's Birthday Weekend at the Cabin," November 2, 2008.

The Wait Is Just Beginning: Springerle

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 02:02:00 +0000

At the height of summer, I purchased some baker's ammonia from King Arthur Flour, and I have been trying to find new uses for it since. I soon learned that baker's ammonia is a key ingredient in springerle cookies, but I also read that it is inadvisable to make spingerle in humid weather. So, I have been waiting for months for the crisp, dry weather of autumn to arrive, and it's finally here!

Springerle are dry, cake-like German cookies that are imprinted with molds and traditionally flavored with anise. I purchased some springerle molds from House on the Hill, and also used a recipe that was included with my order, which is available here. In addition, I watched this video demonstrating the recipe before I set out to give it a try.

The recipe method is a bit unusual. After you beat room temperature eggs for 10-20 minutes, you beat in powdered sugar, softened butter, baker's ammonia that has been dissolved in milk, salt, flavoring, and cake flour. Since I am not really a fan of anise, I made my springerle lemon flavored by using Boyajian lemon oil (I used 4 teaspoons, which was the amount specified for citrus oils in the version of the recipe I received with my molds). After the dough comes together, you knead it with flour until it's no longer sticky, roll it out, print it with the molds, cut out the cookies, and leave the cookies out to dry for 24 hours before baking.

The mold I used for my cookies was "Bird on a Branch," which is fairly large with an image almost four inches in diameter. It took a bit of practice to get the printing technique down, but after a few tries, I was able to get cookies with clean impressions. I got only 18 cookies from my batch of dough, and after I let them dry for 24 hours, I baked them for 25 minutes at 300 degrees.

I thought the cookies looked a little plain, so I painted the birds on some of the cookies with gold luster dust dissolved in alcohol. I loved the way these cookies tasted -- a strong clean lemon flavor, with a firm, cakey consistency. I understand that springerle can be stored for weeks and are supposed to improve with time, but I thought they tasted wonderful right after baking. However, I'm going to stash some away and see how they taste in December -- I think they will be worth the wait!

Recipe: "Nini's Perfection Springerle Cookies," from House on the Hill.

SuperFudgy Brownie or Vampire Soap Opera?: Dark Shadows

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 13:18:00 +0000

The first time I flipped through Lisa Yockelson's Baking Style, a recipe for "Dark Shadows" caught my eye. The name of the recipe was enough on its own to garner my attention (this recipe appears in the "Intense Bold" chapter, "Tipping the Scale on Chocolate" subsection), but the cookbook also features a full-page color photograph of the bars, and this introductory description: "The following recipe is what happens when chocolate is used to its fullest capacity: dark, rich squares of buttery sweetness, wrapped in underpinnings of vanilla, are interrupted periodically with miniature semisweet chocolate chips." How could I resist?

The "buttery cocoa batter" is made by beating eggs and sugar, blending in sugar, brown sugar, melted butter and bittersweet chocolate, vanilla, and vanilla bean seeds, and then incorporating sifted dry ingredients (cocoa, all-purpose flour, cake flour, baking powder, and salt). At the end, you fold in miniature chocolate chips that have been tossed with some of the dry ingredients, pour the batter into a pan, and bake. These brownies are no health food. While the recipe calls for a relatively small amount of chocolate (two ounces of bittersweet chocolate and 3/4 cup of miniature chips to make a 9-inch by 13-inch pan; the bulk of the chocolate flavor comes from two cups of cocoa, which exceeds the volume of both flours combined), it also includes an obscene amount of butter (a full pound!) and 8 eggs.

The recipe instructs you to bake the bars for 40-44 minutes, until just set. I bake a lot of Lisa Yockelson recipes, and in my experience, the specified baking times are exceptionally accurate. However, in this case, when I checked the bars at 40 minutes, I didn't even have to use a toothpick to test doneness; I could tell they were still raw in the middle because the bars jiggled as I pulled the pan out on the rack. I ended up baking the bars for 55 minutes, at which point they were just barely set.

After cooling and chilling the brownies until firm, the recipe directs you to either do the conventional thing and cut the bars, or "run amok, and break the big block into odd-shaped pieces and fragments." I went the cutting route, and skipped the final step of sifting powdered sugar, or powdered sugar mixed with cocoa powder, on top.

These bars were ultra, ultra fudgy, but with a quintessential classic brownie flavor. Bordering on creamy, these bars are indeed pure chocolate joy. I thought, and many tasters agreed, that these would have been a serious contender in the SuperFudgy round of the Brownie Tasteoff. I was amused that the recipe name spawned numerous conversations among tasters about the 1960s ABC television show "Dark Shadows," which featured vampires and apparently pioneered the concept of a soap opera with a supernatural theme. I had never heard of the show before (I am a child of the early 1970s), and I'm not sure if Yockelson had it in mind when naming these bars. But I do know that Yockelson was spot on when she wrote that the recipe "is a jewel of a formula, and will deliver raves greatly out of proportion to the kitchen work involved in its preparation."

Recipe: "Dark Shadows," from Baking Style: Art, Craft, Recipes, by Lisa Yockelson.

Previous Post: "Unfortunately, These Aren't Number One: Biscotti #2," October 13, 2011.

Baked Sunday Mornings: Pumpkin Cheddar Muffins

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Sun, 06 Nov 2011 14:07:00 +0000

I'm going to count this week's Baked Sunday Mornings assignment, Pumpkin Cheddar Muffins, as one of the most unexpected delights from Baked Explorations. I wasn't particularly enthused about the recipe; I have never had pumpkin and cheddar together, so I didn't have any particular expectations for what the finished product would taste like.

I was glad to see that this is one of the easier recipes from the cookbook. You just whisk together flour, baking powder, cayenne pepper, salt, black pepper, and brown sugar, and then make a well in the middle and pour in a mixture of pumpkin puree, sour cream, eggs, and melted butter. Once you incorporate the wet ingredients, you fold in shredded cheddar cheese (I used Seaside Cheddar, a sharp white English cheddar available at Whole Foods). You divide the batter into greased muffin cups, sprinkle the tops with more cheddar and some pumpkin seeds, and bake.

I could definitely smell the cheddar while the muffins were baking; it reminded me of the aroma of my cheddar-chive scones when they are in the oven. I used a microplane instead of a box grater to grate the cheese, and the cheese on top of the muffins was barely visible after baking. The recipe instructs you to serve the muffins warm, so Tom and I tried them shortly out of the oven. We were both floored at how moist, tender, and flavorful they were. I have to say that there wasn't much pumpkin flavor, but the cheese and black pepper were intensely fabulous. I happen to love black pepper, and the black pepper flavor was bold and aggressive (I think that most of the heat came from the pepper and not the cayenne, but it was a little hard to tell).

I immediately thought that these muffins don't seem like a breakfast food, but like the ideal dinner side for autumn; I think they would be perfect for Thanksgiving. I love, love these muffins. Warm from the oven, they are indescribably good.

Recipe: "Pumpkin Cheddar Muffins," from Baked Explorations: Classic American Desserts Reinvented, by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito. Recipe available here at Baked Sunday Mornings.

Ipso Fatto Instant Photos: Pablo's Baby Shower

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 05:08:00 +0000

Restaurant Eve cupcakes have become one of my standards for baby showers. The moist, white cake is delicious and universally popular, and the frosting is sturdy and versatile for decorating purposes. Plus, one recipe conveniently yields enough batter for exactly two dozen cupcakes. For a recent baby shower with a butterfly theme, I had the idea of making the cupcakes look like flowers with butterflies on them. I purchased some sugar butterfly decorations from Little Bitts in Wheaton, MD, and some Wilton yellow petal baking cups. I dyed the frosting yellow to match the color on the baking cups, and used a bit of gold luster dust on the sugar butterflies to evoke the iridescence of real butterfly wings (it's difficult to see the effect in the pictures, but the luster dust really did give the butterflies a lovely sheen). This is the first time I've used the Wilton petal baking cups, and while they are just adorable, I was slightly disappointed to discover that they are not greaseproof. Nonetheless, I was so pleased with the way that these turned out.

Recipe: "Restaurant Eve's Cake," from the April 23, 2006 Washington Post.

Previous Posts:

"Ipso Fatto Instant Photos: Cecelia's Baby Shower," May 7, 2011.
"Ipso Fatto Instant Photo: Ella's Baby Shower Cake," March 16, 2010.
"Think Pink!," November 15, 2008.

Now In Technicolor: Coconut Teacakes Redux

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 04:50:00 +0000

When I was tasked with making some baked goods for someone who likes coconut (after abandoning the idea of making a dessert with grapefruit, another one of his other favorite foods), I thought that lamingtons would be a good choice. I have made King Arthur Flour's lamington/coconut teacake recipe several times before (see, e.g. here), and I have always been happy with the results. However, I have been bothered by the fact that my lamingtons never look like the ones pictured with the recipe on the King Arthur website.

The raspberry glaze shown on the website is an intense reddish-pink color, while mine is always a muted reddish-tan hue, the color of the raspberry spreadable fruit I use to make the glaze. I know that some raspberry jams might be more brightly colored than others, but I still didn't understand how a thin coating of any jam (especially jam thinned out with corn syrup and water) could have such a saturated color; jam is, after all, translucent by nature. I am a bit compulsive in this respect, but my expectation is that if I bake something, it should look as good as the cookbook photo. Or better. Well, I have finally discovered why my lamingtons have literally paled in comparison.

I recently bought all of the 2009 back issues of The Baking Sheet, King Arthur's bi-monthly newsletter of recipes. The 2009 Early Spring issue contains the lamington recipe, and it's not the same as the one on the King Arthur website. Not only does the cake recipe vary slightly (it basically contains the same ingredients in different ratios), but Baking Sheet version of the raspberry glaze is not made from raspberry jam, but from frozen raspberries, lemon juice, and sugar. The resulting glaze is, not surprisingly, the bright shade of raspberries. The color is so vivid that it looks completely fake. I cut my lamingtons into snack cake shapes (1-inch by 1-inch by 3-inch fingers), and after I rolled the cakes in coconut, they were dead ringers for a raspberry Hostess Zinger.

Although I normally toast the coconut I use to coat lamingtons, in this case, I skipped the toasting step so that the bright white coconut would have greater contrast against the raspberry glaze. I definitely prefer this glaze to the jam version -- not only is the color more eye-catching, but the raspberry flavor is markedly stronger.

Really, assuming you are not in the coconut-hating camp, what's not to love about this captivating cake?

This cake is too dense to put in any sort of cream filling, but now that I know the secret to making the Technicolor glaze, I'm half-seriously considering the idea of making a Zinger knockoff with vanilla cake and cream filling. I'm definitely putting it on my "I'll get to that someday" list.

Recipe: "Lamingtons," from The King Arthur Baking Sheet, Early Spring 2009.

Previous Posts:

"Bloody Poofy Woolly Biscuits: Lamington Cupcakes," May 2, 2010.
"Woolly Biscuits Take II: Coconut Teacakes," July 19, 2010.

This Tart Sticks With You: Lattice-Topped Apple Tart

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 12:33:00 +0000

I recently got a copy of Bake! by Nick Malgieri, and I was excited to see that the book offers quite a few tart recipes. I have always had trouble with pies, but I will happily make tarts all day long. In fact, the book has three chapters on tarts using different types of crusts: sweet pastry dough, flaky pastry dough, and cookie dough. I decided to try the recipe for "Lattice-Topped Apple Tart" for my first foray into the book.

This tart is in the flaky pastry dough chapter. I made the dough in the food processor from flour, salt, baking powder, cold butter, and eggs. After chilling, the dough was pretty easy to handle and roll out. Conveniently, the dough recipe makes enough for two crusts, so I only needed one batch to have enough dough for both the bottom crust and the lattice.

The filling for this tart is diced apples tossed with a mixture of sugar, brown sugar, flour, and cinnamon. You sprinkle a little bit of the reserved sugar mixture onto the bottom crust, pour in the apples, and then dot them with butter before putting on the lattice. The cookbook says that Northern Spies are the best apples to use for the filling, but I have never seen them available in this area. Fortunately, the recipe also suggests a readily available substitute -- equal parts Golden Delicious and Granny Smith apples. As the recipe directed, I cut the Granny Smith apples smaller since they are firmer and would otherwise take longer to soften.

The lattice top for this tart is not woven, but simply overlaid, so it takes almost no time at all to assemble on top of the filling. By moistening the edges of the bottom crust with water, it's easy to get the strips of the lattice to adhere. After brushing the lattice with a little water and sprinkling on some granulated sugar, the tart is ready to bake.

The recipe advises you to put a sheet of foil on the bottom of the oven to catch drips when the filling comes to a simmer close to the end of the baking time. Instead, I put my tart pan directly on a sheet pan (I usually do this anyway, since it makes the tart part easier to handle and eliminates the possibility of accidentally knocking out the removable bottom when picking up the pan). At the end of the baking time, the crust was golden and the filling was gently bubbling; some of the liquid had run out onto the sheet pan, but my tart pretty much looked exactly like the one pictured in the cookbook, so I was feeling pretty confident. I noticed that when the liquid on the sheet pan cooled, it was completely hard, like caramel. After the tart had cooled, I tried to lift out the pan bottom, but I couldn't get it to budge -- it was completely stuck. I have made countless tarts in the past, and I have never once encountered this problem before. Even more distressing, I had made this tart for my friends Jim and Colleen, and so I had to drop it off at their house and sheepishly explain that the tart was stuck and I had no idea if they would be able to get slices of it out of the pan.

So I didn't actually get to see the tart when it was cut and served, but I am informed that the sticking problem was limited to the outside perimeter of the tart. Presumably when the filling bubbled over, the liquid fell into the gap between the crust and the pan and then hardened as it cooled, gluing the crust to the pan in the process. I was assured that the tart filling was delicious and the crust properly cooked through. Jim and Colleen had the great misfortune of being forced to sample several unsuccessful pies over the summer (see here, here, and here), and Jim -- who is not afraid to be honest with me when it comes to baked goods -- reported that this tart was far superior to all of them.

I am looking forward to making this tart again so that I can taste if for myself! In the meantime, unless someone informs me otherwise, I'm considering this recipe a success. Although, just to be on the safe side, I'll make sure that I don't plan to serve this tart at some formal occasion where it would pose a problem if I find it stuck to the pan again!

Recipe: "Lattice-Topped Apple Tart" from Bake!: Essential Techniques for Perfect Baking, by Nick Malgieri.

This Cake Needs a Second Chance: My First Chocolate Birthday Cake

littlebakerbunny@yahoo.com — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 04:22:00 +0000

Earlier this month, we celebrated a birthday in my office, and when I asked the birthday girl what her baked goods preference was, she mentioned chocolate. So I went straight to the "Chocolate Birthday Cakes" chapter of Lisa Yockelson's ChocolateChocolate cookbook. I decided on "My First Chocolate Birthday Cake." The name makes it sound like something a grade-schooler might produce in an Easy Bake Oven, but Yockelson explains, "Plain and simple, this layer cake most likely began the tradition of chocolate-flavored birthday cakes in my small family."

The cake batter is made from butter, sugar, eggs, vanilla, unsweetened chocolate, milk, cake flour, baking soda, and salt. The Old-Fashioned Chocolate Frosting that goes along with the cake is made from butter, unsweetened chocolate, salt, vanilla, powdered sugar, and milk.

The frosting had a nice thick consistency, and the recipe makes plenty of frosting to fill, frost, and decorate the cake. I made this cake the night before I was going to serve it, so I kept it in the refrigerator. I took it out about an hour before serving.

I thought this cake was quite good, although there a couple of things I wish I had done differently. First, the cake was slightly overbaked, even though I baked it only for the 30 minutes specified in the recipe. I used dark non-stick pans, and I think the cake would have turned out better if I had used light-colored pans or reduced the baking time. Second, the cake was still quite cold when I served it, even though I had taken it out of the refrigerator an hour before. Not only was the chocolate flavor of the cake and frosting muted because of the cake's temperature, but the frosting was solid, like cold butter. When I made the frosting, it had a luscious and creamy smooth consistency; eating it cold was just not the same. In the future, I would be sure to either store the cake covered at room temperature, or to take it out of the refrigerator several hours in advance to allow it to fully reach room temperature before serving.

I am interested in making this cake again, because I want to taste it at its full potential; I know the cake would have been much better if not overbaked and served at the proper temperature. I'm looking forward to my second attempt at My First Birthday Cake!

Recipe: "My First Chocolate Birthday Cake/Old-Fashioned Chocolate Frosting," from ChocolateChocolate by Lisa Yockelson.