Bello Cioccolato

May Charcutepalooza - Sausage, Sausage, Sausage

2011-05-15T09:16:00.000-04:00

Finished Sausage!

The world of Charcutepalooza -- I'm trying things I never thought I could do and learning lots. This month's challenge was to produce sausage -- several types of fresh sausage were on offer. My choice was the pork garlic sausage with the addition of a few of my own spices. I bought a grinder and sausage stuffing attachment for the reliable Kitchen Aid and secured some hog casings -- all from Amazon -- surprised by Amazon being a source for hog casings!! My meat choice was the recommended boneless pork shoulder butt, garlic, salt and pepper and I added my own twist with toasted fennel and sage from my garden. Initially, the garlic was the overwhelming flavor but as the mixture has settled, the toasted fennel is emerging as dominant. No additional fat was added so the final product wasn't overly fatty (my complaint with a lot of sausage).

Seasoning ready to add to sausage

The process was chilling, cubing, chilling, chopping and combining, chilling, grinding (into chilled bowl), chilling, mixing, more chilling, stuffing, more chilling and eating/freezing. Whew! I did it solo and think it would be better as a two person operation -- one to push the meat and the other to guide the stuffing.

I've served the sausage for two friend dinners. One cooked on the stove top and the second on the grill with applewood smoke. Both dinners were well received.

March Charcutepalooza

2011-03-15T10:57:00.001-04:00

Seasoned, moist and tasty are a few of my adjectives for the March Charcutepalooza challenge – adventures in brining. Because I’m more of a baker, I’ve never experimented much with meat cookery. Charcutepalooza is changing that and I’m developing a lot more confidence in my skills. The March challenge included an apprentice challenge of brining a whole chicken or pork chops and a Charcuterie challenge of brining a piece of beef. My choices were a whole chicken and a beef brisket (in separate preps).

I followed the recipes in Charcuterie for both challenges. My biggest surprise was that I had to heat up the brining liquid to simmer to dissolve the salt and sugar and then cool it to refrigerator temperature before submerging the meat. I never did that in my previous experience brining a turkey for Thanksgiving – no wonder it never seemed to work! The chicken was tasty and had a great texture. I used a free-range chicken from the local farmer’s market. I was unable to buy a brisket from a local farmer, so I cheated and bought a beef brisket from my local BJ’s. Once the brisket was brined, I braised it for around 4 hours. The result was a nice piece of corned beef.

The corned beef was made into mini Reuben sandwiches for a party last Saturday. I give a shout out to Nancy, Holly, Jude, Claire and Marjorie, who mixed, formed, ate, sipped and gabbed on Saturday. I used Zoe Francois Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes and taught my friends the technique. They baked boules, baguettes, pain d’epi and pitas over several hours. The Reuben sandwiches were a hit – whenever I passed a plate, it came back empty. Comments included the best corned beef I ever tasted.

Brined and roasted chicken

Corned beef

Mini reuben

Multiple minis with my favoriate, sour cornichons

One of the boules from Saturday

February Charcutepalooza

2011-02-16T17:09:00.007-05:00

Welcome to the world of Charcutepalooza – a year-long celebration of the craft of meat – salting, smoking and curing. Charcutepalooza is the creation of food bloggers Mrs. Wheelbarrow and The Yummy Mummy (http://theyummymummy.blogspot.com/). They lay down a monthly meat challenge for participants, taken from recipes and guidance in Charcuterie by Michael Ruhlman and Brian Polcyn. Information about the challenges, “ruhls” and bloggers are on Mrs. Wheelbarrow’s blog site (http://www.mrswheelbarrow.com/).

A couple of things attracted me to Charcutepalooza. The first is my nearly complete lack of knowledge of meat (only surpassed by my complete lack of knowledge of seafood). What a better way to learn? I participated in Tuesdays with Dorie to teach myself more about baking and pastry and this suits my style of learning by doing. Michael Ruhlman is one of my favorite non-fiction writers and food bloggers so using his book as the guide also was a draw. I love French charcuterie – smoked meats, cornichons and sour onions, Dijon mustard and a fresh baguette. This is my entre to making it rather than gathering it!

The February challenge was the Salt Cure and was broken into an Apprentice Challenge – making cured and roasted bacon – and a Charcuterie Challenge – making pancetta. Before I could begin the challenge, I needed to gather a few things. The first was the Ruhlman and Polcyn bible which came very quickly from my used bookseller. The salt cure itself had a few new ingredients—including cure salt and juniper berries. Living in the Capital District, I have access to some terrific food suppliers and was able to get both items locally from Adventures in Food Trading (http://www.adventureinfood.com/). We had a couple of days of blizzard conditions which slowed me in attacking the challenge. The last and most important item was the meat. One of the Charcutepalooza “ruhls” is to source meat as locally as possible from farms that humanely raise the animals. Again, this area is rich in farms and I am lucky to have Flying Pigs Farm in nearby Shushan, New York (http://flyingpigsfarm.com/). Flying Pigs raises heritage breeds and is a major vendor at New York’s Greenmarket – yes, they travel weekly from Shushan to New York City. When I picked up my pork bellies at the farm, the manager knew all about Charcutepalooza and had already filled several orders for pork bellies.

With all my ingredients, I mixed my basic salt cure (by weight, not volume). For the Apprentice Challenge I processed two pork bellies. To one, I added extra brown sugar and to the other, I added maple syrup, of course, local NYS syrup. At the same time, I mixed the savory salt cure for the pancetta. Being rubbed with their cures, they went into the refrigerator in individual plastic bags. Every few days, the bags were flipped until the bellies were firm. At that point, they were brought out of the refrigerator and the salt cure washed off. The bacon bellies were roasted in a very slow oven until their internal temperature reached 150 degrees F. The pancetta belly was wrapped in cheesecloth because it was too small to roll and it’s currently hanging in my cool and humid back room.

Bacon, bacon, bacon!
Cured & Roasted

Today I cooked and tasted my first slice of bacon (brown sugar cured) in an open-face BLT. The sandwich was served on homemade bread from Zoe Francois’ Artisan Bread cookbook. The tomato was one that I bought on the vine (and tasted pretty close to how a tomato tastes in the summer). I found it challenging to slice the bacon thinly, used a single slice of my homemade bacon on my BLT which was more like 2-3 slices of commercially bought bacon and found it very filling. It was delicious. I’m planning to use a few more slices in the next few days to make Amatriciana sauce (Divina Cucina’s recipe) and then slice and freeze the remainder. The pancetta has 5-6 days more to dry. When it’s done, I’ll make carbonara and write a post to the blog.

BLT with Salt Cure & Brown Sugar

A Julia Child Feast

2009-08-09T13:35:00.009-04:00

As a young twenty-something, watching Julia Child’s The French Chef on Sunday evening was my introduction to fine cooking. I bought her cookbooks and picked a few favorites that became part of my repertoire. When My Life in France came out, I bought a hard-cover copy and was delighted to learn about how she became Julia Child, my mentor. About the same time, I also was delighted to read Julie Powell’s sweet book. The opening of the movie that combines the two stories required a special celebration.

I invited my close friends to a Julie and Julia potluck dinner. Everyone was asked to channel their inner Julia Child and produce a dish from one of her cookbooks – but preferably from Mastering the Art of French Cooking (MAFC). We planned to go to the Julie and Julia movie following the dinner. So on a perfect Saturday evening in Saratoga Springs, we set out on our dining and viewing adventure.

Everyone arrived around 4:30 to allow us time to eat and make a 7:30 movie time. The meal began with an aperitif of sparkling wine with cold blueberry soup. The cold blueberry soup was not a Julia recipe but one I got from Kim Suneé. I attended her cooking demo this summer at the Battenkill Kitchen. Everyone loved the combination and Kim’s recipe from her book, The Trail of Crumbs (kimsunee.com) is below:

Chilled Blueberry Soup

Add 1 or 2 teaspoons of this to a glass of champagne or prosecco for a sweet summer sparkler; use to top crepes, pancakes or ice cream; or serve for dessert in chilled espresso cups.

6 cups fresh blueberries, divided, or 2 (12 ounce) bags frozen blueberries
4 cloves
½ cup liquid honey
1 vanilla bean, scraped, or 1 cinnamon stick
1 Tb fresh lemon juice
3 Tb crème de cassis
1 Tb balsamic vinegar
Garnish: lemon or orange zest, crème fraiche

Rinse blueberries and place all but 1 cup in a large pot. Add cloves and stir in honey. Split vanilla bean lengthwise, scrape seeds into pot using tip of knife, and add scraped bean halves (or scrape cinnamon into pot and add stick). Add 1 cup water and stir.

Bring to a boil, reduce heat and let simmer about 10 minutes. Strain, using back of spoon to crush berries, through a fine sieve into a bowl. Discard solids. Let soup cool. Stir in lemon juice, crème de cassis, and vinegar. Add more honey, as needed. Chill in refrigerator 4 hours and up to 2 days. Serve in chilled bowls with reserved 1 cup fresh blueberries. Garnish if desired. Makes 3 cups.

To accompany the aperitif, I made Julia’s Galettes au Fromage (p. 197 MAFC). Julia’s instructions were to test bake one because the amount of flour to use depended on the cheese used. Was she right! I used a softer cheese than the recipe and my first test just flattened out on the sheet. I added more flour and the second test was successful.

Marjorie Martin made our first course of Vichyssoise (p. 39, MAFC). She bought new bowls for the party (she said it was one of the wonders of the Dollar Store) and she garnished the soup beautifully with minced chives. Marjorie rated it a very easy recipe. We paired this part of the meal with Pouilly-Fuse. Throughout the meal Kay Olan provided a constant supply of beautiful baguettes from Mrs. London’s (she is not a cook and not apologetic about it)!

After the soup, we went to the main course. This was nearly overwhelming! We had a Salade Niçoise, Roast Chicken, Tomates a La Provençale and Timbale of Fresh Corn. We opened a bottle of Cotes du Rhone Rose to accompany.

Jude Nordhoff made the Salade Niçoise ( p. 542, Mastering the Art of French Cooking). She was a little flustered by the recipe, said it took her much longer to make than anticipated and had to improvise the dressing because the cookbook referred her to a page she didn’t copy. What the matter, the results were spectacular.

Nancy Luther made the Tomates a La Provencale (p. 507 MAFC). She minced the ingredients by hand (a la Julia) and said it took a lot more effort than she anticipated. Julia recommended that the tomatoes not be crowded in the dish and Nancy discovered that if they had been crowded they would have been difficult to serve. Gratefully, Nancy left me some tomatoes ready for heating today.

Holly Lawton came with the Timbale of Fresh Corn (p. 127, Julia Child & Company). It was delicious. I’m including the recipe because not many of my friends have the cookbook and Holly said she would make it again and again and again.

Timbale of Fresh Corn

For an 8-cup baking dish, serving 8 people

12 or more ears fresh corn (to make about 3 cups grated corn)
6 eggs
2-3 Tb grated onion
1 tsp salt
4-5 Tb minced parsley
2/3 cup lightly pressed down crumbs, from crustless nonsweet white bread
2/3 cup lightly pressed down grated cheese (such as a mixture of Swiss and/or Cheddar or mozzarella)
2/3 cup heavy cream
1/8 tsp Cayenne pepper
8-10 grinds fresh pepper

Scrape or grate the corn and turn into a measure to be sure you have about 3 cups. Beat the eggs in a mixing bowl to blend; then add all the rest of the ingredients listed, including the corn.

Recipe may be completed even a day in advance to this point; covered and refrigerated.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. About 2 hours before serving, butter the baking dish and line bottom with a round of buttered wax paper. Stir up the corn mixture to blend thoroughly and pour into the dish. Set corn dish in a bain-marie. Bake in lower-middle level of oven for half an hour, then turn the temperature down to 325 degrees. Baking time is around 1 ¼ to 1 ½ hours, and water surrounding the timbale should almost but never quite bubble; too high heat can make a custard grainy. Timbale is done when it has risen almost to fill the mold, the top has cracked open, and a skewer plunged down through the center comes out clean. Let rest 10 minutes or more in turned-off oven, door ajar, before unmolding.

May be baked an hour or so before serving; the timbale will sink down as it cools.

My contribution was Roast Chicken (p. 240, MAFC) which was supposed to be a “perfect” roast chicken. It wasn’t perfect, but pretty good. A couple of problems with trussing (no trussing needle made inserting the string a little difficult) made it difficult to roast the chicken on its side. My solution was to roast it upside down. Also, I was less than diligent about basting, but did get in a several bastings. I reduced to pan juices to a sauce (burned my finger by grabbing the hot handle of the roasting pan on the stove) and poured it over the finished bird (which I cut up into serving pieces before it went to the table).

By this time we were all really stuffed so we took a little pause before the cheese course. We soon started on the cheeses which included gorgonzola, Wensleydale with apricots and a creamy camembert.

Beverly Reedy brought dessert – Tarte au Citron et Aux Amandes (p. 646, MAFC). Let me tell you a little about Bev. She is a local chef – founded Beverly’s on Phila Street in Saratoga, currently owned by her son Michael Bowman, and author of the cookbook Beverly’s Best (http://beverlysbest.net). She also has a line of barbecue sauce, sweet relish and apple butter that is carried at the restaurant and other locations in the Northeast. Beverly bakes! She followed MAFC but said with her own recipes she could turn out the tart in about an hour. She had issues with Julia’s technique for candying the lemon rind and thought her own method is a lot better. The tart was fabulous and she served it with a berry puree sauce (blueberries, blackberries and raspberries). We also had some crème Fraîche to accompany the tart.

Okay, we missed the Julie and Julia movie because the dinner lasted four hours. No one felt stuffed by the end because we paced out the meal and did not rush. Guess the French have it right. It was a lovely meal with great friends. We’ll be getting together next week for the movie.

Kay & Jude

Holly & Marjorie

Marjorie & Kay

Beverly & Nancy

It's Only a Bakewell Tart!

2009-06-27T16:50:00.006-04:00

The June Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Jasmine of Confessions of a Cardamom Addict and Annemarie of Ambrosia and Nectar. They chose a Traditional (UK) Bakewell Tart... er... pudding that was inspired by a rich baking history dating back to the 1800's in England. I've actually stayed in Bakewell and tasted a Bakewell tart. I don't remember it being as good as this recipe.

When I told an English acquitance that I was making strawberry jam for a Bakewell tart, he wondered why because it's only a Bakewell tart! Well I did make strawberry jam, not specifically for the tart but it got used in it anyway. My jam center was half and half strawberry and rhubarb-ginger jam (also homemade). Also, I substituted lemon extract for almond extract.

In the past few years, I've switched to uncooked jams -- they go in the freezer and I find the fruit flavor much fresher than the cooked jams. My freezer has raspberry jam from last year and two new batches of strawberry jam. They make great toppings for ice cream as well as peanut butter and toast.

Bakewell Tart…er…pudding

Makes one 9” tart
Prep time: less than 10 minutes (plus time for the individual elements)
Resting time: 15 minutes
Baking time: 30 minutes
Equipment needed: 9” tart pan or pie tin (preferably with ridged edges), rolling pin

One quantity sweet shortcrust pastry (recipe follows)
Bench flour
1 cup jam or curd, warmed for spreadability
One quantity frangipane (recipe follows)
One handful blanched, flaked almonds

Assembling the tart
Place the chilled dough disc on a lightly floured surface. If it's overly cold, you will need to let it become acclimatised for about 15 minutes before you roll it out. Flour the rolling pin and roll the pastry to 1/4” thickness, by rolling in one direction only (start from the centre and roll away from you), and turning the disc a quarter turn after each roll. When the pastry is to the desired size and thickness, transfer it to the tart pan, press in and trim the excess dough. Patch any holes, fissures or tears with trimmed bits. Chill in the freezer for 15 minutes.
Preheat oven to 400F.
Remove shell from freezer, spread as even a layer as you can of jam onto the pastry base. Top with frangipane, spreading to cover the entire surface of the tart. Smooth the top and pop into the oven for 30 minutes. Five minutes before the tart is done, the top will be poofy and brownish. Remove from oven and strew flaked almonds on top and return to the heat for the last five minutes of baking.

The finished tart will have a golden crust and the frangipane will be tanned, poofy and a bit spongy-looking. Remove from the oven and cool on the counter. Serve warm, with crème fraîche, whipped cream or custard sauce if you wish.

When you slice into the tart, the almond paste will be firm, but slightly squidgy and the crust should be crisp but not tough.

Sweet shortcrust pastry
Prep time: 15-20 minutes
Resting time: 30 minutes (minimum)
Equipment needed: bowls, box grater, cling film

8oz all purpose flour
1 oz sugar
½ tsp salt
4oz unsalted butter, cold (frozen is better)
2 egg yolks
½ tsp lemon extract
1-2 Tbsp cold water

Sift together flour, sugar and salt. Grate butter into the flour mixture, using the large hole-side of a box grater. Using your finger tips only, and working very quickly, rub the fat into the flour until the mixture resembles bread crumbs. Set aside.

Lightly beat the egg yolks with the almond extract (if using) and quickly mix into the flour mixture. Keep mixing while dribbling in the water, only adding enough to form a cohesive and slightly sticky dough.

Form the dough into a disc, wrap in cling and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.

Frangipane
Prep time: 10-15 minutes
Equipment needed: bowls, hand mixer, rubber spatula

4.5 oz unsalted butter, softened
4.5 oz confectioner's sugar
3 eggs
½ tsp lemon extract
4.5 oz ground almonds/almond flour
1oz all purpose flour

Cream butter and sugar together for about a minute or until the mixture is primrose in colour and very fluffy. Scrape down the side of the bowl and add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. The batter may appear to curdle. In the words of Douglas Adams: Don’t panic. Really. It’ll be fine. After all three are in, pour in the almond extract and mix for about another 30 seconds and scrape down the sides again. With the beaters on, spoon in the ground nuts and the flour. Mix well. The mixture will be soft, keep its slightly curdled look (mostly from the almonds) and retain its pallid yellow color.

Saratoga (Parisian) Apple Tart and Peonies

2009-06-09T11:35:00.008-04:00

This week's TWD Parisian Apple Tart is a keeper and will be a regular dessert feature for future dinner parties. The recipe was selected by Jessica of My Baking Heart and the recipe is available on her blog. Because of this week's TWD, I now have puff pastry sheets to last a long time. To try to get a better quality puff pastry dough, I visited Adventure in Food, a specialty food wholesaler in Albany, NY, where I purchased a "small" box of frozen puff pastry -- made by Pennant from France. The small box isn't really that small and as a result I now have 20 (- 1/2 sheet) 12 oz pastry sheets resting in my freezer. I like them already because they're packaged flat rather than folded like the Pepperidge Farm puff pastry. I always hated rolling across the fold. Anyway, I'm seeing a summer of beautiful tomato tarts with the beautiful San Marzano tomatos that I anticipate harvesting from my garden.

Speaking of gardens -- my first peony is now blooming. The flowers are easily 6 inches across and they smell delightful. I took some pictures to share as well as my newly remodelled veggie garden.

Cinnamon Squares??? - Chocolate Heaven

2009-06-02T15:00:00.005-04:00

When I first saw the listing for this week's TWD selection, I wasn't impressed and didn't think I would participate. Over the weekend I looked at the recipe and thought it looked interesting and really easy to make. I've been spending a lot of my time in the garden so I'm looking for easy right now. It was easy, but I think the name is wrong. It should be a name that includes the abundant chocolate in the recipe -- maybe Dark Chocolate Squares or maybe Chocolate Heaven. Any suggestions? The recipe is available at http://traceysculinaryadventures.blogspot.com. In my recipe, I substituted buttermilk for whole milk.

The veggie garden is planted but still kind of young to photograph. I've added some features to make it fit better with my old 1840s house. Pictures will come soon. The perennial flowers are starting their display. The clematis and columbine are blooming and the gorgeous peony is about ready to pop. The macro lens makes everything look incredible.

Springtime - Ricotta Gnocchi and Asparagus

2009-05-17T18:31:00.005-04:00

This is the opening challenge for Daring Cooks and as promised -- it looked simple but proved a little more difficult to form the gnocchi. The master gnocchi recipe was taken from the cookbook by Judy Rodgers, named after her restaurant, The Zuni Café Cookbook. I made the gnocchi for the 14th but only finished the recipe today. I took my inspiration for my final recipe from a Babbo recipe for asparagus and ricotta ravioli. I blanched and chilled the asparagus and added it to the pan with melted butter. When the gnocchi cooked, I added it to the sauce along with some pasta water. I garnished it with shaved reggiano parmesan. It was delicious!

TWD - Tartest Lemon Tart

2009-05-12T07:51:00.004-04:00

Okay, I love this recipe but couldn't really believe that it called for whole lemons! I wonder how common this is? Yesterday David Lebovitz posted a lemon tart recipe in which he used only lemon zest and lemon juice -- http://www.davidlebovitz.com/archives/2009/05/tart_au_citron_french_lemon_tart.html. His recipe made a point of using unsprayed lemons. I can hardly believe that any fruit is brought to market without being sprayed with all the creepy crawlers and insects in the warm climates where they grow. I used my supermarket lemons and scrubbed them with warm soapy water and a good brush -- making sure to remove the green Sunkist ink!

This was the last recipe I made during my marathon baking day for my friend's wake last week -- Tiramisu cake, peanut butter cookies and then this tart. The fact that tart crust was pressed in rather than rolled out, saved a ton of time and anguish. I finished off the tart with powdered sugar rather than creme fraiche. The recipe can be found at http://www.ayearfromoakcottage.com/.

RIP - Dear Friend, Kate

2009-05-05T19:13:00.005-04:00

Today was the funeral for my friend Kate O'Connell, who passed last week. She was a poet, photographer, philospher and wonderful friend. Over the past few summers we had memorable jaunts to Tanglewood and the Glimmerglass Opera in Cooperstown. I will miss her.

Following her funeral, there was a reception for friends and family. This week's TWD Tiramisu cake (and next week's Lemon Tart) were part of my contribution. The recipe for the Tiramisu cake can be found on Megan's blog My Baking Adventures.

Plain Jane Cheesecake – April Daring Bakers

2009-04-28T15:46:00.020-04:00

The April 2009 challenge is hosted by Jenny from Jenny Bakes. She has chosen Abbey's Infamous Cheesecake as the challenge.

This month of April, my thoughts are not so much on the kitchen as they are on my garden. For this Daring Baker challenge I went with a plain Jane cheesecake. No extra embellishments – just the cheesecake with flavoring courtesy of M. Cointreau. This was a wise decision because the plain cheesecake was fantastic -- it had a simple and clear flavor. The texture was the star -- smooth and creamy, almost melting in your mouth. The recipe is a winner -- the baking instructions produced a cheesecake with no cracks or sinkholes. Thanks for the recipe Jenny.

The weather in Saratoga Springs has been amazing for the past few weeks and I've been photographing some of the emerging plants and flowers on my daily walks.

Molto Bene! Lasagne of Emilia-Romagna

2009-03-30T14:31:00.007-04:00

The Daring Bakers challenge has taken baking to a new a welcome change -- we're making pasta rather than sweets. The March 2009 challenge is hosted by Mary of Beans and Caviar, Melinda of Melbourne Larder and Enza of Io Da Grande. They have chosen Lasagne of Emilia-Romagna from The Splendid Table by Lynne Rossetto Kasper as the challenge. The challenge recipe can be found on their blogs.

The central part of the challenge was to produce hand-made pasta. In this recipe, Kasper uses spinach pasta. She gives directions for both hand-rolling and using a hand-cranked machine to produce the dough. I've owned a hand-cranked machine for ions so I pulled it out for this recipe. The other requirement was to use a white (bechamel) sauce. The choice of ragu recipe was open and I chose to use a recipe for ragu alla Bolognese from chef Fabrizio Bazzani of Chianti il Ristorante in Saratoga Springs.

Bazzani offers cooking demonstration dinners at his restaurant and I attended one focusing on Emilia-Romanga earlier this month. For Bazzani, ragu alla Bolognese is about the meat. Here's how he makes it:

9.5 oz ground pork
9.5 oz ground beef
3 oz pancetta, chopped
3 oz prosciutto, chopped
6 oz sausage
1 onion, finely chopped
1 carrot, finely chopped
1 rib of celery, finely chopped
1 full glass (or more) of red wine
9.5 oz ground peeled tomatos
Broth
Milk
Slat and Pepper
2 oz butter
2 oz extra virgin olive oil

Saute the pancetta, celery, carrot and onion with the butter and oil, season lightly with salt only. Add the ground meats, let it gain some color and pour in the wine. Let the wine evaporate then add the tomatos and a little broth (4 oz).

Lower the fire to a simmer and let it cook for three hours, adding broth if necessary. Toward the end, add the milk and let it finish cooking until it's been three hours. Season with salt and pepper at the end of the cooking time.

A word of caution -- the cooking ragu will smell wonderful -- given the aromatic vegetables, pancetta and proscuitto.

Bumble my Blueberries – Making Substitutions

2009-03-24T08:37:00.008-04:00

Last week I glanced at the recipe for this cake and thought how simple it looked and didn’t include any unfamiliar techniques. I made the classic cooking mistake and didn’t read through ingredient list carefully. Yesterday I started making the cake. As I worked along, I came to the final steps that included combining the dry ingredients with buttermilk. No buttermilk in the pantry! Two choices – make a quick trip to the market or look for a substitution. Dorie’s Baking has a whole list of substitutions in the back of the book. I used her recommendation for buttermilk substitute by combining 2/3 cup of plain yogurt and 1/3 cup milk. It worked fine.

The recipe for Blueberry Crumb Cake is available at http://fundamentally-flawed.blogspot.com/. Thanks to Sihan for selecting the recipe.

Blueberry Crumb Cake in the late afternoon sun.

French Yogurt Cake with Lemon Glaze – TWD

2009-03-17T20:01:00.001-04:00

What an easy recipe! Like so many of TWD members, I couldn’t find lemon marmalade so I used lemon curd. I thinned it with a little freshly squeezed lemon juice which produced a very lemony flavor. One of my tasters (who’s known to like a lot of extra butter and cream) suggested serving it with cream cheese.

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

Bess at the Dog Computer

2009-03-07T09:07:00.004-05:00

Last year a work colleague introduced us all to the SF Shiba Inu puppies on Upstream TV. I happened to bring up the site at home and found that Bess not only responded to the sounds of the puppies but actually watched and seemed to get some genuine excitment from the experience. She always examines the laptop to figure out where those puppies are hiding and why she can't smell them and play with them. There's an idea for the next technology wave and maybe one a dog could actually operate!

Yesterday she was watching some very sleepy bloodhound puppies ...

and two lazy French bulldog babies.

2009 Basel Fasnacht - die drey scheenschte Dääg

2009-03-01T12:20:00.013-05:00

This Monday morning at 4 AM Central European Time, the Basel Fasnacht kicks off with the Morgestraich. The whole of the central part of the city goes dark, the cliques light their floats, the fifes start playing and the marching begins. I was there for the 2007 Fasnacht and the pictures in this post are from that year.

My friends and I found we needed a strategy for Morgestraich. Unlike the stereotype of the Swiss as being orderly, Morgestraich is anything but orderly. There are lots of people watching and lots of people in the cliques. We were in a crowd at the edge of Barfüsserplatz and had cliques coming at us from multiple directions. The head of the clique has a sort of a pike stick that is used to break through the crowd. We would dodge one and another would be coming at us from another direction! It was difficult to move around the center and finally we realized the best strategy was to march behind one of the cliques.

There’s lots of traditional food served – Basler Mehlsuppe (http://www.recipesource.com/ethnic/europe/swiss/basler-mehlsuppe1.html), kaisewaie, and zweiblewaie washed down with glasses of Warteck or Feldschlösschen beer. Lots of the beer.

The big parade goes off on Monday afternoon. The cliques have changed into costumes that match their theme and they mount their floats for the parade. The masks are works of art. Along the parade route, the cliques throw mimosas, oranges, candy, kisses and confetti. The rule is that you can’t throw anything on someone in a mask. There are smaller clique groups without floats. The biggest thing are the fife and drum corps and the brass bands (Guggemusik). Each of the large cliques have both musical groups. There must be terrific music schools and musicians in Basel given the number of corps and bands. I think the cliques offer music lessons. It is amazing how much effort is put into Fasnacht.

There are other parades on Tuesday and Wednesday. Tuesday is the Kinder-Fasnacht parade. Tuesday evening is capped off by a Gugge-Musik concert in Barfüsserplatz. Not to be missed. All day long, every day, there are people out marching, playing fife and drum or band music. You can hear the shrill of the fife’s playing all night. The Gugge-Musik groups tour the bars and hotels and play for drinks! I don’t want to slight the Schnitzelbangg which are comic musical performances that highlight something that impacted Basel in the last year. They are all performed in Baseldytsch which I don’t understand.

I love Fasnacht but can’t be there every year. You can watch Fasnacht remotely through live web-cam broadcasts from cameras strategically placed around the city. Go to http://www.fasnacht.ch/ and click on the link for 2009 Fasnacht Live. Marktplatz/Rathaus or Barfüsserplatz would be the best choices. The best is in person and I’m looking forward to 2010.

Chocolate Valentino - Daring Bakers - Heartless, Flourless Chocolate Cake

2009-02-28T12:05:00.008-05:00

This may be a comment on my romantic life - but I baked my chocolate valentino in a round springform pan and then cut it in square serving pieces. Hooray, it's the last day of February and I'm having a dinner party tonight to give the winter a kick. There's still a foot of snow on the ground in Saratoga and it's cold today. I've been looking at the temperature in Firenze and it's nearly 70 degrees Farenheit and sunny! Why am I in this frozen tundra???

The February 2009 challenge is hosted by Wendy of WMPE's blog and Dharm of Dad ~ Baker & Chef.We have chosen a Chocolate Valentino cake by Chef Wan; a Vanilla Ice Cream recipe from Dharm and a Vanilla Ice Cream recipe from Wendy as the challenge.

I used couverture chocolate in my cake and mixed 4 parts of 70% dark chocolate and 6 parts 35% milk chocolate. This proved a great mix and the cake is dark and rich with a little sweetness. I used a whipped cream garnish in place of the ice cream -- can't think of ice cream when in this climate.

Brown out on Devils Food White Out Cake - TWD

2009-02-17T13:09:00.006-05:00

This is a cake worthy of the cookbook cover - a real show stopper! I browned mine with as many of the crumbs as I could get on it -- so it's a browned out devil's food white out cake.

I ate this piece immediately after snapping the photo and found the strawberry was a perfect accompaniment. So, it's a longer walk with the dog and a couple more hours on the treadmill! Handing off the rest of the cake to my neighbors and friends.

This cake was much easier than I thought and way easier than the photograph would suggest!

Thanks to Stephanie for chosing the cake! Check out her blog at Confessions of a City Eater for the recipe for the Devil's Food White Out Cake.

Peanut Butter Scare - What's a Baker to Do?

2009-02-09T15:29:00.008-05:00

There's a lot of misunderstanding of the peanut butter recall out there -- no doubt caused by one food scare rolling into the next. Last week I was shopping for peanut butter and a woman stopped me and asked wasn't I afraid of eating peanut butter because of the contamination. I explained the new recall and that it didn't impact peanut butter. I love peanut butter and could hardly ever give it up. When I was a kid, it was Peter Pan but as I've gotten older, I can't stand it because it's so sweet. Now I prefer natural crunchy peanut butter -- love Teddie Super Cunchy Natural -- just peanuts and salt.

Last Wednesday's New York Times had an article about it in the Dining session. What a baker is to do is make their own peanut butter confections. Included in the article was a recipe for peanut butter cookies adapted from Chris Kimball of Cook's Illustrated. From the recipe I could almost taste those cookies, so much that I had to make a batch. I deviated from the NYT recipe by adding a handful of semi-sweet chocolate chips to half of the cookies. Here's the recipe -- adapted to ingredients in my pantry:

2 1/4 cups all purpose flour

1/2 tsp. each of baking soda, baking powder and salt

1 1/4 cup roasted salted peanuts

1/2 pound unsalted butter (softened to room temp)

1 cup packed light brown sugar

1 cup granulated sugar

1 cup Teddie super crunchy natural peanut butter

2 large eggs

2 tsp. vanilla extract

Handful of semi-sweet chocolate chips

Adjust oven rack to low center position. Heat oven to 350 degrees. In a medium bowl, sift flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Set aside. Place peanuts in a food processor and pulse until the texture of bread crumbs. Set aside.
In bowl of electric stand mixer, beat butter until creamy. Add sugars and beat until fluffy, about 3 minutes, scaping sides as necessary. Beat in crunchy peanut butter until fully incorporated, followed by eggs and vanilla. Slow mixer to low and gradually add flour mixture. Fold in ground peanuts with a rubber spatula just until incorporated. If adding chocolate chips, fold them into all or part of the dough as well.
Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Drop dough onto sheet in spoonfuls a little bigger than a golf ball (small ice cream scooper is perfect) about 2 inches apart. Dip a fork in cold water and then press the back into the dough, repeating to make a crisscross.
Bake until cookies are puffed and slightly brown along edges, but no on top, 10-12 minutes. Cool cookies on cookie sheet until set, about 3 minutes. Transfer to wire rack to cool completely.

The recipe produced 4-1/2 dozen cookies.

Dinner last night was a few peanut butter cookies and a glass of milk -- enjoy.

January Daring Bakers - Amaryllis Petal Tuiles

2009-01-29T15:39:00.007-05:00

This month's challenge is brought to us by Karen of Baking Soda and Zorra of 1x umruehren bitte aka Kochtopf. They have chosen Tuiles from The Chocolate Book by Angelique Schmeink and Nougatine and Chocolate Tuiles from Michel Roux.

My self-rating on this challenge was middling. I came up with a great inspiration for the form -- a beautiful amaryllis blooming in my front room but my presentation of the project was somewhat less spectacular. I sacrificed one of the petals of my flower to use as a shape for the cookies, and everything went smoothly through baking and shaping. My downfall was the final presentation. I decided to dip the tuiles tips in white chocolate but hurried it without following the proper crystallization process. The result was a mess. I hurried along this path by taking some red raspberries (frozen but picked by me last summer) and dipping them in the same white chocolate. That didn't work very well so I nuked the white chocolate a little more and attempted to drizzle it over my creation. Not a pretty sight as you can see! However, red raspberries, white chocolate and tuiles taste terrific. Need to work on the presentation!!

Cheers to all the Daring Bakers and wishing winter would end quickly. We are blanketed with about 4 feet of snow in New England and Northeastern New York.

TWD - Chocolate Gingerbread!

2009-01-27T10:13:00.004-05:00

Gingerbread is not one of my favorite sweets -- but chocolate is! The result is that this week's TWD recipe is one that I would make again. The exact recipe can be found at Sherry Triffle, the blog of Heather who selected the challenge.

I changed the recipe slightly by baking it in smaller pans. I baked it in two 3 inch springform pans and 12 normal sized cupcakes. Following Dorie's note, I filled the pans about 2/3 full which worked out really well. Also, I cut the baking time to about 30 minutes.

TWD – Berry Surprise Cake

2009-01-20T18:20:00.006-05:00

Struck out with this one! From the photo evidence, I made the genoise cake. When I pulled it out of the oven, it collapsed in the middle. I did a little research about why it collapsed and discovered that opening the oven can cause it to take a dip. Well, I probably opened the oven 3-4 times during baking. I was preparing to start over and decided to taste the sponge. I didn’t like it – not the texture or the taste -- so I abandoned the project.

Ooh-lah-lah French Pear Tart - TWD

2009-01-05T18:34:00.004-05:00

Dorie's recipe note that this is such an easy recipe is totally on the mark. I had some sweet tart crusts frozen and pulled them out and used canned pears. I made them in small 6 inch tart pans and it took about a half or more pears per tart. The recipe was so easy to make. I'm constantly impressed by Dorie's pastries -- that they may sound complicated but are easy to make and produce tasty pastries. Thanks Dorie - I'll make this again!

December Daring Bakers - Yule Log to New Year's Cake

2008-12-31T14:02:00.008-05:00

This is my first Daring Bakers challenge and what a challenge it was. This month's challenge is brought to us by the adventurous Hilda from Saffron and Blueberry and Marion from Il en Faut Peu Pour Etre Heureux. They have chosen a French Yule Log by Flore from Florilege Gourmand. They translated the recipe from the original French recipe for us English speakers and non-metric followers -- thanks! For the story of how they chose the recipe, the tremendous work they put into it and the recipe itself check out http://saffronandblueberry.blogspot.com/.

See them -- six elements (praline not showing)!

This was quite a challenge. The finished product had to contain 6 different elements -- Dacquoise, Mousse, Ganache, Praline (Crisp), Creme Brulee and Icing. I had no praline paste, nor any prospect of procuring some, so I had to make a batch and for the gavottes I used Special K. Otherwise I had made nearly all the other elements in some form. I was aiming for a New Year's confection so I made mine as a cake rather than a log. I had a 6 inch baking ring and aimed all the elements to fit inside it. In the end, the layers slightly exceeded the height of a single ring, so I stacked two for the construction. The finished product was nearly as high as it was wide. Some days I feel that way myself! I used a white ganache icing and decorated it with edible gold sprinkles. It's off to a party tonight with lots of Prosecco and good company. Happy New Year to all!

Linzer Sables - TWD

2008-11-30T18:26:00.010-05:00

You say sables -- I say I love Linzer tarts. My love goes back to my student days in Switzerland and Germany and being introduced to Linzer torts. Those lovely hazelnuts and raspberry jam and the interlaced crust -- what's not to like! And Linzer tarts are a great reminder.

If you had to grind nuts for the dough, this recipe would take more effort. A few years ago, I was introduced to buying ground nuts and I generally keep a supply of them in my pantry. I used some ground almonds for this recipe -- although ground hazelnuts would have been my preference. This was definately a shortcut to whip up these cookies.

I want to share another great baking short-cut. I recently bought an add-on for my stand mixer. This is in the form of a flat paddle beater with little wings. What this incredible item provides is scraping the bowl as it turns -- eliminating the need to stop and scrape down the side of the bowl. I found mine on the internet.

Here it is in action.

Here are my maple leaf Linzer sables. Dusted two and the reminder are in the freezer waiting for the holidays. Check out Living the Life for the recipe.

Wow - Twofer Pie - TWD

2008-11-28T09:42:00.007-05:00

With everyone watching their calorie intake, it's not unusual to see people eat the pie filling and pick away at the crust and leave most of it behind. Dorie's Good for Everything Pie Crust is not like that -- and my TG guests ate the whole pie (or at least their piece of pie). One of them said, this was the best pie they had ever eaten and I have to agree. This is a keeper!

Kugelhopf Tastes Like Grandma's Coffee Cake

2008-11-11T10:56:00.003-05:00

At first glance, the kugelhopf recipe scared me and I decided I would skip this week's posting. On Sunday, I gave the recipe a second look and changed my mind. I'm not home this week and took Dorie's advice about the kugelhopf making great toast so from the start planned to bake it in a loaf pan. I finished baking it late Sunday, tried a "few" slices (not toasted), wrapped the remaining loaf and threw it in the freezer. Given my compressed schedule and less than dramatic load pan presentation, there are no photographs of the finished cake for my posting.

My reaction, this tasted great and, even more, it reminded me of my Grandma Arps' coffee cake. She made coffee cakes for holidays -- especially Christmas. She rolled her coffee cakes much thinner (one or two inches thick) and they were sized to fit in a baking pan. She soaked the just baked cakes in butter and sugar just like the kugelhopf but also added cinnamon to the mixture. This would no doubt be a nice adaptation for the kugelhopf. Grandma Arps lived to be 92 and her parents emigrated from Wittorf in northern Germany to northwestern Ohio where many families from the same community landed. She was a great baker and made lots of cakes (one of my favorites was white hickory nut cake), cookies and homemade noodles. Grandma, thanks for the love of baking.

Yummy Chocolate Cupcakes

2008-10-28T05:53:00.008-04:00

For me, there's never enough chocolate. I've taken chocolate classes -- learning to temper chocolate and produce tasty bonbons. So, there's always a supply of chocolate in my pantry. So this recipe was bound to please -- chocolate cake with chocolate ganache frosting. These were so easy to make -- just love them. I added a sprinkling of orange sugar to for Halloween. As usual, I gave most of them away! Check out Clara of I Heart Food4Thought for the recipe.

I got carried away with the pictures this week but enjoy.

TWD - Pumpkin Muffins - What Not To Do

2008-10-21T03:40:00.007-04:00

What not to do is mis-read the ingredient list and decorate your muffins with salty pumpkin seeds and be extra generous with the seeds. It didn't even taste good, didn't look like the muffins in Dorie's cookbook -- what was I thinking?

What to do then, is to carefully pick off the offending decoration! Much better, but don't look too closely.

Orange - Walnut Biscotti

2008-10-14T06:26:00.007-04:00

This week's TWD recipe is perfect as gifts for friends. The ones I made are going to England with me today and will be a little gift to my hosts there. I packed them into decorative cello bags and they look quite impressive.

But back to the recipe. I'm not a fan of almond flavor and I could tell from the list of ingredients that the almond flavor would be overwhelming to my palate. So I substituted orange extract for the almond extract and used chopped walnuts. The result was outstanding -- mild orange flavor and the crunchy walnuts.

To the suitcase!

TWD - Malted Milk Chocolate Drops and Saratoga Wine & Food Festival

2008-09-11T19:22:00.010-04:00

The recipe Q&A this week provided a warning that malted milk powder might be hard to find in the stores, but my neighborhood market had Olvatine – so it was no problem. My challenge was finding Whoppers. Tried three markets with no luck and it finally struck me that the local candy shop might have them. They didn’t carry Whoppers but something better – homemade malted milk balls – with a choice of milk or dark chocolate coating. Naturally, I picked the dark chocolate ones.

Ingredients in place, I quickly made up the batch of cookies. On Monday, I took the cookies to the office and everyone loved them -- one more great recipe from Dorie’s cookbook.

Last weekend, the Saratoga Performing Arts Center hosted a Wine and Food festival – culminating in the Grand Tasting on Saturday. What a terrific event. Many fine restaurants from the area and several hundred vineyards served samples. Even more fun was a special seminar and wine tasting hosted by Kevin Zraly and Burt Wolf. We tasted seven red wines – my favorites were the Brunello di Montalcino 2003 from Aleramici, the Barabaresco 2004 from Marchesi di Gresy and the Amarone Classico 2003 from Tedeschi. From the picture, there was a whole lot of sipping going on! The Wine and Food festival is the first weekend after Labor Day – can’t wait until next year’s edition.

TWD - Got Milk??

2008-09-02T07:00:00.018-04:00

Whether home-made cookies or mass produced oreos, cookies taste best when dunked in a glass of milk. Dorie’s peanut butter chocolate chip cookies especially taste good with a nice cold glass of milk.

Cookies and milk almost gone!

Two things about this week’s recipe were different than other chocolate chip cookie recipes I’ve made. You can find the recipe at Proceed with Caution. The first was the proportion of oatmeal and flour – the recipe called for 3 parts old-fashioned oatmeal and one part flour. Other recipes I’ve used have 2-3 cups of flour to one cup of oatmeal. The second was the addition of cinnamon and nutmeg. I’ve never made a chocolate chip or peanut butter cookie recipe with those spices and they are very prominent in the flavor of the final product. The flavor was not unpleasant but not exactly to my liking.

Cookies are so easy to make. The tricks are chilling the dough so they don’t bake so fast and hold together better and slightly under-baking the cookies. If a recipe calls for 15-17 minutes baking, I’ll usually bake them for 15 minutes. You have to know your oven and check that the cookies are nicely browned.

This was the last weekend of summer and I visited friends in Adamant, Vermont. I took a little short cut home – the Essex Ferry across Lake Champlain. It was a fantastic summer day and the sailors were out in force on the lake with the Adirondack Mountains to the west and Green Mountains to the east. Little Bess loved the journey.

TWD - Blueberry Sour Cream Ice Cream with Chocolate Chunks

2008-08-12T17:54:00.000-04:00

Graeter's Ice Cream in Ohio http://www.graeters.com/ makes some of the best ice cream I've ever eaten. My favorite Graeter's flavor is black raspberry with chocolate chunks. As an homage to Graeter's, I decided to add some chocolate chunks to TWD Blueberry Sour Cream Ice Cream. I couldn't decide wheter to use dark or milk chocolate. My thought being the milk chocolate would balance the sour cream flavor in the ice cream better than the dark chocolate. The chocolate didn't really impact the flavor but added to the texture and "mouth-feel". The key to working with the chocolate was to add it to the ice cream machine just before it's finished.

As others noted in the P&Q, the sour cream flavor was strong, not exactly what you expect in ice cream. Check out http://culinarycuriosity.blogspot.com/ for the recipe for Blueberry Sour Cream Ice Cream.

I took my camera with me when I walked my dog on Saturday and snapped some pictures of flowers. I'm definately loving my new macro lens.

TWD - Black and White Banana Loaf

2008-08-05T10:40:00.006-04:00

There were ripe bananas on the counter and I always have couverture chocolate so I was all prepared for this week's TWD recipe.

I didn't mash the bananas too finely and the batter came together exactly as described in the recipe. I globbed the two mixtures together but didn't stir them after combining them in the pan so the marbling stayed intact.

This recipe took a lot of bowls to prepare! This wasn't one of my favorite recipes.

Walk in the Garden

2008-08-01T11:56:00.008-04:00

A few months ago I bought a macro lens and have been enjoying photographing lots of things in detail but especially the flowers in my garden and neighborhood. It gives me a whole new appreciation for the details of nature.

Some perspectives of a Stargazer Lily in full bloom.

Peachy Keen - TWD Summer Galette

2008-07-29T06:59:00.007-04:00

One of the best bits of summer is tasting a perfectly ripe peach -- biting into it and the warm juice running down my chin. It's interesting where you can get great peaches. Do you know that suburban Washington, DC has several large peach orchards (outside of Rockville, MD) or that they're grown on the western slope of the Rockies? A few crazy things you learn if you have a job like mine! For this week's TWD recipe I chose to use ripe peaches. While local peaches aren't ripe in NY's Upper Hudson Valley, I picked up some perfectly ripe Georgia peaches from a local farm store.

Making the galette dough went well. Practice makes perfect, right? So the Good for Almost Everything Pie Dough went more smoothly than it did for the blueberry pie. Duh, the secret seems to be in having just the right amount of liquid. Didn't my mother tell me that when she tried to teach me to make pie dough? With a good pie dough, putting the galette together was a breeze. I had a little leakage during baking (scraped that off the parchment paper) and only used a small portion of the custard because of the size of the fruit. Coreopsis from of my garden.

Summer Fruit Galette

From Dorie Greenspan, Baking - From My Home to Yours (NY: Houghton Miflin, 2006)

Good for Almost Everything Pie Dough for a single crust, chilled
3 tablespoons of peach marmalade (from Steininger's)
2 tablespoons of crushed graham crackers
4-5 large ripe peaches (I bought 8, used 4-1/2 and ate the rest but not in one sitting)

For the custard:
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted in the microwave
1/3 cup sugar
1 large egg
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.

Roll the pie dough out between 2 sheets of parchment paper and use one of the sheets to line the baking pan. Roll the dough out into a large 1/8 inch thick circle. Use a knife to trim the dough into a 13 inch diameter circle. With a 9 inch cake pan as a template, use the tip of a blunt knife to trace a circle in the center of the dough for the area of the filling.

Using a small offset spatula, spread the marmalade over the the central circle and sprinkle the crushed graham crackers over the marmalade. The graham crackers will absorb excess moisture from the fruit. Cover the prepared dough with plastic and refrigerate while you prepare the fruit.

Blanch the peaches for 10 seconds in a pot of boiling water, transfer them to a bowl of ice water to cool, then slip off the skins. Halve and pit the peaches.

Arrange the peaches on the dough, cut side down, then gently lift the unfilled border of dough up and onto the filling. As you life the dough and place it on the filling, it will pleat. If possible, freeze the galette to give the crust a rest.

Brush the dough very lightly with a little water, then sprinkle it with a teaspoon or two of sugar. Bake the galette for 25 minutes, or until the crust is brown and the fruit is soft.

Meanwhile, make the custard: Whisk together the melted butter, sugar, egg and vanilla in a bowl; set aside until needed.

Remove the baking sheet from the oven (leave the oven on), and carefully pour or spoon the custard around the peaches. Depending on how much juice has accumulated and how much space you have between the fruit, you may not be able to pour all the custard in the galette, but even 2 tablespoons can give the right effect. Pour as much custard as you can, then carefully return the pan to the oven.

Bake another 12-15 minutes, or until the custard is set - it shouldn't jiggle when you gently shake the pan. Cool the galette on the baking sheet on a rack for 10 minutes.

Very carefully slide a small baking sheet or cake lifter under teh galette and slip it onto a rack to cool. The galette can be served when it is just warm or when it has reach room temperature. Dust with confectioner's sugar just before serving.

TWD - I Found my Thrill on Blueberry Hill

2008-07-08T02:48:00.001-04:00

My hostess was happy when I offered to bring the TWD blueberry pie to her July 4th celebration. The 4th was a glorious day in Saratoga Springs. The temperature was in the mid-70s and there were no clouds in the sky. I started the morning with a kayak paddle on Fish Creek (the dog went along and took a swim – amazing for a terrier), a lunch of fresh tomato sandwiches in my friend Deb’s beautiful garden and finally a late afternoon picnic dinner. It was the best 4th celebration in recent memory.

The pie was devoured by the picnickers. I added some homemade vanilla ice cream (from Dorie’s recipe) to round out the dessert. The crust recipe was more like a cookie with the abundant butter in the pie dough and although a little tricky to roll out, it held up very well. My motto that butter makes things better was especially true for the pie dough. Heck, the pie dough was good enough to eat raw -- did I mention I sampled it? With the filling, I used fresh blueberries but as suggested by other Dorettes tinkered with the bread crumbs. In my pie I substituted crushed Nilla cookies for the bread crumbs. It added some complexity of vanilla to the flavor along with the lemon zest which the picnickers really liked. I didn’t reduce the amount of sugar in the pie, just went with the cup she recommended.

TWD - Johnny Appleseed's Finest

2008-07-01T12:18:00.008-04:00

This week’s project was to bake Dorie’s Apple Cheddar Scones. My pantry had no dried apples and fresh apples didn’t appear to be an acceptable substitute. I picked up some beautiful fresh Pink Lady apples, peeled, cored, sliced them into thin slices and dried them on racks in a slow oven for about 6 hours. It took 2 apples to make a good half cup of dried fruit. The oven dried the apples perfectly but they were more difficult to chop into fine pieces than properly dehydrated fruit.

The recipe simply called for cheddar cheese and I chose to use an extra sharp Cabot Hunter’s cheese. The strong flavor predominated in the finished scones. The cheese over powered the dried apples unless you specifically got a slice of dried apple. The butter, as usual, made everything go down better.

TWD - Orange Cream Puff Ring

2008-06-19T20:10:00.009-04:00

"Yum" said one taster friend. "Very Good," said the next and all rated this week's TWD creation a 5-star dessert.

This week I transformed the Peppermint Cream Puff Ring into an Orange Cream Puff Ring. I find the combination of orange and chocolate flavors the most pleasing and since I had some candied orange peel on hand I decided to go with the orange. I adapted Dorie's recipe and steeped orange zest in the cream mixture for about a day. This produced a subtle orange flavor in the cream. Then I drizzled the chocolate ganache over the cream puff and added the candied orange peel.

One of my taster friends thought it was a long process to make candied orange peel. This is not the case. I adapted a recipe from a February 2005 issue of Bon Appetit which is quite quick and easy.

Candied Orange Peel

1 orange

1 cup sugar, divided

3/4 cup water

Remove orange part of peel from orange in long strips making sure you remove the pith. Cut peel lengthwise into thin strips. Stir 3/4 cup sugar and 3/4 cup water in heavy small saucepan over medium-low heat until sugar dissolves. Bring to boil. Reduce heat and simmer 2 minutes. Add orange peel; simmer 15 minutes. Place remaining 1/4 cup sugar in small bowl. Using slotted spoon, remove peel from syrup and transfer to sugar. Toss to coat. Store at room temperature in an air tight bowl. The orange peel keeps for several weeks.