February Challenge - Julia's French Bread

(for some reason I can't get the images to resize - apologies)

Heh. Remember what I said about yeast-risen things and how I'm terrified of them, etc, etc? Well, the joke's on me because that's just what the February Daring Baker's challenge was.... great. French bread, no less. The fewest number of ingredients, but the most fiddly. However, since I skipped January's Challenge of Lemon Meringue pie, I had to do this so here I went!

I will say that, while bread is one of my favorite things to eat, it's not really at all my favorite thing to make, unless it's a quick bread like zucchinni or banana or date-nut bread. There's no rising involved, you mix everything together, and throw it in the oven. An hour or so later, it's done, it's delicious. I have always envied those who enjoy making bread - my uncle, and my mom's best friend each take a day each week to make their bread for the coming days. I love the concept.... but I don't love the execution. I haven't ever had success with breads that require rising time. I don't know if my yeasts are old, or if my house is too cold to foster a proper rise, or what. But they usually come out like bricks.

To get the full recipe, you can go here

Here are some pictures and notes of my progress:

The Ingredients, Part I


Salt, yeast, all-purpose, unbleached flour, and water. See my thermometer? It was 100 degrees on the mark.

The Ingredients, Part II


After mixing the yeast with the water and the flour and salt together, right before everything was mixed together.

I Need to Knead


After mixing everything together, here's the kneading for the first pass. I have to say, I do enjoy kneading - it's a great movement that really works the arms and feels fantastic when the ingredients blend and merge.

After the first rise




My little helper got a little piece of dough to beat up so that I could futz with the dough and get it ready to rise again. I did the first 2 rises in the oven, which seemed to work out well, but the 2nd time I put the towel on over the plastic, it kind of fell into the bowl and I think it kept the 2nd rise from true success.

Ready for More


This was post-2nd rise, getting the dough ready for its resting and 3rd rise. Because I am slightly lazy and pregnant, I opted to do 1 large boule-type of loaf.



I think this is where I ran into a little more trouble - my house is cool, and it was a cool, not-sunny day. If the sun had been out, the room that this third rise took place would have been much warmer. It did go to be fairly large, though, with the wrappings and all. And my cats didn't bother the dough, which was unprecidented.

Baker, Baker


Here's the hedgehog loaf (so-called due to how the cuts in the dough came out), after I brushed it with water. I did this, and the crust was lovely.



After coming out of the oven. Nice color, a little flat but still lovely.

I couldn't wait for the bread to cool before eating it - for one thing, it smelled too good, and second, this bread had taken all day to make, and it was dinner-time so we had it with our supper.




Overall, I'll say that this was a fun challenge, but it wasn't fun enough or worthwhile enough to commit to making my own bread. I have a high respect for those who do make their own bread - it takes time and patience, and I don't have much of either of those qualities right now. It was tasty, and it makes some delicious toast with honey in the morning. So, thank you for the challenge! It's certainly a departure from what I would normally bake!

December Challenge - Buche de Noel

There aren't many things that terrify me in the kitchen when I'm baking. One is pastry flour, the other is yeast-rising type things, and the other three things are: anything involving a pastry bag and frosting; rolling cakes, and buttercream. The Buche de Noel uses these last three things, big-time.

Let's get started, shall we? I woked backwards when I made this cake: decoration, filling, cake, frosting.

The Mushrooms
I opted to make the meringue mushrooms - I'm not a fan of marzipan, so I braved the pastry bag and went for it. I preheated the oven to 225 d F and lined 22 baking sheets with parchment. I got my pastry bag fitted with my tip - I didn't have a #6 so I used a #4. To make the meringues, I combined 3 room temperature egg whites and 1/4 tsp cream of tartar in my mixer's bowl (making sure there was no trace of errant fat in the bowl) and beat them until very foamy. I slowly added 1/2 cup granulated sugar and increased the speed to high and beat until soft peaks formed. I continuted until the whites were very stiff and shiny, then folded in 1/3 cup confectioner's sugar with a rubber spatula.




I scooped the mixture into the pastry bag, and piped as many stems as I could onto one sheet- at first they looked like piles of white spaghetti but as I got more comfortable with the movements, I was able to make some decent stems. On the other sheet, I made caps - once I figured out that I could just squoosh a bunch of meringue into a ball, the caps came out beautifully. I smoothed out any points, and dusted everything with cocoa.



These all baked for 55 minutes, then I removed them, flipped the caps upside down, poked holes in them, took the stems and dipped them in the remaining meringue, and married the two together. They went back into the oven for 15 minutes, then got to spend the night in a tupperware container, until I was ready to garnish.




The Filling
I decided to make something different for the filling, so I went to my favorite chocolate pudding recipe and made that up. It's in the Joy of Cooking, and it is a miracle in a bowl. Lots of cocoa powder, sugar, and milk (I used 1/2 half and half and 1/2 milk to save a few precious calories).



When the pudding had set, I peeled off the skin (the best part, hands-down) and whipped up some cream. I let the pudding come to room temperature, and after the cream had been whipped, I slowly added it in. This made a beautiful, delicious mousse-like filling.

The Cake
The cake was a plain genoiose, and was very easy to make. I had been warned by people at work (I work for a food magazine, not in the kitchen) not to overcook, because this could end up being very dry.

I preheated the overn to 400 d F, prepped my jelly roll pan by buttering it and then putting a parchment sheet down and buttered that, then filled a medium saucepan with water and boiled it. I combined 3 large eggs, 3 egg yolks, a pinch of salt and 3/4 cup sugar in my mixer's bowl and placed the bowl in the hot water on the stove. I wisked until the mixture was 100 d, then put the bowl in the mixer and whipped with the whisk until the mixture had cooled and tripled in volume - this took about 20 minutes on medium-high.

After whisking 1/2 cup of cake flour and 1/4 cup of cornstarch together, I sifted them in three batched over the egg mixture and folded it in. It was tough to make sure i had gotten all the lumps out, because I didn't want to overbeat the batter. Finally it was ready to go in the pan and into the oven.



I baked the cake for only 10 minutes, then removed it from the oven and let it cool just slighly while I got the rolling stuff together. I had also been advised by my friends at work that it's best to roll the cake while it's still warm (which is why I made the filling first. They told me to put a clean kitchen towel down, then another piece of parchement, then dust the parchment with cocoa to keep the cake from sticking.



I quickly transferred the cake to the rolling station, and it was already cool enough to fill with the filling, so on it went, and away I rolled. I filled it with my chocolate mousse and rolled it up as tighly as I could. The cake was so delicate, it did crack a little, and I think I maybe had too much filling in there.



I transferred the cake to the plate, and I thought that that was really the biggest challenge. It was so mooshy, and so delicate, I thought I'd drop it or break it. But I made it, so it got wrapped up tightly and put in the fridge to set up overnight. I made the mushrooms, the cake, and the filling on Friday afternoon.

The Frosting
Yesterday (Saturday) I made the buttercream frosting, and was a little afraid It would separate. It kind of did, but it still tasted delicious. I made only 1/2 the recipe because I had used something else for the filling, and wouldn't need much for the outside.

I took 2 large egg whites and 1/2 cup of sugar and whisked it together in the bowl of my mixer, then put the bowl over more simmering water and whisked until the sugar had dissolved and the egg whites were hot. I put the bowl on the mixer and whipped with the whisk attachment on medium until it was cooled, then switched to the paddle and beat in 12 tbsp of softened unsalted butter. This went ok, but there was not as much of a consistent blend as I would have liked to see. I dissolved 1 tbsp instant espresso powder into 1 tbsp kahlua (I didn't have any brandy or rum, and figured the kahlua would bring out the coffee flavor) and put it into the butter/egg/sugar mixture. The frosting was too soft when I was done so I decided to let it set up in the fridge for a little while. It was quite liquid-y.

About an hour later, I frosted the cake with the buttercream and drew some fork lines in it - the lines were more like a shaggy bark than clean decoration, but I thought it looked good. I applied the mushrooms, and put a little green around the cake.


Then I thought: hey, it's winter, let's put some pow-pow on for snow!
So I did that, and it looked great.



We had a party to go to last night, so this was what I brought. People thought the mushrooms were really real, and were delighted at the taste of the cake, as was my husband. I'm pleased too - I wish the frosting had come out a little better, but all in all this cake reminded me that i have nothing to fear in the kitchen (excepting, perhaps, my inability to really decorate well). It was tasty, though! A little more work-intensive than I care to undertake when I want a cake, but it would be nice for a special occassion, for sure.

Happy Yule and Holiday to you all! Thanks for this challenge!

Cookie, cookie, cookie starts with "C"

Here are some treats from our baking extravaganza... oh, if only you could taste them all!

The wonderful, damn, addictive Hats:




Boot Tracks (I'm not saying WHAT it looks like you stepped in, but it does taste pretty darn good):




Scottish shortbread: flour, sugar, butter. That's all that needs to be said.




Pecan tartlettes that my mom had to wing the recipe for, but they still turned out quite nicely:




Cranberry, pistachio, almond macaroons. Something went a little funny on the recipe, but that did not - I repeat did NOT - keep me from eating more than my fair share:




This isn't even all of the stuff we made.... All in all we had about 50 dozen cookies, and most of them went away to friends & family. We used about 12 lbs of butter, at least 5 lbs of sugar (brown and white), 3 dozen eggs, and a bunch of flour, vanilla, and nuts. It's all good. Happy holidays! (if you'd like any of these recipes, please let me know and I'll post them).

Hats! Hats! Everywhere!

Oh my god.
The hats have arrived.

Next weekend my friend M and my mom and P and I will be doing our annual holiday cookie baking - I have to make something in the area of 36 dozen cookies to send to family and friends - and yesterday I thought I'd get a jump on some of the cookies so I made Peanut Butter Kiss cookies. These are the simplest cookie to make, ever. 4 ingredients. That's all. But for some reason I only make them around Christmas.

They are so simple that one time I gave the recipe to a friend who thought it was incorrect because there wasn't a ton of ingredients and measuring. So she found some other recipe that had flour and cinnamon and a ton of unnecessary things and made them, and they really tasted like crap. Follow this recipe. Trust me. And I see that Hershey is trying to capitolize on the popularity of this by selling kits. This is easier and cheaper and probably better than their package of preservatives.

I don't know if they're better right out of the oven (all mooshy and melty) or better after they've been in the garage, wrapped up against critters, frozen and a little crunchy. Either way, they're awesome. The cheaper the peanut butter, the better. The toughest thing about these cookies is YOU NEED TO WAIT. You can't take them off the cookie sheet too soon or else they turn to little trainwrecks of mush. They still taste delicious, but they look horrible.

So here you go. And I think I'll be making more, to "get a further jump on my baking for next weekend" (ahem!) and I'll also try to take some pictures. Enjoy!

1 cup peanut butter
1 cup sugar
1 egg

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
Mix peanut butter, sugar and egg together well. Let sit for about 5 minutes while you unwrap Hershey Kisses.
Roll into balls about 1/2" in diameter, place onto cookie sheet - they can go close together.
Take a kiss, push it into the ball of dough gently, until the ball is slightly flattened out.
Bake for 12 minutes
Remove from oven, let sit on cookie sheet for 10-15 minutes. Remove, cool, enjoy.

These can be frozen or refrigerated. They are delicious!!!!

Sorry I didn't get around to posting the November Challenge

I was too exhausted to cook potatoes then make them into bread!!! Thanksgiving dinner preparations kind of did me in. Next time, I promise, there will be a post with lovely pictures!

Daring Bakers October 2007 Challenge - Bostini Cream Pie

As almost a foresight to the Sox taking the World Series last night, Mary of Alpineberry's challenge for October 2007 was "Bostini Cream Pie" (from Donna Scala & Kurtis Baguley of Bistro Don Giovanni & Scala's Bakery).... This was not your normal BCP (which I LOVE), something a little different, with a couple of twists: one was the addition of a significant amount of fresh orange juice and orange zest to the cake, and the serving was done in individual ramekins, as little mini BCPs. I think my adaptation of this recipe was pretty spot-on, with the exception being that I didn't have enough ramekins to bake the cakes as individual cakes. You'll see my solution, below....

I'll list the ingredients first, so that you can read them, have your saturated-fat induced heart-attack, then while you're recouperating in the hospital you can see my pictures and notes on this challenge.

CUSTARD:
3/4 cup whole milk
2-3/4 tbsp cornstarch
1 whole egg, beaten
9 egg yolks, beaten
3-3/4 cup heavy cream
1/2 vanilla bean (I used 1 tsp real vanilla extract)
1/2 cup + 1 tbsp sugar


CHIFFON CAKE:
1-1/2 cups cake flour
3/4 cup superfine sugar (I used regular sugar and pulsed it in my mini-food processor for a few seconds)
1/3 tsp salt
1/3 cup canola oil (good fats!!)
1/3 cup beaten egg yolks (3 to 4 yolks)
3/4 cup fresh orange juice
1-1/2 tbsp grated orange zest
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup egg whites (about 8 large)
1 tsp cream of tartar


CHOCOLOATE GLAZE
8 oz semi or bittersweet chocolate (I used semisweet chips)
8 oz unsalted butter

METHOD:
To prepare the custard:
Combine the milk and cornstarch in a bowl, blend until smooth.

Whisk in the whole egg and yolks, beating until smooth. Combine the cream, vanilla and sugar in a saucepan and carefully bring to a boil. When the mixture just boils, whisk a ladleful into the egg mixture to temper it, then whisk egg mixture back into the cream. Cook, stirring constantly, until the mixture is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon.

Strain the custard and pour into 8 large custard cups (I used ramekins). Refrigerate to chill.


To prepare the chiffon cakes:
Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Spray 8 molds with a non-stick cooking spray (use ramekins, or something that will fit over the custard tightly. Or, do what I did and bake them in a 9" x 12" and 8" x 8" baking pan, lined with parchment and sprayed, and then cut the cakes out because you don't have enough ramekins - see below for photos)

Sift the cake flour, sugar, baking powder, and sale into large bowl. Add the oil, egg yolks, orange juice
, zest and vanilla. Stir until smooth, but do not overbeat.

Beat the egg whites until frothy. Add the cream of tartar and beat until still peaks form. Gently fold the beaten whites into the orange batter. Fill the molds (or pans) nearly to the top with batter.

Bake approximately 25 minutes, until the cakes bounce back when lightly pressed with a fingertip. Do not overback. Remove from over and let cool on wire rack, when completely cool, remove from molds, cover to keep moist.

To prepare the gaze:
Chop chocolate into small pieces, place butter in a saucepan and melt over low heat until it's about to bubble. Remove from heat, add chocolate, stir to melt. Strain and keep warm until assembly.

To assemble cake
Cut a thin slice from the top of each cake to create a flat surgace. Place a cake flat-side down on top of custart, cover tops with warm chocolate glaze. Serve immediately.
Or, you can do what I did and take your cake from the 8" x 8" pan, cut out round pieces, and fit them over the top:




I think this was a good solution to not having enough ramekins to go around.

Here's the finished product, plated, gooey with chocolate, dusted with "pow-pow" (thanks, DeeDee, for the tip!) with a floral accoutrement:




I have to say that when I heard that this was an orange-flavored cake, I wasn't very thrilled. I'm not a big fan of citrus and chocolate, so I was kind of apathetic when it was making this. I enjoyed the challenge, and when we sat down to eat (we had some friends over to try this out), they were all very enthusiastic.

However, I have to say that the combination of the chocolate, custard, and cake was VERY pleasing, and the flavors all complimented each other very well. It was the first citrus dessert I've enjoyed in a while!!

My one criticism for this recipe was the custard, which was by far my favorite single element of the recipe. The instruction to "cook until it coats the back of a spoon" is slightly misleading. I've made other custards before, and puddings, and there are usually more detailed instructions about temperature. I took the custard off when it coated the back of the spoon and seemed thick enough, but when I strained it, the liquid that was left never firmed up so the custard was very runny. The cakes did a nice job of soaking it up, but it wasn't like a real Boston Cream Pie in that way.

Thanks for the challenge, Daring Bakers! I can't wait to see what November's challenge is!
(it's 4:30 and I'm just getting this in under the gun!)

New post coming soon... I PROMISE

I've gone & joined the Daring Bakers, and the first challenge that I'm participating in needs to be posted on Monday, 10/29. So rev up your taste-buds... I've got something yummy cruising down the pike for yous all.