Daring Bakers: Traditional British Pudding

When I first read what this month's challenge was going to be, I thought hmmmmm...well, ok, this is a new one and something I've never made before and in some varieties, I've actually eaten. But hey, I have a soft spot in my heart for certain British folks and hey, give me that cool British accent on the right guy and it's over! You know the saying, "the way to a man's heart, is through his stomach" and if this type of guy or this type of guy could be the end result, then I say bring it on!

First let me introduce our hostess this month:

The April 2010 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Esther of The Lilac Kitchen. She challenged everyone to make a traditional British pudding using, if possible, a very traditional British ingredient: suet.

Daring Bakers: Nanaimo Bars & A Surprise!

I've had Nanaimo Bars on my list of recipes to make "someday". My recipe list comes in many varieties. I've bookmarked recipes that I've found on one of many favorite food blogs, or the stack of magazines with beautiful pictures and delicious sounding recipes that I've kept for years, or the recipes that I've printed out and actually filed them in my recipe binder which seems to grow daily. So when I saw this challenge, I was excited to cross this dessert off my list and complete another Daring Bakers challenge.

Before I get into the details of this challenge, let me introduce our hostess, the writer of one of my favorite blogs:

The January 2010 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Lauren of Celiac Teen. Lauren chose Gluten-Free Graham Wafers and Nanaimo Bars as the challenge for the month. The sources she based her recipe on are 101 Cookbooks and http://www.nanaimo.ca/.

Daring Bakers: Gingerbread Houses

Gingerbread Houses--one of my favorite Christmas traditions!

When I found it was this months Daring Bakers Challenge, I began planning immediately how I would fit it into my schedule. But before I get into those details, let me introduce our two fabulous hostesses!

The December 2009 Daring Bakers’ challenge was brought to you by Anna of Very Small Anna and Y of Lemonpi. They chose to challenge Daring Bakers’ everywhere to bake and assemble a gingerbread house from scratch. They chose recipes from Good Housekeeping and from The Great Scandinavian Baking Book as the challenge recipes.

A few days later I had a client ask if I was selling Gingerbread Houses on my holiday menu this year. I explained that although it wasn't on my menu, I'd be happy to make one for her to purchase. It worked out great, since I was already planning to purchase the supplies (candy) for one house, what is one more? And then I had a second client order another house as well. I used my long-time favorite family recipe for my client's gingerbread houses, since I knew exactly how the dough would turn out.

I set aside a few hours and began to make what ended up being three batches of my favorite gingerbread dough and one batch of Y's recipe. I decided to try Y's recipe because I was intrigued by the Scandinavian dough that didn't have any molasses in it and my recipe did. Y's recipe yielded a bit more than I had expected, so I made a large house and a smaller house; turning the three gingerbread houses into four!

Gingerbread House for Client #1:



Gingerbread House for Client #2:



My favorite aspect of creating desserts is the decorating part of the process. I enjoyed every single minute and hour in creating those gingerbread houses for my clients, but I was antsy to begin work on my own house. Finally after about four or five days of being extremely busy with Jillicious Desserts orders, I was able to start construction on my houses.

Jill's Gingerbread Village (I don't know if two houses make a village, but it has a village-like feel to the scene):



I really enjoyed creating these houses and I probably went a little picture crazy, but I just wanted to share all the fun details from this project.

Large Gingerbread House:



[Close up view of front door.]



[Windows made from melted butterscotch candy pieces. I used a battery-operated tea light inside the house. It fit easily through the front door and the light flickered through the candy windows.]



[Star is also made from butterscotch candy pieces & the Christmas lights are chocolate covered sunflower seeds. They were the perfect outdoor light shape!]



[The roof is made out of chocolate frosted mini-wheat cereal.]



[The rocks on the chimney are chocolate candies--I love how they look like real rocks. One of my favorite elements are the candy cane trees that I found at one of the supermarkets while searching for candy.]



[Every gingerbread house I've made over the years always has some sort of peppermint candies on it; this one has mini candy canes and the round peppermint candies.]



[Aerial view of large house and Santa with all nine reindeer.]



The second part of my gingerbread project was the Bake Shop. This was probably my favorite house to create, because I had nearly a week to decide what I wanted to do with it. I made several small, very small bake shop items and most of them you can look through the door and see them in the shop. Next year, I may have to make another one, but larger, so it's easier to see inside.

Jill's Gingerbread Bake Shop:



[Notice the door with the open sign on the Bake Shop; in honor of the Jillicious Online Bake Shop that opened earlier this month.]



[This is the only picture I took while putting the houses together. I got so involved in the process, I completely forget to take step-by-step pictures. This was taken before the front and roof was attached.]



[All of these were made out of fondant and the writing was from an edible ink food pen. They were so much fun to make and I just love how cute they turned out!]



[The roof was made from Christmas hard candies, something I remember getting in my stocking every year as a kid. I really had to track this candy down and finally found them in the fifth store I went to.]



[View from the large house--one of my favorite views of Santa.]



[Santa, his sleigh and the reindeer were all made from fondant. The trees are made out of chocolate, each layer piped separately, then attached with chocolate to create the tree shapes.]



[More Santa pictures, because he is just so dang cute!]



[View from the back of the houses.]



Now for the recipe! I was pleasantly surprised at how good this gingerbread dough tasted; especially since it didn't have molasses and I was worried at the amount of cloves it had in the recipe, but it was really good.

Thanks for sharing it Y!

*My notes are in green.

Y's Recipe:
Scandinavian Gingerbread (Pepparkakstuga)
from The Great Scandinavian Baking Book by Beatrice Ojakangas

1 cup butter, room temperature [226g]
1 cup brown sugar, well packed [220g]
2 tablespoons cinnamon
4 teaspoons ground ginger
3 teaspoons ground cloves
2 teaspoons baking soda
½ cup boiling water
5 cups all-purpose flour [875g]

1. In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar until blended. Add the cinnamon, ginger and cloves. Mix the baking soda with the boiling water and add to the dough along with the flour. Mix to make a stiff dough. If necessary add more water, a tablespoon at a time. Chill 2 hours or overnight. *I chilled my batch for about 2 hours and it was enough time.

2. Cut patterns for the house, making patterns for the roof, front walls, gabled walls, chimney and door out of cardboard.

3. Roll the dough out on a large, ungreased baking sheet and place the patterns on the dough. Mark off the various pieces with a knife, but leave the pieces in place. *I used a really good technique I've used for years with gingerbread dough. Line the baking sheet with foil and place the dough in the middle. Using a regular rolling pin, roll the dough from the middle to all four corners, until the dough is evenly rolled out. The dough should be smooth and even (see pictures below).

4. Preheat the oven to 375'F (190'C). Bake for 12 to 15 minutes until the cookie dough feels firm. After baking, again place the pattern on top of the gingerbread and trim the shapes, cutting the edges with a straight-edged knife. Leave to cool on the baking sheet. *After 15 minutes, remove the foil from the pan, with the gingerbread still on it and carefully move the pieces to a cooling rack.



Royal Icing:

1 large egg white
3 cups (330g) powdered sugar
1 teaspoon white vinegar
1 teaspoon almond extract

Beat all ingredients until smooth, adding the powdered sugar gradually to get the desired consistency. Pipe on pieces and allow to dry before assembling. If you aren't using it all at once you can keep it in a small bowl, loosely covered with a damp towel for a few hours until ready to use. You may have to beat it slightly to get it an even consistency if the top sets up a bit. Piped on the house, this will set up hard over time.

Simple Syrup:
2 cups (400g) sugar

Place in a small saucepan and heat until just boiling and the sugar dissolves. Dredge or brush the edges of the pieces to glue them together. If the syrup crystallizes, remake it. *I didn't use the simple syrup, but many Daring Bakers said it worked really well.



I wish you all a very MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Daring Bakers: Ran out of time...

I hope you all had a Happy Thanksgiving yesterday.

Today is the reveal date for this months challenge: CANNOLI! I know, doesn't that sound so yummy?!

Well, the month flew by, and this week I had lots of Thanksgiving dessert orders to fill (so happy for a busy week) and then in the middle of it all, I began to get sick. So here we are and because I'm feeling so dang awful, I can't even pull off the challenge at the last minute.

Be sure to visit our hostess with the mostess; Lisa Michele at Parsley, Sage, Desserts & Line Drives to read about this fantastic challenge and the how-to in creating it yourself.

After I'm feeling better, I'll see if I can do a late posting of this awesome challenge. Right now, I plan on staying in bed the rest of the weekend.

Stay tuned.

Daring Bakers: French Macarons

Boy oh boy, do I have experiences to share and pictures to show you this month with this challenge! But before I get into that, let me introduce our hostess of the October Daring Bakers' Challenge:

The 2009 October Daring Bakers’ challenge was brought to us by Ami S. She chose macarons from Claudia Fleming’s The Last Course: The Desserts of Gramercy Tavern as the challenge recipe.

Our hostess explains what french macarons are:

"In the United States, the term “macaroon” generally refers to a cookie made primarily of coconut. But European macaroons are based on either ground almonds or almond paste, combined with sugar and egg whites. The texture can run from chewy, crunchy or a combination of the two. Frequently, two macaroons are sandwiched together with ganache, buttercream or jam, which can cause the cookies to become more chewy. The flavor possibilities and combinations are nigh endless, allowing infinitely customizable permutations".

I found that the challenge recipe did not work as well as another one that I've been using almost weekly over the past six months. [If you would like to see the actual challenge recipe, click here.]

I followed the directions for the challenge recipe exactly and the results were a disappointing FAIL (see pictures below):

Against my better judgement and previous experience, the parchment paper did not remotely help these poor things. I even baked them on Silpats, just to be sure. This is how they turned out:



And here is a close up of the failed macarons:



Now this is how macarons SHOULD look (notice the ruffled edges at the bottom of the macaron, these are called feet and you want them for a successful macaron):



I'm not sure if it was because it was a rainy, high-in-moisture Oregon day and this recipe didn't have as much powdered sugar and almonds to the egg white ratio. Also, I have found that parchment paper does NOT work as well as Silpats for my macarons. I did try the double pan technique that was mentioned, and that really didn't help them either. Although, this wasn't a successful first run, I'm glad I tried all the tips and the recipe, if only to know what doesn't work.

As I mentioned above, I've been making French Macarons for the past six months as a collaboration with a local chocolate shop owner and we sell them from his store each Saturday. So I've worked through many recipes over this time and I will share the one that I adapted from a basic recipe found at Tartelette's website. If you haven't visited her website, I highly recommend you do--she is an expert macaron baker and she gives clear and helpful directions and her macarons are beautifully done.

The one aspect I really enjoyed from this challenge was creating a new flavor that I hadn't tried before and I was excited to use some Oregon Hazelnuts that I just purchased here locally from Hazelnut Hill in Corvallis, Oregon.

I've included my own thoughts and notes from things that I've found to work really well in making French Macarons.

*Jillicious notes in this color.

Pumpkin Spice Hazelnut French Macarons

Adapted from Tartelette's Recipe found here.

For the macaron shells:

90 grams egg whites (aged 2-3 days)
1 tsp. lemon juice
30 grams granulated sugar
200 grams powdered sugar
55 grams almond flour
55 grams hazelnut flour
1 tsp. pumpkin pie spice
3 to 5 drops of orange food coloring

Prepare the macarons:

1) In a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, whip the egg whites to a foam, gradually add the sugar until you obtain a glossy meringue. While the egg whites are still at a soft peak, add the food color. Do not over beat your meringue or it will be too dry.

2) Place the almonds, hazelnuts, powdered sugar, and pumpkin pie spice in a food processor and give them a good pulse until the nuts are finely ground.



*After grinding the mixture, it should be fine and look like this:



3) Add them to the meringue, give it a quick fold to break some of the air and then fold the mass carefully until you obtain a batter that falls back on itself after counting to 10. Give quick strokes at first to break the mass and slow down. The whole process should not take more than 50 strokes. Test a small amount on a plate: if the tops flattens on its own you are good to go. If there is a small beak, give the batter a couple of turns.

4) Fill a pastry bag fitted with a plain tip (Ateco #807 or #809) with the batter and pipe small rounds (1.5 inches in diameter) onto silicone mats lined baking sheets. *I usually use a smaller tip Ateco #806--just a preference.



*Because the batter will spread slightly, it's best to pipe macarons in alternating rows as pictured:



5) Preheat the oven to 280F. Let the macarons sit out for 30 minutes to an hour to harden their shells a bit and bake for 15 to 20 minutes, depending on their size. *I have a convection oven and I bake mine for 8-9 minutes, then turn the pans and switch racks and continue to bake for another 8-9 minutes.

6) Let cool. If you have trouble removing the shells, pour a couple of drops of water under the parchment paper while the sheet is still a bit warm and the macarons will lift up more easily do to the moisture. (*This is another reason I use Silpats; once the macarons cool, they come off very easily.) Don't let them sit there in it too long or they will become soggy.

7) Once baked and if you are not using them right away, store them in an airtight container out of the fridge for a couple of days or in the freezer.



Dark Chocolate Hazelnut Ganache

4 oz. dark Belgian chocolate, finely chopped
1/2 cup heavy cream
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
1/4 cup Nutella

1) Chop chocolate into small pieces and transfer to bowl; set aside.

2) Heat cream over medium-high heat. When it reaches scalding point, remove from heat and pour over chocolate.

3) Stir chocolate and cream until combined. Add vanilla and Nutella and stir until incorporated and smooth. Let ganache cool and is firm enough to pipe on macarons.

4) Pipe ganache on macaron (bottom side facing up) and sandwich carefully with second macaron (top side facing down).



I was very happy with how this version of French Macarons turned out. I really liked the addition of the hazelnut flour to the macaron and the pumpkin pie spice was a nice flavor with it.

The reason I choose to use a dark chocolate and mix it will the Nutella, was because although I like the strong hazelnut flavor of the Nutella, I didn't want it to take over the ganache flavor completely.

In the end, both components complimented each other and I would say that this macaron challenge was a SUCCESS!

Daring Bakers: Puff Pastry (Vols-au-Vent)

Today is the reveal date for this month's Daring Bakers' Challenge and guess what?!

I'm still mixing, rolling, turning, chilling and baking (this will make more sense when you read the directions later).

Yep, I've waited till the last possible minute, so I'll be back much later today (hopefully before midnight PST). Check back later for write-up and pictures of this delicious pastry.

I know, I know, it's actually Tuesday now (yes, I'm 2 days late with this post--my first time and hopefully the LAST time) and I have the puff pastry made, baked and filled with yummy goodness.

But first things first--a BIG thank you to our hostess for choosing a great Daring Bakers' challenge:

The September 2009 Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Steph of A Whisk and a Spoon. She chose the French treat, Vols-au-Vent based on the Puff Pastry recipe by Michel Richard from the cookbook Baking With Julia by Dorie Greenspan.




These last two weeks have been busy, busy, BUSY with work and other types of baking and before I knew it, it was the 27th and I hadn't started the challenge yet. I've been looking forward to making puff pastry, since it's been awhile since I've made it and I was excited to come up with some delicious savory and sweet fillings--and then I ran out of time and had to make fillings using what I happen to have on hand.

I decided to only use 1/3 of the dough and I rolled out the rest into sheets and they are in the freezer. I will be re-visiting the puff pastry later in the month and be a bit more creative with some fillings, but all was not lost with this last minute challenge.

If you happen to have some puff pastry in your freezer (homemade or even store bought), then you will appreciate the simplicity of the fillings I made. They were quick and easy and the best part was they were delicious and they could be made at the last minute if you have unplanned guests show up.

I decided to make mini vols-au-vent's for both the savory and sweet fillings. Although they can be eaten in 3 or 4 bites, 2 or 3 of these filled with the savory filling were plenty.

For the first batch, I made a Creamy Chicken & Herb filling with fresh cherry red and yellow tomatoes, topped with freshly grated Asiago Cheese.

Creamy Chicken & Herb Filling

Ingredients: Boneless, skinless chicken tenders, cream of chicken soup, milk, lemon-n-herb seasoning, fresh parsley, salt, pepper, asiago cheese & yellow and red cherry tomatoes.

1) Cook chicken with seasonings and herbs in pan on stove top.

2) Add cream of chicken soup and about 1/2 cup milk and mix with cooked chicken. Simmer for a few minutes till combined and hot throughout.

3) Spoon chicken mixture into puff pastry and garnish with parsley, cheese and tomatoes.

Now for the dessert. I made a puff pastry trio dessert plate, because two desserts are better than one and three is better than two!

Again, these were filled with ingredients or products that I had on hand and they didn't take long to put together.

Dessert #1:
Fresh Raspberries w/Dark Chocolate & Sweetened Whipped Cream

Dessert #2

Apricot-Vanilla Bean Whipped Cream w/Fresh Pomegranate Seeds

Dessert #3

Lemon Curd w/Fresh Blueberries & White Chocolate Shavings

It was fun and relaxing to make puff pastry (once I was able to catch up with my work and everything else that I felt like I was behind on) and it was a great reminder to make this more often than I have in the past.

Now for the recipe!

Michel Richard’s Puff Pastry Dough
From: Baking with Julia by Dorie Greenspan

Yield: 2-1/2 pounds dough

Ingredients:

2-1/2 cups (12.2 oz/ 354 g) unbleached all-purpose flour
1-1/4 cups (5.0 oz/ 142 g) cake flour
1 tbsp. salt (you can cut this by half for a less salty dough or for sweet preparations)
1-1/4 cups (10 fl oz/ 300 ml) ice water
4 sticks (16 oz/ 454 g) very cold unsalted butter
plus extra flour for dusting work surface

Mixing the Dough:

*Check the capacity of your food processor before you start. If it cannot hold the full quantity of ingredients, make the dough into two batches and combine them.

1) Put the all-purpose flour, cake flour, and salt in the work bowl of a food processor fitted with a metal blade and pulse a couple of times just to mix. Add the water all at once, pulsing until the dough forms a ball on the blade. The dough will be very moist and pliable and will hold together when squeezed between your fingers. (Actually, it will feel like Play-Doh.)

2) Remove the dough from the machine, form it into a ball, with a small sharp knife, slash the top in a tic-tac-toe pattern. Wrap the dough in a damp towel and refrigerate for about 5 minutes.
3) Meanwhile, place the butter between 2 sheets of plastic wrap and beat it with a rolling pin until it flattens into a square that's about 1" thick. Take care that the butter remains cool and firm: if it has softened or become oily, chill it before continuing.

Incorporating the Butter:

1) Unwrap the dough and place it on a work surface dusted with all-purpose flour (A cool piece of marble is the ideal surface for puff pastry) with your rolling pin (preferably a French rolling pin without handles), press on the dough to flatten it and then roll it into a 10" square. Keep the top and bottom of the dough well floured to prevent sticking and lift the dough and move it around frequently. Starting from the center of the square, roll out over each corner to create a thick center pad with "ears," or flaps.

2) Place the cold butter in the middle of the dough and fold the ears over the butter, stretching them as needed so that they overlap slightly and encase the butter completely. (If you have to stretch the dough, stretch it from all over; don't just pull the ends) you should now have a package that is 8" square.

3) To make great puff pastry, it is important to keep the dough cold at all times. There are specified times for chilling the dough, but if your room is warm, or you work slowly, or you find that for no particular reason the butter starts to ooze out of the pastry, cover the dough with plastic wrap and refrigerate it . You can stop at any point in the process and continue at your convenience or when the dough is properly chilled.

Making the Turns:

1) Gently but firmly press the rolling pin against the top and bottom edges of the square (this will help keep it square). Then, keeping the work surface and the top of the dough well floured to prevent sticking, roll the dough into a rectangle that is three times as long as the square you started with, about 24" (don't worry about the width of the rectangle: if you get the 24", everything else will work itself out.) With this first roll, it is particularly important that the butter be rolled evenly along the length and width of the rectangle; check when you start rolling that the butter is moving along well, and roll a bit harder or more evenly, if necessary, to get a smooth, even dough-butter sandwich.

2)With a pastry brush, brush off the excess flour from the top of the dough, and fold the rectangle up from the bottom and down from the top in thirds, like a business letter, brushing off the excess flour. You have completed one turn.

3) Rotate the dough so that the closed fold is to your left, like the spine of a book. Repeat the rolling and folding process, rolling the dough to a length of 24" and then folding it in thirds. This is the second turn.

Chilling the Dough:

1) If the dough is still cool and no butter is oozing out, you can give the dough another two turns now. If the condition of the dough is iffy, wrap it in plastic wrap and refrigerate it for at least 30 minutes. Each time you refrigerate the dough, mark the number of turns you've completed by indenting the dough with your fingertips. It is best to refrigerate the dough for 30 to 60 minutes between each set of two turns.

2) The total number of turns needed is six. If you prefer, you can give the dough just four turns now, chill it overnight, and do the last two turns the next day. Puff pastry is extremely flexible in this regard. However, no matter how you arrange your schedule, you should plan to chill the dough for at least an hour before cutting or shaping it.

Forming and Baking the Vols-au-Vent:

Yield: 1/3 of the puff pastry recipe below will yield about 8-10 1.5” vols-au-vent or 4 4” vols-au-vent

*You will need: well-chilled puff pastry dough (recipe below)-egg wash (1 egg or yolk beaten with a small amount of water)-your filling of choice

1) Line a baking sheet with parchment and set aside.

2) Using a knife or metal bench scraper, divided your chilled puff pastry dough into three equal pieces. Work with one piece of the dough, and leave the rest wrapped and chilled. (If you are looking to make more vols-au-vent than the yield stated above, you can roll and cut the remaining two pieces of dough as well…if not, then leave refrigerated for the time being or prepare it for longer-term freezer storage.)

3) On a lightly floured surface, roll the piece of dough into a rectangle about 1/8 to 1/4-inch (3-6 mm) thick. Transfer it to the baking sheet and refrigerate for about 10 minutes before proceeding with the cutting. (This assumes you will be using round cutters, but if you do not have them, it is possible to cut square vols-au-vents using a sharp chef’s knife.) For smaller, hors d'oeuvre sized vols-au-vent, use a 1.5” round cutter to cut out 8-10 circles. For larger sized vols-au-vent, fit for a main course or dessert, use a 4” cutter to cut out about 4 circles. Make clean, sharp cuts and try not to twist your cutters back and forth or drag your knife through the dough. Half of these rounds will be for the bases, and the other half will be for the sides. (Save any scrap by stacking—not wadding up—the pieces…they can be re-rolled and used if you need extra dough. If you do need to re-roll scrap to get enough disks, be sure to use any rounds cut from it for the bases, not the ring-shaped sides.)

4) Using a ¾-inch cutter for small vols-au-vent, or a 2- to 2.5-inch round cutter for large, cut centers from half of the rounds to make rings. These rings will become the sides of the vols-au-vent, while the solid disks will be the bottoms. You can either save the center cut-outs to bake off as little “caps” for you vols-au-vent, or put them in the scrap pile.

5) Dock the solid bottom rounds with a fork and lightly brush them with egg wash. Place the rings directly on top of the bottom rounds and very lightly press them to adhere. Brush the top rings lightly with egg wash, trying not to drip any down the sides (which may inhibit rise). If you are using the little “caps,” dock and egg wash them as well.

6) Refrigerate the assembled vols-au-vent on the lined baking sheet while you pre-heat the oven to 400ºF (200ºC). (You could also cover and refrigerate them for a few hours at this point.)

7) Once the oven is heated, remove the sheet from the refrigerator and place a silicon baking mat (preferred because of its weight) or another sheet of parchment over top of the shells. This will help them rise evenly. Bake the shells until they have risen and begin to brown, about 10-15 minutes depending on their size. Reduce the oven temperature to 350ºF (180ºC), and remove the silicon mat or parchment sheet from the top of the vols-au-vent. If the centers have risen up inside the vols-au-vent, you can gently press them down. Continue baking (with no sheet on top) until the layers are golden, about 15-20 minutes more. (If you are baking the center “caps” they will likely be finished well ahead of the shells, so keep an eye on them and remove them from the oven when browned.)

8) Remove to a rack to cool. Cool to room temperature for cold fillings or to warm for hot fillings. Fill and serve.