Herbs!

I went plant shopping the other day, aiming to get mint, and ended up with a windowsill full of wonderful plants! The pothos and other houseplants were extant; I ended up getting peppermint, parsley, basil, mini red bell pepper, and blue pepper plants! I'm so thrilled to be able to use fresh ingredients in some of my cooking!!

blue pepper - houseplant - parsley - pothos - succulent - bamboo - peppermint - basil - mini red bell pepper - mini succulent

Green Tea Shortbread Bark

Yum! I found this one on Martha Stewart's website, and knew I had to make it as soon as possible. The "bark" part of the recipe is more accidental than premeditated, but a happy accident made for more interesting cookies. They've been a hit with everyone who's tried them; I even got the seal of approval from a grandmother and baker coworker of my boyfriend's! I'm making another batch to send to my grandma; the real test...

Green Tea Shortbread Bark

[Makes 3 dozen if they're small]

[Adapted from Martha: 

http://www.marthastewart.com/recipe/green-tea-shortbread-leaves]

[Note: For stronger flavor and color, use more green tea powder. These are very lightly flavored and quite tasty as is!]

Ingredients:

•  2 c. all-purpose flour, plus more for rolling
•  2 Tbs. Chinese green tea powder (Matcha) (or more for stronger flavor)
•  1/2 tsp. salt 
•  1/2 lb. (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
•  1/2 c. confectioner's or granulated sugar (plus more for topping)

Directions:

1.  Sift flour, tea powder, and salt into a small bowl; set aside. 
2.  Place butter in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Cream on medium speed until fluffy, 3 to 5 minutes. (Hint: If it's not quite room temperature, cut it up into small slices; it'll beat fine, and the friction will warm it up anyway.)
3.  Add sugar; continue to beat until very light in color and fluffy, about 2 minutes more. 
4.  Add flour mixture; combine on low, scraping sides of bowl with a spatula if necessary, until flour is just incorporated and dough sticks together when squeezed with fingers. (It will be sticky. Fret not.)
5.  Place a piece of parchment on a clean surface; dust with flour. Roll dough to 1/4-inch thickness; chill in refrigerator or freezer until firm, about 30 minutes. (To make "bark", roll dough out, sandwich between two layers of parchment paper, make a jelly-roll out of it (curl one edge up and keep rolling it, creating a log of dough and parchment) and stick it in the freezer.) 
6.  Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment. Cut chilled dough with 2-inch leaf cutters. (If you chose the bark method, pull the dough out of the freezer and unroll it slowly. Pieces will break off, creating bark-like shapes. Ignore the re-chilling part, as there will be no scraps if you're breaking pieces off as you go. (Unless you wait too long and the dough gets mushy, in which case you can stick it in the freezer while the first batch is baking.) Dust with sugar and bake.) 
7.  Using a wide spatula, transfer to baking sheets. Chill until firm. 
8.  Gather scraps together, re-roll, chill, and cut shapes. 
9.  Bake until firm and barely starting to color, 15 to 20 minutes, rotating halfway through. (WATCH THEM CAREFULLY!! Smaller cookies will brown faster than larger ones; remove them or deal with burnt edges.) Cool completely on wire rack; store in an airtight container for up to 3 to 4 weeks (if they'll last that long without being eaten!).

(Batch 1, covered liberally with powdered sugar before baking. Gives them a nice texture. Notice the small ones got crispy; watch for that, and remove them!)

(Batch 2, sprinkled lightly with sugar before baking. Not as textured. I watched more carefully though, so they're more evenly baked!)

Triplir Mousse: Chocolate, Salted Butter Caramel, Vanilla

Whew! Crazy week... high time for an update! This mousse gave me a bit of trouble last week, but it was well worth it. Quite sweet (dare I say too sweet?) and best eaten in (very) small quantities, this triple-layer mousse is a challenge to make and a delight to eat. I recommend it after a salty entree. 

Triplir Mousse: Chocolate, Salted Butter Caramel, Vanilla

[Makes 6-8, depending on the size of your verrines or ramekins]
[Adapted from Tartelette: http://www.mytartelette.com/2009/09/recipe-vanillasalted-butter-caramel-and.html]
[Note: you want to prepare the caramel part of this triplr mousse first as it needs to cool down properly before being incorporated to the rest of the base.]



For the caramel:
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 2 Tablespoons water
- 1/2 teaspoon fleur de sel or fine sea salt
- 1/4 cup heavy cream
- 2 teaspoons unsalted butter

For the chocolate:
- 4 oz dark semisweet chocolate

For the vanilla mousse base:
- 4 egg yolks (really, really no whites here)
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 1 cup whole milk
- 1/2 vanilla bean (or 1/2 to 1 teaspoon of extract)
- 1 Tb powdered gelatin, sprinkled over 3 Tb water
- 1 cup heavy cream


For the garnish:
- Handful of fresh or frozen berries (I used frozen blueberries)
- Powdered sugar

Directions:
Prepare the caramel:
1. Place the sugar and water in a medium heavy bottomed saucepan and bring to a boil over high heat. DO NOT STIR. (Unless, of course, your heating element is uneven and burns one edge like mine did. In that case, you have full permission to stir wildly while fanning out the smoke and badmouthing the electrician. If this happens, assume the burned parts will make the rest of it sufficiently caramelized and skip to step 3.)
2. Continue to cook until caramel in color. 
3. Remove from the heat and add the salt, heavy cream and butter. Stir with a wooden spoon until completely smooth. 
4. Let cool to room temperature.

Prepare the chocolate:
1. In a medium bowl set over a pan of simmering water, melt the chocolate until smooth. (Note: melting chocolate this way does NOT mean it will never burn. It will still burn, and it will wait until you've looked away to do so. Ergo, DON'T LEAVE IT ALONE. If it does happen to burn as mine did, add a tablespoon of canola oil and 1/4 tsp. butter (or smaller amounts, if it didn't burn all that much) and mix to combine, heating if necessary. Not perfect, but it gets the clumps out.)
2. Remove from the heat and let cool to room temperature.

Prepare the (vanilla) mousse base:
1. In a large bowl, whisk the egg yolks with the sugar until very pale. 
2. In the meantime, in a large saucepan set over medium heat, bring the milk and the vanilla bean (split open and scraped over the milk) to a boil. 
3. Slowly pour the milk over the yolks, whisking constantly. (Slowly means REALLY SLOWLY. I did this too fast the first time and ended up with scrambled eggs. Tasty, but not mousse. I took a full few minutes to drip the milk in the second time, and it worked marvelously. Also, if you have any whites in with your yolks, the mixture will foam uncontrollably at this point. You can either hope that the next step will work, turn the mixer down and fold the foam into the creme, or try it again with no whites.)
4. Pour the mixture back into the saucepan over medium low heat and cook until the cream coats the back of a spoon (as if making creme anglaise) [NOTE: DO NOT COOK TOO LONG, YOU WILL MAKE SCRAMBLED EGGS! You only need enough heat to melt the gelatine, which isn't much at all. I set mine down on the heat for as long as it took to plop the gelatine into the pot, stirring constantly. I then removed it from the heat to melt the gelatine in. Works fine, and saves the anguish of scrambling]. Add the softened gelatin and stir until melted completely into the cream. 
5. Let cool to room temperature.
6. Whip the heavy cream to soft peaks and fold it into the cooled cream base. Divide the base into three equal portions (one will stay untouched).

Assemble:
1. Add a couple of tablespoons of the base to the caramel to lighten it a bit and stir with a spoon. 
2. Gently fold the rest of the alloted mousse base into the caramel with a spatula.
3. Do the same for the chocolate portion.
4. Layer all three parts evenly into dishes or ramekins. 
5. Sift sugar on top, garnish with berries and refrigerate for at least an hour.
[HUGE ASIDE: When layering, decide on your order beforehand. The chocolate is the heaviest, followed by the caramel and then the vanilla. Helene layered hers lightest to heaviest, as I did, and the chocolate fell right through to the center, having coagulated early. If you plan to layer the hard way, I recommend splitting the mousse base in thirds, layering in the vanilla portion, and sticking your dishes in the fridge or freezer while you mix the caramel layer. Layer that one on (sllloooowwwwllllyyyy), fridge. Mix chocolate, layer. Don't wait too long between layers, as the vanilla base will start mousse-ing pretty soon after you let it cool down. The gelatine does its thing and makes the mousse moussey. Cooling between layers lets the lighter one set up a bit before layering something heavier on top. If it still falls through though, don't fret; each layer is strong enough that they'll striate and not intermingle too much. The tastes will be preserved! =) ]
6. Enjoy!

Puff Pastry?!

Ok, so here's what happens when I sit down on my (impromptu) day off: I open my mail, read a few webcomics, and inevitably end up with six tabs open of Tartelette recipes, drooling uncontrollably and having to stop myself from buying six Silpat mats and a stand mixer (and a plane ticket to France with an empty suitcase to fill with fresh food). My latest revelation, inspiration and downright challenge is to try making puff pastry dough. Yes, that puff pastry dough. The turn-it-six-times pain-in-the-butt puff pastry dough. The first time I read how to make it (about half an hour ago), I got really excited, then really discouraged (six times? cold butter? MARBLE SLAB?!). In a makeshift kitchen on a grad student's budget in a humid, humid, humid (did I say humid?) apartment, puff pastry dough seemed all but impossible. It's taken me a fair few hours to make the recipes I have taken a stab at so far (triplir mousse, post forthcoming, peach and blueberry galettes...), so I sat there imagining an entire day of pacing the kitchen, waiting for the dough to cool every half hour.

And then I read her recipe for gluten-free puff pastry dough. Yes! Gluten-free! And... easier? Easier than regular puff pastry dough? AMAZING!!! So, as a challenge to myself and a gift to my gluten-free compatriots (I was gluten-free myself until a few months ago), I'm going to make gluten-free puff pastry. And then make something with it (I haven't decided what quite yet). Any suggestions? (Who am I kidding... five posts in one week; who's had time to find, read or comment yet?) I might go with a mascarpone creme filling; berries are still in season here, and man do I love a good blueberry. It'd give me an excuse to go berry picking for the first time! (I know, I know, I've lived here how long?) Alright then, blueberries it is. But I do awfully like pears... Pear-blueberry? Nah... OOH! YES! Here we go, providing I can find the ingredients and still be able to pay rent this month: Gluten-free puff pastry with blueberry mascarpone creme and whipped pâté de foie gras. I'm not sold on the mascarpone part, seeing as I've never had it before, but we'll see what happens. I love love love goat cheese, so that might replace it. Whipped blueberry goat cheese is one of my favorite yummy summer spreads. Goat cheese + foi gras though? Hmm.... The puff pastry might be enough... Ok, so we've got:

- Puff pastry (gluten-free)
- Pâté de foie gras (possibly whipped)
- Blueberries
- (maybe) Goat cheese

Go! =) I might make that as the second big thing for next week's baking party, along with Tartelette's Pear and Almond Fallen Soufflé Cakes. Yum!

(I got way over-sweeted by the triplir mousse I made last night, and am craving something a little more savoury.)

I'll post as I go, throwing caution to the wind and spare change at farmstands. Where do I find foie gras in a farm town...? (Oy, I just realized I could probably make it myself... Well, here goes nothing!)

Poached Peach Tea and Dessert Topping

These are really the leftovers from poaching peaches for Sunday's Peach Blueberry Galettes, but they're so tasty they deserve their own post. [Pictures forthcoming.]

Poached Peach Tea and Dessert Topping

[Makes about 1/2 gallon of tea, depending on size of pot, size of peaches and strength of tea]

[Note: If you're doubling, be sure to include 2 tea bags. Try mixing flavors!] 

 Ingredients:

- 2 Tbs. sugar (granulated; also might be tasty with brown...)

- 2 peaches (medium)

- 1 tea bag (I've found that green tea and earl gray work well, flavored or plain)

- Water (enough to cover the peaches)

Directions:

1.   Place peaches in a heavy-bottomed medium saucepan with enough water to cover them. Some peaches float; don't worry, just push them down while measuring water. Add tea bag and sugar; stir. Poke peaches with a fork to gauge initial tenderness (necessary in order to determine fork-tender stage in step 3).
2.   Place on stovetop on high heat, stirring occasionally to dissolve sugar and turn any floating peaches, until water boils.
3.   Lower heat to medium and poach peaches until just fork-tender, about 20 minutes. (Poke them with a fork periodically to check tenderness. Fork-tender means there should be little to no resistance all the way through to the pit. If the peel begins to fall off, they're done or over-done. Though really, over-done just means mushier peach yumminess later.)
4.   Remove from heat. Fish peaches out with a slotted spoon, and place on plate to cool (you can stick them in the fridge briefly if you'd like). Remove tea bag and discard. Transfer tea to heat-stable bowl (or just leave it in the pot, if it'll fit in your fridge), cover and place in fridge to cool.
5.   When the tea is cool enough to taste, try it and water it down to taste. It can get pretty strong, especially with black tea, though sugar and peaches offset most of the tang. Once cooled sufficiently, transfer to a bottle (dumping it from the pot to a large vessel with a spout, then into a bottle makes for less spill. Or use a funnel if you have one, or ladel it). Store in an airtight container in the fridge (recycled Arizona tea / Simply Lemonade bottles work well). Enjoy hot or cold, with finger sandwiches or biscotti, or the yummy concoctions topped with peach goodness that you finish in the next step!
6.   When peaches are cooled slightly, peel, halve, pit and slice (or don't slice). Reserve syrup if possible (that's the gooey drippy part that gets everywhere when you handle the warm peaches). Use to top cold vanilla ice cream, fresh biscuits, toast with strawberry jam, nutella or butter. Yum yum yum!

Baking Party!

Or rather, a group of people coming over to eat my baked goods. Plus a movie, which makes it a party (as if yummyscrumplicious food didn't already, psh). On the menu are two Tartelette recipes (surprised?) and one from Ms. Martha (Stewart, that is). And possibly a standard favorite, -ish.

1. Triple layer mousse (chocolate, salted caramel, vanilla)
2. Fried strawberries (yes, fried) with nutella and fresh whipped cream (or canned, if I run out of time/arm strength)
3. Green tea shortbread cookies
4. (possibly) Strawberry muffins (frozen berries were on sale!)

Since my kitchen is still in flux and staples still unbought, this is taking some planning. And a whole lot of restraint. I reallyreallyreallysuperreally want to make Tartelette's Peach & Almond Fallen Souffle Cakes (YUM), but since I have only 1/4 of the ingredients, it'll have to wait until next week. (4 parties, 4 weeks til school starts! Eee!)

Peach Blueberry Galettes with Basil Sugar

Ok, so first off, YUM. Secondly, this recipe and the inspiration for my baking frenzy comes from Tartelette, at mytartelette.com. Do not browse while hungry. I've had to stand up from my desk at work and do a hungry dance more than once while clicking through her posts. Amazing recipes + amazing food photography = one hungry hungry hippo. Ergo, last week, during one of my more pronounced fits of alternately groaning and squeeing over recipes and photographs (groaning from hunger, squeeing from excitement of having a kitchen (!!!!) and being able to bake (!!!!!) some of the wonderful yummy goodness on my screen), I found these galettes on her site and had to make them. Take a look at her pictures; they're amazing! http://www.mytartelette.com/2010/08/recipe-peach-blueberry-lemon-thyme.html

I had to bake them. So off I went to the grocery store, picked up the necessary fruit, and sped home to begin what was to be a laborious and joyous four hours of baking. Yes, four hours. They don't look that complicated, do they? Granted, I'm not exactly adept at making, rolling or cutting dough, so that might've been some of the stall, and I poached two batches of peaches in different tea one right after the other, but still a good chunk of time. Without further ado, the recipe, my additions, comments and results:

Peach Blueberry Galettes with Basil Sugar

[Makes 8-10 galettes, depending on thickness of dough and peaches]

[Recipe copied from Tartelette, annotated with my tidbits, gripes and what have you]

[Original recipe here: http://www.mytartelette.com/2010/08/recipe-peach-blueberry-lemon-thyme.html]

[There's also a gluten free version! See her page for the flour substitutes]

For the pastry dough:
- 5 tablespoons (70gr) unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 2 egg yolks
- pinch salt
- 1.5 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 tablespoons to 1/4 cup cold milk [I used a little more than 1/4 cup]

For the fruits:
- 4 peaches
- 1 tea bag [I used two actually; one jasmine green tea for the first 2 peaches, and 1 lavender earl gray for the second batch. The tea that comes from the poaching liquid is absolutely scrumptious. I might have to post about it separately. It's so good!]

- 2 tablespoons sugar

- 1/2 cup blueberries (or less; I only used them for garnish)

For the basil sugar:
- 1/4 cup sugar

- 1/4 to 1/2 tablespoon basil (I used basil instead of 1tsp lemon thyme; she suggests sweet basil, rosemary, oregano or chocolate mint if lemon thyme isn't available. Not being able to find sweet basil, I used regular basil. BE SPARING IN YOUR USE OF BASIL. I used a little too much, and they smell a bit like pizza.)

Prepare the crust:
In a mixer, whip the butter on medium speed until light and airy. Add the egg yolks, one at a time and beating well after each addition. Mix until incorporated. Add the salt and flour and mix briefly. Add enough milk to moisten it. [It will be clumps at this point. Don't panic, just moosh it together on the board.] Dump the whole mixture onto a lightly floured board and gather the dough into a smooth ball. Flatten the dough into a disk, wrap it in plastic wrap and refrigerate for an hour.

Prepare the fruits:
While the dough is resting, place the peaches, tea bag, sugar and enough water to cover the fruit in a large saucepan set over high heat. Bring to a boil, reduce the heat and poach the peach until just fork tender. Remove from the heat and let them cool on a clean kitchen towel. [Letting them cool is essential; trying to slice warm poached peach is like trying to cut unset jello; it's a mushy syrupy mess.] Once cooled, peel and halve them, remove the pits and slice the peaches thin.

Prepare the sugar:
In a small bowl, mix the sugar and basil together with your fingertips and set aside.

Preheat oven to 350F and position a rack in the center.
When the dough is nice and cold, roll it out on a lightly floured board or in between two sheets of plastic. If the dough tears while you roll, just patch it with your fingertips. Cut eight 4-inch rounds, rerolling and using the dough as you go (if it gets too soft, just refrigerate for a few minutes as you fill the other galettes with fruit).

[Ok, I have a big aside about this one... I cut circles with 4"diameter, but I'm guessing she wanted them with 4" radius, since my galettes weren't big enough to hold half a peach, much less have enough extra to pleat them around. They look much bigger than mine in her pictures! Oh well; two-bite galettes it is if you use 4" diameter, or larger sliceable versions with 8" diameter.] [Also, at this point, I would've liked to have less smooshy-juicy peaches. I'm guessing I poached them for a little too long, but if you also come across the oozing slices problem, I suggest running them under cool water and/or blotting them on a clean towel/paper towel to remove excess liquid. The extra juice seeped into the crust and didn't let it cook all the way through in the oven.]
Arrange the slices of half a peach [or whatever will fit] in the center of each round and gather the edges, pleating as you go with your fingertips (don't worry about being even - these are free form. Imperfections are wonderful anyways...). Add blueberries on top if desired and sprinkle with some basil sugar.

Place all the galettes on a parchment lined baking sheet and bake for about 30-35 minutes. [I checked them at 25 and 30, taking them out at about 32 minutes. Depends on your oven; look for light browning around the edges.]

In Process...:

 

The finished product!:

- They're much more savory than I expected them to be, but turned out to be wondercfully tasty mid-morning snacks for work. It's like a miniature fruit pizza! Next time, I'll make them larger and with less basil. I wonder if this would work with tomatoes and cheese.....

The story begins... with German Chocolate Cupcakes

Well, here it is! The beginning chronicle of my life in the Valley. Well, the two tastiest parts, anyway: baking and building. I might cook a little, too, but no promises.  My history with food is long and complex, well-varied, and severely stifled by 4 years of dorm mush. I'm trying my darndest to recreate and support the wonderful foodie heritage I grew up with. Goodbye eggos, hello Tastywheat pancakes! Out with the mushy sub, in with the smoked fish salad. Mmmm.... Oh, right, and I'm going to school for architecture. 4 years of a studio art degree, and I managed to find a pretty good way to meld both sides of my brain and my degree in a sustainably-focused Master's of Architecture program. Yay! Starts in a month, and I just moved into a new apartment (!!) with a kitchen (!!!!!!!) and a stove (!!!!!!!!!!!) !!!! Ergo, baking precedes building, both to be blogged about by (b)me, (b)here.

So, long story short (too late): I have my own kitchen for the first time in my adult life, and am trying to bake as much as humanly (and budgetly) possible before school starts and my time at the oven is replaced by time at the drafting table. Hopefully my foray into baking will continue well into the school year and beyond, but just in case it doesn't, I'll blog about the intricacies of graduate school life as well as food (I know; after cakes and cookies, real life seems so blasé). Stay tuned!

Recipe 1: German Chocolate Cupcakes 

(from a box, on a budget, but still pretty, if I do say so myself)

The story: Desperate to bake and low on funds, I caved and bought boxed mix and frosting. Eager to give it a twist (and distinctly not fond of frosting-between-teeth), I made them macaron-style.





Ingredients:

[Makes about 24 cupcakes]

1 box Betty Crocker chocolate cake mix

Vegetable oil (I used peanut oil, borrowed from a neighbor, in a pinch)

Eggs

... [I'll check the box and update ingredients list later]

1 can Duncan Hines coconut-pecan frosting

Directions:
Note: I made the whole box of batter, but only ended up baking half of it so far (no space to store the finished cupcakes!); they were a hit at work!
1. Mix batter according to instructions on box.
2. Lightly grease/butter cupcake tins, and fill about 3/4 full with batter (will create more macaron-like tube cupcakes; to create a muffin top, fill tins completely).
3. Bake cupcakes according to the instructions on the box (25-35 minutes at 350). I checked them at 5 and 10 minutes before the max bake time, inserting a knife to check for clean draw.
4. Remove cupcakes from oven, let cool slightly. Pop them out of the tins and let cool on a wire rack or countertop.
5. Once cooled, slice in half, spread a liberal amount of frosting in the middle, and reassemble. Yum! Bite-sized German Chocolate Layer Cake in a fraction of the time. Plus, frosting the middle and not the top makes for easy-peasy storage (no goopy cupcake bottoms!). Enjoy!