The Dogs Eat the Crumbs

Dorie's Lemon Pound Cake

2012-01-24T17:53:00.001-05:00

The actual name of recipe is Perfection Pound Cake, from Dorie Greenspan's Baking From My Home to Yours, and it was baked by the Tuesdays With Dorie baking group four years ago this week. I wasn't a member of the TWD group then, and now that the group has finished baking through the book I am catching up on the ones I missed by baking the recipes chosen early in the group's history.

"Perfection" in the title of the recipe sets a mighty high bar. Going into my baking session I was dubious. Not because I don't trust Dorie's recipes; I do. If I were to bet that anyone could make an extravagant claim for a baking recipe and prove it to be true, my money would be on Dorie. But I had read some accounts of this cake from various bakers over the years, and reports indicated that the cake tended to turn out "dry." That's a common hazard for a pound cake.

I've been to enough Southern funerals to have tasted a goodly number of pound cakes. Many are dry, to be sure, but I have garnered some outstanding pound cake recipes. My absolute favorite comes from the cookbook put together by my children's elementary school as a fundraiser. I haven't blogged that one, and I now realize that I need to remedy that.

The day I baked this cake I stood in front of my mixing bowl and contemplated added a little something to the cake batter to ensure that it wouldn't turn out dry - a dollop of sour cream or yogurt sounded like a good plan to me, but I squelched that thought and baked Dorie's recipe as she wrote it. I wanted to know if it really is perfection!

n.o.e.'s notes:

- You can find the recipe for this cake on Michelle (now the Brown Eyed Baker)'s old blog, here.

- I cut the recipe in half and stuck right to the recipe. I couldn't resist having some fun, though, and used a cute little silicone pan that I had bought at IKEA back in the fall.

- Dorie gives the option for a lemon variation, and that's what I chose. I figured that lemon would give the cake a boost in case it fell short of perfection. To adapt the recipe from the basic pound cake, rub grated lemon zest into the granulated sugar with your fingertips before adding the sugar to the butter.

- My little cake rose nicely and developed that signature pound cake crack on the top. It was so small and cute - like a little muffin pound cake. I think I might have left it in the oven a minute too long.

the verdict:

Well, I have to be honest here: my cake did not rise to the lofty heights of perfection. But it was a good pound cake. My tasters and I enjoyed the lemon flavor and the fact that it wasn't overly sugary (which can happen in a pound cake.) Was it dry you ask? My answer is: I don't think so. This was an issue of some discussion with my tasters and we couldn't quite decide if it was dry. But at the same time it was not what I'd call a moist cake. I think if I had taken it out of the oven a minute or two earlier it would have been better. As it was the cake paired nicely with strawberries, and if I'd had any whipped cream on hand it would have been nearly perfection!

[note: my friend Leslie of Lethally Delicious is baking on the same TWD catch-up schedule and your can read her opinion of the pound cake on her post.]

Spice Bars with Pecans and Raisins

2012-01-15T21:47:00.003-05:00

At this point you might be "fussed-out" from rolling, cutting, decorating, and eating fancy cookies during the December baking season. These Raisin Pecan Spice Bars are a perfect January treat: they are simple to throw together and their warm spices, nuts, and dried fruit make them very welcome if you're caught in deep winter's chilly grip.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- The recipe from The Modern Baker by Nick Malgieri. Since I am a (very lax) member of the The Modern Baker Challenge, and the group has agreed to not post the recipes baked from the book, I'm not including the recipe. I can give you a glimpse of the ingredient list, though: all-purpose flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, butter, dark brown sugar, sugar, eggs, molasses, sour cream, raisins, and pecans.

- I couldn't find any sour cream in the fridge so I used yogurt.

- I stirred a mixture of golden and dark raisins into my batter.

- Chopped toasted pecans from Trader Joe's are a great time saver and give a wonderful nutty flavor in baked goods!

- Instead of one 9x13 pan, I baked the recipe in two 8x8 pans because I wanted to make sure the middle got baked through.

- My bars took 30 -35 minutes to bake, and were still quite moist inside, with a nice crackly top.

- I cut the bars small because they were going on a big platter of bar cookies and brownies.

the verdict:

These bars have a perfectly balanced combination of flavors. The raisins are a strong presence but blend beautifully with the spices and nuts. I like the way these bars round out a collection of bar cookies - they are great with blondies and brownies. On the other hand, they are strong enough to stand all by themselves. I'll turn to this recipe time and again for a versatile cool-weather cookie.

I have been enjoying the streamlined, delicious recipes from The Modern Baker. In fact I included the book as one of my favorites in my 2010 Cookbook Roundup and purchased three copies of the cookbook in hardcover: for me and for each of my daughters. If you don't have a copy, the book is now available at very reasonable cost in paperback! I was honored that Nick Malgieri recently sent a paperback copy of the book to each member of The Modern Baker Challenge.

Galette des Rois for Epiphany

2012-01-10T00:32:00.000-05:00

January 6, the twelfth day after Christmas, is the feast day of the Epiphany, which in Western Christian tradition commemorates the visit of the Three Kings to the infant Jesus in Bethlehem. I have always loved celebrating Epiphany. When my girls were small, we would all dress up in finery for our Epiphany dinner and I decorated the table with scattered glittering "jewels" and candles in golden crown-shaped holders. Based on some holiday books, I baked a cake or cupcakes with one piece of colorful candy tucked inside; the person lucky enough to find that candy would be crowned with a fancy paper crown and be the monarch for the rest of the day.

I'd never really heard of any specific traditional type of cake, though, so I was excited to see a post on Nick Malgieri's blog last January for a Galette des Rois, or traditional King Cake from France. I promised myself that I'd try it the next time Epiphany rolled around. Last week got a little busy, however, and I missed baking the galette for the actual date of Epiphany. Luckily, from what I gather from French sources, the Galette des Rois Season lasts through most of the month of January, so it wasn't too late to enjoy the galette when I baked it on Sunday.

According to French custom the galette is typically baked with a fève, a dried bean or trinket, inside. The person who finds the fève in his or his the piece of galette receives a paper crown and becomes king or queen for the day, and in some circles, has to provide the cake for the next Epiphany celebration. Apparently the French bakeries have gotten quite elaborate these days and the fèves are often lovely little porcelain figurines.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- For my first galette des rois I followed the Nick Malgieri recipe.

- Instead of attempting homemade puff pastry (maybe some day!) I used the duFour brand of store-bought all-butter puff pastry. This comes in 14 oz packages, just over half the size of the 1.5 pounds of puff pastry called for in the recipe. I cut the sheet of puff pastry in half, rolled each half into a square, and cut circles approximately 9 inches in diameter from each square. I made 2/3 recipe of the filling (very easy math, and it used half a can of almond paste - I froze the other half for a future recipe) and had a bit left over after filling the galette.

- My fève was a dried cherry.

- This galette had a traditional almond cream filling flavored with vanilla and kirsch. I reduced the amount of sugar in the filling by just a bit.

- Next time I'll be more careful when scoring the puff pastry and make sure that the knife cuts to an even depth in the pastry so that the cuts will open in a regular pattern as the galette bakes. This, my first galette was a lovely golden brown and it was beautiful to me despite the random way the scoring turned out!

- Here are some galette des rois links:

- Dorie Greenspan's latest blog post talks about glaettes des rois and other types of galettes enjoyed by the French.

- Some pretty -and apparently tasty - galettes des rois from Paris bakeries can be found here.

- A step-by-step guide to homemade galette des rois was posted by Clotilde on her beautiful blog Chocolate and Zucchini. I didn't find her post until after I had baked my galette but I will definitely use it as a guide the next time I bake this treat, as it contains some fantastic tips for forming and baking the galette.

the verdict:

The galette presents a simple - and very delicious - combination of flavors, buttery crisp crust and creamy almond filling. I had fun baking this galette des rois, sampling it, and sharing it with a few neighbor families. The galette des rois is destined to become an Epiphany (or at least January) tradition in my kitchen.

Brown Sugar Pecan Shortbread Cookies (in three sizes)

2012-01-03T22:48:00.001-05:00

As we saw in last week's post, the Tuesdays With Dorie group is officially finished with Dorie Greenspan's Baking; From My Home to Yours, having selected every recipe in the book over a 4 year period of weekly baking assignments. I wasn't a member in the first several months of the group's history, so I'm going back now and catching up on what I missed by baking the recipes that were selected early on. I am following the order that the recipes were originally selected in 2008 in Tuesday of the corresponding week here in 2012.

Here's the way it will work: The group (although I think it was just 2 bakers at that point) baked the first recipe, Brown Sugar Shortbread Cookies, on Tuesday January 1, 2008. I baked the recipe and am posting it today, the first Tuesday of January in 2012. And so on until July, when I will reach the corresponding week to the one where I joined the group in 2008, and at that point I will have baked every recipe in the book!

n.o.e.'s notes:

- You can find the recipe on Michelle's blog post from 2008 on her blog Sugar & Spice (the blog was later renamed Brown Eyed Baker.) Michelle was one of the two bakers in Tuesdays With Dorie that first week along with the group's founder, Laurie.

- Rather than grinding up my own pecans (which isn't particularly difficult in a food processor) I used pecan meal, which is very finely ground pecans. Knowing that the meal would come in very handy some day, I'd ordered it a while ago when King Arthur Flour offered one of its periodic free shipping promotions.

- I doubled the quantity of salt in the recipe, and even so it was not very noticeable in the dough.

- The recipe calls for a pinch of cloves; I couldn't wait to see what they would contribute to the shortbread.

- Dorie's instructions are to roll the shortbread dough (in a zipper plastic bag, which is a very cool technique), cut it in squares, poke holes in the cookies with a fork before baking. I've done that with some of the past TWD shortbread recipes (here and here.) I almost always have issues with my shortbread spreading as it bakes, unless I bake it in a pie or tart pan, as I did in this post. and this one. Also my baking buddy Phyl made some shortbread cookies with cookie cutters recently, so I decided to do some experimenting with shaping my cookies:

1. I rolled some of the dough then cut it with a fluted cookie cutter. The cookies turned out pretty well, although they spread a little bit and lost some of their definition.

2. I patted some of the dough into the molds in my silicone mini tart pan. After baking, these popped out of the pan and cooled on a rack.

3. And finally, I spread some dough into my 4" fluted tart pans with removable bottoms. They released well, and produced a hefty cookie.

- All of the cookie shapes turned out well. My favorites were the ones in the silicone pan - they were a great size, baked evenly, and I loved how easily they released from the pan after baking.

the verdict:

After all the fun I had shaping and baking the shortbread it was time to see how it tasted!
The cookies were crisp around the edges and tender in the middle. They were quite buttery, with complex flavor from the brown sugar, pecans, and cloves (which were not at all noticeable as an individual element, but added a mysterious little hint of spice.) There was just enough salt. I loved these cookies and will definitely bake them again!

[edited on January 4, 2012 to add: the next recipe in the TWD rotation was Quintuple Chocolate Brownies. I previously baked this recipe and posted it here, so next Tuesday, January 10, I don't have a catch-up TWD post.]

My 500th post: the final recipe of TWD {Peanut Butter & Jam Thumbprint Cookies}

2011-12-27T23:59:00.001-05:00

Although I baked these cookies three weeks ago, I'm hurrying to write this post in the remaining few minutes of Tuesday. Hurrying, that is, after I have procrastinated and found countless excuses to postpone sitting down at the keyboard. The reason for my hesitation? This post is all about milestones and their accompanying transitions.

The first milestone: My 500th post! This is the 500th time that I've filled a blank white box on the computer screen with words and images and shared it electronically under the banner of The Dogs Eat the Crumbs. 500 is a big round number so it's a good reason to pause for thought. But there's an even bigger reason to pause, and to think, remember, sigh, dab the corner of the eye. The second milestone of today: the baking group Tuesdays With Dorie has reached the final recipe in Dorie Greenspan's book, Baking; From My Home to Yours.

Tuesdays With Dorie began on the first Tuesday of 2008 with two or three bakers joining Laurie (of the blog Slush) in her invitation to bake through all of Dorie's Baking. Today, the last Tuesday of 2011, the group finishes the book. The group has assigned every recipe in the four years of Tuesdays, and I'm guessing that at least one baker in the group may have completed the entire book.

I have baked every recipe since I joined TWD in July of 2008, but there were seven months of recipes chosen before I was a member. It's impossible for me to come this far and not finish the task so even though the TWD group is finished with the book I intend to bake all of the recipes that I missed, beginning next Tuesday. I'll bake them in the order that they were originally chosen, and post them on the corresponding Tuesday to their original baking date. Given that schedule, I'll finish all of the recipes in July. That will be a momentous day, but it will not touch the bittersweet feeling that has haunted me all day today - the final day of the group.

The past four years have brought some of the most challenging and busy times of my life. I've dealt with joy and loss, with extended periods of travel, and months and months of ongoing renovations in my house. Making sure I published a blog post for TWD every single week - on Tuesday - and planning my schedule so that I could bake ahead if necessary - gave me a steady outlet for much needed creative activity. And there was something else: the support of dozens of other bakers, who offered encouragement, tips, comments and support, for matters in the kitchen and out.

It is this original community of TWD bakers that is ending (even as plans are being made for a second round of TWD to begin in February 2012, using Dorie's book Baking With Julia.) Dorie wrote a lovely post on her blog today about the ending of TWD, and the connections we all have made over our common experience of baking her recipes. I have been fortunate to have met about a score of TWD bakers in real life in the past several years. I previously wrote about the TWD friendships and about being interviewed about the TWD community for O Magazine.

Not all of the bakers will continue in the new version of Tuesdays With Dorie. And while the new book will have wonderful recipes, and present even greater technical challenges, the freshness of our shared experience of "I really can bake that successfully" or "Wow, that was such a failure" is behind us. Thanks to Dorie's steady guidance and the support of fellow bakers, we've all become much more competent and confident in our own kitchens.

Transitions are often difficult, and this one has made me quite sad. I'll miss the sense of purpose of the original TWD community: the weekly rhythm of writing, posting, comparing notes with many other baking buddies, and then stealing the time to visit other blogs to see, read, and leave comments.

And now, onto the week's recipe: Kids' Thumbprint Cookies.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- Dorie herself is the host for this last recipe of the TWD group. You can find the recipe, and a lovely reflection about what TWD has meant to her (she calls it "the end of a delicious journey") on Dorie's blog post today.

- I baked these cookies with my daughter JDE and our friend JH in a marathon Christmas cookie-baking session. It felt so right to be baking and sharing these cookies. JDE was responsible for getting me started in TWD in the first place, and JH has been one of my blog's most loyal readers over the past several years.

- After a little bit of debate, we skipped the egg white wash + chopped peanuts on outside of the cookies. I knew I would like the texture better without the crunch peanuts, but the peanuts make the cookies look quite festive.

- Our cookies baked faster than the recipe; we had to watch them for doneness beginning at 9 minutes. When they were out of the oven and still hot, I pressed the indentation again, to make sure there was plenty of room for jam (the cookies puffed when in the oven).

- We had one "awkward batch," the one where the oven got turned off and I didn't realize it until the cookies had been baking in a - cooling - oven for a while. Then I turned the oven back on and got distracted looking for cookie cutters for another recipe and JH had to remind me of the cookies in the oven. The ended up just a little browned and crispy, and I managed to ruin several of them by poking holes all the way through them so they resembled little donuts and wouldn't hold any jam.

- I grew up eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and so did my daughters. My mom always bought grape jelly but I used strawberry jam for my girls' sandwiches. For these cookies I used both flavors of jam: a jar of French strawberry preserves for most of the cookies, and a few cookies got the remaining drops of a jar of muscadine grape jelly that my daughter ALE had made last year.

the verdict:

One bite and I knew exactly why Dorie called these thumbprints for kids: they taste exactly like a pb+jam sandwich in cookie form. The cookies were even better when they sat for a day or so. They were tender and delicately peanutty in flavor, with an intense jolt of strawberry (or grape) from the boiled jam. I loved this recipe, and I loved being a member of the Tuesdays With Dorie group!

Thank you Dorie (for the wonderful book)
Thank you Laurie (for starting the group)
Thank you Julie (and others who have helped administer the group over the past 4 years)
and finally, Thank you fellow bakers and friends and readers for sharing the sweet journey of Tuesdays With Dorie!

Recipes, Old: David Eyre's Pancake, and New: Culinary Apps

2011-12-25T01:15:00.002-05:00

Here's my daughter, ALE, last Christmas with a double batch of David Eyre's Pancake

Merry Christmas to all of you who celebrate the holiday! For today's Christmas post, I want to share something from the past and some things very much from the present.

First things first: one of my favorite recipes from my childhood; its flavors resonate deeply, inextricably tinged with my memories of time and place, of pleasures experienced in my mother's kitchen long ago.

My father clipped the recipe for David Eyre's Pancake out of The New York Times newspaper when it was first published in 1966 (it was a Craig Clayborne recipe). It became one of our family's favorite special-occasion dishes. And we weren't the only ones; apparently this recipe is the most popular that the Times every published. The skillet-sized pancake was impressive as it came out of the oven all golden and puffed. And when it was dusted with confectioner's sugar, spritzed with lemon juice, and cut into wedges, we savored its delicate sweetness.

When my children were young I introduced the recipe to them, and it became one of the first things that they could prepare themselves (with a little help putting the skillet in and taking it out of the hot oven). Even though the pancake is relatively easy to make, for us it remains a dish for special occasions, particularly Christmas morning.

The recipe can be found here along with a fascinating account of the recipe's history. The recipe is also contained in Amanda Hesser's 201o release, The Essential New York Times Cookbook (I've spoken about this book before - I cannot recommend it highly enough.)

My mother always made the pancake from the original 1966 newspaper clipping. Soon after it was published the recipe was discovered to have too much butter, and a correction was quickly published in the newspaper (the measurement of butter should be 4 tablespoons, rather than 8 - the or half a stick was correct), but Dad never saw the correction and we always went by the yellowed clipping taped to the front and back of a recipe card:

Last Christmas, rather than pulling out the recipe card, we opened my brand-new copy of The Essential New York Times Cookbook for the pancake recipe. My daughter read for the first time that there had been a correction to the recipe over 40 years ago! I'm sure that somewhere along the line we may have periodically used less butter but I have to say, the pancake we typically made, swimming in butter, highlighted by the lemon juice and powdered sugar, is part of my memory of the deliciousness.

I heartily recommend this celebrated recipe for your Christmas breakfast (preferably without the extra butter!) It would be equally good for any lazy Sunday, or a weekend when you have house guests. But unless you make a double batch in a large skillet - as my daughter did in the photo above - you might have to make a second pancake so everyone has enough!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And now for the present:
If you have just received an iPad, iPhone or Android under your tree, or if you need a very last minute gift for the cook or baker in your life, a culinary app might be just the thing!

Similar to my cookbook post, here I've gathered a few links to lists of "best apps" of a culinary/food nature. At the end I'll put in a plug for a couple apps that have caught my attention.

Bon Appetit's Top 10 Best Food & Cooking Apps for the iPhone and iPad
Huffington Post's Best Cooking Apps for iPad, iPhone and Android
Nextweb, 12 Seriously Tasty Apps for Foodies
Gizmodo, The Best Cooking Apps
The Washington Post's Top 10 Food-Related Apps

n.o.e.'s notes on apps:

I have only dipped a toe into the proverbial sea of culinary apps, and here are a few that I've experienced:

In a stunning technological achievement, The Professional Chef (the Culinary Institute of America's textbook) is now available as an iPad app., enhanced by video how-tos. You can buy the entire book for $59 or individual chapters for $2.99 (which is what I did). The soup chapter is available as a free download. [in the interest of full disclosure; one of my daughter's lifelong friends works for Inkling, the company that developed this app, but I did not receive anything from the company. I paid for my own app download]

Given how much I've enjoyed the Food 52 website (see, for example, the rum balls recipe I posted earlier this week) I had to give the Food 52 Holiday Recipe and Survival Guide app a try. It's smart and beautiful (just like the website!) and has a nice selection of recipes, both sweet and savory, as well as a video on making a gingerbread house. We baked the brown butter and cheddar apple pie for Thanksgiving and it was heavenly.

Dorie Greenspan's app, Baking With Dorie, is on my Christmas list this year. Although it doesn't have a ton of recipes, I'm looking forward to seeing Dorie demonstrating baking techniques via video clips. Dorie's cookbooks give the feeling that she is right there stirring and measuring with you; this app brings her even more vividly into your kitchen!

If you have a favorite childhood Christmas recipe, or a favorite culinary app, please share in the comments!

Ginger Plum Rum Balls (gluten-free)

2011-12-23T15:02:00.004-05:00

Bourbon balls were a fixture of my childhood at Christmas time. My mother's recipe - as most - used vanilla wafers as a base, combined with sugar, nuts, and of course booze. I could eat them by the handful. Even as an adult, if there aren't bourbon balls in the house Christmas is always missing a small but vital element.

About a month ago the home-cook-sourced site, Food 52, featured Ginger Plum Brandy Balls in their "Best Holiday Confection" contest. These were based on gingersnaps, and I knew I had to try them.

As luck would have it my fabulous daughter JDE needed to bake something gluten-free for a party. I had some Trader Joe's gluten free gingersnaps in the cupboard, so she threw these together and kindly left me some. Christmas bliss!

n.o.e.'s notes:

- You can find the recipe here on Food 52's site.

- These couldn't be easier for me to make, because all I did was gather a few ingredients and my daughter prepared them in my kitchen! Happily this recipe was quick and easy for her also; there's no baking involved and most of the prep is done in the food processor.

- The recipe gives a pretty wide latitude as to the type of alcohol to use. We had a bottle of spiced rum on the counter, so that's what we used.

- Cocoa powder is optional in the recipe. JDE opted to use it.

- I love the way the recipe's title uses the word "plum" - if it said prunes (which in fairness really are dried plums) it wouldn't sound nearly as appetizing I suppose. Our prunes were the cherry-flavored ones. For the rest of the dried fruit JDE used a mixture of dried cherries and cranberries (translate: whatever we could scrounge in the dried fruit drawer.)

the verdict:

These rum balls were very good, so good that I plan to make another batch to have on hand for our house guests during the holidays. Next time I'll skip the cocoa powder (I think chocolate tends to mask the flavor of spices) and try bourbon. They'll be a true throwback to my childhood Christmas treats!

{TWD} Soft Chocolate Cakes

2011-12-20T00:37:00.000-05:00

When I baked these back in November I didn't think to photograph them in a holiday setting. The clip art holly sprigs add a festive touch, don't you think?

We're within a week of Christmas so the top brass at Tuesdays With Dorie headquarters have given us TWD bakers a bit of a break from our normal routine. Instead of baking an assigned recipe, we have a "rewind" week: we each choose a recipe from Dorie Greenspan's book Baking; From My Home to Yours that we did not bake at the time the recipe was originally chosen for the group (or revisit an old favorite recipe).

There are a couple dozen recipes that were chosen in the early days of TWD, before I joined the group. I've been very slowly trying to bake some of those recipes on my own, so that I can - eventually - say that I've baked every single recipe in the book. Such is the case with Dorie's Gooey Chocolate Cakes, which I baked in early November when I was stuck at home waiting for repair people and it was chilly and gray outside: perfect baking conditions!

n.o.e.'s notes:

- This recipe is Dorie's take on the craze for molten/lava chocolate cakes. You can find the recipe on this blog post from the early days of TWD on the blog Lemon Tartlet.

- I made 1/2 recipe and used silicone mini cake pans, similar to these. Because the pans were silicone, I didn't need to butter or flour the pans, and after they were baked the cakes slipped right out.

- The timing is critical in this recipe. Because the cakes are supposed to end up being liquid in the center, doneness tests don't work. You have to use your timer and trust that it will all come out correctly. In my case, however, the cakes didn't end up molten. I was baking in a different oven from my usual, so it might run a bit hot, or I might have baked a minute or two too long.

- Although my cakes were not totally molten in the middle, they were soft. I served them with whipped cream, which melted into the warm cake in a most appetizing fashion.

the verdict:

These were perfectly portioned little cakes, and even if they weren't exactly gooey inside, they were soft-ish and quite good. This recipe is ideal for instant-gratification: the cakes are not too difficult to put together, have a short baking time, and are designed to be eaten hot. Win, win, win!

Church Windows Marshmallow Candy

2011-12-18T00:01:00.001-05:00

It's Sunday, and just a week before Christmas - what better time is there to post Church Windows Marshmallow Candies? From the first minute that I saw these candies I knew that I wanted to make them. They are pretty and unusual and they looked relatively easy to make. I loved that they evoked a church, which makes them perfect to mark the holiday (holy day) season.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- You can find the recipe on this blog post.

- After melting butter and chocolate chips, and cooling the mixture a bit, you stir in the marshmallows. Then you divide the mixture in two and roll each half into a log shape.

- I experimented a bit with the coating for the chocolate rolls. For half the recipe, I rolled the chocolate log in in dessicated coconut, and the other log in hazelnut meal. In the future I'd like to experiment with different rolling and coating techniques. I think powdered sugar would be nice, or chocolate sprinkles, or crumbs of chocolate wafer cookies.

- The colored mini marshmallows can be a bit difficult to find. The first couple of grocery stores that I checked didn't have them, so I was thrilled to find them in Target. In theory each of the 4 colors of marshmallows has a different flavor, and if I concentrated very hard I could detect it - but that was before putting the marshmallows with the chocolate.

- I'm sure that you could make your own marshmallows for this candy; if you do, let me know how it goes!

- Be sure to use a very sharp knife to cut slices of the candy, so the chocolate doesn't drag through the marshmallow, and so the marshmallow cuts cleanly.

the verdict:

These are good at room temperature and straight from the fridge. Because they are so quick to throw together, they're perfect for adding to Christmas trays.

{TWD} Puffed Double Plum Tart and Chocolate Blueberry Ice Cream

2011-12-13T18:41:00.000-05:00

OK, folks, *it's* getting real in the Tuesdays with Dorie baking group. We are down to our last 3 recipes in Dorie Greenspan's book, Baking; From My Home to Yours. This week's host blogs are the two head honchos of the group: Laurie of Slush, who started this whole project 4 years ago, and Jules of Someone's in the Kitchen, who has been doing yeoman's duty administering the group.

Next Tuesday we all get to choose something from the past recipes to make and post. And the last Tuesday in December?

On December 27 Dorie Greenspan herself is choosing the final recipe of the book. Well when there's only one recipe left, I'm not sure you can really call it a choice, but Dorie is hosting us for the final week of TWD. I'm sure I'll be smiling through the tears at Dorie's "party" on the last week.

This week was another double header. First, a lovely tart:

Puffed Double Plum Tart

n.o.e.'s notes:

- You can find the recipe for this tart on Jules' tart post today.

- Back in October I found some Italian (prune) plums at the grocery store so I went ahead and baked this tart then.

- I made 1/3 recipe, using 6 dried prunes and 3 Italian prune plums. I didn't realize when I bought them, but the dried prunes were cherry flavored (and quite delicious!). Following Dorie's directions, the prunes are steeped for 15 minutes in spiced red wine. Then the wine mixture is boiled down to make a syrup which is dabbed on the tart before baking.

- For sprinkling on the edges of the crust I used turbinado sugar, figuring that the sugar crunch would add a nice texture.

- Once it's in the oven, I always halfway hold my breath until the puff pastry actually puffs

- I used duFour all-butter puff pastry that I had in the back corner of my freezer. Its directions say that moderate oven temperatures are best for this pastry, recommending the temperature of 375, so I baked the tart at 375 for 15 min + 360 for 10 minutes. At that point it was nicely golden and puffed around the edges.

- The pastry under the fruit didn't puff, so perhaps my tart might have needed more time in the oven. Also, syrup ran off the edges of the tart so it's possible that I was too generous with my "dabbing" of the (delicious) syrup!

- Although Dorie said to put some of the fresh plums cut side up and some cut side down, next time I would keep all of the fresh ones cut side up because their more golden color provided a greater contrast with the dried ones (which were dark).

the verdict:

This tart was a perfect autumnal treat. The buttery crust paired beautifully with the deeply intense wine-steeped plums. My husband said it was "a gustatory delight" and I totally agree with him. We ate the entire tart in one sitting and were very regretful that I'd only made a mini tart. I'd have to say that this was one of the top fruit desserts in Dorie's book; it was just that good.

...and the second recipe for this week:

Chocolate Blueberry Ice Cream

I'm not sure why this recipe's flavor combination sounds so odd; chocolate and fruit are an age-old pairing. And I've been known to toss of handfuls of chocolate-covered blueberries at a time. But odd or not, after all these years of TWD I finally know well enough to trust Dorie's instincts, so I decided to make this ice cream as she developed it.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- Laurie's ice cream post has the recipe and her reflections 4 years after starting the TWD group. Head over there and check it all out from the original TWD member!

- This was the kind of ice cream base that after an overnight in my fridge turned pudding-like and too thick to churn. I think this probably comes from using so much chopped chocolate. I guess the solution might be to not chill the base quite as long, and/or stir in preserves (and alcohol if you use it) before putting the base into ice cream maker rather than afterwards, as the recipe directs.

- My blueberry preserves had whole blueberries in it. I was hoping that they wouldn't turn into icy pieces as they froze but luckily they didn't.

- Per a tip from ice cream guru David Lebovitz, I added 1.5 T kirsch liqueur to improve texture of the ice cream and add a subtle fruity boost.

- This is a small-yield recipe; it made a heaping pint of ice cream

the verdict:

The blueberry is subtle in this ice cream, providing a hint of fruit to the intense chocolate flavor. The bits of blueberry in my preserves provide little fruity punctuation and a fun textural note.

Big Cookbook Roundup, 2011 version

2011-12-12T14:04:00.014-05:00

I had so much fun compiling last year's cookbook post, that I thought I'd do it again for the 2011 holiday gift-giving season! I've kept my eyes peeled for links and lists of top cookbooks and giving guides and other cookbook-related information. Most of the links feature cookbooks published in 2011, but there are some more far-reaching cookbook projects worth mentioning.

I hope that by perusing the lists and compilations you will find some gems to give as gifts or to round out your own cookbook holdings. You can purchase the books at your local independent bookseller, or order from Amazon up until the very last possible moment.

[edited December 31, 2011 to add:]
The wonderful search-your-own-cookbooks site, Eat Your Books (see my description below) has amalgamated voting from 195 "best of 2011" cookbook lists (including my post!), to come up with a consensus top cookbooks of 2011. Check out their findings here, and click on links to all of their individual source links of lists.

Cooking Light; 25 years:

To celebrate the 25th anniversary of the magazine, Cooking Light is compiling a list of the 100 best cookbooks of the past 25 years:

"As we contemplate turning 25, we decided to pick our favorite 100 cookbooks, which we’ll unveil over the next year across 15 categories. We looked at best-seller and awards lists, and talked to editors, authors, and experts. For consideration, books had to be published in the United States since 1987 and either be in print or easily available online. Winners emerged after passionate debate about voice, originality, beauty, importance, and a clear mission or vision. Yes, we tested the recipes. "

In November, the magazine listed the 9 Best General Cookbooks (I was pleasantly surprised to find that I own 5 of the 9 - and the yellow gourmet but not the green). Next came December's compilation of the 7 Best Baking Books (I have 3 of the 7) Tune into Cooking Light's site each month for more categories of Best Cookbooks of the past 25 years.

Best Cookbooks of 2011 ~ lists from media & content sources

New York Times - The year's notable cookbooks (registration may be required for access to New York Times articles)
New York Times Sunday Book Review - Embracing Home; Books About Cooking
Bon Apetit - Best Cookbooks of 2011
Zagat - Holiday Gift Guide: Cookbooks
The Guardian - list of Books for Giving; Food
NPR - 2011's Best Cookbooks: Revenge Of The Kitchen Nerds
...and NPR's runners up
NPR interview - 2011's Best Cookbooks, Tested and Tasted
Chicago Tribune - Holiday Cookbook Haul
The Seattle Times - cookbooks by local Seattle authors
Huffington Post - The 11 Best Cookbooks of 2011
Epicurious list of The 10 Best Cookbooks of 2011
The Eater Fall 2011 Coobook and Food Book Preview
Amazon's recommended best cookbooks of 2011
Top 10 Cookbook Bestsellers (on amazon: updated hourly apparently)
Esquire, Best New Cookbooks 2011 (five word reviews of selected cookbooks)
Fox News, Top 10 Best Holiday Cookbooks
Irish Times, Best Foodie Books of 2011
[edited Dec 13 2011 to add:]
Washington Post, Top 10 Cookbooks of 2011
[edited Dec 18 2011 to add:]
Lynne Rossetto Kasper of the Splendid Table's Not-So-New Books for Entertaining Ideas
[edited Dec 19 2011 to add:]
Food & Wine editor's picks of 5 Favorite Cookbooks of 2011

Best Cookbooks ~ lists from food writers and bloggers

David Lebovitz, Best Cookbooks of 2011
Ruhlman, Season's Best Books and Others I Like
Pioneer Woman, Cookbooks for Christmas (some current books, some old chestnuts)
Running with Tweezers, 2011 Cookbook Roundup
Cheryl Sternman Rule's list of 16 cookbooks to give
Simple Bites (blogger) list of top cookbooks of 2011
Pastrygirl 2011 holiday baking cookbooks
[edited December 20 to add:]
Dorie Greenspan, Cookbooks by Friends: The 2011 Collection
[edited December 21 to add:]
Nancie McDermott's Holiday Gift List: Cookbooks from the 2011 Bumper Crop
[edited Dec 25 2011 to add:]
Shine (Yahoo), 16 Cookbooks Every Home Should Have
[edited December 28 to add:]
Sarah Moulton's Favorite Cookbooks of 2011 (on Good Morning America)

Also of interest:

- Check out this fascinating article "Recipe for Paring a Cookbook Collection" by Amanda Gold of the San Francisco Chronicle about how she and her husband winnowed their cookbook shelves complete with lists of their favorite cookbooks. Following that article, Bill Daley of the Chicago Tribune listed his 10 keeper cookbooks.

- SF Foodie has been compiling a list of best of cookbooks lists, which are posted here, with promises to update the list:

- Goodreads Award for Best Food and Cooking Book (by popular vote)

- New York Times article about cookbooks written by chefs for home cooks
(registration may be required)

- the kitchn asked: What Was Your Favorite New Cookbook of 2011?

- Observer Food Monthly had a reader poll of best cookbook of 2011

- the 2011 James Beard Foundation cookbook nominees and winners

Cookbooks in favor in my kitchen in 2011:

When I was in my kitchen in 2011, these are the books that most frequently graced my kitchen counters. Because I don't get any free cookbooks, I tend to buy them when I can, and consequently, I'm rarely cooking from the very latest. That's fine with me; when I find a book I like I tend to use it for a long time. I hope you find books here (and among the 13 I recommended at the end of last year's cookbook post) worthy to add to you own bookshelves.

Amanda Hesser, The Essential New York Times Cookbook, - This cookbook falls in the "brick" category; so chunky and substantial that it could double as a doorstop (of a very heavy door). It is comprehensive and impeccably edited. I've tried a dozen or more recipes from this book and all have been exceptional; the Spicy Red Chili is our new go-to recipe.

Dan Lepard, Short and Sweet, - I am a huge fan of the British baker Dan Lepard. He understands both the science and the art of baking, and is always exploring new techniques and flavors. The "short" in the book's title doesn't refer to the length of the cookbook - it's a hefty tome that manages to reassure and instruct beginning bakers while still providing delightful inspiration to more those more comfortable with their ovens. I've made his vanilla ice cream (good) but otherwise have only delved into its riches by while sitting on the sofa. This book isn't yet available in the US; I ordered it from amazon.co.uk and it arrived in a week's time at a total cost $30 including delivery from England. That's not bad for an excellent 576-page book.

Coleman Andrews, Country Cooking of Ireland - I discovered this book when I was writing last year's cookbook roundup post, and I'm glad I did! Although there are entire chapters I'm not likely to explore, there are enough wonderful, rustic, intriguing dishes that call me to turn to this book when I'm looking for something just a bit different, such as a memorable soda bread that I made with freshly ground whole wheat flour.

Sam Beall, The Blackberry Farm Cookbook - This book, from the country resort hotel the Inn at Blackberry Farm, is glossy and pretty and just a little highfalutin' to read, but the recipes are quite accessible and top-notch in flavor. I've made some lovely pies and exceptional ice cream.

Molly O'Neill, One Big Table - I think of this book as a super-charged (in size and quality) version of those spiral-bound regional cookbooks. Molly O'Neill traveled across the US gathering recipes and talking with restaurants and home cooks. She makes the pages come alive by including stories about the people who contributed the recipes. This book is as fun to read as it is tasty to cook from.

I haven't cooked from this book, not one thing, but I didn't have any of Jacques Pepin's cookbooks and when I saw this one at Costco in November I pounced on it. I've been happy to see that it's made some of the top cookbook lists, above, and look forward to exploring it.

I wrote about meeting Jeni Bauer and about her ice cream previously, but wanted to mention her book again. Jeni has devised a startlingly different way to make ice cream, using no egg yolks, but adding cream cheese, corn (or tapioca) starch, and corn (or tapioca) syrup to her ice cream base. The resulting ice cream has great texture and the book presents a wide array of creative flavor combinations for which Jeni's ice cream is famous.

Finally, if you love cookbooks (and I cannot imagine that you've read this far if you don't care about them) I highly recommend the web service Eat Your Books. It acts as a search engine for your own collection of cookbooks and helps you find the perfect recipe in books on your very own shelf. I receive nothing from the site; I pay for my $25 annual membership just as you would (although membership is free if you index 5 books or fewer), and believe me, it pays me back in savings of time and in providing the satisfaction of using my own beloved cookbooks more fully.

If you have cookbook recommendations you can leave them in the comments. I'd love to hear them!

{TWD} Russian Tea Madeleines and Honey Almond Pluot Tart

2011-12-06T00:02:00.001-05:00

This is another one of those weeks where the Tuesdays With Dorie baking group is doubling up on recipes - after 4 years of weekly baking, the group will finish Dorie Greenspan's book Baking; From My Home to Yours by the end of 2011. I'll no doubt have some reflections in the final post (December 27) but until then I'm not letting myself think about it too much - too sad!

Today we have another tart and another recipe for madeleines. My Honey Almond Pluot Tart hearkens back to autumn while my Russian Tea Madeleines are decidedly wintry, featuring satsuma and grapefruit flavors.

First, the madeleines (pictured up above):

Russian Tea Madeleines

Dorie's recipe is for Earl Grey Madeleines, but I have completely run out of Earl Grey tea. I keep running across recipes needing Earl Grey and I have scavenged and scrounged the last of the Earl Grey from the recesses of my tea drawer. Since that drawer is still bursting with other varieties of tea, I am holding out on replacing the Earl Grey. But one byproduct of all that scrounging is that at the very back of the tea drawer I found an unopened tin of Russian tea. As it happens, this tea has orange bergamot oil - just like Earl Grey! - and also tangerine and grapefruit flavors. It sounded perfect for my madeleines.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- The madeleine recipe is hosted by Nicole of Bakeologie. You will be able to find the recipe on her cute madeleine post.

- Dorie's recipe calls for lemon zest, which is rubbed with the fingertips into granulated sugar before beating both with the eggs, I decided to use satsuma tangerine zest and grapefruit zest to complement the flavors of the Russian tea.

- This recipe uses an unusual technique to incorporate the tea: leaves of tea are infused in hot melted butter for 15 minutes. Then the butter is strained and added to the batter, carrying the tea's flavors with it.

- Unlike the last time I baked madeleines, I tried to not overfill the molds. They turned out just right, characteristic humps and all, even though I forgot to use Dorie's trick of setting the mold onto a hot baking stone.

the verdict:

These were delicious little cookies - crunchy edges, and softer centers, with the citrus and tea flavors adding complexity and holiday cheer. My husband and I enjoyed them with ice cream and a cup of tea, respectively.

And now, on to the tart:

Honey Almond Pluot Tart

I love baking tarts. Even if f this group were "Tuesdays With Tarts", and we baked a tart every single week, I don't think I'd get tired of baking - or eating - tarts. This week's tart has plenty of appeal. It started as a fig recipe, but there are many other fruits that Dorie suggests as possible variations on the recipe.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- The tart was chosen for TWD by Kayte of Grandma's Kitchen Table (she's a tart fan also). You will be able to find the recipe for the tart and her lovely grapefruit variation if you click to her blog post, but what's even better, you will find her reflections on nearly 4 years of TWD participation. I couldn't say it better.

- Earlier in the fall I looked at the remaining TWD recipes and decided to bake all of the ones that needed seasonal autumnal fruit while it was still in stores. At that point I could still find figs but I had just baked a honey fig cake for TWD and decided to branch out to one of Dorie's suggested alternate fruits. I was hoping for apricots or nectarines but there were none to be found so I picked up some pluots. They're half apricot so I deemed them "close enough."

- For the tart's crust, I made Dorie's Sweet Tart Dough with Nuts, using Bob's Red Mill Almond Flour. I love that tart dough recipe and thought the almond would complement the almond filling. Also, I managed to run out of flour so it was fortuitous to replace some of the recipe's quantity of flour with ground nuts.

- I added almond extract to highlight the almond flavor of the filling.

the verdict:

This was a lovely tart, accompanied nicely by a scoop of vanilla ice cream. The brightness of the pluots was a counterpoint to the sweet creamy almond filling.

All in all, two more delicious recipes, and just three more remain until the book is finished!

Soft Gingerbread Molded Cookies

2011-12-04T21:04:00.005-05:00

logo by Allifer Designs

Three times in the past decade I had the good fortune to travel to Germany in December. Each city and town we visited had its own Christmas Market and I loved poking around the wares in the stalls of the market vendors.

Christmas market in the Gendarmenmarkt, Berlin

I browsed through woolens, and toys, and acres of Christmas decorations - wood, straw, glass, lead, cloth - and I always kept my eyes open for carved wooden cookie molds. Over the several visits, I managed to put together a little collection of pretty molds. (In case you'd like cookie molds of your own, I've included some information at the end of this post.)

My German molds are a mixture of Christmas/winter (snowman, Father Christmas, church, tree) and general (flowers, birds, fruit) in subject.

The molds below are especially nice because the carving is deep and detailed.

The mold below is one of my favorites. When I bought it I had no idea who it was or what it meant.

After a bit of internet sleuthing my good buddy Wikipedia turned up the answer for me:

Münchner Kindl is German for "Munich child", the symbol on the coat-of-arms of the city Munich. This symbol has been the coat-of-arms of Munich since the 13th century. The figure portrayed was originally a monk (or friar) holding a book, but by the 16th century it evolved in different portrayals into the figure of a small child wearing a pointed hood, often shown holding a beer mug and a radish. It has been theorized that the name for the city of Munich (München in German) comes from the term "Kloster von Mönchen" or "Cloister for Monks" due to the Imperial Abbey of Tegernsee--a Benedictine Monastery near which the original town of Munich was built.

It took me a while to actually use my molds, though. The prospect was a bit intimidating; I didn't have a tried-and-true recipe, and I wanted the recipe to be as wonderful as the molds. In my mind, it added up to an Epic Project, and, as such, it never actually got started.

Then I got my copy of the lovely baking book Tartine, and saw molded cookies on the cover. I knew it was time to try out my German cookie molds with the Soft Gingerbread recipe in Tartine.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- Tartine's recipe for soft gingerbread can be found here, or buy the book! Of all the bakery cookbooks I've seen and baked from, this one's the best, and I highly recommend it.

- Blackstrap molasses gets very little love, and I was glad to see it featured in this recipe.

- This dough is perfect for rolling in a gallon ziploc bag.

- The way that I found to work in shaping the cookies in their molds is to place the mold face down on the rolled dough, and cut around the outside with a bench scraper. Then turn mold over and press dough gently so it fits into the indentations. I've even rolled the back lightly with the rolling pin. The next step is to turn the mold over onto a parchment-lined baking sheet, remove mold, trimming as necessary with the bench scraper, before baking as directed.

- The cookies puffed in the oven more than I expected, so some of the definition was unfortunately lost.

- I didn't glaze the cookies with the optional glaze in the recipe because I prefer my cookies plain.

- I also used this dough for gingerbread cookies made with regular cookie cutters and they came out beautifully.

the verdict:

This recipe makes the perfect gingerbread cookies, either rolled/pressed into molds or rolled/cut with cookie cutters. The taste is fantastic, with the perfect balance of molasses and spices. I love working with this dough, and it has become my go-to gingerbread cookie recipe. The molded cookies lost more definition than I'd like, but with flavor this good, it's hard to care.

This cookie is my contribution to the 2nd Annual Virtual Cookie Exchange over at Di's Kitchen Notebook. Visit Di's blog in about a week to see a roundup of all participating blogs and delicious cookies, still in time for Christmas baking! I'll add that the cookie exchange badge was painted by my daughter Allison; if you need any form of custom art visit her website.

Christmas market in Leipzig

more about cookie molds:

An article in the December, 2008 Martha Stewart magazine featured molded cookies and included a recipe for Speculaas cookies, a spice cookie traditional in the Netherlands and Germany. The online reviews were very mixed, however, so I never baked that recipe. The source for Martha's cookie molds is House on the Hill (www.houseonthehill.net) I have ordered a couple of molds from House on the Hill to supplement my collection, and they are beautiful.

If you have a Springerle rolling pin, you can use that to make molded cookies, cutting them apart either before or after baking. You can also find molds on ebay, or keep your eye open at the local thrift shop or antiques market.

{TWD} Normandy Apple Tart

2011-11-29T20:00:00.002-05:00

One advantage to having so many tarts to make for Tuesdays With Dorie - four tarts over a four week span - is that I could make one big double batch of Dorie Greenspan's Sweet Tart Dough and use it for all of the tarts, baking the different tart recipes in a variety of sizes, from minis to nearly full size. The dough is perfect for freezing, but I baked all of the tarts in a matter of just a few days. In fact I baked this week's Normandy Apple Tart the day after I had baked the Alsatian Apple Tart, which gave us perfect comparison of the two recipes.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- This week the recipe was chosen by Tracey of Tracey's Culinary Adventures. Tracey is always cooking and baking up something interesting in her kitchen, so when you click over for the tart recipe stay awhile and explore the other delicious things that Tracey posts on her blog.

- This tart has three elements: a sweet pastry base, an applesauce layer, and apples sliced on top. The recipe gives directions for making applesauce, which looked quite enticing, but I had several bags of homemade applesauce in the freezer, so I opted to use it instead.

- The rectangular tart pan that I used is approximately 3/4 size of a full tart recipe.

- With the tart crust already made, once I thawed my applesauce it was quick work to cut some apples and pop the tart in the oven.

the verdict:

This was very popular with my book group; the members couldn't stop exclaiming over its deliciousness. I'll have to say that as good as this tart was, I preferred the custard-based Alsatian apple tart.

Today's other TWD recipe is for Sour Cream Pumpkin Tart, which I posted here.

{TWD} Sour Cream Pumpkin Tart

2011-11-29T00:02:00.006-05:00

I love pumpkin pie. More specifically, I love a particular pumpkin pie. In fact, at my daughter's recent wedding, she had pie rather than wedding cake, and requested that the caterer make our Molasses Spice Pumpkin Pie recipe as one of the flavors. The caterer, a wonderful restaurant in central New York called Circa, was happy to oblige. Additionally, Circa put the pie on their own menu the day before the wedding. Apparently it sold out quickly.

I will eat just about any pumpkin pie, even though they typically fall short of pumpkin pie perfection of our family recipe, and I'm always happy to try a new pumpkin pie recipe (but I usually sneak in extra spices!)

This week the assigned recipe for the Tuesdays With Dorie baking group is Sour Cream Pumpkin Tart (Pie) which was a perfect choice because we could all bake this as our Thanksgiving pumpkin pie last week and post it today. And you can bake it now, just in case you're like me and didn't get enough pumpkin pie on Thanksgiving day.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- Judy of the blog Judy's Gross Eats is hosting this week's pumpkin selection. Head over to her blog for the recipe.

- Dorie Greenspan gives two alternate ways to present this pumpkin dessert: as a traditional pie or baked into a tart shell. I'd never baked a pumpkin tart, so this is the route I chose.

- I made 1/4 recipe, which yielded enough filling for one little tart and two ramekins.

- Instead of light brown sugar, I used dark brown, and a spiced dark rum rather than plain rum.

- Because I'm all about the autumn spices, I generously heaped the measure of the cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, and added a bit of black pepper.

the verdict:

I served one of the ramekins to JDE, and this was our conversation:

JDE: "this stuff is really good."
me: " I added some extra spices. Do you think it's too spicy?"
JDE: "Is that even possible?"

Later, I got to taste the tart myself. The recipe makes a very good pumpkin filling and I was glad I'd experimented with tart dough (rather than the more common pie crust). The added spices gave it a little kick, which was beautifully mellowed by the sour cream in the recipe and some additional softly whipped heavy cream on top.

While I can't say that this recipe reaches the pinnacle of perfection of my usual favorite pumpkin pie, it was a lovely tart, and I'd gladly eat it again. Most of all, I'm grateful for the technique of adding pumpkin filling to a tart shell, which I will definitely keep in my repertory.

Today's other TWD recipe was Normandy Apple Tart, which I posted here.

Russian Grandmother's Apple Pie Cake

2011-11-22T23:59:00.000-05:00

This week, in honor of Thanksgiving, Tuesdays With Dorie has loosened up the rules. Rather than an assigned recipe; this week members are free to "rewind" a previously-selected recipe that they might have missed. There's also leeway in posting so you'll see TWD posts on various blogs all the way up to Friday. I'm going to post now because my rewind is the Russian Grandmothers' Apple Pie Cake, and it's a good candidate for Thanksgiving baking if you want something just a smidge out of the ordinary.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- You can find the recipe for this apple dessert on the blog post of TWD founder Laurie. It was chosen for the group way back in March of 2008.

- Before I baked this, I checked out the experience of the TWD bakers, such as my friend Di (here's her post), and I learned that the filling tended to be dry and the crust browned quickly. Since I was baking my pie/cake in a dark silicone loaf pan and was using a new-to-me oven I reduced temperature to 350 degrees

- I wanted to make sure that the filling was cooked by the time the crust was browned, so I precooked the apples with the sugar and cinnamon on top of the stove for 5 or 10 minutes before putting it in the crust.

- In making the crust, Dorie gives an approximate measure of flour, allowing an extra 1/4 cup to be added as needed. I didn't use the extra, as the texture seemed soft but still doughy without it. The dough was very soft, and with so much butter it warmed up quickly

- I totally forgot to add the raisins, which were measured and sitting on the counter. Right as I was closing the oven door I saw the raisins but I wasn't going to disassemble the pie/cake to add them.

- My pie/cake stayed in the oven for about 50 minutes, at which point it was a lovely golden brown.

the verdict:

This was an unusual dessert, but very appealing. The crust was a fairly thin layer like a pie, but soft like a cake. The apples were tender and sweetly spiced. All of the juices that accumulated when I precooked the apples were absorbed by the soft crust as it baked.

A scoop of vanilla ice cream made the ideal accompaniment (as it usually does with anything apple). My husband, the apple-dessert aficionado, was a big fan of this pie/cake and thought it was fine without the raisins.

Helen's Sour Cream Bundt Cake

2011-11-15T23:04:00.004-05:00

Here it is, November 15, National Bundt Day, and she's been at it again.

the "she": Mary, the Food Librarian
the "it": 30 Days of Bundt Cakes

For three years running she has celebrated National Bundt Day by baking a different bundt cake for each of the 30 days leading up to November 15. Nothing makes Mary happier than a good bundt cake; in fact her theme for her baking spree is "I Like Big Bundts." Mary has hinted that this is her last year of bundtish extravaganza, but somehow I see the tradition continuing.

In a much more modest form of celebration, each year I have joined Mary by baking one bundt cake and posting it on November 15. Last year I baked an apple triple ginger streusel bundt cake, which you can see here, and my bundt from two years ago was a spiced cake made with blackberry jam, which I posted here.

For 2011 I wanted to bake an unusual and cool bundt cake. I needed to look no farther than the blog Whitehaven, an interiors blog of my friend Helen and her business partner who have an interior design business. For Whitehaven's one year blogiversary, Helen posted the recipe for this cake. Voila! This would be my contribution to National Bundt Day.

Helen is one of the members of my wonderful book group, and I actually baked the cake for a book group dinner hosted by Helen and her husband - she got a kick out of someone else baking her cake and serving it at her house!

- Scroll down to the bottom of this post for the recipe, or click over to Whitehaven's blog for the cake recipe and lots of beautiful design posts. My favorite: the House of the Week feature - it's always fun to see which house near or far is highlighted each week.

- The method for mixing this cake is somewhat unusual. The egg yolks are added to the batter first and the whites are separately beaten and folded into the batter at the end. I used some fabulous huge duck eggs from my farm box.

- Did you know that the bundt pan is an American descendant of European kugelhopf pans? I used 10-cup kugelhopf pan. I found out that this is a seriously big cake - it rises a lot as it bakes, even if you think you might have over-folded the batter. Mine rose above the rim of the pan but luckily it did not overflow. I'm guessing that a 12-cup pan would probably be perfect.

- As it bakes, the cake makes the most wonderful crunchy sugary crust.

the verdict:

This is a perfect special-occasion cake, striking in appearance with a light texture and delicate flavor from the vanilla and lemon juice. The cake is close-crumbed and moist, and looks a bit like a pound cake, but it is not a bit dense or heavy. In fact, it is almost fluffy inside. I'm guessing that the tight crumb comes from the slow oven.

Mary will post a round up on her blog of all those who celebrate National Bundt Day, so check her blog for that post in late November; there are sure to be some great recipes. In the meantime, you can find Mary's previous bundt posts:

2011 I Like Big Bundts (30 different Bundt cakes)

and her Bundt Cake page, which includes, among other things:

2010 I Like Big Bundts (30 different Bundt cakes)
2010 Round up of Bundts (86 people made Bundts for National Bundt Day)

2009 I Like Big Bundts (30 different Bundt cakes)
2009 Round up of Bundts (41 people made Bundt cakes to celebrate National Bundt Day)

Also, here's a blog post by cake goddess Rose Levy Beranbaum's about bundt cake pans, complete with some pretty terrific bundt cake tips.

Happy National Bundt Day!

the recipe:

Helen's Sour Cream Cake

2 sticks butter
3 cups sugar
6 eggs, separated
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 cup sour cream
3 cups plain sifted flour
2 tsp lemon juice
1 tsp vanilla

Cream butter and sugar.

Add egg yolks, one a time, beating well after each addition.

Mix soda into sour cream.

Add flour to butter, sugar, egg mixture, alternating with sour cream then add flavoring.

Fold in stiffly beaten egg whites.

Pour into well greased and floured 12-cup bundt pan. Bake one and a half hours (90 minutes) at 300 degrees.

{TWD} Bittersweet Chocolate Brownies and Sweet baking friendships

2011-11-15T10:59:00.000-05:00

In late October when the November recipes were announced for the Tuesdays With Dorie baking group I set forth to bake as many of them as I could because I knew that first thing in the morning on November 1 my husband and I would board a flight to the West Coast. We will be spending a fair amount of time in the Bay Area over the next couple of years; this particular trip would be the first half of November. I was pretty sure I wouldn't be able to bake while away from my home kitchen so before leaving for California I managed to bake, taste, and photograph 7 of the 8 November recipes (we're doubling up this month in order to finish the book by the end of 2011). The one that I didn't manage to bake was this week's Bittersweet Brownies, chosen by Leslie of the blog Lethally Delicious.

Leslie has been a longtime virtual baking friend; we met through TWD, have baked bread together in the Slow & Steady subgroup of the Bread Baker's Apprentice Challenge (which I sporadically chronicle on my bread blog), and compare notes on baking and life via twitter. As is clear from her blog Leslie is kind, funny, talented, and smart as a whip. I knew that Leslie lives in the Bay Area and I had hopes that we could eventually connect on one of my visits. As it turned out, soon after I reached California, we both happened to have a free afternoon, and Leslie invited me to bake the brownies with her.

I quickly accepted her generous offer. I've enjoyed meeting TWD bakers on my various travels (some of the meet-ups have been recounted in Oprah's magazine, here, and on my blog here, here, and here), but this was the first time I've actually baked with a fellow TWD member!

The way it worked was this:

I drove to Leslie's house... we met... we immediately started talking... we talked some more... we laughed... we talked...

...then we decided to bake the brownies:

Leslie (who fortunately has laser-focus) got busy measuring and stirring and reading the recipe while I continued talking... we talked and laughed... Leslie measured and mixed...we talked... oh, and I chopped some pecans... we talked and laughed...

...the brownies went in the oven...

I had a blast checking out Leslie’s cookbook collection... we talked...

...the brownies came out of the oven...

we talked... the brownies cooled... we talked and laughed... we photographed brownies... we talked... we sampled brownies... we talked and laughed...

...and then it was time for me to leave.

All in all, it was a lovely afternoon, and I came away with a Ziploc bag of brownies and more importantly, a real live warm and gracious friend in the area.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- You can find the recipe, and her version of the bake-along, on Leslie's brownie post.

Leslie had lots of tips and techniques that we used in baking these brownies:

- She added vanilla earlier than the recipe specified. Why wait, right?

- Leslie whisked the espresso powder in with the flour and salt, then added them to the batter together. Oh, and Leslie keeps a plastic container in her flour drawer for weighing flour. Every couple of recipes she'll toss it in the dishwasher. Genius!

- The chocolate was Ghiradelli 60% bittersweet chips, which Leslie uses for a lot of chocolate recipes; it's easy - no chopping! - and delicious.

- Leslie expected these brownies to be sweet, so she cut back on the sugar about 10% - from 300 grams to 275.

- Pecans were among the assembled ingredients on Leslie's counter, and I agreed that nuts would be a fun addition to this recipe. Leslie showed me a cool trick that she learned from Cook's Illustrated for adding nuts to brownies. Instead of mixing them in, where they can absorb moisture and get a little soggy, we sprinkled the nuts on top of the brownie batter. They toasted as the brownies baked. Ingenious, no?

- Leslie has a nifty way of laying a piece of parchment in the brownie pan and folding the corners to fit. No measuring or cutting, easy and effective.

I was a baking near-slacker, but managed to chop nuts and contribute one or two little techniques:

- We used the trusty King Arthur Flour Divot Test and the brownies were baked through perfectly.

- I love chilling my brownies to get a fudgier texture. After a stint in the fridge, they were nice and dense.

the verdict:

These were really good brownies; I absolutely loved how the pecans were so dry and toasty thanks to Leslie's method. The nuts added a great textural element to this recipe, and the pecans in particular complemented the intense chocolate flavor. I usually use walnuts (when I add nuts to brownies) but will definitely use pecans again.

The brownies were on the sweet side, made even sweeter by sharing them with a longtime new friend. Thanks, Leslie, for inviting me to bake with you on your TWD hosting week, and thanks, TWD, for bringing us together!

Today's other TWD recipe is the Alsatian Apple Tart, which I posted here.

{TWD} Alsatian Apple Tart

2011-11-15T00:02:00.002-05:00

The final weeks of Tuesdays With Dorie bring us a raft of pie and tart recipes, just in time for Thanksgiving! This week it's Alsatian Apple Tart (the other recipe this week is a versatile chocolate brownie). The tart features a custard base and slices of apples on top, and although it's ideal for Autumn baking, I'd be happy to find this tart in my oven - or on my plate - any season of the year.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- The tart recipe was chosen by Jessica of Cookbook Habit. You can find the recipe on her tart post today.

- I made 1/3 recipe in a small baking dish.

- I love Dorie Greenspan's tart dough recipe, particularly the variation with nuts. It's versatile, sturdy, easy, and complements a variety of tart fillings.

the verdict:

We quickly scarfed up this tiny tart and sighed that it was gone! This is my favorite of all the apple recipes that we've baked in TWD. The custard + apple makes for a winning combination, reminiscent of my longtime standby German Apple Pie, but even better.

Today's other TWD recipe is for Bittersweet Brownies, which I posted here.

{TWD} Maxi Madeleines

2011-11-08T12:02:00.002-05:00

This week the other Tuesdays With Dorie selection (earlier today I posted Depths of Fall Butternut Squash Pie) gives a nod to Dorie Greenspan's French baking roots, with Mini Madeleines. Since I baked the recipe in a madeleine pan with full sized wells and they turned out quite large, I'm calling mine "Maxi Madeleines". But as good as these taste, I'm happy to have a bit more madeleine on the plate!

n.o.e.'s notes:

- This week's madeleine baking session is hosted by my Di of Di's Kitchen Notebook. Click over to her post to see some absolutely adorable mini madeleines, and get the recipe. While you're there, check out her other fabulous baking creations.

- These madeleines have honey and brown sugar and lemon zest among their ingredients - what a fantastic flavor combination.

- I made half recipe, which actually makes 7 or 8 full sized madeleines if your pan has the same sized wells as mine. My pan has only 6 wells; I divided the batter among the 6, and they were over-filled, as you can see from the extended madeleine edges. I probably should have put the extra batter in a ramekin to bake.

- The big issue when baking madeleines is getting the desirable "hump" on the backs of the cookies - that is, the batter should rise and be domed as the madeleines bake. I was lucky that there was a nice hump on the cookies I baked. After I baked mine, I saw a link that Di provided to a post by Dorie with some new madeleine techniques. It's always fun to see new tips to making baked goods even better.

the verdict:

These madeleines had a lovely texture and even lovelier flavor! They were a huge hit with my book group tasters and just about flew off the plate. I'd definitely bake these again!

{TWD} Butternut Squash Pie (and Gluten-Free Butternut Squash Crisp)

2011-11-08T00:03:00.002-05:00

As we wind to the end of the Tuesdays With Dorie baking group, we find ourselves with a fair number of tart and pie recipes from the book still to bake. The November lineup for for the group includes 4 pies/tarts! This is fine with me, since tarts and pies are among my favorite things to bake and eat, and what could be better for November, with Thanksgiving approaching?

The first pie/tart on the November docket is Dorie's Depths of Fall Butternut Squash Pie. I've come across the recipe in the book often and always thought that it looked intriguing; it's made with cubed butternut squash, pears, dried fruit and nuts. I had high hopes for this recipe.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- Valerie of Une Gamine dans la Cuisine chose Fall Butternut Squash Pie, and you can find the recipe on her blog post.

- The recipe specifies 1" cubes of squash. That seemed awfully big to me, so I cut my pieces of butternut squash much smaller, probably closer to 1/2" cubes.

- For dried fruit I used a mixture of golden raisins, cherries, and cranberries.

- I made a full recipe of the filling. I used half for a 7" pie. The other half I put in a baking dish and topped it with a gluten-free crumble mixture (equal parts of oats, butter, and brown sugar.)

- The pie crust recipe I used was my favorite: Cook's Illustrated Vodka Crust, which I previously posted, here.

the verdict:

I served both the pie and the crumble, accompanied by vanilla ice cream, at a dinner with friends. Unfortunately the pie wasn't a runaway hit with the five people who tasted it. Our friend DaH said, "This is interesting and pretty good." He thought it had a bit too much squash. My husband would have preferred no squash at all in the pie; he firmly believes that vegetables don't belong in baked goods. To me the filling was too bland and not quite sweet enough, although I didn't have ice cream with mine, and I think it would have been better with the sweetness of the vanilla ice cream.

As an aside, the pie crust won rave reviews!

As for the crisp version, my friend DeH loved it; the sugar in the nut topping might have helped give some oomph to the filling. I wish I had tasted it, but I gave all of the remaining crisp to her to enjoy.

TWD is doubling up on recipes this month in an effort to finish Dorie's book by year-end. Here's my madeleine post.

Carrot Souffle

2011-11-06T00:08:00.001-04:00

Thanksgiving just wouldn't be complete without a fluffy orange side dish, right? This slot is usually filled by a sweet potato casserole, prepared with sugar and spices, and topped with nuts or marshmallows (or both!) Well, move over sweet potatoes: there's a new orange dish in town and it wants a place on your Thanksgiving table. The newcomer is a Carrot Souffle, and the flavors are most decidedly savory rather than sweet.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- The recipe from Sam Beall's "The Blackberry Farm Cookbook." If you want to make this dish (and you definitely should), scroll down to the bottom of this post for the recipe.

- I was very low on carrots when I made this recipe, so I regretfully had to make one third of the recipe.

- I prepared this dish gluten-free, so I eliminated the cracker crumbs. I intended to add a bit of almond flour and maybe some coconut flour, but totally forgot. The souffle turned out with a lovely texture even without the crumbs.

- The recipe is easier than most souffles, and is more relaxed to make. It doesn't puff up a great deal in the oven, and doesn't collapse when it's served.

the verdict:

We absolutely loved this dish, and were very sad that it only lasted for one meal. I'll be making this recipe again and again. The savory flavors from the cheese, onion and peppers match beautifully with the souffle's soft texture. This dish is versatile enough to serve with a weekday dinner, and it would be a wonderful addition to the Thanksgiving table. If you already are planning another fluffy orange side dish make them both!

Phyl, of the blog Of Cabbages and King Cakes, is hosting a special Thanksgiving-themed roundup, and I'm contributing this side dish post to his virtual Thanksgiving dinner. Check his blog later this week for a gracious plenty of fabulous holiday food, posted in plenty of time for your Thanksgiving menu-making.

the recipe:

Carrot Souffle
adapted from Blackberry Farm

Ingredients

2 lbs carrots, peeled and sliced into rounds
1 cup whole milk
1 cup Saltine cracker crumbs (I omitted these)
3/4 cup grated sharp cheddar cheese
1/3 cup minced onion
1 Tbsp room temperature unsalted butter
1 teaspoon Kosher salt
1/8 teaspoon cayenne
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
3 large eggs

Method

1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter a 2-quart baking dish and set aside.

2. Place carrots in a saucepan and cover with an inch of water. Add about 1 teaspoon of salt to the water. Bring to a boil and cook for about 10 minutes, or until the carrots are tender. Strain the carrots and purée in a food processor or with an immersion blender.

3. Place carrot purée in a large bowl. Slowly add in the milk, a little at a time, whisking after each addition so that the mixture stays smooth, not lumpy. Mix in the saltine cracker crumbs, if using, the grated cheese, onion, butter, Kosher salt, cayenne, and black pepper.

4. In a separate bowl, whip up the eggs with an electric mixer until frothy. Then whisk them into the carrot purée mixture.

5. Transfer the carrot mixture into the prepared soufflé dish and bake for 40 to 45 minutes, until puffed and light golden brown on top. Serve warm.

{TWD} Far Breton ~and~ Honey Nut Scones

2011-11-01T11:14:00.001-04:00

The baking group Tuesdays With Dorie began on January 1, 2008, and each week it has presented members with one assigned recipe from Dorie Greenspan's book Baking: From My Home to Yours. Right now we are *this* close to finishing the book, and the group's leaders have decided that we should finish by the end of Calendar Year 2011, making the group exactly 4 years in duration. In order to meet this deadline, we have to double up on weekly recipes for most weeks this month, leaving Thanksgiving week free for us to choose a recipe we might have missed. So there's a lot of baking going on in my kitchen, and each Tuesday's post in November will have not one, but two recipes.

This week's recipes are Far Breton and Honey Nut Scones.

Part 1: Far Breton

n.o.e.'s notes:

- Nicole of Cookies on Friday chose Far Breton, and you can find the recipe on her post.

- Far Breton is a regional dish from Brittany, containing prunes. Apparently the word "far" mean "flour" in Breton, but the batter for this cake is quite egg-centric with very little flour at all.

- I made 1/2 recipe in 6"x3" round cake pan.

- Instead of white sugar, I used granulated golden palm sugar, and duck egg rather than chicken eggs.

- The recipe calls for prunes and raisins, although Dorie gives permission for other dried fruit substitutions. I stuck with the prunes and raisins, cutting the prunes in half before soaking the fruit in very strong black tea. The recipe specifies Early Grey, but I didn't have any (I rooted through the entire tea drawer not once but twice to prove that to myself.) Another option is to infuse the fruit with Armagnac, but I've never been able to locate it in the liquor stores in my hamlet.

- The far puffed a lot as it cooked, and browned beautifully. It took a good hour to bake, even at half the size.

- When I unmolded the far, it fell considerably, like a souffle.

the verdict:

The far was squarely in the delightful no-man's-land between custard and cake, like a baked custard with enough flour added to edge it toward cake territory. Both my husband and I loved the finished product. It was eggy and dense and sweet and fruity. After its long soak in strong tea, the dried fruit was tender and nearly melted away into the custard. We found the far at perfect at room temperature as an after-dinner dessert, and nearly as good, chilled, for breakfast the next morning.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Part 2: Honey Nut Scones

n.o.e.'s notes:

- The scones recipe was chosen by my baking buddy Jeannette of The Whimsical Cupcake.

- I stuck closely to Dorie's recipe, with the exception of using I used pecans instead of walnuts.

- Dorie's method for forming scones produces small, individual scones. I prefer a bigger scone with more "inside" and less "outside", so here's how I baked these: After mixing the dough I patted it into a disk in a greased glass cake pan, scored the disk into 6 or 8 wedges with a bench scraper, then baked. When the scones are still hot from the oven, I cut them into separate wedges along the score lines. To me the scones don’t end up dried-out this way.

the verdict:

These scones were a welcome sight for Saturday morning breakfast. And for Sunday and Monday as well! I'm more used to fruit than nuts in a scone, but I really liked the crunch and that the nuts lend to this recipe. This was one of my favorite scone recipes in the book.

{TWD} Fig Cake for Fall

2011-10-25T00:31:00.001-04:00

The Tuesdays With Dorie baking group is quite seasonal this week: our recipe is A Fig Cake For Fall. I knew this recipe would be coming up soon (because there are so few recipes left for TWD to bake) so when I saw some early figs in the produce section back in September, I made sure to buy them and bake up this cake.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- Our hostess this week is Alvarosa of the blog Cookie Rookie, who is from Vienna, Austria, and who had never baked before joining Tuesdays With Dorie. You can find the fig cake recipe on her post, and you can read about how she found and joined the baking group (hint: it involves meeting Dorie herself in Paris).

- The recipe calls for poaching the figs in ruby port. I had a bottle of tawny port but no ruby port. I consulted the internet for advice, and found this chowhound discussion. My conclusion after reading: use whatever type of port that you have. So I used the tawny port.

- I made half recipe in a 6" springform pan

the verdict:

Although the poached figs were delicious, this was not my favorite cake. The cornmeal was a little too prominent, and the ratio of cake to fig was too high for me. As I ate my slice of cake I found myself wishing for a denser, moister crumb, with more lemon flavor, and more figs.

Overall, I prefer more intensity in a fruit dessert, but it was still fun to try this very seasonal dessert.

{TWD} Ginger Chocolate Brownies

2011-10-18T10:23:00.000-04:00

One thing I can say with assurance about Dorie Greenspan's book, Baking; From My Home to Yours: There is no shortage of brownie recipes. As we've baked along in the Tuesdays With Dorie baking group, we've never been far from a chocolate brownie recipe. In fact, we baked brownies just a month ago. But we have not exhausted the brownie category. Today's TWD assigned recipe is Ginger Jazzed Brownies, and there's even one more brownie recipe to be baked in the remaining few weeks of the TWD group.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- Clivia of Bubie's Little Baker is hosting this week's brownie baking session; you can find the recipe on her brownie post, along with some lovely pictures of fall flowers.

- Once the brownies came out of the oven, they cooled for just a few minutes before I put the pan of brownies into the fridge. I love how chilling chocolate cakes and brownies intensifies their fudginess. I tasted one brownie before refrigeration, and it was soft and truffly in texture. After the fridge, the brownies were denser.

the verdict:

Before I baked these brownies I was slightly dubious about the ginger + chocolate combination, which is not a huge favorite of mine. I knew that I'd get a good sample of opinions from my book group, so I made a full batch to bring to the meeting. There were also strawberries and whipped cream at book group, so the brownies were eaten plain and also with various amounts of strawberries and whipped cream.

I'm happy to report that these brownies were very popular with my tasters. I surprised myself by liking the brownies quite a bit. I'm glad that I chilled the pan of brownies; the fudgy texture really helped them. The hefty hit of ginger enhanced rather than detracted from the overall brownie flavor.

I had a couple of brownies left over which I later enjoyed with some gingered whipped cream and crystallized ginger. Turns out I really enjoy the ginger + brownie combination.

Roasted Pumpkin Soup with Cider Cream

2011-10-12T18:06:00.002-04:00

I make no secret of my love for All Things Pumpkin. I'll happily bake and cook with pumpkin on a year-round basis, but the cool, crisp and/or blustery weather of Autumn makes pumpkin recipes all the more appealing.

Most pumpkin dishes employ a sweet spiced flavor profile, such as my favorite pumpkin pie or my two favorite pumpkin bread recipes. When it comes to dinner selections, however, I prefer the savory ones. I have a pumpkin soup recipe that I love (which I have shared here in the past), but when I saw this recipe for a savory Roasted Pumpkin Soup with Cider Cream from Williams-Sonoma, I had to give it a try.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- You can find the soup recipe here. The recipe has several steps, but they can be done in stages. The pumpkin could be roasted days in advance, and the same with the reduced cider.

- Although the recipe directs cutting the whole pumpkins in quarters to roast, I roasted mine in halves, drizzled with olive oil and pepper. I added the salt later, because I thought it might draw the moisture out of the pumpkin as it roasted.

- I love that this recipe combines the flavors of sage and nutmeg.

- To finish the soup, the recipe has a lovely whipped cream flavored with concentrated cider. Rather than reducing a bunch of cider, I used boiled cider from King Arthur Flour, and the cream was perfectly flavored.

- I found that a half recipe made a big vat of soup.

the verdict:

My husband, who is definitely not the pumpkin fan that I am, said when he tasted his soup, "This is perfection." Don't tell anyone, but I was actually a bit disappointed by his reaction, because it meant less leftover soup for me!

By itself, the soup by was very very good but adding the cider cream completely balanced the flavors. The cider cream was not really sweet per se but it added a smoothing, slightly fruity note to the herby savory mixture of vegetable flavors in the soup. I can't wait to make this recipe again!

I'm sending this wonderful soup to my buddy Phyl to add to his pumpkin dinner roundup.

{TWD} Buttermilk Biscuits

2011-10-11T21:54:00.002-04:00

In the final few months of the Tuesdays With Dorie baking group we are finally baking Basic Biscuits! There are many reasons why biscuits are a perfect recipe to have in your baking arsenal. They have but a few ingredients, most of which are usually on hand, they are simple to put together, and they are appropriate to every season of the year and occasion. Biscuits can be the vehicle for lots of delicious combinations: butter-and-jam, sausage-and-gravy, mustard-and-ham, roast beef-and-horse radish.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- Jennifer of Cooking for Comfort chose Basic Biscuits. You can find the recipe on her biscuit post.

- Although I'm not a native Southerner, I do know enough to use White Lily Flour for my biscuits. These were extra-special because I had a little stash of the original White Lily, from before the company was bought and the mill moved out from Knoxville, Tennessee to Ohio.

- The recipe is for biscuits with milk, but Dorie gives a variation for buttermilk biscuits, which is the kind I baked.

- Northern folks tend to add sugar to things like cornbread and biscuits, but that's not the norm in the South. Dorie's recipe calls for some sugar. I compromised by adding just a touch of molasses crystals instead of sugar.

the verdict:

I baked these rather late this evening in order to make the Tuesday posting deadline. They smelled so fantastic right out of the oven that my husband and I had a little after dinner biscuit break. mmmm, they were quite good piping hot from the oven. In my husband's words, "They're so light they could fly."

{TWD} Apple Walnut Muffin Cake

2011-10-04T22:29:00.001-04:00

It's October, and even here in the sunny, hot Southland, we can actually say that autumn has arrived. And what goes hand in hand with cool weather? Baked goods with apples, of course! This week's assignment for the Tuesdays With Dorie baking group is Apple Nut Muffin Cake, a very timely selection.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- This week's recipe was chosen by Katrina of Baking and Boys - click over to her post to find the recipe.

- Anything baked with apples is likely to be popular at my house, so I made an extra-big batch of this cake: 1.5 recipe in 4 muffin-sized loaf pans and one larger square pan. I bought this pan a year ago when I was in London - I love the very square corners and the removable bottom, which makes releasing the cake from the pan an absolute breeze.

- The recipe does have lots of ingredients, but it's not a difficult cake, since the preparation consists mostly in measuring. The method is simple and uses two bowls, a whisk and a spatula to combine the ingredients to make the cake batter.

- I had every intention of following the recipe - really I did - but as I went along, I made a few changes here and there. To start with, I used freshly ground whole wheat flour for 1/3 of the flour.

- To reduce the glycemic load, I cut the sugar by 1/3, and used palm sugar rather than white granulated sugar.

- The recipe calls for apple cider or apple juice. I used a mixture of King Arthur boiled cider and apple juice.

- I used chopped walnuts for the nuts, and to amplify the walnut flavor I substituted walnut oil for 1/3 of the oil in the recipe.

- I added a bit more salt, but next time I would increase the salt even a bit more.

- I'm not sure what kind of apples went into my cake - they were an unidentified variety from my farm box. I cut a bit more than the recipe specified.

the verdict:

Warm from the oven, the cake's texture was soft and the flavors blended beautifully. The pieces of chopped apple provided bursts of flavor. I would add a touch of nutmeg next time.

We enjoyed this cake for breakfast with salted butter. In fact, this cake was on the breakfast menu for a week, and it only improved with time.

{TWD} Flip Over Plum Cake

2011-09-27T23:59:00.001-04:00

There's something very special about cooked plums. Raw, plums are fine, although not my favorite fruit by a long shot. But cooked? Plums become a completely different fruit. The flavor intensifies and the texture almost melts. Paired with the right ingredients, plums make spectacular desserts. What's more, lovely plum desserts are perfect for transitioning from summer to fall baking, which makes this week's assigned recipe, Flip Over Plum Cake, very timely.

The Tuesdays With Dorie baking group has baked with plums in the past. In 2009 we made the Dimply Plum Cake, and my I enjoyed the cake so much I actually posted a follow-up to the original post. I couldn't fathom why Dorie would include another plum cake in her book, nor could I imagine how it would be different or that it could be better.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- Becky of Project Domestication chose Flip-Over Plum Cake and will have the recipe on her blog today.

- Dorie says that the cake is a cross between a cake and a pudding. As I was preparing the recipe for this "cake" it reminded me of the southern-type of cobbler - where you make a batter and scatter fruit on the top and as it bakes in the oven, the fruit sinks to the bottom.

- In addition to flour and milk and butter, the batter for this cake is made with ground cinnamon, ginger, vanilla extract, almond extract, and a surprise ingredient, ground coriander.

the verdict:

This was an amazing fruit dessert. The plums get jammy and flavorful, and the addition of the spices to the batter elevate this one above the simple cobbler (or cake). It's one of the best fruit desserts in Dorie's book. In fact, we liked this as well, or better, than our old favorite, the dimply plum cake!

{TWD} Salt and Pepper Cocoa Shortbreads

2011-09-20T23:58:00.003-04:00

Is there any flavor combination more classic than salt + pepper? In recipes and at the table, the two stick pretty close together; in fact, it is considered bad etiquette to pass one at table without the other. Never separate "the twins"!

Although it seems that the two have been paired for all eternity, it turns out the 17th century French can take the credit for elevating the status of pepper and putting it with salt, familiar from ancient times. Separately, salt and pepper are intensely savory and assertively spicy, respectively. But they really shine when they're together; they complete each other to wake up the flavors of the food they visit.

This week the Tuesdays With Dorie bakers were treated to Dorie Greenspan's spin on the traditional combination; the assigned recipe was Salt and Pepper Cocoa Shortbreads. I love salt and pepper in sweets, although they usually appear separately, so I was excited to try these cookies.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- Tia of Buttercream Barbie chose these cookies, and if you click over to her shortbread post, you can find the recipe.

- When I first heard of these cookies, I thought they were just salt and pepper shortbread. And they sounded really good. Then I realized they were salt and pepper COCOA shortbread. Oh. That still sounded fine, but not as good as a basic shortbread amped up with salt and pepper treatment. It turns out that my baking buddy Phyl had the same idea; he baked one batch with cocoa and one batch without, and reported that he actually preferred the non-chocolate version. I got a little lazy and baked them with the cocoa, as conceived by Dorie.

- The cookies were simple to put together, and the dough chilled for several hours in the refrigerator until they could be formed for baking. Rather than making the shortbread as refrigerator slice-and-bake cookies, I piled all the dough into a medium tart ring and baked the shortbread that way.

- My daughter ALE had baked these cookies when she first got her copy of Dorie's book, and had told me that the salt and pepper flavors were relatively mild. Based on her advice I increased the quantity of both salt and of pepper that I used in the dough. And just before baking, I sprinkled fleur de sel and coarse pepper over the top of the shortbread.

- When making shortbread in a pan, it's helpful to score it with a bench scraper or knife before baking, and then, after it's baked, cut along the score lines while the shortbread is still hot from the oven.

- I served at a meeting of my book group, accompanied by some of David Lebovitz's Black Pepper Ice Cream, which I previousl posted here.

the verdict:

The shortbread was fairly crumbly when warm, but settled down nicely by the next day. As for the taste, on first bite I thought, "these are interesting, if a bit odd." The next bite was pretty good, and thereafter I found the shortbread curiously addictive. I thought - and my book club tasters agreed - that the cookies were especially delicious paired with the black pepper ice cream. The creamy cool pepperiness of the ice cream mellowed the salty, dry, chocolatey pepperiness of the shortbread. Except for the crumbly nature of the shortbread, the combination would be a delicious ice cream sandwich. As it was, I just balanced a bite of each on the spoon and ate it that way.

Plum Caprese Salad

2011-09-16T23:04:00.000-04:00

My dad was an inveterate reader of newspapers. He subscribed to at least 4 papers at any given time, and he was rarely, if ever, seen without a folded section of newspaper stuck in his back pocket. He took great delight in finding articles of interest to his relatives and friends; in fact, when my siblings and I grew up and left home my parents reserved a desk drawer for each of us, just to hold newspaper clippings. Every time I visited my parents I'd open my drawer to find a stack of newsprint articles with my name scrawled in pen across the top margin.

Some of my favorite recipes are ones that my father unearthed in the newspaper, usually the New York Times. My own newspaper reading is spotty, but I rarely miss perusing the Food section of any paper that's in front of me. A few weeks ago, I was shuffling the sections of the weekend Wall Street Journal, and on the front of the Off Duty section I noticed an article about the many uses of the herb basil. It was written by none other than Dorie Greenspan, and was complete with several appetizing recipes. I immediately pulled out the ingredients for a fanciful Basil, Mozzarella, and Plum Salad. This is, in essence, the old standby, caprese salad, but, in a stroke of genius, Dorie substitutes plums for the traditional tomatoes.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- You can find the article and recipe here.

- The first step in the recipe is to make basil oil, which is not difficult but takes a bit of time to infuse.

- Once the basil oil is steeped, it is used in two ways. It's tossed with salad greens, and it's also stirred into a mixture of plums, mozzarella, torn basil, lime juice, jalapeno pepper, salt and pepper. The salad is assembled by spooning the plum/mozzarella mixture over the greens.

- We had some non-plum eaters around our dinner table the evening I served this salad, so I made theirs a traditional caprese salad with tomatoes instead of the plums.

the verdict:

This salad is both surprisingly beautiful and unusually delicious. It's a wonderful transitional salad - perfect for the end of summer/early autumn, when stone fruit is plentiful, and fresh basil is readily available.

{TWD} Classic Brownies

2011-09-13T21:59:00.003-04:00

One thing I'm glad I did when my two daughters were young was to cook and bake with them. From the time the girls could stand next to me on a stool in the kitchen, they got to measure, pour, and stir ingredients, not to mention licking the spoon and the bowl. I can't say I had them join me in the kitchen from any conscious life plan, but it has played out beautifully. Each of the girls is culinarily confident and more than competent.

My older daughter, ALE, chronicles her domestic adventures on her blog Friends and Hammers - she bakes marvelous bread and I can never get enough of her homemade jams. My younger daughter, JDE, is the one who started me on the Tuesdays With Dorie path more than three years ago, and she is equally talented in preparing savory or sweet dishes. So when she heads into the kitchen, I know we are in for a treat!

Case in point: JDE came into the kitchen on one recent morning and offered to bake something. What luck! I pointed her to this week's TWD assignment, Classic Brownies, and she took it from there.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- These brownies were chosen by Anne, of the blog Anne Strawberry. Her post has the recipe and four different brownie variations, too!

- Dorie's recipe calls for walnuts in the brownies, but these were baked by my daughter, and when the baker doesn't want nuts, the brownies don't get nuts.

- We were planning to make a half batch, but when we saw the relatively modest quantity of ingredients and the 8-inch pan, we opted for a full batch. I'm glad we did; they are not super tall brownies. If you're planning to feed several people, I'd definitely double the recipe.

- As always, the trusty King Arthur Flour Divot Test proved that the brownies were perfectly done.

the verdict:

These brownies are chocolatey and rich. They were not not quite as fudgy as I like, but I'm pretty sure that an overnight stint in the fridge would remedy that. As it turned out, we scarfed down just a few of these, and popped the rest in the freezer. I'm guessing that they will be denser and fudgier after they thaw. While these are not my very favorite brownies (that honor goes to these or these) they were a solid, classic, brownie, sure to please folks on most parts of the brownie-loving spectrum. And the best part? Not only did JDE bake these and share them with me, she left my kitchen spotless after baking!

{TWD} Chocolate Spice Cookies

2011-09-06T22:49:00.002-04:00

Sweets that are quickly made have a solid place in my baking repertory; they are perfect for late-notice guests or to finish a more complicated dinner. One of the virtues of the Swedish Visiting Cake, for example, besides the universally appealing flavor, is that it is simple to throw in the oven. Our family butterscotch brownie recipe is super-fast. It's hard to beat the speed of my stand-by cobbler recipe. I make mental notes of those things that I can put together on a moment's notice, even memorizing the easy recipes. Do you?

Cookies are rarely difficult, but they can take a bit of time to form each one, and to bake in successive cookie sheet-fuls in the oven. So fast recipes for cookies are welcome finds. This week's assignment for the Tuesdays With Dorie baking group is Chocolate Spice Quickies. An intriguing name for a cookie: promising speed and spice in the same recipe.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- This week's hostess is Jessica of the blog My Baking Heart. To find the recipe, click over to her post, and to see how other bakers make these cookies, check here for their links.

- I made 1/2 recipe, and got about 20 cookies. These are petite little things, so they all fit on one baking sheet.

- The recipe gives a choice of cloves or allspice for the spice. I used cloves because I found them first in my spice cabinet.

- Rather than grinding almonds in the food processor, I used almond meal from Bob's Red Mill.

- I'm not sure why Dorie chose the recipe's title: these are no quicker than any other cookie; slower actually, if you count in letting the butter warm to room temperature, melting and cooling the chocolate, and the substantial chilling time before the cookies can be sliced and baked. They weren't difficult or super-time-consuming, but I wouldn't call them quick. In fact, I was baking madeleines at the same time and they were much faster and simpler.

the verdict:

These cookies didn't exactly deliver on either promise of their name: not only were they were no quicker than other cookies but the spice was almost undetectable. No matter, though, because they were addictive little morsels, tender yet chewy, and quite chocolatey. They were a bit like Dorie's World Peace Cookies (also slice and bake and chocolate) but not as sturdy and without the studded pieces of chocolate.

{TWD} Blueberry Cornmeal Loaf-lets

2011-08-30T08:31:00.001-04:00

Many years ago I learned a nifty trick from my sister-in-law for dressing up a plain box of Jiffy Cornbread mix: add blueberries and make muffins. I've served the blueberry/cornmeal muffins at brunches and luncheons, and they are always popular. When this week's Tuesdays With Dorie recipe, Cornmeal Fruit Loaf came along, I knew exactly which fruit I wanted to try.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- We can thank Caitlin of the blog Engineer Baker for choosing this week's breakfast treat; click over to her post to find the recipe.

- Dorie's recipe calls for a mixture of dried and fresh versions of the same fruit. She suggests apples (dried + fresh) or pears (dried + fresh) At the time I baked this recipe, I had fresh + dried blueberries which I was excited to use, but in the future I'd try fresh + dried cherries.

- I made half a recipe. My pan collection has lots of cute little rectangular loaf pans that would have worked for the scaled-down recipe, but what caught my eye were some pretty flower-shaped baking molds that my daughter picked up for me when she traveled to Hong Kong. The batter is put together exactly like muffin batter, so I figured these would be perfect muffin-like loaf-lets. There was just enough batter in the half recipe to fill the four little pans.

- This was a simple recipe, and baked up in 22 minutes or so.

the verdict:

These were a lot like corn muffins with fruit in them. The dried and fresh blueberries combined to produce an intense blueberry sensation with each bite. We thought they were a terrific addition to the summer breakfast repertory. One suggestion: if you tend to like your cornbread sweet, go ahead and put the full measure of sugar in, otherwise you could cut the amount of sugar a bit.

Rich Vanilla Ice Cream a la Chez Panisse

2011-08-27T21:54:00.002-04:00

This weekend the Berkeley, California restaurant Chez Panisse is celebrating the 40th anniversary of when it served its first meal. Far from being any ordinary restaurant, Chez Panisse, under the direction of its founder Alice Waters, was the standard bearer for fresh, local, and organic food, back at a time when those were exotic concepts.

Although I certainly cannot celebrate in person, I'm having a little virtual anniversary celebration right here on my blog, featuring a Vanilla Ice Cream recipe from an old cookbook in my collection, Chez Panisse Desserts. I have the 1985 hardcover edition of the book, but it's available in softcover. I've included the recipe, below.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- The recipe, as I made it, is at the end of this post, below.

- While I won't say I exactly changed the recipe, I made a few minor enhancements to boost the vanilla flavor. First, I used vanilla sugar for part of the sugar in the recipe. Vanilla sugar is about the easiest thing in the world to make: when you scrape the seeds out of vanilla pods, just rinse if necessary, then dry on the counter before popping them into a jar of regular sugar. The pods will infuse the sugar with a lovely flavor of vanilla.

- In addition to the recipe's directions to use vanilla seeds and infuse the custard with the pod, and my addition of vanilla sugar, I also added about 3/4 tsp of vanilla extract before churning. I learned that trick from David Lebovitz. His view is that several types of vanilla, especially extract with its alcohol base, give various experiences of the flavor: "Remarkably, alcohol also changes the way your senses ‘taste’ flavors, so I add a bit of vanilla extract to recipes even if I’ve infused them with vanilla beans."

- Incidentally, Lebovitz has a close connection with Chez Panisse. He worked in the kitchen there for 13 years, beginning as a line cook and ending up as the pastry chef, before leaving in 1999. Lebovitz is attending the 40th anniversary festivities this weekend, and has written a charming post about Chez Panisse.

- I also added a tiny pinch of salt.

the verdict:

This was the creamiest, most intensely vanilla-ish vanilla ice cream I've ever made. It had great texture and flavor, and held up well in the freezer.

the recipe:

Chez Panisse Vanilla Ice Cream
adapted from Chez Panisse Desserts by Lindsey Remolif Shere
makes: 1 quart

1 vanilla bean
1 cup half and half ( I actually used 1/2 cup cream and 1/2 cup milk since I was out of half and half)
2 cups whipping cream
2/3 cup sugar
pinch of salt
6 egg yolks (I used about 105 grams of yolk)
3/4 tsp vanilla extract

1. Split the vanilla bean and scrape the seeds into the sugar, rubbing the mixture between your fingers until the sugar is fragrant.

2. Add the vanilla, sugar, vanilla pod, half and half, or milk and all the cream to a sauce pan. Warm the mixture, stirring, until the sugar dissolves.

3. Whisk the egg yolks in a separate bowl until just mixed. Gradually pour the hot mixture into the egg yolks in a steady stream, whisking constantly.

4. Pour all back into the sauce pan and heat over medium-low heat, stirring, until the mixture thickens slightly into a custard and coats the back of the spoon.

5. Strain the custard into a storage container, add back the pod to the custard, and chill in the fridge until cold.

6. Add the vanilla extract, remove the vanilla pod, and freeze in an ice cream maker.

{TWD} Golden Brioche Raisin Bread

2011-08-23T23:38:00.000-04:00

I ordered this cool cutting board here after hearing about it from Jaden of Steamy Kitchen

This week's recipe for the Tuesdays With Dorie baking group - the Golden Brioche Loaves - comes as a little bit of deja vu for those bakers who were part of the group's early history. Dorie Greenspan uses the same dough for this week's loaves as she uses as the base recipe for her Brioche Raisin Snails and her Pecan Honey Sticky Buns. Both of those treats were chosen in the first few months of TWD, so any bakers who were with the group from close to the beginning will have seen this dough previously.

I joined TWD after the sticky buns and raisin snails so I had not previously made Dorie's brioche formula, but I am not a total brioche newcomer. In bread bakers' terms, brioche is an "enriched dough" because it is, well, enriched - by a combination of eggs and butter. Brioche can be extremely rich, or it can be "lean" (which is still pretty rich) and used for en croute and other applications. I've baked a medium-rich brioche for the Bread Baker's Apprentice Challenge (you can read about that bread in this post on my bread blog) and I made a lean brioche dough of Dorie's when I made the brioche berry tart.

I decided to kill three birds with one stone this week. I froze two thirds of the dough so that I can use it for those Dorie Greenspan recipes that I missed, the Brioche Raisin Snails, and Honey Sticky Buns. Stay tuned for eventual posts on those breakfast goodies.

With the remaining third of dough, I decided to make another breakfast classic: raisin bread. Seriously, how delicious does brioche raisin toast sound?

n.o.e.'s notes:

- Margaret of Tea and Scones is the hostess for this week's brioche, and you can find the recipe on her post.

- Instead of active dry yeast, I used instant yeast, which doesn't need to be activated. Rather, it is added with the dry ingredients.

- I cut the quantity of sugar in half.

- I don't use a mixer for making bread, but I often use my food processor. One huge advantage to using the food processor for breadmaking is that you can start with cold ingredients; there is no need to warm them. The motor on the food processor can get hot, and it definitely warms up the bread ingredients as it mixes them. In many people's eyes, one huge disadvantage to using the food processor for bread dough is cleaning out the food processor once the dough is mixed!

Here's how I mixed the dough in my food processor: put the flour, salt, instant yeast and sugar in the bowl of the food processor and process enough to mix the dry ingredients. Slowly add the water, milk, eggs and process until the dough comes together. Add the butter and process until the dough passes the windowpane test. Then it is ready to transfer to the rising bucket.

- The brioche dough is very very soft, almost batter-like. Mine took a very long time to double.

- Once the dough has doubled, it rests in the fridge. After time in the fridge, the dough becomes quite stiff. that's when you form it into logs and lay them in the loaf pan to warm up, rise and then bake.

- To make the plain brioche into raisin brioche, I kneaded in some raisins, then divided the dough into four pieces. I flattened each piece, sprinkled it with cinnamon, and rolled it into a little log that lay crosswise in the loaf pan.

- I was way too lazy to break an egg to make egg wash for this little loaf, so I brushed the surface with some milk before popping it into the oven.

- My bread was baking swimmingly until I went to check it for doneness. One edge had stuck to the pan and when I loosened it with a spatula, I ended up deflating one side of the loaf. Which is why it looks so lopsided in the picture. Luckily, it was still fluffy and light inside.

the verdict:

Luckily the lopsided shape didn't matter once the bread was sliced up. The golden brioche made for a beautifully refined raisin toast. As if there wasn't enough butter in the dough (there was), the toast was fabulous warm with butter melting into the cinnamony raisiny tender crumb.

Tart Lemon Bars

2011-08-20T18:35:00.001-04:00

Lemon bars are the Little Black Dress of the dessert world. They are season-less, elegant, and always in good taste. Nearly everyone likes lemon bars, making them a logical choice for a group, and they are fairly easy to transport, making them appropriate for nearly every occasion.

I've eaten many a lemon bar, and baked several different recipes (and a box mix or two, shhh!) in my day, and I was eager to try this recipe for Tart Lemon Bars from Alice Medrich's book Pure Dessert. Medrich's recipes are always impeccable, a perfect trait in a lemon bar!

n.o.e.'s notes:

- You can find the recipe here.

- The recipe can be made with lemons or limes. Medrich notes that in the case of using Meyer lemons, which are milder in flavor than regular lemons, you should cut sugar nearly in half.

- I made this recipe several months ago when I had Meyer lemons on hand, so I decided to try that variation. I like that it has less added sugar.

- As they bake the bars can get a foamy film on the top, but no worries, the powdered sugar will cover it.

the verdict:

These lemon bars are amazing. They have a wonderful lemon flavor on a buttery crust. This will be my go-to lemon bar recipe from now on, and I am eager to try the lime version next!

{TWD} not-so-Tropical not-so-Crumble

2011-08-16T13:27:00.000-04:00

This week's recipe for the Tuesdays With Dorie baking group is called Tropical Crumble. The recipe's creator, the inimitable Dorie Greenspan, says, "think of this in the dead of winter, when a taste of the tropics can be as warming as a cashmere throw." For Gaye of Laws of the Kitchen who chose this crumble, this was indeed a taste of the tropics during the wintertime - she's in Australia where the seasons are the opposite of what I'm experiencing here in the US.

As for me, I don't have a huge incentive to experience the tropics at the moment; our temperatures have been sky-high for weeks, with humidity to match. Through the wonders of global trade I can definitely buy mangoes and bananas here year-round, but I turned instead to the plenitude of summer fruit that was filling my fridge and freezer. I had some ripce local peaches from my farm box, and a few weeks back when I was overrun with blackberries I'd tossed them in the freezer for future baking projects. Peaches and blackberries sounded like a winning seasonal combination to me.

While the "not so tropical" part was intentional, in the course of baking this recipe I had an unintended crumble fail. In the end, my dessert didn't bear a very close resemblance to the way I imagine this recipe was supposed to turn out.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- You can find the recipe on Gaye's post.

- As I was preparing to bake the crumble, my 1st question was how much fruit to use, seeing as I was using completely different fruit. So I put the issue out on twitter: "I need to figure out how many cups of fruit is the equivalent to two mangoes and four bananas. any guesses?" In a matter of minutes, I had a response. From none other than Nancie McDermott, who wrote the book on pies - literally - so if anyone knows her fruit, it's Nancie! And although she is a fellow Southerner (living in North Carolina), the cool thing is that she was traveling in Taiwan when she replied to my question! Her reply: "3 cups." Great! I had a plan.

- I had a fair amount of ripe peaches to use, and by the time it was all said and done, I probably used close to 4 cups of peaches and blackberries. Trying to approximate Dorie's instructions, first I cooked the peaches about 5 minutes on high and added the frozen blackberries for 2 additional minutes. I added a pinch of salt to Dorie's filling ingredients, and rather than a fresh lime, I used about 1/4 teaspoon of lime zest from my freezer. I refrigerated the cooked fruit mixture overnight.

- The topping recipe calls for 8 T butter to 1/2c brown sugar to 3T flour to 1/2c nuts. I didn't stop to think about that proportion, just measured and combined the ingredients and popped it into the freezer overnight. Looking back at it, that's a lot of butter for a relatively small amount of dry ingredients.

- The following day, I brought the fruit to room temperature, sprinkled on the frozen crumble topping and put it in the oven to bake.

- I'm pretty sure I measured my ingredients correctly. But as the dish was baking, the topping never became crumbly; in fact, it never became topping. It was just big pool of melted butter with some clumps of sugar and pecans discernible among the fruit.

the verdict:

When I went to serve the "crumble" I spooned off as much of the pooled butter as I could, then put it in a bowl with some vanilla ice cream. My husband loved "the compote" and I agreed that it had good flavor. The lime and ginger paired beautifully with the peaches and blackberries, and the crunch from the pecans was lovely. Although it was a crumble #fail, it was at least a tasty flop!

Sometime I'd like to try this recipe as Dorie wrote it, with the bananas and mangoes, but before I did, I'd have to check the proportions of butter to dry ingredients so that it would be a true crumble rather than a buttery mess. I will be interested to see how this recipe worked for everyone else who baked this week.