{TWD} Floating Desert Islands

I've just got to say right at the outset : this has got to be the oddest dessert I've ever made. In the intro to the recipe, Dorie says that this classic French dish is the one dessert that "remains a mainstay in the make-at-home repertoire, in some part because it is so easy and in some part because it's a naturally showy dessert."

Well.

Not only does it look odd (really, don't you think a lump of meringue in a puddle of creamy stuff appears a bit unusual? or am I just being provincial?) but this two page recipe isn't what I'd term "easy." Easy is stirring together an ingredient or two and popping it in the oven. This recipe, on the other hand, has a meringue element and a custard element, and if you're being traditional, a caramel element. Each of these contain a few potential pitfalls for a home baker like me. But assuming you are French or can otherwise effortlessly breeze through these components without mishap, there's always the mountain of bowls and pans this recipe produces...

So the whole time I was cooking this, I thought of people in their kitchens in France, blithely manicuring and poaching meringues and coating spoon backs with perfectly tempered custard.


n.o.e.'s notes:

I made half recipe for my husband and me - it stretched for two desserts for two of us, mostly because I had tasted so much of it during preparation that I didn't need a very big serving. After reading the Floating Islands P&Q, I decided to follow steph (whisk/spoon)'s lead by making and poaching the meringues first and then use the leftover poaching milk to make the creme anglaise.

whipping:

Some people can whip up a meringue like it's a walk in the park, but not me. For me whipping egg whites is a Big Deal, especially when the meringue is going to be formed into an island that then must poach in simmering milk.

To successfully whip egg whites, the mixing bowl and implements must be spotlessly clean. The day I made this recipe I was more scrupulous about cleanliness than I've been since I brought my firstborn home from the hospital, and even then I realized that a little dirt was probably good for her. But not with egg whites. Even a speck of wayward grease or foreign matter is liable to lead to certain meringue demise.

The next hurdle is to beat the whites long enough that they are fluffy and full of air, but not so long that they become dry, which is a sign of over-mixing and spells bad news for meringues. I was so worried about this that I may have under-beat my whites just a bit.

shaping:

Forming the islands is where the rubber hits the road. According to Dorie, there are two options: the rough volcanic island and the manicured oval island. I'll leave it to you to guess the classification of my islands.

When I think of "manicured" real estate I think of precisely-maintained lawns or shrubs. I think of golf courses. Turns out I'm not so much the manicured type. Here's my front yard:


And the ornamental shrub by my front door:

...and this is what it looked like after a trim.

With this track record, I wasn't about to try for manicured meringue islands. No matter what I used to scoop the meringue, that implement became the meringue's best buddy, and the two had to be forcibly separated. There was absolutely no way that the meringue was going to go back and forth between two spoons. I ended up using an old-school oval ice cream scoop (not a disher) and pried the meringue out and into the hot milk.

poaching:

I poached my islands for about 2-3 minutes per side.

At this stage, dessert did not look promising - the bottom of the milk kept trying to scorch and the top kept skinning over. I was busy skimming milk skin and peeling it off of the meringues. Meanwhile the poaching liquid was fast disappearing (even though I added extra). After straining the poaching milk, I had just under half of what I needed for making the creme anglaise.

Dorie says to lay out a clean towel next to the stove, but then never reveals the purpose of the towel. I figured I'd park my poached islands there after they cooked. What's better than a nice clean towel after a dip in a warm milk bath?

creme anglaise

I wonder if the French ever have to make their creme anglaise twice because the first time it scrambled? Hmm? Well, I did. Dorie says the eggs may take 10 minutes to cook. I was pulling up a stool to the counter to get comfy while I stirred, when my custard reached the proper consistency - after about 2 minutes, or even less. I was so surprised that I just stood and looked for a second, and in that time the eggs scrambled ever so slightly. It absolutely would not strain through the fine mesh strainer.

Luckily I was making a half batch, so I only wasted 3 egg yolks on the first attempt. (And the custard still tastes great, but just has a crazy texture.)

creme anglaise, take 2:

I had used up all of my large-graded eggs, so I turned to the eggs from the farm box. These are ungraded and tend to be smaller than large eggs from the store. I think this worked in my favor, to slow the thickening process, as the proportion of egg to milk was smaller. It still went pretty quickly - maybe 6 minutes, and I got it into the strainer not a minute too soon. In fact, the custard in the bottom of the pan was just starting to scramble. My creme stayed pretty much in liquid form even after it cooled.

topping:

There was absolutely no way I was going to tackle the (thankfully) optional homemade caramel for this recipe. Meringue and custard were enough for one afternoon, without having to deal with molten sugar also. So it was bare desert islands for us.

I drizzled one serving of the islands with some cranberry syrup that I made by simmering some cranberry liquid that I'd reserved from another recipe. I knew that we would prefer the flavor of the unadorned vanilla version, but couldn't resist making one in Valentine colors.

the verdict:

I had sampled the various components as I cooked them. The meringue was good - light and not too sweet. The custard was also good - rich but not decadently so. But this was not enough to write home about. I could only hope that when tasted together the meringue and the custard would combine for a total experience beyond the sum of the individual parts. And they did. This is a delicate yet delicious dessert.

My husband loved it, giving it a rating of 9 out of 10. I liked it too, and will freely admit to licking the empty creme anglaise bowl before sticking it in the dishwasher. I told my husband that I wouldn't be making it again, unless he were to specifically request the island dessert. Just too odd. And time consuming.

I have no doubt that many of my fellow bakers found this one to be easy, and produced precisely manicured islands swimming in a perfect anglaise sea, topped with gossamer caramel strands. You can find out by visiting the TWD blogroll and clicking on each baker's blog. You can find the recipe on page 401-402 of Dorie's book Baking From My Home to Yours, or on Shari's post.

{Adventures in Yeast} #3 - KA Blitz Bread

In my recent quest to bake with yeast, I've been buoyed up by my experience with King Arthur's English Muffin bread, which I've made at least a dozen times. All of my loaves have risen nicely - except the batch where I actually forgot to add the yeast. Yeah.

I've been having a great time reading bread books and yeast recipes. It's a very deep rabbit hole indeed! I'm trying to start with baby steps (the Stollen was a pretty big - and not totally successful - stride).

For my third yeast experiment, I went with another King Arthur bread variety - no knead, start to finish in under 2 hours! It's a focaccia-mimic and it is as tasty as it is easy. King Arthur calls it "Blitz Bread" (recipe here, blog post with step-by-step photos here). The nice thing about this recipe is that you can season it to suit your mood, or your menu.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- As advertised, this is bread comes together very easily.

- I did not use (do not own) the optional pizza dough flavor or the optional cheese powder.

- I wanted to get a good first taste of the base bread, so I sprinkled a few basic herbs very sparingly. I was not particularly sparing with the olive oil, which pretty much coats the dough as the bread cooks.

the verdict:

This bread was fragrant and tasty. We ate it warm from the oven as an accompaniment to dinner. The best part was the olive oil- soaked bottom crust.

Herb Salt Roasted Potatoes

Last week I found a bag of fingerling potatoes in my cupboard that just begged to be cooked in a really special way. These potatoes were a mix of colors: white, red and purple (and the purple ones were purple all the way through!) Roasting them seemed the way to go, and I looked to Tyler Florence for help preparing these little babies.

Tyler Florence's recipe for herb salt roasted potatoes gave a slightly different riff on the usual olive oil/rosemary roast potatoes that I make.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- I had all the ingredients on hand - boy do I love it when I don't have to make a special grocery run.

- I used fingerling potatoes. I cut some of them so that the pieces would all be roughly equivalent in size. That way they'd cook evenly.

- Tyler's technique of making a herb salt worked great. I used 1/2 T sage for 1/2 T of the rosemary. My husband seems to developing a 'thing' about rosemary, so I'm trying to camouflage it. Besides, isn't every savory dish improved by adding sage? (hmm, or bacon?)

the verdict:

These are very good roast potatoes. I'll be using this recipe as my stand-by from now on, improvising if necessary to reflect the herbs I have on hand.

I'm submitting this recipe to Tyler Florence Fridays. The cooks in this group prepare a mouthwatering variety of Tyler's recipes each week, so click on over to this week's roundup to see what everyone's cooked up this time!

Country Captain

There is a chicken thigh under all that wonderful sauce and garnish!

Over breakfast on Sunday, my husband reads the newspaper. Last week he paused in his perusal of the Times Magazine to share with me the featured recipe for Country Captain, a chicken dish. (The whole article accompanying the recipe is well written and well worth a read.) "Why don't we make this tonight?" Jim asked. And so we did.

I have heard of Country Captain, and frequently paged past recipes for the dish in many of my (regional) cookbooks. But it took the New York Times to make me pay attention to this quintessential Southern dish.

Cooking this recipe on a Sunday afternoon was a return to a practice we'd let fall by the wayside. About 15 years ago, my husband and I had a habit of cooking Sunday dinners together. Those afternoons of chopping and sauteing, along with weekly breakfasts at our local coffee shop, were valuable opportunities to stay in touch with each other amid the whirl of carpool, scouting, dance classes, work, and the million other distractions of a busy household. As a bonus, we developed a small but mighty arsenal of delicious recipes (with the Times frequently playing a contributing role).

Last week I realized anew what a wonderful job Jim does of chopping vegetables (and he remembered how relaxing he finds that to be). The recipe, while not a difficult one, takes some time to prepare. Working together didn't cut the prep time in half, really, but it more than doubled the fun of cooking. One of the perks of cooking with this man is that he cleans as he goes (whereas I, ahem, do not) and we end up with a cooked dinner and a clean kitchen to boot!

Check out those beautifully chopped veggies!

n.o.e.'s notes:

- I used around 3.5 lb chicken thighs with bone in and skin on, although I couldn't help myself from trimming some overhanging skin/fat from the thighs.

- When I ran out of dried thyme (seriously, how does one even do that?) I rounded out the teaspoon with Italian seasoning.

- Instead of cooking the bacon and then crumbling it, we cut 4 slices of bacon (Benton's) into lardons before cooking it to crispness. We poured off half the bacon grease (although the recipe contemplates using it all) before adding the vegetables.

- We used curry paste (Patak's hot curry paste which I have ordered online if I can't find it in the store) instead of curry powder. I love this stuff!

- The medium onion weighed around 200 grams (for future reference).

- We used diced san marzano tomatoes (rather than the chopped tomatoes the recipe specifies).

The chicken, just out of the oven and ready to be scarfed, er, served

the verdict

In the words of my husband:

"This recipe caught my eye in NYT mag over bagel and coffee this a.m. because it listed diced onions, celery and bell peppers - the Holy Trinity where I come from (land of Galatoires) - and minced garlic - the Pope. Also chicken thighs and bacon (which for us means only one thing, Benton's from Tennessee). Served over rice. First taste: The name 'Country Captain' is a shameful travesty. Instant field commission to 'InterGalactic Field Marshal'."

From what I can tell, this is probably my husband's new favorite chicken recipe. As for me: I'd put it on the top rung, at least. It's really delicious. The rice really worked to complement the flavors in this dish. The currants, bacon, and almonds were great additions, although we didn't need all of the bacon. Benton's is a very intense smoky bacon, and we only needed to sprinkle on a little bit or we'd have run the risk of the bacon overpowering the chicken and sauce. In the future, 3 slices would be fine.

{TWD} Let there be Peace on Earth ...and let it begin with cookies!

We sang two songs at my eighth grade graduation: "Let There Be Peace On Earth" (and let it begin with me) and "I Believe" (for every drop of rain that falls, a flower grows...) From that day I've always had a soft spot in my heart for both, but I must say that my husband does not. As a plebe at the Naval Academy, each time he started a sentence with the words "I believe," an upperclass midshipman would make him sing the song! Come to think of it I wonder if we may have been singing the song at the exact same time, since he was a plebe the same year I was in eighth grade.

I have to say that when I saw the recipe for World Peace Cookies was the chosen TWD recipe for this week, I was thrilled. Not the "Oh, boy I've been waiting to bake these and now they've been chosen" thrilled, but the "Oh, my, I'm busier than I've been in a long while, and I've already baked these, and I already have a draft post in the works" thrilled! And when I say "I've already baked these," I mean that these cookies have been baked in my kitchen - several times - mostly by my daughters, but that I had the presence of mind to photograph them with my camera. In fact, it was daughter J.D.E. who found the recipe for us; you can see her cooking World Peace cookies in the picture over there in the right sidebar.

There's a reason that we've baked these so many times, and once you try this recipe (which you can find on page 138-139 of Dorie's book Baking From My Home to Yours. or on Jessica of cookbookhabit's blog post) you too will no doubt add these cookies to your repeat list.

cook's notes:

This will likely go on record as my shortest TWD post. We've followed the recipe precisely to the letter each time. One time the cookies spread, and I think it's because the girls were horsing around while they were slicing cookies from the logs and putting them on the cookie sheets, and the cookies sat around for a few extra minutes and got a bit warm. If you have similar goings-on in your kitchen, I'd recommend that you re-chill the cut cookies before baking them. They really are nifty when they retain that fat sliced-slab-of-cookie shape.

the verdict:

These are the best chocolate cookie I've ever eaten (much less baked). I usually like my cookies soft and chewy, but these are more sandy in texture. But still chewy! The salt is a great addition to the recipe. Luckily they are easy to whip up, and you could even keep a log of cookie dough in the freezer for later baking.

We've brought these cookies to several parties and gatherings, and they have always been a huge hit with everyone. One group calls them "the salty cookies" and another calls them "those peace cookies." No matter which other cookies I show up with now, I know that secretly (or not-so-secretly) people really are wishing I'd brought World Peace cookies.

And now that I'm writing this post and looking at my pictures of World Peace Cookies, I'm really wishing I had one to eat right about now. That would be the beginning of Peace. Right here with Me.

I Believe...

January m.o.m. - Clementine Oat Muffins

One of the things I gave my mother for Christmas was "muffin of the month" (m.o.m.) - a dozen muffins delivered to her each month. December's muffin flavor was gingerbread. In January, clementine recipes jumped out at me from every side, and with one of those boxes of clementines languishing in my fridge, I knew clementine muffins would be just the thing. Dan Lepard has a recipe for Clementine Oat Muffins that sounded perfect.

n.o.e. notes:

- The recipe calls for caster sugar, which is a superfine sugar. I had no superfine sugar and was low on caster sugar, so I used approximately 1/3 each of the following: caster sugar, golden bakers sugar (a superfine golden sugar that was in my baking drawer) and made up the difference with regular granulated sugar whirled in mini food processor.

- I baked 1 1/2 recipe, which yielded 12 large-ish muffins in my silicone muffin tins.

- When measuring the AP flour, I added a generous spoonful of oat flour. The recipe also calls for oats.

- I ended up with plenty of juice from the clementines, and added some additional clementine pulp.

- When measuring out the oil, I first put about 1/3 nonfat Greek yogurt in bottom of the measuring cup, then filled the rest with canola oil (I didn't have sunflower oil).

- These muffins straddle the muffin/cupcake line. Dan's muffins have a luscious-sounding clementine glaze on top. I wanted mine more muffin-y so I skipped the glaze.


the verdict

Warm from the oven, the muffins tasted tender and sweet and very much contain the essence of clementine. They have a solid citrus scent but true to the sweet nature of clementines, the taste did not have the tang of other citrus baked goods. The muffins dried just a bit with time, though, so I'd recommend keeping an eye on them and covering them right after they are cool.

These muffins are a great choice for using clementines, especially where you might want a refined, rather than rustic, muffin. With the glaze they'd be a special tea-time treat. I'd definitely make these again.

Tyler's Slow Cooked Collard Greens

I've got a confession to make: I was an extremely picky eater as a child. On many evenings you could find me sitting at the dinner table long after everyone else had left, staring at a plate. A few cold, forlorn vegetables looked right back up at me. Eventually I'd choke down a couple of bites and be excused. Mostly this drama played out with green beans, but spinach also took its turn on the dinner plate. Luckily my mother never served brussels sprouts, or I might still be sitting there!

Well, children are resilient, thank goodness, and I've grown up to be an average eater. And my erstwhile arch-nemesis, green beans, are now among my favorite vegetables. I grew to like spinach in salads, then quiches and more. But I've been content to let the wider waters of "greens" remain pretty much unexplored, with only a little toe dip now and then.

On a trip to London in 2006 I discovered how much I (and apparently most of Great Britain's restaurants) love arugula ("rocket" over there). I had it in salads and on pasta and couldn't get enough of its peppery bite. It's become my favorite salad green. As far as cooked greens, I made a tasty crock pot chard lasagna last winter that I found delicious.

However, when it came to that most Southern of leafy greens, collards, this picky-eater Northerner remained totally unswayed. I could never bring myself to even try those olive green, slimy (looking) limp leaves that inevitably were seen in a cafeteria line, or at a meat+3 restaurant, swimming in a pool of 'pot likker.' So when my Southern-born husband wanted a taste of collards he has had to order them at a restaurant or heat up a can.

But I must say that food blogging has really opened me up to experimenting with tastes and new recipe sources. As I began to get more serious about cooking this past year, I signed up for a membership in Moore's Farm, which grows and/or sources regional produce, takes orders, and delivers the food to several locations in the Atlanta area, including a church in my neighborhood.

I ordered and prepared komatsuna, mustardy salad greens, and kale. And loved them. And my resistance weakened. I decided to order collards and cook them for my husband. Which brings me - finally - to the subject of this post!

The fresh collards on one of their three soaks in the sink

When the vegetable order came in I wondered if Tyler Florence had a good recipe for collards, because if he did I might, just might, even taste some. Sure enough, a quick search brought up Tyler's Slow Cooked Collard Greens, complete with nearly unanimous favorable reviews. Done!

n.o.e.'s notes:

- I made half a recipe, using 1 lb collards, 1 quart chicken stock, etc.

- Instead of a ham hock I used 1 1/2 slices of Benton bacon (cut into lardons, of course!). The first thing I did was to cook up the lardons. Then I added the onion and bay leaf to the bacon and continued to cook per the recipe instructions (I did not add any olive oil).

the verdict:

These were the first collard greens I've ever brought myself to taste, and they were quite tasty. And they were not slimy at all! They were tender but still a little crunchy. And the hint of smoky bacon - yum.

My husband was in heaven - he loved the greens. For his first serving, he ate them with only salt and pepper for additional seasoning. On the second plateful, he broke out the hot pepper sauce. For some reason, we haven't been able to find Bruce's at the grocery stores, so he made do with Texas Pete's (which comes from, guess where? Winston-Salem, North Carolina!) He actually preferred the greens without the pepper sauce, which has to be an all time first!

In honor of the occasion, my husband requested to post the following guest verdict:

Reflections upon first taste of Tyler Florence “Slow Cooked Collard Greens” - by Jim E.

"I am transfixed into thankfulness; Deepest appreciation to the following:
-Ben Franklin for electricity
-Robert Noyce for the microprocessor
-Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs for the Mac
-Vint Cerf for internet protocol
-Sir Tim Berners-Lee, CERN, Al Gore for the WWW
-Marc Andreesen for the browser
-J.D.E. for food blog awareness / enlightenment
-Tyler Florence for his genius
-Bentons for their Lardons
-Nancy for her culinary talent – anybody from the North who can do collards like these is truly omnipotent (but we knew that already)."

I'm submitting this to Tyler Florence Fridays. If you haven't checked out all the good food that the TFF bloggers cook up from Tyler's recipes, hop on over to the roundup each Friday and see!

{Simple Soup Supper} Union Square Black Bean Soup, two ways

Black bean soup is one of the signature dishes at the Union Square Cafe in New York. When I ate there a year ago, I ordered this soup. It was extraordinarily good. Imagine my joy when I discovered an online recipe for the soup! [edit to add the link for the soup recipe] And even greater joy when I was given a copy of the Union Square Cafe Cookbook.

So the week before last, with temperatures dipping into the single digits (yes, here in Georgia), I decided it was the perfect time to make this soup.

n.o.e. notes

- I was very tempted to brown the veggies and bacon for a bit, but the recipe says to throw it all in a pot with water and the black beans, then pop it in the oven for, oh, 4 hours or so. That's what I did.

- The recipe calls for a 3-quart pot. After reading the recipe, I was dubious about the size, but figured surely the cookbook knows how much it makes. I used my 3-quart le Creuset-wanna-be Lodge pot and sure enough there was no way 2 quarts of water were going to fit in that baby with all the other ingredients. 6 cups were the limit. I ended up adding a little bit more as the soup cooked down. Luckily, the soup didn't seem to need the full 8 cups.

- I used Benton's bacon (of course!) While the soup cooked, the smoky aroma of the bacon just filled the house.

- I loved the technique of baking this soup. It totally eliminates any question of soup sticking to the bottom of the pot. Just pop it in the oven and forget about it. I imagine this recipe could be made in a slow cooker.

- After the soup comes out of the oven the directive is to "puree the beans with their cooking liquid." What about the veggies? and the bacon??? do they get to come along for for a whirl in the blender? Pureeing boiled bacon sounded kind of weird to me. I shot off a quick email to the restaurant asking them about that pureeing step. And whether I should have sauteed the veggies and bacon in the beginning. And the restaurant actually emailed me back!!! How cool is that??? And here's the scoop: the recipe does mean for us to just throw everything into the pot in an uncooked condition, but in the actual restaurant the chefs "show a little love" by sauteeing everything first (well, not the black beans.) And yes, according to the chef, we are supposed to blend everything together at the end.

- I used my new immersion blender that Santa brought me for Christmas. Boy is that thing effective! As it turns out, after 4 hours in the oven, the bacon is so softened that it blends just as well as everything else.


- My husband Jim was there (with a spoon) when I took the pot out of the oven and he fell out over* the taste. He didn't want me to puree it, and suggested that we leave some unblended and compare it to the blended. A taste test! I'm all in.

the verdict:

This is a very nice black bean soup. The smokiness of the Benton's comes through as well as the flavors of all the veggies, complemented by the shot of sherry that gets added to the bowl at serving time. I served this with a salad and the Mesa Grill corn muffins. Ha, recipes from two NYC restaurants!

We both tasted the soup both ways - pureed and un-pureed. My husband preferred his un-pureed, saying, "the mastication process infuses the taste into my olfactory facilities," which in turn made it taste better. I kinda agree with him about the taste thing, but if I'm going to have black bean soup I just want it pureed. Easy as that.


* "fell out over" in common parlance means to disagree about something. My very Southern mother-in-law, however, always uses the phrase to mean "liked something very much."

{TWD} Chocolate Gingerbread, and a Gingerbread Taste Test

Adventures of a gingerbread purist, part 2

Being the gingerbread snob that I am, I was dubious about the concept of chocolate + gingerbread. I'm not one of those people who think that a handful of chocolate chips or a drizzle of chocolate improves everything. And I really don't want anyone messing with my gingerbread (or pumpkin pie, either. Remember that Thanksgiving Twofer Pie? That was just wrong.)

But this week's TWD selection was Fresh Ginger and Chocolate Gingerbread, so I put on my best game face and set out to bake it. I figured I'd serve it to my book group and get rid of it get some opinions that were a bit more objective than mine (although I must say the book group is pretty fond of my usual gingerbread.) I made this back at the beginning of January.

n.o.e notes:

- I made a full recipe, so everyone will be relieved to know that no math is involved this week! Although I must say that I wish I'd made half a recipe.

- used 8 T butter + 3 T nonfat Greek yogurt

- For flour, I combined white flour with a white/wheat flour blend

- I used dark brown sugar

- I forgot to look for/buy stem ginger so I just left it out

- I added pinch of salt and would have added pinch of black pepper but in the end I forgot.

- I liked the technique of mixing the fresh ginger with sugar, which produced a lovely ginger-y syrup.

- Since I was using a dark silicone pan set on a dark cookie sheet, I reduced oven temp to 330. The inside was still very jiggly at 38 minutes, so I increased the oven temp to 340. It baked for around 10 min more.

- For the frosting, I didn't want to brew any coffee, so I used 1/4 tsp instant espresso + 1 T water


The cake took a lot longer to make than I anticipated, so I had to rush at the end. I brought it straight to book club (We were late) just after spreading the frosting. We served it before the frosting had fully set up, and it was harder to cut (neatly). By the next day, the frosting had hardened and the cake itself cut much smoother and neater (top picture).

the verdict:

The cake was beautiful, dense and moist. It held up beautifully on the counter, covered, for days.

But I found it totally disappointing in the flavor department. I love chocolate and I love gingerbread. I. do. not. love. chocolate gingerbread. at. all. But we sort of guessed that would happen, right? Let's move on to my testers, the wonderful members of the book club (and some children of the host couple).

A couple of people loved it completely

A couple people loved the cake part but thought the frosting detracted

A couple people thought "eh, not worth seconds"

and

1 person thought it was really intense and thought the ingredients conflicted with each other. He
suggested using semisweet instead of bittersweet chocolate - something less assertive that might complement the ginger rather than fight with it.

I gave away most of the cake to those who liked it, but kept a bit of it to photograph (let's ignore how skewed that sounds - keeping cake I don't like because I had to take pictures of it - shall we?) Over the next few days I'd periodically cut a bite for myself, thinking, "it looks so good and smells pretty yummy, maybe I'll like it this time." Although it kept promising, it never delivered. Great texture, fabulously moist, quite aromatic. At first it seems that these flavors will pop out, but then it ends up strangely bland. Like they've had a battle and canceled each other out. What was left was a moist chocolate cake with a bit of spice. (I did love the frosting however)

And although I could detect the ginger under all the chocolate, good gingerbread is all about the perfect balance of spices and not just the ginger.

Speaking of balance and canceling each other out, here's the opinion of the family that I left most of the cake with: they really loved it the second day, after it spent the night in their fridge. They said that the cold toned down the chocolate and let the gingerbread flavors come through. However, one of their sons did say, "I like gingerbread better without the chocolate." I'm with him!!

taste test:

I actually brought gingerbread blondies to book club in addition to the chocolate gingerbread. So the next day I poured myself a cup of Earl Gray and ran a personal taste test of gingerbread-y goodies. The contestants and my impressions:

A) Dorie's chocolate gingerbread: no matter how hard I try, I just can't find the gingerbread flavor under the chocolate

B) Martha's gingerbread blondies, which I made without white chocolate and with extra ginger: these were soft and chewy with a mild flavor. They are fairly sturdy and easy to transport.

C) my favorite gingerbread (I had a bit left from Christmas baking): this really is the gold standard. Even 10 days old it beat the ginger off either of the others. It's not as deep and dark as Trader Joe's, nor as ginger-y as Dorie's, but it hits the right combination of spices. The streusel topping takes it to the next level.

D) Trader Joe's gingerbread mix (wasn't actually part of the taste test because I made it a few days later): it was dark and dense but was missing a strong gingerbread-y presence. But it's very easy to bake, since it's a mix and all. I'd take it over the chocolate gingerbread, and probably over the blondies.

A Gingerbread Snob Branches Out: Martha's Gingerbread Blondies and Trader Joe's Gingerbread Mix

Above: Trader Joe's Gingerbread mix baked in a pig-shaped pan!

Or: Adventures of a gingerbread purist, part 1

I've become spoiled by very good gingerbread. You could call me narrow-minded, but I prefer to think of myself as a purist. To me the best gingerbread is moist, highly spiced, and rich with molasses flavor. My usual recipe is as close to ideal as I'm ever likely to come. And this matters to me because I really, really love gingerbread.

Every now and then, however, given the plethora of recipes out there (and those assigned to me!) I'm led to try another gingerbread. This winter has brought a bounty crop of gingerbread-y recipes to my attention. While not trying a new recipe for a classic gingerbread, I did succumbed to the siren call of Martha Stewart's White Chocolate Gingerbread Blondies. I also baked up a box of Trader Joe's Gingerbread mix, which came highly recommended.

Martha's White Chocolate Double Ginger Blondies

Martha's Gingerbread Blondies in a low light photo.

n.o.e. notes:

- I stayed pretty true to Martha's recipe with one major exception. The white chocolate. I just don't like the stuff, and I suspected it would make the blondies too sweet for me (blondies really border on excessive sweetness to begin with, imo. So I omitted the white chocolate and substituted a handful of chopped crystallized ginger instead.

- The recipe is supposed to be made on a huge baking pan. I wanted to bake just enough to check out the flavor and to bring to my book group to taste test alongside Dorie's chocolate gingerbread (which will be posted on Tuesday). I made 1/3 recipe, which fit perfectly in a toaster oven tray (an 8x8 baking dish is also 1/3 of the 11x17 rimmed baking sheet Martha specifies.)

- I thought that the recipe called for relatively little ginger

- I combined white flour with a white/wheat flour blend

- I used dark brown sugar + light brown - more dark than light

- I'm pretty sure I substituted some plain nonfat Greek yogurt for some of the butter, but I can't find that in my notes.

the verdict:

The blondies turned out soft and chewy and not overly sweet - I'm really glad I didn't use the white chocolate. The chopped crystallized ginger added texture and a stronger ginger flavor, but even with the ginger boost, the blondies didn't taste very gingerbread-ish to me. However they were a hit with all of my tasters; young and old.

Trader Joe's Deep Dark Gingerbread


n.o.e notes:

This mix is easy, easy, easy.

I baked the gingerbread in a "good luck pig" silicone cake pan that I bought in a German Christmas market and in a silicone ice cube tray. I thought it would be cool to have little rectangular cake-bites. As it turned out, the ice cube tray baked as a whole cake not as individual ones - no doubt because there wasn't any air between the compartments as there is in a muffin tin. So the middle squares rose higher and took longer to bake.

The cakes took awhile to bake - close to 30 minutes, I'd guess. I just kept adding 3 minutes to the timer and checking until it was done.

the verdict:

This gingerbread is very dense and dark. And moist. It tasted more of molasses than of gingerbread spices. There was a bit of a spicy note there, however. With a streusel topping or with whipped cream (or both?), this mix is a solid option; a nice payoff for a little bit of work. I'll have to say that it doesn't come close to the perfection of my usual recipe, but it will be great to have around in a baking pinch.

My husband, who is allergic to chocolate, really liked this gingerbread, finding it very reminiscent of a chocolate cake.

little bites o' gingerbread baked in an ice cube tray

Bobby Flay Rebounds for Corn Muffin Throwdown!

After losing in my kitchen's red chili throwdown, Bobby Flay just begged for a rematch. "Really?" you say. "Well," I reply, "we didn't actually speak about it. But out of the kindness of my heart I decided to give him another chance."

Right after baking Dorie Greenspan's spicy corn muffins, I came across the Mesa Grill Blue Corn muffin recipe, and just had to bake them immediately! (Edit: I saw these muffins mentioned on Katrina's TWD post - thank you for the tip!)

Since I baked Bobby Flay's muffins right after Dorie's, and the recipes are so similar, I think conditions are ideal for another throwdown post!

(As a little bloggy aside, I'm posting this from out of town, and don't have access to all my photos, so if you come back in a couple of days, I'll have added some more pix)

Dorie Greenspan's Savory Corn and Pepper Muffins

First up was Dorie Greenspan's muffin recipe. You can read my recent post about these muffins, and see the recipe here. To summarize my experience with Dorie's muffins: I made some changes in the interest of health (reduced the fat, upped the whole grain quotient) and stepped up the spice and heat a bit.

the verdict on Dorie Greenspan's muffins:

Recapping: We liked the muffins a lot, finding them very moist and tasty. They had lots of flavor, but were not really hot per se. A great recipe and one that I'd gladly make again (I have a zipper bag of the dry ingredients all pre-measured out for another batch).

Bobby Flay's Mesa Grill Blue Corn Muffins

You've probably already noticed that Mesa Grill muffins, pictured up top, are not blue. I love the thought of using blue cornmeal in muffins - I love blue corn chips - but I didn't locate any in the ordinary course of grocery shopping. My choice was: (1) to wait until I located blue cornmeal (if I even could locate any), or (2) bake the muffins with yellow cornmeal - the same cornmeal that I used for Dorie's, in fact. I had all the other ingredients, and there was a pot of black bean soup on the stove, so I went ahead and baked the muffins.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- Trader Joe's Desert Mesquite Honey was perfect for these muffins. [edit: I saw two very similar versions of the Mesa Grill recipe online. I linked to one, above, but actually baked from the other, whose link I didn't save. It had 1T honey instead of granulated sugar. Other differences: 2 cloves garlic instead of 1, 1/4 cup diced onion in place of 3T. ]

- My jalapeno was very large - and very hot - so I used most but not all of it.

- [As with Dorie's muffins, I chopped the corn kernels roughly]

- I baked the muffins in the same silicone muffin pan as Dorie's. They cooked with a lovely golden brown bottom and edges but an incredible moist yet sturdy but not tough crumb.

- The kitchen was filled with the most amazing smell while these muffins were in the oven.

the verdict: Mesa Grill Corn Muffins

With the fresh and cooked ingredients, these muffins had lots of crunch and flavors. I love the complex flavor that the sauteed onion and garlic gave to the muffins. The slight hint of an outer crust was my favorite part. Well, and the taste! They were just about perfect, although I might experiment with adding a tiny bit of chili powder the next time.

As for the ever-pressing question of sweetness, these were not "sweet" corn muffins by Northern standards. There was a sweetness to them, however, and we thought 1 T was plenty of honey. I could see cutting it next time by a third or so. With all those savory ingredients stirred in, I personally wouldn't want them any sweeter.

Despite the quantity - and the undeniable heat - of the jalapeno I put in the batter, the muffins were not hot or spicy, just flavorful. My husband, who recently read an interesting article about hot peppers, reminded me that dairy products bind the capsaicin in the pepper, and so does bread. I guess that by stirring the jalapenos into the muffins (along with milk) they lose most of their heat, but transmit their pepper flavor.

Winner of the Throwdown

Although I previously described Dorie's savory corn muffins as "perfect", Bobby Flay was the indisputable winner of the throwdown! His muffins had great texture and flavor, and I will make them again in a heartbeat. Now I'm ready to track down some blue cornmeal to see if it improved the taste.

To be perfectly fair to the contesting muffins, I need to admit right up front that I made changes to both recipes, mostly to reduce the fat content of the muffins. I believe the fat content ended up roughly equivalent, as I cut some butter in Dorie's and used skim milk and egg substitute in Bobby's. I meant to use part whole-wheat flour in Bobby's muffins as I had done in Dorie's, but I forgot when the time came. I don't think that would have changed out vote, however, and I intend to make the Mesa Grill muffins with part whole wheat flour next time.

I'm glad that Bobby redeemed himself on the rematch!

{Adventures in Yeast} #2 - Dan Lepard's Stollen

One of the most enduring fixtures of the Christmas season in Germany is the traditional Christmas cake, stollen. This is a sweet yeast bread that is filled with dried fruits and is flavored with Christmas spices. The outside is coated with a thick layer of powdered sugar, which is said to be a representation of the Christ Child in His swaddling clothes. By tradition, the stollen weighs 4 pounds and is often filled with a marzipan center.

I've tasted stollen over the years, and have always enjoyed it. Sometimes stollen can be a bit dry, but it always has great flavor. Legend has it that stollen originated in Dresden in the 1400's. Dresden even has a special Stollen Festival each year.

Although I did not make it to Dresden on my most recent trip to German in December (I've been there previously) I saw lots of stollen at the bakeries and Christmas markets. My hotel in Berlin even had a special little shop set up in the lobby to sell Dresden stollen.

My suitcase was too full to bring any stollen back from Germany with me, and I didn't give any thought to the possibility of baking my own until I saw this recipe for Dan Lepard's Extra Moist Stollen (recipe here, forum discussion here). It seemed like the thing to bake on a quiet winter's day in the week between Christmas and New Year's. Although my yeast-baking experience consisted entirely of (1) Kugelhopf for TWD and (2) the King Arthur English Muffin Bread, I jumped right into the deep end and tried this recipe.


noe notes:


- For the mixed-in fruit, I used golden raisins, unsulfured currants, and citron. (I didn't have mixed peel but have lots of citron) I macerated the raisins and currants in warmed dark rum, and used water where the recipe called for rum.


- I grated lime zest because I was out of lemons.


- At the Christmas market in Berlin I bought some orange flavored marzipan, which was perfect for this recipe. I filled one end of the stollen with the marzipan and left the other end plain.

- The recipe gives a choice of rye or wholewheat flour to add to the dough; I chose rye flour.

- I used instant yeast.

- I baked it at 350 degrees on a cookie sheet lined with a silicone mat. After baking for the prescribed 35 minutes the stollen was still raw on the bottom, and the internal temperature was somewhere under 150F.

- At that point I turned the oven to 'convect' and took the stollen off the cookie sheet, baking it directly on a cooling rack set on the oven rack so the heat would reach the bottom. I baked it until it registered 185F on an instant read thermometer (I lost track of the time but maybe between 15 and 30 additional minutes?) I declared it "done" and took it out of the oven.

- After letting it cool, I gingerly sliced into the loaf. As a whole it was very dense, yet moist. The very center was still a bit undercooked.

the verdict:

My word, this stollen was amazing. My husband and I LOVED the flavor and rationed it out over several days' time. He preferred the end without the marzipan, and I have to say that I agree. Daughter A.L.E. was home at the time I baked it and there was some flavor in it that really bothered her. We've sort of narrowed it down to the cardamom, so if you aren't a fan of that spice, leave it out.

Every time I looked at it I had this sense of unreality: Did this creation really come from my kitchen? I can see how yeast baking can be totally addictive!

By far the best part of making this stollen (aside from how GOOD it was) is the level of support that I personally received from Dan Lepard, on his baking forum. I posted a couple of questions, and he answered them quickly and completely. I asked him about the way my stollen baked up and learned that I should have used a smaller baking pan or a baking stone (and I think a higher oven temperature). Thanks, Dan!

I plan to bake this again - Christmas season or not - and will make the adjustments Dan suggested. I'll wait a little while before diving in that deep again, though! In the meantime, I'll take a giant step back and take baby steps in further yeast adventures.