NaBloPoMo

so!

today begins NaBloPoMo, or National Blog Post Month..or something like that. to be honest, i'm feeling a little lazy today. it's sunday, and i'm leveling my shammy and i had to work at 7am. buuuuut, i needed to get my required post in, so here it is. i'm committing to doing this. i thought about doing NaNoWriMo again, but with the time constraints, it just doesn't seem feasible. anyway, sorry about the lame post but, uhm, yeah, still counts. (:

daring baker: milan cookies

well, another month has slipped past, and that means it's time for the next daring baker's challenge reveal! i'm posting this a bit late, as life has gone from zero to hectic in the space of two weeks, but better late than never!

the july daring bakers' challenge was hosted by nicole at sweet tooth. she chose chocolate covered marshmallow cookies and milan cookies from pastry chef gale gand of the food network.

oh glorious food network, how i miss watching you for hours on end.

the challenge could be done either doing both the mallows and the milan cookies, or just choosing one. as i was unemployed at the time i was completing the challenge, i opted for the one that i had all but one ingredient on hand for: the milan cookies! ..also i am a huge fan of these, and much less a fan of the mallow cookies, although had i had the funds, i would have tried it out just for fun.

this challenge, while it seemed easy at first glance, gave me some trouble. you'll see. let's take a look at the recipe:

milan cookies
(gale gand's recipe)

prep time: 20 min
inactive prep time: 0 min
cook time: 1 hr 0 min
serves: about 3 dozen cookies

• 12 tablespoons (170grams/ 6 oz) unsalted butter, softened
• 2 1/2 cups (312.5 grams/ 11.02 oz) powdered sugar
• 7/8 cup egg whites (from about 6 eggs)
• 2 tablespoons vanilla extract
• 2 tablespoons lemon extract
• 1 1/2 cups (187.5grams/ 6.61 oz) all purpose flour
• cookie filling, recipe follows

[crazy delicious] cookie filling:
• 1/2 cup heavy cream
• 8 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped
• 1 orange, zested

1. in a mixer with paddle attachment cream the butter and the sugar.

2. add the egg whites gradually and then mix in the vanilla and lemon extracts.

i think that this is where i started to have a slight problem. since i am still without an electric mixer, i was doing this all by hand. in theory, this shouldn't be a problem, but i think i just wasn't trying hard enough. my mixture at this point looked a bit odd and curdled (much like the frangipane we saw last month, except that was supposed to look that way), but i shrugged it off and forged ahead.

3. add the flour and mix until just well mixed.

4. with a small (1/4-inch) plain tip, pipe 1-inch sections of batter onto a parchment-lined sheet pan, spacing them 2 inches apart as they spread.

5. bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for 10 minutes or until light golden brown around the edges. let cool on the pan.

all well and good right? i thought i was in great shape! and then i pulled my second batch out and found...well...this:


whoops! what happened?! as i had to make them in about a million batches (smallest cookie sheet ever), i theorized that both my batter and the sheet pan were just too warm. i decided to try popping the batter into the fridge and the pan into the freezer between batches, with somewhat better results. onto the filling!



6. while waiting for the cookies to cool, in a small saucepan over medium flame, scald cream.

7. pour hot cream over chocolate in a bowl, whisk to melt chocolate, add zest and blend well.

8. set aside to cool (the mixture will thicken as it cools).

9. spread a thin amount of the filling onto the flat side of a cookie while the filling is still soft and press the flat side of a second cookie on top.

10. repeat with the remainder of the cookies.

now, by the time my cookies were done baking, i was hungry and frustrated. i'd already melted the chocolate, but just didn't feel like filling the cookies - i wanted dinner instead! so i put the final two steps on hold until the next morning. the filling kept just fine, i just re-melted it, and then spread it while it was still hot.

i organized my cookies by shape (most like a real milan cookie to least like a real milan cookie) and nibbled at the deformed ones in between.


they turned out looking pretty okay...at least at the angles i photographed them. ;)

(speaking of the photographs, somehow they are getting dull and washed out between saving them in photoshop, and posting them here. i thought it was an iphoto issue (thus switching to photoshop) but it still appears to be happening. if anyone has any suggestions on how to fix this, please let me know. i'm saving them as the highest jpg quality available, but maybe i need to save them as something else? my cookie edges were golden and beautiful!)

the real disappointment with my cookies came from the cookie texture itself. rather than being crisp and crumbly, it was a bit chewy and sticky; it sort of stuck on the tooth. i think this goes back, perhaps, to the creaming and egg-adding steps in the recipe, and the way it curdled and didn't mix quite right. i'd like to try these again (with some mint in the filling, too!) to see if i can remedy it.


and so concludes another month's challenge!

i have a whole bunch of photos and recipes that i just haven't had the time to post yet, leaving this blog a bit bare except for my challenges, but i *will* get to it!

daring baker: bakewell tart...er...pudding

this month i completed my very first challenge for the daring kitchen! i'm really proud of myself for a couple of reasons; first, the challenge involved making four things completely new to me (more on that in a moment), and second, i managed to complete this despite moving halfway across the country in the middle of the month. being somewhat terrible at finishing what i start, that might be the greater accomplishment!

the daring baker's challenge this month was given by jasmine (confessions of a cardamom addict) and annemarie (ambrosia and nectar). the challenge was to make a bakewell tart...er...pudding. i'd never heard of this before the challenge, nor did i own a tart pan, so i was a little nervous starting out.

i picked up some adorable little tartlet pans (they were so cute, i couldn't resist, although i regretted this a bit later, as making six baby tarts was quite a bit more time-consuming than i imagine one would have been), some fresh ingredients, and set to work.

it was a process that took a few days, as i opted to make my own jams, and also was in the midst of unpacking a new apartment and trying to find everything.

the first step was to make the fruit filling: peach jam and strawberry preserves - i'll post the recipes for these later - both of which turned out to be quite delicious on toast.

the next step was the sweet shortcrust pastry shell. below is the recipe provided for the challenge, my comments in italics.



prep time: 15-20 minutes
resting time: 30 minutes (minimum)
equipment needed: bowls, box grater, cling film

225g (8oz) all purpose flour
30g (1oz) sugar
2.5ml (½ tsp) salt
110g (4oz) unsalted butter, cold (frozen is better)
2 (2) egg yolks
2.5ml (½ tsp) almond extract (optional) [i used vanilla]
15-30ml (1-2 Tbsp) cold water (i used two or three times this to make it work)

sift together flour, sugar and salt. grate butter into the flour mixture, using the large hole-side of a box grater. using your finger tips only, and working very quickly, rub the fat into the flour until the mixture resembles bread crumbs. set aside.

lightly beat the egg yolks with the almond extract (if using) and quickly mix into the flour mixture. Keep mixing while dribbling in the water, only adding enough to form a cohesive and slightly sticky dough. (again, i had to use more.)
form the dough into a disc, wrap in cling and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.

i had a hard time using the measurements in this recipe. normally it wouldn't have been a problem, i'd just have googled the conversions easily, but since i don't have any internet at home yet, it posed an extra challenge, and required a bit of cursing at my patient boyfriend's iphone.

next came the frangipane! again, here's the challenge recipe:

prep time: 10-15 minutes
equipment needed: bowls, hand mixer, rubber spatula

125g (4.5oz) unsalted butter, softened
125g (4.5oz) icing sugar
3 (3) eggs
2.5ml (½ tsp) almond extract
125g (4.5oz) ground almonds
30g (1oz) all purpose flour

cream butter and sugar together for about a minute or until the mixture is primrose in colour and very fluffy. scrape down the side of the bowl and add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. the batter may appear to curdle. in the words of douglas adams: don’t panic. really. it’ll be fine. after all three are in, pour in the almond extract and mix for about another 30 seconds and scrape down the sides again. with the beaters on, spoon in the ground nuts and the flour. mix well. the mixture will be soft, keep its slightly curdled look (mostly from the almonds) and retain its pallid yellow colour.

annemarie’s notes:
• add another five minutes or more if you're grinding your own almonds or if you're mixing by hand (heaven help you).

OH THE HILARITY! it just so happens that i DID have to mix by hand! my hand-mixer has mysteriously disappeared. oh well. it wasn't so bad, really.



with all the elements ready to go, it was time to put it all together.

i'd already pressed my shortcrust pastry into my tartlet pans, and chilled them in the freezer for about fifteen minutes. next was a layer of jam into each tart, three peach, three strawberry.



then, spread the frangipane on top, and into a piping hot 400F oven! the recipe called for thirty minutes of baking time, but i don't even think i kept mine in for twenty. the tops browned quickly, and i had to hustle to get them out, sprinkle the almonds on, and give them another few minutes without burning them to a crisp! this was a task made much more difficult by the fact that i am also somehow missing all my potholders and mitts...sigh.



they came out DELICIOUS! we piled them with some cold vanilla ice cream and it was divine. the almond taste was just a hint, and the homemade jam was just perfect - and they looked lovely to boot!

here's the peach:



and a strawberry:



om nom nom!