TWD Chocolate Souffle

There's dessert and then there's DESSERT, souffle falls into the latter category. The magic of eggs and sugar whipped and folded together to create a puffy dessert that must be served immediately. Fun to make, serve and especially to eat. Thanks to Susan of She’s Becoming DoughMessTic for choosing this recipe. You can find the recipe for the chocolate souffle on her website.

Souffle's are amazingly easy to make. Some people find them nerve-wrecking, but as long as your ingredients are room temp, and you can whip your whites properly; it's a piece of cake (or souffle in this case). The only change I made to the recipe was I halved it because I was making it for two. I also added a pinch of salt to the egg whites and reduced the overall sugar by 1 tablespoon to bring out the chocolate flavor.


(Souffles as soon as they came out of the oven)


The souffles were just lovely. Airy and very chocolaty. Joe liked them so much he ate two! We pair the souffle with Schweiger Port VII which was perfect with the souffles.





For dinner that night we made a simple risotto with just a bit of finely chopped asparagus topped with an asparagus bacon garnish and buttery seared scallops. We paired our risotto with Patrick Bouland Chiroubles 2006, which was a perfect wine for this dish. Though most people wouldn't pair a red wine with a scallop dish we chose it because it was a nice light Beaujolais. We prefer reds to whites in general, so we frequently drink Beaujolais with meals that are more white friendly. As far as meals go, our scallop risotto and chocolate souffle night will go down as one of the top 10 meals of 2009.

TWD Classic Banana Bundt Cake

Mary of The food librarian chose banana bundt cake as this week's TWD recipe.

There's not to much to say about this cake other than, make it. Make it now. I loved it. The aromatics of it as it bakes are reason enough to pick up bananas and sour cream at the grocery store. If I could capture the smell of this cake in a candle, I would be a millionaire.

Making the cake is very easy. I halved the recipe and it made 6 mini bundt cakes. They baked for 23 minutes, and looked picture perfect right out of the oven.



How you like them apples? I mean, banana cakes:



(Forgive me, clearly Boston is starting to effect me in a negative way... quoting a movie from 1997. Wow, Good Will Hunting is 12 years old; that makes me...)

For fun, I made three different glazes; chocolate, rum and caramel. Caramel was my favorite because I liked the crunch against the soft cake.

Chocolate Cake with Mocha Icing

At Sofra we make a cake that I like to call a mayo cake. We whip eggs and sugar together then we whip in olive oil very slowly creating an emulsion very similar to an aioli. The resulting cake is amazing. It's moist with a beautiful crumb structure.

The emulsion in that recipe reminded me of some of the older cookbooks I have which contain recipes for cakes with Mayonnaise. Never one to fear mayo, I decided to try out a chocolate cake recipe fromThe Wooden Spoon Dessert book. I tweaked the recipe a bit, but mainly stayed true to it. It's a great recipe to make if you're in a pinch and need to whip up something fast (as is the following icing recipe from the same book). The cake tastes lovely and you would never know the "secret" ingredient.



Chocolate Cake adapted from The Wooden Spoon Dessert Book by Marilyn Moore
Preheat oven 350F
Grease a 9x12" pan (I used mini bundt pans)

Sift together:
2 cups AP flour
4 Tablespoons cocoa powder (I used Vahlrona)
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda

In another bowl mix together:
1 cup mayonnaise
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup granulated sugar

Add alternately (3 dry:2 coffee), blending after each addition
reserved dry ingredeints
1 cup cold coffee (I had instant espresso, so I made 1 1/2 cups of hot espresso; chilling one cup and reserving the other half for the icing)

Fold in:
3 oz 70% chocolate (I used Lindt)

Bake in a 9x12 pan fro about 30 minutes or in mini bundt pans for 23.

Quick mocha frosting
again adapted from The Wooden Spoon
Sift into mixing bowl:
1 1/2 cups confectioner's sugar
1 tablespoon cocoa powder

whisk together, then add

4 tablespoons soft butter
pinch salt
3/4 teaspoon vanilla
4 tablespoons of warm espresso (from extra brewed for cake)

I wanted this icing to be runny, so I increased her recipe from 2T coffee to 4T espresso.

TWD Nutella Swirl Ice Cream

Lynne of Cafe LynnyLu decided on Vanilla Ice Cream as this week's TWD recipe. Check out Lynne's blog for the recipe.

Vanilla ice cream is such a fun base to play with. For today's treat I decided to add nutella (about 1/2 a container) and some finely chopped toasted hazelnuts (about 1/2 cup) to my ice cream. I added the nuts to the base about 4 minutes before it was done churning. Once it was fully churnned I folded in the nutella.



It shouldn't be surprising to anyone that this ice cream was beyond delicious. There is just no way nutella, hazelnuts and vanilla can go wrong (unless of course you're allegic to nuts).

Olive Oil Madeleines

Pretty? Yes

Easy? Yes

Best Ingredients? Yes

Tasty? Not so much



I really want to like everything I bake, but sometimes there's no love to be found. I found a recipe in this month's Gourmet for Olive Oil Madeleines. The recipe came from Eleven Madison, so I was pretty sure I would love it. They baked off perfectly. Beautiful bubble on the bottom and just the slightest color on the "shell." They looked perfect. Flavor wise they were bland, bland, bland; which was shocking because I used an amazing olive oil from Lebanon and the zest of two lemons. I think this recipe could work if I wanted to make a "spiced-up" madeleine, but for the time being; I use my stand-by madeleine recipe.

TWD Blanc Manger

Susan of Sticky, Gooey, Creamy, Chewy selected Raspberry Blanc-Manger as this week's TWD recipe.

I loved the idea of this cake, but the end product was a bit lack-luster. Two things I did that I won't do again. I used natural almonds which created a non-blanc manger. Second, I make the cake in VT, and I accidently grabbed a 10" cake pan instead of an 8". The resulting cake was really thin, maybe only 1/2" tall. I would like a taller cake next time. I did love the contrast between the tart raspberries and creamy almond mousse. I found myself only eating the sections that had both raspberries and cream.



I love the idea of a go-to no bake summer dessert, so I'm going to try this again soon. Next time I'll infuse my cream with thyme, and I will use a smaller cake pan and blanched almonds.

TWD Katherine Hepburn Brownies

Lisa of Surviving Oz chose Katherine Hepburn brownies as this week's TWD recipe. I had made these once before using the optional cinnamon and wasn't thrilled. Today I decided to make them without the cinnamon, and kept my fingers crossed that I would like them.

Shockingly enough, I'm a bit chocolated out. After the brownies I made for my dad, and the grandmother's cookies from Martha… I'm ready for some vanilla or fruit.

The recipe was very easy to make. You melt your butter then add cocoa powder and espresso powder. Next beat in your eggs and vanilla; followed by dry ingredients and chocolate chunks. I love that this recipe is done by hand so quickly. The resulting batter is dark, dark, dark studded with bits of lovely bittersweet chocolate.





I left the brownies in the oven for an additional 5 minutes because they were still liquid after 30 minutes of baking. After reading a bit online, it seems like I should have used a metal pan instead of a glass for them to bake in the 30 minute zone. Regardless, these brownies are good. Their intense fudginess almost screams for vanilla ice cream. Luckily, I didn't have any on hand...these are so fudgy that you can't eat too many. As far as brownies go, I still prefer the Scharfenberger recipe to this one. That being said, I would be proud to serve these to company.

 

(Not my) Grammy’s Chocolate Cookies

Martha strikes again. Grammy's chocolate cookies are addicting, chewy, crunchy (from the turbinado) and insanely chocolaty. They spread a lot while baking and become very flat; making them the perfect cookie for sandwiching with some vanilla ice cream.

For the recipe, please reference Martha Stewart's Cookies or visit Martha's website here.

The only difference I saw between the two recipes is the book calls for an additional 2 tablespoons of AP flour; and it calls for rolling the cookies in sanding sugar (not granulated). I highly suggest rolling the cookies in either turbinado or sanding sugar. Sanding and turbinado sugars add a nice crunch to baked items because they typically don't dissolve in the oven.



Another suggestion I have is use the best cocoa powder you can get your hands on. The cocoa flavor dominates this cookie, so the better the cocoa powder the better the cookie.

My Dad’s Brownies

I take after my mom for my never ending desire to bake; and my dad for my never ending desire to eat baked goods. Growing up, we used to hide boxes of cookies under a basket turned upside down on top of the fridge, so that he couldn't find them. The funny thing is for all the cookies he ate back then, he was still in great shape (why didn't I take after him for that!). Now, my dad is over 50 and eats much healthier than back then. No more sweets for him, he's taking care of his heart. Every now and then though, he will indulge; and the following brownies are the perfect reason. They are dense, chewy and chocolaty.

A little over two years ago, I made 16 batches of these brownies for my wedding reception. That's when my dad fell in love with them. I can't tell you have many times during the wedding weekend he said how good they were, or better yet; how many times he's brought them up since the wedding. He LOVES these brownies. So, for Father's day this year, I decided to send him something he would actually like (I bet you can guess what).

The brownie recipe comes from The Essence of Chocolate by John Scharffenberger and Robert Steinberg. It is a beautiful cookbook full of great chocolate recipes and really interesting information on chocolate. I highly recommend it. The recipe can also be found here.

TWD Parisian Apple Tartlettes

Jessica of My Baking Heart picked Parisian Apple Tartlettes as this week's TWD "recipe". It's hard to call it a recipe because you're supposed to buy puff pastry, cut it into a 4" round, and top it with half an apple and a bit of butter and sugar and bake. For a Dorie Greenspan recipe, this is as "semi-homemade" as she gets.

Instead of buying puff pastry, I decided to make a dough that acts like a quick puff pastry. Essentially mix equal parts butter, cream cheese, flour and a pinch of salt in a mixer till a dough forms. Chill then roll and use in place of puff pastry. I like making this dough because it's so easy, gets nice layering and I usually have all the ingredients on hand to make it. The dough works best with an overnight rest, but due to time constraints I had to make mine an hour and a half before baking. Even so, I was a little nervous that it would grow out of control, so I docked each tart shell and then topped with the apples.

Once they came out of the oven, I realized that docking them was a bit overzealous. They didn't rise as much as I expected them to, but the dough was still lovely.

The resulting tartelettes were okay. I baked them for an extra 5 minutes because the apples were still leaning towards raw, but that still wasn't enough time. Technically there was no way I could have baked the apples through and not overcooked the dough. Due to its simplicity, I think this recipe has a lot of potential. However, the apples should be sliced thinner, or the chunks should be par cooked before baking. This was so easy to make though, I'll definitely play around with it again.

TWD Tartest Lemon Tart

Today's TWD recipe Tartest Lemon Tart was chosen by Babette of Babette Feasts. For the recipe please visit her website here.

In the Buswell household my husband and I have an undeclared (but very active) war over lemon (specifically zest). I love lemons in everything, but he doesn't like them at all. To him, lemons taste like soap, especially lemon zest. So, I spend lots of time thinking of ways to sneak lemons in desserts without him noticing. Sometimes this works, but I can't count the number of times I've heard "Is there lemon in this?" or "I would love this if you hadn't put lemon zest in it." Oh well, if at first you don't succeed… make the tartest lemon tart ever.

I was unsure if Joe would like this, so I made a half batch of this recipe. I've made the sweet tart dough with almond meal more than a few times, so it was fast to assemble. The filling was fast as well. The only change I made was I blanched the lemon peel 3 times to get rid of some of the peel's bitterness.



Once the peels cooled, I blended them with the lemon, sugar, eggs, cornstarch, cream and melted butter. One thing I loved about this recipe is the ease of making it. The filling really took no time at all to make, and the ingredients are all items that I usually have on hand (except maybe the heavy cream).

Since I knew I would be making a half batch, I decided it was time to get some new tartlet pans. I had heard there was a cute kitchen store in Concord, MA; so I headed over to The Concord Shop before I made the tarts. This store has everything a baker/cook could want and more. They also have a nice selection of newly released cookbooks. While I was there, I picked up two 4" tartlet pans and a small offset spatula.



The only downside of the Concord shop was the service. I was the only person there and I had to wait 5 minutes to be rung up because a woman I think was the owner was giving the counter girl a hard time about losing an invoice. I was thinking "isn't this something that could wait" as I stood there. Also, I think greeting a customer with a smile is important; and it was frown city in Concord. Lastly when I got home, I realized they had charge me an extra 50 cents for each tart. Regardless of all that, I'm going to hope it was just a bad day there. I really want to like this shop because it has a lot of great kitchen equipment; and few store in the Boston area do. I'll give it one more try before I decide to spend my money somewhere else.

Back to the tarts; they baked at 325 for 20 minutes and then at 350 for 20 more. Total baking time was 40 minutes. I put the extra custard in ramekins and they took another 10 minutes at 350. The tarts looked just as described set with a light sugary crust.





They smelled and looked amazing when I took them out of the oven. The tarts were amazing. So amazing, that Joe even liked them. I bruleed one tart, and kept the other plain. Aesthetically, I liked the look of the unbruleed tart better. I'm also glad that I blanched the peel before making the filling. Other TWDers found the filling to be too bitter, but mine wasn't at all. I will definitely make this tart again.

Gingerbread

This past week I made gingerbread from Beth Hensperger's The Bread Bible. Her recipe calls for a combination of maple syrup, brown sugar and molasses. I grew up in Vermont, so any recipe with maple syrup as a sweetener is bound to peak my interest. All in all this was a fun easy recipe to make. The recipe calls for adding baking soda to boiling water and then adding that to the batter. It turns into a neat example of chemistry in action.

As far as gingerbreads go, this was great. I like it better than Dorie Greenspan's gingerbread which was a bit too bitter because of the espresso chocolate edge. This gingerbread was moist with a medium spice level. I love spicy gingerbread, so next time I make it I will add come finely chopped candied and fresh ginger. I made an 8" cake and a baby gingerbread loaf. As soon as it cooled I froze the 8" cake. I hope to make a layered cake with it sometime soon.

Here's the recipe:

Gingerbread from The Bread Bible by Beth Hensperger

Makes one 9" pan or twelve 3" round cakes.

Preheat oven to 350 and grease cake pan

Ingredients:

2 ½ cups AP Flour

2 Tbsp instant espresso powder

1 Tbsp ground ginger (increase this if you want a bold ginger flavor)

1 tsp cinnamon

½ tsp ground cloves

½ tsp grated nutmeg

¼ tsp ground black pepper

Grated zest of 1 lemon (I omitted this because I didn't have one on hand)

8 Tbsp (1 stick) butter

½ Cup light brown sugar

½ Cup unsulfured molasses

½ Cup maple syrup

2 large eggs

2 tsps baking soda

1 cup boiling water

Method:

Combine Flour through lemon zest in a large bowl and mix well with a whisk.

In a small saucepan combine the butter through molasses. Stir frequently over low heat till butter is dissolved.

Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and pour in the hot butter mixture. Add the eggs and quickly beat with a wooden spoon till smooth. Combine the baking soda with the boiling water. Pour over the batter and stir gently to evenly incorporate.

Pour into greased pan. Bake for about 30 minutes.

TWD Four Star Chocolate Bread Pudding

I am no stranger to bread pudding. It is something I have made on countless occasions while working in the baking and pastry field. At Sofra we make a special brown butter bread pudding on weekends that people swoon for. While at Henrietta's we made a chocolate bread pudding with a banana rum caramel sauce. At Bouchon we made hotel pans of chocolate bread pudding and would cut them into cylinder shapes and top with a canele of caramel whipped cream. So much bread pudding in such a short career (now almost 4 years).

Since I've had so much exposure to bread pudding I wasn't planning on making this recipe. Also, the truth is bread pudding doesn't really do it for me. I'm not a huge custard fan, and I usually find it to be a bit boring. I decided to make this because I had a little bit of stale bread left over from the Oatmeal Bulgur bread I made on Sunday. I couldn't stand to see this bread go to waste, so I decided to make a very small batch based on Dorie's recipe. I made 1/6 of the recipe and changed it a bit. I didn't have whole milk or heavy cream, so I subbed skim and evaporated milk. Also, I read in the P&Q section of TWD that it wasn't chocolaty enough, so I added a little cocoa powder. Here's the recipe as I made it. For the actual recipe was Dorie would make visit Lauren of Upper East Side Chronicle. She picked this TWD recipe.

Extra Chocolaty Chocolate Bread Pudding

2 ounces of cubed bread

A small handful of dried cherries

½ cup of skim milk

2 Tbsp plus 2 tsps Evaporated whole milk

1 scant Tbsp Valhrona cocoa powder

1 large egg

1 Tbsp plus 2 tsps sugar

1 ¼ ounce Scharfenberger 70% finely chopped.

Put the cubed bread and cherries in a bowl large enough to hold about 2 cups. Bring skim milk, evaporated milk and cocoa powder just to a boil in a small sauce pan whisking frequently. Once the liquids come to a boil whisk together the sugar and egg. In a very slow stream pour the hot liquid into the egg sugar mixture whisking constantly. Once all your liquid is in the bowl. Strain the hot liquid onto the chocolate. (Side note: I have no idea why she doesn't say to strain the custard, as a rule of thumb it's a very good idea to always strain custards). Whisk the custard/chocolate mixture till all the chocolate melts. Pour the mixture onto the cubed bread and cherries.



Let sit for 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Bring some water to a boil for your water bath. Carefully take your soaked bread cubes and cherries out of the custard putting it into a ramekin (I used an 8 oz ramekin). Try not to man handle your cubes too much or else they will disintegrate. Pour your custard remaining custard up to the line in the ramekin (not the very top).



Place your ramekin into a larger dish that has tall sides and is oven safe (I used a larger ramekin). Pour your hot water into the larger dish to create a water bath.



Carefully put your dishes into the oven and bake for 33 minutes (till a knife comes out clean).

When the bread pudding was in the oven, I realized the recipe didn't call for salt. I'm a huge fan of salt, so I decided to make a salted caramel to go along side the pudding. Unfortunately, I didn't measure it out, but essentially all I did was I put about 3/4 cup of sugar in a pan and brought it to the caramel stage. Then I poured in some evaporated milk (maybe ¼ cup), added a touch of butter and a very healthy amount of fleur de sel. Whisked all that together, and there was my salted caramel sauce.

We ate the bread pudding and caramel sauce warm. They were very nice together, but I think next time I would also add some vanilla ice cream to even things out. Will I make this again? Sure, if I have left-over bread. I think the Oatmeal Bulgur bread was perfect in this, there was no hint of "healthiness" (from the bread) in this chocolate bread pudding. It was all about indulgent chocolate, custard and caramel.