Christmas Cakathon

Happy Belated Christmas everyone. :) I was kind of dead yesterday after all the baking and cooking I had to do so here goes the 'belated' Christmas baking post. I'm eager to see what everyone else had made too. :)

Cake #1: Buche de Noel (Yule Log Cake)

I was quite pleased with how this turned out. I didn't have time to make the meringue mushrooms but all was well anyways. I used a Cook's Illustrated recipe that included a rich, dark chocolate sponge cake with an espresso mascarpone filling. The filling was most especially delicious and although I had thought about substituting the mascarpone with cream cheese I am glad I hadn't. The mascarpone lended a creamy velvety texture to the filling without the tangy 'cheesy' taste. I did have a bit of a problem rolling the cake as it immediately started cracking but that was fixed with extra ganache. I think I may have overbeaten the egg whites again (those darn egg whites!)

Cake #2: Creme Brulee (actually not a cake)


I decided to accompany this creme brulee with the chocolate cloud cake (see below) for the Christmas Eve party at my dad's house. One of his good friends is celiac (meaning he can't have any wheat) so I always find it a fun challenge to bring unique non-flour desserts when he is there. For this creme brulee, I used Nigella's recipe from Nigella Bites. I was originally going to use Cooks Illustrated but it was way too much for only 5 people so I paired down with Nigella's recipe. Plus, Nigella's is cooked on the stovetop which I thought would be much better than setting up the water bath for an creme brulee oven bake. However, the first time I started making this my custard split and I did see it coming but did not (although highly recommended by both recipes) keep cold water nearby to stop the cooking. So I had to make it a second time (and kept a roasting pan full of ice and cold water) and cooked it over low heat making it nearly 15 minutes before it had thickened enough to my liking. And it did set nicely after it had chilled with a very smooth vanilla taste. It was a lot of fun torching the sugar on top but it did take some practice. In fact, mine ended up being the only one that was torched properly. Oh well, everyone still thought it to be quite good.

Cake #3: Chocolate Cloud Cake ** no picture unfortunately :( **

This was the accompanying flourless chocolate cake that I made for Christmas Eve and boy am I glad that I used the best chocolate I had (Green & Blacks) because that's all you could taste with this cake: a rich, truffle-like with a lightly sweetened cloud of whip cream to just mildly counter the chocolate rush that hits your mouth when you take a bite. Of course, this was out of Nigella Bites (although this particular one is not her's) and because of that turned out to be absolutely delicious. :)

Cake #4: Snowman Cake


Sorry for the lack of better quality pictures (these were taken with my boyfriend's cell phone camera). This is my fourth year in keeping up with the snowman cake tradition so this year I decided upon buying the 3-d snowman mold from Williams & Sonoma. Well, I'm not sure I would do it again because the cake was a little hard to bake in the mold. Because the mold has various depths and widths to accommodate the shape and outline of the snowman, the cake was overcooked in the shallow ends and a bit underbaked in the more deeper ends. Then when I tried to frost it the two parts of him kept coming apart but I might have remedied that by letting it set for a bit before standing him up. Anyways, here is a picture of last years snowman and this years snowman.

Chocolate Babka (burnt)

I have to say that I am once again disappointed by one of Gale's recipes. Normally Chocolate Babka is served during Easter (or at least that's what I've read) but since I'm not Eastern European I figured tradition wouldn't hold a grudge against me for baking it around Christmas. Well... I burned it. It is still edible but I think I might have to trim the crust which is a shame because some of the filling is closer to the crust.

• The recipe calls for 5 egg yolks and 1 whole egg. And this is supposed to make a cake or dough with only 2 cups of flour!? I ended up adding 2 more cups just to make it kneadable.
• The filling composed of 4 oz of bittersweet chocolate, 1 egg white, 1 tbsp of butter, and 7 oz of almond paste. My super-duper-never-has-a-problem-with-anything food processor couldn't get this filling together. It was so sticky and unspreadable that I basically just dotted clumps of it onto the dough which is why most of it ended up concentrated in certain parts.
  
• The dough would not cook all the way! This batter was just way too much for a single snail roll in a 9-inch cake pan. It rose like Mt. Everest and even after 45 minutes, the insides were far from done. And I was right too because when I opened it up the insides were just right. But pretty much the crust got ruined.

Martha has a recipe for this in her Baking Handbook (and it even had a strudel topping!) and now I wished I had baked that one. Poop.

Crazy Cooking Day: Rugelach, Creamy Pumpkin Cookies, and more

So on Tuesday I had blogged about my Sweet Potato and Cheese Souffles but little would I know that my boyfriend's office was having a potluck and that I would definitely want to make something for it. So this is what I ended up cooking that day (not all of which was for the potluck):

• Sweet Potato and Cheese Souffles
• Danish Pastries
• Creamy Pumpkin Cookies with Pumpkin Frosting
• Rugelach
• Creamy Potato Gratin
• Lumpia (Filipino spring rolls)
• Crispy catfish with steamed rice and peas (a bit of a rushed dinner hehe)
  

Cheese Danishes

The danish pastry recipe was from Nigella's How to Be a Domestic Goddess book. It's probably one of the easiest ways to make danish pastry dough as the butter is cut into the flour with a food processor and once you have chilled it overnight, you then fold and and roll out only three times without having to rest the dough inbetween. After that you let it rest for about 30 minutes before rolling it out again and cutting into squares for the actual pastries themselves. The longest part probably being that once you have formed them, you have to let them rise for about 1 1/2 hours before baking them. Much too long for making them in the morning unless you like to get up 2-3 hours before breakfast time (I normally get up at 10am hah.) For some reason, I couldn't get them to hold their form so they pretty much came undone in the oven. But as Nigella would say, that's okay because they are homemade. :)


Rugelach

This is actually the first time I had made this sweet and fruity Jewish pastry and I was very pleasantly surprised. At the Nigella board they were talking about how both Nigella and Ina Garten had wonderful recipes for this cookie so be as it may I decided I'd give them a try. I decided I'd try out Ina Garten's recipe since it was so conveniently online at Food Network (Click here for the recipe.) I'm normally not a dried fruit and nut fan but these cookies were fantastic! I guess you had to know since the dough is made up of 1/2 pound of both cream cheese and butter. :D My boyfriend especially liked them and I find myself sneaking in a cookie everytime I walk into the kitchen (which is still a mess haha!) So after having made these cookies, I am considering getting the Barefoot Contessa Parties! book. Can never have too many cookbooks, I say! :D


Creamy Pumpkin Cookies

This recipe I got from a holiday cookie magazine published by Land O Lakes (my favorite butter company :) All the cookies in this magazine are creative and festive and since I had some leftover canned pumpkin from making the pumpkin pie pancakes I decided this might be a perfect fit for the potluck. The pumpkin frosting nicely complemented the pumpkin flavored cut-outs and added just the right amount of sweetness and spice. This batch makes quite a bit (I think I made about 4 dozen cookies).

For the Cookies
1 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup sugar
1 egg
1/3 cup canned pumpkin
1 tsp vanilla
2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp pumpkin pie spice (Note: To make pumpkin pie spice, combine 1 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon, 3/4 tsp ground ginger, 1/4 tsp ground nutmeg, and 1/4 tsp ground cloves)
3/4 tsp baking powder
1/8 tsp salt

For the Frosting
3 oz cream cheese, softened
2 tbsp butter, softened
1 tbsp canned pumpkin
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/4 tsp pumpkin pie spice (see above for recipe)
1 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar
1 to 2 tsps milk or half-and-half

To make the cookies: In an electric mixer (or use a hand mixer), mix the butter and sugar at medium speed until light and fluffy. Add the egg making sure to scrape down the sides to fully incorporate. Then add the canned pumpkin and vanilla and beat until well mixed. Reduce the mixer to low speed and add in the rest of the ingredients (flour, pie spice, baking powder, and salt). Note: I sifted the dry ingredients together prior to added them to the butter mixture

Divide the dough in half and wrap in plastic. Refrigerate until firm or at least about 2 hours.

Preheat your oven to 350F. Roll out 1/2 dough onto a lightly floured surface to about 1/8-inch thickness (not too thin as I mistakenly did on my first batch.) Cut with favorite cookie cutters and place about 1-inch apart on cookie sheet. Bake for about 8 to 10 minutes or until the edges start to brown. Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

To make the frosting: Combine all the frosting ingredients except for the confectioners' sugar and milk. Beat at medium speed until creamy. Reduce speed to low and then add in your confectioners' sugar. Add the milk gradually until you have the consistency that you want (for me, I hardly added any at all.) Spread the frosting on the cookies and sprinkle with decorative sugars.


Creamy Potato Gratin, Lumpia, and Crispy Catfish
(picture coming soon, I swear! :)

The creamy potato gratin recipe comes from Nigella Bites and is one of the most amazing comfort foods ever. Especially if you love potatoes, the creaminess will blow you away.

For the lumpia, I kind of make this intuitively as I've watched my mom make this ever since I could remember. The recipe goes kind of like this and you can improvise as needed. The lumpia skins you'll have to get at an asian supermarket unless they sell them in the frozen section at your local supermarket.

Lumpia

1 lb ground pork (or you can use 1/2 lb ground pork and 1/2 lb ground beef)
1 cup shredded cabbage
1/2 cup shredded or finely minced carrots
1/2 cup green onions
1 onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
To taste: soy sauce, garlic powder (optional), salt and pepper

Fresh or frozen lumpia skins

Other vegetables you can add are 1/2 cup peas, 1/2 cup chopped green beans, 1/2 cup cooked bean sprouts, 1/2 cup canned bamboo shoots, etc. You can even add raisins as my mom has done (I'm not too particularly keen on this though) and you can make them vegetarian by omitting the meat and adding more vegetables.

In a large frying pan, cook the meat until no longer pink (add vegetable oil as needed depending on how lean your ground meat is.) Remove from the pan and then saute the onions and garlic together until soft. Add in your carrots or any other long-to-cook vegetable first and saute until softened (about 5 minutes or so). Then add in the cabbage, green onions, and meat. Season with soy sauce (I like to add in a generous amount), garlic powder, and salt and pepper. Cook for about 10 minutes or until vegetables have wilted and all ingredients are properly mixed. Pour mixture into a bowl or pan and let cool.

Once the mixture has cooled, you can wrap it as filling for the lumpia skins. Take the square lumpia skin and have one of the ends pointing towards you (it will look like a diamond shape). Put about 2 tablespoons of filling closer to your end but not on the tip. Flip the end closer to you over the filling and fold the sides in. Once the skin is aligned with the mixture length, roll to the other end and place seam-side down on a plate. Note: Sorry this isn't the best explanation of the rolling technique but if you have ever rolled burritos its the exact same thing lol!

Deep fry the rolls in peanut oil until golden brown. Serve with sweet chili sauce.


Crispy Catfish
This recipe is nothing special as you can probably find better recipes online. This is an easy and fast recipe and we used to eat this every Friday with peas and steamed rice when I was growing up.

Combine 1 cup flour with about 1 tbsp kosher salt, pepper, and a generous sprinkling of garlic powder inside a plastic ziploc bag. Shake your fish fillets inside the bag and then fry in peanut oil until golden brown. Serve with tartar sauce, peas, and steamed rice. :)

Sweet Potato and Cheese Souffles

My first time making individual savory souffles and I think they came out okay! This recipe comes out of the UK magazine Olive and actually utilizes cheshire cheese but I used cheddar cheese instead. So because I used cheddar cheese, I think these came out a little under-salted since the recipe does not call for any salt. I'd add in some salt if you decide to use another type of cheese such as cheddar or gruyere.

Also, its good to try and mash the potatoes as well as you can. I mashed them by hand and they still came out a little chunky. Normally I like my mashed potatoes to be chunky but for this souffle dish I think it would be better if they were almost of puree quality. So the best way to achieve that would be to put them in the food processesor (but not for too long!)

Sweet potato and Cheshire cheese souffles
(adapted from Olive December 2006 issue)

25g/2tbsp butter
3 tbsp parmesan
350g/3/4lb sweet potatoes, peeled, cut, boiled, and then mashed
2tbsp plain flour
150 ml milk (a little over 1/2 cup)
75g cheshire cheese, crumbled
pinch dried chili flakes
1 tbsp chives
2 eggs, separated

Equipment:
4-6 6-oz ramekins


1. Melt the butter in a saucepan and stir in the flour. Cook for about 1 minute. The, gradually add the milk, mixing well, until you have a smooth sauce. Add the cheese, stirring until melted then stir in the chili flakes and chives. Remove from the heat and fold in the mashed sweet potatoes. Let cool slightly and then stir in the egg yolks.
2. Put your egg whites into a bowl and beat until stiff. Fold a quarter of the beaten egg whites into the potato mixture to loosen it up and then fold in the rest. Divide the batter among the individual ramekins (I used 4 6-ounce ones) and then put the ramekins onto a baking sheet.
3. Bake for about 20 to 25 minutes or until risen and golden.

Note: You might try baking the ramekins in a water bath. Put the ramekins into a baking pan and then once you've put them into the oven, fill the pan with boiling hot water halfway up to the ramekins.

Edit: I'd forgotten the cheese in the recipe. Silly me but I've now updated it! :D

Meron Pan

For those of you that like Japanese sweets (e.g. manjuu, pocky, etc.), you might like meron pan (Melon Bread). Its basically a sweet bun with various flavors including melon and maple and there are some that have anko (sweet red bean paste) inside. We went to a Japanese market in Mountain View this weekend and I picked up a couple as sometimes they are hard to find.

I'm not sure where you can order them online but if you ever stop by a Japanese market and find them try them out!

Oh and a small little Japanese trivia for you. "Meron" is a japanization of the english word "melon" and "pan" is also a borrowed word from Portuguese meaning "bread".

Pumpkin Pie Pancakes

Sorry for the lack of good quality in the picture. I need to get a tripod for my camera so I can take better pictures.

So I decided to scrap the whole panna cotta thing since I didn't feel like getting more buttermilk. A poster at the Nigella board told me that it was probably because I did not melt the gelatin all the way which I think is entirely possible. I was reading a Cooks Illustrated recipe that said you needed to stir the gelatin and milk mixture for at least 10 minutes before chilling it. Gale's recipe just said to stir it in and then pour them into the ramekins so poopies on her (and me for not knowing I guess :P).

After the all-savory breakfasts last weekend, my boyfriend finally said he might like something sweet for breakfast so I made these pumpkin pie pancakes since he loves pumpkin pie so much. They actually do taste like pumpkin pie... at least just the custard part of the pumpkin pie and not the crust, mind you. :P They are very soft and fluffy (kind of a melt in your mouth type of pancake) but it was a big pain to flip them so I suggest making smaller versions of these.. not more than 4 inches wide (Personally I like my pancakes bigger than 4 inches but its hard to get away with that with this recipe.)

Note: This recipe is actually served with Spiced Pumpkin Ice Cream and has the recipe included. I don't have an ice cream maker (boo!) so I'm not going to post the recipe (scrooge, I am!). It tastes lovely with whipped cream and maple syrup though. :)

Pumpkin Pie Pancakes
(from Pancakes: From Morning to Midnight by Dorie Greenspan)

Dry Ingredients:
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup granulated sugar
3 tbsp (packed) brown sugar
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ground ginger
1/8 tsp freshly grated nutmeg
Pinch of cloves
Pinch of salt

Wet Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups buttermilk
2 large eggs
4 tbsp (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, melted
2 tbsp dark rum (optional)
1 tsp pure vanilla extract

To fold in:
3/4 cup canned solid-pack pumpkin


Combine dry ingredients in one bowl, wet ingredients in another bowl. Make sure everything is at room temperature, otherwise your melted butter might scramble your eggs.

Combine your wet and dry ingredients together. Do not overmix! Lumpiness is good! Next, fold in your pumpkin.

Preheat your griddle or skillet to about 350F. I don't have an electric skillet so I just set my electric stove to medium heat. You can also lightly oil or butter your skillet but I've always found that to get in the way of a nice-evenly browned pancake. Only oil if you are using nonstick (IMO). Have your oven slightly warmed so that you can keep your pancakes warm while you are cooking the rest of the batch.

Spoon about 1/4 cup of batter onto the griddle for each pancake and allow space for spreading. When the bottoms are golden brown and bubbles are coming up to the top, flip over carefully.

Serve immediately with warmed maple syrup, fluffy whipped cream, and nice cup of joe. :)

Recipe #4: Buttermilk Panna Cotta with Strawberry Mash

I am starting to lose faith in Gale. This is the third failure out of the four recipes I've tried in the book. I'm not sure what I did wrong but when I made this custard dessert, the gelatin totally separated from the custard leaving a clear liquidy mess speckled with my precious vanilla beans. I am a bit disappointed since the custard part still tasted good... but just a bit powdery (not sure why). Maybe the gelatin didn't soften enough before I added it to the buttermilk mixture (it was a least 3 or 4 minutes though) but why would it separate? Most of the recipes I see online are pretty similar to Gale's... I wonder why it messed up. Blah.

On a more positive note, I jumped on the bandwagon and baked a Minimalist Loaf. Its actually my second once since my first one didn't get such a good rise. I'll post some pictures as soon as I've cut it open.

Ladyfingers with strawberries and cream

I'm finally back to Gale's book. These turned out to be quite divine... they were like little cakes with a sweet, slightly crunchy exterior but a warm, soft, velvety delicate "cakeness" inside. They are definitely pretty different from the crunchy ones you can buy at like Trader Joes... I hope they will hold up in a tiramisu because I'm set on making one. :)

Since the only leavening in these cookies is the egg whites, I was pretty careful about not overbeating the whites. I did this by using an egg method I had read about in one of Chris Kimball's books. For soft peaks, a raw egg placed in the beaten egg whites will fall to the bottom; for medium peaks, the raw egg falls into the egg whites but not all the way to the bottom; and for hard peaks, the egg sits right on top of the beaten egg whites. I wouldn't recommend using this test each time you need to beat egg whites but if you're not familiar with the egg whites being at one of these stages you can try it. By the way, when I stuck my hand in the egg white foam it felt like I was touching cotton... or a cloud. It was actually something I wasn't expecting but nice. :)

Ladyfingers

(from Chocolate & Vanilla by Gale Gand)

5 large eggs, separated (Note: I think you will need to let these go to room temperature before beating them)

1/4 cup granulated sugar

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1 cup powdered sugar, plus extra for dusting the ladyfingers

1 scant cup cake flour

On a piece of parchment paper, draw 2 parallel lines 4 inches apart to use as a guide for piping the ladyfingers. Draw a second set of lines 1 1/2 inches from the first set. Turn the paper over and place pencil-side down on a cookie sheet.

Preheat the oven to 375F. Have a large pastry bag fitted with a large (1/2-inch) plain tip ready.

To make the ladyfingers, in a mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, whip the egg yolks and granulated sugar on medium speed until the mixture is light and thickened and falls back in a ribbon when the whisk is lifted from the batter, about 5 minutes. Stir in the vanilla.

In another clean, dry bowl, whip the egg whites on low speed until they're foamy, then increase the speed to medium and whip while adding the powdered sugar gradually, increase the speed to high and whip until the whites hold a stiff peak.

Sift half of the cake flour over the yolks and fold in the flour using a rubber spatula. Fold the whipped whites into the yolks and then sift and fold in the remaining flour.

Fill the pastry bag with the batter and pipe finger-thick stripes 1 1/2 inches apart between the sets of parallel lines.

Sift powdered sugar heavily over the tops of the lady fingers.

Bake until golden brown, 8 to 10 minutes. Let the ladyfingers cool on the cookie sheet before lifting them off the parchment paper.

Serve with sweetened whipped cream and strawberries. :)

Spanakopita

I bought this lovely book I Like You: Hospitality Under the Influence written by the comedian/actress Amy Sedaris. Its very entertaining and funny and has tons of recipes (that are not fake :). The best part that I like about this book is the retro-looking pictures of the food. It reminds me of my grandmother and all her old cookbook and recipe books from the 1960s. I highly recommend at least taking a look at this book the next time you go to the bookstore. The cover is gorgeous as well. ;)

So here is the recipe for Spanakopita or Greek Spinach pie. The filling turned out very tasty and didn't have an overly strong taste of greens. I actually used all fresh spinach for this recipe even though it calls for 30 ounces of frozen spinach. I don't really recommend this as you'll have to boil up a stockpot full of water and blanch all your spinach and then wring out the water. Well, you'll have to do that for the frozen spinach too but at least that's one less pot to clean. :P

Brushing each layer of the phyllo dough was very time consuming and as dinnertime was approaching fast I didn't do the whole entire 1 lb package. It still turned out fine and I've read some other recipes that used less phyllo dough.

Spanakopita

5 eggs
3 10-ounce packages of frozen, chopped spinach, defrosted (ring out any water using cheesecloth or dishrag) Note: You can use equal amounts of fresh spinach weighing it AFTER blanching them in boiling water
8 ounces cream cheese, softened
8 ounces crumbled feta cheese
Olive Oil
2 bunches of chopped green onions, sauteed
1 tbsp chopped parsley
Dill, fennel (optional)
3 tbsp of Parmesan cheese
1 1-pound of box of phyllo pastry
1/2 cup butter, melted

1. Preheat oven to 350F.
2. In a mixer or food processor, beat the eggs until fluffy. Add all ingredients (except for phyllo) and process. Note: I would put the ingredients in this order after the eggs: cream cheese, feta cheese, cottage cheese.. blend... spinach, green onions, parsley, parmesan cheese, and a dash of the olive oil... blend.
2. Butter a 9 x 13 x 3 inch pan. One sheet at a time, lay the phyllo dough into the pan and brush the butter onto each sheet inbetween. After about half the box, spread your spinach filling on top of the phyllo pastry. Continue with rest of phyllo dough until box is finished (or until you get tired of doing it :)
3. You can precut the pie at this point and place in the freezer until ready to bake. Bake for 45-50 minutes or until top is brown and crispy.

Tyler's Videos

Food Network has a series of holiday cooking videos done by Tyler Florence that you can view. It's actually pretty cool and his dishes look very yummy. I'm most especially interested in the chocolate mousse and chocolate bourbon pecan pie.

I didn't realize Tyler got a little chubby now. hah


Click here for the videos