EllenFork

A Throne Fit for a Cake

 It's January. It's cold. It's the perfect time of year to hole up in your cozy apartment and just make things, food things. It's the time of year when braising, baking and roasting are the perfect methods of cooking, since it is really too cold to go out and do anything. Might as well lurk around with a myriad of cooking magazines, books and websites, plotting the next culinary foray.

This weekend I had planned my culinary entertainment around two very important and very new additions to my kitchen arsenal. First, the lovely red Le Creuset 5 1/2 quart dutch oven I received for Christmas. That fiery red siren has been calling my name since it's arrival in December, but I had yet to properly utilize it. Second, the absolutely lovely glass cake dome given to me by my friend Becca as a hostess gift. I've been prowling around in search of such a vessel for a while, until this baby just landed, literally, on my doorstep. When I saw the package outside my door, I was afraid I had sleep-ordered something off the internet.

Anyway, something had to be done to fill these two items with delectable foods. Little did I know that a winter snowstorm would leave me cozy and captive for all of Saturday! Perfect conditions for a baking, stewing bonanza.

I'll go ahead and tell you that the dutch oven was used for a Cassoulet, but I'm not blogging that one til later, since it has so many damn ingredients and I'm just not up for it at the moment. So instead I will tell you all about the lovely cake that I enthroned in the dome! Enthroned in the dome, enthroned in the dome, enthroned in the dome... say that one ten times fast. 

I used a recipe from Cooks Illustrated for the cake itself. Have I mentioned how much I love Cook's Illustrated? My mother gave me a subscription, and I fell for it, hard. I think it's the side by side comparison of appliances that truly speaks to me...and the step-by-step illustrated directions for dummies. For the icing I improvised on recipe from the Kitchen-Aid booklet that came with my stand mixer. Sometimes the best recipes are found in random places, like the instruction manual of an appliance or the back of a box. If you are dying to use a specific ingredient, I recommend looking on the maker's website or the back of the package for a recipe that is totally based around it. 

Here is a truly delicious, moist and totally perfected cake recipe:

Rich and Tender Yellow Cake

Makes two 9-inch cakes.    Published March 1, 1999 in Cook's Illustrated.  

To quickly bring the eggs and milk to room temperature (65°F), submerge them in a bowl of warm water for about 10 minutes after mixing them together. Adding the butter pieces to the mixing bowl one at a time prevents the dry ingredients from flying up and out of the bowl.

4	large eggs , room temperature
1/2	cup whole milk , room temperature
2	teaspoons vanilla extract
2 1/4	cups sifted cake flour (or if you only have all purpose, subtract 2 tbsp from each sifted cup)
1 1/2	cups granulated sugar
2	teaspoons baking powder
3/4	teaspoon table salt
1/2	pound unsalted butter (2 sticks), softened, each stick cut into 8 pieces

Instructions

1. 1. Adjust oven rack to lower-middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. Generously grease two 9-by-1 1/2-inch cake pans with vegetable shortening and cover pan bottoms with rounds of parchment paper or wax paper. Grease parchment rounds, dust cake pans with flour, and tap out excess.

2. 2. Beat eggs, milk, and vanilla with fork in small bowl; measure out 1 cup of this mixture and set aside. Combine flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt in bowl of standing mixer fitted with paddle attachment; mix on lowest speed to blend, about 30 seconds. With mixer still running at lowest speed, add butter one piece at a time; mix until butter and flour begin to clump together and look sandy and pebbly, with pieces about the size of peas, 30 to 40 seconds after all butter is added. Add reserved 1 cup of egg mixture and mix at lowest speed until incorporated, 5 to 10 seconds. Increase speed to medium-high (setting 6 on KitchenAid) and beat until light and fluffy, about 1 minute. Add remaining egg mixture (about 1/2 cup) in slow steady stream, about 30 seconds. Stop mixer and thoroughly scrape sides and bottom of bowl. Beat on medium-high until thoroughly combined and batter looks slightly curdled, about 15 seconds longer. (To mix using hand mixer, whisk flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt in large bowl. Add butter pieces and cut into the flour mixture with a pastry blender. Add reserved 1 cup of egg mixture; beat with hand mixer at lowest speed until incorporated, 20 to 30 seconds. Increase speed to high, add remaining egg mixture, and beat until light and fluffy, about 1 minute. Stop mixer and thoroughly scrape sides and bottom of bowl. Beat at high speed 15 seconds longer.)

3. 3. Divide batter equally between prepared cake pans; spread to sides of pan and smooth with rubber spatula. Bake until cake tops are light golden and skewer inserted in center comes out clean, 20 to 25 minutes. (Cakes may mound slightly but will level when cooled.) Cool on rack 10 minutes. Run a knife around pan perimeter to loosen. Invert cake onto large plate, peel off parchment, and re-invert onto lightly greased rack. Cool completely before icing.

 

Chocolate Buttercream Frosting (adapted from Kitchen-Aid manual)

1/3 cup butter, softened

1/4 cup cream or evap. milk

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 splash almond extract, if you like

1/4 tsp salt

4 cups powdered sugar, divided

low-fat milk, if necessary

Place butter in mixer bowl. Attach bowl and flat beater to mixer. Turn to Speed 4 (see what I mean, I love how this recipe has the exact speeds, since it is made by KA!) and beat about 1 minute, or until creamy. Stop and scrape bowl. Add cream, vanilla, almond, salt and 1 cup powdered sugar. Turn to Stir Speed and mix about 30 seconds. Stop and scrape bowl. Stick your finger in and lick it. Turn to Speed 2 and mix about 1 1/2 minutes, or until well blended. Stop and scrape bowl.

Turn to stir speed. Gradually add remaining 3 cups powdered sugar and mix until blended. Stop and scrap bowl if necessary. Add milk, 1 tsp at a time, if necessary (I did). Turn to Speed 4 and beat about 1 minute or until smooth.

This makes enough for a two layer cake. Oh yeah, and I sprinkled PECANS all over the top!! Yum!

Make this for people you want to like you. After they eat it, they won't care what you said about their mother anymore. They'll like you. It's THAT kind of cake.

New Year, New Whatever

Well well well, here we are again at the beginning of a new year. I had just started to get used to the last one and now 2010 just comes out of nowhere, the jerk. Much like the rest of the populace, I am vowing to quit wallowing around in my own filth (figuratively of course). Naturally I am trying to eat healthier and exercise more, but I think everyone feels that way after swimming through the veritable pools of butter, wine and lard that come along with the holidays. Seriously, I'm on a lean meat, cruciferous veggie, cheese-reduced lifestyle bender and so far I feel way less sluggish. Additionally, two more realistic goals for this year are to BE POSITIVE!!!! and to TAKE ACTION!!! You know, do what I say I am going to do... kind of like the millions of times I swear up and down that I'm going to write a blog post (even going to far as to make and photograph something! There are many lovely posts waiting to debut in 2010...) and get distracted by something shiny. Shiny like my brand new RED KITCHEN AID ARTISAN MIXER! Boyfriend S. has scored major brownie points. And yes, that's a pun because I'm totally gonna make him BROWNIES WITH IT! God, I'm hilarious.

ANYWAY, who cares about my personal trials and tribulations. This post is about COOKIES, y'all. Yeah, yeah, I know I just said that I'm cutting down on the crap, but these cookies are actually good for you(ish). Cooking Light magazine says so. (PS- Has anyone noticed how much better that mag has gotten lately?? The pictures, the recipes, the columnists, it's all so much more readable. Many less Mom-ish articles (sorry moms) and ads for incontinence drugs)

The following recipe is one I snagged from this month's Cooking Light, but I've used various other oatmeal cookie recipes through the years to create chocolate-cherry oatmeal cookies. So, if you have your fave oatmeal cookie recipe, just throw in some cherries and chocolate and you're in biz. The actual title of these cookies is "Chocolate-Cherry Heart Smart Cookies", but I don't want to sound too healthy. I'm renaming them to...

Choco-Cherry Oatmeal Chompers

(by Marcie Dixon, featured in the Jan/Feb 2010 issue)

Ingredients:

1.5 oz (or 1/3 cup) all-purpose flour

1.5 oz (or 1/3 cup) whole-wheat flour

1 1/2 cups old-fashioned rolled oats

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

6 tbsp unsalted butter

3/4 cup light brown sugar

1 cup dried cherries (I used Bing)

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 large egg, lightly beaten

3 oz bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped (I used semisweet chunks)

Cooking spray

First, preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Combine flours and the next three ingredients (through salt) in a mixing bowl (the bowl of your pretty red stand mixer, if that's what you're using...). Stir with a whisk.

Meanwhile, melt butter in a small saucepan until melted. Remove from heat and add brown sugar, stirring until it becomes smooth. For me, they never fulling incorporated, but that doesn't seem to matter. Then add sugar mixture to the flour mixture and beat with a mixer at medium speed, until well blended.

Add cherries, vanilla and egg, beating until combined. Fold in chocolate. Drop the dough onto a silpat or greased cookie sheet by the tablespoon, 2 inches apart. Bake at 350 degrees for 12 minutes. Remove pans from oven and let sit for 3 minutes; then remove cookies from pans and cool on wire racks.

Yield: 30 cookies (although for some reason I only got 22...not sure why)

And because this is Cooking Light, here is the nutritional info!

Serving size: 1 cookie    Calories:94 Fat: 3.2g Protein: 1.5 g Carb: 15.7g annnnd who cares about the other values, these are enough. And, they're not so bad! So enjoy one of these lil cookies for breakfast or a quick snack during the day without feeling like a slob. You deserve it.

Happy New Year!

A Shameless Tart

Again with the summer fruits. I can't help myself...this time though, we're talking apricots. Take a step outside your comfort zone, the zone where apricots are shriveled up little gnome-like fruits that hang out in bags of only sort of delicious trail mix. 

These apricots were for real. Which is why I made them into a tart. Because that's how they roll. Another recipe from the Zuni Cookbook, before I am forced to return it to the library (actually, as of this post, it is late). I love how Judy Rodgers writes these recipes as if she was in your kitchen with you, explaining this to you. The details are so specific! At one point she describes the consistency of the dough as "humid grape-nuts", which seems weird but you know exactly what she means when you see it! I can't really do it justice in my descriptions, you must buy or borrow the book to get the true experience. In the meantime, I will do my best to explain. Here goes.

Apricot Tart from Zuni Cafe

Ingredients:

Basic Tart Dough "with a little flake"

1 c all purpose flour

8 tbsp cold salted butter (1 stick)

Up to 2 tsp sugar (optional)  

Fruit Filling

1 lb firm-ripe apricots
1/3 c sugar
2 or 3 pinches of salt

First, prepare the dough as you will want to freeze it before using it. On a cool work surface or wide bowl, mix flour and sugar.

Cut the stick of butter lengthwise into about 1/4 in slices. Coat each slice with flour on both sides and squish each piece with your fingers til the slices become little shards. Now fold the sheets and shards of butter into the flour, squishing them together and breaking them into shards repeatedly. Do this until you have about 2/3 crumbs and 1/3 flakes of butter in your mixture.

Now trickle 1 tbsp of ice water evenly over this clump of strangely textured dough. Stir it all together and work it with your fingertips. Here is where you should see the "moist sawdust begin to look like humid Grape-Nuts". Mass the dough and knead it a bit. At this point, add a few more drops of water if your dough feels really dry- it will prob be sticky, so flour up those fingers. Now, on a lightly floured surface, knead this all into a smooth ball. Put the ball between sheets of plastic wrap and press into a disk about 1 in thick and smooth the surface with a rolling pin. Wrap up that dough and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes to let the Gluten relax. The Gluten had a hard day at the office, so it really needs some quiet fridge time, preferably with a Scotch.

When the Gluten is done being a lazy SOB, roll it out and place it into a 9 1/2 in tart shell pan. Wrap with plastic wrap and freeze before filling and baking. You can do this a day or two ahead of time, but make sure its wrapped well, to prevent freezer burn. You don't want a tart crust that tastes like frozen Brussels sprouts (or DO you...?!).

OK NOW! Time for the fruit.

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

Cut your 'cots in half, remove the pits and quarter them. Toss them with sugar and salt to taste, in a large bowl. You will want this much sugar, since cooking will bring out the acidity and tannins in the skins of the apricots. Place the fruit in neat circles in the crust, skin side down. The fruits are friends, so they should touch but don't stack or crowd them. Haven't you ever heard of PERSONAL SPACE?! Scrape the sugar sludge from the bowl over the tart. 

Bake tart until crust is golden brown and the fruit is soft and has begun to caramelize. This is usually about 50 min, but it took a bit longer for me. If at any point the crust looks burny but the fruit needs more time, quickly take the tart out and protect the crust with strips of aluminum foil. Just tear some off and gently press it over the rim, without breaking any of it.

While the description may be a bit long, this is a SUPER EASY TART!!! It really only has a handful or so of ingredients. I enjoyed it for dessert and then AGAIN for breakfast! It did not last long in my home, sadly.

Enjoy!

A Cupcake Bakes in Brooklyn

As some of you may know, I am not the only female in my family with a penchant for food. Aside from the obvious interested parties (me, my mother), my twin sister Alice is a beast in the kitchen as well. And not only that, but she is married. Do you know what this means, my little chickadees? It means she has every delightful dish, serving utensil and gadget that a foodie could want. Kitchen Aid mixer? Check. Wire cooling rack? Check. Recipe for deadly, butter-soaked cupcakes? CHECK. Did I mention Al is particularly talented in the Dark Arts (and by that, I mean baking)?

Recently my cupcake-loving sis entered a neighborhood Cupcake Bake-off in her Brooklyn neighborhood. Not one to venture lightly into a competition, good ol' Al decided to make some cupcakes that would stun, terrify and enchant all who encountered them. CHOCOLATE OATMEAL CUPCAKES WITH MAPLE-BACON BUTTERCREAM?!? MARGARITA CUPCAKES? WHAT?!

Please read her guest post below for a true account of a Cupcake Queen. AND she was interviewed and photographed by the Daily News!!!

[Note: Alice was misquoted here. Instead of ""Home bakers should be afraid of experimenting with savory flavors." the quote should be "Home bakers should NOT be afraid of experimenting with savory flavors." DUH!]

Read more: "A Brooklyn cupcake bakeoff savors a mix of exotic flavors and frostings"

 

"The cupcake trend sweeping the food nation for the past few years is going strong in Brooklyn.  How do I know this? Because I was one of 65 entrants into the 3rd Annual Cupcake Bake Off put on by The Brooklyn Kitchen.  Last year, I was but a mere cupcake enthusiast, showing up to Union Pool, a local watering hole,  to sample cupcakes and beers (which go together great, btw. I recommend a light, citrusy weissbier or hefeweizen!).  I was so envious of all those proud cupcake bakers, standing behind their adorable little 'cakes and happily explaining flavors and decorations.  Next year, I vowed, that would be me.  So, on Monday May 11th, I spent 9 hours baking and 2.5 hours basking in the glory of Cupcake World.

I have had a recipe from the New York Times bookmarked since February: "Chocolate Oatmeal Cupcakes with Maple Bacon Buttercream". "WHAT?!" I squealed when I stumbled upon it. "BACON?!" So, duh. Decision made.  An unutterable, ungodly amount of butter was used to make these cupcakes, as documented in my photos.  I nicknamed them "Lil' Heart Attacks", which is very appropriate. I made 2 dozen of those little charmers, I also made a dozen of what I called "Margarita Cupcakes". They were basically lime cupcakes with a lime zest buttercream icing, sprinkled with grey sea salt. I only made a dozen of those and they flew so fast I didn't even get to sample one!  From what I heard, they were very light and moist and tasty.  Check them out here, on a local NYC blog. They were lugged over to Union Pool in my handy dandy cupcake carrier that was a wedding gift...that I registered for (thank you, Kasia!).

 I had such a blast just sitting and chatting with the sugared up crowd.  I had entreaties from a guy to make trays of them for a party, who declared "these are the cupcakes from a girl you take home to mom". The Daily News came by and took photos and interviewed me. I am quoted in the online article, but my picture made the printed version! My only regret is that I didn't have very much time to schmooze around with other contestants because I was manning my Bacon Station.  Luckily, the nice girls sitting next to me amassed a major cupcake stash. I seriously think they had almost one of each! They were very generous and let me snack on their horde. Thanks, anonymous cupcake hoarders!

Alas, I didn't win anything. But I had such a nice time scarfing cupcakes, sampling other bakers' wares, and enjoying the spring evening that I don't even care. Next year, next year....."

Gonna Butter Your Biscuits...

Hey, y'all. It's biscuit time.

Any good southerner worth their salt has sampled many biscuits in their day, topped with gravy, preserves, jam, honey, ham, sausage, eggs, bacon or maybe even just butter. The biscuit is a mighty vehicle for items both savory and sweet! And remarkably easy to "fix". You probably have all these ingredients in your pantry RIGHT THIS SECOND! Except maybe buttermilk. The whole reason I decided to make these biscuits is the half carton of buttermilk that was languishing in my fridge (the other half met its demise in a vat of mashed potatoes- an honorable death).

This recipe is from the book Slow Food Nation's Come to the Table: The Slow Food Way of Living edited by Katrina Heron. It's a fantastic book about small farms in California. Accounts of daily existence, raison d'etre and some of their finest fresh food recipes are part of why this book is so wonderful...not to mention a foreword by my personal hero, Alice Waters (more on her later!).

Before I share this recipe, let me just say that I am not a very good baker. I am bad at math, and I season all my dishes by taste (which is why I have trouble translating the ones I make up into recipes...a dash is not very precise...), and I have learned through trial and error that baking does not operate the same way. That being said, these biscuits arrived hot and delicious with little to no crying or cursing on my part. Because I did not have baking soda, I subbed extra baking powder (which is an acceptable remedy, according to some cookbooks) and they were not extremely fluffy, but very yummy.

Now that I've confessed, here is the recipe:

Paul's Best Biscuit Recipe from Come to the Table
Sweet Home Ranch

2 cups all-purpose unbleached flour
1 1/2 tablespoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/3 cup unsalted butter, frozen
1 1/4 cup buttermilk (with 2% butterfat)

Ok, first preheat the oven to a blistering 450 degrees. Blend flour, b. powder, b. soda and salt. Cut the frozen butter into little pieces and blend into the four mixture with a pastry cutter (which I do not have) or two sharp knives (which I do have). Add b. milk and mix.

Now, on a surface that you have liberally sprinkled with flour, flatten dough to about 1" thick and fold in half. Do this about three times quickly, but no more than that. Flatten dough to 3/4" thick. Use a jar or other vessel with a small mouthed opening to cut into rounds. Clean any dough from the mouth of whatever you are using and coat with flour before cutting more rounds. Otherwise it will stick and cause unsightly, malformed biscuit rounds. Horrors.

Use up all the dough in this way. Bake until golden, Paul recommends 10 min. Serve hot, with jam and a smile. 

This makes about 12 biscuits, so share!