A very special Birthday Treat

Hai's special fruit tart

(apple and blueberries tart with chocolate banana filling)

My dear friend Hai had his Birthday last Saturday, and he was so depressed. I am not sure why, he is still young and living a pretty good life. But whatever the reason I felt bad. I am pretty cheery on my Birthday, it's my excuse to pamper myself. For the past two years I spent my special day at the spa with one of my best friends. I usually go on a shopping spree, renewing my wardrobe. Or I surround myself with some good friends and cook them a special meal. That's my special day, when everything can happen. Anything to feel good, right ?

So, I had to intervene. Via Facebook chat, since it's the norm now. "Hai, what would make you feel better? Do you want me to make you a Bday dessert?" [excitment on the internet] "OMG yes make me a fruit tart !". I serve to please, so you know what's next...:)

Hai is a very sweet person, he deserved a new creation, a special tart that could bear his name. Because his birthday falls in February, I used two common winter fruits, apples and blueberries. That's what on top for everyone to see. Pretty and easy to arrange in a pattern. But beneath it all hides more sweetness to be discovered, a mixture of chocolate and banana that lingers on the palate and makes you yearn for another bite.

Hai loved it ! But most importantly his spirits were lifted. And he did blow all his candles :)

The recipe:

Crust (see previous post):

1 cup flour, 1/3 cup almond flour, 4 oz butter, 1 egg, 1 tsp almond extract.

Bottom Filling:

1 banana, 1/3 cup choclate chips, 3 tbs half and half cream, 5 tbs almond flour, 2 tbs kalua liquor

Melt the chocolate chips on low heat and add to the pureed banana. Mix in the half and half, the almond flour, and the liquor. Spread the mixture on top of the crust and chill for 15 minutes to harden the chocolate. It makes it easier in the next step.
Top filling:

3 apples, 1 oz butter, 5 tbs sugar, pint of blueberries.

Peel, core and cut the apples in eight thick wedges. Cook them in a pan with the butter and the sugar on medium heat until the sides are browning. They should be soft. Put them aside and add the washed blueberries to the leftover juice in the pan. Cook for 1 minute and set aside.

Place the apple wedges on top of the hardened chocolate banana, in a creative pattern of your choice. Pour the egg cream (below) slowly as to not know disturb the pattern, then sprinkle the berries.

Cream:

2 eggs, 4 tbs sugar, 3 tbs marsala wine, 1/2 pint half and half cream.

Mix eggs and sugar together, then add the marsala wine and the cream. Pour the egg cream on the apples.

Bake the tart for an hour at 350F. Serve warm or cold, by itself or with ice cream. And don't forget the birthday candles !

Chocolate Cake Pudding...

...or How to Recover from a Kitchen Accident and Look Fabulous !


Don't you hate it when you make your best cake ever, right on time so it will be slightly warm when served, and kaboooom ! You drop it ! We all have those horror stories. They are all too real, unfortunately. But I find that's in the face of adversity that we can make huge leaps in creativity. Let me share my story, which happened this past week-end...


I was pumped, ready to make my sin-delicious chocolate cake for the ceramics studio opening, Clay Associates. I stopped at the grocery store on my way from work to stock up on eggs (good thinking in retrospect!), and once home I started at once. Cake batter was ready in 20 minutes following the recipe on my previous post. I even added some clementine rind (out of oranges) for extra flavor (great combo !). I baked the cake for 30 minutes, it looked good, it smelled good, I was on a roll. I took it out of the oven, the kitchen towel I used to grab the pan slipped thus exposing my ring finger to the hot pan. Surprised, I screamed well-placed expletives while dropping my creation upside down on the lowered oven door! Followed by 10 seconds of silence, a minute of self-cursing, then heavy sweat. "What am I going to do ?" I could easily salvage the cake but it was in no shape presentable anymore.

What ensued was the longest 5 minutes in my life. I was processing thousands of ideas in my mind to turn my proverbial lemons into lemonade. I settled for the quick and easy, as I was running out of time. I made my first pudding !

You see, pudding originally is recycled bread, old bread that's too hard to eat. It is crumbled and soaked in a sweet egg-based cream to find new life as a warm dessert, excellent with ice-cream. Suddenly, it was the perfect solution for my problems.

Here is what I did.

1) I boiled a pint of half and half with a pint of fat-free milk (normally I would simply boil whole milk but I was out) and 1/2 cup sugar.

2) I beat 4 eggs and slowly added the warm milk to it while turning.

3) I added some vanilla flavor (1/8 teaspon) (it's optional and can be substituted with your favorite flavoring including alcohols!)

4) I crumbled the chocolate cake in small pieces and let them soak in the egg cream for 20 minutes

5) I transfered the mixture into a greased loaf pan and baked at 320F for 45 minutes.

The pudding was still warm when I brought it to the studio. It was an instant hit and disappeared quickly ! Light, soft, chocolatey with a smooth orangy flavor, not too sweet, it was divine, or as one guest told me "one bite and I went to Heaven!". Best compliment ever !

Sweet Chocolate Bites

Bouchees Gourmandes au Chocolat

(Sweet Chocolate Bites)

Well, the brioche fun continues...I made a big batch of brioche dough last week-end with a bit of whole wheat mixed in (see earlier post). Too much to use up at once. So I kept the leftover in the fridge in a zip-lock bag for about 5 days. According to the website Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day, that's the limit before freezing the dough. No problemo ! I've been tempted to make chocolate croissants with the brioche dough for a while. I do love my chocolate :) To make sure I had enough dough to share the sweets, I decided to go for the bite-size category. Easy to sample, great for a guilt-less snack, and fun for kids to bite into.

After days in the fridge, dough was not sticky anymore. It was like playing with soft clay. So I took small pieces, flattened them in a circles, filled them up with semi-sweet chocolate chips (the kind you use for cookies), wrapped the chocolate chips with dough and rolled the dough into a ball between my hands. When all the dough was used, I whipped an egg with a tablespoon of sugar and some vanilla flavoring, and I thoroughly brushed the egg glaze all around the dough balls to get that shiny light brown color.

Before

After

After baking at 375F for about 30 minutes (overkill, I got distracted by the dog), I obtained a full tray of bite-sized buns with a heart of melted chocolate ! I noticed the buns did not rise much. It could be because of the dough freshness or because I flattened it in the process.

While best out of the oven, the buns can be heated up in a microwave for 20 seconds to recapture that hot and fresh taste with oozing chocolate. One can imagine replacing the chocolate chips for other appropriate fillings, including jams, peanut butter, white chocolate, etc...or mixture thereof !

Great for breakfast, morning or afternoon snacks, you can slide a few in your pocket to enjoy later. And if you've got more to spare, don't forget your friends !

Having some chocolate fun !

Pierre's Marble Cake

Sometimes I just like to take the mixing bowl out, some eggs, sugar and flour and start mixing something up with no specific idea in mind. I call it "spontaneous baking" :) With the basic elements on the kitchen counter, I let my eyes wander around the kitchen, from the fridge to the fruit bowl and the pantry, looking for something to stimulate my imagination. This simple (and sometimes random) experimentation is what discovered some interesting pairing, like mixing coconut and almond flours to regular flour for texture.
Today was slightly different. I started by taking out my baking tools, as well as the eggs and butter out of the fridge, with images of chocolate cakes in mind. Unfortunately, I did not have enough chocolate on hand ! Not being one for running out the door to the neighborhood grocery store, I had to compromise with a marble cake.
I like making marble cakes, for one simple reason: mixing the batter with the chocolate batter. Depending on how you do the mixing, you can get wonderful designs. And you won't know until you cut the cake. Like opening a Christmas present :)
The picture is of the cake I made today. Notice how perfectly round the chocolate portion turned out ! The chocolate batter was poured right along the center, then the last portion was distributed on top for a crusty chocolate top. Poured differently, the chocolate batter can yield other designs, it's a fun experiment to do with kids.
Here is my recipe. Have fun with it !

Ingredients:

• 3 large eggs
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 6 oz melted butter
• 1.5 cup flour
• baking power
• 1/2 cup whole milk
• 4 oz Ghiradelli chocolate (60% cocoa)
• 1/8 cup Grand Marnier liquor (optional)

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 380F.
2. Mix the eggs and the sugar until homogeneous, then add the butter.
3. Mix in the flour and the baking powder.
4. Mix in the milk, with the liquor if desired.
5. Pour half the batter into a greased pan.
6. To the other half in the bowl, add the melted chocolate and mix it until it's completely blended.
7. Now the fun part is pouring the chocolate batter on top of the regular batter in the pan.
8. Bake at 380F for an hour.

Just writing this post gave me a few ideas to try when mixing the two batters together :)
Enjoy and experiment !

You Wanna Piece of Me ??!!!

It was only a matter of time before the classy chocolate cake that melts in your mouth makes its appearance on my blog. A star of the dessert world, its wide appeal rests on one simple truth: good quality chocolate! If you are to dedicate your time to its confection, please do not degrade its magnificence with what I call chocolate-flavored wax. Sacrebleu! At the very minimum use 60% cocoa chocolate (semisweet to bittersweet). Personally I choose at least 70% for a true chocolate flavor. In other words, if you are going to swallow those calories, make it worth it !

I did mention calories. Well, yes, at 2 sticks of butter and sugar to match, it is not for the weightwatcher. I am sure you can find a low calorie alternative out there, with fake sugar and, gasp, fake butter, but I won't comment on the taste. So I'll let you in on a little secret. There is a reason for maximizing the cocoa content, hence the bitterness, of the cake: a tiny piece and you are satisfied. Dependent, of course, of your level of addiction to the black substance :)

So here is how I satisfy my cocoa addiction. Welcome to my Hell ! :)

Ingredients:

• 8 oz chocolate, minimum 70% cocoa
• 8 oz unsalted butter
• 8 oz sugar
• 4 eggs
• 1/3 cup flour
• 2 table spoons of Kailua liquor

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 360F
2. Melt the chocolate on low
3. In the meantime, mix the soft butter (I soften it in the microwave for 15 seconds) and the sugar until you get a creamy consistency
4. Add the eggs one by one, mixing each egg with the batter for a minute each
5. Add the melted chocolate and mix well
6. Add the flour and mix well
7. Add the coffee liquor (it's an option) and mix well.
8. Pour into a greased cake pan (I use butter for greasing, of course) and bake for 45 minutes at 360F. You know the cake is ready when you put a knife into teh center and it comes out clean. Be careful not to overcook the cake or it could get a bit on the dry side.
9. Cool the cake down, flip it to present the bottom up, and sprinkle some confection sugar on top for presentation.

Then just wait for the OOOOhs and the AAAhhhhhs :)

Pierre