by Sam Tackeff | Mar 1, 2009 | Baking
After making the beautiful Meringues Chantilly for this weeks Barefoot Blogging Challenge, I had to decide what to do with the three gorgeous deep orange egg yolks that I had leftover. I was torn. A hollandaise for the asparagus that have just come in season? Some pastry cream? A sweet sabayon perhaps? I couldn’t just rush into the decision! How would I do them justice?
Ultimately I settled on some Pots de Crème, infused with the wonderful fragrance of star anise and cardamom. Two days ago was my dear friend Sara’s birthday, and together many years ago, for a miraculous little dinner party, we had made Donna Hay’s version of these star anise creams. It was the first recipe I had cooked from her most wonderful book Flavors and such a great introduction! They were so incredibly delicious. I hadn’t really used star anise before, and was just really amazed by it’s deep fragrance, and how pretty each little star was. (Devon says they look like spiders.) Because we now live on opposite coasts, and I couldn’t be home to celebrate her birthday with her, I decided to make these in her honor.
These little custards are heavenly. I’m eating one right now. What I like best about them is that you really get the taste of the spices infused into the cream. Donna Hay’s use only anise, but after a little bit of experimentation, I added the cardamom, to mimic the flavors of Indian masala chai, a spiced milky tea.
Come to think of it, you could probably do the same type of infusion with a masala chai tea bag instead of the whole spices and it would also taste delicious… perhaps that will be my next attempt.
Star Anise Pots de Creme
adapted from Donna Hay
makes 3 small custards
(can easily be doubled)
Ingredients
– 1/2 cup heavy whipping cream
– 1/2 cup milk (I used skim, but you could certainly use heavier)
– 1 clove star anise
– 2 small cardamom pods
– 3 large fresh egg yolks
– 1/4 cup sugar
– for the topping: 1/4 cup honey (optional)
Method
1. Preheat the oven to 300F. In a small sauce pan, heat milk, cream, star anise, and cardamom on low heat until hot, but not boiling. Allow to simmer for a few minutes, and take off the stove to allow the spices to infuse into the cream. After about fife minutes, remove the star anise and cardamom from the mixture.*
2. Beat the egg yolks with the sugar, until well blended. Pour about half of the (now slightly cooled) cream mixture, and mix. Stir into the rest of the cream mixture. Pour into three six ounce ramekins (I use pyrex), and place into a baking dish filled with enough water to come halfway up the side of the ramekins.
3. Bake for 30 to 35 minutes, until the center of the cream is just barely set, and remove from the baking dish and refrigerate until cool, about two hours.
4. The last step is optional. After the cremes have cooled and set, squeeze a few tablespoons of honey on top and put for a few minutes under the broiler, until the honey is just browned. [Note: because I used pyrex, I didn’t want to use the broiler, so I simply put the honey in a small sauce pan, and stirred it until it had browned, and poured it on top.]
*Instead of throwing away the cardamom and anise after they have infused the cream, you can actually save these and make yourself some delicious masala chai by heating them with some milk, tea, and a little bit of sugar! (So delicious.)
by Sam Tackeff | Feb 26, 2009 | Baking, Barefoot Blogging, Challenge
A few weeks ago, I discovered Barefoot Bloggers, a group of people who love Ina Garten, the Barefoot Contessa, just as much as I do, and who have joined together to cook through her marvelous recipes. The next recipe on the list was Ina’s Meringues Chantilly, chosen by BMK of Reservations Not Required Fantastic! I love meringues! But the question was, would it be possible to make it in my kitchen in time to post today? You see, there are rules about meringue. Fresh eggs! Metal bowl! Only on a sunny dry day! That was the one I was the most worried about…. this is San Francisco… a sunny dry day? Oh dear.
I scanned the recipe list.
My first challenge: Cream of Tartar. Hmmm.. I’ve always had cream of tartar lying around, but now I don’t have any in my new kitchen. So began the search for cream of tartar. Apparently, it’s not really something that you just buy here. Four stores later, I finally found some overpriced cream of tartar and bought it. There is nothing like spending six dollars for something you are going to use a quarter teaspoon of. Sigh.
The next part was the eggs. According to the experts, you need the freshest eggs, to help break down the protein in the whipping process. I got mine from Omnivore Books on Food, where Celia, the owner sells fresh eggs from her neighbor’s farm in addition to her well chosen selection of cook books and books on food. These eggs are the absolute best, with really big orange yolks (which because they were omitted from this recipe are about to end up in a custard).
Now for a metal bowl. I didn’t have a metal bowl, but I had a glass pyrex. Would this work well enough? According to the experts, glass should work fine- the key is not to use plastic, because the fat from previous cooking might stick to it and ruin your meringue.
Finally, Ina’s recipe called for orange liqueur, and framboise, a raspberry liqueur, although all the hard liquor I had in my house is… Seagrams Whiskey. I know. I was the queen of the liquor cabinet. Four years of collecting the finest alcoholic libations in my dorm room, and all I have now is a bottle of whiskey, in a plastic jug no less. Because my current priority is paying my rent rather than paying for the expansion of my liquor cabinet, I opted to substitute the whiskey.
Finally I was ready to make the meringues.
…And it rained hard, down pouring rain for three days. I just couldn’t do it. The experts tell you to avoid moisture- not even to run your dishwasher or boil a kettle!
Just two days ago, the sun broke through the clouds and I was prepared to make the recipe. I went to the cabinet and…. apparently we didn’t have a hand held mixer. How could I forget! Oh god, I’ve whisked meringue before, and it’s a long, arduous process with no real assurance that they will even stiffen into peaks. A quick panic led to the obvious thought- I live in an apartment building now! I could borrow a mixer!! Huzzah!! So, with the great kindness of my neighbor Khrista, the following recipe was accomplished.
The original recipe is here, but the following was my adaptation that given there are just two of us, would feed a few less than the intended recipe.
Meringues Chantilly
adapted from the Barefoot Contessa
makes 6 meringue cups
Ingredients
– 3 extra- large egg whites, at room temperature (make sure there is no yolk!)
– 1/8 teaspoon cream of tartar
– a pinch of kosher salt
– 3/4 cup granulated sugar, divided
– 1/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
– Whipped Cream, see below
– Stewed Fruit, see below (cooled slightly or it will melt your whipped cream)
Method
1. Preheat the oven to 200 Farenheit. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper (or a silpat, or foil, which is all I have and works fine).
2. Beat the egg whites, cream of tartar, and the salt on medium speed until froth. Add half a cup of the sugar, and increase the speed to high until the egg whites form very stiff peaks. Whisk in the vanilla, and carefully fold in the remaining quarter cup of sugar into the meringue.
3. Put meringue into a piping bag with a large star shaped pastry tip, or if you are me, you put it into your ziplock bag in which you have attempted to cut a star shaped tip into one of the corners. Pipe into 3 1/2 inch or so circles.
4. Bake for 2 hours, until the meringues are dry and crisp, but not browned. Then turn off the oven, and wait for four hours, or overnight. Frankly though, I think you can use them right away and they would be fine, if not even better (I like a less dry meringue).
5. On a plate or bowl, spread some of the sauce from the stewed berries, place the meringue, fill with a dollop of whipped cream, and top with the fruit and eat.
Stewed Strawberries:
1/8 cup sugar
1/8 cup water
1 teaspoon whiskey
1/8 teaspoon orange zest
Combine all the ingredients in a saucepan, and bring to a boil. Lower the heat, and cook uncovered for a few minutes, allowing the sauce to get syrupy.
Whipped Cream:
Because I was not making the whipped cream for the entire recipe, I simply used about a 1/4 cup of cream and whipped it until stiff, whipped in a teaspoon or so of sugar and some vanilla, and a tiny bit more of the whiskey. It worked wondrously.
Ina’s recipe though calls for a pint of cold heavy cream, two tablespoons of sugar, two teaspoons of vanilla extract, and a tablespoon of orange liqueur. Well, next time!
by Sam Tackeff | Feb 24, 2009 | Candy, Challenge, Turkish
Sugar High Friday is a monthly food blogging event created by Jennifer, The Domestic Goddess and is hosted each month on a different food blog. This month’s host for the event is Palachinka, and the theme is “Copycat”, where you copy one of your favorite store bought candies.
I spent a good couple of weeks thinking of the best candy I could copy. Would it be Snickers, my favorite bar candy? Pecan Divinity? Nutella? (I was seriously considering Nutella, until I realized that it would completely ruin any semblance of a healthy diet if I made it and then ate the entire concoction in two days.)
Finally I turned to Turkish candies, because Turkey happens to have some of the best confections: Lokum (Turkish Delight), Dragees (chocolate covered nuts and orange peels), Pişmaniye (a type of wispy candy floss that I can’t describe with any justice). My mother happens to be in Turkey this week, and now that I live across the country from her, I know that I’m going to be depressed when she returns and I get calls of what wonderful things she has brought home. Maybe she will send me a care package (hint).
And so, after thinking of all the candies that I wouldn’t be getting, I decided – why not create one of my favorites here at home? I finally settled on cezerye, a Turkish candy made of carrots! Now, although they have a lot of vitamin A and B from the carrots, they also have enough sugar to fully sweeten your blood, so I wouldn’t exactly qualify them as health food, but they certainly are delicious.
Home-Made Cezerye
makes about twenty five candies
Ingredients
2 cups grated carrots
3/4 cups loosely packed dark brown sugar
1/4 cup white sugar
about 1/2 cup water
1/2 cup ground walnuts
1/2 cup ground petit beurre biscuits
1/2 cup shredded dried (unsweetened) coconut
Method
1. Grate a few medium carrots and put into a medium saucepan with the sugar. I simply took my cup measure, loosely packed it three quarters of the way with brown sugar, topped it with the white sugar, and added water to wet the sugar (as much fit in the cup).
2. Simmer on low heat for a half hour or more, covered. Add the ground nuts and petit beurre cookies, and continue to cook uncovered for a few minutes. Take off the stove, and let cool enough to handle the mixture.
3. To make the carrot balls, roll the dough balls in some shredded coconut, as you would if you were making truffles. Place in the fridge for at least an hour, and eat!
These come out a little bit moist, but they should dry as they sit.
