Meringue Cookies (& Chocolate Ruffle Cake)

Meringue and I go well together (unlike genoise).  Maybe its beginner's luck, but I tend to have success with meringue-based things, thus far.  Despite this luck,  these meringue cookies,  look no where near professional, but then again, a 4 and a 7 year old piped up most of them.  (But even mine lacked a professional air.)  I think, the only thing easier than whipping these up, is eating them.

On the other end of the difficulty spectrum was the chocolate ruffle cake (or the chocolate roll cake in my case).   This recipe had 5 recipes within it; not your after-dinner-whip-up-dessert dessert.   And not a recipe to be repeated anytime soon or anytime, period.  That being said, I am glad I did it.

I have always wondered how cakes were wrapped in a thin sheet of chocolate; I had absolutely no idea how it could be done.  Making that sheet and wrapping my little cake was far and away my favorite part.

My favorite part to eat was the chocolate creme fraiche filling.

And wow, those ruffles have to be made with impeccable timing.

I will leave this one up to the professional bakeries from here on out, but I have a much deeper respect for the 5-7 recipes and the subtleties that go into a slice of cake like this.

Rhiannon!

Brie in Brioche, Babas and Buttermilk Bread (Not in a Bread Machine)

Better late than never. 

I sat down to post tonight on the delightful buttermilk bread (2 days late), but realized I had two more recipes in my queue (> 2 weeks late).

Brie in brioche (above) felt a bit quirky and a bit indulgent: butter, egg rich dough surrounding a wheel of brie topped with slow cooked onions.   So odd yet so delicious, as is everything with brioche dough. 

Babas were my second go at this type of sweet yeasted dough, the first being savarin.  I recall not being a fan of the savarin; I was not excited to give this one a shot (leading me to be late). But it turned out better than all expectations, especially the vanilla pastry cream tucked up inside. 

And finally, buttermilk bread, not made in a bread machine.  It has been some time in our baking that we have baked bread, and it felt homey and reassuring to do so.  This recipe is one I will hang onto for quick dinner rolls/ bread. Simple, simple, simple. 

Check out other bloggers here:  Tuesdays with Dorie.

And Rhiannon at the coast.

Cornmeal Currant Biscotti

Not your traditional twice-baked biscotti but nice, fat, plump diamond shaped tea cookies.  These will only last a week on your shelf, but given all the leftover holiday treats lying around, I could have used the one month shelf life of regular biscotti. (Truth be told these can be molded and baked like regular biscotti but I wanted to sample these not-so-traditional ones.)

These are tasty little tea cookies with a higher butter content and a nice crackly corneal texture.  I used raisins instead of currants, and I like the contrast of the soft raisins and the crunch of the cornmeal.  Despite these attributes, I don't think I will make these again; I have too many other biscotti recipes that I favor.  But then again maybe I will, as Rhiannon loved them.

And Rhiannon… she loved these cookies!

Vanilla Hazelnut Cheesecake- Rewind

I don't normally like cheesecake but I did like this one.  I don't even normally crave hazelnuts in my desserts, but this one won me over.   Amidst the holiday sweet craze, this could have been lost, but it wasn't.  And cottage cheese in a cheesecake, not a deterrent.

The advantage of doing this one as a rewind, I was able to heed the advice of a fellow Baking with Julia blogger: I did not attempt the flip.  This cake was intended to be made in a round cake pan and upon cooling, flipped out and then re-flipped onto a serving pan.   I have a history with flipping and decided to go with a spring form pan and a regular graham cracker crust (with butter).   I did forget to wrap the pan in foil so the crust was a little water logged; this still did not ruin this cake.

I also did not cook/ burn the caramel for the hazelnut paste quite enough so the coloring of the cake is unremarkable.  But the taste is there.

As for another rewind recipe, I have my eyes on the Brie in Brioche recipe in the coming weeks but, I may need to save some calories for that one.

Rhiannon in the line-up.

Parmesan Puffs…. and Hazelnut Loaves and Raspberry Swirls

Yet another catch up post.   I have been baking all along, but the posting dates have not been corresponding to my baking dates.   I have no life changing excuse like a move or a new job or newborn baby, just regular life with all its irregularities and oddities.  It resembles this set of recipes.  When put all together they seem a bit odd and mismatched and overwhelming.  But individually they were all quite delicious and not too taxing.

From most recent to the not so recent:

Parmesan Puffs: an exercise in deep frying (deep frying puff pastry nonetheless).  Yum.

Hazelnut baby loaves: obviously not a baby loaf, but one big one, delicately flavored.

Raspberry Swirls: genoise rolled and layered, my only successful genoise yet.  (It doesn't hurt that it is dipped in chocolate.)

Rhiannon: my faithful taster.

Please check others' posts at the blogroll: Tuesdays with Dorie. 

Brioche x 2

It took brioche to bring me back (after the chaotic summer that was just starting during my last post).

I swear there is nothing better for me to make, bake, eat and eat again, than brioche.

I think its the texture.  And the chewiness.  And the slight sweetness.

For the first brioche recipe, the brioche served as the base of a custard tart, topped with a sabayon and poached plums.

For the second, the brioche was twice baked, to use up those stale leftovers of brioche laying around (as if).  The stale bread is dunked in orange vanilla syrup and topped with an almond cream.  Brioche plus almond cream might just be better than brioche itself.

For the rest of the book, I will try to keep up and make up what I have missed from the Baking with Julia cooking group.  But there are no guarantees without brioche.


Rhiannon eating her favorite: honey toast.

White Chocolate Patty Cake & Fruit Focaccia

Whew.  I am back.  A whole month away feels like a long time to be gone from the Baking with Julia group.   I didn't go anywhere by the way,  just swept away by the end of the school year and the start of a chaotic but awesome summer.

For rewind week, last week I chose to make the fruit focaccia after reading rave reviews from my fellow bloggers and despite my prior focaccia failures.  (For some vegetarian reasons the savory puffs didn't sound as appealing.)  This was a challenge in planning for me.  I originally set up the dough to rise in the fridge so that the final rise would occur at 10pm for a bake at 1am.  So, I just let it rise longer in the fridge (until 6am) so I could bake at the more reasonable hour of 9am.  This turned out just delicious and chewy and slightly fermented (likely due to its overlong rise).

For this week it was back to cakes with a White Chocolate Patty Cake.  Watching the video helped subdue any anxiety I was having with baking another cake.  This cake is intended to be flat (after rising, then cooling).  Phew.  I can handle a cake like that.  This was a surprisingly satisfying cake.  It had a dense crumb from the white chocolate and tasted more like a pound cake.  And how can one go wrong with fresh raspberry sauce?

My taste tester.