Almond Roca Ring

For the past few months that I have been searching for glossy chocolate frosting around food blogs, I finally found it in my drawer, from my 1980s cook book.

I made this last week. It was a the first in my wish-to-bake list. There are actually a few goodies that I baked during Christmas left unblogged. I will try my best to get them up here.

Almond Roca Cake( From the Joy of Chocolate 1982)

6 eggs plus 2 yolks

1/4 C granulated sugar

1/2 C brown sugar

1/2 C ground toasted almond

1/4 tsp of almond extract

1 tsp finely grated lemon zest

1 C sifted all purpose flour

1/2 tsp salt

3 tbsp unsalted butter , melted and lightly brown

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter and flour a 9-inch tube or bundt pan

Beat eggs , yolks and sugar over simmering water until the mixture becomes warm and sugar crystals dissolve. Then off the heat, beat until egg mixture form heavy ribbon trail.

I got nervous every time I made sponge cake. For me, it is one of the most easy-to-go wrong cake. Seemed like, if I happened to pick up a 1-minute phone call while folding the batter, I would make myself belive the cake would be dense and ugly, and I would be screaming to whom ever called me at that moment "I'm making my baby, I'll call back asap"......ohhh, am I being exaggerate. Well, I belive it just a matter of repetition, and pratricing. Maybe I need to bake it frequently to get some confidence. Okay, where are we ?

Gently add almonds , vanilla and almond extracted and zest, beat briefly. By hand, fold in the flour and salt in 3 portions with whisk (or you may do so with spatula, if you like, but every time I used spatula I ended up with lumps of flour). Work rapidly and gently so as not to deflate the egg volume. Then incorporate the melted butter. My trick is to beat melted butter with about 1 cup of fluffy egg mixture in a separate bowl (I used fork, don't worry that you deflate this 1 cup of mixture , you have the whole bowl to lift the cake) ... then pour it back to the batch and fold gently with spatula (now I switch to spatula). By doing this, melted butter tend not to sink to the bottom.

Pour batter in prepared bundt pan. Bake for 35 minute or until cake shrinks slightly from the side. Let cool for 10 minutes. Then unmold cake on the rack. Let cool completely before you apply chocolate frosting.

The recipe calls for syrup (which I skipped). The ingredients are simply 1/3 cups of sugar and 1/2 cups of water. Bring to a simmer for 3-5 minutes. Remove from heat and cool briefly. Stir in amaretto or liqueur of your choice.

If you choose to make syrup, cut the cake by half, drizzle hot syrup over the cut side. Let cool, then spread on chocolate glaze. Here is the recipe for chocolate glaze.

4 oz. semi sweet chocolate glaze

1/2 C granulated sugar

1/4 C light corn syrup

1/4 C hot water

5 tbsp unsalted butter

1 tsp vanilla extract

4-5 tbsp confectioners' sugar

Put everything except butter and confectioners' sugar in the saucepan. Cook over medium low heat. Stir constantly. I have to confess....I was screaming when I saw lumps in my sauce pan. I doubted if I did not stir constantly. After trying fix it by stiring heavily, I ended up having bubbles in the glaze and all the lumps were still there. Well, it was okay to have some bits to chew after all...er..r that was a silly way to comfort meself (yes "mee-self" as in Jamaican accent) when thing goes wrong.

Let the mixture cook at low heat for 3 minutes. Off the heat. With spoon (as mentioned earlier, do not use whisk as it traps bubbles in the glaze) stir in butter 1 table spoon at a time then add vanilla and confectioners sugar. Stir until glaze cool slightly and is a nice spreading consistency.

I used spatula to pour glaze on the cake. Remember to let the cake cool completely otherwise the glaze will be runny. I also put some toasted nuts and crushed caramel candies around the edge to

dress up a bit

Chez Panisse Almond Tart

I need to confess. I misspelled Chez Panisse, for a few times before I got it right.

David described the famous tart in his website. While reading, my mind was wandering, sitting at the patio, fork-digging the tart...then the fork bent (as David mentioned, this pie was removed from the menu as customers complained they had trouble eating it with fork), I then use my hand grabbed it up...put it my mouth...chew...w...w. Okay, wake up to reality. I was inspired, it was time to strap on the apron.

I agree with David, this one is a bit tricky (and sticky). I would really really and really love to make it again, but...(yes, there is a but) I will need to stand in front of the oven at all times. You'll see why.

Find the recipe here

The crust was easy to make. The dough I made was not as soft as David's. I prefer to make it dryer as easier to handle that way.

Once finished rubbing butter into flour, I added water by spraying water into the flour(instead of pour 1tbsp directly into the bowl as I found it is almost impossible to get all bits well-combined with 1 pour of tiny amount of water). While spraying, toss the bowl to dampen dry crumbs.

Talking about spraying, I counted how many times I sprayed into the bowl, how many strokes would turn crumbs into dough. It counted 75. -_- I intended to measure ….75 puffs was equal to how many tablespoon or water(?) . I know, I got my agenda. The day passed by, I forgot to do this. Then My sub-consciousness reminded me, in my dream that I needed to do this first thing in the morning. So next morning, I did. [Are you envisioning me, getting up in the morning, running in PJ , crazily puffing water into a tiny tablespoon? My neighbor might have seen me , which explains why they looked at me in a odd way.

[now go back to procedures.]

I stopped spraying when the crumbs held together when I squeezed them in my palm. I think I used more than 1 tbps of water as directed. I was surprised though that unbaked dough came out drier than expected. May be the humidity was low? See below, humidity in my kitchen was only 30'ish (in summer it was 70'ish, and FYI, in Bangkok it was 80'ish in a non-rainy day).

I poured the dough on the working space, as the rule of thumps in making pie, I didn't knead. I wrapped the dough and it went directly outside the window. No, I dint’ throw away, I just rest the dough in a cold place. Outside was colder than the fridge. I set alarm clock not to forget it there, an hour later, before I went shopping.

Can I confess one more thing? I used bread flour instead of all-purpose flour. I have a (lame) excuse; bread flour is a lot easier to buy (here in shanghai) and a lot cheaper. I did try to source cake flour produced locally. No luck. Bread flour should be okay, I thought. I barely kneaded it, plus there was very little liquid in the dough, I was just crossing my fingers that gluten wouldn’t develop. And I’m glad it came out okay.

After I came back from shopping (gee, it was cold out there. I couldn't feel if my ears were still attached to my face. Especially, after an old guy pointed at me...gossipped with his grandson at the mall, maybe my ears fell off the ground !?). I checked myself in mirror and I looked fine (and pretty). So, I strapped on an apron and started to roll the dough.

The dough was easy to handle. I pressed the dough up to fully cover the side. Once done, I chilled the pan for half an hour. Put it out, slid inside the oven and baked blind. After 15 min, the side of the dough shrank quite a bit !!! I kind of expected this but...oh gee, please don't shink further. I wanted to decored it up to the edge, made it nice...but boyd, the oven was hot! So, I just hoped that it left some edge for me enough to hold the filling.

While baking pie shell, I made filling, which is super easy. But hold on, once you pour the filling and start baking....someone got to do the dirty job.


In the oven, once the filling started to bubbled...I smoothed it out to prevent ugly top as described in David's website. It was not easy but it is a must. And when you open oven door frequently, temperature was , I think, a bit difficult to control.

And this was when I think how baking new recipe is interesting. There are a few factors out of control. Sometimes I just scream when things went wrong in the midst.

And , I found it very difficult to make top crust as nice the original. Eventhough this was a pain, I made this twice with in twon weeks. It was a big hit , maybe my (male) colleagues love something crunchy ? I myself like it very mooch (much) too. I will definitely make this again.

Thanks again David.

Note: David Lebovitz is my latest culinary hero, besides Alton Brown. :-D

Gingersnaps

Gingersnaps had me at hello. If I recall it right, I was on US domestic flight and they served crisp, flat, cookies. I didn’t even know what it was called back then until I flipped though the empty package....gingersnap(???). Apologies for my ignorance, I was not quite an epicure.

Recently, I bought ginger cookies from IKEA store, not bad at all. I understand that they are imported from Sweden as with the rest of the goodies on the shelf. My visits to IKEA lately didn't always end up buying housing stuff, but always carried back a few packs of cookies.

So far, I haven’t had bad gingersnap (and I wouldn’t wish to). I wonder if I could make one of my own. Since Christmas is around the corner, I have good excuse to strap on my apron.

Got Hardware? Ginger-man cookie cutter, checked. Rolling pin, checked. Hand mixer, checked. Got Software? Ground ginger, checked, Ground cinnamon, checked. Nutmeg, unchecked (uhh !).

See recipe from David's Website (Chez Panisse Gingersnap) here

I sprinkled cinnamon sugar on unbaked cookies. I have no quota on spices so…put them on!

The good thing about ginger cookies is that you can fearlessly play with it. It won’t go bad-shaped. One thing need to be care full is the room temperature that may soften the dough and that cutting and re-rolling becomes a messy task.

Verdict: I smiled when I had a bite. The sweetness is just right. If you roll thinly, it melts in your mouth. I will double ginger and cinnamon power next time. This is just the matter of personal preference. You may stick to recipe and adjust spiciness later on.

Comments from a freind of mine, Kate - "could you please next time don't make cookies resembles human shape ? I feel like a monster biting out those gingerman's litlle arms and legs."

Me - "okay, I'll make them round-shaped next time"

Kate - (silence, grabbed the last gingerman from zipbag) Ngawm..m..ngawm..m (chewing).

Me - 8-^

Miniature Cream Scones (Gourmet Magazine, March 1990)

Before I gave up, I had to finish this business, baking scones. The first time after two scones-disasters, I finally got nice, light, buttery, flaky scones. Thanks Epicurious for publishing this recipe (it was first published in Gourmet magazine , March 1990).

Ingredients

1/2 C of heavy cream plus additional for brushing the scones (I use egg+1tbsp of milk for brushing)

1 large egg

1 tsp vanilla extract

3 tbsp of sugar plus additional for sprinkling the scone

2 1/4 C of cake flour

1/2 tsp of salt

1 tbsp (or 3 tsp) of double acting baking powder

1/2 tsp of baking soda.

3/4 stick (6 tablespoons or 90 g) of cold unsalted butter, chopped into tiny bits.

1/2 C of dried currants (I used dark raisins)

In a bowl, whisk together 1/2 C of cream, egg , vanilla and 3 tablespoon of sugar until they combine well. I warmed up cream in microwave so that sugar dissolved easier. In another bowl sift all dry ingredients. I sifted twice so that wet ingredients can soak in quicker.

Now the key procedure, working with butter. I don't have food processor. And I cannot work with my bare hands as they are too warm to smash the butter directly into flour. The bottom line we want is coarse crumbs of flour+butter with the size of small tiny peas. My method is to chop up butter into little pieces, as if you are chopping onion for stir fry (some people use cheese grater, but butter must be freezing cold enough to grate) . No surprise, butter will stick to blade and chopping board, so sprinkle sifted flour, set aside in the bowl, would be a good idea. Once chopped, my butter cubes are just as small as 2 x 2 millimetres (oh yeah, they were that small). Feel free to sprinkle more flour while chopping as these will be all scooped back to the bowl. Once done , in the bowl, use pastry blade to cut in butter and flour mixture to coarse crumbs. This process should be quick as the butter cubes are very very tiny and they incorporate into the flour in shorter time. Be careful not to let butter metl, especially if your kitchen temperature is warmer than 25 C . Luckily, my kitchen was freezing cold, 12 C (imagine next week is Christmas !).

Warm up the oven to 200 C. Put the tray in the middle of the rack, no need to grease the tray.

With the fork, stir wet ingredients into the dry, slowly mix in. Don't over stir. How ? pause every 3-4 strokes and let the wets soak in. You'll see that once you pause, flour absorbs humidity around them and becomes lumbs. Continue stiromg, just until combine. Add raisins or other dried fruits of you choice. Some part of the dough will look a bit sandy or dry, that is okay.

On a lightly flour surface , knead the flour for 30 second , approximately 20 strokes, not more than that. I am a gluten nerd, I would do anything to prevent gluten formation as I don't think anyone likes chewy scones. (right ? right?)

Pat down the dough, roll into ½ inch thick. Make sure you roll it evenly; otherwise, the scone will be tilted when baked in the oven. Cut with cookie cutter, set aside. I used the 1.5 inch diameter cutter, yielded 9 scones.

On pre-heated tray, put scones next to each other, don’t leave spaces. Putting them shoulder-to shoulder will help them rise better (crowd them so they have no choice but to sit straight!) Some website suggests to thumb-press on top of scones to prevent domed structure. I didn’t do that, I forgot.

You can brush with cream as advises in the recipe. I brushed with egg, lightly beaten with 1 tbsp of milk. Be careful not to brush on the side as it prevents the edge to rise. Bake for 15-18 minutes or until brown.

Got Tea?

chocolate mousse

One day, I got bored and felt like I needed to make something nice out of my my left over creme in my fridge.

I love chocolate and so do my freinds. So , here it goes. Nothing fancy about it.

I was in search of gloossy chocolate frosting. (which obviously, this one is really not). But it does look pretty, doesn't it?