French Fridays With Dorie - Hot Pink Cocoa Sablés

I've never felt like I was in the cookie business. I've always been in a feel good feeling business. My job is to sell joy. My job is to sell happiness. My job is to sell an experience.

~ Debbi Fields (of Mrs. Fields Bakeries)

You can't see the words 'Mrs. Fields' without images of buttery, crumbly/chewy cookies entering your mind immediately afterwards. Well, Mrs. Fields' words above somehow resonated strongly as I baked this week's French Fridays with Dorie recipe, Cocoa Sables. I wanted to bake cookies that would invoke a similar feel good feeling to anyone who sets their eyes on them, and if they're lucky enough, who gets to eat them too.

But first, what in culinary heavens is a sable? It's simply a classic French cookie originating in Normandy. Sable is French for "sand", and refers to the sandy texture of this delicate and crumbly shortbread-like cookie. Butter is what gives these cookies their wonderful, rich flavor. A typical sable would have a coating of raw or granulated sugar around the edges but I decided to forego the sugar and make something that's more visually appealing. And what could possibly be more appealing than a layer of sweet, sweet sugar on a chocolate cookie? How about an eye-catching color, like hot pink, for example? Yes, hot pink dough enveloping dark chocolate is all the rage nowadays. At least in my kitchen it is, I'm not sure about anywhere else :).

My original idea was to pair a more innocent shade of baby pink with the dark brown. However, because I  very rarely play with food coloring, I underestimated the strength of my little blob of pink gel. It proved too much for the amount of plain batter I was using that the 'baby' part of the pink tuned into a very adult 'hot' in 60 seconds... Oh well, we're all grown-ups here, and eating a sexy cookie is really not the worse thing that could happen to you on a Friday!

Dorie's recipe also suggested the incorporation of finely chopped bittersweet chocolate in the cocoa batter, but I decided to keep things simple and omitted that option too. This resulted in a smoother finish to the cut surface of the sables, which I preferred. What I didn't like was the uneven thickness of the cookies when I sliced through the dough using a knife. Somehow it didn't occur to me to use a thread to do a much cleaner job of it. Next time I bake these, I'm going to use pastry flour instead of the all-purpose because I read that it results in more tender cookies.

Not only do these sables invoke a heart-tugging sensation of love-at-first-sight (who can resist that hot pink squiggle?), they may also cause you to fall in love-at-first-bite, too. These shortbreads are crumbly, sweet, slightly salty and very chocolatey. An all-round experience of joy and happiness right there :).

The recipe for these cocoa sables can be found in Dorie Greenspan's cookbook, Around My French Table. The rest of the FFWD cooking group members will have their own take on these cookies, it's totally worth checking them out here.

Muffin Monday - Eggnog Muffins

The rays of happiness, like those of light, are colorless when unbroken.

~ Henry W. Longfellow

In most countries around the world, today is a public holiday or at the very least, the day after a public holiday. Whether you celebrated Christmas or not, I hope yesterday was good for you (and yours, if you're with them). I am writing this early, so that when this post gets published, I will be on a beach or in a pool somewhere under the hot sun. Hang on.... that sounds very much like everyday at home. Let me rephrase that - I will be going nowhere far but shall be taking a bit of a blogging break this week to ponder about the things I'd like to happen in 2012. In my life, I mean.

As I'm writing this, it's 3 days till Christmas and I'm feeling bad because most of my seasons greeting cards are sitting on my dresser, not yet mailed. Well, they have to be written in first before they can be posted, and I'm stalling on the writing part. Lately, I seem to have acquired a super-clingy new best friend and she goes by the name, Procrastination. I'm still trying to figure out how to give her the slip.

To cheer me up today though, 'P' (my new friend's nick) and I baked some eggnog-flavored muffins for Muffin Monday. Not having any eggnog essence, we stuck with vanilla and it still tasted great. Just for fun, P suggested we pipe some muffin batter into clean, empty eggshells just to go with the 'Egg'nog theme. She's so entertaining, that girl! 

Well, since I had oh...hours to waste, I agreed and we used this technique by SandeeA to attain our egg-shaped muffins. We didn't make them with the suggested topping in the original recipe, instead we sprinkled some crushed peppermint candy cane over the batter. These eggnog muffins had some serious swag, and they tasted delightful to boot!

Note: Muffin Monday is an initiative by Baker Street. A culinary journey of sharing a wickedly delicious muffin recipe every week. Drop Anuradha a quick line to join her on her journey to make the world smile and beat glum Monday mornings week after week. 

Eggnog Muffins
(recipe from King Arthur Flour)
Makes: 12 muffins

Batter

1/4 cup (1/2 stick, 2 ounces) butter

3/4 cup (5 1/4 ounces) sugar

2 large eggs

2 1/2 cups (10 1/2 ounces) King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon eggnog flavor or 1 teaspoon vanilla

1 1/4 cups (10 ounces) eggnog or half and half

Topping*

1/2 cup (3 1/2 ounces) sugar

1/2 cup (2 1/4 ounces) King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour

1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

1/8 teaspoon eggnog flavor, optional

3 tablespoons (1 1/2 ounces) butter, melted

*(I used crushed peppermint candy cane)

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 425°F. Line a muffin tin with 12 paper or silicone muffin cups, and grease the cups with non-stick vegetable oil spray; this will ensure that they peel off the muffins nicely.

2. In a medium-sized mixing bowl, cream together the butter and sugar till smooth. Add the eggs, beating for several minutes and scraping the bowl, till the mixture is smooth and light colored. Beat in the baking powder, nutmeg, salt, and eggnog flavor or vanilla.

3. Stir the flour into the butter mixture alternately with the eggnog or half and half, beginning and ending with the flour and making sure everything is thoroughly combined. Spoon the batter evenly into the prepared muffin cups.

4. Stir together all of the topping ingredients JUST till crumbly. Stir gently, and don't overmix; you don't want to turn this crumbly topping into a solid mass. Sprinkle the topping over the muffins.

5. Bake the muffins for 20 minutes, or until they're a pale golden brown. Remove them from the oven, and serve warm, or at room temperature.

Vanilla (Chocolate & Matcha) Éclairs - French Fridays with Dorie

Its only my second week of French Fridays with Dorie, and the complexity of the recipes has already risen up a notch. From leisurely steaming broccoli last week to this, making éclairs. I was slightly intimidated to start off with but then realized that I had no real reason to be. Despite common perception, éclairs are actually not that complicated to make especially when you've got Dorie's soothing words guiding you.

My arsenal of choice for this challenge consisted of a wooden spoon, different-sized ziplock bags, gigantic piping tips, an ice water bath and really strong arms. Okay, I cheated on the arms part and gave in to the convenience of an electric whisk. If you even have the slightest intention of conjuring up choux pastry and its accompanying custard cream filling one day, then this you should know, there's going to be some seriously heavy duty stirring/whisking involved! So be prepared and muscle up your strong arm.

My ridge fetish

I don't want to mislead you into thinking that this was the first time I've ever attempted éclairs, oh no....I have made these puff, puff babies before. Once. My last flavor combination was lavender and black sesame éclairs with dulce de leche pastry cream filling. Quite the adventurous little missy I was, and I won't even waste your time explaining the rationale behind that feat. In short, those flavors worked amazingly well. You'll probably be relieved to know that this time round, the recipe in Dorie's book, 'Around My French Table' stated simply Vanilla Éclairs. Sadly, I had no excuse to go too far off the plot.

Saying that, however, I couldn't claim the right to call mine an adventurer's kitchen if I didn't at least try to explore other possibilities. So here are some things I did a bit differently to my heart's calling:

1. I used a star tip to pipe out my choux pastry because I actually like the beauty of ridges on my éclairs.

2. I opted for a bitter-ish, dark chocolate ganache glaze instead of the tart, sugary version suggested in the recipe. The ganache made for easy glazing, especially on the ridges. I just dipped the tops of the éclairs in the soft ganache and it spread very readily over and in between the ridges.

3. Apart from the vanilla flavored pastry cream, I also made additional chocolate and matcha cream fillings. It was easy, I just divided the vanilla cream into 3 equal portions, added melted chocolate to one and a teaspoon of matcha powder to the other. The third portion was left plain.

4. As I was preparing to fill the choux fingers, I had a lightning (haha) moment. Wouldn't it be a great idea to pipe two flavors into each éclair? Chocolate-vanilla. Vanilla-Matcha. Matcha-Chocolate. You get the idea. The execution wasn't as simple - I had to engineer a large enough piping bag out of heavy duty plastic ziplock, and fitted two little baby ziplocks in there filled with the different flavored pastry creams. Not a pretty sight as you can see below, but it worked. You can't tell from these photos but I actually had bi-flavored éclairs. It's nice to have a little bit of something for everyone, you know.

My makeshift ziplock piping bag for dispensing the double-flavored pastry cream!

5. It was raining a typical rainforest thunderstorm the day I made these so I knew there would be trouble as far as maintaining the puffiness of the pastry was concerned. Luckily, I'd burnt my fingers from hot ovens too many times just so I could gain this knowledge... which is, the best strategy for combating humidity is to let the cooked choux pastry dry and cool in the oven well after the stated cooking time. I simply turned off the heat, lodged a wooden spoon in the oven door (to keep it ajar) and left it for an hour. Guess what, the choux fingers stayed proudly puffy....not a single one had deflated.

Chocolate, vanilla, matcha or me?

So there you have it, a recount of my fairly uneventful (but plenty messy!) éclair attempt. The verdict from The Clan was super-thumbs up! Oh, the kids didn't really notice the double flavors so I managed to get them to down some matcha which is a sizeable achievement. If you wish to learn the recipe, you'll likely have to buy the book. After which, you might as well join along and cook with us. Take your pick of éclairs from the other FFWD bloggers here.

Vanilla Rooibos with Coconut and Macadamia Bread Pudding and YBR

Your kind words and support have made me feel like it's time to come out of the woodwork and cook up something nice for you. Think of it as my Thank You :-).

I also feel that I need to fulfill some obligations to fellow bloggers this month. The first is the Bread Pudding of the Month Club hosted by my lovely friend, Victoria at Mission Food. Anyone who has made bread pudding during the month of March is invited to link up to her event, and I'd greatly encourage you to check it out before the month is out, soon! This is my contribution: Vanilla Rooibos with Coconut and Macadamia Bread Pudding, topped with White Chocolate Cream Sauce.

I first discovered this blend of Vanilla Rooibos tea when I stayed at an upscale serviced apartment in Virginia last year. The housekeeping ladies, bless them, left out fresh fruits, pastries and the most amazing coffees and teas for their guests every morning and I guess that was where I got hooked on this rich and full-bodied tea with a creamy vanilla finish. This organically-grown Rooibos is also rich in vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants, and is a naturally caffeine-free infusion, so it was only inevitable that I cargoed home boxes of the stuff when I left Virginia! They're distributed by Tealeaves.com, in case you're interested.

Since I love the heavenly aroma, I decided to flavor my bread pudding with Vanilla-Rooibos and wrapped the bread with coconut and macadamia to give a lush, tropical feel to it. But that's not all, top the warm pudding with a white chocolate cream sauce and you know you've arrived in the big leagues when you take a bite out of this. It's called the Power of Attraction, don't you know?

Here's the step-by-step, folks:

Now for the slightly tedious part, but only slightly....

Bringing up the rear for another event, please head out to Your Best Recipes hosted by the lovely, uber-accomplished Nancy of Spicie-Foodie. My best recipe for February was my Valentine's Cupid's Cobbler made of plums, cream biscuits and rose-basil seed cream! Check out her site for other participants' contributions or send her your best recipe before the end of March. Gosh, I just realise that I haven't got any recipe, let alone a best one, for March! But there are a few days left, and there's hope yet....

Vanilla Rooibos with Coconut and Macadamia Bread Pudding and White Chocolate Cream Sauce
Ingredients:
Bread Pudding
2 organic Vanilla Rooibos teabags
1 litre milk
1/2 cup palm sugar, grated
2 eggs, lightly beaten
8 slices stale bread, crusts removed
50g butter
1/2 cup sweetened dried coconut slivers, chopped finely
1/4 cup macadamia nuts, chopped finely
Butter, for greasing pan

White Chocolate Cream Sauce
200g white chocolate
200ml heavy cream

Method:
1. Butter a shallow baking dish (1-2 inch deep) and set aside.
2. Flatten each bread slice with a rolling pin and use the rest of the butter to spread on one side of the bread slice.
3. Spoon about a teaspoon each of chopped coconut and macadamia on top of a buttered slice, then roll the slice tightly to form a cylinder. Cut each cylinder into three 1-inch long slices and arrange the circles tightly (cut-side up) on the base of the baking dish in one layer. Do this with all the bread slices until the dish is full. Set aside while you make the custard.
4. Place the milk and vanilla rooiboos teabags in a pan and heat until just starting to boil, stirring constantly to prevent the milk from burning. Remove from heat while you prepare the egg mixture.
5. Whisk eggs and palm sugar in a small bowl, then add a cup of the warm milk and beat further. Pour this mixture back into the pan with the rest of the milk and stir until it just starts to simmer. Remove the teabags.
6. Carefully spoon the custard onto the bread slices until they are completely soaked and the custard reaches the rim of the baking dish. Bake at 180C for 30 minutes. Drizzle with white chocolate-cream sauce before serving.

7. For the sauce, simply warm the cream in a pan on medium-low heat and add the white chocolate until completely melted. Use immediately.

Muffin Shortbread Cookies With Nutella-Cranberry Filling

Yes, I know. I've disappeared, gone on hiatus for about a fortnight. What can I say? The well sometimes run dry, I wasn't even the inspired to write about stuff not related to food. Such as why I've disappeared, for example.

But today, today I'm back. At first, I thought of writing about my various kitchen disasters to date as I'm sure someone out there would be interested. Who doesn't like to be reminded that we food bloggers are only human, after all? Then quite suddenly, a simple new recipe I came up with turned out to be a success. A cookie recipe at that. So I'm going to write about this instead and save the exploding kitchen story for another day. I'm sure you guys can wait.

I've called these Muffin Shortbread Cookies because I decided to bake the shortbread dough in mini-muffin pans. They held the distinctive muffin shape but melted in the mouth like typical shortbread once you bite into them. As for the Nutella filling, hey, who needs to explain away Nutella? It's just plain good to have it in any recipe, that's my opinion. Since Christmas is just around the corner, chucking in some chopped cranberries along with the Nutella elevates this humble shortbread to the likes of the Festive-Cookie Brigade!

 

Before I get on to the recipe, I'm doing another post tomorrow. It seems strange to post two days in a row after my recent absence, but it's for the International Incident Party hosted by Penny of Jeroxie.com.  Catch this blog again tomorrow, you won't be disappointed!

Muffin Shortbread Cookies With Nutella-Cranberry Filling
Makes 48-50 cookies
Ingredients:
Shortbread
2 cups flour
1 cup butter
1/2 cup brown sugar, packed
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Filling
1 cup flour
1/2 cup butter, softened
1/4 cup Nutella
1/4 cup dried cranberries, chopped finely

Method:
1. First, make the shortbread. I do it the stressfree way - just place all the ingredients in a food processor and blend it for a minute or so until the dough forms into a ball. Remove dough, place in a bowl and chill in the refrigerator while you prepare the filling.
2. For the filling, add butter and flour in a bowl. Rub the butter into the flour until it resembles breadcrumbs, then add the Nutella and dried cranberries and knead into a ball with your hand.
3. To assemble the cookie for baking, make small round balls with the shortbread and press into the base of a non-stick mini-muffin cup. Crumble the Nutella-cranberry filling on top, then place another larger ball of shortbread on top and press down so that its surface is even with the top of the muffin cup. Do this with the remaining shortbread and filling.
4. Bake in a preheated oven at 180C for 10-12 minutes (depending on the size of your muffin tin) until the shortbread dough turns a light golden brown. Leave to cool completely in the pan. To remove muffin cookies, turn the tray over and give it a firm tap against a hard surface. The muffins will pop out easily. Store in an airtight container for up to two weeks.

Tropical Quenchers: Dragonfruit & Pomelo Sensations

Aaaah... sometimes the heat outside and humidity gets to me! The sun decides to bless us with its golden rays for most of the day, then just before it disappears into the horizon, Mother Storm pays a visit and it starts to rain bloody murder... Gee, thanks. There goes my late afternoon run. The race is this weekend, and I'm starting to fret from this lack of, well, running.

When I'm in this mood (fretting, feeling caged in), I can't think creatively to make a meal I want to feed myself with, let alone others. So I go on a juice diet - juices are easy, there's not much thinking involved. Plus they are fun and delicious to consume - more importantly, they really quench that thirst on a HOT day. Luckily, I live where I live. Plenty of juicy, sweet, weird and wonderful fruits to turn into cocktails or coolers. You can go colourful (mango, watermelon, banana, jackfruit) or not (coconut, pomelo, lychees, longans).

Walked into the kitchen and found these two juicy queen of fruits - the regal red Dragonfruit, and the cool, collected Pomelo. Perfect, I'll make TWO contrasting drinks!

There are actually three varieties of dragonfruit: red-skinned with translucent white or red purply-red flesh, and yellow-skinned with white flesh. No surprise, I went with my favourite colour - red (flesh). If you've never had dragonfruit before, it's been described as tasting something like a cross between a kiwi fruit and a pear. In actual fact, it's much subtler than that. I would say that it tastes like a very watered-down version of a watermelon - quite bland. Which is an irony because visually, the dragonfruit is one of the most stunning-looking fruits I've ever come across. Unfortunately, The Big Kahuna created it to be this gorgeous bimbo of the fruit community, just to be fair to other fruits, I think. Haha, the thought.

That's the reason why I added raspberries to the quencher recipe below, to add a bit of sensuality (tastewise) to it. Let's face it, the raspberry could've had it all (red, curvy, sweet, tangy, delicious), but it too was created fairly. Why do you think it's so tiny? *grins*  

Dragonfruit~Raspberry Quencher

1 red dragonfruit, peeled and sliced

1/2 cup fresh or frozen raspberries 

2-3 cups water

sugar syrup, to taste (optional)

calamansi limes, to garnish

Blend the dragonfruit slices together with the raspberries, then add 2 cups water and some sugar syrup (optional) and stir. If the consistency is a bit thick for you, then add some more water. If you want it cooler, blend in some ice-cubes. Pour into a glass, slice some calamansi limes and place on top of the drink. Sip or stick a straw in the glass and enjoy! 

The next drink is pretty elegant and straightforward, no blending necessary. Just add ice, and carry around at a late afternoon pool party for that rock star factor!

Pomelo-Vanilla Green Tea Cooler

1/2 medium sized pomelo, skinned and sliced

2 teabags of vanilla green tea

4-6 cups water

sugar syrup, to taste (optional)

Steep the teabags in 2 cups of hot water for about 5 minutes, allow to cool, then add up to 4 cups of cold water and ice-cubes. Take the sliced pomelo, tear the flesh apart with your hands and add to the cold vanilla tea. Add sugar syrup if you wish, it will enhance the aromatic vanilla and balance the slightly bitter, grapefruitlike pomelo flavors. Serve to guests and be prepared to take a bow!

I SCREAMED! Gelatos That Confuse The Tastebuds

All these recent banana split posts on Foodbuzz featuring their fab home made/store-bought ice-creams concoctions have triggered some sort of uhh… I don’t know, ICE-CREAM envy(?) in me. Thank goodness it’s not banana envy, eh, because that would be some kind of difficult for me to deal with! Before I go any further, I'm using 'gelato' and 'ice-cream' interchangeably here because they're the same thing ... aren't they? Well, I'm not such a food snob to admit that I don't really know the difference. Perhaps I'll Google it up later.

Anyway, I brainstormed on some ice-cream flavour combinations and looking at what I came up with, you could be forgiven for thinking that I'm a member of a well-oiled Gelato Think Tank somewhere this side of the ocean. But you’re wrong, I’m just wired differently. Especially when it comes to food.

Without further ado, I introduce to you:

Roasted Capsicum and Vanilla Gelato

Ginger~Chocolate~Orange Gelato

I'm sure I'm not the first one on the planet to make these, it's just I haven't seen Haagen Daz come out with these combis (I know they do ginger, just ginger though). Now, before you think anything untoward about these rather odd couplings of flavours, let me assure you that they really do work, are utterly delicious and you are able to taste each of the distinct flavours of roasted capsicum (or bell pepper), vanilla, orange, ginger and chocolate.

Not having in my possession the famed “Flavor Bible”, I’m not quite sure how I came up with these matches made in heaven. Let’s just put it down to my scary imagination and the fact that I aced Chemistry at high school and college! *high fives*

Btw, I don't have an ice-cream machine to my name (BFFs: please take note), so I made these using the age-old method of freezing/whisking/freezing/whisking/freezing instead. It's really no hassle and I quite enjoy the feeling of anticipation!

Roasted Capsicum and Vanilla Gelato

Ingredients:

• 1 cup whole milk

• 1 cup heavy cream

• 1 red capsicum (bell pepper)

• 1 egg

• 2 egg yolks

• ¾ cup sugar

• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract

Method:
1. Slice the capsicum in half, remove the stem and seeds, and roast under a hot grill until the skin splits and the capsicum softens (about 10 minutes). Cool slightly and peel off skin, then chop into slices. Set aside.

2. Heat the milk and cream in a saucepan just to the point of boiling and add the chopped capsicum. Remove from heat and steep, covered, for 15 minutes. Add the sugar and vanilla and reheat the milk and cream.

3. Meanwhile, whisk the egg and yolks in another pan until well-combined. Once the cream mixture is almost boiling, gradually whisk it into the eggs, constantly beating so that the eggs do not curdle. Gently boil over low heat until the custard thickens and coats the back of a wooden spoon.

4. Cool the custard mixture completely before churning either by hand or in an ice-cream machine. You can speed the cooling process by putting the bowl in an ice bath, but if you make your custard the night before like I did here, you can chill them overnight in the refrigerator and begin the churning process the next morning.

Some swirling action here.... and after 3-4 hours, Voila!

Ice-cream that tastes very cashew nut-like with a subtle peppery edge to it. Yes, it's really weird.

5. After I’m done chilling the custard, I put it in the freezer for an hour, take it out and stir the gelato to separate it from the edges of the bowl. I then blend with the hand mixer for about 15 seconds. I do this 3 times over the course of 3 hours then let the gelato freeze completely. If you’re diligent and willing to do this small task, take it from me, the results are better than the gelato in that swanky café down the high street!

Ginger~Chocolate~Orange Gelato

Ingredients:
• 1 cup whole milk
• 1 cup heavy cream
• 1 (2-inch) piece of fresh ginger, sliced thinly
• 1 egg
• 2 egg yolks
• ¾ cup sugar
• 1 orange, squeezed for the juice
• 125g (4oz) dark chocolate, chopped

1. Heat the milk and cream in a saucepan just to the point of boiling and add the sliced ginger. Remove from heat and let it steep, for 15 minutes. Then carefully fish out the ginger bits with a spoon and set these aside.

2. Meanwhile, whisk the egg and yolks in another pan until well-combined.

3. Add the sugar to the milk and cream and reheat. Once mixture is almost boiling, gradually whisk it into the eggs, constantly beating so that the eggs do not curdle. Gently boil over low heat until the custard thickens and coats the back of a wooden spoon.

4. Remove the custard from the heat and stir in the chopped chocolate until it melts. Stir in the orange juice (strain for pips beforehand). I had a flash of inspiration at this point and decided to throw the ginger bits back into the custard! So glad I did, because these really added bite and enhanced the gingery-ness of the ice-cream. I mean, come on, it had to compete with the dominant flavours of orange AND chocolate!

Ginger bits, we LOVE you and therefore you're staying.

5. Cool the custard mixture completely before repeating the churning process in step 5 above.

Baby, churn ~ churn ~ churn ~churn...

The great thing about eating ice-cream at home is that you can just about plonk it in the bowl any old how and not have to worry about it having to look all fancy like in a restaurant. It still tastes exactly delish and you even have the liberty of licking off the bowl at the end!

I hope you try these recipes out and let me know if there are any other odd combi flavors out there that go well together. Happy days, people!