Dessert Day - the "that's not what we planned on making" edition

So a few days before Christmas, Deidre sent me a text message that included a picture of a recipe she thought we should make for Dessert Day - a red velvet cake star in the middle of a white chocolate cheesecake. We established that we should Dessert Day on the 30th of December, and then the festive season took over and we promptly forgot all about our plans until the night of the 29th of December. Obviously, this led to us vaguely wandering around my local supermarket on Monday morning searching for ingredients for the aforementioned fancy cake, and largely unable to find them (for example, vegetarian gelatine).

So we ultimately abandoned that plan and turned instead to something we've been meaning to make for ages and have never quite gotten around to - Tim Tam cake. We used this recipe with a few alterations:

1. Beat the eggs, then gradually add in the sugar.
2. If you are using a Kitchenaid to beat the eggs, transfer them into a different bowl before adding the dry ingredients, otherwise you'll end up with clumps of flour everywhere thanks to the weird bottom of the Kitchenaid bowl.
3. Make two separate lots of cake batter. We had to throw out the second cake and start from scratch because a) it ended up smaller than the first one, b) it had a giant clump of unmixed flour in it, and c) sitting around while the first one baked didn't do the batter any favours, and it was basically a really sad puddle of grossness. So we started over, and the second (third?!) cake was a dramatic improvement on either of its predecessors.

We also left out the Tim Tams because GLUTEN (and gluten free ones are a) kind of gross, and b) not available at my supermarket), and I'm not convinced that we missed out. Oh, and we added raspberry extract to the frosting for the middle, and it was quite possibly the best decision I've ever made. It was so delicious that it was a struggle to get the frosting into the cake!

Oh, and you could probably cut back the ganache recipe by at least a quarter, because there was way too much. Anyway, enough of my wibbling, let's get to the pictures, which is what you really care about, right?

Sad looking bottom layer of cake

Delicious frosting of epic proportions

Sad cake is less sad once frosting is involved

Second cake added and smothered in ganache

Now with added bite so that it really looks like a Tim Tam

Om nom nom nom nom

We also made lemon sorbet from the Commonsense Cookery Book, a stalwart of Australian kitchens. The recipe is as follows:

4 cups water
2 cups caster sugar
1 cup lemon juice
2 tablespoons lemon zest

Bring water and sugar to the boil, stirring to dissolve sugar, and boil for five minutes. Cool syrup, then add lemon juice and rind. Pour into refrigerated trays, freeze until syrup becomes mushy. Beat well and freeze again until solid.

Now we, obviously, did the first two steps and then used the ice cream maker to speed things along. Still, when we came to dish it up and take photos, it was baaaaaaaaaasically in a state not much more solid than a Slurpee, and plopped into the parfait glass in a very splashy way. Still, it was delicious. Although I would recommend not using a Microplane to zest the lemons, as it led to little strings of lemon zest all the way through...

Unlike the cake, the sorbet did not photograph particularly well:

Still, it was delicious, and that's what really matters!

What should we make at our next Dessert Day?

K xx

Dessert Day: almond edition

Yesterday was Melbourne Cup Day, which means that the whole of Melbourne has a day off to go and watch a three minute horse race. Yeah. That happens.

Anyway, I spent the day watching absolutely no horse racing and instead baking up a storm with Deidre. We'd both been jonesing for a Dessert Day for a while, but were uncertain about what to make. That all became a lot simpler when Deidre was given a bag full of nut products from Lucky Nuts to try!

We decided on three recipes - a pumpkin cheesecake, some almond paste biscuits, and raspberry and white chocolate friands. Because, you know, you can never tackle too many dessert recipes at once! We started out with making the crust for the cheesecake. We used Lucky Nuts' new oven roasted almond meal, mixed with butter and brown sugar (as suggested on the packet), and it made for a phenomenal crust. Unlike your usual gluten free crusts, it wasn't oily or soggy. It had exactly the same consistency as a typical cheesecake crust, which was incredibly exciting. Most gluten free crusts come out quite gluggy. Or turn out to be a complete disaster.

The filling came from this recipe, which I think we were both a little disappointed in. Although having just checked the recipe, it appears we left out the cinnamon (it's not Dessert Day without making things up as we go along!), which may account for why it seemed a little flavourless... I still feel like it could have used some nutmeg though, and the recipe doesn't call for that.

Anyway, the pumpkin cheesecake turned out like this:

Next up, we made the biscuits, which were from a recipe book that accompanied the nuts. They were insanely easy to make, but a bit of a struggle for the food processor given the quantities of ingredients!

This was after it had been running for about a minute. We ended up having
to process everything in two batches. 

Things got kind of messy in making these - I covered myself and the bench in dough, and then did the same thing when we dipped them in chocolate. But the end result? Was DEFINITELY worth it!! They're completely delicious.

Finally, we made raspberry and white chocolate friands from the Australian Women's Weekly book, Bake. Except we used a muffin tin to make them, because who has the time and money to acquire a friand pan?!?!?  I mean, honestly. They were much easier than I thought they would be (although that could be because Deidre did the dreaded egg separating!) - I always made the assumption that friands would be complicated and somewhat temperamental. But they're not! The final verdict was that in the future, we'd smush up the raspberries and mix them through that way, rather than plopping them in on the top just before putting them in the oven.

They probably wouldn't look as pretty, but I think it would give them a more uniform raspberry flavour. Which can only be a good thing!!

Aaaaaaaaaaaand then we proceeded to taste test everything, resulting in epic food babies. Because, as is Dessert Day tradition, we'd already stuffed ourselves on cheese and corn chips and hummus and spicy pumpkin dip. And, you know, Mr Darcy:

Source

Frankly? If given the choice between watching a horse race and baking while watching Colin Firth smoulder his way around the screen, I'll take the latter every time...

K xx

Dessert Day, supersized, fancy pants edition

About a month ago, my lovely friend and baking partner-in-crime Deidre sent me a message. It basically said "LOOK WHAT I FOUND WE SHOULD GO OMG OMG OMG" (It may have been a little more eloquent, if I'm completely honest...), and included a picture of the schedule of chocolate classes being held at Ganache Chocolate. Obviously, my reply was a resounding "Uh, YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!".

However, we quickly came across a dilemma - which course should we sign up for?? And then we remembered our previous attempts at making macarons:

Pancake-y macarons that kind of look like baked dog poo, because
I only had a star tip for the piping bag. They tasted awesome though... 

Super puffy and super fall-y apart-y raspberry macarons. Good, but almost
impossible to assemble. Basically, really sad meringues.

The decision was obvious.

So on Saturday, Deidre and I headed to the Ganache shop to learn how to make macarons PROPERLY.

You guys may or may not know that Deidre and I have something of a phobia of raw egg. I *may* have sent her a text message a week or so before the course that said "Oh my God, do you think we'll have to crack the eggs? Because that would lead to disaster...". Thankfully, macarons are a labour of love, and the egg whites that you use need to age for a full week in the fridge before you use them (herein lies step 1 of a millionty on the path to Where We Went Wrong Last Time), so we didn't have to crack any eggs. Which is excellent, because there would have been "OH GOD THE EGG IS TOUCHING ME!!"-ing in front of a group of strangers. And that would have been awwwwwwkward. So hurrah to egg whites that need to age!

Ahem.

The course started with "compulsory free hot chocolate". Anything that starts with these words cannot be a bad thing. From there, head chef and owner Arno Backes taught us all about macarons. We learned that Ganache make their macarons with Italian meringue (boil water and sugar together, beat egg whites, slowly pour sugar syrup into egg whites while beater is running) rather than French meringue (beat egg whites, slowly add sugar), as it's more forgiving. Once the meringue is made, you add in the dry ingredients - which have ALSO been maturing for about a week.

(Seriously, you guys - macarons require a LOT of planning ahead...)

And then it was time to get our hands dirty. We mixed red food colouring into our portion of macaron batter (wherein we learnt that we were FAR too gentle with the mixture last time), and spooned it (very awkwardly, in my case) into piping bags. And then the piping started:

Me and Deidre looking like we know what we're doing

Piping is fun, yo.

The next step in Where We Went Wrong Last Time involved banging the tray to flatten out the macarons. We tapped them gently. Uh, NO. You need to bang the living crap out of that tray. Make as much noise as a two year old who's got a saucepan and a wooden spoon, and you'll be on the right track. Not surprisingly, banging the tray is far more effective than tapping it gently.

The macarons sat for five or ten minutes, or until the tops were no longer sticky to the touch. And then they went into the giant, could-walk-into-it-if-you-really-felt-the-need-to oven:

Hello, enormous oven.

While they were in the oven, Arno told us all about how he became a Master Chocolatier and Patissiere (answer: lots and lots of training), which was completely fascinating. I'd honestly never thought about how much training goes into a career in chocolate and baked goods! And he's so passionate about what he does.

While the macarons were in the oven, we also learnt how to make ganache and what you can use it for:
Arno: This is a good, basic ganache. You can use it to fill macarons. You can use it to fill a cake. You can use it to ice a cake. You can mix it with Mexican chilli powder and put it on chicken as a mole. Or you can put it in a little pot next to the toaster and have it on your toast in the mornings!
Me: BEST. IDEA. EVER.

The ganache we used to fill the macarons was made with raspberry puree instead of cream, and it was quite possibly the most amazing thing of ever. Like, ZOMG. I am totally going to make some and keep it in a little pot next to the toaster. And when I weigh a thousand kilograms and have to be lifted out of the house by crane, I will have no regrets whatsoever.

Once the macarons came out of the oven, we sorted them into pairs and filled them with delicious ganache, and somehow managed to fight the urge to squirt the piping bags of ganache directly into our mouths. (Seriously. It was that good.)

Remember when I said before that macarons are a labour of love? Yeah. Once you've baked them and filled them and squidged them together, you have to put them in the fridge for 24 hours to soften and allow the flavours to develop.

This is seriously hard work. It helps if you have a tub of fancy pants ice cream on hand to take away the pain of waiting. But it's so totally worth it at the end of that 24 hours.

NOM.

Obviously, the REAL test will come when I make macarons by myself. But that will require the purchase of three things:
1. A candy thermometer for the sugar syrup;
2. A digital scale to ensure ingredients are weighed properly; and
3. A minion to crack and separate the eggs for me, because NYARGH.

But once I've covered those three bases, I'm going to give it a go and see if I can replicate the final product at home!

The course was a lot of fun and if you're curious about making macarons, you should seriously consider going. If you're not interested in making them yourself, you should still swing by Ganache for a hot chocolate and a macaron or two. Both of them are totally worth it!!

K xx

Disclaimer: Ganache gave us a discounted price in exchange for blogging about the course. All opinions are my own. A huge thank you to Ganache and Arno Backes for the opportunity to make macarons that don't look like they've been sat on!!

Challenge recipe 13: Hot raspberry souffles

I had my lovely friends Em and Matt over for dinner on Sunday night. It was Em's birthday during the week, and I usually try and do something a bit special in the way of dessert to celebrate. This year, I figured I'd take the opportunity to cross a recipe off the challenge list. I put soufflés on the list because I remember making them in a high school home economics class, and them being delicious. And I figured that if 15 year old Kirsti could handle making soufflés in a shitty gas oven that was so hard to light I'm STILL surprised we all came out of class with our eyebrows intact, surely 28 year old Kirsti could do just as well in a decent electric oven!

Anyway, here's the book:

And here's what you'll need, plus a tablespoon of water, which I couldn't work out how to put in the photo without making a mess:

Start by putting 250g of the raspberries into a saucepan:

Add a tablespoon of water:

Put the saucepan on the stove and bring it all to the boil:

Simmer uncovered until the raspberries turn to mush:

Then add 1/2 cup of caster sugar:

Stir it until the sugar dissolves, then bring to the boil. Reduce the heat and let it simmer for about five minutes or until it's thickened and kind of a jammy texture:

Take it off the heat and dump it all into a sieve over a bowl:

Push it through the sieve with a spoon until you're left with this:

Resist the urge to just eat it all with a spoon and put the raspberry purée to one side. Technically, you should move straight onto beating the egg whites, but I made the raspberry purée way ahead of time. So I moved on to making the raspberry cream to go on the side.

Put the remaining 50g of raspberries into a bowl:

Measure out 300mL of cream. Yes, you read that right. 300 MILLILITRES.

Add 2 teaspoons of caster sugar:

And pour in the BAZILLION LITRES OF CREAM:

Whip it all together until it's slightly thickened:

Next up, you need to prepare the soufflé dishes. You'll need 1 cup dishes. Brush the insides with melted butter and while the butter's still tacky, dust the inside with some caster sugar:

I apologise because the photos are about to get kind of shitful. This is what happens when you're manning a beater with one hand and an SLR with the other... When you're ready to make the soufflés, put 4 egg whites (at room temperature!!) into a bowl and beat them until soft peaks form:

Gradually beat in the raspberry purée until combined:

Spoon the mixture into the prepared dishes. The recipe claimed to make 4, but I didn't want to overfill them and end up with an oven filled with sad soufflé mush. So I just grabbed an extra soufflé dish (despite not having made soufflé since 1998, I somehow own 12 soufflé dishes!) and filled that too.

Bake for about 15 minutes in a 180 degree oven. Do not be even REMOTELY tempted to open the oven before the 15 minutes is up, or it'll all go to crap. They're done when they're puffy and slightly brown on the top. And I'm sorry about the disgustingness of my oven door:

Whisk them to the table (my mother kept telling me to do this when I told her I was going to make soufflé, so now I can't get it out of my head...) immediately, and serve with a dollop of raspberry cream:

The verdict? OMG, SO FREAKING GOOD!!! We even ate the extras, that's how good it was. Seriously, these were surprisingly easy to make. And yes, soufflé does sink when you take it out of the oven, but it's basic physics, people! If something is hot, it contracts when it starts to cool. It's SUPPOSED to sink. Hence the whisking it to the table.

The only thing I would do differently next time would be to halve the quantity of raspberry cream. It was an exorbitant amount of cream, considering it was just meant to be a dollop on the side. I GUESS you could save it and do other things with it, but it's probably easier to just make less of it.

Anyway, don't be afraid to try a soufflé recipe - if you do everything but the egg whites ahead of time, it's surprisingly quick and stress-free!

K xx

Challenge recipe 6: Mixed berry and mint sorbet

Given that this week marked the end of summer, I figured I should get this one out of the way before the weather cools down too much. Sorbet's hardly appropriate for cool weather!

Here's the book:

Yes, I own the Biggest Loser cookbook. But to be honest, I've only ever used the exercise parts of the book, not the recipes. Anyway, here's what you'll need:

It's pretty basic stuff. Start with 1.5 cups of water and 1/2 cup caster sugar. Dump them into a saucepan, thusly:

Heat until the sugar is dissolved, then bring to a boil. Once it's boiling, add in 3/4 cup of mixed berries.

Cook until the berries are soft - this should only take a couple of minutes:

Then take 1/2 cup mint leaves:

Turn off the heat, and add the mint leaves to the pan:

Leave the whole thing sitting around until it's completely cool. Then put a strainer over a smallish mixing bowl and dump everything into the strainer. Squish it through with a spoon - basically, you want to get the juice out of the berries without adding the seeds or the mint leaves to the sorbet:

Looks pretty gross, huh? Once you've squished out all the juice, you'll be left with this:

Pour it into a plastic container of some description:

Then stick it in the freezer overnight:

Attack it with a fork to fluff it into sorbet, and serve with a mint leaf on the top:

The verdict? Eh. I mean, it's tasty and all. And I'm sure it's lovely on a stinking hot day. But frankly, I'd rather have the berries with a little dusting of icing sugar. And it's probably healthier that way too.

That said, the mint goes well with the berries (although I think it would go better in a mojito...), and it's simple to make. So while it's something I can see sitting in the freezer until I need the Tupperware container, I might try it again during next summer and see how it goes in really hot weather. Until then, I'm sticking with 'eh'.

K xx