Midweek Kitchen Recommendations 3: Leftovers

So, a while back, I had a little bit of leftover coconut pastry cream from the Toasted Coconut Cake. I put it in the freezer for a month (or so) and then last weekend decided to use it in a tart. I made a basic tart shell (which, incidentally, was kind of a FAIL--I need to figure out my own tart crust recipe),

filled it with the leftover pastry cream, put cut fruit on top, glazed with an easy glaze (apricot preserves, plus a little booze--you could even use coconut rum! (or you could use water)--cook until melted, strain, brush over fruit). Voila! Easy dessert. And yummy, to boot!

All this to say: even 3/4 cup of leftover pastry cream can come in handy for a delicious dessert at a later date. Your freezer and freezer bags (plus a Sharpie to mark the date) should be your best friends, if they aren't already.

Black Forest Pie

So, does this taste anything like Black Forest Cake? No. Not really. I mean, it's sort of reminiscent of it, but not really like it. Is it delicious? Oh yes. I have to say this was another success from the braintrust that is my family. In fact, I think it's better than Black Forest Cake. But that may be because the only Black Forest Cake I've ever had was...overly sweet cherry filling, somewhat dried out cake, and...you know...cool whip (I will run outside and spit and turn around three times as penance for saying that curse).

Here's how it goes:

Black Forest Pie *click here for printable version*

Use a chocolate cookie crust (buy one, use your favorite recipe, whatev--I used the recipe that is part of the BAKED Diner-Style Chocolate Pie. I used a different kind of cookie, though, perhaps that's why the crust didn't want to leave the pan. BUT, that didn't diminish the deliciousness AT ALL.

Use this recipe as written (you may remember, I multiplied it by 2.5 when I made French Silk pie a while back. Don't do that this time--it's the perfect amount as is for this pie. Pour into your chocolate cookie crust. Place plastic wrap over it (the plastic wrap should touch the filling so it doesn't develop a "skin").


Refrigerate while you make:

Cherry Topping:

1/2 c. + 2 T sugar
dash salt
1/8 c. cherry juice (drained from canned cherries)
2 c. cherries (approx. 1 can)
1/2 T butter
1/8 c. cherry juice
1-1/2 T cornstarch
1/4 tsp. vanilla extract

Combine sugar, salt, and 1/8 c. cherry juice in a saucepan. cook over medium heat until mixture comes to a full boil.

Add cherries and butter; bring to a boil again. Boil 2 minutes.

Make a paste (slurry) of 1/8 c. cherry juice and cornstarch. Add to hot mixture and cook, stirring constantly, until thickened.

Remove from heat. Add vanilla extract. Cool completely.

Spoon cherry topping over chocolate filling and refrigerate for at least 2 hours before serving. Top each slice with freshly whipped cream.

And remember: don't use canned "pie filling"! Use these:


Yum. Rich chocolate filling. Delicious, not too tart, not too sweet cherry topping, FRESH whipped cream. Hm. All my favorite things. In one pie.


TGIP Rating--Black Forest Pie--KEEPER



Next up: I think I might try my hand at Biscotti. Will there be chocolate? Most likely.

Midweek Cocktails: Coconut

Remember when I told you I would come up with some tropical cocktails to use the leftover Coconut Simple Syrup from the Toasted Coconut Cake? I always keep my promises.

Granted, there's nothing new about these. They're both adapted from a variety of other recipes to fit my personal tastes. Because the truth is, I'm not much of a tropical cocktail person, generally speaking. I find them overly sweet and not nearly potent enough. So, if you're like me...then...you'll like these. I've tested both of these recipes (multiple times), and, you know, I'm good. Neither of them is too sweet. The lime cuts through the sweetness of the pineapple in the Piña Colada, and frankly, the Coconut Lime Rickey may be my new favorite summertime drink.

Here are all the recipes:

Coconut Simple Syrup *click here for printable version*

adapted from Throwdown's Toasted Coconut Cake by Bobby Flay

1-1/2 c. water

1 Tbls. + 1 c. granulated sugar

3/4 c. sweetened flaked coconut

1/2 tsp. coconut extract

Bring water and 1 Tbls. sugar to a boil. Stir in the coconut, remove from the heat and let sit for at least 30 minutes and up to 4 hours. Strain the liquid into a clean saucepan, add the 1 c. sugar and extract, bring to a boil and let cook until the mixture is slightly reduced, about 5 minutes. Let cool.

Piña Colada *click here for printable version*

Serves 4

1/2 pineapple, cut into small chunks

juice of 2 limes

4 oz. heavy cream

2 oz. coconut simple syrup

8 oz. coconut rum

Place all ingredients in blender, pulse until smooth. Pour over ice.

Coconut Lime Rickey *click here for printable version*

adapted from Atomic Cocktails

Serves 1

1-1/2 oz. coconut rum

1 oz. fresh lime juice

1 oz. coconut simple syrup

1 oz. half and half

Fill a cocktail shaker with ice and add all ingredients. Shake vigorously to blend and chill.

Strain the mixture into a cocktail glass (either straight up or over ice). Garnish with lime wedge, if desired.

A couple of things: a--both of these drinks would be tasty even without the rum. I made them for my kids and they loved them. And 2--if you like your tropical drinks frozen/slushy (I don't) and you have the kind of blender that will support that (again, not me) you can put all the Piña Colada ingredients and the ice together in the blender and...there you go.

Dark Mocha Cake

Confession 1: the only part of this that I made up was the combination of the two recipes.

I used the same Chocolate Stout Cake recipe that I used for Chocolate Irish Car Bomb Cake, and I found the Mocha Buttercream recipe online at Zoe Bakes, and thought they'd make a good combination for mr.'s birthday cake. And they were. The coffee flavor is not overpowering to the buttercream-just sort of subtle and deepens the flavor. And like I said before, you can hardly taste the stout in the cake, it just makes for a very complex flavor. Together, they make for a cake that is flavorful and wonderfully textured. And rich? Oh my, yes.

Confession 2: I don't think I really like using an Italian meringue as a starting point for buttercream. The frosting was delicious, and the texture was lovely. But look at all of the cooked sugar (i.e., "candy") that I ended up digging out of various stages of the frosting:

The directions indicate that you should pour the cooked sugar down the side of the bowl so it doesn't hit the beaters and splash out, but then the sugar just gets stuck to the side of the bowl. And there's no way to avoid some of it getting whipped like spun sugar around the mixing bowl, even if you're using a low speed setting. However, using a low speed setting, I think, is what results in these giant chunks of candy. I think it sort of pooled at the bottom of the mixing bowl because I was using a low speed. So, yeah, I need to figure out a way to alter the BAKED basic buttercream into a Mocha Buttercream. I'll add it to my list.

Pretty though, right?!

TGIP Rating--Dark Mocha Cake--KEEPER--in concept. I think the idea of mocha frosting with this particular cake is perfect. I just need to work on a different version of the frosting--ALTHOUGH THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH THIS ONE. It's just a preference thing.

Next up: Black Forest PIE. I'm making it up as I go along, folks.

Midweek Recipes 2: Kazan Lemon Bars

A long time ago, before I was a wife or a mother, I spent a lot of my time with my friend Araxi (Tita Rax). I didn't know a whole lot about baking at the time. Just enough to get myself in trouble in the kitchen occasionally. And enough to know when a recipe was easy enough and delicious enough to keep. I've kept this recipe since Rax gave it to me (on 4/17/96 to be exact), partially because it's a great one and partially because it has a handwritten note from her reminding me that I needed to send her the recipe for Wine Cake. We don't see each other much anymore; life has gotten complicated for both of us...and we live in different states. But I still think about her often, especially when I make these.

Kazan Lemon Bars *click here for printable version*

1-1/2 sticks butter
1/2 cup sifted powdered sugar
1-1/2 cups all-purpose flour

Mix until crumbly. Press into an 8 x 8 pan. Bake high in the oven at 350 for 20 minutes.

3 eggs, slightly beaten
3 Tbls. all-purpose flour
1-1/2 cups granulated sugar
juice of 1-1/2 lemons

Combine ingredients, pour on top of baked portion. Bake another 20 minutes--take care not to overbake. Lemon topping should resemble custard with a faint browning in patches. Dust with powdered sugar while hot. Cut into small squares when cool.

This recipe is easily doubled for a 9 x 13 pan. Cooking times are very approximate--the recipe originated at sea level--so adjust as necessary. Resist the urge to cut large squares, the bars are very rich.

Me and Araxi a LONG time ago. In costume for a production of Measure for Measure, if you must know. We didn't dress like this ALL the time.

Shaker Lemon Pie

There is nothing more disappointing than a pie that turns out…less than delicious. All that time and effort, not to mention ingredients—gone to waste. I try to mitigate these kinds of results by choosing recipes that come from trusted sources and/or have excellent reviews (if they are online). Martha is usually a pretty trustworthy source. But this pie. A big fat yellow disappointment.

I don’t think I did anything wrong, I think it’s just not a pie that I like (nor does anyone in my family). It’s possible that my lemons weren’t sliced quite thin enough.


It’s possible that they weren’t large enough, yielding too little lemon in relation to sugar/eggs. But I don’t know that perfectly sliced lemons or the perfect proportion of lemon slices would have made the difference for me. The taste was just really uneven. Some bites were very lemony, some very eggy, some tooth-achingly sweet. Everything was stirred together completely, as it should have been. And even though the lemon slices sat, coated in sugar, for almost 24 hours, they still had a bitterness that was right on the verge of metallic.


It just…didn’t taste very good. And wasn’t the lemony dessert I was craving.

I’m tempted to make a Cherry-Chocolate pie to make up for the fact that I didn’t get to enjoy the pie treat I was looking forward to. But that would still leave me down one lemon dessert. Maybe I’ll make lemon bars using a trusted recipe from my dear friend Tita Rax. Which should I do? Help me decide.

And maybe one of you should try this recipe. One of you who owns a mandoline for slicing things super thin. And report back on how it turns out for you.

TGIP Rating--Shaker Lemon Pie--NEVER AGAIN. Not worth even 5 minutes of effort.

Next up: mr. is celebrating his 40th birthday in a week and a half. Per his request, I'm combining a couple of recipes to make a Dark Mocha Cake. And I think it will turn out beyummy (beyond yummy).

Midweek Recipes: Hillman's Challah

Feel free to pronounce the first sound in "Hillman" the same as the first sound in "Challah". I do when I look at this recipe. Sorry, Hillman, I can't help it.

Anyway, some time ago, I blogged about challah and it was delicious and the recipe looked about as complicated as a recipe can be. I tried my dear (and awesome--see below) friend's (you also know her as The Priestess of Irish Car Bomb Cupcake fame) challah recipe and it was easily more delicious and is a much more user-friendly recipe. The addition of honey is *lipsmack* yummy. Try this one instead.

Hillman's Challah *click here for printable version*

minorly adapted from Ethnic Cuisine by Elisabeth Rozin

Proof 1 Tbls. yeast in 1/3 c. warm water

Meanwhile, mix in a large bowl:

1/4 c. honey

1/3 c. vegetable oil

3 eggs + 1 egg white (save the yolk)

2/3 c. warm water

Then pour in the yeast water and mix well.

Add:

2 tsp. salt

2 c. flour (all-purpose white)

Beat until more or less smooth.

Add 3 more cups of flour to make a smooth, elastic dough. It'll still be sticky, though. Give it about an 8 minute knead, adding the smallest amount of flour you can as you go to keep it from sticking to everything. If you sneak in as little flour as possible, the challah will reward you with tenderness, but the dough will be too sticky to get away with adding none.

When your knead is done, oil, cover, and let rise in a warm place for an hour. Prep your baking sheet towards the end of the hour--I use oiled parchment.

Punch down the dough and divide it in half. Take one half and divide into two parts--2/3 and 1/3. Take the large part and divide into 3 parts and braid. Take the smaller part and divide into 3 parts and braid, then put the smaller braid on top of the large braid. Repeat for the second half of the dough. Now you have two challot--it's traditional to have two.

Cover and let rise for 45 minutes to an hour.

Take the reserved egg yolk and mix in 2 tsp. water. Brush both loaves thoroughly with the egg wash. Sprinkle poppy seeds or sesame seeds, or leave as is. Place loaves in a cold oven. Set it to 400 and bake for 25-30 minutes until nicely golden brown.

Two confessions:

1. I ran out of all-purpose flour in the middle of this recipe. If you've ever seen the quantities of flour and sugar I buy, you would think such a thing would be impossible. I apparently thought so too. So, I used part bread flour and it still worked out beautifully.
2. I still prefer the single braid, personally, but I'm a goy.
   

Hillman (as we most affectionately refer to her):

And if you know who those men are surrounding her, you know exactly how awesome she is.


P.S. I changed my mind about what I'm baking next. Spring has sprung and I'm craving lemons. In an ideal world, I'd make the tarts on the cover of BAKED. But I don't have mini-tart pans right now. So I'm trying this Shaker Lemon Pie recipe of Martha's. Bread & Puppet Theater bread another time.