“Envie de dessert p.88″; “”Ma cuisine 100 façons p.268″

Pour la Glace à la vanille livre “A table avec TM p.124″

• 6 jaunes d’oeufs
• 500 gr. de lait
• 1 c. soupe de sucre vanillé “recette lolomix”
  
• facultatif : 1 c. à café de vanille liquide
  
• 250 gr. de crème fraîche liquide

Pour la Pâte à choux :

• 80 gr. de beurre mou
• 120 gr. de farine
• 1 c. soupe de sucre semoule
• 3 oeufs
• 1 pincée de sel

Pour la sauce au chocolat:

• 250 gr. de chocolat noir
• 200 gr. de lait
• 40 gr. de beurre mou

La veille faire la préparation de  la glace à la vanille  et la congeler en glaçons cf recette du livre de base “A table avec TM p. 124″

Faire  les choux “recette lolomix”

Préparer la glace: mettre les glaçons de glace dans le bol et mixer 1mn. / vit.6

Couper  les choux en deux et les remplir de la glace. Les remettre au congélateur le temps de préparer la sauce au chocolat.

Mettre le chocolat en morceaux dans le bol et mixer 10 sec. vit.9. Ajouter le beurre et le lait et programmer 4 mn. / 100° / vit. 2

Sortir les choux et les servir napper de sauce au chocolat.

Variantes:

• Vous pouvez remplir vos choux de la  glace de votre choix (chocolat , noix de coco…)
• Vous pouvez remplir vos choux du sorbet maison de votre choix et remplacer la sauce au chocolat par un coulis de fruits
• Vous pouvez aussi fourrer vos choux de crème chantilly.

Remarques:

• Vous pouvez congeler  vos choux et faire  votre glace à l’avance. Le jour J vous sortez vos choux deux heures avant le service et 10 mn avant le service vous sortez votre glace et vous remplissez vos choux .
• Je rajoute une c. café de vanille liquide dans ma glace pour renforcer le goût vanillé

A row of lime and fuchsia seats outside Chouquette

Raindrops on roses, whiskers on kittens, bright copper kettles and warm woollen mittens, brown paper packages tied up with string, these were some of Maria’s favourite things from the sound of Music. Maria also liked cream coloured ponies and crisp apple strudels.

I think she had the right idea about some things, especially the copper kettles, the brown paper packages and the apple strudels. Vanilla Townies with tan coloured saddles, the smell of new shoes in their thick cardboard boxes, Japanese wrapping paper, fresh coffee in the morning, a delicious brunch with perfectly poached eggs…the list goes on.

One of my favourite things (funnily involving food) is a good morning or afternoon tea. I must admit that any meals of the day are my favourite things…but I think it’s much harder to find a good morning or afternoon tea than any other meal times of the day.

A peak into their kitchen

I had one of the best afternoon tea experiences recently when I went to Chouquette in New Farm. It was a Friday afternoon, so the bakery/café wasn’t especially busy (as I heard it can get on Saturdays). Next to the actual bakery, there’s a commercial kitchen you can see through, the café is small, with one wall lined with wicker baskets of freshly baked breads and croissants and a pastry case full of delectable delights. Small tables line the other wall, there were also a row of brightly coloured lime and fuchsia seats outside facing the street.

Gorgeous fresh baked breads

Delectable delights in the pastry case

Clockwise from left: Green tea, Chocolate gateaux, citrus tart

Four layered chocolate gateaux

I will definitely be going back so that I can try the myriad of other pastries they have on offer, and I leave you with more pictures to drool over.

Rosey Cheeks

Their Petit fours, second from left is my choux with praline cream

I’ve never heard of Cream Puffs before until my sister moved to Singapore. She told me about this place called Beard Papa that sold Cream Puff.  They sounded yummy and all, at the time, but nothing fantastic.

Then she sent me this show called “Absolute Boyfriend” (Link at bottom of post. It’s Japanese by the way) and the way they kept going on and on and on about these cream puffs…boy. So of course, I couldn’t stop thinking about cream puffs, so I made them.

Thanks to Gabrielle and her hand mixer, it was soo fun trying to make them. I had to throw away a whole batch of dough because it burned in the pot. If it were up to me alone, I probably would have used it. That just shows it’s not always a good idea to bake alone.

Then, we decided to make dairy-free coffee pastry cream. That was the most amazing coffee pastry cream i’ve ever had in my life! The 2nd obstacle after burning the dough was trying to mix eggs into a lumpy dough, then trying to de-lump a cold pastry cream. Again, thank you handmixer. *mwah*

Oh, how can I forget my smoking oven??? Who makes grease paper whose “grease” starts to smoke in an oven. But once the grease burned off it was all good again. It all ended happily ever after with perfectly hollow puffs, filled with the coffee pastry cream.

But bad news for me later on….my bubble got burst after my sister told me cream puffs are huge. Mine were small, so small you would be tempted to just keep poppin them.

Well anyway, the whole point of that long convoluted story is that….Me being so disappointed, I HAVE to make them again, and the real ones this time. But I want to try and invent a filling. How about Burnt Caramel.

I know it sounds awful and bitter, but its not. It’s sweet as regular caramel, but in a different way. You have sugar which is in-your-face sweet, then caramel which is sweet but not in-your-face, then burnt caramel which is sweet but not noticeably so. It has another element of slight bitterness, but its not unpleasant at all. So tell me what you think?

ABSOLUTE BOYFRIEND- http://www.mysoju.com/absolute-boyfriend-zettai-kareshi/

BEARD PAPA

How wonderful food scales. I finally managed to get my profiteroles to rise and puff up like I remember eating at my birthdays. Will post a pic next time as I will no longer mess up the measurements.

This month I had the honour of hosting KBB’s challenge #12, with Arfi and Regina helping along.

Cheese souffle is the challenge this time,  I made it with Gruyère  instead of cheddar and add some chives for some extra bites…making it was quite easy as it was not my first encounter with baking souffles (I  love a quick fix of chocolate souffle), but this is my first time of actually taking a picture of a souffle… and that was the real challenge.

I had to make 2 times of half batch because taking picture of the first batch was a disaster ( I’m afraid it’s kind of my pattern now on doing the challenges:( ), second time was better but still  far from how I wanted… so I guess you will be seeing a few other souffle posts in the future, as I need to practise photographing it .

Cheese Souffles

Resource : The Perfect Cookbook by David Herbert. Penguin Books Australia Ltd 2003.

Ingredients:

• 100g unsalted butter
• ½ cup plain (all-purpose) flour
• 300ml milk
• 1 cup grated cheddar
• 2 Tbs  freshly grated Parmesan
• ½ tsp Dijon mustard
• pinch  cayenne pepper
• 4 eggs , separated

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 190C (375F, Gas Mark 5). Grease and lightly flour six ½-cup-capacity souffle dishes.

Melt butter in a small saucepan over low heat. Add the flour and cook, stirring constantly, for 1 minute. Gradually add the milk and whisk continuously over medium heat until the mixture is smooth, thickens and comes to the boil. Allow to cool for 5 minutes.

Transfer the mixture to a bowl and stir in the cheddar, Parmesan, mustard and cayenne pepper. Mix well.

Lightly beat the egg yolks and add these to the cheese mixture. Mix well.

With an electric mixer, whisk the egg whites in a clean bowl until firm peaks form. Fold a quarter of the whites through the cheese mixture to slacken it slightly, then gently fold through the remaining whites.

Spoon the mixture into the prepared dishes and bake for 20-25 minutes, or until risen and golden. Don’t be tempted to open the oven until the souffles have risen. Serve immediately.

Trois petites salades à déguster par ces temps de chaleur ! A mettre  au frais et savourer avec plaisir !!

Salade de tomate :

Couper  en gros dés  des tomates olivettes à la chair  bien ferme, saupoudrer légèrement de sel, un peu d’ail haché, un  peu de persil ciselé (mon pot de basilic viens de rendre l’âme !), quelques miettes de thon, quelques olives et un filet d’huile d’olive fruitée !

Salade de poivron :

Faire griller les poivrons  sur un barbecue ou sous le grill du four, placer dans du papier essuie tout, puis dans un sac en plastique. Laisser refroidir, éplucher les poivrons, éviter de les relaver, ils perdront de leur goût. Découper en lanières, rajouter un peu d’ail haché, saler et arroser un filet d’huile d’olive fruitée.

Salade de chou :

Ciseler finement le cœur de la tête de choux, le  saupoudrer de sel, l’arroser de vinaigre et laisser dégorger dans une  passoire pendant  une petite heure. Rincer  abondamment en pressant. Égoutter  et essorer puis arroser d’une vinaigrette fortement moutardée et garnir de lamelles de cornichon.

Nghe chồng thông báo có mấy ng bạn chồng đến thăm cả nhà. Sẵn có con gà đồi mang ra tiếp, thử nghiệm món tôm cay của afamily (món này quá thành công, hi hi). Thì mình làm thêm mẻ bánh su kem ăn cho thanh tao. Kết quả là thành công mỹ mãn. Tối nay lại lọ mọ để làm cho chồng mang về hối lộ, đợt này ko về quê được (phát huy tác dụng hết cỡ).

*PHẦN VỎ
NL:
240ml nước
140gr bột mỳ
100gr bơ nhạt
4 quả trứng
1 chút muối
1 chút đường

CL:
Cho nước và bơ, muối, đường vào nồi đun cho chảy đến khi sôi
Khi nước sôi thì cho bột vào (qua rây), khuấy nhanh tay sẽ được hỗn hợp đặc lại thành khối không bám nồi (lưu ý, nồi vẫn để trên bếp, văn nhỏ lửa)
Tắt bếp, để vài phút cho nguội, đập từng quả trứng vào đánh đều tạo thành hỗn hợp bóng mịn (phần này quấy hơi lâu, may mà có anh xã hỗ trợ, ko thì to tay)
Làm nóng lò tầm 190 độ đến 200 độ, cho vào túi bóp kem, nướng khoảng 30 đến 35 phút hoặc đến khi bánh chuyển màu hơi vàng sậm là được.
Cũng có thể nướng ở nhiệt độ 220 nhưng với nhiệt độ trên mình đưa ra bánh sẽ đẹp và thích hợp cho trang trí.

*NHÂN KEM
NL:
300ml sữa tươi (hoặc 250g sữa tươi, 50g kem tươi)
40g đường
3 lòng đỏ
50g bột mì
1 chút muối
Cho 1 chút sữa vào bột, tán cho bột ko vón, sau đó cho toàn bộ hỗn hợp vào nồi, đun nhỏ lửa trong khi khuấy liên tục, sẽ được hỗn hợp chín mềm. Bỏ ra để nguội. Cho vào túi bóp kem. bỏ vào ngăn mát, cho kem mát ăn sẽ ngon hơn.
Lúc này vỏ bánh đã nguội, và nhân kem đã mát, dùng dao rạch 1 đường nhỏ, cho nhân kem vào vỏ.
Với loại bánh này có thể dùng nhân kem tươi, phủ thêm socola, hạnh nhân…
Bánh có thể làm vỏ trước bọc kín, bỏ vào ngăn đá. Khi nào ăn thì bỏ ra, làm nhân. Có thể bảo quản được 1 thời gian dài.

(Bài sử dụng công thức của chị Khai tâm, có sửa đổi đôi chút trong quá trình làm)

pour 6 personnes :
6 saucisses fumées
3 beau choux-rave
6 pommes de terre
1 brin de thym

voici les choux-rave, on utilisera aussi bien le bulbe que les feuilles dans cette recette.

Tout d’abord, faire un peu colorer les saucisses

Ajouter les bulbes de choux coupés en petits morceaux et couvrir d’eau

Emincer les feuilles de choux et les ajouter à la préparation ainsi que le thym.

Laisser mijoter à feu doux une bonne demi-heure puis ajouter les pommes de terres en cubes.

Faire cuire encore un bon quart d’heure et servir

Je ne me lasse pas de confectionner des tartes. Avec une préférences pour les salées et servies encore chaudes … saison oblige !  Accompagnées d’une belle salade, c’est un vrai repas complet à déguster aussi bien à midi que le soir.

La meilleure tarte ? C’est celle dont la pâte est faite maison. Et quand on y a goûté, c’est difficile de s’en passer. Les pâtes du commerce peuvent rendre service, certes, mais elles sont pour la plupart fades, voire sans goût. Et puis, faire sa pâte, c’est très facile, rapide et celà permet de nombreuses variations.

tarte aux brOcOlis

Pâte brisée  (pour un moule rond de env. 30 cm)

• 250 g de farine
• 1/2 cc de sel
• 110 g de beurre froid en morceaux
• 1,5 dl d’eau

Mélanger la farine et le sel. Ajouter les morceaux de beurre et mélanger en frottant avec les mains jusqu’à obtenir une masse grumeleuse.
Verser l’eau et mélanger rapidement à la corne à pâte en une pâte souple. Surtout ne pas pétrir car la pâte durcirait. Emballer la pâte dans du papier film et mettre au frais au moins 1 heure.

Il est possible de confectionner la pâte brisée au robot. C’est d’ailleurs ce que je fais le plus souvent. J’utilise un robot Kenwood et le fouet en forme de “K” qui est livré avec. Avant de vous lancer, je vous conseille de vous référer au mode d’emploi de votre appareil ou si vous en avez reçu un, au livre de recettes fourni avec. Suivez les instructions, car comme je le dis plus haut, il est très important de ne pas trop travailler la pâte et avec un robot c’est vite arrivé.

La pâte se conserve 3-5 jours au frigo. Elle peut  être congelée sans problème 3-5 mois. 

Cette pâte convient également pour des tartes sucrées.

Liaison

• 2,5 dl de crème liquide
• 3 oeufs
• 1 cc de pesto d’ail des ours
• 2 cs de fromage râpé (Gruyère)
• poivre-sel

Battre les oeufs, ajouter la crème et le reste des ingrédients.

Garniture:

• 200-300 g de brocolis frais blanchis ou surgelés, décongelés et bien égouttés avant l’emploi
• 1 bonne poignée de chapelure

Abaisser la pâte sur 3-4 mm et foncer un moule rond de env. 30 cm. Piquer le fond à la fourchette puis y parsemer la chapelure. Répartir les bouquets de brocolis et pour finir ajouter la liaison.

Cuisson:

Environ 30-40 min, dans la partie inférieur du four préchauffé à 200°C.  Sortir du four, laisser légèrement tiédir avant de démouler. Déguster encore chaud, c’est bien meilleur !

Régalez-vOus !

verO

Firstly, I have to apologise for being sooooo slow updating my blog … things have just got away from me and then to add to this my husband has been writing a proposal for funding his research work.  This proposal has meant that for the last 3 weeks he has been hogging the laptop and I haven’t been able to write things up.

So, the first thing I need to do is update where we have got to in respect of the George Brown Baking Arts course.  We have now completed weeks 5, 6 and 7.    I have written a fully description for the Cream Caramels we made in week 5 however, in order to get the pictures up and catch up I am going to just give bried descriptions for the others (and of course pictures) … if I do then get more time, I will try and get more details up for each item.

Week 5

This week wasn’t really what most people would call baking but it was definitely something sweet and the food that was produced was absolutely lovely.

Cream Caramel (I know these as Creme Caramel but then we are in Canada)

These are those little custard puddings you buy which you then invert and a caramel sauce appears on it.  They are very very sweet and the resulting pudding is so elegant it would seem to be quite complicated but in actual fact they are simple to produce once you have managed to master the steps.

First things first and you make the caramel:

400g White Sugar (granulated sugar is what we used but I would assume that castor sugar would also work well).

Place a saucepan on the stove on high heat.  Put the sugar in the pan and cover with water – you don’t want too much water but enough to cover the sugar plus a little.  Allow the sugar and water mixture to cook and melt on the stove until the sugar has melted and turned golden brown.   Remove from the heat and pour a small amount into the bottom of 12 ramekins – just divide the mixture equally among the ramekins.

The important bits here are that you must watch the sugar carefully as once you have removed the pan from the heat the sugar continues to cook.  Alot of the people in our class let the sugar go too golden brown on the stove and by the time they had started to pour it into the ramekins it was burning (the smell of burnt caramel is VERY noticeable – if in doubt bin it and start again!).  Me and Mike kept ours cooking until it reached a pale golden brown – if I were to describe it, I would say we pulled it off the heat when it reach the golden colour of a $1 coin (or £1 coin) and by the time it was all poured out it was much darker (nearer the colour of a 1cent or 1penny).

The next important point is in connection with the above – the sugar continue to cook once it is removed from the stove and therefore it is important to work fast in pouring out the mixture into the ramekins to ensure it doesn’t burn to the pan … or cool too much and turn solid in the pan as then it is too late!

The final thing to remember is do NOT stir the sugar.  If you stir the sugar, it will definitely melt faster but it may also crystalise … crystalisation is BAD.  So just watch it and it will be fine.

Then once the caramel is poured out into the ramekins you then start work on the Creme:

8 Whole eggs

200g Sugar

Generous pinch of salt

1 litre Milk

1 tbsp Vanilla or the seeds from 1 vanilla pod

Reuse the saucepan in which you made the caramel and put the milk on the stove to warm – it doesn’t need to boil just get hot so watch to make sure it doesn’t boil.

While the milk is warming, in a separate  bowl whisk together the eggs and sugar until blended.  Add the vanilla to the eggs and sugar and whisk in.

When the milk is warmed mix the milk into the egg and sugar mix while whisking continuously until just incorporated.

Take this custard mix and pour through a sieve to remove any lumps.  Then transfer this custard into the ramekins on top of the cooled caramel – divide the custard equally into each of the 12 ramekins, they should be filled to the top.

Place these ramekins into a water bath (roasting dish with about 2 inchs of water in the base) and cover the roasting dish with silver foil.  Place in an oven preheated to 350F oven for approximately 40 minutes until the custard is set.

The silver foil is optional but it encourages the custards to set quicker as it keeps the steam inside the water bath during baking.

It is important to keep a very close eye on these while they are cooking – if they bubble they are boiling and that means they are cooking too fast so watch out.  The custard needs to be only just set – the flavour and texture of the creme caramels will change if the overbaked custard starts to boil.  While cooking these during the class we checked on them every 10 minutes.

These are best kept for AT LEAST 24 hours before eating as the caramel needs time to melt down again and become the liquid that you expect.  However, when storing and eating these we found that they actually took more like 2 days to become liquified again.

Chef said that these could be stored for 1 weekin the fridge – ours actually kept for more like 2 weeks in the fridge and were absolutely fine.

DO NOT FREEZE – the custard does not freeze well.

Cream Caramel

Bavarian Creams 

These are also a pudding, like little jellied mousses.  They have gelatine in them but you could use agar agar or pectin instead. 

We made them with milk and cream and put some vanilla flavouring in half and mango flavouring in the other half.  You can use a fruit purees to make them flavoured as well, in this case you would remove the milk and just put in blended fruit (this has the added bonus of making them a bit healthier too).

When we left these to set we put them into little ramekins to shape them however, you can pipe them.  If you do want to pipe them (a little like in the picture below) you have to wait until they are almost set and then pipe before they set completely.  It is important not to set them completely and then soften them as they will not set properly again.

These freeze brilliantly and you can either defrost them or eat them frozen a bit like ice cream – this is how we have been eating them to make them last longer and they are delicious.

Week 6

This week we made bread rolls – loads of different toppings and stuff and these are sooo versitile the same bread recipe can also be used to make cinnamon buns!

Week 7

This week we made choux pastry and then used this pastry to make cream puffs and eclairs.  The empty shells freeze so we didn’t fill that many as it meant they went soggy and had to be eaten really quickly.  We gave a few to the neighbours and they seemed to enjoy them to so there you go it isn’t just my opinion.

Cream Puffs

Of course you don’t have to make them look like swans … but hey that’s just a little bit more fun!

Eclairs

I don’t think I need to say anything about chocolate eclairs … they just are … wonderful!?!?

Hopefully next time I write I’ll be able to give you more details and stuff but I have to go now as THE proposal still isn’t written so the laptop is needed back.

For Valentines or the winter blues, nothing goes better with Champagne!

I use Thomas Keller’s super simple recipe for the profiteroles, and for the strawberry mousse filling, I use this equally awesome and simple recipe from A la Table des Rois, a book I reeally want to get:

The only difference is that I add more whipped cream than the recipe calls for (about 2x), to make the filling extra fluffy, and I put it in a piping bag instead of in molds.

Once you have the profiteroles and mousse prepared per the recipes’ instructions, here is what to do:

1. Cut a 1.5″ circle out of the top of each profiterole. I find it easiest to leave them attached by only cutting 90% of the circle.

2. Remove the piping bag of strawberry mousse from the refrigerator. If you don’t have a piping bag, a strong plastic bag with 1″ cut from the corner will work fine. “Inject” each profiterole with mousse, being sure to get in all the corners and nooks. There should be enough to fill the profiterole to the top when the “lid” is closed.

Close them, dust with confectioner’s sugar, and refrigerate until ready to serve.

My sister, Brooke, recently took a trip to Napa Valley and came home raving not about the wine but about the gougeres she ate while she was there.  Gougeres are little cheese puffs (technically called a ‘choux’ pastry) that pair perfectly with wine and champagne.  I finally decided to get to the kitchen and make these little delights for the first time, and they came out just right.

Swiss and Chive Gougeres

I used some leftover Swiss cheese that I had in the fridge, but gruyere would be exceptional in these.  Other cheese would work just as well, but softer varieties may change the consistency of your gougere a bit.  Also, feel free to get creative with the herbs you add to these guys!  The ingredients below yield 24 bite-sized gougeres.

• 1/4 cup milk
• 1/4 cup water
• 1/2 stick unsalted butter (4 tablespoons)
• 2-3 pinches sea salt
• 1/2 cup all purpose flour, sifted
• 2 eggs, plus 1 egg white
• 1/2 cup grated Swiss cheese
• 2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh chives
• 1/4 teaspoon dry mustard
• Dash or two cayenne pepper, optional
• Freshly ground black pepper to taste
• Grated parmesan cheese for garnish

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.  In a small or medium saucepan, bring the milk, water, butter, and salt to a boil stirring as it heats.  Remove the pan from the heat and add the flour to the butter mixture all at once.  Stir to incorporate the flour, and return the pan to low heat.  Continue stirring about 2 minutes to dry out the flour mixture some. 

Pour the flour mixture into a medium bowl and let it sit for a minute or so.  Add the eggs one at a time, stirring with your wooden spoon in between each addition.  The mixture will look curdled at first, but keep stirring vigorously until the dough becomes smooth again.  Add the egg white and stir again until smooth.  Add the cheese, chives, dry mustard, cayenne, and black pepper to taste (I used a very generous amount of black pepper) and stir to mix evenly.  Spoon the mixture into the bottom corner of a quart-sized Ziploc bag.

Line a baking sheet (the jelly roll kind, not an airbake cookie sheet) with parchment paper.  As a side note, silpats will not work as well for these, so stick to the regular parchment.  Snip the bottom corner off the filled Ziploc bag and pipe the dough into little mounds on your parchment paper.  I fit all 24 gougeres onto one baking sheet, spacing them about 1 inch apart.  Sprinkle grated parmesan cheese on top of each gougere and bake for 20-22 minutes, or until golden brown.

These crispy puffs are light and airy, laced with cheese and herbs and a hint of spice throughout.  They really do make the perfect match to wine or champagne, and would be an easy hors d’ouevre at a cocktail party.  Freeze your baked gougeres and reheat for only 5 minutes at 400 degrees for a simple, make-ahead finger food.  Enjoy…