Bake 2.23: Sachertorte

Technical, curtesy of Mary Berry, the Sachertorte. I used the recipe here. It is a lovely chocolate torte with a layer of apricot jam in the middle, and a ganache. 

If you are Austrian you probably have  feelings about how this cake is famous, but I think that may only be in Austria? Not to burst any bubbles but I thought it was fine. I like my normal chocolate cake recipe better. The apricot was a delightful new combination with the chocolate however, I wasn't sure what to expect there and it lifted the floral nature of the chocolate and balanced nicely. 

It is a simple cake to make and doesn't take too long either, a good shift from more complicated bakes if you want a nice weeknight treat! Yum!

Bonus: Christina Tosi Compost Cookies (with a twist)

A bit ago I received a lovely gift from Rachel, who is an amazing baker and followed her passion to pastry school and now works in a bakery that has the best pie. She has pie skillz. When she handed me the jar of espresso/cacao/vanilla extract the very first thing that popped into my head are Christina Tosi's compost cookies. She shares the recipe on her website here. These cookies have potato chips and pretzels, chocolate and butterscotch chips, they are fun. They call for ground coffee, and I do not enjoy coffee. So I subbed the vanilla in the recipe for 2 teaspoons of the the espresso/cacao/vanilla extract. It was brilliant, still highlights the chocolate but without an overpowering coffee flavor. Perfect for the non-coffee lover in your life! YUM!

 

Bake 2.22: Banoffee Mille-Feuille

This is a fun one! I used 1/2 a recipe of puff pastry but you could use store bought puff pastry too, that would make this a pretty quick dessert that is very impressive. Mille-Feuille which sounds so fancy is layers of pastry and cream, with other things as desired. I was inspired by the classic UK banoffee pie and used caramel pastry cream and bananas in my layers. 

Ingredients
1/2 recipe puff pastry (I prefer this recipe)
3 ripe but not soft bananas

3 cups whole milk

1/3 cup sugar

1/4 corn starch

1 tablespoon flour

4 large egg yolks

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

4 tablespoons salted butter, room temp

1/3 cup caramel sauce + a drizzle for the top

Start with the pastry cream. Heat 2 1/2 cups milk with the sugar in a saucepan. Whisk together the 1/2 cup remaining milk, corn starch, flour, and egg yolks. Once the sugar has completely dissolved, ladle a small amount into the corn starch mixture to temper. Pour all back into the saucepan and cook until thick, pudding like consistency. Remove from the heat and whisk in the vanilla, butter, and caramel sauce. Pour into a dish and cover with plastic wrap, pressing the wrap onto the surface to ensure no skin forms. Put in the fridge to cool!

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Roll the pastry to 11x14 on a silpat or parchment sheet. Slide onto a baking sheet. Prick the dough all over with a fork. Cover with another silpat or parchment sheet and a second baking sheet. This weight causes the pastry to cook flat and crispy, rather than puffing up like with the croissants. Bake for 18-20 minutes, and check the browning around 14 minutes in, you can remove the top sheet if needed to ensure the top browns nicely. Allow to cool. 

Now assembly! Chop 1 of the bananas and set aside. Slice the other two bananas if you want to be fancy and decorate the sides like I did, if not, just chop them and put them in the layers. Standing the slices up along the edges allowed me to put more pastry cream in the middle, just sayin'. 

Carefully cut your large sheet of pastry into three equal rectangles. I eyeballed the first one, then used it to cut the remaining two. Put one piece of pastry on your platter. Line the edges with half slices of bananas all the way around (they are a little sticky on the cut side so actually just stand up there on their own). Fill the center with pastry cream using an offset spatula to gently ease it up to the edges. Top with 1/2 the chopped banana. Add another layer of pastry, again with bananas along the edge, pastry cream in the middle, chopped bananas. Add the last layer of pastry. I decorated with a few remaining bananas slices and a drizzle of caramel. Ideally put it in the fridge for a few minutes before slicing, and then slice gently. YUM! 

Bake 2.21x2: Almond Croissants

To continue to challenge myself I did a second round of laminated dough to see if I could get it through without any cracking. You may remember that my mixer died but thankfully the new one came in the mail and it is ... so clean! You thought I was going to say something else, I know, but it is hard to keep a mixer clean and it will likely never be this clean again! 

So round two for laminated dough. Followed the same recipe, you can see it here. 

For the filling I used a frangipane, an almond cream that is just right for croissants, or a tart, so many options. 

Ingredients
3 tablespoons soft butter
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup ground almond meal
1 large egg
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract 
1 tablespoon flour 

This is an easy one, cream the butter and sugar, add the almond meal and mix, add the egg and extracts and mix, add the flour and mix. Done. Put that in a pastry bag for ease of assembly. 

You can make your own almond meal if you have almonds and a good processor. We keep almond meal on hand because we use it for recipes often enough. If you have Costco in your neck of the woods that is usually where we buy it and we store it in the freezer so it doesn't spoil before we get through the whole bag. 

Now, we used 1/2 of the puff pastry (laminated dough) recipe for these croissants. 

When it is ready to be rolled into final shape roll out into a 11x 14 rectangle and cut that into 8 smaller rectangles that measure about 5 1/2 x 3 1/2. I definitely measured ... with my eyes. 

Now lay out one of the rectangles. Pipe a line of almond cream near one of the short sides, fold that side over, pipe another length of cream and fold over again. Place on a parchment lined baking sheet with the fold on the under side. Cover with plastic wrap 

Allow to rest on the counter for 1 hour. Then rest in the fridge for 1 hour. 

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Brush the croissants with a beaten egg + a little milk. Pipe a thin line of almond cream along the top, and press sliced almonds into the cream so they stick. They will toast up nicely in the oven. I used 1/3 cup almonds across all the tops. 

Bake 18-20 minutes, rotating halfway, until golden and delicious! 

Look at those little nuggets before they rested and baked!

Bake Club: Pistachio Pinwheels

To celebrate St Patrick's day we had bake club on Sunday and made Pistachio Pinwheels! We used the recipe in Claire Saffitz' book Dessert Person. Given the snow storm, I used the pistachio's I had on hand which were roasted and not the lovely bright green of the raw ones so I added three drops of green food gel. I should probably have just done 1, but it was too late after I had done three! Reminder to self that gel color is always more intense.

You can see the recipe here, thanks to the New York Times also thinking this was a great recipe.

You can watch Claire make them on YouTube here. I have gone down the rabbit hole of watching her videos and she is lovely, approachable, and easy to follow. I am aiming for less wonky swirl next go round using her tips from the video! YUM!

Bake 2.21: Laminated Pastry

For the showstopper in the patisserie episode (the semi-final!) the bakers were asked to make three pastries from the same laminated dough. I did a lot of reading in the books I have, my favorite blogs, and watching of videos and was feeling limited confidence in making a laminated pastry successfully. 

In the end I was half successful, and in the midst of being half successful my mixer died. So I will be remaking the dough next weekend after the already ordered new mixer comes in the mail in hopes of getting even closer to top notch pastry. 

In my practice I followed the tips in Claire Saffitz' book Dessert Person, and King Arthur Baking Company and used the recipe from one of my favorite blogs, Sally's Baking Addiction. There is a good video by Sally too if you are a learner who likes videos. The recipe is here.

When I first shaped the butter (by hand since the mixer died when making the dough) and put it in the fridge for the requisite 30 minutes I learned that my fridge is too cold. When I went to roll the dough the butter layer cracked into a bunch of pieces. I let it warm up and then continued with the turns and rather than refrigerating for 30 minutes again, I cut the time to 15 minutes. I was able to save the dough enough to still get some flaky layers. Next time around I will play with the temperature and how long to chill in the fridge. 

I decided to practice shaping so not to waste the dough, doing pinwheels, plaits, Danish, and croissants with half the dough. With the other half, I rolled it out into a large rectangle, sprinkled with 1 tablespoon cinnamon and a healthy dose of brown sugar (1/2 cup give or take), rolled it up into a log, cut into 12 pieces, and baked. Once finished baking I glazed them with a simple mixture of powdered sugar, milk, and pinch of salt that I whisked together until smooth. 

So even if your laminated dough doesn't work out perfectly, there are delicious options! YUM!

Easy Danish, twisted dough, filled with strawberry jam and glazed.

To ensure the rolls maintained their round shape I baked them in a muffin tin.

Stay tuned for another attempt at laminated pastry here soon!

Bake 2.20: Iced Fingers

Technical bake curtesy of Paul Hollywood: Iced Fingers filled with whipped cream and jam. The recipe is simple and delicious. Paul would be a touch disappointed that I did overprove mine, so they are more like iced arms, but the taste was spot on. 

I followed the recipe here. The recipe calls for jam, you are more than welcome to make your own, use diced berries and sugar, no need to add pectin as it will be spread in the buns. 

YUM! 

Bake 2.19: Tropical Layered Mousse Cake

We had a drizzly day this week and I thought a summery mousse cake was in order. The challenge was to create a layered mousse cake with a light sponge and at least 1 mousse flavor. I decided to go with a coconut sponge and then layered pineapple jam and mango mousse. Yum yum!

Ingredients
Coconut Cake

1 1/4 cup cake flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

6 tablespoons butter

3/4 cup granulated sugar

2 large egg whites

1/4 cup sour cream

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 teaspoon coconut extract

1/2 cup coconut milk - canned

1/2 cup sweetened shredded coconut, toasted lightly

Pineapple Jam

10 ounces pineapple chunks (I used frozen) 

1 cup sugar

1/3 cup water

Juice of 1 lime

1 teaspoon gelatin powder

Mango Mousse 

8 ounces mascarpone cheese 

1/2 cup whole milk

1/2 cup mango puree*

2/3 cup granulated sugar

1 1/2 tablespoons gelatin powder

6 ounces heavy cream

*10 ounce bag of frozen mango thawed in a colander to remove excess moisture and and then puree until smooth. Run through the colander to ensure there are no chunky bits. If you have a mango tree or access to fresh mango, puree the fresh mango, it is nicer but harder to find.

Put the jam on the stove while you make the cake (or make it ahead!). Put the pineapple, sugar, and water in a saucepan on the stove and cook on a low-medium heat. Cook 20-30 minutes until the fruit is soft and the sugar is fully dissolved. Allow to cool slightly - or take the risk - and blend until smooth in a blender or food processor. Return to the same pan and cook another 20-30 minutes until thickened. Bloom the gelatin in 1 tablespoon of cool water. Add a scoop of the jam to temper and then pour into the pan, add the lime juice, and whisk until well incorporated. I used a spare cake pan lined with plastic wrap to let the jam layer set up, pop it in the fridge, or freezer, depending on how quickly you need it to set.

Next up cake. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and prep your cake pan. As I was going to build the cake in a springform pan, I chose a cake pan that was one size smaller than my springform, 8 inches. I used one of the cake pans to set the jam so when I pop the cake in the mold the jam will fit right on top. That may have been an in the moment decision but it worked 

Mix the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt and set aside. Cream the butter and sugar in the mixing bowl. Add the egg whites one at a time and mix. Add the sour cream and extracts. Don't worry if it separates, it will come back together. Add the dry ingredients alternatively with the coconut milk. Before all the flour is incorporated, add the shredded coconut. Pour into the prepared cake pan and bake 21-24 minutes, until a toothpick comes out clean. Set aside on a wire rack to cool. 

Optional: put the remainder of the coconut milk in a small saucepan and reduce. Use that to soak the cake. I say optional but let me tell you, when cooked down it is the coconut version of sweetened condensed milk. It is so good. So. Good.

Mousse time! Bloom the gelatin in 2 tablespoons cool water. Whisk the mascarpone, milk, and mango puree and heat until warm. Whisk in sugar and a pinch of salt until dissolved. If it has cooled too much heat slightly, you want it to be warm still, then whisk in the bloomed gelatin. Set aside. In another bowl lightly whip the heavy cream to soft peaks. Fold the two mixtures together. 

Assembly time. I lined the bottom of a springform pan with parchment, trimmed the cake to be an even layer and placed it in the bottom, then soaked it with the condensed coconut milk. Placed the jam layer on top of the cake. Then pour the mousse over both. 

Now you have to be patient while the whole thing chills! That is the hardest part. 

I had extra mango puree so I added 1/2 teaspoon of bloomed gelatin to it and then heated and whisked them together, cooled and then poured that over the top of the cake after the mousse had started to set. I then sprinkled some coconut on top, nothing fancy! Clearly waiting for the cake to be ready was a struggle for me and I had a little extra gelatin... and Yum! 

Bake 2.18: Cardamom, Blood Orange and Caramel Croquembouche

I maybe though that this wouldn't work. How in the world could it possibly stand up! With a few tips from Claire Saffitz' new book Dessert Person (use craquelin so the puffs are more evenly round, and her step by step tips for caramel) it did work. Slightly wonky since I angled the cone shape too much the first few rounds and then tried to recover but goodness, it was a success! A delicious success! 
This fancy dessert is definitely a labor, it took a few hours with all the pieces, but you can stop between the pieces too or make the puffs and cream the day before assembly - that is what I did. I used a standard pate a choux, topped with a  brown sugar craquelin, filled them with a cardamom and blood orange diplomat cream, and dipped them in a lightly salted caramel. I could eat the cream with a spoon. I ate the cream with a spoon. We all at the cream with a spoon. 

Ingredients

Pastry Cream

3 cups whole milk

1 teaspoon cardamom seeds, ground

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1/4 cup corn starch

1 tablespoon flour

4 egg yolks

4 tablespoons salted butter

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 tablespoon blood orange zest

2 tablespoons blood orange juice

1/2 cup whipping cream

Craquelin
1 stick butter (1/2 cup)
1/2 cup brown sugar

1 cup flour

Pinch of salt

Pate a Choux

1/2 cup whole milk

1/2 cup water

1/2 cup butter

1 tablespoon sugar

1 cup flour

5 eggs

Caramel

2 1/2 cups sugar

1/2 cup water

1/2 teaspoon salt

As the pastry cream can be made ahead of time it is a good place to start, alternatively you could make the craquelin and choux and then make the pastry cream while those cool. 

Put 2 1/2 cups milk, the cardamom seeds, and granulated sugar in a saucepan and heat until a high simmer. In a separate bowl mix the remaining milk, corn starch, flour, and egg yolks until well combined. Once the milk is simmering, ladle a scoop into the corn starch mixture, and whisk, you want to temper the eggs so they don't scramble. Pour the mixture back into the sauce pan and whisk while the mixture thickens. You can tell that it is thick enough when the bubbles have made it to the middle and are getting larger, you want to see a few large bubbles rather than the bunches of small ones. Remove from the heat, whisk in the butter, vanilla, zest and juice. Pour that pastry cream into a bowl or pan that fits in your fridge (learned that from experience?) and cover with plastic wrap pressing it to the surface to avoid the unpleasant skin. 

While that cools, whip the cream to medium peaks. Once the pastry cream is cool, whisk to loosen the cream and then whisk in the heavy cream. Done! Put it in a pastry bag until ready to fill. 

Craquelin next. Cream the butter (room temp works best of course) and sugar until smooth. Stir in the flour and salt gently until combined. Turn out onto a clean work surface and knead a few times until smooth. Divide in half and roll out between two sheets of parchment paper until 1/8" thick. Put those in the freezer for at least 15 minutes. 

Once frozen, cut as many circles as possible, I used a 1 inch round cutter. You want to aim for 75 circles to have enough for all your puffs. If you want to make larger puffs then use a larger cutter and make sure you make your puffs larger too. If I was not making a tower I would do 1 1/2-2 inch puffs. Put the cut circles back on the tray in the freezer until ready to back. 

Dough time! Prep two cookie sheets by using the same round cutter to trace as many circles as you can onto parchment, about 1 inch apart, aim for 35-40 per sheet. I use a permanent marker since that shows nicely, then turn the parchment over so the ink is on the opposite side and set aside. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. 

Add the milk, water, and sugar to a saucepan. Bring to a boil and toss in the flour. Beat the flour in with a wooden spoon. It will form a film on the pan and then reabsorb into the mixture. The goal is to cook the flour so the mixture will seem to be drier than when it first came together. Pour the dough into the stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Turn the mixer on low to allow the dough to cool down. You want to be able to touch the outside of the mixing bowl before you start adding the eggs. 

Add the eggs one at a time, the dough will separate and look funky and then come back together, once it comes back together, add the next egg. I used 5 eggs but test the mixture after the 3rd egg and only add as many as you need. To test the dough, pull the paddle up out of the mixture, you want it to ribbon off the beater forming a V shape. Once the dough is ready, scoop into a piping bag. 

Snip the piping bag to have a 1/2 inch opening (you can be fancy and use a piping tip too), pipe mounds using your template. Place a disc of craquelin on the top of each mound. Place the two trays in the oven, immediately dropping the oven temperature to 375 degrees. Bake for 20 minutes, and then swift like a ninja, rotate the trays, bake for another 10 minutes until lovely and golden brown. Since we are stacking these, turn off the oven and allow to sit in there with the door cracked for 10 more minutes. Then pull the trays out and poke each puff with a skewer or knife point to allow a steam hole. You can do a secret side hole just at the edge where the craquelin meets or on the bottom. Allow to cool. 

Once cool, use the hole to fill the puffs with the cream. I did a combination of counting to 6 (completely made up) and feeling that they get heavier when filled. There is no skimping on filling around here. Prepare a base, using a small plate, or cover a removable cake tin bottom with foil - that's what I did.

Set the puffs aside. It is time to make caramel! I loved the look of Claire's croquembouche as she did the craquelin and then dipped them in a thin layer of caramel so I just had to do the same. 

In a heavy bottom sauce pan stir the sugar and water until the sugar dissolves. Continue stirring until it comes to a boil. Then no more stirring. Brush down the inside of the pot with water using a pastry brush to avoid crystals forming along the sides. Ready a heat proof bowl, pyrex measuring cup or similar to pour the caramel in once completed. Continue cooking the sugar, swirling occasionally, until it turns a deep amber color. Sprinkle in the salt and want pour into the ready bowl/container. Allow to cool slightly, then dip carefully the top of each puff into the caramel, swirling to allow any extra to drip back and then set aside to cool. Be quick, but also, be careful. Wear gloves if needed. If the caramel becomes too firm, heat carefully over a double boiler. 

Once all the puffs have been dipped, begin stacking! If your caramel becomes to firm, heat carefully, or make a new batch, you will only need to do a 1/2 amount the second time. 

I did 10 in the bottom round, working up from there, I chose as similarly sized as I could for each level. Dip in the caramel, hold for a moment and then move on. I found that a jar in the middle to support the first few rows was helpful, though I also angled them in too far. Keep going, reducing the size by 1 each go round. You want to situate the puffs so they are offset. using a little caramel on the sides to ensure they stick on the bottom and sides. Keep on going until you reach the top. Cap it off in style with a few puffs. Now using a fork, pull threads out of the caramel and wrap them around the tower. Ta Da!

SO GOOD!

We also learned there are two people in the world:

people who take the next bit when they stick together,

and people who leave a tiny bit behind... 

serious question, what kind are you?