{BAKE!} chocolate meringue tart

If a picture is worth a thousand words….
I need say no more!

This was delicious. Chocolatey. Tasty. Sweet. Delicous. No wait, I said that.

The filling is, naturally, chocolate, but chocolate with a hint of orange and cinnamon. Just a hint! And the meringue is made a completely new way to me.

The egg whites are heated and then whipped up. I had never made it with warm whites. The meringue was amazing. Full bodied. Didn’t sweat. Sat up high. PERFECT!!

This is THE way to make meringue.

I made 1/2 of the filling recipe and ended up with two mini tarts and two mini bowls with meringue. The only trouble I had was that the filling would not set. Still good! And it was ‘Pilot error.” I don’t know what I did, but….

This was my pick for this week’s BAKE! rotation. (page 33) I know!! It’s not cheesecake! It’s not bread pudding! But it was sure tasty.

When you finish here, go check out the other BAKE! members on FB and see their tarts, Please.

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{BAKE!} EKMEK!

What? Ekmek! What the heck is that? I didn’t know unti I made it this past week for this week’s BAKE! It is a Turkish Flat Bread! And it is great!

I made a full batch of dough 1.5 lbs. and made a small free form loaf and two small disks.

The dough was so extrememly easy to make. It only took about 75 minutes to make the bread from mixing the ingredients to pulling the bread from the oven.

Flour, water, yeast, oil, salt. Such simple ingredients for such a tasty bread. I cut the dough in half, using 1/2 for the loaf and 1/4 for each disk. The loaf is made by folding the dough twice like a long envelope and then allowed to rise twice before baking. With the disks the the dough is pulled up around the perimeter and pushing the flaps into the center.

I used some Artisan Seeds (from KAF) on one disk, 7-Spice on one and left the loaf plain. The loaf made great sandwich bread so I will try the dough in a regular loaf. The disks did not stay flat. But even considering how puffy they are they will be great for dipping.

While they didn’t come out as crusty as I would like (my oven is wonky sometimes) they are definitely repeatable.

While we aren’t publishing Malgieri’s recipes you can find the Ekmek recipe HERE.

This was Andrea’s Pick for Bake! Thanks! Good stuff!!

 

{Malgieri Monday} Gaaarp’s Ox Tongues

So this one is only a week late.
This one is from Bake! by Nick Malgieri. There are several of us baking regularly from Nick’s book and every two weeks some one picks the recipe for each of us to make.
This past week (10/22) was Phyl’s pick, but I didn’t get to make it because I haven’t been in the kitchen for a while. But that ‘a while’ is over now. YAY!!

Ox Tongues

Made from circles of puff pastry they are sweet, flakey, layered little treats.

Using Malgieri’s quick puff pastry the dough is cut into 2″ circles which are then rolled {on a sugared surface rather than a floured surface} into ovals and baked until caramelized {from the sugar} and flaky.

I sprinkled turbinado sugar on some and it just added to the sweetness. The ‘cookies’ were flaky and crunchy and delicious And so easy!

Nick made them on Martha’s show last Fall and you can find the recipe there with a video. We don’t print the recipes – you really need to buy BAKE! and join us baking through it.

 

{Livestrong} A Taste of Yellow

Today is October 2nd.

LiveStrong.
Fighting against Cancer.

Winning some.

Losing Some.

It has been a very hard year. Very Hard. And it isn’t over yet. But the ending will be better than the beginning. I am sure of that!

I am not going to say it couldn’t get any worse because the last time I did, it did!

Last September The Man in my Life was diagnoseded with Colon Cancer. Before surgery his CEA was 14. Aftr surgery it was 9. Today it lingers around 2.9/3.0 Normal is anything below 5. What wonderful numbers those have become.

I wrote my First LiveSTRONG post last year on this day. Last year seems like a long time ago. If you remember My MIL had been diagnosed with MDS – MyeloDysplastic Syndrome. The Doctor gave her a year. She passed away on September 13, 2011. We had a little over a year with her – as the doctor predicted. It was hard on the family, naturally, but doubly so because of my Husband’s condition.

There is no official LiveSTRONG with a Taste for Yellow this year, but I couldn’t let the day go by without some kind of special post. It is hosted every year by Barbara of Winos and Foodies, but this year she has just finished another round of Chemo and just wasn’t up to it.

My MIL’s favorite dessert was Lemon Meringe Pie.

It is also My Husband’s favorite. We had it for his birthday. He is 61. We are thankful he was here for it because we almost lost him in February. He has many many more ahead of him.

This year I made…

LemonCrumb Bars

…from Malgieri’s BAKE! for my Husband even tho he cannot eat them because he is in the hospital again. But it’s for a good reason this tme.

They will still be here when he gets out.

1 batch sweet pastry dough (recipe below)
Crumb Topping

1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1/2 cup sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
Pinch of salt
1/4 pound (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted

Lemon Topping

3 large eggs
1 tablespoon lemon zest (I used lime)
4 tablespoons fresh lemon juice (I used yuzu)
1 1/4 cups sugar

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees with racks in the top and bottom third of the oven . Line a 9 x 13 pan with buttered foil or parchment paper, and line a baking sheet with parchment.

Roll out the pastry to a little larger than 9×13, and place it in the prepared 9×12 pan, pressing in into the corners. Remove all but 1/2 inch of the dough on the sides of the pan. You need that much lip to contain the filling, but you don’t need more than that. Chill the crust while you prepare the crumb topping.

In a medium bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Stir in the butter. Let it sit for a few minutes, then break up the clumps with your fingers so you have 1/4 to 1/2 inch pieces and sprinkle those on your prepared baking sheet.

Place a piece of parchment on top of the pastry in the 9×13 pan (cut or fold it to fit) and weigh it down with pie weights or dry beans. Bake the crust on the lower rack and the crumbs on the upper rack for 10 minutes.

Move the crumbs to the lower rack. Remove the weights and parchment from the pastry, and place that pan on the upper rack. Bake the crust until it is dry and golden and bake the crumbs until they are deep golden and firm.

Cool the crust and topping on racks. Meanwhile, move the oven rack to the center position.

While you’re waiting for the pastry to cool, make the lemon topping. Whisk the eggs and zest in a bowl. In a separate bowl, mix the sugar and lemon juice, stirring to melt the sugar as much as possible. Add the sugar-juice mixture to the eggs, and stir gently to combine.

Pour the lemon mixture into the prepared crust, and bake until the topping is set, about 15-20 minutes. Remove the pan from the oven, scatter crumbs on top, and bake another 5 minutes.

Cool the pan on a rack for 15 minutes before removing the bars using the foil or parchment as a sling. Transfer the bars to a cutting board and let them cool completely before cutting into squares.

Sweet PastryDough
2 cups all purpose flour
1/3 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 pound (1 stick) cold unsalted butter
2 large eggs

Combine flour, sugar, baking powder and salt in the bowl of your food processor. Pulse a few times to combine. Cut the butter into 8 pieces and add it to the food processor. Pulse in 1-second bursts until the butter is finely mixed into the flour.

Add the eggs and pulse again until the dough forms a ball. (Here’s where I needed to add water.)

Flour your work surface and dump the dough out. Form it into two disks (if you’re making pies) or into a square if you’ll be making the lemon bars. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate until needed, up to 2 days.

I made them more like a tart.

At the funeral one of Nana’s friends told me that she thought a lot of me. I never knew that. Now it’s nice to know. She was a nice lady. A good Mom. A Great Grandmother. And I will miss her.

These are for Nana and My Man!!

And all of those out there who are struggling with Cancer. And their families.

Today is October 2, 2010. In case you didn’t know this was the day in 1996 that Lance Armstrong was diagnosed with Cancer. He was 25. Today he is 40. Live Strong!!!

Please visit The Lance Armstrong Foundation. You aren’t alone.

 

{BAKE!} Malgieri’s Thin Crusted Pizza

This week’s Bake! pick is from Abby of Stir it! Scrape it! Mix it! Bake it! and I am so glad she picked this one. I have made pizza before, but not thin crusted. And Malgieri’s recipe for the dough is simple with just a few ingredients – as it should be. While she picked the basic technique for making pizza, we could pick any of the varieties of pizza Nick lists in the book.

Pizza Margherita

Simple. Delicious. Repeatable.

THere are only three toppings on this pizza. A simple tomato sauce scattered with shredded mozzarella cheese, shredded fresh basil leaves (and I loved the fact I could walk outside my door and simple pick a few from the plant!!) and a drizzle of olive oil. Okay, four toppings.

Then you bake it for a mere 10 minutes and you have PIZZA!!

I only made 1/2 of the dough which rests in the fridge for a few hours. Mine tried to escape it’s little package…

IF you let the dough sit on the counter for 5 or 10 minutes it will be much easier to spread into the pan without tearing. As I found out the hard way. I ended up with two kinds of rectangular pizzas. They were about 12 x 14. Kinda! One the Margherita and one just cheese.

The recipe is on page 96 of Malgieri’s BAKE! but I also found it on Indulge! a blog by Corrine.

I only have one problem -which topping do I use next time?? So many pizzas, so little time!!

Abby made this, too.

 

{Bake} Truffle Brownies

CHOCOLATE!!!!

Nuff Said!!!
And thanks to Glennis of Can’t Believe We Ate Blog we {The bakers of Bake!} made some of the most delicious brownies EVAH!!

What you have here are Malgieri’s TRUFFLE BROWNIES.

These were so very delicious.

{Yes, Kayte!! at least Mark and Matt with like them!!}

The middle was fudgy and the outside was crispy chewy. In other words, the perfect browmie.

A full recipe does contain 2 sticks of butter and 2 cups of sugar along with 10 ounces of melted chocolate. Yes, they certainly earn their truffle description. A small one is all you need to fulfill your chocoalte cravings!!!

They were so good I used them in Tracey’s Milk chocolate Brownie Ice Cream. I took about 1/4 of the sheet of brownies and cut them into small cubes.

These were added to probably the best chocolate Ice Cream we have had in a long time.

Look at that chunk of chocolate. YUMMY!!!! I want to try it by itself, although without the brownie cubes…….

You can find the recipe on Tracey’s site. It’s from Lebovitz’s The Perfect Scoop.

So mosy over the Tracey’s site and get the recipe and then visit the BAKE! FaceBook Page for other goodies.

BTW I found the recipe for the Truffle Brownies on Serious Eats.

 

{Bake!} danish cheese pockets

WAY back at the first of the year Kayte asked me to pick a recipe for the Bake! members to make. I chose danish cheese pockets. Unfortunately I didn’t get to make them because of… well most of you know why. So, finally, this weekend I got to make the danish.

Danish Cheese Pockets

These were soo good. I used Nick’s Quick Danish Pastry Dough. It is very easy to work with and puffs beautifully when baked. Before baking they are brushed with an egg wash and topped with sliced almonds. After, they are drizzled with a sugar/water icing. And they are sooooo good. I have always liked danish and have been wanting to make them. Now I have. I will again…and again…and again…and…well you get the picture.

This danish is from Malgieri’s Bake! It’s on page 113.

 

{Bake!} Playing Catch-up: Pinwheels

There were a few months at the first of the year that I was not in the kitchen. Four months actually. During that time I missed several ‘assignments’ from Bake!. Now it’s time to play catch-up.

danish apricot apple pinwheels

Using Malgieri’s Quick Danish Pastry Dough I had made a batch of earlier in the week I took 1/4 of the 1/2 recipe and made 4 pinwheels. The recipe had several variations including plums, pineapple, and apples in addition to the apricot. I used the apple filling from the strudel

Pinwheels are fun to make. Cut 4″ squares of dough. Cut them from the corner toward the center leaving a small platform of dough, fill, turn one corner of the dough square into the filling (from each corner) and bake. Easy Peasy. YES!!!! Easy!! ANd VERY good!

You can find the recipe on page 114 of Nick Malgieri’s Bake!

NOW!! Go pick up Malgieri’s Bake! and join in the fun. And vist the FB page for Bake!

 

{Bake!} Individual Danish apple Strudels

Strudel!!
Ich liebe Strudel!!
Yes I do, I love Strudel!!
It is so good filled with apples slowly cooked down with sugar and cinnamon and butter. Then mixed with Golden Raisins. What’s not to like? Oh, did I mention it is made with home made danish pastry dough?

The recipe called for a full recipe of pastry which then makes eight 4″ mini strudels. I only made 1/2 of the quick danish pastry dough recipe. And only 1/4 of that to make two 4″ strudels. That gives me enough to catch up on the other danish pastries I have missed making with the BAKE! group since January!

One of the things I love about making pastry dough is rolling out the dough and seeing those hunks of butter just waiting to melt in the pastry and give out all that yummy goodness!

And then you add in the apple/raisin mix {to which I added some chopped walnuts}to the middle of the dough

Roll up the pastry around the filling, brush with egg wash, sprinkle with LOTS of sugar and bake. 20 Minutes {mine only took 14} later you have a beautiful, tasty, elegant dessert. Now I know I will have to keep some of thids dough in the freezer just so I can make one of these up when I really want something different.

This was Abby’s (of Stir It! Scrape It! Mix It! Bake It!) pick. Hers came out beautifully.

You can find the dough recipe and the strudel in Malgieri’s Bake! on page 110 and 116. I also found the pastry dough recipe on

 

{Bake!} Golden Sour Cream Layer Cake

It Worked!!

I made a cake from SCRATCH and it actually worked! Finally!! The oil based chocolate cake I made for the Devil’s Food Bombe was a FAIL. The cake did not rise.

This cake, a butter based cake, rose nicely and was delicious.

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Golden Sour Cream Layer Cake

This was Phyl’s pick for this week’s Bake! Selection. It is his birthday cake pick. So this cake is dedicated to him. Happy 29th (Hunh!!) Birthday!!!

What Malgieri did with this cake was to substitute sour cream and egg yolks for the milk and egg whites in his White Butter Cake. Malgieri’s recipe is on The Epicurious site.

Phyl picked the cake to either have a chocolate or vanilla Meringue Buttercream. I chose Vanilla…

It was amazingly easy to make and it came out light and fluffy. Malgieri was on FoodTV for a cake special and the recipe for the buttercream is HERE. {There is one difference in that recipe and the one in Bake! In Bake! M uses 1 1/4 cups sugar rather than 1 cup.}

Now, most of you know I am a lover of chocolate. Even I was surprised that I didn’t put a chocolate frosting on this cake. But the vanilla, which is NOT sweet, was perfect with the Strawberry Jam filling.

I made 1/2 of the cake recipe and 1/2 of the frosting and used two 7.7″ by 5.5″ oval pans. Perfect for the two of us.

This cake is also dedicated to my Mom. She is 86 today.

Happy Birthday, Mom!!

Abby has already made this cake and others are working on it. Check out the FB page.