Archive for December, 2010
My new favourite dessert – Eton mess, traditionally served at Eton College’s annual cricket game against the students of Winchester College in the UK – is like a deconstructed pavlova you eat with a spoon – and so perfect post-turkey dinner. (As much as I love plum pudding, it’s not exactly the sort of thing you want to eat after a roast turkey, stuffing, potatoes and gravy.) This version is made with cranberries, which I thought would taste weird, but totally doesn’t. I’ll be making these for dessert tomorrow – turns out I’m making a full-on turkey dinner for Mike’s extended family.
Our Christmas party is still going on downstairs. I took photos. Just wanted to sneak off and say hi.
December 19 2010 | leftovers | 6 Comments »
Those of you following along on Twitter know I was up late (and early) constructing a gingerbread house designed by the Marc Boutin Architectural Collaborative last night – a 16 panel über-contemporary single family dwelling made of cookies, royal icing and hard candy windows (made with hot sugar poured into foil molds constructed by Marc himself). I baked the pieces last night and put them together early this morning in the studio with the very-much-appreciated help of Mike DeBoer (one of the MBAC), which required some strategic use of icing and whittling of edges, but it went up, internal stairs and glass courtyard and all.
And a very kind person donated $1000 to the Calgary Inter-faith Food Bank in exchange for taking it home. $1000!
The photos don’t do it justice, really. The whole story, and design specs, will be in tomorrow morning (this morning?)’s Swerve, print edition and online, if you want to play cookie contractor and make one yourself.
Hours of rolling and cutting panels last night taught me (and reminded me of) a few things:
1) mostly, you don’t want to overhandle rolled cookie dough. If you’re looking for structural soundness, as you would with a gingerbread house, you’ll want the opposite – kneading the dough or even rolling and rerolling scraps will give it a dense, smooth, leathery finish that once baked won’t go as puffy or wonky on the edges.
2) you don’t have to worry about transferring (and wrecking the shape of) cut dough pieces if you roll it out on a silpat mat or piece of parchment (placing it on a damp countertop will keep it from sliding around) – cut and remove scraps, then transfer the whole thing to a cookie sheet to bake.
3) you need at least two pairs of hands, and two mugs to prop things up with, to make a gingerbread house.
Classic Gingerbread Dough
1 cup butter, at room temperature
1 cup packed brown sugar
2 large eggs
1 1/2 cups dark molasses
6 – 6 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 Tbsp. ground ginger
1 Tbsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. allspice
1/2 tsp. salt
In a large bowl, beat the butter and sugar until fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time,then beat in the molasses. Stir together the dry ingredients and add to the wet, beating on low or stirring by hand just until combined. Knead a few times, until you have a soft ball of dough. Cover and let rest for at least 30 minutes before rolling, or wrap and refrigerate for up to 4 days.
When ready to bake, roll gingerbread out 1/4″ thick on a lightly floured surface, and cut into desired shapes – bake at 350F for 10 minutes, or until pale golden around the edges and set. Makes tons.
December 16 2010 | leftovers | 12 Comments »
Once again I’m leaving you a trail of gingerbreadcrumbs.
I made these yesterday – gingerbread cupcakes with teeny gingerbread cookies on top. I’m particularly happy with the photo – it was late afternoon (or rather, around 3), starting to get dark.
Dinner tonight was pizza, on account of it being Christmas concert day and thus having made 300 cookies and brownies and 96 cupcakes for the shows. We’re just back from the evening’s performance, and although I’d love to go through and show you photos from the evening, or curl up and watch Frosty with W, I’m psyching myself up to make and bake a 16 panel gingerbread house (designed by the Marc Boutin Architectural Collaborative – no pressure) to auction off for the food bank tomorrow morning on CBC radio one. Fortunately my awesome friend A offered to take on the task of the melted candycane windowpanes (I’ll tell you later). Did I mention I have to be there at 6am? And I’m due for a shower.
December 15 2010 | leftovers | 10 Comments »
We’ve been nibbling on these pear loaves for the past two days-my motivation, as usual, were two beautiful pears I forgot about in the bottom of the fridge that I couldn’t bear to let go without fulfilling their reason for being. Or one reason, at least. You know how I hate to waste stuff.
Overripe pears turn almost to sauce when you grate them on the coarse side of a box grater. They’re great for muffins and cakes, and pancakes and oatmeal, and add sweetness and fibre, too. I sound like my Dad. These would be festive with a handful or two of fresh (or frozen) cranberries.
Tonight, W and I will be baking 200+ cookies for the Christmas concerts at Ramsay school tomorrow. (I’m thinking molasses-ginger crinkles, Russian tea cakes, and red and white striped candy cane cookies I’ve never made before.) Eggs on toast and French onion soup for dinner.
Spiced Pear Loaves
To make muffins, bake the batter in paper-lined muffin tins for 25-30 minutes.
1/4 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup canola oil
1 1/4 cups sugar
3 large eggs
2 tsp. vanilla
3 cups all-purpose flour, or half all-purpose, half whole wheat
2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg
1/4 tsp. allspice
1/2 tsp. salt
2 large ripe pears, coarsely grated
1 cup buttermilk
a handful of raisins or dried cranberries (optional)
Preheat the oven to 350?F. In a large bowl, beat the butter, sugar, oil, eggs and vanilla with an electric mixer for 2-3 minutes, until pale yellow and fluffy. Add the eggs and vanilla and beat well.
In a small bowl, stir together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice and salt. Add about a third to the butter mixture and beat on low speed just until blended. Add half the grated pears and half the buttermilk, then another third of the flour, the rest of the pears and buttermilk and the rest of the flour, stirring or beating on low speed just until combined.
Gently stir in the raisins or cranberries and scrape the batter into two 8-x 4-inch loaf pans that have been sprayed with nonstick spray. Bake for 50-60 minutes, until golden and tops are springy to the touch. Cool completely in their pans on a wire rack. Makes 2 loaves.
December 14 2010 | bread and breakfast | 4 Comments »
I’ve been a bit preoccupied with the thought of gnocchi lately. Maybe because they remind me of teeny little pillows. Maybe because they’re perfect little chubby carbohydrate dumplings I want to curl up on the couch and hibernate with. Maybe because they are so closely associated with browned butter. Probably all of the above.
I’ve made gnocchi, and ordered it at restaurants, but never bought it at the grocery store – this was a total impulse buy. It was fine – like plain pasta that needed some dressing up. In this case I resurrected some mushrooms, sauteing them with butter and garlic after doing the same to a diced sweet potato. I had seen this, but mine was far, far more streamlined.
It would be a waste to write out a recipe, not that I’d remember it anyway. Heavy cast iron skillet, canola oil and butter, diced sweet potato, then mushrooms and garlic. Boiled gnocchi tossed with all of the above, plus a glob of butter left to melt, then turn golden and nutty in the pan with the browned bits in the bottom. Easy to stab at with a fork at my desk on nights when it’s already dark by 4 o’clock.
December 13 2010 | pasta and vegetarian | 9 Comments »
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