Cinnamon buns; inside and out 1

Prezzzzzure!

Still have till 12 tonight to finish this post. I bet you know by now that our Daring Baker's Challenge this month had something to do with cinnamon buns. Had your fill of cinnamon buns? Want to try something different? For the recipe of these Dutch babies and instruction pics please check back tomorrow! After all these pictures of gorgeous cinnamon, dripping sticky's, screenlickingly good buns... What's a girl gottado? Besides being fashionably late? Why....Bake Cinnamon buns of course, brought to us by the lovely Marce (host of the equally lovely Pip In The City) who will provide you with the recipe by Uncle Peter Reinhart.

Wasn't late baking cinnamon buns, in fact I baked three batches (and counting..) One batch following Da Rulezzz, one contra-batch following a King Arthur recipe and one batch together with my Baking Bunnies; Tanna who got up at an unseemingly early 4 am to bake together with Ilva and me in Europe, so sweet! Again: thank you so much for the fun! (Ever tried a sightseeing house tour by webcam? I think all Ilva saw was an orange blur)

Let's talk shop:

Behind curtain no. 1 the originals: very slack dough, definitely sticky not anywhere near tacky, clay-like Play-doh dough. Begged it to rise, wouldn't budge. Difficult to roll, even more difficult to slice.....but .... mighty fine buns! A tad dry, though the lemon in the dough is great.



Behind curtain no. 2 the trusted outsider: the one recipe that yields dough I love to work with; a soft pliable pillow of dough, rises like it should, rolls and slices like it should. In short: dry uninspired buns (what? how's that possible?).



Behind curtain no. 3 again the original, modified. The added flour created a manageable dough which did rise (took 3 hours but there was movement girls and boys).

I allowed for some modifications: added cubed peach and apple in the dough, Dutch cookie-spices and extra cinnamon mixed in with the sugar. Subbed the lemon this time for orange zest and extract. Prior to sprinkling the sugar mixture I smeared the dough with caramel....licious!! I think last was best, especially fresh from the oven...but in all batches made I missed something, though very tasty and beautiful they all lacked some moistness.

However much I love you all and I know all of you love me *cough*, but seriously, is anyone going to read this after having a fill of eh.. 90 cinnamon logs?

Thanks Marce for giving us the opportunity to work with dough again and don't forget to check out the Daring Bakers on the roll and please, come back tomorrow for the recipe of these Dutch version of inside out cinnamon buns: Zeeuwse bolussen!

Blushing apples on apple day!

Zorra at 1x umrühren bitte invited us to take part in "Apple Day". Aye Zorra, are you sure an apple a day keeps the doctor away?

I discovered I don't use them a lot in cooking other than the occasional apple cake or our Dutch "appeltaart". I will use the occasional shriveled ones in apple-sauce and some as a filler or main star in preserves. I think my kids, like the Swiss, eat their fair share of the 18 kgs per head per annum and they prefer to eat them fresh. Since we have this neat little device even their friends pick apples over candy (at least sometimes..).

So, yesterday when it suddenly occurred to me that submission day was today I made a carrot apple cake. Simple, straightforward, and the fragrance in the house as an added bonus. (Edit: you can still participate, submission date 30th September!).

Recipe Apple-carrot cake:
250 gr ap flour
2 ts baking powder
1 ts baking soda
1/2 ts salt
1 ts cinnamom

3 tbs poppy seeds
200 gr light brown sugar
3 eggs
zest 1 orange
200 gr carrot, grated
115 gr butter, melted and cooled
100 gr apple, cored, peeled, cubed
75 gr nuts (used crushed hazelnuts)
optional: a small hand dried cranberries

almond slivers to garnish

Make a batter muffin-style: Mix and sift dry ingredients, mix and cream wet ingredients in a separate bowl. Mix dry and wet, make sure you don't overmix. This is btw an excellent muffin batter, this time I used an 24 cm round spring form.

Line bottom of spring form and oil the sides, spoon batter in form and bake for 30-40 minutes in a preheated oven (175C). For muffins bake at 175C for +/- 20 minutes. Drizzle with glaze. Enjoy!

Beware of great ideas and poor planning!

My mind is able to paint pretty pictures. My mind is able to come up with original ideas. My mind is very confident. It's also able to be pretty convincing. I do wish my mind and hands would communicate a little more.

Task on hand: my friends celebrating their 25th anniversary. We're invited.
I knew that.
I knew they were going to do this party, heck I was involved in the idea a year ago.
So they need a present right?

Thinking of presents the morning before the day.
Couldn't think of something nice but crazy ideas? Oh yes I can think crazy ideas.
I am going to bake them a wedding cake. (Hoot! Hoot! Yay! Wonderful idea! Clap clap!)
Evening before the party, no practice cake, no preparation, no shopping for ingredients. (Clapping and hooting dies down).

But you know....when they were getting married they had no money whatsowever, so they had a wedding with just the thrills and no frills. And I think I remember her telling me that they had no wedding cake. So this will be a nice gift right? (Aaaahh...) I am going to bake them a small one. Think three tiers. Hide an "envelope" inbetween layers, nice idea. (Remember, this is still my mind speaking).

Start by baking cakes. Ask DH to dream up dimensions for nice sizes. He did a great job.

Eggs in bowl. Break egg no. 5... and it is spoiled! Never ever encountered a spoiled egg. New batch. Bake cakes. Not enough cake to cut out the layers I want. Another batch. It's getting very late. Cut out cakes. With a knife. Ragged edges. (Well, there is going to be icing?) Make bavarian cream. Fill. Assemble. Dimensions are great, Hubs did a wonderful job.

Decide to leave icing till tomorrow. Two eggs left. Dig in freezer for egg whites.

Next morning. Stalling. Frantic e-mailing with friends (xoxo for the support, you know who you are!), what icing to choose? Narrowed it down to three: quick pour fondant, butter cream, marshmallow icing. DH advices me to go with something I'm familiar with so marshmallow icing it was.

Little did I know that I was going to come up with a fourth of my own: not-so-quick-pour marshmallow icing! Poor me! Had a glorious icing going, everything worked out great untill I decided to add the last minute tbs of butter...within seconds my peaky, snowy white, spreadable icing was reduced to pourable gooey mass.

Out of eggs. Out of time. Still had to get fancy-dressed too. And drive 20 minutes with a towering cake.

Time-management and planning ahead are highly overrated.

Did a quick practice with cake-scraps and pour icing. Hmm.

Go ahead anyway.

So I poured. And poured again. Ragged edges shine through.

DISGUISE!

Ribbon!

My mind went into overdrive. Ribbon! I need disguise! Ribbon! Where in the world is ribbon when you need it?
Christmas!
Ribbon.
I knew I once had some wide ribbon (shh don't tell but it has been used to decorate my front door wreath several years).

Holy Sh*t. It's gold! (forget about the cute li'l pink hearts sprinkle I bought to decorate)
Plastered some ribbon around.
Plunked the bride and groom on top. (Full force disaster pic... They look scared don't they? Holding on to each other like that).Frantically searched my wardrobe for something to wear (had 15 minutes to get dressed)....

Planning and preparation.
Yes.
I am sooooo organized.

Cream of tomato soup

Subtitle: "A chemical experience"

A well hidden secret here is that I never make tomato soup with fresh tomatoes. Gasp! Really? Yes, really! I add fresh tomatoes to my soup, that much is true but generally it's made from good canned tomatoes in this house. Overall I don't like the flavour from my soup uniquely made with fresh tomatoes. (Remind me I should ask my mom how she goes about).

This being said I admit I made fresh cream of tomato soup a couple of days ago. I figured it would be an instant hit with the kids, not a vegetable in sight, soothing sip-and-swallow soup. Well it was! Sad thing is: kids loved it, I didn't like it at all. It reminded me of a can of Campbells, and, if it tastes like that anyway, why bother and make your own?

So, why blog? Because the recipe mentioned to use 1/2 ts baking soda...... which reminded me of the following:

Friend -Hi Nic!- married to a chemist (no apothecary, the real Dow Chemical chemist type) making tomato soup with fresh tomatoes, complaining while stirring a huge pan, couldn't get rid of the sour flavour real tomatoes have in soup. Husband walks by, is invited to sample and says dead pan: well, if it's acidic add soda and goes on explaining about basic and non-basic fluids...

She adds soda (um.. the real thing not baking soda) indeed got rid of the sour and refuses to eat it. I think he did....

The story always stuck in my mind and we make fun of it every now and then (sorry Michiel!). Reading this recipes using baking soda it all came back and since I had some ripe tomatoes I decided to give it a go with above mentioned results. Won't give you a recipe here, plenty to find on the Net using fresh tomatoes, milk, baking soda, the occasional drop of sherry (in the soup, not for the cook).

But why? What does this baking soda do? Does it keep the tomatoes and milk from curdling? Neutralize the acidic in the tomato? Do you use baking soda, or add sugar or both? Do you make fresh tomato soup at all?

Pretty in pink

pretty in pink, originally uploaded by BakingSoda.

We had a lovely talk on the bench in front of my house, the neighbor and I, sitting in the sun, having a cup of tea, nibbling on fresh baked cookies. She went back into her house only to return with a bucket (!) full of beetroots...

Now, it took me some time to convert my family into eating beetroots (I say: eating, not enjoying! I think a CSI crew can still find evidence of the beetroot fights in our former house) and now I had a winter's worth of beetroots in my hands. They had to be cooked. And peeled. Frozen. Served. Hours of cooking ahead. I sighed and schlepped myself and the beetroots into the kitchen.
Wait! Just outside the backdoor was my deep fryer. Silent witness of not so healthy yesterdays snack. Beetroot chips!

So I sliced thin thin slices, (no mandoline in this house, I used my cheese shaver) patted them dry as best as I could, and deep fried. Making sure they were separated and turned. It took some time to get them crisp but oh the reward! Sprinkled with sea salt, this is a treat! The sweetness of the beetroots, enhanced by the crisp and saltiness.... Really very good!

The down side of it... it's a lot of work. Slicing raw beetroots is not something to think light off and the beetroots need to be thoroughly dry otherwise they won't crisp. Frying is a lot of work and I had only a little bowl of beetroot chips which disappeared alarmingly fast. Not something to do when you expect a crowd. But so very good!

Moroccan Gold on my plate

And I'm not sure if I like it...

This appears to be a precious little bottle of oil, all the way from Morocco. It's called Argan Oil, I've been doing some reading today and apparently it's good for almost anything, culinary purposes, radiant skin, anti-aging, luscious shining hair, you name it.

I don't know if my SIL thought I should do something about my appearance when she brought it back for me from her vacation in Morocco, I believe she meant for us to enjoy and eat it, I must admit it was sitting in the basement for a while, but it's out now and I plan on using it.

As I said, a little reading was in order and the part that I had the most fun with, was the part with the goats. Goats? Yes! Somewhere in the back of my mind upon receiving the present there was this little story on goats eating, er.. processing and fermenting, and hey presto: extra-special aroma! But....that was coffee beans.... It turns out it's Argan nuts as well. Or is it?

Different sources, different stories but goats in every one of them. In one, we unsuspecting readers and future consumers are reassured that goats are only allowed to climb the trees that are not used for culinary purposes....(hah, no, we won't eat that but instead dab it on our pretty faces...duh!) in another we are told that because of the goat-fermenting process the nuts are easier to crack and so the oil can be pressed. In the area around Agadir where these Argan trees are found, food is hard to get and for the goats the fruit of these trees are a much welcomed part of their diet. They eat the whole fruit, leaving the inner core (the nut) intact and in passing the digestive system makes it softer and easier to crack.

For the sake of sanity argument I am going to believe that these goats can be trained to climb the not-culinary-nut-holding-trees, and that the people collecting the nuts are trained to distinguish between goat-processed nuts and not-goat-processed nuts. Nuts. Indeed! Do you think goats can climb trees, not just the lower branches but the entire tree? Go on....click!

Isn't that fun? Now that I have this bottle, truth or dare? I braced myself and tasted the oil as it was, straight from the bottle like you would an olive oil. Hmm, quite strong and powerful, funny aftertaste, very nutty earthy flavor, somewhat herbal? It gives a very oily/buttery mouthfeel as well (organoleptically speaking *grin*). The next thing was try it on some good bread with er.. soft goat cheese (sorry, that was on hand in the kitchen and I thought it was kind of appropriate). Well eeh....the flavours mingled and seem to enhance one 'n other.....

Haven't had the chance to use it in a dish yet, but I'm thinking a salad will be nice, using oranges and parsley, some roasted pine nuts. And a dash of oil instead of butter in a bowl of couscous sounds good too. And maybe I should try to make the Moroccan variety of peanutbutter, Amlou, a mixture of roasted ground almonds, honey and argan oil. Suggestions anyone?

Het goud van Marokko op mijn bord

English will follow...soon!

Mijn schoonzus (ja, die van de kaas) had wederom een heel speciaal kadootje voor me meegenomen van hun vakantie in Marokko.

Argan olie dus, moeizaam en zeer arbeidsintensief verkregen uit noten. Ik kreeg ter plekke visioenen van noten die door geiten gegeten worden, langs natuurlijke weg het lichaam verlaten, en vervolgens... Ho. Stop! Dat zijn koffie bonen. (Dat verhaal hou je nog een keer tegoed en nee, ik heb nog niet het genoegen gehad die zeer speciale koffie te mogen drinken. Hoeft ook niet geloof ik).

Schakel mentaal even over naar Berbervrouwen die in een verre uithoek van Marokko harde noten kraken om deze olie te kunnen persen uit de zaden. Hard werk, weinig opbrengst. Even verder zoekend kom ik, ha, zie je wel, toch geiten tegen!! En inderdaad, noten worden gegeten, verlaten de geit, zijn intussen ietwat gefermenteerd (bij gebrek aan een ander woord) en zachter geworden en dus makkelijker te openen. Gelukkig worden deze noten niet gebruikt om culinaire olie van te maken....(en dat geloven wij onmiddellijk. Toch?) beweert de ene bron, de andere beweert even stellig het andere...

"De vruchten zijn te bitter om te eten. Maar geiten houden ervan en klimmen er graag voor in de takken. Een bizar gezicht, dat wel steeds ongewoner wordt, omdat het alleen wordt toegestaan bij bomen waarvan geen olie voor de markt wordt verkregen"

Die geiten weten dat natuurlijk precies, welke boom wél en welke níet beklommen kan worden.

Afgezien van direct uit Marokko schijnt deze olie hier moeilijk verkrijgbaar te zijn en vrij kostbaar (eh...erg kostbaar geloof ik). Al lezende denk ik dat ik het flesje wellicht beter in de kluis leggen dan ongegeneerd over mijn salade met geitenkaas en sinasappels uitgieten. In Nederland overigens hier te verkrijgen. (Zie je wel...ook Manfred heeft het over geiten! Klik hier eens, toe?). LOL!

De smaak... ik weet het eerlijk gezegd niet zo goed. Zo puur is het letterlijk even slikken, heel vol en krachtig van smaak, erg nootachtig en op e.o.a. manier kruidig. Op een stukje brood met zachte geitenkaas alweer heel anders, het lijkt of ze elkaar versterken (grijns!). Nog even experimenteren dus, met salade, couscous...

Layered jelly roll cake (recipe)

Yesterday's cake was in my mind for some time, the components aren't difficult, the only thing I had to decide was whether I would make a "bombe" or build it in a spring form.

Recipe cake layers top and bottom
4 eggs
7 tbs hot water
200 gr sugar
1 package vanilla sugar (1 tsp vanilla extract)
150 gr ap flour
60 gr corn starch
1 heaped tsp baking powder

In the bowl of your mixer, combine eggs and water and whisk on high speed for 1 minute. Add sugars and whisk for another 3 minutes. Mix dry ingredients and sift half of it into the egg creme. Whisk on low until incorporated, add the second half and incorporate. Don't mix too long.
Pour 3/4 of this batter on a sheet pan lined with parchment paper, spread to corners. 1/4 of the dough goes into a 22 cm springform pan (bottom lined with paper).
Bake for 10-15 minutes on 200C (sheet) and 15-20 minutes (springform).

Straight from the oven, turn the sheet cake upside down onto a towel generously sprinkled with powdered sugar. Carefully remove paper. While still warm, spread with jelly and carefully roll cake from long end. Cool on wire rack at least 30 minutes. (I used a slightly damp towel to keep it from unrolling. When cooled, slice into approx. 16 1" slices. Remove bottom layer from spring form and set aside to cool on a wire rack.

Recipe bavaroise filling
1 tbs gelatine powder (6 sheets gelatine)
3 tbs cold water
25 gr corn starch
200 ml white wine (would sub by fruit juice next time)
60 gr sugar
3 egg yolks
juice of 1 lemon

500 ml whipping cream
150 gr greek yoghurt

Mix powder with gelatine, set aside to soften. In a medium saucepan mix egg yolks, sugar, juice and wine and heat on low/medium, whisking continuously until it starts to thicken, then add the gelatine mixture. Pay attention, due to the lemon juice this comes together very, very quickly! Set aside to cool.
Whip cream to medium peaks and fold in yoghurt. Fold this mixture into the cooled gelatine cream. Use right away, don't let it set too much.

Recipe gelatine mirror
1 package clear cake glaze
25 gr sugar
250 ml white wine (I used packaged clear fruit juice)
-if you don't have access to this cake glaze you could use the recipe for the mirror- as well.

Assembly
Now this is one to pay attention to, I really thought it over but the best way to do it is build it top side down, that way you´ll ensure the top layer is straight and level. In short hand: jelly roll slices go in first, bavaroise is next, top with cake layer, cool and unmold. Finish with mirror and decorate.

~ Prepare a larger spring form (26cm), oil the sides with a vegetable oil, line the base with waxed paper.

~ Arrange the jelly roll slices on the base, starting on the rim, working your way to the center. Make sure the slices are firmly pressed together, don´t leave any gaps.

~ Pour the bavaroise in (save about a cup of bavaroise for piping a rim around the cake layer), wiggle a bit to get rid of air holes and ensure an even smooth layer.

~ Arrange your base cake layer on top of the bavaroise, lightly press down, leaving a rim.

~ Pipe a ring of bavaroise around the cake layer. Smooth with the back of a teaspoon.

~ Refrigerate and let cool and firm up for about two hours or more.

You won´t be able to move this cake around once it´s turned so use your serving platter, place it on top and turn upside down. Open ring, carefully slide it off, remove springform base. Now, place the ring around the cake again, ever so careful, snap it close and pour the thickened (syrupy not jellied) finish over the top of the cake. Refrigerate again to let it set.

Verdict and Filling: I used the wine-yoghurt recipe for the filling, but frankly I thought it was a bit disappointing (I might have picked the wrong wine, and perhaps should have used a dessert wine instead) and I think a minority of the taste/panel agreed. I didn´t like the slight bitter (not tart) flavour and would prefer a tart yoghurt bavaroise, or the bavarian we used in the Strawberry Mirror Cake, recipe can be found here.

My preference for the filling is a yoghurt based bavarian like this which I also used in the second strawberry mirror cake I made:

150 gr yoghurt/quark
150 gr fruit puree/fruit juice (or fresh pressed citrus juice like lemon or lime)
200 gr powdered sugar
500 ml whipping cream
6 sheets gelatine

Mix yoghurt, juice, sugar. Soften gelatine sheets in cold water for 5 minutes, squeeze to get rid of excess water and dissolve in 4 tbs of hot water. Whisk gelatine mixture and yoghurt mixture. Whip cream to soft peaks and fold into yoghurt/gelatine mixture.
Use as directed in the recipe.

Question: would you like to read this recipe in Dutch as well? Let me know please!

Darn.... no candles?

Baked the cake, made the pictures, listened to the song, unwrapped the presents (spoiled!)forgot the candles?

Er... well, do I really want that many candles on the cake?
Nah...don't think so!

This is the cake, recipe will follow...soon! Have a nice day today, I think I will.

I know, I know it's not the world's best pic of this grand cake (hmpgh) but it's the only one Flickr/Blogger allowed me to upload this morning. Seriously pic-upload people, I have tons of things to do besides waiting for pics to upload and be rewarded with BOINK..try again? NO!

Acme Herb Slabs and a Swedish bakery

During our vacation in Sweden we visited the Skansen Open Air museum and I studied the bakery with more than casual interest. The bakery was open for visits and the Swedish chef was working on pretzel shaped breads. I could almost here him singing a little Muppet song ("bork, bork, bork") and sure enough we bought some sweet breads to munch on.
It was nice to see the equipment and the baker at work, and I willed him to turn around and ask me to join him, would have loved to get my hands on that dough, alas no chance. In the pic near the ceiling are proofing racks, ideal; warm air travels up and will help proof the dough! I know I would like some of those! I think the white device in the middle of the room is a kind of waffle iron or pizzelle maker to make these Swedish stacked cakes, with wafer thin printed layers.

------------------------

Once back home, the first bread I made was Maggie Glezer's Acme Herb slabs, a ciabatta style rosemary flavoured bread. My partner in crime -again- was Tanna, we baked almost simultaneously. The recipe can be found in Maggie Glezer's Artisan Baking as well as here, so I won't repeat it. I followed the recipe exactly and only prolonged the first fermentation a bit. (room temperature was quite cool). It's a bread made with a sponge which rests overnight on your counter. The amount of yeast you use in this is very very small (Glezer likes to keep the use of yeast to an absolute minimum and I like her for that!).

The proofing of both sponge and dough gives this bread extra depth and flavour with little effort. I must say that the method reminded me a lot of the famous Royal Crown Tortano which Lindy baked here, and I baked here and others following suit here and here. That bread got rave reviews and I still use a picture of it as my "icon picture".

The initial dough is very smooth, silky and almost too soft to handle. I added chopped fresh rosemary, a small hand full needles. Like the tortano, you are supposed to turn the dough in it's bowl in 20-minute intervals during the first 60 minutes of fermenting. This first fermenting takes 5 hours! Now, don't let that scare you, you don't have to sing lullaby's, you can just leave it be after the first 60 minutes. The award is in the eating.After balling the dough it get's another rest in a couche and then you'll proceed by the standard, ciabatta method of pressing in a rectangle and dimple the bread with your fingers. Covered it will get another rest (yes this is a third one) untill it gets very soft and well expanded. About two hours. We're now at a total of 8 hours..... Remember it's still worth it!! Plan to make this bread on a day you'll be in and out of your house, (I did some major shopping during the first rise) it is a very friendly dough, it won't scream at you when you leave it alone for a while.

The instructions for baking were very cruel though! We were asked to poke the risen breads with a skewer all the way through and flip the breads once they had been in the oven for 5 minutes. That, my dear fellow bakers, hurts! They were getting some nice ovenspring and usually I'm very happy to see that, but now... I had to brutally flip them over, right on their domed uppers. Ouch!

This was turning into a major brick like bread disaster..... But NO! NO! It was so good, in fact it was so very good that we were dipping and munching our way through two entire breads in one sitting. During the afternoon. Dipped in lemon olive oil and Crema di Balsamico.
(Which Tanna, Sue and I found here, they have a white and a dark variety and it is a smashing hit in our house!)

Sadly enough the bread didn't make it to dinner...

So I'll guess I'll have to make it again and guard it with my life to bring to the annual Festa al Fresco end of summer party Lis and Ivonne are hosting on September 9th!
(So very nice of them to host a party for my birthday! They promised to do the dishes as well). To make sure there will be enough bread to share, Tanna will bring hers as well.