In case not everything works out the way you'd like it to....
Keep safe!
On the second day of Christmas my true love said to me: "Can we please have something light and crisp..."
Our founders Ivonne of Cream Puffs In Venice and Lisa of La Mia Cucina decided to throw a log our way for the December Challenge. The blogging world is smoldering Yule Logs or Bûche de Noel! In the past weeks whisks have been whipping up a buttery storm to make frosting, ovens were spitting out genoise sheet cakes and chickens had a hard time keeping up with demand. And where did that leave me? Well, I was hiding in a dark corner, dreading the day that I had to make butter cream frosting... I still have a vivid memory of baking a last minute wedding cake. Shudder! It didn't help that our happy trio (Tanna, Ilva and me) was split due to travel and an already overflowing December month. It happened that I was on my own :: puts fist in mouth, scrunch up eyes:: 
So after a long bath, deep cleansing my hair, cleaning the kitchen, vacuuming the floor, reading Saturday's paper (hey, I know how to procrastinate!), I started by measuring out all ingredients and trying to decide with which part to start. Plenty egg yolks there because I used medium eggs and added an extra one.
Genoise: was a bit anxious about heating the eggs and sugar, but all went well and I had a perfect batter in minutes. Lined the baking sheet with waxed paper, and just finished smoothing the batter when my eyes fell on some print. It said -in German-: "this side down". Yeah right, and I was able to read it. Hmm, not very clever. Still I managed to unmold and tear away the paper without a hitch. Batter was a bit much for my square baking sheet resulting in a rather thick sheet and thus a little difficult to roll.
While the genoise was in the oven I started my first batch of buttercream frosting. The filling was going to be caramel flavoured. I used our Dutch soft brown sugar instead of granulated and added 1 tsp of caramel aroma and a dash of clementine syrup. Already had the butter out on a warm spot since morning and just gave it a quick microwave to make it even softer. Not melted but very soft. Turned out that both whipped meringue and butter had the ideal temperature to live happily ever after! No curdling!
Immediately applied a generous layer of light brown buttercream on the cake and rolled it with the help of the slightly damp tea towel underneath. Wrapped in plastic it had a well deserved rest in the fridge. Another "must-do": merengue or marzipan mushrooms. Couldn't decide which ones I would make. Ehh. Oops and edited*!
To see how many many other Daring Baker's survived this month's challenge please visit our Daring Bakers blogroll and click away!
Using a muffin tin, bake these for approx. 20 minutes at 350F or 175C.
Enjoy!
Stom genoeg ben ik vergeten foto's te nemen tijdens de voorbereidingen, op de een of andere manier had ik maar 2 handen op dat moment. Enne....iedereen gaat je dus vertellen om Royal Icing te gebruiken als lijm. Tja, dat kan. Wat je ook kunt doen, is eerst een paar uur naar de gebakken onderdelen kijken, bang zijn om te beginnen, en dan zo rond een uur of 10 spoorslags naar de schuur lopen, je lijmpistool tevoorschijn halen, je echtgenoot van de bank rukken omdat je zijn handen nodig hebt en in 10 minuten zit je huis letterlijk muurvast! Tsjakka! (Had ik al gezegd dat we dit huis niet gingen eten? Dan weet je nu waarom niet). 
A lot of fun (for cats)! Dolle pret (voor de katten dan....)!
Tonight is the night! Mid November Sinterklaas arrives on his steamship all the way from Spain, loaded with presents and accompanied by his white horse Amerigo and all of his helpers. With him he carries the Big Bold Red Book in which he keeps notes from all the kids in the country and their behaviour.....were they good or bad, are they going to get presents?
From left to right some of the traditional candy that is typical for Sinterklaas:
This year I finally managed to make speculaas and use my wooden stamps successfully! I did make speculaas before, wrestled the molds, got frustrated and cheated by using cutters to form cookies. This is a brand new mold, but even my old/antique one worked this time. I think it's all about the texture of your dough and flouring the mold just so. I used Lien's recipe this time (great tutorial! in English and Dutch), and followed Gea's advice (Dutch but great pics!) to use a brush for flouring the mold.
There are many recipes out there so I won't repeat them here, basics are chilled and rested dough (preferrably one night) and the use of "speculaas" spices. These spice mix is found in any Dutch supermarket this time of year, there are two varieties, "koekkruiden" (cookie spice), or "speculaas" spice. The difference between the two is in the addition of cloves in the speculaas spices. In some mixes you'll find coriander and orange peel as well. Make your own mix:
Oh....and of course.... if you make the dough recipe and won't have time nor patience (or access) to handle the molds, call your children to the kitchen table and plan an afternoon of fun: roll "pepernoten" (peppernuts), even the smallest kids can join in. Just take marble sized pieces of dough and roll between the palms of your hand. Go Dutch traditional and serve hot chocolate, sing the Sinterklaas songs!(click on one of the titles to hear children sing our traditional songs.
"And I'm loooooooosing controhohol..."*
I could of course do the elaborate glazing-the-cookie-thing with red and green or even intricate Dalarna colouringg but in this household there isn't much oohing and aahing over decorated cookies. They just grab and crunch, whether the horse has legs or not.
