Daring Baker's - Maple Mousse

This month the Daring Baker's were challenged to make maple mousse in an edible bowl. The challenge sounded fun, but I had absolutely no creative ideas for the bowl, so I wasn't sure if I was going to get around to it.  Evelyne, who hosted the challenge, suggested making a bacon cup which looks very cool, but sounds very heavy and greasy.  I like the idea of bacon sprinkled on top of the mousse, but a whole cup of bacon sounds a bit much. 


After much deliberation I decided to make a crust using pretzels, I had a lot left over after Maggie's last co-op day so it was a perfect way to get rid of them.  I made the crust the same way you would make a graham cracker crust and baked them in mini muffin tins.  Unfortunately my crust didn't work out very well.  I had made it too dry and then over baked it, so I ended up having only two that came out of the tins in tact.



The mousse on its own was delicious, but I love maple syrup.  If you don't love the stuff then the mousse would probably be too much. After my crust flopped, I kind of gave up on the project and just plopped some mousse in the two cups that did come out - which explains the ugly picture.  The rest I dished up in regular boring glass cups layering it with the crumbled crust that didn't work.  The saltiness of the pretzel crust was great with the sweetness of the mousse and provided a nice balance.  I think I preferred the layering since you got some sweet and salty with each bite.  With the two cups that did work there wasn't the same balance and the sweetness of the mousse was much more pronounced. This would be a great mousse in the fall served in a baked apple sprinkled with pretzels, or even bacon.  



As always the Daring Bakers' came up with some amazing creations.  A couple people did pancake cups which look fun.  Check them out, there are a lot of great ideas!

The April 2011 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Evelyne of the blogCheap Ethnic Eatz. Evelyne chose to challenge everyone to make a maple mousse in an edible container. Prizes are being awarded to the most creative edible container and filling, so vote on your favorite from April 27th to May 27th at http://thedaringkitchen.com!

Tortilla Bowls

I know my kids will eat more when they can serve themselves and build their own meal.  They would probably be very happy if we had a permanent salad bar in our kitchen. But, I don't make meals like this very often, mainly because I hate all the dishes that are produced.  It is so much easier when I just cook and plate it up for them.

Last night I played the good mom and did their favorite fix-it-yourself meal, Fajitas, with the usual options - lettuce, black beans, tomatoes, salsa, avocado, and chicken - but we changed it up a little by making tortilla bowls.

I have been seeing a lot of blogs using edible containers, I think partly because of the recent Daring Cooks Challenge, so I thought I would give it a try and it was a huge hit with the kids.  Using the bottom side of a muffin tin we arranged tortillas between the cups and then baked them at 350 until crispy, about 8-10 minutes.

Maggie had a great time designing different bowl shapes and would love to design a bowl for every meal.  Very simple, but one simple change made the meal a little more exciting and gave the kids an added an incentive to eat a little more.

This is my quick fix chicken I like to use when we have Fajitas.  I love it because you can use any type of precooked chicken, sometimes I pickup a rotisserie at the grocery store, but a lot of the time I use leftover chicken.  

Fajita Salad Chicken Filling

2 c. Cooked Chicken, shredded

1 small onion, diced

1 c. chicken broth

1 tsp. Cumin 

1/2 tsp Oregano

1/2 tsp Chili Powder

Saute onions until soft.  Add shredded chicken, broth and seasonings.  Cook until heated.  Serve with your favorite toppings.  

Pancakes

It has been a while since I have written about any of the cooking I have done with the kids.  Mainly because we haven't been doing anything new.  My son hasn't been as interested in helping out in the kitchen, number two would be happy if we could make cookies everyday and the little one can't stop eating weird things, like flour, and then throwing it on the floor.  I still get them in the kitchen as often as possible, but they are often in for just a short amount of time and then they grow tired and move on to something else.

We were at the bored melt down phase last night when I discovered what will keep them in the kitchen - the stove.  Will had made the pancake batter and I had planed on taking over from there, but the whining and fighting began, so I offered them the chance to try and flip the pancakes if they could stop the complaining. I have always been nervous with them around the stove, I'm fine if they have knives, but the stove makes me nervous.  But desperate times call for desperate measures, it was complaining or the stove, and the stove bribe worked.

It would have been smart to start with something simple like scrambled eggs, but we were making pancakes so that's what we started with.  It was fun, but very messy.  The flip is definitely a hard skill to figure out.  Once you have it you're all set, but getting there can be tricky and it is one of those things that is hard to explain.  The only way to figure it out is to practice.  We had a lot of pancakes half in the pan half out and a lot of double decker pancakes.  But, they were all yummy, and now they can begin fixing me breakfast in bed.

Favorite Basic Pancakes
2 c. Flour
2 tsp. Baking Powder
1 tsp Baking Soda
1/2 tsp. Salt
3 Tbs. Sugar
2 Eggs, lightly beaten
3 c. Buttemilk
4 Tbs. Butter, melted

Combine dry ingredients, stir lightly to combine.  Add eggs, buttermilk and butter.  Gently stir together, batter  will have small lumps.
Heat griddle, brush with melted butter, or spray to just coat pan.
Pour a ladle full, about 1/4 cup for a small pancakes, onto hot griddle.  Evenly space pancakes.  Wait until tops begin to bubble then flip.

Ice Cream

Co-op time at the preschool and this month we made ice cream in an ice cream ball.  This was a fun activity that all the kids could help with.  We used a simple recipe of just heavy cream and sugar, the kids voted 6 to 7 not to include strawberries.  With the ice cream ball the ingredients are poured into one end of the container and the other end is filled with ice.  The kids took turns adding a handful of ice, which was much more entertainment than I expected.  Once it was filled we began rolling it around the circle.  Once filled the ball is a heavy and it was hard for some of the kids to roll the ball across the circle, but they had fun coming up with different ways to pass it around.  The most popular was to chant "shake shake roll" as the ball went around the circle.  We weren't able to roll the ball enough to completely freeze the ice cream, so we had milkshakes instead of ice cream, but it was still a nice treat.

Basic Vanilla Ice Cream
1 quart Heavy Cream
1 Tbs. Vanilla
3/4 c. Sugar  (I used 1/4 c. vanilla sugar and didn't add the 1 Tbs of Vanilla)

Pour all ingredients into the ball, add ice to other end and roll until frozen.

Daring Bakers Yeasted Coffee Cake

Late again.  This pretty much how everything has been with me recently.  Things get done, but definitely not on time.  This is one thing I am glad I got done, even though late. 


The March 2011 Daring Baker's Challenge was hosted by Ria of Ria's Collection and Jamie of Life's a Feast.  Ria and Jamie challenged The Daring Bakers to bake a yeasted Meringue Coffee Cake.   I really enjoyed this coffee cake and love that the filling can easily be altered and you can get two variations in one recipe.  I love it when I can provide options without increasing the amount of time spent in the kitchen.  

Because I didn't make it until the last minute and then didn't pay attention to how much time the whole process would take I left it to proof too long.  By the time I got around to rolling the dough out it had started to deflate.  Due to time restraints I didn't let it proof long enough during the second proof, so I don't think the cake part was right, although it was still tasty.
For the filling I had to do a little digging through my kitchen.  I came up with some dried fruit, pecans, almonds, chocolate chips and an apple pear jam.  So, I had one cake with a chocolate chip pecan filling,

and the second cake was filled with dried fruit, almonds and apple pear jam.

I loved both fillings, and my husband was happy to have a non-chocolate option.  The cake with the jam was a little hard to roll and filling exploded.  The jam was a little soft and add a some extra moisture which caused the egg whites to break down.  If I do a jam version again I will make sure to whip the whites a little extra and gently fold the jam in rather than spread it directly on the dough.

This is a great recipe for a brunch or an afternoon snack, just make sure to plan it out so the bread has enough, but not too much, time to proof.

FILLED MERINGUE COFFEE CAKE
Makes 2 round coffee cakes, each approximately 10 inches in diameter
The recipe can easily be halved to make one round coffee cake

Ingredients
For the yeast coffee cake dough:

4 cups (600 g / 1.5 lbs.) flour
¼ cup (55 g / 2 oz.) sugar
¾ teaspoon (5 g / ¼ oz.) salt
1 package (2 ¼ teaspoons / 7 g / less than an ounce) active dried yeast
¾ cup (180 ml / 6 fl. oz.) whole milk
¼ cup (60 ml / 2 fl. oz. water (doesn’t matter what temperature)
½ cup (135 g / 4.75 oz.) unsalted butter at room temperature
2 large eggs at room temperature

10 strands saffron for Ria’s version (Saffron might be hard to find and it’s expensive, so you can substitute with ½ - 1 teaspoon of ground cardamom or ground nutmeg. Or simply leave it plain like Jamie’s version)

For the meringue:

3 large egg whites at room temperature
¼ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon vanilla
½ cup (110 g / 4 oz.) sugar

For the filling:

Jamie’s version:
1 cup (110 g / 4 oz.) chopped pecans or walnuts
2 Tablespoons (30 g / 1 oz.) granulated sugar
¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 cup (170 g / 6 oz.) semisweet chocolate chips or coarsely chopped chocolate

Ria’s version:
1 cup (130 g / 5 oz.) chopped cashew nuts
2 Tablespoons (30 g / 1 oz.) granulated sugar
½ teaspoon garam masala (You can make it at home – recipe below - or buy from any Asian/Indian grocery store)
1 cup (170g / 6 oz.) semisweet chocolate chips ( I used Ghirardelli)

Egg wash: 1 beaten egg
Cocoa powder (optional) and confectioner’s sugar (powdered/icing sugar) for dusting cakes

**Garam (means “hot”) masala (means “mixture”) is a blend of ground spices and is used in most Indian savory dishes. It is used in limited quantities while cooking vegetables, meats & eggs. There is no “one” recipe for it as every household has a recipe of their own. Below, I am going to share the recipe which I follow.

4 or 5 sticks (25 g) Cinnamon Sticks (break a stick and open the scroll)
3 ½ tablespoons (25 g / less than an ounce) Cloves, whole
100 g. (3.5 oz.) Fennel seeds
4 tablespoons (25 g / less than an ounce) Cumin seeds
1 ½ tablespoons (10 g / less than half an ounce) Peppercorns
25 g (less than half an ounce) Green Cardamom pods

In a small pan on medium heat, roast each spice individually (it hardly takes a minute) until you get a nice aroma. Make sure you stir it throughout so that it doesn’t burn. As soon as each spice is roasted, transfer it to a bowl to cool slightly. Once they are all roasted, grind into a fine powder by using a coffee grinder, or pestle & mortar. Store in an airtight container and use as needed.

Directions:

Prepare the dough:

In a large mixing bowl, combine 1 ½ cups (230 g) of the flour, the sugar, salt and yeast.

In a saucepan, combine the milk, water and butter and heat over medium heat until warm and the butter is just melted. Ria’s version: add the 10 saffron threads to the warmed liquid and allow to steep off of the heat for 10 minutes. This will give the mixture a distinct aroma and flavor and a yellowish-orange hue.

With an electric mixer on low speed, gradually add the warm liquid to the flour/yeast mixture, beating until well blended. Increase mixer speed to medium and beat 2 minutes. Add the eggs and 1 cup (150 g) flour and beat for 2 more minutes.  Using a wooden spoon, stir in enough of the remaining flour to make a dough that holds together. Turn out onto a floured surface (use any of the 1 ½ cups of flour remaining) and knead the dough for 8 to 10 minutes until the dough is soft, smooth, sexy and elastic, keeping the work surface floured and adding extra flour as needed.

Place the dough in a lightly greased (I use vegetable oil) bowl, turning to coat all sides. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and a kitchen towel and let rise until double in bulk, 45 – 60 minutes. The rising time will depend on the type of yeast you use.

Prepare your filling:In a small bowl, combine the cinnamon and sugar for the filling if using. You can add the chopped nuts to this if you like, but I find it easier to sprinkle on both the nuts and the chocolate separately.

Once the dough has doubled, make the meringue:
In a clean mixing bowl – ideally a plastic or metal bowl so the egg whites adhere to the side (they slip on glass) and you don’t end up with liquid remaining in the bottom – beat the egg whites with the salt, first on low speed for 30 seconds, then increase to high and continue beating until foamy and opaque. Add the vanilla then start adding the ½ cup sugar, a tablespoon at a time as you beat, until very stiff, glossy peaks form.

Assemble the Coffee Cakes:

Line 2 baking/cookie sheets with parchment paper.

Punch down the dough and divide in half. On a lightly floured surface, working one piece of the dough at a time (keep the other half of the dough wrapped in plastic), roll out the dough into a 20 x 10-inch (about 51 x 25 ½ cm) rectangle. Spread half of the meringue evenly over the rectangle up to about 1/2-inch (3/4 cm) from the edges. Sprinkle half of your filling of choice evenly over the meringue (ex: half of the cinnamon-sugar followed by half the chopped nuts and half of the chocolate chips/chopped chocolate).

Now, roll up the dough jellyroll style, from the long side. Pinch the seam closed to seal. Very carefully transfer the filled log to one of the lined cookie sheets, seam side down. Bring the ends of the log around and seal the ends together, forming a ring, tucking one end into the other and pinching to seal.

Using kitchen scissors or a sharp knife (although scissors are easier), make cuts along the outside edge at 1-inch (2 ½ cm) intervals. Make them as shallow or as deep as desired but don’t be afraid to cut deep into the ring.

Repeat with the remaining dough, meringue and fillings.

Cover the 2 coffee cakes with plastic wrap and allow them to rise again for 45 to 60 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C).

Brush the tops of the coffee cakes with the egg wash. Bake in the preheated oven for 25 to 30 minutes until risen and golden brown. The dough should sound hollow when tapped.

Remove from the oven and slide the parchment paper off the cookie sheets onto the table. Very gently loosen the coffee cakes from the paper with a large spatula and carefully slide the cakes off onto cooling racks. Allow to cool.

Just before serving, dust the tops of the coffee cakes with confectioner’s sugar as well as cocoa powder if using chocolate in the filling. These are best eaten fresh, the same day or the next day.

Chocolate Cream Pound Cake

Another month has flown by and it is time to reveal what the Cake Slice bakers have been working on.  This month we made Lauren Chattman's Chocolate Cream Pound cake.  It was a nice cake, nothing exceptional, but since my family managed to devour it in about a day I will probably be making it again.

I made a couple of minor changes.  First I added a tablespoon of coffee to the cocoa heavy cream mixture.  I love the combination of coffee and chocolate, the coffee makes the chocolate much richer.  I sometimes make the coffee a little too strong, but I love coffee, so I am fine if there are coffee undertones.

The second change was the pan.  I received a beautiful min-bunt pan a few years ago and have never had luck with it.  I break it out about once a year hoping it will finally produce beautiful little cakes, but it has yet to work for me.  Most of cakes get stuck and the ones that do come out never look like I hope they will.  I had the same results this time.  The daisy cakes came out fine, one of the sunflowers was a success and the roses were a big mess.  I am beginning to think this pan would be better used as a decoration.

I say give this recipe a try if you are in need of a quick easy snack.  Check out the other Cake Slice bakers for more ideas.

March’s Cake: Chocolate Cream Pound Cake
(Recipe from Cake Keeper Cakes by Lauren Chattman)

Ingredients
6 tbsp unsweetened Dutch process cocoa powder
¼ cup heavy cream
1 cup plus 2 tbsp all purpose flour
¼ tsp baking soda
¼ tsp salt
½ cup (1stick) unsalted butter, softened
1½ cups sugar
3 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract

Method
Heat the oven to 325F. Grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan and dust with flour.
Sift the cocoa powder into a heatproof bowl. Place the cream in a microwavable bowl and heat for 30-60 seconds until just boiling. Pour the hot cream over the cocoa and stir and mash with a spoon to make a thick paste. Set aside to cool.
Combine the flour, baking soda and salt in a medium mixing bowl.
Combine the butter and sugar in a large bowl and cream with an electric mixer on medium-high speed until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Scrape down the sides of the bow once or twice as necessary. Beat in the cocoa powder paste until smooth.
With the mixer on medium-low speed add the eggs, one at a time, scraping down the bowl after each addition. Stir in the vanilla.
Turn the mixer to low speed and add the flour mixture, ½ cup at a time, scraping down the sides after each addition. Add the last addition, mix for 30 seconds on medium speed.
Scrape the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top with a rubber spatula. Bake the cake until it is firm to the touch and a toothpick inserted in the centre comes out clean, about 1 hour and 10 minutes. Let the cake cool in the pan for 5 minutes. Invert it onto a wire rack and then turn it right side up on the rack to cool completely. Slice and serve.
Store uneaten cake in a cake keeper or wrap and store at room temperature for up to 3 days.

Stout Cupcakes

St. Patrick's Day is one of those holidays where I always have great plans for making fun yummy treats and then never get around to doing anything.  This year I had plans for Irish Soda bread and shamrock sugar cookies, both easy yet I never got around to making them.  Part of the reason I didn't get to them was I became distracted by these Stout cupcakes with Bailey's Buttercream.  I remember seeing the recipe last year and wanted to make them, but never got around to it, so this year I put everything else aside and decided to focus on the adult desserts and let the kids fend for themselves.  And oh it was such a good decision.
I have made the Bailey's buttercream before and it is just mouthwatering.  I could eat a bowl of it by myself, in fact it is a pretty good snack when slathered on a graham cracker.
I hadn't done the cupcakes before, but am glad I gave them a try, they will definitely be added to the collection.  I did have a little problem when mixing the liquid ingredients together, I didn't bring the beer up to room temperature before adding it to the melted butter which caused the butter to solidify in weird clumps.  I poured the beer butter mixture through a sieve and remelted the butter, but it was still clumpy and the cupcakes had small hard pieces.  Which while not awful definitely messed up the texture.
This recipe makes a lot of cupcakes, I made two dozen large ones and another two and half dozen small ones.  When I make them again I will do even more small ones.  The ratio of buttercream to cake was perfect.  In fact I think I will add them to my mini dessert options.

Stout Cupcakes

Courtesy of Jami Schmidt and 

 

3/4 cup of unsweetened coca plus more for dusting at the end
2 cups sugar
2 cups AP Flour
1 tsp Baking soda
Pinch of fine salt
1 bottle of Guinness (room temperature)
1 stick melted butter (cooled slightly)
1 tbs Pure vanilla extract
3 large eggs
3/4 cups sour cream

Preheat to 350
Mix together dry ingredients in one bowl
In another mixing bowl combine stout, melted butter, and vanilla. Beat in eggs, one at a time. Mix in sour cream until combined and smooth. Gradually add in the dry.

 Fill the cupcake liners 3/4 full. Bake for 15-20 minutes, rotating half way through  

Bailey's Irish Cream Frosting
Courtesy Martha Stewart
3 sticks unsalted, room temp butter
4 C. powdered sugar
3 Tablespoons Bailey's Irish Cream liqueur
1/2 tsp. pure vanilla extract

Cream butter until smooth.  Slowly add in powdered sugar, scraping down the sides as needed.  Add Bailey's and vanilla and beat until combined and smooth.