Daring Bakers: Claudia Fleming's Macarons...or is it macaroons?

Recipe: Macaroons
Recipe origins: Claudia Fleming's The Last Course: The Desserts of Gramercy TavernHostess: Ami. S of Baking Without Fear

The 2009 October Daring Bakers’ challenge was brought to us by Ami S. She chose macarons from Claudia Fleming’s The Last Course: The Desserts of Gramercy Tavern as the challenge recipe.

Hosting a Daring Bakers' challenge is not an easy thing. Trust me, I know.

There's a wide range of abilities, experience and attitudes. From those who've never stepped foot into a kitchen (I could comment, but I won't) to those who probably own a professional kitchen. From those who try and keep to DB origins and follow a recipe exactly as written (unless there are financial, ethical or health reasons that force otherwise) to those who think of themselves as the sparkliest snowflakes of all, believing rules do not apply to them and will present a chocolate sponge as a completed challenge when the host called for a lemon meringue. metric vs Imperial, weights vs. volumes...it can be quite the tempest in a teapot.

Whenever I've come across a recipe I wasn't sure of I've done my best with it and have tried to post an accurate account of my adventures. Sometimes they are straightforward and produce fantastically tasty treats, sometimes as convoluted as Suicide Squid's origin story that sometimes produce the same fantastically tasty treats...but sometimes not so tasty treats.

When the results are good, they are very good. When they aren't, well, I try not to be unduly spiteful...quite honestly, I don't know how succesful I am at the not being unduly spiteful part.

So when it came to this month's DB challenge...well, I wasn't sure what to expect. Partly because I didn't know if I was making macarons...or macaroons. The write-up said "macaroon" but as the accompanying photos didn't look like the coconutty mini-mountains, and looked like a cross between 19thC nightcaps and happy little jellyfish, I assumed they were macarons.

Semantics, yes...but it's important.

Anyway...I've never made either before. I've eaten macaroons. I've never eaten a macaron.

I'm going on blind faith that whatever this recipe produces is a macaron.

The batter came together well enough, I suppose. I was a little concerned after the first third of the whites were incorporated as it just seemed too crumbly. By the final third, it looked good.

Which was probably the last time it actually looked good.

The first baking seemed okay...they were round and poofy, but rather lacklustre.

By the time the oven came to temp for the second baking the round, poofy lacklustryness collapsted into themselves...they kind of looked like a beanbag chair that lost the essence of being a chair.

When I took them out of the oven...they looked...rumpled. Like punching bags that had been punched one time too many.

Not all of them turned out--and that is, I think a fault of Beelzebub--of the 20 blobs (I scaled the recipe down to 40 per cent), 10 had charred bottoms: a hazard of using a stove possessed by the spirit of a lazy food-hating daemon who'd rather see me reliant upon big-box processed microwavable fud than...well...bake.

I will say of those that survived the baking process, most of them had the little feet or jellyfish skirt that I've seen in photos. For that I'm rather tickled.

So that left me 10 blobs, enough for five sandwich cookies. Given there's only one of me, five cookies are absolutely fine. Part of the challenge was to fill them and quite honestly, I wasn't very imaginative and reached for the last of the raspberry jam. Almonds, raspberries--very Bakewell Tart-like.


What did I think? Well, I'm not sure if they came out as they should. I'm also not entirely sure of the texture. I thought they'd be light and crisp not light-ish and chewy.

I've read a few Tweets by more experienced bakers than I voicing concern over the recipe, so maybe they're a better judge of this recipe than I.

But I do know I want to try my hand at macaron-making, but perhaps with a different recipe.

Click here for a list of participating Daring Bakers.

cheers!
jasmine


I'm a quill for hire!

Pumpkin Bread and Butter Pudding

I was checking out email
When out the corner of my eye,
I saw a pretty little thing miaoing at me.
She said I never seen a gal,
Who looks so overworked,
Could you use a little small yummy?
In the office they'll suffice
Your kitchen it entice
Or you can sit here and give me no sway,
I said you're such a sweet young thing,
Did you think of this yourself?

She looked at me and this is what she said.
Oh, there ain't no rest for the wicked,
You need to stow their needs,
You got cakes to bake,
You got yeast to feed,
There ain't nothing that beats lychees.
I know you must whisk eggs,
I know your cookbook stack
Though I know there's somthin' you should,
Oh yes there ain't no post for the potluck,
And we need to bring something good.
--with apologies to Cage The Elephant

Okay...Hagia didn't exactly sing this...but when I looked over and saw her squirmy with glee over this month's Chatelaine Nigella feature, she reminded me that I've not yet been able to submit one post for the weekly Nigella event at I Heart Cooking Clubs (Yeah, Workasaurus and Deadlinadactyl take full credit). Add a tweet late last week from Mel of Bouchon for Two asking for pumpkinny baking and I knew I had a post that fit both bills.

My Dear Little Cardamummy handed me a 796ml tin of pumpkin purée for the Thanksgiving tarte, which left 550+ mls of purée in my hands. I made a granola-topped pumpkin loaf with some of it, cookies with the rest (yes, I realise I'm being mean and not giving you those recipes yet).

Unfortunately, and I don't know how I did this, I only ate two slices of the bread all week. Trust me, it was delicious, but I just didn't eat it. Even though it was a bit stale by the time I realised this, I knew it was more than salvageable.

Just as the bread was made because I had good food that needed to be used up, this bread pudding was made because I had good food that needed to be used up. Bread puddings are a time-tested way of stretching stale baking. Take scraps of not-the-freshest baking, give it a good soak in custard and pop it into the oven. And *poof* (literally and figuratively) you've got a good wintery dessert.

This recipe is done in the spirit of Nigella's Grandmother's Ginger-Jam Bread and Butter Pudding. I don't spice the pudding as La Lawson did, as the pumpkin bread is quite flavourful from the spicing and a bit crunchy from the granola I baked onto it, but I did take a cue from the ginger jam and used orange marmalade. The result is a lovely, soft, eggy sweet and spicy pudding. Quite honestly, I think I'll make the bread again, just so I can make this pudding.

Pumpkin Bread and Butter Pudding

1 loaf (or as much as you have of) pumpkin bread that's been hanging about a bit longer than you'd wish, sliced
Butter
Orange marmalade
3 eggs
2-3 Tbsp sugar
250ml heavy cream
375ml table cream
raisins, dried fruit, nuts (optional)

Butter a pudding dish large enough to hold the pudding and custard.

Make marmalade and butter sandwiches with the bread. Cut each sandwich in half to form triangles or squares, whichever you prefer. Arrange the little sandwiches in the buttered dish.

Whisk the eggs with the sugar and then add the milk and cream and mix well. Pour over the sandwiches. Strew whatever dried fruit or nut you wish on top of the pudding.

Let the bread soak up the custard for at least 10 minutes. This is a good time to set your oven to 350F/180C.

When your oven is to temp, pop the bread pudding in the oven for 45 -60 minutes, depending upon your kitchen gods' moods. The pudding is ready when the custard has set and is poofy.

Related post: Granola-topped Pumpkin Bread

cheers!
jasmine


I'm a quill for hire!

The "You know I usually don't like Brussels sprouts, but I love these Brussels sprouts" Brussels sprouts dish

Many things don't make any sense to me.

Fahrenheit temperatures.
Euchre.
Directionals (as in North, South, West and East).
American football.
Trooper's Raise A Little Hell used to sell saltines*.
The apparently 6'3" non-cook who designed my kitchen.
Dan Brown's literary career.

For years I never understood how people can *not* like Brussels sprouts (or brussel sprouts). I mean really. They're cute and leafy. They're teeny little cabbages that grow on sticks...and we all know foods on sticks aren't just fun, but they taste better.

The first time I had Brussels sprouts they were curried--very simply done--lightly steamed and then sauteed with onions and masala. How anyone could not like that was unthinkable. A bowlful of those spicey sphere-ishes and I'd be as happy as Beanie with a turkey leg. I thought everybody liked Brussel sprouts.

Then I started hearing stories about slimey concoctions whose funk would make a grizzly bear in heat reach for the Febreeze. Tales about the little tiny cabbages boiled for an hour or so were enough to send me screaming out of a room in the same way as I would should Celine Dion magically appear, offering to sing me any stanza from her screechy songbook.

Who would ever treat such vegetably emeralds with such disdain?

When the exbf told me that one of his online followers uploaded a post about beautiful green orbs that beckoned him/her at the grocer...and then taunted him/her in the fridge because...well...he/she doesn't actually like Brussels sprouts, I knew I had to upload this post sooner rather than later.

This is the "You know, I usually don't like Brussels sprouts, but I love these Brussels sprouts" dish.

This is the dish that's won converts every time it's served to new people who theoretically don't like Brussel sprouts.

This is the dish that My Dear Little Cardamummy tries and tries again to replicate, but can't somehow do it (here's a hint: follow my instructions...but then again, she's not online so that bit of advice won't really help her)

It's a variant of my earlier dish made with sausage and potatoes, and makes good use of a leftover boiled potato or two. It's not an incredibly labour-intensive dish. Really: sitting at a table discarding yellowed leaves and slashing the stem ends really isn't onerous and allows for a good think or chat. Frying bacon and potatoes...that's nothing. And the veggies just steam themselves.

Even though you can make with two pots -- one to steam the veggies and one to do up the bacon and potatoes -- I do the entire dish in one vessel (my wok, to be specific). The trick to this dish is to not over cook the sprouts. Apparently this is easier said than done. The embryonic cabbages should be a bright green and still firm to the tooth with a little bit of give...I suppose slightly crunchy, but not squeaky, if you get the nuances. Once the leaves yield too easily to the tooth, you know you've cooked a bit too far.


Brussels Sprouts with bacon and potatoes
serves 4-6

500g Brussels sprouts
3-4 rashers streaky bacon, chopped
cooking fat (butter, oil, bacon fat)
300-400g cubed potatoes, steamed or boiled and cooled
1-2 cloves minced garlic
Black pepper
Salt
1 onion, julienned
1 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce (or to taste)
Chilli pepper flakes (optional).

Clean and trim the sprouts by removing any yellowed outer leaves and slashing an "x" the stem end (if the sprouts are small) or slicing in half (if they are large).

Fry the bacon until crispy. Remove the bits, leaving the fat in the pan.

Tip in the potatoes (in batches, if necessary), adding more fat if necessary. Add onions, garlic, salt and pepper. Fry until browned and crispy and remove.

Pour about 60ml (quarter cup) of water with a healthy pinch or two of salt into the pan. Tumble in the prepared sprouts, cover and let steam for a few minutes until the sprouts are vibrant and barely cooked. Drain the water and add the cooked bacon and potato-onion mixture.

Pour in the balsamic vinegar and a splash or two or three of Worcestershire sauce and give everything a good stir. Adjust seasoning to taste, adding chilli flakes if desired.


cheers!
jasmine

I'm a quill for hire!

*Really. What part of this song says "crumbling crackers in soup is a rebellious and uber-kewl thing to do"?