Grapefruit, Golden Beet, and Avocado Sandwich

Look at the beautiful colors of the ingredients on this sandwich!

If that strikes you as an odd combination, you aren't alone. Quite a while ago I found the 'wichcraft cookbook on sale. I wouldn't ordinarily spring for a sandwich cookbook, but I like 'wichcraft (especially their ice cream sandwiches!) and it was a good bargain. I finally got around to using it and it's excellent!

I have a lovely organic green grocer near me so I decided to go for a vegetarian sandwich and I wanted something cold since we were eating it with a bowl of mom's tomato soup.

With all that in mind, I picked this sandwich. It is a remarkably hearty sandwich of sliced avocado, segments of grapefruit, sprouts, and julienned, raw, golden beets tossed in a light vinaigrette on some bread. That's it. The smooth avocado, the crunchy beets, and the juicy grapefruit worked so well together. The flavors all meshed and I was really surprised how nice the raw beets were--I've never eaten uncooked beets before. 

The combination was unique and the sandwiches were delicious. I can't wait to try more sandwiches from the cookbook!

Is it Still Slimming if it's a Little Black Cake?

Putting the final touches on the cake

I went to this demo before I started my wedding cake project. I wanted to pick up as many tips and tricks as possible for making a wedding cake. I did pick up some general tricks on how to cover cake layers in fondant and how to stack them. I learned four specific tips I'd like to pass on:

1. Don't try to dye fondant black yourself. Buy pre-colored fondant. It'll save you a lot of work and keep you from dying your hands black.
2. Don't buy circle cutters for making dots, just use pastry tips of varying sizes. We did this in class to an extent, but I didn't realize just how versatile they could be until I saw the drastically different sizes Chef Ron was able to make with them. (I admit I didn't use this trick at school, I never needed dots, but I've used it since.)
3. To make even lines use a straight pin to tack ribbon of the appropriate width to the cake. That way you can line up your decorations by using the straight edge of the ribbon. For scallops, cut a circle of parchment to fit the circumference of the cake, fold it up into an accordion stack and cut a semi circle out of the top (it's just like making paper chains of hearts or little kids holding hands). Unfold it and tack it on. Then use it as a guide just like the ribbon.
4. Everything looks good in black, even wedding cakes. (Okay, that's not so much a tip as an observation. I hadn't expected a black wedding cake to be wedding-y, but with the simple white decorations and the single pop of color from the sugar paste flower this one really was.)

The ribbon and parchment paper guides in use

Chef Ron not only showed us how to decorate the cake, but also how to properly cut and serve it--in slices rather than wedges as you would slice a cake at home. The cake, if I remember correctly, was alternating layers of chocolate and white cake with alternating layers of buttercream flavored with strawberry jam and peanut butter. It was delicious!

Baked Brownies with No-Churn Coffee Ice Cream

Some of my favorite brownies are the Baked brownies (I think the recipe is in their first cookbook, Baked, but they have variations thereof in all of their books.) We had some bad news today (nothing terrible, but not great) and we decided we needed brownies--and people say I stress eat...humph. The Baked brownies are a relatively simple recipe, no mixer needed (meaning I can put all the equipment in the dishwasher rather than hand washing), and the recipe makes a 9x13in pan rather than a 9x9in pan (as with the recipes from my other favorite brownie brand, Fat Witch brownies). Regardless of my stress and need for an easy recipe, I love this recipe. They are chocolaty, gooey, and delicious!

I happened to have some no-churn coffee ice cream in the freezer. The recipe is from Nigella Lawson's newest cookbook, Nigellisma. It's simple and produces a surprisingly creamy, surprisingly ice cream-y result considering that you don't need an ice cream machine to make it. (And considering that I'm currently without an ice cream maker, that's great!) I'll discuss this recipe at greater length soon. The coffee ice cream was delicious on the warm, deeply chocolaty brownies. It was the perfect dessert after a stressful day. Of course it would be the perfect dessert after pretty much any day--you can't go wrong with brownies and ice cream!

Pumpkin Scones

I love the pumpkin scones at Alice's Tea Cup. The slightly spicy pumpkin-y goodness and the sticky caramel sauce that soaks into the top and drips down the side of each scone is addictive. I always wanted to know how to make them so I bought the Alice's cookbook as soon as it came out. Of course I was busy and have only just made the recipe. It did not disappoint--much.

I made the scone sans sauce--as is typical of a sauce, it is applied after the scones are baked, so leaving it off doesn't affect the baking process. The scones rose properly and were flaky and light inside. I've had trouble with a few of the Alice's scones coming out flat, dense, and a bit damp, so I was thrilled that these didn't give me any of those problems. Of course the dough was extraordinarily sticky and I had to add quite a bit of flour to make it workable--so that could be why they worked well (and came out a bit dry, as mentioned below.) The pumpkin flavor was just as I remembered: pumpkin, spice, and a hint of baking soda (in a good way...rather like a baking soda biscuit).

As I said, I did not make the caramel sauce. I love it and from glancing at the recipe it seems simple and probably perfect, but I was out of heavy cream and didn't want to go out for it. In any case, I wanted to keep the scones to munch on for a few days and I figure the caramel sauce will make them soggy if they sit overnight. Obviously this did change the taste of the scone, since the caramel sauce soaks into them at the restaurant, but it wasn't much of a difference--since their scones are very large, much of the middle and bottom of their scones remains untouched by the sauce. It did render them slightly drier than they should have been, so I whipped up a pumpkin and mascarpone cream. The dainty scone cream with a healthy dollop of the cream and a little raspberry jam spread was delicious! (I can't wait to try it with the glaze.)

Milk Chocolate, Orange, and Mascarpone Mousse

This, like my usual chocolate mousse, is not technically mousse. But it's delicious and mousse-y, so close enough. I made this by whipping heavy cream and mascarpone to soft peaks with a bit of orange zest and extract. Then I folded in melted milk chocolate that I'd allowed to cool to about 100*F (that's basically body temperature, so if you stick your finger in and the chocolate doesn't feel warm or cold, you've got the right temperature) into cream and cheese mixture.

You can serve this right away, but it keeps perfectly in the fridge. I recommend making it before you start making the meal (it doesn't take long since you can whip the cream while the chocolate is melting--just keep an eye on the chocolate, you don't want it to burn), letting it chill, and serving it just before you eat.

To serve, I used an ice cream scoop to get nice even scoops and plopped them into tea cups. I topped the mousse with a sprig of basil--basil is a cousin of mint and is underused in sweet applications, which is a shame really as it's lovely with citrus and chocolate--and voila, a delicious, no cook, gluten free dessert.

Winter White Birthday Cake

Remember the friends I baked those brownies with? It was their father's birthday recently so I baked a cake for home when they came over this weekend. Since he's a grown man I thought that the cute little elephants or teddy bears I usually associate with boys birthday cakes weren't right. But then again the pink icing and sugar paste roses of a more adult cake seemed a bit girlie.

So I decided to make a devil's food cake with plain un-dyed (but winter white sounds better) vanilla buttercream decorations. One of the girls suggested I do something to the sides of the cake and I happen to have a brand new cake comb, so we picked the medium groove and combed the cake. Cake combs are a really useful tool, by the way. I'd seen a lovely border done with a leaf tip in a cookbook so I figured I'd give that a shot--it worked very well! Then I just made a ring of the leaves on the top and filled it with delicious white chocolate crunchy candies (from callebaut). I think the cake looked elegant enough to serve as a wedding cake for a small wedding--it was an 8" 3-layer cake, so it would have had to be small one.

I love how the edge looks almost fluffy.

By the way, the devil's food cake recipe was from one of the Baked cookbooks (sorry I can't remember which). It's a bit different than other devil's food cake recipes I've made before. It was a little bit lighter than regular devil's food cake, which was really very nice since I was filling and covering the cake with buttercream, which is not known for it's lightness. Overall, it was a delicious and beautiful cake, if I do say so myself!

Look at the inside of that cake! Yum.

Chocolate Dipped Breadsticks

A few years ago Carluccio's, a restaurant chain in the UK, stopped selling chocolate dipped breadsticks. That was probably good since they were addictive and not exactly healthy. But I've always missed them and decided I had to try to recreate them. I suppose I could make homemade grissini (and I will try that some day) but for now I figured I'd purchase them. This was not as easy as I would have thought. I wanted plain grissini, no cheese, no cornmeal on the outside, no herbs, nothing. As it turns out, that's not so easy to find. Finally I did find some lovely, skinny, plain breadsticks. I tempered some bittersweet chocolate (61% dark chocolate if I remember correctly--I might have to get some cocoa butter, the chocolate was a bit thick) and dipped the breadsticks in the chocolate, leaving on a bit undipped on the end to hold it by. They were as good as I remember them! (I suppose you can't go wrong with bread dipped in chocolate, though.)

Sugar Cookies

I got a bunch of fun cookie cutters on sale a while back (including the champagne cutter and the apple/pumpkin cutter). I also got an ice cream cone and a cup cake cutter. I really like the idea of a cookie decorated to look like a cupcake. It's so cute!

These weren't too hard to decorate--two colors, two consistencies, two piping bags and one squeeze bottle (for the flood icing), and some sprinkles. The brown for the cone and the cupcake wrapper and the reddish-pink for outlining the shape of the cupcake top and the ice cream were both piping consistency, then I thinned the red to make a flood consistency to fill in the outlines. Before that dried, I sprinkled on some sprinkles. So simple, even for someone with a less than steady piping hand.

Mini Sugar Cookies

I forgot to post these the other day. I had a bit of dough and royal icing left over from the champagne cookies, so I made some simple, miniature sized rounds and decorated them with some simple patterns. I like this look and I think they would be lovely in any color with monograms or flowers as well as the hearts, spirals, and dots I did.

Champagne Sugar Cookies

These aren't champagne flavored; they are champagne shaped. I found a champagne flute cookie cutter on sale and had to have it! I think the little bit of champagne colored royal icing really did work. I'm not sure about the Demerara sugar--I saw it in a cookbook, but it may be a little much. Regardless, these are delicious and really lovely. I made these quite a while ago, but never posted them. I figured I'd put them on now since they are perfect for a New Year's Eve party.