Coconut Cookies

I normally like buttery crunchy cookies. TripleQ likes his cookies soft and chewy. Coconut cookies based on this recipe are slightly crusty yet chewy inside. Finally the cookies we both enjoy. The original recipe is from here.

Ingredients:

• Butter, 1 stick
• Sugar,1/2cup
• Brown sugar,1/2cup
• Egg,1
• pinch salt
• Baking powder, 2tsp
• Flour, 2 cup flour
• Coconut, 1 cup

Instruction:

• Cream sugar & butter
• Add egg & vanilla
• Add dry ingredients
• Add coconut
• Shape the cookies with your choice of cookie cutters
• Bake @350F for 15 minutes

Final verdict:

Need I say more? the most popular cookie recipes among the Martinis.

Cranberry Chocolate Cake

To celebrate TripleQ's birthday, I made this 6" (almost) molten chocolate cake. I was hoping to take this opportunity to clear up our dark chocolate inventory(~1 lb). And I did. In fact, there was barely any chocolate left to make enough ganache to cover the cake. If you're health-conscious, WALK AWAY. The cake itself is packed with 2 sticks of butter, 1 cup of sugar and 3/4 lb of chocolate. It is truly "death by chocolate" (one good way to die for btw).

The recipe is loosely based on Chef Michael Smith's brownie recipe. There happened to be a jar of dried cranberries in the pantry so I used cranberries instead of walnuts (called in the original recipe).

Servings: one 6" cake + two ramekins


Note: for this recipe, you'll need to bake the cake & let it sit (at least to room temperature) before applying the jam glaze & ganache glaze. You'll have plenty of time to make other components while the cake is baked in the oven or cooling down on the rack. To make this post easier to follow, the ingredient list & instruction for each component are grouped together.


~ for the cake

INGREDIENTS (Cake)

• Bittersweet dark chocolate, 12 ounces (339g)
• Butter,2 sticks (8 ounces)
• Flour, 1 cup
• Salt, a pinch
• Baking powder, 1 tbsp
• Eggs, 4-5*
• Sugar, 1/2 cup
• Brown sugar (packed), 1/2 cup
• Splash of liqueur** or vanilla extract
• Dried cranberries, 1 cup
• More liqueur** for reconstituting cranberries

NOTE* Depends on the size of eggs & your fridge space
NOTE** I use creme de cassis, Grand Marnier and orange liqueur to achieve the balance I'm after. If you are not a self-proclaimed mixologist like me, you can reconstitute cranberries in orange juice or cranberry juice and add vanilla extract to the cake batter.


PROCESS (Cake)

• Melt butter and chocolate over a double boiler
• In a small sauce pan, pour in generous amount of liqueur. Heat over stove to burn off as much alcohol as possible.
• Saucepan off the heat. Add cranberries and soak.
• Sieve and mix all dry ingredients
• Pre-heat the oven to 350F Note: this step can occur whenever convenient. My oven takes 5 minutes to pre-heat.
• Use the mixer to beat eggs & sugar. Add chocolate butter mix. Add dry ingredients.
• Drain cranberries. Reserve the liquid. Add cranberries to the batter.
• Butter & lightly flour a 6" spring foam. Pour batter in. Gently tap the mold to remove big air voids.
• Bake @ 350F for 40 minutes or until set.
• Let the cake cool on the rack
• (Optional) Chill in the fridge if you want to make a "proper-looking" cake. See PROCESS (Assembling).

~ for the jam (sealer layer)

INGREDIENTS (Raspberry)

• Raspberry jam (few tbsp)
• Liqueur reserved from reconstituting cranberries

PROCESS (Raspberry)

• Gently heat jam on the stove until the jam melts slightly (it should be runnier than at room temperature)
• Thin the jam with liqueur (reserved from soaking cranberries) until the mixture has the consistency of raw egg white.
• Strain the mixture if your jam contains fruit bits. (Skip this step if you don't mind bumpy surface on your cake)

~ for the ganache glaze

INGREDIENTS (Ganache)
Original recipe is from joyofbaking.com.

• Cream, 1 part
• Chocolate, 1-3 parts
• Butter (about 1 tbsp butter to 1/2 lb chocolate)
• Splash of your choice of liqueur
• Sugar to taste

Note: I'm the type who can snack on 85% chocolate so no more sugar for me. But it's purely personal preference.


PROCESS (Ganache)

Many tutorials available on the internet. The rule of thumb is to melt chocolate in warm cream without scorching the milk or burning the chocolate.

PROCESS. (Assembling)

What I did:

• Trim the top of the cake.
• Brush on a thick layer of raspberry jam glaze to seal crumbs & also act as filling
• Spread ganache on the cake
• Garnish with star-shaped sprinkles (if everything fails, this is the last resort to wow the audience)

What you can do ("the proper-looking cake"):
Assuming the cake has been in the fridge for minimum 2 hours.

• Trim the top of the cake. Slice the cake in half horizontally.
• Brush on a thick layer of raspberry jam glaze all over the cake (top, sides, in between layers) to seal crumbs & also act as filling
• Whip the ganache until it's nice & fluffy
• Spread ganache all over the cake

Note: When the cake is warm, the center is soft & runny. Put the cake in fridge for few hours if you want to slice it in half for the ganache filling. I didn't do so because we like it as molten chocolate cake.

I want another enameled cast iron pot - part 2

A KitchenAid pot similar to the one mentioned in this post was on sale at CanadianTire again. Except this time it was 70% off (so cheap you almost wonder if people ever pay full price). For CD$30 we almost got nothing to lose; worst comes worst I can use it as a planter.

This KitchenAid cast iron pot is 3.5 qt (smaller than the 5qt Staub pot we have), in dark red. The handle is silicon/stainless steel so the whole pot can go in the oven. Although it has the glossy interior (like Le Creuset) and the self-basting dips (like Staub), the finish is not comparable to either. But hey! it's only 10-15% $ of the "real thing".

Comments after the initial use:

• TripleQ used it to make no-knead bread. It does produce thinner crust than with regular baking mold.
• I braised pork shoulder in it. The steam came out from the edge and over-flew. This never happens with our other pot.

(TripleQ) "What's the point of putting silicon on handle if I still need an oven mitt to lift the pot?"

Brioche - revised

After couple more batches of brioche, I finally figure out the formula we enjoy the most. So here it is:

INGREDIENTS:

• flour, 3 cups
• sugar, 6 tbsp
• salt, 2 tsp
• butter, 10 tbsp
• eggs (medium-large), 5
• warm milk, 0.25 cup (or 60mL)
• dry yeast, 1 package (8g)

PROCESS:

• Put all ingredients in a mixing bowl, stir gently with a spatula
• Mix with a dough hook in the lowest speed until it's well-blended (about 2 minutes).
• Increase the speed and mix for 5 minutes. Stop and scrape the side. Repeat 3 times (basically you make the mixer do the kneading for you)
• Cover the dough and let it sit for about 4 hours (at around 25 C)
• Divide the dough into 12 muffin cups. Let it sit for 1 hour. (The dough will continue to puff up)
• Bake for 15 minutes at 375 F in a convection oven. Turn off the heat and let brioche stay in the oven for another 5 minutes.

LESSONS LEARNED:

• Just for the record, I did try to follow the original recipe and store the dough in the fridge over night. The dough was hard enough that we could roll it into small balls (Baby Martini enjoyed doing it tremendously). If you go with this recipe, the dough will be too sticky and too soft to roll.
• For the dough stored in the fridge, the brioche turned out to be pretty dense (more like bread). But brioche from this recipe has the texture between croissant and bread.
• I added a handful of lavender bloom in this batch. It was subtle, like biting off lavender-scented clouds. I might get braver and start to incorporate more flavors in brioche.

FINAL VERDICT:

• Stick to this recipe! Some people might snarl at how simplified the steps are and claim the end result is not brioche. Fine, buttery bun it is. But this is the recipe the Martinis will go by.

Brioche - first take

I couldn't forget the wonderful brioche from Victoire I had when I visited Sydney, Australia. I decided to make one batch just to see how difficult it is. I found this link. The recipe seems to be straight-forward enough, judging by the first picture that all the ingredients are in the mixing bowl at the same time.

As straight-forward as it seems, I still made some modification (whether it's intentional or not). Here's what happened:

• I don't have milk powder at home so I have to improvise. I had 1/2 cup of warm milk to replace 1/4 cup milk powder and 1/4 warm water.
• instead of 1 tablespoon yeast, I put 1 package of instant dry yeast (8g).
• This is the second time our mixer reached its limit. Instead of using flat beater for 5 min after all ingredients were fully incorporated, I had to switch to bread hook to knead the dough after couple of minutes.
• The dough didn't go in the fridge for minimum 2 hours (to overnight); instead, it was sitting in the kitchen for about 2 hours (the first stage and last stage of fermentation were same as instructions in the recipe).

Results and lessons learned:

The end result looked similar to the pictures on the recipe page. It has the matte finish as opposed the "glossy finish" (by applying egg wash (egg yolk) on the surface of the dough).

Flavor-wise, it's neither sweet nor salty. I might need to increase the amount of seasoning next time. It goes well with marmalade or banana compote with orange juice reduction though.

In terms of texture, it is a tad dry (for brioche). Somehow I suspect it's due to the fact that I went the shortcut on the fermentation process. The dough wasn't stored in the fridge. Maybe I'll try to make softer dough next time as well.

Reference link for troubleshooting:
http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=007zip

Final verdict
It's unanimous (including Baby Martini's vote) that I should make it again.

Sapphire Martini, "How come the brioche from Victoire tasted so flaky and buttery?"
TripleQ, "I think you just mentioned the keyword."

Recipe see Brioche - revised.

Tequila braised beef with apples and onions

 I find it's interesting that when some of my Mexican friends hear the brand José Cuervo, they have that same expression like the Aussies to Yellow Tail. Anyhow. I don't remember why I have a bottle of tequila (as suggested by my name, I'm a gin drinker). I do notice that I cook with tequila more often than drinking it. Tequila adds interesting flavor to a dish and its full body goes well with meat.

Ingredients:

• Beef blade roast (oven roast)
• onion, 1 large or 2 mediums, peeled and quartered
• 1 or 2 apples, peeled and quartered
• 1 bunch green onions, cut about 5cm-long
• Garlic, 4 cloves
• Sage. We have abundant supply of sage from our garden, so I use a lot. About handful of fresh leaves
• Seasonings: soy sauce, sugar, black peppers, Worcestershire and last but not the least, a generous splash or tequila!

Note: a bit of kick from chipotle, jalapeno or other chili peppers will be nice. Alas! that's too much for a 3-year-old.

Process:

• Marinate the beef (with seasonings, water and all the ingredients) overnight
• Heat the pot with a splash of olive oil
• Drain and pat-dry the beef, sear it in the pot until the brown crust develops.
• Remove the beef from the pot, deglaze with the marinade.
• Add all ingredients and beef back to the pot, cover with lid. Simmer for 2 hours

Beef marinated with apples & onions

Searing the beef

There is no picture for the final product; everyone was hungry.

The verdict:
Not sure if it's due to the cut or the cooking. It was too tough to TripleQ's liking. It is indeed on the tough side, despite I cut against the grains. Maybe I'll try to cook it in the oven (with low temperature) next time.

The pot - Staub Dutch oven

I just realize that I never post any information about our enameled cast iron pot.

Picture from Staub USA website.

Staub round cocotte, size 26, 5qt. Royal blue.
This is probably the most versatile size: big enough for a chicken (and other trimmings) yet not too heavy to handle. And I love that glossy gradient blue.