Back to Baking Through ...the Cake Bible

Yes, finally! We have returned to The Cake Bible. Robb and Janet actually got together for a day of baking and made a couple of things: The Scarlett Empress p.177, and Orange Glow Chiffon Cake p.155.

The Empress was OK, we had made the sponge cake and rolled it up with raspberry puree back in, dare I say... October. It sat patiently waiting in the freezer until this past week. This was not a great idea, but when we tucked it away, we thought we'd be back to it in a couple of weeks, not in several months! The texture of the cake didn't suffer, but the flavor did. We decided to push ahead and get it done, even with the not so tasty cake. This spectacle of the Empress is what we were interested in, and we figured it would be just fine if we didn't greedily gobble up every morsel.

The outside of the cake is slices of jelly roll and the filling is a vanilla Bavarian cream. It's a nice idea, an unusual twist compared to a regular buttercream filled layer cake. The flavor possibilities are endless, and all you need is a bowl to use as a mold.

We decided to whip out another cake while we were waiting for the Bavarian cream to set up. In the sponge-type cake section of The Cake Bible are a bunch of chiffon cakes and we chose the Orange Glow Chiffon Cake. Chiffon cakes have all the lovely qualities of angel food cake, along with an improved texture and flavor due to the addition of fat- oil and egg yolks. Go figure, fat makes stuff taste good. I loved the chiffon cake, it needs no frosting and satisfies a cake jones without much trouble.

Happy Baking!
Janet

Queen Mother v Bittersweet Genoise

We made the Bittersweet Cocoa Almond Genoise (RLB pg 134, pictured in front) and the Queen Mother's Cake from Maida Heatter (back). Rose says her genoise is based on Maida's so, knowing us, we had to compare and contrast.

At first, we weren't really too impressed with either one. It seems that the Queen Mother's Cake got a bit over cooked. Like a lot over cooked. Bottom too brown (really almost blackened) and the sides were way too dark and dry. We cooked it for the specified amount of time, even shaving off some time, and it still was too dark.

Since we cooked both of them at the same time, it wasn't because the temp was off as Rose's genoise came out perfectly.

The process for these two cakes was similar. Make the almonds into a flour -- they offer the only structure as these are flourless cakes. Then you combine the butter, sugar, egg yolks and then, after they are in add the chocolate or cocoa. Beat up the whites, till soft, add sugar and beat till stiff. Fold them together. Bake.

The difference between them is that Rose's genoise has cocoa powder and Maida's has semisweet chocolate. We expected more depth of flavor with the cocoa powder and we were right.

Rose's was by far the prettier one when finished. At the initial tasting, Rose's suffered because it was still warm. When it's 90 degrees outside, it can take a long, long time for cakes to cool off, even if you have an air conditioner in the kitchen!

After it cooled and hung out in the fridge, I found it to be quite nice. M liked it quite a bit too. I wasn't sure that I liked it enough to make it again, but it really grew on me. I might just have to try it again.

Robb

Triple Chocolate Cake

Triple Chocolate Cake (pg 201)

Contains: 1 recipe Light Whipped Ganache (pg 268), 1 recipe Moist Chocolate Genoise (pg 132), 1 recipe syrup flavored with Frangelico, 1 recipe chocolate praline sheets (pg 386)

The genoise came together fairly well. We did have a bit of trouble with flour clumping. I think it had something to do with the humidity. Or, it could be that it just wasn't stirred properly. Either way, the cake had white balls of flour along the bottom, not a tremendous amount, but even one is too many, right?

Actually the flavor and crumb of this cake was how I envisioned the previous cake (The Fudgy Genoise Jeffery) was supposed to be. Moist, crumbly, richly flavored. We really liked this cake, overall.

The whipped ganache was lovely. It's just cream, chocolate and vanilla, that you whip up. All around, a nice way to frost the cake. A chocolate frosting that's light. Who knew?

I conquered a fear this time. I made the caramel. I almost burned chocolate too, but we'll get to that. Caramel always seemed to be a scary venture to me. You put sugar on heat and wait for it to almost, but not quite, burn. Then you call it caramel. Well, lo and behold, magic can happen in a kitchen. You drizzle the caramel over the hazelnuts and let it harden. Then blend into a powder. We came as close as we could to fine powder, but the nuts were beginning to become a paste. So, we stopped grinding them. It left the chocolate praline sheets a bit grainy. The taste was exemplary, but the texture was a bit off with the smooth chocolate ganache and the moist chocolate genoise. We wondered if it would better to use a puree of praline rather than a crunchy caramelized sugar.

Yes, I almost burned the chocolate. In a fit of haste, read: in a hurry and clueless, I dropped chocolate into a pan to melt (notice I didn't say double boiler). J was working on the praline powder and she looks up and and says, "That chocolate smells hot". I lifted the pan off the stove and continued to stir, rapidly, just outside the kitchen. Luckily, I hadn't added all the chocolate and J has a superfine olfactory sense so the chocolate never burned!

You must cool the chocolate praline sheets before you put them around the cake. We ended up freezing them. But even that didn't help us on a fairly warm day in the kitchen. As we put the sheets around the cake, J could work with them for a fair amount of time. I, the guy who's usually a bit chilled, generated so much heat in my hands that I almost melted them on contact. I felt a bit like Heat Miser. "Every thing I touch, starts to melt in my clutch, I'm too much."

All in all we liked this one. The layers were moist and gently infused with the Frangelico and the whipped ganache was tremendous, the choclate sheets that wrapped the cake were tasty, and next time we'd use a paste of praline to have a smooth texture.

Robb

Well they all can't be winners!

Fudgy Genoise Jeffrey (pg 136) with the Perfect Whipped Cream, Mocha variation, (pg 253)

When last we met, we were extolling the virtues of this section of genoise cakes. This genoise went a bit haywire.

For this cake, you whip the egg yolks, add the melted chocolate, add the whipped egg whites and bake. Straightforward enough, but here's where it veered off course:

* The yolk/chocolate mixture was so thick, almost gloppy, that we worried that we may have over beaten the egg yolks. A bit of heat thinned it out enough for us to add the egg whites. But it always seemed a bit stiff.

* The "crisp, meringue-like crust" fell off when we turned the cakes out onto the cooling racks.

* The edges were a bit over done -- almost burnt.

* The middle part was a bit doughy/gooey.

* The texture wasn't fudgy in any way, it was actually a bit dry.

We thought it we could have over cooked it -- it wouldn't be the first time, but the almost un-done interior made us think that wasn't the case. Yes, it was dry and undercooked! Bizarre.

Sometimes we assume operator error, and figure that we'll give it a try again some time. But too much was wrong with this particular cake. There just weren't any redeeming qualities.

And, most sadly to me, somehow, I cracked the cake plate that J & K & John got me for my birthday.

The one thing that did go well was the perfect whipped cream. It was amazing. The inclusion of the tablespoon of cocoa and the teaspoon of instant espresso was wonderful. Both of us expected it to be gritty and granular, but it was smooth and a beautiful tan color. And, let me tell you, it tasted divine. We highly recommend the mocha whipped cream.

One of the things that we've learned together is that sometimes fixing a mistake is what baking is all about. In this case, we removed the crust (top, bottom and sides), cut the cake horizontally and created the rustic napoleon type cake you see here.

We had such high hopes for this cake. Perhaps it was those expectations that made this cake seem not so good? No, this one just didn't work.

Sometimes, I feel like Paula Abdul, I have to find something nice to say about what we baked. Often, the journey is more important than the finished product. This is one of those times where we got to hang out while the cakes baked and chat, eat lunch and enjoy the sun.

(But, I can say that the whipped cream was a thing of beauty.)

Bake through

Robb

Temper, Temper

With forks still in our mouths, both of us said, "This is a great cake!"

Strawberry Maria (pg 184)

The Strawberry Maria has 1 recipe Genoise au Chocolat (pg 129), 1 recipe syrup flavored with Grand Marnier (pg 129), 1 recipe Strawberry Cloud Cream (pg 264), 1 Chocolate Lattice Band (pg 388) and strawberries dipped in chocolate.

J was so happy with the photo of this showcase cake, that her enthusiasm made the entire baking time fun. And, if we hadn't taken the class at La Tulipe, we'd never have had the confidence to do the lattice work with chocolate, which turned out so beautifully.

Tempering chocolate isn't nearly as frightening as I originally thought. We learned in the class about the 4 kinds of crystals in the chocolate structure and that the melting point of each of them is slightly different. Tempering involves melting teh chocoalte, cooling it so that a crystal in that chocolate (the one you want) begins to form, then heating it again so that the other kinds of crystals (the ones you don't want) don't form.

It sounds complicated, and it helps to have had a trained professional, in a professional kitchen show you how. I am beginning to see how working with chocolate could be a whole life's work. There is much to know about chocolate and how to be creative and do more daring things. But the basics- melt, cool, melt keeping it a little cooler but still workable- are not tough!! It see ms like some kind of mystical process, but

we said if those teenagers who work at Godiva in the mall can do it, so can we. We've had professional instruction after all.

We dipped the strawberries into chocolate, drizzled stripes on them and J suggested we melt some white chocolate to drizzle over them. What a hit. The texture of both dark and white stripes looked really cool.

The genoise came together quite nicely. Actually this whole section of genoise has come together nicely. The syrup, well, who doesn't like sugar syrup? And, can anything be bad if it has Grand Marnier?

Strawberry Cloud cream is a fancy way of saying strawberry flavored whipped cream. We did the same thing to strawberries that we did to raspberries -- take frozen ones, thaw them, capture the juice, bowl i t down, puree the fruit, blend. Add a cup or so to the whipped cream. Really simple now, but in the midst of doing this, we forgot to measure the pureed bit and ended up with what looked like the beginning of a very soft serve ice cream. So, we remade it. Urgh, the basics of measuring still bites us in the butt sometimes. It turned out quite nice.

Another cake that sounded good, looked good, and tasted good. One year ago, we would have been freaked out and probably not tried the lattice band. But, this really was easy to put together. We are so happy with this one, we will each make it again.

Now that I've at least faced my fear of chocolate, I hope to overcome my fear of piping. Who knows.

Robb

White Lily Cake

This is a lovely photo of the White Lily Cake (pg 202)

It consists of 1 recipe White Genoise (pg 127), 1/2 cup Cointreau (we used Grand Marnier, since we had it), 1/2 recipe Orange Fruit Mousseline (pg 245), 1 recipe of Rolled Fondant with orange flower water (page 306), & 1 recipe of Royal Icing.

Really, since we've done this so many times, we're no longer intimidated by the recipes. Well, I still say a quick, silent prayer whenever we have to do any piping work. But, it's a lot like doing hair color: Break it down into its component steps. And, since we know we can make a genoise, a mousseline and a fondant, we can surely put it together. And, I think that we did a fine job of it.

Even the piping turned out nice. They are supposed to look like lilies, and they do!

This was made e asy for a host of reasons. We had made the white genoise a few weeks ago. Frozen, it'll keep 2 months. We just defrosted it and followed the directions. J had the idea to make the cake layers at our last baking session. And, I thank her.

As for the Cointreau, we decided an orange flavored liquor could be substituted with another one, right? So we used the Grand Marnier that we had on hand.

We decided that making Orange Curd was a big waste of time. While we loved the color and the flavor, the runny texture and effort of making it is too big a drawback. We just substituted lemon curd, and added it to the mousseline.

Do you remember the mousseline? Neither could I. It is the one with a syrup of water and sugar, that gets drizzled into egg whites beaten with sugar. You beat this until it's cool, which has never happened in the prescribed time of 2 minutes. Then, you add butter, lots of butter, and beat until smooth. If you want to add liqueur or a flavor variation, you do so now. Yum!

I really don't care for fondant. It never tastes as good as you want it to and I usually pull it off. While I'm slowly lobbing blobs of butter into the kitchen aid full of egg whites, J made the fondant. We only had dark corn syrup. So, you'll notice that there is a lovely light beige tone to the fondant. We liked it quite a bit. The slight color difference made the piping really stand out and look more beautiful. The flavor of the fondant was enha nced with orange flower water. There was a nice fragrance wafting from the cake; a flowery orange aroma followed by the orange flavor of the cake. In tasting our slice, we actually ate the fondant!!

Periodically J and I would stop what we were doing and wander over to the other's station to check on the progress. The fondant starts out a crumbly mess. With some kneading, the gelatin, water, glucose(that's where the corn syrup is substituted), glycerin, solid white shortening and powdered sugar all come together at first, it looks a bit like a very dry biscuit dough. You'll notice how smooth J got it. The cracks seem to happen to us because we are too slow applying it to the cake.

It's come to the point that we've developed almost a short hand and have to constantly check to make sure we've not skipped or doubled up on steps. We each know what the other is going to do and rarely are we wrong about it.

I have to thank J for doing all the pre prep stuff. Sometimes, I feel like a FoodTV chef who's production assistants have done everything so all I have to do is smile for the camera and pour the pre-measured amounts into the stunningly clean Kitchen Aid.

This cake was lovely. We were both so excited, not just by how it looks or just by how good it tasted. For the first time, in a long time, we liked the cake we made! Then, on the first sunny day we've had baking in a long, long while, there we were, all done, sitting outside in the sun, sipping soda and tea and just chattin'

Welcome to Spring.

Robb

Looking Back

After I realized that we'd been doing Bake Through for a year, I found myself re-reading the previous posts.  Back in April 2007, we had said that we'd like to try the Chocolate Cherry Almond Pound cake (pg 32) in its more traditional Apricot Version.  Well, here it is.

I have to say that I wasn't a big fan of this cake, then or now. And, while I'm glad that I made it using apricot preserves and a lemon sugar glaze, I'll not make this again. The texture once again was too dry and crumbly. It had a host of good things in it: hazlenuts, almond paste, chocolate, yet, it seemed almost too bland to me.

When I mentioned to J that I had remade it, she said, "Isn't that the one that looked like meatloaf?"  As soon as she said it, I knew she was right. Look at this picture: 

Sometimes, it's good to go back and see how far you've come.  Honestly, a year ago, this would have seemed to daunting of a task to attempt.  And now, I did it on a Sunday afternoon, just because I had a bit of time.

Bake Through

Robb

Learning Lessons

The Golden Cage (pg 172)

Yes, we are still working our way through the Cake Bible. But, we've decided that it's much more fun to work through it a bit at a time and darnit, we enjoy just hanging out sometimes.

The Golden Cage uses the Golden Genoise (pg 125), Barak Palinka or brandy, Apricot Silk Meringue Buttercream (pg 243) and Gold Dust & Caramel Cage (pg 313)

The Golden Genoise is an incredibly dense cake, made with 12 egg yolks. So, it's rich with a texture that is fine -- RLB says it makes wonderful Madeleines. One of these days were going to have to try this. This cake has such a tight uniform crumb without being dense and heavy. Simply amazing.

After all this baking, I have to be honest, buttercreams still rock! We've done so many variations on this theme (Today's: Apricot Silk Buttercream). The Silk Buttercream, as you may recall, has a couple things happening simultaneously. You make a creme anglaise, you make an italian meringue, you beat the butter, you add the creme anglaise, until smooth, you add the Italian meringue (This is the one with egg whites and a sugar syrup beat into them). There are a ton of steps, but it always seems to turn out for us -- even back in the beginning.

For the caramel cage and dust, you basically do a controlled burn of some sugar with some water. Once you've got it just right (amber colored), you drizzle it over a prepared kugelhupf pan (OK, neither J nor I have one of these, so we used the alternate spring form pan to bake the cake in). For the cage, we improvised and ended up with a few really good pieces that we stuck into the top of the cake, in a caramel version of the Enchanted Broccoli Forest (in college, we had a copy of that cook book on our communal shelf. Full disclosure, I still have a copy on my shelf.)

We learned a couple of things with this recipe. A humid day really does make it tough to work with caramel. It never stops being sticky on a humid day. Although, in this months Gourmet, one of the writers says that they made wonderful meringue in Ireland, I wonder how they fare with caramel? Ours just never stopped being sticky, except when we wanted to get it off the spoon, it stuck like concrete! But it did taste good.

(Notice the strawberry? That was J's suggestion and she was right!)

Second, trimming the dark edges off the edge of the cake layers is a good thing to do. That's what we're doing this project for- to learn and improve and to have fun spending time together of course. I think we have done some improving, and I hope that it is noticeable?

This cake was an amalgam of things that we've learned baking our way through the Cake Bible and taking the class at La Tulipe. Next week's post will have an example of something we probably couldn't have done without some of this last year's worth of practice.

Wow, what a year it has been. I remember the trepidation that I had bringing up the idea of Bake Through to J. Would she think it a colossal waste of time? Would she laugh and politely get out of it? It didn't occur to me that she'd embrace it with even more excitement than I had. That she'd be the one to, more often than not, push to keep us on track so we will some day actually make our way through the book.

So while I take my hat off to Rose for the book, and Chef Maarten for the baking class, I throw it in the air that J and I get to spend this time hanging out. I can't imagine a better baking partner.

Bake through everyone.

Robb

Good Charlotte, An Angel

Well, as usual, it all begins with the next recipe in the Cake Bible. This time, it started on page 120 the Genoise Classique. Boy that sounded pretty. The most complicated thing about this recipe was learning how to pronounce "beurre noisette" (according to dictionary.com: bur nwah-zet" . I can't get the midwestern out of my voice for the first word.

From the Genoise Classique, we move on to CB pg 179 and the Chocolate Chip Charlotte. This is photographed in the book, which I find is a great help. Sorta like a puzzle box having the picture on it so I know what I'm supposed to be making. Unlike a puzzle, I rarely get it exactly right in baking. But looking at the picture at the top, you have to say it looks mighty fine.

We also have to make one of our favorite frostings: Ganache (pg 279). This is so easy. Chop the chocolate and add it to warmed cream. Stir. Damn, it's easy and it's good!

We make a syrup, it's a part of the original Genoise recipe. Then, the fun whipped cream with nuts, chopped chocolate (in our case, mini morsels) and a touch of gelatin.

Nothing in any of these recipes was difficult, and all of the instructions up to the 6th step of the Charlotte were easy to follow.

At step 6, Houston we had a problem. Ok, it wasn't nearly as bad as being trapped in space until you possibly burn upon rentry. But there was a moment when I thought, "How the Hell does this actually work?"

After J cut the edges to form a point to keep the top from being a wad of cake dough, I was "supposed" to lay them in the bowl with the chocolate facing out and the points all meeting at the bottom of the bowl. I have to say that I'm more of a bull in the China shop sort. I barrelled on through, hoping that at some point, it would all make sense.

The trouble is I can't barrel through and chat and when J said, "It's gotten quiet in here, it's starting to be work." I realized she was right and all that was missing was my tongue sticking out as I tried to write. Growing up I always thought of myself as Charlie Brown. It seemed to me that everyone was so mean to him, especially when he tried to do something good and bring home that sad under loved Christmas tree. Then, when Linus gets up and recites the real meaning of Christmas... I need a hanky.

The Chocolate Charlotte was not, however, hanky inducing. It came together with a bit of

barreling through and a pause, and a bit of a redo, but it turned out quite nice. About half way through (ok, about an hour into our 3.5 hour baking session), we thought we'd not finish the charlotte until next week. So, we made the Chocolate Lover's Angel Food Cake (pg 160). J had made it before and thought it would be a quick one to whip up and that way we'd have something to show for our day's work.

Well, here it is....

Somehow, we spent the next hour and a half (while the Angel Food cake cooled and the ganache cooled on the genoise) looking at blogs. Thanks everyone for your comments on the Lemon Meringue Pie entry. This Daring Bakers thing could get awfully addictive. We looked at pictures from J's Mom and her homemade Twinkies, made from an actual Twinkie baking kit, complete with a plastic Twinkie the Kid!

We got to look at J's dad's wonderful baguettes. Ok, that sounds a bit dirty, (you can stop giggling now). There is something about seeing someone create a thing of beauty, whether it be a Twinkie, a baguette, or variations on a theme like the lemon meringue pies to inspire you. John's photos inspired us so much that when we get back together in two weeks, we are going to make those baguettes. They are from the latest Fine Cooking issue, to which we all three subscribe. The link takes you to a picture and a video of how to shape the loaves, although the recipe is available only through a subscription. An additional subscription even for those of us who pay dearly for a hard copy subscription every year. No, we didn't have our complaint fall on deaf ears at Taunton Publishing or anything, really. Don't get us started.

I am away next week on baking day, heading to North Carolina for to meet with folks at a salon outside of Charlotte. I can hardly wait, I've never been to Charlotte. (Seemed fitting to bring up since we made a Charlotte and I'm going to Charlotte.)

See you soon.

Robb

Good Food, Good Friends, Good Gosh, Let's Eat

"That was the best that we've eaten from this book." M said to me after he'd done all the dishes following our crepe gathering. (That's right, he did all the dishes. I do so love him.) There were a bunch of people over at my place to sample crepes on Monday January 21, Martin Luther King Jr. day since most of us had it off or were going to work later in the day.

11 people gathered around our dining room table. There is something in my genetic code that stresses that I should cook for lots of people. I think that J feels the same way. Why else would we cook 5 recipes of crepes all in one fell swoop? (Shakespeare either created that phrase or made it popular in Macbeth, 1605, who knew? The people at www.phrases.org.uk did.)

The crepe section of RLB's Cake Bible -- actually there isn't really a section, but they are all placed in the same chapter -- starts on page 110 and proceeds through page 118, there are Chantilly Crepes. The Crepes Suzette, Lemon Crepes Suzette, Lemon Creme Illusion Crepes all start with one recipe of the Chantilly Crepes. The Chocolate Velour Crepes with Orange-Apricot Sauce are unto themselves as they are a chocolate batter, well, duh.

Rule #1 Measure twice, cut once. Important in carpentry and equally important in baking. Originally we were going to quadruple the recipe for Chantilly Crepes. Luckily we checked to see if the blender would hold that much. It doesn't. So we only doubled it. Again, as in the past, doubling is so much easier than halving a recipe.

It never occurred to me to use corn starch for anything other than sitting in the cupboard taking up space, waiting to be used in gravies, the occasional Chinese style sauce or lemon meringue pie. Who knew it could be so useful.

The Chantillly Crepe is one of my favorite types of batter. Put all ingredients into a blender, blend and you're done.

I've never made crepes before. I'd always thought I wasn't too good with pancakes, but given Carb Fest '08, and this crepe extravaganza, I realized that I'm pretty good at crepes. Each and every one of the Chantilly Crepes ended up being perfect. I didn't have to throw out the first one, it was great. (A bit too much butter in the pan, but hey, it looked good and really after all the butter cream we've consumed, what's a touch more butter really going to do?) Light and lacy, I did have to fight my desire to create pancake style or Swedish pancake style crepes. While some may have been too thick, they were all firmly in the crepe family.

Pan shot - a thing of beauty.....

This is the staging area, just before the

pan sauces appear and all Hell breaks loose.

You try flambeing in public. That is legal isn't it?

The Crepes Suzette were light and airy, and the sauces, both the traditional orange, and the lemon (both pictured below) were exceptional. As K said, "I can see why these are so popular".

(Orange) Crepes Suzette

(Lemon) Crepes Suzette

The Lemon Creme Illusion were the most amazing things. You create the crepes and fill them with the Lemon Creme Illusion (RLB pg 266). It's a Light Italian Meringue and lemon curd. It is a creme that is a bit loose. More like a sauce in its own right. Once filled, the crepes are placed in an oven and baked until they are lightly golden, puffy and way delicious. A light sprinkling of powdered sugar was all that was necessary.

Lemon Illusion Crepes

Sadly, none of the Chocolate photos came out. And, by the time we realized this, all of them were gone. The Choclate Velour Crepes with Orange -Apricot Sauce were changed a bit in the making of them. We realized, about half way through the creation of the crepes that neither of us had picked up the apricot preserves. You can almost hear my shrill, panicky tones, "Quick what are we going to do? The people will be arriving soon. Can we send K out to get some? Have someone bring it with them?" Janet, ever the calm one in the kitchen said, "Hey, I brought some of the Raspberry sauce that RLB has had us make for previous recipes." (It is by far our favorite sauce we've made in this whole experiment -- so much so, that we've made it three times.) So, we substituted the raspberries for the Apricot, because both J and I like raspberry and chocolate together, and because that's what we had!

The chocolate crepes were a bit trickier to cook than their Chantilly counterparts. But again, these crepes are a dream to make. You can see then filled and folded just before saucing, above. The fuss was really in the timing. This time, J and I decided that we'd start earlier so our hungry guests don't have to wait too long to get to the table. At carb fest, we were off by a lot. With the crepe party, we were only off by 1/2 an hour. Each time we'll get closer to the exact timing. And, that is really my major kitchen flaw, timing. Either the food is ready way too early and cold or it's not ready in time and people are chewing off their own arms in hunger. This time, luckily no arms were chewed during the making of this meal.

After it was all served, Santiago (our infant brunch guest) had eaten an entire crepe, and The Black Chook Sparkling Shiraz was being finsihed, J turned to me and said, "You know, I really did like the chocolate crepes best."

Now that is noteworthy.

Robb

We live in a Topsy Turvy World

I'm just glad that it's not called the topsy turvy pineapple upside down cake. If that were the case, I'd have to come up with a new set of lyrics for "I Am a Model of a Modern Major General" and honestly, I'm really not up to that task.

And, just to get it stuck in your head...here's the first verse:

I am the very model of a modern Major-General,

I've information vegetable, animal, and mineral,

I know the kings of England, and I quote the fights historical
From Marathon to Waterloo, in order categorical;
I'm very well acquainted, too, with matters mathematical,
I understand equations, both the simple and quadratical,
About binomial theorem I'm teeming with a lot o' news,
With many cheerful facts about the square of the hypotenuse.

and a picture of Henry Litton playing that wonderful part in Gilbert and Sullivan's Pirates of Penzance.

We made the Pineapple Upside Down Cake (CB pg 92). Every so often we think a recipe is going to turn out the way we want it to, that we are going to like it and it'll just be beautiful. This was one of those times. 

(Did you see that opening photo? J got a new camera and now we're all about the lighting and the cropping and the making the pictures sing with beauty.)

Once you get the butter and brown sugar moistened in the pan, you place the rings of pineapple on the bottom and put cherries in the wholes and fill in around them with pecans. Then you mix the yolks and sour cream, mix up the dry ingredients and add butter, remaining sour cream and aerate for 1 1/2 minutes. We decided against doing that as in previous cakes, we suspect this had lead to holes. We mixed it until it formed strings of dough that connected the paddle to the bowl- only 20 or 30 seconds. It looked really pretty in the bowl. Why would this differ from RLB's instruction? Maybe we beat at too high a speed? Maybe we can't tell time? Who knows. The important thing is that we are not stubbornly following the recipe and have learned from our experience. When the batter looks "pretty" as we call it, stop beating. Good enough!

Then you pour it into the pan and bake 40 - 50 minutes. It was really that simple. Our cake was done at about 45 minutes. The top was a nice golden brown and it was firm, but springy.

This cake had a moist, loose crumb, and was springy and hole free, when we cut into it. We couldn't wait. And Rose did say it could be served warm or at room temperature.

My one change would be to cook the brown sugar/butter mixture a bit as the top didn't caramelize quite as much as I'd have liked it to. One of us suspects that is due to the addition of pecans which hog valuable surface space on the cast iron skillet. J was very reluctant to include the pecans, she might have even used the word blasphemy at one point. I thought they were very good. This was one cake we didn't want to share. But given my New Year's resolution, we decided to give a slice or two to Dave and Natalia, who reported enjoying it.

We also made Swedish Pancakes (CB pg 108). Somehow in Carb Fest '08, we missed one pancake recipe. These were light and lovely, a cross between a crepe and a pancake with more egg. The hint of lemon zest in the batter added just the right amount of perk. RLB suggests the traditional Swedish lingonberry sauce as an accompaniment, or a dusting of powdered sugar. We used boysenberry jam, whipped cream and raspberries, and they were a stupendous light bite.

The directions for mixing are only one sentence! So, they are simple to make and an elegant approach to breakfast. They were a perfect transition from Pancakes and Waffles to Crepes. We will have Crepe Fest '08 in a couple weeks, so look out!

This next week, we will be on hiatus. My work takes me to Pittsburgh for training. We will return to baking and all it's glory on the 21st. J may dazzle you in the meantime with the German Chocolate Cake that K enjoyed on his birthday, or more dog biscuits - she and her mother have been testing some new recipes for our 4 legged friends, or who knows what.

My main goal for doing this blog was to spend time with Janet. Together, we make each other laugh and think. My secondary goal was to become comfortable with baking. Happily, both of those goals have come true.

Today J and I were talking about what we'd like to do once we finish the Cake Bible. A few things became clear: 1. We will continue, but obviously we won't be rebaking the Cake Bible, 2. We will try things we've not tried, paella, bread baking (I've not once made a good loaf of yeast bread).

This means more field trips, more variety in our recipe choices and we'll probably throw in some food history as we learn it and through all that come to a better understanding of this wonderful thing called cooking.

Don't be surprised if you show up and it's no longer just about cakes.

robb

New Year's Day Carb-Fest 2008

I know that there is a way to make sense of why J and I continue to do a blue

million recipes at the same time. Our birthday cake for our 3 year old friend Lila had three layers, a filling, a frosting and dacquoise. Our Brioche day had three recipes and required 2 days. Our last baking installment, I should just call it a Baking Event is lay spread in front of you. Quite like the Whore of Babylon, in all her carbohydrate laden glory. (Ok, not the best simile as it meant as an allegory of Rome and it's brutality. Gotta love Wikipedia.)

There is scuttlebutt about that carbs are bad for you. And, they may be if you set down to a table that looks like ours. Here is what we made: Blueberry Buttermilk Pancakes (pg 100) & Blueberry Buckwheat Pancakes (pg 102). So is that enough for you?

Oh, you say, I can eat more carbs than that. We also made Buttermilk Waffles (pg 103) & Marion Cunningham's Raised Waffles (pg 105). Still not enough carbs you say.

Well, we also made the Best Buckwheat Blini La Tulipe (pg 106). Ha ha, you have fallen. You are no match for our mighty table laden with carbs.

J and I tend to binge bake I've noticed. So, alas, has my waist. New Year's resolution is to hit the gym twice a week. I've put on 10 pounds since we started this blog. Ok, that's not really true. Sadly I put on 10 lbs, but it was just since November 1.

Once we got our rhythm, we were able to bang them out quite efficiently. Initially, the pancake recipes didn't really work the way that we were used to. There was a lot of cracking and softness to them that we didn't expect. This was rectified by turning up the heat and cutting back on the blueberries. I am the culprit who over stuffed the pancakes with blueberries. But really 6 berries as Rose prescribes?! It just isn't right.

This little falter, caused us to mistime the serving of our fellow guests. This iritated us quite a bit, and it left M a bit hungry, but at 12:30 we all sat down for our brunch. Sadly, the food was to begin at 11:00 ish. Even I can't accept an hour and a half as "ISH". But once the food was served and the champagne was poured, I don't think a soul really minded.

The Buttermilk Pancakes were good and worth a try. Light and airy, if not exactly fluffy as some prefer, they still had the strength to stand up to the maple syrup I love maple syrup. MMMMM....


The both types of waffles were a bit limp (a problem with many waffles) when we finished them in the waffle iron. J had a great idea -- as is usual -- let's toast them she said. The toasting helped the Buttermilk waffles so much that our guests raved about them. The Raised Waffles weren't as well received, although the toasting did help them.

Often I ask J if we'd have liked this recipe better if we weren't trying to compare it to our other recipes on the table. We've never come up with a simple answer for that. On some things, yes, they pale only in comparison. In other things, they just weren't our cup of tea -- can anyone say chestnut cake? (I find it especially difficult to assess an item if I already have - get ready for me to sound really full of myself- a perfected recipe. For waffles, I worked for several years to find and create exactly what I want. It's not like it happened overnight, to be sure! I tried many recipes and experimented and added and subtracted and adjusted and can now reliably make a waffle I really like. It's crisp on the outside, fluffy and tasty on the inside. And, for pancakes, you just can't beat the recipe on the bag of Aunt Jemima's self-rising flour. That I wasn't dazzled by the CB recipes doesn't surprise me, but I didn't expect to be disappointed. I really was unimpressed by the pancakes- too thin, rubbery texture, no buttermilk tang, no crumb for butter to melt into. Do they suffer by comparison? Absolutely. But, that might be because they're not so terrific. -J.)

Here is what happens when you've sat at a table full of friends and had a bit too much champagne and there are only a few bits and pieces left on plates....

You find yourself about ready to eat a Jimmy Dean sausage pattie, topped with sour cream, chopped green onions and a perfectly crisp blini. And really, it doesn't get any better than that. Well, the smoked salmon on the blini with sour cream might be a match. The blini, we all agreed were quite tasty, and cooked without difficulty. While we don't exactly run in the circles where caviar is served as the norm, we could adopt these blini as our standard, if we had need of such a thing.

For this, our first blog entry for 2008, you may have noticed, there have been some changes made. J and I have realized that this exercise has challenged us to become better bloggers. Just looking around the web, we found ourselves wanting to step up to the proverbial plate.

You may have noticed the new Daring Bakers logo on our website. We've joined this group of intrepid gourmands as they rise to monthly challenges. (J will have more on that in an upcoming blog entry). Try checking out some of the websites of other Daring Bakers. Some have posted comments on our Daring Baker's Challenge entry for December 23. Take a moment to look at some of their blogs.

Daring Bakers and other bloggers have become an inspiration to us as we are striving to learn more about this medium.

Everything's Bake in 2008

Bake through

Robb