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Blueberry Buttermilk Bundt Cake

 

Buttermilk didn't make this cake* pretty. The bundt pan did that.

What did the buttermilk do? From my experience with cake recipes (like devil's food) using sour cream or buttermilk, I know these ingredients are acidic and will contribute slight tangy flavor and tenderize a cake's structure. However, I am careful about substituting acidic ingredients in recipes, especially to recipes with downy soft cake flour, because I am easily heartbroken by a fallen cake. One doesn't want to tenderize to the point of collapse. (I suppose that's true of people...and not just cakes!)

I still lack a solid foundation in how this works (and the vocabulary to match), but I know that the addition of buttermilk to a recipe using all-purpose flour will be softer that if I used regular milk. Well a knowledgable baker via Rose Beranbaum's forums explains it better that I: "buttermilk is acidic...which weakens the gluten in the flour, and makes all-purpose flour behave more like cake flour in terms of gluten strength." So we are weakening gluten! that explains why some of my cakes and cupcakes have fallen (teardrop).  But does buttermilk only affect structure?

In Rose Levy Beranbaum’s recipe for blueberry muffins , she recommends that, when using buttermilk, to substitute baking powder for some of the soda for flavor...not for texture.  I wonder why that is? 

I am doing more research on buttermilk to find out.

Onward!

*I made this recipe (Bon Appetit, April 2004) exactly as written and it was promptly devoured, so there is no adapted version to post. However, I found the finished cake ever-so-slightly sweet for my taste, and were I to make it again, I would tweak it as follows:

-Use frozen wild blueberries (and not fresh) for better distribution throughout each cake slice. The recipe already specifies frozen, but wild are smaller, more instensely flavored and will not get in the away of creating a soft crumb.

-I would use less sugar (probably 1-1/3 cups?) in the cake batter and make a small amount of tart glaze with freshly squeezed lemon juice to pour over the top. It would be pretty (bundt pans were made for glaze!) and add brightness to balance the soft and sweet cake.

Rhubarb Cobbler with Buttermilk Graham Biscuit Topping

 

I meant to make Deb's cobbler. I really meant to make it exactly as written. I even had exactly two hard-boiled eggs in the fridge, so it seemed meant to be. Even though I am a crisp/crumble gal who loves brown sugar and rolled oats making a thin crunchy cap on top of fruit filling, I was game to try a biscuit topping.

Well, of course, I ran out of this and that, completely forgot about the eggs in the fridge, and decided I had to use the rest of the buttermilk in the carton. (This was the dessert for the mother's day brunch I prepared for my mom, and I had made blueberry buckwheat pancakes with buttermilk. Probably explains the frazzled baker. Making three dishes at once!) Then I thought graham crackers would go with everything beautifully. Well, lucky for me, all this finagaling worked. Imagine a biscuit/scone topping with the flavor of a graham cracker pie crust. DELISH. My mom said "you better keep track of this one!" 

Rhubarb season is pretty much ending now. So posting this recipe is kind of mean. If you can get your hands on some rhubarb, even if you don't want to use it immediately, snatch it up.  Rhubarb freezes beautifully (and if you live somewhere where you can get rhubarb in the freezer section, you already know that). Rinse the stalks, trim the ends, cut into 1″ pieces, and stick in the freezer in a freezer-safe zip-top bag. Last May, I froze a ton of rhubarb when it was in season (early May in Northern California), and used the last of it for an impromptu crisp all the way in early December. So no need to use it up fresh.

Rhubarb Cobbler with Buttermilk Graham Biscuit Topping
Adapted from Smitten Kitchen

You could easily add more fruit filling. The blackberries were sort of a lark – I just had some extra on hand. They were good, but you could substitute more rhubarb, strawberries, or cherries.

For dough
½ cup whole wheat pastry flour + ¾ cup oat flour (or all-purpose)

½ cup crushed graham crackers (from about 4-5 whole crackers)
3 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/8 teaspoon salt
4 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
2/3 cup buttermilk

 

For filling

1-1/2 pounds rhubarb, trimmed and cut into 1/2-inch pieces (about 4 cups)

1 pint strawberries, hulled and halved

½ cup blackberries
¼ cup sugar
1-inch piece of vanilla bean, split lengthwise, pulp scraped
3 tablespoons cornstarch
1 tablespoon turbinado sugar

 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In the bowl of a food processor, combine the flours, graham crackers, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Pulse to combine. Add the butter and pulse until the flour resembles coarse meal. Add buttermilk and pulse until the dough comes together. Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface and gently pat it together, incorporating any stray crumbs. (Dough will be very sticky/wet.)

Gather the dough together and wrap in plastic wrap. Chill for 20 minutes. Meanwhile, put the rhubarb and strawberries in a shallow 2-1/2 quart casserole or soufflé dish and toss with sugar, vanilla, and cornstarch. Allow to macerate 15 minutes.

Drop the dough on top of the fruit filling with a spoon (or your fingers) to mostly cover the filling. Sprinkle with turbinado sugar. Bake the cobbler until the rhubarb is bubbling and the biscuit topping is golden brown, about 40 to 45 minutes.

Serve with ice cream or tart frozen yogurt.

Quadruple Coconut Cake, or Happy Birthday James Beard

The James Beard awards last night were kind to the Bay Area, but getting a table at A16 will be harder thanks to Nate Appleman's win and I haven't been there yet. Dang. A little bird at Beard Foundation told me to cozy up to a slice of coconut cake to celebrate James Beard today, the day that would have been the gastronome's 106th birthday.

Well, I think James would be happy with this decadent coconut cake, even if it's not quite the same as Margaret Tingling's cake in Delights and Prejudices.

The quadruple indeed indicates four different types of coconut in the cake: unsweetened coconut milk in the batter, frozen (but amazingly fresh tasting) grated coconut from the Philippines in both the batter and the frosting, and then two types of toasted coconut showered over (and patted onto the sides) at the last minute.

The large shavings are store-bought organic coconut, toasted to a golden brown. Obviously hand-shaved fresh coconut would have been even better. Alas, no coconut handy...but should I do a coconut wedding cake project, cracking a fresh coconut will surely be on the agenda. The smaller flakes of coconut are moist and tender sweetened flake coconut. I toasted this very lightly just to enhance its flavor, but not so much as to sap the life force out completely. I prefer Mounds brand sweetened flaked coconut to Bakers, as does a certain friend whose coconut snowball cupcakes are legendary.

The contrast between two types of coconut flakes is beautiful on the finished cake, whether you leave them raw for a pure white shag carpet, or toast them for a warm golden color and flavor as I have done here.

The cake in the photo is a 6" layer cake (the size of the top tier of a typical wedding cake) and I think this is the perfect size for a small birthday dinner. Most people have 8" or 9" cake pans and this recipe will work fine in two of those. If you do happen to have 6" cake pans, it makes for an adorable cake (and the slices will fit on even the most diminutive dessert plates), and you can use the rest of the batter for 12 cupcakes. Also, I think the swiss meringue buttercream recipe below is delicious, but if you find a cooked sugar buttercream too challenging or fussy, your favorite cream cheese icing or buttercream will do very nicely in its place.

Oh, and if your meringue buttercream does not set up properly for you, you can use the runny stuff as a coconut creme anglaise by warming it a bit, and serve it around the plate, and no one wll be the wiser! Thanks to Hector's tip, I will never throw away a failed buttercream again.

Dark Chocolate Cake - Flo Braker

Dark Chocolate Cake - Flo Braker
Originally uploaded by rachelino

I was a lucky enough duck to meet baking legend Flo Braker again at the signing for her new book, Baking for All Occasions, at Omnivore Books, an *all* cookbook bookstore in Noe Valley (San Francisco) with new, antiquarian and collectible food & cookbooks. EEK-my personal book heaven!

But that's not all.

Flo brought baked goods from her very own kitchen. And not only did she sign my book, but much to my delight, actually hand wrote a correction to one of the recipes! Part of my delight was seeing how much it irritated her that there was an error. I can relate.

So it is fitting that the first recipe from Baking for All Occasions I tried was the personally corrected version of Dark Chocolate Cake, a fudgy chocolate cake with sour cream and coffee. I must admit that it did not turn out perfectly and it was entirely my fault.  I am always on the hunt for a chocolate cake recipe, including sour cream or buttermilk, that can be adapted for cupcakes. Chopped bittersweet chocolate blooms upon melting, creating  deep, dark, delicious cake.

As I made the batter exactly as written, then put the batter into cupcake tins, I knew it might need a leavening tweak.

But even though they were a bit concave (which might have been avoiced by simply leaving them in longer) look how beautifully a little cinnamon cream cheese frosting can dress them up! Also, if you haven't tried cinnamon in your chocolate baked goods, you should. The spice cozies right up to chocolate like nobody's business. It works especially well with devil's food as the warmth balances out the tang.

since I want you all go out (or ) and buy the book, I won't publish the dark chocolate cake recipe here. I will tell you that the correction is to add the melted chocolate just after the eggs. Leave a message in the comments if you have the book and this correction does not make sense!

Heirloom Vegetables: Tuscan-Style Baby Artichokes

Carciofi alla Toscana 

Late winter or early spring? Either way, I love this time of year. Even though there are a few weeks left of winter, tender leaves and shoots are springing up around the city blocks, my yard, and local farms. Plum and magnolia trees are starting to bloom, a silent pink reminder that the rain will eventually end. Last week, the Heirloom Organics farmers brought to market tender young heads of baby escarole, beautifully streaked french Heirloom Radishes, and the ultimate early treat, baby artichokes from the Central Coast of California. Usually these aren't around until March or later.  

You will want to select small, tightly closed artichokes-- a hole or gaping leaves in the center top is a bad sign. 

All artichokes require some prep work, but the babies are easiest of all because the centers aren't tough or bristly enough to bother removing. You will notice that many recipes using artichokes call for soaking them in lemon water, but few explain why. By trimming the chokes and soaking them in lemon water, you are both loosening dirt that may have settled between the leaves (think leeks) and preventing them from browning. Useful whether you plan to bake, fry, steam or saute them (as in this recipe). 

If you have full-size artichokes, you can still use them, but you must remove the spiky choke. 

Nothing beats being able to pop the entire caramelized baby artichoke in your mouth, though. And after bad experiences with steaming large artichokes for hours and having them still be tough....it's a joy to cook them this way.

As Mario Batali promises in the head notes of this recipe, "you will never taste anything that expresses its intense flavor so clearly as these little chokes."

Tuscan-Style Artichokes/Carciofi alla Toscana

adapted from Mario Batali's Molto Italiano

 I am convinced it would be good with only salt, paper and olive oil, though.

1 lemon, halved 

16 baby artichokes

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil

4 cloves garlic, thinly sliced

1/4 tsp.each dried basil and sage

1 tsp. freshly ground black pepper

salt 

1. Pour 8 cups of cold water into a large bowl and squeeze the juice of the lemon into it. Remove the tougher outer leaves from each artichoke and trim about 1/2 inch off the top of each one. Cut each lengthwise in half, and drop into the lemon water.

2. Heat a 10" to 12" saute pan [I think the cast iron skillet is the best thing that ever happened to artichokes!] over medium-high heat, then add the olive oil and heat until smoking. Meanwhile, drain the artichokes well and press between two kitchen towels to remove almost all the water (not all of it). 

3. Taking care to not let the sputter hit you, add the artichokes to the smoking oil and toss quickly to sear. The recipe did not warn me about this, but obviously if you adding the chokes with some water between the leaves to hot smoking oil, it is going to furiously sputter for a while! Watch out! When the sputter subsides, add the garlic, dried herbs and pepper and cook, stirring frequently, until the artichokes are tender and slightly crisp at the edges. This takes about 8-10 minutes - look for the carmelization in the photo at the top of the post. Season with salt, and serve at room temperature. 

Homemade Granola: Deemed Worth It

"Mares eat oats and does eat oats and little lambs eat ivy." Homemade Granola with Dried Apricots, Figs and Cranberries.

I noticed a pair of my good friends always have store-bought granola in the house. I recently decided they needed to have some homemade granola as a gift and I hit paydirt. One half of the pair is an avid cyclist and burns 5,467,893 calories a day; and apparently granola is one of his daily tank fillers.

Does my addition of raw oats and bran technically make it meusli? Dunno, but I do know the raw oats add a new texture, taste and color to the finished granola and keeps the granola from being too oily while the bran sneaks in some extra nutrients. Feel free to subsitute other whole rolled grains like spelt, rye or barley for some of the oats. 

I like to check in advance whenever using dried fruit in a recipe intended for someone else, but I wanted to surprise them and I figured that if I diced the apricots and figs very finely that they wouldn't overwhelm any one mouthful. I think this is true of most things people dislike or avoid - there is a way to do it right. To get that perfect dice on apricots, I have a system I will tell you about later. :)

The difference between storebought granola and homemade is remarkable, except perhaps for this stuff,which is addictive.

Worth all the trouble? Yes. Granola is so darn easy to make yourself that you might as well, especially since it allows you to control the amount of oil and sugar and chemicals you are eating AND get the perfect mix of grains, fruits and nuts you like.

After all this you might think I eat bowlfuls of granola all the time. No, after making a large batch and giving most of it away, my favorite things to do with granola are to sprinkle it over plain greek yogurt for breakfast or over apples to make the world's easiest fruit crisp for dessert. 

But you should have a bowl. 

 (granola recipe and apricot process photos after the jump!)

Chocolate Chip Cookies from the Best Light Recipe

Chocolate chip cookies from The Best Light Recipe from the editors of Cook's Illustrated. From what I can tell this is not available online. Irksome.

This recipe makes 24 cookies, a manageable amount (half of typical recipes). To cut the fat, melted butter in used but only half a stick, hand mixing keeps the dough tender despite the reduction in fat, and fewer chocolate chips are used. So, because I am too full on cookies to type out the recipe (and too stubborn because I think it should be available online somewhere, at least to someone who bought the book, and I am also lazy) I wanted to pass on a tip that can be used to improve any chocolate chip cookie recipe. As far as regular chocolate chip recipes, I am not fancy. I like the Nestle Toll House Recipe, the fabled Neiman Marcus recipe (secret ingredient: espresso powder) and boy, these look good. My favorite part of the recipe was the instruction to roll out 1" dough balls instead of just glopping the dough onto the sheet with a spoon. I love the adorable balls and how uniformly they bake up, and I have always rolled up drop cookie dough despite the "drop by tablespoon" instruction. The time taken to roll is worth it - the finished cookies really do look better and taste better. This is because there are no stray edges of dough that burn before the center of the cookies are cooked. It helps to use smaller chocolate chips when making cookies this size.

Orange Cranberry Muffins

   

It was cold this morning, and we have a house guest, and I felt bad for him. Heck, I felt bad for me having woke up with a cold stuffing cotton in my head and itching up my throat. There is no central heat or functioning wall heater in our little 1920s crab shack, and we were already dressed warmly cuddling the space heaters. After a cup of black tea had cleared some of the cotton from my brain, I realized I could turn on the oven to get warm. Probably the oldest form of central heat. Duh.

  One of my favorite things to do is get rid a bunch of ingredients that need to be used in the same recipe or dish without going grocery shopping. The most obvious way to accomplish this is a soup or stir fry, but it was breakfast time and I had a warm oven to fill. My larder is fairly bare right now, so I flipped through many recipes, wistfully, that I will try later, like baked eggs (no fresh herbs), cranberry cinnamon rolls (no yeast) and french toast Casserole (no bread) before finding a dairy-free baked breakfast item that would help me use eggs, fresh cranberries, one navel orange and wheat germ.   

Luckily I came upon these muffins and they were delicious and easy enough to make while sick. I had three.

   I made the recipe as written, and used fresh cranberries. I like to chop cranberries and anything else likely to fly away from me on a cutting board in the mini-chopper attachment to my immersion blender. That's great for the fresh berries in this recipe.

If I were to make it again, I would double the berries, but I am a sucker for fresh cranberries when they are in season.

Pecan and Date Pie with Flaky Whole Wheat Cream Cheese Crust

 

Click here to see the post featuring my Pecan and Date Pie with step-by-step photos.

I am doing the Apartment Therapy Home Cure and discovered the sister website the Kitchn just in time for the 2008 Best Pie Bake Off, a contest with an inspirational goal -- to "make some converts, discover new recipes, and find the truly best versions of classic pies." I know how many people are reluctant to make pie because they are intimidated by the crust in particular.

I was one of them. Even with a mother that could whip out flaky crusts for her famous fruit pies (her signature being lemon-lime meringue pie with five perfect peaks), it took me years and years to master pie crust. But I know the delicious payoff -- beautiful homemade pie like an edible hug-- is worth it. Had I started out with good recipes it would have taken a lot less time!

I figured this gave me the perfect opportunity to finally put down to paper MY perfect, favorite version of pecan pie which includes dates, whole wheat flour and cream cheese. I use the whole wheat version of Rose Levy Beranbaum's classic flaky cream cheese pie crust recipe as written in the Pie & Pastry Bible.  The Bake Off rules allowed any recipe, original or adapted or not, as long as it was the best.

The new player up to bat was the Lyle's Golden Syrup I was searching for when I last made pecan pie. Well, Lyle hit a home run, making the flavor mellow and rich with none of the cloying sweetness or tacky texture that pies made with regular corn syrup can have. The lighter color allows more of the natural cognac sheen of the pecans to show through. I like pie made with corn syrup; I just like this version much better.

You will find my new favorite pecan pie recipe after the jump. Go on over to the Kitchn and check out the other submissions and find a new pie recipe to scent your kitchen!

I don't even like granola

Well, I have been busy planning a wedding, getting wedded, and honeymooning. It's a tough life.

I took some time off for the first time in 5 years. And thank you, everyone who advised me against making my own wedding cake. Of course, I wanted to bake my own cake. Molly did it, and even gave away her recipe as a favor to the guests.  In my particular circumstances,which included, but were not limited to:

• having no access to a kitchen even remotely close to the site; and
• helping my Best Woman put together flowers, which needed to be done at the last minute of course, just like food items, and 
• bringing in even basic services to the site, including renting these Airstream-esque solar-powered restrooms, and

well, it may have resulted in a bald bride.

Not only did my oven remaing cold and unopened for a few months, I barely had time to make myself simple regular meals. I am obsessed with Peet's and that part of my routine did not change, but gave up coffee shop pastries some time ago. While they look purty in the case, all but the best pastries pale in comparison to freshly homemade and I won't settle for anything less than the best when I am ingesting upwards of 600+ calories. Oh YEAH, the nutrition information on most of these coffee shop chain pastries? Go on, check it out. Pathetically small amount of bang for your caloric buck.

So I am happy was charmed by the name Haute Diggity Date and took a (albeit very tiny) chance on a granola bar in a green wrapper beside the evil pastry case at Peet's and discovered 18 Rabbits bars. First they taste really good, and a texture that suggests they were made this week instead of last year. And you know how some granola bars are mostly binder studded with the good stuff such that they can press out into flat planks a la particle board that shatter upon impact?(Nature Valley, I am looking at you!) Well, these bars are mostly good stuff (everything is organic and tasty, but they even use premium local honey and Straus butter!) with very little binder.

This is the granola bar I would make myself if I cared.

But I don't, and I practically had to pencil in "breath 400 times today" on my to-do list so I wouldn't turn blue and fall over, so I basically survived on these granola bars for the last few months.* so try them!

I don't even like granola. They're that good.

And thanks to this post, I have discovered I can order boxes of 12 online, AND that there is a flavor that Peet's doesn't carry with yet another adorable name, Nibble a Sultana.

Here's looking forward to writing about my last wedding cake, just like Deb at smitten kitchen, except in retrospect, so not really just like that at all. D'oh! I torted for the first time and used a cooked sugar / meringue buttercream on a stacked cake for the first time and learned all sorts of lessons.

*and bubbly!