Tom and I just enjoyed another fun weekend in the Shenandoah Valley on the annual cabin trip organized by our friends Jim and Colleen. This year, there were eight of us on the trip, and Tom and I were responsible for making Saturday night dinner. Tom handled meats and a vegetable side, and I made the vegetarian entree and dessert.
I browsed
epicurious.com for vegetarian main dishes and decided to try making a
Roasted Butternut Squash and Caramelized Onion Tart. It was seasonal, and it looked like it would be substantial. Tom and I stopped by
Wegmans in Fairfax -- my favorite grocery store anywhere -- on the way to the cabin to pick up our food supplies, and I was somewhat panicked when I realized that they were out of whole butternut squash. Fortunately, Wegmans also sells fresh, diced butternut squash, and that ended up being a whole lot easier to deal with anyway.
I decided to go ahead and make the
pastry dough crust included with the recipe instead of buying a frozen crust, even though this required me to lug along my food processor, rolling pin, silicone pastry mat, and pie weights (not such a big deal, since we were already bringing along all sorts of equipment for our other weekend cooking and baking projects). The dough was easy to handle and baked into a beautiful, golden crust. The filling was not all that difficult to prepare, and the tart looked and smelled wonderful when it came out of the oven.
I was positively thrilled with the way this tart came out. While not technically difficult, it was somewhat time consuming (especially making the crust, roasting the squash, and caramelizing the onions). But it was totally worth it! The crust came out flaky, buttery, crisp, and full of flavor. The filling was well set, wonderfully herby, and rich with savory deliciousness. The dominant flavor was not squash, but herbs, cheese, and caramelized onions. I used panko instead of fresh bread crumbs, and the crisp panko sprinkled on top made for a wonderful little crunch. I would absolutely, definitely make this tart again -- assuming I had a few free hours on my hands, of course.
For dessert, I decided to make chocolate soufflés. Normally I bring a birthday cake to the cabin, since the annual cabin trip traditionally takes place over Jim's birthday, which is the day after Veteran's Day. Since Veteran's Day inconveniently falls on a Wednesday this year, and five days is a bit much for a long weekend, we decided to go up to the cabin for a quick three-day trip, just Friday through Sunday. I told Jim that I probably wouldn't bring a cake this year, since it would be doubtful that we could finish it in the short time we would be at the cabin (especially because I also brought along two loaves of banana bread that I baked the day before we left, and refrigerated dough for a batch of
Jacques Torres' chocolate chip cookies, which Jim likes to eat fresh out of the oven). Jim jokingly said that he didn't care, so long as there were still candles.
I made my usual
chocolate soufflé recipe from epicurious.com. Usually I make the
pistachio ice cream that goes along with the soufflés, but I didn't feel like dragging along my ice cream maker to the cabin as well. I decided to try something new and make an
Earl Grey Custard Sauce to go along with the soufflés instead. I wish I had taken a picture of the sauce. It was the color of coffee with cream and in fact tasted exactly like Earl Grey tea. It was a very good complement to the soufflé, and a bit like having tea with your dessert!
I did, however, learn an important lesson after we stuck a few birthday candles into Jim's soufflé. Don't put birthday candles into a hot soufflé! I should have realized that this would happen, but the hot center of the soufflé completely melted the candles. After Jim blew out the candles (which were severely tilting by the time we finished singing "Happy Birthday") and pulled them out of the soufflé, all that was left of the portion that had been inside the soufflé was the wick. Poor Jim lost quite a bit of soufflé when he had to dig the melted wax out of his soufflé before he could eat it!
Recipes:
Previous Post: "
Jim's Birthday Weekend At The Cabin," November 2, 2008.
Recipe: "Brown Sugar Pound Cake with Caramel Glaze," adapted from Southern Cakes by Nancie McDermott, printed in the August 22, 2007 Los Angeles Times.
The finished cookies were buttery and crisp, like shortbread. I was a big fan, and I thought that the citrus accent added a perfect touch of distinctive brightness to the cookie. This beautiful cookie virtually screams "Christmas!" because of its red and green color scheme, and I am pretty sure these will end up on the menu for our annual holiday party.
Nonetheless, these biscotti were tasty. Even though the recipe uses only 1/2 teaspoon of almond extract, the almond flavor is very strong. I didn't even bother with the white chocolate because I didn't think it was necessary. I hope to try making these again soon -- at their proper smaller size -- and I can see how they would look especially festive with a white chocolate drizzle. Maybe next time! I certainly have a lot more Craisins to get through!
Normally when I bake a cake in a tube pan, I take it to the office intact and let people cut and serve their own slices. But I could not bear to let anyone else lay eyes on this monstrosity. Instead, I cut the cake into 24 slices -- which all looked fine -- and took the slices into the office. At least the glaze set firm and there was no problem with it staying adhered to the cake after slicing.
This cake was incredibly delicious. I was afraid that it was going to be too sweet (total sugar for the cake and frosting put together: 1 pound dark brown sugar + 1/2 cup white sugar + 1 cup light brown sugar + 4 cups powdered sugar), but the sweet flavor of the cake had both depth and interest due to the molasses in the brown sugars. A co-worker commented that it tasted just like the brown sugar flavor of Häagen-Dazs Five ice cream. The cake crumb had a very fine and tender texture and the frosting was sweet but flavorful. Tom and I both agreed that the cake was so good it didn't even need the glaze, but that said, the glaze was very tasty. This cake was a little different from a run of the mill vanilla pound cake and I hope to be making it regularly from now on (and to figure out how to glaze it in a more attractive fashion). Don't let all the sugar and glaze scare you. This recipe is a really wonderful find.
Recipe: Raspberry-Filled White Chocolate Bars from the 1990 Pillsbury Bakeoff, by Mark Bocianski.
I played everything back in my head and could not identify anything I had done wrong in making the brownies. I had committed to bringing some baked goods to a work event the next day, so I had no choice but to give the recipe another try. I mixed up another batch of batter, put the pan in the oven, and kept my fingers crossed. This batch came out perfectly, fudgy and rich with orange flavor, and with completely smooth tops.
Tom and I tried the charcoal batch of brownies, and they were not terrible, but the texture was all wrong. They were tough, whereas the second batch was creamy and smooth. The charcoal brownies ended up in the circular file.
Tom and I just enjoyed another fun weekend in the Shenandoah Valley on the annual cabin trip organized by our friends Jim and Colleen. This year, there were eight of us on the trip, and Tom and I were responsible for making Saturday night dinner. Tom handled meats and a vegetable side, and I made the vegetarian entree and dessert.
I was positively thrilled with the way this tart came out. While not technically difficult, it was somewhat time consuming (especially making the crust, roasting the squash, and caramelizing the onions). But it was totally worth it! The crust came out flaky, buttery, crisp, and full of flavor. The filling was well set, wonderfully herby, and rich with savory deliciousness. The dominant flavor was not squash, but herbs, cheese, and caramelized onions. I used panko instead of fresh bread crumbs, and the crisp panko sprinkled on top made for a wonderful little crunch. I would absolutely, definitely make this tart again -- assuming I had a few free hours on my hands, of course.
I did, however, learn an important lesson after we stuck a few birthday candles into Jim's soufflé. Don't put birthday candles into a hot soufflé! I should have realized that this would happen, but the hot center of the soufflé completely melted the candles. After Jim blew out the candles (which were severely tilting by the time we finished singing "Happy Birthday") and pulled them out of the soufflé, all that was left of the portion that had been inside the soufflé was the wick. Poor Jim lost quite a bit of soufflé when he had to dig the melted wax out of his soufflé before he could eat it!
A few months ago, I was pleasantly surprised when I tried one of the recipes that Starbucks had published to promote the fact that it is now serving "real food," the recipe for their Outrageous Oatmeal Cookie. Last week I finally got around to trying their other published recipe, for Banana Walnut Bread.
Recipe: Banana Walnut Bread from Starbucks.
I don't think the chocolate dough itself is all that interesting, but I do love these cookies for the caramel-y sweet surprise in the middle. We also had a few boxes of Milk Duds left over, and I tried making a few cookies with Milk Duds instead of Rolos and thought these also turned out well. I made a mental note that it might be interesting to substitute Milk Duds for chocolate chips in some other cookie or brownie recipes. Mmmmmm, caramel!
Recipe: Caramel-Filled Chocolate Cookies by Jean Olson, from the 1990 Pillsbury Bakeoff.
Last winter I attempted fleur de sel caramels a couple of times using a recipe from epicurious.com, with somewhat disappointing results. I wasn't able to get the texture quite firm enough. A few months later, I came across a recipe for salted chocolate-dipped caramels in The Moment Blog of the T: The New York Times Style Magazine. I printed out the recipe and added it to my stack of recipes I keep around and that I fully intend to get to some day.
I poured my caramel into a pan lined with lightly-oiled parchment paper, and the caramel set very firm. It was easy to cut with an oiled knife after cooling and the cut caramels kept their shape nicely and were easy to handle as I wrapped them in waxed paper (which I buy pre-cut from Little Bitts in Wheaton). Just to save time, I skipped the step of coating the caramels in chocolate, but I can only imagine how tasty these things would be with chocolate. The caramels were creamy, buttery, and nicely salted. This will definitely be my go-to caramel recipe from now on! The recipe is very easy to put together, and you get a beautiful, delicious result!
Recipes:
