German chocolate cake, bitches. I found this recipe in bumming around the internet, and had to try it out. Normally, chocolate cake doesn’t do much for me, but I’m a huge fan of German chocolate cake, what with its fluffy texture and coconut-and-pecan filling and all, and this recipe just looked fantastic (even if his history of the name is somewhat… fanciful).
Turns out it’s actually very easy to make, albeit time-consuming. I had a bit of trouble with the icing, but I’m fair sure that’s down to my fuckup and not an issue with the recipe itself; everything else was punch and pie. As far as I’m concerned, the most difficult part is making the custard for the filling, since the recipe rather glosses over the details and just sort of assumes you’re familiar with making custard. In practice, though, that’s not much of a problem, since it’s really not at all delicate. Unless you stop stirring it. So don’t.
He also doesn’t go into detail on the process of toasting the coconut and pecans, but that’s really quite simple: to toast the coconut, put it in a large, shallow pan (a frying pan will do nicely) with no oil or butter or worcestershire sauce or anything, then give it low to medium flame, and shake it frequently. It’s done when it’s tan instead of white. The pecans are the same exact process, except that since they’re already tan, you’re looking for them to darken somewhat. Unsweetened coconut can be a bit harder to find than you may expect, and you may end up getting soaked by having to buy some "organic" bullshit, but them’s the breaks. Also to note is that if you buy chopped pecans for baking, you’ll probably want to chop them a good deal smaller for this purpose, unless you fancy half-pecans in the centre of your cake.
Do yourself a favour and use an electric mixer for creaming the butter and mixing in the dry and so forth — some people will tell you that it’s better done by hand and that electric mixers are the devil’s work, but they’re just luddites. Ignore them. Do not, however, attempt to fold the egg whites into the mixture with the electric mixer; folding is meaningfully different from plain old mixing, and if you just run the whole thing in the mixer you’ll get a very dense, uncharismatic cake. If you want the proper light, fluffy texture, you need to fold. It’s not hard, I promise. You’ll also need to make sure you get those egg whites properly stiff-peaked — only cowards and sissies would ever whip eggs with an electric mixer, since stiff-peaking egg whites with a baloon whisk is the way Real Men do this kind of Women’s Work.
Anyway, this cake is great. It’s so delicious and moist!
December 3rd, 2008
Posted by
Darien |
Recipes |
3 comments
My soups are developing a bit of a cult following lately, which came as quite the surprise to me, let me just tell you. One of my most popular soups is tomato blue cheese, which (for various reasons) I make only a few times a year, when the stars are all in alignment. It is highly-anticipated and there is much celebration when I finally roll it. But despite all that, it’s startlingly easy to make — so much so that I always feel like I’m cheating. As with all of my soups, I generally make this about two gallons at a time; I’ll do my best to scale it down for home use, but several bits may be left as an exercise for the reader.
It begins, as do so many soups, with onions and garlic. You’re looking for a fine chop on the onion and a mince on the garlic — don’t purée it, fod pity’s sake. A good-sized home batch probably uses about one medium-sized yellow onion (spanish or vidalia) and half a bulb of garlic. Once they’re chopped, melt some butter in the pot you intend to use (it’s a one-pot soup, so this will look a bit foolish at first, with just the onions and garlic), and put the vegetables in to soften. Next you add the tomatoes — the best thing about tomato soups is that canned tomatoes are actually excellent for the purpose, so there’s no need to peel the goddamn things. What you’ll want here is about six cups of "peeled ground" tomatoes; other tomato products can be used if you want your soup chunkier or thinner (I don’t advise going thinner myself, but it will probably work going all the way down to tomato juice if that’s your thing. But your mileage may vary and all that). Once that’s added, let it heat over medium flame until it’s just beginning to steam (don’t boil it), and then add one quart of heavy cream. Pour the cream in slowly and whisk until it’s combined and it shouldn’t break; what to do if it does is beyond the scope of this article, but it’s something I’ll address shortly.
Once your soup is creamed you’re going to want to heat it slowly back up, stirring frequently. Again, make sure it doesn’t boil. As it heats, add salt, pepper, oregano, thyme, and tabasco to taste — the tabasco is mainly for sympathetic flavour with the cream and cheese, and isn’t actually for making the soup spicy; if you’ve seasoned it properly, it shouldn’t have any heat to it at all. Since probably nobody knows what I’m talking about here, let’s just call it a teaspoon of tabasco and get on with it, yes? Yes. Good. Once the soup is hot again, you’ll add the cheese. Cheesey cheese. Yum. You’ll want a crumbled blue cheese of moderate quality for this; don’t get anything foolishly expensive and then melt it in the damn soup, but don’t get the blue-cap Easy Cheese and expect it to be awesome. Use your best judgment here. Regardless, add about a cup and a half of crumbles, stir until they’re melted in (you won’t see white bits floating in it anymore), and taste it. If it doesn’t have enough blue cheese "tang" to it, add a bit more. Once you’re happy with the cheesiness, hey, you’re done! It’s best to let this soup age for a half-hour or so on very low heat before eating it, but, hell, if you don’t want to wait it’ll be fine right out of the pot.
Variations:
The only major variation on this soup I tend to make involves adding mushrooms. For this much soup you’ll want about two quarts of raw, sliced mushrooms (whites or criminis should both work fine; if you want something more outré, hey, it’s your soup) added in with the onions and garlic at the beginning. And of course instead of just softening the vegetables you’ll want to let them sizzle until the mushrooms have stopped releasing liquid.
April 2nd, 2008
Posted by
Darien |
Recipes |
no comments
So what if it was yesterday? I was too busy doing this stuff to write about it then. You’ll get what I give you and like it!
I made a special extra-romantic Valentine’s Day dinner for Mrs. Darien. Since I’m all proud of it, I’m going to talk about it here, and tell you how to make it too if you want to surprise Mrs. You with it next Valentine’s Day! Or next week or whatever. None of my business. It’s not a terribly complicated meal to make; it took me five hours start to finish, but a lot of that was research and shopping (the shopping took a lot longer than it should have, since I was looking for duck legs and went to several different markets trying in vain to find them). With a guide — like this one — it shouldn’t take more than 90 minutes start to finish, and a lot of that time will be spent waiting for things to finish in the oven. Anyhow, let’s begin!
Step 1: Appetizer
The appetizer I chose, since it’s Valentine’s Day and all, is chocolate-covered strawberries. Ingredients are as follows:
• Strawberries
• Chocolate chips / chunks / squares (semi-sweet or sweeter — don’t use unsweetened)
• Heavy cream
• Vanilla
• Salt
Put the cream and vanilla in a pan (if you’re doing one bag of chocolate chips — which will make a lot of dip — use about a cup of cream and a few drops of vanilla) and heat it over very low flame until it’s just beginning to steam. Once it’s steaming, add the chocolate and a pinch of salt, and stir it constantly until the chocolate is completely melted and smooth. It may take a few minutes, but you seriously don’t want to stop stirring or it’ll burn. Don’t whip the shit out of it; you’re not in the World Series of Stirring, so take it easy. Just make sure you keep it moving. Once the chocolate is smooth and melted, remove it from the heat and let it stand while you rinse and dry the strawberries. Once the strawberries are thoroughly dry, hold them by the stems and dip them into the chocolate, rolling them around until they’re coated, and then set them on a plate / platter to cool. I like to dust mine with a little powdered sugar after they’re dipped, personally.
The wine I paired these with was an Australian Riesling — white with chocolate may seem a bit odd, but the chocolate isn’t terribly strong and I wanted to start with a lighter wine and move into the big red wines later in the meal. Rieslings are very crisp and mellow, with an excellent fruitiness that meshes well with the berries, and a very clean finish. One of my favourite whites by far.
Step 2: Entrée
The entrée I chose for the evening consisted of roasted chicken thighs with orange sauce, cheese-stuffed caramelised pears with prosciutto, and pasta alfredo. You’re probably thinking at this point that that’s a lot of fruit, and you’re not wrong; I figured something sweet and fruity would be appropriate for the day. Most of this dish can be prepared in advance, and I’ll note that below.
The first thing you’ll want to work on is the pears. For that, you’ll need the following:
• Two bosc pears
• 2 tbsp mascarpone
• 2 tbsp gorgonzola
• 4 thin slices of prosciutto
• Olive oil
• Salt
• Black pepper
• Raw unsalted hazelnuts, shelled
Note that I’m assuming you’re serving two people, since it’s a romantic Valentine’s Day dinner. You’ll need to increase proportions accordingly if you’re in to the group thing.
Step one is to wash and dry the pears. Once that’s accomplished, cut them in half length-wise and rub them thoroughly with olive oil, salt, and pepper. Place them cut-side down on a baking sheet and pop it in the oven at 375 for about 40 minutes. You should place these low in the oven. Since the amount of time they need to roast varies with the ripeness of the pears, you’ll need to keep an eye on them. When they’re done, they’ll be soft and bubbly, the cut part will be brown and smooshy, and the skin will be cracking and bubbling. If they’re black and crispy, that was too much. Rewind them.
While your pears are roasting, toast the hazelnuts. This is accomplished by heating a skillet over fairly high flame, and then tossing the nuts into it and shaking it around until they brown. That’s really it — no oil, no water, no goddamn eggs, no nothing. Just shake your hot nuts until they turn brown.
Once the pears are ready, you’ll want to set them aside to cool for a while. Once they’re cool, scoop out the cores with a spoon — don’t scoop out all the pear guts, just the hard part in the middle with all the seeds. Cream your mascarpone and gorgonzola together, and add a little bit of salt and pepper (be careful with the salt — gorgonzola is a salty cheese to begin with. As always, taste as you go). If you’re preparing in advance, stop here. The rest of this should be done immediately prior to service. Put about a tablespoon of the cheese mixture in the hollowed-out part of each pear half, then return them to the oven for about five minutes to melt the cheese. Serve immediately after removing from the oven, each pear half on a slice of prosciutto with a drizzle of olive oil on top, sprinkled with the toasted hazelnuts.
The chicken is as follows:
• Chicken thighs (preferably bone-in)
• Water
• Salt
• Olive oil
• Black pepper
• Rosemary
• Fennel seed (untoasted)
• One medium orange
• Light brown sugar
• Vodka
• Red and yellow (or orange if you have it) food colouring
The first thing to do is draw about two quarts of water and dissolve a half-cup of salt in it. Then place your chicken thighs in the water and let them soak for at least an hour — this is called "brining," and it will greatly improve the flavour and juiciness of the chicken. While that’s doing its thing, zest the orange, reserving both the orange and the zest. Once the chicken is done soaking, rinse it thoroughly with cold water and lay it in a roasting pan. Rub the chicken with olive oil, and then rub the orange zest into it. Crush some black pepper on top, and add the fennel and rosemary, and then give it one more brisk rubbing. Then throw that sumbitch in the oven — conveniently, this should roast at the same temperature as the pears (375), but in a higher position. (It’s almost like he planned that!) The chicken will take about an hour all told, and will be crispy and brown on the top when it’s finished.
To make the sauce, juice that orange into a small saucepan (pick out the seeds and any giant gobs of pulp — small bits of pulp are fine) and add a few tablespoons of brown sugar and a quarter cup (or so) of vodka. Turn it on low flame and let it bubble slowly — you want to reduce the hell out of this, so it’ll be a while. You should have about one-fifth the volume remaining when it’s finished. If you so desire, add two drops of red food colouring and three drops of yellow (or some amount I don’t know of orange if you have such a thing) — this will give it a nice vibrant orange colour. Also, I suggest not being an ass and sticking your face in to take a nice big whiff right when it starts to simmer — boiling vodka isn’t kind to your nasal cavity. So I’ve, umm, heard.
When the sauce has reduced, remove it from the heat and let it cool a bit to thicken. If you’re preparing in advance, stop here. Take the chicken out of the oven, and serve it topped with a drizzle of sauce. If you have enough sauce to do well more than a drizzle, resist the temptation to soak the shit out of the meat. Trust me on this one.
The final step here is the pasta. You’ll need:
• Some pasta (any type you like)
• Heavy cream
• Butter
• Parmesan cheese
• Garlic
• Salt
• Black pepper
Dried pasta is fine, but fresh is better — see my article on that if you’re keen on making your own. Still, if you can’t be arsed (or, like me, don’t think to do pasta until the last minute), dried will be fine. The only part of this dish you can prep in advance is cooking the pasta, and I’ll wager you can handle that without instruction. Once the pasta’s done to your liking, drain it and cool it (run cold water through it and toss it around until it’s cold), then oil it and set it aside. We’ll come back to it later.
When you’re ready to roll, put a couple of tablespoons of butter in a large sautée pan and get it melting over medium-high flame. Once it’s melted, throw in some minced garlic (crushed if you absolutely must, but minced is prefered) and let it sizzle for a moment, then add a cup of cream. Once that’s bubbling nicely, grate some parmesan cheese into it, and give that time to bubble and melt. Then throw in the pasta, salt, and pepper, and let it bubble and simmer until it’s thick and adheres to the noodles. If you’re looking at noodles in a cream soup, it needs to simmer longer. Once it’s ready it’ll "crackle" a little bit; if it’s full-on popping and squeaking, you’ve gone too far. Rewind it.
To put this all together into one meal, I suggest preparing in advance as much as you can. Once that’s all done, the timing on the chicken becomes the limiting factor; finish the pears and the pasta when the chicken’s almost done. As these things go, it’s not terribly difficult to time. I personally begin the plate with the pasta, then shingle the chicken alongside it; in the remaining space I place my prosciutto and pears, and tuck a leaf of some curly green on the edge for colour — watercress is probably my first choice, though anything similar would be fine. Hell, you could probably use goddamn romaine lettuce if it’s what you have. The finished product should look like this:
The light in my kitchen isn’t very good, but you get the idea. I paired this with a strong blueberry wine (of all things); it turned out to be a lot oakier than I expected, but that helps to cut down on the sweetness of the blueberries, and does a good job of balancing a meal that, frankly, is otherwise rather lacking in earthy flavours.
Step 3: Dessert
The meal here was rather sweet and fruity, so for dessert we take the easy way out — ice wine! I have a vidal blanc lurking in my fridge that’s quite nice, and also a more traditional ice riesling. If you need to have a more food-type dessert, I’d suggest going with a cheese plate of some type, since you’re not likely to want fruit or sweets to finish a meal like this.
It makes for quite the intimidating wall of text, I know, but it’s not actually that hard to make, and a fancy dinner like this can be a major part of a romantic Valentine’s day for you and yours. I know we enjoyed ours quite a bit.
And, no, you can’t see the pictures from the rest of the night. You can’t see the movie either.
February 15th, 2008
Posted by
Darien |
Recipes |
no comments
There’s some argument in the comments on my Pasta column as to the true value of pasta. So I thought I’d throw in another recipe to demonstrate an interesting and unusual thing you can do with pasta – delightful little cookies.
This starts with pasta dough, so read that column first. You’re going to want to make it pretty much the same way, but get some brown sugar involved in the action this time – maybe half as much brown sugar as flour. The idea is for the dough to come out sweet and dark, but still pliable as before. So you’ll probably need to add more water. Once you have a nice brown dough made, and once the gnomes have done their evil magic, roll it out thin and cut it into circles. You’ll probably want to aim for about two inches across; a standard drinking glass (such as it is) is great as a ghetto cutter if you don’t have anything else.
Then we need to talk filling. The main ingredient in the filling is macadamia nuts. You’re going to want them chopped fine; if you have a food processor, this is a great place to use it. If you don’t, get ready to murder yourself chopping the bastards. Chop chop chop until you have sort of a coarse nut meal with no big pieces left in it. Once that’s settled, get it in a mixing bowl and add a whole bunch of honey, some cocoa powder, a pinch of nutmeg, a pinch of salt, and a splash of cognac. Mix it all together. You should come up with a dark, sticky paste – if you don’t, most likely you need more honey.
Once the dough is cut and the filling’s prepared, place a dollop of filling in the centre of each dough round, then fold it in half and crimp the edges with a fork. You’ll get a nice little half-moon with cute ridges on the curved side, which is exactly what you want. When you have the whole bunch done, you’re ready to fry them.
What? Fry them? You betcha. If you have a funky home fryer gadget, that’s the best plan (clearly), but you can make do with a pot full of oil on the rangetop. A high-temp thermometer (do NOT use a thermometer designed for temping sick mortals unless you like the idea of fishing little glass slivers out of hot oil) can be a help here, since you can keep your oil in the right range. I recommend soybean oil for this, since it doesn’t have the nasty off-taste of canola oil and also doesn’t have the nasty price tag of olive oil, and you’re going to be using a whole gallon. You’re going to want to keep the oil in the 350 – 400 degree range; if it’s smoking, it’s too hot. Once you’re pleased with your oil, toss in a cookie and see what happens. It should start bubbling more or less right away; if it doesn’t, your oil’s too cold. Assuming everything’s fine, you’ll want to fry it for a minute or two, then flip it (it will be floating) and fry it on the other side. Ideally you’re shooting for a nice golden-brown colour, with a bit of cratering on the surface. Continue to fry them a few at a time (be patient – do too many at once and you’ll kill your oil temperature, and then they’ll soak up a bunch of oil and get shitty). After you remove them from the oil, drain them on something suitable – a couple of layers of paper towel on a plate works fine if you don’t have anything fancier. There’s no need to throw the oil out when you’re finished frying in it, by the way; let it cool, strain out any big chunks of stuff, and save it for re-use frying later. Frying oil actually tends to be somewhat improved as it darkens a bit.
Once the cookies are all fried, it’s time to make the fudge. Fudge fudge fudge. Start with a can of sweetened condensed milk (NOT evaporated milk, unless you want some thoroughly nasty fudge). Heat it over very low heat until it starts to steam, then add about a pound of chocolate (chocolate chips are fine; if you’re using unsweetened baking chocolate, you will need to add sugar also) and a teaspoon or so of vanilla. Stir this constantly – or I promise you it will burn – until the chocolate is thoroughly melted, then remove it from the heat. Dip your cookies in the fudge; generally, I like to dip only half the cookie, so one end is fudge-covered and the other is not. If you’re a big fudge fanatic, feel free to dip the whole cookie, but be aware that it’ll be a pain to do and a pain to eat. Set the dipped cookies on a sheet of waxed paper to cool; it’s not a bad idea to dust the waxed paper with a bit of confecitoner’s sugar beforehand. Once all your cookies are dipped, dust the fudgey parts with confectioner’s sugar if you want (I think it makes them look nice) and you’re good to go!
See? Fancy pasta cookies. They’re delicious, unusual, and not altogether very difficult to make. The only hard part is CHOP CHOP CHOP, and you can get around that thanks to the wonders of modern technology. Oh, also, if the sharp-witted among my readership detected that this seems a lot like making ravioli, well, you’re right. You’ve basically made dessert ravioli here. Leave out the brown sugar and fill them with something more savoury – meat or cheese – and you can make a lovely dinner exactly the same way. You can even still fry them if you like, since fried ravioli is also delicious.
Pancakes my aching ass.
September 28th, 2007
Posted by
Darien |
Recipes |
2 comments
Dried pasta is so cheap and so ubiquitous that a great many people aren’t aware that there can be more to pasta than that. Now, I know what you’re thinking: what’s with this asshole? Even Barilla isn’t good enough for him? Fuck you, man. Fuck you. But slow down there, hoss! I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with dried pasta. It’s a perfectly good food item, but, let’s face it, not much of a dish in and of itself. Without a sauce on it, there’s not much to it. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that it’s more of a sauce-to-face communication medium than an actual food in and of itself. Pasta can be more than that, though, and everybody should make some now and again. Don’t worry; it’s not painful.
The primary ingredients are flour, water, and olive oil. Don’t skimp and use a crap oil here; you don’t need a whole lot, and you won’t get high-quality output from low-quality ingredients. The traditional method is to mound the flour up in a heap, dig a little “well” in the centre, and then add water into the well and slowly work it through. Me, I like to use a bowl instead. So dump in your flour, a rougly equal volume of water, and a tablespoon or so of oil, plus whatever herbs and spices you favour, and a bit of salt. Mix it thoroughly – get your hands dirty here, it’s a pain in the ass with a spoon. The goal is for it to come out somewhat firm and elastic, but still pliable. If it’s crumbly, you need to add more water; if it’s sticky, you need more flour. Once you get the mix right, cover it with a wet towel and go away for a half-hour so the pasta gnomes can work their Dark Sorcery upon it.
When the gnomes are finished, you’re going to want to flatten the dough out into a sheet. You want it a lot flatter than you think, since it’s going to puff up when you cook it. If you own a pasta mill, this is about where that gets involved, but, then, if you own a pasta mill, you already know all this and you’re just reading so you can heckle me later, so fat chance I help you any. Once your dough is all flat and smooth, you cut it into whatever shape or shapes you desire. One key factor to keep in mind here is that, even though the pasta doesn’t stick to you at this point, it’ll still stick to itself. In fact, it will stick to itself quite aggressively. I suggest waxed paper and flour to combat this. Just don’t let two pieces of dough come into contact with each other if you don’t want them to assimilate each other into the Dough Borg.
Cooking the pasta is a simple matter, and basically the same as cooking dried pasta, with the exception of the time. You’ll only cook fresh pasta for about two minutes (assuming you haven’t made something peculiar), and then it’s done. It won’t have the same colour or texture as the dried kind, but it should be firm enough to hold itself together. Once your pasta is cooked, you can sauce it anyway you like. Alternatively, you may find fresh pasta delicious with only a bit of oil. Try it lots of different ways, and don’t hesitate to experiment; if you do something wrong, hey, Escoffier is not looking. It’s okay.
September 25th, 2007
Posted by
Darien |
Food, Recipes |
3 comments
