It all started with an innocent Facebook post: “Eat your heart out, Julia Shanks.”
My friend Dave had made a soup he was exceptionally proud of, and wanted to share a photo with me. Somehow his words got minced, and friends assumed he challenged me to a cook-off.
Dave accepted the challenge. Or I did? However it happened we decided to face off on April Fool’s Day.
The rules were set: We each prepared a three-course meal featuring common ingredients: goat cheese for the appetizer, pork for the entrée and strawberries for dessert.
The judging was fierce, and I just barely eeked out a win. What put me over the top was my dessert: Chocolate Mille Fuille with Chocolate Mousse and Minted Berries.
Chocolate Mille Fuille
15 sheets of filo dough 1 ½ tbs. cocoa powder 1 ½ cup sugar 1 cup melted butter
¼ cup sugar 3 egg yolks 1 egg 7 oz. heavy cream 10 oz. melted chocolate
1 qt strawberries 1 tbs. freshly chopped mint 1 tsp. vanilla ¼ cup sugar, or to taste
1. For the filo sheets. Lay them out, and keep them covered with a damp towel at all times to keep them from drying out. Take one sheet at a time. Cut it in half. Brush it with melted butter and sprinkle cocoa powder and sugar on top. Fold into quarters and place on a buttered cookie sheet. Repeat this process until you have 30 squares. Bake for 10 minutes at 425, or until golden brown.
2. For the filling: Combine eggs and sugar in a bowl, and place over simmering water. Stir until sugar dissolves and the temperature is approximately 110 degrees. Remove from heat and whip until mixture is cold. In a separate bowl, whip cream until soft peaks. Fold cream into egg mixture. Gradually stir chocolate into base.
3. Wash strawberries. Cut into quarters. Toss with mint, vanilla and sugar.
4. To assemble: Put a chocolate filo square on a plate. Put a spoon of custard in the middle and top with another filo square. Garnish with strawberries.
Cook bacon until crisp and then drain really, really well. Coarsely chop.
While bacon is cooking, melt chocolate over a double boiler. Stir with a rubber spatula. When about 80% of the chocolate is melted, remove the chocolate from the heat and keep stirring until the remaining chocolate melts.
3. Fold the bacon into the chocolate and continue stirring for a minute or two more. Pour the chocolate into molds and let set.
Cultures around the world have developed tasty strategies to repurpose leftovers and give them new life. Across Asia, day-old rice becomes fried rice, in Italy risotto becomes arancini, and in Ireland, boiled dinners become bubble and squeak. I have even turned leftover 4th of July fare into a hearty Bolognese sauce. When done right, leftovers taste fresh, not stale.
Last night, I was invited to a friend’s house for dinner. When I asked what I could bring, he promptly replied, “Dessert.”
I considered my options – run to the market and pick something up, or figure something out with what’s in my pantry. I spied a stale baguette on the counter and recalled another ingenious use of leftovers – bread pudding.
Ironically, a search for bread pudding will yield recipes that call for brioche or other specialty bread. It seems antithetical to purchase fresh bread to let go stale. But since I was bringing the dessert to a friend’s house, I took a cue for this idea, and jazzed up the pudding to make it seem as an intentional creation and not an afterthought. Chocolate and dried cherries were the perfect antidote.
Shhh… don’t tell Paul. Chocolate Bread Pudding with Crème Anglaise A classic bread pudding can easily be made by omitting the chocolate and using raisins instead of dried cherries
3 cups milk ¼ teaspoon salt 1 tablespoon cocoa powder 3 cups stale bread, cubed 3 eggs 1/3 cup white sugar 1/3 cup brown sugar 1 teaspoon vanilla 1 teaspoon cinnamon ½ cup apple sauce ½ cup dried cherries ½ cup chopped chocolate 4 tablespoons butter Crème anglaise
1. In a pot, heat milk with salt until small bubbles form around the edges of the pot. Add the cocoa powder and bread and let sit for 10 minutes. 2. Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 350. Put butter in a 9” x 13” pyrex dish to melt while oven is preheating. 3. Mix together the eggs and sugars until well combined. Add the vanilla, apple sauce, dried cherries, vanilla, cinnamon and chocolate. Stir in soaked bread. 4. Pour batter into buttery pyrex dish. 5. Bake for 45 minutes, or until set. Let cool. 6. Serve with Crème anglaise.
People have become accustomed to cheap food. At the grocery store, we expect to pay less than $3 for a gallon of milk, and $1/pound for whole chicken. Many people scoff at the “high” price of organics and farmers’ market produce. Unfortunately, conventional and processed food has hidden costs, externalities not factored into the price structure: The farm subsidies which keep the costs artificially low, the extra health care costs from a culture that has become fatter and fatter from the “western diet”. And the environmental impact of processing and shipping food, and soil erosion. Worse still, conventional food producers do not have the same commitment to paying workers and farmers a fair wage.
The economics of our food system are broken. We need to make investments in farms and food producers that not only sell high quality products, but also practice sustainable farming. We need to shift our focus from solely looking at short-term financial returns to include long-term social returns.
Equal Exchange has been championing a sustainable food system since 1986 by helping small farmers bring chocolate, coffee and tea to market and earn a fair profit for their crops. And Slow Money is a new organization that is looking for ways to invest money in our local food economies so that we not only grow more healthy food, but preserve the land and our environment.
Several weeks ago, I went to the National Gathering for Slow Money in Burlington, VT. The highlights were listening to Joel Salatin (from Polyface Farm) and Gary Hirschberg (CEO of Stonyfield) speak about the nature of their organic businesses.
You may recall Mr. Salatin from Omnivores’ Dilemma and Food, Inc. He’s an engaging speaker whose business focus is not on earning or profits, but on producing the highest quality product and protecting the environment. He posits, if revenues drop, the solution is not in marketing, but in improving quality: a high quality product sells itself.
Gary Hirschberg provided an interesting counterpoint to Polyface’s business model. You may recall that Stonyfield was sold to DANONE several years ago, and has since brokered a deal with Wal-Mart to sell yogurt in their stores. Stonyfield got a lot of flak from the “organic” community for this decision. But Mr. Hirschberg reminded us that we need to help organic become a mainstream food item, not an elitist luxury. Selling through Wal-Mart is an important step in that goal.
I was also impressed by some of the real, tangible cost savings that Stonyfield reaps by being organic. Humanely raised cows yield more milk and live longer. Ultimately, the cost of milk produced from his cows is less expensive than the commercial counterpart. As such, he pays more to the farmers for their milk so that they can earn a respectable wage for their work.
Equal Exchange is an important player in a sustainable food economy. In addition to being a champion of all farmers having the right to earn a fair profit for their crops, they also give out $65,000 in grants to organizations who are working to support Fair Trade, small-farmers and co-operatives. In fact, every year they give out 7% of net profits in this manner. Equal Exchange appreciates your interest in sustainable food systems.
As a thank you, they will give a $40 gift certificate to one lucky reader. All you need to do is leave a comment here. And please share your thoughts on sustainable food systems and organic vs. conventional. A winner will be announced on Tuesday, July 6th. You must have an active PayPal account to receive the gift certificate.
Update: The deadline has passed for the give-away and the winner has been notified. Congratulations to Miss Maya who won the gift certificate. Thanks to all for the wonderful comments.
The strawberry production continues in my little urban garden, yielding a handful of berries a day: still not enough for a pie or jam, but certainly a lovely accompaniment to a dessert or salad. And as I pick berries, conveniently located next to the mint patch, I’m reminded of what a lovely combination they are.
I stopped baking in earnest in 1997, when I left my last restaurant job, as a pastry chef. I was never a particularly good baker by professional standards (which would probably explain why I didn’t last long at that job), but managed to hold my own in the circle of home cooks.
The desserts I make today are the same I made 15 years ago… Thankfully, they’re timeless and always in good taste (sort of like the clothes from Eileen Fisher). The chocolate molten cake is a mostly flourless chocolate cake that is intentionally undercooked so the inside is gooey and lava-like.
My favorite garnish for the molten cake is berries tossed with mint, a sprinkle of sugar and a touch of vanilla. The preparation yields a garnish that your guests will actually want to eat, even with commercially grown berries (as opposed to a lone mint sprig or a rock-hard, bland strawberry)
Chocolate Molten Cake
yields: 4 – 6 oz. servings
6 oz. semi sweet chocolate 4 oz. butter (1 stick) 2 eggs 2 egg yolks 1/4 cup sugar pinch of salt 2 tbs. flour extra butter and flour for ramekins.
1. Butter and flour 4 ramekins.
2. In a double boiler, melt chocolate and butter.
3. In a mixer, whip eggs, sugar and salt until tripled in volume
4. Slowly mix in flour and chocolate/butter mixture until well incorporated.
(Don’t forget about the chocolate giveaway. Leave a comment before midnight, Tuesday, November 17th)
It’s so easy to brighten someone’s day. A friendly smile. Stopping to give tourists directions, or take their picture for them. Donating ‘gently worn’ clothes to the Salvation Army. Or baking cookies.
Lydia Walshin founded Drop In & Decorate in 2002 to bring people together to bake, decorate and donate cookies to shelters, food pantries, and nonprofit agencies meeting the basic human needs of people in their own communities. And so far, with this simple gesture, she has brightened the lives of close to 10,000 people with her cookies.
The number 10,000 is how many cookies she’s baked and donated. But truthfully, she’s made the day of many others – each of us who have participated in the venture of decorating the cookies. Each year around the holidays and again at Mother’s day, Lydia rallies dozens of friends and neighbors to decorate cookies in log-cabin house in the back woods of Rhode Island. I’ve joined her for the last three years. And though I’m artistically challenged when it comes to icing, I always have fun at her party.
The idea has spun off, and now folks all around the country are hosting their own Drop In & Decorate parties… and donating them to organizations in their own community.
If you’d like to host your own Drop In & Decorate® event, Pillsbury and Wilton would like to help. And maybe you’ll be the one to give away the 10,000th cookie.
Pillsbury has donated 50 VIP coupons, worth $3.00 each, off any Pillsbury product — including sugar cookie mix, icing and flour — to be distributed, first come, first served, while supply lasts, to anyone who plans to host a Drop In & Decorate event (max. 5 coupons per person). And we'll include a Comfort Grip cookie cutter, donated by Wilton, while our supply lasts.
Write to lydia AT ninecooks DOT com for more info on how to get your free coupons and cookie cutters.
And if you plan to go to Lydia’s event this year, I look forward to seeing you there! ___________________
All this talk of cookies and chocolate got me into a baking mood.
Though they may not be the best choice for Drop In and Decorate, these chocolate brownie cookies are great for sharing and will definitely brighten someone’s day.
No adaptation… I made this recipe to the letter. I recommend you do the same.
1/4 cup all-purpose flour 1/4 teaspoon baking powder 1/8 teaspoon salt 2 large eggs 2/3 cup sugar 1/2 tablespoon brewed espresso or dark coffee 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 2 tablespoons unsalted butter 7 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped 3/4 cup mini chocolate chips
1. Preheat oven to 375°F. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.
2. In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.
3. In the bowl of an electric mixer, briefly whip the eggs to break them up. Add the sugar, espresso, and vanilla and beat on high speed for 15 minutes, until thick.
4. While the eggs are whipping, place the butter in the top of a double boiler, or in a small metal bowl suspended over a pot of simmering (not boiling) water, and scatter the extra-bittersweet and unsweetened chocolate on top. Heat until the butter and chocolate melt. Remove the boiler top from over the water and stir the chocolate and butter until smooth.
5. Gently fold the chocolate mixture into the egg mixture until partially combined (there should still be some streaks). Add the flour mixture to the batter and carefully fold it in. Fold in the chocolate chips. If the batter is very runny, let it rest until it thickens slightly, about 5 minutes.
6. Drop the batter by heaping teaspoonfuls onto the prepared baking sheets and bake until puffed and cracked, 8 to 9 minutes. Cool on a wire rack before removing from the baking sheets.
Regularly, books and movies report on the commercial agricultural industry’s dependence on corn, and government subsidies are revealed to keep food prices artificially low. While we still pay for the high cost of food, we do so in taxes, and not at the supermarket.
Small-scale farmers, who do not receive these subsidies, must charge more for their food to earn even a modest wage. While sustainable farming can be less expensive in the long-run, it’s a costly path. I try to support the local farmers, even if it costs more, because I know that I’m helping to preserve our food-systems and keep more money in my community.
In second- and third- world countries, from where we get most of our coffee and chocolate, farmers make even less. The path from field to table is long, and provides little (if any) support for the farmer. They make pennies a day – most of the profits go to the middlemen in this supply chain.
Equal Exchange, a national leader in fair-trade, created a new path for small farmers to get their products to market. They do this by partnering with small-scale farmer coops. Through this process, we can be closer to the source of our food and the farmers see a greater portion of the profits – enabling them to better support their own community.
Fair Trade includes: • Direct purchasing from those who are poorly served by conventional markets, specifically small farmers and their co-operatives. • Agreed upon commodity floor prices that provide for a dignified livelihood. • A promise by importers to make affordable credit available to the farmer co-operatives. • A worldwide network of non-profit certifying organizations.
Equal Exchange chocolates continue to win awards for its quality and taste. The Panama bar was a finalist in the New York City Chocolate Show in October. And one of their Peruvian cocoa producer partners won a quality competition!
And now for the giveaway… The Deadline has passed. Chocolate Winners: Judit U-M and Grace, Congratulations! You were randomly selected to win the chocolate sampler boxes from Equal Exchange. Please email your mailing address to julia [at] growcookeat [dot] com. And thanks to all for your great comments and supporting fair trade!
To enter the drawing, please leave a comment here telling us something you can do to support fair trade. Also, please include your email address, so that we can be in touch with you if you win. While anyone can support fair trade, you must be a US or Canadian resident to win this drawing. Winners will be announced on Wednesday, November 18th.
Psychgrad at Equal Opportunity Kitchen gave me my first blogging award! This is quite an honor for two reasons:
1. As you know, I just started blogging a few months ago. I've enjoyed the practice of writing on a regular basis and forcing myself to try new recipes and think about food in a different way. It's flattering to know that others are enjoying my blog as well!
2. The award comes from Psychgrad, quite an accomplished food-blogger. She and her mother co-write their "living cookbook with colour commentary." I started reading their blog soon after I started my own. I've enjoyed reading about their culinary adventures, especially their perspecitve on Jewish holidays and food. I'm always inspired by their recipes, and they help get me out of my own cooking rut.
If you were in Cambridge, I would make you a thank you present:
Cappuccino Brownies with Cinnamon and Chocolate Glaze
8 oz. semi sweet chocolate 6 oz. soft butter 2 tbs. instant espresso, dissolved in 1 tbs. boiling water 1 1/2 cup sugar 2 tsp. vanilla 4 eggs. 1 cup flour 1/2 tsp. salt.
1. Melt chocolate and butter together. Mix in espresso, vanilla and sugar.
2. Beat in eggs, one at a time until fully incorporated.
3. Mix in flour and salt.
4. Bake at 375 for 20 minutes in a 9” x 13” pan.
5. Remove brownies from pan and let cool. Spread cream cheese frosting on top, and let cool in the refrigerator.
6. Pour chocolate glaze ontop of frosting. Let set. Cut into bite sizes pieces.
These freeze well so you can eat just a few at a time and save the rest for later.
Frosting 8 oz. cream cheese 6 tbs. soft butter 1 1/2 cup confectioners sugar 1 tsp. vanilla 1 tsp. cinnamon
Mix everything together
Chocolate Glaze
6 oz. semi sweet chocolate 2 tbs. butter 1/2 cup heavy cream 1 1/2 tbs. instant espresso dissolved in 1 tbs. boiling water
1. Melt everything together in the top of a double boiler.
My first few attempts at challah were surprisingly easy and successful. The recipe yields two loaves. And while I could easily eat both before they go stale, I decided to experiment with the dough. Babka seemed the natural successor to challah… the sweet, yeasty dough with chocolate swirls in the middle. Martha Stewart has a recipe that uses butter and milk. I made it once and for such a complicated recipe it was disappointing. Zabaar’s makes the best babka I’ve eaten and it’s dairy free. It seems like a logical step that challah enriched with eggs and oil would be as suitable substitute for sweet dough enriched with butter and milk.
I switched out the recipe for the dough, but otherwise used Martha’s technique.
I blended bittersweet chocolate with butter, sugar and flour. I rolled out the dough to ½ inch thick rectangle and sprinkled the chocolate mix on top. I rolled up the dough like a jelly-roll and folded it until it fit into a loaf pan. I sprinkled the dough with a streusel topping of flour, sugar, butter and cinnamon.
My friend Leslie is teaching a class on Bûche de Noël – the classic French Christmas Treat. In preparation, she wanted to do a trial run to test the timing of the class, and also to get pictures for the class posting.
We all know, I’m not a good baker and more a salt-head, than a sweet tooth. Nonetheless, I have a secret dream of being a star, cake decorator. I even bought a cake turn-table for when the urge strikes. Probably once a year, I make a few pounds of butter cream, a couple of cakes and decorate to my heart’s content. They look like pouffy wedding dresses reminiscent of the 1980’s (read: overdone and not particularly fashionable), and I never eat them, but it’s fun. That being said, I couldn’t miss an opportunity to watch and learn, so I offered to take pictures (just for her, I SWEAR!)
According to Wikipedia:
One popular story behind the creation of this dessert is that Napoleon I of France issued a proclamation requiring households in Paris to keep their chimneys closed during the winter, based on the notion that cold air caused medical problems. This prevented Parisians from being able to use their fireplaces, and, thus, prevented them from engaging in many of the traditions surrounding and involving the hearth in French Christmas tradition. French bakers, according to the theory, invented this dessert as a symbolic replacement around which the family could gather for story-telling and other holiday merriment.
The cake, which ultimately looks like a tree log with mushrooms, can be made with either a vanilla or chocolate sponge cake and filled with chocolate or vanilla buttercream. The cake is lighter than traditional genoise which makes it easy to roll. This cake batter is so light that it can only be used as a sheet-cake and can’t stand up to a layer cake. The mushrooms are made with Italian Meringue.
Before you can even think about assembling the cake, you must assemble all the parts: cake, filling, icing/glaze. For the garnish: rosemary sprigs to look like pine needle covered in ice and meringue mushrooms. The special equipment is limited to a piping bag with a round tip, a “decorating triangle” (used to texturize the icing to look like bark) and a good icing spatula.
For the Cake and the other components:
Cake 6 large eggs, separated 1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar 12 tablespoons sugar 1/4 cup cake flour, sifted 2 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder, sifted
Separate the egg whites from the egg yolks. Whip the egg yolks with sugar until they are thick and pale. In a separate bowl, whip the egg whites sugar to stiff peaks. Fold the whites into the yolks. Sift the cocoa powder and flour onto to the egg mixture and gently fold to combine. Bake on a sheet tray for 15 minutes at 400F.
The filling is less persnickety. You can use a traditional buttercream or a modified version of simply beaten butter with white chocolate. The filling can also be used to glaze the outside of the cake or you can use a chocolate ganache:
Ganache 1/2 cup whipping cream 6 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped 2 tablespoons light corn syrup 1 tablespoon rum or other favorite liquor
Heat heavy cream over medium heat until bubbles form around the edge. Remove from heat. Stir in remaining ingredients. Continue to stir until chocolate dissolves.
For the mushrooms, make a French meringue.
½ cup egg whites 1 cup sugar ¼ teaspoon cream of tartar.
Dissolve sugar in egg whites over a pot of simmering water, whisking constantly, and heat until 110F degrees. Remove from heat and then whip until stiff peaks. To make the mushrooms pipe out mounds to be the caps, and pipe up 1” stems. Bake at 200F for 45 minutes and the 175 for another 30 minutes to dehydrate. When they are dried, you can brush the bottom of the mushroom caps with melted chocolate. Using a small paring knife, cut a little indentation into the base of the mushroom cap. Use chocolate or icing to glue the stem into the cap.
To make pine needles, dip rosemary sprigs in beaten egg whites, then roll in granulated sugar.
Assembly Ice the sheet cake. Roll it lengthwise, and roll the seam to the bottom. Slice the cake, 1/3 portion, on a bias to create two pieces – on that is twice as long as the other. Put the longer piece on a serving platter. Take the smaller piece, and align the angled side along the longer piece. This should give you the basic shape of a log. Ice the whole cake to cover the seam, but leave the ends un-iced to show off the roll. Run the decorating triangle along the outside to texturize.
