Cookie Strudel

This lovely little "cookie" strudel filled the house

with the most amazing aroma,

causing my granddaughters and daughter in law

to ask

What ARE you making?

With minimal ingredients this recipe gives a lot

in return for very little effort.

Flour, salt, butter and sour cream are mixed together

and left overnight to chill.

Rolled out paper thin, smeared with apricot jam,

pecans and dried currents, they are baked in

log shapes.

My first log was a bit sticky because I was conservative

with the flour.

The second log was easier to roll with more flour.

Half way through baking, the logs are brushed with

milk then sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar.

Once again the hardest part is waiting SIX hours for these

lovelies to cool.  I didn't make an hour,

for the sake of picture taking, or some such excuse.

This really is a delightful pseudo~ strudel.

~

The Baking Bible

by

Rose Levy Beranbaum

White Chocolate Club Med Bread

There simply was no way to anticipate the flavor of

White Chocolate Club Med Bread.

It is delicious!

Rose says to let it cool for two hours

but I was impatient with curiosity

and sliced off the end

at the hour mark.

It was barely warm

which let the exquisite 

lighter than air texture and flavor

shine.

First plain and then with

strawberry jam, both were

nice but I prefer

it plain.

It is the delicate ballerina

white tutu of breads.

My daughter suggested it would make wonderful

bread pudding and I happily agreed.

It was hard to tear up  four slices of this lovely bread

It was worth it

With Black Arkansas caramelized apples

At first, I found it a bit peculiar

that Club Med gave

departing guests their own loaf as a gift,

never having heard of such a thing.

Lucky guests!

 Rose went above and beyond

to recreate it.

And this dough is not the easiest to work with.

It is sticky, fiddly and I guessed at the double fold over dough step.

By the end I had no hopes for it at all.

Whenever I reach the 

Oh bloody hell stage

 plopping it in the pan for final proofing,

it's always such a shock to

open the oven door to a beautiful

loaf of bread.

This yeast alchemy never ceases to amaze me.

The Baking Bible

by

Rose Levy Beranbaum

The Fudgy Pudgy Brownie Tart

I wasn't looking forward 

to making this ultra chocolate tart.

I am dark chocolate-ed out,

which is odd since it's my favorite.

                                                         And then I found out this is                                                          National Chocolate Week

in the UK.

Not day but week!

So it seemed very appropriate indeed

to bake this today

if I can't be frolicking around London.

First up was making chocolate pate sucree

which is basically a very nice soft

chocolate cookie dough and 

lining a two piece tart pan.

While that was off for a chill in the frig,

the Fudgy Pudgy ingredients

were assembled.

White chocolate, dark chocolate, cocoa powder

butter, sugar, eggs, vanilla, salt

toasted pecans, flour.

Butter, chocolates and cocoa powder

in a double boiler over hot water.

I call this step

Chocolate Zen Stirring

Tipped into the mixing bowl with 

sugar and eggs and then the dry ingredients

stirred in with the final addition of the pecans.

Poured into the unbaked tart shell

it was ready to bake.

Since the tart pan was a ten inch instead of nine,

I tested the temperature at the minimum bake time,

but it wasn't done.

Smelled lovely!

This last step was perhaps over the top,

literally,

as in covering the thermometer holes

in an otherwise perfect crust surface

with milk chocolate caramel ganache,

languishing in the freezer.

This brownie tart is delicious

and would be perfect 

topped with coffee ice cream,

salty caramel gelato or

Steve's Bourbon Vanilla ice cream. 

Off to the store and

then to share this meltingly

fudgy brownie wrapped in a tart.

~

The Baking Bible

by

Rose Levy Beranbaum

Feather Banana Bread

Rose calls Feather Banana Bread the 

lightest texture of all her breads.

Working with the dense, sticky dough, I would 

not have thought it possible!

But stay the course and

once again the alchemy of

flour, water, yeast, honey,

dried milk and banana

transform into the softest dough,

very reminiscent of the lovely Golden Panettone.

A month ago I had an over abundance of frozen ripe bananas,

went on a clearing out spree and only saved three.

Those three were spoken for in 

The Banana Split Chiffon Cake.

So I tried something new before going on a grocery

store hunt.

See the yellow bananas with the darkened

one beside it?  They were all of the same bunch.

I popped one into a paper bag, turned the oven

on low, left it warming for an hour, turned the oven off

and left the banana overnight.

Voila!

This is what I found this morning.

Perfectly softened and overly ripened.

Flour mixture to blanket the sponge

I truly enjoy stirring and whisking by hand.

Something so calming and meditative.

Never tire of the sponge breaking through the 

blanket of flour

Time to add the banana and tiny bit of butter

and on to the dough hook

The lump of very tacky and sticky dough

lightened up into puffy dough

First business fold before the warm rise

Magic!

After the rise

Made it over the top

of the ten inch pan

Such a beautiful color,

even sans top crust

The bottom crust was fine.

This bread is just amazing.

The texture and lightness is like nothing

I have ever tasted before.

No one can believe it!

Once again, Rose makes me

look like a baking genius.

Taste always wins over perfection.

There is a definite difference between day 

one and day two

but there is this:

Can't take credit;

my daughter thought of it.

~

The Bread Bible

by 

Rose Levy Beranbaum

Banana Split Chiffon Cake

The humidity weather report

is not something that I normally seek out

but since the Alpha Bakers are making a chiffon cake,

I certainly did today.

Why you might wonder?

Humidity does not generally bode well 

for chiffon and angel food cakes.

A thunderstorm rolled into the valley last night

which we have not seen for quite a long while.

Humidity held at 36% 

Onward with baking!

First on the agenda was searching

through the freezer for errant overly over-ripe

bananas that have been languishing for months.

I found three and it made exactly the requisite cup.

Rose calls for bananas, egg yolks, oils,

lemon juice and vanilla to be blitzed

in the food processor.

Everything fit tidily into the mini Cuisinart.

I'm always so happy when I get by

with my little work horse.

Flour and sugar are mixed with

the banana puree 

and then stiffly beaten egg whites

folded into the mixture.

You know that moment when

you realize you've made a colossal error

and a few swear words echo around the kitchen?

I realized too late the cream of tarter was to be

beaten with the egg whites, not added to the dry ingredients.

Nothing to do but carry on.

It didn't seem to cause any harm. 

The cake stayed put upside down in the pan

whilst cooling.

Always a hold your breath moment with this step.

I had a plan though.  If it fell out

it was going to be turned into a triffle.

I thought the top was prettier

with the golden crust

but flipped it over.

Drizzled with chocolate ganache sauce,

soft caramel sauce, whipping cream and nuts,

it's quite a fancy dessert for a deliciously flavored banana chiffon cake.

I also like it plain.

The light banana flavor is refreshingly simple.

~

The Baking Bible

by

Rose Levy Beranbaum