Gutsy Cooks and HCB'ers share a Sunday

Heavenly Cake Baker's baked one of the most amazing Sticky Toffee Puddings I have ever tasted. A moist, flavorful, a lightly spicy cake, with a decadent lemon toffee sauce, creme fraiche with lemon juice and zest, and toasted pecans. As the fork tines slid into the cake, I knew making this recipe was worth every second.

What was an opening surprise for me was the 8 ounces of stout beer and moist dates. You soak the dates in the beer then puree both together in a food processor. I wasn't sure what to expect since stout beer is a distinguished flavor all its' own.

Then you have the toffee sauce. A lot of fresh lemon juice gets added in to give a citrus edge.

Matched with creme fraiche and toasted pecans, this is one dessert I will remember for a long time.

The Gutsy cooks have been extremely busy as well. Cynthia and Sam are the hosts for this month in the Gutsy Cook Club and chose a main dish of chicken biryani and a dessert; pear, mascarpone, hazelnut tart. I made the Indian chicken biryani, but I followed Monica's wonderful advice over at Sweet Bites; I am so glad I did because after a little research, this is what I found: Aayi's recipes: Hyderabadi chicken biryani recipe! Authentic Biryani from India. Aayi does not give specific measurements for all her ingredients so each person gets to approach the recipe accordingly. Lets just say, I can't wait till next weekend to make this again!


Aayi's ingredient list is as follows (adapted and changed just a tidbit):
1 cup sliced onion (fried in oil till crisp)
1/2 pound of boneless skinless chicken (I used 1 full pound)

Chicken Marination:
3 T. chopped coriander leaves
2 T. chopped mint leaves (I used dried)
1/2 t. ginger paste (found at Safeway by fresh mushrooms)
1/2 t. garlic paste (found in same place as ginger paste)
3 green chilies (I chopped mine; bigger pieces then diced)
1/2 t. red chili powder
4 cloves powdered (I used 1/2 t. of cloves-next time I will use a little more)
1" cinnamon powdered (I used 1 1/2 t. ground cinnamon)
1/2 t. cumin powder (will add 1 t. next time)
1/2 t. coriander powder
1/2 cup thick yogurt (I used Greek yogurt and more like 3/4 cup)
salt

Method:
Add all the marinade ingredients and 1/4 cup fried onion to chicken pieces and leave it aside for about 1 hour in refrigerator.

For Rice:

1 and 1/2 cups Basmati rice (par-boiled, long grain Basmati is the best)

1/4 cup onion

3 cups water

2 cloves (I used 1/4 t. ground cloves)

1" cinnamon (I actually used a cinnamon stick)

2 cardamon

2 bay leaves

1/2 t. ginger paste

1/2 t. garlic paste

1/2 t. green chili paste

1/4 t. turmeric (I believe for the yellow coloring of the rice.)

Ghee (clarified butter; amazing stuff!)

Salt

Method:

Heat ghee and add cloves, cinnamon, cardamom, bay leaves, ginger and garlic paste, green chili paste, turmeric, onion and fry for a few minutes. Now add the rice and fry for 2-3 minutes. Then add salt water and let it cook (I let the rice cook uncovered for 14 minutes).

Putting Everything together:

Heat ghee in a thick bottomed pan and add marinated chicken. Fry for about 2 minutes. If chicken leaves some water, that is fine.

Spread half the quantity of rice, followed by 1/2 the quantity of fried onion. You can add 1/4 cup water just to make sure the rice is completely cooked.

Spread remaining rice and then onion.

Cover the pot with lid and cook on a medium low flame (I have an electric stove so went with medium low heat) for about 30 to 45 minutes. (I cooked mine for 40 minutes.)

I served the chicken biryani with baked artichokes and our dinner was perfect, filling, and delicious! Not the prettiest plated dish but taste made up for looks.
I made the raspberry souffles from last week's menu, using the rose water. My raspberries actually tasted like raspberries; surprising for being in the middle of wintertime.



My first time making anything with Rose water. I have seen plenty of recipes but I have always chickened out. To be absolutely honest, after trying the finished, chilled raspberry souffle, I am not a fan of the flavor. The first taste was raspberries then a lingering rose flavor. Maybe the dislike comes from being a new taste for me but I didn't care for it. The little souffles turned out adorable and I will make these again, only with plain water or maybe a raspberry liqueur.

The longest part of the recipe was making the puree and chilling the souffles. Pretty easy and definitely beautiful to present.

SMS-Hazelnut Raspberry Layer Cake; HCB'ers-White Velvet Cake with Milk Chocolate Ganache; ABC'ers-Evie Lieb's Processor Challah and Football Food

GUTSY COOKS post is coming shortly.

I LOVE the color of this cake! How pretty and what a great cake this would be to bake for Valentine's Day. Candy Girl chose the new year's recipe from Sweet Melissa Sundays short list left to bake. Candy picked a fun cake called Hazelnut Raspberry Layer Cake.

Seedless raspberry jam, fresh raspberries, and Chambord liqueur give this cake an amazing raspberry flavor.

I have learned a long time ago to shorten the baking time from whatever is listed in Melissa's cookbook. I have no idea why oven times are so different compared to Melissa's. I baked my cakes for 20 minutes.

The raspberries we found looked beautiful and using such bright colored berries seemed to cheer the whole kitchen up.

The cake has a light crumb with a deep hazelnut and raspberry flavor. I am not a buttercream frosting person and yet this particular buttercream frosting flavor works for me. Dumping a bowl of fresh raspberries and Chambord into the buttercream was kind of fun.

Thank you Candy for such a delicious and pretty dessert to start the year off right!

Heavenly Cake Bakers

The Heavenly Cake Bakers cake for this week is the White Velvet Cake with Milk Chocolate Ganache.

The cake itself was easy to assemble and bake. The ganache went swimmingly until I added that last tablespoon of butter. My ganache then turned into a pourable, yet slightly thick, frosting.

The chocolate flavor in the ganache was delicious. The velvet cake baked up nice and fluffy but I was a little surprised at how mine turned out a little crumbly when I cut into the cake. Maybe I didn't wait long enough for the cake to be completely cool.


Overall, this is a good cake recipe but with so many other to-die-for cake recipes I have tried from Rose's heavenly cakes cookbook, I may leave this one as we enjoyed it but now I want to see if she has one even better to bake in the near future.

Avid Cake Bakers - Evie Lieb's Processor Challah


I adore Flo Braker and every recipe I have tried out of her cookbooks has been a winner in my kitchen. Her Challah bread, made in a food processor, is no exception. Fun and easy to make is a great way to describe making and baking this loaf of bread.

I have never made a two-tier braided bread before and had fun assembling the loaf.

I am a week behind in posting about baking the processor Challah but I did make the bread over a week ago. Sometimes, finding the time to sit and blog can become a rarity; I am here now =0).

Thank you for such a delicious choice for January 2011~! We loved every bite.


FOOTBALL SUNDAY food - Stuffed Sweet Onions Toluca

4 Sweet onions about 4 to 6 inches in diameter

4 ounces chorizo

4 ounces lean ground beef

1/4 t. salt

1/2 t. pepper

4 slices Muenster or Gruyere

4 flour tortillas

1/2 c. salsa

1/2 c. guacamole

1/3 c. sour cream

Directions:

Remove a slice from the top (stem end) of each onion so it sits flat. Starting at the opposite end (root end), hollow each onion, leaving about a 1/2-inch thick shell. Place onions in a steamer basket. Place in a large pot over boiling water; cover and steam 20 minutes. Remove; cool until easy to handle.

Meanwhile, for filling, in a medium saucepan, cook and stir chorizo, ground beef, salt (optional), and pepper about 10 minutes or until meat is brown. Drain in colander.

Arrange onions in an 8x8x2-inch baking pan. Spoon meat mixture into onions. Top each with a cheese slice. Also, wrap the tortilla shells in tinfoil. Bake both the stuffed onions and wrapped tortilla shells in a 350 degree oven for 10 minutes.

Remove both from the oven and raise the oven rack to about 6 inches from heat element. Broil onions 2 to 3 minutes or until cheese begins to turn light brown. Place one tortilla on each plate and top with an onion. Serve with salsa, guacamole, and sour cream.

TWD - Tarte Fine; Finale for HCB and Paul Newman's Tortellini with Chicken

Leslie of Lethally Delicious decided on the Tarte Fine on page 315 of Dorie Greenspan's Baking, From My Home to Yours for this week. Leslie chose this week's dessert out of the kindness of her heart for what her friends here on Tuesdays with Dorie could easily purchase on a budget, no matter where he or she lives. I always enjoy reading her blog because of the sweet lady she is. Today, you even get to meet her co-author Pearl, so click on over to see Dorie's recipe posted on Leslie's site along with Leslie's own Tarte Fine.

I horde Whole Food's Dufour puff pastry and have been known to pet the frozen pastry without taking it out of the freezer for several months. We never use this pastry on just any recipe . . . especially at $9 + a package. I really enjoy the buttery perfection Dufour creates in this little one sheet of pastry package.

Dorie's section to the right on "Playing Around" was put into effect when creating my apple Tarte Fine. We enjoyed the extra butter and sugar sprinkled throughout, especially since my Golden Delicious apples still had a slightly tart taste to them.

In my Heavenly Cake Baker's group, I learned to use a melon baller to scoop out the seeds in an apple. The ease, precision, and no waste has me hooked on the scoop method and I have never looked back.

I used my mandolin for slicing the apples into thin pieces; of course, I forgot to take a picture to show off the ease and efficiency when using a mandolin. Another piece of kitchen equipment I could not see myself living without.

Would you believe I added aluminum foil for the edges?

Thank you Leslie for picking out a beautiful Fall treat, centered on ease and baked with love.

For my Heavenly Cake Baker's group finale, the cake slicing and tasting. First word to come to mind is "rich", followed by "deep chocolate", then "crumbly". My step-son enjoyed his 18th year birthday cake as breakfast but what an adrenaline rush after one slice plus a cup of coffee. My slice was half of the one you see in the picture above and I could just "feel" my heart speeding along.

I did have a few air pockets in the cake. The chocolate ganache is rich and delicious too. Only half of the cake was eaten; the rest is in the freezer, waiting to be broken down into chunks and added into a freshly made container of vanilla ice cream.



For dinner we made Paul Newman's tortellini with chicken. I received Paul Newman's cookbook as a freebie when I ordered Dom Deluise's original Italian cookbook. I assumed the cookbooks would be full of cliche' recipes. I was wrong, in fact, I have been enjoying not only the recipes but the stories going along with to introduce each section or individual recipe.

The tortellini with chicken was the first recipe we have tried so far, AND I have many marked to be tried soon.

I thought I would share:
Tortellini with Chicken
(Paul Newman's Own Cookbook)

Ingredients:
1 medium onion, chopped
2 T. butter
3 skinned and boned chicken breast halves, cut into 2-inch pieces
salt and pepper
1 T. dried tarragon or thyme or 2 T. fresh tarragon or thyme
Flour for dredging
2 - 3 cups Newman's Own spaghetti sauce or homemade spaghetti sauce
10 ounces cheese or meat tortellini, prepared according to package directions
Chopped parsley for garnish


Directions:
Saute onion in butter until limp and set aside. Season chicken with salt and pepper to taste and tarragon if desired. Dredge in flour and saute in pan used to saute onion for about 5 - 7 minutes. Add onions, spaghetti sauce, and tortellini. Stir together, heating thoroughly for 5 - 10 minutes. Garnish with parsley.

Sweet Melissa Sundays & Heavenly Cake Bakers

I learned to can from my Grandma, scared out of my shoes. We didn't have much money at the time and my daughter Ashley was maybe 3 years old. I found the hot produce spots to hit from my old neighbor, Walt (who has canned for years), had $100 to our name, a Ford pick-up tank full of gas (Grandpa filled the tank) and off we went to Eastern Washington to get peaches, pears, tomatoes and whatever else I could get a hold of. I was so excited.




I have been known to be exuberant, spontaneous and over-enthused. We came home with 250+ pounds of produce. At one stop, I paid for (2) 35 pound boxes of peaches at $7.50 a box. Picked the largest looking boxes and loaded them into the truck. Went back to look at pears. In the meantime, hubby also loaded (2) 35 pound boxes of peaches into the truck. We did not figure this out until we were back home.

We get home and unload and unload and unload the truck. My kitchen and washroom was covered in boxes, stacked two high, and none of the fruit was ripe enough to can . . . except for the tomatoes (all 75 pounds of them!).



Grandma called (from 1 mile away . . . she knew a LOT of work when she saw it) to tell me that I did not save money if all the fruit spoiled instead of being canned AND that my fruit WAS going to all spoil!

I inherited her stubborn streak . . . and it was GAME ON! I lost a total of 6 peaches. I had to wait for the fruit to get ripe but when the fruit "did" get ripe . . . ALL of the fruit was ripe! I did not sleep for 3 days. It was horrible and THAT is how I learned to can.



I now know how to enjoy making a single small batch and I always laugh when I pull out "ol Faithful" my canning pot.

Sweet Melissa Sundays brought Plum Raspberry Preserves, chosen by Margo of Effort to Deliciousness, and was a breeze to assemble and using Granny Smith apples for natural pectin was a nice change of pace. I stuck to the recipe because raspberries, plums, and apples cooked down has a delicious sweet, tart flavor. I did cut my sugar down by 1/2.


The jam thickened up to a consistency where you do not have syrup and you are not cutting the jam out of the jar . . . spreadable.



I canned miniature jars (hold 4 ounces each) for Christmas presents and the rest is for hubby and I to enjoy.



The color turned out bright red with the right amount of soft chunks of fruit. Just how I like my preserves.

Thank you Margo for the wonderful run down memory lane and a delicious choice to be enjoyed now and later! You can find the jam recipe at Margo's blog or you can buy Melissa's cookbook and have ALL the recipes at your fingertips!

HEAVENLY CAKE BAKERS

Presents:

Chocolate Tomato Cake with Mystery Ganache

I dreaded this cake, I know Rose would NEVER put a sub-standard cake in her cookbook but the IDEA of tomato soup in the cake batter AND in the ganache had me worried. Especially since this was going to be my step-son's 18th year birthday cake.


Whipping the chocolate cake batter together was a rather quick session, especially after completing a 7 page dessert last week. I tasted the chocolate batter and could not detect any tomato flavor. Unfortunately, I told Larry (hubby) about the tomato part of this recipe last week and he has had the dreading look on his face since. So when I asked him to try the batter, he ~ of course ~ said he could taste the tomato but just slightly. Yeesh!

The cake baked up fluffy and had just a slight crack in the middle when removed from the oven. The layers were allowed to cool overnight and the ganache was made in the morning.

I had just as much trouble telling myself to put tomato soup in the ganache as I did the cake batter. I would now like to state for the record how the tomato soup was NOT discernible in the cake batter nor the ganache. I was relieved and excited. We have not cut into the cake yet because we took Dustin to an all-you-can-eat Asian buffet (what he asked for) and now he is too full to squeak. I will return in the morning with cut cake pictures!

HCB ~ Apple Caramel Charlotte

Heavenly Cake Bakers is causing a serious eye twitch. No, that is not it. The recipe for the Apple Caramel Charlotte is causing the eye twitch. No, not true either.

6 pages of directions did almost make me run the other direction out of sheer panic but the measuring of cake pieces and assembly appeals to my love of mathematics.

The eye twitch came from being 2/3'rds the way through the project and having a disagreement with my other half (I may call him the better half when I am over it), anyways the wind fell out of my sails and that is when issues with the recipe started.

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My half sheet pan was 16 x 12 1/4 x 2 - inch (Not the 17 1/4 x 12 1/4 x 1 - inch needed) so I calculated my measurements out to fit an 8 - inch springform pan. Made my templates and used a serrated knife to cut my pieces (except for the circle; I used kitchen cutting shears).

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Jonathan apples were used in the recipe and I added peel to the liquid, as mentioned as an alternative per Rose.

(Later, the seeds were scraped into the apple poaching syrup and the pod was rinsed, dried, and added to a container of powdered sugar.)

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The layers were assembled with strained apricot preserves, frozen, then sliced 3/8 - inch thick.
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Still smooth waters, assembling my spring form pan circumference.

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ALL Hell breaks loose. I'm huffy, frustrated and windless (I am pretty sure that is a word.).

I am cooling my gelatin laden caramel Bavarian cream filling (with my edge gone, I did not see this coming) my caramel went from a LITTLE to warm to BAM!!! solid gel caramel. Instead of warming slightly, I panicked. I know, I know! In the kitchen, you take a breath . . . think about the situation . . . THEN you make a smart decision.

I was NOT suppose to panic and dump in the 2 T. of Calvados, mixing like a mad person and HOPING For a miracle. Oh wait, there is more.

I mix in the Italian meringue AND whipped cream, still hoping for a miracle. What "doesssss" happen?

I have little floating, gelled pieces of apple caramel floating in my "suppose to be" Bavarian perfection.

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I REALLY LOVED my pretty, slightly pink apple petals. LOVE them!

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I cut the charlotte and the cake stays assembled and cuts with ease.

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BUT we have floating caramel gems floating throughout. 3 days of work and I am not happy. I was aiming for Rose's photo in her cookbook. Honestly, I enjoyed the flavor but do not see myself making this again to rectify (1) bad move. =) We are smiling, see? =)

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Before glaze and . . .

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After Glaze.