mm: coconut-pecan caramel sandwich cookies

martha mondays: coconut-pecan caramel sandwich cookies

welcome to the first showing of martha mondays! i hope you had as much fun as i did making these sandwich cookies. the photo in her baking handbook was one of the first things to catch my eye, and i'm glad i finally tried baking them. and i'm glad to have the company too! especially because this was my first time ever making caramel. wow. homemade caramel = sugar heaven. also, sticky hell :)



how did your cookies go? unfortunately i could not find a flower cut-out in the right shape, so i just made rounds. first lesson for me ... roll out dough in pieces. i seem to have the innate inability to roll out dough evenly 1/8 inch high across 10+ round inches. so next time, i will halve the dough before chilling so i can have smaller pieces to work with.



i had a lot of fun making the caramel. i wanted to use a squeeze bottle, but the plastic melted a bit, whoops! the canvas piping bag i have is too large. so i used a spoon and it came out fine, but the dollop and drizzle on top came out a little too heavy. of course i only show the ones that came out nicely, haha! but to me, my cookies came out a little too caramely and next time i will have to try harder at manipulating the sweet stuff. but to mr. mimi they were perfect.
and the taste? this is definitely a sweet cookie. but really yummy. it's a keeper! and it's great for the diet too. unlike, let's say, chocolate chip cookies which you can totally munch like five, six, ten in a row in one sitting ... you can really only handle one of these sweet babies at a time :)

online recipe can be found here with slight differences from the book (in the book: 1/4 cup coconut and for the filling 1 1/3 cup sugar, 1/2 cup cream, and 4 tb butter). depending on what happens with this event, i'll post again with a round-up of anyone else who made these!

update: go check out alexandra at addicted sweet tooth to see her great cookies, including some with ganache filling!

frosted bake shop also joined us and made awesome looking flower shaped cookies! and i was just waiting until someone got around to saying ... it's a "good thing" :)

lime meltaways

extra limes left over from mexican poker night last weekend. i'm sure there are more creative ideas, but i decided to go with lime meltaways. hmm, who wouldn't like to melt away to warmer weather and soft beaches?



these were fun and easy to make, although i made a mess with the confectioner's sugar. and they were a bit more delicate than i expected, so i don't think i can bring these into work (delicate and powdery? that's nothing but trouble and a messy keyboard!) i am also not sure if i particularly like this type of cookie, with the sugar coating all sides. i know i like linzers, so i thought i would like these too. it was worth a try. these were good. but not great.


although you know what? mr. mimi likes them. so maybe you're a limaholic and would like to take your own try? i would suggest adding more juice or zest. you can find the recipe, along with a very cute video, if you click here.

update: i just had some meltaways (two days old now) and let me say, wow, delish! i guess, for me, these are one of those cookies that taste better the next day. super yummy, with a slight saltiness. i would still probably add just a pinch more juice or zest next time. but i take it all back, these are great!

i've got a new toy!

i am a firm believer that machinery does not make a photograph. when reading around blogs or websites, you could swear that if you had a bunch of L-series lens, then you, too, could be one of the best. and yet, the "best" didn't even have image stabilization! what did they have? the eye and the spirit.

so, no, i don't believe that a camera set up over $1,000 will somehow mean you get better photos. but i do believe that they are fun! :)

so without further adieu, let me introduce my new toy and its companion workhorse, and some first photos. as you can see, i have lots to learn. i look forward to a beautiful new relationship! and if anyone has any suggestions to make the lighting less bright, pass them along! :)

canon xt with macro lens

lowel ego lights in my "studio" setup, aka, living room coffee table. for a description of these lights (and where i got the idea to buy them) check out jaden's great write up. of course, my photos still don't look as good as her's, but that isn't cuz i ain'ts trying! :)

at the market (that's mr. mimi in the blue jacket!)

neighbor's kitty

wine

orchid

pine cone

and what did i use before this lovely hunk of digitalization came my way (via B&H)? just a littler version :)

and in case you're curious, this is my old toy, the old classic which has provided many a happy film photo or slide. not so useful for blogging, but still travels with me.

olympus OM-1

linguine with fresh clams

beautiful weather is almost here, which gets me thinking about the fresh clams, one of my favorites for on the grill. but since it isn't that beautiful yet, we're still stuck inside for our cooking.

this little dish is super easy to make, quite quick, and has tons of flavor, freshness, and fills you right up. that is why i'm submitting it for the fun blog event hosted by equal opportunity kitchen for tried, tested, and true. you know ... those great dishes that are loved by all, all the time. we are lucky to have a couple of those in our repertoire, and are happy to share this lovely one. often times i crave this dish, and it always comes out delicious. although the recipe described is for two, it is easily adaptable for dinner party size.


linguine with fresh clams: serves 2

1/2 lb linguine
1 lb fresh clams (get the smaller sized clams, like cockles or littlenecks)
2 large shallots, diced
4 cloves garlic, minced
2 tb parsley, chopped
1/2 tsp red pepper flake
1 tb butter olive oil
1 lemon
1 cup vegetable broth (or water, or fresh clam juice)

1. cook linguine according to package. put clams in cold salt water bath, let sit for 15 minutes. rinse thoroughly with fresh, cold water.

2. in meantime, heat olive oil and butter in sauté pan (using butter gives great flavor, adding olive oil ensures it doesn't burn). add garlic and red pepper flakes, sauté until golden. add shallots and sauté until tender. de-glaze with broth.

3. bring to simmer, add clams, and cover. let simmer until clams all open. depending on size, but it should be about 5 minutes. discard any clams that don't open.

4. gently toss pasta with broth and clams. add parsley, fresh lemon juice. serve and dream of the briny summer ocean air!

twd: lemon cream tart

by the stroke of the seasonal luck, when i went to fairway this weekend to buy lemons for this week's tuesdays with dorie, the meyer lemons were back in stock! i first spotted them in february, but hadn't seen them recently and was begrudgingly paying $1.50 for each pair of plain measly thick-skinned lemons. but here they were in all their gorgeous orange-yellow soft juicy glory and i bought a whole bagful. so be ready for lotsa lemon posts :)

first is the lemon cream tart by dorie, inspired by pierre hermé (who isn't inspired by him?), with a pâte sablée dough.


hermé's lemon cream (and dorie's recipe) is pretty much a traditional lemon curd, but with the butter added at the end, after the double boiling of the sugar, eggs, and lemon juice. according to dorie's description, emulsifying the butter like this creates a "velvety light" texture.

who doesn't want velvety light lemon curd?


and what beautiful fragrance the meyer zest made! i was in lemon heaven.


continued to whisk in the double boiler until 175F, thick and whisk tracking. moved to adding the butter. looks light and airy with lots of bubbles. i set it in the fridge sunday night. come home monday evening, i take a look, and it's fairly thick.

or so it seemed! i whisked it loosely as prescribed but then proceeded to pour it into the tart shell. that's right ladies and gents, it poured. no spoons need apply! if you need a lemony crème anglaise, i got what yous need. but a tart curd? uhh, just move along folks, nothing here to see.

this was obviously beyond set-able in the proper sense. so i popped it in the freezer for a little over an hour to get it to firm up in the fastest, easiest way i knew how. it came out manageable. and absolutely velvety light and delish. no complaints on the taste at all, one of the best i've had. but a couple of photos later, and it was already melting.

which i'm sad to say because i've now tried five dorie recipes and have been unhappy with all of them. sometimes with the taste and sometimes with the mechanics and end result. of course it could be me, i'm a newbie, what good do i know? but i've been happy with many other baking recipes so it can't be that i'm totally ill-equipped and incompetent.

then again, many other people out there thoroughly enjoy her book and have great success with her recipes. but baking chemistry is more than just what goes on in the oven, right? it's also the relationship between the teacher and the student. so i (somewhat) look forward to trying more, but it may just be that dorie isn't the right lady for me :(

for the lemon cream tart recipe, click here.

to see the list of other lovely tuesdays with dorie bakers, click here!




oops! all three photos have a different yellow hue. pardon my complete lack of post-processing skills ;)

bratwurst: another first

yes i am getting older (wahh!) but i'm still young enough to be able to say that for nearly half of my life i have not eaten meat. the very first time i chose to become vegan at thirteen was because i ended up reading (from where did i even get this book in the first place?) the book that changed my life. yes, words have power and books can change one's lives. that is why i can theoretically understand why people want to ban them. of course i believe censorship is wrong. but i can't stand when my fellow anti-censorship folks smugly reply, "it's just a book!" no folks, you can't have it both ways. you can't treasure books for their beauty and meaning and endless possibilities, and then when challenged, you claim "it's just a book!"

okay, that was a huge random tangent. anyhoo, since the majority of at least my young adult life has been meat-free, there are many kinds of meat i have never eaten. it wasn't until i was in my 20s when i had a mussel. or a flank steak. but to this day i still have never eaten fried chicken. or pork tenderloin. or duck. or lamb. or many kinds of other beef cuts. etc etc etc.

so i found it amusing this weekend when we went to the farmer's market and in front of flying pigs, mr. mimi asked me what i would like? tenderloin, chop, ribs? i had no idea and i just looked at the stand table, sadly kind of feeling lost. even if i had these things before, i was probably ten years old and i can no longer remember the taste, or feel, or smell of these meats.

then mr. mimi spotted the bratwurst and was instantly enamored by the idea of a proper german-inspired quick dinner. after buying, i asked the farm person why it was white and not red like the other sausages? he did not hear me or did not want to answer. i asked twice. nothing. so we walked away (so unlike me to just walk away! but standing in front of meat induces me into such an unfamiliar bewilderment). i kind of regretted that i let mr. mimi take charge and buy this pack of strange, white sausage. actually, as we continued shopping at the farmer's market, i pouted the whole time and told him i didn't want the 'wurst!

but oh how delicious those strange, white sausages became! i absolutely loved them and felt so good. you know when you have a meal (home cooked or otherwise) that is just so satisfying? it's not really about being full or even being satiated. it's not even about the taste or the ambience. it's never just one thing and i can never adequately articulate the feeling it creates. but i also find that mysteriousness quite sexy about food and eating.


we enjoyed the grilled bratwurst with red cabbage and mr. mimi's dijon-dill potato salad. this is the old standby. the quickie that never fails. no exotic ingredients or creative combinations. just potatoes, onions, and mustard. the way it should be :)

dijon-dill potato salad: serves 6

1 lb yukon gold potatoes
1 large vidalia onion, sliced
1 tb dijon mustard
1 tb dijon mustard, whole grain
2 tb olive oil
1/2 tb white wine vinegar
1 tb water
salt + pepper
1 tb fresh dill, chopped

1. boil potatoes whole. i know what you're thinking, can't you just cut them up and then boil them to make it go faster?! but please don't, because you'll end up with a potato mush as the pieces would saturate with water. so boil the potatoes whole in salted water. you can also bake them if you prefer.

2. cool potatoes. meanwhile sautée the onions with salt and pepper until golden caramelized, about 20 minutes.

3. cut potatoes in 1" diced cubes and put into mixing bowl. add onions.



4. make dijon vinaigrette: in small bowl, combine both mustards. whisk in oil. whisk in vinegar. add water and whisk in until vinaigrette becomes fluffy and frothy. thinning it out like this makes it easier to coat. but don't add too much water where it becomes runny. you can also use milk if you prefer a creamier vinaigrette.

5. add vinaigrette to potatoes, add dill, a little pinch more of salt and pepper. toss and serve!

swiss orange chocolate cupcakes

i work full-time five days a week. i go to school three days a week. including school and gym classes or tennis lessons, i don't get back home until past 9 o'clock at five nights a week. add all of that to my renowned lack of time management skills, and it is rare that i actually have any leisurely spent afternoons on the weekends.

yesterday afternoon, after the morning spent running errands, and before our friends would arrive in the evening, the most sensible thing would be to relax on the couch with mr. mimi as he watched in perennial disappointment as the maine went down.


but ladies and gents, i have caught the baking bug and the fever is running high. two or three hours down time? sure, that's all i need. i just NEED to bake something, anything. i need to measure, mix, whip, crack, fold, and pour.

and i had leftover buttermilk burning a hole in my fridge. so i dreamed and salivated around the daring bakers until i found a recipe with buttermilk and all the other ingredients on hand.



so here they are, quick and easy. i omitted the chocolate glaze because i only had regular size chocolate chips, so the cakes were quite chocolatey already (okay, okay, the real reason was because i was lazy). i forgot to dust the chips with a little flour so they wouldn't all sink in baking, but let's not get picky. they were delicious and buttery. almost too buttery. is there such a thing? :)

for the recipe, click here. thanks to mary at alpineberry!

there is a season, turn, turn, turn!

asparagus bread pudding
(it ain't the prettiest, but it's pretty tasty!)

sure the song might be about peace, but when i hear the word "season" i always think of hours at the ocean in the long days of summer (did you actually wonder if think about food first?!) but then i do think about all the great seasonality of food.

most of us follow seasonality on a most basic level. a hearty stew or beanful chili gets made in the cold days of winter. a hamburger (boca, of course! but we'll see what happens this summer huh?) on the grill. cold margaritas at a summer sunset. yeah yeah, okay that can be enjoyed any time of the year :)

but i also really try to follow seasonality in the small choices i make about vegetables and fruits. of course, living in new york means i don't really follow seasonality to a T, but don't confuse being seasonal with being a locavore - they are related but not the same (i still eat oranges from florida and "hawaiian gold" pineapples).

i'm not pedantic or preachy but some things i'm strict on. i pretty much only buy apples in the fall, oranges in the winter, artichokes in the spring, berries and pit fruits in the summer. that's why you won't see any strawberry tarts from me yet. with other things i'm flexible. sure, spinach tastes best after harvesting in the cold months, but i eat it all year long. melons, bananas, corn, and green beans are almost year round too. thank goodness cheese has no season huh? :)

bread alone is one of my favorite places for bread that i don't bake myself. the other is tom cat and that isn't just because we have four cats :)

asparagus is one of those only in the spring purchases. because it's cheesy and bready, this recipe is great for thinking about spring produce even when it's still cold outside, like the most unfortunate days we're not enjoying in the city.

did i tell you i can't wait for strawberries to arrive? sigh ...


asparagus and mushroom bread pudding: serves 6
adapted from madison's local flavors book (2002, p. 37) - i love deborah madison!

1 head garlic
3 cups milk
1 loaf white bread (1 lb) cut into thick slices (stale bread from the day before)
1-2 lb asparagus, preferably thick and bottoms peeled
3 tb butter
1 large shallot, finely diced
1 lb mushrooms, coarsely chopped
4 large eggs
1/3 cup parsley
3 tb chopped tarragon or marjoram
2 cups grated gruyère cheese
salt + pepper

1. preheat oven to 350F. lightly butter a 8 x 12 gratin dish. coarsely chop garlic, add to milk, and bring to boil. turn if off and set aside to steep.

2. break bread into chunks, put in large dish, and strain milk over it. let it sit while you prepare the vegetables. occasionally turn bread so it soaks up as much milk as possible.

3. slice asparagus on diagonal about 1/3 inch thick and soak in cold water for couple minutes. fill skillet with water, bring to boil, add salt and asparagus. simmer until bright green and partially tender, about 3 minutes. drain, rinse with cold water.

4. melt half butter in skillet. add shallot, cook for 1 minute, then add mushrooms. cook over high heat until tender after several minutes. season with salt and pepper.


5. break eggs into large bowl and beat until smooth. add herbs, salt and lots of pepper. add bread and any milk left behind, along with asparagus and mushroom mix (plus the skillet juices) and 2/3 of the cheese. toss well.


6. pour mixture into gratin dish, even it out, dot with remaining butter and sprinkle with remaining cheese. bake until golden, about 45 minutes. let cool for few minutes and serve with crunchy side salad. the delicious gruyère smell makes this a great leftover to re-heat for lunch in your cubicle :)

twd: gooey chocolate cake

because i can't just get enough, i've just signed up for tuesdays with dorie. my first recipe was for gooey chocolate cake, a perennial favorite of chocoholics everywhere! good luck for mr. mimi, as he, too, very much likes this dessert.

this recipe is super easy to whip up, and more than likely you already have all the standard ingredients on hand. because it's so easy, this would make a great dinner party dessert.


we ate them right away, but i think thirteen minutes was a bit too long in the oven. it was very soft and slightly gooey inside, but it wasn't the real gooey lava. next time, i would probably cut off a minute or two (or three).

but with that said, we served them up with a scoop of soy ice cream (to make us feel just a wee less indulgent) and they were delish!! although not very photogenic :)

gooey chocolate cakes: serves 6
adapted from dorie's baking from my home to yours (2006, p. 261)

1/3 cup all-purpose flour
3 tb unsweetened cocoa powder
1/4 tsp salt
5 oz bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
1 stick butter, cut into 8 pieces
2 large eggs, at room temperature
1 large egg yolk, at room temperature
6 tb of sugar

1. preheat oven to 400F. spray 6 cups of a regular size muffin pan, dust the insides with flour and tap out excess. i used the disposable aluminum foils (as recommended by dorie) so that they would pop out easier.

2. sift the flour, cocoa. and salt together.

3. set a heatproof bowl over a saucepan of gently simmering water, put the coarsely chopped chocolate and the butter in the bowl and stir occasionally over the simmering water just until they are melted – you don’t want them to get so hot that the butter separates. remove the bowl from the pan of water.

4. in a large bowl, whisk the eggs and yolk until homogenous. add the sugar and whisk until well blended, about 2 minutes. add the dry ingredients and, still using the whisk, stir (don’t beat) them into the eggs. slowly and lightly stir in the melted chocolate and butter. divide the batter evenly among the muffin cups.

5. bake the cakes for 13 minutes (i suggest a shorter time if you want real gooey cakes). transfer them, still on the baking sheet, to a rack to cool for 3 minutes.

6. unmold cakes onto dessert plates and serve with a glass of milk or scoop of ice cream!