A Romanian Pastry

I work with the coolest people. One of them is a Romanian mother of two, with whom I joke that we'll open a pastry shop together when academia doesn't work out. She makes an array of delicious desserts on a semi-regular basis (though I'm not sure where she finds the time), including a many-layered dobosh torte, walnut bars, and these. Matt has always been partial to anything resembling a linzer torte, so I asked for the recipe. We're planning to have a baking session sometime where I can learn all her secrets. She's also on my committee, which is awesome.

Dough

• 2 2/3 c. flour
• 2 sticks butter
• 1 1/3 cup sugar
• zest and juice of one lemon
• 4 yolks

Filling

• 2 1/2 cups frozen raspberries
• 1 1/2 cups sugar

1. Combine the flour and sugar and zest in a both. Cut in the butter until the mixture is like coarse sand. Stir in the yolks and lemon juice until the dough just holds together. It should be dry, but should hold together when pressed.
2. Divide dough into 2/3 and 1/3 and form into discs. Wrap tightly and refrigerate for at least an hour.
3. For the filling, bring the raspberries and sugar to a boil in a medium saucepan. Boil for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally, until thick and jam-like. Remove from heat.
4. Preheat the oven to 350F
5. When the dough is chilled, take out the 2/3 piece and roll it out to fit a 13"x9" pan. You may have to let it warm up a little before it is rollable. Butter the bottom of the pan and place the dough in it.
6. Spread the raspberry filling over the dough, and stick it back in the fridge.
7. Take out the remaining 1/3 of the dough. Roll it to about 10"x5" and cut into 1/2-inch wide strips. Take the pan back out of the fridge and layer the dough strips in a lattice pattern. You don't have to weave them. The angle and frequency of the lattice strips will depend on how you rolled and cut the top dough.
8. Bake for 35 to 40 minutes until the top is slightly browned and the jam is bubbly. Cool completely before cutting into squares.

Making the lattice top

A wedding

The happy couple

Our brother got married last weekend to the girl he's been dating for 7 1/2 years. Everyone loves her and she has been a part of the family for years already. My brother was my best friend thru high school and has always been one of the most important people in my life. I was so happy to see them together all dolled up and married that I think I cried more than anyone. And I don't cry much about external things. The wedding was perfect. The photographer was brilliant, the flowers stunning. The bride was so organized that she knew exactly how things were supposed to go and they certainly all went right. Amanda and I had our first bridesmaid experience along with T's other two sisters, and we all had a fun girly time getting ourselves and T ready. She made us hangers with our names on them for bridesmaid gifts.


Best wishes to both of you in your new life and enjoy moving home again!

While I was home, I helped make dessert for the groom's dinner Friday night and 120 cupcakes for Amanda's graduation party in two weeks. For the cupcakes, she picked lemon and chocolate. I spent Thursday morning baking for about 3 hours. It was heavenly. I can now probably make cupcakes in my sleep. For the groom's dinner, mom and I decided to go with an array of bars. I pulled out our trusty New Best Recipes (which I gifted to the bride and groom :) and picked lemon bars, pecan bars, and brownies. When my mom learned that I wasn't going to frost the brownies, she decided she had to make them herself in order to ensure sufficient amounts of sugar were involved.

Part of the huge cupcake parade

The lemon bars were pretty fun and turned out fantastic. Afterwards, I was left with 2 cups of egg whites and so was forced to make an angelfood cake too. Poor me.

What lovely yolks

Lemon Bars
from the New Best Recipes cookbook

• 1 1/4 cup flour
• 1/2 cup powdered sugar
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 8 Tbsp. butter, softened
• 7 egg yolk, plus 2 whole eggs
• 1 cup plus 2 Tbsp sugar
• 2/3 cup juice and 1/4 cup zest from 4-5 lemons
• 4 Tbsp. butter
• 3 Tbsp. cream

1. Spray a 9x9 pan with baking spray and line with foil. Spray the foil
2. Process flour, powdered sugar and salt in a food processor. Add 8 Tbsp butter in 1 Tbsp blocks and process to blend until the mixture resembles cornmeal or 8-10 seconds. Sprinkle mixture into pan and press to an even layer. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.
   
3. With oven rack at middle position, preheat to 350 and bake the crust for 20 minutes.
4. For the filling, whisk yolks, and eggs until combined and whisk in sugar. Add lemon juice, zest and salt and whisk again until combined. Transfer mixture to a saucepan, add the 4 Tbsp. butter in pieces, and cook over medium-low. Stir constantly until the curd thickens to a sauce-like consistency and reaches 170 degrees (about 5 minutes).
5. Strain the curd if you like and pour onto warm crust.
   
6. Bake 10-15 minutes until filling is shiny and opaque and jiggly in center. Let cool for 45 minutes before cutting.
   

Used lemons. So sad.

Dijon (it's not French for mustard)

Admission: I've been meaning to food blog for a long time, and have always come up with some excuse. My camera is too old, my kitchen's lighting sucks, my food isn't pretty. And so on. But here I am, ready to take the plunge. Luckily, I have an immensely charming sister who also spends way to much time reading blogs (of another sort) and was willing to go in together. Also, I got a cute little lamp to improve the lighting in my kitchen.

Doesn't it remind you of the Pixar lamp?

To start off, I figured I should make something fantabulous and unusual. Enter dijon + pretzels + caramel + chocolate. I've always been partial to mustard as a condiment, and to salty sweet things, so I figured this recipe from Gourmet's website would be a good excuse.

The recipe instructs you to make a wet caramel with water and sugar. As you can see, my first try didn't turn out so well. And it actually looks better than the second try. I think they all got the idea to crystallize and it spread like. . . a prion?

Caramel fail.

But finally, success!

Thanks to David Lebowitz though, I tried making the caramel without water, which worked much better. When it gets nice and smooth, stop the caramel with the butter, cream, mustard, and 2 Tbsp water (because I didn't add it at the beginning)

Mmmmm. Dijon.

Line your pan with foil (I used a 9x9) and lightly grease it, then lay in your pretty pretzels in an organized fashion. Though less organization would certainly taste good too. A third of the pretzels should be crushed/chunked up.

Naked pretzels

with the caramel

When the caramel is done, pour it over the pretzel layer and let is hang out for about 20 minutes until it's hard. Meanwhile, melt your chocolate in a bowl over a pot of boiling water. Spread it over the caramel and sprinkle the crushed pretzels over it. Then let it cool in the fridge for 30 minutes.

Mustard Caramel Crunchies with Chocolate Glaze
adapted from Gourmet

• 1 cup sugar
• 1/8 cup water
• 3 tablespoons Dijon mustard
• 1 tablespoon unsalted butter
• 1 tablespoon heavy cream
• 6 oz thin pretzel sticks, divided
• 8 oz bittersweet chocolate, chopped

1. Line baking pan with nonstick foil, leaving an overhang on 2 sides. Arrange two thirds (4 oz) of pretzel sticks in baking pan, all in same direction.
2. Heat the sugar in a saucepan over medium heat, folding and stirring as the bottom begins to melt. Keep stirring to keep the caramel from burning. When the caramel is smooth and dark-amber colored, remove from heat and add mustard, butter, cream, and water . It will bubble a lot, but keep stirring carefully until incorporated
3. Pour caramel over pretzels as evenly as possible. Let caramel set, 20 to 30 minutes.
4. Put remaining 2 oz pretzels in a resealable bag and crush with a rolling pin.
5. Melt chocolate in a bowl over a pot of boiling water and pour over caramel layer, spreading evenly. Sprinkle with crushed pretzels. Chill 30 minutes.
6. Lift out confection using foil overhang and transfer to a cutting board. Let stand about 10 minutes, then cut into 36 squares. Invert to serve caramel side up (lift squares off foil to serve).