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

Berry Cake

One of Matt's most endearing qualities is his tendency to get fixated on things. We've been talking about doing cake tastings for our weddings, with a particular mind to our favorite Whole Food's cake, Berry Chantilly Cream. Then our friend Erin texts us a picture of a white berry cake that she made. And we're fixated. We originally thought we'd make a king cake for Carnivale/Mardi Gras. Then we remembered that king cakes aren't really that tasty. So the berry cream fixation came back up.

We've been working our way through tasty recipes in our new Cook's Illustrated Cookbook (amazing!) And it turns out there is a strawberry cream cake recipe! Score.


In other news, I bought some excellent knobs from Anthropologie on discount. I frequently wander the store looking at the bizarre collection of knobs, knick-knacks, and dishware. So a sale rack was hard to resist. I thought I'd make a rack to hang my numerous necklaces on so that I could use the top of my dresses for something other than a pile of necklaces. And I finally got around to it. I got a foot of baseboard for a buck at Home Depot and sanded it to make it look weathered. You know, cause that's in.


Strawberry Cream Cake
from Cook's Illustrated

• 1 cup sugar
• 1 1/4 cups cake flour
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 5 large eggs (2 whole and 3 separated), room temp
• 6 Tbsp unsalted butter, melted and cooled
• 2 Tbsp water
• 2 tsp vanilla
• pinch cream of tartar

1. Grease a 9-inch cake pan or springform pan, line with a parchment paper cut to fit the bottom and grease the parchment. Reserve 3 Tbsp sugar. Whisk flour, baking powder, salt, and remaining sugar in a medium bowl. Whisk in 2 whole eggs and 3 egg yolks, butter, water, and vanilla until smooth.
2. Whisk egg whites and cream of tartar until foamy on medium-low. Increase speed to medium-high and whip whites until soft and billowy. Add the reserved 3 Tbsp sugar and whip until soft peaks form (about 1-2 minutes). Stir one third of the whites into the batter, and gently fold in the rest.
   
3. Pour batter into prepared pan and bake 30-40 minutes. Let cake cool 10 minutes, then invert and let cool completely out of pan, about 2 hours.

• 2 pounds strawberries (or other berries)
  
• 4-6 Tbsp sugar (depends on sweetness of berries)
  
• 2 Tbsp kirsch
• 8 oz. cream cheese
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1/8 tsp salt
• 2 cups heavy cream, chilled.

1. For the filling, halve 24 of the strawberries for garnish and mix the remainder in a bowl with 4-6 Tbsp sugar. Let sit one hour. Strain juices and reserve. Pulse the berries briefly in blender or food processor. Simmer reserved juices and kirsch over medium-high until reduced to 3 Tbsps (3-5 minutes). Pour reduced syrup over berries, add salt and toss.
2. For the whipped cream frosting, whip cream cheese, sugar, and vanilla until light and fluffy. Ad heavy cream slowly while mixing and ship on medium-high until stiff peaks form.
   
3. To assemble, cut the cake horizontally into three layers.
4. Place one layer on a plate, place a ring of 20 strawberry halves around the outside (tops out) and fill with half of the filling. Frost is 1/3 of the whipped cream. Repeat with the second layer. After placing the third layer, frost the remaining cream on top and garnish with remaining berry halves.
   

By the way, the frosting is the best ever.

Hobbies and hole hweat

I've come to the conclusion that I need a hobby, as Matt spends most of his free time playing with making mobile games. Knitting came up as a likely candidate. I've knit in the past, but usually find myself to restless to take pleasure in it. So last night I decided to knit a cabled hat, and throughout 5 hours of BBC Pride and Prejudice, I started and finished it. (pattern here) Pretty good, eh? Other candidates for hobby include guitar and painting. We'll see what I actually get to.


A friend had us up to her house in the mountains the weekend to watch the meteor shower. I thought I'd bake something to share for breakfast, but in my laziness refused to run out to replenish our supply of white flour. So the only option was whole wheat. Or flourless chocolate cake (why didn't I think of that at the time?) Marcy Goldman's "A Passion for Baking" has become my go to book when I need to make something ridiculously delicious for a crowd who isn't watching their calories (there's a brownie recipe with marshmallows, raisins, dates, oreos, chocolate chunks, pecans, crisp rice and almost as much butter as flour). There's also a section in the back with recipes that may or may not be actually healthy, but they usually lack something considered unhealthy or include something considered healthy. This is one such. She definitely goes for the kitchen sink approach, but these guys definitely garnered some compliments.

Breakfast Scones
from A Passion for Baking

• zest of one orange
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 2 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
• 1/2 cup oil or butter
• 1/4 cup honey
• 2 Tbsp maple syrup
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup plain yogurt or buttermilk
  
• 1 cup granola
• 1/3 cup rolled oats
• 1/4 cup cornmeal
• 1/4 cup sesame or sunflower seeds
• 1/4 cup chopped almonds
  
• 1/2 cup raisins
• 3/4 cup frozen berries or chopped apple
  

1. Heat oven to 400. Line a cookie sheer/baking pan with parchment paper or grease it.
   
2. Blend zest, bp, bs, salt, cinnamon, brown sugar, and flour in a bowl. Drizzle in oil or cut in butter.
3. Add honey, syrup, eggs, and 3/4 cup yogurt or buttermilk. Mix halfway, then fold in granola, oats, cornmeal, seeds, nuts, and fruit. Stir and add more dairy if it does not hold together.
   
4. Pat half the dough into a 3/4 inch thick round and cut into six scones. Repeat with other half. Arrange scones on baking pan and bake them for 17022 minutes. You can brush with milk or beaten egg to make them more shiny if you like.
   

Pi Day is delicious

Happy belated Pi Day by the way. Surprisingly, most of my friends didn't know about pie day until we came along. Growing up a proud math nerd, I find this disconcerting. Then again, I am the girl who still knows the 70 digits of pie she memorized in middle-school homeroom.

We did make a pie, but didn't have a camera, so the pictures and less than ideal. The intent was blueberry pie, but we misread the random recipe online on Matt's droid and got 3 cups frozen bloops instead of 6. So it turned into a blueberry-apple pie. Bloople pie. Berry pies always seem to run, so I grated one of the apples with the skin on to increase the pectin.

Bloople Pie

• Your favorite double-pie crust recipe
• 3 apples of baking inclination
• 3 cups frozen blueberries
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup flour
  
• 2 tsp orange zest
• 2 Tbsp orange juice
• 2 tsp cinammon

1. Make your pie crust dough first and divide into two balls. Let it sit in the fridge for at least 3 hours.
2. Grate one of the apples, skin on into a bowl. Peel and dice the other two.
   
3. Add the rest of the ingredients and mix. Let is sit in the bowl until your crust is ready
   
4. When your crust dough has been sitting in the fridge for a while, roll the bottom part out and put into the pie pan. Roll out the top crust too while you're at it.
5. Put the filling into the crust, and top with the top crust. Crimp the edges together to minimize the leakage of tasty filling juice. And to make it pretty.
6. Cover the crust edges with foil and bake at 375 for 40 minutes. Remove the foil and bake another 20.
   
7. Cool completely before eating unless you want runny pie juice everywhere. Maybe you do.
   

Forgive the crappy mobile phone photos