Happy Birthday, Duncan! You Too, Kat

Sadly, I didn't get a talking cake for my birthday [*SIGH*], but this red velvet one Adam and Marie brought from Brown Betty in Philadelphia was okay. I GUESS.

And by "okay" I mean delicious. And by "I GUESS" I mean I DIED from the deliciousness.

Obscenely Easy White Pizza

I know you’re probably sick of my pizza recipes. I know. But what can I say? The Easy Whole Wheat Pizza Dough, she just keeps on giving! This particular cheese/bread combo has been a Sunday night go-to for several weeks now, and it seems to go equally well with pinot noir, pinot gris, and Tecate. It’s also super easy, and all of the ingredients can be purchased at even our crapshoot of a local grocery store (It’s called Bravo, but one day I’m going to start calling it “Booooo!”).

The first time I made this, I topped it with slivered basil BEFORE putting it in the oven. Bad idea. As you can see from the photo, it shriveled up to almost nothing, which I probably could’ve predicted if I wasn’t dying of hunger at the time. Anyway, last night we sprinkled the basil on just after the pizza came out of the oven, and it was perfection.

Now go on then, pick or whip yourself up a pizza crust, get your mozzarella shred on.

Obscenely Easy White Pizza

Makes two 12-inch pizzas or one 13- x 16-inch pizza.

1 recipe Easy Whole Wheat Pizza Dough
4 cloves garlic, sliced thin
8 oz. mozzarella, shredded
2 oz. goat cheese
2 roma tomatoes, thinly sliced
1 handful fresh basil, slivered

The prep on this is seriously so easy that I almost feel like a tool even typing it out. But anyway. Preheat the oven to 450 degrees.

When the crust is risen and ready, sprinkle the shredded mozzarella all over in an even layer. Follow with nickel-sized glops of goat cheese, then the sliced garlic, and finally, the tomato slices.

Place the pizza in the center of the oven and bake for 10 minutes. Once the crust is brown and lovely and the cheeses are melted, remove from oven and top with the slivered basil. I also find that this pizza benefits from some fresh black pepper and a drizzling of olive oil.

Basic Brioche

Marie Antoinette, likely brioche enthusiast

Making these brioche for the first time sparked a fun little history lesson at our house. While comparing recipes, I read a couple articles that suggested Marie Antoinette's famous "let them eat cake" quote was more likely "let them eat brioche."

I was relating this to My Dude when he stopped me. "Actually, it was probably Marie Antoinette's mother who said that. She was Austrian. So was Marie Antoinette. And so is the brioche."

A little further internet research (i.e., Wikipedia and The Straight Dope) reveals that no one really knows who said the line in question, what kind of pastry they were referring to, or whether or not they meant it in a bitchy way or whatever. What we do know is this:

• Jacques Pepin totally owns everyone when it comes to French pastry
• I totally own everyone when it comes to slavishly following a recipe
• After much consideration, I used Msr. Pepin's recipe

Ergo, my brioche was bangin'.

To wit:

It got even better when I looked inside:

So airy and buttery! We ate them with my future bro-in-law's homemade jam, but next time I think I'll make them a bit bigger so we can use them as burger buns. I think Marie (and her mom) would approve.

Best Bread in NYC?

Since I haven't yet summoned up the nerve to tackle Julia Child's 15-page baguette recipe, when I'm craving an apple and brie sandwich I usually head to Amy's Bread on Bleecker and buy a loaf for $2 or so. It's close to where I work, the quality of the bread is excellent, and if I have a little extra time I can swing into Murray's Cheese while I'm at it. But in classic Carrie Bradshaw, gal-in-the-city fashion, I can't help but wonder: what am I missing? Should I be getting out there and seeing other baguettes?

Anyone care to set me up on a blind date with a new bakery?

Aw, HELL Yeah!

[In my head, I hear Will Smith saying the title of this post.]

Tiny pies! I knew it could be done! The cupcake's reign of tyranny has officially ended. I am SO making these.

Don't stop the rockin', Not Martha.

Caramelized Onion, Rosemary & Gorgonzola Pizza

I owe this one to Adam Roberts at The Amateur Gourmet, who owes it to Alice Waters. I came across the recipe when I was having a craving and entered "caramelized onions" into the Food Blog search engine. It takes about an hour and a half from start to finish, but only about 15 minutes of that is active, so it's a great pizza to make while you're, say, watching the U.S. Open -- you can leave the onions and dough to do their thing for a couple games and check on them when John McEnroe's banter gets tiresome.

Caramelized Onion, Rosemary & Gorgonzola Pizza

• 2 Tbsp. unsalted butter
• 2 Tbsp. olive oil
• Four red onions
• 1/4 lb. Gorgonzola cheese
• 1 Tbsp. chopped fresh rosemary
• Salt and pepper

Rising dough

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees and move one of the racks to the center of the oven. For the crust, I used the reliable Easy Whole Wheat Pizza Dough.

The caramelized onions will look something like this.

While the dough was rising in its bowl, I chopped up the onions and put them in a pan with butter and olive oil over low heat, uncovered. Season with a bit of salt and pepper. You don't need to stir them much, maybe every ten minutes or so. You'll know they're done when they're tender, brown, and sweet. It can take anywhere between an hour and an hour and a half but don't rush it! They won't properly caramelize and you will die of shame and regret. I've seen it happen.

The pizza, just before baking

Once the dough is shaped and has properly risen, spread on the onions, followed by quarter-sized gobs of Gorgonzola, about 2 inches apart. With this pizza, there IS such a thing as too much cheese. Follow with a sprinkling of fresh rosemary and sling it in the oven for ten minutes.

It's just the right combination of sweet and savory, just like pretzels and chocolate and Donny and Marie.

And Now For Something Completely Different

Every now and then I gotta veer off topic and post something that I'm just obsessed with. This is one of those times:



That Samantha Bee, she's sugar to my soul.

Cupcakes: So Last Season?

Sprinkles are the new leggings.

This just in from The New York Times City Room blog: the cupcake trend is on the outs. The market is over-saturated, and in light of the obesity epidemic, sweets of all kinds are coming under fire by parents and schools.

If it's true, it wouldn't necessarily be the worst thing in the world. In the area where I work in downtown Manhattan, you cannot swing a dead cat without hitting a fairy cake piled high with buttercream, and it would be nice to see a little more diversity in bakeries. Sure, they're conveniently sized, but so are brioche and croissants and cookies -- hey, why not individual tarts or pies at the next office party? Something a little less...precious?

The point I'm getting at is that cupcakes are great, but there are so many other exciting things that can be done with flour, sugar, and butter. Why so many shops devoted to just one item? If I can figure this out, I will have also solved the mystery of the tangy fro-yo phenomenon.

My Omnivorous Hundred

Not explicitly baking-related, but a fun exercise nonetheless: The British blog Very Good Taste has made a list of the 100 foods every self-proclaimed omnivore should try at some point in their life. Food bloggers are encourage to copy the list to their blogs, bold the items they have tried, and strike the items they will not consider trying. Here's mine...

1. Venison
2. Nettle tea
3. Huevos rancheros
4. Steak tartare
5. Crocodile
6. Black pudding
7. Cheese fondue
8. Carp
9. Borscht
10. Baba ghanoush
11. Calamari
12. Pho
13. PB&J sandwich
14. Aloo gobi
15. Hot dog from a street cart
16. Epoisses
17. Black truffle
18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes
19. Steamed pork buns
20. Pistachio ice cream
21. Heirloom tomatoes
22. Fresh wild berries
23. Foie gras
24. Rice and beans
25. Brawn, or head cheese
26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper
27. Dulce de leche
28. Oysters
29. Baklava
30. Bagna cauda
31. Wasabi peas
32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl
33. Salted lassi
34. Sauerkraut
35. Root beer float
36. Cognac with a fat cigar
37. Clotted cream tea
38. Vodka jelly/Jell-O
39. Gumbo
40. Oxtail
41. Curried goat
42. Whole insects
43. Phaal
44. Goat’s milk
45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/$120 or more
46. Fugu
47. Chicken tikka masala
48. Eel
49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut
50. Sea urchin
51. Prickly pear
52. Umeboshi
53. Abalone
54. Paneer
55. McDonald’s Big Mac Meal
56. Spaetzle
57. Dirty gin martini
58. Beer above 8% ABV
59. Poutine
60. Carob chips
61. S’mores
62. Sweetbreads
63. Kaolin
64. Currywurst
65. Durian
66. Frogs’ leg
67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake
68. Haggis
69. Fried plantain
70. Chitterlings, or andouillette
71. Gazpacho
72. Caviar and blini
73. Louche absinthe
74. Gjetost, or brunost [How have I not eaten this? It makes me want to cry - K]
75. Roadkill
76. Baijiu
77. Hostess Fruit Pie
78. Snail
79. Lapsang souchong
80. Bellini
81. Tom yum
82. Eggs Benedict
83. Pocky
84. Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant.
85. Kobe beef
86. Hare
87. Goulash
88. Flowers
89. Horse
90. Criollo chocolate
91. Spam
92. Soft shell crab
93. Rose harissa
94. Catfish
95. Mole poblano
96. Bagel and lox
97. Lobster Thermidor
98. Polenta
99. Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee
100. Snake [Rattler. I'm sorry, I thought this was a pissing contest - K]

Any list of this nature it sure to draw criticism, e.g. "why x and not y, etc.," but it was fun going through it, remembering the first time I tried certain things, which became favorites (Aloo gobi! Heirloom tomatoes!) and which I haven't touched since (borscht). And although I can't see myself ever ordering my own portion of horse, I'd like to think that I'd try a forkful. Does that count?

Mmm, etc., etc.

Have you ever done a Google Image search for "mmm doughnuts"? Here, try it. I'll wait. Hmm hmm hmm, la la la. You back? Now I ask you, how badly do you want a doughnut right now? Pretty badly, right? That is how I feel pretty much nonstop throughout the months of September through November. I want, no, I NEED doughnuts on a daily basis. With fresh apple cider. Served hot. With a cinnamon stick.

When I was a kid, one of my favorite places to go when the air got brisk was Uncle John's Cider Mill in St. Johns, Michigan. For years afterward, no doughnut has ever compared to the memory I had of the ones at Uncle John's -- even the phenomenal lavender doughnuts at The Doughnut Plant left me strangely unfulfilled. So last fall, during one of my trips home, I insisted on heading out to St. Johns to fill the void.

The first thing I noticed was that the cider mill has become a rougher place in recent years.


The second thing I noticed was even more devastating. The doughnuts? Not that good. There! I said it! Are you happy? They were dense, over-sugared (yes, it's possible), and worst of all, stale.

What was I to do? My cinnamon-sugar doughnut craving had now ballooned to the size of an aging Hell's Angel's stomach, and if I didn't do something to feed it, I would die. Die from an acute lack of doughnuts. Like any self-respecting amateur baker, I turned to the Internet. I wasn't terribly optimistic, since most doughnut recipes call for a deep fryer, and while we don't suffer for kitchen space as badly as most New Yorkers, we still keep things fairly minimal. Luckily, the brilliant Heidi Swanson at 101 Cookbooks had just what I needed (just what I needed!): a recipe that delivers light, fluffy, yet satisfyingly chewy baked -- yes, baked! -- doughnuts.

A word to the wise: I tried experimenting by rolling these in powdered sugar, and had a lot of trouble getting it to adhere. The regular sugar/cinnamon combo worked beautifully, and I bet glazing them would, too.


Baked Doughnuts

From Heidi Swanson at 101 Cookbooks.
Makes 1 1/2 - 2 dozen medium doughnuts, plus holes

• 1 1/3 cups warm milk, 95 to 105 degrees (divided)
• 1 packet active dry yeast (2 1/4 teaspoons)
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 2/3 cup sugar
• 2 eggs
• 5 cups all-purpose flour
• A pinch or two of nutmeg, freshly grated
• 1 teaspoon fine grain sea salt (Kat sez: I used kosher)

For the sugar dusting:

• 1/2 cup unsalted butter
  1 1/2 cups sugar
• 1 tablespoon cinnamon

Tools:

• Parchment paper
• Baking sheet
• Doughnut cutter OR two biscuit cutters, 1" and 3"

Place 1/3 cup of the warm milk in the bowl of an electric mixer. Stir in the yeast and set aside for five minutes or so. Be sure your milk isn't too hot or it will kill the yeast. Stir the butter and sugar into the remaining cup of warm milk and add it to the yeast mixture. With a fork, stir in the eggs, flour, nutmeg, and salt - just until the flour is incorporated. With the dough hook attachment of your mixer beat the dough for a few minutes at medium speed. If your dough is overly sticky, add flour a few tablespoons at a time. Too dry? Add more milk a bit at a time. You want the dough to pull away from the sides of the mixing bowl and eventually become supple and smooth. Turn it out onto a floured counter-top, knead a few times (the dough should be barely sticky), and shape into a ball.

Transfer the dough to a buttered (or oiled) bowl, cover, put in a warm place (the top of a preheating oven works well), and let rise for an hour or until the dough has roughly doubled in size.

Punch down the dough and roll it out 1/2-inch thick on your floured countertop. Use the cutter(s) stamp out circles. Transfer the circles to a parchment-lined baking sheet and stamp out the smaller inner circles using a smaller cutter. If you cut the inner holes out any earlier, they become distorted when you attempt to move them. Cover with a clean cloth and let rise for another 45 minutes. (Kat sez: I saved the inner circles and let them rise/bake along with the big guys -- why waste a doughnut hole?)

Bake in a 375 degree oven until the bottoms are just golden, 8 to 10 minutes - start checking around 8. If you're unsure, err on the side of underbaking. While the doughnuts are baking, place the butter in a medium bowl. Place the sugar and cinnamon in a separate bowl.

Remove the doughnuts from the oven and let cool for just a minute or two. Dip each one in the melted butter and a quick toss in the sugar bowl. Eat!

Kinda Healthy-ish Chocolate Chip Snacking Cookies

Sometimes I'm in the mood to eat a lot of little things, instead of one big thing, you know? Well, obviously somebody out there knows what I mean -- how else can you explain the success of White Castle? Is it healthier to eat ten little hamburgers rather than one enormous one? Debatable. Is it more fun? Unequivocally, yes.

Hence, the allure of the "snacking" cookie. It's not a full-fledged dessert, I tell myself, it's just a wee snack. When I first started making mini-cookies, I just used my grandmother's (cough, Tollhouse, cough) recipe, until one evening, when I was on my second handful and realized that it might be worth trying to make them just a touch healthier.

Don't get me wrong, these are not health food. As a general rule, I like to let a cookie be a cookie, which means that it's sugary and buttery and altogether fabulous. This cookie is not ooey-gooey decadent, but it does crisp up nicely, and the natural sugar gives it an almost spicy flavor. The fact that it also has a bit less saturated fat and less refined sugar and flour is just an added bonus.

Kinda Healthy-ish Chocolate Chip Snacking Cookies

NOTE: I don't have a food processor (if destiny has a heart, one day...), but a trusty spatula works just fine for this batter.

• 1 1/4 cup whole wheat flour
• 1 cup white flour
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
• 3 tbsp. unsweetened applesauce
• 1 cup Florida Crystals or other unrefined sugar
  
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 4 egg whites
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 1 cup miniature chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees, and place one rack in the middle of the oven. Have a baking sheet at the ready.

Whisk together the flours, salt, and baking soda. Set aside.

In a large bowl, beat the butter, applesauce, and sugars until light and fluffy. It might look a bit more liquid than you're used to, but trust me, it'll all be okay. Beat in the egg whites and vanilla, scraping down the sides as you go. Add the reserved flour mix in three increments, making each new addition when the previous one is just incorporated. Fold in the chocolate chips until evenly distributed.

Drop by teaspoons onto the cookie sheet, one to two inches apart (after all, they don't get too big) and bake for 9-10 minutes, until edges are barely golden. Cool on racks.

Makes about 90 mini-cookies, roughly 24 modest servings.

Cake-tathalon

This is what the inside of my brain looks like.

My Dude and I got engaged recently, and we decided that the easiest thing to do would be to have the wedding 600 miles from where we actually live. This means that the amount of time we have to meet and speak with photographers, florists, etc., must be limited to one short, jam-packed visit. Well folks, I have just returned from said visit, and I'm pretty sure I have wedding coming out of every orifice. Forreals, I am still yanking the tulle out of my ears.

Luckily, there was a big pot o' gold at the end of the rainbow, my saving grace after four exhausting days: the cake tasting. Confection bakery of Kalamazoo, I owe you my life. I do not think I would have had the strength to go on had you not provided me with no fewer than six kinds of cake, six frostings, and four fillings to sample, in various combinations.

Honey buttercream: this must be what angel poo tastes like

As you would expect, choosing my wedding cake is not a decision that I take lightly. In fact, I trained for weeks for this event so that I would be at the top of my cake-eating game. I was bench-pressing cupcakes, doing laps in a vat of ganache; it was a very demanding regimen.

At the end of the race, we had a three-way tie between the banana cake, the hazelnut with amaretto frosting, and honey-lavender cake with honey buttercream. After running through the play-by-play, my dude and I are pretty settled on the winner. And the prize is an all expense paid trip to my belly.

How to Choose?

Who is more reliable? This baker:

Or this baker:

There has been much talk of brioche at our house lately, and by "much talk" I mean I brought it up once or twice. This is opposed to never, which is how often we used to talk about brioche. As I mentioned a couple weeks ago, I'm very eager to dive in to the gibassier recipe I managed to track down, but the idea made My Dude a little nervous. "Maybe you should try a basic brioche first, before you go throwing down a bunch of money for orange blossom water, whatever that is."

After I took a few minutes to grumble about how he had absolutely no faith in my abilities, I had to concede the point. If I blow it, I'll certainly be glad that I didn't drop a pantload of money on orange blossom water (whatever that is), and if I succeed in making excellent brioche, well, who doesn't like to have some extra brioche around the house?

Ordinarily I would just flip open my copy of How to Bake and get to it, but then I noticed Jacques Pepin's Complete Techniques sitting on the shelf. When I compared the two recipes, I noticed a significant difference: while Nick Malgieri's recipe calls for a sponge or "preferment," Jacques's does not. So whom am I to side with here? The Italian-American baker who has yet to steer me wrong, or one of the most-respected French chefs alive today?

Ugh. I feel like the little kid in "Kramer vs. Kramer." Except that neither Nick nor Jacques know that I'm alive. But other than that? Exactly the same situation.

My fellow bakers, what would you do?

As If You Needed Another Reason to Bake

Hiring a "professional" to provide the baked goods for your special event is no guarantee. I'm not saying I'm the greatest baker out there, but I'd like to think that if I were running the cake decorating department at Kroger or whatever, I'd at least raise the standards to include functional literacy.

Comprehension gaps, hideous frostings, and terrifyingly lifelike cake babies (and more!) at the hilarous Cake Wrecks.

Whole Wheat Flatbread with Pesto, Potatoes and Farmer's Cheese

How big of an idiot am I? I achieved what was probably the height of my culinary career, and I did not take one. Single. Photo. Actually, it's more accurate to say that if I had taken two minutes to locate my camera, our party guests would've devoured the whole thing, and damned if I wasn't going to grab myself a slice. My dear friend Sarah was able to capture the moment when I stuffed it into my face before throwing down her camera and storming the food table herself.

This amazing flatbread/pizza is yet another treat inspired by our recent trip to Portland, OR. My brother-in-law to be was kind enough to take us to Clyde Common for lunch, and My Dude and I loved it so much that we went back the very next day. I had their vegetarian flatbread both times, because I was determined to re-create it for our engagement party. On our first visit, I let myself get lost in the restaurant's laid-back vibe, my cold glass of wine, and my light yet comforting meal. On the second visit, however, I covertly lifted away each layer and discovered just how easy it really was: pesto, thinly-sliced fingerling potatoes, and lumps of fresh farmer's cheese, placed under the broiler until golden.

My favorite thing about this recipe is that it satisfies a pizza craving while still being light and fresh enough to serve on the muggiest, most oppressive days of a New York summer, those days when the very thought of stepping into the un-air-conditioned slice joint on the corner makes me melt into a puddle of sweat and Clinique City Block.

I've posted the full recipe after the jump, but you could easily cut a few corners by using a pre-made pizza dough or crust and a decent jarred pesto and it would still turn out great. To be honest, the pesto is more My Dude's territory, so I think I'll have him write up his recipe in a subsequent entry. Anyway, without further ado...

Whole Wheat Flatbread with Pesto, Potatoes and Farmer's Cheese

Makes two 12-inch pizzas or one 13- x 16-inch pizza.

• One recipe Easy Whole Wheat Pizza Dough (see below)
• 1/2 cup olive oil
• 5 or 6 large fingerling potatoes
• 1/2 cup pesto, jarred or homemade
• 1/4 lb very mild, soft farmer's cheese (I used Westfield Farm Capri from Murray's)
• 4 leeks, green parts only, sliced diagonally

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees.

Prepare and par-bake the crust in the center of the oven, about 9 minutes. Let it cool off a little on the baking sheet.

Peel the potatoes and slice them paper-thin, or as thin as you can reasonably get them without slicing off a finger. Heat about 1/4-inch of olive oil in a skillet on medium-low. Add potatoes and cook until tender, turning occasionally. If you notice the edges starting to crisp, turn down the heat. Drain the potatoes on paper towels.

Spread the pesto evenly over the crust in a thin layer. Top with another even layer of potatoes, followed by nickel-sized lumps of cheese.

Turn the broiler to low (if you have the option) and let it heat up. Place the pizza directly under the heat source and broil until the top of the cheese lumps are a nice, golden brown. Depending on the stregth of your oven, it should be about 5-10 minutes, but WATCH CLOSELY. This thing can go from zero to charred in no time.

Top with the leek and serve. But maybe grab yourself a slice first.

Easy Whole Wheat Pizza Dough

Adapted from Nick Malgieri's How to Bake

• 1 1/2 cups white unbleached all-purpose flour
• 1 cup whole wheat flour
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup warm tap water
  
• 1 envelope (2 1/2 teaspoons) active dry yeast
• 3 tablespoons olive oil

Combine the flour and salt in a large bowl and mix well. In a separate bowl, whisk the yeast into the water, followed by two tablespoons of olive oil.

Make a well in the center of the flour and salt mixture. Pour the liquid into the center of the well and stir with a fork all the flour is incorporated and a soft, sticky dough forms. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let it rise until doubled in bulk, about 1 hour.

Grease a cookie sheet with the remaining tablespoon of oil. Without stirring or folding the dough, use a rubber spatula to scrape it from the bowl onto the oiled sheet. Oil your hands and press, pull, and pat the dough into the pan. If it starts to get stiff and resist, let it rest for a few minutes before continuing. Let the dough rise in the pan uncovered until it starts to puff up slightly, about 30 minutes.

Apricot and Pistachio Tart

Folks, if you want to impress the holy hell out of your future mother-in-law, run, don't walk, to your local fruit stand, buy some apricots, and make this tart. This picture doesn't do it justice, so please don't let my high school photography skills deter you.

In our little household, my dude holds the title of alpha chef, since he has a superhuman palate and claims to be able to tell the difference between varieties of bottled water (Him: "Volvic is more mineral-y. You don't taste that?" Me: "Um.") -- it's like if Jeffery Steingarten and Ruth Reichl had a love child, is all I'm saying. For this reason, when we have guests for dinner I generally leave the menu to him, except for dessert, which I guard with a jealous fury. So when we cooked our first-ever dinner for his parents, I went into compulsive baker overdrive.

Stone fruits have been stunning this season here in New York, so I decided to go from there. Since I don't even buy flour without consulting Nick Malgieri first, I opened up How to Bake, and there it was: an Apricot and Pistachio Tart.

This was only the second tart I've ever made, and the first ever sweet one. I was a little apprehensive, since the first tart I made went largely untouched -- although I think that's because I made it for the Fourth of July, and everyone was drunk and full of hot dogs by the time I served it. But still, that kind of rejection sticks with you. It also didn't help that when I expressed my nervousness to my future mother-in-law, she waved her hand and said, "oh, tarts are easy." Which I read as: "...so if you can't even get this right, you're a class-A dumbass. And a slut."

When I pulled the tart out of the oven, the edges of the apricot halves were lightly browned, and the filling was puffy and golden. Everyone was silent as they dug in their forks and took their first bite.

"Wow." Said my future father-in-law.

"Can I have the recipe?" Said my future mother-in-law.

Victory! [Said like Entourage's Johnny Drama in his "Viking Quest" costume]

Apricot and Pistachio Tart

From Nick Malgieri's How to Bake

Makes one 9- to 10-inch tart, 8 to 10 servings

• One recipe Sweet Tart Dough

For the filling:

• 1 cup (about 4 oz.) shelled unsalted pistachios
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon almond extract
• 2 eggs
• 4 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 12 medium (2 to 2 1/2 lbs.) apricots, washed, halved and pitted

For the glaze:

• 1 cup apricot preserves or jam (Kat sez: try to find preserves with little to no added sugar; the apricots pack plenty of sweetness on their own)
• 2 tablespoons water or white rum

Prepare and chill the dough.

To remove the annoying skins from the pistachios, place them in a saucepan and cover with water. Bring the water to a boil. Drain the pistachios and place them on a clean kitchen towel. Fold the towel over the pistachios and give them a good rub; this should help to loosen the skins and make it easier to pick 'em off.

Coarsely chop 1/4 cup of the pistachios and set aside for finishing the tart. Dump the rest into a food processor, along with the sugar, and pulse until the mixture is finely ground (about 1 minute). Add the almond extract and one of the eggs and continue to pulse until the mixture becomes a smooth paste. Cut the butter into 8 or so small pieces, and add to the work bowl, pulsing a few times after each addition. Continue to pulse until the butter is smoothly mixed with the nut mixture. Add the remaining egg and pulse until smooth. Allow the machine to run continuously for 30 seconds and scrape down the inside of the bowl. Add the flour and pulse until just incorporated. Set aside, covered.

Set a rack at the lowest level of the oven and preheat to 350 degrees.

Roll out the dough and line the pan.

Spread the pistachio filling on the dough. If you have a circular tart pan, arrange the apricots, cut side up, in 2 or 3 concentric circles. (I have a square tart pan, so I placed them in evenly-spaced rows.)

Bake the tart for about 35 minutes, until the crust and filling are baked through and the apricots are cooked. Cool the tart on a rack.

To make the glaze, bring the preserves and water or rum to a boil, and reduce until it gets thick and syrupy. Strain out the pulpy bits. Brush the hot glaze over the surface of the cooled tart. Sprinkle the reserved 1/4 cup chopped pistachios around the edges.

Unmold tart. Impress the holy hell out of future mother-in-law.


Sweet Tart Dough

• 8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened)
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 egg yolk
• 1 1/4 cup bleached all-purpose flour

Combine butter and sugar in a mixing bowl and beat on medium speed for 5 minutes, until the mixture is soft, fluffy, and almost white in color.

Beat in the vanilla and the egg yolk and continue beating for another two minutes, until the mixture is soft and smooth and resembles buttercream.

Place the flour in a strainer of sifter and sift it, all at once, over butter mixture. Using a rubber spatula, fold the flour into the butter mixture until no traces of flour remain visible.

Shape the dough into a rough 12-inch disk, about 1/4 inch thick and cover in plastic wrap. Refrigerate the dough.

To use the dough, fold it in half and line the long edge up against the interior diameter of the pan. Unfold. Gently press - using the palm of your hands and fingertips - the dough against the interior surfaces of the pan.

To finish the top edge of the tart shell, position your floured thumb and index finger of one hand so that the thumb and index finger of one hand so that the thumb is inside the pastry and the tip is against the bottom of the crust. The tip of your index finger should rest against the top edge of the crust. Press gently with both thumb and finger to make the top of the crust straight and even.

If possible, chill until the crust is firm. This will minimize shrinkage. Bake according to the instructions in individual recipes.

Gibassier

I owe it all to Pearl Bakery in downtown Portland, Oregon. As soon as I walked through the doors of this open, airy space, saw its brick ovens and its piles and piles of crusty loaves, I thought to myself, So THIS is the meaning of life.

I've been baking for as long as I've been allowed to use an oven. It started with brownies from a box and Tollhouse chocolate chip cookies, then I gradually progressed to cakes and muffins, then bread and pies. The methodical nature of it appeals to me; mix some of this with a bit of that, heat it up this much for that long, and suddenly your house smells mother-loving amazing.

The best amateur chefs I know are instinctive, quick on their feet, and resourceful. Unfortunately, I am none of these things, at least when if comes to food. I like to make lists, I like check off tasks. If it weren't for recipes, I'd eat cold cereal or takeout pad thai every night. Fortunately, baking rewards rigidity. If you add even a teaspoon too much water to your pie crust, your whole kitchen will explode. You'll just have to trust me on this one.

Anyway, being in Pearl Bakery reminded me of something I had forgotten during my years of outsource-everything New York City. Some people actually get PAID to bake. I know! They're these people called "bakers"! Forrealsies!

I was dying to try the walnut levain, but then my guy spied the gibassier, brioche dough flavored with orange peel, anise seeds, and orange blossom water and sprinkled with sugar. Now, I know some people claim to be anise-averse, but that's just because they've lived their lives under a cloak of ignorance. When used properly, anise can give otherwise plain cookies and breads a lightly spicy, festive taste. It also reminds me of sausage, which is always a plus.

Tragically, I don't have a photo of the gibassier we tried, but in the near future I think I'm going to challenge myself to recreate them using this recipe. Come along on this journey of obsessive adherence to instructions, won't you?

But First...

Does moving the focus of this blog mean that I can't play videos of drag queen Pussycat Doll tribute bands? Because if playing videos of drag queen Pussycat Doll tribute bands is wrong, well...

• MTV
• Music Videos
• MTV Shows
• Entertainment News

A Half-Baked (har har) Idea?

I'm thinking of taking a new direction with this blog. I knew when I started this thing that I'd eventually settle on some sort of a theme, and since I like to save the the tales of paranoia and deep-seated family resentment for my Punky Brewster fan fiction, I've decided to devote this space to my other passion: baking.

Specifically bread. And pies. And cookies. Ooh, and I have been getting into tarts lately. (That's what SHE said!)

Tomorrow I'll share with you the exact time and place that inspired the new direction, but until then I invite you to break through the crusty outside and sink your teeth into the soft fluffy middle of this title...

Kat Bakes.

As if the Zombie Apocalypse Wasn't Enough to Worry About

Now we have monkeys with telekinetic powers. Great.