Le Petit Chef

In a matter of 4 months, we have gone from a household of graduate students to a house full of Ph.D.s.  And it’s AWESOME.  We celebrated Chris’s thesis defense yesterday in Pasadena with lots of good food and beer.  Thought I would share with you the carrot cake collaboration between me and Chris’s mom.  She baked it and I iced and decorated it.  There was no evidence there was any cake by the end of the night except for a dirty cake board and some photos.

More than one person has told me today that this toffee is like crack.  They all inhaled it.  Two batches, gone in less than 12 hours.  Fortunately, it’s quick and easy to make and doesn’t require many ingredients at all.  You can also easily modify the recipe to include different types of chocolate or toppings.  I prefer the dark chocolate and walnut topping shown here, but milk chocolate and crushed pecans are also delicious.  (This toffee also makes a great gift around the holidays!)

The Recipe

1 cup sugar
1 cup (2 sticks) butter
1 cup sliced almonds
1 bag chocolate chips (or 6 Hershey Special Dark candy bars)
1 cup crushed walnuts

In a saucepan, combine you butter (room temperature makes life easier), sugar, and almonds and warm over medium heat.  Be sure to stir the mixture throughout the process or else it won’t cook evenly.  Additionally, toward the end of the procedure, the sugar mixture gets EXTREMELY hot (as evidenced by the burn on my finger).  Be careful to avoid any contact with the hot toffee!  

Continue heating the toffee mixture over medium heat until it begins to boil.  At this point you’ll need to pay attention to the color of the toffee.  As it heats further it will eventually begin to smoke and turn a deeper amber color.  Once it darkens to this color, remove it from the heat and quickly pour the hot toffee onto an ungreased baking sheet.  With a silicone spatula (trust me the silicone is best for these purposes and won’t stick to your toffee!), spread the toffee into an even layer (about 1/4” thick).  

While still hot, spread the chocolate chips into a layer over the toffee and wait about 1 minute for them to melt.  Using a small offset spatula, spread the chocolate in an even layer over the toffee, completely covering it.  Top it off with crushed walnuts sprinkled over the top.  Finally, refrigerate the toffee for about an hour until the chocolate sets and then break into smaller pieces to serve.

Much thanks to my cousin “D” for passing this recipe on!

Let me be up front with you: I hate pumpkin.  Everything pumpkin — the look, the smell, the texture.  Except this bread.  It embodies the fall season with its aroma and spices.  Your house will smell amazing for three days after you make this bread, even though the loaves will only last a fraction of that time.  At this point, I can’t keep it in my house after baking.  It gets wrapped and given away immediately.  Too tempting otherwise.  Do yourself a favor: make this the next time you find yourself at home avoiding the cold on a Saturday morning in your pajamas.  It’s better than the warmest blanket.  Enough gushing…I hope you’re convinced.  

The Recipe 

3 1/2 cups flour
3 cups sugar
4 eggs
1 cup oil
1 15 oz. can pumpkin puree
2 tsp. salt
2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. each cinnamon, nutmeg, and allspice (all ground)
1 1/2 tsp. cloves (ground)
2/3 cup water

Preheat your oven to 350 °F and grease two loaf pans.  In a bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, and cloves.  In a separate large bowl, beat together the eggs, oil, and sugar.  Once they are fully incorporated, add the pumpkin puree and mix well.  At this point, add the dry ingredients and mix until thoroughly incorporated.  Finally, add the water and stir until smooth.  Divide the batter into your two prepared loaf pans and bake at 350 °F for 75 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the bread comes out clean.  Cool the loaves 10 minutes in their pans, and then on a wire rack removed from the loaf pans until you can’t wait any longer to eat it.

What do you do when you have chocolate, heavy cream, and pecans sitting around the house?  Make truffles and cover them in candied pecans!  This was one of those experimentation recipes.  Didn’t really know where I was going with it, but am happy where I ended up!

The Recipes

Candied Pecans

8 oz. pecan pieces
1 cup sugar
1 egg white
1 tbsp. water

Preheat your oven to 250 °F.  Beat the egg white and water together with a whisk until foamy and opaque.  Put your sugar in a separate bowl.  Toss the pecans in the egg white mixture and then in the sugar.  Spread the sugared pecans in a thin layer on a greased cookie sheet and bake at 250 °F for 1 hour, stirring every 20 minutes or so.  After 1 hour, remove the pecans from the oven and cool to room temperature.  If you have no interest in truffles, these are delicious on their own as a snack. 

Candied Pecan Truffles

12 oz. semisweet of bittersweet chocolate, chopping into small pieces
1 1/4 cups heavy whipping cream

Making the center of a truffle is extraordinarily simple, especially compared to other types of candy.  It’s essentially a ganache that can be covered in a number of different things.  Most recipes begin with the simples cream and chocolate combination, and can become more elaborate to include ingredients such as butter, corn syrup, and various extracts and liquors.  I kept things simple.  Heat the cream to a simmer and pour over the chocolate.  Mix until very smooth and then allow to cool to room temperature.  Once cooled, refrigerate for 3-4 hours and then place in the freezer for about 20 minutes before rolling into balls.  I found that putting the ganache into the freezer really made my life easier and a little less messy.  

Scoop into tablespoon sized portions and roll into spheres.  Roll the spheres in crushed candied pecans and set on a parchment lined baking sheet.  Place in the freezer to firm up the truffles.  For serving, I placed the truffles in small paper candy cups.  This recipe made 25 truffles.    

For my own good, these will be going to lab tomorrow.  Hope my new labmates enjoy them!

When you grow up in New York, there are two things for which you have unreasonably high expectations: bagels and pizza.  After leaving New York, I eventually learned that sometimes you can make better pizza than you can buy in some cities.  Sure you can buy pizza dough in most supermarkets, but nothing compares to homemade dough.  Honestly though, who has the foresight to say “I’m going to want pizza tomorrow night, so I had better get my dough started tonight?”  No one.  After significant investigation, I’ve found that adapting the recipe from “Martha Stewart’s Baking Handbook” gives the best combination of taste and texture and ease of preparation.  Less than 2 hours.  That’s how long it took from yeast proofing to belly. 

The Recipe

1 cup water (about 110 °F)
1/4 tsp sugar
1 envelope active dry yeast (1/4 oz.)
14 oz. all-purpose flour (plus more for dusting
1 tsp. salt
1 1/2 tbsp. olive oil

Begin by combining your sugar and yeast in the warm water.  This is the most important thing you will do.  If after 5-10 minutes, the water isn’t foamy and smelling like bread, your yeast is no good and your crust won’t rise.  At all.  Anyway, while your yeast is proofing, combine the salt and flour in your food processor with the dough blade.  Add the yeast mixture and olive oil to the flour mixture and pulse until the dough comes together into a ball.  It will still be somewhat tacky.  Turn the dough out onto a floured work surface and knead it 4-5 times into a smooth ball.

Now the dough is ready for the first rising.  I oiled a bowl with some olive oil (only a little bit), placed the dough inside, and covered the bowl loosely with a piece of plastic wrap.  Leave it completely alone for 40 minutes (or until doubled in size). It’s important that the dough be left in a warm place.  If it’s very cold in your kitchen, the rising process will take much longer.  After the first rise, turn the dough out onto your floured work surface, and punch it down.  Knead it 4-5 times again into a smooth ball, and replace in the oiled bowl for the second rise.  Cover with plastic wrap and let rise another 40 minutes, until doubled in size.  At this point, the dough is ready for use.  Remove it from the bowl, punch it down, and divide into 2 equally sized portions.  Shape each portion into a smooth ball and allow to rest for 5 minutes.

I preheated my oven to 450 °F with a pizza stone inside.  A stone does wonders for maintaining your oven temperature and ensuring even cooking.  I use it for everything.  Anyway, stretch the dough into a disc and cover with anything you want.  I’m a purist: sauce, mozzarella, and parmesan cheese for me.  After preparation, bake the pizza for 10-12 minutes.  The extra dough can either be used right away, refrigerated for up to one day, or frozen.  If frozen, thaw completely in the refrigerator and then bring to room temperature before use.  Room temperature dough will rise more in the oven.

These might be my favorite dessert to bring along to parties and events.  I honestly have no idea where the recipe came from, but it’s definitely one that’s been passed around the family over about 20 years (maybe even more!).  The recipe is very reliable and the cream puffs are best eaten within a few hours of filling.  I often make the shells the night before and then fill them the puffs at the last minute.  This prevents the moisture from the filling from making the shells soggy.  For the finishing touch, I drizzle the puffs with melted chocolate and dust them with powdered sugar.  There will be no leftovers.  I promise.

The Recipe

For the shells:
1 stick butter
1 cup water
1/4 teaspoon of salt
1 cup flour
4 eggs

Preheat your oven to 375 °F and line your baking sheets with parchment paper.  Melt the butter, water, and salt together in a saucepan and bring to a boil.  Remove from the heat and add the flour in one portion, mixing well until all the flour is incorporated and a ball forms.  At this point, add the eggs one by one, mixing thoroughly after each addition before adding the next egg.  Once you finish adding the eggs you have a basic choux paste that forms the basis for lots of different pastries.  Drop tablespoon-sized lumps of the dough onto your parchment-lined baking sheets, keeping them about 1-2 inches apart.  Bake the puffs at 375 °F for 30-35 minutes until golden brown.  At this point, remove the puffs from the oven and cut a small (about 1/2 inch) slit in the side of each puff.  Turn off the oven heat and then return the puffs to the (off) oven for 10 minutes.  After this time, remove them from the oven for good and cool on a rack.  You can store these tightly wrapped for about a day or so.

For the filling:
1 package vanilla instant pudding
1 cup whole milk
1 cup heavy cream

Combine the vanilla pudding, whole milk, and heavy cream in a large bowl and whip on medium speed until the consistency is appropriate for filling the cream puff shells.  I use a pastry bag to fill the cream puff shells through the small slit.  Whatever cream is left over, I eat with a spoon or spatula so it doesn’t go to waste.  The finished puffs can be drizzled with melted chocolate and dusted with powdered sugar right before serving.