CHOCOLATE-DIPPED CINNAMON COOKIES: VEGAN & DELICIOUS

Posted in Cookies by sallybr

Today I share a recipe for delicious cookies that happen to be vegan. No eggs, no dairy, but no sacrifice of flavor and texture. The recipe comes from Modern Vegan Desserts, written by a professional patissiere, Petra Stahlová. I invite you to read my review on her book (as well as musings on vegan baking in general) by visiting the Home Bakers Collective site, with a click here.

CHOCOLATE-DIPPED CINNAMON COOKIES
(published with permission from Petra Stahlová)

62g soft vegan butter (I used Country Crock plant butter)
62g icing sugar
15g almond flour
54g aquafaba
82g plain flour
3g ground cinnamon
200g 70% dark chocolate

In a mixer, beat the softened butter and the icing sugar until light and fluffy, then mix in the almond flour. Gradually mix in the aquafaba, adding a tablespoon of plain flour after each addition of liquid. Once all the liquid has been mixed in, carefully stir in the rest of the flour and the cinnamon with a spatula.

In a bowl, cover the batter with cling film so that it directly touches the surface, and leave to rest for half an hour at room temperature. Put the dough into a pastry bag with a 10mm diameter tip. Place either a silicon mat or some baking paper on the baking tray and pipe out 2.5 inches long lines onto the sheet. Don’t squeeze the bag too hard; the width of the batter should correspond to the diameter of the tip, i.e. 10mm. Leave half-an-inch space between the cookies, as they will spread out during baking.

Heat your oven to 375F (convection on, if available) and bake for about 7 minutes until the cookies are golden brown. Afterwards, leave the cookies on the baking tray for half a minute to firm up and then transfer them onto a cooling rack.

Temper the chocolate, then dip the cooled cookies and put them on either a silicon mat or baking paper to let the chocolate crystallize. Decorate with sprinkles, if so desired.

ENJOY!

to print the recipe, click here

Comments: I made these cookies for Mondays with Sweetness, in which I share bakes with our departmental colleagues. Since there is one adorable person who is allergic to eggs, I am always trying to find bakes that she will be able to enjoy. Nobody could tell these are vegan. The cinnamon flavor is perfect, the chocolate complements it well, and with the golden sprinkles they get a festive look. If you don’t feel like tempering chocolate, you can get by with candy melts but there will be a little compromise in flavor. I usually take the opportunity of tempering chocolate to make some extra decorations that might come in handy in future bakes.

I close this post inviting you to read more about Modern Vegan Desserts,
so please stop by the Home Bakers Collective.

ONE YEAR AGO: Lemony Barley with Shrimp and Spinach

TWO YEARS AGO:Black Rice with Roasted Cauliflower

THREE YEARS AGO:La Couronne Bordelaise

FOUR YEARS AGO: A Special Birthday Dinner

FIVE YEARS AGO: Duck Confit for a Special Occasion

SIX YEARS AGO: Tuscan Grilled Chicken and Sausage Skewers

SEVEN YEARS AGO: Celebrate Wednesday with Pork Tenderloin & Apples

EIGHT YEARS AGO: Salmon Wellington

NINE YEARS AGO: The Green Chip Alternative

TEN YEARS AGO: Weekend Pita Project

ELEVEN YEARS AGO: Let it snow, let it snow, eggs in snow

13Jan2021

FENNEL-RUBBED SHRIMP IN LIGHT COCONUT SAUCE

Posted in Seafood by sallybr

Nothing comes together faster than a meal involving shrimp. Or sea scallops, for that matter. But in this neck of the woods it is a rare, very rare event to find dry scallops, whereas good quality shrimp is always available. For this preparation, instead of using a full can of coconut milk (so common in recipes everywhere), I opted for full-fat yogurt with a touch of light coconut milk. Worked wonderfully well. Tasty but considerably lighter.

FENNEL-RUBBED SHRIMP IN LIGHT COCONUT SAUCE
(from the Bewitching Kitchen)

1 + 1/2 pounds large shrimp, peeled and deveined
1 tsp ground fennel
1 teaspoon ground Kashmiri chiles
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp turmeric
1½ teaspoons kosher salt
1 to 2 tablespoons grapeseed oil
1/3 cup cashews, toasted
1/2 cup full-fat yogurt
1/4 cup light coconut milk
drizzle of honey
dried mint, to taste (optional)

Combine the ground spices and salt in a bowl, add the shrimp and mix to cover it with spices. Refrigerate for 30 min to 1 hour, if possible, but you can start cooking right away. Mix the yogurt with coconut milk and honey, reserve.

Heat the oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add the shrimp, cook, stirring them for a couple of minutes. Add the yogurt-coconut mixture, and cook in low-heat until shrimp is fully cooked and the sauce reduces a bit. Add the cashew nuts, dried mint (if using), and serve..

ENJOY!

to print the recipe, click here

Comments: I am calling this dish “Fennel” shrimp because it was the flavor that came through more obviously, at least for me. If you like more heat, add more pepper, or add a touch of cayenne. I love the flavor of Kashmiri pepper, so that’s what I used. If you are like me, and twist the nose at dried mint, I suggest you give it a try. I lost my dried mint snobbism after reading about it in Middle Eastern cookbooks. It has a permanent spot in my pantry now.

Shrimp in light coconut sauce over white rice. So simple, and so satisfying! My kind of dinner!

ONE YEAR AGO: Puff Bread Balls, Two Salads and a Cookbook Review

TWO YEARS AGO: Pistachio-Caramel and Apple Mousse Cakes

THREE YEARS AGO: La Couronne Bordelaise

FOUR YEARS AGO: A Special Birthday Dinner

FIVE YEARS AGO: Duck Confit for a Special Occasion

SIX YEARS AGO: Tuscan Grilled Chicken and Sausage Skewers

SEVEN YEARS AGO: Celebrate Wednesday with Pork Tenderloin & Apples

EIGHT YEARS AGO: Salmon Wellington

NINE YEARS AGO: The Green Chip Alternative

TEN YEARS AGO: Weekend Pita Project

ELEVEN YEARS AGO: Let it snow, let it snow, eggs in snow

10Jan2021

COOKIES WITH A SMILE

Posted in Cookies by sallybr

For almost two years now I’ve been baking for weekly homeless meals, in a church-organized project called Common Table. Before pandemic times they had a sit-down dinner in a big room, so I could bake whatever I felt like it, including regular cakes, pies, tarts. With Covid-19 in the equation, everything changed. They show up and grab a bag with their meal, so any sweets must be individually wrapped and packed together with their main meal. This has obviously restricted my choices of things to bake, and I find myself making more cookies and less of everything else. But, there is always a silver lining. Focusing on cookies made me decide to improve my decorating skills, so that sweets could also bring a smile, especially for families with kids. Every week I include about a dozen iced sugar cookies, so that I can practice different styles of decoration, and at the same time not get too overwhelmed by the process. Visiting Youtube University I try to learn from the great cookie decorators out there. In this post I show you a few of my favorite recent adventures and include the video tutorials I followed to make them. The basic cookie recipes were either gingerbread (this post) or variations of my default recipe for sugar cookies.

PENGUIN GINGERBREAD COOKIE

To make these cutie pies I followed Haniela’s tutorial found in this link. Starting with a simple round cookie I drew a heart shape with a food pen. Then I used four different colors of Royal Icing: black and white with flood consistency, and orange and pink with thick consistency. For Royal icing I recommend the wonderful recipe from my tent-baking friend Tanya. All piping was done without icing tips, just bags cut with sharp scissors.

After flooding with white, I waited for it to crust, flooded with black and waited for it to crust also. A couple of hours later I made the details of nose, feet, and the little bow. For the feet, it is better to pipe the two external parts, wait 10 minutes and pipe the central one, so that they don’t join together. Next, just like in the video, I drew the eyes, and added red luster powder to the cheeks with a soft brush. Finally, I piped an outline of white royal icing, and immediately touched the wet surface of the cookie into a plate with black sanding sugar. I love my little penguin girls.

SANTA’S HEAD

To make these sleepy Santas, I followed the tutorial from Little Cookie Co. Just three colors of Royal Icing are needed: white, peach and red. Her tutorial explains it all very well, and I was just a little nervous to make the mustache, because it had to be piped free hand and I have a hard time making things symmetrical. I guess it turned out ok, maybe Santa had a bit too much eggnog the night before, but these are trying times for all.

SNOWGLOBE SUGAR COOKIE

Another wonderful tutorial by Little Cookie Co. I made quite a few of those during the month of December, some smaller containing just a small snowman, some with a Christmas tree as Royal icing transfer (shown in the composite picture that opened this post). If you watch the tutorial, you’ll see she pipes the tree with icing free-hand (check it out at 4 min and 5 seconds), but I simply could not bring myself to even try. This is a more elaborate cookie to make, many layers, a lot of waiting, a work of patience. But I do think the result is pretty nice!

SWAN SUGAR COOKIE

I followed part of the tutorial shown in this link, but added my own feathers… oops my own design of feathers. I am actually featherless. I modified it because I don’t care for the taste (or texture) of fondant, although I admit it looks absolutely stunning. It seems also quite a bit of work, as each feather must be shaped individually using small silicone molds. I decided to just pipe some white Royal Icing and immediately shower it with white sanding sugar.

The cookie is actually quite simple to make. Flood the body with white, let it crust. Add the orange beak leaving a small space between the beak and body. Right away add a small band of black royal icing, and pull with a scribe tool very lightly towards the beak and towards the body. A small dot of black for the eye, and just the tiniest touch of white off center on the eye. It is a small detail that makes eyes look a lot more realistic.

HOT CHOCOLATE MUG COOKIE

To make these cookies I followed the tutorial from this link (at 4 min 20 sec). For the decoration of the mug itself, I opted for three different styles. Two are shown above: royal icing transfer of a snowflake, or wet-on-wet white icing over the basic blue. After the mug crusted, I added the whipped cream part, let that crust and hours later added the white swirls + mandatory sanding sugar coating.

The third style was air-brushing with white pearl dye and a stencil. The top was sprayed with Diamond dust, a product I featured recently on In My Kitchen.

REINDEER LITTLE STAR

For these cookies I did not follow a tutorial, just saw them somewhere in the internet, saved a screenshot and improvised my version. Flooded the white part, waited about 10 minutes, flooded the upper brown, waited a couple of hours and added the triangle white for ears, black for antlers, and red for nose. Next morning it was time to draw the eyes and add red powder dust for the cheeks. Perhaps this was my favorite cookie of this series, although I do love the Penguin Girls…

I tell you one thing, I already miss holiday baking!

ONE YEAR AGO: Pearled Farro with Asparagus Coins

TWO YEARS AGO: Pistachio Caramel and Apple Mousse Cake

THREE YEARS AGO: Someone turns 70 today!

FOUR YEARS AGO: Carioca Cake, the Final Chapter

FIVE YEARS AGO: Duck Confit for a Special Occasion

SIX YEARS AGO: Ken Forkish’s Warm Spot Sourdough

SEVEN YEARS AGO: Bran Muffins, Rainbows, and a wonderful surprise!

EIGHT YEARS AGO: Salmon Wellington

NINE YEARS AGO: The Green Chip Alternative

TEN YEARS AGO: Weekend Pita Project

ELEVEN YEARS AGO: Let it snow, let it snow, eggs in snow

SWAN COOKIES

7Jan2021

PORK TENDERLOIN WITH APRICOT-MISO GLAZE

Posted in Pork by sallybr

My default method of preparation for pork tenderloin is butterflied and grilled. I suppose default means a single entity, so I will break that rule and include a second option: sous-vide. But sometimes you get into a situation that prevents both from happening. It was very nasty outside so grilling would be masochism. And there was not enough time to sous-vide unless we wanted to have dinner at 9pm. Brazilians do that often, but I totally lost that habit and have no interest in re-visiting it. I had to come up with a plan C, and this was the tasty outcome.

PORK TENDERLOIN WITH APRICOT-MISO GLAZE
(adapted from Bon Appetit)

Nonstick vegetable oil spray
5 tablespoons apricot preserves
1/4 cup red miso
1/4 cup Champagne vinegar
2 teaspoons finely grated orange peel
2 pork tenderloins
1/2 cup low-salt chicken broth

Heat oven to 425°F. Coat large rimmed baking sheet with oil spray. Combine preserves, miso, vinegar, orange peel, and garlic in small pot over medium heat. Cook until thickened, 1 to 2 minutes. If you want to make a smooth sauce, use a handheld mixer or small food processor for a few seconds. Reserve.

Sprinkle pork with salt and pepper. Place on prepared baking sheet, tucking thin end under to ensure even cooking. Brush with 2 tablespoons apricot glaze; roast 12 to 15 minutes. Turn pork over with tongs and brush with 3 more tablespoons glaze. Continue to roast until instant-read thermometer inserted into center of pork registers 150°F, 10 minutes longer. If you like your pork cooked a bit more (we do), keep cooking and check the internal temperature with a probe thermometer.

Transfer pork to cutting board, tent with foil, and let rest 10 minutes. Meanwhile, add chicken broth to remaining apricot glaze. Bring to simmer and cook until reduced to 2/3 cup sauce, about 5 minutes. Season with salt and pepper. Slice pork crosswise into 1/2- to 3/4- inch-thick slices and arrange on platter. Spoon sauce over and serve.

ENJOY!

to print the recipe, click here

Comments: There is really nothing special about the handling of the tenderloin, apart from the delicious glaze. Different brands of apricot preserves have different levels of “chunkiness”, I used one with pretty large pieces of apricot and they did not quite melt into the sauce even with heating. So I opted to smooth things out with my blender. You might get by without that step. I only roasted one tenderloin, and had a bit of sauce leftover. It showed up again a couple of evenings later to coat chicken-cashew meatballs. Perfect marriage. Actually I believe this glaze will go well with pretty much any type of protein, including seafood.

ONE YEAR AGO: Tropical Sunshine Entremet Cake (perhaps my favorite ever!)

TWO YEARS AGO: Freekeh with Zucchini and Almonds

THREE YEARS AGO: Salmon a la Wellington, re-visited

FOUR YEARS AGO: The Unbearable Unfairness of Cake Baking

FIVE YEARS AGO: Hermit Cookies

SIX YEARS AGO: Cremini Mushroom Meatloaf

SEVEN YEARS AGO: Ottolenghi & Tamimi’s Roast Chicken with Clementines

EIGHT YEARS AGO: Eight-Ball Zucchini: The Missing Files

NINE YEARS AGO: Grilling Ribbons

TEN YEARS AGO: Peppery Cashew Crunch

ELEVEN YEARS AGO: Ossobuco Milanese: an Italian Classic

4Jan2021

BEE HAPPY HONEY MACARONS

Posted in macarons by sallybr

The year ended with macarons, the new year starts with them. French macarons launched me on the path of baking, so they will always have a very special place in my heart. But if you are a reader of my blog, you know that already. I wanted my first macarons of 2021 to be happy and uplifting. And sweet. Sweet as honey. Like life should be.

MANUKA HONEY & MASCARPONE MACARONS
(from the Bewitching Kitchen, decoration inspired by Sugar and Cloth)

For the shells:
200g Icing/powdered sugar
115 g almond flour
115 g egg whites at room temperature (approx. 4 eggs)
1/8 tsp of cream of tartar (optional)
100 g granulated sugar
¼ tsp vanilla paste or extract
gold or yellow food gel color (I used gold from Sunny Side Up Bakery)

For filling:
30 g unsalted butter softened
60 g mascarpone cheese, at room temperature
1 tbsp manuka honey (or another intense honey)
185 g powdered sugar
1/8 tsp lime oil or extract

Line 3 heavy baking sheets with parchment/baking paper or Silpat mats. Layer the powdered/icing sugar and ground almonds/almond meal in a food processor. Pulse until the mixture looks like fine meal, about 12 pulses. Pass through a sieve and transfer to a small bowl or to a sheet of parchment/baking paper. Set aside.

Place the egg whites and cream of tartar in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment. Make sure that the bowl and the whisk are impeccably clean. Starting on medium speed, whip the whites with the cream of tartar until they look like light foam. The whites should not appear liquid. The foam will be light and should not have any structure.

Slowly rain in the granulated sugar in five additions, trying to aim the stream between the whisk and the side of the bowl. Turn the speed up to high. Continue to whip the meringue until it is soft and shiny. It should look like marshmallow creme (marshmallow fluff). Add the vanilla and food colors. Whip the egg whites until the mixture begins to dull and the lines of the whisk are visible on the surface of the meringue. Check the peak. It should be firm. Transfer the whites to a medium bowl.

Fold in the ground almond/almond meal mixture in two increments. Paint the mixture halfway up the side of the bowl, using the flat side of a spatula. Scrape the mixture down to the center of the bowl. Repeat two or three times, then check to see if the mixture slides slowly down the side of the bowl. Put the mixture in a piping bag fitted with your choice of piping tip (round, ¼ or ½ inch in diameter or 6 – 12 mm). If you don’t have a macaron mat, draw circles on baking/parchment paper about 2inches/5cm in diameter & turn the paper over before placing on the baking sheets. Pipe shells, I like to count numbers in my head and use the same count for each shell so they end up similar in size. If making snowmen, make a template with two circles joined together to form head and body, and pipe each section.

Slam each sheet hard four to six times on the counter/worktop. Let the unbaked macarons dry until they look dull but not overly dry. Drying time depends on humidity. In a dry climate, the macarons can dry in 15 to 20 minutes; in a humid climate, it can take 35 to 40 minutes.

While the macarons are drying, heat the oven to 300 F. Bake one sheet at a time on the middle rack. Check in 11 minutes. If the tops slide or move (independently of the ‘feet’ when you gently twist the top), then bake for 2 to 3 more minutes. Check one or two. If they move when gently touched, put them back in the oven for 1 to 2 more minutes until they don’t move when touched. Let the macaroons cool for 10 minutes before removing from the pan. The macarons should release without sticking.

For the filling, use a hand-held electric mixer and whisk the butter and mascarpone cheese until creamy. Add the honey and lemon extract, whisk a minute longer. Add the powdered sugar, whisk in low-speed at first, the increase speed and whisk until creamy and smooth. If needed, add a very small amount of milk or heavy cream.

Assemble the macarons: find two macarons similar in size and add a good amount of filling to the bottom of one of them. Place the other on top and squeeze gently to take the filling all the way to the edge. Store in the fridge for 24 hours for perfect texture.

Decorate with Royal icing bees if desired.

ENJOY!

to print the recipe, click here

Comments: I must confess something. The filling was going to be slightly different: I wanted to make a buttercream or ganache with burnt honey. Recently one of my tent-baking friends made a cake and used it for the filling. Apparently the flavor is just amazing. But I got lazy. So I decided to part with a tablespoon of my Manuka honey because its flavor is so intense, it could (maybe) compensate for my laziness. And it really did. I love the way these macs turned out. The lemon extract cuts a bit through the sweetness, so don’t omit it.

The decoration requires a little time but is pretty simple. You will need a very small amount of Royal Icing dyed yellow-orange. Pipe small cylinders where you want each little bee to be (ooops, sorry about that). Let it set. Next, make the little dots to represent their flying path with a fine tip food pen. Use the same pen to draw antennas and wings. Please note that the antennas should go opposite to the end of the flying path (after a few bees it is easy to make a mistake). To make the black lines on the body, it is best to use a marker with a soft tip (like these), but if you don’t have one, let the bodies set for at least 4 hours and then go gently with a regular food pen. The surface is obviously very fragile. I am truly in love with these babies!