Woody's Black and White Brownies Rose's Alpha Bakers

Woody's Black and White Brownies (with a touch of green) 'The Baking Bible'

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 Stuart's video brownie review Flickr. 

Little Stuart is eight years old and has autism, each week he asks me "is it chocolate yet?" This week it is chocolate!! Woody's Black and White Brownies. 

Stuart wanted to take the brownies to school tomorrow, so the we had to veto the bourbon in the ganache topping and no nuts (nut free school).  This caused an hour or three problem as Stuart kept repeating "the recipe says bourbon" but we settled on mint largely due to Stuart loving 'Peppermint crisp' chocolate bars. :)

peppermint crisp bar a popular chocolate bar in Australia, New Zealand and South Africa... often used in desserts. 

Chocolate and butter were melted in a double boiler and scraped into the mixing bowl of the stand mixer.

Cocoa and sugar were added and mixed until incorporated.

Eggs and vanilla were beaten in, the mixture became thick and glossy.

Cream cheese was added and beaten until small bits remained and the mixture was spread evenly in the lined baking pan. I added a handful of choc chips, well just to surprise Stuart really. 

Hmm, I wondered at this stage were you supposed to be seeing the little bits of cream cheese?

Brownies were baked until the batter was set one inch from the edge.

Next was making the white chocolate custard base that would be a compontent of the white chocolate buttercream. I used small callettes so I didn't have to cut chocolate into pieces.

I had never made a custard from melted white chocolate and butter until this recipe, interesting technique. 

White chocolate and butter are melted over a double boiler.

Whisked eggs are added and cooked until slightly thickened (you have custard), it's then strained and cooled.

white chocolate custard ready to be cooled

Butter is whipped until creamy, custard gradually mixed in. Beaten to stiff peaks form and covered and popped away for a couple of hours. 

Frosting is them rebeaten briefly and vanilla added.

Time to spread frosting on cooled brownie base. 

Next up "dark chocolate ganache glaze", cream and chocolate are melted together (there is bourbon in this bit if you are using) and ganache is spread on frosting. I sprinkled the crushed peppermint crisp chocolate bars on top at this stage. 

The brownies are back to fridge now to chill at least one hour before unmoulding and slicing.

Straight from the fridge the texture is like this. The brownies are much easier to slice. Once returned to room temperature the white chocolate frosting is extremely soft and will squelch out as you bite. I'd like a firmer white layer more in line with denseness that is "a brownie". The brownie base is great, fudgy without being cloying. You can still see the little pieces of cream cheese, not sure what that is about but hey "it's good'.  

Stuart studying his brownie, he absoloutely loved them... as did his Dad.

How it works... now I've joined the fabulous existing alpha bakers, once a week I will post about what I have baked from Rose Levy Beranbaum's 'The Baking Bible'. This won't include the recipe due to copyright and publisher restrictions however, I will be posting how it went and photos of making/baking the gorgeous baked goods.

Would I bake again? All the elements yes, but not together. Great tasting brownie. Great tasting white chocolate custard frosting. Just not the two together.  

Would I change anything? Yes, I would make the brownie base alone and top with ganache. Maybe incorporate the cream cheese fully because it's not visually appealing.

The Baking Bible available from Amazon and all discerning book retailers. 

You might also be interested in chocolate twirly swirly decorations 

100 percent Whole Wheat Walnut Loaf Rose's Alpha Bakers

100% Whole Wheat Walnut Loaf 'The Baking Bible'

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Brrrr, baby it's cold outside! It's been hailing off and on all day and rumours of snow in a nearby suburb in the hills, I say "rumoured" because we do all get excited about even one flake of snow. 

Walnut bread toasted (grilled) aged cheddar cheese sandwiches and pumpkin soup with a hint of orange, the perfect starter to ward off winter chills. 

100% Whole Wheat (in Australia we say wholemeal) Walnut Bread is a fabulously flavoured versatile bread, lets get started.... 

I started by making the dough starter (sponge), wholemeal flour, water, honey and yeast are combined. To make a vegan bread swap the honey out for golden syrup.   

The mixture is whisked to incorporate air, it will resemble a thin batter. 

Time to make the dough now with more wholemeal flour, *gluten flour and instant yeast are sprinkled over the sponge starter forming a blanket of flour. 

An hour later and there is bubbles bubbling up through the flour. 

Ok better toast and break up the walnuts now, 166 grams to be exact are toasted in the oven and the then the skins are removed. 

Shhh, I cheated and used a photo of removing walnut skin from the Stilton Cheesecake story.

With the dough hook fitted on my mixer, dough is mixed and then rested for 20 minutes. Back to mixing now with the addition of walnut oil, salt and toasted walnut pieces before going off to rise.

The first rise. 

The second rise. 

After turning out the risen dough the dough is "dimpled" using your fingertips to get rid of air bubbles. The dough is shaped and put into prepared tin (I used four small tins instead of one large) and then off to rise for the last time before baking. 

Over half way through last rise, almost time to go into the pre heated oven. 

Baked, cooled and it's time to eat!!  

It's not the "prettiest" bread but boy served fresh with blue cheese and pear and it's a wonderful combination of flavours. Plus it's easy to slice thinly, like what I used in the aged cheddar cheese toasted sandwiches paired with the pumpkin soup today.

Oh, oh, oh mini loaves would make the best hostess gift, wrap the centre of the loaf with brown or baking paper, tie with kitchen string, throw in a chunk of blue or a bottle of red for a unique and welcome hostess gift.

This bread is also great for vegetarians/vegans, high in protein, low GI and perfect to serve with your favourite veggie stew.  

Also great "baker's treat"... toasted crusts of walnut loaf with French fine cut marmalade. 

Happy Baking :) 

*Gluten flour: we used gluten flour to promote rise and texture in today's bread. The gluten is in the whole wheat flour but the wheat germ is blocking the release so you use added gluten, a protein composite from wheat and related grains. This gives you not only extra "lift" in rising it also provides the characteristic "chew" we associate with bread. It's why you add various gums to gluten free bread trying to recreate the chew gluten provides.  Gluten flour is also used extensively in vegan and vegetarian cuisine to create seitan and in asian cooking for dishes such as like "mock duck". 

Would I bake again? Yes, loved it for "something different to serve" factor.. plus tasted great. 

Would I change anything?  I loved it as is, I would continue to bake smaller sized loaves. I'd like to try halving the walnut weight and adding either dried apricots or dried muscatel grapes for a fruit/nut loaf. 

 How it works... now I've joined the fabulous existing alpha bakers, once a month I will post about what I have baked from Rose Levy Beranbaum's 'The Baking Bible'. This won't include the recipe due to copyright and publisher restrictions however, I will be posting how it went and photos of making/baking the gorgeous baked goods.

The Baking Bible available from Amazon and all discerning book retailers. 

You might also be interested in Amore Frangelico Truffles, rich in mascarpone and chocolate!

ElderBlueberry Pie (with no elderberries) Rose's Alpha Bakers

ElderBlueberry Pie (with no elderberries instead blackcurrants and blueberries) 'The Baking Bible'

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Apparently elderberries grow well in Australia, so my local nursery man told me. Yet I have never seen one, an elderberry that is. All about elderberries on Wikipedia

We love a savoury pie here, usually red meat but poultry, seafood and veg pies are also popular. Perhaps that is the reason we don't have a fruit pie culture in Australia, ummm "apple" you might have apple pie over winter or perhaps an aunt might whip up an apple/rhubarb pie.  Add in a mini fruit mince pie or three at Christmas and that's your dessert pie eating over for the year. We do like tarts and tarte Tatin but the double pie crust is a hard sell without the meat! 

This is supposed to be a family sized pie, but I went with "mini pies" to give sample pies out for my first ever berry pie.

Starting with Rose's 'Perfect Flaky and Tender Cream Cheese Pie Crust' recipe, butter is cubed and then frozen. You can make by hand or with the food processor, I went with the latter.  The recipe is a rough puff pastry with a cream cheese/butter combo (rather than all butter or shortening/butter or lard/butter combination). 

frozen cubed butter

It's cream cheese that creates a little magic with this pastry, but more on that later first you need to take your chilled flour, salt and baking powder mixture from the freezer and process it with cream cheese.

The frozen butter then goes in for a whizz, cream and vinegar are added and the mix is processed until the butter is the size of small peas. 

Removed from the food processor in it's crumb form and pressed together, wrapped and then chilled.

Time to roll... the mottled look showing the tiny pieces of cold butter. I rolled mine between two lightly floured pieces of plastic wrap. Envelope folded, rerolled, chilling happening too! 

Cutting my top pieces with love heart steam hole. 

There is chilling/resting steps along the way here but I'm on to the elderberry (less) fruit filling now. 

Yep, it's winter here so it's frozen berries. Blackcurrants and blueberries were left to defrost over a strainer so I could use the juice in the next step. 

A slurry is made with water and cornflour (I used the juice from defrosted berries and made up the extra with water). 

Sugar and fruit is added to the pot, I added zest as elderberries would have added more tartness. Looking rather brightly coloured at this stage, but after a brief cooking time to activate cornflour (corn starch) the mixture is thick and dark. If serving pies warm the mixture will thin a little and at room temperature will thicken again. 

Pie pan was lined with pastry, filled with berry filling, topped with pastry tops and baked. Lol, this is one of those"dang I thought I took photos of that bit" moments. But here is a pie! 

Inside corner of pie showing the flakiness of the pastry even when rolled paper thin.

Now back to the "cream cheese pastry magic". Normally once you re-roll puff or rough puff pastry you lose more of your "puff" each time your re-roll  ... however the cream cheese in this pastry is far more forgiving and allows you to re-roll many times and not lose the rise. Example above is fourth roll out of scraps and you are still getting this height after the pastry was "scrunched" and re-rolled. 

Bread baking next Rose's Alpha Bakers bake.

Happy Baking :) 

Would I bake again? Yes and no... pastry yes... this would make a wonderful savoury pie crust. As a fruit pie no, but I do want to try other fruit pies from Rose's books there could be a "game changer" in there. 

Would I change anything?  No, it tasted fine and I guess that's what a berry pie should taste like, I suppose, not sure ha ha.  

 How it works... now I've joined the fabulous existing alpha bakers, once a month I will post about what I have baked from Rose Levy Beranbaum's 'The Baking Bible'. This won't include the recipe due to copyright and publisher restrictions however, I will be posting how it went and photos of making/baking the gorgeous baked goods.

The Baking Bible available from Amazon and all discerning book retailers. 

you might also be interested a fondant pie cupcake ... it has blackbirds :)

Prosciutto Ring

proscuitto ring; a coarse rustic bread just waiting to be ripped apart. 

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This is my first monthly post for 'The Bread Bible' by award winning cookbook author Rose Levy Beranbaum. 

Excited by the opportunity to learn more about bread baking, my Grandfather and Great Uncle were both Master Bakers that owned their own bakery in the northern suburbs of Melbourne. The bakery sold cakes, pies, pastries but were especially known for their bread. My Great Uncle taught/lectured at the culinary university in Melbourne, particularly on the subject of wheat production. 

I never met my Grandfather who died before I was born, some say that my love of baking is in my genes. I believe it's belng raised hearing about tales of the bakery from my Dad and Aunt that sparked my love of cooking. 

20 years ago I ate some salami ... yep, and in 2009 my step son made chocolate bacon for a school exams and I tried that, but since this is my first bread bake from 'The Baking Bible' I'm commited to the "meat" for this loaf. Lets start with the lard. 

Lard:  despite its reputation, lard has less saturated fat, more unsaturated fat, and less cholesterol than an equal amount of butter by weight. Unlike many margarines and vegetable shortenings, unhydrogenated lard contains no trans fat.  wikipedia

With the resurgance of traditional British recipes for the last decade (which I love!!) and favour with chefs world wide, the demand for good quality lard continues. The neutral flavour, high smoke point, lower saturated fat product is produced from swine fat. Often combined with butter to produce light and crispy pastry, lard is tradionally used in fruit studded Welsh and Lardy cakes to crispy roast potatoes.

Today's bread is a "lard bread" but is also brushed with bacon fat. Here I am making wet-rendered bacon fat, this is how you make lard too. Bacon fat is put in a saucepan (or slow cooker if you are making a lot) and boiled with water until the fat releases/melts. On cooling I skimmed the bacon fat off ready to be remelted to brush on the loaf. 

wet-rendered bacon fat

The prosuciutto loaf contains three meats, prosucitto, pepperoni and hot sopressata (a dry salami). Rose suggests baked ham or even turkey ham can be substituted if desired.

I used prosuciutto, salami and bacon... because I had bacon meat left over from producing the bacon fat. 

prosuciutto, probably should have been cut a little thicker than this

salami I used... couldn't anything close to hot sopressata without going to the city to get it

Flour, yeast, black pepper and barley malt syrup were combined before salt, warm water and lard are added. All done in the KitchenAid, but there is hand and food proceesor instructions in the book too. 

 lard brought to room temperature is spreadable and in fact is still used in parts of europe as alterative to butter.

Dough once meat has been added.

The dough is rested briefly before rolling into a sausage shape and formed into a ring and brushed with cooled melted bacon fat.

Bake in a hot oven, before reducing heat and transferring directly to baking stone for further baking, the kitchen aroma reminded me of the local pizzeria. Once removed from the oven the loaf is then brushed with bacon fat again and left to cool.

Taste, well it's surely "meaty"... the bread itself is fabulous, serve this rustic loaf as part of antipasto platter, accompany with a green salad and you have a picnic brunch, lunch for the family or a light dinner with a bottle of red to wash it all down. 

Would I bake again? Yes, I can imagine using up leftover Christmas ham etc in this bread for a boxing day brunch perhaps.

Would I change anything? Oh, I'd love to give a vegetarian version a try. Charred grilled veg, little pesto... maybe some pinenuts too. Sundried tomatoes, feta and kalamata olives would be good too... add a handful of fresh herbs. 

How it works... now I've joined the fabulous existing alpha bakers, once a month I will post about what bread I have baked from Rose Levy Beranbaum's 'The Bread Bible'. This won't include the recipe due to copyright and publisher restrictions however, I will be posting how it went and photos of making/baking the gorgeous baked goods.

 The Bread Bible  available from Amazon and where all good books are sold.

You might like Toblerone Dessert in 30 minutes. 

Praline Pecan Meringue Ice Cream Sandwiches Rose's Alpha Bakers

Praline Pecan Meringue Ice Cream Sandwich 'The Baking Bible'

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A quick, easy and gluten free go to ice cream sandwich biscuit (cookie) today. 

I've made brown sugar meringues and meringue ice cream sandwiches before, but it's the combo of brown muscovado sugar and toasted pecans in these cookies that instantly turns a scoop of ice cream into a portable ice cream sundae.

The recipe called for light muscovado sugar or dark brown sugar, my local Woolies had light and dark muscovado on special this week... and I thought I got one of each, but nah I grabbed two dark muscovado's by mistake so dark it is.  

If you haven't used muscovado before, it has a wonderful aroma and unique treacle-y flavour that is unmatched in the world of sugars. 

Start by toasting your pecans, then leave half whole and chop the rest into small pieces.

Muscovado sugar and egg whites are whipped until thick and light, the cooled pecans are folded in. I divided the mixture as this stage and added choc chips to one half... just because, well "chocolate" hello!  

Scoops are put on your lined baking tray and gently shaped to discs with a spatula. 

Baked, cooled and filled with your favourite ice cream flavour, home made or store bought. Rose includes a recipe for 'Rose Blend Ganache Piping Glaze' for topping the ice cream sandwiches, a lovely white/dark ganache mixture that I didn't pipe I more did the "strewn" thing... delicious either way.  

Think of pairing the biscuits with salted caramel ice cream, bourbon banana for a banana foster ice cream sandwich, chocolate (of course), burnt caramel fig ice cream, coffee (not the sweet Vietnamese coffee type, but rather an Italian espresso type to counter cookie sweetness) or just a scoop of classic vanilla. 

The meringue mix can also be baked as cookies, just bake in scooped shape for chubby, light and crisp with squidgy centres.  

Would I bake again? A definite yes!! Loved these cookies, with only three ingredients (or four if you add chocolate) we all need a quick pantry staple cookie. Fabulous they are gluten free.

Would I change anything? Umm, if I added chocolate I would use a darker higher cocoa ratio variety to play against the sweetness... otherwise no.  

How it works... now I've joined the fabulous existing alpha bakers, once a week I will post about what I have baked from Rose Levy Beranbaum's 'The Baking Bible'. This won't include the recipe due to copyright and publisher restrictions however, I will be posting how it went and photos of making/baking the gorgeous baked goods.

Happy Baking :)

The Baking Bible by Rose Levy Beranbaum is available from Amazon and where all good books are sold. 

And for something totally different...  Squid ink grisini recipe.  

Double Damage Oblivion chocolate cake Rose's Alpha Bakers

            Double Damage Oblivion chocolate cake 'The Baking Bible'

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Renowned chocolate cake lovers, the single dad with his eight year old autistic son picked up the Double Damage Oblivion cake that I baked from Rose Levy Beranbaum's 'The Baking Bible' today ... I just got the review back "You've got a good cake here".

The guys review contradicts my opinion of the cake and once again illustrates different people have different likes and dislikes and it all comes down to personal preference and knowing your audience. 

Today's bake calls for baking two different cakes, starting with the Chocolate Oblivion by first melting chocolate and butter together over a pot of hot water.

Then with a long handled whisk, eggs were beaten over a pan of simmering until warm, before being beaten in a mixer until light and billowy. 

The whipped eggs are folded into the chocolate mixture. 

The tin was a springform, greased a third of the way up and base lined with baking paper. 

The sides and base of tin were double wrapped in aluminum foil and the cake baked in a water bath until set but still wobbly in the centre. Then the cake was covered and popped in the refrigerator overnight.

Cake two is the Deep Chocolate Passion. You can tell we are up to the second part of a recipe because I forgot to take photos :P

A cake tin with greased bottom only, is then lined with baking paper. Cocoa and boiling water is beaten until smooth the cooled. Oil and eggs are added to the cooled mixture and beaten until smooth and shiny. Flour is added an resulting batter spread evenly into the tin and baked.

Oh my... this next part made me nervous, after running a flat knife around the edge of the hot baked cake you have to turn out the hot cake!! Yep, nervous for no reason the cake came out easily and it was time to peel the away the baking paper and reverse cake so the top is ummm, on the "top".  

Dang, don't take photos of the paper liner when your hot cake is the wrong way around on the rack... you will get this effect "a cross hatch cake".

There is ganache; yes you make ganache and spread it on your chocolate oblivion, which is topped with the bottom layer of deep chocolate passion cake... then reversed... more ganache on the now top of oblivion and then the final layer of cake is laid on top.  

Now you will see your chocolate oblivion layer needs trimming to be the same size as your cake... once you have trimmed, a hot knife is run around cake until you have a smooth and shiny finish. 

Sprinkle sifted cocoa powder and eat!

Here is the inside texture of cake, all the layers look super moist but what I found was it ate "dry", after a mouthful you felt like you needed a drink, second mouthful more drink, third mouthful maybe I'll just drink my coffee. The chocolate oblivion layer tasted like a ganache truffle but doesn't have the melt in mouth truffle feel.  

Would I bake again? Not sure, there is other Rose's chocolate cakes I like more. 

Would I change anything?  There was an option to use jam rather than ganache to join the layers but either way if I baked again I would have preferred the cake to be syruped. A coffee liqueur syrup, or orange or perhaps chambord would have been nice. A thin water gel or berry gel layer would be good too. 

How it works... now I've joined the fabulous existing alpha bakers, once a week I will post about what I have baked from Rose Levy Beranbaum's 'The Baking Bible'. This won't include the recipe due to copyright and publisher restrictions however, I will be posting how it went and photos of making/baking the gorgeous baked goods.

Happy Baking :) 

Award winning author Rose Levy Beranbaum's The Baking Bible is available from Amazon and other good book stores worldwide.  

You might also be interested in Baci chocolate Ice-cream recipe

The Red Velvet Rose (cake) Rose's Alpha Bakers

red velvet rose cake with raspberry sauce, served with ice-cream

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What's in a name? that which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet;

Romeo and Juliet  William Shakespeare 

I didn't have the rose bundt pan needed for today's Red Velvet Rose cake from 'The Baking Bible' bake, but I baked in anyway in the heritage bundt pan. 

There is a few different options for this cake colour/flavour wise, at Christmas I used beetroot juice to colour and the extra cocoa option.  Colour wise the resulting cake was a non descript "brownish hue". Today I went with less cocoa and red food colour.

Ok, I can see the appeal of red velvet for valentines, weddings or even Halloween but really "I don't get it"...it's not on my list of favorite cake varieties. 

Today's bake started with mixing egg whites, red food colouring and vanilla to combined.

yep nice and red

Butter, oil and sugar were beaten to fluffy. I liked this in the recipe, the taste of butter combined with moistness oil adds to cakes. A flour mixture including a small amount of cocoa was mixed in, then the red whites were added.

tiny amount of cocoa powder

resulting red batter once all the ingredients were combined

Whilst the cake was baking I was defrosting frozen raspberries to gather to juice to make a reduction.

The reduced juice was added to raspberry pulp, sweetened and sieved to make a brushing sauce.

This sauce has a threefold action of moistening, adding a lot of fresh flavour plus adding more colour. The sauce seeps into the cake after a short rest period. 

Cake after it has been entirely brushed with sauce. 

I served the cake with ice-cream wedges spinkled with freeze dried raspberries and grated chocolate. I made an extra thick raspberry sauce using the leftover sauce as a base. 

The cake has a great light texture, I loved the raspberry sauce. The red colour I found a little "frightening.

Yes, there has been a lack of other blog posts... oh my goodness if there is a winter bug in the air apparently I'm going to catch it!! Thanks Jacinta for the homemade soup, medicine, gift and the rest :) I'm sure that will make me feel better.      

Happy Baking :)                                                                                                                                                                                                                      

Would I make again? No, unless family/friend requested which is possible, it's not my kind of cake but I have a family member who loves it. 

Would I change anything? Hmmm, don't know really red velvet by it's very nature of intense colour is difficult to flavour.

How it works... now I've joined the fabulous existing alpha bakers, once a week I will post about what I have baked from Rose Levy Beranbaum's 'The Baking Bible'. This won't include the recipe due to copyright and publisher restrictions however, I will be posting how it went and photos of making/baking the gorgeous baked goods.

The Baking Bible  available from Amazon and all good book stores. 

 

You might also be interested in a cocktail, cupcake style with a Japanese Slipper Cupcake 

Classic Brioche Rose's Alpha Bakers

Petite Brioche Nanterre Loaves  : Classic Brioche 'The Baking Bible' 

Ban the Brioche Bun!!! Late last week our major talk back radio station called for a ban of hipster brioche bun hamburgers and brioche pulled meat buns. I don't think those people calling saying "enough is enough" with brioche buns have to worry, like the macarons before them the brioche bun craze has reached saturation point now McDonalds sells "build your own brioche burgers". 

Really I've yet to come across a brioche burger bun that comes close to home made brioche! With today being the Queens Birthday public holiday in Australia it's apt that I'm baking the queen of breads the classic brioche from 'The Baking Bible'.  This buttery beauty is a stunner, for me the aroma evoked the memory of bakeries as a child... oh and as Dad worked for Sara Lee when I was a kid, it kind of reminds me of a fresh soft version of Sara Lee's pecan danish. 

New to baking? There is a lot of steps in this recipe yet it's an easy recipe, most of steps you are "waiting" for the yeast to do it's thing. 

You start by making the "sponge" (a yeast starter), I made mine in a mixer. 

A flour mixture is then sprinkled over the sponge. 

Two hours later you'll have bubbles rising through the blanket of flour in parts.  

You'll need butter for buttery enriched bread, and here is what the rest of the world is perplexed about an American "stick of butter".  It's one hundred and thirteen grams for the rest of us... thanks Rose. 

Eggs and well softened butter are added and beaten in.

The resulting dough goes off for a rest in the fridge now, here I'm gently deflating before another hour in the fridge. Brioche, like other enriched breads has a refrigerator period to solidify the butter and make the dough easier to handle. 

The dough is envelope folded, rolled, folded and I forgot to take pictures of this bit. 

But I remembered to photograph when I wrapped my dough for it's overnight developing time.

Just unwrapped the dough here after a night in the refrigerator. It needs to be deflated a little before working with it. 

'The Baking Bible' uses a large loaf tin, I went with small individual tins.  I like the petite size, perfect for sharing and it does make really cute sandwiches for afternoon tea and the like. 

Smooth balls: whatever shape you are using, your dough needs to nice and smooth. Any fault in your dough now will show in the end product. 

Since I'm making Brioche Nanterre, there is eight balls in each lightly buttered tin to create the classic shape.  The tins are then covered with oiled plastic wrap and off to rise once again before baking.

I had enough dough to make four petite loaves. I used pearl sugar on two and left two plain.  There was a small amount of dough left so I made a few bite sized parisienne (Brioche à tête) with the classic fluted sides and "tête" (head) on top. 

Would I bake again?  Absolutely!! This recipe is incredibly versatile and can be used for sweet and savoury applications and yes, even for a batch of hipster hamburger buns. 

Would I change anything? Nup. 

How it works... now I've joined the fabulous existing alpha bakers, once a week I will post about what I have baked from Rose Levy Beranbaum's 'The Baking Bible'. This won't include the recipe due to copyright and publisher restrictions however, I will be posting how it went and photos of making/baking the gorgeous baked goods.

The Baking Bible

Happy Baking :)  

You might also like a recipe for making your own honeycomb 

French Orange Cream Tart Rose's Alpha Bakers

                                french orange cream tart 

Dad is running wild: always look forward to the 10pm phone call from the nursing home saying "your Dad is using his walker as a weapon". Dad's kept me busy this week with a trip to hospital plus two falls at the nursing home (he is fine... though I suspect his leaving a trail of staff and residents in his wake), soooo, I'm behind with my usual blog posts but I have finished my bake for Rose's Alpha Bakers. :) 

I'm sure many of you are familiar with (or have eaten 402 slices) of the classic French Tarte Au Citron (Lemon Tart)... today's tart is a lovely alternative to lemon tart using oranges. 

Started by making a template as per instructed by Rose to use as my pastry cutting guide. Hmm, The Simpson's ruler probably belies the sophistication of the tart... but I needed "inch" measurements. 

Thought I should make it food safe, so wrapped in foil. 

Pastry time started with processing the cold butter cubes with raw sugar until the sugar disappeared. 

Flour, cream and egg are added and you have a crumbly mix ready to be turned out and pressed together.

Pastry making always has a touch of alchemy to it, the crumbs from the food processor become "pate sucree pastry" with a few simple presses. 

Ready to roll, between two pieces of lightly floured plastic wrap.

Here comes the bit I have never done before, the pastry with the bottom layer of plastic wrap is draped over the back of a cake tin. 

Then your loose bottomed tart tin is fitted on top and the whole thing is flipped. 

I was wondering why I was doing this instead of chucking the pastry in the tin like I usually do (ok, not chucking, don't chuck... gently placing in the tin) but I "got it", the reason for doing it that is. What you end up with is a perfectly shaped pastry case, with flat bottom and neat corners.

Case is blind baked as per normal. 

The filling is a breeze to make and if you do get little air bubbles on top of your unbaked poured mix, use your gas torch to lightly go over the surface, it will pop all bubbles before it goes in the oven.   Ha, my filling is almost neon orange thanks to local free range eggs that had the brightest yolks I have ever seen!

After baking and chilling it's time to fire up the torch it's time to brûlée. A local cafe uses the term "burnished" when they are talking about their lemon tart "burnished lemon tart" and that's really what the finish is like on this tart. Only a few teaspoons of icing sugar is used/brûléed to become a whisper thin burnished sugar finish.

A small amount of icing sugar is applied and torched, after a brief chilling a second small amount is sifted over torched. I thought at first it the sugar wasn't going to caramelise, but it's just a matter of holding the torch a little closer and a little longer in one spot than you think.   

I choose not the neatest tart slice today, but rather a shot of where the icing sugar was a little thick... you can see on slicing the sugar lifting. You don't want the pretty, delicate appearance of the tart spoilt ... although I did crave the "burnt sugar" crust that the word brûlée evokes. 

The accidental misfire photograph of the tart shows the light shining through the pastry. Dang, this is the thinnest prettiest pastry case I have ever made!!! 

Would I bake again? Yes, I'm going to bake for Christmas this year I do love "Christmas/oranges". I'll skip the torching and go for snow sugar and red currants to decorate. 

Would I make any changes? perhaps check the bitterness or not of the zest before I used it. The recipe has a little lemon zest and I forgot how bitter my backyard lemons are! A little bit of bitter aftertaste in an otherwise perfect tart. 

How it works... now I've joined the fabulous existing alpha bakers, once a week I will post about what I have baked from Rose Levy Beranbaum's 'The Baking Bible'. This won't include the recipe due to copyright and publisher restrictions however, I will be posting how it went and photos of making/baking the gorgeous baked goods.

The Baking Bible

Happy Baking :)

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Stilton Baby Blue Cheesecakes Rose's Alpha Bakers

stilton baby blue cheesecakes 

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"It's feeling a lot like Christmas" ... Well that is when I usually have blue cheese, instead it's just me alone with the baby blue cheesecakes today, I've been stomped on by a flu virus for the past eight days.

Now, not that my family and friends want me to have the flu, but I kind of think a least a couple were relieved they weren't partaking in blue cheese cheesecakes taste testing this week.  Sheeeesh, more for me then... I love blue cheese, and these little cheesecakes were just what the doctor ordered ha ha.... I'm allowed a bad joke quota due to slight flu delirium!!  

stilton cheese

Savoury desserts have been a foodie trend for the last couple of years and these 'Stilton baby blue cheescakes' fit the bill perfectly, with a touch of sugar combined with the umami of stilton cheese.

Started the cheesecakes in the same way as last weeks 'Double Chocolate Oriolos' by oven toasting walnuts and then rubbing the warmed nuts in a clean tea towel to remove the skins.

Silicone cupcake pans or a metal muffin pan were suggested, but since I have a mini cheescake pan I thought I'd use that following the pan preparation method in 'The Baking Bible' for the metal cupcake pan. making parchment circles for the bottom on my pan

Seven grams of finely chopped walnuts were pressed into the base of each hole. 

Cream cheese was beaten with cornflour, sugar and pinch of salt until soft and creamy. Sour cream, stilton cheese and eggs were added before the mix was ready for baking. You do have the choice at this stage on how much stilton you add, depending on how savoury you want to go.  

15 minutes in a low oven, turn and another 15 result in super creamy (and rather rich) small baked cheesecakes. 

I topped mine with roasted walnuts, pear slice (love the green skin/ripe pear flesh of packham pears) and drizzled rosemary infused honey to keep playing with the savoury/sweet theme.  Consider plum, pear, fresh fig, rhubarb (poached or compote), red grapes, celery, walnuts or honey as toppings. 

Would I bake again?  Yes

Would I make any changes? I'd probably use a locally produced blue cheese rather than the imported Stilton but other than that no. I think just the sheer volume of toppings that compliment the stilton baby blue cheesecakes will keep this recipe "fresh" and in my repertoire. 

How it works now I've joined the fabulous existing alpha bakers, once a week I will post about what I have baked from Rose Levy Beranbaum's 'The Baking Bible'. This won't include the recipe due to copyright and publisher restrictions however, I will be posting how it went and photos of making/baking the gorgeous baked goods.

The Baking Bible

Feel like making an Albert ??