This month’s Daring Bakers challenge was exciting. For not only was it chocolate based, it only had 3 ingredients. Yes seriously. Of course I’m not counting the ice cream part. They wouldn’t let us get away with something so simple. But even give this head start of sorts, I still waited til the last week to do this. I’m not usually a procrastinator, indeed I prefer to get things done earlier than waiting and dreading for something. Call me a Peeling-Off-The-Bandaid-Quickly kind of person. I was the one that handed in University papers early (although conversely I sometimes show up 5-10 minutes late to things). It’s probably because I like planning, in fact my husband told me that I was recently talking in my sleep where I impatiently issued him instructions on how to organise and move plants. Yes that’s what my dreams are made of. Hardly hot stuff wouldn’t you say?

But I digress, the cake itself is incredibly moist – most flourless cakes are, but this one contains no almond meal as well as no flour. So the look suffers a little in that is sinks and forms a crater. And for someone that loves the look of a cake as much as the taste, this dismayed me a little. I paced around the house clucking like an anxious Type A personality chicken. What do I do? The plans I had to decorate it were awry. It was too sunken. Then I flicked through Gordon Ramsay’s 3 Star Chef cookbook and combined two decorative touches I saw on the pages. **Sigh** “No Chicken Little,” I said to myself, “The Sky is not falling”.

I’d like to tell you that I reduced some plum juice to a syrup but I took the lazy option and used jam mixed with water to create the pools which gave me a good flavour, without little effort. The biscuits on top I bought from Aldi, which I buy every year for Valentines Day. I did mention that we had to make an ice cream to go along with it, and I had originally intended for an Apricot sorbet (it would have matched the decorations I had in mine before I realised that it was a sunken cake) but instead I used a Cafe Au Lait Ice Cream I had made previously. And whilst it didn’t turn out as I’d originally hoped, the proof as they say is in the tasting. It is a wonderfully gooey cake, like a gorgeous soft nut free brownie.

As for my plans, we’re off to New Zealand’s South Island for our 3rd Wedding Anniversary. I shall of course have internet access and I look forward to reporting back on all that is wonderful, good and foody in the Land of the Long White Cloud.

The February 2009 challenge is hosted by Wendy of WMPE’s blog and Dharm of Dad ~ Baker & Chef.
We have chosen a Chocolate Valentino cake by Chef Wan; a Vanilla Ice Cream recipe from Dharm and a Vanilla Ice Cream recipe from Wendy as the challenge.

To see other Daring Baker’s creations, click here

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An Australian friend of mine Kathy recently moved to the US with her American husband Brandon. She told me about her in laws and how they’d warmly embraced her into their family and I’d in turn drool at the photos of food at their family gatherings (this is one family that is serious about good food). As with all of my friends, we always end up talking about food and she mentioned a cookbook of family recipes her husband’s Great Grandmother (Margaret Raimo) had put together many years ago for Brandon’s Grandmother Irene to ensure that she fed her son well. Margaret Raimo was a very Italian woman who migrated from Napoli to  NY.

It’s a lovely collection of recipes, some frugal as she lived through the Depression, that catalogues the times and tastes of her generation but is also a surprise in some ways. Being Italian, she was already back then using herbs, spices and ingredients that would probably been unusual for her time and there was also a section of Food as medicine where she painstakingly researches and outlines food with its health benefits.

Grandma Irene & Grandpa John in Brooklyn in the 40s soon after they first met

Her daughter in law Irene, who was of Norwegian descent, had the book printed and bound and every new member of the household receives one (which makes me wish that my family had something similar but I know my mum won’t let go of her recipes). It’s a part of history told through food. Indeed her recipe for Fried Bread Dough stipulates buying “20c worth of bread dough” and there are references to the “Frigidaire” the term back then for a fridge in the same way that to Hoover means to vacuum. The list of recipes is long and even then she was advocating the use of wholewheat. All in all it’s a mother’s way of ensuring that her adored son was well looked after, even after he left the family nest.

The list of recipes:

Broccoli (plain)
Broccoli with potatoes & carrots
Spinach, Carrots & Rice
Broccoli omelet
broccoli salad
lasagna
Potato croquettes
Fish with sauce, potatoes and carrots
Fish salad
Baked fish
fried fish
tuna fish salad
scallops with sauce
string beans (fried)
asparagus
beet soup
potato salad (italian style)
baked mozzarella
cream cheese french toast
fried stuffed bread dough
rice & ricotta pie
rice croquettes
mozzarella sliced on bread & baked
chicken with sauce
cauliflower fritters
bran muffins
corn muffins
wholewheat muffins (with variations)

Kathy at Thanksgiving

Kathy, now a Raimo, sent me copies of the dishes, and I was so excited to be able to make some. I showed the dishes to my husband and he immediately gravitated towards the Fried Stuffed Bread Dough. I thought about copying out the recipe but a comment from him about her handwriting convinced me that showing it to you, in it’s original form was a better way of giving you the recipe (was it laziness too? Never!).

Kathy baking

I don’t think it’s even possible to go wrong with deep frying bread. Actually let me qualify that – you may run afoul of your cardiologist but taste wise it’s comforting and moreish. What results from this recipe is a delicious savoury turnover filled with a flavoursome combination of two cheeses, capsicum and salami. Of course it’s not light by any stretch of the imagination being that it is deep fried but I was really pleased at how delicious it was and after doing  a quick calorie versus taste equation, I found these were certainly worth it.

I approximated the amount of bread dough as the original recipe stated buying 20c worth which in today’s terms would mean less than enough for a roll so I made enough dough to make 1 white bread loaf. Since I don’t know if you can buy bread dough, I’ve provided the recipe below. I found that there was about 2 cups of filling leftover after I had filled that amount of bread dough which resulted in 10 turnovers measuring about 16cms x 11cms each with about an ice cream scoop’s worth of filling in each so I can say that you might need less filling than the recipe suggests or more dough, whichever you prefer.

I am a deep frying phobic, I dislike it and am scared of oil splatter (to fry these in the searing Sydney heat I wore long sleeves and a fancy feathered cocktail party mask – it was the only mask I had as I am without a balaclava) but because these have no moisture or water on the outside there was no spitting at all as I had made sure the the ends were pressed together firmly. So rest assured fellow deep frying phobics that this is a relatively safe recipe. It’s a bit of a labour of love to make these when you make the bread dough from scratch but it’s delicious and paired with a salad and you’ve got a great dinner.

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The initial seed for this macaron sandwich had a rather esteemed pedigree. It was while I was interviewing Adriano Zumbo that he mentioned watching Ferran Adria speak of making a strawberry shaped item made of something else entirely. And because Zumbo is know for his gorgeous macarons my mind wanders to macarons when talking with or about him.

I wanted to do a macaron strawberry that looked kind of like a strawberry. The only issue is that I have an issue with the Wilton colouring gels that I purchased. The colours fade, and badly at that, so I tend to resort to using liquids if I want a bright red colour. So I was only able to add a certain amount of liquid before stopping, worrying that I would affect the texture of the macaron. This week was also the week of horrifically hot weather so my mind was muddled when I made these macarons and I accidentally mixed in the icing sugar to the egg white mixture. It didn’t quite beat as glossy stuff as it would have and I think this is why I didn’t get the “foot” on the base. However taste wise, these are gorgeous.

Like all divas, it’s a little bit of trouble, the entire thing can’t be assembled too far ahead of time as the mousse will make the macaron too wet. Also affixing the black sesame seeds as “pips” might be frustrating unless you try and convince yourself that it’s an adult’s version of the game “Operation” where a steady hand is paramount.

Strawberry season is nearing an end here, as witnessed by some truly woeful looking strawberries on offer. But I picked through 3 punnets in order to get some decent looking specimens. You could of course make these in a heart shape for a special romantic dinner or anniversary, although as a strawberry it does evoke a similar reaction of lust. This is fiddly, but it is deliriously light and melt in the mouth. The white chocolate mousse is the perfect foil for the sweet macaron.

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