Pavlova

We're are a big fan of meringues in my house.  They are easy to make and keep well in an air tight container and they are relatively fat free, though not low caloric due to the sugar.  Meringue cookies are the usual form they take when I'm whipping up egg whites.  This time I decided to make them a tad bit bigger and go for the National Dessert of New Zealand and Australia, the Pavlova. 

Named after the famed ballerina, Anna Pavlova, these puffy, light, and crunchy meringue shells filled with whipped cream and topped with fruit are ethereal. They are a perfect summer dessert when berries are available in abundance and a heavy dessert after dinner just isn't warranted.  There is such a sensory experience going on when these are consumed.  The crunch and marshmallow texture of the meringue combined the sweet and soft whipped cream topped with the tangy cool fruit.  Quite remarkable!  I chose to make small ones so the leftovers could be stored sans whipped cream and fruit.  But wouldn't it be fun to have a big one at a dinner party with friends where everyone had their own fork and just dug in to a communal Pavlova?  I need to have a summer dinner party soon.

Pavlova

Makes one 9" pavlova or 8 mini-pavlovas
For the meringue base:

4 egg whites
1 cup granulated sugar
1/2 tablespoon cornstarch
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon white vinegar

For the topping:

1 cup heavy cream
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon sugar
2 cups diced fresh fruit
Preheat the oven to 275°F with a rack in the lower third of the oven. Line a baking sheet with parchment. Trace a 9" circle on the parchment using a cake pan or dinner plate as a guide. (If making mini-pavlovas, use drinking glasses as guides.) Flip the parchment over. Mix the sugar and cornstarch together in a small bowl. Mix the vanilla and white vinegar together in a separate bowl.

Whip the Meringue. Make sure your mixing bowl and beaters are very clean with no residual fat or grease. Pour the egg whites in to the bowl and begin beating at low speed. Gradually increase the speed to medium.

When the egg whites have reached soft peak consistency and the beaters leave trails in the whipped whites, begin adding the sugar a few tablespoons at a time, waiting a few seconds between each addition. While doing this, gradually increase the speed so that you are at maximum speed once all the sugar has been added.
Continue whipping until the meringue holds stiff peaks. Stop the mixer and sprinkle the vanilla and vinegar over the meringue. Beat for another 20 seconds to fully mix.

Use a spatula to scrape all the meringue onto the parchment in the center of the circle. Working from the inside out, spread the meringue to fill the circle. Smooth the sides if desired or leave it in billowy lumps.

Put the meringue in the oven and immediately turn down the heat to 250°F. Make for 60-70 minutes for one large pavlova or 50-60 minutes for mini-pavlovas. The pavlovas are done when the outsides are dry to the touch, are very slightly browned, and sound hollow when tapped. It's fine if cracks form in the crust.

Turn the oven off, but leave the pavlova inside with the oven door ajar. Let sit until the pavlova is completely cooled, or overnight. At this point, the pavlova can be wrapped in plastic or sealed in an airtight container and kept for several days unless your house gets very humid (in which case, eat your pavlova right away!).

Just before you're ready to serve, make the whipped cream. Combine the cream, vanilla, and sugar in a mixing bowl and whisk until stiff peaks are formed. Spread the whipped cream over the pavlova, leaving a little bit of an edge. Top with fruit and serve within an hour or two. (Do not refrigerate; the meringue will quickly soften.)

Summer Fruit Dessert

It was time to clean out the refrigerator freezer last weekend. Along with the unidentified foil packets filled with mystery meats (all of which I tossed), I found two freezer bags filled with blueberries from our backyard bushes. I knew I must put them to good use pronto as these same bushes are currently full of flowers and soon will be bearing lots more berries. 

There are such wonderful fruit desserts that have the most quaint names such as cobblers, buckles, grunts, betty's, etc. and I opted for a buckle.  This website gives great definitions for the differences in all these types of desserts. It says the buckle is similar to a crisp in that it has a streusel-like topping and when baked, it comes out with a buckled appearance.  This is a delicious, moist cake thanks to the buttermilk with a slight lemon taste which really compliments the blueberries.  It made for a wonderful brunch contribution.

Blueberry Buckle

Crumb Topping

1/2 cup all purpose flour
1/4 cup white sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
dash salt
1/4 cup room temp unsalted butter, cubed

In a small bowl, sift the flour, sugar, and salt. Using a fork or your fingers, mix in the butter until pea size crumbs form. Store crumb topping in freezer.

Cake

1 1/2 plus 2 tbsp all purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
6 tbsp room temp unsalted butter
3/4 cup sugar
zest of 1 lemon
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 cup buttermilk
2 cups blueberries (If still frozen, allow for extra cooking time)

In a large bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt, forming the dry ingredients.

In a separate bowl, using a stand mixer or hand held mixer, cream together the butter, sugar and lemon zest. Add one egg at a time to the mixing bowl, mixing after each addition.

Add 1/3 of the dry ingredients and 1/2 of the buttermilk and vanilla. Mix.
Add another third of the dry ingredients and the final half of the butter milk. Mix.
Add the remaining third of the dry ingredients. Mix.
Fold in 1 cup of blueberries.

Spread cake batter evenly over a greased 9×9 baking container of your choice. Sprinkle the remaining cup of blueberries over top.

Remove crumb topping from freezer and spread over the berries. Bake at 350 for 40-45 minutes until it starts to brown.

Almost Pie-O-My

What to do with a half a bag of frozen peaches and frozen blueberries in the freezer, I quandaried? A pie would be nice but my irrational fear of fighting to get a bottom and top crust together into a harmonious dessert got the best of me. What I opted for was a free form fruit galette. Almost a pie but so much easier!

I'm very happy with how this impromptu cooking session turned out, as I truly was clueless when I walked into the kitchen to make a dessert. I utilized my go-to pie crust recipe of Martha Stewart's which is pate brissee. I have blogged this recipe in the past. I did cut the recipe in half as I only needed a single crust. The fruit filling consisted of, as I mentioned above, about four cups of frozen sliced peaches with about a cup of frozen blueberries. Into the fruit I added in 2 Tbsp of cinnamon sugar and 2 Tbsp of corn starch to thicken the juices.I made the pastry in the food processor, rolled it out, slapped it onto a parchment lined cookie sheet, mound the fruit in the center and folded the crust up around the fruit. I brushed a little cream around the crust edges and sprinkled on some sugar and baked the galette for 45 minutes in a 400 degree oven. A sliver of this rustic, almost-pie and a scoop of vanilla bean ice cream was a perfectly delicious dessert.

A Summer Fruit Tart

I just can't get enough of Dorie Greenspan's wonderful baking cookbook, Baking: From My Home to Yours, which I have referenced once before. She is such a great teacher and her recipes are extremely thorough and easy to follow. I made a fruit tart using two of her recipes; one for a sweet tart crust and the other for a filling of luscious vanilla pastry cream. The combination of the crust, pastry cream and wonderful ripe seasonal berries was just delicious. And so, so pretty!

Sweet Tart Crust

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 cup confectioner’s sugar

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 stick plus 1 tablespoon very cold (or frozen) unsalted butter, cut into small pieces

1 large egg yolk1. Put the flour, sugar and salt in the bowl of a food processor and pulse a few times to combine. Scatter the pieces of butter over the dry ingredients and pulse until the butter is coarsely cut in—you should have pieces the size of oatmeal flakes and some the size of peas. Stir the yolk, just to break it up, and add it a little at a time, pulsing after each addition. When the egg is in, process in long pulses—about 10 seconds each—until the dough, which will look granular soon after the egg is added, forms clumps and curds. Just before you reach this stage, the sound of the machine working the dough will change—heads up. Turn the dough out onto a work surface and, very lightly and sparingly, knead the dough just to incorporate any dry ingredients that might have escaped mixing.

2. To roll the dough: Butter a 9-inch fluted tart pan with a removable bottom. Roll out chilled dough on floured sheet of parchment paper to 12-inch round, lifting and turning dough occasionally to free from paper. Using paper as aid, turn dough into 9-inch-diameter tart pan with removable bottom; peel off paper. Seal any cracks in dough. Trim overhang to 1/2 inch. Fold overhang in, making double-thick sides. Pierce crust all over with fork. Freeze the crust for at least 30 minutes, preferably longer, before baking.

3. To fully bake the crust: Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 375°F. Butter the shiny side of a piece of aluminum foil (or use nonstick foil) and fit the foil, buttered side down, tightly against the crust. (Since you froze the crust, you can bake it without weights.) Put the tart pan on a baking sheet and bake the crust for 25 minutes.

4. Carefully remove the foil. If the crust has puffed, press it down gently with the back of a spoon (or prick it with the tip of a small knife). Bake the crust about 10 minutes longer, or until it is firm and golden brown. Transfer the pan to a rack and cool the crust to room temperature.

The dough can be wrapped and kept in the refrigerator for up to 5 days or frozen for up to 2 months. While the fully baked crust can be packed airtight and frozen for up to 2 months, the flavor will be fresher bake it directly from the freezer, already rolled out–just add about 5 minutes to the baking time.

Alternate press-in technique: If you want to use the press-in method, you can work with the dough as soon as it’s processed. Just press the dough evenly over the bottom and up the sides of the pan. Don’t be too heavy-handed–press the crust in so that the edges of the pieces cling to one another, but don’t press so hard that the crust loses its crumbly texture. Freeze the tart in the pan for at least 1/2 hour before baking as described above.

Vanilla Pastry Cream

2 cups whole milk

6 large egg yolks

1/2 cups sugar

1/3 cup cornstarch, sifted

1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

3 1/2 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into bits at room temperature

Bring the milk to a boil in a small saucepan. Meanwhile, in a medium heavy-bottomed saucepan, whisk the egg yolks together with the sugar and cornstarch until thick and well blended. Still whisking, drizzle in about 1/4 cup of the hot milk– this will temper, or warm, the yolks so they won’t curdle. Whisking all the while, slowly pour in the remainder of the milk. Put the pan over medium heat and, whisking vigorously, constantly and thoroughly (making sure to get the edges of the pot), bring the mixture to a boil. Keep at a boil, still whisking, for 1 to 2 minutes, then remove the pan from the heat. Whisk in the vanilla extract. Let sit for 5 minutes, then whisk in the bits of butter, stirring until they are full Incorporated and the pastry cream is smooth and silky. Scrape the cream into a bowl. You can press a piece of plastic wrap against the surface of the cream to create an airtight seal and refrigerate the pastry cream until cold or, if you want to cool it quickly, put the bowl into a larger bowl filled with ice cubes and cold water, and stir the pastry cream occasionally until it is thoroughly chilled, about 20 minutes.

Fill the cooled tart shell with the chilled pastry cream and then embellish your wonderful tart with an array of fresh fruits currently available.

An Apple A Day

At the local farm market I found such an array of apples I had a hard time choosing so I went for a variety and decided to do an apple tasting. What a wonderful place in the country (and world I might add) to live where one can pick from 7 or 8 varieties of apples all grown in the field right next to the market. Thank you Johnny Appleseed and Mother Earth!

I chose 5 different apples for my apple tasting today. These included in the picture below from top left clockwise: Golden Delicious, Johnagold, Melrose, Honeycrisp and in the middle, Gala.

The Golden Delicious was large and firm, very juicy and on the sweet side.

The Johnagold was very sweet and juicy and also quite firm. A very nice eating apple.

The Melrose was an apple I had never tasted before. It was the most interesting tasting with a almost lemony perfumy taste to it. Quite unlike all the rest.

The Honeycrisp was my favorite. It was the least sweet of them all, very crisp (thus the name) and very juicy. Loved this one.

The Gala was the smallest apple and my least favorite. Though it was crisp, the flavor was bland.

With this wonderful mix of apples around me I decided to combine them all in a big pot and make some homemade applesauce. I peeled and cored the apples, cut them into bite size chunks, tossed them in the pan with a couple tablespoons of water and 2 teaspoons of cinnamon over medium low heat, covered them with a lid and let them stew away for 45 minutes. The house filled with that wonderful homey aroma of cinnamon and apples. I like my applesauce to have some detectable chunks so I don't cook mine down to total mush. The applesauce was on the tart side when finished so I added 2 tablespoons of honey at the end to complete this heartwarming fruit dish.

A Peachy Dessert

We're off on another mini-vacation. This long weekend will be spent in Astoria, Oregon with the Father-In-Law and other family members. I always look forward to our getaways to that quaint town on the Columbia River.

One of my old travel companions, Laddy Joel and I once had a humorous trip through Astoria on our way to a vacation in Cannon Beach. We needed gas and stopped in Astoria where, much to our delight, attached to the gas station was a wonderful little store called the POP SHOPPE. And guess what they sold there? POP!!! Many, many varieties of pop which came in small clear bottles. They were all lined up on shelves looking like little jewels. Oh what decisions we had to make. As I recall, we bought a whole case, 24 bottles of pop, and enjoyed every one of them.

I don't really like pop anymore.

Okay. Enough reminiscing. I'm making dessert for Friday night's group dinner and decided on Peach Crisp as the peaches at the Wednesday Market were so beautiful and ripe. It's a very easy recipe and serves 8-10. I made them in individual ramekins but this could also be done in a 13x9 pan.

Peach Crisp

8 ripe peaches (peel by letting the peaches sit in boiling water for 1-2 minutes. The peels slip right off)

3 Tbsp. flour

1 tsp of cinnamon (optional)

1 tsp vanilla

Preheat oven to 375 deg.Slice the peaches into a large bowl. Sprinkle with flour, cinnamon and vanilla and toss carefully until the peaches are well coated. Pour into greased 13x 9 baking pan.

Crisp Topping

2 cup old fashioned oatmeal

1 1/2 cup brown sugar

1 1/2 cup flour

3/4 cup finely chopped nuts (walnuts, pecans, almonds)

1 tsp cinnamon

2 cubes of room temperature salted butter

Combine all the ingredients in a large bowl and with fingers, mix the butter into the dry ingredients until it resembles a medium crumb. Generously layer the topping over the prepared fruit. Bake in oven for 30-35 minutes until golden brown and fruit is bubbling. Serve with ice cream or vanilla flavored whipped cream. Enjoy the summer's bounty.

Banana Muffins Extraordinaire

Tonight I got the baking bug at 6:15pm after I was already bathed, in my bathrobe and settled in watching Judge Judy (one of my major guilty pleasures).

As I had three nicely ripened bananas on the counter begging to be eaten from last weeks grocery expedition, I decided on banana bread. My intent was to bake something to take to work tomorrow as a treat for the office mates and my banana bread always wins them over. I shook the regular recipe up though and opted for banana muffins instead so everyone can have their own tasty mini-banana bread bites instead of whacking off slices from the communal loaf. I shook the recipe up even more and threw a cup of chocolate chips into the mix for good measure.

I think chocolate and bananas are a delightful combination. Think of the classic combos out there - chocolate covered bananas, the old camp fire standard of banana boats and would a banana split even exist without the chocolate sauce? I think not. So with that said, the recipe is as follows:

Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins

3 large ripe bananas, mashed

3/4 cup white sugar

1 slightly beaten egg

1/3 cup melted butter

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1 1/2 cups flour

Preheat oven to 350 deg. Mix the mashed banana, sugar, egg and butter together in a bowl and set aside. In a separate bowl mix together baking soda, baking powder, salt and flour. Mix wet and dry ingredients together just until well incorporated. Do not overmix or you will get a tough product. Bake in oven for approx. 20 minutes or until lightly browned. Makes 18 muffins.