Tooth Fairies and sweet teeth

It's been a busy week for the Tooth Fairy at our house.  Between them, my children managed to lose three teeth in the span of four days.  Brianna lost one last Wednesday (I had to help that one along a tiny bit).  Then on Friday when I picked Gillian up from daycare, she proudly showed me the tooth that came out at naptime (she managed that on her own).  But the most dramatic was on Saturday night, when B bit down on the piece of chocolate that she was eating for dessert and another tooth came out with it.  Much more of this, and the Tooth Fairy is going to start demanding overtime pay!

Maybe I can bribe her with some danish instead.  I know how powerless I am at resisting the buttery, flaky goodness that comes with laminated dough.  I've made danish and croissants the traditional way, wrapping dough around butter, and doing lots of folds and turns.  There's no question that the end result is fantastic.  But I'm not always in the mood for something that finicky.  That's why I was glad to see a recipe for Rough Danish Dough in Dan Lepard's column in the Guardian last weekend.  First you make a quick sponge with water, instant yeast and bread flour, and let that sit for about an hour to get bubbly.  The final dough calls for 00 flour but I didn't have any, so I used all-purpose flour instead.  Being danish dough, there's a little sugar and a couple egg yolks added to the dough as well.  Instead of forming the butter into a big block, you leave it in large cubes and mix it into the dough.    

As you roll the dough out, the butter is flattened out into thin sheets.  As you fold the dough (like a letter, in thirds) and roll it out again, layers are formed.  The dough goes into the fridge for half an hour between the turns so that the dough can rest (which makes it easier to roll out again) and the butter can firm up a bit (so it doesn't get squished out all over the place).  For some tips and great step-by-step photos of folds and turns (for traditional croissants), check out my friend Tracey's blog.  She and I actually made the danish dough together via Twitter.  One tip that I found helps with the rough version is to keep extra flour handy.  If the dough is sticky and the butter is trying to break through, coat that spot with some flour and keep going.  I also kept my bench scraper nearby to pick up the dough and make sure there was enough flour underneath as well.  The first turn is kind of a mess, but don't be discouraged.  The second will be better, and by the third, the dough will look a lot like traditional laminated dough.

The recipe says you can shape the dough right after the chilling after the third turn, but I left my dough in the fridge overnight.  You don't want to leave it for much longer than that; the yeast in danish dough keeps fermenting and it gets pretty puffy.  When I was ready to use the dough, I divided it in half.  One half I wrapped really well (plastic wrap and then a freezer bag) and put it in the freezer.  The rest I made into rolls filled with chocolate.  I ended up making half a dozen, and dressed them up with a drizzle of chocolate glaze after baking.

The verdict?  So, so delicious.  Brianna and Gillian loved the chocolate-filled danish.  The glaze was a bit over the top for me, but still really good.  I eventually ended up making a raspberry-filled danish braid with the other half of the dough, and it was amazing.  I'll definitely be making this recipe again.  I even bought some 00 flour when I was at Central Market this weekend so I can try the recipe with that.  

If you'd like to try your hand at danish dough, you can find the recipe here in the Guardian.  You can also find lots of other great recipes from Dan Lepard in their How to Bake series.  Also, check out Yeastspotting for lots of other amazing yeasted treats!

Dough from Dorie

I've been in some sort of a blogging slump lately.  I've been baking, and even taking some pictures, but haven't been writing much.  I've even been having a hard time participating in the blogging events that I usually enjoy a lot.  So I'm trying to shake myself out of it.  Work has been crazy, but I don't want that to bring me down anymore.  Kids have been crazy, but hey, what else is new? =)  The holidays are here, bringing with them lots of fabulous cooking magazines, both regular November and December issues and some holiday newsstand specials.  This is the perfect time of year for blogging--in fact, I'm coming up on my second blogiversary very soon.  Hard to believe I've been at this that long!!

One thing that I'm looking forward to is the next round of Adopt-a-Blogger.  If you're a veteran blogger, please consider signing up.  I know Kristen always gets lots of newbies wanting help, so more experienced bloggers are always needed.

It's also been a while since I participated in Magazine Mondays.  But the above mentioned stack of magazines has inspired me.  In particular, something from the December 2009 issue of Bon Appetit caught my eye.  I used to subscribe to Bon Appetit, but stopped several years ago because I wasn't enjoying the magazine all that much anymore.  But that was before I started blogging and talking to other bakers via Twitter.  A couple months ago, I picked up an issue, based on comments from some of my tweeting friends.  I was pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed it (the October 2009 issue).  For one thing, some of the articles are by authors I recognize and like a lot, such as the wonderful Dorie Greenspan.  And Peter Reinhart (breads in the November issue).  In fact, I decided to start subscribing again to save myself some money. =)

Anyway, where was I going with this?  Oh, right, the December issue.  Dorie's column jumped right out at me.  Sticky buns really aren't one of my favorites.  But these were different than the ones I've made before.  They use a Spiced Sweet Dough as the base.  I took a look at the recipe, and it's a sweeter, lean brioche with cinnamon, ginger and orange zest.  Mmm.  I had to make it.  But I didn't make sticky buns with it.  In addition to the recipe in the paper magazine, there's another one online for Streusel-Topped Chocolate-Cranberry Bread.  Now that sounded really good, especially since I recently discovered that I love cranberries and chocolate together.  The only problem is that I didn't read the recipe closely enough.  It wasn't until after I had chilled the sweet dough overnight that I realized that I was supposed to add the cranberries and chocolate before chilling.  Oops.  Now what?

I decided to play around.  I ended up using the dough to make something similar to a Danish braid, like I made here.  I took half of the dough and rolled it out into a rectangle.  I spread cream cheese filling down the middle third of the dough and cut the sides into strips for braiding.  (Check out some great how-to pics from Kelly at Sass & Veracity here.)  After braiding, I let the dough proof until puffy (maybe about an hour?) and then baked it for about 25 minutes at 350 degrees F.  For the other half of the dough, I used cream cheese filling and also some raspberry fruit butter.  I drizzled the still-warm bread with a simple glaze of powdered sugar and milk.

The verdict?  I really, really like this dough.  I will definitely be making it again.  I should have used more filling, since the dough rises a lot more than Danish dough, and the ratio of filling to pastry was off.  But it was still quite tasty.  Jamie and the girls all liked it, too.  Next up will be the chocolate-cranberry bread for sure. =)

You can find the recipe for the dough here.  I'm sure there are lots of other fun things that can be made with it.  And besides sending this over to Ivonne for Magazine Mondays, I'm submitting this to Yeastspotting.  Oh, and my TWD post will be coming in the next day or two, since Laurie said it was okay to post late this week due to the holiday.

Flaky...

...is a pretty good description of how I've been feeling lately about way too many things.  I looked around my bathroom this morning and all I could think was, when am I going to find to clean up here?  There just aren't enough hours in the day.  Plus I'm stressing out a lot about trying to get Brianna and Gillian to bed earlier.  It's just so hard, since on the nights I work late I don't get home until about 7:45, and on the other days we're lucky to be home by 7:00.  *sigh*  Any of you moms out there have any suggestions?

I knew I didn't want to miss another Tuesdays with Dorie, so I was committed to making the apple turnovers picked for us by Julie of Someone's in the Kitchen.  I love pastry.  That wonderful browned butter flavor you get is addictive.  Much as I love chocolate, pastry is my real weakness.  Croissants, danish, palmiers, all-butter pie crust, you name it.  And as I've discovered how rewarding it is to make it all myself, I can't see going back to the store-bought stuff.  It's just not as good.  Thankfully, some of it, like this week's recipe, really isn't that hard to make.  After reviewing the recipe, I did decide to stick with half a batch of dough, since I really don't need more temptation than that...

As Dorie often recommends, I started mixing the dough by hand, rubbing butter into the dry ingredients. I deliberately left some fairly big bits of butter, knowing that it would add to the flakiness of the dough when I rolled it out.  Once I was done working the butter in, I added the sour cream and ended up with a fairly soft dough.  Into the fridge it went to chill overnight.  That was Sunday.  It was Monday night before I got back to it.  I rolled the dough out and gave it a turn as Dorie indicates in the recipe.  Since the dough was still pretty cold, I actually decided to do a second turn as well before putting the dough back in the fridge to chill again.  It was late, so I didn't actually get to the turnovers themselves until Tuesday morning.

I had just enough time before work Tuesday morning to roll out half the dough.  I ended up cutting it into 9 small squares (about 3 1/2 inches on a side) and making some mini triangular turnovers.  I think of triangles when I think of turnovers, not the rounded shapes that are indicated in the recipe.  Plus then I was able to use pretty much all of the dough.  I used one Granny Smith apple for the filling and eyeballed the corresponding amounts of sugar, flour and cinnamon.  After filling and sealing the dough, I brushed the tops with a bit of water (didn't want to mess with egg wash) and sprinkled them with some turbinado sugar.  I baked the turnovers for about 22 minutes, let them cool slightly, and took them to work with me.

I tacked the rest of the dough Tuesday night after instead of dinner.  I made slightly bigger turnovers with that portion of dough, ending up with 6 turnovers from squares that were about 4 1/2 inches on a side.  When they were done baking, I plated one with a scoop of Caramel Apple Spice ice cream that I made over the weekend (you can now find the recipe here), drizzled it with some more caramel sauce and dug in.  As Tracey said, it has fruit, so that makes it healthy enough to eat for dinner, right? =)

The verdict?  These turnovers were fabulous.  The crust was nice and flaky.  Unlike some of the other apple things I've made recently, the filling was well cooked and tasty.  The minis fared well at work; I think the guys were surprised that I made them myself from scratch.  Gillian really seemed to like the "apple pie" she ate for breakfast this morning.  Brianna thought it was okay, too, but I think she would have preferred more filling.  Jamie thought the dough worked quite well--sturdy enough to hold up to a bit of handling, but tender and flaky once you bite into it.  I ate them plain, with the ice cream, then plain again for breakfast this morning.  All I can say is, yum.  Oh, and it's a good thing I only made the half-batch.  Though I'm pretty sure it won't be long before I make them again.

Head over to Julie's blog for the recipe.  And be sure to check out the other TWD bakers to see what everyone else did with this week's recipe.

A little help from my friends

In my almost year and a half of blogging, I've joined several groups (TWD, DB, BBA) expecting to expand my baking horizons.  I figured I'd learn new techniques as well as try recipes that I might otherwise skip.  I definitely have.  And this baking blog has evolved a bit to where I don't just write about my baking experiments.  I've realized that I enjoy writing about what's going on in my life (especially with my kids) as well.  What I didn't expect was that in the process I would make so many great friends.  A while back, someone said something to me about how I was writing here for strangers to read.  But many of the people who read my blog aren't strangers anymore.  

We may not have met each other in person, but we've gotten to know each other quite well.  First someone invited me to join Facebook, and that's been fun.  It's allowed me interact more with a lot of people (college friends, family), not just other food bloggers.  Then more recently, I joined Twitter.  And I have to say, so far it's been a blast.  It's like baking along with a whole bunch of friends.  All you have to do is throw out a question ("What size pan would be best if I double this recipe?" or "So where exactly did you find that fresh yeast?"), and before you know it, someone is there with an answer.  It's so neat to hear the experiences that others have as they're baking through the same recipes.  

This week's Tuesdays with Dorie recipe is a good example.  Jessica of My Baking Heart picked Parisian Apple Tartlets for us to make.  In reading through the recipe, this looked like one of the easiest TWD recipes yet.  You cut half an apple into quarters, place it on a circle of puff pastry, and sprinkle it with brown sugar and a bit of butter.  Then you bake it at 400 degrees F for about 25 minutes, and voila!--apple tartlet.  But of course I couldn't do it the easy way...

In reading this week's P&Q, a number of people said they were making their own puff pastry.  And that got me thinking.  At the beginning of the year, I was thinking about some of the things I wanted to make this year.  Puff pastry was on the list.  So I figured this was as good a time as any to try it, since the rest of the recipe was simple.  I remembered recently seeing it on Wendy's blog.  When I mentioned it on Twitter, Wendy was quick to say that it wasn't that bad to make.  Plus it gave me the chance to try a recipe from my new cookbook, The Art and Soul of Baking.  

I made the puff pastry on Sunday, at the same time that I was making coffeecake from brioche dough (post coming soon).  Wow, I went through a lot of butter this weekend!  I figured that if I was going to spend the time making puff pastry, I might as well make the full recipe.  It made over two pounds of dough.  I actually did four turns instead of three, and the dough really started to look good on the last one, so I'm glad I did it.  I chilled the dough for about 24 hours, since I didn't have a chance to bake my tartlets until Monday afternoon.  I divided the dough into four pieces (about 9 oz each) and immediately stashed two in the freezer for later. (Still debating what to do with the extra piece in the fridge--may also go to the freezer for now.)

To make the tartlets, I rolled out one of the pieces of dough to about 1/8 inch thick--it may have been a bit thicker, but it was close.  Then I hunted around in my cabinet for something that was about 4 inches in diameter to use for a template.  I ended up with the lid to a sour cream container. =)  I traced around it with my fluted pastry wheel to cut out four circles.  Next was the choice of fruit--apple or peach?  I put out another query on Twitter.  Turns out that Nancy tried these with a variety of fruit, but like the apple the best.  So I decided to go with apple.  I peeled and cut up my apples and placed them on the dough circles (on a parchment-lined pan).  They looked funny--there was a big hole in the middle from where I'd removed the apple cores.  Oh, well.  I continued on, adding some brown sugar and butter and popped them in the oven.

Twenty minutes later I checked on the tartlets.  Okay, that's a lie.  I probably turned on the oven light and peeked at them through the oven window half a dozen times in the first ten minutes, watching like a little kid to see if the pastry was puffing. =)  Fortunately it was.  Not a lot, but I expected that, since I used the fluted cutter rather than a straight knife (which compresses the layers a bit at the edge, making it harder for them to separate and puff).  But when I took them out for a closer look at twenty minutes, they definitely weren't done.  More tweeting ensued, since Tania was baking her tartlets at the same time I was.  I decided that the holes in the middle of the apples were bothering me too much, so I filled them with raisins and put the tartlets back in.  After a total of 45 minutes of baking, I finally pulled them out because I had to go pick the girls up from daycare.

When I got back, I looked at the little tarts again.  They definitely looked kind of sad, nothing like the pretty picture in the book.  Tania suggested they needed caramel sauce or something, which sounded good to me.  That's a sure sign of how far I've come in the past year and a half.  I thought nothing of whipping up a quick batch of salted caramel sauce (starting from white sugar and water) while making dinner.  And it definitely made my tarts much nicer looking. =)

The verdict?  The apples definitely weren't cooked all the way through.  I seem to have this problem a lot with Dorie's recipes (often when I substitute apples for another fruit).  I think I need to try a different kind of apple or something.  But they still tasted good, especially with the caramel.  The pastry was fantastic.  I split one of the tartlets for the girls to try.  Gillian ate everything but the apples.  Brianna just ate the raisins out of the middle of hers.  Jamie and I split another one, eating the whole thing. =)  I still have lots of pastry dough left, so I think I may have to try these again with different fruit.  

Be sure to head over to Jessica's blog to see some really lovely tartlets.  And of course check out the blogroll at Tuesdays with Dorie to see what everyone else did this week.  

A tale of two strudels

When will I finally learn not to wait until the last minute to make my monthly Daring Bakers recipe?  Once again I found myself in the kitchen on the day before the post is due, finishing baking so I could take pictures and put a post together.  But hey, at least I'm not doing it on posting day this month! =)  I had originally planned to make this month's recipe while Jamie's parents were here, but that didn't happen.  Then I was going to do it on my day off last week, but I got sick.  And this past weekend got away from me, between bagels and brownies.  Fortunately I had this afternoon off, so there was one last chance.

The May Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Linda of make life sweeter! and Courtney of Coco Cooks. They chose Apple Strudel from the recipe book Kaffeehaus: Exquisite Desserts from the Classic Cafés of Vienna, Budapest and Prague by Rick Rodgers.  

My first thought on reading the selection at the beginning of the month was "Wow, now that will definitely be a challenge!  Strudel kind of scares me."  But that's why I joined this group, right?  Once I read the recipe, it didn't seem as scary, and it promised not to be too time-consuming.  Which turned out to be a really good thing, since I waited so long!  There really weren't any special ingredients needed.  In fact, the only requirement was that we had to make the strudel dough--the filling was completely flexible, sweet or savory.

As I was driving home after working this morning, I was still trying to decide what to make.  I've had some apples sitting in the bottom of my fridge for a while, and I figured I'd just use them.  But then I started trying to figure out what to make for dinner, and it hit me.  Why not make two strudels--one savory and one sweet?  I could divide the dough in half.  I was kind of worried about having too much strudel anyway, and I didn't think it would keep well.  

I mixed up the dough, which didn't take all that long.  It was very easy to work with, and quite nice to knead.  Since I knew it had to rest for a while, I left it covered on the counter while I went to pick the girls up from schools.  (It rested for about 2 hours.)  I was kind of afraid of trying to stretch out the dough successfully with the two of them underfoot, but I was running out of time.  And it actually worked out a lot better than I expected.  Before I started playing with the dough, though, I prepared my filling ingredients.

For the savory version, I sauteed some leeks.  Then I diced some red potatoes (skin on) and sauteed them as well.  I didn't cook either of them completely, but wanted to give them a head start to make sure they would cook through in the oven.  I also chopped some fresh thyme leaves and shredded some fontina cheese.

I got out my rolling pin, but didn't even use it.  As soon as I divided the dough in half, it started stretching.  I transported it over to my kitchen table, which I'd prepared with a floured tablecloth.  I stretched the dough a lot like I stretch pizza dough, working around the edges, and stretching it over the backs of my hands.  It got really thin really quickly, but I managed to keep it from developing a lot of holes.  I was pretty impressed that I could see the pattern of the tablecloth so clearly through it!

Once it was big enough, I drizzled the dough with some melted butter which I smeared around (carefully) with my fingers.  Then I scattered crisped bread crumbs over the whole thing.  I layered my filling ingredients across one end of the dough and trimmed the thick edges from all sides of the dough. (Brianna had fun playing with the scraps.)  

Then, as instructed, I used the tablecloth to help roll the strudel over on itself until it was all rolled up.  

I carefully transferred the roll to a parchment-lined baking sheet and drizzled a bit more melted butter on top.  Then it went into a 400 degree F oven for 30 minutes.

While that one was baking, I mixed up ingredients for the sweet version.  I diced a bunch of fresh peaches and put them in a bowl.  Then I added some sugar, a bit of freshly ground nutmeg, some ground ginger and a teaspoon or two of cornstarch.  I didn't really measure anything, sorry. =)  I repeated the assembly process and soon had the second one ready for the oven.  Brianna tried some right after dinner when it was still pretty warm, while Jamie and I waited until after the girls were in bed (our reward for surviving the bedtime shenanigans).

The verdict?  My mom is surely looking down on me and laughing.  This is probably revenge for all the dinners I complained about as a child.  Even though she tasted and claimed to like all the components that went into the savory strudel, Brianna refused to eat the finished product.  She picked some of the peaches out of the fruit version, but left most of that on the plate, too.  Gillian wasn't much better.  Jamie and I really enjoyed both.  The combination of flavors in the savory version was similar to other dishes I've made, so it wasn't surprising that we liked it.  The texture was very nice as well.  The fruit version was a bit softer, probably from the excess juice, but still very tasty.  

If you want to give this one a try, head over to Linda's blog for the recipe and instructions.  It really was much easier than I expected.  And be sure to check out the Daring Bakers blogroll for lots of other great strudel creations.

Dough scraps make great playdough. =)

Puff the magic pastry

As I was reviewing last year, I was also thinking about things that I wanted to try in 2009.  I try to fit in as much baking as I can during the week and on weekends, but sometimes it's hard.  In fact, in October, I barely managed to  make my Tuesdays with Dorie and Daring Bakers recipes.  So it's always nice when I know I'm going to be on vacation, since it gives me a chance to try some new stuff.  In fact, I started my notebook (the one this blog is named after) during a week of vacation in May 2005.  Well, everything came together nicely, and over the past several days I've finally had a chance to make something that I've wanted to for quite a while. 

When I got my February/March issue of Fine Cooking, one article immediately caught my eye.  It was Croissants.  Laminated dough really used to scare me, until the June 2008 DB challenge when we made Danish Braids.  Even though I discovered then that it wasn't as hard as I thought, I still never got around to making anything else.  And then lately, I've been seeing croissants everywhere.  

I still managed to get a later start than I wanted, but it worked out okay.  The timeline in the Fine Cooking article has things spread out over three days.  On Friday, I mixed up the dough that would be wrapped around the butter.  It went into the fridge to develop flavor overnight.  Saturday morning, while Brianna and Gillian were occupying with cartoons and playing, I laminated the dough.  The recipe calls for three turns, but I actually did four.  The third one was particularly difficult for some reason--the dough really seemed to resist being rolled out.  So I waited a bit longer to do the last one, and it went better.  Once I was done, I wrapped everything up and stowed it back in the fridge until Sunday morning.

I was pretty surprised when I took the dough back out on Sunday, since it had risen quite a bit.  I cut it in half and carefully wrapped one half and put in in the freezer for later.  Then I rolled out the other half of the dough.  The dough rolled out nicely, which was really good, considering how sore my upper back was from Saturday's workout.  (It still hurts...)  I cut it as directed, ending up with 7 large triangles of dough and 2 small ones.  Most I rolled up as plain croissants, but I also wanted to make some chocolate filled ones.

Now I usually have plenty of chocolate on hand.  But I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to sample something new that I received recently.  At the end of December, I was lucky enough to qualify for a giveaway over at Blake Makes.  And a week or so ago I came home to find a small box containing my bar of Amano chocolate.  I saved a few squares to sample straight, and broke the rest into bars to put on three of my triangles of dough.

After letting the formed croissants rise for a couple hours, I baked them for a little less than 20 minutes.  The whole house smelled amazing.  The hardest part by far was waiting for them to cool long enough to avoid burning my tongue on molten chocolate.  

The verdict?  Oh, it was totally worth all the work.  The croissants tasted amazing!  It's good that I froze part of the dough.  It's bad enough that I made as many as I did, since I don't think they'll last very long.  I ate one of the chocolate ones for brunch (definitely too late to be called breakfast) and used another for my sandwich at lunch.  Gillian ate one of the small ones and really enjoyed it.  Brianna ate the middle out of hers and complained that she didn't like the crispy outside.  Crazy, I know.  But typical... =)  

I'm posting this as part of Magazine Mondays, and also submitting it to Yeastspotting.  If you're looking for a workout and want to give these croissants a try, you can find the recipe here. (It appears to be free for everyone at the moment.)

Down to the wire

This month totally got away from me. Earlier this week, someone at work made a comment about plans for Labor Day weekend, and my reaction was "What?! Wait, that's this weekend, isn't it?" This week was particularly challenging, since it was Brianna's first week of kindergarten. It was very apparent by Tuesday evening that they don't nap in kindergarten (it's all day). Ugh. There was lots of crying. Brianna crying, Gillian crying, me crying... But I'm sure it'll get better as we get more into our new routine. Of course, that'll be just in time for us to go to Pennsylvania for a week for my sister Kate's wedding. =) I think Brianna really is enjoying school, but it's a lot of change all at once (new teacher, missing her friends from daycare, having to get up earlier, etc.).

Long about Thursday, I was thinking that I was just going to end up passing on this month's Daring Bakers challenge. This month's selection is Chocolate Éclairs from Chocolate Desserts by Pierre Hermé, chosen by Tony Tahhan and Meeta K. I should have started earlier in the month, but I had other baking to do and didn't really have a good occasion to make these for. I did actually make the chocolate sauce needed for the glaze last weekend, but that's as far as I got.

Last night, I started thinking. How hard could it be? I've made cream puffs before and the same dough is used for éclairs. I've made pastry cream, though not chocolate. The glaze shouldn't be a big deal. Half a recipe of everything wouldn't make too much. What the heck, I'll give it a try. Of course I was too tired to do any of it last night, after working all day.

So this morning, I got up around 7am (that's sleeping in, for me). Because my kiddos were so exhausted from the past week, they actually slept until almost 8am, which gave me some much-needed peace and quiet to tackle the mess that had piled up in the kitchen. Hard to use the stand mixer to make pâte à choux when you can't get to it... =) The dough was pretty straightforward. I piped out éclair shapes, but I think I overdid it, because I only got 6. That was my first mistake. I baked them as instructed, but after 20 minutes they didn't seem done. I left them in for another 5-6 minutes, then took them out. Mistake number 2. It quickly became apparent that they weren't done, as the tops sank. I thought that maybe I could salvage some, so I went on with making the pastry cream. I changed my mind after I caught Gillian grabbing one off the rack. She took one bite and spit it out. Part of me wanted to yell at her, since she shouldn't have been doing that to begin with. The rest of me was laughing, realizing that even my not-quite-2-year-old could figure out that these were no good. 

So I made another batch.  This time, I piped 11 of them (half the recipe, remember). I baked them for 10 minutes before propping the oven door open, then baked them for 30 minutes more. Much, much better!

The pastry cream was no problem, and it gave me a chance to use up some more of the chocolate in my pantry. The glaze was pretty easy, too. I did find it a bit odd that you have to make chocolate sauce as one of the ingredients in the glaze. The chocolate sauce itself was okay, but definitely not my favorite. We'll manage to use it up somehow, though. It makes pretty decent hot chocolate when mixed with hot milk (and a bit more sugar if it's for the kiddos).

The verdict? Pretty darn tasty. I usually pass on éclairs, since I'm not very fond of vanilla pastry cream. I much prefer the chocolate. It's yummy enough to just eat with a spoon. Everyone enjoyed the éclair that I put together for pictures--we each had a bite--and is looking forward to more for dessert. Be sure to check out the blogroll for lots of other scrumptious eclairs. You can find the recipe at Meeta's blog, here.

Tart galette

This week's Tuesdays with Dorie recipe, Summer Fruit Galette, was chosen by Michelle of Michelle in Colorado Springs.  There are several things I like about this one.  For one thing, it's versatile--you can go with whatever fruit is available and looks good.  Also, it gives me a chance to try out Dorie's "good for almost everything" pie crust, which I missed out on by skipping the blueberry pie a couple weeks ago.  And hey, it's like pie!  I love pie!

I was a bit disappointed that I couldn't find any local Texas peaches at my grocery store this week.  I ended up with some nice ones from Georgia, though.  They turned out to be freestone peaches, as well, which made my life easier.  I couldn't resist the chance to pair them with some raspberries--have you picked up yet on the fact that I like raspberries? =).  I had graham crackers, which I pounded into crumbs (fun with the rolling pin!), and some of my favorite raspberry butter to go underneath everything.  And I had some pretty sparkling sugar for the crust.  

The only thing I didn't have much of was time.  I worked a really long day on Friday and then Saturday as well.  I intended to get an earlier start on Sunday than I did, and had other things that needed my attention (two of them are named Brianna and Gillian).  I did get as far as making the dough for the crust, though.  My favorite crust is all butter, but I was more than willing to give this one a try.  It seemed like the shortening made the dough softer.  So off to the fridge it went to chill.  I checked it later in the evening, but it still seemed too soft, so I ended up leaving it overnight.  

I got up just a little bit earlier so I could make the galette Monday morning.  That seemed preferable to trying to bake it and blog about it Monday night, plus I figured I'd get better pictures earlier in the day.  =)  The dough was pretty easy to roll out, but seemed a little on the fragile side.  I transferred it to a piece of parchment on my baking pan and added the jam, crumbs and fruit.  Since I knew I wasn't going to manage to eat all of the galette in one day, I decided to omit the custard, since I wasn't sure how well it would keep.  I'll have to give it a try another time.  I did add a little sugar to my fruit, since it wasn't going to be topped with the sweet custard mixture.  Into the oven everything went while I finished helping Jamie get the girls out the door and finished getting myself ready for work.  Boy, did my house smell good!  

The verdict?  The peaches and raspberries made for a more tart combination than I was expecting.  I suspect the custard would have helped with that.  Fortunately, I like tart things.  The galette was also a bit on the soggy side.  If I'd had time to preheat my oven and baking stone longer, I would have put the baking pan directly on the stone, which might have made for a crisper crust.  Maybe next time.  The crust was flaky, but I think it would have been better if it was a little sturdier.  Definitely worth trying, though.

For the recipe, head on over to Melissa's blog.  And don't forget to check out all the other wonderful creations from the Tuesdays with Dorie crew! 

Tasty braids

I think this is my favorite Daring Baker challenge so far.  Don't get me wrong, I enjoy things like cake and cheesecake.  But I think bready things are even better!  You might have guessed that based on the past challenges that I've replicated--bagels and cinnamon rolls.

This month's challenge was Danish Braid, chosen by Kelly of Sass & Veracity and Ben of What's Cookin'?  The specific recipe chosen was from Sherry Yard's The Secrets of Baking. (It's handy when the recipe is from a cookbook I own...)  The dough for a danish braid and other danish shapes is laminated (think puff pastry or croissants).  That's the main reason I've avoided making it up until now.  I imagined it would be more difficult that it actually was.  But that's what the Daring Bakers are all about, right?  Being challenged and making new things!

I think one of the things that helped was that I've made brioche dough a couple of times now.  I know how tasty the end result of a buttery dough can be.  =)  I was worried that the process  would be pretty time consuming.  And while it did take a fair bit of time from start to finish, a lot of that was waiting time.  I was able to do a bunch of stuff around the house--wash dishes, do laundry, etc.  (I made the dough on one of the days I was on vacation--kids at daycare, so peace and quiet.)  A number of people had challenges with the butter oozing out of the dough, but I didn't run into any of that.  While we've been having a month-long heat wave here (20+ days of triple-digit temps), my house is nice and air conditioned.  All in all, I found the dough very nice to work with.

We were allowed to vary the filling and play around a bit with the flavor of the dough.  I had planned to make the dough almost exactly as written, with flavors of cardamom, orange and vanilla (extract only--I couldn't find any affordable vanilla beans locally and kept forgetting to check out online options).  The cardamom I already had on hand, so no problem there.  And I thought I had oranges.  Well, technically, I did have them, but it turned out that they were moldy.  Since I had everything else ready to go when I discovered that, the orange was out.  I substituted some additional milk for the orange juice, which seemed to work fine.

On to the filling... My favorite is cheese danish.  That was pretty easy to do--Sherry Yard has a simple recipe in the section of the book with other danish shapes.  To make things a little more interesting, I paired the cream cheese filling with some of my favorite raspberry fruit butter (I'm sure those who read my blog are so surprised by that!).  For the second braid I added some peach butter, too.  Yum.

The house smelled amazingly good while the braid was baking.  I could barely wait for it to cool enough (hot cream cheese filling isn't that appealing).  And the taste?  Out of this world good, especially with a little icing drizzled on top.  Plus it looked so cool!  Brianna wasn't so sure she liked my filling choices, but Gillian had no complaints.  And I got lots of compliments when I shared the second braid with some coworkers.

I found one thing kind of interesting...  The first braid was made the day after I made the dough (after it had rested overnight).  I wasn't sure when I would get to the second one, though.  So after the second part of the dough had been in the fridge for about a day, I popped it in the freezer.  The day before I was going to bake the second braid, I put the dough in the fridge to thaw overnight.  While the first braid was very good, the second one was fantastic.  It browned better and the outside was very crisp and flaky.  Other than holding the dough in the fridge and freezer for the week, I only did one thing differently.  The recipe says to apply the egg wash to the braid before it proofs, but I forgot that the first time, so I did it right before I baked it.I did it the way the recipe says for the second one.  That may have had something to do with it.  But then I remembered something that I'd read in a Cook's Illustrated article for Crescent Rolls. The person testing the recipe found that refrigerating that dough for a longer period of time made for a blistered, flaky crust.  I'm thinking that might be what happened with my dough, since I held it for quite a while.  I'll just have to make some more danish to find out for sure!

Thanks again to Kelly and Ben for picking a great challenge this month.  I learned a lot, and I'm not afraid of laminated dough anymore.  On to croissants!  =)  Oh, and be sure to head over the the Daring Bakers Blogroll for lots more delicious pastries!

For the dough recipe and instructions, check out Kelly's or Ben's blog.  Here's the filling I used:

Cream Cheese Filling

(enough for one braid when combined with other filling)

4 oz cream cheese (I used 1/3 less fat because it's what I had)

2 tablespoons granulated sugar

1/4 teaspoon vanilla

1/2 beaten egg (approximately--I measured out about half and used the rest for my egg wash)

pinch salt

Cream everything together until smooth.  When forming the braid, spread the center section of the dough with jam or other fruit filling.  Dollop the cream cheese filling on top and gently spread on top of the jam.  Proceed with braiding.