Go Figure.

After a month of picnicking and al fresco dining, July rolled in. It's uncomfortably hot and I don't have air conditioning, so clearly I thought it best to start baking again. I dabble, it's true. Doug makes fun of me as I always claim to never, ever bake. Usually I'm proclaiming this as I'm handing him an oatmeal cookie or a loaf of banana bread or some such thing. He's right. I do bake more than most non-bakers, and I certainly bake more than I ever have before. But the truth is, most of the time I don't really know what I'm doing.

I rarely perceive recipes as anything more than a general guideline, a suggestion, and in baking – unless you're Betty Crocker – that's not very wise. So I do have some flops. Most of the time my baked goods are yummy or look good, but usually not both. And there are always tweaks I intend to make the next time I bake that cake, or pie, or what have you. The main problem, I think, is that so often I'm experimenting and playing and riffing, but I almost never make the same thing twice. Hence, I never actually perfect any of my baking projects. Those tweaks I mentioned? They never have a chance to see the light of day. Or rather, the light in my oven.

Some clients of mine gave me a bag of tart, little apples from their parents' garden a few weeks ago. This is what lured me into this baking surge. I tried to eat one of those apples, but it was was so sour all of the moisture was sucked straight out of my mouth. And they hurt my teeth (most apples do). Nothing can ever, ever go to waste with me, especially not a sweet home-grown gift. And so, as I do when I have a baking conundrum, I called my mom. “Apple Crisp. It's in your Craig Claiborne.” That's basically all she had to impart – which was enough. She has been making apple crisp all my life, and – cooked fruit aside – I have always loved it. Granted, I prefer to pick the crumb part all out and leave the baked apple part for someone else.

So I made an apple crisp. But, of course I couldn't just follow the recipe. I had to add blackberries. And I'm sure other stuff, too. So, while it was pretty tasty, it was really wet. Which, of course my mom warned me about: “Tweeters, just remember, the blackberries will be good but they will completely liquify, so you may need to compensate.” Compensate? I did not. She was right. So the next week, when my neighbor gave me some peaches, I decided to make a peach crumble. Keeping in mind the lesson I learned the week prior, I compensated by adding lots of extra crumble part. But, of course it was unnecessary as there were no blackberries. Just the peaches. So I essentially made a doughy extravaganza with a peach essence.

Live and learn? Or not.

Earlier yesterday, the fourth of July, I could not get back to sleep after Fred roused himself to go surfing at the crack of dawn. So I wandered into the kitchen, made a pot of coffee, and poked around in the fridge to see what I wanted to get into. And there were the black figs.

So I called my mom. And as she often does, she suggested a pie. But I just so happen to be deathly afraid of making doughs, and crusts and stuff like that. Oh, and never bread. Never. But I also refuse to purchase pre-made pastry dough. Quandry. I figured, since it was hours before I usually got out of bed, why not get down and dirty, and confront my fear with some pastry dough play times.

I followed my mom's recipe to the T. I used chilled lard. I used butter. Everything. But I also decided that I wanted to add almond flour instead of all all-purpose flour. I had almonds. I had the flour-making version of the Vitamix. Almonds sound like they would profile perfectly with figs. Oh, and there was that one, errant white peach hanging around, too...

And, against my better judgement, the riffing began again. I found about three recipes that all looked good, but were completely different: parbake crust, do not parbake crust, cut the figs in quarters, lengthwise – cut the figs in slices, widthwise (is that even a word?). Oh wait, this one calls for mascarpone and honey and I've got some crème fraiche and honey! What about a little vanilla? And some lemon zest! Here I go again on my own...

I did par-bake the crust. And, yes, I added all of the stuff I mentioned above. And it was beautiful. And it would have been perfection, cartwheels and wait for it... fireworks... If I had A) cooked it all the way through, and B) why has no one ever explained the pricking little holes in the bottom of pastry dough to me before? Maybe if I had read any one recipe all the way through...

So finally, I decided to break my bad pattern and make the very same tart again. Mostly it was because I got up so ungodly early and was confused about how much time still lay ahead in my day. And my mom's pastry dough recipe did make enough for two.

Now that it was mid-afternoon on the fourth of July, during the hottest part of the day, and in my house, after the oven had been on around 400 degrees for the better part of five hours, I succesfully created what I considered to be a A) varsity level baked good, and B) I try, tried again and got it right. Lesson learned. Go figure.

Now, let's hope Fred will make some ice cream before I melt.

Fig, Peach & Mascarpone Tart

Makes 1 9-inch tart

For the Crust:

1 cups unbleached all-purpose flour

¼ cup almond flour

1 teaspoons granulated sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

4 tablespoons sweet butter, chilled

3 tablespoons lard, chilled

3-5 tablespoons ice water, as needed

Sift flours, sugar and salt into a mixing bowl. Add chilled butter and lard. Working quickly and using your fingertips, rub or cut fat into dry ingredients until the mixture resembles course meal.

Sprinkle on ice water, 1-2 tablespoons at a time, and toss with a fork. Turn dough out onto your work surface and, using the heel of your hand, smear dough away from you, about 1/4 cup at a time. Scrape it up into a ball and wrap in wax paper. Chill in refrigerator for 2 hours.

Roll dough out to 1/4-inch thickness on a floured work surface. Line a 9-inch pie plate with half of the dough.

For the Filling:

1/2 cup mascarpone cheese

1/3 cup honey

Zest of ½ lemon

1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

2 fresh peaches, sliced

8 to 12 fresh figs, sliced

confectioner's sugar for dusting (optional)

To make the crust in a medium bowl combine flours, sugar and salt into a mixing bowl. Add chilled butter and lard. Working quickly and using your fingertips, rub or cut fat into dry ingredients until the mixture resembles course meal.

Sprinkle on ice water, 1-2 tablespoons at a time, and toss with a fork. Turn dough out onto your work surface and, using the heel of your hand, smear dough away from you, about 1/4 cup at a time. Scrape it up into a ball and wrap in wax paper. Chill in refrigerator for 2 hours. Crust can be refrigerated for up to 24 hours.

When ready to roll out, unwrap the dough onto a lightly floured work surface.  Using a floured rolling pin, roll the dough out to an 11-inch circle.  If the dough starts to break up or tear as you’re rolling it, don’t panic.  Simply place the dough into the tart pan and use your fingers to press it along the bottom, sides and edges.  If your rolling was successful, carefully place the dough in the tart pan and press it against the sides and edges so no gaps are present.  Cut any excess dough flush with the tart pan.  Refrigerate dough for 20 minutes while the oven preheats.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Remove the tart pan from the refrigerator.  Line the unbaked crust with a sheet of foil or parchment paper covering all sides.  Fill the pan with dried beans or pie weights.  Bake for 10 minutes.  Rotate the pan and bake for another 10 minutes.  Remove the foil and beans from the pan and bake for another 5 minutes, or until the bottom crust looks dry and the shell is a very pale golden color.  Remove the pie from the oven and let the shell cool completely.

To make the filling in a medium bowl combine mascarpone, lemon zezt, honey and vanilla extract and stir to combine.  Mixture will be smooth and glossy.

When the crust is completely cool, score the bottom and smear the filling evenly across the bottom of the tart.  Arrange sliced figs and peaches in a circular pattern on top of the filling.  

Place back in oven and bake for 45 minutes or until the pastry edges are golden brown. Dust with confectioner's sugar and serve.

This tart will keep, well wrapped in the refrigerator, for up to two days.  It’s most lovely served the day it’s made.  

Printable recipe.

One year ago: Sausage, Egg & Fontina Cheese Pizza

Two years ago: Chicken Breasts with Anchovy-Basil Pan Sauce

Three years ago: Summer Squash Gratin with Salsa Verde

Cookin' It. Livin' It. Lovin' It.

Even though we have a very, very long history of written correspondence via the good old post office, for the past few years Paz and I have been taking turns sending each other 'care packages'. They are kind of, but not necessarily, for birthdays, Christmas, and the like. The ones from me show up on time – unless I accidentally send one to her childhood address where a bunch of frat boys now live, or I mess up the postage, for no good reason at all. The ones from Paz, well, they show up when they show up. I received my last birthday package on the first day of Fall. My birthday is in mid-June. And so, fittingly, she gave me my Christmas package while I was visiting home last month. In April.

From my end the packages are not what most people would describe as important or precious. Often I go through my house and find an odd mish-mash of tchotchkes, randoms and play pretties. Anything from old pictures, to stickers, to a Ryan Gosling coloring book, to old CDs, to clothes that no longer fit, to Chanel nail polish. The very Chanel nail polish she was oohing and ahhing over in some fashion magazine the last time she visited me in LA. To her credit, her packages do seem a little more thought out than mine. It certainly doesn't seem that she is ambling through her house grabbing this and that off of the shelves.

My recent April Christmas package was really kicky, actually. She had been back to visit her 'people' in the Dominican Republic very recently, and snagged some pretty great stuff for me during her stay. There were two types of rum (rhum?), white and black. I don't drink rum (rhum?), but fortuitously my dad does. So I left that behind for him. There was nail polish (not Chanel), a cowbell (no clue), a Guy Fieri spatula that reads, “Cookin' It, Livin' It, Lovin' It”, and a huge wad of straight-from-the-DR, dulce de leche. Paz knows me well. She knows I don't have a sweet tooth, per se, but I love the more savory, more muted versions of sweets: dulce de leche being a prime ejemplo.

And so from the Dominican Republic, to Richmond, Virginia, to Los Angeles, California, traveled this dulce de leche. And the Guy Fieri spatula. Of course. Funny thing about the Guy Fieri spatula; I know she gave it to me as a gag (we shared massive giggles over the, now-infamous, Pete Welle's scathing review of Guy's American Kitchen & Bar this past November). But, I have to admit, it is actually a really good spatula. Who knew Guy Fieri would ever be so prominent in my own Flavor Town; my kitchen.

Back to the dulce de leche, which is literally translated as candy of milk, or milk candy. The Dominican Republic version is made with equal parts milk and sugar with cinnamon, and the texture is a lot like fudge. Now. What was I going to do with it? I know that it is often used to flavor cakes and cookies. I've also seen toffee-like dulce de leche candies. But the weather is warm, the flowers are blooming, the tank tops are out, and when Fred and I looked at one another we knew. It's ice cream time.

Which is great, because that is all Fred. Fred is the ice cream man, and everyone who has eaten his ice cream will agree. He has a way. And when I say he has a way, I mean to say he has a French (or sometimes Italian) way. Fred is not afraid of the egg yolk. And considering eggs are so the new bacon, which is to say, wicked hip, why should he be? I guess my Fred is wicked hip.

To elaborate, French ice cream is made with egg yolks, so it's thick and custardy. Both French and Italian ice creams are made this way, while the French use a bit more cream to milk and Italy more milk to cream. Whereas American ice cream (also called Philadelphia-style) is made with sugar, milk and cream. No eggs. European ice cream is richer, silkier and it doesn't develop nearly as many ice crystals as its lighter cousin. And when I say cousin, I mean to say the kind of cousins that don't much care for one another. The French hate American ice cream.

Fred's ice cream is no joke – sweet, decadent, thick and velvety. For his dulce de leche ice cream he also added some toasty, salty almond chunks for texture. For a small dinner party coming up he is making a pine nut ice cream with fresh strawberries and honey. I mean, come on.

And yes, he makes the ice cream with our new Guy Fieri spatula. Because we, in fact, are “Cookin' It, Livin' It, Lovin' It”.

And Eatin' It.

Dulce de Leche Helado

Makes 2 pints

1 lb. Or 1 2/3 cup dulce de leche (purchased, or homemade)

2 cups whole milk

1 cup heavy cream

4 egg yolks

2 tablespoons sugar

¾ cup chopped toasted (and lightly salted) almonds

Pinch of salt

Whisk together dulce de leche and the whole milk in a medium saucepan. Heat gently over medium heat until very hot, but not boiling. Meanwhile, whisk the egg yolks and sugar until light in color.

Slowly add the hot milk mixture to the eggs while whisking. Pour back into the pan. Gently cook over low to medium heat, until it starts to thicken and reaches 160 degrees F on an instant read thermometer. (Don't let it exceed 180 degrees, or it will curdle. If you don't have a thermometer, cook until the custard is thick enough to coat the back of a wooden spoon.) Strain the cooked custard through a fine mesh sieve into a clean bowl and add the cream.

When mixture is thoroughly cold, churn using your method of choice. Add almond chunklets to the ice cream when there are about 5 minutes left in the churning process. Transfer to a freezer safer container and freeze for several hours before serving.

Printable recipe.

One year ago: Classic Shad Roe with Bacon & Fresh Herbs

Three years ago: Lima Beans in Cream & Butter

Detour

In the late 1940s and early 1950s the French were watching a lot of the popular films coming out of this country.  After a little while they stopped to pause and wondered what in God’s teeth was going on over here?! In these films there were men coming home from the war to find the women had taken their jobs, their wives cheating on them or leaving them for the men who weren’t even “manly” enough to go to war, and their children were completely alienated from them. We were full of cynical attitudes and sexual motivation. Absolute disillusionment. We were broken people. A broken country.

But we didn’t seem to realize that at the time.

The French called this era, this genre of film, Film Noir. Black film. These films all have elements of German Expressionism and Italian Neo-Realism. They all incorporate low-key lighting, unbalanced compositions, femme fatales, narration, hard-boiled detectives, and non-linear plot structures (a lot of flashbacks and flash forwards). They are almost always self-reflexive. Some perfect examples of these are: The Maltese Falcon, Double Indemnity, D.O.A., The Woman in the Window, The Lady from Shanghai, The Big Combo and Out of the Past. And I just adore The Blue Dahlia. Interestingly, most all of the material for these films evolved from the pulp novels of writers during the Depression (Chandler, Hammet, etc.)

It seems that usually when we, either as a body of people, or individually, go through big changes we don’t necessarily see it until after the fact. It then is something we went through to get to where we are or where we may be going. Change is more easily understood and seen in a future want, like a New Year’s resolution, but most commonly in retrospect. Others can usually identify our changes before we do.

But occasionally we have those times they are a changin’ that we are staring square in the face. You didn’t even make a New Year’s resolution but suddenly look around and every element of your life, especially the thing that is the most secure, is hanging in the balance. Everything is changing before your eyes, like it or not.

Good, bad, beautiful or ugly – welcome to my now. My change. And right at my birthday. And no, I’m not going through menopause.

This is good. Really. But admittedly, exceedingly daunting. I’ll let you know how it turns out when I can be less reflexive and more reflective.

One change that is occurring that I am conscious of and working towards is my panic with certain fruit related issues. I know I’ve touched on it at least once in the past, but let me really explain the way this works for me:

I do like fruit.
I don’t like fruit touching other fruit.
I don’t like hot or cooked fruit, but I’m getting a little better there.
I am usually wary of fruit in my savory dishes, but I’ve come a long way with that one.
Gooey fruit, such as that in most pies, crumbles, compotes, etc. disarms me. It’s unfortunate.
Fruit FLAVORED anything is a big no.
Any citrus is exempt from all of the above.
If I so much as see applesauce, I will leave the table. That will never change.

As I said, I’m working on most of these things. As a foodie it is a major detriment to hate anything edible. I’m aware of that. But I can proudly say that I will eat anything else in the world.
 
As you may know, my mom is the pastry chef for Dinner at Eight. The first dessert incorporated fresh strawberries. They were not cooked but they did have some liquid that made me a little edgy. I tasted every version we tested for that meal and enjoyed each one. But not without hesitation. For this last Dinner at Eight she made a rustic cherry tart with almond ice cream. Warm, cooked cherries. I tasted the first test and second test runs.

On the first tart we used whole, pitted cherries. They looked like bloody eyeballs to me. I did have a small slice, to make sure it was up to par for the dinner party, but no more than that. And it was really good. I just couldn’t get past the cherries staring up at me. Everyone else who tasted it thought it was divine. Round two is what is photographed here and its recipe is below. We just had to chop up those cherries a bit and I was okay with it (mostly). Again, everyone else that tried it was over the moon.

We’ll see what happens with my whole fruit thing. As I mentioned, I’m working on it. And I guess we’ll see what unfolds with all of these other big, broad strokes of my life. As my friend, Brian, used to always say, “Everything will work out. Or not.”

Rustic Cherry Tart with Almond Ice Cream

Crust
 
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 cup + 5 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/2 cup raw almonds
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
8 tablespoons unsalted butter (melted & cooked a little)
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 375.
Toast almonds on baking sheet for 10 minutes.
Cool and place in food processor with sugar; pulse to coarse meal.
Add flour and salt and pulse to combine with almonds.
Transfer ingredients to bowl, add melted butter, vanilla extract and 1 tablespoon ice cold water.
Mix until just combined.
Press dough into a buttered 9" fluted tart pan.
Chill for a minimum of 2 hours.


Filling

1 pound fresh cherries coarsely chopped (chop around pits); toss chopped cherries with 3 teaspoons of sugar and leave in bowl until ready to use
5 tablespoons unsalted butter at room temperature
1/2 cup all purpose flour
1/4 cup sugar
1 large egg
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 400
Place butter, sugar, flour, egg and vanilla extract in a bowl; mix until combined.
Remove crust from refrigerator; prick surface with a fork.  Using an offset spatula, spread the mixture evenly over crust and chill 15 minutes more.
Remove tart from refrigerator; spread the cherries evenly over the tart mixture. Bake 20 - 25 minutes.



Almond Ice Cream

2 cups raw (whole) almonds
2 cups whole milk
2 cups heavy cream
4 egg yolks (large)
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Preheat over to 375
Toast almonds on baking sheet for 10 minutes.  Cool and chop coarsely.
Put 1 cup of the almonds in saucepan, pour in milk and cream.  Bring to boil over medium heat.  Remove from heat and cover- (30 minutes)-flavors will infuse.
Bring mixture to boil once again.  Remove from heat.
Whisk egg yolks and sugar together in a bowl.  Remove almonds (with slotted spoon or small strainer) from milk/cream mixture.  Whisk 2 to 3 tablespoons of warm mixture into the yolks & sugar.
Add remainder (slowly) while whisking.  Add vanilla extract.  Return to saucepan and cook over medium heat (stirring frequently with rubber spatula) for 8 minutes or until custard thickens and coats the back of the spatula. Strain mixture and chill for 2 hours.  
Process in an ice cream maker (refer to manufacturer's instructions).  Stir in remaining almonds when done.