Dessert By Candy

Banana Walnut Chocolate Cookies

My annual Christmas cookies baking is typically one of the largest baking project I take on every year. During those couple of weeks, my house fills with the fragrance of butter and sugar and spice. However, the planning begins much earlier than that. Throughout the calendar year, I test out different recipes looking for the gems that yield tasty and pretty cookies. By the time November rolls around, I know exactly what I want to make based on earlier experimentation.

Since I purchased Martha Stewart's Cookies, I've been in a baking mood because there are plenty of recipes that entice me. I tried making the Banana Walnut Chocolate Cookies (p. 170) last night. I was intrigued by the recipe's use of mashed banana because instinct told me the cookie dough would be too wet. The use of old-fashioned rolled oats gives this cookie the structure that it needs to offset the moisture in the dough. However, that is also where the problem lies. When I scoop out the balls of dough, the oatmeal could not be evenly distributed in every piece obviously. As a result, the cookies all had different degrees of spread once baked. The cookies tasted moist and full of banana flavour, reminiscent of a cross between banana bread and oatmeal chocolate chips cookies. Unfortunately, the non-uniform appearance makes this recipe a less-than-ideal candidate for Christmas baking. 

Stripes

As a teenager, I used to have a lot of clothes with stripes. I love the geometry of the pattern, the constrast of colours, and the imagery associated with stripes fashion (think stereotypical Parisian women with their striped boat-neck shirts and a scarve). Well, that love affair ended abruptly when I looked in the mirror one day and noticed how unflattering (aka fat) I looked in my striped shirt.

It's been years since I last purchased any tops or bottoms with stripes though I found different ways to incorporate this pattern in my wardrobe. My sock drawer, for example, is filled with stripes knee-high socks and arm warmers of many colours. I wandered into American Eagle Outfitter yesterday, a store that I have not visited for a few seasons. I guess it must be the anticipation of summer...when I saw all those shorts and t-shirts, they really brightened up my mood. Sensibility told me that I'm too old to dress in such "spring-break appropriate" attire but I figure I will likely need some casual clothes to play in the warmer weather anyway. So I picked out this striped wide-neck hooded t-shirt and striped shorts just for kicks.

In the fitting room, I was surprised to see that neither of them add any visual poundage. I think the fitted but not sausage-tight shape has much to do with it. In addition, the t-shirt has a longer bodice than normal which goes well with the low-waist shorts. In general, patterns are best used as an accent piece in the entire outfit. So for example, if I wear a striped shirts, it would be best to keep the rest of my outfit in solid colour. However, mixing this striped shirt, shorts, and knee-high socks seem to work in an unexpected way. All I'm missing now is a pair of classic red Converse and I'll be all set for summer!

Confused

In the last few months, I've slowly regained composure in my life...enjoying activities that I engage in and savouring the little things that bring a smile to my face. Those are undeniable improvements. My mood is less affected by what he does nowadays. As for those unavoidable interactions? Well, they are few and far between so I don't have to keep my poker face for long.

However, I have not yet let go of the animosity. I cannot make sense of the rejection and it still leaves me feeling like there is something disgusting about my personality that I have to hide, to correct. It really messes me up because I try so hard to be a fabulous girl in every way possible, every day of my life. It feels like someone is whispering in my ears that I am a phony...I can try all I want but I cannot fool anyone when they inevitably find out the truth.

I am still waiting for my turn to fall out of love. I still care a lot about his well-being and that totally sucks, for lack of a better choice of words. Perhaps it's my imagination but I think I am hearing some snickering. Affections that are unreturned are simply wasteful energy. Besides, caring about a person who causes me so much pain is yet another thing that I cannot make sense of. I need to be smarter than that.

So I've been living in this state of confusion for quite some time. I know what I want but they contradict each other. Strictly speaking, I'm on the right track and eventually these confused feelings will fade into the background so I no longer pay attention to them. Things are not exactly peachy but hey, it's been worse so what is there to complain about?

Financiers Variations

I wrote about my love for financiers long ago. This cookie is definitely something I enjoy making just as much as devouring. For anyone who makes dessert regularly, you probably run into the problem of having leftover egg whites from egg yolks-only recipes. My favourite recipes for creme anglaise, pastry cream, ice-cream, buttercream, even butter cake coincidentally all use six egg yolks. This six egg whites recipe for financier conveniently uses up all the leftover so I don't end up wasting anything.

Financiers are very versatile when it comes to food pairing. They are wonderful companion to strong tea or coffee. Though I would just as readily serve them with a creamy dessert.

Ingredients

• 180g unsalted butter
• 200g granulated sugar
• 100g ground almond
• 6 large egg whites
• 90g all-purpose flour

Method

1. Make beurre noisette: put butter in a small heavy bottom sauce pan. Cook at medium high heat until butter is golden brown and smelling like hazelnut. Strain immediately into a small bowl and let cool.
2. In a clean small heavy bottom sauce pan, stir together almond, sugar, and egg whites. Cook over medium high heat until mixture is runny and hot to the touch. Remove from heat.
3. Mix flour into the almond batter. Work in the beurre noisette until batter is homogenous. Pour into a container and press a plastic food wrap directly on top of the batter. Store in refridgerator for at least 8 hours, up to three days.
4. Preheat oven to 400F. Divide batter to financier or barquette molds. My personal favourite is the silicone barquette pan in multiples of 9. Depending on the size of your molds, bake for 15-20 minutes until golden. Serve on the same day.

Variations

• Earl Grey Financier: empty the content of two Earl Grey tea bags into the flour. Stir to combine. Earl Grey is a rather refreshing counterpoint to the richness of this cookie.
• Hazelnut Financier: replace ground almond with ground hazelnut
• Pecan Financier: replace ground almond with ground pecan
• Espresso Financier: stir two tbsp freshly ground espresso with the flour. I originally thought the coffee flavour would overpower the delicate buttery nutty flavour of this cookie but turns out it complements very nicely.
• Chestnut Financier: to be experimented...though I think i would reduce ground almond to 50g and use 50g of chestnut flour. Put a glob of creme de marron in each mold before baking for a little surprise perhaps?

Happy Strawberry Shortcake Day!

I have a penchant of declaring arbitrary celebration days (remember March Muffin Madness?). Last week, I wanted a reason to celebrate something so I declared April 29 The Official Dessert By Candy Strawberry Shortcake Day.

Happy Strawberry Shortcake Day Everyone!!

Okay, now that the greeting is out of the way, of course the only way to celebrate is by making and munching some delicious strawberry shortcake. Strawberry shortcake has always been a bit of a deceiving name to me because it is the furthest thing away from "cake". In fact, it's really a tea biscuit filled with macerated strawberries and cream. The basic premise is simple so it opens up lots of opportunities for interpretation.

When I see all those containers of strawberries on sale at the supermarket, how can I resist bringing them home? However, I personally prefer to use a mixture of fresh and individually frozen berries. Nothing compares in flavour when the fruit is picked ripe at the height of the season but that is not always possible. Therefore, frozen berries offer a bit of consistency in terms of quality. A squeeze of lemon juice works wonders to brighten up the flavour. To fancy things up a bit, I added Grand Marnier.

If classic is what you have in mind, chantilly cream is what you're after. It certainly is good but I adore the richness of creme anglaise (i.e. custard sauce). For my version of strawberry shortcake, I made a vanilla creme anglaise and dispensed it using an iSi Pro. The result is the lightness of a loose whipped cream combined with the yumminess of custard.

The biscuit part is the most challenging. Though deceptively simple, there is also nowhere to hide so technique is everything (kinda like my love-hate relationship with pie dough). A tender biscuit requires a very gentle touch. However! If you do end up overworking the dough just a smidge, serving the biscuit warm can somewhat mask the toughness. Oh yeah, and drenching it with cream and syrup doesn't hurt either. I used the butter biscuit recipe from Rose Levy Beranbaum's The Bread Bible. It's an interesting recipe because it uses hardboiled egg yolks in the dough. The last time I worked with hardboiled egg yolks was in a linzer cookie dough. I have a long way to go to perfect my biscuit technique, sigh.

Just before serving, sandwich some strawberries and cream between a biscuit sliced in half. With a sprinkling of icing sugar and some fresh strawberries halves to garnish, this is one gorgeous dessert to kick off the beginning of summer!

(psst: serving the shortcakes at 5C plus windchill is a bad idea. Everything hardens except for the cream which loves the cold temperature.)