Today's Not-so-conventional Dessert

There was a major avocado sale the past week--probably due to Mardi Gras--so Mom and I bought a small stockpile of them. I picked out some ripe for the next day or two, and several unripe ones for later. We put them in salads, sushi, omelets, or just plain with soy sauce and wasabi. But by the end of the week, we still had about 4 perfectly ripe avocados. What to do with them? I would've turned them into soups or guacamole--had my parents liked Latin American foods. But since cilantro is one of Dad's least favorite foods (among many), I had to think of something else. Can desserts be made from avocado? I thought. I did a quick online search and found a sweet avocado smoothie recipe. If it can be made into a smoothie, then it can be made into....an ice cream!

I diced up the avocados--which turned out to have the perfect consistency--drizzled in lemon juice, sugar, milk, and a dash of vanilla, and blended them into a smoothie-like puree. I churned the mixture into our ice cream maker. The result.... ultra-smooth and creamy ice cream that's also surprisingly light and delicious.

I served it with strawberry coulis, grapefruit curd, and bruleed bananas. I named it after my friend who is, unfortunately, allergic to avocados, bananas, and strawberry. He was flattered by the dessert but also bummed he can't have any of it.

The avocado ice cream and the grapefruit curd were a match made in heaven! The ice cream is egg-free, and loaded with vitamins and healthy fats. If a non-dairy substitute (i.e. soy, hemp, rice milk) is used instead of milk, it will be a vegan ice cream.

Chocolates & Confections Week 7

Chocolates & Confections Week 7

This week, we made what's called "crystalline confections". Basically they're sugar-based confections that have a melt-in-your-mouth quality to it (unlike something chewy like taffy). So like fudge and pralines.
Project for today: chocolate fudge, penuche (brown sugar fudge, popular in East Coast), and pralines (from New Orleans). I made the pralines, since I love pecans :)

Pralines from New Orleans (pronounced prah-leens from Naw-leens) are delicious confections made from brown and white sugar, cream, milk, and butter. The mixture is cooked to 230F...

Right now, it's at 221F. Once we reach 230F, we dump in the toasted pecans all at once.

Notice that the display on my digital thermometer looks a little berserk. Yes, even though these are designed to read up to 450F, it doesn't seem to handle intense heat too well for a prolonged period of time. Once the pecans are added, it has to be cooked to 237F.
Then we leave it alone until it's 212F. We then stir it until nice and creamy.

Naw-leen's Praw-leens, portioned out onto parchment. Once this cools, it sets up, so it can be picked up and munched on.

My teammates made chocolate fudge and penuche.
The sugar mixture is cooked, then poured onto a granit slab, and remaining ingredients are allowed to sit on it. The fudge needs to cool before mixing everything in...but the person making it waited too long and the mixture hardened before everything got incorporated into it.

She was about to toss it, but I decided to give it one more shot by stretching and pulling it like a taffy--lo and behold, it DID turn into a taffy. Moral of the story: don't give up.
Penuche, a brown sugar fudge, is tabled and can be molded. Here we used some hardware shelving to assemble a mold.

We let it set, then slice them into bite-size pieces.

I love the texture, but they're too sweet for me. I think I'll roll them up and dip them in bittersweet chocolate--kind of like butterscotch buckeyes.

It's been three years...

Last Thursday, February 16th, marked the third anniversary of what I refer to as, "My Re-Birthday" (hey, Alice in Wonderland has "The Unbirthday Song"). It's the day I had my stroke. The day I "died" and came back to life. The day I was reborn, a very special day for me.

The last two years, I've made pastries with a brain-theme. Clever, yes, but a bit graphic/morbid. This year, I wanted to put the emphasis on the new life that I was given on this day three years ago.
Starting out with a chocolate cake base, crispy chocolate cookie layer, chocolate-hazelnut mousse dome--glazed with chocolate ganache...

The ganache was a little too thick, and didn't get applied evenly...next time...
I let that set, then starting the fun part of decorating with chocolate decor that I made earlier.
To go with the "New Life"/"Rebirth" theme, I thought a new sprout and butterflies would go perfectly well--how an ugly caterpillar turns into a beautiful winged creature.

I used the dome molds for the "egg shells" of the butterflies and caramelized hazelnuts for the sprout "seeds".

Close up of the top decoration.

The only trouble with these kind of tortes is serving them. I mean, some tortes consist of 50% decorations--how on earth is it supposed to be cut and eaten? We ended up removing a lot of the decorations before cutting them into portions, and putting them back on for the sake of presentation. :P

With the leftover tortes, I played around with different plating presentations and deconstructing them.

My deconstructed Rebirthday Torte: Hazelnut mousse, cookie crumbles, chunky cherry sauce, chocolate decor and caramelized hazelnuts. I especially like the last shot, how the chocolate sprout appears to be growing out of the embedded caramel hazelnut "seed" in the mound of chocolate mousse "earth".

Since my stroke, so much has happened, and a lot has changed--for the better. I'm loving life, and couldn't be happier right now. Happy Rebirthday to me!!

Chocolates & Confections Week 6 Day 2

Chocolates & Confections Week 6 Day2

On Day 1, we made the Dragees, Rochers, and the Marzipan. The marzipan we left out to set overnight. But this is what we made yesterday....

It's a mixture of nuts, sugar, and glucose cooked to a certain temperature, then ground into a thick paste. We pressed it into a brick...

Then poured melted chocolate over it, and let it set overnight. Today, we flipped it over and stamped out circles.

These will be dipped and garnished with almonds. I had my flower cutters too, so I stamped out some flower-shaped marzipan as well.

Unfortunately, only the five shown turned out perfect. All the others had white streaks on them, meaning that something went awry during the tempering process. I don't know what I'm doing wrong...I'll try to monitor my temp more closely next time.

Chocolates & Confections Week 6 Day 1

This week was pretty laid back for some reason. On Day 1, we made dragees, rochers, and prepared the marzipan truffles.

The dragees are caramelized almonds coated with chocolate. A mixture of sugar syrup is cooked to a certain temperature. Once it hits 230F, almonds are tossed in and the whole thing is stirred like crazy.

Eventually, the sugar will crystallize and form a white, sugar crystal coating on the almonds.
We then turn down the heat to medium-low and continue cooking the almonds. Eventually, the sugar coating starts to melt, and turn into a translucent caramel coating...

...We add a bit of butter which causes them to separate into individual pieces and give them a nice gloss. They are spread out on the silpat to cool, then put in the fridge. In the meantime, we temper some dark chocolate for the coating.
The chilled almonds are coated with three layers of chocolate.

We try to keep them separated into individual pieces. To finish them off, we coat them with a mixture of powdered sugar and cocoa powder.

These are SUPER addictive! It's a delicious egg-free, gluten-free snack...except to those with nut allergies. Then soynuts can be used instead.

The Rochers are slivered almonds coated with liquor and sugar, then toasted in the oven til golden. The mixture is coated with tempered chocolate, then formed into little mounds that resemble campfire.

We used amaretto liquor, which enhanced the almond flavor. This was pretty addictive as well.

Tomorrow, we finish our marzipan truffles. We make ours with fresh almonds--other nuts can be substituted as well, such as pistachio, walnuts, and hazelnuts.

Going pyro

OMGoodness, I LOVE my new butane torch! As a matter of fact, I love it so much I've been bruleeing every desserts that I've been serving the past few days.

First up, bruleed banana. There is bananas foster, but I like my bananas more intact and not as sweet. Regular bananas foster uses lots of brown sugar and butter.

On the plate: Bruleed banana w/almonds, pineapple compote, chocolate chip cookie, coconut sorbet.

With the exception of the chocolate chip cookie, this dessert contains no eggs or dairy. I coated a ripe banana with sugar and torched the surface until the sugar caramelized. The result was a banana with all-natural creamy sweetness, enhanced by the crisp caramelized sugar on the outside. If I substitute a vegan brownie or chocolate cake for the cookie, this would make a perfect vegan dessert!

Next up: Earl Grey Creme Brulee, white nectarine compote, fresh orange sections

The earl grey creme brulee was incredible! Perfumed with earl grey tea, its flavor only enhanced by the caramelized sugar. The fruits were a nice accompaniment as well.

This last one was a "let's throw everything together and see what I can come up with" kind of dessert. I call it "Deconstructed Strawberry & Lemon tart sans crust". Lemon curd, Italian meringue, fresh strawberries, chocolate sauce. The browned meringue was like marshmallow, its intense sweetness offset by tangy lemon curd and the not-too-sweet strawberries.

Chocolates & Confections Week 5--Midterm!!

Week 5 is our Midterm!
Wanting to do a "resurrection" theme for our Midterm, we planned on making a sugarwork phoenix, sitting on a pastillage base.

Unfortunately, it was disaster after disaster.
First: One of my teammates put the our colored sugar in the oven to warm it up to a workable consistency. Except he forgot about it. Alas, this was the result...

So he had to make new ones, which took up some time. I was busy making our truffle filling the entire time. But finally he got our sugarwork done on Day 1.

We let it set up overnight. The next day, we carefully assembled everything together.

It turned out pretty cool! Then a few minutes later, the same guy who melted the sugar toppled it over and broke it...
And if that wasn't enough, the chocolate that he tempered wouldn't set. I'm guessing it was contaminated with other stuff. We were running out of time, so we had no choice but to use that to dip the truffles.

Even after an hour, they were still not set. At least they tasted good. I had to roll them in cocoa powder so I can take them home without making too much of a mess.

And we still managed to put everything together. But I think everything worked well with our theme of resurrection--the phoenix was "born", died, and then came back to life (albeit with disheveled feathers).
Hopefully we'll do better for our final...

Tahitian vanilla and Butane Torch

We had a HUGE blueberry sale going on this past week, so I just had to make some sort of a blueberry dessert.

So here it is...Fresh Blueberry Crumb Pie! With walnut streusel topping and the flakiest crust.

Most blueberry pies are double-crusted, meaning they have a top and a bottom crust--but I'd always preferred the crumb topping over the heavy extra pie crust. Nuts are healthier anyway. I like to serve mine warmed up, hence it's on a wooden trivet here.

Served with homemade vanilla ice cream--made from Tahitian vanilla extract! Most vanilla extracts are made from Madagascan vanilla, and they have a more woody, strong, screaming "I AM VANILLA!!" kind of flavor. Tahitian vanilla is milder, and more flowery--perhaps lady-like--softly singing "....Vanillaaaaaa...." Anyways, the pie and the Tahitian vanilla ice cream were a match made in heaven, and were quite delicious.

And remember how I used that gift certificate to SpoonsN'Spice to get a butane torch?? Well, I finally put it to use. I made coconut creme brulee, just to try something different...that and Mom claimed she "doesn't like coconut" (...and I wanted to prove her wrong).

It took me several attempts to get the torch going, but very soon, I was bruleeing away! So here it is, coconut creme brulee with coconut sorbet, butter cake, and pineapple compote. It turned out so good Mom and Dad were almost fighting over it!

What should I brulee next?? I'm worried I'm turning into a pyromaniac...

Chocolates & Confections Week 4

Chocolates & Confections Week 4: Sugar Cookery

This week, we learned about sugar cookery and sugarworks. Things like caramel, taffy, and hard candy involve cooking sugar to a very high temperature. Today, we made soft caramel (I put cinnamon in mine), chocolate taffy, peanut brittle, and pulled/blown sugar. With pulled/blown sugar, a mixture of sugar, glucose, and water is heated to 290F ~295F, at which point acid (in this case, tartaric acid or cream of tartar) is added. The acid prevents the sugar from crystallizing, keeping it malleable and workable.

Here's my teammate pouring the cooked sugar onto a silpat...

He has to then quickly work in gel food color, using the silpat to manipulate it around and mix it in.

Notice how he's not actually touching the molten sugar. Did I mention this has been cooked to approximately 290F??

Phew! That was HOT! This is the finished sugar, ready to be pulled, blown and shaped. While my friend here practiced with it, I went off to the side and made mixed-nut brittle...

...Ooooh with pistachio, almonds, and walnuts. Peanut Brittles are delicious, but this was just as addictive. Other teams used cacao nibs; pecans and chipotle; and simply almonds.
Same thing here, a mixture of sugar, glucose, and evaporated milk is cooked to a certain temp, at which point nuts, vanilla extract (or other flavorings), and butter are mixed in. Addition of baking soda causes the whole thing to bubble up, incorporating air into the hot caramle-like mix. This gives the brittle a honey-comb like network, giving it a lighter texture. That way, it's still crispy and hard, but not so hard that it'll break people's teeth.

Now back to pulled sugar...my friend grabbed some blue sugar from other teams and made a lovely rose in a vase.

Notice the plastic pen tube in the bottom right corner. We used the plastic tubing of a pen to blow the sugar into balloons and balls. It was a little intimidating at first, but pretty easy once I got the hang of it.

A pink balloon that I blew. Now what to do with it...?

Suddenly, the nerdie biology major in me awakens. This was the resulting product.

...Hehehe. A heart, complete with aorta and pulmonary vein! Come on, it's almost Valentine's day!

Fruit Tarts Galore!!

Every Sunday, I make goodies to take to church for the people to enjoy with their coffee after worship; been doing that for well over a year now. Well...last week, a gentleman came up to me and handed me a card. Puzzled, I thanked him, and he smiled back saying, "No...thank YOU."

Upon opening the envelope, I was surprised and delighted to discover a thank you card from several people in the congregation. It said, "Thank you for the delicious treats," and "Thank you for your sweet ministry." Awww....so heartwarming.... It's little things like these that drives me, that gives me motivation to keep on making pastries :)

Then I saw another envelope along with the card. It turned out to be a gift certificate for SpoonsN'Spice, a local kitchen gadget store! I was stoked! :D

Later that week, I went to the store and got the torch for bruleeing creme brulee and meringue topping--something that I've always wanted.

Wanting to show my appreciation, I decided to go a little fancy this Sunday...

Fruit tartlets! There was a major berry sale at several grocery stores, so I stockpiled them. The shells turned out awesome--buttery and crispy. I filled them with pastry cream, topped them with the berries, and brushed them with strawberry jam. I think I made about 25 of these; but alas, when I put them out, they disappeared in a matter of few minutes. A lady suggested I take one to the pastor, and I managed to grab one of the remaining three. That was close....

I saved two shells for our own dessert (so Dad wouldn't get sulky). I put mangoes and a mint leaf garnish.
But there was still half a tub of the pastry cream left, along with lots of berries. What shall I do with them? Make more tartlets of course!
I ended up making ten of them for three families, and three for our own. Mrs. A's family has a voracious appetite, so we gave them six--that should be enough for two adults and two small children, right?

Later that day, Mrs. A informed me that her hubby was "Mmmmmmm...."-ing as he ate it. Gotta love feedbacks like that :)
But there were STILL some leftover cream and tart dough. So this time around...

Voila. A 4" tartlet, enough for three small bites.

Thank you everyone! Love you all!