Clifford Sized Cookie

The title of this post, as well as the frosting on the cookie, require a little explanation. A few weeks ago, our theme for preschool was cookies. One of the books we chose to read was called Cookie Crazy, and it was about Clifford visiting the local fair and giving in to the temptation presented in the form of a giant cookie. I don't think the life lesson they were trying to teach was about giving in to temptation, but after reading about giant cookies it's only appropriate that we would bake a giant cookie.

The frosting is in honor of our song for that week of preschool. You know the one . . .  sung by the great vocalist, Cookie Monster . . .

C is for cookies, that's good enough for me,

C is for cookies, that's good enough for me,

C is for cookies, that's good enough for me,

Oh, cookies, cookies, cookies start with C.  

And we could go on with the words but since you already have it stuck in your head like I do, I'll just let you finish it out. Oh, and if you were like me and you had never heard this song before because you didn't really watch Ses.ame Street as a kid, then you can g.oogle the title and actually see Cookie Monster performing it on youtube. 

**On a side note, I'm not sure if you need a baking stone for this or not. It might work with a pizza pan, but I've never tried it because I have a baking stone.**

Colossal Candy Cookie

Makes about 10 servings

1 cup candy-coated chocolate pieces

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup butter or margarine, softened

1/3 cup sugar

1/3 cup packed brown sugar

1 egg

1 teaspoon vanilla

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Reserve 1/3 cup candies for decorating; coarsely chop remaining candies. Set aside.

In a bowl, combine the flour, baking soda and salt; mix well. In a mixing bowl, beat butter and sugars until creamy. Add egg and vanilla; beat well. Add flour mixture; mix well. Stir in chopped candies. 

Place dough in center of pan. Using a lightly floured rolling pin (or your hand) spread the dough to an inch or two from edge of pan. Decorate with reserved candies.

Bake for 16-18 minutes or until light golden brown. Cool completely. Carefully loosen cookie from pan. Cut to serve.

Orange Berry Muffins

I don't have much to say about this one. There can't have been many people who haven't had a blueberry muffin at some point in their life. Since I like trying out different blueberry muffin recipes, I figured I'd try this orange blueberry muffin. It was yummy, as are most blueberry muffins! Enjoy!

Orange Berry Muffins
Source: Brown Eyed Baker

grated zest and juice of 1 orange
about 3/4 cup buttermilk
2 large eggs
3 tablespoons honey
1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted and cooled
1/3 cup sugar
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup blueberries - fresh (preferably) or frozen (not thawed)
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decorating sugar for topping (optional)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Prepare your muffin pan by spraying or lining with paper liners.

Pour the orange juice into a large glass measuring cup and then pour in enough buttermilk to make 1 cup. Whisk in the eggs, honey, and melted butter.

In a large bowl, rub the sugar and orange zest together with your fingertips until the sugar is moist and the fragrance of orange strong. Whisk in the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Pour the liquid ingredients over the dry and gently, but quickly, stir to blend. Stir in the blueberries. Divide the batter evenly among the muffin cups.

Bake for 22 to 25 minutes. If you want the tops of the muffins decorated with sugar, sprinkle on the sugar after the muffins have been baking for 10 minutes. When fully baked, the tops of the muffins will be golden and springy to the touch and a thin knife inserted into the center of the muffin will come out clean. Transfer the pan to a wire rack and cool for 5 minutes. Remove muffins from pan.

Starfish Cookies

Don't you just love starfish? Well, maybe not the real thing so much, but these sugar cookies sure are cute! We wrapped these up and gave them to our MOPPETS workers as thank you's. Included was the following story.

The Starfish Story

Original Story by Loren Eiseley 

One day a man was walking along the beach when he noticed 

a boy picking something up and gently throwing it into the ocean.

Approaching the boy, he asked, "What are you doing?"

The youth replied, "Throwing starfish back in the ocean. The surf 

is up and the tide is going out. If I don't throw them back, they'll die."

"Son," the man said, "don't you realize there are miles and miles of beach 

and hundreds of starfish? You can't make a difference." 

After listening politely, the boy bent down, picked up another starfish, 

and threw it back into the surf. Then, smiling at the man, he said . . .

"I made a difference for that one."

You can find the cookie recipe here. Enjoy!

Chicken Enchiladas

If you ever have a baby, a family illness, or some other need for a meal to be delivered to you this is most likely what I will holding while standing on your doorstep. These chicken enchiladas are mild tasting, delicious, very filling, and they freeze great. Enjoy!

Chicken Enchiladas

Makes about 8-10 enchiladas (depending on how full you fill them)

10 ounces cooked chicken (can do fresh or canned)

1 can cream of chicken soup

1 can diced green chiles

1 can green chile enchilada sauce

1 container sour cream

8-10 medium tortillas 

cheddar or jack cheese, shredded (enough for sprinkling over the top)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. 

Mix chicken, cream of chicken soup, green chiles, and about half of the can of enchilada sauce in a bowl until combined. Pour about a 1/4 of the remaining enchilada sauce in the bottom of a 9x13 pan. 

Spread a spoonful of sour cream over tortilla. Place small amount of chicken mixture on one end of tortilla. Roll it up and place it seam side down in pan. (I usually do this a an assembly line with all 8-10 tortillas laid out on the counter so that I can evenly distribute the chicken mixture.)

When all enchiladas are in the pan, pour the rest of enchilada sauce over the top and sprinkle generously with shredded cheese. Bake for about 20-30 minutes. 

If planning to freeze, cool completely, then wrap 2 at a time in aluminum foil.

Rainbow Cake (Six Layer Version)

I had these grandious plans to make a six layer coconut cake from the Peninsula G.rill, but that plan fizzled quickly when I got back home from running my half marathon and realized I was too tired and my cupboards were to bare to have even a semblance of what was needed for this monster cake. Another recipe for another time, I guess. I then thought I'd make a coconut layer cake that wasn't quite such a monster but decided that I really needed to go with something that I knew and was familiar with. Hence, the six layer rainbow cake that you see pictured above. This was my first time actually making it as a true six layer cake. My other versions involved a single layer and cupcakes so this was a deviation from the past, and even though I knew I had made something somewhat similar before, the ladies to whom I fed it to had not seen it before.

I followed the recipe exactly. It was helpful to have the wax paper under the layers of finished cake until I was finished icing. If not, can you imagine how messy that glass cake stand would have been? That's the first time I've actually used that method to frost a cake so it was fun to try a new technique.

Whipping up the buttercream frosting was an interesting experience. I thought for sure that I had whipped it too much and it had curdled, but lo and behold I waited just a few more minutes until the sound of the mixer changed and when I looked it was absolutely perfect. Not the smoothest buttercream you've ever seen but it was definitely tasty! Enjoy!

Rainbow Cake
Source: Whisk Kid

Cake:
3 cups cake flour
4 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2-1/3 cup sugar
1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
5 egg whites, room temperature
2 teaspoons vanilla
1-1/2 cups milk, warmed about 30 seconds in microwave to bring to room temperature
food coloring (gels work the best)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Oil and line three 9" cake pans or however many you have. (I just reused the three I had.)

Sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.

Cream the sugar and butter. Add the egg whites one at a time; add the vanilla and mix until fully incorporated. Then, alternating between wet and dry, add the milk and flour mixture in two parts.

Divide the batter between 6 bowls. (Easiest way is to do it by weight.) Stir in a fair amount of the appropriate food color to each bowl. Pour into pans and smooth out so batter is even. Bake for about 15 minutes each.

Remove from oven; let rest in pan on cooling rack for 10 minutes. Then flip, cover, and put them in the fridge to cool quickly.

Lemon Swiss Meringue Buttercream
To fill and crumb coat
9 egg whites
1-3/4 cup sugar
2 cups unsalted butter, room temperature
2 teaspoons lemon extract

To frost:
5 egg whites
1 cup sugar
1 cup butter, cubed, room temperature
1 teaspoon lemon extract

Cook the egg whites and sugar in a small saucepan over medium heat, whisking constantly, until the sugar is completely dissolved. Pour into another bowl and whip on high speed until room temperature (about 10 minutes). Then, on a medium-low speed, add the butter one cube at a time, waiting until each piece is incorporated before adding the next. After all the butter has been added, turn the mixer back up to high speed and whip until it has come together (about 5 minutes). Add the extract, beat briefly. (If the buttercream seems soupy after all the butter has been added, refrigerate for 5 to 7 minutes and continue whipping until it becomes fluffy and workable.)

Assembling:
Start with whichever end of the rainbow you would like to. Lay first layer down on plate. (I divided my frosting for filling and crumb coating into six bowls because I wanted to make sure I had enough.) Cover with layer of frosting, top with next cake layer, repeat for all layers. You may want to chill the cake at this point so the frosting is more workable. Cover the top and sides of the cake with frosting.

Daring Bakers - Croquembouche

The May 2010 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Cat of Little Miss Cupcake. Cat challenged everyone to make a piece montée, or croquembouche, based on recipes from Peter Kump’s Baking School in Manhattan and Nick Malgieri.

May is the third month I will have taken part in a Daring Bakers challenge and so far the same thing has crossed my mind each month after reading the presentation of the challenge: "Oh man, what have I gotten myself into". It is typically followed by reading the recipe, looking at a few examples, and in general processing the whole idea before I soon realize that this is something that I can do. It may not be the most beautiful creation ever to grace a food blog, but it will be completed and done to the best of my ability. This month was no exception.

When I read the title (very French sounding) and saw the photo on the challenge instructions I immediately felt a certain amount of anxiety. I am imagining that if you saw a huge tower of pastries with firecrackers coming out of it you would be a bit stressed too! Couple that with the fact that the pastry components had unfamiliar French names and that I have never even made a cream puff in my entire life (and have rarely eaten any either), and I immediately felt the stress level increase. After settling my thoughts down a bit I began to look over photos of several other completed croquembouche and realized that there was quite a variety of flavors and styles of this elegant dessert. Whew, that made me feel a bit better. Well, that and actually watching the whole 15 minute video of Martha making one. I've told you before, I am a visual learner.

So, on to the challenge. A croquembouche, or piece montée, is a high pyramid/cone made of profiteroles sometimes dipped in chocolate, bound with caramel, and usually decorated with threads of caramel, sugared almonds, chocolate, flowers, or ribbons. In layman's terms, it is basically a tower of cream puffs that are bound together with chocolate or caramel and then can be decorated with a variety of edible and inedible items. For this particular challenge we were given a specific recipe for the crème patissiere (pastry cream), pate a choux (puff pastry), and a chocolate or caramel glaze.

My first intention was to make three different versions as mini towers so that I could experiment with different flavors and glazes. I had intended to make a whole batch of puff pastries, and then divide a half batch of pastry cream between a raspberry flavor and a coffee flavor. The raspberry flavor I was going to pair with a white chocolate glaze and the coffee flavor would be paired with a dark chocolate glaze. Unfortunately, I forgot my idea in the glee of my pastry cream actually turning out and added the raspberries to the entire batch. Not only that but I also forgot that I was going to freeze half of the puff pastries and promptly filled every single one of them with the raspberry cream. Oops! Add to it the fact that once my husband and I ate one for a taste test we couldn't seem to stop eating them. I think the fact that they are light as air has something to do with the fact that you have to eat a whole batch to feel like you've eaten anything. That's my story and I'm sticking to it!

 
Back to the process. There was one point when I was whisking the pastry cream where I felt that I had screwed things up because it was looking like it was starting to have chunks in it, like the eggs had solidified. I even gave up for a minute, set the whisk down and was ready to throw in the towel, but then I decided to keep stirring a bit. I'm glad I did because once it cooled in the fridge and I added the raspberry puree it turned out just perfect.

This was my first time making puff pastry from scratch. It was interesting to see how the dough would change as you added the eggs one by one, stirring between each addition. When first adding the egg the dough would be slimy and balled up, but as you stirred it in and the egg became absorbed, the consistency changed to that of mashed potatoes. Every time an egg was added the same thing happened. It was really quite fascinating. I did get a bit frustrated shaping the actual pastry since in my non-existent experience I was unsure of what to do to get the shape I wanted. They are supposed to be piped out of the pastry bag as round balls and you smoosh the little hat down with a wet finger. Mine not only had hats, but heads and bodies as well! I think it just added a bit of character to my little misshapen cream puffs, but that does not work to your advantage when you are looking for identical rounded balls to stack on top of each other.

Assembling the tower was not terribly difficult for me. Partly because it was a small tower in comparison to some of the croquembouche that are out there and also because I considered this my practice run. At this point I was still thinking that my final product would be raspberry filled cream puffs with a white chocolate glaze, but once I drizzled the white chocolate over the top I found it terribly plain looking. I knew I did not want a bunch of stuff sticking out of it like I had seen in some examples, and there was no way I was ready to do spun sugar, so I decided to add some dark chocolate drizzle to see if that livened it up a bit. Who can go wrong with dark chocolate? It not only livened up the appearance of the croquembouche, but it also livened up the flavor. I may still attempt another masterpiece before the month is over, but at this point I don't think my husband and I can get away with eating 35 raspberry filled cream puffs, half drizzled in oodles of chocolate, in a three hour time period again, so I'll have to come up with a different plan for its consumption. Enjoy!

If you would like the recipes for the pate a choux (puff pastries), crème patissiere (pastry cream), and the glazes, please email me. I followed the exact recipes, but I added a raspberry puree to the pastry cream once it had cooled and set up in fridge. The raspberry puree was made from frozen raspberries, thawed and then all the juices squeezed out through a cloth so there were no seeds. Sugar was then added to taste.

Triple Coconut Cream Mini Pies

While trying to decide what to make for a small get together I was having I ran across this recipe and I knew immediately that this would be what I was going to bake for dessert. There were two reasons for this, the first and most important being that over a year ago my husband and I got our hands on a magazine that showcased the best desserts in Seattle and this was in there. We tried many, and I mean many of the other restaurants, cupcake bakeries, and dessert shops, but we had yet to make it to the Dahlia Bakery to try the famous Triple Coconut Cream Pie. The second reason was that I was looking for something that I could serve in individual portions instead of one large dessert where half would be left when everyone was gone and I would be forced to eat it all by myself.

These mini pies really were the perfect size. The coconut pastry cream was so rich that having only a small portion of it really made it quite manageable. This was my first time purchasing an actual vanilla bean and now I know why I don't do it often. They are fairly expensive but I figured I'd splurge for this dessert. I did have a few issues with baking them but nothing that I wasn't able to work out. In the original recipe for the pastry crusts it was unclear to me whether to leave the chilled dough in the pan while baking or to move them to a cookie sheet. Well, let me just say that it is a good thing that I set the timer for only half the required baking time because when I opened my oven and saw them laying as flat as a pancake I realized my error. I was able to scoop them up with my spatula and then reform them into the muffin tin, stick them back in the oven, and they turned out fine. There was a momentary sense of panic at the time though! I also had no dried beans or pie weights so I just used parchment paper with rice poured on it so that the bottoms wouldn't puff up and it would hold it's general shape.

I found that one batch of the pastry crust made enough for nine small pies, but one batch of coconut pastry cream and one batch of the whipped cream actually made more than enough for the nine pies. I ended up making another half batch of pastry crust and using the leftover coconut cream and whipped cream to make 2 more 4-inch pies (that was after eating a few spoonfuls of the coconut pastry cream out of the bowl). Now all that's left to do is to head down to the Dahlia Bakery to compare pies. Enjoy!

Triple Coconut Cream Mini Pies
Source: MyRecipes.com

Coconut Pie Shells (can freeze unbaked, formed pastry shells for a few weeks)
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons flour
1/2 cup sweetened shredded coconut
2 teaspoons sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/2" cubes
3 to 5 tablespoons ice water

Mix together flour, coconut, sugar, and salt until combined. Add butter and blend in with pastry blender or two knives until butter forms little peas. Add water a tablespoon at a time, blending with a fork after each addition just until dough hold together.

Turn crumbs onto counter, form into a ball, and divide into 9 equal parts forming each into a small disk. Wrap each disk in plastic wrap and chill at least 30 minutes and up to 1 hour.

Upwrap rounds; working with one disk at a time, set on a lightly floured surface, and roll dough into a 5-inch circle using short strokes from the center outward (about 1/8" thick). Transfer dough to brioche mold (or muffin pan), letting it fall into place (if you push or stretch the dough it will shrink back when baked). Trim overhang flush with edge (I didn't do this for the muffin pan). Prick bottom lightly with a fork. Repeat with the remaining rounds. Chill unbaked pie shells for 1 hour before baking.

Put an oven rack in the lowest position and preheat oven to 400 degrees. Lay a sheet of parchment paper in each pie shell and fill with dried beans or pie weights (I used rice). If using brioche mold, put shells on a cookie sheet; if using a muffin pan, leave shells in muffin cups. Bake until medium golden, about 10-12 minutes. Remove beans and parchment paper; return to the oven. Bake until bottoms of crusts have golden brown patches, about 10 minutes. (Mine were done after the first 10-12 minutes baking so I didn't need to remove the paper and rice and bake them longer.) Cool completely before filling.

Coconut Pastry Cream (can be made ahead and refrigerated up to two days)
2 cups milk
2 cups sweetened finely shredded coconut
1 vanilla bean, split in half lengthwise
2 large eggs
1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar
3 tablespoons flour
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened

Put milk and coconut in a medium saucepan over medium-high heat. Scrape seeds from vanilla bean and add both seeds and bean to the saucepan. Bring mixture to a gentle simmer, stirring occasionally.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the eggs, sugar, and flour. While whisking, drizzle about 1/3 of the hot milk mixture into egg mixture, then slowly whisk the egg mixture back into the saucepan. Cook over medium-high heat, whisking, until the pastry cream thickens and begins to bubble (about 4-5 minutes). Remove from heat, stir in butter, and discard vanilla bean.

Spoon hot pastry cream into a bowl and set in a larger bowl filled with ice and cold water, stirring occasionally, until cooled to room temperature. Remove bowl from ice water bath, cover with plastic wrap, pressing it directly onto surface (to prevent a skin from forming) and chill until cold, at least 3 hours.

Whipping Cream and Garnishes
2 1/2 cups heavy whipping cream
1/3 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
-----
1 - 3oz. chunk of white chocolate
1 cup unsweetened "chip" coconut (found at natural food stores) or 1/2 cup unsweetened shredded coconut,
          toasted (toast coconut in a 350 degree oven until golden, about 5-10 minutes)

Assembling the pies:
Carefully remove pie shells from the brioche mold or muffin pan. Spoon chilled pastry cream into shells, filling each a little more than halfway (I went all the way to the top of the pastry crust).

With an electric mixer, whip the cream, sugar, and vanilla until it holds stiff peaks. Fill a pastry bag fitted with a large star tip (no. 6) with whipped cream and pipe a double layer of cream onto pies, or simply spoon it on. (The pies should look like little beehive hairdos.)

With a vegetable peeler, scrape wide curls or shavings from the chunk of white chocolate. Sprinkle curls or shavings over pies, dividing evenly, and top with toasted coconut. Serve immediately. (You can fill the pastry crust with the coconut pastry cream hours before and just add whipped cream and garnishes right before serving.)