I’m not sharing a recipe with you today.  I’m sharing an idea, and that idea is cashew butter.  Ok, so it’s not an idea, it’s an ingredient.  I’m not sharing with you a recipe because this is one I want to adapt to be gluten [...]]]>

I’m not sharing a recipe with you today.  I’m sharing an idea, and that idea is cashew butter.  Ok, so it’s not an idea, it’s an ingredient.  I’m not sharing with you a recipe because this is one I want to adapt to be gluten free first.  This is my dad’s grandmother’s peanut butter cookie recipe, and it’s totally glutenicious.  I’m pretty sure that’s one of the main reasons why these are so delectably soft compared to traditional flourless peanut butter cookies, and I want to be able to present to you the same quality of awesomeness that comes with the original recipe.

The last time I made similar cookies (Almond Butter Cookies) I got lucky when I added in flour and they happened to work.  This time I don’t want to get lucky.  I want to get it right and know exactly why it works.  And when I do I will share with you her secret family recipe, GF style

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Read the rest of Cashew Butter Cookies (338 words)

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You’re probably sick of hearing me talk about strawberries by now, but I have one last strawberry dish for you!  The season is sadly ending, and I am holding out as long as I can before having to wait another year for my favorite red fruit again. [...]]]>

You’re probably sick of hearing me talk about strawberries by now, but I have one last strawberry dish for you!  The season is sadly ending, and I am holding out as long as I can before having to wait another year for my favorite red fruit again.  Luckily, Summer is full of great tasty fresh fruits throughout the season, so now there are things like cherries, melons are coming in, and soon there will be peaches!  I think I might be able to survive entirely on fresh fruit during this season, well if it weren’t for things like cheese or chocolate to distract me…ok maybe there are some other foods too that I enjoy as well

This dish, however, might be the one.  And by that I don’t mean my next life-long relationship (even strawberries cannot trump the awesomeness of my husband), I mean the dish that lets the berries sing through every bite, a joyous chorus of praise and adoration for all things wonderful in life.  Bright and cheerful, you can feel your spirits lifting and your cares dissolving with each successive spoonful.  I think this crisp may have the ability to mollify tensions and makeup after arguments.  Especially served right out of the oven with a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top.  I think it could be that powerful.

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Read the rest of Summer Berry Crisp (441 words)

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The success of cooking is as much dependent on how well one follows the directions of a good recipe as it is on being able to add a personal element – either to suit your tastes, your current pantry, or just to [...]]]>

The success of cooking is as much dependent on how well one follows the directions of a good recipe as it is on being able to add a personal element – either to suit your tastes, your current pantry, or just to give a recipe a little bit of flair to help you make a dish become a part of you.  And that’s why I’m going to be embarking on a little project.  Over the next month or so, I’m going to make for you a guide.  A guide to GF ingredients, a guide to knowing when you can switch one thing for the other – in the hopes of giving you more tools to enjoy your gluten free cooking.  I’m going to aim for a month to put it together, and I hope it will help you.

One of the hardest facets of gluten free baking is making the right decisions about substitutions – When does it matter what flours are in a recipe?  When can you just substitute a box mix?  Is it really necessary to own 20 different types of ingredients to make something?  If you are like me, you probably have a base of 4-5 flours that you use regularly, and when you see a recipe with someone else’s gluten free flour mix, you do your best to make do with what you own rather than going out to spend even more money at the store – cause let’s face it – gluten free ingredients often bring a whole new definition to pricey groceries.  I think about substitutions almost every time I bake gluten free – sometimes I am sure the end result will come out great and other times I’m praying to the gluten free baking gods that whatever is in the oven will turn out edible.  As you probably well know, baking is not my original area of expertise, and even I am prone to a mess-up or two.

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Read the rest of Strawberry Chocolate & Banana Quick-Bread (666 words)

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I am a scientist.  As such, I am no stranger to using technology to solve problems.  I love that so many sophisticated tools have been developed to offer us a unique way of seeing the world that has never been possible before.  When you step [...]]]>

I am a scientist.  As such, I am no stranger to using technology to solve problems.  I love that so many sophisticated tools have been developed to offer us a unique way of seeing the world that has never been possible before.  When you step back and look at the evolution of our technology through the course of history, you have to admit that it’s quite astonishing just how intricately all of our lives have become married to a dependency on so many complex machines.   But sometimes you have to sit back and think – is it all so absolutely necessary in every aspect of our lives?

On an average night, I am usually only cooking for the two of us – I’m not a chef in a restaurant, cooking for an entire evening of customers.  Nor am I preparing a giant buffet for a reception.  It’s just me and my husband.  And when things are small and simple, sometimes using modern technology gets in the way.  For example, take the act of whipping cream.  It will actually take me more time to dig out the hand mixer and assemble it, and it will make more of a mess to beat whipped cream with a mixer in my bowls than it would if I just grabbed a whisk out of the drawer and did it by hand.  That’s right, I’ll say it again – for me, a collection of metal shaped into a ball is faster than an electric mixer at making whipped cream.

I first learned to make whipped cream this way when I was young, though I didn’t fully appreciate the method until later.  Almost as long as I can remember, growing up in church we had a giant strawberry festival for a month in the summer, and we would raise money by selling beautiful homemade strawberry shortcakes.  To this day those are some of the best strawberry shortcakes I’ve ever had.  My family was volunteering to help out that day, and I got set on the task of whipping cream by a woman with a particularly distinct Scottish brogue – ha back then I thought I would never get this cream into whipped cream!  But in a kid’s mind time goes differently – and a few minutes can seem like an eternity.  Now, a few minutes is nothing.  Whipped cream with a whisk is easy.  Maybe even easier than with a mixer.  Did I mention it’s one less dish to wash too?

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Read the rest of Individual Pavlovas (585 words)

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When my sister in law came to visit a couple weeks ago, my husband and I were both ecstatic to receive a gift of a giant jar of peanut butter.  While one can get peanut butter here, it is pretty darn expensive [...]]]>

When my sister in law came to visit a couple weeks ago, my husband and I were both ecstatic to receive a gift of a giant jar of peanut butter.  While one can get peanut butter here, it is pretty darn expensive and, well, there is nutella instead  So the very first oh-so-elegant dish that we made with our new treasure?  It was totally “ants-on-a log”.  You may or may not know of this snack, the last time I was actually served it I was probably in about first grade.  Take a stick of celery, fill it with peanut butter, and line it with rasins.  I know it sounds odd, but it’s quite satisfying.

So what was our next peanut butter adventure after we’d grown up from “ants on a log”?  Making another that is a symbol of home, the buckeye.  A buckeye is actually a tree, which produces nuts that look very much like this dessert (hence the name).  Making buckeyes couldn’t be easier – combine equal parts peanut butter & powdered sugar, roll into truffles, and dip almost completely in chocolate.  Yep, that’s it!  And with another great gift of some semi-sweet chocolate chips (why can’t I find chocolate chips here?), our treat was perfect

It’s funny how much we have gravitated towards comfort foods and flavors since moving abroad.  I figured that we would be reaching out more to try new cuisines, and increasingly we find ourselves preparing the familiar.  I think in a way our cooking has become a psychological outlet for dealing with being thousands of miles away from virtually everyone that we know.  While we love living in a new country and learning how to live in a society with many many differences from what we are used to, and being able to visit mountains and other countries in just a mere weekend getaway, I think we are still constantly seeking something we can recognize to make a bit of a home for ourselves.  And with so many things in life, home begins with food.

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The ultimate gluten free chocolate cake doesn’t come from a flour mix.  It doesn’t come from a complicated recipe, and it doesn’t include xanthan gum.  No, the richest, most flavorful gluten free chocolate cake I have ever tried has astonishingly few ingredients, no required substitutions, and relatively simple instructions. [...]]]>

The ultimate gluten free chocolate cake doesn’t come from a flour mix.  It doesn’t come from a complicated recipe, and it doesn’t include xanthan gum.  No, the richest, most flavorful gluten free chocolate cake I have ever tried has astonishingly few ingredients, no required substitutions, and relatively simple instructions.  That’s because the richest, most flavorful gluten free chocolate cake is a completely flourless chocolate torte.

Torte is just a fancy (or rather, French) word for cake.  I have been making this recipe for at least more than the better half of the past ten years.  I could make it in my sleep probably.

I love this recipe because I break the rules.  I eat it warm, after only about 20 minutes coming out of the oven.  Traditional tortes like this are chilled overnight, and it even says so in the recipe.  But when you eat it right out of the oven, it is much fluffier.  I love when a flavor is so intensely rich and yet its texture is deceptively delicate.  That’s how this torte is if you don’t wait.  Ok, truth be told, I figured this out completely by accident one day because I was in grad school during a crazy stressful time, freaking out about my candidacy exam, pulling my hair out, hyped up on way too much caffeine than should be considered sane, causing my husband to wonder if I really was going to be this much of a mess for the next forever that we were going to know each other, and I just did not have the willpower to let chocolate sit in the fridge overnight.  I have my weaknesses.

But trust me, it’s still awesome even if you let it sit overnight.  But it won’t be as fluffy.  It will be the rich dense chocolate torte you probably already have conjured up in your head.

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Read the rest of Flourless Chocolate Torte (940 words)

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I am devoting an entire post to this cream because it is worthy of a post all of its own – I originally made this when I made these tartes au citron last week, and it was the perfect paring with the lemon curd.  Ha yes, last time [...]]]>

I am devoting an entire post to this cream because it is worthy of a post all of its own – I originally made this when I made these tartes au citron last week, and it was the perfect paring with the lemon curd.  Ha yes, last time I tricked you and only showed you the dish 75% done!  Sometimes I can be sneaky like that.  But I had my reasons, and the reason was to give the proper homage to this delicious cream.  I was worried about the tartes possibly being a little too tart, and so I wanted to make a sweet little something to complement them.  I love lemons and pistachios together, it’s such a bright blend of flavors.  Well, actually I love pistachios in just about any way, but that’s beside the point.  In the end the tartes were just fine, but I decided to add this on anyways, haha.  I really just sort of threw this together, and now that I had an entire container of it in my fridge I keep coming up with ideas for how to use it – well provided my husband doesn’t eat it all first!

There is one change I really think needs to happen from my original go at the pistachio cream, and I am going to put it directly in the instructions – that is to blanch the pistachios first, to help soften them up.  The cream was rich and flavorful and sweet, but really too gritty in the way that I did this.  Blanching the pistachios will allow you to get closer to a true purée, making for a much smoother texture.  So don’t skip that step.  It’s not the end of the world if you do, because this was really quite something to behold, but it will help immensely.  Mouthfeel is just as important as taste, and should be treated with equal consideration.

I did my best to form pretty little quenelles of cream on top of these tartes, but think I need some more practice – they didn’t quite come out as pretty as they should…

A little goes a long way with this cream, so you only need a small amount!(...)
Read the rest of Pistachio Cream (213 words)

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Do you ever develop emotional attachments to your cookbooks?  I certainly do – I tend to get sentimental about books anyways, but especially my cookbooks – after all, they have been with me through some failures and successes, repeated trials, discovering new techniques and all of the crazy adventures [...]]]>

Do you ever develop emotional attachments to your cookbooks?  I certainly do – I tend to get sentimental about books anyways, but especially my cookbooks – after all, they have been with me through some failures and successes, repeated trials, discovering new techniques and all of the crazy adventures that go with learning how to cook.  For example, I feel like Marcella Hazan taught me pasta in her Classic Italian Cookbook.  The first time I made it I totally freaked out, but her directions were so clear that after reading I felt like she gave me all the confidence I needed.  Confidence is really the most important ingredient in cooking.  You have to believe in what you are doing – like if you try to make macarons and get all nervous and anxious about it, I’m convinced that the cookies somehow know and will misbehave accordingly.  Or maybe I’m just very superstitious  But over the years, I have come to depend on my cookbooks always being there, offering guidance when I felt lost.

So you can imagine the small feeling of panic when I realized I could not bring my entire library of cookbooks (well, enough to fill a couple bookshelves at least) with me across the ocean.  I told myself I could find whatever I needed online or buy them again here.  I ended up bringing just a couple of books and making the decision of what to pick was agonizingly painful, it was like saying good bye to a long time friend.  So now I am here, and when my parents came to visit a few weeks ago they brought me a gift – a cookbook from Ladurée – there couldn’t have been a better housewarming gift (well, maybe the macarons that they brought too, those were pretty darn good – and naturally gluten free!).  I love the soft velvety cover and gold lined pages, it feels so special.  And I’m totally going to use the ribbon as my bookmark, haha.  Translating and cooking from it (as it is in French) will definitely be a learning experience, and I fully intend to be able to convert the recipes I make to be gluten free.  I decided to start with a basic tarte shell, the pâte sucrée aux amandes.

The first time I made some basic apple tartes and the 2nd time I changed my proportions around a bit and decided to make David Lebovitz’s tarte au citron.  It’s fantastic by the way, and the next time I may be tempted to not even bother with the shell and just eat the lemon curd straight out of the pan.  I almost sat myself down on the couch and did just that after tasting, it was so irresistible – but I managed to bring myself to pour the curd into my tarte shells and set them in the fridge overnight.  That took an unbelievable amount willpower! But anyways, back to these tartes.  They worked really well both times – gluten free crusts are not so hard because there is no stretching or rising required in a crust, so gluten is not so important.  But there are still some techniques that make working with gluten free dough a little easier, and I totally cheated and did most of this in the food processor.  I think my 2nd attempt at the crust had more flavor, so it’s the recipe I am showing here.

I apologize up front for not having volume measurements.  One of my first purchases for my kitchen was a scale.  It reads in grams.  I am a chemist, mass and metric units make sense to me, and everyone should really weigh their ingredients anyways – if you are going to take the effort to measure out your ingredients you might as well be precise and accurate.  If you don’t believe me, then believe Michael Ruhlman – he knows what he’s talking about and describes just about how much variation volume measurements can have.  Mass measurements are definitely the way to go.

Adapted from Ladurée – Sucré

Ingredients (for four 4″ tarts):
65 g almonds or hazelnuts, pistachios, whatever is your favorite
120g butter, cut into pieces
70g powdered sugar
pinch salt
1 egg
60g potato starch
60g rice flour
40g finely ground buckwheat flour

Directions:
1.  Pulse nuts in a food processor until you have formed a meal.  If the oil released from the nuts causes them to clump together too much like in a butter, add in a little bit of the powdered sugar.
2. Pulse in the butter, then powdered sugar and salt, then egg.
3. Mix together the gluten free flours in a bowl, and then gradually add to the dough, pulsing only enough for all of the dough and the flour to be incorporated.  Then take the dough with your hands and form it into a ball, wrap in plastic wrap and stick it in the fridge for a couple hours.  You want the dough to be really cold to work with it.
4. Take out of the fridge,  and separate the dough into 4 parts.  Put the other three back into the fridge, you only want to work with one at a time.  Roll out the dough between two sheets of plastic wrap until it is thin – you want it a little less than 1/4″.  To transfer to your tarte dish, peel off the top layer of plastic wrap, take it in your hands, and gently flip it onto your dish.  Then carefully peel off the other layer of plastic wrap, and press into your dish.  Trim any lose ends, and prick the bottom with a fork.  Do the same with the other 3.
5. To bake, preheat oven to 350F, cover it with foil that has been greased and weigh down your tarte shell (beans, pie weights, etc.). If you don’t, the shell will puff up and the sides will fall down.  It will still be tasty, but you will just end up with a thick tarte bottom instead.  Baking time will depend on the thickness of your dough – mine took around 20 minutes.  Keep in mind that I am doing this all in a glorified toaster oven because I don’t have an actual oven in my apartment, so it’s not like I could digitally set the temp and the temp may not have been exact.

© Jenn Cuisine, 2009 - 2010. | Permalink | 6 comments | Add to del.icio.us

Hi.  I’m Jenn and I am a chocoholic.  I eat chocolate every day.  I love dark chocolate that isn’t very sweet.  In fact, the higher the percentage of cocoa solids in chocolate, the better as far as I am concerned.  And next to eating delicious chocolate, I [...]]]>

Hi.  I’m Jenn and I am a chocoholic.  I eat chocolate every day.  I love dark chocolate that isn’t very sweet.  In fact, the higher the percentage of cocoa solids in chocolate, the better as far as I am concerned.  And next to eating delicious chocolate, I love to cook with it.

To conclude our Valentine’s dinner, we decided to make chocolate soufflés after I found out the shocking information that my husband had never eaten one before.  ”Are you kidding?” Who has not enjoyed the paradoxically light and airy yet incredibly rich delight that is the chocolate soufflé?  My jaw dropped to the floor.  To correct this problem, I immediately decided that we had to make soufflés for Valentine’s Day.  I’d never made a chocolate soufflé before, but I have made cheese soufflés and figured they couldn’t be that difficult.  In fact, they aren’t.  They just take some work.  Ok a lot of work.  Prepare for your arm to be quite sore from all the whisking afterwards.  In fact, take a couple weeks beforehand to lift some weights and develop those biceps.  Ok, I’m joking, but whisking constantly for a while does take some effort.  Don’t let that hold you back though, because the end result is totally worth it.  Like your world will come to a screaming halt and you will instantly be lifted to a higher plane of being upon taking your first bite.

Just make sure to serve them tout de suite before they start to fall!  My husband was laughing at me as I was frantically trying to take a couple of quick pictures.  In the picture above the soufflé had already fallen about halfway, but you get the idea.  Light and airy, dark and mysterious, all in one complex little dish.  Just wonderful.

Adapted from Gordon Ramsay’s Maze

Ingredients (for 2):
butter for greasing the ramekins
2 tbs. sugar + some for coating + 1 tbs. sugar
2 eggs, separated
a few drops lemon juice
100 g good quality dark chocolate (at least 70%), chopped

Directions:
1. Grease 2 ramekins about 3/4 cup in size with butter, then dust with sugar.  This will help the soufflé raise up straight.  Preheat oven to 200 C (about 390F).
2. Add lemon juice to whites and beat until foamy – gradually add in 2 tbs. sugar and then beat until siff peaks.
3. Use or make a double boiler (I had a pyrex bowl sitting in a pan of water) and bring water up to a simmer.  Meanwhile, whisk egg yolks and 1 tbs. sugar together until smooth.  Put bowl of yolks into simmering water and whisk constantly until tripled in size.  Remove from heat and keep whisking until room temperature. Note – this order is different from the original recipe (as is the amount of sugar and chocolate), but I found it easier if you are not a very fast world reknowned chef
4.  Add chopped chocolate to another small pyrex bowl, and melt over the simmering water.  Once melted and smooth, remove from the heat and let sit for about 60 seconds.  Gently fold in the egg yolks and about 1/2 c. of the beaten egg whites.  Once mixed together, add all to the rest of the beaten whites and fold until fully incorporated.  Pour into ramekins leaving about 1/2 cm. from the top of the dishes and bake for about 10 minutes until puffed up and risen.  When done, immediately (and quickly) remove from the oven, garnish with some powdered sugar if desired, and serve.  Enjoy!

© Jenn Cuisine, 2009 - 2010. | Permalink | 15 comments | Add to del.icio.us