Pithiviers

Participating in the Tuesdays with Dorie online baking group means learning new things as well as being introduced to unfamiliar desserts.  Pithivers is in north central France, the location of a Nazi internment camp.  A pithivier is a pie made with puff pastry and almond cream (frangipane).

Having little previous experience with puff pastry I was unprepared for how easy and impressive Dorie's Pithiviers recipe is.

The version in Baking Chez Moi calls for a home made prune jam.  I used a chunky plum ginger jam made by local culinary students.  The almond cream is simply a mixture of butter, sugar, optional lemon or orange zest, almond flour, all purpose flour, cornstarch, egg white, and rum or vanilla.  This plus store bought puff pastry is all you need to make this wonderful dessert.

Salted Chocolate-Caramel Bars

Salted Chocolate-Caramel Bars from Dorie's Cookies have a chocolate shortbread base with a salted chocolate caramel topping sprinkled with toasted chopped pecans.

My caramel had lumps, which I removed with a spoon.  After refrigerating the bars overnight I was disappointed to see that the caramel did not set.  Perhaps I should have reviewed how to make caramel before starting, used a heavier pan, swirled the pan less as the sugar mixture was cooking, let it get a little darker before I took it off the stove, warmed the cream before adding, who knows what went wrong.

Perhaps some time in the freezer will improve the texture.

Black-and-White Marbled Madeleines

Two years ago we made Lemon Madeleines from Baking Chez Moi.  It is one of my favourite baked goods from the book so far.  I was happy to get out my madeleine pan to try Black-and-White Marbled Madeleines this week.

I followed the recipe exactly except I left out the grated lime zest because I really don't like lime.  If I make these again I would like to try adding cinnamon to the chocolate portion of the dough.  Also I'll use a different chocolate as I found the bar I used was very sweet without much chocolate flavour.

The madeleines came out of the pan without a hitch.  They look lovely and taste pretty good, but lemon is still the best.

"Corked" Breton Galettes

Breton galettes, from Dories Cookies, are thick, round buttery cookies.  The dough is shaped into a roll, chilled, sliced, and baked in a muffin tin. The recipe instructs us to press a cork or the end of a wooden spoon into the cookies when they come out of the oven.  I added jam to the holes, and can see it will be fun to experiment with other fillings.

Rose-Hibiscus Shortbread Fans

Rose - Hibiscus Shortbread from Dorie's Cookies was my project for this week's Tuesdays With Dorie.

My hibiscus tea also contains organic peel, cinnamon, cranberries, lemon verbena, and rosehips with natural organic flavour.  I decided to leave out the rose extract or rose water called for in the recipe.  It seemed like there would be a lot happening flavour wise just with the tea.

I didn't have rice flour on hand and made the All-Purpose Shortbread variation with all-purpose white flour.

The recipe has a short ingredient list and was easy to put together.  I wondered as I patted the dough into the round cake pan, pricked it and crimped it as instructed, if it would break after baking.  I baked the shortbread for 23 minutes and followed the cutting and pan removal directions exactly as written.  I'm happy to say nothing crumbled and we ended up with 16 slim wedges of delicately flavoured shortbread.

Sunday in Paris Chocolate Cake

I made Sunday in Paris Chocolate Cake from Dorie Greenspan's Baking Chez Moi for this week's Tuesdays with Dorie posting.
Inspired by a Paris pastry shop, Dorie's recipe uses an ingredient which is unusual in France - peanut butter.
The batter features both bittersweet or semisweet chocolate and cocoa along with peanut butter and chopped peanuts.
I chose to bake the cake in a square pan so that I could decorate it for Valentines Day.  To amp up the peanut butter flavour I replaced the heavy cream in the ganache with peanut butter.  The cake looks rustic and not at all Parisian, perfect for an at home celebration.

Valentine's Day Share-a-Heart

Valentine's Day Share a Heart is a roll and cut chocolate cookie made with cocoa powder in the food processor.
Rather than doing a giant heart I chose to have some fun and cut out medium big hearts free hand.
The cookies have a nice brownie flavour and will be great for sharing with neighbours.