bounty chocolate: April 2011

Peanut butter brownies + your comments on a certain post

I’ve been thinking about the comments you left on my post about Gwyneth Paltrow’s cookbook and thought I might have been misunderstood by some: I agree with the fact that some people are naturally thin and can eat tons of food without gaining 1 single pound – I have cousins and friends that way. Nothing against those people – I wish I were one of them! :D
And I don’t think that one has to be

Nibby financiers

Certain smells, movies, songs – or even certain words – automatically remind us of certain people. In today’s case, it’s food that brings me two lovely friends of mine to mind – it’s impossible for me to bake financiers without thinking of @liliantrigo and Paula. :D

Nibby financiers
adapted from Rose's Heavenly Cakes

2/3 cup (66g) almond meal
1/3 cup + ½ tablespoon (51g) all purpose flour
¾

Chocolate lime pie + popsicles on the side

A couple of days after talking to you about intuition I had an insight while making this pie: since the tart pan I was using was a bit smaller than the one called for on the recipe, there was some filling left. I stared at the velvety cream and thought it would taste amazing as some sort of frozen dessert – I immediately poured the cream into my popsicle molds and ended up with totally

Chicken teriyaki

I’ve been cooking for as long as I can remember and in certain periods of my life I did not have much time to spend in the kitchen – I needed delicious yet quick meals for weeknights.
On my days as a single lady I used to make lots of pasta – both my dad and my sister are crazy for it and dinner would be on the table in less than half an hour.

Recently I’ve been trying my hand at Asian

Double chocolate chip cookies - from skinny cooks to skinny cookies

A while ago I was talking to Fezoca (via Twitter) about Gwyneth Paltrow’s cookbook – I have to say I wasn’t (and still am not) all that excited about it. I think she’s a beautiful woman, can sing really well, but would never make it to my list of favorite actresses – I find her really limited as far as acting is concerned. Anyway, that has nothing to do with the cookbook thing – what doesn’t

For me?! Thank you!

Look at what I've just been handed by Mother Humble, fresh from her flight across the Atlantic. A gorgeous box of Ladurée Macarons.

What do you think... chill and slice up some of the world's best macarons? Give the macaron fanatic bakers out there a good visual idea of how these are done when they're done just right.

Who is interested? :)

Or, I could just eat them. Immediately.

Photos are ready! Cut them all up and not a gap to be found. Perfectly executed (didn't expect anything less). This is actually my first batch of professional macarons where I could not find even one gap or hollow when subjected to the Global knife test.

I'm going to post a few of the photos in full-res, that way any obsessive baker types can click them and get a better idea of the texture of matured macs (though a couple of these were a hair on the dry side for my own tastes). There are relatively few photos of actual matured macarons on the blog. I usually photograph them the same day I bake them, so this should be helpful.

Top left: Vanilla, Top right: Raspberry, Middle Right: Salted Caramel, Bottom Right: Rose

Salted Caramel & Rose

Raspberry & Vanilla

Pretty darn perfect, don't you think?

Enjoy the photos, I'm going to go enjoy the cookies now.

Vanilla flan with gingerbread crumbs

Those of you who – sometimes – devour lunch with an eye on dessert, please, raise your hand. 0/

I made a beautiful, delicious salad with tuna – from this book – for lunch and, even though I happily savored each bite of it, I was really interested in trying this flan. :)

And since I know you are all so dear and won’t judge me, there goes the recipe. :D

Vanilla flan with gingerbread crumbs

Wholemeal apple and marmalade cake

Back in 2009 my dear friend Valentina introduced me to Nigel Slater – it was love at first sight. His delicious recipes, beautiful garden and passionate way of speaking about food – clear without being patronizing – were a perfect combination.

I really do not know why it took me so long to buy one of his books, but I certainly started with a wonderful one. This cake is absurdly tender –

Mini raspberry cheesecakes and trusting your instincts

Something I’ve been trying to do more often is to trust my instincts, but sometimes I fail miserably at doing so – and deeply regret it afterwards.

Take this recipe, for instance: the mini cheesecakes looked adorable on the book, but after reading the recipe I wasn’t so keen on the idea of making the batter using an electric mixer – it would add too much air to the mixture, so a food processor

Pecan, coconut and lemon bars

I’m a creature of habits, and I’m OK with that.

Going through Amanda Hasser’s amazing compilation of recipes, my heart stood still when I read the words “lemon” and “bars”; I immediately thought that you’ve already seen enough lemon bars around here, but I went on and read the recipe anyway. I’m so glad I did: these were not regular lemon bars. These were a match made in heaven of a chewy,

Texas sheet cake

Grandma-style-cake again – but this time, there’s chocolate involved. ;)

I needed a large cake – the idea was to share it with 12 of my coworkers – and the Texas sheet cake recipe I found at "Bon Appétit Desserts" seemed perfect [yes, I am obsessed with this book, and I know how understanding you all are]. ;)

Both the cake and the icing were delicious and were wonderful together – a day after

Flourless peanut butter and chocolate chip cookies

Flour – an ingredient always present in my pantry, essential for someone who loves baking like I do. But sometimes we can go on perfectly well without it and it’s not necessary at all – like Renée Zellweger in “Cold Mountain”. :)

My peanut butter cookie recipe hunt started with this amazing book, but I was really after a flourless version, which I found on Epicurious.
The cookies turned out

French Crullers with Honey-Sugar Glaze

Crullers are such gorgeous donuts, I could snap photos of them all day with sticky fingers. That is... if they ever lasted that long around here.

Not only are they photogenic, they're not terribly difficult to make. Perfect for the absent minded pregnant lady who wants a sweet treat asap.

For those unfamiliar with French crullers, they're different than your average yeast or cake donut. French crullers are light, airy and eggy morsels of powdered or glazed dough. (I usually tell folks: If you like Dutch baby pancakes, you'll enjoy these too.) They don't pack the same bellyache inducing carbohydrate-wallop that other donuts do. Which is a good thing, until you find yourself helping yourself to a second and then a third...

Lemon molasses marble cake - a cake with a workout

This cake was the first recipe I tried from this book, which is full of amazing recipes and perfect for a sweet tooth like me; lemon cake, no surprise there, but the idea of marbling it with a molasses cake sounded too good not to try.

Indeed the flavor combo is delicious and the cake is very tender; do not be put off by the different steps of preparation – think of them as a great workout,

Peaches and cream ice pops - updated

My summer issue of the DH mag has finally arrived, but unfortunately summer is already gone. I could not resist the ice pops spread, though – each and every flavor looked so good I would have to make at least one. :)
My initial idea was making the raspberry yogurt popsicles, but I’d used my raspberries in other recipes. Luckily I still had a couple of peaches – the last ones of the season – and

French Lemon Poppy Seed Loaf

Is it already April?!

Well, I'm wrapping up the final weeks of my pregnancy and I feel like a Weeble Wobble. Only I do fall down.

I've been devoting my energy towards getting things ready for the baby. Nesting, as many call it. One cannot deny the powerful hormonal urge to put things in absolute order. So I've been tearing up my house, reorganizing everything in sight and writing 'Honey-Do' lists that span pages. I've even been waddling around, cleaning the garage. Though, I suspect the newborn will spend little time in there.

The house looks great but I admit the kitchen has been neglected, logging only two baking sessions this month. I've had to fulfill my cravings with store bought treats. (Mr. Humble wants me to admit publicly that I threatened to kill Mr. Stinky, our sourdough starter, if he didn't bring me home chocolates one day after work. As they say, desperate times call for…) Though, I admit that I should probably knock that off, since store bought treats can be sub-par.

I had the most terrible eclair last week. How does one mess up choux, anyway? Hard, crunchy eclairs? Why, why!?

Anyway, I've been keeping up on the blog-work, but not doing a lot of posting. I may have some help here soon though, blogging and otherwise. We've had some big news in the Humble family: Mother Humble is hanging up her English Wellies and moving across the pond to sunny, tropical Seattle. We expect her here in two weeks and she has promised to lend a hand, as I will be recovering from a caesarean next month. She has also expressed some interest in doing a little guest food blogging on NSHP.

Mother Humble is a terrific cook and someone who I credit for much of my comfort in the kitchen. I'm pretty excited about her posting. She may prove more entertaining than myself, since she has a rather quirky streak in her nature. Whatever she posts, it will likely be delicious and help relieve some of the lulls we've been experiencing while I'm down and out from babies.

So enough updating as to my status, let's get down to the food!

Rice pudding with rhubarb compote and homemade meringues

Another rhubarb recipe – please, bear with me. :)

The idea for this dessert came from "Jamie at Home" – he uses strawberries for it – the rice pudding is Sophie Dahl’s – have I told how much I love this book? :) – and the rhubarb compote and the meringues are the ones left from the mini pavlovas. Does that sound messy? I bet that not as messy as the dessert itself. Nor as delicious. ;)

I ate

Brown sugar cake with mixed toffee nuts + a list of hints and tips

I’ve told you before how much I enjoy receiving your comments and emails, I really do - they have brightened some dark days I’ve had. Since some of those emails are packed with questions and doubts I thought a list of hints and tips would be useful – and I’ve added one to the blog menu now.

I don’t mean to sound presumptuous, please – I still have a lot to learn and I do not have any