25 replies to this topic

[Steve Klc]

Amanda rediscovers the joy of plain old vanilla today at the hands of Bill Yosses. Get the recipe for his killer warm vanilla cake that I alluded to earlier in the New York/Citarella thread: click.

What Amanda doesn't tell you--which I think is of value to amateur and pro alike--is that the batter can be held in the fridge for 3-4 days.

[Fat Guy]

I thought the vanilla package was one of Ms. Hesser's better ones of late. I believe she does her best work when she digs deep into a single ingredient, technique, product, or other such subject area. I miss her gadget pieces, which were always excellent.

A little while back I wrote a series of pieces for a magazine about building-block ingredients (salt, pepper, butter, oil, vinegar) and how they are often misunderstood and overlooked despite their potential variety and subtlety. One of these pieces was on vanilla. Unfortunately the magazine died an early death, so I've been running the series on my Web site. I'll be pushing the one on balsamic vinegar in my newsletter to come out on Monday October 1.

That bit of self promotion aside, I think most home cooks can benefit more from discussions of the basic ingredients and techniques than they can from any number of cookbooks. It's amazing how delicious food can be when prepared only with salt, pepper and butter -- provided all ingredients are excellent and there is a solid foundation of technique. And it's amazing how the simplest recipes -- such as toll house cookies -- can be transformed by the inclusion of superior vanilla and chocolate.

[Steve Klc]

In the spirit of digging deep into a single ingredient--for those that may wish to--may I recommend the finest treatment of vanilla that I'm aware of:  Ed Behr's chapter in "The Artful Eater," his 1992 book which is unfortunately out of print.  Perhaps if you contact him and subscribe to his quarterly food letter, "The Art of Eating," Ed will throw in a photocopy of the vanilla essay.

http://www.artofeating.com/index.htm

Another sympathetic treatment of vanilla, much more of a culinary and cultural travelogue, can be found in Saveur #39 (December 1999) by Maricel Presilla, an expert on Latin and South American cuisines.  (Maricel also happens to be a chef and co-owner of Zafra, a newish restaurant in Hoboken, NJ).

[Jason Perlow]

I've read Maricel's vanilla peice -- have you been to her restaurant?

[Lesley C]

I made that "killer warm vanilla" cake for a few friends last night. It wasn't a hit (and that's putting it mildly). Stated by one especially frank pastry chef: "What's this, warm white chocolate? Yuk!"
Guess I'll be going back to the old -- hard to beat -- Jean-Georges moelleux au chocolat.

[Steve Klc]

Lesley--are you talking about JG "dark" chocolate moelleux?  Obviously a big difference if you are.  Have you tried Philippe Conticini's "white" chocolate moelleux yet?

and I'll make Amanda's version of Bill's cake this week and report back here on Monday or Tuesday.  Wouldn't surprise me if something got lost in her "adaptation" and the weight to volume conversion deemed so necessary.

I could only vouch for Bill's cake being killer in the restaurant.

Perhaps we'll inaugurate an ongoing thread--good recipes gone bad at the hands of others?

[Fat Guy]

Quote: from Steve Klc on 9:41 am on Sep. 29, 2001
Perhaps we'll inaugurate an ongoing thread--good recipes gone bad at the hands of others?

We'll add more memory to the eGullet server!

[Lesley C]

Yes, I think dark chocolate cake works better hot. The white chocolate is a bit too rich, sweet and cloying and the cake also has an off-putting eggy flavour. I prefer using vanilla beans in crème anglaise-based preparations like ice creams or Bavarians  where the beans are steeped, allowing them the chance to release their full perfume (Hesser is right about cheesecakes). Even cookies. Butter cookies or pound cake made with vanilla beans will taste better after a few days than if eaten an hour out of the oven. All that to say, I prefer my vanilla cold.

[Steve Klc]

Colleen and I made Amanda's adaptation of Bill's warm vanilla cake yesterday--and it turns out not to be too far from the way it is actually prepared and served at Citarella.  (Though remember, ideally it is not eaten in isolation--but as one component and texture of a larger whole--accompanied by a sauce and quenelle of ice cream.)

Bill was also quite willing to share his actual recipe (by weight) with our eGullet Cooking forum--and I have a few observations, too, to share after having played with both versions.  Here's the restaurant version:

100g butter (3.5oz)
200g Valrhona white chocolate (7oz)
5 eggs
3 vanilla beans
40g bread flour (1.5oz)
pinch cream of tartar
100g sugar (3.5oz)

He scales this up by ten--and bakes the cakes off in a convection oven for 10 mins at 350 degrees.

The immediate differences?  Bill uses less bread flour (Amanda's 'volume' version calls for 2.1oz approximately); Bill uses more sugar (Amanda calls for 3.05oz approximately) and Bill specifies Valrhona--other varieties of white chocolate may be thicker or thinner and more or less sweet.

Some of Amanda's instructions are a little too fussy/prissy--but she's just trying to be thorough and helpful.  You can ignore them or do things differently.  (For instance:  I'd microwave the chocolate and butter on 30 second bursts, stirring after each burst, and avoid the water bath entirely.)

Some observations after working with the recipes at home:

1.  You don't need to "sift" the flour over the mixture.  Just dump the sifted flour in and stir until smooth.
2.  Letting the batter rest in the fridge for 8 hours is important.  Very important, and perhaps should warrant a separate line in the recipe.
3.  The amount of white chocolate that you push down into the center of the cake--before baking--is variable.  Amanda uses 3oz for 12 cakes--and this can be adjusted down, depending on your personal taste.  Use as little as 3g per cake.
4. To create even more of that earthy, musky element in the cake--and for those of you averse to white chocolate in general--after all, it is basically sweet fat--use El Rey white chocolate instead of Valrhona.  El Rey uses non-deodorized cocoa butter--which is less sanitized and less stripped of flavor than all other white chocolates, Valrhona included.
5.  If you want less of a jiggly/souffle-like cake--bake it a different way:  instead of letting the batter rest, in the bowl, overnight and then piping into rings--pipe the batter into rings immediately after mixing and then let rest for 8 hours, in the rings.  The cake bakes off much less souffle-like, yet remains perfumed, light and ethereal.  And as an added bonus--the rings slide right off and you won't need to run your paring knife around the edge to remove! If you do it this way, hold off pushing the white chocolate pieces or pistoles into the batter until you are ready to bake.  (Otherwise, overnight, they will just sink to the bottom.)
6.  I love the little crunch of the tiny vanilla seeds in this cake--which I don't remember detecting when I had it at the restaurant.

Hope this helps--Steve

[Lesley C]

Great follow-up Steve! Thanks. I'll try it again but next time I might omit the white chocolate insert altogether. I used Valrhona Ivoire and all other instructions seem correct (does anyone melt chocolate over a bain-marie anymore?).
I think this dessert needs an added element though. Some sort of fruit to offset the sweetness of the cake and ice cream. At Citarella do they serve it with just the cake and ice cream on the plate?
You mention a sauce. Is it a coulis?
~Lesley

[Steve Klc]

Bill changes what he serves with things all the time, depending on what his produce buyer, Greg Mufson, procures for him.  (Greg is a real unsung hero there--with sourcing to all these small, organic and biodynamic farms.) I think when I had it 6 weeks ago he was serving a clear, syrupy sauce infused with orange zest and vanilla beans.

But you've hit on something important about how our palates react to things--and how different cooks and chefs come up with ideas and adapt or modify tastes--based on what happens on their own tongues and in their mouths--and what they perceive to be missing.  I suspect you can easily reduce the sweetness, and add a little tartness, by sticking blueberries, or apricots or cranberries, even, in the center of the cake instead of the white chocolate.  For the sauce, perhaps cook a caramel and reduce it with some infused tea or citrus juice.  All of this diverts attention away from the vanilla--which is not necessarily or inherently bad--just different. Report back.

[Andy Lynes]

Quote: from Lesley C on 4:53 pm on Oct. 5, 2001
does anyone melt chocolate over a bain-marie anymore?

Yes, of course. I don't have a microwave and won't give one kitchen room.  

[Andy Lynes]

As we are talking white chocolate, Heston Blumenthal of Fat Duck in Bray on Thames in the UK is currently serving a white chocolate and caviar button. It taste great, so maybe you could fill your cake with caviar!  

[Bux]

We are off topic, but can you tell me that the white chocolate is unsweetened. I'd prefer no answer to one that tells me there's sugar in this. Sorry, I just finished writing a note about why I disliked dinner at one French bistro and a local meal of soft shell crab in candy orange sauce is still a cloying memory.

[Steve Klc]

Bux--I am not aware of an unsweetened white chocolate.

[Andy Lynes]

It's definitely a sweet white chocolate, I think Heston uses Valhrona. The button is the thickness of one egg of caviar and is obviously served cold, so therfore the chocolate is less cloying than if it were hot. The reason it works is that the chemical make up of the two main ingredients is very similar (Heston gave me the data to prove it).

I did think of trying out Heston's recipe for hot chocolate fondant with a warm white chocolate and caviar sauce but Heston thought that it may well not work in a molten state so I gave that up as too expensive to risk. Anybody out there with some money to burn, let me know if it works.        

[Lesley C]

I'm not ashamed to say I have a microwave in my kitchen. I don't cook with it but I do use it to melt things: chocolate, butter, cocoa butter, and the like. I've also been known to use it to re-heat a cup of coffee (I'm sure some of you started to shake when you read that). Cooks hate microwaves, but all the best pastry chefs I know use them in the most creative ways. It's just another kitchen tool to me.
About Le Cake, I served it with wild blueberries. It worked, but I like the bitter orange idea better. I wonder if the notorious American sweet tooth may have something to do with my chef friends -- French and Belgian -- not liking the cake. Perhaps Europeans prefer something less sweet ( though some of those Belgian chocolates make Hershey bars taste like Valrhona). According to Frédéric Bau, many chic Parisians munch on squares of unsweetened chocolate -- sans caviar. added).  

[chefette]

I agree with Lesly
I tried the Vanilla cake, found it pretty sweet and thought it needed to be friends with fruit.  I though pears poached in red wine and the cold vanilla ice cream would give a happy and attractive combo.

[Jason Perlow]

Poached pears might be really good.. I'm also thinking some kind of citrus fruit slices (de-membraned of course) like perhaps blood orange or a sweet grapefruit. For a kinda creamsicle flavor effect.

[Bux]

I am not aware of an unsweetened white chocolate.

I was afraid of that. ;)

The combination of caviar and sugar touches on the subject of sweet and salty. A friend of mine who was born in the US, but has lived and worked in Paris for decades once mentioned that he thought the combination of salt and sugar was an alien taste to the French, but not to Americans. Ketchup was his prime example as I recall. Chinese and Japanese recipes frequently use sugar and salt in the same dish. I'm not sure this is true about French tastes, but it merits consideration. Offhand, the first contradictions that come to mind are the wonderful salt butter caramels of Brittany and the use of salt butter in Breton pastries.

Cooks hate microwaves, but all the best pastry chefs I know use them in the most creative ways. It's just another kitchen tool

I think contemporary cooks and chefs are far less resistant to new ideas and becoming quicker to adapr new tools and methods if they can be proven to produce the same results. I suspect there's much less "it has to be done that way, becase that's how we've always done it."

[Andy Lynes]

The unusual thing about the white cocolate and caviar combination is that the two flavours mingle and you don't get a salt/sweet sensations at all. It really is quite extraordinary.

[Jason Perlow]

Andy... I've heard the same thing about vanilla ice cream flavored with black truffles..

[Bux]

Jason--But not, I trust, to chocolate covered pretzles. As I kid I enjoyed vanilla ice cream with salty pretzles. I should try it again. There seemed to be a rash of desserts highlighted with salt in NYC recently.

[mj leland]

11/28/01 - i just took the lemon pound cake out of the oven.  the batter was too much for my glass loaf pan so the cake was dry on top and over the sides while moist on the inside.  it's quite out of this world and sinfully delicious but it is not coming out of the loaf pan without breaking up so it's not a pretty sight.  the pieces of lemon and zest of lemon throughout set it apart from other pound cakes.  it was an L.E. (learning experience); i hope to improve my technique the next time around.  i might try the real thing at Citarella the Restaurant in NY.

[wingding]

Blackcurrants[cassis]are an excellent  foil for desserts with white chocolate.Frozen berries,or puree are available from various suppliers.Kumquats work well too.

[Gail Hughes]

Quote: Some sort of fruit to offset the sweetness of the cake and ice cream.

You know what jumps to mind?  A kind of compote of blood oranges.

Gail