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"Baking: From My Home to Yours" (Part 3)


emmalish

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Hi all,

I tried to make the Caramel Peanut-Topped Brownie Cake yesterday and had a bit of trouble with my caramel. What should be the consistency of the caramel? Mine hardened so much that I had trouble cutting the cake. It's almost like peanut brittle. Thought I measured something wrong so I made another batch of the caramel and it turned out the same. What did I do wrong? How do I fix it? Add more cream?

Thanks in advance!

Loopy

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  • 3 months later...

It's summer, and fresh raspberry season, so I dug out Dorie and made a tart: "Quick Classic Berry Tart", p. 377. As you can see, I under-baked the crust, but for my first attempt at both pate sablee and pastry cream, I was very pleased. The tart came out perfectly, despite such user errors as putting the egg into the pate sablee at the wrong time, using salted butter, and not having any jam to glaze the berries with. It was quick and easy to put together, and the best part was watching the family polish it off in one sitting.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I'm on maternity leave and I'm trying to bake something everyday, and this is the cookbook I'm usingfor most of the recipes. I made the brrrownies and the peach variation of the cranberry upsidedowner today. Both turned out really well although (pleading sleep deprivation) I inadvertently melted the peppermint patty pieces in with the chocolate rather than stirring them in at the end. I did realize my mistake before i finished putting them together so I added a little bit of extra flour to compensate for the potential extra gooeyness, a half cup instead of a third. I also realized that what I thought was unsweetened chocolate in the cabinet was actually bittersweet so I subbed really good cocoa powder and 3 extra T of butter for that. And despite the tweaks, they turned out great...that's a forgiving recipe! The peach cake was really good too but it was really juicy, I think it would have been more solid if I'd waited 10 min or so to turn it out of the pan. Live and learn...but I'll definitely make it again.

If you ate pasta and antipasto, would you still be hungry? ~Author Unknown

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I have this book out this summer, too. In fact, I have a pan of her blueberry orange muffins in the oven right now for breakfast. I too find her recipes quite forgiving; recent ways I've botched recipes and still had them turn out:

Yesterday: Making the blueberry crumb cake: seconds before I tumbled the walnuts into the crumb mixture, I remembered the nut allergy of the friend I was baking it for. The crumb layer became a "crunch" layer. And while I was mixing the batter, my mixer gave up the ghost, meaning i had to beat it all by hand. The batter was lumpy, rather than the shiny the recipe describes, but it turned out fine, especially when covered with vanilla ice cream.

Last weekend: the French lemon cream tart; I only had salted butter in the house and couldn't go out for more. The recipe calls for something like two sticks of butter to be beaten in; I knew the salt would be noticeable; I did it anyway. Everyone raved, though. I guess people in my family are just used to tooth-achingly sweet pies from Costco. I thought it was too noticeably salty, so I definitely use unsalted next time.

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Yeah, if there's only one ingredient I don't have in the house and it's not one of the major ones (ie, peaches and I'm making a peach cake) I'll try to substitute to save the trip. Most of the time it works out fine, and if not, live and learn! I'm looking forward to the lemon cream tart, that's one of the ones that I'm planning on making in the next week or so, but I always overwork my tart crust, so we'll see how it goes...

If you ate pasta and antipasto, would you still be hungry? ~Author Unknown

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Made the buttermilk biscuits this morning for breakfast and they didn't even last long enough to get a picture. We covered them with butter and some homemade apricot preserves I threw together a couple of weeks ago. The perfect breakfast. I also made the Chocolate Banana bread, which was great. I added some walnuts for extra crunch and I really should go get a picture before everyone else realizes it's cool enough to slice and it all disappears!

If you ate pasta and antipasto, would you still be hungry? ~Author Unknown

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  • 1 month later...

I'm about to start the Brioche Plum Tart on p. 54 subbing with either peaches or pears depending on what catches my eye when I go to the farmers' market tomorrow morning. For the thin-skinned pears, I could see not peeling them but wonder about the thicker-skinned peaches? Which would probably steer me towards making this with pears!

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  • 4 weeks later...

I made the French Pear Tart for Thanksgiving dinner yesterday. My grandma is a bit confused about things these days, and thought they were apples, but she loved it. Very high praise indeed from the baking queen of my childhood. I've made this recipe before and it's always a winner :smile:

**Melanie**

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I'm about to start the Brioche Plum Tart on p. 54 subbing with either peaches or pears depending on what catches my eye when I go to the farmers' market tomorrow morning. For the thin-skinned pears, I could see not peeling them but wonder about the thicker-skinned peaches? Which would probably steer me towards making this with pears!

Just reporting back that I was seduced by the gorgeous Magness pears at the market and they made a wonderful tart. I had a hard time telling when it was done, but it was delicious. This could become a brunch staple.

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  • 1 month later...

I'm making coconut domes, but am having a problem. I had converted the volume measurements to weights to make it easier to scale up or down and came up with this

110g whole milk

149g coconut

90g sugar

2 large eggs (about 104g)

Today I mixed up a batch scaling up to accommodate the 200g bag of coconut I had, and it when first mixed, it was very very soupy. It's been sitting in the fridge for almost 12 hours, and the coconut has absorbed much of the liquid, but it's still much runnier than the last time I made it.

If the runny-ness is not reduced further by tomorrow morning, would it be so bad to add a touch more coconut and then let it sit for a bit longer? Or is it better to bake it as is and then just cut the seepy stuff off after baking (as recommended in the recipe)?

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Mmmm! About to make my second batch of World Peace Cookies. Anyone who hasn't tried these really should. I'm kind of a light weight when it comes to densely chocolate things but not these. Could eat them all myself.

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  • 1 month later...

Finally baked the World Peace Cookies this past December, they are wonderful! Baked them again for a New Year's Party.

This weekend I made the butterscotch pudding (with Oban single malt), quite delicious. I sampled the pudding before adding the scotch, also quite good. The audience will determine which version I make in the future.

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Earlier today I made a batch of chocolate chunker cookies for a football watching potluck dinner. One of my friends remarked, after her second cookie, that these helped ease the pain of defeat.

I tinkered with the basic recipe to use what I had on hand. So instead of adding raisins and peanuts to the basic chocolate dough w/ chocolate chunks, I used dried cherries and chopped walnuts. Really good, and I don't like chocolate.


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  • 2 months later...

Just found Baking: From My Home to Yours in the 'new' section of our library. A real delight.

Searched as best I can through eG and apparently no one has ever made the 'Chocolate-Banded Ice Cream Cake'. I thought I might make it for my birthday this year. Chocolate and Raspberry. What's not to like? With homemade ice cream, of course. Nothing is too much trouble for my 70th. :raz: Will report back.

I'm thinking I might do a test run of sorts in the interim...

Darienne

 

learn, learn, learn...

 

We live in hope. 

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Looks good but I've never made it. This book is certainly one of the more attractive baking books in my library and there's a number of things I'd like to try when I have time. Let us know how it turns out and have a happy birthday!

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  • 4 months later...

Looks good but I've never made it. This book is certainly one of the more attractive baking books in my library and there's a number of things I'd like to try when I have time. Let us know how it turns out and have a happy birthday!

Thanks for the good wishes. I never made the cake...made the old tried and true Double Chocolate Mousse Bombe from One Cake, One Hundred Desserts with five kinds of chocolate. Delectable.

Maybe the 'Chocolate Banded Ice Cream Cake' next year.

Darienne

 

learn, learn, learn...

 

We live in hope. 

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