Your Daily Sweets: What Are You Making and Baking? (2015 – 2016)

[Anna N]

@Franci

 

Those look amazing. Wish I could reach into the iPad and grab just one.  

[Franci]

Anna, usually I always looks for faults...but this time, I'm just going to hide them from myself! I'm sure my children will finish them at the speed of the light

[Franci]

Anna, usually I always looks for faults...but this time, I'm just going to hide them from myself! I'm sure my children will finish them at the speed of the light

[Patrick S]

Shain, that babka looks delicious!

 

Franci, I've never seen cornetti before - they look super.

 

RWood, I adore the combination of peanut butter and chocolate, so I'm lusting for some of that Easter cake. Everything you post is so well-executed and artfully plated.

 

jmacnaughtan, excellent glaze on your Easter entremet.

 

After the caloric excesses of my own Easter weekend (I regret nothing), I had planned on adhering to a lower-calorie diet for the remainder of the week. But I had some pate de croissant left over from the Ispahan, and some chocolate glaze left over from the doughnuts, and both were at the point of freeze-it-or-waste-it. And since the freezer was full and I hate to waste things, I made chocolate-glazed cronuts on Tuesday night. I atoned the next day by eating a kale salad and extending my workout by 30 minutes.

Edited April 1, 2016 by Patrick S (log)

[shain]

Dessert from last night. Palachinta, filled with farmer cheese, lightly sweetened with honey, brandy soaked raisins, lemon zest. Cherry jam for dipping.

[Anna N]

@shain

 

 Those crepes look delicious but I admit I had to Google to find out what they were.  

[excv_]

I've always wanted to try my hand at one of those fancy shaped breads but was intimidated by the whole process- then I decided to give it a go after seeing Patrick's beautiful nutella brioche here. It's not nearly as gorgeous as his, obviously, but I'm pretty satisfied considering my usually mediocre bread baking skills and uneven-as-hell oven; It was really fun to make, and tasty too.

 

Something to note the next time: I used a cinnamon roll like brown sugar filling in place of the commonly used nutella as I'm not a big fan of it- It tasted and looked just fine but sort of oozed out while baking and gave the bottom a monkey bread-like texture. Not undesirable but not what I'd positively expected, either. My mistake in substitution. Also, I should probably have worked faster while shaping, as the surface/edges of the dough was fairly dry by the time I was almost done and it was a pain to get the ends of the 'petals' to stick together.

I added a cute little(badly made) bow. Festive, huh?

[shain]

@Anna N Thanks you very much. The palachintas derived from my Hungarian side of the family. They resemble blitzes more then they do crepes, but are made with a less rich batter, giving them slightly more chew.

@excv_ This is a beautiful bread. And I really like the ribbon  An egg yolk and some cornstarch might help keeping your filling from oozing.

[Patrick S]

Great job, excv_!

[Franci]

I feel I'm gaining a little more confidence with these Italian laminated brioches. I filled them with apricot preserve and caramelized apples

 

 

 

 

 

[curls]

New bundt pan and new recipe. Need to tap / bang the pan a bit harder next time to get rid of the air bubbles but really liked this brown sugar sour cream bundt from KAF. Served it with a sour cherry & strawberry sauce.

[excv_]

@shain Thanks! And yes, it seems like a good idea- I shall try that in the future to get more of a cleaner look.

@Patrick S Thank you so much!

[oli]

On 4/2/2016 at 5:25 AM, shain said:

Dessert from last night. Palachinta, filled with farmer cheese, lightly sweetened with honey, brandy soaked raisins, lemon zest. Cherry jam for dipping.

 

My favourite way to have these are with ground walnuts with apricot jam.  My last visit to Sopron, my relatives had a stack of these for dinner, they were so yellow, and they were all with cottage cheese.  My mom used to put these in a pyrex container with some half and half and sugar, then slip them into the oven. Very good, but I still prefer the walnut/apricot filling.

Edited April 4, 2016 by oli (log)

[oli]

On 4/2/2016 at 9:01 AM, shain said:

@Anna N Thanks you very much. The palachintas derived from my Hungarian side of the family. They resemble blitzes more then they do crepes, but are made with a less rich batter, giving them slightly more chew.

@excv_ This is a beautiful bread. And I really like the ribbon  An egg yolk and some cornstarch might help keeping your filling from oozing.

Every bachelor Hungarian guy who can't cook knows how to make these.

Edited April 5, 2016 by oli (log)

[shain]

1 hour ago, oli said:

Every bathelor Hungarian guy who can't cook knows how to make these.

Indeed so, and for a good reason - they are delicious and easy. My grandmother wasn't much of a cook, and she left Hungary while young so she didn't knew much Hungarian cookery, but this is one of the things she did make and I loved them since childhood.

[Ann_T]

 This past week the weather was beautiful here on the west coast of Canada

 

and my rhubarb was ready to pick.

 

First Rhubarb Pie of the season. 

[RWood]

On April 1, 2016 at 5:00 PM, Patrick S said:

Shain, that babka looks delicious!

 

Franci, I've never seen cornetti before - they look super.

 

RWood, I adore the combination of peanut butter and chocolate, so I'm lusting for some of that Easter cake. Everything you post is so well-executed and artfully plated.

 

jmacnaughtan, excellent glaze on your Easter entremet.

 

After the caloric excesses of my own Easter weekend (I regret nothing), I had planned on adhering to a lower-calorie diet for the remainder of the week. But I had some pate de croissant left over from the Ispahan, and some chocolate glaze left over from the doughnuts, and both were at the point of freeze-it-or-waste-it. And since the freezer was full and I hate to waste things, I made chocolate-glazed cronuts on Tuesday night. I atoned the next day by eating a kale salad and extending my workout by 30 minutes.

 

 

 

Thanks so much Patrick.  Just saw your post. You do some beautiful work with doughs that I wish I had more of an interest in doing more of myself.  Your Nutella flower is beautiful (and Nutella and anything hazelnut is one of my weaknesses.) I'm more of a cake, chocolate and dessert girl.  While I don't mind occasionally making something dough related at home, I couldn't stand it as a job. The last time I ventured into croissant dough, I made these orange hazelnut rolls. One of my favorites :). And I thought my dough layers were pretty good. 

 

[Patrick S]

Those look great also! There's something about the cross-section of a well-constructed laminated dough, like your second picture, that's just  so mesmerizing and attractive, like a sunset or giggling babies. 

Edited April 4, 2016 by Patrick S (log)

[Shelby]

3 hours ago, Ann_T said:

 This past week the weather was beautiful here on the west coast of Canada

 

and my rhubarb was ready to pick.

 

First Rhubarb Pie of the season. 

Annnnnnnnnnnnnn oh how I love rhubarb pie.  I haven't had it in a long long time.  

 

I tried to grow it and it was a sad failure.

[RWood]

Two cakes this past weekend. I wasn't that crazy about the bling-y one, but most people have seemed to like it. And the other, I don't quiet get why a banana slug would be a school mascot :). But, that's UC Santa Cruz. The owner of the restaurant came to me on Wednesday and wanted this theme for a cake on Saturday. Suuuurrre, last minute, have no idea what to do. Aye!

 

 

[Ann_T]

Shelby,  it grows like a weed here with very little  attention.

[rajoress]

I was asked at the last minute to make a cake for a birthday at work and the birthday girl's favorite is carrot cake. It made it through the ice and snow this morning and is sitting in my car in the 25 degree temperature keeping that cream cheese icing cool! Thanks for looking. 

Ruth

[Darienne]

13 hours ago, Ann_T said:

Shelby,  it grows like a weed here with very little  attention.

 

Shelby, it grows like a weed here (east central Ontario) with NO attention.  Our house is over 100 years old and there are about 5 patches of rhubarb on the hill above the house.  I'll bet they are also 100 years old.  I've never paid any attention to them and cut them every year.  Oh yes, and there's snow on the ground today and it's really cold.

[oli]

In BC they also grew like weeds. Never had to do anything with them which was an added benefit before cutting them for pies.

[Katie Meadow]

I wait all year for rhubarb, which has a relatively short season in the stores here in the Bay Area. Not only does it not look that great, but it has become very pricey over the last few years. I'm so envious of you with your wild patches! Once in a while I see it at the Farmers' Market, but last spring I bought some and was disappointed, as it had little color and less flavor, despite being organic, semi-local and expensive. I guess it doesn't grow very well where winters are warm (and getting warmer.)