Your Daily Sweets: What Are You Making and Baking? (2017 – )

[Kerry Beal]

8 hours ago, Anna N said:

Gotcha.  I’ve been guilty of that myself and my best friend is frequently guilty of it.  Aren’t you @Kerry Beal?

 

SQUIRREL!

[andiesenji]

On 9/20/2018 at 2:07 PM, kayb said:

Going to make these soon as the new sorghum comes out of the mills. Likely next month.

 

For those who don't live close to the source, "new sorghum" has a distinctly different taste from sorghum molasses after it ages a few weeks. Very bright and almost citrusy. It was always an occasion when one could get the first "new sorghum" of the year (they'd announce it on the news on the local radio station. Major big deal), and I knew what dinner  would be that night. Country bacon, crackling cornbread, canned tomatoes and new sorghum. And there was a very specific way to eat it. One put a couple of tablespoons of butter on one's plate, poured a similar amount of sorghum over it, and mixed the two with the blade of a knife. Then one spread dollops of it on the cornbread, a bite at a time. (I always dipped my bacon in it, too.

 

The tomatoes were a nod to having a vegetable on the table, and served to cut the richness of the other items, as well.

I remember this so well and how proud I was when cook handed me a metal pitcher - probably held about a quart - and sent me down to get some fresh molasses at the filter.  I was finally big enough to be trusted to carry it up to the house without spilling it.  One of my "chores" probably to get me out from under foot in the kitchen.  

Either my grandpa or my grandmother would put some butter in a bowl and pour in the sorghum and mix it till it looked like marble, the colors swirled together.   We called the mixture "scumble" and until I got more control over my flatware, the stuff was applied to my biscuits for me. 

The bulk of the sorghum was put into gallon cans.  Some, that was going to Ft. Campbell for the Army, went into 5-gallon cans.  

For us kids, the "cook off" of the sorghum was fascinating as it started in one "pan" and when it reached a certain point was filtered into a second "pan" and finally into the "finishing pan" where it was tested with fascinating instruments that we were warned never to touch. 

Before it went into the tank from which it was canned, there was a spigot on the side of a pipe and that is where one of the workers would draw off the still warm molasses for immediate consumption.  

It was a clear light amber, close to the color of maple syrup.  As it aged, it would darken and it also got thicker.  

Cook had several things she made with the fresh molasses.  A pudding made with cornmeal and apples.  Pies, cakes, "stack" cakes and candy.

Molasses taffy, which required the cook and both the women who worked with her in the kitchen to "pull" it till it was light and fluffy.  

[blue_dolphin]

I decided the copycat spice wafer ice cream sandwiches were a good thing so I made a few more

[Rajala]

So, I was able to mould with my blackcurrant "chocolate", and I filled them with a mango ganache.

 

 

[MelissaH]

3 minutes ago, Rajala said:

So, I was able to mould with my blackcurrant "chocolate", and I filled them with a mango ganache.

 

 

The colors are beautiful, and the flavors sound like they should work well together.

[Rajala]

1 minute ago, MelissaH said:

The colors are beautiful, and the flavors sound like they should work well together.

 

They actually do. I tried a chunk of the "chocolate" with some of the ganache, prior to filling them, and it was a bit weird. But, with the amount you get with the shell and the filling, it worked out perfectly.

[kayb]

On 9/21/2018 at 2:44 PM, lemniscate said:

 

Wow, that sounds wonderful.  Is there particular brand/maker you use?  Do they have an online store?  Is it even feasible to want "new sorghum" outside of its area of production?   

 

 

I buy it from the local produce market whenever I'm up home. The maker we used to buy from all the time is no longer in business. I found an online source in the same general part of the state;; I know nothing about them, or whether they could ship new sorghum to you quickly enough it would not age too much. Of course, it's still good! You might check these folks out, maybe call and ask.

 

http://store.muddypondsorghum.net/

 

[Matthew.Taylor]

Hello! New Poster here. I love baking, though I don't get to do it as much as i'd like. 

Last weekend, I was looking through an old issue of Baked from Scratch, and found a recipe for New York Style cheesecake. I decided to take the plunge and make it. I don't have any pictures (and am still mystified as to how to post them online, sorry). It was a "real" one. Water bath, 90 minutes of cooking, 60 of resting in oven, 2 hours on cooling rack, overnight in the fridge, all of that. It came out really great, though some water got through my foil covering for the Spring-form pan and wetted down a bit of the outer crust, but the inner crust was still satisfyingly crunchy.

[Pete Fred]

Gateau Breton (Brittany Butter Cake)...

 

 

Not much of a looker, admittedly. If you've never heard of it, the texture is somewhere between shortbread and cake. Given it's made with so few ingredients, it all comes down to the quality of the butter used; in this instance, raw-cream salted butter from Isigny, so it tasted great. I keep meaning to make this with the traditional buckwheat flour; it'd be interesting to see what the nuttiness brings to the party.

[shain]

Tarte tatin.

Edited September 28, 2018 by shain (log)

[Anna N]

 

Flourless (gluten-free) brownies courtesy of Anne Byrn.  They are intended for someone who has an objection to corn starch so I subbed in some potato starch. 

[Pete Fred]

I guess there's no time like the present when it comes to cake, so Gateau Breton made with buckwheat flour...

 

 

The crumb was a little tighter compared to regular flour, and the nuttiness was ok. Overall I preferred yesterday's version; it had a better texture and the butter flavour was cleaner.

[pjm333]

Chocolate Trio 

[Rajala]

Pistachio / cherry tart

 

[pjm333]

Nutella Eclair 

[jmacnaughtan]

On 9/30/2018 at 2:22 PM, Rajala said:

Pistachio / cherry tart

 

 

Nice piping finish  

[Shelby]

Just chocolate chip cookies.  Nice, non-cakey, chewy.  

 

[IowaDee]

And there went that diet!  

[Anna N]

1 hour ago, IowaDee said:

And there went that diet!  

 Now that was just plain mean.  😂😂😂

[IowaDee]

I'm just jealous 'cause I don't have any of those cookies!  

[Kim Shook]

Jessica made Martha Stewart’s Thin & Crisp Chocolate Chip Cookies:

If you are a fan of super thin, crisp cookies (as we are), these are the ones.

[Pete Fred]

Continuing to plough my way through Ottolenghi 'Sweet'. This is the Almond Butter Cake with Cardamon. Simple but delightful...

 

 

Conscious of the fact that I've been on a run of quite plain cakes recently, I made his accompaniment of baked plums. Here it is plated...

 

 

The plums are baked with wine and spice. Sadly, they were a bit 'meh'. The curse of commodity plums strikes again; will I ever learn?!

[Pete Fred]

I feel the need to 'fess up to being inordinately annoyed that my almond cake sunk somewhat in the middle. I figured it might be down to using the wrong cake tin (20 cm/8 inch in diameter and 7.5 cm/3 inch deep).

 

So obviously I had to make it again. 🙄 <cue bakers everywhere groaning sympathetically in acknowledgement>

 

 

This time I used a 4.5 cm/2 inch high tart ring and it worked out much better. The edge rose to the top of the ring and set, with the middle continuing to rise a little further before settling back level. Rejoice!!

 

Lesson learned. 🤔

[shain]

Kaiserschmarrn.

[Anna N]

35 minutes ago, shain said:

Kaiserschmarrn.

 

 Had to look it up. Looks intriguing.