A Holiday Baking Diary

[fou de Bassan]

lucia, I should have explained about the rounding, sorry. My only excuse is that the bronchitis meds are fogging my already dim lights. When I started baking the thing I used to try to remember was that finished bread dough will feel like a babys cheek.

[M. Lucia]

Christmas morning:

Biscuits, country ham, fig jam (no time for pics)

we also had Cranberry-Maple-Apple-Oat Casserole

some cooking-related Christmas loot:

Christmas dinner:

Cheese and Olive balls

cheddar, butter, flour, paprika:

wrapped around green olives and baked:

Rolls

dough made and risen:

refrigerated:

shaped, risen again, and baked:

Madness (i.e. getting ready for dinner):

but I digress...

Caramel Cake served wih vanilla ice cream

Edited December 29, 2004 by M. Lucia (log)

[M. Lucia]

I want to thank everyone for the advice offered. I got out some baking books to go over some kneading basics, and that rounding description really helped, I certainly wasn't doing that before. As to the chocolates, I agree there must be a way to roll them smooth when they are almost, but not quite, set.

At this point, with cooking and all the holiday parties, I am considering a baking break. We have leftovers to work through, plus food gifts (stollen, fruitcake, cookies), and someone insisted on making about 5 quarts of vegetable soup and a ton of aspic (doesn't that drives you crazy?).

However, I have made a mix-starter bread and will be making desserts for New Years, so I wil post some pictures of those soon.

In the meantime, another cake picture:

Happy New Year!

[kthull]

Man, that was quite the baking blitz. Thanks for sharing and have a great New Year!

[LaurieA-B]

Lucia, in addition to the temperature decrease, I recommend Alice Medrich's cooling tip. When you remove the brownies from the oven, immediately pop the pan into a larger shallow pan of ice water. Leave to cool. This gives the brownies a wonderful dense fudgy texture. We always do this, with Medrich's New Classic Brownies recipe (from Cookies and Brownies).

While I understand wanting a break, I hope you'll make and post about the Chocolate Caramel Tarts, because I've been wanting to try that recipe. Happy new year.

[M. Lucia]

It's not over yet!

Mixed Starter Bread

I am following the recipe from Baking with Julia, with the alteration of using part whole wheat flour (trying to get in some healthy fare). This was a bit nerve wracking as I have never made such a complicated bread, and I kept having visions of 2 days of work collapsing in the oven.

The first starter is made and risen:

Then the second starter is made, risen and refrigerated:

Making the dough (including ww flour):

another rise and then shaping:

another rise, more shaping, before and after baking:

A baguette and an epi. I could have done a better job slashing the baguette but this was my first time doing this, lesson learned for the future.

The photos don't do them justice, this was really excellent. The book says it's one of the best breads you'll make, and I have to agree that there is a great complexity of flavor, certainly the best baguette-style bread I've ever made.

More to come! Happy New Year!

[M. Lucia]

Well, I made the Claudia Fleming's Chocolate Caramel Tarts for New Years and what a disaster. Also, the camera wouldn't work so there aren't any picures.

I made the tart shells and they came out just fine. The dough was very soft and sticky to work with but also forgiving, and they baked up nicely.

Then the caramel filling. I burned the filling not once but twice! The first time I was careless, being overconfident in my caramel making skills. However, the second time I watched carefully, cooking slowly, and it still burned!

With determination I made a third and final attempt. I added the butter and cream when the sugar was just barely beginning to color. This time the caramel seemed just right, it had the proper consistency and was the exact color of the picture in the book (I wish I had photos). The directions say to let the mixture rest for about 45 mins, however, I noticed after about 15 mins the caramel was firming up too much. The caramel is supposed to remain soft and runny but it was already hardening to the texture of caramel candies. Soon, it was way too stick-to-your-teeth chewy to be edible.

I painstakingly scraped the caramel filling out of the tart shells. I made a thick ganache with Guittard bittersweet chocolate to fill the shells and topped with fleur de sel. The result was one of the prettiest desserts I have ever made. Everyone really loved them and I liked the caramel-salt combination.

So the final result was that I'd never make the recipe again (though I am still a big fan of the book as a whole). But the simple chocolate tarts are keepers.

[Rehovot]

Great blog! Keep it up! I'm impressed that you're doing all this on a student budget (that is, student funds *and* lack of time!).

I love caramel, but never make it, because all I end up with is sugar in some freakishly unnatural form. Seems like making the stuff requires the skills of an alchemist. Grrr.