Simple Spinach Dip

School has finally started again, and as have the hectic days filled with work. Days seem to get shorter, and fall is soon approaching. The leaves haven’t yet fallen, but you can feel it in the air. I’d say fall is one of my favorite seasons, with its warmth of flavors, the colors, and even fall fashion. Its the season of pie, cinnamon, apples, and pumpkins. However, summer is also one of my favorite seasons, and one of the vegetables I see as part of the summer is spinach. It may seem strange, but its very much like summer, bright, vibrant and good for you. This post is a good bye to summer.

This spinach dip is a simple easy spinach dip, and you can add more to it to add a bit more of your own flavor to it. I’ve never made this recipe the same, not even once. What is here is simply a base, that you can add to, and make it better.

Simple Spinach Dip

adapted from Sailu’s Kitchen

• 1 3/4 a cup of spinach
• 1 tbsp. of butter
• 1 1/2 tbsp. flour
• 1 c. of milk
• 3 tbsps. of cheese
• 1/2 tbsp garlic
• any other ingredient you feel you want to add, to give it a little more flair :)

1. Parboil the spinach, adding a little bit of water to the bottom of a medium sized pan(until its about centimeter deep), and cover. Check every couple minutes, and cook until wilted.
2. Turn off the heat, and strain the spinach with a sieve to remove the water. Set aside
3. In a pan, melt the butter, then add the flour. Cook until slightly browned.
4. Add the milk and cook for approx 5-7 minutes on high-medium, until the flour/butter mixture is smoothly blended in.
5. Add the cheese, and anything else you want to add(such as more cheese/ different cheese or artichokes, or increasing the garlic, or instead using roasted garlic or whatever you feel is right)
6. Add in the properly drained spinach ( if theres too much water left in the spinach, it could mess with the consistancy of the dip).

Sometimes I even use this dip for a sandwich.

Bon apetit & happy fall!

~Dee D.

Meringue Coffee Cake | Japan

From my childhood, I remember that every few years or so there would be some sort of catastrophe. There was Hurricane Katrina, 9/11, the huge tsunami and Haiti. Now, there’s Japan, and I personally think, that this recent disaster has been one worst ones of them all. It was a huge triple blow to Japan. First the earthquake and its aftershock, then the tsunami, and now the impending disaster of  a possible nuclear explosion.

When I saw the before and after shots, I was astonished by how much Japan had been affected by all of this. It’s absolutely devastating, especially for the people there.  It’s truly heartbreaking. I feel the need to do something, and I’m thinking about doing maybe, a bake sale for Japan? I’m not sure how that will work out, but I’ll try to do the best I can.

On a happier note: I made the daring  bakers challenge, and I loved it!

The March 2011 Daring Baker’s Challenge was hosted by Ria of Ria’s Collection and Jamie of Life’s a Feast. Ria and Jamie challenged The Daring Bakers to bake a yeasted Meringue Coffee Cake.

This coffee cake is so delicious soft and most definitely not the way I expected it to be. When I saw the addition of the meringue in this, I was surprised. Usually when baked, meringue turns hard, however when I took it out of the oven and cut myself a piece, I saw that instead of a hard sugary layer inside which I’d expected, there was a warm,  and utterly soft inside with a layer of almond chunks, chocolate and white chocolate.

The texture of the cake was amazing, and it was very similar to the texture of brioche, a cross between a cake, and bread. The chocolate inside added wonderful taste to it and the almonds gave a subtle nutty crunch. This is absolutely amazing, when it was straight out of the oven, and just as good when toasted a little afterwards.

Bon appétit!

Filled Meringue Coffee Cake
Makes 2 round coffee cakes, each approximately 10 inches in diameter
The recipe can easily be halved to make one round coffee cake

Ingredients
For the yeast coffee cake dough:

• 4 cups (600 g / 1.5 lbs.) flour
• ¼ cup (55 g / 2 oz.) sugar
• ¾ teaspoon (5 g / ¼ oz.) salt
• 1 package (2 ¼ teaspoons / 7 g / less than an ounce) active dried yeast
• ¾ cup (180 ml / 6 fl. oz.) whole milk
• ¼ cup (60 ml / 2 fl. oz. water (doesn’t matter what temperature)
• ½ cup (135 g / 4.75 oz.) unsalted butter at room temperature
• 2 large eggs at room temperature

For the meringue:

• 3 large egg whites at room temperature
• ¼ teaspoon salt
• ½ teaspoon vanilla
• ½ cup (110 g / 4 oz.) sugar

For the filling:

• 1 cup (110 g / 4 oz.) coarsely chopped roasted almonds
• 2 Tablespoons (30 g / 1 oz.) granulated sugar
• ½ c. white chocolate
• ½ c. semisweet chocolate

Egg wash:

• 1 beaten egg (or if you simply happen to have egg yolks lying about, those work too!)
• Cocoa powder (optional) and confectioner’s sugar (powdered/icing sugar) for dusting cakes

Directions:

To Prepare the dough:

1.       In a large mixing bowl, combine 1 ½ cups (230 g) of the flour, the sugar, salt and yeast.

2.       In a saucepan, combine the milk, water and butter and heat over medium heat until warm and the butter is just melted.

3.       With an electric mixer on low speed, gradually add the warm liquid to the flour/yeast mixture, beating until well blended.

4.       Increase mixer speed to medium and beat 2 minutes. Add the eggs and 1 cup (150 g) flour and beat for 2 more minutes.

5.       Using a wooden spoon, stir in enough of the remaining flour to make a dough that holds together.

6.       Turn out onto a floured surface (use any of the 1 ½ cups of flour remaining) and knead the dough for 8 to 10 minutes until the dough is soft, smooth, sexy and elastic, keeping the work surface floured and adding extra flour as needed.

7.       Place the dough in a lightly greased (I use vegetable oil) bowl, turning to coat all sides. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and a kitchen towel and let rise until double in bulk, 45 – 60 minutes. The rising time will depend on the type of yeast you use.

8.      Prepare your filling:In a small bowl, combine the cinnamon and sugar for the filling if using. You can add the chopped nuts to this if you like, but I find it easier to sprinkle on both the nuts and the chocolate separately.

Once the dough has doubled, make the meringue:

1.       In a clean mixing bowl – ideally a plastic or metal bowl so the egg whites adhere to the side (they slip on glass) and you don’t end up with liquid remaining in the bottom – beat the egg whites with the salt, first on low speed for 30 seconds.

2.       Then increase to high and continue beating until foamy and opaque.

3.       Then add the vanilla then start adding the ½ cup sugar, a tablespoon at a time as you beat, until very stiff, glossy peaks form.

Assemble the Coffee Cakes:

Note: I made little individual pockets, but it was hard to fill these and in the end they didn’t have enough filling. So I recommend taking a look at the other shapes the other bakers made here(just click on any link you want and check it out :)). Below I’ve included the instructions for a wreath like shape, which most bakers did.

1.       Line 2 baking/cookie sheets with parchment paper.

2.       Punch down the dough and divide in half.

3.       On a lightly floured surface, working one piece of the dough at a time (keep the other half of the dough wrapped in plastic), roll out the dough into a 20 x 10-inch (about 51 x 25 ½ cm) rectangle.

4.       Spread half of the meringue evenly over the rectangle up to about 1/2-inch (3/4 cm) from the edges.

5.       Sprinkle half of your filling of choice evenly over the meringue (ex: half of the cinnamon-sugar followed by half the chopped nuts and half of the chocolate chips/chopped chocolate).

6.       Now, roll up the dough jellyroll style, from the long side. Pinch the seam closed to seal. Very carefully transfer the filled log to one of the lined cookie sheets, seam side down. Bring the ends of the log around and seal the ends together, forming a ring, tucking one end into the other and pinching to seal.

7.       Using kitchen scissors or a sharp knife (although scissors are easier), make cuts along the outside edge at 1-inch (2 ½ cm) intervals. Make them as shallow or as deep as desired but don’t be afraid to cut deep into the ring.

8.      Repeat with the remaining dough, meringue and fillings.

9.       Cover the 2 coffee cakes with plastic wrap and allow them to rise again for 45 to 60 minutes.

10.   Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C).

11.    Brush the tops of the coffee cakes with the egg wash. Bake in the preheated oven for 25 to 30 minutes until risen and golden brown. The dough should sound hollow when tapped.

12.    Remove from the oven and slide the parchment paper off the cookie sheets onto the table. Very gently loosen the coffee cakes from the paper with a large spatula and carefully slide the cakes off onto cooling racks.

13.    Allow to cool.

Daring Bakers | Panna Cotta & Florentines

Almost every time my father comes home from a business trip, he will sit and happily tell me about all the desserts and dishes he had tried at many restaurants. It’s maddening for me, listening to the names of all these fancy, amazing desserts, which I really want to try. However, every now and then he tells me about a new dessert, which I immediately go look up. If I find it appealing enough, I book mark a recipe to make later.

A couple months ago, my father mentioned panna cotta. It sounded delicious as he described it. “It’s like flan, just as creamy, but lighter, and instead of caramel on top, there’s fruit…” I was intrigued, and so looked it up and found a recipe by Giada De Laurentiis, and left it bookmarked intending to make it soon. However I completely forgot about the recipe and it stayed there gathering dust.

This month when I logged on to the daring bakers website, to check the challenge, I was surprised: The challenge was panna cotta(and florentine cookies), and recipe for the panna cotta was exactly the same one that I had bookmarked so many months ago!

The Febuary 2011 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Mallory from A Sofa in the Kitchen. She chose to challenge everyone to make Panna Cotta from a Giada De Laurentiis recipe and Nestle Florentine Cookies.

When I first tried out the vanilla panna cotta recipe I noticed that it had a nice honey flavor, that could be balanced perfectly by something that was slightly tart. Later I re-made the panna cotta, but this time I added a little more honey, to amplify the honey taste, and paired it with some tart(not too tart though) berry compote. The flavors are wonderful: creamy, tart, fruity, and sweet. It’s quite simple, yet complex.

And as for the florentines: I tried some variations and it came way different but need a few tweaks here and there…I will share the recipe later…

Honey Panna Cotta

Adapted from Giada De Laurentiis

• 1 cup  whole milk
• 1 tablespoon  unflavored powdered gelatin
• 3 cups) whipping cream (30+% butterfat)
• 1/3 cup  honey(slightly more but not quite 2/3 a cup…)
• pinch of salt

Directions:

1. Pour the milk into a bowl or pot and sprinkle gelatin evenly and thinly over the milk (make sure the bowl/pot is cold by placing the bowl/pot in the refrigerator for a few minutes before you start making the Panna Cotta). Let stand for 5 minutes to soften the gelatin.
2. Pour the milk into the saucepan/pot and place over medium heat on the stove. Heat this mixture until it is hot, but not boiling, about five minutes. (I whisk it a few times at this stage).
3. Next, add the cream, honey, sugar, and pinch of salt. Making sure the mixture doesn’t boil, continue to heat and stir occasionally until the sugar and honey have dissolved 5-7 minutes.
4. Remove from heat, allow it to sit for a few minutes to cool slightly. Then pour into the glass or ramekin.
5. Refrigerate at least 6 hours or overnight.

Berry Compote

• 1 cup of frozen mixed berries(or any fruit that you want really)
• some sugar

Wash the frozen berries in sieve to get the ice off of it.

Put the fruit in small sauce pan and just let it simmer for a while, and let the fruit defrost. Stir it a little and you’ll see some juice gathering on the bottom. Keep stirring and if you don’t see juice add little water. Not a whole lot or you’ll end up with a very watery compote, that won’t taste very good. Taste the compote. If needed add a little bit of sugar, until it tastes right to you.  Let it simmer for some more time, until the juice around the berries, thickens a little more. Remove from heat and spoon onto panna cotta.

NOTE: Because I had frozen rasberries, and blackberries in my frozen berry mix, which fell apart easily, my compote will look much different from yours. Usually compotes look something like this, with the syrup, separate from the fruit, unlike what you see here.

Enjoy!

~Dee D

Mocha Pots de Creme | Later

As a little child, I always knew definitely what I was going to be. If you asked me, I’d give a definite answer. A doctor. A scientist. An astronaut. A writer. But as I grew up the that changed. I became more focused on what was here in front of me, and didn’t bother thinking about the future. And now when I’m so close to time to decide, I have no idea. My parents friends always ask me, and every time I reply, “I’m not quite sure yet…”

Now that it’s winter break and I actually have time to sit down, and think about it and well…I still don’t know what I want to do.

So I asked a close friend what she thought I should do. She replied, “Do what you like to do best.”

So I sat there and I thought about it for a moment. I liked to do a lot of things. Bake. Write. Swim. Read. The list seemed to go and on. But what did I like to do most? It came down to baking and writing. You may be thinking, Wait, Dee. Writing? Are you sure you want to do that? I know I’m not that great of a writer on here. I’m actually more of a creative writer, not so much an informative one.

Although I don’t know where I would go with creative writing. So that narrowed it down to baking. I actually would love to open up a cutesy little bakery of my own. A small bakery, like Crumbs and Magnolia and just as cute.

But yet, I’m still not sure, and probably won’t be sure till the last minute.

But to take my mind off that I baked something. When taking a bite of what I baked, you first find the most obvious flavor first: a rich coffee flavor, creamy and delicious. Then if you wait a second, you’ll find the briefest flash of a chocolate flavor. It’s amazing.

I present to you: Mocha pots de crème.

Mocha Pots De Crème

Adapted from Real Kitchen via Whisk Kid

1 1/2 c heavy cream
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
1/8 c whole black coffee beans (I replaced that with instant coffee powder, and put in a little more than 1/8 a cup of that)
3 egg yolks
1/4 c  sugar
1 1/2 Tbls brewed espresso coffee, cold
1 oz (28 g) semisweet chocolate, melted and cooled

1.    Preheat your oven to 325 degrees farenheit.

2.    In a small saucepan, bring the heavy cream vanilla and coffee beans to a brief simmer in a small saucepan. Don’t let it boil. Then strain the mixture to take out the coffee beans.

3.     Meanwhile…Whisk together the sugar and egg yolks until the egg yolk lighten and become lemony in color and the sugar is dissolved. Then pour in the heavy cream mixture slowly, whisking continuously or else the mixture will curdle.

4.    Stir in the coffee and chocolate.

5.    Pour the mixture into ramekins, and put them in a shallow baking pan with water that goes halfway up the ramekin.

6.    Bake until just the center is slightly jiggles a little. If you make them in ramekins that are approximately eight ounces then the baking time sound be around a half an hour.

7.    After they’re done let the ramekins cool a little for approximately ten minutes them chill them in the refrigerator for two hours(at the least).

~Dee D.

Julia Child & Chocolate Mousse

Last night as I was sorting through my email I opened up a news letter from Saveur about recipes from movies. I, of course, was instantly interested, mostly because I wanted to find out how to make ratatouille(a dish that wins over a harsh critic?? It must be good!). But along with ratatouille I found a recipe for Julia Child’s chocolate mousse, and immediately dug out my recipe book and scrawled it down. Of course I wanted to try it out. And so I did, and i turned out awesome(although a little denser than I thought).

I ended up with a whole brownie tray sized amount of the mousse! Wayyy to much for my health conscious family(funny how a girl who likes sitting about making desserts ends up with one) so i ended up giving half of it to neighbors.

But it was fairly easy to make, and apparently you can make it entirely by hand(my scrawny arm muscles and I tried. Frankly it did not work out.)

Go here for the recipe:
http://www.davidlebovitz.com/2008/05/perfect-chocola/

I followed the whole thing word by word, so I see no point in restating the whole entire thing. Just one small thing, if your going to do it by hand, be prepared for sore arms and make sure you set out some time because it’ll take a while…

Mmmm, it’s so good!

~D.D.

Tiramisu & Love

When I saw this dessert, it was love at first sight…

I still remember the first time we had met…it was a couple years back, I was eating dinner and Tiramisu showed up upon my dinner table…he was gorgeous….a dark brown hue layered with a creamy, warm white and dusted cocoa on the top…mmm…and the taste! Absolutely amazing…a sharp espresso flavor, lightly touched by a tinge of alcohol, with small but very notable ring of chocolate , and a amazing cream blanketing the whole thing….soo crazily delicious!

Of course, the next day I spent a while digging about and finding the perfect recipe, and trying it out, and it turned out quite good, and awesomely yummy. Plus it’s real easy to make :)

Here we go:

Tiramisu Italiano

adapted from Food Network

Ingredients:

For the cream(the white part):

• 7 eggs yolks(I’m not sure if size of the egg makes a difference, but I use medium sized eggs)
• 1/2 a cup of sugar(refer down 3 ingredients, for a small modification)
• 1/3 a cup of sweet marsala(you may want to minimize this if you don’t like the taste of alcohol in desert too much)
• 8 ounces of room temperature mascarpone( you can also use the coffee mascarpone if you somehow dig that out and it’s actually cheaper than the regular kind)
• 1 cup of heavy cream(and possibly more) OR some pre-made whipped cream(in which case you should minimize the sugar, unless you, for some magical reason, have found sugarless whipped cream)– (I prefer using the pre-made whipped cream, it’s just easier :D)

For the ladyfingers(the brown part):

• 1 cup espresso coffee(brewed)
• 1 oz. dark chocolate OR about a heaped half a tbsp. of dark chocolate powder and some sugar.
• 1/4 a cup of rum(once again, if you do not like the taste of alcohol minimize this)
• 2 tablespoons of marsala
• 1 tsp of vanilla extract
• 48 lady fingers

and Lastly:

• cocoa powder for dusting!

For the cream:

Okay, so first, in bowl(check the bottom to see if it’s heat proof) over a pot of simmering water combine the egg yolks and the sugar. When they are successfully creamed together, add in the marsala, and then whisk(or use an hand mixer) the mixture until it starts to gain volume. Then set the whisk/hand mixer aside, take the bowl off stove and then add in the mascarpone and mix it in with a spoon(it’s easier with a spoon) until it’s successfully mixed in.

Now for those who are using pre-made whipped cream:

Take a gigantic spoon of the whipped cream, and using a whisk(or a hand mixer with the whisk attachment) mix the whipped cream in. Continue adding spoons of the whipped cream until the mixture appears to be capable of holding it’s shape.Note: every now and then, just pop the mixture in the freezer or refrigerator, because the cold helps the mixture to get thicker.

For those who are making whipped cream from scratch:

Grab a whisk(or hand blender or hand mixer), a bowl(make sure you pre-chill this by putting it in the freezer) and the (chilled)heavy cream.

• If you use a hand blender or mixer, simply flick a switch and in five minutes you will have a nice whipped cream.
• But how ever, if you intend to whip it by hand(which is crazily hard, and I do not recommend, but it is possible, because how did people do it back in the day?), use the whisk and whip the cream really hard, and every now and then put it in the freezer for a few minutes, then take it out and whip it up again.

Then after you have your whipped cream simply whip it into the marsala/sugar/egg/mascarpone mixture and you may need more than you already have to get it to a  state where it is able to hold it’s shape for a couple of seconds.

And voila! You have the cream part of the tiramisu!

Now just stick it in the fridge and let it chill.

Now, for the lady fingers…

Lady Fingers(the brown part) Part:

Okay…

If you are you are using solid chocolate(chips, a bar,etc…), grab a small-ish sauce pan, the chocolate, the espresso, the rum, the marsala, and the vanilla. Put all the ingredients into the small sauce pan, and heat on medium until the chocolate is fully melted. Now lets call this mixture CERMV(the initials of every ingredient).

If you are using chocolate powder grab a bowl(small-ish), the chocolate, the espresso, the rum, the marsala, and lastly the vanilla. Combine all the ingredients in the bowl and go snatch your sugar. Spoon in two teaspoons of sugar into the chocolate/espresso/rum/marsala/vanilla(lets call it CERMV) mixture. Now taste it. If it tastes worthy to be thrown down the drain, add in more sugar, and taste again. Continue doing this until it tastes semi-edible(because remember that we’re dipping the ladyfingers in this then layering them with the cream which already has sugar).

Now take the all the lady fingers, and arrange them in a dish(or dishes) that is(are) capable of holding two layers of the lady fingers, and the cream also. Make sure you do this before you start dipping the lady fingers, because if you suddenly realize that the tiramisu won’t fit in the dish you are working with, it’s not fun to re-arrange soggy lady fingers.

Okay, now we dip the lady fingers into the CERMV and form the first layer of lady fingers on the bottom of your dish.

Dipping tips: if you have the harder kind(there are soft ones that are spongy and hard ones that are…hard)of lady fingers, I reccomend holding them in the CERMV, completely submerged, for exactly five seconds(w/ the Mississippi’s).  However, if you are using the softer ones, try four or three seconds. But for both types of lady fingers you want them soft enough to sag over your fingers a bit as you are dipping them. If they are under dipped, then you will have a very dry tiramisu, without a strong enough coffee flavor, which is not good. If the lady fingers are over dipped, then they’ll break up on your fingers while they are being dipped or carried. But if you’re lucky and they don’t break at all, that’s fine.

Okay so now since you’ve formed your first layer of lady fingers, cover that layer with half of the cream, and then add another layer of lady fingers(that are dipped in CERMV) and cover that with the rest of the cream.

Let it chill in the freezer for a half hour or maybe more.

And TADA! you are done :)

Another little note: when you serve the tiramisu just dust it over with a bit of chocolate powder.

Hope you enjoy :)

~D.D.

P.S. You may not want to keep the tiramisu out for too long in heat, it tend to become a little melt-y(as you can see in my pictures :D)