I Scream, You Scream

Sorry, I couldn't come up with a better title for this post. I recently got an ice cream maker attachment for my Kitchenaid, and so I figured I had to try it out and make some ice cream. Gourmet recently printed a recipe for a recipe for salted caramel ice cream, and so I thought I would try my hand. I thought the ice cream this made was really good, with a strong toffee flavor. I didn't think the salt came through particularly though, but maybe that's just me.

Salted Caramel Ice Cream

1 1/4 cups sugar, divided

2 1/4 cups heavy cream, divided

1/2 tsp flaky sea salt

1/2 tsp vanilla

1 cup milk

3 large eggs

1. Heat 1 cup sugar in a dry, heavy skillet. Stir sugar with a fork until it begins to melt, then stop stirring and cook, swirling pan occaissionally so sugar melts evenly. Continue cooking until the sugar reaches a dark amber.

2. Carefully add 1 1/4 cups cream (mixture will splatter), stir until all of the caramel is dissolved. Transfer into a bowl and stir in the salt. Cool to room temperature.

3. Bring milk, remaining cup cream and 1/4 cup sugar just to a boil.

4. Lightly whisk eggs in a medium bowl. Add half the hot milk mixture in a thin stream while whisking. Pout back into the saucepan and cook over medium heat, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon. Continue cooking until mixture coats the back of the spoon and registers 170 degrees on a candy thermometer.

5. Pour the mixture through a fine mesh sieve into a clean bowl. Chill in the fridge, stirring occasionally, for 4-5 hours. Freeze according to instructions of your ice cream maker.

Brunch Food

I had friends over for a potluck brunch this morning. Earlier in the week the weather got really nice, and it put me in the proper mood (of course today it was cold and rainy). Brunch is one of my favorite meals, mostly because it is an excuse to eat vastly oversugared breakfast foods, along with some fruit, and call it a meal. In keeping with that theme, I decided to make pecan rolls. I followed Dorie Greenspan’s recipe in “Baking From my Home to Yours.” Her recipe, however, calls for a full recipe of Golden Brioche dough to be made, and then only half of the dough to be used. I was having enough people over that I wanted to use the full amount of dough, so I made one regular recipe of Honey Pecan Rolls, and one recipe of Chocolate Almond rolls. I thought both turned out really well. The pecan rolls were sticky and caramely, and the almond rolls were rich and chocolaty (I didn’t make the almond rolls in a caramel glaze). 

I did find that the rolls baked faster than the recipe called for. The recipe also said to knead the dough until it pulls away from the bowl, and after 20 minutes in the mixer, I found this still hadn’t happened. The rolls tasted great anyway though, so I didn’t worry too much about it. I did find that the almond buns got a little burnt on top, because they didn’t have a glaze to sit in. I’m not sure what can be done about that. Fortunately covering them in glaze helps to hide it.

Golden Brioche Dough

Makes 2 loafs

2 packets active dry yeast (each packet of yeast contains approx. 2 1/4 teaspoons) 

1/3 cup just-warm-to-the-touch water 

1/3 cup just-warm-to-the-touch whole milk

3 3/4 cups all-purpose flour 

2 teaspoons salt 

3 large eggs, at room temperature 

1/4 cup sugar 3 sticks (12 ounces) unsalted butter, at room temperature but still slightly firm

1. Put the yeast, water and milk in the bowl of a stand mixer and, using a wooden spoon, stir until the yeast is dissolved. Add the flour and salt, and fit into the mixer with the dough hook, if you have one. Toss a kitchen towel over the mixer, covering the bowl as completely as you can-- this will help keep you, the counter and your kitchen floor from being showered in flour. Turn the mixer on and off a few short pulses, just to dampen the flour (yes, you can peek to see how you're doing), then remove the towel, increase the mixer speed to medium-low and mix for a minute or two, just until the flour is moistened. At this point, you'll have a fairly dry, shaggy mess.

2. Scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl with a rubber spatula, set the mixer to low and add the eggs, followed by the sugar. Increase the mixer speed to medium and beat for about 3 minutes, until the dough forms a ball. Reduce the speed to low and add the butter in 2-tablespoon-size chunks, beating until each piece is almost incorporated before adding the next. You'll have a dough that is very soft, almost like batter. Increase the speed to medium-high and continue to beat until the dough pulls away from the sides of the bowl, about 10 minutes.

3. Transfer the dough to a clean bowl (or wash out the mixer bowl and use it), cover with plastic wrap and leave at room temperature until nearly doubled in size, 40 to 60 minutes, depending upon the warmth of your room.

4. Deflate the dough by lifting it up around the edges and letting it fall with a slap to the bowl. Cover the bowl with the plastic wrap and put it in the refrigerator. Slap the dough down in the bowl every 30 minutes until it stops rising, about 2 hours, then leave the uncovered dough in the refrigerator to chill overnight. (After this, you can make the sticky buns or freeze all or part of the dough for later use.)

Pecan Honey Sticky Buns

For the Glaze:

1 cup (packed) light brown sugar 

1 stick (8 tablespoons) unsalted butter, cut into 4 pieces 

1/4 cup honey 

1-1/2 cups pecans (whole or pieces)

For the Filling:

1/4 cup sugar 

3 tablespoons (packed) light brown sugar 

1 tablespoon ground cinnamon 

3 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature

For the Buns:

1/2 recipe dough for Golden Brioche loaves (see below), chilled and ready to shape (make the full recipe and cut the dough in half after refrigerating it overnight)

1. Mix the sugars and cinnamon together in a bowl. If necessary, in another bowl, work the butter with a spatula until it is soft, smooth and spreadable.

2.  On a flour-dusted work surface, roll the chilled dough into a 16-inch square. Using your fingers or a pastry brush, spread the softened butter over the dough. Sprinkle the dough with the cinnamon sugar, leaving a 1-inch strip bare on the side farthest from you.

3. Starting with the side nearest you, roll the dough into a cylinder, keeping the roll as tight as you can. (At this point, you can wrap the dough airtight and freeze it for up to 2 months . . . . Or, if you want to make just part of the recipe now, you can use as much of the dough as you'd like and freeze the remainder. Reduce the glaze recipe accordingly).

4. Generously butter a 9-x-13-inch baking pan (a Pyrex pan is perfect for this). In a heavy-bottomed saucepan, bring the brown sugar, butter, and honey to a boil over medium-low heat, stirring frequently to dissolve the sugar. Pour the glaze into the buttered pan, evening it out as best you can by tilting the pan or spreading the glaze with a heatproof spatula. Sprinkle over the pecans.

5. With a chef's knife, using a gentle sawing motion, trim just a tiny bit from the ends of the roll if they're very ragged or not well filled, then cut the log into 1-inch thick buns. (Because you trim the ragged ends of the dough, and you may have lost a little length in the rolling, you will get 15 buns, not 16.) Fit the buns into the pan cut side down, leaving some space between them.

6. Lightly cover the pan with a piece of wax paper and set the pan in a warm place until the buns have doubled in volume, about 1 hour and 45 minutes. The buns are properly risen when they are puffy, soft, doubled and, in all likelihood, touching one another.

7.  When the buns have almost fully risen center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Remove the sheet of wax paper and put the pan on a baking sheet lined with parchment or a silicone mat. Bake the sticky buns for about 30 minutes, or until they are puffed and gorgeously golden; the glaze will be bubbling away merrily. Pull the pan from the oven. The buns must be immediately unmolded. To do this, place a rimmed cookie sheet lined with a silpat directly over the baking pan, and flip everything over. The buns should fall out of the pan onto the silpat. Be careful, the caramel will be scalding hot! These are best eaten as soon as they have cooled enough.

 Chocolate Almond Buns

For the glaze:

1 1/3 cups powdered sugar 

2 T milk 

½ t vanilla extract 

¼ t almond extract 

Slivered almonds

For the filling

¼ cup granulated sugar 

3 T brown sugar 

¾ blanched almonds 

¾ cup mini chocolate chips 

3 T butter

1. Put the sugars and blanched almonds into a food processor. Pulse until mixture is coarse. Stir in the chocolate chips.

2. On a flour-dusted work surface, roll the chilled dough into a 16-inch square. Using your fingers or a pastry brush, spread the softened butter over the dough. Sprinkle the dough with the almond-chocolate mixture, leaving a 1-inch strip bare on the side farthest from you.

3. Starting with the side nearest you, roll the dough into a cylinder, keeping the roll as tight as you can.

4. Generously butter a 9-x-13-inch baking pan (a Pyrex pan is perfect for this). With a chef's knife, using a gentle sawing motion, trim just a tiny bit from the ends of the roll if they're very ragged or not well filled, then cut the log into 1-inch thick buns. (Because you trim the ragged ends of the dough, and you may have lost a little length in the rolling, you will get 15 buns, not 16.) Fit the buns into the pan cut side down, leaving some space between them.

5. Lightly cover the pan with a piece of wax paper and set the pan in a warm place until the buns have doubled in volume, about 1 hour and 45 minutes. The buns are properly risen when they are puffy, soft, doubled and, in all likelihood, touching one another.

6. When the buns have almost fully risen center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Remove the sheet of wax paper and put the pan on a baking sheet lined with parchment or a silicone mat. Bake the sticky buns for about 30 minutes, or until they are puffed and gorgeously golden. Unmold by placing a rimmed cookie sheet over the top of the baking dish, and then inverting.

7. Mix together the sugar, milk, and extracts until smooth. Drizzle the tops of the buns with glaze, and sprinkle with slivered almonds.

 

Sorta Alfajores

This is the third and final cookie I made for my Christmas in September party. These aren’t quite alfajores, because they don’t use dulce de leche. I had made some caramel a week ago for the apple cupcakes, but it ended up too burnt tasting for me to want to use it. Instead I put it in the fridge and saved it to make a burnt caramel frosting at some point in the future. I ended up using it for these cookies. The cookie base is an orange-almond shortbread, and the filling is the burnt caramel frosting. People really loved these, although they were a little messy to eat because the caramel would leak out. The recipe I’ve provided also makes WAY more caramel filling than you need for the number of cookies. Stick it in the fridge and use it to frost some cupcakes.

Almond-Orange Shortbread

Makes 18 Sandwiches (36 cookies)

1-1/2 cups (3 sticks) unsalted butter  

1 cup confectioners' sugar  

2 tablespoons granulated sugar  

1/4 teaspoon salt 

1/4 teaspoon orange extract  

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract  

1/3 cup ground almonds (I ground about ¾ of a cup of whole, blanched almonds to get this amount)  

3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour

1. Cream together the butter and the sugars on medium speed until fluffy. Mix in the salt, the extracts, the almonds, and the flour. Once the dough starts to come together into medium sized clumps stop the mixer and press the dough together with your hands.

2. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 30 minutes.

3. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Take the dough out of the fridge. Break the dough into two pieces. On a floured surface roll out one of the disks until it is about ¼ inch thick. Use a round cookie cutter, or a glass to cut 2 – 3 inch circles out of the dough. Pick up the extra dough, and transfer the circles to the cookie sheets. Roll out the second disk of dough and do the same, then combine the extra pieces of dough and roll it out. Continue rolling out the dough until you have made as many cookies as you can.

5. Bake for 12 – 14 minutes, or until the edges are just turning golden. Remove from the oven and let cool on the cookie sheets

Caramel Filling

1 cup sugar

6 Tbs butter

½ cup heavy cream

2 sticks butter softened

8 oz. fat free cream cheese

3 cups confectioner’s sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

1. Put the sugar in the bottom of a medium large, heavy-bottomed saucepan over medium high heat. Whisk the sugar constantly until it is fully melted and begins to bubble.

2. As soon as the sugar begins to bubble, add the 6 Tbs of butter and continue whisking constantly until the butter is melted.

3. Take the caramel off the heat. Count to three, and then pour in the heavy cream. Recipes say that the caramel will really bubble up at this point, but mine never does. If it’s not bubbling start whisking briskly to keep the caramel even. Once the caramel has cooled a little, pour it into a measuring cup to cool.

4. Once the caramel has cooled off, cream together the remaining two sticks of butter and the cream cheese until they are fluffy. Add the caramel and vanilla and beat to combine. Begin adding the powdered sugar. Beat in at least 2 cups and taste, add the third cup if you think it needs it.

Assembly

1. Spoon ~ 2 tsp of caramel onto the bottom of a cookie, and press another cookie on top of the caramel.

2. Sift confectioner’s sugar over the cookies for decoration.

Pecan Bars

This is number three in the set of recipes I’ve made Martha’s Cookies book. I actually made these at the same time as I made the chocolate malted sandwich cookies, but it took me awhile to get around to posting them. These cookies were pretty tasty, but I was expecting the layer of caramel to be a little thicker from the picture in the book. I also thought the shortbread part of the cookie could have been a little thinner. If I were going to make the cookies again, I think I would make ¾ of the shortbread, and 1 ½ times the caramel. I also thought the caramel tasted a little strongly of honey at first, but that flavor mellowed. Even so, these cookies were definitely worth making, and got rave reviews from all my friends. This Cookie book has definitely been worthwhile, the recipes are a little truncated in their explanations, but they’ve all turned out very tasty.

Pecan Bars

Makes 1 13 x 9 pan, about 36 cookies

Crust:

1 cup plus 2 Tbs (2 ¼ sticks) unsalted butter, softened
¾ cup packed light brown sugar
½ tsp salt
3 cups AP flour

Filling:

½ cup (1 stick) unstalted butter
½ cup packed light brown sugar
¼ cup plus
2 Tbs honey
2 Tbs sugar
2 Tbs heavy cream
¼ tsp salt
2 cups pecan halves
½ tsp vanilla extract

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Cream the butter and brown sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer. Mix on medium speed until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Mix in the salt.

2. Add the flour 1 cup at a time, mixing until fully incorporated after each addition. Continue mixing until the dough comes together in large clumps.

3. Press the dough into a greased 9 x 13 inch baking pan. Pierce the dough with a fork. Chill the dough until firm, about 20 minutes.

4. Bake until golden brown, 18 to 20 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack to cool, and reduce the oven temperature to 325.

5. To make the filling (wait until the crust is mostly cooled to do this): place the butter, brown sugar, honey, granulated sugar, and heavy cream in a saucepan over high heat. Bring the mixture to a boil, stirring constantly until the mixture coats the back of a spoon, about 1 minute.

6. Remove from heat, and stir in salt, nuts, and vanilla. Pour the filling over the cooled crust.

7. Bake at 325 degrees until the filling begins to bubble, about 15-20 minutes.

8. Allow the cookies to cool completely. Run a knife around the edge of the pan, and invert onto a cooling rack, and then flip back over onto a cutting board. Use a serrated knife to cut into 1 x 3 inch bars.