DARING BAKERS Filbert Gateau with Praline Buttercream

It is that time again this month for the unveiling of my Daring Bakers challenge. The challenge was to make a Filbert Gateau...this consists of:

1 Filbert Genoise (Cake Part)
1 recipe sugar syrup
1 recipe Praline Buttercream
½ cup heavy cream, whipped to soft peaks
1 recipe Raspberry Glaze
1 recipe Ganache Glaze

All I can say about this month's challenge is holy crap. This challenge has been sitting on my back for weeks and I haven't been able to find the time to tackle it until yesterday. The first problem I encountered was that it took me days to find a store in my area that even carries Hazelnuts (Filberts). I am a very determined person and I wanted the Hazelnuts, so Hazelnuts were what I was going to use! I finally found them at a little specialty store in a town neighboring our town. The only thing with the nuts that I found was that they had their skins still on.

The next problem that I encountered during this challenge was that I DO NOT own a food processor. This kitchen item has been an appliance that my mother in law insists on me owning, but I have NEVER found any reason to own one. So, after reading all the forums on the Daring Bakers website, HAPPY BIRTHDAY to myself, I am now the proud owner of a Cuisinart 11 cup food processor. Funny thing about this is that it isn't my birthday! Ha Ha!!! Don't tell the husband!

So, I got my nuts and my food processor and there I was for another week and no Filbert Gateau. Yes, it is that time of year that every mother (especially stay at home moms like me!!) wonders why she decided to have children. My little guys are 21 months apart and they are all boy. They keep me extremely busy and I couldn't imagine what the Gateau would look like if they were in the kitchen with me to help! I would have been medicated at this point, just put it that way!

Time to make the Filbert Gateau. Yesterday the husband took the boys to run some errands and then off to the weekly classic car show. I quickly unboxed the new food processor and washed it up. While I was waiting for it to dry off, I turned on the oven to toast my hazelnuts. I put them in the oven at 350 degrees for 10 minutes. When I removed them from the oven I placed them onto a dish cloth. I folded the dish cloth and rubbed my hands back and forth over the cloth. When I opened the cloth up most of the hazelnuts skins had come completely off. I repeated this step several times to remove all of the remaining skin. I did have to take a paring knife to a few of them to remove some stubborn skins.

Next I got to use the new food processor. I had to finely grind up some of the hazelnuts to make the genoise (cake portion of the Gateau). This was very exciting since I have lived almost 29 years (that is how old my kids think I am!) and have never even touched a food processor. It certainly did the job and quite quickly too! I was then onto the task of clarifying butter....yeah, I haven't ever heard of that before either!! I took 2 sticks of butter and melted it over a low heat. After about 10 minutes, I skimmed the milk product off from the top and strained the rest. The butter was so very clear, I was very proud of myself for not burning or ruining it in any other way.

I now had my processed nuts and my clarified butter, time to start working on the genoise (cake part). I whipped the yolks of 7 eggs and then 5 whites and they turned out real nice. I then had to combine all the ingredients. I folded the fine hazelnut flour combination into the egg yolk and egg white mixture and then poured in the clarified butter. It was a real nice looking mixture, very fluffy. I poured it into a 10" springform pan and then went to put it into my preheated oven. I opened the oven and it was COLD!! I turned on the wrong oven when I was trying to multi-task! So, I prayed, prayed more and more for the mixture to not deflate. My prayers were answered and the oven heated quickly and the mixture didn't deflate!

Time to start on the other MANY parts of this recipe. I got the simple syrup made with light rum because I didn't have dark rum....rum is rum to me, he he! I worked on the praline paste for a long time...the first time the sugar got really dark too quickly and smelt burnt. The next time I got it melted and then added the hazelnuts and brought it to a slight boil and before I could get it out of the pan, it must of slightly burnt. I continued on to make the praline paste, but there was a slight taste of over cooking that I didn't care for. So, I decided to for go the praline paste since I didn't have anymore nuts and didn't want the entire dessert ruined because of burnt nuts.

By the time I was done burning nuts, good thing the husband wasn't here, the genoise (cake part) was ready to come out of the oven. I had to let it cool and then slice it into 3 layers. I did this by putting toothpicks around the edges and letting the knife use them as a guide. This technique worked out really well. After the slicing I had to make the swiss buttercream. This came together well as I had heard was a real nightmare, so I was extremely happy since the praline paste had met its match. Time to assemble~~I brushed the first layer with the simple syrup and then applied the plain buttercream and then whipped cream, I did this again on the second layer. I put the top layer on the cake and then put it into the fridge for about 30 minutes. I pulled it out of the fridge and then trimmed the edges and poured the raspberry glaze over the top and sides. Bake into the fridge while I made the Gananche Glaze. After the glaze was done I transferred the cake to a wire rack and poured the glaze over the top.

I was so exhausted at this point, it was 5 hours now that I had been working on this recipe. My husband thinks that I am crazy, I just might have to agree with his this time. Anyhow, I put my Filbert Gateau on a cake plate and decided I would put some decorations on the top. I filled my decorating bag and put a few little squirts around the top with the center empty. I was going to put a signature "L" on the top for my initial, but the tip went crazy and I got a huge squiggle. So I went with that since I couldn't remove it from the ganache glaze. This challenge was really trying, but I have learned a lot and am glad that I didn't hide and make a box cake this month instead.

OH MY, I just cut the Filbert Gateau and it is heavenly! It is so great without the pralines in the buttercream, I cannot imagine what it tastes like with them in it! I might have to slave away in the kitchen at Christmas to make this one again. Here are some more pictures:

Just Picked Cherry Cobbler

Mmmm, Good Stuff!

No fancy pit remover, just a straw
Push the straw into the center of the cherry
And out pops the pit....amazing and QUICK!

I got a surprising call from my sister this week, she was outside in her yard picking sour cherries. If any of you know my sister and for those of you that don't, she doesn't like being very domestic. She makes a killer venison meatloaf, from what I hear, but she doesn't just pull a cookbook off from the shelf and whip anything up. So, I got the kids in the car and zoomed over to her house. All of us started picking the cherries and ended up with 3 gallon size Ziploc bags full. When I came home, I washed and bagged them up and off to the freezer they went. It has been driving me nuts that I haven't done anything with them and they have only been in the freezer for 2 days! So I found a recipe for Cherry Cobbler and got busy today. I partially defrosted the cherries and started to cut them in half and pull out the seed. Oh my, I did this to about 10 of them and was ready to chuck all of the other cherries in the garbage can. Suddenly I came up with the idea of shoving a plastic straw through them to get the pit out of the cherries. All you do is just hold the cherry flat on a plate, push the straw into the cherry, then pull the cherry up over the straw. The pit remains on the end of the straw. It worked great and in about 30 minutes I had 5 cups of pitted cherries. Sometimes I just amaze myself !!!

Here is the quick recipe:

INGREDIENTS
1/2 cup butter
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon vanilla

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1 cup milk
4 cups fresh or frozen pitted sour cherries
3/4 cup white sugar
2 tablespoon all-purpose flour

DIRECTIONS

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Melt butter and pour into the bottom of 9 X 13 baking pan. In a medium bowl, combine 1 cup of flour, 1 cup of sugar, baking powder and cinnamon. Stir in milk and vanilla until well blended, then pour the batter into the pan over the butter. Do not stir. Place cherries in a bowl and toss with the remaining 3/4 cup of sugar and 2 tablespoons of flour. Spoon the cherry mixture evenly over the batter. Do not stir. Bake for about 60 minutes until golden brown. A toothpick inserted into the cobber should come out clean. Enjoy warm with a scoop of vanilla ice cream!

DANISH BRAID

Here we are at the end of another month and I have completed another Daring Bakers Challenge. This month we were challenged to make a Danish Braid. This Danish Braid is made of a danish dough in the family of butter-laminated doughs. This dough is sweet and super yummy. Since I have NEVER made any type of danish, I was very scared to see the results of what was to come out of this. I kept checking the Daring Bakers Website to see what results other bakers had with the recipe and what fillings others were using. I began thinking of just what fillings were going to be just right. I finally decided on making the first one a Strawberry-Rhubarb with Sweetened Cream Cheese filled Danish and the second one a Sour Cherry Cream Cheese Danish. I was just hoping that the dough would turn out so that I could get that far with the recipe!!!

I started on the dough one afternoon after lunch. I got out the ole' Kitchen Aid and started the dough and then the butter block. I rolled out the dough and then smothered 2/3 of it with the butter block. I folded the dough according to the directions and put it in the fridge to chill for 30 minutes. After the 30 minutes, I had to get the dough out and roll it into a 18 X 13 inch rectangle. Then I had to fold it according to the directions again....this took place a total of 4 times. After the 4th time of rolling it out and folding it, I divided it in to 2 pieces and I had to let the dough rest over night in the fridge.

The next morning I was so excited to start the danish making process. I got the dough out and rolled it into a 15 X 20 rectangle about 1/4 inch thick. This proved to be difficult since I broke the rolling pin handles from pushing so hard! I trudged on and cut the dough so that I had a base area for the filling and then I had the strips on both sides so that I could braid it. I put the cream cheese mixture on first and then the fruit fillings. I then braided the top of the danish. This was another thing that was difficult, I didn't know what I was doing....my braiding technique needs help to say the least! I will have to practice when I get another rolling pin!

I put the danishes in the oven for 10 minutes on 400 degrees and then another 15 minutes at 350 degrees. I couldn't believe the smell in my kitchen. Good thing that we live on a large lot of land in the neighborhood or the neighbors would have been coming by the flock if they would have smelled the aroma!!! I let the danish cool and then drizzled a little powdered sugar/milk mixture over the top! I then proceeded to eat almost 1/2 of the Strawberry Rhubarb Danish that late afternoon. I packaged up 1/2 of the Cherry filled one for my girlfriend and took some of both over to my neighbors......if I hadn't of done that, it would have been very bad for the waistline!

I am very happy that I had the time to tackle this challenge this month. Everyone that tried the danish couldn't believe just how wonderful it was. I think that I have something new to give at Christmas other than my boring Banana Bread!

Rhubarb & Strawberry Crumb Pie

Ever since I was a very small child, I have been intrigued by the taste of Rhubarb. My grandmother grew it in her backyard and every spring we would always break pieces off and laugh as the sour taste made us have what seemed like lock jaw. We never made anything fancy with it, just ate it raw (from what I can remember). So, when grandma sold her home a few years back, I inherited half of the plants for my home. Last year I found a Rhubarb Strawberry Crisp recipe that I thought wasn't worthy of my "heirloom" Rhubarb. I have been on a mission to find that perfect recipe and this Crumb Pie was given the thumbs up by everyone that was given given the privilege to have a piece. (Arrogant, huh? Yeah, we are talking about my precious rhubarb!) My brother-in-law actually hinted that he would like to see another full pie like that again soon! This recipe is very simple to make and everyone that is privileged enough to have a piece or your pie will think that you have slaved away for hours! Without further ado, here is the recipe that I found in my new recipe book, "Pie" by Ken Haedrich and tweaked a little by moi!

Skillet Crust:

2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

1 cup sugar

1/4 teaspoon salt

3/4 cup unsalted butter

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Combine the flour, sugar and salt in a medium size bowl. Set aside. Melt the butter in a large skillet over medium to low heat. Stir in the vanilla. Add the dry mixture and turn off the hear. Stir the flour and butter with a whisk (it worked GREAT). It will be a little clumpy, but just keep working it. Set the crumbs aside to cool for several minutes. When the crumbs are cool enough to handle, transfer about 2/3 of them to a buttered 9 1/2 inch deep-dish pie pan. Press them into the bottom and up the side of the pan.

Filling:

4 cups (1 1/2 pounds) fresh rhubarb sliced 1/4 inch thick

2 cups sliced strawberries

3/4 cup sugar

Juice & Zest of 1 lemon

1/2 cup all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon cardamom (if you have it, if not it is alright.)

In a large bowl, combine the rhubarb, strawberries, sugar, lemon juice & zest, flour and cardamom. Set aside for 10 minutes. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Turn the filling into the pie shell, smoothing the top with a spoon. Crumble the reserved crust mixture evenly over the pie, pressing down on it gently. Place the pie in the center of the oven rack and bake for 30 minutes @ 350 degrees. Reduce the oven temperature to 325 degrees and rotate the pie 180 degrees. Just in case of spills, slide a foil lined baking sheet below the pie to avoid a huge mess. Continue to bake until the top is golden brown and the juices bubble thickly around the edges, 40 to 50 minutes. If the top starts to get too dark, cover with loosely tented foil during the last 15 minutes. LET COOL FOR AT LEAST 2 HOURS BEFORE SERVING, while cooling the pie will thicken.

Drumstick Cake Dessert

Yummy stuff, trust me!

My little kitchen helper :)

On a recent trip to my parents house, I rummaged through my mom's recipe box for some new recipes. I found this recipe from one of her old co-workers and she swore that it was something that I would love. Well, she is my mother and she does know me very well and she wasn't wrong! This recipe tastes similiar to those icecream drumsticks that you buy at the store, but this is made in a 9 X 13 pan. Oh, it is so good and a small piece really does satisfy a sweet tooth. Here is the recipe:

DRUMSTICK CAKE

Base:

3 Cups Crushed Vanilla Wafers (1 box)

1 Cup Chopped Peanuts

1/2 Cup Melted Butter

Mix the 3 ingredients together and pour 1/2 of the combined ingredients in the bottom of a 9 X 13 pan. Reserve other 1/2 for topping.

Filling:

1/2 Cup Sugar

2 Tablespoons Vanilla

1 (8oz) Package Cream Cheese

3 Eggs

1 Large Cool Whip (16oz.)

1/2 Cup Peanut Butter

Topping:

1 Jar (16-18 oz) Hot Fudge Topping

Mix cream cheese, sugar, peanut butter, vanilla and eggs together. Mix well until smooth. Fold in Cool Whip and pour onto base. Place in freezer to set for approximately 1 hour. Heat Hot Fudge topping until it is pourable. Remove pan from freezer and pour Hot Fudge topping onto the top of dessert then sprinkle with the other 1/2 of the base ingredient mixture. Cover and freeze.

ENJOY!!

Chocolate Strawberry Trifle

In honour of Mother's Day and my own mother, I made this awesome quick recipe given to me by my neighbor, Caroline. This is so tasty that all of your guests will think that you slaved away in the kitchen for hours....my brother-in-law actually had this thought! What you do is just bake a box cake in a 9 X 13 pan and then cut it into cubes. Mix 2 (8ounce) cool-whips with 1 (4 ounce) instant chocolate (or any flavor) pudding. And last but NOT least, slice up some strawberries.

First (Bottom) layer: cake

Second layer: pudding mixture

Third layer: sliced strawberries

Repeat layers until your Trifle dish is full

Enjoy and let me know what you think of it!

Daring Bakers Challenge for April

The challenge for this month was Cheesecake Pops. This recipe looked almost like several other cheesecake recipes that I have made in the past, but only you cut (Scoop) them into little balls or shapes and then dip them into chocolate. While looking at the recipe I had to gasp, I have been trying to loose weight and the thought of all that cream cheese.....oh my! I got the cheesecake mixture into the pan and had to cook it about 65 minutes. I wanted to make sure that it was indeed done and it didn't appear to look done at the suggested 35 to 45 minutes. I put it into the fridge overnight on a Friday night and on Sunday morning I carefully cut the cheesecake (with a plastic knife, I don't know why that works so well!) into triangular shapes and then dipped them into mint chocolate. I got this minty chocolate at a cake supply shop near my home and oh it is really good! I then put lots of cute spring color sprinkles on the still wet chocolate and did they look cute and tasted WONDERFUL!! I would make these again for a special occasion -- or even just one day that I want to splurge! Here is the recipe if you would like to try them for yourselves! Sorry no pictures my camera isn't working...need to go and get a new one! Here is the recipe:

Cheesecake Pops
Makes 30 – 40 Pops
5 8-oz. packages cream cheese at room temperature
2 cups sugar
¼ cup all-purpose flour
¼ teaspoon salt
5 large eggs
2 egg yolks
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
¼ cup heavy cream
Boiling water as needed
Thirty to forty 8-inch lollipop sticks
1 pound chocolate, finely chopped – you can use all one kind or half and half of dark, milk, or white (Alternately, you can use 1 pound of flavored coatings, also known as summer coating, confectionery coating or wafer chocolate – candy supply stores carry colors, as well as the three kinds of chocolate.)
2 tablespoons vegetable shortening
(Note: White chocolate is harder to use this way, but not impossible)
Assorted decorations such as chopped nuts, colored jimmies, crushed peppermints, mini chocolate chips, sanding sugars, dragees) - Optional
Position oven rack in the middle of the oven and preheat to 325 degrees F. Set some water to boil.
In a large bowl, beat together the cream cheese, sugar, flour, and salt until smooth. If using a mixer, mix on low speed. Add the whole eggs and the egg yolks, one at a time, beating well (but still at low speed) after each addition. Beat in the vanilla and cream.
Grease a 10-inch cake pan (not a spring form pan), and pour the batter into the cake pan. Place the pan in a larger roasting pan. Fill the roasting pan with the boiling water until it reaches halfway up the sides of the cake pan. Bake until the cheesecake is firm and slightly golden on top, 35 to 45 minutes.
Remove the cheesecake from the water bath and cool to room temperature. Cover the cheesecake with plastic wrap and refrigerate until very cold, at least 3 hours or up to overnight.
When the cheesecake is cold and very firm, scoop the cheesecake into 2-ounce balls and place on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet. Carefully insert a lollipop stick into each cheesecake ball. Freeze the cheesecake pops, uncovered, until very hard, at least 1 – 2 hours.
When the cheesecake pops are frozen and ready for dipping, prepare the chocolate. In the top of a double boiler, set over simmering water, or in a heatproof bowl set over a pot of simmering water, heat half the chocolate and half the shortening, stirring often, until chocolate is melted and chocolate and shortening are combined. Stir until completely smooth. Do not heat the chocolate too much or your chocolate will lose it’s shine after it has dried. Save the rest of the chocolate and shortening for later dipping, or use another type of chocolate for variety.
Alternately, you can microwave the same amount of chocolate coating pieces on high at 30 second intervals, stirring until smooth.
Quickly dip a frozen cheesecake pop in the melted chocolate, swirling quickly to coat it completely. Shake off any excess into the melted chocolate. If you like, you can now roll the pops quickly in optional decorations. You can also drizzle them with a contrasting color of melted chocolate (dark chocolate drizzled over milk chocolate or white chocolate over dark chocolate, etc.) Place the pop on a clean parchment paper-lined baking sheet to set. Repeat with remaining pops, melting more chocolate and shortening (or confectionery chocolate pieces) as needed.
Refrigerate the pops for up to 24 hours, until ready to serve.