January 15, 2010
Posted by The Serious Eats Team, December 22, 2009 at 10:26 AM
Basically World Peace Cookies, but with more mayhem.
- makes about 36 cookies -
Brought to the Serious Eats Cookie Swap 2009 by Friend of Serious Eats (FOSE) LeeAnne Shaffer.
Adapted from Dorie Greenspan's recipe for World Peace Cookies.
Ingredients
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/2 stick unsalted butter, at room temperature
2/3 cup packed light brown sugar
1/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon fleur de sel
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
7 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped into varying sizes between small chunks and fine dust
3 ounces pecans, chopped
1 vanilla bean
Procedure
1. Sift the flour, cocoa and baking soda together.
2. Working with a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, or with a hand mixer in a large bowl, cream the butter on medium speed. Add both sugars, salt and vanilla extract and beat for 2 minutes more.
3. Turn off the mixer. Pour in the flour, pulse the mixer at low speed about 5 times, a second or two each time. At low speed, mix for about 30 seconds more, only until the flour disappears into the dough—for the best texture, work the dough as little as possible once the flour is added, and don't be concerned if the dough looks a little crumbly. Toss in the chocolate and pecan pieces and mix only to incorporate.
4. Turn the dough out onto a work surface, gather it together and divide it in half. Working with one half at a time, shape the dough into logs that are 1 1/2 inches in diameter. Wrap the logs in plastic wrap and refrigerate them for at least 3 hours. (The dough can be refrigerated for up to 3 days or frozen for up to 2 months. If you've frozen the dough, you needn't defrost it before baking—just slice the logs into cookies and bake the cookies 1 minute longer.)
5. Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 325°F (160°C). Line two baking sheets with parchment or silicone mats.
6. Working with a sharp thin knife, slice the logs into rounds that are 2/3 inch thick. (The rounds are likely to crack as you're cutting them—don't be concerned, just squeeze the bits back onto each cookie.) Arrange the rounds on the baking sheets, leaving about one inch between them.
7. Bake the cookies one sheet at a time for 12 minutes—they won't look done, nor will they be firm, but that's just the way they should be. Transfer the baking sheet to a cooling rack and let the cookies rest until they are only just warm, at which point you can serve them or let them reach room temperature.
Posted by Ed Levine, March 15, 2009 at 9:25 AM
When I made last week's silver dollar pancakes I never got to sit down with Will and Vicky to enjoy them fully. I was always bouncing up from the table to pour or turn the pancakes.
What's the answer to this age-old problem? Make one big pan-sized puffy browned pancake served in a skillet, like the one I've adapted here from former Serious Eats contributor Dorie Greenspan's great Sweet Times: Simple Desserts for Every Occasion.
Word to the pancake wise: This baby deflates as fast as a pricked balloon, so serve it immediately to your already seated guests. This pancake waits for no one.
Continue reading »
Posted by Dorie Greenspan, April 24, 2008 at 2:00 PM
Illustration by Florine Asch
It's not just potato-chip makers that understand that if you offer us something salty we won't be able to eat just one—French pastry chefs know that trick too. And Arnaud Larher, whose pastry shop is in Montmartre, is a master of the add-salt-and-we'll-munch-away school. He's the chef who created the TV Snacks, irresistibly munchable, salty little butter cookies molded into lumpy, bumpy balls.
When I asked Larher how he came up with the idea to make a salty cookie, he said it came to him very naturally, since he grew up in Brittany, where butter is always salted. "I'm just continuing the tradition," he said.
I bet you could start your own tradition with these.
Continue reading »
Posted by Dorie Greenspan, April 10, 2008 at 1:15 PM
Photograph by Alan Richardson
Here's my go-to cheesecake recipe, a classic that can be varied in almost limitless ways. (I've got 11 variations in my book, Baking: From My Home to Yours, and the only reason I stopped there was that it would have taken way too many pages to keep going.) It's an almost traditional New York Cheesecake—it's missing the lemon, which, of course, you could add—and it's tall and lush and, no surprise, creamy. I usually make it with a graham cracker or chocolate cookie crust, but if you'd like to make this for a Passover meal, you can easily omit the crust or use macaroon crumbs.
You'll see that I use either sour cream or heavy cream in the cake. The sour cream will give you a tangier cheesecake, more New York, I think, while the heavy cream is milder. As long as you keep the measurement at 1 1/3 cups, you can use whatever combo of the two you'd like. You can also add fruits or nuts, swirls of chocolate (melt some chocolate and mix it in with some of the cake batter) or flavor the cake with an extract or oil. Whatever you do, serve something light beforehand—the cake is rich and, even though everyone knows it, people still reach for seconds.
Continue reading »
Posted by Dorie Greenspan, April 3, 2008 at 11:00 AM
While I have been known to exaggerate now and then, I've never gone overboard in my praise for this lemon cream (think curd); I just call it extraordinary and rest assured that I haven't gone overboard.
The recipe comes from Pierre Hermé, my pastry hero, and I think it's fascinating. It has all of the ingredients you find in a traditional lemon curd, but the way you make it changes the cream's texture—Pierre's lemon cream is tangier, lemonier and, I think, lighter on the tongue, than traditional lemon curd. The secret is in the way the butter is added. In a curd, all the ingredients, including the butter, go into a pot and you cook, cook, cook and stir, stir and stir and then, when the mixture cools, it's curd. With Pierre Herme's lemon cream, you cook and stir everything—except the butter—then, when the ingredients have thickened, you put them into a food processor or blender, let them cool a bit, then whir in the butter and keep whirring. Essentially, you make an emulsion. And, because the butter doesn't melt and re-firm, as it does with curd, the lemon cream is silky, luxurious and yes, extraordinary.
Continue reading »
Posted by Dorie Greenspan, March 20, 2008 at 1:30 PM
I must be in a mini-mood—I just looked over my posts from the past couple of weeks and saw that everything was baby-sized. And here's another "small enough to hold in the palm of your hand" recipe. This one is for little bread puddings made in 6-ounce custard cups or ramekins. (Although, now that I think about it, I bet you could make these in muffin cups or, better yet, silicone muffin cups.)
I like to make these with prunes and to flavor the brown-sugar custard with allspice, but they're just as good with dried apricots and ginger (see Playing Around). Whatever dried fruit you use, make sure that it's soft and plump before it goes into your mixture. If your fruit is hard, you can either soak it in some very hot water or steam it for a minute or so, a process called "plumping." In either case, make sure to pat the fruit dry before mixing it into the recipe.
Maybe when the weather is more spring-like, I'll start feeling more expansive and break out the BIG recipes. For now, I hope you enjoy these little babies.
Continue reading »
Posted by Dorie Greenspan, March 13, 2008 at 1:30 PM
Photograph by Alan Richardson
I’m still in Paris (yay!) and while I saw brilliant yellow forsythia when I was at the Sunday market, and while there are a few cherry blossoms out in the gardens that get full sun, it’s been cold and rainy all week—we even had snow for two seconds and a couple of hail showers—which means I’m still making hearty soups and substantial stews, one of which, a daube of red wine and beef cheeks, is simmering in the oven now. Between the chill outside and the breeze that comes through my ancient window frames, I don’t think my friends will find it unwelcome.
The daube will be familiar to my Parisian pals, but its accompaniment won’t—I’m going to serve the stew with a basketful of corn muffins. Of course, I’ll have to use frozen corn, but I can find really good cornmeal here, so it will be fine. And I might add a few herbs and a little bacon to the mix (the bacon here is fabulous), just to make it more savory and because there’s bacon in the daube. The way I see it, adding bacon to the muffins is like pulling an outfit together by wearing a scarf that picks up the color of your shoes. And besides, what isn’t better with bacon?
Continue reading »
Posted by Dorie Greenspan, March 6, 2008 at 1:15 PM
By the time you read this, I'll be in Paris, where I hope I will have not have discovered that I left half of what I needed in New York. If so, it won't be the first time. For as much as I travel, I'm not a good packer—I'm always stuffing one last thing into a bag—and I'm not terribly organized. I pack at the last minute, which is how I end up taking more of what I don't need and sometimes forgetting that one vital something.
Knowing this about me, my husband wondered why, when nothing was packed and I was still writing to meet a deadline, I decided to make a banana cake. You'd have thought after all these years he'd be able to guess, since the reason is both simple and obvious: I had two over-ripe bananas languishing on the counter! And besides, nothing makes me calmer or happier than baking and a calm, happy me might actually pack better.
Continue reading »
Posted by Dorie Greenspan, February 28, 2008 at 12:30 PM
I don't know where you are, but I'm in Connecticut looking out at a bunch of snow. Sure, I've seen a robin or two, but it's not feeling rhubarbish around these parts yet, which is why these baby cakes, which Johanne Killeen, she of Al Forno in Providence, Rhode Island, made when she came to bake with Julia Child, look so good to me.
I know they look like moist little chocolate cakes, but they're really moist little hot and spicy cakes, sweet little things pumped up with ginger and black pepper and fortified with cocoa and espresso powder.
Johanne, a fabulous baker and a mistress of all that is small, likes to make this recipe in pans that are 4 inches across and 1 inch deep. If you don't have mini pans, you can try making the cake in muffin pans or use one 10 inch pan, in which case it will have to bake for 50 to 60 minutes.
The cakes are great with whipped cream and candied lemon zest and just as good with ice cream—particularly coffee ice cream. A couple of bites could give us northerners the patience we'll need to wait for spring.
Continue reading »
Posted by Dorie Greenspan, February 21, 2008 at 1:45 PM
While those of us in the northern part of the world are sitting around waiting for spring to come, it's nice to know that lemons are within easy reach. Not only do they perk up any salad, bring out the best in seafood and look cheery on the counter, they're a blessing when you've had your fill with apples and pears. (I love both apples and pears, but it's nice to give them a little time off in the winter, don't you think?)
I've got a bunch of lemon desserts that I turn to this time of year, but one of my favorites is a lemon tart I learned to make when I was working with Daniel Boulud on Cafe Boulud Cookbook
It's an elegant tart with a filling made with whole lemons—zest, juice and pulp—so that it's tart, tart, tart, as in really puckery.
Continue reading »
Posted by Dorie Greenspan, February 14, 2008 at 1:00 PM
It's not easy to translate gourmandise from the French. Strictly speaking, I guess it would be a delicacy or a treat, but the word, when applied to food, can also mean greedy. It's a great word—I mean, how many of us haven't been greedy for the treats we love—and it's a great name for this dessert from Pierre Herme.
This gorgeous dessert has three parts; from the bottom up they are: rich coconut-tapioca; spears of fresh pineapple mixed with lime zest and sweet orange marmalade; and thin, thin slices of oven-dried pineapple.
When I wrote the description of this dessert for the first book that I did with Pierre (Desserts by Pierre Herme
), I said that it "... falls into that rarely explored realm between refreshing and comforting. The coconut—its consistency like that of a bisque, its floating pearls just right for popping against the roof of your mouth—is mild, milky, soupy and soothing, while the pineapple, glistening with bittersweet marmalade and spiked with lime zest, is all sparkle and zip." More than a decade later, it still seems right to me. More important, the dessert is still exciting.
Each part of the dessert can be made ahead and, really, each part could be served separately, but that wouldn't be very gourmandise-ish, would it?
Continue reading »
Posted by Dorie Greenspan, February 7, 2008 at 1:00 PM
If you haven't already whipped up something wonderful for the sweetheart(s) in your life, here's a recipe for a cookie that makes any day sweeter. It's a linzer cookie—made with flour and ground nuts and spiced with cinnamon and cloves—cut out with a cute little heart-shaped cutter and dipped in melted chocolate. (I love the technique of pre-rolling the dough when it's soft and malleable and I hope you will, too.)
The cookie has the same buttery goodness and soft spices as a linzer tart and, in fact, you could use the dough to make a tart, if you wanted to. You can also make sandwich cookies (a classic linzerish thing to do), sandwiching the cookies with red jam. (Bring 1/2 cup of raspberry jam and 1 teaspoon water to the boil. Let the jam cool slightly before using it.)
Continue reading »
Posted by Dorie Greenspan, January 31, 2008 at 12:45 PM
Use a heart-shaped waffle maker for the best results
I know it’s a little early for Valentine’s Day, but for those of you who plan ahead and test ahead, you might want to give these little heart-shaped waffles a pre-fete run.
The batter for these waffles is almost a chocolate cake batter, which is why, when they’re baked, they taste like no other waffle you’ve ever had. That they’ve got crushed amaretti in them only makes them that much more special. Amaretti, for those of you who need a new addiction, are dry, crunchy, kind-of-meringuey Italian almond cookies that, in their most famous incarnation, are sold wrapped in beautifully printed tissue paper. Even though they’re a splurge, the amaretti I like best are Lazzaroni Amaretti di Saronno—they’re the ones in the red boxes and save-worthy tins. That said—I’ve used supermarket-brand amaretti and my waffles have been fine.
To get the full heart effect, you need a five-of-hearts waffle-maker. Lacking that, don’t give up on the recipe: make it in your regular waffler and, if you want to be truly romantic, cut your waffles ordinaires into hearts.
Continue reading »
Posted by Dorie Greenspan, January 24, 2008 at 11:30 AM
Here's an intensely chocolaty cake from Lora Brody, who made this when she came to Cambridge to tape an episode of Baking with Julia. The official name of the cake is Boca Negra, or black mouth, and the name aptly describes what your mouth will look like after one bite. I can't think of another cake that's this chocolaty (okay, maybe the Grandmother's Cake from La Maison du Chocolate) or this easy to make. And I love the boozy white-chocolate cream that Lora makes to go on top of it. (Attention: You should make the cream a day ahead.)
Lora suggested that the cake be served warm or at room temperature, when it's moist and dense, but if you like fudge, then you'll want to pop the cake into the fridge and have it cold. Either way, I know you'll be happy.
A word about whipping up the cake: You can make this cake by hand—a cinch—or in a food processor—even cinchier. It's easy no matter which method you use; actually, it's so easy that if you've never baked before, you can start here and be a star.
Continue reading »
Posted by Dorie Greenspan, January 17, 2008 at 1:00 PM
I always think of pots de crème, or little pots of crème, as the French answer to our puddings. Really a baked custard, the crème can be created in just about any flavor combo. That uber-chef Daniel Boulud created them to be coffee-cardamom was a nod to the way coffee is often drunk in the Middle East: through a cardamom pod held between one’s teeth.
Of course, Daniel being Daniel (and thank goodness he is), he ups the ante a bit: he caramelizes the coffee beans and cardamom pods before he pours in milk and cream and steeps everything for a few minutes. Even though this dessert is made with big flavors—you can hardly call coffee or cardamom wallflower flavors—the caramelizing step makes the flavors even bigger and more intense.
When these are baked in a professional kitchen, the custard cups, set in a roasting pan filled with water, are covered with a sheet of plastic wrap. The wrap doesn’t budge or burn because the temperature is low (of course, you’ve got to have an oven that keeps this low temperature). If the idea of baking with plastic wrap doesn’t make you comfortable, cover the set-up with foil.
Continue reading »
Posted by Ed Levine, January 13, 2008 at 8:00 AM
Today's Sunday Brunch recipe, Oatmeal Breakfast Bread, comes from the fertile imagination of one of our 2007 Most Serious Eater award winners, Dorie Greenspan. In her headnote she describes this bread as "lightly spiced, fruit-speckled, almost pudding soft." Yum.
Continue reading »
Posted by Dorie Greenspan, January 10, 2008 at 3:00 PM
I don't know why, but whenever I'm in Paris, I end up buying way too much yogurt. Maybe it's the endless shelves of yogurt in every supermarket that makes me forget that I don't need quarts of it—or that I'd just bought a quart the day before. Maybe it's the fact that there are so many different kinds of yogurts to choose from—there's non-fat and full-fat, brasse and Greek and Bulgarian and let's not even mention the myriad flavor options. So, I've got a fridge full of the stuff—as always. And now I've got a yogurt cake—as always.
The cake, made with unflavored yogurt and olive oil, is good enough that it would be worth it to go out and buy yogurt for the express purpose of making it. (Of course, I've never had to.) It's a plain cake, rather like a pound cake, but with a somewhat coarser crumb, and it's made without fuss or fancy equipment.
This week's recipe is an olive-oil and lime variation on the cake I usually make with flavorless vegetable oil and lemon. It's great both ways, but I think the evo (extra-virgin olive oil) rendition has a richer flavor.
Continue reading »
Posted by Dorie Greenspan, January 3, 2008 at 12:30 PM
Here in Paris we said au’revoir to the last bûches de Noël (yule logs) on New Year’s Eve and bonjour to les galettes des Rois on January 2, the day the city’s pastry shops reopened. While the galette des rois is a cake meant specifically for January 6, Epiphany, it’s impossible to resist its temptations before or after the official holiday—so impossible that some shops offer the sweet until the end of the month.
The galette is really very simple, if a little time-consuming to make—it’s an almond and pastry-cream filling sandwiched by two rounds of (all-butter) puff pastry dough—but so, so good. Nothing beats buttery puff pastry and a filling made with more good butter! But great taste is only one of its attractions—the chance to wear the king’s crown is another, and probably the one that keeps kids asking for the cake over and over.
Continue reading »
Posted by Dorie Greenspan, December 27, 2007 at 1:00 PM
I’m in Paris now where the sweet you see in every pastry shop and bakery this time of year is pain d’épices. Sometimes translated as spice bread or likened to gingerbread, I think pain d’épices comes closer to honey cake than to any other sweet in the pantheon. The problem with pinning down this cake, a specialty of Dijon and Alsace and probably a bunch of other areas as well, is that it comes in a million varieties: it can be a loaf or a huge sheet cake; it can be as dark as mahogany or as light as a peanut-butter blondie; it can have nuts, or not; be full of dried fruits, or not; and be either firm or soft. And, of course, as is true with most traditional recipes, everyone who makes pain d’épices thinks his recipe is either the most authentic or the best or both.
This is a recipe from Pierre Hermé, the famous Paris pastry chef, who comes from a family of pastry chefs, each of whom made pain d’épices. In fact, if I remember correctly, Pierre said that this recipe is based on one his father, a pastry chef in the Alsatian town of Colmar, made.
Continue reading »
Posted by Dorie Greenspan, December 20, 2007 at 12:30 PM
I don’t know how it got to be just five days before Christmas (and therefore almost the end of 2007—yikes!), but here we are. The stockings are already hung by the chimney with care and the carolers will be at the door any second. And by now you just might be cookied-out, having baked for the cookie exchange, the office party, the kid’s school, a bunch of charitable groups or a house party—or maybe all of the above. So, this week I’ll skip the cookies and give the recipe for what I think is a fabulous gingerbread cake.
Continue reading »
