Turrón Tembleque December 9, 2009

Puerto Rican culture is a mixture of 3 different cultures from about 500 years ago – Taino Indians, African and Spaniard.  So over time, many of our typical customs actually come from one of these 3 original root cultures.

Turrón or Nougat candy is very typical Spanish candy and we typically eat it during Xmastime.  It’s an almond-based candy that’s super sweet and delicious.  You can’t find them in the stores any other time of the year.  You know it’s Xmas when the supermarkets play typical Puerto Rican “parranda” music and you see the stacks of turrón, panetone and nuts in every end of aisle.

I’ve stopped eating turrón for quite a few years because the recipes of the main brands include eggs or eggs whites as one of the ingredients.  I used to love the Alicante (the hard kind) or the Jijona (soft ground almonds) types eaten with pieces of edam cheese.  There are a bunch of other varieties, even chocolate turrón my dad loves, but most of them have eggs.

But this year, my friend Daniel gave me this recipe… and he mentioned he found a turrón without eggs.  WHAT!!!!! Turrón without eggs… I need to look into this definitely.  This is the power of the internet and collaboration, KarmaFree readers submitting ME recipes.  Awesome, no?

I found the mysterious turrón at a local supermarket… and truth be told, Nata Nueces is awesome without any eggs in the ingredients list.  It’s an almond paste, similar to marzipan, with walnut pieces all throughout.  It tastes really good by itself, but Daniel included it in my mom’s Tembleque recipe.

     

This was Daniel’s creation, but I think you will like it too…  GRACIAS DANIEL!!!

 

TURRÓN TEMBLEQUE

1 can cream of coconut – Coco Lopez or any other brand, this is what you use to make Piña Coladas

1 can coconut milk

Water

2 cinnamon sticks

A pinch of salt

1/3 cup cornstarch

1 package of Turrón – Nata de Nuec es is good and does not includes eggs

Ground Cinnamon to taste

 

1. Take the 2 cans of cream of coconut and coconut milk and add enough water to make 5 cups of liquid all together.  Reserve 1 cup of liquid and pour the rest in a large pot to cook over medium-high heat.  Add the salt and cinnamon sticks to the pot.
2. Cut the turrón bar into small pieces and smash it a bit between your fingers before adding it to the saucepan with the hot coconut milks.  Mix it well – it will melt into the liquid mixture.
3. Mix the cornstarch to the liquid you  just before serving.

My friend Ana and I loved this recipe… the consistency of the tembleque is changed by adding the turrón, but the coconut flavors go very well with the walnuts and almonds in the turrón.  And as time passes in your fridge, the walnuts get a kind of licquor flavors… so it tastes very festive.

Passion-Fruit Yogurt December 6, 2009

I like yogurt… but I no longer buy fruit-flavored yogurts because most of them are made with gelatin.  Only a few brands out there make fruit-flavored yogurts without gelatin.  We can talk about those brands later on…

So for years now, I mostly buy plain or vanilla-flavored yogurt.  I have grown to love eating the yogurt plain like that.  I love it in creamy dips, smoothies or just with a drizzle of honey or agave nectar.  But every once in a while, I like a fruit-flavored yogurt… that’s how I started making these…

Usually fruit-flavored yogurts come already mixed or with the fruit at the bottom. My version has the fruit on top…

 

PASSION-FRUIT YOGURT

½ cup of plain or vanilla yogurt

The pulp of 1 passion fruit

1 tbs agave nectar or honey

1. Just mix the ingredients in a small demitasse… mix together well and enjoy.

The seeds of the passion fruit will give a nice crunch to the treat.  I enjoy this as a breakfast, as a treat, as a dessert.

Don’t the seeds look awesome on top of the yogurt???

Cranberry Trifles November 27, 2009

It’s been a few years now that I gift Cranberry Preserves as a Xmas gift.  People love it…

Cranberry juice is popular here in Puerto Rico, but eating fresh cranberries is not.  I usually get asked by EVERY cashier at the supermarket every time I buy the Ocean Spray bags of fresh cranberries what do I make with them.  It’s super weird…   I usually explain to them that I make a jelly with them… but now I can also mention that I make these trifles too… which will bring us to a different dilemma with them – explaining what’s a trifle?

I like this recipe because it makes use of any leftover cranberry preserves you might have from Thanksgiving and looks super pretty too.  We made them last in wine glasses, but you can certainly make them in a large trifle dish too.  I got the inspiration for this dish from the Everyday Food December 2008 issue.   I like it because you can prepare some parts ahead, buy some others and just assemble… and if you purchase the pound cakes, no baking necessary.

 

CRANBERRY TRIFLES

2 cups of cranberry preserves – recipe here

1 loaf of pound cake – or make this recipe for egg-less yellow cake here… – cut up into 1” cubes

1 tub of whipped topping

½ cup passion fruit juice

1. In your preferred presentation dish assemble first a layer of the cranberry preserves at the bottom.
2. Then place a layer of cake cubes.  Dampen them with a little passion fruit juice using a pastry brush.                                                
3. Place a layer of cranberry preserves on top of the layer of cake.
4. Place a layer of whipped topping on top of cranberries.
5. Continue layering this same way until you reach the top of the dish you’re serving it in… finishing with the whipped topping.

Place in the refrigerator for about an hour before serving.  This will allow the flavors to mix in together.

Organic Lollipops November 8, 2009

I have a sweet tooth… and for Halloween all I was craving were there lollipops from Yummy Earth.

 

I tasted them first when my mom received them as a gift for her birthday.  They are not easy to find here in Puerto Rico, but you can indeed find them.  They’re not only delicious, but they’re also ORGANIC.

The bag comes in 4 flavor varieties…  my favorite are Pomegranate Pucker and Mango Tango.

 Try them soon and let me know what you and your kids think, OK?

Mango Sorbet with Kiwi Fruit June 26, 2009

You have friends over and little time to make dessert? 

Embellish a store-bought frozen dessert with fresh fruit…   easy peasy.  And if the colors are as striking as these, nobody will even question your culinary skills.

 

 

MANGO SORBET WITH KIWI FRUIT

1 pint of Häagen Dazs Mango Sorbet

2 kiwi fruit, peeled and diced

 

1. Take some pretty glasses or cups
2. Scoop 2 sorbet balls and garnish with kiwi pieces on top
3. Wipe the sweat off your face after all this hard work…

Fresh Strawberry Sauce April 30, 2009

This is another of the recipes related to my Foodbuzz’s 24,24,24 April event…  A Very Veggie Experiment.

 

Recently, my goddaughter Kamila told me she loved strawberry ice cream. So when this idea of making dinner for her and her siblings started, I decided to make strawberry ice cream from scratch for her.  Unfortunately, I live this crazy life that I did not have time to fix it.  So I decided to do the next best thing I knew… prepare a fresh strawberry sauce to top vanilla ice cream.

This is great with any berry, in fact, the original recipe I learned from Ina Garten in her Barefoot in Paris book.  I had made it with raspberries, but strawberries are cheaper and more readily available.

 

 

 

VANILLA ICE CREAM WITH FRESH STRAWBERRY SAUCE

1 pint of fresh strawberries, hulled and cut in quarters  

½ cup brown sugar

¼ cup water

½ cup strawberry preserves

1.  In a small saucepan over medium heat, place strawberries, sugar and water and cook them for about 5 minutes, until the sugar dissolves and the fruit starts to breakdown a bit.
2. When the fruit has cooled down a bit, add them to the bowl of a food processor.  Add the preserves and pulse a few times to combine.
3. 
4. Transfer to a small bowl and refrigerate for a few hours until ready to serve.

 

Surprisingly, the little ones loved this strawberry sauce, not so much the older ones.  Kamila even wanted hers with a fresh strawberry as a garnish.  Her older brothers exchanged theirs for plain ice cream.

Foodbuzz 24,24,24: A Very Veggie Experiment April 26, 2009

When I was a little girl I was a very picky eater… so much that my parents put me in a school where they offered lunch to see if I would expand my eating horizons.  For 2 years I ate white rice and ketchup for lunch.  True… my mom would ask me everyday what I had for lunch and I would reply – Arroz con ketchup!  Proudly…

But my pickiness never came because my parents never offered me a wide variety of foods.  They always instilled in me I had to TRY EVERYTHING BEFORE I could say I didn’t like it.  In my former life, before I became a vegetarian, there used to be a time where I would only eat the paella rice and not eat anything else in it.  I would only eat the sauce of stewed beans and still remember how my dad tried to teach me to swallow oysters with cocktail sauce… never did it, but became a fan of the sauce and horseradish.  Also, when in a ballet summer camp, they made us go on a diet where we ate steamed broccoli and cauliflower…  I hated the taste, the smell, the texture, but now I eat them regularly.  I also remember how in my Quinceañero I spent the whole evening eating these delicious “onion rings”.  When I told my mom how good they were, my mom told me there wasn’t any onion rings on the menu… that they must have been the calamari rings!!!  I never took the calamari off the paella anymore after that.  And I remember the first time I had marinated tofu in a sandwich and fried gluten… that fried gluten tasted like pork “chicharrones” rinds and I was “scared” that someone at the yoga center got confused and made something not suitable for the vegetarians at the party. 

                     Don’t they look like onion rings???

 My point… people, kids and adults alike are many times prejudiced with what THEY THINK something tastes like.  They think they do not like to eat something because of its color, its appearance, their idea of its taste.  Something I have learned throughout the years is that you might not like a specific ingredient in a specific preparation… but if you give it a few tries you might like it prepared differently.  For example, I much prefer eggplant battered and fried than stewed.  I very much prefer garbanzo beans in a hummus than in a bean salad… you would “never” see me eating a bean salad.  That’s something I have not been able to conquer or think I will…

                                                                              

Being such a finicky kid, believe it or not, I was not the finickiest…  My friend Mariví was worse than me.  We have a LOT of history together.  And it was not until we were late in high school that she came to eat at her first salad bar.  We went to Ponderosa to eat and she asked me if she had to eat the salad… I said emphatically “OF COURSE!!!, why else would we come to Ponderosa if not for the all-you-can-eat salad bar???”  She confessed, with her salad plate in front of her, that she thanked me because it was the first time she had tried lettuce, tomato and corn.  I could not believe her mom had not taught her to eat salad…  It was so far-fetched to me, as finicky as I was…

                                                      

 Now time has passed… Madelyn is vegetarian and Mariví has 5 kids!!!  Yes, that was not a typo…  5 kids – Ignacio who’s 11, Diego who’s 10, Kamila who’s about to turn 8, Daniel who’s 4 and the newest one, Sergio who’s just 3 months old.  They’re as finicky about eating as Madelyn and Mariví were when growing up…  the thing is that by having also a finicky mom, it’s my theory they’re not as exposed to as many foods as they should be…  And this might be my own impression, but I see plain hamburgers without an ounce of lettuce, tomato, or even ketchup at their birthday parties… and when I mention certain things to eat to my goddaughter Kamila, she makes faces at me…

So I decided to hold a little experiment…  I would prepare a meal for Mariví and her 4 oldest kids without telling any of them what is in any of the dishes.  They will eat them, enjoy them, hopefully even LOVE them and then afterwards tell them what was in it…  to prove to them that they do indeed like to eat more than what they’re exposing themselves to and to expand their eating horizons.   It is my belief that kids learn mostly by example and what better example than their parents habits.  If the parents do not eat something or do not expose kids to certain things they will not gain an appreciation for them.

 

They came over without knowing of the experiment… I did not want them to prejudice themselves knowing I am vegetarian.  I explained to them I had made dinner and I assured them they would love it all.  And if they wanted to know about how anything was made, I would tell them at the end of the meal.

  Here was last night’s menu:

Asparagus Party Sandwiches

Cauliflower and Cheese Mac

Breadfruit Tostones

Lettuce, Tomato and Cucumber Salad with Thousand Island Dressing

Vanilla Ice Cream with Fresh Strawberry Sauce

 

THE TASTING

Asparagus Party Sandwiches

      

I can remember the first time I ate an asparagus sandwich at a birthday party.  I just ate it thinking it was a regular “sandwichito de mezcla” just rolled into a different shape and loved it.  It was not after I had eaten about 10 of these little sandwiches that someone told me it was asparagus.  I was hooked. 

I knew Mariví’s kids would be surprised about liking them too…  I just make a mixture of jarred asparagus and egg-less mayonnaise and spread it onto whole-wheat bread.  I flatten the bread so I can roll the sandwiches and give them a fancier look.  Sometimes people place a whole asparagus spear in the center and then roll the bread around it, but because I knew these guys are finicky, I just made a puree out of the ingredients to avoid any apprehension before they tasted them.

Both Ignacio and Diego smelled them before putting them in their mouths… so typical of a finicky kid!!!  Ignacio, Diego, Kamila and Mariví all loved them.  They were all trying to figure out what was in them.  Ignacio and Diego had about 4 each and even told me they would love to have them again…

   This was Ignacio’s face when I told him the sandwiches were made from asparragus – HUH?!?!?

 

 

Cauliflower and Cheese Mac

A few weeks ago I tested my Undercover Carrot Mac and Cheese as a way to “sneak in” some added veggies into my niece’s ,Mariana, dinner.  A reader suggested me to try it too with cauliflower.  So this is my version of mac and cheese with added cauliflower.

I usually make mac and cheese with a white cheese sauce. I thought it would be something different the kids would enjoy – steering away from the orangy sauces they’re so used too.   I cooked the cauliflower in the same water as the macaroni.  I used Jerusalem artichoke pasta instead of the regular semolina pasta.  I then combined it all with a cheese sauce made from soy milk, gruyère, pecorino romano, cream cheese, an Italian-blend grated cheeses and Parmesan.  I baked it all in the oven for about 30 minutes to get the crust golden brown.

Mariví was amazed that this has cauliflower and was so good.  Ignacio felt there was something more in there than just mac and cheese and kept asking me how I made it…  Diego just didn’t care and started shoveling it in.  The two little ones did not understand how a mac and cheese was white instead of orange.  So I convinced them to try it again after I mixed in a few slices of American cheese into their portions – bringing to the cheese total to 6 – the cheesiest I have ever made a mac and cheese before.   The learning… when you make mac and cheese from scratch  for the little ones, make it ORANGE with regular cheddar cheese.  They’ll find it more familiar and will not look at it as funny as Kamila and Daniel did.

                             

 

 

Breadfruit Tostones

Tostones in Puerto Rico are typically made from plantains… but you can make tostones also out of Breadfruits.  We call them PANA in Spanish.  Breadfruits are very polarizing – people either love them of they hate them.  There’s a breadfruit tree behind my grandma’s house and I decided to expose Mariví’s kids to breadfruit. 

These were a complete hit!!!  Everyone wanted to be in the kitchen with me when I fried them and everyone gobbled them up.  Even the little ones went for the tostones first before they started on the fixed-up mac and cheese.

Tostones need to be fried twice… so I had fried them for the first time earlier in the week and kept them frozen in a Ziploc bag.  I defrosted them in salted garlicky water and fried them again right before eating them.

  Diego going first after the Breadfruit Tostones…

 

 

Lettuce, Tomato and Cucumber Salad with Thousand Island Dressing

I knew this was going to be the most difficult one to “sell” to these kids.  They are just not used to eating salad. But I had to give it a try…  I used organic romaine lettuce and organic cucumbers.  I bought mini cherry tomatoes and told them these were tomatoes specially made for kids.

I made them a Thousand Island Dressing to go along with the salad.  That used to be the only dressing I liked when I was a kid, so I figured they might prefer that to any vinaigrette I could make.  I started with a Mayo Ketchup base and added some sweet pickles.

Some of them tried the tomatoes only but they were not impressed.  It was so sad to see all the salads left almost intact…  I was the only one who really ate the salad.  Everyone else, including the mom, left salad on their plates.  This was the real challenge… but I will not give up.  I will make them eat salad if it’s the last thing I do for that family…

 

 

Vanilla Ice Cream with Fresh Strawberry Sauce

Recently, Kamila had told me she loved strawberry ice cream. So when this idea started I decided to make strawberry ice cream from scratch for her.  Unfortunately, I live this crazy life that I did not have time to fix it.  So I decided to do the next best thing I knew… prepare a fresh strawberry sauce to top vanilla ice cream.

This is great with any berry, in fact, the original recipe I learned from Ina Garten in her Barefoot in Paris book.  I had made it with raspberries, but strawberries are cheaper and more readily available.

Just cook some fresh strawberries with some water and brown sugar.  Mix them in a food processor with strawberry preserves and voilà!! – Fresh Strawberry Sauce.  Kamila even wanted hers with a fresh strawberry as a garnish. 

Surprisingly, the little ones loved this strawberry sauce, not so much the older ones.  They exchanged it for plain ice cream. 

 

THE RESULTS

I believe all in all this VERY VEGGIE EXPERIMENT was a SUCCESS!!!!  More thumbs up than thumbs down… overall.

Marivíand her kids were exposed to a bunch of different foods they are normally not exposed to – asparagus, cauliflower, gruyere and pecorino romano cheeses, Jerusalem artichoke pasta, pickles, breadfruit…  And out of the 5 things I prepared, they liked 4 of them with the salad being the most challenging of all.  Which I was really expecting…

      

I hope Mariví now has learned how exposing her kids, and even herself, to foods she might not be familiar to is a good thing.  They will in the end be healthier and better-rounded individuals. 

Based on this experience, I will make an effort to invite the kids over more often to expose them to foods I know they might never try otherwise and even teach them how to prepare these dishes for their parents.

 

For complete directions on how to prepare all these dishes, stay tuned in the next few days to KarmaFree Cooking when I will share the recipes and instructions in detail.

Guava Paste and Cream Cheese March 15, 2009

This has to be the first dessert I was taught how to make… besides opening a bag of Hershey’s Kisses, that is.

I grew up in a house where there always was guava paste and cream cheese, two if my dad’s passions.  I guess the passion rubbed off on me, because nowadays I heart anything with either guava or cream cheese, not to mention anything that combines the two.

This is just so simple that’s difficult to even call it a recipe…

 

GUAVA PASTE AND CREAM CHEESE

3 strips of guava paste

3 strips of cream cheese – you can use regular or the 1/3 less fat kind – the only difference is that the regular kind will hold its shape better when eating it…

1. Place guava strips onto a plate and place the cream cheese strip on top.
2. Take carefully with your fingers and enjoy the pleasure…

 

Read well the guava paste packages before buying.  Buy guava paste that’s free of additives or artificial colorants.  It should only contain guava, sugar and citric acid.  Anything else in there you do not want it or need it.

If you’re not into cream cheese, or do not have it in the house, just use any other cheese like queso blanco, cheddar or even muenster would work well here… it’s just something to cut the sweetness of the guava paste.

Mami’s Tembleque February 6, 2009

My mom is not one of those moms that slaved over the stove when we were growing up.  That was my grandma… my grandma would offer you food from the moment you stepped into her house, until the moment you left.  My mom would take home bowls of food my grandma had made and served it to us after we had returned from ballet classes and done our homework.

She taught us how to cook a few survival dishes so we would not “starve to death” when we went to live by ourselves when we left for school.  She did many dips and salads for parties… hey, she even once made a Friendship Cake where she had to macerate fruit for almost a month.  But in general, desserts were not her thing.  That’s why it surprised me when for Three Kings Day (Día de Reyes) she made Tembleque.

I asked my aunt to come to my grandma’s house to have lunch for Día de Reyes… I wanted to eat her Arroz con Maíz and Ensalada de Papas.  But my mom surprised me the most when she said she had made a tembleque from scratch and even more so that my dad had found her the recipe in the Internet!!!  My dad – the least online-friendly person I know!!!  This will be a 2009 full of surprises if this is the way the year is starting…

Like me, my mom almost follows recipes… so even though she got a recipe off the Internet , that was not what she did…

 

 

 

MAMI’S TEMBLEQUE

1 can cream of coconut – Coco Lopez or any other brand, this is what you use to make Piña Coladas

1 can coconut milk

Water

2 cinnamon sticks

A pinch of salt

½ cup + 1/3 cup cornstarch

Ground Cinnamon to taste

 

1. Take the 2 cans of cream of coconut and coconut milk and add enough water to make 5 cups of liquid all together.  Reserve 1 cup of liquid and pour the rest in a large pot to cook over medium-high heat.  Add the salt and cinnamon sticks to the pot.
2. Mix the cornstarch to the liquid you reserved.  Mix well and add to the pot when the mixture starts to simmer.  The coconut mixture will start to thicken a bit as it simmers/boils.
3. Take it off the heat and pour into the container you want to serve it in.  You can do it in a square pyrex dish or even individual demit asses or ramekins.  Place it in the refrigerator to set.  It will set just like gelatin does.
4. Sprinkle the top with ground cinnamon just before serving.

Coconut Tembleque April 26, 2008

Tembleque is a Puerto Rican dessert, traditionally made mainly during Xmas time.   However, it can be enjoyed year round.  And it’s a special treat when you can taste it outside of Xmas… very unexpected.

The name “tembleque” comes from the verb “temblar” or “to tremble”.  The dessert is a jiggly/trembly custard made with coconut milk, sugar and set with cornstarch.  I added the word coconut in the name for the benefit of those who are unfamiliar to the tembleque dessert.  But, we do not add the word coconut in front; it would be “redundant”, because tembleques are only made with coconut milk… there are no other versions… yet. (This explanation is giving me ideas…)

We decided to make this because so many people in the Center who are avoiding wheat, spelt and dairy products so dessert options need to get more creative each time.  Plus, this would be a good accompaniment to other true Puerto Rican delicacies such as Arroz con Gandules and Alcapurrias.

It’s easy and super delicious…  check it out.

 

 

 

COCONUT TEMBLEQUE

Makes about 24 servings

 

12 cups of coconut milk

1 ½ cups of brown sugar

6 cinnamon sticks

1 ¼ cup cornstarch, diluted in some reserved coconut milk and ½ cup water

Ground cinnamon, to garnish

 

1. In a large pot, pour about 10 cups of coconut milk, sugar, cinnamon sticks and bring to a simmer.
2. In a small mixing bowl, mix together the remaining coconut milk, the cornstarch and water.  Whisk together well and pour into the simmering coconut milk. 
3. Whisk in the whole coconut milk mixture until it thickens slightly.
4. While it still hot, CAREFULLY (because it can burn you – I speak from experience), divide in individual servings, about  1/3 – ½ cup each.  
5. Garnish with a sprinkle with ground cinnamon on top.
6. Refrigerate for about 2-3 hours.  Serve cold.

Carrot Cupcakes April 24, 2008

It’s Spring, or as we say here in Puerto Rico… Summer’s here!!!!   The heat is blazing already, the humidity is rising and I am in the mood to bake cupcakes.

I learned this recipe from Mr. Alton Brown, one of my culinary teachers from the Food Network.  I love this cupcake recipe because I do not need a mixer.  It’s super easy to make and super reliable.  I always make them to raise funds for the Yoga Center… people can’t get enough of them.  They’re moist, chewy, and taste delicious.  I usually make them without the traditional cream cheese frosting because of all the dairy-free people at the center.  But I will make some with cream cheese frosting and share the recipe with you.

Also, these cupcakes are the 1^st recipe I am making for my “catering/baking” business.  I am looking to understand if my next serious career move should be something regarding my cooking and selling these cupcakes are a start…   The picture is from the dry run I did before I actually go out and sell these to people.  I know I still need to make them larger, so I am playing around with quantities… but for your personal enjoyment, the measures in the recipe work very well.

 

 

 

CARROT CUPCAKES

Adapted from an original recipe from Alton Brown

2 ½  cups, whole-wheat or spelt flour
About 5 medium carrots, grated medium
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
¼ tsp ground cinnamon
¼ tsp freshly ground nutmeg
½  tsp salt
1 ½ cup brown sugar, firmly packed
4 ½ tsp egg replacer mixed with 6 tbs of water
6 oz plain yogurt
6 oz vegetable oil

½ cup raisins

½ cup chopped walnuts

 

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
2. Measure the flour, baking powder, baking soda, spices, and salt in a large mixing bowl and whisk to sift and combine.  Add the carrots to this flour mix and toss until they are well-coated with the flour.
3. In the bowl of the food processor or in a blender, combine the sugar, egg replacer, vegetable oil and yogurt.   Pour this mixture into the carrot mixture and stir until just combined.   Add the raisins and walnuts and stir one last time to combine.
4. Line cupcake pan with cupcake liners and pour about ¼ cup batter measure per cupcake.   Bake on the middle rack of the oven for 45 minutes. Reduce the heat to 325 degrees F and bake for another 20 minutes.
5. Remove the pan from the oven and allow cake to cool 15 minutes in the pan. After 15 minutes, take the cupcakes out of the pan and allow them to cool completely.

Dorie’s Perfect Party Cake – DBC March 2008 March 30, 2008

I was very excited to receive the recipe for March 2008 Daring Bakers Challenge - a cake!!!  That is definitely something I can do.   This month’s challenge is hosted by Morven at Food, Art and Random Thoughts and the original recipe comes from Dorie Greenspan’s Baking: From My Home to Yours.  So thanks Morven for such a nice recipe.  I was so excited about this recipe that I actually tried it twice – the first time I made it with whole wheat pastry flour and the second time I tried it with spelt flour.  As you’ll see, spelt yielded better results overall.  What I loved most about this challenge was that Morven gave us the flexibility to change ingredients and presentation as long as we followed the basic recipe components – the cake, the frosting and the fruit preserves.  The rest, was up to us, the creative daring bakers…

I was faced with 2 other challenges for this recipe… First, I do not own any round cake pans – as I mentioned in my last DBC post, I am not a “baker” per se, so I have never attempted to do any layered cakes before and second, I could not find lemon extract anywhere.  My solutions to these dilemmas…  to use my cupcake/muffin pans and to double on the lemon zest and add the juice of the lemons to get the lemony taste.

 

So here’s the Karma-Free version of Dorie’s Perfect Party Cake…

For the Cake:

2  ½ cups spelt flour

1 tbs baking powder

½ teaspoon salt

1 ¼ cups buttermilk

6 tsp egg replacer diluted into 8tbs water

1 ½ cups brown sugar

Zest of 2 lemons (about 4 tsp)

1 stick unsalted butter, at room temperature

The juice of 1 lemon

For the Sweetened Whipped Cream frosting:

1 pint heavy cream

1 cup brown sugar

1 tsp vanilla powder

For Finishing:

2/3 cup seedless raspberry or strawberry preserves stirred vigorously or warmed gently until spreadable

1. Centre a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Butter and flour your pans – I used 2 cupcake/muffin pans. I also used cupcake liners and worked great too.

To Make the Cake

    2. Sift together the spelt flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside.

    3. Whisk together the egg substitute and buttermilk. Set aside.

    4. Whisk together the sugar and lemon zest in a mixer bowl or another large bowl and rub them together with your fingers until the sugar is moist and fragrant.

    5. Add the butter and working with the paddle or whisk attachment, or with a hand mixer, beat at medium speed for a full 3 minutes, until the butter and sugar are very light.

    6. Beat in the lemon juice, then add one third of the flour mixture, still beating on medium speed.

    7. Beat in half of the milk-egg sub mixture, then beat in half of the remaining dry ingredients until incorporated.

    8. Add the rest of the milk/egg sub mixture beating until the batter is homogeneous, then add the last of the dry ingredients.

    9. Finally, give the batter a good 2- minute beating to ensure that it is thoroughly mixed and well aerated.

  10. Divide the batter in your muffin/cupcake pans.

  11. Bake for 30-35 minutes, or until the cupcakes are well risen and springy to the touch – a thin knife inserted into the centers should come out clean

  12. Transfer the cakes to cooling racks and cool for about 5 minutes, then take them out of the pans to fully cool.
 

To decorate the Cake

I made a Sweetened Whipped Cream Frosting just because I do not particularly like the taste of buttercream.  So, to make the frosting:

1. Using both a chilled bowl and chilled beaters, beat the cream until frothy.
2. Add the brown sugar and vanilla gradually while beating.
3. Whip until light and a thick enough consistency to spread as an icing.
4. Use immediately.

Here are my renditions of these lovely cupcakes… 

    

This first picture is the whole wheat version.  As you can see, the tops cracked and the color was a bit paler.  The picture on the right, are the spelt version, with much nicer color, top texture and flavor too.

As you can see, I still have a lot of ways to go in terms of decorating techniques… but the flavors were spot on.

    

     

This recipe is super easy to make.  After you’ve done it once, the following tries are much, much easier… and everyone who had the chance to taste them were impressed by the lemony taste and the crispiness that the bundt muffin pan imparted to the outside…  aren’t they cute?

My favorite way to eat them was to leave them plain, without any decorations, and just spread some of the preserves to a morsel of cupcake and pop it in my mouth.  Delectable!!

Storing
The cake is best the day it is made, but you can refrigerate it, well covered, for up to two days. Bring it to room temperature before serving.

                        

Roasted Pears – A Deux March 7, 2008

I am on a pear thing…  it started because I wanted to do a pear butter, which I have not gotten around to do.   But I learned to make last year these poached pears and I decided to take the pear desserts a few steps further. 

This recipe is even simpler than the Poached Pears I posted recently…  less ingredients always scream easier to me.  The basic recipe for these roasted pears was given to me by Diane Carlson, as part of the Conscious Gourmet retreat I attended.  I decided to try some embellishments of my own and they ended up being really good combinations…  check them out.  I love the first photo – my pear had a belly button – sooooo cute!!

         

 Let’s start with roasting the pears…

ROASTED PEARS

2 Bartlett pears – ripe but firm

the juice of 1/2 a lemon

1 1/2 tbs maple syrup

1. Pre-heat oven to 450F. 
2. Peel and cut the pears in half, vertically.  Core them using a melon baller – it’s the best tool for this.
3. Place pears cut side down on a glass casserole dish and drizzle the maple syrup and lemon juice.  I rub the pears a bit trying them to be coated all over with the syrup/lemon juice liquid.
4. Roast in oven for about 45 minutes.  I noticed that if pears are nicely ripen, the time can be cut to 25-30 minutes.  Just roast them until they’re cooked but still have their shape.

I think 1/2 to 1 whole pear per person is a fine portion - so feel free to double, triple or cuadruple this recipe as you need.

Now we play with the accompaniments…

ROASTED PEARS with ALMOND PRALINE

1. Serve the roasted pears with the sauce the maple syrup created in the baking dish. 
2. Sprinkle Almond Praline around it. 
3. Note: the almond praline does not need to look this dark… I walked away from the kitchen and had to live with the consequences.

ROASTED PEARS with BLUE CHEESE and HAZELNUT PRALINE

 

1.  Serve the roasted pears cut side up and in the indentation place some crumbled mild blue cheese.  I used this cheese…
2. 
3. Drizzle some of the sauce created by the maple syrup and sprinkle some Hazelnut Praline on the side.

This version also is screaming to be served for company… it tasted as if I was eating in a restaurant.  Scrumptious…  Need proof??

Hazelnut Praline March 7, 2008

I have been meaning to share with you some desserts, but I wanted to make them with Almonds.  Every-time I go to the market, I forget to buy them.  If I don’t write it, I will never remember it.

Then the other day I was reorganizing my fridge (in preparation to my upcoming trip to Costco) and I found along lost bag of shelled hazelnuts.  My dear mom helped me shell these hazelnuts I bought before Xmas and I never got to eat and they were sitting, very unassumingly, in this ziplock bag in the back of my fridge… how about Hazelnut Praline!!!  I am sure it will taste fantastic too.  It did…

                 

HAZELNUT PRALINE

1/2 cup shelled hazelnuts

1 tbs maple sugar

1 1/2 tbs maple syrup

1.  I like to start with peeled hazelnuts.  I think the taste of the nut comes across better when the little skin is taken off.  So to do this with hazelnuts, I roasted them for a little while in a 350F oven for about 10 minutes.  They’ll start to smell a bit.
2. Then place them in a clean kitchen towel and scrub them all together.  Most of the skins will come off.  Some I had to peel a bit of my hands.  Wait a bit until the nuts cool down some.  You don’t need to get your fingers burned.
3.  
4. Cut the hazelnuts in a smaller pieces.  I used a serrated knife and it worked very well.  The nuts did not fly all across the cutting board.
5. Mix the nuts in a medium bowl with the maple syrup and maple sugar.  Transfer to a parchment lined baking sheet and bake in a 350F oven for about 12 minutes.  I try not to leave the kitchen because nuts tend to burn fast and remember, you may have already roasted them a bit already to skin them.
6. When they’re done, they’ll smell really sweet and nutty delicious.
7. Be careful taking them out of the oven, but transfer then to a metal dish right away to help them cool off.  I sometimes put the nuts in the fridge to help keep them away from the humidity we always have here in PR.

Snap the nuts loose and eat them alone as a snack or sprinkle them over your favorite dessert.  I particularly enjoyed them today with my Roasted Pears with Blue Cheese.

Strawberry Banana Sherbet March 5, 2008

I know it’s the middle of winter in the US… but it’s 83 degrees in Puerto Rico.  I am working without air conditioning for a few weeks now and I need something to cool off with when it gets hot.  So I decided to put together a few frozen things I already had in my freezer and see how they tasted all-together…

This is how Strawberry Banana Sherbet was born.  Nice little experiment, no?

 

STRAWBERRY BANANA SHERBET

1 cup strawberries

1 medium banana

1/4 cup brown sugar

1/4 to 1/3 cup fresh orange juice – nobody will notice if you use Tropicana, so don’t worry

juice of 1 lemon

1/2 cup of kefir – this will make it a sherbet, rather than a sorbet

1.  Mix all the ingredients in a blender.
2. Pour the mixture in a container to freeze up.  I used an ice tray… it’s convenient and helps in portion control too.  You could also use mini plastic cups or even place a wooden stick to serve as popsicles.
3. Freeze for about 2-3 hours until it hardens up

I used fresh fruits I had frozen myself, but you can use fresh ones if you have them around or even frozen fruits bought from the supermarket.  I am sure you can use the same method to create other nice fruit sherbets.  I will be experimenting a few more in the coming weeks.  I promise to share.

Poached Pears with Almond Pralines February 3, 2008

This is an awesome dessert…  I love fruity desserts much more than cakes or other baked goods.  And even though pears are not something you can grow here in Puerto Rico, most every supermarket has them on sale these days.  I saw some lovely Bartlett pears on sale the other day and thought it would be the perfect opportunity to re-create a recipe I had originally learned last year at the Conscious Gourmet Cooking seminar - Poached Pears with Almond Pralines.

The original recipe called for Bosc pears, but they were so much smaller than the Bartletts that I decided to go for size and beauty.  The recipe turned out perfectly, IMHO.

And the Almond Pralines – this is awesome!!!! They’re the perfect accompaniment to these pears or a great snack all by itself.  They would taste great on top of ice cream or yogurt drizzled with a bit of caramel sauce…  mmmmm!!!!  I feel another craving coming up.

 

POACHED PEARS with ALMOND PRALINE

3 cups unsweetened organic apple juice

2 tbs maple syrup

1 tsp cinnamon

pinch of ground cloves or a few whole cloves

pinch of ginger

6-8 Bartlett or Bosc pears - peeled, halved and cored

1. Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees F. 
2. Combine all ingredients, except pears, in a roasting pan.  Set pears in the poaching liquid. 
3. Bake in oven for 45 minutes. 
4. Check the pears for doneness – they should be soft when pricked with a knife. 
5. Remove the pears from poaching liquid and transfer them to a separate dish.
6. Transfer the poaching liquid to a skillet or wide saucepan and boil until the liquid is reduced by half.
7. Serve by placing one pear half on a dish, drizzle with the reduced poaching liquid and sprinkle with Almond Pralines.  recipe below…

I have a confession to make… the original recipe calls for you to cover the roasting pan and bake covered.  I did not notice that in the recipe and forgot.  The results were good too…  I just had to leave them a few more minutes in and increased the temperature to 425 degrees and left them an additional 15 minutes.  They should be done by then.

ALMOND PRALINE

1 cup sliced almonds – but slivered or chopped almonds would work too

1 tbs maple syrup

1 tbs maple sugar

1. Combine all ingredients in a mixing bowl.
2. Transfer to a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. 
3. Bake in a 350 degrees oven for 15 minutes until golden brown – you can take advantage of the same oven you’re making the pears in.
4. Transfer IMMEDIATELY into a metal bowl to cool off and crisp up.

Cherry Carob Cookies January 11, 2008

I started my cooking adventures mainly by making Martha Stewart’s cookie recipes.  Most of them are easy and super delicious.

My favorite cookie by far are these Cherry Carob Cookies… they’re an adapted version of Martha’s Torie’s Cherry Chocolate Chunk Cookies.  I have made these cookies, the original recipe and the new adapted version, to give as gifts for Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, Xmas, and even Birthdays.  I always get requests for them.  This time around I made them for my dear friend Choy, who makes the most awesome vegetarian egg-less cheesecake. 

Hope you enjoy them as much as we all do…

 

CHERRY CAROB COOKIES

2 1/4 cup organic whole wheat pastry flour

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

2 sticks of unsalted butter

1 1/2 cup packed brown sugar

1 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons vanilla powder

equivalent of 2 eggs from egg replacer

1 cup carob chips

1 cup dried cherries

1 cup toffee chips

1. Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees.
2. In a bowl whisk together the flour and baking soda.  Set aside.
3. In another bowl, beat together the butter and the sugar with an electric mixer on medium speed, until light and fluffy.
4. Mix in the salt, vanilla and egg replacer. 
5. Add flour mixture in 3-4 batches.  Mix until just combined.
6. Stir in the carob chips, cherries and toffee chips.
7. Drop heaping tablespoon-size balls of dough 2 inches apart in a cookie sheet lined with a silplat or unbleached parchment paper.
8. Bake until golden around the edges. about 10 -12 minutes.
9. Remove from oven and let them cool on the baking sheet.  After a few minutes, transfer warm cookies to a cooling rack to  cool completely.
10. Store cookies in the fridge for up to 1 week in a tightly sealed container.

But don’t worry, they will not last long.  They are eaten best with a tall cold glass of milk. 

Strawberry Kanten December 23, 2007

This is a recipe I learned from Diane Carlson while at a cooking retreat called the Conscious Gourmet back in April of this year.  I made some wonderful friends and learned some awesome recipes, this being one of them.  Among the wonderful friends, my friend Kathleen from Kathleen’s Vegetarian Kitchen.

 I learned this is called KANTEN because that’s another name of the agar-agar in the recipe. It’s an easy recipe, but you need time to make it… you’ll see why…

 

 STRAWBERRY KANTEN

4 cups apple juice – Knudsen’s organic brand is highly recommended

1/4 cup agar flakes

1 tablespoon roasted almond butter

dash of lemon juice

pinch of sea salt

2 cups strawberries

1 tablespoons maple syrup or to taste

1. Place apple juice and agar flakes in a medium saucepan.  Set aside for 15 minutes so the agar flakes start to dissolve a bit in the juice.  Bring liquid to a boil, lower heat and gently simmer for 5 minutes or until agar is completely dissolved.
2. Pour the hot kanten into a metal bowl or metal baking dish and place in freezer until very firmly set.
3. Slice 1/2 cup of strawberries for garnish.  Puree the remaining strawberries in a blender with maple syrup and salt.  Strain the strawberries through a fine sieve to remove as many seeds as possible.
4. When the kanten is fully solidified, break it up into a food processor.  Add the almond butter, lemon juice and salt and puree until smooth. Layer kanten and strawberry sauce in parfait glasses.  Garnish with remaining strawberries.

It’s important to use the metal bowl to help the kanten solidify faster.  Depending on how cold your freezer is, this part will take at least 2 hours.

 The color of the apple juice you use will definitely affect the color of your kanten.  The Conscious Gourmet version was made with Knudsen’s apple juice.  The version I did on  my own was made with Mott’s Natural apple juice, therefore, this latter version was beiger, while the Knudsen version is pinkier.

 

Carrot Burfi December 20, 2007

This is another of the dishes I made with my friend Rosani.  This is actually her recipe, and she’s super excited to be published via this blog.

This is a very nutritious and healthy dessert she had originally on her first trip to India.  It’s traditionally made with carrots, ghee and powdered milk.  Our version is trying to be dairy free, and I say trying because we ended up adding evaporated milk for the mixture to get the consistency we wanted.  And I will be TRUE to the recipe we actually did, which ended up super delicious.  I guess you at home can follow our example of just go with the dairy-free version… I’ll tell you where to adjust.

 Again, we did this for a crowd… so I am using a recipe I found on the Internet to guide me with the quantities.

CARROT BURFI

4 medium-sized carrots, finely shredded

2  cups of sugar

1/2 pint of soy creamer

1/2 carton of evaporated milk

2 tablespoons of ghee or clarified unsalted butter

1/2 cup of shredded coconut

1 teaspoon of cardamom (optional, it’s traditional, but we didn’t use it on our version)

               

** If making the recipe dairy-free, use 1 pint of soy creamer and omit the evaporated milk all-together.

1. In a large skillet, cook the grated carrots and sugar, covered for about 20 minutes.
2. Add the grated coconut, soy creamer and evaporated milk, if using.  Stir often to avoid it to sticking to the bottom.
3.  
4. Stir in the ghee and mix in the cardamom, if using.
5. 
6. Cook over medium heat until the mixture has absorbed most of the liquid and when a spoon is scraped across the mixture, you can see the bottom of the skillet.
7. Spread in a baking dish to cool off.
8. Spoon into dessert dishes and enjoy.

Brown Rice Krispies Treats December 19, 2007

This is my Xmas present to all my vegetarian friends.

I’ve always been a fan of Rice Krispies Treats but they’re made with marshmallows, which are made with egg whites. This version is a mixture of a bunch of recipes I found on the Internet. And I even made a few adaptations of my own.

I hope you and the rest of my friends enjoy it as much as I enjoyed making them.

 

BROWN RICE KRISPIES TREATS

1 cup light corn syrup with brown sugar (Karo brand)
1 cup almond butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
6 cups brown puffed rice krispies
1 cup carob chips

1. In a large saucepan over medium heat, mix together the sugar, corn syrup and almond butter until their all pretty warm, mixed together and syrupy.
2. Remove from heat and pour in the puffed rice cereal. Stir well until all the cereal is covered in the sticky mixture. This is where going to the gym will some in handy…
3. After all the mixture is combined, stir in the carob chips. They’ll melt a bit, but that’s part of the charm, in my humble opinion.
4. Pour mixture into a greased 9 x 13 glass dish. I greased using my Canola Oil Spray.
5. Spray your hands with the Canola Oil Spray too and press flat.
6. Let cool for 1 hour before cutting into squares. Don’t put in the refrigerator, it gets rock hard there. I had a tough time cutting it.

Makes 18 nicely sized squares.