Frosting Gone Wrong

I was born without certain genes. I can't whistle or snap my fingers. I can't fold clothes nicely.

I can't frost cupcakes. I can make cupcakes. I can make frosting. But I can't frost cupcakes.

I'm trying to pipe chilled chocolate ganache -- made only with 60% dark chocolate and heavy cream -- onto chocolate cupcakes and it's just going everywhere. I've googled "how to make a pastry bag out of parchment paper" and I go through about half of a roll.

I give up. I forgo traditional swirls and go for abstraction. I push my finger through the pastry tip to see what comes out. Kind of like throwing paint across a canvas.

The result? My cupcakes have uneven (sometimes spiky...) halos of frosting.

There's icing on the refrigerator, on the salt and pepper shakers, on the floor, on me. I picked the wrong day to wear khakis. Tomorrow is laundry day, for sure.

And then I had a side of cupcake with my icing. For dinner.

A Dinner Party with Strangers & the Best Egg Ever

L and I take Dartmouth Street to the South End and then walk along Tremont, until we find Barbara Lynch’s enclave at the corner of Tremont and Waltham. Tonight, we’re eating at the Chef’s Table at Stir.

But, before we go in, we have to change our shoes. I’m in flip flops and L is wearing sneakers. We’re right outside Stir, leaning against the building, and we change back to our high heels (red patent leather peep-toe heels for me, classy nude pumps for L). Shoes matter. 

What I notice first: the huge wall of books and all of the stainless steel. Stir is small and intimate – but modern and sleek at the same time – and I wish my kitchen looked just like it. And our “hosts” for the evening, Stir manager Elle and Chef Kristen, tell us that it’s almost an exact replica of Barbara Lynch’s kitchen. Lucky, lucky Barbara.

The Chef’s Table is not a traditional class. The ten of us around the square table are forgoing the Friday night rush at every other Boston restaurant and, for $145, we have the opportunity to watch dinner be prepared, to talk with Kristen and Elle, and to ask them every question we can dream up. And to eat some really good food.

Our first course is summery: wedges of chilled cantaloupe, orange segments pickled in white balsamic vinegar (a great pairing of sweetness and acidity), and baby beets. Elle and Kristen are very into fresh, local produce and it shows. My favorite part is the sear on the cantaloupe, which, from a distance, looks like grilled sweet potato. Grilled fruit should really happen more often.

For me, the seared Day Boat scallops are a page right out of the B&G Oysters book. What’s most interesting is Kristen’s attention to technique. The sous-vide carrots are razor thin and add a delicate touch to the dish.

Everyone’s enjoying their food and the wine pairings. But we all get real jazzed when the entrée is served: a small beef tenderloin served with a potato puree (equal parts potato and butter, flavored with a little white truffle oil and vanilla bean) and the eagerly-anticipated 1 ½ hour egg.  I'll call the egg the best soft-boiled egg ever. 

Steak, meet egg. Egg, meet steak. 

I puncture the egg with my fork tines and my plate is flooded with creamy, yellow yolk. I make sure that each bite of steak gets dredged in egg. 

And the wine pairing, a 2007 Qupe Syrah "BobCat Cuvee," is so smooth, so drinkable. It’s a hugely successful course.

L and I are thinking we should try to re-create this dish. It’s a simple concept: As the incredibly articulate Kristen points out, it’s steak, eggs, and potatoes. And we all love steak. When a gentleman to our left asks where tenderloin comes from, Elle has Kristen be the cow, drawing a line down Kristen's back to identify the source of the tenderloin.

Dessert is a chocolate mousse tablet, with mascarpone replacing the usual cream. I'm not thrilled with the passion fruit gelee (a matter of personal taste, that's all), but the hazelnut-butter crumble is a winner – it'd be the ultimate ice cream topping. The pairing, the 2010 Marenco Brachetto d’Acqui, is a sparkling, red dessert wine. It’s sweet (obviously) and I smell strawberries. I do like it, but my taste buds are absolutely overwhelmed with the sugar. 

The mousse, with hazelnut-butter crumble... butter is always a good idea. 

When we finish our dessert, we all look a little confused. There’s no bill to pay, no official end to the evening. And, though the atmosphere is friendly and intimate, we’re not at a friend’s dinner party. So what do we do?

There are a few more questions asked, a little debate about dark chocolate versus milk chocolate, a little talk about food bloggers in Boston. And then we begin to drift out.

After this lovely dinner, it’s hard to complain. But, if I have one criticism, it’s that the experience is anti-climatic. One delicious dish after another... and then you leave.  I think Stir has the opportunity to wrap up the evening with something small and witty – like a printed recipe for the 1 ½ hour egg and one egg from a local producer.  A dinner at Craft in New York last December ended with strudel-topped muffins (“For tomorrow!” the hostess told me). I ate my muffin the next morning in bed (my sheets were totally covered in strudel, but that’s okay).

Elle and Kristen tell anecdotes about Barbara Lynch throughout the evening and they tempt us with a run-through of Stir’s upcoming classes. All good marketing. But one little touch at the end of the evening would, for sure, bring us all into the fold.

We leave the perfect foodie bubble that is Stir. Back to the real world. L and I head back the way we came (changing shoes, of course – we're practical city girls).

We’re at The Met Back Bay, sipping martinis, when Papi charges Baltimore Orioles reliever Kevin Gregg like a bull. He throws the first punch; the field at Fenway explodes into a fistfight. Everyone at the bar swivels and watches the pile-up (and the five or six instant replays).

And then Friday night continues.

Cupcake-Palooza

I woke up excited (again) to make cupcakes (again), this time for E’s birthday.

I found the recipe for Joy the Baker’s Chocolate - Peanut Butter Cookie Dough – Toasted Marshmallow Cupcakes a month or two ago and I’ve had it bookmarked since then for E.

The chocolate cupcakes are easy, by far the quickest part of the recipe.  Really, they’re practically an afterthought: The important part is the topping.

I hollow out the tops of the baked cupcakes and fit each one with a small cookie dough ball (eggless, of course, so as not to incur salmonella poisoning). After a lunch break, it was time to cook the meringue.

I didn't expect the meringue to be so sticky and hard to work with. I should have. But I didn't. I try to pipe the meringue out of the corner of a Ziploc bag (my pastry tips are MIA), but I can’t form the swirls I want and I give up. I cover each meringue with a thick coating of meringue and push them in the oven under the broiler.

The meringue toasts quickly and the kitchen smells like fire-roasted marshmallows. I tackle a cupcake with a spoon and scoop out just the top – toasted, crisp, sweet meringue and chocolate chip cookie dough, warm and almost melting. 

But I’m worried: the meringue is still slightly sticky in places. The recipe calls for only a minute under the broiler. I gave it two and a half and it's not enough. 

Who am I going to call? M. Definitely M.

I think part of being a successful human being is knowing who to call. Evaluate the situation and use a lifeline. Last night, with a painful ankle and heel, I called K. K is an athlete and, in a year, will be a practicing physical therapist… a very good friend to have. Over the phone, K put me through a series of diagnostic stretches (flexing, pointing, extending…) and, half an hour later, decided that it’s an old injury flaring up from overuse and overtraining (Last weekend’s 10K definitely didn’t help).

K is good at all things athletic. K has also advised the swimming portion of my sprint triathlons and has actually jumped in the pool with me to tweak my stroke.

M is good at all things food. She promises to leaf through a few cookbooks and to call me right back.

With M on speakerphone, I put the cupcakes back in the oven at 350 degrees and set the stopwatch on my iPhone. Two minutes makes all the difference… the cupcakes are saved!

I'm relieved. I realize, though, that I’ve been in the kitchen for over five hours and that I had promised S I would buy beer for the Fourth.  I emerge into the afternoon and it seems really bright and warm outside.

I don’t blame the liquor store for carding me. Right now, I look about twelve years old. I’m covered in meringue and chocolate cupcake batter.

I call M back. We talk cupcakes. I think this batch of cupcakes will be a crowd-pleaser. But, next time, I want to make a really dark chocolate cupcake, with bittersweet chocolate. And I’m committed. I’m going to make cupcakes until I have the perfect cupcake.

Expect to see a lot more cupcakes around here. 

Muesli Makes Mornings Better

I've been playing around with oatmeal. Late Tuesday night, I stood at the stove, yawned, and stirred for twenty minutes as a huge batch of oatmeal slowly cooked. And, when it was done, it went straight into the fridge.

The next morning, I tucked blueberries in the oatmeal and added cinnamon and milk. 2:30 in the microwave later, and breakfast was ready.

I didn't grow up with a microwave. Microwaves are a mystery to me (kind of like cake mix -- I literally don't know what to do with it).

You know that scene in Zoolander where Zoolander and Hansel go all ape?

Yea. I'm pretty much like that. I punch the buttons randomly until the microwave starts. I don't know how long to microwave food. I burn popcorn and I can't defrost chicken. I was amazed when my blueberry oatmeal turned out so well -- a bowl of creamy oatmeal with blueberries so warm and sweet that they were almost syrupy. I had a "Look what I made!" moment.

But breakfast -- especially when you're making a sandwich for lunch and blow-drying your hair (and re-setting the circuit breaker when you blow a fuse) -- should be a no brainer.

Muesli is so good. It's simple. And the refrigerator does all of the work.

Muesli

1 1/4 cup old fashioned oats
1 cup milk (I use 2%)
2/3 cup yogurt (I use non-fat plain)
1/2 cup raisins
1 cup walnuts

Combine all ingredients in a large bowl and stir well. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and put it in the refrigerator for a minimum of 12 hours.

The muesli, if refrigerated, will keep for several days. Serves two to three people.

There are so many possible variations on this basic recipe. You can substitute 1/2 cup of sliced almonds for 1/2 cup of the walnuts. You can use flavored yogurt or a different kind of dried fruit.

Or get a little indulgent. You know that pint of heavy cream in your refrigerator? The one leftover from making cupcake frosting? Yeah. That one. Go for it. Add a splash.

A Boston Classic: Making Boston Cream Pie at Flour Bakery

Fact: The official Massachusetts State dessert is the Boston Cream Pie.

That can’t be a surprise, really. I mean, look at the name of the pie.

Boston can’t make too many claims to original desserts. New York Style Cheesecake is out. So is Mississippi Mud Pie.

But the Boston Cream Pie, invented at the Parker House Hotel (now the Omni Parker House Hotel) in the 19th century, is all ours.

Another fun fact: You can learn to make Boston Cream Pie at Flour Bakery.

After the B.A.A 10K and blueberry pancakes yesterday, I showered, chugged a liter of water, and made the walk from South Station to Fort Point. This is completely normal, right? To set a personal best in a 10K and then take a baking class?

I don’t do anything half-hearted when it comes to running or food. Or note-taking. Because, as Executive Pastry Chef Nicole Rhode and Pastry Chef Sarah Powers walk us through the steps in a demo-only class, I’m taking notes like there’s going to be a quiz.

In my 6th grade European history class, we had our first test about two weeks into the school year. I panicked and asked my teacher if we were really going to be tested on all the material. I showed him my twenty (double-sided) pages of notes. Here’s another fun fact: most 6th graders don’t take forty pages of notes. At the end of the school year, my teacher asked if he could keep my notebook.

Yesterday was no different. My copy of the recipes is covered with exclamation marks, notes, underlining, and arrows. I was highly motivated. I really love Boston Cream Pie: I bake it, I eat it, and I want to master it. And Flour set out some of its excellent coffee for the class and I plowed through two cups scary-fast. So I was excited and buzzing and all ready to tackle some pie.

There are four components to Flour’s Boston Cream Pie – sponge cake, cream filling, coffee syrup, and chocolate ganache, all made with simple, high quality ingredients. I’m delighted to see no cornstarch and Sarah actually makes a point of saying that Flour uses cornstarch very infrequently.

Sarah and Nicole are pastry professionals, so, of course, the recipe looks easy. But I really think that it is straightforward. The pastry cream (milk, egg yolks, sugar, salt, cake flour, and vanilla extract) takes less than fifteen minutes to make. I’m used to Maida Heatter’s recipe, which calls for lots of stirring and watchful waiting, and Flour’s version seems much faster, but, hey, that’s never a bad thing.

Our instructors mention that the pastry cream is the same one used in Flour’s tiramisu and they brainstorm – maybe we’d want to stuff brioche or doughnuts with the leftover cream? And, as it happens, Sarah actually offers us doughnuts between recipe steps. Mine is gorgeous, dipped in granulated sugar, and bursting with raspberry jelly. I’m totally distracted.

They pull out a golden brown sponge cake baked earlier in the day and show us how to assemble the three layer cake: brushing coffee syrup and pastry cream over each layer of cake, and then finally pouring dark, shiny chocolate ganache over the whole thing.

It’s so good. Really. It’s really, really good. But I’m conflicted. So conflicted. Why?

Because it most reminds me of tiramisu. Between the multiple layers, the coffee syrup, and a filling that tastes more like whipped cream than a standard pastry cream, we’re definitely headed into tiramisu territory. (This is not to detract from the fact that it’s sweet and creamy and I would happily take another piece.)

So what’s the line between a Boston Cream Pie and tiramisu? When I ask Nicole, she says that a tiramisu usually relies on ladyfingers and a mascarpone cream laced with rum. True. But the Boston Cream Pie (traditionally a sponge cake cut in half, stuffed with vanilla pastry cream so thick that it’s practically pudding, and doused with a chocolate glaze) has been re-interpreted many times. And tiramisu has been re-interpreted too. And now we’ve got some overlap in taste.

I’m thinking that I need to go to the Omni Parker House Hotel to have the classic. I need to establish a baseline for my research. (This is a high class problem to have.)

Moving on, Sarah and Nicole also teach us the recipe for Strawberry Cream Cake, another spongecake dessert. The filling – sweet strawberries, a tart lemon syrup, and cream cheese whipped with vanilla and heavy cream – is tightly rolled up in a single layer of sponge cake. I’m sold. I think it’d absolutely be a terrific dessert to make for a party: It’s simple and it tastes like summer. And the cream is practically turning pink from the strawberry juice. I love it.

The instructors send us home with little white boxes of cake. Mine has a big, blue Flour Bakery sticker and attracts some attention (“I see you went to Flour!”) as I make my way home.

So what’s on tap for tonight? I’m eating the rest of my strawberry cream cake, obviously. And looking for an excuse to make a sponge cake. 

Knives, Raspberries, and Cooking in the Dark

It's been the most interesting week so far.

Monday, I was back and forth across the city and then across the river too. Over in Cambridge, I almost did a victory dance in Shaw's when I found cupcake liners. Because I haven't been able to find cupcake liners in any Boston grocery store. Do Bostonians not make cupcakes? And then I spent three hours learning to cut in a Knife Skills class at the Cambridge School of Culinary Arts. Some of the class participants had truly gruesome stories about kitchen accidents -- one girl had almost sliced off a grape-sized portion of her palm with a mandoline -- and were motivated to avoid further injuries. Me? I just want to be comfortable with large, sharp knives. I want to chop vegetables quickly, efficiently, and uniformly. And I now know the absolute best way to cut a red pepper -- and  it's so cool. It's so cool that it's practically a party trick.

Tuesday, I was up to my elbows in raspberry puree. It's a long story why and where, so I'll save the details for another time. But as I blended an ice cream base and the raspberry puree, I accidentally (and thoroughly) soaked myself in puree. The reaction from those around me? "You look like you killed somebody!" Awesome. Later, as I headed to meet A for a cocktail, I looked down at my forearms, saw red splotches, and thought I'd broken out in hives. Nope. Just raspberry. Everywhere.

That brings us to today. The kitchen light blew out and the Internet and cable went down. Picture this: I'm quickly dicing celery (using my newfound appreciation for knives!) and cooking chicken on the stove I hate, in the dark, with Comcast on the phone. A dangerous combination.

But, a lightbulb was located, I went up on a kitchen chair, the kitchen light (covered by one of those huge glass bulbs with nails holding the whole thing together... you know the type) was replaced, and there was light. A few tense discussions with Comcast later, the Internet and TV reappeared.

And then I made chicken salad.

All-American Chicken Salad

2 whole chicken breasts (approx. 1.75 lb.), cooked and shredded
6 medium stalks of celery, diced
1/2 cup light mayonnaise
1 cup raisins
Salt and fresh lemon juice to taste

Combine all ingredients (except for the salt and lemon juice) and mix well. Season to taste.

Serves 2-3 people.

A Day Making Brioche

Brioche is always worth getting out of bed for.

Especially when you’re learning to make brioche with the immensely talented patissiere Annie Pambaguian of Sweet Little Something.

Learning to make brioche is on my bucket list and I’m thrilled to spend the morning with Annie. Using one of her recipes written out in her native French, Annie walks me through the steps. She laughs when she reads that the eggs are described as “frais et gouteux,” but then she concurs with the directions: “We will do fresh and tasty… because in brioche, the eggs really do matter. You want the butter to taste really good and the eggs to taste really good.”

In Annie’s kitchen, it’s not about exact baking times. It’s about using all your senses and paying attention. I bake often and I bake a lot, but I don’t fully understand food chemistry and I don’t always know what to look for in terms of texture.  

Annie has finely tuned instincts and relies even upon sound. She walks away from the standing mixer because she can hear when the dough is ready: It will slap against the sides of the mixing bowl.

She sends me home with a bucket (literally) of brioche dough. Precious cargo… I’m almost tempted to fasten a seatbelt around it.

I baby-sit the brioche through the afternoon. I’m careful to not depend too much on time. As the brioche rises in the refrigerator, I look at the height. As I gently mold it into pans, I press one finger down to check for springiness. Hours later, I slide the pans into the oven and watch for the golden brown color to develop. And then I fret and fret and fret as the buttery inside doesn’t cook: maybe I filled the molds too full? I run and pull Julia Child off the bookshelf – she recommends wrapping tinfoil over the brioche loosely, so I give it a try. Finally, it’s cooked through.

It tastes like everything I expect brioche to be. But I can’t take credit.

I know I have a lot of practice ahead of me.