Last Minute Gift Idea: Sweet Confections by Nina Wanat

I was crushed earlier this year when Nina Wanat shut down her awesome candy company BonBonBars which produced some of the best candy anywhere, ever. But Nina must know the old adage, give me some candy and I eat for a day, teach me how to make candy and I eat for a lifetime, because while BonBonBars is no more, she has a new candy making book out just in time for the holidays.

Sweet Confections: Beautiful Candy to Make at Home, is a fabulous book. It's got some of everything: caramels, fudge, marshmallows, toffee, after dinner mints, you name it.

The best thing about this book is that it is very accessible. I've made lots of chocolate but never made any other types of candy, and I was able to jump right in and make some great things out of Nina's book. The recipes are clearly explained and not overly time consuming. And for the most part, you can do them with ordinary kitchen equipment, although you will need a candy thermometer. Lots of recipes also require a stand mixer, but I found I was able to do fine with a food processer. The only caution I have is to watch how much the recipe makes; some of them make quantities that are larger than you may need (unless you're opening your own candy store) so you may want to halve them.

One thing to be clear about is that this isn't a BonBonBar cookbook. Very few recipes for the old BonBonBars appear (the exceptions are some of their marshmallow candies). My guess is the candy bars were just too challenging for the average home cook, so I will have to wait to see if there is a second volume that teaches me out to make those Scotch bars.

So if you're looking for a great gift for a home cook or lover of sweets, check out Sweet Confections, available for only $12 on Amazon.

We All Scream for Sweet Cream

People who are obsessive about coffee insist on drinking only straight espresso or drip coffee. In their view, milk obscures the fragrances and flavors that make the coffee distinct and exceptional. Whiskey lovers are the same way...ice numbs the palate, and while a little water is acceptable, neat is preferred. Yet in the world of great ice cream, the trend seems to be to create the most bizarre flavor combinations. Everyone wants you to try their new bacon-wasabi-cheddar ice cream.

Well, when it comes to ice cream, I like fun flavors as much of the next person, but I also like to taste it in its purest form, and that means sweet cream. Sweet cream is the basis of all ice cream. A creme anglaise (a custard of milk, eggs and sugar) with heavy cream. Creme anglaise itself is one of the wonders of the world and I am totally happy to eat it straight, but when you add cream and freeze it, it's sublime. Tasting the core ingredients stripped of any additives makes you understand that all ice cream really is "frozen custard."

When I lived in New England, sweet cream was on offered at all the great ice cream places. I've seen it occasionally since then, but recently it seems to have dropped off menus, or maybe it was just never as big in California.

So now, I make it myself in a little ice cream make I recieved as a wedding present many years ago. My only addition is a few teaspoons of maple syrup which adds to the depth of the sweet element but isn't enough to give a maple flavor.

After 40 minutes in the machine, it's soft, white, fluffy and pure. Ice cream at its most basic and wonderful form. Long live the sweet cream!

Happy End of Passover: Matzo Brei

Eggs, salt, butter, matzo...what's not to like? Nothing says spring weekend morning like a mess o' matzo brei. For best results, I follow Jim Leff's recipe.

Home Affogatos

One of the best things about having a home espresso machine is the ability to make affogatos. It's shocking how something this simple can be this delicious. To wit: one small scoop of vanilla ice cream, one shot of freshly pulled espresso; I add a dollop of wet whip cream. Heaven in a cup.

Hey, pour in a shot of Irish Whiskey and this would make for a great St. Patrick's Day treat, sort of an Irish Coffee on steroids.

Farmers Market Pork - Jimenez Family Farm

It's amazing how much protein you can get at the Sunday Hollywood Farmer's Market these days. A few years ago, it was just produce. Now you can get fish, oysters, bison, butter, cheese, pork, beef, sausages and more.

One of my favorite meat purveyors is the Jimenez Family Farm stand. Located on the east side of Ivar, north of Selma, it used to be my go-to place for lamb. Oh the lamb roasts and steaks I made from their gamy, domestic lamb. Apparently though, they no longer carry lamb, so instead I went for some pork. Well, the pork was as good as the lamb. A bone-in shoulder, roasted with a nice wet rub, turned crisp on the outside with sections of white and red on the inside. This was beautiful stuff.

They also have goat and rabbit, which I'll have to work up some never for as I've never before cooked them.

Check it out!

Behold the Latte Art

Well, sort of. Here's the update. After receiving the awesome Rancilio Silvia espresso maker as a holiday gift (from myself), I set about to drag my '90s era barista-self into the third wave.

At first, I tried to find someone who would take my hand and teach me the fine art of microfoaming and latte art, but to no avail. So I set about on a totally DIY course, reading coffee forums, watching endless videos of people pouring milk and practice, practice, practice. My conclusion: it's harder than it looks.

After two months, this is probably the best I've done. A friend on Facebook called it a tornado, which I'm willing to go with. As my art evolves, I'll continue to post. And I'm always open for hints, suggestions or other schooling.

FYI, this was made with Cafecito Organico's Espresso Clandestino.

Home Espresso Users: Great Videos from Seattle Coffee Gear

If you are like me, a relatively inexperienced home barista, then there is no better series of instructional videos than those from Seattle Coffee Gear. The crew from this Seattle area retailer
knows their stuff and give clear and concise, no-nonsense demonstrations for the home espresso maker. They are particularly helpful for those who own a Rancilio Silvia or a Giotto Rocket, which seem to be the two they spend the most time on. They cover everything from making espresso to grinding, and most helpfully, cleaning and maintaining your machine. They also have excellent videos on choosing an espresso machine.

If you own a Silvia or a Rocket, you need to check these folks out.

Happy Holidays to Me!

What you see above is the Rancilio Silvia home espresso maker. My first home espresso maker since the Krups Espresso Mini I bought in 1990! I also got a Rancilio Rocky doserless grinder.

My espresso making skills, I have to admit, are stuck in the '90s when I worked as a barista. If anyone wants to teach me how to make microfoam and latte art, I'm ready to learn.

In the future, I'll be posting some of my home espresso adventures.

Happy holidays!

Sweet Chanukah Kugel

Kugel is a Jewish casserole typically made for holiday meals. They can be sweet or savory and made of almost anything, though the most common are potato, matzoh and my favorite, noodles kugel.

For many years, I've been making a sweet noodle kugel as part of our family Chanukah meal, and practice has made perfect with this never-fail recipe:


Boil about a half pound of egg noodles.
In a large mixing bowl, combine the noodles with:

6 tbs melted butter
1 1/2 lb sour cream
1 1/2 lb cottage cheese
8 eggs
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1 cup raisins

Pour into a greased 9x13 baking dish and bake 30-45 minutes until custard is set and the top is lightly browned. It will come out moist and delicious.

Happy Chanukah!

Butchering the Pig

How did I miss this?

One of Mozza2Go's classes for their "scuola di pizza" was entitled "Introduction to Pig Butchery" and included this great description:

Join Mozza Chef Chad Colby as he demonstrates how to utilize a whole pig and turn it into a meal.

Yes, for only $150, I could have learned how to butcher a whole pig. Now granted, this is not the most practical of classes for the lay-cook. I mean, the closest I ever come to a whole pig is at the LA County Fair, but it just seems so cool.

If anyone has taken the class, please chime in. I'd love to hear about it and to know what you did with the snout.

DIY: Chocolate Peanut Butter Pie

If you want something easy to make with incredible results, this is a can't-miss dessert. It tastes like a giant Reese's Peanut Butter Cup. At our place, it's a staple for my daughter's birthday. I adapted the recipe from the Silver Palate Cookbook by Julee Rosso and Sheila Lukins (where it's known as Candace's Chocolate Peanut Butter Pie), meaning it pretty much comes from them but I make the crust chewier, the filling creamier and the topping chocolatier.

Ingredients

Crust
1 1/2 cups graham cracker crumbs
1/3 cup sugar
1 stick unsalted butter, melted

Filling
12 oz cream cheese
1 1/2 cups peanut butter
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 cups heavy cream

Topping
4 oz good dark chocolate
1/2-1 cup of heavy cream


Make It:

Crust

Combine the graham cracker crumbs, melted butter and sugar. Spread the mixture out on the bottom of a 9 inch pie plate. Bake for 8 to 10 minutes at 350. Set aside to cool.

Filling

Combine the cream cheese, peanut butter, sugar and one cup of heavy cream in a large bowl until well blended (it works better if the cream cheese has been allowed to come to room temperature). Whip one cup of heavy cream until stiff and fold it into the cream cheese-peanut butter mixture. Pour this mixture into the cool pie crust.

Topping

Melt the chocolate in a double boiler. Slowly add the heavy cream to form a ganache, adding only a little at a time and stirring to make sure the cream is completely mixed and forms a ganache. Do this until the mixture has the consistency of chocolate syrup, you don't want it to get watery. Take the mixture out of the boiler and let it cool but not harden. When it is room temperature but still liquid, pour the chocolate over the pie.

Refrigerate the pie overnight and enjoy!

Important Fourth of July Warning: Be Safe and Sane with S'mores

Attention foodies: Every summer, hundreds of foodies end up needlessly ruining s'mores by screwing up the ingredients. These poor saps are left with a disgusting excuse for a campfire treat and unhappy children. Don't let this happen to you!

S'mores are a simple treat; stop overthinking them with foodie ingredients. To help the struggling foodie, I have put together this very simple guide to s'more ingredients. The elements of your s'mores should be as follows:


1. Hershey's Milk Chocolate Bar

Chocolate is the essential s'more ingredient, but it's also the main way that foodies screw up. I have seen far to many foodies, sitting around the campfire after finishing their pancetta-bison burgers with confit of caramelized onion, drag out some 78% Ecuadoran single origin bean-to-bar chocolate for the s'mores. Now don't get me wrong, I'm a huge fan of high cacao chocolate and have reviewed many of them, but there is a time and a place for it. That time and place is not in your s'mores. Dark chocolate doesn't complement the pure, sticky sweetness of marshmallows and graham crackers. You want a milder flavor profile for that: the taste of old-fashioned Hershey's milk chocolate. You know, the kind you were perfectly happy with before around 1999. Plus, the richness and subtlety of high cacao bars is lost in the amalgam. Putting them on a s'more is like mixing great Bourbon with Coke; you lose the flavor. Plus, if you're s'moring with kids, artisan chocolates are (1) not kid friendly (who wants to see a kid with a sad face after eating chocolate, of all things?) and (2) filled with caffeine. Come on foodies, I know you have it in you, go to Von's or Rite Aid (you will find addresses for both on Google), walk up to that candy aisle and grab a Hershey bar.


2. Nabisco Honey Maid Graham Crackers

This is a similar issue. Most fancy schmancy graham crackers are too thick, too sweet and too full of weird flavors to make a good s'more (lavender-maple graham crackers do not belong on s'mores). The s'more is a sandwich. You want it on thin crackers that are just slightly sweet and easy to bite through. Do they taste like cardboard on their own? You bet! But the s'more is about the gestalt; the whole is greater than the sum of the parts.


3. Marshmallows

Okay, marshmallows are the one thing I will give on if the foodies are raising a ruckus. The traditional big-name marshmallows are pretty offensive and full of weird chemicals. Some of the craft marshmallows (as opposed to Kraft marshmallows) out there are pretty darn good and would probably taste good on a s'more, so I give you permission to use them, but no weird flavors (pictured above are the excellent vanilla marshmallows from BonBonBar). That being said, it won't necessarily be easy. The old Jet-Puffeds are the perfect size to slap on a stick and roast over the fire. Artisan marshmallows tend to be petite and a bit fragile. While the taste will work, the execution might not. I suggest doing a few trial runs and having a big bag of the old-standbys just in case.

So, please, have a safe and sane Fourth of July and don't ruin anyone's summer fun with your weird foodieness. Oh, and don't forget to shoot off lots of illegal fireworks! Happy Fourth!

Good Pesach - Good Macaroons

Homemade coconut macaroons, regular and chocolate (dipped in Scharffen-Berger chocolate). A most impressive Passover dessert that takes no more than 30 minutes from start to finish (plus drying time for the chocolate).

Adapted from the New Basics Cookbook:

1. Beat two egg whites with a pinch of salt until soft peaks form; add a tablespoon of sugar and beat until glossy with stiff peaks.

2. In a separate bowl, combine 5 oz. shredded coconut, 2/3 cup of sugar and one teaspoon vanilla extract (warning for the observant: vanilla extract is not technically kosher for Passover, but I can't bear to use artificial vanilla). Fold into the egg whites.

3. Using a half-sphere tablespoon or a mini ice cream scoop, scoop batter out onto a buttered cookie pan covered with buttered parchment paper.

4. Cook for 12-15 minutes at 325. Cookies are done when browned on the bottom and lightly browned on top. Makes about 20 cookies.

5. For chocolate covered macaroons, melt chocolate (I use equal parts Scharffen-Berger 62% and 70%). Remove chocolate from heat to a bowl. Dip cooled macaroons in melted chocolate and let cool.

Put them out and watch these babies disappear.

Good Passover to all!

Happy New Year...and Brunch

New Year's brunch: Eggs Benedict on homemade rolls with hash browns (and homemade Hollandaise - natch). A yummy start to the decade.

She Wore Red Velvet

I'm not much of a cake baker. I tend to stick to chocolate desserts for my baking, but when your significant other loves cake and it's her birthday, what are you going to do? In fact, nearly all my cake baking has taken place around one of her birthdays over the past 15 years. I've fumbled a few, though I've had a few triumphs as well, including a nice tres leches that I made from an Alton Brown recipe.

One of her favorite cakes is red velvet, so this year I took it on. After searching high and low, I found this Chowhound post. All I can say is, use it. The recipe is near-flawless. The secret ingredient is a bit of vinegar and baking soda, which adds that fizzy CO2 to the batter. I followed the recipe pretty much to the letter with the exception of substituting butter for the Crisco, since I have a deep-seated fear of Crisco.

And the frosting is wonderful, though be warned it is a buttercream, and some folks prefer cream cheese frosting on their red velvet cake. As for me, you could frost dog shit with a good buttercream and I'd happily lap it up.

Enjoy!

My Birthday Cheese Making Experiment

Only a spouse who truly loves and understands me would get me a cheese making kit for my birthday. I am a lucky man indeed. She first read about Ricki Carroll's home chessemaking operation in Barbara Kingslover's locovore manifesto Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life and was convinced I would love making my own cheese.

Carroll runs a cheese making supply company and sells books and other materials to home cheesemakers. Her starter kit for making mozzarella and ricotta comes with a book and DVD as well as various supplies and ingredients, including vegetarian rennet tablets, citric acid, finely cut cheese salt, cheesecloth and a thermometer. Once you have the kit, all you need is a big pot, a slotted spoon or ladle and milk.

As you know if you are a regular reader, I eat lots of cheese, but though I've occasionally heard about home cheesemakers, I'd never contemplated making my own. I've seen artisan cheesemakers in action before and it doesn't look easy. However, Carroll starts you on the easiest cheeses and has done an amazing job of finding recipes that can be replicated in a home kitchen with everyday ingredients.

My first project was the Thirty Minute Mozzarella, a cheese that could allegedly be made in a half hour. The process is amazingly simple. You heat up the milk which curdles upon the addition of citric acid. Then you add rennet and heat it a bit more. The rennet creates the solid curds which separate from the whey. Once they have separated, you ladle the curds into a bowl, salt them and microwave it a few times, stretching the cheese a bit in between heatings. A gallon of milk produces a softball sized mozzarella ball.

I figured that, while it looked easy on TV, the actual process would be a bit harder. Once you get the hang of it, it is remarkably easy, but it took me three tries to make something edible.

The first try was with Trader Joe's Organic Whole Milk. It didn't work, turning into a runny, mess. My hypothesis is that TJ's treats its milk to very high temperatures during pasteurization. The book warned that ultra-pasteurized cheese would not work for cheesemaking, and while TJ's isn't labeled ultra-pasteurized, the result was the same that was warned of for the ultra-pasteurized cheese. So, we took a quick trip to Ralph's for some Altadena and Ralph's brand milk, both of which worked.

The second batch came together as cheese, but had the consistency of rubber. Two hypotheses here. Either I cooked it to too high a temperature or I played with it too much when it was about ready (it was hard to resist stretching and braiding it like taffy; it's fun stuff).



Batch three was a success. I added a bit more salt than recommended for flavor, cut down the heat and resisted the temptation to treat it like silly putty. It was moist and delicious.

The cheese that results doesn't taste much like the fresh mozzarella you get it stores, but was very tasty. It has more of a milky taste than a cheesy one. We ate it plain and on a bruschetta.

The cheese was also not as tasty when cool. Freshly made and warm, it was wonderful and hard to stop eating, but it became a bit hard when cold. I ended up warming it prior to serving.

Next up I'll be making ricotta and will report back. The book actually includes recipes for all manner of cheeses, hard, soft, washed rind, cheddars and more, but many of those appear pretty labor intensive and require presses and other special equipment. For now, I'll stick to the easy ones. What a great, cheesy birthday present!

Happy Chanukah!

I love Chanukah and all of it's oil-soaked glory. What could be better than a holiday in which you are practically required to cook fried foods? The fact that it has a cheese tie in is just gravy.

I love cooking the Chanukah meal and use my well-tested recipes for latkes (with homemade apple sauce) and noodles kugel.







For the second year, I've also tried some doughnuts. Last year, I did little cake doughnuts. This year's batch were glazed yeast doughnuts, but the yeast didn't really do its thing, so they were a bit dense but still tasty.



When Chanukah is this close to Christmas, it's a real hardship for the bi-religious home cook, so soon I'll be mixing up eggnog. We will do traditional Jewish Christmas Eve at a Chinese restaurant (I'll report back) and then I'll be cooking Christmas dinner.

Happy holidays!

Whiskey Wednesday will be back for the new year.

A Cut Above: Knife Skills Class at Sur La Table

Even though I love to cook and do a fair amount of it, I seldom write about it on the blog. Why? Because I am an ambitious but totally self-trained cook. I have terrible technique; the only things I know I learned from reading Julia or watching Alton.

About a year ago, I was trying to go all Iron Chef on some cantaloupe and I cut my thumb so badly that I had to visit the emergency room to get it stitched up. The next Christmas I received a well intended Sur La Table gift card to be used for a knife skills class (regular price, $70).

Well, it took me almost a year to get to it, but I finally signed up for a class at the SLT at the Third and Fairfax Farmers Market, and I'm so glad I did.

Super-animated but down to earth instructor Tina Rogers started with the basics of knives: the different knife types, sharpening and honing and proper handling. After that, she gave us demos of the basic cuts and hints about how to improve technique, subsequently setting us loose with the knives to try it all out. We sliced, diced and julienned to our hearts' content using everything from ceramics to santokus to big old Shuns.

Rogers was a great instructor with a good sense of humor who was game to answer any question, relevant or not, and I literally learned at least a dozen things that will improve my game in the cutting world. While there was a "shopping break" for which to use our complimentary 15% off coupon, there wasn't any hard sell, and in fact, Rogers was less than enthusiastic about the world of $300 knives and unnecessary knife accessories.

During the class, our beautifully cut food was carted away to the front kitchen where it was turned into a pasta dinner that we enjoyed, with wine, after the class. Considering this, and the fact that during the class there were ample snacks and bottled water, it's a pretty good deal for $70.

Now, I've got to admit, I'm not a Sur La Table fan. Let's face it, you can get pretty much everything they sell for at least half the price at Cost Plus or Surfas, but this class was both fun and gave me new skills. The next day, when I chopped up apples for my baby daughter, I took the opportunity to give her nicely julienned strips.

The Sur La Table culinary program, which is only available at selected stores, includes a number of interesting sounding classes including baking, holiday meals, sauces and even molecular gastronomy. Some classes, like knife skills, are hands on, but others are demos, so check that out when you sign up. Tina Rogers seems to teach knife skills about once a month, but sign up early because they do fill up.

Given how much I enjoyed this class, I know I'll sign up for more. Until then, I plan to engage in lots of injury free cutting.

DIY: Drinking Chocolate

One of the most annoying food terms that has cropped up in the past few years is drinking chocolate. We used to have a perfectly good word for this...hot chocolate, but apparently, coffee chain marketers thought people wouldn't pay $4-$8 dollars a shot for something they mostly associated with a bag of Carnation or Swiss Miss, so they came up with a new item: drinking chocolate.

I fear that this conjugation will inevitably be expanded. Will fresh-squeezed juice become drinking fruit? Will fine Scotch be dubbed drinking barley? At the cheese counter will I be forced to order some eating milk?

The saddest thing about people buying little cups of drinking chocolate, especially the overly sweet goop at Starbucks (if they even still sell that stuff; I'm not a regular), is that if you happen to own that specialty cooking tool known as a stove, you can make hot chocolate that's better than pretty much anything you pay $8 for at a cafe in Brentwood.


DIY: Hot (Drinking) Chocolate

For about 6 servings, I use 6-9 ounces of good dark chocolate.
Scharffen-Berger is my cooking chocolate of choice, and I usually use equal parts semisweet (62%) and bittersweet (70%), but use the combination and type of chocolate that suits you.

Melt the chocolate in a double boiler over medium heat. When it is fully melted and smooth, begin adding milk very slowly while stirring. I usually add it about a quarter-cup at a time and then mix until fully integrated (creating a shiny ganache) before adding more.

Add milk to taste. I like a super-rich drink, so I usually go about two cups of milk, but most people prefer more. Then heat until warm.

Once it's ready, take it off the heat to prevent the chocolate from seizing (separating and becoming an ugly mess).

Serve and enjoy.

Special tip: hot chocolate of this sort is really enhanced by a night in the fridge, which allows the flavors to meld. What you end up with the next morning may seem very thick, but just microwave it or reheat on the burner. In theory, making it a day ahead of time would be a good rule, but in practice, liquid chocolate is hard not to consume immediately.

I've done a lot of hot chocolate experiments, using cream, half & half, and other additives in different proportions, and I've come to believe that just milk and good chocolate makes the ideal cup.

Oh, and remember, this stuff is caffeinated!