Chateau Gateau

I made a pretty significant amount, so this recipe can definitely be halved. Also, it’s super easy - you just stick all of the ingredients (except the chips) into a food processor and process away, and then mix in the chocolate chips. The nice thing with food processing is that you can always add things to adjust the taste. You could definitely cut down the sugar or add some kind of milk to adjust the sweetness or texture. 

INGREDIENTS

2 cans chickpeas, rinsed

1/2 cup sunflower seed butter

1 cup brown sugar

2 tbsp. vanilla

pinch of salt

1 bag vegan chocolate chips

I made a second pie this week because I had a lot of extra pumpkin. I initially planned to bring two pies with me to work, but didn’t have time to make a second one. I admit that I was ill-prepared to be baking pie, as I didn’t have any of the spices I needed for the recipe other than cinnamon and pepper. 

For my first pie, I decided that I would try the Duchess recipe for pie crust rather than my pastry school recipe. I had some trouble getting the dry ingredients adequately combined in my stand mixer, and ended up leaving my double batch of dough in the fridge with the hope that the moisture would distribute itself enough to be used in time. I immediately made a second batch of dough, enough for one pie, by hand. The moisture was definitely better distributed in this batch, even though the recipe calls for the dough to be mixed in a stand mixer. I’ve never used a stand mixer to make pie dough before, so perhaps my judgement was just poor. Who knows.

I left my double batch of pie dough in the fridge for about a week before I got around to making my second pie. When I pulled it out I found that the outside was still quite dry, while the inside was quite moist. I used it anyway.

You can see the uneven colouration in the dough from the variations in moisture. Also note, the cute crust braid is intact!

I found that the edges of the crust with both pies contracted quite a bit while they were baking, with the contraction being more pronounced with the second one. I wasn’t 100% sure why this was, because I previously haven’t had major issues with this. I Googled, and found this page that lists common pastry problems and describes possible causes. Under “crust shrinks” it stated that the likely problem was the overdevelopment of gluten in the dough, the dough wasn’t adequately chilled, there was too little butter/shortening, or that there was too much water. I highly doubt that my dough was too warm, as I typically leave it refrigerated overnight before using it and prepare my pie filling before removing the dough from the fridge. There was a butter puddle on the bottom of my oven after baking my pies and the dough was still quite dry, so I’ve ruled out those troubles as well. The gluten speaks to me, however. In the past I have used cake and pastry flour for all of my pie crusts, whereas these crusts were made with all purpose flour. I think that the combination of the higher gluten content of all purpose flour might be the culprit. Another way that gluten develops is through working/kneading dough, but I don’t think that I over did it because I’m very conscious of not over-mixing when I make pie crust.

Bake bake bake

What did I learn? Always use pastry flour when making pie crust. If you don’t it will totally negate all of the cute pie crust edges you create, because they will end up taking a dive into your filling.

Note the pie-equivalent of the Marianas Trench, as well as the half hidden braid border.

The other thing I need to figure out is how long to bake pies in my new oven. I ended up with cracks in the middle of both my pies, which tells me I over baked them. Typically I set my timer for 30 minutes to check on the progression of the filling, but after that I keep forgetting about my pies and leaving them in the oven for unknown lengths of time. Oops. I haven’t burned any pies, which is good, but I do feel like they look appropriately ready when I take them out (not overdone). I suppose it is also possible that they are cooling too quickly, and I’m not overbaking them after all.

My pie was very well received by my co-workers, to the point at which dibs was called on the left over pie! Michael is also really enjoying having some pie around, though I think he’s a little bit biased. I would definitely say that overall these pies were a success, even though I have a few details to hammer down. I would also like the give this another try with a graham cracker crust, as the first time didn’t go as well as I would have liked. Guess I’ll be baking more pie!

The Best Pumpkin Pie

Crust - use your favourite recipe :)

Filling Ingredients

2 cups (450 g) pumpkin puree

3 eggs

1 ¼ cup (250g) packed brown sugar

1 tbsp cornstarch

½ tsp salt

1 ½ tsp cinnamon

½ tsp ginger

¼ tsp nutmeg

1/8 tsp cloves

1/8 tsp ground pepper

1 cup (250 ml) heavy cream

¼ cup (63 ml) milk

Method

Prepare your crust/dough. Make sure your oven is preheated to 375 degrees F.

In a medium bowl, mix together the pumpkin puree, eggs, and brown sugar. (I used a handheld mixer on low-medium)

Add the cornstarch, spices, cream, and milk. Mix until well combined.

If you’re using dough, roll it out and put it into your pie dish. Pour in your filling and add any embellishments that you want.

Bake that sucker until the filling has an even wobble.

There was a very positive response to these brownies. One person said it was the best red velvet anything he had eaten! 

RED VELVET BROWNIES (9 x 13″ pan) - from here

INGREDIENTS

4 eggs

224 g (1 cup) unsalted butter

400 g (2 cups) granulated sugar

20 g (4 tsp.) vanilla extract

42 g cocoa

1/4 tsp. salt

2 tbsp. red food colouring

7 g (1.5 tsp.) vinegar

190 g pastry flour

2 x 8 ounce blocks of cream cheese

100 g (1/2 cup) granulated sugar

2 egg yolks

5 g (1 tsp.) vanilla extract

DIRECTIONS

Line a 9 x 13″ pan with parchment paper. Preheat oven to 350 F. 

Beat the eggs together into a small bowl. Set aside. 

Melt the butter. Stir in the sugar, vanilla, cocoa, salt, food colouring, and vinegar. Mix well. 

Whisk in the eggs, and fold in the flour. 

Level the batter into the pan, leaving 1/4 cup set aside. 

Make the cheesecake swirl by mixing together the cream cheese, sugar, yolks, and vanilla with a hand mixer. 

Spoon the cheese mixture in globs on top of the brownie mixture. Spoon the rest of the red velvet mixture on top of the cream cheese globs. 

Use a knife to swirl everything around. 

Bake for 30 - 50 minutes (or until a toothpick comes out clean). 

Notes:

I was quite happy with how the colour turned out. I think the AmeriColor Electric Purple dye created more of a plum colour, rather than the blue-purple that I got using Wilton Violet. I did find that depending on the lighting the cake did still look red-ish, however.

The cake itself was wonderfully moist, but didn’t quite have a red velvet texture to me. I also found that the cupcakes caved in a little bit on the top. I’m not sure this is the right recipe for us, but it’s definitely a great one to have in your back pocket!

As this was mostly an art project, we were not terribly concerned with the recipe details. We made double this eggless vanilla cake recipe in a jelly roll pan so that we had a thin layer that we could stack and work with. I also had some leftover swiss meringue icing, so we just used that. 

After carving out the dragon, we did a base icing coat. We then used a circle tip and a small spatula with black food colouring on it to get the multicoloured scaled look. We made the eyes, horns, and claws out of fondant. The egg and baby dragon were scaled appropriately and 3D printed. And obviously, you can’t have a dragon without treasure. 

Theresa and I both worked together to make a wedding cake for our friends Stephen and Ashlea, almost two years ago now. I think it will be a similar process, but tricky because Katherine and Theresa now live in Ottawa! Thank goodness for Skype! After some online chatting we solidified a plan to make a red velvet cake + cupcakes with a purple twist. Tentatively we will be decorating with cream cheese frosting in a rosette pattern.

The first step, of course, is for us to find an awesome recipe to use. I have a few different ones, but I don’t remember the differences between any of them. Somehow none of them have been blogged... The last time I made red velvet cake was actually for Katherine’s birthday a few years ago. She loved it, but as mentioned in my blog post I have no idea which recipe T and I actually used. Oops.

I sent Theresa the first red velvet cake recipe that I ever used, so that we could both give it a try. My cake did not turn out well because (I think) I messed up the baking times, causing my cake to fall and become dense. Theresa made cupcakes that actually turned out well, thankfully. It’s a good recipe, but we both thought we could find ones that’s better. The purple did turn out very purple, however. We both used Wilton gel dye in violet, but I found it to be a very blue toned purple. I plan on trying my AmeriColor electric purple for my next cake.

Baking chips :)

I used this recipe for MiniEgg Easter Cookies, and used my baking chips as a substitute for chopped MiniEggs. An old favourite recipe for a new kitchen! 

Ready for my kitchen’s first bake!

My condo is still pretty bare bones, so it was odd reaching for things I used all the time at my Mom’s house then realizing that I no longer have that thing! The circumstances were definitely not ideal, but I was just glad to be baking again :)

CHOCOLATE CAKE (from Sweetapolita.com)

INGREDIENTS

145 g dark chocolate

260 g unsalted butter

24 g (1/4 cup) cocoa

2 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. salt

315 g (2.75 cups) cake flour

4 eggs

200 g (1 cup) granulated sugar

220 g (1 cup) brown sugar

1.5 tsp. vanilla

475 mL (2 cups) sour cream

DIRECTIONS

Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease and line 3 x 8″ cake pans. 

Melt the chocolate and butter in a bain marie until smooth. 

Sift together the cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and flour. Set aside. 

In a mixer, beat together the eggs, sugars, and vanilla until fluffy. 

Mix the melted chocolate into the sugar mixture at low speed. 

Alternating adding in the flour and sour cream in three batches, starting and finishing with flour. Don’t overmix. 

Spread the batter into the three pans. (I weigh them to ensure even layers).

Bake until a toothpick comes out clean (25 - 40 minutes). Don’t open the oven door before 20 minutes. 

CARROT CAKE

INGREDIENTS

400 g (3-4) carrots

240 g cake flour, sifted

90 g almond flour

2 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. cinnamon

1/4 tsp. ground cardamom

250 g (2.25 cups) granulated sugar

100 g (1/2 cup) brown sugar

4 eggs

170 g (3/4 cup) oil

250 g (1 cup) unsweetened applesauce 

DIRECTIONS

Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease and line 2  x 8″ cake pans.

Grate carrot until you have ~3 cups (400 g) of grated carrot. Set aside. 

Sift together the cake flour, almond flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, and cardamom. Set aside. 

In a large bowl, mix together sugars and eggs. Mix in the oil and the applesauce and mix well. 

Mix in the dry ingredients without overmixing. 

Fold in the shredded carrots. 

The final cake was 3 x 6″ pans, 3 x 8″ pans, and 3 x 10″ pans. I did some math, and made three times the recipe shown below. I did the 8″ pans with the first batch, the 6″ pans + a 10″ pan with the second batch, and two 10″ pans with the third batch. 

To make things efficient, I greased and lined the pans at the start. I also measured out my butter + sugar + lemon zest into three bowls at the start. 

LEMON CAKE (adapted from Layered )

650 g cake flour

3 tsp. baking powder

1.5 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. salt

340 g unsalted butter (room temp)

600 g granulated sugar

20 g lemon zest

1.5 tsp. vanilla

2 eggs

6 egg yolks

1 tsp. lemon extract

2 tbsp. lemon juice

485 g buttermilk

DIRECTIONS

Preheat the oven to 350 F. Line and grease the cake pans. 

In a stand mixer (with paddle attachment) mix the butter, sugar, and zest until smooth and fluffy. It should go to a white-ish colour. 

While butter is mixing, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in another bowl. 

Add the vanilla to the butter mixture. Add in the eggs one at a time. Add the lemon extract and lemon juice. 

At low speed, alternate adding the flour mixture and buttermilk to the butter mixture, starting and ending with the flour mixture. 

Using a scale, evenly divide batter between the cake pans. 

Bake until a toothpick comes out clean (>20 minutes)

Let the cakes cook for 20 minutes and then invert onto cooling racks. 

Notes: 

I did my calculations to simplify things, but they are a little off. Basically, I considered the 3 x 6″ pans to be a single batch, the 3 x 8″ pans to be a double batch, and the 3 x 10″ pans to be a triple batch. Technically, if the 3 x 6″ pans are a single batch, the 3 x 8″ pans are a 1.8x batch, and the 3 x 10″ pans are a 2.8x batch. I decided this was close enough, and just cut more off the tops. 

To make things efficient I just got batter prepared while the previous cakes were baking. 

I used a lot of lemon since the first cake I made barely had any lemon flavour. 

Each cake (after torting) ends up at about 5.5″ (14 cm) tall

I left the butter out overnight which got it to the perfect temperature (in Vancouver summer) 

I made 2.5 batches of buttercream to ice the cake. I didn’t actually need as much since I used jam inside the cake. I tried to make raspberry icing, but I couldn’t not get the flavour across. Gina didn’t want seeds in the icing, but it seems like the straining process strained away the flavour as well. I decided to bypass adding any raspberry to the icing and to just let the jam impart the flavour. 

SWISS MERINGUE BUTTERCREAM (adapted from Layered )

240 g egg whites

400 g granulated sugar

675 unsalted butter

1 tbsp. vanilla

DIRECTIONS

Put the egg whites and sugar in a stand mixer bowl and whisk together immediately. 

Put the bowl over a bain marie (making sure it doesn’t touch the water)

Whisk the mixture until it reaches 72 C. 

Remove the bowl and place it into the stand mixer. Mix with the whisk attachment on high speed until the bowl is room temperature (8 - 10 mins).

Switch to the paddle attachment and add in butter a few spoons at a time (at low speed). Add in vanilla once butter is added.

Increase to medium speed and beat until the buttercream is silky looking. 

Notes:

Again, the butter being left out overnight allowed for the perfect consistency. 

If something looks wrong, it can probably be fixed. There are a ton of resources on troubleshooting SMBC woes. 

If you have to mix this out of the fridge, it may change colour. The icing I brought with me to the wedding changed colour and I couldn’t use it on the cake. 

ASSEMBLY

Once the cakes have all cooled, torte them. I used my cake leveler to do this. I suggest doing this after you’re done all of the cakes so that they can be cut to identical sizes. 

After torting, I used a pastry brush to apply a simple syrup. I just did a a 1:1 sugar:water mixture with some cut up lemons. 

Once the cake layers were prepared, I got each tier ready. I used my first batch of icing to create domes and filled the insides with jam. I also did a very thin crumb coat, and refrigerated the tiers overnight. I built each tier on its respective cake board. 

The next day, I prepared a second and third batch of icing. I tried to get the first day’s icing close to the colour I wanted, but I wasn’t super concerned since it would all be covered. 

I coloured the icing appropriately and iced each tier. Once iced, I stuck them back in the fridge. 

I picked up some food grade dowels to place in the bottom two tiers. I used a hacksaw and mitre box to cut them to size (although I was really considering buying a bandsaw). I am pretty sure I gratuitously doweled, but better to be overdoweled than underdoweled! 

I used some non slip mats to put the cake tiers in cardboard boxes for transportation, and then prayed that they didn’t move in the car. 

Once at the venue, I stacked the tiers! My icing changed colour so I just used flowers and greenery to hide things that weren’t perfect. 

I made a really giant amount of this (13″ X 18″ pan), so the recipe below is halved for a 9″ X 13″ pan. Parts of the recipe are adopted from this Nanaimo bar recipe. 

NANAIMO BAR BASE

INGREDIENTS

225 g (1 cup) unsalted butter, cubed

100 g (1/2 cup) granulated sugar

62 g (1/2 cup + 2 tbsp.) cocoa

2 eggs

3.5 cups graham crumbs

2 cups flaked coconut

1 cup chopped almonds (optional)

DIRECTIONS

Line a 9″ X 13″ pan with parchment paper. 

On a bain marie, mix together the butter, sugar, and cocoa until melted and smooth. 

In a bowl, mix together the two eggs. 

Pour a little bit of the hot chocolate mixture into the eggs and mix rapidly to temper the eggs. 

Pour the egg mixture back into the chocolate mixture and mix until thick. 

Remove from heat and mix in the graham crumbs and coconut (and almonds)

Press into the pan in an even layer. 

CREME PATISSIERE

INGREDIENTS

500 ml full fat milk

100g granulated sugar

40g cornstarch

2 egg yolks

half a vanilla bean

DIRECTIONS

Pour ¾ of milk into a saucepan, and ¼ into a separate bowl.

Put the saucepan over medium heat, and add in the split vanilla pod and seeds.

Dissolve the sugar and cornstarch into the bowl, and then mix in the yolks. Whisk extremely well to get out any lumps.

When the milk comes to a boil, pour half of it on the egg mixture (and mix well) to temper the eggs. Then add the egg mixture back into the saucepan, and whisk hard!

When it starts to boil, take off heat.

After it has cooled for a few minutes, pour onto the graham layer. 

Notes:

Use a whisk!

Cornstarch binds at 72˚C, but it’s a good idea to cook until boiling.

If you mix the heated custard in a machine until cold, you’ll get a very fine and smooth custard

CHOCOLATE COATING

INGREDIENTS

250 g dark chocolate

20 g butter

DIRECTIONS

Melt the chocolate and butter over a bain marie. 

When it has cooled slightly, pour over the pastry cream and even out

Notes:

CANNOLIS

INGREDIENTS

25 g butter

175 cake flour

2 g baking powder

35 g sugar

1 egg

25 g white wine

DIRECTIONS

Rub the butter into the flour + baking powder.

Mix in the sugar, egg, and wine until smooth. Don’t over work the dough. 

Flatten out the dough, wrap it in plastic wrap, and refrigerate until firm (up to 3 days). 

Using a floured surface, roll out the dough. 

Cut circles and fold them over cannoli tubes, using water to seal the edges together. 

Deep fry (350 - 375 F) until golden brown. 

Notes: 

More sugar = lower frying temperature

If you fry them properly, the oil shouldn’t penetrate too much. 

If you don’t have white wine, water also works. 

RICOTTA FILLING

INGREDIENTS

220 g ricotta cheese

25 g sugar

15 g dark chocolate chunks

15 candied orange peel

15 g candied lemon peel

15 g cranberries

DIRECTIONS

Chop up the dry fruits/nuts/candied peels/chocolate.

Combine everything together. 

Pipe inside the cannoli shells and and dust with icing sugar. 

VANILLA PANNA COTTA

INGREDIENTS

6 g gelatin sheet

180 mL homo milk

200 mL whipping cream

65 g granulated sugar

Vanilla

2 coffee beans

1 pinch lemon zest

DIRECTIONS

Bloom the gelatin in cold water

In a saucepan, combine the rest of the ingredients. Heat them over a low heat to give the flavours more time to infuse.

Dissolve the gelatin in the liquid, strain, and fill the containers.

Let the panna cotta set in the fridge. 

Overturn the panna cotta once it has set. 

STRAWBERRY CONSOMME

INGREDIENTS

250 g strawberries

40 g fresh raspberries

20 g granulated sugar

1 tsp. lemon juice

DIRECTIONS

Wash and halve the strawberries. 

Toss the strawberries, raspberries, sugar, and lemon juice in a metal bowl

Cover the bowl, and place over a water bath for 3 hours.