This week, I must admit, has been humbling. During the past few days I’ve found myself on-the-hunt for my sense of humor and good will. This is not a week when I’ve felt the love from either our Dorie or Mother Nature.
Today the French Fridays with Dorie recipe choice is Almond-Orange Tuiles (pronounced tweel), a paper-thin cookie and perennial favorite in France. Dorie describes tuiles perfectly, “lacy, fragile, light, curved and naturally elegant.”
Heavy sigh.
Wednesday evening I mixed together the tuiles batter, consisting of sugar, flour, Bob’s Red Mill Almond Meal/Flour, orange juice and butter, for an overnight sleepover in the fridge. So far, so perfect. Thursday morning I woke up with a can-do attitude, threw on my bathrobe and charged into the kitchen to bake these treasured gems.
I noticed, however, I already had a text from Melissa, my daughter who lives in California. “I am sorry about the Aspen weather, Mom. Not to be bossy, but maybe you should stay inside today.”
I fired up my Mac and clicked to our weather link. Throughout the night the snow accumulation in Aspen had jumped to more than 14”. Not too alarming. We need the snow. The temperature? Currently registering at minus-17 degrees Fahrenheit. (For my international readers, that’s -27.222 degrees Celsius.) Baby, it’s cold outside.
Amazed but undeterred I soldiered on, precisely following Dorie’s instructions, suggestions and tips. The result? This is a cookie that fights an amateur baker like me every step of the way, from the initial hand-rolled ball to the moment it curves over the rolling pin.
I ate my tuiles with my morning coffee and enjoyed every crumb. I came. I saw. I didn’t conquer. Tuiles-la-la.
STILL LIFE: Almond-Orange Tuiles at -17 degrees and 14 inches of snow.
While I may not have excelled at cookie baking this week, I did shine in another department. Although I choose to call The Gant my home, it is really a destination hotel and resort with no covered parking. Therefore when the weather is fierce, my vehicle is brutalized. If cars could talk, mine would be filing for divorce.
Determined to make nice, I bundled up, grabbed a shovel, window scraper and spent more than an hour cleaning it. I don’t mind admitting I was quite “I-did-it–myself-proud” of the result.
These are frigid and snowy times throughout most of North America. To all my readers, not to be bossy, please take care and be safe for the next few days. Mother Nature is quite unforgiving right now.
For all of us belonging to French Fridays with Dorie and Tuesdays withDorie: Baking with Julie, this is a very special day and opportunity to raise our whisks in celebration of our leader. Today, October 24th, is Dorie Greenspan’s birthday. We are honoring you, dear Dorie, with good wishes and baking efforts and love………..
First, Our Birthday Beauty Makeover
Mary & Dorie, Au Naturel, International Food Bloggers Conference in Seattle
Recently, at the IFBC in Seattle, many FFWD participants were able to meet you, Dorie. Knowing we each dreamed of a photo op to mark the occasion you were ever the good sport and didn’t disappoint. After posting our picture on my blog, Lights on Bright no Brakes, my good friend, artist Dale Hollinger (KarlHollinger), decided a beauty makeover would be a giggle. Since my birthday was October 22 and yours, two days later, Dale got busy and sent us her gift. You and Michael [Dorie’s husband] and I were amazed by the power of rouge, lipstick and airbrushing. We thank you, Dale, for a vision of “us” we never had.
A Birthday Bash and Two Cakes
When my friends discovered your birthday was also this week, Dorie, they included you in my October 22nd celebration. Happy Birthday and a healthy year ahead from (l to r) DonnaDeux (the two Donnas), Charlotte, Bernie, Kathy, Fred and me with Stephen and Michael, behind the lens. All of them have shared many FFWD recipes with me and consider you part of “the” family!
While I will write about my delicious and unique birthday dinner in another post, I did want to show you our birthday cakes. The blonder Donna made me a classic Hummingbird Cake using the same recipe that renown Chef Art Smith made for Oprah’s 50th Birthday Bash. It was a moist, amazing banana cake with a tropical pineapple twist and delicious cream cheese frosting. I’m a Birder. It was the perfect choice.
For you, I made the Classic Banana Bundt Cake from your cookbook, “Baking, From my Home to Yours”. To my eyes (and, I hope, to yours), this little beauty is a thing of wonder and amazement. Dorie, this is the first baking success I’ve had since returning to Aspen and 8,200‘ altitude. Although I haven’t yetmade a cut,I just know it’s as ‘dense, moist and extremely banana-y‘ as you describe it to be.
From a loyal member of your flock, Dorie, I wish you a wonderful and happy day and a year ahead filled with good health, continued professional successes, and making more joyful memories with friends and family. To see the birthday greetings of other colleagues who also cook-the-books, go to our French Friday with Dorie and Tuesdays with Dorie:Baking with Julia links.
This week’s French Fridays with Dorie recipe is Caramel-Almond Custard Tart, a delightfully delicious dessert and a classic. To be honest, it was by-the-book-classic until Dorie lessened the sugar, carmelized the custard pudding and added one cup of lightly-toasted sliced almonds to intensify the flavor.
Although not terribly difficult to toss together, my caramelization process suffered in color. I tend to blame my high-altitude adjustments. Or, non-adjustments. Moving from Nevada’s 2,181’ altitude to Aspen’s 7,890’ has further damaged my fragile baking ego. (Not yet discussing last week’s bruising cookie fail.)
This particular pastry concoction is not ready-for-prime-time at my dinner table. However, my Dorista colleagues give it an enthusiastic toques up so check out their tastier versions here.
The beautiful Clark’s Nutcracker ……..birds.audubon.org
While I am still struggling with altitude adjustments, let’s chat about someone who isn’t. Today’s Post honors the Clark’s Nutcracker. This full-time resident flies high (and, nosily with its throaty squawks) despite oxygen deprivation, weather and predator aggravation. Discovered by you-know-who during the 1804-1806 Lewis & Clark Expedition, it has nested in the mountains over two million years. Survival longevity is just a minor phenom about this incredible creature.
This week, besides the Caramel-Almond Custard Tart, I also prepared a presentation for my nature-study group about our forty or so non-migratory birds who survive our winters and live to chirp about it. The Clark’s is my favorite.
This nutcracker is all about cache-and-carry with a diet of pine nuts** being its primary source of survival during our challenging frigid months. Each fall this 4.6 oz. bird removes seeds from fallen pine cones, not rendered easily, to bury in the ground. By the first heavy snowfall, each bird may have concealed 98,000 seeds in 30,000 caches.
The extraordinary Clark’s Nutcracker…..nextdoornature.org
Are you kidding me?
Nutcrackers have a unique sublingual pouch, an opening in the floor of the mouth beneath it’s tongue. They can cram more than eighty pine nuts (seeds) into their pouch before flying nearby or miles away to a cache site. One-by-one they bring up each seed and bury it about an inch beneath the ground, one seed or fifteen to a cache.
Wait, there’s more.
Where can I cache my seeds? birdingisfun.com Robert Mortensen
What’s hidden must be found and these birds rely solely on their long-term memory to retrieve each high-energy morsel. Despite the snows which alter the landscape, they appear to triangulate, remembering boulders, tree, stumps and logs as markers. Each year they recover about half their seeds, leaving the others to germinate and propagate future forests.
When hiking this fall, it’s rather exhausting to watch the frenetic pace of the Clark’s and others – jays, woodpeckers, chickadees – as they fortify their bodies and their food supply chains to weather the coming months. I’m reminded that many of nature’s critters residing in the northern hemisphere are also making preparations in their own particular and unique manner.
Loyal readers, this seemed an ideal opportunity to salute these creatures, great and small, who enrich our lives and bring us pleasure. Thank you for sharing this blog post with me.
** A nut is a seed but not all seeds are not. In this Post the terms are used interchangeably.
Thanks to Wild at Heart by Janis Lindsey Huggins and Made for Each Other by Ronald M. Lanner for teaching me about the Clark’s Nutcracker
If I had tried to orchestrate this week’s French Friday with Dorie recipe scenario, I could not have done better. From beginning to end, it was the perfect storm.
Literally.
Springtime in Colorado
Today’s recipe is Financiers(fee-nahn-see-AY), tiny rich buttery cakes. created a century ago at a patisserie near the Bourse (the French Wall Street). These treats were popular with stockbrokers as pick-me-up, finger food.
What makes these exceptionally delicious is beurre noisette, (brown butter). Financiers require oodles of butter. When cooked to a golden brown coloring, it acquires a nutty flavor. NOTE: Go the extra mile and brown your butter.
Beurre Noisette, in the making…
One cup of sugar and almond flour, 2/3 cup A-P flour and 6 egg whites later, you’ve got batter ready to chill for an hour or two. Overnight is better.
Although the Financiers can be any petite shape, I only could find a mini-muffin tin in my moving boxes. I found gorgeous raspberries at the store. Thus, fruit Financiers. To celebrate my first week in Aspen, I decided to share the spoils with the young people manning our front office.
To those of you who have asked, The Gant, my new home, is an 143-condominium complex located in the heart of downtown Aspen. Built in 1975, each condo is individually owned. It is basically a resort rental complex with all the amenities and staff (100) that go along with that moniker. Most homeowners come for the summer, holidays and a week or two during the ski season. Only 8 other owners live here full-time.
Nine years ago, because of my husband’s health, we needed to escape the altitude, find a kinder climate and be nearer our kids. After selling our house and thinking we could at least enjoy the Aspen summers, I bought a condo here at The Gant. When it became apparent we couldn’t return, Donnie Lee, the general manager, promised me, since my hands were full, that they would take care of our condo. Whenever they needed to buy, build, install, improve, or change something in my place, someone would call to get my approval. They did the rest. Every year I’d return for 3 or 4 days to check in. That’s why I’m lucky enough to know all the staff and consider them family.
Mr. Lee, the Boss
Now back to the Financiers. After whipping up the batter Monday evening, I woke up early Tuesday to a raging spring snowstorm. Really? Wouldn’t warm little raspberry mini-muffins (the staff’s eventual name for my Financiers) be a tasty treat for the front desk staff who often work outside as well as in?
I filled the buttered molds with batter and raspberries and baked them 18 minutes until golden and springy to the touch. They popped out easily and, while still warm, I covered them carefully and pulled on my boots and heavy jacket to scurry over to the office.
Here’s what I can say about the Financiers. There is no photo because I didn’t have the heart to freeze-frame the staff’s enthusiasm, insisting they pose for this Post. However, with apologies to Roger Ebert, the bellmen each gave them a Ten-Fingers Up.
To see the absolutely gorgeous, fancier Financiers that my colleagues made this week, go here.
Welcome to my first Work-in-Progress Post. This week’s French Friday withDorie recipe is the very appropriate and élégant Coeur à la Crème.
The most difficult part of making this week’s recipe was finding the heart-shaped molds. I finally found two 7-inch molds at Sur La Table. Guess where???? On The Las Vegas Strip. Go figure. FANTES.COM
Explanation, please. According to Barron’s Food Lover’s Companion, KEWR ah la KREHM is French for heart with cream. This classic dessert is made in a special heart-shaped mold with holes and little feet to hold it up. Cream cheese is mixed with sour cream or whipping cream (and, sometimes confectionary sugar) and placed into the cheesecloth-lined mold. The dessert is then refrigerated overnight, during which time the whey (liquid) drains out through the perforated mold. To serve, the dessert is unmolded and garnished with a coulis and fresh fruit.
After beating cream cheese, confectionary sugar, salt and vanilla to a smooth and velvety texture, it was set aside. We whipped heavy cream until it just began to hold firm peaks. (pictured here).
Like many of you, I had seen pictures of this classic dessert in fancy food magazines but had never eaten it nor even considered making it. That’s one of the many reasons I joined FFWD. To belong to this cooking group and remain in good standing, you must cook each week ……a specific recipe for the team.
We folded the cream cheese mixture gently into the whipped cream AFTER FIRST gently stirring about one-quarter of the whipped cfream mixture into the cream cheese to “lighten” it. After fitting a dampened cheesecloth square into each heart, we filled the molds.
Admittedly, I’ve never been considered a team player. At a recent birthday gathering I was described as “tenaciously independent” – by a family member. Although said more in exasperation than jest, it really wasn’t meant to be a compliment.
But, as a Dorista, I’ve been a pussy cat, so onward and upward to making what Dorie describes as “an indulgently luxurious coeur à la crème with a texture so light you could fool yourself into thinking you were eating sweetened air.’”
After filling the molds, we folded and wrapped them in the dampened cheesecloth and put in the refrigerator to chill overnight. This dessert can be made up to three days in advance.
Realizing that I would be in Colorado for this week’s food project, I loaded and lugged my KitchenAid mixer, the non-refrigerated ingredients and two 7-inch heart-shaped molds to Aspen. My friends, Donna and Bernie, are hosting a dinner party for me tonight so I offered to bring dessert. Donna, not only a delightful hostess but also a talented cook, suggested we make this dessert together, a first for both of us.
For the topping (ever so slight), we made a raspberry coulis by pureeing frozen raspberries, staining the seeds, and adding framboise. Incidentally, the raspberries were from Serbia which we found interesting.
Yesterday morning (Thursday), we made this little bit of dessert heaven, needing very few ingredients, with no trouble at all. It was simple. So far. So good. We refrigerated our two molds and filled a strainer with the leftover batter to chill overnight. We cannot wait until tonight to unmold our coeurs, drizzle our homemade raspberry coulis over the top, toss a few raspberries on the plate and present what we hope is party perfection to our eager taste-testing friends. May the hooping and hollering begin. Photos to follow.
Tonight, Donna and I will unveil and serve our FFWD Coeur à la Crème. Feeling a little pressure. Just like in Nevada, my friends here are all extremely fine cooks so I want this to look beautiful and taste wonderfully. These are good friends, after all, all in fun, but this has been a week-long “talk-in-progress” so here’s hoping for another Dorie-success story. Photos to be posted – success or failure – later this evening.
If you want to make this heart dessert , find the recipe here. To see the finished Posts of my colleagues, go here. I would like to urge you readers to buy the cookbook we are using for FFWD, “Around My French Table”, by Dorie Greenspan. Even if you don’t want to make some of the recipes I post every week (and, as you know, I don’t love everything), there isn’t a week that goes by that I don’t learn some terrific technique or clue or idea or variation from this cookbook. Dorie takes complicated recipes down to simple and enables the average cook (which I am) to succeed , flourish and have a great time. My book’s cover is torn, some pages are stained, there are coffee rings on others, and many corners are dog-eared. It’s a cookbook with character, that’s for sure, and I so enjoy using it every week.