Canele Je t'aime

Canele de Bordeaux

This is a story of beauty and the beeswax. There is a happy ending.

It's all about the Canele de Bordeaux, a little cake originating from the French city of that name. Caneles are available throughout France but in Dallas, we know of only one bakery offering them, the boulangerie Village Baking Co.

The canele is rare and fabulous (like creme brulee once was), a combination of caramelized exterior with a soft, almost custardy interior. There's a bit of something more on the outside that you can't quite name.

Many stories involving nuns, thefts of flour along the waterfront and other mysteries surround the canele, and Paula Wolfert has those tales to tell. Let's just say whenever French patissiers form a confrérie (brotherhood) to protect a product, it's important news. The confrérie establishes standards to protect the tradition, in this case, for the canele.

Even before the first bite, you notice the shape - it's small, circular like a Doric column and fluted. It has a little indentation on top, which offers room for a good apricot jam, a dollop of pastry cream or a single cherry.

To make it, you need a canele mold.

These can range from the pricey $8 mold to the eye-popping $25 copper version from Amazon. (Silicone molds are out there, with varying degrees of performance vs. the metal molds.)

Next, you need a method that has worked out all the issues of timing and temperature. The canele method from Chez Pim performs deliciously well. Pictures and directions carefully walk you through the key steps.

That crunchy but elusive exterior ingredient comes from beeswax. In a 1-1 ratio, a bit of edible beeswax gets melted with butter and coats the mold's interior. Chez Pim shows you what happens if you don't use it. This baker found beeswax essential for the taste and texture, giving a hint of honey essence. Find beeswax wherever honey is sold at farmers' markets.

Tip from the beekeeper: Freeze your beeswax. When ready to use, place in a plastic bag and hit it with a hammer; it will splinter for easy melting, better than trying to cut it up.

We had a silicone mold and one Canele Bordelais Mold ("Bordelais" meaning "of Bordeaux"), so we tried the batter in each type. Result? We rushed out to buy the rest of the Sur La Table metal molds. The silicone mold was floppy, so it didn't sit straight on the rack when in the oven. The fluted edges weren't clean and sharp, the uneven distribution of heat left the interior sagging once out of the mold (leaning tower of pisa) and worst of all, some of the batter spilled onto the surface of the silicone and quickly burned there. We have not been able to clean off the residue. We'll stick to metal.

Notes: At a small dinner, we served the caneles with a dollop of pastry cream and handed out some caramel sauce. The hostess brought out gelato and voila, magic. The leftovers were frozen and are holding up well, at least for a week. For the batter, we chose Grand Marnier over rum. Otherwise, we followed the Chez Pim method and will do it again and again. Plan ahead if making for an event. The batter must rest about 48 hours in the fridge.

Canele de Bordeaux makes the treat tray for the dinner with the boss (see previous posts), because it soars on all levels. It's portable. It fits in the hand. It's lovely to look at and beautiful when tasted, not overly cloyingly sweet like that other character, The Cronut. 

It's rare and it's fabulous.

After all, it has its own brotherhood keeping watch.

Be Holed, the Cronut

Lemon Glazed and Cinnamon Sugar Croissant-Based Doughnuts

Last post, we looked at must-have goodies for a treat tray to take to El Jefe's house. There were chocolate chip cookies and fudgy finds, brownies, favorites and sure bets.

Then I got greedy and started messing around, for that is what happens if you go for the Cronut, butter and sugar go everywhere. My first inkling of this croissant-doughnut breakout star came from the British - who wondered (with longing) if the New York sensation of Dominique Ansel Bakery would cross the pond. You can read about it in The Guardian.

I checked with the talented and gifted Ellen Colon-Lugo, who knows her NYC from top to bottom, to see if she had heard of the new rage in town. Her European interns at Ellen Christine Millinery have joined the long line at the bakery ever since, hoping for a capture.  Like The Guardian's reporter I wondered, could you make a Cronut at home, and could you do it well enough for the boss?

The answer is yes, but.

To the question "would you make it again" the answer is no, but.

The real deal is a proprietary pastry for Chef Ansel and as such is a trade secret. The rest of us are just attempting a knock-off, and if you want to, the method I followed is from the KitchenSurfing blog. Please know going in that you can achieve a delicious combination of crunchy exterior and creamy, layered interior with a sugary glaze that seals the deal. Yes, you can make it, but should you?

My "yes, but" answer means that if you follow KitchenSurfing's method, you will get a show-stopping pastry that comes close to the superstar. (Let me know how the croissant dough works out; I used my own batch, long ago embraced from Gayle's Bakery in Capitola, California.)

That said . . .

My "no, but" answer is tied to three small points. The Cronut is 1. rolled in sugar; 2. filled with cream; and 3. topped with glaze (quoting from the bakery here). In short, if you make it, you daren't eat it.

Remember, it starts as croissant dough. Butter, butter everywhere.

Then it is deep-fried, sugared, creamed and glazed. Yes, I did eat it and certainly, it was magnificent. The richest indulgence ever. It is also a guilt-inducing madness of artistic genius and a marketing marvel, too. There isn't a person I've met who hasn't heard of the Cronut.

No I won't make it again, but it is a wowza.

Awright so if you're going to do it, I did learn a thing or two.

1. KitchenSurfing suggests you cut two circles (and two smaller circles out of the middle), then stack the two together. The dough rose just fine, but once it hit the hot oil, the top piece started to fry away from the bottom piece, that is, sort of topple over, lopsided. I could see it would never stack attractively, so I separated the two while they were still in the oil, and continued frying them as if they were doughnuts. As you see in the photo, they look like doughnuts, but that's OK because do you really want to put a pastry the height of two doughnuts in your mouth?

2. The Ansel Bakery uses grapeseed oil for frying, but I went with good old canola. Grapeseed is expensive, and this was only a test run, n'est-ce pas?

3. KitchenSurfing called for rolling the fried rings in a sugar/cinnamon combo, but it made them very sweet (and recall, there was still a glaze to come). I preferred the plain version.

4. KS also used a chocolate glaze, but that seemed in theory just too rich, so I used a lemon glaze from Heartbreak Recovery Kitchen. A hint of acid always helps sell the sugar. We're in the business of selling sugar, so a little acid is a must. (That's what lemon juice, buttermilk, sour cream and vinegar do). Jacquy Pfeiffer of the French Pastry School in Chicago told me that. He would know.

5. The Cronut's shelf life is short and does not include the refrigerator, so it will not make it on the treat tray.

Now the Canele de Bordeaux on the other hand . . . next time I give it the glory.

If You Give a Boss a Cookie

Chocolate chip cookies, oatmeal cookies, coconut macarons, Pave Montmartre almond cake

Peanutty blondies with fudge icing, brownies, french chocolate macarons with raspberry buttercream

We're invited for dinner with the boss. To the eternal question "What Can I Bring" he replied, "BYOB, but if you want to do pastry, sure."

We live in Dante's Inferno - better known as the month of August in Texas. Most desserts have no chance of making it from my house to the party without melting, sweltering or falling face down on hot pavement. Rather than sweat this assignment, I'll turn to the experts in cookies and brownies and come up with a Treat Tray. Good plan.

These recipes deliver in ways that delight a crowd.

Find David Leite's article "The Quest for the Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookie" in The New York Times, then try his recipe, adapted from "Mr. Chocolate" Jacques Torres. Right now I have a big batch of this dough "aging" overnight in the fridge. This cookie dough is so good, you could save it in the freezer for those times when friends need immediate solace. (I once soothed a co-worker with a log of cookie dough at the office. We hid in a closet and ate it.)

Dorie Greenspan shares her "Salted Butter Breakups," and thank goodness. This unusual cookie is crunchy on the outside, tender on the inside and attractively scored with cross hatches made by a fork. It's meant to be rolled out large and served in one giant piece for the table, allowing guests to break off what they want. For my purposes, I might precut it into diamond shapes so they fit on the tray.

Another Greenspan gem is the Peanuttiest Blondie from her book "Baking From My Home to Yours." A blondie makes a good visual counterpoint to the ubiquitous chocolate version, so try this nutty recipe loaded with peanut butter, nuts and chocolate chips. I added 1/2 teaspoon of cardamom after generously adding peanut butter, which left the dough too much of a good thing. Cardamom and peanut butter, make a note.

Speaking of brownies, Smitten Kitchen has a wonderful version The Huffington Post called "the only brownie recipe you'll ever need." No more fussing with how much and what kind of chocolate makes the best brownie - this recipe uses Dutch Process cocoa powder. My DP cocoa of choice is the E. Guittard Cocoa Rouge.  I took this brownie to Iowa for the annual Ragbrai bike ride across the state. I needed more than I brought. It disappeared faster than a certain bike team riding with a certain former Tour de France winner. The brownie is a champion.

Over on the Heartbreak Recovery Kitchen site, Jeanne Ambrose has a "Quick Salted Caramel Fudge" that's a great answer to a day of too many meetings. It's no-bake, it's fast, it's good for the soul. If you don't have Dulce de Leche for the top coat, may I suggest the caramel sauce at Epicurious.com?

By the way, have you noticed how I love to mention Jeanne, who talks about David Leite, who talks about Dorie Greenspan, who knows Ruth Reichl? When you find what you like, it's natural to share what you love in this sweet world. My fantasy birthday party would include all of them, the good folks from King Arthur Flour (Jeffrey Hamelman, this means you!) and Kathleen Flinn, the one who wrote "The Sharper Your Knife the Less You Cry." Why not Jacques Torres himself? Feel free to tell me who else should be there.

Speaking of Reichl, there is a chance I'll go overboard with the treat tray concept and spin the ice cream in Reichl's post on the classic American sundae. The vanilla ice cream and the fudge sauce are the stuff of childhood happy faces. This could truly impress the boss' two children.

Finally in thinking about treats, I scribbled these coconut macaroons from a magazine page found floating around in a salon. They remind me of what macaroons used to be before French fashion took over and we all learned how to make the shells and buttercreams of a fancier dessert. I like that little twist with the lime. I recently interviewed the winner of a cookie contest. She adds gin to hers.

Lime Coconut Macaroons

2 large egg whites

¼ cup sugar

1 tablespoon grated lime zest

¼ tsp kosher salt

7 ounces coconut (4 cups)

Preheat oven to 325.

Whisk egg whites and sugar in a large bowl to combine until frothy. Whisk in lime zest and salt, add coconut, fold to coat. Drop by tablespoons on a parchment-lined baking sheet.

Bake 18-22 minutes, rotating halfway through.

Store in airtight container at room temp. They freeze beautifully.

Did I say finally? For visual appeal, let's add on. It's for the boss, after all.

Strassburger Cookies
(adapted from a final exam at Le Cordon Bleu)

Unsalted butter, room temp          6 oz

Powdered sugar                                4 oz

Eggs                                                    1 each

Yolks                                                   1 each

Vanilla extract                                   ½ tsp

Cake flour                                          10 oz

Cardamom                                         ½ tsp

Raspberry jam (or other for finishing)

Preheat oven: 360

           

1.     In the bowl of a stand mixer, cream butter, powdered sugar and cardamom until light and fluffy, about 2-3 minutes.

2.     Add egg and yolk, one at a time, mixing between each to incorporate. Add vanilla and continue mixing.

3.     Add cake flour and mix until incorporated and all flour is worked in, but don’t overmix.

4.     Fill piping bag fitted with star tip, pipe out cookies in figure eight shapes onto baking sheets lined with parchment.

5.     In separate piping bag, add raspberry jam, then pipe in two places in the middle of the figure eight shape.

6.     Bake 3 minutes, rotate pan, bake 3 more minutes or until edges just begin to brown. Remove to a cooling rack.

Eye on the Pie of Iowa

A homemade pie of blueberries and gooseberries, Eastern Iowa

Pie is out there. That's the good news. Could there be any bad news? Well, yes.

In a recent journey through Iowa during Ragbrai, the annual bike ride across the Hawkeye State, many pies were sighted. Some were tried. Few measured up.

So let's get into this. If the "eyes eat first," as the saying goes, overall crust execution is key, whether selling in a bakery or along a bike route.

Is the pie crust thick, thin, attractively crimped? How's the score on top? What's the overall effect? Let's examine the "Blue Goose" pie in the photo above. The crimped edge is heavy compared with the thin top crust. During baking, the edge broke away from the top. The good scoring of a swirl pattern with tiny fork cross hatches gets lost under the juice spilling over it. That suggests this fruit pie of blueberries and gooseberries is not thickened enough. The vendor heard my "hmmm," and quickly admitted the interior was runny, but she did add "lots of flour."

I forked over the $13 for Blue Goose because I had to taste that blue and goo berry combo.

I wanted to tell her to read the "Thickening of Fruit Pies" entry on King Arthur Flour's blog, but I held my tongue. Thickening with flour is old school. Cornstarch is a better choice, as is Clearjel, made from waxy maize. (Learn more about Clearjel here.) Read the KAF blog entry for a comparison of fruit pie thickeners.

The Blue Goose crust seems to be from the Crisco Generation - I'd suggest heave-hoeing the shortening and going with unsalted butter for better flavor. The interior was a good blend of tart and sweet - not too overpowering in either direction, but it was also the consistency of soup. Berries should not float in their own juices.

The Blue Goose met a bad end in a gas station. The riders in our camp would have none of it. This is a shame, because I'm sure it was made with love. There is no shortage of love in Iowa.

In Western Iowa, women from a Methodist Church had the right idea.

This raspberry pie had a delicate, well-rolled-out top layer, was caramelized nicely, and had diminutive crimped edges (nobody eats those thick crimped edges; they're always left behind). The interior was all berry, though it appears a bit runny in the photo. This pie showcased the fresh raspberries, not the pie crust, with satisfying results. The women had an irresistible marketing edge, too. One of them had a tremendous voice. Her bleating of "peeeaaach pie" in singsong auctioneer style drew me across a crowded street of bike riders. The local TV station stuck a microphone under her chin to catch the delivery.

At the beginning of Ragbrai, we saw these offerings.

They might have been delicious - they just looked damaged, or handled roughly, so we passed. As Carl Sagan said it, "If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe." Handle with care.

We wish we could go back to Eldon, Iowa, and the American Gothic House to meet Beth Howard, known as "The Pie Lady." Her Shaker Lemon Pie at theworldneedsmorepie.com looks just like what we wanted - thick, fruity interior, light hand on top with the crust.

Word of mouth.

Before entering Iowa, we visited one of those bakery restaurants in Nebraska where the menu is deep, the pastry case extensive and the shelves stacked with fresh bread. Our two cents? Offer less and do it better. More does not make better. Better is better. The pie prop in the following photo has a better lattice top than what we saw.

Piece out.

A fine pie prop made of balloons, Minden, Iowa