Baked Rice Pudding

Projectile Rice Pudding: A Baker's Piston (PV=nRT?)

During a short visit to my parent's place, I decided that I'd make rice pudding with raisins (my father's favorite), but with a twist! As opposed to the traditional rice pudding, I thought that I'd bake it with a graham cracker base and try it out with a little bit of lemon. Although I did enjoy it, it should be noted that people generally don't like it when you alter traditions... (On a side note, happy Father's Day!)

This recipe was borrowed from the 50th Anniversary Joy of Cooking cookbook, I think. (05/19/2013)

Spinach Fatayer

Spinach Fatayer: A delicious filling wrapped in a light pastry!!

Oh man. I really liked these... 

Each of the fatayers hide a rich filling composed of spinach, ground beef, green olives and cheese among other things, which makes this (in my eyes!) a seemingly healthy snack! Needless to say, I wouldn't hesitate to substitute a pile of these for a whole meal...

The recipe for these was snagged off of Delices d'Orient's blog, which can be found here! (These were made 05/16/2013...)

Amandin

Amandin - A Superb Orange and Almond Flavored Cake

Doesn't that look pretty!? Not only that, but this happens to be one of the few posts that I can actually tell you how it tastes too! Since I know you're wondering, I'll tell you! "Awesome".

Never heard of an amandin before? No worries! Neither had I. I was venturing for recipes with orange in Pierre Hermé's "Le Larousse des Desserts" this morning and this one happened to appear, fortunately. Seeing that it had a small selection of ingredients, virtually no butter and a reasonable amount of sugar, I was set on baking this.

So, what does it taste like? Would this be right for you? I'm actually rather bad at giving descriptions; however, since I have actually tried it before posting, I'll do my best to help you out!! The amandin is a moist, lightly sweet orange and almond dependent cake that is not too dense and not too light. For me, the density was just right. The texture is very smooth and the cake is held together rather well, so you don't need to worry about finding that elusive steak knife or taking a bath in cake crumbs by the time you finish. This is definitely something that I'd like to make again.

What are the ingredients and how is it made? Well, let me tell you!! (Taken and adapted from Pierre Hermé's "Le Larousse des Desserts")

Mango Carrot Cake

Carrot Cake: Carrots? Yes. Cream Cheese Icing? Yes. Mangoes? Hmm...

A mango carrot cake, you say?

Yes, that is indeed what we have! I thought that it was an interesting spin off of the traditional carrot cake and I wanted to give it a try. (Adapted from a Better Homes and Gardens (BHG) issue from earlier this year and it seems that they have a video?)

When I bake, I do my best to work from scratch, so even though this recipe called for some brand named mango juice, I went ahead and made some instead. Mangoes are rather foreign to me, so I found this to be an interesting exercise. In addition, QC prefers to purchase produce at the local farmer's market, so I went ahead and sent her on a mission to retrieve some mangoes and carrots. Should baking from scratch, reducing sugar/fat, and buying local produce feel this righteous...? Don't worry. The topics of capitalism, organic and raw food diets don't have their place on this blog. 

Tarte Pomme d'amour

Tarte pomme d'amour

This is a rather creative apple tart that I discovered and adapted (with QC!) from a fellow French blog: Delices d'Orient. For those who aren't familiar, a simple way to describe a tart would be to liken it to a small pie that usually contains whole fruit or jam. Wikipedia may be able to help answer other questions that you may have.

Since I hoped to bake this tarte for a special occasion (graduating seniors!), I went ahead and ran through the recipe twice. The first one was to experiment a little since this is unfamiliar ground for me. As could be expected, a few errors were encountered, but they were corrected for the second trial. Tips that I'm providing come from what was learned during the two runs.

In this particular tarte, sablé breton is used as the pastry base and apples and raspberries constitute the filling, more or less. From what I understand, sablé breton is a classic French cookie originating in Normandy. Some claim that a unique sand-like crumbling texture is desired all the while having a slightly salty flavor.

Orange Extract

Can't wait to use this delisciousness!!

With summer coming up, I hope to be able to try out some new and challenging recipes. However, as any good creative worker should know, you have to keep your audience in mind. My audience being the girls, fellow labmates and exceptionally friendly professors/instructors. Being that the girls love oranges, I figured that it would be worth investing some time into making orange extract to satiate their palette.

Romanian Cozonac

Cozonac Loaves: Rolled (front) and Braided (rear)

What? You've never heard of cozonac before? No worries. You're not alone!

Besides being one of the many who had suggested that I start a baking blog last week, my Analytic Mechanics lecturer, AG, also hinted that I should attempt to bake a traditional bread from his motherland. Cozonac is a seemingly well known festive bread that crawls out of ovens around Easter and Christmas in Eastern European countries including Romania and Bulgaria.

Cozonac is a sweet bread that can be made with a combination of raisins, lokum (Turkish Delight), oranges, lemons, walnuts, hazelnuts, vanilla, rum and so on. According to my trustworthy friend, Wikipedia, Romania has the most diverse variations of cozonac that significantly differ from region to region. Therefore, I feel justified in identifying this cozonac as being Romanian. Who says it can't be!