A Long Overdue Update, plus Chocolate Covered, Coconut Stuffed Stawberries

I took a break from posting to my blog for awhile, but I definitely haven't stopped cooking! Here's a sample of what I've been making for the last few months...

This Filet Mignon with Caramel-Brandy Mushroom Sauce was delicious, with a sweet sauce that complimented the tender filet. My only mistake was substituting some re-hydrated dry mushrooms for fresh mushrooms, since they ended up being a little tougher than they should have been.

This Spinach Gratin was decadent - cheesy and creamy, with a hint of nutmeg to compliment the spinach. It was also really easy to make. If you are in the mood for something rich, I definitely recommend it!

Inspired by the lentils in the Crispy Salmon with Warm Lentils and Balsamic Essence recipe, these lentils with chicken were hearty and flavorful, but I do think the dish needed something sweet to go with it, like the balsamic essence in the salmon recipe.

This mushroom risotto was yummy, but my favorite part were the roasted carrots. They are incredibly easy to make and the carrots get really tender and sweet. You can compliment the carrots with your favorite herb - in this case I used parsley.

This started out as a good concept: scrambled eggs, with sundried tomatoes, spinach, and onions, on some crusty french bread covered with goat cheese. Then I realized I had some leftover turkey and decided to add that in to the mix.  Wow, it was terrible!  There was something about the flavor of the turkey and the eggs that completely clashed - maybe they are too similar? Trust me: turkey and eggs is not a good idea.

These chocolate covered strawberries stuffed with coconut are really easy to make and very yummy!  Since you can make them in advance, they are great as a dessert when you have company over.

Chocolate Covered Strawberries Stuffed with Coconut

10 strawberries

about 5 ounces white chocolate (or dark, whatever you prefer)

1 vanilla bean

1/2 cup shredded coconut, just enough to fill the strawberries

Cut the stem off of each strawberry. Instead of cutting the whole top off, angle the knife and cut just around the stem and the white part of the strawberry.

After you remove the stem, this should reveal a hole in the middle of the strawberry.  Fill liberally with shredded coconut.  (Or, try your favorite ingredient as a filling instead.)

Line a cookie tray with wax paper, to hold the strawberries after they have been dipped in chocolate.

Melt the chocolate in a metal bowl over boiling water, or in a double broiler. Cut the vanilla bean lengthwise and scrape out the seeds. Add the seeds to the melted chocolate and mix well.

Dip each strawberry in the chocolate, large end down, using a toothpick to hold the strawberry steady, and spooning the melted chocolate up the sides to coat. Optionally, leave the top of the strawberry uncovered.

Place each strawberry on the cookie sheet, large end down, and chill in the fridge for at least 15 minutes, or up to 24 hours, before serving.

Chunky Triple Nut and Chocolate Biscotti

Despite seeing countless variations of biscotti featured on Everyday Italian, I was never inspired to make any myself until recently. The problem is that anytime I think of biscotti, I think of the rock hard, tasteless stuff that shows up in places like Starbucks. However, I finally decided to try it out the other day after I saw Gina DePalma, a pastry chef from Babbo, do a demo of the Mosaic Biscotti recipe from her new book.

I loved listening to Gina tell her story. She seemed very genuine, talking about herself and her career openly and with a sense of humor. She is obviously passionate about food, and her approach to cooking emphasizes tradition, attention to detail, and quality ingredients.

One thing I thought was interesting is that she stressed the importance of whisking together the dry ingredients before adding them to the wet ingredients. When I bake I'm always tempted to skip this step because I'm never sure how necessary it is, so it was nice to hear an opinion on that from someone as experienced as her.

Gina talked about how she got into the food business and how she started culinary school intending to become a chef, falling into the pastry side of things when she did an internship and found that she really enjoyed it. She said that she thinks this background helps her as a pastry chef since it's important to understand the savory aspects of a menu to do the dessert part well. I think that makes a lot of sense, and I would imagine that this might help her to be more creative with flavor combinations in her desserts.

As a slight tangent, could someone please explain why there is such a rigid division between being a pastry chef and a chef? If you watch shows like Top Chef, you'll know what I mean - the downfall of several of the very talented chefs on that show has been a dessert that they threw together with the disclaimer "I am not a pastry chef". It seems like a well rounded chef ought to be able to do both, so it doesn't really make sense to me that there is such a separation between the two specialties.

Anyway, back to biscotti. I followed Gina's biscotti recipe exactly, except I changed the types of nuts in the biscotti and used three different kinds of nuts instead of two. The quantity of nuts and chocolate in this biscotti astounded me. When you get the dough mixed together, there's very little dough to actually hold all of the filler together. I think that's what makes it so good - the result is chunky, chocolaty, and packed with nuts.

Biscotti is actually just one big cookie, baked in a long log and then cut into slices and baked again. It's actually easier than making regular cookies in a way, since you don't have to portion the dough for each cookie. Another great thing about biscotti is that it keeps for a long time. These should be good for at least 2 weeks.

Chunky Triple Nut and Chocolate Biscotti
based on Mosaic Biscotti from Dolce Italiano

For the biscotti:
1 3/4 cups flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
2 large eggs
1 large egg yolk, reserve the egg white for the glaze
1 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
6 ounces chocolate, coarsely chopped, whatever type you prefer, I used 4 ounces of bittersweet and 2 ounces of semi-sweet
1 cup sliced almonds
1/2 cup coarsely chopped macadamia nuts
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

For the glaze:
1 egg white, reserved from above
3/4 Tbsp sugar

Combine the flour, baking powder, and salt and stir so that the salt and baking powder are evenly distributed.

In a separate bowl, mix the eggs, egg yolk, sugar, and vanilla extract on medium speed for several minutes, until well combined. Change the speed of the mixer to low and add the dry ingredients gradually, allowing each portion to incorporate before adding more.

Add the chocolate and nuts and stir in by hand. Place the dough onto a cookie sheet that is lined with a silpat or greased. Form a long log that runs the length of the cookie sheet, about 4 inches wide and 1-2 inches high. The dough will be pretty sticky, so you might want to flour your hands before forming the logs to make it easier, and prepare to get messy.

Lightly beat the reserved egg white to break it up a little (Gina says you just want to break up the protein a bit) and brush the top of the log with it. Then sprinkle granulated sugar on top.

Bake at 325 for 20-25 minutes until lightly brown and firm to the touch.

Wait for it to cool completely, about an hour. Then use a serrated knife to cut into slices, on a slight diagonal, to form individual cookies. I like the slices to be about 1/2 inch wide, but you can personalize this to whatever you like.

Put the slices back on the baking sheet and bake at 200 degrees until the biscotti dries out a bit and is a little crisp to the touch, about 25 minutes.

Spicy Fennel Cupcakes with Date Buttercream Icing

I came up with the idea for these cupcakes when I saw the theme of this cupcake roundup: "Re-Invention". I had just made the lamb tagine, and when I saw the theme it occurred to me that the date and fennel flavors in the tagine might actually translate well to a dessert. If you've been following my blog, you'll recall that the first time I experimented with a baking recipe wasn't that long ago. So, I approached the project of creating my own cupcake recipe with excitement and a bit of trepidation.

I began by doing a little research online to find out what mix of ingredients is usually used as a base for cupcakes. I discovered that most recipes have a similar proportion of butter, sugar, eggs, and flour, so I started out with that base as well. Since I love the spicy/sweet contrast of the tagine, I wanted that flavor to resonate in the cupcakes. To achieve this contrast, I decided to put fennel in the cake part, with some of the tagine spices, and to use the dates to enhance the sweet flavor of the icing.

I ended up trying this cupcake recipe 3 times before settling on a version that I liked. You may think I'm crazy, but one of the biggest surprises to me was that none of the tries actually flopped! I mean, I was always taught that you need to be very careful about measuring everything when you bake, but the more I experiment the more I realize that you can play around with many of the ingredients without compromising the end result.

The biggest challenge for me in making this recipe was creating the flavor profile that I wanted. For example, a decision I struggled with was which spices I should add to the cake. Ginger and cinnamon seemed like obvious choices, as they are commonly found in Moroccan food, and they are also often used in sweet recipes. I was pretty hesitant at first with spices like coriander and cumin, since I wasn't really sure they belonged in a dessert. However, I ended up increasing the amount of these spices as I tested the recipe, since I found that they made the final product really unique and spicy.

Another important decision was how to incorporate the fennel and date into the cupcake. One of the things I've heard about fennel is that roasting it can really bring out the flavor, so I decided to roast the fennel before adding it to the cupcake. I pureed the fennel in a bit of milk, which helped to incorporate it into the cupcake. For the date, I didn't want the peel to interfere with the smooth texture of the icing, so I ended up making a date puree.

One idea I had didn't work. You guessed it - I tried throwing some cilantro into the cake. Unfortunately, I found that the baking process dilutes the flavor to the point where you can't even taste the cilantro anymore, so I removed it from the recipe.

I think the color of these cupcakes could use some work. However, overall I was very pleased with the result of my first very own cupcake recipe!

Spicy Fennel Cupcakes with Date Buttercream Icing
(makes 12 cupcakes)

For the fennel cake:
2 fennel bulbs, about 1 1/2 cups after roasting
olive oil, enough to coat the fennel before roasting
3/4 cup milk
1/2 cup butter, room temperature
3/4 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 1/4 cups flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
2 tsp ginger
1 tsp coriander
1/2 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp cinnamon

For the icing:
5-6 dates, chopped into large pieces, about 1/2 cup after chopping
1/4 cup water
1 cinnamon stick
1 stick butter, room temperature
2 cups confectioners sugar, or less if you don't like very sweet icing
1/2 tsp vanilla

First, roast the fennel. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Chop the fennel bulb in half and then into chunks about 1/2 inch thick. Place on a baking pan and drizzle with a bit of olive oil. Mix to fully coat in olive oil. Cook for 15-20 minutes, turning the fennel pieces over halfway through, until the fennel is soft and beginning to brown.

After the fennel cools, it needs to be chopped before adding to the cupcakes. Put the fennel in a food processor and pulse it several times while adding the milk. If you don't have a food processor, you can also chop by hand.

While the fennel is cooling, begin the batter for the cupcakes. Mix the butter and sugar and beat on high speed for a couple of minutes, until the butter begins to lighten in color and the texture becomes smooth. Add the eggs, one at a time, and mix until fully combined.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees for the cupcakes.

Combine the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and spices in a separate bowl. On low speed, add the dry ingredients to the batter, mixing until just combined. Now add the fennel and milk mixture, stirring until just combined.

Use an ice cream scoop to portion the batter into 12 cupcakes. Bake for 20-25 minutes, until a toothpick comes out clean.

For the icing, first make the date puree. Put the chopped dates, water, and cinnamon stick in a small pot. Cook over low heat for about 15 minutes, stirring occasionally until the dates begin to break down and fall apart. Set aside to cool.

For the icing, combine the butter, confectioners sugar, and vanilla and beat on high speed for 5 minutes until light and fluffy, stopping a couple of times to wipe down the sides of the bowl.

After the date mixture is cool, pass the mixture through a sieve. You should end up with about 1/3 cup of date puree that passes through the sieve. Add the date puree to the icing and stir just until combined.

After the cupcakes cool, ice them and enjoy!

Rich Rolled Cinnamon Cookies

A couple of weeks ago we celebrated Eid, the holiday marking the end of Ramadan. Traditionally, Muslims go to the mosque for a quick prayer in the morning and celebrate afterwards by eating with family and friends.

This year I made these cut out cookies for Eid, following a recipe that we used often when I was growing up. These cookies are thin and rich, but not too sweet, with a hint of cinnamon. There is something about their simplicity that makes them addictive.

I have so many childhood memories attached to these cookies. As kids, we painstakingly cut them out and decorated them, carefully adding details like a nose and eyes, as if they wouldn't be eaten hot out of the oven in 10 minutes. These days, I just use decorative sugar to add some color to the cookies.

The key to getting these cookies right is rolling the dough out to the right thickness. Too thin and they will be crisp and hard. Too thick and the cookies will not cook through. If you aren't sure that you have the right thickness, you can always try a few out before making a full batch.

I prefer to use plastic cookie cutters whenever possible, since I find them to be more durable and easier to maintain than the metal ones. Also, I've found that the cookie cutter shape actually makes a difference in the finished product. Choose a larger shape with fewer thin, sharp projections and it will result in a cookie that has a more even texture.

These cookies are perfect for any holiday and are especially fun for kids to decorate. Hope you enjoy!


Here is the recipe, adapted from Joy of Cooking:

Rich Rolled Cinnamon Cookies
(makes about 40 medium sized cookies)

For the cookie dough:
1 cup butter, room temperature
2/3 cup sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
2 1/2 cups flour
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 Tbsp cinnamon

For making the cookies:
cookie cutters
rolling pin
decorative sugar

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Beat the butter and sugar on medium speed for several minutes until the butter lightens in color and becomes fluffy. Add the egg and vanilla and mix until combined.

Sift together the flour, salt, and cinnamon, or mix so the cinnamon is evenly spread throughout the flour. On low speed, add the dry ingredients gradually, mixing until just incorporated.

The dough should be rather thick at this point. Divide into two pieces, form them into flat balls, and cover them with plastic wrap. Refrigerate for at least a couple of hours, until hard. If you don't chill it long enough, it will be sticky and the cookies will be difficult to cut out.

Place a piece of chilled dough between two sheets of wax paper and roll out to about 1/8 of an inch thick. Use your cookie cutters to cut as many cookies as you can from the dough, and then place each one on your cookie sheet. You should try to work rather quickly to cut them out, as the dough will become more difficult to work with as it warms up. Gather the remaining dough scraps, roll them into a ball, and return them to the fridge to keep chilled. Once the cookies are on the sheet, you can take your time to decorate them.

Alternate to the other dough piece still in the fridge, and repeat this process until you finish all the dough.

Bake for 6-9 minutes, until the cookie feels firm when you push on the top. If you can see visible brown spots around the side, you've taken it too far and may need to adjust the thickness of the dough or the cooking time.

Moroccan Lamb Tagine with Fennel and Dates

When I wrote about Moroccan Style Chicken and Chickpeas, I promised to tell you more about tagines. The word tagine refers to both a North African stew-like food, as well as the cooking vessel it is made in. Tagines are easy to make and full of exotic flavor, so if you haven't made one yet I highly recommend it.

The tagine pot is ideal for slow cooking. It has a cone shaped top, which allows liquid to condense and drip back down into the stew, creating a moist, flavorful dish. These days, mainstream brands like Le Creuset and Emily Henry have come up with their own westernized (and pricy) versions of the tagine.

I first started making tagines when my mom got me the Le Creuset tagine for my birthday last year. At first it was pretty amazing to me that something which looks so decorative can actually be used on the stovetop like any other pot. One of the few things that is different about cooking with a tagine is that you generally want to keep it over low heat after putting the top on.

Usually in tagine recipes there is some kind of sweet ingredient (like honey, dates, raisins, or other dried fruit) which contrasts with spices (like cumin, coriander, and ginger). The practice of cooking savory food with fruit is thought to have been brought to Morocco originally by Arabs who migrated to the country long ago. Tagine recipes traditionally call for slow cooking, which produces some fantastic aromas and allows the sweet and savory flavors to blend.

This recipe is taken from the Le Creuset website and uses dates, fennel, and lamb as the primary ingredients. While the original recipe calls for several hours of cooking, I've found that you can often get away with somewhere between an hour and an hour and a half, while still producing a tender stew. If you don't own a tagine of your own, I think this recipe would work just fine cooked in a regular pot. However, I love the visual appeal of serving the finished product in such a beautiful dish! :-)

Moroccan Lamb Tagine with Fennel and Dates
(serves 3-4)

1 Tbsp olive oil
1 red onion, sliced thinly
1 fennel bulb, sliced thinly
1.5 lbs lamb, cut into 1-1.5 inch cubes (I usually ask the butcher for a piece of lamb that would work well in a stew. Also they are generally willing to cut into cubes for you if you ask.)
2-3 garlic cloves, chopped
1 tsp ginger
2 tsp coriander
2 tsp cumin
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper, or chili powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup chopped dates
1 cup broth, or water
cilantro

Heat olive oil in the base of the tagine over medium heat. Add the fennel and red onion and sautee until translucent. Remove onion and fennel to a bowl.

Add the lamb pieces to the tagine base and cook a few minutes until just browned on all sides. Then add the spices and salt, stirring to combine evenly.

Finally, return the onion and fennel to the tagine, and add the dates and broth. (Depending on the tagine you are using, you may want more or less broth. It should be covering the ingredients most of the way, but should not be so close to the top that it will overflow during cooking.) Reduce heat to low and cover. Cook for 1 to 1.5 hours, until the meat is tender and soft.

Serve over a bed of couscous and garnish with cilantro.