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All posts in category Bread and pastry

Mille-feuille recipe (homemade Napoleon recipe)

Our October 2012 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Suz of Serenely Full. Suz challenged us to not only tackle buttery and flaky puff pastry, but then take it step further and create a sinfully delicious Mille Feuille dessert with it!

Puff pastry has been on my list of things to try forever. I have always been intimidated by the process and although we have made laminated dough before when we made croissants but still, I felt puff pastry was a tad too complicated! So when this month’s challenge was announced I was really excited! it is time to give puff pastry a try!

I have to say it was much easier than what I thought it would be! Sure it is time consuming and it takes you a while to wrap your head around all the instructions and  folds but when all is said and done you realize that puff pastry isn’t as complicated or demanding as you thought it would be. Thank you Suz!

This challenge was not only about making puff pastry from scratch, oh no! We were daring bakers after all and we had to face the challenge of turning our puff pastry into Mille feuille.  Mille Feuille is a french pastry dessert. The name translates into a ”thousand sheets” refering to the layers of the puff pastry.Traditionally, a mille-feuille is made up of three layers of puff pastry (pâte feuilletée), alternating with two layers of pastry cream (crème pâtissière), but sometimes whipped cream, or jam are substituted. The top pastry layer is dusted with confectioner’s sugar, and sometimes cocoa, or pulverized seeds (e.g. roasted almonds). Alternatively the top is glazed with icing or fondant in alternating white (icing) and brown (chocolate) stripes, and combed.

I chose to fill mine with pastry cream and dust it with confectioner’s sugar and all I have to say is that this way heavenly! Crisp, crunchy buttery layers of puff pastry that crackle when you bite into them. Alternated with a velvety smooth pastry cream. The perfect combination and contrast between crunch and silky smooth. Buttery and sweet. Beautiful and sinfully delicious.

Pâte feuilletée /Puff Pastry

Servings: Makes 8-10 mille-feuille

Ingredients:
250g all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon salt
50g melted unsalted butter (room temperature)
150g cold water
for the beurrage:
175g cold butter

Additional flour for rolling/turning

Directions:

Place the flour and salt in a bowl or on your counter top

make a well in the center

Add the water and slowly start to incorporate flour from the rim till you will get a paste

Add the melted butter and continue incorporating the flour

Don’t over work the dough you just want to bring it together until the mixture starts to cohere and come away from the sides of the bowl or off your counter

Knead for three minutes on a floured surface until the dough is some what smooth.

Shape into a square and make a few cuts in the surface of the dough that do not go all the way through (this helps the dough relax in the fridge)

Wrap in cling film and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.

While the dough is chilling, take the cold butter and place it between two sheets of cling film, and with a rolling pin shape it into a  square about the size of your dough.

You can use a ruler (or similar) to neaten the edges.

Refrigerate the butter square for about 10-15 minutes so the butter firms up slightly. If it’s still soft, leave it a bit longer. If it’s too hard and inflexible, leave it out to soften a touch. You want it to be solid but still malleable.

Once the dough has chilled, roll it out on a floured surface into a square.

Start rolling out the corners of the square as you can see in the picture, making sure you leave the center thicker than the rolled corners.

Place the butter square in the center of your rolled dough

Use the rolled out dough to enclose the butter, folding one rolled part at a time.

The end result should resembles an envelope(make sure you seal up the edges with your fingers.)You’ll be left with a little square parcel.

Turn the dough parcel over and tap the length of it with your rolling pan to flatten it slightly.

Keeping the work surface well floured, roll the dough carefully into a rectangle ¼ inch /6 mm in thickness

With the shorter side facing you, fold the top third towards you, so it’s covering the middle section, and ensure that it is lined up .

Brush off the flour from the part you just folded.

Fold the lower third over the top third that you just folded, so you’re left with a narrow three-layered strip (see below).

You have now finished one turn (a turn consists of rolling out the dough into a rectangle then folding it into thirds the way you fold a business letter)

Turn the dough rectangle 90 degrees

Do one more turn by repeating the steps of rolling out the dough  into a rectangle then folding it into thirds

Wrap the dough in clingfilm and chill for at least 30 minutes.

Do 2 more turns

Wrap up in clingfilm and chill again for at least 30 minutes.

Do two final turns

Wrap up in clingfilm and refrigerate until needed. The dough keeps a couple of days in the fridge.

Pastry Cream / Crème Pâtissière:

Ingredients

1 and 1/4 cups whole milk

1 tablespoon corn flour/cornstarch

1 tablespoon flour

1/4 cup powdered sugar

2 large egg yolks

1 large eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

Directions:

Whisk the eggs and egg yolks

Add the cornstarch and the flour and whisk untill combined

Place the milk and sugar in a saucepan with the sugar, dissolving the sugar and bringing the milk to the boil. Remove from heat.

Add the hot milk little by little to the egg mixture while whisking (You want to slowly heat the egg mixture). Make sure you  stir constantly to prevent the eggs from cooking.

Place the mixture back into the pan and cook over medium heat while whisking (don’t stop or it’ll solidify) till the mixture starts to thicken.

Continue to whisk till the mix bubbles

Remove the saucepan from the heat and thoroughly whisk the pastry cream. At this stage the pastry cream can look slightly lumpy, but a good whisking soon makes it smoother. (N.B. If you’re worried about the pastry cream continuing to cook off the heat, you can transfer it to a stainless steel/ceramic bowl.)

Add the vanilla and whisk until fully incorporated.

If you haven’t already, pour the pastry cream into a stainless steel or ceramic bowl, and then place clingfilm over the surface to stop a skin forming.

Refrigerate overnight to give the pastry cream time to further thicken. (you need the over night chilling for the cream to set completely, if you use it sooner it will be somewhat runny)

Mille-Feuille/ Napoleon/ Custard Slice

Servings: Makes 8- 10

Ingredients

1 x batch pâte feuilletée/puff pastry (see above)

1 x batch crème pâtissière/pastry cream (see above)

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to moderately hot 200 °C /400°F/gas mark 6.

2. Lightly dust your work space with flour and remove your dough from the fridge.

3. Roll into a large rectangle, the thickness of cardboard.

4. Cut into three equal pieces and place on a baking tray. If you don’t have space for all three, you can bake them separately.

5. Prick the pastry sheets all over with a fork. 6. Place another sheet of greaseproof paper over the top and then a heavy baking tray. This will prevent the layers from puffing up too much.

7. Bake each sheet for about 25 minutes in a moderately hot oven 200 °C /400°F/gas mark 6, removing the top layer of greaseproof paper/tray 10 minutes before the end for the tops to brown. Keep an eye on them and lower the temperature if you think they’re browning too much.

8. Remove the baked sheets from the oven and leave on a wire rack to cool.

9. Once the pastry has cooled, you’re ready to assemble your mille-feuille. Get a sturdy flat board, your pastry and the chilled crème pâtissière from the fridge.

10.Cut the puff pastry sheets into rectangles to make individual Mille feuille.

11. Pipe the pastry cream on top of the first layer of puff pastry

12. You can add a layer of sliced fruit or cruched nuts before placing the second layer of puff pastry on top of the pastry cream and press gently to make sure the pastry adheres to the cream

13. Pipe another layer of pastry cream

14 top with the final layer of puff pastry

15. dust with powdered sugar

Dig in!

Storage & Freezing Instructions/Tips:

The puff pastry dough will keep in the fridge for up to two days. Any leftovers can be well wrapped up & frozen for a year. Thaw for 30 minutes on the counter or overnight in the fridge.

The completed mille-feuille can be made a day or two in advance;  it will last 2 or 3 days in an airtight container in the fridge, though will become less crisp.

Notes:

The puff pastry recipe requires you to chill your dough after every two turns, but if your kitchen’s a bit warm or you think the butter might be melting, you can chill it after each turn.

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78 Comments
by Sawsan@ Chef in disguise on October 27, 2012  •  Permalink
Posted in Bread and pastry, Daring bakers, Dessert, How to
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Posted by Sawsan@ Chef in disguise on October 27, 2012

http://chefindisguise.com/2012/10/27/mille-feuille-recipe-homemade-napoleon-recipe/

Pita bread recipe – how to make pita pockets

Pita bread is the recipe I have received the most questions about and requests for ever since I started this blog. After much experimentation here it is :)

Living in the middle east means you can get great pita bread at every bakery and restaurant but that also means that if you decide to make it at home, you either do it right or not at all.That is why it took a little time for me to get it right, a pita bread recipe I can post on my blog knowing it is the one!

Before we get to the “How to make pita bread”, let’s cover “Why to make pita bread?”

Pita bread is one of the most versatile things to have in your kitchen. There is a world of possibilities to use this wonderful flat bread

1. Fill the pita pockets with your choice of filling and turn it into a sandwich or wrap

Click on the picture to get to the recipe

2.Serve it with dips, soups and appetizers

Click on the picture to get to the recipe

3. Cut it into squares and drizzle it with olive oil and season it with herbs or spices. Bake it in the oven till crisp and enjoy the crunchy pita chips (be warned, they are addictive)

4. Fry them or toast them and use them to top your salad and add crunch to it. If you have never tried it before, make fattoush..you’ll love it

5. Use them to top Horaa osbao

If you try to google “pita bread recipe” you will find that most recipes share three basic ingredients : flour, water and yeast. You see, pita bread is simply a yeasted dough that is baked in a very hot oven and the trapped steam inside the bread causes it to puff and as a result the pockets in the pita form.

Keeping that in mind your bread dough needs to be soft as opposed to stiff and dry. You also need to use little flour during rolling because you don’t want to dry the dough out. Some recipes will tell you to mist the rolled dough before baking or mist the baking sheet. I personally cover the dough balls and the rolled bread with a damp kitchen towel during resting and that helps keep them from drying out.

If you look closer at different bread recipes you will find some that add olive oil, powdered milk, replace water with milk and others use ghee and honey. Each addition serves a purpose. Olive oil makes the dough easier to handle and makes it less likely to stick during rolling and consequently you use less flour while rolling it. Powdered milk and honey make the resulting bread chewy and soft and helps keep them soft after cooling.

I know some people will lecture me on the fact that traditional pita bread never uses honey and that may be true but the honey is my personal addition to the recipe. My secret ingredient. You can’t taste it in the final dough but the bread is so much more chewy and soft and I love the texture that results from adding it to the recipe. I have tried MANY pita bread recipes and the one I am sharing today is the end result of those experiments. It is soft and chewy. It puffs up beautifully in the oven giving you wonderful pockets to turn your homemade bread into a variety of sandwiches. It stays soft for a few days if wrapped and stored at  room temperature and last but not least, it freezes very well. All you have to do is take the bread out of the freezer and heat it on the stove top or in the oven and it is as good as new. Give it a try and you will never buy pita bread again.

Pita Bread recipe

1 package (about  2 1\2 teaspoons)  of dry yeast

1/2 cup warm water

1 teaspoon granulated sugar

1 tablespoon honey

4 to 4 1\2 cups all-purpose flour

2 tablespoon olive oil

1 teaspoon salt

3 tablespoon dry milk

1 1\2 cup lukewarm water

Preparing Pita bread dough

Proof the yeast by mixing it with the 1/2 cup of water and the sugar and honey. Wait for the yeast to foam and bubble.

If the yeast does not foam and bubble with in 10 minutes it has gone bad and you need to discard it and start again

In a bowl add the flour, salt and powdered milk then drizzle the olive oil.

Using your fingertips rub the oil into the flour mixing all the other ingredients in the process.

Keep rubbing the flour and oil until the oil is completely taken up by the flour.

Make a well in the center of the flour and add the yeast water mix and 1 cup of warm water.

Using a wooden spoon (if you are doing this by hand) or the  hook attachment if doing this in a stand mixer, stir to form a dough.

Take the dough out of the bowl or mixer and place on a floured surface.

Add the rest of the water slowly and knead with your hands to get a better feeling of the dough.

Continue kneading until the dough becomes soft, smooth and elastic ( this takes about 5-7 min.)

A tip that will get you smoother dough is to left the dough and slam it on the table 7-10 times as you knead it.(it’s a great way to vent stree too :) )

Lightly oil a bowl and place the dough in it,lightly coat it with oil and cover the bowl with a damp clean towel.

Allow the dough to rise in a warm place until it doubles in size (the time required depends on how hot it is where you are. If you are tight on time see the notes to see how to shorten rising time)

When the dough doubles in size punch it down and then pinch out 10-12 small pieces, depending on the size you like your pita.

Place balls on floured surface. Let sit covered with a damp clean towel for 10- 15 minutes.

Roll out each ball of dough with a rolling pin into circles, 3-4 mm in thickness

Place circles of dough on a flat board or a table, covered  with dry cloth and then place a clean damp cloth over the dough circles and allow them to rest for 10 minutes.

Baking Pita bread

In the meantime, Preheat oven to 270 C or to the highest temperature your oven will go.

Place the rack at the very bottom of oven or better yet take it out all together and place your baking sheet directly on the oven floor.

Preheating your baking sheet is an essential step to get your bread to puff up perfectly. If you have a pizza stone you can use that to make pita bread but again you need to get it good and hot before you start baking bread.

Gently place your dough circles on the preheated baking sheet, make sure that you place the dough flat on the baking sheet, any wrinkles will prevent the bread from puffing up and once you place the dough you will not be able to move it, it will stick to the baking sheet until the bottom is baked.

Bake each batch for 2-5 minutes till the bread puffs up, when they do flip the dough on the other side and bake for 1-2 more minutes.

Using a spatula remove the puffed pita bread from the baking sheet and out of the oven, serve hot or  cover with a clean dry towel till the bread cools down.

If you leave the pita bread uncovered as it cools it will become dry and crusty

When the bread cools place it in your storage bags.

Storing Pita bread.

Fresh pita bread will keep in a bag at room temperature for 2-5 days. In the freezer it will keep in good condition for up to a month. Just take the amount you need out of the freezer and warm on your stove top or in the oven for a minute or two

Notes:

You can use this same recipe to make whole wheat bread. Replace up to half of the flour with whole wheat flour and proceed with the same recipe. Just keep in mind you will probably need more water because of the whole wheat flour.

If you are short on time and need th dough to rise quickly. Heat the oven to 180 C for 5 minutes then turn it off and place the bowl with the dough covered with the damp cloth in the oven. the dough should double in 15-20 minutes maximum.

 Pita bread troubleshoot

My dough did not rise

1. your yeast was inactive to start with.

Proofing the yeast (mixing it with water and sugar and waiting for it to foam and bubble) before using it helps you avoid this problem. If the yeast doesn’t foam and bubble discard it and start with new yeast.

2. The place you left the dough in is too cold

In cold weather it takes longer for the yeast to raise the dough. Always put the dough in a warm place or see the notes about using the oven

3. You did not allow enough  time

The time required for the dough to double in size depends on how hot or cold it is where you are. The colder the weather, the longet it would take for the dough to rise.

My pita bread did not puff up

1. Your oven is not hot enough.

Allow the oven enough time to heat at 270 C  before baking.(10 -15 minutes would be best).

2. You did not allow the rolled dough to rest before baking

3. When you placed the rolled dough on the baking sheet it was not flat

My pita bread became hard and crusty when it cooled

You did not cover the bread when it came out of the oven. You need to keep the bread covered with a clean dry cloth or towel till it cools down

80 Comments
by Sawsan@ Chef in disguise on October 3, 2012  •  Permalink
Posted in Bread and pastry, Vegetarian
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Posted by Sawsan@ Chef in disguise on October 3, 2012

http://chefindisguise.com/2012/10/03/pita-bread-recipe-how-to-make-pita-pockets/

Empanada Gallega

Patri of the blog, Asi Son Los Cosas, was our September 2012 Daring Bakers’ hostess and she decided to tempt us with one of her family’s favorite recipes for Empanadas!  We were given two dough recipes to choose from and encouraged to fill our Empanadas as creatively as we wished!

Empanada (or empada, in Portuguese) is a stuffed bread or pastry baked or fried in many countries in Western Europe, Latin America, and parts of Southeast Asia. The name comes from the Galician, Portuguese and Spanish verb empanar, meaning to wrap or coat in bread.The filling for empanada can vary meat, chicken, cheese, fruit and vegetables. It is really up to your taste and preference and there is plenty of room for creativity.

I love working with yeasted dough so this challenge was a pleasant surprise. The dough recipe was easy to handle and wonderful to work with. After baking it became fluffy and soft. My kids actually started picking the leaves off and snaking on them as I was taking pictures!

The filling I tried was a beef filling with a few twists that sounded crazy, namely raisins and boiled eggs but if you are not daring and adventurous on a daring bakers challenge, you never are! The filling was a huge success despite the fact that I forgot to add the eggs, I only saw the egg slices setting on my counter after I placed the empanada in the oven! The oregano and cumin gave it a Mexican twist. The olives added a new and interesting flavor, the raisins gave a hint of pleasant sweetness that you couldn’t really pin point. Add a chewy , fluffy bread wrapping and you’ve got a recipe that you know you’ll be making again and again.

Empanada gallega

Servings: 10 – (makes a  40cmx30cm square empanada or about a 35cm diameter round empanada).

The filling may sound a bit strange at first, but that’s until you taste it

Dough Ingredients:

5-1/3 cups (1280 ml) (750 gm)  flour

2 cups (480 ml) of lukewarm water

1 satchel (1 tablespoon) (15 gm) dry yeast

2 teaspoons (10 ml) (11 gm) salt

4 tablespoons (60 ml) oil

1 large egg, for egg wash

Dough Directions:

Measure out all the ingredients.

Sift the flour into a big bowl and make a well in the middle.

In a small bowl, mix the water, yeast and sugar and wait for the yeast to foam (2-5 minutes)

Now, using your fingers or a wooden spoon, start adding the yeast water mixture. Keep on working with your fingers or spoon until you have added enough water and all the flour has been incorporated and you have a messy ball of dough.

On a clean counter top, knead the dough for approximately 10 minutes

Place the kneaded dough in an oiled bowl. Cover it with a napkin or piece of linen and allow it to rise in a warm place

Once risen, turn the dough back into a floured counter and cut it in half. Cover one half with the napkin to prevent drying.

Spread the other half of the dough using a rolling pin. You can use a piece of wax paper over the counter, it will make it easier to move the dough around. Depending on the shape of your oven pan or cookie sheet, you will make a rectangle or a round.

Now, the thinness of the dough will depend on your choice of filling and how much bread you like in every bite.

Beef filling

from epicurious.com

1/2 medium onion, finely chopped

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 garlic clove, finely chopped

1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

1/2 teaspoon dried oregano

3/4 pound ground beef chuck

2 tablespoons raisins

1 1/2 tablespoons chopped  olives

1 (14-ounce) can whole tomatoes in juice, drained, reserving 2 tablespoons juice, and chopped

Preparation

Saute the onion in olive oil in a heavy medium skillet over medium heat, stirring frequently, until softened.

Add garlic, cumin, and oregano and cook, stirring, 1 minute. Stir in beef and cook, breaking up lumps until done.

Add raisins, olives, 1/2 teaspoon salt, 1/4 teaspoon pepper, and tomatoes  then cook, stirring occasionally, until liquid is reduced but mixture is still moist,

Spread on a plate to cool.

Assembling the empanada

Either lightly flour or line  your pan or tray with parchment paper.

Cover the base and sides with the dough.

Place the filling, making sure it is cold and that all the base is covered. Using a hot filling will make the bottom layer of the empanada become soggy.

Be careful to avoid adding too much oil from the filling, try to make it as “dry” as possible.

Using the rolling pin or a knife, cut the extra dough.

Start preheating your oven to moderate 350°F/180ºC/gas mark 4.

Take the other half of the dough and spread it out to the same or less thinness of the base.

You can use a piece of wax paper for this too. Take into account that this “top” dough needs to be smaller around than the bottom, as it only needs to cover the filling.

If you are planning on making the tree shape, using a sharp knife cut out the shape of the trunk and branches. Keep in mind that doing this means you have to be extra careful transferring the dough to the pan because if it stretches, you will lose the shape or even tear the dough, doing it on wax paper really helps

If not using wax paper, move carefully the top to cover the filling. If using wax paper, transfer the dough, turn upside down, cover the filling and gently peel off the wax paper.

Using your fingers, join bottom and top dough, when you have gone all the way around, start pinching top and bottom together with your thumb and index finger and turning them half way in, that way you end up with a rope-like border.

This is one situation when a picture is worth a thousand words, please watch this video that Patri made to see how it is done: http://youtu.be/CNpB7HkTdDk

You can use left-over dough to decorate the empanada, using rounds, bows, lines… let your imagination flow and make it pretty!

I rolled some of the left over dough into a rope, folded it in half and then twisted it to form the trunk of the tree. Then I did it again but made the dough rope thinner and made the branches.

I rolled out another part of the left over dough and cut out leaf shapes out of it and used egg wash to glue them onto the top

In a small bowl, beat an egg and add a tbsp of vinegar. With the pastry brush, paint the top of the empanada with the egg wash.

Place the empanadas in the oven and bake for about 45 minutes. Check that the bottom part is done

Place under the broiler for a few minutes till the top is golden brown

Thank you Patri for a wonderful challenge :) Emapanada is a recipe that is going into my regular rotation and I can’t wait to try out all the different fillings

98 Comments
by Sawsan@ Chef in disguise on September 27, 2012  •  Permalink
Posted in Bread and pastry, Daring bakers
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Posted by Sawsan@ Chef in disguise on September 27, 2012

http://chefindisguise.com/2012/09/27/empanada-gallega/

Filled pate a choux swans

Kat of The Bobwhites was our August 2012 Daring Baker hostess who inspired us to have fun in creating pate a choux shapes, filled with crème patisserie or Chantilly cream.  We were encouraged to create swans or any shape we wanted and to go crazy with filling flavors allowing our creativity to go wild!

This month I was not the one who got super excited about the challenge! it was my kids. They usually buy these swans at a wonderful little bakery here and they are totally in love with them, the shape, the creamy filling, the sugar dusting. So when they knew that our challenge this month was to make pate a choux swans they were beyond excited!

The kids had a great time with this challenge and so did I :) and I have to say that these pate a choux swans were the perfect summer dessert, crunchy pate a choux and a coolcreamy velvety filling. They also make for an elegant presentation when you have company and they are sure to please the little ones in your family :)

I will be making these again for sure.Thank you Kat for a wonderful challenge.

I followed the recipe provided by Kat with a few adjustments, you will find them in red

Pate a choux

(cannot be doubled)

Ingredients

½ cup (120 ml) (115 gm) (4 oz)butter

1 cup (240 ml) water

¼ teaspoon (1½  gm) salt

1 cup (240 ml) (140 gm) (5 oz) all-purpose flour

4 large eggs

Directions:

Line at least two baking sheets with silicone mats or parchment paper, or grease pans well.

Preheat oven to moderately hot 375°F/190°C/gas mark 5 .

In a small saucepot, combine butter, water, and salt.  Heat over until butter melts, then remove from stove

Add flour all at once and beat, beat, beat the mixture until the dough pulls away from the sides of the pot.

Add one egg, and beat until well combined.  Add remaining eggs individually, beating vigorously after each addition. Resulting mixture should be somewhat glossy, very smooth, and somewhat thick.

I only used 3 eggs, based on many videos I watched and recipes I read you want your dough to get to a stage where if you take a little dough between your index and thumb and open them, the dough will stretch without breaking. In my case that happened after 3 eggs, adding the 4th would have made the dough very runny and it would not hold its shape

Using a ¼” (6 mm) tip on a pastry bag, pipe out about 36 swan heads.  You’re aiming for something between a numeral 2 and a question mark, with a little beak if you’re skilled and/or lucky.

My piping bag gave out after the first couple of heads, so I used a bag that I cut off the corner and used to pipe the necks then make the opening bigger and made the bodies. I wet my fingers with a little water and shaped the bodies to give them a little tail shape

Remove the tip from the bag and pipe out 36 swan bodies.  These will be about 1.5” (40 mm) long, and about 1” (25 mm) wide. One end should be a bit narrower than the other.

Bake the heads and bodies until golden and puffy.  The heads will be done a few minutes before the bodies, so keep a close eye on the baking process.

Based on the advice of my fellow daring bakers on the forum. I baked them at 375 for about 10 minutes, poked holes in them, then dropped the temperature down to 350 for another 10 minutes to puff them up again and dry them out, then turned the oven off, propped the door open, and let them dry for another 5-10 minutes. This made sure I had and maintained nice, crisp pastry shells that maintained their shapes, even after I filled them

Remove the pastries to a cooling rack, and let cool completely before filling.

Vanilla Creme

Ingredients

1 tablespoon (15 ml) (7 gm) (1/4 oz) (1 envelope) unflavored gelatin

½ cup (120 ml) (115 gm) (4 oz) sugar

2 tablespoons (30 ml) (18 gm) (2/3 oz) all-purpose (plain) flour

4 large egg yolks, well beaten

1 cup (240 ml) milk

1 teaspoon (5 ml) vanilla extract

1 cup (240 ml) heavy (whipping) cream (about 35% butterfat)

Directions:

    1. In a medium saucepan combine gelatin, flour, and sugar.  Mix very well.
    2. Add milk and egg yolks and turn heat to medium-low. Stir almost constantly until mixture is thick enough to cover the back of your spatula or spoon. This should take about 10 minutes.
    3. Once thick, immediately dump into a bowl, straining the mixture if you are concerned about lumps of cooked egg.
    4. Add the vanilla, and mix in well.
    5. Cover the surface to prevent a skin from forming, and chill for about 45 minutes.  You do not want the mixture to set, just to continue thickening.
    6. Now is a good time to begin your choux paste.
    7. In a large bowl, beat cream until light peaks form.  Carefully fold the vanilla mixture into the whipped cream until the mixture is well-blended and fairly smooth.
    8. Refrigerate mixture if not using immediately.

Assembly

Take a swan body and use a very sharp knife to cut off the top  ½ to 2/3

Cut the removed top part into two parts by cutting down the center to make two wings.

Dollop a bit of filling into the body, insert head, and then add wings.

Dust with powdered sugar if desired

Freezing/Storage Instructions/Tips:  While the crème filling stores well when covered tightly and kept in a refrigerator, the baked choux does not store well at all, especially after being filled.  Therefore, you must eat these the day they are made.  This won’t be a problem, though, I assure you.
117 Comments
by Sawsan@ Chef in disguise on August 27, 2012  •  Permalink
Posted in Bread and pastry, Daring bakers, Dessert
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Posted by Sawsan@ Chef in disguise on August 27, 2012

http://chefindisguise.com/2012/08/27/filled-pate-a-choux-swans/

Maamoul (Stuffed shortbread cookies)

Maamoul or mamool are small shortbread cookies traditionally filled with dates, pistachios or walnuts. They are popular in Levantine cuisine(Palestine, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon).

I have fond memories of making cookies with my mum for Eid.  Making maamoul is usually an event for family and friends to come together, all helping and participating in making the dough, filling the cookies, forming them and baking them. All this happens in a cosy atmosphere filling with chats about the blessings of Ramadan, the experience of fasting, Eid preparations and plans.  Kids talk about the new cloths and toys they bought for Eid, all the places they plan on going, helping deform a few maamoul cookies here and there in the process. As soon as the first baking sheet goes into the oven, a cloud of spice and heavenly smells fills the house and it suddenly feels like Eid is indeed a couple of days away :)

Biting into one of these cookies, you will first get the slightly crumbly crust with a hint of mastic and mahlab. Next comes the chewy and sweet filling.Be it the nutty pistachios or walnuts or my favorite, the dates with hints of cinnamon and cardamom. The whole thing melts in your mouth playing a melody of textures and flavors. One thing I know for sure about Maamoul, you can never stop at just one!

Maamool cookies are usually formed into unique shapes using hand carved wooden molds that not only make the cookies look special but they help you tell what type of filling is in each cookie. The flat round ones are filled with dates, the elongated oval ones and the oval ones are for the nut fillings: pistachios and walnuts. Another way of forming the cookies would be using special decorating tweezers you see in the pictures. The tweezers are used to pinch the dough to form different patterns

Maamoul Recipe

Recipe can be doubled or halved

Maamoul dough recipe

200 gm butter (room temperature)

200 gm margarine (room temperature) or ghee (melted)

1 cup (250 ml) vegetable oil

2 eggs

1 cup powdered sugar

1 cup powder milk

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 teaspoon yeast

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon ground fennel seeds

1/2 teaspoon ground mahlab

1/4 teaspoon mastic, ground finely

1 kilogram flour.

Filling recipe

Ingredients – Fillings

If you decide to make the whole amount with a single type of filling then use the amounts below, if you want to use more than one filling then use these ratios as a guideline, and make less/more depending on how much you want to make

  • 1 kg date puree and 1/2 cup butter kneaded with 1 tablespoon of cinnamon, 1 teaspoon cardamom
  • 500 gm chopped walnuts and 1/2 cup sugar with 2 tablespoons orange blossom water, 2 tablespoons butter or ghee and 1 tablespoon cinnamon
  • 500 gm coarsely ground pistachios and 1/2 cup sugar with 2 tablespoons orange blossom water and 2 tablespoons melted butter or ghee
  • Orange blossom water, cardamom and cinnamon are added for flavor and are entirely optional
  • You can replace half of the sugar with 1/4 cup of simple syrup. I find that the addition of the syrup keeps the filling from drying out while baking and makes it more flavorful

Making the crust dough

Beat the butter margarine and oil in the food processor, stand mixer or in a bowl with a whisk

Add the eggs and vanilla and beat till the mix is pale in color.

Add the sugar and powdered milk and beat till the mix is creamy and homogenous

Add the yeast, baking powder, mastic, mahlab and ground fennel

Add the flour slowly, one cup at a time and knead the dough (keeping in mind that you do not want to over work it) till you get a smooth and soft dough.

Allow the dough to rest for one hour

Cut the dough into egg sized balls.

If making date maamoul:

Form the kneaded date puree into small balls about half the size of the dough balls

Flaten the dough ball , place the date ball inside and seal the dough around the stuffing making sure the filling is completely enclosed by the dough and shape it into a ball.

Maamoul using the molds

Place the dough in a mold, press firmly but do not over do it or the maamoul will stick to the mold (see the notes for a trick that will help you get the cookies out of the molds whole every time)

Place a kitchen towel on a cutting board or your kitchen table

Then invert the mold and tap the end of the mold  on the kitchen towel and the formed cookie will fall out.

Free form maamoul

With your thumb, press gently in the center of the cookie to make a circular depression.

Add your desired pattern using the decorating tweezers or forks.

If making pistachio or walnut maamoul

Create a little ball of dough and make a hole in it, making the sides even

Fill with your desired filling.

Close the dough by pinching the open dough rim together making sure that the filling is totally covered by dough

Follow the steps of forming the maamool using a mold or tweezer

Baking Maamoul

I bake maamoul on the middle rack of a preheated oven (230 C) till the edges are golden brown (5-12 minutes) and then place them under the broiler till the tops are golden brown (2-5 minutes)

Take the cookies out of the oven and allow them to cool on the baking sheet for 10- 15 minutes then move them to a cooling rack because they are proun to crumble if you move them when they are still hot

Important notes about making maamoul:

  • Add the flour slowly because different types of flour absorb fat differently, you may not need the whole kilogram. If you happen to add too much flour and your dough becomes a little dry and crumbly, add 1/2 to 1 stick of softened butter and knead it into the dough and it should go back to being smooth and easy to handle.
  • You can bake maamoul without shaping it, just form the stuffed cookies into balls and arrange them on a baking sheet and bake them, they will be just as tasty without the molds or decorations
  • You can stuff these cookies with apples that you sautéed with a little butter and cinnamon or with chopped dried figs or dried apricots that you have soaked in rosewater. The traditional stuffings are dates, walnuts and pistachios but that does not mean that you cannot be creative.
  • To make it easier to get the cookies out of the molds, I line the molds with a little piece of plastic wrap
  • Maamoul bakes really quickly, don’t walk away from the oven while the cookies are baking they can go from white to black in a couple of minutes.
  • Kept in an airtight container these cookies will last for 3 weeks

136 Comments
by Sawsan@ Chef in disguise on August 12, 2012  •  Permalink
Posted in Biscotti, macaroons and cookies, Bread and pastry, Dessert
Tagged , , , , , , , , , ,

Posted by Sawsan@ Chef in disguise on August 12, 2012

http://chefindisguise.com/2012/08/12/maamoul-stuffed-shortbread-cookies/

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