fruit leather

I had way too much fun taking pics of this flexible stuff

My friend Alice suggested that I make fruit leather and who am I to turn down a suggestion? So I picked up 2.5 kilos of apricots at a roadside stand (for 17sfr) and roughly 48 hours later, I have fruit leather. It's not hard, but it's a long wait. After 24 hours drying in the oven, I almost gave up. It seemed like an indulgent waste of energy, keeping the oven on so long. But the thought of throwing away 17sfr of fruit made me persevere. (Realistically, only those growing their own fruit should make their own fruit leather; mine cost about 6sfr per sheet.) And boy am I glad. It's so tasty. Now I just have to stop myself from eating it all in one sitting.

I used this recipe for reference but it made me angry because it says to add 1/2 cup water to the fruit before cooking. I knew this was way too much, but I decided to trust the recipe. I was right: it was way too much!!! My fruit puree was so liquidy that it took days to dry. Only add a tiny bit of water to keep the fruit from initially sticking as you turn on the heat, before the fruit starts releasing its own juices.


ready to eat


rolled up for storage


gotta love that curly-q

Recipe: Fruit Leather

1. Locate your fruit. Roughly 4 cups of fruit will yield one baking sheet of fruit leather. Use any combo of fruit that sounds good to you.

2. Rinse fruit, de-pit and/or stem as necessary, and cut into large chunks. Place fruit in a large saucepan. Add a little water or juice, just enough to keep the fruit from sticking when you initially turn on the heat. The fruit will release it's juices rather quickly. If you add too much, you'll have to cook down the puree for a long time or dry the leather for a really long time (days!).

3. Cook for 10-15 minutes, just until fruit is tender and ready to puree.

4. Puree fruit with food mill or blender. A food mill will also remove the skins and fibers, making for a finer texture.

5. Add sugar, a couple tablespoons of lemon juice, and spices as desired (you can add these while cooking the fruit, but I find it easier to adjust the taste after the fruit has been pureed). The amount of sugar depends on the sweetness of the fruit. My apricots needed tons of sugar (at least 1 cup sugar to 4 cups apricot) and after tasting the final product, I still think I could have added more.

6. Line a baking sheet with plastic wrap. Pour the puree into the baking sheet, about 1/4 inch thick. Any thicker and it will take a lifetime to dry (I only had two baking sheets, so I think I did mine a little too thick, thus increasing the drying time even more). Make sure the plastic wrap doesn't fold over onto the puree. I had trouble with this, so moistened the sides of the pan with a little fruit puree to make the plastic wrap stick to the sides. Worked like a charm. Also, try to keep the plastic wrap from touching the sides of the oven.

7. Place baking sheet in oven at 140F/60C and let it dry until the puree is stiff and has a smooth surface, 12+ hours. Mine took at least 36 hours.

8. When the fruit leather is ready, peel up the plastic wrap off the baking sheet. To eat, peel off the plastic wrap and chomp, chomp, chomp. To store it, you can roll it up (keeping the plastic wrap on the back), put it in an airtight container in the fridge or freezer.

pie crazy

what's summer without a peach pie?

My in-laws graciously brought me lots of goodies on their recent visit, including The Pie and Pastry Bible by Rose Levy Beranbaum. It's a great read and inspiring. So I've been baking a lot of pies. In the process, I've learned three very helpful techniques:

- To make fruit pies less liquidy and more flavorful, Rose recommends mascerating the fruit in sugar, collecting the juices, boiling the juice down into a syrup, and adding the syrup back to the fruit. I love it and will definitely apply this to other recipes besides Rose's.

- If you add too much liquid to pie dough, too much gluten will form, creating a tough crust. Thus most pie crust recipes only add a tablespoon or two of liquid, making a very dry dough that is difficult to roll out. Cook's Illustrated has a clever technique that uses vodka for some of the liquid. Vodka is 40% alcohol, which doesn't form gluten when mixed with flour. But the additional liquid makes the dough more supple and easier to roll out. The vodka evaporates on baking and adds no flavor. I tried it and the dough was a dream to roll out and tasted great, although some of my tasters slightly preferred Rose's crust. (See the recipe and video here)

- When making the pie crust, you need some of the flour to be coated with butter (to ensure flakiness) and some dry (to ensure tenderness), which is why you have to cut the butter into the flour, not mix. But getting a good ratio every time can be difficult, either having too big of butter chunks with lots of dry flour or most of the butter smoothly blended into the flour. To help get a good ratio every time, Cook's recommends mixing the butter with only half the flour, then stirring the remaining dry flour in before adding the liquid. This means exactly half of the flour is totally coated with fat, while the other half the flour is totally dry. I love it because not only is it so darn clever, but it works!


I wanted to stick to fruit pies in summer, but by popular demand, I made this pecan pie. After the first bite, I was so glad I made it.


apricot/raspberry - pretty, tangy and yummy
I used my own apricot preserves to glaze it - yay for me


I didn't get any good photos of this nectarine/raspberry pie, but I thought it was the best of the bunch

Recipe: Single Pie Crust with Vodka
abbreviated from Cook's Illustrated (see original here)

1 1/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour (6 1/4 ounces)
1/2 teaspoon table salt
1 tablespoon sugar
6 tablespoons cold unsalted butter (3/4 stick), cut into 1/4-inch slices
1/4 cup chilled solid vegetable shortening , cut into 2 pieces
2 tablespoons vodka , cold
2 tablespoons cold water

1. In food processor, mix 3/4 cup flour, sugar and salt together. Add butter and process until homogenous dough just starts to collect in uneven clumps, about 10 seconds. Add remaining 1/2 cup flour and pulse until mixture is evenly distributed around bowl and mass of dough has been broken up, 4 to 6 quick pulses. Empty mixture into medium bowl.

2. Sprinkle vodka and water over mixture. With rubber spatula, use folding motion to mix, pressing down on dough until dough is slightly tacky and sticks together. Flatten dough into 4-inch disk. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate at least 45 minutes or up to 2 days.

3. Use as you would regular pie crust dough, rolling into a 12-in circle about 1/8 thick. Before filling, it should be blind-baked at 435F for 20-25 minutes (removing pie weights after 15 minutes). For all the details, see the original recipe.

scallion pancakes: the snake and the snail

scallion pancakes - an easy snack

I love food friends. My friend Lily, from Shanghai, likes to show me how to make asian food. It's usually so simple, just something I wouldn't think to make. I like that for her, it's regular weekday food, not a party trick. Plus we get to eat on all her lovely asian pottery.

Last time she made Chinese spring rolls, of which I ate about 20 (I'm such a pig!). This week she showed me how to make scallion pancakes (and sushi, but that's for another post). It was so easy and so fun. Her son calls it "the snake and the snail" because that's what it looks like when you roll it up. My picky 4yr old loved them and the next day, begged me to make them again - music to my ears. I'm hoping I can include grated veggies in my next batch to make this a healthy snack.

1. Mix 2 cups flour with 1 cup water (or more or less, just keep the ratio 2:1) until it becomes a smooth ball. The recipe I used had me put the flour in the food processor and pour boiling water through the feed tube as it processed. This was effective, but probably not necessary. The recipe also said to let the dough sit covered for an hour but I used my after about 10 mins with good results.



2. Tear off a section of dough, a bit bigger than a golf ball. Roll it into a thin circle. Brush with oil and sprinkle on sliced spring onions and salt (don't skimp!).

3. Roll up the circle into a snake (as shown above).

4. Then roll up the snake on itself like a snail, tucking the end under one flat side of the circle so the onions don't fall out.



5. Smash the circle flat and roll it out thin again. It might tear a little with some oil and onions peaking out. Don't worry. It'll still taste yummy.

6. Heat a pan to med-high and brush with a little oil. Fry up the pancake, a couple minutes on each side. You want it golden brown and cooked long enough that the inside isn't doughy.

7. Slice and serve.

normandie caramels

On our Normandie trip, I saw darling packages of salted caramels everywhere: at tourist sites, at bakeries, at groceries, even at gas stations. I was afraid I might be a sucker for the marketing, but this time the stuff inside was just as good as the outside promised. The caramels were soft, lush, and creamy with a perfect hint of salt. I just wish I had bought more. These are a definite "don't miss" if you happen to be in Normandie.

ravioli

ok these are not ravioli, but tortellini are more photogenic

Inspired by my friend Astrid's posting on fresh pasta, I dusted my pasta machine off and cranked out some ravioli. It was fun and yummy. I shaped some into tortellini because they are just so darn cute. My favorite part was the filling, which I love to eat on its own because the ricotta is so yummy here, so smooth and creamy. (I had some leftover and scrambled it up with some eggs, it was so good!) I learned a couple things:

- use plenty of flour. On previous attempts, my homemade pasta was always stuck together and was extremely difficult to roll out with only two hands (I've recruited my 3yr old to catch pasta while I cranked and fed in the dough - not recommended). But after watching lots of food TV about making pasta, I learned that pasta should be liberally floured at each stage. It works like a charm. I could fold my pasta sheet as it rolled out with no sticking at all.

- roll dough in small batches. Previously, my pasta sheets were so long, they reached across the room and were very unwieldly. I realized that if I just work with smaller bits of dough, the sheets are a manageable length. Seems obvious, I know. But sometimes I follow directions so precisely, thinking there must be a reason for the madness, instead of using common sense.

- wet filling makes for wet pasta. I made my ravioli at mid-day, leaving them on the counter to air-dry, and cooked them for dinner (the recipe said this was ok). After a few hours, the dough started to get soggy and stick to the parchment paper. I think this was because my spinach was a little too wet. I suppose more liberal flouring would have helped a bit there too.

- space ravioli filling closer together than you might think. I thought my filling was too close, but I ended up with lots of pasta between each ravioli, and thus, less ravioli.

- thickness??? The instructions said to roll to #6 on the pasta machine, but I thought the resulting cooked raviolis were much too thick. I'm going to try #7 next time and report on the results.


filling dolloped out and dough moistened, ready for folding


folded over into raviolis, ready for cutting


in squares, ready for tortellini shaping

The following recipes are adapted from How to Cook Everything by Mark Bittman

Pasta
2 cups (10 ounces) all-purpose flour
1 tsp salt
3 eggs

Mound flour on counter and create well in center. Break one egg in the flour well and use fork to beat egg and incorporate into flour. Repeat with other two eggs and mix until all flour is mixed with the eggs. Knead a couple minutes until dough forms a smooth ball. Cut the dough into 4-6 pieces and cover in plastic. One ball at a time, roll pasta out with pasta machine.

Spinach-Ricotta Filling
10 ounces spinach, blanched, drained, cooled and chopped finely (or use frozen - thaw it and drain thoroughly)
1 egg
1 cup ricotta, drained for a few minutes in strainer
1 cup grated Parmesan cheese
salt and pepper
1/2 tsp freshly grated nutmeg

Combine all ingredients. Taste and adjust seasonings as necesary. Use to fill pasta immediately or refrigerate for up to a day before using.

Butter-Sage Sauce
6 tablespoons butter
20 to 20 fresh sage leaves or 1 tablespoon dried whole sage leaves
salt and pepper to taste
1 pound pasta
1 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Bring large pot of water to a boil. Meanwhile, melt butter in saucepan over low heat. Add sage, salt and pepper. Cook until the butter turns a light brown, about 10 minutes. Cook ravioli in boiling water until they float, just a couple minutes. Drain ravioli and place in individual bowls. Spoon sauce over ravioli. Sprinkle with cheese.

hot chocolate

 

There's something about being served hot chocolate in this manner that makes it taste special. This was part of our breakfast in Giverny, France.

tripe sausage

This time in Normandie I went too far. I like to try new and weird stuff, but this tripe sausage baked over camembert and apples was almost more than I could take. I could smell it coming to the table and I was scared. It wasn't that bad, but it wasn't very good either. I might take a little break from the weird stuff and eat normal stuff I crave.

quick access

I saw this container in a friend's kitchen and immediately went to IKEA to get my very own (50sfr). It has five heavy duty glass containers in a wood frame. Mine gives me quick access to salt, kosher salt, flour, sugar, and hot chocolate mix. I can easily get a couple teaspoons of these ingredients without hauling out my huge storage containers. It even holds enough flour make few batches of pancakes. I love it!

yucky honey cake

it tasted as bad as it looked

I tried the Medovnik recipe floating around everywhere on the internet. It was yucky. I threw it away after one slice. Yes, I'm willing to accept that I prepared it incorrectly. But I'm pretty sure that no matter who makes this recipe, it's not going to be anything like the true Czech honey cake. It was a lot of work, too. After making the "cake" batter, I had to roll out five 8in circles and bake them individually.

I'm going to try this other recipe for 15 layer Russian Honey Cake. I like that it uses sour cream instead of sweetened condensed milk in the cream filling. If this recipe fails, I'm going to experiment with a spiced genoise. I'm determined to eat honey cake again!

Some things I learned...
- I did bake the cakes too long. The recipe recommends 3-5 mins, I did 6 min because the cake was so underdone at 5 mins. But after cooling, they were too dry, even after hours of soaking in the filling.
- I would cut exact circles immediately after baking so the cake would line up and look nicer. Plus the cake edges were crispier than the rest of the cake and I don't want to eat that part.
- The recipe has you crumble one layer and use that as the crumb topping - this is a great idea assuming the flavors are good.

freiburg food

We visited Freiburg last week and though it wasn't nearly as tasty as Strasbourg, we did have two great finds.


First... At the farmer's market, one tiny stand had a long line, apparently only one product, and was selling it at lightning speed. On principle, I like any booth that has a small product offering (here's to you In-and-Out!), so I jumped in line and then tried to figure out what I was in line for. Turned out to be german cheesecake, which is lighter than American cheesecake with a crust. It's made with quark, a yogurt-like fresh cheese not readily available in the US. It was sooooo good. It was so smooth, so light, and totally tangy, not sweet at all. This stand sold three flavors: classic, raisin, and cherry. I'm almost curious enough to go back to try the other ones. I've had Käsekuchen in Zurich a few times, but here it's much more cakey and dry, basically completely different in every way. I highly recommend this if you happen to be in Freiburg.



Second... We're always scanning the food booths to find something we haven't tried before. We found this super yum spätzle/sauerkraut combo at a sausage stand. It's truly inspired. We all loved it, even my 4yr old.

strasbourg: sticky

Macarons! Almost every pâtisserie in Strasbourg had some, but I liked these from Riss (35 Rue du 22 Novembre). Max and I shared this sampler bag, splitting every one in half so we could taste all the flavors.


I'd never seen these giant macarons before, but lots of places had these in addition to the normal bite-size ones:


The cakes were so colorful and fanciful. I wish I could live there so I could try a different cake each week.


I liked the look of these "baked potato" treats in the back and the lemon tarts in the front. I'll have to try these next time.

strasbourg: savory

When in Alsace, you must eat the traditional Choucroute garnie. We first ordered this in Colmar last year, not really sure what we were ordering. We ordered one each, based on the cute, normal portions of food other diners were enjoying. This pot arrived. Correction, two of these pots arrived. I was scared.


We opened our pots to reveal an unholy amount of pork in various forms, sitting on top a mountain of sauerkraut. Plus a huge basket of steamed potatoes. It tasted fine, it was just a ridiculous amount of food.


Tyler tried Choucroute again in Strasbourg and received this tasty plate:


He starteted his meal with some foie gras, of course.


I don't know what I ordered but I got some sort of creamy sauerkraut studded with ham bits and maybe nuts??? It also had weird ham slices that had the consistency of salmon sushi. It was pretty tasty but unlike anything I've ever eaten.


The "kid's" meal came with a chocolate mousse dessert, which was dark, smooth and yum.


The restaurant was cute and small, with an interesting deli/meat counter on the first floor. As the name Porcus implies, this place is all about the pork.


I liked these elaborately decorated meat pastries in their window.

strasbourg: sweet

I want candy!

We stumbled across this fantastic candy shop in Strasbourg, France. OK, it's impossible to miss, directly in front of the cathedral. We loaded up on lollipops, caramels and fruit candies. It's a magical wonderland of pastel fabulousness. And they gave out lots of free samples, American-style consumerism - I love it! I definitely recommend visiting this place if you're in Strasbourg: La Cure Gourmande 5, Rue Mercière


it's cheaper to buy individual pieces by weight, but more fun to buy them in the crazy cute tins


these look like big candies, but they have little sticks making them into short, squat lollipops


the cute door


outside the shop

homemade yogurt, pure magic

homemade yogurt - try it, you'll like it

When I first read about making homemade yogurt in Super Baby Food, I thought the writer was crazy and thought it was ridiculous to waste time that's already so inexpensive, good quality (at least in Switzerland) and relatively unprocessed. Then I read/heard a few things about how commercial plain yogurt (even organic) doesn't contain much of the the beneficial or probiotic bacteria, which is one of the main reasons to eat yogurt. Plus it often has added milk powder (which increases the lactose making it harder to digest) and is often pasteurized, bla, bla, bla...

Anyhoo, I decided to experiment and was quite pleased with the results. I like anything approaching magic with food and yogurt certainly fits the bill. Scald a little milk, add a bit of starter yogurt, let it sit for a few hours and voila - yogurt! I followed the instructions in Super Baby Food, but there are loads of recipes on the web. Here's my short version:

1. Scald a quart of milk (heat to 185F, just before boiling)
2. Cool to 115F
3. Stir in 2TB yogurt (your starter that should have active bacteria)
4. Pour into sterile containers and put on lids
5. Place in warm place (oven turned on lowest setting - 110F) to maintain temp of liquid between 90F and 120F (ideally at 100F). Leave for 4-12 hours until mixture is firm. You now have yogurt.
6. Refrigerate for a few hours.
7. Add flavorings/sweeteners, eat and enjoy.

Notes: I used whole milk and mine was plenty thick. I didn't add any milk powder or gelatin to thicken it. I used mason jars to store the yogurt in. Mine was done after 5 hours. It wasn't sour at all, which was a plus because I'm trying to get my baby to eat it. If you want it more sour, just ferment it longer. It keeps 1-2 weeks in the fridge. If it doesn't set, either the starter didn't have enough bacteria (maybe too old) or the fermenting milk got below 90F or above 120F, thus killing the bacteria.

one fish, two fish

the semi-clean spot in the middle was where my salmon was cooking

This is why I don't cook fish. Every time I cook fish, my pan ends up looking like this and I can never get it all off. Does this happen to you? I know I must doing something wrong, but I don't know what. I get the pan hot, use a minimum amount of oil, and don't move the fish during the advised time (about 7mins for salmon). The fish was tasty, but at what cost? I've probably spent an hour trying to restore this pan to its original condition. I've tried all sorts of chemical concoctions (de-glazing and boiling combos of dishwashing liquid, baking soda, vinegar, etc) praised on the internet, to no avail. Any suggestions?

Later that day, I baked a fish encased in salt, aka salt coffin, and it would have been great if I had paid attention to the recipe and realized the cooking times were for a 2-3 pound fish, not a 3/4 pound one. I'll try this method again though, much cleaner.


my single serving fish in his salt coffin

prague: last yum yums

One last Prague post. We loved these filled donut things - you should definitely have one if you go. There were so many treats we didn't try, particularly lots and lots of cakes. I hope we make it back soon but there are so many places to go still. Thanks Prague. Our tummies are happy.

prague: pork knee and other hearty stuff

me and pork knee - a phrase seldom uttered

Czech food, I love you. Where have you been all these years? I admit this new crush is based on only a few lucky meals, but seriously, I loved what I ate in Prague. For one thing, I had no idea until this trip that I love cabbage. Here's a sampling of some of the good things we ate.

Our first meal in Prague, we hunted for an hour and finally settled on Restaurace Certovka, near Kampa Park, with a patio overlooking the Charles Bridge. It was absolutely empty (I hate empty restaurants) and we expected the worst). But it turned out to be our best meal of the trip. Here's my meal from here, potato pancakes, ham and sweet apple cabbage - yum, yum, yum!


Tyler had goulash with dumplings, good but not my favorite:


My favorite sausage of this trip was this one topped with sauerkraut and horseradish. I didn't even know I liked either of these toppings but I couldn't get enough of it. At breakfast, this booth was serving the same sausage topped with a fried egg:


Our car driver recommended Olympia, one of the Kolkovna chain, basically a cleaned up pub with better food. After returning home, I've seen lots of bad reviews online from expats living there (expensive, grumpy service, tourist trap, etc.) but we liked it. The food was good (we had much, much worse elsewhere) and seemed freshly-made compared to other places that clearly were serving frozen mass-produced stuff. We could get all the Czech standards in one place, instead of hunting and pecking all over town. The prices were the same or lower than everywhere else we looked (~200kc is a normal main dish price, but on the Old Town Square, you'll pay 2-3 times that). The service was fine, but we did eat slightly off-peak hours. Below is my yum meal of goose leg, potato dumplings and sweet cabbage.


Here's a detail pic of the Pork Knee I ordered at Olympia's sister restaurant. Who can resist ordering something with a description like this: "Knuckles roasted on black beer, with onion and grandmother cabbage crackles."


Below is Olympia's menu (click for a closer look).

prague: honey cake

I picked up a last piece on my way to the airport, so no time for staging this pic

I didn't try honey cake, aka Medovnik, until my last day in Prague, and then only by accident. I had skipped breakfast and was starving outside Troja Chateau. There was only one restaurant and they didn't have any breakfast items. The waiter suggested something from the dessert menu and I luckily selected honey cake, my new favorite cake! The first bite was heaven and it only got better and more satisfying. No law of diminishing returns here. The waiter said it was a 1000 year old recipe. I can't wait to try making it myself. If anyone knows where I can get one of these in Zurich, please let me know. I want to have a Medovnik party asap!

Here's the honey cake story from The Prague Post
Check this fun blog entry I ran across, waxing poetic on Medovnik.

prague: langoše

langoše "pizza"

The other main treat at the Prague easter market was Langoše, which I'm told is actually Hungarian. In Prague, it was served with garlic, ketchup, and cheese - not a particularly good combo. But the fried bread is double yum, so we tried it again, but with nutella, which was delicious. You know you are eating something good when people come up to you asking where you got your food. Price: 50 crowns, about 3USD/CHF.


I was fascinated by the enormous mounds of dough they emptied from huge plastic sacks onto the table, then proceeded to cut with a monster serrated knife into individual dough portions.


ok, the picture is horrible but nutella was a winner

prague: trdelnik

When traveling, I love trying new food almost more than seeing the sights. Here's the first of several fun foods we tried in Prague - Trdelnik. It's a sweet dough rope wrapped around a metal bar, which is spun over a flame until golden, then rolled in a sugar/cinnamon/nut mix. It's yum and not hard to find. At the old town easter market, there were at least a dozen booths. I ate three or so, then switched to langose, which I'll blog about next.


I was a little worried that one of these enormous trdelnik replicas (each booth had one) would fly off in the gusty wind and take us out


best when warm, also works as a wrist band

gadget envy

I saw a link to this SideSwipe Spatula Mixer Blade for KitchenAid stand mixers on David Lebovitz's blog and now I'm desperate to have it!

recipe added: rolls

Per request, I added the "Best American Dinner Rolls" recipe to this post. Happy baking!

Tarte au Citron

I was anxious to eat this last piece, thus the boring pic

Finally, something to blog about. I tasted a yummy Tarte au Citron at a dinner party a couple weeks ago and was inspired to make one of my own, mainly so I could eat a lot more of it. I stumbled across Thomas Keller's recipe that is used at his restaurants The French Laundry, Bouchen and Per Se. I've had the pleasure of dining at The French Laundry twice, due to the tireless efforts of a good friend, which involved months of persistent calling and checking cancellations online. I've never made one of his recipes before, so I was a little intimidated. But this was quite simple and even in my inexperienced hands and sad, little kitchen, almost perfect.

I got the recipe off Epicurious (click here for recipe) and it was amusing to read the comments. So many commenters had made alterations to the recipe, e.g. using Splenda instead of sugar, cutting back on the butter, etc. and then complained about the results. Hmm.

I followed the recipe to the letter, including using the pine nut crust and maple syrup mascarpone whipped cream. This recipe uses a sabayon technique instead of a lemon curd, so it's really light and smooth. I liked the pine nut crust, but the flavor is so subtle that I'd probably just use a regular pâte sucrée next time. I loved the cream and would definitely make it next time; the maple syrup gives such an interesting flavor. I found the recipe for the cream in the comments, which said it came from the original cookbook recipe. Simply whip up 4oz cream, 3tb mascarpone, and 1-2TB maple syrup. Yum.

So many commenters complained about the filling not thickening that I was worried, especially as I whipped like a maniac for several minutes with no thickening. Aaa! Then I remembered the key to getting custard-like things to thicken is temperature (at least 160F), not extra whipping. So I whipped out my handy-dandy thermometer and of course, my filling was only at 135F. I turned up the heat and within a minute I was up to 160F and my filling was perfectly thick. Crisis averted.

I did not have a kitchen torch, so I used the broiler as recommended. I was scared because the recipe says "it" happens in just a few seconds and I wasn't sure what "it" was and I was terrified of burning my tart. But after 10-15 seconds, little bubbles appeared on the top of the tart and like magic, a deep brown spread across the top. I did have to turn and move the tart around to get a more even browning. And I was timid and pulled when I was only spotty brown, not truly golden. It should have looked more like this.

This recipe is a keeper.


crumbs make me happy - that means people ate it


my cookbook, casualty of my sloppy cooking

what did I order?

Swiss cuisine is so predictable that if I see something I don't understand on the menu, I order it. Sometime I ask the waiter what it is, but I usually don't understand their explanation enough to figure out what I might get. Almost every time, I've gotten something really yummy.

Yesterday at Hintergiessboden on Zugerberg was no exception, though there was a twist. I thought I was ordering fish. The waiter returned and asked me something that I thought meant "do I want it all cooked?" This was confusing so I asked if the fish was too big and perhaps he was asking if I wanted only a half portion. After a couple of minutes, we realized that I had ordered "fleisch" (meat), not fish and he was asking how I wanted it cooked, medium or well-done. We settled on medium and I awaited my fate. I got a steak, nicely presented and delicious, covered in garlic butter. Throughout the meal, I was raving about the meat, how tender and tasty it was. It didn't cut like a regular steak, it kinda fell apart like a roast.

Later that night I translated what I had ordered and discovered that I had eaten....


you guessed, horse meat. Specifically, I had ordered Fohlenfillet, which translates to foal or young horse. So not only did I eat a horse, but the horse equivalent of veal. I wasn't disgusted like I eaten a spider or something. I just felt dirty and a little sad, like I just ate a puppy or endangered animal. So gauche. Today, I've been treated to all manner of neighing and clip-clopping around the house.


we started with housemade garlic bread, super yum


Max opted for the horse-free Aelplermagronen, the swiss mac n'cheese

tarte tatin

I agreed to bring a tarte tatin to a dinner party this week. This worried me because the last time I made a tarte tatin, the caramel was super liquidy and promptly spilled all over my pants on the drive to the dinner party. I served soupy tarte tatin and spent the night in sticky jeans. But this weekend, my tarte tatin was spot on - yay!

I forked out 7.90sfr/kilo for Granny Smith apples from Italy (why??? Italy is so close). I also treated myself to a new non-non-stick 9in pan, since I didn't have the right size for this dish. It was hard to find; almost everything is non-stick here. When I asked the sales clerk if this pan could go in the oven, she looked at me with shock and horror and asked why I would do that. Sometimes I wonder why I bother asking anyone anything?


caramelizing beautifully


I drew a circle on the parchment paper to help me roll the dough to a 12in circle


trying to fit a 12in circle into a 9in pan - why?


flipped perfectly, with one little bit of dark caramel from a hot spot on my new pan - argh!

I used the Cook's Illustrated recipe but next time I think I'll use my favorite free-form tart pastry instead of this egg pastry, which didn't excite me.

gingerbread caramels

the recipe made about 150 caramels, which took forever to individually wrap

I was inspired by my friend, Michelle, to make gingerbread caramels, which taste like just like your best Christmas memory. I took them to Megan's baby shower and they were a big hit.

The recipe calls for corn syrup, which I can't buy here. But luckily, Michelle brought me a couple bottles when she was in Zurich during a short layover last year. I made a huge mess of the kitchen, not remembering how big candy boils before it cooks down. I switched to bigger pans twice, resulting in this sticky mess...


Candy requires very specific temperatures so I had three thermometers going, just in case. But all three were giving dramatically different readings as shown in the pic below. I panicked and tried a meat thermometer, dangling it into the bubbling cauldron with tongs. Of course, I promptly dropped it and had to fish it out with the tongs. Then I realized that I had attached the wrong sensors to my digital timers/thermometers. Once I switched the sensors to their proper owners, I got better readings but still a couple degress off from each other. I think I cooked the candy to 248F, which would be hard ball stage, but my candy was still quite soft. I'll cook it a little higher next time so the caramels keep their shape. But in any case, this recipe is a keeper. Thanks for the inspiration, Michelle.



Gingerbread Caramels
From Martha Stewart, my notes in green

Makes about 12 1/2 dozen

Vegetable-oil cooking spray
4 cups (2 pints) heavy cream
2 cups light corn syrup
4 cups granulated sugar
12 tablespoons (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
1/2 cup unsulfured molasses
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
3/4 teaspoon ground ginger
3/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

Coat an 18-by-13-inch rimmed baking sheet with cooking spray. Line with parchment, leaving a 2-inch overhang on short sides. Coat parchment. (Make sure parchment covers the whole pan - I left a tiny bit exposed on the long sides of the pan and I had to unstick the caramel with a knife)

Bring cream, corn syrup, sugar, butter, and molasses to a boil in a large pot over high heat, stirring until sugar has dissolved. (make sure this pot is at least twice the volume of your initial mixture as it grows when it reaches a boil - I used a tall stock pot) Clip a candy thermometer to side of pan, and continue to cook over medium-high heat, stirring frequently, until mixture reaches 248 degrees (firm-ball stage), about 20 minutes. (Some candies require that you don't stir the mix to avoid crystallization, but this recipe says to stir frequently. I didn't have a problem - the candies were super smooth)

Remove from heat, and stir in vanilla, salt, and spices. (Make sure you really stir. When I poured the caramel into the pan, a hidden chunk of spices plopped out and I had to mix them in the baking pan, which was not easy) Immediately pour onto prepared sheet, without scraping pot. Let stand, uncovered, at room temperature for 24 hours without moving.

Coat a large cutting board generously with cooking spray. Pull up parchment to unmold caramel, and invert onto the cutting board. (I did not invert onto cutting board - I simply lifted caramels and parchment onto the cutting board, cut into pieces on parchment, and peeled off pieces to wrap individually.) Remove parchment. Cut into 1-by-1 1/4-inch pieces (My pizza cutter worked well here). Wrap each in cellophane or waxed paper (I used parchment paper, but cellophane would have been prettier). Caramels can be stored in an airtight container for up to 1 month.

measure it

One of my favorite gadgets is my Super Fast Thermapen Digital Thermometer. Yes, it's expensive, but it's so worth it. I get an accurate reading in seconds, so no losing heat from the oven or food cooling down while I'm waiting for that stupid little dial on old school food thermometers to creep around. Wondering what you might use it for?

• don't get sick from your meat
• don't curdle your custard (180F and it turns into scrambled eggs)
• ensure your ice cream base is cold enough (40F) so it will freeze in the ice cream maker
• boil your candy to the proper consistency: soft ball, firm ball, hard ball, soft crack, etc
• and...

don't kill your yeast (100F is usually best, but definitely nothing over 120F)


maintain deep-frying oil at optimum temperature (360F), so your food doesn't soak in too much oil (too cold) or burn (too hot, duh)


know when bread is done by the internal temperature (195F-205F depending on the recipe)


Yes, I am a gadget geek and also have an infrared model so I can test surface temperature. This is great for pancakes which cook the best at exactly 350F.

sloppy croissants

Inspired by my friend Astrid, I attempted to make croissants. Per usual, I used the Cook's Illustrated recipe, aided by Sherry Yard's instructions in The Secrets of Baking. Despite my poor and lazy effort, they tasted pretty darn good, probably because of the 12 oz (24TB) of butter for 12 croissant. I ate three in one day (one slathered in Nutella) and felt like I might have a heart attack at any minute. They were definitely better than Swiss croissants, but as Astrid says, that's not saying much. Here's what I learned (I was in a hurry so I didn't take pics of all the steps and the pics are blurry and ugly - sorry)...


This is the butter block that will be rolled between the dough layers. Getting this cold butter into a 7in square was the hardest part. Obviously, I'm not a perfectionist. That is the smoothest I could get that stupid block o' butter without throwing it out the window and calling it quits.


Then I folded the corners over the butter and chilled for 2 hours. Then I rolled out to 14in square. This involves banging the dough/cold butter with the rolling pin to soften it. I thought bang meant bang, and I banged too hard creating lots of chunks of butter in my dough instead of smooth layers. Must be more gentle next time.


I folded it in thirds like a business letter, then again, creating two "turns" in pastry terms. Then chill 2 hours and repeat. I chilled the dough in the fridge overnight before the final roll and shaping. This didn't have any poor effect on the dough (like over yeasty flavor or something).


I rolled to 20in square, cut and rolled up the croissants. Mine are so ugly, esp. compared to Astrid's. Only that one in the top right-hand corner any hope of being pretty. Then they rose for an hour or so.


After a couple minutes in the oven, there were pools of butter under every croissant and I was expecting the worst. However, they puffed up nicely and were flaky, buttery, and delicious. They were however, quite heavy - not sure why. Next time I will roll more gently so the butter evenly spreads in the layer - I think that's my main problem. I froze six shaped but not baked ones. I'm curious to see if they bake up ok.


there's nothing better than a croissant fresh out of the oven - ok, maybe two croissants fresh out of the oven

america: the spoils

In addition to lots of eating, there was lots of shopping in America. Switzerland has nothing like a Bed, Bath & Beyond or Sur La Table or even the kitchen section of Target. I have to go all the way to Paris to get a proper kitchen store like Mora or E. Dehillerin.

My biggest investment was my first KitchenAid attachment: the Kitchen Aid Fruit & Vegetable Strainer, Food Grinder and Slicer/Shredder Attachment - yay! This means I don't have to spend hours hand-cranking 10 kilos of apples through my manual food mill to get apple butter next fall.

I got several bread-making supplies from King Arthur: hi-gluten flour, vital wheat gluten, diastatic malt powder, caramel color So I now I can really bake proper bagels.


fourteen pounds of brown sugar - you can see where my priorities are


sprinkles - apparently the Swiss don't care for sprinkles shaped like dinosaurs, vampire bats, and lips


what kitchen is complete without an avocado slicer?


we saw this oil dispenser in the Crate & Barrel catalog and just had to have it

Plus various other knick-knacks:
> universal silicone lids - plastic wrap never sticks, so I thought I'd give these "universal" lids a try
> non-tapered french rolling pin
> 55 decorating tip set - I'm not much into decorating cakes, but I like to have a nice variety when I do
> silicone cupcake molds - I'm hopeful, but not sure if they'll work

Still on my list: cute cake stand, bamboo cutting board, three baguette pan, proper china

cooker man

On Christmas morning, this apron and chef's hat from me was a big dud (I think Max actually screamed in digust upon opening it). But now he loves it and calls it his "cooker man." He loves helping in the kitchen and insists on wearing this gear when he does.

america part 8: in-n-out

I dedicate my last America food entry to In-N-Out Burger: fresh, fast and delicious.

But now I must say goodbye and return to bratwurst, rösti, and schoggi gipfeli (chocolate croissants) in Zurich. Thank you America - a good time was had by all.

america part 7: super size

Everything in my swiss cooking life is small. My oven doesn't fit my half sheet baking pans. Fitting anything in my fridge is a Tetris puzzle. Milk comes in liters, not gallons. Eggs come with 4 instead of a dozen. The largest bag of flour or sugar is 1 kilo (2.2 pounds). My freezer is a joke. So visiting America is like Jack climbing the beanstalk.


we seem to drink a gallon just as fast as a liter


the package says "anything goes with eggs"


kiss that garlic press goodbye


"spread the fun"

america part 6: gyros

Does this make you hungry? I want to eat another Gyros sandwich right now just looking at this pic. Back in the day, a few of us would just get a couple pounds of gyros meat and snarf it down. In Zurich, I can get a Doner sandwich on practically every corner. It's a similar idea but the meat tastes different, the yogurt sauce is thin and spicy instead of thick and tangy, and it uses flatbread instead of a fluffy pita. In short, nothing like a Gyros. I had this one near Belmont park at Mission Beach. It was a special treat.

america part 5: mexican

fish and shrimp tacos - one of my must-have foods while in San Diego

Mexican food is far and away what I've missed the most being away from CA. I've eaten Mexican almost every day since I've been here and I can't get enough: carnitas, carne asada, fresh tortillas, mexican rice, refried pinto beans, salsa bars, horchata... ok, I'm going out to lunch right now.

Even better is simply the experience of eating out. I can be anywhere in San Diego and think, "I feel like eating tacos" and within a couple minutes, I'll drive by some Albertos or Robertos or Alibertos (almost always a variation on "bertos") taco shop where I can easily park, plop down $5 and be eating fantastic, fresh tacos in 5 minutes. It makes me so happy.

Zurich has a few mexican restaurants, but
a) it's too expensive - 25sfr for a burrito?
b) they usually use bottled salsa that tastes like tomato sauce - gross. There's just no excuse. Fresh, interesting salsa is the whole point of mexican food and it's so easy to make.
c) it's more "fancy" (duck enchiladas, anyone?) and tex-mex, than good ole california taco shop style.


this is what mexican food should look like: cheap, messy and delish!


this is where mexican food should be eaten - the beach!


gotta love those taco shop prices - $.99 guacamole and $.69 salsa


carne asada torta, an old favorite - grilled flank steak and guac on bread

america part 4: donuts n' things

was $2.60 ever better spent?

Zurich might have an endless supply of pastry shops, but they don't have a Donutopia. It's wonderful to be a land full of tiny run down donut shops, named such hopeful things as Yum Yum Donuts and Donut Heaven. Excepting Krispie Kreme, why do all donut shops look exactly the same, particularlywith the same empty, nicked, bright yellow tables frequented only occasionally by the down-n-out or wasted out-past-curfew teens? But the donuts are always awesome! Glazed raised, old fashioned, sprinkled cake, chocolate twists - it doesn't matter to me. I love them all. But with donuts, it's always the case of diminishing returns. They are so cheap, you have to by at least a half dozen. And the first one is so good, you have to eat a second, which makes you sick. Then you go for a third, just in case the second was a fluke. Then you never want to have another donut. Good times.