Sticky Toffee Pudding - a Rainy Celebration

While half of the country has been swept up by the vortex, we have been sweltering (not quite) here in drought-ridden California. This past weekend we finally got a reprieve and had four glorious days of rain, which to me means that I can hunker down and get cozy and just eat, read and nap all weekend long - which I did.

When I lived in London, I had a deep and abiding romance with sticky toffee pudding and since leaving I must admit, I have felt a void. This weekend I decided to take matters into my own hands and make it myself. I immediately googled British recipes looking for the "best" sticky toffee pudding. After perusing for a while I realized I did not have the will to get the traditional ingredients (i.e. golden syrup, turbinado sugar, etc). So instead, I opted for an Americanized recipe that I found from Bon Appetit.

The pudding was DELICIOUS and tasted just like the versions I had abroad - I know that traditionalists will balk, but this was gooood. To make: Combine 1 1/2 cups dates and 1 1/4 cups water in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Once boiling, remove from heat and add 1 teaspoon baking soda. Set aside to cool. Sift together 1 1/2 cups AP flour, 1 teaspoon baking powder and 1/2 teaspoon sea salt. Then in a large bowl beat 1/2 stick butter, 1 cup white sugar and 1 teasoon vanilla extract until just combined . Beat in 1 egg. Then add in 1/3 of your flour mixture and then stir in 1/2 of the date mixture, alternating until both are incorporated. Beat in the final egg. Pour the mixture into a buttered and floured pan - the official recipe calls for a bundt pan, I did mine in a pie pan or you could do smaller individual puddings in ramekins - up to you.

Now, this part is key, the hard sauce. In a saucepan combine 1 1/4 cups packed light brown sugar, 1/2 cup cream and 1/2 stick butter and bring to a boil, stirring constantly. Continue boiling and stirring for 3 minutes then remove from heat and stir in a smidge of vanilla extract and brandy (I used calvados). The pudding is best served warm, drizzled (or drenched) with hard sauce and a dollop of clotted cream (go big).

Oh Canada - Une Tarte Tatin

Mont Royal Park in Montreal

The boat house in North Hatley

It's been much too long since I've posted anything but better late than never, I guess. I just wanted to share a few photos from the first leg of our Canada journey and to accompany the photos I made a yummy autumnal tarte tatin. I hope you enjoy the photos and the recipe (adapted from Smitten Kitchen). 

Casa Bianca - our lovely b&b in Montreal

North Hatlley in the Eastern Townships

Montreal

I think the key to this tarte tatin is making your own dough - it is so buttery and flaky and caramelize-y and just YUM. The original recipe uses a food processor but as I don't have one of those I turned it out by hand and it came out just dandy. To begin mix 1.5 cups flour and 1 tablespoon sugar together. Cut in 10 tablespoons of chilled butter until the mixture resembles very coarse meal (with some butter pebbles). Then drop in 3 to 6 tablespoons ice water (I generally end up using 5ish) just until your dough comes together (don't overwork it). Roll out the dough so that it will cover whatever pan you are going to cook your apples in (I go with my grandma's cast iron skillet). Then cover with plastic wrap and set it to chill while you make the filling. 

The beautiful fall colors in North Hatley

For the filling:  Cut up a pan-full of apples (peeled, cored and quartered) I used 4 enormous honeycrisp apples and then 1 extra for later, so 5 total. Melt a stick of salted butter (I like the salt factor in this sweet dessert) in your skillet of choice. Remove pan from heat and stir in 1 cup granulated sugar. Spread the sugar mix evenly in the pan and then arrange your apples in the pan so they are snug up against one another (they shrink in their initial cooking so you can later fit in your extra apple, or two). Once positioned, return the pan to high heat and let bubble away for 10 to 15 minutes, until you get a nice dark caramel color. Then flip all your apple slices (so each side gets nice and caramel-y) and add in your extra apples to fill out your tarte. Cook over high heat for another 5. 

Notre Dame du Montreal

To finish: Place the chilled pie crust on top of your apples and tuck in the edges. Pop into a 375 degree oven for about a half an hour or until your crust takes on a nice golden hue, et voila! Let your pie rest for a half hour or so and then turn out onto a plate and admire.

Lake Massawippi

Berry Pickin at Swanton Berry Farm

We spent a luxuriously long weekend for the 4th doing all sorts of pleasant things - eating and drinking with friends, soaking in thermal pools, walking on foggy beaches and picking berries, among other things. Halfway between Santa Cruz and San Francisco we stumbled upon Swanton Berry Farm, which I am familiar with from the local farmer's markets up here but have never had the fortune of actually visiting. We had a great afternoon with only a few tense moments (upon arriving we found a quiet little patch and set to picking, only to realize later that we were in the "no picking" zone - we stealthily tiptoed away to find a sanctioned area to resume picking). We picked 3 pounds of tayberries, olallieberries and blackberries and probably ate our way through a solid amount as we worked. In spite of getting home fairly late - I decided to throw together a quick little berry buckle, enjoying some nice wine and cheese as I baked. I based my recipe on Smitten Kitchen's Brown Butter Nectarine Buckle Recipe and tweaked it here and there. See below for what I did.

For a nice article from Saveur about Swanton farmer Jim Cochran and his delicious berries you can click here. 

Brown Butter Berry Buckle: To begin, melt one stick of butter in a pan and let brown (keep a close eye on it as it doesn't take much to go from browned to burnt). Once browned, set aside to let cool. In a medium bowl combine 1 1/2 cups flour, 2 tsp baking powder, 3/4 tsp salt and a pinch of nutmeg. Then in a large bowl whisk together the browned butter and 1 cup sugar. Whisk in two eggs, one at a time. Stir in 2/3 cup buttermilk. Add the dry ingredients to the wet and stir to combine. In a separate bowl combine the juice of half a lemon, about 1/3-1/2 cup sugar and about 2 cups of berries. Grease a cast-iron skillet, line with parchment and pour the batter on in. Pour the sweetened berries on top of the batter and finally top with streusel. (I made the streusel by combining 1 cup flour, 1/2 cup each of brown and white sugar, 1/2 tsp salt and 3/4 cup chilled butter. Cut until the mixture resembles coarse meal and then mix in about a cup of oats.) Bake in a 350 degree oven for 45 minutes.

As an aside - we got to enjoy an afternoon at Refuge Spa in Carmel Valley and I definitely recommend it if you are nearby. You can read about it here courtesy of Sunset Magazine. 

One last thing, in case you have never heard of a tayberry here is a little information from YumSugar. 

Summer Excursion - Sonoma and Little Apricot Cakes

I have been away from my blog for too long - trips to LA, Santa Barbara, Big Sur and Sonoma and visits from friends and family combined with work and life have kept me busy. But here is a little snippet of our visit with our friends Gil and Gibbo and a wonderful day spent together in Sonoma. Scribe Winery is my new favorite, the setting was idyllic, the people friendly, the vibe laid back and the wine scrumptious. 

I've been cooking, that wonderful simple casual kind of meal that seems to come so easily in the summer with the onset of warmth and the first crops of peaches and tomatoes, I just haven't been very good about photographing it. Here is a simple summer dessert that I found in Bon Appetit - Little Apricot Cakes. The texture was nice but I think my batch needed a little more sugar - in spite of this critique, they readily disappeared.

Combine 1 cup flour, 1.5 tsp baking powder and a quarter tsp salt in a medium bowl. In a large bowl beat together 3/4 stick butter and 1/3 cup sugar until light and fluffy. Add 1 large egg, the zest of one lemon and 1 tsp vanilla extract. Then in 3 additions beginning and ending with the dry mixture, add in the flour mix and 1/3 cup whole milk. I stirred in a dollop of sour cream. Pour the batter in a greased muffin tin and top with thinly sliced pieces of apricot. Sprinkle with raw sugar and bake at 350 for about 25 minutes.