“Steingarten is perhaps one of only a handful of food critics who routinely takes a gun when he goes for a pizza. The gun is a non-contact thermometer and it tells him the heat of the oven: the crucial factor, he believes, in the success of the pizza base. As we leave the dumpling restaurant he has it cradled under his arm. And this gun, he explains, is not his only weapon in his fight for American taste. He also packs an instrument that allows him to measure the amount of sugar in a liquid. This has been his key strategic tool in a concerted two-year campaign to find the perfect peach.”
— Tim Adams on Jeffrey Steingarten, in Eating in America.

Well, I missed out on Srivalli’s Dosa Mela, but was very keen to participate in the Roti Mela, because I love all kinds of Indian flatbread. That said, I don’t usually make Naan at home because the result is never as authentic as the stuff that comes out of a tandoor oven.

I came across this recipe recently, after making a batch of chicken curry, and because the time and the ingredients were ready at hand, I decided to give it a go. The authors of the Cinnamon Club Cookbook have proudly endorsed their new way of making naan, and while it’s ingredients and method are by no means truly authentic, I’ve found the end result to be a nice big step in the right direction.

While making this recipe, I was also reminded of Jeffrey Steingarten’s attempt at making authentic pizza in his home. He did this by trying to rig his oven to reach higher temperatures than a normal domestic oven would. I didn’t exactly do this (because if my oven broke down due to mishandling, I couldn’t exactly ask American Vogue to replace it for me), but I did employ a few tricks I learned from reading Steingarten’s article on making pizza. The first thing to do was to turn the oven up to it’s maximum setting, and then also have the top grill on, so that it will give you the nice brown patches on your bread. I preheated a Matfer tray, which is a thick, heavy duty, black steel baking sheet that absorbs and retains heat very well. It gets hot enough such that the bread dough doesn’t stick to it while cooking, and pockets of air rise up almost immediately when the dough is placed on the tray to cook (which was fun to watch, I’ll have to say!). The dough cooked fairly quickly this way and there was no need to turn it.

A few other things to note, if you’re thinking of trying this recipe. I found the sugar to be irrelevant – in fact, it makes the bread a little less savoury than it should be, so either reduce it, or omit it altogether. Before baking the bread, I sprinkled some sesame seeds which I thought were a nice addition, and once the bread comes out of the oven, you can also brush a bit of butter over the top. Next time I make this, I’m also going to try replacing some of the egg with plain yogurt.

Naan Bread :
(makes 16; from The Cinnamon Club Cookbook by Iqbal Wahhab and Vivek Singh)

750g plain flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 tablespoon salt
400ml whole milk
2 eggs
3 tablespoons caster sugar
3 tablespoons vegetable oil

Mix the flour, baking powder and salt together in a bowl. Whisk together the milk, eggs and sugar, then add this mixture to the flour and knead lightly to make a soft dough (take care not to overwork the dough or it will become too stretchy). Cover with a damp cloth and leave to rest for 15 minutes.

Pour the oil over the dough and turn it a few times so it is evenly coated. Divide the dough into 16 pieces, roll out each one into a circle about 9cm in diameter, then gently stretch out one side to form the traditional teardrop shape.

Preheat the oven to 220’C, placing a baking tray in it to heat up. Place the naan breads on the hot tray and bake for 4-5 minutes, until they are starting to brown in patches. You might need to turn the bread to colour both sides.

There is a house built out of stone
Wooden floors, walls and window sills…
Tables and chairs worn by all of the dust…
This is a place where I don’t feel alone
This is a place where I feel at home…
— To build a home, The Cinematic Orchestra.

Whoosh. The sound of choux pastry in the oven, rising from zero to hero.

Hsoohw. The sound of the shrinking number of posts on this blog. Is that a collective sigh of relief I can hear? No more peppering you each day with the silly little things I have been madly churning out from my little kitchen at home. No, I haven’t actually grown tired and bored of baking. On the contrary, I’m going to miss it. But unfortunately, all good things have to come to an end, or in this case, slow down considerably.

I can’t believe how much time has passed since I resigned and then eventually left my last job. At first, it was hard to submit myself to being on Holiday Mode. I quite liked keeping busy in that way, but eventually I got the hang of my hiatus from working life, and started pulling various baking books off the shelves and bookmarking things I’d always wanted to try. Of all the many things I’ve been making and tasting, one of the greatest and most memorable discoveries have actually been, believe it or not, these simple but incredibly moreish cookies by Claudia Fleming.

But like I said earlier, such things which I’m going to have less time for, do eventually have to come to an end. Next week, I start a new job at this restaurant, and I’m incredibly excited because it’s one of my favourite restaurants in Sydney. Realistically, it’s going to be a return to the long hours, double shifts and everything else that restaurant work entails, but I’m also looking forward to it being as big and as useful a learning experience as it was working with the amazing, wonderful and ultimately rather crazy Andy.

(Sorry Mir, it looks like I won’t be able to meet you in London afterall! :/ )

In the meantime, I still have a few more things that I made recently, that I’d like to share with you. Don’t know about you, but I don’t think I’ve ever met a gougere I didn’t like. These cheesy “puffs of air” as David Everitt-Matthias dubs them, are no different, and I’m contributing these gougeres to HHDD #20, hosted by Suzana of Home Gourmets.

Gougeres :
(makes 30-40; from Essence, by David Everitt-Matthias)

100ml milk
50g unsalted butter, diced
100ml water
125g plain flour
3 eggs
85g Gruyere cheese, finely grated
85g aged Parmesan cheese, finely grated

Put the milk, butter and water in a heavy-based saucepan and bring to a rolling boil. Pull the pan to the side of the stove and tip in the flour, beating all the time with a wooden spoon. Place back on the stove over a medium heat and beat vigorously until the mixture is shiny and leaves the side of the pan. Continue to beat over a low heat for 1-2 minutes to dry out the mixture a little.

Transfer the mixture to a freestanding mixer, and using the K paddle, beat for 2 minutes to cool it down slightly.

Meanwhile, crack the eggs and whisk lightly to break them up. Add them to the dough a little at a time, fully incorporating them before the next lot is added. The mixture should be smooth, shiny and fairly firm; you might not need quite all the egg. Stir in the cheese and add some salt and pepper.

Transfer the mixture to a piping bag with a 1.5cm nozzle and pipe it in mounds of 3x3cm on a baking tray lined with baking parchment, allowing a 4cm gap between each one. Place in an oven preheated to 180’C and bake for 15-20 minutes, until well risen and a rich golden brown. Allow to cool slightly, then serve.

Unlike their more sophisticated French cousins, which are pretty and pastelly, but have no hold over me, I have a weakness for coconut macaroons. I love their rough and tangled look, their crispy golden shells and intense chewy innards.

I recently saw a recipe for coconut macaroons that was quite different to my normal recipe and decided to try it out. Most macaroon recipes are often not worth trying because while they’re incredibly simple and merely require you to fold whipped egg whites and sugar into shredded or dessicated coconut, there’s too much moisture in the mix for the macaroon to stay crisp after it has been baked. What you usually end up with is a disappointing soft macaroon that makes you wonder what the fuss is all about.

This recipe, from a C.I.A. pastry book, is pretty good. It’s not about to replace my favourite recipe, but as far as coconut macaroons go, it yields a rather good product. Good enough that is, for it to take only a few days after baking, for them to disappear completely from our house.

I flavoured my macaroon mix with lavender buds, that beautiful purple flower more commonly associated with potpourri sachets and cupboard air fresheners. Lavender is a member of the mint family and is apparently closely related to herbs such as rosemary and sage. It is said that you can substitute lavender in almost any dish that usually requires rosemary, such as lamb and rabbit, in breads and in desserts such as custards, cakes and ice-creams. The key to remember when cooking with lavender, is that ‘a little goes a long way’, because the inclusion of too much lavender to a dish can render it unpleasantly bitter. Lavender also goes with honey, white chocolate, lemon, goats cheese and, as I have discovered, coconut!

Coconut macaroons, with a hint of lavender, are my contribution to this week’s WHB, hosted by Wandering Chopsticks.

Coconut Macaroons :
(makes about 35 macaroons; recipe from Baking and Pastry, by the Culinary Institute of America)

180g sugar
20g light corn syrup
90g egg whites
272g shredded unsweetened coconut
10g cake flour, sifted

Line trays with baking paper.

Heat the sugar, corn syrup and egg whites over simmering water until the mixture reaches 60’C, whipping constantly. Remove the pan from the heat and mix in the coconut and flour with a wooden spoon until just incorporated. [Here, I also added the lavender buds. 1 teaspoon should be enough, depending on how floral you want your macaroons to be]

Using a No.100 scoop, portion the batter, pressing each scoop lightly, and place in even rows on the prepared trays [I used a measuring tablespoon to do this]. Air-dry until slightly dry, about 1 hour.

Bake at 191’C until the cookies are a light golden brown, about 12 minutes. Cool completely on the tray.