Recipe as analogy : White chocolate and preserved lime fudge

Fudge-WhiteChocPreservedLime

(White Chocolate and Preserved Lime Fudge)

Once I forgot the butter in a cake. It turned out sweet, but dry. Nothing lubricating each little crumb, and as I tried to eat it, it clung to my throat a little longer than I wanted it to, as if in vengeance. As I tried to cough or breathe,

it said :

Hello there baker
who likes to spend hours, thumbing through crisp pages of unused cookbooks.
Who is obsessed with ‘perfect’ banana bread, and
who has eaten cake for breakfast, or dessert for dinner.
Who chooses the light of the oven over the sun glinting off leaves on trees.

Look out the window.

Do you feel the hours slipping through your fingers like butter, or clump between your nails, like flour. Is it hard to remember the important things that make up this crazy recipe called life?

Sometimes you need to take a break. Rewind to the time when you didn’t have so many different flours in your cupboard, or when you never used to run out of sugar twice in one week. When the question was What shall I do today, rather than What shall I bake today?

I coughed. The crumb crawled down to the pit of my stomach.

Screw you, little crumb, I said.

I tossed the rest of the cake out, and made fudge instead.

White chocolate and salted lemon fudge :
((Just like life, often the best recipes incorporate a little sweet, sour and salty. To keep it interesting. This lovely fudge recipe is from Desserts by David Everitt-Matthias)

100ml double cream
750g granulated sugar
250ml liquid glucose
400g white chocolate, chopped
50g unsalted butter, diced
125g salted lemons, finely chopped [I used preserved lime, but David salts his own lemons with coarse sea salt, bay leaf, lemon juice and olive oil]

Put the double cream, granulated sugar and glucose in a large, heavy-based saucepan and bring slowly to the boil, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Raise the heat and boil until it reaches 140’C on a sugar thermometer, stirring frequently to prevent it catching on the bottom of the pan.

Transfer the mixture to the bowl of a freestanding food mixer and start beating on low speed. Add the chopped chocolate in 3 stages, allowing each one to be incorporated before adding the next. Then add the butter and beat well on low speed. Finally mix in the salted lemons.

Pour the mixture into a baking tray lined with baking parchment, place another sheet of parchment on top and leave to cool. Put it in the fridge to set. Cut it into the desired shapes and store in an airtight container until needed.

You could also pour some melted white chocolate on the fudge before cutting it.

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Survival Guide

BananaPiloncilloCake

(Banana, piloncillo and buckwheat cake, coconut lime sorbet)

I have a new little helper at work. She has been struggling a little bit, since she is relatively new to this kind of job. As a consequence, I have been putting in extra hours and trying to be more patient. Over time, I hope the patience pays off and that she is able to step up and exceed expectations. With a team consisting of just two people, there is no where to hide and no one to hide behind.

Since I’ve been observing her for the past couple of weeks, I have started to reminisce about what it was like for me when I started out. It hasn’t been a very long travelled road of manning pots and pans or whipping egg whites, because I started cooking later than most. Armed with just a desire to learn how to cook, and knowing nothing at all about the industry, I remember rocking up to my first kitchen trial without any knives or uniform. Pretty naive of me, now that I think about it.

Shuna of Eggbeater has written more comprehensively about such things before. However, it still got me thinking about the things I had learned/realised (mostly in retrospect) along the way.

First and foremost (and as cliched as it sounds), you have to really want the job. I remember the head chef saying just that to me during the interview for my previous job. I also remember thinking at the time, what a ridiculous statement. Of course I want the job! I’m applying to work with one of the most amazing pastry chefs in the country. What’s not to want?

That last job was one of the hardest and best experiences of my life. Every day for the first month or two, I wanted to give up. I saw more people come and go than I could remember faces and names. Some packed up and disappeared in the middle of a busy service. Others just didn’t turn up one day. A few were courteous enough to give notice.

Once I just faced facts and accepted that it’s going to be hard, I kept my head down and worked as hard as I could. Tears might happen and defeat might appear imminent, but know that it is worth it, if you stick with it. Some of the most talented chefs I know are a little cocky and arrogant. A little self confidence helps when you are captain of a big ship, but when you’re starting out with a new crew, you have to be prepared to swallow your pride a little.

You should be the first one in and the last one out. Do more than is expected of you. Ask questions, but know when the right time is to ask them. Invest as much time in the place as the place is investing in you. If you contribute enough, you will find that people around you are more willing to share their knowledge. In a busy kitchen, no one has time for you unless you are useful to them. In a busy kitchen, you are either going to be chewed up and spat out, or you will gain an experience you will treasure for the rest of your life. The outcome, is up to you.

But, you really have to want it.

(Recipe to follow)

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Daring Bakers Challenge : Vols-au-Vent

DB-VolAuVent3

(Encapsulated tarte tatin with Calvados custard and vanilla bubbles)

The September 2009 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Steph of A Whisk and a Spoon. She chose the French treat, Vols-au-Vent based on the Puff Pastry recipe by Michel Richard from the cookbook Baking With Julia by Dorie Greenspan.

Until now, I’ve never bothered to make puff pastry at home. I am a commitment-phobe when it comes to long processes. If I’m baking at home, I usually like the simple things – a handful of cookies, and the odd cake; maybe with some icing, or maybe not.

DB-VolAuVent

Not to make it sound too daunting of course. Baking puff can be quite a rewarding experience. Watching it bake is as mesmerising as the hypnotic tumbling of a front-end loading washing machine (or am I just too easily amused?). It is a performance piece which you put into the oven, draw back the kitchen towel curtains and watch rise to applause.

Even though it took me almost a month to finally start this challenge, the process itself only took a few hours. During that time, I mulled over what I would fill my end product with. When I saw this, the indecision was immediately over. An encapsulated tarte tatin? Yes please!

For the puff pastry recipe, please visit Steph’s blog. For the encapsulated tarte tatin, fill the vols-au-vent with caramelised apples and calvados custard. Top each one with a caramel disc, warming it gently to ensure it melds to the pastry. Serve with a vanilla sauce poured at the table.

DB-VolAuVent2

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