It was only after I caught myself licking a slick of lemony buttercream off the wooden spoon that I paused to ponder the sanity behind my decision to sign up as a Daring Baker. Party cake, cheesecake pops and now L’Opera. I mean, what was I thinking?! This can only end one way, and that way is, fatly.

Ah well. Through the miracle of friendly fabrics and prudent shopping, the clothes still fit, and afterall, life is meant to be lived, right? Everything in moderation, I say. So here’s a modest tease of a slice of Opera cake, flavoured with green tea (maccha), lemon and blackberry.

I don’t often find myself eating this kind of cake, but love it for it’s angular beauty and it’s unashamed use of bold flavours, rich buttercream and ganache. This was my first time making an Opera cake that wasn’t dark chocolate and coffee flavoured. The experience was almost.. liberating. To be able to pick from such a wide spectrum of flavours might seem daunting, but I always knew it was going to have green tea as it’s base flavour. Everything else, just seemed to fall into place. 🙂

This month’s DB challenge is dedicated to honorary Daring Baker member, Barbara of Winos and Foodies. To create your own version of L’Opera, you might want to check out the hosts’ and co-hosts’ pages for the recipe. Thanks guys – it was a great and truly indulgent challenge!

Never too young to listen to Mavis Staples.

Never too old to read Shaun Tan.

Never too full for just one teeny tiny TV snack…

Croq-Télé (TV Snacks) :
(makes about 50 cookies; adapted from Patisserie Arnaud Larher, in Dorie Greenspan’s Paris Sweets)

100g blanched almonds
100g sugar
1/4 to 3/4 teaspoon salt, according to taste
140g plain flour
100g cold unsalted butter, diced

Position the racks to divide the oven into thirds and preheat the oven to 180’C. Line two baking trays with baking paper and set them aside.

Put the almonds, sugar, and salt in the work bowl of a food processor fitted with the metal blade and pulse, scraping down the sides of the bowl now and then, until the nuts are finely ground, about 2 minutes. Turn the nut sugar onto a piece of wax paper and keep it close at hand.

Put the flour in the work bowl of the food processor and, with the motor running, drop in the pieces of cold butter. As soon as all the pieces are in, switch to pulse mode and pulse just until the mixture looks sandy. Add the nut-sugar mixture and pulse in 3- to 4-second spurts until the dough forms small curds and clumps. Scrape the dough onto a piece of baking paper.

To shape the cookies, pull off small pieces of dough about the size of cherries and squeeze them in your hand to form irregularly shaped chunks. Place the pieces of the lined baking trays, leaving about 1.5cm space between them.

Bake for 9 to 11 minutes, rotating the sheets top to bottom and front to back after 5 minutes, or until the cookies are set but not really browned. The cookies will still be soft. Let the cookies rest on the baking sheet for 3 minutes, then, using a wide metal spatula, carefully transfer them to racks to cool to room temperature.

The cookies can be kept in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 5 days or frozen for up to 1 month.

Mad about Macarons? Well, not really, to be perfectly honest. Of course, when in Paris, B and I scoffed cholesterol-defying amounts of croissants, baguettes, brie and macarons, but back home, I can think of other things I’d rather be girding my hips with, than sugary macarons.

Mad about Macarons is an event by Couture Cupcakes; a celebration of macarons in their many colours and flavours. A boon surely, for all the many macaron-obsessed people out there – and there are many.

Even though I’m not always enamoured by them, I do appreciate the love and the art involved in creating macarons – from the clever flavour combinations (Pierre Hermes’ raspberry, rose and lychee-flavoured Ispahan comes immediately to mind, or Helene’s exotic sounding cherry blossom and hibiscus numbers. Even something as deceptively simple a flavour as salted butter caramel) to that perfect pastel hue and the crisp outer shell with the melting interior.

So when I recently saw Aran’s exquisite pink peppercorn macarons, I was intrigued. Her recipe is quite similar to the one I normally use, except that the ratios differ a little and she uses powdered egg white – something I had never used before. They were interesting enough variations to get me searching for some egg white powder to purchase. I wanted to make my macarons green tea flavoured, but I was running out of green tea powder, so I made them pink instead, with strawberry powder sprinkled over the top of each macaron (they darkened considerably in the oven, but the ‘roasting’ they got, actually helped draw out the strawberry flavour without being bitter). After they were baked, I sandwiched them with some berry jam and small scoops of vanilla bean ice-cream.

I haven’t come to any conclusion about the egg white powder yet. The macarons turned out really well, but that could just be due to the sum of their parts, thanks to Aran’s recipe. I might have to try this again in the near future, this time without the powder, to see if I can discern any difference.

Tempted? You can find the original recipe on Aran’s blog.