Category Archives: Fruit

Barely Sweet

Posted on by

If you read my blog astutely, not that I expect you to, but you may have noticed that I posted Allan and I went on a trip to Slovenia and Croatia.  Now, I had every intention of giving day by day coverage of our discoveries, but I forgot the charger for my camera and I burned out the battery on day 2.  Without photos, let’s face it you don’t have much of a blog.  I took some pictures with Allan’s phone and I may dribble those out over time, but I missed the big photo op.

But maybe it’s better this way.  Maybe Slovenia and Croatia just became part of me and I will reveal how they changed me through small revelations.  That is actually true, and I noticed that tonight.  I always have a quart of strawberries in my fridge these days because they are so beautiful and abundant in Tunisia, right now.  We don’t eat much dessert at our house, but the weather has turned chilly again, and the sea is stormy, and Allan and I aren’t feeling our best, so our son made a gorgeous chicken soup with homemade dumplings for dinner.  I decided I could at least contribute a little cake to have with our strawberries.  I saw a recipe today for a cornmeal cake, which I hoped would be like just about every dessert we had on our trip:  barely sweet.  The desserts were heavily fruit laden, think strudel,  with just a hint of sweetness.  I commented several times that the dessert could almost be a side dish.  This cornmeal cake has that very touch of sweetness and a really nice corn crunchiness (I used a coarsely ground cornmeal), while being fork tender at the center.  It was just what I wanted to have.

DSC_3480

Shutter: 1/60, Aperture: f/2.8

Cornmeal Cake with Strawberries

From Fresh From the Farmers’ Market by Janet Fletcher

  • Unsalted butter and cornmeal for preparing the pan
  • 1 1/4 cups sifted cake flour
  • 6 tablespoons yellow cornmeal
  • 2 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1 teaspoon grated lemon zest
  • 1/2 cup milk
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.  Butter the bottom and sides of a 9-inch round cake pan with 2-inch sides, then dust with cornmeal, shaking out excess.
  2. In a bowl, stir together the cake flour, cornmeal, baking powder, and salt.
  3. With an electric mixer, beat butter until creamy.  Add sugar gradually and beat, scraping down sides of bowl once or twice, until creamy and light.  Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.  Add lemon zest.
  4. Combine milk and vanilla extract.  With mixer on low speed, add dry ingredients in three batches, alternating with milk.  Beat just until blended, scraping down sides of bowl once or twice.  Spread batter evenly in prepared pan.
  5. Bake until top is golden brown and firm to the touch, 35-40 minutes.
DSC_3495

Shutter: 1/60, Aperture: f/2.8

A Montana Fourth

Posted on by

Celebrating the Fourth of July, as it should be done, for our family,  revolves around a trip to Montana.  In Montana reside my parents, my sister and her family, and my brother David’s family.  Billings, Montana is also about equidistant between Colorado and Washington which is the spread of my siblings and me.

This brother, David, also happens to own an idyllic box canyon ranch, stocked with Icelandic horses and many other fantasy features of a true western lifestyle.  It is flat-out fun and we love going there, because we love both our family and Montana.

It felt like the extended family made a greater effort than ever to get there this year and one of the things we all said we enjoyed the most about our time together was how we took turns with the meals.  For our part, there was a dinner based on Thomas Keller’s Buttermilk-Fried Chicken that was quite popular, especially with my 23 year old nephew who is living on his own now and really appreciates a home-cooked and free meal.

I also made an Ina Garten plum-apricot crumble to contribute to the Fourth of July barbecue.  This dessert was not-too-sweet, with extra crumb topping, and the plums and apricots bubbled together to form a pleasing pink color.

The main attraction, however, was the breakfast burritos made by my niece, Camilla, and her husband of almost one year, James.  Camilla has struggled with food allergies for many years and has explored cooking with a far greater variety of grains than I ever have.  She owns her own grain mill and for these tortillas ground hard Montana spring wheat, kamut, and spelt.  Camilla and James made and froze the tortillas and the Chili Verde Con Cerdo ahead of time and then cooked the eggs and bacon on the morning of the fourth.  We were absolutely groaning from the deliciousness and it was so much fun to share an interest in food preparation with them.

Breakfast Burritos

Flour Tortillas

  • 4 cups flour (choose any kind of flour such as wheat, kamut, spelt, etc…)
  • 2 teaspoons salt
  • 3 teaspoons baking powder
  • 2 tablespoons olive oil
  • 1 1/2 cups hot water
  1. Mix all ingredients until dough pulls away from the sides of the bowl.
  2. Take a gallon-sized zip-lock bag and liberally add olive oil.  Place dough in the oiled bag and extract as much of the air as possible before sealing.  Roll dough around in the oiled bag to cover it well then let it sit in a warm place for 20 minutes.
  3. Form dough into golf ball sized portions and lay on a parchment covered baking sheet.  On a lightly floured surface, roll dough into tortillas.  Heat a dry nonstick skillet to medium heat and cook tortillas on both sides as they are rolled. Stack them on a plate as they come off of the pan and cover the stack with a dry dish towel.

Makes between 12-15 tortillas

Serve with any of the following: scrambled eggs, bacon, ham, cheese, onions, green chilies or potatoes.  Smother with Chili Verde Con Cerdo.  Top with additional grated cheese and sour cream.

Finally, what would a family reunion be without cute little boys playing with kittens and eating ice cream sandwiches?

Poppy Seed Cake with Grilled Peaches

Posted on by

Ten days from today, we’re on our plane flying home to Lummi Island.  This is my last week to cook through some ingredients that I don’t want to leave until I come back in August.  Last summer, when I returned, our household helper informed me (you should have heard that multi-lingual exchange accompanied with pantomimes) that some of my spices had termites so she threw them out.  I would have found that a little unbelievable except one week later, my son was about to sprinkle some pimente forte on his pizza when he noticed that little white things were wiggling in it and threw it away, too.  That local chili powder is almost too hot for humans to eat, yet it is a perfect breeding medium for bugs?

I had a large quantity of poppy seeds after spending my winter vacation in Prague and Germany.  Using them at the rate of a teaspoon here and there wasn’t even making a dent in my stash.  I needed a recipe that was pretty much based on poppy seeds.  I found this one that had been developed by caterer Vered Guttman and which was printed in the Washington Post.

Poppy Seed Cake

12 servings

Ingredients:

  • 14 tablespoons (1 3/4 sticks) unsalted butter, plus more for the pan, at room temperature
  • 4 large eggs, at room temperature
  • 1 1/4 cups sugar
  • 1/4 cup flour, plus more for the pan
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 3/4 cup plain unsweetened applesauce or yogurt
  • 7 ounces (about 2 cups) twice-ground poppy seeds (see following notes)

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Butter and flour a 9-inch springform pan.

Combine the eggs and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer; beat on medium speed for 10 minutes.

Meanwhile, combine the flour and the baking powder in a small bowl.

Reduce the mixer speed to low; add the butter and applesauce, then gradually add the flour mixture and the twice-ground poppy seeds to form a very wet batter. Pour into the pan and bake for 45 to 50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out with only crumbs. Transfer the pan to a wire rack; let the cake cool completely before removing the springform ring.

For this recipe, you have to double grind about 2 cups of whole poppy seeds in a coffee or spice grinder.  It actually takes some intensity to break them down.  As you might imagine, they are so round and hard they just whirl around for a few seconds until some heat builds up in the grinding chamber and they gradually start to crack.  Here is the contrast of whole poppy seeds and what they look like after one grinding.

Then, this is the color and consistency after the second grinding.

Now, what does that remind me of?  Let me see?  Of yes, a cat litter box!  When you start to get that clumping consistency, you’ve got what you’re grinding for.

I made this whole cake on Sunday morning and then took it to two parties, one barbecue lunch and one garden dinner.  When I told the other guests the quantity of poppy seeds in the cake, I could feel their nervousness.  I knew they were wondering if it is OK to eat pure ground up poppy seeds and if they were going to become high as there were some jokes about not taking a drug test in the next week.

I did some research to find out what effect on health or nutrition poppy seeds have.  I was surprised to learn that they contain actual nutrients and aren’t just decorative.  Here are the highlights:

Health benefits of poppy seeds

  • Poppy seeds contain anti-oxidants.
  •  The seeds are especially high in oleic and linoleic acids which help lower LDL or “bad cholesterol” and increase HDL or “good cholesterol”.
  • Poppy seeds’ outer coat is rich in dietary fiber.
  • Dietary fibers bind to bile salts (produced from cholesterol) and decrease their re-absorption in the colon, further helping lower  LDL cholesterol levels.
  • The seeds are an excellent source of B-complex vitamins such as thiamin, pantothenic acid, pyridoxine, riboflavin, niacin, and folic acid.
  • Poppy seeds contain good levels of minerals like iron, copper, calcium, potassium, manganese, zinc, and magnesium.
  • Dried poppy seeds contain very small levels of opium alkaloids when consumed in food, producing minimal effect on the human nervous system.

This cake is a real surprise.  It looks like it is going to taste like chocolate, but it tastes of molasses and buckwheat flour, two ingredients absent from the recipe.  It is very moist and keeps well for a few days.  We had it with these grilled peaches and the caramel sauce was key to pulling this dessert all together.

Cinnamon-Grilled Peaches

Ingredients

  • 4 large ripe freestone peaches (I peeled them, first)
  • 8 (3-inch) cinnamon sticks (I used actual licorice sticks- nothing to do with the candy)
  • 8 fresh mint leaves
  • 4 tablespoons unsalted butter
  • 1/4 cup firmly packed brown sugar
  • 1/4 cup dark rum
  • 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
  • Pinch salt

Directions

Rinse the peaches and blot them dry with paper towels. Cut each peach in half and discard the pit. Then, cut each peach into quarters. Using a pointed chopstick or metal skewer, make a starter hole in the center of each peach quarter, working from the pit side to the skin side. Skewer 2 peach quarters on each cinnamon stick, placing a mint leaf between the 2 quarters.

Combine the butter, brown sugar, rum, cinnamon, and salt in a saucepan and bring to a boil over high heat. Let the glaze boil until thick and syrupy, about 5 minutes.

Prepare and preheat the grill to high. Brush and oil the grate. Next, place the skewered peaches on the hot grate and grill until nicely browned, 3 to 4 minutes per side, basting with the rum and butter glaze. Spoon any remaining glaze over the grilled peaches and serve at once.

©Television Food Network G.P.
All Rights Reserved.

Crisp-Skinned Vietnamese Chicken with Peaches

Posted on by

I was at the beach all weekend, literally sitting in a chaise lounge talking to girlfriends.  It was so much fun, but I got no shopping or prepping done for the week.  Once we got back into Tunis, we stopped at a roadside stand for some produce.  They had these pretty, little, doughnut peaches and I bought them not entirely knowing what I was going to do with them.  I really appreciate the stone fruit season, here.  It is in spring and it allows me to enjoy some of the fruits I miss every August in Washington State when I have to leave to come back to Africa.

I had some chicken thighs and creme fraiche so I thought I would make a poulet a la peche I remember making a couple of decades ago when my husband and I were cash tight.  I had gleaned peaches after a harvest and he had home butchered some chickens he got from the absolutely free ads in the newspaper and we had a gourmet dinner one hot August evening at the little table in the kitchen of our first house.  That is a good memory.

Searching for a recipe, however, I found this light, crisp, spicy dish that sounded so much better.  Because these peaches slipped nicely out of their skins after I parboiled them, I decided to leave them whole, but the recipe directs slicing them into the salad.  I can’t remember the last time we fried chicken, but it was so worth it to create the crunchy contrast to the minty salad and the sweet peaches.  The recipe is from the Australian magazine Gourmet Traveler and it is making me think a little fondly of our days in Southeast Asia, which are good memories, too.

Serves 6

Ingredients

For Deep Frying

  • Vegetable oil
  • 1 chicken, cut into 12 pieces

Salad

  • 3-5 peaches, peeled, halved, stones removed, thinly sliced
  • 1 Lebanese cucumber, halved lengthways and thinly sliced on a mandolin
  • 1/2 cup (loosely packed) each coriander and mint
  • 1/2 cup roasted peanuts, coarsely chopped (I substituted toasted macadamia nuts)

Nuoc Cham

  • 1 tablespoon each fish sauce and lemon juice
  • 1 tablespoon caster sugar
  • 1 long red chili, finely chopped
  • 1 garlic clove, finely chopped

Procedure

Heat oil in a deep saucepan or deep fryer to 180 degrees C.  Pat chicken to dry with paper towel then deep-fry in batches, turning occasionally until golden (10-12 minutes per side).  Drain on paper towel and season to taste with sea salt and freshly ground pepper.

Meanwhile, for nuoc cham, whisk fish sauce, lemon juice, sugar and 1 tablespoon water in a small bowl to combine, then stir in chili and garlic.  Set aside.

Combine peaches, cucumber slices, and herbs on a serving plate.  Top with crisp-skinned chicken.  Drizzle with nuoc cham.  Scatter with nuts  and serve.

Mini-Strawberry Tarte Tatins

Posted on by

My friend Annie, at work today, whooshed past me as I was waiting to scan and send some recommendation letters.  She turned back and said, “Do you want to do some cooking with strawberries?”  My mind was far away from cooking at that moment and I wasn’t even sure I had heard her correctly, so I weakly smiled and dumbly nodded and she walked away.  But I do,  I do want to do some cooking with strawberries, still.  We have had strawberries for several months, now.  All winter I associated strawberries with the tonic flavors of winter:  fennel, leeks, spinach, and citrus.  By the way, I never get tired of that combination and we still have fat, ox-blood colored berries trying to catch our attention in the entryways of the produce stalls and I still cannot resist them.

Strawberries, however,  are verging on a danger zone for me.  It’s May now and a mythical place called Whatcom County, Washington is beginning to awaken from its dormancy in my brain.  I am pretty effective at cryogenically freezing that attachment when I have to be away all year, but I’m past the winter season here and the next encounter with strawberries will be in Washington and we will be right back into the shortcakes, jam, and I hope this summer, ice cream and then we will be with our sons, and our other side friends and family, worshipping the Strait of Juan de Fuca, and the violet, solstice sunsets.

This was a recipe I piloted during the cook-a-thon that was the month of April.  It is from Donna Hay who, God bless her, keeps everything as simple as can be.  Even working with pastry.  I also love her committed use of vanilla beans with strawberries and it is a combination I insist on now, too.  This comes together easily and don’t think twice about buying puff pastry from the store which means, do that.  I am an advocate of making a lot of things at home, but puff pastry is not one of those things.  I’ve tried.  Warning, these boil over so bake them on a lined baking sheet.

Mini-Strawberry Tarte Tatins

Donna Hay, Issue 60

  • 1/3 cup butter
  • 1/4 cup superfine sugar
  • 1 1/2 tbsp water
  • 1 vanilla bean, split and seeds scraped
  • 2 pints strawberries
  • 1 pkg. frozen puff pastry

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.  Place the butter, sugar, water, and vanilla in a small nonstick or glazed pan over medium heat and stir until the sugar is dissolved.  Bring to the boil and cook for 2-3 minutes, remove from the heat and compost the vanilla bean.

Divide the strawberries between 4 x 3/4 cup capacity, lightly greased muffin tins or mini-cocotte pans and pour over the caramel.

Roll the pastry out on a lightly floured surface to 1/4 inch thick.  Cut circles 1/4 inch wider than the form you are using and place on top of the strawberries.  Bake for 20-25 minutes or until golden.  Invert onto plates and serve with whipped cream or creme fraiche.

Makes 4.

Oatmeal, Pecan, Date Bars

Posted on by

There are going to be some date recipes on this blog.  Dates have become, in my kitchen, a little like bananas used to be when I lived in the US.  I always bought a few bananas, usually had some around, and then needed to use them in something when they got past fresh eating stage.

Dates don’t go quite so fast as bananas, but they are a staple we love to keep in our kitchen and then find creative uses for when the time comes to move them through.  It’s the date circle of life.

I am again crediting cooks.com with a recipe, with some of my adaptations.  I’ll tell you why I’m OK with recent cooks.com attributions.  I don’t mind because I’ve gone searching for good recipes from an entirely ingredient point of view and it turned out that cooks.com had some useful recipes that allowed for the modifications I wanted to make.  Too defensive?  Maybe so, but this is a great date bar.

DATE–NUT FILLING:

1/2 c. granulated sugar
1/4 c. lemon juice
16 oz. pitted dates, chopped
1 c. water

OATMEAL CRUST:

2 1/4 c. flour
3/4 tsp. baking soda
3/4 tsp. salt
1 1/4 c. butter
1 1/2 c. light brown sugar
2 1/4 c. raw quick oats

1/2 c. chopped, toasted pecans

In a pie plate, toast pecans until slightly browned.  Cool and chop.

Make filling in a small saucepan; combine dates and sugar with water. Over medium heat, cook stirring constantly until thickens. Remove from heat. Stir in lemon. Cool.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees; grease 13 x 9 x 2 inch pan.

Sift flour with soda and salt.

Beat butter and brown sugar in medium bowl with mixer until light and fluffy. Add flour, oats, and nuts. Mix with hands, leaving dough in some clumps.

Press 1/2 oat mixture evenly on bottom of pan. Spread with filling, cover with remaining mixture. Bake 25 to 30 minutes. Cool slightly, cut in squares while still warm.

Back on the Juice

Posted on by

My husband has been gone to the US for a week.  He got back last night, on Valentine’s Day.  It was alright having some time all to myself.  I’m working on some big projects and it was fun to have some endless days, especially on the weekend, to work and think and only stop to put a few bites of leftovers in my mouth.  But I very much missed Allan’s juicing routine.  I think I made it clear in Two Ways with Turnips that produce, all produce, is really inexpensive and organic in Tunisia.

We had a handy citrus juicing attachment for our food processor last winter and started the habit of making citrus juice everyday.  This year, we made the investment in an extraction juicer so we could take advantage of the beets, carrots, ginger, pears, and apples we have available all winter, in addition to citrus.

Allan has taken this practice on almost like a form of meditation.  We have a great produce shop just a block from our house and every few days we stop by, often after school.  When we get home, Allan heads to the kitchen and while I work on dinner and we listen to news, he washes produce and then starts juicing.  He used to make it every morning, but it involved quite a bit of clean up so he has taken to filling two or three Nalgene bottles and putting them in the fridge and then we have enough for two or three days.  This juice is so electric and vitamin packed I almost worry sometimes what it can do to a body to consume the equivalence of an entire bunch of beets in one glass, but I’m taking my chances and so far, we are both super healthy.

I think Allan is almost as proud of the bucket for the compost as he is of the juice.

My blood orange aperatif.  Notice the frothy crema on the top.

Preserved Lemons

Posted on by
           Every little Mom and Pop provisions shop around Tunis carries a few staples that a mother could send her 11 year old to fetch as she’s making dinner and realizes she’s missing a key ingredient.  There will always be canned tomatoes, tuna, a big variety of pasta and couscous for a little store, eggs, butter, and a few cheeses, olive oil, a variety of cured olives, and preserved lemons.  When I moved here, I intended to be all about using preserved lemon, but, as with the olives, while the store-bought ones are nicely flavored, I wonder how they have been prepared and handled.  How many times has the brine been reused?  Thinking about that puts me off a little.  Preserving my own olives turned out to not be so hard.  Preserving lemons takes just a few minutes to get started and about a month till you’re in the gold.
           My teaching partner and I have a shared hobby around the study and discovery of salt.  It began when we developed a unit to teach our students about the impact of salt on the entire history of the world, an ambitious unit.  In the process of our study, we both became energized on the subject. Richard gave me one of the most beautiful gifts I think I’ve ever received:  a copy of Mark Bitterman’s impassioned “manifesto” (his subtitle) on the subject of salt, titled Salted, along with a small collection of about 16 of the earth’s rarest salts.  Becoming educated about salt is going to be an ongoing pursuit and Richard and I are going to meet up in Portland this summer to visit Mark’s specialty shop, rather his temple to salt, to continue that process.
           Following is the recipe for preserved lemons from Salted which yields about 1 quart.
Ingredients
  • 8 large lemons, scrubbed clean
  • About 3 cups rock sea salt (This is my modification.  Mark calls for sel gris and maybe after I visit his store next summer I will be able to indulge in such a quantity of  specialty salt, but for today, it will be nice-enough Tunisian sea salt.)
  • 8 juniper berries (optional)
  • Fresh lemon juice, as needed
Process
Cut the tips off the ends of the lemons.  Cut each lemon into quarters lengthwise leaving them attached at one end.  Pack the lemons with a much salt as they will hold.  Insert one juniper berry into each lemon.
Put the lemons in a sterilized wide-mouth quart-size jar, packing them in as tightly as possible.  As you push the lemons into the jar, some juice will be squeezed from them.  When the jar is full, the juice should cover the lemons; if it doesn’t, add fresh lemon juice.
Seal the jar and set aside for 3-4 weeks, until the lemon rinds become soft, shaking the jar every day to keep the salt well distributed.  The lemons should be covered with juice at all times;  add more as needed.  Rinse the lemons before using.
 What the heck do you use preserved lemons for?  
            Fair question.  I have to say that this is a condiment you have to just try and discover the quality it gives to dishes.  It is not brightly lemony.  It does taste deeply of lemon, but without the tart edge.  It bears a saltiness, but you rinse it before use so the salt is in good balance.  Once you try it in a few dishes, I wager you will start to crave the flavor depth it can provide.  I put preserved lemons in a category with anchovies.  While they both contribute depth of flavor and a little mystery to a dish, they don’t make it taste straight-up fishy or lemony.   Here are some suggestions from my favorite food magazine, Cuisine, which is published in New Zealand.

● In small quantities, preserved lemons add a little zing to tapenades as well as a refreshing flavor to couscous, lentil or quinoa salads. The liquid from the jar can also be used in dressings. 

● Preserved lemons transform yoghurt or mayonnaise to be used as a dressing and, finely chopped, add flavor to a tomato and cilantro salsa to accompany fish. 

● Add a dressing of extra virgin olive oil and finely chopped preserved lemon peel to cooked, warmed lentils or beans along with plenty of watercress or arugula.   Serve with crumbled feta or as an accompaniment for grilled lamb. 

● Make a flavored butter by adding finely chopped preserved lemon, garlic and chives to softened butter. Spread under a chicken skin before roasting or serve atop a piece of fried fish. 

● Finish a seafood risotto with finely chopped preserved lemon or add to a gremolata, along with finely chopped parsley and garlic, to finish a braise of beef or lamb. 

● Add slivers of preserved lemons to vegetables before roasting. Or blanch and sauté broccoli or cauliflower in olive oil with garlic then add slivers of preserved lemon and some pitted olives. 

● Make a tagine of lamb or chicken by browning the meat then adding chopped onions, garlic, slivers of preserved lemons, cumin seeds, a few chopped tomatoes, fresh cilantro and a little stock or water. Preserved lemons will also enliven all kinds of other casseroles.


 

Brown Sugar Pavlova with Strawberries

Posted on by
We have had a dribble of strawberries already, but being a seasoned Tunisian resident, I’ve lived here over a whole year now, I didn’t bite on the first buzz-bomb strawberry that caught my eye.  No, I know we will still have some strawberries in May and I remember making strawberry jam in March last year, so I was waiting.  I come from a strawberry-fulfilled county in Washington State.  I know, however, that the first strawberries you see in June are from California and taste like sheetrock.  You have to wait until the local berries are almost spoiled before you can get the really good ones.  Don’t get me started on the year my county was practically dumping strawberries into dumpsters they had such a bumper crop and our local Trader Joe’s had a pyramid of California strawberries in their store.  I didn’t go in that store for about two years after that.
            We live by local harvests here.  Can you imagine something so pure and wonderful?  When you see strawberries in the market, you can buy them and they will be sweet and full of the tastes of earth and sunshine.  I still can’t believe it.
            I am a big-time strawberry shortcake devotee, but only if every ingredient is homemade and real.  For these gentle, hand-raised strawberries, I made a special, but wholesome, pavlova, bearing the warm flavor of brown sugar.  The pavlova layers were a little crisp and chewy on the outside and marshmallowy on the inside.  Piled with layers of whipped crème fraiche, and strawberries, it was a winter delight, especially as it was pouring rain outside.
 Brown Sugar Pavlova with Strawberries
adapted from Gourmet Grilling, 2011
For Meringue
Confectioners’ sugar for dusting
1 cup superfine granulated sugar
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
1 1/2 Tbsp cornstarch
1 1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
2 tsp. distilled white vinegar
3/4 cup egg whites (5-6 large eggs) at room temperature for 30 minutes

For Berries
2 1/2 lb strawberries, trimmed and quartered
2 Tbsp granulated sugar

For Cream
1 1/3 cup creme fraiche
Make Meringue
Preheat oven to 275 degrees F, rack in middle.  Lightly butter 3 (8-inch) round cake pans and line with rounds of parchment paper.  Dust sides of pans with confectioners’ sugar, knocking out excess.
Pulse superfine sugar, brown sugar, and cornstarch in a food processor until well combined.
Stir together vanilla and vinegar in a small bowl.
Beat egg whites with a pinch of salt , using an electric mixer at medium speed until they hold soft peaks.  Increase speed to medium-high and add sugar mixture 1 tablespoon at a time.  After all sugar has been added, beat 1 minute more.  Add vinegar mixture, then beat at high speed until meringue is glossy and holds stiff peaks, about 5 minutes.  Spoon meringue into pans (about 2 1/2 cups per pan) and smooth tops.
Bake until meringues have a crisp crust and feel dry to the touch, about 1 hour (insides will still be moist and marshmallow-like).
Turn oven off and prop door open slightly, using a wooden spoon if necessary.  Cool meringues in oven 1 hour.
Run knife along sides of cake pans and carefully turn meringues out of pans.  Carefully peel off parchment (meringues will be fragile and may crack further).  Carefully turn right side up.
Toss berries with sugar and let stand at room temperature until ready to use (up to 1 hour).
Assemble Dessert
Beat creme fraiche using an electric mixer until it just holds soft peaks.  Put 1 meringue on a serving plate and spread 1/3 of whipped cream over it.  Spoon 1/3 of fruit (with juice) over top.  Repeat layering with remaining meringues, cream, and fruit.

Sticky Date Pudding

Posted on by
            Me dates ‘ave gone soft.  If that isn’t a constant concern for cooks.  We buy dates by the hank here.  They’re still on the stem and bundled together, almost like a skein of yarn, and they taste like caramels.

But they are dusty when you bring them home and need a rinsing.  Usually they dry right out and have an ongoing shelf life, but this particular batch isn’t drying so well and they have gotten a bit sticky.  So naturally, I thought of making another (also see Whole Orange Cake) Australian housewives’ staple dessert:  sticky date pudding.  You do know that a pudding is nothing more than a cake in British/Australian speak, so don’t let it intimidate you.

I first fell in love with this cake at a little Australian café in KATHMANDU, of all places.  The restaurant was opened by an Australian couple who were trying to adopt a Nepali child.  This turned out to be one complete genre of expat we frequently met in Nepal.  Others were Buddhist students, missionaries, ancient hippies, mountaineers, and entrepreneurs, along with diplomats and aid workers.   As the adoption process lingered on, this family decided to save the wear and tear on their family and just move to Kathmandu and open a restaurant, what they knew how to do.  The name of the restaurant was The Red Dingo.  I remembered this by association as it was right around the corner from another expat favorite, a Mex-Nepali restaurant called Lazy Gringo.  What made that restaurant Mex-Nepali you ask?  I guess it was mostly because all of the cheese they used was yak cheese, but there were other indicators, too.   The Red Dingo, however,  was quite un-Nepali which made it fun to visit now and then.  Inside the ceiling to floor glass windows were black and white tiles, a blackboard with the daily menu, and lipstick red leather sofas and chairs where you could sit with several friends and pretend that you were being very urban and First World.
 They always had sticky date pudding on the dessert menu.  I know myself well enough by this time in life to understand how completely I am lured in by caramel sauce.  Is anyone else defenseless against a sauce of butter, sugar, and cream?  I thought so.  The caramel sauce poured all over the date-studded cake causes the whole thing to just melt together.
Sticky Date Pudding
Serves 8
Description: lose

Ingredients 

Print recipe
Description: ticky date pudding
Sticky date pudding
Print your recipe with:
Description: rint
1 1/2 c.  pitted dates, chopped 
1 teaspoon baking soda 
1 1/2 cups boiling water 
1/2 c.  butter, softened 
1 cup brown sugar 
1 teaspoon vanilla extract 
2 eggs 
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour, sifted 
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt


Caramel sauce 
1 cup brown sugar 
3/4 c.  thickened cream  or creme fraiche
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract 
1/4 c. butter
Method 
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease and line the base of an 8-inch springform cake pan. 
Place dates and baking soda into a bowl. Pour over boiling water. Allow to stand for 20 minutes. 
Using an electric mixer, beat butter, sugar and vanilla until pale and creamy. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating well
after each addition. Using a large metal spoon, fold through date mixture and flour until well combined. 
Spoon mixture into prepared cake pan. Bake for 30 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the center 
comes out clean. When cool enough to handle, place plate under cake. Open springform pan side and remove it
. 
Make sauce:
Combine all ingredients in a saucepan over medium heat. Cook, stirring often, until sauce comes to 
the boil. Reduce heat to medium-low. Simmer for 2 minutes. 
Pierce pudding all over with a skewer or large-tined fork. Pour 1/2 cup of warm sauce over warm pudding. Let 
stand for at least 10 minutes before cutting into wedges.
Serve with remaining warm sauce.

Finished cake swimming in caramel sauce.  I love the air hole indicating the sauce is soaking way inside.

Next time your dates go soft (not an idiom) you know just what you can do with them.