Red Velvet Cupcakes with Vanilla Buttercream

I love Valentine's Day.
I am not ashamed.
It is my favorite day of the year. Not because I am a hopeless romantic (though perhaps I am).
Valentine's Day is wonderful for many reasons--flowers! hearts! Love! (Okay, maybe I am a bit of a romantic.) But it is most wonderful, aside from the affection I get to lavish on my friends and family, for all the marvelous food and luscious treats. Truffles--both the mushrooms and the chocolates--make an appearance, as do less rarified ingredients, like the very first asparagus of the season and handmade tagliatelle.
But really, it's all about the desserts. Unrepentantly dense, dark, flourless chocolate cake. Smooth, satisfyingly tangy lemon tart. But what says Valentine's Day more than Red Velvet Cake?
It is perhaps a bit played out by now, with the endless replays of Sex and the City on cable, but I am from the South, where red velvet cake was just another dessert in the stunningly long repertoire of my grandmother's regular baking rotation, along with things like coconut cream cake, buttermilk pie, apple buckle, blueberry whim-wham, and syllabub. But for Valentine's Day, she always made me Red Velvet Cake.
Now I'm a grown-up, and frankly appalled at the thought of all the red dye I must have eaten as a child. I had always thought that the cake was red from a chemical reaction between the dutch process cocoa powder and the baking soda used to leaven it. Once upon a time, that may have been true, and that is why there is a subcategory of chocolate cakes with names like "Devil's Food," but the color was vague at best, and with the advent of commercial food coloring, the vibrantly hued cakes of my childhood were possible.
I would be happy with something less brilliantly scarlet than that--some of the recipes I looked at called for 2 ounces of red food coloring for a single 8-inch cake!, but I would like to serve something that was recognizably Red Velvet.
After much thought, and quite a bit of internet searching, I stumbled across beets. (That, and a package of them in my vegetable drawer that was looking lonely.) Further research on some other people's experiments with beets and reading through some ancient cookbooks, where sweet vegetables like beets and tomatoes make appearances in desserts with some regularity, yielded this recipe for red velvet cupcakes with vanilla buttercream frosting.

Just in time for the best day of the year.

*One Caveat: This recipe relies on the interplay of pH levels to keep the red color of the beets bright and lively through the cooking process. I started with buttermilk and the juice of a whole lemon, and moved on to sour cream and half a lemon with some cider vinegar, which is what worked best for me and my kitchen. If it doesn't work for you, please feel free to play with the acid levels--find what works! And then tell me!

Recipe:

Cupcakes
1/2 can cooked beets or 1/2 pack cooked beets from one of those cryopacks in the veggie section (good stuff, those. great for salads.)
2 Tablespoons sushi vinegar
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup vegetable oil
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 cup all-purpose flour
2 Tablespoons cocoa powder (NOT Dutch process)
pinch salt
1 egg
1/2 cup sour cream

Preheat oven to 375 degrees with rack in the middle of the oven

1. Prepare a 12 cup muffin tin with cupcake casings or baker's joy.

2. In a food processor, blitz beets, lemon juice and vinegar until a very smooth purée forms, scraping down the sides of the bowl occasionally with a spatula.

3. Add sugar, butter and vanilla and blend until smooth. Add dry ingredients. Blend until smooth. Add eggs and sour cream and blend until just combined.

4. Divide evenly among 12 cups and bake approximately 20-25 minutes until well risen and set--a cake tester (or toothpick) comes out clean, with no batter or crumbs.

Vanilla Buttercream

2 egg whites
1/2 cup water
2/3 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 sticks butter, cut into small pieces

special equipment: candy thermometer, electric mixer with a whip attachment

1. In a small saucepan over medium heat, put water and sugar to boil.

2. While sugar heat, beat egg whites in an electric mixer until stiff peaks form. By this time, the sugar should be boiling merrily and be about 240 degrees. Add to the egg whites and beat on high speed until the metal bowl is cool to the touch, between 5 and 10 minutes.

3. Add butter gradually. Don't worry if the mixture looks as if it is beginning to curdle, keep with it. It will eventually return to creamy gorgeousness. Add vanilla and beat to combine.

Makes enough to ice a dozen cupcakes plus plenty to snarf on.

Blood Orange Infused Madeleines (or) Eat Your Heart Out, Proust

We all know about Proust and his madeleine. The man fetishized a small tea cake to a point that his seven volume novel, Remembrance of Things Past, is bookended by the thematic significance of the delicious little morsel.

I agree with him. Madeleines are that good: a delightful cross between a cookie, with crispy, nicely browned edges, and a wee cake with a moist, rich interior. The distinctive shell shape on one side and convex mound made by the rising batter on the other are so distinctive, there can be no mistaking a madeleine for anything else. The classic madeleine is delicately flavored with vanilla and lemon, both zest and extract giving it a rich, nuanced citrus flavor that permeates every delicate crumb. There are several variations, the most popular being chocolate, though I have seen almond and even a savory version flecked with kernels of fresh, sweet corn. My favorite has always been the pistachio madeleine that Balthazar Bakery occasionally sells, made all the more delicious because of its rarity.

Feeling a bit like taking a stroll through my own memories on a snowy day, Annabelle and I decided to try a new kind of madeleine. It's January, and that means we are right in the middle of citrus season. Right now the markets are full of blood oranges. A wonderfully gothic name for a really delicious fruit. Sweet, with flesh that varies in color from a faint pink blush to deep, dark garnet, blood oranges taste slightly more complex than a regular orange, their sweetness tempered by a hint of bitterness that is very refreshing.

Not content to merely zest our blood orange in the batter, we decided to make a simple icing from the gorgeously pink juice we squeezed from the pulp and dunk our madeleines in it while they were still warm from the oven. The end result was a glaze that crunches delightfully with each bite and tastes like sunshine on a cloudy, snowy day. Remembrance of things past? If it's this delicious, definitely.

Recipe:

1 stick salted butter (1/2 cup)
1 cup whole milk
4 eggs
2 cups sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon orange extract
2 cups flour
1 blood orange, zested and juiced
2 teaspoons baking powder

1 cup sugar for glaze

Special equipment: madeleine cookie tins

Preheat oven to 375 degrees

*Grease madeleine tins well--the cookies can be difficult to remove.*

1. In a small pot over low heat (or in the microwave), heat milk and butter until butter has completely melted. Remove from heat.
2. While butter is melting, in a large bowl beat eggs, gradually adding sugar, vanilla and orange extracts. Add the orange zest and flour and stir until well combined.
3. Add the hot milk mixture to the bowl and stir until batter is smooth. Sprinkle baking powder over the top and stir just until it is combined--do not over mix.
4. Spoon into prepared cookie tins and bake in the middle of preheated oven for 15 minutes for mini-madeleines, or 18-22 for full sized madeleines.
5. Cookies are done when well risen and crispily brown around the edges. Remove and let cool on a cooling rack for a few minutes.
6. While the cookies are cooling, prepare glaze. In a small bowl, stir together juice from the blood orange with remaining 1 cup sugar until completely dissolved. Gently remove cookies from tins--sometimes a spoon can be used to gently pry reluctant cookies out--be gentle. While still warm, dip each cookie into the glaze and then place on wire rack over wax paper (to catch drips) until cool.

Makes about 3 dozen big madeleines or many, many mini madeleines

Cherry Orange Chocolate Chip Cookies

A gray, blustery day in January needs a little something unexpected. Cookies are obligatory, and chocolate, of course. But how about some chewy, slightly tart dried cherries? And maybe a hit of orange zest to bring some brightness to a chilly, dark afternoon? Yes please!

Recipe

2 sticks butter, softened
1 cup light brown sugar
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon orange extract
zest of an orange
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 cups flour
1/2 cup dried cherries
1 12 ounce bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips

Preheat over to 375 degrees

1. In a bowl cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs and stir until well incorporated. Add vanilla and orange extracts and the orange zest and stir until well combined.

2. In a separate bowl, stir together flour, salt and baking soda. Add to the wet ingredients and mix until batter is smooth.

3. Add cherries and chocolate chips and stir well.

4. Drop in mounded spoonfuls on an ungreased baking sheet and bake in the center of the preheated oven for 10 minutes, until cookies are puffy and set and just beginning to turn a light, crispy brown.

5. Remove from the oven and let cool on a cooling rack.

Makes about 24 large cookies

A Sweet Way to Start the New Year

Save all of those stern resolutions for after breakfast! Ease into the new year with a bite of something deliciously sweet. With a food processor, these tender, fluffy cinnamon buns can be ready in moments. Homemade is a wonderful way to start the New Year!

Quick Cinnamon Buns

1 recipe Sunday Biscuits (blog post October 2012)
2 Tablespoons butter, cubed
2 teaspoons cinnamon
flour, for dusting

For Glaze:

1/2 cup powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 Tablespoon milk

1 X 12 cup muffin tin (makes a dozen buns)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees

Butter or spray the muffin tin


1. Make a batch of Sunday Biscuits. Mix until just combined. Turn dough out onto a lightly floured board and roll gently with a rolling pin until you have a rectangle, about 1/2 inch thick.

2. Dot the surface with butter and sift cinnamon over the whole surface.

3. Roll up the dough jelly-roll style, pinching gently to seal seams.

4. Using a serrated knife, slice roll into 12 pieces and place, swirl side up, in muffin tins.

5. Bake, 12-15 minutes until the buns are fluffily risen and just beginning to brown. Let cool for a few minutes in the tins and then turn out gently on baking rack to cool.

6. While buns are cooling, make icing: whisk together powdered sugar, vanilla extract and milk until smooth. Drizzle over muffins and serve, with lots of napkins!

Feast of the Fishes, Part II

Spicy Tuna Tartare on Cucumber Rounds

This really could not be an easier, or more impressive hors d'oeuvre. The most finicking part--cutting the raw tuna into small dice--is made exponentially simpler when you put the tuna in the freezer until it is firm but not totally frozen. It is SO much easier to cut this way. Some spicy, finely diced jalapeño, sweet red bell pepper, salty soy sauce, the nutty crunch of toasted sesame seeds all anchored by cool, crispy cucumber. A single bite of perfection.

Recipe:

8 ounces sushi grade tuna
1/2 medium red bell pepper
1/2 jalapeño pepper
2 teaspoons toasted sesame seeds
2 teaspoons soy sauce
1 English cucumber

1. Pop tuna into the freezer until it is firm, short of being frozen stiff (20 minutes or so should be plenty.) Slice into small dice-as small as you can go without turning it into hamburger meat. Place in a small bowl.

2. Dice red pepper and jalapeño into the same sized dice as the tuna and add them to the bowl. Add sesame seeds and soy sauce and toss gently but efficiently so that everything is well mixed.

3. Slice cucumber into rounds (a mandoline or even a cheap slicer is excellent for this) thinly, but not too thinly. 1/8 inch thick is perfect.

4. Top each round with a small spoonful of tuna.

Makes about 48 hors d'oeuvres

Lobster Pot Pies

This is a delicious twist on the comfort food classic. Plump bits of lobster claw and knuckle meat add the perfect touch of luxury for a special evening. It is also a wonderful meal to do ahead. The pot pies can be assembled and then refrigerated for up to a day before adding the puff pastry crust and cooking. Also, there are many aspects of this recipe than can be purchased ready-made. On Christmas Eve, I am definitely going to let someone else handle the lobster shelling, pearl onion peeling, and puff pastry rolling--I have gifts to wrap!

Recipe:

1 medium onion, chopped
1 stalk fresh, green celery, chopped
2 carrots (or 8 baby carrots), neatly chopped
6 ounces small button mushrooms, halved or quartered
2 ounces smoky, thick cut bacon, diced
1/4 cup all purpose flour
7 ounces lobster meat (the Cozy Harbor brand, in the frozen fish section, is very good quality)
1/2 cup dry white wine
8 ounces clam juice
1 cup heavy cream
1 cup whole milk
1 tablespoon tomato paste
6 sprigs fresh thyme, stems removed (or 1/2 teaspoon dried)
16 frozen pearl onions
salt and pepper to taste
1 package (2 sheets) frozen puff pastry dough, thawed

egg wash (egg yolk whisked with water and salt)

Preheat oven to 375 degrees with rack in the middle of the oven.

1. In a large saucepan over medium heat, cook bacon until it begins to render its fat. Add carrots, onion and celery and reduce heat, cooking until mirepoix (the fancy name for the combination of carrot, celery and onion) begins to soften. Add button mushrooms and continue to cook until they are golden and vegetables are beginning to brown lightly.

2. Sift flour over the vegetables and stir briskly to coat everything--it will look a bit grimy, but never fear. Add wine to deglaze the pot, scraping up all the lovely browned bits. Add clam juice, heavy cream, whole milk, thyme and tomato paste, stirring well. Cook until the liquid has thickened and coats the back of a spoon. Remove from heat and add lobster and pearl onions. The base may be cooled and refrigerated at this point, covered, for 24 hours.

3. Gently roll out puff pastry--do not press too hard, you will flatten out all those lovely pastry layers! Trace the outline of your serving bowls (I like to use my café au lait bowls, they hold about 12 ounces), adding 1/4 inch to outline--puff pastry shrinks as it cooks. There will be enough to cut four tops and plenty left over to cut decorations.

4. Spoon lobster base into bowls--this recipe makes 4 12-ounce portions,  and gently drape with puff pastry tops. Brush each with egg wash and cook in the preheated oven for 30 minutes, until puff pastry is well-raised and nicely browned. Remove from oven and let cool 5 minutes before serving. Remind your guests that the bowls are HOT!

Feast of the Seven Fishes, Part 1

Christmas Eve is about friends, family, festivities, and...fish. At least in my house. We have always followed the Italian custom of serving fish and shellfish on Christmas Eve, even though we are not, in fact, Italian. But a great idea is a great idea, and it is a wonderful family tradition I am happy to honor in my own home. But the seven (7!!) courses of fish that is part of a traditional Italian Festa dei sette pesci (Feast of the Seven Fishes) is a bit much for this mama, house cleaner, tree-decker, present wrapper and cookie baker. I have paired down my aspirations to three courses, with salad and dessert, of course. (No fish in the dessert please.)

This year, I am making:

• Spicy Tuna Tartare on Cucumber Rounds
• Smoked Salmon and Potato Galette
• Individual Lobster Pot Pies
• Bibb lettuces with marinated anchovies
• Flourless Chocolate Cake

All of these recipes can be made in advance (from a few hours to a few days) and are perfect for a cozy meal for 4 or a few more, or doubled (even tripled) to feed a crowd. There are lots of opportunities for short-cuts--pizza dough and puff pastry from the grocery store, pre-cooked and shelled lobster meat from the fish counter, even frozen, peeled pearl onions, to make Christmas Eve dinner prep even easier on the chef. (There are other things to do on Christmas Eve, after all!)

Today's post is all about the fabulously easy, versatile, delicious smoked salmon and potato galette. It can be assembled in less than ten minutes, and after another ten to twenty minutes in a hot oven, it's ready to go, but it's even better at room temperature. It is excellent as a simple supper, a luxe luncheon main course, or the star of a brunch for two or twenty.

Smoked Salmon and Potato Galette

Recipe:

1 ball of pizza dough, about 20 ounces (store bought or homemade)
2 ounces créme fraiche (1 ounce softened cream cheese mixed with 1/4 cup heavy cream works too)
2 Tablespoons Dijon mustard
1 large russet potato, peeled
1 medium red onion
6 ounces smoked salmon
fresh dill
olive oil
juice from 1/2 lemon
salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 450 degrees with racks in the top third and the bottom third of the oven.

1. Lightly grease a large baking sheet with a drizzle of olive oil or cooking spray. You can also use a pizza stone and parchment paper if you have one. Stretch pizza dough out until it is evenly thin. I like thin, crispy crust, but if you like a crust with more heft and chewiness, stretch accordingly. Lay it out on your baking sheet (or pizza peel with parchment paper.) In a small bowl whisk together créme fraiche (or cream cheese and cream) and dijon mustard until smooth and gently spread onto the prepared crust.

2. Using a mandoline (I love my cheap, Walmart slicer) or a sharp knife, slice red onion into transparently thin slices and spread over the créme fraiche. Be lavish, but keep it evenly spread across the crust so that it cooks fully.

3. Now slice the potato into thin rounds--as thin as you can go without hurting yourself--1/8 inch thick is fine. Spread across the thinly sliced onion. You can overlap the slices slightly in a scale-like pattern if you are feeling especially clever (an ode to the theme of the evening) but a spiral pattern looks quite nice as well. If you have more of a rectangular shape to your gallette, uniform rows of slices look smart as well. Season with a drizzle of olive oil, salt and a few healthy grinds of fresh black pepper, and pop it into the top third of the hot oven.

4. When the potatoes are nicely cooked (prod with a fork, there should be no resistance when pierced) after about 10 minutes, shift it to the bottom rack and continue to cook another 5-10 minutes or so, until the crust is nice and firm and golden on the bottom and bubbly and brown on the top. Remove it from the oven and slide it onto a cooling rack.

5. Arrange smoked salmon slices on top. Sometimes I like to go for a rustic, haphazard look with big, generous pieces of smoked salmon scattered across the surface of the galette, and other times gentle folds of silky thin salmon neatly placed look nicer. Do what looks good to you. Gently squeeze the juice from half a lemon over the top, add another grind or two of pepper and salt to taste, and a scattering of fresh chopped dill.


This recipe can feed 4, 6, or even 8 people as a first course, and many more when sliced into small, bite sized rectangles and passed as an hors d'oeuvre*. For more than 6 or 8 people, make two separate galettes. Simply double the ingredient amounts.

*If you are serving this recipe as an hors d'oeuvre, dress it up a little: place the salmon in a nice, even layer over the galette and then slice with a very sharp knife (or pizza cutter.) Garnish each serving with a sprinkling of fresh, chopped dill and a tiny spoonful of caviar if you have it. Sophisticated and festive.

Next Post: Spicy Tuna Tartare and Individual Lobster Pot Pies

Chocolate Dipped Orange Shortbread Cookies

Nothing is better than chocolate. Or cookies. Sadly, I am one of those perverse people who does not like chocolate cookies, under any circumstances. But cookies dipped in dark, dark chocolate? Heaven.




Recipe:

1/2 cup sugar
2 sticks of butter, cubed
2 teaspoons dried Valencia orange zest*
pinch salt
2 cups flour

6 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

1. In the bowl of a food processor, blitz sugar for a few moments to make the texture a bit finer. Add butter, and zip it on and off in quick bursts until the butter and sugar are creamed together.

2. Sprinkle in a pinch of salt, the orange zest and the flour. Zip again just until the dough begins to form a crumbly ball. Turn it out onto some waxed paper, wrap and chill in the fridge for 15-30 minutes. It should be firm but pliable.

3. Roll out the dough on a lightly floured surface (or roule pat mat) until it is approximately 1/4 inch thick. Cut out shapes with cookie cutters or simply make triangles with a knife (called "petticoat tails") or use a ruler to cut nice, even rectangles. 

4. Transfer gently to a parchment lined baking sheet and bake in the middle rack of the oven for 10-12 minutes, until edges are pale golden. Shortbread gets overdone very, very quickly, so set a timer and keep an eagle eye on them. Let cool 5 minutes on the baking sheet before transferring to a cooling rack. Cool completely.

5. While cookies are cooling, melt chocolate in a double boiler or in the microwave. Stir gently until the chunks are melted completely and the chocolate is smooth and silky. 

6. When the cookies are cool, dip them into the hot, melted chocolate and return them to the cooling rack to rest until the chocolate has set. Conversely, dip a small spoon into the chocolate and drizzle chocolate over the cookie. I prefer this method--it makes a prettier cookie, the chocolate is more evenly distributed across the surface, and your melted chocolate stays smooth and crumb free. 

Depending on the size of your cookie cutter, this recipe makes about 2 dozen larger or 3 dozen smaller cookies. 

*If you can't find dried orange zest (McCormick makes a very good one, and it is available almost everywhere) feel free to use fresh orange zest, but up the quantity to 1 TABLESPOON.