Wedding Cakes

This summer I had two friends commission me to make one of the most special desserts of their lives...their wedding cakes. For Emily and Russel I made a pumpkin spice cake with caramel and cream cheese frosting. They had an artist make little wooden figurines of a deer and a donkey to be their cake toppers. I created a frosting meadow for them to stand side-by-side in springtime twitterpated bliss.

Here is a close-up of the top of the cake.

Here is the cake at the wedding venue...doesn't the light make it look pretty?

For Annabelle and Darrin's wedding, I did a hazelnut cake with chocolate ganache and Frangelico buttercream. They wanted a henna design, and actually that is my favorite design to do.

Darrin created the design for the top of the cake, I transfered it into frosting.

The side of the cake says "Eternal Dance of Joy" in Sanskrit.

Happy babies

My sister and I were happy babies whenever it was time to eat.

My Mom

This is my mom.

Can you guess...

where I got...

...my love for desserts!!!!

The picture at the top is of my mom and I at ChikaLicious in New York. In front of us you can see three desserts: a fromage blanc cheese cake (hard to see on the bright white plate), a warm chocolate tart with pink peppercorn ice cream and red wine sauce, and the third I can't remember, but it was chikalicious!

The next picture is my mom enjoying her cafe' con panna in Florence, and the last is of her trying to put an entire morning bun in her mouth at Tartine.

My mom is an awesome cook and we often work side-by-side in the kitchen. She does the savory stuff and I do the sweet. So while my mom doesn't cook too many sweets, she does love to eat them with me. We have had countless wonderful outings together that revolve around trying new bakeries or re-visiting our old favorites. She's the best mom ever.

An Ode to Ice Cream

Whatcha' doin' ice cream?

Being the most delicious thing in the world.

Oh, thanks for doing that.

You're the best.

And I love you.

Ice cream is my favorite food in the world. I can't resist the call of its silky texture, cool refreshment, and sweet deliciousness. The top photo is of a batch of red velvet ice cream that I made. Since I've never seen red velvet ice cream at any shop or restaurant, I think I invented it. Actually, it was so delicious that I think it used me to invent itself. Anyways, the basic idea is to take a vanilla ice cream base and after churning, mix in chunks of red velvet cake, and swirl in ribbons of cream cheese frosting. Here are the recipes for the components:

Red Velvet Cake

from: Lee Brothers' Southern Cookbook

yield: 2 9" rounds

2 3/4 c. + 1 T sifted cake flour (or 2 1/2 c. AP flour)

2 t. salt

2 t. baking powder

1/4 t. baking soda

1/4 c. cocoa powder

1 oz. red food coloring

1 1/2 T water

8 oz. softened butter

2 c. sugar

3 ea eggs

1 1/2 t. van x

1 c. buttermilk

1) Sift dries

2) Make a paste with the cocoa powder, coloring, and water

3) Beat butter and sugar for about 3 minutes

4) Add eggs and vanilla

5) Add the paste

6) Add the buttermilk, alternating with the dries (*avoid overworking)

7) Bake at 350º for about 30 minutes

Cream Cheese Frosting

3/4 c. butter

1# cream cheese, softened

1# 10x, sifted

2 T milk

Vanilla Ice Cream

from: Farallon, probably developed by Emily Luchetti

2 c. Milk

1 c. Cream

1 ea. vanilla beans

5 yolks

1 1/2 c. sugar

pinch salt

The second picture is of Peach-Buttermilk Sherbet. A very delicious summer treat. Oooh Idea! I bet it'd be good with champagne poured over it.

The third picture is of an awesome gelateria. Since I am half-Italian, I am biased in my belief that the best gelaterie are in Italy. But his one happens to be in Austria! It is Zanoni Zanoni Gelateria in Vienna, Austria. Look at the gelato piled high! What heaven. I went there when I was 21 and traveling with Paul and Rachel, and we were hardly eating because we had no money. This was such a splurge. It was like a beautiful oasis in a desert of bread and cheese (which was also delicious, but not as delicious as ice cream).

The fourth picture is of the famous Buy Right Creamery on 18th St. in San Francisco. I always go with friends here because they make waiting in the ever-present line not so bad. I think on that particular day I was eating coffee-toffee, but I always change it up.

And the last picture is of a mini ice cream cone that I made at Zuni when I worked there using Jen's pizzelle mold. Isn't it adorable!

Figs and Family

Figs make me think of my nonno. He has 4 fig trees around his house (2 in the front yard and 2 in the back). They've been there since I was born so for me, they've always been there. He has both black and white figs as he calls them, but I think they are Missions and Kadotas. I remember when I was a little girl I wouldn't eat the figs because the insides looked like they were full of worms. Now, however, I can't resist them! We are able to pick figs from my nonno's trees twice a year, once in June and again in August. These are pictures from the first coming of the figs this year, 2009. I can't wait for August!

When we get so many figs we don't know what to do with them, my nonno dries them. He puts them in jars with powdered sugar and they become a delicious sweet snack for the rest of the year.

A very "Martha" 4th of July

I think every July issue of Martha Stewart magazine has some variation of the "Flag Dessert" as I like to call it. Whether it is a pastry cream tart with berries, a cake with berries, or a collection of cupcakes with berries, it's there. So when my aunt asked me to make a flag cake like the one she saw in Martha Stewart magazine, I knew exactly what she was talking about, and I readily accepted! I made a half-sheet red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting. It's topped with blueberries, strawberries, and raspberries. I feel so patriotic.

Happy Birthday Rachel!

Dessert at Farallon!

Farallon (on Post Street near Union Square) was the restaurant that gave me my beginning in the world of pastry and for that I am infinitely grateful! The pastry chef at the time, Jen Creager, and the executive pastry chef, Emily Luchetti, took me in a patiently taught me the basis of what I know today. I worked there for a year and 8 months, eventually working under pastry chef Terri Wu, and sous chefs Lauren Vasallo and Theresa Ebilane (now pastry chef at Waterbar). I loved my time there.

Emily's desserts are elegant on the outside but home-y and comforting on the inside. Terri adds a hint of the exotic in her interpretations of Emily's recipes. For example, Emily has a summer berry pudding that goes on the menu each year. It is to die for, consisting of brioche soaked in a berry compote made with blueberries, blackberries, and raspberries. It's simple and delicious! This year Terri added a blackberry-rose geranium sauce and a ricotta cream to go with the pudding. I loved the added depth of flavor.

At Farallon I split my time between plating desserts and dessert production (the actual cooking and baking). Plating could often be stressful but at the end of a hectic and crazy night, it felt really good to look back and realize that I had done it! I remember the adrenaline rush I'd get when we would have 10 tickets that just came in (all at once of course), ice creams running out, the back-up cakes just coming out of the oven (we need them now!!!), communicating to Theresa or Lauren what I was doing so they wouldn't repeat it (firing 5 pies all day...no make it 6. Firing 13 amuses...seriously...13?), a customer comes to the pastry station asking if we like to bake, yelling "runners please!!!" so that the food would go out before the ice cream melted everywhere...

After a shift like that I'd be plating desserts all night in my sleep. I can't say I miss plating on nights like that, but I can look back with a sense of accomplishment, knowing that what didn't kill me made me stronger.

Production at Farallon was just fun. I got to make ice creams, cakes, cookies, pie dough, chocolates, candies, sauces, fillings, etc, etc, etc. It differed from Zuni (where I work now) in that it was more stream-lined for efficiency. At Zuni, Jen (the pastry chef) and I sometimes feel like grandmas when we do tasks like making pie dough by hand. At Farallon we would just throw the dough in the mixer. The recipe was such that it would still come out well, but the tart dough at Zuni has a superior flakiness and tenderness. The flavor at both places is equally delicious. I'm getting off subject thinking about eating crust, one of my favorite foods.

All in all, Farallon has delicious desserts and I am proud that I worked there. I recently returned to Farallon for dinner and dessert with my friends Sylvia, who used to work there too, and Julie, who still works there. Here are pictures and descriptions of the delicious desserts:

Summer Berry Pudding with blackberry-rose geranium sauce and ricotta cream

Blueberry Pie with Cinnamon-Brown Sugar Swirl Ice Cream

Chocolate Brownie Cake with White Chocolate Sauce and Espresso Chip Ice Cream

Me, Julie, and Sylvia

A question for my readers

Does anyone know how to fix uncooked portions of a fruit tart bottom? 

At Zuni we make 12-inch fruit tarts every day. Our method is this: take a shell that we rolled earlier from the freezer and arrange fruit on top. Sprinkle with sugar and put in a 375 degree convection oven for about 20 minutes. Transfer to a 350 degree deck oven for another 20-30 minutes. (Times vary depending on the type of fruit and how juicy it is.)

Once in a while, portions of the bottom do not cook. As far as we can tell, these portions are where the crust has bubbled up during baking.

Has anyone run into this problem? Any suggestions on how to fix it?

Photos from the Farmer's Market

I recently spent a wonderful Tuesday morning at the Ferry Building's Farmer's Market. I love shopping for produce in July! Here are the pictures I took:

                      Blossom Bluff nectarines

                 Blossom Bluff peaches, nectarines, and plums

                       colorful peppers

                         squash blossoms and baby corn

    the squash blossoms that I fried up later...delicious!

Slow Food's Blog

There is some good content on the Slow Food Nation blog. Check it out! 

There are so many wonderful blogs out there

When I don't feel like cooking on my weekends, I get my foodie fix by surfing the web and reading delicious food blogs. I never cease to be amazed at the creativity, talent, and passion that I see. I am going to start choosing three cool blog posts to share every time I go into one of my binge blog reading sessions. So here are three that I chose for today:

The first is "Airy Fairy Cupcakes" at www.airyfairycupcakes.com. She is based in Ireland and blogs about her cupcake baking experiences. She has GREAT ideas for cupcake flavors such as lavender, french toast, chinese five-spice, "strawberry, champagne, and cream", and Guiness. The pictures on her blog are beautiful and made me crave a cupcake with some kind of gooey caramel goodness inside. I had never heard of "Welsh Rarerabbit Muffins" or "Millionare's Shortbread" until I read her blog, so click away if you haven't either. So, thanks Airy Fairy! I'll keep reading!

The next is Almond Corner's post "It's Raining Berries". She is based in Zurich, Switzerland, and she wrote this lovely post on wild strawberries. Here in California, the strawberries that are predominately sold in stores are the gargantuan ones. The wild ones, however, are quite petite and tasty. It was nice for me to read that she had picked these wild strawberries on her morning walk...how dreamy. I wish I could do that! She called them "tiny red smiles". She used them to make a chocolate-strawberry tart. She has quite a few interesting posts and good ideas, such as deep-frying elderflowers and strawberries! Wow! I can't wait to see what she makes next!

The third is a post about strawberry tart written on the blog Anne Strawberry. I like how the post includes a picture of each step in the tart assembly. The strawberries look gorgeously red and the tart looks delicious. The best part is, both the author and I have red Kitchen Aides. Yay!

So those were my favorites today. I hope to do this kind of post again soon!

Chez Panisse

Last Wednesday I had the honor of going to the Taj Mahal of restaurants, the Vatican of dining experiences, the ultimate foodie Mecca: Chez Panisse.

There are four simple principles behind why Chez Panisse is such a perfect restaurant:

1. Ingredients are relatively local. This is especially important these days because the high price of gas makes food that is transported long distances much more expensive. By supporting local farms and food producers, Chez Panisse helps to keep them in business, helping to avoid their take-over by large corporate agriculture. Also, delicious breeds of fruit and vegetables that don't do well in long-distance transport do not go extinct.

2. Local farms and food producers are glorified and respected. Farm and producer names are listed on the menu, where they recieve credit for the perfection of their product. This way, customers' awareness is raised without them having to ask. Farmers and food producers should be visible. If not, they are at risk of being overtaken and forgotten.

3. Ingredients are organic. It's pretty simple...pesticides are bad for us. Organic is better. Unfortunately it is also expensive to buy organic. There is a great book called "To Buy or Not to Buy Organic: What You Need to Know to Choose the Healthiest, Safest, and Most Earth-Friendly Food" by Cindy Burke that can help you sort through the trade-offs between buying organic and saving money. Organic won't become the norm and prices won't go down unless we the people demand it. Chez Panisse and the other restaurants buying organic and sustainable produce can help lead that change.

4. The food is awesome! No matter how honorable Chez Panisse's intentions, they would be nowhere if their food didn't taste good. Fortunately, it is delicious and imaginative. They have 2 chefs who split their year between Berkeley and France...what a life! There are also 2 pastry chefs and many assistants. Good job to everyone for creating such wonderful food!

You may say, "I see restaurants all over the Bay Area that go by the Local, Organic, Sustainable mantra. Why is Chez Panisse so idolized?" Well, as far as I know, they were the first restaurant to do it, and have been successful all these years. Chez Panisse is the reason that so many reastaurants in the Bay Area and all over the United States go by that mantra in the first place. 

Another restaurant to abide by these principles is Zuni Cafe, where I work. I can say first-hand that using local ingredients is a more sustainable, more fulfilling, more delicious way to work.

So now on to the good stuff: my dining experience! I went to Chez Panisse with three of my friends from culinary school: Haley, Sylvia, and Patricia.

Check out our blog at www.bakershalfdozen.blogspot.com. Patricia works in the pastry department at Chez Panisse so she was able to give us a tour of the kitchen. It is quite small! 

The food was great...we had a garlic pizzetta, spaghetti with Monterey Bay squid, sweet corn polenta, and halibut. But of course the highlight was dessert. We started with a bowl of Santa Rosa plums from Sunny Slope Orchard.

Then because Patricia works there, they brought us a special dessert: a puff pastry tart with Santa Rosa Plums and cardamom ice cream. The puff pastry was made there and it was perfectly crisp...not tough at all. Yum! 

After that, our server thought we would be satisfied. Little did he know that we can never get enough dessert! We also wanted to try something that Patricia had specifically made, so we ordered two more desserts: a summer berry cobbler

and peach leaf sherbet with boysenberry ice cream, fresh fruit, and a mexican wedding cookie.

Both were amazing. Good job Patricia! I was most intrigued by the peach leaf sherbet. They infuse cream or milk with peach leaves, but only for a few minutes. The leaves give a flavor like bitter almond, similar to the flavor of noyau. It was sooo good. We then got a bowl of fresh Mercy Wang apricots and Middleton Farm raspberries...perfection.

Our meal lasted 3 1/2 hours. It was wonderful to share such an experience with good friends!

I joined the Foodie Blogroll!

Hello everyone! As you can see in my sidebar, I joined the Foodie Blogroll. I have been checking it out and getting familiar with it, and I am excited by what I have found! I am now linked to foodies all over the world and have a community full of people with different experiences and backgrounds to share ideas with. I hope to learn about new ingredients and techniques for my cooking, get travel tips from real foodies in places that I will be visiting, and increase traffic on my own little blog. I can't wait!

Something Fancy

Usually when I bake at home I stick to simple desserts that have a maximum of two components, and I leave the fancier stuff for work. But yesterday I decided to make something a little more complicated. What an exciting way to spend my day off!

I knew I wanted to create layers of flavor...but what flavors? I came across a recipe for Cream Cheese Bavarian Cream in my Gisslen Professional Baking book and that got me to thinking about cheesecake. Then I went to my favorite grocery store, Rainbow Grocery, and I saw some small, red, perfectly ripe strawberries. Are you thinking what I was thinking? Strawberry cheesecake? Yep. But I wasn't going to make an ordinary strawberry-topped cheesecake, I was going to make a cheesecake-inspired fancy dessert! 

So here is what I came up with. I've included recipes and pictures..enjoy!

Strawberry and Cream Cheese Bavarian Cream Layers with Graham Flour Langues de Chat, Rose Cream, and Fresh Strawberries

Step 1: Make the Langues de Chat:

*This recipe is from Lindsey Shere's Chez Panisse Desserts cookbook, but I use graham flour instead of all-purpose. It makes them more cake-like.

2 oz. (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, softed

1/3 c. sugar

a few drops of vanilla extract

a pinch of salt

2 egg whites

1/3 c. graham flour

1. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Prepare a baking sheet either by placing parchment or a silpat on it. I used a silpat.

2. Cream the butter, sugar, vanilla, and salt until light and fluffy. 

3. Add the egg whites and mix until combined, scraping the bowl as many times as necessary. If it won't mix well, turn the speed way up for a bit.

4. Add flour and mix until combined. It might look broken, that's ok.

5. Before you start on this step, decide what shape you want your cake to be. It is a molded cake that you will turn out, so choose a container to put it in. I used a medium-sized pot and a small loaf pan for the two cakes that I made. Once you do that, take your batter and spread it on the silpat or parchment making shapes that are slightly bigger than what will fit in the container. You will need three layers per cake. After they bake you will trim them to fit in just right. So because I made one round cake and one small rectangular cake, I spread the batter to be three circles and 3 small rectangles. E-mail me if you have questions about that step.

6. Bake for about 5 minutes, until they no longer look moist and are starting to brown around the edges.

7. When cool, take a spatula and carefully remove them from the tray, being careful not to break them. If you do, it's not the end of the world, just make it so you can patch them together.

8. Now take a pair of scissors and cut them to fit perfectly inside your chosen container.

Step 2: Prepare the mold:

1. Line the mold with plastic wrap making sure there is overhang. 

2.Put your first langue de chat on the bottom of the mold, lying flat.

Step 3: Make the Strawberry Puree:

1. Puree about 2 cups of strawberries in a food processor.

2. Pass the puree through a fine-mesh sieve, discarding seeds and pulp 

Step 4: Make the Strawberry Bavarian Cream:

*This recipe is adapted from Gisslen's Professional Baking, 4th Edition

4 oz. strawberry puree

2 oz. sugar

1/2 oz. lemon juice

1/4 oz. gelatin

2 1/2 oz. cold water

6 oz. heavy cream

1. Whisk together the puree, sugar, and lemon juice

2. Pour the water over the gelatin and let sit for a minute. Heat briefly, just until the gelatin is dissolved. Make sure you don't heat it too much or the gelatin won't work. Add that to the puree mixture.

3. Whip the cream to soft peaks. Fold it into the strawberry mixture. You might need to whisk it in at the end. That's fine.

4. Pour into mold and smooth it off. 

5. Place your second langue de chat layer on top. Refrigerate until set.

Step 5: Make the Cream Cheese Bavarian Cream

*This recipe was adapted from Gisslen's Professional Baking, 4th Edition

6 oz. cream cheese

2 oz. sugar

pinch salt

zest of 1 lemon

a few drops of vanilla extract

1/2 oz. lemon juice

1/8 oz. gelatin

1 oz. water

1 c. heavy cream

1. Paddle cream cheese, sugar, salt, lemon juice, zest, and vanilla in a mixer until soft and fluffy.

2. Put water over gelatin and let sit for 1 minute. Heat briefly to dissolve the gelatin. Stir into cream cheese mixture.

3. Whip the cream to soft peaks. Fold into cream cheese mixture.

4. Pour into mold on top of strawberry layer and langue de chat. Place your 3rd langue de chat on top. Refrigerate until set.

Step 6: Unmold your cake:

1. Place a plate on the top of your mold and flip it all over, so now the cake is on the plate and the mold is upside-down. Pull on the plastic to get the cake to come out of the mold. Remove the plastic.

Step 7: Make the rose cream:

1/2 c. heavy cream

 few drops of rose water

2 tsp. sugar

1. Whip all to soft peaks

2. Fluffily spread on top of your cake.

Step 8: Garnish:

1. Cut some fresh strawberries however you would like. Arrange them on top of the cake.

Step 9: Show it off!

I know this recipe has a lot of steps, so if you have any questions, feel free to e-mail me.

Piato Forte

A cool part about being the only pastry chef in my family is that I often get to be the one to make desserts for family gatherings. Yesterday, on the 4th of July, I had one such opportunity. It was my grandfather's, or Nonno's, 88th birthday. He was born in Coselli, Italy, and has been living in California for 78 years. When I asked my nonno what kind of dessert he would like he said, "Piato forte would be nice" without even a hesitation, as if he'd been planning on having that for his dessert all year. I had never made piato forte before, but I knew I had my great-aunt Inez's recipe tucked away somewhere, and I was up for the challenge.

Piato forte is like a trifle, but with a couple of distinct Italian-American twists: lady fingers and lots of booze. Here's the recipe, just as my aunt Inez Giusti wrote it:

4 egg yolks

4 coffee royal glasses of milk

4 slices lemon rind

some orange rind

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

4 packages lady fingers

whipped cream

mescolansa

chocolate syrup

Make a custard with the first five ingredients. Sprinkle a layer of lady fingers with mescolansa. Add a layer of custard, a layer of cream, and a layer of chocolate sauce. Continue layering.

I find this recipe interesting for 2 reasons. First of all, what is a coffee royal glass and how big is it? Recipes are so much more personal when unconventional measuring tools are used. Second, the directions are very minimal. That is because back then, most women knew how to do basic cooking techniques, such as "making a custard" without the entire procedure being written out. In cookbooks and magazines nowadays, each step of a recipe is described in detail.

So the above recipe is what I had to work with to make my Nonno a delicious piato forte. I started by making the custard. I decided to use 2 cups of milk and I added some sugar. (See recipe below for my version). For the chocolate sauce, I used a mocha hot fudge sauce recipe...I think the coffee flavor gave the whole thing a boost. For the lady fingers, I visited my local italian delicatessen, Lucca Ravioli Company, and bought a package. (Lucca happens to be the nearest city to where my Nonno was born in Tuscany, so it works.) 

For those of you wondering what "mescolansa" is, it can mean a mixture of anything. In my family, we use it to mean a spice mixture or a mixture of liquors and alcohols. In this case, it is a mixture of alcohols made by combining the last bits from bottles over the years. Any good Italian family will have a bottle with the original name of the contents crossed out and replaced with the word "mescolansa". So I used my mom's mescolansa for putting the "forte" in my piato forte.

It was a huge success! My Nonno loved it and said it tasted just like Inez's. Everyone at the party enjoyed it thoroughly. I finished off the night by licking the serving spoon until there was nothing left. So here is my version of the recipe:

Piato Forte

4 egg yolks

2 tablespoons sugar

2 cups milk

zest of 1 lemon

zest of 1/2 an orange

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

about 20 lady fingers

3 cups heavy cream

2 tablespoons sugar

mocha fudge sauce (use a recipe that you like)

mescolansa (you can mix together rum, amaretto, peach schnapps, frangelico, etc...whatever you want)

1. Heat the milk and zests until it starts to steam. Cover and let it sit for 20-30 minutes. 

2. After the milk and zests have sat for 20-30 minutes, whisk the yolks and 2 tablespoons of sugar together. Pour a bit of milk into the yolks and whisk. Now pour that back into the milk and cook on the stove over low heat. Stir it constantly with a rubber spatula, scraping the bottom the whole time, until the mixture thickens slightly and coats the back of a spoon.

3. Remove from heat (be careful...if it gets too hot the eggs will curdle. If it gets a little lumpy it's no big deal, but ideally it will be smooth). Whisk in vanilla extract, strain out the zest, and chill. (This can be done a day ahead)

4. When your custard is cool, you're ready to assemble the piato forte. In a bowl or a trifle dish, put a layer of lady fingers. Arrange them the best you can to fit as many in laying flat as possible. It doesn't have to be perfect. Sprinkle them with the mescolansa until all the lady fingers look moist...it's up to you how much you want.

5. Next, pour 1/3 of your custard on the moist lady fingers. Next, drizzle your mocha fudge sauce over everything.

6. Whip your 3 cups cream and 2 tablespoons sugar until it will hold soft peaks. Put 1/3 of it on top of the lady fingers and chocolate.

7. Put another layer of lady fingers on top of the cream. Sprinkle with mescolansa. Pour another third of your custard over them. Drizzle with chocolate and top with a layer of whipped cream. Repeat one more time.

8. Let the piato forte sit in the refrigerator for at least an hour...the more soaked the lady fingers become the better.

9. When it's time to eat it, scoop it out with a spoon. Enjoy!!!

Chocolate Pictures

I came across these pictures that I took in culinary school when we were learning to make chocolates. I think they are pretty and fun to look at so I decided to share them!

Fun With Marzipan!

Marzipan is like play-doh, only better because you can eat it. And I, unlike a lot of people, actually like eating marzipan. In culinary school we got to play with marzipan for a whole day. We made it and colored it ourselves and then made all kinds of little figures...so much fun! I would like to do a shout-out to my friend Haley Gilbert who won first place in my own personal contest for who could make the best marzipan figure. She made a marzipan Paul. Paul is another friend of ours who is currently traveling on a bus from London to Nepal. The picture below is of Paul holding Marzipan Paul. The other pictures are of my other marzipan creations. Enjoy!