Sweet Potato Cheesecake

Did you ever want to have your cake and it eat it too? Here’s your chance. This is a delicious cheesecake packed with the nutritious power of sweet potatoes. At first glance, you might be thinking there’s no way this thing works, but trust me. It does, in spades. (And in your belly.)

This recipe was given to me by a friend. Actually the same friend whom I had made the Salted Caramel Apple Pie for. (And yes, I meant to end that sentence with a preposition. You’re allowed to.) She had given me the recipe a long time ago, but I hadn’t gotten a chance to try it yet. So I tried it for Thanksgiving. (Yes, I realize that Thanksgiving was a while ago, but I bake things a while ahead of when I write about them.) I have made pumpkin pie in the past, but this year I thought I would try something different.

The first thing to do was roast the sweet potatoes. I had originally looked for sweet potato purée in the grocery store when I went shopping in order to save myself the trouble. They didn’t have any, so I got some sweet potatoes. I was worried that it was going to be difficult to roast and purée them. I was pleasantly surprised.

I found and followed some very easy instructions. I laid them out on foil, pierced them with a fork, and baked them. (Those of you who read last week’s post know that I baked them while I was waiting for my bread to rise.) It was fun to hear them whistle and see them ooze while they baked. (Whistle and Ooze would be a good band name, IMHO.) When they were done, I peeled them. The peel came right off. Easy peasy. I thought, “Why don’t I do this more often?” I then mashed them with a masher and stuck them in the fridge overnight, so I could make the cake in the morning to be ready in time for Thanksgiving dinner.

Making the crust was pretty easy. The hard part was figuring out how many crackers equaled how much in the way of crumbs. In case you’re wondering, it was a pack of crackers for a cup of crumbs. (I think 9 crackers in a pack.) I made crumbs via the rolling pin/plastic bag route. (I’m old-fashioned that way.) Some of the crackers were already a little crumbly and some were already crumbs. I joked they were overachievers getting ready for the crust ahead of time.

I’ve often used Annie’s Bunny Grahams to make graham cracker crust. They’re much harder than your run of the mill graham crackers, so they take a bit of effort to turn into crumbs. This time I used Trader Joe’s graham crackers and they were much softer and easier to crush. Even so it takes a little bit of work. 2 cups is much more than I thought. I ended up needing a bigger bowl. (This seems to be an ongoing issue. One day I’m going to write up a list of things that I learned while baking. A set of baking “rules” or something. This will be one of them. Always use a bigger bowl than you think you’ll need.)

The recipe called for a 10″ springform pan. I didn’t have one. I used a 9″ cake pan. I knew it would be a little smaller, but I didn’t realize till later just how much smaller. However, the crust didn’t seem too big. At the time I thought that the crumbs seemed to be just enough. In retrospect, they probably would’ve worked fine for a bigger pan if they had just filled in the bottom, and not gone up the side. I think my crust was a little thicker and later I realized it was bunched up where the bottom met the side. (See below.)

When I was mixing the cream cheese, it reminded me of making the red velvet frosting. At first, it looks like nothing. Then for a while, it continues to look like nothing, and like it will never be anything. But after a while it makes something awesome. (When I make this “rulebook,” perhaps the next one will be: always have patience, especially where cream cheese is involved.)

Before the sweet potatoes.

The cream cheese mixture was very thick. There was cream cheese flying everywhere while I mixed it. After adding just a couple of eggs, the consistency changed completely. It became smooth. With a capital smoo. After adding the sweet potato purée it looked like peach yogurt. (Mmm. Peach yogurt. I used to eat a lot of that.) When it was all done, there was a lot of it. I mean, it was two pounds of cream cheese and at least a pound or so of sweet potatoes.

With the sweet potatoes. Apologies for the bad lighting.

I put the cheesecake together and then I setup the cheesecake bath. Fun! I got a baking pan full of hot water and put the cheesecake in. I had never made cheesecake before, but you learn something new every day.

Before baking.

I had a whole bunch of filling left. And when I say a whole bunch, I mean a lot. The dish I used was a bit smaller than the one the recipe needs. It wasn’t just being an inch smaller. I didn’t realize how much bigger springform pans are. I ended up with two containers worth of filling left. So I had to start looking for ideas on how to use it. (You’ll hear about what I came up with in next week’s installment.)

I hadn’t gotten started on it as early as I had wanted to. So the turkey had to wait a little bit till after the cheesecake was done before it went in. It delayed our expected start time by a little bit, but it was just my wife and I and one friend. It wasn’t how I planned it, but thankfully it wasn’t a big hungry crowd waiting for food.

And now to the important question. How was it?

Fresh out of the oven.

It was delicious. Absolutely delicious. Who knew the humble sweet potato could be so delicious? It was even better the next day, according to one source who got to try it two days in a row. It had a yummy cheesecake taste and texture. It also had the taste of sweet potato. It was a great combination.

Look at all that extra crust on the bottom left.

One note about the crust: as you can see in the pictures, the crust bunched up at the seam between the side and the bottom. That was all me. I was trying to make sure it wasn’t too thin on the side or at the seam. I was also trying to make sure it all held together. I’ll try things differently next time.

While I enjoy pumpkin pie and sweet potato pie, this was definitely a good way to mix things up. What’s your go-to Thanksgiving dessert? For that matter, what’s your favorite cheesecake? How does graham cracker crust treat you? Let me know in the comments below!

Recipe courtesy of Chef Keith Snow, Harvest Eating, via Mambo Sprouts.

Average Joe Artisan Bread

This probably won’t come as a shock to you, but I enjoy baked goods. This blog has mostly featured sweet baked goods, desserts and such. But not all baked things are sweet. (Even though most of them are sweeeeeeet.) This week’s baked good is one that is so simple and so basic, yet so wonderful. This week we talk about bread.

I love bread. How much do I love bread? I’ll let you in on a little secret. I often eat toasted rye bread with butter as a snack. Rye bread with caraway seeds of course. I know you can technically call it rye bread without caraway seeds, but I like to pretend that kind doesn’t exist. I  enjoy bread so much I also once ate a whole huge loaf of Caputo’s bread while standing on a street corner talking with friends. In case you don’t live in my neighborhood, Caputo’s is an awesome old-school Italian bakery. It’s worth a trip to Brooklyn just to have it. I used to live a block away, and every night walking home I would pass by and the smell of them baking bread was heavenly.

So couple the fact that I love bread with the fact that I’ve been baking a lot, and you come to the genesis of this week’s post. My wife got me a bread making kit as a gift a little while ago. As you may know my wife tries to stay away from wheat, so the irony wasn’t lost on either of us. It was very sweet of her. Even if the bread itself isn’t sweet. You know what I mean.

I had never really made bread before. Well, to be clear, I had never made it by hand. Growing up my parents had a bread maker, and we made bread with that. But calling making bread with a bread maker “making bread” is kinda like adding water to instant mashed potatoes and saying you made mashed potatoes. I mean, yes, you did. But, no, you didn’t.

This kit was the Average Joe Artisan Bread Kit. I have to say that this is a great kit. It comes with all the ingredients and equipment you need. There are detailed instructions where they go through it step-by-step, with pictures and commentary. I’m not a baking novice, but I appreciate the level of detail they went through to make sure it was easy to understand. And it helps a lot when you’re getting started, as you may not know what things are supposed to look like.

Simple ingredients.

Part of the detail in the book that I really enjoyed was how much they discuss measuring. They talk about different ways of measuring and include imperial, metric, and baker’s percentage. Baker’s percentage was a new one for me. I had never heard of it before. (I’m only an amateur after all.) They encourage you to use metric so it’s more precise. It does make a difference.

I did the first part one night. I mixed the water and yeast. I added the flour and salt. I mixed again, covered it, and let it sit to rise. It was very easy. It only took a few minutes to do. It then needed to sit for 18-24 hours, so I let it rise and planned to finish up the following evening.

Ready to rise overnight.

After letting it rise overnight and then some (22 and a half hours to be exact), I was ready for the next part of this bread making extravaganza. At this point, the dough looked like a blobby mess. This was a good thing! That was how it was supposed to look. (I confirmed this by referring to their handy-dandy pictures.)

A big blobby mess.

I then scraped the dough out of the bowl. Easy. I formed the dough as they described. Basically squooshing it in on itself a few times. Easy. I put some bread dust into the bread pot and put the bread in. Super easy. I let it rise some more. Nothing to do there. While it was rising, I even had time to bake some sweet potatoes. (In the not too distant future, you’ll hear about the recipe I used the sweet potatoes in.)

After it was done rising, I nudged it a bit into the center of the pot. They suggested doing so, in order to keep the bread from attaching to the side of the pot, which would create a challenging mess to clean up. They give you lots of ideas for what you might want to do to top off the bread: olive oil, salt, bread dust, etc. I ended up sprinkling some bread dust on top. I then scored it using the included baker’s blade. Scoring just meant cutting a few lines in the top of the dough. I then covered it back up and baked it. All very easy.

Ready to bake.

Just so you know, when I say “bread pot”, I say that because that’s what this bread was designed to be made with, and that’s what they refer to. I didn’t have an appropriate pot handy. So, I improvised. I used a large aluminum baking dish, which I covered with aluminum foil. If how the bread turned out is any indication, and I would dare say it is, the improvised “bread pot” worked out well.

The bread smelled amazing while it was baking. And it really came out great. It looked great. It smelled great. It even sounded great. You could hear it crackling as it cooled. While you could dig into it earlier, ideally they suggested leaving it to cool for six hours. Since it came out of the oven at 12:30am, I wasn’t planning on eating it right away. (Although I definitely thought about it.) I left it overnight to cool. I had actually made it for Thanksgiving, and this was the night before. So it was ready in plenty of time for Thanksgiving dinner.

Fresh out of the oven.

Yes, I realize that Thanksgiving was a while ago, but I always bake these recipes way ahead of writing about them. Thanksgiving turned out to be a good time for the bread in any case, as it was delicious. We ate it up. Some of it plain, to sop up the gravy and such from our plates. And some of it with a delicious herbed butter that my wife had made. We finished off much of it that night, even with all the bounty of Thanksgiving. What was left I stored in a paper bag as they suggested, and that was devoured over the next day or so.

There’s something primal about baking bread. I bake lots of delicious things, but they’re often fancy, involved delicacies. Wonderful in their own right, but you wouldn’t live off them. (I don’t suggest taking that as a challenge.) But bread! Bread is so basic and fundamental to our culture. Learning how to bake bread seems akin to learning how to make fire or inventing the wheel or something like that. Obviously, I didn’t invent bread or fire or the wheel. But I did make bread from scratch. And it was delicious. And very fulfilling. And filling, for that matter.

What makes it even more amazing to me is the simplicity of it all. The kit comes with all the ingredients and accoutrements that you need. Flour, yeast, salt, bread dust. A scraper and a baker’s blade. That makes the kit kind of awesome. But if you wanted to make it yourself, it wouldn’t be hard to source the ingredients. They’re all very simple. (Okay, I had never heard of bread dust before, but they say you can just as easily use corn meal.) But from such simple ingredients comes something so wonderful. It’s like it’s greater than the some of its parts.

The recipe I tried was their basic recipe, what they call “The Golden Standard”. But the book has a bunch of other recipes, including one for pizza crust. Seeing what success I had with it, and how much I enjoy bread, I’d like to try making it again, and trying some variations. Bread in the store is plentiful, cheap, and usually pretty good. But none of that beats making your own bread. If you haven’t tried doing so yet, I sincerely suggest doing so. If you enjoy bread, it can be well worth your while.

Have you ever baked bread? Have you tried this kit or others? A bread maker? A recipe handed down from grandma? How much do you love bread, and how much do you love the bread you made yourself? Let me know in the comments below!

Recipe courtesy of Average Joe Artisan Bread Kit.*

*Normally here is where I would link to the original recipe, or for recipes like this one that are out of a book, the author’s site. Unfortunately, I can’t find a current link to this kit. There is a website that is referred to in several places, but that website no longer seems to be associated with this kit. If you find a current link, please let me know. I would love to share it with everyone.

Red Velvet Cupcakes – Happy Birthday Edition

When we last left our fearless blogger (me), he was spinning a tale about a grand and glorious adventure making red velvet cupcakes. Okay, maybe grand and glorious is a bit hyperbolic, but it was an adventure nonetheless. This week we revisit the lovely red velvet cupcake. But lest you think I’m repeating myself (or repeating myself 😉 ), this week is a brand new adventure. Last week was the dress rehearsal. This week is the real deal.

Last week’s cupcakes were good, but they could have been better. This time, I was determined to make them right. Someone’s birthday was at stake. Well, not the entire birthday, but at least my surprise birthday dessert. In the grand scheme of things, it wasn’t a big deal. But it was to her. And, as you might have guessed from reading this blog, I take desserts (and particularly birthday desserts) seriously.

One of the big things I had to fix about the cupcakes was to make them red. Last week’s were delicious but brown. I needed to get better food coloring. Serious food coloring called for serious shopping. Thankfully my friendly, neighborhood baking/cooking/anything-you-might-have-in-your-kitchen-and-lots-of-things-you-might-not-have-but-totally-want store had some. In this instance, my chief taste-tester also became my chief food coloring procurer. I had such a busy day that day that I didn’t have a chance to pick any up before they closed, so my wife thankfully agreed to pick it up for me. (Thank you, dear!)

The serious food coloring she picked up for me was gel food coloring. Ateco Spectrum Super Red, to be exact. (I don’t believe it actually gives you super powers after eating it, but it totally should.) It’s potent. I did a little searching around, and since it’s stronger than liquid food coloring, you don’t use as much. I only used half a teaspoon, versus the 2 tablespoons you would use of the liquid. You then have to add water, so the volume of liquid remains the same. You can judge for yourself, but I think the color worked out well this time.

It’s red!

I measured out all the ingredients ahead of time. I can’t recommend this enough. It makes things way easier. The consistency of the batter looked great before they went in, the cupcakes smelled great while baking, and they looked great once they were done. They were not as poofy this time, but they still looked delicious. In between making the cupcakes and the frosting, I cleaned the bowl, the beaters, and the spatula. I knew I would need them again.

Ready to go in.

Fresh out of the oven.

I had gotten an 8 ounce package of cream cheese, and since the recipe calls for 4 ounces of cream cheese, I split it evenly between the test batch and this one. Or so I thought. I didn’t measure it exactly, I just eyeballed it. I must have been a little bit off, because last time I had a bit too much frosting, and this time I had just barely enough.

I finished up the bag of powdered sugar I had while making the frosting. I had a couple of grams too much, but I didn’t want to leave just a couple of grams in the bag. I didn’t sift the powdered sugar, either this time or last, because I didn’t notice that the directions called for the sugar to be sifted until after the fact. Maybe next time?

Waiting for their frosting.

One other issue I aimed to fix this time was the bowl-tastrophe I previously encountered. I used a big bowl this time, but it still went everywhere while I was trying to mix it. I then realized what I needed. The bowl has to be big enough so the frosting doesn’t fly everywhere. (“I’m free!” it shouts, as it flies across the kitchen. “I’m free!”) However, at that point the bowl is so big that the frosting barely takes up any space in it, and it actually seems like too small of an amount to work with in such a big bowl. So I think what I need is a tall, thin bowl.

I got better at doing the frosting this time. I cut a smaller hole in the plastic bag. However, while I was frosting the cupcakes, I used a little too much pressure on the bag, and the back of it popped open. Luckily the frosting was thick enough that it didn’t splatter anywhere. A friendly commenter pointed out on last week’s post that I needed a bigger plastic bag. I think that would have helped prevent the bag from popping open this time. I’ll definitely keep it in mind for next time!

The first couple cupcakes were hard to frost, as the frosting still needed to warm up a bit. After I worked with it a little bit and it warmed up, it was much easier to frost with.

I made the cupcakes in the early afternoon. The delivery was scheduled for later afternoon/early evening. The birthday gal knew I had something for her, but she didn’t know what. These cupcakes seemed smoother and redder than the first batch, but I would have to wait for the red velvet lady herself to know how they turned out.

The cupcake delivery was such a New York City thing. There was no pomp, no circumstance, no glamour. It was a cold, rainy day. We met up outside the subway station near where she worked. We stood just out of the rain and spoke for a couple of minutes. But she was obviously very cold, so I quickly handed her the cupcakes, and wished her a happy birthday. She was very appreciative and asked if it would be bad if she ate them on the subway platform. I said, “Hey, they’re your birthday cupcakes. You get to do whatever you want with them.” And that was it. She got into the subway, and I walked home.

Don’t get me wrong, it was a lovely moment, but it was definitely a New York City moment. It’s like the city moves so fast, there isn’t even time to enjoy your cupcakes. The city moves on its time, not on yours. So you get moments, but they’re often cold, rainy, brief, and unglamorous. I don’t know that New York City invented that, but we’ve done an awful good job of perfecting it.

And as for the cupcakes, how did they turn out? They looked great, but I wasn’t able to partake in them (see moment, New York City above). So I had to rely on the birthday girl. She’s a red velvet connoisseur, and I wasn’t sure if they would live up to her expectations. I spoke with her later about the cupcakes. She said, “I would describe them as a harmonious blend of all that is good about a red velvet cupcake, smooth icing with just a hint of cinnamon… A very good cake but the icing is definitely the star of the show.”

Well, then. I’m glad you liked them, birthday girl. I guess the lesson of today is that practice does make perfect…ly good cupcakes. What lessons have you learned while baking? Do you have any perfect New York City moments? Let me know in the comments below.

Recipe courtesy of Joy the Baker.

Red Velvet Cupcakes – Test Batch

Sometimes I have to ask myself, “How far would you go to make someone’s wish come true?” When I say how far, I mean figuratively. And when I say, make someone’s wish come true, I don’t mean their biggest wish ever. I mean their birthday dessert wish. As you may know, I sometimes make birthday desserts for people. This time it was red velvet cupcakes. I had never made red velvet anything before. In fact, I never really understood the fascination with red velvet. But this is what the birthday gal wanted, so who was I to argue?

I decided to make a test batch before the real batch. The reasoning was twofold. First, having never made it before, I figured a test batch would give me a better chance of success for the real batch. Plus, I had to buy ingredients to make it. And some things you can only buy in certain sizes, so it would have left me with a bunch of unused ingredients. With the test batch I would use up what would have been the extra ingredients.

So, are you sitting down? I’m going to tell you something that may surprise you: red velvet cupcakes are red. (I said may surprise you.) But they’re not born that way. It takes a lot of red food coloring to make them red. Not like gallons of it, but a lot from the standpoint of the amount you normally get in a package of food coloring. So, while I had a package of food coloring in the cupboard – you know, the one with the four different containers of different colors –  it wasn’t nearly enough red. I didn’t want to get a whole bunch of packages of the four, because then what in the world would I do with all the rest of it? The question then was, could I possibly find a whole bunch of just red food coloring?

The answer, fortunately, was yes. I could, and I did. Better yet, I found natural food coloring. I figured, why not? I didn’t know if it would work, but this was just the test run. And if it worked, it would make me happy, as I like to keep things natural when I can. I could buy just red food coloring on its own. And even better, I could buy it in the neighborhood. Sometimes, I really love Brooklyn.

Making the cupcakes wasn’t that hard. And when all was said and done, the cupcake batter turned out to have a pudding like consistency.

It’s not pudding.

While the natural food coloring was a great idea, and I’m sure it works for some things, it didn’t work in this case. The cupcakes ended up looking more brown than red. I’m guessing that it isn’t as potent, and that I probably needed to use more. I also didn’t use the best bowl to mix the food coloring with the cocoa and vanilla. It was a wide rimmed bowl, and I think some of the mixture got lost on the fancy designs on the rim. In any case, I’m glad this was the test batch.

It was about an hour from start of making them to putting them in the oven. Some of that was fussing with the ingredients. Some of that was being methodical about doing it. Some of that was cleaning up and putting stuff away. After putting them in the oven, I washed the beaters and the spatula so I could use them for making the cream cheese frosting.

I baked them for 20 minutes and they were totally done. They were big and poofy and beautiful. They smelled amazing. I have to say, they were some of the most beautiful looking cupcakes I’ve made. So they were brown instead of red. They were still lovely. Maybe I just made awesome looking brown velvet cupcakes by accident?

Poofy cupcakes, fresh from the oven.

Extreme cupcake closeup.

The cream cheese frosting was very simple . . . once I found the right bowl. I know bowls aren’t the most glamorous item in the kitchen. I know they don’t get a lot of respect. But the wrong bowl can mess things up completely. And the right bowl can save you so much trouble. The food coloring incident above was just the start of things. When I got to working on the frosting, that’s when the bowl trouble really kicked in.

The first bowl I used for the frosting was too small. I had powdered sugar flying everywhere. So I tried a bigger bowl. Unfortunately, it wasn’t big enough, so I had the same problem. Plus, it was a plastic bowl, so I was afraid to mix too much, as it wasn’t the strongest plastic, and I didn’t want to dig into it. The third bowl, apologies to Goldilocks, was just right. It was the one I had used to mix the cupcake batter in. I had washed some stuff along the way, but not this bowl. Which means I had to stop in the middle of making the frosting in order to wash the bowl. I realized at that point that I needed to get another big mixing bowl so I don’t run into this problem.

I also realized at that point how much I would love a bigger kitchen. Our kitchen is definitely a New York City size kitchen. For those of you who don’t know what that means, let me explain a little bit. You can have either the oven or the refrigerator or the dishwasher open at any one time, but not more than one at a time.

As an aside to this kitchen aside, let me say that it’s actually a big deal to even have a dishwasher. People who visit from outside the city don’t get it. I’ll say, “And there’s a dishwasher!” They just shrug. The same with having a washer and dryer. I’ll say, “And we have a washer and dryer inside the apartment!” Nothing. They don’t get it.

To further illustrate the size of the kitchen, I’ll say this: if someone else is in the kitchen, and you want to open the dishwasher, if you get them to squeeze to one side or the other, you can just about open it. You can barely have two people in the kitchen in the first place. Well, you can both be in there, but you can’t both do much of anything without being in each other’s way. If my wife and I are making dinner together, it’s always “Can you stop chopping the vegetables for a second so I can get around you and grab the wooden spoon from the drawer?” or “Be careful with the mixing that you’re doing, I need to open the fridge and I don’t want the door to hit you.”

I know, first world problems. I actually love our kitchen. It may be small, but it does everything you need it to do. And my wife and I have made many beautiful and meaningful dishes and meals there. My grandmother’s latke recipe which we make every year. My wife making her mother’s famous roast chicken. The icebox cake I made for my wife’s birthday. It’s our kitchen. It’s our first kitchen together. Seeing how big a role food has had in both of our families, it’s a really great thing that we get to have a place to continue that.

But at that point, while I was making the recipe, I wanted a bigger kitchen so I would have room to spread out and put stuff. I wanted a place that wasn’t near the oven (so things could stay cool), wasn’t near the sink (so things could stay dry), and wasn’t in the middle of the mess I had just made on the counter while putting stuff together (so things could stay clean). I managed to make do, but a boy can dream.

So as I said, after I had the right bowl, it was very simple to make the frosting. For a while there, it didn’t seem like it would all mix together, but eventually it did. I don’t think I mixed it too long, but it was a little hard to tell, what with all the switching of bowls. It did get a little runny at the end, but I think that might have been from the room temperature.

Bag of frosting, anyone?

I don’t have any real equipment to do frosting with. So I did the old plastic bag trick. You know, take a sandwich bag, spoon in the frosting, seal it, and cut a hole in the corner. This generally works like a charm. However, the first hole I cut was way too big. That made it really hard to frost with any precision. So I had to cut a second, smaller hole elsewhere, and I had to hold the first hole closed. It was a little challenging, but the small hole was much easier to use. Overall, I think I frosted them okay. I definitely need some more practice though, if I want them to look really nice.

And there are some other things I need to work out for the final product. They need to be redder. I need to use a big bowl for making the frosting. I also need to be careful not to overdo it while mixing the frosting. Also important, only cut a small hole in the bag in order to frost the cupcakes properly.

Don’t ever cut a hole this big when you’re trying to frost cupcakes.

And lest you think I forgot, how do they taste? They taste good. The cupcakes themselves don’t have a super strong flavor, but they’re kinda sweet. In that sense, they remind me a little bit of the bacon, egg, and cheese muffins I recently made. There’s also the slight hint of cocoa. The frosting, however, is really yummy. According to my chief taste-tester (my wife), it has a great consistency and a great taste. It looked like it was melting a little while I was frosting the cupcakes because, I surmise, I was holding the bag in my hands and that had warmed the frosting. But once on the cupcakes, it firmed up.

One of the first ones I frosted.

One of the later ones I frosted, as I was starting to get the hang of it.

As you can see, I was able to frost some cupcakes better than others.

Stay tuned for next week’s exciting installment to hear about how the actual birthday cupcakes turned out. In the meantime I’d love to hear from you. Do you ever make test batches of new recipes? Maybe for special occasions? And what lessons have you learned from doing the same recipe more than once?

Recipe courtesy of Joy The Baker.

Kouign-Amann

To paraphrase, these aren’t the pastries you’re looking for. I mean, they are. They are buttery, flaky goodness. But they’re not some fly-by-night pastry you can have a passing fancy with. If you want these, you need to make a commitment to them. You don’t have to move in with them or marry them. But you have to be committed to going the distance. They’re a lot of work. I’m sure it gets easier as you make them more often, but there’s no getting around it being a lot of work. So why would I spend many hours slaving over this delicate pastry?

One reason is that I like a challenge. Another reason is that I enjoy learning how to do new things, like adding new recipes to my repertoire. But primarily, this is something I made “because you asked”. Well not “you” the reader, but “you” my friend who asked. It started with an innocent enough post on Facebook a little while back which said, “I am not a baker. Will someone who is PLEASE make this for me?”. To which I responded, “Oooh! That looks fun and yummy. I will totally make those.” And so a few months later, when I had time to, I did.

Actually, there’s one more reason. As some of you know, linguistics is one of my other interests. And a French pastry with a name that most English speakers would find unpronounceable piqued my interest. For those of you wondering how it’s pronounced, it’s roughly “queen a-mahn”. Why the interesting spelling and pronunciation? Well it’s a specialty of the Bretons, a Celtic people who live in northwestern France. Say what? That’s right, Celtic. If you’re interested (as I am), you should definitely research the history of these fascinating people and their language. (I did.)

It’s also worth seriously researching (by which I mean trying) their food. It’s delicious, as I can attest to from the kouign-amann. So on to the pastries! Which reminds me. I guess I should mention that this post inaugurates a new category on the site: pastries. Yum!

My friend had originally posted a particular recipe for kouign-amann. I looked at that one, but then I also looked at some other recipes to see if there was one I liked more than the others. I stumbled across one that looked good from Bon Appétit. But what really made it stand out was this cool feature they have which has step by step instructions. Instead of having to go back and forth between the ingredient list and the directions, they have a step by step guide which walks you through it, listing the ingredients with the exact amounts right in the directions. It’s kind of awesome.

I’ve linked both the main recipe and the step by step guide below. I’ll also link the step by step guide here, in case you want to follow along. Just click on “Step-By-Step” at the bottom of the page. Where I mention particular steps below, I’m referring to the steps in this guide. Because this recipe has a lot of steps, a lot of this post will be about the details of making it. I also took lots of pictures, so you have fun stuff to look at as well as read.

Thankfully, I had most of the ingredients on hand. Despite its richness and complexities, it uses very few, simple ingredients. That’s a testament to those who created this pastry, as they managed to turn the mundane into the amazing. I did have to get yeast and Kerrygold butter. Well, I didn’t have to get Kerrygold per se, but I needed to get high-fat butter. And Kerrygold seemed like the way to go in that regard. Maybe it was something subliminal about the Celtic connection.

There was a lot of fun measuring in this recipe. It was awesome. It was all about the grams. I love me some metric system for measuring. It made everything so much easier.

So, the saga begins: I started about 4:40pm.

A little flour fell in the yeast while I was measuring it. (Oops!) Thankfully, it didn’t seem to make a difference. The yeast didn’t exactly foam up like they said. Maybe the bowl was too big? Maybe I don’t know what they mean by foam. I let it sit a few more minutes than they said. When it came to kneading the dough, It wasn’t quite five minutes that I kneaded it before I thought it was ready. It took about 45 minutes for this first part (up until the proofing in Step 4). Then I cleaned up the mess I had made so far.

The dough about half way through proofing.

I let it proof for about 1 hour until Step 5. Then it was just a couple of minutes for that step. Then I let it sit for 45 minutes in the fridge.

It wasn’t a lot of work up until this point. But there was a lot of waiting around. I did other work in the meantime, including writing up other recipes. (In retrospect, maybe I should have done more writing then on this one, as this one is quite a lengthy one.)

After Step 5.

Step 6 took just a few minutes.

6×6″ square.

Then I let it chill for 30 minutes. I worked on the butter block (Step 8) while it was chilling.

The butter block took forever! (Okay, about 40 minutes. But it seemed like forever.) The dough had finished chilling. I had to take it out of the freezer and put it into the fridge, so it wouldn’t get too hard. Then I had to put it back in the freezer once the butter went in the fridge.

Here’s what happened with the butter block: I cut up the butter. Maybe it wasn’t small enough, but it was tough to blend. It got stuck. I had to turn the mixer up to high-speed to flick it off. Then I went back to mixing it. I had to do that a few times. Eventually, I got it all mixed. Maybe I mixed it too much. It was closer to whipped than waxy. It wasn’t quite 3 minutes mixing.

I wasn’t sure how big a piece of parchment paper to use for the butter block, but it ended up being too small, or else I didn’t place it right. It took a long time to mush the butter into place, and by then it was melting. The parchment paper kept rolling up. I tried weighing it down. It didn’t work. I ended up taping it down. Then I ended up taping it down again with bigger pieces of tape just to keep it down. I then tore off the pieces of parchment where the tape was so the parchment I ended up with would still be clean.

At this point there was lots of measuring. And then mushing. And then measuring again. And mushing again. (I had misread it as 12×16 instead of 12×6 in Step 9.)

Butter block.

Because the parchment paper was too small, I had to use more when I folded it over. But then when I was rolling it out, it got kinda messy getting out the air bubbles, because it wasn’t one solid piece. It leaked out a little. I eventually got it into decent shape. But I had trouble closing it up, because of it being multiple pieces. I used some butter to try to keep it together. (Tape didn’t work on the outside.) I didn’t measure it, so I didn’t know if it was 1/4 inch like it was supposed to be. I just had to assume. I chilled it for 25 minutes.

Step 11.

Step 12.

Starting Step 13.

Finishing Step 13. Butter burrito, anyone?

Step 14. (I’m sorry it’s a little blurry. I must have been either tired or excited.)

Step 15 done.

Step 16. In retrospect, I don’t think that looks right. Oh well, too late now. 🙂

Moving on a bit: I wasn’t quite sure what they meant by flap. Maybe I had accidentally folded it over. I didn’t turn it (Step 19). It was hard to maneuver. It was very sticky at Step 21. When rolling it out in Step 22, I had to fold it over to get the right size. I ended up with layers. I’m assuming that was intentional.

Step 22. Rectangle, slightly larger than 16×12.

Step 22. Trimmed to 16×12.

In Step 23 it was hard to get the excess flour off of the dough, but I did my best. I didn’t bother so much with removing the flour from the surface.

Step 23. Squares!

In Step 25, I was 10 grams of sugar short. I didn’t feel like opening up another bag of sugar just for a few grams. I figured it was okay, as lots of it fell off anyway.

Squares. Extreme sugar close-up.

Before their good night’s sleep.

For Step 26, I let it sit for 10 and a half hours, starting at 11:50pm. My wife helped clean up from this round. (Thank you!) We were done with cleaning up around 1:20am. We had also managed to have dinner and watch a movie during the time while it was chilling. (We didn’t finish cleaning up until after the movie which is why we finished so late.)

This is what my work surface looked like at the end of the night. Before cleaning, obviously. 🙂

The next morning, I continued. For Step 27, I used just 23g of sugar. (I know! The sorrow. The deep, deep sorrow.) I didn’t want to open up a new package of sugar for such a little amount, so I used some sugar packets that we had.

More sugar.

While the oven was preheating, I put the pastries back in the fridge. That’s because Step 28 said to bake them while they were still cold.

They smelled awesome while baking. (Otherwise the kitchen smelled a little yeasty, if that’s even a word.) I baked them for 28 minutes. After 25 they looked brown, but the sugar didn’t quite look caramelized enough. After 28 minutes, they still didn’t look super caramelized, but I think they were caramelized enough. I didn’t want them to burn.

Fresh from the oven!

Tray 2, fresh from the oven!

I pulled them out with two forks. (Thank you to this other kouign-amann recipe for the hint.) I let them cool. They smelled kinda like croissants.

Just hanging out. (And cooling.)

I tasted the remains in the muffin tins. You know, the little bits that don’t come out when you pull the baked goods out. Some of the sugar was definitely caramelized, some of it was definitely not.

My wife came home and almost lost it. (In a good way.) She was like, “Oh my god, it smells amazing.” To which I replied, “You live in a French pastry shop now.”

Once they cooled, we tried them. Much happiness commenced. Some reactions to eating them from those who tried them:

• Wow.
• Phenomenal.
• These are 7 dollar pastries.
• This was definitely worth skipping lunch for.
• They’re crunchy on the outside, soft on the inside.
• They are delicious.
• Great texture. Great taste.
• Kinda like croissants, but a little sweeter and more substantial.

I recommend that you eat these quickly. (I don’t imagine you’ll have much trouble.) After about two and a half days, the flavor was still very good, but the texture changed. They started to dry out a little.

So how about my friend who suggested them in the first place? What did she think? Unfortunately, she wasn’t able to have any. There was a scheduling conflict, so I couldn’t get them to her in time. I will have to coordinate better for next time.

Speaking of next time: one of the other versions of the recipe I had found was a much easier recipe. I will have to try that one next time and see if it tastes as good. I knew this one would be much more work, but I wanted to try it first, so I could see how it’s “supposed to” be done.

I had thought the apple pie recipe was a lot, but this takes the cake. The pie? The pastry? Well, you know what I mean. It was a lot. And it was spread out over more time.

I hope I haven’t scared you off of making them, though. They’re a lot of work, but they’re definitely worth it. Please give them a try, and let me know how they turn out. I’d also love to know if you’ve ever done any other recipes that were equally ambitious.

Recipe courtesy of Bon Appétit. (Step by step instructions here.)