CHICKPEA SEWING STUDIO

Thanksgiving Meringue Mushroom

   As a French born vegetarian, I find it always takes an herculean effort to get in the Thanksgiving mood. This year was going to be different, starting by baking something we would really like, something sweet... Started yesterday, finished this morning, these little meringue mushrooms are truly something to be thankful for, much more than a classic meringue somehow. The bittersweet chocolate does all the heavy lifting.

Nibs and ink are back in use, lest I forget absolutely everything Melissa taught me. It's sad how fast you can loose you hand with things like calligraphy. But back to the mushrooms with a closer look and the recipe link.

Kugelhopf {Sunday Brunch}

Salt Lake City is covered in a heavy blanket of snow that in many areas of the yard and local park reaches my knees. No better time to bake rich buttery breads and sit down for brunch.To simplify the process, I experimented with leaving the dough in the molds overnight for the second rise, and it was a complete success (for once!). The dough just rises slowly all night and you have nothing more to do than take the molds out of the cold and bring them back to room temperature (the clay molds would most likely break if they entered the oven chilled).

The strawberry coulis came from  last minute inspiration. It's nothing more than 4 cups of frozen strawberries, 1 Tsp of sugar and 1Tps of 'real fruit pectin' cooked together until the berries fall appart. It's tangy and not too sweet.

 

Kugelhopf never lasts here and if it did it never tastes as good as when barely cooled from the oven. It's recommended to toast the left over, which I admit I have never tried. The recipe for the Kugelhopf comes from my favorite cooking book for all things French. At the time it was pricey, but now that time has passed it must be possible to borrow it at a local library or pick up a used copy. The pictures are exquisite, you will find yourself traveling all over France, it's an excellent way to discover how truly diverse the country  is, in landscape and culinary traditions

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Macarons Verveine {lemon verbena}

Summer is not the time for blogging apparently, or coming up with anything greatly creative. Just back from an unforgettable trip to the Tetons and Yellowstone, I am rather deflated on the crafting front. Furthermore David Rakoff, beloved writer and crafter extraordinaire, died yesterday most likely of cancer. Upon hearing the news in my car I wept. It's not secret that "This American Life" is my favorite american past time and I guess, after so many years I became attached to all their voices. His loss is like a deafening silence in my ear... Ok, I am crying again (ridiculous).

Here is an interview of him on Fresh Air. Here you can find one of his most funny story about cancer in his youth and here another story about visiting the Martha Stewart craft department (act III).

Moving onto from sad to sweet, I am not really completely idle and still confectioning (is this even a verb?) macarons.

Lemon Verbena Macarons

recipe by Tartelette

Yesterday with two of my girlfriends we attempted to make three batches which really didn't turn out well. I blame a cold oven for our many unending problems. A veritable comedy of errors which didn't prevent anyone to enjoy the fruit of our labor when it was finally over.

The great thing about macarons is that they freeze well and this way you can have all kinds of choices while making only one batch at a time. Greens: Basil-Lime, Yellow: Meyer Lemon, Purple: Lavender, White: Lemon-Verbena.

Macarons! at last

I have tried and failed enough times to make decent macarons that I gave up for a few years. But after dragging at least two of my girlfriends to numerous shops in town to sample the available confections in Utah, it's become plain that either we must drive a long way to buy "imported from France" confections or I am going to have to 'woman-up' and make them myself.

A trip to the local restaurant supplies company and two days later, I am pretty pleased to announce that after ravaging the kitchen a few times we have some decent products to sample. The Meyer Lemon with cream cheese filling macarons above and the day before Rose Water macarons, below:

As I am in no way an expert, I will not bore you with recipe details. I used Tartelette as a guide for the firsts and the book I (heart) macarons for the seconds. Tartelette's worked better but that might be a fluke.  The cookies taste as they should, have feet etc... now I need to improve my pipping technique. Looks like that must come with practice...

demi complet no knead bread

Before I start talking about carbs I would like to tell you the story of how today was the day I got SPAT ON!

Mid morning I could contain my new found enthusiasm for running no longer and I headed out the door on a two mile loop when I quickly found myself behind a man pushing a stroller. Nothing weird so far, except for the cigarette he was apparently lighting up and the big gust of smoke that blew in my eager lungs. Feeling this was not a particularly good position to be running in I decided to stealthily pass him, his baby and his cigarette road side. As I did just that he turned his head and spat on the ground which was now covered (ever so briefly) by my shoe! What made in laugh made me speechless, for so many reasons better left behind. Gross, gross, gross.

Onward to better things. My friend A and I have been working on a foolproof recipe for an healthier version of the no knead bread and I thing this is it!

Today's Loaf

 

Recipe adapted from the New York Times and with help from Penni Wisner

Semi-Whole Wheat No Knead Bread

Start this recipe in the evening, make sure your starter is well fed and very active

mix ingredients together in this order in a medium bowl

using the rice spatula that came with your rice cooker (!)

1/2 cup of sourdough starter

2 cups of water

1.5 cups of King Arthur's Bread flour (blue bag)

1/2 to 1 Tablespoon of coarse salt

1.5 cups of Bob's Red Mill whole wheat flour

 

 

Mix well and set aside. Every once in a while for the first two hours give the dough a few turns with the spatula. After that time you can cover the bowl and leave it overnight to rise. In the morning, invert the bowl on a floured plastic platter (it cuts down on cleaning considerably) and let it sit for 10 minutes. Shape the dough into a ball as best you can with the help of a dough scrapper and additional flour if needed; 'plop' the ball into a bowl and let rise for 2 hours. When only 30 minutes remain I usually turn on the oven ( 500 F) and place a number 22 Le Creuset dutch oven inside. My friend uses all kinds of covered dishes with success, however we think that the cast iron dish creates a thicker/crunchier crust. Bake the bread for 30 minutes with the lid on (I add a little flour to the bottom before I invert the dough inside the hot dish). Then remove the lid and bake for an additional 25 minutes with the oven temperature reduced to 425F. Remove from the dish promptly and wait until the loaf has cooled completely to cut into it. It's an important step to insure a good crumb texture.

This bread keeps for an extremely long time. We found it is still very nice after five days if stored at room temperature wrapped in a cloth towel. It is the best bread I have ever made and it matches exactly the taste and feel of Country Sourdough from the Locally Illustrious Crumb Brothers.

Sucré-Salé: apple-cheddar pie recipe

I am feeling home sick at this time a year, so with Finn we came up with this sucré-salé (sweet and savory) quick pie recipe this morning. It's fast enough to make for lunch with a side of greens. It's completely mouth watering, much easier to make than it tastes. Here is the recipe, with advice to include a three and a half year old.

Tarte aux Pommes et Tillamook Sharp Cheddar

4 medium apples (Gala, Braeburn)

1 cup of Tillamook sharp Cheddar cheese

1 Pillsbury refrigerated pie crust

1/4 cup of light brown sugar

1 tablespoon of cinnamon

coarse salt

pam for baking.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Unroll the dough and place it in a pie dish lightly sprayed with pam for baking (with flour). I use this product a lot since it's extremely fast and Finn has the attention span of a squirrel.

Sprinkle one or two pinches of coarse salt in the bottom of the pan and press the salt down with your fingers, finger cooking is always a hit with kids. my great grandmother "mamie Lili" would always use coarse salt at the bottom of her pies making my dad's mouth salivate just at the thought of it. She of course would make her own dough. I do so occasionally using Martha Stewart Everyday recipe which I find makes a classic 'Pâte Brisée', however it's very common in France to use prerolled supermarket dough and I was overjoyed when Pillsbury came out with theirs.

Shred enough cheddar to fill one cup and set aside.

With an apple peeler have your child prepare the apples and break the spirals into smaller pieces in a bowl. Add the sugar and the cinnamon to the apples pieces and mix well, pour the apples into the pie dish.

Place in the oven for about 25 minutes keeping an eye on the pie. When you see that the dough is almost ready but not quite golden yet sprinkle the cheese on top. Bake about another 20 minutes of when the cheese is bubbly. The apples will still feel a little crisp in your mouth but the dough will be flaky. Serve warm.

I hope you give it a try!

note: I use a pie pan made of two metal pieces, it makes it vey easy to lift the pie out of the dish, the bottom of the pan stays under the pie though.

before/after

 

Every year around Christmas I host a dinner for the group of lovely people that work with Thomas (my DH). It's not often that we fill up our table extended to it's limit, we all squeeze around with odd chairs, eat, drink and laugh. Good times!

Last year we purchased three sets of really inexpensive Ikea dishes to have enough for everyone without stress and this winter I scored a set of twelve napkins for a song on Ebay. I dyed them china blue (dylon, 2 packages, sink method) to complement the plates. It turned out to be pretty easy to ditch the disposable napkins at last.

A few weeks ago I heard an interview of Martha Stewart on NPR, she was pitching her new book on entertaining. Apparently there is a before/after picture of a diner centered around drinking Burgundy wine. I would love to see it, it must be quite strange imagining martha's house left un-kept overnight.

We are never so bold and end up staying up very late getting things to resemble "normal". That's just how we roll, a bit of loud music and we get going... (apparently I baked a little too much this time).

stupid food

We made these Mummy Smart Dogs for lunch this week. It's not our kind of fare, but they were just too tempting, and so easy too.

I told my granny (via transatlantic phone call) about them, she is usually very sceptical of our vegetarian way but she approved completely and started listing of the fancy French blue cheeses I should stuff in there. Let's just say I didn't mention the american slices that went in mine...

Not so bad for an invalid

So, recovering from wrist surgery is not exactly going like I had in mind. Having to go back to the hospital through the ER wasn't also part of the plan, but what is done is done and hopefully next week will be oh so much better. I am counting on it!

I did manage to cook the above soup from Vegan Yum Yum by using scissors on most of the ingredients. Thomas had to chop an onion and I could feel his fear (my eyes are going to sting, oooh lala!).

Most of the time though I can do nothing but sit around with my arm propped up. This led to much web surfing and Sunday night a panic attack during which I started madly downloading all the fan-fictions I like, looking for pdf files of the ones that have been pulled (fearing viruses and generally wondering if all this was legal).

This afternoon I made the major mistake of watching the movie adaptation of Never Let Me Go. One should never watch a movie with vaguely medical things when convalescent. Bad idea. Plus the story always makes me sob out loud ( SOL, made me smile for a moment). I don't usually make that much noise when crying for fictional characters, I prefer to hide in my sleeve. Not this time, I woke the cats up.

On a  brighter note, look how cute Carey Mulligan is in that outfit:

She really looks great with short hair. Better than Emma Watson if you ask me. (picture from here)

Tisane

Last night I was inspired to make my own herbal tea, that after using a lot of spices for my Moroccan valentine dinner. It turns out that it's really not that hard. I believe that three out of four ingredients can be found in an asian supermarket making them very affordable.

Mix and grind the following four spices with a mortar and pestle, the side effect of which will be the amazing smell: coriander seeds, green cardamom pods, star anise and licorice root. In terms of quantities inspire yourself from the ratios on the picture above. This will yield enough tea mix for two tea pots.

 

The Licorice might be a little harder to find, I bought mine from a local health store called Dave's. Use a tea ball to keep your drink chunk free.  I am on my second pot already.

If anyone has a recipe they would like to share I can add it to this post.