A Baker in Brooklyn

Stenciling again

2009-11-30T10:37:00.000-08:00

My pal Ed over at Stencil1 has a supercool new book out. The stencils included in the pack are larger-scale than his last round, making them ideal for larger surfaces like walls or floors. The official release party for press and media is this Thursday at a real klassy chocolate shop in Manhattan. Then the BIG party that's open to the public is this Saturday, December 5 from 4 - 6 at powerHouse Arena in Brooklyn (37 Main St., in DUMBO) - stop by, meet Ed, eat some of my baked stuff, and enjoy a little DIY crafternoon! If you've never been to powerHouse, you should go check it out. It's pretty cool and offers a great view of the Manhattan skyline.

So I've once again been brainstorming for some ideas of how to get these patterns and images onto to edible items. I've been racking my brain to come up with something - anything - easier and more professional looking than last year's event. Those were nice, but I really love these new patterns in Ed's book and wanted to do something less organic-looking and more structured and tight.

So I was watching Ace of Cakes last night while recovering from a seriously bad stomach problem (sorry, Eric!), and it hit me. Use fondant. While I've never I've never used fondant, never made fondant , and never even liked fondant, I was sure that this was the best way to go.

Fondant is basically a thick sugar paste that you roll out and drape over a cake for a smooth, satin-y finish. Wedding cakes are usually covered in fondant because it's so smooth and pretty. The problem is that it usually tastes like ca-ca-doo-doo. People hate it so much that they even sometimes peel it off the cake and leave it on the plate! What a waste.

I'm not one to waste anything in kitchen (and I certainly don't want to see anyone peeling my cookies apart and throwing the pretty part away - how awful!), so I decided to flavor the fondant with vanilla and almond for one batch, and chocolate for the other. Duh - so easy!

I used this recipe, primarily because I had these ingredients in my cabinet. Well, I didn't have the glucose, but since I didn't know what that did anyway, I just omitted it (maybe it's a flexibility ingredient or something). The recipe worked well and I turned out a batch of vanilla/almond and a batch of chocolate fondant within an hour. I probably kneaded it longer than necessary, but I like kneading, so whatever.

My ingredients:

I forgot to photograph the kneading process, probably because I LOVE kneading things!

Anyway, I rolled out a bit of the chocolate fondant and tried the stenciling process using powdered sugar on one and red royal icing on the other.

While I like both effects and will likely use both techniques, I was really excited by the red icing. It looks great, retained the sharp lines of the stencil, and has already hardened to a durable finish.

So that's the end of experiment day 1. Tomorrow is dough day, when I'll be making the cookie doughs for these patterns to go on. I hope this all works out, because I have no time for a do-over by Thursday.

Yeesh.

Off to work now.

2009-11-22T15:34:00.001-08:00

Shutout.

2009-11-22T11:36:00.001-08:00

Hey! I'm on my phone. I've just entered a pie competition at a really cute store in Williamsburg called Spacecraft. I was going to make a blackberry apple pie, but since no one had any blackberries, I created an apple/blueberry hybrid. I'm sure it will taste great, and it looks pretty good (despite my extremely poor time mgmt this morning). But there are like 75 pies here! Fucking Williamsburg kids and their free time!

Judging is coming soon. Fingers crossed!

BAKE OFF!

2009-11-14T08:05:00.000-08:00

If you're in New York City today and need something to do, come by Nowhere's first ever Bake Off!

If you want to enter your favorite recipe, have it to the bar by 7:30 for judging. Otherwise, just come and enjoy the cheap drinks and sweet treats!

I'll be slinging drinks behind the bar, but I may be sneaking in an entry or two...

We're at 322 East 14th St., NYC 10003. Hope to see some friendly faces!

Christian

Granny Fingers

2009-10-27T08:26:00.000-07:00

Wanna see something scary? My pal Brian over at Camp Blood approached me a few weeks ago about a project he was working on for Halloween. He wanted to do a gay-horror-Halloween-themed DIY home project segment. After a few hours of shooting at my new place (and a few shots of tequila), here's the result. I think it's fucking hilarious and awesome!

The dude making that cool mummy bag is Aaron from Brooklyn Bags, and also from my last blog post. He's a happy newlywed!

As promised in the clip, here's the recipe for the ladies' fingers. It's adapted from Martha Stewart's recipe for the same idea. I added a few new elements and I've tried to include a few different ideas/twists. The ingredients are easy to find, and with the exception of the yeast, you might already have everything in your kitchen. Don't be afraid to experiment with the decoration part to make them as ugly or pretty as you like. Now you can really give your boss the finger!

Ingredients

Makes about 4 dozen

Red or green food coloring (optional, but encouraged, for nail polish)
24 blanched almonds, halved lengthwise (or cashews or walnuts)
2 cups warm water (110 degrees), plus 3 quarts, plus 1 tablespoon
1 tablespoon sugar
1 package active dry yeast (1/4 ounce)
Vegetable oil
5 to 6 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for work surface
1 tablespoon coarse salt
2 tablespoons baking soda
1 large egg
Sea salt
Fried rosemary (optional, for toes)

Directions

Place a small amount of food coloring, if using, in a shallow bowl, and, using a paintbrush, color the rounded side of each split almond or cashew; set aside to dry. If using walnuts, they look grossest if left unpainted and broken up.
Pour 2 cups water into the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the dough-hook attachment. Add sugar; stir to dissolve. Sprinkle with yeast, and let stand until yeast begins to bubble (bubble, toil and trouble), about 5 minutes. Beat in 1 cup flour into yeast on low speed until combined. Beat in coarse salt; add 3 1/2 cups flour, and beat until combined. Continue beating until dough pulls away from bowl, 1 to 2 minutes. Add 1/2 cup flour. Beat 1 minute more. If dough is sticky, add up to 1 cup more flour. At this point you could halve or quarter the dough and add some spooky color to part of the dough, like green or purple. Transfer to a lightly floured surface; knead until smooth, 1 minute.
Coat a large bowl with cooking spray. Transfer dough to bowl, turning dough to coat with oil. Cover with plastic wrap; let rest in a warm spot to rise until doubled in size, about 1 hour.
Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Bring 3 quarts water to a boil in a 6-quart straight-sided saucepan over high heat; reduce to a simmer. Add baking soda. Lightly coat two baking sheets with cooking spray. Divide dough into quarters. Work with one quarter at a time, and cover remaining dough with plastic wrap. Divide first quarter into 12 pieces. On a lightly floured work surface, roll each piece back and forth with your palm forming a long finger shape, about 3 to 4 inches. Pinch dough in two places to form knuckles. Or, to make toes, roll each piece so that it is slightly shorter and fatter, about 2 inches. Pinch in 1 place to form the knuckle. Cut a bit of dough off the back half of the finger or toe (so it looks like it was chopped off). When 12 fingers or toes are formed, transfer to simmering water. Poach for 1 minute. Using a slotted spoon, transfer fingers to the prepared baking sheets. Repeat with remaining dough, blanching each set of 12 fingers or toes before making more.
Beat egg with 1 tablespoon water. Brush pretzel fingers and toes with the egg wash. Using a sharp knife, lightly score each knuckle about three times. Sprinkle liberally with sea salt and rosemary (for hair), if using. Position almond nails, pushing them into dough to attach. Push one almond or cashew into the back side of each finger and paint around it with red food color. Bake until golden brown, 12 to 15 minutes. Let cool on wire rack. Fingers and toes are best eaten the same day; or store, covered, up to 2 days at room temperature.

Bag Laddies Wedding

2009-10-16T08:38:00.000-07:00

I'll tell ya - moving sucks. It just totally disrupts everything. But unless you're from one of those countries where kids stay with their parents until they get married or unless you're too young to have moved yet (shouldn't you be doing homework?), you've moved and you know the hassle. It just sucks that much more right now because I moved a year ago and I invested so much time into feathering that tiny, stupid little nest with a bitchy landlady.

That said, I'm settling nicely into my new place and have been working feverishly to get things looking real klassy before my pending housewarming date in early November. I haven't made much time to bake or write lately, butI do want to cover that wedding cake I made last month.

The wedding was in Provincetown, MA, one of the gayest and nicest places on Earth. The people are so friendly and the place is so effing charming that you just want to vomit. Or maybe that's from all the booze everyone drinks. Regardless, it's a really nice city to visit if you're L, G, B, T, or Q.

Garry and Aaron told me they were getting married earlier this year, and I immediately asked if I could make their wedding cake. They agreed, so we chatted about colors and themes and flavors. These were questions I had to research to know what to ask - I'm generally opposed to silly, expensive weddings and really have no idea what people expect out of a wedding cake. The guys told me they were doing an informal, small gathering on the beach to exchange vows, then a nice little cocktail-and-nibbley party after. They also told me they 1) didn't want a fancy cake, 2) wanted it blue and white, 3) wanted it to match their party theme, which was "Knotical" (get it? Nautical and tying-the-knot? Cute, right?), and 4) wanted chocolate and fruit flavors.

I decided to make a chocolate cake with raspberry-blueberry filling, and covered in white chocolate buttercream. I wanted to try my hand at something relatively dramatic, too, so I decided to make a 3-tier, 9-layer thing.

I had a lot of logistics to deal with, like do I make the cake in Brooklyn, freeze it, and transport it up to PTown? Do I make it in PTown, and if so, how? Do I rent an apartment? Do I make it at someone else's place? And if I make it in PTown, how do I get all my equipment up there? Do I buy everything I need in NYC where I know I can get it, then lug it all up to Massachusetts, or do I risk a grocery store in a small town not having everything I needed?

In the end, I decided fresher was better. Garry and Aaron offered to drive up all my equipment in their car. The only food item I bought in NYC was Callebaut white chocolate for the frosting (probably pretty hard to find up there). That was kind of it. I rented a nice studio apartment that was entirely coincidentally on the same block as the boys. Then I just packed my bag and headed up.

The apartment I stayed in was awesome. It was a one-bedroom with a big kitchen, and and a really nice view out the kitchen window.

After getting settled and spending a few days hanging around, I got my butt over to the grocery store and was relieved to find everything I needed. On the Friday before the wedding, I got busy by first making the white chocolate buttercream...

...in a lobster pot.

It all came together quickly and thickly - just the way I like my frosting.

The three tiers I decided to make were going to each be three layers: one 10", one 8", and one 6". In my head, that seemed like a decent amount of cake for about 30 guests. I made three batches of batter. One batch filled one each of the three sizes. I was making this up as I went along - I had no idea how much batter it would take to make this thing.

Once I figured out that one batch of batter would fill one layer of each tier, I churned these out like a machine, baby!

I even found time to make a few plum tarts:

At the end of a (VERY) long day, I had the cakes assembled, filled with the berry jam, and crumb-coated in the white chocolate buttercream. This day was about 11 straight hours of work, from start to finish.

The next morning, aka The Big Day, I had to be out of my apartment by 10. I got up early and walked everything down the street to the boys' apartment at lovely Captain Jack's Wharf, managed by the incredibly helpful and chatty Gregory Saint Jean. He very graciously allowed me to assemble the cake in a vacant unit on the wharf next to Garry and Aaron's place. The view was, well, the best I've seen for cake-decorating.

And from the outside in:

Hi, little cake!

It was so quiet. The only sounds were of the water slapping against the rocks, a foghorn, and an occasional seagull. Coming from the noise of NYC, it was just unreal. These few hours alone in that apartment on the wharf with just the cake and the ocean were probably my favorite of my entire trip. It was the only time during my five days in Provincetown that I felt very far away from New York and on my own. Despite the stress I'd been under with my personal crap back home, and despite the stress I should have been under to get the cake done, I fell into this really calm, dreamy state. It was a really wonderful feeling, and I think it really helped me out with the assembly process.

I measured and cut the cake supports.

I got all the cake tiers frosted.

Then I went for coffee and lunch, waiting until the last possible moment to assemble and decorate the cake. Assembly did NOT go as smoothly as I was hoping. I cut many of my supports just a bit too long, so the tiers didn't touch.

I knew I could fake it with frosting and decoration, but I was still frustrated that I had gotten this so wrong. I got to work filling in the gaps between the tiers, and it came out fine.

I was going to try to tie a knot out of something edible, like sugar paste, but in the end, I just ran out of steam. I asked Gregory to tie me a square knot out of twine I bought. Easy. Here are a few shots of the finished thing.

So there.

Oh! One major problem I encountered was that I totally forgot to bring the cake board, dowels, and supports I bought. I walked ALL OVER PTown to find something that would work to not only serve as a sturdy base, but also would support each tier. After walking and talking to everyone in town who worked at a hardware or kitchen store, I settled on a wood base (it went with the informal and outdoors-y theme), and I found some corrugated plastic sheets that I cut into the right sizes to hold each tier. I have to stress that finding these items took me half a day. In the end, it all worked out fine.

The wedding was lovely, and the reception went off very well - until the frosting starting melting off the f*cking thing! At this point, I resigned. I was far too stressed and so upset that my frosting wasn't holding up. I guess that's what you get when you throw a chocolate buttercream cake into a warm kitchen. I fixed as much of the cake as I could with a spatula, insisted the guys make toast and cut the thing ASAP, and I left. For half an hour, I talked with Gregory, did a few shots of tequila to calm down, and hung out at the end of the wharf, enjoying the drizzley weather. When I finally got the nerve to go back in, I was pleased to see this:

The feedback I got on this cake was really phenomenal. Everyone really seemed to enjoy the flavors, the cake was moist and chocolatey, and the frosting was really creamy and flavorful. The rasberry and blueberry filling I concocted was a refreshing, tart counterpoint to the rich chocolate. I've said in the past that chocolate and raspberry is one of my all-time favorite flavor combinations. It's just so perfect together.

For a week after I finished this, I swore I'd never make another wedding cake. The stress was just too much for me. But now that some time has passed, and with much more experience under my belt, I'd like to give it another try. So if you're getting married soon, give me a holler. I have a solid portfolio of one wedding cake to show you.

My next project is coming up in a few hours, actually. My pal Brian over at Camp Blood is stopping by to shoot me for a segment on his video blog. I'm making pretzels, but in the shape of ladies' fingers. GET IT?! SCARY!!!

Thanks for reading, as always.

I'll miss you

2009-09-25T08:57:00.000-07:00

At least I have this.

Startin' anew

2009-09-25T07:21:00.000-07:00

Well I'm back from my week in Provincetown. The wedding cake came out pretty well, considering the challenge it presented (being in Massachusetts, baking in someone else's kitchen, white chocolate buttercream on a humid, rainy day next to the ocean, etc). More on that later, and some pics.

I also just moved into my new apartment, and I'm really hoping to stay here for a while. I'm been struggling with being in New York lately - questioning if my time here may be coming to an end, and if not (probably not), then what can I do to jazz things up? I've decided not to get cable again. It's too distracting (though I'll miss you Sandra Lee!). I'm going to instead try to use my time for more cooking, baking, preserving, canning, pickling, and dinner parties. And I want to learn how to sew. And make candles the old way.

Anyway, no more cable. A great new apartment with a ton of space for me and Loretta. The arrival of fall. I feel like I have a lot to look forward to.

And I'll be writing about it all.

Thanks.

Christian

More!

2009-08-25T08:19:00.001-07:00

More more more.

More apartment drama. More work drama. More baking!

I am moving out of my current apartment. Despite living here for a year and doing tons of improvements like new wood floors and tiled kitchen backsplash, and I still hate this apartment and now, my landlord as well. Since my lease ended in July, and with a ridiculous rent increase looming on the renewal, I've decided to say goodbye to this shoebox with mice. I'll probably have to demo out all the work I've done and replace the pink vinyl floors held down with packaging tape and the wrinkled wallpaper backsplash. I'll get some before-and-after shots up here soon. You'll be seriously amazed.

I mentioned in my last post that I've been tapped to do a wedding cake in Provincetown, MA in a few weeks. I was hired last week to make a cake for a friend's birthday and decided to use it as a practice run for the wedding cake. My friend Scott at Sosebee Design said his friend wanted something "chocolate and fruity and rich and sweet." Perfect. The wedding cake I was thinking of was going to be chocolate cake, raspberry filling, and white chocolate frosting (probably with a blueberry mirror glaze on top, but I'm still working on that).

Loretta again helped me out with this one.

Just kidding.

Here's the warm raspberry jam on top of the first layer of chocolate cake.

Then I made a giant batch of white chocolate frosting. Ten warm egg whites a some sugar:

And yes, that's EIGHT sticks of butter coming to room temperature for the frosting.

The frosting came together very well. It wasn't too sweet and it was firm, yet very spreadable and workable. And here's my raspberry OCD decorating idea:

The feedback I got on this cake was very, very good. One helpful criticism is that the cake could have been more chocolatey, so I'm definitely going to work that in the next time I make this one.

As an aside, I saw Julie and Julia, that Julia Child blogging movie. It was really awful and hokey ("Julia, you saved me. How do you do it all?"), but I have to admit, it got me thinking about blogging more often. So for that, I guess it was ok, but seriously, don't see it. Go see District 9 instead. Like Julie & Julia, District 9 is icky, stomach-wrenching, and largely about eating things that maybe you shouldn't.

That's all for now.

Finally

2009-08-17T10:40:00.001-07:00

This summer has been weird and stressful and crazy. And maybe I've been indulging in Pacificos a bit too often.

Without getting into it all, I'm just going to post a few pics of what I've been up to. Then I'll try to keep up on this blog more often.

Also, thank you to the kind folks who apparently read this blog and have been asking to see more of my junk. I really appreciate it.

Here's that Fire Island cake from my last post:

I wasn't able to get many good pics after I finished this cake, due primarily to the "indulgence factor" in play, as mentioned above. I had too many beers, ok? Sheesh.

I made a giant chocolate banana cream cheese cake. It's banana cake with fresh bananas and chocolate-banana ganache filling (my own recipe), and cream cheese frosting with fresh banana slices on top.

I kept the bananas from browning by spritzing them with lemon juice and freezing them solid.

Here's a red velvet cake I did for a big party at work for everyone who is a Leo.

(When I look at that one, I can kind of tell my heart wasn't in it.)

Also this summer, my refrigerator was broken for two weeks, my camera finally died, and an important relationship in my life ended. Or is "changing," I guess. Or some crap like that. I dunno. It's very hard for me and it sucks.

But something amazing also came into my life this summer. Her name is Loretta, and she's pretty great.

Turns out, she's a whiz in the kitchen, and she likes home improvement projects, too!

I have another cake coming up this weekend (some sort of chocolate raspberry confection, as yet to be determined). And next month, I'm making my first ever wedding cake. I'm still trying to work out a flavor combination. Also, it's in Provincetown, MA, so I'll be traveling for that one. It's going to be logistically tough, but I'm excited for the challenge. I like planning stuff like that out.

That's it for now. Again, and as always, thanks to anyone who clicks on a link or Facebook or MySpace or Sparber's blog to come to my blog to read what I'm doing. I'm changing this site into a website soon, but I'll keep the blog going on the side.

Ok, bye.

It's hot.

2009-05-22T16:27:00.000-07:00

Man.

Been working in the kitchen all day on a 3-layer half sheet bacon chocolate cake. I've basically made three whole cakes, which has been a bit of a logistical problem, given my limited studio apartment-sized kitchen space.

I'm trying something new with this cake. Well, several things. I've tweaked the recipe a bit and added a new flavor. No one will know, but I've added a tablespoon of instant espresso to the batter. Ina Garten taught me this little trick - coffee brings out the flavor of chocolate. It's very true.

So there's that. Also, I'm taking this gigantic cake out to Fire Island. A car ride. Heat. Humidity. a ride on a boat. A 20 minute walk. I have to assemble most of the cake on site at the house.

Additionally, I'm "decorating" this cake at the request of the buyer (a very good friend). I'm writing on the cake. I have little fake trees. I have little sesame candy to build a boardwalk. I have some nice little deer that I bought today at Toys 'R Us in Times Square. THAT was an experience.

Right now, I have no idea how this is going to work out. I just trust that it will.

Maybe another Pacifico will help.

Cake success, Southerner fail.

2009-05-12T05:19:00.000-07:00

Here's a red velvet cake I made for Easter for my pals David and Matt. I again used a recipe from the Baked cookbook. I even fought my instinct and used their recipe for cinnamon frosting - instead of cream cheese frosting.

This goes against everything I know as a Southerner and as a baker. My family would be ashamed, and I'm not even kidding. They'd absolutely brand me a "yankee." It's a sin not to use cream cheese frosting on a red velvet cake. That said, the cinnamon frosting was very good - a little spicy, buttery, and very creamy. And, because the frosting is partially cooked, it really held it's shape very well.

You can see how red the cake is in this photo:

In hindsight, I think that two tablespoons of red gel food color was too much. I might try to add two teaspoons next time. I wanted the cake to be subtly red, not blood red like this. But at least there's no mistaking that this is a red velvet cake, I suppose.

Here's the full crumb coated cake:

You can see the need for a "crumb coat" of frosting in this photo. It literally collects the crumbs off the cake so they don't end up in the final layer of frosting.

Here's the finished product:

I got the sugar flowers at NY Cake and Bake. I made the little candies by holding a lighter over some chocolate discs for a few seconds, then pressing a hot tamale onto the melted surface of each one. I wanted Red Hots, but those were impossible to find.

Boxed up a ready to go!

Both David and Matt said this cake was well-liked. So a success. BUT - I will soon start to work on a more stable version of a cream cheese frosting. The guilt I felt from this was more than I expected. Cake success, Southerner fail.

Here are a few albums I've been really enjoying lately. Really great for balmy summer afternoons. You should check them out!

RIP BEA

2009-04-27T07:21:00.000-07:00

You were always my favorite.

Bizzy bizzy bizzy!

2009-04-19T08:09:00.000-07:00

Lordy be, I've been bakin' up a storm over here in Brooklyn. A couple of weeks back, I fulfilled three orders in a week's time. Doesn't sound like a lot, I know, but I was also planning a surprise 30th birthday party, did some photo work for MTV, and worked three days at the bar. It all took a few weeks of planning and scheduling and some serious time-management (not my strongest suit). In the end, the week was a success all-around - the producers loved the photos, the cakes were well-received (well, except one - more later on that), and the bar was busy.

I was planning to write a superlong post with tons of pictures and stuff to cover all of this activity, but considering the intimidating volume I'd have to cover, plus the GORGEOUS weather outside in New York City right now (65 and sunny), I've decided to reduce this to more of a "photo-post."

Here's one. It's a sugar-free carrot cake that I made for my pal Richmond. It's sweetened with honey and pineapple juice. Richmond claimed to love it (even though I thought it tasted like cardboard and had a texture similar to that of a firm, oily sponge). I learned that you should never really try to sweeten cream cheese frosting with honey - it just doesn't work. The two flavors are so strong and really don't mix well at all.

Please don't ask me for a sugar-free cake again.

Another, more successful cake I made was a red velvet. I used the recipe more or less exactly as it was printed in the Baked cookbook. I iced it with the cinnamon buttercream the recipe called for, but I didn't like it too much. Maybe it was too much cinnamon, or maybe I just think it's a little blasphemous (and very un-Southern) to not use cream cheese. I mean, it was all fine and tasty and well-received, but I just felt a little guilty about that frosting thing.

It was really red!

I heated up some chocolate candy discs with a lighter and stuck on some Hot Tamales. The flowers were on sale at the cake shop. This was for Easter, by the way.

Here's the one I was most proud of, because it's my recipe (and, as far as I can tell, my idea). A chocolate bacon cake I'm going to call the Dirty Pig cake. I know this trend - chocolate paired with bacon - is very popular right now, but I've never seen a chocolate bacon cake. I mean, I'm sure there are other chocolate bacon cakes out there. Right? I don't know. Anyway, it was very, very well-recieved. I've already made another since that night.

Each layer had about two tablespoons of crispy bacon and a tablespoon of salt. So it was built up like this: cake, salted caramel, chocolate caramel ganache frosting, the bacon, and the salt.

The finished cake:

Here's Ryan, the birthday bacon boy. I think he enjoyed it, though I'm not sure how it went with that Hoegaarden he's drinking.

I also made a chocolate peanut butter Butterfinger cake for a pal in LA. I made all the components and shipped them overnight. It was then up to the recipient to assemble everything. It was a fun experiment. I vacuum-sealed the cake layers in Ziploc bags with my vacuum cleaner! In the end, though, I have no clue how it worked out. I got a ho-hum-sounding text from the recipient, and still no photos. I don't even know if the shipping worked. I haven't pressed the issue of getting more information or photos, mostly because I'm afraid to hear about it. I have a feeling it was a failure, and an expensive one at that. In the end though, I'm so glad I got to try it.

So yeah, that's some of what I've been up to lately. I hope everyone is having a great Spring. Summer's right around the corner!

Beach season! Tanning your buns! Yay!

An Idea

2009-03-25T16:51:00.000-07:00

I've been wondering for a while how I can get more of my cakes and pies and stuff out there for people to try, but without making the full-sized deal. So, I got this idea to start making "minis" to give out as samples. I have several mini aluminum pie pans, but since I've been making more cakes lately, I wanted to work on those.

Well lookey what I found online:

Mini cake pans, all 3" x 2". Pretty cool, right? Right?!

Wait, no, ok, I know - not THAT cool. But now I just need to get to work on these little guys. First up will be my own adaptation of Baked's salted chocolate caramel cake that I've been making so often lately. My secret ingredient will be revealed soon.

Stay tuned...

Manilow scones

2009-02-16T09:15:00.000-08:00

I've been really enjoying Ina Garten on the Food Network lately. She's great at using a few ingredients to make something really special. I like her "doesn't-have-to-be-perfect" approach to cooking and baking. While I, personally, still really enjoy meticulous chopping and measuring, it's nice to sometimes let all that go, just throw some good stuff in a bowl, mix it up, and add heat. Ina really seems to enjoy what she's doing and how simply she does it. That's kind of inspiring to me.

I was watching Ina a few days ago as she made her signature strawberry scones. My past few attempts at making scones have been just awful. They come out flat and tough. Having not tried scones in two years but feeling much more comfortable with my knowledge of what makes a scone good, I decided to give it a go. If they sucked, I'd only be out a few bucks, as the ingredients are relatively affordable and easy to find.

I didn't have any dried strawberries, but I did have like three bags of chocolate chips in my fridge that have been screaming at me everytime I opened the door. I decided to use these to make chocolate chip scones. And I decided to bake said scones to the musical stylings of Mr. Barry Manilow.

It's a Miracle.

Here's what I used (minus the flour/baking powder/salt/sugar mixture already in the mixing bowl):

The absolute most important thing is to keep everything very cold until it goes into the oven. This was nearly impossible at my old apartment, which was extremely difficult to cool, except on the coldest days of the year. When the cold butter, cold eggs, and cold cream go into the hot oven, all their moisture evaporates. The gas from the evaporation pushes the scones up and makes them super flaky.

Working very quickly, I mixed everything up, then rolled out the dough (which smelled like heaven, by the way):

A simple egg wash and a sprinkle of sanding sugar:

And after 20 minutes in the oven - success!

These came out flaky, delicious, not too sweet, and beautifully browned.

If you've got an itch to bake and have these simple ingredients in your pantry and refrigerator, I highly suggest you try these. You can put in almost anything your precious little heart desires.

This One's for You, Barry:

Chocolate Chimp

2009-02-03T08:44:00.000-08:00

Goodness me, I have been so slack about writing lately. I've been having a hard time finding motivation to bake and blog these past few weeks. Well, I was in Mexico for a week, too, and yeah - I'm totally bragging about it. I missed the coldest days of the season here in NYC, with high temperatures of only 8 degrees (that's - 13.3333 for all you Celsius folks). On those days, I was swimming in the Pacific Ocean and drinking a few ice cold Pacifico beers. If you want, you can see my photos here.

I've mentioned it a few times, but I did a really interesting, challenging, fun project for my pal Ed over at Stencil 1. His first book of stencils hit the shelves right before Christmas and the response has been great! He's already working on his second book. I'm very happy for him, and so was very happy when he asked me to stencil some baked stuff for the book release party.

After searching all over the internet for ideas and techniques, I discovered that there isn't that much information out there about stenciling on food. You non-bakers are probably laughing and thinking, "Duh, what did you expect, Christian?" But considering how far the boundaries are being pushed in food and craft these days (have you seen this??), learning how to get an image onto a piece of food through a sheet of plastic seems relatively simple, right? Wrong.

Well, I'm starting with the cake, and it actually was simple. Make a cake, level it off, put a smooth glaze on top that firms up when it sets, then stencil with cocoa or powdered sugar. I used a recipe from Martha Stewart for a chocolate cake made with dried cherries, molasses, and a lot of Guinness. Delicious.

This was all very straight-froward. I cooked the cherries in a mixture of Guinness and molasses:

The recipe made a TON of batter! Technically, this is just enough for 2 10-inch cakes, but dang. I almost had a flowing batter fountain:

Filled my bowl to the very top.

Oh, also, I used silicon cake pans for the first time ever. I got them on sale a few months ago, but had never needed to make a 10" cake until now. I really liked how they worked! I still prefer to cook in metal, but these are a great addition to any baker's arsenal.

The cakes baked evenly and they came out smoothly, with no breaks or tears. No complaints.

These cakes were very moist and had a really deep, rich chocolate flavor. You could taste a bit of the iron from the molasses and Guinness, which I thought was great. The cherries added a really nice toothsome texture. They were fun to chew on.

After trimming the tops of the cakes and making sure they were level...

I made a simple chocolate ganache glaze and spread it on. Once it set, it was time for the fun part. Getting this image on the cake:

I knew this would work.

I was really into the idea of chocolate on chocolate, so I took a bit of cocoa powder:

And dusted like a fool. (How nice that I left my old coffee in this shot.)

Success!

I made four of these cakes. The first two were experiments, the second two were for the party. Here are a few shots from the "party cakes." I stenciled these the day of the party so I could be assured of their freshness and good looks.

In that last shot, you can plainly see that I was unable to get the glaze to smooth out to a glossy, even layer. I'm sure this is largely because I still don't really know how to use chocolate beyond, say, melting it, then waiting for it to harden back up. Another small obstacle I had to overcome was learning how to lift the stencil off the cake without it sticking. When the plastic sticks to the cake, it kind "snaps" up when you lift it, which can knock off some of the excess cocoa off the plastic. Not really a big deal, but it can make the edges of the image a little less perfect. Actually, it drove me nuts. No one else seemed to notice, though.

The cake stenciling was, in my mind, an easy success. The cookies, however, were a completely different story. They were much more challenging, but mostly because I didn't know what I was doing. After some trial and and a lot of error, I figured it out. Coming soon...

Curdtastic

2008-12-31T05:11:00.000-08:00

I've been super busy in the kitchen lately. But I've also been super busy with Thanksgiving, birthdays, Christmas, travels, work, and other projects that seem to keep coming up. Even as I type this on New Year's Eve, my apartment is a wreck, but I've done so much baking and I'm so behind on blogging that I just have to get something up on here.

Last month, I did a major stenciling project for my pal Ed for the release party for his new book, Stencil 101. In fact, you can see a pretty cool photo on this page of some of the work I did for that event. That project took a lot of trial and error and resulted in many unused, ugly-ass cookie-stencil experiments, but in the end, it all looked really great. I was proud of my work. I'll be putting together a long, photo-intensive post on this blog about that project soon, but for now, I'm going with something a bit easier.

My pal Charlie turned 30 a few weeks ago, so I made him a cake. I was going to make him the sweet and salty cake, so I bought everything for that. Then, girl tells me she don't really like chocolate cake. What?! That's news to me. Girl wants a lemon cake. Grrrrr...

So at the last minute, and in the midst of making all the food for his party (which I love doing - don't worry Charlie), I ran out to get everything for the lemon cake. I used the recipe in the Baked book, since everything I've made from that book has worked so well. I didn't photograph the process too well because I was simultaneously making hors d-oeuvres for 25 people.

Anyway, the cake came out really well:

It looked perfect, and I was thrilled with the icing. It was lemon buttercream, but also had a bit of flour that was boiled into the cream. It was smooth and flavorful, and it spread on like spackle and held its shape PERFECTLY. I think this could be the heat-resistant buttercream icing recipe I've been looking for. It's sturdy, transports easily, and has a sculptural quality that makes it fun to work with.

I accidentally added coconut extract to the cake instead of vanilla. Oops! But it turns out that the flavors go really, really well together. I amended the recipe in the book for the next time I make this cake.

Here's a cross section:

Here's Ashton, Randy, and Eddie having a slice:

Brian likes it, I think. He always gives good "attitude face."

Brian's boyf Matt seemed to enjoy it, too.

This was a great cake, made all the more great to me because I made it in 4 hours flat and was very proud of the look and the taste of it.

I guess this is my last post of 2008. I'll get that stencil stuff up soon. To everyone who reads this inane drivel, thank you. I always get such nice compliments from people about my blog. It warms this old man's heart. Seriously, thanks for bothering to look. I really appreciate it.

Now go get the Baked cookbook. Happy New Year!!

Sweet and Salty

2008-11-04T06:19:00.000-08:00

And bitter! My pal Paul just had a birthday.

I wanted to make him a cake that was interesting and different and attractive and a little bit masculine - you know, the opposite of Paul. I kid, I kid. I love this guy. The Baked cookbook I've been in love with has some great cake recipes, including one for a Sweet and Salty cake.

Even considering my interest in baking things that aren't too sweet, making a salty cake seemed like a risk (especially considering that I've never tried this cake at Baked). It vaguely reminded me of a story that my friend Dustin told me once about his bitch of a neighbor who made him a cake for a party he was having. Apparently, she hated his parties, so when she baked the cake, she unloaded her hairbrush into the batter. The cutting knife sliced through the hair, but peoples' teeth didn't when they put it in their mouths. I guess that doesn't really have too much in common with a salted cake (beyond the idea of tasting something you absolutely don't expect), but I like that story a lot.

Salted chocolate and salted caramel are two very trendy flavors right now. Even Starbucks has gotten on the bandwagon with their "salted caramel hot chocolate." I mean, it makes sense. Good salt really brings out the layers of flavor of dark chocolates and sweet caramels. I'm not fully aware of the chemistry behind it, so for now, I'll just allow myself to think of salt as a "magic crystal."

I felt relatively comfortable making this cake, as I've made caramel before. Remember? That pie was kind of a total disaster, but I made several batches of caramel for it. It's simple to make, but it can be tricky to perfect. Caramel heats up very slowly, until about 300 degrees, then it starts to cook very, very quickly. I don't think mine was perfect, but it tasted really great.

I just cooked some water, sugar, and corn syrup until it caramelized at 350 degrees, then added that simmering cream in the back of the photo below.

Easy. I stirred it for a bit, then threw into the fridge for the night.

I made the chocolate cake using Baked's recipe, which produced a moist, sturdy, very flavorful and very "chocolatey" tasting cake. I'll definitely use this recipe again. I think it might take other flavors pretty well, like espresso, or maybe even chili pepper or cayenne pepper. Hm...

The frosting it calls for uses a really easy, creative twist on a basic ganache that I always make. With ganache, you simply pour hot cream over chopped chocolate, stir it until it melts, then add sugar and butter and whip it till it fluffs up. This was basically the same technique, but instead of adding just heated cream, the recipe calls for making a creamy salted caramel and adding THAT to the chopped chocolate. It was really delicious. The frosting also had 4 sticks of softened butter in it.

Here's what four sticks of soft butter look like.

Here's the prep for the frosting:

And the warm ganache:

(I hate those white bowls.)

So after whipping the ganache and adding the butter, I started assembly. This is really always the most exciting part of the baking process for me. I really love making these things look perfect and pretty. I've always found that, regardless of great taste, if something looks good, people love it. Plus, it's just so nice to see people faces light up when they see something that looks good.

Each layer went like this:
1. Cake
2. Caramel sauce
3. Frosting
4. Tablespoon of sea salt crystals

Visually:

Eventually, it all gets wrapped up like this:

(Look at how sloppy I was on the cake board under the cake! It looks terrible!! I forgot to line the bottom edges of the cake with parchment. Doh!)

Eventually, the finished cake looked like this:

There were a few execution errors here. I forgot to line the cardboard with parchment, which would have prevented the fat in the butter from soaking into the paper and looking so greasy (not a cute look). The cake came out taller than the tallest box I had, so I had to use that cheap-o Rubbermaid "cake carrier." Since I assembled the cake directly on the cake board (expecting to then slide the cake board and cake into a box), I had to trim the edges of the square cake board to fit onto the round cake carrier.

Oh well. The cake looked nice, anyway.

I was proud of how it looked, and the taste was AMAZING. The crunch of salt on each layer of sweet, chocolatey caramel was sensational. The salt I used (Maldon crystals - expensive but worth it), stayed crunchy and make the chocolate taste extremely savory. Love love love this cake! Paul's party go-ers seemed to enjoy it, too.

In the next month, I'll be working on something new - stenciling. My friend Eddie has a really cool graffiti stencil business called Stencil 1, and has just published a book (which you can check out and buy here!) The book release party is Saturday, December 6, and Eddie has asked me to stencil a whole bunch of cookies and cupcakes and stuff. Fun!! What a cool challenge. I'll be working on several recipes/techniques in the coming weeks, so look out. Should be interesting.

Thanks for reading!

Christian

Muffinth!

2008-10-13T09:01:00.000-07:00

It's been a while, yes.

I've been working literally non-stop on my apartment, so cut me some slack, yo. I've been installing shelving, installing flooring, painting walls, repainting walls, measuring twice, cutting once (or in a few instances, two or three times), organizing, assembling, drilling, nailing, spackling, screwing (in the home-improvement sense), cleaning cleaning cleaning, and occassionally honking for Shirley when I've had to get the heck out of this apartment and out of town.

I feel like I'm coming to a good place to slow down the frantic renovation efforts and re-focus on baking, knitting, and other fun fall festivities. So on that note, I decided to make some muffins yesterday morning. Nothing fancy. A few weeks ago, I got the cookbook from Baked, my absolute favorite bakery in New York City, and I've been so eager to start using it. They use adult flavors like salted caramel and dark chocolate, and nothing I've tried is ever overly-sweet. They really do things the way I like (although their cashiers and baristas are often not too friendly).

I decided to make something quick and easy this morning since I had a busy morning before going to work. I used the recipe for "Banana Chocolate Espresso Muffins." I had all of the ingredients on hand, so I whipped 'em up in my mixer. They were embarrassingly easy.

After beating some mushy bananas to a liquidy pulp, I added melted butter, white and brown sugar, and an egg. The I sifted and added in the flour, salt, baking soda, and espresso powder. After folding in the chocolate chips and baking at 350 for 20 minutes, I got...

These.

They were extremely moist, presumably due to the bananas. I ate a few of these warm. Two friends gave me two different critiques: one said there was to much chocolate, and the other said they were too moist. I agreed.

But after sitting for a day, I tried one this morning. Once cooled, they firmed up very nicely, weren't overly-moist, and the excessive chocolate taste seemed gone. The texture was still moist, the chocolate morsels had a nice "chew" to them, and the crumb was very nice.

I'm thoroughly enjoying these muffins this morning.

I'm also enjoying some Neko Case:

I was recently introduced to this amazing album from the Watson Twins, thought the album is not new. It's a really well-harmonized, low-key, sunny-fall-day-sounding country-esque album. I think it's pretty perfect.

Thanks for checking in. More to come!

Christian

Amazing Asparagus

2008-09-04T08:08:00.000-07:00

I've been meaning to post this for some time now. Just before I moved into my new place, I made this little asparagus tart for a dinner party in Brooklyn. I'm not even entirely sure it counts as baking, since I did nothing but assemble 4 ingredients. It just seems to simple to count. In the end, though, it was baked in the oven, so I'm saying it counts. Right? Besides, I've posted on here about making jam, and that ain't baking at all.

Oh, before I forget, if you're looking for a good album to ease into fall with, you should get this little gem by the Fleet Foxes. It's really beautiful, acoustic, and mountain-y sounding, with gorgeous harmonies and sweet lyrics. Perfect for picking apples in your new itchy vintage-looking sweaters or for falling in love with your new boyf/girlf under a sunny blue sky in McCarren park. Delightful. I'm listening to it now. Again.

Ok, this tart is a real treat, and so very easy to create. I got the idea after watching Martha Stewart make one on her show. I really kind of hate her new talk show (but I loved and still mourn her old show). It just happened to be on at the gym one day when I was Stairmastering my little buns off, and I realized my mouth was watering.

It's simple. You need:

1. Two bunches (bundles? groups? asses?) of asparagus. Asparagi?
2. Really good, aged Gruyere cheese
3. Pre-made puff pastry (more on this below)
4. Salt and pepper

I originally was going to say that two bunches of asparagus was too much, but I ended up eating everything that didn't fit on the tart, so it's ok.

I believe Martha blanched her asparagus for a few seconds in hot water, but I love grilled asparagus, so that's what I did. I used my grill pan, and though it's very smoky, it imparts such a wonderful, complex layer of flavor. I tossed the asparagus in olive oil:

Then threw a handful in the pan to grill up:

After about ten minutes and a few turns, voila! Grilled asparagus, nutty and crunchy and delicious!

This is where I was happy to have all the extra asparagus on hand. I ate about 12 of these. So delicious! Also, I should point out that I cooked these over a really high heat. You want the skins to grill up and get those nice little lines in them, but you don't want to cook them through. If you don't have a grill pan, you could saute them in a bit of olive oil over a high heat until they brown on the edges a bit. They have to cook for a while longer once they go into the oven. I don't know about you, but I think mushy asparagus are really disgusting. I love the texture and crunch you get when you bite into a well-cooked asparagus. Yum!

Next, I just shredded the cheese. I love this kind, from Whole Foods:

I don't know how to describe cheeses at all, so I'll just say this one is "really, really tasty." No, seriously, it's... umm... it's firm. So it shreds nicely. And it's salty. Sort of.

Whatever. Buy it. Or don't and be sorry.

Oh, also, this cheese is not too oily or slick when it melts. If you used, say, white cheddar, you'd probably end up with puddles of oil all over your tart. NOT cute.

Ok, so the asparagus are grilled, the cheese is shredded. Next is the puff pastry. If I'd had time or energy or experience or a cooler kitchen, I would have tried making my own pastry. But hey, for $9.99 at Whole Foods, you can save yourself a day of work. I really like this brand and have used it several times:

And look - it has a gold sticker that says it's a WINNER.

You buy this stuff frozen, let it thaw a bit until it's pliable, then just unfold it and roll it out a bit.

Into the pan it goes.

I didn't take too much time with the edges or corners. I'll say that this is because I wanted it to look rustic (and not because I was in a hurry or got sloppy). By the way, it smells SO GOOD. And I love the way it feels in my hands - like a sheet of pure, pillowy, velvety butter. Touching it is my favorite part of working with it.

You prick the insides a bit before you pre-bake it. This prevents the inside part from rising as quickly:

Then you just bake the pastry a bit until it browns up JUST lightly, and you can see that the surface is shiny and looks "sealed."

And that's basically it for the prep work. Next is assembly - just sprinkle on the cheese, pepper, and salt. I didn't use too much salt because the cheese is pretty salty and tangy. Then arrange the asparagus however you like. Here's what I did:

You can see in that photo how the edges of the partially baked pastry had puffed up, but that they aren't really brown or cooked. You can also see how the edges of the asparagus are brown and caramelized from the grilling. This is such a wonderful flavor, and one that you don't get with blanching. It's a small hassle, but so worth it. The flavor is out of control.

So that's it. Bake it at 400 degrees until the cheese has melted and the pastry is brown and puffy.

Poof. Done.

SO SIMPLE!

I guess this is ultimately like a fancy pizza - bread, cheese, vegetables. But dang. It's SO good. Six of us ate almost this whole thing, in addition to everything else we had for dinner. It's easy to make because you don't have to do much, and it will impress your friends. Give it a shot!

While I was working on making this last month, one of my all-time favorite episodes of Golden Girls was one. It was the one where Dorothy's cast of the school play all get measles, so the girls all decide to star in the play themselves. They do the story of Chicken Little, and each of them plays a different fowl. Rose is the dumb chicken, Henny Penny. Blanche is sexy Goosey Loosey. Dorothy is the bookish, nerdy Turkey Lurky. Sophia is just the narrator, but you can see her wearing a fierce high-heeled boot for a second. Anyway, each of the girls brings their personality to the character, and I just laugh my ass off every time I see Bea Arthur be totally serious and earnest while walking like a fucking turkey and wearing a ridiculous (yet remarkably well-made) feather costume. I also laugh when I see her in tights and flats. The other girls have heels. Shit gets me EVERY time!

Thanks for reading. Check back soon for more experiments in my new kitchen. I have to buy a new oven first, but I'm on that.

Thanks for reading!

Quick update

2008-09-02T10:20:00.000-07:00

Just a quick note. I'm still in the midst of settling and renovating my new apartment, but I'm getting there. In this, you can see my new floors that I installed (all by myself!). I was also switching the refrigerator door so it opened from the other side, at which I also succeeded. Hoorah.

I also made a seriously good asparagus tart a few weeks ago. I'll be posting that up soon.

Thanks for checking back with me on here. More to come soon!

Christian

New Kitchen!!

2008-07-31T07:27:00.000-07:00

Check it, ya'll! Here's my new kitchen.

Obviously, it needs a little renovation and a serious paint job (those cabinets - yikes!!), but I'm excited to get to work on it. It has plenty of light from the big window, a workable layout, lots of floor space to add more storage/work surface, a cool old white enamel sink, and best of all, removable decoration! Yes, someone attached these totally fug tiles with VELCRO behind the oven, and there's a poorly-adhered strip of wallpaper running laterally as a "backsplash." Easy to remove, exciting to replace!! It'll be a custom, tricked-out kitchen in no time, so I'll be baking again by September.

I'm moving in by the middle of August, after a week-long trip to gay it out on Fire Island with my closest buddies. Stay tuned for the house-warming details!

Christian

How embarrassing!

2008-07-09T15:36:00.000-07:00

Sorry I haven't been in the kitchen lately, friends. I discovered recently that I have move, so I've been busy packing up my kitchen and my life and looking for a nice one-bedroom somewhere in Brooklyn. With a big kitchen, of course. I'll be back baking again very soon.

In the meantime, watch this totally embarrassing video of me baking bread.

Gnarly!

2008-06-25T16:01:00.000-07:00

Check out what this dude in Thailand is doing with his bakery!

The Scary Body Parts Bakery - video powered by Metacafe

Cool, or gross? What do they taste like? What if you bite into a piece of foot bread, and it tastes like chicken? Ew, what if the toes taste like cheddar cheese, but the heel just tastes like yeast?! Does he sculpt edible bunions, too?

These look pretty cool, but I really wonder who his market is. I guess judging by the video, it's children.

Weird. They look pretty lifelike, though. Props there.

Thanks to Charlie for passing this along!