I haven’t made gorditas in years and I’m not quite sure why.  I always loved them as a kid and their open faced counterpart, the sope or sopito.  Thick corn tortillas cooked on a griddle, then sliced open, deep fried and stuffed full of meat, beans, lettuce, tomatoes, salsa and cheese was heaven on a plate.  Hearty and delicious fare that filled me up and made me sleepy afterwards.  I love all the textures and flavors of them, the crispy thickness of the dense corn tortilla, the chewiness of meat, the soft beans and the freshness of the cold vegetables.  My mouth is watering writing this and I’ve just finished one!  And yes, I am laughing at myself…

Gorditas can be filled with just about anything.  Beans, meat, chicharrones in green chile – the possibilities and variations are endless.  Today I am making them stuffed with ground pork, refried beans with cheese and the chopped tomato, onion and cilantro mix I love so much.  I made salsa de molcajete too and I know my son Phillip will add a dollop of crema and sprinkle his with a little queso cotija like he always does.  Any way you have them, they are so good.  Decadent good.
Some of that decadence comes from LARD.  Yes, that’s right I said LARD.  Look, you can add vegetable shortening or olive oil or whatever you like to try and make a healthier alternative and it will work, even be good but there is no substitute for the piggy taste of lard.  You don’t make gorditas every day, heck I haven’t made them in years so my philosophy is this: if you’re gonna do it – do it up right.  Use the lard!  It’s just a bit and sure, it will clog  your arteries a bit but add a bit more chile to burn it out.  Live a little and then put away the recipe for a year or two.

My grandmother made gorditas like no one else could.  Her swift hands made fast work of forming them while some of us used a tortilla press to get them perfectly round and of equal thickness.  Her hands worked gracefully, almost in musical rhythm and she never missed a beat.  Her gorditas were perfectly round, all uniform in size and all of the same thickness.  I still can’t do that, though I get the taste just right.  Watching her was like watching a magician and I would sit on my little red chair with my elbows on the table, chin in hands just admiring and daydreaming of the day I’d be standing at that stove making perfect bits of delicious roundness.

Well, I never could get them as perfect as hers anymore than I can get all the peel off an orange in one long curl like she did but they sure taste like hers and eating them again makes me all the more determined to get it right next time without using a tortilla press.  Some things never change though and when I see my grandchildren watching me at the stove, I know they are daydreaming of being the one at the stove making magic.

Gorditas

For the masa:
2 cups Maseca (corn flour)
1/4 cup white flour
2 tsps baking powder
1/3 tsp of salt
1 1/2 cup of warm water
1/4 cup of lard (or vegetable shortening)

Mix the maseca, the flour, salt and baking powder in a bowl.  Add the lard or shortening and the warm water.  Mix until the dough is smooth and can be formed into a ball.  Divide into balls and keep covered with a damp cloth.

Either using a tortilla press or shaping with your hands, make the gorditas in about a 4 inch diameter about 1/4 inch thick.

Heat the gorditas on a hot griddle or comal until cooked on each side.

Slice each cooked gordita almost to the end but keeping it together, forming a kind of pocket.  Some people don’t make the cut until it’s fried, but I like the insides crispy too.

Deep fry the gorditas in oil  until golden brown and drain on paper towels.

Stuff the pockets with any filling you like.  Beans, shredded beef, carnitas, chicharonnes in green salsa,  queso fresco, scrambled eggs with nopales, etc.

Jasmine really loved the chocolate glaze.

The Challenge: Chocolate Eclairs from Pierre Hermé’s book, Chocolate Desserts by Pierre Hermé.

The Hosts: Tony Tahanand/Meetak

Many, many thanks to our wonderful hosts this month. What a wonderful recipe they chose and how supportive and marvelous they were. (Insert applause here).

Hurry up Autumn, I’m getting a little tired of baking in a 100 degree kitchen and worrying I’m going to drip sweat into dough or something. This month’s challenge was Pierre Hermé’s (swoons  because I worship the pastry laden, rose petal Isapahan ground he walks on) luscious chocolate éclairs.

Did I stay true to my idol’s recipe? Um well, I changed one little thing. The cream filling was not chocolate but something summery and lighter. Lavender-orange pastry cream. The rest was true to Mr. Hermé’s recipes (is it not wonderful that he is not only a pastry God but has the same last name as that vintage buttery leather 72k handbag on ebay)? I’m just saying. Pastry, Birken…ecstasy, heaven. Okay, okay get on with the recipe. No one cares about my obsession with Hermé, both the bags and the chef. And yes, I know the bag is Hermes but its close enough for me.

Marissa dropped the kids off early and we washed up and got ready to bake. The first thing we started with was the pastry cream. It turned out perfectly, smooth, thick and lucious until i put it into its ice water bath. I turned to grab ingredients for the chocolate sauce and Aiden took the opportunity to add about a quarter cup of ice water INTO THE CREAM! Yeah, so. I wanted to say something, but I couldn’t. He’s three, he thought he was creating something wondrous and being helpful. I wanted to fix it, but I couldn’t. It was his little creation. So we had runny cream filling, so what?

This is when he did it

I took several deep breaths and moved onto the chocolate sauce, which was divine. Mmmmm chocolate. Jasmine and I made the glaze together. She looked at me and said, “Grammy, you’re going to put chocolate in chocolate?” and looked puzzled. When I said yes, she beamed and squealed something about chocolate and more chocolate. I agreed. Chocolate on chocolate is a marvelous thing. When it was all done, I reached for a bowl to pour it in and Jasmine quickly grabbed her favorite Barbie bowl instead. Beaming proudly, she said “Grammy that yummy chocolate can use my bowl.” So it was that Pierre Hermé’s sleek, sophisticated chocolate glaze ended up in a 99 cent pink plastic Barbie bowl. I won’t get into my militant feelings about Barbie because Jasmine can read now.

Next up the Pâte à Choux. Yeah oooooooooh. I was dubious about the whole cooked dough thing and I could tell Jasmine was too. She wanted to know why it wasn’t going straight to the Kitchen-Aid but I just shrugged and started heating the milk. When it was boiling, I handed her the cup of flour and nodded. “All of it Grammy?”, she asked. I nodded. She looked at me, her little eyes wide and then shrugged and dumped it in. Wow. I started stirred and we had a big lump of golden dough. I kept stirring to dry the dough and it did create a little crust on the bottom of the pan. Once it had been dryed enough, I transferred it to the Kitchen-aid and started mixing.

Now the crap part they don’t tell you about. Pâte à Choux is sticky, way sticky. Getting it into the pastry bag was a mess. Working with it was tough. I thought I had done something wrong, so I took a minute to chat online with a chef friend. “Is Pâte à Choux supposed to be stick?” Answer: “it has been every time I’ve worked with it” Great. Back to work. Aiden kept eating the sticky dough and I couldn’t get the gunk off my hands but managed to pipe some éclair-like blobs onto the baking sheet. I popped them into the oven and did the oven door wooden spoon trick later in the baking. They came out beautifully and puffed up proudly. Things were looking up.

Jasmine and Aiden were so excited they couldn’t stand it. I could barely fill the mini-eclairs and cream puffs fast enough. The lavender-orange filling was so good with all that chocolate. Marissa came home and ate several in quick succession and we both decided for the sake of our butts to take the rest of the platter over to That Yarn Store for David and the gang to munch on.

We had so much fun making these and I can’t wait till the weather is cool and we can do it again. Next time though, I’ll make cream puffs only. They held much more pastry cream and were easier to pipe.

Pierre Hermé’s Chocolate Éclairs
Recipe from Chocolate Desserts by Pierre Hermé
(makes 20-24 Éclairs)

• Cream Puff Dough (see below for recipe), fresh and still warm

1) Preheat your oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Divide the oven into thirds by
positioning the racks in the upper and lower half of the oven. Line two baking sheets with
waxed or parchment paper.

2) Fill a large pastry bag fitted with a 2/3 (2cm) plain tip nozzle with the warm cream puff dough.
Pipe the dough onto the baking sheets in long, 4 to 41/2 inches (about 11 cm) chubby fingers.
Leave about 2 inches (5 cm) space in between each dough strip to allow them room to puff.
The dough should give you enough to pipe 20-24 éclairs.

3) Slide both the baking sheets into the oven and bake for 7 minutes. After the 7 minutes, slip the
handle of a wooden spoon into the door to keep in ajar. When the éclairs have been in the
oven for a total of 12 minutes, rotate the sheets top to bottom and front to back. Continue
baking for a further 8 minutes or until the éclairs are puffed, golden and firm. The total baking
time should be approximately 20 minutes.

Notes:
1) The éclairs can be kept in a cool, dry place for several hours before filling.

Assembling the éclairs:

• Chocolate glaze (see below for recipe)
• Chocolate pastry cream (see below for recipe)

1) Slice the éclairs horizontally, using a serrated knife and a gently sawing motion. Set aside the
bottoms and place the tops on a rack over a piece of parchment paper.

2) The glaze should be barely warm to the touch (between 95 – 104 degrees F or 35 – 40
degrees C, as measured on an instant read thermometer). Spread the glaze over the tops of
the éclairs using a metal icing spatula. Allow the tops to set and in the meantime fill the
bottoms with the pastry cream.

3) Pipe or spoon the pastry cream into the bottoms of the éclairs. Make sure you fill the bottoms
with enough cream to mound above the pastry. Place the glazed tops onto the pastry cream
and wriggle gently to settle them.

Notes:
1) If you have chilled your chocolate glaze, reheat by placing it in a bowl over simmering water,
stirring it gently with a wooden spoon. Do not stir too vigorously as you do not want to create
bubbles.

2) The éclairs should be served as soon as they have been filled.

Pierre Hermé’s Cream Puff Dough
Recipe from Chocolate Desserts by Pierre Hermé
(makes 20-24 Éclairs)

• ½ cup (125g) whole milk
• ½ cup (125g) water
• 1 stick (4 ounces; 115g) unsalted butter, cut into 8 pieces
• ¼ teaspoon sugar
• ¼ teaspoon salt
• 1 cup (140g) all-purpose flour
• 5 large eggs, at room temperature

1) In a heavy bottomed medium saucepan, bring the milk, water, butter, sugar and salt to the
boil.

2) Once the mixture is at a rolling boil, add all of the flour at once, reduce the heat to medium
and start to stir the mixture vigorously with a wooden spoon. The dough comes together very
quickly. Do not worry if a slight crust forms at the bottom of the pan, it’s supposed to. You
need to carry on stirring for a further 2-3 minutes to dry the dough. After this time the dough
will be very soft and smooth.

3) Transfer the dough into a bowl of a mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, or using your
handmixer or if you still have the energy, continue by hand. Add the eggs one at a time,
beating after each egg has been added to incorporate it into the dough.
You will notice that after you have added the first egg, the dough will separate, once again do
not worry. As you keep working the dough, it will come back all together again by the time you
have added the third egg. In the end the dough should be thick and shiny and when lifted it
should fall back into the bowl in a ribbon.

4) The dough should be still warm. It is now ready to be used for the éclairs as directed above.

Notes:
1) Once the dough is made you need to shape it immediately.

2) You can pipe the dough and the freeze it. Simply pipe the dough onto parchment-lined baking
sheets and slide the sheets into the freezer. Once the dough is completely frozen, transfer the
piped shapes into freezer bags. They can be kept in the freezer for up to a month.

Chocolate Pastry Cream
Recipe from Chocolate Desserts by PierreHermé

• 2 cups (500g) whole milk
• 4 large egg yolks
• 6 tbsp (75g) sugar
• 3 tablespoons cornstarch, sifted
• 7 oz (200g) bittersweet chocolate, preferably Velrhona Guanaja, melted
• 2½ tbsp (1¼ oz: 40g) unsalted butter, at room temperature

1) In a small saucepan, bring the milk to a boil. In the meantime, combine the yolks, sugar and cornstarch together and whisk in a heavy?bottomed saucepan.

2) Once the milk has reached a boil, temper the yolks by whisking a couple spoonfuls of the hot milk into the yolk mixture.Continue whisking and slowly pour the rest of the milk into the tempered yolk mixture.

3) Strain the mixture back into the saucepan to remove any egg that may have scrambled. Place the pan over medium heat and whisk vigorously (without stop) until the mixture returns to a boil. Keep whisking vigorously for 1 to 2 more minutes (still over medium heat).Stir in the melted chocolate and then remove the pan from the heat.

4) Scrape the pastry cream into a small bowl and set it in an ice?water bath to stop the cooking process. Make sure to continue stirring the mixture at this point so that it remains smooth.

5) Once the cream has reached a temperature of 140 F remove from the ice?water bath and stir in the butter in three or four installments. Return the cream to the ice?water bath to continue cooling, stirring occasionally, until it has completely cooled. The cream is now ready to use or store in the fridge.

[bNotes:[/b]
1) The pastry cream can be made 2?3 days in advance and stored in the refrigerator.

2) In order to avoid a skin forming on the pastry cream, cover with plastic wrap pressed onto the cream.

3) Tempering the eggs raises the temperature of the eggs slowly so that they do not scramble.

Chocolate Glaze
Recipe from Chocolate Desserts by Pierre Hermé
(makes 1 cup or 300g)

• 1/3 cup (80g) heavy cream
• 3½ oz (100g) bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped
• 4 tsp (20 g) unsalted butter, cut into 4 pieces, at room temperature
• 7 tbsp (110 g) Chocolate Sauce (recipe below), warm or at room temperature

1)In a small saucepan, bring the heavy cream to a boil. Remove from the heat and slowly begin to add the chocolate, stirring with a wooden spoon or spatula.

2) Stirring gently, stir in the butter, piece by piece followed by the chocolate sauce.

Notes:
1) If the chocolate glaze is too cool (i.e. not liquid enough) you may heat it briefly
in the microwave or over a double boiler. A double boiler is basically a bowl sitting over (not touching) simmering water.

2) It is best to glaze the eclairs after the glaze is made, but if you are pressed for time, you can make the glaze a couple days ahead of time, store it in the fridge and bring it up to the proper temperature (95 to 104 F) when ready to glaze.

Chocolate Sauce
Recipe from Chocolate Desserts by Pierre Hermé
(makes 1½ cups or 525 g)

• 4½ oz (130 g) bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped
• 1 cup (250 g) water
• ½ cup (125 g) crème fraîche, or heavy cream
• 1/3 cup (70 g) sugar

1) Place all the ingredients into a heavy?bottomed saucepan and bring to a boil, making sure to stir constantly. Then reduce the heat to low and continue stirring with a wooden spoon until the sauce thickens.

2) It may take 10-15 minutes for the sauce to thicken, but you will know when it is done when it coats the back of your spoon.

Notes:
1) You can make this sauce ahead of time and store it in the refrigerator for two weeks. Reheat the sauce in a microwave oven or a double boiler before using.
2) This sauce is also great for cakes, ice-cream and tarts.

Orangette

Coming from a Mexican family with an amazing group of cooks for aunts, grandaunts, second cousins and my phenomenal grandmother Lupe meant that I was surrounded by food: cooking, talking, eating, making, reading about, growing, learning. Food was everywhere and it was never just simple because in my family, food wasn’t food unless it was intricately layered in flavor and processes. Even the simplest of things were uncannily complex in one way or another. My grandmother taught me early on that color flavor, aroma, taste and even the plate you served it on was important and that there was joy to be found in creating something from the garden to the table.

It stands to reason that she, who taught me so much was the axis of my world and she was. I was her constant observer, her shadow and she was rarely without me in tow. My mother told me once that she remembered when I was just starting to eat fruit, my grandmother would cut tiny bits of strawberry, putting them on a toothpick one at a time and dipping them in honey to feed me bit by bit. I still love strawberries and I did the same with my granddaughter.

My grandmother was intensely interesting to me and she seemed the most magical of people. She grew up (the first to be born here in the US) on a ranch in Piru, California where they grew oranges. Her young life was poor and it must have been tremendously hard. Migrant farmworkers have never had it, easy (check the UFW website to see how many have died from heatstroke this year). If it had been me picking oranges season after season, I’d be heartily sick of them but my grandma Lupe loved them. Nothing made her happier than when on of my great uncles would drive down from Piru with a big box of freshly harvested Valencias for her. She’d sit out in the patio in back, take her paring knife and long curly waterfalls of peel would fall quickly into her apron in one long swoop. They never broke and she did it without thinking. I’d sit across from her goggle-eyed and wishing I could do it too. I still can’t without it breaking. She’d look at me, smile and hand me a section, popping it into my mouth. “It tastes like sunshine, doesn’t it, mi reina del cielo? (queen of heaven)” her name for me.

Another of her favorites were the chocolate-covered orange sticks my grandfather would bring her from the Thrifty’s in Glendale. He’d only bring a box every once in a while but those days were special. My grandmother would always be thrilled and giggly as a young girl. My grandfather would always hold his hands behind his back before bringing out the box and stand there with his boyish, blushing face holding it out to his sweetheart. I always felt the deep love they had for each other in those moments, love that spilled out like sugar all over everything and everyone around them. She’d smile and take one, just one and let me have it. The rest were hers and she hid them and kept the box for a long time, making it last. I’d savor my one piece and to me, it was the best thing in the world.

I don’t think she knew about orangettes or we would have made them. I was blessed to have a grandmother that gave me anything and everything I needed for cooking if I wanted to make something. She never gave it a second thought – I got the pan, the spice, the expensive nuts – whatever I needed, I got it. I know now what a sacrifice it must have been to two senior citizens on a fixed income with bills and family obligations, but she made it happily and I never once knew it was anything but a joy. I wonder if she knew what a difference cooking would make in my life, what a wonderful gift she gave not just to me but to my children, grandchildren and the people who share my life. I expect not. She was pure love, that woman and everything she did was filled with it.

I wish I could have made these for her, but I made them for Jasmine and Aiden and I think my grandmother is watching and smiling.

Orangette

What you’ll need:
Oranges, a thick skinned type like Valencias (you can do these with tangerine as well)
Water and sugar (ratio is about 1 ¼ c. water to 3 c of sugar)
A sharp knife
Sugar for dusting them
Chocolate that has been tempered

Scrub the oranges well and dry them off.
Cut off each end so they sit flat on a cutting board
Take your knife and score them just to the edge of the orange in about ¼ inch strips.
Peel away each strip, leaving rind on the orange but not the orange itself. Trim off any bits of orange.
Set aside.

Jasmine will show you how to peel off a section and what to do with the leftover orange.



See my orange Grammy scored for me?



Halfway there



I'm really careful to peel these off neatly.



Nom! I know just what to do with the orange.

I tried Jennifer Yu’s method of blanching the peels three times to do away with the bitterness but I still got some that was a little bitter when I tasted it as it cooled.  However, once it dried completely the bitterness was completely gone.  Weird, but cool.

Once blanched, I drained my orange peels and made my sugar syrup. Bring 1 ¼ c. water to boil and add the 3 c. sugar and stir till dissolved. Let it come to a full boil, then reduce heat to the lowest simmer. Add the orange peels and let simmer, stirring occasionally until they are transparent. Mine took about 40 minutes.

Working carefully (sugar syrup burns are nasty), scoop them out onto drying racks with parchment paper underneath to catch the drips. When they are cool enough to touch you can roll them in sugar, but I prefer not too. I like them with just the chocolate but I sugared some for the grandkids. This time, I added a few sprigs of rosemary to the left over syrup to candy them and flavor the syrup for another recipe. The syrup will be the base for a rosemary citrus ade (thanks to @peckedbyducks for the idea) and the candied sprigs will be garnish for something later this month.

The orange peels take several hours before they are dry but once they are you can either store them as is or dip into tempered chocolate. For these I used bittersweet chocolate with a little butter. I took another hint from Jennifer Yu and dried the chocolate ones on a cookie sheet lined in parchment rather than on the racks. Thanks Jennifer!

Store in airtight container or eat them. Most of mine will be gone, but I’m saving a few for something I have planned to make later this month.

Oh and Aiden?  I so busted you stealing orangette when you thought I was distracted by photographing it.  Thing is, I photographed you.  Sneaky, sneaky, sneaky buddy and very cute.



Aiden being very, very sneaky

This post is dedicated to my grandmother, the UFW, Dolores Huerta, César Estrada Chávez and to farmworkers everywhere trabajando en la pisca. Show some love by donating to the UFW donation page.

Mexica tiahui y buen provecho.

For more pictures, please visit the photo gallery page here.  If you like the photos, they are courtesy of my son Albert, who with his typical generosity of spirit sent his mom a new Olympus Evolt camera to take her food pictures with.  Albert is former Navy from age 17 to 29 who was commended for saving lives and is currently in Iraq as a contractor working with the Army.  I miss him every day and no matter how tough he is, he will always be my little boy.  Love you mijo!

One of the simple things that I make and my grown children go absolutely nuts over and always ask for is my tostadas de atún or tuna tosadas. It’s super simple, but so good and perfect for hot weather when you just don’t want to cook at all. It also a good recipe to make when you have little, hungry kids in the house and they want to help cook. Jasmine and Aiden like helping cook a lot so I chop everything up for them, open cans and then just let them add everything to a mixing bowl and stir. It makes them happy and they get a decent meal in the heat. The recipe also allows for a lot of creativity. It’s pretty flexible. When my kids were growing up, each one had their own spin on it. Albert always wanted me to add canned corn to it, lots of it and no mayo. Bernadette wanted pickles, cucumber and chopped celery. Phillip was the one who drowned it in so much lemon that we made him make his own and Bobby loved it with canned jalapenos and plenty of avocado.

Last Saturday, it was typical L.A. July weather, hot and nasty. We had gone over to Read Books for story time and Jasmine invited her friend Velouria over for an impromptu kiddie pool play date (for all my Twitter friends who commiserated and suggested help for the drowned Blackberry, yes that’s when I dropped it into the pool and thanks to all my Twitterfriend’s advice, it survived and is working).

After some fun time out back with Velouria’s mom Monica and the kids, Aiden and I went inside to fix lunch for everyone. I quickly decided on Tostadas de atún, because it was fast, easy and perfect for the day. I also decided I’d make my Grandma Lupe’s horchata de melon or agua de melon, a very cool and refreshing drink made of cantaloupe seeds. It was always my favorite agua fresca in the summertime and my grandkids love it just as much as I did.

While Aiden and I were working on lunch Monica and the girls came in from outside and Monica very kindly offered to take pictures since my camera is broken and I am not so patiently waiting for my new one to arrive. Thanks Monica!

Tostadas de atún

Tostada shells (store bought like we use or you can make your own)
Canned tuna (we use albacore in spring water)
Mayonnaise (optional)
Lettuce or other green leafy (on this day we used Mache)
Fresh lime or lemon juice to taste
Chopped tomato
Chopped green onions
Chopped cilantro
Finely chopped fresh jalapeno peppers (optional)
Avocado chopped for the tuna and some slices for garnish
Powdered chile limon, sometimes called pico de gallo (optional)
Canned corn, chopped celery, chopped cucumbers, pickles, canned jalapenos (all optional)
Salt and pepper to taste
Tapatio or other chile sauce to taste

Add tuna to a mixing bowl and add the chopped tomato, avocado, cilantro and green onion along with any thing else you want to toss in. Add about a quarter cup of mayonnaise if you want it creamy or just add the juice of one squeezed lemon or lime if you want it plain. I use both.

Scoop it onto a tostada shell and garnish with avocado slices. Add Tapatio sauce if desired and a squirt of fresh lime.

Horchata de melon/Cantaloupe orchata

The seeds of one cantaloupe
Sugar or honey to taste
Ice
Water

Slice a chilled cantaloupe and scoop out the seeds and put into a blender.
Add about a cup of ice and water to almost fill the blender.
Puree for about five minutes, then strain through a sieve lined with cheesecloth to get all the seeds out.
Add sugar or honey to taste and more ice if desired. Serve.

[singlepic=613,320,240,,center]

I love cooking and baking and take just about any opportunity to try something new or make something. If I’m cooking, I’m a happy camper. So when my roommate Rachel wanted to buy Challah for Shabbat with a friend, I jumped right in and asked if I could make it.

I had this recipe floating around that belonged to my grandmother Ruth on my dad’s side of the family. Grandma Ruth was a tiny bird of a woman who ruled with the proverbial iron hand in velvet glove. My grandfather Cecil Gleason towered over her at 6’8 and she was a tiny just under five feet woman. He was Irish, she was Jewish/English (or maybe Welsh) I believe. I wasn’t as close to them as I was to my Mexican grandparents but they loved me and they were sure interesting as hell. Grandma Ruth’s father Cornelius Losey was from Holland. I’m not sure when they came over or how the Judaism got left behind but that’s all I have from my dad. If any long lost family members see this and want to fill me in, I’d be grateful. I think my Grandma Ruth gave me this recipe years ago when I was still married and came over for a vist in a little envelope with a few other recipes. I’ve never tried any of them, although I really want to try her oxtail soup recipe.

I dug around for the recipe and there it was on a faded index card and found not too much to go on, no measurements. See I get that from both grandmothers!

The recipe was written as follows: flour, honey, yeast, eggs, oil, salt and water. Braid into six strands and bake. Garnish with poppy or sesame seeds.

Well that told me a whole lot. I surfed the net to find a challah recipe that jibed with my Grandmother’s card. I was able to find several which made it more confusing and a video on braiding a six-strand challah, which I found very useful even though I still managed to get tangled up. I decided to wing it and using several recipes as a guide, this is what I came up with.

1 package active dry yeast
1 cup warm water
2/3 c. honey
5-6 c. sifted flour
2 tsp. salt
2 eggs
2 tbsp. oil
1 egg yolk
sesame seeds

Dissolve yeast in warm water and add honey. Add dry ingredients to a bowl and sift together.
Make a well into the middle of the dry ingredients and add the eggs and yeast mixture into it. Mix well and then turn onto a floured surface and knead for about 10-15 minutes until the dough is smooth.

Coat all sides the dough with oil (I used a pastry brush) and pop it into a greased bowl. Cover and let rise until doubled. It took roughly about an hour and a half.

Punch down and let rise again until doubled again.

Divide the dough into six equal sized balls and braid. I highly recommend checking out Maya Sophia’s very useful video here.

The Challah turned out to be delicious and Rachel was happy with it. I am definitely going to make it again! I placed it on Rachel’s pretty Challah plate and left her to her Shabbat.

For more Challah recipes, check these informative sites.

When I first saw this challenge posted, my first thought was, “oh holy crap no, there’s no way I can make that, I’m skipping this month,” but then I shook myself off and started thinking about fillings. The fillings got me going and as I read through the recipe, it actually didn’t seem that hard. Watching the video helped immensely (thanks to our hosts for providing that link) and I found other videos on Youtube that helped as well. I was starting to get excited about this recipe.

I ran into a few small snags. One was the weather here in Los Angeles. It was so hot I was calling in it Hell A instead of L.A. I worried that my dough wouldn’t hold the butter so I kept putting it off, hoping for cooler weather. One morning I woke up and decided to head off to Silverlake for ingredients. I neglected to check the weather and only when I was there did I find it was 110 degrees! Still I was dressed for the weather and determined to get what I needed. It turned out to be quite the odyssey.

For my fillings I wanted one to have something to do with these amazing glazed, roasted figs I had found a few months ago at The Cheesestore in Silverlake. I was lucky and found the one package they had left which caused a bit of consternation. Would it be enough? I quickly decided that chopped Fuji apples would be great with the figs and Brie and would augment my small quantity of the figs. The second braid would be filled with brandied cherries and dark chocolate, a little homage to someone I care deeply about whose favorite cake is Black Forest. To find out more about my crazy day hunting ingredients in 100-degree weather, check out my L.A. Journal.

I also sweet-talked my brother into taking me on a separate day to the Indian store I love in Los Feliz. They have a huge selection of spices and I was happy to find several varieties of cardamom. The proprietress let me snap away pictures at will in the store and seemed to be amused by my desire to do so. I have to go back, I completely forgot rosewater to try my hand at macarons ala Pierre Hermes.

Finally, a cooler day arrived and I was eagerly anticipating my baking. I gathered up my ingredients and three teenagers (my niece Arielle, my nephew Jesse and their friend Debbie who are out on summer break) and set off for last minute ingredients. We put off the dough for one more day and hung out a bit until they went off to the movies. The next day my brother Jesse dropped three sleepy teenagers off at my house and left whistling. I dubbed them Daring Baker Dude and Bakerettes and put them to work. Arielle grated orange rind, Debbie handed me flour and Jesse did a last minute store run for more flour. They all got to sniff the cardamom that I had found in cheaply at an Indian store in Los Feliz and I got to give a little impromptu class on spices, dough, yeast proofing and other fun tidbits. I found I really like teaching teenagers to bake! It helps that they were into it, interested and eager to learn. (If my brother is reading this, it does not mean your kids can hang at my house all summer long).

We watched movies in between the turns and hung out in my room checking out my books, which made the waiting easier. I had help rolling out the dough and when we put it in the fridge for the last time they went home.

The next day my brother arrived with two of the three teenagers bright and early. He brought coffee and croissants but I wanted to wait for the Danish. I put Debbie to scoop out Brie into a bowl and Arielle to chop the figs. I peeled and cubed apples, then caramelized them at set them to cool. I also drained the cherries and Arielle and Debbie chopped chocolate into cubes.

We took the dough out of the fridge and started rolling and measuring with my tape till we got it the right size. At one point, the dough started shrinking back and we left it to sit for a bit, which worked like a charm.

Debbie and Arielle were particularly interested in the buerrage or butter block. I also explained the English method of grating the butter, which we will probably try next time we make this. The idea of grating butter appeals to all of us.

Once the dough was ready he girls and I had lots of fun making the braids and filling them. We worried that the chocolate would melt all over but it held. Arielle was disgusted that I put stinky French cheese in a Danish and “ruined” perfectly good apples and pastry. We argued good-naturedly about the cheese and I couldn’t persuade them to like it. One day they will love stinky cheese. Good thing I didn’t use Gorgonzola or another blue, they’d have freaked out totally.

We watched Fur while waiting for the braids to rise and what a weird movie that was. I guess I should have screened it first. While the girls were watching, I snuck in and put a braid in the oven and soon the whole house was redolent with the incredible smell of cardamom, orange, vanilla, cherries and baking chocolate. The aroma was the most hedonistically gorgeous thing I’ve smelled in a long, long time. Oh yeah, I’m making this again.

The cherry-chocolate braid that I named Mark’s Black Forest Danish was a huge hit with the girls and they happily bagged it up to take home, while avoiding the fig, apple and cheese one. We had had some trimming dough left over and they used ever bit of it making tiny little Danishes, some with just a single cherry wrapped in dough that Debbie dubbed Cherry Poppers. They took those home too and set off with a bag full of goodies. My brother called and asked for me to make the dough again so he could have it just plain with no filling. I will in the fall when it’s cooler – I won’t attempt it in summer time again.

All in all, we had a blast and ran into no problems with the dough other than sore arms from all the rolling. It’s a lot easier than it looks and so incredibly good. It helps to have two or three teenagers around to lighten the load and make it more fun. I never would have attempted this without the incredible Daring Bakers by my side and for that I am grateful.

Many thanks to our hosts Kelly of Sass & Veracity, and Ben of What’s Cookin’? They provided so much good info and instruction!

Don’t forget to visit The Daring Bakers in their new forum and The Daring Bakers Blogroll to see everyone’s braids.

Technique: Making and working with yeasted laminated dough
Recipe: “Danish Braid” from Sherry Yard’s The Secrets of Baking

DANISH DOUGH

Makes 2-1/2 pounds dough

Ingredients
For the dough (Detrempe)
1 ounce fresh yeast or 1 tablespoon active dry yeast
1/2 cup whole milk
1/3 cup sugar
Zest of 1 orange, finely grated
3/4 teaspoon ground cardamom
1-1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1/2 vanilla bean, split and scraped
2 large eggs, chilled
1/4 cup fresh orange juice
3-1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt

For the butter block (Beurrage)
1/2 pound (2 sticks) cold unsalted butter
1/4 cup all-purpose flour

DOUGH
Combine yeast and milk in the bowl of a mixer fitted with the paddle attachment and mix on low speed. Slowly add sugar, orange zest, cardamom, vanilla extract, vanilla seeds, eggs, and orange juice. Mix well. Change to the dough hook and add the salt with the flour, 1 cup at a time, increasing speed to medium as the flour is incorporated. Knead the dough for about 5 minutes, or until smooth. You may need to add a little more flour if it is sticky. Transfer dough to a lightly floured baking sheet and cover with plastic wrap. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.

Without a standing mixer: Combine yeast and milk in a bowl with a hand mixer on low speed or a whisk. Add sugar, orange zest, cardamom, vanilla extract, vanilla seeds, eggs, and orange juice and mix well. Sift flour and salt on your working surface and make a fountain. Make sure that the “walls” of your fountain are thick and even. Pour the liquid in the middle of the fountain. With your fingertips, mix the liquid and the flour starting from the middle of the fountain, slowly working towards the edges. When the ingredients have been incorporated start kneading the dough with the heel of your hands until it becomes smooth and easy to work with, around 5 to 7 minutes. You might need to add more flour if the dough is sticky.

BUTTER BLOCK
1. Combine butter and flour in the bowl of a mixer fitted with a paddle attachment and beat on medium speed for 1 minute. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and the paddle and then beat for 1 minute more, or until smooth and lump free. Set aside at room temperature.
2. After the detrempe has chilled 30 minutes, turn it out onto a lightly floured surface. Roll the dough into a rectangle approximately 18 x 13 inches and ¼ inch thick. The dough may be sticky, so keep dusting it lightly with flour. Spread the butter evenly over the center and right thirds of the dough. Fold the left edge of the detrempe to the right, covering half of the butter. Fold the right third of the rectangle over the center third. The first turn has now been completed. Mark the dough by poking it with your finger to keep track of your turns, or use a sticky and keep a tally. Place the dough on a baking sheet, wrap it in plastic wrap, and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
3. Place the dough lengthwise on a floured work surface. The open ends should be to your right and left. Roll the dough into another approximately 13 x 18 inch, ¼-inch-thick rectangle. Again, fold the left third of the rectangle over the center third and the right third over the center third. No additional butter will be added as it is already in the dough. The second turn has now been completed. Refrigerate the dough for 30 minutes.
4. Roll out, turn, and refrigerate the dough two more times, for a total of four single turns. Make sure you are keeping track of your turns. Refrigerate the dough after the final turn for at least 5 hours or overnight. The Danish dough is now ready to be used. If you will not be using the dough within 24 hours, freeze it. To do this, roll the dough out to about 1 inch in thickness, wrap tightly in plastic wrap, and freeze. Defrost the dough slowly in the refrigerator for easiest handling. Danish dough will keep in the freezer for up to 1 month.

APPLE FILLING
Makes enough for two braids

Ingredients
4 Fuji or other apples, peeled, cored, and cut into ¼-inch pieces
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/2 vanilla bean, split and scraped
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
4 tablespoons unsalted butter

Toss all ingredients except butter in a large bowl. Melt the butter in a sauté pan over medium heat until slightly nutty in color, about 6 – 8 minutes. Then add the apple mixture and sauté until apples are softened and caramelized, 10 to 15 minutes. If you’ve chosen Fujis, the apples will be caramelized, but have still retained their shape. Pour the cooked apples onto a baking sheet to cool completely before forming the braid. (If making ahead, cool to room temperature, seal, and refrigerate.) They will cool faster when spread in a thin layer over the surface of the sheet. After they have cooled, the filling can be stored in the refrigerator for up to 3 days. Left over filling can be used as an ice cream topping, for muffins, cheesecake, or other pastries.

DANISH BRAID
Makes enough for 2 large braids

Ingredients
1 recipe Danish Dough (see below)
2 cups apple filling, jam, or preserves (see below)

For the egg wash: 1 large egg, plus 1 large egg yolk

1. Line a baking sheet with a silicone mat or parchment paper. On a lightly floured surface, roll the Danish Dough into a 15 x 20-inch rectangle, ¼ inch thick. If the dough seems elastic and shrinks back when rolled, let it rest for a few minutes, then roll again. Place the dough on the baking sheet.
2. Along one long side of the pastry make parallel, 5-inch-long cuts with a knife or rolling pastry wheel, each about 1 inch apart. Repeat on the opposite side, making sure to line up the cuts with those you’ve already made.
3. Spoon the filling you’ve chosen to fill your braid down the center of the rectangle. Starting with the top and bottom “flaps”, fold the top flap down over the filling to cover. Next, fold the bottom “flap” up to cover filling. This helps keep the braid neat and helps to hold in the filling. Now begin folding the cut side strips of dough over the filling, alternating first left, then right, left, right, until finished. Trim any excess dough and tuck in the ends.

Egg Wash
Whisk together the whole egg and yolk in a bowl and with a pastry brush, lightly coat the braid.

Proofing and Baking
1. Spray cooking oil (Pam…) onto a piece of plastic wrap, and place over the braid. Proof at room temperature or, if possible, in a controlled 90 degree F environment for about 2 hours, or until doubled in volume and light to the touch.
2. Near the end of proofing, preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Position a rack in the center of the oven.
3. Bake for 10 minutes, then rotate the pan so that the side of the braid previously in the back of the oven is now in the front. Lower the oven temperature to 350 degrees F, and bake about 15-20 minutes more, or until golden brown. Cool and serve the braid either still warm from the oven or at room temperature. The cooled braid can be wrapped airtight and stored in the refrigerator for up to 2 days, or freeze for 1 month.

Additional Resources:

Baking with Julia by Dorie Greenspan. There are a variety of filling recipes that work quite well for Danish Braid.

Danish Pastry technique on YouTube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yg-zXn_Y … re=related Interesting general information on laminated dough (not specific to our recipe or Danish Braids).

PBS.org – Julia Child: Lessons with Master Chefs
http://www.pbs.org/juliachild/meet/ojakangas.html#
Video cut for a Danish Pastry Braid by Beatrice Ojakangas who is the featured baker of the Danish Braid recipe in Baking with Julia by Dorie Greenspan. Great information.

When I was growing up, I loved tamale season and my favorites were the meat filled ones. I hated, absolutely loathed the sweet ones. Everyone in my family, especially my grandfather, loved the sweet ones but something about them just gave me the icks. Maybe it was the peanuts, maybe it was the peanut butter in the masa, maybe it was the fact that the taste of corn fought with the raisins, I don’t know but I never liked them.

As an adult, I thought I’d give the sweet tamales another try. I still had the icks but was determined to find a sweet tamale that I liked. My grandmother had once made some incredible strawberry tamales that I liked and so, over the years I’ve been experimenting with berries and various fillings on my quest for the perfect sweet tamale. I’ve made strawberry ones that were great, coconut ones, piña colada, almond, blackberry and apple cinnamon and they were all good tamales but nothing I couldn’t live without.

Yesterday, I invented the perfect sweet tamale. Raspberry flavored masa with a fig-walnut filling and a touch of raspberry syrup. Oh. My. God.

Want the recipe? I’d better write it down so I don’t forget it since I made it up on the fly.

I had been shopping for ingredients for my tamalada and had bought the things for pineapple tamales as well as for coconut tamales. I was in this little store in Glendale and spotted large trays of fresh raspberries on sale and right along side of them, boxes of fresh mission figs for 49 cents. Yowza! I love figs and I love raspberries so I grabbed all the boxes of figs and five trays of raspberries. Marissa asked, “What do you need those for?” and I said, “No idea but this is a great deal” and tossed them into the cart.

Yesterday, when I was preparing for the tamalada I started pulling out the stuff to make pineapple tamales when I saw the raspberries. Something clicked and I got into this state my kids used to call the Mom-recipe inventing robot mode. It’s weird really, almost a dreamlike trance where everything is on autopilot and images just pop into my head and somehow become a recipe. This is what I came up with.

A stand mixer makes easy work of mixing the masa

Raspberry Tamales with Fig-Walnut Filling

3 lbs. raspberries, washed, hulled and patted dry
10 cups of prepared corn masa (can be ordered and bought ready made at Mexican bakeries or grocery stores)
4 lbs. fresh figs, washed
1 pound coarsely chopped walnuts
2 c. sugar for raspberries
1 tsp. allspice
3 tbsp. Chambord
2 cinnamon sticks
5 c. sugar for masa
2 more cups of sugar for syrup
Soaked corn husks

Wash raspberries and remove hulls. Gently pat them dry and put them into a heavy saucepan. Cover the raspberries just barely with cold water and add the two cinnamon sticks. Bring to a boil, then reduce to low heat and let simmer for about a half hour. Remove cinnamon sticks and slowly stir in 2 cups of sugar. I used brown Mexican cane sugar, but any sugar will do.

Once the raspberries are cooked down and the sugar is dissolved, about another ten minutes, turn off the stove and let cool.

Scoop out the cooled raspberries with a slotted spoon and puree them in the blender, leaving the water in the pot.

Push the puree through a very fine sieve into a bowl. Set aside.

Put the corn masa into a big mixing bowl, or if you have a KitchenAid stand mixer, which is what I used (Marissa and Rachel got it for my birthday present), put as much of the masa as you can into the mixing bowl. Make sure to use the splash guard if you’re using the mixer. Turn on the mixer on medium speed and then start pouring the puree little by little into the bowl. Add the sugar and allspice and let it mix. I set the speed up to the maximum and let it do its thing for about 15 minutes. You want a light masa, so it’s going to take some work. If you’re beating this by hand, it’s going to take a while and you’ll need someone to spot you. Use the heavy-duty mixer.

While the masa is being mixed, turn the stove back on and heat up the remaining water from the raspberries. Add the two tablespoons of Chambord. Bring to a boil and start stirring in the remaining two cups of sugar. Lower the flame and let cook, stirring constantly until the consistency is thick and syrupy. It takes about five to ten minutes. Remove from heat and let cool. Strain, using a fine sieve. If the small raspberry seeds bother you, double strain it through cheesecloth. I thought they added a little texture and dimension so didn’t bother. Set aside till you’re ready to assemble the tamales.

Once the masa is thoroughly mixed, removed from the mixing bowl into a bigger bowl or large container. I used a disposable aluminum roasting pan. Set aside.

Roughly chop the fresh figs and walnuts. Using a spatula, turn the figs and walnuts into the masa. If the masa seems a little watery and not spreadable, add more masa with your spatula till it’s the right texture. You want something almost the consistency of thick peanut butter. It’s now ready to be spread on the corn husks.

Soak corn husks for about an hour in warm water and pat dry. Run your fingers along both sides to check texture. The smoother side is where you should be spreading the masa. Using the back of a spoon spread the masa from the bottom up in a fan pattern. Get about a quarter inch of masa on the husk. Using another spoon, drizzle a line of the raspberry syrup right down the middle. Fold the bottom of the husk up and wrap the tamale. (See Rachel Braver’s step-by-step photo instructions on how to wrap a tamale).

Once you’ve assembled and wrapped all your tamales, place them in a tamale steamer standing up, bottoms sides down. Depending on how many you fit in the tamale steamer, it could take anywhere from an hour to three for the tamales to be done. Make sure the steamer never runs out of water and make sure the tamales aren’t sitting in water. They have to be above it and cook only with the steam. Tamales are done when the masa is set and firm.

I served these a little of the left over raspberry syrup on top and some homemade whipped cream. Garnish with a couple of fresh raspberries if you like. One of the comments I got was, “wow this is like a dense cake”. They are worth the effort and you can probably experiment to get this recipe smaller. I just tend to do things in huge batches.

One of the things I love most about the cold weather celebrations in Mexican households is the traditional ponche (hot fruit punch). There is nothing like it. The smell is incredible, it’s packed with stewed fruit and has an unbelievable flavor. You can add a dash of tequila for someone who wants an extra kick to hit, but I love it just as it is. It’s one of my favorite things and I look forward to it every year. I knew I just had to make some for my guests at the tamalada.

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In ponche, there are some hard-to-find ingredients but they are absolutely necessary or it just won’t be the same. Fortunately, the ingredients are getting easier to find here in L.A. One of the main ingredients, tejocotes, used to be virtually impossible to get unless you went to Mexico and brought them over canned since you can’t bring fresh fruit across the border.

The tejocote is what gives the ponche it’s unusually delicious flavor and without it, it’s just so-so. I’ve been lucky in the past few years being able to find them (at somewhat high prices) frozen. This year, I hit the tejocote lottery and found them fresh! I paid a high price per pound, but the ponche was amazing and it was worth it.

I’m using my grandmother Lupe’s recipe, originally written in Spanish so the measurements may be a little off. I never measure and I never could translate grams and litres into cups and teaspoons.

Some of my guests came in cold from the weather and a hot cup of ponche was just the thing to warm hands and tummies.

Ponche (Mexican Hot Fruit Punch)

1 ½ pounds Tejocotes
1 ½ pounds Guayabas (guavas), not very ripe
1 pound of apples (I used Gala) sliced into rings so that the star in the middle shows
1 pound of Caña (sugar cane) – you can get it frozen in Mexican specialty stores if you can’t find it fresh. If fresh, chop into 2-inch sections and peel. If frozen you can add it right in, it’s already sectioned and peeled.
10 prunes
1 piece of piloncillo (Mexican brown sugar cone)
1 handful of flor de Jamaica (hibiscus flowers, dried)
1 cup of pineapple chunks or rings (optional)
1 dried piece of tamarindo (tamarind), peeled (optional)
Tequila or rum (optional)

Wash all the fruit, peel the sugar cane and slice the apples.
Soak the hibiscus flowers in cold water for about five minutes and strain.
Put a big pot on the stove half filled with cold water and add the tejocotes and cinnamon sticks. Let come to a boil, then add all the fruit and piloncillo. Make sure that the water covers all the fruit. Cook on a medium heat, covered till all the fruit is soft.

Serve hot with some of the cooked fruit in the cup. Add a dash of tequila or rum if desired.