Strawberry Weekend

Hello reader!

It's strawberry season here in Myanmar right now, and it's so crazy trying to fit in a dozen recipes in one week. =)

Oh boy, I love strawberry season. This lil' cheese cake tart is my own creation from the kitchen.

It's light, fresh, and a perfect way to start tea time with some friends. So lets get jiggy.

The 3 components:

• Strawberry concentration 
• Pate Sucree 
• Fluffy Cream Cheese Filling

...and of course the strawberries to decorate.

Frist off, the strawberry concentration. You'll need:

• 1 1/2 cup of fresh strawberries (if you have frozen ones, see the note below)
• 1/4 and a tablespoon of sugar
• 1/2 + 1/4 cup (maybe more) of water
• a twist of lime/lemon
• a pinch of salt

First wash the strawberries if you haven't yet, then halve them. In a medium sized sauce pan put in the strawberries, sprinkle the salt and sugar and twist the lime over the strawberries. This helps the strawberries to bleed some more juice. (It doesn't matter if it's frozen, its even better cause when it melts the juice just falls out, so let it thaw while you are cooking it.) Then after a few minutes, add the water, enough to cover the strawberries. Place the sauce pan over the burner. And leave it there until it thickens. You might want to stir it once in a while, but no too often because stirring creates a foam, and we don't want that cause we want a clear sauce. When it thickens, most of the water will be evaporated, and it will look a bit like watery jam. But thats what we want!
Take that, and put it through a sieve and TADA! You have a strawberry sauce, but whatever you do. Don't use the scrapings on the bottom of the sieve, this will make that beautiful clear sauce cloudy. It's what left of the seeds and whatnot. Discard of the pulp and seeds in the sieve. And put the sauce in the fridge for later.

The Fluffy Cream Cheese Filling:

• 250 grams of Cream Cheese
• 250 grams of Whipping Cream
• 1/3 cup of sugar
• 1/2 tsp of Vanilla Extract

Place whipping cream in a mixer bowl with whisk attachment, and whip until soft peaks, then add sugar, and whip until stiff peaks or until the sugar is dissolved. If you have another mixer or a hand mixer it would be more convenient. If not just switch out the whipping cream into another bowl, no worries. Place the cream cheese in the mixer bowl with the creamer attachment (not with the whisk attachment, the cream cheese would murder it)  and whip until it's fluffy and light. Then fold in the whipped cream, a third at a time, until combined add vanilla. Then again with the whisk attachment, whip the combo until the lumps of cream cheese are smooth with the whipped cream. Cover with plastic wrap and leave this in the fridge until need.

cooled and ready for decoration!

For the pate sucree you could use any recipe. But I use my own (which I will post next time). Just roll out the dough, and fit it in to little tart tins, and bake as instructed until golden brown.
Cool off on racks. This is essential, because the filling will split if the crust are too hot.
Fill each tart shell with a table spoon or 2 table spoons of filling, smooth it out. Then decorate with strawberries, and glaze the sauce over them.

And there you have a beautiful Strawberry Cheese Tartlet.

Hello Hello :)

It's good to be back!
I know its been a very,very,very, long long long time. But Senior year is hectic! Applications and whatnot, visas and other stuff, its just been super crazy. BUT.
There's always time for good food! Always.

So a couple of things that happened when I was away:

•  Finally got "feet" on my Macaroons! YAY!
• I got into The Culinary Institute of Switzerland! Woot Woot!
• Turned 18 :D
• I'm going to graduate in 128 days. 
• Still madly in love with food. (but who isn't)

Loki inspired Birthday cake

And so the adventure continues!

Soon, I promise. I can already feel the chocoholic in me taking over.

Over and out homes. JULIA

Distractions

Hello Reader!

I know I've been missing in action for the last week, and I guess the title says it all. Distractions are every where this week. Freaky science fictions TV series, birthday parties, guest coming over, making dessert for a family gathering, and saying good bye (for now) to good friends, last week was one hell-of-a week.

Anyway, lets get on with the food part of this stuff. So I made, a tropical fruit tart, Berry and vanilla Panna cottas, as well as a small blue berry cream tart with the extra tart dough.
And yes, it was delicious. I spoiled myself, just a little. :)

I used Martha's Pate Sucree recipe which I love love love! It's easy, quick (kind of), and most important crisp and crumbly. Perfect for most any filling or sweet, dessert pie you want to make. And it holds up great if you want a free form pie.But I tweaked it a bit, the butter was to much for me, so cut it down to 1 stick (1/2 cup), and it worked fine.

So heres the recipe:

It makes enough for two 9 inch pies

Ingredients:

• 2 egg yolks
• 1 stick of butter (cut into cubes)
• 1/4 cup of sugar
• 2 tbs of cream ( or full cream milk is fine)
• 2 1/4 cups of all purpose flour
• a pinch of salt

Combine flour, salt, and sugar in the mixer bowl, and mix. With the mixer on slow, slowly add the little cubes of butter and mix till combined. Mean while whisk the egg yolks and cream or milk, and slowly add to the mixer. Turn on to medium speed ( be careful the flour may splash). When it looks like everything is combined, its ready. Scrape out the dough, and wrap in plastic and refrigerate for 1 hour. OR take little chunks of the dough and press in to the pan, then you and place it in the freezer for about 10-15 minutes and bake directly in a 350 degree oven until golden brown. Then wrap with plastic and freeze the rest.

:)

MIA

Hello reader! 

I know I've been MIA lately, but I promise it will all pay off soon. This whole week I worked on making croissant, and it was a major faliure (major failures to be exact). But! I think I'm getter closer,so there's still hope!

But till the next post, keep munch'in on these little babies. 

 

S'more Sundae

Hello Reader.

Its time to reveal my secret plan for my super chunky, clunky rocky road ice cream. Here it is, the S'more Sundae. 6 layers of overflowing chocolate goodness on a perfectly sunny Monday afternoon. Oh, life's good. I spoiled myself a little today. <3

I was inspired by this great post on S'more pudding Jars  I saw on Food Gawker, and I thought it would be perfect for my little get together. Sweet cold ice cream would be a perfect way to end dinner


So lets get jiggly with the layers:
(bottom  up)

The Cookie Crust- Crushed digestive biscuits, or graham crackers.

Chocolate Fudge-Its just traditional chocolate fudge! And it's so gooey and great! Serious Eats has an awesome recipe for this. Here! 

Brownie Chunks-Here any brownie recipe will do, it depends if you want them soft and gooey in the center or fully baked and chewy.The recipe I used is from Joy the Baker.

Rocky Road Ice Cream-The recipe for this is in my last post. It's chalk full with white chocolate chunks, crushed almonds, mini marshmallows, and tiny brownie chunks.

Topped with a soft&sweet toasted marshmallow, this sundae has the crunchy, chewy, gooey and awesomeness to give you a sugar high for the rest of the day. True story. :)

Fudge Brownie:

• 1 2/3 cups of sugar 
• 3/4 of cocoa powder 
• 3/4 Butter
• 2 Tbs of water or coffee
• 2 eggs
• 2 tsp of vanilla
• 1 1/3 of All porpouse flour
• 1/4 salt
• 1/2 baking powder

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease the pan you choose to use ( I used a 9in round springform).

Combine butter, cocoa powder in a sauce pan and place over medium heat and melt butter. Once the butter is melted, add the water of coffee to the mixture and whisk till combined. Set aside let cool a little while.

Then in a medium size bowl, whisk eggs and sugar. Add vanilla extract and stir in the butter and cocoa mixture slowly, stir till combined.

Add flour, salt, and baking powder to the mixture and stir until everything is combined. Pour the batter into the pan and bake for 20-25 minutes. Or until a tooth pick comes out clean. (or not clean if you like them a bit under cooked)