David Rocco's apple yogurt cake

Oh, David Rocco.... I watch him on tv, usually in awe. He's a Canadian who lives part-time in Italy. He hangs out with his buddies in Rome, and cooks. He visits fun places like a chestnut farm, and eats and cooks among the trees. What a life! How do I sign up for this gig?

With all honesty, I don't really want to have a tv show. I'd rather have my perfect little bakery. In the meantime, I have David Rocco's latest book "Made in Italy" to review.

So far, I've tested a handful of recipes. What I love about this book: the simplicity. The recipes are quite simple and rustic. You don't need a fancy food processor, blender, mixer, etc. to make David Rocco's recipes. The photos in the book reflect this simplicity, depicting simple, traditional Italian dishes. There are no fancy plating techniques here: the pizzas aren't perfectly round and there are sometimes dribbles of sauce on the serving plate photographed. The dishes really look homemade.

What I don't love (i.e. me being picky): solids (like flour, sugar, etc.) are measured in cups/milliliters (mL). My inner chemist thinks that volumes are for liquids, weights are for solids. Unfortunately, I think Canadian publishing regulations dictate that solids be reported for cookbooks in cups/mL. This makes absolutely no sense to me, but those are the rules. Oh well.

My other issue is with the ingredient lists. For the dessert (dolci) section, I think it is important to specify to use unsalted butter and granulated sugar, for example. However, in this book, these ingredients are listed as butter and sugar, which is fine for the experienced bakers who know what type of butter and sugar to use, but for a novice, I think it's important to specify exactly what ingredients were used. These are really minor details though, and I'm definitely going to continue cooking with this book.

This apple yogurt cake is a dessert recipe adapted from David Rocco's  "Made in Italy" (page 341). The recipe is really simple and can even be mixed together by hand (or with a hand mixer, as David Rocco recommends) if you don't have a stand mixer. The cake has a lovely moist texture and is full of apple slices. The original recipe said to bake the cake for 40 minutes, but mine took over an hour to bake. I love the crispy sugar topping that crackles as the cake cools and its crispy texture is a welcome sweet contrast to the soft, slightly tart apples. This is a great snacking cake and absolutely appropriate for the end of fall.


Apple yogurt cake

    Makes one 8-inch cake

• 1 1/3 cups (150 grams) all-purpose flour
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/2 cup (115 grams) granulated sugar
• 7/8 cup (200 grams) unsalted butter, melted, plus a little extra for buttering the pan
• 2 large eggs
• 1/2 cups (125 mL) yogurt (I used 2.5% fat yogurt)
• 2 apples, peeled, cored, and thinly sliced
• zest of 1 lemon
• 1/3 cup (75 grams) granulated sugar (for the topping

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Butter an 8-inch cake round.
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, cinnamon, and salt.
3. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the 1/2 cup of sugar and the melted butter until it has lightened.
4. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating between each addition and scraping down the bowl as needed.
5. Reduce the mixer speed to low and add the flour mixture alternately with the yoghurt, beginning and ending with the flour.
6. Stir in the sliced apples and the lemon zest, and pour the batter in the prepared pan.
7. Sprinkle the 1/3 cup sugar evenly over the top of the cake.
8. The original recipe suggests a baking time of 40 minutes, but I think it needs to bake for over one hour (until a tester inserted into the center (not through an apple if possible!) comes out clean.
9. Let cool completely before serving.

Please note that I was sent this book by Harper Collins publishing, but my opinion is my own.

Montreal's best banana bread according to Joe Beef

If you've ever read about Montreal, then you probably encountered a blurb or two on the restaurant Joe Beef. It's described as iconic, and typical of Montreal. It's a small space filled with big, jovial, fun-loving personalities and comforting, delicious food.

Some of the Joe Beef crew put together a wonderful book entitled "The Art of Living According to Joe Beef" that really reflects the ambiance of our city, and my growing neighborhood of Saint-Henri. The book assembles the stories behind the restaurant and its people, and even gives away several of their favorite and/or famous recipes. It's a great bedtime read, and a fun kitchen tool.

The book contains recipes for a few awesome dishes like lobster spaghetti, canard et saucisse, and even "good fries". Obviously, I went straight to the desserts section at the end. The dessert section is pretty random because it contains all sorts of sweet treats from simple banana bread to a fancy marjolaine layer cake. Personally, I love the randomness, but some may shake their heads.

Go figure, the one recipe I kept coming back to was one that the Montreal bloggers Foodie Date Night also recommended. And, even more intriguing is that the recipe actually hails from Olive & Gourmando, a great café in Old Montreal that we all have lined up for at some point.

I'm pretty sure you are thinking to yourself "Not another banana bread recipe!" but yes, I had to. This banana bread is moist and flavorful, and it may well be the best banana bread ever. It contains cardamom, which I thought was crazy for a banana bread recipe. However, the floral spice of the cardamom actually enhances the flavor of the bananas, rendering this the tastiest banana bread I've ever encountered.

The technique of this recipe will probably seem familiar since it is similar to the one published by Cook's Illustrated where you nuke the bananas to cook them so that they release their juice, then you cook down the banana liquid before adding it and the crushed cooked banana to the cake batter. This adds a few steps to the typical quick-bread recipe, but they are well worth it because you will end up with a moist, flavorful, and light banana bread that is sure to satisfy even the most discerning of banana-bread-critics. Just trust me and make this.

I tweaked the recipe a little, reducing the salt and also adding the baking soda along with the dry ingredients (instead of combining it with the sour cream as in the book). Mixing the baking soda and sour cream seemed counter-intuitive to me because the lifting power of the powder would be lost before it ever makes it into the cake batter. My inner nerd rebelled, and here's my version of the original recipe.

Montreal's best banana bread

    Makes 9 mini loaves or 10 muffins

• 1/2 cup (115 grams) unsalted butter, room temperature, plus a tbsp more melted butter for the pans
• 4 very ripe bananas, peeled
• 1 1/2 cups (170 grams) all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 1/2 tsp ground cardamom
• 1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
• 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1 cup (200 grams) packed light brown sugar
• 2 large eggs, room temperature
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup (125 mL) sour cream (14% fat)

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Grease 10 standard muffin cups or 9 mini loaf pans with the tablespoon melted butter. Set aside for later.
2. Place the bananas in a glass bowl and microwave them for 2 to 5 minutes to allow them to heat up and release their liquid. Transfer the bananas/liquid to a fine strainer, and strain the liquid into a small saucepan, gently mashing the bananas a little with a fork. Cook down the liquid over medium heat until it is reduced by half. Add back the bananas and let the mixture cool for later.
3. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, cardamom, nutmeg, and cinnamon. Set aside.
4. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the rest of the butter and sugar on medium speed for 2 minutes to lighten the mixture. Add the eggs, one at a time, scraping down the bowl as needed, and mixing on low. Add the vanilla and mix again.
5. Add the dry ingredients with the mixer on low, alternating with the sour cream and banana mixture, beginning and ending with the dry.
6. Stop the mixer and give the batter a stir or two with a spatula by hand to be sure the batter is evenly mixed.
7. Divide the batter evenly among the prepared muffin cups or loaf pans.
8. Bake the mixture for about 30 minutes, or until a cake tester poked through the middle of a cake comes out clean.
9. Let the cakes cool completely before serving.

I absolutely adore layer cakes. I think layer cake is one of my favorite things to eat, and possibly my favorite thing to bake. When I was in grad-school, I went through a layer-cake-making phase. They weren't always perfect, but my labmates always enjoyed them (and I'd like to believe it's not just because my cakes were free). I made a different layer cake every week for months, and my most cherished moments of grad-school were slicing into and sharing these cakes with my friends. We'd cut into the cake every Monday evening, and we'd sit together and chat, and revel in the sugar-high. Those Monday night sweet breaks made spending another late evening in the lab almost okay.

Now that I've graduated, my layer cake endeavors usually involve a celebration of some kind. Each one is an opportunity to test a new recipe or to learn a new technique. I made this cake in celebration of a fellow chocoholic-turned-friend's birthday. New recipes can be nerve-wracking, especially when your cake is going to be served to a room full of foodies/bloggers. Fortunately, this cake was a showstopper and enjoyed by all. The recipe is from Baked Explorations: Classic American Desserts Reinvented, and I learned a few things along the way. Here are some of my tips for cake-making success:

• You will want this tool to help you transfer the delicate cake layers from pan to rack, etc. Trust me, it makes things a lot easier!
• The cake layers are very delicate, so to make cake assembly easier, I wrapped them in cling wrap and put them in the freezer just before I made the buttercream. This way, the cake layers firm up in the freezer and can easily be stacked and iced without them falling apart on you.
• The buttercream is thickened with flour. You must boil the milk/ flour/sugar mixture sufficiently so that it is very thick, otherwise you will end up with a soupy buttercream.
• After it has thickened, make sure to beat the milk/flour mixture until it has completely cooled or you will melt the butter when you add it.
• I couldn't find coffee extract, so I made very, very strong espresso and used that instead. It was strong to the point of being undrinkable, but just right for flavoring a buttercream.
• I only used half the chocolate glaze that the original recipe called for. Surprisingly, I don't think more was needed. In the recipe that follows the amount of chocolate glaze that I used is given, if you want more, double the ingredients.

What I love about this recipe is that the layer cakes are light and moist, and a little chocolaty. The chocolate glaze certainly reinforces that chocolate flavor. The coffee buttercream tastes remarkably similar to a Coffee Crisp bar (well, minus the crispiness). This recipe is not hard, but requires a little extra time that is well worth it.

Chocolate cake with coffee buttercream

    Makes one 8-inch, 3-layer cake

Chocolate cake ingredients

• 3/4 cup (85 grams) dark unsweetened cocoa powder—I used Cacao Barry Cocoa Powder - Extra Dark, plus more for dusting pans
• 2/3 cup (~170 mL) sour cream (14% fat)
• 1 1/4 cups (312.5 mL) hot water
• 2 2/3 cups (295 grams) all-purpose flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 3/4 cup (170 grams) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1/2 cup (~115 grams) vegetable shortening
• 1 1/2 cup (340 grams) granulated sugar
• 1 cup (200 grams) dark brown sugar
• 3 large eggs, room temperature
• 1 tbsp vanilla extract

Coffee buttercream ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups (340 grams) granulated sugar
• 1/3 cup (40 grams) all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 cups (375 mL) whole milk (3.25% fat)
• 1/3 cup (~80 mL) heavy cream (35% fat)
• 1 1/2 cups (340 grams) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 2–4 tbsp very strong espresso, room temperature

Chocolate ganache ingredients

• 114 grams Valrhona guanaja chocolate (or your favorite dark chocolate)
• 3/8 cup (85 grams) unsalted butter, room temperature, cut into pieces
• 1/2 tbsp corn syrup

Extras

• 20–25 Godiva chocolate pearls

To make the chocolate cake

1. Preheat the oven to 325°F. Grease three 8-inch round cake pans, line each of them with parchment, grease the parchment and dust the pans and parchment with cocoa powder. Set them aside.
2. In a medium bowl, mix the cocoa powder, sour cream and hot water. Set aside for later.
3. In another medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
4. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter and shortening on medium speed until it is light and fluffy.
5. Add the sugars to the bowl of the mixer and beat on medium speed until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Scrape down the bowl as needed.
6. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well between each addition. Add the vanilla, and beat well.
7. With the mixer on low, add the whisked dry ingredients alternately with the cocoa mixture, scraping the sides of the bowl as needed.
8. Give the mixture a last stir by hand before dividing among the three prepared pans.
9. Bake the cake layers for 30 to 40 minutes, or until a cake tester inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. The cake will pull away from the sides of the pan when the cake is done.
10. Let the cake cool in the pans for 30 minutes before flipping them onto a wire rack to cool completely. Wrap them in plastic wrap to store them.

To make the coffee buttercream

1. Place the wrapped cake layers in the freezer while you prepare the buttercream.
2. In a medium saucepan, whisk together the sugar and flour. Whisk in the milk and cream, and cook over medium heat, whisking often until the mixture boils and thickens. This takes a good 15 minutes.
3. Transfer the thickened mixture to the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Beat on high speed until the mixture is completely cooled, about 10 minutes (don't just feel the bowl, check the mixture itself to be sure it has cooled!).
4. Reduce the speed to low and add the butter, mixing until it is thoroughly incorporated. Increase the speed to medium-high to make the frosting light and fluffy.
5. Add the vanilla and the espresso (or coffee extract) to taste.

To assemble the cake

1. Trim the cake layers so that they are flat and leveled.
2. Place one cake layer in the center of a serving plate. Place parchment strips to cover the exposed plate and catch any buttercream/ganache drips.
3. Top the first layer with 1 1/4 cups buttercream. Place the second layer over the buttercream, and repeat with another 1 1/4 cup of buttercream and the third layer.
4. Frost the top and sides of the cake with what's left of buttercream. Place the cake in the fridge while you make the chocolate glaze.

To make the chocolate glaze

1. Place the chocolate, butter, and corn syrup in the top of a double boiler.
2. Stir the mixture with a small spatula until the ingredients have melted and the glaze is smooth.
3. Take the pan off the heat, and stir for a few minutes to allow the glaze to cool and thicken a little.

Finishing touches

1. Slowly pour the glaze over the top of the cake, pushing tiny droplets down the sides.
2. Let the glaze set for a few minutes before decorating the cake with a few chocolate pearls.
3. Refrigerate the cake for 20 minutes to set the glaze. The cake should be served at room temperature.

Easy cranberry french toast muffins

Sometimes, bad things happen. All you can do is wrap yourself in comfort, bake some muffins, clean the house, watch your favorite movie... I do all of these things, even the cleaning part, and I like to throw in a little extra breakfast because nothing says comfort like breakfast, especially when it's drowned in a good amount of maple syrup.

These french toast muffins are super easy to make. And, even on a bad day, you probably have all the ingredients on hand. I added some frozen cranberries and an eighth of a teaspoon of nutmeg to the mix because I needed a little Christmas cheer, even though it's only mid-November. The nutmeg makes me think of eggnog, and automatically puts me in a happier state of mind. Of course, you can add your favorite frozen berries and spices, or leave them plain, and drizzle them with extra maple syrup.

This recipe makes 12 muffins, but if you don't eat them all, you can wrap each of the leftover baked ones in some cling wrap and freeze them. Defrost them in the microwave when you need them.

Cranberry french toast muffins

    Makes 12 muffins

• 3 large eggs
• 1 1/2 cups (375 mL) 1% milk
• 1/3 cup (75 grams) granulated sugar
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 1/8–1/4 tsp nutmeg
• 10 slices Hearty Grains bread, cubed
• 3/4 cup (~75 grams) frozen cranberries
• Lots of Quebec maple syrup for serving

1. Preheat the oven to 375°F. Prepare two standard muffin tins by greasing them. Set them aside for later.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together the eggs, milk, sugar, vanilla, and nutmeg until well combined. Add the cubed bread and toss gently until the egg mixture has been absorbed. Add the cranberries and toss gently to combine.
3. Divide the muffin mixture evenly in the muffin pans, being sure to also evenly divide the cranberries among the muffins.
4. Bake for about 30 minutes (or more, depending on how "done" you like your french toast).
5. Serve muffins warm, with a generous drizzling of maple syrup.
6. Leftover muffins can be cooled completely, wrapped individually in cling wrap, and stored in a resealable bag for another day.

Adapted from here.

Spicy cranberry-pepper jelly

I am mildly addicted to jams, jellies, and preserves. Well, maybe it's a little more than a mild addiction. More often than not, I will return home from a vacation with jars of jam in my luggage, heavy to carry but totally worth it. If I visit a new grocery store, I can spend ages in the jam aisle reading all the labels and carefully picking a new jam to try.

When I was preparing for my PhD defense, I went through jars of jam. During the last week before the big day, I honestly polished off a large jar of Bonne Maman rhubarb jam in the space of 3 days. I ate it on toast. I ate it spooned directly onto pieces of aged cheddar cheese. I ate it straight from the jar. I guess you could say that jams and jellies are comfort foods for me in times of crisis.

When I was younger, I used to take the left-over Thanksgiving cranberry jelly to school in a tupperware. I would eat it for dessert at lunchtime. While most kids had jell-o cups, I ate leftover cranberry jelly, happily. Jell-o freaked me out (and still kind of does), but cranberry jelly was a real treat for me. I think it's the intense flavor of cranberry jelly that gets me every time. It's sweet and tart, and so amazingly cranberry. I just love the stuff.

Pepper jelly is another favorite of mine. It's sweet and spicy, and sometimes it can even be a little vinegary. I especially love toast with a thick layer of cream cheese or a mild goat cheese, and then topped with an embarrassing amount of pepper jelly. Sometimes I add lettuce or sprouts (if I have them on hand), in an attempt to be healthy. Greens on a pepper jelly toast happen rarely at best. I just want the jelly, really.

All this to say that when I saw the recipe for cranberry-pepper jelly in the November issue of Bon Appétit, I had to make it. Combining two of my favorite jellies into one seemed like a genius idea to me, and boy was it ever. It's quite spicy, loaded with cranberries, and with just a hint of sweetness. It would make a great accompaniment to a Thanksgiving turkey, or even just a simple Sunday roast chicken. Delicious! And yes, I also ate it by the spoonful, and dolloped over slices of Weston Première Fournée bread with some Chèvre des Neiges spread thick.

As you can see, I stuck to the original Bon Appétit recipe pretty closely, and only slightly changed the method.

Cranberry-pepper jelly

    Makes 2 1/2 –3 cups

• 3 red bell peppers, seeded and finely chopped
• 2 long red chili peppers, seeded and finely chopped
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1 1/2 tsp crushed hot pepper flakes
• 1/4 tsp grey salt
• 1 tbsp freshly squeezed lemon juice
• 1/4 cup liquid pectin, I used Certo brand
• 3 cups frozen cranberries, thawed (you can use fresh of course!)

1. In a medium saucepan, stir together the chopped peppers, granulated sugar, pepper flakes, and salt. Let the mixture sit at room temperature for 30 minutes so that the peppers begin to release some of their juices.
2. On medium heat, bring the mixture to a simmer, stirring occasionally. Make sure all the sugar is dissolved before proceeding.
3. When the sugar is dissolved, add the lemon juice and liquid pectin, and stir. Continue simmering for another 10 minutes
4. Add the cranberries, and simmer gently for another 10 minutes or until the cranberries have burst and the mixture has thickened slightly.
5. Transfer jelly to sterilized jars, and let cool completely before refrigerating. Alternatively, you can seal the jars according to your jar manufacturer's instructions.