In the few days I had at home last weekend I managed to catch the very beginning of red currant season. Red currants are still fairly uncommon in the US. Astringent and seedy, I can see why they don’t fit in with the sugar-sweet raspberries and mellow blueberries we favor, but I’d like to make a case for them. Firstly, they’re beautiful – translucent globes that shine with red juice. They freeze well – and when frozen they make the most satisfying marble sound as you drop them into a glass bowl. They also add an acidic complexity to otherwise saccharine fruit desserts.

I was worried the currants might be overripe by the time I returned from my trip to Asia. I wanted to make sure I could use at least a few in a new recipe, so I picked the reddest of the bunch. With them (and some frozen ones leftover from last year), I made a Red Currant Crème Brûlée, inspired in equal parts by dinner at ForettaBarinn last week in Iceland, where I had a delicious rhubarb crème brûlée, and by Nigel Slater’s beautiful cookbook, Ripe. Trevor has promised to watch over the rest of the berries and optimize their harvest so that I can enjoy as many as possible when I get back home.

Sometimes when people ask me what my favorite food is, I tell them that it’s cream. This is only partially a joke. Accordingly, crème brûlée is one of my all-time favorite desserts, and it can be very difficult for me to not order it. Luckily (dangerously?) it’s very easy to make at home – just a simple custard of egg, cream, and sugar, gently baked in a bain marie.

This particular crème brûlée – with a layer of homemade red currant jam on the bottom – was exceptional. The sweet, silky smooth custard just barely punctuated by bursts of tart red currant jelly, the crackling burnt sugar crust – it’s more than the sum of its parts, for sure. I only wish I hadn’t inadvertently calculated the nutrition facts when pouring all two cups of lovely cream into the bowl. If I hadn’t known, I would have eaten more.

I didn’t remove the seeds from my homemade red currant jam because I don’t mind them. But if you want a really smooth jam, strain the jelly through a fine mesh strainer after simmering. You can also use store-bought red currant jelly if you don’t have any of your own fresh currants around.

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More Red Currant Recipes…

Red Currant Crumb Bars

Red Currant Kompot

Red Currant Chutney

Red Currant Crème Brûlée

A fruit-on-the-bottom version of Crème Brûlée using a thin layer of homemade red currant jam. 

Inspired by Nigel Slater’s Ripe and the crème brûlée at Forettabarinn.

• Author: Katie at the Kitchen Door

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups fresh or frozen red currants, stems removed
• 1/3 cup plus 6 TBS of sugar, divided, plus more for caramelizing the tops of the custards
• 1 TBS raspberry liqueur
• 2 cups of heavy cream
• 1/2 vanilla bean
• 4 large egg yolks

Instructions

1. For the red currant jam: Combine the red currants, 6 TBS of sugar, and the raspberry liqueur in a small saucepan. Lightly crush some of the currants with the back of a wooden spoon to release their juices. Bring to a simmer over medium-low heat. Simmer until the currants have burst and softened and the sauce has thickened to the consistency of a thin jelly (it will continue to thicken as it cools). This should take about 10-15 minutes. Remove from the heat. If a very smooth jam is desired, strain through a fine-mesh strainer while still hot, discarding the seeds. I prefer to use it un-strained. Set jam aside and let cool to room temperature.
2. For the crème brûlée: Preheat the oven to 325F. Place the cream in a clean, medium-sized saucepan. Carefully slice the vanilla bean in half lengthwise and use a small spoon to scrape the vanilla seeds into the cream. Add the vanilla bean to the cream as well. Heat cream over low heat until it just reaches a slight simmer, stirring the cream frequently to prevent a skin from forming. Once it reaches a simmer, immediately remove from the heat and let steep for 4-5 minutes. After 5 minutes, use a spoon to remove the vanilla bean.
3. In a large, heatproof bowl, whisk the egg yolks and the remaining 1/3 cup of sugar together until the egg yolks are pale in color and the sugar is mostly dissolved. While continuing to whisk the yolks, pour the warm cream over the egg and sugar mixture. Whisk until very well combined.
4. Divide the red currant jam between four 6-oz ramekins, spreading the jam out so there is a thin layer on the bottom of each ramekin. Carefully pour the cream mixture over the top of the jam, doing your best not to mix the jam and the cream. Place the filled ramekins in a large, high-sided baking dish or casserole. Carefully fill the baking dish with very hot water so that the water reaches halfway up the sides of the ramekins. Don’t get any water inside the ramekins! Carefully transfer the baking dish to the preheated oven. Bake until the centers of the custards are just barely set – they should still jiggle slightly when the dish is moved – about 45-55 minutes. Remove from the oven and let cool completely, then remove the ramekins from the  baking dish, cover with plastic wrap, and chill for at least 2 hours.
5. Just prior to serving, remove the chilled crème brûlées from the fridge. Spoon a thin, even layer of sugar over the top of each custard. Use a pastry torch to caramelize the sugar until it is melted and browned all over, forming a thin crust on the top of each crème brûlée (here’s a video to help!). Serve immediately.

Notes

You will need a pastry torch and 6-oz oven-safe ramekins for this recipe.

The post Red Currant Crème Brûlée appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.

2017 Update: This one-bowl lemon pound cake remains a perennial favorite with my family, making appearances at most summer dinners. I love that it’s so easy and requires almost no planning ahead. It also turns out consistently time after time, the true measure of a great recipe. I served it at a backyard dinner party at my house and took the opportunity to update the photos and the recipe below. This one is worth rediscovering!

Sitting in bed, listening to the crickets chirp and snuggling under the down comforter to ward off the lovely night breeze reminding me that fall is just around the corner, I’m feeling pretty good about today.  The rain finally stopped, the humidity that’s been hanging over everything and making it impossible to breathe lifted, and the sun came out with a fresh breeze to accompany it.  I woke up more refreshed than I’ve felt in days, having finally spent a night by myself in my own bed. I spent the day swimming and sunning and watching my brothers and cousins mess about in boats.  At lunch I had a few spoonfuls of the creamiest homemade peppermint stick ice cream, and after lunch it got quiet enough at the dock for the loons to swim up and be photographed.  I went for a jog at dusk, then sat down to a steaming bowl of this pork and black-eyed pea chili, followed by a slice of this incredible lemon pound cake you see here, topped with wild raspberries and blackberries that I picked along Lily Lane yesterday afternoon.  I’ve been uncharacteristically anxious and stressed these past few weeks, and it’s nice to step back and appreciate the calm and joy of simplicity.  Days like this should not be taken for granted, they should be savored.

Like this one-bowl lemon pound cake. Because this cake recipe is one of the best ever.  I don’t know where it came from, or how old it is, I just know that it’s nearly perfect.  It’s one of those recipes that’s been passed from mother to mother at bake sales and pot lucks, scribbled down from memory on a notecard.  My own mother makes it at least once every two weeks in the summer, when fresh berries, the cake’s perfect foil, are abundant and super-sweet.  She received it from a friend at a church picnic, and we love it so much that she even used to send it to us as a care package at school.  We’ve shared the recipe with aunts and friends, and one of my aunts even shared it with the owner of a bakery, who immediately added it to her menu.  It’s that good.

In addition to its sweet lemon flavor and perfect consistency, a few other things make this cake noteworthy. First, it uses exactly one bowl. No separating dry ingredients from wet ingredients, just beat everything together and pop it in the oven. It even goes into a cold oven and bakes from there.  Both of these characteristics make me think that this recipe is from another decade. It’s exactly the kind of cake I can see grandmothers making 60 years ago – no fuss, with so few ingredients that it can easily be made from memory.  You don’t even need to plan far enough ahead to preheat the oven.

It couldn’t be easier to make, or more of a crowd-pleaser to serve.  Dress it up with a drizzle of lemon glaze or a bowl of fresh berries and homemade whipped cream, and it’s elegant enough for company. Or wrap it up in a bit of plastic wrap and stick it in a lunchbox, and it becomes the perfect mid-morning snack.  The almond and lemon extracts give it the perfect scent and flavor, the inside of the cake is dense and moist, and the outside gets a crackly-sweet glaze as it bakes. My brothers and I can never resist breaking off little pieces of the sweet “crust” as the cake cools.  If you make this cake, which I sincerely hope you do, please make it exactly as written at least once before changing it.  Generally, I adjust recipes as I think best – even if it’s just changing the type of sugar or the amount of extract, but this one is well tested.

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One-Bowl Lemon Pound Cake

This Lemon Pound Cake is a favorite family recipe in the summer. We always serve it with berries and whipped cream, although sometimes a simple lemon glaze is nice as well (or both! What’s stopping you?). It’s an easy, consistent cake that feeds and pleases a crowd.

This recipe came to my family through a friend at a picnic, and my mother has been making it ever since. If anyone knows the original source, please share!

• Author: Katie at the Kitchen Door
• Yield: 16
• Category: Dessert

Ingredients

• 3/4 c. butter, softened
• 2 1/2 c. sugar
• 5 eggs
• 2 1/2 c. flour
• 1 c. whipping cream/heavy cream
• 1/2 tsp lemon extract
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 tsp almond extract

Instructions

1. Prepare a large bundt pan by greasing and flouring the inside.  A cooking spray works best to get all the creases of the bundt pan.  In an electric mixer or large bowl, cream the butter and sugar together on medium speed.  Since the ratio of sugar to butter is so high, the creamed butter will not get as fluffy as in some recipes, and may remain grainy.  This is fine – it’s not a fussy cake!  Add the eggs one at a time, leaving the mixer on low speed, or beating by hand until fully incorporated in between additions.
2. Add 1 1/2 c. flour to the batter, and beat until incorporated.  Next, add 1/2 c. of the heavy cream and beat until incorporated.  Add and incorporate the remaining 1 c. of flour, followed by the remaining 1/2 c. of cream.  Beat until smooth and fully incorporated.  Mix in the lemon, vanilla, and almond extracts.
3. Pour the batter into the prepared bundt pan.  Place pan in cold oven, then turn heat to 300°F, and bake cake for 90 minutes.  Cake top will be beginning to crack when cake is done.  Turn oven off and leave cake in oven for 15 minutes longer.  Remove cake from oven, and allow to cool for 15 minutes in pan.  Then, turn cake over onto a cooling rack and allow to cool completely before serving.  Serve with fresh berries tossed with a bit of sugar, and a dollop of homemade whipped cream.

The post One-Bowl Lemon Pound Cake appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.

*This post is sponsored by La Crema Wines. All opinions here are my own. You can find the companion recipes over on the La Crema blog. 

As soon as the first hint of spring arrives, I start thinking about rosé wine. Perhaps I’m just more susceptible to social trends and marketing than I think I am, but somehow, that first chilled glass of rosé, preferably consumed on a terrace on a sunny but cool evening, has come to embody the fact that summer is coming. In March and April I test the waters with a glass here and there, usually consumed indoors while looking longingly at the outdoors, wishing spring would hurry up and get here. And then May hits, and it’s all rosé all the time (#roséallday, people).

In celebration of the start of rosé season, I’ve put together a pairing dinner using La Crema’s two rosé wines – the Monterey Pinot Noir Rosé and the Saralee’s Vineyard Pinot Noir Rosé. In the past my dinner series collaboration with La Crema has taken us to Japan for Izakaya, Latin America for a spicy Thanksgiving menu, and Italy for a summery seafood feast. Now, for spring and for rosé, we’re going to France, where effortless appetizers and simple but elegant entrées are king. And also there’s a lot of pink wine.

There are four courses in this menu. First, a Spring Crudité Platter. If you are thinking to yourself, “how boring,” bear with me a moment. This is not a platter of dry baby carrots and too-thick ranch dressing sitting, ignored, in a corner. This is a vibrant, effortless display of spring’s best vegetables. Blanched asparagus, snap peas, tender spring carrots, bitter endive, spicy radish slices, and sweet pepper… all served with an addictive, pale green herb aioli. Crudité platters can be very classy.

Second, a simple and savory Goat Cheese Tart with Peas and Prosciutto. It’s similar to a quiche, but thinner and denser. It’s also so, so good. Even if you’re not tackling the whole French Rosé Dinner menu, give this goat cheese tart a try. It’s  a great multipurpose recipe to have in your cooking arsenal, and you can vary the vegetables with the season. Equally good warm or cold, a thin slice is a perfect appetizer for dinner, while a big slice makes a filling breakfast.

The main course is a lovely Baked Halibut Provençal – halibut marinated in lemon and olive oil and served over a rich tomato, olive, and caper sauce. It’s inspired by the time I spent in Provence years ago, on my first vacation with Trevor. We rented an apartment at the top of a hill in Cassis and spent a week there. It was a tiny little place with an expansive patio, and every day after beach hopping we would hike up the hundreds of dusty stone steps with bags of vegetables from the market hanging on our shoulders. We were using most of our disposable income on the apartment so we ate simply – ratatouille and grilled chicken. This recipe takes it’s cues from those meals. A simple but perfectly cooked protein accompanied by a sauce full of seasonal vegetables and herbs.

And to finish off this lovely French dinner, a cake! Or, mini Strawberries and Cream Chiffon Cakes, to be precise. I wanted to make a French version of strawberry shortcake, one of my favorite spring desserts. I swapped the buttery shortcakes for a light and airy chiffon cake, and layered the chiffon cake with strawberries and whipped cream. A few more tweaks upped the elegance – there’s rosé in the cake batter and mint and tarragon in the strawberries.

This cake was everything I was hoping it would be. I was worried that it would be worse than your standard strawberry shortcake. Strawberry shortcake is, after all, pretty difficult to improve upon. But the chiffon cake – soft and airy – was the perfect thing for soaking up all the delicious strawberry juices. The rosé wine flavor was just barely present in the cake, and you could taste the mint and tarragon in the strawberries, too. It was the kind of dessert that I thought about multiple times while sitting at work. That’s the surest sign of a win, in my book.

You can find the recipes for the first three courses on the La Crema blog: Spring Crudité Platter, Goat Cheese Tart with Peas and Prosciutto and Baked Halibut Provençal. The Strawberries and Cream Chiffon Cake recipe is below!

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Strawberries and Cream Chiffon Cakes

A French take on Strawberry Shortcake, using light and airy chiffon cake as the base. The chiffon cake has rose wine whipped into the batter for a hint of flavor, and the strawberries are macerated with fresh tarragon and mint.

Chiffon cake recipe adapted from the Joy of Cooking.

• Author: Katie at the Kitchen Door
• Yield: 6
• Category: Dessert

Ingredients

For the cake:

• 2 1/4 cups sifted cake flour
• 1 1/4 cups sugar
• 1 TBS baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 5 egg yolks
• 3/4 cup rosé wine
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil or canola oil
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 7 egg whites
• 1/4 tsp cream of tartar

For the filling:

• 2 lb. strawberries, washed, hulled, and thinly sliced
• 1/3 cup plus 1/4 cup sugar, divided
• 2 TBS minced fresh tarragon leaves
• 2 TBS minced fresh mint leaves
• 3 cups heavy cream
• 2 tsp vanilla

Instructions

1. For the cake: Preheat the oven to 325°F. Spray an 11×17 inch sheet pan lightly with cooking spray, then line with a piece of parchment paper. Set the prepared pan aside.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together the cake flour, sugar, baking powder and salt until evenly combined. Now add the wet ingredients – the egg yolks, wine, canola oil, and vanilla and beat thoroughly, until a smooth batter is formed. Set this batter aside.
3. In a large, clean bowl, begin beating the egg whites on high speed (or vigorously by hand). After about 30 seconds, stop and add the cream of tartar, then continue beating. Beat until the egg whites are very stiff and glossy – they should completely hold their shape. Add a third of the beaten egg whites to the bowl with the batter and gently fold with a spatula until the two mixtures are evenly combined. Now add the remaining egg whites and fold in until evenly combined. Scrape the batter into the prepared sheet pan and use a spatula to spread evenly. Bake until the top of the cake springs back lightly when pressed, about 20 minutes. Run a knife along the edges of the pan to release the cake. Let cool to room temperature, then invert the cake on a piece of aluminum foil and peel off the parchment paper. Set the cake aside or refrigerate until ready to use.
4. For the filling: Place the sliced strawberries in a large bowl with 1/3 cup of sugar and the minced mint and tarragon leaves. Stir to coat the berries with sugar. Set aside and let macerate for at least 15 minutes. You can also cover the berries and let them sit in the fridge for up to 24 hours.
5. When you are ready to assemble and serve the cakes, beat the heavy cream on high with the remaining 1/4 cup sugar until it is whipped enough to hold it’s shape. Avoid over-beating as it will take on a butter-like consistency. Stir in the vanilla.
6. Cut the cake into 12 squares that are approximately 4 inches wide. For each cake, place one cake square on a plate. Cover with 2 or 3 large spoonfuls of strawberries and their juice, arranging neatly. Spread some whipped cream on top, then repeat the layers – cake, strawberries, whipped cream – once more. Garnish with a strawberry. Serve immediately.

The post French Spring Dinner with La Crema: Strawberries and Cream Chiffon Cakes appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.

For the second year in a row, I let my birthday slip past without my customary celebratory blog post. Last year’s blog post is sitting somewhere in WordPress purgatory, photographed, partially written, but never published. It was a lovely pesto pasta salad with green olives and mushrooms that we ate at the beach on a sunny April afternoon. It was good, but not that memorable.

This year, I just didn’t get around to making my birthday dessert in time. I still celebrated my birthday with the usual enthusiasm, but had to take a last-minute trip to Portugal that week. The dessert I had planned – Portuguese Chocolate Mousse with Chocolate Salami – remained a plan. But it’s such a good dessert that I decided this was a “better late than never” situation. Plus, Trevor’s birthday is coming up on Friday so we have an excuse for having a fridge full of chocolate mousse.

This mousse is inspired by the Mercado de Ribeira, one of my favorite Lisbon haunts. Also known as the Time Out Market, it’s by no means a hidden spot. The concept is like an upscale food court, but all of the “stalls” are outposts of the best Lisbon restaurants and vendors. You can find tender grilled octopus doused in olive oil, bacalhau in all its forms, $5 wines, and rich eggy desserts. After 8pm it’s bustling with tourists and locals alike, and reserving a table requires some aggressive seat-saving. But it never fails to disappoint – the food is amazing, the vibe is energizing, and there’s something for everyone.

The chocolate mousse at Nos e Mais Bolos inside the market is amazing. It is rich and pudding-like and has bite-sized pieces of Portuguese Chocolate Salami as a topping. Don’t worry – there’s no meat in chocolate salami. The best way to describe it is as a no-bake fridge cookie. It’s made from cocoa powder, butter, a bit of rum or liquor, and chopped up cookies, then rolled into a log to look like salami. It’s a traditional dessert in Italy and Portugal, so common that I once found it in a vending machine in a 1,000 year old castle on top of a mountain. Really good hiking snack, by the way. It also takes chocolate mousse to the next level.

While researching mousse recipes, I stumbled upon something called “two ingredient chocolate mousse.” It’s an incredibly simple recipe by Heston Blumenthal, which requires nothing other than chocolate, water, and a bowl of ice. Because all Portuguese desserts are made primarily with a ton of eggs and a ton of sugar, I was pretty sure that this magical mousse could not be the answer. But I had to try it anyway, just to see. Because what if two ingredient mousse was really a thing? That would mean that I could have chocolate mousse at any time with only 10 minutes of effort. Dangerous, but also amazing.

So I made two batches of chocolate mousse. The first was the aforementioned two ingredient version. The second was a more traditional mousse, with eggs and butter and a touch of cream. The verdict? They were both really good. Different, but good. The super-simple mousse has a very pure, chocolaty taste and surprisingly creamy texture, but no richness. You want to use your very best chocolate for this, because it’s the only flavor. The mousse loaded up with eggs and butter and cream is obviously much richer, but doesn’t have that same purity. Tasted side by side, the winner kind of depends on my mood at that moment. But to be totally honest? I think most of the time I’ll prefer the two ingredient version. Crazy!

Whether you go the easy route or the rich route, the pieces of Portuguese Chocolate Salami on top add this amazing extra dimension. The chocolate salami is easy to make and super-chocolaty. It’s very rich – kind of the perfect thing to keep in the fridge at all times, as just a bite will satisfy an intense chocolate craving. As my trips to Lisbon are slowing down, I’m happy to have cracked one of my favorite dessert recipes at home. Now I just have about 8,000 pastries left to learn.

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Portuguese Chocolate Mousse with Chocolate Salami

Traditional Portuguese chocolate mousse served with crumbled “Chocolate Salami” – a sliceable chocolate fridge cookie. Inspired by the Chocolate Mousse at Nos e Mais Bolos.

Chocolate Salami recipe adapted from Easy Portuguese Recipes.

Note: this recipe is the traditional, rich mousse with eggs and cream. If you want to try the two-ingredient mousse, the recipe for that is below!

• Author: Katie at the Kitchen Door
• Yield: 4

Ingredients

For the Chocolate Salami:

• 1 stick (4 oz.) salted butter
• 1/2 cup (4 oz.) granulated sugar
• 6 TBS (1 1/2 oz.) dark, high-quality cocoa powder, such as Valhrona
• 2 egg yolks
• 2 TBS port wine, rum, or fruity liqueur
• 7 oz. biscotti or vanilla wafer cookies
• powdered sugar for coating

For the Chocolate Mousse:

• 2 TBS butter
• 8 oz. bittersweet chocolate chips
• 2 TBS port wine or rum
• 1/4 c. heavy cream
• 4 large eggs, separated

Instructions

1. To make the chocolate salami: melt the butter in a medium saucepan over low heat. Add approximately half of the the sugar and whisk to combine thoroughly. Add the cocoa powder and whisk thoroughly. Continue to cook for 1 minute longer, whisking the whole time – mixture should be smooth. Remove from the heat.
2. Place the egg yolks and the remaining sugar in a medium, heat-proof bowl, and whisk until thick and creamy, about 1 minute. Slowly pour in the hot cocoa mixture, whisking the egg yolks vigorously as you do so. Stir in the port wine or rum and whisk to combine. Mixture should be thick, smooth, and glossy.
3. Cut the cookies into small pieces using a serrated knife. Add the cookies to the warm chocolate mixture and stir gently to thoroughly combine. Let the mixture cool to room temperature. Once cool, place a sheet of wax paper on the counter. Scrape the mixture onto the wax paper and shape it into a log roughly 8 inches long. If the mixture is too runny to do this, place it in the fridge for 30 minutes before shaping into a log. Wrap the log in waxed paper and then again and tinfoil. Place in the fridge and chill until firm, at least 2 hours.
4. To make the chocolate mousse: add the butter, chocolate chips, port wine or rum, and heavy cream to a medium metal bowl or double boiler. Bring a small pot of water to a simmer – the bowl should fit snugly on top of the pot without the bottom of the bowl touching the top of the water. Place the metal bowl over the simmering water and melt the chocolate, stirring continuously with a rubber spatula. As soon as the chocolate mixture is fully melted, remove it from the heat. The chocolate should be thick and glossy.
5. In a medium, heatproof bowl, vigorously whisk the egg yolks for 30 seconds, then pour the hot chocolate into the egg yolks, whisking as you do so. Beat thoroughly to combine. Mixture should be thick but run freely from the whisk when lifted. Set chocolate aside and let cool to room temperature.
6. Use a stand mixer or handheld mixer to beat the egg whites until they form soft, shiny peaks. Add half of the beaten egg whites to the cooled chocolate mixture and use a spatula to gently fold the two together. Repeat with the remaining egg whites, doing your best not to deflate the whites. When the two mixtures are fully combined, pour the mousse into four wine glasses or coupe glasses. Refrigerate until firm, at least 2 hours.
7. To serve, cut the chocolate salami into slices, then cut the slices into cubes. Place on top of each glass of chocolate mousse. Serve chilled.

Magic Two-Ingredient Chocolate Mousse

This incredible chocolate mousse has only two ingredients – chocolate and water – with a deep chocolate taste and a smooth, fluffy texture.

Recipe by Heston Blumenthal via Eat Live Run.

Note: this recipes is all about the chocolate you use, so use the good stuff. If you don’t love the flavor of the chocolate, you won’t love the flavor of the mousse. If the mousse becomes grainy as you whip it, return it to the heat and re-melt, then try again.

• Author: Katie at the Kitchen Door
• Yield: 2
• Category: Dessert

Ingredients

• 4.5 oz of bittersweet chocolate chips or roughly chopped chocolate, the best you can afford
• 1/2 cup water
• ice

Instructions

1. Fill a large metal bowl with ice and cold water and set aside.
2. Place the chopped chocolate and the water in a metal bowl. Bring a small pot of water to a simmer – the bowl should fit snugly on top of the pot without the bottom of the bowl touching the top of the water. Place the metal bowl over the simmering water and melt the chocolate, stirring continuously with a rubber spatula. The water should get incorporated into the chocolate as you stir. As soon as the chocolate mixture is smooth and fully melted, remove it from the heat. Place the bowl with the chocolate in the bowl with the ice water, and whisk the chocolate constantly for 2 to 3 minutes, until the chocolate has thickened slightly and the color has become a bit more pale.
3. Divide the mousse into 2 wine glasses or ramekins and chill for at least 30 minutes, then serve.

The post Portuguese Chocolate Mousse with Chocolate Salami appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.

I always tell myself I’m not going to order Indian food when I get home from an international flight, but I’m pretty much never right. Typically, it’s a Friday, and I’ve been on a plane all day, zoning out on movie after movie. We land, I go through customs, pick up my luggage, get in a taxi. It all feels like a bit of a time warp, difficult to remember how long you’ve been in between places. In between away and home. When I walk through my front door, into my warm house, I’m always so happy to be there.

When I get home, I check the fridge, thinking that I’m going to find some magical answer to my post-flight comfort food craving. But after being in transit for 12+ hours, mustering the energy to cook is just not realistic. So I cave and order malai kofta and naan and butter chicken (because it always takes two entrees to meet the delivery minimum) and $40 later I’m sitting on the couch, tucking in to the most delicious, creamy, comforting Indian food. It’s not the healthiest or most budget-conscious habit, but it’s a hard one to break.

The last time I did this, a few weeks back, I found myself wondering: what if I had my favorite Indian food in the freezer, waiting for me? That might solve the problem. Even at my most disoriented, I can usually manage to simmer rice. So I resolved to learn how to cook malai kofta and stash some away before my next trip.

Malai kofta is one of my favorite take-out orders. If you’re unfamiliar, they’re sort of a vegetable meatball served in a thick, tomato-based curry sauce. I’ve ordered them for years without ever really knowing what’s in them. When I made them myself, it became quite obvious why they’re one of my favorite foods – they’re basically fried potato and cheese balls served in a spicy tomato cream sauce. It’s probably not possible to get more of my favorite foods into one dish.

I have a little experience cooking Indian food but not very much, and it can be hard to get the same richness and balance of flavors as restaurant-quality takeout. These, however, were a very close approximation of my favorite malai kofta (and better than some of the ones I’ve had from inferior Indian restaurants). They’re still not particularly healthy – they are made of fried cheese and potatoes – but they are much more economical to prepare. And so good. Seriously, even if you don’t make these at home, promise me you’ll order them the next time you get takeout.

My plan to make this and stash it in the freezer for my next homecoming was good in theory. In practice, Trevor and I ate two thirds of this the first night. We couldn’t bring ourselves to freeze what was left, either – the idea of eating the leftovers for lunch the next day was too tempting. At least now I know how to make them. And since it’s not that difficult to scale up, next time I’ll make a double batch so that at least a little bit makes it into the freezer.

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Malai Kofta

Malai Kofta – a favorite vegetarian Indian takeout dish. Potato, paneer, and vegetables are rolled into kofta and fried, then served in a rich tomato-cream masala sauce. 

Recipe adapted from Spice up the Curry, Padhu’s Kitchen, and Veg Recipes of India.

• Author: Katie at the Kitchen Door
• Yield: 4
• Cuisine: Indian

Ingredients

For the kofta:

• 3 medium red-skinned potatoes, peeled and quartered
• 8 oz. paneer cheese, grated or finely crumbled
• 1/3 c. frozen peas
• 1/4 c. grated carrot
• 2 TBS raisins
• 3 TBS finely chopped cashews
• 1 Thai green chile, chopped finely
• 3 TBS cornflour, plus more for rolling
• 1 tsp sea salt
• 1/2 tsp ground cumin
• 1/2 tsp ground coriander
• canola oil, for frying

For the masala sauce:

• 2 TBS canola oil, divided
• 1 medium onion, peeled and finely chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, peeled and pressed or pounded into a paste
• 2-inches fresh ginger, peeled and pounded into a paste
• 2 cups. crushed tomatoes
• 12 cashews
• 1/4 tsp turmeric powder
• 1/2 tsp red chili powder
• 3/4 tsp ground coriander
• 1/2 tsp garam masala
• 1/2 cup water
• 1 TBS butter
• 2 cloves
• 1 bay leaf
• 2–3 cardamom pods
• 1/2 tsp caraway seeds
• 1/4 cup heavy cream

Instructions

For the kofta:

1. Place the potatoes in a saucepan and cover with cold water. Bring to a boil and boil until potatoes are very tender, about 15-20 minutes. Drain potatoes.
2. Add potatoes, grated paneer, peas, grated carrot, raisins, cashews, and chopped chile to a bowl. Mash the potatoes with a fork, then mix everything together thoroughly. Use your hands if it’s easier.
3. Stir in the 3 TBS of cornflour, sea salt, ground cumin, and ground coriander. Mix until evenly combined.
4. Roll mixture into golf-ball sized balls, pressing together gently with your hands. Pour the extra cornflour into a bowl and roll the balls through the cornflour so there is a light coating on the outside.
5. Pour enough canola oil into a high-sided frying pan to reach 1/4 inch up the sides. Heat over medium heat until a piece of potato mixture dropped into the oil sizzles on contact. Add two or three of the potato balls to the oil and fry until golden brown all over, using tongs to carefully turn the balls as each side cooks. When they are done, use tongs to transfer them to a plate lined with a paper towel.

For the masala sauce:

1. Heat 1 TBS of the oil in a large frying pan over medium heat. Add the onion and saute, stirring frequently, until golden brown, about 5 minutes. Add the garlic and ginger paste and saute until fragrant, another 1 minute. Add the tomatoes, salt, cashews, and all the ground spices. Bring to a simmer and simmer for 10 minutes, stirring frequently. Then remove from the heat.
2. Transfer the sauce to a blender (let cool first if your blender can’t process hot liquids). Add 1/2 cup of water to the sauce and blend on high until a very smooth sauce is formed. Set aside.
3. Rinse or wipe the frying pan out. Heat the remaining 1 TBS of oil and 1 TBS of butter in the pan until the butter has melted. Add the cloves, bay leaf, cardamom pods, and caraway seeds. Fry for 60-90 seconds, then add the blended sauce to the pan. Cook, stirring frequently, until the oil begins to pool on the top of the sauce, about 5 minutes. Remove from the heat and stir in the heavy cream. Add the kofta to the sauce, and serve over basmati rice.

The post Malai Kofta appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.

I’ve been trying to perfect some of my pasta recipes. In my kitchen, pasta is both a luxury and a staple, giving it a unique place in my repertoire. It’s easy to make, and it’s what I crave when I’m exhausted and can’t think of anything else to make. But it’s also a treat – I usually go heavy on the cream and the cheese. So when I make it, I want it to be really good. And too often, it’s just OK. Why indulge in a giant bowl of pasta that’s just OK? I want my pasta to be great.

The first recipe I tackled was a fresh heirloom tomato sauce. It took a few tries, but now it’s pretty much the only thing I want to eat when I’ve got an excess of fresh tomatoes (and you can find the recipe here). Next up, mushroom cream sauce. I’ve been making a variation of this for ages, but it’s never quite what I want, which is: golden brown and crispy mushrooms; a thick, luxurious sauce that covers each and every bite of pasta; the right balance of mushrooms and pasta; and plenty of cheesy flavor in every forkful.

So here’s what I’ve learned over the past few weeks in my efforts to make the perfect bowl of creamy mushroom pasta. First, there’s never enough sauce. What looks like a huge amount of sauce becomes dwarfed by half a pound of pasta in no time. As a corollary, you need more mushrooms than you think you do – I weighed my mushrooms this time, thinking there would be way too many and wanting to give you accurate measurements. But a pound of mushrooms quickly cooks down into just enough for half a pound of pasta. You already know this one, but don’t crowd your mushrooms – give them lots of space in the pan so they turn crisp and brown. And last, my secret pasta weapon: mascarpone. A spoonful stirred into hot pasta makes all your pasta dreams come true, thickening the sauce just enough to luxuriously coat each noodle.

I know that many of us are trying to watch the indulgences this month – saving room for all the cookies and wine and Christmas treats. But it’s all about balance, right? And sometimes you just need a bowl of pasta. When you do, make it a good one.

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More perfect pasta recipes:

Heirloom Tomato and Sweet Onion Pasta

Rigatoni Bolognese

Butternut Squash Carbonara with Fried Sage

Creamy Mushroom Pasta

A Katie at the Kitchen Door original recipe. Serves 2-3.

• 3 TBS butter
• 2 shallots, peeled and sliced into thin rings
• 1 lb of mixed wild mushrooms, thinly sliced (I used an equal mixture of criminis, shiitakes, and chanterelles)
• 1/2 cup heavy cream
• 1/2 lb. spaghetti
• 2 oz. freshly grated parmesan cheese (about 3/4 cup packed)
• 1 cup of pasta cooking water
• 1/4 cup mascarpone
• black pepper
• sea salt
• 2 TBS minced fresh parsley leaves

1. Bring a large pot of salted water to a rolling boil. Let boil while you prepare the sauce (don’t add the pasta until the sauce is almost ready).
2. Melt the butter in a wide frying pan over medium heat. Add the sliced shallots and saute until soft and translucent, about 3-4 minutes. Add one variety of the sliced mushrooms in a single layer, being careful not to crowd the mushrooms to ensure good browning. Let the mushrooms cook undisturbed until they are golden brown on one side, about 2-5 minutes depending on the mushroom variety, then flip and cook on the other side. Transfer the cooked mushrooms to a plate, then repeat with the remaining varieties of mushrooms. Once all the mushrooms are cooked, add them all back to the pan and lower the heat to medium-low.
3. Add the spaghetti to the boiling water and cook until barely al dente, 1 or 2 minutes less than the package directs.
4. Add the heavy cream to the pan with the mushrooms and stir until the mushrooms have absorbed most of the cream, about 1-2 minutes. When the pasta is just al dente, use tongs to transfer the noodles directly into the pan with the mushrooms and cream. Add a ladleful of the hot pasta water to the pan as well (about 3/4 to 1 cup), along with the grated parmesan cheese. Use the tongs to toss the pasta with the mushrooms until the cheese is melted and a smooth, luxurious sauce has formed. Cook one to two minutes longer if needed for the sauce to thicken. Remove from the heat. Stir in the mascarpone and parsley until they coat the noodles. Season generously with black pepper, and to taste with sea salt, and serve immediately.

The post Creamy Mushroom Pasta appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.

I’m still organizing my thoughts, feelings, pictures, recipe notes, etc. from Hong Kong and Japan, trying to find the right way to share 6 weeks of travel with you all. One thing I have accomplished, is stocking up on Asian cookbooks (Vietnamese, Japanese, and Chinese are all fair game) and groceries. Last night we made an excursion to HMart, the giant Korean grocery store in Cambridge, and we were like kids in a candy store. I came home with 5 different varieties of frozen fresh egg noodles: there is a lot of ramen in my future. While I process everything and experiment with recipes, I can at least share this delicious curried fish chowder with you – especially because if I wait much longer, we will be decidedly out of chowder season.

I’m sure I’ve mentioned it before, but I’ve only really been eating fish for the past year and a half. As a kid, I found fish absolutely revolting, and have terrible memories of sitting at the dinner table crying over the piece of now-cold baked cod that I couldn’t bring myself to eat. And now, after a lifelong hatred of all things seafood, here I am, posting two seafood recipes in a row. Smoked fish was my gateway drug. I started eating it on airplanes when it was the only choice (really, it’s amazing how frequently airplanes serve smoked salmon, at least in my experience). Although there are still things that I can barely get down (squid sashimi, for example), I will now readily eat smoked fish, ceviche, most sushi, grilled fish, fried fish, and shrimp. This may not sound like much of an accomplishment to you, but I really didn’t expect my tastes to change so drastically in such a short period of time.

This soup, adapted from one of my favorite cookbooks, A Change of Appetite, is the sort of thing that can help convert non-fish lovers into fish lovers. It has a lot of intense flavors – caramelized onions, curry and cayenne, savory lentils, smoked fish, and even smokier pancetta. It is not your average fish chowder. I love it – it’s something I make every few months (an anomaly in a house where we are pretty much constantly trying new recipes). One word of caution – this makes a giant batch. If you’re just feeding one or two people, cut this one in half.

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Curried Smoked Whitefish Chowder

A hearty winter smoked fish chowder with two delicious twists – the addition of traditional curry spices like turmeric and cardamom, and a base of  lentils.

Adapted from A Change of Appetite. 

• Author: Katie at the Kitchen Door
• Yield: 6-8

Ingredients

• 3/4 c. Puy or green lentils
• 1 bay leaf
• salt and pepper to taste
• 2 large onions
• 1 TBS olive oil
• 2 tsp dark brown sugar
• 1 TBS butter
• 2 oz. diced pancetta or bacon
• 1 tsp curry powder
• 1/2 tsp ground ginger
• 1/4 tsp ground turmeric
• 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
• 1/8 tsp ground cardamom
• 3 medium Yukon gold potatoes, peeled and cut into 1/2 inch cubes
• 4 c. chicken stock
• 1/2 lb. smoked white fish, deboned and flaked into chunks
• 1 lb. fresh cod, deboned and cut into 1 inch chunks
• 1/3 c. heavy cream, plus more for serving

Instructions

1. First, prepare the lentils. Place the lentils and bay leaf in a saucepan and cover with water. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat and simmer until just tender but not falling apart. This will vary slightly with each batch of lentils but should take between 15-30 minutes. Test your lentils at various cooking times to see if they are done. When they are tender, drain the lentils, season to taste with salt and pepper and set aside.
2. Peel one of the onions and cut into thin slices. Heat the olive oil in a medium frying pan over medium-low heat and add the sliced onion. Cook until golden brown, stirring frequently, then add the brown sugar and caramelize until onions are dark brown and sweet. Set to the side for serving.
3. To prepare the chowder, melt the butter in a large pot over medium-low heat. Add the pancetta or bacon and cook until crisped, stirring frequently, about 5 minutes. Peel the remaining onion and chop into small pieces, then saute with the butter and pancetta until translucent, about 5-8 minutes. Add the spices and cook until fragrant, about 2 minutes. Add the potatoes and stock and bring the soup to a boil, then reduce to a simmer and cook until potatoes are tender, about 15-20 minutes.
4. When potatoes are cooked, add the smoked fish and the cod to the chowder and cook until cod is opaque throughout and beginning to flake into smaller pieces, about 4-5 minutes. Remove from the heat and gently stir the cream into the chowder.
5. Divide the lentils between bowls and ladle the chowder over the lentils to serve. Top with the caramelized onions.

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It’s a bit impossible for me to believe that it’s already May. I was having this debate with my manager yesterday – whether time moves more slowly or more quickly when you’re incredibly busy. I say quickly. With all the planes and coming and going, I feel as if I’m in a constant state of transit, never quite settled. It’s not my favorite feeling, but I’ll admit that being a frequent traveler has a certain glamour to it. Anyway, between airports and planes and a never-ending Boston winter and buying a house, the last 5 months seems to have slipped right by, and now it’s the first of May. It was unreasonably chilly outside today, but I still woke up this morning excited about spring and summer and hopefully carving out some time to really enjoy this season. May is really a lovely, happy month. It has Trevor’s birthday, cinco de mayo, the season’s first BBQs, Memorial Day Weekend… and Mother’s Day.

My first picnic of the year was in honor of my mom, although she wasn’t actually there, which I’m sure she will mention to me as soon as she sees this post. (Don’t worry, mom, I will give you your own picnic when it is actually Mother’s Day — this picnic was just in preparation so that the real one can be as good as possible. And so that other people could read this and plan picnics for their moms. Also, I will bring you a trifle on Sunday.) Mothers are wonderful, special people who pour a whole lot of energy and love and heart into ensuring that we, their children, are safe and well-fed and happy and that ultimately we turn out alright. They are worth celebrating, probably a lot more frequently than once a year, but let’s start there. Brunch is perhaps the most typical way to celebrate Mother’s Day, but I think that a picnic is an equally lovely way to treat mom to something special. If the weather cooperates, it’s a great way to linger over a meal, enjoying the outdoors, each other’s company, and some light and spring-like dishes.

The savory part of this picnic is Mushroom and Goat Cheese Savory Squares, which is just a fancy name for “puff pastry tarts.” These are super simple to prepare: the mushrooms are sliced and sautéed with butter, garlic, Chardonnay, and thyme, then baked along with goat cheese on store-bought puff pastry. Despite being easy to make, they look and taste super elegant, thanks to the wonderful amount of butter in puff pastry. For dessert, there are Mini Lemon Curd Trifles. Trifle, because it reminds me of my mother; mini, because packing things in mason jars is trendy and perfect for picnics; and lemon curd, because I love it and it screams springtime. The trifle layers are lemon shortbread, lemon curd, whipped cream, and fresh raspberries. I could have eaten about 6 of these little trifle mason jars on my own, they were so good. And of course, the wine! A bottle of Cambria’s Bench Break 2012 Chardonnay is the perfect thing to bring along, because it’s a lovely match for the mushrooms, goat cheese, lemons, and buttery pastry and shortbread.

Find the recipes for the Mushroom and Goat Cheese Savory Squares and the Mini Lemon Curd Trifles over on the Cambria Wines blog!

Disclaimer: This post is sponsored by Cambria Wines. All opinions are honest and my own.

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The post Mother’s Day Picnic // Mushroom Savory Squares, Lemon Curd Trifles, and Chardonnay appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.

I’ve been spending a good amount of time in Bogotá this year, and will continue to visit for work throughout the spring and summer. Unfortunately, my plans to take an extra day to explore the city on my last visit were thwarted by a combination of more snow (surprise!) and my plane catching on fire (don’t ask, but everything was fine), so I still haven’t seen too much beyond the area near my office. My initial impressions of the city are very positive – it’s fun and vibrant and I love the sunshine, the views of the mountains, and the vaguely German bungalow style architecture in the financial district. I also love the food, which is rich and hearty and full of avocados, plantains, beef, and potatoes. In particular, I’ve sort of fallen in love with ajiaco, a classic Bogotano chicken and potato soup that hits the spot every time.

I’m headed down to Latin America again this week, this time with a few days in Chile in addition to Colombia, but before I left I wanted to make some ajiaco at home for Trevor to try. The soup broth is fairly thick, like a stew, but still somewhat translucent, and flecked with the herb guascas, which apparently gives the soup its distinctive flavor. Chicken, potatoes, and corn on the cob are served in the soup, and capers, avocado, rice, and cream are served on the side for you to top as you go. It’s this last aspect – spooning bits of perfectly ripe avocado and plump capers on top of the hot bowl of soup – that really makes the meal special for me. Each time you bite into a caper it’s such an unexpected pop of salty tang against the creamy and hearty background flavors, I just love it.

Even a small amount of internet research will quickly reveal that making an authentic pot of ajiaco is basically a science, and one that doesn’t leave much room for experimentation. The thickness of the broth is typically created by the addition of papas criollas, a small Andean potato that dissolves into the broth. Since they’re hard to come by outside of Latin America, I used grated russets instead, and that worked well, although the soup wasn’t quite as thick as other versions I’ve had. From everything I read, using guascas is essential to the flavor of the soup, so I ordered some from Amazon in advance. For everything else I pretty much stuck to the traditional method, although I do prefer using frozen corn to serving the whole cob in the soup (I’ve had it both ways in Bogotá, so I think it’s fair to still call it traditional). It’s a bit time consuming to make the stock, but otherwise a very easy recipe, and the result was pretty close to, although not quite as good as, the Colombian version. I have a feeling this may be a new staple in our kitchen.

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Ajiaco Bogotano – Chicken, Potato, and Corn Soup with Avocado and Capers

A classic Colombian chicken and potato soup. Thick and creamy, it’s served with capers, avocado, and crema on the side so you can add toppings as you eat. One of my favorite Colombian recipes!

Adapted from these sources:The Kitchn, My Colombian Recipes, and Serious Eats. 

• Author: Katie at the Kitchen Door
• Yield: 4-6

Ingredients

• 1 rotisserie chicken
• 2 carrots
• 1 onion
• 5 cloves garlic
• 20–30 parsley stems
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp black pepper
• 2 medium russet potatoes, peeled and coarsely grated
• 3 medium red bliss potatoes, cut into 1/4 inch cubes
• 2 TBS dried guascas
• 3/4 c. frozen corn kernels
• 1/4 c. Mexican crema, for serving
• 2 avocados, pitted and sliced, for serving
• 1/4 c. capers, rinsed, for serving

Instructions

1. Use a fork to pull the meat from the chicken, setting aside in a large bowl. Place the chicken carcass, bones, and skin in a large stockpot. Cut the carrots and onions into rough chunks and add to the stockpot. Peel the garlic and cut in half, then add to the stockpot along with the parsley stems, salt, and black pepper. Cover the stock ingredients with water, using 3-4 quarts of cold water. Bring to a simmer over medium heat, then simmer until stock is rich and golden, about 3-4 hours.
2. Ladle 8 cups of the stock through a fine-mesh strainer into a different stockpot, discarding the solids left behind and saving any extra stock for a different use. Add the grated potatoes, diced red potatoes, and guascas to the stock and bring to a simmer over medium heat. Simmer until the russets have completely dissolved and the soup has thickened, about 20-30 minutes. Add the reserved chicken meat, chopped into bite-sized pieces if necessary, to the soup and simmer for another 15 minutes. Add the corn and cook until warmed through, about 5 minutes. Season the soup to taste with salt and pepper, and serve immediately with the crema, avocados, and capers on the side.

The post Ajiaco Bogotano – Chicken, Potato, and Corn Soup with Avocado and Capers appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.

We’re leaving for vacation in the morning and I still have about a million and one things to do before that, so I apologize in advance for the brevity and scatteredness of this post. If it illustrates the situation for you, let me just share that I’m sitting in a pile of laundry, eating leftovers of this penne alla vodka cold out of a plastic tupperware. Food blogging isn’t all rustic wooden tables and nice ceramics, guys. Sometimes it’s cold leftovers in tupperware.

Anyway, penne alla vodka. When I was in college, most likely in similar states of chaos, I used to order penne alla vodka from the local Italian place for late-night delivery. It came in a big aluminum container, was just spicy enough, and the sauce to pasta ratio meant I was always spooning sauce out of the container long after I’d eaten the last bite of penne. I hadn’t thought about those glorious containers of terrible-for-you noodles until this fall, when I suddenly started craving them, and since then I’ve whipped up a batch more times than I should probably admit. Let’s just say that I brought a bottle of nice vodka home from Russia last year, and about 90% of it was used in this recipe. That may sound like a waste of good vodka to some, but I don’t regret it one bit. It’s just the perfect thing for harried nights or after a particularly long day – it only takes 20 minutes to make, and hits all the tangy, salty, creamy, spicy notes I crave when I’m feeling less than motivated. I use the Serious Eats recipe as a base, but tone down the vodka and quadruple the red pepper flakes. If you have the time, blend the sauce for that smooth and thick consistency that coats penne so well, but if you’re in a hurry, or just don’t feel like washing your blender, I can attest to the fact that it’s just as good a little bit chunky.

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Penne Alla Vodka

Adapted from Serious Eats. Serves 6.

• 3 TBS butter
• 1 small white onion, peeled and finely diced
• 6 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
• 1 tsp red pepper flakes
• One 28 oz. can crushed tomatoes
• 1/4 c. vodka
• 1/2 c. heavy cream
• salt and pepper to taste
• 1 lb. penne pasta, cooked to al dente

1. In a medium saucepan, melt the butter over medium-low heat. Add the diced onion and cook, stirring frequently, until onion is fragrant and translucent, but not browned, about 5-7 minutes. Add the garlic and red pepper flakes and cook for 2 minutes longer, stirring.
2. Stir in the tomatoes and bring to a simmer. Add the vodka and cook until the alcohol has evaporated, about 5 minutes. Transfer the sauce to a blender, and blend on high until smooth. Return to the saucepan and stir in the heavy cream. Season to taste with salt and pepper, then toss with the penne and serve immediately.

The post Cravings: Penne Alla Vodka appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.

If halloween were a more elegant holiday than it is, this is what I would serve at halloween parties – smooth, silky creme brulee with a hint of roasted pumpkin and fall spices, topped with spicy garam masala pumpkin seeds. As it is, we’ll save this for fancier events and stick to the garish chocolate and peanut butter combinations tonight. I’m a creme brulee fiend – I can never resist ordering it for dessert when we’re out for dinner – so when Trevor made this amazing version at home he won me over all over again. This recipe is all him, so I’ll let him tell you its story…

A couple of months ago, when we started cutting into our very first home-grown Sugar Pie pumpkins, I decided I really wanted to do something besides endless pies with them. My first thought was ‘Oh! pumpkin creme brulee!’ The pumpkins we grew have a lot of natural sweetness, and would be perfect for a light creme brulee. A quick google, however, revealed that I wasn’t the first, or even the fifth person to think of it. The internet is full of pretty well-established pumpkin creme brulee recipes.

Demoralized, I decided to play with the flavors of roasted pumpkin seeds. Rather than salt and oil, I settled on the sweet, caramel-y flavors of Indian spices with a little kick. Cumin, masala, and chili powder paired nicely with the sweetness of the ginger and the nutty seed flavor. So I made these once, and they were gone in about a day, (mostly my fault).

I figured that the crunchy, crystallized seeds would be the perfect garnish for a bruleed crust, and would add a little something different to the pumpkin creme brulee recipes that were already out there. So with the seeds as a starting point, I threw some darker, intense spices into the milk while making the custard. Adding too much pumpkin to a creme brulee recipe is problematic for the final set of the custard, so the autumn flavor really has to come from the spices. The amounts aren’t enough to hit you over the head, but it’s definitely more than your classic vanilla bean dessert. It turned into a classy dessert with a little something extra, and I think it made Katie pretty happy. So it’s all good.

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Garam Masala Pumpkin Seeds

Makes 1 cup of seeds.

• 1 cup pumpkin seeds
• ½ cup granulated sugar
• ⅛ tsp cumin
• 1 tsp garam masala
• ⅛ tsp ginger
• ½ tsp chili powder
• 1 tsp sea salt
• 1 ½ tbsp canola oil

1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Combine sugar, salt and spices.
2. Combine pumpkin seeds and oil in a separate bowl, stirring to coat seeds completely. Add half of the sugar mixture to the seeds and stir to coat.
3. Spread the seeds evenly over  a baking sheet and bake for 30 min, stirring every 8-10 minutes, until the seeds just begin to brown, and become crunchy.
4. Before the seeds begin to cool, add the remaining sugar mixture, and stir to coat.

Pumpkin Creme Brulee

Serves 4. Adapted from The Fundamental Techniques of Classic Pastry Arts.

• 1 ½ cups heavy cream
• ½ cup whole milk
• ⅛ tsp ground ginger
• 3 whole cloves
• ⅛ tsp ground cardamom
• ⅛ tsp ground cinnamon
• ½ cup granulated sugar
• 4 egg yolks
• ¼ cup pumpkin puree
• 4 cups boiling water
• ⅓ cup white sugar (for sprinkling)
• ⅓ cup turbinado sugar (for sprinkling)

1. Preheat the oven to 325°F. Combine milk and cream along with the spices in a small sauce pan and heat over medium heat until the mixture begins to steam heavily and give off a nutty aroma. Do not let the mixture come to a boil.
2. Remove from heat and allow the milk to steep for 15 minutes. In a small bowl, combine the granulated sugar and egg yolks and whisk until smooth.
3. Strain the whole spices and any skin that formed from the milk mixture. Add the strained milk to the egg yolks and sugar, stirring constantly. Once combined, add the pumpkin puree and mix until smooth.
4. Divide the mixture between four creme brulee dishes, and set in a large baking dish. Fill the baking dish with boiling water so that the water reaches to just below the lip of the creme brulee dishes. Bake in the oven for 30-40min, checking after 30 minutes for done-ness. The custards should be firm, but jiggly. Refrigerate for 3 hours or overnight, covering with plastic wrap, but ensuring the wrap does not touch the surface of the custard.
5. Combine the two sprinkling sugars in a small bowl, and remove the dishes from the refrigerator, uncovering them carefully. Spread the sugars evenly in an ⅛” layer over the top of the custard, taking care not to disturb the surface.
6. Move a lit pastry torch over the surface of the creme brulee such that the tip of the blue flame is about 1 ½” away from the surface of the sugar. Keep the torch moving over the sugar until it begins to bubble slightly and turn a light brown.
7. Allow the sugar to cool. Sprinkle masala pumpkin seeds over the top and serve immediately.

The post Pumpkin Creme Brulee with Garam Masala Pumpkin Seeds appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.

Last weekend, Trevor and I went on a little adventure. We drove up the coast into Maine, trekked out into the woods, and began our search for forest gold: chanterelles.

The first time I had chanterelles in any quantity was last summer in St. Petersburg. There’s a much stronger foraging and preserving culture in Russia than here in the states, and when chanterelles come into season, the whole city explodes with лисички сезон (lisichki sezon) menus, featuring chanterelles in every form imaginable. Although prized and celebrated for their texture and flavor, they aren’t the commodity that wild mushrooms are here, and while you may pay a few dollars more to have your mushroom soup made from chanterelles, it won’t break the bank.

Around Boston, however, it’s rare to find specialty wild mushrooms like chanterelles in grocery stores, even the upscale ones. When you do, they’re usually exorbitantly priced – I’ve seen morels go for as much as $70 a pound. Morels are delicious, but there are a lot of other delicacies I could buy for 1/3 of the price – like filet mignon and wild-caught salmon. So when Trevor’s uncle called to let us know that chanterelles were abundant in Maine, and offered to take us on a foraging trip, we jumped at the chance. Trevor’s uncle is a foodie in the truest sense of the word, without any of the negative connotations that word sometimes carries. An author and editor who has lived in both France and Russia, he has a deep understanding of food and its history from multiple cultural perspectives. Many of his books revolve around food: From Here You Can’t See Paris chronicles a year in the life of a restaurant in a rural town in France, while his cookbook, Fresh From Maine, shares recipes and stories from Maine’s up-and-coming chefs. In short, a good person to go foraging with, and an even better person to get ideas from for what to do with your bounty of mushrooms.

I had no idea that chanterelles grew in such prolific quantities in New England. Michael led us to hillsides covered with the small golden mushrooms, poking up from the pine needle-blanketed forest floor. Once we had found a good spot, we set to work gathering: down on our hands and knees, slicing the mushrooms from their stems, brushing the dirt and pine needles from the caps, then adding the clean mushrooms to our quickly filling bags. It’s a lovely thing to do, foraging for mushrooms – it’s quiet and focused, with the exhilaration of discovery and the wonderment of nature’s creations. Find someone who knows the forest and knows mushrooms and is willing to teach you – it’s worth it.

After only an hour of picking Trevor and I had gathered 5 pounds – as much as we could dream of using – and Michael probably picked twice as much as the two of us combined during the same time period, so we packed up our mushrooms and hiked out of the woods. We enjoyed a quick but perfect lunch of mozzarella, tomato, and basil on fresh baguette, then Trevor and I were on our way back home, where the task of further cleaning and processing our mushrooms awaited us. Although the cleaning and processing is not a small amount of work, we now have enough bags of butter-sauteed chanterelles tucked away in our freezer to get us at least through the fall. We froze about 2/3 of our haul, but we kept enough fresh mushrooms in the fridge for a week of good eating. We started off with a Chanterelle Carbonara, then these Chanterelle and Corn Tacos, and finished up with Chanterelle Burgers. All three recipes were delicious, and perhaps I’ll share the other two with you later, but for now, let’s focus on these tacos. I had been toying with the idea of a summery, mushroom and corn vegetarian taco for a while, so it was the perfect thing to try when we found ourselves with a surplus of mushrooms. The mushroom filling is as savory and satisfying as any meat-based taco, and the creamy and slightly spicy chile sauce is a little bit addictive. The tacos don’t need much more than that, but I added some sliced avocado and a bit of crumbled cotija cheese to finish them off. A worthy use of our chanterelles, for sure.

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Chanterelle and Corn Tacos with Chile Crema

Serves 2 as a main, 4 as an appetizer.

• 1/4 c. sour cream
• 2 TBS heavy cream
• juice from 1/2 lime
• 1/4 tsp coarse sea salt
• 1/2 tsp chili powder
• 1/8 tsp smoked paprika
• 2 TBS butter
• 3 c. chanterelles torn into large pieces
• 1 ear raw corn, corn kernels cut from the cob
• 1/2 small jalapeno, seeded and minced
• 1 TBS minced fresh thyme leaves
• salt and pepper, to taste
• 1 avocado, halved, pitted and sliced
• 4 small tortillas
• 2 oz. crumbled cotija

1. In a small bowl, stir together the sour cream, heavy cream, lime juice, sea salt, chili powder, and smoked paprika until smooth. Taste, and adjust flavorings to your taste. Set aside.
2. In a large frying pan, melt the butter over medium heat. Add the chanterelles and cook until soft and deeply colored, about 8 minutes. Add the corn, jalapeno and thyme to the pan, and cook, stirring occasionally, until the corn and jalapeno have softened slightly, about 5 minutes. Remove from heat and season to taste with salt and pepper.
3. To serve, line each tortilla with a few slices of avocado. Top with 1/4 of the mushroom and corn mixture, then drizzle some chile crema over the top. Sprinkle with the crumbled cotija, and serve immediately.

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I could not be more ready for the weekend. I had one too many 7am meetings this week, each one followed by long days working frantically toward a major deadline Thursday afternoon. The minute the deadline passed, I felt a wave of exhaustion wash over me. I was spent. But now the weekend has arrived and I have two full days to sleep in, not think about insurance, and enjoy the beautiful weather we’re supposed to have. We’re going to head out to the garden to check for tomatoes and squash and blueberries, try and catch a showing of Chef, and hopefully head up to Maine to look for chanterelles with Trevor’s uncle.

One thing that helped me keep my head up during this hectic week was coming home to these delicious basil panna cottas in the fridge – I won’t lie, I had a few bites every night this week. When it comes to basil, my eyes are often bigger than my stomach. I find the scent of basil truly intoxicating, and am seemingly unable to walk by a box in the store or a patch in the garden without taking some home. But its shelf life is shorter than I think, and more often than not I use up a little right away and then end up with a bunch of slimy black leaves a week later, which feels like such a terrible waste. One solution is to mix up and freeze a big batch of pesto, but after a while, as delicious as pesto is, it feels boring.

On the ride home from our garden the other day, a bag of freshly picked basil sitting in my lap, I tried to think of things other than pesto that I might make to use up leaves on their last leg. When I got to basil ice cream, I moved backwards a few steps to basil-infused heavy cream, and then jumped forward again to settle on basil panna cotta. Since I had a few overly ripe apricots in the fridge that needed to be used up as well, I decided on rosé-poached apricots as a topping. I read up on my panna cotta theory in The Best International Recipe (a great resource for knowing how and why recipes work), then changed things up a little, and the result was sublime. Not too sweet, extremely light and smooth, and with delicate, floral flavors, it tasted like a restaurant quality dessert but was extremely simple to execute. It might be my new dinner party go to. If you also have an abundance of basil and quickly ripening stone-fruit sitting on your counter (’tis the season!) I encourage you to give this recipe a go – you won’t be disappointed, and you’ll have spared yourself the sadness of wasted produce.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

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Basil Panna Cotta with Rosé-Poached Apricots

Serves 4.

• 1 1/2 c. heavy cream
• 1/2 c. basil leaves, washed and dried
• 1 c. sugar, divided
• 1/2 vanilla bean
• 1/2 c. milk
• 1 1/2 tsp gelatin
• 3/4 c. rosé wine
• 4 fresh apricots, halved and pits removed

1. Add the heavy cream, basil, and 1/4 cup of the sugar to a small saucepan. Split the vanilla bean lengthwise and scrape the seeds out into the cream with a small spoon, then add the vanilla bean pod to the cream as well. Heat the cream over medium heat, stirring gently to dissolve the sugar, until the cream just comes to a simmer. Remove from the heat and let sit for 15 minutes, then strain the cream through a fine mesh strainer into a bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and chill until cold, at least 30 minutes. Discard the basil.
2. Add the milk to a small saucepan and sprinkle the gelatin over the top of the milk. Stir gently to combine. Let the gelatin sit for 10 minutes to hydrate, then heat over medium-low heat just until the gelatin dissolves, which should take about 90 seconds to 2 minutes. Remove from the heat, whisk to combine, then pour into the chilled basil-infused cream. Whisk the mixture for 1 minute to fullly combine and to begin to chill the gelatin, then divide the mixture between four ramekins or glasses, cover each with plastic wrap, and chill until firm, at least two hours.
3. For the apricots: add the remaining 3/4 c. of sugar and the rosé to a small saucepan. Bring to a simmer, then gently place the apricot halves into the pot, submerging in the simmering liquid. Let simmer until soft, about 3-4 minutes, then remove with a slotted spoon to a bowl. Continue simmering the liquid until it is reduced by half and slightly syrupy, about 10-15 minutes. Remove from heat and pour over the apricots. Cover the apricots and syrup and chill until cold.
4. Serve each panna cotta with one or two apricot halves and a few spoonfuls of syrup poured over the top. Serve cold.

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Although my 25th birthday was two and a half weeks ago, I’ve only just finished celebrating it, as per usual. This weekend we hosted a joint celebration at our house – the culmination of my birthday festivities and the kick-off of Trevor’s (one week from today!). It was a casual thing – grilled pizzas made-to-order and eaten on the porch, hot arancini dipped in tomato sauce to tide us over between pizzas, pitchers of mojitos, blackberry sangria, and a wealth of good beer. We managed to rally a crew to go out dancing afterwards, and it was a really fun night. I already like being 25; no quarter-century crises for me so far (I think I had mine when I was 21, anyway).

Everything was delicious, but the culinary highlight of the evening was undoubtedly this gorgeous cake that Trevor made – three layers of homemade angel food cake, spread with strawberry jam, an airy whipped cream cheese frosting, and mounds of fresh berries (best when swiped through the frosting on the top of the cake). It was stunning to look at and dreamy to eat, sweet and light and perfect. And it only took 20 egg whites to make. Now I just have to come up with something that tops it for next week.

Past Birthday Posts:
2013: Triple Lemon-Cake with Lemon-Mascarpone-Cream Cheese Frosting
2013: Sparkling Strawberry Sangria
2012: Mom’s Birthday Waffles with Strawberry Sauce

Angel-Food Layer Cake with Whipped Cream Cheese Frosting

Recipe based on The Fundamental Techniques of Classic Pastry Arts. Serves 12.

For the angel food cake:

• 290 grams cake flour
• 200 grams confectioners’ sugar
• 400 grams granulated sugar
• 2 tsp cream of tartar
• 800 grams large egg whites (roughly a score of eggs [editorial note: that means 20])
• Pinch of salt
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

For the frosting:

• 8 oz box cream cheese
• 2 ½ cups of heavy cream
• ¼ tsp cream of tartar
• ½ tsp vanilla extract
• 1/3 c. sugar

For the assembly:

• ¾ cup jam of choice (I used strawberry)
• 1 pint strawberries
• ½ pint blackberries
• ½ pint raspberries

Instructions for cake:

1. Sift together cake flour and confectioners’ sugar. In a separate smaller bowl, mix together salt and cream of tartar.
2. Preheat oven to 325°F.
3. Separate egg whites (really make sure you don’t get any yolk in there), and add salt to them in the bowl of a stand mixer.  Whip using a stand mixer (or an immersion blender with a whisk attachment.) Beat on low until foaming, gradually raising the speed of the beaters while adding the granulated sugar in batches. Beat until stiff, foamy peaks are achieved.
4. Add vanilla and gently fold in. Fold in the flour and sugar mixture in in several additions, being careful not to mix too vigorously, as the batter will deflate.
5. Pour batter into two 9-inch springform cake pans and two 6-inch springform cake pans and bake for about 35 minutes, or until the top is light golden brown and firm to the touch. Do not grease the pans – the pans need to be ungreased so that the cake can climb up the sides and get that nice airy texture.
6. Invert the cake pans on a wire rack. Run a knife around the edge when the cakes are cool and carefully unmold. Run a knife between the bottom plate and the cake before attempting to remove the bottom plate.

Instructions for frosting:

1. Mix cream of tartar, sugar and vanilla into cream cheese. Gradually add heavy cream and whip until it is the consistency of dense whipped cream. Chill until

To assemble:

1. Place the first large cake on a plate, and spread jam on the top of the cake. Spread frosting on top of the jam. Put each additional layer on with jam and frosting on top, leaving the last layer jamless.
2. Frost the rest of the cake, and artfully arrange berries on top. And add a flower. Put additional berries on slices. Can’t have too many berries.

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The Book: The newest cookbook on my shelf is Eating with the Chefs, a photography-driven book that documents the family meals served at the world’s greatest restaurants. The goal of the book: to take you behind the scenes, into the kitchens and after-hours, to experience the “family life” of the people who make these restaurants run, and the “honest, simple food” they make for each other outside of the dining room. From the pillars of America’s modern dining scene (The French Laundry, Chez Panisse, Blue Hill at Stone Barns), to the international innovators that have been making global headlines for the past few years (Noma, Attica, Mugaritz), you will get a little taste of the experience and flavors of each restaurant, without needing to hop on a plane and fly to Denmark/Australia/Spain (as nice as that would be if you could). Like all of Phaidon’s books, Eating with the Chefs is gorgeously designed, an art book as much as a cookbook, if not more. The pages are thick and matte, the text sparse, and the stories are told primarily through the gorgeous and subtle photographs of Per-Anders Jorgensen, the book’s creator. The restaurant stories and recipes are found interspersed between the pictures in text “inserts,” further emphasizing the focus on the photography. It’s a book you’ll want to leave out on the coffee table. As for the recipes themselves, between the seemingly universal unwritten rule that family meals should be straightforward and comforting and the immense talent and creativity of the chefs cooking them, the 50 recipes included in this book fall right in the sweet spot of how I love to cook.

The Food: As soon as I saw the recipe for Indian Butter Chicken in Eating with the Chefs, I knew it had to be the first recipe I tried. I’m forever on the hunt for recipes that accurately approximate my favorite Indian takeout dishes, but making good Indian food requires such a thorough study of cooking techniques and knowledge of Indian pantry ingredients that it can be a real challenge. I’ve had good success with recipes like these Pea and Potato Parathas and this Pakistani Chickpea Pulao, but none of them have been “takeout-y,” by which I mean over-the-top rich and spicy and addictive. As you might expect from one of Australia’s pre-eminent chefs, this recipe hit all the right notes of great Indian food – creamy, spicy, salty, savory – and was perfectly balanced. I’m really excited to have added this one to my repertoire, and if the other recipes in the book are as dead-on as this one was, I’m going to have a lot more dinners in my rotation.

Recipe Shortlist: Basque-Style Garlic Soup; Emmer Wheat Foccaccia; Quark Pillows with Corn and Grilled Peaches; Holiday Cannelloni; Squab Torte; Roast Chicken with Apple and Onion Confit and Pommes Mousseline; Lentil Stew with Pork Ribs; Quay’s Green Chicken Curry; Chocolate Ripple Cake

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Disclaimer: I received a review copy of Eating with the Chefs from Phaidon, but I was not otherwise compensated and all thought and opinions are my own.

Indian Butter Chicken

Recipe from Eating with the Chefs. Serves 2.

• 1/2 c. plain Greek yogurt
• 2 tsp lemon juice
• 1 1/2 tsp ground turmeric
• 1 1/2 tsp garam masala
• 1 1/2 tsp ground cumin
• 1 lb. 2 oz. skinless chicken breasts or thighs
• 3 TBS butter
• 1 tsp vegetable oil
• 1 small onion, peeled and finely chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, peeled and finely chopped
• 1 TBS grated fresh ginger
• 1 TBS whole cumin seeds
• 1 small cinnamon stick
• 1/3 c. canned diced tomatoes
• 1 fresh red chile, seeded and sliced
• 1/4 c. chicken stock
• 1/2 c. heavy cream
• 1/2 tsp tomato paste
• 1 TBS ground almonds
• 3 sprigs fresh cilantro, to garnish
• salt to taste

1. Combine the yogurt, lemon juice, turmeric, salt (to taste, approximately 1/2 tsp), garam masala, and ground cumin in a small bowl and stir to combine. Pour over the chicken, making sure chicken is fully coated, cover, and refrigerate for 24 hours.
2. When ready to cook, melt the butter and oil in a large pan over medium heat. Add the onions and cook for about 10 minutes or until translucent, stirring occasionally. Stir in the garlic, ginger, and cumin seeds, and cook for 3 minutes, until spices are fragrant and onions are lightly browned.
3. Add the cinnamon stick, diced tomatoes, and sliced chile to the pan and season with salt, then cook over medium heat for 10 minutes. Add the chicken and it’s marinade to the pan and stir to combine, then cook for another 5 minutes.
4. Add the chicken broth to the pan and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer for 30 minutes. Stir in the cream and tomato paste, and cook for another 10-15 minutes, or until the chicken is fully cooked through. Stir in the ground almonds and cook for a final 5 minutes. Serve with rice, garnished with fresh cilantro.

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