Real Cajun's German Chocolate Cake

My method for buying cookbooks goes something like this: First I check them out at the library. Then if there at 12 or 15 pages I've marked with those page keeper sticky things, then I know I should buy the cookbook. That's what happened with Real Cajun: Rustic Home Cooking from Donald Link's Louisiana.

And the first recipe I had to try was the German Chocolate Cake. The photos totally sold me. Sugary, oozy frosting dripping all over luscious layers of dark, dark chocolate cake. I couldn't imagine how this cake couldn't be anything but decadent and mouth-watering.

But I warn you, this cake is a project, not only in terms of making the cake, but for the sheer amount of ingredients. 17 eggs! 4-1/2 sticks of butter! 3 cups of condensed milk! I guess a lot of people would say this is a special occasion kind of cake, but as a friend of mine said, 'Every day is a special occasion in Brooke's kitchen". Seriously, why wait for a special occasion? Why doesn't an ordinary day deserve a great cake? The answer is, it absolutely does. So maybe this isn't a cake you make spur of the moment on a weeknight, but on a thoughtfully planned Saturday or Sunday. Ooh how about on Saturday and then you can serve it for Sunday lunch or dinner? Just make sure each guest has easy access to at least 2 glasses of milk because they're going to need it!

I also have to say that I will be making just the cake from the recipe and leaving off the frosting, the German bit. This cake reminds me so much of my Nana's chocolate cake. Unfortunately, like so many of her amazing dishes, she didn't leave behind the recipe. I can't remember the last time I had a slice of her cake but it's impossible for me to ever forget it. I have searched for years for a recipe that comes even close to the feel and flavor of hers. We knew it had to be butter that made it good, but how much? Also this cake is just as dark as hers. I used the pricey Valrhona cocoa powder for this cake. Look at the photos, you'll see what amazing color this cocoa has. Really unbelievable stuff. However, I recommend the Ghirardelli brand for cocoa if you don't feel like a splurge.

The Great Biscuit Experiment 04: The Winner! Angel Biscuits!

*Method:
Yeast, freezing, lard and butter

Oh Lord, this biscuit is exactly what I was looking for. It does take more time to execute, but is it ever worth it! A little crunch on the outside gives way to a moist and tender interior. Light, fluffy, buttery, great for re-heating, you can add more butter or leave it as it is, you can use jam or nutella or cinnamon sugar. Whatever you like!
I found this recipe all over the web and the variety of amounts for the ingredients was all over the place, especially when it came to the amount of fat. I finally decided to go with King Arthur's version of the recipe because they provided a great step by step photo guide. They also suggested freezing the biscuits after they've had a chance to rise to let the butter and lard chill up again for extra rise. I was a little worried about putting frozen biscuits in the hot oven, but it worked like a charm.

Although, I'm fairly certain I won't find a better biscuit recipe, I am going to try another using a Southern flour to see if the softer wheat and lower gluten content does indeed live up to the biscuit-hype.

Angel Biscuits or Bride Biscuits adapted from the King Arthur website.

1/2 cup (4 ounces) lukewarm water
1 teaspoon instant yeast
2 1/2 cups (10 1/2 ounces) King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour
2 tablespoons (7/8 ounce) sugar
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 cup (1 5/8 ounces) lard
1/4 cup (1/2 stick, 2 ounces) cold unsalted butter
1/2 cup (4 ounces) buttermilk (room temp, well-shaken)

In a small mixing bowl, whisk together the warm water, yeast and 1/4 cup of the flour. Set the mixture aside for 30 minutes. In a medium-sized bowl, whisk together the remaining flour, the sugar, salt, and baking powder. Cut in the shortening and the butter, mixing until everything's rough and crumbly. Add the milk to the yeast mixture, and pour this all at once into the dry ingredients. Fold together gently until the mixture leaves the sides of the bowl and becomes cohesive. Sprinkle with an additional tablespoon of water only if necessary to make the dough hold together.

Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured work surface. Pat it gently into an 8 x 10-inch rectangle; it'll be about 3/4-inch thick. Cut the dough into fifteen 2-inch round biscuits. Gather, re-roll and cut the scraps, if desired; the resulting biscuits will probably be a bit tougher. Place the biscuits on an ungreased or parchment-lined baking sheet. Cover them lightly, and allow them to rise for 1 hour, or until they've increased in size by about a third. (The biscuits may be refrigerated for several hours or overnight at this point, or frozen for later use.)

Preheat the oven to 400°F. Uncover the biscuits, and place the pan in the top third of the oven. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes. The biscuits are done when golden brown on the top and bottom. Yield: about fifteen 2-inch biscuits.

The Great Biscuit Experiment 03: Using Lard, Cake Flour & the Fold-Over Method

Well, folks. I'm happy with the results of this experiment. How pretty are these? They're itty bitty biscuits, about 1 1/2" in diameter. I used the lard I made last week and I have to say, that was very, very satisfying. You don't get a pork taste at all. All you get is a lovely, layered rise! The only thing I'd change about these is the amount of sugar. They were a tad too sweet for even me, the Sweet Tooth Queen.
I think the fold-over method (patting the dough out and then folding the dough onto itself several times) is interesting, but I don't think it's necessary. I got about the same amount of rise in my first buttermilk recipe that simply called for rolling out the dough. Also, I could not perceive any difference between using Cake flour and All-Purpose flour, so save your money, and just use what you have. It would be interesting to see if there is any difference when using King Arthur Flour (widely available out here on the West Coast) and White Lily Flour, the traditional "Southern" flour. I would certainly do this experiment, but White Lily is not what it used to be after Smuckers bought them out, or so I hear.


The Lee Brothers, the authors of this recipe, give additional recipe tips for making Lemon, Herbed, and Vanilla Buttermilk Biscuits. They all sound so good! I think I'll have to do the Vanilla ones. 

Lee Bros. Bird-head Buttermilk Biscuits

- makes about sixteen 2-inch round biscuits -

Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients

2 1/4 cups sifted cake flour or 2 cups sifted bleached all-purpose flour, plus more for your work surface and hands *I used King Arthur unbleached cake flour

1 tablespoon baking powder

1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon sugar *I would use less sugar next time, maybe half.

1 teaspoon salt

4 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into several pieces

2 tablespoons cold lard or vegetable shortening, cut into several pieces

3/4 cup cold whole or lowfat buttermilk (preferably whole)

Procedure

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

2. In a medium bowl, mix the dry ingredients thoroughly with a fork. Transfer to a food processor fitted with the chopping blade. Add the butter and lard and pulse the mixture in 2-second increments until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs with a few pea-sized pieces, about 5 pulses. (If you don't have a food processor, cut the fats into the dry ingredients in a bowl by mashing with a fork, a whisk, or a pastry blender; it will take about 3 minutes.)

3. Transfer the mixture back to the bowl, pour the buttermilk over it, and mix with the fork for about 1 minute, until the dough just comes together. Turn the dough out onto a floured board, knead with floured fingers once or twice, and pat it into a rectangle about 6 x 10 inches and 1 inch thick.

4. Fold the rightmost third of the rectangle over the center third and fold the left third on top. Turn the dough a quarter turn, pat it into a 6-x-10-inch rectangle, and fold it upon itself in thirds again. Repeat one more time, then pat the dough into a 6-x-10-inch rectangle about 1 inch thick.

5. Using a floured 2-inch biscuit cutter (or an upside-down shot glass), cut the biscuits from the dough and place them about I'll inches apart on an ungreased baking sheet. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes, until the tops just begin to brown.

6. Serve the biscuits warm, with butter or eggs and bacon.

Rendering Lard

It's a four-letter word. And yes, I'm gonna say it. LARD. (Here's your visual: Ralphie in A Christmas Story...."Fuuuuuuuuuddddddgggggge!!!")
It feels so bad. But it tastes so good!
Whilst in my pursuit of the perfect biscuit, I realized I just had to use lard. In the words of Ruhlman, "Lard is an exquisite cooking medium and ingredient". From what I've heard, it's the best fat to use in pie dough and for my beloved biscuits.
But before you get completely disgusted, take heart. Lard is good for you! I know, it's crazy, right?
Lard is a rich source of Vitamin D, second only to cod liver oil. Lard also has less saturated fat, more unsaturated fat, and less cholesterol than butter!
Can you believe it?!? And it has none of those pesky trans-fats!

But finding good quality lard is easier said than done. Not even Whole Foods had it. However, they would save me pork fat trimmings if I called them early enough in the morning. You can buy lard in a can at Mexican grocery stores, but they have to make it shelf stable, so what do they add? You guessed it. Trans-fats (partially hydrogenated soybean oil). However, on a spur of the moment trip to Surfas (a chef's supply store in Culver City), I happened to stumble across frozen leaf lard. And it was so cheap!

Leaf lard is considered to be the best lard. It's the fat that is procured from around the kidneys of the pig. However, you can't just slice off a piece and add it to your dough. It has to be rendered into a malleable product, much like shortening.

So render it I did. I followed the Homesick Texan's directions. Basically all you do is chop up the lard into small pieces, put the lard into a pot, add a little water and turn the heat to medium low. Wait about an hour and a half (stirring occasionally) and what you'll get are cracklin's floating in liquid fat.

At this point, you strain the cracklin's from the liquid, refrigerate the liquid, and voila, there's your lard! I can't wait to try it out!

Biscuit Experiment 02: Sweet Potato Biscuits

I wasn't going to post this recipe because I was totally unimpressed. I know, I know, sweet potato biscuits have to be delicious, right?
I'm not saying they weren't good, they just didn't meet my standards. I want some lift, some fluffiness! And these didn't do it for me.

The reason I attempted this recipe was for a several reasons.
1. Sweet potatoes. yum.
2. The recipe required the butter to be frozen and then grated through a box grater. I thought this was an interesting twist to simply chilling the butter and then cutting into cubes. I wanted to see if this technique made any difference in the quality of the biscuits. It did not, as far as I could tell.
3. This recipe did NOT call for the piercing of the dough as the previous biscuit recipe did (Scott Peacock's recipe). I wanted to know if not perforating the dough would have an effect on the lightness of the biscuits. These biscuits were flat and didn't rise very much, but whether the perforation had anything to do with it, I have no idea.
In addition, I read a tip that said you should sift the flour on its own and then sift again with the other dry ingredients for more lift. Well, that didn't work.

I am wondering if I hadn't added the sweet potato, what kind of biscuit would this be?

This is my Great Biscuit Experiment and I definitely learned something from cooking these biscuits. But will I make these again? Nope.

Sweet Potato Biscuits featured on Chow.com by Kate Ramos

INGREDIENTS
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 tablespoon granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 cup whole milk
1 cup baked, mashed sweet potato about 1 medium potato
8 tablespoons unsalted butter 1 stick, frozen
Heavy cream for brushing the tops

INSTRUCTIONS
1.  Heat the oven to 400°F and arrange a rack in the middle. Combine all dry ingredients in a large
mixing bowl and set aside. In a separate large bowl, mix together milk and mashed sweet potato
until evenly combined.

2.  Grate frozen butter through the large holes of a box grater and toss with dry ingredients until
butter is coated. Add milk mixture and mix lightly until dough forms a shaggy mass.

3.  Turn out mixture onto a floured surface and knead just until it comes together. (The dough will not
be smooth.)

4.  Pat into a circle and use a floured rolling pin to roll dough to a thickness of about 3/4 inch.
Using a 4-inch biscuit cutter, cookie cutter, or glass, cut the dough into rounds. Gather leftover
dough into a circle, reroll, and cut until you have 8 large biscuits.

5.  Place biscuits on a baking sheet, brush tops with heavy cream, and bake until golden, about 12 to
15 minutes.

My favorite recipe for Banana Bread

Oh my. This bread is good. Really good. It beat out 3 other recipes for the top spot.
I was beginning to wonder if I was going to find a recipe that met my expectations. Although this recipe called for the addition of poppy seeds and dates, I politely overlooked those and stuck to tradition. Sometimes you want to reinvent the wheel and I'm all for that, but this time, I wanted a recipe that I could feel confident about making my 'go-to' banana bread recipe. Not merely a decorative touch, is the application of sliced banana on top and the dusting of powdered sugar after cooling. Beautiful.

The author of this recipe is Zoe Nathan, pastry chef at Huckleberry and Rustic Canyon in Santa Monica. The LA Times publishes readers' requests for recipes for their favorite dishes at local restaurants. Thanks to Ms. Helen Chiu of Westchester we can all partake of this delicious bread.

Banana poppy seed loaf
Total time: 1 1/2 hours
Servings: 2 loaves (about 8 servings each)
This recipe requires 2 small (8 1/2 - by-4 1/2 -by 2 1/2 -inch) metal or glass loaf pans.

3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) butter, plus extra for greasing the pans
1 1/2 cups (6.4 ounces) flour
1 1/2 cups (6.75 ounces) whole wheat flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons poppy seeds
3/4 cup sugar plus 1 teaspoon, divided
3/8 teaspoon salt
3 eggs
5 very ripe bananas, plus 1 1/2 fresh bananas, divided
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 cup yogurt
3/4 cup coarsely chopped dates
1 to 2 tablespoons powdered sugar

1. Heat the oven to 375 degrees. Grease and line the bottoms of 2 (8 1/2 - by 4 1/2 - by 2 1/2 -inch) loaf pans with parchment paper.

2. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, wheat flour, baking powder, baking soda and poppy seeds. Set aside.

3. In the bowl of a stand mixer, or in a large bowl using an electric mixer, cream together the butter, three-fourths cup sugar and salt until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Add the eggs, one at a time, until incorporated.

4. In a medium bowl, mash the very ripe bananas. With the mixer running, add the mashed bananas and vanilla to the butter mixture until incorporated. With the mixer on the lowest speed, add the dry ingredients just until incorporated. Gently fold in the yogurt and dates. Divide the batter evenly between the 2 pans.

5. Slice the remaining 1 1/2 bananas crosswise into one-eighth inch slices. Top the batter in each pan with the banana slices, arranged in rows. Sprinkle the remaining teaspoon of sugar evenly over the sliced bananas, then place in the center of the oven (leave a few inches between the loaf pans).

6. Bake until a toothpick inserted comes out clean, about 1 hour, rotating halfway through for even baking. Check the pans after 20 to 30 minutes and periodically after that to see that they do not darken too quickly; if they do, lightly cover the tops with aluminum foil and continue to bake.

7. Cool the pans and unmold the loaves. Sift the powdered sugar evenly over the 2 loaves. Cut the loaves into 1-inch slices and serve.

*As I mentioned, I removed the poppy seeds and dates from this recipe, however, I added 3/4 cup of chopped walnuts.

Baked Beans 01 : Cast-Iron Skillet

When I was home in July, I bought a ceramic bean pot from the thrift store my mother kept telling me I really should visit. She was right. Of course. I had visions of beans sunning themselves in the blue glow of my brown gas oven in their matching brown bean pot. The bean pot did not make it home in one piece, unfortunately. So that dream was dashed, however, it did get me to thinking about baked beans and the fact that I have never cooked baked beans from scratch.  They've always started out as a can of Bush's Baked Beans which have been subsequently doctored with brown sugar, ketchup and/or BBQ sauce. Oh yeah, and maybe some mustard.

Despite the demise of the cute bean pot, I pressed onward when I picked up the "Cast-Iron Skillet Cookbook" at my nearby Barnes & Noble. Jackpot!! I am such a sucker for any recipe that calls for a cast-iron skillet. I don't know what it is, do I think that the recipe automatically HAS to be great if it's cooked in an iron skillet? Do I think that somehow I have a window into the past by simply using this tool? It's definitely a bit of both. I also love the versatility of the iron skillet, easily cooking to perfection on either the stove top or in the oven.

However, it seems I cannot read a recipe. I thought the recipe said to add all the ingredients, but in reality it said to save the salt for last. Duh, I should've known this. Always salt at the last moment with beans or else they won't absorb the water. The other problem I had, and this was not my fault, was that the recipe said to only soak the beans for 1 hr. I questioned this, but I thought I would give the recipe writers the benefit of the doubt. I ended up having to cook these beans for over 5 hours when it was only supposed to take 3. I could've cooked them longer, but I really wanted to go to bed already. That having been said, I thought these beans were quite satisfactory considering my mistakes. It was exactly what you think of when you think baked beans. I love how the onions get cooked up in the leftover bacon grease--one ingredient lending something to the next. When making this recipe again, I will remember to add the salt last and soak the beans overnight to reduce cooking time. And have a bunch of people over because I am SO over baked beans right now.


The next Baked Beans recipe I'll attempt will be from the Big Sur Bakery Cookbook and is a vastly different recipe, quite nontraditional in its ingredients.

Best Baked Beans from The Cast Iron Skillet Cookbook: Recipes for the Best Pan in Your Kitchen by Sharon Kramis & Julie Kramis Hearne

Makes 12 Servings
8 cups cold water
2-3/4 cups (1 lb) dried Great Northern Beans
4 strips of bacon
1/2 yellow onion, diced
1 cup beer, preferably pale ale
2 cups water
1/2 cup molasses
1/4 maple syrup
1 tblsp Worcestershire sauce
2 tblsp light brown sugar
2 tsp dry mustard
1 tsp paprika
2 tsp salt

1. In a large stockpot, bring the cold water to a boil over high heat. Add the beans to the boiling water and cook for 2 minutes. Remove from the heat, cover and let soak for 1 hour. (This is what the recipe says, but I say just soak your beans in the water overnight.) Drain in a colander and rinse the beans.

2. Heat a 10- or 12-inch cast iron skillet (the larger the better) over medium heat. Add the bacon and cook until golden, turning once. Transfer the bacon to a paper towel, pour off all but 3 tablespoons of the bacon fat.

3. Return the skillet to medium heat. Add the onion and cook, stirring occasionally and scraping up the browned bits from the bacon, until golden brown. Add the beans, beer, water, molasses, maple syrup, Worcestershire sauce, brown sugar, dry mustard, and paprika. Coarsely chop the bacon and add it to the skillet. Reduce the heat to medium-low (or place the skillet in a 250 deg oven) and cook, covered for 3 hours. Add water as needed to keep the beans covered. During the last half hour of cooking, remove the lid and don't add any additional water to the beans. When the beans are done, stir in the salt just before serving.