Huff..puff...puff...

and huffing and puffing, I actually managed to turn out the Voul-au-vent aka puff pastry with filling on the reveal date for Daring Bakers!

The September 2009 Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Steph of A Whisk and a Spoon. She chose the French treat, Vols-au-Vent based on the Puff Pastry recipe by Michel Richard from the cookbook Baking With Julia by Dorie Greenspan.

Puff pastries are those mouth-melting wonders that I never thought I would try to make myself..the Daring Bakers really do challenge us to dare try these previously only wondered about things..

Once I read the instructions and saw the video link provided, I was more confident to tackle this and once I started it did turn out to be pretty straightforward but follow the instruction to T kind of experiment...

For Dough:(I halved the recipe)

1 nd 1/4 cup AP flour

1/2 cup cake flour ( substituted 1/2 cup AP flour + 1 tbsp cornstarch)

salt, as desired

1/2 + cup ice water

Preparation:

Mix the dry ingredients, add ice water and knead the dough. Cover and refrigerate. Beat 2 sticks of butter to form a rectangle 1/4 inch thick. Roll the dough to bigger than the butter rectangle and wrap the butter in it. Turn the dough as seen in the video. Chilling between each stages is highly recommended.

Things went pretty smooth till the dough stage , it was the forming stage that almost undid me.. I couldn't find the round shaped cookie cutters, so I got the flowery kind one..It had those pointed edges , my layering didnt turn out so well...I filled it with mushroom-goat cheese filling and I stop here for now, but I have lot of pastry dough frozen and I shall try with more combinations and update here..

Technically, Im still a daring baker ;)

Off I go to visit our blogroll members, who Im sure have out-done themselves with this challenge !!

Theme of the month...

Theme of the month seems to be tardiness :( .. not intentional..but I just don't know where the time is flying .. Summer is over already ?? September is more than half gone too ?? Did I skip some days or weeks in between a-la time-traveller's-wife ?

Neway,last couple of months I've been part of this wonderful group which combines my love for books and food together - This book makes me cook , but for some reason or the other I have not able to contribute to it.. Last month, they announced reading 'Pomegranate soup' , which I promptly ordered from my library, got it and read in an easy read - very light but heart warming book about 3 sisters all the way from Iran to Europe on their culinary journey...and all other filmy elements within - like the necessary villain, a beautifully vague hero , a cause-bearer...but all in good fun..

I also managed to make this simple but delicious soup from the recipe in the book, but never got around to posting it..so without further ado:

This is a simple soup made of olive-oil fried onions cooked with red masoor daal for about an hour or so with simple spices....you think Ive forgotten them ? Actually I have .. maybe I will get the book back and check and update..maybe not..but the soup was good! I havnt forgotten that :D

Sometimes I'm confused..

Sometimes I'm confused by what I think is really obvious. But what I think is really obvious obviously isn't obvious...

So yesterday I thought that it was one of the challenge reveal dates, but thought it was the Daring Bakers which I havn't tried in the busy and frantic days that Ive had the past weeks..

I didnt check if it was Daring kitchen which had Indian Dosa this time which in fact I'd tried immediately after the challenge was revealed...and had a nice picture all taken and uploaded too...

One of my feeds actually brought me out of the fog today and late, but not never..here it is..Lovely Dosa...this is how it was packaged and eaten around my place and I cannot forget the numbers of lovely dosas we used to devour during those early evening , after college..with friends..on our 2 wheels...aah...

Neways...Debyi from The Healthy Vegan Kitchen hosted the event this time around and I would like to try an alternative recipe some time, I made this lovely dosa with the recipe handed over by my ma-in-law - the traditional south indian dosa recipe :

1 cup rice

1/3 cup urad dal

1 tsp fenugreek seeds

Soak 5-6 hours and grind with little water. Let ferment overnight. Add some more water and salt to make batter consistency when ready to make dosa.

Filling :

5-6 potatoes

1 medium onion

1 tsp chat masala

1 tsp oil

Boil the potatoes, peel and mash them. Heat the oil, saute onions and mix potatoes and chat masala in it.

Heat the pan/tawa and spray some oil and some drops of water and wipe it off the hot pan. Spread the batter into a pancake. Take the filling and spread it layered over the dosa. Once the cooked side is crispy fold the dosa like a wrap and cut into pieces Serve with chutney and/or sambar.

Thank you Debyi for bringing this amazing and ubiqiutous Indian Dosa to the DaringKitchen !!

Sat morning Jammy muffins for S nd S

With all that I have started baking , I still havn't tried any muffins so when Sweet and Simple Bakes announced this Jammy Doughnut Muffins I was quite excited !

For the jam, I used the fresh and abundant farmers market peaches as follows :

4 peaches, square cut

1/2 cup sugar

1 tbsp cornstarch

Prep : Let the peach and sugar stew for about 30-35 mins..Dissolve the cornstarch in little water and mix it in the thickened jam. Let cool and store in fridge.

The muffin recipe with my variations for making it eggless :

Ingredients
275g (10 oz) plain (all-purpose) flour
3 tsp baking powder (I made it 2 tsp of baking powder + 1/2 tsp baking soda)
Pinch salt
100g (4 oz) caster (superfine) sugar
2 eggs ( I substituted 3/4 cup of applesauce )
200ml (7 fl oz) milk
75g (3 oz) unsalted (sweet) butter, melted and cooled ( I was running out , so used ghee - clarified butter)
1 tsp vanilla extract (Forgot :( )
12 tsp strawberry or raspberry jam
For The Toping
100g (4 oz) unsalted (sweet) butter
150g (5 oz) granulated sugar
½ tsp ground cinnamon (optional)

You will need 12 hole muffin tin lined with paper cases.

Method
Preheat the oven to 375°F.
Sift the flour, baking powder and salt into a large mixing bowl, and stir through the sugar. In large jug, lightly beat the eggs then add the milk, cooled butter and vanilla extract and beat together. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients stir gently until just combined. (Do not over mix, its fine to have a few lumps in the mixture.) Spoon half the muffin mixture into the base of each paper case. Top each muffin with a teaspoon of jam. Now equally between each paper case, top with the remaining muffin mixture. Bake in the preheated oven for 15 – 20 minutes until well risen, golden and firm to the touch.

For The Topping: melt the butter in a saucepan over a low heat. Spread the granulated sugar in a wide, shallow bowl with the cinnamon if using. When the muffins are baked, leave in the tin for 5 minutes. Dip the tops of the muffins in the melted butter and then roll in the sugar. You can serve these muffins warm or cold; however, I do prefer to eat them whilst warm.

These turned out to be great li'l muffins, not too sweet with a nice sweet-sour gooey jammy interior...and very simple to make...on a saturday morning it didnt take me more than 30 mins to whip this up for a warm breakfast !

Thanks Sweet nd Simple bakes for this nice recipe..