Dark Chocolate Cake & Lemon Curd

Week 11 | 4.26.2010

Last week I came across a bag of Meyer lemons at the office. A co-worker had generously brought in her surplus stock from her garden and I snagged a few (more than half-dozen).

Fruit Galettes

Week 10 | 4.19.2010

It is an awkward in-between season for fresh fruit. Whichever fruit (screams) out to me the loudest when I visit the market will make it into these little rustic tarts. Most likely I won’t be able to decide, in which case a variety of galettes will be made : )

Quince Financiers (Friands)

Week 9 | 4.12.2010

There used to be a small European bakery in my hometown that my mom would bring us girls to on occasional weekends. An Indian restaurant has since moved in but I still remember the almond teacakes that we would buy by the piece when we visited, the best I’ve tasted.

Puff Pastry

Pâté feuilletée. Hm, where to begin. Prepare for a wordy post.

Puff pastry is a delicious base for any number of sweet or savory pastries. It’s hard to go wrong when you start off with a pound of butter! Despite its impressive puffy transformation from 1/8″ to inch(es) and the laminating technique of layering butter between the flour-water detrempe, the dough is not difficult to make.

The recipe below is from a one-day pastry class with the owner of La Bedaine, a tiny French bakery-deli-prepared meals shop on Solano Ave. in North Berkeley.

Sun-dried Tomato & Ricotta Vols-au-vent

Week 8 | 4.5.2010

Vols-au-vent, “blown by the wind”. What a playful image. It reminds me of the Dutch phrase Uitwaaien, “walking in the wind for fun,” from the fun language book In Other Words.