Dessert By Candy

Crimson Transformation

Cooking is a transformation of ingredients. It is often a transformation of texture and flavour but most dramatic when appearance is involved. One of my favourite is Italian prune plum. A bit of heat can take the fruit from deep blue purple to an eye-popping shade of red. This quality endears the Italian prune plum as my fruit of choice for making fruit compote, cobbler, and crisp.

Plums are abundant at the market right now in Ontario with an affordable price tag to match. As much as I love working with this fruit, I’m always a little sad to see them because they are one of the last stone fruit of the season. They are a harbinger of autumn harvest which means the days of lazy hazy summer are numbered. It’s hard not to be wistful. However, being sentimental never stops me from celebrating and I celebrated last weekend with a rustic Spiced Italian Prune Plum Crisp from Claudia Fleming’s The Last Course.

Corn Chowder Ought To be Corny

 

Corn is native to Americas and it was a key part of the traditional Mayan diet. In recent years, this summer delicacy has been vilified in media for contributing to the evil Western Diet. I have many friends who simply refuse to eat corn in any shape or form. As for myself, I believe that eating whole food in moderation is perfectly fine. It doesn’t mean I stuff myself silly with processed food full of corn derivatives. But I don’t shy away from corn on the cob, fresh corn salad, nor corn chowder. Especially corn chowder.

Allow me to be Captain Obvious today and state that I want my corn chowder to taste corny. Unfortunately I am often disappointed with sips tasting predominately of cream, bacon, or potato. I want corn chowder that is velvety smooth, hearty, and most important of all, corny sweet. My search naturally landed me at America’s Test Kitchen but even ATK has numerous corn chowder recipes to suit different tastes. Which one to pick?

Suspense Of Being Upside-Down

Unmolding an upside-down cake counts as one of the more stressful moments in my sweet kitchen. The cake pan is ungreased and unlined. The only thing that stands between cake and pan is a thin layer of caramel. I have to place complete trust that the melted butter and sugar would indeed spare my cake from being torn apart when I release it from the pan. This is certainly a suspense I would gladly do without. On the other hand, when the unmolding is successful, the reward is a beautiful mosaic of fruit and caramel and cake. The cake is moist and gooey from fruit juice and caramel sauce. The reward far outweighs the risk of disappointment.

Italian plums and blueberries are both in season now in Ontario and I came to a windfall of both for a song. Cooking really intensifies the tartness and sweetness of these two fruits. My original plan was to make a simple fruit crisp but serving it at the office would be a messy affair. Once my mind zeroed in on using Italian plums and blueberries in a dessert, I could think of little else. My eyes light up at the very mention of them. So when one of my regular reads posted a recipe for Plum Blueberry Upside-Down Cake, I knew I had to make it. Here is where things started to get interesting.

What About That Rumtopf?

The jars of rumtopf that I started back in beginning of summer are coming along nicely. All the berries are accounted for and they are ready for stone fruits. You can see in the photo that there are layers of strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, and Bing cherries. Apricots are going in tonight. I adore these small ones about the size of a walnut with deep pink blush. The peaches are the market are still semi clingstone. It must be a good year for Niagara peaches. Every single one I purchased in the last couple of weeks was honey sweet and dripping with juice. As soon as the freestone peaches arrive, I’ll add some to the rumtopf too.

You may remember that as a measure of risk management, I have four smaller jars fermenting. Two of them contain dark rum and the other two vodka. I could easily distinguish between the two when I first started but now I can hardly tell them apart without taking a whiff. The berries stain the spirit to deep burgundy.

Progression Of Corn

The corn at the market is as sweet as ever but my enthusiasm has waned after feasting on them for the last while. This is not unlike dating a stunningly beautiful woman. Yes, you still find her attractive but her beauty no longer makes your jaw drop. All that is to say I still enjoy summer sweet corn but I’m looking for fun ways to incorporate them into a meal. I had some corn kernels leftover in the fridge this morning though Wednesday being market day, I was keen to get rid of them for fresher ones. This was how my breakfast of corn fritters and Romano bean mole with roasted butternut squash came to be.

The Romano bean mole is adapted from one of my older recipes using ingredients I had on hand. Cooking with fresh shelling beans is a joy because they always come out creamy with significantly shorter cooking time. I made a big batch of this mole last night using butternut squash, swiss chard, and fresh tomatoes. The richness imparted by dark chocolate, roasted almond, coffee, cinnamon, and chipotle in adobo made me want to bottle that sauce and slather on everything I eat.

As Light As Whole Wheat

Baking with whole wheat flour requires some finesse since it’s all too easy to fall prey to heavy leaden texture. I can’t imagine anyone wanting a piece of cake that would weigh you down like a brick. However, the deep nutty taste of stone-milled whole wheat flour can give baked goods a lot of character. How do we harness this taste without sacrificing texture? Dan Lepard’s recent mini-series on traditionally milled flour offers a glimpse on the versatility of such flours and I bookmarked his Whole Wheat Plum Tart with Sherry Cream recipe the minute it was published. This recipe would be perfect for the stone-milled whole wheat flour I received from Kawartha Ecological Growers.

Lepard’s recipe creates a stiff dough that reminds me of cookie dough. Butter is creamed with muscovado sugar and lightened with egg and honey. Whole wheat flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, and cardamom are mixed in just until combined and this dough is coerced into the pan before baking. Italian plum halves stud the top of the dough which turn into jammy pockets of sweet and tart to complement the rustic cake. Despite using 100% whole wheat flour, the teacake is light and moist. A gentle touch with the mixing is important to prevent excessive gluten development which would toughen up the cake. And don’t underestimate that little bit of honey! It helps to keep baked goods moist.

Oasis In O’Hare

Finding a decent meal in airport can be downright depressing. You’re hungry, you’re in a hurry, and you’re spending the next few hours cramped in a small space with people you don’t know. My travel brings me to Chicago O’Hare airport on a regular basis and it’s amazing how the food offering at the terminal has evolved over the years. In fact, I’m quite happy to have a connecting flight via ORD because of the food. Imagine that!

My favourite spot of all is the newly opened Tortas Frontera by Rick Bayless. Located in concourse B next to the McDonald’s (terminal 1 B11), this latest addition to the terminal is my must stop for meal on the go. Made-to-order Mexican griddle-baked sandwich is the attraction here all washed down with fresh tortilla chips, guacamole bar, and selection of agua fresca. The sandwiches are made with bolillo or telera breads and generously stuffed with your choice of protein and complementing accompaniment.

Essence Of Tomato

Slow roasting fruit or vegetable is common practice to concentrate flavour. The long hours of gentle heat evaporate excess moisture so the taste is much more intense. This is a familiar technique I use often in Ottolenghi’s recipes so this week’s tomates confites from Around My French Table is less than challenging to say the least. The fun part comes after the roasting was completed. What to do with those sweet wrinkly tomatoes?

The thought of using the tomates confites as burger topping briefly crossed my mind. After all, I do have some bread and butter pickles ready for action. Hard to believe but I am not in the mood for burgers. An antipasti platter seemed like a wonderful idea to enjoy in the backyard with a glass of wine except I feel a little silly sitting in the yard all by myself. I do like the Italian direction so the idea of making panzanella bread salad with tomates confites instead of fresh tomatoes took hold.

Cook With The Test Kitchen Cast

The last time I made sugar cookies I was a teenager in high school. It was one of those free recipe cards I picked up at the grocery store featuring loads of name brand shortening. It’s no wonder I lost interest in this cookie for so many years. Besides, sugar cookies seem so plain. I am easily distracted by chocolate, nuts, dried fruit, and lately whole grains. I had little incentive to revisit this classic until this week when I saw a new contest hosted by America’s Test Kitchen Feed. The premise for Cooking With The Cast is simple. A feature recipe is selected by a cast member who fills the readers in with his/her tips and tricks. All I need to do is to cook the recipe and submit a photo of my dish. The cast member gets to pick a favourite to be the winning entry. That was how I came to bake my first batch of sugar cookies in over twenty years.

Zucchini Bread Two Ways

Seriously, zucchini bread needs a new publicist. This mildly sweet loaf cake is the perfect accompaniment to breakfast or tea-time cuppa for people who are not into overly sweet treat. And people always ask me to bake things that are not too sweet! Yet, just uttering the words zucchini and bread together can guarantee a reaction of “Ewww! Vegetable? Bread? And you call this dessert?!”. Sigh, this is what you want people. You just don’t know it yet.

It is the time of year when zucchinis take over our gardens and markets. This year, I’m determined to try more unusual takes on the old stand-by. Perhaps you are one of those who know what zucchini bread is but you’re turned off by one too many sugary, dense, gummy slice. Trust me, tasty zucchini bread is not an oxymoron and I’m here to show you two wonderful examples.