No Daring Baking this month

I just did not have the time. I was out of town for a few weeks and then I had some very busy on call weeks.

Click here for the Daring Bakers blogroll to see how the other the other cakes came out.

Tuesday with Dorie, Summer Fruit Galette

Thank you Laurie of quirky cupcake for setting up Tuesday with Dorie. This has been fun and I have made many delicious things that I have never made before. Anyway this weeks recipe I chose this recipe because I like fruit deserts, this is the height of fruit season and this recipe did not have a picture. I went to the Farmers market a few blocks away and got some Apricots. For color I added some blueberries for color. This was an easy recipe, at the rate things are going I will be keeping extra pie crust in the freezer for this. Just defrost and add what fruit you have on hand.

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Just to note chilled pie crust is not a suggestion, you need to have it cold or a cold area to work with. Otherwise it gets very soft and is hard to move to the cooking service. That is what happened to the large one I made. Leaking and tearing happened, Ohh but is tasted very good and did not last the night. My quilt group ate it all. This was not a dessert for looks but the taste more than makes up for it.

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I added the rest of the custard mixture into some fruit and cooked it right beside the galette. It was good. When cooking the custard with fruit the fruit should be one that is not to juicy. I did this with berries, a little liquidy, and peaches, not bad. Depending on the fruit extra sugar maybe a good idea.

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Dorie Greenspan's Summer Fruit Galette
from Baking From My Home to Yours

Good For Almost Everything Pie Dough for a single crust, chilled
2-3 tablespoons jam or marmalade
about 2 tablespoons graham cracker crumbs
Fresh summer fruit: about 10 apricots, 8-10 nectarines, 8 ripe but firm peaches, 8-10 firm plums or 2 stalks rhubarb
Decorating (coarse) or granulated sugar, for dusting

For the Custard
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled
1/3 cup sugar
1 large egg
¼ teaspoon pure vanilla extract
Confectioners’ sugar, for dusting

Getting Ready
Center rack in the oven and preheat to oven to 425 degrees F. Line a baking sheet with parchment (see below) or a silicone mat.
To make it easier to move the pie dough onto the baking sheet, roll the dough between sheets of parchment paper ( in which case, you can use one of the rolling sheets to line the baking sheet) or wax paper or plastic wrap. Alternatively work on a well-floured surface, taking care to keep the dough moving by turning it and flouring the surface often.
Roll the dough into a large 1/8 inch thick circle. Using a pastry wheel or a paring knife, time the dough to a 13 inch diameter. Using a cake pan or a pot lid as a template and the tip of a bunt kitchen knife as a marker, lightly trace a 9 inch circle in the center of the dough- this is the area for the filling.
With the back of a spoon or a small offset spatula, spread some of the jam over the circle- how much will depend of the jam flavor you want. Sprinkle over the crumbs, adding a little more than 2 tablespoons if you think you’ve got particularly juicy fruit. Put a piece of plastic wrap or wax paper over the dough and refrigerate it while you prepare the fruit.
Wipe the apricots, nectarines or plums clean with a damp towel and cut in half; discard the pits. Blanch peaches for 10 seconds in a pot of boiling water, transfer them to a bowl of ice water to cool, then slip off the skins. Halve and pit the peaches or peel rhubarb to remove the strings, and cut into 1 to 2 inch pieces.
Arrange the fruit on the dough, cut side down if using stone fruits, then gently lift the unfilled border of dough up and onto the filling. As you lift the dough and place it on the filling, it will pleat. If you’re not in a rush, freeze the galette for 15 minutes to give the crust a rest.
Brush the dough very lightly with a little water, then sprinkle it with a teaspoon or two of sugar. Bake galette for 25 minutes, or until the crust is brown and the fruit is soft.

Meanwhile, make the custard
Whisk together the melted butter, sugar, egg and vanilla in a bowl; set aside until needed.
Remove the baking sheet from the oven (leave the oven on), and carefully pour the custard around the fruit. Depending one how much juice has accumulated and how much space you have between the fruit, you may not be able to pour all the custard into the galette, but even 2 tablespoons can give the right effect. Pour in as much custard as you can, then carefully return the pan to the oven.
Bake for another 12 to 15 minutes, or until the custard is set- it shouldn’t jiggle when you gently shake the pan. Cool the galette on the baking sheet on a rack for 10 minutes.
Very carefully slide a small baking sheet or cake lifter under the galette and slip the galette onto a rack to cool. The galette can be served when it is just warm or- my preference- when it has reached room temperature. Dust with confectioners; sugar just before serving.

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Good for Almost Everything Pie Dough

For a 9 inch Single Crust

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour

2 tablespoons sugar

3/4 tsp salt

1 1/4 sticks very cold unsalted butter, cut into tbsp size pieces

2 1/2 tablespoons very cold vegetable shortening, cut into 2 pieces

About 1/4 cup ice water

Put the flour, sugar, and salt in a food processor fitted with a metal blade, pulse just to combine the ingredients. Drop in the butter and shortening and pulse only until the butter and shortening are cut into the flour. Don’t overdo the mixing- what you’re aiming for is to have some pieces the size of fat green peas and others the size of barley. Pulsing the machine on and off, gradually add about 6 tbsps of the water- add a little water and pulse once, add some more water, pulse again and keep going that way. Then use a few long pulses to get the water into the flour. If, after a dozen or so pulses, the dough doesn’t look evenly moistened or form soft curds, pulse in as much of the remaining water as necessary, or even a few drops more, to get a dough that will stick together when pinched. Big pieces of butter are fine. Scrape the dough out of the bowl and onto a work surface. Shape the dough into a disk and wrap it. Refrigerate the dough for at least 1 hour before rolling (if your ingredients were very cold and you worked quickly, though, you might be able to roll the dough immediately: the dough should be as cold as if it had just come out of the fridge).

Tuesday With Dorie - Cherry Rhubarb Cobbler

This week on my adventures with Dorie Amanda from Like Sprinkles on a Cupcake selected Cherry Rhubarb Cobbler. In Many ways this was an interesting cobbler recipe. It is like most cobblers but the mix is different. I would not thought of Cherry and Rhubarb together and putting ginger in the topping would have never occurred to me. I only wish that she had cups of fruit listed instead of pounds. I do not have a kitchen scale so I had to guess on how much fruit to use. I have a feeling that I was off.

This cherry pitter that I got a few years ago at Goodwill was a life saver. It only took 10 minutes to pit 3 cups of cherries. I only use it maybe once a year but for only $2 it was a good buy. Rhubarb season is over for now here but I had dehydrated some when they where in season. I rehydrated around a cups worth.

The cobbler came out a little on the tart side. I like it that way but if I was making it for a potluck I think that I would add just a little more sugar and decease the amount of ginger in the topping. The fruit to topping was a little to much on the topping side. It needed more fruit. I made the biscuits as drop biscuits so after it was all together I just dropped the biscuits onto the fruit by the spoonful. I think that I will use this topping for the next cobbler that I make except I might use cinnamon instead of ginger or maybe cardamon.

For more cherry cobbler goodness visit Tuesday With Dorie. Next week I got to chose and I picked the Summer Fruit Galette on pages 366 - 367. So I will see you then.

Tuesdays with Dorie, Mint Chocolate Pudding non dairy

This week Melissa from Its Melissas Kitchen has picked Chocolate Pudding. Well this was the first pudding that I have ever made from scratch. I have always used instant. It was a good pudding. It does need to set in the fridge for the full 4 hours though. I will most likely make this again but in the winter. It was hot to make and made my kitchen even hotter. The skin forms very fast.

Changes made to recipe : I used vanilla soy milk instead of milk, earth balance instead of butter and a non dairy chocolate. When you heat up the milk I added 20 crushed mint leaves and then strained them out when you add the milk to the egg mixture. It gave the pudding a mild mint flavor.

They soy substitutes worked well, you could not tell the difference between this and a dairy version. What is very important though is to use good chocolate. I used Safeway's Organic chocolate chips. It is the to easiest non dairy chocolate to find and they taste pretty good.

For more takes on chocolate pudding check out Tuesday's with Dorie. Some people made it into Ice Cream and there were also some chocolate pies happening.

Tuesdays with Dorie, Double Crusted Blueberry Pie

This week on Tuesdays with Dorie Amy of South in Your Mouth selected Double Crusted Blueberry Pie. This was an interesting recipe because I was debating on whether or not to make this. Blueberries are expensive here and I do not care for blueberry pie. What made me try it was the pie crust, I have not made many and this one was different from the ones I have made in the past. The crust came out flaky and buttery. I liked it. I did have some trouble rolling out the crust. I think that I may have added just a little to much water, it kept sticking to everything. That and it was warm.

I made three small hand pies. for the filling I used rhubarb, I have lots right now, some frozen blueberries and a little bit of sugar. Instead of bread crumbs I used some gram crackers. It soaked up the juice nicely.

For more pies check out Tuesdays with Dorie, some people went and did the coolest things with pie.

Tuesdays with Dorie, Apple Cheddar Scones

Thank you Karina of The Floured Apron, she chose Apple Cheddar Scones for the recipe this week. It came out well and I got to use my scone pan for the first time. I did the butter part the same way I do biscuits. Melt the butter and then add in the other wet ingredients cold. This makes the butter clump up a little bit. Then you add in the dry stuff and plop into the pan and cook as the recipe says. The cheese flavor was very faint put I liked the texture of the apples.

For more scone just visit Tuesdays with Dorie.

Bookmarked recipe Egg Salad with Dill

This week for my Bookmarked recipe is a new one but was very good. Wow, I found an egg salad recipe that I like. Thank you Pages, Pucks and Pantry. I have been trying for a few years. Now I just need a pesto recipe I like. The only thing that I changed was to use less mustard and cut out the onions. This recipe is going into my recipe book.

Tuesday with dorie will be a little late

I went to make it this morning and the only cheese that I had was very moldy. So this will happen after work today.