Category Archives: Recipes (Sweet)

Cocoa-Marzipan Pound Cake For the Ages

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Cocoa-marzipan pound cake to wind down the year with.

I’m not ready for Christmas nor for the end of 2009.

But I’m ready for cake.

Is it me or has this year just raced by at hyperspeed?

It feels like it should be May or July at the very latest, not December, for gosh sakes.

I remember how when I was little, summer dragged on forever — but in a good way, of course. Now, hours and days zoom by, and before I know it, I’m planted squarely on a new calendar page, wondering how I got there and how the dates have already filled up so fast when I’ve barely taken a breath.

It may be a cliche that “Time flies when you get older.” But I’m feeling the years when I think 2009 is almost over — day by day disappearing, just like that, with nothing I can do about it.

That’s why I need cake.

The recipe makes enough to share.

To be sure, cake is always welcome. At least in my world.

With one forkful, it recalls the past with candles, frosting, party hats and chirpy, sing-song wishes. And it beckons the future with its sweet promises of good tidings to come.

Cake makes time stand still, at least for a moment, as we sink our teeth into something airy, festive and special that makes everything else around us disappear.

I can’t stop 2009 from coming to a close all too soon.

But I can give you cake that will make time slow to a welcome crawl long enough for you enjoy a nice, thick slice.

”Cocoa-Marzipan Pound Cake” is such a cake. It’s by esteemed pastry chef and blogger, David Lebovitz, and it’s from his book, “The Great Book of Chocolate” (Ten Speed Press).

It contains one of my all-time favorite baking ingredients: almond paste, which gives it a lightness and delicacy not found in most denser pound cakes.

Look at the color of this cocoa powder.

It also contains one of my new favorite ingredients: E. Guittard Cocoa Rouge. You can use any unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder in this cake. But when I spied this so-called rare red cocoa powder at Sur La Table, I just had to fork over $8 for the 8-ounce can to take it home to play around with.

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Giving Thanks for a Non-Pie Pumpkin Dessert on Thanksgiving

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A pumpkin dessert that's not pie.

I love all things pumpkin — except pie.

Forgive me my idiosyncrasy with this hallowed squash.

Many of you already know I won’t ever turn down pumpkin bread, pumpkin cheesecake, pumpkin muffins or any savory pumpkin dish. But if pumpkin pie comes to the table, I’d just as soon pass. I think I find it just too dense and one-dimensional.

Yet, I still enjoy the autumn taste of pumpkin and I know it rightfully deserves a place on the festive Thanksgiving table.

That’s why I’m always elated when I find a lovely pumpkin dessert recipe that is not pie.

“Crema di Zucca” or “Creamy Pumpkin Custard” stars pumpkin in the form of creamy, smooth individual puddings that get dolloped with whipped cream and boozy golden raisins.

The recipe is from one of my favorite cookbooks, “Dolce Italiano” (W.W. Norton & Co.) by Gina DePalma, pastry chef of Babbo restaurant in New York.

Cream cheese, mascarpone, and egg yolks give the batter luxuriousness and a fluffier texture than pumpkin pie filling. Pulverized crystallized ginger gives it a special little kick.

The golden raisin compote gets its sweet, grown-up taste from orange juice, sugar, butter and rum.

The custards bake in a water bath, then are chilled before serving.

The original recipe calls for chilling the custards for at least four hours, before inverting them onto individual plates. Try as I might after that allotted time, though, I couldn’t get my custards to release from the ramekins.

The custards after being baked, then chilled overnight.

I conferred with DePalma via email, who noted that at the restaurant, they actually chill the custards overnight. She thought that might make them firmer and easier to remove from the ramekins.

So I waited overnight, and tried again. And what do you know — it worked this time. The custards were indeed firmer. I ran the tip of a knife around the edge of each custard, then let the ramekins sit in a bowl of very hot water for a few seconds, as DePalma also had suggested. Then I placed a small plate over a ramekin, turned it over, and gave it one big shake, which helped release the custard onto the plate. Voila!

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A Profusion of Pears and Spices

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Autumn pears star in these cheesecake-like bars.

That’s just what you’ll find in these creamy-dreamy “Pear Cream Cheese Bars with Macadamia Nut Crust.”

They’re potent with ground ginger, cloves, cinnamon and coriander — a whole teaspoon of each. Whoa!

The fact that they’re so spice-heavy shouldn’t come as a surprise — not when the recipe comes from a cookbook with the name, “The Spice Kitchen, Everyday Cooking with Organic Spices” (Andrews McMeel) by Sara Engram and Katie Luber with Kimberly Toque. Engram and Luber have their own line of spices. And Toque was an assistant test kitchen chef at Lawry’s.

My friends who sampled the bars found the amount of spice overwhelming. I didn’t mind the pronounced flavor, except that it did make it very hard to actually taste the pears in these treats.

Next time, I think I would cut the amount of spice in half, which is how I’ve adapted the recipe below. Feel free to cut the spice amounts even more if you prefer.

The bars have a great interplay of textures — a crisp, nutty cookie foundation, then an almost cheesecake-like middle, followed by slices of fresh pears, and a quite sweet, thick layer of crunchy streusel on the very top. The flavor is reminiscent of a heady pear spice cake in a whole different guise.

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An Autumn Apple Treat

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A crust to bring tears to your eyes. And a filling with a secret ingredient.

We all know it’s what’s on the inside that really counts.

But boy, what’s on the outside sure can titillate, thrill and work us into a frenzy, too.

Oh, come on. You know I’m right.

Take this “Open-Faced Apple Galette with Quince Paste.”

What attracted me in the first place to this recipe from Flo Braker’s “Baking for All Occasions” (Chronicle Books) was what was inside. After the rectangular galette emerges from the oven with its filling of sliced apples, walnuts, sugar, cinnamon and allspice, it cools just until you won’t burn your fingertips. Then, you carefully slip tiny pieces of sweet, deep, rose-colored quince paste between the apple slices.

The quince paste, which you can pick up in the cheese section of any well-stocked grocery store, not only adds color, but a brighter, more complex autumn flavor to this wonderful rustic dessert. I loved the interplay between the sweet-tangy, tender apples (I used Pink Lady ones) and the sticky, gooey sugary quince with its subtle acidic note.

The recipe calls for Golden Delicious, but I used Pink Lady apples.

Yes, I loved the inside. But boy, let me tell you about the outside, too.

It’s a beaut.

Braker, who lives in Palo Alto and has been teaching baking for 35 years, sure knows how to put together a crust.

If there ever was such a thing as a perfect crust, this could be it. It’s very buttery, so crisp it shatters when a fork cuts through it, and so multi-layered flaky that my husband thought it nearly bordered being puff pastry’s more svelte cousin.

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You Won’t Believe How Much Ginger Is In This Scone

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Tender, cakey ginger scones to start your day with.

You all know by now that I have a thing for ginger.

Big time.

So when I spied this recipe for “Ginger Scones” in the Los Angeles Times’ food section last year, it was only a matter of time before I made these lovelies.

They tempted me with their 1 cup of diced crystallized ginger, and their 1/2 pound — yes, you read that correctly — of fresh ginger.

Just how much fresh ginger is that exactly? See that pile below? All of that — yes, indeedie — went into making a mere 10 scones.

A whole lotta lovely ginger.

Don’t let that scare you. It may seem like a lot of ginger, but I promise that your throat will not be ablaze. This is no four-alarm bowl of chili. This is far more nuanced and measured. It’s subtle heat that merely tickles.

The recipe comes from Chef Hans Rockenwagner, who bakes these scones at his Rockenwagner Bakery in Los Angeles and 3 Square Cafe + Bakery in Venice.

The scones bake up crisp on the outside. The interiors are not crumbly like traditional scones, but more tender, moist and cakey in texture. Bite into one, and you get the sugary-tingling hits of candied ginger immediately, followed by a warm, soothing, noticeable yet surprisingly moderated burn of fresh ginger at the every end.

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