TWD - Rosy Poached Pear and Pistachio Tart

This week's Tuesday with Dorie is hosted by Lauren of I'll Eat You, who has chosen the alliterative Rosy Poached Pear and Pistachio Tart for this week's recipe.


As you can see, this tart is an absolute feast for the eyes with the contrasting muted green and red, and would be a fabulous centrepiece at a dinner party. It also tastes obscenely good - the pastry cream contains pistachio nuts, which gives it an interesting flavour and texture as well as giving it a green hue, and the pears poached in red wine are tender and flavourful. The caramelised chopped pistachios on top add texture, and their hard crunchiness contrasts nicely with the softer filling beneath.


However, the drawback of making this tart is that it is major production. There are four separate components to make (five if you make the pouring syrup), and two of those components need several hours to chill. I ended up making this tart over 4 nights, starting with making and freezing the unbaked pie crust on day one, then making the pastry cream on day two, poaching the pears, baking the pie crust and caramelising the pistachios on day three, then finally assembling it and making the syrup on day four. Once again, you can't just decide to make this a couple of hours before guests arrive; you need to plan and set aside the time to make the various components and assemble the finished tart.


OK, enough of the analysis. There is only a photo of the finished product in Dorie's book, so I thought it would be fun to show you the step by step photos.


First, here are the poached pears, drained of the poaching syrup:





Aren't they a gorgeous colour? I poached my pears in a bottle of 1997 Mount Tambourine Black Shiraz that I had hoarded for years, then promptly ruined for drinking when the cork disintegrated into the wine on opening.


And here are the pears sliced in half to demonstrate the contrast between the coloured outer pear, which touched the poaching syrup, and the tender but uncoloured inner pear:





This is the pistachio pastry cream; you could choose to strain out the nuts, but I liked the texture that they added to the pastry cream:




These are my caramelised pistachios, which went slightly sticky even after one night:



And finally, here is the finished product, sliced to show the layers:



I made the optional syrup to go with my tart, figuring that any leftovers would be delicious poured over icecream:






I loved this tart, but because of the time intensive nature of this tart and the expense of the ingredients, it won't be in regular rotation here. However, for a special occasion, it is a real winner as an adult dessert.


To see the recipe, go to Lauren's site; and to see how the other TWD members went with this tart and what they thought, visit the TWD blogroll.

The Kitchen Reader - The Warmest Room in the House

November's pick for The Kitchen Reader is The Warmest Room in the House by Steven Gdula. The book's title comes from the author's introduction, where he states that:

My family's kitchen was the warmest room in the house.

It's kind of hard writing this review today, as every room here is the warmest room in the house - our maximum temperature was 35 degrees Celsius, and it is still currently 26 degrees outside (and way hotter inside!).

However, Gdula is not referring to the temperature of his family's kitchen; rather, for him, it was the fact that the kitchen was the room where his extended family came together and stayed together as a family, thereby keeping their traditions and their pasts alive, which made it "the warmest room".

The Warmest Room in the House is a history of the American home kitchen in the twentieth century. It works its way, in chapters divided into decades, through developments and changes in the American home kitchen. Gdula assists readers to understand how the political and social changes which took place inside and outside the home led to corresponding changes in the kitchen. This made Gdula's book an interesting read, despite being purely historical; I would never have imagined that outside events could have such an influence on the domestic sphere of individuals.

The kitchen of the first decade of the twentieth century was often a dark and depressing place where only the servants entered. The labour was hard, and women who did not have servants spent much of their time in the preparation and preservation of food. There were none of the mod cons such as electric or gas ovens and refrigerators, and canning and other means of preserving were important.

During the 1920s, sweets and soft drinks replaced the prohibited alcohol as a means for people to indulge, which was counter-balanced by the fashion for small figures to fit into flapper fashion. It was the decade in which boxed cereal and sliced bread first hit the shelves, revolutionising the way in which people ate, as these were the beginning of "convenience" foods.

The 1930s saw the introduction of many new kitchen gadgets to take the labour out of kitchen chores, such as pressure cookers and sink garbage disposal units. Another important innovation was the gable topped milk carton, because it could be resealed without having a lid.

In the 1940s, the war led to unexpected developments in the home kitchen, as freeze-dried meat, the microwave, Teflon coating and aluminium foil came about through scientific research for defence purposes. Additionally, the stimulus to the economy started by the war effort led to affluence in the kitchen, by contrast to the Depression years of the previous decade.

Further technological developments in the 1950s meant that people could spend less time in the kitchen, and leisure time came into vogue. Bigger families also led to bigger homes with bigger kitchens, and the development of the open plan living area in ranch style house meant that people could interact with family and friends while preparing food. The invention of the modern electric refrigerator during the 50s revolutionised the way in which food was stored. In this decade, the beginning of the long association between men and barbecues also began.

The 1960s began people's awareness of potential food contamination through the very chemicals that were being used to increase yields, such as pesticides, commencing with Silent Spring by Rachel Carson. This led to the birth of the organic food industry. "Non-food" items such non-dairy creamers and artificial sweeteners were invented. The 1960s was also the decade when Julia Child first beamed into American homes, and urged people to ditch convenience foods in favour of cooking from scratch. Weight Watchers and similar organisations were also born during the health conscious 60's.

In the 1970s, as both men and women entered into the workforce in greater numbers and became time poor, technological advances in gadgets (such as the food processor and the Crock Pot) and convenience foods (such as Hamburger Helper and frozen dinners) became popular. People also became more familiar with authentic international cuisine such as Chinese, Italian and Greek.

The 1980s saw the battle of the bulge launch into full swing, as studies showed that Americans had become unhealthy on high fat and sugar laden diets. Diet books and diet foods were all the rage (as they still are today). Poultry and fish became more popular in American diets than ever before. Chickens became easier and cheaper to raise due to scientific advances in disease control, which helped poultry's popularity on the dinner table. Americans also branched out into more exotic international cuisine, such as Japanese, Vietnamese and Thai. Beautification of the kitchen came into vogue in the 80s through Martha Stewart.

In the 1990s, "Frankenfoods" (genetically modified foods) were approved for sale by the FDA, continuing the trend of technological advancements in the kitchen, while at the other end of the spectrum, nostalgia overtook the kitchen, with the re-emergence of the martini and retro-inspired kitchenwares becoming popular. This was also the era when people stockpiled non-perishable foods in preparation for the Millennium Bug which threatened to bite at the turn of the next century. Increases in the price of food during the 90s saw the return in popularity of foods such as the Hamburger Helper, originally developed to help people to save time but which now also helped them to save money by making more of less. The 90s was also the dawn of online grocery shopping - another technological advancement which meant that people could attend to the necessities without ever leaving the house.

Gdula finishes his history of the American kitchen with a short chapter on where the American kitchen may go from here. He concludes with this summation of the role of the American kitchen:

In its recipes we find our past; in the daily preparation of its meals we celebrate the present; and in our desire to share these recipes, meals, and moments with family and friends again, we look hopefully toward a warm and comforting future.

Although I am an Australian, I found Gdula's book interesting, because there are obviously strong parallels between the development of the Australian and the American kitchen, and we have been influenced by similar world events and share many aspects of American popular culture, from television shows through to groups such as Weight Watchers. I enjoyed learning how and why many things that we now take for granted were created, and after reading this history, I am appreciative that I have a modern twenty-first century kitchen rather than a labour intensive turn of the twentieth century kitchen.

Gdula clearly demonstrates how wider social, economic and political issues impacts on the domestic life of all Americans (and of course, everyone). Although The Warmest Room in the House is a history book, it is certainly never dull, and makes interesting reading for foodies and modern historians alike.

Yoghurt Cake with Blueberries

This weekend, I commenced my Christmas baking and preparations in earnest, so I didn't have time for complex side ventures. However, as a simple item that I could take to work to share, I made Clotilde's (of Chocolate & Zucchini) Yoghurt Cake, and threw in a few blueberries for additional flavour.

Clotilde tells us that this cake is the first one that French children learn to make because it is so simple - what's not to like about that? She also accurately describes this cake as fluffy and not too sweet.

I enjoyed my slice of yoghurt cake with a scoop of vanilla icecream:



I own Clotilde's first book, Chocolate & Zucchini, which contains this recipe. It is a beautiful book, and well worth the purchase price. There are plenty of recipes, just like this one, with lovely photographs for each recipe, and a nifty set of conversion tables in the back (which I use all the time for oven temperatures when making American recipes).

Hope you had a great weekend!

Daring Bakers - Holy Cannoli!

The November 2009 Daring Bakers Challenge was chosen and hosted by Lisa Michele of Parsley, Sage, Desserts and Line Drives. She chose the Italian Pastry, Cannolo (Cannoli is plural), using the cookbooks Lidia’s Italian-American Kitchen by Lidia Matticchio Bastianich and The Sopranos Family Cookbook by Allen Rucker; recipes by Michelle Scicolone, as ingredient/direction guides. She added her own modifications/changes, so the recipe is not 100% verbatim from either book.

My cannoli were made according to Lisa Michele's recipe without any changes, given that I really only had a vague idea what cannoli were and had certainly never tried them before. I only made a half batch of shells, using Marsala, and quartered the given ricotta filling recipe, which contained chocolate, orange zest and nuts. The ends of the cannoli were dipped in chopped chocolate and mixed chopped nuts, respectively.

Here is my cannoli dough prior to rolling into submission:

I took the plunge and deep fried my cannoli shells, just as the recipe intended. I am scared witless of deep frying, but I survived intact, despite all of the protesting, popping and spitting from the oil in the pan. Despite my kitchen measuring 29 degrees Celsius on my digital thermometer, I wore a light weight cardigan while frying the shells so that I had some protection for my arms in the event that the pan spat too vehemently and caught my limbs. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to control the oil temperature that well, and some of the shells ended up a little on the dark brown side.

The shells blistered like they were supposed to, which made me feel justified in christening the pasta machine that had previously lived for 5 years unopened on the top of my kitchen cupboard to ensure that my dough was ultra thin. I understand from my research that ultra thin dough is required to obtain blistering of the shells. Here's the pasta machine in action:

And here are my unfilled but fried to perfection (errr - or a little more) cannoli shells:

I am proud that they turned out warty and ugly, just like they're supposed to. And as for taste - well, once filled with ricotta, they were delicious! When I bit into the crispy shell, it shattered and gave way to the moist, smooth filling inside, with a curious combination of flavours and textures that somehow seemed just right.

Thanks to Lisa Michele for being our host this month and introducing me to something entirely new (oh yeah, and making me conquer my fear of the deep fryer). You can get the recipe I used from Lisa Michele's post. To check out the many creative varieties of cannoli dreamed up by the other Daring Bakers, visit the blogroll at The Daring Kitchen.

TWD - All In One Holiday (Mini) Bundt Cakes

Last Saturday night, I attended my high school reunion. It was one of those occasions where, almost until the last moment, I waivered as to whether or not I'd go. I wasn't one of the popular crowd at school, and did some regrettable things from time to time as all teenagers do, so I wasn't sure I wanted to revisit memories that I'd locked up and thrown away the key on.


However, I was brave, and I went. And I am glad that I did. It wasn't the ordeal that I imagined it might be, and dare I say it, I had fun. All that angst for nothing!


Tuesday with Dorie this week is a reunion of sorts, in that I re-made the All In One Holiday Bundt Cake, chosen by our host, Britin of The Nitty Britty.


Having made one large cake last time, I decided to halve the recipe and make mini bundts this time. I used a silicone pan and a metal pan to do this. All of the bundts in the silicone pan stuck, while none of the bundts in the metal pan stuck. Both pans were treated the same, so I am not sure what the story is. However, I do know that I will be sticking (forgive the pun) with metal pans in the future.

As ever, these cakes were delicious - moist, fruity and tangy. It is an absolute keeper of a recipe, and one of my favourite Dorie recipes.


You can check out everyone else's All In One Holiday Bundts at the TWD blogroll. If you'd like the recipe, it will be posted on The Nitty Britty.

Blueberry Lemon Curd Ring

I had a yen to make bread recently, and after flicking through my books, I settled on the Blueberry Lemon Curd Ring on p228 of Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day by Jeff Hertzberg and Zoe Francois.

My effort, pictured above, doesn't quite look like the author's version, which you can view, together with the recipe, on their website.

I'll blame the differences on the fact that my kitchen was pretty hot and steamy and the dough didn't take kindly to being manipulated when it was nearly melting into the tray.

The finished product tasted OK, but personally, I'd like more lemon curd in it. My friend Ruth didn't believe me when I said there was lemon curd in this bread (there is half a cup). I'd also probably chill it before making the slashes, because hot dough when slashed just melts back into the slashes.

If you try (or have tried) this, let me know - I would love to hear your tips. (Have just spotted a few bloggers who made this, including this one - they all look something like mine and not the authors' version.)

TWD - Sugar-Topped Molasses Spice Cookies

This week's Tuesday with Dorie is hosted by Pamela of Cookies with Boys, who has chosen Sugar-Topped Molasses Spice Cookies. Now personally, I find that title a mouthful; however, they are very much like gingernut biscuits. There - now you all know what they are! (Well, as best you can given that they are apparently different in every Australian state.)

The batter for these cookies smelled devine - I wanted to eat it raw, but didn't. And when they were baking - the smell was out of this world! It was a smell to make you feel happy, full of brown sugar and spicy goodness.

I included all of the spices, including the black pepper (which some TWDers balked at), and used treacle instead of molasses.

These cookies tasted oh so good - they were crispy at the edges and chewy in the middle, and were densely caramelly delicious. I ate two while they were still warm - I couldn't help myself! I'd definitely make these again - they are fairly low fuss, although you need to freeze the gooey dough for half an hour before baking.

You can see what all the other TWDers got up to by visiting the TWD blogroll, and you can obtain the recipe for these cookies from Dorie's book or Pamela's site.