French night

We really worked for this one, completing a record five recipes in the one night. Really getting through the cookbooks here. We've cooked from around 40 (maybe a third of the way there).

Unfortunately we couldn't make it to our friend Mark's birthday dinner at Eau de Vie.  So we invited him and a few others around for a dinner party on Friday night.  We have a few theme menus up our sleeves so we gave him the option of French or British.  Being a man of distinction, Mark of course chose French.

On the French menu was Croque Madame from Bill Granger Everyday, Lyonaisse Terrine from Professional Charcuterie, Canard de l'Orange from Classic French Cooking, Gratin Dauphinois from the Pleasure of the Table and Saint Honoré from The Art of French Baking.

Painstakingly placing what seemed like the smallest potatoes
in the worldin to a pretty arrangement (not just on the top layer either!)

A lack of foresight meant that Thursday night after work was spent making Veal stock (which would be the start of the sauce for the canard de l'orange), the Lyonnaise terrine and preparing the dauphinois potato.  This all meant that our Friday was slightly less frantic.

 

Always been a big fan of anything small (or big for that matter) so the Croque Madame's made with baguette and quails eggs were a hit in my eyes.

Canard de l'orange -A really tasty dish.  Full of butter -we all felt our arteries tighten a little that night. Probably has something to do with the book being published in the 1970's (a simpler time before calorie counting and low GI).  The food styling was our attempt at replicating the glamorous over the top vibe of the book.  It looks a little amateur, but I can assure you the taste far exceeded the look -and that's what really counts right?

The birthday boy with his Saint (dis)Honore cake.

   
Verdict:
1. Croque madame -We made as canapes with quails eggs and sliced baguette for our arriving guests.  They went down a treat.  Everyone likes mini stuff though!
2. Lyonnaise terrine -Pork, veal and chicken livers encased in crepinette.  Great textures and flavours.  We served it with toasted challah and some homemade chutney.
3. Gratin dauphinois -The decision to use kipfler potatoes was a bit of a time kill, but it looked great! Surprised by the lack of cream or any kind of liquid in this dish. 
4. Canard de l'orange -The hero of the night.  We made 2 for ten people.  It could have been significantly less, it was so rich that only a small amount was needed.  The flavour of the sauce amazing, but seeing a pound of butter being casually whisked in was not.
5. Saint Honore -A few melt downs over the choux pastry ring, the saint honore cream and the overall presentation but everyone seemed to enjoy it.  It was the perfect ending to a night of excess.
Would we make this again?:
Yes, maybe, yes, yes with half the butter and yes to get it right.

Pierre Herme "The Picasso of Pastry"

This is a new addition to our book shelf since the challenge has begun.  To say that it's made it to the bookshelf is a bit of a lie, it's still open on the table at the ready for us to flick through and drool over the marvelous creations.  You may remember that an all out ban on cook book purchases was placed on our household, but how could we resist when we heard Pierre Hermé was bringing out a new book? One pre-order and Pierre Hermé Pastries was at our doorstep a couple of weeks later - it's all too easy this day in age to be a cook book addict!

Needless to say, we want to cook A LOT from this book.  He takes classic recipes from around the globe, explains the history behind it then goes ahead and creates a new and glorious recipe inspired by the the first.  We found it hard to pick just one, but Brittney decided our first recipe would be the Apricot and Hand of Buddha Financier which was baked for a workmate (Alainnah) on her birthday.

There were a couple of deviations from the recipe
1. We couldn't locate any Hand of Buddha for its zest (this has now moved up the ranks on the list of trees we would like to buy for our garden). 
2. The search for apricots was fruitless (excuse the pun) so we substituted apricots for plums.

A baked financier made with burnt butter, plums, chopped almond and sugar syrup. The almonds caramelized the top and this was decorated with a caramel mascarpone cream and some toffee pieces - delish!

Verdict: Yum, the mascarpone caramel was amazing, well it was all good. It did have a bit of a slide around in the top box of the Vespa, so it didn't arrive to work like this, but it's all meant to be about the flavours, right?

Would we make this again?: Yes, before the mascarpone was added to the caramel it was mouth watering, add a couple of teaspoons of salt and we think we have found the perfect salted caramel, jar it up and maybe it may give Burch and Purchese Salted Caramel a run for it money. This is on the Easter's holiday to do list.

Crossing the Ditch, a Milestone Event

Going global this weekend, the butcher, baker and tea towel maker went off shore and took their cooking challenge with them.
We headed to New Zealand for my Grandma's 90th surprise birthday, and there wasn't a more perfect occasion to bake one of their amazing creations from Momofuku Milk Bar by Christina Tosi.

We had to withstand New Zealand oven conditions (although anything can be better than our crappy oven) and a double recipe, but the task was set.

Carrot cake is one of Grandma's favourite, so we chose the layered carrot cake - but this just isn't any carrot cake. I wouldn't say any recipe in this book are too difficult as such, but when the recipe involves 5 different components, there is 5 more chances that something could go wrong. But not here my friend, this cake was a huge success.

The bits:
Carrot cake, Liquid Cheesecake (half baked cheesecake, so still spreadable), Graham frosting, which a graham crust had to be made first (we used digestive biscuits), and a milk crumb.

Triple layer carrot cake, with layers of liquid cheesecake, a biscuit frosting, and
milk crumb.

The cakes fate is in Troy's hands.

The stack:
Cake, Cheesecake, Crumb, Frosting, Cake, Cheesecake, Crumb, Frosting, Cake, Frosting, Crumb!
What's that? 11 layers of love!

Frozen overnight, and refrigerated 3 hours before serving.

We blew up 90 helium balloons prior to the arrival of Grandma, including a few
chipmunk impersonations.

90 balloons were let off by all great grandchildren and grandchildren, lets hope there were no planes flying over.

The cake in question - Happy Birthday Gram!

Verdict: It was well worth the time to make, and a bit of a show stopper. Was it the recipe or my baking skills?
Would we make this again?: If you are getting comments "this is the best cake I've ever tasted - ever!", I wouldn't pass up that praise any day. Maybe for Grandma's 100th!