Delectable Endeavors

Grapefruit Curd

Dr. Wells — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 05:23:51 +0000

I’ve been doing quite a bit of baking lately (with pictures to come!). After baking many items that required copious amounts of egg whites, I began to acquire quite the store of egg yolks.

Whats a girl to do with so many yolks? As it turns out, after some googling, I found out the perfect thing to do is make curd!

Curd is an amazing food. It has a soft jelly-like consistency and manages to be both sweet and sour at the same time. You can even spread it on scones! What a wonderful invention. Now, I’ve spent years coveting the traditional lemon curds you find in grocery stores, often covered in a thin layer of dust in the British isle, or something obscure like that. I am not sure why some people consider curd only acceptable for elderly woman at tea time. But you can put it on ice cream, with oatmeal, in yogurt, and in macarons! (soon to be made) Curd is delicate and delightful and if you have not tried it, you certainly need to.

As it turns out, curd is actually incredibly easy to make. I would highly recommend giving it a try if you have some aging fruit and older eggs. I had the perfect companion to the abandoned yolks, an aging grapefruit. So in quite a complementary way, my soon-to-be discarded scraps became delicious grapefruit curd. I love it when cooking turns out that way.

From Good Life Eats

1/2 cup grapefruit juice
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 tablespoon grapefruit zest
1 – 1 1/2 cups sugar
8 egg yolks
10 tablespoons butter, sliced into tablespoons

In a saucepan, combine first 4 ingredients. Heat over medium heat until the sugar mixture reaches a simmer. Make sure all the sugar is dissolved, then turn heat down to low.

Whisk egg yolks until smooth. Pour approximately half of the warm dissolved sugar mixture into the bowl with whisked egg yolks. Vigorously whisk together until combined. Then, pour the combined egg and sugar mixture back into the saucepan with the remaining sugar and juice mix.

Continue to cook over low heat while whisking until mixture thickens and coats the back of a spoon, which should take about 5-10 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in the butter 1 tablespoon at a time.

Cool to room temperature then store refrigerated in an airtight container for about a week.

Soup Sundays – Curried Carrot Soup

Dr. Wells — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 21:10:57 +0000

Along with the Brunch Series, I am starting Soup Sundays. This winter I started making soups on Sunday afternoons. I like to take leftovers, or fresh ingredients that need to be used and make them into a delicious soup – the perfect Sunday night meal for those chilly winter afternoons. I decided to post this little ritual for all of you to share. Not only is making soup a nice, relaxing way to spend the afternoon, but then you have delicious leftovers to eat all week. If you double the recipes you could free some as well.

Additionally, I’m not sure if I have adequately expressed my love of carrots. I do love carrots. They have to be on my top 5 of all vegetable options. Of course, in America, we are often resigned to eating them raw with Ranch Dressing. Gross. I don’t not approve. (Speaking of which, if you have never seen Saturday Night Live’s skit on Ranch dressing, you much check it out here.) There are so many better ways to utilize such a versatile veggie.

Carrots are actually a root vegetable, related to the potato and the dandelion. Which means they are hearty, starchy, and packed with vitamins. It also means there are many, many different types of carrots. Did you know you can actually get a purple carrot? No lie. Check them out the next time you go to the farmer’s market.

I wanted to make a soup that highlighted my love of carrots and their versatility. This soup is a great example of how carrots can rise above Ranch dressing and even complement Eastern spices. In this recipe, I use crushed garlic and ginger because I like how they lend flavor to the soup. I feel as though they permeate the soup better in this form. Of course, you can just as easily substitute minced garlic and grated ginger. I also use finely ground black pepper for the same reason. My favorite is Tellicherry black pepper from The Spice House.

Curried Carrot Soup – A Delectable Endeavors Original

2 Tbl vegetable oil

1 medium yellow onion, finely chopped

4 cups of roughly chopped carrot

4-5 cloves garlic

1 Tbl grated ginger

1 Tbl of your favorite curry paste, or 2 tsp. of your favorite curry powder (I used red curry paste)

3 cups of chicken or vegetable broth

1 14 oz can of coconut milk (I often use the lowfat kind and it works just fine)

1 Tbl lime juice

soy sauce to taste

Heat oil in a dutch oven or other large saucepan. Add garlic and ginger. Saute until fragrant (only about a minute).

Add onions and saute for a few minutes. Add carrots and season generously with salt and pepper. Let cook until they begin to soften.

Make a small space in the middle of the pan and add curry. Let it cook a bit, then mix in the rest of the vegetables. Pour stock over curry and vegetable mixture. Let simmer until all of the vegetables are softened and cooked through.

Add coconut milk and reduce heat to low. Let cook and combine for as long as you would like. When you are ready to serve, add lime juice and soy sauce to taste. Either let soup cool and blend it in a blender, or do what I do and take a hand blender to the pan. I like to leave my soup a little chunky.

To serve, you can reserve a little of the coconut milk and swirl in the soup for a nice touch.

Brunch Series – Vanilla Pear Muffins

Dr. Wells — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 17:49:36 +0000

This is how my morning started. Red pears and coffee, yum. I began my day by peeling pears for this delicious recipe, which is actually quite a delightful, relaxing way to start the morning. Now that the husband and I have some free weekend time, I wanted to wake up and make him a big, delicious brunch. This was the weekend was the weekend for that.

I found a recipe for vanilla pear muffins that I wanted to make for some aging pears I had on hand. Unfortunately, the recipe wasn’t *exactly* what I had hoped for, because they called for applesauce and had no actual pear in them. I changed the recipe slightly to add more of a pear punch by switching the applesauce to ground up pears. I peeled and cored 2 of my own pears and chopped them up in the food processor, which worked great, because there were some little bits of pear that didn’t get pulverized which cooked wonderfully in the muffins. However, if you don’t want to make your own, it is pretty easy to get pear sauce now.

These muffins are not your normal muffins; they are incredibly moist and fragrant. In fact, my husband asked if I was making cookies while they were baking, they smelled so good. The vanilla and pear delicately balance each other and the granola topping adds a nice crunch.

Adapted from The Pastry Affair

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
Pinch of salt
2 large eggs
1 1/2 Tablespoons (that’s correct, Tablespoons) vanilla extract
1 tablespoon lemon zest
1 cup packed light brown sugar
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 cup pear sauce or approximately 2 pears, ground in a food processor
granola, for sprinkling

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, nutmeg, and salt).

In another bowl, mix together the eggs, vanilla, zest, brown sugar, butter, oil, and pear sauce until well combined. Fold the wet ingredients into the dry until just combined. Do not worry about lumps; it is ok to have some in a muffin mix. Distribute the muffin batter evenly between 12 baking cups. Sprinkle granola on top of muffins, if desired.

Bake for 20 minutes, or until the muffin tops are lightly browned and bounce back to the touch. Serve hot or at room temperature.

Brunch Series – Lorraine Egg Souffle with Spinach

Dr. Wells — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 01:07:36 +0000

I am starting a brunch series! That means, I’ll start posting a series of recipes, one by one, that complete a delicious brunch! My first go at this is a delicious brunch of muffins and egg souffle. Add some healthy fruit, and it even LOOKS delicious, as you can see.

This “egg souffle” is actually somewhat like scrambled eggs cooked into a pastry shell. You may recognize these from Panera Bread. It is a flaky, buttery crust with a light, fluffy, eggy filling. It is basically an envelope of deliciousness.

Even though these look very fancy, they are actually very easy to make. They didn’t take too long either. If you were going to make this brunch to impress some friends, you could easily make the muffins a day or two ahead of time, and make these tasty souffles in the morning without breaking a sweat or wasting more than 30 minutes! Although the recipe is only for 4 souffles, you can easily double the batch for company. If you don’t have ramekins, these would be cute in some oven-safe coffee cups.

Adapted from Todd Wilbur’s Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2

4 slices thick cut bacon
1 container of Pillsbury Croissants
2 tablespoons flour, for dusting
5 eggs, divided
5 tablespoons half and half
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon black pepper
3/4 cup swiss cheese, divided
1/2 cup spinach, washed and torn into small pieces
4 tablespoons shredded parmesan

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Spray 4 oven-safe coffee cups or ramekins with non-stick cooking spray.

Place bacon on a microwave safe plate between paper towels (as in plate, 2-3 paper towels, bacon, topped with another paper towel). Microwave on high 7 minutes. Bacon should be nice and crispy. Once bacon is to cool, crumble.

While waiting for the bacon to cool, lay the croissants out on a floured surface (do not separate into triangles). Pinch all the seams together and lightly dust the top with more flour. Roll into a large square (the rolling will help seal the seems). Using a pizza wheel cut into 4 equal size squares. Carefully lay one square into each of the ramekins, using your fingers to press them into the base. You want the egdes of the square with fall out of the ramekin. Let them rest outside of it, you will be placing them on top of the egg filling.

In a microwave safe dish, beat 4 of the eggs with the half and half, salt and pepper. Whisk in 1/2 cup of the swiss cheese, the onion, bacon crumbles, and parmesan cheese. Microwave on high in 30 second increments (stirring in bewteen) until a very runny scrambled egg consistency. It should look like the when it reaches this consistency. You can see there are some spots where it is beginning to cook up, especially around the edges, but overall it is still mostly runny.

Place an equal amount of the egg mixture into each of the ramekins and top with a tablespoon or so of the swiss cheese. Fold the edges of the croissant over on top of the egg mixture (it won’t cover the whole thing, you just want the croissants IN the ramekin, not OUT). Beat remaining egg and brush the tops of the croissant and souffle with it.

Place ramekins onto a baking sheet and bake for 20-25 minutes until golden and puffy. Serve hot. You may remove them from the ramekins or serve them in them.

Happy New Year with Gingerbread Dreams

Dr. Wells — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 02:53:11 +0000

Happy New Year! 2011 brought a LOT of changes for me. I graduated with my doctorate, got married, got my first real job, and moved to a different state. It certainly was a busy one for me. With all that change, the blog got a little neglected, but I’m back with a lot of fun new kitchen gadgets and an arsenal of recipes, so watch out!

Wisconsin has not yet realized it is winter, so we have no standing snow and I haven’t even my pulled out my snow boots. What is January without snow? Saying that, I’m not complaining that it hasn’t been below freezing every day, but as a Midwesterner, I get a little suspicious when I can’t see the white stuff at the start of winter.

One thing that always makes me think of winter is gingerbread. I revel in the earthy, slightly sweet and complex flavor. I embrace the warm, spicy smell of it baking in the oven. You can almost close your eyes and feel the snow softly falling outside while it bakes.

Gingerbread has a wonderful history. I’m sure most readers are familiar with gingerbread cookies, which are little cut out men that are often thin and crispy. This is not the only type of gingerbread, rather this is a type of gingerbread cookie. The other kind of gingerbread is a cakey, quick bread, more like a brownie than a cookie. It originates from Europe, most notably central Europe in countries like Germany and France via Armenian monks. Today, in these European countries, gingerbread is enjoyed in cookie form for gingerbread houses or large cookies worn as necklaces and in cake/bread form as squares or round shapes similar to muffin tops. These are often lightly iced with vanilla or chocolate, and they are fantastic. I have had the privilege of enjoying true German gingerbread, and there really is nothing like it. But this comes close. :)

From Lick My Spoon

Black, Sticky Gingerbread

You can bake this in two 9×5 bread pans to make a loaf or you can cook it in a 9×9 pan for something more similar to a cake or brownie.

1 cup unsalted butter

1/2 cup water

3/4 cup unsulphured molasses

3/4 cup of quality honey

1 cup tightly packed dark brown sugar

3 cups all-purpose flour

1 1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

2 tsp ground ginger

2 tsp ground cinnamon

1/8 tsp mace or nutmeg

1/8 tsp ground clove

3 large eggs, room temperature

1/2 cup milk

1 Tbl packed, grated ginger

Preheat the oven to 325 F. Lightly grease baking pan and line the bottom with a piece of parchment paper that has been cut to hang over two opposite edges by a couple of inches.

Combine the butter, water, molasses, honey and brown sugar in a medium non-reactive saucepan and place over low heat. The most common non-reactive is stainless steel or glass. Stir the mixture frequently until the butter is melted, and all of the ingredients are well blended. Remove from the heat, pour into a large bowl and set aside to cool.

Meanwhile, sift together the flour, baking soda, salt, ginger, cinnamon, all-spice and cloves, and set aside. When the molasses mixture feels just warm to the touch, add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the milk and stir to combine. Fold the dry ingredients into the batter in four additions, using big, long strokes. Don’t be concerned if you can’t get all the lumps out. Stir in the grated ginger.

Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake in the center of the oven for 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 hours for a full pan, around 1 hour for bread pan, or until the top of the cake springs back when touched and a cake tester inserted into the centre comes out clean. Allow to cool for 15 minutes, then, using the overhang of parchment, lift the cake out of the pan and cool completely before cutting.