Showing posts with label marcel proust. Show all posts
Showing posts with label marcel proust. Show all posts
1.4.11
whee!
filmcraft is being featured on baking is hot today! thanks & kissed to pattycake and of course to our muse, marcel proust!
27.3.11
a small piece of cake
oh my. i don't know why i was worried, because madeleines are a (small, shell-like) piece of cake to make. i ended up going with the larousse recipe, partly because the lebovitz didn't seem like it would make lots (none of the recipes included info on the final output) and also because my computer, which lurks around the dinner table generally, had been put away in expectation of guests. i did incorporate the lebovitz tweaks that i remembered, namely beating the eggs and sugar together first, and chilling the batter and mold. i still have some batter in the fridge actually, and since lebovitz says to chill for "up to twelve hours" i should be good to bake some more.
here are the three remaining madeleines which have yet to be gobbled, reclining in the last rays of the afternoon sun:
and a snap of the fabled "hump" which some worry is difficult to attain:
(i love that photo; makes it look fairly majestic i think.)
and while we're at it, a snap of some pretty flowers and mostly-gone chocolate gateau a l'ocean:
the rillettes were not so pretty to look at, but super yum to eat on home-made bread as well as being super easy. and trout remoulade is always delish. all in all a success i'd say!
madeleines
4 large eggs (i did not weigh them, but will hazard a guess that's about 9 oz)
9 oz sugar
9 oz soft flour (aka cake or pastry flour - not self-rising)
9 oz unsalted butter, melted
pinch salt
zest of a lemon
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
grease and flour a madeline mold, chill.
beat the eggs and sugar together until tripled in volume.
gradually add flour and fold in gently with spatula.
gradually add melted butter and flavourings and fold in gently with a spatula.
chill batter for an hour or two. pre-heat oven to 425F.
spoon dollops of batter into molds. it will be thick, it's almost like making a drop cookie. the temptation is to overfill the molds, but you don't need much more than a tablespoon.
bake for about 10 or 15 minutes. allow to cool in the mold on a rack before trying to slide them out. it is so much easier to get them out once they've cooled. i find the best way to get them out of the mold is to press gently with both of my thumbs against the flat end of the madeleine, and slide it along the same direction as the grooves of the shell.
makes about 3 dozen.
here are the three remaining madeleines which have yet to be gobbled, reclining in the last rays of the afternoon sun:
and a snap of the fabled "hump" which some worry is difficult to attain:
(i love that photo; makes it look fairly majestic i think.)
and while we're at it, a snap of some pretty flowers and mostly-gone chocolate gateau a l'ocean:
the rillettes were not so pretty to look at, but super yum to eat on home-made bread as well as being super easy. and trout remoulade is always delish. all in all a success i'd say!
madeleines
4 large eggs (i did not weigh them, but will hazard a guess that's about 9 oz)
9 oz sugar
9 oz soft flour (aka cake or pastry flour - not self-rising)
9 oz unsalted butter, melted
pinch salt
zest of a lemon
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
grease and flour a madeline mold, chill.
beat the eggs and sugar together until tripled in volume.
gradually add flour and fold in gently with spatula.
gradually add melted butter and flavourings and fold in gently with a spatula.
chill batter for an hour or two. pre-heat oven to 425F.
spoon dollops of batter into molds. it will be thick, it's almost like making a drop cookie. the temptation is to overfill the molds, but you don't need much more than a tablespoon.
bake for about 10 or 15 minutes. allow to cool in the mold on a rack before trying to slide them out. it is so much easier to get them out once they've cooled. i find the best way to get them out of the mold is to press gently with both of my thumbs against the flat end of the madeleine, and slide it along the same direction as the grooves of the shell.
makes about 3 dozen.
26.3.11
mmmadeleines
so this is the weekend i thought i'd get a little french. tg's father has returned from cape town via maputo, lusaka, and dubai, so we are having a little get-together that is totally non-france-related, but if i'm doing the hosting and the cooking, it is only fair that i get to choose! so we are having poached trout (easy) with remoulade sauce (easy), a couple of salads, some cheese (my beloved bresse bleu among others), olives, baguette, and gateau chocolat a la ocean.
all of which i have done before. but the new things i am keen to try are rabbit rillettes (i love nothing more than the rillettes of rabbit with pistachios and prunes at chez bernard in st-sauveur-des-monts) and madeleines. the rillettes seems fairly straight forward: pop the ingredients in a braiser for a few hours, then mash a bit (modern recipes say to pull apart the meat with a fork, the larousse gastronomique insists it must be punded in a mortar). but madeleines are meant to be tricky.
larousse is typically vague on technique. they offer two versions, commercy and plain, with the commercy recipe adding lemon zest and baking soda but containing less butter. basically, the gastronomique says to put everything but the butter in a bowl, "work with a spatula until smooth," then add the butter. one crucial difference between commercy and plain? one is baked "in a very slow oven," the other at 375F.
david lebovitz, on the other hand, cooks them even hotter and makes a big fuss about chilling the molds and chilling the batter and insists that added leavening is sacrilege - all the lightness comes from whipping the eggs and sugar together first. sort of the opposite of the gastronomique; i can't imagine "working with a spatula" would get a terrific amount of air into anything. and as the "plain" recipe looks a lot like a pound cake batter, i imagine they would be quite stodgy.
the other big difference is that the gastronomique recipes make between 2 and 5 times as many madeleines, at a guess.
i think for this weekend i will stick with the hand-holding lebovitz (but perhaps doubling the quantities), and mess with the gastronomique recipes on a less momentous occasion. the gastronomique may not be terrifically user-friendly, but any encyclopedia that offers a 5-page section entitled "restaurants of bygone days" will always have a place on my shelf.
all of which i have done before. but the new things i am keen to try are rabbit rillettes (i love nothing more than the rillettes of rabbit with pistachios and prunes at chez bernard in st-sauveur-des-monts) and madeleines. the rillettes seems fairly straight forward: pop the ingredients in a braiser for a few hours, then mash a bit (modern recipes say to pull apart the meat with a fork, the larousse gastronomique insists it must be punded in a mortar). but madeleines are meant to be tricky.
larousse is typically vague on technique. they offer two versions, commercy and plain, with the commercy recipe adding lemon zest and baking soda but containing less butter. basically, the gastronomique says to put everything but the butter in a bowl, "work with a spatula until smooth," then add the butter. one crucial difference between commercy and plain? one is baked "in a very slow oven," the other at 375F.
david lebovitz, on the other hand, cooks them even hotter and makes a big fuss about chilling the molds and chilling the batter and insists that added leavening is sacrilege - all the lightness comes from whipping the eggs and sugar together first. sort of the opposite of the gastronomique; i can't imagine "working with a spatula" would get a terrific amount of air into anything. and as the "plain" recipe looks a lot like a pound cake batter, i imagine they would be quite stodgy.
the other big difference is that the gastronomique recipes make between 2 and 5 times as many madeleines, at a guess.
i think for this weekend i will stick with the hand-holding lebovitz (but perhaps doubling the quantities), and mess with the gastronomique recipes on a less momentous occasion. the gastronomique may not be terrifically user-friendly, but any encyclopedia that offers a 5-page section entitled "restaurants of bygone days" will always have a place on my shelf.
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