Archive for August, 2009
That's not for Pépito! – Green tea, coconut, and almond bouchées
Aug 26th
Ca, ce n’est pas pour Pépito! – Bouchées au thé vert matcha, à la noix de coco et poudre d’amandes
I just adopted the most adorable white parakeet and named him Pépito (named after some chocolate cookies in France when I was growing up called Pépito, they were cookies covered with milk chocolate and all the kids were going crazy for them)…so Pépito must have flown away from a cage somewhere and ended up on my stairs, good thing I found him….because he could have been the happy breakfast of the neighbor’s cat! So here it is, Pépito has been adopted.
I was reading that those little birds need a quite balanced diet, not only made out of seeds but also with vegetables, fruits, greens and other type of food humans eat. He eats from my hands now, and sits on my finger, but he is still afraid, if I move to quickly, he freaks out and flies away. So I happily got up this morning and prepared him a nice mixture of honey, corn flakes, cinnamon, peach, sesame seeds and millet…he stared at it for a while but did not touch it. I tried to made him accustomed to that mixture but nothing worked, so I gave up and was trying to find on the web what do those birds like, other than millet seeds. It seems like they love a bunch of mixtures, but apparently not mine.
So in the middle of my parakeet menu thoughts, I decided to make something for my tea time, and went for those green tea bouchées. Bouchée means morsel, those are so small that they can fit in any size mouth. I will share them with Pépito, if he ever decide to stick his beak in there, but I doubt it.
I don’t know why I am not crazy for green tea as a drink, I know it’s full of anti-oxydants but I its bitter flavor in the drink bothers me, but I love green tea flavor in desserts. Matcha green tea has been quite popular in France recently, probably because Japanese cuisine has been on the top of the trend for restaurants. Paris has tons of them now (something never thought of 10 years ago) and even Nancy my home town which is a town of about 300,000 inhabitants has three of them! the French are not too keen on raw fish, so I am stunned they’re starting to go crazy for Japanese food.
Those bouchées are great with a cup of strawberries and cream, with some mint tea, or just as is. They’re easy to prepare and to bake, overall time is 25 min!
Ingredients for 12 bouchées
- 2.8 oz (or 80 g) butter
- 1.7 oz (or 50 g) white unbleached flour
- 3.5 oz (or 100 g) powdered sugar
- 2 1/2 tsp matcha green tea powder
- 2.7 oz (or 75 g) almond powder
- 3 tbs coconut flakes
- 1 egg
- 1 egg white
- 1/3 tsp of baking powder
Preparation
Pre-heat oven at 365-370F.
Cut butter in pieces and melt butter slowly in a small pan. Do not melt until the butter turns brown.
In one container, mix flour, sugar, green tea powder, almond powder, coconut powder and baking powder. Mix well. Incorporate egg and egg white. Add butter and mix the batter to obtain an homogenous paste.
Place in individual mini molds (I used silicon molds, that I can’t get enough of) and bake for about 15 minutes, check to see if they’re cooked around that time and continue baking if they’re not cooked in the middle.
Vegetables inside and out – Carrot tagliolini with zucchini-walnut pesto
Aug 26th
Verdura fuori e dentro – Tagliolini di carote con pesto alle zucchine e noci
More on the homemade vegetable pasta chapter… I am in my Italian cooking phase, I left French food aside and going back to my roots. Playing with pasta is a lot of fun. I love making homemade pasta, and having my hands in flour. Kneading the dough, relaxes me, it’s like a therapeutic anti-anxiety session. So I guess it’s better than taking Xanax!
I Found my pasta machine after searching for an hour, it was stuck at the bottom of a drawer, hidden with hundred of other kitchen utensils. I did not feel like using rolling pin (mattarello) this time, the beet tagliatelle were quite time consuming and I did not have time. Making those carrot tagliolini took a lot longer than when making regular pasta with plain flour and no vegetable, because the dough was somehow soft, due to the carrots and the water they contain. So I had to add flour constantly to prevent dough from sticking.
I’m not sure how to translate tagliolini in English, maybe angel hair? I think angel hair are thinner than those. My grandma used to make tagliolini in a tomato broth and we would eat them in a soup-based consistency. Tagliolini are a typical traditional pasta, larger than capellini but narrower than tagliatelle. When made fresh, they cook fast and usually they’re served with light sauces.
If you have a regular pasta machine (I have an Imperia one), it comes with that particular cut, it’s the thinner one (the other one is the tagliatelle cut). If you make the pasta with rolling pin, it needs to be about 2mm large
Zucchini pesto is quite tasty with a lighter texture than regular pesto since it mostly contains zucchini, you can slightly taste the flavor of zucchini which tends to be bland, but enhanced with basil, and parmesan.
Ingredients for 4
For the pasta
- 3 cups white flour + more flour
- 2 eggs
- 200g pureed carrots
For the pesto
- 2 zucchini
- 3 tbs walnuts, chopped
- 3 tbs freshly grated parmigiano reggiano
- 2 garlic cloves
- 10 basil leaves
- 3 tbs olive oil
- salt and pepper
Preparation
For the pasta
Cook carrots in water until well cooked all the way through. Drain, let cool and puré with a potato masher, or a mixer so that you get a smooth and thin cream. Place in a mixing bowl, add flour, egg and mix to get a homogeneous dough. Remove from bowl and start kneading on a flat surface. At this point, you might need to constantly add flour, so that dough does not stick to the working surface. Proceed like you would make regular pasta sheets with your pasta machine.
For the pesto
Cut zucchini in medium size pieces. Place in a blender with the other ingredients and blend to a medium consistency. Adjust with some additional olive oil if the pesto is a little thick and blend a little more.
Cook pasta in a large pot of salted boiling water for one minute and drain. Toss with pesto and serve hot.
A close cousin has just arrived – Whole wheat orzotto with shrimps, sea scallops, fennel, radicchio and herbs
Aug 24th
Un cugino è appena arrivato – Risoni integrali con gamberi, cappesante, finocchio, radicchio ed erbette
Orzo in the US, is that tiny pasta shape like a bird’s tongue, orzo in Italian means barley, so when I just arrived to the US, I got confused. Now since I am in the US, I will try to use american names so that people don’t get confused either. I have known orzo to be a cereal whole my life, in Italy they use it even as a drink, caffè d’orzo, it’s basically a powder like the instant coffee, you add hot water, dilute it and you get a cup of dark drink that somehow tastes like coffee and has no caffeine. It’s an alternative to coffee.
My mom used to make me soups with this pasta when I was a child and called it “bicca” meaning “seed” in her local dialect, they’re called Risoni in Italian (riso = rice, big rice grain).
Anyway going back to the other orzo, the pasta-orzo, in this dish I cooked it like risotto, coating it with olive oil, then adding broth and white wine gradually. You can also cook pasta this way. The water is absorbed gradually and pasta gets all the flavors of the stock.
I love this dish, it’s healthy, flavorful and very delicate and an alternative to risotto, if you want once in a while get some whole wheat grain in your diet and still be fully satisfied with your meal, this would be be perfect. I love risotto, a well-made risotto is heavenly but sometime I just want some whole wheat grains.
Ingredients for 2-3
- 1 cup whole wheat orzo
- 12 shrimps with shell and heads on
- 2/3 cups small sea scallops
- 1 shallot, chopped
- 1 carrot
- 1/2 onion
- 3 cloves
- celery stick
- 2 cups water
- 1/2 cup dry white wine
- 1 tbs fresh tarragon
- 12 mint leaves
- 6 large basil leaves
- 2 tbs parlsey
- 1 tbs fresh oregano
- 1/2 fennel, finely diced
- 1 cup shredded radicchio
- 1 tbs olive oil
- salt and pepper
Preparation
Start making the stock. Place 3 cups of water to a boil and add all the herbs, the fennel, the radicchio, let cook for 2 minutes. Remove from the water and drain. Chop the herbs finely and set aside.
Add carrot, celeri stick, stick cloves inside the onion, and add to the stock. Peel the shrimps, head and shell and add to the stock, reduce until you have about 2 cups of stock. Let it simmer for about 30-40 minutes, adding a little water if the water evaporates.
When the stock is ready, drain and keep the liquid.
In a pot, heat olive oil, add shallot and let it brown. Add risoni, coat them with olive like you would for a risotto. Add a little stock and wine, stir until the liquid has evaporated, and add continue stiring and adding stock and wine.
10 minutes before the orzo is almost cooked, add sea scallops and 9 shrimps cut in pieces, leave 3 or 4 for decoration. Stir well and cook until the seafood is cooked all the way through. Add the herbs, radicchio, fennel mixture. Stir well and let rest for about 5-7 minutes. Drizzle with olive oil and serve very hot.
A few mousses in a layer or two – Mascarpone mousse with raspberries and strawberry coulis imitation tiramisù
Aug 22nd
Delizio in un bicchiere – Mousse di Mascarpone con lamponi e coulis di fragole alla Tiramisù
At this time of the year, I am either in Italy or France with my family and right now I tend to get nostalgic…it’s cold, foggy and windy in San Francisco, and I wish I were home. When I get homesick, I start cooking things I make when I am over there. I love to use mascarpone in all kinds of desserts, it’s a wonderful cream, not sure I would call it cheese though, anyway it does not matter, what matters is all the wonderful recipes you can make with it.
It’s certainly not to be snobby but if you get mascarpone, please try to get the imported one, not domestic. The domestic mascarpone is thicker, more yellow and more rubbery, so your mousse will not be as fluffy. I think when it has to do with tiramisù, I tend to be very “purist” in the sense that I hate to see tiramisù with whipped cream, I don’t know why it’s just one ingredient that I don’t want to see in tiramisù, therefore will not call this tiramisù, even if it looks like one. Yes, sometimes as far as food is concerned, I can be strange.
I had some extra mousse so I made an additional little verrine…banana, pear and vanilla. You can use any other fruit, but I just had those two left and the good thing is that they are two fruits that mix really well together. You can add some chocolate coulis after the layer of fruits.
Ingredients for 3-4
- 1.5 lb strawberries
- 1/2 lb raspberries
- 1 pack lady fingers
- 1/2 lb (or 250 g) imported mascarpone
- 2 eggs
- 3/4 cup heavy whipping cream
- 3 tbs powdered sugar
- 2 tbs granulated sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- juice of 1 orange
- 2 tbs sweet wine (like Marsala, Pinot des Charentes, etc…)
Preparation
Wash and cut strawberries, add granulated sugar and cook at medium heat for about 15 minutes until the strawberries are cooked but not over mushy and that they have produced a deep red juice. Drain and keep the juice aside. Let cool.
Add orange juice, marsala, and vanilla extract to strawberry juice, mix well.
Separate yolks from whites. Beat yolks with powdered sugar until the mixture whitens and double its volume. Add mascarpone and mix thoroughly. Beat egg whites to a thick consistency, and until they start peaking. Fold carefully to the mascarpone mixture. Whip the cream and add to the egg/mascarpone mixture.
Deep lady fingers in the strawberry juice. Deep long enough so that they absorb enough juice. Place at the bottom of a deep dish or a glass. Add a layer of cooked strawberries, then add fresh raspberries. Proceed with another layer of mascarpone cream, and start again with another layer of lady fingers, straberries, raspberries and cream. Decorate with fresh raspberries, and/or powdered chocolate or any other pretty item.
Place in the refrigerator for 2 hours and serve.
The little trendy appetizer – Pear crumble with roquefort cheese and hazelnuts
Aug 20th
La petite entrée à la mode – Crumble de poires, roquefort et noisettes
Crumbles are quite trendy in France right now, I think anything with an anglo-saxon name is… Last time I was there, I noticed a few American items such as muffins, crumbles, brownies, cookies, (not to mention hamburgers au MacDo, that’s the way the French call McDonalds), but let’s just forget about McDo for now. Funny how McDonlads are all over France but never really made it to Italy that much and I’m really glad about that.
I was reading an article on Le Monde the other day and it seems like there is a new trend in France and real need for gourmet and organic fast food items that are going to compete with McDonalds and I am so glad that they want to change the traditional fast food concept into a better and more nutritious way of eating. Hopefully soon, you could eat sur le pouce (on the thumb) when you don’t have time to eat and still enjoy healthy and tasty food. Many chains are opening with famous chefs being involved in the food preparation. Let’s see what happens on that end…
We have seen the combination of pear and blue cheese before in many recipes….but I really like it and it’s been very popular anytime I served it, so even if this combo is not a top creation, it’s quick and delicious. I used to make tarts with gorgonzola and pear, salads, etc…so why not a crumble? If you don’t like the sweet twist of the pear, you can use spinach, greens, potatoes, etc… It’s a perfect little appetizer, that goes wonderfully with a simple frisée salad on the side.
I used individual ramequins, you can use a larger dish, individual ramequins make a nicer presentation but it’s not necessary. If you are using an indivdual ramequin, half pear would be enough, if not count one pear per person.
This is very easy but more so quick to prepare, so if you have unexpected guests, it would be perfect, you can put it together in less than 10 minutes and enjoy your evening. Now you might not have roquefort cheese waiting for you in the fridge, but any blue cheese would work. I used the British stilton before and it worked fine.
Ingredients for 4
- 4 pears, peeled and sliced
- 4.2 oz (or 120 g) roquefort cheese, cubed
- black pepper
For the crumble topping
- 4 tbs wholewheat flour
- 5 tbs plain bread crumbs
- 1 1/2 tbs hazelnuts, chopped (or pistachios)
- 1 egg
- 2 oz (or 50 g) butter
- a little salt and pepper
Preparation
Place pear slices in a deep dish or ramequins. Add roquefort on top and add pepper.
For the crumble topping, beat egg. In a mixing bowl, add flour, bread crumbs, hazelnuts, egg, soft butter. Mix well.
Place crumble topping on the roquefort and cook for about 15 minutes. Remove from the oven and sprinkle with additional chopped hazelnuts. Serve hot.
One unexpected gratin – Gratin with spaghetti squash, potatoes, tomatoes, gruyère, parmesan and basil
Aug 19th
Un gratin inattendu – gratin de courge spaghetti, tomates, pommes de terre, gruyère, parmesan et basilic
Now I know that this might be a little too much of spaghetti squash in just a couple of days. I was not planning on writing a blog about it, I took the pictures, just in case…then after eating almost all of it by myself, I figured it was definitley blog “worthy” and I have to say it’s my favorite spaghetti squash recipe. I had quite a lot of extra squash left from the pancakes, and certainly did not want to throw anything away. I was taught not to throw food growing up, and I rarely do. I still have some squash left, but I promised I will not write another blog about it.
Vegetable gratin are every French basics. They come in all colors, shapes and form. One thing in common they have cheese in it, actually almost all of them, the real potato gratin, le gratin dauphinois has no cheese in it (although a lot of people do put cheese, but the “purists” will grind their teeth at the though of cheese in gratin dauphinois).
I absolutely love this gratin, and I recommend it to anyone who likes spaghetti squash.
Ingredients for 2
- 300 g cooked squash (approximately)
- 3 riped tomatoes, peeled, seedless and cut in small cubes
- 3 medium size potatoes
- 2 tbs basil chopped
- 2 tsp fresh thyme, chopped
- 2 garlic cloves, crushed
- 1/2 onion (optional)*
- 4 tbs Gruyere cheese, grated
- 4 tbs Parmigiano Reggiano, grated
- salt and pepper
- 2 tbs olive oil
Preparation
Cook potatoes in boiling water until tender but do not overcook them, they will cook more in the oven.
Add a little oil at the bottom of a deep dish, slice potatoes and lay them flat in the dish, add salt and pepper. Add another layer of spaghetti squash using half of the squash. Add garlic, basil thyme, tomatoes and cheeses, salt and pepper. Sprinkle with olive oil. Proceed with another layer of the same ingredients, ending with cheeses at the end.
*You can add onion fondue and add the onions after the potato layer. You have to cook onion at medium heat in olive oil until they’re translucent. Add a tsp of balsamic vinegar.
When you’re done layering the gratin, press firmly with your hand on the surface to remove any air in between the layers. That way, when it’s cooked it will stand and not collapse.
Cook in a pre-heated oven at 370-375F for 30-40 minutes until the top is golden brown. Serve hot as a side dish or as is with a green salad.
For a Sunday brunch…or not – Mouillettes with heirloom tomato salad, rucola and pancetta wrapped yellow carrots
Aug 17th
Pour le brunch du dimanche…ou pas – mouillettes avec salade de tomates, roquette, et carottes jaunes roulées à la pancetta
In France we don’t have something called brunch, we either have breakfast or lunch. Brunch is an Anglo-saxon concept, and I like it.
There is a restaurant in Sausalito (San Francisco North Bay), called Le Garage where I really like to have my brunches on Sunday, it’s facing the marina and has a huge outside patio, they serve really good mouillettes with prosciutto and asparagus.
Mouillette in French means a small and long piece of bread you dip in oeuf à la coque. Oeuf à la coque literally means Egg in its shell, implying with soft yolk. If the yolk is hard, then it becomes oeuf dur (hard egg). The English translation I found for oeuf à la coque is boiled egg, but I don’t think it’s really that accurate. Oeuf à la coque is a part of every French kid childhood and I remember mine with those two eggs waiting for me on the kitchen table before I would leave for school in the morning.
What’s great about mouillettes is that you can add any side dish you like and make a great brunch with all kinds of combination you like.
I found the cutest mini yellow carrots at the Berkeley Bowl and had to buy them, so then ended up wrapped in pancetta, not a bad way to end. You can also use asparagus instead of carrots, they’re great too, or serve it with thinly sliced prosciutto, you can use your imagination and combine ingredients you like.
Ingredients for 2
- 4 eggs
- 2 heirloom tomato
- 2 cups rucola
- 6 small yellow carrots
- 6 slices pancetta
- rock salt
- Kosher salt and pepper
- 2 tbs olive oil
- 1/2 tsp balsamic vinegar
- parmigiano reggiano shaved
- Grilled baguette cut in 3 inches long sticks
Preparation
For the eggs
Place eggs in a pot of water, start counting 3 minutes from the time the water starts boiling. Remove from pot (it’s better to cook the eggs at the end).
For the carrots
Boil carrots in water, when cooked wrap one slice of pancetta around, add pepper and place under broiler until all sides are grilled.
For the tomatoes
Cut tomatoes in small cubes, add olive oil, toss and sprinkle with rock salt and pepper
For the salad
Sprinkle rucola with olive oil and balsamic vinegar, a little salt, and shave some parmesan on top.
Serve each item in a large plate, dip your mouillettes in the egg and enjoy!
Pink and pinkier – Pink beet tagliatelle with leek and Taleggio sauce
Aug 16th
Rosa e ancora più rosa – Tagliatelle rosa alle rape rosse con salsa ai porri, taleggio e pinoli
I have many friends who don’t like beets, they have an earthy taste that can be unappealing for some. I have been thinking for a long time to play with pasta dough, and make some colorful pasta, but I wanted something colorful and pretty, in the pinkish tint, and to get a pink color, beets are perfect, their deep red juice can color anything. My pasta machine being somewhere I cannot find, I used my mattarello (or matterello it depends on the region) (rolling pin) and went back to the basics.
I prefer pasta rolled with a rolling pin, you get a grainy texture that you don’t get with a pasta machine, therefore the sauce gets absorbed much better and pasta is really deliciously perfect. Now rolling the pasta with a mattarello (rolling pin) can get tricky if you have never done it, so if you don’t have the right rolling pin and never done it before, I recommend using the pasta machine.
Taleggio is a cheese from Northern Italy (it belongs to the stracchino category of cheeses), it has a distinct and nutty flavor, quite aromatic that I also like to eat with bread. It’s an ancient cheese and its origins can be traced up to year 900. If you cannot find Taleggio, you can use gorgonzola, its flavor is stronger but mixes well with beets.
You can use pre-cooked beets, I always find them at Trader Joe’s if I don’t have time to cook them. You can also buy the uncooked one if you have plenty of time and cook them in water for about 40 minutes.
If you don’t want to use all the pasta, you can put the extra on the refrigerator for up to two days.
Ingredients for 4
For the pasta
- 15. 87 oz (or 450 g) flour
- 7 oz (or 200 g) cooked beets, pureed
- 2 eggs
- 1 tbs olive oil
- one pinch of salt
For the sauce
- 3 large leeks, chopped
- 1 garlic clove, crushed
- 4 tbs Taleggio (or gorgonzola), cubed
- 5 tbs parmigiano reggiano, grated
- 2 tbs heavy cream
- 2 tbs pine nuts (optional)
- 2 tbs olive oil
- salt and pepper
Preparation
Puree the beets in food processor. Set aside. Place flour in a mixing bowl, make a hole in the middle, add beets, and gradually add eggs, a pinch of salt and olive oil. Start kneading the dough, adjusting the flour if necessary, dough needs to be hard enough and not sticky. Knead the dough for about 10 minutes. Form a round ball and place in a plastic wrap for about 30 minutes and let rest.
Cut the dough in about 4-5 pieces, add flour if it is a little sticky, flatten it and start rolling the pasta with the pasta machine. I will post a detailed instructions soon on how to make pasta. La pasta fatta in casa, as they would say in Italy. When the pasta has been cut, it needs to dry a little bit, I would let it dry for about 30 minutes. Most of the time, I don’t let it dry, but for this particular types of pasta with beets, the dough tends to be softer than regular plain pasta, so you might need to let it dry longer.
Heat olive oil in a pan, add one garlic clove, add leeks, salt and pepper. Cover and cook leeks at medium heat. When cooked, remove from pan. Add taleggio, and let it melt slowly, add cream.
Start bringing a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add pasta, when the pasta comes to the surface, after 2-3 minutes, drain and add to the pan with cheese. Add leeks, parmesan and pine nuts. Mix carefully and serve hot
Spaghetti squash got squashed – Pancakes of spaghetti squash with feta and oregano
Aug 15th
On a écrasé la courge! – Galettes de courge spaghetti à la feta et origan
I love galettes, or pancakes, or anything that has vegetables in it and that looks like a flat crêpe. Spaghetti squash is a great vegetable to prepare yet not very popular. You can make so many different dishes and in so many different ways. Besides, its texture and aspect are very interesting. I used to serve this squash as a vegetable dish, in its shell, then I got tired of it, and figured, it can be prepared like zucchini.
Strangely enough, I have never seen it served in any restaurants…I don’t know why it’s not popular among chefs. Now I am wondering if chefs who own restaurants do come up with menus with specialties they really enjoy preparing or if the completely adapt their menus to the tastes of the local population. Probably a combination of both. Nevertheless, I think that especially in America, where people are more open to new flavors and cuisines due to its melting pot of nationalities, people can easily be “trained” to new flavors and concepts. It is more difficult in Europe, especially France and Italy where everyone is still attached to local traditions and cuisines and are two countries with ancient and reputable culinary history.
Those pancakes have little egg and little flour, so as any vegetable pancake, they tend to be a little soft in the middle, this is not a fritter so don’t expect them to have to consistency and texture of a fried dough. One spaghetti squash will be enough to make about 20 pancakes.
Ingredients for 6 pancakes
- 10.6 oz (or 300 g) spaghetti squash (1/3 of a whole squash)
- 1 egg
- 3 -4 tbs flour
- 3 tbs feta cheese
- 2 tsp fresh oregano, chopped
- 1/3 tsp chili flakes
- salt and pepper
- 1 tbs olive oil
Preparation
Start cooking spaghetti squash. Cut in half lenghtwise and wrap in aluminum foil, don’t leave any hole, the foil needs to be well sealed. Cook for about 1h30 min in a 400F pre-heated oven. Check once in a while to see the squash is a little soft but not too soft. If you cook the squash too long, it will be filled of water and you won’t be able to get the spaghetti strands out of it, therefore won’t be able to make those pancakes.
When cooked, remove the seeds, and remove the spaghetti-pulp with a fork. Place in a container.
In another mixing bowl, mix egg with flour, salt and pepper, to form a thick dough, if the dough is too liquid, add flour.
Add chili flakes, oregano, salt and pepper to the squash, mix well. Add egg/flour mixture. Mix with well, and at the end add feta cheese. Mix using tip of your fingers not to break the feta, you want to keep some chunks.
Heat olive oil in a pan, and spoon one large tbs of the mixture in pan. Cook on both sides, at medium size heat. You might need to adjust heat not to burn the outside of the pancakes but still brown them and cook them inside.
Serve hot with a salad, or as a side dish.
A small je ne sais quoi – Ricotta cake with honey, raisins, cranberries, candied orange, and spices
Aug 15th
Un petit goût de pain d’épices qui me plait bien – Gâteau de ricotta au miel, raisins secs, oranges confites et épices
This has been something that arrived out of the blue after a crazy wedding weekend…ricotta is an ingredient I like to put everywhere, and I love it particularly in desserts.
On my last trip to France, I bought a pain d’épices spices mix. I have wanted to make pain d’épices for a long time, it literally translates to “spiced bread” and is a wonderful and spicy cake from Alsace, my neighboring region. The base of the cake is honey and lots of spices, it has a dark brownish color, and is quite sweet. Kids love it. Even though you can find many variations to the cake, the city of Reims has its own, the city of Dijon as well. In Alsace you can find a Pain d’épices Museum that retraces the history of that cake with all the tools developed for its fabrication.
I would certainly not call this cake a pain d’épices, but it does have a few important ingredients that pain d’épice has such as the spices and the honey, so there is an after taste of pain d’épices. The spice mix I used is composed of star anise, cinnamon, cardamom and clove. Since I don’t like cinnamon that much, I did not add too much, but I know that Americans are very fond of that spice, so whoever likes it can add more if desired. For those who won’t have the spice mix available, I would just use the loose spices powder.
The ricotta made this cake very moist and soft and the spices are not overpowering, so it turned out really well. To be enjoyed with a nice hot cup of tea a bowl of fresh fruits or whatever you feel like having.
I added Mirabelle liquor which is something I brought from France, my dad makes it with our mirabelle plums he grows in his garden. You can find it I think in some specialty liquor store in the US. You can use other fruity liquor as well, such as calvados, Grand Marnier, etc…
Ingredients for 6
- 3 eggs
- 4 tbs honey
- 6 tbs light brown sugar
- 1 cup ricotta
- 1 cup white flour
- 1/3 cup quinoa flour
- 5 tbs vegetable oil
- 1 tbs dried cranberries
- 3 tbs golden raisins
- 2 tbs candied orange zests
- 2 tsp pain d’épices spices mix or (1/2 tps cinamon, 1/2 tsp cardamom, 1/2 tsp clove, 1/2 tsp star anise powder)
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- zest of half a lemon
- 1 tbs herbal liquor (I used Mirabelle, a liquor made out of plums)
- Powdered sugar to sprinkle on top
Preparation
In a mixing bowl, mix eggs, sugar, honey then add ricotta. Add oil. Mix well. Add liquor. Add flour and baking powder and baking soda. Mix well. Add spices, lemon zest, and dried fruits. Mix well to get a smooth consistency.
Bake in a non-stick deep dish, in a 375F pre-heated oven for about 45 minutes, check after 30 min. to see how the cakes comes along, and keep cooking or until the cake is cooked all the way through.
