Cilantro?

Yesterday, I happened to read this post on the Food 52 blog. This blogger's cilantro chocolate chip cookies made it onto their 'what's in' list. It was like a compulsion or a dare, I couldn't not try them. I followed her recipe for basil verbena cookies, replacing those herbs with cilantro. (It was easily veganized: I just left out the egg and added a little water and cornstarch).

I couldn't let the cookie dough rest as long as it should have: it rested for about 3 hours in the fridge. And the verdict? Delicious. The cilantro added a mild but zippy mintiness. Overall, though, I think I might prefer actual mint. I might try basil next time, as in the original recipe.

Croissants

These are sourdough croissants made with homemade vegan butter. They worked out pretty well (though they're nowhere near as impressive as their inspiration, txfarmer's gorgeous ones). They're much better than the last time I attempted vegan croissants.

The annoying thing about the recipe is that it asks for a 3 hour final rise at 26C. I couldn't see how to make that happen and still have them ready for breakfast, so I left them at cold room temperature (15 - 17C) for about 12 hours, and then put them near the oven as it preheated. They definitely rose a lot in that time, but they weren't (as the recipe puts it) 'soft and jiggly', so maybe they were slightly underproofed. 

The vegan butter behaved nicely for the encasement step, but I was a bit worried about the first turn after it had a rest in the fridge for an hour. I think the butter was too firm: it seemed to crumble as it folded. The final dough looked like pie dough, with specks of butter, which didn't seem quite right. I wonder if it would be better to let the dough rest at room temperature for 20 minutes between turns, as in Peter Reinhart's recipe.

Cauliflower inarizushi

Dinner: 'inarizushi' filled with cauliflower rice, plus dolmades, over salad greens.

The cauliflower rice was half a cauliflower, pulsed in the food processor, plus one carrot, likewise, plus sesame seeds, salt and liquid from the can of inari wrappers. The dolmades were from a can, and were a sort of jokey last minute addition to fill out this meal.

I read that there are various options with inarizushi: you can use plain rice, sushi rice or sweet rice (okay, cauliflower) like I did here. I think I might prefer sushi seasoning over the sweet version.

Also, it should be noted that Inari herself, as the goddess of rice, would be very unhappy with these cauliflower imposters. I'm not sure how foxes would feel about them.

Catchup

Good things I ate (or drank) in the second half of 2014:

From Vedge, Broccoli Rabe Philly Style (seriously bitter homegrown broccoli rabe [which I cut with gai lan to tone it down a bit], roasted red capsicum, porcini mayo)

 Pizza and roasted cauliflower at Pizza Domenica in New Orleans:

 Birthday/journal acceptance cake (Chocolate/root beer):

Asparagus pizza:

Enchiladas Especiales Tacuba style (wish I'd had poblanos; made do with green chillies and used rehydrated yuba sticks as chicken, and cashew cheese)

Pasta with a pureed caramelized onion / nutritional yeast sauce and cubed smoked tofu:

Pumpkin and pecan pie(s):

Home brewed saison:

Smoked carrots

I made this dish from Vedge: spiced little carrots with chickpea sauerkraut puree. It's a play on a reuben -- the carrots are roasted with a spice mix inspired by Montreal-style smoked meat. I smoked the roasted carrots (10 minutes, then left in the smoker box until cool). It was really nice. Unsurprisingly, the leftovers made a good sandwich.

Pok Pok

This was a great dinner courtesy of Pok Pok. Maybe I should say 'inspired by', because I did a lot of veganizing and lazifying to the very precise recipes.

It's a cucumber salad in the style of papaya salad, with coconut rice and grilled eggplant salad. We also had (not pictured) some flavored tofu with this -- I was inspired by the recipe for Khao Man Som Tam (papaya salad with coconut rice and sweet pork). The combination of the cucumber salad, rice and sweet tofu was superb -- I kept making myself perfect little bites with a bit of each on my fork. The coconut rice in particular was the best version I have ever made: the secret is coconut cream instead of milk, and a bit of sugar. (Who'd have thought adding extra fat and sugar would make something taste better?)

For veganizing, I replaced fish sauce and dried shrimp with a healthy dose of toasted and ground tua nao. I didn't have a mortar and pestle for the cucumber salad, so I just bashed everything a bit in a bowl.

Hazelnut dacquoise

I made this hazelnut dacquoise to go into a fancy cake. These two layers were sandwiched into the middle of a vanilla cake, layered with a cooked vanilla frosting. (I think a mousse would be better, but this cake was for a frosting-lover.)

I used my recipe for meringue, and added some ground hazelnuts. (I was inspired by this recipe for peanut dacquoise.) I think I might've overbaked them a bit -- next time I might do closer to an hour rather than an hour and a half. In the finished cake, the dacquoise tasted fantastic and added a really interesting texture. It didn't soften as much as I expected -- this is where I think that baking for a shorter time might help. Anyway, overall the verdict was: delicious!

UPDATE: Bake for 1.5 hours, then turn off the oven and leave them in there until completely cool / overnight. After being in the oven overnight, they had started to soften slightly. Once in the cake, layered with frosting/mousse, they softened completely. Perfect!

Dacquoise:

120 g water
100 g caster sugar
pinch of cream of tartar
vanilla
2.3 g versawhip 600k
1 g xanthan gum
1.2 g agar powder
1 cup hazelnut meal

1. Mix everything but the vanilla and hazelnut in a pot and bring to the boil. (I seem to remember some problems with clumping, so hit it with the stick blender if need be.)
2. After it's boiled for a little bit (activating the agar), take it off the heat and add vanilla.
3. Whip the mixture (using a stand mixer) until you have a thick foam. It should form a large blob on the whisk when you lift the mixer head.
4. Fold in the hazelnut.
5. Draw circles the diameter of your cake on parchment paper, and split the dacquoise mixture accordingly. I was making a small cake (about 18cm/7 inch), and made two circles. The dacquoise spreads out as it cooks -- you end up trimming them to get them back to the right size.
6. Bake at 130 C (275 F) for at least an hour. When they are done, they should have taken on some colour, and will be dry to the touch but still soft. [UPDATE: Bake for 1.5 hours, then leave to cool in the turned-off oven.]
7. Let them cool. Trim to the appropriate size. Eat all the offcuts.
8. Layer into your cake with frosting/cream/mousse. Let it sit for a while before you serve -- the idea is that the frosting softens the dacquoise a bit, making it deliciously chewy.