Valencia: Orange, Chocolate and Nut Entremets, wonderful recipe from chef Sadaharu Aoki

As I told you that I'm crazy about chef 青木 定治 (Sadaharu Aoki) right now ^^, but his recipe is not easy to find (I told you already that he has only 2 baking books). I still want to try more recipe from him.

Home Made Orange puree

It's hard to find in my country, but it's not hard to make. Boiling the whole orange for a long time will erase the bitter taste from the peel, without being bland.

Brown sugar Chestnut Pound Cake: Delicious cake with natural taste

  I opened my cupboard and saw a bag of steamed chestnut, I wondered what I planed to do with it at the first place. Something's fancy or something's easy, with a bag of it there are a lot possibility.

Pistachio Macarons: To you my sister!

The last time that my sister came to visit me was not a right time for me. After I took her (and her family) to Pattaya, I got a cold and had to stay at the hospital for a week.

Red Velvet Cupcake: Cute cupcake, to put a smile on your face.

Red velvet cupcake is cute ^^, and the look of it always bring a smile on people face (well some of them are surprised, haha). The bright red color of the soft and moist cake, and the light chocolate flavor make this cake many people favorite.

Green tea Dacquoise: Delicious sandwich cookies

For my sister, she loves everything with the buttercream, ^^. So, after I decided to make the butter cream  from "................................" I need something to accompany it, haha. 

Actually, my sister asked me why don't I use the Matcha macaron from the same book, I have to say that I want to try  "Green tea Dacquoise" from the book ................... too. Because my friend once told me that it tastes so good, I must give it a try. But I have so many things to try, haha. So it took me a long long time, until I'm ready to make this one.
The Dacquoise can be used as a cake layer, or as a cookies on its own ^^ (the amount of the ingredients will be different, depends on the texture of the dacquoise that you want). Mostly it made from egg whites, sugar, icing sugar and almond. The one that I made this time, seems like a rustic kind of macaron (in my own opinion, hehe) but it's a lot easier to make and it gives you more mouthful feeling and less sweet than macaron too.
You can add many kinds of flavor into the dacquoise batter, or in the buttercream, with your imagination, the variety that you can create is endless.
This time I had a chance to use my dacquoise mold, that I got it for almost 2 years by now, haha. I already told you that I love to collect all the kitchen gadgets and equipment, but I don't want to keep it "I want to use them ALL!" But if you don't want to  buy the mold , just pipe your dacquoise into a disc, it will be great too. 
The dacquoise will be done when it's puff, soft on the inside and firm on the outside, don't bake it too long or it will be hard. Finally I did it, the Green tea Dacquoise, and if you ask me is it as good as my friend said, I have too say, "very good!", now it's your turn to try it too ^^.

Green tea Dacquoise 

Makes 16-18 pairs

Green tea Dacquoise
180g ................................ Almond powder
80g .................................. Icing sugar
10g ................................... Green tea powder
40g .................................. Superfine sugar
2g ..................................... Egg white powder
200g ................................ Egg whites
.......................................... Icing sugar for dusting 
Green tea buttercream
300g ................................ Any kind of butter that you like (You can choose from this page, I use La crème au beurre)
10g ................................... Green tea powder


Preheat the oven to 180°C.
Line baking sheet with baking paper or silicone baking liner.
Sift almond powder, icing sugar and Green tea powder, together twice.

 Make French meringue by whipping the egg whites, egg white powder until foamy then add the superfine sugar. Whip until glossy, stiff peaks form.

 Fold the almond mixture into the meringue. 
Put the mixture into a piping bag with large nozzle.

Pipe into 3.5cm disc or in Dacquoise ring.
Dust with icing sugar twice.
Bake for 15-20 minutes.
Let them cool completely.
Make the green tea buttercream by beating the green tea powder into the buttercream.
Sandwich the dacquoise with the buttercream, and refrigerate until ready to serve.

Green tea Dacquoise: Delicious sandwich cookies

La crème au beurre

This one is very good, the taste is not too sweet and not too rich, well I love it that's all ^^.

La crème au beurre

Makes  about 600 g

43g .................................. Egg yolks

182g ................................ Sugar

73g .................................. Milk

300g ............................... Unsalted butter

50g .................................. Egg whites

1tbsp ............................... Water

 Mix egg yolks with 82g of sugar and bring the milk to boil.
Pour the milk into the egg yolk mixture, stirring all the time.
Heat the mixture over low heat, stirring all the time. until the temperature reaches 82°C.
Pour the mixture into large bowl, let it cool completely.

 Beat the butter into the custard base, until fully combine.

Make the Italian meringue using 100g of the sugar and 1tbsp of water (see how-to here).
When the meringue cool mix in the butter and custard mixture, beat until fully combine.
Add the flavoring of your choice.

Chicken Farm Baker's Project # 40 : Play me please!!, Pâte à choux, Éclairs Forêt Noire

 It's not easy for me to create anything fancy at this moment, well, there are a lot of bad news on the television, so I'm not in a happy mode -*-.

Anyway, life goes on, we can't stop anything by ourselves, give other people a hand when you can, it's the most important thing that you can do at this moment. My family bought a lot of drinking water, food and some clothes and send them to the people who face (and still facing) with heavy flood, it's the best thing that we who still live a normal life can do. 
So for this month, Chicken Farm Baker's Project # 40 : Play me please!!, Pâte à choux. I felt like I lacked of an energy to make it. Well, like every month I have a lot of idea and a long list. Pâte à choux is very interesting, making it is different from other kinds of the pastry, it's a cooked flour mixture with a lot of egg! I once read that the Pâte à choux will be very good if you can add as many egg as you could into it. So you can see that when making the pastry, we need to stir the flour mixture over the heat to dry it and when the batter become dry, it can accept a lot of egg too.
Baking it is quite tricky too, the key is to make it puff up as much as it can and dry it until it holds its shape. I choose to use high heat at first part of baking and reduce the heat to dry it, but you can go on with lower heat (180°C) and bake longer than me. Remember that don't open the oven door until you're sure that the choux start to hold its shape or your choux pastry will collapse in front of your eyes.
  Actually I really think about making the Choux Pastry Mille feuille, by using the Pâte à choux instead of puff pastry but I really can't concentrate. My aunt came to stay with me because her house has a fat chance to be under the water too, so she watches the news on the TV all the time and and it makes me concern too.  

So finally, I choose to make something easier "Éclairs Forêt Noire", it's a simple éclair with a new filling idea and lovely decoration. It's a mixture of  Pâte à choux, Crémeux au chocolat, cherries, Crème chantilly, and some chocolate decoration. 
Because I made this for my niece too, so I skip the kirsh, but you can add it if you like, by mix 10ml of it into the Crémeux au chocolat after mix in the chopped chocolate. 
If you love chocolate and like black forest cake, this éclair will be a great idea to try ^^, and I hope that you will love it too.

Éclairs Forêt Noire

Makes about 15 pieces 

 Pâte à choux
160ml ................................. Water
3g ........................................ Sugar
70g ...................................... Unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
3g ........................................ Sea salt
15g ...................................... Milk powder
90g ...................................... Bread flour (or all purpose flour)
3 ........................................... Eggs (about 160g)
Egg wash
1 ............................................ Egg mix with 1tbsp of water 
Crémeux au chocolat
110g ..................................... Dark chocolate (70%), chopped
150ml .................................. Milk
160g ..................................... Whipping cream
3 ............................................ Egg yolks
15g ........................................ Sugar
½ tsp .................................... Vanilla paste
Filling
200g ..................................... Dark cherries in heavy syrup, drained and cut into small pieces
Crème chantilly
190g ...................................... Whipping cream
10g ........................................ Icing sugar
Decoration
500g ..................................... Dark chocolate, tempered and cut into 13x3 cm pieces
............................................... Chocolate curls



Preheat the oven to 200°C
Sift the flour and set aside.
Line the sheet pan with baking paper.

 Bring water, butter, salt and sugar to a boil. Add the milk powder and bring back to boil.
Remove from heat, add flour all at once, blend well, stir vigorously with a wooden spoon until mixture no longer sticks to pan and forms into a ball. Reduce heat to low and return pan to stove, beating for 3-4 minute Remove from heat. Whisk in eggs one at a time (a little at a time, you might not need all of them).

When the batter is smooth and glossy, test with your finger, you will be able to stretch it.
Fill a pastry bag with the pastry and, using a 2.5cm star nozzle, squeeze the pastry to make 12.5x 2.5 cm éclairs on to the prepared baking sheets allowing space for them to rise separately.
Brush with egg wash.

Bake for 20minutes  then lower the heat to 180°C and bake for another 15-20 minutes or light and holds its shape.


 Make Crémeux au chocolat:

Whisk the egg yolks, sugar and vanilla paste together in a small saucepan, boil the milk and cream, then slowly whisk it into the egg yolk mixture.
Put the saucepan over low heat, stir all the time and heat until 82°C.
Take the pan off the heat and stir in the chocolate, stir until melt.
Place some Clingfilm over the surface and chill until required (the Clingfilm will prevent a skin from forming)


Fill the éclairs:

Use a 8 mm nozzle to cut small holes under the éclairs.
Push the cherries into the holes, about 6-8 small pieces per 1 éclair.
Filled with Crémeux au chocolat and chill in refrigerate.


Decorate:
Make Crème chantilly by whipping the whipping cream with icing sugar.
Pipe small amount of the Crème chantilly over the top of the éclair and place 1 piece of the chocolate on top of it.
Pipe the Crème chantilly over the chocolate and place another piece of chocolate on top.
Dot a small amount of Crémeux au chocolat on the chocolate and decorate with chocolate curls.

Chicken Farm Baker's Project # 40 : Play me please!!, 

Pâte à choux, Éclairs Forêt Noire

Brésilienne: Coffee and Caramel Entremets from Hidemi Sugino's Book

 I try my best to test many recipes that I have ^^, well even I try so hard there are a lot of cookbook that I never had a chance to use it. I know that chance depends on me because I bake as a hobby, but sometimes I'm just too lazy to do anything, haha.

Carrot Cake with Mascarpone and Orange Frosting

There are a lot of food writers who I never read their books before, I think it's common for us to turn to the people who we are custom to ^^. And because most of the time I order my book from Amazon, actually reading it before buying is not possible.

Bunny Shortbread: Who say you can't play with "Cookies"?

 There are moment that I just want to play, ^^, and you can guess I always play with my food (who say you can't!!!!). Making cutout cookie is something I choose, it's both fun and delicious.

Strawberry milk Macarons: I'm dreaming of a red macaron!

I have a lot of imagination when thinking about baking, sometimes I close my eyes and dream about something that I want to make, haha, I'm just a baking freak!

Chocolate and Meringue Semifreddo: Hand made, Home made Ice cream!

 Sometimes, I don't believe that we really need a lot of kitchen gadgets (ice cream maker, food processor and etc.) to make something delicious ^^ but for anyone who love to collect them, it's different reason, haha (including me too).