Pearl Sugar

Week: 13
Ingredient: Swedish Pearl Sugar
From: King Arthur Flour
Recipe: Liège Waffles¹

Until about a year ago, I liked waffles. Then I had a life-changing experience. It was one of those fateful days, when a series of circumstances were laid out in front of me such that there were no decisions to be made. All I could do was follow the single course of action as it was revealed. Unaware of the magnitude of the events taking place, I followed that course to its inevitable conclusion: I love waffles.

It was bound to happen sooner or later. I was not going to let the waffle iron Danny gave me for Christmas (or was it my birthday?) go to waste. Or was I? In fact, that waffle iron sat untouched for years (no more than three) in my pantry. Then it finally saw the light of day ... when I removed it from the pantry to pack up for the move to my new house. Once unpacked, the waffle iron found a new home in a new closet ... where it sat for a few more years (no less than three).

I still remember the Saturday morning when it happened. I was watching Food Network (as I often do on Saturday mornings), and I was hungry (as I often am when I am watching Food Network). Sometimes all the shows on Saturday morning follow a theme, and the theme that day was breakfast. As I watched the Food Network chefs cook bacon and French toast and hash and eggs and so much more, I lamented the fact that my own kitchen was so poorly stocked—no meat, no potatoes, no bread, no cheese, no fresh fruit—no way to make any of the delicious things I was seeing on TV. I resorted to perusing Joy of Cooking² (another frequent pastime) in the hopes of finding some breakfast food that could be made with only the barest essentials from my pantry and refrigerator. That’s when I discovered waffles.

Maybe “discovered” is not the right word. It is not like this was the first time I had ever eaten a waffle. But this time was different. Somehow the simplest ingredients (flour, baking powder, sugar, salt, eggs, butter, and milk) combined into a masterpiece. It was love at first bite. I didn’t even bother with a plate. Or a fork. The only reason I did not eat straight out of the iron was that I put one waffle on a cooling rack just long enough to get the next waffle started. After three waffles, I realized I had eaten the equivalent of half a stick of butter. That almost didn’t stop me, but in the end, prudence won out, and I saved the rest of the waffles for later.

For a few months after that, waffles became regular fare at my house. I experimented with other flours, different recipes, and I even used a plate and fork when I experimented with different fruit toppings.

Of course my waffle pursuits also included some internet research. That is how I learned about Gaufres de Liège (Liège waffles). Liège waffles are yeast-raised waffles with added pearl sugar which caramelizes as the waffles bake. I have never been to Belgium for the real thing, but they pretty much had me at “caramelized sugar.” I had to try them.

Pearl sugar was not the easiest thing to find, but that is only because I did not try the internet first. I ordered some from King Arthur Flour (along with a bunch of other fabulous ingredients), and when it arrived I was surprised at how small the “pearls” were. I do not know where I got this idea, but I was expecting something approximately the size of a peppercorn. It was actually a little smaller and looked a lot like pretzel salt.

Well, I made Liège waffles. As with most yeast-raised dough, they took a while to make, but they were not difficult. I did make a sticky mess because I tried to work the dough by hand. In hindsight, I should have spooned the dough into the waffle iron. Nonetheless, the waffles came out nice and golden-brown. However, I was quite disappointed that the sugar did not caramelize. (That was, after all, the selling point for me to try Liège waffles!) Without the caramelization, they were essentially really sweet waffles. They had a slightly yeasty flavor and a chewy texture—kind of like a soft pretzel but sweet instead of salty. Not quite what I was hoping for, but far from terrible.

Conclusion: Pearl sugar probably needs a higher temperature to caramelize properly. I might be out of luck when it comes to Liège waffles because my waffle iron does not have an adjustable temperature. On the other hand, sugar that does not melt so easily is perfect for sprinkling on top of baked goods. I might try to make Liège waffles again, but if I have similar results, I will save the rest of the pearl sugar for other uses.

¹I found the recipe for Liège Waffles months ago somewhere on the internet and printed it out. I never imagined that I would have cause to use the link again, and, Google as I may, now I cannot find the same recipe. So, my apologies for not citing my source correctly. Thank you, unknown sharer of recipes on the internet.

²Irma S. Rombauer, Marion Rombauer Becker, & Ethan Becker, Joy of Cooking, 75th Anniversary ed. (New York: Scribner, 2006), 71, 646-647.

The Black Cocoa Experiment

Week: 11
Ingredient: Black Cocoa
From: King Arthur Flour
Recipe: Dark Chocolate Shortbread

Happy Saint Patrick’s Day!

I always get excited about holidays that give an excuse to eat something special. Therefore, I find it a little strange that I have never celebrated Saint Patrick’s Day with an Irish feast. Mmm ... colcannon and soda bread and ... Guinness? OK. I admit I do not know much about Irish cuisine. Unfortunately Saint Patrick’s Day crept up on me this year, and there was no time to plan an Irish meal. So, I decided to settle for something (at least semi-) Celtic.

The first element of my (at least semi-) Celtic adventure was a shortbread mold decorated with Celtic knots. It arrived last week in a very exciting package from King Arthur Flour. I did not order it with Saint Patrick’s Day in mind, so the Celtic design was a happy coincidence. And what do you do with a shortbread mold but make shortbread? Shortbread is typically regarded as Scottish, and Scotland is a Celtic nation, so that was a happy coincidence as well. But how could I make shortbread adventurous?

The not-so-Celtic part of my adventure also arrived in the very exciting package from King Arthur Flour: black cocoa. According to its package, black cocoa “will make the darkest chocolate cake or cookies you’ve ever seen.” I like dark chocolate, so dark chocolate shortbread seemed like a good idea. And to make a good idea even better, I decided to turn this into an experiment. I would make two batches of shortbread: one with regular cocoa and one with black cocoa. That way I could really see what a difference the black cocoa makes.

See for yourself:

I was pretty astonished at the difference between the two shortbreads. When I looked at the regular cocoa shortbread on its own, it looked very chocolaty, but placed beside the black cocoa shortbread, it looked kind of weak. In addition to the difference in appearance, the shortbreads differed in texture. The black cocoa produced a soft shortbread while the regular cocoa shortbread was crumblier. What was most astonishing, however, was the taste. You would expect something that dark to be intensely chocolaty, but that was not the case. In fact, I would not even say the black cocoa had a stronger flavor; it was just different. The regular cocoa shortbread tasted like chocolate, and the black cocoa shortbread tasted like the cookie part of an Oreo. It pains me a little to compare my homemade confection to a mass-produced cookie, but that is the best way I can think to describe it. You can decide for yourself if an Oreo-like flavor is a good thing or a bad thing.

Conclusion: I really like the color the black cocoa lends, but I am not thrilled with its flavor. Because the black cocoa package warns that using it alone “will produce a very strong-flavored baked good,” I (more or less) heeded its advice and made my black cocoa shortbread with a 2:1 ratio of black cocoa to regular cocoa. In the future when I want the dark color of black cocoa, I will probably try a ratio more like 1:1 or 1:2.

Bonus: If I ever decide to embark on an adventure to unlock the secrets of the Oreo, I have a really good lead on what gives them that black color.

A Birthday Cake for Danny ... with Arrowroot

Week: 8
Ingredient: Arrowroot Starch
From: Martin’s, Harrisonburg, VA
Recipe: White Chocolate Blueberry Pecan Cake

This week (well, it’s Monday, so actually last week) was very busy, and I nearly forgot about finding something new and different to cook. In fact, when my mom and I decided on Wednesday that I would take care of making a cake for my brother’s birthday party on Sunday, all my culinary scheming became focused on Danny’s cake.

In my family you get to request any kind of cake (or pie or ???) you want for your birthday. So, like a good sister, I texted Danny:

I'm making cake. Tell me what you want or you get surprise!!

Danny replied:

i would like a cake that incorporates blueberries, pecans, and white chocolate, and no cream cheese! unless that's a bad culinary idea.... you're the expert!

Hmmm ... not a combination I would have picked. White chocolate can be a tricky ingredient for blending. In small amounts, it has a delicate flavor that can easily be overwhelmed by other flavors (like regular chocolate). In large amounts, it is so sweet and rich that it needs to be balanced out with something light, fresh, and/or tart (like lemon). When I thought through Danny’s idea, I decided it had merit. There would need to be lots of white chocolate if I wanted its flavor to come through along with the blueberries and pecans. However, the pecans would help cut the sweetness, and the blueberries would add freshness. Piece of cake! Insert groan at bad pun here.

My mind took off, exploring possibilities long before I had a chance to look for recipes. When I finally had time to sit down and do some research, I went straight for The Cake Bible,¹ which has become my go-to resource for all things Cake. (For those of you who are not familiar with Rose Levy Beranbaum’s masterpiece, I will just say that it is not for the casual baker. Read the reviews on Amazon if you want to understand more.) The first component of the cake was obvious: “White Chocolate Whisper Cake.” “White Chocolate Mousseline Buttercream” and “Winter Blueberry Topping” followed close behind. I toyed with the idea of incorporating pecans into the cake batter or using one of the nut cake recipes, but I could not decide on anything that satisfied me. So, I decided to toast the pecans and use them as a garnish. Still, I was missing something. The cake, buttercream, topping, and nuts were not going to come together in perfect balance in the four-layer pièce de résistance I was dreaming up. It needed more ... blueberry.

Enter blueberry curd. A curd is an intensely-flavored fruit spread, topping, or filling. Lemon curd is the canonical curd, but other fruits can be made into curd as well. A four layer cake would require three fillings. Two of blueberry curd and one of white chocolate buttercream would make a lovely balance. None of my trusted recipe sources had recipes for blueberry curd, but I figured I could improvise on another curd recipe. The plan was complete.

The first thing I made was the curd. When it was finished cooking, I set it aside to cool and moved on to the cake itself. I measured carefully (by weight, not volume), painstakingly followed the instructions, monitored the oven temperature closely, and rotated my cake layers midway through cooking. They came out looking perfectly golden and perfectly level. Fantastic, I thought. A short break, and then on to the buttercream.

It was not to be. Before I moved on to the buttercream, I realized something had gone horribly awry. The blueberry curd was not thickening, and the cake layers had both sunk in the middle. There was no way I could make a four-layer cake out of two half-sunken layers and runny filling. Quel dommage!

I was able to salvage the sunken cake layers. I trimmed them into two 1-inch layers. However, I considered the blueberry curd a complete loss, and it is still in my refrigerator (and will probably be used as a pancake topping).

The buttercream came together like a dream, and I used that (mixed with some pecans) to fill the layers. I frosted the (2-layer) cake with buttercream (sans pecans), and coated the sides of the cake with pecans. I piped a border around the top and bottom, and spooned the “Winter Blueberry Topping” (which also came together quite nicely) on top.

It was not the cake I had envisioned, but if I had not told the story, no one would have known anything was amiss. It was quite delicious. There is really nothing like a quality cake, and despite its flaws, this one was top notch (if I may say so myself). All the butter and white chocolate in the cake and icing gave it a wonderful melt-in-your-mouth quality (plus a little crunch from the pecans). The flavors of the white chocolate and blueberries complemented each other. Danny, you chose well!

Conclusion: I have not mentioned arrowroot starch at all so far. It kind of feels like I cheated. “Winter Blueberry Topping” called for arrowroot OR cornstarch. I really could have used cornstarch (which I always have on hand), but I needed a way to fit some new ingredient into this cake adventure; there was no time for something else. So, I used arrowroot. Maybe in a side-by-side comparison I could tell a difference between arrowroot-thickened and cornstarch-thickened blueberry topping, but in this stand-alone instance, all I can say is that it worked. That hardly seems like an adequate synopsis, so I will leave you with Rose Levy Beranbaum’s probably-based-on-actual-experience opinion that “arrowroot is preferable to cornstarch because it adds sparkle.”

¹Rose Levy Beranbaum, The Cake Bible (New York: HarperCollins Publishers Inc., 1988).