Strawberry Sorbet

Fresh strawberry puree mixed with simple syrup and lemon juice. Churn in an ice cream machine and voila! The best strawberry sorbet ever!

Marshmallows

Vanilla marshmallows coated in toasted coconut. Mmm...fluffy...

More Salted Caramels

More of the salted caramels packaged up.

Chocolate Caramels

The last time I was in Seattle, I went into Fran's Chocolates and sampled these amazing gray salt caramels. I tried to recreate something similar here using himilayan pink sea salt. The recipe I used for the caramel is from the book "Chocolates and Confections at Home".

The recipe doesn't specify exactly what degree to cook the caramel at and just tells you to test it out with a spoon. For the caramel that I made, I ended up cooking it till about 246F and it was a good consistency. It held its shape but was still soft enough to chew on.

Soft Caramels
-from Chocolates and Confections at Home by Peter Greweling

4 oz water
1 lb sugar
1 vanilla bean, split and seeds scraped
1 can condensed milk
12 oz light corn syrup
6 oz unsalted butter, soft
1 tsp salt (I used 2 tsp)

-lightly butter a 9x13" baking pan
-combine water, sugar, vanilla bean, condensed milk, butter, and corn syrup in a pot and bring to a boil, stirring constantly. Mixture will foam so be sure you use a fairly large pot.
-continue stirring till about 245F. Start testing caramel consistency with a spoon at 240F
-remove from heat and stir in salt. pour into pan and cool to room temperature
-cut and dip in tempered chocolate

Mini Burger Anyone?

As all of my friends know, I love all things mini and burgers are no exception. I made little brioche buns and my sister sandwiched them with caramelized red onion, a tiny patty, mayo, and some greens. Cute no?

Strawberry Rhubarb Tartlettes

You know what's strange? After 23 years of being in Canada, I had never had a strawberry rhubarb tart before! In fact, the only time I ever worked with rhubarb was at a restaurant where we had a rhubarb custard tart that I wasn't a huge fan of.

I decided to change that after picking up a few stalks of rhubarb and a basket of strawberries the other day. I cooked the rhubarb with a vanilla bean and added a splash of rosewater at the end just for an extra kick, and macerated the strawberries in a little sugar and some lemon zest. For the tartshell, I opted for a pate brisee dough because of the crispiness and blind-baked those first. Filled it with the rhubarb and topped it off with the strawberries. A little sprinkle of sugar on top and then flash baked to glaze it.

I was really amazed at how well these turned out! The rhubarb was not too tart but still very distinct and the strawberries really shone through. They're great little bites for the summer!

World Cup Fever

To celebrate an avid World Cup fan's birthday, we watched the final match between Netherlands and Spain. Unfortunately for him, the psychic octopus was correct again and Spain won.

Here we have a flourless chocolate cake layered with chocolate buttercream, with a feuilletine base for extra crunch. As you can see, I was having a bit of trouble fitting in the "South Africa" in between the FIFA and the soccer player. I know what you're thinking: "what are those blue smudges on the sides?". They are exactly that: blue smudges. The idea of it was good but....yeah. I'll just leave it at that.