Dulce de Leche Recipe

makes about 1 cup / 250 ml

Ingredients:

4 cups / 1000 ml whole milk
1 1/2 cups / 375 ml granulated sugar
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 vanilla bean, split OR 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Special Equipment:

• A skimmer

Instructions:

1. In a heavy saucepan, combine the milk, sugar, and baking soda.
2. Slowly bring to a boil over medium heat without stirring. A foamy layer will develop on top as it reaches a boil.
3. Remove from the heat when it reaches a boil. Skim the foamy layer on top and return to the stovetop over medium heat.
4. If using the split vanilla bean, add it at this point.
5. Continue to simmer gently for 1 hour over medium heat, skimming the top as needed and stirring occasionally.
6. If using the split vanilla bean, remove and discard it at this point.
7. Continue to simmer gently for 1 to 1 1/2 hours over medium heat, stirring often. Once the dulce de leche reaches a deep caramel color and thick consistency, watch it closely. Stir continuously to prevent the bottom from scorching.
   
   Watch out for scorching when it gets to this stage
8. Reduce the heat to low when dragging a spatula across the bottom of the pan leaves trails.
   
   Happy trail
9. Fine-tune the consistency to your liking at this point, keeping in mind that dulce de leche will stiffen slightly as it cools. You can thin dulce de leche by adding small amounts of water if it gets too thick.
10. Strain the dulce de leche.
11. If using vanilla extract, add it at this point.
12. Cool to room temperature before storing.

Meatballs de Liège

Ingredients: 300 grams minced pork, 2 onions, 1 egg yolk, 2 tablespoons parsley, 3 tablespoons breadcrumbs, salt, pepper, butter, 2 tablespoons vinegar, 200 ml fond, 3 tablespoons of Liège syrup, 2 tablespoons raisins 2 tablespoons cornflour,

Number of persons: 3

Preheat the oven to 90 degrees. Mix 300 grams minced pork with 1/2 finely chopped onion, 1 egg yolk, 2 tablespoons finely chopped parsley, 3 tablespoons breadcrumbs, salt and pepper. Make 3 meatballs of it. Place the meatballs in an ovenproof dish. Place the ovenproof dish about 1 1/2 hours in the preheated oven. Put the last 8 minutes of baking time the oven at 140 degrees so the meatballs are brown well.

For the Liege sauce bake 1 1/2 finely cut onion in hot butter. When the onion is glassy, add 2 tablespoons vinegar again. Bake briefly while stirring. Add 200 ml fond, 3 tablespoons of Liège syrup and 2 tablespoons raisins. Simmer for about a minute or 10. Bind the sauce with 2 tablespoons cornflour . Serve the meatballs with the sauce Liège, Flemish fries and a mixed salad. Enjoy!

Dulce de Leche Caramel Cupcakes

Little sis is in town this week. And that means one thing: lots of cupcakes. We’ve made it our goal this week to finalize the flavors for the wedding. We’re looking for two more flavors to compliment the tried and true Rich Chocolate and Vanilla Bean Cupcakes and Almond Cupcakes. We didn’t even have to think twice about wanting those two gems on the menu. However, we quickly decided that there is such a thing as a person that doesn’t like chocolate, and we need a non-chocolate cupcake recipe in the mix. While some variation of the White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Cupcakes might still be in the running (we’re thinking raspberry filling?), we had a few other ideas up our sleeves as well.

Like these. Don’t you ever find yourself dreaming of creamy caramel? Or maybe it’s just me. But I wanted to turn those dreams into a cupcake. We adapted the recipe from our favorite book of all time, Vegan Cupcakes Take over the World. The caramel itself is vegan, made with a combination of brown rice syrup, brown sugar, and soymilk. Taking into account my lactose intolerance, and my fear of burnt sugar, it was a very easy and edible way to make a caramel substitute. Keyword here is substitute. While it was good, it wasn’t great, and lacked the true depth of flavor of a good quality caramel.

The cake itself, however, was divine. Moist and fluffy with a beautiful crumb, it might just be the perfect cupcake base.

To improve on this cupcake, we’re thinking of adding some caramel extract to the cupcake itself. Screw vegan at this point, and get some real life caramel sauce or dulce de leche and drizzle it over top of the cupcakes and mix it into the frosting for a rich and authentic caramel flavor.

Our other, extremely enticing and devious idea: add some applesauce and spices to the cake, top it with the caramel frosting, and voila! Caramel apple cupcakes. You might be seeing that one soon.

Dulce de Leche Caramel Cupcakes

Makes 12 cupcakes. Adapted from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World.

INGREDIENTS
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar, packed
1/3 cup oil
1/2 cup soy milk
1/2 cup coconut milk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest

Caramel Buttercream
1 cup butter or margarine, room temperature
4 cups confectioners’ sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon caramel extract OR 1 tablespoon caramel sauce

Vegan Caramel Sauce
1/4 cup soy milk
1/4 cup soy creamer
1/4 cup soy milk powder
1 tablespoon arrowroot or cornstarch
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup brown rice syrup
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

DIRECTIONS
Preheat oven to 350ËšF.

In a large bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Add sugar and brown sugar and mix. Whisk together the oil, soy milk, coconut milk, lemon zest, and vanilla. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and pour in the wet ingredients. Mix until relatively smooth. Fill cupcake liners with 1/4 cup of batter (should be about 2/3 of the way full). Bake for 20-25 minutes or until golden.

For caramel sauce, in a small saucepan, whisk together soy milk, creamer, soy milk powder, and arrowroot. Stir constantly over medium heat until arrowroot is cooked and the mixture starts to thicken, about 4 minutes. Whisk in brown sugar, and then brown rice syrup. Turn up heat to medium high and bring to a gentle boil, then turn heat to low to sustain a low simmer, whisking constantly. Cook until mixture is thick and slightly reduced, about 10 minutes. Allow to cool slightly before drizzling on cupcakes or adding to frosting.

For frosting, whip butter or margarine until fluffy. Add confectioners sugar 1/2 cup at a time, and mix until smooth and fluffy. Add extract and caramel and whip until combined. Spread or pipe onto cooled cupcakes.

Dark Chocolate Creme de Menthe Cupcakes

Happy St. Patrick’s day to you! I’ve had these on my mind for quite some time now, I’ve been plotting and scheming and planning my creme de menthe tactics, and this green-loving holiday seemed like the perfect time to make them. I’m warning you, if you are in the least bit hungry or craving anything even remotely sweet right now, don’t read any further unless you have the time to run to your kitchen and bake these right now. There is no avoiding it, you won’t be able to resist these.

I’ve had a cupcake realization – coconut milk just might be the best thing ever. While many of my cupcakes call for soymilk, including the original Rich Chocolate Cupcakes these are based on, I substituted coconut milk in this time. The result is a moist and fluffy cake, with an incredible depth of flavor. Rich and slightly nutty, but not in any way coconutty (great for those of us who aren’t particularly fond of the white stuff contaminating our truffles), there is something about the coconut milk that brings out the best in any chocolate flavor. And for these, I splurged and got some of the Special Dark cocoa powder, which explains why my cupcakes came out of the oven almost a midnight black.

The frosting is a rich and minty swirl of green mint and dark chocolate mint buttercreams, topped with an andes mint (my favorite – and the inspiration for these cupcakes). The flavor comes from Creme de Menthe flavor oil (can be purchased in an itty bitty jar here: http://www.bakeitpretty.com/item_321/Candy-Flavoring.htm), but that little jar goes a long way. A few drops of it in the frosting was more than enough minty flavor for a dozen cupcake swirls.

After eating one of these last night, Taylor and I soon realized that had it not been 9:30 at night, and had we not had a reasonable sense of self control, we just might have eaten the entire dozen right then and there. They are that good. In fact, here we are at 9:28 am on St. Patrick’s day morning, and I just might have to sneak one of these for breakfast.

Dark Chocolate Creme de Menthe Cupcakes with Buttercream Swirl

Makes 12 cupcakes.

INGREDIENTS
1 cup coconut milk
1/3 cup canola oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 cup sugar
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/3 cup dark cocoa powder
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt

6 Andes mints, halved on the diagonal

For Frosting:
1 cup butter or margarine, room temperature
2 tablespoons soymilk, divided
1 1/4 cups confectioners’ sugar, divided
2 ounces dark chocolate, melted
creme de menthe flavoring
green food coloring

DIRECTIONS
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line muffin pan with paper liners.

Whisk together the coconut milk, sugar, oil, and vanilla extract and beat till foamy. In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Add in two batches to wet ingredients and beat until no lumps remain (or very few remain).

Pour into liners, filling each with 1/4 cup of batter. Bake 18-20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Transfer to a cooling rack and let cool completely.

For frosting, cream butter until smooth and fluffy, 2-3 minutes. Add 1/2 tablespoon soymilk and mix to combine. Remove half of butter mixture to another bowl and set aside. Add 4 drops of creme de menthe extract and a few drops of green food coloring to remaining butter mixture, along with 1/4 cup confectioners’ sugar. Beat until combined. Add remaining sugar 1/4 cup at a time and mix until light and fluffy, 3-5 minutes. Spoon frosting into one half of a piping bag, set aside.

Move remaining half of butter mixture back into the mixing bowl. Slowly add melted chocolate, and beat until fluffy and incorporated, 3-5 minutes. Add remaining 1/2 cup confectioners’ sugar, a little bit at a time, mixing well after each addition. Add 3 drops creme de menthe flavoring, and more soymilk if needed. Beat until fluffy. Spoon into other half of piping bag, and pipe onto cooled cupcakes. Top with halved mints and enjoy!

Ginger-Chocolate Pot de Creme

As a chef, desserts aren’t my thing. Most chefs will tell you the job of the pastry chef is too exact. Ingredients are weighed out and measured very precisely, temperatures are controlled very stringently, to be honest, it seems more like science class than actual cooking. When it comes to defection, you see many more pastry chefs crossing the line to the savory side, and being successful, than savory chefs walking around with a sugar thermometer in their sleeve pocket.

That being said, it is of the utmost importance that savory chefs have a couple of slam dunk desserts in their back pocket for any given emergency. If that means physically carrying around a recipe with you just in case, then so be it, at least you are prepared.

Ingredients for Ginger-Chocolate Pot de Creme

This Ginger-Chocolate Pot de Creme is one of my slam dunks. I think the reason I am so fond of it stems from my days as a kid eating chocolate pudding by the pint after school. That, along with heaping bowls of Stove Top stuffing, were my first culinary accomplishemnts. Yeah, they both came from a box, but the satisfaction of knowing I made them myself, of taking out the electric mixer or moms beat up old stock pot, made them that much better.

When I was working with Sean Kelly at his Aubergine Cafe in the mid 90’s (the same summer as the OJ trial), Sean did a very simple and traditional Pot de Creme. Its one of those desserts you can riff off of, throw different flavors into, but the Ginger Chocolate always stuck with me. After trying a combination of chocolate and chili and being amazed at the juxtaposition of the spicy, sweet and creamy, I wanted to find something as strong but still somewhat exotic. My wife, a pastry chef by trade, who trained in Germany is not a big fan of this dish, the flavors are very subtle and not everyone gets it, but if you do like I do, you’ll be making it often.

Ingredients:

In a large mixing bowl, place the sugar, eggs, and egg yolks and mix well.

• 8 oz. Semi-Sweet Chocolate (I like the Scharffen Berger 62% cacao) broken or chopped up into small pieces
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 large egg
• 7 egg yolks
• 1 cup milk
• 1 1/2 cups heavy whipping cream
• 1 oz. grated fresh ginger
• 1/4 tsp. salt

Preparation:

1. Preheat oven to 325°.
2. Place the chocolate in a large bowl and set aside.
   

   Pour ¾ of the milk mixture over the chocolate and stir until the chocolate has melted.

3. In a large mixing bowl, place the sugar, eggs, and egg yolks and mix well.
4. Place the milk, ginger and cream in a heavy bottom saucepot and scald.
5. Pour ¾ of the milk mixture over the chocolate and stir until the chocolate has melted.
6. Temper the egg mixture with the remaining hot milk.
7. Combine both the eggs and the chocolate mixture and mix well.
8. Add the salt.
9. Strain the pot de crème batter through a chinois or fine mesh strainer.
10. Fill 8 8 oz. ramekins with 5 oz. batter.
    

    Grate ginger on the small holes of a box grater.

11. Place ramekins in a baking pan and fill with room temperature water halfway up the side of the ramekins.
12. Bake for 35-45 minutes, until the center ripples but does not jiggle.
13. Remove from the oven.
14. Carefully remove the ramekins from the water and allow to cool to room temperature.
15. Wrap in plastic and refrigerate.
16. These Pot de Crème be made 3 days in advance of serving.

Fill each 8 ramekins with 5 oz. batter.