Recipe for Chaussons au Anana – Pineapple Turnovers

When Dan and I were in Taiwan we really loved eating pineapple cakes. They were often super fresh with cooked down pineapple fillings surrounded by a shortbread crust. As Lunar New Year was coming up, Dan wanted to make pineapple cakes (a traditional Lunar New Year treat in Singapore and Taiwan) but also incorporate croissants or some kind of laminated pastry. 

Dan recently came across a pineapple jam filling from a Singaporean Chef named Violet Oon. This recipe involves stewing the pineapples with cinnamon and cloves, something very different from Dan’s previous iterations. We had some puff pastry in the freezer and thus, Dan’s need to combine different elements was satisfied through making a pineapple turnover, or a Chausson au Anana.

Outside ChiaTe – this pineapple cake had a blend of
pineapple and mashed winter melon

SunnyHills Pineapple cakes – this one was 100% pineapple

Ingredients

*Makes 8 large pastries or 18 medium sized ones.

• One large ripe pineapple – approximately 750g of pineapple pieces
• Pack of frozen puff pastry – made with butter (thawed)
• Small beaten egg
• 150g Sugar
• Cinnamon stick
• 5 cloves *but 10 would be better

Directions

1. Chop up pineapple (we used a food processor to quickly chop up in a 10 pulses).
2. In a medium sized pot, put in the pineapple, cinnamon stick, sugar and cloves. Cook at medium heat for 20-25 minutes until the liquid is mostly boiled off.
3. While the pineapple filling is still warm, extract the cinnamon stick and cloves and allow the filling to cool down (about 1 hour).
4. Preheat the oven to 400F.
5. Beat a small egg in a bowl.
6. Slice up a “sheet” of puff pastry using a ruler. Depending on the size you want to make, you can either make large 5 inch squares or 3.3″ squares.
7. Place the pineapple filling in the middle of each square. For small squares about use about 1.5 tablespoons of filling. For larger squares about 3 heaping tablespoons.
8. Brush the edges with the beaten egg wash.
9. Fold one side over diagonally so you end up with a triangle shape.
10. Use a fork to crimp the edges. 
11. Place the pastries on a prepared baking sheet with parchment paper.  You will likely need two baking trays.
12. Brush the top with the beaten egg and generously sprinkle sugar on the top of each turnover.
13. Put baking sheets into the oven – one on the top rack and one on the bottom rack. Bake for 15 minutes. Rotate trays and bake for another 15-20 minutes until the tops are golden brown.
14. Eat and enjoy! Take photos as necessary.

When I looked through the chosen recipes for January for Tuesdays with Dorie I saw that the Bakewell Tart was on the list. After looking through the recipe I realized it sounded familiar. In fact, I had seen this once before, on the CBC Great Canadian Baking Show (Season 4, pastry) for one of the technical bakes!

But, what is a Bakewell Tart? The Bakewell tart is a British classic dessert and usually has a short crust pastry, frangipane and jam (typically raspberry). From what I have read, there can actually be different variations. 

To me, it feels like you you are mixing the essence of a pie and cake together. Perhaps that simplifies it a bit, but let’s go into how it went for me. 

To make the recipe in Dorie Greenspan’s Baking with Dorie you first make a pie crust. Hers is a pate sucree (mixture of cold butter, flour, egg and sugar).  The dough is then rolled out into an 11inch circle, then partially blind baked (where you add pie weights onto the crust – to keep it from bubbling up in the oven). 

Blind baked pie crust cooling

At this point, you can decorate with just a drizzle of icing (icing sugar mixed with water). However the first time I decorated my Bakewell Tart it turned out terrible. So in an effort to make it more aesthetically pleasing (for myself) I added icing all over the tart and then attempted to make some pink lines for a feathering effect. That didn’t go nearly as well as I had hoped but it looks decent! 

In all honesty, if this was a real technical bake in a real baking challenge I would have failed on the presentation alone. My feathering (for the lines) did not go very well as I was trying to work fast as the icing was starting to set! 

I love how tasty this Bakewell Tart is. It isn’t too sweet, despite the icing on top and the haskap jam went very well with the rest of the tart. The cake part of the tart has a nice almond flavour from the almond extract as well as the addition of almond meal and flour. I personally also love the nice crispy pate sucree crust at the bottom as it is my favourite part about pies. So, there you have it, my experience of baking up my first Bakewell Tart! 

You can get the recipe for Steph’s Bakewell Tart on pg.298 of Baking with Dorie or here.

All right everyone! We are back with another recipe from Dorie Greenspan’s Baking with Dorie. Of the two options for those month I chose to do the Apple Pandowdy first. We were going over to a friends’ place so bringing a warm dessert seemed to fit the occasion nicely. We happened to just have enough ambrosia apples in the fridge to make the dessert so it was meant to be. The main difference for this dessert is that usually when you see a dessert with apples you think of cinnamon. Dorie Greenspan highly suggests keeping it simple and just having a lemon forward dessert for this apple pandowdy. The apples are simply dressed with sugar, lemon zest and lemon juice. The reason why its called a “Pandowdy” is because typically this dessert is made with the scrap pieces of dough you may have around after baking a pie. It isn’t about perfection but just random scraps of dough.

The top of the apple pandowdy is topped with ample amounts of sugar

Would we make this again? Most definitely. The lemon forwardness of the dessert didn’t make us miss the cinnamon at all. Dorie Greenspan also gives ideas on how to change up the dessert; more spice for a warmer dessert and/or adding in different fruits depending on the season.

Clearly it must have smelled amazing as Luna (our own pup) made an attempt to hop up onto the bench at our friend’s place to get a taste. Don’t worry, she wasn’t able to. But you can definitely see in the picture how much she wanted to while Lovey (her sister from another litter) looks on.

You can find the recipe for this Apple Pandowdy on page 257 of Baking with Dorie or here. 

Feel free to check out the Tuesdays with Dorie page to see what everyone else ended up cooking up (you had the choice to make either Apple Pandowdy or English Muffins). 

Side profile of the Maple Miso Loaf

I love that there is ample time spent rubbing the orange zest (or lemon if that is what you have) with the sugar so it becomes infused with the orange flavour.

Sugar and orange zest rubbed together

Before the bake

Maple Miso Loaf Recipe

4 ounces/113 grams unsalted butter, at room temperature, plus more for the pan
1 ¾ cups/238 grams all-purpose flour, plus more for the pan
1 ¾ teaspoons baking powder
¼ teaspoon baking soda
¾ cup/150 grams granulated sugar
¼ teaspoon fine sea salt
finely grated zest of 1 orange or tangerine
¼ cup/70 grams white or yellow miso
¼ cup/60 milliliters pure maple syrup (I used dark)
2 large eggs, at room temperature
1 ½ teaspoons pure vanilla extract
⅓ cup/80 milliliters buttermilk (well shaken before measuring)
¼ cup/80 grams orange marmalade or apricot jam (for the glaze, optional)

Directions

Umami Burgers from Every Day Dorie

Brioche Buns in the Oven

Seeing that we were having burgers for dinner, the hubby decided to make his own brioche buns. He started the baking process last night (Thursday) so he could bake them up after work for dinner.

The beginnings of the mushroom mix for Umami Burgers

Cooked down mushroom mix with sauce added

After the chopped mushrooms and red onion (vidalia) has cooked down (about 6 minutes), a sauce is added. Simply mix oyster sauce, soy sauce, sesame oil, and in my case spicy chili crisp sauce. Go easy on the oyster sauce, as the sauce tends to be fairly salty for my taste. I also did not add more salt to the cooked mushrooms and onions as it felt adequately salted already.  When the mushroom mix is cooked, place in a bowl and let it cool. 

Forming the Umami Burger Patties

After our acupuncture appointment we came home and finished assembling the rest of dinner. Dorie does suggest that if you want additional mushroom flavour, you can mix the mushroom mix with the beef and let it sit in the fridge for a day. For us, we just mixed the beef and mushroom mix together and allowed it to marinate for around 10 minutes. 

Cooking 4 Umami Burger Patties on a Cast Iron Pan

Fresh Brioche Buns

It’s no surprise that milk bread (shokupan) gets rediscovered every few years. Compared to western style sandwich loafs, the insides are light, soft and fluffy. It’s hard to resist tearing the bread apart just to see the elastic inside. Milk bread not only derives its name from the using milk but also the bright white milk-like colour of the inner crumb. Some people may only associate this bread with Hokkaido (Japanese) milk bread but the bread actually has Chinese origins.

One of the key steps to making milk bread is a Chinese technique called TangZhong (湯種法). Chinese bakers have been using this technique since the early 1900s to make soft buns. TangZhong is like a roux, it’s made by cooking a small amount of flour in a liquid (milk). The resulting gel releases more steam during the baking process resulting in higher loaves.

In terms of shaping, milk bread often comes in two or three lobes in the span of a single loaf pan. The instructions show how to make a three-lobed loaf but you can adapt this to any style.

This recipe makes 1 loaf.

Equipment

• Buttered loaf pan
• Small pot to make tangzhong
• Small bowl to hold tang zhong
• Small bowl to hold milk and yeast
• Large bowl (to hold dough as it doubles)
• Scale (optional)
• Baking tray (optional)
• Rolling pin (optional)
• Silicone or bristle Brush (optional)

Ingredients for the loaf

• 330 g all Purpose flour (1.5 Cups of flour)
• 24 g sugar (approximately 1.5 tablespoons)
• 7g salt (approximately 1 tsp)
• 4g dried active yeast (about 1/2 teaspoon)
• 95g warm milk (26C-32C/ 78F-89F)
• 1 egg
• 20g unsalted softened butter (1 tablespoon)
• 2 tablespoons of milk (for brushing the loafs)

Ingredients for Tangzhong

• 100g of boiling milk (1/2 Cup less 1 tablespoon)
• 40g of flour (2 tablespoons)

Instructions

1. Make the tangzhong in a small bowl, mix the boiling milk with the of flour. Keep stirring until all the flour is cooked. It should smell a bit like almond. Set aside and allow to cool.
2. Using a microwave to warm the milk to (30-35°C); this should take approximately 20 seconds. The milk should be warm, not scalding. Mix the yeast into the warm milk and let sit for 5 minutes.
   

3. Mix the dry ingredients (flour, salt, and sugar) together in a large bowl.
4. Add in the yeast-milk solution (should be slightly foamy by now) and mix.
5. Add egg, butter, and tangzhong.
6. Using a stand mixer with a dough hook, mix for about 8 minutes or until the dough comes together and it doesn’t stick to the sides of the bowl. Alternatively, you can knead by hand for about 12-15 minutes.
7. Cover the bowl and let the dough rise until doubled (about 90 minutes based on room temperature). At this point, if you need more time you can punch down the dough and keep it in the fridge overnight.
8. Divide the dough into 3 portions.
9. You are now going to shape each of the portions into a small loaf. Do the following: 
1. On a lightly floured surface flatten out into a long rectangle so that the short end is facing you.
   
2. Taking the top edge fold it over the middle and take the bottom fold it over the top like a letter (letter fold).
   
3. Rotate the dough so that the short end is facing you.
4. Flatten out into another long rectangle with the width about the same width as your loaf pan.
5. From the short end facing you, firmly roll the rectangle up into a smooth cylinder.
   
10. Place each of the rolls with the spiral facing the long sides of the loaf pan into a well-buttered loaf pan with some space in between. The rolls will rise and expand one last time so they need room to grow.
    
11. Brush the top of each of the rolls with milk.
    
12. Cover the loaf pan and wait 30-45 minutes for it to rise (rolls should expand above the height of the loaf pan).
13. Preheat oven to 375F.
14. Carefully brush the top of the rolls with milk one last time before placing the loaf into the oven.
    
15. Bake for 35 minutes or until the tops are golden brown and it sounds hollow.
16. Remove from the oven and let it cool down before removing from the loaf pan.

Milk bread has this interesting property where the outside will harden but the inside remains very soft.  This means you should only slice as you need it so each slice is nice and soft. You can eat it plain, or toast it and spread it with your favourite jam or some condensed milk. If there are any leftovers after a few days, it makes a great french toast.

While this bread is not as simple as a “no-knead” style bread, it only takes a few tries before you get the hang of it and add your own twists and modifications.

Let’s continue following along with Cook the Book Fridays and cooking from Dorie Greenspan’s “Every Day Dorie”. This week’s was a Cheesecake. We had the option of using mandarin, tangerine or another citrus if we couldn’t find tangerines. I loved how quick it was for this cheesecake to come together. I must admit that I have never made a tangerine or mandarin flavour cheesecake before so this was a first. I was a bit sad that the cheesecake dropped a bit as it cooled in the oven and then the fridge (over 8 hours) but overall the cheesecake came out of the pan so well. I loved that the cheese cake was so simple. The flavour came mainly from the zesting of the mandarins into sugar and then slowly whisking together cream cheese, ricotta and eggs. 

A slight layer of melted honey is slathered on top to give the cheesecake a shiny glaze. As you can see this cheesecake was quite large! Good thing there are many neighbours around us to help us eat all the food we experiment and create! We gave away a solid half of the cheesecake as Dorie says it feeds up to 16 servings! 

Go check out the Cook the Book Fridays page to see how everyone else did! If you want to make this yourself, check out Dorie’s cookbook “Every Day Dorie” from amazon, chapters or wherever cookbooks can be purchased. 

oh and before I forget here is a picture of the short ribs I made a few months ago for Cook the Book fridays and forgot to post it!!

This week it has been a whole host of cooking from Dorie Greenspan’s cookbook Everyday Dorie. I was super impressed how fast this recipe came together considering the fact that I only got home at 6pm but managed to prep, cook and have the soup done by 7pm. One way I sped up the cooking process was through using the Instant Pot (pressure cooker function). 

We really loved this soup. I was a bit worried initially that the ground ginger would be too much as it calls for 3.5 tablespoons of ground ginger. Since we only had about 2 tablespoons worth we put that amount in. 

The one interesting part is that Dorie’s recipes indicates that you can include meatballs in the recipe. Since I was in a slight rush, I put the Instant Pot in saute mode and then starting forming about 500g of ground beef into meatballs. Okay, I realize this picture below does not look super appetizing but I just wanted to show that I seared the meatballs a bit prior to putting them into the soup. After some slight searing I took out the meatballs and started making the rest of the soup. I sauteed the onions, garlic, spices, and the can of diced tomatoes. Then I added the meatballs back in and continued stirring and cooking for a few more minutes. 

Once the meat had some time to cook further, I added in the rest of the ingredients (chicken stock, water, lentils, chick peas). Finally, I pressure cooked the soup for 10 minutes. 

We ended up with a good almost 6-7 litres of soup (we have a 8 quart instant pot)! We had so much soup we shared some with our neighbours as well as friends. We really enjoyed the flavours of the soup. Dorie also suggests adding a pinch of lemon juice at the end for additional flavour. The recipe also calls for noodles, but we felt that there was plenty of ingredients in the soup already without the noodles.  

I did find that by pressure cooking our soup, the meatballs were able to absorb some of the flavours.  However, next time I would season the meat. Perhaps, I would season the ground beef with some chopped garlic, salt, pepper and some of the spices from the soup. I am also not sure if I needed the saffron for the recipe. The soup also tasted great 2 days later. It certainly added more flavour and body to the soup over time. 

I has been cold where I am in Edmonton, so this soup was perfect. You can find it on Page 66 of Dorie Greenspan’s Everyday Dorie. You can also check the Cook the Book Fridays website to see how everyone else did with this week’s recipe.

Most people love brownies, but have you ever heard of mochi brownies? I tend to think of Brownie and Mochi = Brochis! But first you might be asking, what is mochi? Mochi is a form of sticky rice cake that is made from Japanese short grain rice called “mochigome”. Mochigome is a chewy, sticky rice that is actually naturally sweeter than regular rice. You can have mochi either savoury or sweet and with different fillings inside. In this particular recipe, the mochi flour is used to make these brownies extra chewy. The best way to describe these particular chocolate mochi brownies are that they are full of decadent chocolate and chewy goodness. The recipe is from Kaori Becker’s new cookbook “Mochi Magic”. 

Now if you never had mochi before then you should certainly get her book! The best thing is that I have been given permission to share with you this recipe for Chocolate Mochi Brownies! I would highly encourage you to use mochiko flour if possible. Initially when I made a few recipes from the book I wasn’t able to source mochiko so I used a Korean style of ground rice flour that seemed to match what we were looking for (finely ground rice flour). In chatting with Kaori through instagram she indicated that this would be a good substitute or glutinous rice flour could do the trick as well; though taste would be different. 

Kaori herself describes these brownies as “Crispy on the outside and ooey-gooey mochi-licious on the inside, these brownies come together quickly and pack a serious chocolate punch!”

Chocolate Mochi Brownies (makes 10 pieces)

Ingredients 

• 3 cups mochiko
• 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 large eggs
• 1 3/4 cup brown sugar 
• 2 1/2 cups whole milk
• 1/2 cup olive oil
• 1/2 cup melted butter
• 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
• 1 cup dark chocolate chips or chopped dark chocolate 

Excerpted from Mochi Magic by Kaori Becker. Copyright © 2020 Published by Storey Publishing. Reproduced by arrangement from the author Kaori Becker. All rights reserved.

We realized that the inside of the cake was not pictured so we could make it whatever flavour we wanted (especially if we were going to eat it). I LOVE chocolate so I decided to go with a chocolate cake as the main cake, with strawberry frosting. To make the chocolate cake, we split our batter into two 9 inch round chocolate cake pans (9inch by 2 inch). 

Chocolate Cake Recipe

Ingredients

• 240g (1 cup) a double shot of espresso diluted with hot water until it fills one cup
• 60g (6 Tbsp) dark chocolate (chopped)
• 388g (1 3/4 cup) sugar
• 236g (1 1/2 cup) cake flour
• 180g (1 cup) dutch processed cocoa powder
• 1 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2 large eggs
• 120g (1/2 cup) olive oil
• 240g (1 cup) buttermilk
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

Directions for Chocolate Cake

1. Preheat oven to 325F (160C). Line the bottom of both cake pans with parchment paper (cut out approximately 9inch circles so they fit exactly) and butter the sides of the pan. 
2. Pull a double shot of espresso and dilute with hot water until you get 1 cup. In a large bowl pour the hot coffee over the dark chocolate. Wait one minute and then start to whisk the chocolate so that it has melts completely.
3. In another bowl, mix together sugar, cake flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder and salt.
4. In the bowl of a stand-up mixer whisk together the egg, olive oil, buttermilk and vanilla together.
5. While the mixer is still mixing at medium speed, slowly add the chocolate coffee mixture.
6. Slowly add in all the dry ingredients to the wet mixture. Mix until the batter just comes together. The batter may appear lumpy but try not to over mix.
7. Split the batter into the two cake pans. Bake both pans for approximately 40 minutes. Check that the cakes are done by inserting a toothpick into the middle of the cake. When it comes out clean the cakes are done.
8. Allow the cakes to cool completely.
9. After they have cooled for an hour, run a knife around the edge of each pan. Then gently flip each cake out. Set the cakes aside to cool completely. 

Ingredients

• 188g (1 1/4 cup) white chocolate
• 150g (2/3 cup) whipping cream
• 2 Tbsp water
• 84g (1/3 cup) sugar
• 1 Tbsp white corn syrup
• 188g (3/4 cup) unsalted room temperature butter
• 2.5 Tbsp ground freeze dried strawberries

Red Chocolate Dripping

Ingredients

• 70g (1/2 cup) white chocolate
• 95g (1/4 cup) whipping cream
• 1 tablespoon of water
• 30g (1 1/2 tablespoons) white corn syrup
• 1/8 of teaspoon of red powdered color food dye

Directions

1. Melt white chocolate in large bowl over boiling water.
2. In a separate small pot, heat whipping cream, water, and corn syrup until near boiling.
3. Slowly pour the hot cream over the white chocolate while mixing with a spatula.
4. Keep stirring with a spatula until smooth.
5. Add the red food dye in parts so that the colour is even.
6. Take out a large baking pan and put a cookie cooling rack on top of the pan. This is to catch any drippings.
7. Take the cake out of the freezer and place it on the cookie cooling rack.
8. Transfer the chocolate mixture into a large measuring cup so that it is easier to pour.
9. Slowly add more melted chocolate so that it starts to drip over the edges of the cake.