Gingerbread House, The Daring Baker's Challenge December 2009

The December 2009 Daring Bakers’ challenge was brought to you by Anna of Very Small Anna and Y of Lemonpi. They chose to challenge Daring Bakers’ everywhere to bake and assemble a gingerbread house from scratch. They chose recipes from Good Housekeeping and from The Great Scandinavian Baking Book as the challenge recipes.

Not great, ha... ha ... ha... but I did it. Never mind about the construction and the decoration. The gingerbread tasted delicious.

Thanks to Anna and Y for hosting the most challenging challenge, and thanks to Lisa & Yvonne for creating the Daring Baker's Challenge event.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

~photo taken by my son AD~

Wish you all a very merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Cheers,

elra

Chocolate Croissant For The Chocalholic

Unlike the regular croissant, this chocolate version doesn't have any crescent shape. It is less elaborate to assemble, because you only need to cut the dough into strip, fill with chocolate chocolate stick, then roll.

By the way, I should have waited a bit longer to cut it ...

this is what I am talking about that you have to wait until it is cool completely before serving, or else it will get doughy. As you look closely in the photo above, the bottom part (under the chocolate) is doughy. But then, I needed to take the photo quickly before the chocolate harden. So, I needed to choose between to show the layers or to show the melting chocolate. I chose the later because it looks more appetizing, at least, that's what I think.

Chocolate Croissant dough recipe

1 ounce bittersweet chocolate (for each croissant)

1 egg yolk + 1 tbs milk, mix well (for brushing the croissant)

• If your dough is previously frozen, thaw in the refrigerator the night before. When ready to be cut, unfold, cut into long strip with about 3 to 4 inches wide and 8 to 10 inches long. Place the chocolate an ounce stick of chocolate at the short end nearest you, then roll. Place on the baking sheet, seem side down.
• Cover the croissant with clean kitchen towel, let rest and rise at room temperature for 2 to 4 hours until it is really double in size.
• Preheat oven to 350⁰F.
• Brush each croissant with egg wash. Bake for 25 minutes, or until deep golden brown. Cool completely before serving, if you eat the croissant while it is still hot, the dough and the layers doesn't have enough time to set. As a result, your croissant will be doughy, and you won't get those flaky layers that you are looking for in a croissant.

KOUGELHOPF

December is the month when I bake so many bread, cakes, and cookies. The first thing I bake for Christmas this year is this delicious Alsatian specialty. Unlike the one I posted last year, this time I am able to use the kougelhopf mold that my generous friend brought from her village in Alsace. But this, was not the first time she brought gifts for me. There were clay pot that I use to make Baeckaoffa-potees-boulangeres, Alsatian cookbook (in France), and so many different kind of kitchen towels that I love so much.

Unlike most kougelhopf recipes that I found in most cookbook, this one does not use any raisins. Instead, I used citrus peels since I love the aroma fill the air throughout the house. The ingredients I adapted from Anne Willan cookbook, but using this technique. It was really simple and the result was delicious and very citrusy bread. I like that!

If you want to try it, you can use the ingredients below, and use the technique shown in the video.

This ingredients is for one kougelhopf mold

250 ml milk

140 g butter, plus more for the mold

45 g granulated sugar

1 cake fresh yeast

390 g flour

1 tsp salt

3 eggs, lightly beaten

3 - 4 tbs sliced almond (I skip this one)

250 g orange, and lemon peel

a few whole almond (about 13) to decorate the bottom of the mold

Confectioner's sugar for sprinkling

• Place the flour, salt and sugar in the mixer bowl. In a small glass, mix the fresh yeast and the milk. Pour into the mixer bowl, add the eggs, mix on medium until it comes together. Add the softened butter, continue to mix until the dough pull it self from the side of the bowl, then add the citrus peel, mix (see the video). Transfer to a large bowl, cover, then let the dough rest until double in volume.
• Butter the mold generously, arrange whole almonds on the bottom of the mold.
• Transfer the dough to a counter top, shape into round (boule) and make hole in the middle so it will fit into the mould. Cover with towel, let it rest another hour, or until double.
• Bake at 375⁰F for 35 minutes. Cool before serving.

Morrocon Cigars Using Left Over Thanksgiving Turkey

With so many leftover Turkey from Thanksgiving, and leftover oil from November Daring Baker's challenge, I made a delicious snacks that everyone who tried this just loved it. I first tried this fried spicy snack in Israel (with ground lamb), and hooked right away. If you are too concern about frying them, I suppose you can bake it in the oven, although I doubt that it will be as delicious.

Ingredients:

about 4 ounces left over Turkey, chopped into small pieces, OR ground lamb or beef (even more delicious)

½ cup chopped onion

1 tbs ground cumin

1 tbs ground coriander

½ tbs ground cinnamon

1 tbs sweet paprika

½ tbs cayenne pepper

¼ cup finely chopped mix of parsley, mint, and cilantro

oil for deep frying

salt and pepper to taste

1 box Filo dough strips, thaw if frozen according to package direction

1 egg white for brushing

Confectioner's sugar and ground cinnamon, for serving (optional)

• Fry the onion with ½ tbs oil until soft, set aside to cool.
• In a large bowl, combine the cooled onion, and the rest of ingredients, except the oil for frying.
• Cut filo dough to 6 x 14 inches (you need about 20 strips of filo), cover with slightly damp kitchen towel to prevent them from drying out. The leftover filo can be put back in the freezer for other use. Just cover with plastic, and put them back in the original package.
• Take a sheet of filo, place about 2 tablespoon of filling on the short end of filo dough. Tuck in the both end, so that the filling will not come out, then roll up into cigar shape. glue the end with a little egg white. Do the same with the rest.
• Fry in hot oil until brown on all side. Serve hot accompanied by confectioner's sugar and ground cinnamon for dipping.

p.s

I am sending this tasty snack to Natasha for her 5 Stars makeover.