I made an interesting recycled cake recipe from the second volume of Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking: La Charlotte Africaine.
Basically, you take 8 ounces of melted chocolate and combine it with an equal weight of crumbled cake scraps and beaten eggs. It is a bit of a pain in that you need to beat the yolks and whites separately. Ideally, you bake it in a charlotte mold, but I used a 6″ cake ring.
As a general rule, Passover desserts are either the kind that do not need flour to begin with, or are the type that have been converted for Passover use by swapping out the usual flour for potato starch and matzoh cake meal. The chocolate cake here represents a third sort: a baked good that is supposed to be made with potato starch.
This is Julia Child’s Le Glorieux, from Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume Two. It is a genoise type of cake that is made with potato starch. A large amount of melted butter and chocolate is added to make this a light, but rich cake. (more…)
As I’ve said before, Passover desserts fall into two camps: (1) recipes that are not based on flour and need little or no changes to work for Passover, and (2) recipes that are based on flour and need to be converted to work with potato starch and matzoh cake meal.
Generally, flourless desserts are a safer bet. But, sponge cake and chiffon cakes are a holiday tradition.
In the past, I have not had spectacular success with this kind of recipe. This year, I think I am finally making headway.
When it comes to Passover desserts, you have two options: (1) make a recipe that substitutes potato starch or matzoh meal for flour, or (2) use a recipe that does not depend on flour. Option two is usually the most successful.
Flourless chocolate cakes are the most obvious choice (and I will get to my favorite momentarily). There are cookies that are more or less flourless that are great options as well.
Maida Heatter’s famous chocolate cookies (also known as Soho Gobs, Mudslides, Bittersweet Decadence and a bunch of other names) are a fail-safe cookie choice. I especially like Alice Medrich’s take on this cookie in her book Bittersweet. Just substitute potato starch for the minimal amount of flour called for in the recipe.
I just discovered another winner: Beacon Hill cookies, as reinterpreted by Alice Medrich. So easy and so good–the only catch is that the cookies do not have much of a shelf life.
Happy Purim! Chag Sameach!
(above hamantaschen cake was make from the Rose Levy Beranbaum chocolate cake recipe recently featured on Joe Pastry; the frosting was a variation of Julia Child’s buttercream: 4 ounces of margarine, 5 ounces of semisweet chocolate, and 2 ounces of hot coffee. The “mohn” filling is just colored sprinkles.)
I meant to post this for BBD #23, because this bread certainly was like nothing I have ever made before. This potato bread, from Baking with Julia, is basically a huge, yeasted, baked gnocchi. (more…)
The picture of the fougasse in Baking with Julia was irresistible; I had to give the recipe a try. I loved the way that the surface of the dough was covered with little bubbles. (to watch the original PBS episode, go here; for the recipe and to see how some other bloggers have fared with it, try here, here, and here)
For the Fourth Annual Julia Child Birthday Celebration, hosted by Champaign Taste, I made Reine de Saba. Julia said that this was the first French cake that she ever ate, as prepared by Simone Beck. (more…)
Pragmatic Attic 