Category Archives: Dessert

Not back yet, but here is some tasty filler. Coconut Cream Pie, by request from Not Crocker’s padre (recipe for Gingersnaps included)

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Dad’s doing fairly well, as well as he can. He’s certainly got his sense of humour. He has a steady flow of visitors each day, and more importantly, a steady flow of scotch. Today, his son-in-law brought him a bottle of Johnnie Walker Blue Label and we all enjoyed the smooth delicious blend of ridiculously expensiveness. I am looking forward to another paper cup with a scotch rock (granite frozen to cool the scotch without watering it down) and a splash of the good stuff tomorrow.

Dad asked the other day, for some pie, specifically apple… and then pumpkin…and finally coconut cream. So coconut cream pie it is! Kel and I got to making it that night and we had it the next day, the longer the flavours mellow, the better. And wow, super delicious. I really can’t think of a time when I’ve had coconut cream pie, and I’ve stayed clear of banana cream pie for the most part because it seems like one too many smooth textures, I need some textural variation. Well, coconut cream pie has some chewy bits of toasted coconut, a nice gingersnap crust and two different layers of creamy goodness. The pictures aren’t great because I am still in the midst of the Great Camera Fiasco of 2012. I left my battery charger up here in the Yukon in July. Mom and Dad were supposed to head south mid-August, so I made-do with the cord. Then all of this madness happened and I had to come north, a month after I left it here. Well, I get off the plane and tell mom how excited I am to charge my camera battery (it’s the small things, clearly) and she tells me that she mailed it the day before. Curses! Anyway, the iPhone photos can’t take away from the scrumptious pie. Make it. Love it. Tell me all about it.

Coconut Cream Pie

Lightly adapted from Anna Ols0n. 

INGREDIENTS 

Gingersnap Crust

  • 3/4 cup + 1/3 cup butter, room temperature
  • 1 cup brown sugar, packed
  • 1/4 cup molasses
  • 1 egg
  • 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
  • 2 tsps baking soda
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1 tsp ground ginger
  • 1 tsp ground cinnamon
  • 1/2 tsp ground cloves
  • 1/2 tsp cardamon
  • sugar, for coating

Coconut Filling

  • 2/3 cup sugar
  • 2 1/2 tbsp cornstarch
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 2 1/4 cups coconut milk
  • 2 whole eggs
  • 2 egg yolks
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • 2 tbsp butter
  • 1 cup shredded coconut, lightly toasted**

Cream Topping

  • 1 1/2 cups whipping cream
  • 1/4 cup sugar
  • 1 tbsp skim milk powder
  • 1/4 cup coconut, lightly toasted **

DIRECTIONS

  1. The first step is to bake your gingersnaps.
  2. Heat oven to 350 °F.
  3. Cream 3/4 cup butter (reserve the 1/3 for later) and sugar together until light and fluffy. Stir in molasses and beat in egg.
  4. Add flour, baking soda, salt, and spices and stir just until blended.
  5. Roll spoonfuls of dough into balls and roll in a shallow dish of white sugar. Place 2 inches apart on a greased or parchment-lined baking sheet and press flat with the palm of your hand, or a fork. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes, until edges are lightly browned. Remove from baking sheet to cool. If you just want gingersnaps, stop here. Eat cookies.
  6. To form the crust: grind cooled cookies in a food processor, or by hand (good luck!) and measure out 2 1/2 cups of crumbs (we used all but 6 cookies, which we munched on the next day). Melt the 1/3 cup butter and mix into crumbs. Press into a 9-inch pie pan (we also put some into a 4-inch tart pan so Dad could have his individual pie at the hospital) and chill until ready to fill.
  7. For filling: stir sugar, cornstarch, and salt together in a heavy-bottomed saucepot. Whisk in coconut milk, whole eggs, and egg yolks. Heat custard on low while whisking constantly for 5 minutes.
  8. **Turn oven to 400°F, spread coconut in a thin layer on a baking sheet. Bake for 5 minutes, stir on pan and toast for another 3-5 minutes until light brown. Some darker toasted shreds are totally ok. Reserve 1/4 cup for sprinkling on top.
  9. Back to the custard! Increase heat to medium and continue whisking until custard thickens and becomes glossy, about 5 more minutes. Remove from heat and strain. Stir in vanilla, butter, and toasted coconut. Stir until butter has melted. Pour immediately into chilled pie shell, let cool on the counter for 15 minutes, then chill completely before topping with cream, at least 4 hours.
  10. For cream topping: whip cream to a medium peak, and whisk in sugar and skim milk powder. Top coconut custard with whipped cream, and sprinkle remaining toasted coconut on top as garnish.

Coconut custard.

Dark Chocolate Mousse!

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I love chocolate, particularly dark chocolate and this mousse is a celebration of my love! It takes a few bowls, but is totally worth it. It is light and airy, mousse-style; rich and indulgent, dark chocolate-style. I like to top it with some fresh summer berries, a dollop of lightly-sweetened whipped cream, or a quick drizzle of liqueur. I served this to a small party of friends I had over last night, quote of the night came from Tobias who said, “THIS IS THE BEST THING I HAVE EVER PUT IN MY FACE.” I think that is what he said, other friends, correct me if I am wrong.

Dark Chocolate Mousse

From this submission.

Ingredients

  • 1/3 cup white sugar
  • 6 tbsp prepared, strong coffee
  • 225 g dark chocolate (I prefer in the 70% range) (7oz)
  • 1/4 cup whipping cream
  • 3 large egg whites
  • 1 1/2 cups chilled whipping cream

Directions

  1. In a saucepan, dissolve sugar in coffee over medium heat. Set aside.
  2. In the top of a double boiler over hot, (not simmering or boiling) water, melt the dark chocolate, stirring constantly, until smooth. When completely melted, whisk in the 1/4 cup of cream and the coffee/sugar mixture. Stir until smooth. Allow to cool.
  3. Beat egg whites to soft peaks. Gently fold in 1/2 cup of the cooled chocolate mixture. Pour this latter mixture back into the chocolate mixture, folding gently.
  4. Beat chilled cream to soft peaks, and fold into chocolate mixture, very gently until totally mixed.
  5. Pour mousse into a large serving bowl, or 8 individual dessert glasses. Cover with plastic wrap, chill for 4 hours or overnight.

Step-by-step

  1. In a saucepan, dissolve sugar in coffee over medium heat. Set aside.
  2. In the top of a double boiler over hot, (not simmering or boiling) water, melt the dark chocolate, stirring constantly, until smooth. When completely melted, whisk in the 1/4 cup of cream and the coffee/sugar mixture. Stir until smooth. Allow to cool.

    Melting away on my makeshift double boiler.

  3. Beat egg whites to soft peaks. Gently fold in 1/2 cup of the cooled chocolate mixture. Pour this latter mixture back into the chocolate mixture, folding gently.

    Looks like bad news but it will come together! The key is slow folding!

    Tah dah! Eggs and chocolate, well combined!

  4. Beat chilled cream to soft peaks, and fold into chocolate mixture, very gently until totally mixed.

    Ready for the big chill. This doesn’t look like a lot, but it is a very big bowl!

  5. Pour mousse into a large serving bowl, or 8 individual dessert glasses. Cover with plastic wrap, chill for 4 hours or overnight.

Warning: May cause extreme happiness.

Cookie Dough Dip

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Another cookie dough related post! This was the second dip I brought to my friends’ party, the first being the glorious, much loved Buffalo Chicken Dip. This dip was also well-received, served with simple cookies and some apple slices. It is sweet but not too sweet, fluffy, and distinctly tastes of a lovely cookie dough. Wanted to try this type of a sweet dip, enjoyed it, may make it in the future.

Cookie Dough Dip

Adapted from this recipe.

Ingredients

  • 1 – 8 oz package cream cheese, softened
  • 1/2 cup butter, softened
  • 1 cup powdered sugar
  • 2 tbsp dark brown sugar
  • 1 1/2 tsp vanilla
  • 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

Directions

  1. Cream together cream cheese and butter.
  2. Add remaining ingredients and mix until well-combined.
  3. Serve with light cookies (in flavour, try to find sturdy cookies, this dip is fluffy but still needs a strong cookie, the ones I picked were a little delicate) or apple wedges. Also, nearer the end of the night, some were eating this with carrots which they claimed tasted like carrot cake… so, to each their own. This dip is good to make the day before, it stayed fluffy and smooth overnight.

Whipping it all together.

Gen is doing some stellar hand-modelling.

Flan, super easy recipe from Nigella Lawson

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I was pretty hesitant of this recipe when I first read it, because canned milks freak me out… but it is AWESOME. The flavour and texture are spot-on. My El-Salvadorian dude loves it and is disappointed when I don’t make it (or make it at someone else’s house and don’t have any to bring home… sorry Gen!). It is super easy, but it does take some patience, it needs to set for four hours, or overnight. But it is worth it.

Flan

Recipe found through this great blog, originally from Nigella Express 

Ingredients

  • 3/4 cup sugar
  • 1 (12 oz) can evaporated milk
  • 1 (14 oz) can sweetened condensed milk
  • 3 large eggs
  • 2 tsp vanilla

Directions

  1. Preheat oven to 325°F.
  2. Pour the sugar into a 9″ metal pie plate (must be metal, you are heating this directly on the stove). Place the pan over low heat until the sugar begins to caramelize, becoming liquid, syrup. Swirl the sugar every now and then as it melts. Press the larger chunks of unmelted sugar down to encourage their melting. Your spoon will be coated in hard caramel, run it under hot water to clean it after. The sugar will begin to caramelize-just before the sugar reaches the color of maple syrup, take the pan off the heat and place it on a cool surface. This process isn’t kind to your pie pan, it doesn’t wreck it, but it will likely discolour after a couple times. I used two reusable pie plates when I was over at my friend’s and they worked well.
  3. Swirl the caramel up the sides of the pan and set aside
  4. Boil a kettle of water (for the water bath).
  5. Whisk together the evaporated milk, sweetened condensed milk, eggs, and vanillas.
  6. Place your pie pan into a roasting pan (or another deep oven-safe dish)
  7. Pour the milk mixture into caramel-coated pie pan (it will go right to the top, this is why you put it in the roasting pan first).
  8. Pour the boiling water into the roasting pan, up to 1 inch deep.
  9. Carefully slide the whole shebang into the oven (some might slosh, that’s cool). Cook for 45-50 minutes, until set. It may still seem wobbly after 50 minutes, but don’t leave it longer.
  10. Let the flan cool on the counter, out of the roasting pan. When cool, cover with plastic wrap and put in the fridge for 4 hours, or overnight.
  11. Eating time?! Place a large plate over the pie pan, carefully and quickly flip it over and let the flan fall out (you might have to run a butter knife down the side to encourage movement). Cut in wedges and spoon the syrup over each slice.

Muffin Pudding (hmm, sounds weird) Muffin Bread Pudding (better?)

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Well I am not sure how to properly title this. I had a heck of a time googling around to see if it had been done, done successfully, or was being warned against. I found all of the above but little other information. Bread pudding is one of my all time favourite desserts, which is weird, I know. Something about the creamy custard and the rich flavours. It just floats my boat. Anyway, yesterday was Gen’s birthday, so I felt the need to make every meal a fancy feast. My whole plan was to bake some brioche on Friday, slice it up and make french toast casserole on Saturday. Well that’s not how things panned out. I made a mess of the bread, we wont even speak of it. It tastes fine but it is under cooked and very dark… I need to go into a bread baking workshop, I am not doing it right. Anyway, so this morning I was out of luck for that dish, though I did make some delicious omelets with the left-over Jalapeño Popper Dip from the night before. But as I was making pizza (recipe tomorrow), I looked over at the leftover Coffee Cake Muffins and had a brain wave. I kind of winged it, but it turned out delightful. Not too sweet, the sugar in and on the muffins did the trick.

The pictures are not great because I wasn’t entirely sure that this was going to turn out. Also, I switched from the 9 x 13 pan to a 1 1/2 quart casserole dish that was deeper so the custard could reach more of the muffins. It was nice using already so tasty muffins because it meant I had to do little in the line of flavouring to make this tasty. You could certainly use other stale muffins, but the flavours will change substantially depending on the muffins you use. These had a nice hint of nutmeg and cinnamon, and they were studded with the walnuts I had used in the crumb topping. Awesome.

Muffin Bread Pudding

Ingredients

  • 1 cup milk
  • 1 tsp vanilla
  • zest of ½ lemon
  • 1/3 cup butter
  • 7 slightly stale muffins, in this case my Coffee Cake Muffins
  • 3 eggs
  • 2 tsp sugar (more if your muffins are less sweet)
  • 1 cup cream
  • 2 tsp nutmeg
  • 1 tbsp brown sugar

Directions

  1. This pudding needs 15 minutes soaking time, follow the directions, let soak for 15 minutes and then bake.
  2. Break muffins into medium chunks and spread on a baking sheet, place in 350°F oven to toast for 8 minutes.
  3. Put the milk into a small pan with the vanilla. Bring to a simmer, then turn off the heat, add the lemon zest and allow to cool.
  4. Meanwhile, butter a medium casserole dish and put the muffin chunks into it, dot with the butter.
  5. Beat the eggs together with the sugar until combined. Beat the milk, nutmeg, and the cream into the egg mixture. Pour over the muffins, add any nuts or fruit you might want, and leave for 15 minutes.
  6. Pre-heat the oven to 375°F. Sprinkle the brown sugar over the top.
  7. Place on middle rack and cook for 20-30 minutes. The pudding is done when it is browned on top and set. Serve with half-whipped cream (whip until it just starts to thicken)

Muffins crumbled with butter, then I realized this dish was not going to work.

Perfect!