Merry White Christmas!

 

Isn't this beautiful! The upper mid-west had a huge snow storm starting Tuesday to Wednesday. It dumped about 18 inches heavy snow in our yard and landscape. This storm was the 2nd biggest I have seen in the 20 years here. It made a scene, and truly a beautiful scene. This picture is taken about 1/2 mile down the road from my house. Took the picture on the home from dropping kids at school. I have to mention, the temperature is about 5 F, but the sun is making every shining and warm. I love it.

Here are kids cleaning snow on Wednesday morning. It took us more than 2 hours in the morning and husband an hour in the afternoon to clear the drive way and side walk. Nobody went anywhere that day. Kids were so joyous of the snow. They played and built forts. Meimei always hides treats in hers so Jack, our black lab, can go find them. 

We are celebrating dear son's 14th birthday today. It's been a hectic week for all of us, finishing up things before our big trip. Yes, we are leaving tomorrow to visit my home city for 3 weeks!!! It's been 4 years for son and husband. Meimei and I were there 2 years ago. My mom has been asking a couple of weeks ago if I were done packing. Are you kidding? I just finished all the laundry this morning and started the packing process. Didn't realize how much stuff I am bringing home until they were all laid out in front of me. That's okay, though. Husband is at work; kids are at school; bird is at the sitter; I was ready to go. I have pretty much got it done. I still need to drop off Jack the dog at the friend and stop by the library to get books for kids. Whew! Then, we can have a good birthday dinner with kids. I didn't make cakes for him this year, but he knows that we will have many different kinds of cakes when we get to Taipei. 

Kids really miss not having a Christmas tree this year since we are traveling. Son has been cutting family tree since he was 11, and we are very proud of him stepping up for the role. Meimei is still a little girl, well she is only 11, and loves decorating the tree and surprises. We will be celebrating the Savior's birth on the other side of the Pacific Ocean. It has a lot of meaning to me. I didn't have time to make much Christmas cookies or treats, but I did make a batch of pecan tassies. This little yumminess has become part of our Christmas traditions for many years. This recipe is originated by Pampered Chef, but I modified it. If I ever get a chance to blog on my vacation, I'll add the recipe.

Merry Christmas to everyone. We shall be back on the New Year Day!

Happy Birthday to Me!

Can't believe it's October already. What happened to September? Oh yes, I need to post something about Chinese Moon Festival and all the pastries I made this year. I had a good birthday this year. Nothing loud, but it was so cozy. Dear husband, and kids in a small portion, gave me the gift I wanted - a Staub 6.5 quart round "La Cocotte"! I used it right away to make the Chinese beef stew for noodle as my, and the rest of the family's, favorite birthday dinner. 

The cake was the black and white cake from Dorie Greenspan's "Baking: From My Home to Yours". I decorated it my way. I made some changes to make it less sweet. Kids loved it, but husband and I still thought the sugar part can be toned down more. 

I need to come back here more often. We picked about 10 pounds of apples last weekend, and I am already make different apple treats. I'll leave it for the next post. 

Celebrate another year with love, joy, and hope!

What happened to the summer?!

I just can't believe my last post was dated back in May. Yes, yes, I thought I could blog more in the summer. Here I am, almost the end of the summer, and kids start school in a week, I just realized that I have not posted once in the past 3 months. Sorry. Have to keep this one short, too.

(The picture on the top was taken at Chicago's downtown Millennium Park. I call it "The Helmet!")

Lots of tart making this summer. Here is one of my creations, Mango tart with Almond cream base and pastry cream filling. Very good combination, to my surprise, and summery taste. Love it! I also made several fruit tarts, pear tarts, and Tirimisu tarts for various occasions and orders. It's a tart summer! 

Have to go now. Will come back soon for regular, well more regular, posting later. Summer in the upper Midwest is going away fast. We are taking in as much as we can! 

One Macaron, Two Macaron, Three Macaron NUTS

The first time I ever heard of "macaron" was about 3 years ago. Lots bloggers in my home country were crazily talking about it. You see, curiosity usually doesn't long to get me. I started looking into more and more information about it. If you google the word "macaron" today, you get tons of search results. Some say it's cookie, while the others claim its identity as family of candies. You pick which to believe. My first macaron was 2 years ago at an upscaled bakery while visiting my home country. The impression was pretty downscaled, I have to say. All I can remember about that macaron was that it made my teeth ached. WAY TOO SWEET! Due to that experience, I was determined to make good macarons. I started looking for recipes and compared the sugar amount, AND I FOUND THEM!

As you can tell, it took me about 2 years of investigating these little "things" to take my own first step. Helen the tartelette and Aran the Cannelle are my mentors on the macaron path. I have read almost all their posts regarding macarons. It really helps, trust me, to get yourself familiar with the techniques by reading before doing. Both of these ladies are amazing. They are well experienced but yet very kind to share what they know. They set good examples for me. So, this post is a tribute to them.

I made the chocolate macarons in Aron's blog for my macaron debute about 3 months ago. It was a total success. I filled them with bittersweet chocolate ganache, and it was the most favorite among family and friends. Since then, I have made Aran's pistachio macarons with white chocolate grapefruit ganache, Aran's Chocolate Macarons with salty peanut butter filling, Helen's opera macarons, and many different kinds of butter cream, ganache, and my own caramel sauce to go with different macaron shells. It was so much fun, almost like a game. Every time I made a combination, it became the favorite among the testers. Funny! 

Helen's recent post on strawberry macarons really caught my eyes. I like new things and changes. So, I made them right away. The first two pictures are them. I promised they are NOT chocolate macarons. I don't have any pink powder color, so I used burgundy. It came out a bit too dark. And, it took me 2 hours in 250F oven to dry those sliced strawberries. Argh! That's the only downside for these tasty macarons. I made some butter cream wtih egg yolks, instead of egg whites. I mixed half a pod of vanilla beans in, and it was perfect! 

I confess that I don't always follow the recipes to the exact. It is fine to add my own touch and baking experience to the stuff. I don't change too much when I follow Helen's and Aran's macaron recipes. Well, I am known as a "more-or-less" cook/baker. As long as you don't drift too far off, I think it's not harmful. (Please don't my words for it, if you don't agree.) Making macarons are not difficult, but it's tricky. Here are some my opinions:

- mastering meringue is the first and most important task. I have been making chiffon and sponge cakes for many years, and I LOVE working with egg whites. This experience came very handy making macarons. I don't mind making Italian meringue. But I think for small batches macarons, French meringue is the easiest. AND, in my opinion, French meringue macarons are less sweet than Italian meringue ones. What you need to look for is the finish meringue should have the texture of the make-up sponge ladies use for putting the foundations on their face. You almost can not see the air bubbles. It should not look at the scrubbing sponge you use to wash dishes. You want your meringue looks so welcoming, so shining, and so soft that you want to put your face on it. Got the idea? One big lesson about whipping egg whites I learned from April is to finish the meringue in a slow speed with the electric mixer. This is what I do sometimes. Once the whites are whipped to the full body, take the bowl off the machine and whip it by hand. It will truly stabilize your egg white.

- I very much appreciate Helen's "Macarons 101". She carefully explained all the details her French meringue macarons. I love it when she wrote "... starting to fold vigorously and rather fast at 

first, .." Woo, being vigorous is one of my strengths. So I followed, and that gave me my first batch of macarons successfully. 

- Aged egg whites in room temperature works well for me, so I always make sure separate the whites 2-3 days beforehand, leave in the refrigerator, then let it sit in room temperature for 24 hours. I usually put it in my basement where is cooler than my ground level kitchen temperature. 

- Drying process after piping is very important. The one time my macarons came out flopped was when I hurried them into the oven. Of course, the sitting time has a lot to do with the humidity of the environment. I made most of mine in the winter season, and we always had heater going. House humidity was low, so one hour was sufficient. 

- I started grinding nuts using my coffee grinder. It really saves money. I bought a pound of blanched almond flours from the organic food section in my local grocery store. It was $10. The slivered almond is only half of that price per pound. I can do the grinding myself, and it doesn't cost much!

Oh yes, the homemade caramel sauce is awesome. I didn't like store bought caramel at all until I started making my own. The recipe is from Rose Levy Beranbaum's The Pie and Pastry Bible. By the way, that book is educational. I have been using it for pies and tarts since I got it few years ago. 

Completely Happy!

It's hard to find time blogging. One of my main reasons for this blog is to pay tributes to some important people. Well, I realized how much time I need to compose each post. Now, I have a few posts pending in my file folder, and I will get to them when I have time. 

Just want to post a few pictures of birthday cakes I made in the past 4 months. 

Friends are very good to me. They give me total freedom creating cakes for them. From the time they order, I start forming idea from the cake body, the flavor of the mousse, the layers, the frosting, to the decoration. Each cake is custom made and often different. It really challenges me, and I love it. 

The cake on the top is a chocolate chiffon cake with white chocolate whipped cream, of course layered with strawberry slices and topped with many strawberries.  The cake on the upper right is the green tea mousse with green tea sponge cake base. The one to the right is basically followed the Mascarpone and blueberry cake in Dorie Greenspan's book "Desserts by Pierre Herme", and obviously I used strawberries instead. The cake below is a chocolate mousse finished with ganache. 

My First Ever!!!

I can't believe I am doing this - I am blogging!!! Oh well, there is always the first time. I am no good at photographing; I am no good at English wording; I am no experienced at blogging. But I love baking. It can be a struggle deciding to bake or not to bake while there are work, house, family, piano, kids, husband, friends, and on and on. Finally, I decided that this is a place to record my on-going learning of baking and cooking and growing in many different ways.

I have learned from many bloggers who are far beyond me yet have shared so much with people like me, those who are Helen, Aran, April, and many more. My greatest appreciations go to them.

Thanks to dear friend P.-Y. for taking these pictures with her flowers. Oh yes, I am also no good at gardening, but she is. 

Like many others, I also have a bad habit of collection cook books. Dorie Greenspan's Desserts by Pierre Herme is my new love lately. I followed almost to the exact making this lemon tart. I also made some small tartlets but they were all gone to many happy stomachs before I could bring out the camera. I again need to thank Aran for pointing the right place to get those small tart rings. I love them. 

This will be it for the first shot. More later.