Raspberry Chocolate Clafoutis

I love this last photo. It makes me drool.

Clafoutis: the dish so nice, I made it twice... in the span of two weeks. Okay, that was cheesy. I apologize. I'm not going to lie; clafoutis are easy, delicious, versatile, and can sort of pass as breakfast food when I'm running out the door in the morning. Ahem. Also, I just plain love anything chocolatey, and since the HUGE power outage that knocked out the power for something like 300,000 houses in our area, I've been looking to use the defrosted frozen (previously fresh) berries that have been sitting in my fridge.

This is me being industrious and delicious AT THE SAME TIME. Admit it; I'm awesome.

I think my roommates are FINALLY getting used to my style of baking (aka loud music, dancing, godawful singing, and a huge mess everywhere... hey, I never claimed to be the prettiest baker to ever hit the interwebs). Cassie even asked... okay, who the hell am I kidding? Cassie DEMANDED to help me mix the batter, in between screaming at the new episode of Jersey Shore. I live in a mental asylum, but at least it's interesting. :)

Also, for the first time, I let the gods of last.fm decide upon my musical selection while baking. Laaaaazy. I just used the "Play Your Library" function, and it spit out a great mix, which I will now enumerate. Those who care, feel free to add me as a last.fm friend! --> http://www.last.fm/user/alynnhouse

Those who don't, feel free to skip ahead.

1) "The Resistance" - Anberlin

2) "Cuddle Fuddle" - Passion Pit

3) "Are You Sleeping?" - Harry Nilsson

4) "Crush'd" - Say Anything

5) "Tidal" - Imogen Heap

6) "Are You With Me" - Vaux

Primo jumping around the kitchen music. :)

ANYWAY... on to the actual recipe. This recipe, it turns out, is NOTHING like the other clafoutis recipe I posted. This dessert is very much a dessert; it's very rich and sweet and tangy (thanks to the raspberries). The texture is much more like a custard (thanks, I'm sure, to the whole milk and less eggs). Still, this recipe is absolutely a keeper, just for a different purpose. Yum!

Raspberry Chocolate Clafoutis

Adapted from Gourmet

Ingredients:

• 12 oz raspberries
• 1 tbsp sugar
• 1/3 c flour
• 1/2 c brown sugar, packed
• 2 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
• 3 eggs
• 1 c whole milk
• 4 tbsp unsalted butter, melted
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 6 oz semisweet chocolate, roughly chopped

To Make:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Spray baking dish (I used the infamous casserole dish, but I'm sure any would work) with nonstick spray.
2. Toss raspberries with sugar and set aside.
3. Combine all remaining ingredients EXCEPT chocolate, beating until smooth.
4. Spread raspberry mixture evenly in bottom of baking dish. Pour batter over raspberries.
5. Bake for 35 minutes (SEE NOTES) until puffed up. Remove and immediately scatter chocolate over the top. Cool for at least 20 minutes.

Some Notes:

• Next time I am absolutely going to butter the dish instead of nonstick-spraying it. It created the best crust on my last clafoutis.
• I would definitely recommend lengthening the baking time by at least 5 minutes on this dish. It didn't firm up the way I expected it would... nothing like my last clafoutis. I think this was probably because the raspberries I used were much juicier than the cherries. Although this clafoutis was cooked through, it was the most custard-like around the edges.
• Next time I might also use bittersweet chocolate, like the original recipe called for, instead of semisweet. The semisweet and the raspberries together were a bit much. It would have been nice to have the bite of bittersweet.

Cherry Clafoutis

Helloooooo! We're going to go ahead and pretend that I have not been completely absent for the last half a year. Let's, instead, accept the fact that I'm coming late to the party, and embrace the fact that I showed up at all!

I've been living in Washington, DC this summer, interning and generally getting lost way more often than I probably should be. The apartment that I'm living in came furnished with dishes, but they wouldn't tell me what dishes before I moved in... so I did the unthinkable. I LEFT ALL MY BAKING EQUIPMENT IN AKRON! And of course, we don't even have a baking pan other than a casserole dish. I've had to scrape, borrow, and sell my firstborn child to get any baking done here. Hence, this lovely breakfast food... Cherry Clafoutis in a casserole dish!

Kat and I FINALLY had time to talk on the phone about a week ago... and oh, boy, did we talk. I miss her, although I'm really excited that she's moving out West in a little more than a week, I also am jealous and want to be able to visit her a lot! P.S. Kat- I am buying a ticket next week. Thanksgiving for the ages!

Anyway, she point-blank told me to make a clafoutis. And because I respect my elders, I did. And it was delicious. If you don't know what a clafoutis is... I really can't help you out. It's french in origin. But I can't figure out how to explain what it tastes like other than the french like butter a lot, and cherries are delicious this time of year. And now that I'm absolutely pro at clafoutis-ing, I have a killer recipe for raspberry-chocolate clafoutis that I could probably pass off as some semblance of a breakfast food...

Glad to be back. :)

Cherry Clafoutis "Casserole"

Adapted from Sunlight Cafe

Ingredients:

• 1 tbsp butter
• 1 1/2 c ripe cherries, pitted and halved
• 1 1/3 c flour
• 1 1/2 c milk
• 4 tbsp sugar
• 4 eggs
• 1/4 tsp salt
• whipped cream

To Make:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. While preheating, melt the butter in the bottom of the casserole dish, and allow to spread all over the bottom of the dish. Mix 1 tbsp of flour with the cherries and set aside.
2. Combine milk, sugar, eggs, vanilla and salt and mix until smooth. Pour batter into the casserole dish, and spoon the cherries into the batter, concentrating them near the center.
3. Bake the dish for 35 minutes, until browned around the edges.
4. Top with whipped cream, and serve warm.

Profiteroles with Caramel Sauce

It's criminal, I know. An entire semester has gone by without a post. In my defense, this was a tough semester educationally, emotionally, and socially. BUT I never stopped baking whenever I was given the opportunity!

One of my favorite classes this semester was People and Cultures of Latin America. We had an evening get together at the professor's house one night, potluck style with all sorts of traditional Latin American foods. I was in charge of the dessert, so I ended up bringing profiteroles with caramel sauce and Mexican tea cookies.

The pictures above don't show the profiteroles (a kind of cream puff popular at weddings in South and Central America) with the caramel sauce, because I made it fresh when I got to the professor's house. That was an experience in itself, cooking with everyone watching me... I got some serious nerves. But these went over really well! They take a lot of time to make, and are technically challenging, but I think they're worth it...

Profiteroles with Caramel Sauce

Adapted from Bon Appetit

Ingredients:

For puffs

• 1 c. water
• 1/2 c. unsalted butter
• 1 c. flour
• 1/4 tsp. salt
• 4 eggs

For filling

• 1 tbsp. water
• 1 tsp. unflavored gelatin
• 2 c. whole milk
• 2/3 c. whipping cream
• 1 vanilla bean
• 6 egg yolks
• 2/3 c. sugar
• 1/2 c. all purpose flour
• pinch of salt

For caramel sauce

• 1 1/3 c. sugar
• 1/3 c. water
• 2/3 c. whipping cream
• 1/4 c. butter, cut into cubes

To Make:

1. Boil water and butter for puffs in sauce pan. Reduce heat to low, and add the flour and salt. Stir until the mixture pulls away from the sides and forms a ball.
2. Transfer to large bowl, and using a mixer, beat in eggs one at a time. Cover and let stand, 1 hour.
3. Preheat oven to 425 degrees F, and butter two baking sheets. Put coupler (with no tip) into a pastry bag, and spoon dough in. Pipe 1 inch rounds onto the baking sheets, and smooth the tops. Bake until golden brown, about 20-25 minutes. Take out of oven and turn off oven. Using a knife, pierce the sides of each puff and put back into oven for 10 minutes with the door ajar.
4. Place the water for filling into a bowl, and sprinkle in gelatin. Simmer in a saucepan milk, cream, and vanilla bean (cut in half with the seeds scraped into the pan).
5. In a large bowl, mix egg yolks, sugar, flour, and salt. Gradually whisk in hot milk mixture, then return to saucepan. Whisk over medium heat until thick.
6. Stir in gelatin mixture. Transfer to bowl, and cover with plastic wrap pressed to the mixture. Chill.
7. Spoon mixture into pastry bag with a 1/4 inch tip, and pipe into completely cool puffs.
8. Stir sugar and water for sauce in a saucepan until dissolved, over medium heat. Turn up heat and boil, without stirring until deep amber in color. Take off heat, and stir in cream then butter. Drizzle over puffs.

Some Notes:

• In the future, I will definitely replace steps 4-6 with the much easier and less gelatin-y cream from my favorite banana cream pie recipe.