Monday, November 2, 2009

Halloween 2009







Just a quick little post!! M and I just recently moved into a new house and were excited to shell out candies to all the kids in our hood! We had about 40 kids but would've had more had we not stopped to watch the Leaf game. Check out our pumpkins, they were done last minute but cute nonetheless!


I also made some pumpkin seeds with a recipe from here: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Spiced-Pumpkin-Seeds/Detail.aspx

They were quite tasty and super easy!! Here's a pic of the yummy snacks.

Daring bakers October Challenge: French Macarons


The 2009 October Daring Bakers’ challenge was brought to us by Ami S. She chose macarons from Claudia Fleming’s The Last Course: The Desserts of Gramercy Tavern as the challenge recipe.


Well this was a challenge for me. I have to say not one I wish to repeat any time soon. Perhaps part of my problem was that I've never had the pleasure of trying one of these famous macarons so I didn't have anything to compare it to. That being said, I got some great tips from a fellow daring baker and I think had I not had these tips I probably wouldn't have been as successful as I was.


The difficulties I ran into were these, a)still kind of chewy/raw inside, I did manage to get the "feet" but I think I may have needed a few more minutes in the oven. I was scared as they were starting to turn quite golden regardless of using the 2 pan stacking method! Grr... b)sticking to the parchment paper. Now I did try using a few drops of water under the paper and still had troubles with the macarons sticking. Partly I think due to the fact that they were still under cooked. c) Also I wasn't sure if I under beat the egg whites. I had soft peaks but maybe I could've whipped it a tad bit longer. I was fearful of over beating!! Urgh!!


Overall, I'm satisfied with the results, everyone who had one enjoyed them, that being said they've also never had the pleasure of having tried a real one from a proper pastry shop! I used Dulce de Leche and Nutella.