Strawberry and Rhubarb Tartlets

PROJECT PATISSERIE:  Adventure #13

Rhubarb and strawberries go together like peanut butter and jelly, peas and carrots, Bonnie and Clyde. Having an allergy to either of these fruits (and I know people who do) would be as tragic to me as being allergic to chocolate. Rhubarb and strawberries are among the first fruits of spring and come as harbingers of hope, announcing to the world that the winter is finally over! That’s a message I know a lot of North Country folks are only too happy to hear!

If, dear reader, you find yourself on the fence regarding the general awesomeness of rhubarb, or perhaps have never considered the superiority of this fruit, maybe these little factoids will help to win you over. 

In descending order…

Cool Rhubarb Factoid #4: Rhubarb has been used medicinally in China as far back as 2700 B.C. to heal all manner of ills including the treatment of burns and as an astringent.  How often can something make an awesome pie and an equally lovely facial treatment?

Cool Rhubarb Factoid #3:  Rhubarb’s leaves are poisonous, which is probably why rhubarb is only sold in stores and farmers’ markets without its leaves (the stalks are perfectly edible though, just to be clear.)

Cool Rhubarb Factoid #2: If, dear reader, you have been irritated by my continual use of the word “fruit” throughout this piece to describe what appears to be a vegetable, you are not alone. In 1947 there was actually a lawsuit filed in New York State arguing over the classification of rhubarb. Lawyers spent hours and hours fighting over whether rhubarb was really a fruit or a vegetable. In case you’re wondering, New York ruled that it is indeed a fruit, which makes the U.S. one of the few countries in the world that doesn’t consider this sweet-tart stalk to be a vegetable.

And, obscure factoid #1: rhubarb should be held in higher general regard if, for no other reason, than because the words “rhubarb, rhubarb” were reputedly used in early British theatre and radio dramas to simulate the effects of unintelligible background conversation. ( Be sure to use that as a conversation starter at a BBQ this summer!)

The end of rhubarb season overlaps with the beginning of strawberry season is probably what birthed this classic combination. When talking about strawberry and rhubarb, the most obvious recipe is the strawberry rhubarb pie- that delicious early summer staple. But I thought that maybe this week we would take the road less traveled…

When I was home for Mother’s Day, I raided my mom’s Southern Living stack and found a recipe for this strawberry rhubarb tartlet in the May 2014 issue. Immediately capturing my imagination, the tartlets were my contribution to last Sunday’s family gathering and this week’s Project Patisserie recipe.

The finished pastry looks a lot like a fancy pants toaster pastry, although I must stop short of actually dubbing it that as I admittedly didn’t try putting one in a toaster. While they’re not as time- or labor intensive as some French pastry recipes, they do require a little bit of work and some resting time. I guarantee that the results are worth it, though. They were well received by my crew and I had no problem finding volunteers to split the few left over tartlets with.

STRAWBERRY RHUBARB TARTLETS

(recipe courtesy of Southern Living magazine)

I used a food processor (as it’s a bit faster) but feel free to adapt this recipe to the traditional hands-and-a-mixing-bowl method for the dough- either works!

Pulse 2 ½ c. of flour with ¼ c. sugar, ¼ tsp. salt, and ¼ tsp. of baking powder. Add 1 c. of cold butter cut into small pieces, and pulse a few times until the mixture resembles a coarse meal.  Stir together 2 large egg yolks with ½ c. of ice water. With the food processor running, pour the yolk-water mixture through the food chute and process until the mixture forms a ball and pulls away from the sides of the bowl.  Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and chill for 1 hour.

Meanwhile, melt 3 T. of unsalted butter over medium heat. Add ½ c. of sliced rhubarb and sauté for 3 minutes. Stir in 1 c. sliced strawberries and 2/3 c. of granulated sugar. Cook, stirring constantly, while crushing the fruit with the mixing spoon for about 5 minutes.

In a small bowl make a rue by mixing together 1 T. of flour and 2 T. of fresh lemon juice until smooth. Pour the rue into the rhubarb-strawberry mixture and bring to a boil. Cook, stirring often, until it thickens (about 2 minutes.) Transfer the mixture to a small bowl, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for about 30 minutes. This is the filling for the tartlets.  In my experience, I only ended up needing about half of it for the tartlets. Don’t throw the rest out! Make a double batch of the dough and use it for more tartlets- I promise you won’t have any trouble finding people to take them off your hands. I ended up mixing the leftover filling into vanilla pudding that I made later that day, but it would also be delicious drizzled over vanilla ice cream or cheesecake, or on crepes, or with your morning pancakes, or as a cake filling. 

You get the idea!

By now, the dough should be thoroughly chilled. Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Unwrap the dough and roll it out on a floured surface to a thickness of about 1/8”. The recipe says to cut the dough into rectangles using a 2 ½ x 3 inch cookie cutter- I don’t happen to have a rectangular cookie cutter and I couldn’t find one locally so I used a fluted pie cutter and a ruler and just measured out 2 ½ x 3 inch rectangles. If you don’t have the patience for all of that, just use a large round cookie cutter-  the finished tartlets will be slightly reminiscent of ravioli, but who doesn’t love ravioli? Especially strawberry-rhubarb filled pastry ravioli?

Place half of the pastry cutouts on a parchment-lined baking sheet, spaced about 2 inches apart and top each with about 1 T. of filling. Brush the edges of the dough with a bit of water and top with the remaining dough cut outs.  Press around the edges to seal.

Stir together 1 large egg and 2 T. of milk and brush the tops of the tartlets with the mixture. Cut a small “x” in the top of each tartlet for the steam to escape and bake them for 30-35 minutes, or until golden. Transfer to a wire rack and cool.  These guys are delicious warm, just as good at room temperature, and maybe even better cold -you can really taste the butter when they’ve been chilled which plays well with the sweet-tartness of the filling.

Strawberry-rhubarb tartlets- so, so good!

What a Peach! : A Vintage Dessert

PROJECT PATISSERIE: Adventure #12

My friend Julie (a born and raised LaFargevill-ian) married a wonderful man named Nate on May 3^rd. The couple had a small, private ceremony: in attendance were only the bride and groom’s immediate family members; the bride wore yellow.  No frills, no expensive cakes, or elaborate invitations. Personal and authentic, to paraphrase Frank Sinatra, Julie did it her way. In a world that is not always so joy-filled or happy, I think it behooves us to celebrate, whenever we can, things that are.

Julie comes from really good, salt-of-the-earth kind of people. So when her friends got together with the newly-minted couple this weekend to celebrate their marriage, the meal was inspired by her, and her country roots. The menu headliners were fried chicken, biscuits, gravy, hot potato salad (a kind of potato gratin, really), and green bean casserole. Julie furnished the homemade honeywine, I tended to my favorite course- dessert. No country-style meal would be complete without pie- buttermilk, this time, and, as a special treat, a little thing called Peach Delight.

The recipe for Peach Delight did not come from the Amish, or one of my fancy pants cookbooks, or the inter-web, even. In line with the theme of the event, it actually came from an old country antique store that I used to frequent B.B. (before babies.) I found the recipe, framed and sandwiched under a piece of glass, a few years ago and it’s been hanging on my dining room wall ever since.

Peach Delight is super easy to make, the prep time is very short, and it bakes quickly. Unlike its French and Italian brethren, there’s no waiting involved, no fancy flavors that need time to get to know each other before the dessert tastes its best.  It’s a friendly, come-as-you-are kind of dessert. It can be eaten very shortly after it comes out of the oven while still warm, but it’s also very good cold. It’s excellent with vanilla ice cream or Chantilly cream. My most favorite aspect, though, is that the recipe specifies the use of canned peaches.

While grocery store canned peaches are just fine, I choose to believe that the author specifically meant “canned” as in “put up.” I imagine the woman who put this recipe to paper was thinking about the kind of peaches that someone like Julie’s mama would can in her kitchen, using glass mason jars and her big enamelware kettle, full of all the love and care associated with everything homemade.

Peach Delight

The recipe reminds me of my grandmother. When asked for a recipe, she would happily share it but always with approximate measurements. When pressed for more exact measurements, she would say “Oh, just enough.” Because the recipe didn’t specify, I used a teaspoon for most of the measurements here and I was happy with the results. But don’t be bound by the teaspoon! I’ve never had a dessert that suffered from too much cinnamon or butter…

Preheat oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit. Put large canned peach halves and a little canning liquid in a muffin pan (I used single serving ramekins for easier service.) Fill the center of each peach half with about a teaspoon of brown sugar, a small piece of butter, and two drops of vanilla. Sprinkle the tops with cinnamon, and top with a tablespoon of drop biscuit dough (recipe below). Bake about 15 minutes or until the biscuits are golden brown.

This is the drop dough recipe that I used, but I think any good drop dough biscuit recipe will work. Sift together 2 c of flour, 4 tsp. baking powder, ½ tsp of cream of tartar, ½ tsp salt, and 2 T. sugar. Cut in ½ c, of butter or vegetable shortening until the mixture resembles a course meal. Slowly pour in 2/3 c. of milk. Add one beaten egg and stir well. The dough is now ready to use for the Peach Delight. There will be dough leftover, so either double the Peach Delight recipe, or portion and drop the remaining dough on a cookie sheet and bake at 450 for 10-15 minutes.

A little plain right out of the oven but imagine
 it with a dollop of Chantilly cream or a scoop of
 vanilla ice cream!

P.S. - Regarding last week’s Mud Hen Bars: I learned that there is a saying in the South that refers to something unsightly as being “uglier than a Mud Hen.” While no one seems to know for sure, I feel that that may be the key to last week’s mystery: the connection between the waterfowl (the Mud Hen) and the dessert (Mud Hen Bars.) Either way, it still seems more likely than my theory of a baker/ornithologist with a penchant for the American Coot marsh bird!

What's a Hen Got to do With It? : The Mud Hen Bar

PROJECT PATISSERIE: Adventure #11

What’s a Hen Got to do With It: The Mud Hen Bar

“What in creation is a mud hen?” That’s what I was asking myself when I came across the Mud Hen Bar recipe in my Amish cookbook. The funny thing about Amish cookbooks is that there’s not a picture to be found in them so (to paraphrase a certain California Representative) I had to bake it in order to find out.

We have a flock of chickens at home. I’ve seen them in all conditions- including very muddy, but they never reminded me of a dessert. I’ve also heard of mud puppies, which I mistakenly thought was Southern vernacular for an alligator (it’s apparently a salamander) - but a mud hen?

Never one to give up on the pursuit of useless knowledge, I turned to the internet. It turns out that there is such a thing as a Mud Hen- it’s apparently the common name for the American Coot, a water bird that looks a bit like a duck crossbred with a chicken. If you’re having trouble visualizing such a creature, dear readers, imagine a duck’s head on a chicken’s body, but with smoother feathers- that’s a Mud Hen. One photograph did show the American Coot as having a brown and white coloring. Mud Hen Bars are brown and white- so maybe that’s the connection?

It turns out Mud Hen Bars (we’re talking about the dessert now, not a place where the American Coots congregate over beer) are a Southern dessert. I got very excited because the American Coot is found in parts of the South, but then I kept reading and learned that they are also quite common as far north as British Columbia. Finding myself at a loss, I formed this hypothesis: a Southern baker/ ornithologist with a penchant for the American Coot named a dessert after it- that’s my shot in the dark. Alas, this may just be one culinary mystery that will have to be left unsolved.

Culinary enigmas aside, I recall introducing friends and family to this dessert at a recent party as Mud Hen Bars, or Muddy Hens, or some variation thereof. My family must have been equally puzzled by the name as they very quickly became known as the “ooey-gooey bars” probably thanks to the marshmallows.

These are quick and very easy to make. While they look like a gooey mess, and they are a bit gooey, the funny thing about these guys is that, after being refrigerated, they taste like brownies. It’s the darndest thing and quite fitting for a dessert with such mysterious origins to have an equally mysterious taste.

A word of warning: these are very sweet. In addition to the chocolate, marshmallows, and then the brown sugar used in the meringue topping, the recipe calls for an additional cup of sugar for the batter. On the next go round I think I’ll try to scale back on the sugar in the batter and see if the results aren’t better.

The Mud Hen Bar (a.k.a. The Ooey-Gooey Bar) Recipe

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Mix together ½ c. of melted butter and 1 c. of sugar. Beat in one whole egg and two eggs yolks (save the whites.) Add 1 ½ c. flour, 1 tsp. baking powder,  ¼ tsp. salt, and 1 tsp. vanilla.  Mix thoroughly and the spread the mixture in a greased 9 x 13 pan. 

Scatter 1 c. of semi-sweet chocolate chips and 1 c. of miniature marshmallows over the batter.

In a clean bowl, beat the two left-over egg whites until stiff peaks form, and then slowly add 1 c. of brown sugar. Beat just until incorporated. Spread this over the chocolate chips and marshmallows. Bake for 30-40 minutes or until golden brown. Cool and cut into squares. 

The Mud Hen

                                          

                                                    ...and the Mud Hen. Does anyone get the reference?

Chocolate Mocha Pie

PROJECT PATISSERIE: Adventure #10

Last week I waxed poetic about my new Amish cookbook- given the book’s immense pie section I thought I’d linger there just a little bit longer. Next week I promise to move on, but I found something in there that I couldn’t pass up: Chocolate Mocha pie.

The chocolate mocha pie was our contribution to my in-laws’ Kentucky Derby party last weekend. I can hear the collective shouting the obvious: “Derby Pie!” Yes, nothing would have been more apropos for a Kentucky Derby Party than a Derby Pie and the suggestion itself was echoed by a few party goers. I guess I could try to play it off as an intentional choice, pretend that I was just being too cool for school (or theme parties) or blame it on my contrary nature- “Rebel Without a Cause” in a frilly kitchen apron. What’s closer to the truth, though, is that I was more of a “Baker Without a Clue.” I vaguely recall hearing about Derby Pie in passing, I think, but really it just didn’t register. The only thing I can say in my defense is that I have a one-track mind when it comes to desserts and, as it so often is, that track was focused squarely on chocolate.

Out of curiosity I did look into Derby Pie. Derby Pie is served every year at the Kentucky Derby and is comprised of pie crust, chocolate, walnuts, and a bit of Kentucky bourbon. Although I’m not a fan of high-octane desserts, I am a sucker for tradition and I have a soft spot in my heart for the good people of Kentucky, so I may just have to pencil Derby Pie in for next year!

But back to the matter at hand. “Chocolate mocha pie” is a bit of a misnomer, as it does not contain any coffee or coffee flavoring. My best guess is that the mocha reference comes into play from the color of the filling which could, indeed, be best described as mocha-colored. Its ingredients are simple and straightforward: homemade flaky pie crust (the foundation of any delicious pie!), melted chocolate, cream cheese, and Cool Whip. That’s pretty much it. OK- and a little bit of sugar and some milk, but that’s really all.

It’s as easy as pie to make (what pie article would be complete without that reference?) and so delicious. Something about the subtle hint of cream cheese mixed with chocolate and the lightness of the whipped topping was heavenly.  It was almost like a chocolate cream cheese mousse.

As delicious as it is, the real test of any dessert is what happens with the uneaten portions. Typically my mother-in-law encourages us to take some food home so that she won’t be saddled with quite so many leftovers. The funny thing is that last weekend my in-laws were only too happy to relieve me of the remaining slices of pie- and because I love them, and homemade pie is all about love, I was only too happy to let them have it.

Homemade Pie Crust 

(so good and well worth the extra effort)

If, dear reader, you missed the opportunity to make the homemade crust last week, here it is again. Just in case- the only difference is that this week’s pie crust needs to be pre-baked.

Sift together 1 1/3 c. of all-purpose flour, 1 Tbsp. sugar, and ¼ tsp. of salt into a large mixing bowl. Cut 5 Tbsp. of cold unsalted butter and 3 Tbsp. cold vegetable shortening into the flour mixture until the mixture forms large, coarse crumbs the size of peas. Drizzle 4 Tbsp. of ice water over the mixture and toss with a fork until the dough is evenly moist and starts to come together into a mass but does not form a ball.

Transfer the dough to a work surface dusted with a bit of flour and shape it into a 6 inch disk; wrap it tightly, and refrigerate for 1 hour.

When chilled, unwrap the dough and return it to the dusted work surface. Sprinkle the top of the dough with a little extra flour (not too much, just enough to keep the rolling pin from sticking to it) and roll it out into a 12 inch round, lifting and turning the dough several times during the process to keep it from sticking to the board. If it starts to stick, loosen it with a bench scraper.

Line the pie plate/tin with the dough, taking care not to stretch it. Once lined, trim the edge of the dough, leaving a ¾ inch overhang, and tuck the overhang under itself to create a high edge on the pan rim. Using your index finger and thumb, pinch the dough around the rim to form a fluted edge or other decorative finish.  Put it in the freezer for 30 minutes and pre-heat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.

Line the frozen crust with a piece of heavy aluminum foil. Fill the foil-lined crust with dried beans, or pie weights. Bake the crust until it dries out- about 15 minutes. Once dried, remove the foil and weights from the crust and reduce the oven temperature to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.  Bake the crust until golden brown, about 10 minutes longer. Transfer the crust to a wire rack to cool. NOTE: Let the crust cool completely before adding the filling- warm pie crust has a habit of liquefying most whipped fillings.

The Filling

Melt 8 ounces of semi-sweet Baker’s chocolate with ¼ c. of milk over low heat, stirring constantly. Beat in 8 ounces of softened cream cheese, ½ c. of sugar, and another ¼ c. of milk. Let cool and then carefully fold in 3 ½ c. of Cool Whip.  For those who don’t like Cool Whip (I’ll begrudgingly concede to the possibility!) Chantilly cream or just plain old whipped cream could be substituted- in theory, anyway. Cool Whip’s whipped texture is stabilized during the manufacturing process, whereas the only thing keeping Chantilly cream and whipped cream light and fluffy is air- so not terribly stable. The next time I make this recipe (which I hope will be very soon) I’ll play around with these substitutions and report back!