Shamrock Shake

Somehow this week accidentally became about me redoing McDonald's desserts. 

I had plans to share another dish today, something with corned beef and cabbage and brown bread, but I was feeling kind of meh about it and a then a lighting strike of inspiration hit me at approximately 5:05 pm yesterday, for something green and minty and (most importantly) that would help me use up the whipped cream I had waiting in my refrigerator*. On the bus ride home, I urgently texted my ex-barista sister about how fast I could reasonably cool down hot milk without giving myself food poisoning. Answer: not that fast. I hurried to my neighborhood grocery store, where I found a barren wasteland offering fresh mint but no vanilla ice cream. I found some at the Walgreens next door then speed-limped home to race the sunset**.

*Is this just a problem I have? Why don't I ever have useful things like extra eggs waiting in the fridge?

**#photographynovice #ineedlight

And in a St. Patrick's Day miracle, I won! Daylight Savings, which I have been cursing every morning this week, gave me the extra hour of natural light that I needed while I steeped mint tea in warm milk and anxiously watched the horizon. Once the milk had cooled to lukewarm I whisked in some matcha, a.k.a. the green part, over an ice bath. I blended the milk mixture with ice cream, poured it into a glass and topped it off with a scoop of the whipped cream. The result was a creamy, refreshing, and naturally green milkshake with a subtle cool minty flavor tempered pleasantly by the matcha.  It's free of food coloring, imitation extracts, and whatever else lurks in that fast food version. 

Is now the time to mention I've never had a real Shamrock Shake?

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Shamrock Shake

Makes 2 shakes

1 cup whole milk
2 mint tea bags
2 tsp matcha powder (food grade, don't use the pricey stuff here)
vanilla ice cream
whipped cream, optional, for garnish

1. Gently heat the milk in a small saucepan. Add the tea bags and cover. Remove from heat and let steep 1 hour.
2. Pour the milk into a medium bowl and whisk in the matcha powder until milk is frothy and has turned bright green. You can do this in a bowl set inside another larger bowl filled with ice water, to rapidly cool the milk, or you can whisk in the matcha and then chill the milk mixture in the refrigerator. Either way, you want the milk very cold so it doesn't melt the ice cream.
3. When ready to make milkshakes, add milk mixture to a blender, then scoop in desired amount of ice cream. Blend until combined. Serve with whipped cream, if desired.

Happy Pi(es) Day!

And my Hamilton obsession, but first, pies!

I think Pi Day is my favorite made up food holiday, because it appeals to my inner nerd, and also, because pie. I especially love that so many other people love to celebrate it too! Last year I was in New York City for Pi Day, and I went with my friend to a Pi Day party, featuring an assortment from esteemed pie bakery Four & Twenty Blackbirds, and we brought a couple of apple pies from McDonald's. As a joke, yes, but still, how could they compare? So this year I decided to correct my one-year younger self with a redo, in the form of these homemade apple pies a la Mickey D's. I used my Grandmother's apple pie recipe that I fell in love with a couple years ago at Thanksgiving as a starting point. I used packaged pie dough, which is usually a no-no for me but I was trying to keep the spirit of the fast food version, so I went with it, and I have to say, this is the flakiest pie dough I've tried in a long time. Pastry goals to work toward, I suppose. These pies are cute, and tasty, and way better than that fast food version. And Grandma, don't worry, I didn't forget the egg white!

Ok, that's out of the way, so, while we are on the subject of all-American things like apple pie, can we talk about Hamilton now?

My best friend has been telling me to listen to it for months, and I finally did, and it's been my whole life for 5 days. I mean, it really is the best thing I’ve heard in a long time. Hip hop and history in a musical? There is a freaking rap battle about establishing a central bank! It really shouldn’t work, and yet I’ve fallen in love with the songs and the rhymes and the petty bloodthirstiness of George III, who I’m copying in all my valentines cards next year. The men are brilliant and flawed and full of themselves. The women are amazing and will break your heart. It’s hilarious and educational and I love it. I’ve laughed out loud walking down the street and cried at my desk at work (seriously don’t listen to the last few songs in public), and I can’t wait for it to come to SF.

I’m really excited about these apple pies, but I’m more excited about Hamilton right now. Go listen to it, then make these!

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Apple Pie Bars

Makes 10-12 small pies

1 package pre-made pie dough (with dough for 2 crusts)
1 large granny smith apples, peeled and diced small
1 tbs sugar
1/2 tsp flour
1/4 tsp cinnamon
pinch of salt
1 egg white

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees and line two baking sheets with parchment.
2. Combine apple, sugar, flour, cinnamon and salt and stir together. 
3. Trim edges of each circle of pie dough so that you have two large rectangles. Cut each rectangle in half across the center and then cut each half into 4 equal rectangles. You should have 16 equally sized rectangles of dough. Roll out dough scraps and repeat. You should be able to get at least 6 more rectangles.
4. Wet the edges of half of the dough rectangles with water, and place diced apple in the middle of each. Top with remaining dough rectangles and press to seal. Crimp edges with a fork. 
5. With a sharp knife, cut three slashes in the tops of each pie and brush the tops with the egg white.
6. Bake 20-25 minutes, until golden brown and crisp.

Black Forest Whoopie Pies

Black Forest Cake has never appealed to me. Chocolate cake? Sure. Layers of soft cream? Of course. Cherries? Byeeee!

I have a very specific memory of coming home one day in Germany to find one of our neighbors sitting at the picnic table outside our building with some half eaten cherries in front of her that she had picked from the trees along our street. Apparently some turned out to be harboring worms, which is a horrifying thing to show an eight year old, and I’m sure this is why I never learned to love cherries until a few years ago. I was that kid who always left the maraschinos in the bottom of her empty Shirley Temple glass, or picked them off of sundaes, although I always loved finding one in my can of fruit cocktail (but only in that context, where you could argue every piece of “fruit” just tastes like the syrup it’s sitting in).

But even once I realized that cherries are little tiny stone fruit flavor bombs to be savored during their cruelly short season, I still didn’t have any interest in finding them in cake. This could be that the only examples of Black Forest cake I’m ever confronted with are the supermarket varieties, with their too-sweet icing and crowns of (still) hated maraschinos. Last time I was handed a slice of that at someone’s birthday party, I ate a few forkfuls of frosting and set it aside, thinking that this just couldn’t be the real thing.

And to my utter non-surprise, it’s not. One day, hopefully, I’ll find the real deal on a menu somewhere, but for now, I knew I wouldn’t be making it in my own kitchen any time soon. A true Schwartzwäld Kirschtorte (for those of us who took high school German) is a chocolate-flecked tower of chocolate sponge cake, whipped cream, and black or sour cherries. An extra boozy cherry flavor comes from soaking the cake layers in Schwartzwäld Kirschwasser, a German cherry brandy that also gives the cake its name. Sounds much better than those neon grocery store cakes, but it also calls for some very specific ingredients, ones I didn’t particularly feel like hunting down. So I hypocritically took a page from supermarket bakeries and made my own abridged version, in cute whoopie pie form. My cakes are not made from a traditional sponge cake, but they are soaked in a (domestic) kirsch syrup, filled with lightly sweetened cream and a cherry jam, and dusted with chocolate curls.  Not strictly authentic, but I promise, delicious.

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Black Forest Whoopie Pies

Cake recipe from Katie Lee

For the cakes:

2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1 cup granulated sugar
8 tbs unsalted butter, softened
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup milk

For the kirsch syrup:

1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup water
1 tbs kirsch

For the filling:

1/2 pint heavy whipping cream
1/2 tsp sugar
splash vanilla extract
1/2 cup cherry jam
1/2 oz square of semi sweet chocolate

1. Make the cakes: In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder, and salt, and set aside.
2. In the bowl of a mixer place sugar and butter and mix on medium high speed until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Mix in the egg and vanilla. 
3. Mix in the flour mixture, alternating with the milk so that you end with the flour mixture. Chill mixture for one hour.
4. When ready to bake, preheat oven to 400 degrees and prepare two large baking sheets by lining with parchment and spraying with cooking spray. Scoop the mixture onto the prepared baking sheets, leaving plenty of room between (they will spread). I used a 4 oz scoop, which made giant whoopie pies, but a 2 oz scoop is probably better. 
5. Bake for 8-10 minutes, until tops are firm and cakes are no longer glossy. Let cool for one hour on a wire rack.
6. While the cakes are cooling, make the kirsch syrup. In a small saucepan, combine the sugar and water and bring to a boil. Lower heat and stir until sugar is completely dissolved, remove from heat and stir in the kirsch. Set aside to cool.
7. To fill the whoopie pies: Place the cakes bottom up on a cookie sheet or counter and brush with the kirsch syrup. Beat cream, sugar, and vanilla until stiff peaks form. Spoon the cream into a piping bag fitted with a star tip and pipe the cream around the outside edge of half of the cakes, leaving a well in the center. Fill the well with a spoonful or so of cherry jam, and top with another cake. 
8. Using a vegetable peeler or sharp knife, shave the chocolate into small curls and sprinkle around the edges of the cakes onto the whipped cream. Serve immediately.