Simple dinner plans are sometimes thwarted by complicated desserts, but if you avoid elaborate cakes and tarts, most desserts can be made in less than 30 minutes of working time, although the cooking time is often longer. Custards such as crème brûlée can be put together in minutes and slowly baked as you’re preparing other foods. If you want to make something more involved, the project can be broken down into 2 days—one for making a tart shell, for example, and another day for making the filling.
The nicest way to present this dish is to cut the oranges à vif, meaning cut the oranges to create wedges without membranes (see box). If you don’t want to deal with that, cut the peel off the orange, and then slice the oranges into rounds. Unless you have an abundance of fresh raspberries, frozen raspberries do the trick perfectly well.
Makes 4 dessert servings
Cut a slice of peel off the top and bottom of each orange just deep enough to reveal the inner pulp of the orange. Stand the orange on the level surface you just created, and slice away the peel so you’re left with an orange with no membrane on the outside. Slice the orange into rounds between ⅛ and ¼ inch thick or cut it à vif.
Put the oranges in wine glasses and spoon the raspberry puree on top (keep in mind that it will seep to the bottom). Dollop with whipped cream. Serve immediately.
CUTTING CITRUS À VIF
The trick with cutting fruit à vif is to cut between the wedges so you eliminate any membrane clinging to the wedges. Once you’ve cut the peel off, hold the orange in your left hand (assuming you’re right-handed) and slide a sharp paring knife into the center of the orange with the knife right up against one of the membranes separating the wedges. Cut again, this time with the knife up against another membrane so the wedge falls out with no membrane. Work over a bowl so you capture any juices released during the cutting (I usually just drink the juice).
Escoffier invented this dish for the opera singer Nellie Melba in the early part of the twentieth century. It’s a perfectly seasonal dish since raspberries and peaches are in season at the same time. (I don’t recommend making it with canned peaches.)
Makes 4 dessert servings
4 perfectly ripe peaches
1 cup Raspberry Puree
4 scoops vanilla ice cream
Flavored Whipped Cream (optional)
Cut the peaches into wedges. Dish a scoop of ice cream into four large wine or martini glasses and arrange the peaches on top. Spoon over the raspberry puree and add a dollop of whipped cream to each. Serve immediately.
These strawberries make a delightful little treat, or you can serve a few as a simple dessert. The long-stemmed strawberries called for here may be difficult to find. Look for them around Christmas time when they’re grown in hot houses.
Makes 16 strawberries (4 dessert servings or 16 after-dinner little bites)
½ pound bittersweet chocolate, chopped
16 long-stemmed strawberries
Put the chocolate in a small metal mixing bowl. Bring a saucepan, smaller than the mixing bowl, of water to a boil and turn off the heat. Set the bowl of chocolate on top of the saucepan of hot water and let it sit for 5 minutes. Stir, let sit some more, and continue in this way until all the chocolate has melted. Take the chocolate out of the saucepan. Stir until smooth. Don’t let the slightest amount of water get into the chocolate or it will “seize,” which is to say turn into a lumpy mess. When the chocolate feels neither hot nor cold to the back of a finger, line a baking sheet with waxed paper.
Dip the strawberries, one at a time, into the chocolate, until covered about halfway. Transfer to the waxed paper and let cool until the chocolate hardens. Store in the refrigerator and serve within 2 days.
Fruit purees, including raspberry puree, make refreshing toppings for other fruits, including the oranges. The purees are best made with uncooked fresh or frozen fruit since the flavors will be brighter than when the fruits have been cooked (or, heaven forbid, canned!). Excellent frozen fruit purees, made from raw fruit and never pasteurized, are available online. Keep in mind when using fruit purees that they should accent the dessert they are accompanying. For example, if your dessert is very sour, the puree should be made sweet. Conversely, if the dessert is very sweet, leave the puree on the tart side by using less (if any) sugar.
Makes about 1 cup
1 pint fresh raspberries, or one 10-ounce package frozen raspberries (whole berries in bags, not packed in syrup), thawed
Superfine sugar
Pour the berries into a strainer set over a bowl and work them through the strainer with a small ladle to eliminate most of the seeds. Sweeten the raspberry puree to taste with superfine sugar. You can store the puree for up to 5 days in the refrigerator or a year in the freezer.
Roast Pears with Butterscotch Sauce
One of the advantages to this dish is that the pears make their own delectable butterscotch sauce. You can also prepare this dish as an accompaniment to savory dishes, such as duck or chicken, by cutting the sugar down to 1 tablespoon, skipping the cream, and then slicing the pear halves lengthwise after they’re roasted.
Makes 4 dessert servings
4 large underripe pears
6 tablespoons sugar
½ cup (1 stick) butter
½ cup heavy cream
Flavored Whipped Cream, to serve (optional)
Preheat the oven to 450°F.
Peel the pears, halve them lengthwise, and cut out the core with a small scoop (a melon baller is perfect) or small paring knife. Arrange the pear halves, flat-side up, in an ovenproof pan or pot, just large enough to hold them in a single layer. Sprinkle over the sugar and plop in the butter.
Roast for about 40 minutes, or until the pears are easily penetrated with a knife. At this point the sugar should have caramelized on the sides and bottom of the pot or pan. If it hasn’t, put the pan on top of the stove and cook over high heat until the sugar browns. Pour in the heavy cream and bring to a boil over high heat; the sugar and butter will come together in a sauce. Immediately remove from the heat.
Serve the hot pear halves with the sauce and whipped cream.
Here, fresh pineapple wedges are cooked with sugar and butter that have been lightly caramelized into butterscotch. At the last minute, they are flambéed with rum. The kind of rum you use will make a big difference in the finished product. Don’t use Puerto Rican rum unless you know it’s from a pot still (see box on Pot Stills). Use a dark rum, the most reliable of which come from Martinique. Alternatively, if you prefer kirsch, use a German, Swiss, French, or American kirsch from a small producer.
When flambéing, certain precautions are in order. If you have a gas stove, you can ignite your food by simply tilting the pan toward the flame. If you have an electric stove, you’ll have to use a match. Never pour liquor straight out of the bottle, but instead put it into a measuring cup or other small container; otherwise you risk igniting the whole bottle. If you want to serve this dish in the dining room, carry out all the cooking in a chafing dish.
Makes 4 dessert servings
½ pineapple, cut vertically, peeled
½ cup sugar
½ cup (1 stick) butter
½ cup dark rum or kirsch
Flavored Whipped Cream, to serve (optional)
Vanilla ice cream, to serve (optional)
Cut the pineapple half lengthwise into three wedge-shaped strips. Cut the core away from each the strip and cut the strips into wedges about ¼ inch thick.
Combine the sugar and butter in a large sauté pan that will hold the pineapple in a single layer. Cook over medium heat until the butter turns frothy and the combination of sugar and butter begin to brown, about 5 minutes. Add the pineapple wedges and shake them around to coat them completely with the butter and sugar. Cook over medium heat (or over the Sterno flame of the chafing dish) until the pineapple wedges brown, about 10 minutes. Turn the pieces of pineapple over and cook for about 2 minutes on the other side. When the pineapple wedges are brown on both sides, pour in the rum and ignite, standing back. Spoon the flaming rum over the pineapple until the flames go out. Serve on hot plates topped with a dollop of whipped cream or scoop of vanilla ice cream.
Hard liquor is made by distillation. In a traditional still, called a pot still, the fermented mash (corn and/or rye for bourbon and rye, molasses for rum, fermented grape juice for Cognac, fermented cherries for kirsch) is heated until the alcohol, which has a lower boiling point than water, vaporizes and works its way through a series of cooling pipes, usually in a coil shape, causing the alcohol to condense and liquefy. Vodka, some rum, and most clear alcohols (dry fruit brandies, such as kirsch, being the exception) are fermented in a different kind of still called a column still. A column still allows for continuous fermentation and produces alcohol less expensively than does a pot still. Alcohol produced in a column still is stripped of flavor. For this reason, when buying alcoholic beverages for flavoring foods, it’s best to be sure they come from a pot still. Cognac, kirsch, straight bourbon (versus blended bourbon) are all made in pot stills but rum, especially rum from Puerto Rico, is often made in a column still.
Pineapple and kirsch seems to be one of the matches made in heaven—it’s a popular dessert on French bistro menus—and requires only the work of peeling the pineapple and tracking down a good bottle of kirsch.
In general, the best brands of kirsch come from Switzerland and Germany with France in second place. Small American distillers have also come up with some excellent versions, but these aren’t cheap and as of yet aren’t as predictably reliable as their foreign cousins. In any case, kirsch should smell like the cherries from which it is made and not of bitter almonds, which means it was made from cherry pits and not from cherries.
Lately, so-called golden pineapples have made it to the market. An explanation of their origins, possibly apocryphal, is that the difference between golden pineapples and regular pineapples is one of ripeness: golden pineapples are picked ripe and air-freighted to the mainland while regular pineapples come by ship. Despite a higher carbon imprint, I recommend the golden versions when you can find them.
Makes 6 dessert servings
Twist the leaves off the pineapple and cut away the peel. Cut deep enough to cut away the little pits embedded in the flesh. Once peeled, cut through the pineapple lengthwise, cutting it in half through the center core, and then cut each of these halves in thirds. Slice off the strip of core that runs along the strips. Slice each of the strips into 1/4-inch-thick wedges.
Toss the wedges with the kirsch and let sit in the refrigerator an hour or two before serving. Serve on plates and pass the whipped cream.
When you find yourself with limited ingredients, and the only fruit in the house is bananas, this is the perfect solution to the question of what to make for dessert. If you’re serving this recipe to kids, don’t worry too much about the alcohol since most of it is burned. Use dark rum, preferably from Martinique.
Makes 4 dessert servings
¼ cup sugar
6 tablespoons butter
4 bananas, peeled and halved lengthwise
⅓ cup rum, Cognac, or bourbon
Combine the sugar and butter in a sauté pan just large enough to hold the banana halves in a single layer. Heat the pan over medium heat until the butter froths and the mixture browns slightly. Add the bananas and baste them with the sugar and butter mixture until heated through, about 5 minutes. Pour in the rum and let the rum come to a boil over medium heat. Light the rum with a match, standing back. Or, if you have a gas stove, just tilt the pan toward the flame. Stand back as the mixture may suddenly burst into flame. Continue cooking and basting over medium heat until the flames die out. Serve immediately, with sauce spooned over each portion.
Unless you have in-season local strawberries, it’s unlikely that the strawberries are going to be sweet enough on their own. It helps to macerate them with a little sugar to bring out their flavor, much in the same way that salt brings out the flavor of savory foods. Here we macerate—when fruits are “marinated,” they’re said to be macerated—the strawberries with a little bit of orange liqueur, not enough to make this off-limits to children since each portion has less alcohol than a teaspoon of cough medicine. It’s always nice to serve this dish with a few plain butter cookies.
Makes 4 dessert servings
2 pints strawberries, stemmed and sliced or quartered vertically
¼ cup superfine sugar, or more to taste
¼ cup orange liqueur, such as Grand Marnier or Cointreau
1 cup heavy cream
2 tablespoons granulated sugar
In a bowl, toss the berries with the superfine sugar and orange liqueur and let macerate for at least 1 hour or up to 6 hours in the refrigerator.
Put the heavy cream in a bowl in the freezer for 5 minutes. Add the granulated sugar and beat for about 5 minutes by hand or 2 minutes in a stand mixer on high speed until the cream stiffens. Don’t overdo it, or you’ll end up with butter.
Serve the strawberries in chilled bowls and dollop with the whipped cream.
You can make this clafoutis with frozen pitted cherries, but if you’re going to use fresh cherries, you need to decide whether to leave the pits in or not. Traditionally they’re left in, but your guests will be happier if you take them out. Pitting is easy if you just squeeze on the cherry to get the pit to slip out. This recipe is designed for sweet cherries. If you want to make it with sour cherries, increase the sugar by ¼ cup.
Makes 8 dessert servings
One 12-ounce package frozen pitted cherries, thawed, or 1 pound fresh cherries, stemmed and pitted (pitting optional)
1 cup flour
½ cup sugar
3 eggs
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup milk
½ cup (1 stick) butter, melted
Pinch of salt
Confectioners’ sugar, for dusting
Preheat the oven to 350°F. Butter and flour a 9-inch porcelain or glass pie dish.
Distribute the cherries in an even layer in the prepared dish.
In a bowl, combine the flour, sugar, eggs, vanilla, and about half the milk. Whisk until you obtain a smooth paste. Work in the rest of the milk, the butter, and the salt. Pour the batter over the cherries.
Bake for about 45 minutes, or until puffy and golden brown. Serve warm or at room temperature, dusted with confectioners’ sugar just before serving.
Apples are perfect for a crumble because they don’t release as much liquid as other fruits as they cook. The crumble mixture is essentially biscuit dough that’s been crumbled on top. While you can make this crumble in a cake pan or baking dish and dish it out, it works best in individual ramekins, gratin dishes, or crème brulée molds.
Makes 4 dessert servings
4 baking apples, preferably local and in season, peeled, cored, and cut into ½-inch dice
½ cup sugar
¾ cup flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ cup cold butter, cut into ¼-inch cubes
Flavored Whipped Cream, ice cream, or crème fraîche, to serve
Preheat the oven to 375°F. Butter four 5-ounce wide ramekins or crème brulée molds or one 9-inch cake pan.
In a bowl, toss the apples with 3 tablespoons of the sugar and spread them in the prepared pan(s). In a second bowl, whisk together the flour, the remaining 5 tablespoons sugar, and the baking powder. Work the butter into the mixture with the back of a fork until there’s no loose flour left in the mixture. Crumble this mixture over the apples.
Put the crumbles on a baking sheet pan, slide into the oven, and bake for about 20 to 30 minutes, or until golden brown.
These are simply dishes of raspberries cooked with crumbled up biscuit dough on top. You’ll need little porcelain dishes for these cobblers. Because raspberries release a lot of water, these cobblers are baked for what seems like a very long time; this is to evaporate the liquid released by the raspberries. You can also make these with cherries (which release less liquid), blueberries, or blackberries.
Makes 8 dessert servings
Raspberry Filling
2 pints raspberries, or two 10-ounce packages frozen raspberries, thawed
⅓ cup sugar
¼ cup fresh lemon juice
Biscuit Topping
1½ cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons cold butter, thinly sliced
⅔ cup buttermilk
Flavored Whipped Cream, vanilla ice cream, or crème fraîche, to serve
Preheat the oven to 375°F.
In a bowl, toss the raspberries with the sugar and lemon juice. Divide the raspberries evenly among eight individual baking dishes (ideally 5-ounce ramekins or crème brulée dishes). Set the baking dishes on a baking sheet in case the raspberries release too much liquid and the cobblers overflow. Bake for 30 minutes.
While the raspberry filling bakes, prepare the biscuit topping. In a bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, and salt. Add the butter and use a pastry blender to cut it into the size of small peas. Add the buttermilk and stir just long enough for any dry flour to disappear. Pour the mixture out onto a work surface and crush it with your hand, kneading just a minute to bring the dough together. Chop up the biscuit dough to the consistency of coarse gravel and sprinkle it over the raspberries. Bake for about 20 minutes more, or until golden brown. Serve warm or cold.
The shortcake here is very similar to biscuit dough, not too sweet and rather crumbly. For an elegant touch, fill these with the Strawberries Romanoff.
Makes 6 dessert servings
1¾ cups flour
5 tablespoons sugar, plus more for sprinkling on the strawberries
¾ teaspoon baking soda
¼ teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons cold butter, thinly sliced
1 egg, beaten
½ cup buttermilk
Water, for brushing
1 quart strawberries, hulled and sliced
Grand Marnier (optional)
Preheat the oven to 375°F.
In a bowl, whisk together the flour, 3 tablespoons of the sugar, baking soda, and salt. Cut the butter into the mixture with a pastry blender or round-edge pastry scraper. Continue cutting until the butter is the size of small peas. Add the egg and the buttermilk and stir until there’s no loose flour. Flatten the dough into a disk about ¾ inch thick. Use a 3 ¼ inch cookie cutter to cut out six rounds. If there’s not enough dough, gather together the scraps, flatten them, and cut out more rounds. Place the rounds on a baking sheet. Brush with water and sprinkle with the remaining 2 tablespoons of sugar. To ensure that the bottoms don’t burn, put the baking sheet on another baking sheet that’s been sprinkled with water. Bake for about 20 minutes, or until pale golden. Let cool completely before building the shortcakes, or they’ll melt the whipped cream.
About 4 hours before serving, put the strawberries in a bowl and sprinkle with sugar and/or Grand Marnier to taste.
Just before serving, cut the shortcakes through the middle with a serrated knife. Put the bottom halves on plates, spoon the strawberries on top, then the whipped cream. Put the lids on top and serve.
While very similar, there’s a distinction between flavored whipped cream and whipped cream in that flavored whipped cream contains vanilla and sugar. The amount of sugar to include is largely subjective, so I’ve given a range of 1 to 2 tablespoons per cup of heavy cream. Make whipped cream as much at the last minute as possible because it separates after a few hours in the refrigerator. One thing to keep in mind: the cream and all the implements must be cold when you whip the cream. In the winter, when the kitchen is cool, this isn’t a problem; but in the summer, it’s a good idea to put the cream in the bowl and then put the bowl in the freezer for 5 minutes before whipping.
Makes 2 cups
1 cup cold heavy cream
2 to 4 tablespoons granulated sugar
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
Combine the cream, sugar, and vanilla in a large bowl. Beat until the cream is fluffy and clings to the whisk. When you hold the whisk sideways, the cream shouldn’t sag. Beating by hand takes about 5 minutes; the stand mixer on high speed takes little more than a minute, so be careful unless you like butter.
Lime curd makes an excellent dessert, especially when served with Flavored Whipped Cream. But lime curd (and lemon curd) can also used to as a filling for fruit tarts. The butter makes the curd firmer and, of course, provides flavor but it is far from necessary.
Makes 4 dessert servings, or one 9- or 10-inch tart
3 eggs
¾ cup sugar
1 tablespoon finely grated lime zest
½ cup fresh lime juice
6 tablespoons butter, sliced (optional)
In a metal mixing bowl, whisk together the eggs and sugar until pale and smooth. Add the zest and lime juice. Place the bowl over a saucepan of simmering water and stir the mixture with a whisk until it thickens, about 6 minutes. Stir in the butter with a whisk. Remove the bowl from the saucepan, cover with plastic wrap, and chill for an hour or so. Serve in wine glasses with the whipped cream spooned on top.
Variation:
To make lemon curd, replace the lime zest with lemon zest and the lime juice with lemon juice.
This curd makes a fabulous dessert as well as a lining for a fruit tart. When buying passion fruit puree, try to find the kind that comes frozen from France; it has a much brighter flavor the puree that which comes in jars. You may have to buy more than you think you need, but when you discover how delicious it is, it probably won’t last long. Because passion fruit puree is so acidic, this recipe contains a lot of sugar.
Makes 4 dessert servings, or one 9- or 10-inch tart
4 eggs
1 cup sugar
1 cup passion fruit puree
½ cup (1 stick) butter, sliced (optional)
In a metal mixing bowl, whisk together the eggs and sugar until the mixture turns pale. Add the passion fruit puree and put the bowl over a saucepan of simmering water. Stir the mixture with a whisk until it thickens, about 6 minutes. Whisk in the butter. Remove the bowl from the saucepan, cover with plastic wrap, and chill for about an hour. Serve in wine glasses with whipped cream spooned on top.
These soufflés are especially simple because they’re made with egg whites alone and not the usual mixture of yolks and whites. When you buy frozen raspberries, be sure to buy the kind that come in bags and that are individually quick frozen, not raspberries packed in syrup which usually come in a box. You can make this soufflé with other fruits, especially other berries.
Makes 6 dessert servings
One 10-ounce package frozen raspberries, thawed
Softened butter
⅓ cup sugar, plus more for sprinkling
6 egg whites
Pinch cream of tartar (optional)
Pinch of salt
Confectioners’ sugar, for dusting
Put the raspberries in a strainer and work them through the strainer into a nonstick sauté pan (the sauté pan will help them cook down quickly). Cook the raspberry puree over medium heat until it begins to thicken and has cooked down to about one-half its original volume. Let cool.
Preheat the oven to 375°F. Brush the insides of six 5-ounce ramekins with butter and coat evenly with sugar.
In a large bowl, combine the egg whites with the cream of tartar (if you are not using a copper bowl) and beat until the whites form stiff peaks. Add the sugar and a pinch of salt. Beat for 1 minute more in a stand mixer on high speed or for 2 to 3 minutes more by hand. Fold the raspberry puree into the egg whites and divide the mixture evenly among the ramekins. Smooth the tops with a spatula. Set the ramekins on a baking sheet and slide into the oven.
Bake for about 12 minutes, or until risen to double the height of the ramekins. Serve immediately, dusted with confectioners’ sugar.
Here, I call for cocoa powder, but you can also use semisweet or bittersweet chocolate (4 ounces per serving) melted in the hot milk. There’s no need to grate or shave the chocolate. Just let it steep in the hot milk and then whisk until smooth.
This pudding is slightly loose in texture, almost pourable once cold; if you like it stiffer, increase the amount of cornstarch to ¼ cup.
Makes 6 dessert servings
3 cups milk
1 vanilla bean, split in half lengthwise, or 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
5 egg yolks
6 tablespoons sugar
3 tablespoons cornstarch
⅓ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
In a saucepan, over high heat, combine the milk and vanilla and bring to a simmer.
In a bowl, whisk the egg yolks with the sugar until they turn pale, about 2 minutes. Add the cornstarch and the cocoa and whisk to form a smooth paste. Scrape the seeds out of each half of the vanilla bean and put them back in the milk. Whisk the hot milk into the egg mixture and transfer the mixture to the saucepan used for heating the milk. Heat over medium heat, stirring constantly, until the mixture has a silky consistency.
Divide the pudding among individual serving bowls or glasses. Put plastic wrap directly on the surface to prevent a skin from forming. Refrigerate for at least 4 hours, or until chilled and set. Remove the plastic wrap and serve with whipped cream.
These custards are essentially crème caramels without the caramel. If you want to make the caramel, see “Variation” below. It’s hard to fail with these custards, but do keep in mind that they must cook slowly (don’t be tempted to hurry them along by turning up the oven) or they will curdle and you’ll end up with soup.
Makes 6 dessert servings
3 cups milk
1 vanilla bean, split in half lengthwise, or 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
4 eggs
¾ cup sugar
Preheat the oven to 350°F.
In a saucepan, combine the milk and vanilla and bring to a simmer. In a bowl, whisk together the eggs and sugar for about 2 minutes until they turn slightly pale. Remove the vanilla bean, scrape out the little seeds from the insides of each half, and put these back in the milk. Whisk in the hot milk into the egg mixture.
Pour the mixture into 4- to 6-ounce ramekins and put the ramekins in a baking dish. Add enough of the hottest water that will come out of the tap to come halfway up the sides of the ramekins.
Bake for about 40 to 60 minutes, or until you see no movement on the surface of the custards when you move the baking dish gently back and forth.
Take the ramekins out of the hot water and allow to cool. Refrigerate for at least 2 hours before serving.
Variation:
To make a caramel, melt 1 cup sugar in a heavy-bottomed sauce pan over medium heat, stirring frequently. When the sugar melts and the caramel is dark and just begins to smoke, pour enough into each of the ramekins to just coat the bottom.
Yogurt with Cardamom and Saffron
This dish is inspired by a wonderful cardamom and saffron ice cream served in one of my favorite Indian restaurants in New York.
Makes 4 dessert servings
4 cups plain yogurt
¼ cup honey
1 pinch saffron, soaked in 1 tablespoon hot water for 30 minutes
½ teaspoon ground cardamom
¼ cup chopped green pistachios or almonds, for topping
In a bowl, combine the yogurt, honey, saffron along with its soaking liquid, and cardamom and mix well. Divide the mixture among individual bowls and top with the nuts. Serve chilled.
Essentially, panna cotta is a custardlike dessert held together with gelatin instead of eggs. The effect is lighter than a traditional custard and has an intriguing, melting texture.
Makes 6 dessert servings
3 cups heavy cream
2 vanilla beans, split lengthwise, or 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
One ¼-ounce packet plain powdered gelatin, soaked in ¼ cup warm water
½ cup sugar
1 cup Raspberry Puree or other fruit puree
In a saucepan, combine 2 cups of the cream, the vanilla bean or extract, the gelatin along with its soaking liquid, and the sugar. Bring to a gentle simmer over medium heat. Scrape the seeds out of the vanilla beans and put them back into the hot cream. Stir in the remaining cup of cream and transfer the mixture to six 4- to 5-ounce ramekins. Let cool at room temperature and then refrigerate until set.
Just before serving, unmold onto cold plates. If you have trouble getting the panna cotta out of the ramekins, hold each in a bowl of hot water for about 30 seconds before turning it out onto a plate. Serve immediately, passing the fruit puree at the table.
Variations:
Try melting chocolate in with the cream or flavoring the panna cottas with coffee by infusing ¼ pound ground coffee into the hot cream and then straining it out, or by adding 1 tablespoon of instant coffee.
There are many different approaches to making a chocolate mousse, but most involve melting the chocolate, combining it with egg yolks, and then folding this mixture with whipped cream or beaten egg whites. This recipe calls for beaten egg whites.
Makes six dessert servings
5 ounces bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
3 tablespoons butter
3 eggs, separated
Pinch of salt
Pinch of cream of tartar (optional)
2 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
In a bowl set over a saucepan of barely simmering water, melt together the chocolate and butter. Take the bowl off the heat and stir in the egg yolks until smooth.
In a large bowl, combine the egg whites and salt. Add the cream of tartar if you are not using a copper bowl. Beat until the the egg whites form stiff peaks. Add the sugar and beat for a minute more in a stand mixer or for 2 to 3 minutes more by hand. Fold the egg whites with the chocolate mixture and the vanilla by first folding one-quarter of the whites into the chocolate and then folding in the rest. Spoon into glasses or ramekins. Serve chilled—give it an hour or two in the fridge—with the whipped cream on the side.
Note: According to the Centers for Disease Control, one in every 20,000 eggs is contaminated with salmonella. I keep in mind these statistics, which is to say I risk the odds on the occasional raw egg.
Because white chocolate doesn’t behave like regular chocolate, it is approached somewhat differently. In most recipes, the chocolate is melted and combined with whipped cream and gelatin. In this recipe we dispense with the gelatin and rely on the white chocolate itself to set the mixture.
Makes 4 dessert servings
1¼ cups heavy cream
3½ to 4 ounces white chocolate, chopped
In a small saucepan over medium heat, bring ½ cup of the cream to a simmer. Remove from the heat, add the white chocolate, let sit 5 minutes, and stir until smooth. Let cool slightly.
Beat the remaining 1¾ cups of cream to medium peaks (the cream sags slightly when a whisk is held sideways) and fold into the chocolate mixture by first folding in one-quarter of the cream and then folding in the rest. Spoon into glasses or ramekins and chill for an hour or two. Serve chilled.
Keep in mind that you can make the tart shell and the apples ahead of time. Essentially this tart filling is a custard—milk held together with eggs.
Makes 6 dessert servings
Baked 9- to 10-inch tart shell, thawed if frozen
3 eggs
½ cup granulated sugar
½ cup milk
Confectioners’ sugar, for dusting
Preheat the oven to 300°F.
Arrange the apples in a rosette pattern (like the spokes on a wheel) in the tart shell starting from the outside and working inward. Set the tart shell on a baking sheet.
In a bowl, whisk the eggs and sugar until pale yellow. Whisk in the milk. Pour this mixture into the tart.
Bake for 30 to 45 minutes, until the custard sets—
it will no longer move in the middle when you jiggle the pan slightly.
Serve warm or at room temperature, dusted with confectioners’ sugar just before serving (not before or it will “melt” into the surface of the tart and disappear).
This crisp, buttery tart is always a delight. If you buy frozen puff pastry, there’s really very little involved except slicing apples. Be sure to buy puff pastry that’s been made with butter and not something suspect, such as hydrogenated this or that.
Makes 8 dessert servings
One 1-pound package frozen all-butter puff pastry, thawed
3 Golden Delicious apples, or more if the apples are small
½ cup sugar
½ cup (1 stick) butter
Sprinkle a 13 by 17-inch sheet pan with 1 tablespoon cold water to prevent the bottom of the tart from burning.
Roll the pastry into a rough 12 by 16-inch rectangle between 1/16 and ⅛ inch thick. If the pastry is hard to roll or springs back after each roll, let it rest in the refrigerator for 30 minutes, then continue rolling. Transfer the dough to the prepared baking sheet.
Poke the dough in about twenty places with a fork to help prevent it from puffing under the apples. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.
Preheat the oven to 400°F.
Peel the apples, cut them in half vertically, cut out their cores with a paring knife or melon baller and slice the halves crosswise as thinly as you can. Arrange the slices, starting around the outside of the tart; each slice should overlap slightly. Sprinkle the apples evenly with the sugar. Slice the butter into about fifteen pieces and distribute evenly over the tart.
Bake for about 45 minutes, or until the apples are lightly browned. Because the pastry tends to puff, forming large blisters that disrupt your careful arrangement of the apples, check the tart every 10 minutes and use a thin-pronged fork or skewer to pop the blisters and to nudge any apples back into their original arrangement. Don’t worry if butter and sugar run off the side of the tart and burn—this is normal.
Let the tart cool for 10 minutes on a wire rack. Slide a long metal spatula under the tart to detach it from the sheet pan. Transfer it to a work surface and, while gently lifting it one side at a time with the spatula, inspect it on the bottom. If there are any burnt patches—despite the sprinkling with water there often are—scrape them off with a sharp knife.
Cut the tart into 8 rectangles. Serve warm on heated plates. Pass the whipped cream.
Once you have the baked tart shell, nothing could be easier than this tart. Keep in mind that this tart can also be used as a base for other fruit tarts.
Makes 8 dessert servings
1 cup heavy cream
10 ounces semisweet (or bittersweet) chocolate, chopped
1½ pints raspberries
In a saucepan, bring the cream to a simmer. Remove from the heat and add the chocolate. Let sit for 10 minutes. Stir with a whisk until smooth and dark. Pour into the tart shell and let set at room temperature. If the room is hot, refrigerate about 30 minutes.
Arrange the berries on top of the tart. Serve in wedges.
Over the years of making tart and pie pastry, I’ve continually simplified my method. Two common misconceptions about pastry abound. One is that the dough can’t be worked in a food processor until it forms a ball (to the contrary, I’ve found this works fine). The other is that the dough has to rest before you can roll it out. In fact, it’s better not to let it rest (at least in the refrigerator), or it will harden and be impossible to roll out without cracking. The one major caveat: Don’t let the dough get warm. If it’s a hot day, refrigerate the dough as needed while you work to keep the butter from melting. Keep in mind also that flours differ in their ability to absorb liquid. For this reason, the liquid called for in this recipe isn’t added all at once. This recipe makes more dough than you need—so you have plenty extra in case it doesn’t roll out evenly. You can save the trimmings in the freezer and roll them out for other projects.
Makes one 9- or 10-inch tart shell
1 cup cake flour
1 cup all-purpose flour
½ teaspoon salt
1¼ cups (2½ sticks) cold butter, sliced
2 eggs, 1 egg separated
2 tablespoons cold water, or more as needed
Preheat the oven to 425°F.
Combine both flours, the salt, butter, 1 egg, and 1 egg white (reserve the egg yolk) in a food processor and process until a ball is formed, 30 to 60 seconds. If a ball doesn’t form, add the reserved egg yolk and process for 30 seconds more. If a ball still doesn’t form, add 2 tablespoons water and process again. Add even more water, if necessary, although this is unlikely. Flatten the ball into a disk.
Select a 9- or 10-inch tart pan and roll the dough out so there are two extra inches all around when you place the tart pan on top of the rolled-out dough. Fold the dough in half and lift it over the tart pan. Unfold it. Press the dough into the corners of the tart pan. Work a little of the dough in toward the center of the tart around the edges to form a lip. Roll over the tart pan with a rolling pin to detach the excess dough. Pinch the lip of dough slightly to cause it to rise slightly above the rim of the tart pan.
Place a sheet of parchment paperover the tart—don’t cut the parchment to fit the tart, or you’ll have difficulty removing it. Fill the tart with rice or beans (on top of the parchment) and put the tart pan on a sheet pan.
Bake for about 25 minutes, or until you see the beginning of color around the edges. Take off the foil or parchment with the rice or beans and bake the tart shell about 10 minutes more, or until the center turns an even pale brown. Let cool. The shell should be used right away or be carefully wrapped and frozen. It will keep in the freezer for up to 3 months.
Unless you’ve already baked the tart shell and made the lemon cream, making a fruit tart is really more of a weekend project, but the great thing is that both the tart shell and lemon curd can, indeed, be made ahead. Then assembling the tart is a last-minute affair that usually only takes about 10 minutes.
Makes one 9- or 10-inch tart (8 servings)
Spread the lime curd in a smooth, even layer in the tart shell. If you’re using raspberries, arrange them on top. If you’re using strawberries, cut off the stem end so they stay flat in the tart. If you’re being really fussy, cut a small wedge out of the side of each of the strawberries so when you fit them in the tart they can be nestled more closely together. Arrange the strawberries in the tart. Serve in wedges.
Variations:
Other fruits, such as peaches, plums, or apricots (cut into wedges); or sliced persimmons, kiwis, or bananas can be arranged on top of the lime curd.
I’m pushing my luck calling cheesecake simple, but the elimination of the traditional graham cracker crust saves a lot of prep time. The cheesecake should be baked in a springform pan wrapped in aluminum foil and partially submerged in a water bath. The baking time is 1 hour and 15 minutes. But the actual work involved in preparing the batter is minimal.
Makes one 10-inch cake
Two 8-ounce packages cream cheese, at room temperature
¾ cup sugar
3 eggs
1½ cups sour cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
½ teaspoon salt
Preheat the oven to 350°F. Butter an 8- to 10-inch springform pan and wrap the outside of the pan with aluminum foil.
In a stand mixer with the paddle attachment, beat the cream cheese for about 4 minutes on medium speed, or until smooth and soft. Add the sugar and beat about 5 minutes on medium speed. Beat in the eggs, one at a time, waiting for each egg to be thoroughly mixed in before adding another. Add the sour cream, vanilla, and salt, and beat for about 1 minute, or until smooth and completely mixed.
Pour the batter into the prepared springform pan and put the pan in a roasting pan or other pan with high sides. Pour in enough of the hottest tap water to come halfway up the sides of the pan (this prevents cracking).
Bake for about 1 hour and 15 minutes, or until only a 1-inch-wide bull’s eye in the center of the cake moves when you jiggle the pan. Take the pan out of the water and let cool for 1 hour before removing the foil. Refrigerate for at least 2 hours before serving.
It took me many tries to figure out what I was doing wrong with my pound cake—the center always looked raw no matter how long I cooked it. It turns out I wasn’t beating the sugar and butter mixture enough at the beginning—so please beat it for the full 5 minutes on high speed.
Pound cake is one of the most basic of cakes, and this traditional version contains no leavening—the only lightening comes from beating sugar and air into the butter and eggs. Many more complicated cakes are based on pound cake and usually rely on baking powder, baking soda, or beaten egg whites for leavening.
Makes 1 loaf cake
1½ cups (3 sticks) cold butter, sliced
1⅓ cups sugar
½ teaspoon salt
5 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1½ cups flour
Preheat the oven to 350°F. Butter a 9 by 5-inch loaf pan. Line the bottom with parchment or waxed paper. Flour the sides of the pan, tapping out the excess.
In a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together the butter and sugar on high speed for 2 minutes. Switch to the whisk attachment and beat for 3 minutes more on high speed. Scrape down the sides of the mixer every minute with a rubber spatula.
Beat in the salt, the eggs one by one, and the vanilla. Add the flour and incorporate it into the batter on slow speed. As soon as you don’t see any lumps of flour in the batter, stop beating, usually after about 30 seconds. Transfer the batter to the loaf pan and put the loaf pan on a baking sheet.
Bake for about 1 hour and 15 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the top comes out clean. Let cool completely on a wire rack before removing from the loaf pan and slicing.
Creamed butter and sugar are the base for many a cake because the air that’s beaten into the butter during the creaming causes the cake to rise. But to make matters somewhat more complicated, the butter should be cold. If it is warm or melted, it has no capacity to entrap air. Hence it can be hard to work, especially if you’re working by hand or with a hand mixer. The easiest approach is to use a stand mixer and start the creaming with the paddle blade and as the butter becomes more malleable switch to the whisk attachment. Of course when working by hand or with a handheld mixer, you don’t have this option. But as long as the butter is sliced, a bit of patience and, in the case of hand beating, elbow grease, will do the trick.
The only slightly exotic piece of equipment that you’ll need for angel food cake is a tube pan. You also need a lot of egg whites. Other than that, nothing could be simpler. Angel food cake can be eaten plain, but it’s delightful sprinkled with a little rum or sweet wine (kirsch would be grand) and then sprinkled with berries.
Makes one 9-inch angel food cake (8 servings)
15 egg whites (2 cups)
Pinch of cream of tartar (optional)
1 cup sugar
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1¼ cups cake flour
Preheat the oven to 350°F.
In a large bowl, combine the egg whites with the cream of tartar (if you are not using a copper bowl) and beat by hand or with a handheld mixer for about 14 minutes or in a stand mixer for about 7 minutes on medium speed to medium peaks—the whites cling to the whisk but sag slightly when you hold the whisk straight out. Add the sugar and beat for about 3 minutes more on medium speed with a stand mixer or about 8 minutes with handheld mixer or by hand with a heavy wooden spoon, until you’re exhausted, 5 to 10 minutes. Sprinkle the lemon juice and vanilla over the egg whites and fold in the flour, sifting in one-quarter at a time. Keep folding, lifting the egg whites as you go and scraping against the bottom of the bowl, with a rubber spatula, until you’ve used all the flour and no flour is visible in the egg whites. Spoon the mixture into an ungreased 9-inch tube pan.
Bake for about 40 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean. Turn the tube pan over onto the neck of a bottle and let cool. Cut around the outside of the cake with a sharp knife to dislodge it. Serve in wedges.
This is essentially a cake made with a special meringue that contains cornstarch. It is traditionally topped with whipped cream and strawberries. Because this cake is very sweet, you may want to substitute a pint of sour cream or crème fraîche for the traditional whipped cream.
Makes 6 dessert servings
5 egg whites
¼ teaspoon salt
Pinch of cream of tartar (optional)
1¼ cups sugar
5 teaspoons cornstarch
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups heavy cream
1 pint strawberries, stemmed and quartered
Confectioners’ sugar
Preheat the oven to 275°F. Butter and flour a 9-inch springform pan.
Combine the egg whites and salt in a large bowl. Add the cream of tartar (if you are not using a copper bowl). Beat until the egg whites form medium peaks—the meringue sags slightly when you hold out the whisk straight out. Add the sugar and beat until very stiff. Sift over the cornstarch and fold in with a rubber spatula. Fold in the vanilla extract. Spread the meringue in the prepared springform pan, leaving a slight indentation in the center to hold the berries
Bake for about 1 hour and 15 minutes, or until pale brown on top. Let cool on a wire rack. Open the springform pan and remove the sides. (You can serve the pavlova right on the base of the springform pan.)
Beat the cream to stiff peaks. Spread the top of the pavlova with the whipped cream, sprinkle over confectioners’ sugar, and top with the strawberries. Serve immediately.
Meringue Cups with Strawberry Ice Cream
The trick to successful meringue is to bake on a dry day and to bake in the lowest possible oven. Keep in mind that meringue isn’t really cooked as much as it is dried out, hence the low oven.
It’s ideal to make meringue in a copper bowl (it keeps its height better) but if you don’t have one, add a pinch of cream of tartar to the egg whites.
Makes 8 dessert servings
8 egg whites
Pinch of cream of tartar, optional
1⅓ cups granulated sugar
2 pints strawberry or other flavor ice cream
In a large bowl, combine the egg whites and cream of tartar (if you are not using a copper bowl). Beat the egg whites to stiff peaks. Add the sugar and beat for 1 minute more in a stand mixer on high speed or by hand or with a handheld mixer for 3 minutes.
Cover a sheet pan with a sheet of parchment paper (this is to prevent sticking; don’t use butter; it will interfere with rising). Spoon or pipe (with a pastry bag fitted with a ½-inch tip, see box on Pastry Bags) the meringue out into mounds about 4 inches in diameter. Press into the center of each mound with the back of a wet spoon to make an indentation. Don’t press down so much that you see through to the sheet pan.
Slide the meringues into the oven and set the oven to 175°F. Bake for 3 hours, until the meringues are dry to the touch and feather light. If they still feel sticky and are perfectly white, bake another hour and check again. If they’re beginning to brown, but still feel sticky, turn the oven to as low as it will go and continue baking for at least another hour. The meringues can be stored, tightly sealed in a tin box or plastic bag, for up to 5 days.
Serve topped with a scoop of strawberry (or other) ice cream.
Very similar to the gougères, cream puffs are made with cream puff pastry, not to be confused with flaky puff pastry. Once you have the dough, you can pipe it out into cream puffs, éclairs, profiteroles, or any shape you like. (For more about pastry bags, see box.) You will also need an egg wash, which is simply an egg beaten with a teaspoon of salt. The salt helps thin the egg and make it easier to spread. The egg wash is brushed over the cream puffs just before they go into the oven to give them their characteristic sheen.
Makes 8 large cream puffs
Cream Puff Dough
1 cup water
½ teaspoon salt, plus 1 teaspoon
½ cup (1 stick) butter, sliced
1¼ cups flour
8 eggs, or more as needed
Whipped Cream Filling
2 cups heavy cream
3 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Confectioners’ sugar, for dusting
To make the cream puffs, in a saucepan, combine the water, ½ teaspoon of the salt, and the butter and bring to a simmer over high heat until the butter melts. As soon as a simmer is reached, add the flour all at once and stir with a wooden spoon for about 2 minutes, or until the mixture forms a cohesive mass and pulls away from the sides of the pan, leaving a white film of flour on the pan sides.
Transfer the dough to a bowl and stir it around for a minute to get it to cool. Work in 7 of the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Check the consistency of the batter by pulling a wooden spoon through it. When the groove it makes slowly closes in on itself, you have added enough eggs.
Preheat the oven to 500°F. Unless you have a nonstick baking sheet or a silicone pad, put a tiny dollop of batter into each corner of a sheet pan and line the pan with a sheet of parchment paper, pressing the corners of the parchment onto the dollops of batter to anchor it in place.
Fit a pastry bag with a ¾-inch fluted tip and spoon the batter into the bag (see box below). If your pastry bag isn’t big enough, you may have to pipe out the cream puffs in two batches.
Pipe eight rounds of batter onto the prepared baking sheet. Each mound should be about 3½ inches across and 1½ inches high in the center. Make an egg wash by beating the remaining egg with the remaining teaspoon of salt. Brush the mounds with egg wash.
Slide the baking sheet into the oven and immediately turn down the oven to 400°F. Bake for 20 minutes, or until the pastries are golden brown. Do not open the oven door during baking. Turn the oven down to 250°F and bake 10 minutes more. If the puffs start to look too brown, turn down the oven to 200°F. Let cool completely on a rack, for at least 20 minutes, before filling.
To make the filling, combine the cream, sugar, and vanilla in a mixing bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer. Put the bowl with the cream mixture in the freezer for 5 minutes. Beat on high speed for about 2 minutes or by hand for about 7 minutes, until the cream is stiff and sticks straight out when you hold the whisk sideways.
Use a serrated knife to cut each cream puff in half horizontally. Spoon or pipe the cream into the eight bottoms and put on the tops. Dust with confectioners’ sugar. Cream puffs are best served right away since the cream gradually releases liquid that can make the pastry soggy.
ABOUT PASTRY BAGS
When buying a pastry bag (or disposable pastry bags), buy a large one. It should be at least as long as the distance from your wrist to your elbow—so when you fill it, it doesn’t overflow. When filling the pastry bag, fold down the top to make a cuff that extends several inches down the side of the bag. Assuming you are right-handed, hold the bag in your left hand with your fingers and thumb spread out under the cuff. Use your right hand to transfer mixtures to the bag with the aid of a wooden spatula or spoon. Use both hands to unfold the cuff. Close the top of the bag by making a series of small folds. When the bag is completely sealed, twist it so the mixture inside is taut and the bag sticks straight out. If the mixture isn’t taut, the bag is impossible to control.
Once you make the batter and have ice cream on hand, these require very little effort—you just have to pipe or spoon the batter out into smaller mounds than is required for cream puffs. The chocolate sauce couldn’t be simpler.
Makes 6 dessert servings
2 pints vanilla ice cream
Egg Wash
1 egg beaten
1 teaspoon salt
Chocolate Sauce
1 cup heavy cream
½ pound bittersweet chocolate, chopped
Prepare the cream puff dough. Prepare the egg wash by beating egg with 1 teaspoon of salt in a small bowl.
Preheat the oven to 400°F. Unless you have a nonstick baking sheet or a silicone pad, put a tiny dollop of batter into each corner of a sheet pan and line the pan with a sheet of parchment paper, pressing the corners of the parchment onto the dollops of batter to anchor it in place.
Pipe (using a pastry bag, see box on Pastry Bags) or spoon the batter out onto a sheet pan into mounds about 1 inch high and 1 inch in diameter. Brush with the egg wash.
Slide into the oven, turn the oven down to 400°F, and bake until golden brown and puffed, about 15 minutes. Turn the oven down to 300°F and keep baking for 10 minutes more.
Take out the puffs and let cool on wire racks. Cut the puffs in half through the equator. Place a scoop of ice cream on each puff bottom, and put top back on. Once you’ve filled the profiteroles, set them on a baking sheet and freeze to keep them cold while you make the sauce.
To make the chocolate sauce, bring the cream to a simmer in a small saucepan. Add the chocolate and let sit for 5 minutes. Stir until smooth.
Serve the profiteroles with the chocolate sauce on the side or make a dramatic presentation by pouring it over the profiteroles at the table.
For some reason, crepes intimidate people. Other than some fooling around with how much batter to add and the temperature of the pans, there isn’t much to worry about. It helps to have more than one crepe pan or nonstick sauté pan so you can make more than one at a time. Crepes can be made ahead of time and kept, with a piece of waxed paper between each one, in the refrigerator for 5 days or in the freezer for months.
Makes twelve 9-inch crepes
¾ cup flour
3 eggs
2 cups milk
½ teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons butter, melted
In a bowl, combine the flour, eggs, and about two-thirds of the milk and whisk until the mixture forms a smooth paste. (If you add all the milk at once, the flour stays in lumps.) When the paste is smooth, add the remaining milk and the salt.
Depending on your comfort level, brush one or two 9- or 10-inch crepe pans with melted butter. Heat the pan(s) over medium heat and ladle about 3 tablespoons of the crepe batter in each one. The batter should sizzle, but not aggressively. Turn the pan around at all angles so the batter runs over the surface of the pan. Cook until the edges start to brown and curl up slightly, about 3 minutes. Lift the crepe with the thumb and forefingers of both hands and flip it over. Cook for about 1 minute more on the second side. Stack the crepes on a plate.
Despite its reputation for luxury and difficulty, crepes suzette can be made with a limited number of ingredients. Once you have the crepes on hand, the suzette part (making an orange butter and flavoring it with Grand Marnier or Cognac) requires very little effort. Grand Marnier is a nice addition to this recipe, but it’s expensive and therefore, I’ve made it optional. Cointreau is somewhat less expensive and triple sec is much less expensive, but tastes like hair tonic unless sufficiently disguised with other flavors. On the other hand, this recipe calls for Cognac. Buy the least expensive Cognac you can find, but make sure it says Cognac on the bottle and not just brandy; alcohol just marked as brandy rarely has any flavor.
Makes 4 dessert servings
Finely grated zest of ½ orange
¾ cup (1½ sticks) butter, at room temperature
⅓ cup sugar
¼ cup Cognac
¼ cup Grand Marnier (optional)
In a bowl, work together the zest, butter, and sugar using a heavy wooden spoon.
Fold the crepes into quarters or roll them up. Melt the butter in a sauté pan or chafing dish and arrange the crepes on top in a single layer. Pour in the Cognac and the Grand Marnier and turn up the heat to high. When the liquor starts to boil, ignite the alcohol with a match or by tilting the pan toward the flame (if you have a gas stove). Stand back as the mixture bursts into flames. Spoon the flaming mixture over the crepes and push the crepes down into the sauce. When the flames die out, turn off the heat and serve on heated plates.
Most of the time when wine is used in cooking, all its finesse is cooked off, so it’s very hard to judge its quality. But in this dish, the wine isn’t cooked, so subtle nuances and varietal character will be retained to a large degree. It’s worth buying a wine with some identity like, perhaps, a French Gewürztraminer or Riesling, a lesser Chablis, or a Vouvray. This dish takes most of a day to make (it depends on how cold your freezer is) but requires very little in the way of actual work, and the effect, on a hot day, is heavenly.
Makes 6 dessert servings
1 bottle (750 ml) dry white wine
½ cup sugar
1 cup water
1 pint berries, such as raspberries (optional)
Put the white wine in the freezer to thoroughly chill it.
Combine the sugar with the water in a small saucepan and bring to a simmer. Simmer until the sugar dissolves. Let the sugar solution cool, then slide it into the freezer to get as cold as possible.
When both the wine and the sugar solution are thoroughly chilled, combine them and pour them into a baking dish large enough so they form a layer between ½ and 1 inch thick. Slide the baking dish into the freezer.
When a solid layer of crystals has formed on top of the granita, stir it into the rest of the granita with a fork. Work quickly so the granita doesn’t warm up. Return to the freezer until it forms solid crystals. Break the crystals up three or four times by working a fork back and forth in the semifrozen mixture.
Spoon the granita into chilled wine glasses and serve immediately, topped with some berries.
Makes 6 dessert servings
2 cups milk
1 vanilla bean, cut in half lengthwise, or 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
¼ cup sugar
6 egg yolks
Bring the milk to a simmer with the vanilla bean or extract. When the milk comes to a simmer, take out the vanilla bean and scrape the little seeds out of both halves. Return these back to the milk.
Whisk together the sugar and the egg yolks in a mixing bowl until the yolks turn pale.
Pour half the milk into the egg yolks and whisk thoroughly to combine. Pour this mixture into the pan with the remaining milk and cook over medium heat, stirring with a wooden spoon, until the mixture is silky and thickens slightly, anywhere from 30 seconds to 5 minutes depending on how hot everything is. I don’t suggest using a thermometer because as you’re playing around with the thermometer, the custard, or crème anglaise may curdle. Be sure to reach into the corners so the eggs don’t hide out and curdle. Don’t stop stirring for a second and don’t let the mixture boil or it will curdle. Remove it from the heat and continue to stir for about 3 minutes to prevent the eggs from setting.
Let cool at room temperature (or over ice if you’re in a hurry), stirring from time to time to keep a crust from forming. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate until cold. Freeze in an ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s directions.
Variations:
Crème Anglaise. The same custard cream that is frozen into ice cream can be served cold as a dessert sauce, over fruits and tarts.
Mint Ice Cream. Numerous ice cream flavors can be made by infusing flavoring ingredients in the custard cream while it’s still hot. To make mint ice cream, add a bunch of mint to the hot custard mixture and let it infuse as the custard cools. Strain through a medium mesh strainer (a fine mesh strainer will strain out the vanilla bean). Then chill and freeze as above. If you like mint chocolate chip ice cream, chop some bittersweet chocolate and fold it into the ice cream as soon as it comes out of the machine. Don’t try putting it in at the beginning, or it will all sink to the bottom.
These cookies are sometimes called Mexican wedding cookies. Whatever you call them, they’re full of butter and give the impression of butter suspended in air. Best of all, they’re easy to make.
Makes 30 cookies
2 cups flour
¼ teaspoon salt
1 cup (2 sticks) cold butter, cut into ½-inch cubes
⅔ cup granulated sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cups pecans
Confectioners’ sugar for dusting
Sift the flour and salt into a bowl and set aside.
Working in a large bowl, cream the butter and granulated sugar until fluffy by hand or in a stand mixer fitted with a paddle blade. This will take about 5 minutes by hand or 2 minutes in a stand mixer at high speed. When the butter is creamy, work in the vanilla extract.
Process the pecans in a food processor for about 30 seconds. Add the nuts to the butter mixture and work until smooth. Work in the flour mixture just long enough to avoid lumps or dry patches. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.
Use a nonstick baking sheet or line a regular baking sheet with a sheet of parchment paper. Scoop up about 2 tablespoons of the dough and form into a 3-inch long finger shape. Continue until you’ve used all the dough, placing the cookies about ½ inch apart on the baking sheet. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.
Preheat the oven to 300°F.
Bake about 35 minutes, or until the cookies are golden brown on the bottom and very pale brown on top. Let cool, sprinkle with confectioners’ sugar, and serve.
These cookies are so often made with shortening that it’s a welcome delight to have them made with butter. The trick to success is to keep the dough cold at all times. If it starts to warm up, slide it into the refrigerator immediately.
Makes about 50 cookies
3⅓ cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
¾ teaspoon salt
1¾ cups (3½ sticks) cold butter
1½ cups granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 eggs
1 egg yolk
Whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt in a large mixing bowl. Set aside
In a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together the butter and sugar on high speed for 2 minutes. Switch to the whisk attachment and beat for 3 minutes more on high speed. Scrape down the sides of the mixer every minute with a rubber spatula. Beat in the vanilla, eggs, and the egg yolk. Add the flour mixture and work it in until smooth and until there’s no more loose flour, about 30 seconds.
Refrigerate the dough for 30 minutes.
Preheat the oven to 325°F. Have ready two nonstick baking sheets or line two regular baking sheets with parchment paper.
Roll the dough into golf-ball-size balls. (If the dough starts to get sticky, stick it in the fridge until it firms up.) Place a couple of inches apart on the cookie sheet to them to allow them to expand. Press with the heel of your hand to flatten the balls into rounds about ½ inch thick.
Bake for about 25 minutes, or until you perceive the slightest hint of browning. Let cool and serve.
For those who like butter, shortbread is the perfect cookie. While you can make these by hand, it helps to have a stand mixer.
Makes 12 two-inch cookies, or more if made smaller
1¾ cups flour
½ teaspoon salt
1 cup (2 sticks) cold butter, cut into slices
¾ cup granulated sugar
Turbinado or granulated sugar, for sprinkling
In a bowl, whisk together the flour and salt.
In a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together the butter and sugar on high speed for 2 minutes. Switch to the whisk attachment and beat for 3 minutes more at high speed. Scrape down the sides of the mixer every minute with a rubber spatula. Add the flour mixture to the butter mixture and mix until just incorporated.
Place the dough on a sheet of parchment paper and place another sheet on top. Hammer the dough with a rolling pin or the side of a cleaver to flatten it. You can also use the heel of your hand. Roll over the dough with a rolling pin to smooth its surface. Continue working the dough into a 9- by 12-inch rectangle—you may have to trim off the edges to make a perfect shape. Refrigerate for 30 to 60 minutes until very hard.
Preheat the oven to 375°F.
Transfer the dough on the parchment paper to a baking sheet. Remove the top sheet of parchment. Sprinkle with the turbinado sugar until the cookies are well coated.
Bake for about 15 minutes or until golden brown on top. Cut into squares while still hot. Serve as soon after baking (once cool) as possible. Shortbread (and other cookies) can be stored in a tightly sealed tin or plastic bag for 5 to 7 days.
Some people like their brownies cakey, while others want them dense with chocolate. This recipe strikes a balance between the two camps.
Makes 8 brownies
¾ cup (1½ sticks) butter
½ pound bittersweet chocolate, roughly chopped
3 eggs
½ cup sugar
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
½ cup flour
1 cup coarsely chopped walnuts (optional)
Preheat the oven to 325°F. Butter an 8-inch square baking dish.
Combine the butter and chocolate in a microwavable bowl and microwave for 30 seconds on high. Stir until smooth. If the chocolate hasn’t completely melted, microwave for another 15 seconds.
In a bowl, beat together the eggs, sugar, salt, and vanilla. Stir in the chocolate mixture. Sift over the flour, stir, and stir in the nuts.
Spread the mixture in the baking dish and bake for about 30 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean. Allow to cool for 15 minutes before cutting the brownies and serving.
Zabaglione is usually eaten alone, either with spoon or simply drunk out of a glass. It is quite similar to the French sabayon sauce (see variation). The main difference is that Madeira or Marsala (from Sicily) or even cream sherry, which is easiest to find, is used for zabaglione and white wine for sabayon. Sabayon sauce can be served hot or cold; zabaglione is served hot. Zabaglione is traditionally served with figs. It is also good with cheese.
Makes 4 dessert servings
1 cup sugar
2 cups Madeira, Marsala, or cream sherry
8 egg yolks
1 whole egg
Whisk together the sugar, Madeira, egg yolks, and whole egg in a bowl set over a saucepan of simmering water. Continue whisking until the mixture stiffens and you see bubbles coming up, after about 10 minutes (this is the alcohol boiling off and won’t cause the zabaglione to curdle). Serve zabaglione in old-fashioned glasses or wine or martini glasses.
Variation:
Sabayon is a sweet fluffy sauce that is a perfect accompaniment to fruit and fruit tarts. Decrease the amount of sugar to ¾ cup, replace the Madeira with a dry white wine, and cook as above. If you’re serving it cold, continue beating off the heat until it cools to room temperature.
