French Tarte Faves (FTF) No. 1: financiers

This is the launch of an idea I came up with recently - a series of posts entitled “French Tarte Faves” that I hope to pop into the mix every now and then! I bake/make a number of things that never end up as the subject of a blog post, and so I’d like to include some of those treats now and again.

Even though I have posted on this one, I’m going to start with one of my tried and true favorites - financiers. I do mention them periodically in some of my seasonal updates and, in fact, make them so often that I can’t even begin to recall all of the versions Steve and I (and others!) have enjoyed. Check out this post from many moons ago. Back in my Pawtucket shop days, pear ginger was a standard. So good.

The beauty of financier batter is its relative ease of preparation, versatility, wonderful texture and all around deliciousness. Here are a few recent variations you might like to try - or create your own.

As is often the case, a project may be spurred on by various components/ingredients I have on hand from other baking adventures or classes I’ve taught. This time some blueberries and blackberries, lemon curd, dark chocolate ganache, ground hazelnuts, dried apricots and the remainder of a bag of almond flour (before I open a new one!). Once baked, they hold well in the freezer to be plucked out for those times when the urge for a little treat strikes.

I baked several versions on a couple of different days. As usual, I use my silicone molds for these babies - no buttering/flouring. I have a number of shapes and sizes, the first day’s session involving ovals and mini-muffins.

First, here’s a link to my base recipe. Made with egg whites, browned butter, confectioner’s (or granulated or brown) sugar, all purpose flour and almond flour, it’s a straight forward task to prep the batter and refrigerate it until ready to bake off. You should give it at least a 4 hour or so chill, but I usually make the batter a day or two ahead. It will keep for several days so you can choose to bake it as desired, scooping out a portion of batter and adding chosen flavors like citrus zest or spices, dried fruits or chopped chocolate to create your own unique versions. It’s also common in the mignardise world to simply top the batter with a berry or two before baking. Crumble isn’t bad either.

Back to the task at hand. I’ve explained before (I think) how to determine the quantity of what I’ll call “chunky” additives for a batter. Weigh out the finished batter. Take 10-15% of that weight to figure your additive(s). E.g. if you have 500 g batter, blend in 50-75 g of chopped chocolate, dried fruit pieces or toasted chopped nuts.

It’s different for flavor additions like citrus zest, spices and extracts - that’s really more of a learning curve based on trial as well as experience. E.g. with my base recipe I might add the zest of one large orange or two medium lemons or three limes - adjust as you like. I tend to amp up citrus so I might even use more.

OK. For this project I added chopped dark chocolate to half the batter and piped it into my favorite mini-muffin silicone molds. Remember - no buttering necessary!

After baking and cooling I spread a swirl of dark chocolate ganache on top and sprinkled ‘em with chocolate cookie crumbs. Yum.

For the next I added lemon zest to the other half of the batter, piped it into ovals, made a shallow well, piped a dollop of lemon curd in and topped with blueberries..

Once baked, I gave them a light lemon juice/confectioners sugar glaze for that extra special something.

The next duo involved subbing ground toasted hazelnuts for half of the almond flour. When ready to bake, I divided the batter in half and to one half added about 2 tablespoons finely diced crystallized ginger and about 50 g diced, dried apricots that I had soaked in some hot water and a splash of rum to soften them up. Pat the apricots dry before adding to the batter.

My square savarin molds give me a blank canvas for garnishing. I had some lightly spiced peach apricot Swiss meringue buttercream in the freezer from a previous macaron project. A nice swirl is all it takes to dress these up a bit. You could even put a dollop of apricot jam in the well before piping on the buttercream.

How about some garnish?

You could even top ‘em off with some oat crumble or toasted candied pistachios for some added texture.

I piped the remaining half into mini muffin molds and pressed some halved blackberries into the top.

While these are delicious as is, I gave them a nice swirl of orange caramel Swiss meringue buttercream. Mmmm . . . . . good!

These petite cakes are simply delightful, no matter how you make them. What a wonderful way to vary your creations by flavors, seasons, favorite fruits or nuts or . . . . . . You get the idea. Now go make your own version of financiers!

One big bearded iris among giant allium. Love that purple!

Gorgeous rhodedendrons at D&D’s in Massachusetts

Flowering astilbe along our front walk

Coriander buttermilk "bouchon"

If you’re dreaming of the perfect buttermilk pancake and donut hole rolled into one, this is it! Moist with hints of nutmeg, coriander and ginger, these small bites go down so smoothly that you’ll clamor for more. I first made these in 2012 in my small shop inside Hope Artiste Village in Pawtucket RI. When Steve and I saw them, we immediately knew what they should be called.

Bouchon is the French word for cork, and the champagne cork shape develops as they bake in small round flexi-molds. The key is to fill the wells enough so that the top poofs out over the edges as the cakes rise, giving that signature look.

The process is your basic creaming method of cake prep. In a nutshell: cream butter and sugar, add eggs and vanilla, blend in dry ingredients alternating with wet (1/3 dry, 1/2 wet, 1/3 dry, 1/2 wet and end with 1/3 dry), scraping down after each addition.

In the plan ahead phase, bring 170 g / 6 ounces unsalted butter, one cup buttermilk and 2 large eggs to room temperature. While not a complete deal breaker, this will cut down on any curdling that can occur during mixing when things are too cold.

Heat the oven to 425ºF.

In a medium bowl whisk 200 g all purpose flour, 146 g whole wheat pastry flour, 3/4 teaspoon salt, 1.5 teaspoons baking powder, 1/4 teaspoon baking soda, 1 teaspoon ground coriander, 1 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg (I eyeball it and probably end up using less) and 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger.

Place the 170 g room temp butter with 75 granulated sugar and 67 g dark brown sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle. Cream for 2-3 minutes and scrape down the bowl.

Add the eggs, one by one, as well as a teaspoon of vanilla extract. Do the dry/wet additions as mentioned above.

In the image above you can see the Demarle Flexipan mold 2266 I use for this - at purchase it is a 48 well mold, but I cut it in half to fit on a half sheet pan. I probably haven’t mentioned this for some time now, but I always set silicone flexi-molds on a wire grid on the sheet pan. This allows for better oven heat circulation and more even baking.

This cake batter is quite thick so I use a wide round tip (20 mm / 3/4” diameter) to pipe and hold my offset spatula in the other hand to cleanly “cut” the batter away from the tip as I go. Works like a charm.

Pipe the batter to nearly the top of each mold with a nice dome at the finish. Not having made these for some time, I had to fine tune my piping as I went. The yield varies but I typically get 32-34 cakes from a recipe. I ended up with 42 this time which tells me I need to be more generous with my piping for the next go. Gotta get those cork tops!

Bake about 15 minutes until golden. The cakes should feel firm when gently pressed on top.

While the cakes bake, melt 4 tablespoons butter in a small bowl; in another small bowl mix 1/2 cup sugar with 1 teaspoon ground coriander, 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger and a few grates of fresh nutmeg.

Once out of the oven, let cool about 5 minutes then pop the cakes out onto the wire racks.

Working in small batches, dip the tops in the melted butter, give them a couple of minutes for the butter to absorb and then dip/roll them in the coriander sugar mixture.

I didn’t dip and roll the whole batch since I wanted to freeze some au naturel to have on hand for later. You never know when a bouchon occasion might arise.

These babies are dense yet light, not too sweet and with just the right warmth from the spices.

My inspiration for making these after a number of years was two-fold: I was dreaming about them and just happened to have some buttermilk in the fridge, plus a weekend visit from sister Joyce for whom I had to have a little treat or two on hand. Thanks for your visit Joybell!

Oh - and let’s not forget that Steve loves them!!

Happy bouchon making everyone and here’s to more autumn baking adventures.

Ciao for now.

Orange pecan crumble pull apart rolls

This one is great fun! Add some spices to your favorite sweet roll dough, let it rise, roll it out, spread with an orange zesty sugar/butter filling, cut it into squares and create your own pull-apart shapes. Top it off with a nutty pecan crumble and you’ll be happy you did!

The dough I used is easy to work with, soft and pillowy and quite delicious. The yield is either 7 or 9 rolls depending on how many squares of dough you use per roll to create your version (as you’ll see coming up). Note - the images below show ingredients and steps for my base recipe test batch with a 9 roll yield.

Base recipe: put 120 ml / 1/2 cup whole milk in a microwaveable container (a 2 cup Pyrex measurer works well here), heat just to boiling then add 56 g / 2 ounces cubed, unsalted butter to the milk. Stir to melt the butter and let the mixture cool to tepid ( ~105ºF).

Now add 1 lightly beaten large egg and 1 tablespoon vanilla extract to the milk/butter mixture and keep it on standby.

In the bowl of a stand mixer combine 130 g / 1 cup all purpose flour, 130 g / 1 cup bread flour, 50 g / 1/4 cup packed light brown sugar, 5 g active dry or instant yeast, 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt, 1/2 teaspoon ground coriander, 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger, a pinch (or more to taste) of cinnamon and, in my case, I threw in some vanilla powder that I had made by grinding down and sifting some dried vanilla beans. Even though there’s vanilla extract in the dough, I figured a dash or two of the powder would only enhance the flavor.

Stir in the milk mixture and mix with either the paddle or a large spatula or wooden spoon until combined.

Fit the mixer with the dough hook and knead on low speed for about 6-7 minutes until smooth and elastic. Or knead by hand for about 12-14 minutes.

Place the dough in a lightly buttered bowl . . . .

cover with plastic wrap and let rise for anywhere from 45 minutes to a couple of hours depending on the ambience of your room. You’re looking for about double in size.

While the dough is rising make the filling by blending 66 g / 1/3 cup sugar, 2 tablespoons orange zest, 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt and 42 g / 3 tablespoons soft unsalted butter.

For this test batch I wasn’t sure what pan/form would be best for what I had in mind, so I did some comparisons with standard muffin tin, individual cake pan and panettone paper.

Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface, gently de-gas then roll it out to a 9”x9” square. Spread the filling over it then cut into thirty-six 1.5” squares.

Stack 4 squares together (for a yield of nine rolls) and tuck ‘em into buttered and sugared pans (FYI - no need to butter and sugar the panettone paper).

Cover loosely with plastic wrap and let them rise for about an hour. About 30 minutes before you plan to bake, heat the oven to 375ºF.

Top with pecan crumble before baking.

Note: for the crumble combine 60 g all purpose flour, 60 g sugar and 60 g cold, diced butter. Sand the butter into the dry ingredients to achieve coarse crumbs and add in anywhere from 30 - 60 g toasted, then chopped pecans, depending on how nutty you like your topping. I usually double or triple any crumble I make so I can stash the rest in the freezer for another time. Nothing like planning ahead.

Bake from 20-25 minutes until golden brown.

Each form yielded a slightly different end result. Not being rigid, the panettone paper roll skewed into an oblong pull apart, while the individual cake pan held the dough nicely in place.

The standard muffin tin, being more shallow than the cake pan, allowed for more rising and flaring out of the dough, kind of like one of those wide curved balloon-y kind of kites that billow out into a big, rippled rectangle.

Once out of the pan, they almost pulled themselves apart!

The taste test received a big thumbs up from both Steve and myself, and I knew I wanted to make these again.

This time I doubled the dough batch (here’s the recipe PDF) and rolled out each HALF of the dough into the 9”x9” square, spread on the filling and cut the thirty-six 1.5” squares. NOTE: I found it easier to work with the 9” square portions then a full double batch of dough.

I had done a bit of calculating and decided to use 5 pieces for each pull apart (for a yield of 7 rolls per dough half or a total of 14), arranging them more as a flower than a rectangular stack. I buttered and sugared my individual cake pans and tucked the pieces in an overlapping, rough swirl fashion. Having a couple of extra squares of dough, I tucked those in where they seemed to be most needed.

Since I own only 12 of the aluminum Fat Daddio cake pans (which I LOVE!), I used 2 ramekins to fill the bill.

After the rise they also received the pecan crumble top . . . .

and baked up like a dream.

After 5-10 minutes of cool time I gently loosened the edges with an offset spatula and popped them out onto a wire rack to finish cooling.

Boy are these babies good! I made these as part of a pastry assortment for a neighbor’s Saturday morning gathering, and the followup reports were A+. Steve and I enjoyed some of the extras, plus a few went into the freezer for later. They kept well for a day or two in a covered container and were even better with a few minutes warm up in a 325º oven.

Love that pull-apart feature! I’m already planning another round soon.

In the meantime Steve and I are wishing everyone calm days and peaceful nights as we continue to try to understand what’s happening in our world day by day.