Tuesdays with Dorie: Black & White Arborio Rice Pudding

First let me say I adore rice pudding. It is pure creamy comfort in a bowl. But oh how I wish I had read the P&Q before making this one!

I did a few double takes while reading this recipe. First at just 1/4 cup of rice with that much liquid for 4 serves. Ummmm, what the...? Next at just 30 minutes cooking time to absorb 80% of the liquid into such a teeny tiny amount of rice? Eeek.

I have made rice pudding with arborio many times and we always have it in the pantry. The parboiling worked well but there simply was not enough rice. Even after close to 50 minutes cooking time it was still pretty soupy and never really thickened in the fridge.

The taste test ...

Despite the soupiness this was lovely. I much preferred the plain vanilla to the chocolate, partly because the chocolate flavour was too intense but also because it ended up with an odd grainy texture which was not at all appealing. Let the record show that N disagrees with this point - he is all about the texture. So, next time more rice, more cooking and less chocolate. Then we will have a winner!

Thank you to Isabelle of Les Gourmandises d’Isa for this week's pick. Even the weather cooperated, with temps dropping from mid 30s to low 20s (celsius). Perfect for rice pudding!

Next week: Thanksgiving Twofer Pie.

Tuesdays with Dorie: Caramel-Peanut-Topped Brownie Cake

This week's recipe was chosen by Tammy of Wee Treats by Tammy and what a great choice! Considering how decadent Dorie's picture looked I decided we didn't need a whole cake, so I thirded the recipe and made 3 muffin sized cakes.

The cake mix worked perfectly. I lined a jumbo muffin pan and baked them for 25 minutes at 150 deg C. The texture was probably more cake than brownie but very soft, moist and intensely chocolaty. Maybe a few minutes less would have given a more fudge-like middle but I was totally happy with these.

The taste test ...

The cake was delicious! I will definitely be making this again. The muffin size works really well and I love doing individual serves. My only issue was with the caramel.

It took about 15 minutes to get a beautifully clear, deep amber toffee (I was tempted to make toffee apples at this stage) but when I added the cream and butter it all went wrong. The caramel went really milky and cloudy looking and cystalised as it cooled. The end result looks dull and uninviting. It tasted nice but a bit sugary rather than smooth as I had envisinged. While I did halve the recipe I've never had any trouble working with sugar before.

So if anyone out there can tell me where I went wrong I would be very grateful! My taste testers didn't care but the perfectionist in me really wants to make it, well ... perfect!

Caramel Heaven

I think I love caramel even more than chocolate. It's a big call I know but when you feel like drinking a whole jugful of caramel sauce it's pretty clear you're a caramelaholic!

Last night we had pancakes with icecream, homemade caramel sauce and crushed peanuts for dessert. Yum! The perfect Saturday night dessert really - easy, fun and delicious.

Best Ever Pancakes
From Modern Classics No 2 by Donna Hay, p 56

2 cups plain flour, sifted
3 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 cup caster sugar
1 egg
1 1/4 cups milk
3/4 cup buttermilk
75 g butter, melted

Place the flour, baking powder and sugar in a bowl. In a separate bowl place the milk, buttermilk, butter and egg and whisk until combined. Add the milk mixture to the flour mixture and whisk until smooth.

Heat a non-stick frying pan over medium heat. Pour 1/3 cup mixture for each pancake into the pan, doing as many per batch as your frypan will hold. Cook until bubbles appear on the surface then turn and cook for another minute or until golden.

Keep the pancakes warm while you cook the remaining batter. Makes 15

Caramel Sauce
From Modern Classics No 2 by Donna Hay, p 96

3/4 cup brown sugar
1 cup pure cream

Combine in a small saucepan over medium heat and stir until sugar is disolved. Increase the heat and simmer rapidly for 8 minutes or until the sauce thickens. Allow to cool until thick enough to spoon over cake or icecream.

Easy and absolutely heavenly! Probably best NOT eaten regularly :)

Bread and Butter Pudding for One

For me lunch is the trickiest meal of the day. As I work from home I generally have lots of time to think about and plan meals. Mostly I try to make enough dinner so there are leftovers to eat the next day. But when that doesn't happen I spend ages gazing into the fridge and pantry to find something yummy that won't take ages to make. Lately I've resorted to noodles or baked beans on toast and that just won't do!

Today I decided to make one of my favourite things in the world. While it feels incredibly decadent just to have dessert for lunch, this is actually pretty healthy (no cream!) and has carbs and protein and even fruit if you count the marmalade! Or at least that's what I keep telling myself :)
Bread and Butter Pudding for One
A food.baby original

2 slices of white bread
1 egg
1 tbs caster sugar
1/2 cup milk ( I use reduced fat)
2 ts soft butter
1 tbs orange marmalade (or any other jam you like - 100% fruit is best otherwise you might find it too sweet)

Preheat oven to 180 deg C.

Remove the crusts from the bread and spread one side of each evenly with butter (I actually left the crusts on this time because we had really yummy bread). Slice into quarters or whatever shape will work best for your baking dish. Layer into a greased ramekin or small baking dish. Make sure you leave lots of pointy edges facing up as these will get nice and crunchy.

In a small bowl beat the egg, sugar and marmalade together and set aside.

Place the milk into a small saucepan and bring to the simmer. Once the milk is hot pour over the egg mixture, beating constantly to ensure there are no lumps.

Pour the milk and egg mix over the bread and let sit for about 15 minutes to absorb. This will make the pudding lighter and not stodgy.

Place the ramekin into a larger baking dish and pour enough hot water to come half way up the sides of the ramekin. Bake for approx 20 minutes or until the top is crunchy and golden and the pudding feels set. Allow to cool for a few minutes before digging in. It will firm up as it cools. Delicious!

Tuesdays with Dorie: Chocolate-Banded Ice Cream Torte

To be honest my torte doesn't really have bands as such, more wobbles, swirls and waves!

This recipe really caught my eye when I first flicked through my copy of Baking. Dorie's torte is stunning in its simplicity, precision and colour. I guess 1 out of 3 isn't bad? Only raspberries can give you that shocking pink colour!

This happened purely because I tried to cheat by not freezing the layers as long as recommended (I was too tired to stay awake that long) and the results speak for themselves! When I placed the icecream layer on top and smoothed it out it pushed the chocolate to the edges. But if I hadn't made it when I did it wouldn't have been made at all.

The taste test ...

I LOVE the combination of chocolate and raspberries and the colour was fabulous. It just wasn't as pretty as it could have been :)

Thanks to Amy of Food, Family and Fun for choosing such a great recipe. I will definitely be making this again in the future and next time will follow the directions exactly.

Next week we have Chunky Peanut Butter and Oatmeal Chocolate Chipsters. Try and say that 3 times fast!

Tuesdays with Dorie: Blueberry Sour Cream Icecream

I was really excited to make icecream this week, despite the fact that it's the middle of winter here. I felt a little ridiculous actually, preparing icecream while wearing jeans, thick socks, ugg boots and 3 layers on top including a big woolly jumper. Brrrr!

This week's recipe was chosen by Dolores of Chronicles in Culinary Curiosity.

I have to say I loved this recipe. I tasted the blueberry/sugar/lime mix as it was simmering and it tasted like the perfect base for a cocktail! It made for a beautiful colour too.

The taste test ...

Delicious. I thought it was like frozen blueberry cheesecake which can never be a bad thing! I ended up adding the juice of a whole lime and I'm glad I did because it needed that extra zing. Overall more like frozen yoghurt than icecream but big thumbs up all round.


Next week we have ... Granola Grabbers (??) No idea. Will have to wait and see what that is!

Tuesdays with Dorie: Cherry Rhubarb Cobbler

Another Tuesday, another dessert! I'm really going to have to start exercising more often to burn off all this sweet stuff. At least there is fruit in this one so I can pretend it's healthy! (We won't talk about the huge scoop of Sara Lee vanilla ice cream on top).

Amanda at Like Sprinkles on a Cupcake chose this week's recipe. I found it online at Cook Almost Anything, and this was a really lucky find because the recipe had been converted into 'Australian'. I completely agree with Haalo's observations there about how Dorie's (and a ton of other cookbooks) are written purely for the American market. We don't measure butter in sticks or cups. It's so much simpler to measure/weigh everything and then you KNOW it's accurate. Particularly when baking is an exact science and requires exact proportions of ingredients. This is actually one of the main reasons I haven't purchased Dorie's book*. Anyway, you can find the recipe at the link above.

I think I have made a cobbler exactly once before. We tend to stick to crumbles in our house because they're easy and always delicious. The cobbler was also incredibly easy to put together - the filling just stirred together and the topping blitzed in the food processor.

As I mentioned last week N loves rhubarb so this was always going to be a winner. I had to use frozen fruit for both the rhubarb and the cherries. They actually did have fresh cherries at the supermarket but it's completely the wrong season so they've been imported (which makes me cranky) plus they were ridiculously expensive.


The only changes I made to the recipe were the proportions of fruit. I used a 350g box of cherries and a 450g box of rhubarb. I also added some extra sugar (approx 1-2 tbs) to account for the acid from the extra rhubarb.

The taste test ...

Well it tasted great but the presentation was lacking - the balls of dough on top didn't spread out at all which was a bit odd. I would also prefer a greater ratio of fruit to topping. Overall we enjoyed it but would definitely tweak the recipe if we were making it again.

Next week we have Summer Fruit Galette!

*Remember I am not officially a part of TWD, just playing along at home!

Peach and Cardamom Trifle

Are you sick of cake and cream yet? I nearly am and that's saying something!

I made this trifle for a Christmas in July dinner with the family this weekend. Trifle was always my favourite dessert when I was little - filled with bought jam roll, lots of red and green jelly and artificially yellow custard. These days I have (slightly) more sophisticated tastes.

This trifle is built around homemade sponge cake with a filling of dried peaches and orange slices which are poached in a sugar syrup subtly spiced with cinnamon, cardamom and brandy. Yum! The kitchen smelt absolutely divine with this bubbling away on the stove. And quite Christmas-y too I think.

It also gave me a chance to use one of our gorgeous wedding presents - a Krosno glass salad bowl - which works really well for this. (Thanks Beth!)

Sponge Cake
From Modern Classics Book 2 by Donna Hay, p75

1 1/4 cups plain flour
6 eggs
3/4 caster sugar
60g butter, melted

Preheat oven to 180 deg C (I did 160 deg fan forced).
Grease two shallow 20cm (8in) round cake tins and line the bases with baking paper.

Sift flour 3 times and set aside.

Place the eggs and sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer and beat for 8-10 minutes or until thick and pale and tripled in volume.

Sift the flour over the egg and sugar mixture and gently fold through using a metal spoon. Then fold through the melted butter.

Pour half the mixture into each tin and bake for 25 minutes or until the cakes are springy to touch and come away from the sides of the tin.

Cool on wire racks. Decorate as desired (I would normally fill them either jam and cream or lemon curd and dust with icing sugar). Serves 8-10.




Peach and Cardamom Trifle
Recipe from Notebook Magazine, Sept 05, p158 (as seen on Taste.com.au)

1 plain unfilled sponge cake (in 2 layers)
200g Dried Peaches, cut in slices
1/4 cup (60ml) brandy
3 cardamom pods
1 cinnamon stick
1 tsp orange rind, finely grated
1/2 cup (125ml) orange juice
1/2 cup (100g) sugar
2 oranges, peeled, sliced
500g Pauls Premium Vanilla Custard (or any custard you like - I would have made it myself but we had run out of eggs)
flaked almonds, toasted

Place one cake layer in the base of a 2-litre (8-cup) capacity glass serving bowl.

Place the dried peaches in a medium saucepan with brandy, cardamom pods, cinnamon stick, orange rind, orange juice, sugar, and 3/4 cup (185ml) water. Place over high heat and bring to the boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer for 10 minutes or until peaches soften. Add orange slices and then set aside for 10 minutes to cool.

Spoon half the peach mixture over the oranges and top with vanilla custard. Repeat layering with remaining cake, orange slices, peach mixture and custard.

Cover with plastic wrap and place in the fridge for 3 hours or overnight to develop the flavours.

To serve, top with lightly whipped cream and sprinkle with toasted flaked almonds.


(Sorry for all the condensation on the bowl - it doesn't make for great pics!)

The taste test ...

Overall it got a big thumbs up from everyone. I think next time though I will make double the syrup and simmer the spices in it before adding the fruit. The cinnamon and cardamom flavours weren't as pronounced as I hoped they would be. But it was still delicious and a great end to the meal.

Tuesdays with Dorie: Chocolate Pudding

Ok so i'm not an official member of Tuesdays with Dorie (TWD) but I've been following along for a while now. To be a member you not only need a food blog but you need to own the cookbook the group is based on, Baking: from My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan. We received a ton of gorgeous cookbooks for our wedding a few months ago so I really can't justify splurging on another one right now!

This week's TWD is hosted by It's Melissa's Kitchen. But I'm lucky enough that this week's recipe for Chocolate Pudding is already online at Dorie's own website. We're not supposed to publish the recipe so just click here to find it.

Having never made pudding before I wasn't totally sure what to expect. For most Australians 'pudding' can mean just a dessert in general, or something like a self-saucing chocolate pudding or steamed pudding that you would enjoy at Christmas time with lots of custard. Yum!

To me this chocolate pudding is like a firm chocolate mousse or chocolate custard. It is made with milk and eggs like a traditional custard, just with a few more ingredients.


I made one hell of a mess preparing this as you can see from the photo below. Next time I might streamline the process a bit and hopefully use fewer pots and pans. There was also a lot of in and out of the food processor that was a bit fiddly. Apart from that it's really simple to make.


The taste test ...


Well what can I say? It was absolutely sublime! Smooth, silky and incredibly chocolatey. I used Lindt Intense Mint chocolate for the pudding which added a different dimension of flavour. I topped them with some pure whipped cream and a shaving of Lindt 70% chocolate over the top.

I would definitely make this again.

Next Tuesday we will be making Cherry Rhubarb Cobbler. N loves rhubarb so he'll be happy!