TWD BWJ - Rugelach

This week we have Rugelach! Before making them for TWD a few years ago I had never heard of Rugelach and had no idea how to pronounce it let alone how they were supposed to look or taste. I felt a bit more prepared this time around and had fun with the recipe.

I made just a 1/3 batch (using only 1 stick of butter instead of 3!!!) and used prunes, dark chocolate and walnuts for the filling. Yum!

It seemed like the humidity would be a problem for this pastry so I made it in the food processor using cold butter and cream cheese then chilled it overnight before rolling. It worked like a charm and made some seriously good pastry!

Even with a 1/3 batch I still got 24 little cookies (pastries?). They were amazing straight out of the oven and still good the next day although they had lost their crispy edges.

There's still about a cup of prune levkar left and my boys are loving it spread on their toast or stirred through porridge for breakfast.

Thanks to Margaret and Jessica for a great pick! I'm happy to have conquered Rugelach and will definitely make them again with the apricot filling too. You will find the recipe on their blogs under today's date.

TWD BWJ - Chocolate Truffle Tartlets

Wow, our second recipe for Baking with Julia and it couldn't be more indulgent! This week we have Chocolate Truffle Tartlets which contain chocolate in almost every form.

First, a chocolate pastry made with cocoa. Next comes a decadent truffle filling made with melted dark chocolate, eggs and sugar. Then it's finished off with a smattering of milk and white chocolate pieces. Can anyone say yum?!

Surprisingly these tartlets aren't over the top in sweetness. A big scoop of creamy vanilla icecream was perfect on top. Still wouldn't want to eat too much though.

I made a full batch of pastry but only used about 2/3 of it to make my 4 tartlets (with a half batch of filling). I rolled the remainder of the pastry out and baked some little biscuits with it. Hubby was a big fan of the tartlets and my 2 littlest taste testers couldn't get enough of the pastry!

Our hosts this week are Steph, Spike, Jaime and Jessica. Thanks for a great pick! You can find the recipe on their blogs under today's date.

TWD Baking with Julia - White Loaves

This is the first week of the new Tuesdays with Dorie - Baking with Julia, how exciting! We will be baking fortnightly and should have one simple and one more complicated recipe to post each month. With over 300 bloggers baking along this is going to be fun!

So, first up we have White Loaves, chosen by Laurie and Jules.

I have been making bread a lot recently but cheating a bit because I use my breadmaker. I heart my breadmaker! While it makes great bread, of course, it also makes pizza dough and I can turn a basic dough mix into almost anything. Just last week I made cinnamon rolls (no pics sorry) and in the lead up to Easter there will definitely be some fresh hot cross buns too!

It has been a while though since I made a loaf of bread completely from scratch. I had forgotten how easy it is and Oscar loved seeing the dough rising and being punched down and turned into real bread.

This is a very simple recipe and it made 2 absolutely delicious loaves of bread. I stuck strictly to recipe and made 2 plain loaves perfect for sandwiches. We go through a LOT of sandwiches in this house. It froze well too and also made great toast.

All in all a great place to start the new TWD. I hope everyone else had success too! The list of bakers should be up soon on the TWD page.

You will find the recipe on pp81-82 of Baking with Julia by Dorie Greenspan, or Laurie and Jules will have it in their posts due today.

TWD REWIND - French Yoghurt Cake with Marmalade Glaze

I have to say TWD Rewind weeks are always difficult. I mean there's just so much to choose from! When it comes down to it though we all have our favourites and in my case, it tends to be the simpler more homestyle recipes. The ones I want to make over and over again. So this week I chose Dorie's French Yoghurt Cake with Marmalade Glaze on p224-5.

I was so looking forward to this one but I didn't even get a bite. Actually no one did on account of me baking with a tub of yoghurt that had expired a few weeks earlier. Whoops! You really should check your labels kids, BEFORE you bake.

Now I know some people would eat it anyway seeing it's yoghurt and already sour and it was baked etc etc but really who wants to risk a bout of food poisoning the week before Christmas?

Come to think of it there were quite a few mishaps with this cake. I had already poured it into the tin when I realised I'd forgotten to add the oil. After it was baked, and before I realised the yoghurt problem, I opened my new jar of marmalade to discover it was covered in green fuzz. Yuck. Clearly the universe did not want me to eat this cake (don't worry I didn't take use the mouldy marmalade, I had some already opened in the fridge).

Please don't be put off by all this. When made correctly this cake is fabulous! It's moist and tangy and just plain good. You can find all the details and the link to the recipe here.

It's quite sad but this is our second last ever week of TWD. Coming up next week are Kids' Thumbprint Cookies chosen by Dorie herself.

TWD - Unbelievably Good Chocolate Blueberry Ice Cream

This week our fearless leader Laurie of Slush chose Dorie's Unbelievably Good Chocolate Blueberry Ice Cream. Now I love chocolate ice cream and blueberries but I have to admit I wasn't sure about this combination, especially when it involved mixing ice cream with jam!

As it turned out though, after forgetting to buy any blueberry jam (no really! I did forget!) I subbed in frozen blueberries and ended up with the most luscious chocolate ice cream punctuated by sharp icy berries. Delicious!

It took hubby a little while to hunt down our ice cream maker. We moved in to this house over a year ago and it never really got unpacked. This has reminded me just how good homemade ice cream can be and I foresee a whole lot more being made this summer!

You will find the recipe for this amazing ice cream on Laurie's blog under today's date.