TWD: Chocolate crunched caramel tart

It was a bit hard to get this weeks TWD recipe out. Not for any sane reason, like not wanting to make the recipe.. because believe me that picture looked so good and chocolaty, I knew I wanted to make this one! The real problem you see is that this is the last week before we leave for the USA and get MARRIED! Yup so sorry if this is a kinda lonely blog for awhile but pretty much all of October is wedding and honeymoon.. so come 10/10 you know I'll be digging into my own wedding cake that me and my mom have made- with a little help from some bridesmaids!

As you can see this is pure deliciousness and for once I had no issues with making caramel! Hooray! A quick press in (i love not having to roll it out) cookie tart dough- breezy caramel and super simple ganache and you have something that looks beautiful, tastes like the best candy bar you've ever had and definitely impresses! Make sure to check out the rest of the TWD blogroll tarts!

Daring Bakers: Vol au Vents

The September 2009 Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Steph of A Whisk and a Spoon. She chose the French treat, Vols-au-Vent based on the Puff Pastry recipe by Michel Richard from the cookbook Baking With Julia by Dorie Greenspan.

I was pretty excited to make my own puff pastry this month. I remember doing it once as a kid with my mom so I thought I'd see how tough it could be on my own. I must admit I found this pretty straight forward. I spent one Saturday doing errands and then coming in and doing a turn of the dough before starting something else and returning.

The result was a nice crispy, golden, flakey form ready for me to fill! I had some leftover black bean hot pot that was fantastic in these!

Be sure and see the rest of the Daring Bakers posts this month!

TWD: Cottage Cheese Pufflets

We have had a bumper crop of plums this year- so I thought this would be a good excuse for using up some of the jars of jam in the fridge that didn't seal properly.

These were very simple to make and the cottage cheese added an interesting tanginess to things. I think perhaps they might of needed a bit more time in the oven to get flakier, but they were delicious even slightly underdone!

Yum!

Be sure to check out the rest of the TWD blogroll today.

Daring Cooks: Indian Dosa

This months daring cooks is a great choice for me as I am vegetarian and the past couple have been pretty meat/fish heavy. While this 3 piece recipe seemed daunting at first the filling came together quite easily.

I then moved on to making the sauce- and I think there must be some sort of misprint in the instructions as it ended up tasting too stocky.. kinda like gravy (not so curry inspired) I doubled the coconut milk- but it was still a sort of gravy taste..

For me I think the biggest challege was the dosa themselves- getting these pancakes to turn out took some time figuringout the right amout of oil in the pan and the right heat. I got there in the end though!

These were pretty good- but I did find the recipe too reliant on curry powder- i guess living in the curry capital of the UK this was just a bit too 'translated' for me to really taste anything like the dosa I can get in Bradford!

Daring Bakers: Dobos Torta

The August 2009 Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Angela of A Spoonfulof Sugar and Lorraine of Not Quite Nigella. They chose the spectacular DobosTorte based on a recipe from Rick Rodgers' cookbook Kaffeehaus: ExquisiteDesserts from the Classic Caffés of Vienna, Budapest, and Prague.


This was pretty easy to make but perhaps not so interesting to taste.. I must admit I had some trouble with the carmel always tasting like lemon and never really hitting a dark amber color.. So I called it after what seemed a very long time! and the result was crisp- uncut/edible topping that on the second day became moist again.

On the whole I thought this tasted like pancakes with nutella... not worth the effort... but pretty when cut!

TWD:Creamiest Lime Meringue Pie

This weeks recipe is a play on lemon meringue or key lime pie as it is topped with meringue in my family recipe. This was a fantastic pie! The ginger really was subtle, but helped to ramp up the lime flavor.

There was a bit of me that was shocked at the amount of butter added to the lime cream and if I make it in future I might just go for the straight lime cream as I thought it was fantastic!

I used a cookie crust- mostly as I knew I wouldn't have enough butter otherwise! Make sure you try this recipe its a very yummy one!

TWD:Bananna Bundt

This weeks recipe was very tasty. A notch up from regular bananna bread it was the perfect thing to slice up for morning tea breaks while also being a pretty damn fine dessert!

This batter was dead simple to throw together and even forgave me for not having quite enough bananna.

However as you can see I had a bit of sticking problems in my supposedly non-stick silicone pan!

Oh well- this left me with a top crust less cake- not going to win any beauty contests, but still fabulous to eat!

Be sure and check out all the rest of the fabulous Dorie bakers this week!