Mixed pepper tart with gougère crust

I really didn't know what I was in for with this recipe.  A cheesy choux pastry turned into a tart crust and topped with vegetables?  It's a bit intimidating going into a recipe with no idea what the outcome should be, not even a photo.  On the other hand, it's liberating not having any expectations-- it eliminates disappointment.  So did I make the recipe correctly?  I have no idea.  But did I like the outcome?  You bet.

I made the recipe without any significant changes.  The only issue I had was with the pan-- I didn't have an 11" tart pan, so I used an 11" cake pan, which was considerably deeper than a tart pan and might have affected how it baked up.  Also, it was black.  Fearing it would over brown the tart, I covered it in aluminum foil.

Here's what I used:

3 medium red, yellow, and/or green sweet peppers, sliced

1/2 of a red onion, sliced 

1 clove garlic, minced 

2 tablespoons olive oil 

1/4 cup chopped fresh basil 

1 tablespoon chopped fresh rosemary

3/4 cup milk 

5 tablespoons butter, cut up (unsalted)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper

1 cup all-purpose flour 

4 oz. blue cheese, crumbled 

4 eggs 

1 oz. blue cheese, crumbled (1/4 cup) 

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Grease an 11-inch tart pan with a removable bottom; set aside. In a large skillet cook peppers, onion, and garlic in hot oil over medium heat until tender. Stir in basil and rosemary. Season with salt and pepper; set aside.

In a small saucepan combine milk, butter, salt, and pepper.  Bring to boiling, then remove from heat and, using a wooden spoon, vigorously beat in flour.  Reduce heat and return saucepan to heat.  Stir for 2 minutes.  Transfer dough mixture to a large bowl and add the 4 ounces of blue cheese.  (The large bowl is necessary because bits of dough go flying, and also so the batter isn't too deep, otherwise it climbs up the beaters.)  Using a hand mixer, beat on high speed for 2 minutes.  Add eggs, one at a time, beating on medium speed after each addition, until each egg is fully incorporated.

Spread dough evenly in the prepared pan.  Bake 10 minutes.  Spread vegetable mixture over dough.  Bake 40 minutes or until puffed and golden brown.  Sprinkle remaining blue cheese over tart before serving.

I didn't have fresh rosemary, so I used dried (1 teaspoon), but that wasn't very nice.  I should have added it early into the peppers so it could absorb some moisture and soften, but I added it at the end, as directed.  It ended up as sharp little sticks and probably didn't add much flavor.  

With all the cheese, I was concerned about its being too salty, so I used unsalted butter, but then added 1/4 teaspoon of salt.  This was a little too salty for a sizable serving, but adequate for a side serving.  Ultimately, you can add salt as desired, or use salted butter.  Generally, I like something salty with something bland, so either a salty crust and bland topping, or salty topping and bland crust.

The dough didn't rise much, which actually didn't surprised me.  I'm not sure why it's baked first for 10 minutes, but I suspect it's to firm the surface a bit.  After 10 minutes, my batter was still wet in the middle.  (This might have been due to using a deeper pan.)  I contemplated leaving it in long enough to dry the surface, but plodded ahead as directed and dumped the peppers on the raw batter.  In the end, I baked it about 15 - 20 minutes longer than called for; it didn't even show the slightest hope of rising until after 45 minutes.  I don't know that the batter would have risen much anyway under the weight of the peppers.  The end result was a moist and soft but firm crust, sort of like cold polenta.  It cut easily with a fork and held up to a stab, but not a slice you could pick up with your hands.

Conclusion:  This was a happy surprise, much like a cheesy vegetable pizza with a soft, supple crust.  It wasn't too rich, which I'd been concerned about.  With a green salad, it would make a nice light lunch.  Other soft vegetables, such as mushrooms, would be a good addition.

Recipe:  "Mixed Peppers in a Gougère Crust" via Better Homes and Gardens magazine, September 2010
(Also see this recipe for a gougère tart.) 

Onion and sage rolls

I happened upon an episode of Hairy Bikers, and two of the recipes they made that day appealed to me:  parsnip and apple soup, and these savory rolls.  It's been rainy for days, and one of my new year's resolutions is to cook more.  At the time I was cooking, I did not know there were written recipes available, so I was going off the video of the episode.  They weren't entirely clear in the video of everything they were doing, but nothing left unclear was terribly critical.  Maybe.  (See asterisk.)

The rolls they made had seemed rather small (and didn't use a full loaf's worth of flour), so I made the full recipe, which actually resulted in 8 fairly good-sized, though quite fluffy rolls.  My only known deviations from their recipe was the flour and adding cheese.  Here's what I used:

150ml (0.6 cup) milk
150ml (0.6 cup) water
1½ teaspoon rapid rise yeast
1 teaspoon sugar
400g (2½ cups) bread flour
200g high-protein white whole wheat flour
200g high-protein AP flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons butter*
1 tablespoon oil
1 onion, finely chopped
1 clove garlic, grated or crushed
approximately 12 large sage leaves, finely chopped*
large pinch of black pepper
approximately 1 cup grated pecorino Romano cheese

Heat the milk and water until quite warm; use about 1/4 cup to proof the yeast and sugar.  Once proved, add the remainder of  the liquid, along with the yeast mixture, to the flour and salt.  Knead for about 10 minutes, until smooth and elastic.  Form into a ball; place in a greased bowl and allow to rise, covered, until doubled-- about 1 - 1½ hours.  Meanwhile, heat the butter and oil in a medium frying pan; add the onion and garlic and sweat over low heat for 10 minutes until soft and transparent, but not browned.  Add the sage and pepper and cook for another 2 - 3 minutes.  Set aside to cool.

Punch down the dough; remove from the bowl and flatten out on work surface.  Spread the onion mixture (and cheese, if using) over the dough, then roll up so all the filling is contained.  Knead the filling into the dough until it is evenly distributed, sprinkling with flour where it becomes too wet.  Divide the dough into 8 equal pieces; roll each into a ball.  Arrange the dough balls in a greased baking sheet in a circle with one in the middle and edges touching.  Cover lightly with oiled plastic film and allow to rise until doubled, about 1 hour.

Preheat the oven to 375F (to 400F).  Before baking, brush each roll lightly with milk, then top with a single, small sage leaf.  Bake for about 20 minutes.  Move to a rack to cool.

*Their written recipe calls for "1/2 ounce" of butter (1 tablespoon - I'm sure they used more on the show) and "15 - 20 sage leaves" (probably what I should have used, given the size of my leaves.)

They mixed their dry yeast, salt, sugar, and flour all together, then added the warm liquid.  I decided to proof my yeast first, since I was using less.  The butter and oil measurements weren't given; their pan of onion was liberally oily, but I didn't know the ratio of butter and oil, so I estimated.  (I assume just a small amount of oil is present to prevent the butter from browning.)  The yeast was given as "1 sachet", which is presumably 2¼ teaspoons, though I chose to use a little less.  Their sage leaves were quite large and I suspect I didn't use nearly as much.  They probably had at least 1/3 cup of chopped sage, if not 1/2 cup.  (It was certainly a manly handful.)  I noticed their rolls had probably twice as much green speckled throughout as mine did.  Their oven instructions were for "190C to 200C" (375F - 400F).  I've never seen a recipe with a range for the oven temperature, and both of these are higher than I normally see in a bread recipe.  I don't know why they didn't provide a single temperature.  (He probably couldn't remember the correct temperature at the moment of filming.  The written recipe indicates 200C, which I think would have been better than 190C.)  My oven does not maintain a stable temperature; it was 400F when I was ready to bake, but I tried to cool it down a bit after putting the rolls in and then worked to keep it at 375F.  They looked done at 20 minutes, so I took them out.

I had concerns about the baps being too salty with added cheese, (I used salted butter with the onions, and the dough already tasted a bit salty), but in the end they were okay.  Salty, yes, but not too bad for a savory roll.  (If I used more cheese, I would cut down on the salt elsewhere.)

Conclusion:  Easy enough to make, but I wasn't thrilled with the result.  Surprisingly, they were a bit bland and tasted a little floury.  Something gave them a slightly bitter taste, perhaps the whole wheat flour or the cheese.  They also could have used just another minute or two in the oven-- baking at 400F likely would have been perfect.

Recipe:  Sage and onion tear and share bread via Hairy Bikers (season 1, episode 2 of Best of British)

Ukrainian cheese-filled buns (3 variations)

 
Ukrainian's eat a variety of stuffed buns as snacks, filled with everything from cabbage, to cheese, meat, and fruit.  I was intrigued by this recipe for a cheese-onion filling because of the photo of layers of buttery dough, but was also interested in one that showed soft buns stuffed with cherries.  Since it appears that every household has its own recipe, I figured I didn't have to be held to any particular one, so I made up my own variations.  

Translating the recipe from the original Ukrainian was interesting -- I think someone has "interfered" with Google's Ukrainian-to-English dictionary, because the results were about as clear as if I'd used a random word generator.  Curiously, translating first into German (or French) and then into English worked almost perfectly.  (This was the case across all pages, not just this recipe.)  Some words, particularly those related to cooking, don't translate well no matter what.  Case in point is the "federation" of green onions.  When you think about it, it makes sense... but I had to think about it.  (Another interesting translation was the nutritional information that showed the amount of "squirrel" per serving; process of elimination indicated that had to be "protein".)  Measuring units or proprietary products particular to a country are always the biggest challenge; in those cases I research as best I can, then ultimately just have to use my best judgement.

These are the unit translations I used:

e    I never did figure out what this was, but logically it seemed to approximate a tablespoon
cube    Assuming this was fresh yeast, I couldn't find a product quantity, so used a standard amount of dry yeast
tl    teaspoon
el   tablespoon
federation    bunch

I had to measure flour by volume because my scale is broken.  Fortunately, the filling recipe and bread recipes in general are fairly forgiving, depending a lot on personal preference.  The biggest problem was not knowing what I was looking for with the bread dough. Initially, I assumed I was kneading to the window-pane point, but then I thought perhaps they don't want all that gluten development, since the recipe called for low-gluten flour. So should the dough remain sticky, more like batter?  Or should I add more flour until it's manageable, but knead only enough to get it smooth? In the end, I kneaded it to the window-pane point, but it was probably not as wet as it should have been since I didn't have any problems with sticking later, even without flouring anything.  The recipe lacked other critical information, like what size pan to use (although it does recommend a "round tepsi") and how long to bake it. (For reference, I put the original Ukrainian -> German -> English translation at the bottom of the page.)

I cut the recipe quantities in half and that is what is below. (I've shown the original quantities and their original units in parentheses.)  Then I split the filling into thirds and left one third with just the onions, one third with onions and spinach, and one third I sweetened and added tart cherries. Here's what I used:

2½ tablespoons warm milk (5 e)
1 teaspoon active dry yeast (½ cube)
½ teaspoon sugar (1 tl)
2 cups type 405 (pastry*) flour (500g)
1½ tablespoons neutral oil (3 el)
¾ teaspoon salt (½ el)
5 ounces warm water (300ml)
100g cow's milk feta cheese (200g)
100g sour cream (200g)
½ bunch (3-4) green onions, cut into small rings (1 federation)
salt to taste
5½ tablespoons unsalted butter, melted (150g)

Prove the yeast in a small bowl with the milk and sugar, then mix it together with the flour, oil, salt, and warm water; knead to form a smooth dough, adjusting flour or water as necessary. Cover the dough and let rise for about an hour. (It will triple in volume.)

For the filling, place the feta in a bowl and mash until smooth. Add the sour cream and onions; mix well and season with salt if necessary, along with any other herbs or spices of choice.

Lightly butter a 10 x 7.5-inch baking tray. Divide the dough in half. On a floured work surface, cut one of the halves into 8 roughly equal pieces and form into balls. Roll each ball out to a 4-inch disc, sprinkling with a little flour if necessary to prevent sticking. Brush each disc (except the last) lightly with the melted butter and stack them on top of each other. (Leave the top piece unbuttered.)  Roll the stack out to a 10 x 7.5-inch rectangle and fit it into the baking tray. Spread the filling evenly over the top almost to the edges (the cheese will burn against the sides of the pan) and brush with a little melted butter. 

 

Do the same with the second half of the dough as described above and place it on top of the filling. Cover the tray with a cloth and let it rise for about 15 minutes while the oven preheats to 480F (250°C). When the dough has risen slightly, cut it into small squares or diamonds (about 5 cm).  Brush with a few tablespoons of butter and place in the oven, immediately turning it down to 390F (200°C). Bake about 30 minutes, until golden brown.  

Brown the remaining butter (about 2 tablespoons) in a saucepan, then carefully add an equal amount of water (caution:  it foams and sputters!) and a little salt. Brush the browned butter (I strained it because the browned bits were unattractive) evenly over the crust and cover with a cloth and a plastic bag or cling film; leave to stand for at least 10 minutes. (The crust will be quite hard -- this helps to soften it.)  Recut through all layers of the bread.  Serve slightly warm or at room temperature.

*I replaced 5 tablespoons of the AP flour with corn starch. This is a little more than the recommended substitute because my AP flour was already higher in protein than normal.

Spinach option
Defrost and drain about 1 cup of frozen, chopped spinach.  Squeeze as much water out as possible, using a tea towel. You should have about 2 tablespoons. (You can use more or less -- it's really to taste.) Mix into the cheese and onion mixture, then follow the recipe as directed.

Cherry option
Soften about 2 tablespoons of dried, tart cherries in a little warm water; strain out any excess liquid. Add 1 tablespoon of sugar to the feta and sour cream mixture. (Omit the onions.) Spread the cheese mixture over the dough, then dot evenly with the cherries. Follow the rest of the recipe as directed. Sprinkle cooled pastry with powdered sugar.

Interestingly, the feta-sour cream mixture tasted remarkably like cottage cheese, which is a common bread filling in eastern Europe. I didn't get all the bread layers that others got, but this was never going to be a "flaky," pastry-like bake. However the bread was somewhat tough, and I'm not sure what causes this. I probably had too much flour in the dough, and I'm pretty sure I baked it too long.  (I baked it 35 minutes. The recipe stated until "nicely browned", which I took to mean well browned, but the photos of other bakes show it much lighter.) The wetter the filling, the more the bread softened and the better the buns fared the next day. So on day two, the cheese-onion ones were a bit dry and firm, the spinach ones were a little nicer, and the cherry ones were fine.  (The sugar made the filling much looser, and the cherries were wet.) Also, the sweetness of the cherry-cheese filling balanced the saltiness. The edge pieces were extra firm and had less filling, exacerbated by using a smaller pan; this recipe might be better made in a round pan and cut into wedges so that the edges are shared evenly amongst all pieces.

Conclusion:  I'm pretty pleased at being able to muddle through the recipe and end up with something that was very tasty.  Too salty for my tastes (try 1/2 teaspoon salt), and the bread texture needs improving (or just less time in the oven), but overall a nice snack. There are endless filling variations, even if just adding herbs and spices, like paprika, oregano, or black pepper.

Recipe:  Ukrainian Special "Pi" (пі спеціальний) via Food CORS

Original translation
You also need a rolling pin, a tray with a high edge (a round tepsi is best) and a large tea towel. 

For the dough, heat the milk in a cup in the microwave, but don't let it get too hot. Then stir in the sugar and crumble in the yeast. Leave it all for about 10 minutes. 

Meanwhile, put the flour, oil and salt in a bowl and bring the water to lukewarm. Now put the yeast in the bowl and knead with the water to form a smooth dough. If there is not enough water, simply add a little more, if there is too much, simply knead in a little more flour. Cover this dough and let it rise for about an hour. For the filling, simply cut the spring onions into rings, not too coarsely. In a bowl, add the sour cream and grate or mash the feta cheese over it with your fingers. Mix well and season with salt if the feta cheese wasn't too salty. Divide the dough in half and cut one half into 8 equal parts on a floured work surface and form into round buns with your hands. Roll out these rolls to a diameter of approx. 15 - 20 cm and sprinkle with a little flour, otherwise they will stick. Then brush each flatbread with the melted butter and stack the flatbreads on top of each other. Then roll out this stack to the size of the sheet and place in the greased form. Spread the filling evenly on top and brush with a little butter. Do the same with the second half of the dough as described above and place it on top of the filling. Cover the tray with a cloth and let it rise for about 15 minutes. Preheat the oven to 250°c. When you can see that the volume of the pite has increased a little, cut it into squares or diamonds (approx. 5 cm) with a knife, brush them with a few tablespoons of butter and put them in the oven. However, switch it down to 200°C. When the pite is nicely brown, brown the remaining butter (approx. 4 - 5 tablespoons) in a pan, fill up with the same amount of water (caution: risk of splashing!) and add a little salt. Then spread this mixture evenly over the pite, cover with a cloth and put a plastic bag or some cling film over it and leave to stand for at least 10 minutes. You have to do this so that the pite softens a little as it cools down. Straight out of the oven, the batter is way too hard to enjoy.

September ABC challenge: Buckwheat Galette with Apples, Onion, and Cheddar

This month, the challenge is apples.

The original recipe for this galette was badly written, which really makes me question their "test kitchen approved" stamp.  Per the comments to date, only one person had made it other than myself and it didn't turn out well.  Not all the ingredients were in the list, for one thing, and some were vague, like 1/4 of an onion, and 5 slices of cheese.  I had also questioned the need to add flour to the apples--- they weren't very juicy.  In fact, there was no running liquid in the pan.  But since it doesn't have a container to hold in any juices while baking, I figured this must be a safeguard.  In the end, it probably wasn't necessary, but didn't seem to hurt.

I've rewritten the recipe to be more clear, where that was possible, and also provided notes. My changes or suggestions are italicized or in strikeout.

Topping
5 slices sharp cheddar (packaged, pre-sliced)
3 fresh sage leaves, julienned
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon packed brown sugar

Dough
1 cup + 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/2 cup buckwheat flour
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 cup unsalted butter, cut into chunks and chilled
1/3 to 1/2 cups ice water

Filling
1 tablespoon butter
2 fresh sage leaves, julienned
1/4 red onion, sliced 1/8" thick (about 1/4 cup)
2 green apples, cored, sliced 1/8" to 3/16" thick
2 tablespoons packed brown sugar
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour

Chill the cheese in the freezer until it's firm, but not frozen. Pulse in food processor with the sage leaves until lightly crumbled. Add the 1/4 cup flour in three batches, pulsing between each, then pulse together at high speed until it's well combined into small crumbs. Pulse in 1 tablespoon brown sugar.  Set aside.

Whisk together the flours, sugar, and salt, then cut in or process the butter into the flour until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs the size of peas.  Add the ice water and stir until the dough forms into a ball-like mass. Flatten the dough into a disk, wrap in plastic, and chill for at least 30 minutes.

In a large sauté pan over low heat, melt the butter with the 2 sage leaves. Add the red onion and cook until wilted, then add the apples and sauté on medium heat for 3-5 minutes, until apples soften and release their juices. Add 2 tablespoons brown sugar and toss to coat. Cook an additional 2 minutes so the sugar melts. Remove the pan from heat and toss with 1 tablespoon flour to thicken the juices. Reserve and cool filling.

Roll out the dough into a rough 12-inch circle. (The rough edges should extend beyond the 12 inches or the dough will be too thick.)  Move to a baking pan, then arrange apple mixture evenly in the center, leaving a 2- to 3-inch border. Fold edges over the apples and sprinkle with cheese crumble. Bake at 350° F for 40 mins or until the dough is cooked through and cheese is golden brown.  Serve warm.

I sliced the onion on the thinnest setting of my mandolin, less than 1/8 of an inch, but used a thicker setting, about 3/8 inch, for the apples.  My onion was rather small (often red onions are huge), so I used about 1/3 of it.  (I contemplated using 1/2, but played it safe.  Good choice-- I wouldn't have wanted more onion.)  I also didn't have fresh sage, so I used dried and just approximated the amounts.  I should have crumbled it more, as I tended to get the occasional strong bite of sage.

About the cheese... 5 slices?  Presumably the author is thinking of the packaged, pre-sliced cheese, which comes in about 4" x 4" x 1/8" slices.  Who buys that???  You'd think you could use cheese according to personal taste... except there's flour involved.  Too much cheese and you'll have it melting everywhere.  Too little and it will be floury and tasteless. Better too much than too little?  Turns out, possibly not.  I used 16 slices that were about 4" x 1" x 3/16", and I used about 1/3 mild cheddar and 2/3 New Zealand (white) sharp cheddar. I had just under 1½ cups of the crumbles, but I felt that was too much, so used only about 1 cup of it.  (This confirms my thought that the recipe intends you to use packaged, pre-sliced cheese.)  I started with only 2 tablespoons of the flour when the cheese was in about pea-sized chunks, and it looked okay, so I added another tablespoon.  Then it looked too floury, so I processed it longer and the cheese broke down into much smaller bits and the flour was well incorporated.  I just can't remember if I added the last tablespoon. I don't think I did, and since I started with too much cheese, my crumbles were certainly more cheesy than the recipe intended.  The flavor was fine, but once the galette cooled, the cheese became hard.  With more flour, I think they would have been softer, more shortbread-like.  (Could the cheese go under the apples, or would the oil cause havoc with the crust?)  It was fine, though, once rewarmed.

Conclusion:  I liked this more once I'd gotten over the initial disappointment when my expectation didn't meet reality.  This was definitely on the savory side, despite all the sugar. However, it might have been nicer made with slightly sweeter apples, or a combination.  The buckwheat added a nice flavor, but made the crust soft and a bit mealy, and gives it an unattractive hue.  The cheese, also, I find unattractive, especially after cooling.  Very tasty with a dollop of sour cream.

Recipe:  Buckwheat Galette with Apples, Cheddar, and Sage via Food52