The Perfect Omelet

I haven't made many cakes since my mother got sick, but I made some eggs this morning. I wanted to make "The Perfect Omelet," according to Cooks Illustrated. I have modified the ingredients and procedure a bit.

I started by dicing one tablespoon butter and sticking it in the freezer.

I preheated an 8" nonstick pan on low heat for 10 minutes, setting the timer, with 1 teaspoon vegetable oil.

My pots and nonstick pans are from Ikea and, conveniently, the lid from my saucepan

fits perfectly on my 8" frying pan. You do need a lid for this recipe, so find it now and set it aside.

Break 2 large eggs and 1 yolk into a small bowl, and add a pinch of kosher salt and a little pepper.

I use a plastic storage container as a "garbage bowl" for the egg shells and whites. After having had some coolie dough ruined by bad egg whites, I no longer store egg white or yolks for later recipes, so the egg white goes in there too.

My kids eat sliced mild cheddar cheese (rather than American processed cheese), so that's what I have on hand.

I sliced my cheese slice; this is what we do whenever we need a little grated cheese. The original recipe called for Gruyere, which would be yummy, but I think almost any cheese would work.

In the signature fussiness of ATK, I pierced the yolks with a fork and beat the eggs with the fork for 80 strokes, then mixed in one half of the frozen butter.

When the pan had preheated, I wiped out the oil and added one half tablespoon non-frozen butter, and let it melt and the bubbles subside. The bubbles are water, and you want the water evaporated so the butter can get hot. The white foam is milk solids, which will not go away, but eventually brown and burn.

I put the eggs in the pan and turn the heat to medium-high. The recipe calls for chopsticks, which I don't have, so I used the handle of a wooden spoon to stir the eggs in the video above. I use sort of a planetary spiral of circles, which is easier to demonstrate than explain. I stop when I start to get larger clumps of eggs.

This is where the video stops, because I need both hands here :-)

I smooth out the eggs with a silicon spatula and then sprinkle on one half of the cheese. I then put on the lid and let the eggs sit, off heat, for a timed 2 minutes. Then return the pan to low heat for 30 seconds to finish cooking.

The eggs here are a little soft for me, so I stirred the top a little and cooked another 30 seconds on low heat with the lid on.

The first omelet folded, but the second rolled. It was definitely the best omelet I've made, and the procedure gets faster and easier.

Perfect Omelet

Modified from Cooks Illustrated, January 2009

Serves 2

4 large eggs and 2 large yolks

1/2 teaspoon oil

Salt and pepper

2 tablespoons butter, divided

1 tablespoon cheese, grated, optional

Dice and freeze 1 tablespoon of the butter. Cut the other tablespoon in half, and let it rest on the counter. Preheat an 8" nonstick pan and oil for 10 minutes over low heat. Get handy a lid for the pan, a wooden spoon, a silicon spatula, 2 plates, a paper towel, and the cheese.

While pan is heating, put 2 eggs and one yolk in a small bowl and season. Break yolks with a fork, and beat for 80 strokes.

When the pan is hot, wipe it out and put it 1/2 tablespoon of room temperature butter. Add 1/2 tablespoon frozen, diced butter to the beaten eggs.

When the butter is hot, add the eggs and stir gently with the handle of the wooden spoon. When you see the first large curd, remove pan from heat, smooth eggs with the silicon spatula, sprinkle with cheese, and let rest, covered, for 2 minutes.

Put pan back over low heat, covered, and heat 30 seconds or until done to your taste. Loosen edges with spatula, then transfer omelet to plate, folding or rolling as desired.

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Irish Oatmeal in the Slow Cooker

This is a favorite recipe I've modified from the very, very good book Slow Cooker Revolution (affiliate link). I've adjusted the seasoning and sweetness to my taste, so feel free to do the same for yourself. I start the oats late in the evening, before bed, or prepare the dry ingredients ahead in batches and freeze.

I started by melting 2 tablespoons butter in a 12-inch skillet; I used my Lodge cast iron skillet. When I'm preparing multiple batches, I use a 7-quart Dutch oven.

I measured 2 cups steel-cut oats. They are cheapest in the bulk section if a health food store, but you can even buy them in Walmart now. The fanciest ones are imported from Ireland. "Old-Fashioned" rolled oats are steamed and rolled flat; steel cut oats are sliced (by steel blades) rather than being flattened. They have more flavor and fiber than the rolled oats, but take longer to cook. Un-violated oats are called oat groats, and the intact grain is very slow to cook.

I toast the oats in the butter until medium brown. Toasting is optional, but I never skip it; If I'm going to make "real" oatmeal, I might as well go all the way. I tried very hard to capture the color above, but I'm not the best photographer. You're going for slightly darker color on average, with none if the oats reaching the dark-brown burned state, which would flavor the whole batch.

I add the toasted oats to my large slow cooker, along with 1 teaspoon salt, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, and 3/4 cup light brown sugar. These amounts are all adjustable to your taste. I've added raisins, but the long cooking time makes them a little prune-y.

Next I add 8 cups water, or 1/2 gallon. Conveniently, I have a 1/2 gallon water pitcher from the Dollar Store.

Things do not look delicious at this point :-) I went to bed.

The ideal cooking time is 4-6 hours on low. This works for us because my husband gets up earlier in the morning than I do. It's not really a problem if the oats go a bit longer though.

In the morning, the oatmeal looks like this.

It's less exciting but more homogeneous after being stirred.

My husband and I eat a filling portion with milk, then he (wonderful man) refrigerates the rest in 1-serving portions.

On a personal note, I will be posting less frequently for a while. My mother is very ill, and I'm spending a lot of time with her.

Irish Oatmeal in a Slow Cooker

Adapted from Slow Cooker Revolution from America's Test Kitchen

Serves 8

2 tbsp butter

2 cups steel-cut oats

1 tsp salt

1 tsp cinnamon

3/4 cup light brown sugar

8 cups water

Melt butter in 12-inch skillet over medium heat. Add oats and toast, stirring very often, until browned around the edges. Transfer to a 2-quart slow cooker.

Add salt, cinnamon, sugar, and water to slow cooker and cook on low 4-6 hours. Stir and serve with milk.

To prepare ahead, toast oats and transfer to a quart-sized freezer bag. Add salt, cinnamon, and light brown sugar. Freeze. The night before you want to eat the oatmeal, transfer the contents of the bag to the slow cooker, add water, and cook as above. You may easily prepare-ahead several batches of oatmeal in this manner, then freeze in individual bags for later cooking.

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Banana Cake with Chocolate Peanut Butter Ganache

I've wanted to make a chocolate peanut butter cake for a while, but I've only seen a few peanut butter mousse recipes. In Rose's Heavenly Cakes by Rose Levy Berenbaum, she has a recipe for chocolate peanut butter ganache. During my water yoga class, I had a flash of inspiration: bananas, peanut butter, and chocolate.

I've made one Momofuku Milk Bar inspired cake before: the Pumpkin Pie Cake. I was scared of cutting out layers from a sheet cake, so I make them in regular cake pans. I also was a little concerned about the declared difficulty of Christina Tosi's cake recipes.

Shannon of A Periodic Table to the rescue! She did a fabulous tutorial for the Apple Pie Layer Cake, and I felt much more confident after reading it.

I made the banana cake from Milk Bar. The recipe warns of a difficult emulsion (most batters are emulsions, which is why you add ingredients to them slowly and in a specific order), but it came together fine. If you are new to Milk Bar, I would suggest making the Corn Cookies or Compost Cookies first, as those recipies will help acquaint you with Christina Tosi's techniques.

Tosi pairs her banana cake with gianduja, an Italian chocolate hazelnut candy, or upscale Nutella. I went decidedly more American with a Chocolate Peanut Butter Ganache and a cut up Heath Bar.

I still don't have the 6-inch cake rings, so I assembled the cake in a 6 by 2-inch round cake pan. I reused the acetate collars given to me by the Wegman's bakery.

I was a little worried about removing the cake from a pan without a removable bottom. I let the cake set up in the freezer for about 20 minutes; the ganache completely hardened and the cake tipped out without any difficulty.

I'm enjoying this method of layering cakes and fillings, and my family enjoys eating the cakes. I see lots more in my future!

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A Gum Paste Rose for Valentine's Day

This is a gum paste rose on a chocolate-chocolate cake for Valentine's Day. I made the rose in the second class of my Wilton Fondant and Gum Paste class.

I left the side naked, as I liked the look. I was partially inspired by the Tomboy cakes from the Miette cookbook (associate link). They are just beautiful, and mine aren't nearly as pretty. I went a little heavier on the frosting in between the layers, to try for the same total amount of frosting, but didn't get it quite even.

I emailed all the women in my church, trying to find someone who had an event I could make the final cake for. I found an event (which I can not yet discuss), and in the process, I found people who wanted cakes for other occasions. I will have a busy month :-)

I'm most enjoying the process of trying to find my voice in cake design. I make what I believe are called Dessert Cakes, as contrasted to Theme Cakes or Wedding Cakes. My first priority is flavor. This does compromise the appearance, as my very soft cakes cannot be carved or support fondant. Both of these techniques require a finer-textured, firm cake. And lots of buttercream icing would violate the flavor balance of my cakes. My husband reminds me to keep my focus as I look at the many beautiful cakes on Cake Central, books, and blogs.

When I did my taxes this year, I declared my profession as home-maker, but I'm starting to tell people as I'm introduced to them that I'm a baker and blogger. This is so, so much fun!

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Frostings, Icing, and Fondant

First, big news for the Cake Flake! My mother bought me a Wilton class at Joann, and I'm starting Fondant and Gumpaste on February 4th. I've been spending a lot of time trying to get the equipment and ingredients together. The class is pretty inexpensive if you catch a special, but the supplies run about $100, which my mother include in her gift. Thank you, Mom!

I stated in my first post that, as I prioritize taste over appearance, I was not interested in fondant. My Wilton teacher told me that fondant tastes like you had put a piece of chewing gum on top of your cake. Well, a couple of months ago I taught a cake decorating class for the Young Women's group at church with Kelly Hall of Sweet Nectar Confections. I taught buttercream and she taught fondant, and she shared with me some Satin Ice Fondant, which tasted like plain sugar and wasn't too chewy. I now find the idea of fondant pretty interesting, and I LOVE some of the things you can do with it decoratively.

I've been thinking a lot about frostings since I started the blog. I even did a taste test a while ago. I like many bakers, like Italian or Swiss Meringue Buttercream, which has a ratio of 1 part sugar to 1 part butter (as I made it; recipes do vary). Everyone else at the tasting said that the meringue frostings were too rich or even greasy, and preferred the American Buttercream, made with 2 parts sugar to 1 part butter. I revived the 1:1 ratio in my new Fudge Frosting.

The "greasy" comment brings me to another thought. In buttercream, the dominant favors are sugar and butter. If the frosting does not have enough sugar for your taste, it will seem fatty or greasy because that's the only other dominant flavor. In meringue buttercreams, the meringue adds body but not flavor. A cream cheese or chocolate frosting adds complexity with either tangy or bitter flavors. But, absent a third player, a frosting is either too sweet, too rich, or, ideally, in balance.

Again I have mentioned taste. People have very different preferences for sweetness. Early in our relationship I made my now-husband a lemon meringue pie, his favorite dessert, from a Cooks Illustrated recipe. He hated it because it was way too sour for his preference. I loved it and, embarrassingly, ate the whole pie in the next couple of days. I learned two valuable lessons: one in my husband's blunt honesty, and another in the importance of cooking to your audience's taste.

So what I the correct sweetness for frosting? 2:1, 1:1, or as Rose Levy Berenbaum specifies, 1 part sugar to 2½ parts butter? The correct answer is, of course, any and all of these, depending on the occasion. Based on my taste test I default to the 2:1 American Buttercream. If I am baking for myself or another baker I would use a 1:1 frosting.

But fondant allows an interesting possibility. Perhaps I can frost a cake with a less sweet frosting, then top it with thinly rolled fondant? Then you could eat the fondant or not, and enjoy your individual sweetness preference. I can't wait to try it.

A final thought: frosting versus icing. My husband has been teasing me about this question since I started the blog. According to Serious Eats, frosting is thicker and richer, while icing tends to be thinner and sweeter, though these aren't absolute. That makes sense to me, and I've tried use the more specific (IMO) word frosting in my blog.

The endless varieties of frostings and icings fascinates me, and I will continue to read recipes and bug every baker I meet.

 

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Fudge Frosting

This is a new, original chocolate frosting recipe I am very happy with. I made it by accident when I ran out of powdered sugar, but I liked it so much that I used it on my own birthday cake.

The flavor comes from cocoa. I used mostly the Scharffen Berger Natural, topped off with some Hershey Special Dark. Good cocoa is expensive!

I wanted the same yield as my American Buttercream recipe, but with a different ratio of ingredients.

I started by creaming 12 ounces or 3 sticks of very soft salted butter. I then added an equal weight of shortening and mixed them together. You can see that, by creaming the butter first, I have eliminated the butter lumps I previously struggled with. I also here mixed in 1 teaspoon vanilla extract.

I next measured and sifted 6½ ounces of cocoa. I measure directly into my "sifter." Cocoa is so fatty that it has lumps if I don't sift it.

I mixed 1½ pounds powdered sugar and the cocoa into the butter, a little at a time. When the sugar was almost all in, I mixed in 2 tablespoons meringue powder, which is optional. Finally I added about 2 tablespoons milk to smooth it out.

The final frosting is a lot softer than the American Buttercream. Most significantly, it doesn't crust, so you can use the Viva trick to get it very smooth. I really prefer the flavor.

I'm using a Chocolate Sour Cream Cake, baked in three layers.

I'm going to demonstrate how I use the icer tip. Warning: this is my first video.

I'm using a 16" reusable Wilton Bad with the end cut to fit the icer tip.

After the bag is filled, I twist the end closed, like a bread bag,

Then I tuck the end under, where its secured in my hand.

I pipe with my right hand, while spinning the turntable with my left. This makes icing application much easier.

Moving right along, this is what happens when you don't level the tops of your cakes. I use the wedge shape of the icer bag to fill in the gaps, then frost the sides.

The frosted cake.

The final birthday cake, after my son helps me with the sprinkles.

It was wonderful, but a little overwhelming, with the chocolate, butter, and sugar, which is what I wanted :-) I gave the leftovers to the local Missionaries already, which makes me a little sad.

Chocolate Fudge Frosting

Makes enough frosting for a 9" 3-layer cake.

12 ounces or 3 sticks salted butter

11 ounces or 1½ cups vegetable shortening

1 tsp vanilla extract

1½ lbs or 5 cups unsifted confectioners' sugar

6½ ounces or 2½ cups good cocoa, natural or Dutch processed, sifted after measuring

2 tbsp meringue powder, optional

2-4 tbsp milk, cream, or water

Beat butter in mixer until smooth. Beat in shortening, then the vanilla extract.

Add powdered sugar, a cup at a time, then the cocoa, while the mixer is on low. Mix in the meringue powder.

Add enough milk to smooth out the frosting. Add less for a stiff consistancy frosting, more for soft.

 

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Christmas Re-cap

I'll admit, I'm a little burned out from all the baking I did for Christmas—mostly cookies.

I didn't fulfill my ambitious Christmas baking plans. I am happy with what I got done.

The above cake is a Chocolate Sour Cream Bundt cake from a Cooks Illustrated recipe. The pan is Nordic Ware Gingerbread House Bundt Pan, and I'm super impressed with the quality and the detail. My son and I decorated the cake later, but I didn't get a picture :-(

This is my favorite of the Christmas cakes I made. It's the Paula Deen recipe for Red Velvet Cake and my American Buttercream. I do not recommend making the cake as written, but it's close enough that I plan to work on the recipe. For the decorations I used palettes (thank you Shannon Weber for letting me know the name of the circle sprinkles), star sprinkles, and silver glittery coarse sugar. I feel quite emphatically that Christmas decorations should be unrestrained rather than tasteful.

My favorite of the cookies I made was the Compost Cookies from Momofuku Milk Bar. A good online adaptation of the recipe is a Amateur Gourmet, though I recommend the much more specific original. My mix-ins were potato chips, mini-pretzels, chocolate chips, white chocolate chips, toffee bits (yum!), and oatmeal. My husband suggested I rename them Candy Bar Cookies, because they taste like a candy bar. I'll do a full blog post on them someday. :-)

My Dad's birthday is December 25th, and for his cake I made the Chocolate Sour Cream Cake that won my Chocolate Cake Taste Test and a brand-new original Fudge Frosting that I will post soon. It was so good that I'm making the cake and frosting again for my birthday later this month.

How did your Christmas go? Did you try to do too much as well?

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