Profiteroles with Cranberry Caramel Sauce and Maple Spiced Pecans

After holding tryouts for Thanksgiving dessert, I of course ended up going in a completely different direction than any of the contestants. Let me explain how this happened. Kurt claims to not have much of a sweet tooth, but there are three similar sweets that he really likes. Those are Boston cream pie, eclairs, and profiteroles. I’d made the first two at different times in the past, but I’d never made profiteroles even though we always order it when we see it on a restaurant dessert menu. I had various ideas about how to change up the classic components of a profiterole to make it a more seasonal, Thanksgiving kind of dessert, and Kurt voted down almost all of them. He insisted plain, vanilla ice cream and standard chocolate sauce was the only way to go. There would be no pumpkin or cinnamon ice cream or spiced pate a choux or nutmeg dusting on top or any such thing. But, there was a Cranberry Caramel Sauce that I absolutely had to try. It’s from the October/November issue of Garden and Gun, and it belongs with a Pumpkin Bread Pudding recipe from Austin’s own Jodi Elliott of Foreign and Domestic. So long as the ice cream remained nothing but vanilla and the pastry puffs weren’t messed up with any spices, Kurt was willing to try a sauce other than chocolate. Then, I went ahead and made the Maple Spiced Nuts from the bread pudding recipe as well. One last, little change from the classic preparation wouldn't hurt.

This dessert was made up of four parts, so I started by making the vanilla ice cream in advance to have one part completed and ready. I used the vanilla ice cream recipe from Eggs by Michel Roux which is nicely rich with six egg yolks and perfumed with seeds from a vanilla pod. Next, I made the puffs according to Ina Garten’s recipe in Barefoot in Paris. I like that she suggests pulsing the eggs into the pastry dough in a food processor rather than stirring and stirring by hand. That recipe is also available online. The great thing about choux pastry puffs is that you can refrigerate them or even freeze them, and then just re-warm them for a few minutes in the oven before serving. The tops will re-crisp and the airy insides will be as puffy as when they first came out of the oven. The third part of the dessert was the cranberry caramel sauce which was a simple matter of cooking sugar, water, and corn syrup until amber and then adding cranberries and pure cranberry juice. The berries and juice were stirred into the caramel and the mixture was brought back to a boil until the cranberries had all popped. Off the heat, salt and vanilla were added. After letting the sauce cool a bit, it was pureed in a blender, and then I strained it before letting it completely cool. Last but not least, the pecans were tossed with maple syrup, corn syrup, sugar, salt, and a mix of cumin, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and cayenne. The nuts were baked until toasted through and allowed to cool before I chopped them.

The hint of spiciness and bit of salt in the nuts was perfect with the tart and sweet sauce. And, I think plain vanilla ice cream was the way to go here since it allowed the flavors in the toppings to shine. In the end, we were both completely happy with these changes to the traditional profiterole for Thanksgiving dessert, but I don’t think I’d get away with messing with the classic eclair.

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Ale-Steamed Mussels with Garlic and Mustard and Matchstick Potatoes

For Kurt’s birthday week, because I like to celebrate things like birthdays for more than just one day, I always whip up some of his favorite foods. He’ll find scones in the kitchen for breakfast, usually his favorite pasta meal the day before or the day after his birthday, of course a birthday cake, and at some point in the week he’ll be served a meaty meal with some cut of beef. It’s not that he never gets to eat beef any other time of year. But, since I don’t eat it, I don’t choose to cook it unless it’s a special occasion and I’m also cooking something else for myself. This year, I cheated. I didn’t actually cook anything with beef. Instead, I devised a bistro-style menu which would include steak frites for Kurt and moules frites for me. I knew Kurt would prefer his steak to be grilled, and that meant he’d cook it himself. I was left to concentrate on the frites which could be kept warm in the oven while my mussels quickly steamed. It all sounded so easy. I made the fried matchstick potatoes from Barefoot in Paris, and the ale-steamed mussels from In the Kitchen with a Good Appetite.

Naturally, my plan fell apart. The potatoes required more time for frying than I anticipated because there were more batches than expected, and of course, frying made a huge mess. The potatoes were peeled and then cut on a benriner with the medium slicing blade attached. They were soaked in water, drained, and dried with towels. Matchstick-size fries are simpler to fry than thicker ones because there’s only one frying step. You don’t have to blanch in oil and then re-crisp since they’re so skinny. Just be sure to use a large pot with plenty of room, use a thermometer to check the oil temperature, and fry in small batches. Once the fries are removed from the oil, drain them on a rack set over a baking sheet, sprinkle with salt, and then keep them warm in a 250-300 degree F oven. Since I was hustling to finish frying all those batches of frites, I didn’t pay much attention to the mussels. Thankfully, they don’t require much attention. I soaked the mussels in water with some flour to be sure they were clean. Then, they were drained and rinsed. In another large pot on the stove, shallots and garlic were sauteed in olive oil. Some good Belgian ale was added and brought to a simmer, and then the mussels were placed in the pan, and the lid was set on top. When the mussels opened, they were transferred to a serving platter, Dijon mustard and butter were added to the ale mixture in the pot, and all of that was whisked to combine. The resulting sauce was poured over the mussels before serving. It all worked out in the end; it just took a little longer than expected.

To serve the frites, they were piled on a platter, sprinkled with chopped parsley, and I added a drizzle of white truffle oil. After tasting them, the time it took to make them and the mess from frying didn’t matter anymore. They were pure, crispy goodness and with truffle oil were beyond words. I was thrilled with the mussels too, and I instantly thought this was the best version of mussels I’ve ever made at home. And, what about Kurt’s steak? He chose bison instead of beef, and grilled it to his own exacting standards. The bistro concept worked out great, but how could it not with a big, shared platter of frites?

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Eggplant Gratin

UPDATE 15 OCTOBER 2011:
This is such a great eggplant dish, I wanted to update the photos from the original post. The following text is in its original form, but the photos have been replaced.

For my week of French food, I chose one meal from Ina’s Barefoot in Paris. This is easy French food, as the subtitle rightly claims. Eggplant gratin was Ina’s husband’s favorite meal the first time they visited Paris. I can see why. I had an eggplant from my CSA, and in this richly flavored gratin, it made quite a meal. I also served Ina’s green salad vinaigrette and some toasted sourdough baguette with the gratin. The only problem with this meal was that it ended up happening one day later than planned. While prepping the parts of the gratin, I pre-heated my oven or thought I did. Just when I was ready to pop the dish into it, I noticed that it had pre-heated to nothing. This is the same oven that had just baked baguettes the day before, and it sat there, literally giving me the cold shoulder, mocking my dinner-making efforts. Into the refrigerator went the gratin. A pasta meal was prepared instead, and the next morning I set about finding an oven repair person. Unbelievably, I found a repair service that came an hour and a half after being called, fixed the oven quickly, and charged exactly what was quoted. I had forgotten what it’s like to receive such good service.

With the oven back in working order, the gratin was baked at last. It’s really a simple dish. You do have to fry the eggplant slices before layering them into the dish, but that’s the most difficult part of the preparation. The recipe suggests using a store-bought tomato sauce, but I had some left-over, homemade sauce in my freezer. That was thawed and poured over the fried eggplant slices in a baking dish, a second layer of eggplant was added, and a mixture of ricotta, eggs, half and half, and parmigiano reggiano was spread on top. These were supposed to have been individual gratins in separate dishes, but I used one larger baking dish instead. A little extra parmigiano was applied, and it was placed in the once again fully functioning oven.

This is similar to eggplant parmesan, but the ricotta mixture puffed into a nice, custard-like layer making it a slightly different dish. I could see making a larger version of this with several other vegetables included as well, but it was an excellent way to highlight eggplant. The tomato sauce and the cheese mixture were delicious together, and the humble eggplant was made into something really special. With the salad and bread, it was a great meal. I can also highly recommend the green salad vinaigrette made with an egg yolk. Because of my oven issue, I learned that the gratin can be made in advance and baked when you’re ready. Good to know. This was another successful meal from Ina, and clearly Jeffrey has very good taste.

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