Fig Muffins with Goat Cheese Filling

There was a time when I could eat the same thing for breakfast every morning, or every weekday morning anyway, for an entire year if not longer. I’d pour the same cold cereal into a bowl every Monday through Friday without any interest in mixing it up. Something happened to change my thinking on that lately. Now, I can only go for about a week with the same thing for breakfast each morning, and then I have to have something different. I never go all out and cook eggs or anything like that on a weekday morning, but I’ve been switching around my breakfast with homemade granola and yogurt, whole grain toast, bagels, and most recently these muffins. Whatever I’m choosing for breakfast, I like for it to include some whole grains and fruit, and these muffins fit that demand perfectly. They’re from Ancient Grains for Modern Meals by Maria Speck, and they’re made with white whole wheat flour, dried figs, and olive oil, with a goat cheese and lemon zest filling. If you’re not familiar with white whole wheat flour, it’s not a refined flour but is made from a white wheat rather than hard red wheat berries. It looks the same as all-purpose flour but has the nutritional profile of regular whole wheat flour. 

To start the muffins, the filling was made and set aside. Room temperature goat cheese was mixed with lemon zest, some honey, and vanilla extract. The muffin batter was made by sifting white whole wheat flour with baking powder, baking soda, and salt. A well was made in the middle of the flour mixture. In a separate bowl, eggs were whisked, and brown sugar, vanilla extract, olive oil, and buttermilk were added. The wet ingredients were poured into the well in the flour mixture, and the batter was stirred together with a rubber spatula. Chopped dried figs were folded into the mix. The batter was spooned into a buttered muffin tin, and each cup was filled to about half. The goat cheese filling was then spooned into the center of each muffin cup, and the remaining batter covered the filling. Just before going into the oven, each muffin was sprinkled with turbinado sugar. 

This was a great way to start the day. The chewy, sweet figs were delicious with the tangy goat cheese filling. Just because I’m switching up my breakfast choices more frequently now, that doesn’t mean I can’t circle back to repeat one now and then. These muffins will undoubtedly make repeat appearances. 

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Strawberry and Fig Jam Crostate

It's no surprise that after I read a cookbook, I want to run to the kitchen and start cooking. But, something different happened when I read The Mozza Cookbook a few months ago. Yes, there were some recipes that lured me toward the stove, but the book also really made me want to visit Mozza in Los Angeles. I'll need to plan this visit with a group because I imagine I'll want to taste just about everything from the mozzarella bar, the antipasti, several pasta dishes, pizzas, salads, contorni, and probably every single dessert. I love cooking Italian food, but the thought of sitting down to the kind of feast I'd enjoy at Mozza is dreamy. I couldn't even decide which pizza I'd try first. There's one topped with squash blossoms, tomato, and burrata, another with funghi misti, fontina, taleggio, and thyme, and the bianca that's spread with whipped cream as a thick sauce and topped with fried sage leaves and cheese. I want to try making the fresh pasta dough from this book since it contains even more egg yolks than my current go-to recipe, and I want to try shaping orecchiette and garganelli. But, of course, the dolci chapter is what I cooked from first. This book is by Nancy Silverton, which means the desserts are all going to be fantastic. I simplified the strawberry and fig jam crostate by skipping the little meyer lemon panna cottas that were to sit on top of each and the saba that should have been drizzled over the panna cottas. Instead, I served these mini crostate with whipped cream with creme fraiche.

You should start by making the jam because that can actually be made up to a week in advance. You combine stemmed and halved dried figs and dried strawberries in a saucepan with sugar, lemon zest and a vanilla bean and the seed scrapings. Water is added to cover, it's brought to a boil, and then it's left to simmer for 30 minutes. After the mixture cools, the lemon zest and vanilla bean are discarded, and the rest is pureed in a food processor. The jam is then refrigerated. Next, the dough is made for the crust. As the recipe is written in the book, it's suggested to be made in a stand mixer. I cut the quantity in half, and mixed the dough by hand since it was a small amount. So, flour, confectioners' sugar, butter, baking soda, baking powder, and salt were worked together until the mixture formed a coarse meal. Two egg yolks and some vanilla extract were added along with some toasted sesame seeds and mixed until the dough was smooth. The dough was wrapped in plastic and refrigerated for an hour before proceeding. The dough was then rolled out to a thickness of about one quarter inch, and six five-inch circles were cut from it. The dough circles were placed on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Then, the edge of each circle was rolled in just once to form a tiny edge. The dough scraps were to have been rolled by hand into thin ropes, but the dough kept breaking when I tried that. Instead, I kneaded the scraps together, rolled it out with a rolling pin, and cut thin strips to use for the lattice tops. The dough rounds were spread with the strawberry fig jam and topped with lattice dough strips in a diamond pattern. The baking sheet with the crostate was chilled before being baked for about 25 minutes.

What I loved about these crostate was that they're kind of like a cookie and kind of like a tartlet. They're sturdy enough to pick up and eat with your hands and pretty enough to be served on a plate with whipped cream. There's more I want to attempt from the dessert chapter, but next, I'm ready to try my hand at some pasta shapes I've never made before.

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