Chocolate Angel Food Cake

This is an intensely chocolatey cake but it's quite light; a Sybarite could eat a quarter of it himself.  It's impressive but not that difficult to make well.  Use top quality cocoa for this since it's the primary taste.

It goes exceptionally well with a tart Belgian Bier such as Liefmans Goudenband, or Lambics such as Gueuze, Kriek and Framboise from Frank Boone, Cantillon, Liefmans or Lindemans.  Barolo Chinoto is excellent as well. Coffee is OK; we haven't found a wine that can work anywhere near as well as the Belgian Bier.

We recently added freeze dried raspberries and like the addition, but we might double the amount next time. We got them from Trader Joes.

Chocolate Angel Food Cake: we couldn't wait to eat it!

160 g      3/4 C        Sugar

 90 g      3/4 C        Cake Flour

 65 g      2/3 C        Cocoa powder, excellent quality

 34 g                   Raspberries, freeze dried (optional)

400 ml   1 3/4 C        Egg Whites, room temperature (about 11 eggs)

 10 ml       2 tsp      Lemon Juice

  1 pinch    1 pinch    Salt

210 g        1 C        Sugar

 10 ml       2 tsp      Vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 375F.

Place ungreased angel food (tube) cake pan on cookie sheet to catch drips.

Process 3/4 C Sugar, Flour, Cocoa Powder and optional dried Raspberries for two 10-second bursts.

Dry ingredients (including free dried raspberries) about to be whizzed

In a very clean 6 quart mixing bowl (a 4 quart Kitchenaid mixer bowl is too small) combine Egg Whites, Lemon Juice, and Salt.

Beat at high speed until white and foaming.

Gradually add 1 C Sugar, one Tablespoon at a time, beating constantly.

Add Vanilla with last spoonful of Sugar.

Continue beating at high speed to stiff peak meringue stage.

Egg whites and sugar with stiff peaks

Sift 1/4 C processed dry ingredients gently over beaten egg mixture;

use a sieve fine enough to trap any of the optional dried raspberry seeds.

Fold in gently with large spatula, trying not to deflate egg whites.

Continue adding 1/4 C at a time, gently folding to barely mix.

Gently folding in the dry ingredients

Turn batter into tube pan gently.

Gently level and clean off any dribbles from inside of tube pan,

otherwise the cake won't rise well and you'll get burnt bits.

In the cake pan ready for the oven

Bake 35-40 minutes until a skewer comes out clean; there will be large cracks in the surface.

Cool upside down with tube pan over neck of wine bottle.

A good rise, a bit over the edge of the pan before cooling

Corned Pork shoulder

we've made "corned beef" many times, starting out with those pre-pickled packs in american supermarkets around st patrick's day that one just has to boil, gradually moving on to completing all steps of the curing process ourselves with, generally, a standard pickling spice mix and "pink salt" for both it's flavour and preservative properties.   we find a hunk of brisket, dry rub it and let it sit in the bottom of the fridge for a while, curing away.

they've all been fine, tender juicy brisket cut across the grain and served with potatoes and other boiled vegetables.  an important discovery was that the vegetables were far too salty (and frankly odd flavoured and coloured) when cooked with the meat and since we occasionally used the pressure cooker it was impossible to work with the various cooking times needed so we separated the cooking of the cabbage, carrots and whatnot from the meat.  a little of the "pot liquor" can be used to flavour the vegetables for serving.  it can also be used moisten the meat when reheating slices which are easier to cut the following day as the flesh tightens up on cooling.

i've been curious about "corning" meats other than beef for some time now, turkey breast comes to mind, so when i had a couple of pounds of pork shoulder left over from another project i found a recipe for a pork rub and left the meat for the full two weeks in the back of the fridge despite some misgivings about the length of the cure - this was supermarket pig after all, not someone whose provenance i knew.  for safety there was pink salt in the cure mix but beyond that the original recipe post has disappeared so i've no idea what else :-(

during an outdoor jerk pork party i put the cured pork off to the cooler side of the barbecue and it baked away for the many hours that the charcoal was burning, truth be told i pretty much forgot about it in the bustle of the gathering so i've no idea how long it actually cooked.  after chilling overnight we sliced it thinly and took a tentative bite.  damn, it's good!

as you can see the cure didn't penetrate all the way to the center, the greyish as opposed to the pinkish flesh, but the flavour didn't seem to change all that much across the slices.  next time i would choose a less fatty piece of meat or trim more carefully - the mouth feel of the fat wasn't too pleasant.  

A Tonic for the Dog Days of Summer

Steamy DC summers call for plenty of gin and tonics, but the commercial tonics are sticky sweet and not very flavorful; trendy tonics like Fever Tree and Q are tasty but cost more than the gin -- awkward. So we made our own tasty tonic base -- a syrup -- following Jeffrey Morgenthaler's updated recipe from 2014.

Since we were working on our vermouths and chinatos we had the critical Cinchona -- quinine -- in powdered form. We made a tincture of 30g to 600 ml clean cheap Frïs vodka, a bit higher concentration than he uses, and strained through a coffee filter to produce a clear copper bitter elixir.

30 g Cinchona powder (mine's a very fine powder)
600 ml Vodka (clean-tasting)

Mix well, let sit a few hours, stir, and strain through a coffee filter -- this could take an hour or more

The rest of the recipe we followed pretty closely, adding a bit more citrus because denuding a grapefruit produced a bit more than the 30 g requested, and we had a half a lime lying around. We had the citric acid from Irene's cheese making and other kitchen experiments.  It was pretty easy: simmer the aromatics with sugar and water; off heat, strain then add some of the quinine tincture. I've decreased the sugar a bit and added a little fresh ginger.

20 g Citric Acid
10 g Gentian Root
2 g Cinnamon, broken into pieces
30 g lemon zest (2 lemons)
30 g grapefruit zest (1 grapefruit)
15 g Ginger, fresh, sliced very thinly
350 g Sugar
500 ml Water

Bring the aromatics, sugar and water to boil, reduce heat, cover, simmer gently for 20 minutes.
Strain, cool.

Add 45 ml (1 1/2 ounces) of the Quinine Tincture to the cooled aromatic syrup.
Refrigerate up to 2 weeks.

Straining simmered aromatics through sieve and coffee filter

Measuring ingredients that went into the tonic syrup

For a single drink, use 1 ounce tonic syrup, 3 ounce sparkling water, 1 1/2 ounce gin. Easy.

The payoff: beautiful, fresh-tasting G-n-T.

It has a fresh citrus taste, Irene got orange right away. It's flavorful without the chemical taste of commercial tonics, and it's not nearly so sticky.  We can also adjust the taste, perhaps lightening it up with a bit more sparkling water on hotter days.  

Good stuff, not hard to make. Nice color too, but we haven't tested to see if it glows under blacklight. :-)

Merloto Chinato, a riff on Barolo Chinato dessert wine

We recently opened a bottle of Barolo Chinato, a dessert wine made of Barolo and various herbs and spices: Chinato refers to "Cinchona", the quinine used in tonic water. I think it's my new favorite drink, redolent or cherries and maybe chocolate, some herbs; on the taste, it was very full bodied, rich. These are said to go really well with chocolate, and indeed they do. This bottle, by Damilano, was pretty pricey -- $66 for 500 ml, but we liked it so much Irene got me another brand for Christmas, from Cocchi, similarly priced.

Since we've been making our own vermouth, we figured we'd have a go at making our own approximation: could we make something for $10 for 750 ml?

Two commercial and two home made, with Irene's chocolate angel food cake

Recipe

The big difference between Barolo Chinato and Vermouth (aside from red vs white wine) is that vermouth is based on the bittering agent "vermut" or wormwood, while Chinato uses Cinchona.  I soaked 30g cinchona powder in 600 ml clean but inexpensive Frïs vodka for a few hours then strained it through a coffee filter; it came out a pleasant clear copper color.

When making vermouth, I use 300 ml of bitter herbal tinctures to two 750 ml bottles of wine, so did the same thing here. I started with about 75 ml of my cinchona tincture, and added other tinctures I'd made for vermouth: rhubarb root, nutmeg, clove, bay leaf, angelica root, cinnamon, vanilla, cardamom, black walnut, fennel, juniper and others. I didn't measure these for this first experiment.

For my vermouth, I make a caramel, cooking to 188C/370F, but this one got away from me and came out a bit darker with a more burnt edge than usual.

I wanted to try an experiment so I split the 1800 ml of wine and tinctures into two jugs. To the first, I added the caramel (200 g sugar to 60 g water), and to the second I added agave syrup (133 g because it's 50% sweeter than sugar).

Tasting

We let them sit overnight to chill with the commercial bottles in the fridge, then did a blind taste test in the morning when our tastebuds were fresh. I lettered the bottoms of the glasses so I could determine which was which, then randomized them and assigned the fronts numbers so we could take notes. We served with this some of Irene's chocolate angel food cake. Our notes are below, and we reveal which is which.

Caramel: partly cloudy, caramel edge, perhaps slight burnt note, herbal.
Agave: cloudy, cinnamon; brighter and more winey than the caramel one.
Damilano: clear, brownish; fruity smell, thick body, taste of cherry pits, perhaps chocolate, maybe licorice.
Cocchi: clear, ruby; no fruit aroma, some woody aroma; fruity taste, caramel and wood flavors.

Of the four, I preferred the Damilano -- the fruit aroma was seductive; Irene preferred the Cocchi. We both preferred the caramel homemade to the agave one, but maybe the burnt taste was a bit too burnt. The commercial ones had thicker bodies that felt right for an after dinner drink, a digestivo.

Next Time

I'd use caramel next time but back down the color to my normal 188C/370F temperature; I might try another split batch, using honey instead of agave, since it will bring some flavor to the mix. I really love the fruit aroma in Damilano so I'd add bitter orange peel, maybe some crushed cherry pits, perhaps licorice root. The sweet spices remind me too much of mulled wine, so I'd back down the cinnamon and cloves to a barely perceptible level. I'd probably use a more heavy bodied wine, but to keep the cost in check, go with something like a California ancient vine Zinfandel, or maybe one of the affordable Ripassos from Trader Joe's.

There are some recipes for homemade versions on the interwebs including Stefan's with a reference to an Italian one from 1932, and a "secret" recipe that shows photos of the ingredients list. The handwritten secret recipe uses coriandoli (coriander), garofani (carnation flowers), quassia, noce moscata (nutmeg), and vanilla, in addition to the requisite Barolo, cinchona and sugar. Two of these use raisins, cocoa beans and elderberry so I might add cocoa nibs, raisins and elderberry flowers.

I might also try oak aging it by letting it rest on some oak chips for a week to round out the flavor.

Old Bay Crab Stock and Risotto

On the 4th of July, Summer got a big bushel of Eastern Shore crabs, cooked the way they do things 'round here -- steamed or boiled in plenty of Old Bay seasoning. A bunch of us sat around at Dee's, pickin' crabs all day, and we saved all the bits we didn't eat -- shells, small legs, even all the guts and gubbins. At the end of the day, she and I split up the spoils to make stock.

We had some qualms about using the "mustard", "lady fingers", etc -- they're things we don't eat. But I figured that those masters of stock -- The French™ -- wouldn't waste anything so neither would I.

I got a giant pot I used to use for homebrewing, about 8 gallon capacity, and loaded it up with all the shells and offal; it came nearly to the top of the pot.  I added some carrots and celery, and some trimmings of fennel and onion we keep in the freezer for making stock. I added enough water to cover, and it came right up to the edge of the pot.  I brought it to boil then backed it off to a low low simmer.  After a while, I skimmed the scum with a fine mesh skimmer.

Crabs and aromatics, most of the water added, heating up

Usually, fish stocks only simmer for about 45 minutes -- that's all you need to extract the flavor and you don't want to impart a cooked taste. I tried it at about that time, and it seemed a bit weak, so I let it ride another hour or so: crab shells are thicker than fish frames.  I then had to strain it -- no easy feat! I pulled out the bigger shells and set them into strainers over bowls, then pulled out the small stuff to strain, then finally strained the liquid itself.  Whoa, a bit cloudy that!  I ran it through our finest chinois to filter out all the particulates I could, then gave it a taste. Still a bit thin.

I put the now residue-free stock back on the burner and boiled another hour to reduce and concentrate the flavor. Strained it again through the chinois, then set it to to chill in a sink full of ice water. After cooling I covered it and put it in the fridge overnight; it was about 2am by this point.

Next day, I did what we always do: ladelled out the stock into 2- and 4-cup ziptop baggies, laid flat on a cookie sheet, and froze them solid. This gives us good sized packages for cooking with later. I think I got about 3-4 gallons of stock.

It was still a murky greenish brownish color, not particularly appetizing.  I needed to cook something with it to see how it tasted in context and how it looked. I initially planned on doing a seafood risotto, but figured the color might be better for a dark roux gumbo.  But it's summertime here and risotto seemed a better dish, so that's what we made.

I sauteed some shallots and garlic in some nice olive oil, then added the Arborio rice and sauteed it a bit until it turns a bit translucent. Then I added the preheated stock a bit at a time to cover, and cooked and stirred until the rice exuded starches and began to turn tender (no, you don't need to use your grandmother's wooden spoon, or always stir in a clockwise direction; it's pretty forgiving). I kept adding hot stock until the rice was the right texture, with just a bit of a bite left.  We threw some shrimp in at the very end to cook through, then served, garnished with a bit of paprika.

Risotto with shrimp

"This is really good!", exclaimed Irene. It had a definite seafood taste, but not like fish -- it had the sweetness of good Chesapeake Bay blue crabs.  There's a slight hit of heat from the spicy Old Bay, but not overwhelming; the salt level is in check, too. The color was a bit off, not something you'd serve at a white tablecloth restaurant, but I'm willing to overlook that.

Now I'm really glad we saved all the crab bits and made so much stock!

Pork Burgers with Ethiopian Mitmitma Spice

We've made pork belly burgers that turned out well, they were super rich and juicy. This time we're using leaner "country style ribs" that still has a fair amount of fat, and we're adding the very piquant Ethiopian Mitmitma spice for flavor. Ethiopians don't generally eat pork, but this is far from a traditional preparation.

Pork Mitmitma burger with Injera and Mead

1.5 pound Pork country style ribs (boneless)
6 tsp Mitmitma powder
1 Tbs Salt
1 Tbs chopped Parsley
1/2 Onion

Cut and grind the country style ribs from frozen: they grind better when nearly frozen instead of smearing. We use a grinder attachment on a KitchenAid mixer.

Cut and grind while still nearly frozen

After a first pass through the coarse cutting disk, we add the Mitmitma, Salt and Parsley, then combine gently.

First coarse grind

Run this through the smaller cutting disk while still cold so it cuts cleanly. When grinding meat, I usually follow the last piece with a bit of onion which will push the final bits of meat through the blades, and a little pulverized onion adds flavor and moisture.

Fine grind with seasonings

Form gently into burgers: 6 seemed about right, they'll be 4 ounces each in this case. I made these flatter than I'd make beef burgers as I want to ensure they'll cook all the way through.

6 4-ounce patties, and the test piece

There's a tiny portion on the bottom left that we cooked up to test the spice level: the small amount of Mitmitma was definitely enough to give these a burn but without bringing tears to our eyes like some Kitfo (Ethiopian beef tartar) we've had. We cooked them fast to develop a bit of a sear on cast iron, even though we'd be breaking the burgers apart for serving tonight.

Sear on cast iron

We served this with Injera bread from Dhama Bakery on Columbia Pike in Arlington VA, heated (incongruously, but effectively) in a Mexican tortilla warmer.

Injera bread

Instead of the Ethiopian Tej honey wine, I brought out a bottle of mead I made over 20 years ago.

Home made mead

Salmon en Papillote

Salmon with Lime en Papillote (aka: Salmon in Paper Bag) is something I've made since the early 80's, from a recipe in Cuisine Magazine.  I made this last night for Valentines Day as a reprise of the first fancy meal I cooked for Irene when we met, about 25 years ago. For these photos, we used Red Snapper because it was fresh at the fish market, and it worked beautifully; we garnished it with salmon roe which is attractive and has a great popping texture.

The combination of rich butter/cream and lime on perfectly cooked moist fish is an indulgence. This is a needlessly fussy recipe but can be made fairly quickly. I need to rewrite it to simplify, but this'll do for now. 

Red Snapper with lime/cream/butter sauce, served with mashed potatoes

Serves 4.

1 1/4 # salmon fillet (about 1 inch thick), skinned, in one piece
5 T unsalted butter
2 t unsalted butter
1 small lime
1 small piece ginger, pared
1/4 c shallot, minced
1/2 c port, preferably white
1/2 c heavy cream
1/2 t lime juice, fresh (reserved from lime above)
  cooking parchment paper (paper bags work just fine)
  salt
  black pepper, freshly ground
  cayenne pepper

FISH

Cut parchment so that fish will lay on it, then parchment will be
sufficient to fold over and enclose fish with about 1-2 inches extra
all around to make a seal.
Brush with melted butter.

Remove zest from lime in long, thin strips, leaving pith behind.
Cut into julienne strips.
Blanch in small heavy saucepan of boiling water for 3 minutes.
Drain; refresh under cold running water, and drain again.
Reserve, covered, in a small bowl.
Remove pith from lime; carefully cut 4 lime sections away from membranes.
Reserve sections in second small bowl.
Reserve remaining lime for later use.

About 20 minutes before serving, heat oven to 550F (or highest setting).

Trim salmon; remove tiny bones, if necessary, with tweazers.
Cut salmon on shallow angle into four equal scallops, each about 4 ounces.
Place each piece salmon on parchment to the side of the centerline.
Salt and pepper fish; sprinkle lightly with cayenne.
Grate finely about 1/8t ginger over each.
Reserve pinch ginger for sauce.
Place 1 reserved lime section on top of each piece of salmon.
Strew 4-6 strands lime zest on top.

Fish topped with lime zest, lime supremes, spices on buttered parchment

Seal parchment packets.
Fold over and even up edges.
Roll and fold edges/flaps, then staple to make an airtight seal.

Fish sealed in parchment packets; the staples aren't classy, but they're easy

Place packets on rimmed baking sheet.
Bake until parchment is puffed (about 5 minutes for fillets, 10 minutes for
thicker steaks); salmon should just be cooked.

Baked at 500F for 7 minutes, paper is puffed and scorched, but fish is fine

SAUCE

Melt 2 T butter in small heavy saucepanb over medium-high heat.
When foam subsides, add shallot; saute, stirring frequently, until softened but
not browned, about 3 minutes.
Add port; increase heat to high.
Heat to boiling.
Cook, uncovered, until liquid is reduced by half, about 2-3 minutes.
Squeeze reserved lime to obtain 1/2t juice; add, along with cream, to reduced
liquid.
Heat to boiling, then reduce heat to very low.
Add the pinch of grated ginger.
Whisk in remaining 3T butter, half at a time, waiting until first piece is
almost incorporated before adding second.
Remove from heat; season with salt, black pepper, cayenne.
You should have about 2/3c sauce.

ASSEMBLY

Open parchment packets.
Transfer fish to plates.
Spoon sauce on and around each serving.

Parchment packets opened up, perfectly cooked fish

NOTES:

1. You may want to get a start on the sauce before putting the salmon in the
   oven, since the salmon doesn't take much time to bake.

2. I usually use salmon steaks, but bake longer to accommodate the thickness.

3. This recipe seems to be needlessly fussy, as if made for bored housewives.
   You can have great success without being so anal (see Note 4).
   Separating the lime segments from the membrane is an almost impossible task
   so don't worry about it too much.

4. In college, I once did a "student-version" of this to see how much I could get away
   with. I substituted salmon from a can, paper sandwich bags sprayed with Pam,
   instant minced onion, and probably `Real Lemon' juice and milk. It came out
   very nicely, in about 10 minutes total.

Linguiça for Caldo Verde

I got kale at the farmer's market to make the Portuguese soup Caldo Verde, which requires Linguiça sausage. Irene used this recipe to make the linguiça, cut in half.

After smoking

• 5 pounds (2.25kg) pork butt, untrimmed
• 10 cloves garlic, minced
• 3 tablespoons (55g) paprika
• 1 tablespoon (15g) salt
• 1 tablespoon (15g) ground coriander seeds
• 1 teaspoon (5g) ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon (5g) allspice
• 1 teaspoon (5g) black pepper
• 2 teaspoons (10g) cayenne pepper (optional)
• ¼ cup (60ml)white wine vinegar
• ½ cup (120ml) cold water

Grind the meat, whiz garlic, coriander, cinnamon, and allspice together, add to meat with remaining ingredients, mixing well.

Stuff into pork casings, rest in fridge overnight.

Cold smoke for 4 hours.

We made Caldo Verde, loosely following the technique from Serious Eats, with a Spanish onion, and using good Spanish olive oil instead of butter. Irene thought the dish was a little bit too sweet (next time use a yellow onion) and could benefit from a splash of vinegary hot sauce.

The finished Caldo Verde

Spanish Chorizo Fresco

We wanted to make Spanish (rather than Mexican) Chorizo for a dinner we're planning. Since we don't have a curing chamber required to maintain the temperature and humidity for the authentic dry-cured sausage, we made a Chorizo Fresco with the same spices. Hard core recipes at Our Daily Brine and Meats and Sausages talk about the required molds and starter culture, but we just adapted their proportions of seasonings. We did use some pink salt to retain the porky color.

Chorizo after smoking 4 hours

100.00%  1800g  Pork shoulder butt
  1.10%    20g  Paprika, smoked, sweet
  1.10%    20g  Paprika, spicy
  0.22%     4g  Garlic powder
  2.70%    50g  Salt
  0.17%     3g  Sugar
  0.61%    11g  Pepper, black, ground
  0.17%     3g  Marjoram
  0.50%     9g  Pink salt (aka Prague Powder #1)
  5.00%    90g  White Wine

Grind the Pork coarsely. 
Mix spices together then sprinkle through Pork.
Add Wine and thoroughly combine.
Cook a sample of the seasoned meat and adjust spices: our spicy Paprika was tired so we bumped up the heat with some hot chile and more black pepper, and added a touch more salt.
Stuff pork intestine casings, twisting about every 10cm to create links.
Let sausages air-dry uncovered in the fridge overnight to allow flavors to meld and casings dry somewhat.

Chorizo drying before smoking

 The next day, cold smoke for 4 hours.

Chorizo on the smoker

These, unlike dry-cured sausages, need to be cooked before eating.

Cremat: Catalan flaming coffee with brandy

Brandy and spices burning

We first had cremat by the beach at Can Gelphi in Calella de Palafrugell, Catalonia, Spain;
it's wonderful on a cool evening.  Credible recipes on USENET and the
web cite Colman Andrew's Catalan Cuisine and the "new edition" of
Joy of Cooking; the only difference is 2 versus 3 sticks cinnamon.

Serves 4-6

8 ounces Spanish Brandy, warmed (I use Cardenal Mendoza)
12 ounces Dark Rum, warmed (I use Myers)
3 tbs Sugar, superfine (grind in coffee/spice grinder)
  Peel of 1 Lemon
3 sticks Cinnamon
4 cups Coffee, black, strong, hot

Warm the Brandy and Rum to make the alcohol volatile.
Combine with Cinnamon and Lemon Peel in a flame-proof dish,
preferably a large glazed ceramic dish; stir.
Carefully ignite the mixture; it will flare up and burn.
Let the mixture burn, stirring occasionally, until the alcohol has burned off
sufficiently for the flame to die out (or don't wait);
you can use a metal spoon to stir the coffee, lifting some and
drizzling it back into the dish for a spectacular pyrotechnic display.
Very slowly add the coffee, stirring well;
this should extinguish the remaining flames, but if not, blow it out.
Serve at once in individual cups.
After dousing flames with coffee

$Id: cremat.txt,v 1.3 2004/12/31 21:36:18 chris Exp $

Chocolate Fernet Gelato

We had this sophisticated, decadent Chocolate Fernet gelato recently at Masseria in DC: I love the combination of bitter herbs with intense chocolate; our version comes pretty close. It's intensely chocolatey, with a very complementary accent of Fernet's woodsy bitterness, and the texture is perfect, even right out of the freezer, with an appealing "fudginess". We've made this with good quality dark chocolate as well as Abuelita Mexican chocolate that has sugar and cinnamon. 

Intense chocolate and a hit of bitter herbs

We started with Ina Garten's Deeply Chocolate Gelato and tweaked it based on what we had in the house.

400 ml     14 ounces Whole Milk
150 ml      5 ounces Heavy Cream
100 g     1/2 cup    Sugar

  1 pinch   1 pinch  Kosher Salt
 85 g       1 cup    Cocoa Powder, unsweetened
 60 g       2 ounces Chocolate, chopped fine or grated fine
  4         4        Egg Yolks
 55 g     1/4 cup    Sugar
150 ml      5 oz     Fernet Branca

Heat Milk, Cream, 1/2 cup Sugar in saucepan until sugar dissolves and milk barely simmers.
Add Cocoa Powder and Chocolate, whisk until smooth.
In mixing bowl, mix Egg Yolks and 1/4 cup Sugar on high for 5 minutes, until light yellow and thickened.
Temper by pouring hot Chocolate mixture slowly into the Egg mixture while the beater is running: you don't want to cook the custard.
Pour the mixture back into the pan which held the Chocolate and stir constantly while heating to 180F.
Take off heat, let cool a bit, and add Fernet.
Cover and chill well.
Process in ice cream machine for 30 minutes; it won't thicken significantly but the gelato will set up nicely for service when frozen.
Pour into freezer containers and freeze overnight.

Carri-anne's Focaccia Bread

Carri-anne made Focaccia bread at our house and we really liked it -- great at any time of the day. The richness from oil and the intensity of the herb topping make it very satisfying. I think our version comes pretty close to hers.

Focaccia's a great breakfast, snack or mealtime accompaniment 

Carri-anne is a professional so her recipe is rather abbreviated:

Terse recipe, but fine for a professional

It also looks to be proportioned for a full sheet pan, not the half sheet pans (45x33 cm, 18x13 inch) that will fit in a domestic oven, so I'm cutting her recipe in half. At 74% hydration, this is a wet dough so will be sloppy, but that's fine since you'll be working on a sheet pan.

900 g   Flour, Bread (100%)
668 g   Water (74%)
 12 g   Yeast (1.3%, 1 Tbs)
 16 g   Salt, Kosher (1.8%, 1 Tbs)
150 ml  Extra Virgin Olive Oil
 20 g   Dried Herb Blend: Herbes de Provence, garlic powder, rosemary, etc
  9 g   Salt, Kosher, for topping

In stand mixer, combine Flour and Water until a shaggy ball forms and flour is incorporated.
Cover and let rest 30 minutes to autolyse (enzymes break down starch to sugars).
Add Yeast and mix in stand mixer for a minute at speed 1.
Add 16 g Salt and mix for 2 minutes at speed 2.
Leave dough in mixing bowl, cover, and let rise until doubled, about 30 minutes.

Add all the Oil to a half-sheet pan; it will seem like a lot.
Add the dough and stretch to fill: it will spring back.
Refrigerate for 10 minutes and stretch out again, lifting bottom of dough from the pan so it doesn't stick; it should feel more relaxed.
Repeat twice: it should be relaxed enough to fill the corners and start puffing up.
Top with Herb Blend and 9 g Salt -- this is more coverage than most focaccia but it's good this way; you can use fresh herbs too, but they weigh more so use a bit more.
I dimpled the dough with my fingers, but Carri-anne didn't.

Topped and dimpled, rising

Let rise until quite puffy, about 3 cm height, almost even with the edges of my sheet pan, about 45 minutes.
Bake at 180C (350F) until dark golden, about 45 minutes; it should rise to an impressive 4 cm.

Next Time

The bread stuck to the pan. Next time, make sure to lift the dough from the pan each time it's stretched out. Or maybe line with foil.
The dough lacked salt, but I had put salt in the topping so got a burst of salt; either ensure salt is in the topping or bump it up in the dough; I've noted it in the topping above.
The dried herb blend was a bit much at 30 g, so back it down to 20 g; updated above.
The herbs didn't adhere well to the top of the dough, so dimple or gently press it in more.
Watch out for standing pools of oil on the top as they'll weigh down the dough and prevent full rising -- spread it with your hands or a pastry brush.

60 Layer Lasagna

We wanted to recreate Del Posto's 100 Layer Lasagne and started with basic proportions from a Batali recipe; he cheats and counts pasta, ragu, and besciamella separately where Del Posto uses 50 sheets of Pasta and 50 layers of combined sauce. It was laborious, but the presentation's excellent. We used Del Posto's trick of searing the slices for service to give it a good crust.

Batali's recipe is full of errors, but we used it as a starting point for ratios of pasta dough to ragu and besciamella. We modified the Ragu based on what we had on hand. I've got a mix of imperial and metric measurements here because our starting recipes are written for a US audience, but we tend to work in metric and use a scale rather than measuring cups.

Seared lasagne slice on bed of tomato sauce

Ragu Bolognese

1/2 Cup Extra Virgin Olive Oil
3 Small Onions, chopped
4 ribs Celery
5 cloves Garlic
3/4 pound Country Style Pork Ribs
1 1/2 pound Meatball/meatloaf mix (equal pork, veal, beef)
6 ounces Tomato Paste
1 cup Whole Milk
1 1/2 cup White Wine
1 tsp Fresh Thyme leaves
Salt

Saute the vegetables until soft
Grind the meat and saute to brown.
Add the rest of the ingredients and cook for 1 1/2 hours, covered loosely
Process in food processor to remove chunks that would interfere with the layers.

Pasta

3 1/2 Cup Flour (we used Caputo 00 Pizza flour)
4 extra large Eggs
2 1/2 Tbs Olive Oil

Whiz everything in a food processor until the dough comes together, adding a bit more flour if needed; finish on counter to get it to come together. It should be a soft, sticky dough but with a firmness like play-dough or soft clay. Wrap in cling film and refrigerate to hydrate.

We used a 13x4x4-inch pullman loaf pan (33x10x10 cm) because it provides the height we need and can just accommodate the ingredients above.

Roll the dough out with a pasta roller machine to it's thinnest setting; the width of the strip will be 15 cm (6 inch), and aim to make the strip twice the length of your pan.

Mercato Atlas pasta roller, hand cranked

We used masking tape on the counter to mark out the finished dimensions, 20 x 66 cm. Roll with a rolling pin to make the strip even thinner, and widen it to 20 cm (8-inches), twice the width of the pan. Cut the strip lengthwise into 2 pieces and widthwise into 2 piece: you'll have 4 pieces that just fit your pan. Set the cut pasta aside on the counter and roll out the rest; it's OK that they dry out, but be aware that they will become a bit brittle.

Rolling the sheets thinner and wider by hand

Besciamella

5 Tbs Butter (or a mix of Butter and Olive Oil)
1/4 cup Flour, all purpose
3 cups Milk
2 tsp Salt
1/2 tsp Nutmeg, freshly grated

Heat the butter, add the flour and cook to make a pale roux.
Add the Milk and whisk until you have a smooth sauce.
Add the seasonings and cook about 5 minutes to eliminate the raw flour.

Assembly

30 sheets, besciamella, ragu

Warm the Besciamella to make it easier to spread. Add a 20 ml layer of besciamella (about 1 heaping Tbs) to the bottom of the pullman pan to keep things from sticking.

First layer

Add a sheet of pasta. Use a disher to dollop with 40 ml of the Ragu, using a silicone pastry brush to even it out: it will be quite thin.  Add 20 ml of Besciamella and swirl to even it out. Repeat for the remaining 29 sheets, ending with Ragu and finally Besciamella.

Last layer

Put the lid on the pullman pan to keep it from drying out. Let it sit overnight in the fridge to hydrate: we need the starches to hold everything together.

Cook

Early the next day, put the pullman pan on a half sheet pan to catch any drips, and bake covered for 90 minutes at 160C (325F) convection (180C / 350F without). Let it cool again to firm up.

Place the cold pullman pan in a bath of hot water to loosen the sides from the pan, then run a thin blade around the sides: we want the bottom sheets to come out instead of sticking to the pan. Firmly invert the pan onto a cutting board.

Lasagne removed from pan, layers visible on the side

Slice into 3 cm wide slices, and sear on a hot cast iron surface covered with a bit of oil. It will develop a beautiful crust. Flip over each slice and sear it too. Check the internal temperature, it should be hot enough to serve at this point; if not, turn down the heat and warm through.

Cutting the slab reveals the layers more clearly

Searing on cast iron to brown and give a crunch

Dollop some red sauce on the plate, gently place the grilled slice on top, and serve.

What Worked, What Didn't

We were delighted the finished lasagne came out of the loaf pan readily: it was an attractive square shape when cut into slices for service.

We liked the way all the thin layers looked, like the pages of a book. 

The searing emphasized the layers and provided a satisfying crunch, in contrast to the softer interior.

Despite being a behemoth of a lasagne it was surprisingly delicate on the palate.

There was too much oil, some of it bubbled out of the loaf pan and onto the sheet pan.

It was a little drier than we'd like, we'd prefer something a bit more creamy.

Our sheets weren't all the same sizes because I cut the dough into eight roughly even balls before rolling, so it was hard to get them to be the size we needed for rolling to double-width.

Hand rolling the pasta was an enormous amount of work, quite the workout, but our sheets would not have been nearly as delicate if we had just used the pasta roller's thinnest setting. 

Next Time

Use a bit less oil when sauteing the vegetables.

Divide the dough into 8 equal portions and measure them to be sure each sheet can be rolled out to the same size. This will give you 32 sheets -- close enough.

We'd like more moisture, so increase the besciamella from 20 ml to 30 ml; we'd need to decrease the Ragu accordingly, dropping it from 40 ml to 30 ml: so 30 ml (2 Tbs) of each part of the sauce; a #30 disher would be useful here. It would be easiest to combine the besciamella and Ragu when layering, so a #16 60 ml disher would be appropriate.