Cranberry Update: Ice Cream

I tried making cranberry ice cream as promised.  First I strained yogurt to thicken it up a little.  Mixed it with the cranberry sauce in the spinning ice cream machine with two teaspoons agave nector.  The result is the beautiful pink ice cream.  The walnuts in the sauce gave it a crunchy textural contrast, the agave just enough sweetness to perk up the tartness of the cranberries and the yogurt. 

This will be a beautiful accompaniment to holiday dishes next winter.

There's Never a Bad Time for Cranberry Sauce

My Aunt Donna (actually not my aunt, but close family friend) is an excellent cook with an arsenal of great recipes.

This is one of my favorites, her cranberry sauce.  I love this stuff.  I could eat it all year round.  It's pretty simple, cranberries cooked with apple juice and honey until they pop.  Throw in some orange zest, celery, and walnuts.  Let chill.  It is excellent with yogurt, ice cream, and really anything.  We've eaten it on pumpkin pancakes, and even used it as the base for a crisp.

This fall we bought extra cranberries and froze them so we could enjoy the sauce mid-winter blues.  And that's exactly what we've done.  Yesterday, while enjoying a bit with yogurt we thought of making frozen yogurt with a bit of cranberry sauce and some yogurt.  I'll update with some pictures and opinions soon.

Valentine's Cookies

(Yes we're talking Sablés, again)

This is a Dorie Greenspan recipe for Linzer Sablés.  These cookies are traditionally made for Christmas.  I think they're quite perfect for Valentine's Day, withe red jam and a heart window.  The dough is equal parts ground almonds and flour, as well as your normal cookie ingredients.  Just like traditional roll outs, the dough is chilled before flattening and cutting out the shapes.

The most important thing is that you have two heart shaped cookie cutters in the same shape but differing sizes.  One has to be small enough that it will fit inside the larger one while leaving you enough dough space that the cookie won't just fall apart.  The other important thing to remember is that you need equal numbers of plain hearts and windowed hearts.  Once that is done, they're ready to bake.

When the cookies have been baked and cooled, they are ready for assemble.  I made two kinds of jam for these linzers, with fruit that was otherwise going to go bad.  One is a strawberry balsamic jam, the balsamic cuts the sweetness of the strawberries nicely while still complementing the flavors.  The second was a basic cranberry jam.  (These are adult cookies, meant to surprise with the sweet and sour combination.)  

After sandwiching the jam between the two cookies, a little sprinkling of powdered sugar, you have a beautiful treat for your Valentine.  A platter of these cookies is really spectacular. 

Crust, Jam, and a Little Nostalgia

 I think the picture pretty much speaks for itself.

We made homemade pop tarts. These were adult pop tarts, with a homemade cranberry jam filling; a little tang to counterbalance the sweet.  The recipe came from a great cookbook, Jam It, Pickle It, Cure It.  It's one we use often.  The pastry dough was some of the best I've ever had: flaky, flavorful, and tender.  We're going to try it as a pie crust.

But really, the pop tarts were super fun, especially for those of us who weren't allowed to eat them on a regular basis as a child.  They got a lot of laughs, great conversation piece.

Cranberries: The Color of the Season

Lured by the stunning beauty of the cranberries on a Chocolate and Candied Cranberry Tart recipe I decided to try my hand at it. Not much of a chocolate fan, I changed the bottom layer completely. Mine was a pumpkin and candied cranberry tart.

The pumpkin layer I made much like you would a pumpkin pie. To combat the sour cranberry I substituted almost paste for all of the sugar. Almond paste's rich, sweet flavor melded beautifully with the pumpkin and stood up well to the cranberries. I think the pictures tells the rest.