Cherry and Homemade Nutella Bakewell Hazelnut Tart -- Daring Bakers

Let me just start off by saying that I have now made and eaten the whole Frangipane tart, but I still for the life of me have no clue what it is nor could I explain it to others. That being said, I LOVE FRANGIPANE. It’s so light and fluffy, very similar to a nutty sponge cake crown. This months DB was challenging because I really had nothing to base it on. Frangipane is not a word that we throw around often here in Canada, wait, scratch that, we NEVER throw it around. That doesn’t mean that I was going to sit this challenge out, it’s "Daring" Bakers, not “Wussy” bakers.

So to start off I made some homemade nutella. Yes, you read that right, you can easily produce nutella in your very own home and it is so very very very delicious (very). Alright, I'm jumping the gun, first came the tart dough. Warning to the wise, do not make short dough with cold butter on a 30 degree day. It’s a bad and oily idea.



So after that mess of a tart shell was pressed into its mold and cooled forever, in went a thick layer of homemade Nutella and a second substantial layer of Bonne Maman's Cherry Jam. Finally it was time to top the tart with Hazelnut Frangipane. I switched the ground almonds for hazelnuts to complement the nutella and once the final product was out of the oven and cooled, was I ever glad that I did!

From the cherry jam and nutella, to the frangipane, everything came together to create a very gourmet tasting tart. I’m pretty sure that I filled my tart too full because it leaked everywhere when I cut into it, but really who cares, the flavours were sensational. Thanks DB's.

The June Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Jasmine of Confessions of a Cardamom Addict and Annemarie of Ambrosia and Nectar. They chose a Traditional (UK) Bakewell Tart... er... pudding that was inspired by a rich baking history dating back to the 1800's in England.

Note: I will post the nutella recipe in the next few days!

Cherry and Homemade Nutella Bakewell Hazlnut Tart
adapted from Daring Bakers June 2009 Challenge

Sweet Shortcrust Pastry
1 cup all purpose flour
2 tbsp. sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup unsalted butter, frozen
2 egg yolks
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
1-2 tbsp. cold water

Filling
1/2 cup nutella
1/2 cup Bonne Maman Chery Jam

Frangipane
125g (4.5oz) unsalted butter, softened
125g (4.5oz) icing sugar
3 eggs
1/2 tsp almond extract (optional)
125g (4.5oz) ground hazelnuts
2 tbsp. all purpose flour

Sweet Shortcrust Pastry
Sift together flour, sugar and salt. Grate butter into the flour mixture, using the large hole-side of a box grater. Using your finger tips only, and working very quickly, rub the fat into the flour until the mixture resembles bread crumbs. Set aside.Lightly beat the egg yolks with the almond extract (if using) and quickly mix into the flour mixture. Keep mixing while dribbling in the water, only adding enough to form a cohesive and slightly sticky dough. Form the dough into a disc, wrap in cling and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.

Frangipane
Cream butter and sugar together for about a minute or until the mixture is primrose in colour and very fluffy. Scrape down the side of the bowl and add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. The batter may appear to curdle. In the words of Douglas Adams: Don’t panic. Really. It’ll be fine. After all three are in, pour in the almond extract and mix for about another 30 seconds and scrape down the sides again. With the beaters on, spoon in the ground nuts and the flour. Mix well. The mixture will be soft, keep its slightly curdled look (mostly from the almonds) and retain its pallid yellow colour.

Assembling the tart
Place the chilled dough disc on a lightly floured surface. Flour the rolling pin and roll the pastry to 5mm (1/4”) thickness, by rolling in one direction only (start from the centre and roll away from you), and turning the disc a quarter turn after each roll. When the pastry is to the desired size and thickness, transfer it to the tart pan, press in and trim the excess dough. Patch any holes, fissures or tears with trimmed bits. Chill in the freezer for 15 minutes.Preheat oven to 200C/400F. Remove shell from freezer, spread as even a layer as you can of nutella, then cherry jam onto the pastry base. Top with frangipane, spreading to cover the entire surface of the tart. Smooth the top and pop into the oven for 30 minutes. Five minutes before the tart is done, the top will be puffy and brownish. Remove from oven and strew flaked hazelnuts on top and return to the heat for the last five minutes of baking.The finished tart will have a golden crust and the frangipane will be tanned, puffy and a bit spongy-looking. Remove from the oven and cool on the counter. When you slice into the tart, the almond paste will be firm, but slightly squidgy and the crust should be crisp but not tough.

Peanut Butter Jelly Time...umm.. I mean Bars

Before I met Ian I was a real wild child. Eccentric to the bone. No one could stop me. OK, really, how much trouble could one little molecular biologist in training get herself into. So I wasn't as much of a renegade as I like to think I was. BUT, I did enjoy running around (at 23 years of age) singing 'peanut butter jelly time... peanut butter jelly time' (sing it Jen!!!) to anyone and anything that would listen. I have no clue why, I guess I am just 6 years old at heart and my roommate was totally into the childish song too. Now three years later, I am a tame and mature woman who still finds herself singing 'peanut butter jelly time!'

So even though I was in a baking stupor yesterday and did not want to go near the kitchen I was pulled in once again by "The Cookie of the Day" on the Martha Stewart website. It didn’t help that there was an 8x8 glossy photo staring back at me when I went searching for the recipe in my Martha Stewart Cookie’s Book. And the kicker that really did me in was that I know one of Ian's favorite things in the whole wild world is Peanut butter and Jelly Sammie's.

So girls, if there is one easy way to a man's heart, it is to make their favourite dish into a dessert (not that I don’t already have the key to Ian’s).

As one of Ian's best friends put it "they are like eating the PERFECT toasted and buttered peanut butter sandwich." Actually, I didn't totally make these just for Ian; I made them so that I could sing Peanut Butter Jelly Time.....


Peanut Butter Jelly Time Bars
adapted from Martha Stewart's Cookie's Book

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 large eggs
2 1/2 cups smooth peanut butter
1-1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups raspberry jam
2/3 cup salted peanuts, roughly chopped
Heat oven to 350 degrees. Line a 9-by-13-inch pan with parchment paper. Whisk butter and sugar in a bowl until fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add eggs and peanut butter; beat until combined. Mix in salt, baking powder, and flour till combined, then add vanilla. Transfer two-thirds of mixture to prepared pan; spread evenly with offset spatula or fingers. Spread jam on top of peanut-butter mixture. Drop pieces of remaining third of peanut-butter mixture on top of jam. Sprinkle with peanuts. Bake until golden, about 45-55 minutes, turning half way through. Cut into about thirty-six 1 1/2-by-2-inch pieces and refrigerate for 30 min.

Itty Bitty Chocolate Persian Sable's with Cherry Filling

And now for the best cookies ever! Well, maybe not the best, there is still something missing if you compare them to those perfect little cookies from Nocochi. But these are extremely close. (Please do not judge me on the horror that was yesterday’s events.)

I tried to remember what I loved about the cookies and realized my favourite part is the extremely short dough that they use. It’s so light; it literally melts in your mouth. So I pulled out the big guns, well actually the tiny ones. I found this book by Flo Braker called 'Sweet Miniatures' at Winners for seven bucks (steal!). It seems that she has her finger in every pie because I also noticed that she made a large contribution to the ultimate "Baking with Julia" cookbook.

She says that rice flour is the key to a distinguished shortbread. I had come across this ingredient in many of the Persian cookie recipes and gave it a try with the addition of cardamom and rose water to keep that Persian taste.

They came out so, so, so good. Although cutting out each tiny cookie, cooling the dough, punching a hole in the cookie, cooling them...again, baking them, cooling them...a third time, powdering a million little tops, then finally filling them with cherry jam and squishing them together(pheeeeewwphhh) took four hours.

So I think next time I will just spend the money on the real ones and save the time. I am still going to use this recipe, just not on such a teeny tiny cookie.

Itty Bitty Chocolate Persian Sable's with Cherry Filling
adapted from Flo Braker

1 cups all purpose flour
2/3 cup rice flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1/3 cup dark cocoa powder
1 stick plus 6 tbsp. unsalted room temp. butter
1/2 cup of powdered sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1/2 tsp. ground cardamom
1 tbsp. rose water
1 cup cherry jam

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Whisk butter for one minute, and then add sugar and whisk until light coloured and fluffy. Add vanilla, cardamom, and rose water. Mix until blended. Add both flours, cocoa, and salt in three increments, mixing between each addition. When dough is combined, lay out on a plastic sheet and roll until 1/8 inch thick. Cut out tiny shapes with cookie cutter, punching a hole in half of them. Cool the rolled out dough with the cut shapes for 10 minutes so that the pieces lift easily from the plastic sheet. Cover a cookie sheet with parchment paper and place pieces on it. Cool for another 10 minutes. Bake for 9 minutes. In the mean time strain 1 cup of cherry jam into a small pot, boil for 7 minutes. Cool for 10 minutes. When the shapes with the hole are cool dust with powdered sugar. Place 1/8 tsp. of jam on bottom piece of cookies and squish together.