I feel it is my duty to introduce you to my latest pastry fav: The Kouign Amann (queen ah-MAHN “queen-yah-manh”). Imagine a croissant, but instead of thin sheets of dough layered with butter, it’s layered with butter and sugar. Together, they bake up into a delightful pastry with golden layers of caramelized goodness crisping and flaking in your mouth. MmmmmMmm!
My favorite is the chocolate kouign amann. Just imagine the one above with some chocolate in the middle. I have no good pictures because I keep polishing them off before remembering that I wanted to snap a picture for you. Oops =P.
I tried my first kouign amann two years ago after one of my BFFs (and fellow dessert-lover) emailed me: i want to take you to get a kouign amman (have you had one yet??) from a neighborhood store!
Truth be told, I wasn’t all that excited about it. I couldn’t figure out how to pronounce the words in my head or out loud, which somehow made it less exciting to me. But do you see those two question marks? That was her subtle way of saying “Have you had one yet? Because if you haven’t YOU REALLY SHOULD! YOU WOULD LOVE IT!!!” I know this because we’ve been BFF-ing it for over 15 years. Yup.
And she was totally right. She took me to get one the next day, and I LOVED IT:
yummmmmmmmmmmm the toasted chocolate kouign amman was SO yummy! we toasted it and ben devoured almost the whole thing. he loves it. you’re right, it develops such a nice crunchy crust! i told him i’d ask you to bring one down with you next weekend… and he asked me to ask for two haha :).
I love the way the whole house feels when I make this banana bread loaf cake. Every room is infused with this amazingly warm, spicy aroma that makes you feel all cozy and homey and delicious and wonderful when this is in the oven. Sometimes I make it a point to bake it before Ben gets home from work so that I can look forward to him walking into the house, inhaling deeply, and saying, “Mmmm smells gooood in here! …Banana bread?!?!”
If that’s not the very picture of domestic bliss, I don’t know what is.
I’ve been eating this for breakfast for the last couple of weeks. Getting my probiotics in… some fruit, some protein, chia seeds… good stuff! I guess “pudding” makes it sound more like a dessert, but I definitely think of it as a yogurt. It’s made with healthful ingredients: almond milk, yogurt, and chia seeds!
I like the texture of the chia seeds once they’ve absorbed some of the liquid. It reminds me of small tapioca pearls I enjoy in desserts. The hint of maple syrup is just right, and this is a nice alternative if you’re trying to avoid refined sugars. The original recipe calls for Greek yogurt, so I’m sure that works well, but I’ve been using plain whole milk yogurt. It’s a bit runny when I first stir everything up, but thickens up nicely by the morning.
I have been a sucker for scones ever since my Auntie S. made a batch of blueberry scones when I was in elementary school. I begged her to share her recipe with me, and I even invented my own little technique for stuffing blueberries in the middle of the scones. It was my solution for the messy, purple, staining mess that came with mixing blueberries into the dough. I don’t do that anymore (although my mom says she liked it that way), but I do still love to make cream scones!
*8/28/2014 UPDATE: Congrats to Teresa A., winner of the giveaway! Thanks, all for your participation!*
California Dreamin’
I live in California. There’s a lot to love, from the weather to the diversity to the FOOD! The food, my friends. The food. And it’s not just me– these people agree that when it comes to food, California is tough to beat! I was particularly impressed to learn that California produces half the nation’s supply of fruits, vegetables, and nuts! WOW! That makes the whole “eating local and fresh” thing so much more enticing!
I’m sure you’ve heard it before: eat organic, eat local, eat fresh. It’s not just for hippies or hipsters anymore– groceries stores everywhere are reflecting the increasing demand for fresh, local, and organic products. I can get behind that. And so can a lot of other people, apparently. For example, over the last few years, I’ve been hearing more and more about juice bars: cafés serving freshly prepared fruit juices. It’s a thing. And why not? There are few things more satisfying than sipping exquisitely fresh, tasty, and healthy juice!
I have a feeling most of my readers are not from California, though. Wouldn’t it be nice to get some fresh-pressed, made-to-order, organic, locally-sourced, raw, California-sunshined juice delivered to your doorstep… tomorrow?
**REMINDER: BOOK GIVEAWAY ENDS TONIGHT AT 11:59PM PST! :]]**
HOORAY! I JUST FOUND MY NEW FAVORITE WAY TO USE UP EGG WHITES!
…and I had a lot of them. I should’ve taken a picture of the three cups of egg whites brimming over in my Pyrex. Kinda gross. Why so many egg whites? Because ice cream, my friend. Lots and lots of ice cream. Specifically, lots of “frozen custard,” which is just a fancy way of describing a method of making ice cream with egg yolks.
Made an angel food cake, egg white omelette, or some macarons and have leftover egg yolks? Here are ideas for using ’em up! I love rich, creamy desserts, and here are some of my all-time favorites! Bookmark or pin them so they’re handy the next time you need this!
Using up egg yolks is easy for me. Ice cream, creme brulee, pastry cream… these are all some of my favorite things. I’m always left with a bowl full of egg whites, so I’ve had to find ways to finish off up to sixteen egg yolks at a time! Here are my favorite ways to not waste those whites. Bookmark or pin them so they’re handy the next time you need this!
Yeah, I totally just added “breakfast” as one of the categories for this treat… and why not? Peanut butter? Bananas?? Sounds like 2/3 of a complete breakfast to me!
This is a similar concept to the chocolate-dipped frozen bananas concept I posted yesterday, but smaller, cuter, and stuffed with peanut butter! I also made my own “magic shell” this time with chocolate chips and a little bit of coconut oil. Overall, it’s a little more work, but it makes a much prettier result, don’t you think?
Slice bananas and pipe some PB onto half of them. I find a piping bag quicker, cleaner, and easier than spreading peanut butter on with a butter knife. Of course, a butter knife totally works!
What do you think happens when I mix these ingredients together and stick ’em in the oven?
….
THIS!
AMAZING, right?! I would have never guessed that peanut butter, eggs, coconut oil, and bananas make delicious, light and fluffy muffins… but they do! They really do! I threw in a handful of chocolate chips cuz, well, that’s my thing. I feel like I’m eating a complete breakfast when I stuff one of these guys in my mouth!
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