Maple Cheese Popsicles, the mystery revealed!

Hello everyone! I do hope you are enjoying the holidays. As you may have heard on the news Toronto was savagely hit with an ice storm last weekend and over half a million homes were left without power, some still don’t have power. I am very pleased to report that our power was only out for about  28 hours so it wasn’t that bad. We did have to rejig our Christmas plans as we were to host festivities on Christmas Day and not knowing how quickly the power would be restored we made arrangements to have it at JT’s sister’s place in Peterborough (the power company had indicated it may be 5 days!). My nephew Brian kindly offered us his apartment for warmth which was great because I had to prepare a few things to take for Christmas Eve’s dinner and Christmas Day dinner. It made me realize how fragile we are and how dependant we are on power, particularly in the winter. Fortunately, we didn’t lose food,  we put refrigerator things to keep cool outside and the freezer was cold enough and full enough to maintain the frosty temperature (thanks to Norma Garden to Wok, who kindly suggested to put buckets of ice into it if it wasn’t chuck full).
The house temperature fell to around 10°C  (50°F) so we turned the water off and put antifreeze in the traps and toilets. We didn’t have to do anything with our hot water rads, apparently they are good until the temperature falls below freezing for a couple of days. Of course, that’s just a wild guess and I am so glad we didn’t have to find out the hard way. Many of our dear friends reached out to us and offered a warm place to stay, which was incredibly generous, THANK YOU! We are indeed very lucky to be surrounded by such a wonderful group. Merry Christmas indeed.

As the holiday season continues and we are partying with gusto, I wanted to pass along a recipe I developed after Barb and I were introduced to a very novel hors d’œuvres at the KPMG Clara Hughes event in November. This hors d’œuvres was so unique and delicious I had wanted to try to recreate it for cocktails with Barb and her family on Christmas Eve, a tradition we’ve been enjoying for many years, but unfortunately we were one household of a 250,000 left without power for a few day after the ice storm last weekend so I put it off. It’s not complicated but it does require technique so you may wish to practice a bit before you serve it up at your party. You will need a slab of ice, easily made using a cookie sheet or roasting pan, or more authentically a good amount of freshly fallen, CLEAN snow. In the city, our snow is not very clean, so I opted for the slab of ice.

The sweet candied Maple Syrup provides a wonderful contrast to sharp cheese such as blue, extra old cheddar or even Parmesan (any double or triple cream cheeses will be too soft to do this with)..

Maple Cheese Popsicles

Serves 4-6

Ingredients:

• 1 slab of ice (or shaved ice*), made using a cookie sheet or rectangular roasting pan (you will need to make this 2 days or more in advance). Add sprigs of Christmas tree trimmings and bright red cranberries for a festive feel. I lined a 10″ x 13″ x 2″ roasting pan with plastic wrap to help me lift the ice out of the pan.
• An accurate candy thermometer.
• 1/2 cup pure maple syrup (any colour will do, but we used Amber).
• A variety of cheeses (such as blue, extra old cheddar or even Parmesan) cut into 1 cm x 2 (1/2 inch x 1 inch) rectangles.
• tooth picks.

Directions:

Prepare everything in advance:

1. Bring the cheese to room temperature, place one tooth pick into each and set the little soldiers aside.
2. Prepare a lovely serving dish by lightly spraying it with non-stick spray. You will set the maple cheese popsicles onto this dish and if it’s not sprayed, the maple candy will stick to it (at least that was my experience).
3. To keep the maple syrup from setting up as you prepare these delightful bites, fill a cake pan deep enough to hold boiling water about half way to three-quarter the way up the small sauce pan sides. Place it directly at your work station.
4. Place a dish cloth at your work station and put the slab of ice on it (decorate the edges with Christmas tree clippings or add cranberries and greenery to the ice when you make it so that it’s very festive. You may remove the pan or leave the ice it in, it’s up to you).

Now you are ready to begin cooking the maple syrup:

1. When all of your guests have arrived, put the maple syrup into a heavy bottomed very small sauce pan (mine was ~1 cup (250mL) volume) and insert the candy thermometer, cook on medium to medium-high heat until it reaches 240° F (116° C) which is about 8-10 minutes depending on how cold your maple syrup was to begin with. Watch the syrup carefully as once it hits 250° F (121° C) it will begin to crystallize and it will be ruined for this application, but you can use it in coffee or tea, so don’t discard.
2. When the maple syrup has reached  240° F (116° C), remove it immediately from the heat and place the sauce pan into the bath with the boiling water.
3. Using a dry spoon which holds about 1 tsp, drizzle the maple syrup in a lace-like rectangular pattern on the ice slab long enough to roll the cheese in once. Almost immediately after you finish drizzling, using one of the prepared cheese bites on a tooth pick, begin at one end and roll up the maple candy around the cheese. Either hand it to a guest or place it on the prepared serving platter.
4. Repeat until you have used up all of the cheese. If your kitchen is chilly, you may wish to replace the boiling water bath about half way through so that the syrup doesn’t set up.

These photos were from the second trial, the first trial didn’t work out!

Although these aren’t as lacy as I would have liked, they did turn out better than I expected.

It takes a bit of practice to get the technique right.

The maple candy starts to melt, that’s why it’s good to spray your serving dish with non-stick spray. I made these about 30 minutes ahead and stored them in the fridge and they still melted a bit.

Notes:

• If you forgot to make your slab of ice, you can take  about 10 ice cubes and in a good strong blender or food processor, pulse until you achieve a reasonable amount of shaved ice without big bits. The shaved ice will melt faster therefore it is a good idea to have more ice on hand to refill the shaved ice container. You will need to continue to work so have your kitchen helper shave more ice, or prepare it in advance and store it in the freezer on another cookie sheet or flat platter.
• I prefer blue cheese as the pairing with the sweet maple syrup, but some people don’t like blue, so have some cheddar on hand.
• Fry up some thick cut bacon that is cut into 1 cm x 2 (1/2 inch x 1 inch) rectangles and wrap the maple around it as an alternative option.

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Maple Prosciutto Scones from Sawsan, Chef in Disguise

To accompany the navy bean ‘risotto’ on our ski day, I was inspired by Sawsan’s Scone post and decided a scone would be the perfect foil for the beans. I was also inspired by Kristy’s Maple Bacon Biscuits to change up Sawsan’s recipe and add some good old fashioned maple syrup! I am happy to report they were AMAZING. The maple really complimented the saltiness of the crispy fried prosciutto very nicely, the only thing I would change is not add the cheese, it had no impact on the flavour what-so -ever. What’s really interesting about this recipe is that has so little fat in it…most biscuit or scones have at least a half a cup of butter or shortening! I followed Sawsan’s recommendations with some exceptions as indicated in blue below. My one regret is that I didn’t double the recipe! Thanks for a winner, Sawsan, I shall certainly make these again and again!

Basic Scones (from Sawsan at Chef in Disguise)

Servings: about 6 7½ cm scones that are 2.5 cm high

Recipe can be doubled

Ingredients:

• 1 cup (240 ml) (140 gm/5 oz) plain (all-purpose) flour
• 2 teaspoons (10 ml) (10 gm) (⅓ oz) fresh baking powder
• ¼ teaspoon (1¼ ml) (1½ gm) salt
• 1 tablespoons (15 gm/0.5 oz) frozen grated butter
• 1 tablespoons (15 gm/0.5 oz) frozen grated shortening
• approximately ¼ cup (120 ml) cold milk
• approximately ¼ cup (120 ml) cold maple syrup
• 2 pieces of crispy prosciutto (I baked mine on hi broil for 3-4 minutes and then blotted the rendered fat out of them. Break them into smaller pieces).
• ½ cup grated frozen cheddar
• 1 tablespoon milk, for glazing the tops of the scones

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to very hot 475°F/240°C
2. Triple sift the dry ingredients into a large bowl. (If your room temperature is very hot refrigerate the sifted ingredients until cold.)
3. Rub the frozen grated fats including the cheese into the dry ingredients until it resembles very coarse bread crumbs with some pea-sized pieces if you want flaky scones or until it resembles coarse beach sand if you want tender scones. I used my pastry cutter to do this. Add the crispy prosciutto bits.
4. Add nearly all of the liquid at once into the rubbed-in flour/fat mixture and mix until it just forms a sticky dough (add the remaining liquid if needed). The wetter the dough the lighter the scones (biscuits) will be!
5. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured board, lightly flour the top of the dough. To achieve an even homogeneous crumb to your scones knead very gently about 4 or 5 times (do not press too firmly) the dough until it is smooth (make sure your hands are not warm as it will melt the fat). To achieve a layered effect in your scones knead very gently once (do not press too firmly) then fold and turn the kneaded dough about 3 or 4 times until the dough has formed a smooth texture. (Use a floured plastic scraper to help you knead and/or fold and turn the dough if you wish.) I also used the folding technique that Sawsan recommended
6. • pat the dough into a rectangle and fold 1/3 of the dough over itself (similar to croissant making)
   • fold the other third over the first
   • turn 90 degrees and repeat patting and folding
7. Roll out the dough into a 6 inch by 4 inch rectangle by about 1 inch thick (15¼ cm by 10 cm by 2.5 cm thick). Using a well-floured 2-inch (5 cm) scone cutter (biscuit cutter), stamp out without twisting six 2-inch (5 cm) rounds, gently reform the scraps into another ¾ inch (2 cm) layer and cut two more scones (these two scones will not raise as well as the others since the extra handling will slightly toughen the dough). Or use a well-floured sharp knife to form squares or wedges as you desire.
8. Place the rounds not touching on a cookie sheet lined with parchment. Glaze the tops with milk.
9. Bake in the preheated very hot oven for about 10 minutes (check at 8 minutes since home ovens at these high temperatures are very unreliable) until the scones are well risen and are lightly coloured on the tops. The scones are ready when the sides are set.
10. Immediately place onto cooling rack to stop the cooking process, serve while still warm with sweet butter.

I made them large on purpose, you don't have a problem with that, do you?

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Panettone French Toast

Weekends are always special for breakfast. We’re not rushing around to get out of the house as we do during the week, we have a bit more time to fancy it up. One of our favourites is Panettone French Toast. I usually buy a large dried fruit panettone whenever it’s on sale, and slice it up into 3-4cm thick slices and freeze them in individual baggies (in Toronto our Italians make the panetonne in about 20 cm rounds, so I generally cut the slices in half). In effort to cut back and be a little healthier, I find that cubing a 1/2 slice of panettone between the two of us, is plenty. This time I topped it with sliced oranges and prunes.

Panettone French Toast Cups

Ingredients:

• 1/2 slice of panettone cut into 2cm cubes (about a half a circle 20cm in diametre)
• 1 egg
• 1/2 cup of egg whites
• 1/2 cup of non fat yogurt
• 1 orange, sectioned
• 3 prunes cut into small pieces
• 1/4 cup maple syrup with 1/2 tsp vanilla, warmed

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
2. Spray two ramekins (about 8cm in diametre and 10cm tall) with non-stick cooking spray.
3. Place the panettone cubes into each ramekin (about the same number in each)
4. Beat the egg, egg white and non fat yogurt in a small mixing bowl.
5. Pour half the mixture into each ramekin and push the panettone down so that it soaks up the mixture well.
6. Bake in a preheated oven for 30-40 minutes or until a cake tester comes out clean. The egg mixture will rise like a beautiful souffle. Turn out of the ramekin and sit upright in the middle of the plate.
7. Serve immediately with warm maple syrup and sliced oranges and prunes. You can even dollop some non-fat yogurt on top for a nice contract of cold and hot.

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