Gougeres

I decided I wanted to make some sort of roll that I could put in the freezer and take out when the mood struck. I of course decided on fancy rolls--gougeres. The lovely French version of a cheese puff (with traditional gruyere of course). I had made them before with success, but the second time I tried to make them (for a friend's Thanksgiving meal, no less) they failed. I think they failed the second time because I didn't let the choux paste come together properly because I was in a hurry. The photo below shows proper choux paste.


In all honesty the hardest part of making gougeres is getting the dough in the pastry bag. There are only eight ingredients in the Tartine cookbook recipe I used: milk, butter, salt, flour, eggs, gruyere cheese, black pepper, and fresh thyme (which is optional in most recipes). The second hardest part of making gougeres is piping the dough on a cookie sheet. I didn't even do a great job of piping, but they still came out great. And it never fails that I fill the pastry bag too full and the dough comes out both ends of the pastry bag. Since filling the bag is the hardest part I tend to overfill. Will I ever learn my lesson? Probably not.

Besides eating about five of these when they came out of the oven, I have another couple dozen packed away in the freezer. To freeze them you simply pipe them on a cookie sheet, put the cookie sheet in the freezer, and then pack the gougeres up when they're frozen. Tartine says they'll remain fresh for about a month. I'm not sure we'll make it a month before they're all eaten.

My husband's tart

I'm a little bummed my husband loves my Tartine cookbook as much as I. Why? I guess because I want to master all of the recipes myself. Is that ridiculous? No, not the mastering part, but the hogging the cookbook part is. Why? Because anyone who doesn't want someone else to make them goodies from Tartine is a moron. These recipes are not easy! Also, I always enjoy the dishes other people make more than my own (probably because I'm usually full from sampling my ingredients before my dish is ready).

When I announced I was going to make a Tartine fruit tart for Easter my husband volunteered to make it (in addition to the ham). I would have been crazy not to take him up on the offer. I was already making pecan rolls (anything with yeast in it always stresses me out), a green salad with potatoes, roasted asparagus, and, um... Nothing else. That doesn't sound like a lot does it. Well, I was running around trying to find a new tablecloth (which ended up including new napkins) and the perfect flowers. I also dyed eggs. And cleaned. Okay, now I've redeemed myself. Anyone who knows me well knows cleaning is a very involved, slow, thorough process for me. But I digress...

My husband's tart was not only beautiful, but also delicious and refreshing. How often can a woman say that about her husband's tart? Our guests agreed and we were left tartless. Thank you, Tartine! And thank you dear husband.

Croissants are a pain in the ass (and worth it)

Some of you (mainly Brad and Melanie) know I've been talking about making croissants from the beautiful cookbook, Tartine, for a couple months. I finally braved the daunting five-page recipe and did it. It took forever, and now it's taking even longer because I'm blogging about it. However, they actually turned out--sort of. They tasted amazing. They were the best croissants I've ever had. The only problem was that they were huge! I called them my everything's-bigger-in-Texas croissants. They were ginormous!

Here's what I mean by daunting and forever:

Friday night

• Make preferment (I thought this would be fast, but it turned out to take at least a half hour)
  

Saturday

• Make dough
• Let dough rest for 15-20 minutes
• Mix dough until smooth and elastic (about 4 minutes)
• Let dough rise and increase by half (about 1.5 hours)
• Form dough into 2" thick rectangle
• Place dough in refrigerator to chill 4-6 hours
• Mix butter (almost three cups!) until malleable about an hour before taking dough out of refrigerator
• Roll dough into 28x12 rectangle, "spot" the butter over two-thirds of the length of the rectangle, fold dough into thirds and seal seams
• Again roll dough into 28x12 rectangle and fold again in the same manner
• Place dough in refrigerator for 1.5-2 hours to relax the gluten
• Again roll dough into 28x12 rectangle and fold into thirds
• Place dough in freezer to chill until evening/night
• Place dough in refrigerator before going to bed

Sunday

• Roll dough into 32x12 rectangle (this was hard as the dough was cold and had never been stretched this much)
• Cut dough into long triangles
• Roll triangles into croissants
• Let pastries rise 2-3 hours (croissants should double in size)
• Make egg wash
• Brush croissants with egg wash and let dry for 10 minutes
• Bake 15-20 minutes (rotating after 10 minutes)
• Cool croissants
• Eat croissants