Brownie mini-cake with Pistachio Praline Cream and Rainier Cherries

These mini cakes are an impressive combination between heavy brownie base, light and nutty pistachio praline and fresh and juicy rainier cherries. 



I used Irina's recipe for the brownies. I found her website a while ago and fell in love with her ambitious perfectionism and artistic skills. She is quite a collector of teasing recipes. I guess, we fall for similar baking products and confections. 

for the Brownie Base:

45 g unsalted butter
85 g dark chocolate
100g brown sugar

45 g flour
20 g Dutch processed cocoa powder
pinch of salt

4 Tbsp milk
1 tsp vanilla extract

1. Preheat the oven to 180 C.
2. Butter 7 of the cavities of a whoopee-pie pan. Sift some cocoa powder.
3. Place the butter and chocolate together in a heavy bottomed pan over a low heat.
4. Add the sugar and stir to melt. Add the egg.
5. Add the milk and vanilla extract. Stir to combine well.
6. Sift over the flour, cocoa and salt. Stir.
7. Distribute the batter into the cavities and bake for 10 min. Do not let the brownies to dry out.
8. Place on a wire rack to cool.


for the Pistachio Praline Cream:

500 ml milk
6 egg yolks
125 g sugar
50 g cornstarch
10 g flour
50 g butter
4g vanilla extract

4 g gelatin sheet

30 g pistachio paste

100 g butter
40 g hazelnut nougatine crashed

Prepare the Pastry Cream first:

1. Soak the gelatin sheet in cold water.
2. Heat the milk, but without bringing to boil.
3. Whip the egg yolks with the sugar, corn starch and flour. Add half of the milk, whisking continuously to dissolve the sugar. Pour the egg mixture back to the pan with the rest of the milk. Place over a bain marie and stir until the cream thickens. Add the butter and vanilla extract, after the pot is away from the heat.
4. Add the gelatin to the hot cream, discarding the water. Stir to dissolve.
5. Add the pistachio paste and place in a bowl of a self-standing mixer. Beat the cream with the paddle attachment to cool to ambient temperature.
6. Whip the butter and hazelnut nougatine to soft peaks. Fold in the pastry cream. Cover with cling foil and place in the refrigerator for at least 4 hours or overnight.


Tailoring:

1. Place the brownie on a serving dish as a base.
2. Pipe some of the pistachio praline cream on top of each brownie.
3. Cut the cherries in half and arrange the around the piped cream.
4. Cover with caramelized hazelnuts and crushed nougatine.
5. Serve cold. Store in a refrigerator.



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Lebkuchen Houses

Image
Traditions are sculpted by the memories of the people. For some traditions is particularly easy to cross time and geographical borders, because of the taste. The well known gingerbread houses today are the young ancestors of the lebkuchen houses, born in Germany two hundred years ago, when Brothers Grimm wrote "Hansel and Gretel". German bakers were inspired by the descriptive story and freed their imagination into baking differently shaped and coloured small and big delicious houses.  Decorated with candies, small cookies, chocolate pieces and lots of icing, the houses are extremely appealing not only because of their whimsical appearance, but because of the heavenly aroma of the spices as well. Make this in advance and you will have Christmas feeling all season long.  I chose to bake lebkuchen houses because of the variety of spices used in the recipe . My houses are gently decorated with white royal icing and I did not use any candies. I like this way of decor...
Read more

Rustico Buttergipfel

Image
55 g unsalted butter I 225 g unsalted butter II 30 g flour 15 g cold water 7 g dry yeast 20 ml lukewarm water 160 ml col water 14 g malt syrup , or 30 g dark honey 12 g salt 1 large egg 380 g flour My Grandma used to "toast" the butter for almost every pastry - either at the time of preparing or just before serving. It gave just a small "intonation" of difference to the colour but such a complete finish to the taste. At the time I did not care what and why she did that - to me it was just an extra unnecessary work. Later on at the university I realized how the separation works and what a difference it makes to the taste. French call it beurre noisette and use it mostly for pastry and savoury hot sauces, Indians call it ghee and cook mainly with it, in Germany and in the German part of Switzerland, chefs use this "toasty" butter for the buttergipfels .  The process is a simple separation into butterfat and milk solids, called clarificat...
Read more

Old-fashioned Lebkuchen Stars and Hearts

Image
This is the classic recipe for Christmas Cookies from old Germany, or Switzerland (if you'd prefer). A recipe, I was hoping to find for a long time. Thanks to Sara Kelly Iaia and her fine memories, collected in the book "Festive Baking", I am happy to bake the first cookies for this Christmas. The honey and the quantity of the fragrant spices make these cookies unique. I would advise not to skip any of the spices or to change their quantity. I am pretty conservative when it comes to perfumed spices. I think the simpler ingredients make one dish tastier. But here, the spices are in perfect unison.   for the cookies: 490 g all purpose flour 1 tsp baking soda 1 tsp baking powder 1 Tbsp cinnamon 1 tsp cardamom 1/2 tsp ground cloves 1/2 tsp powdered anise 1/2 tsp grated nutmeg 1/2 tsp ginger 225 g honey 160 g light brown sugar 134 g unsalted butter 1 large egg 1. Sift the flour in a bowl. 2. In another bowl, sift all...
Read more