If you Google White Chocolate Flourless Cake, you don’t get shit. At least nothing use-able. I mean, almond flour is still a flour of sorts, and any recipe you find seems to use it. I wanted a flourless cake like my dark chocolate recipe;with a rich, fudge-like texture. If you look at my old ratio, it’s quite simple. Chocolate, butter, sugar, eggs, and water. I figured I’d start there. So white chocolate is basically sweetened cocoa butter and milk. Cocoa butter is fat, so I omitted the butter from the the OG recipe. White chocolate is sweet, too sweet for some, so I yanked the sugar. Water? Didn’t feel right. Cream felt right. So I used cream. I put the batter together like the OG, baked like the OG, bottomed it with crunchy layer and glazed it like the OG. What I ended up with; the guests who ate it and I determined, was a baked custard. The texture was like a thick pudding, a decadent “just-set” confection with a coma-inducing richness that left diners with glazed eyes and lolling heads. The plate had raspberry coulis, preserved lemon granita,  and crushed hazelnut brittle.

White Chocolate Flourless Cake

54 oz white chocolate

15 oz eggs

3/4 cup heavy cream

line a 1/4 sheet pan with parchment. Preheat the oven to 250 F.

melt the chocolate over a double boiler.

whisk together the eggs and cream.

when the chocolate is fully melted, whisk in the eggs. Scrape the bowl and whisk again, making sure all is incorporated and homogeneous.

transfer the batter to the prepared pan, and bake until GBD and set, about 45 minutes to an hour. Turn the oven off and let the cake finish inside, Chill thoroughly before glazing and portioning.

Seriously, ordering a Creme Brulee is like purchasing a golden retriever. Have some fucking imagination.  I mean, its like saying you favorite Simon &Garfunkel song is “The Boxer,” I have had it on my menu for so long for a couple reasons, first and foremost: It sells.  People identify with it.  Much like the golden retriever, it’s an easy out, you don’t have to think about it.  Also, I have the molds, and I have the process down cold.  I don’t even use a water bath to bake ‘em.  I could caramelize a creme brulee in my sleep.  In fact, I’ve often done so in my nightmares.  You see there’s this snake in a vest rolling a big doughnut, and he’s standing over this table that goes on forever, with and endless supply of custard waiting to be torched.  I always wake up screaming.

So enough ranting about custard that can suck it, let’s talk about something that is almost exactly the same but somehow different.  It’s like the difference between spaghetti and penne.  It’s made from the same ingredients; but is texturally different, it somehow “tastes” different.   Pot de Creme and creme brulee are almost identical recipes.  Sweetened dairy product thickened with eggs.  One has a caramelized sugar crust and one does not.  One is typically baked in a low flat dish and one in a cup or “pot.”  One in my mind is totally played out and annoying, and one is pretty cool.  Anyway, here’s a recipe.  My method may seem overwrought and finicky, but it works every time.

Caramel Pot de Creme

yields 14 - 4 oz molds

Does this look like barf to you? Does it remind you of that morning after close up you got of the contents of the toilet after that long night of too many PBRs and poor choices?  Me too! But that’s not what it is.  In fact, it’s popped popcorn infusing dairy product with its buttery goodness.  Last year I had pretty good success with sweet corn ice cream in a blackberry float. The idea of a float on a summer dessert menu is always a welcome one to me, both refreshing and decadent if done right.  So after several large bong hits and two bags of sour cream and onion potato chips I thought: “Dude…POPCORN…ICE CREAM!!”

To be honest, the process is quite easy and the results are quite rewarding.  Sure, it takes three days.  Sure it uses three bags of popcorn that you could have just eaten.  But was Rome built in a day?  Fuck no.  Neither was a Raspberry Float.  The frozen custard is smooth and creamy but toasty and buttery.  It tastes just like it sounds.  I decided to pair it with raspberries in the float, it just seemed natural, like raspberry cornbread. I wish the fucking thing sold better, I guess it just sounds too weird for people.  Faithful readers know, though: I wouldn’t steer anyone wrong! I deal in delicious through and through people!! Now eat the shit!

Popcorn Ice Cream (makes a shit ton)

3 bags popcorn (no “light” bullshit.  Use something that sounds bad for you.)

6 cups half & half

2 cups heavy cream

16 oz sugar

1 cup glucose powder (optional)

16 egg youlks

More half & half as needed

1. Pop two of the bags of popcorn and place in a large sauce pot.  Add the half & half and heavy cream.  Bring to a boil and cover, then kill the heat.  Steep for thirty minutes.

2. Transfer to an airtight container and refrigerate overnight.  Next day, pour the whole barfy mess into a chinoise and use the back of a ladle to push as much of the liquid through as possible.

3. Re-measure the cream and make up any difference with half & half.  Pop the final bag of popcorn and place it in your large sauce pot.  Add the popcorn milk and BTAB.  Cover and kill the heat,  Steep for thirty minutes.

4. Strain the dairy (use the ladle to push) again and re-measure.  Make up any difference with half & half.   Return to a pot and create a custard with the sugar and egg yolks.  Review how to do this here, be sure to read the footnote.

5. Pour the custard into an airtight container and refrigerate over night to ripen the flavors.

6. Next day strain the custard again and spin it in an ice cream machine according to the manufacturer’s instructions.

You could serve this in a float, or simply in a bowl with berries and caramel corn.  Have your friends over and surprise the living shit out of them with your culinary prowess.  I promise, there will be no barfing.

I’ve been through a lot with this bread pudding recipe.  I’ve done about ten different versions since I’ve been at Ten-01; and until a recent mishap, was about to give up on it.  I was trying to bake the pudding in a dome mold, trying to coax a new plate design out of this tired old custard soaked bread.  The flexible silicon molds produced perfect little domes, but they were all custardy near the top.  Also, the crusty upper region, the best part, was now on the bottom.  I fed one to Chef and he was not into it.  It got me thinking.  Like I said, the best part of this pudding is the top inch or so of dark brown crustiness.  So I cut off the part that was soggy custard, ending up with perfect round disks, perfect for sandwiching something.  I bet could achieve that same result by baking it in a thin layer in a sheet pan.  Hmmm…..I went back to the recipe’s roots to start a flavor profile.  When I learned it from Tony, it was Bourbon Bread Pudding.  Maker’s Mark glug-glugged it’s way into the custard once more.  I had made Butter Pecan ice cream the week before and it’s salty richness held up the bourbony pudding nicely.  Salted Caramel sauce also fit in well.  I’ve been experimenting with different tuile cookies lately, and  Lace Tuile made it into this presentation because of it’s simple light crunch.  I learned some new things with this dessert.  Firstly, that I can bake bread pudding in a thin layer and get great results.  Second, I can form freshly spun ice cream into a sausage and slice it at service, for a nice clean portion.  At first I made a plastic wrap tube a la Michel Richard, but after a quick chat with John our sausage maker, I was using collagen casings for my ice cream logs.  This dessert is selling like crazy, and is making the Chocolate Cake look so last year.  On the menu it reads Ice Cream Sandwich, and I think that really sells it.  It recalls childhood, a whimsical peek at the past.  Soaked in bourbon.  Learn how to make bread pudding here.  Make Butter Pecan Ice Cream and Lace Tuile with the recipes below.  Add salt to your favorite caramel sauce recipe.  Enjoy delicious sweets.

Butter Pecan Ice Cream adapted from Ben&Jerry’s Ice Cream Book.

8 oz butter

2 cups pecan pieces

1 tsp salt

4 eggs

1 1/2 cups sugar

2 cups heavy cream

1 cup milk

1.Saute the pecans in the buuter until the butter begins to browm slightly.  Sprinkle in the salt.  Strain off the butter and reserve.  Spread the pecans on a sheet tray to cool

2.Whip the eggs in a stand mixer until light and frothy, then add the sugar.  Whip on high to ribbon stage (4-5 minutes?)

3.Reduce the mixer speed to it’s lowest setting and pour in the milk and cream.

4.Transfer the mix into a blender and with it running, pour in the butter to emulsify.  I like to puree in some of the toasted nuts at this point as well.

5.Spin the mix in your ice cream machine, adding the nuts a few minutes before the ice cream is done.  Eat some immediately.  Using a pastry bag, pipe it into a sausage casing and freeze if desired.

Lace Tuile

8 oz butter

1 1/2 cups sugar

1 oz honey

1 oz brandy

2/3 cup flour

pinch of salt

1.  Cream the butter and the sugar in a stand mixer.

2.  Add the honey and brandy and mix to combine.

3.  Add the flour and salt and mix to form a smooth paste.  Spread thinly onto a non-stick baking mat and bake until golden brown in a 350 degree oven.  Mold while warm over a rolling pin.

My buddy David, a server at the restaurant, told me one day how he loved my bread pudding.  He told me it was as if a waffle had fucked a doughnut.  I don’t think he was pleased with my reaction to his verbal description, so he took it a step further and drew this illustration.  Thanks Dave, I’m glad you like it.

Mark Dunleavy showed me this process.  He’s kind of a dick.  Since he created the Chorizo Burger however, I’ve paid attention when he talks about food.  Except for that one time with the Consomme, when I wasn’t paying attention at all.  Anyway, he’s a keeper. He told me he learned the following technique from the pastry chef at Blue Hour, where he worked as a pastry cook.  I respect Mark’s resume.  I mean here he was, grinding herbs for ice cream down the street, making desserts, then he simply wheels around the block, and starts working saute at the restaurant.  Y’know…cooking happy hour and shit.

So here’s what you do weigh the sugar and the herb you want to use into the Robo-Coupe and grind it into a paste. Place this paste in your sauce pot and add the dairy product.  Bring to a boil and cover the pot, killing the heat.  Steep for thirty minutes.  Temper in your yolks cook to nape, stirring, scraping often with a spat. Pour the base into a hotel pan to cool in the fridge.  I usually ripen the base overnight in a cambro. It’s not imperative but does increase the flavor.  Next day strain that shit into your Gelatoo-D2 unit and spin to a stiff sour cream consistency.  The base recipe was adapted from AB’s, but Mark taught me the herb-paste bit. I imagine it works so well because it really opens up the herbs, and prepares to steep. You also achieve a bright, herby color this way.  I want to say something about surface area but I don’t know if that’s right.  It works great for Mint Chip and any other herb you might like to try.  I’ve also used this herb grinding to make a Rosemary Pine Nut Tart for TXGV,  but that’s another story.

Herb Ice Cream

yields 2 qts.

6 cups half & half

2 cups heavy cream

18 oz sugar

2-3 bunches herbs (sage, mint, basil, etc.)

16 egg yolks

1.  Grind the sugar and herbs to a paste, and place them in a sauce pot with the dairy products. Bring to a boil and cover, kill the heat and steep for thirty minutes.

3.  Seperate the eggs into a bowl, whisk vigorously.**

4. Temper the hot liquid into the yolks.  Cook over medium heat unit it thickens up, or about 165 F, if you want to get fancy. Scrape and stir often with a rubber spatula.  It should coat the back of a spoon when its ready.

5.  Pour the base out into a shallow pan to cool rapidly under refrigeration.

6.  Once thoroghly chilled, trasfer to a storage vessel for overnite ripening.

7.  Next day strain into your ice cream machine and spin accordingly.  Serve with a famous dessert.

**In the original AB recipe, he whisks the sugar with the yolks, thick and pale.  This created a really good texture in the finished ice cream.  I remember that Good Eats episode now, and it was something about protein.  Next time I make this, I think I’ll use a portion of the sugar to do this.

I ran this dessert as a special last weekend and it sold pretty well. With milk chocolate sauce and hazelnut praline, it looked sharp and tasted delicious. The chocolate base is Tony’s truffle sponge, almost a brownie but with egg whites folded in. The central crunchy layer was a caramel candy filling, which I augmented with a little milk chocolate and feuilletine. The mousse was a new recipe, one I found on Cuisine French. The recipe caught my eye because it assumed a certain level of knowledge and technique. For example, step three in the recipe states “prepare a custard with the milk, sugar, constarch, and egg yolks.”  That’s my kind of recipe. The praline garnish, I’m embarrassed to say, is isomalt.  This synthetic sugar always makes me feel like a cheater, a corner-cutter and a hack.  It is a beautiful garnish however, so I guess it’s OK.  I learned how to make those over ten years ago now.  Hmph….I’m getting old.  Meanwhile, it’s business as usual at the restaurant,  things have been picking up.  The Oregoinian released an excellent review of us last week, and we’ve been seeing increasing numbers. I couldn’t find the review online…even without mention of the desserts-it was a good one.  

So thaaaats how long it takes to use every single whip, spat, bowl, and container in the kitchen.  Actually, its probably not even a third of the small wares, but certainly all the spats.  AB would be ashamed of me.  Anyhoo there was a lot of stirring and straining and spinning going on today making ice creams.  Today we have blueberry white chocolate, and lemon meringue.  For the blueberry I folded in frozen berries and white chocolate mouse to a custard base. Lemon curd and soft merinque went in more base for the other.  The blueberry was very white chocolatey, and the lemon was tasty.  A good start.   I also made malted milk chocolate peanut butter and  a base for salted whiskey caramel.  I enjoy making ice creams and sorbets, because once I have base made, I can always be spinning.  I’ll be all hell of into doing something else (such as a simple plating) and the machine will go ”BEEP!” Then we eat soft serve.  Just keep spinning..Just Keep spinning

SPINNING ALL DAY!!!

The first night of the new dessert menu for Carlyle…well…it kicked ass.  The Car Bomb was of course the big seller, closely followed by The Deep Fried Caramel Apple Bread Pudding.  I was really happy with how the Cheesecake Three Ways went out, it was a study in cheesy custard.  We only sold two Velvet Elvis, but it was so great to hear the chef call it out across the kitchen, and to see dessert go out with bacon on it.  When the runner picked it up I called “Elvis has left the kitchen!”  The Rosemary Pinenut Tartlette was the sleeper, but a guest told the owner it was “damn good.”  I also put out a special order Apple Pie, for which we charged an exorbitant price.  The menu was so well recieved by the staff and guests it almost made me forget about this.

If I can make a custard with one arm, then I can make bread pudding.  If I can make bread pudding, then I can deep fry it.  Jaybill came up with idea as a joke, but I really liked the idea of taking old croissants, soaking them in custard, baking them in a waterbath, breading them with panko, and then deep frying them.  Anyway here’s Panko-Fried Chocolate Bread Pudding.  PFBP for short.  Check out how to make it in my new Recipes section.