Doughnuts

The second my friend mentioned she wanted to attempt to make her own cake doughnut after an inspirational at Parkers Maple Barn in New Hampshire, I quickly thought of the doughnut recipe from the French Laundry. After looking at the recipe and seeing the glorious picture, I began craving them. Its just my luck that the Bouchon bakery in the Time Warner Building makes them. Unfortunately for me, they are ussually only available on the weekend and I'm almost never around during that time. But since I frequent the Wholefoods there a lot, I figured I would check frequently just on the off chance that they had made some for the day. On my second attempt, I was successful.



And soon after I was home with two beautiful doughnuts. Both nice and cakey. Both perfect for dipping into a nice cup of coffee. Now I just need to get off my lazy ass and make some for myself.

Cooking the 'French Laundry Cookbook' part 2

A continuation of this previous post.

What's a vday dinner without desert. Since the meal I had prepared was pretty heavy, I was looking for something light and fresh to finish. Thomas Keller's recipe for a Lemon Sabayon Tart with Honeyed Marscapone Cream fit the bill. Too bad the gf isn't a big fan of tarts. I should have known better. On to the tart!

First of all, I burnt it. The pinenut crust was burnt. the top of the saboyon was burnt. You can see the burn crust in the picture. I scraped off an entire layer of burnt sabayon. I tried to eat it, but the crust was burnt all over. I do have to say the sabayon was very nice without the crust.



Of course with more crust dough in the fridge, I had to attempt it again later in the week.

My problem this time was that the lemons weren't as fresh.



This time I didn't burn it. But my lemons were not as fresh. I do love this desert though. I think next time I'll have to make it in individual portions. That way I can easily give some away since you end up with a lot of dough with the recipe. Then again this might turn into a party desert only.

Cooking the 'French Laundry Cookbook' part 1

For Vday, I had decided to cook the gf a nice meal. I broke out Thomas Keller's 'The French Laundry Cookbook', something we've owned for a couple of years now but have been too intimidated to try to cook from. The dish of the night was Keller's take on Mac & Cheese, Butter Poached Maine Lobster with Cream Lobster Broth and Marscapone-Enriched Orzo.



I have to say, that I started way too late in the day in order to do this correctly. The Creamy Lobster Broth needs to reduce twice, which left the gf and I very hungry (remedied by a quick gnocchi appetizer!). As it started late into the night, I became impatient and the Broth ended up being more watery than I had expected. Even with the wrong consistency, the broth was very strong and very rich. Its sort of scary how rich and thick its supposed to be. I can see why the portions need to be small, as opposed to my large portions.

I tried Keller's method of cooking lobster, which would have been great if I didn't overcook it in the Beurre Monté. But on the upside, now I have a quite a bit of clarified lobster butter.

I also failed on the parmesan crisp. Burning 2 patches before giving up.

The only hints I can give anyone is to give yourself plenty of time and do as Keller says and strain & skim all the time.