Autumn

Spiced Rum, Date, Walnut, Molasses Bundt Cake with Rum Caramel Drizzle

October 7, 2018 By stemsandforks 8 Comments

Koreans can’t bake.

That’s been my insecurity since starting this baking journey. That I’m Korean. And unlike my fellow caucasian friends, I have no family pie recipe or a mom that baked chocolate chip cookies with me on Saturday mornings. The only things I baked as a child were Pillsbury crescents from a tin or boxed Duncan Hines. Baking from scratch was never a part of my family growing up.

Instead, my Saturdays consisted of Korean language classes followed by math drills with Sargent Shin… and his chopstick wand. After math, my sisters and I would get to watch some TV whilst stuffing thousands of Korean dumplings called “mandu”. Okay. Maybe not thousands but god did it ever feel like thousands! Only after all the mandus were stuffed and our math drills were done correctly, were my sisters and I allowed to bake Duncan Hines Classic Yellow Cake. And if we were really lucky, my mom would have bought the chocolate icing in a carton for us to ice the yellow cake with. As a child, baking this cake and devouring it was my escape, my utopia, my moment of being unkorean.

Until I was a teen and got a job at an upscale bakery. Cardamom coffee cake…what was cardamom? Hazelnut dacquoise…what was dacquoise? My inner sweet carb spirit was awakened. My Saturday mornings no longer involved memorizing math formulas instead being transported to sugary moments of utter bliss, learning flavours and spices I had never heard of. In retrospect I should have paid this bakery rather than the bakery having paid me.

My weekend bakery job and Duncan Hines days are a distant memory now. And the feeling of “Koreans can’t bake” does jab me every so often. Especially when reading fellow bloggers stories of great Aunts sharing pie crust hacks and grandma’s almost 100 year starter named Arras (after the WWI battle)

But as I write this, I realize I have something that the blogger with Arras and the baker with the family pie hacks don’t have. I have patience and the willingness to drill and train myself until I get that pie crust flaky and this Spiced Rum Date Bundt perfectly drunk with moistness and flavour. It may not sound as heartwarming as a soft rosy cheeked gran smelling of cinnamon and bread. But Sargent Shin with his chopstick wand and those thousands of dumplings taught me something I believe to be just as valuable if not more. Perseverance. And so goes, that This Korean Bakes.

Bon app! or as we Koreans say Mashikeh-Mogo!

My two older sisters and my dad. I’m bottom right. (1982)

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Spiced Rum, Date, Walnut, Molasses Bundt Cake with Rum Caramel Drizzle

Author: Betty Binon

Prep time: 35 mins

Cook time: 50 mins

Total time: 1 hour 25 mins

Serves: 8-10

Ingredients

FOR THE BUNDT:
2 cups or 260 grams whole grain flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
+1 teaspoon baking soda (for the date puree)
1 teaspoon cardamom
½ teaspoon salt
1½ cup or about 200 grams fresh dates chopped
1 cup or about 120 grams dried dates
1¼ cup water
¾ cup spiced rum
1¼ cup or 250 grams granulated white sugar
¾ cup fancy molasses
4 large eggs room temperature
1 cup canola oil (or a light oil)
1 cup or 125 grams chopped walnuts
FOR THE RUM CARAMEL: (Caramel recipe ONLY adapted from https://www.finecooking.com/recipe/dark-rum-caramel )
1½ cup granulated white sugar
⅓ cold water
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
¾ cup heavy cream
2 tablespoons spiced rum
pinch of salt

Instructions

Take your 10 cup bundt pan and grease very generously and carefully with melted butter making sure you grease all the nook and crannies.
Dust with all purpose flour discarding access...set aside
Preheat oven to 350F with oven rack in middle of oven
In a large bowl, sift the whole grain flour, baking powder, baking soda, cardamom, salt and whisk well...set aside
In a medium saucepan, bring the 1/14 cup water to a boil and then add the dried and fresh chopped dates.
Stir in 1 teaspoon baking soda. Bring to a boil then put lid on and turn heat off and set aside
In your stand mixer, with paddle attachment, beat the sugar and molasses together until smooth
Add the eggs one at a time to the sugar mix.
Add the canola oil in a slow steady stream to the sugar/egg mix
In your blender/juicer or kitchenaid, puree the now softened dates until a smooth puree. A few chunks is okay.
Stir in the spiced rum into the date puree with a spatula
On low speed, add the dry flour mix to the sugar/egg/oil mix in the stand mixer then add puree mix doing the flour mix in thirds and ending with the dry flour mix.
Fold in the walnuts with a spatula
Do not over mix
Pour into bundt pan and bake for 50minutes to 1 hour or until tester stick comes out mostly clean
Allow to rest in pan for 10-15 minutes. Invert onto a cooling rack and allow to completely cool
In the meanwhile, FOR THE CARAMEL:
In a medium heavy sauce pan, whisk the ⅓ cup cold water and sugar.
Cover with lid and bring to a boil over med-high heat all the while swirling the pan every so often...(do not stir..Swirl)
Remove lid after about 8 minutes and keep swirling until the sugar liquid turns a rich dark amber hue.
Turn the heat to low immediately upon it turning dark amber and carefully whisk the butter in. Whisk until the bubbles subsides
Add the Heavy cream and keep whisking until the caramel is smooth and silky about 2-3 minutes on low
Remove from stove top and add the spiced rum and salt. Allow the caramel to cool in fridge for 15 minutes or so or at room temperature for an hour before drizzling half the caramel over the cooled cake.
Keep the other half caramel for serving on the side.

SweeTango Apple, Chèvre and Cardamom Tart (refined sugar free)

October 2, 2018 By stemsandforks Leave a Comment

This is a sponsored post in collaboration with SweeTango. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Apples are the most cultivated and universally recognized fruit and perhaps one of the oldest that has existed on earth. It’s also arguably the most written about fruit in fables, religion and myths. It has been symbolized as both good and evil.

In the western world, we know the story of Adam and Eve in the Old Testament, where the serpent tempts man to eat the forbidden fruit thereby starting the fall of man and the Christian definition of sin. Irish folklore has it that if a woman peels the skin of the apple in one continuous ribbon and tosses it over her shoulder then the initials of her future husband will appear. And the Trojan War? Well, the idea of Troy tossing the golden apple to the chosen goddess soon evolved to an ancient Greek tradition of throwing an apple to the one you love.

SweeTango apples available early October to mid November. See SweeTango.com for a retailer near you

It’s no wonder this beloved fruit has been developed and bred into such amazing varieties. One favourite variety of mine is SweeTango. Grown in Canada exclusively for the Canadian market, SweetTango is a premium apple variety famed for its crisp, sweet, tangy and juicy bite. SweeTango also holds the Guinness World Record for “Loudest Crunch of an Apple” (March 2016) The bite registered at an impressive 79.1 decibels. To put things in perspective, a normal conversation clocks in at 60 decibels and a vacuum or kitchen blender 70-80 decibels (according to American Speech-Language Hearing Association)

As a food stylist and baker, I adore SweeTango’s photogenic qualities. They’re red skinned with an intermittent splash of yellow and dotted with small white freckles…like a Paul Gauguin fruit still life. However unlike an immortal still life painting, this wondrous apple is only available early October until mid-November or until stock runs out. Thus the scramble to bake and crunch on as many SweeTango apples as possible.

It’s remarkable how far along apples have evolved. From the apple that inspired Isaac Newton to theorize universal gravitation to my utterly sublime SweeTango Cardamom and Chèvre Tart. Apples are here to stay. To nourish, inspire and dazzle us. And if you’re my kids, to make selfie videos crunching on some explosive SweeTangos.

Bon App!

Visit https://sweetango.com for more info and recipes.

Instagram: SweeTango_apple

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sweetango

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SweeTango Apple, Chèvre and Cardamom Tart (refined sugar free)

Author: Betty Binon

Ingredients

INGREDIENTS FOR THE PASTRY DOUGH
260 grams or 2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
⅓ cup ice cold water
1 teaspoon white vinegar
¾ an egg beaten
(save the other ½ egg for the pastry wash later)
100 grams or ½ cup shortening
115 grams or ½ cup unsalted cold butter
INGREDIENTS FOR THE FILLING
5 small apples or about 600 grams of SweeTango apples
½ cup or 115 grams chèvre unripened
2 tablespoons organic honey
½ teaspoon cardamom
1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
a pinch of lemon zest
TO FINISH
1 tablespoon organic honey to brush on apples before baking AND
1 tablespoon organic honey to brush on apples after baking
2 tablespoons unsalted butter cut into small cubes
¼ beaten egg

Instructions

Grate on largest hole of box grater the cold butter on a plate.
Cut the shortening into small 1 cm cubes and add to the same plate as the butter and pop in freezer uncovered for about 10 minutes.
In a large bowl, sift the flour, salt, baking powder, whisk well and set aside.
In a small bowl take half the whisked egg, 1 teaspoon vinegar and ⅓ cup water and whisk together. Set aside.
Preheat oven to 400F.
Take the chilled shortening and butter and toss with pastry cutter or forks in with the flour until the mixture resembles large coarse breadcrumbs.
Drizzle the water/vinegar and egg mixture over the flour mixture and toss together with a spatula until the mixture starts to come together.
Don’t overwork. You want to maintain some chunks of butter and shortening.
Dump out onto large piece of parchment paper about 14 x 14 inches and fold the dough over using the paper about 5-6 times. Use a misting bottle to spritz extra dry spots in between folds…if you don’t have a misting spray, use little droplets of cold water.
The dough should now hold its form with a few dry spots and chunks of butter/shortening.
Shape the dough into a rectangle and wrap with plastic. Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.
Meanwhile, take the chèvre, honey, lemon juice, lemon zest and cardamom and mix thoroughly together with a small spatula until smooth and set aside.
When the dough is ready, allow the dough to soften/warm up a bit — about 5 minutes. Roll out to form a large rectangular shape with a rolling pin all the while constantly lightly sprinkling flour and moving your dough to avoid it from sticking to your counter.
Once it’s about 15 x 11 inches, take a ruler and sharp knife to trim the edges so the dough is 10 x 14 inches…. place the dough onto the baking tray lined with parchment paper.
With an offset spatula, spread the chèvre out into an even layer leaving about an inch of the edge.
Pop baking tray with rolled out dough into fridge.
Wash, core the apples and cut into quarters length wise quarter and thinly slice about 8 slices. (you can also use a mandolin to slice your apples).
Do this to all quartered apples so 20 quarters (from 5 small apples).
Take dough out of fridge and start arranging your apple slices starting from the left to right. Snuggly place the sliced groups side by side in a cross-hatching pattern, leaving about 1 inch from the edge until the chèvre is completely covered with apple slices-about 4 quarters across by about 5 quarters down.
Pop in fridge again for about 15 minutes to let the dough chill again.
Once the dough has chilled, brush about 1 tablespoon of honey on the sliced apples and
Brush the ¼ beaten egg wash on the crust.
Sprinkle the small cubes of butter all over the tart.
Bake for 40-45 minutes or until crust is crisp and golden brown.
Brush on about 1 tablespoon of organic honey while the tart is still warm.
Serve as is or with a scoop of ice-cream.

King Georges’ Granola Bars

November 17, 2017 By stemsandforks 4 Comments

I fully admit I spoil my kids rotten when it comes to food. I’m often caught making fresh cut fries an hour before bedtime or whipping up cupcakes for breakfast. My husband and I always joke that we are our kids slaves. In a sense I suppose we are. Google’s definition of slave; “a person who is the legal property of another and is forced to obey them” and “work excessively hard”. I’d have to say we are definitely slaves to our kids in that case.

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Pumpkin Spice Macarons

October 23, 2017 By stemsandforks 3 Comments

I only started baking macarons this year. I confess I was a bit late on the trend of eating and baking macarons. I felt I needed to master basic things such as pie crust and pâte à choux first before tackling macarons. If you’ve been following my baking journey, you’ll know I’m a self taught baker. No grandma or mum with old traditional baking recipes passed down. Kimchi, jigae, marinated meats and other korean scrummy dishes yes. So my food memories are a bit different from those caucasian friends around me. They involved spices and smells that that could awaken any hibernating bear in the dead of winter and have them running for cover.

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Pumpkin and Walnut Bundt Cake

October 3, 2017 By stemsandforks 7 Comments

We are definitely not a turkey family. Well, I personally enjoy a fresh roasted turkey but my husband and kids don’t. Pumpkin however is always a hit with all the Binons.

This thanksgiving (Canadian) pumpkin is definitely on the menu. I’m thinking of some creative ways of using this wonderful squash asides from a cake or pie. Dumplings…soup…maybe even pumpkin steak? Ha! I’m just thinking out loud right now. Of course if you have any ideas…do let me know. As my daughter always points out…I like “weird” recipes.

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Orange Cardamom Cake with Blackberry Curd

September 27, 2017 By stemsandforks 6 Comments

Its that time of year. Winter is coming, for those in the north. Being Canadian, I can completely relate to House Stark of Game of Thrones. We Canadians often joke that we have two seasons. Winter and Summer. Here, at least in the Greater Toronto Area, winter unofficially starts around Remembrance Day (mid November) and can easily continue well into April. Each year around April, without any gentle segway, a blast of beautiful mild weather emerges from our long cold winters. A sort of tortuous teaser that lasts about two days. Then without any warning, a massive deposit of snow. So when autumn rolls in, we embrace and covet the short time she is here.

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Apple Raspberry Pie With Pistachio Crust

February 6, 2017 By stemsandforks Leave a Comment

Learning how to bake for me was not always so idyllic. You’ll quickly catch on to this if you read my first blog. I learned the hard way – by myself, through trial and error.

The first time I made a pie, it was like a mammoth pimple with an ungodly slime (which was the sorry excuse for the filling), that oozed out from every crevice of the crust. It was impossible to cut through with a fork and too leathery to chew. Epic failure. The second time it looked better but the scalloped crust had shrunk and the filling ended up all over the bottom of the oven. There was also an inch-high pool of juice in my pie pan after I cut a slice. Consecutive attempts continued to render fails. At times, the pie would look like a fruit geyser, or the dough would fall apart in my hands while crimping the edge. But without fail, the crust was always tough and leathery when chewing. I didn’t get it. I could bake so many other things with such ease and success. Why was pie so hard to make?

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