the dare

The November 2009 Daring Bakers Challenge was chosen and hosted by Lisa Michele of Parsley,Sage,Desserts, and Line Drives. She chose the Italian Pastry, Cannolo (Cannoli is plural), using the cookbooks Lidia’s Italian-American Kitchen by Lidia Matticchio Bastianich and The Sopranos Family Cookbook by Allen Rucker; recipes by Michelle Scicolone, as ingredient/direction guides. She added her own modifications/changes, so the recipe is not 100% verbatim from either book.

This was the first time that I have ever attempted making Cannoli and I must say they were well received by my clan of recipe tasters. I have to admit I completely strayed off the traditional recipe (no surprise there). When I heard about the challenge for this month I was going through a "passion fruit" stage, experimenting with them in different ways. This all to say I decided to go a more "tropical" route instead of the more traditional "Italian" style. So, if you would like to try the traditional cannoli recipe just click the link for theDaring Kitchen  and you will also be able to see some of the wonderful pictures that have been submitted as well. If you would like to try your hand at the "tropical" type try this one...it turned out great!

Enjoy!
Shannon

Coconut & Key Lime Mascarpone “Cannoli” with Passion Fruit Coulis
Loosely adapted from Gourmet May 1995

For “Cannoli” shells:
About twenty 6-inch square parchment paper
¾ cup flaked unsweetened coconut, toasted and cooled
2 Tbsp. all-purpose flour
5 Tbsp. unsalted butter, cut into pieces and softened
½ cup granulated sugar
2 Tbsp. firmly packed light brown sugar
1 Tbsp. milk
1 Tbsp. coconut rum (optional)
Four 3 1/3 to 4 inch long cannoli forms (about 5/8 inch in diameter)

For filling:
4 ounces cream cheese, softened
1/3 cup granulated sugar
2 tsp. freshly grated lime zest
4 Tbsp. freshly squeezed Key Lime juice
1 cup mascarpone cheese

Passion Fruit Coulis:
8-10 passion fruit (an option if you can't find passion fruit would be mangos)

Accompaniments: fresh raspberries

To Make “Cannoli” shells:
Preheat oven to 350°F and lightly grease a heavy baking sheet.

Arrange 4 parchment squares on the greased baking sheet.

In a food processor blend together coconut and flour until coconut is ground fine. Add butter, sugars, rum and milk and blend until dough forms a ball, about 10 seconds. Spoon a well-rounded teaspoon of dough onto each of the 4 parchment squares and with slightly wet fingertips evenly pat into 2-inch rounds.

Bake cookies in middle of oven until very thin and golden brown, about 10 minutes. Immediately transfer cookies (still on parchment) to rack and let stand until just firm enough to hold their shape, 30-45 seconds. Working with 1 cookie at a time and using parchment as an aid, quickly roll cookie around a cannoli form to make a cylinder. (If cookies become too firm to roll, return them to parchment on baking sheet to oven 1 minute to soften.) Cool formed cookies on a rack before removing cannoli form. Make more cookies in same manner with remaining dough, baking and forming cookies in batches of 4 and allowing baking sheet to cool completely between each batch. Cookies are fragile. Cookies keep in one layer in an airtight container at room temperature 4 days.

Make filling:

In a bowl with an electric mixer beat cream cheese with sugar, zest and lime juice until smooth and beat in mascarpone. Chill filling, covered, until firm, at least 4 hours and up to 1 day.

Make Passion Fruit Coulis:

Cut Passion Fruit in half and scoop out seeds and pulp. Put into a food processor and pulse just until seeds begin to crack. Strain mixture through a fine sieve and refrigerate until ready to serve with “cannoli”.

Assemble dessert:

Whisk filling and transfer it to a pastry bag fitted with a ¼-inch plain or decorative tip. Carefully pipe filling into both ends of 12 cookies. Pour about ¼ cup Passion Fruit Coulis onto each of 6 dessert plates to distribute evenly, and top with 2 “cannoli” and raspberries.

shared experiment

We have been taught since we were knee-high that it is “good to share”. There is a joy to receive but as we’ve learned it is a joy to give as well. And I am so thankful for friends that are willing to be “guinea pigs” so to speak and share with me all of these cooking endeavors I am exploring.

The credit for today’s experiment goes to Nigel Slater, in whose cookbook Kitchen Diaries I found this particular recipe for Passion Fruit Roulade. It is a pretty straight forward recipe, the only ingredient that might be a challenge to find is the passion fruit. But in Southern California right now I can find them at my farmer’s market, but probably only for a couple more weeks. In the recipe Nigel calls for lemon or orange curd which you can buy already prepared, which is completely fine. But I have a recipe I am particularly fond of for lemon curd, so I made mine from scratch. I tweaked the recipe slightly to make it a lemon-orange curd to take it a little sweeter, since the passion fruit is on the tart side. I think the combination is a winner.

Enjoy!
Shannon

Passion Fruit Roulade

the cake:

6 large eggs

½ cup superfine sugar
2 lemons
2 heaped tablespoons all purpose flour
Confectioners’ sugar for dusting
For the filling:
1 cup lemon or orange curd (for homemade version see below)
1 ½ cups heavy whipping cream
8-12 passion fruits, ripe and wrinkled
Superfine sugar to finish

You will need a jelly roll pan measuring approximately 14x12, with shallow sides. It doesn’t matter if it is just a few inches out either way.
Set the oven to 400°F. Line the pan with a piece of parchment, making sure it comes up the sides.
Separate the eggs, putting the yolks into a food mixer and the whites into a bowl large enough in which to beat them. Add the sugar to the yolks and whisk until thick, pale and creamy.

Grate the zest from both the lemons, taking care not to include the bitter white pith underneath, and squeeze the juice of one of them. Beat the egg whites until they are thick and capable of standing in a soft peak, and then fold the juice and zest into the egg yolk and sugar mixture, followed by the sifted flour and then the egg whites. Add the egg whites slowly, firmly but gently, so the air is not knocked out of them as you mix them in. It is crucial not to over-mix. Scoop the mixture into the lined pan, smoothing it gently out to the edges.

Bake for about ten minutes, until the top is very lightly colored and it feels softly set. Let is cool for a few minutes.

Put a piece of wax paper on a work surface, cover lightly with superfine sugar, and then turn the roulade out on to it. The cake should be crust side down. I find this easiest to do if you are fairly forthright about it, just tipping the roulade out of its pan in one swift movement. Carefully peel away the paper and cover the roulade with a clean moist dish towel. It will be fine like this for an hour or two (I have even left them like this overnight and they have come to no harm).

When you are ready to roll the cake, remove the towel and spread the lemon or orange curd over the surface, then whip the cream until it will stand in soft peaks and spread it over the curd. Cut eight of the passion fruits in half and spread the juice and seeds over the cream. Now take one short end of the wax paper and use it to help you roll up the roulade. It the surface cracks, no worries just dust with confectioners’ sugar and cut into thick slices, use the remaining passion fruit juice and seeds squeezed over each slice.

Enough for 10



Lemon-Orange Curd
4 large eggs
1 cup sugar
1/3 cup lemon juice
1/3 cup orange juice
Grated zest of 1 orange
½ stick unsalted butter, at room temperature, cut into 8 pieces

Choose a saucepan that will hold the bowl from your mixer (or a heatproof mixing bowl) in a double-boiler arrangement. Fill the pan with 2 to 3 inches of water and bring to a simmer.

Put the eggs and sugar in the mixer fitted with the whisk attachment and whip at high speed until very light and fluffy. (or put in the mixing bowl and use a hand-held mixer.) Still whisking, add the lemon and orange juice and grated zest. Set the bowl in the saucepan, making sure that the bottom of the bowl does not touch the simmering water, and cook the mixture, whisking constantly by hand, until it is smooth, thick and custard like. Be patient; this can take a while. Transfer the bowl to the counter and whisk in the butter piece by piece. Press plastic wrap against the top, and refrigerate until thoroughly chilled and set. The curd can be made up to a week in advance and kept in an airtight container in the refrigerator. Once the curd is set, it should not be stirred again.

whack!

Well it hit me…inspiration that is. Those purple, egg shaped wrinkly (and getting more wrinkled by the day) passion fruit have been waiting for me to get inspired so that I could incorporate them into something sublime.

Thankfully, I stumbled across this recipe from an Australian publication that I get online. When I came upon the recipe for Passion fruit yo-yos with white chocolate and passion fruit ganache I knew that was it. Heck, who doesn’t want to eat something called a yo-yo, especially when it’s a cookie? The recipe is from a very talented Australian food stylist Emma Knowles. I had to fiddle with the measurements a bit, since they are in grams, but I think I got them pretty close (thanks to gourmet sleuth)

The sweet, tart flavor that comes from the passion fruit puree and white chocolate together is heaven. The cookie itself almost melts in your mouth, since it uses both flour and cornstarch as the base along with quite a bit of butter.

So head on out to your farmers’ market and get those passion fruit while their still here, and see what inspiration might hit you with these little beauties.

Enjoy!
Shannon



Passion fruit yo-yos with white chocolate and passion fruit ganache
Recipe adapted from Emma Knowles

Ingredients
yo-yos
12 Tbsp. unsalted butter, softened
¾ cup powdered sugar
1/3 cup passion fruit puree (see note)
1 ½ cups all purpose flour
2/3 cup cornstarch
White chocolate and passion fruit ganache
¾ cup heavy cream
¼ cup passion fruit puree (see note)
2 pieces lemon rind, removed with a peeler (avoid the white pith)
6 ounces white chocolate, finely chopped

1. For ganache, combine cream, juice and rind in a saucepan and bring just to the boil over medium-high heat. Place chocolate in a bowl, strain over hot cream mixture, whisk until smooth and refrigerate for 4 hours or until thick.

2. Beat butter and sugar in an electric mixer until light and fluffy, add juice and combine. Add flour and cornstarch and mix until just combined, then turn onto a floured surface, form into a disc, wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1 hour.

3. Preheat over to 350°F. Roll out pastry to ¼ inch thick and using a 1 ½ inch diameter cutter, cut rounds from pastry and place on parchment paper lined oven trays. Press scraps into a ball, re-roll and repeat. Bake for 8-10 minutes or until just golden, cool on trays for 5 minutes then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

4. Spread half of the biscuits with a teaspoon each of ganache, sandwich with remaining biscuits and stand until set. Yo-yos will keep for up to 1 week in an airtight container or up to a month in the freezer.

Note To make passion fruit puree, blend passion fruit pulp in a food processor to crack seeds, and then strain through a fine sieve. Twelve passion fruit yield about 1 cup of juice.

Makes 24

with a passion

Passion fruit is a plant cultivated commercially in frost-free areas for its fruit. It is native to South America and widely grown in, New Zealand, the Caribbean, Indonesia, California, Florida, Hawaii, Australia, East Africa, Israel and South Africa.

And now is the time to enjoy them here in Southern California. They will be in season for about another 3 weeks, according to my farmers’ market vendor. Passion fruit is not widely available in stores, so most of the fruit comes from backyard gardens or wild groves. It can be found, however, in farmers' markets throughout my area.

The passion fruit is round to oval, yellow or dark purple at maturity, with a soft to firm, juicy interior filled with numerous seeds. The edible part of a passion fruit lies under a leathery, dark purple, bitter-tasting skin.

Within is a cavity more or less filled with an aromatic mass of double walled, membranous sacs containing orange-colored, pulpy juice and as many as 250 small, hard, dark brown or black, pitted seeds. The unique flavor is appealing, musky, guava-like and sweet/tart to tart.

The fruit can be grown to eat or for its juice, which is often added to other fruit juices to enhance aroma. Its intense, tropical-flavored orange pulp and seeds are excellent in fruit desserts, sorbets, beverages, jams and sauces.

Choose the largest passion fruit available. They're usually sold by the piece. Look for one that's partially deflated or creased to be sure it's ripe before eating. Cut the passion fruit in half with a sharp knife. Scrape out the pulp with a spoon. Press through a fine sieve to remove the tiny seeds if desired. You'll get about 1 tbsp. pulp from one of the egg-shaped, 2-inch-long passion fruit.

So yes, I bought a bag full and they are still on the kitchen counter waiting for inspiration to hit me. 

Until tomorrow.

Shannon