Wednesday, March 28, 2007
Sour Cherry Slice
I was chatting to a fellow blogger and asking if sour cherries would have been a viable substitute in a certain recipe and she replied that she felt sour cherries wouldn't have worked in her recipe and were best matched with chocolate.
Which got me thinking.
I completely understand matching sour cherries to chocolate. Two of my all time favourite cakes, sour cherry kugelhopf and the classic Black Forest cake both show off the wonderful marriage these two can make. For chocolate is such a bully really, pushing other less assertive ingredients to the background, that it needs a strong partner to pull it into line. But that's not all there is to sour cherries. Think of rhubarb for instance, which has about the same tartness. It is very often featured just on its own as the star ingredient and sour cherries are just as confident on their own and need just like rhubarb, a little sweetness added.
The reason I had asked about using sour cherries is that I had made for the first time a cherry clafoutis in which I used sweet cherries and was totally disappointed with its lack of cherry flavour, though I would say it was better cold than warm. I wondered then how it would have been if it contained sour cherries instead. The reason I was thinking this was that every year we go the a cherry orchard and buy many kilos of sour cherries for making various things, like sour cherry jam, cherry vodka and quite a few are simply bottled for cakes and desserts during the year.
Now the thing is every year we eat some fresh, to get an idea of how much flavour they have. Even though they are called sour cherries they are not sour like a lemon for instance, it would be fairer to say they are tart and something else is instantly obvious - the length and depth of flavour, its almost like essence of cherry. Some Europeans actually quite like to eat fresh sour cherries, but the majority of the crop will be preserved in some way. In fact it is European countries that lead world production of sour cherries and it would probably surprise you to learn that of the world-wide production of cherries, which is around three million tons, one third of that is dedicated to sour cherries.
Stephanie Alexander in her book the Cooks Companion goes on to say...
Well, perhaps it's not inevitable if you have a source for sour cherries, as even supermarkets carry jars of sour cherries these days, usually labeled as Morello cherries, which can be used in place of fresh cherries when they are no longer in season. If you like rhubarb you will certainly like this slice, which is my entry to Weekend Herb Blogging, this week hosted by the wonderful originator, Kalyn of Kalyn's Kitchen.
DOROTA’S SOUR CHERRY SLICE
1 cup sugar
3 cups plain flour sifted
2 teaspoons baking powder
250 g butter
5 egg yolks
3 tablespoons sour cream
1 litre jar sour cherries
Topping
5 egg whites
1 cup icing sugar
4 rounded tablespoons vanilla custard powder
In a large bowl mix flour and baking powder, cut butter into small pieces and rub into flour with fingertips, until flour looks like coarse sand. Add sugar, sour cream and egg yolks, and mix until dough forms, do not over mix. Divide dough into ¾ and ¼ pieces, wrap in plastic. Put ¾ piece in fridge and ¼ piece in freezer for at least a ½ hour. In a baking dish 38 cm x 26 cm place ¾ piece of dough and with your hands, push the dough to cover the bottom of the dish. Drain sour cherries and put them on the dough.
Whisk eggwhites until soft peaks form, then slowly whisk in the icing sugar, then the custard powder. Pour this mixture over the sour cherries and level. Take ¼ piece of dough and grate evenly over topping. Bake in 170 c oven for 50 minutes.
Just in an aside, the leftover juice from the jar of sour cherries makes a refreshing drink, more so with a shot of vodka, a cook's bonus if you like.
Which got me thinking.
I completely understand matching sour cherries to chocolate. Two of my all time favourite cakes, sour cherry kugelhopf and the classic Black Forest cake both show off the wonderful marriage these two can make. For chocolate is such a bully really, pushing other less assertive ingredients to the background, that it needs a strong partner to pull it into line. But that's not all there is to sour cherries. Think of rhubarb for instance, which has about the same tartness. It is very often featured just on its own as the star ingredient and sour cherries are just as confident on their own and need just like rhubarb, a little sweetness added.
The reason I had asked about using sour cherries is that I had made for the first time a cherry clafoutis in which I used sweet cherries and was totally disappointed with its lack of cherry flavour, though I would say it was better cold than warm. I wondered then how it would have been if it contained sour cherries instead. The reason I was thinking this was that every year we go the a cherry orchard and buy many kilos of sour cherries for making various things, like sour cherry jam, cherry vodka and quite a few are simply bottled for cakes and desserts during the year.
Now the thing is every year we eat some fresh, to get an idea of how much flavour they have. Even though they are called sour cherries they are not sour like a lemon for instance, it would be fairer to say they are tart and something else is instantly obvious - the length and depth of flavour, its almost like essence of cherry. Some Europeans actually quite like to eat fresh sour cherries, but the majority of the crop will be preserved in some way. In fact it is European countries that lead world production of sour cherries and it would probably surprise you to learn that of the world-wide production of cherries, which is around three million tons, one third of that is dedicated to sour cherries.
Stephanie Alexander in her book the Cooks Companion goes on to say...
'Cherries are an ancient fruit and originated in south-eastern Europe and western Asia. There are still many cherry recipes that are closely linked to these areas, especially from Russia, Hungary, Turkey and Germany, the latter of which is home to the fabulous Black Forest cake. Kirsch and many other cherry liqueurs are also produced in central and eastern Europe. European cherry recipes are all intended for the sour cherry, which develops far greater complexity and depth of flavour than a sweet cherry when cooked. Inevitably, sweet cherries will have to be substituted most of the time.'
Well, perhaps it's not inevitable if you have a source for sour cherries, as even supermarkets carry jars of sour cherries these days, usually labeled as Morello cherries, which can be used in place of fresh cherries when they are no longer in season. If you like rhubarb you will certainly like this slice, which is my entry to Weekend Herb Blogging, this week hosted by the wonderful originator, Kalyn of Kalyn's Kitchen.
DOROTA’S SOUR CHERRY SLICE
1 cup sugar
3 cups plain flour sifted
2 teaspoons baking powder
250 g butter
5 egg yolks
3 tablespoons sour cream
1 litre jar sour cherries
Topping
5 egg whites
1 cup icing sugar
4 rounded tablespoons vanilla custard powder
In a large bowl mix flour and baking powder, cut butter into small pieces and rub into flour with fingertips, until flour looks like coarse sand. Add sugar, sour cream and egg yolks, and mix until dough forms, do not over mix. Divide dough into ¾ and ¼ pieces, wrap in plastic. Put ¾ piece in fridge and ¼ piece in freezer for at least a ½ hour. In a baking dish 38 cm x 26 cm place ¾ piece of dough and with your hands, push the dough to cover the bottom of the dish. Drain sour cherries and put them on the dough.
Whisk eggwhites until soft peaks form, then slowly whisk in the icing sugar, then the custard powder. Pour this mixture over the sour cherries and level. Take ¼ piece of dough and grate evenly over topping. Bake in 170 c oven for 50 minutes.
Just in an aside, the leftover juice from the jar of sour cherries makes a refreshing drink, more so with a shot of vodka, a cook's bonus if you like.
Labels: sour cherry slice, Weekend Herb Blogging
Thursday, February 08, 2007
A Grate Adventure
Being married to someone from another country other than your own has huge advantages on the culinary front. It means that you are exposed to many other dishes that in the normal course of events you may never try. Before I met my wife D, there was not a single Polish dish I had tried.
Now there are plenty of Polish dishes that I have grown to love and happily eat over and over again. It seems to me that Polish people love their food, more so than most other Eastern European countries and I can't think of a single country that loves sausage (keilbasa) as much as the Poles, who have raised their making and consumption to an art form. The array of smoked porky bits stuffed in intestines is mind boggling and you had better be paying attention when you are told the names of each sausage.
In one shop, Wisla, that used to be in Chapel Street, Prahran we regularly bought sausages. One time I saw some frankfurters and ordered them and looked away to find something else to purchase. When I got home and unwrapped my frankfurters I was shocked to see they had given me another sausage instead. When I returned to the shop they told me that they had indeed given me frankfurters and what I wanted was called another name. It was no loss really because their frankfurters were fabulous.
Funnily enough later on when I was shopping at The Polish shop in Queen Victoria Market I saw the same sausage and asked for some frankfurters and they tried to give me what was really a frankfurter. I should have realised that The Polish Shop is a bit more Australianized!
But along with their meat, Polish people lurrrve potatoes, in the same way Asians love their rice; no meal is complete without them. Mostly they are plainly boiled, thank goodness, but when D is a little homesick there is one potato dish she invariably makes, placki (pronounced plach-key). It comes from a whole line of grated and fried potato dishes common to most of Europe which includes latkes (Jewish), kartoffelpuffers (German), rosti (Swiss) and rarakor (Swedish).
The particular version D makes calls for finely grated potatoes with none of the potato liquid poured off, it's a very wet mix. This produces a flat pancake with crispy, lacy edges that are impossible to resist. It's not the sort of dish for making and serving at the table, it's the kind of thing that you all need to be standing in the kitchen, family style, and eat them as soon as you can handle one hot from the oil. D likes hers with a dollop of sour cream, me, I prefer the pepper mill, our daughter M eats them plain. But whatever you put, keep it simple. We also never serve anything else with them, try them and you'll see why!
Placki
1 kg (2.2 lb) white, starchy potatoes
2 eggs
2 tablespoons flour
salt
oil
Peel and finely grate the potatoes into a large bowl, keeping all their juices. Add the eggs, flour and salt to taste and beat in, the mixture will be very loose. Place a heavy or cast iron frypan on the stove and turn the heat to high. When the frypan is hot add a layer of oil to cover the frypan well. Place large spoons of potato mixture evenly in the pan and fry on high heat until browned, then turn over and fry the other side till brown. Remove and drain on paper towels. Repeat with the rest of the mixture, adding more oil when necessary. Serve with sour cream and some fresh ground black pepper. Eat until full.
This is my entry to Weekend Herb Blogging, this week hosted by Kalyn from Kalyn's Kitchen. Unlike last time when I couldn't decide which vegetable to nominate, this week it's potatoes which are probably not served in any South Beach diet approved way! But it is vegetarian, though not vegan.
Now there are plenty of Polish dishes that I have grown to love and happily eat over and over again. It seems to me that Polish people love their food, more so than most other Eastern European countries and I can't think of a single country that loves sausage (keilbasa) as much as the Poles, who have raised their making and consumption to an art form. The array of smoked porky bits stuffed in intestines is mind boggling and you had better be paying attention when you are told the names of each sausage.
In one shop, Wisla, that used to be in Chapel Street, Prahran we regularly bought sausages. One time I saw some frankfurters and ordered them and looked away to find something else to purchase. When I got home and unwrapped my frankfurters I was shocked to see they had given me another sausage instead. When I returned to the shop they told me that they had indeed given me frankfurters and what I wanted was called another name. It was no loss really because their frankfurters were fabulous.
Funnily enough later on when I was shopping at The Polish shop in Queen Victoria Market I saw the same sausage and asked for some frankfurters and they tried to give me what was really a frankfurter. I should have realised that The Polish Shop is a bit more Australianized!
But along with their meat, Polish people lurrrve potatoes, in the same way Asians love their rice; no meal is complete without them. Mostly they are plainly boiled, thank goodness, but when D is a little homesick there is one potato dish she invariably makes, placki (pronounced plach-key). It comes from a whole line of grated and fried potato dishes common to most of Europe which includes latkes (Jewish), kartoffelpuffers (German), rosti (Swiss) and rarakor (Swedish).
The particular version D makes calls for finely grated potatoes with none of the potato liquid poured off, it's a very wet mix. This produces a flat pancake with crispy, lacy edges that are impossible to resist. It's not the sort of dish for making and serving at the table, it's the kind of thing that you all need to be standing in the kitchen, family style, and eat them as soon as you can handle one hot from the oil. D likes hers with a dollop of sour cream, me, I prefer the pepper mill, our daughter M eats them plain. But whatever you put, keep it simple. We also never serve anything else with them, try them and you'll see why!
Placki
1 kg (2.2 lb) white, starchy potatoes
2 eggs
2 tablespoons flour
salt
oil
Peel and finely grate the potatoes into a large bowl, keeping all their juices. Add the eggs, flour and salt to taste and beat in, the mixture will be very loose. Place a heavy or cast iron frypan on the stove and turn the heat to high. When the frypan is hot add a layer of oil to cover the frypan well. Place large spoons of potato mixture evenly in the pan and fry on high heat until browned, then turn over and fry the other side till brown. Remove and drain on paper towels. Repeat with the rest of the mixture, adding more oil when necessary. Serve with sour cream and some fresh ground black pepper. Eat until full.
This is my entry to Weekend Herb Blogging, this week hosted by Kalyn from Kalyn's Kitchen. Unlike last time when I couldn't decide which vegetable to nominate, this week it's potatoes which are probably not served in any South Beach diet approved way! But it is vegetarian, though not vegan.
Labels: placki, Polish, Weekend Herb Blogging
