Polvorones

One of the things I love about this time of year, is I get to do a lot of baking.  Granted, nothing is really stopping me the rest of the year, except my fear of ballooning out to Paul Prudhomme size.  During the holidays, there are tons of opportunities for unloading baked goods in cookie exchanges, as impromptu gifts, at potlucks etc.  This year, I decided to reacquaint myself with the tasty but simple polvorones, or what are more commonly known as, Mexican Wedding Cookies.  I am not sure why they are called that.  I've been to plenty of Mexican weddings in my lifetime, and can't think of a single occasion where these were served.  Growing up, I remember eating, and baking them, mostly during the holidays.

If you have never had them, polvorones are sort of like a nutty shortbread cookie.  They are always made with ground nuts, usually pecans, but sometimes walnuts or almonds.  They are either round or crescent shaped, and they are usually rolled in powdered sugar.  When done right, they are melt in your mouth tender, not too sweet, and very nutty. 

I've made these many many times in the past, but it has been at least 10 years since the last time I made them.  I needed to dig up a recipe.  I found a promising one on Saveur magazine's website.  I liked it, because it had less sugar than many of the other recipes I was seeing, and I know that magazine strives for authenticity.

I baked up a batch and had forgotten how ridiculously easy these things are to make.  Dangerously easy.  It was literally 15 minutes from digging the mixing bowl out to putting them in the oven.  

Here's my version of their recipe.  The only modification I made was to add salt, which I was really surprised to not see in their ingredients list.  I tried doubling and then quadrupling this recipe and had no problems, which makes it great for holiday baking.  

Mexican Wedding Cookies (Polvorones)

1⁄4 lb. butter
2 tbsp. confectioners' sugar
1/4 tsp. salt

1⁄2 tsp. vanilla
1 cup sifted all-purpose flour
1 cup finely ground walnuts or pecans

Additional confectioner's sugar for coating the cookies

1. Preheat oven to 375°. Cream butter until fluffy. Add confectioners' sugar, salt and vanilla. Beat for 1–2 minutes. Gradually beat in flour. Stir in nuts.

2. Shape dough into 1" balls, using about 1 tbsp. of dough for each. Place 1" apart on an ungreased cookie sheet and bake 15 minutes, turning sheet so that cookies bake lightly and evenly. Transfer to a rack, allow to cool, and roll in confectioners' sugar.

Makes about 2 dozen cookies.

A few illustrated notes on the process.

You may be able to find ground nuts in the bulk section of your meglomart, but I prefer to grind my own in a food processor.  I like the texture to be a little less uniform than the stuff you find commercially.

You need to be gentle when rolling these cookies in the powdered sugar, as they can be quite delicate.  

I made a second batch of these, and did some experimenting.  I added about 1/4 tsp. of ground cinnamon to the dough, and also tried three different coatings:  

• A mixture of half powdered sugar, half cocoa powder
• a basic cinnamon sugar
• 1 cup of powdered sugar with 1 tsp. garham masala

We tasted these variations, and the cinnamon sugar was a definite winner, with the garham masala a close second.  The cocoa powder combo was good, but the chocolate sort of covered up the subtle nutty taste of the cookies too much.

A few recipes from Thanksgiving 2011

I haven't posted anything in quite a while.  My kids, job, and yes, I'll admit it, my TV have kept me busy lately.  This Thanksgiving I tried a few different things, and thought I'd pass the recipes along.

For the first time, I tried a soup as a first course instead of salad.  The soup I made is a Mexican classic called Crema de Elote.  It is a simple but elegant soup made from corn and milk, often garnished with roasted poblano pepper.  The recipe I typically follow is by Rick Bayless from his Authentic Mexican cookbook.

Here's the original recipe:


Crema de Elote - Fresh Corn Chowder with Roasted Peppers


Ingredients:
3 large ears of fresh corn or 1 1lb. bag of frozen corn, defrosted.
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 medium onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 1/2 tablespoons cornstarch
2 cups milk
2 fresh poblano chiles, roasted, peeled, seeded and diced
1 cup Mexican crema or heavy cream
salt to taste, about 1 teaspoon
1/2 cup crumbled Mexican queso fresco
2 tablespoons chopped flat leaf parsley for garnish


Cut the kernels off the corn cobs, and place them in a blender jar, or if using frozen, just dump it into the blender jar.


Melt half the butter in a small skillet over medium heat.  Add the onion and cook until soft, 6 or 7 minutes, then add the garlic and cook one minute longer.  Add the onion mixture to the blender jar along with the cornstarch and 1/4 cup water.  Process until smooth, scraping down the jar as needed.


Melt the remaining butter in a large saucepan over medium heat.  add the corn puree and cook stirring constantly until very thick.  Whisk in the milk and simmer, partially covered, for 15 minutes, stirring frequently.


Strain the soup through a sieve.  Rinse out the pan.  Return the soup to the pan along with the poblano pepper and cream.  Season with salt and simmer over medium-low heat for 10 minutes stirring frequently adding a little milk if the soup seems too thick.


Ladle the soup into bowls and garnish with a tablespoon or two of the crumbled cheese and a little chopped parsley.


Serves 4.

I knew I'd be busy on Thanksgiving so I skipped a step or two from the recipe and cooked it in a slow cooker.  I also had to triple the recipe to accommodate the crowd I was serving.  I replaced 1/3 of the milk from the recipe with turkey broth, to lighten it up a little...and to use up some of the gallon or so of broth I had on hand.  To do the slow cooker version, I simply pureed the milk and broth right in the blender with the corn, strained the raw puree through a sieve, and cooked it along with the poblano pepper in the slow cooker for about 4 hours on medium.  Instead of adding the crema to the soup, I added a small dollop on top of each bowl of soup before topping with the cheese.  The poblano peppers wound up a little on the soft side after the long slow cooking, but it was still a hit.

I always make pumpkin pie plus one additional pie for dessert.  This year the second pie was pecan.  My family isn't crazy about it because it's usually too sweet.  I found a recipe for a piloncillo pecan pie on line, which I tried, with a small modification or two (one unintentional...forgot the flour), and it turned out great.  Here's my version.

PILONCILLO-PECAN-COFFEE TART

2 cups chopped pecans

• 8 peppercorns
• 4 cloves
• 1 (2-inch) cinnamon stick, preferably Mexican (canela)
• 4 1/2 ounces piloncillo chopped
• 1/2 cup Lyle's Golden Syrup
• 1/3 cup strong coffee
• 6 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 1 large egg
• Yolks of 2 large eggs
• 3 tablespoons half-and-half or cream
• Pinch salt
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract, preferably Mexican
• 1 (10-inch) tart shell, blind baked
• Ice cream, to serve

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. 

Toast the pecans on a cookie sheet for about 10 minutes, until fragrant.  Set aside to cool.

Bruise the peppercorns and the cloves, crushing them slightly with a pestle, then combine in a small saucepan with the cinnamon, piloncillo, corn syrup and coffee. Bring to a boil. Simmer about 10 minutes until the piloncillo is dissolved. Add the butter, in pieces. Set the mixture aside to cool, stirring occasionally so that the butter melts.  Strain the syrup to remove the chunky spices.

Beat the egg and yolks together. Add the cooled syrup to the eggs, along with the half-and-half, salt,  and vanilla. Stir to combine.

Spread the pecan pieces evenly across the bottom of the tart shell. Carefully pour the syrup over the nuts.  Place the tart on a baking sheet and bake about 35 minutes or until tart is set. Serve with ice cream or whipped cream.

Makes 10 to 12 servings.

A few more tidbits.  

Say what you will about Martha Stewart, the recipes she publishes are among the most reliable ones I've ever used.  She goes a little overboard with the gourds, wreaths, and ribbon, but in the recipe department, she never lets me down.  I've become quite fond of her recipe for pate brisee, which is now my go-to pie crust recipe.

Earlier this summer, I was looking for a whipped cream recipe that would be stable enough to sit around for an hour or two and came across a great recipe for a cream cheese whipped cream by Cooks Illustrated. You'll need to be a member to follow that link, but basically you take 4 oz. of cream cheese, whip that with 1/3 cup of confectioners sugar a pinch of salt and a bit of vanilla, then add a cup of cream and whip to soft peaks.  It is nice and stable with a slight tang from the cream cheese.  I recommend it highly. 

You're not going to toss those are you?

I am a pretty frugal guy when it comes to food.  I am not quick to throw things away.  You know those "sell by" dates on dairy containers?  I largely ignore them and rely on my nose to tell me if my milk is still good to drink or not.  With cheese, I will cut off the mold, and use it.  However, when it comes to produce, I am a bit less frugal.  Who wants to eat a brown wilted piece of lettuce or a mushy old strawberry?  Life's too short for that.  However, there is one type of produce, that I will almost never chuck, no matter how nasty it looks, and that is bananas.

Although I hate eating over-ripe bananas out of hand, they are fantastic in baked goods.  When they are really ripe, their flavor comes through much more in breads and cakes.  My favorite use for them is as the base for a tasty muffin.

The recipe I use evolved from a recipe that appears in Beth Hensperger's book The Bread Bible.  Her version is a delicious, sweet muffin, with a slight kick of cinnamon, and a nice crunchy streusel topping.   I have made a few, very small, tweaks which change up the flavor a bit making a more unusual tasting end product.  To the streusel, I add about a 1/4 teaspoon of kosher salt, which gives the topping a slight salty taste, sort of reminiscent of a salted caramel.  To the batter, I nix the cinnamon, and add some ground cardamom instead.  If you are not familiar with it, cardamom is a spice that is quite popular in Indian cooking.  I love what it does to sweets.

I baked up a batch this evening using some bananas that were a day or two past their prime, having lost their ability to hold their shape.  The recipe is pretty simple.  I made them with the help of my five year old daughter, which turned a 30 minute process into something closer to an hour, but cooking with your kids is important.

The first thing you need to do is make a streusel topping, which is just some flour, sugar, butter, and the  kosher salt, which are combined with a pastry blender, until the butter is completely incorporated and the mixture resembles moist sand.

Next you mash up your bananas, which with bananas as old as these, goes pretty quick.  Don't mash them down too far.  You should still see a few small chunks of banana.

Next you combine some eggs, oil, and sugar with a whisk, until the mixture is pale yellow in color.  You want to take some time with this step, to work some air into the mixture, which makes for a nice puffy muffin.

Then you add in your bananas, and your dry ingredients.

Scoop the batter into a greased muffin pan (an ice cream scooper works really well for that task), top the muffins with the streusel topping, and they are ready for the oven.

Bake until golden brown and a cake tester (who has one of those?) or a toothpick comes out clean.

Banana Muffins

1 cup sugar

1/2 cup vegetable oil (I like peanut)

2 eggs

1 1/3 cups (3 medium) mashed very ripe bananas

2 cups unbleached all purpose flour

1 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp. baking soda

1/4 tsp. ground cardamom

1/4 tsp. table salt

3/4 cup chopped pecans or walnuts

1/4 cup shredded coconut (optional but tasty)

Streusel Topping

1/2 cup sugar

1/3 cup unbleached all purpose flour

4 tbsp. chilled unsalted butter

1/4 - 1/3 tsp. kosher salt (I just add a hefty pinch, but for the recipe I've measured how much I pick up in a pinch, and it is a bit over 1/4 tsp.)

1. Prepare the streusel:  Combine the sugar, salt, and flour, then using a pastry blender or your fingers, work in the butter until coarse crumbs are formed.  Set aside.
2. Using a whisk, beat the sugar, oil, and eggs until light and foamy.  Add the mashed bananas and mix until incorporated.
3. In a separate bowl combine the dry ingredients, and the nuts.  Add the banana mixture, an stir with a spatula until just moistened.
4. Spoon into greased muffin cups, filling them about 3/4 of the way to the top.  Top each with a tablespoon or so of the streusel topping.  Be generous, but you may still have extra topping.  If you do, wad what is left into a ball and eat that now.
5. Bake in a preheated 375 degree oven for 20 - 25 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out clean.
6. Cool muffins for 5 minutes in the pan, then transfer them to a rack to cool.  

Makes 10 - 12 muffins.

Bella helping with cleanup.

Enjoy.