Endurance Chocolate Truffle Tartlets

The Feb. 21th recipe for Tuesdays with Dorie is Chocolate Truffle Tartlets starting on page 382 of Baking with Julia (see http://www.goodeatsblog.com/ for the full recipe or refer to the cookbook).

To learn more about Tuesdays with Dorie and links to the blogs of my fellow bakers: http://tuesdayswithdorie.wordpress.com/

Ohmigod, I'm exhausted. This recipe is a lot of work, especially when you have a weekend full of plans, laundry, a baby, a husband and um... a life! I got up before my three month old on a Saturday to make dough by hand. If that isn't dedication to Tuesdays with Dorie, I don't know what is!

This is my beautiful chocolate dough, in my lovely little tartlet pans that some family members bought me for my wedding shower (thanks family!)

Due to my love for said tartlet pans, I was a little too gentle poking holes in the dough with my plastic fork (there was no way I was scratching up my pretty little pans!!). So some of my shells turned out bumpy like this:

Here is a hole I poked in one to check the extent of my error. Darn, this tart will have to be for me to eat.

Oh well, must push on. In a frantic rush between church and a ladies lunch date (where hungry girls expected these tarts for dessert) I made the filling of egg yolks and dark chocolate with milk chocolate, white chocolate, and biscotti chunks. Mmmm. Notice how big the biscotti chunks are. This a no-no if you want a smooth, sophisticated looking tart. At this point I was happy with sufficient and edible.

At the dough step I had extra dough. Now if you think I'm going to get up at 5 am on a Saturday and make dough just to throw some of it out, you are insane. I made two more shells using fancy little quiche pans also gifted to me at my wedding shower by members of my family (thanks again family!). Also I had extra filling, so that ended up in some ramekins my sister bought me for my birthday. My family keeps Williams Sonoma in business.

Done! The tartlets give a respectable showing at the ladies lunch and when I arrive home I excitedly ask my chocoholic husband what he thinks about the tarts left for him. "Uh" he shrugs, "They were kinda dry. Not what I expected." The sad thing is I agreed with him, they were a little dry. Where was this velvety truffle texture I was fantasizing about?

After all that work and gauging the crowd response, this is what I've decided. These tartlets elicit ohhs, ahhs, and look oh so fancy. But if what you want is a seriously decadent chocolate hit, just make the filling with very good eggs, undercook it a bit in a ramekin, and put a big scoop of ice cream on top. Add other creamy, sugary vices as desired. And sleep in.

White Loaves and the Superbowl

The Feb. 7th recipe for Tuesdays with Dorie is White Loaves starting on page 81 of Baking with Julia (see http://someonekitchen.blogspot.com/ for the full recipe or refer to the cookbook).

To learn more about Tuesdays with Dorie and links to the blogs of my fellow bakers:http://tuesdayswithdorie.wordpress.com/

White Loves is a hurry-up-and-wait recipe, which the multi-tasker in me LOVES. No guilt for ignoring the laundry and other housework while I putter about in the kitchen because I can do both! The only day I was going to be home long enough (with my husband around to assist with babycare) was Superbowl Sunday. Luckily I don’t care a bit for football, but I love having a block of uninterrupted hours in the kitchen.

I was able to indulge in the ultimate of new mom luxuries (ie a nap) during the afternoon, so I didn’t start on the bread until a half hour before kickoff.

I started mixing the ingredients during the pre-game activities. Right after the national anthem, the mixer went on. I was impressed with how my well-loved Kitchen Aid handled the dough (see the Tuesdays with Dorie website for other mixers that didn’t fare as well) although I was surprised at how warm it was when mixing was done and I had to call my husband away from the game to remove my mixing bowl from the mixer base. This is a serious bread.

Before the first rise

After the first rise

During the first and second rises, I did all kinds of necessary tasks like:

cooked dinner, breastfed the baby, ate dinner, felt guilty the baby was watching so much football, cleaned the kitchen, breastfed again, put the baby to bed, peeked on facebook, previewed the next recipe (which looks much more complicated)

My rolled out dough

My lovely rolled-up dough

(the directions initially seemed daunting, but was much easier that expected)

Bread came out of the oven during the 4^th quarter, with

just over 7 minutes to go.

The finished product! Look at how pretty it is inside!

Mmm homemade bread with homemade jam.

This made me very happy when I ate it.

Next is Chocolate Truffle Tartlets, on pages 382-383. Tune in February 21st!