Aromatherapy

It all began innocently enough, mystery fruit appearing on my desk one fateful Monday morning.  They were clearly labeled with pink post-it notes (my favorite) denoting the specific types of citrus.  Much like Alice discovering the bottle marked “drink me”, I was intrigued by the display.  The first was a sweet lime with no acid, the second a sour orange and the third was also marked as an orange with bergamot flavor. 

My friend Sara had clearly been out shopping again.  She is as much a foodie as I am,  and is always bringing new and interesting items into the office from Union Square Farmer’s market or Dean and Deluca.  These fruits happened to be from the latter and she thought I would be interested in trying them.  Indeed!  I have been on my winter citrus kick for some time now and this is exactly what I needed to shake things up a bit. 

The fruit were a perfect solution to the conundrum of what kind of birthday cake to make for Izabella and Jonathan.  They share the same birthday week in March, and every year I try to think of something new and fun and different to make for them, especially since they are such dear friends.  Now, I always hate cramming two celebrations into one, but it’s hard to pull off two fantastic birthday cakes in one week with my hectic schedule, so when I saw the strange and wonderful fruit on my desk I felt inspired to do some testing and create one fabulous cake for two fabulous people.

My main inspiration came from the bergamot.  Scratching the surface of its yellow flesh yields a slight grapefruit scent, somehow deeper and more bitterly fragrant; something I couldn’t quite put my finger on but I knew instantly that I loved it.  I decided right then and there to do a bergamot infused cake for my friends with some type of curd filling and a lovely buttercream on the outside.

I headed over to Dean and Deluca to look around and see what I could find.  Their citrus selection is ridiculous, in a good way.  Actually, their selection of everything is ridiculous, and not necessarily cheap either.  Any sort of gourmet item you may be looking for lives just beyond their front door in well-lit display cases full of treasures.  Cheeses, breads, specialty baking and cooking items line the walls in a most welcoming fashion, calling you to spend tons of money in order to surround yourself with food related luxury…and it works.  I can never get out of there without going a little nuts.

As far as the fruit goes, you name it, it was there.  I wandered around and around looking for bergamot, but didn’t see it labeled anywhere.  I saw a grouping of unmarked fruit with the guise of lemons and low and behold it was they.  All I had to do was scratch the peel with my nail, and the bitter, musky scented oils clang to my finger as if in a tender embrace.  I asked the gentleman working the fruit counter to be sure my nose was correct and he assured me I was.  Then he threw me for a loop and asked with a slight Italian accent, “what are you going to do with those?”  I responded with my desire to use them in cake, to which he nodded in approval and said that it was a good idea.  The man said most people don’t know what to do with them, but infusing dessert was an excellent idea.  Apparently he was from Calabria, Italy and this is the region of Italy where most bergamot is grown, the coast along the toe of the “boot”.  I thought it a rather strange coincidence, but also a happy one.  He went on to tell me how bergamot was a very common fragrance component to cologne and candles from the 1970’s and that as an essential oil it is still in great use today.

Who would have thought the fruit guy would have so much knowledge about the random item I was looking for, but it was very exciting to me and made me want to learn more.  After he made the comment about candles and cologne the scent clicked with me, you know, one of those strong sense memory moments from a time gone by.  I’m sure I’ve smelled it many times not realizing what the fragrance was.  Upon further research I discovered bergamot has been in use much longer than the 1970’s.  Bergamot was an original scent component of Eau de Cologne created by Italian chemists in Germany during the 17th century and is still found in about half of all women’s perfumes as well as one third of men’s colognes…aromatherapy at its best. 

My favorite part of the research led me to a paper on herbal remedies in Calabria.  The paper focused mostly on folk cures for the “evil eye”, which I found hilarious, but when bergamot wasn’t lifting curses off desperate housewives it was employed as an aid in treating both malaria and depression.  Additionally, it’s a main component in Earl Grey Tea.  This fruit seems to have a long history of uses and I only happily discovered it by accident on my desk in March of 2011.  It goes to show you how many unknown treats are out there waiting to be discovered.

So there I was, back at the fruit stand, picking up my bergamot, when the idea for a curd filling hit me.  Originally I thought I would use all bergamot to flavor the cake, but after having tasted the fruit and smelling the zest I began to think it might be too much.  I also thought that I needed a color contrast to liven up the cake’s appearance a bit.  Blood oranges were sitting casually, not too far from the bergamot and I began to think about the blood red flesh and juice inside.  Though they definitely taste of orange, the natural red color could really add a saturated punch to citrus curd and make it stand up and shout.  So I bought some of those too as well as a couple of sour Seville oranges to mix in.  My plan was coming together.

The last component was the outer look of the cake.  Here again I have to thank Sara.  She had sent me a link to a blog featuring a citrus related cake, and on top of each slice were slivers of candied lemon.  This got me thinking about a bigger concept.  What would a cake look like completely covered in candied fruit?  I was about to find out.  So I bought several extra bergamot and blood oranges and left Dean and Deluca feeling prepared for cake creation.

The precious weekend rolled around and I was flustered.  In my former life, I was used to having long stretches of time to devote to baking or other activities, but now with little Miss Siena in the mix I’m learning to moderate my tasks and break things down into manageable parts.  Not a bad thing, really, and something I could certainly apply to the rest of my life instead of continually trying to bite off more than I can chew with the time I’m given.  Plus our friend’s David and Jack were coming up that weekend to meet our daughter and have a little getaway of their own.  My plan had been to start experimenting Friday evening with candied fruit, but as per usual I came home late from a busy day and couldn’t be bothered to do more than watch mindless reality television.  It would have to wait.

Saturday dawned, our guests arrived and we went off for a visit to one of our favorite little towns, Cold Spring.  I’ve mentioned it in the blog before and am never hesitant to tell people to “go there” for a fun time, especially if you like good food and antiques.  The Main street is lined with tons and tons of cute shops, eateries, bakeries, antiques and every sweet little thing your heart can imagine wrapped up in a pretty New England village package.  Every time we go there I discover something new.  This time it was a section of town beyond the railroad tracks, out along the Hudson River where there was a lovely promenade and a restaurant called the Hudson House.  We decided to pop in and see what they might offer for lunch.  It was quiet, charming, care-worn in appearance and was empty enough to feel baby friendly at that hour of the day.

We strolled in and had a fantastic lunch, but the insane discovery for me was the popovers.  I have never made popovers, but have seen Martha Stewart do it a number of times on her holiday specials.  I know you need a hot oven and a hot popover pan.  I don’t own a specific pan for this (I know many of you are gasping in surprise), but if I did, I would certainly try to create these little pockets of steamy goodness.  I can only recall having them at one other restaurant on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, aptly named the Popover Café, near Brian and my first apartment together.  These popovers were as beautiful, light and flakey, as the one’s I remember enjoying from so many years ago, and were accompanied by delicious honey/strawberry butter.

After a little nosh, we hit a few antiques shops rather quickly as it was late in the day and everything seemed to close down by 5:00pm.  Working my way through tiny, overflowing booths and isles with a stroller is a new feat, but I think we managed just fine and Siena is able to “say” she has now been antique-ing with her dads (something I’m sure she desperately wanted to do).

We returned home exhausted from all that shopping and eating, but it was time to candy some fruit.  I put David and Jack to work perusing cookbooks (to assuage my gilt of being a neglectful host) as a fun distraction while I began slicing fruit on the mandolin.  I sliced up three large bergamot and one blood orange to boil and then cook in simple syrup…a one to one ratio of sugar to water.  The basic Candied Fruit recipe can be found by clicking this link.

The fruit cooks for about an hour, simmering in syrup until they become translucent.  After they are done, lay them out on parchment-lined sheets to cool.  They will be quite sticky, but the sticky-ness factor (I learned) will aid you when it comes time to decorate the cake.  The slices will keep in an airtight container until you are ready to use them, but since I was using them the next day I kept them on the sheet pans covered in plastic wrap overnight.  Candying the fruit makes the entire slice edible, rind and all, and intensifies the flavor something fierce.  The perfume-like fragrance and taste of the bergamot was strong.  I recommend only eating a few slices at a time or it might feel like you are downing a pint of perfume…not something I would try at home.

It was important to get the fruit done in advance so I could focus on the cake Sunday morning.  I got up bright and early with Siena.  Who needs an alarm clock when you have a 9 week old?  After she ate breakfast and chatted with me about all her hopes, dreams and favorite flavors of milk, she took a nap and I began to work on the cake.  I found The Whiteout Cake recipe in Baked: New Frontiers in Baking (the first cookbook from Baked Bakery in Brooklyn)and began to prep my pans and get the ingredients ready.  I suddenly felt like I was back in pastry school, trying to mise en place as quickly as possible, get the pans ready and be done with everything before the teacher moved onto the next step.  Baking with a baby is sort of a race to see who will get done first.  Will I get the cakes in the oven before she wakes up???  Luckily, yes I did…and she didn’t even wake up when I turned on the Kitchen Aid.  Now that’s a good baby!

The Whiteout Cake (from Baked: New Frontiers in Baking)

2 1/2 cups cake flour

3/4-cup all-purpose flour

1-tablespoon baking powder

1-teaspoon baking soda

3/4-teaspoon salt

Zest of 1 bergamot (my addition)

1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened

1/2 cup vegetable shortening

1 3/4 cups sugar

1-tablespoon pure vanilla extract

1 large egg

1 1/2 cups ice cold water

3 large egg whites, at room temperature

1/4-teaspoon cream of tartar

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.  Butter three 8-inch round cake pans, line the bottoms with parchment paper, and butter the parchment.  Dust with flour, and knock out the excess flour.

Sift the flours, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together into a large bowl.  Add zest.  Set aside.

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter and shortening on medium speed until creamy, 3 to 4 minutes.  Add the sugar and vanilla and beat on medium speed until fluffy, about 3 minutes.  Scrape down the bowl, add the egg, and beat until just combined.  Turn the mixer to low.  Add the flour mixture, alternating with the ice water, in three separate additions, beginning and ending with the flour mixture.  Scrape down the bowl, and then mix on low speed for a few more seconds.

In a medium bowl, whisk the egg whites and cream of tartar until soft peaks form.  Do not overbeat.  Gently fold the egg whites into the batter.

Divide the batter among the prepared pans and smooth the tops.  Bake for 40 to 45 minutes, rotating the pans halfway through the baking time, until a toothpick inserted in the center of each cake comes out clean.  Transfer the cakes to a wire rack and let cool for 20 minutes.  Invert the cakes onto the rack, remove the pans, and let cool completely.  Remove the parchment.

While the cakes were baking I began to make the curd.  I love curd.  I’ve said it a million times and I’ll say it a million and one, it’s probably one of the best things I’ve ever eaten.  Lemon, lime, grapefruit...who cares…I love them all, and blood orange curd is my newest favorite.  I used Martha Stewart’s basic lemon curd recipe from her Baking Handbook as my base, and just changed out the juices and zest I was using.  My version is as follows:

Marty’s Blood Orange Curd (based on Martha Stewart’s lemon curd)

8 large egg yolks

1/2 cup freshly squeezed juice from 2 blood oranges, 1 Seville orange and 1 bergamot

Finely grated zest of 2 blood oranges

1-cup sugar

1/8-teaspoon salt

1 1/4 sticks (10 tablespoons) unsalted butter, cold, cut into pieces

Combine yolks, orange zest, juice, and sugar in a heavy-bottom saucepan; whisk to combine.  Cook over medium-high heat, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon (be sure to scrape the sides of the pan), until the mixture is thick enough to coat the back of the spoon, 8 to 10 minutes, and registers 160 degrees on an n instant-read thermometer.

Remove saucepan from heat.  Add salt and butter, one piece at a time, stirring until smooth.  Strain through a fine sieve into a medium bowl.  Cover with plastic wrap, pressing it directly onto the surface of the curd to prevent a skin from forming.  Refrigerate until chilled and set, at least 1 hour or up to 1 day.

The color is stunning.  It had a lovely, luscious red-orange hue that looked perfect sandwiched in between the layers of pale yellow, bergamot-scented white cake.  All that was left was the Swiss Meringue Buttercream.  By this time Siena was up and running once more, maybe because she too will come to love buttercream and was eager to find out how to make it.  Brian was good enough to entertain her and our houseguests while I finished up the cake. 

Assembly is the fun part, the time when the creation really comes together and you either wind up with a masterpiece or a mess.  In this instance I think it came out beautifully.  I trimmed the “bubble” top on the cakes to make them level, layered on the blood orange curd and did a smooth coat of buttercream on the outside before letting it chill in the fridge for 15 minutes (this allows the frosting to set up for the next coat.)  After an additional smooth coat of buttercream, I began placing the candied fruit on the cake in a decorative pattern.  The blood orange slices made a nice trim along the bottom while the bergamot resembled the petals of a flower all along the top and reminded me of the spring days so close around the corner.  I say, if the crocuses are blooming in the garden then it’s the perfect time to bake this candied fruit/floral cake, and we all devoured about half of it that evening.  I admit the cake was a bit more time consuming than I had planned on, but when you are creating something you love it tends to be the case.  There is no point in making mediocre cake, or any other product for that matter. 

The following week brought about St. Patrick’s Day once more.  A new project ramped up at work leaving me little time for anything else, including any green desserts.  If I were honest with myself, and I usually am, I have to say it didn’t pain me much to miss out on making anything for the “holiday” itself, primarily because I don’t do anything for it other than stay out of the way of drunken teenagers on the commuter train.  I don’t recall it being quite like that when I was growing up, but maybe I was oblivious, joyfully chasing rainbows on my unicorn, running through fields of four-leaf clover…or maybe there wasn’t a large Irish Catholic community where I grew up.  Either way, it’s not one of my favorites.  That is not to say other people might not want a recipe for something warm a tasty on this special day.

The weekend after St. Pat’s, when things had settled down once more and I could collect my thoughts, I turned to my cookbook collection for inspiration.  Part of me wanted to create something outrageous and green to honor the color spirit of March 17th, but the other side of me who really wanted to relax and spend time with my family wasn’t up for another lengthy weekend of baking.  I’m learning my limits.  I was keen on making the traditional Irish Soda Bread I baked last year for this blog, but I’m not a big fan of repeating recipes.  I’m the same way with weeknight meals: not a fan of repeats.  What interests me is continuing to try new things, the creative spark of trying a recipe I’ve never made before, so I went in search of something different.

With my time constraints I looked to find something pretty yet fairly speedy to make and something that could tie in with dinner in some way (killing two birds with one stone).  I rarely do anything savory because of my horrible sweet tooth, but bread seemed like a good way to go (and I was also desperately craving carbs).  I turned Jim Lahey’s My Bread for inspiration.  I have done a couple of his breads before and they always come out great.  The fact that you can mix the ingredients in a bowl, cover it and walk away for 12-18 hours while it proofs is very appealing to this workaholic/new dad.  And low and behold, what did I find??? 

Jim’s Irish Brown Bread

2 1/4 cups bread flour

3/4-cup whole-wheat flour

1-teaspoon salt

1-tablespoon wheat bran

1/4 teaspoon instant or other active dry yeast

3/4 cup Guinness stout, at room temperature (about 72 degrees)

3/4-cup well-shaken buttermilk, at room temperature

Additional wheat bran or flour for dusting

In a medium bowl, stir together the flours, salt, wheat bran, and yeast.  Add the beer and buttermilk and, using a wooden spoon or your hands, mix until you have a wet, sticky dough, about 30 seconds.  Cover the bowl and let sit at room temperature until the surface is dotted with bubbles and the dough is more than doubled in size, 12 to 18 hours.

When the first rise is complete, generously dust a work surface with flour.  Use a bowl scraper or rubber spatula to scrape the dough out of the bowl in one piece.  Using lightly floured hands or a bowl scraper, lift the edges of the dough in toward the center.  Nudge and tuck in the edges of the dough to make it round.

Place a tea towel on your work surface and generously dust it with wheat bran or flour.  Gently place the dough on the towel, seam side down.  If the dough is tacky, dust the top lightly with wheat bran or flour.  Fold the ends of the tea towel loosely over the dough to cover it and place it in a warm, draft-free spot to rise for 1 to 2 hours.  The dough is ready when it is almost doubled.  If you gently poke it with your finger, it should hold the impression.  If it springs back, let it rise for another 15 minutes.

Half an hour before the end of the second rise, preheat the oven to 475 degrees, with a rack in the lower third, and place a covered 4 1/2 to 5 1/2 quart heavy pot in the center of the rack.

Using potholders, carefully remove the preheated pot from the oven and uncover it.  Unfold the tea towel and quickly but gently invert the dough into the pot, seem side up.  (Use caution—the pot will be very hot.)  Cover the pot and bake for 30 minutes.

Remove the lid and continue baking until the bread is a deep chestnut color but not burnt, 20 to 30 minutes more.  Use a heatproof spatula or potholders to lift the bread out of the pot and place it on a rack to cool thoroughly.

Variation:  Add 1 1/4 cups currants to the flour mixture in Step 1.  Increase the amounts of Guinness and buttermilk to 1 cup each.

Jim's bread is a variation on Irish Soda Bread, minus the soda.  It has wheat bran, wheat flour and bread flour.  To be honest it’s a beautiful crusty brown bread that doesn’t resemble soda bread in its flavor profile, but I was game.  It doesn’t call for caraway seeds, what I believe to be the key to the traditional recipe, but does mention adding currants as a variation to add a little sweetness to this otherwise slightly salty, rustic bread.  In place of the baking soda is yeast, a smell I’ve come to adore.  After the dough has risen and you punch it down for the first time, releasing that fragrant bread-like smell, is when you know you are onto something special.  The other undoubtedly Irish ingredient in this bread is Guinness beer.  The malt taste hangs out on the back of your tongue, bringing a depth to the bread it would otherwise be missing.

To me, this bread is elevated peasant food.  Something to serve with cabbage and potatoes or corned beef, but also raises up a basic weeknight soup from its usual doldrums.  I found a recipe for a Spring Vegetable Bread Soup in the April 2011 issue of Everyday Food.  The brown bread was the perfect playmate for the lovely green peas, onions and zucchini, but was also wonderful on it’s own with some salted butter.

Any of Jim’s breads are a quick and easy solution to having fresh bread every week.  All you need is a sturdy cast iron pot with a tight lid, one that is oven safe, to do all the baking.  The hot pot simulates the process of wood firing in some magical/scientific way, giving you gorgeous crusty bread from your regular old oven.  There is something so comforting about the yeasty smell floating through the house.  It makes me think of grandma in the kitchen and all the favorite bakeries I’ve ever walked into.  And the look is stunning.  A loaf of fresh bread stands on it’s own, photographs beautifully (in my opinion) and is the epitome of home cooking. 

Now I sit on the train, heading to work once more.  It’s Friday and is time to start thinking about my baby/baking weekend…not baking the baby, of course.  It’s the time when I let myself begin to switch gears from the non-stop thinking and planning of the busy workweek to my relaxing downtime with family and friends.  With April swiftly approaching and a couple of “teaser” warm days in March, my brain is wandering to the tender leafed greens and soft yellow daffodils peeking out of the ground.  If there isn’t inspiration to be found out in the blooming garden, then I don’t know where to look.

As per usual since Siena came to us we will be having visitors over the weekend.  We have had more people in the last 10 weeks come to our house than the near four years Brian and I have lived there.  I guess that’s what a baby does, she draws people to you with her wily baby charms, and then if you are me, you ply your friends and family with baked goods and hope they want to come back for more.  It’s just who I am.