TWD: Snickery Squares

Well if you read my previous post you know that I had some issues with this recipe. It was definitely not the recipe's fault; I blame myself completely. Unfortunately, my issues didn't quite end with the initial dulce de leche fiasco.

I will say that the flavor of these squares are A-M-A-Z-I-N-G! They seriously might be one of the tastiest desserts I've ever eaten, and trust me I've eaten an embarassing amount of desserts in my 26 years! However, my creation is one of the ugliest things I've ever seen. I know the problem lies in the dulce de leche.

You see after my attempt at making the DDL failed, I relied on being able to find it in a store in Florence, SC (which is a good bit bigger than my hometown). Unfortunately the closest thing I could find was a caramel spread. I thought it may work because the first ingredient listed was sweetened condensed milk, so I though it may be close to DDL. I guess the difference was that this spread just refused to actually set up. So after cutting into squares the caramel/DDL substitute just ran everywhere (this was after being in the freezer for at least an hour). The two squares in the above picture just happened to not run as much as the others. So they definitely don't look as tasty as they actually are. Luckily I stopped cutting at about half the pan so I have some non-spread out squares to bring to work tomorrow.

For full disclosure (haha) here is a picture of the bars that I attempted to remove from the pan:

So anyway, I'm very happy that I completed the challenge. I'm quite pleased with the taste so I can guarantee that I will be trying this again by making my own dulce de leche using one of the recipes that the some of the other TWD bakers used!

Here's the recipe (I nearly forgot it):

Snickery Squares

For the Crust:
1 cup all-purpose flour
¼ cup sugar
2 TBSP powdered sugar
¼ tsp salt
1 stick unsalted butter, cut into small pieces and chilled
1 large egg yolk, lightly beaten

For the Filling:
½ cup sugar
3 TBSP water
1 ½ cups salted peanuts
About 1 ½ cups store-bought dulce de leche

For the Topping:
7 ounces bittersweet, coarsely chopped
½ stick unsalted butter, cut into 8 pieces, at room temperature

Getting Ready:
Preheat oven to 350F. Butter a 8 inch square pan and put it on a baking sheet.

To Make the Crust:
Toss the flour, sugar, powdered sugar and salt into a food processor and pulse a few times to combine. Toss in the pieces of cold butter and pulse about 12 times, until the mixture looks like coarse meal. Pour the yolk over the ingredients and pulse until the dough forms clumps and curds-stop before the dough comes together in a ball.Turn the dough into the buttered pan and gently press it evenly across the bottom of the pan. Prick the dough with a fork and slide the sheet into the oven.Bake the crust for 15-20 minutes, or until it takes on just a little color around the edges. Transfer the pan to a rack and cool to room temperature before filling.

To Make the Filling:
Have a parchment or silicone mat-lined baking sheet at the ready, as well as a long-handled wooden spoon and a medium heavy bottomed saucepan.Put the sugar and water in the saucepan and cook over medium-high heat, stirring, until the sugar dissolves. Keeping the heat fairly high, continue to cook the sugar, without stirring, until it just starts to color. Toss the peanuts and immediately start stirring. Keep stirring, to coat the peanuts with sugar. Within a few minutes, they will be covered with sugar and turn white—keep stirring until the sugar turns back into caramel. When the peanuts are coated with a nice deep amber caramel, remove the pan from the heat and turn the nuts out onto the baking sheet., using the wooden spoon to spread them out as best you can. Cool the nuts to room temperature.When they are cool enough to handle, separate the nuts or break them into small pieces. Divide the nuts in half. Keep half of the nuts whole or in biggish pieces for the filling, and finely chop the other half for the topping. Spread the dulce de leche over the shortbread base and sprinkle over the whole candied nuts.

To Make the Topping:
Melt the chocolate in a heatproof bowl set over a saucepan of barely simmering water. Remove chocolate from the heat and gently stir in the butter, stirring until it is fully blended into the chocolate.Pour the chocolate over the dulce de leche, smoothing it with a long metal icing spatula, then sprinkle over the rest of the peanuts. Slide the pan into the fridge to set the topping, about 20 minutes; if you’d like to serve the squares cold, keep them refrigerated for at least 3 hours before cutting.
Cut into 16 bars.

TWD: TBPS (Tuesday's With Dorie: To Be Posted Soon)

But first...a disaster of sorts (well, probably not really a disaster, just a mishap I guess)...

Why did I begin this challenge thinking that I was capable of tasks that Dorie obviously felt were too difficult to print in her cookbook. I mean her cookbook isn't your typical Betty Crocker type book to begin with. It does take some cooking knowledge and skill to turn out her recipes. I also think Dorie is awesome..I mean really awesome. Her recipes so far have been amazing. They turn out perfectly, and they are usually easy too cook.

But no...this time...I felt the need to challenge myself further. You see this week's challenge called for using dulce de leche, store bought dulce de leche for that matter. For some reason I immediately decided that I was better than dulce de leche; I was even better than the common method of making dulce de leche (boiling a can of sweetened condensed milk); I decided that I had to make the real deal dulce de leche. You see...I became a dulce de leche snob before I EVER TASTED IT!

My first excuse was that I couldn't find store bought dulce de leche in my tiny little town. Well that excuse went out the window when I went to Charleston on Sunday and HELD a jar of the stuff, but I put it back....the snobbery was growing. My next excuse was the fear of a can of sweetened condensed milk exploding, which was unfounded as well when I read that as long as the can stays covered in water there are really no worries. (There was also snobbery there too, I read somewhere that wasn't the real stuff). So truly I was out of excuses, but because I am a DDL snob it didn't really matter.

So I researched and found a recipe for DDL snobs! Basically you mix a heck of a lot of milk and sugar together with a little vanilla and sea salt and boil it for a few hours and it magically becomes DDL. So let's see, I start this beautiful mixture at around 6:30; I'm still reeling from my snobbery at this point and thinking how fabulous I am for challenging myself to the fullest. I'm even writing my post in my head about how great it was (and how awesome I am) to make my very own DDL sauce.

It is now 11:52 p.m. and this is what's left of my snobbery, my beautiful plans for my TWD post, and of course my dulce de leche...

What you see there is a pot soaking in my (probably a bit dirty) sink, with WHITE (note no caramelization) chunks of dried milk in it. So it goes without saying that Dorie should have no worries that the great Lori of Carolina Eats & Treats will soon take over her reign as queen of the baking world...at least the TWD baking world.

Oh well...tomorrow we go to a bit larger city than where I am now and I plan on actually purchasing a jar of DDL if I can actually hold another one in my hands! So stay tuned everybody because the crust is made, the peanuts are candied, and I will find the sauce to complete this challenge!

French Toast w/ Homemade French Bread

I mentioned in the post below that some serious motivation was required to make me complete the last Daring Baker challenge. I must admit that my sister was a big part of the motivation, but I also was motivated by the thought of a thick slice of homemade french toast. I experimented with an Allrecipes French Toast recipe on Christmas morning this year with some thick slices of Challah bread and it was great, but I envisioned that fresh French bread would make it amazing.

Usually my hubby is lucky if he gets breakfast at all on weekday mornings, so I think he was feeling especially fortunate when I told him that I was making a nice, hot breakfast on a weekday. So I got up early, ran my pitiful one mile, then came home and got the French toast going. It actually ended up being a really quick to cook so that part wasn't too bad.

The results were absolutely fabulous! I just dipped my hubby's toast in the egg mixture to make sure his wasn't soggy in the middle, but I soaked mine a little longer to get the flavor throughout. I think we were both quite pleased with the end result. I have to say though that the fresh French bread definitely made a difference. The slices were so thick and the bread soaked up the mixture like a sponge. YUM! If you are a French toast fan then you definitely need to try making it with French bread!

Here's the recipe:
From Allrecipes (2 servings)

INGREDIENTS
4 thick slices bread
2 eggs
1/4 cup and 3 tablespoons milk
1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon (optional)
1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg (optional)
3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract (optional)
salt to taste

I usually add a little powdered sugar to the mixture so you get a little caramelization on the outside of the bread

DIRECTIONS
Beat together egg, milk, salt, desired spices and vanilla.
Heat a lightly oiled griddle of skillet over medium-high flame.
Dunk each slice of bread in egg mixture, soaking both sides. Place in pan, and cook on both sides until golden. Serve hot. I spread some butter on each slice and of course smothered it in maple syrup!

February Daring Baker Challenge-French Bread

I nearly backed out of this challenge...I mean I came so close to backing out. Yes, I realize that is not very daring of me, but when I compared the size of my kitchen to the length of this recipe I was just not sure I could do it without losing my mind. Luckily my sister, of Whiskful, was kind enough to offer to do the challenge together. So keep in mind any pieces of kitchen you see in these pictures are of her beautiful kitchen, not my pitiful one! In the end I was quite happy that I chose not to be a poor sport and a wimp. It was actually a lot of fun and really not that difficult, although it was quite time consuming. I definitely feel more like a daring baker now than I did before we took this on!

Anyway, on to the process. I'm not going to post the recipe here, but if you want to view it you can visit Breadchick's blog (who was also one of the hosts for this month's challenge). We of course had to do much kneading and rising, which should be expected when baking any kind of bread. I think I was a little shocked by just how long it was supposed to take for this bread to rise. I mean who has time to do all this except all of us crazy, daring bakers!




We had every intention of serving this bread with a full meal for our whole family, but we slightly underestimated the time it would take to finish the bread, so unfortunately our poor families had to smell the bread (which was a fabulous scent...I must say) but not get to eat any of it with dinner. After a near disaster (I smushed my sister's loaf while trying to move mine into the oven...thank goodness the loaf sprung back from disaster...whew!), we finally finished baking the bread around 8:30.

I think it turned out quite nicely. My hubby and I were able to hold out tasting until around 10:00, when we finally gave in and it was a fabulous tasting bread. I cannot believe that yeast, flour, water, and a little salt could make something that tasted so good.

We ended up making a batch of French Toast the next morning, which I'll post about separately a little later on. Anyway, this was a fantastic bread and it ended up being a great baking experience. Now I feel bad that I had any doubts whatsoever about baking this bread, it was definitely worth it!

Tuesdays with Dorie