Happy Sunday to everyone.
I am in the first week of my long July break. And it has been full of fun activities and good food so far.
This coming weekend we have Swedish visiting cakes and gougeres available for ordering. And the following weekend we have vanilla macarons and mint chocolate chip ice cream.
A couple days ago I made something new for a family event: a chocolate hazelnut torte. This torte uses ground hazelnuts in place of the flour typically found in cakes. It's a very simple recipe that combines sugar and cocoa with the ground hazelnuts, which is then gently folded into meringue and then baked. And in this case I topped it with a sweet chocolate sauce, vanilla whipped cream and hazelnut candies. I had planned to do a hazelnut cake, but with only a few days left before the event for which it was needed, I determined that I couldn't source hazelnut flour anywhere close by and it would have to be ordered. I didn't trust that it would come on time. So I opted to make a torte instead.
The torte was nice, very nutty, mildly sweet, and filling. But it wasn't something that I think I would make again. So now I'm taking the time to source some hazelnut flour, get it ordered and delivered, and then make a cake that I hope will be much more to my liking. I don't think the torte was a favorite part of the event, but that's OK. It was experiment. We tried it and determined it's not something to pursue again.
That doesn't mean I won't try another hazelnut torte. I love hazelnuts so I most certainly will. But I will design a new recipe.
Today I'm shopping for the first of three mac and cheeses that I will make this week. I have made all of these before, so this really a new trial run to compare all three and see if I want to add one of them to the menu. My wife is a big fan of mac and cheese so she will serve as taste tester in addition to me.
These mac and cheeses each use a blend of different cheeses and each uses a different preparation method: one on stovetop, one in the oven, and one that combines both. I love to do comparison cooking like this, so it will be a fun week.
That's all for now. Enjoy the final day of your weekend and eat some good food that makes you smile and feel satisfied.
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