2nd Annual Scharffen Berger Bakery Crawl

This year's Scharffen Berger Bakery Crawl took me to 3 new places I had never been before, as well as one repeat. I was also pleased to be a resident of the the city of San Francisco this time, and may have overly enjoyed the fact I could just catch BART to get to and from the tour. I have only recently made the move, so yeah, it was kind of a big deal to me.

This year's theme was cookie sandwiches. One of the SB reps suggested that they thought the cookie sandwich might be the "next big thing" to out stage cupcakes, but there was some debate about whether or not cake pops were going to be. Time will tell! In any case, our tour was dedicated to finding these said cookie sandwiches, which did come a wide variety of shapes, sizes, types, and flavors.

As last time, we started off in the Scharffen Berger's only brick and mortar shop that is in the Ferry Building along the Embarcadero. Conveniently located adjacent to Miette, a delightful bakery with a variety of tasty treats. Our sample was of a chocolate macaron with sumatra coffee ganache filling. I'm not really into coffee, but the flavor was not overwhelming and the cookie was actually not too sweet, which a lot of macarons can be. Cute little packages, too.

We were then corralled out into our trolly car, and headed down into my neighborhood, the Mission. We came to Goody Goody Cream & Sugar, a cafe that has apparently won best chocolate chip cookie in the city award.  Not what we were there to try though. The owner is a long time food industry veteran who had gotten burned out and decided she needed to call the shots, so opened this place up with her family. 

It was a fun spot in a kind of worn down looking block across from this amazing mural.

She created for us the most amazing flavor combo I have ever had in a cookie sandwich. Oil cured cocoa wafers filled with a buttercream with preserved lemon and fresh basil. I know right, what the hell is that going to taste like? It was amazing. I was super skeptical since I've had some pretty overwhelming basil-in-my-dessert experiences, but some how this one worked perfectly. No flavor out-did any other. The cookies were super crisp and nutty, and had a nice salty flavor, and the lemon and the basil worked together being a combination of tart, sweet and savory. I definitely took 2.

We got back in our trolly and headed over the hill to Cole Valley to Ice Cream Bar.

It had a cute interior, with a very retro feel.

The owner served up an amazing platter of ice cream sandwich cookies. It was by far the worst episode of food paparazzi, as we couldn't stop taking pictures of the amazing pile of perfectly stacked sandwiches, but the owner finally forced them upon us since they were in fact filled with now melting ice cream. 

When I first read the flavor on the cards we were given at the start of the tour, I was also skeptical. I am not a big banana-in-desserts fan, and worried that the flavor would overpower the whole piece. Ok, here's the mouthful: Caramelized honey and milk chocolate ice cream sandwiched between 2 banana and cocoa nib cookies (with caramelized cocoa nibs studding the sides, also). 

I ate the entire thing. I mean, it was the size of my fist, let me be clear.

It was so good. The banana flavor was not super strong and the cookie was super soft and puffy. The ice cream was creamy and perfectly sweet, which worked against the crunchy and slightly bitter cocoa nibs that you got a little bit of in every bite. It was just an amazingly well crafted flavor and texture experience.

Trundling back onto our trolly, we landed at our final stop. Here we are parked in front of Macy's Union Square. We were going into the cellar to watch Yigit Pura do a demo on making an amazing custard based ganache (learned something new!) and got to sample one of his fancy cookie sandwich creations as well. He was also extremely high on sugar, which made him all the more entertaining.

We then popped upstairs to the 3rd floor of Macy's to see his brand new pastry shop, Tout Sweet. A very bright, open and welcoming space, with so many tasty treats to tempt you with.

Ok, maybe this was the bigger food paparazzi moment. 

I don't even know what he had us try, but it was delicious. Also noted that he put a nice smooth raspberry jam filling into each lated raspberry. The details!

It was a delightful end to the trip. We got hang out and chat with him about his presentation and his career moves (the shop had literally opened only 3 weeks before, so he was still working on his baby). He also just started offering some savory options, of which I recall sous vide egg sandwiches being on the menu. Must go back!

Another year, another contest - with a bigger prize this time: www.chocolateadventurecontest.com/


Thanks again to Scharffen Berger for hosting such a lovely bakery crawl.

Easter Baskets

For a special Easter treat, I will be making cupcake Easter baskets, available to order. A baker’s dozen of 3 mini cupcake varieties: Carrot cupcakes with cream cheese frosting decorated as Easter eggs, Zesty lemon cupcakes with homemade marshmallow chicks, and Chocolate malt cupcakes with ganache chocolate bunnies, all arranged in a decorative basket. 

$45, plus tax. 

Please order by this Friday, April 22. No early orders can be filled. Pick up Saturday afternoon (local orders only).

S'more Cupcakes

As the summer season begins to wane, I begin to feel nostalgic about those last few days we used to have before school would start; trying desperately to hold on to the freedom and adventure we so foolishly took for granted in early July.

As an adult, the sense of panic doesn't get much better. I question whether or not I really appreciated all that the summer had to offer: did I enjoy the warm weather enough, the late daylight saving's evenings, or the fresh ingredients of the season, etc. And as much as I adore and eagerly look forward to what Autumn has to offer, I find I'm still scrambling to hold on to all the good things about summer before it's all washed away in the sea of Halloween Costume stores.

So, to keep it alive with just one more recipe, I fall back on family tradition: camping. And what makes camping really camping? Roasting s'mores over an open fire, of course.

I have over the past couple years been on a fairly epic quest to perfect a s'more cupcake recipe. Sadly, I don't think I'm 100% there, but this latest version does have a very appealing look about it. AND I got to use my little kitchen torch, which is always fun.

To start, I attempted to combine a vanilla cupcake recipe with a graham cracker twist:

Graham Cupcakes:

Preheat oven to 350˚

Line approximately 20 cupcake tins.

• 2 C Flour
• 3/4 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 C butter
• 1 C brown sugar
• 2 tbs honey
• 2 eggs
• 1 C buttermilk

Whisk together flour, baking soda and salt and set aside. In electric mixer, blend butter, sugar and honey until creamy, scraping down sides occasionally. Add honey and one egg at at time until incorporated. Beginning and ending with flour mixture, add flour and buttermilk alternately. Fill cupcake tins. Bake for 20 minutes. Cool.

Then dip each cup

cake top into

Chocolate ganache:

• 8 oz chopped chocolate (I used semi-sweet) or chocolate chips
• 4 oz heated cream (warm but not boiling)

Pour warmed cream over chocolate and let sit 1-2 minutes, then whisk together until smooth. I occasionally have to stick the mixture in the microwave for 10 second intervals until all the chocolate is melted. Be careful not to overheat, as it will begin separate. Bad.

Once your cupcakes have a healthy topping of chocolate, then comes the marshmallow! With a stand mixer, making marshmallows from scratch is a cinch, albeit messy. Luckily, I was able to get the freshly made marshmallow cream to my piping bag without much hassle, and it piped onto the tops of the cupcakes perfectly.

Marshmallow "Frosting":

• 3 envelopes (1/4 oz) unflavored gelatin
• 1/2 cup cold water
• 2 cups sugar
• 1/2 cup corn syrup
• 1/2 cup water
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 large egg whites
• 1 tablespoon vanilla

In bowl of a stand mixer sprinkle gelatin over 1/2 cup cold cold water, and let stand to soften (about 5 minutes are needed).

In a heavy sauce pan cook sugar, corn syrup, 1/2 cup water, and salt over low heat, stirring until sugar is dissolved. When it begins to boil, stop stirring. Boil until candy thermometer reaches 240°F. Pour sugar mixture over gelatin mixture, stirring until gelatin is dissolved.

Beat mixture on high speed until white, thick, and nearly tripled in volume, approximately 6-8 minutes.

In a separate bowl beat egg whites until they hold stiff peaks. Beat whites and vanilla into sugar mixture until just combined.

Gently spoon this mixture into a large piping bag and start topping the cupcakes.

(To be honest, I think I only made half the recipe for this many cupcakes, but there's never any problem with too much marshmallow mix. See my marshmallow recipe for instructions on how to deal with the "leftover" if necessary. )

After cupcakes are topped, let them refrigerate for an hour or so until the marshmallow is set. It'll still be pretty sticky no matter how long you leave them for, so in the interest of not drying out your cupcakes, I recommend not leaving them in there too long.

Now it's time for the torch. Be careful, have supervision, all those disclaimers, etc, etc, and try not to overly scorch the cupcakes. Or, I guess it really just depends on how you like your marshmallow. I was going for looks, so didn't let it get too burnt or mushy.

As I was saying earlier, I don't think I'm quite there yet. The graham cracker cupcake wasn't bad, but it didn't quite fulfill the role of graham cracker, likely because there was no crunch, but was also a little dry. As well, many people thought it needed a higher chocolate to cupcake/marshmallow ratio. No complaints on the marshmallow, as far as flavor, but I did find that in some instances, the marshmallow was not completely adhered to it's ganache partner, which was noticed mainly when you took a bite of the cupcake, and the marshmallow stuck to your lip, popping right off the cupcake.

So, there is more work to be done, but all in all, I'm moving in the right direction.

With that, I will say adieu to the summer of 2010, and with a clear conscience, I can eagerly move forward into the brimming and wondrous season of Autumn.

Wedding Cupcakes

So, I'm a little delayed in getting these posts complete, but I've been pretty busy in the kitchen and really want to share some of the adventures!

Mainly, I had the pleasure of baking cupcakes for my friends' wedding this September. It was a beautiful wedding down in Pasadena at the CalTech campus where they both went to school.

As Pasadena is nearly a whole state away from me, I had to migrate my kitchen for the weekend in order to accomplish the cupcakes. Transplanting all my tools into the Avery dorm kitchen for a couple days was not as incredible of an undertaking as I imagined, but still quite a hefty chore. I was really grateful that the few kids who were roaming the dormitory halls were very courteous and respectful of me in their space, especially as my cupcakes overwhelmed their common areas, and that the ominous emails the bride-to-be sent to them before my arrival (relating to missing cupcakes) were dutifully noted. I'm not sure how many dorms you could get away with leaving 250 cupcakes lying around overnight without there being some kind of cupcake massacre.

In any case, the task was 125 Banana cupcakes with cream cheese frosting, and 125 Chocolate cupcakes with semi-sweet ganache frosting. I was able to prep a few things beforehand, and did some last minute supply shopping, but mainly just dove right in hoping I'd calculated the quantity of my ingredients correctly. And there were some issues. For example, I had figured I'd need 16 pounds of butter when it was all said and done, but really ended up only using about 10 or 12 pounds. I had to buy 2 more bananas because I had not calculated in the mini-cake I was making (so they'd have a little something to cut into). But overall I was quite pleased with how close I came to my guesses... er... calculations.

So the baking went very smoothly and all the cupcakes were cooled and frosted by 10 or 11 the night before the wedding. The kicker was the little decorations I made on them. Having finished a class in cake decorating, I was feeling pretty good about my buttercream roses, so decided to put a mini one on top of each cupcake. The wedding colors were burnt orange and eggplant purple. So, I thought the orange would look lovely on top of the cream cheese frosting and the purple would go well with the rich chocolatey brown of the ganache. And yeah, I think they did come out looking rather cute. But oh my god did my hand cramp like nothing else! That is a muscle I have yet to develop. So after 3 hours of gently piping one little rose onto my fancy little rose-making spinny-pin, then gently transferring each one to the top of a cupcake and repeating that process until I had a full tray or so of them, then piping on a little stem and leaves to each one of those little rose buds... then, after 250 of those I was able to call it quits. It was that moment I realized using a mouse at work was not going to be the reason why I get carpel tunnel!

But was it worth it? Yeah, I think so. Everyone seemed to really enjoy the cupcakes, and the little girls in their cute little pink dresses at the wedding were in so much awe about them, they had to have been good!