Aebelskiver, aka Danish Pancake Balls

A couple of years ago some students at the end of the year gave me an aebelskiver pan. Proof that I had taught them well! Since I live alone I never make pancakes. There is always too much batter and no use for it. But since I got this pan, I do every now and then make a batch of aebelskiver. Since they freeze wonderfully, a prerequisite for registration in my breakfast course. They also make a great afternoon snack.

The recipe, from Beatrice Ojakangas in The Great Scandinavian Baking Book.

1 cup milk,  heated to lukewarm

½ cup melted butter

3 egg yolks

3 egg whites, whipped to stiff peaks

2 tbs sugar

1 ½ cups all-purpose flour

2 tsp baking powder

Melted butter for brushing pan.

Whisk together milk, butter, egg yolks, and sugar, Whisk in flour and baking powder. Fold in egg whites. Heat pan over medium heat, reduce heat to low and use about one heaping tablespoon batter for each Aebelskiver, lightly butter pan before each round.

Bouquet of (Paper) Sunflowers

Homemade Cavatelli with Vodka Sauce

The recipe is from Lidia's Italy. The semola makes a silky smooth dough and the cooked pasta is pleasantly chewy. I ran out of patience shaping the individual cavatelli, and just ended up rolling them between my palms. A hand cranked cavatelli maker with wooden rollers is now on my Amazon wish list.

The sauce is half an onion very thinly sliced and sauteed, an anchovy mashed, a small can of tomato paste, half a cup of water and a cup of cream, a lot of salt and pepper and a big splash of vodka.

Chocolate Rum Cake Balls, No Cake Mix or Canned Frosting Alllowed

These chocolate rum cake balls combine two super simple recipes:  Beatty's Chocolate Cake, courtesy of Ina Garten, and Creamy Chocolate Frosting, courtesy of Cook's Illustrated. Bake the cake in a 9x13 pan, or in cupcake liners, or in a couple of 8 or 9 inch round or square pans, and when it cools just dump it into a bowl and break it up into crumbs. Then moisten the crumbs generously with rum -- 1/3 to 1/2 cup -- and fold in the entire batch of frosting. Refrigerate for several hours, roll into balls, roll the balls in almond meal seasoned with fleur de sel, and let ripen in the refrigerator as much as four or even five days. The cake balls change texture and develop flavor as they sit. They start very good and they become spectacular.

To everyone caught up in the cake ball craze, please, please, just put down the cake mix and the canned frosting and walk away slowly. It gets better, it really does!

Yukon Gold Cinnamon Rolls, 24ct

Over the years I have tried a lot of different recipes for cinnamon rolls, and the outcome almost always falls short of expectations. I want a cinnamon roll that is light, moist, fragrant, sweet but not cloying, and that freezes without complaint.  The closest I've gotten to my ideal so far is the formula by Marion Cunningham in her classic The Breakfast Book. Her recipe is simplicity in a single bowl and produces a much more satisfying treat than the overworked brioche-based entries from otherwise superb sources such as Nancy Silverton and Rose Levy Beranbaum. But even granting Marion Cunningham her due, this recipe for Yukon Gold Cinnamon Rolls at Epicurious, brought to my attention this week by a friend, exceeds the high standards she established. It is -- drumroll -- decidedly the best in category within my admittedly not exhaustive but not so shabby experience. Which is to say that after one round the print-out of the recipe has taken a privileged spot in my kitchen:  in my acrylic recipe holder among about two dozen or so other pages of recipes that are just too good to tuck away in my black three ring binder where I might forget about them.

The recipe as provided does however benefit from some adjustments. Kitchen notes follow without further ado.

1. The 2 cups water for boiling the potatoes is way too much. Instead 1 and 1/2 cups is more than enough.

2. In place of active dry yeast, I used 1 and 1/2 teaspoons instant yeast.

3. Since I used instant yeast, I also changed the assembly of the dough. After making the mashed potato-salt-butter-eggs-flour mixture, I combined 3 cups flour, yeast, sugar, and peel from one orange in the bowl of my stand mixer. Then I added the potato mixture, and worked it with a dough hook. The additional 1/2 cup water again was too much. Instead add just enough to get the dough going, and then flour as necessary after a couple of minutes to get a very very very sticky dough. Definitely keep the dough wet!

4. I baked these in jumbo aluminum muffin tins, and got 24 total, and even then some of them were overflowing too much the tins.  But however one slices the dough, I think a reasonable yield is anywhere from 18 (still really big) to 30 (a bit small, but then more treats to share).

5. For the glaze I just thinned confectioners sugar with fresh squeezed orange juice and added a big pinch of fleur du sel. The overall hint of orange is subtle and satisfying and suits just right. And anything more complicated I think is not necessary and perhaps out of balance.

6. Did I mention that these cinnamon rolls love the freezer?