Decadent Desserts Class with Tina Bacon

About a month ago I had the opportunity to attend a baking class called Decadent Desserts at Well Seasoned. The class was put on by Tina Bacon, owner and founder of the Pink Spatula. Tina is a fantastic pastry chef and creates the most amazing hand crafted marshmallows I've ever tasted (peanut butter ripple marshmallows anyone?!! - try that in a s'more!!). Check our her website for beautiful photos of her dessert offerings and where to find her hand crafted marshmallows.

During the class we made Individual German Chocolate Cakes (pictured above), oreos (pictured below), burnt sugar ganache mini tarts, and butterscotch pots de creme topped with dark chocolate pudding. It was an ambitious evening full of delicious, calorie-laden treats, handy tips and great recipes. Tina kindly allowed me to share the recipe for the burnt sugar ganache mini tarts with you (thanks Tina!!). I made them at home again yesterday to make sure the recipe turned out as well under my hand as Tina's professional hand and sure enough, it was a slam dunk!! Delicious and addictive. :)

First step for these delicious little guys is to make the miniature sweet tart dough (makes about 32 mini tarts):

Miniature Sweet Tart Dough
Recipe by Tina Bacon

Ingredients:

• 1 cup (8 oz) unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 1 large egg
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 2 3/4 cups (12 1/2 oz) all-purpose flour
• 1/8 tsp fine sea salt
• 5 1/2 tbsp (2 1/3 oz) sugar

Method:

1. Cut butter into small cubes and set aside.
2. In a small bowl stir together egg and vanilla with a fork.
3. Measure flour, sugar and salt into a food processor bowl. Pulse together a few times to combine. Add butter and pulse till it's the size of rice. While still pulsing, slowly pour egg/ vanilla mixture through tube and mix just till it begins to form a dough. Turn out onto lightly floured surface and knead a couple times to form a smooth dough.
4. Portion all of the dough first using a 1 1/2 - 2 tsp measure. Next, roll all the dough into balls and place in a miniature muffin pan (see photo below). Form into tart shells using either a tart tamper or your fingers to form a thin, even crust.
5. Bake in 350F oven for about 10 minutes or till edges are golden. Allow to cool in pan 10 minutes, then place tart shells on a rack to cool completely. Store airtight. Can be frozen.

Burnt sugar ganache tartlets made by Tina in her class

 Next up, make the burnt sugar ganache. Please note that I have adapted this recipe slightly - it originally called to make the caramel using the dry method, but having had a couple of really bad experiences in the past with this method, I opted instead to use the wet method. :)

Burnt Sugar Ganache
Recipe from Tina Bacon (Tina adapted the recipe from Pierre Herme's Faubourg Pave)

Ingredients:

• 1 3/4 cups (305g) chopped dark chocolate
• scant 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup water
• 4 tsp unsalted butter
• pinch of fine sea salt
• scant 1 1/4 cups heavy cream
• 1 1/2 cups (12 oz) unsalted butter, at room temperature

Method:

1. Place sugar in a pile in the middle of a saucepan. Carefully pour water in around the pile of sugar. Over medium high heat, gently and carefully stir the water and sugar mixture until the sugar is dissolved. Once the sugar has dissolved, stop stirring. Let it bubble until it reaches a nice golden brown colour and remove from heat. Stir in first amount of butter and salt until melted. Add cream (careful - it will bubble like crazy and puff up), stirring well. Return to a boil, remove from heat.
2. Pour half of caramel over chocolate, stir to create ganache. Stir in remaining caramel till smooth. Set aside to cool till only slightly warm, about 10 minutes. Beat butter till malleable. Gently stir small amounts at a time into ganache with a wooden spoon till smooth. Don't use a whisk for this part - you don't want to incorporate air into this mixture.

Adding butter to the flour for the pastry dough

 To assemble your tarts - pour burnt sugar ganache into each tart until full. Sprinkle with coarse sea salt. Allow to set up. Enjoy!

Dough balls waiting to be formed into tart shells

Baked tart shells (my at home attempt)

Burnt sugar ganache tarts (my at home attempt)

This was a fantastic class and I would highly recommend attending any of Tina's baking classes at well seasoned. You'll learn a lot and get to sample loads of delicious food along the way (remember, calories don't count on cooking class nights).

This post has been linked up with Whatcha Baking Wednesdays over at Cajun Sugar Pie.

Happy Baking my Friends!

A Little Nosh's Dark Chocolate Cupcakes with Peanut Butter Frosting

Woohoo! So stoked that it is time for the Secret Recipe Club reveal again... feels like this month took forever to go by. Maybe thats because I was so excited about my blog assignment (And the recipe I found on her blog to bake)!!!!! I was assigned to Amy's blog, A Little Nosh. Amy is a food blogger from Washington, D.C. with a really down-to-earth, healthy approach to cooking and baking. She posts a lot of healthy recipes and some treat recipes too! Can you guess what type of recipe I chose??!! Surpise, I picked a treat recipe to bake. I chose her Dark Chocolate Cupcakes with Peanut Butter Frosting because they sounded soooo amazing and you know what? They were even better than they sounded! Yummers!

Do stop by Amy's blog when you have a minute, especially when you need a quick and healthy idea for dinner! She has so many great ideas that don't take a lot of time, which I guess is important when you're as busy as Amy is! I learned that she is a mother to a cute little boy and a wife to a smart, funny man annnndddd she has a kitchen that is even smaller than mine! But she doesn't let that stop her. Thanks Amy for sharing so many great recipes and tips for eating well and eating quick! :)

Now, on to the recipe!!

Dark Chocolate Cupcakes

Recipe from A Little Nosh (October 2010)

Ingredients:

• 8 tbsp unsalted butter, cut into pieces


• 2 oz semi-sweet chocolate, chopped


• 1/2 cup dutch processed cocoa powder


• 3/4 cup all-purpose flour


• 1/2 tsp baking soda


• 3/4 tsp baking powder


• 2 eggs


• 3/4 cups granulated sugar


• 2 tsp vanilla extract


• 1/2 tsp fine salt


• 1/2 cup sour cream

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 350F. Line muffin tin with paper liners and set aside.


2. Combine butter, chocolate and cocoa powder in a microwave safe dish. Using 30 second increments, microwave until melted. Stir well until smooth. Set aside to cool.


3. Whisk flour, baking soda, salt and baking powder in a small bowl.


4. In the bowl of your stand mixer, beat eggs until fluffy. Add sugar and vanilla and beat well until fully incorporated. Beat in cooled chocolate mixture until well combined. Stir in one third of flour mixture until just combined, then beat in sour cream. Add the remaining flour mixture and stir until just incorporated. Do not overmix or you will have tough cupcakes!


5. Divide batter evenly among baking cups. Bake 18 minutes in preheated oven until toothpick comes out with a few moist crumbs on it.


6. Cool cupcakes completely, then frost with peanut butter frosting (recipe below).

Peanut Butter Frosting

Recipe from A Little Nosh (October 2010)

Ingredients:

• 1 cup icing sugar


• 1 cup creamy peanut butter


• 5 tbsp unsalted butter, at room temperature


• 1.5 tsp vanilla extract


• 1/4 tsp kosher salt


• 1/3 cup heavy cream

Method:

1. Beat together icing sugar, peanut butter, butter, vanilla and kosher salt until well combined.


2. Beat in heavy cream until icing is smooth.


3. Pipe liberally onto cupcakes however you like!


4. Try not to eat the whole batch of cupcakes.

Thanks Amanda for hosting the Secret Recipe Club again this month, and thank you to Amy at A Little Nosh for introducing me to such a lovely recipe!

If you want to join the Secret Recipe Club, check out the website here.

Happy Baking my Friends!