Caramels

Makes 80:

50 g cream (35% fat)
380 g sugar
350 g corn syrup
30 g butter, softened

Prepare a silpat or line a baking sheet with parchment paper and grease.
Place a greased rectangular bottomless pan over the silpat.
Bring the cream to boil.
Melt the corn syrup over low heat, add the sugar and let it caramelize.
Combine with the butter and the hot cream.
Let the mixture reach 117ºC.
Remove from heat and pour into the pan.
Let it cool down and cut in small pieces.
Wrap each caramel with thin plastic paper.
Store in a box on a dry place.

Source: Pierre Hermé

This is my project…

Baileys and white chocolate truffles:

Makes 36 (12 g each):

60 g baileys
80 g cream
300 g white chocolate, chopped
50 g Cocoa

Place the chocolate in a bowl.
Bring the cream to boil with the baileys and pour over the chocolate stirring constantly.
The ganache must be smooth and shiny.
Cover the bowl with wrap film and refrigerate for at least 4 hours (or overnight).
Put the cocoa on a plate.
Make small balls with the truffle mixture and gently roll each truffle in the cocoa to coat.
Refrigerate for 1 hour at least before serving.

To make the house, I’ve used tempered dark chocolate sprinkled with powdered cocoa.

“Do not blame your food because you have no appetite.”
Rabindranath Tagore

Besan Laddu (Indian typical gram flour roasted cakes)

Makes 36 (12 g each):

125 g butter
5 g grated coconut
12 g hazelnuts, roasted and finely chopped
1 /2 tsp. cardamom, grated
137,5 g icing sugar
200 g gram flour

Melt the butter over low heat.
Add the gram flour and combine stirring constantly until roasted (15 minutes).
Add the coconut, the hazelnuts and the cardamom stirring well for a couple of minutes.
Remove from heat and add fold in the icing sugar.
If necessary help with a fork to make it smooth.
Let it cool down for a while.
With wet hand make small balls or cubes with the mixture.

Coconut topping (not part of the traditional recipe)
60 g coconut, grated
20 g cane sugar
10 g butter

Bring the sugar to medium heat until it completely melts, stirring constantly.
Add the butter and the coconut.
Spread the Besan Laddu with this topping.

Moussaka, Petalaki, Saragli and Baklava…
Today I had dinner like a greek…

Salonika’s delights:

1 Filo pastry packaging
125 g butter, melted (pode ser necessária mais manteiga)

Syrup:
500 g sugar
water (as needed)
¼ orange, diced
¼ lemon, diced
1 cinnamon stick

Bring all the ingredients to boil for some minutes until the sugar completely dissolves.
Set aside.

Baklava’s filling:
100 g walnuts, finely chopped
100 g almonds, finely chopped
10 g nutmeg
10 g cinnamon, powdered

Combine all the ingredients.
Roll out a filo pastry sheet and brush with melted butter.
Spread the filling on one end of the pastry and roll the filo sheet.
Repeat this process to make another roll.
Roll out a filo pastry dough and brush with melted butter.
Place the two rolls on one end of the filo sheet and roll tightly.
Slice the roll.

Petalaki’s filling:
50 g sesame seeds

Roll out a filo pastry sheet and brush with melted butter.
Sprinke with the sesame seeds and place another butter brushed filo sheet on top.
Fold the sheets in half and roll to make a cylinder.
Cut in pieces and fold in horseshoe’s shape.

Saragli’s filling:
100 g hazelnuts, finely chopped
100 g pinenuts, finely chopped
10 g nutmeg
10 g cinnamon, powdered

Roll out two filo pastry sheets overlapped in half and brush with melted butter.
Spread the filling on one end of the pastry and roll the filo sheet.
Slice the roll.

Place all the “delights” on a greased baking sheet.
Brush the top of each piece with melted butter.
Bake for 30 minutes at 180ºC.
Remove from oven and pour the syrup over the delights.
Let it cool down with the syrup for at least a couple of hours before serving.

Poem to Mother

In the deepest of you,
I know I have betrayed, mother!

All because I no longer am
The sleeping portrait
In the depth of your eyes!

All because you ignore
That there are beds where coldness doesn’t linger
And rustling nights of morning waters!

For that, sometimes, the words I tell you
Are hard, mother,
And our love is unhappy.

All because I’ve lost the white roses
You clenched to your heart
In the portrait with the frame!

If you knew how I still love the roses,
Maybe you wouldn’t fill your hours with nightmares…

But you have forgotten many things!
You have forgotten that my legs grew,
And that all of my body has grown,
And even my heart
Is now huge, mother!

Look – do you want to listen? -,
Sometimes I am still the little boy
That fell asleep in your eyes;

I still clench against my heart
Roses so white
As the ones you have in the frame;

I still hear your voice:
Once upon a time there was a princess
amidst the orange trees…

But – you know! – the night is enormous
And all my body has grown…
I left the frame,
I gave my eyes as water to the birds,

I shan’t forget, mother.
I keep your voice inside me.
And I leave you the roses…

Goodnight. I go with the birds!

Eugénio de Andrade

I’ve made this post for mother’s day but I couldn’t find any time to translate the recipe… Anyway I think it’s the least important thing today…