Mango Passion Fruit Cheesecake

I think you've realized by now that I have a serious weakness over mango and passion fruit. I used to underestimate these two fruits when I was back in Indonesia, we had so many varieties of mango and you can pretty much find all of the exotic tropical fruit there, some I don't even know what to call or if they have any name. It was only after I moved here, especially after I started baking, that I realized how precious they are, but I guess it's a trade off because you can't really find fresh raspberry or blueberry in Indonesia, it is like finding needle among hays if you try. They have strawberries, but nothing like sweet California strawberry in summer time. I think they have this mindset that strawberry is supposed to be that tart. Yes, strawberries in Indonesia are so tart that it is so painful to eat it fresh. People usually use them in smoothie or cake decoration.

It is no secret that it runs in my family for our love for mango. I could probably survive the whole day just by eating mango. Too bad US doesn't have as many variety as in Indonesia for mango, but I think it's a fair trade since we can find all the gorgeous stone fruits and berries here.

I've been in charge for feeding the whole family for the past month because my nephew's and niece's grandma who usually cooks for us, she went back to Indo for a few months. So technically, I was half-mom, sometimes playing the role of a full-time mom these days, that includes taking care of the baby, cook for the whole family and making sure they're well-fed, cleaning up, bathe them, etc on top of my full-time job. So my poor niece and nephew now have to eat dinner at 9-9:30pm because by the time I got home at 8pm from work, I need to start cooking and cleaning up.

I was actually making this to celebrate my brother's birthday two weeks ago. I've been making mango cakes for the last two years for him or the wife or the son. The birthday fell on Friday, which was actually perfect since we celebrated it on Saturday, but the cheesecake wasn't done until Saturday evening and it needed a good few hours in the fridge. So yeah, we didn't have any cake after dinner that night, so we just ate it as dessert, which is good in some way I guess because I can cut them up and decorate them individually to make them look more cute.

I used almond crust for the base, it's actually a mixture of almond powder and graham cracker crumbs. I love this type of crust a lot more than the plain old graham cracker crumbs, and I keep coming back to them everytime I'm making cheesecake. As usual, I kinda mix and weigh at the same time to find out how much stuff I put it. The end result was slightly tart due to the passion fruit pulp addition (it was so tart, remember the story of this cake?). I wanted the cheesecake to have both mango and passion fruit together so I kept tasting it until I was happy with the result.

I was really happy with the result though. The texture is not as dense as regular NY cheesecake due to the addition of the fruit puree and I'm loving the tropical flavor! One thing I learn about making baked fruit-flavored cheesecake (at least for mango or mango passion fruit) is that the flavor concentrates and the color becomes stronger after baked. I'm making notes of all the things I need to modify for next time but until I get it perfected, I won't post the recipe just yet.

For those of you who wants to make this, you can use a basic cheesecake recipe, add some mango pulp/puree as well as passion fruit to the batter. Adjust the amount depending on your taste. Ah.. one more item I can cross off my list now, onto the next item... :)

4th of July BBQ and Trio of Sorbet

I know 4th of July is over three weeks ago, but I just can't let the occasion pass without any sort of contribution to the event.

When summer rolls around and the hot weather started to soar, all I can think of is BBQ, BBQ, and BBQ, with cold drinks or cold desserts to fight the heat (don't get me started on the fruits). After a slow transition from Spring to Summer, we finally got a feel of what real Summer in California is. The temperature rises to maybe low 90 under the sun, which might be nothing compared to other states, but yeah it was pretty darn hot, but perfect for BBQ!

It's like a tradition to have a BBQ on 4th of July, American way and I was so ecstatic about this. You see, we usually buy ready-grill stuff at Costco or just marinated Korean beef/pork, but this time I wanted REAL BBQ. We made most of our own food this time (well, mostly). So here's the rundown of the menu:

Entree:
- baby-back ribs
- chicken kebab with red onion and bell pepper
- marinated pork (YUM!)
- three different kinds of sausages (store-bought)

Sides:
- roasted-garlic mashed potatoes
- grilled asparagus
- different kinds of chip and tortilla with salsa and artichoke dip
- grilled corn with mayo, lime and parmesan cheese

Drinks:
- mango and orange punch
- sodas

Dessert:
Trio of sorbet (pineapple, strawberry, and white peach)
Fruits (watermelon, cantaloupe, and honeydew melon)

It wasn't too hot that day, in fact, it was perfect. We had the BBQ at our house and the way our house is facing, it's cooler in the evening, the sun moves to the front part of the house. We got a warm weather with slightly cool breeze.

I was so excited about the dessert (read: the sorbet) because I think it was the perfect choice. The days were so hot that you're craving something to fight the heat. It happened that I was on a frozen dessert making frenzy after making the previous sorbet. Given that July is a National Ice Cream Month, this makes it even more perfect! I opted for three kinds of sorbet this time, strawberry (made on a previous post), white peach, and pineapple.

I really love the flavor of white peach, it's fragrant and subtle. I tried to use it in a cake once but I don't think that was a good idea, the flavor was so subtle that it gets lost easily among other flavors. So, sorbet was the perfect choice as it capture the pure flavor of the fruit. The only thing I wasn't too satisfied about was the color. I used white peach and it gets discolor rather fast. It turned brown within seconds after peeling, I wish someone can tell me how to keep the white color of the peach. I saw some blogs posted their white peach sorbet with pretty pink color (I'm dying to be able to get that color), or clean white.

The pineapple however was a request from my little nephew. He loves pineapple (I mean, who doesn't?), and as I mentioned before, we share the same love for sorbet over sweet ice cream (disclaimer: he hasn't tried homemade ice cream that's why). He kept asking me when I would make it everytime he saw the two pineapple sitting on the counter to ripen. He was beyond happy when I finally made it and he kept coming back to have a bowl of the soft-serve pineapple sorbet while it's still churning.

The three sorbet turned out really good. I mention about how good the strawberry sorbet was in the previous post, the strawberry flavor was so strong and fresh, the white peach is subtle with floral taste, the pineapple was so good that it was just bursting with flavor when you put it in your mouth, it was that good. One thing I noticed though, the texture of pineapple sorbet was different than the other two. I used the same recipe, adjusting the amount of sugar for each one, and the amount of puree depending on the sweetness of the fruit. It wasn't as compact as the other. I'm not complaining though, but just curious. I flipped through the same book and it has different recipe for pineapple sorbet, hmm.... curious why it has to be different.

For the next few days after the BBQ, me nephew kept asking me for the three sorbet for his dessert after dinner. I have a feeling he will grow with a fine tastebud :)

It was a relaxing and fun time surrounded by family and close friends, really good food; we played game and we even had a small firework in the backyard! Talking about back to the past, reminded me when I was still a kid.

Strawberry Sorbet -- recipe here
White Peach Sorbet -- same recipe as strawberry, but reduced the sugar to 100 g
Pineapple Sorbet -- same recipe as strawberry, but I used about 1000g-1200g of puree instead

Strawberry Obsession: Strawberry Shortcake, Strawberry Sorbet and Strawberry Lollipop

I'm in some sort of strawberry madness lately, as you can tell by all three strawberry desserts in one post. Everytime I go to farmers' market almost every Sunday, I try so hard not to stop by my favorite strawberry stall, I even try not to stare! But when you see bright red color in the corner of your eyes, you just gotta look, and that's very dangerous as I can hardly contain myself from tasting a sample and ended up buying it. It happens everytime, classic. Does it happen to you too? Please tell me that I'm not weird :(

But anyways, here I am, always overloaded with fresh juicy strawberries almost every week. Ever since we went strawberry picking last time, I kept thinking of how to make the best out of the strawberry season this year, and that's when I started writing my list of things to make this summer. At least now I can be glad and proud that I can cross two out of a hundred items (and still growing) on that list.

Started out with strawberry shortcake. If you notice, I make strawberry shortcake every year at the peak of strawberry season. I think this is one of the best ways to highlight the sweet strawberries at its finest. I'm not talking about the all-American strawberry shortcake which is made with flaky scones, but I'm talking what most people referred to the Japanese-style strawberry shortcake, which uses soft genoise or sponge cake instead of scone. Strawberry plays one of the most important role in this dessert, and that it has to be sweet. There's nothing more horrifying that eating strawberry cake with sour strawberries.

I like to use orange liqueur such as Cointreau or Grand Marnier with my strawberry shortcake as I love the combination of strawberry and slight orange taste in the background. Many people use Kirsch as well, but I am not particularly a fan of it, it's all a matter of taste.

Before I'm moving on the sorbet subject, I have a confession to make. I own some cookbooks (or dessert books), not so many, but there a couple of them (I should take a picture of them sometimes), but I rarely or almost never followed any recipe from them. I don't know, I've always been put off in trying one of their recipes because I'm afraid that I won't like them or the recipe is just too lengthy. Most of the cookbooks that I own (or all of them) are the kinds that have a very long recipes page with multiple different components, a lot of them has some bizarre ingredients that I've never heard before or the ones that would cost me a fortune.

If I have to choose between ice cream or sorbet on a hot summer day, I would probably opt for sorbet. I don't eat frozen stuff that often (I have very sensitive teeth), but when I do, it has to be good. Sorbet is also one of the best ways to bring out the best flavor of the fragrance of the fruit, so simple and so pure.

When I was looking for a sorbet recipe, I have a few recipes I can try with very similar ingredients from French magazine and from one of my cookbooks, but I finally settle on the later, which is from this book. The picture of the sorbet looks so smooth and has a great texture, but it has some unfamiliar ingredients such as atomized glucose and sorbet stabilizer. This is one of my favorite books together with this and this. The book explains what each ingredient is and what their role is in the sorbet, love it! Luckily, one of my favorite baking sites carries it! I had to order it twice because I missed one ingredient the first time, but now that I got them, I'm all set to go.

The resulting sorbet turned out to be so delicious! It's all I've ever wanted in a sorbet, strong flavor, great texture, just perfect! It's like strawberry explosion in your mouth, just pure and intense strawberry flavor. The strawberries you use need to be tasty, I won't recommend making this using winter strawberries, even in California. I had to make two batches of this sorbet because my nephew loves it and he constantly asked for it. He and I share the same preference in frozen stuff, sorbet over ice cream. I was going to save the sorbet for dessert for something else with other sorbets I'm going to make (more on that later), but I just can't say no to my nephew when he "begged" me for it on a really hot California day. So, I decided to make more using my last fresh and frozen strawberries I have, I guess it can be considered as another Spring Cleaning? :)

So, what's up with the strawberry lollipops? Umm... nothing really. I just thought that they look so cute on a stick :), don't they?

Strawberry Shortcake

Sponge Cake:
4 whole eggs
4 egg yolks
100 g sugar
80 g cake flour, sifted
60 g melted butter

Filling:
100 g mascarpone cheese, room temperature
50 g sugar
250 g heavy cream
Cointreau or Grand Marnier (or Kirsch)
fresh sweet strawberries, sliced (set aside some whole ones for decoration)

• To make the sponge cake: Preheat the oven to 350F and lined two 8" square pan with parchment paper
  
• Beat the eggs (whole and yolks) with the sugar on a med-high speed until the mixture is very thick and pale (ribbon-stage)
• Incorporate the flour in three addition and fold carefully as not to lose too much air
• Fold in the melted butter until well-mixed
• Divide the batter between two prepared pans and bake it for about 20 minutes or until done.
• Let cool on a wire rack
• To make the filling: Combine the mascarpone cheese, sugar, heavy cream, and liqueur, and beat until it forms a semi-stiff peak but still has its shine. Use it immediately
  
• To assemble: Put one layer of cake on a base and spread the filling on top.
• Arrange the strawberry slices and top it with the other cake.
• Spread another thin layer of filling on top and decorate all you want
• If you don't have enough filling for the top layer or to decorate it with, just simply whip fresh whipped cream with a little sugar (you can add liqueur if you want).
  

Strawberry Sorbet
adapted from Grand Livre de Cuisine: Alain Ducasse's Desserts and Pastries

750 g strawberry puree
60 g atomized glucose
120 g sugar
80 ml water
3/4 tsp sorbet stabilizer

• Put the water and atomized glucose in a sacepan and bring it to a gentle boil.
• Mix the sugar and the sorbet stabilizer, and add it to the water mixture and bring it back to a boil.
  
• Let cool completely (you can put this mixture in a fridge overnight)
• Mix the cool syrup with strawberry puree and let it the mixture "mature" in the fridge for 24 hrs
• Churn it in an ice cream machine

Note:

• The book says to mix everything (except the strawberry puree) without boiling them first. I boiled mine to dissolved the sugar.
  
• The book also suggests another alternative, which is to boil all ingredients to a certain temperature, and cool it for 24 hrs before churning.
• The mixture needs to sit for a long time to let the stabilizer develop its role, but I also read a few other recipes (not from the book) which only matures the sugar syrup overnight and churn it immediately after being mixed with the puree. Some doesn't even require maturing, just mix and churn.
  

Spring Cleaning Part II: Mango Tart

The Spring Cleaning is taking a little longer than expected, it was three months ago since I started my first one. I did have quite a few list of things to make from the "leftovers" but for some reason, a lot of them did get used up for something, which is good, I guess. It's not Spring anymore, it's Summer (yay!), but I still call it Spring Cleaning as I've never heard of Summer Cleaning before :)

This time, everything seems like it was meant to be for this tart. You probably guessed it right that I have just two 4" baked tart shell from making key lime tartelettes (not featured in this blog), one ripe small mango, two 3" of frozen mango mousse. I did have to make the custard filling for the tart which was a breeze to make, it was just a simple custard made with whole egg, a little cream, and sugar, baked inside the tart shell. Then, I put slices of mango on top of the cooled custard, placed the frozen mango mousse on top, put a strawberry for decoration and color and voila! you got one of the tastiest and simplest mango tart ever! A pile of raspberry, mint leaf, and white choc decor would probably look great on these, but strawberry did the justice just fine.

I love the yellow color of this tart! It reminds me of sunny warm summer day, sitting on the back porch with a cup of tea, hmm....

So, please don't throw away those leftovers you have, be it just a little of any mousse, jelly, sponge cake scraps, cream cheese frosting, sugar syrup, or anything at all, you can always transform them to something totally delicious with just a little extra effort!

I'm enjoying the best of California weather at the moment, clear blue sky with a little streak of white clouds here and there, warm sun, birds chirping and crisp weather in the morning, ahh... simple pleasure :)

Components:
- Pate sucree (leftover from this, don't poke holes on the tart if you will bake a runny custard in it)
- Custard (made with egg, sugar, and cream, baked inside the tart shell until set in the middle)
- Fresh mango slices
- Mango mousse (leftover from this)

Enjoying the Bounty of Summer: My First Cherry Clafoutis!

Yes, I've said it, I've never made clafoutis before. There, done.

According to what I've been reading, clafoutis is one of the easiest French desserts there is, it falls into the same category as gratin, pots de creme, creme brulee, etc. as it has almost the same ingredients and method, except for the addition of flour. For someone who describes herself as French pastry aficionado, it is quite a shame that I've never made it or ate it before until now. While I'm very familiar with its custard family (gratin, creme brulee, ...), this is the only one that's left out. To be honest, cherry clafoutis has always been on my list of things to make every year, at least for the last three consecutive years, and finally it comes to reality :).

Since cherry season is really short, I usually find myself out of cherries when I finally had the chance to make it. Sure I can make it with other fruits, but for some reason, I've always wanted to try the classic for the first time :).

It's funny how I always make a list of things to make during summer, each year, but not all of them are actually made it to a realization. With the gift of summer, fresh ripe sweet cherries, blushing apricots, fragrant peach, succulent strawberries, I mean, how can anyone resist? Simple things that bring you contentment in life. This year, I do the same thing too. In fact, the list is getting longer and longer and I'm determined to make at least 60% of them or hopefully I can make all of them, which means that I have to bake about 3 times a week :). We'll see how it goes, but for the next few months, you will see lots of summery goodness in this blog.

Finding the best recipe was pretty hard as I don't know how a good clafoutis texture or taste would be like. If it's a mousse or a cake that I'm pretty familiar with, I can usually have a prediction of how it would turn out like by looking at the amount of each ingredients, but not this time. What made it so hard too is that there a LOTS of good-looking clafoutis floating around the web. Whenever I visit tastespotting or foodgawker or my favorite blogs, you can bet that at least there's one clafoutis being posted, and they're all look gorgeous! I love this time of the year when everywhere I go for blog hopping or to one of those sites that feature food with good photography, I saw summer summer and summer and I'm lovin' it! BBQ, outdoor parties, strawberry cakes, cherry desserts, stone fruits goodies, refreshing drink, they all scream for summer! I finally settled down to this recipe.

Making this was easy as predicted, the longest time was when I had to wait for the cream to cool down so that it can be infused with vanilla bean, but I left it overnight so it wasn't really a problem. Oh, I bought cherry pitter too for this special occasion :), not only for the clafoutis, but I have some other cherry desserts/cakes lined up to be made. At least buying it will give me more pressure to put the pitter to a better use :D

Many people say that the traditional clafoutis have the unpitted cherries in it. They believe that the pit will release a nutty flavor to the clafoutis, but I decided to skip that part because I don't want my little niece and nephew to choke on them. The texture of this dessert is a cross between a custard and a cake because of the addition of flour. Many people eat it as dessert, snack, or even breakfast, but since I don't eat berakfast other than my dose of caffeine in the morning, I saved it for dessert or snack and it's even better with a scoop of vanilla ice cream!

Cherry Clafoutis
adapted from here

200 ml heavy cream
1/2 vanilla bean, scraped
100 ml whole milk
3 eggs
50 g caster sugar
70 g all-purpose flour, sifted
1 Tbs. Kirsch (or substitute with Grand Marnier or Cointreau)
pitted or unpitted black cherries
powdered sugar for dusting

• Preheat the oven to 180C (350F)
• Heat the cream and vanilla bean seeds, together with the pod on a gentle heat until simmer
• Add the milk and let cool
• Remove the vanilla pod
• Whisk the eggs, sugar, and flour in a bowl, then add the cooled cream, whisk well
• Add the liqueur
  
• Put some cherries (pitted or unpitted) in your baking dish (I used four 4" ceramic dish) and pour the batter on top of the cherries
• Bake for about 30-40mnts until the top is golden brown
• Dust with powdered sugar and serve warm or at room temperature
  

Cherry & Strawberry Picking and Lemon Buttermilk Sherbet

Every year, when cherries are in season, I try to do cherry and strawberry picking, except last year because we went too late and all of the cherries were gone. Well, who's to blame when cherries are out on late July? Not to mention that I completely missed the cherry season last year due to I don't remember what. I just know that I didn't eat enough cherries as I wanted to and my biggest disappointment is that I didn't get the chance to play with them in the kitchen! You see, cherry season is very very short, from Mid May-mid June, maybe late June if you got lucky, but that's about it.

This year, I came more prepared. I've already made a list of the cherry desserts I wanted to make as well as some strawberry desserts, and off to cherry and strawberry picking earlier. Our farmers' market has abundant of them, but it's the experience that you're missing when you're buying off of the market. I'm not complaining though because I completely rely on those cherry and strawberry stands in the market every week and they have the sweetest and the most amazing fruits I've ever had.

It was particularly hot that weekend when we went, and quite windy too at the farm, which made it better because it didn't feel as hot as I thought it would be. We were off to a good start with our buckets full of rainier and bing cherries, I took my niece with me too and she enjoyed every second of it, she had her own basket from home, and she even wore cherry-printed shirt! Now, that's the spirit!

It was scorching hot though when we started the strawberry picking, but it didn't stop us from getting the most beautiful and the sweetest strawberries! It was so tempting to munch on them when we're picking it, but we had a good self-control :).

This hot weather makes me crave for something cold and refreshing, and that's when sorbet comes to mind. Plus, I've been dying to use my brand-new ice cream machine I got from my birthday this year (thanks guys!). It would be perfect if I made strawberry sorbet, but not this time. Don't worry though, it'll come soon once I gather my last ingredient for it :). I don't want something fancy this time, just something simple, cool and maybe lemony, and that's when I spotted this from one of my favorite bloggers, how perfect! I had some leftover buttermilk from the baby shower event that needed to be used up lots of meyer lemon juice and zest in the freezer, so everything was ready.

Making this sherbet was a breeze, as it only has few ingredients. I reduced the amount of the lemon juice a little because it was too tart for me. It turned out GREAT! just everything I wanted, simple, tangy, cool, and very refreshing, with some lemon note to it. Ahh... I couldn't stop eating the ice cream while it's still running in the machine, it was so good. This is exactly what I would crave for on a hot sunny day. The taste reminds me of the original flavor of frozen yogurt at its best with lemon flavor.

I'll leave this post at that because now, I have to start pondering what I should make with all those cherries and strawberries in my fridge :).

Lemon Buttermilk Sherbet
adapted from David Lebovitz's "The Perfect Scoop"

80 ml water
130 g granulated sugar
zest of one lemon
225 ml buttermilk
35 g lemon juice

• Combine together the water, sugar and lemon zest in a saucepan and bring it to a gentle boil (I like to rub my zest with the sugar to release the lemon oil for more lemony flavor).
• Remove from the heat and transfer it to a bowl, chill until completely cold (I chilled mine overnight)
• Add the buttermilk and the lemon juice to the sugar syrup and churn it in the ice cream machine.
• Transfer to a container and freeze