Art Sucre: Berlin

When I was in Berlin two weekends ago, I had the pleasure of meeting the creative, talented bakers behind Art Sucre, Berlin’s newest baking duo supplying the market with a much needed dose of macarons.  When I walked in, Nina, who trained in France, was focued on pipping out heart shaped macarons for a Valentine’s day order.

I spent an hour with them “talking shop”, getting a tour of their kitchen and got to sample some of their delicious macarons such as coconut, chocolate, pistachio, vanilla, cranberry-kirsh, lemon and cafe latte to name a few.  The macarons I tasted had the right balance between a crispy exterior and a soft, chewy interior and the ganache or middle fillings had a distinct, fresh and flavour not in the least bit artificial tasting that you get with an overly commercial operation.

From my own research in the city, outside of Galeries Lafayette Berlin, it’s pretty hard to find a good macaron, or any for that matter in Berlin. I mean, which city should be without a  trusted macaron shop to dazzle guests with trays of colourful macaron when throwing parties, or simply for your own personal macaron fix?  I know I am at a loss in Prague when I am craving macaron.  The commercial stuff you get from Paul just doesn’t cut it in comparison to something freshly made.

Back to Art Sucre, owners Frank and Nina have been in business for about a year and are moving towards becoming THE place for macarons in Berlin.   Something unique about their business is their savoury macarons.  In addition to the sweet flavours that are typical of a bake shop, Art Sucre also makes a line of savory macarons that are perfect with a glass of wine accompanying an aperitif for a cocktail party or after work drinks.  With flavours such as thyme and lemon, spicy parmesan, wasabi and beet and blue cheese and quince I am sure Art Sucre’s savory macarons will make it on every bride’s, hotel’s and hosts list of new and desirable items to serve to guests.

Tea at Chateau Mcely

On Sunday afternoon, my fiance and I took a quick, thirty minute drive out of Prague to go for tea at Chateau Mcely in the town of Mcely. The Chateau, located in a tiny village surrounded by forest,  reminded me of a villa that I visited in Florence back in October.  The property sits on a large piece of land with beautiful views of hills, trees and farmland.  It was very quiet this weekend, we were one of three tables in restaurant for tea.

The tea menu is quite large.  I sampled something called Sunshine Mate, which tasted like chocolate, caramel.  A nice tea on its own but when paired with a tea, I kind of wished I ordered a Jasmine tea instead to cut through the sugar.  The dining area is beautiful and large made up of three adjoining rooms plus a fourth enclosed “sun room” outback.  We sat in the first dining area that had a massive French-country-esque wall hutch which housed beautiful platters, tea, champagne and other trinkets.  The restaurant had a light and airy feel to it as all the furnishings were in the white/lavender/eggplant/grey and beige family with an accent of gold in some of the furniture. The dining room also had some impressive cameo wallpaper!

The tea itself was great and the desserts were not overly sweet.  I always think back to my tea at Moroco (in Toronto) which I deemed the best tea ever (in Toronto) but it is so sweet you go into a diabetic shock from the sugar levels in their delicious desserts.  The tea menu at Chateau Mcely had a nice mix of sweet and savoury and the sweet items were not too overpowering so you could actually enjoy them.

Since we weren’t starving, combined a half portion and full portion tea and shared the two.  Tea came with four good sized sandwich halves (cucumber, salmon and a misc. meat I did not try).  On the sweet side there were scones, a homemade marmalade which was topped with mint, mascarpone cheese and fresh butter, two lemon macaron that were a bit overdone, four adorably mini pop-in-your-mouth tarts and two triangles of a brownie/dense chocolate walnut cake.

I would like to go back to Chateau Mcely to try their lunch or dinner one time.  This place would certainly be a beautiful spot to host an event or escape for a weekend of quiet.  The grounds (although snow covered) were beautiful and you feel like you are in another country, only 30 minutes out of the city.  I love this place!

Guest Post: Sweet Heart Pancakes from Norene Gilletz

The making behind today’s post, kept my fiance and I busy for a couple of hours on Saturday morning between the prepping, making, photographing, eating and cleaning.

I had the pleasure of testing out a great Valentine’s day pancake recipe from Norene Gilletz, who I asked to write a guest post for Valentine’s day.  Norene is a Toronto based leading author of kosher cookbooks in Canada. She a real going concern in the food industry and splits her time between being a food writer, culinary consultant, spokesperson, cooking instructor, lecturer and editor.  She also developed an amazing chocolate-chocolate chip pancake recipe, which my fiance and I got to eat on Saturday and that I am going to share with you today. We were truly stuffed after we made them and I would recommend sharing this recipe among friends.

Norene included a lovely introduction about her pancake recipe when we corresponded that I included below.

“Celebrate Valentine’s Day with a heart-healthy breakfast and enjoy these scrumptious chocolate pancakes. You can mix up the batter the night before, then cook them up quickly for a special breakfast treat for your loved one(s). They also reheat in moments in the microwave.

Children (and grown-ups!) love it when you ‘write’ their initials with pancake batter! Pour the batter into the hot skillet to form the desired letters of the alphabet.  For Valentine’s Day, use a heart-shaped cookie cutter and trace the outline onto a piece of waxed paper to form a heart-shaped template. Place the template onto each pancake and sprinkle with icing sugar through a fine sieve. How sweet it is!”

CHOCOLATE PANCAKES

Adapted from Norene’s Healthy Kitchen by Norene Gilletz (Whitecap)

These pancakes taste like brownies – yum!

1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
3 tablespoons granulated sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
Pinch salt
2 large eggs
1 cup skim, 1 per cent or soy milk
2 tablespoons water
2 tablespoons canola oil
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
Fresh or frozen raspberries or strawberries, for garnish
Vanilla yogurt, for garnish

Icing sugar, for garnish

INSTRUCTIONS

In a large mixing bowl or a food processor fitted with the steel blade, combine the flours, cocoa, sugar, baking powder and salt. Mix well. Add the eggs, milk water, oil and vanilla. Whisk together, or process for 8 to 10 seconds, until just smooth and blended. Using a rubber spatula, stir in the chocolate chips.

Spray a large non-stick frying pan with cooking spray and heat over medium heat for 2 minutes or until a drop of water skips on the surface. Drop the batter, using a scant 1/4 cup for each pancake, into the frying pan. Cook for 2 to 3 minutes, or until bubbles appear on the top. Turn pancakes with a spatula and lightly brown the other side for 2 to 3 minutes.

Transfer the cooked pancakes to a plate and keep warm in a 200-degree F oven. Repeat with the remaining batter, spraying the pan between batches. Because chocolate chips tend to sink to the bottom of the bowl, stir batter often.

Serve pancakes warm with berries, yogurt and or icing sugar.

Makes about 16 3-inch pancakes

My notes:  We found we had to add almost another full cup of flour to Norene’s recipe to get the batter to a thicker consistency.  Flour, when measuring by volume, can fluctuate which is why measuring by weight (in grams) can sometimes help you avoid undesirable consistencies or outcomes in baking.  We also didn’t have any whole wheat flour in our pantry in Prague, so we just used 1 cup of all purpose flour.  I cut the heart out of paper and decided to use the negative and positive space of the cookie cut out to get variation on our pancakes.

The pancakes were filling, delicious and tasted great with raspberry yogurt, maple syrup, chocolate chips, and frozen raspberries!  Your Valentine will be happy to wake up to a batch of these tomorrow.  Or, just give them a shot instead of your regular pancake routine.  Chocolate, chocolate chip is decadent but a nice treat. Thank you to Norene for supplying a new pancake recipe topped with an icing sugar hearts.  If you want to see what else I have made of Norene’s, her chocolate chip cookie recipe is another staple of mine.

Fondant Covered Valentine’s Day Heart Sugar Cookies

It’s Friday!!  While that does not necessarily mean anything for me this weekend as I have a weekend full of work, that doesn’t mean I won’t make time for a bit of fun.  The three things I am looking forward to most this weekend include:

1. Testing out a sweet heart pancake recipe from a guest poster that will be featured on Lamb411 next week.  I have written about her recipes before in previous blog posts.  I’ll give you a clue here.

2. Baking a chocolate beet cake with beet icing for Valentine’s Day that I wrote about earlier this week.

3. Visiting my first castle in the Czech Republic.  I am headed to Chateau Mcely for tea on Sunday afternoon and I CAN”T WAIT!!  I promise to bring back pictures of the tea and castle grounds pending weather.

In the mean time, a friend of mine kindly reminded me on Facebook of my crazy Valentine’s Day baking bonanza pop-up (in-house) shop that I created back in 2008.  I woke up with the keen idea of supplying people with cookies for Valentine’s Day and wanted to put my cookie decorating skills to practice after having taken multiple courses at Bonnie Gordon’s College of Confectionary Arts (Alumni include Flour Studio, Cake Opera, We Bake in Heels and Bobette and Belle to name a few).

The cookie decorating course was one of my favourites and I was looking for an excuse to cater en-masse!  Well I got my chance and I’m going to share some pictures with you from the endeavour.  If you have never baked mass quantities of anything, it’s no walk in the park but the end result is always rewarding.  I wish I had all my baking materials with me in Prague.  I could go for round two, though not this weekend.

Guest Post: A Dash of Compassion’s Balsamic Fudge Cookies

I am excited to share with you a recipe and a guest post from Nicole of A Dash of Compassion, an extremely talented vegan baker in Toronto.  I have known Nicole for six years and have had the opportunity to taste her vegan treats on numerous occasions, my favourites are the cookies she makes and packages in cute tins at Christmas.  Her baking is full of flavour, texture and and stacks up to any non-vegan baked good any day.

I have personally never ventured into the vegan baking realm but have certainly been curious (and impressed) by the possibility of creating flavourful, vegan treats.  I look forward to giving Nicole’s recipe a try because it doesn’t look too hard or scary for a regular home baker. For more ideas, of course venture on over to Nicole’s site.  Lots to learn over there!

I thought the best way to introduce you to Nicole was via a mini interview which you can read below.  Plus she was kind enough to include a recipe for all you vegan or vegan-curious bakers out there: Balsamic Fudge Cookies.

Interview

Lamb411: How did your career start and what led you to pastry arts/specifically vegan baking?

Nicole: My passion for baking began in my childhood when I would help my grandmother bake banana bread and ginger cookies. I became even more interested in the creative process and incorporating healthier ingredients after I became vegan in 2001. By my mid-20s, I was developing my own recipes, and people loved them. So it just sort of stuck. I’ve realized that the more I bake and experiment with new techniques and ingredients, the more I love it.

Lamb411: What are you passionate about?

Nicole: For me, baking is about inspiring others to think differently about what they eat. So this sort of creative activism is my passion. Once you are faced with the disturbing reality of how our society exploits animals, it is hard to ignore. I can’t support that kind of food system. What I can do is show people how easy it is to create delicious pies, tarts, cookies and cakes without the use of animal products like eggs, butter or cow’s milk. There is a whole world of plant-based ingredients that can be used to satisfy your sweet tooth without harming your health, the environment or the animals.

Lamb411: Where do you get your inspiration from?

For me, inspiration is everywhere. It often starts with a new ingredient I want to play with, such as coconut nectar, cacao paste or vanilla beans. From there, I look at other food blogs, Pinterest or magazines, and it is often a beautiful photo of a cupcake or other dessert that inspires me to get in the kitchen. You’d be amazed by how excited I get when I have a new idea for a recipe!

Lamb411: What has been the most rewarding part of opening A Dash of Compassion?

Nicole: Just like I wrote on my “about” page, there is nothing more rewarding than sharing my recipes with the world, knowing I have the potential to change lives or habits just by encouraging others to celebrate the deliciousness of a plant-based diet. My blog has made me fall in love with photography all over again, too, which is also very rewarding. The food styling, lighting setup and photo snapping is another excellent creative outlet.

Lamb411: What do you hope A Dash of Compassion will be known for in Toronto?

Nicole: A resource for delicious, cruelty-free dessert recipes!

Lamb411: What are your favourite desserts right now?

Nicole: Banana soft serve is a long-time favourite treat, and it’s so easy to make! Just blend one or two peeled, frozen bananas in a blender or food processor until creamy. Spoon it into a bowl and serve! There’s no need for sweetener because ripe bananas are already naturally sweet. I often top mine with chopped nuts or nut butter and dairy-free chocolate chips.

Lamb411: What are your favourite bakeries outside of Toronto (could be global…)

Nicole: I haven’t been to many bakeries outside of my little corner of the world, but Babycakes in NYC and Sweetpea Baking Co. in Portland, Oregon are definitely on the list.

Lamb411: Who are your pastry/baking superstars?

Nicole: Pastry chef Fran Costigan became my superstar after I graduated from her Vegan Baking Boot Camp Intensive training program in NYC. We both share the same values when it comes to using cruelty-free, fair trade and organic ingredients. Cookbook authors Isa Chandra Moskowitz and Terry Hope Romero are also very inspiring activists in the vegan community.

Lamb411: If you could invite one special person to taste something from A Dash of Compassion, who would it be?

Nicole: Tough question! I’d love to invite one of the above-mentioned superstars.

Lamb411: What is behind the name A Dash of Compassion?  How did you come by it?

Nicole: Compassion is a powerful word for me. I knew I wanted to incorporate it in my blog name, and “a dash of” is very much synonymous with baking. So I thought they worked well together.

via A Dash of Compassion

A Dash of Compassion’s Recipe for Balsamic Fudge Cookies

Ingredients

1 cup light spelt flour
1/4 cup cocoa powder, sifted
1/4 cup muscovado sugar  (or brown sugar)
2 tbsp arrowroot
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp sea salt
1/4 cup maple syrup
1/4 cup canola or sunflower oil
1 tbsp good-quality balsamic vinegar
1 tsp vanilla extract

Instructions

In a large bowl, whisk together the spelt flour, cocoa, sugar, arrowroot, baking powder, baking soda and sea salt. In a separate bowl, whisk together the maple syrup, oil, balsamic vinegar and vanilla extract. Add the liquid mixture to the flour mixture and mix until just combined. Cover the bowl and refrigerate for about 20 minutes. Line a cookie pan with parchment paper and drop the dough by tablespoons onto the pan. Flatten the dough balls with your hand or the bottom of a glass. Bake at 350 degrees for 8 to 10 minutes, or until the tops of the cookies are cracked. Cool completely on a wire rack. Store in a tightly covered tin container at room temperature.

Travelling with a Coffee Snob

Given the bitter cold temperatures in Europe this past week, much of the time spent wandering around Berlin was spent in search of a place to warm up.  The most convenient places to warm up, of course, are coffee shops or cafes.  I had done a “bit” of research on coffee shops in Berlin in order to locate where I thought may be worthy of a sit and sip for my travel partners and made sure to have the list on hand as we roamed the city.

What I quickly (re)learned (I know this already) is that all coffee is not made equal. When travelling with a coffee snob aka coffee enthusiast, aka passionate coffee drinker, aka has the OTAKU for coffee, the difference between good and bad tasting coffee is evident and brought to light via long facial expressions, wilde gestures and mentally shutting down- talk about interesting consumer behaviour!

My list of hot, Berlin coffee spots included The Barn, Kaffee Mitte, Bonanza Coffee, God Shot, Espresso Ambulanz, Five Elephant Coffee, and Sloerm.  We siped and sampled in four of the seven place and concluded that the Barn had the best filter coffee and Espresso Ambulanz had the strongest espresso that would put hair on your chest.

The other thing I learned about on this trip was that hard core (filter) coffee drinkers seem to distinguish themselves by the accessories they used to brew, taste, and sip the beverage.  If you are not familiar with the Japanese company, Hario, then wake up and smell the coffee.  Hario has been making specialized glass and metal products (accessories) for coffee, tea and food since 1921.  I only found out about Hario after visiting several “niche” coffee shops/micro roasters around Europe and gazing around while my fiance tasted the coffee and chatted with the barista behind the counter (remember I am a non-coffee drinker).

So what type of coffee accessories do all the cool coffee shops use? I have posted four pictures below to give you an idea of what I’m talking about.  If you see the following items being used or sold the next time you enter a cafe, you know you are out of Starbucks land and into some serious coffee business. Happy tasting.

Photos via 1, 2, 3, 4