Thanksgiving Pumpkin Pie, Niagara Falls

I could barely keep my eyes open as a strong gust of water almost blew me away. I had gotten as close as I could to the waterfall, and was now drenched. I had been there only for a minute, but it seemed as if a strong storm had appeared and left as quickly as a tornado. It wasn't the 1600's, when the first non-native Americans, French explorers, first experienced the Falls. The feeling must have been similar, though.

The Maid of the Mist

The small boat that took me past one set of falls to the next zigzagged in and out of the blue marble countertop like a turkey gravy server. As a result, one could feel a soft moist spray throughout most of the voyage, one that has been taken since 1846.

Thunder crashed down in the form of water, leaving a cloud of what appeared to be white debris dust that rose above it, and could be seen from miles away. As I became nearer to this force that gathered strength as it pushed past long jagged rock cliffs that resembled black phantoms hidden beneath the river, the rumbling sound was almost more beautiful than the impressive view, when it cleansed the soul, and left room for nothing else but its contemplation.
A rainbow stretched its glassy colors across the view, much like the bridge nearby. It was a frequent and daily sight in this place, which surely must have fairies, leprechauns, and pots of gold.

 History of Pumpion Pie (that's how it used to be spelled) and Thanksgiving
The first written cooked pumpkin pie recipe was a French recipe recorded in the 1600's. At the time, its dose of vitamin C saved the pilgrims from scurvy. At first, sweet pumpkin recipes were baked inside the gourd, and milk, honey, and spices were added within it as well. Even though a recipe for the pie existed, it might not have been baked in a crust in the New World, or have been a Thanksgiving staple, until the beginning of the 1800's.
It is now eaten for Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas in the United States and Canada.

Harvest decoration at a Niagara winery

Niagara Falls at night

Recipe from Libby's Pumpkin Pie Can

3/4 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
2 large eggs
1 can Libby's pumpkin
1 can evaporated milk
1 unbaked 9-inch pie crust
whipped cream (optional)

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Mix all ingredients, except for the pie crust and the whipped cream, in a bowl. Pour into the unbaked pie crust shell. If you desire, you can take an additional amount of pie crust and cut out miniature leaves to place on the edge and in the center for a decoration. Place in oven for 15 minutes. Lower temperature to 350 degrees and bake for an additional hour. Cool on wire rack for 2 hours. Then serve with whipped cream.

References
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maid_of_the_Mist
http://www.niagarafallsheritage.ca/heritage/show.asp?id=252761
http://whatscookingamerica.net/History/PieHistory/PumpkinPie.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pumpkin_pie

Swedish Cardamom Bread

I visited Pippi Longstocking's house, where she fried eggs and cooked pepperkakor cookies, as small children scrambled in and out of its jungle gym rooms. A short while later, I continued my househunting after timetravelling to see ancient Scandinavian wooden or straw house structures

inside Skansen park, (http://www.skansen.se/en/grid/countryside) or an ancient shipwreck at the Vasa Museet, which I followed with a trip on a boat in front of the Royal Palace, where Nobel Prizes have been presented year after year. After a piece of light green Princess Cake, I walked down the cobblestone streets of the magnificent Gamla Stan, a medieval center, where crowds would celebrate the midsummer night that very same evening. 

History

This milky bread is traditionally served during Christmastime. 

Recipe

1 tablespoon yeast

1/4 cup water (110 to 115 degrees C)

1 1/4 cup milk, warm

1/2 cup butter, soft

1/3 cup sugar

3 yolks

2 1/2 teaspoons cardamom

1/8 teaspoon salt

5-5 1/2 cups flour

Knead dough 8 minutes. Let it rise for one hour; divide it in half then in three parts. Roll each part into a 16-inch rope. Then braid three ropes together. Cover. Rise until doubled 45 minutes. Bake at 375 degrees for 20-25 minutes. Cut each loaf into 12 slices. 175 cal, 1 g fiber.

Filling

2 tablespoons butter, melted

1/4 cup pecans, chopped

2 tablespoons sugar

2 teaspoons cinnamon

Cover the bread with the nut filling.

References

http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/swedish_coffee_bread/

http://thisweekfordinner.com/2009/12/30/vetebrod-swedish-cardamom-bread/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardamom_bread

http://www.momsway.com/2012/07/12/top-ten-places-to-visit-in-stockholm-sweden/

Chocolate Chip Cookies in New York State in the Fall

Jackolantern chocolate chip cookie made with Wilton cookie cutter

In New York State, you can travel through Ichabod Crane's Sleepy Hollow town (http://www.visitsleepyhollow.com/things-to-do/visit-irving-landmarks) as you follow the road through the landscapes sprinkled with colorful fall foliage in October. 

After following side roads such as I9 west, you can go through Saugerties to the Catskill Mountains, where trees shine metalically, like glow-in-the-dark puzzle pieces, as the sunlight strikes their backs. Locals who declare having arrived for the Woodstock concert in the 1970's, now run restaurants and other small businesses in that small town in the state park.

Seneca Lake, one of the Finger Lakes in New York

Colorful barns and silos on the road, near Niagara

Further north, vines curl around Seneca and Keuka Lakes, as red and orange tree flags pop up every so often. As you near Niagara, barns and silos loom ahead, one after another, until you reach the powerful River, and waterfalls. 

Recipe:

Alton Brown's Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookie

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/the-chewy-recipe/index.html

Follow the recipe to make the dough, and get a small scoop ready. You can only do half of the scoop, for a regular-sized cookie, or you can do the full scoop, the way his recipe indicates in ounces, to make a larger one.

 Make sure you line your cookie sheets with parchment paper to ensure better shaped cookies. Either avoid using darker pans, or make sure you reduce the baking temperature by 25 degrees if you do use them.

Your cookies will turn out chewy and have a round shape if you use the scoop!

To make the jack'o'lantern, use a Wilton cookie cutter. Place some dough on the cookie sheet, making sure the dough shape is larger than the cutter. Push the cutter into the dough, and remove the dough left around the cutter. You can bake with the cutter still on the dough. This large cookie takes at least 15 minutes longer usually, to bake. Once you take it out of the oven, let it rest for three minutes. Then remove the cutter inmediately, using a knife to run it along the interior edges to make the cookie come out. It will come out in pieces, which you can either paste together with frosting, or just set together on the plate.

References

http://www.recipegirl.com/2012/05/14/new-york-times-chocolate-chip-cookies/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Headless_Horseman_(Legend_of_Sleepy_Hollow)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_Irving

Irish Potato Apple Pancake for Halloween

I didn't try these delectable potato pancakes when I went to Dublin in April. I am trying them now, though, because they are an Irish Halloween staple. When Halloween used to be a festivity called Samhain, all kinds of foods used to be eaten. However, when it became All Hallow's Eve, people had to fast, and meals were vegetarian. Hence the tradition of eating potatoes on this day.

While this recipe is sweet, there are others available elsewhere that are savory. Mainly, harvested foods are enjoyed.

Trick or treating began when children or poor people would go from house to house singing a song, or saying a prayer for the dead, in exchange for a soul cake, flattened bread with fruit in it. Other people would dress up to scare away evil spirits, or to avoid being carried away by them the following morning.

Recipe

1 pound potatoes, weighed after peeling

1 oz. melted butter

1 1/2 ounces flour and 1/2 ounce oatmeal

pinch of salt

2 teaspoons sugar

10 oz. cooking apples, peeled, cored and sliced

a little milk

1 ounce butter

1 ounce sugar, white or brown

pinch of ground ginger or cinnamon

bake at 400 degrees.

Boil potatoes until they are cooked. Mash them with butter, and add flour, oatmeal, and salt. Roll out half of the dough into an 8-inch round. Cut and slice apples and place them on top of the circle; add butter. Place the second round on top.

Brush the cake with milk and sprinkle the sugar and cinnamon on top.

References

http://www.yourirish.com/halloween-in-ireland

http://www.tasteofhome.com/Recipes/Potato-Apple-Pancakes

http://www.divinedinnerparty.com/traditional-halloween-recipes.html

Tarte Tatin

 

Visitors arrive on horseback at the stunning, expansive castle surrounded by hunting grounds. After waiting to be invited in, they are ushered to a spiral staircase. As they climb the stairs, a nobleman inside descends them hurriedly, emerges through a  hidden door and steps into a stagecoach, leaving the grounds as quickly as he can.

Both characters are in Chambord, a hunting castle in the Loire Valley, France covered with turrets that look like they're made out of cookies and candy. In this region, castles and 16th century Italian-style palaces dot the countryside. Chambord has a winding double staircase designed by Leonardo da Vinci, so that the inhabitants could easily escape at the same time as their visitors take the staircase upwards, in the opposite direction. 

Another palace, pictured above, is called Chenonceaux and it stretches on arches across the Cher River. 

History
The Tatin sisters, Caroline and Stephanie made this tart for the first time in the 1880's. They used basic ingredients: sugar, apples, butter, flour, and water. At the time, they used unpeeled apples, though nowadays most people peel them before cooking. They began a hotel in 1894, and its most famous dessert was this tart.

Recipe 

Crust

200 grams flour

100 grams butter, chopped in small pieces

500 grams warm water or milk

1 pinch of salt

Apple topping

2 kilograms of apples, peeled, cored, and halved

200 grams of sugar

75 grams of butter

Mix the dough for the crust and chill in the refrigerator. Preheat oven to 180 degrees C.  Place butter and sugar in a skillet. Add apples, and cook for 15 minutes. Remove the apples, and let the sugar mixture thicken. Place the apples in a 12-inch pan. Add the caramel, then cover everything with the dough round. Poke holes in the top of the dough. Place in oven and bake for thirty minutes. Remove from oven, then turn over onto a plate so the apples are on top. Cut and serve.

References

http://www.tarte-tatin.info/recette-tarte-tatin.html

Marquesitas, Toledan Almond Gluten-Free Cupcakes for Columbus Day

Toledan coat of arms

When I stepped off the bus onto the cobblestone streets of Toledo, I was transported to Spain of post-Roman times, when it was once the capital of the nation, until the 8th century. The steep paths led me upward through the gates of the fortified town. One of the first sights is the cathedral, where warm statues smiled tenderly at visitors, and a skylight holds figures that peek inside, with their legs dangling impishly over the edge of the dome as if they were leprechauns instead of saints and cherubs. 

Around the corner, silversmiths welcome onlookers as they insert their tools on the handles of swords to decorate them with intricate, black designs, just like others did centuries before them.

My visit though enchanting was short, as I hurried to take the hour-long bus ride back to Madrid to catch a plane. Someday I will return to visit the Toledan home of  the Cretan il Greco, a famous Spanish painter.

History of the Marquesita

These delicacies were created in Sonseca, by the son of a Toledan candymaker, who had learned the craft of making mazapanes (almond paste candy) from his family. His wife was from Sonseca, so he set up his own candy store in that neighboring town. 

Recipe

300 grams finely ground almonds

5 eggs

250 grams powdered sugar

zest of 1/2 a lemon

Sift the finely ground almonds and powdered sugar together. Beat eggs separately, then combine both. Add the zest of 1/2 a lemon, and pour into mini cupcake papers. Preheat oven to 500 degrees F. As soon as you place the cupcakes in the oven, lower it to 350 degrees and bake for 10 minutes. Yields 36 cupcakes.

New Orleans Beignets at Cafe du Monde

Beignets served at Cafe du Monde 24/7

Cafe du Monde at Jackson Square

"Only two spots left!" the horse carriage driver bellowed. At Jackson Square, several of these vehicles depart at a time.  They wind around the streets, the nimble horses hooves rhythmically clicking against the pavement like long fingernails tapping on keyboards. On the opposite side of the street, one of the main landmarks in the city-Cafe du Monde- is open day and night. Inside, flocks of waiters and waitresses flutter around tables, as tourists sit down to vaccuum in the snow-covered, irregular-shaped donuts, excited to be in a restaurant that never closes. 

On the opposite side of the square, St. Louis' Cathedral regally reaches to the night sky, as statues cast giant shadows that enthrall photo-takers.

St. Louis Cathedral interior, at Jackson Square

The second Cafe du Monde location is in another section of town, near the view of the bustling Mississippi River. A small cafe du monde is surrounded by the competing stands doing their best to sell the hottest hot sauce on earth, while long barges float, seeming clumsy, much like a Hummer or limousine trying to find a parking space in a crowded parking lot. It is closer to the port where coffee entered the United States for the first time in the 1700's. so  people quickly grew fond of the unique taste in their cup, thus still adding it to Louisiana coffee to this day.

History 

In the middle ages, the Spanish made bunuelos, fried flour-water balls. The French made a similar concoction called beignets (from the word beigne which means to raise), and took them to Louisiana, where it became a staple, and was declared the state donut in 1986. In New Orleans, Cafe du Monde began serving strong coffee and beignets since 1862, during the Civil War. 

The New Orleans coffee served along with the beignets has chicory (endive root, related to lettuce) in it, because it was added to stretch coffee supplies during the French civil war, when it was scarce. It added body and flavor.

Pontalba Building, at Plaza de Armas (Jackson Square)

Recipe from: http://www.tastebook.com/recipes/2276442-Cafe-Du-Monde-Beignets

1 tablespoon yeast 

3/4 cup of warm water (110 to 115 degrees)

1/2 cup of evaporated milk

1/4 cup of granulated sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 egg

2 tablespoons shortening

3 1/2 cups of flour

optional: experiment by placing 1/4 teaspoon of cinnamon and nutmeg.

Homemade beignet dough

Homemade beignet squares

Roller for cutting beignet dough into squares (Cafe du Monde, Riverwalk)

Heat water until it is almost boiling, add a tablespoon of sugar, then cool until the water reaches 115 degrees.  Add the yeast to it. Mix ingredients in bowl; beat the yeast water in too. Knead the dough for five minutes, and let sit for an hour. Next, roll out the dough onto a generously floured surface, and cut into squares. The dough will be very soft; therefore you will need a lot of flour. Fry the squares in a pot filled with oil until they're golden. Remove them and place on paper towels. Serve on a dish; sift powdered sugar on top of them. If you only spoon the sugar on them, it will clump.

Homemade beignets fresh out of frying pot

Beignet frier at Cafe du Monde, Riverwalk

Sprinkling powdered sugar on the beignets

References
http://www.ehow.com/about_5392837_history-beignets.html
http://www.mademan.com/mm/history-beignets.html
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20091119093550AAsqVeP
http://coffeetea.about.com/od/typesoftea/a/Chicory.htm
http://www.cafedumonde.com/coffee