Orange Tian: An Epic Failure

The 2010 March Daring Baker’s challenge was hosted by Jennifer of Chocolate Shavings. She chose Orange Tian as the challenge for this month, a dessert based on a recipe from Alain Ducasse’s Cooking School in Paris.

There are only a few things for me to say about his dessert- I had hardly any time and it didn't go very well.

I had to push off my dessert making to Wednesday, having been sick previously, and we were leaving town the next morning. On Tuesday night I was able to make a few ingredients, however. I'll go through my tian thingy in sections:

Marmalade: I really had no idea how to make marmalade. Let's just let that be clear right now. That being said, here's what I did; I blanched my orange slices several times, but the bitterness was still apparent, so I just continued on to pulverise (not mince) them in the food processor, adding a gluggy splash of agave nectar and later some of the juice from segmenting my tangelos. I cooked off the water and called it done. Never try to make marmalade like this- it was really gross!

Whipped cream: A lesson was learned during this challenge- you can't whip silken tofu. So on VEGirl went to the coconut whipped cream method. You just skim the solidified fat from the top of a chilled can of coconut milk and whip until fluffly, but I whipped so long it actually began to separate. Oops!

Caramel sauce: The plan to make this was lost along with the time!

Pate sablee: Abandoning all attempts at low-fat and origanality, I cut together some Bob's Red Mill All Purpose Gluten-Free Flour and some Earth Balance non-dairy butter, and threw in baking powder, agave nectar, and flax eggs. Into molds and an oven the batter went (forget chilling the dough and cooke cuttering it, it's midnight for heaven's sake!). What emerged was not a flaky pastry dough, but a crumbly baked thing. It tasted okay, though, so into the tian it would go.

Orange segements: Very fun, as a matter of fact! I enjoyed learning how to segment an orange, but I actually used tagelos for my dessert. Unfortunatly, I only had eough segments for a few slices for each tian.

So how did the finished dessert taste? I couln't finish mine- the marmalade really ruined it. I have no picture becuase I couln't turn the dessert out of the little mold I provided for it, even though I chilled it in the hotel freezer. I don't think you want to look at a mold.

I hope that other peoples' tians went well, and I hope I can give this another try some time.

The Graham Cracker and Nanaimo Bar: Daring Bakers January '10

The January 2010 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Lauren of Celiac Teen. Lauren chose Gluten-Free Graham Wafers and Nanaimo Bars as the challenge for the month. The sources she based her recipe on are 101 Cookbooks and www.nanaimo.ca.

I happily took up the challenge- I have been long trying to make satisfactory graham crackers, and had never heard of Nanaimo (pronounced Nah-nye-Moh) bars! To make it vegan, I would have used Earth Ballance non-dairy butter- but I decided to pass up on the the ten sticks of the stuff (how expensive could that get?) and experimented with a more healthy low-fat version.

My little sister thought the middle layer was a homemade (vegan) ice-cream, and was shocked when I told her it was beans! Didn't stop her eating them though....

A traditional Nanaimo bar is comprised of three layers: the first is a chocolate, coconut, almond, graham cracker crumb base (made gluten-free). The middle layer is a butter-custard mixture, and then topped of with a chocolate spread (mixed with more butter).

Well, my bar went a like this....

Graham crackers: I decided to, once again, try to design my own gluten-free, vegan, sugar-free, oil-free graham cracker recipe. I tried. MANY TIMES. I finally just used the soy grits leftover from homemade tofu making- mix it up with some GF flour, agave, etc., press it into the pans, preliminary bake, cut into squares, and dry out in a low-temperature oven. Sadly, the dough cracked and would not cut- and ended up breaking off the pan in small chunks and crumbs. Oh well, they had to be pulverized anyway.

Nanaimo bar:

First layer: Using sesame seeds instead of almonds, and a combination of carob and cocoa powder changed up the flavor a bit. Cooked garbanzo beans were my bet on replacing butter and.... it worked! With consistency, anyway. The bottom layer was my favorite part- though I wished I had left out the carob. Brown rice syrup lent a hand in binding the mixture and sweetening.

Middle layer (garbanzo "custard"): Garbanzo beans replaced the butter in this layer- even though I added a bit of Earth Balance for flavor. Garbanzo beans gave the same color, stiff texture, and a mostly neutral flavor- a perfect booster for the sweetness of brown rice syrup, and some other ingredients to mimic a custard flavor. It had a slightly mealy texture that I'm convinced the dried dates did.

Chocolate topping: A mixture of unsweetened bakers chocolate and date syrup made a suitable chocolate ganache to smear atop to bar.

A freezing session in the freezer (the garbanzo "custard" wouldn't harden otherwise) made a nice slicing subject, and gave the garbanzo "custard" a great texture, aside from the slight mealiness. I did like the bottom layer- and I have lots of graham cracker crumbs leftover for other baking ventures!

I certainly want to perfect my approach to this particular confection- I believe that this first try has great possibilities.

Thanks Lauren, for the great challenge!