Frostings and Fillings III

I'm almost done with the frostings and fillings, I swear.  Today, at least, I was able to finish up the buttercreams, and the local cows are rejoicing.  First up today was the most labor intensive of the group, the Praline Buttercream on page 40.

The first thing you have to do is to make the praline powder from scratch.  Start by dissolving the sugar into some water in a pan.

Boil this until it just starts to turn brown.

Dump in your almonds and cook until the sugar starts to turn a dark golden brown and the almonds have been toasted.

Pour this onto a baking sheet that has been sprayed with Pam, and allow to thoroughly cool.

Sure, sure, you can chop this up in a food processor or something, but when you have something as cool as my giant mortar and pestle, why would you?

When cooled, the praline will stick together as one sheet.  Break this up into pieces and place in the mortar and pestle.

Release the fury!

Now that you have praline powder, it is time to make the buttercream.  Place a mixing bowl in a pan that has been filled most of the way with water.  Think of this as another bain marie.

Whisk the eggs and sugar in the simmering water bath until it has tripled in volume.

Remove from heat, but keep stirring until cool, unless you like scrambled eggs.  Start beating in your butter, and when creamy, add in the praline powder.

There you go, you now have Praline Buttercream!  It's not difficult, it just takes a while to do.  This would be really cool on top of a simple cake.

Next up today was the last of the buttercreams, the Mocha Buttercream on page 40.

Thankfully, this was a little less labor-intensive.  Start by creaming your butter in the stand mixer.

Add in the sugar in parts to allow it to incorporate.  With the last addition of sugar, also mix in your chocolate powder.  Like the previous entry's coffee buttercream, add in your coffee syrup as well.

Mocha madness, buttercream style!  I could see how this stuff could be addictive to certain people.

Have you ever tried to find potato flour?  Yesterday was another wild-goose chase looking for that stuff, and it was completely unsuccessful.  Potato flour is just dehydrated potatoes that have been ground into a powder, how hard should this be to find?  When I was talking about this with a friend last night, he suggested dehydrating your own potato.  While I wasn't about to do that, it did give me an idea.  You CAN buy dehydrated potatoes and grind them yourself!  So this morning I picked up some dehydrated potato flakes.

See?

Here is the before and after shot.

I now had what I needed to make the Pastry Cream Filling on page 41.

Well, except for the two cups of creme fraiche...I didn't feel like shelling out over twenty bucks for that stuff (another wild-goose chase this morning) so I used sour cream as a substitute.  Anyway, mix together your flours and creme fraiche, then whisk in the eggs and sugar.

Place in a saucepan over moderate heat and stir until it thickens.  At first it seems like nothing is ever going to happen, then suddenly your wooden spoon has lumps on it.  Start stirring like mad, because the starches in the flours are starting to expand.  Eventually, the mixture will be so thick that as you stir you will notice the mixture does not ooze back together in the pan.

Allow this to cool, and then add kirsch if you like.  You are done!

The final project today was the Crème Pâtissière on page 41.

Begin this recipe by scraping the seeds out of a vanilla bean.  Use a paring knife to do so.

Split the bean.

Then scrape the seeds out with the tip of the knife.

Throw both the seeds and the bean into your milk and then bring to a boil.

While the milk is coming to a boil, whisk together the eggs, flour, and sugar.

This will be quite thick for now.

In the previous entry I showed you how to temper the egg mixture so that you don't have scrambled eggs floating in milk.  Do the same thing here.

When all of the milk has been whisked in, return the mixture to the saucepan and give it some gentle heat.  Start stirring immediately, as this is already quite hot.

In very little time you will have a nice, thick filling!

Overall, the Praline Buttercream was the most fun to make, and the Crème Pâtissière had the best flavor.  I can imaging using the latter in something like the Choux Pastry Dough that I made earlier.  The Pastry Cream Filling was VERY tangy, so I'm interested in seeing how it is applied in future recipes.

Six more frostings and fillings to go!