Salvaging Deliciousness

As a new chef, I'm terminally likely to totally screw up half the recipes I attempt. It's okay, I'm learning, but occasionally, wrestling with failure, I feel like Ralph Wiggum struggling to open a milk carton.

So after botching one of the first steps of making Baklava, I was feeling kinda low. The friends I was cooking with, however, had other plans, and what they decided to do made me feel, for the night, like a real chef:

We improvised.

The problem with our Baklava recipe was, we tried to speed up the defrost process of the Fillo dough with warm water, assuming the bags involved were hermetically sealed. They weren't, which left us dough rather soggy at the edges. But the middle of the roll was fine--and after some cutting, we had lots and lots of thin strips of Fillo. That'd be one helluva narrow pan of Baklava...but what else could we make?

Tarts, as it turns out. With a maniacal look in his eye and an inspiration I'm still trying to understand, one of my friends started mixing up spare stuff around the kitchen--raspberries, cinnamon, some lemon zest from the baklava---until he had a bowl full of deliciousness. Meanwhile, my other friends began laying down strips of Fillo.

We took turns layering the paper-thin dough and filling it with the raspberry mixture, making funny shapes (including what can only be described as a raspberry tumor). It was my idea to fold the dough into triangles, someone else's to make some sauce with honey intended for the baklava, someone else's idea to...you get the idea. It was like cooking by wiki.

The results? Well, I'll give you a hint.


YUM.

The recipe can be found here: Improvised Raspberry Honey Tarts.

Enjoy! I know I did.

The Ultimate Battle

The constant dispute between R* and I is whether dessert should be chocolaty or fruity. Sometimes we can compromise with a combination, but most of the time I crave a large slice of chocolate cake or a light and airy tower of chocolate mousse, while his stomach grumbles for a glazed fruit tart or caramel-covered bananas. Any true chocolate-lover can understand what a strain this puts on our relationship.

I. Need. My. Chocolate.

He's learning to understand this.

In the meantime, I draw upon the age-old skills of sharing and compromise and occasionally agree to a fruit-centric dessert. Inspired by a recipe we found in a cookbook, we decided to take advantage of the deliciously juicy pears that are in season and bake them. The original recipe called for some sort of store-bought custard on top, which didn't sound good to either of us, so we improvised for the most part. The pears were ripe and baked quickly, and though the recipe said to baste the pears with the cooking liquid throughout the baking time, I found the liquid stuck to the bottoms and was too gloppy to baste with. In the end, we topped the pears with a scoop of vanilla ice cream, whipped cream and a sprinkle of lemon zest.















I will admit, reluctantly, that it was a fantastic, quick and easy dessert that did satisfy my sweet tooth after dinner. The cold ice cream melting over the hot pear was a delicious combination and the lemon zest kept it from being overly sweet. The recipe said to count on one pear per serving, but we both felt that was a larger portion than we could handle.

If you have a similar struggle in your relationship, I encourage you to try this recipe as it seems to be an adequate compromise. Maybe next time I'll drizzle some chocolate sauce on top... [insert evil laugh here: muah ha ha ha].

Baked Pears
Ingredients

4 ripe pears
Juice of half a lemon
1/2 C. brown sugar
1 Tbs. cinnamon
1 Tbs. butter or nonfat spread
2 Tbs. lemon zest

Optional Garnishes: vanilla ice cream, chocolate sauce, whipped cream, etc.

Directions

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Peel and core each pear and place cored side down in a baking dish. Brush lemon juice on top of pears, covering completely. Combine brown sugar, cinnamon and butter in a small saucepan and heat gently until completely combined into a syrup-like texture. Make sure not to burn the liquid. Pour sauce over pears and put in oven for about 20 minutes or until pears are soft. If the sauce is not too thick, try to baste the pears once or twice during the cooking time.

To serve, place 1 or 2 pears on a dessert plate or bowl. Drizzle with extra sauce from pan and top with ice cream and lemon zest.

Yield: 4-6 servings

*Please note: the man previously referred to as "my boyfriend" will henceforth be referred to as R per his request. I think he thinks I'm going to say something embarrassing about his cooking that can be traced back to him... but he lets me take pictures of his food, so we'll humor him.