raspberry tart

The crazy weather this spring and this summer has done terrible thing to crops like sour cherries, but at least the raspberries are doing okay.

birthday

I started with my favorite cake, a génoise, and with some fresh peaches and raspberries from the farmer's market and some various creams — whipped and bavarian (pastry cream and more whipped cream) — I made myself a pretty satisfying birthday cake.

vegan kabocha pots de crème

I love the texture of kanten but imagined agar agar had more possibilities — It does.

I found this recipe for pumpkin custard with agar agar. I continued my love affair with kabocha (try it in pumpkin pie!) and substituted kabocha for the pumpkin. I used brown sugar instead of the suggested agave syrup (I find the agave craze ridiculous), used a quarter teaspoon of agar powder and upped the cashews just a bit.

The topping is coconut milk whipped over ice with some agar-sugar syrup. I then let them set (overnight, as I was pressed for time).

This was creamy like a pot de crème, which is thanks to the wonders of cashews and just enough agar agar to get a light set. Raspberries from the farm share were a perfect topping.

fiddleads, duck & brussels sprouts

Last time A. came to visit she was very pregnant. This time she was with her adorable six-week old. Something special was in order. We had duck breast marinated in red wine and ground mustard seeds (brown/yellow) with a raspberry melomel (mead) reduction, fiddleheads sautéed in duck fat and a few pickled brussels sprouts (they were embedded in some sauerkraut from the fall!). I was quite happy with the result.


A. also brought Prosecco and pomegranite juice which were mixed to create a cocktail that went wonderfully with the duck. It was really good. And that we finished off with a pear-hazelnut torte (from Deborah Madison's Local Flavors):

racking

I've had a raspberry melomel and a braggot with cranberries going for a few months now, and today I racked them for the second time. Also, a cider racked for its first.

The melomel — just mead with fruit — is raspberry blossom honey, water, some champagne yeast (plus all the wild ones in the honey and on the fruit, since nothing was heated) and a few quarts of raspberries. The raspberries were added a pint at a time throughout the raspberry season at my farm share. Once those seemed spent, I racked the melomel and let that sit for a few months. And here we are. It tastes like — to be honest — a raspberry cough syrup, without sugar. It has a lot of punch, even with less fruit that many formulæ call for. This one will do well with aging. As in maybe a few years. (See bottom left: looks like Kool-Aid.)

The braggot — malted mead — is also raspberry blossom honey (got a bucket from Warm Colors) plus amber malt, some bog myrtle and a little fresh sage. I used some generic wine yeast with it, which has left some sweetness. After that had finished its primary fermentation I racked it into another carboy with some cranberries (frozen and thawed to soften them). That top photo is the spent cranberries flosting on the last bit to be sucked out into a clean carboy. They add some tannins to the braggot. This seemed to be the more far-fetched of the meads but already has a nice flavor. I'm hoping it'll be superb by the fall.

The cider is a basic cider. I added some champagne yeast this time, whereas my last two were all by spontaeous fermentation. I've also relly made cyser in the past, a mead-cider, so this tasted much cleaner. I'm not sure which I'll prefer. My cyser that's coming up on a year of aging is quite nice. I'll bottle and prime this in a month or two. And then we'll see.

death of an apple, birth of a melomel

I moved at the end of last month -- not far -- and was without internet for a week, and then... my Mac died. Very dead. So posting might be few and far between and sans photos.

Started raspberry melomel (fruit mead) with raspberry blossom honey and raspberries from my farm share : each week I'll add my share of berries until it's out, then I'll let it sit. For probably a year. I'll rack it after a month or two and strain those berries out. I'm very excited. Last year's mead is coming up I think and it's about time to see how it has matured. (Last year's cyser [cider made with some honey] is bright, sharp and delicious).