Pineapple Upside-down BarsNo more school till next Monday, but that doesn't mean I'm done baking. I have several things I plan on working on this weekend, when I am not busy selling at Sur La Table. The Pineapple bars I actually made Monday morning to help settle my nerves before going to school. They are an adaptation of a Chocolate Raspberry bar recipe my sister Maria gave me. She had made the bars when I was visiting for Christmas and they were highly addictive. I really liked that the crust has chopped pecans in it. I adjusted the recipe slightly more by replacing half of the all purpose flour with a whole wheat white flour and some almond meal. I used fresh Pineapple, brown sugar and butter to make the filling. I confess these are just as addictive as the chocolate raspberry version. I think the basic crust recipe could be used with many types of fillings and I plan to explore it further in the future.
On another note, Knife skills class was last night. We had a short lecture about knives, followed by a sharpening and steeling demo, and then broke into groups to go practice the cuts discussed at the beginning of the session. We also got to select our chefs knife. Contrary to the advice of one instructor to "choose the largest knife", I selected the 8" wide. It just felt the most comfortable in my hand.
Then in to the kitchen, where ironically (if you heard my comment in my interview about lemonade and lemon meringue pie) the first item to fall victim to my new keenly sharpened knife was a lemon. It was almost poetic. From there we chopped potatoes, carrots, and squash. We almost made it through the onion demonstration, when one of the students cut her finger tip.
I told her later, as our eyes were stinging from the onions on our chopping boards, that we were crying for her poor finger. She was definitely a little knife shy the rest of the evening. She even said, "This is why I am taking pastry, I didn't want to have to cut anything". Oops.
We made it through garlic, and as I was making the garlic paste with the edge of my knife, I was thinking of the warm bread from the night before and thinking how good this paste would be on that bread. I might have to make some at home. Last but not least we cut up oranges. I kinda wish we had done lemons last, it might have lessened the smell of garlic and onions, that is still lingering on my finger tips this morning. Yes, I still have all ten of my fingertips. I think I did quite well in Knife class.
Next week we continue our exploration of bread baking, and I believe our seminar covers chocolate. Mmmm chocolate.
On another note, Knife skills class was last night. We had a short lecture about knives, followed by a sharpening and steeling demo, and then broke into groups to go practice the cuts discussed at the beginning of the session. We also got to select our chefs knife. Contrary to the advice of one instructor to "choose the largest knife", I selected the 8" wide. It just felt the most comfortable in my hand.
Then in to the kitchen, where ironically (if you heard my comment in my interview about lemonade and lemon meringue pie) the first item to fall victim to my new keenly sharpened knife was a lemon. It was almost poetic. From there we chopped potatoes, carrots, and squash. We almost made it through the onion demonstration, when one of the students cut her finger tip.
I told her later, as our eyes were stinging from the onions on our chopping boards, that we were crying for her poor finger. She was definitely a little knife shy the rest of the evening. She even said, "This is why I am taking pastry, I didn't want to have to cut anything". Oops.
We made it through garlic, and as I was making the garlic paste with the edge of my knife, I was thinking of the warm bread from the night before and thinking how good this paste would be on that bread. I might have to make some at home. Last but not least we cut up oranges. I kinda wish we had done lemons last, it might have lessened the smell of garlic and onions, that is still lingering on my finger tips this morning. Yes, I still have all ten of my fingertips. I think I did quite well in Knife class.
Next week we continue our exploration of bread baking, and I believe our seminar covers chocolate. Mmmm chocolate.
1 comment:
omigod those bars were super tasty
Post a Comment