A dear friend of ours, Isabelle (@spoonsie) is quite the runner and cyclist. She spent the past year, training for a triathlon. This coming fall, she has challenged herself to cycle from Vancouver, British Columbia to Austen, Texas. The 4,264 km route will take 12 days to compete. To qualify, she has elected to raise $10,000 for the Canadian Cancer Society in the five months leading up to October 11. 2010.

She recently launched her website to co-ordinate sponsorship and fundraising.

isaonabike.com
As per her Canadian Cancer Society fundraising website, Izzy will be leveraging social media for her campaign and will be holding community events.

One of her community events was a bake sale at last weekend's Great Glebe Garage Sale.

Great Glebe Garage Sale 2010
Source: Greg (@cyclaw)

In total, she raised a respectable $1,107.25. Some local bakeries and fine food shops contributed bakery and candy, including the newly opened Flour Shoppe (Ottawa's first cupcakery), Wild Oats Cafe and Catering, and Second Avenue Sweets.

We contributed a dozen red velvet cupcakes (recipe) and 14 bags of biscotti (recipe), everything freshly baked the night before.

Not so Red-Red Velvet Cupcakes, flavoured with Maple Vinegar and topped with Cream Cheese Frosting

Cranberry, Almond, and Apricot Biscotti

Upcoming fundraising events we are planning include a poutine crawl of downtown Ottawa and a women's barbecue. For more information, subscribe via e-mail to isaonabike.com.

Particulars:
The FlourShoppe
617 Bank St (@Stratchcona)
(613)695-3752

Wild Oats Bakery Cafe And Catering
817 Bank Street
(613)232-6232

Second Avenue Sweets
151B Second Avenue
(613)233-7277

Since Christmas 2006, I promised myself to bake something different every holiday season for the potlucks my better half and I attend. Christmas 2007, we made cranberry scones, learning how in a baking workshop at a local bakery (Three Bakers and a Bike) earlier that fall. We would make them again a year later, but this time I re-worked the recipe to use only butter. I would also make several batches of biscotti, but I looked for something new, thumbing through magazines and surfing the web.

Eventually, I settled on Alton Brown's "Macaroon Delights."

AB's Macaroon Delight
Seeing AB's vid on how to make the macaroons would be one of the last videos I watched from the Food Network website. In following months, the powers that be blessed modifications to the site that not only favoured Microsoft Internet Explorer, but also browsers on the Microsoft Windows platform. As a proponent of open source software, I use Ubuntu Linux, my preferred web browser, Mozilla's Firefox.

Even more interesting, the webmaster or database administrator would mix up AB's two macaroon recipes on the Food Network website, an older recipe coming from Good Eats' "Down and Out in Paradise" special. For some odd reason, half way through the month of December, the month when food websites are most heavily searched, the title and links of AB's macaroon recipes were mixed up. "Macaroon Delight" was no longer search-able. Its corresponding recipe was renamed "Paradise Macaroons." The "Down and Out in Paradise" macaroons was renamed "Toasty Coconut Macaroons."

That said, whatever they were intended to be called, AB's holiday macaroons came out great!

Biscotti Macaroon Platter

Without re-printing AB's recipe, 14 oz of unsweetened + 2 oz of sweetened coconut (by weight) were mixed with 2 oz of sweetened condensed milk (by weight), a pinch of kosher salt, and 1 tsp vanilla extract.

Sweetened Condensed Milk

Dry Coconut Mixture

Then, 4 large egg whites, 5 oz of fine granulated sugar (by weight), and 1/2 tsp of cream of tartar were whipped with an electric mixer until they formed medium peaks.

Egg Shells

Whipped Meringue

Medium Peaks
I discovered that a smaller metal bowl, allowing the egg white and sugar mixture to pool halfway up, produced a better meringue. After all a meringue is what beating egg whites and sugar together produces.

Finally, the meringue was folded into the coconut mixture to lighten it. The mixture was scooped onto parchment lined half sheet pans and baked in a pre-heated 325 F oven for 25 minutes.

Final Mixture

Tray of Baked Macaroons

Close-up

Trust me, use a disher when scooping the macaroon mixture to produce a nice tight package. Otherwise, you will end up with these:

Flat Macaroons
They still brown up nice though, producing a toasted flavour.

Browned Macaroon Bottom

The taller macaroons turned out chewy, crispy, sweet, vanilla-flavoured, and slightly caramel. They disappeared quickly at the pot luck they went to. Incidentally, AB's original recipe, topped the macaroons with semi-sweet chocolate and chopped nuts. I will have to try that sometime...

Other Notes
While the macaroons baked, I decided to play with meringue a little more, using a Tyler Florence recipe and producing the following snow peaks.

Snow Peaks

Close-Up
Clearly, I need more practice, working with a pastry bag.

Here are the logs of biscotti that turned into what was platterred above...

Biscotti Logs

During Christmas 2008, I also discovered pre-cut parchment paper.

Pre-Cut Parchment Paper
While convenient, a roll of parchment paper is cheaper by length overall and much more flexible when using half sheet pans.

And as always, here are contingency ingredients in case the macaroons didn't work.

Dry Cookie Mix and Marshmallows

Cupcake Tins, Almonds, Cranberries, and Powdered Sugar
You don't want to know how many cartons of eggs I had in reserve. The pantry is always stocked with extra bags of sugar and flour. Worst case scenario, I planned on baking up chiffon cupcakes and icing them with a marshmallow frosting.

With foodiePrints celebrating its third birthday - its first published blog entry, a twice re-written "hello world" and its first recipe, one for almond biscotti - I discovered that we have relatively few Christmas-themed posts. This post aims to slowly remedy this by compiling a selection of images from our archives to share some of our traditions.

Office Christmas Parties
Office Christmas parties are an interesting species of get-together. As Jack Knox wrote in his "Office Christmas party all about being inappropriate" for Canwest's canada.com, the general consensus from business leaders is to attend. For the organization, they provide management an opportunity to evaluate staff's soft skills for future advancement. Such includes appropriate dress, conversation skills, and showing discretion. For employees, they provide the opportunity to get to know each other in a relaxed setting and get a sense of the prevailing thoughts of management.

The party I attended with my better half's office was held at Ottawa's then Civic Centre (1015 Bank Street) at Landsdowne Park. There, I watched my first live hockey game, featuring Ottawa's 67's.

67's Game

Served was typical sport stadium grub.

Onion Rings and Chicken Fingers

Not Particularly Spicy Wings

Beer, Mexican Corona

Mine was held at La Boîte à Chansons (444 Bd De l'Hopital) in Gatineau, a very large restaurant, whose interior is made to resemble a log cabin.

La Boîte à Chansons

There, I ate a traditional Quebec feast:

Clockwise from bottom: tortière, meatballs, roast beef
Everything was smothered in gravy. Though, I was instructed the tortière, a revered meat pie dish, had to be eaten with ketchup.

Mini Tortière, properly served
Indeed, the tortière did well with some added sweetness and acidity to match the savory filling and rich pastry.

A week later, my team also bid farewell to our office assistant, a wonderful gal. She happened to be the person who ensured that I ate my serving of tortière without embarrassing myself. To celebrate her advancement, we took her out to lunch at Naples Pizza (70 Rue Montcalm), again on the Gatineau side.

While my colleagues each ordered great pizza, I went rogue and ordered the lasagna (spelled "lasagne" on the menu, cost: $9.95). Here is the oddity of pasta I was served. It still puzzles me today.

Chimney-shaped Lasagna

Filled with Pizza Sauce, Cheese, and Pepperoni
On Naples Pizza's menu, the lasagna was described as "a special blend of Italian Noodles, Pepperoni, selected Cheeses, & Meat Sauce." Lesson learned: When going to a renowned pizza house, order what it makes best. Comparison-wise, a personal combination pizza ("mushrooms, pepperoni, green peppers, bacon & onion") cost $9.75.

Christmas Baking
That year, Jenn and I baked cranberry scones and almond biscotti, batches of each destined for two potlucks and several close friends.

Regarding the biscotti, I followed the tried and true recipe that launched this blog.

One Batch of Almond Biscotti, drying

Though, whilst searching for that year's Christmas basket fodder, we came across these biscotti at the Dollar Store.

Dollar Store Biscotti
They were slightly more puzzling than the chimney lasagna.

Regarding the scones, their recipe comes from a baking course we took at Ottawa's Three Bakers and a Bike Bakery (1281A Wellington Street W.).

Scones Destined for Jenn's Parents
I am not at liberty to share that recipe, but here are hints that work with all tea-style scones recipes. When making scones, there must be enough fat to coat the flour mixture to form pebbles.

This is too dry

So add enough fat that...

...the mixture resembles this.

Bake six to a half sheet pan, lined with parchment paper

Cool on cake racks...

...and you will have great scones

A Toaster
That year, a dear friend gifted my better half with something she had been eyeing for a while...

A Hello Kitty Toaster

Naturally, it arrived boxed in pink

Interestingly, it makes pretty good toast...

...which we ate a lot of that Christmas

On a related kitty note, here is a mousse filled chocolate kitty Jenn's sister Jasmine received as a Christmas gift.

One odd looking chocolate cat
And, here is how we discovered it was filled with mousse...

One bisected odd looking chocolate cat

Speaking of tortière, the following is a twitter conversation I had on the subject this past weekend...

More after the jump...

It was a busy weekend for many Ottawans. Some crowded the streets in the Glebe neighbourhood on Saturday for the annual Glebe Garage Sale (GGGS). Many, eager to search for bargains and participate in what my better half tells me is an experience that needs to be seen to be appreciated. Others, participated in the Ottawa Race Weekend, running the 2 km, 5 km, and 10 km on Saturday or the half and full marathons on Sunday. According to CFRA (a local radio station), over 36 000 people ran in the various events, setting a new participation record.

Speaking of which, my dear friend, Yannick, ran the half marathon on Sunday. His time, 1:40:24.9, placed him 666th, an outstanding finish. The interesting position number aside, he ranked within the top 10% of the 10 435 registered runners for the specific event. According to his personal blog, the result was a personal best. Congratulations to him!

Me, I spent the weekend recuperating from two weeks of running about, tending to various dinners and entertaining guests. Saturday actually saw me sleep in until 3:00 pm. I however, ended my two weeks of mad cooking by contributing baked goods to a fund raising event, organized by a favourite tweep of mine, @spoonsie (aka: Izzy the #bacon princess) for the GGGS.

She spent several days mobilizing Ottawans to either come to the event at the corner of Lyon and First Avenue or contribute delectables. In the end, she raised over $1000 for the Ottawa Regional Cancer Foundation to support breast cancer research.

Spoonsie's Bakery Fundraiser
Source: @spoonsie's personal blog

Congratulations to Izzy!

Here are contributions from foodiePrints' meager kitchen:

Ingredients: Thursday night saw me chasing to the local mega-mart for additional provisions. My strategy for the following Friday: make a fool-proof recipe (biscotti) to ensure some bakery for the event. Then, re-attempt chiffon cupcakes with a new marshmallow icing/frosting recipe. And, if time permits, attempt master chef Heston Blumenthal's chocolate chantilly recipe to make vanilla wafer sandwiches.

Bakery Provisions to Supplement Existing Stores
The dried cranberries were part of a secondary contingency in case the chiffon cupcakes fell. I would have used them to make more biscotti. The whipping cream was intended to balance the chocolate chantilly, should it have proven too strong in flavour.

I ended up running out of time. Chocolate chantilly will have to wait for another event.

Honeyed Almond Biscotti: Turned out great!

Biscotti Logs, cooling for cutting

Sliced and toasted biscotti, air drying
Though, I still think they could have used a couple more hours air drying...

Recipe is located here.

Seeing the finished product, another favourite tweep, @rosella76, sent me an authentic Italian recipe for a special type of biscotti, called "cantucci." Gotta luv karma :)

Vanilla Chiffon Muffins: Turned out great!

Baked Cupcakes

As per habit, I baked several extras using cupcake papers and oven-proof custard cups. Here is the resultant texture: success!

Test Cupcake

Recipe is located here.

For the icing, I followed a recipe from the wonderful people at HowToEatACupCake.net. While there are many marshmallow icing recipes on the web, this one advocates heating its egg white base to 160F on a double boiler before whipping or adding marshmallows. Since the event the cupcakes were destined for was a bake sale, I didn't want to take any chances with raw eggs.

Recipe (adapted from HowToEatACupCake.net)
What you'll need:

• whites from 2 large eggs
• 1 cup fine sugar
• 6 tbsp water
• 1 tbsp syrup (used table syrup)
• 1/2 tsp cream of tartar
• pinch of salt
• 1 cup miniature marshmallows
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

Method:
1. In a large heatproof bowl, combine the egg whites, sugar, water, corn syrup, cream of tartar, and salt.
2. Set the bowl over simmering water in a pot and heat the mixture, whisking constantly with a balloon whisk, until the sugar has dissolved and the mixture reaches 160F on an instant-read thermometer. For me, this took approximately 4 minutes.
3. Remove the bowl from the saucepan and, using an electric mixer, whisk the mixture until it forms soft peaks. The bowl should still be quite warm when finished.
4. Slowly add the marshmallows, while continuing to whisk on low speed.
5. Add the vanilla and continue beating until the marshmallows are melted and the icing is smooth. For me, I actually had whisk while alternately placing the mixture back over the simmering water. This is because the egg white mixture did not have sufficient heat to melt the marshmallows.
6. Use immediately


Completed marshmallow frosting

Iced Test Subject

Jenn and her sis Jazzie then sprinkled pink-coloured sugar in a bow design onto the cupcakes while I did the dishes and cleaned the kitchen.

Finished Cupcakes
Many thanks to both for helping me out.

Izzy even dropped by to pickup the bakery. In my care, I doubt they would have made it to the event in any resalable form!

I should note that after a successful bake sale, Izzy went on to run a 10 km the same day, truly an amazing individual! She will even be walking 60 km this coming weekend to further raise money for the same cause as her bake sale fundraiser. Click here to sponsor this amazing lady!


Tag(s): cupcakes, biscotti, Glebe

Two weekends ago, two of Jenn's former house-mates came to Ottawa for the weekend. They came to visit and enjoy some of the festivities of Ottawa's annual winter festival, Winterlude. Unfortunately, the weekend was fraught with blisteringly cold temperatures and freezing rain, so, from time to time, we had to stay indoors. Happily, poor weather really can't keep a houseful of foodies down. Besides visiting Ottawa's premier shawarma establishment, the Shawarma Palace, a lot of the weekend was spent swapping old recipes and trying a handful of new ones.

Here's what turned out:

Pernil

Anyone for Cuban Sandwiches?

Biscotti Baby!

Dried Cranberry and Pistachio Goodness

What's Frying Doc?

Southern Fried Chicken

Recipes follow:

More after the jump...