Believe it or not, I actually have a better reason than the usual, “Sorry, we’re busy” for not posting much lately. If you keep an eye on the flickr site, you might’ve noticed that food pictures have been appearing there but never migrating over to the site. Well, the reason is that I’ve had a side project going on — I’ve been making a cookbook! My good friend Jessica is getting married today, and as a wedding present for her, I gathered recipes from her friends and family and put them together in a cookbook that I had printed over at blurb.com. I didn’t have time to make everything myself, but we did test out and photograph some of the recipes, so those are what you may have seen show up on flickr. I wanted to share some of these delicious recipes with you, too, but I didn’t want to ruin the surprise for Jessica, who I think might read this here blog occasionally. But the beautiful wedding was yesterday today, so the cat’s finally out of the bag. The next several posts will be recipes shared by Jessica’s friends and family.

First up is this Irish cream poundcake from Katrin Baker, an advisor to both Jessica and me when we were in the Honors program at NCSU. I couldn’t resist adding some chopped chocolate to Katrin’s recipe, though I’m sure it would be delicious either way. As Katrin says, this cake actually gets better after it sits for a day or two. I especially liked it toasted. Thanks, Katrin!

Chocolate Chip Irish Cream Poundcake

adapted from Katrin Baker, originally from Cooking Light, she thinks

2 3/4 cups cake flour (about 11 ounces)
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup low-fat or fat-free cream cheese, softened
10 tablespoons butter, softened
1 cup granulated sugar
1 cup packed brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 large eggs
3/4 cup Irish cream liqueur
3/4 cup dark chocolate, chopped, or chocolate chip (optional)
Cooking spray
2 tablespoons powdered sugar (optional)

Preheat oven to 325 F.

Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt.

Beat together cream cheese and butter with a mixer at high speed. Beat in granulated sugar, brown sugar, and vanilla. Add eggs, 1 at a time; beat well after each addition. Beat on high speed 1 minute.

With mixer on low, add flour mixture and liqueur alternately to sugar mixture, beginning and ending with flour mixture; mixing well after each addition. Stir in chopped chocolate, if using.

Pour batter into a 12-cup Bundt pan coated with cooking spray.

Bake at 325 F for 55 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes on a wire rack; remove from pan. Cool completely on wire rack. If desired, sift powdered sugar over cake.

I got this nifty square tart pan (how could I have gone this long without a tart pan?!) with a gift certificate from Christmas.  I was itching to try it out, but I’m cutting back on sweets, so I was on the lookout for a savory tart idea.  I ended up using a balsamic vinegar crust from La Tartine Gourmande and a custardy filling of beets, goat cheese, and walnuts from alpineberry.  It was a delicious but light and simple supper.  Matt’s comment was “it’d be good as an appetizer, and smaller” — well, not a bad idea, maybe I’ll try it sometime with miniature tart pans.  Anyway, the night we made it, all we needed was something light and simple, and this fit the bill perfectly.  It was also pretty good leftover, at room temperature even.

The balsamic vinegar added a different little tang to the crust, and I think beets and goat cheese are always a great combination.  The only problem I had was that the tart shell shrank — a lot — but I think that was probably my own fault since I didn’t want to wait to let the dough rest after I made it.  So, if you try this out, I’d recommend letting the dough sit in the fridge at least an hour before rolling it out, and then refrigerate again before baking.

Beet and Goat Cheese Tart with Balsamic Crust

adapted from La Tartine Gourmande and alpineberry

For the crust:
1 1/4 c all purpose flour
7 T butter, cold
2 T balsamic vinegar
2-3 T cold water

For the tart:
2 beets
1 T butter
1 small onion, thinly sliced
3 large eggs
3/4 c heavy cream
1/4 t dried thyme
8 oz goat cheese
1/2 c walnuts, chopped

Preheat oven to 400 F.

Cut butter into flour. Add balsamic vinegar and just enough water to bring the dough together. Shape into a ball, wrap tightly in plastic, and refrigerate at least an hour.

Meanwhile, wrap the beets in foil and roast until they’re tender, about 1 hour. (Making the dough and roasting the beets can both be done up to a few days ahead.)

Roll out the dough and place in a tart pan and prick with a fork.  Refrigerate for at least 15-30 minutes.  Preheat oven to 375 F and bake for 20 minutes or so, until lightly golden.

For the filling, heat butter over medium heat.  Cook the onion in the butter until tender and a little bit caramelized.  Slice the beets and cut the slices into chunks.

Combine the beaten eggs, cream, and thyme, and season with pepper and a little salt.

Place the beets and onions in the bottom of the tart.  Pour over the custard.  Sprinkle with goat cheese and walnuts.  Bake about 35 minutes at 375 F until set and golden.

So in case you haven’t noticed, I’ve gotten a bit behind on my blogging events. I missed last month’s Daring Baker’s event (though that Filbert Gateau sounded delicious, I just ran out of time), and I’m several weeks behind on Whisk Wednesdays, too. (I do have several Whisk events that I’ve cooked but haven’t found time to write up yet.) Part of my problem lately has also been that our camera isn’t working right — more on that later, but that’s why the pictures this time are not quite up to par, and why everything was taken with a flash. However, I was very excited to participate in this month’s challenge — Chocolate Eclairs, with a recipe from Pierre Hermé.

From reading the other posts that are up so far, it sounds like quite a few Daring Bakers had previously mastered eclairs and didn’t find this to be too much of a challenge. I’d never made choux paste (pâte à choux) before though, so I was pretty psyched to try it out. For this challenge, we were supposed to use at least Pierre Hermé’s recipe for the choux paste, and then at least one other chocolate element: chocolate pastry cream and/or a chocolate glaze on top. I went with the chocolate glaze, but stuck with a more traditional vanilla pastry cream (custard) filling (recipe from Joy of Cooking), as I thought both chocolate elements might be a bit over the top. (And, honestly, I just didn’t have enough chocolate in my stash — GASP! — and didn’t want to go to the grocery store.) I decided to make mini éclairs, again because I think a whole one can be too rich, so I now have a nice stash of bite-sized éclairs in my freezer, you know, for unexpected guests, or late night chocolate cravings.

As I said, this was my first time making any kind of cream puff dough, so I was thrilled when my éclairs actually puffed up as they should. There might have even been some dancing around the kitchen, though you’ll have to ask Matt about that, as I admit to nothing. Really, the only part about this recipe that was a bit challenging is that I under-filled the bottoms of my éclairs a bit, and so they wouldn’t always keep their tops on (how rude!). Other than that, the filling and the glazing was a bit tedious, but everything was pretty successful, and the finished products were mighty tasty!

Thanks to Tony Tahhan and MeetaK at What’s for Lunch, Honey? for hosting this month. If you want the recipe we used, I’ll link to it on someone else’s blog once a few more posts are up. (Most of it is in the pictures below actually, though if you want to make them you might want a few more details.) And, as always, check out the blogroll to see how everyone else fared!