Tag Archives: chocolate

No BS

January 24, 2016 By in Recipes Tags: , , , , 2 Comments

Pistachio Baci Di Dama Cookies

Processed with VSCOcam with c1 preset

I have writer’s block. I have too much on my mind to be creative, so whatever I write here to take up space would be a bunch of feathery BS. No one likes feathery BS.

I don’t think writer’s block is all bad—it gives me the headspace to create other things—but I’m not going to go too far into it since I’m not really a Writer writer.

I do still want to share this recipe for Pistachio Baci di Dama, though, for three reasons: 1. I’m sick of waiting for the words to come back. 2. I saw a two-pack of them being sold at Hell on Earth (Trader Joe’s, for the uninitiated), so I feel a trend coming on and I want to beat it. 3. Baci di Dama means “lady’s kisses” in Italian, and posting the recipe any closer to Valentine’s Day would be way too cute. 729 Layers, Inc. doesn’t tolerate treacle.

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My Brain On Vertigo

November 15, 2015 By in Recipes Tags: , , , , 9 Comments

Flourless Peanut Butter Blossoms
with Dark Chocolate and Torched Marshmallow
(Or, Stoner’s Delight III*)


When I was 12 years old, I became convinced I was going to die before I reached college. The idea presented itself in a dream and that was all the prophecy I needed. Thinking that it was my truth, I held my secret close; no one would understand. I reached driving age and still hadn’t died, so I delayed getting my license for a year; a car accident seemed like a reasonable way for a 16-year-old to go. That’s why I still hate driving.

Years later, I now fear the opposite—I fear that I’m cursed with never-ending life. I’ve had too many scares to still be here and my body constantly surprises me with how strong it is, so I must be immortal. This is a much scarier truth.

These irrational thoughts on my own mortality were going through my head as I sat on the floor of my cubicle at work on a Saturday, Halloween, two weeks ago, my knees clutched tightly against my chest, the pulsating beats of my music reverberating violently against my tympanic membrane; like when I have migraines, I was trying to drown out the hollow white noise of my own between-the-ear nausea. I didn’t know what was wrong, but I kept the trash near me in case of emergency, and I just sat there, alone, turning up the volume every so often until I feared my eardrums would burst.

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A Hard Year

June 3, 2014 By in Recipes Tags: , , , , , 13 Comments

Caramelized Milk Chocolate Magic Shell (plus ice cream with duck eggs)

pouring chocolate
I’m having a bit of a hard time letting go of chocolate this year. Every year, around this time (well, actually a bit sooner), I post a recipe with chocolate to get it out of my system as, with the change in seasons, my days turn from brown to color.

I’ve described myself as a chocolate lover but not a chocoholic; the ingredient doesn’t fuel my creativity as much as dough, spices, herbs, and produce do. But this winter—the harshest I’ve experienced—may have turned a friend into a lover. I didn’t post more recipes that included chocolate than normal, just three: Chocolate-Dipped Peanut Butter Cookies with Aleppo Pepper, Individual Sesame-Chocolate Ice Cream Cakes, and Miso S’more Bars. But the ones I did post may have been some of my best and boldest.

I really turned into a lush. I found myself craving warm, fudgy-crumbed brownies, irresponsibly sliced into while they’re just baked and still gooey; the darkest and densest of flourless chocolate cakes, so overwhelming that it needs to be sliced into pencil-thin slivers; and rich ganaches coating just about everything.

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Sweet, Salty, Spicy

February 13, 2014 By in Recipes Tags: , , , , , , 7 Comments

Chocolate-Dipped Peanut Butter Cookies with Aleppo Pepper

spicy peanut2
I don’t love to post recipes that are Valentine’s Day–themed. So I didn’t. Intentionally, anyway. But then I made these chewy, intensely flavorful cookies and thought, “Oh. God. Yes.”

Instead of lacing this post with innuendo, I’m just going to put it out there: These are sex cookies. A little sweet, a little salty, a little heat, and some chocolate—that’s all you need out of Valentine’s Day, right?

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Ice On Ice

January 30, 2014 By in Recipes Tags: , , , , , 4 Comments

Individual Sesame-Chocolate Ice Cream Cakes

ice cream sandwich2

(Tahini Ice Cream, Flourless Chocolate Cake, Ganache, Honey Sesame Clusters)

When I was about 8 months old, my mom innocently gave me a lick off her spoon of vanilla soft-serve. That was my first taste of ice cream. My then-blue eyes widened, my dimples poked through very chubby cheeks, and my little tongue, reportedly, flapped furiously for more—that was my way of communicating that “Hey, I like that. Can I have some more, Mommy?” With that lick of swirled, most likely artificially flavored confection, my mom had created the monster that I am today: a fine ice cream seeker, maker, junkie.

I’m not sure why so many pastry people seem to love—and I mean love ice cream. While I get lots of pleasure out of making my own ice cream, the process isn’t as beautifully tangible as working a dough is. Pastry works my mind, pastry is my crutch when I’m feeling off but, more often than not, what I crave is ice cream. I’d take a good scoop over cake, and if only allowed to eat one sweet for the rest of my life, I might even choose ice cream over my beloved pie. I crush on ice cream so hard, that I’ll eat it in abundance deep into a second “polar vortex.” In fact, while I may go out for ice cream more often in the summer, I make more of it in the winter when berries and stone fruit, which sometimes take on an unpleasant texture in frozen desserts, are off my radar. Ice on ice. There’s just as much warmness to ice cream as there is coldness: Sometimes you patiently infuse warm milk and cream with fragrant flavors and a burst of steam kisses your face when you open the pot’s lid. You dip a spoon into it and taste to see if it’s on point. You reheat and pour this steamy mixture, carefully and slowly, into egg yolks while whisking like mad. Then you pour all of this back into the pot, and you stand, whisking still, over this gradually thickening, hot pot of custard. Dribbles of custard inevitably trail down the side of the pot or the bowl to which you’re transferring this liquid gold and you wipe them up with your finger and lick off the warm mixture—that tiny drop contains so much flavor. No, ice cream isn’t just cold.

I love how chocolate swirls find their way to the corners of your mouth, how the lips become coated by an opalescent milky film, how a dot of cream adorns the tip of your nose if you’re licking off a double-scoop cone. I love how something can at once be childlike and sophisticated, no matter what herbs or alcohols your ice cream is infused with.

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Stoner’s Delight II?

October 24, 2013 By in Recipes Tags: , , , , 11 Comments

Miso S’more Bars

corner pieces
I like to think that I have a magic tongue.* A tongue so vital and active and curious that it must possess neurons and synapses and such. It can taste and feel what’s not on it. Sometimes I find more sense and more wisdom in that tongue than I ever could in my actual brain. It’s sensitive to idea. Inspiration strikes just about anytime and that crazy, infallible tongue won’t stop thinking and wagging and thinking some more until dream is reality and foodstuff comes from oven.

As such, I often feel like I know exactly what something—a flavor combination, a restaurant menu item, a cookbook recipe—tastes like without ever having tasted it, physically. I’m not sure if this tongue is a blessing or a curse. Blessing: There’s always something new to try. Curse: Well, there’s always something new to try.

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Joan and Ed’s

May 23, 2013 By in Other Bites, Recipes Tags: , , 4 Comments

french silk pie

Chocolate Curls
Register on the left ahead of the menorah, dreidel, and shalom door placard paraphernalia, for sale all year. Deli counter on the right. Brightly lit dessert refrigerator straight ahead, with restaurant seating behind.

This was my Jewish deli. My metrowest, semi-suburban, strip mall–contained Jewish deli.

Joan was warm and jolly with white hair, red lips, and a big-toothed smile. Ed had a shiny bald spot and a nose almost as pronounced as mine that carried a square pair of specs. Joan wasn’t always visible. Ed stood behind the takeout deli counter, watching as kugel, and stuffed cabbage, and broth-bathed matzo balls were scooped into containers and sold.

But for the most part, Joan and Ed were the infamous black and white caricatures depicted in paintings hung on the dineresque restaurant’s walls — their family members the visible staff at the restaurant along with their team of sassy, almost-middle-aged waitresses who reeked of perfume and called you “honey” and such.

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You Are Not Creative

February 13, 2013 By in Recipes Tags: , , , 15 Comments

caramelized white chocolate pots de crème with cocoa nib tuile “crust”

dessert spoons

You are not creative.

It’s been done before. You’ll never be fast enough. Those with sharper minds, bigger voices, and wider audiences will always beat you to an idea. Sorry.

It’s OK, though. It’s just fine. It’s life. Drink it down (literally, if you like), and move on.

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Hello, Love

January 10, 2013 By in Recipes Tags: , , , , , 8 Comments

chocolate-almond pear tart with cinnamon whipped cream

Cinnamon Whipped Cream
It’s over. The experiment is over. Winter is here.

Remember this? You thought I was crazy. You were ready to revoke my dessert-lover’s license. I may be crazy but this year, like every year, I did not have a hard time avoiding chocolate from mid spring-December. (And I’m talking real chocolate; the use of white *cough*sweetened cocoa butter*cough* chocolate was totally acceptable.)

This certainly does not (as I tried and failed to explain in my farewell post) mean that I didn’t eat chocolate or chocolate-laced baked goods made by others. I was not following some sort of regime or cleanse. I eat chocolate everyday, and I definitely indulged in plenty of chocolate desserts and pastries while out and about.

But since I did not use my hands to manipulate it—chop a big block of it with all of my might or stir it ever so carefully as it melts into velvet in the bowl of a double boiler—I was still somewhat disconnected from it. Now I am craving something rich, dark, and maybe a bit gooey like I never have before. But the process was justified. I didn’t long to bake with chocolate. I was distracted for the reasons I outlined: The fruits and the flavors of late Spring, Summer, and Fall are too intriguing and too fleeting to put on the back burner. The yearly experiment is a way to broaden my baking horizons and stray from the obvious, from the universally loved.

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Goodbye, Love

April 19, 2012 By in Recipes Tags: , , , 20 Comments

chocolate-pistachio tart


I cannot say that I’m a “chocoholic.”

I eat chocolate in some way, shape, or form everyday. I’m known to top off my lunches with a small chocolate treat. At night, a square of 85% dark soothes my stomach after a day’s eating. I find the taste of straight dark chocolate to be divine — toe-curling, even — in its rich, fruity complexity. I love that perfectly tempered, snappy milk chocolate melts into creamy submission once it touches your lips. It’s difficult to savor; it’s gone in an instant. And sure, some white “chocolate” can be cloying on its own, but its high cocoa butter content makes it a luxurious pairing with more piquant ingredients.

But, no, I’m not a “chocoholic.”
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