Treacle Tart

If you have been keeping up with my blog as of late, you know that I am currently rereading the Harry Potter series and I am constantly watching Food Network channel. With the TV watching has come researching food that I am familiar with. Sincee I'm assuming most of you are Harry Potter fans (if you're not, you're just super lame), you will know that treacle tart/fudge often makes an appearance in the books. But, upon my recent research, I have realized that I don't actually know what treacle tart is. Hopefully I'm not alone? So next time you decided to pick up those Harry Potter books again, you'll know what treacle tart is!

Alright, so the basics. Apparently this is a very popular dessert in Britain. It is made with treacle, or "golden syrup." Treacle can also refer to molasses, but true treacle tart is made with golden syrup. The dessert is basically a pudding pie, there is a crust on the bottom, then the custard on top, then the pastry is latticed on top for a yummy tasting pie that is usually served with whipped cream or ice cream. YUM!

So what is treacle? According to wikipedia and wisegeek.com (yay for unreliable sources!), treacle, or golden syrup, is a by-product of sugar making, more specifically the process of turning sugar cane into juice, or by mixing a sugar solution with acid. I won't go into all the science-y details (even I don't really care about that!), but picture a substance that is very similar to honey in texture and color, but apparently extremely rich (sign me up NOW!). Mmmmmmmm... sugar.

Wisegeek.com describes treacle tart as the following: a rich, shortbread pastry for the base, the filling is golden syrup, breadcrumbs, lemon juice, and some spices (ginger was mentioned), and then the pastry stripes lining the top for more crisp.

I guess treacle is hard to come by in the US, foodnetwork.com doesn't even have a recipe for anything with "treacle" in the title. However, there are a lot of recipes on-line (all Harry Potter themed, for some reason :) that call for light corn syrup or molasses if you can't find golden syrup. Most recipes though said that golden syrup is key, so you can find it on Amazon or in the syrup section at your local Whole Foods (which for me is about 5 hours away in Atlanta. Boo). I think I might try to make it one of these days, using honey, since a few websites said that golden syrup is often used with people who don't eat honey. I also find molasses to have a really strong flavor, so if given the chance, I'll use something else.

Great. Now I'm really hungry. For something really sugary!

Bet You Don't Know What This Is

Guess it's time to post again... I've actually been quite busy, and with lots of projects plans, but no down time when both the animals are sleeping, I have to rotate. Anyways, I thought it was time to write about one of the mystery ingredients on "Chopped" and cross something off my list.

So have you ever heard of... Gefilte fish? No, you haven't? What's wrong with you?

Ok, just kidding. Unless you're Jewish, you probably haven't heard of gefilte fish. I never had until it showed up in the Mystery Basket.

What is it, you ask? Well, obviously it's Jewish. Gefilte means stuffed or filled, based from the German word with the same meaning. Basically, white fish is ground into a paste, then boiled with carrots and onions. Then you shove it into a whole fish and cook it. Think Thanksgiving stuffing stuffed into the turkey. I guess modern cooks are really lazy, because according to the website I checked out, most gefilte fish is no longer actually stuffed into the whole fish. So if you think about it, it should be called "Not Gefilte Fish." But I'm sure there's pure forms out there.

So I guess they are served in patties with some horseradish-vinegar sweetened sauce (give me some of that, please!). They look disgusting, you should Google Image it. (Because I'm way too lazy right now to upload a picture to this post).

And I just had to go cockroach hunting. Or at least keep the dog and cat away while Matt killed it.

Ok. Well. So why would people want to eat gefilte fish? Jewish people eat it because one of their laws on the Sabbath includes "not deboning fish." Since gefilte fish doesn't have bones in it, they can eat it quite easily! And it was probably made ahead of time.

Eeeehhhh, I'm not sure if I could eat this. Maybe if you didn't tell me what it was... this is based mostly on the fact that 1. it looks disgusting, and 2. I'm not so much into white fish, which gefilte fish is primarily made of.

So happy eating!

More Than You Ever Wanted to Know About Durian

I have a new goal. I told you in a previous post that I enjoy watching Chopped. As a desire to "continue" my education (i.e., keeping on learning new things!) I have decided that I will research at least one food item on the show that I don't know anything about, or haven't heard of. So last week, one of the mystery baskets contained "durian." I don't remember whether it was for the appetizer, the entree, or the dessert, and I also can't remember what any of the chefs did with it, but I do remember one thing- nobody liked the taste of it. So I thought durian would be a good first food item to research.

Here is a picture of one:

(www.srilankanguardian.org)

As you can see, it's pretty gigantic. According to the ever trusty website Wikipedia, these spiky fruits can get up to a foot long, have a diameter of 6 inches, and weigh 7 pounds!

Now, if it's size and distinct shape and texture (I wouldn't want to hold that thing!) aren't enough, if watching the chef's facial expressions is any indication, these enormous fruits also have an enormous smell- and it's not good. Apparently it smells like death, skunk spray, vomit, and the like. Here is a great video on the durian's smell.

It is an Asian native and has many culinary uses in the Asian cuisine, including Malay candy and ice cream. It's so common in ice cream, in fact, that the popular Indonesian dessert Es durian (meaning durian ice cream), is sold in stalls on the streets of cities (think hot dog stands in NYC). From my research, it looks like it's also mainly used in sauces and commonly used with coconut milk and in soups.

I'm not so sure if I would ever be willing to try this (interesting?) fruit, but I can tell you this: I don't want one of these to ever fall on my head. Ouch. And that is you introduction to durian.

Tell me, would you ever try it?