desserts & sweets Archives • Ant & Anise

Easy candied orange peel

When December rolls around, you can count on me to first start thinking of what holiday treats I’ll be creating. Shortbread is a given, both sweet and savory. Fruitcake (yes!). Something chocolate, whether that’s a dark flourless cookie or almond roca bars, or – in rare years – chocolate fudge. And candied orange peel.

It’s one of my go-to holiday treats. For years it was grapefruit instead of orange, but I’ve come around to enjoying the orange peel more. So many reasons to love this recipe. It’s…

sweet but not heavy like so many holiday treats
easy to make
a fantastic gift from your kitchen
vegan, gluten free and nut free

So unless someone in your circles is staying away from sugar, it’s got a wide appeal.

Pun intended, Bob 😉

Start by slicing the peel into even segments, then bring them to a boil in a saucepan a few times to remove any bitterness.

Simmer in a sugar syrup until the peel is tender and glistening, then move to a parchment-lined baking sheet to dry. Once the peel is almost dry, finish it off by rolling in superfine sugar.

And that’s it. Simple. Amazingly tasty. And just in time for Christmas. Enjoy!

Easy candied orange peel

Yield: 144 pieces

An easy treat for the holidays, and a welcome counterpoint to the heavy butter-laden cookies and tarts on your dessert tray. Naturally vegan and gluten free too.

Ingredients

3 medium naval oranges
1 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup superfine (berry) sugar, for coating

Instructions

Line two large baking trays with parchment paper and set aside.
Wash and dry the oranges, and trim the ends off.
With each orange, cut the peel through to the fruit in quarters. Gently separate the peel from the orange with your fingers. Reserve the orange for another use.
You should now have 12 pieces of orange peel (four from each orange). Evenly cut each piece into 12 pieces.
Place the peel in a medium saucepan and cover with cold water. Bring to a boil over medium heat. Boil one minute and drain. Return the peel to the saucepan and repeat this step three more times to remove the bitterness from the peel.
Return the peel to the saucepan, cover with cold water, bring to a boil and simmer for 10 minutes. Drain the peel.
Heat granulated sugar and water in the saucepan over medium heat, stirring until the sugar dissolves. Add the peel and boil gently in the syrup, stirring to ensure the syrup evenly coats the peel.
When the syrup has mostly absorbed into the peel (10-15 minutes), remove from heat and place the peel in separate pieces on the parchment-lined baking sheets. Let dry, uncovered, at room temperature for 8 hours or overnight.
After the peel has dried, toss a few pieces at a time in a small bowl with the superfine sugar, shaking any excess sugar off. Place sugar-coated peel on parchment-lined baking tray for a few hours.
Transfer the peel to an airtight container.

Cheer for ginger cookies

Hip hip hooray!

I’m talking cheer for ginger cookies. They once were hard as a rock, but now they’re soft again and kissed with Christmas cheer. Cheer as in brandy. Definitely worth cheering about, especially with the holidays right around the corner.

Here’s what happened: I was making a wonderful ginger cookie recipe from Emily Lucchetti. I bought her Stars Desserts book ages ago and have made her ginger cookies countless times. What I like best about them, aside from the spicy-sweet flavors of ginger, cinnamon, allspice and molasses, is the texture. Crispy outside, tender inside. Hard to go wrong, really.

Well…it’s not so very hard. The trick with keeping the crisp-tender texture is to under bake them. (I make these mini sized, and only 5 minutes in the oven is the perfect timing.) Unfortunately, I left the first two trays in a few minutes too long; once they cooled, they hardened up like little lumps of gingery coal.

But they weren’t lost for good. Here’s the trick: A tablespoon of brandy sprinkled on a paper towel, then left overnight on top of the hard cookies in an airtight container. The next morning they were lovely and soft again, with a hint of brandy flavor too. Resurrected. So happy. And I’ve only eaten 3 before breakfast today.

Triple Chocolate Brownies

It might surprise you that I don’t like a lot of dessert.

Um, let me put that another way. I absolutely adore desserts and sweet treats, especially when chocolate is a main ingredient, but I’m satisfied with having only a bite or two. Ask me how big a slice of cake I’d like after dinner (chocolate or not) and I’ll always say a really, really small piece, or the smallest you can do. Always.

But there’s usually an exception to every rule, and these triple chocolate brownies are it. I can’t have just one, like Mark Messier’s ad for Lay’s potato chips. Why?

Because they are perfection. Rich, intensely chocolate from three sources — melted dark chocolate, cocoa powder and chocolate chunks. Chewy, with a toothsome crunch from large chunks of pecans. I’m swooning already.

My triple chocolate brownies are smack in the middle of cakey and fudgy, the two hotly contested camps of the brownie spectrum. If you’re a brownie lover, chances are you have strong opinions on which one reigns supreme: Cakey brownies are the lightweights, airy bites with (no surprise here) a cake-like texture. Fudgy brownies are devilishly dense, usually thinner than their cakey cousins but way more intense.

Unlike the two brownie extremes my triple chocolate brownies are, in my opinion, just right. The ones that Goldilocks would have settled on. They have the best of the cakey and fudgy worlds — crisp outside with a moist, chewy inside. Straight up chocolate, nuts, and chocolate chunks on top. While they are more rich and satisfying than a cakey brownie, they won’t leave you, after only a few bites, grasping for the sofa to have a lie down until the chocolate coma passes.

No, these are simply gorgeous — see for yourself:

Aside from looking and tasting great, these brownies are simple to make. Plus, by substituting a gluten-free flour mix for the all purpose flour they are easily made gluten free.

So, do you think you could eat just one?

Triple Chocolate Brownies

Yield: 16-24 pieces

The perfect brownie: Simple to put together, richly chocolate, and chewy. They're so addictive, I dare you to have just one.

Avoiding wheat? No problem -- these are easily made gluten free by substituting your favorite gluten-free flour mix for the all purpose flour. I've had particularly good results from Cup4Cup gluten-free flour mix.

Ingredients

4 ounces butter, cut into 1/2 inch pieces
4 ounces unsweetened chocolate, coarsely chopped
2 large eggs
1-1/4 cups white sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup all purpose flour (or substitute a gluten-free flour mix to make these gluten free)
2 tablespoons Dutch processed cocoa powder
4 ounces toasted pecans, coarsely chopped
4 ounces milk chocolate, cut into 1/2-inch chunks

Instructions

Place the butter and chocolate in a medium saucepan over low heat. Stir gently until the chocolate has melted. Watch it closely and take it slow -- chocolate scorches very easily. Once the chocolate has melted, remove from heat and let cool for at least 10 minutes.
Preheat oven to 350F and grease an 8x8-inch square pan (or line with a strip of parchment paper).
In a large mixing bowl with the paddle attachment, beat the eggs with the sugar and salt on medium speed until the mixture is smooth. Scrape down the sides of the bowl, then add the vanilla extract and mix in.
With the motor on low speed, add the cooled chocolate-butter mixture to the eggs and sugar a little at a time. Scrape down the sides of the bowl.
Sift the flour and cocoa powder into the bowl, and mix in. Scrape down the sides of the bowl, add the chopped pecans and mix in on low speed. Mix briefly, just until the all the pecans are evenly distributed in the batter.
The batter will be thick and look like molten chocolate goodness. It is. Spoon it into the prepared pan and top the brownie batter evenly with the chunks of milk chocolate.
Bake for 30-35 minutes (metal pan) or 35-40 minutes (glass pan), or until a cake tester inserted into the middle of the pan comes out with only a few crumbs attached. Remove from the oven and place on a cooling rack. Slice into squares when the brownies have cooled completely. And try to stop at just eating one.

Chewy Chocolate Coconut Macaroons {Gluten Free, Grain Free}

I’ve made 4 different batches of coconut macaroons in the past 3 weeks. April has been a whirlwind of coconut and eggs for me. Luckily, I’ve had a lot of tasters to help me share the eating part.

(Now if only my tasters could help with my chocolate drizzle technique… I’m sure they could, if I asked them. Or maybe they like the big blobs of chocolate on top.)

This coconut macaroon experimentation-turned-brief-obsession started out as a pre-Passover, pre-Easter way to welcome spring in the form of an egg-heavy, casual sweet nibble after dinner.

But tasting my first two coconut macaroon attempts side by side, I knew I’d be back in the kitchen, tweaking amounts of sugar and coconut until I arrived at chewy, coconutty perfection. And, yes, adding chocolate to them….

Chocolate Truffles for Your Valentine

Today is Valentine’s Day +1. But it’s not too late to make your valentine smile.

It’s a simple equation: good quality chocolate + heavy cream (+ optional flavorings) = heavenly chocolate truffles. Yum.

It’s true, a lot of chocolate and candy making is tricky. I’m quite happy to leave the tough stuff to the pros at Beta 5, Chocolate Arts, Thomas Haas and others around town. Those are some impressive chocolates.

Chocolate truffles are impressive too. Intense bursts of chocolatey goodness. And they’re surprisingly easy (and fast) to make, even if your skills and equipment are limited in the kitchen. …

Wow, it is that time of year again. The calendar is running out on 2013, and fast.

I feel like I’ve eaten my weight in sugar in December, from recipe testing and tweaking. With the copious, rich food (savory and sweet) over the past few weeks, I’m happy to take a little time out of the kitchen.

So to close off 2013, here are a few of our favorite posts from this year:…