Waterford Blaas

Waterford is famous for its crystal...and its blaas.  Well not really, blaas aren't too well known outside Waterford.  A blaa is basically a soft floury bread bun,  they are delicious served warm with butter or indeed any filling.

500g strong flour
10g salt
15g honey
1 egg
7g instant yeast (or 14g fresh)
125g milk
125g water
85g butter at room temperature

makes 10 weighing  90g each

Add all the dry ingredients and the honey to the mixing bowl.  Fit the mixer with a dough hook.

With mixer turning on low speed add the milk and water, one the dough has come together increase speed to medium and mix for 7 minutes.

Now turn the dough out on a floured surface and cover the surface lightly with cling film and leave rest 1 hour.

After 1 hour remove the cling and cut dough into 10 pieces.  Leave these pieces rest another 10 minutes before shaping.

Shape into rounds -  Follow the instructions as for hot cross buns

Place the blaas on tray

Press down on each bread to flatten slightly

Now brush or spray with water

Dust liberally with flour on each blaa

Leave rise

Cook at 180C for about 25-30minutes

Rice crispie nests

Happy Easter!

Rice Krispie buns are a quick and easy treat, and are easy to turn into Easter goodies.

If you have small Easter egg moulds you can pack the mixture into the moulds and turn out when set-to have rice crispie eggs, stick the two sides with ganache and for a smooth finish pour over liquid ganache and leave set.  You can make large eggs in the same manner-smoothing the mix along the side of the mould to leave a hollow centre.

The nests shown were made using silicone hemisphere moulds and the nest straw made with white chocolate coloured pink.

rice krispie spheres

cover the top of one of the rounds with ganche

put the straw on top of the bun

top with mini eggs and chicken

Tempering Chocolate and Chocolate eggs

It is easier to temper larger amounts of chocolate by hand, at least 1kg.  But if this is too much for your requirements give tempering a smaller amount a go.  Tempered chocolate is shiny and has a 'snap' when broken, untempered chocolate pieces will  go grey and dull or have a grainy appearance and texture (bloom). If you are doing show pieces it really is essential.  You can also temper by 'seeding'-adding tempered chocolate to untempered chocolate.

For manual tempering heat the chocolate to 40-45C

Turn  2/3 of the chocolate out on to work surface (granite is best but you can use any surface-the process usually will just take longer ).  It can be hard to gauge 2/3- a good tip is to quickly pour the chocolate from the bowl on to the surface without using a scraper etc.  The amount of chocolate left in the bowl will be the right amounts-it is essential you then scrape down the sides of the bowl so the chocolate sits as a central mass in the bowl

now scrape the sides

Now spread the chocolate with a palette knife (step palette knife is best)

Now bring the chocolate back into the centre with a scraper, wipe excess chocolate off the scraper on to the palette knife as you work.  You can check the temperature of the chocolate now if you wish it should be at 28C for dark and 26C for milk and white.  If it is too warm repeat the spreading and scraping before taking the temperature again.  If the chocolate is too cold (it may start to seize if it is) you'll have to remove the chocolate and add to the chocolate in the bowl and start again-reheating to 40 or 45C.  (if you don't have a thermometer and are going to use this chocolate for yourself, you can check the temperature the old fashioned way-touch some chocolate from the scraper to your lip-it should feel neither hot or cold.

bring the chocolate together on work surface then spread out again

When you have the correct temperature, scrape the chocolate into the bowl of remaining chocolate and stir well (stir in one direction only or you'll get bubbles)  the chocolate is now at 31-33C for dark and 29-30C milk or white

For these eggs I cut out some letters in fondant icing and placed them inside the egg moulds, then piped around the letters with tempered chocolate so as to keep them in place-the result will be that the letters are flush with chocolate shell.

make sure your moulds aren't cold when you add the chocolate

You can spray your moulds with a 50:50 mix of cocoa butter and chocolate for extra shine


place letters haphazardly or straight and pipe around-the letters will be flush with the chocolate



Fill the eggs to top with chocolate then give a tap on the side with the scraper to remove any air bubbles, then turn the moulds upside down over the bowl of chocolate.  Then turn the mould back over and scrape away any excess chocolate from the side of the mould.

the letters are flush with the chocolate

Now leave the moulds sitting on a sheet of greaseproof to set at room temperature-if you put them in the fridge the chocolate may contract too quickly and may shatter.  You can allow the chocolate to crystallise and then add another coating of chocolate to strenghten  the egg or to add a different chocolate on the inside -white or milk

you can see here the chocolate has begun to contract

the contraction is increasing

Once the chocolate has clearly contracted  you can remove the egg form the mould by gently sliding it out of the mould.  Wear cotton gloves for this (most plastic gloves will still allow finger prints to come through)  You don't have to buy expensive chocolate gloves, there was a craze recently for applying moisturiser and then gloves  to the hands before going to bed- these gloves you can buy in chemists/pharmacies and are the exact same as chocolate gloves-a cotton and Lycra mix.

remove the egg, but wear gloves to avoid fingerprints

To stick the egg halves together warm a tray in the oven (not too hot-your hand should be able to hold the tray-about 40C)

warm one side on a warm tray

Now place the warmed half on top of the other side and make sure the edges are in line so the join is neat.

a plain egg

The I added sugar crystals to the letters on the egg below and using  edible white paint added some more decoration

The letters on this egg had dried petals added to the letters to add further interest to the eggs

Kitchen Nostalgia

Its been over a year now since I said goodbye to my bakery and although I don't miss the long hours (17hours on average a day, 20 during the Summer-including administration - this is no exaggeration) I do miss the space and creativity a professional kitchen allows. 

I recently found a CD of pictures from my bakery (I'm still on the hunt for the rest of the pictures-they were misplaced  in the move).  Below are some of the individual pastries, I'll post some viennoiserie, tarts, large cakes, chocolate and bread pictures later if I can find them.

Some people from the East and South East may recognise the bakery from the pictures. I'd like to thank our customers for their support during our years in business.

the counter

l-r: matcha tea opera, creme brulee, eclairs, chocolate mousse, lemon tart, mille feuille

l-r eclairs, creme brulee, mocha cake, blackberry crumble



Caramel Orange Cheesecake



l-r eclairs, rhubarb crumble, blueberry tart, mousse, pear and almond tart, hazelnut brownies

Brioche

Brioche is best made in a mixer fitted with a dough hook as the mixing time is long.  Due to this long mixing time alot of heat is generated during the mixing, it is for this reason it is a good idea to refrigerate the flour and eggs at least an hour before using, especially if the kitchen temperature is high.  The butter however should be at room temperature-if it is too hard it won't mix into the dough uniformly.

As this is an enriched dough (contains egg and butter) the high yeast content and long proving time is necessary.  A better result is achieved by proving the dough overnight in the fridge, you can however make the dough, shape and bake on the same day, but the dough should be placed in the fridge after the first rise for at least half an hour to make shaping the dough easier.

You can leave the recipe plain or add chocolate chips, praline, fruit or extracts for flavour.  This recipe has red pralines added to it, these are available in the supermarket in France.  In Ireland they are available from La Rousse foods (trade only).  You could make your own praline if you cannot source them.

makes 12 brioche

• 500g strong flour
• 14g (two sachets) fast acting yeast or 24g fresh yeast
• 70g sugar
• 7g salt
• 224g butter (1/2 lb) at room temperature
• 250-300g eggs (5 or 6 large eggs)
• (optional) 1tsp vanilla extract-or add some vanilla sugar to the sugar
• (optional) red pralines or chocolate chips

weigh out all your dry ingredients into the mixing  bowl  keeping the yeast and salt away from each other (see post on yeast goods)

fit the mixer with the dough hook and while turning on low speed add 5 eggs, decide whether or not to add some, all or none of the last egg (the dough should not be too dry or too wet) if you have an egg over you can use it for egg wash at the end. 

continue to mix for 10 minutes on a low speed.  Meanwhile cut your butter into cubes.  when the ten minutes is up, increase speed to medium add a cube of butter to the bowl without stopping the mixer.

Continue adding the butter over a 25 minute period-you do not have to stand by the mixer during this time, after adding some butter the dough will look  and sound  wet and may make a 'slapping' sound against the bowl, when this sound stops return to the mixer and check to see if the butter has been absorbed (it won't look like a dry dough with the more butter you add it will look slightly wet and stringy this is normal).  If you feel the need to stop the mixer and scrape down the side occasionally, do so.

When all the butter has been added and you are happy that the dough is ready (see 2nd next picture below), reduce the speed to low and add your praline or chocolate chips etc.  Mix briefly (so as to avoid breaking the praline or chocolate)

  

red pralines

The dough may look sticky but you know it is ready when you pull the dough away from the side of the bowl and it comes away cleanly.

pull a section of dough away from bowl-it will come away cleanly.

the finished dough looks loose/ wet-but is not.

Cover the dough with cling film touching the surface (to prevent a skin) and allow sit at room temperature for 1 hour.

As you can see from the picture above the dough will rise beautifully, you can allow it to rise another hour or so and finish shaping and baking on the same day  but it is better to place the bowl of brioche in the fridge overnight for about 15 hours.

after 15hours refrigeration the dough has continued to rise slowly but is firmer so is now easier to handle

The following day remove  the brioche from the fridge, remove the cling and turn out on to a floured surface.

notice the beautiful spongy texture of the dough and the ripple effect of the red pralines

Divide the dough into 12 pieces (about 80g each).  If you are new to shaping dough and find it takes a long time, allow the portioned dough to rest in the fridge while you work on shaping one piece of  dough.  Brioche dough straight from the fridge is easier to handle.

Shape the dough into rounds (see hot cross muffin post for instructions)

For individual têtes-brioche with heads, form as pictured above-with the hand held straight as pictured, bring the hand 3/4 across the rounded dough, then make a sawing motion to form the 'head'

Now twist the head as pictured to make a neck

Now push the neck down ino the base of the dough

Place in silicone moulds or tin moulds that have been buttered and floured

For loaf brioche leave the dough as rounds and place 6  in a tin/earthenware dish

Leave to prove/rise

When risen, brush with egg wash (egg and pinch of salt blended) or milk

cook in preheated oven at 170C  25mins approx for individual and 45mins for loaf 

This is delicious served toasted or fresh with the ganache recipe on this blog.

slice when cold

the centre

brioche loaf

brioche loaf piece torn away

the red sugar of the praline marbled through the dough