Boxcar Kitchen

In October, to celebrate my 30th birthday, some friends gifted me with a baking class at the Ecole Ritz Escoffier. The hub was perfect in choosing a 4 hour-long Saturday afternoon class dedicated to chocolate. (Yeah!) The combination of spending an afternoon with a real-life pastry chef in a veritable professional pastry kitchen at on of the most prestigious palaces in the city was enough to make me swoon. The only hitch was the wait. The class was scheduled for January which meant three long months of perusing their website and obsessing about what we might bake.

The day finally arrived and it it was one of those unseasonable warm days that have made up the majority of this winter season. With just a light jacket and the sun on my shoulders, I took the bus along the Seine to the Concorde and then walked up rue St. Honoré. I cut through a marbled shopping gallery that spills out on the Place Vendôme and came face to face with the Ritz. As I crossed the threshold of the main entrance I couldn't help but have one of those "I can't belive I'm here" blasts of happiness.

There were 10 of us in the class and we were split up into two groups which meant that we really were able to be hands on and not just silent observers. Each armed with a plethora of utensils and crisp white aprons we got down to business. Our chef was relaxed, easy-going and really interested in answering questions and teaching us just as much about technique as about the recipe we were preparing. The dessert in question was Le Délice or The Delight: a Sacher spongecake layered with chocolate mousse (saturated with a simple syrup) and a pistachio crème, covered in a chocolate ganache and painted with cocoa butter.

The best part though was all the little "pro" hints that make baking at home so much more interesting. For example, instead of using cake pans you can use rings which de-mold a million times easier. If your cake bakes in the shape of a volcano it means that you've overmixed. Although I'm sure that never happens to anyone. You can use a pair of square dowels set on either side of your cake to act as a guide when cutting it into cross sections. When making chocolate mousse, you can add your sugar as a boiling simple syrup to your egg yolks which gives your dessert a longer lifespan. When making a dessert like The Délice, which has a caramelized cream center, you freeze it before assembly. Cool, right?

Now, the only thing I need besides a kitchen torch, a 10 pound bag of Valrhona 70% chocolate, and an airless paint sprayer for the cocoa butter finish is a spot in the Ecole's 6 week-long pastry program this summer followed by a champagne toast at the hotel bar!

Well, I thought that I was onto something with this one, but apparently my so called stroke of genius wasn't genius after all. So I guess that leaves me with just a stroke...whatever that means. It's somewhat deflating to come up with a really great recipe idea only to discover, after a two second Google search, that about 40 billion other people have had the same idea. I didn't do my research until after I made up this recipe so I might as well share it.

My very unique and personal inspiration for this mango tart tatin came from- yes, you guessed it- mangoes. Pretty creative, right? But these were not just any mangoes! I was hit by a stomach rumbling bolt of inspiration while I was riding home on the bus, munching away on a bag of dried mangoes. Sure there are lots of different kinds of dried mangoes, but after relentless testing, I can honestly say that N°12 Just Mango is by far the yummiest. They are my newest addiction and can be found at the Grande Epicerie or at my favorite lunch spot, Cojean.

What is so great about these particular dried mangoes? To start, they have the perfect consistency: leathery but not tough and plump without being gummy. Like the name indicates, it's just mango: no added sugar or strange crystallization. And because the drying process is natural, each piece is unique. My tatin idea came from one particular slice that happened to be more dried than the others. The sweet slightly burnt flavor immediately made me think of caramelized fruit which is the staple of the tarte tatin. The mango tatin is a funky take on the time-honored dessert that will convince even the most diehard traditionalist.

• The key to making these 'boxcarkitchen style' is to let your caramel go until it is really nice and dark. It's important to remove the caramel from the heat right before it is almost too dark, stir the butter in right away and then quickly pour it into the pans before it hardens.

Very rarely do I read a recipe and say to myself, "Wow, that looks really complicated for no apparent reason ; I think I'll give it a try." But this is exactly what happens when you are faced with yet another rainy Sunday in May, a freshly purchased bag of semolina flour and a Monthly Mingle birthday to celebrate.

The previous week, I had found a great Oriental grocer near the marché d'Aligre on my way to a friend's house. Paris is chock full of Middle Eastern/North African mom and pop shops but this one was particularly impressive. Shelves stacked from floor to ceiling with spices, conserves, and sauces covered the walls and the center of the shop was dedicated to everything in bulk. Dozens of fat, perfectly aligned bags full of flours and dried legumes were meticulously arranged. I quickly spotted the almost 10 different grades of semolina and immediately thought of a cake - an orange water semolina cake. I chose the second finest mill of flour and I was stunned when the owner weighed out EXACTLY 500 grams of flour with one scoop and a tiny flick of the wrist. I was so happy walking away with my 50 cent bag of flour. I was going to make a cake, a semolina orange water cake just for Meeta.

I decided to use a slightly snooty Food and Wine recipe as my launch pad. I've never used so many dishes to make a cake before. I did ended up changing the recipe quite a bit but I stayed true to the structure. Even though I ended up using milk and light cream and less butter than called for, I still thought the cake was a little oily. The original recipe was for one large cake and it was completed with a center layer of raspberry preserves and then sprinkled with powdered sugar. Since I made individual cakes, I tried the jam but found that it detracted more than anything from the cake. It was kind of like eating a high end jelly donut. The cakes were so much better plain and fresh from the oven. The semolina flour added a nice crunch to the outside and the inside was dense, steamy and perfumed by the orange flower water.

Happy Birthday Monthly Mingle!!

Originally, this was supposed to be for the Waiter, What's in My...Pie event but that didn't really work out. Well, actually the pie BEFORE this one was supposed to be for the event but that pie quickly turned into the pie that WAS. This one almost suffered the same dangerous fate if not for the sheer and heroic willpower of my mother.

On one of the many blustery nights when I was back home, my mom and I decided to turn on the oven, heat up the kitchen and make ourselves a pie. And since we all (my pops included) think that blackberry pie is hands down the best pie on the planet, the flavor decision was unanimous. The smell of flakey crust and bubbling berries soon filled the house and we all sat around the kitchen waiting impatiently; very, very impatiently. When the oven timer finally went off, it was dark outside and there was no light left to shoot the pie. So, we ate it. All of it. Well, we did share it with my aunt and uncle but still, there wasn't a single sliver left to photograph.

What to do? We did what any good bakers do. We made a second pie the very next day. The crust was even closer to perfection and not a single ounce of berry juice spilled out through the venting. The pie was picture perfect. The only problem was that once again, it was evening, there was no light and the very bad berry pie monsters were getting hungry; very, very hungry. You know that you're a goner when your reasoning starts going something like, "Well, if the three of us only eat half of the pie tonight, that leaves an entire half for pictures tomorrow."

And then, it happened. A slow and steady chant began to fill the room, "More pie, down with photos!, MORE PIE, down with photos!, MORE PIE, DOWN WITH PHOTOS." To my surprise I heard my own voice echoed by my dad's. We were pie possessed and the official unofficial pie strike had begun. We chanted; we stomped our feet; we paraded through the living room. We were united!!!! No backing down until we had more pie!!

Our solidarity paid off, we got our second piece, er... I mean 1/3. I'm almost ashamed to admit that I ate 5/6 of a blackberry pie in less than 48 hours. But then again, it was good; really, really good.

PS: My mom was the only one with enough willpower and thanks to her sacrifice there was one piece left the next morning. This photo is dedicated to her.

Once again Meeta has chosen another great Monthly Mingle. She is bringing us Sweet Love to the table: an homage to our valentines and sweets that say I love you and nothing screams sweet love like sour lemons, at least in my house anyways.

I didn't have to think very hard to find the perfect treat for the hub. Lemon tarts and pain au chocolat are pretty high on his list of favorites and yet I never make either of them. By the time you tally up all the bakeries in Paris that make exquisite bread and pastries, making certain things yourself starts to seem useless. But the fact that we were very recently deceived by some no good very bad tartelette au citron, I started to think that maybe I could do better. Then, not only could I please the hub but I could also finally break in my new tartelette pans!

I got the honey idea from this month's issue of Food and Wine. One of the featured desserts is a honey lemon custard served with crème fraîche. Although I don't usually use honey in my baking, I was intrigued by the idea and decided to give it a whirl. I actually changed the recipe quite a bit by cutting yolks, adding whites, more zest, less honey and the results are phenomenal. The honey doesn't just add sweetness. It brings out this whole other mellow warm flavor that is the perfect foil to the zip of the zest.

I think that this curd is by far the most unique and sophisticated that I have ever tasted and I had a bit of inspiration as I was filling up the last crust. This lemon curd is so good that I think it is worthy of an attempt at recreating Keyser's feuilleté au citron that has now become famous among my family and friends.