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Daring Bakers time again, my friends. This month’s recipe, chosen by Meeta and Tony, is from a book I’m dying to get: Chocolate Desserts by Pierre Hermé.

Thus, I was excited from the get go. Even more so when I actually read the recipe and realized that this was all about éclairs. Something I’ve never tried. As in, never, ever, tried. Not to eat, not to make.

I have made /2008/07/jalapeo-cheese-puffs.html”>cheese puffs, using a choux pastry dough with cheese, and loads of armpower. (Most of it provided by my able friends.) That was.. not so much fun actually, but quite tasty in the end.

This recipe turned out to be a lot easier. First of all – there was specific instructions for using a stand mixer. Excellent. That sure saved my shoulder from excessive beating. And second of all – I didn’t encounter a single snag, because I was so appallingly late in doing this that many other Daring Bakers had already put up their posts, complete with good tips.

Thanks in particular to Fanny, who mentioned spraying the dough with water after shaping and also slitting the baked puffs with a knife right away. I did both – misting the dough once right before going in the oven and twice during baking, and then slitting them open straight away when they were done. Which they were after about 17 minutes. I have a convection oven and didn’t bother with the rotating sheet thing. Sorry. But other than that, I followed the instructions.

Wait. More or less. Because I didn’t make a pastry cream. I know, I know. But the guidelines gave us some leeway there, and I ended up just mixing vanilla custard (from a box!!) with some whipped cream. I had plans to add fresh berries, but the realities of life foiled me once again and well, no berries. I bet it’d have worked really well though, a few fat raspberries tucked underneath the glazed tops… well, next time. They were delicious just like this though. I particularly liked the chocolate glaze – that recipe is a keeper for sure!

You can find the recipes here, the blogroll here, and the discussion forums – open to everyone! – here.

I translated the parts of the recipe that I used – you can find that here.

Slow Food Nation is a an indoor and outdoor affair with high ticket fundraisers and plenty of free events and activities. If you want to enjoy it on the cheap, head over to Civic Center and take a walk through the inspiring Victory Garden. In the garden swing by the “Soapbox”, where a series of speakers and artists get to have their say. The garden is ringed by booths called “the Marketplace” which is kind of like a national farmer’s market with growers and producers from all over and plenty of free samples and tastes of fresh fruit, cheeses, nuts, milk and more.

Even if you’re on a budget, stay for a snack or a meal. There are all kinds of offerings from Slow on the Go, including local favorites and regional specialities. My pick? A scrumptious muffaletta made from Heritage Foods company Salumi of Seattle! And if you can’t make it to San Francisco, I hope you’ll enjoy the slide show.

Thank god for an extra fridge.

Ok, sorry for not posting yesterday. I have good reason though – I was busy baking. A lot. Today is my brother’s birthday party, and I had volunteered to make dessert for his 100-or-so guests. (What was I thinking?!) Anyway. So I did. I quickly scrapped my original plan of making cupcakes, and instead asked my friend Tesse for her awesome carrot cake recipe. I made a double batch of that, and then double batches of Earl Grey Cookies (recipe to come), /2005/06/amazing-chocolate-chip-cookies.html”>Chocolate Chip Cookies and /2008/03/cardamom-biscotti.html”>Cardamom Biscotti. I tried to make a double batch of /2005/11/cinnamon-tosca-squares.html”>Cinnamon Tosca Squares, but something went horribly wrong and most of it ended up on my oven floor. And eventually in the wastebin.

Anyway. I have to share the carrot cake recipe. It’s really awesome, and I think part of the reason is that it uses butter rather than oil. Tesse always uses normal salted butter, but I used unsalted and instead added a small pinch of salt. You can do it either way.

I made twice this recipe (and three times the frosting) for the batch I made, but this is enough for a thick normal sized cake. (Use a 9-inch springform tin.)

Tesse’s Carrot Cake

4 eggs
400 ml sugar
400 ml flour
2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp vanilla sugar
1 tsp baking soda
200 g butter, melted
600 ml (about 500 g) carrots, finely grated
cinnamon

Beat eggs and sugar until very fluffy. Stir in flour, baking powder, vanilla sugar and baking soda. Then add the butter, and finally the carrots.

Pour into a buttered and floured baking pan, and sprinkle over cinnamon.

Bake at 175°C until the cake is baked through. Count on about 35-45 minutes, but depending on your pan it can take longer so keep checking it.

Let the cake cool completely before frosting it.

Cream cheese frosting
150 gram cream cheese
60 gram butter, at room temperature
250 ml powdered sugar

Beat all ingredients until it’s really light and fluffy. Spread over the cake and place in the fridge to set.

Decorate, if you wish, with /2007/09/caramelized-carrots.html”>caramelized carrot strips.

Recipe in English:
Tesses morotskaka

How do you enjoy Slow Food? There isn’t one sanctioned way. What began as a protest against fast food has become the symbol of a new consciousness about food. While the organization is somewhat controversial, the goals are admirable–to promote a return to the way people used to eat. What that looks like these days is up for debate. That very discussion was part of the Re-Localizing Food panel discussion today at Slow Food Nation, the community event organized by Slow Food USA, part of the international Slow Food movement.

The panel featured author and journalist Michael Pollan, chef Dan Barber, Gary Nabhan, founder of Renewing America’s Food Traditions Alliance, RAFT and Winona LaDuke, a Native American activist. It was moderated by James Oseland, editor of Saveur.

Michael Pollan explained that the current state of our food systems was a product of interstate highways, supermarket chains, refrigerator trucks and cheap fossil fuel. But the days of cheap fossil fuel may be over. Shipping broccoli from the Central Valley in California to New York used to cost $3 a box, now it costs $10. That kind of change is making communities rethink long distance shipping of food that can be grown locally. He also told the sold out crowd that even $5-10 a week spent on local food makes a difference and said you shouldn’t feel like you have to go to extremes to make change happen.

I was most impressed with Dan Barber who talked about his experiences growing native grains. A customer sent him Otto File, a special variety of native corn. He later found out that it had been traded with the Italians who recognized its quality and grew it for polenta. You can buy the polenta at Zingerman’s or eat it at Dan Barber’s restaurant.

Barber stressed that a blend of old world wisdom and newfangled technology could be combined to great result. He then told of a visit to a goose farm in France where birds naturally gorge themselves instead of being forced, and even wild birds choose the farm, flying in from all over, because of the high quality living conditions. Electrified fences keep animals from entering the property but not from leaving. Though the animals are free to leave, it sounds as if they never choose to.

Barber actually made a plug for the foodservice provider Sysco, a company you would expect to be part of the problem, but he says, the CEO is reacting to chef’s requests for local food and changing profitable and conventionally “efficient” ways of doing business to plan for a less commodity oriented future. All in all the panelists were optimistic about the future and the way we as a country are returning to more local food and less dependence on cheap fossil fuel.