Mocha Spice Blend and Cookies

When I mixed up my unusual CMR Spice Blend, I was also playing with an idea for another spice blend. It sort of got put on hold for a time, but I finally put it together a couple of weeks back. Again, though the spice mixture was made, I didn't get around to doing anything with it until yesterday. 

Mocha Spice Cookies I

I called the mixture Mocha Spice, because 2 of the main components are coffee and cocoa. The other ingredients are cinnamon, cloves and Szechuan peppercorns (which are not even a relative of pepper). The mixture smells wonderful, and my thought was to make my recipe for Hermit cookies, substituting the Mocha Spice Blend for all of the spices and the coffee in that recipe. I figured that since the cookies originally called for coffee, this mixture should work well. I did a 1:1 swap for the total amount of the spices in the recipe and made the cookies last evening. This is the original Hermit cookie recipe, before changes:

Hermits

Hermits

Makes about 4 dozen cookies

½ cup shortening
1 cup brown sugar
1 egg
2 tablespoons water
1½ cups all-purpose flour, sifted
1 tablespoon instant coffee powder
½ teaspoon soda
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
¼ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg
¼ teaspoon ground cloves
¾ cup raisins
½ cup walnuts, broken

Thoroughly cream the shortening and sugar. Add egg; beat well. Mix the instant coffee into the 2 tablespoons water, then add to the creamed mixture. Sift together the dry ingredients and add in slowly until combined. Stir in raisins and nuts. Drop from teaspoon, or small cookie scoop, about 2 inches apart on a baking sheet sprayed lightly with cooking spray. Bake in a 375 oven for 10 minutes.

NOTES: These can be iced with an icing of choice, or a glaze type icing. For the glaze, use 1½ cups confectioners' sugar, a pinch of salt, ½ teaspoon of vanilla extract. Add in water or milk, one tablespoon at a time, stirring very thoroughly before adding more. It is deceptive at first, and you may not need much more than another tablespoon or so. If the cookies are baked as individual cookies, dip the tops into the glaze, then set to dry. If using the "Busy-Mom-Method" just spread the glaze over the hot cookie straight from the oven. Slice when cool. 

Hermits using Busy Mom Method

 

Today, I took the new version (below) to a luncheon, asking everyone who tasted them to tell me what, precisely, they tasted of spices. One person said ginger. Which, since there was no ginger at all, made me wonder how that flavor seemed to dominate, because I could certainly taste that also. Cinnamon was mentioned and clove. No one caught any kind of hint of coffee or cocoa, and much less the Szechuan pepper.

coffee, cinnamon, cloves, cocoa, Szechuan peppercorns

The cookies were fabulous, don't misunderstand me. The flavors were perfect for a spice cookie. The only problem was that nothing outside of cinnamon and clove was noticeable. My next thought was to come home and revise the Mocha Spice Blend. I doubled the amount of coffee, tripled the cocoa, left the cinnamon amount the same, decreased the cloves by ½ and doubled the Szechuan peppercorns. Just on a straight taste test on the tip of my finger, the bitterness of coffee and cocoa are much more apparent. I still do not taste the Szechuan peppercorns. I am tempted in add in some more cloves, but will refrain until I taste this mixture in a recipe. Once baked, the flavors may well change. 

Mocha Spice Blend I

Mocha Spice Blend I

Makes about 1/4 cup

2 tablespoons coffee beans
1 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder
1 tablespoon cassia cinnamon
20 whole cloves
1 teaspoon Szechuan peppercorns

In a spice grinder, coffee grinder used only for spices or in a small Bullet type blender with the blade for dry ingredients, grind the coffee beans, cloves and Szechuan peppercorns to a fine powder. Add this to the cinnamon and cocoa on a bowl and mix well to distribute all spices equally. Place in a glass jar with tight-fitting lid and store in a cool, dark place.

Mocha Spice Blend II

Makes just over 1/2 cup

Mocha Spice Blend II

4 tablespoons coffee beans
3 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
1 tablespoon cassia cinnamon
10 whole cloves
2 teaspoons Szechuan peppercorns

In a spice grinder, coffee grinder used only for spices or in a small Bullet type blender with the blade for dry ingredients, grind the coffee beans, cloves and Szechuan peppercorns to a fine powder. Add this to the cinnamon and cocoa on a bowl and mix well to distribute all spices equally. Place in a glass jar with tight-fitting lid and store in a cool, dark place.

I have a whole jar of egg whites in the fridge, so I want to make an angel food cake. I am going to use Mocha Spice Blend II in the cake and see how it comes out. Meanwhile, here is the recipe for the Mocha Spice Cookies:

 

Mocha Spice Cookies I

Mocha Spice Cookies

Makes 40 - 50 cookies

½ cup shortening
1 cup brown sugar
1 egg
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 tablespoon water
1½ cups all-purpose flour
4 teaspoons Mocha Spice Blend (either will work)
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
¾ cup raisins, optional
½ cup walnuts, optional

Preheat oven to 375 degrees (350 on Convection Bake).

Cream together the shortening and brown sugar until fluffy. Add the egg, vanilla and water; beat well to combine. In a separate bowl, whisk or sift together the flour, Mocha Spice, baking soda and salt. Add these dry ingredients and beat to just combine. Add the raisins and nuts and mix well. Drop the dough from a spoon, or use small cookie scoops. Keep the cookies at least 2-inches apart on an ungreased baking sheet. Bake the cookies for 10 to 12 minutes, until set and browned.
Another thought came to me when musing on the spices and amounts used in the Spice blends. I used a good Cassia cinnamon in the blend, which is the most commonly sold cinnamon in the US. True cinnamon, cinnamomum verum, is used in many countries around the world and has a lighter flavor with a hint of citrus. True cinnamon is the soft-quilled variety found in any Mexican grocery. These true cinnamon quills are easily crumbled and can be added to the coffee beans, cloves and Szechuan peppercorns when grinding the whole spices. If using whole true cinnamon (often named Ceylon cinnamon), I would use about 2-inches of the quill. 

All these are ideas I have for the future. For now, I have Mocha Spice Blend II already made, and will be experimenting with more uses, soon.



My passion is teaching people how to create a harmony of flavors with their cooking, and passing along my love and joy of food, both simple or exotic, plain or fancy. I continue my journey in ethnic and domestic cuisines, continuing my journey to explore diverse culinary experiences and hopefully to start you on a journey of your own. Join me also at A Harmony of Flavors on Facebook, and Pinterest.

Port and Chocolate Salami

With the big wine tasting event just one week away, I am now going into high gear with finalizing the 6 appetizer dishes being created to pair with 6 specific wines - none of which I have tried except for the Warre's Warrior Port. I did this same thing last year, going in essentially blind, except for my knowledge of what the different varietals are like, and my trusty Wine and Food Pairing sheets. I knew I wanted to use chocolate, and walnuts help tone down sweetness as well as tart dried fruit like cherries. While port is a sweet wine, no wine can pair with anything too sweet. Nuts are a great accompaniment, as are many cheeses.

Fonseca Bin 27 Port and Warre's Otima Tawny

Port is a confusing wine, to those who do not know too much about wines. And if you are unfamiliar with port, though you love other wines, this will apply here also. Port is a fortified, sweet wine that originally came only from in and around Oporto (a port - as in, on the water, for shipping - town), in Portugal. Now, "port " wines are being made in Australia, South Africa, the US and many other places, and often from many grapes never used in Oporto. A fortified wine has had brandy added to the partially fermented wine to stop the fermentation process before it ferments out all the grapes' sugar. This makes port a dessert wine, which can be one of exceptional sweetness and depth. The very best port wines are vintage wines. A "Vintage" is only declared in years that the port growers (in Portugal) decide that the grape crop is worthy of making the greatest wine. Many factors come into play, but weather is the most overriding factor in wine-making everywhere. If the weather doesn't cooperate, the wines may come out just so-so; not the result vintners look for!

Fonseca Guimaraens Vintage Port

To make recognizing a true Vintage Port even more confusing, and I speak from my experience while still learning, is that some ports are labeled "Late-Bottled Vintage", for example. The word Vintage in there is confusing; is it a vintage or not? Not. Or a label that states "20-year old" - does that mean it is a vintage that was aged? Nope. Or another is having a year on the bottle that gives you the year the company was founded - but it is a year, right? No, not vintage. Then again, even among vintage ports, there are some few that are "declared vintage", but from a year that is not a declared vintage! What?! Well, these are found on occasion when a particular port grower has a certain small plot of land with a particular name all its own. Possibly that year was not the overall best for port growers all around Oporto, but that one little vineyard had optimal growing weather. There are little micro-climates possible in many vineyards. So for example, the very first Vintage Port I bought, before I was as familiar with this phenomenon, was a Fonseca "Guimaraens", 1967. Fonseca, along with many other wonderful Port wine growers, have certain little vineyards such as this. For these small vineyard selections, they may declare a vintage year, even though the rest of the Port growers do not see the crop as good enough. It turned out that my first purchase was a truly wonderful vintage. Beginner's luck. 

Then, aside from these red vintage ports, there are ports known as Ruby and Tawny. When you have the great vintage ports that need to be cellared for 20 years before they become palatable, Ruby Port is a nice change, meant to be drunk young. It can be pure plonk. Or it can be really very good. It has a lovely color, giving it the name Ruby. Tawny port is red port which has been left in a barrel over very long periods of time. Red wine, as it oxidizes with age, becomes lighter, more brick colored, and if very old, a lighter tawny color. In a barrel, with the amount of air that is available, the wine oxidizes more rapidly. Tawny ports can also be really lovely wines, slightly less sweet than some of the great vintage wines.

Warre's Otima Tawny Port left; Fonseca Bin 27 Port right

And then there are the red port wines that are called port, that don't fit into any of these categories, such as two of my most favorites, Fonseca Bin 27 or Warre's Warrior. These two are about the closest to what a vintage style will be like, but at a far more reasonable price. They are great to have on hand, because they are always good. I will be serving the Warre's Warrior for the wine tasting event. All this info, and there are so many other styles of Port to choose from!



In the past, I have made a recipe I found in an ad in the Food and Wine Magazine, to pair with port. Essentially, a chocolate candy with walnuts and dried cherries, it is a very good pairing, and easy to make. It is what I had planned to serve with the port wine tasting. And then I was online, looking for something else entirely, as usual, and came across a recipe for Chocolate Salami. I now see there are so many variations out there, but I went forging ahead on my own.

Chocolate Salami served with Port

First off, it is the cutest idea ever. This is a dessert, "sausage" only in the sense that it rather looks like a nice cry-cured sausage, but made with wafer cookies, cocoa, dulce de leche , dried fruits and nuts. 

Using the recipe I found as a baseline concept, but changed the ingredients to fit my need. I wanted to have a dessert that was not too sweet, so the sheer amount of condensed milk and dulce de leche seemed excessive. I decided to use only dulce de leche and skip the condensed milk. The cookies called for were "biscuit cookies". Vanilla Wafers can be a little more sweet than I wanted, so I found some called Leibniz Wafers and they are perfect in this recipe. Vanilla Wafers could be used. I wanted dried fruits in it, and used dried cherries and blueberries, along with walnuts, for their bitterness factor. I used a whole teaspoon of Kosher salt per recipe I made, balancing out the sweet with enough salt to give it character. When I finished making it, I tasted a little bit with a Fonseca Port I had opened on the counter and OMG! What a most heavenly-perfect match. 

Chocolate "Salami"

So, after finishing the recipes for the event, here is what I did:

Chocolate Salami

3 slices per serving = about 24 slices depending on thickness of slices

1¾ sticks unsalted butter, room temperature
¼ cup + 1 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder
⅓ cup dulce de leche
7 ounces wafer cookies, such as Leibniz 
1 teaspoon Kosher Salt
⅔ cup walnuts, broken
⅓ cup dried cherries
⅓ cup dried blueberries
confectioners' sugar for dusting

With a mixer, first beat together the butter and cocoa until very creamy. Add the dulce de leche to combine.

Formed and saved in paper towel tube

In a large bowl, crush the wafer cookies to medium-small bits. They do not need to be completely pulverized. Add the salt, walnuts and dried fruits. Make a well and scrape in the cocoa mixture. First using a spoon or spatula, begin to combine the ingredients, then switch to hands when the mixture gets too stiff to stir. Squeeze the ingredients together until the cocoa mixture is completely combined. Turn out onto a surface and divide into two equal parts. Begin rolling one section into a log. This will take a bit of patience, as with all the nuts and fruits, the mixture wants to break apart. Eventually it will come together, making a very dense log. Make the log as smooth as possible, rolling it out to about the size of a paper towel center roll. (If you have a couple of empty paper towel rolls handy, they are great for storing the logs until they get solid enough on their own.) Repeat this with the second part of the mixture, making two logs. Roll the logs in confectioners' sugar to coat, then wrap the logs in plastic wrap or waxed paper, twisting the ends. Slide the logs into paper towel rolls if available. Another alternative is using a baguette pan. The rounded forms help the logs to stay round while chilling. Set the logs into the refrigerator to chill completely before serving.

To serve, slice the logs with a very sharp knife in about ¼ inch thick slices. The amount of slices per log will depend on the thickness of the log and the length, and how thick the slice. 


My passion is teaching people how to create a harmony of flavors with their cooking, and passing along my love and joy of food, both simple or exotic, plain or fancy. I continue my journey in ethnic and domestic cuisines, continuing my journey to explore diverse culinary experiences and hopefully to start you on a journey of your own. Join me also at A Harmony of Flavors on Facebook, and Pinterest.

Yeast Waffle Experiences

Long ago I found a recipe for Marion Cunningham's Yeast Waffles in the local newspaper. I tried the recipe and it was fantabulous! The smell of the waffle baking with its yeasty aroma so like bread baking; the flavor with the yeast right out there and apparent, the tender crispness of the waffle - all these made for one heady breakfast experience. I have been making them almost exclusively ever since.

I have tried other kinds of waffle recipes. Though I am not particularly fond of chocolate at most times and really not for breakfast, I did try a recipe that uses cocoa and Porter beer with its chocolatey undertones. That recipe is wonderful, and I usually serve those chocolate waffles with strawberries cut up into sour cream with a little sugar. Wonderful. I also spent time exploring ways to add fiber into the diet and made lots of waffles with added oat bran or wheat bran or corn meal. Nothing beats the yeast waffles recipe for flavor.

My Refrigerator Yeast Waffles with Pecans and Blueberries

Waffle irons come is many sizes and shapes. These days many also have perfected the timing so one no longer has to make a guess when it might be done. I got a waffle iron from Williams Sonoma about 10 years ago. It has a slide bar to set, from 1 to 7, how done you want the waffle to be. It has a little red light to tell you it is heating or cooking, and a green light when the waffle is done, along with a little high-pitched whistling sound. It works great, and I have absolutely no complaints. It is a round waffle maker. If the batter goes all the way to the rim (which usually means it will overflow a little), it makes about an 8-inch diameter waffle. If the batter stays inside the rim, it makes about a 7-inch waffle. I have never had a Belgian waffle maker. I have never cared for the exceptionally deep wells it creates. I don't know why. It's just my thing. 

M.C.'s recipe calls for mixing the yeast, milk, butter, salt sugar and flour and mixing well, then lightly covering and leaving the bowl on the counter overnight. In the morning, or when ready to make the waffles, the batter will have risen noticeably. The smell is heavy with the slight fermenting of the yeast. At this point eggs and a little baking soda are added and whisked in and the batter is ready to bake. Obviously, I cannot just publish Marion Cunningham's Yeast Waffle recipe as mine (which I just read she got from Fanny Farmer's Cookbook), so I decided to try making a recipe for a yeast batter and see how it would go. 

Batter after 24 hours in fridge

I wanted to make a batter that was ready to use right away. I mixed basically the same ingredients, but in different proportions, adding in baking soda. I am not a chemist, and am not sure exactly what the soda does in a yeast mixture (as opposed to it working with soured milk or buttermilk in a quick bread, cake or pancake). I feel it must help with the bubbling and puffing, particularly if the batter is left out to ferment. Well, my batter had not been fermented, but I added it anyway. I made the waffles yesterday. I was unimpressed. There was absolutely no yeast smell from the batter nor any aroma while baking. The waffles were fine. While there was nothing inherently "wrong" with them, they were just - plain - waffles.  I also made a couple of pancakes with the batter, and those worked fine, too, but were similarly uninteresting.

Consistency of the batter

I decided to put the rest of the batter in the fridge. I covered it lightly with plastic wrap. The batter grew to completely fill the bowl by this morning. I stirred it down and tried again. This morning the batter noticeably smelled like yeast, though without that wonderfully pungent fermented quality. I had hopes. I made waffles. I sprinkled ¼-cup chopped pecans onto the batter in the iron. The waffles tasted better, but still no real yeasty aroma while baking, nor anything to indicate they are yeast waffles while eating them. I am going to give them another day in the fridge and try again tomorrow. I like things that are ready right away and not something I have to wait for days to develop flavor. I think I am going to go back to making a new recipe that will ferment overnight and see what I can come up with. Meanwhile, this is my recipe, to date:

Refrigerator Yeast Waffles

¼ cup warm water
1 package yeast
1 cup whole wheat pastry flour (or use all-purpose for the total amount)
2 cups all-purpose flour

Refrigerator Yeast Waffle with pecans

2 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon baking soda
2¾ cup milk or half & half
3 eggs
1 stick unsalted butter, melted

Stir the yeast into the warm water and let it froth. In a large bowl, combine the flours, sugar, salt and soda. Whisk together the milk and eggs; add in the melted butter. Pour this mixture into the dry ingredients and mix well. Add the yeast and beat to combine. Store in a plastic or glass bowl in the refrigerator overnight and up to 4 days: make sure the batter has a LOT of room to grow, or you will find a mess next day. Cover lightly. If you top with a lid that seals tightly, it could explode as the batter expands.

This will make approximately 10 (7-inch) round waffles or about 20 pancakes. As each waffle iron is different size and shape, you will have to experiment to see how much batter to use per waffle. Bake according to waffle iron instructions. I had mine set on the higher side of medium.



My passion is teaching people how to create a harmony of flavors with their cooking, and passing along my love and joy of food, both simple or exotic, plain or fancy. I continue my journey in ethnic and domestic cuisines, continuing my journey to explore diverse culinary experiences and hopefully to start you on a journey of your own. Join me also at A Harmony of Flavors on Facebook, and Pinterest.