Banana Splitsville

So to continue with our candy making unit in Food Art we made Banana Splitsville which the recipe was from Good Eats: Citizen Cane. The recipe was split into 3 parts, the basic caramel software (which was the doodads, a random candy swirly thingy), the caramel sauce and the banana brulee. The recipe for me was personally confusing when I read it but when I watched the Good Eats video (Good Eats: Citizen Cane) it made more sense.

Finished Product

The recipe:

Ingredients:  

Basic Carmel Software:

• 500 mL sugar
• 250 mL water
• 1 tablespoon light corn syrup

Caramel Sauce Software:

• 1 batch caramel (above)
• 500 mL heavy cream

Banana Brulee Software:

• 4 bananas
• sugar for coating

Additional: ICE CREAM

Method:

1. Combine the sugar, water, and corn syrup in a small, heavy saucepan and place over high heat.As soon as the sugar dissolved, heat your thermometer under warm tap water (to prevent thermal shock) and attach to the side of your pot,  making sure that the bulb is completely submerged but doesn't touch the bottom of the pot. DO NOT STIR THE MIXTURE OR AGITATE THE PAN AT THIS STAGE!
2. When the mixture reached 230°F (110°C), reduce the heat to medium and allow the sugar to colour gradually. As the temperature approached 300°F (150°C) the colour will start to turn amber. At this point, it's safe to swirl the pan gently to help distribute the heat evenly. As the caramel heads towards 340°F (170°C), it will reach a deep amber colour.
3. Remove the pan from the heat and slowly stir with a metal spoon, allowing it to cool until the caramel falls from the spoon in a solid stream, like a string (keep stirring and lifting up the spoon). When it does, it's doodad time!
4. Form the doodads by holding the spoon 12 to 16 inches over with caramel and drizzling a pattern on the parchment. The thinner it fall from the spoon the better (Hint: allow the spoon to unload into the pan for a few seconds before attempting the doodads. This will allow a narrower stream).
5. Quick back and forth motions or side to side movements are the best (I personally like to make circles). It's all in the wrist. Allow the doodads to cool for 15 minutes then peel the paper off (not the other way around, you might break it). Stack in an airtight container with wax paper between in each pieces if you are not using it.
6. After making 15 to 20 doodads, you should have sufficient caramel reaming to move on to the sauce phase.
7. Return the remaining caramel to medium high heat and continue cooking until you dee the first sign of smoke (in the pot not the element!) Immediately remove from the heat, and add the cream all at once, at arms length (it will boil furiously). Once the mixture calms down, return to medium heat and boil for 3 minutes more, stirring occasionally. Cool to room temperature and then move to squirt bottle (or just into a glass bowl and cover with plastic wrap) and refrigerate for up to a week.
8. To make the banana brulee, quarter the bananas (peel on) and then remove the peel and put sugar (we put a lot) on the flat part of the banana and place on cooling racks over several players of foil. (Don't try to do this on you dining room table). Don you safety goggles and fire up your torch (you don't actually need goggles). Hold the torch so that the very tip of the flame barely touches the banana, and move quickly back and forth until the sugar melts, turns brown, and bubbles. As soon as it looks like caramel (the top of a crème brulee), move on. You know you've got it down when a solid, glass like sheet of gold (no graininess)  has formed on the banana.
9. To do the split (so to speak), squirt a pattern  of caramel sauce on a chilled plate top with 4 banana pieces (Lincoln log style), top with ice cream of your choice and finally, a doodad. But you can do it any style you want if you don't want to do the log one.

Product: 

I keep forgetting to bring my camera to class >.< (had to charge it last night and forgot to put back the battery so I brought a camera with no battery) so yet again I had to use my iPhone camera  which not only was crappy but in the middle of taking pictures it shut down on me when it still had 100% and refused to open again for the whole day until I plugged it in a charger! So I was only able to take few. I asked if someone (ie. one of my group mates that wasn't my sister) if she could take some pictures for me and send it to me but she refused which was pretty mean especially when she took pictures off my blog without asking me! Sorry for that little rant there but it was making me angry.

Sorry for the really bad pictures

heating the sugar

we didn't get an amber colour for our doodads >.<

Caramel sauce when we added the heavy cream (bubbling)

Our first attempts but we got better!

We actually put more sugar on it but it dissolved
but we put more in the end

Bananas we torched

close up, you want an amber colour

the plate that I decorated

my finished product! it was good though the ice
cream was kind of bad, it was all chunky 

tried to use this new app on my phone

Overall the product tasted really good (except the ice cream), my group really liked the caramel sauce, they were putting in everywhere! The doodads were kind of spiky when we ate it...it hurts when it when down our throat. 

Banana Loaf with Hazelnut

So this is our second loaf! We decided to do a banana loaf (as you can tell by the title) with hazelnuts and a chocolate glaze! The recipe is basically the same expect that we used bananas and hazelnuts instead of apples, walnuts and cranberries. I found that our loaf was cooked for a little too long but it had too because for some reason the inside was still wet after the time was up >.< but overall it was a good loaf!

Our Finished Product

The recipe:

Ingredients:  

• 1 Banana (mashed)
• 185 mL hazelnut (chopped)
• 310 mL flour
• 185 mL sugar
• 5 mL baking powder
• 5 mL salt
• 2 mL baking soda
• 2 mL cinnamon ( you could put lesser if you don't like cinnamon or none at all)
• 1-2 mL of nutmeg (same with the nutmeg)
• 2 eggs
• 125 mL vegetable oil (we used vegetable oil) or butter (melted) or plain yogurt (it doesn't really have to be plain yogurt) or sour cream
• 5 mL vanilla extract
• 5 mL citrus zest (optional)

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F or 180°C. Lightly butter/spray one 9-by-5 inch loaf pan or three 6-by-3 inch mini pan.
2. Mix in the flour, sugar, baking powder, alt, baking soda, cinnamon and nutmeg in a large bowl.
3. Add your dry mix-in (hazelnuts) in the flour mixture.
4. In a separate bowl, whisk 2 eggs, 125 mL of vegetable oil (or the other ingredients that you choose), 5 mL vanilla extract and the citrus zest (optional).
5. Stir in your fruit or vegetable (banana) into the egg mixture.
6. Fold in the egg mixture into the dry mixture until combined.
7. Spread the batter in the prepared pans. Baked until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, about 55 minutes for a standard loaf pan and about 35-40 minutes for mini loaf pans.
8. After they are done baking, cool 30 minutes in the pan(s) on a rack and then turn out onto the racks to cool completely.

 The glaze:

The glaze is an optional thing for your loaf. For this loaf we made a Chocolate Glaze which was even simpler then the other one

Ingredients:  

• 250 mL of confectioners' sugar
• 30 mL cocoa powder
• 30 mL of milk
• 1 mL of vanilla extract
• a pinch of salt

 Method:

1. Whisk the confectioners' sugar, cocoa powder, milk, vanilla extract and salt together until liquid/mixed together. You may need to add more milk if does not mix together well.

  Our Product:

It looks kind of flat because someone forgot to put something in it

With chocolate glaze

Inside of the loaf