Disney Gingerbread Castle
For more than six months now, my niece, Najwa, has been dropping clues about her desired birthday gift. On Amal’s last birthday, another niece of mine, I gave her a 3D Disney castle puzzle that excited my nieces a lot and their mothers even more. So I started looking for a similar gift for Najwa’s upcoming birthday, and came across a crazy 4,080-piece LEGO Disney castle.
Chocolate Pistachio Tart
This post is inspired by the first tart I ever made. A chocolate pistachio tart from one of my favorite blogs “Metukim Sheli”, a blog that pretty much set my path into the baking world. Daniel was in love with this tart from the first bite. Many years have passed since then, but Daniel still hasn’t found any other dessert that has won over his heart as did this chocolate pistachio tart. Every dinner party, Daniel asks for the chocolate pistachio tart. Every birthday, Daniel asks for the chocolate pistachio tart. And, every Monday, well, you get the idea.
Pistachio Spread
When I traveled to Sicily this summer, I came back home with four jars of pistachio spread made by the residents of Bronte. The city takes pride in its green pistachios and every shop, bakery or café is proud of its own homemade pistachio spread. It wasn’t easy to choose which spread I should take back to the family. There were so many to choose from; smooth and creamy spreads that reminded me of Nutella, more textured spreads that contained tiny chunks of pistachios, milk based spreads,olive oil based spreads and so on…
Ferrero Rocher Tartlets
Last year, two friends of mine and I held a little pop-up event together. During the event, I sold 5 different kinds of tartlets. One of them was this Ferrero Rocher tartlet. It was made from a gianduja chocolate mousse with a hazelnut praliné core, covered in a chocolate glaze studded with caramelized pieces of hazelnuts and set on top of a shortcrust pastry, concealing a crunchy chocolaty biscuit with hazelnuts*. Is it complicated? Yeah, a little bit.. Is it tasty? No doubt about it!
Pistachio Tiramisu
Last summer (can’t believe it’s winter already) I traveled to Sicily and came back home with one goal in mind: to recreate all the greenish desserts I enjoyed during my trip. I did not schlep back 4 kilos of the finest pistachios in the world for nothing. Toward the end of the trip, after a day of wandering through the alleyways of the city of Syracuse, I decided to give up dinner and just dive right into a cup of pistachio and ricotta tiramisu. I found paradise in a small cup.
Chocolate Meringue Tartlets
Last year my American friends invited me to their Thanksgiving dinner. I baked these chocolate meringue tartlets for the event, in addition to a pistachio tart I brought as back-up. I’m pretty sure the other guests enjoyed these tartlets, you could see it on their faces. Literally, there were traces of meringue all over their beards and noses!
Pistachio Ginger Tart
This post was created for one reason only. I really wanted to try my hand at decorating the edge of a tart crust as seen in this YouTube video (although mute, it says a lot). In the video the chef explains how to do a perfect fonçage, which is important too, but then he continues to show how to make a nice decoration around the tart. I got excited.
Hazelnut Tartlets (from homemade Nutella)
I really wanted the headline to be Hashahar Tartlet. Hashahar is a classic local cocoa spread. I tried to make a tartlet version of Hashahar, but unfortunately it came out terribly sweet. Then I thought to maybe change it to Nutella tartlet, but it felt a little too branded. At the end, I decided to go for a tartlet with hazelnut cream (homemade Nutella) mixed with mascarpone cheese. It came out wonderfully and very nutty.
