Raspberry-Blueberry Buckle - Recipe

Raspberry-Blueberry Buckle

A long time ago (the late nineties) in a galaxy far, far away (Milwaukee), I used to play a lot of pool. One Pocket was my game, but I also played a lot of Nine Ball. In Nine Ball as long as you hit the lowest numbered ball first, you win on any shot that sinks the 9, so it is quite possible to get lucky. In the slang at least of our particular poolroom, if you were going to shoot a shot that you thought might end up lucking in the 9, you'd say "Buckle Up!", to warn your opponent that their nerves (and wallet) might need seatbelts to survive the next inning.

And I tell you this story why? Because whenever I think of the dessert named "buckle", it always takes me back to the poolhall. But this dessert is no gamble.

Wow, that was a cheesy segue. My apologies.

So what is a buckle? It is a rustic American baked fruit dessert, in the same general family as cobblers, crisps, crumbles, grunts and slumps. (Rustic Americans were nothing if not picturesque in their nomenclature.) You make a quick cake batter, mix it with a raft of fresh fruit, top it with a little streusel and bake. Apparently the name derives from how the streusel top buckles (bends and cracks) in the oven.

I made this buckle with raspberries and blueberries, because they are overflowing out of our farmer's market and refrigerator, but you can do it with any fruit that could live in a pie. Pitted cherries, pears, peaches, apples, heck pineapple if you want to. Like its cousins, buckle seeks out (and destroys) vanilla ice cream, or just a pour of heavy cream.

For the cake batter, you can use cake flour or all purpose flour, but my favorite choice is whole wheat pastry flour. It is low in gluten so the crumb will be tender, and you get a little bonus nutrition but without any overt signs of being "health food".

I think this could easily be my new favorite homey dessert. Buckle Up!

Raspberry-Blueberry Buckle
(based generally on a Joy of Cooking recipe)
Vegetarian; not vegan nor gluten-free
Serves 8

For the streusel:

• 1/2 cup sugar
• 6 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg, preferably fresh ground
• 1/2 teaspoon Kosher salt or sea salt
• 4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) cold butter, cut into small pieces

1. Mix all ingredients except the butter in a small bowl. Add the butter and work it into the flour mixture with your fingertips until it looks like coarse cornmeal, just like when making a pie crust. It is fine if there are a few larger bits of butter. Refrigerate until ready to use.

For the cake:

• 1.75 cups whole wheat pastry flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon Kosher salt or sea salt
• 4 tablespoons soft unsalted butter
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1.5 cups fresh raspberries, rinsed and patted dry
• 1.5 cups fresh blueberries, rinsed and patted dry

1. Preheat oven to 350. Butter a 9x9 baking pan.
2. Whisk together the flour, baking soda and salt.
3. In a mixer, beat the butter, sugar, egg and vanilla until fluffy.
4. Beat in the milk.
5. Gradually add the flour mixture and combine gently until just mixed, like you would for pancake batter.
6. Gently fold in the fruit. It will seem too much fruit.
7. Pour the batter in the pan, and sprinkle on the streusel top evenly.
8. Bake until browned and a toothpick comes out clean, about 40 minutes.
9. Let cool for 20 minutes and serve while still warm, with vanilla ice cream, yes.

Chocolate, Chocolate and More Chocolate

The second annual Seattle Luxury Chocolate Salon is coming up again on July 12. I was a judge last year and was impressed with the wide range of chocolatiers that showed up to sample their wares, and at $20 for an adult advance ticket I thought it was a darn good deal.

I won't be able to attend this year, but somehow I still had the good fortune to receive a few advance samples from two of my favorite places: Theo Chocolates and Chocolopolis. Sometimes it is good to be a blogger!

Theo sent along a 91% Costa Rica bar that was amazingly smooth for such a high percentage, and a 45% milk chocolate that completely redefined my understanding of the light stuff. It has a complex, caramelized flavor that I could go back to over and over. Also included was a coffee & dark chocolate bar done in concert with Caffe Vita, and these incredible ghost chile & sea salt caramels.

I had the opportunity to tour Theo a couple months ago with a group organized by Keren Brown (aka the Frantic Foodie). I was amazed at what a small, committed group of people can do. How many chocolate companies do you know that have two Ph.D.'s on staff, one who specializes in the anthropology of cacao and another who is helping growers around the world improve the quality of their beans and processing? Or that have already been featured on Oprah? Or that partner with Jane Goodall? Or that uses only organic, fair trade beans? Amazing stuff. I can't even begin to tell you their whole story, you should just go visit them and take the factory tour, or if you live far away, peruse their site and buy some bars.

Chocolopolis also deserves lots of love. Chief Chocophile Lauren Adler curates ultra-high quality bars and confections from around the world, gathering them all at her small Queen Anne shop. It is a terrific place to taste, learn about chocolate, and come home with goodies you can't find anywhere else. They also make some awesome stuff on-site. The fig filled with anise ganache and dipped in 72% chocolate was one of the best bites I've put in my mouth in a long time.

Speaking of local Seattle companies, take a minute to sign up for the ChefShop.com newsletter and you have the chance to win $500 worth of their products. Their products are awesome.

Whopper Cake - Book Review Plus Chocolate-Cream Cheese Frosting Recipe

"Today is Grandma's birthday
and Granddad has an itchin'
to bake a whopper chocolate cake
and traumatize the kitchen"

They had me at "traumatize". Whopper Cake, by Karma Wilson and Will Hillenbrand, is a great children's book. The story is of a Grandpa who wants to make a cake for his wife, but has a little bit of trouble following the recipe. It is just too tempting for him to scale it up a hundred-fold or so. A delicious mess ensues.

The book ends with a (normal-scale) recipe for Whopper Cake. With my daughter's birthday approaching and the book in nightly rotation, it was obvious that we should make it for her big day. I can confirm, it makes a very moist, tasty chocolate sheet cake. You should buy this book for any kid that loves to cook with his or her family. Or any kid that loves cake.

The recipe didn't specify a frosting, but I was faced with three simple facts: (1) we had a lot of leftover cream cheese (2) my wife loves cream cheese frosting (3) cream-cheese frosting is super easy to make. Here's what I came up with:

Chocolate-Cream Cheese Frosting
Enough for a 9"x13" sheetcake
Vegetarian and gluten-free (the icing, not the Whopper Cake!); not vegan

• 12 ounces good quality chocolate chips (Ghiradelli works well)
• 4 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 6 ounces cream cheese (I used the whipped kind, but a denser one should work fine too, just break it up into cubes), at room temperature
• 1/8 teaspoon salt

1. Melt the chocolate chips and butter in a double boiler or microwave. To microwave, combine in a microwave-safe bowl and cook 1 minute at a time, stopping to carefully stir in between. This is my favorite way to do it, you just have to be sure not to overcook or you can scorch it.
2. Allow to cool a bit, so it won't cook and curdle the cream cheese.
3. Whisk the cream cheese and salt into the melted chocolate. Keep whisking until smooth.
4. Refrigerate for an hour or so until firm enough to spread.
5. Yum.