This dessert seemed simple enough, although it had multiple parts to it. The ingredients were surprisingly simple. As the title indicates however, there were a few discoveries along the way, some disasters, but overall, the flavor was divinely delicious.
Tarte Au Citron:
- We used Meyer Lemons in this recipe (no particular reasons except that Whole Foods sold them in a bag of 6 which is what we needed). The rind is thin on these lemons so cutting the rinds off was a challenge, even while using the peeler. Fortunately, Tim did all of this work :)
- The pine crust was easy to put together using a KitchenAid Mixer and held up nicely. We refrigerated the dough before filling our tart pan. We didn't have a spring form one but ended up using a ceramic tart pan which worked just fine. Per Ei-Lun's tips, we made sure to cook the crust until it was well done. We did do one addition however, and that was to add a good 1/2 tsp of salt to the crust. I was surprised to see the crust didn't call for any salt. Although this is a dessert (and having the experience of working in a bakery) I know how important a little bit of salt goes in any type of pastries. Later on, when tasting the tart, I was glad we added it for extra flavor.
- The crust had a good melt in your mouth feel and is a crumbly type. But the flavor of pine nuts is just not strong enough to impart a crust that I would deem magnificient in flavor. As I ate it, I kept wondering if a graham cracker based crust or one made of a stronger nut flavor would have tasted better.
The sorbet was the easiest part of this dish. We "cheated" and used fresh squeezed orange juice we bought at the market. However, I don't think I would have tasted the difference between squeezing our own oranges. The sorbet was light, perfectly sweet, and citrus-y for our taste.
We made candied lemon peel since we had all those lemons for the sabayon. Since we used Meyer Lemons, the rind was thin and hard to peel off, let alone slice off into toothpick thick strips, but we (or rather, Tim) managed to meticulously hatch them all. The candied peel started off easy enough as the syrup was easy to prepare. However the recipe called for letting the rinds cool in the pan before you take the rinds off with a fork. I strongly disagree with this step. Similar to Ei-Lun and Kirk's experience, our rind stuck to the water bath as the syrup quickly crystallize. This step happened very very quickly so beware! We had to heat up the syrup again, but that little bit of extra heat took the rind over the top and crystallized the rind into hard pieces of candy. We put them over parchment paper without letting them cool in the pan this time, but it was difficult to get all the syrup out. If you can imagine, our rinds were not in neat strips but captured into crystalized hardened sugar water. Admittedly, we did not have a candy thermometer so we probably went over the 230 degrees. Despite all these mishaps, a few pieces over the sorbet ended up being quite tasty, although a bit crunchy :)
Sabayon Part 1 - this by far was the most finicky step of the dessert. The first time we made it, we followed the recipe to a T and used a water bath, cooking it over 8-10 minutes. Our sauce was thin, however, and never looked thick and smooth as it should have been. A quick search on the internet told us we had not cooked it long enough. By that time, we had already added the butter and it was too late to fix.
Intead of throwing away the sabayon (we had no lemons at the time to start over), I quickly remembered that mini tapioca pearls are used as a thickening agent in berry pies (I happen to love them in pies and had some in the pantry). We put the sabayon back on the burner and added two tbsp of the tapioca. After several minutes, the sabayon developed a nice thickness to it. We let it chill, poured it over the crust and used the broiler method. Later, upon tasting, we found the texture of the tapioca a nice touch texture wise to the tart and actually would consider doing it this way the next time.
Sabayon Part II - Since we had extra pine nut crust left, we decided to try making the sabayon again the next day once we got more lemons. I had read that a double boiler was not necessary and putting the sauce directly over low heat would work. Since our problem was too thin of a sauce from undercooking, I was interested in this method. The sauce did thicken more and instead of 8-10 minutes of total cook time, we cooked it at least for 20 minutes. However, the sauce never thickened to what I would consider thick enough to set even after adding the butter. Since we didn't want to waster the sabayon, we ended up putting it in the oven at 350 degrees for 20 minutes which helped cook the custard. Next came the broiler step but beware, you HAVE to sit and watch the oven! I ran over to Alia to watch her and when I came back 1-2 minutes later, the broiler had put a crust similar to a creme brule crust over the tart. The custard did seem set however.
This second sabayon is in our fridge and I'll update as to the taste and flavor tomorrow.
Sadly, I don't think we mastered making a true sabayon the two times we tried. I'm not sure I am that interested in making it a third time! But if I was, I would cook the sabayon even longer than the 20 minutes and would definitely forgo the water bath as it did not seem necessary.
Overall impression: The flavor of the sabayon (although we didn't totally get it right) was divine, very tart, not too sweet, very fresh tasting. The pine crust had good texture, but not enough of a strong flavor, given the subtle taste of pine nuts. The sorbet was refreshing and light but Tim and I wondered about serving it with the lemon tart. Since the sorbet is "mushy" and so is the tart filling, it didn't seem to go as well together texture wise although delicious on their own. The candied peel was tasty and crunchy and a nice accompaniement to the sorbet, but I wonder if it was supposed to be "crunchy" vs. "chewy." Ours was definitely the former but without a candy thermometer, we'll never know if it was due to overcooking.
Tarte Au Citron:
- We used Meyer Lemons in this recipe (no particular reasons except that Whole Foods sold them in a bag of 6 which is what we needed). The rind is thin on these lemons so cutting the rinds off was a challenge, even while using the peeler. Fortunately, Tim did all of this work :)
- The pine crust was easy to put together using a KitchenAid Mixer and held up nicely. We refrigerated the dough before filling our tart pan. We didn't have a spring form one but ended up using a ceramic tart pan which worked just fine. Per Ei-Lun's tips, we made sure to cook the crust until it was well done. We did do one addition however, and that was to add a good 1/2 tsp of salt to the crust. I was surprised to see the crust didn't call for any salt. Although this is a dessert (and having the experience of working in a bakery) I know how important a little bit of salt goes in any type of pastries. Later on, when tasting the tart, I was glad we added it for extra flavor.
- The crust had a good melt in your mouth feel and is a crumbly type. But the flavor of pine nuts is just not strong enough to impart a crust that I would deem magnificient in flavor. As I ate it, I kept wondering if a graham cracker based crust or one made of a stronger nut flavor would have tasted better.
The sorbet was the easiest part of this dish. We "cheated" and used fresh squeezed orange juice we bought at the market. However, I don't think I would have tasted the difference between squeezing our own oranges. The sorbet was light, perfectly sweet, and citrus-y for our taste.
We made candied lemon peel since we had all those lemons for the sabayon. Since we used Meyer Lemons, the rind was thin and hard to peel off, let alone slice off into toothpick thick strips, but we (or rather, Tim) managed to meticulously hatch them all. The candied peel started off easy enough as the syrup was easy to prepare. However the recipe called for letting the rinds cool in the pan before you take the rinds off with a fork. I strongly disagree with this step. Similar to Ei-Lun and Kirk's experience, our rind stuck to the water bath as the syrup quickly crystallize. This step happened very very quickly so beware! We had to heat up the syrup again, but that little bit of extra heat took the rind over the top and crystallized the rind into hard pieces of candy. We put them over parchment paper without letting them cool in the pan this time, but it was difficult to get all the syrup out. If you can imagine, our rinds were not in neat strips but captured into crystalized hardened sugar water. Admittedly, we did not have a candy thermometer so we probably went over the 230 degrees. Despite all these mishaps, a few pieces over the sorbet ended up being quite tasty, although a bit crunchy :)
Sabayon Part 1 - this by far was the most finicky step of the dessert. The first time we made it, we followed the recipe to a T and used a water bath, cooking it over 8-10 minutes. Our sauce was thin, however, and never looked thick and smooth as it should have been. A quick search on the internet told us we had not cooked it long enough. By that time, we had already added the butter and it was too late to fix.
Intead of throwing away the sabayon (we had no lemons at the time to start over), I quickly remembered that mini tapioca pearls are used as a thickening agent in berry pies (I happen to love them in pies and had some in the pantry). We put the sabayon back on the burner and added two tbsp of the tapioca. After several minutes, the sabayon developed a nice thickness to it. We let it chill, poured it over the crust and used the broiler method. Later, upon tasting, we found the texture of the tapioca a nice touch texture wise to the tart and actually would consider doing it this way the next time.
Sabayon Part II - Since we had extra pine nut crust left, we decided to try making the sabayon again the next day once we got more lemons. I had read that a double boiler was not necessary and putting the sauce directly over low heat would work. Since our problem was too thin of a sauce from undercooking, I was interested in this method. The sauce did thicken more and instead of 8-10 minutes of total cook time, we cooked it at least for 20 minutes. However, the sauce never thickened to what I would consider thick enough to set even after adding the butter. Since we didn't want to waster the sabayon, we ended up putting it in the oven at 350 degrees for 20 minutes which helped cook the custard. Next came the broiler step but beware, you HAVE to sit and watch the oven! I ran over to Alia to watch her and when I came back 1-2 minutes later, the broiler had put a crust similar to a creme brule crust over the tart. The custard did seem set however.
This second sabayon is in our fridge and I'll update as to the taste and flavor tomorrow.
Sadly, I don't think we mastered making a true sabayon the two times we tried. I'm not sure I am that interested in making it a third time! But if I was, I would cook the sabayon even longer than the 20 minutes and would definitely forgo the water bath as it did not seem necessary.
Overall impression: The flavor of the sabayon (although we didn't totally get it right) was divine, very tart, not too sweet, very fresh tasting. The pine crust had good texture, but not enough of a strong flavor, given the subtle taste of pine nuts. The sorbet was refreshing and light but Tim and I wondered about serving it with the lemon tart. Since the sorbet is "mushy" and so is the tart filling, it didn't seem to go as well together texture wise although delicious on their own. The candied peel was tasty and crunchy and a nice accompaniement to the sorbet, but I wonder if it was supposed to be "crunchy" vs. "chewy." Ours was definitely the former but without a candy thermometer, we'll never know if it was due to overcooking.
Pine nut crust is easy using a KitchenAid mixer
Weighing the dough into 3 parts helped ensured uniformity
Whisking a never-thickening sauce
Sabayon w/ tapioca - prebroiling
Sabayon w/ tapioca - post broiling
Crispy, crunchy candied lemon peel
Orange sorbet, tasty and refreshing
Yum, yum, yum
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