Sunday, October 21, 2012

Baker's nightmare


Office cooking club does not bring out the best in me. I do not know what it is!

You know me, I love to cook. But whenever I am making something for cooking club, things go wrong.

Today I was making Alsatian Apple Flan. It is out of this monastery cookbook by this monk I have learned to trust. He has a great name. It is Brother Victor-Antoine D'Avila-Latourrette! Only the French could come up with a name like that.

So, this Apple Flan, it comes from Alsace in France, which we were just talking about, remember, when I went last week to Our Lady Help of Christians.

Where was Our Lady Help of Cooking Club Members?

This flan, zut alors, would not bake!

Brother Victor-Antoine Etc. Etc. said that it would be done in about 45 minutes. But I kept checking and it always seemed to be liquid.

Zut alors and son of a sea cook! If I were just making this for myself it would be done in a snap. But no.

I had followed the recipe exactly. I had even weighed out my apples! These were those Northern Spy apples I bought a few days ago. Then because Brother Victor-Antoine was vague about the size of the baking dish, I had wasted 20 minutes pouring the apples in and out of this and that baking dish, trying to find one of optimum size.

What could the problem be? I can interview great conductors about Leonard Pennario but I cannot bake a simple dessert? Heck, I am even Alsatian! I was born to make this apple flan.

Long story short: It baked for TWO HOURS.

You figure it out. I sure can not.

Luckily it came out of the oven just in the nick of time.

I know in cases of office cooking club always to start things early!

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