boston cream pie

Life has been all sorts of crazy lately. I've been finishing up my Christmas shopping, kicking some finals butt, and spending time with my brother before he leaves tomorrow. :( Yesterday we actually had a Christmas lunch with my mom's side of the family because my brother's leaving and some of my family is going to India for a wedding over Christmas. My cousins and I are all in the midst of finals so we couldn't even make it a dinner and stay late like usual. So it's been a little weird and early but hopefully with more traditions still to come, Christmas will feel semi normal this year.

I made this Boston Cream Pie last year for a Christmas gathering and it was a pretty big hit so I decided whip it up again for the lunch! Once again, it didn't disappoint.

This recipe has three parts so I started with the cake. Sift your dry ingredients into the bowl of a mixer. Make a well and pour the wet ingredients inside. Mix!

Pour the mixture into a separate bowl and set aside. Give the mixer bowl a little wash and dry. Put in your egg whites and cream of tartar and whip!

When it forms stiff peaks, grab the first mixture and pour it on top of the egg whites. Fold!

Pour the batter into a pie pan and bake. While that's going, make the pastry cream. Boil milk in saucepan and infuse with vanilla. Let that cool slightly and whip egg yolks, sugar, and cornstarch together until smooth.

Temper the egg mixture with a 1/4 cup of the hot milk. Mix well and add the rest of the milk. Strain the whole thing back into the pot and heat until thick and bubbling.

Pour the pastry cream into a bowl and let it cool slightly. Cover with plastic wrap, pressing the plastic onto the cream to prevent a skin from forming. *bleh!* Pop it in the fridge for a least an hour.

When cake is cool, cut it in half. Layer the bottom half with the custard and top with the other half.

Make the ganache topping and pour over the cake.

Refrigerate until you're ready to serve!

What is your favorite holiday dessert? Will you be trying anything new this year? :)


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Boston Cream Pie
recipe adapted slightly from Food Network

For the Cake
1 cup + 2 tbsp cake flour, sifted
2/3 cup sugar
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup milk
1/4 cup cooking oil
2 egg yolks
1 tsp vanilla
2 egg whites
1/4 tsp cream of tartar

Preheat oven to 350F. In a mixing bowl, combine first four dry ingredients. Make a well and add milk, oil, yolks, and vanilla. With a mixer, beat on low until well combined. Then beat on high for three minutes. Put mixture aside. In a mixing bowl, whip egg whites and cream of tartar until it forms stiff peaks. Pour egg yolk batter over egg whites and fold *carefully* until well combined. Pour batter into a greased 9 inch pie pan and bake for 25-30 minutes or until top springs back. Invert pan on a wire rack and cool completely.


For the Pastry Cream
2 cups milk (whole, 2%, or 1%)
1/2 vanilla bean, seeds scraped out (or 1/2 tsp vanilla extract)
6 egg yolks
2/3 cup sugar
1/4 cup cornstarch
1 tbsp unsalted butter

In a small saucepan, bring milk and vanilla bean seeds/extract to a boil over medium heat, stirring constantly. Immediately remove from heat and let it sit for 10-15 minutes. In a small bowl, whisk sugar and egg yolks until fluffy. Add cornstarch and whisk until smooth. Slowly add 1/4 cup of the hot milk mixture and stir. Mix in the rest of the hot milk and add back to the pot through a strainer. Heat on medium until mixture thickens and bubbles. Remove from heat and allow to cool slightly. Put it in a bowl and cover with plastic wrap, pressing it down on top of the cream to prevent a skin from forming. Refrigerate for at least one hour. Pastry cream can be made up to 24 hours in advance.


For the Ganache
8 ounces semisweet chocolate
1/2-3/4 cup heavy cream

In a small saucepan, bring cream to a boil, stirring constantly. Pour hot cream over chocolate and stir until melted and smooth. Start by adding 1/2 cup and add more cream if you need to thin it out.


Assembly
Cut the cooled cake in half, lengthwise. Put the bottom on a serving plate and spread the pastry cream on top. Put the other half of the cake on top. Pour ganache over the cake, letting it run over the sides. Store in the fridge until ready to serve!

new things for 2012

Hey there! Just taking a break from writing a paper for a final exam to pop in here an let you know about some things that will be coming soon from Tenpenny Splendid. :)

iPhone scenes from the past month..

My new blog design is just about finished. I just have a few minor touches to add and it will be ready to go! One of those touches is your ads! That's right, starting in January 2012, Tenpenny Splendid will be taking on sponsors. Since this is still a growing blog, I will be doing it on an exchange basis for now. I got this idea from some of my bloggy friends and I thought it'd be great to start doing on here!

{Edit: I changed the sizes so there are now three options.}

All you have to do is put up my ad on your blog and I'll put up an ad for your blog or shop over here! If you don't have a blog but still want to advertise, just email me and we'll work something out! I have three ad sizes.. 185x230 which is the featured spot. I'll have only one of those per month. The medium size is 185x160 and the small size is 185x80. If you are interested, please comment, tweet, or email me and we'll talk specifics! I can also make an ad for you for free if you don't already have one. I love the idea of supporting each others' creative endeavors and I think this is a great way to do it! :)

And a few more..

Another thing I'm working on is a "shop my closet" store. I've seen a lot of bloggers do this also and I think it's a great idea. It's a fun way to share clothes that may not be vintage or handmade so can't be put on Etsy, but are still fun and in great condition. I actually want to start off with some formal dresses I have. They're from different events, like weddings and dances, and were each worn only once. It'd be a shame for them to just go to waste so I'm going to sell them for about a third of the price that I bought them for.

I'm going to put the money from those sales directly toward opening my Etsy shop, which has been on permanent vacation since it's existence. I keep making it a goal to open it each month in hopes that it will actually happen, but with the financial constraints of an unemployed student, it has been really hard to fabricate my ideas. I'm hoping this will take the financial burden off of me a little bit and be enough to get me jump-started. If they sell, that is. ;)

That's all I wanted to say for now! Let me know if you are interested in trading ads. I also may be seeking out some of you who already have this system. :)

Have a great weekend!

deseeding pomegranates

Otherwise known as, why POM juice costs so much. Deseed a pomegranate and you'll suddenly understand.

I used to eat pomegranates the hard way.. basically just tearing into the skin at any random point and digging out the seeds as I went along. About this time last year I saw a *much* better way of going about it that involved extracting the seeds all at once so you can shove them into your face like handfuls of popcorn. Which is another issue itself. ;)

I've since perfected the art of seed extraction and decided to share it with you since it is indeed the season of pomegranates! Here's what you need.. a pom, a sharp knife, and a bowl of water.

Start by cutting the pom right through the top where that little nugget is. (1) Cut about 3/4 inch down. You'll be cutting through the white fleshy part instead of rupturing all the seeds. (2) Now grab it at the split and just tear it in half. View all the seeds you could have potentially massacred if you cut it all the way! (3) Make the same sort of cut in the top of each half and then tear those in half so you now have four pom chunks. (4) At this point you may have some loose seeds so just shake them into the bowl.

This part is hard to show with a camera in one hand, but now you just (1) take each piece and sort of rub the seeds. They'll start sprinkling out into the water. (2) Just bend it around and peel off the white skin to reveal more seeds and keep pushing them off into the water.

The idea here is that the seeds will sink in the water and all the white junk will float so you can scoop it out when you're done instead of picking it out from between the seeds later! It really helps if you have a crazy small sifter so you can skim it like a little pool. :)

 

When you've scooped out all the unwanted bits, carefully drain the water and move your seeds to a container for storing. I find that old wonton containers work especially well for this. ;) 

Now kick back and enjoy your loot! It is certainly a laborious process but well worth it. Pom seeds are delicious and super good for you too! And yes, it's safe to eat the whole seed. I've seen people eat them like sunflower seeds where they sort of suck out the juice and spit out the seedy part. Not necessary. And very messy. The whole thing is perfectly edible! 

Do you like pomegranates? Do you just eat them by the handful or mix them into things?

I usually eat them by themselves but I'm dying to make chocolate covered pom seeds this year. Yea.. that's a thing. Amazing right?

Have a great week!

fall reading

Back in September I made a summer reading list post and I decided to keep it going. Each season I'll list the three books I read and give my two-cents on them. One of my 101 in 1001 goals is to read a book a month so this will help me keep track of that. I really need to update that list one day!

During the the fall, I only got to two books because of school reading (and there was plenty of that) so I think I'll take advantage of the upcoming wintery vacation to get an extra book in so I can keep up with my list! I mean, what's better than getting cozy with a blanket, a good book, some hot chocolate, and your guy while he plays video games when it's cold and snowy outside? I can't think of a better scenario. :)


Fall Reading List 2011

1. The Girl Who Chased the Moon by Sarah Addison Allen
Loved this book. It's no wonder it's a New York Times bestseller. I found this book down the shore when Charlie and I dusted off the sand, got a little dressed up, and took a walk around Stone Harbor. I actually loved it during the day. I usually only go at night when it's packed with people, but during the day, the streets were empty. We found the cutest little coffee shop that had a hodge podge of old couches dating back to around the 20's. Definitely a place I will go back to. So we grabbed some iced coffee and headed to the Atlantic Book Store. Sadly, next time we go it won't be there anymore because that branch is shutting down. :(

Anyway, I was determined to find a new book since I had just finished my beach reading and this one caught my eye. The description was everything I look for in a book so I grabbed it. It's all about a girl discovering family secrets that she never could have imagined in a town where magical things seem to happen. And bonus? This book is themed around cake as a sort of magical force so there are three cake recipes in the back taken right from the story! And I intend to make every one. What I love about this book is that it has a little bit of a supernatural quality but in a very believable, not too out there way. Definitely recommend.


2. Lullaby by Chuck Palahniuk
This was the second book I read by Palahniuk and it didn't disappoint. I know he has a cult following but if you haven't read his work or at least not this book, definitely pick it up. There weren't as many unexpected twists and turns like there were in Invisible Monsters, but it was still a gripping story. I'm not sure if all of his books are like this, but in the two I've read so far there is this sort repetitive quality that the narrating character has. Every now and then they repeat two lines that pertain to the whole story, changing them only slightly to be more relevant to the particular passage. Sorry if this is confusing but you know what I mean if you read these two books.. I just don't want to give too much away!

This book also has a sort of supernatural quality. I must be into that. ;) It is totally thought provoking, forcing you to imagine a world where sound is feared because one small utterance could cause you to drop dead where you stand. Amazing. Once again, I recommend this book completely. I will be seeking out more Palahniuk books too now that I've thoroughly enjoyed two of them. I have three authors on my radar now that I'm hoping will have multiple hits.


What are you reading lately? Any books on your list for hibernating season?

sneaky peak

If you follow me on Twitter you may know that I've been hard at work on a major blog overhaul. I've been sharing some of my excitement over successful coding and having things work out right. If you've ever dealt with html or css you know how downright thrilling it is to have something work the way you wanted it to. With each reload I would hold my breath and then do a little happy clap whenever something moved into the position it was supposed to be in or did the appropriate thing on a hover, etc.

So here's a little sneaky peak of what I've been working on. No, I couldn't have made it any smaller. ;) I just don't want to give too much away before the big reveal.



I'm actually almost done, I just ran into a temporary setback this weekend. If you follow me on Twitter, you may also have seen this..


Has anyone ever seen this before? More importantly have you ever fixed it? It doesn't effect the layout of the blog whatsoever but it makes it damn near impossible to edit anything. I have a plan B if no one knows what to do with this but I wanted to see if there was a quick fix first.

The gadgets just got all jumbled and unmanageable in the page editor. :(

And just so you know what I already tried, I logged out of Blogger, cleared my cache, shut down firefox and reopened it, signed back in to Blogger, and it was still like this. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. If not, on to plan B!

Hope everyone's week is going well! I have two finals left and then I'm done school for the semester. :)