mocha chip meringues

It's always a tough day when there's no flour in the kitchen. Do you ever get in that mood where it seems silly to go all the way to the store to only buy one thing? You can't think of anything else you urgently need, but if you go you'll end up with a third jar of peanut butter cause it's on sale and a very large bag of tortilla chips and maybe some new nail polish. I'm a grocery store impulse buyer, so I try to avoid it until I actually need groceries. Try is the key word, though. I usually end up there all the time, buying squares of fancy cheese or bags of shredded coconut.

I do have grocery store impulse control sometimes, which is when I end up making meringue cookies. They are so easy to make and require such little effort, things I often forget when egg whites are involved. Egg whites are fun to work with and meringues are such adaptable little cookies. They are always sure to impress too, because everyone thinks they are difficult to make. I went with an espresso+cocoa mixture and studded them with chocolate chunks. They taste like little clouds that melt with each bite.

Mocha Chip Meringues
Adapted from an Everyday Food recipe

3 egg whites, room temperature
1/4 tsp cream of tartar
pinch of salt
3/4 c. sugar
3 tbsp cocoa
1 tsp instant coffee
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 c. semi-sweet chocolate, chopped into chunks

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper (easy, easy cleanup!). Stir together coffee and vanilla until coffee is dissolved. Set aside.

In a large bowl, beat together the egg whites and and cream of tartar using electric beaters or the whisk attachment of your stand mixer, beating until frothy. Add the sugar 1 tbsp at a time and continue beating until the mixture holds stiff glossy peaks. To test this, turn the mixer off and turn the whisk over. If the whites stay firm and tall (they should look like snowy mountaintops) then you've reached the right consistency. Make sure to scrape down the sides of the bowl. Add in the cocoa, coffee mixture and chocolate chips. Mix until just combined.

Drop the batter by spoonful onto the baking sheets. You can also pipe them, using a plastic bag with the corner cut off, to achieve more uniform shapes. Bake until dried out and crisp, about 30-40 minutes. Cool on baking sheets, then transfer to a sealed container to store. Meringues will keep for days and days, if you can keep from eating them.

whole lemon tart+french tart dough

I love the warm, lazy days of summer but sometimes I find myself having trouble filling them. The days, that is. I'm currently in full-on running mode, training for the Marine Corps Marathon in October. It's a commitment and it's given me
a great summer goal. But it's just too darn hot to run during the day. So I either wake up early and beat the heat, or wait til the sun goes down. But what to do in between? I've charged myself with a second summer goal: break out of the baking rut. Try new recipes. Feed my marathon-training hunger.

A few weeks ago, a Costco-sized bag of lemons and 2 dozen eggs lurking in the fridge at home caught my eye. A cake seemed too heavy, a cookie was nothing exciting. I began to research tarts and a few recipes caught my eye. The first was this tart au citron from Dave Leibovitz, which used a charmingly old-French lady, inprecisly measured, melted butter tart dough. It's the kind of casual baking I love, so that was the dough I was going to use. But I didn't want a tart filled with lemon curd, I wanted to the dough and filling to bake up together. Wonderfully enough, I stumbled on another interesting recipe--a whole lemon tart at Smitten Kitchen. The afternoon just got exciting! Two new baking strategies to try!

The tart dough was a blast to make. Read the post here about how to make it. I can't say anything else about it other than work quickly once it's out of the oven to press it into the tart pan.  Once again, it's the casual style of baking that I love. I think the skill of the baker and the elegance of the ingredients really shines when the recipes and techniques are simple and informal. I par-baked the crust before pouring in the filling and continuing to bake. This helped keep the dough from getting too moist and retain a lovely, flaky texture.

Just like the tart dough, I wanted a simple recipe and ended up cobbling a few recipes together. The whole lemon tart uses, as the name suggests, the ENTIRE lemon. Zest, rind, flesh, everything. All thrown into a food processor, then into a tart dough, then into the oven. So easy, so simple; the perfect dessert to me. As I researched whole lemon tarts, I learned that they are typically made with Meyer lemons, which are sweeter and tend to have less of the bitter white pith (that white layer between the zest and the flesh) than the standard lemon. Since I was using a regular lemon, I chose to complicate the process a little a remove most of the pith. It was one more step, but it ended up making the tart the perfect balance of sweet and tart. The filling will look a little curdled and unappealing, but forge on! Pour it into the par-baked shell and trust it. It turns out super yummy, like the best lemon bar you've ever had.

Whole Lemon Tart with a French Tart Dough
from David Leibovitz via Paule Caillat


French Tart Dough
6 tbsp unsalted butter, cut into pieces
1 tablespoon vegetable oil (I used canola)
3 tablespoons water
1 tablespoon sugar
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 cup flour

Preheat the oven to 410º F (210º C).

In a ovenproof glass bowl, combine the butter, oil, water, sugar and salt. Place it in the oven for about 15 minutes, until the butter is bubbling and starts to brown around the edges.

Remove from the oven and stir in the flour quickly until it comes together and forms a ball. Place the dough into a 9 inch tart pan and press it into the bottom and edges to form the crust. Reserve a small bit of dough to patch up any cracks or missing spots.

Prick the dough with a fork on the bottom before baking for about 7 minutes. You don't want to bake it completely, but it should begin to dry out slightly. Let the shell cool before filling.

Whole Lemon Tart
adapted from Smitten Kitchen and Food52

1 large meyer lemon cut into 8 pieces (if using a regular lemon, see note above about removing the pith)
1 1/4 cup sugar
1 stick butter 
1 tsp vanilla 
1 tbsp honey
4 eggs 


Put all ingredients (except tart shell) into a food processor or blender and mix mix mix until combined.
Pour into par-baked tart shell.
Bake 35 minutes, watching that the top does not burn. If the crust is looking too dark, make a ring of foil to cover the crust (I luckily have a pie shield--it's great.
Allow to cool completely before serving. This would be fantastic topped with fresh berries or a slightly sweetened homemade whipped cream.