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By Request
Betty Shimabukuro
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Cookbook delights in desserts
THE baking season is upon us. Is your oven smoldering yet?
Perhaps you need some fresh inspiration: Enter "101 Great Desserts from Hawaii's Favorite Restaurants," by Cheryl Chee Tsutsumi (Island Heritage, 2005, $12.99), a cookbook to elevate your sense of style.
Tsutsumi is a freelance travel writer whose column, "
Hawaii's Back Yard," is a Sunday feature of the Star-Bulletin. She considers desserts "the ultimate pampering of the palate."
This collection would challenge serious bakers, those who know what it means to "bloom" gelatin sheets, who own piping bags, who can deal with elaborate ingredient lists and assembly instructions.
The goal, after all, is to replicate artful restaurant fare -- a Chocolate Pyramid, for example, Coconut Orange Creme Brulee or perhaps an Apple Volcano.
For the more average baker, though, the cookbook offers easier items, dressed up for special occasions.
This festive pound cake from Orchids in the Halekulani is studded with candied fruit, but the preparation is banana-bread simple. Plus, it's sized for two loaves, perfect for holiday sharing.
Tropical Pound Cake
1 pound butter
2-1/2 cups sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
8 large eggs
4 cups cake flour
2 tablespoons EACH diced candied mango, pineapple, papaya and dried cranberries
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease two 2-pound loaf pans.
Cream butter, sugar and vanilla until smooth.
Crack eggs into a separate bowl. Sift flour into a third bowl. With mixer on low, alternately add eggs and flour to sugar mixture, in 2 parts. Add fruits; mix only to incorporate.
Divide batter into loaf pans and place in center of oven. Bake 45 to 55 minutes, until a pick inserted into center comes out clean. Cool before removing from pans.
Nutritional information unavailable.
Send queries along with name and phone number to:
"By Request," Honolulu Star-Bulletin,
500 Ala Moana, No. 7-210, Honolulu 96813.
Or send e-mail to
bshimabukuro@starbulletin.com