Fastnachts, Donuts and Other Shrove Tuesday Indulgences

Because I am not routinely a donut person, when Shrove Tuesday / Mardi Gras / Fastnacht Day / Pancake Night comes around, I tend to splurge a little.

When I was growing up, Fastnacht Day was basically an excuse to eat your favorite donut, not necessarily a reason to make a batch of traditional Fastnachts (a particular Pennsylvania Dutch variant) yourself.   For completeness sake, I'll include a recipe for Fastnachts, but I have yet to make them myself.   This comes from a souvenir book (my copy has no copyright info) still sold in PA, I think, called "Pennsylvania Dutch Cookbook:  fine old recipes".   Incidentally, the book also contains a scrapple ("ponhaws") recipe that starts with a hog's head, if you happen to have one lying around:

https://www.amazon.com/Pennsylvania-Dutch-Cook-Early-Settlers/dp/B000CMOR1E/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1518805824&sr=8-2&keywords=pennsylvania+dutch+cook+book

(WARNING WARNING WARNING THIS RECIPE MAKES FOUR DOZEN DONUTS THIS WILL BE YOUR ONLY WARNING)

FASTNACHTS

1 pkg. active dry yeast
1/4 c. warm water (110-115 degrees F.)
1 tsp. sugar
3 c. sifted flour
2 c. milk, scalded and cooled to lukewarm
3 eggs, well beaten
1/4 c. melted butter
1 c. sugar
1 1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
3 1/2 - 4 c. sifted flour

(The original recipe does not specify how much or what kind of fat to use for frying, so insert deep fat frying vehicle of choice here)

Soften yeast in warm water.  Let stand 5 to 10 min.  Add 1 tsp. sugar and 3 cups sifted flour to the milk, stirring until smooth.   Stir in the yeast.  Cover: let rise in a warm place until doubled.  Stir in eggs, butter, the remaining sugar, salt, nutmeg and enough flour so that mixture can no longer be stirred with a spoon (a soft dough).  Cover: let rise until doubled.  Punch down dough and divide into two portions.  On a floured surface, roll out each portion until about 1/2 in. thick.  Cut dough with a donut cutter.  Cover dough and let rise in a warm place until doubled.  Fry in deep fat heated to 370 degrees.  Fry 3 to 4 min., or until lightly browned.  turn doughnuts to brown evenly.  Remove from fat:  drain.

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There is a kind of donut which I used to buy sometimes in PA which is not always easy to find.   Before I discovered places which sold their donuts warm, Country Maid's cream-filled, plain-on-the-outside donuts were my go-to Shrove Tuesday indulgence.  It's still not easy, even "living in the future", to find them online (the website looks either hacked or lapsed or something, and the Facebook pages look unattended).   I learned in the course of my online search that the bakery is in Bowmansville, called Harting's.  There is a website called PA Snacks which offers them in bulk (18 donuts is too many for just me), and I know there are stores in SEPA that sell them.

http://www.pasnacks.com/country-maid-donuts.html

Although I am not motivated to make 4 dozen donuts at a time, I appreciate, and am willing to pay for, a donut which is served while still warm.   It's part of the indulgence.  For a while, there was a Krispy Kreme bakery on 23rd St. in Manhattan, but alas, that store closed and while the one in Penn Station has perfectly good donuts, they are never hot / warm.  However, I know that in other parts of the country, having the "Hot Now" sign lit is still a selling point, and they are memorable when warm.

http://www.krispykreme.com/

I was both horrified and delighted to discover a place underground near Columbus Circle station (a food hall called TurnStyle) which serves tiny, overpriced ($1 each), but warm and delicious donuts, called the Doughnuttery.   They also have branches in the Plaza Hotel and Chelsea Market.

They offer a number of flavors, toppings, and dipping sauces.   My favorite is plain vanilla glaze.   The price is a self-limiting factor that keeps these gems from becoming too regular a temptation.   However, it's a fine diversion for Fastnacht Day.

https://www.doughnuttery.com/

Close to the TurnStyle entrance, there's a booth selling macarons, also a few cookies and liege-type waffles.   The Red Velvet was, to put it mildly, heaven.   I try to keep on the lookout for macarons which are almost worth their high price, and these were the best I've had.

https://bywoops.com/


TurnStyle has a number of other offerings, not just sweet stuff.   I had dinner once at their Yong Kang Street branch and it was delightful, would nom again.   The TurnStyle website will give you some info about shops and restaurants, for menus and more data you may need to search the stores by name.

https://www.turn-style.com/

Food Shop Links, Holiday Protein Edition

I'm finally posting about two shopping trips I made in Manhattan, getting specialty food for my family's Christmas breakfast last year.   And by "last year", I mean "Christmas 2016"  (Yikes).  In lieu of splurging on chocolate or other candy for stocking stuffers, I splurge on meat, cheese and fish.   Which do not go into the stockings, because Ew.

I started at a food shop in what I call the "Little UK" (I think no one else calls it that at the moment), a group of shops in the West Village near 14th Street.   There is a tea shop and a for-reals chip shop, about which more another day, on Greenwich Avenue.   My goal on this day, however, was Myers of Keswick, a food purveyor on Hudson Street near Horatio.  They have an array of imported shelf stable foods, Christmas crackers every December, and a deli counter full of sausages, Scotch eggs, pasties and pies (displayed on the website as "Fresh Goods").   I haven't tried everything there, but I have yet to try a sausage / pie / etc. that I haven't enjoyed.  I usually get the Cumberland sausage and Bangers to cook at home.   They also sell scones, and according to the website they'll put (clotted) cream and jam on them for you.   I shall report back.

http://www.myersofkeswick.com/

In nice weather,  it's not too arduous a walk down to Bleecker Street and Murray's Cheese Shop.  In dreadful weather, it's one stop from the 14th St. A/C/E to West 4th Street, with a little walking on both ends.  In addition to the bewildering array of cheeses and "specialty foods", they have a charcuterie section with sausages, pates, terrines, hams and smoked duck.  I will sometimes get the smoked duck breast, but I keep coming back for the fresh cheese curds, which may or may not be up to dairy farm standards but I like them just fine.  The West Village branch has a kind of lunch counter called "Murray's Melts" that offers grilled cheese sandwiches, and there is also Murray's Cheese Bar down the street from the shop (I will have to visit and report back).   The website also mentions "classes and private events" including cheese tastings and mozzarella pulling.

http://www.murrayscheese.com/

http://www.murrayscheesebar.com/

From the West Village, we now go WAAAAAAAAAAAY up to Yorkville on the Upper East Side (any NYC resident will tell you how maddeningly, ridiculously difficult it can be to visit two non-adjacent neighborhoods in one trip, although on paper it's Take the F from West 4th, Change To The Q At 34th).   This neighborhood doesn't have the same size German population it used to have, but on Second Avenue, Schaller and Weber butcher shop is still offering wursts, landjaeger, cured meats, and imported German foods including sweets, spaetzle, potato pancakes, and coffees (I used to be able to get Tchibo here for someone I loved who got the occasional yen for it).   When I cannot find butterkase (German butter cheese) elsewhere (even the cheese shops have not always heard of it), they usually have some in stock.  Several years ago I came across a kind of ham there called lachsschinken, which looked interesting and tasted delicious.   I brought it to the family Christmas breakfast, and lo and behold, one of the fussier eaters liked it very much, and a tradition was born.

https://schallerweber.com/

The proprietors have opened a tiny space next door to serve hot food (mostly sausages) called Schaller's Stube.   They also serve fried chicken and potato pancakes, which I enjoyed very much.  I want to go back and try a wurst or two, but the sauerkraut and condiments all contain vinegar, which I can't eat, so I have to ask them to make it plain, which I don't always have the energy to do.  The "Teriyaki Brat" looks interesting...

https://www.schallerstube.com/

FOOD LAB -- Brazilian (GF) Cheese Bread Edition

Finally migrating this post over from social media.   In the months since I first wrote it, I have located both standard and mini sized muffin tins which serve to bake pao de queijo very well indeed.

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I fell in love with a GF product called BraziBites -- mixed and frozen cassava (tapioca) - flour batter based on Brazilian Pao de Queijo. One thing I loved was the variety of flavors. Cheddar. Parmesan. Asiago and garlic. They're not cheap, and not easy to find (Costco used to have them for a while, otherwise it's Whole Paycheck or Wegman's), but they scratch a particular "warm bread" itch for me.

brazibites.com

I had also discovered a baked and frozen product called "Against The Grain" which has a similar recipe. Those (larger) rolls NEARLY scratched the same itch, but they got tough sooner than wheat-flour bread. Reheated in the oven, they could quickly turn into rocks. They cost too much to pay for potential rocks. They do have other products besides the rolls. I may revisit them to try the wraps.

http://www.againstthegraingourmet.com/

I started looking for copycat recipes, and the first / only one I found (for a frustratingly long time) looked...insanely complicated, to be brutally honest. The author swore that the brand of tapioca flour made a tremendous difference, Bob's Red Mill would NOT do. The cheese must be low-moisture mozzarella. You MUST use a food processor. The rolls MUST be baked on parchment.
I never attempted a bread this tetchy when I was eating wheat, why would I start now?

Fortunately for me, I have since found a couple of other, simpler recipes which had simple proportions, could be made with whatever tapioca flour your store carries, could be mixed with a blender (or a stick blender), got poured into mini-muffin tins and LET YOU CHOOSE THE CHEESE! The author has had good results with feta. I used the sharp cheddar in my fridge. When mixed, it's like slightly thick pancake batter.

Then I remembered I have no mini-muffin tin.

No biggie. Muffin batter can be baked in a cake pan, those I have. I lowered the temperature and added baking time in case of oops.

The corners rose and the middle did not. Fortunately, the thing was cohesive enough to flip over, and the center baked until it caught up with the corners.

It's better than the frozen ones. I won't need to make a special trip for the commercial brands. Go me 8)

The author of the recipe I used mentions the batter will keep up to a week in the fridge. I am experimenting with creating my own "bites" with an ice cube tray in my freezer. Will update.

UPDATE: They freeze, thaw and bake with little to no impact on taste and texture. Win!

http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/easy_brazilian_cheese_bread/