Some of my favorite memories of elementary school involve going to the park after getting picked up, finding an ice cream truck and buying red, white and blue rocket-shaped popsicles. The colors sold me on those pops, but the rocket ships shape was what made them memorable. Tovolo makes popsicle molds in all kinds of shapes – including that classic rocket ship shape, so you can relive childhood popsicle memories at home. The Rocket Pop Molds are made of plastic, like many standard popsicle molds. Popsicles each stand in their own holder on the included base, a base that keeps them upright in the freezer and allows you to remove the popsicles one at a time. It’s a nice feature of you’ve ever wrestled with a multi-pop tray before. The handles and sturdy and have drip guards around the base to keep your hands from getting sticky.
The only problem with this product is that I haven’t gotten the hang of making the red, white a blue pops with it, yet. The sticks are long and sturdy, so it’s hard to freeze the popsicle in layers and then insert the stick. A minor detail and not really much of a “problem” with the product as much as it is a problem with my popsicle-making skills. I’ll stick with solid rocket pops for now and just enjoy the shape!
A clafoutis is somewhere between a cake and a custard. It’s a french dish, a baked dessert (although you can make savory clafoutis as well) that has lots of milk and eggs in it and is held together with a little flour for added stability. In general, clafoutis have a great eggy flavor to them and go well with a variety of different fruits. Pears are one of my favorites, but for a summer fruit, ripe strawberries work very well in the dish.
I usually make big clafoutis, using pie plates or quiche dishes, and cutting the clafoutis into slices for serving. This time around, I decided to make my clafoutis in individual dessert cups and produce single-serving sizes. I used whole strawberries – minus the green tops – and placed them in the bottom of each dish. I fit three into each and wrote the recipe that way, but if your strawberries are unusually large or unusually small, you might want to use one less or a few more. You basically want to cover the bottom of the cup with whole berries. I filled each dish with the custard mixture and baked.
The finished clafoutis were amazing when still warm from the oven. The custardy portion of the clafoutis was smooth, soft and had notes of both egg and vanilla. It also picked up a bit of strawberry juice that the berries released during baking. The berries were tender, but not mushy. The whole thing reminded me a bit of strawberry shortcake and a bit of the strawberry bread pudding I made not too long ago. This dish doesn’t take long to make and works well for breakfast, dessert and an afternoon snack.
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When it comes to buying specialty appliances, there are a couple of things to take into consideration on top of how well the gadget works: how expensive it is and how much you’ll use it. A single-use gadget (a “unitasker”) is not that practical, but if you’re going to get a lot of use out of it, it’s often worth it. That said, when the price is right, it’s hard to say no to a good deal even if you think you’ll only use it a couple of times. This was the case when I picked up a VillaWare Prego Pizzelle Baker. I had been thinking about getting one, but seeing them on the sale table at a nearby kitchen store sealed the deal for me.
The Villaware Pizzelle Baker is very easy to use and works extremely well. All you do is plug it in and wait for it to preheat for a few minutes before using it. You pop the dough onto the nonstick surface, lock the top and bottom plates together and wait. Pizzelles cook very fast – sometimes in as little as 30 seconds – so the machine has no timer or light to indicate when the pizzelles are done. You might have to check on the first batch or two, but after a couple it’s easy to get a feel for it and make another pair of pizzelles every minute. The nonstick surface makes it incredibly easy to remove the finished pizzelles and also means there is virtually no cleanup required for this machine. The baker turns off when you unplug it and takes a while to cool down enough to where it can be put away. No regrets about buying this one. I’ve used it even more than I had anticipated!
When I write a recipe that includes nutmeg, I try to specify that it should be freshly ground nutmeg. I notice that more and more recipes are written this way, where years ago most just said simply “nutmeg.” This is because nutmeg has a delicate, spicy flavor that starts to dissipate shortly after being ground and you really can get a lot more flavor out of a much smaller amount than you would with preground. There is no exact standard of conversion between fresh and preground, but to give you an idea, you might only need 1/4 tsp of freshly ground nutmeg where you might need a whole teaspoon of preground – and you’ll probably get more flavor from that 1/4-tsp.
Whole nutmeg seeds, which are the dried seeds of a nutmeg tree, are sold in most grocery and specialty baking stores. One jar will last you a long time, and the whole nutmegs will retain their flavor during storage. To grate or grind it yourself, you can either use a nutmeg grinder or a microplane. If only a small amount of nutmeg is called for in a recipe, a few grinds should be enough to impart some nutmeg flavor. If you must use preground nutmeg, try to replace your jar frequently so that the nutmeg has as much flavor as possible when you go to use it.
