New year's TV watching

[jennyaxe]

Last night we had a friend over and tried making three kinds of fondue - cheese, oil and chocolate. I'm not fond of cheese (except for Port Salut which doesn't taste much) so I didn't even try it, but according to Calle and notCalle it was good. The oil fondue was very good indeed, but we failed with the chocolate - it stopped being creamy melted goodness and became chunky and oily instead. So dessert ended up being non-chocolate-dipped pieces of fruit, plus the chocolate cookies I'd made. I don't know what they're called in English; the Swedish word for them is "biskvi" which sounds like a corruption of "biscuit" which is something else entirely. They're made like this:

* Take 400 grams of almond paste and 2 egg whites. Mix together. Make into flat discs, about 1,5" / 3-4 cms wide. Bake at 200 degrees C for about 10-15 minutes. They should be golden, not brown, when done. Let them cool.
* Mix 200 grams of butter, 4 table spoons of cocoa, 2 egg yolks and 3 dls of powdered sugar. (I think that's the right translation; it's sugar that's flour-like.) Put on the flat side of the cakes like a small mountain of batter. Put in fridge for at least an hour.
* Melt 100 grams of good chocolate. Dip cakes in chocolate. Put them back in the fridge and keep them there until it's time to eat them. They should always be stored in the fridge.

While eating, we watched the first seven episodes of "Dexter", a show about a serial killer serial killer. Or a serial serial killer killer, if you prefer. Anyhow, he's a guy who gets the urge to kill people but he only goes after other killers. He works as a forensics expert for the police, specialising in blood spatter analysis. There are voice overs during the whole show with Dexter's thoughts, and the current time is interspersed with his memories of growing up and how his foster father taught him to fit in despite his "problem".

This is the second time I've gotten Calle hooked on a show that's not an SF show. Interesting. I wouldn't have thought he'd like it that much - detective/crime thrillers are much more my cup of tea than his. But it helps that the show has good actors and decent writing. It's based on a novel, and unlike, say, the movie based on Jeffery Deaver's "The Bone Collector", by making it a TV series instead of a movie the producers actually have time to do a very good job of following the novel. Or so I've gathered from comments; I've not read the novel myself yet.

Another interesting point is that there's very little room for slash in this series. Dexter is so disconnected from other people that he mightn't even realise if a guy were hitting on him (much the same way as a lot of other people's jokes just go zooming over his head). His sister is irritating and wants a boyfriend! now! In the season finale there's an opening for two supporting characters, but it's a very small one.

I went to bed at about half past twelve, after most of the fireworks had stopped. And for some reason I woke up at 7 am. Calle and notCalle are both still asleep. I've had coffee, breakfast and pain killers and am a bit bored. Being such a nice person I won't sit watching Dexter (which would also be kind of stupid as I've already seen the entire season and the guys haven't). I'll be reading some Jeffery Deaver instead - am re-reading the Lincoln Rhyme series (the one starting with "The Bone Collector"). Great literature it's not, but it's nice chewing gum for the brain. Also like it that the main female character is a cop who drives fast cars, shoots better than most people, is a good cop and an expert in crime scene searches - and has endometriosis and arthritis. I wonder if Deaver knows that those conditions fairly often go together or if it's just coincidence. He probably does know; he seems to want to get his facts straight, as far as I can tell.

Comments

[megabitch.livejournal.com]

Sounds as if you managed to get some water/alcohol into the chocolate and not enough cream - possibly juice from the fruits? I find making a ganache (boil approx 100 mls of cream and pour over approx 200g dark choc and mix until it's smooth) and increasing the amount of boiled cream until I get the result I want and only then adding any additional stuff like liqueurs. Water & alcohol just make melted chocolate go like clay unless it's already been blended with enough cream (or butter, but then you're into a more fudge-like result anyway) :(

[katlinel.livejournal.com]

Happy New (calendar) Year to you both!

I think that the sugar (powdered sugar) is what I call icing sugar. The cakes sound lovely, but I've no idea if we have an equivalent.

[jennyaxe.livejournal.com]

Icing sugar sounds right; it's the one we use for icing so that should be it.

Happy new year to both of you, too!

[ahruman.livejournal.com]

I think you’ll find that “biskvi/biskvé” and “biscuit” are corruptions of a common, probably French, source. :-)

** looks at etymonline.com… biscuit: respelled early 19c. from bisket (16c.), ultimately (1330) from O.Fr. bescuit "twice cooked," alt. under infl. of O.It. biscotto, from M.L. biscoctum, from L. (panis) bis coctus "(bread) twice-baked." **

Note that “biscuit” means (at least) two related things in English.

[geek-kitten.livejournal.com]

Mmmm... biskvier. I love those. Must make some again soon.

Powdered/powder sugar, icing sugar, confectioner's sugar are all used for pudersocker/florsocker I believe.

[ppopovich.livejournal.com]

I've had chocolate fondue seize like that too. Since then, I've found this dirt-simple recipe. It may not impress someone raised on high-end European chocolates, but it goes over well with folks here in the States. Hopefully, I'm doing the metric conversions correctly...

500g (18-20 oz, typically 1 1/2 packages) semi-sweet chocolate chips
120g (4 oz, typically 1/2 jar) caramel ice cream topping
250ml (1/2 pint) cream
1 splash brandy (optional).

Combine and heat on low, stirring occasionally until melted and integrated. Adjust for consistency as needed: If it's too thin, add more chocolate. If it's too thick, add more cream. I typically serve this in a 1.5 qt crock pot, set very low.

Oddly, it's the caramel topping that prevents the chocolate from seizing, even if you dip acidic fruits like pineapple in it. You can leave the crock pot on for 8 hours or longer, and while it will thicken as the cream evaporates, it won't seize. If it gets too thick, add a little cream to thin up a bit.

(As one might guess, I often buy for two batches at a time: 3 bags of chocolate chips, 1 jar of caramel topping, 1 pint of cream. *grin*)