Key Lime Tart, Kalamata Olive Bread

Key Lime Tart with Wild Maine Blueberry Sauce

Your Basic Key Lime Tart with lots of lime zest to enhance the flavor. My goal eventually with these is to make them with a lime curd (actually made with key limes), and not use sweetened condensed milk at all. Also, to top it with a meringue instead of whipped cream. Here, the guests expect the more traditional method.




Kalamata Olive Bread

Made with a natural starter and no commercial yeast baked directly on the hearth of the oven. The bread pairs excellent quality kalamata olives along with fresh rosemary to create a crusty, chewy, salty goodness.

Caramelized Plum Torte:
The idea here is taken from a classic Bavarian summertime dessert Pflaumenkuchen or German Plum Cake. Instead of baking it as a cake we bake the biscuit (made with cottage cheese) by itself. Then at service we caramelize plums to order. The plums are topped with a French Sabayon (made with a crisp Chardonnay) lightened with some cream and torched for texture and look.





Next we come to Chocolate Blackout Cake as made famous by Ebingger's Bakery in Brooklyn, NY that closed a long time ago. Karen Barker of Magnolia Grill in Durham, NC wrote about it in her baking book and recreated a stellar version which I have borrowed but changed the pudding filling. For effect, we stood up the slice on the plate. While I am not a fan of this type of plating, it a good way to plate a slice of cake and make it look fancy! The cake is nothing like anything I have worked with before. It is so moist and impossible to cut to make layers. It is challenging to work with but the end result is a Chocolate Blackout (cake) :)

Watermelon Granita, Chocolate Mousse Napoleon, Blueberry Pie

Tuesday desserts at the Q: First up we have a watermelon Granita. What fruit symbolizes summer in the states better than watermelon? Watermelon fruit salads, watermelon wedges at a barbecue, juices dripping down your arms and face, but watermelon for dessert? Yes, it can be done. When I was living in Florida people went crazy for Watermelon grilled salads- “Ooh, watermelon with grill marks!” Since we are blessed here at Quisisana with an ice cream machine there is a certain amount of pressure to do a number of homemade sorbets and ice creams but for this dessert I wanted something even lighter and fresher and something that can be served as a lunch dessert. 2 years ago we did Mango Sorbet which is a bit overdone but the guests loved it. 3 years ago we made a lemon sherbet and no one knew what it was. So this year it is time to introduce people to a fun frozen dessert called Granita! Well, you might be asking yourself, what exactly is Granita? Glad you asked- Granita is basically fruit pureed with a simple syrup and mixed by hand periodically until a granular ice mixture forms (think shaved ice with a lot more flavor).

So in this case we seeded and pureed fresh watermelon and mixed it with a mint infused simple syrup and some top shelf vodka and served it in a crunchy tuile cookie basket. The mint garnish is appropriate in this case because the dessert is actually infused with mint.





Chocolate Mousse Napoleon

Lighter egg white versions of mousse for the summer served with puff pastry cookies and marinated orange segments are served for dinner dessert. High quality des Alpes dark, milk and white chocolate are featured separately in a simple but elegant mousse dessert to showcase the quality and nuances of the chocolate. The oranges are lightly marinated in a fresh orange juice and Grand Marnier reduction.





Blueberry Pie

Saturday tradition at Quisisana is to have Blueberry Pie for dinner dessert. After living in the south for many years, I think I have a good grasp on what pie should be. Pie should not be complicated and should always look and taste like pie. I do not believe in going all pastry chef and turning it into an individual pie. Pie is supposed to be something that anyone can make, just mix all the ingredients in a bowl and dump it into the pie shell. If you don’t have time to mix together fat, flour and water than just buy a pre-made pie shell. It’s that easy and everyone can do it and everyone loves it… Okay, already. I get it… Pie should be pie. But why can’t pie be the most outrageous pie you’ve ever had? One where technique and ingredients are the focus rather than opening up a can of pie filling and dumping it into a pre-made pie crust.

Well, if this is the kind of pie you have been waiting for your whole life than your wish has been granted!

From scratch pie dough, double crusted, butter only- no shortening, no margarine, no lard. The butter is frozen and grated so that it can be distributed evenly in the dough and definitely not over-mixed. This gives the dough that beautiful flakiness with a intoxicating smooth aftertaste that you simply cannot get from warm shortening doughs. Now onto the filling:

Fresh, yes, fresh blueberries are mixed with fresh squeezed orange juice, orange zest, a little sugar, and some flour and baked off at hot temperatures to ensure a cooked filling and a perfect crust. Notice that the filling did not contain frozen blueberries, cornstarch, cornstarch slurries, or pie fillings… That is done on purpose to create a unique blueberry pie for the peeps of Blueberry eating Maine. Topped with Maine Vanilla Ice Cream.