Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Christmas Dessert: Buche de Noel

For the very first time in the history of our marriage, Sean and I decided to spend Christmas Day in our own home. In previous years, we've always spent Christmas Day with either my family in Chicago or his family in Montana. After running around like ragged last Christmas Day with two kids in tow, we decided that 2011 was the year to focus on our immediate family unit and put off the traveling until the 26th. It was a wonderful decision. The morning was blissfully slow (and full of yummy French toast), the kids were in pajamas until 3 pm, and I got to plan and prepare a five course Christmas dinner, which made me so happy! We even had a cheese course.

The entire meal was delicious, but the pinnacle of the evening was dessert.  When we invited a few friends to join us, I decided that I wanted a really impressive capstone to the evening. I came across a recipe on allrecipes.com for Buche de Noel. It's essentially a flourless chocolate cake baked in a jelly roll pan then rolled around chocolate flavored whipped cream and decorated to look like a log. It was exactly what I was going for: creamy, chocolatey, and visually impressive. I didn't make too many changes to the recipe as written, so I'll just include the link here. Make sure you read the reviews as there are some good tips. You probably won't have much need for this recipe until next December, but definitely file it away in your Christmas memory - it was delicious! I decorated the log with little mushrooms made out of bell-shaped Reese's peanut butter cups stuck onto miniature marshmallows and decorated with little white icing spots. It was very Smurfy and very festive and as pretty to look at as it was tasty to eat.



Happy belated holidays, all!

2 comments:

  1. Iain had to make this for his French Culture Credit. We were a little wary of the flourless cake and ended up combining two recipes. He also wanted us to make meringue mushrooms that did not come out at all. Next year he'll have to make your mushrooms, they look a billion times easier. Anyhow we used this frosting (also has the link for the mushrooms we couldn't make) http://www.joyofbaking.com/YuleLog.html

    and this is the cake we did:
    http://www.easy-french-food.com/yule-log-cake-recipe.html

    ReplyDelete
  2. Gorgeous!! You are so creative, love the reeses mushrooms, so cute! We enjoyed our first Christmas home together too and it was wonderful. Sometimes we just have to be selfish and focus on our own family units, it is rewarding. Hugs to you all.

    ReplyDelete