To start my new year off

I baked two recipes that I had in my new recipe baking queue. Baking for the restaurant always put new recipes on at the end of the queue.

First up, smittenkitchen's Cranberry pie with thick pecan cumble. This has been in the back of my mind since I read the post. I love anything with crumble and this combination with of the tart cranberry filling and a sweet crumble sounded great. 

Right out of the oven

first slice, dust with powdered sugar and dollop of whipped cream

The cranberry filling isn't really that tart. It really goes will with the crumble and whipped cream. smittenkitchen's pie crust is so delicious, so buttery and flakey.  I'm sharing this one with the restaurant and hope the customers like it.

Next up, RasaMalaysia's Pineapple Tarts. Found these on pinterest and was hoping I had a free moment in my baking schedule to make these up. I think what got me was the pineapple jam. 

pineapple jam  and egg wash

tarts filled, scored and washed

golden brown

first bite, YUM!

With this recipe, it is all about prep. I made the jam first, takes a while to get out the water from the pineapple. Not like your normal jam that sticky and syrupy [I guess I could make it more like that with more sugar]. It's more chunky and not too sweet. 

Then I got the egg wash ready, I made this up now before I forgot. I add some condensed milk as the note at the end of the recipe suggested. Adding condensed milk to any this is good.

The dough at first looked like it was going to be trouble. But the more you kneaded it stop sticking and it wan't too hard after that. 

These tart are so good. The jam are perfectly sweet and the dough is light and slightly sweet. I think I may try this dough with an pan. 

For my last item of the first day of the year, Ozoni. It's a soup, clear broth, I usually make a chicken soup with mizuna [japanese mustard greens] with mochi. But I didn't plan this out well and didn't have most of the ingredients plus started to get lazy. So I decided to go to the restaurant to for the soup and add the mochi to it. Here's a recipe from PBS Food/Marc Matsumoto for Ozoni if you want to make up some. Ozoni is usually eaten on New Year's Day for good luck for the coming year. But it is a great filling soup for anytime of year. Have great 2015! 

Clear broth with mixed veggies and garlic oil from the restaurant with mochi