Hampton Style - October 10, 2008 - The Comfort Cupboard

Treat your sweet tooth this season by stocking
the pantry with these delectable and cozy accompaniments.

An Italian triple-cream, curd-style fresh cream, with a similar consistency to double or thickened cream. Serve a spoonful with fresh figs drizzled with honey or red-wine-poached pears.

It is in the seeds that much of the deep vanilla flavor of the bean is located. Split a whole vanilla been and scrape down the length of the inside to remove these tiny black specks. Add both the seeds and the bean in recipes that ask for a split and scraped vanilla bean.

With its sweet aroma and warm intense flavor, cinnamon is a baking star. Powdered or ground cinnamon tends to stale quickly. Cinnamon sticks, on the other hand, retain their flavor for a longer time, and the quills are easy to grind in a spice grinder. Whole cinnamon sticks should be removed from a dish and discarded after cooking.

Stir 8 oz. mascarpone with 1/4 cup cream (2fl. oz.) and 1 tsp vanilla extract. Add sieved confectioner's sugar to taste. Use this mixture to fill tart shells, serve with sliced fresh fruits, or use instead of thick cream with desserts.

2 vanilla beans
1 cup superfine sugar
Finely chop vanilla beans and place in a food processor with sugar. Process until vanilla is very finely chopped through the sugar. You may like to press the sugar through a sieve to remove any large pieces of bean that remain. Store vanilla sugar in an airtight container and use in baking or wherever a mellow sweet vanilla taste is required. Makes 1 cup.

Cinnamon sugar Grind cinnamon sticks in a spice grinder to make a powder, then stir though sugar. Sprinkle over French toast or pancakes, or use to flavor custards or ice cream.

The golden rule when melting chocolate is not to cook it. There are a few ways to melt chocolate. The best is to melt it over hot water. This is done by placing chocolate in a heat-resistant bowl over a saucepan of simmering water. Make sure the base of the bowl is not touching the water, as this can cause chocolate to burn. Be sure also that no steam or water comes into contact with the chocolate, as this causes it to seize into a hard lump which cannot be remelted. Allow the chocolate to melt slowly while stirring it constantly. Chocolate can be melted over direct heat when it has been combined with other ingredients such as butter or cream. The heat should be low and the mixture stirred constantly during the melting process.