Pistachio Pralines Recipes

PISTACHIO BAVARIAN CREAM AND PRALINE

Steps:

• Heat oven to 325 degrees. Bring a medium pot of water to a boil over high heat. Add the pistachio nuts, and blanch for 30 seconds; drain. When nuts are cool enough to handle, remove skins. Spread out on a baking tray, and place in the oven until they are dry but still green in color, 15 to 20 minutes. Remove from oven, and allow to cool. Set aside 1 1/4 cups nuts. Transfer remaining nuts to a food processor, and process until coarsely ground. Place ground nuts and milk in a medium saucepan, and bring to a boil over medium heat. Remove from heat; transfer to a medium bowl; set aside in the refrigerator for 3 hours.
• To make the praline: Place a Silpat (a French nonstick baking mat) on a baking tray; set aside. Place 3/4 cup sugar and 1/4 cup water in a small saucepan set over medium heat. Cook, stirring occasionally and brushing down the sides of the pan with water as needed, until sugar is golden in color, about 10 minutes. Add reserved 1 1/4 cups nuts, and stir to combine. Pour mixture onto the prepared baking tray, and allow to cool. Break into pieces, and place in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse until the caramel is coarsely chopped; set aside.
• To make the bavarian cream: Fill a bowl with ice and water; set aside. Remove milk-nut mixture from refrigerator, and strain through cheesecloth into a medium saucepan, squeezing all milk from the nuts. Discard nuts. There should be 2 cups strained milk. Bring milk to a simmer over medium-low heat. While milk is heating, whisk egg yolks with remaining cup sugar in a medium bowl, until pale and combined. Pour hot milk slowly into egg mixture, whisking constantly. Return egg-milk mixture to the saucepan, and cook, stirring constantly until it thickens and coats the spoon, 3 to 5 minutes. Do not allow mixture to boil. Remove from heat, and stir in softened gelatin until completely dissolved. Strain mixture into a clean bowl, and set over ice bath, stirring occasionally until mixture is cold. Add kirsch, and stir to combine.
• Using an electric mixer, whip heavy cream to soft peaks. Fold whipped cream into egg-milk mixture until just combined. Use immediately.

PISTACHIO PRALINE & VANILLA CAKE

Steps:

• Heat oven to 190C/fan 170C/gas 5. Butter two 20cm sandwich tins and line with non-stick baking paper. In a large bowl, beat all the cake ingredients together until you have a smooth, soft batter.
• Blitz the pistachios in a food processor until very fine. Add the self-raising flour and caster sugar to the nuts and blitz until completely combined. Add eggs, baking powder and milk and mix together.
• Divide the mixture between the tins, smooth the surface with a spatula or the back of a spoon, then bake for about 20 mins until golden and the cake springs back when pressed. Turn onto a cooling rack and leave to cool completely.
• For the filling mix the soft cheese with the caster sugar and a few drops of vanilla essence.
• Sandwich the sponges with the filling. For the topping, stir 2 tbsp water with 100g caster sugar in a microwaveable bowl and microwave on High for 3-4 mins until bubbling and starting to caramelise. Stir in a handful of roughly chopped pistachios then quickly spoon onto the cake. Keep in an airtight container and eat within 2 days.

PISTACHIO PRALINE BARS

Steps:

• Lightly coat a 13-by-9-inch rimmed baking sheet with oil. Line with parchment, allowing 2 inches to hang over the long sides. Bring sugar and water to a boil in a small saucepan over medium-high heat, tilting pan to swirl and washing down sides with a wet pastry brush to prevent crystals from forming. Boil, without stirring, until mixture turns medium amber, 10 to 12 minutes.
• Remove from heat, and stir in pistachios and salt. Pour mixture onto prepared baking sheet, and quickly spread evenly with an offset spatula. Let cool until just set but still soft, about 2 minutes. Using the parchment as handles, transfer warm praline to a cutting board. Immediately cut praline into bars of desired size using a serrated knife lightly coated with oil. Let cool completely.

PISTACHIO PRALINE DACQUOISE

Steps:

• Line 2 buttered baking sheets with foil or parchment paper and trace a total of three 13- by 4-inch rectangles on the sheets of foil (2 on one sheet and 1 on the other).
• Make the meringue layers:
• In a food processor grind fine the pistachio nuts with 1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons of the sugar and the cornstarch. In a large bowl with an 2electric mixer beat the egg whites with the cream of tartar and the salt until they hold soft peaks, beat in the remaining 1/2 cup sugar, a little at a time, and the food coloring, and beat the whites until they hold stiff glossy peaks. Fold in the pistachio mixture gently but thoroughly and transfer the meringue to a pastry bag fitted with a 1/2-inch plain tip. Starting along an edge of a rectangle, pipe the meringue onto the prepared foil, filling in 2 of the rectangles. Outline the edges of the remaining rectangle with 2 rows of the meringue, leaving the center free, and bake the meringues in a preheated 250°F. oven, switching the sheets from one rack to the other after 30 minutes, for 1 to 1 1/4 hours, or until the meringues are firm and dry when touched. Let the meringues cool on the sheets, slide the foil off the sheets, and peel the meringues off the foil carefully. The meringues may be made 1 day in advance and kept wrapped in plastic wrap at room temperature.
• Make the filling:
• In a small skillet, preferably non-stick, cook 1/4 cup of the sugar, undisturbed, over moderate heat until it begins to melt, cook it, stirring with a fork, until it is melted completely and turns a golden caramel, and add the pistachio nuts, stirring until they are coated well. Pour the mixture immediately onto a piece of foil and let it cool completely. Break the praline into pieces and grind it fine in a food processor. In a heavy saucepan dissolve the cornstarch in 1/4 cup of the milk, stir in the remaining 3/4 cup milk and the remaining 1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar, and bring the mixture just to a boil, stirring. In a heatproof bowl whisk together the whole egg and the egg yolk, add the milk mixture in a stream, whisking, and transfer the pastry cream to the pan. Bring the pastry cream to a boil, whisking, and simmer it, whisking, for 2 minutes. Remove the pan from the heat, whisk in the butter and the kirsch, whisking until the butter is incorporated, and force the pastry cream through a fine sieve into a metal bowl. Stir in the praline and let the pastry cream cool completely, its surface covered with plastic wrap. The filling may be prepared up to this point 1 day in advance and kept covered and chilled. In a small saucepan sprinkle the gelatin over the water, let it soften for 1 minute, and heat the mixture over moderately low heat, stirring, until the gelatin is dissolved and the liquid is hot. Whisk the gelatin mixture into the pastry cream, set the bowl in a larger bowl of ice and cold water, and stir the pastry cream until it is thickened but not set. Remove the bowl from the ice water. In a chilled bowl with an electric mixer beat the heavy cream until it just holds stiff peaks, whisk one third of it into the pastry cream to lighten it, and fold in the remaining cream gently but thoroughly. Transfer the filling to a pastry bag fitted with a medium star tip.
• Arrange a solid meringue rectangle, rough side up, on a platter and pipe some of the filling decoratively in rows down the length of it to cover it. Top the filling with the remaining solid meringue rectangle, rough side up, and pipe some of the remaining filling on the meringue in the same manner. Dust the remaining meringue, rough side up, with the confectioners' sugar and set it on top of the filling. Pipe rosettes of the remaining filling on the meringue, garnish them with the pistachios, and chill the dacquoise for at least 2 hours and up to 4 hours.

PISTACHIO PRALINES

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 350°F. Oil 2 large baking sheets and line with parchment paper.
• In a baking pan spread pistachios evenly and toast in middle of oven until fragrant, about 10 minutes. In a bowl toss hot pistachios with butter and granulated sugar and cool completely.
• In a 4-quart heavy saucepan cook brown sugars, cream, and salt over moderately low heat, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon and washing down any sugar crystals clinging to side of pan with a brush dipped in cold water, until sugars are completely dissolved, about 10 minutes. Increase heat to moderate and boil mixture, without stirring, until a candy or digital thermometer registers 238°F. Remove pan from heat (leave thermometer in pan) and cool mixture until thermometer registers 220°F, about 5 to 10 minutes. With a wooden spoon stir in vanilla and vigorously stir mixture until creamy and beginning to lose its sheen. Working quickly, drop mixture by teaspoons onto baking sheets and top each praline with 3 pistachios. (If mixture becomes too stiff to spoon, warm it over low heat, stirring, until just workable.) Let pralines stand at room temperature until firm, about 1 hour. Pralines keep, layered between sheets of parchment paper in an airtight container at cool room temperature or chilled, 1 week.