it's perfect as is

Ingredients 

2 sticks butter (1/2cup) 

1 1/4 cup sugar 

1/2 cup rum or whiskey or water 

2 Tbs corn syrup, maple syrup, jochung, or other invert sugar

Some big handfuls of chopped up nuts 2 tsp vanilla

4oz chopped dark chocolate (like 80-90% or a mix of 70 and 90)

Flaky salt

Directions

line a quarter sheet with parchment or silpat w/ buttered sides

prep the vanilla and half the nuts and get ready to dump them into the candy later. It'll happen pretty quickly so you'll need to be ready.

in a pot, dump sugar, alcohol, butter, and syrup and bring to boil in med-high heat, and stir constantlyyyyy

this is going to bubble a LOT. It'll maybe double in size beige settling down. The stainless will barely fit, but maybe the small Dutch would be safer

cook till 290° and then turn heat to low and get up to 300°, stirring the whole time.

dump in prepped nuts and vanilla, stir, and pour into pan.

temper the chocolate! https://www.seriouseats.com/the-food-lab-best-way-to-temper-chocolate#:~:text=You%20can%20do%20this%20either,each%20batch%20until%20fully%20melted.

if you're lazy, don't bother tempering, just chop the chocolate and sprinkle it on top of the candy while it's still warm. The heat will melt the chocolate.

Ingredients

For the cookie

120g flour 

80g rice flour 

a pinch of salt 

a crack of pepper 

3Tbs sesame oil 

3-4 Tbs honey 

~2.5 Tbs soju, chungju, or sake

For the syrup

1 cups water 

1/4c honey 

1.5 cup 조청 

1 cinnamon stick 

Directions

mix honey and soju in a small glass with ginger if using

in a bigger bowl, mix the flour, rice flour, salt, black pepper, and cinnamon

makes 16

Ingredients 

600g milk

60g butter

1.5 Tbs good vanilla paste

300g powdered sugar (granulated also fine)

120g flour

120g eggs

48g eggs yolks

40g rum or dark alcohol

Variations

Black sesame 

 3TBS black sesame tahini

Directions

set the milk and butter to simmer. Right before it hits the simmer point, add the vanilla

meanwhile, whisk the eggs and sugar till pale and fluffy, but you don't need to be too precious

Ingredients 

1/2 c or 112g unsalted butter, melted and browned

1 whole egg 1 egg yolk 

2 teaspoons vanilla extract 

100g White sugar 

180g brown sugar

200g all purpose flour 

1/2 tsp or 4g baking soda 

1/2 tsp kosher salt

7 ounces dark chocolate bar cut into shards

Method

in a bowl whisk egg, egg yolk, brown and white sugar, and vanilla. No need to cream, not really look for lightness.

brown the butter and pour into the egg mixture

Add all the dry ingredients and whisk till just comes together

add in chocolate pieces 

form the dough into 2-3" balls

dough goes in covered into the fridge for at least 1 hour, preferably overnight

preheat oven to 350°F

makes enough for around 24 2" choux

Ingredients

1 stick (8tbsp or 113g) unsalted butter

1 cup / 8floz / 240 g water

145 g flour (all purpose king Aurther works best or bread flour)

228 g eggs with shells about 4 eggs

A bit of salt

Directions 

Measure everything out in advance as things may need to move quickly. Have ready a spatula and a regular ol spoon

Put the salt, water and butter in a small pot and use medium heat till butter has melted and water is just starting to boil.

Remove from heat and dump in all the flour at once. Immediately and vigorously begin stirring with the spatula until everything comes together.

Put back on heat and mix with spatula some more for 1-3 minutes or until you can stick a spoon in the center of the dough ball and it stays put without falling. Some people say you can see an oily film on the bottom of the pot but idk? Overcooking here is ok.

Remove from heat and place dough in a mixing bowl. Let it cool until just warm to the touch.

Meanwhile crack and lightly beat the eggs in a separate bowl.

Once the dough is cooled down, add 1/4 of the egg to the dough as mix with a whisk. Slowly add more until the dough is just the right consistency. It should have a nice glossy sheen. If you stir it a bit with your spatula and pull then pull it out vertically, the dough makes a little “v” shape with one nice defined point an inch is so away from the end of the spatula.

Put this in a piping bag

Makes 8 cookies

Ingredients

112g cold egg whites

42g granulated sugar

88g total nut flour ( see note )

88g powdered sugar + a bit more

15g cake flour

Directions

preheat the oven to 190°C from the bottom for 20 minutes just to warm it up. Then crank down to 170°C with convection (180° without)

sift together the flours and powdered sugar and set aside (yes you actually have to sift it)

whip the cold egg whites on medium. It's important that they're cold and you whip relatively low in order to get a really nice dense meringue. We're not using much sugar so we need the eggs themselves to be dense.

add half the granulated when eggs look like cappuccino foam, and the rest at soft peaks. Whip till you get nice stiff peaks

then fold the flour mixture into the eggs. You want the flour to be completely incorporated. It should be smooth, not lumpy. But it shouldn't be runny. When you run a finger through it, it should hold its shape. See trouble shooting

put batter in a piping bag and fill the molds. This is a whole thing that is hard to explain with words but is really quite simple. Look up a video if you forgot? Long story short, pipe a mound of batter into 3/4 of the mold, then use a bench scraper to spread the batter into the rest of the mold. Remove the mold

sprinkle more powdered sugar on top. Wait a minute for the sugar to melt into the batter, and then sprinkle another layer. Wait for this to dissolve fully as well or you'll see unmelted sugar at the top when you're done baking

bake for 13 minutes

Then pair it with a buttercream flavor of your choosing eh?

Makes 1 pie / 12"galette

Ingredients

4 Tbs cubed butter

4 Tbs thinly sliced butter

200g AP flour

13g sugar

pinch of salt

ice water

Directions

make sure all the butter is FUCKING COLD. Prepare it and then put it in the fridge along with a cup of ice water

mix up the flour sugar and salt in a big bowl

work the cubes into the flour, squishing them up. Most pieces should be pretty small, biggest ones are the size of pinky nail

work the slices in the same way

drizzle 75g or 5T or a little more than 1/4c of water in the mix, and then kind of claw it together until it sort of domes together. Take out the peices that clump and drizzle itty bitty amount of water to the bowl, removing clumps, till everything is just barely hydrated. Maybe there's even some dry spots. Better to underdo than overdo here...

press the peices together and put it on 2 peices of crisscrossed plastic wrap. Do that thing Claire does to get it to be a nice packet of dough in the wrap. Do you remember?? Lol. You want a 3/4 thick square of dough

fridge it for 2 hrs

take it out and roll is to be 3:1 aspect ratio. Then fold it into thirds so you have a square again. Wrap it and fridge it. Like a croissant!

Makes enough to fill a 9x13

Ingredients 

5 egg yolks

4 Tbs Sugar

a pinch of salt

6 Tbs Corn Starch

5 egg whites

Directions 

preheat the oven to 350°F and line a 9x13 with parchment paper. Don't grease! Ungreased pan help the rise of the cake! DONT BE STUPID AND FORGET TO DO THIS OKAY???

Whisk the yolks, sugar and salt till pale and fluffy

Whisk in the corn starch

in a separate bowl, whip the eggs to STIFF peaks.

Gently fold. Like literally please so gentle. If you see some small clumps of egg white, just leave it. Underfded is better than overfolded.

IMMEDIATELY pour it GENTLY into the prepared pan, smooth it out, and IMMEDIATLY throw that shit in the prepared oven. If you wait too long here, the whites will settle and you'll get a gross rubbery crust on your sponge

bake for 10-15 minutes or just until the toothpick comes out clean.

Makes 24ish cookies 

Ingredients

For Plain Cookies

175g room temp butter

90g confectioner sugar

1 tsp vanilla

2 room temp egg yolks

255g sifted AP or cake flour

A pinch of salt

For Matcha or Hojicha

Add 10g matcha or hojicha powder

For Nuts (my favorite!)

Replace 255g of flour with: 55g nut flour or finely ground nuts 200g AP flour. (Almond, hazelnut, and walnut have all been tasty in the past)

Add like two handfuls of nuts chopped into fine (3/16" or 1/2cm) pieces. The nut pieces are largely for visual appeal, so add as much as you think looks nice (or omit altogether)

For Cereal Cornflakes

Makes enough for 4 daifuku wrappers

Ingredients 

1/3 cup shiratamako

1/3 cup water

1Tbs sugar

1:4 ratio powdered sugar and corn starch

Directions

Dust the bottom of a baking sheet with a LOT of cornstarch mix . The baking sheet shouldn’t show through the layer of starch

Mix up the shiratamako, sugar, and water

Loosely cover w/ plastic and pop in microwave. Heat for 1 minute, take it out and stir. Repeat 2 more times. At the end you should have a sticky glob that is sort of glossy and looks almost translucent. It'll look yellowish and plastic-y if you overdo it Still need research in consequences of under or over cooking

Dump it out onto the baking sheet, and sprinkle more cornstarch on top. Let it cool just until you can touch it.

Makes 12 cookies

Ingredients

110 g granulated sugar 

110 g light brown sugar 

1 large egg + 1 yolk @ room temperature 

7 ml pure vanilla extract

176 g all purpose flour 

16 g cornstarch 

½ teaspoon (2 g) 

baking soda 114 g 

(1 stick) room temp butter

white chocolate chips ( if not using add a bit extra sugar) flaky sea salt - for sprinkling (optional)

Variations

Matcha

2 tablespoon (30 g) matcha powder

Hojicha

20g hojicha powder + 20g sugar

Ingredients

5 cups (or 1/2 box of corn flakes) 

1/4 cup milk powder 

1/4 cup malt powder 

3 Tbs sugar 

1 tsp salt 

8 Tbs melted butter

Method

preheat oven to 275°

crush the cereal to 1/2 it's original size

add milk powder, malt, sugar and salt

mix in the butter

spread in even layer on a 1/2 baking sheet and bake for 20 minutes

Ingredients

1 c heavy cream 

1/3 c powdered sugar (or to taste)

1 tsp vanilla

VARIATIONS 

Baileys 

2Tbs of Baileys liquor

Directions

put everything in a bowl

whip it.

Nothing here yet... just doing some research 

Makes about 2 cups

Ingredients 

456g whole milk

1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla paste

1/2 teaspoon Diamond Crystal kosher salt 

80g sugar 

30g cornstarch 

5 large egg yolks 

85g unsalted butter cut into 1/2-inch pieces, chilled

Variation 

Black Sesame 

I have this but i think it's in the book! go check

Soba-cha

simmer 3-4Tbs of soba-cha in the milk 

Also add in dash of sesame oil

Directions

bring the vanilla and milk to a simmer

Makes like 2 quart containers of loosely packed marshmallows

Ingredients

5 teaspoons (a little less than 2packets) powdered unflavored gelatin bloomed in 1/2c water in a shallow but wide dish

4/3 cup sugar 

2/3 invert syrup 

1tsp vanilla

2 egg whites 

salt

a bunch of powdered sugar and corn starch

two big handfuls of mix-ins 

chopped walnuts

chopped pistachios

chopped almonds are too hard! texture is weird, but maybe slivers would work

Variations

jochung (or left over syrup from making yakgwa) 

apple syrup (https://www.bakerita.com/homemade-apple-syrup-recipe/) or leftover from making Tarte Tartine

Makes about 1 cup

Ingredients (and Variations)

For Dark Chocolate Cream

100g heavy cream

120g bittersweet chocolate chips

For White Chocolate Cream

65g heavy cream

150g white chocolate chip

For Hojicha or Matcha Cream

12g hojicha or matcha powder

150g white chocolate

75g heavy cream

a bit of salt

a dash of vanilla

For White Chocolate Sesame Cream (WIP)

65g Heavy cream

150g White chocolate

A bit of vanilla