Atlanta entertainer Danielle Rollins debuts her first book filled with 15 gracious Southern parties (many at her own home). Join her as she hosts glamourous guests and talented chefs. Brilliant photography, entertaining tips, stunning floral designs, and mouth-watering recipes will have you dreaming of ideas for your own lavish affair.
You're Invited • Meet Danielle at Table Matters in Mountain Brook Village on November 15 at 12 noon. Join her for a signing and claim your personal copy of Soiree: Entertaining with Style (Rizzoli). In the meantime, enjoy a taste of her decadent temptations here.
TABLE MATTERS • 205.879.0125 • table-matters.com • 2402 Montevallo Road • Birmingham
Chocolate Mousse with Espresso Ice Cream
2 (9.7 oz.) dark chocolate bars, preferably Scharffen Berger, Valrhona, or good –quality European-style chocolate. 1bar for melting. 1 bar, grated, for garnish.
1 ½ C heavy cream
2 lg. eggs, lightly beaten
3 lg. egg yolks
½ C sugar
Pinch of salt
Espresso Ice Cream (See recipe below)
Cacao nibs (for garnish, preferably Scharffen Berger)
8 Wineglasses
1. Place 1 dark chocolate bar (broken into pieces) in top pan of a double boiler and stir continuously over low heat until chocolate has fully melted. Remove from heat and let stand.
2. In separate bowl, beat cream with whisk until it holds stiff peaks. In another bowl, whisk eggs, and yolks together, add sugar and salt, and whisk until foamy. Add a spatula full of chocolate to egg mixture and folk in, then add all the egg mixture to the chocolate and blend until just combined. Add a spatula full of the chocolate mixture to the cream and gently fold in, barely mixing. Add the whipped cream to the chocolate and mix until just blended. (This is called the liason technique, which allows the mixture to slowly adjust to new ingredients without curdling.)
3. Divide evenly among 8 wineglasses and cover each with plastic warp. Chill at least 5 hours. For best results, chill overnight.
4. To serve, scoop a portion of espresso ice cream into each glass of mousse. Shave remaining chocolate bar with a grater over ice cream and add cacao nibs. Serve immediately.
Espresso Ice Cream
2 qts organic vanilla ice cream, softened.
6T ground espresso beans
Place softened ice cream in bowl of a stand mixer and add espresso. Mix with paddle attachment until blended. Return to freezer until ready to serve.
Vanilla Bean Champagne
8 oz. Bourbon
8 Madagascar vanilla beans
1 bottle Champagne, chilled
8 chilled Champagne flutes or tall pilsner glasses
1. In small saucepan, bring Bourbon to a simmer. Add the vanilla beans and let simmer for 10 to 15 minutes or until soft and tender.
2. Remove vanilla beans from Bourbon, shaking off excess, and allow the beans to cool.
3. To serve, split beans in half lengthwise with a knife and place in Champagne flutes; top each flute with Champagne.
Chocolate-Pecan Pie with Toasted Marshmallow Chantilly Cream Tart Dough
½ C unsalted butter, softened
½ C powdered sugar
1 lg. egg yolk
¼ t vanilla extract
1 ¼ C all-purpose flour, sifted
1 ¼- C cocoa powder
Chocolate Filling
2 C heavy cream
8 oz. Calledbaut or Valrhona 66% chocolate
1 T cold butter
½ t sea salt
Marshmallow Chantilly Cream
1 C sugar
1 C glucose, plus ¼C for whipping with egg whites
½ C egg whites
2 t vanilla extract
1 C toasted Georgia pecans (for garnish)
1. To make dough: combine butter and sugar in bowl of a stand mixer. Mix with paddle attachment on medium speed. Add egg yolk and vanilla extract. Sift flour and cocoa together and slowly add to the bowl and mix. Place dough on counter and form into a flat disk, refrigerate at least 1 hour.
2. Preheat oven to 300 F.
3. To make tart shell: on a lightly floured surface, roll tart dough to approximately 1/8-inch thickness. Use the dough to fill 8 individual 4-inch tart pans. Blind bake for 8 minutes. Let cool. Can be stored for up to 4 days.
4. To make chocolate filling: heat cream in a medium sized saucepan over medium heat until just warm. Pour into a bowl with chocolate and stir to melt.
5. Add butter and stir, then add salt. Cool slightly, then fill baked tart shells. Tart shells can be mad the day before and stored in a covered container at room temperature.
6. To make marshmallow Chantilly cream: combine sugar, ½ C water, and 1 C glucose in a stainless steel saucepan. Heat until a candy thermometer reaches 240 F. Keep warm.
7. Whip egg whites and ¼C glucose in medium size bowl until fluffy and shiny but not dry. Add vanilla to egg whites. Continue whipping, adding hot sugar and glucose mixture until light and fluffy.
8. To serve: top each tart with marshmallow Chantilly cream and garnish with pecans. Toast marshmallow cream with a kitchen torch or in the broiler.
Our family restoration project involved an 80-year-old “fixer-upper” on the Jefferson County Historical Register. Though researching a home’s history is easier in the Internet age, I visited the Birmingham Public Library Archives downtown to pull the Board of Equalization files, where I found copies of old photographs and a 1932 appraisal pinpointing a chicken coop and barn. Who knew? While gutting plaster walls to rewire and re-plumb, we found a never-mailed love letter tucked behind an attic doorframe. Old houses have stories to tell, some literally.
So, Dawn and Tobie turned their attentions to the eyesore of the living room: the coal burner. In the 1920s most homes ran off of heat from coal but it was clear that the coal burner in the Higgenbotham home had been built purely for heating purposes as it resembled a hole in the wall more than a heartwarming fireplace. Tearing down a wall to create a new fireplace would have been costly and time consuming, not to mention the destruction of a historic part of the home. Dawn and Tobie chose to keep the shape of the coal burner, which echoes the twin arches in the living room, but installed a new marble hearth and mantle to create a traditional fireside. Dawn says that although the year long renovations often left her feeling discouraged, watching the transformation of the coal burner lifted her spirits. “There were many times I just wanted to crawl into a corner, ” she says with a laugh, “but once I saw the fireplace going in I knew I was going to survive!”
High Hampton Inn Traditions
So how did this newly formed firm gain such notoriety? Apocryphal stories abound. Descendants of Charles and Margaret DeBardeleben pass on the family legend that Charles, president of Auburn predecessor Alabama Polytechnic Institute’s Alumni Association, commissioned the firm to design his own sandstone Cotswold cottage in hopes of persuading the college’s board to hire the three architects who had joined forces the year before. Met with success, Warren Knight and Davis became the primary designers of structures built at Auburn from the 1920s through the 1940s.
Involved, like DeBardeleben, in Birmingham’s early industry, Thomas Benners, Sr., and his son Thomas Jr., also asked Warren Knight and Davis to create Tudor Revival homes on the crest of Red Mountain in 1922. The younger Benners and wife Margaret’s home is styled as a traditional English cottage with characteristic steep cross gables, arched doors, and dormer windows. .png)
John Eayres Davis graduated from the first Alabama Polytechnic’s Architecture program in 1911.
1 Blueberries + Strawberries A blueberry bush underplanted with strawberries gives you vertical and trailing growth, says Jon. This combination of berries will bear fruit from spring to early summer, and will also provide a beautiful mix of bright colors perfect for the season.
