STOPPAGE THYME

Hi! I'm Laura and I'm eating my way through the 2018 FIFA World Cup. I'll document my culinary adventures as I try to represent as many participating countries as possible.

[lickingthespatula]

Australia: Tim Tams

I’m coming to you live from an airport gate chair, stuffy-nosed and reminiscing about my pride and joy: homemade Tim Tams. Remember how I said I’d pick one country from each of the eight groups PLUS one random “wild card” team? I made that rule so I could bake for Australia without actually picking them as my Group C team. I knew I wanted to try cloning Tim Tams... and I’m so glad I did.

The Dish Tim Tams are known as “THE cookie of Australia” or Australia’s favorite chocolate biscuit. If you’ve never had this famous Australia cookie: they’re two thin chocolate malt biscuits sandwiched with a creamy chocolate filling in between them, then dipped in more chocolate. They come packaged, like Oreo or Chips Ahoy cookies to us Americans, and are just absolutely divine. I first tried them in college when my roommate’s Australian friend mailed her a care package. My life hasn’t been the same since.

My roommate and I eventually found them at World Market as Arnott’s (the name of the company who makes them), and we’d go there to get our fix. HOWEVER, about two years ago, Target began carrying them here in the states, and my addiction is unstoppable. They also have caramel, dark chocolate and mint chocolate versions -- but I can’t ever stray from the classic when I’m at the store.

I used Ghirardelli milk chocolate for this recipe and refrigerated them overnight after the dipping to make sure they set. It’s too darn hot in Texas right not to trust that it’ll be cool enough for them to solidify on their own. When I ate one first thing in the morning, it had a nice crunch to it and came pretty stinking close to the classic chocolate biscuit. They got soft and almost cake-like on the inside as they sat out at room temperature, though, but were delicious nonetheless! I can’t wait to add this cookie to my holiday rotation.

Squad Preview

The Socceroos are back! Australia makes its fifth-ever appearance in the World Cup and still has their hero, Tim Cahill, on their roster this year. He’s now 38 years old, playing in a limited capacity for Millwall, and is Australia’s all-time leading goalscorer with 50 goals. He’ll still play a role in this year’s tournament, but the ‘roos will also have Aaron Mooy -- who’s new to the World Cup. Mooy is 27 years old and playing for Huddersfield Town in the Premier League. Australia’s in the same group as France, Peru and Denmark... if they can squeeze a draw out of France and beat one of their other two opponents, they could very well be through to the Round of 16 for just the second time ever. I hope the country celebrates with tons of Tim Tams if that happens. By the way--- why don’t they call Tim Cahill “Tim Tam Cahill?” Let’s get on this ASAP.

Tim Tams (adapted from The Sugar Hit cookbook) Serves: 14 | Time: 2 Hours

Ingredients:

Chooclate Biscuit 

1 stick unsalted butter, softened

1/2 cup pure cane sugar (you can use granulated)

1 whole large egg

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/3 cup unsweetened Dutch Process cocoa powder

1 1/3 cup unbleached all-purpose flour

pinch of salt

Filling

1 stick unsalted butter, softened

1 cup powdered sugar

1 tbsp unsweetened Dutch Process cocoa powder

1 tbsp malted drink powder (such as Ovaltine)

A few splashes of milk or heavy cream (as needed)

Coating

12 oz Ghirardelli milk chocolate 

1 tbsp oil or shortening (optional)

For the chocolate biscuit: Beat the butter and sugar in the bowl of a large stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment (or with a hand mixer) and cream them together until pale and fluffy. Scrape down the bowl as needed. Add the egg and vanilla extract and continue beating until everything is incorporated. Add the cocoa powder and mix until there aren’t any remaining lumps. Turn off your mixer, and with a rubber spatula, fold in the flour and salt until everything is thoroughly mixed together. The dough will be very soft.

Scrape the dough out onto a piece of parchment paper and add a second sheet of paper on top. Roll out the dough between the two sheets until it is a sharp rectangle about 1/4 inch thick. Do your best to keep the dough in a rectangle and not an oval -- shape it with your hands as you go.

Place the dough (still between the parchment sheets) onto a baking sheet and refrigerate it for 1-2 hours until firm. 

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and line two baking sheets with silicone mats or parchment paper.

If you have any rounded edges on your chilled dough, cut them off with a pizza cutter to get sharp edges and corners. This will help you get consistent rectangles. 

Cut the dough into 28 small rectangles, about 1.25″ x 2.5″ each. Place them about 1.5 to 2 inches apart on your baking sheets and bake for 10 minutes. Remove them from the oven, place on a cooling rack, and let them cool completely at room temperature.

For the filling: Cream your butter until soft, then sift in all of the dry ingredients and beat. Add in splashes of milk as needed until you get a creamy, but still thick and spreadable consistency. Mine started to resemble my milk chocolate frosting - I alternated between powdered sugar and milk until I got a filling that was thick and fluffy, but still easy to spread.

Spread a heaping teaspoon of filling onto the bottoms of half of the biscuits, then sandwich them with the remaining half of your cookie quantity. You should’ve made 28 (or any even number close to this) chocolate biscuits, so you’ll have a perfectly even number of sandwiches when you’re done with the assembling.

For the chocolate coating: Melt your chocolate in a saucepan on low heat, gently stirring, until it’s fully melted and smooth. Add a small amount of oil or shortening if you’d like. If you use a good quality chocolate (no chocolate chips!) it should melt smoothly and you *shouldn’t* need to add anything else.

Dip each chocolate biscuit sandwich into the melted chocolate and fully coat it with the chocolate. Remove it with a fork or dipping utensils and place it back on your lined baking sheet. Immediately score the top of the cookies with the back of a fork (similar to the way you press a fork into the tops of peanut butter cookies, but don’t do a criss-cross pattern) and repeat with the rest of your sandwiches. 

Chill your dipped cookie sandwiches in the refrigerator until the milk chocolate coating is firm. Devour, cry, and devour again. Go Socceroos!

[lickingthespatula]

Argentina: Alfajores

If I started this project off with Germany, it only made sense to follow with Argentina: the runners-up of the 2014 FIFA World Cup. And the 2016 Copa America. And the 2017 Copa America Centenario. Don’t get me started.

The Dish

Alfajores are popular throughout South America, and some trace its roots back to Spain. The traditional alfajor is thick and buttery with a dulce de leche filling sandwiched between two of them. I saw photos of alfajores coated in shredded coconut and some dusted with powdered sugar. The consistency of the dough is crumbly, but like Play-Doh or Kinetic Sand – squeeze it between your fingers, and it’ll easily stick together. As I used my circle cookie cutter on the dough, admiring how pretty the circles looked, I figured they’d lose their precise shape in the oven – but thanks to the insane amount of cornstarch in the recipe, they stayed perfectly intact!

One word of advice when making these cookies – make sure they are COMPLETELY cooled before you fill them. I used Nestle’s “La Lechera” dulce de leche, and it was a bit runny. Dulce de leche was dripping out of the sides of the cookies, and some of the top cookies in the sandwich slid off their base overnight. Don’t try to pipe the dulce de leche onto the cookies to feel cooler. I tried this, ended up piping WAY too much dulce de leche onto some cookies, and had a huge mess on my hands when I sandwiched them. I also used Nutella as a filling on some cookies in case my crowd preferred that more. The same rules apply to Nutella – don’t overdo it!

The recipe(s) I used for this cookie called for a teaspoon of lemon zest and it was so powerful. These tasted too much like a lemon cookie – something I wasn’t prepared for. If I ever make these again, I’m going to omit the lemon zest completely. I don’t see a need for it – especially if you’re using Nutella. Chocolate hazlenut and lemon? Odd.

I hope you enjoy these! Remember to let each of your ingredients fully incorporate as you mix the dough together – especially the egg yolks. And don’t be afraid to roll the edges in some shredded coconut!

Squad Preview

La Selección de fútbol de Argentina. A very sensitive subject for me and one I’m constantly chastised about. Lionel Messi is a freaking miracle, and I’m convinced that Kacey Musgroves penned her song “Golden Hour” about him. He has carried this team to so many finals only to be disappointed by his squad of bottlers, but he’s the one who comes away with all of the backlash… all of the comparison to Diego Maradona, who won a World Cup with Argentina, and to Cristiano Ronaldo, who won the 2016 Euros with Portugal. Those guys HAVE major tournament titles; Messi does not. A World Cup title is all he needs.

After Argentina’s second-straight Copa America final loss, in penalty kicks (both times!!), to Chile (both times!!), an emotional Messi impulsively announced his retirement from the national team. He’d had enough. The Argentinian FA is messed up, to say the least. You can claim you’d stay strong and stick through your third-straight loss in the final of a major tournament, with as complicated of a relationship with the fans as Messi has with Argentina, but you wouldn’t after that. You’d wonder why you still try, too. Come on.

When he finally came back, he carried the team through World Cup qualifiers. He had to score a hat-trick in the final match just to sneak Argentina in with a last-minute qualification. So now they return to the FIFA World Cup to try again. This is his last chance; he’ll be too old to do this again in 2022. And even if he wasn’t, I wouldn’t blame him if he didn’t want to give the national team the time of day any longer after this. Argentina coach Jorge Sampaoli has said Messi has a “revolver held to his head called the World Cup.” I need a Prozac just thinking about it.

Other “notables,” I guess, on the team include forwards Sergio Aguero and Gonzalo Higuain. Juventus forward Paulo Dybala, who scored 22 goals for Juve in 2017-18, makes his first World Cup appearance for Argentina. He has 12 career caps with the national team so far, but has yet to score a goal. Goalkeeper Sergio Romero went down with an injury after the preliminary World Cup roster was announced and was officially ruled out this week. This is off to a great start.

Alfajores are Messi’s favorite cookie, and that’s why I was very adamant about learning to make them. That’s partially what sparked this whole project. Have you ever loved an athlete that much?

Here’s the recipe!

Alfajores Argentinos

Makes: 12 sandwiches | Time: 1 hour, 30 minutes

Ingredients:

2 ½ cups cornstarch

1 1/3 cups all-purpose flour

14 ½ tablespoons unsalted butter, softened to room temperature

¾ cup pure cane sugar

3 egg yolks, room temperature

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp vanilla rum

2 tsp pure vanilla extract

½ tsp baking soda

Dulce de leche or Nutella

Shredded coconut (optional)

Sift the cornstarch, flour, baking soda and baking powder together in a medium bowl. Set aside.

In a bowl with a handheld or stand mixer, beat your softened butter and sugar together for 5 minutes.

With the mixer running, add the egg yolks into the butter and sugar mixture, one by one, letting each yolk incorporate well before adding the next.

With the mixer running, add the rum and vanilla extract. Mix well.

With the mixer running, slowly add in your dry ingredients. I poured in about ½ a cup at a time. Mix until a soft, crumbly dough forms.

Gently roll your dough between two sheets of parchment paper (flouring a surface and rolling pin makes the cookies taste too much like flour) until it is about ½ a centimeter thick all around.

Chill your dough in the refrigerator for 30 minutes.

Preheat your oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit.

When your dough has chilled, remove it from the refrigerator. Take a 2.5” round cookie cutter and cut out circles. Place your dough circles an ungreased (or lined with a silicone mat or parchment paper) cookie sheet with about 2 inches of space between them.

Bake your cookies for 10 minutes – don’t let them get golden brown.

Let them cool completely (!!) on a wire rack.

Spread a good amount of dulce de leche on the bottom of one cookie, and sandwich it with another cookie. The bottoms of each cookie should be facing the filling.

If desired, roll the edges in shredded coconut so the dulce de leche filling is covered with coconut. Enjoy!

[lickingthespatula]

Germany: Apfel Kuchen

I had to start with Die Mannschaft. They’re our defending world champs and lead the world with four titles overall. It was only right to feature them first. 

The Dish

Choosing a German dessert to make was more difficult than I thought it’d be. Almost everything included some sort of spice that screamed fall and winter. I lost track of how many recipes said “great for your holiday party!” or “the perfect Christmas morning treat.” Yikes. Not exactly what my taste buds have in mind when our outdoor temperatures flirt with the triple digits. I ended up choosing Apfel Kuchen, or Apple Cake. There are so many variations of this sweet treat! It was one of the more subtle apple desserts that I felt I could pull off at any time of year. The variation I chose is a thin cake topped with thinly-sliced apples that have been arranged in neat little rows.

I’m sure I’ll come across this challenge several more times through this project, but I can’t tell you how many times I questioned myself while making this. I wished there was someone standing beside me telling me I was doing it right because I had never tasted it before and some of the instructions were... questionable. “Mix it? Like, with an electric beater or by hand?”

One big modification, or “hack” I learned from my queen Sally McKenney, is to freeze butter and grate it into your dry ingredients whenever you need to cut butter into dough. You want to keep your butter as cold as possible. Once you’ve shredded your butter into your dry ingredients, quickly cut it into your dough with a pastry blender and then pop the whole bowl into your fridge to keep it cold while you work on the rest of your prep. 

The cake came out delicious, and it’s so pretty to look at, too! Because the recipe tells you to make it in a 9x13″ pan, the cake part is pretty thin. Once I realized it’d be this way, I decided to slice the apples with a mandolin to match. The fact that the dessert is thin keeps each serving from feeling overwhelming. I felt like I could’ve had another big piece.

If you’re interested in making this and don’t want it to be this thin, try making it in a 9″ springform or square pan. I regretted not doing this as I struggled to get the dough all the way to the edges of the 9x13″ pan -- it was a large surface area and the recipe didn’t make that much dough. I was squashing it down and stretching it as much as I could. If you make it in a smaller pan and slice your apples thicker, I’d just suggest baking it for 45-50 minutes. My thin 9x13″ version took 35 minutes.

I didn’t document my progress the way I normally do. I was racing to get the dessert into the oven before the super-thin apples could brown. Apples brown so much quicker once you take out their core! I used all Granny Smith in this baby, but feel free to switch it up with Gala or Ambrosia apples and top it with whipped or ice cream. Recipe is below the World Cup preview!

Squad Preview Germany was placed in Group F with Mexico, Sweden and South Korea. They CRUISED through UEFA qualifiers, going 10-0-0 with a +39 goal differential. Holy wow. Their preliminary roster includes veterans like Mesut Ozil, Toni Kroos and Thomas Mueller. Veteran goalkeeper Manuel Neuer is also listed but has been out for several months with a foot injury. Barcelona’s Marc-Andre Ter Stegen has been covering the net in his absence (and I’m thrilled). We’ll see if Neuer actually makes the finalized roster as a backup.

You know who’s NOT on the preliminary roster? Mario Gotze, the super-sub hero of 2014. Gotze scored the winning goal in the final against Argentina (in the 113th minute!), but his form hasn’t been up to standards as of late. 

This squad’s newcomer to watch is definitely little Leroy Sane. Manchester City’s 22-year-old midfielder scored 10 goals for the league champions this season.

Germany looks great on paper, looked great in qualifying and won the Confederations Cup last summer to get things started. As of May 28, Vegas had them at 7/2 odds to win the whole enchilada again. I can’t wait to catch them start their title defense against Mexico on June 17, and I hope I did them justice with this Apfel Kuchen. :) 

German Apfel Kuchen (adapted from Genius Kitchen)

Serves: 10 | Time: 55 Minutes

Ingredients:

4 1⁄2 cups baking apples, like Granny Smith, Gala or Ambrosia

1 1⁄4 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

2 teaspoons granulated or pure cane sugar

1⁄2 teaspoon salt

1⁄2 cup unsalted butter, frozen

1 egg

2 tablespoons milk

For the Topping: 

2 tablespoons unsalted butter

1⁄2 cup granulated or pure cane sugar

1 1⁄2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1⁄2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease and flour a 9x13″ baking pan (or a 9″ round pan).

Mix 1 1/4 cup flour, the baking powder, 2 teaspoons of sugar, and salt and sift into a bowl.

Grate 1/2 cup of frozen unsalted butter with a box grater into your dry ingredient mixture. Keep the butter as cold as possible through this process.

Cut the shredded butter into your dry mix with a pastry blender until the dough looks like coarse meal. The butter pieces should be the size of a pea.

In a small bowl, beat egg with milk and add it to the dry mix with a wooden spoon.

Mix your dough thoroughly and pat it into the bottom of your baking pan to completely cover the bottom evenly.

Pare and core your apples.

Cut into thin wedge slices with a sharp knife or mandolin and place them on the dough in rows until covered. Cover the thin end of one apple with the thick end of the other.

Cut 2 tablespoons of cold unsalted butter into cubes and dot the apples with the butter.

Mix 1/2 cup sugar, 1 1/2 tablespoons of flour and cinnamon together.

Evenly pour your sugar/flour/cinnamon mixture dry topping over the apples and butter.

Bake in the oven for 30-45 minutes, until golden brown. If you opted to bake it in a 9″ round pan, bake it for 40-50 minutes.

Slice it up and serve with fresh cream or vanilla ice cream!

[lickingthespatula]

Hello, friends.

I didn't know how else to start this off, so I borrowed Jim Nantz's line. Don't tell him.

Welcome to this World Cup culinary project that I have ridiculously decided to name Stoppage Thyme. I'm not usually a fan of puns, but this one was too funny to pass up. I realize not everyone is a football/soccer fan, which means I'll probably have to explain the pun more than twice. Wish me luck.

I've been an avid follower of the Sally's Baking Addiction blog for years and have always admired her monthly baking challenge contest from afar, drooling over the delicious-looking entries and never once considering trying it for myself. Then, this April, her baking challenge of the month was croissants. It was her most anticipated and most complex baking challenge to date -- and for some reason, my insane brain ate it all up. I saw the challenge announcement go out at the beginning of April, including all the delicate steps, all the dough laminating and all the time it takes before you're finally able to pop one of these buttery masterpieces into your mouth, and I just thought, "I have to do this." Challenging feats attract me. None of the much-easier cakes or pies from months prior ever compelled me to get in the kitchen and try it for myself until this crazy multi-day croissant challenge came around. So I budgeted some time one weekend... and I rolled... and laminated... and laminated again... and laminated again. And they came out SO WELL!

But as I stood there in my kitchen, staring at these golden French pastries before me and drowning in an aroma of butter, I knew I was in trouble. I suddenly had an nagging urge to bake my way across the globe, trying recipes from as many countries as I could. When could I do this? And could I blog it, Julie & Julia style? How would I keep it relevant? ...I could do it for the FIFA World Cup!!

We brainstormed the logistics of it over a bottle of Rosé one night, and here's the plan I decided on. I'll pick a country from each pool-play group to advance to the Round of 16, and I'll make a dessert representing that country. When the group stage ends, we'll have 16 countries remaining. I'll then start baking (or cooking!) dishes for the countries that are still alive in the tournament all throughout the knockout stage. When we get to the finals, we'll have two teams remaining. I'll make something representing each of those teams. The entire World Cup tournament consists of 64 matches played from June 14 to July 15. I basically have a month to do this.

Did I mention I'm also moving apartments + traveling + committed to 29 barre classes for the Pure Barre national studio competition in June? Yes, 29 classes. I realize there are only 30 days in June. I am insane.

I've chosen one team from each of the eight groups to advance and one "Wild Card" country, and I'll be baking something sweet for each of them. That's nine desserts to start. I have my nine countries picked out, but I'll reveal them as we go. I can't wait to taste everything. :)

For those of you who don't know, I worked in sports (writing, promotions, media relations, event operations and TV) before I jumped over to the corporate world three years ago, and I still do it on the side for college events every year. I miss the writing quite a bit, but I miss the stats much more. Especially with soccer! My last full-time sports gig had me writing previews for every 2014 World Cup match and I was a freaking encyclopedia. With each dessert post I do on here, I'll probably preview the team a little bit and explain why I picked them. If you don't care for the sport, you can skip over that part and dive into the recipe and food photos.

So here we go! Hopefully you know the World Cup drill:

32 countries divided into eight groups of four

Two teams from each group advance after round-robin play to give us our Round of 16, knockout style

Sixteen teams become eight, which become four, which become two in the final

A champion is crowned!

We also get a third-place match between the two semifinal losers. Sorry. I couldn't find a nicer way to say that.

Here are a few tidbits about this year's World Cup:

This will be the 21st installment of our beloved quadrennial tournament

Iceland and Panama are in the tournament for the first time ever

Peru is back in the tournament for the first time since 1982 and Egypt makes its first appearance since 1990

Italy did not (!!) qualify for the first time since 1958. Could've made an awesome cannoli.

Other shocking absences this year:

Netherlands - Three-time World Cup runner-up, with their last second-place finish coming as recently as 2010.

New Zealand - Part of the Oceania Confederation. They won the Oceania World Cup qualifying tournament, but the confederation winner doesn't get an automatic bid to the World Cup like you'd think. They have to play the fifth-place team from the CONMEBOL qualifying tournament, and the winner gets a bid. They played Peru and lost, 2-0, on aggregate. Oceania gets no representative in the World Cup.

Chile - This one still rocks me. Back-to-back Copa America Champions, 2017 Confederations Cup runner-ups. This summer won't be the same without Alexis Sanchez, Arturo Vidal and Claudio Bravo...

Cameroon - Similar to Chile! They just won the Africa Cup of Nations last year.

United States - ...........................

The tournament starts June 14, but the last of the international friendly matches start May 28. Since I have to do nine desserts in the first round, I'm going to start when the friendlies do and hope that I'm done by the time the group stage ends. Catch you soon!

[lickingthespatula]

Testing

Sometimes when I’m falling in my dreams, I can feel you falling next to me...