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By Amber, on August 1, 2010, at 10:00 pm I recently ran across this recipe on a friend’s blog and knew I had to try it! It assembles pretty quickly, and then you can set it aside to bake whenever you’re ready.
If you are like me and tend to keep a lot of baking basics (flour, butter, eggs, etc.) on hand, you’ll probably only need to buy graham crackers, marshmallow fluff, and chocolate. I went generic on the first two and bought Ghirardelli semi-sweet baking pastilles instead of Hershey bars. I actually bought two tubs of fluff (7 oz each) and needed only one, so I ended up with enough ingredients for two batches at a total of $7.40 plus the minimal value of the staples I had on hand. The bars were so good that we only got two nights out of an 8×8 pan, but that’s still pretty inexpensive.
 I really had to work to get half of the dough spread out across the entire pan. It wouldn’t hurt to double the dough if you like thick cookies — the end product was much thinner than I expected.
When I got to this point I realized why the original recipe calls for Hershey bars — spreading the fluff is a challenge! Remarkably, with a little care almost all of my chocolates stayed where I had pressed them gently into the dough, but next time I think I’ll flip the middle layers and just sprinkle semi-sweet or dark chips across the fluff.
 This is another reason it would be good to increase the dough recipe — unless you are a master dough-handler, you are just not going to make this pretty. It’s so soft that it’s very difficult to work with in pieces of any size, though you could try refrigerating it first if you’re more patient than I am. After I took that photo, I filled in the cracks a little more with what was left over, so when it came out of the oven it looked like this:
 It smells wonderful baking, and the consistency reminded me of s’mores Pop Tarts. I’m looking forward to trying a variation on this recipe with the leftover crackers, chocolate, and fluff. We microwaved our leftover pieces the second night, but first I took a bite of mine while it was still cold from the fridge, and I have to say it was pretty awesome that way, too.
By Amber, on July 4, 2010, at 10:00 pm Happy Independence Day! Today I am declaring temporary independence from editing my Hawaii photos, and sharing something delicious instead. I do that every time I take a trip somewhere — I shoot hundreds of photos and then come home and burn out a fraction of the way through the resizing/editing process. It has taught me to be more selective about determining what I like enough to edit, but I still have to categorize and go through all of them in the first place! Thank goodness for digital.
The recipe for this summery cake was delivered to my inbox a few weeks ago via the King Arthur newsletter — the source of most of my favorite baked goods recipes. If your sweet tooth runs your life like mine does, you really should subscribe. Occasionally there is a recipe for something savory, but you can just delete those emails and nobody will have to know!
This cake is inspired by the lime rickey, a cousin of the mojito. I think you could dress it up any number of ways and end up with something amazing. King Arthur suggested a raspberry sauce, but I’m not a fan of fruit with my dessert (wait, isn’t lime a fruit? Don’t worry, I didn’t use any limes. The recipe gives you the option of using lime oil, which unlike limes, I already had). I considered a ginger glaze, but I feel like I always do ginger with lime, so this time I decided to keep it simple.
I opted to use a bundt pan instead of the recommended 9×13 because it always makes me happy to see something pretty on my cake plate. Plan on about 45 minutes of cooking time if you go this route. And instead of the glaze they recommend, I whipped the following until it was uniform and stiff:
- 4 tbsp (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, melted
- 2 tbsp milk
- 1/4 tsp lime oil
- 2 cups confectioner’s sugar
I love the crunch of sparkling sugar on top of baked goods, so I mixed half a cup with lime oil as recommended and sprinkled it on the glaze. I had maybe half a cup of glaze and half of the sparkling sugar left when I decided the cake was frosted enough.
So how did the cake turn out? We both had seconds on the first night and Mark declared it one of his favorite recipes yet. He says that about almost everything (except for the one time I made a cake with Crisco that had gone bad, whoops), but this really is a very good cake. I was a little worried that it would be too candy-like with the lime glaze, and it is very sweet, but not overpowering.
Even if you are a purist who insists on zesting actual limes, this simple cake would be a great last-minute treat that you could whip up and serve with about an hour’s notice. It’s pretty moist, so I think you could even skip the glaze and whip some heavy cream. See what you think!
By Amber, on May 16, 2010, at 10:00 pm I seldom make chocolate chip cookies because they never live up to my fantasy — moist and THICK. A cookie can’t be too thick. So I was hoping that the recipe by Wendy Gaynor of Ruby et Violette would be the cookies of my dreams.
Recipe!
They were delicious and moist, and (Mom, stop reading) I licked every bit of dough from the beater (I told you not to read that. I promise I did not get salmonella!), but they did flatten out more than I’d hoped — especially the ones that had to bake directly on the pan because I ran out of parchment, oops. Also, I skipped the step where you refrigerate the dough because chocolate chip cookies are comfort food, and I am not interested in waiting OVERNIGHT for comfort food. Seriously, who has that kind of self-control? But maybe it would have kept them thicker, guess I need to try again to be sure. Oh, and the recipe is supposed to yield 36-72 cookies, but in this house, it yields closer to two dozen. I’m sure that had nothing to do with it. :)
The blog where I first stumbled across this recipe suggested that four cups of chocolate chunks were too many and I scoffed — does not the fact that two bags of Whole Foods’ dark chocolate chunks contain four cups plus just enough for a snack while they bake indicate that four is perfect? — but I have to admit that I agree. If you regard the cookie as merely a vehicle for chocolate, then four will work for you, but if you want to enjoy the cookie as well, scale back.
Anyone have a recipe that might work better for me, even if I cheat on some of the steps?
By Amber, on February 9, 2010, at 11:00 pm I’m still not entirely sure I made these correctly, and I was undecided about whether I liked them until the second day, but I can now say with confidence that these unusual cakes are awesome:
I have been thinking a lot about brown butter lately. We often get brown butter ice cream with dessert at Beaver’s, and I am going to attempt to make some at home, but I had never made beurre noisette before and needed something lower-pressure to start with. A pastry gone wrong is one thing; ice cream gone wrong is another.
Making the brown butter was intimidating, but I used this page as my color guide and I think I nailed it. The thing that threw me when I actually baked the cakes was the amount of melted butter left behind in the muffin wells when I pried them out. The cooling racks were soon dripping with butter:
I wasn’t expecting this, and nothing in the recipe had led me to believe I should, but I really can’t find anything wrong with them (I’ve since done some experimenting with leftover batter and found that if you don’t release them to cool, the butter is reabsorbed!). They’re not quite a muffin, not quite a cupcake, but they’re richer than either one. When they’re hot, the texture is that of a perfectly dressed muffin, dense but laden with melted butter. When they’re cold, the flavor reminds me of Royal Dansk butter cookies. I recommend trying them both ways to compare.
And then trying again just to be sure.
By Amber, on January 17, 2010, at 10:00 pm We call these ‘cornbread cookies.’ There are no corn products in them.
My mother used to make these every year at Christmas when I was little, and she’d glaze and top them with red and green decorator’s sugar. The recipe yield is 90-100 cookies, more than our family could eat over one holiday, so she would store some unfrosted cookies in the freezer. When I got older and lived on my own, she’d send me back to New Jersey after the holidays with a freezer bag or two of my own stash.
I had a bag that lingered long-forgotten in my freezer (I’m talking a year or more), and Mark found them one day when I was out. That evening he told me he had eaten some cornbread that was in the freezer. I was pretty certain I didn’t have any cornbread, and he was pretty certain he knew better since he’d eaten it. Thus, these will forever be known as ‘cornbread cookies,’ although I really don’t think they taste anything like cornbread.
What they do taste like is moist, dense deliciousness, thanks to the Ricotta cheese. They’re still amazing months (or years) after you’ve put them in the freezer and forgotten that they’re there.
Italian biscuits:
Cream well:
-1/2 lb butter
-2 cups sugar
Add 3 eggs and beat well.
Add:
-1 lb Ricotta cheese
-2 tsp vanilla
-4 cups flour
-1 tsp baking soda
-1 tsp salt
Drop by small teaspoons onto greased cookies sheet. Bake 10-15 minutes at 350 F. When cool, can be iced and dipped in sprinkles.
Icing: confectioner’s sugar and milk to make a glue-like mixture. Almond or anise flavoring can be added to icing.
So that’s one of my childhood favorites. I substituted half vanilla, half Fiori di Sicilia to give them a little citrus kick. It probably should have been more like 3/4:1/4 because the Fiori di Sicilia is very strong, but there haven’t been any complaints around here. I also made them more like large tablespoons of batter and extended the baking time because I really didn’t want to make 100. I ended up with about three dozen, and obviously I was too lazy to make frosting of any sort. Two days later, I think we may be down to our last dozen.
By Amber, on December 29, 2009, at 10:07 pm So that chocolate shortbread that I messed up? I kept the dough because I hate to waste good ingredients, and I found the perfect use for it.
First, press the dough into the bottom of ramekins, not too much thicker than the cookies you meant to make:
Next, bake it the same way you would the cookies:
Finally, top with ice cream. I used eggnog ice cream because the smooth sweetness perfectly balances the salty, very dark chocolate dough:
I served this fresh out of the oven to our guests, and no joke, they were still raving about it the next day. I’m pretty sure this mistake will be requested again in the near future!
By Amber, on December 27, 2009, at 10:00 pm When you need a little Caribbean in your life:
I adapted Warren Brown’s ‘Gingerly’ pound cake recipe for this (from his book CakeLove: How to Bake Cakes from Scratch). It’s meant for a 12-cup bundt pan, but it made 32 cupcakes. Here’s the recipe with my adaptations.
Dry Ingredients:
- 3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
- 2 tsp cornstarch
- 3 tbsp mini ginger chips
- 1 tsp ground ginger
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 tsp salt
- 1/4 tsp baking soda
- 1/8 tsp ground allspice
Liquid:
- 1 cup sour cream*
- 1 1/2 tbsp molasses
- 1 tbsp honey
- 1/4 tsp lime oil
Creaming:
- 2 sticks unsalted butter at room temp
- 2 1/2 cups granulated white sugar
- 6 large eggs
*I had no sour cream, but I had a cup of buttermilk left over from making red velvet cake, so I combined 7/8 cup buttermilk and 3 tbsp melted butter to substitute.
Preheat oven to 350 F. Sift the dry ingredients into a large mixing bowl. Whisk the liquids together in a small mixing bowl.
Cream the butter and sugar, then add the eggs individually, fully incorporating after each. On low speed, add the dry and liquid mixtures alternately in 3-5 additions each, starting and ending with the dry. Do not fully combine after each addition or you may overwork the batter. Brown says this process should only take about 60 seconds.
Scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl if necessary (I use a beaterblade, so typically all I have to scrape is whatever is clinging to the wiping blade. I highly, highly recommend one of these! I think it makes baking far more enjoyable). Mix on medium speed for 15-20 seconds to develop the batter’s structure.
If you want to make the bundt cake, Brown recommends baking it for 50-55 minutes. If you want to make cupcakes, 20 minutes should do it, unless you’ve overfilled them. They won’t rise a lot, but I had to put a couple of mine back in for 5 more minutes. The tops will be a little sticky before they cool, but if you press them very gently, they shouldn’t deform or leave anything on your fingertip.
For the frosting, I used a recipe from Food Network and substituted 1 tsp lime oil instead of the vanilla, plus three drops of green food coloring. The recipe made just enough frosting. I’m usually of the opinion that cake, however delicious, is mostly a vehicle for frosting, but you don’t want to overdo it on these because the cake’s flavor is fairly subtle. Enjoy — I did!
By Amber, on December 22, 2009, at 9:17 pm I was excited to share this recipe because it is so easy and so tasty:
What you can’t see is that I completely screwed up and you can hardly pick those up without them falling apart. It seems that when you double a recipe, you should double all of the ingredients. Whoops. But let’s not talk about what I did there. Anyway, I tried again and got them right:
 For the vet’s office!
The recipe is here. I first made these a couple Christmases ago and they’ve been a household favorite ever since. The cats look cute, right? But take my advice: it’s not worth it to try to get fancy with the cookie cutters on shortbread cookies because all of that butter makes them crumble, and half of the cats ended up Manx. Nothing says ‘Happy Holidays’ like mutilated cookies!
Yesterday I finished distributing my holiday baking gifts around town. Now I can get down to the business of baking for our soon-to-arrive guests!
By Amber, on December 20, 2009, at 10:45 pm That’s not hyperbole, look at how dark these are:
 Like many of my favorite baked goods recipes, I found this one in a King Arthur e-newsletter. If you like baking, you should subscribe. Anyway, these brownies have a nice balance of sugar and dark chocolate, and they hit that sweet spot between cake and fudge. They really don’t even take that much longer than a mix, but they’re ten times better. These are way too good for a school bake sale.
The recipe is here. I can’t stress this part enough: the key is using double-dutch dark cocoa, which is a blend of regular Dutch-process and black cocoa. I first ordered it because I couldn’t find Dutch-process cocoa in stock at any local grocer. This blend sounded intriguing, and now I won’t use anything else if I can help it. Normally I love playing around with brownie ingredients, but these are so good that I haven’t been able to bring myself to change anything about the recipe since I got it in February!
By Amber, on December 17, 2009, at 11:16 pm You can eat it in the ramekin:
 or out:
 With an eggnog ice cream chapeau!
We’ll have family visiting for the holidays and I have this dessert extravaganza planned, but I had never made molten cakes so I wanted to do a test run. I looked at a bunch of recipes and chose this one because it looked like one of the least complicated. It turned out to be one of the easier desserts that I’ve ever made. I used Ghirardelli 72% cacao baking chocolate and just estimated 6 oz from the 10 oz bag.
The only surprise was the cooking time. I placed the ramekins on a small cookie sheet so I would be able to get them out of the oven without burning myself or dropping them, and I had to keep extending the cooking time until the tops looked done enough at 20 minutes.
The recipe fills four 8-oz ramekins, so I baked two right away and put the others in the fridge overnight. I baked them tonight (for science!) and they were every bit as good as last night. Mark thought they were better, but I’m pretty sure that was a result of all-day anticipation! I’ll definitely be making these ahead of time so I can just pop them in the oven after dinner when we have company.
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