Cupcake Hero - cocoa OR Ugliest Cupcake Ever!

This was a challenge. I prefer to bake with chocolate, not cocoa powder. I am comfortable it - the way it melts, combines, and tastes. My past attempts to use cocoa powder have been disappointing. Admittedly, I have only used Hershey's in past, and I have not used recommended recipes, but recipes found on boxes and cans, etc., but I really have been disappointed with past results. So... I try again!

I started by investing in some good cocoa. I didn't go with the recommended Askinosie Cocoa Powder. I have no good excuse other than fear of their shipping charges. Instead, I bought a kilo (which, may have been a little overboard) of Valrhona cocoa powder. I fell in love as soon as I took it out of the box. There is actually something erotic about the feel of a bag of good cocoa on your hand. I feels so fine, even through the bag. Seriously. This is almost the same high that I get from wandering aisles of books (in a library or a bookstore). Yeah, it's that good.

As some of you may have noticed, I'm on a banana kick. I love them. I love them more when they are combined with chocolate. So I opted for a banana chocolate cupcake for this challenge. I used 2 recipes from one of my so-far-unused cookbooks, Cupcakes!

I used the chocolate portion of the Neapolitan cupcake recipe to make the chocolate batter, and the banana cupcake recipe for the banana portion. I halved the banana recipe and did some impressive math (at least for me) and halved the whole recipe for the Neapolitan cupcakes but tripled, then halved the cocoa/milk addition to the recipe to make it all chocolate.

I was surprised at just how liquid the banana batter was and how un-liquid the chocolate was. I had to revise my original plan of piping them into the tin to get the same effect as a soft-serve swirl cone. Instead, I just dumped in the banana and then piped in a chocolate center. Right? Right!

Baked at 350 for about 15-20 minutes.

I had visions of filling this with whipped ganache from the Junior's cookbook, then topping it with normal ganache and a candied banana slice. What a disaster.

The cupcake center (the chocolate part) was way to dense to even poke through, much less fill. So, no filling.
I went ahead with the ganache topping. That was fine.
Then I thought to pipe the whipped ganache on top to make it prettier. It probably would have been glorious, if I'd waited until everything had cooled. Oops. Instead, it started out beautiful but has since turned into a gooey, drippy mess.
Oh yeah! The bananas! Basically, they were way to gooey and buttery to be considered a topping. Why did I go ahead and sit them on top? Because I make bad decisions.

So tonight (after a night out with the girls, and before embarking on a 5.5 hour early morning drive), I plan to try to cover it all up with some banana buttercream. It'll hide all the messiness, right?

Update later, hopefully with something presentable.

I'm a follower, a sheep, a groupie... a foodie.

I joined the foodie blogroll!

VtV - spinach

Another one of my favorite veggies! I do not like iceburg lettuce. I think it is a silly veggie (although I am loathe even to elevate it to the level of veggie), and should not be tolerated, much less allowed to be passed off as a 'salad' in restaurants across the country. It makes me sad.

Because of this, I became close friends with caesar salads early on in life (because at least there was some green in romaine lettuce), but thankfully, sometime in my early twenties, I discovered that you can have a salad with a non-lettuce base! This was truly a glorious day! It's sad that I can't remember the exact date, so that I can celebrate this glorious anniversary. :( I discovered the spinach (and more often, baby spinach) salad. Glorious! There were months of law school in which the healthiest thing I consumed was a salad of baby spinach, craisins, and raspberry vinegarette. Occassionally, I would add a hard-boiled egg, a bit of grilled chicken, and/or some cheese. Basically, I was addicted (and I still believe that dried fruit and spinach is a combination ordained by God).

Now, after all that, I wanted to make a cooked spinach dish for VtV this week. And another kind blogger (The Picky Apple) inspired me by cooking chicken and spinach stuffed shells. Yummm! It was meant to be. So, thanks to The Sisters' Cafe, here's this weeks VtV -I'll let you get the recipe from them.

Ice Cream Cupcakes

I was inspired by Cupcake Project's ice cream cupcake challenge. I had a huge bag of strawberries in my freezer, and had thought that they'd make a good ice cream. Then, I found vanilla ice cream in a 1/2 gallon jug from the local creamery in my grocery store. It seemed like the universe was suggesting that I make strawberry ice cream, and of course that meant that the cake had to be chocolate!

I used a star-shaped pan to bake the cupcake in, and then used the same pan to freeze the soft ice cream in. I cut the cupcake in half, and placed the moulded ice cream in there, and then froze it all together. I served it covered in hot fudge with a strawberry. :)

As it turned out, the ice cream didn't come together perfectly, and I'm not sure why. So, no more trying ice cream in a bottle. It did freeze solidly in the freezer, but I think the end result was closer to ice milk than ice cream... and that doesn't make me happy! However, the cake froze much better than I hoped, and was actually quite good, even right out of the freezer. The combination was definitely a good decision, and the ice cream, while not amazing, still tasted OK.

Kitchen Garden

I finally gave in and bought a kitchen herb garden kit. I set it up today, and I am looking forward to having fresh cilantro, basil, chives, parsley and thyme. That means a few more fresh herbs without having to depend on providence to find them at the local store. It also means no more fresh herbs in my fridge, lasting until about a week before I want them. It also means another chance for me to try my hand at keeping something green alive. Wish me luck!

TWD - Pecan Honey Sticky Buns

This week's TWD was chosen by Madam Chow of Madam Chow’s Kitchen, and is the Pecan Honey Sticky Buns on pages 51-53.

I'm a little slow on posting, since I spent the weekend away and only began making the brioche last night. It spent the night rising, and I made them this afternoon. (Yes, I did have big plans of getting up early this morning and making them for breakfast, but I am just not a morning person.)

So, now they are out of the oven, and I can finally post. It was fun to try something new, and get out of my comfort zone. I tend to avoid recipes that require this kind of planning, but some of my favorite recipes are those that do take a little more time. I do still have trouble rolling dough. It was also fun to try a yeast recipe. AND, I got to break in my dough hook! My KA danced! See!

All in all, I'm not sure I'd make this again. Others complained that it was too sweet and had too much butter. I don't believe in too much butter, and I didn't think that this was overly-sweet. In fact, I thought it might should have been a little sweeter.

My changes: I used 2 8x8 Pyrex's instead of one larger, just because I didn't have on large enough. I followed others' suggestions and barely warmed the oven and then let the dough do its final rise in there - it was a great warm spot! It didn't seem to take nearly 10 minutes of beating for the dough to pull away from the sides, so I probably stopped around 10 minutes. I also took another suggestion from another blogger and chilled the dough a bit more before cutting. It seemed to make it a little easier. Also, because I suck so badly at rolling (and I think I just plain sprinkled too much cinnamon sugar), I re-rolled a few of the buns after cutting to get them tighter.

Mix Dough (Yay for appliances that do all the work for me!). Let rise and slap down a lot! :)

Make glaze and pour into the bottom of the pyrex. Put in pecans.

Roll out dough (half of brioche recipe) and cover in butter and cinnamon sugar. Roll, and cut.

Place rolls in pan over the topping, let rise, and then bake.

See! Done! Flip immediately and devour.

OMG.

I like things. I like this thing more than most:

VtV - Carrots (late again)

I've been having a lot of trouble keeping deadlines. I'd like to say that it is unusual, but really, a review of my life would not bear that out. I'm just not good with deadlines! I'm working on it, I swear.

I wanted to make a basic, sweet carrot recipe for VtV. I wanted to try another cookbook. I've used this one before (in fact, I suspect it was the first cookbook I ever used as a child), but I hadn't picked it up for a while. It's good for basic recipes, so it seemed like the right fit for this. I used the recipe on pg. 397 of the spiral-bound 1991 edition for

Brown-Sugar-Glazed Carrots

3/4 lbs. small or medium carrots, parsnips, or turnips, peeled (I used a 1lb bag of sliced and peeled carrots, but I bet mixing carrots and parsnips would be delicious!)

1 tbsp butter (I used closer to 1.5)

1 tbsp brown sugar (I used almost 1/2 cup)

(I also added a bit - maybe 1 tbsp? of cinnamon)

Cut carrots or parsnips in half both cross-wise and length-wise (or cut turnips in 1/2 in cubes). (I obviously skipped this step because I bought pre-cut carrots)

In medium saucepan, cook root of choice, covered in just enough boiling water for 7-9 minutes (longer for turnips) or until crisp-tender.

Drain veggies and remove from pan.

Saute butter and brown sugar in the same pan with a dash of salt.

Add veggies (and cinnamon) and cook, uncovered, for about 2 minutes, or until glazed, stirring frequently.

I love carrots. They are one of the few veggies that I have always enjoyed. But like the southerner that I am, I particularly love them cooked to death. Part of the experiment for me was to resist cooking the carrots to the point that they fell apart. And I did! Still, I do love butter and sugar more than I should. Yummm.

Friday Sugar High: Citrus

True to my word, I tried a recipe from a new cookbook, Noses and Tails. I bought it from the Rockbridge County SPCA, and the recipes all looked to be fairly easy contributions from friends of the SPCA.

This seemed like a good month to start playing along with Friday Sugar High, and tartlette chose citrus as this month's theme! Orange is citrus, right?

Orange Cake

1.5 cups sugar
1 cup room-temp butter
zest of one orange (My zester disappeared, and I actually don't own a grater, so I literally peeled the orange. I haven't tasted it yet, but I have hope that the pieces weren't too big)
1/2 cup chopped pecans (or walnuts)
2 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 cup sour cream
3 eggs, separated

Preheat oven to 350.
Cream together sugar and butter.
Add egg yolks.
Sift together baking soda, baking powder, and flour. (I obviously didn't bother with this step)
Add dry mixture and sour cream (alternating) to creamed mixture.
Stir in nuts and orange zest.
In a seperate bowl, whip egg whites until firm, but not dry.
Fold egg whites into batter.
Pour into tube pan - bake at 350 for 50 min, or until done.

Glaze

1/2 cup orange juice
1/3 cup triple sec (orange liquor)
2 tbsp almond slivers (I went ahead and used all of a 1/4 cup bag)

Stir together orange juice and triple sec.
Pour over hot cake.
Add almond slivers.

Cookbooks

I have an addiction. I can't help but be attracted to cookbooks and cooking magazines and cooking blogs. I love looking at recipes and pictures of wonderful food. In fact, I have begun picking up local cookbooks as souvenirs when I travel. The collection is getting a little out of control.

Clearly, giving this up is not an option, so instead, I am resolved to actually use them! I have a bad habit of using the same recipes over and over, because I know I can rely on those recipes. blogging events like TWD and VtV, but I feel I need to force myself to branch out. So, I'm challenging myself. I am going to make a point to use a recipe from a different cookbook (one that I already own - no using this as an excuse to buy more!) each week.

And now, since you've been so kind as to read a post without a picture - a picture from the new ice cream place in Staunton, VA - The Split Banana: This is a scoop each of Murder Mango Sorbet(seriously, this is deadly! I don't know what they added, but it has a kick), mint mocha gelato(surprisingly light amount of mocha, which I appreciated), and chocolate hazelnut gelato(mmmmm.).