Molten Chocolate Cakes

Last Friday I decided to make my husband these Molten Chocolate Cakes that he loves. The first time I made them they came out pretty well so I thought this time would be all the better. You can find the recipe here. The recipe says with “mint fudge sauce” but I omitted the mint because I just wanted the chocolate flavor. Also, I found the sauce completely unnecessary. Honestly, I wouldn’t bother making it. We didn’t even use it this time and it was a waste of chocolate and time. Anyway, here’s how it went…

 

So I’m not really sure what went wrong. The cakes (which I baked for longer than the recommended time) stuck to their cups (which I buttered generously) and completely fell apart when I plated them. Thankfully, it still tasted delicious, so I guess it didn’t really matter… except that it wasn’t quite as impressive.

Even though I had issues, and I would completely leave out the sauce, this recipe is still good and everyone who’s had it has raved about it.

In other news, my daughter is now eating some solid foods and absolutely went crazy for a jar of Chicken and Sweet Potatoes.

Yes, she’s grabbing the spoon and trying to feed herself. A concept that she doesn’t really grasp yet. (No pun intended. hee hee!) But it’s been fun letting her try new things and she’s really been loving pretty much everything we put in front of her. I hope she always stays this enthusiastic about food.

Confessions and Apologies.

So my confession is that when I bake I make a mess.  I mean a HUGE mess. I usually turn around to see that I’ve left all of the cupboards and drawers open and think of the scene in sixth sense that looks similar to this:

It most likely drives my husband crazy. That and the fact that I cannot bake with flour without getting it everywhere. He especially loves that.

In thinking more about motherhood, I also have a public apology to make. It is to mothers that only schedule things around their child’s naps. I used to scoff and think, “seriously? can’t your kid sleep in their carseat or stroller?” I am sorry. I completely understand. Not all kids nap while they are out and I understand the need now for stability. And when a little one doesn’t get their nap – whew! No one wants to be around that. So to all the ladies out there that I secretly judged, I’m sorry.

And to yummy news, my friend/acquaintance posted a blog about some delicious citrus sugar cookies that I’m dying to try! Hopefully I’ll get to this week. Here’s the post and recipe if you’re interested:  http://kalliebrynn.blogspot.com/2011/02/happy-valentines-day.html

The photography of the cookies is fantastic too! Thanks for sharing Kallie!

Valentine’s FAIL.

Last night my husband and I decided we would celebrate Valentines day. He would prepare a delicious dinner and I would prepare a delicious dessert. He kept up his end of the bargain. I did not.

It started out great. I was going to make a Blueberry & Nectarine Pie. Sounds delish right? Well somewhere in the baking process I royally screwed it up. I have a few theories of what went wrong:

1. When I made the pie crust, I was distracted and added a few of the ingredients out of order. Maybe this ruined the chemistry of the crust?

2. I had the crust premade and frozen. The directions said I could do this though, so if this is what caused the problem, I blame Julia Child.

3. The dough was softer than usual, even after freezing it, so I couldn’t roll it as thin as I’d liked to. Thus, it was probably too thick. This could have been an issue because of theory #1.

4. The directions told me to put the pie on a foil lined pan to bake it. I think this caused the bottom not to cook as well as it should have. Again, Julia’s fault.

5. Cupid hates me.

In any sense, the pie looked beautiful but wasn’t edible because the dough on the bottom was soggy and uncooked. YUCK. I know no one wants to make this pie after I shared that but here are the pretty photos anyway:

And final product:

So pretty, right? Such a shame the only ones enjoying it are the ants that probably will find their way into our trash can. To top it off, here’s my husband’s amazing dinner:

Yeah. Delicious. I would have removed the bumbo before I took the picture but it’s pretty indicative of our life right now so I thought I’d leave it in.

His present was even this amazing marble slab for rolling out doughs (like the one that I ruined).

Needless to say, my confidence has taken a little bit of a beating. Hopefully the next thing I make will redeem my cooking self esteem. Oh well, on to better things! Hope your Valentines day involves lots of yummy treats!

French Apple Tart

So my latest baking adventure was quite a feat. I attempted to make a French Apple Tart. The first of the hurdles I had to get over was peeling and coring 9 Granny Smith apples without a coring tool. I swear, these pastries don’t make you fat because of all the work it takes to prepare them!

I really thought I was going to cut myself. Thankfully I had only one scare and there was no bloodshed!

After I peeled and cored 6 of them, I sliced them thin and mixed them with a little flour, sugar and cinnamon and put them on a jelly roll pan to bake. (Jelly roll pans are just baking sheets with edges. Something I learned recently!)

After about 15 minutes of baking, you take them out of the oven and mash them.

You’re supposed to be able to mash them with a potato masher but my apples were being stubborn. I took out the food processor and let them have it.

But I’m a little ahead of myself. First I had to make the pie crust (which I almost horribly ruined, but saved at the last minute), chill it for 2 hours, roll it out and blind bake it (that’s baking without any filling in it) for 30-ish minutes. I let it cool, and then filled it with the apple filling.

Then I peeled and cored the remaining three apples and sliced them thin for the topping. I arranged them on top of the tart…

Then I basted the apples with melted butter and sprinkled sugar on top and stuck it in the oven.

Finished product:

Conclusion: It was beautiful and good. Not amazing. I give it a 4 out of 5. Jason and I both agreed that it wasn’t worth the work that was put into it. (Three different baking elements!) But it was good and it was my first tart. Thank you Julia for the lesson.

Recipe from Baking with Julia, French Apple Tart.

Kids + Baking

One thing I’ve learned in my five months of being a mom is that kids are a wild card. Just like we didn’t choose our parents, we can’t choose what they look like, what personality they have and what they’ll grow up to be. We can only nurture and pray.

Baking helps me cope with the loss of control in my life. My agenda is now run by a thirteen pound little human that can’t control her drool. Baking is stability; butter will melt… these ingredients will make cake…and so on. A friend of mine said to see these new parenting changes as obedience to the master instead of self sacrifice. I have to tell myself that every day. Some days it seems like joyful obedience, some days it feels like painful sacrifice. I will take it all though because my little girl is amazing. And even on the days she’s not behaving so amazing… there’s pastries.

I believe she’s trying to tell me that she will love butter as much as I do. (Please ignore her horribly mis-matched outfit. ha)

Dutch Baby

This morning we wanted a yummy breakfast without lots of prep, so we remembered this delicious looking recipe in one of our food network magazines.

The recipe calls for pears but I used strawberries because that’s what I had in my fridge.

It’s insanely easy:

Combine 4 eggs, 1 cup milk, 2/3 cup flour, 1/2 stick melted butter, 3 tbsp sugar and a little vanilla in a blender. Melt some butter in a cast iron skillet. Add 1 sliced pear (or in my case, several sliced strawberries), then batter and bake at 375 for 35 minutes. Dust with confectioners sugar.

It was similar to a frittata in that it had a heavy egg base, but it was sweet like  a pastry. I mixed it all, stuck it in the oven and went and got ready for church.

35 minutes later, I got this:

& w/ sugar

 

Yum. Thank you food network.

Easiest Brownie Recipe Ever.

My friend Sarah Hanks is credited to giving me this recipe. It’s SUPER easy and delicious. I especially love it because I can almost guarantee that you have all the ingredients for it in your kitchen right now. No box mix necessary… and you know what you’re putting in your brownies. No preservatives! Nothing that you can’t pronounce! Just good ole fashioned ingredients.

Combine 2 cups sugar, 1 1/2 sticks butter and 1/2 tsp. salt

Beat in 3 eggs

Add in 1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder and 1 cup flour

Bake in a square pan at 350 degrees. 8 inch pan = 35 minutes, 9 inch pan = 25-30 minutes

And voila! Delicious brownies. These are the ones that I was saying earlier are better than the fancy Bon Appetit recipe. (Well in my opinion). I did grease the pan too… but seriously easy. Now you can make brownies even when you don’t have a box mix in the pantry.

You’re welcome.

Strawberry Souffle

This recipe comes from the Epicurious app that I have on my phone. If you don’t have this ap yet and you like food AT ALL, you need to get it. It’s absolutely free and has thousands of great recipes.

This is a mixture of strawberries, sugar and cornstarch.

The we blend the egg whites…

And fold it together…

Then I pour the mixture into prepared souffle cups and bake! I was intrigued that this recipe has NO flour in it. Part of me didn’t think that it would rise in the oven.

Slice some extra strawberries to go on top…

And voila!

Little souffles! They were good! I had them with Jason and my parents and we gave them a 4 out of 5 stars. I made pumpkin souffles back in November and those were better in my opinion but these were very light and delicious.

 

Here’s a link to the recipe in case you’re interested: http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Strawberry-Souffle-with-Sliced-Strawberries-5247

Blueberry Ricotta Pancakes

So since I had leftover ricotta from a dinner recipe last week and I had blueberries in the fridge, I wanted to make a recipe that I’d been dying  to try since I saw it. Blueberry Ricotta Pancakes. Only I couldn’t remember where I had seen the recipe so I looked for one online, and found this one. Looked delish, so I tried it out.

Mix the dry ingredients…

Then the wet… (plus sugar)

I whisked these two together and put the egg whites in my kitchenaid mixer (also can be done with a handheld mixer) until they formed soft peaks.

Confession: whenever it said to separate the eggs and beat the whites, I always thought, “Is this really necessary? They are all going in the same batter.” But YES it is necessary. When you beat the whites to make them form peaks they get really airy and light. This helps whatever you’re making become airy and light too and can have a significant difference in the end product. So don’t get lazy and skip this part. It pays off.

Then I folded the egg whites into the batter mixture. [Basically that means taking a rubber spatula (my favorite one ever is from IKEA and costs about 99 cents) and taking the batter from the bottom and bring it to the top in a circular, gentle motion until everything is blended together.]

I always put my pancake batter in a measuring cup so I can easily pour it onto the skillet.

And the finished product:

I was SUPER happy with these. They tasted great and looked beautiful. Again, I sprinkled a little confectioners sugar on top to make it look pretty. YUM. I give this recipe two thumbs way up. I’m sure it would be good with other fruit too or just plain by themselves. The pancakes had a wonderful flavor and were super light.

I now want these every morning.

 

Bon Appetit Brownies

This week we got in our new issue of Bon Appetit (which in my opinion, used to be a better magazine but that’s off the topic)… and it had a really yummy looking brownie on the cover. Naturally, I decided to make them.

This recipe can be found in the newest issue (shown above)

First it had me brown the butter:

(which is basically just melting in a saucepan and simmering until it stops foaming and there are little brown bits on the bottom)

Then I combined the dry ingredients.

(Mainly sugar and cocoa)

I put the butter in my mixer and added the dry ingredients. Then I added the eggs one at a time and let it mix itself into deliciousness. (I don’t say it enough: I love my kitchenaid mixer.)

Baked into gooey perfection. (The recipe called for walnuts mixed into the batter… however I don’t really care for walnuts so I just topped half of the pan so I could have them without nuts and Jason could have them with.

Consensus: Jason said it was the best brownie I’ve ever made. I thought the last batch I made from scratch was better (and the recipe was easier) but I thought they were good. If you’re a cake-y brownie lover, this is not your recipe. These are definitely dark, gooey and very rich.

Try it out and let me know what you think.