Tiramisu Cake

The story behind this cake was that I had coffee liqueur that I was not using, and what best to use it for, but Tiramisu. I had thought about making the traditional tiramisu, but when I was looking up a recipe I found this cake recipe that had even more reviews than the traditional, plus I didn’t have to find a place that sold Lady Fingers in Ogden. This Tiramisu Layer Cake recipe can be found at Allrecipes.com by clicking here.

I used the same white cake recipe that I had made just a week before. The recipe calls for a cake mix, but I feel that’s cheating, so I made my own. I divided the batter into thirds, and added the instant coffee. A tip on instant coffee: I buy the boxes with the little packets, because those about a tablespoon. They are much cheaper than buying a bottle, and they are already pre-measured. Besides, who honestly wants to have a bunch of instant coffee granules anyway?

I baked my cakes the day before I assembled the cake. I wrapped each layer in plastic wrap to keep them moist.

The day of I put together the mascarpone cheese, sugar, and liqueur together. It was really thick, because the mascarpone was cold. I heated it in the microwave for a few seconds. DO NOT DO THIS! The liqueur curdles the mascarpone, rendering it unusable. So after ruining my $5 mascarpone cheese, I got a $1 cream cheese package and re-tried the filling recipe. I let the cream cheese warm up on it’s own before adding the rest of the ingredients, so there was no risk of anything curdling.

I then unwrapped my cake layers and started by poking the first layer with a fork all over and then spooned on the coffee and liqueur mixture on top. I spread on the filling. I did the same with the next 2 layers, except put the frosting on top at the last.

I covered the top with sifted cocoa powder and put chocolate curls along the bottom edge. It was gorgeous and yummy. I took it to a friends gathering that night and it was huge hit!
Make sure you keep it refrigerated though, if you don’t plan on eating it right away, so the whipped cream frosting doesn’t slide off.

**Also, it is now my new goal to take better pictures...these ones were awful - though the phone camera didn't help.

Cinnamon Swirl Bread

This bread was so great!

It was actually cinnamon raisin bread, but I don’t enjoy raisins in bread, so I cut them out. The recipe made 2 loaves, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to eat that much bread, so I halved the recipe. I would also recommend only making a 1/3 - 1/4 of the filling, because there was way too much for 1 loaf of bread even halved.

The recipe:
½ package of yeast
1 cup warm water
3 ¼ cup all-purpose flour
½ stick of butter
¼ cup sugar
1 egg

I put the yeast and water together and let bubble for a few minutes, before adding the rest of the ingredients. I put everything in my bread maker and pressed start. I let the dough rise for the first time in the bread machine, but that ended up taking forever, because it doesn’t get warm enough. I can’t complain though, I got it for $5 at a yard sale. The second time I put the oven on warm for a bit and then turned it off, before putting the bowl full of dough with plastic on top in the oven. In between the first and second rise though, I patted the dough into a round and then folded the bottom third up, the top third down, and the right and left sides over. Put the seams on the bottom of the bowl. I don’t really know if it matters which you do first, it seems like it wouldn’t, but I followed directions. This rise took an hour.

Filling:
¾ cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon cinnamon

I rolled the dough out into a rectangle about 12x10 inches. I put only about half the filling on, before I thought, this is freaking ton of sugar. So I probably only used between a ¼ and a 1/3 of the full recipe, which is double what I just listed above! Then I tucked in the sides before rolling up the dough and putting it into a grease loaf pan. I let this rise about 30 minutes. I brushed the top of the loaf with a beaten egg and then baked at 425˚ for 45 minutes. I ended up putting foil on top about halfway through, because it was getting really brown.

It was delicious! It makes great French toast too after it’s been a few days and it’s dried out somewhat.

Berry Tart

This was a Mother’s Day dessert for my mom. It was such a warm spring day that I didn’t want to do anything real rich or warm. I settled on this fruit tart that ended up being very light and refreshing. It would be great for a summer barbeque with cocktails.

I used Martha’s tart dough recipe, which was a mistake. Don’t use it. It sucks. It’s stick and hard to work with, and then I crumbles after it bakes. No, instead use a REAL French tart dough recipe. I got this from a co-worker when I worked at a kitchen store. She was from France and would bake delicious tarts all the time. Her dough recipe is really simple to make and I’ve never had any problems with it.

Pate Brisée (French for Tart Dough) Recipe by Aurore Williams

1 ¾ cup flour
1/3 cup sugar
pinch of salt
½ cup butter
2 eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla

In a large bowl, mix flour, sugar, and salt. Add butter and work with fingers or pastry blender. Mix in the eggs and vanilla, first with a spoon then by hand. Work the dough until smooth. Split dough in half and roll out one half into a circle big enough to fit into your tart pan. Trim edges and bake as recipe directs. Makes 2 tarts.

I normally half the recipe, because I usually don’t make 2 tarts. It’s easier enough to split in half though, and it makes such a nice dough.

Despite the disappointing crust, the tart turned out really well. I was planning on using strawberries, blueberries, and blackberries, but my frozen blackberries were a little more juicy and falling apart than I wanted. The strawberries and blueberries worked nicely though. It was very patriotic! I thought it would be something perfect for the 4th of July!

I made the dough and pre-baked it the day before Mother’s Day and I also made the custard portion of the pastry cream the day before.

Pastry Cream:

2 cups whole milk (or what I did was 1 cup milk, 1 cup cream)
½ cup sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
4 egg yolks
¼ cup cornstarch
2 tablespoons butter

I cooked the milk, sugar, and vanilla over medium heat until it came to a simmer. I then realized that I was only supposed to put half the sugar in the milk mixture and put the other half in the egg mixture, but it turned out fine anyway. After whisking the egg yolksand cornstarchI added the hot milk mixture ½ cup at a time while constantly whisking. If you don’t, you’ll end up with a scrambled egg custard. After everything was incorporated, I put it back on medium-high heat for 2 minutes until it thickened. Then I transferred it back into a bowl and added the butter. I whisked until the butter was melted and the mixture had cooled somewhat. I then put this in the fridge with plastic wrap touching it, so it wouldn’t form a skin.

On the day of I folded in a cup of whipped cream (without any sweetener) to the custard mixture before smoothing it into the tart crust. I then sliced and arranged the strawberries and blueberries on the top of the cream.

I skipped the lavender syrup all together, which is what the recipe had called for. I didn’t have any lavender, and besides, I thought that the cream and the berries themselves were sweet enough. I didn’t want to make it overly sweet.

This was definitely a big hit. It not only looked beautiful, but it tasted amazing. I wished I had used my always faithful crust though.It’s something different than the usual gelatinous fruit tarts that many people make. It’s really easy to make too. You can do most the things before, and then just assemble everything the day of the event.

White Cupcakes with Chocolate Icing

These were the best cupcakes I’ve made to date. I think the secret was using cake flour as opposed to all-purpose flour. They came out so light and fluffy, and not overly sweet.

I decided to make these cupcakes, because I had leftover chocolate frosting from Val’s cake I believe. It was store-bought and chocked with so much sugar that I was not about to go bad any time soon, but I wanted to get rid of it.

I had never made a white cake before, so this was a first. I had just found my new favorite store, Winco, and bought cake flour, so I was able to make this recipe. Cake flour doesn’t contain any rising ingredient like all-purpose flour does. It also has a very white silky texture, different from all-purpose. Between the flour itself being lighter, the fluffy egg whites that were whipped into soft speaks, and sifting all the dry ingredients 3 times, this is a very light cupcake.

The recipe I used was Heavenly White Cake recipe from Allrcecipes.com. I halved the recipe because I figured I only had enough icing for about a dozen cupcakes.

The batter itself has a very sweet smell and taste to it. I was scared at that point that they were going to be super sweet cakes, but surprisingly they weren’t at all. They were perfect! Sadly, I did forget to add the vanilla and almond extract. I didn’t realize until I had them poured into all the cups and ready for the oven. L Even without those two ingredients, they were really yummy!

Potato-Onion Tartlets

These were a recipe from Martha’s book. They are basically exactly what they sound like: little potato onion tarts. The recipe called for puff pastry for the top crust part, but I’m not a huge fan of puff pastry and it calls for much too much butter than my poor self can afford, so I ended up using just a simple savoury tart crust.

I also didn’t have any mini tart pans, so I used my muffin tin instead. I buttered the tin and then put a few onion rings on the bottom, followed by the sliced potatoes. I sprinkle salt and pepper atop the potatoes before putting the tart circle cut out on top.

I put them in the oven for about 30 minutes at 425˚.

Then I proceeded to make the balsamic vinegar syrup, which consisted of ¼ cup balsamic vinegar with a pinch of sugar. You bring this to a simmer and reduce to a syrup.

The tartlets smelled really good when they were done, but tasting them wasn’t as good. They didn’t taste bad, they were just really bland. The best part was the vinegar, because it added something other than starch. There needed some other spices or something, but I’m not very good at picking out savoury spices. I’m good at the sweet stuff. J

I also don’t have a picture of these, because didn’t look that great.

Whole Wheat Bread

My first loaf of yeasted bread that hasn’t turned out like a brick! Woot! This is the original recipe that I referenced, but I changed quite a lot. It’s still not quite what I want though. I’m going to try again and tweak it some more until I get it right.

So here is what I actually did:

1 1/8 cups warm water

2 1/2 cups whole wheat bread flour

½ cup white bread flour

1 1/2 teaspoons salt

1/3 cup honey

1 tablespoon vital wheat gluten

1 tablespoons vegetable oil

2 tablespoons ground flax seed

¼ oz active dry yeast (approx. 2 ¼ tsp.)

I put the warm water, yeast, and honey in the bread machine and let bubble for 10 minutes. Then I added the rest of the ingredients before hitting start on my bread machine.

I didn’t cook the bread in the bread machine, because last time I did that it didn’t work out so well. So after the bread had gone through both risings I put the dough in a grease loaf pan and baked it in the oven at 350˚ for about 30 minutes. Voila! I had bread! It was nice using the bread machine for the work, but it didn’t seem to work well for making the bread rise. I think next time I will do the rising myself and just knead in the bread machine.

Also, I added the flax seed instead of oil, which tasted fine right out of the oven, but the day after it was a little dry. Next time I think I will add another tablespoon of oil. If you’re having trouble finding bread flour, go to Winco! It’s an amazing store with barrels and barrels of bulk flour for cheap! You can find bread flour, pastry flour, cake flour, ground flax seed, nuts, oats, pasta, and more. It’s amazing. Go there.

Granola

I was not thrilled with this, which is why there are no pictures. I got this from this “Make-a-Mix” book I have. The mixes are good. The recipes are not, so far, are not. It’s from like ‘80s though, so really, what can I expect?

If anyone has a good granola recipe, please tell me. I have a tried a few, and none have really jumped out at me as good.