Too-Many-Apples Apple Cake

05. December 2011 · 50 comments · Categories: Baking, Breakfast, Cake, cooking, Dessert, food, recipes · Tags: , , ,

The weekend that Nate and I went up to beautiful Mohonk Mountain to rock scramble, we also attempted to pick some apples.

Unfortunately neither of us realized that apple season is September til early October and that the apples are pretty much gone by late October (at least in NY). Although it wasn’t quite as fun, they had barrels of apples for purchase. Since I already had my heart set on making some tasty apple treats, we grabbed a huge bag that probably had 2-3 dozen apples.

We also grabbed some hot cider and cider donuts while we were there, so it wasn’t a total bust.

Anyway, I’m not exactly sure what I thought I’d be making with all those apples, but this recipe is one that I made last year and it was so good I knew I wanted to make it again.

The cake is super moist and not too sweet. It could seriously be one of my favorite desserts. So if you still have some apples left from your apple picking, or you just want to make this since it’s so good, head on over to Smitten Kitchen’s website where I got the recipe.

The most yummy blondie ever!

01. December 2011 · 42 comments · Categories: Baking, Dessert, food, recipes

I’m really bad at keeping surprises. Obviously, I’d never tell a secret if you told me not to, but when I have a surprise of my own, it’s practically impossible for me to keep my big mouth closed until the secret is properly revealed.

For 3 months I created and tested the perfect recipe to submit to the Pillsbury Bake-off. For another 6 or so months I kept the recipe to myself since the competition wasn’t over til October. I SO wanted to tell you guys what I was up to, but I knew I needed to keep it a surprise until it was finally submitted and judged. I’ve never actually created a recipe from scratch, without basing it on anything. And let me tell you it’s not easy, especially when you have a specific way in your mind that you want it to turn out.

I went through 5 batches of these babies until they came out just right. Nate, poor guy, had to sample every single batch and he probably doesn’t want to eat another one of these again for a really long time.

The recipe, which I gave you a teaser of (although that was batch #1) are for a Butterscotch Rum Banana Spiced Blondie.  I’m not exactly sure how I came up with this idea, but it may be the best one I’ve ever had. The flavors, while seemingly unrelated, go together perfectly. I wanted them to be dense and chewy, and not too cakey but not too moist. I think I finally achieved the right consistency in batch #5.

Everyone who has tasted these has said they’re delicious. But the only people whose opinion I really care about are the Pillsbury judges, being that the grand prize is a cool $1 million.

Unfortunately, I guess those stupid judges weren’t thinking straight on the day they read over my recipe, so alas I was never contacted. But that doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy these babies at home. Go make a batch now!

**update since I wrote this post (before I actually published it)- Nate recently requested these last week and I was quite surprised. The last time he ate them was probably 3 or 4 months ago, but after having to taste so many of them I thought it would be at least a year til he wanted them again. That’s a good sign.


Butterscotch Rum Banana Spiced Blondies
Recipe by Me

Print this recipe!

makes 24

11 oz(s) plus 1/2 cup Butterscotch Chips
1.5 cup(s) light brown sugar, packed
10 Tbsp Unsalted Butter, cut into pieces
3 Tbsp  spiced rum
3 large eggs, beaten
1.5 tsp Ground Cinnamon
1.5 tsp Ground Ginger
1/2 tsp Ground Cloves
2 cups All Purpose Flour
3/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/2 cup very ripe banana, mashed (about 1)
1.5 medium ripe but firm bananas, cut into 24- 1/4″ thick slices

Preheat oven to 350. Grease and flour a 9 x 13 glass baking pan.

Put a large metal bowl over a pot of simmering water to create a double boiler. In bowl, melt 11 oz. butterscotch chips, brown sugar, butter, rum, and mashed banana. Stir often until butter is completely melted and mixture is smooth. Remove from heat and cool to room temperature.

When mixture is cool, whisk in the 3 eggs.

In a small bowl, combine spices, flour, and salt. Add to butterscotch/sugar mixture and whisk until just combined. Fold in remaining 1/2 cup butterscotch chips.

Pour batter into prepared pan and put in oven.

Bake blondies for 15 min. Remove from oven and place the 24 banana slices evenly spaced on top, in a 4 slice x 6 slice rectangle, so that there will be one banana slice in the center of each cut piece. Don’t push banana slices into batter, as they will sink while cooking.

Return pan to oven and cook for an additional 30 minutes or until bottom is golden and toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Rotate halfway through cooking.

Cool blondies on rack before cutting. Serve room temperature or cold. They’re not as good hot…and believe me I tried sampling them right out of the oven ;)

Chili for When it’s Chilly!

25. October 2011 · 12 comments · Categories: Brunch, cooking, Dessert, food, recipes · Tags: , , , ,

The weather in NYC is finally starting to feel like it should for this time of year. I’ve had to wear long sleeves AND a jacket, when I only needed one or the other up til now. And I’m loving it!

The leaves are changing, the air is crisp and it smells so good out! Nate and I went up to New Paltz this past weekend to go rock scrambling and the leaves were totally gorgeous. It was quite a hike up to the top, but when we got there, the view was absolutely worth it…

…don’t you think?

Despite working up a sweat during the climb, as soon as we got back to normal walking I was chilled to the bone. Weather like this makes me crave a thick, steaming bowl of something comforting. I’ve been wanting to make chili but Nate doesn’t like beef and we both love vegetables so much that I decided to go vegetarian all the way :)

I have to say that this came out a bit less “meaty” than I typically think of chili, but it was good none-the-less. I think perhaps adding more beans would have bulked it up and improved on the lack of meat, but I’m not a huge fan of beans.

You can totally customize this by adding whatever veggies you want. I bet anything would be delicious! I served mine over pasta because Nate needs something besides veggies to fill up his belly…and I happened to have some pasta in the fridge. Over rice would be great too.

*Disclaimer: if you live in a teeny apartment like mine, your whole place will smell like chili for the next week.

Smoky Vegetarian Chili

Recipe by Me

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Serves 8

Ingredients:

1 Tbsp olive oil
2 large sweet onions, chopped
1 red bell pepper, chopped
1 orange bell pepper, chopped (or red if unavailable)
2 yellow summer squash, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 bunch fresh cilantro, stems and leaves separated but both chopped
10 oz. frozen corn kernels, thawed
1.5-2 cups vegetable stock (i actually used chicken but that obviously would make it non-vegetarian)
Three 15-oz cans diced tomatoes with chiles
One 15-oz can kidney beans, rinsed and drained
2 tsp salt
2 Tbsp chili powder
2 Tbsp ground cumin
1 bottle dark Mexican bear
2 tsp liquid smoke (can be found in all supermarkets)
Sour Cream, shredded cheese, limes, avocado as desired for garnish

Preparation:

Heat oil in large pot over medium heat. Add onions and peppers and saute until they’re beginning to caramelize, about 8 min.

Add squash and garlic, and saute til tender, about 5 min.

Add cilantro stems and tomatoes to pot and bring to a simmer. Add beans, salt, chili powder, cumin, beer and the stock (start with 1.5 cups and add more if you like your chili thinner). Simmer uncovered, stirring frequently until the chili thickens and the vegetables soften, about 30 min.

Garnish as desired, and dig in!

Chocolate-peanut butter pb cup cookies

11. October 2011 · 22 comments · Categories: Baking, cooking, Dessert, food, recipes · Tags: , ,

I was on my way to my friend’s apartment recently, and as usual was running seriously early. I never really understood people who are always fashionably late. I get so nervous that the subway will be delayed or the walk will take longer than expected that I allow WAY too much time.

It doesn’t really bother me, though, because I’m pretty good at keeping myself entertained. Sometimes this involves window-shopping, other times I find a good place to sit and either read the book that I always carry with me, play on my phone (i.e. pretend I’m doing something really important so people don’t look at me weird), or just occupy myself with my own thoughts.


It’s amazing how many random thoughts are going on in my head at any one time. Nate can attest to this, as I blurt out irrelevant things that makes sense to me at the time (Duh, I’m thinking about them!), but make no sense to Nate. He actually caught my incoherent blabbering on video the other day, unbeknownst to me. After watching it played back for me, I gotta say that I feel pretty bad for the guy and don’t know how he puts up with me.

As you can see, I’m very good at going off on a tangent! Aaaaanyway, so the other day when I was early and needed to waste some time in the Times Square area, I saw a store called World of Chocolate and could not refuse a quick time-wasting trip. I have to say, the name of the store was quite deceiving. It was a pretty big let-down considering it was all of about 100-200 sq feet of space and only had Hershey’s products.

While perusing the aisles, I came across a bag of mini Reeses Peanut Butter cups. Not only were they totally adorable (I love anything miniature!), but I imagined they’d be absolutely perfect for a cookie recipe. I was thinking pb or chocolate base but hadn’t made a final decision yet.

So I took these adorable chocolates home and waited til I had a spare moment to create something. I started with the recipe I had created for the Chocolate Chocolate chip cookies, but to add some extra pb flavor, I subbed peanut butter in place of the butter in the recipe. I wasn’t exactly sure whether this would work or not.

As I started to blend the batter I realized how dry and thick it was, so I threw in another egg. Again, I had no idea what this would do.

While the batter was still rather thick, I put giant 1/4 cup balls of dough on the sheets a

nd baked them up. When I took them out of the oven and onto the drying rack I was a little worried since each cookie felt like a brick. I swear, so heavy! So don’t get worried when your cookies turn out heavy too.

At this point I was slightly worried that they’d be all dried out on the inside. But lucky for me, this recipe ended up a win! They were the fudgiest chocolate cookies ever. Nate gave them a giant thumbs up!!

If you can’t find mini pb cups, you could easily chop regular pb cups into 1/4-1/2 inch sized pieces.


Chocolate-Peanut Butter PB Cup Cookies
Recipe by Me

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makes 18-ish LARGE cookies

2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup dutch processed cocoa powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup peanut butter
4 Tbsp melted butter
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup white granulated sugar
3 eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups mini reese pb cups (or chopped reeses pb cups)

Heat oven to 325 degrees and have racks on upper & lower middle positions. Put parchment paper on 2 oversized cookie sheets (or do it in batches with smaller cookie sheets).

Whisk together flour, cocoa powder, salt & baking soda in medium size bowl. Set aside.

Mix peanut butter,  butter & sugars until thoroughly blended by hand or with electric mixer. Beat in eggs and vanilla until combined.

Add flour mixture to butter mixture and beat at low speed until just combined. Stir in pb cups.

Roll scant 1/4 cup dough into ball. Put ball on cookie sheet leaving 2.5 inches between each ball.

Bake about 15 – 18 minutes, switching sheets halfway through reversing sheets front to back and top to bottom. Cool cookies on cookie sheets. When cool, peel from parchment.

*Note, cookies will be very heavy when cooked!

…For a Sweet New Year!

26. September 2011 · 40 comments · Categories: Baking, Brunch, Cake, cooking, Dessert, food, recipes · Tags: , , , , ,

For those of you who don’t know, later in this week is Rosh Hashannah, the Jewish New Year.

The traditional food that one eats at Rosh Hashannah is honey, for a “sweet” New Year. So in honor of the holiday, I made this honey cake that my mom recommended.

Honey cakes are very often  made on Rosh Hashannah so there are a lot of recipes going around out there, but most of them are pretty average. I have to say that all the spices in this one made it really flavorful.

I can’t write too much more because this has been a long day…I got engaged!!!! What a sweet way to start off the new year!

So this short post will have to do. I hope you enjoy this, while I go admire my ring :)

Levana Kirschenbaum’s Honey Cake

Taken from Levana

Print this recipe!

Makes one 10-inch tube/bundt pan

Ingredients:

2 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons baking soda
pinch of salt
1 tablespoon ground cardamom
1 tablespoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
2 teaspoons cinnamon
4 eggs
1 cup dark brown sugar, packed
1 cup honey (see note)
1 cup vegetable oil
1 cup very strong warm tea (2 tea bags steeped in 1 cup hot water)
1/2 cup ground almonds, optional
3 tablespoons sliced almonds (add only if using the ground almonds)

In a bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cardamom, ginger, nutmeg, and cinnamon an set aside.

In a food processor, process the eggs with the sugar, honey, and oil, just until combined. Beginning and ending with the dry ingredients, add the flour mixture in thirds, alternating with the tea. Pulse 2 to 3 times after each addition, just to incorporate. Add the ground almonds, if desired.

Pour the batter into a greased 10-inch springform pan or tube pan. Top with the sliced almonds, if using. Bake for 1 hour or until a knife inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean. Invert the cake onto a rack to cool. Turn right side up to serve.

Note: If you measure the oil for the recipe first, then use the same measuring cup to measure the honey, the honey will slide out easily.

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