Chocolate Cherry Cake

When my mom was visiting this past summer, she made this cake one night. She got the recipe from my brother's friend who made it when she was visiting. As she was gathering the ingredients, I wasn't sure what we were going to get. A box of cake mix. A can of pie filling. Not two ingredients that typically go together.

When I took a bite of this cake, I was pleasantly surprised. It was very moist and chocolatey, with a hint of cherry. Delicious. And the ganache was amazing.


Last night we had a Christmas dinner with some friends and I decided to make this cake. I've had the ingredients on hand, and I thought it would be a perfect ending to a holiday dinner. I think I was right. It was a big hit, and tasted just as good as the first time I tasted it.

The best part? It's SO easy! And I keep thinking of all of the variations you could do - white cake mix with peach pie filling, yellow cake mix with apple pie filling, etc. Try this cake. You will not be disappointed.


Chocolate Cherry Cake

1 box devils food cake mix
2 eggs
1 can cherry pie filling
1 tsp almond extract

Mix eggs, pie filling, and almond extract together. Add cake mix. Mix until moist, but don't over mix.

Bake in 9” springform pan at 325 degrees for 55 min. or until done.


Ganache Frosting

2 1/2 Tbsp. butter
3 Tbsp. milk
1/2 c. sugar (powdered)
1/2 c. high quality dark chocolate chips

Melt together. Pour frosting over cake as soon as cake comes out of oven after taking out of pan.

Eggnog Pancakes

To kick off the holiday season right, I made some eggnog pancakes for breakfast. I got the idea from a friend who said to use a buttermilk pancake recipe, and just substitute eggnog for the buttermilk. Genius! I felt so festive eating eggnog pancakes, and then putting up the Christmas tree and decorating while listening to Christmas music. 'Tis the Season!


Eggnog Pancakes

2 eggs, separated
2 cups eggnog
4 tablespoons melted butter
2 cups flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
2 tsp sugar

Heat an electric griddle or frying pan to 350 degrees F. Heat oven to 200 degrees F.

In a medium bowl, combine the dry ingredients and set aside.

Whisk together the egg whites and the eggnog in a small bowl. In another bowl, whisk the egg yolks with the melted butter.

Combine the eggnog mixture with the egg yolk mixture in a large mixing bowl and whisk together until thoroughly combined. Pour the liquid ingredients on top of the dry ingredients. Using a whisk, mix the batter just enough to bring it together. Don't try to work all the lumps out.

Cook on a hot griddle and serve.

Mmm, Pie!

I made my first attempt at lemon meringue pie for Thanksgiving, and it turned out to be an epic battle. 3 pie crusts and 2 lemon curd attempts later, I had a winner.

My first crust was Martha Stewart's Favorite Pie Crust. It was just too thin for me. It was flaky, but not very tender. Strike 1.

The second crust was Alton Brown's Pie Crust. I actually didn't taste it (duh) but it was also too thin for me. Not what I was going for. Strike 2.

My third crust was Sylvia's Perfect Pie Crust. And man, was it perfect. It was tender and flaky, and just the right thickness. It was sturdy enough to hold together when lifted out of the pie pan with that heavy curd in it. And it was SO EASY. Home Run!


The lemon curd recipe I used was Alton Brown's and with a few adjustments it turned out to be amazingly delicious. The first attempt was just plain soup. It didn't set right. And I followed every word in the instructions to a T. So, we made a couple of adjustments. I added an extra couple of tablespoons of cornstarch, and I made sure to simmer each step an extra minute.


In the end, everything was as it should be. Lemon meringue pie that was sweet, tart, and lemony, with tender, flaky crust, and just the right amount of meringue. Life is good.

Sylvia's Perfect Pie Crust

Ingredients

1 1/2 cup Crisco (vegetable Shortening)
3 cups All-purpose Flour
1 whole Egg
5 Tablespoons Cold Water
1 Tablespoon White Vinegar
1 teaspoon Salt

Instructions

In a large bowl, with a pastry cutter, gradually work the Crisco into the flour for about 3 or 4 minutes until it resembles a coarse meal. In a small bowl, beat an egg with a fork and then pour it into the flour/shortening mixture. Add 5 tablespoons of cold water, 1 tablespoon of white vinegar and 1 teaspoon of salt. Stir together gently until all of the ingredients are incorporated.

Separate the dough into thirds. Form 3 evenly sized balls of dough and place each dough into a large Ziploc bag. Using a rolling pin, slightly flatten each ball of dough (about ½ inch thick) to make rolling easier later. Seal the bags and place them in the freezer until you need them. (If you will be using it immediately it’s still a good idea to put in the freezer for about 15 to 20 minutes to chill.)

When you are ready to use the dough to make a crust, remove from the freezer and allow to thaw for 15 minutes. On a floured surface roll the dough, starting at the center and working your way out. (Sprinkle some flour over top of the dough if it’s a bit too moist.) If the dough is sticking to the countertop use a metal spatula and carefully scrape it up and flip it over and continue rolling until it’s about ½ inch larger in diameter than your pie pan.

With a spatula, lift the dough carefully from the surface of the counter into the pie pan. Gently press the dough against the corner of the pan. Go around the pie pan pinching and tucking the dough to make a clean edge.

* For prebaking, prick the crust with a fork several times, then put some parchment paper on top of the crust and fill it with beans. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes, and then remove the parchment and beans and bake an additional 15-20 minutes until golden brown.

* If you want, you can also tent some aluminum foil around the edges of the crust to prevent from browning too quickly.


Lemon Filling

4 egg yolks (reserve whites for meringue)
1/3 cup + 2 tbsp cornstarch
1 1/2 cups water
1 1/3 cups sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons butter
1/2 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 tablespoon finely grated lemon zest

Instructions

Adjust the oven rack to the middle position. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.

Whisk egg yolks in medium size mixing bowl and set aside.

In a medium saucepan, combine cornstarch, water, sugar, and salt. Whisk to combine. Turn heat on medium and, stirring frequently, bring mixture to a boil. Boil for 1 minute. Remove from heat and gradually, 1 whisk-full at a time, add hot mixture to egg yolks and stir until you have added at least half of the mixture.

Return egg mixture to saucepan, turn heat down to low and cook, stirring constantly, for 2 more minutes, until very thick. Remove from heat and gently stir in butter, lemon juice, and zest until well combined. Pour mixture into pie shell and top with meringue while filling is still hot. Make sure meringue completely covers filling and that it goes right up to the edge of the crust. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes or until meringue is golden. Remove from oven and cool on a wire rack. Make sure pie is cooled completely before slicing.

Meringue Topping

4 egg whites
1 pinch cream of tartar
2 tablespoons sugar

Place egg whites and cream of tartar in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment. Beat egg whites until soft peaks form and then gradually add sugar and continue beating until stiff peaks form, approximately 1 to 2 minutes. Use to top lemon filling.

Yield: topping for 1 (9-inch) pie

Sour Cream Cookies

Something you may not know about me is that I have cookie cutters galore for every holiday - Valentine's Day, St. Patrick's Day, Easter, Halloween...you name the holiday, I've got a cookie cutter for it!

So you can only imagine that as we start getting close to a holiday, the thing on my mind is how and when I can make my sour cream cookies. These cookies are tradition for me. We used to make them when I was a kid, and I always looked forward to it. We even made them with my nephews a couple of Christmases ago. We managed to keep the mess under control, and the boys had a lot of fun!

So what is the difference between a sour cream cookie and a sugar cookie? Well, I think the sour cream cookie is softer and has a creamier flavor than the sugar cookie. I also love the little hint of nutmeg that shines through. These cookies are always delicious, and I have never had a batch go wrong. Oh, and the cream cheese frosting? Don't even get me started. DELICIOUS.


Sour Cream Cookies

½ cup melted margarine
1 cup sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla extract
½ tsp nutmeg

Beat the above together until thoroughly mixed.

1 cup sour cream
½ tsp salt
3 ¼ cup flour
1 tsp soda

Mix well adding flour as needed to make dough workable. Best when dough is on the moist side. Roll dough out to about ¼ inch thickness. Bake at 400 degrees for 8-10 minutes until brown barely visible around bottom.


Cream Cheese Frosting

1 pound cream cheese, room temperature (2 cubes)
¾ pound unsalted butter, room temperature (3 cubes)
1 tsp vanilla extract
½ tsp almond extract
1 ½ pounds confectioners sugar, sifted

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, blend together the cream cheese, butter, vanilla, and almond extracts. Add the confectioners sugar and mix until smooth.

Haunted Halloween

My friends and I had another Iron Chef night, and this time the secret ingredient was Halloween. We were assigned dessert, so I went on a search to find something spooky. I wasn't originally planning on doing a time-consuming, detailed dessert, but the baker in me took over and I wanted a challenge.

I found Martha Stewart's Haunted House cake, or should I say, it found me. I knew I didn't have it in me to do every last detail like Martha, but I worked my heart out on this cake. It took me hours to make, but it was a lot of fun. And it turned out pretty haunted looking, don't ya think?


A few notes about this cake - it's a devil's food cake, meaning it's very dark chocolatey-tasting. I was very pleased with the flavor, but it did end up a little drier than I had hoped (probably from my tweaking of sizes of pans to cook it in).

On to the chocolate buttercream frosting. It was honestly delicious. Light, chocolatey, buttery, and oh-so-good. This frosting will definitely be making it into my line up of go-to recipes.

The chocolate cookies for the tree and house were made with dutch-processed cocoa, which is why they look almost black. The cookies were a little salty for me, but they held up really well on the cake. Until the tree fell off of the cake and broke...

Have a Happy Halloween!

Pumpkin Cookies with Brown Butter Icing

I don't know if I've ever mentioned this before, but pumpkin is one of those things that is hit and miss for me. Sometimes I make something with pumpkin and it turns out gooey and just plain awful. Other times it turns out just as I hoped it would. It doesn't help that my husband doesn't really like things with pumpkin in it, so I don't have a whole lot of motivation to perfect this part of my baking. Oh well.

This is a long lost recipe that I made about 5 years ago for the first time. I've only made these cookies twice in my life, but both times they turned out delicious. And that's saying something considering my history with pumpkin!


I found this recipe in the back of a Martha Stewart magazine. I needed a treat for a dinner at my in-laws, so I whipped these cookies up. Everyone loved them, and I even had people asking for the recipe. I made these again last week, and I think they turned out pretty good.

These are a light, almost cake-like cookie. The frosting is very sweet but adds a nice complementary flavor to the pumpkin spice. A few notes - this recipe makes a lot of batter. As an alternative to the cookie, you could throw some of the batter into a muffin pan and make some cupcakes. Also, the recipe on Martha Stewart's website says to pipe the batter out onto the cookie sheet, but I chose to use a 1 1/2 inch cookie scoop. And last, but not least, my cookies stuck to the parchment paper I used. So I pulled out my silpat, and the cookies browned nicely on the bottom and were easy to transfer.

So, here's the recipe. And the best part? They're small so you can eat as many as you want!


Pumpkin Cookies with Brown Butter Icing
Martha Stewart

Makes about 6 dozen

FOR THE COOKIES

2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/4 teaspoons coarse salt
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 1/4 teaspoons ground ginger
3/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
2 1/4 cups packed light-brown sugar
2 large eggs
1 1/2 cups canned solid-pack pumpkin (14 ounces)
3/4 cup evaporated milk
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

FOR THE ICING

4 cups confectioners' sugar, sifted
10 tablespoons (1 1/4 sticks) unsalted butter
1/4 cup plus 1 tablespoon evaporated milk,
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

Directions

1. Make cookies: Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg in a medium bowl; set aside.

2. Put butter and brown sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Mix on medium speed until pale and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Mix in eggs. Reduce speed to low. Add pumpkin, evaporated milk, and vanilla; mix until well blended, about 2 minutes. Add flour mixture; mix until combined.

3. Use a 1 1/2 inch cookie scoop to scoop batter onto parchment lined cookie sheet. Bake cookies, rotating sheets halfway through, until tops spring back, about 12 minutes. Cool on sheets on wire racks 5 minutes. Transfer cookies to wire racks; let cool completely.

4. Make icing: Put confectioners' sugar in a large bowl; set aside. Melt butter in a small saucepan over medium heat. Cook, swirling pan occasionally, until golden brown, about 3 minutes. Immediately add butter to confectioners' sugar, scraping any browned bits from sides and bottom of pan. Add evaporated milk and vanilla; stir until smooth. Spread about 1 teaspoon icing onto each cookie. If icing stiffens, stir in more evaporated milk, a little at a time. Cookies can be stored in single layers in airtight containers at room temperature up to 3 days.

Cupcake Disappointment

My friends and I were in New York last week and decided to seek out some famous cupcakes. Can I just say that I was totally disappointed? I had envisioned this cute, trendy bakery with amazing, melt-in-your-mouth cupcakes. What I found was a little run-down shop that is so small it made me almost feel claustrophobic, and the cupcakes were just average - like something you could find in any old bakery.

Needless to say, my tastebuds were craving some good cupcakes. I really wanted to make some red velvet cupcakes, because 1) I love red velvet cake, and 2) it's something I have never made before. I set out to find a good recipe, and I must say that I was very pleased with the one I found. It's from the Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook, and I was intrigued by the Cinnamon Cream Cheese Frosting. Doesn't that sound delicious? I have never thought to add cinnamon to my frosting!


The result was a rich, moist, slightly chocolatey red velvet cupcake. And the cinnamon cream cheese frosting? Yum! The combination of the two was amazingly good. I am a big fan.

I also made some yellow cupcakes with Cook's Illustrated Fool Proof Frosting. The yellow cake was moist and light. But the real highlight for me was the frosting. I just might have been caught piping some frosting into my mouth...that is...if someone had been around to catch me.


Red Velvet Cupcakes with Cinnamon Cream Cheese Frosting
Recipe from Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook
Makes one dozen cupcakes

4 Tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
3/4 cup sugar
1 egg
2 1/2 Tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
3 Tablespoons red food coloring
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 cup plus 2 Tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons distilled white vinegar

Preheat oven to 325° F.

In the bowl of a stand mixer fit with a paddle attachment, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about three minutes. Turn mixer to high and add the egg. Scrape down the bowl and beat until well incorporated.

In a separate bowl mix together cocoa, vanilla and red food coloring to make a thick paste. Add to the batter, mixing thoroughly until completely combined. You may need to stop the mixer to scrape the bottom of the bowl, making sure that all the batter gets color.

Turn mixer to low and slowly add half of the buttermilk. Add half of the flour and mix until combined. Scrape the bowl and repeat the process with the remaining milk and flour. Beat on high until smooth.

Turn mixer to low and add baking soda and white vinegar. Turn to high and beat a few more minutes.

Spoon batter into a paper lined cupcake baking pan and bake at 325° F for 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center cupcake comes out clean.

Let rest in the pan for 10 minutes, then place them on a cooling rack to cool completely before frosting.

Cinnamon Cream Cheese Frosting
Adapted from Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook

2 1/3 cups powdered sugar, sifted
3 Tablespoons butter, room temperature
4 ounces cream cheese, cold (I used room temperature)
scant 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Beat the powdered sugar, cinnamon, and butter together in the bowl of a stand mixer fit with a paddle attachment. Mix on medium-slow speed until it comes together and is well mixed.

Add the cream cheese all at once and beat on medium to medium-high until incorporated.

Turn the mixer to medium-high and beat for 5 minutes, or until the frosting becomes light and fluffy.

Do not over-beat as the frosting can quickly become runny.


Classic Yellow Cake

1/2 cup butter
1 1/4 cups white sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1/2 tsp almond extract
1 1/4 cups buttermilk
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda

Preheat oven to 350° F.

In the bowl of a stand mixer fit with a paddle attachment, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about three minutes. Turn mixer to high and add the eggs, one at a time. Scrape down the bowl and beat until well incorporated. Add the vanilla.

In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder and baking soda. Beat in the flour mixture alternately with the buttermilk, ending with the flour, mixing just until incorporated.

Spoon batter into a paper lined cupcake baking pan and bake at 350° F for 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center cupcake comes out clean.

Let rest in the pan for 10 minutes, then place them on a cooling rack to cool completely before frosting.

Fool Proof Chocolate Frosting
Recipe from Cook's Illustrated
Makes 3 cups to frost one 9-inch, 2-layer cake

2 1/2 sticks unsalted butter, softened
1 cup confectioners' sugar
3/4 cup Dutch-processed cocoa
Pinch table salt
3/4 cup light corn syrup
1 tsp vanilla extract
8 ounces milk chocolate, melted and cooled slightly

In food processor, process butter, sugar, cocoa, and salt until smooth, about 30 seconds, scraping sides of bowl as needed. Add corn syrup and vanilla and process until just combined, 5 to 10 seconds. Scrape sides of bowl, then add chocolate and pulse until smooth and creamy, 10 to 15 seconds. Frosting can be used immediately and can be made 3 hours in advance. For longer storage, refrigerate the frosting, covered, and let it stand at room temperature for 1 hour before using.