Archive for May, 2009

Devil’s Food Cake with Chocolate-Orange Buttercream

{ May 19, 2009 @ 12:22 am } · { Uncategorized }
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If you’re looking for a cake recipe that can magically smooth over anything bad that ever happened to you and restore your faith in humanity, look no further.  This is, without a doubt, the best chocolate cake I have ever made.

devil's food cake

Ingredients:

Cake

  • 4 ounces bittersweet (not unsweetened) or semisweet chocolate, chopped (I used Ghirardelli Bittersweet 60% cacao chocolate)
  • 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
  • 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon coarse kosher salt
  • 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 cup whole milk
  • 1/2 cup plain whole-milk yogurt (I used low fat sour cream, all I had)
  • 1 1/2 cups (packed) golden brown sugar
  • 3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
  • 4 large eggs

Buttercream frosting:

  • 8 ounces bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, chopped (used Ghirardelli Bittersweet again)
  • 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 7 tablespoons (or more) water
  • 1 1/2 cups (3 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
  • 4 cups powdered sugar, divided
  • 1 tablespoon grated orange peel (used mandarin orange peel)
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
  • 1/2 teaspoon coarse kosher salt
  • 1 tablespoon Grand Marnier or other orange liqueur (used fresh juice from mandarin orange)
  • Chocolate curls

Preparation:

For cake:
Position rack in center of oven and preheat to 325°F. Butter and flour two 9-inch-diameter cake pans with 1 1/2-inch-high sides. Line bottoms of pans with parchment paper rounds. Stir chocolate in top of double boiler set over simmering water until smooth. Remove from over water. Cool to barely lukewarm.

Sift flour and next 4 ingredients into medium bowl. Whisk milk and yogurt to blend in small bowl. Using electric mixer, beat brown sugar, and butter in large bowl until smooth. Beat in eggs, 1 at a time. Beat in melted chocolate until smooth. Mix in dry ingredients alternately with milk mixture in 3 additions each. Divide batter between prepared pans.

Bake cakes until tester inserted into centers comes out clean, about 30 minutes. Cool cakes in pans on racks 15 minutes. Turn cakes out onto racks; remove parchment and cool completely.

For buttercream frosting:
Stir 8 ounces chocolate in top of double boiler set over simmering water until smooth. Cool until barely lukewarm but still pourable. Mix cocoa powder and 7 tablespoons water in heavy small saucepan. Stir over medium-low heat until smooth and thick but still pourable, adding more water by teaspoonfuls if necessary. Cool.

Beat butter, 1/3 cup powdered sugar, and orange peel in large bowl to blend. Add melted chocolate, vanilla, and salt; beat until smooth. Beat in cocoa mixture. Gradually add remaining 3 2/3 cups powdered sugar and beat until frosting is smooth. Mix in Grand Marnier or orange juice.

Place 1 cake layer on platter. Spread 1 1/2 cups frosting over top of cake. Top with second cake layer. Spread remaining frosting over top and sides of cake, swirling decoratively. Mound chocolate curls in center of cake. (Can be made 1 day ahead. Cover with cake dome and refrigerate. Let cake stand at room temperature 2 hours before serving.)

Slow-Cooker Spicy Chipotle Pork

{ May 19, 2009 @ 12:13 am } · { Uncategorized }
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Drum roll please:  This weekend I invented my very first original recipe!  It is incredibly easy and deceptively delicious.  Throw this in your slow cooker and your friends and family won’t believe their taste buds when you tell them how simple it was to prepare.

Here’s the backstory: My dad and I had some pork shoulder in the freezer, which I had put in the fridge to defrost over the weekend.  I had only one problem: I was sick to death of the standard BBQ Pulled Pork slow-cooker recipes, and I was far too busy enjoying the gorgeous sunshine to slave away in the kitchen all day.  After checking at a couple of grocery stores for some adobo seasoning or paste to put in the slow-cooker with the pork shoulder and coming up empty-handed, inspiration struck: my favorite canned chipotle chilis are in an adobo sauce.  I simply plopped the contents of a can of chipotle chilis in the slow-cooker with the skinless, boneless pork shoulder, a cup of water and some roughly chopped onions and set the slow cooker to the 4 hrs cooking time.  I ended up with some tender, juicy, pork that had a deliciously spicy, smokey taste.  I served the pork with a mild avocado sauce, diced fresh pineapple and onions and cilantro.  Wow, am I glad I finally moved beyond slow-cooker BBQ pulled pork, this was amazing!  I’ll take pictures the next time I make this recipe.

Ingredients:

  • 1-3 lbs pork shoulder, skin and bone removed
  • 1 can chipotle chilies in adobo sauce
  • small white onion, roughly chopped
  • enough water to cover bottom of slow cooker, approximately 1/2 cup

Preparation:

Place the whole pork shoulder into the bottom of the slow-cooker.  Pour water into slow cooker.  Pour chipotle chilies and sauce from can over pork.  Drop chopped onions on top of mixture.  Turn slow-cooker on for whatever time period works best for you.  I got a late start on my recipe so I only had four hours.  If you have longer, cook it for longer, it will be even more tender and juicy.  Serve in corn tortillas with fresh salsa, pineapple, onions, and cilantro.  My salsa recipes are in my Tacos Al Pastor post.

Enjoy!

Creme Brulee

{ May 18, 2009 @ 11:51 pm } · { Uncategorized }
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My mom works so hard all year to take care of the fam, I knew I had to roll out the red carpet for her Mother’s Day dessert.  Creme Brulee has long been one of my favorite desserts to order at swanky restaurants.  My disastrous first try at making creme brulee was this past Thanksgiving.  Pumpkin creme brulee is great in theory, but in reality it has a gritty texture from all the spices.  Plus, I didn’t have a kitchen torch, and the oven broiler method made the custard all runny.  Ugh!  It would have ruined most cooks’ resolve to ever make creme brulee again, but a good friend of mine gave me a kitchen torch for Christmas, so I was better prepared for this more successful second attempt.

Behold: My Mother’s Day Creme Brulee.  I like to think it turned out so well because of all the love I baked into it. 🙂

cremebrulee

I was surprised at how simple it is to make this wonderful dessert.  The only hard part is making sure you have the correct equipment: custard dishes and a kitchen torch.

Here is the recipe:

Ingredients

  • 6 large eggs yolks
  • 6 tablespoons sugar
  • 1 tsp vanilla
  • 1 1/2 cups whipping cream
  • 2-4 tbsp granulated sugar
  • Fresh or frozen strawberries or raspberries for garnishing

Preparation

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.  Whisk yolks and 6 tablespoons sugar in medium bowl to blend.  Stir in vanilla.  Gradually whisk in cream.  Divide mixture among dishes.  Arrange dishes in 13x9x2-inch baking pan.  Pour enough hot water into pan to come halfway up sides of dishes.

Bake custards until set in center, about 40 minutes.  Place pan on work surface.  Cool custards in water 30 minutes.  Remove from water; chill overnight.

Sprinkle sugar atop each custard.  Use kitchen torch to caramelize sugar on top of each custard, moving in even circles.  Garnish with berries and serve immediately or refrigerate until later.  (If you don’t have a kitchen torch, you can use an oven broiler.  Here are the broiler instructions: Preheat broiler. Sprinkle sugar atop each custard.  Place dishes on small baking sheet.  Broil until sugar just starts to caramelize, rotating sheet for even browling, about 2 minutes.  Chill until topping hardens, about 2 hours.  Garnish with berries.)

Although strawberries look pretty with the creme brulee, the piquant sweetness of raspberries make a nice foil to the creamy smoothness of the creme brulee.  I can’t wait to make this again!

Angel Food Cake with Strawberries and Ice Cream

{ May 5, 2009 @ 7:53 pm } · { Uncategorized }
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krystipics-036

Angel Food Cake with strawberries and ice cream is one of my all-time favorite desserts.  Made with eggs whites and no butter or oil, it is a fluffy, fat free confection.  It’s pretty easy to make too!

Here is the recipe as found in “The All New Good Housekeeping Cookbook.”

Ingredients

  • 1 cup cake flour (not self-rising). [I never have cake flour, so I just sift regular flour before measuring.]
  • 1/2 cup confectioners’ sugar (powdered sugar)
  • 1 2/3 cups egg whites (12 to 14 large egg whites)
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons cream of tartar
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 1/4 cups granulated sugar
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
  • 1/2 teaspoon almond extract

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Sift flour and confectioners’ sugar through sieve set over small bowl.

2. In large bowl, with mixer at medium speed, beat egg whites, cream of tartar, and salt until foamy.  Increase speed to medium-high; beat until soft peaks form when beaters are lifted.  Sprinkle in granulated sugar, 2 tablespoons at a time, beating until sugar has dissolved and egg whites stand in stiff, glossy peaks when beaters are lifted.  Beat in vanilla and almond extracts.

3. Transfer egg-white mixture to larger bowl.  Sift flour mixture, one-thired at a time, over beaten egg whites; fold in with rubber spatula just until flour mixture is no longer visible.  Do not overmix.

4. Scrape batter into ungreased 9- to 10-inch tube pan; spread evenly. Bake until cake springs back when lightly pressed, 35-40 minutes (mine took more like 30 minutes, so keep an eye on yours). Invert cake in pan onto large metal funnel or bottle; cool completely in pan.  Run thin knife around cake to loosen from side and center tube of pan.  Remove from pan and place on cake plate. Makes 16 servings.

Voila! Here is what the finished product looks like:

krystipics-025

It has a much nicer texture and more cotton candy-like flavor than a store bought angel food cake.  Plus, none of those icky preservatives!  I took a picture of my tube pan.  Before I found this at a garage sale, I’d always used a bundt cake pan for angel food cake.  A tube pan makes the classic shape, and it’s a lot easier to get the angel food cake out of a tube pan.  Enjoy!

krystipics-039

Chocolate Duet Cookies from Panera–My Version

{ May 4, 2009 @ 8:33 pm } · { baking, recipes }
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chocolateduet

This one goes out especially to my Panera Bread peeps, Roxanne and Nate.  We had some great times eating Frontera Chicken sandwiches, Tomato Basil Bisque, and Chocolate Duet Cookies while informally counseling one another on our love lives.  While your great advice may not have stuck with me (sorry guys!), my love for the crunchy, chocolatey deliciousness that is the Chocolate Duet Cookie is still going strong.

Even though there is a Panera less than a mile away from me here in Washington, I like to know how to make all my favorite foods at home.  So, last Friday I scoured the ‘net for the official Panera Chocolate Duet Cookie recipe to no avail.   I improvised!  Here is the recipe I came up with.  If my dad eating the whole batch almost single-handedly in a 24 hour period is any indication, this recipe is a hit!

Ingredients

  • 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
  • 3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 1/2 sticks (3/4 cup) unsalted butter, softened
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
  • 1/2 cup white chocolate chips (for less sweetness use less white chocolate and more semi-sweet chocolate)
  • 1/2 cup coarsely chopped nuts (Panera uses walnuts, I used macadamia nuts)

Preparation

Preheat oven to 375°F (you may need to adjust this based on your particular oven, my mom’s oven bakes these perfectly at 375° and my dad’s needs to be set at 350°.)

Whisk together flour, cocoa, baking soda, and salt in a medium bowl.

Beat together butter and sugar with an electric mixer until pale and fluffy, then beat in eggs and vanilla until combined. Add flour mixture and mix just until combined.  Stir in chocolate chips and nuts.

Drop level tablespoons of dough about 2 inches apart onto ungreased baking sheets and bake in batches in middle of oven until puffed and set, about 8-10 minutes. Transfer cookies to a rack to cool.  Makes about 30 cookies.

Keep an eye on these cookies in the oven, especially on your first batch.  You don’t want them to burn on the edges!