Lego cake & a mother's love

I'm not sure how, but somehow, my little guy is turning six. When I asked him several weeks ago what kind of cake he wanted for his (first ever!) friend birthday party, he responded with, "A weapon's case with weapons on it like a sword and shield and ax." ??! No idea where this stuff comes from. When I explained that that probably wasn't likely, he decided, "How about a blue six-studded Lego block?" Hm...well, that I could probably do.

I did some research, but couldn't find much, until I stumbled on this article from the Kitchn: How to make an anatomically correct Lego cake. I was really impressed with the math and research that went into it...but I wasn't that concerned with the precise measurements of my cake. The one piece of advice I did take was the idea of using mini-muffins for the studs of the Legos.

Following my friend Di's lead, instead of making a sheet cake and trying to slice it in half horizontally, I decided to bake the cake in two jelly roll pans. I was nervous that a 9x13 wouldn't be big enough (we were expecting up to 20 people, depending on how many parents stayed at the party), and then I found two 15.5"x10.5" pans. Perfect!

I settled on Dorie's devil's food cake (you can find the recipe here), remembering that it was sturdy, moist, and yummy the last time I made it. I made a full recipe, divided into the two jelly roll pans, plus 18 mini muffins.

I asked the little guy what kind of frosting he wanted in between the layers, and he decided on chocolate. Knowing how rich the cake was, I wanted a light chocolate frosting and found this recipe, which was just the thing. Unfortunately, I only had one stick of butter at room temperature, so I made a half recipe; I wish I would've had a bit more, but it was enough to make a thin layer in between the cake layers.

Looking for a stable, easy-to-color frosting, with a light taste and texture that wouldn't compete with the chocolates, I decided to try seven-minute frosting. I used ATK's recipe, adding blue food coloring with the vanilla at the end. I was impressed with how easy the frosting was to make, and as promised, it tasted very marshmallowy, and was a huge hit. As I tried to frost each individual stud without getting too many crumbs in the frosting, I said to my little guy, "This is proof of a mother's love." :)

The cake was a huge hit; even I couldn't think of any "it's good but"s. My mom, brother, and sister couldn't stop raving, and the little guy begged and begged for a second piece (I didn't cave). When I asked the birthday boy if the cake lived up to his expectations, he said, "It was perfectly excellent."

Dorie's black and white chocolate birthday cake

It was recently my 37th birthday! I think I've posted before about the fact that, being the cake baker in the family, I frequently passed my birthday without birthday cake. A few years ago, I finally complained to my hubby, and he started buying me an ice cream cake, one of my favorite treats.
Last year, I decided I wanted to make my own birthday treat, and I made cupcakes with my girl. This year, I decided I wanted to make myself a fancy cake. I paged through my cookbooks, finally settling on Dorie's black and white chocolate cake, a yellow buttermilk cake filled with dark chocolate cream and frosted with white chocolate whipped cream.

I made a half recipe, using my two 6" round pans. After reading some commentary about the recipe, I decided to make 3/4 of the whipped cream recipe to be sure I'd have enough to frost the entire cake. The cake was a bit of a process, but I baked the cake and made the chocolate cream a day early, so it wasn't too overwhelming. I was also careful to take advantage of our deep freeze, freezing the cake layers before frosting and freezing it after the crumb coat. It worked beautifully, and was a delicious and fancy way to celebrate my birthday with my favorite people. :)

Popovers! (TWD: BwJ)

I was not all that excited for this week's Tuesdays with Dorie recipe; I think I've only ever had popovers once, the one time I baked them before, and I wasn't that impressed.
But it couldn't be an easier recipe: toss flour, salt, melted butter, warm milk, and eggs into a blender (I was careful to be sure that my milk and eggs were both warm). Pour 1/4 cup into some buttered muffin cups (I did preheat my pan, given some comments on the P&Q). Bake. Eat. Seemed like it would be silly not to try the recipe.

And I really enjoyed them! We ate them warm and buttered, spread with the last of my strawberry-honey jam, with our eggs. Delish!

Check out the rest of the TWDers' experiences here, and check our hosts' pages for the recipe: Paula and Amy....or better yet, buy the book! :-)

Wordless Wednesday: Everyone gets what they like best

Individual berry tart, with Dorie's pastry cream and NM's sweet tart dough, glaze made from strawberry-thyme jam; individual jelly jar parfaits with pastry cream, whipped cream, Dorie's cocoa crumbs, and varied berries depending on preference (inspired by Di)

French strawberry cake (TWD: BwJ)

Genoise and I haven't always gotten along (read this story if you're interested in a cocoa genoise complete comedy of errors), so I was a little nervous about this week's TWD: BwJ recipe: French strawberry cake.

But then we went strawberry picking on the spur of the moment (I love summer!), and it seemed that I'd have to make it for sure. I macerated the strawberries ahead of time, and assuming I'd make a half-recipe because I always do, I used half the amounts.

The next day, I read the instructions for the cake: oops! The recipe makes an 8" round....which I don't own. I have a 9" or a 6". The 6" was too big for a half-batch, so, being too lazy to try to scale the recipe correctly, I made a full recipe, filled the 6", a ramekin, and had a little batter left over.

I knew many people had struggled with the cake, so I was uber-careful. I let the eggs sit in warm water for a long time, carefully measured out all ingredients ahead of time (including sifting the flour prior to measuring because I noticed that it said "1 cup sifted flour" and not "1 cup flour, sifted"), and read each step about 17 times. When my eggs and sugar hadn't doubled in volume after 5 minutes of whipping, I remembered something I'd read on the P&Q about the egg temperature...sure enough, when I stuck my finger in the bowl, the eggs were cool. I set the mixing bowl in a bowl of hot water, and after about five minutes, the eggs felt warm; they whipped up beautifully after that.

When it came time to fold in the flour, I decided not to use my usual method, which usually yields sketchy results: I usually dump in the flour and use a rubber spatula to fold. Instead, I carefully sifted bits of flour over the top and then used a big balloon whisk. This seemed to work. The batter didn't deflate nearly as much as it usually does. The ramekin baked in 24 minutes, and the 6" cake baked in 27 minutes.

While they baked, I made the whipped cream (a full batch because it sounded too good not to): cream, sugar, sour cream, and vanilla...yes, please!

The cake was tall enough to cut in three layers, but I was just making it for our family dessert and it was late and I was tired, so I went the lazy route: two layers and no fancy decorating. It didn't matter; we all loved this cake. I usually make the kids eat dinner before dessert (on the rare occasions when we have dessert), but once in a while, when I make something extra special, I serve it with the meal. The little guy gobbled his cake up before touching anything else, and then said, "There seems to be a problem; my cake is all gone. I think I need another serving."

For the recipe, check out our hosts' blogs: Sophia of Sophia’s Sweets and Allison of Sleep Love Think Dine, and to see what everyone else thought, check the links.

Food for a rainy day: Oasis Naan (TWD: BwJ)

Our first June TWD: BwJ recipe is oasis naan.

When my friend Phyl found out that he was hosting, he proposed a Twitterbake of butter chicken and naan. We were all supposed to make it on a Thursday...and then were all too tired/busy to cook. And then we were supposed to make it on Friday. So Thursday night, I quickly mixed up the dough with warm water, yeast, flour, and salt, and kneaded it on the counter until it was smooth. You're supposed to leave it on the counter for a couple hours or refrigerate it overnight; I stuck mine in the fridge. And then we got invited to a last-minute barbecue at our friends' new house...couldn't pass that up! So I missed out on the Twitterbake once again, and my naan dough lived in the fridge for an extra day.

Finally on Saturday, even though we were heading to the ballpark for dinner, I made the butter chicken and naan. Because both naans in BwJ are made with the same base dough, I decided to try both recipes: Persian naan and oasis naan. And because I'd only made a half-batch of the dough, I made one large Persian naan and two small oasis naan.

The oasis naan is cut into small pieces, rolled out into six-inch circles, punctured with a fork, and then sprinkled with scallions, kosher salt, and cumin seeds. Then it is baked for a short time in a 500º oven on a preheated baking stone. Apparently I didn't puncture my bread vigorously enough because mine puffed up quite a bit...which we actually liked. I will blog the Persian naan when it comes up, but I will say that all of the adults preferred the puffy oasis naan, and it was the perfect tool to eat the butter chicken.

The butter chicken recipe was easier to make than our standby recipe (curried chicken with tomato almond sauce) and the flavor was very similar; I did miss the peas and onion chunks, though. The naan was delicious; our usual naan recipe is brushed with ghee, so we missed that a bit, but cooking these in the oven was much less hectic than trying to do it on the stovetop as my other recipe calls for. And we really loved the puffy texture; I think, with the exception of the missing ghee, that we have a new favorite naan recipe.

Indian butter chicken and naan is not a traditional tailgating meal, but it was delicious and enjoyed by all!

Check out the recipe here on Phyl's blog or here on Maggie's blog. Or better yet, buy the book! And check out other TWDers' naan experience here.

Pecan sticky buns (TWD: BwJ)

Our second May recipe for Tuesdays with Dorie is pecan sticky buns. I just knew these would be a hit in my family, and the recipe was perfectly timed for Mother's Day.

Unlike my usual cinnamon bun recipes which start with a sweet dough, these are made with brioche, an incredibly rich dough made with five eggs and a stick and a half of butter. The dough is mixed before the butter is added and it took forever for my butter to incorporate. But finally, using my mixer and a bit of hand kneading, the dough was ready to rise and then chill.

The next day, the dough is laminated, with another stick and a half of butter folded in. I actually only laminated half of the dough. I knew my kids wouldn't like the pecan sticky buns ("no nuts!"), so I used a quarter of the brioche dough to make plain ol' cinnamon buns for them (the other quarter is in the freezer to be used later).

The dough was really easy to handle. Once it was chilled, I rolled it out and then topped it with sugar, cinnamon, brushed egg, and pecans. I used a little less butter than called for (there was so much!!) and a little extra cinnamon and sugar. Then I rolled up the dough into a jelly roll. The recipe says to freeze it before cutting, but my dough was still quite cool from the fridge, so I just used my normal dental floss technique to cut it and it worked just fine.

My buns did not bake for as long as the recipe called for: the cinnamon buns were finished in 26 minutes and the sticky buns were finished in 30. I loved the look of the layers in the finished buns before I flipped them!

The texture of these was incredible: so light and fluffy. They weren't as sweet as our usual dough, and hubby and I didn't like them quite as much. Which is really quite a good thing, as they were a whole lot more work! Still, a delicious Mother's Day treat, enjoyed by all! :)

Check out the other TWDers' sticky buns here and check out the recipe in Baking with Julia, or on our hosts' blogs: Lynn of Eat Drink Man Woman Dogs Cat and Nicole of Cookies on Friday .

Hungarian shortbread (TWD: BwJ)

Our first May TWD recipe is Hungarian shortbread, a recipe from Gale Gand.

In general, I'm not interested in desserts (especially cookies) unless there is a strong chocolate presence. Every once in a while, an almond flavor will suffice. But a butter cookie with jam filling? Meh. So imagine my surprise when I absolutely 100% loved these cookies!!

I made a half-batch in an 8x8 pan. The shortbread itself was easy to throw together in the mixer: flour, baking powder, salt, unsalted butter, egg yolks, and sugar. The dough is then wrapped in plastic and chilled in the freezer for 30 minutes before being shredded into the pan on the large holes of a box grater. I had a few questions as I got ready to assemble and bake the cookies: should I butter the pan? The recipe didn't call for it, but that seemed weird to me, and several of the places online where this recipe is printed call for buttering the pan. In the end, I did. And several of the people on the Ps&Qs for this recipe mentioned prebaking the bottom crust or it wouldn't fully bake; should I? I ended up putting the bottom part of the crust in the oven for about 5 minutes while I prepared the jam; and then I baked the cookies for 45 minutes to get the top golden. The bottom was much more done than the top; next time, I'd probably skip the prebaking stage altogether.

If I'd filled these with the rhubarb jam called for, it'd be a sure bet that no one would eat them, so I used the last bit from a jar of store-bought mixed berry preserves and part of last summer's strawberry jam. I first used the 1/2 cup of jam called for (I was making a half-recipe), but it didn't seem like nearly enough, so I ended up using quite a bit more (probably a cup total for the half-recipe).

As I said, I was shocked by how much I loved these: sweet, crunchy, buttery, with a bright hint from the jam. Delicious!

Check out all of the other TWDers' shortbreads here: and please visit our hosts' pages to see the recipe: Lynette of 1smallkitchen and Cher of The not so exciting adventures of a dabbler….

Lemon loaf cake (TWD: BwJ)

Our second April recipe for Tuesdays with Dorie is a lemon loaf cake. This is a pound cake that takes all of five minutes and one bowl to make.

It's made by whisking eggs with sugar (gently), and then lemon zest, and then sifting flour and baking powder, whisking in some heavy cream, and folding in some melted butter. That's it; it took a million times longer to bring the ingredients to room temperature than it did to make the cake.

I used three mini loaf pans (5x2) instead of a 9x5 pan; the loaves baked for 35 minutes. We enjoyed one of the mini cakes with dinner; it was a huge hit. The little guy said, "I would like another piece of that delicious lemon cake!" The hubby and I each took a mini loaf to school to celebrate the start of fourth quarter. It must be spring! :)

Check out the other TWDers' lemon cakes here and, if you'd like the recipe, grab a copy of Baking with Julia or check out this week's hosts: Truc of Treats and Michelle of The Beauty of Life.

Pizza rustica (TWD: BwJ)

I'm not sure how it's April already, but here we are: the first Tuesday of the month! Our first April Tuesdays with Dorie recipe is pizza rustica by our very own (Modern Baker Challenge and Bake!) Nick Malgieri!

This recipe (or maybe April itself) sneaked up on me, but luckily it's the kind of recipe where you can realize you need to make it at 8 a.m. at work, send the hubby to the grocery store at 3 p.m. for a couple of key ingredients, and still be eating dinner by 5:30.

Pizza rustica is made with a sweet dough, which is quickly mixed in the food processor and handles like a dream. Into the crust goes a mixture of cheese (ricotta), more cheese (Romano), even more cheese (mozzarella), and meat (prosciutto). I wanted to make the recipe as written the first time, but I know some of the other TWDers experimented with adding veggies, and I would love to do that next time: some onions, spinach, maybe a pepper. Yum! You may be thinking that it doesn't sound like pizza, and you'd be right; it's much more like a quiche. Luckily, some of the TWDers had been talking about that very fact, so I named it "quiche" when describing it to the family and no one was disappointed.

I know the sweet crust-salty/savory filling was weird for some people, but with my big sweet tooth, I thought it was quite tasty! The hubby loved it. In fact, he's pretty sad that I need it for my lunches this week and he won't be able to eat it every day for breakfast. The kids, never fans of foods with ricotta, didn't like the filling, but both ate pieces of the crust like it was a cookie.

For the recipe, buy a copy of Baking with Julia, or check out today's hosts: Emily of Capitol Region Dining and Raelynn of The Place They Call Home.

Showers of food

Photo credit: Asha Thao

One of my good friends from work is having a baby. At my old school, this meant all of the ladies in the school got together in the school library for a little informal baby shower. But apparently high schools are too big for that kind of thing, so showers are done by department...which kind of left me in charge. This is not a good thing, as showers are not my forté. I have been lucky enough to avoid having to host a shower up until this point; my strategy is usually to delay volunteering until someone else offers. :) I barely tolerated my own showers. I am not good at the formal thing, nor the cutsie thing, nor the everything-matching thing. I don't enjoy the games or the piles of presents. I don't think of the little details, like having everyone write out a little piece of advice for the mom-to-be.

Luckily another friend in the department offered to co-host, and she is an excellent party hostess. She has a beautiful house, complete with matching serving dishes, :) and is really good at all of those things I mentioned above. But she doesn't like to bake. She took care of the cutsie, I handled the food...it was a match made in heaven. :)

Yesterday afternoon, twenty past and present teachers gathered to gossip, eat, tell baby stories, and wish our friend well.

Photo credit: Asha Thao

The mom-to-be requested chocolate cake with chocolate frosting. I tried Dorie's cocoa and buttermilk birthday cake with a chocolate ganache frosting from the best chocolate cake ever. The cake didn't seem quite done at the suggested time, but I should've pulled it out of the oven anyway; it was a little overdone, dry and crumbly. The one thing on my list that I didn't have time for was a Swiss meringue buttercream to decorate. Oh well, the flavor was still good and the cake was a hit...practicing my decorating skills will have to wait.

I also made lemon bars from my America's Test Kitchen Family cookbook and NM's truffle brownies. The lemon bars were extremely lemony (6 lemons' worth of zest and juice), and they were quite tasty. I was disappointed with their stamina, though: they didn't hold up well to being transported and moved around. NM's brownies were amazing, as always.

One of my favorite new recipes that I tried were these soft frosted sugar cookies from Tracey's site that I have been drooling over for months. They were even better than the ones from the store, which are a guilty pleasure of mine. And they were so cute!

My other favorite new recipe is these turkey and spinach rolls, which have been on my to-try list ever since Andrea posted them nearly two years ago. I can't believe I waited so long to try them. They were so easy, and soooo delicious. And such a good base for so many other cute sandwich creations. I used the soft dough from ABED that I always use for buns, with half white whole wheat flour. I rolled it out into a giant rectangle as though I were making cinnamon buns, and then spread it with Boursin cheese, spinach leaves, and a couple different kinds of turkey. Then I rolled them up and sliced them, cinnamon bun style, put them on a baking sheet covered with parchment and stuck them in the fridge overnight. The day of the party, I just had to take them out and let them come to room temperature and then bake them for 25 minutes. Everyone who tried them loved them, and people commented on how much easier they were to eat than other party sandwiches. This is definitely a repeat recipe.

Irish Soda Bread (TWD: BwJ)

The second March recipe for the Tuesdays with Dorie group is Irish soda bread, chosen just in time for St. Paddy's Day. But March 17 came and went around here, and there were multiple grocery shopping trips after which I realized that I'd forgotten the buttermilk yet again, and I decided to pass on this one. The one and only time I made Irish soda bread was also the one and only time I'd ever tasted it, and I was not a fan. I think most of it ended up in the garbage.

But...when the first several posts started popping up this morning, everyone talked about how incredibly quick this recipe was, so I decided that if I was going to skip a recipe, this would probably be a pretty silly one to choose. The little girl and I stopped at the grocery store on the way home and picked up some buttermilk, and we were on our way. This truly was the easiest recipe ever: flour, salt, baking soda, and buttermilk, all stirred and kneaded and formed into a round. That's it. I made a half recipe, and decided at the last minute to go the traditional route and not use any of the extra add-ins. My little boule baked for 35 minutes (thanks, Nancy!) until it reached an internal temperature of 180º.

The bread smelled amazing, and we didn't wait long to cut into it. Surprise, surprise, we loved it! How could four simple ingredients bake up into something so tasty? It was delicious as a pre-dinner snack with a little butter, and yummy (even if a little incongruous) with our dinner of chicken-sausage gumbo.

Please check out our hosts' blogs for the recipe (and to see their creative variations): Cathy of My Culinary Mission and Carla of Chocolate Moosey, and check out here to see the other TWDers' creations!

The new best ever: individual ice cream cakes!

February and March are birthday-ful around here. All of the grandmas (my mom, my mother-in-law, and my stepmom) have birthdays within a few weeks of each other, and this year, we had a birthday dinner for one grandma on Saturday night and Nana's birthday brunch on Sunday morning. All of the grandmas love cheesecake and my stepmom, in particular, has a new fascination with limoncello. So when Natashya posted this recipe for limoncello cheesecake squares a couple of months ago, this year's birthday treat was a no-brainer; and since we were celebrating two birthdays in one weekend, I was able to make one pan of treats for both.

too much yellow!

But I knew that, while this was a perfect grandma birthday treat, it would not be appealing or appropriate for the little ones, so I set out to find a fun and delicious birthday party treat for them. When my little guy turned five a few weeks ago, we got a bakery cake for the first time ever (eek! provided by the place where we had his party). But I wanted to make a little something for home, too. I had the idea of an ice cream cake, so I baked up a quarter-version of Dorie's perfect birthday cake in a mini-loaf pan, made a batch of lemon frozen yogurt, and layered the two together. And then I realized that the lemon curd I'd used in the frozen yogurt was way past it's prime, and I ended up having to throw it all away. It was very depressing. And I also realized that an ice cream cake should use a cake and ice cream with contrasting colors.

And then I re-stumbled upon this post from my friend Di for individual ice cream cakes, and I was sold.

For my version, I made a batch of peppermint ice cream. I used Jeni's vanilla ice cream recipe, but skipped the vanilla bean, and stirred in a teaspoon each of vanilla extract and peppermint extract at the end. After churning, I spread the ice cream on a half-sheet pan covered in parchment paper and set it in the deep freeze.

Then I made (as recommended by Di), Dorie's devil's food cake recipe from BFMYTY. I made a half-recipe, and somehow misread Di's instructions: she used a 9x13 pan, but I mistakenly thought she'd used a half-sheet pan. I thought the batter looked too thin when I spread it out, but I baked it anyway (it took about 15 minutes). This turned out to be a really happy mistake! It made a nice, thin cookie/cake layer that looked just like a real ice cream sandwich, and I thought the cake was in perfect proportion to the ice cream. Once the cake was cool in its pan, I added it to the deep freeze.

When it was time for assembly, I used a 2" biscuit cutter dipped in a bowl of hot water to cut out the cake circles and the ice cream circles. Then I used my mini heart cutter to make baby ice cream sandwiches out of the leftover pieces for the family to sample (since by that point, they were all sitting at the counter watching me and saying, "When can we eat these?!"). I stuck the assembled sandwiches back into the deep freeze.

Finally, I made a 1/2 batch of Jeni's chocolate bombe shell, and used that to coat the cold sandwiches. I scattered some sprinkles on top, and once more into the deep freeze until the party.

There were a lot of little steps, and this recipe definitely takes some serious planning to put together, but nothing was too difficult and the results were sooooo worth it! These little sandwiches were a huge hit with the kids and adults alike: they were so delicious and so fun to eat. They definitely go into my top five desserts I've ever made. I foresee many different variations in our future, although the peppermint-chocolate combination will be repeated as well!

(ignore the plate: we were having a use-up-all-leftover-paper-plates party!) ;)

Rugelach (TWD: BwJ)

Our first Tuesdays with Dorie recipe for March is rugelach, hosted by Jessica of My Baking Heart and Margaret of The Urban Hiker. My hubby took one bite of the finished product and said, "It's like a cinnamon roll and a danish and a cookie and something else all mixed together, and it's just so good!"

I made a half-batch of dough early in the morning. It came together pretty quickly in my stand-mixer: softened butter, softened cream cheese, salt, sugar, and flour. Once it came together into a ball, I patted it into a rectangle and put it in the fridge to chill.

Then I made the lekva. We had the choice of prune or apricot lekva. I've never heard of lekva before, but apparently it's a Hungarian fruit butter. I really love prunes, and I'm not a big apricot fan, so this was an easy choice for me. The lekva was incredibly easy to make: prunes boiled in water and combined with sugar, lemon juice, and chopped walnuts. Okay, sounds pretty nothing-special, right? NO! I seriously could've eaten the entire bowl straight-up; it was that good!!

Late the same afternoon, I plumped up some dried cherries and chopped up some apricots, toasted some walnuts and pecans, and proceeded with shaping the rugelach.

I rolled the dough out into a large rectangle and cut it in half. My problems started after I spread it with the lekva and then began to sprinkle on the insane amounts of filling: fruit, nuts, sugar (I also sprinkled in some mini chocolate chips on half, at the kiddos' request). There was no way to roll these babies up! I did the best I could; one strip actually rolled okay. The other one began to tear and there was filling pouring out all over the place.

I chilled the rugelach for about six hours, then brushed them with the egg wash, sliced them, dipped them in the sugar-nut mixture, and baked them. Regardless of their looks, these were a big hit with the family! The little girl and I weren't huge fans of the dried fruit, but we all loved the combination of flavors from the prunes, nuts, and dough.

Check out everyone else's rugelach here!

one of the exploded, less-than-stellar ones :)

Wordless(ish) Wednesday: Dorie's bittersweet brownies (BFMHTY)

I'm not a coffee person, but I followed Dorie's suggestion for adding instant espresso powder to her bittersweet brownies: OMW, these were amazing!!! My 9" square pan was in use (baking the caramel chocolate pecan bars you see under the ice cream), so I used an 8" round...kind of fun to have little wedges of brownies!

Chocolate truffle oreo dreamin' (TWD: BwJ)

Our second recipe for the Tuesdays with Dorie: Baking with Julia group was chocolate truffle tartlets. I'd initially intended to make these as a Valentine's treat because, come on, don't they sound perfect and romantic and decadent? But with all of the birthday goodnesses still hanging around, plus Valentine's cookies baked with the kids, I just couldn't introduce another sweet into our house.

Until the weekend, of course! :) I made the tart dough on Saturday night. Having read the helpful comments left in the P&Qs, I knew the tart dough tended to be a bit dry, so even though I cut the recipe in half, I used the full egg yolk and tablespoon of water. The dough was still pretty dry, but eventually it came together. Then it went into the fridge for an overnight rest.

Sunday afternoon, I divided the dough in three and rolled it out for my mini-tart pans. I decided to skip baking the tarts without their bottoms on a bigger sheet pan; I've baked enough tarts in my mini-pans (thanks, NM!) to know that I can get them in and out of the oven okay. The dough rolled out fine and was easy to work with. I chilled the crusts and then baked them for 15 minutes.

I melted the chocolate (60%) and unsalted butter and let the mixture cool while phone calls and birthday party planning distracted me (can't believe my little guy is going to be five this weekend!!!). Then I made the rest of the topping: whipped egg yolks and sugar, combined gently with the chocolate/butter mixture. Finally I added in chopped milk chocolate, white chocolate chips, and Oreos (I didn't have biscotti in the house, but had already purchased Oreos to make mint Oreo ice cream). I divided the filling between my three tart pans; they didn't look set at 10 minutes, and then I got distracted and didn't take them out until almost 15.

The tarts definitely should've come out a few minutes earlier; they were a little dry. Still, this is a winning recipe: we loved the melty chocolately bits and the crunchy bites of cookie. Especially yummy with mint Oreo ice cream! (Good the next day after being in the fridge, too.)

There are four hosts this week, so check their blogs for the recipe: Spike, Jaime, Jessica, and Steph. Check here for links to everyone else's tarts!

A day of hearts

I've always loved Valentine's Day...what could be bad about a day dedicated to chocolate, flowers, hearts, pink, and love?! (And the fact that it always meant yummy treats for my birthday never hurt, either.)

 Breakfast: Heart-shaped cinnamon rolls (sweet dough from ABED & pink frosting)

 Lunch: (For my little Valentines) heart quesadillas & strawberries

 Dinner: Emeril's cola pot roast & Dorie's basic biscuits (BFMYTY)

 Dessert: Iced heart-shaped cookies (from KAF)

and a romantic Valentine Death Star for my main Valentine.

Happy Valentine's Day! :)

Incredible exploding white loaf (TWD: BwJ)

As I said in a post a few weeks ago, I discovered Tuesdays with Dorie long after they'd started baking through Baking: From My Home to Yours. But once I discovered the magical world of food blogs, I always enjoyed my friends' TWD posts. So when a new TWD group started this year, and I just happened to get the book, Baking with Julia, for Christmas, and I just happened to get some pressure from a certain someone, and I saw that the first two recipes were a bread and a yummy chocolate tart, of course I signed up. :)

After a busy Saturday morning, just as I was heading out the door to go grocery shopping, hubby said, "Hey, what about chicken noodle soup and grilled cheese sandwiches for dinner?!" We had no bread in the house, but I remembered that the BwJ recipe was supposed to be fairly quick (it says, "Since the dough belongs to the direct-rise family....you can mix a batch after breakfast and eat still-warm-from-the-oven bread for lunch."), so I took off my coat and mixed up the dough.

The method was a little unusual to me; you mix some water with the yeast and sugar and let it bubble (no surprise there), then add the flour and mix. Then add the salt. Then knead for a long while, and finally add the butter. But, as promised in the recipe, the dough did finally come together. It gave my stand mixer a workout, so I alternated between mixer and kneading by hand.

The dough rose while I was at the grocery store and a little over an hour later, I came home to this:

Eek!

Instead of dividing the dough and shaping it into two 8x4 loaves, I left it as one massive piece and baked it in my pullman pan with the lid off. I couldn't believe the explosion when I peaked into the oven!

The bread had a slightly unusual flavor, but I couldn't quite place it. Maybe it's because we sliced it when it was still pretty warm. It made excellent grilled cheese sandwiches, and was pretty popular with everyone. Hubby used the rest of the loaf to make eggs-in-a-nest for breakfast over the next several mornings; he was very happy. :)

Laurie and Jules, the fearless leaders of TWD, are the hosts this week, so check out their blogs for the recipe!

Wordless Wednesday: Dorie's chocolate oatmeal drops (BFMYHTY)

 

Better late than never: Dorie's CCCs

Finally, finally after reading so many of my Twitter pals' delicious TWD posts, I caved and ordered my very own copy of Baking: From My Home to Yours.

TWD: BFMHTY started before I even knew that food blogging existed, or had even heard of Dorie Greenspan. In fact, if I remember correctly, I believe that in January 2008 when TWD started, I was busy with a not-quite-one-year-old, trying to figure out how in the heck I was going to deal with the new baby who was due in a few short months.

Anyway, I've made quite a few TWD recipes, after seeing the recipes posted on my friends (and others') blogs, and finally realized that if I was going to make so many of those recipes, I needed to own my own copy of the book. And it is gorgeous! I am so excited to own it...I can't believe how many incredible recipes there are and how many variations. The pictures are amazing and I love the baking techniques. So I know I'm late to the party, but I'm really happy to be here. :)

My first official recipe that I baked from the book (rather than from recipes posted on blogs) was her chocolate chip cookies. There were no surprising ingredients, but I did follow Dorie's advice to use quality chocolate, chopped in chunks. I did need to shorten the baking time, as mine were really brown after 10 minutes. Regardless of degree of doneness (I experimented with several baking times), these cookies were amazing: almost toffee-like, tons of chocolate, filled with buttery goodness.

This is all that was left for a photo.