TWD: Sugar Topped Molasses Spice Cookies

This week I chose to make the Sugar Topped Molasses Spice Cookies (we are allowed to make this month's recipes in any order we like). They were chosen by Pamela of Cookies With Boys. These were delicious! I doubled the recipe. Okay, don't tell, but we put in double the molasses. So we had to put in double of everything else. :D

These were simple and quick to make (well, if you don't count the chilling time). The dough is formed into balls and then rolled in sugar and flattened with a glass. Alright, I'll admit that I was impatient and just wanted to be done with the actual baking of them, so I put twelve on baking sheet. Hey, the book didn't say not to! Obviously they spread. A lot. So I had to cut them apart (see above picture). But, nobody cared. They disappeared quickly. They do keep well, although they are best on the first day.

My only complaint about these was that it seemed like pieces of the cookies were great and pieces were a bit bland. However, this is probably just a mixing error on my part. I recommend this recipe. As always, if you want the recipe, you can buy the book or you can visit Pamela's site (link above), although she may not have the recipe up until further on in the month. Enjoy!

TWD: Cran-Apple Crisps (er.... crisp)

First of all, I'd like to apologize for the terrible picture. The crisp was cut into literally as I was opening the camera case. Second, this month we were given the four TWD recipes as usual, but since some might be great for Thanksgiving, we are allowed to post in any order we want. Which is great for me, because I did not have time to make the cake with filling, syrup, glaze... all that fun stuff. Still having some apples to use up from when we went apple picking, I decided to go with the Cran-Apple Crisps, chosen by Em of The Repressed Pastry Chef. I honestly have never baked with fresh cranberries (shocking!), so I was excited to see how they would come out. Everything turned out great. You need eight ramekins for this recipe, but I only have three, so I just used a big dish. The topping is wonderful - sweet and full of coconut. The filling was great, too. I found the fresh cranberries to be a bit tart, but everybody else loved them. I really recommend this recipe, and it would probably be great for Thanksgiving, too. As always, if you want the recipe, you can buy the book or find head over to Em's blog (link above). She will have the recipe up eventually, if not this week. Enjoy!

Apple Crumble Pie

Okay, so, technically I didn't make this, my mom did, but I have made it tons of times. Since this was my mom, she made it with - dare I say it? - a frozen pie crust. Traitor.

Well, it was delicious anyways. It starts with a basic pie crust and a layer of apples mixed with cinnamon and sugar. Then a crumble of brown sugar and butter goes on top. Yum! We served it warm with vanilla ice cream. It was delicious. Enjoy!

Apple Crumble Pie (BakingBites)

All Butter Single Pie Crust:

1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1 tbsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
6 tbsp butter, chilled and cut into pieces
4-6 tbsp ice water

Whisk together flour, salt and sugar in a large bowl. Rub in butter with your fingertips, pressing it into the flour mixture and breaking it up, until mixture resemble very coarse sand and no pieces larger than a large pea remain. Using a fork, stir in ice water until dough almost comes together into a ball. Press dough into a ball with your hands and wrap in plastic. Chill for at least 30-60 minutes before using.

Apple Filling:
6 med/lg granny smith, jonagold or other pie apples
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp allspice
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup brown sugar

Mix apples, sugar, flour, spices and salt together in large mixing bowl. Set aside until dough is rolled out.

Crumble Topping:
2/3 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup quick cooking rolled oats
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp ground cinnamon
pinch freshly ground nutmeg
3 tbsp butter, chilled and cut into pieces

Combine all dry ingredients in a large bowl and mix well. Add in butter and rub in with your fingertips, pressing it into the flour mixture and breaking it up, until mixture resemble very coarse sand. Set aside until dough is rolled out.

Assembly:
Preheat the oven to 450F.
On a large, lightly floured, flat surface, roll out the chilled pie crust into a large circle. Add more flour as needed to keep the dough from sticking. Keep rolling until the dough will fill the pie dish, which you can double check by holding the pie plate over the dough and looking for 1-2 inches extra crust around the rim of the plate. Gently lay the bottom crust into the dish, crimping the edges if you desire (or just pinching them off, as I tend to do). Lightly score with a fork 4 or 5 times.
Fill pie dish with filling, leaving any excess juice at the bottom of the bowl to help keep the pie from getting soggy. Arrange slices in an even layer. Top with crumble topping, squeezing it into small clumps in your hand (to create larger crumbles) as you finish the pie.
Bake pie for 20 minutes at 450F, until browned. Turn down oven temperature to 350F and bake for an additional 30-40 minutes, until pie is dark gold and apple slices are tender when pierced with a fork. If the apples are not tender and you need to bake for an additional 5 or 10 minutes (some types of apples are very resiliant in the oven. Granny Smiths worked fine for me at this time) and are worried about over-browning the crust, you can place a ring of foil around the edge of the pie plate to shield it from the heat while the filling finishes cooking.
Cool down to room temperature before slicing.

Serves 8-10.

Daring Bakers: Macarons!

The 2009 October Daring Bakers’ challenge was brought to us by Ami S. She chose macarons from Claudia Fleming’s The Last Course: The Desserts of Gramercy Tavern as the challenge recipe.

I have to say, I was honestly considering skipping this month's recipe. I, as always, waited until

the last Sunday before the posting date to make these. And, I only filled them ten minutes ago.

No, I'm serious. :D

These actually are not that time consuming, especially compared to last month's vols-au-vent.

The batter is fairly easy to make, and the only challenging part is piping the circles. But, that

isn't too hard either when you use a template.

The batter, which consists of beaten egg whites, confectioners' sugar, almond flour (you can see from the picture at the bottom that mine wasn't quite sifted enough), and regular granulated sugar. We were given the freedom to choose our own flavorings and fillings (although we had to make at least one filling, preferably from scratch). I chose chocolate, a classic. I added two teaspoons of cocoa powder to the batter and it worked great, because the ganache I used to fill them has a very strong chocolate taste.

The piped batter. It was actually fairly hard to get the circles, even using the template. You can sort of tell from the picture. :)

The baked macaroons. I'm so proud of my little feet! I got three trays of piped macaroons, but the last tray didn't work because I used a hot baking sheet (stupid, I know). So I got a total of nineteen sandwiches (more if we hadn't tasted them straight out of the oven). I really recommend you try this recipe; we loved it!

Ingredients
Confectioners’ (Icing) sugar: 2 ¼ cups (225 g, 8 oz.)
Almond flour: 2 cups (190 g, 6.7 oz.)
Granulated sugar: 2 tablespoons (25 g , .88 oz.)
Egg whites: 5 (Have at room temperature)

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 200°F (93°C). Combine the confectioners’ sugar and almond flour in a medium bowl. If grinding your own nuts, combine nuts and a cup of confectioners’ sugar in the bowl of a food processor and grind until nuts are very fine and powdery.
2. Beat the egg whites in the clean dry bowl of a stand mixer until they hold soft peaks. Slowly add the granulated sugar and beat until the mixture holds stiff peaks.
3. Sift a third of the almond flour mixture into the meringue and fold gently to combine. If you are planning on adding zest or other flavorings to the batter, now is the time. Sift in the remaining almond flour in two batches. Be gentle! Don’t overfold, but fully incorporate your ingredients.
4. Spoon the mixture into a pastry bag fitted with a plain half-inch tip (Ateco #806). You can also use a Ziploc bag with a corner cut off. It’s easiest to fill your bag if you stand it up in a tall glass and fold the top down before spooning in the batter.
5. Pipe one-inch-sized (2.5 cm) mounds of batter onto baking sheets lined with nonstick liners (or parchment paper).
6. Bake the macaroon for 5 minutes. Remove the pan from the oven and raise the temperature to 375°F (190°C). Once the oven is up to temperature, put the pans back in the oven and bake for an additional 7 to 8 minutes, or lightly colored.
7. Cool on a rack before filling.

I used Dorie Greenspan's chocolate ganache recipe from The Book to fill them. Enjoy!

P.S. My apologies for how the words appear before the second picture; I have tried everything but I can't get them to change.

TWD: Cherry... uh... Currant... Fudge Brownie Torte

This week's Tuesdays With Dorie recipe was chosen by April of Short and Rose. She chose the cherry fudge brownie torte, which is composed of a dense, rich layer of cherry brownie (cherry jam, dried cherries, and kirsch), and a thinner layer of light and creamy mascarpone mousse. I was going to make the brownie layer when I realized the closest thing to kirsch we had was Cassis, which is a black-currant flavored liquor. I couldn't find dried cherries at the supermarket, either, so I decided to go all the way and use currant jam and dried currants. It worked out great!

This was quite a time-consuming recipe. For the brownie, you had to cook the currants with syrup, and melt the chocolate and butter over another saucepan, and use an electric mixer - basically make the kitchen look like a tornado went through. But, it was finished, and the mousse was quick and easy. Yum!

I probably won't make this again, simply because it took so long, and it was also a bit too rich. But, it was delicious, and I would recommend trying it. If you want the recipe, you can buy the book or find it here. Enjoy!

Lots and Lots of (mini!) Cupcakes

I got an order this weekend for a friend's birthday party. She said that she wanted 36 mini cupcakes. She was very specific - what flavors, how many of each flavor, what liner to use, how to decorate them - so I really didn't have much to do besides make them. (As opposed to when people leave the decorating up to me). Since there were only going to be twelve of each kind, I went on Allrecipes, where you can scale down the recipes. Since the batter for one regular sized cupcake makes three mini cupcakes, I scaled the cupcake recipes down to five (which would make 15 - 12 for the party and 3 for tasting :D ). 

First up: Chocolate. I have made this recipe in the past for full-sized cupcakes, and it worked great. They had huge domes. But for some reason in mini size they had flat tops. And they were chewy (but in the best way). Yum!  You can find the recipe here. 

Next: Red Velvet. I had never made this recipe before, but it looked very much like the red velvet cake recipes I have made in the past. These didn't spread out at all, which made them really cute. They were delicious - light and fluffy. You can find the recipe here. 

Finally: Vanilla. On Allrecipes, there was only one plain vanilla cupcake recipe. The reviews said that they were more like muffins, but I decided to go ahead. The had huge tops, and they were delicious, but the reviewers were right - they are more dense than cupcakes should be. But, everybody loved them and they would probably make excellent muffins. You can find the recipe here. 

For the icing, I used a simple vanilla buttercream recipe I found at BakingBites. (2 sticks butter, 4 cups powdered sugar, 2-4 tbsp milk, 2 tsp vanilla).

All of these recipes are delicious, and a hit at parties! I recommend you make one (or three!) of them. Have fun!

TWD... uh... Wednesday: Sweet Potato Biscuits

Ok, so, um... I really only remembered that I had to post these today as I was brushing my teeth yesterday night, so I just woke up and I'm doing it now. :D

This week's recipe was chosen by Erin of Prudence Pennywise. She chose Sweet Potato Biscuits. They were quick and easy to make, but they didn't rise very much. I've always imagined biscuits as being huge, like the pillsbury ones. But maybe they're supposed to be like this? Or maybe I did something wrong.... Even though they didn't look great, they are delicious. We couldn't stop eating them! We ate them the next day with vegetable soup, too, and for breakfast... but they are definitely best the first day, when they are nice and flaky. I might make these again sometime, but I am excited to try out the other biscuit recipes in the book. 

As always, if you want the recipe, you can buy the book or find it here. Yum! 

And don't forget to check out the other TWD bakers!