February DB Challenge: Flourless Chocolate Cake with Vanilla Frozen Yogurt

Now, I already have a favorite nearly flourless chocolate cake recipe. But when the Daring Bakers call, I answer. Plus, how terrible can a pound of chocolate, a stick of butter, and nearly half a dozen eggs be?!? Terribly awesome! Okay, sorry, that last bit was unnecessary. I blame it on a college friend, who had a terrible habit of coming up with annoyingly catchy phrases that he peppered into his daily speech. Which caused them to end up in ours as well.

Not only that, we had a DB first - ice cream was the required accompaniment. For some odd reason, even though I have 7 egg yolks sitting in my fridge from various baking ventures, I didn't really want an egg-based ice cream. So I flipped open my copy of The Perfect Scoop and started looking through it for ideas. And that's when I nearly flipped past his frozen yogurt recipe - what a mistake that would have been! So simple, but so absolutely wonderful. Tangy, just a little sweet, and 1000 times better than any commercial frozen yogurt. I had difficulty actually putting the dasher in the sink, because there were still remnants of freshly churned tastiness all over it.


For the cake, I used half milk chocolate and half bittersweet, just because there wasn't anything besides butter, chocolate, and eggs in the cake. I was worried that it would be a bit too intense, even for a chocolate lover like myself. It was probably a good choice, although the boyfriend was still a bit overwhelmed by the strong CHOCOLATE vibe coming from this cake. I also made it in my 5" springform, which perfectly fit a 40% scaled down version. And because my 8" springform fits ~100 cubic inches and the mini fits ~39.9 cubic inches, I was able to bake the cake for the same amount of time as the larger version, just using the lower end of the range - 20 min instead of 25.

It still cratered like a mo-fo, but I was okay with that. It's not like people can complain about a moist, fudgy cake just because it appears to have been hit by a meteor. Right? Okay, phew. I was just making that part up to make myself feel better. I think this is why I enjoy making the nearly flourless cakes. You know, the ones with just a quarter cup of flour to give the cake a bit of gluten-y structure. Insurance, right?


And no, I didn't make it for Valentine's Day. Or in a heart shape. Because sometimes, I can't stand a cliche. Only sometimes though, because instead of this, the boyfriend got pocky covered in heart shaped sprinkles. Compromise, it's a beautiful thing.

Thanks to Dharm and Wendy for hosting this month's challenge!
The February 2009 challenge is hosted by Wendy of WMPE's blog and Dharm of Dad ~ Baker & Chef.
We have chosen a Chocolate Valentino cake by Chef Wan; a Vanilla Ice Cream recipe from Dharm and a Vanilla Ice Cream recipe from Wendy as the challenge.

BBB: Five Grain Bread with Walnuts

What a neat bread to celebrate one year of bread baking goodness! The Bread Baking Babes & Buddies have been baking a bread a month for 12 straight months, and while I haven't been able to make them all, each one I've made has been a winner. This one is no exception - all-purpose flour, oat flour, whole wheat flour, rye flour, and brown rice flour - whew! Throw walnuts in there, and you've got one heck of a substantial loaf of bread. It might even qualify as a health food. Which would mean it's okay that I ate a quarter of a loaf in two days, right?


It was an interesting one to knead too. Due to the oat, rye, and brown rice flours, gluten development was only so-so. It rose, yes, but then deflated a bit in the oven rather than having any tremendous oven spring. Not that my sub-par apartment oven is very good at coaxing oven spring out of breads, but there's always hope, right? But it smelled absolutely fabulous, and after having some plain, some toasted, and some with peanut butter, I'm already dreaming of smearing it with some homemade pear preserves from my mom.


Thanks to this month's host Tanna and the rest of the Bread Baking Babes for letting me bake along with them! You can find the recipe here. And here's to another fabulous year!

TWD: Caramel Crunch Bars

The boyfriend has been a regular sidenote on many of my recipes on this-here blog. I think I've mentioned how he isn't nearly as much of a sweets lover as I am, and that I have difficulty foisting baked goods off on him when I know they'll still be there, three weeks later, just nibbled on. He forgets about them, he claims. How can you forget an ice cream torte (2/3 of it still in his freezer, terribly freezer burned)? How can you forget ginger and chocolate gingerbread (the scraps are still sitting in his refrigerator)? I couldn't. Maybe that's why I have to run so much though. If I was able to forget about delicious baked goods, I wouldn't be planning on going to the gym for a 7 mile run soon after writing this post.


But every now and then, a recipe comes along that the boyfriend swoons over. He demands it, then proceeds to eat all of the resulting tastiness in one night, ignoring that whole "dinner" concept.

This is one of those recipes. I made it, sliced it, and handed him a little sliver. It disappeared. I handed him another one, just to see what happened. Gone. I sat there, with the rest of the cookies just out of his reach. Soon, he got this look on his face - a hopeful, goofy expression that just screams "please, pretty please, with puppy eyes?" I declare victory when I get those looks. Then I send the entire batch home with him, just to drive home the satisfaction of finding a baked good that he can't resist.


So how long did these cookies last? Two nights. He sat down with the container of them on Monday night and ate all of the cookie slices. The next night, he took the crumbled up leftovers and ate them over ice cream.

I'd call that success. And Whitney? You have my everlasting gratitude.


Last Week: Devil's Food Whiteout Cake (there's still some of that left too...)
Next Week: Chocolate Armagnac Cake (the cake that got Dorie fired!)

BBD#17: Bread with Potato

Or, can Caitlin really make up a bread completely from scratch, with no measurements, with Valentine's dinner on the line?!?

Yeah, I don't go low pressure over here. It's high stakes 100% of the time. That's how I roll. Or something like that. Have I mentioned that I should never write posts after a cup of coffee? Yeesh.


Oh, but getting back to the important part - the answer to that question? Yes, although it required a bit of research and a helping hand from the always impressive Jude. Seriously though, I was incredibly nervous - the boyfriend was making Valentine's dinner and wasn't even letting me in the kitchen during the entire process. Evidently, I tend to take over and not let him do anything and eventually kick him out for getting in my way. Not that I'm bossy in the kitchen or anything. He allowed me to do one thing - he needed bread bowls to put the deviled crab with beurre blanc in, and suggested that could be my contribution. But I wanted to multitask this one and get in this month's bread baking day theme - bread with potato. Except that potato breads don't tend to strike me as one of those sturdier breads. Sticky, soft, and incredibly tender, but not sturdy.


Thus the SOS to Jude, who gave me a couple tips - reduce hydration to ~55% and proof in the open instead of covered. I stole another tip from him as well - I formed the bread over inverted bowls (well, the cans the crab came in, actually) so that I didn't have to worry about the bread spreading everywhere. And guess what? It worked!!! I was absolutely giddy when I gently pried the bread off of the cans and found - bread bowls! And the texture was absolutely wonderful, chewy and moist, with just the right crumb.

But you know what the best part was? Halfway through dinner, the boyfriend got this hunted look on his face, before asking if I was planning on taking the bread home with me (it's what I tend to do - bake bread, wherever I am, for the next week's meals). Needless to say, I left the remaining rolls with him, because it isn't very often that he actually wants to steal my baking from me. Unless it involves chocolate and mint, which I've already discussed - yeecchhh. He's welcome to that!


Oh, and the recipe? Umm... a medium sized potato, boiled and mashed; a cup of potato water; a packet of rapid rise yeast; half a tablespoon of salt; enough flour so that you can knead it without ending up with a club of dough for a hand. Knead 5-7 minutes. Let rise 1 1/2 hours, folding every 1/2 hour. Shape, proof 30 minutes, and bake at 350 until it's done. Whenever that is. What can I say? I wasn't really taking notes.....

Thanks go to Lien for hosting this month's Bread Baking Day!

NFR: Blog Anonymity

Please excuse my (relative) absence from the blogosphere - I've been putting 20 hour days at work, and that makes me a bit grumpy. Not at all inclined to take pictures of my cookies, because I just want to eat the darned things. All of them. Immediately.

So instead I'll leave you with a placeholder for my BBD and SHF entries - a question placeholder. Because when you're on the 18th hour out at the same machine, these are the things you think of:

Do you tell your non-bloggie friends about your blog? If so, how?

Various college friends have been happening upon my blog and emailing or IMing me saying they've found it. Truly, it sort of weirds me out, but in a good way. I think.

Your thoughts?

TWD: Devil's Food Whiteout Cake

Stop the presses! STOP THE PRESSES!

I made the whole recipe. The whole recipe! This has to be the first time in weeks that I've done that. Luckily, I had a reason besides wanting to gain 20 pounds in one week - the Super Bowl. You see, the boyfriend was hosting a Super Bowl-watching party, and I decided it needed dessert. I also decided it needed vegetables, but that was overruled. Beef and beer were all that seemed to be allowed. Oh, and cocktail weenies *shudder*


But here's the even bigger shocker (yes, EVEN BIGGER!) - I made double the recipe!!! Not once, but twice, I made this recipe. I had a reason for that too - my first batch didn't rise enough because I used 9" cake pans, and I wanted a cake. You know, it needed to be substantial. This was for a party, people!


But getting back to the whole recipe thing. I had an ulterior motive here besides the Super Bowl party. This is the cover cake. This cake has stared at me. Accused me with its fluffy white frosting and decadently dark cake crumbles. How could I bake out of this cookbook for over a year and not make the cover cake?!? Luckily, Stephanie allowed me to get out of the doghouse for that particular lapse in judgment. And in the end, it was oh-so worth it. It was loved, and even double the recipe was demolished in short order by the dozen people who were packed in the boyfriend's apartment.


And in the interest of not gaining those 20 pounds, I was quite happy when someone brought salad :) Didn't stop me from eating a nice wedge of this cake, but that's a detail, right?

Last Week: Iles Flottante
Next Week: Caramel Crunch Bars

TWD: Iles Flottante

Well, they're called Floating Islands, but it just sounds so much prettier in French. Everything sounds so much prettier in French, actually. I took a couple years of German, but couldn't get over how guttural some sounds were. It always seemed like everyone took Spanish, and Latin was a dead language, so I ended up taking French once I got into high school. Unfortunately, it wasn't offered at my college, so I haven't spoken or written it in 6 years. Someday I'll get back to it, even if it's sort of true that as long as you sound slightly nasal you can mimic some French (or at least that's what twerpy little high schoolers always thought).


Right. Floating Islands. Poached meringue with a creme anglaise and caramel drizzle on top. This seemed, well, a bit weird to me. It's totally not an American dessert, so I have no point of reference. But hey, Shari picked it, and so you gotta trust her, right?


Well, I made a quarter recipe because I couldn't see how I could bring the leftovers in to work. And while Dorie says the caramel is optional - caramel is never optional. Sorry. Not gonna happen. Unfortunately, I was so worried about the caramel hardening on me that I decided to go with a more modern (?) rendition - caramel dots and splotches! Then I played with the caramel and drizzled it all over a plate, which is how I ended up with a shard of caramel to place on top of another little meringue island.


Oh, and the boyfriend's favorite part? The creme anglaise. Would it surprise you to know he goes through ice cream by the bucket?


Last Week: World Peace Cookies, Caffeinated
Next Week: Devil's Food Whiteout Cake

Gianduja Korova Cookies for World Nutella Day

Because no, I can't leave well enough alone. I took two of my favorite things - Nutella and Dorie Greenspan's World Peace cookies - and turned them into little gems of hazelnut and chocolate.

This is short and sweet, because I didn't realize until yesterday that today was World Nutella Day - oops! Not to mention that I've already made these cookies in one form or another here, here, and just two days ago here. Obsessed much?

Basically, I just took the base recipe, replace half of the butter with Nutella, and used toasted, chopped hazelnuts instead of mini chocolate chips. Unfortunately, there are two problems. Number one, these turned out crispy rather than chewy, and very very crumbly. Nutella does not equal butter, lesson learned. Number two, all my photo cookies are gone. Eaten. They were a very tasty sugar rush during the middle of my meeting-packed afternoon, mkay?

Takeaway messages? One, don't sub Nutella in for butter, two, bake more photo cookies. Then eat them. Wait, what? Oh, and thanks to Ms Adventures in Italy and Bleeding Espresso for hosting this year's World Nutella Day!

TWD: World Peace Cookies, Caffeinated

Now, when I think of world peace, one thing pops into my head. The Miss America pageant. Because wishing for world peace is what stereotypical pageant girls do. You know what I don't think of when someone says world peace? Meetings at 7a when the coffeepot at work is broken. If there's one thing I've learned in the couple years I've been out of college, it's that coffee keeps the world going round. Keep someone from it, and they will be irritable, grouchy, and generally not peaceful.


Which is why I think the solution to that hurdle towards world peace is these cookies. Chewy, sandy, caffeinated cookies studded with chopped up cappuccino chips. Perfect to brighten anyone's day, and you might as well start early, right? With quite a hefty dose of espresso powder, you won't even notice that someone left an ounce of coffee in the pot, let it grow cold, and didn't bother to brew another pot again. That lack of consideration makes me a bit feisty in the morning, and you really don't want me feisty at 6:30a when I get into work. I've been told there's other words to describe how I am when this happens, but for one they aren't blog-appropriate, and for two I refuse to believe them. So there.


Oh yes, and because of that whole "different strokes for different folks" thing, I made two other versions of this cookie here (the original recipe) and here (with peanut butter!). As PW says, whatever makes your skirt fly up. Because what I really want to say is - Thank you, Jessica, for making my skirt fly up. That is, if I wore skirts, they'd fly up. Unfortunately, they get stuck in the large machines that I work around every day. But pants don't really fly up so well, so we'll pretend, mkay?

Caffeinated World Peace Cookies (adapted from Dorie Greenspan's Baking from my home to yours)

1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
11 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
2/3 cup (packed) dark brown sugar
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon fleur de sel
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 tablespoon espresso powder
heaping 3/4 cup cappuccino chips, coarsely chopped

Sift the flour, cocoa powder, and baking soda together.

Beat the butter in a stand mixer with a paddle attachment until soft and smooth. Cream in both sugars, the salt, the vanilla, and the espresso powder. Beat for about 2 minutes.

Dump in the flour mixture and switch to a spatula or wooden spoon. (I know Dorie has you use a towel to prevent flour explosions, but it never works for me - I just go with a bit of elbow grease instead.) Mix until the flour just disappears. It will be slightly crumbly, but will come together just fine once you dump it out onto a counter. Pour the chopped cappuccino chips in and mix until evenly distributed.

Turn the dough out onto a counter. Gather up all the little crumbly bits and work the dough into a more cohesive mass. Divide the dough into two halves and shape each into a log 1 1/2 inches in diameter. I tend to go smaller, but I just like little cookies. Wrap with plastic wrap and put in the refrigerator for at least 3 hours. The dough can be refrigerated up to 3 days or frozen up to 2 months. I tend to freeze them because it makes them a bit less tempting.

Getting ready to bake: Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper or a silpat.

Using a sharp thin knife (thinner is better - it's a lot less unwieldy than your standard massive knife), slice the log into rounds about 1/2 inch in thickness. If they crumble a bit or crack, don't worry. Just squish the pieces together - they'll bake up just fine. Place the cookie rounds on the baking sheets with at least one inch in between them.

Bake the cookies for 12 minutes. They won't look done, but will finish firming up outside of the oven. Place the cookie sheet on a cooling rack and allow the cookies to cool on the sheet. Once they're just warm or at room temperature, feel free to caffeinate yourself :)

Note: When I take logs out of the freezer, I like to let them sit on the counter for five minutes or so. It makes slicing the cookies a lot easier, with less crumbling and cracking.

Makes about 36 cookies.

Last Week: Fresh Ginger and Chocolate Gingerbread
Next Week: Floating Islands