TWD: Non-Rum Non-Drenched Vanilla-Cherry Cakes

This week's TWD recipe was for "Rum-Drenched Vanilla Cakes," described as a pound cake soaked with vanilla-rum syrup. Now that's all well and good, but I'm not a drinker, so I had to find something to replace the rum in the recipe. We've had a lot of amazing cherries around the kitchen lately, and I thought a cherry-vanilla variation might be good, so I cooked down some cherries and pureed them with simple syrup and vanilla to create a cherry soaking syrup.

Everything was going according to plan, until it was time to soak the mini cakes with cherry syrup, and they went from being adorable bundts to looking like extras from Braveheart:

You guys, cherry syrup is red. Just sayin'.

So I had to reach into my usual bag of tricks and gussy them up with some glaze and fresh Rainier cherries.
Honestly, I thought the fresh cherries were the best part of this recipe. No, wait. The fact that my mini bundts CAME OUT OF THEIR PANS WITHOUT CARNAGE was the best part of this recipe. Thank you, Pampered Chef ceramic pans! You have saved my sanity.

The cake itself was pretty meh. I'll take the blame on this one, because I put on my Dr. Frankenstein hat and made some changes, like using vanilla extract instead of vanilla bean, and omitting the rum, and--worst of all--using evaporated milk instead of heavy cream. Your honor, I'll plead guilty with an It Was Late and I Was Too Tired To Go To The Store defense.

The crumb was a little coarse for my liking--not fine and tender like I associate with most poundcakes. And despite their shameless red coats, my little cakes didn't have much cherry flavor. But they sure looked like knockouts, and that's 75% of the battle right there.

What'd you guys think? Did anyone else make a teetotaler version?

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TWD Brownie-Cherry Torte and DB's Macarons, oh my

It has finally happened...the perfect storm of blog posting. Two of the baking groups I belong to, Tuesdays with Dorie and The Daring Bakers, have challenges that have to be posted today. As George Costanza would say, "worlds are colliding!" So rather than make 2 separate posts, today's blog will be a super-duper-mega-big post about two delicious things I've made recently: a brownie-cherry torte and (pumpkin spice and nutella) macarons.

It's kind of a shame these guys have to share the limelight, because I thought they were both worthy of their own entry. First up, TWD's brownie-cherry torte.

As you can imagine, my husband, being married to a pastry chef and candy writer/recipe developer, eats a lot of sweets. A LOT. I wouldn't say his enthusiasm for sugar has waned, but it takes more to really impress him these days. And friends, he was blown away by this torte. We're talking head rolled back, tongue sticking out of the mouth, making guttural moaning sounds. I think it's true love.

For the most part, I loved it too. I made a half batch in a 6" pan and it was still super deep-dish and dense. The brownie part was rich and fudgy, and the mascarpone mousse was a surprisingly nice topping. I wasn't sure about the combo as I was making it, but the mousse was so light and creamy, it was the perfect foil to the dark, fudgy brownie. I also loved the cherry flavor, but I wasn't sold on the texture of chewy dried fruit in my brownie. Next time I'd either use fresh cherries or morello cherries instead of dried.But there will be a next time, because this? Was amazing!


Now on to the DB's macarons. I know this is blasphemy, but I don't really like macarons. Shhhh, don't say it so loudly! I've had some that I've thought are pretty good, but for the most part, I think they're just not my ideal cookie. They're often too sweet, and I don't usually love the texture. I guess I'll always be a warm chocolate chip cookie girl at heart. And also, I think they're annoying to make, but that may just be because we have to make jumbo 3" ones at work and let me tell you, the good lord did not intend for macarons to be made so large. They're constantly causing problems and I think I have developed a big macaron-shaped chip on my shoulder because of it.

Aaaaanyways, I sucked it up and made two variations of macarons this time around: pumpkin spice, with a spiced cookie and pumpkin-flavored buttercream, and nutella, with a cocoa-hazelnut cookie and homemade nutella in the middle.

Did y'all know it's possible to make homemade Nutella? And if you did, why didn't you send me any?? This stuff is awesome! It's just ground hazelnuts, with some cocoa, sugar, and a bit of hazelnut oil and vanilla. The texture is closer to natural peanut butter than Nutella, but the hazelnut taste is much more intense, plus it doesn't have any nasty trans fats. Yes please! Subbing hazelnuts for the almonds in the cookie also worked like a dream and gave them a nice subtle hazelnut flavor.

The nutella cookies might have been my favorite because they were less sweet, but the pumpkin spice were a surprising dark horse contender! I added big pinches of cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, and cloves to the cookie batter, and then used some pumpkin flavoring oil (used to make candies, like Lor-Ann brand) to make a pumpkin buttercream. It was like a delicious mouthful of autumn. I would also consider using pumpkin butter as a filling, to give it a pumpkin flavor and maybe cut down on the sweetness.

Making the decorations on top is the simplest thing in the world. Just mix a little liquid orange food coloring with water, and use a (clean) paintbrush or pastry brush to lightly stroke it across the top. You might need to experiment with several brushes to get the effect you want. Allow it to dry for about 10 minutes, and you're all set.

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. It can be found on just about any blog by googling, so I'll skip that for now, but I have put the homemade nutella recipe after the cut...



Homemade Nutella
from the Los Angeles Times


Servings: Makes about 1 1/2 cups
Note: Use good-quality cocoa powder, such as Scharffen Berger.

2 cups raw hazelnuts
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 cup powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/8 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons hazelnut oil, more as needed

1. Heat the oven to 400 degrees. Spread the hazelnuts evenly over a cookie sheet and roast until they darken and become aromatic, about 10 minutes. Transfer the hazelnuts to a damp towel and rub to remove the skins.

2. In a food processor, grind the hazelnuts to a smooth butter, scraping the sides as needed so they process evenly, about 5 minutes.

It was awesome to watch the hazelnuts go from this...

...to this!

3. Add the cocoa, sugar, vanilla, salt and oil to the food processor and continue to process until well blended, about 1 minute. The finished spread should have the consistency of creamy peanut butter; if it is too dry, process in a little extra hazelnut oil until the desired consistency is achieved. Remove to a container, cover and refrigerate until needed. Allow the spread to come to room temperature before using, as it thickens considerably when refrigerated. It will keep for at least a week.

Each tablespoon: 109 calories; 2 grams protein; 8 grams carbohydrates; 2 grams fiber; 9 grams fat; 1 gram saturated fat; 0 cholesterol; 13 mg. sodium.

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Tuesdays with Dorie: Rugelach

So a few weeks ago I whined about how I hate making biscotti because I used to have to make it by the truckload. Someone, somewhere, heard my pathetic grumbling and decided to teach me a lesson by having rugelach be this week's TWD recipe. You see, back in the day when I had to make billions of biscotti, I also had to make tons of rugelach, which is an awful lot of rolling and shaping and cutting and egg washing and baking, believe you me. *patiently waits for sympathy*

So this week's recipe was another baked good I thought I had sworn off forever, and once again I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed making and eating it again. I think there's a lesson here somewhere about not holding grudges and time healing all wounds, but I'm too busy munching on rugelach to really process it. La la la...


The dough was incredibly simple: just some flour, cream cheese, and butter, pulsed in the food processor until it barely held together. I made it the evening before I planned to bake, so it had a good long overnight chill in the refrigerator.

Because I am nothing if not indecisive, I made two varieties. The first one had Nutella (thanks to Clara for that idea!), hazelnuts, and a bit of chopped gianduja chocolate, which is chocolate that is flavored with hazelnut paste.


The second variety had cherry preserves (my favorite, from Trader Joe's), chopped almonds, and finely chopped bittersweet chocolate. I omitted the sprinkling of sugar from both fillings, figuring that they would be sweet enough with the Nutella, chocolate, and jam. The shaping wasn't too tricky, although I wished I'd waited to sprinkle the nuts and chocolate until after cutting, since the pizza wheel I used kept getting caught on the chunks. Cutting each circle into 16 wedges produced the most petite, adorable rugelachies ever! A quick chill in the fridge, an egg wash and a sprinkling of sugar, and my babies were ready for baking.


So how were they? On a scale of Gross to Fantastic, I would rate them Pretty Good! Truth be told, they weren't quite sweet enough for me. I am used to a rugelach dough that contains a bit of sugar, so next time I'll either add sugar to the dough, do a sprinkling before I roll them, or use a much sweeter filling, because they didn't get much sweetness from the bittersweet chocolate or tart cherry preserves. So that was a bit of a bummer, but other folks with less of a sweet tooth liked them quite a bit. I thought the pastry was wonderful--light, tangy, and very flaky--and the miniature size was perfect. Yes, they definitely have potential. What did you folks think?

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