Spiced Chocolate Brownies

In sheer excitement over my new found gluten free baking journey, I think I may have overdone it on stocking.  As I said before, as soon as I accepted the challenge, I ordered about 20lbs of different types of flours from Vitacost.com.  When they were delivered to my door, the cardboard box was a little disheveled and when you opened it, all of my flours were in individually packaged "bricks" stacked together.  As I unloaded my flours, my husband joked that it looked like (what he would imagine to be) a drug shipment.  We still laugh about this "delivery."  About two days after, I found the Namaste GF flour blend at Costco which I ended up loving and buying 4 bags of.  At this point, you'd think my pantry would be well-stocked, if not overly-stocked.  Well, let's not stop there.  Over a month ago, I was visiting my sister in California and I decided to stock up on bags of almond meal from Trader Joe's.  At this point, Austin's new TJ store had yet to open, so I wanted to make sure I had almond meal a plenty to get me through to the opening.

Little known fact though, I'd never used almond meal before so I'm not entirely sure why I thought I needed so much of it.  In any case, I had opened one bag to get a feel for texture, etc, and after a month of being in the fridge decided I'd better use it.  Insert Foodgawker search for almond meal recipes here.

This recipe was to showcase a specific brand of molasses.  I did not use that brand, I used what I had.  It also said to bake pan brownie-style, but I liked the idea of individual bites.   

These brownie bites taste a little bit like a mixture between a cake-y brownie or dense cake.  Take your pick.  Then I dressed them up with a shot of cinnamon chocolate buttercream and they were delicious!

I kind of want to experiment with the spices a little more.  Maybe add cloves and nutmeg?  More gingerbread style?

I basically followed this recipe that I found on Foodgawker with a few changes you can see below. Enjoy!

Mini-Spiced Chocolate Brownies
1 cup almond meal
1 cup sugar
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp cinnamon
3 tbsp cocoa powder
4 tbsp flour (I used Namaste GF blend)
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
3 tbsp molasses
4 eggs

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line mini-muffin pan and fill liners 2/3 full.  Bake for 10 minutes. Allow to cool then frost.

Spiced Chocolate Buttercream
1 stick butter, softened
3 cups powdered sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla extract
1-2 tbsp milk

Cream sugar and powdered sugar until smooth.  Add cinnamon and vanilla extract. Add 1 tbsp milk at a time and whip until desired consistency.

Lemon Cream Cake

This weekend we celebrated my mother-in-law's "not a day over 30"-th birthday.  For this special occasion, I made Dorie Greenspan's Perfect Party Cake---Tara style.  (Same cake recipe I used for the Lemon cupcakes) The original recipe is a very white lemon-scented cake with an 'egg-white' buttercream, layers of raspberry preserves, and covered in coconut.  I made a lemon cake with homemade lemon curd filling and a lemon-cream cheese-buttercream.  Mmmm....

I originally intended to just use the buttercream recipe that the cake recipe called for, but I wasn't a huge fan. So I added some cream cheese and a little powdered sugar and ended up with a delicious fluffy, whipped cream cheese frosting.  

The lemon curd recipe was from Ina Garten and it was absolutely delicious.  Tart and sweet.  I have the extra bit in a container in the fridge and have been eating it by the spoonful. 

Once again, didn't get good quality daylight pictures of the cake when we cut it, but you'll get the idea from the ones below.  

The frosting was very delicate so the cake needs to be refrigerated.  I brought it out about 2 hours before serving and you can already tell that it was getting pretty soft.  

I loved this cake.  The lemon-scented fluffy white cake with a fluffy white frosting that wasn't too sweet and the tangy lemon curd...YUM.  Will definitely be making this again.  If you don't want to go through the trouble of making the egg-white buttercream, I think just a traditional lemon cream cheese frosting would be great, as well. 

Lemon Cream Cake

(printable recipe)

Dorie's Perfect Party Cake 

from Baking: From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan

2 1/4 cups cake flour

1 tbsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1 1/4 cups buttermilk

4 large egg whites

1 1/2 cups sugar

2 tsp grated lemon zest

1 stick (8 tbsp) butter, room temperature

1/2 tsp lemon extract

Center a rack in the oven to 350 degrees F. Prepare 2- 8 inch cake pans.

Sift together the flour, baking powder and salt.

Whisk together the milk and egg whites in a medium bowl.

Put the sugar and lemon zest in a mixer bowl or another large bowl and rub them together with your fingers until the sugar is moist and fragrant. Add the butter and, working with the paddle or whisk attachment, or with a hand mixer, beat at medium speed for a full 3 minutes, until the butter and sugar are very light. Beat in the lemon extract, then add one third of the flour mixture, still beating on medium speed. Beat in half of the milk-egg mixture, then beat in half of the remaining dry ingredients until incorporated. Add the rest of the milk and eggs, beating until the batter is homogeneous, then add the last of the dry ingredients. Finally, give the batter a good 2-minute beating to ensure that it is thoroughly mixed and well aerated. Evenly distribute batter into cake pans. 

Bake 30-35 minutes or until toothpick inserted into center comes out clean.  Allow to cool for 5 minutes before transferring cakes to cooling racks.  Cool completely before frosting. 

Buttercream (modified):

1 cup sugar

4 large egg whites

3 sticks (12 oz) butter, room temperature

1/4 cup fresh lemon juice (2 large lemons)

1 tsp vanilla extract

1-8oz package cream cheese, room temperature

2 cups powdered sugar

Put sugar and egg whites into large heat proof bowl and fit bowl over a pan of simmering water and whisk constantly, keeping the mixture over the heat until hot to the touch, about 3 minutes.  The sugar should be dissolved and mixture should look like shiny marshmallow cream.  Remove bowl from heat.

Working with the whisk attachment, beat the meringue on medium speed until cool, about 5 minutes.  Add the butter a stick at a time, beating until smooth.  Once all of the butter is in, beat the buttercream on medium speed until it is thick and smooth, 6-10 minutes.  During this time, buttercream may curdle or separate, keep beating until it comes together again.  

Modified version:

Add package of cream cheese to buttercream and blend until smooth.  Gradually add in 2 cups of powdered sugar or until desired consistency or sweetness. 

Lemon Curd (Ina Garten)

3 lemons

1 1/2 cups sugar

1/4 lb. butter (1 stick), room temperature

4 extra-large eggs

1/2 cup lemon juice, 3-4 lemons

1/8 tsp salt

To make lemon curd:

Removed the zest of 3 lemons and place in food processor with sugar.  Pulse until zest is finely minced with sugar.  Cream the butter in separate bowl, add in sugar/lemon mixture.  Add eggs, one at a time, until combined.  Add lemon juice and salt.  Place in saucepan and cook over low heat until thickened, stirring constantly.  (about 10 minutes or 170degrees). Remove from heat and cool, then refrigerate in air tight container. 

To assemble cake:

Using a sharp serrated knife, slice each cake in half horizontally.  Put one layer or cake plate or cardboard cutout, spread layer of lemon curd, followed by layer of frosting.  Place 2nd cake round on top and repeat.   Continue until last layer then use remaining buttercream to frost top and edges.  Refrigerate until ready to eat.

Funfetti Cupcakes

Happy New Year! Browsing through recipes, I tried to come up with the perfect cupcake to start out 2012.  

Well my friends, here it is, for the kid in all of us.  

A homemade funfetti cupcake.  :)

I used Jessica's cupcake and buttercream recipe, just used regular sprinkles in the batter instead of the nonpareils.  

Straight out of the oven, these cupcakes were moist and delicious.  Unfortunately, the next morning the cake seems to be a little on the dry side, but still tasty!  My goal is to tweak this recipe to perfection, then repost.  

The icing I'm not tweaking though. It's fabulous.

These cupcakes make me smile and like I said before, despite being a little on the dry side, they are really quite tasty.  

Happy 2012!

Funfetti Cupcakes (makes 1 dozen)

from HowSweetItIs

(printable recipe)

Funfetti Batter

1/2 cup butter

1 cup sugar

2 whole eggs

1 tbsp vanilla extract

1 1/2 cups AP flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/3 cup milk

1/3 cup rainbow sprinkles

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Line cupcake pan with liners. 

Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy.  Add eggs and vanilla and mix until combined.

Combine dry ingredients in separate bowl.  Add half of dry ingredients, mixing until just combined.  Add in milk until combined.  Add remaining flour mixture.  Fold in sprinkles.

Fill cupcake liners 2/3 full and bake for 18-20 minutes.  Let cool then frost.  

Vanilla Buttercream

2 sticks of butter, softened

2 1/2 cups powdered sugar

1 tbsp vanilla

1 tbsp milk, if needed

Cream butter until fluffy.  Gradually add in powdered sugar until combined.  Add in vanilla and whip on high speed for 2-3 minutes.  If frosting is too thick, add 1 tbsp of milk at a time.  I didn't need to use any milk.  

Pumpkin Whoopie Pies

Hello, everyone.  Meet the whoopie pie.

What exactly is a whoopie pie you ask?  Well, according to the trusty and reliable Wikipedia, "a whoopie pie is an American baked good that may be considered either a cookie, pie, or cake.  It is made of two round-shaped pieces of chocolate cake, or sometimes pumpkin or gingerbread cake, with a sweet, creamy filling or frosting sandwiched between them." 

I think that description pretty much sums these little guys up.  Or as I like to call them, an inside-out cupcake.  There you have it.

These whoopie pies are pumpkin with a cinnamon-vanilla buttercream.  I only wish I had made my staple cinnamon-cream cheese frosting for the center and they would have been divine.  However, I was trying to step outside my box and use a regular buttercream.

They were still quite delicious. I just love cream cheese.

I followed the recipe exactly from Brown Eyed Baker. I just went the cinnamon frosting route rather than maple.  To each his own.   I didn't use a whoopie pie pan and you probably don't need to either.  My first batch, I put the batter into a piping bag and piped rounds on a baking sheet.  The second batch, I used a cookie scoop.  They both worked well.

With 3 full cups of pumpkin in these little treats, you're sure to get your pumpkin-fall fix.  Enjoy!

Pumpkin Whoopie Pies with Cinnamon-Vanilla Buttercream (printable recipe)

adapted from Brown Eyed Baker

3 cups flour

2 tbsp cinnamon

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

1 tsp ground ginger

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1 cup sugar

1 cup brown sugar

1 cup vegetable oil

3 cups canned pumpkin puree, chilled

2 eggs 

1 tsp vanilla

1.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.  Line baking sheets with parchment paper.

2.  Combine dry ingredients in separate bowl and whisk together.

3.  Combine sugars and oil in mixer.  Add pumpkin puree until thoroughly combined.  Add eggs and vanilla.

4.  Gradually add in flour mixture until thoroughly combined.

5. Using piping bag, cookie scoop, or large spoon, drop by heaping, rounded tablespoons onto baking sheet about 1 inch apart.

6.  Bake 10-12 minutes or until toothpick inserted comes out clean.  Allow to fully cool on wire rack.

7.  Once cooled, pipe frosting onto one side of one cookie and place another cookie on top and sandwich together. Store in airtight container.

Cinnamon-Vanilla Buttercream

2 sticks butter, room temperature

1 tbsp vanilla extract

1 1/2 tsp cinnamon

1 tbsp milk or cream

4-5 cups powder sugar

1.  Beat together butter, vanilla, cinnamon, and milk/cream until combined. Gradually add powdered sugar until combined.  Once combined. Beat on medium speed 3-4 minutes.  If too thick, add 1 tbsp of extra milk at a time until desired consistency.