Strawberry Shortcake in a Glass

Remember when I made those watermelon rum-aritas two years ago?  No?  Well, you should re-visit the recipe (and try it with jalapeño-spiked rum or tequila while you're at it...trust me).  One of my favorite things about that recipe is that it uses fresh fruit, liquor, and not much else--no soda or syrups, and it uses whole fruit, rather than juice, so you get more nutritional value.  Yes, I referred to the nutritional value of a cocktail.  I can rationalize anything.  Keep reading.

This next recipe falls in the same vein.  It has 3 simple ingredients, two of which are healthy!  The third is vodka.  How could you go wrong?  This is a beautifully sweet way to cap off a meal.  It also makes a great afternoon snack (hey, it's 5 o'clock somewhere, right?) because it's very filling.  And it quite literally tastes like strawberry shortcake in a glass.  Don't let strawberry season pass you by without giving this a whirl (pun intended)!

Strawberry Shortcake in a Glass (a Blondie original)

• 1 pint fresh strawberries, washed and hulled
• 1 to 1 1/4 c. milk (skim works, whole tastes richer)
• 1 c. cake vodka (we like Pinnacle, but I'm sure other brands work, too)
• 3 basil leaves (optional)

Combine strawberries, milk, vodka, and basil leaves (optional) in a blender.  You can adjust the amount of milk depending on how creamy you would like it.  Blend until smooth, and then drink up!  Makes about 4 glasses.

What's Baking?: Walnute Nectarine Muffins

*Blows dust off blog*  Wow, has it ever been a while.  Suffice to say, between work and life, I haven't had a lot of time to be blogging lately!  When the What's Baking? group threatened to kick me out for lack of participation (ooops, sorry guys!), I figured I should get my behind in gear and get a post written.

This month's challenge, brought to you by Yudith of Blissfully Delicious, was to bake using summer produce.  Now, I don't know about you, but one of my favorite parts of summer is all of the fresh produce!  Watermelons, berries, peaches, plums, cherries--don't make me pick, I love them all!  But for this recipe, I'm using nectarines, because they were on sale at my grocery store.  Grocery store, you ask?  Not Farmers' Market?  Let me tell you.  You would think, given that I live in a rural area, that there would be a lot of Farmers' Markets or other opportunities to buy fresh produce.  Do you want to know what the ONLY stall at my Farmers' Market last week was selling?

Funnel cakes.

Yup, funnel cakes.  Nothing else.  No tomatoes, no cucumbers, no zucchini, and certainly no fruit.  So, grocery store, it is.  I will be scouting various other Farmers' Markets over the next couple weeks in hopes of finding one that actually sells *gasp* produce!  In the meantime, Husband (yup, he graduated from Fiancé!) and I will be enjoying these nectarine walnut muffins for breakfast.  We took his mom's basic muffin recipe and adapted it, and they turned out deliciously!  You could make these with any fruit you wanted, truly, although you'll have to play with the amount of milk, based on how juicy your fruit is!  I'm thinking they would also be delicious with white chocolate chips substituted for the walnuts....

Nectarine Walnut Muffins (adapted from Shirley)

• 3 1/2 c. flour
• 2/3 c. sugar
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 2 Tbl. double-acting baking powder
• 2 eggs
• 2/3 c. vegetable oil
• 1 1/4 c. milk
• 2 tsp. vanilla
• 3 nectarines, diced (peeling is optional--I didn't bother)
• 1 c. chopped walnuts

In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, salt, and baking powder.  Add the eggs, oil, milk, and vanilla, and mix until mostly combined.  Gently fold in the nectarines and walnuts until they are incorporated and no streaks of flour remain.  Divide batter evenly among 12 jumbo muffin tins (or 24 normal-sized ones).  Bake at 375*F for 20-25 minutes for jumbo muffins or 15-20 minutes for normal-sized muffins.  Muffins are done when a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

The Cherpumple...errr...Chersweetby?

Brownie here!  It's been a very busy few months for me so most of my baking went unphotographed, but next week is the boyfriend's 26th birthday and after I had told him of the existence of the

His favorite color is green

Cherpumple, he told me he would request one every year until I made him one.  Now, I live by myself, and consuming the remainder of 3 pies and 3 cakes sounded like an insane feat, so I sought to make a mini version of the cherpumple, something a few people could manageably eat.

For those of you who don't know, the cherpumple is a monstrous creation, 3 layers of pie (cherry, pumpkin, and apple, respectively)-stuffed-in-cake.  These things are ginormous.  I decided to use a birthday gift from the boyfriend's sister, this cute tiered cake pan, and make a smaller version.  Normally I do from-scratch baking, but a paper deadline and the enormity of this task required a few compromises...

To make my version, you'll need:

1 4-inch cherry pie (I bought mine from the freezer section because I only had so many tiny pie tins)

Clockwise from left--sweet potato, Kentucky Derby, and cherry

Ingredients for Joe Pastry's Pumpkin Pie, subbing sweet potato for the pumpkin puree, subbing evaporate milk for both the milk and the cream, and scaling it up by 25% if you want to make a spare pumpkin pie, or making only 1/4 of the recipe if you just want the mini ones.

Ingredients for Joe Pastry's Kentucky Derby Pie (I ended up using 1.5 pie crusts for this because using smaller containers contains less volume per crust amount)

1 box yellow/vanilla cake mix, plus the eggs/oil/water it calls for
Spices of your choice (I used 1 Tbl cinnamon, 1 tsp nutmeg, and 1/2 tsp cloves)
Chocolate pudding mix/cocoa-sugar blend (to turn vanilla cake into chocolate; pure cocoa just gets too bitter).

1.5 cups butter, softened
~3 cups powdered sugar
1.5 tsp salt
2/3 cup dark spiced rum

Two days ahead, make the pumpkin pies.  I used something like these mini ramekins that I bought at an estate sale ages ago.  They're a bit deep-dish but that works out well for the cake pan.  Obviously in the small pans they bake a lot faster--mine were done in 10-15 minutes.  Put cooled pies in the freezer.  Eat the big one if you made it--it's a great recipe.

One day ahead, make the Kentucky Derby pies.  I baked these in tartlet pans (I bought mine on Amazon from Fox Run; you want to use ones without a false bottom unless you're really confident in your pie crust since syrup pies can leak) and again shortened the baking time.  Freeze the cooled pies.

Leave some space for them to rise!

The day of, make the cake mix according to the package directions, and divide it into 3 bowls, but not evenly--one bowl should have about 1/5 of the batter (this will be chocolate), and the remaining two will split what's left, with a little extra going to the plain flavor (the medium amount is for the spice cake).

Add the spices of your choice to the spice one, and the chocolate putting mix or cocoa-sugar blend to the chocolate (to taste), and prep your pan by cutting out solid circles for the bottom tier and rings for the upper 2 tiers. You could also spray and flour the pan thoroughly.

Cut the frozen cherry pie into 4 wedges (no more than 1 inch in diameter). Drop a wedge inside each cavity, and top with the chocolate batter. Repeat with the pumpkin and the spice batter, and then finally top with the Kentucky Derby pie and yellow batter (careful not to overfill).  Conveniently, the chocolate batter will be the thickest, so you shouldn't have much trouble with things blending together--my layers were quite distinct.

The glory shot

Bake according to the package directions, and test by springiness rather than a toothpick so you don't misinterpret pie goo as raw batter.  Let cool thoroughly and then invert for 1 hour or so, hoping that the cakes fall out. They might break into the 3 layers but that just gives you more opportunity for frosting.  Refrigerate (or if you want to do a crumb coat, freeze) until ready to frost.

To make the frosting, reduce 1/2 cup of rum in a pan by half, while blending the softened butter with 1/2 cup of the sugar. Alternate the reduced rum and remaining sugar, and then whip in the un-reduced rum (replacing the milk in a normal buttercream). Try to get the buttercream as airy as possible (using whisk attachment) since the cake is so rich.

Frost the cakes (I did a crumb coat and then froze again), then slice carefully and wow all your friends!

What's Baking?: Creamsicle Bundt Cake

I'm alive!  I haven't forgotten about the blog, I swear!  I had a REALLY busy spell at work, so I had to take a break, but I am (hopefully) back in action now!  And, I happen to be just in time for another What's Baking? challenge!

This month, Ange from The Tiny Tyrant's Kitchen challenged us to bake our favorite cocktail.  Um, yum!  This was right up my alley.  And, I knew right away what I wanted to make.  The Fiancé and I have been big fans of the flavored vodkas ever since they came our, but hands-down, our favorite one is whipped cream vodka.  We can go through a liter of that stuff embarrassingly quickly!  He loves to mix it with coke (tastes like vanilla coke) or strawberry soda, while my favorite mixers are root beer (mmmmm, root beer float) or orange soda (hello, creamsicle).  And when I saw this cherry lime cream cheese bread, I knew I could adapt the recipe to highlight the whipped cream vodka and orange flavors.  I ended up using orange juice in this recipe, so it's a much more natural orange flavor, but you could certainly use orange soda to get more of the creamsicle flavor.  This cake was a big hit, and The Fiancé enjoyed taking slices of it to work for breakfast!  I hope you like it as much as we did!

Creamsicle Bundt Cake (heavily adapted from My Baking Heart)

Cheesecake layer

• 16 oz cream cheese (reduced fat is fine), softened
• 1/2 c. sugar
• 2 eggs
• 2 Tbl. flour
• 1/4 c. whipped cream vodka

Cream together the cream cheese and sugar until smooth.  Beat in the eggs, one at a time.  Next, beat in the flour.  Finally, mix in the whipped cream vodka.  Set aside.

Cake layer

• 1 c. butter, softened
• 1 c. sugar
• 4 eggs
• 2 tsp. vanilla
• Zest of 2 oranges
• 3 c. flour
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 2 tsp. baking powder
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 2/3 c. orange juice (or orange soda)

Cream together the butter and sugar until smooth.  Beat in the eggs, one at a time.  Beat in the vanilla extract and the orange zest.  In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda.  Stir about half of this into the butter mixture, until just combined.  Mix in the orange juice.  Finally, beat in the remaining flour mixture until just combined.

Pour about half of the cake batter into a greased bundt pan.  Top with the cheesecake batter.  Cover with remaining cake batter, and carefully smooth the cake batter over the top so that none of the cheesecake batter is showing.  Bake at 350*F for ~70 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.  Cool completely, and remove cake from bundt pan.

Glaze

• 3 c. powdered sugar 
• 2 Tbl. melted butter
• 3-4 Tbl. whipped cream vodka

Stir melted butter and about 2 Tbl. of whipped cream vodka into the powdered sugar.  Continue to add the whipped cream vodka, a little bit at a time, until glaze reaches a thick but pourable consistency.  Pour over top of the cooled cake.

War Cake

For our All In challenge this month, in honor of tax day, we were supposed to make something budget-friendly.  Budget-friendly isn't usually my strong suit, so I was brainstorming ideas with the Fiancé, and he suggested war cake.  I hadn't heard of it before, but Wikipedia tells me "Depression cake is a type of cake that was commonly made during the Great Depression. The ingredients include little or no milk, sugar, butter or eggs, because they were then either expensive or hard to get. Similar cakes are known as "War Cake," as they avoided ingredients that were scarce or were being conserved for the use of soldiers."  Sounds like it should fit the budget-friendly bill!

We used the Fiancé's mother's recipe, and sure enough, there was no milk or eggs in the recipe, but it did include shortening and sugar.  Thankfully, sugar is cheap these days and isn't being rationed, so that's not an issue.  As for the shortening, well, I apparently wasn't entirely "with it" while baking and completely forgot to add the shortening.  The cake turned out alright--a bit chewier than I'm used to and probably a bit drier than it would have been with the shortening, but still tasty.  So, feel free to leave it out, if you want, but I'd bet money that it's better with shortening.

We chose to frost the cake with cream cheese frosting because I love cream cheese frosting and any excuse to make/eat it, but you could just dust it with powdered sugar to keep things a little more budget-friendly.  The spices are also adaptable to what you have on hand, so you don't have to go out and buy spices--you could easily leave out the cloves, or substitute both the cloves and the cinnamon with 2 tsp. of pumpkin pie spice or apple pie spice, or substitute some allspice, nutmeg, and/or ground ginger for one or both of the spices.  The rest of the ingredients are all relatively cheap, too, and this is a very simple cake to make, so it's a good one to keep in your back pocket for the next time you need an easy dessert.  As a bonus, it's vegan if you use vegetable shortening and skip the cream cheese frosting!  I hope you enjoy this cake as much as we did!

War Cake (recipe from Shirley)

• 2 c. sugar
• 2 c. water (if you're not trying to be so budget-friendly, sub 1/2 c. of the water with some spiced rum--yum!)
• 1 lb raisins
• 1/2 c. shortening
• 3 c. flour
• 2 tsp. baking soda
• 1 tsp. cinnamon
• 1 tsp. cloves
• 1 tsp. salt

Combine the sugar, water, raisins, and shortening in a saucepan over medium-high heat.  Bring to a boil, and boil for 3-5 minutes.  Remove from heat, and let the mixture cool a bit.

Meanwhile, whisk together the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, cloves, and salt in a big bowl.  Add the cooled raisin mixture to the flour mixture, and stir until just combined.  Pour into a greased 9x13" cake pan.  Bake at 350*F for 40-50 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.  Due to all the sugar in this cake, the cake will get VERY dark--don't let the color throw you!  It's not burning, I promise!  It's supposed to look like that.  Dust the cake with powdered sugar, OR frost with cream cheese frosting (recipe below).

Cream Cheese Frosting (adapted from my mom's recipe)

• 8 oz. cream cheese, softened (full-fat, please!)
• 1/2 c. butter, softened
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 2 c. powdered sugar

Cream together the cream cheese and butter until light and fluffy.  Beat in the vanilla.  Whip in the powdered sugar until no lumps remain and frosting is fluffy.  Spread on cake, and fight over who gets to lick the bowl.  ;)

Irish Car Bomb Cheesecake Brownies

My company has been going through some layoffs and instituting some new cost-cutting measures recently.  Part of it is that our monthly meeting is no longer catered.  Bummer!  But, I'm looking at the silver lining--I've been making goodies to bring to the meeting each month!  My thought is that it's my insurance against getting laid off--if my name comes up, there will be outcry at the thought of no longer having sweet treats at our meetings!  :)

In honor of St. Patrick's Day, I wanted to make some boozy Irish Car Bomb cheesecake-swirled brownies!  I took a Guinness brownie recipe and added my own Bailey's cheesecake swirl--yum!  The Fiancé declared them the best brownies that he has ever had, and that's saying something!  They're REALLY fudge-y (bordering more on flourless chocolate cake than brownie), not super sweet (the Guinness adds a nice bitterness, and the salt balances out the sugar), and overall quite delicious!  So, if you're still celebrating St. Patrick's Day (I'm Irish, so I reserve the right to celebrate all week!), go ahead and make a pan of these brownies to cap off your dinner!

Irish Car Bomb Cheesecake Brownies (brownie base adapted from Bon Appetit, cheesecake swirl is a Blondie original)

• 1 bottle Guinness (or another stout)
• 12 oz semisweet chocolate chips
• 1 c. butter
• 1 3/4 c. sugar, divided
• 5 eggs, divided
• 2 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1 3/4 tsp. salt
• 1 c. flour
• 8 oz cream cheese
• 2 Tbl. Bailey's (or other Irish Cream)

Boil the Guinness uncovered over medium heat until it is reduced to about 1/3-1/2 c., stirring occasionally.  This might take a while!  Remove from heat and let cool partially.

Melt the chocolate chips and butter in the microwave (try 30-second increments, stirring after each one).  Once smooth, beat in 1 1/2 c. sugar.  One at a time, beat in 4 of the eggs.  Mix in the vanilla extract and the salt--yes, it seems like a lot of salt, but it's the perfect amount, trust me!  Finally, mix in the flour until just combined.  Pour the mixture into a greased 9x13" pan.

Meanwhile, cream the cream cheese with remaining 1/4 c. sugar.  Beat in the remaining egg.  Mix in the Bailey's until thoroughly combined.  Dollop spoonfuls of the cheesecake batter over the top of the brownie batter--there's no science to this, and it does not have to be precise!  Run a butter knife through the mixture to swirl the two batters together--careful not to overdo it, or you will lose the marbled effect!  Bake for about 40-50 minutes at 350* F, or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean (or mostly clean, if you like your brownies slightly underbaked).

What's Baking February Round-Up

As I mentioned in my last post, I was lucky enough to host What's Baking this month!  Everyone did a great job making their own convenience products from scratch!  I was really impressed with the variety of entries!  Take a moment to click through and check out everyone's hard work!

Jen from Beantown Baker made her own cran-raspberry preserves to fill a delicious-looking layer cake with white chocolate frosting.  I'll take a slice of that, please!

Coleen of the Redhead Baker tackled homemade mascarpone cheese!  What a great item to make from scratch, since it's so expensive in the store!  She suggests using it in tiramisu, cheesecake, or to fill profiteroles or cannoli!

Amanda from Our Italian Kitchen showed us how to get the best of both worlds by making your own cake mix from scratch!  Imagine that, the convenience of boxed cake mix, but without all the unpronounceable ingredients!  She used the mix to replicate her wedding cake for her anniversary.

Catherine from Pursuing Domestic Goddess-ness decided to take a more savory route and decided to try to replicate a certain famous store's Swedish Meatballs!  She put her own twist on them by tossing them in a chipotle apple sauce instead of the more common cream sauce.  Yummy!

Carrie of Carrie's Sweet Life tackled one of my personal favorite convenience products--pie crust!  She used it to make ham and cheddar quiches (sounds like a great breakfast to me!), but the recipe is versatile and would work in any pie recipe, too!

Jaida of Sweet Beginnings isn't usually a breakfast person but says her homemade English muffins just might change that!  Who knew that cooking them on a griddle pan is the secret to making this convenience product at home?

Eva from Eva Bakes had 2 pounds of local Virginia peanuts (hi, neighbor!) that she needed to use up, so she decided to make her own homemade peanut butter!  While she's not a peanut butter fan, her husband loved it and really enjoyed getting to adjust it to be as sweet or as salty as he wanted!

Lastly, I made some fresh ricotta that I then used in a ricotta cheesecake--delicious!

Next month's host is Jen from Beantown Baker, and her theme is Sprinkles!  Be sure to check out her blog at the end of March to see what these creative ladies come up with!