Now I can’t give you a recipe for fondant, as I buy that ready made. And there’s no photo tutorial of making the calla lilies either, because Laurens wasn’t around while I was [...]]]> That birthday cake I made for my bloggiversary. I still owe you some recipes.

Now I can’t give you a recipe for fondant, as I buy that ready made. And there’s no photo tutorial of making the calla lilies either, because Laurens wasn’t around while I was rolling them and he always takes my pictures. But the cake itself was heavenly and I can give you those recipes.

The sponge was great, light and fluffy and airy and eggy. Not overly sweet, which is good when you’re filling it with buttercream and ganache.

The buttercream wouldn’t come into the exact right consistency, which had to do with the temperature, but the recipe still tasted really good, and once on the cake, you really couldn’t tell the difference.

The ganache, oh the ganache… I could just eat ganache with a spoon and call it heaven. If ganache were a person, I’d become a polygamist and Laurens would just have to share me. (Yes, I sure as heck love that ganache.)

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Ganache

• 12 oz good quality chocolate (choose whichever one has your preference, dark, milk, really dark, white – just make sure it’s one that you love to eat as it. Don’t skimp and use chocolate chips unless you prefer to eat chocolate chips over eating good quality chocolate bars.)
• 1 cup heavy cream

Chop the chocolate into little pieces, place them in a bowl. Heat the heavy cream until it reaches the boiling point, take it from the heat and quickly pour it into the bowl with chocolate. The chocolate will start to melt. Stir slowly but steadily, mix well and you will see the chocolate and the cream coming together into one thin mass. Once everything is fully incorporated either use it as a glace (by dipping something in there and letting it harden into a thin, glossy chocolate finish) or let it cool off and thicken. You can then either pipe it decoratively (it’s ready when you can spoon in out, let it drip down and it retains it’s shape) or whip it with an electric beater into a whipped frosting. All are equally tasty.

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Custard buttercream

• 2 egg yolks
• 50 grams of sugar
• 12 grams of plain flour
• 1 cup of milk
• butter
• sugar

First make the custard. Mis the eggyolks with the sugar and beat into a light frothy misture, sift in the flour and mix well, then add the milk and mix to avoid lumps. Place mixture in a pot and bring it to heat slowly, while constantly stirring. Once you have a thick yellow custard, remove from heat and keep stirring, it will keep thickening from the remaining heat in the pan. After a couple of minutes stop stirring constantly, but just stir occasionally (every couple of minutes) until it’s cooled down significantly. Stirring it frequently prevents it from forming an icky crust.

Once the custard is completely cooled, you can weigh it and make the buttercream. If your custard ends up heavy or light (some eggs are bigger/heavier than others, how much has evaporated, how fast have you cooked it) adjust the amount of butter and sugar to make the buttercream. The ratio should be 5 – 1 – 3 (custard – sugar – butter).

Mix butter and sugar (I used part brown sugar part vanilla sugar part fine white sugar) until its  the slightly brown-colored equivalent of a light and fluffy mixture. Whip it well! Add the cold custard and whip it again until it’s a wonderful, pretty, smooth buttercream which you want to eat right away. Use it to fill and crumb coat your cake.

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Basic sponge cake

• 4 whole warm eggs
• 100 grams sugar
• 100 grams flour
• optional: replace some sugar with vanilla-sugar and/or add a drop of almond extract to the batter.

The trick of this sponge is a combination of warmth and patience. Get your eggs warm. Remove them from the fridge to get to room temperature, then lay them in a warm water bath. Water should be warm, not boiling, you should be able to put your hand in there, but it shouldn’t be comfortable. Run some hot water through your mixer bowl as well. Then dry that off very very well. The bowl needs to be warm, not wet.

Crack your eggs and add the sugar (and the optional extract) to the bowl of your mixer. Then mix on high speed until you can’t stand it anymore, then whip a little longer. I put Anne-Sophie (my trusty KitchenAid Artisan) on her highest speed for about 10 minutes. Don’t worry, you can’t overbeat it. If you walk away for a minute or two, you’ll see that it’s suddenly turning into a huge bowl of foam. That’s what you want. Airy, foamy sugared egg.

Once you’re sure it doesn’t grow any more gently fold the (double) sifted flour into the mixture. Pour it into a greased pan and bake at 360F for about 25 minutes. A skewer inserted should come out dry. If the top gets brown too quickly just put a sheet of tin foil over it.

Cool on a cooling rack. Make sure it’s completely cooled before you frost or fill it, or your filling will melt. You could replace part of the flour with sifted cocoa powder to make a chocolate sponge.

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First, a little story. A fun story. The story of people who love cookies more than what’s good for them!
This year I dove into the Christmas baking [...]]]> So those recipes I promised you, along with the video of the ginger snaps baking. They’ve finally arrived!

First, a little story. A fun story. The story of people who love cookies more than what’s good for them!
This year I dove into the Christmas baking  big time, with 3 different kinds of cookies, of which 2 types came in different versions. And then there was the ‘mock-Enstrom-toffee’ that made an appearance as well. Lots of sweets to delight not only ourselves, but plenty of others as well.

So yes, I was a nice person, a good baker, true to the title and motto of this blog. I shared the goodies I made!

When bringing some to the office, 3 of my co-workers (who have a 6th sense for sweets, they were standing next to my desk before I’d even plated all the cookies and I hadn’t told anyone I brought them!) requested that I’d start a tradition of making Valentine’s day cookies, Easter cookies, Passover cookies, Queen’s day cookies, Ascension day cookies, Summer cookies, Halloween cookies and Thanksgiving cookies as well. In between those special cookies, they’d accept it if I’d limit myself to Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday cookies.

I guess it meant they liked them :-)

The cookies I opted for  and brought to my hungry, cookie-loving co-workers were chocolate chip cookies with some walnut pieces (pretty much your standard toll house cookie, why mess with a winning recipe), Ginger snaps (courtesy of my friend Amber who got the recipe from Teresa, who’s a fellow goddess-mama to our beloved Gracie, the cookies you saw in that film) and oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. The oatmeal chocolate chip cookies had a version with milk chocolate chips and one with white and butterscotch. Please don’t make me choose which one I liked better. The ginger snaps came in a soft-and-chewy and a crispy version, which resulted in different tasting cookies along with the difference in texture.

Word of warning to the Dutchies here. The measurements, as usual on my blog, are done with American standard size measurements. Don’t try to substitute them for Dutch sizes. a tsp (teaspoon) is really another amount than filling a Dutch spoon you stir your tea or coffee with. While with spices it’ll just give you a very bland tasting cookie, it’ll be disastrous for the end product if you do that with baking powder or baking soda.

Another word to the wise. Baking powder and baking soda are not interchangeable as some Dutch websites suggest. Baking soda is sold at American/English stores, sometimes at ‘toko’s’ or otherwise at the pharmacy as ‘zuiveringszout’ or ‘natriumbicarbonaat’. Also Dtuch melasse, (molasses) isn’t necessarily the same as American molasses. The European version can be fairly strong. If you like that taste, that’s fine, otherwise, substitute about half the molasses with a very mild honey. Or that’s what David Lebovitz tells us, and who am I to question his judgement?!

 

[print_this]Chocolate chip walnut cookies (adapted from the Nestlé Toll House cookie recipe)

• 1 cups + 2 tbsp AP flour
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp seasalt
• 1/2 cup unsalted butter
• 6 tbsp granulated sugar
• 6 tbsp brown sugar (I use a mix of dark and light brown sugar)
• 3/4 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 egg
• 1 cups chocolate chips (I prefer milk chocolate for my choc-chip-cookies)
• a big handful walnuts, roughly chopped

Cream butter and sugars, add egg and vanilla. Sift flour, baking soda and salt together and slowly add into the mixture. Mix well. Add in the chocolate chips and the walnuts, make sure they’re evenly mixed throughout the dough.
Preheat oven to 375 F (185 C), using a cookie scoop or 2 spoons place even-sized little heaps of dough on a cookie sheet and bake for 10-12 minutes until nice and golden brown. (around 10 minutes for a soft, slightly chewy cookie, around 12 for a slightly crispier cookie).
Let the cookies cool on the cookie sheet for about 2 minutes, then move them to a cooling rack to cool completely (if you can resist eating a warm cookie, that is!)

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[print_this]Ginger snaps (adapted from Teresa and Amber’s recipe)

• 3/4 cup unsalted butter
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup molasses
• 1 egg
• 2 cups flour
• 2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp cloves
• 1 scant tsp ginger
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1 good pinch of finely ground (powdered) black pepper

Cream butter and sugar, add the molasses and the egg, then sift in flour, baking soda, salt and spices and mix well. Shape into balls and roll in sugar (do not flatten) bake on an ungreased cookie sheet at 350 F (175 C) degrees for 10 – 12 minutes. If you like them even spicier (try one cooled of cookie first!) add some more ginger and pepper to the sugar which you toll the dough in. Cool on cookie sheet for about 2 minutes, then move to rack for complete cooling. As with all cookies, a shorter cooking time will give you a chewier, softer cookie. In this case, the soft cookie will really taste different, a lot more ‘molassessy’.

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[print_this]Oatmeal chip cookies (adapted from a random recipe I found and altered big time)

• ½ cup unsalted butter
• ½ cup sugar
• ½ cups brown sugar (I use a mix of dark and light)
• 1 egg
• 3/4 tsp vanilla
• 1 cup flour
• ¼ tsp salt
• ½ tsp baking powder
• ½ tsp baking soda
• 1-¼ cup regular oatmeal (not the instant stuff)
• a good handful pecans, chopped
• heaping 1/2 cup (milk) chocolate chips
• heaping 1/4 cup white chocolate chips
• heaping 1/4 cup butterscotch chips

Cream butter, sugar and brown sugar, add the egg and vanilla. Sift the flour, salt, baking powder and baking soda into the butter mixture. Mix well, then add in the oatmeal. Add the pecans and mix well.
Divide the very thick dough in 2. Add milk chocolate chips to the first half of the batter and white and butterscotch chips to the second half.

Roll the dough into small balls, (large walnut/ a bit smaller than golfball size), bake at 375F  (185 C) degrees for 12-15 minutes. Let them cool on the cookie sheet for 2 minutes, then move to a cooling rack.

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Note for all 3 recipes, if the dough is too soft to shape properly, place in the refrigerator for a half hour or so, then try scooping or rolling balls again.

Looking online I found tons of pumpkin bread, squash bread or zucchini cake recipes. I [...]]]> With the ginormous banana squash in Hand I had to figure out what exactly to use it for. Surely, we eat squash, but this was enough for about a week. So I needed to change things up.

Looking online I found tons of pumpkin bread, squash bread or zucchini cake recipes. I figured I’d be able to do something like that with my giant squash as well.

My beloved new knife cut off a giant piece of squash. I peeled it, seeded it and shredded it. Let the fun begin.

Let me start by saying, I don’t know why people call something that contains 2 cups of sugar a bread. It’s not bread, it’s cake. To me the term bread means something savory. A pinch of sugar to help yeast or enhance flavors, is all fine. I figured I’d still make it, but think of it and treat it more like a cake. And I was right. In taste and consistency the end result came out a lot like my mom’s age old spice cake recipe. Served with some whipped cream, or ice cream, it’s a tasty treat. But it sure as heck isn’t a bread!

I liked it though. In taste and texture, which means I probably won’t be making my mom’s spice cake again, as this is a little healthier and tastes the same. Go figure.

Also, the recipe is meant for a BIG loaf pan. Or at least that’s what I assume as my regular sized one filled up really high. The middle took forever to cook and I was afraid of burning the sides. Fortunately that didn’t happen, but still, the cake could’ve used another 10 minutes and then surely the bottom and sides would’ve been too dark. Next time I make it, I’ll use a large springform, and maybe put a nail (the ones you use to make buttercream flowers) on the bottom to help distribute heat to the middle. It worked like a charm for my tiramisu cake, so why not here?

All in all, the cake worked out, but next time I’ll make a smaller recipe and/or use a bigger pan and make sure there are more people to share with. This was a little too much for just the 2 of us.

[print_this]Banana squash cake (recipe adapted from allrecipes.com, makes 1 giant loaf)

• 2 cups shredded banana squash
• 2 cups sugar
• 3 cups flour
• 1 cup half melted butter, half oil (any liquid fat is okay)
• 2 tsp cinnamon
• 2 tsp nutmeg (or if you can get ‘speculaaskruiden’, change 1 tsp nutmeg for the speculaaskruiden)
• 3 tsp baking powder
• 3 eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 325/165 F/C. Beat the eggs until they mix together well, then beat in the sugar, oil/butter and vanilla. Gradually mix in the flour, baking powder and spices. Then slowly mix in the shredded banana squash.

Pour the mixture into a buttered baking dish and place in the oven. After 45 minutes check for doneness by putting a skewer in the middle of the cake. If it comes out clean, the cake is done. (Mine took about 75 minutes to come out pretty clean, but could’ve gone a little longer. Rather go too long than too short, no-one likes uncooked cake (unless it’s batter straight from the mixer!)

Serve with whipped cream, ice cram, or just by itself!

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Oh, and this is what happens when you’re impatient and remove it from the pan within a couple of minutes. (Truth be told, we had an appointment and NEEDED to leave…)

Not that the day had been particularly busy, but I needed chocolate. I was craving chocolate. The world was possibly, probably going to end if I didn’t get my chocolate.

I didn’t have any chocolate. At least no [...]]]> I felt like chocolate. Correction, I needed chocolate. To get me through the evening.

Not that the day had been particularly busy, but I needed chocolate. I was craving chocolate. The world was possibly, probably going to end if I didn’t get my chocolate.

I didn’t have any chocolate. At least no readily edible chocolate. And it was past store-closing-time. Besides that, it was raining. Very very hard, so even the walk to the night shop wasn’t a real option.

Still, I needed chocolate.

The solution, a molten chocolate cake. Once I thought of molten chocolate cake, I knew that it wasn’t chocolate I craved, it was that specific chocolate cake. I craved a cake that so far, I’d only ever eaten in restaurants. But I really needed it. I had to make it. I couldn’t help it.

We had leftovers for dinner, so I had all the time in the world to figure out how to get my hands on that cake. Especially since L wouldn’t be home for another hour or so.

I went online to search for recipes. All recipes were different, but most of them asked for the same ingredients, and partially the same prep method.

I didn’t feel like separating eggs, I don’t know why. I didn’t really feel like measuring either. I figured I’d just try something. I guess my  bout of ‘no-recipe-baking’ just hasn’t come to an end yet.

Now I wish I had measured. Or at least written down what I added, and how much of those things. How come I never learn? I feel that way every time I bake something without a recipe.

The molten chocolate cakes were divine. They coul’d’ve used a couple more minutes in the oven, so they would’ve set a little more on the bottom. It was a bit of overkill on the ‘molten’ part. Which made them look less-than-perfect.

But the taste, the texture. It was divine. It was exactly what I had craved. It was just what I needed.

The leftovers had leftovers that night, but I was satisfied.

Long story short, no exact recipe today. Maybe some other time, when and if I’m able to recreate it.
For now, I leave you with just the ingredients without measurements, and the method used. Just give it a try, see if it works, ’cause if it does, your tastebuds will thank you!

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Molten chocolate cakes

• dark bakers chocolate
• butter
• cocoa powder
• sugar
• eggs
• a hint of vanilla extract
• slivered almonds
• all-purpose flour

Start out by melting the butter and chocolate together (30 second intervals in the microwave), let it cool down a bit. Mix sugar and eggs, add some cocoa powder, then the butter and chocolate mixture. Add a tiny bit of vanilla extract. Mix in AP-flour to make a medium-thick batter. Stir in some slivered almonds, just because you can!
Divide batter over ramekins, which are placed in a casserole with water in the oven. Set the oven fairly high, 200 to 220 degrees celsius, and bake for 12 to 15 minutes, or until it’s not fully cooked on the inside. (there’s no surefire way to check this, or at least I haven’t found it yet. If you make sure, by feeling, that the top is fully cooked, you can serve it and have lots of ‘molten’stuff which is the best part anyways!)
Remove from oven and invert ramekins onto a plate and serve (would be very good with fresh whipped cream or ice cream). Next time I might just serve it in the ramekin, more like a chocolate soufflé.
Enjoy!

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