Peanut Butter and Jelly Cupcakes

I'm late with this post, although I made these cupcakes two weeks ago.  This used a whole jar of natural peanut butter.  I was hoping there would be some peanut butter left over for me.

I used my home made raspberry jam and yummmm.  The cupcake is from the MS Cupcake book.  The cupcakes are wonderful.  They have 2/3 cup of peanut butter and 3/4 cup chopped roasted peanuts.  They are good with out the icing.

For me the icing is to rich.  I can't believe I am saying this.  But the mixture of cream cheese, peanut butter, and whip cream was too much for me.  I took them to work, I gave them to the Handyman and the guy that delivers my meat.  I am now using baked goods in liue of tips.  It seems to be working pretty good.

Cupid's Strawberry Cake with Cream Cheese Buttercream

Don't you wish you were here?

I went to San Diego this weekend to spend some time with my Niece Lexi and my Great Niece Meg.  This is what we did, well this is one of the things we did.  Lexi is back from Japan and enjoying the use of a full size oven.  I am sharing the schedule for the Avid Baker Challenge so she can bake along.  And since this was a mid month recipe we tried it out together.

We made the Signature Yellow Cake from Baking for All Occasions.  This was so good.  Let me tell you the secret.  There are extra egg yolks.  After you bake the cake, you slice each layer in half and spread jam.

Add a layer and add the buttercream, a layer of Strawberries, and another layer of buttercream.  I have to admit, we had some technical difficulties with the buttercream.  There are a lot of steps and we needed a candy thermometer, that we did not have, so we added extra unflavored gelatin.  It was pretty scary putting the strawberries on the cake cause they kept sliding.

Our buttercream did not get as thick as I would have like the day we made the cake.  Since it was not thick enough to spread we just let it pour down the sides. 

I think it came out beautiful and tasted great.  This buttercream was very complicated and I will probably not try that recipe again.  It was very fun cooking with my Niece.  Good Job Lexi!

Apple Cake - Baked

I made the Carmel Apple Cake for Baked Sunday Morning more of a snack cake.  I am not a formal person and need to lose a few pounds, so I figured if I eliminate the icing...

What I got was a beautiful bundt cake.  This recipe did make more batter that the bundt pan would take and I cooked if for about 70 minuets.  I think it could have stayed in the oven longer.  It is a very most cake with great flavor.  I love the cinnamon, allspice and clove mixture.

This cake is so moist it was falling apart.  I will be taking it into work for coffee break with friends.  This is a great fall recipe.

Sunday Loaf - good use for raspberry jam

For the last two weeks in July I was making raspberry jam.  I put up three cases of jam.  I do give these away as gifts, but what can I do with all this jam?  Well I found a recipe for "Sunday Loaf".  Its a quick bread that is made using jam in the dough and after the bread is baked you make a topping of jam and butter to top the whole loaf.  Yummmm

I found this recipe in "The Breakfast Book".  The note say that this can be frozen and toasted.  This is a kick back to when I use to toast that cinnamon bread with the icing.  Yes, my smoke alarm did go off.  This is a sign that things are almost done.  (My poor neighbor)

You know this is not even pink, but it does taste like the jam.  I will let you know how this freezes.  I can not eat a whole loaf before it goes bad and I only have toast for breakfast on the weekends.  And I won't eat all the jam Aileen.  I know you want some!



Apricot Tatin Cake - The Cake Book

I love CostCo, but what does a single girl do with two dozen apricots.  Answer" make a Tatin.

The clear platter make the cake look a bit red, but it is basically a upside down cake.  (which only used three apricots, next time I'll make a pie).

The recipe was for peaches, but I used the apricots instead.  You make a caramel with sugar and water and I had the hardest time getting this to a carmel.   It just wouldn't burn.  What's up with that?  When I don't want things to burn they do!

Also, it called for a 10" cake pan.  This will be my next investment at the housewares store.  It's got to be cheaper than cleaning the oven.  I did use a deep dish pie pan.  It was 10" across at the top, but the cake still went over the edge, or may be it was the carmel.  Anyway, the cake looks beautiful and taste good too.  I think is should be eaten quickly, within three or four days, or it gets a bit soggy and heavy, but never dry.

This does work with different fruit, so you may see these back on my blog again.





Quintessential Cheese Blintzes



yum

I have to admit, the only Cheese Blintzes that I have eaten,up until now, are those at a smorgasbord.  Let me tell you this is not the smorgasbord food.

To start, you make crepes.  This is not my normal crepe recipe.  The one I normally make has more butter, but I certainly could not tell the difference.  Also, I usually rest my crepe batter for 30 minutes, this recipe has you rest the batter for at least 1 or two hours.  For the filling, I could not find farmers cheese, so I used ricotta.  This filling was great with a bit of lemon zest added in. 

I tried to pan fry the blintzes to cook the filling, but I did not do so well.  I finished up the crepe batter and filling a night later and baked those blintzes.  The filling cooked up better baked than pan fried.  Still had that great lemon flavor.  And me, I had to get more raspberries since they are in season.  Drizzled with a bit of my home made raspberry jam. 

This recipe is from Flo Braker's Baking for All Occasions and was made for the Avid Bakers Challenge.

Corn Soup for French Fridays

I'm late again.  This has been a terrible week.  Busy at work and home. But, it's the weekend and a long weekend at that.

It's summertime and corn is cheap.  Six ears for a dollar.  This is a great time to make corn soup, except it's warm outside.    I have never made a corn soup or chowder, so this is a first.  It is so easy and pretty fast.  Cut the corn off the cob and boil the cob with milk.

 Saute the onion.

Cut veggies and add

Ooh isn't this pretty

After the veggies saute for a while you add the milk mixture back in and let it cook for a while.  The recipe can be found in around my french table.  Once everything is done, blitz in the blender, or I use an immersion blender.  (remove the corn cobs, very important)  Then plate. 

 Since the sweet corn and the whole mike make makes this soup pretty sweet I made a chipotle chile oil to drizzle and added a dollop of Greek yogurt.  This is good stuff. I will try to freeze some for lunches.  Try this while corn is in season.  It is really good.