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Monthly Archives: April 2011

Apr 25 2011

Maple with a twist

by Virginie

Like I said in my previous post, my dad is in town. He brought me and my sister each a litre of maple syrup, a brick of maple sugar and some maple butter. All yummy and delicious!

I’ve already done maple syrup cupcakes, but I needed to do it again with all these wonderful maple products my dad brought me. So I did maple cupcakes with a twist! I added cardamom to the mix along with expresso powder and honey. I love cardamom. I don’t use it enough. I thought it would work well with maple and I think it did pretty well. I added some expresso powder to cut the sweetness a bit and some honey to add a bit of variation to the sweetness. Last time I flavoured it all with maple syrup and I used a lot of it which created a very sweet cupcake. This time I tried flavouring it mostly with maple sugar. It makes for a much more subtle taste, which unfortunately I think got a bit overpowered by the cardamom. I put 1 tsp of cardamom in the cupcake dough, but if you try this recipe yourself I suggest only putting 1/2 a tsp. All in all though, I think it was a success!

cake:
- 3/4 cup of butter
- 3/4 cup sugar
- scant 1/2 cup maple sugar
- 2 eggs
- 2 cups of flour
- 2 tsp of baking powder
- pinch of salt
- 1 tsp of cardamom (1/2 tsp would be enough)
- 1 1/2 tsp of expresso powder
- 1/2 cup of cream
- 1/2 cup of milk
- 1 tbs maple syrup

method:
- preheat the oven to 350
- beat the butter until it is light and fluffy
- add the sugar and beat thoroughly
- add the maple sugar and beat thoroughly again
- add the eggs one at a time and beat in between each addition, then beat on high for 30 seconds
- sift the flour, baking powder, salt, cardamom and expresso powder together and combine with the butter/sugar mix
- add the cream and milk and combine until smooth
- add the maple syrup
- line a cupcake pan with paper cups
- bake for 20 minutes

icing:
- 3 egg whites
- 140g of sugar
- 1 1/4 cup of butter cut in 1 inch cubes
- 3 tbs of maple syrup
- 2 tsp of honey
- 1/4 tsp of cardamom

method:
- combine the egg whites and sugar in a double boiler
- whisk a little until all the sugar is melted away
- take off the double boiler and beat on high until cooled and turned into a firm meringue, touch the bottom of the bowl to make sure its at least body temperature
- add the butter one cube at a time while beating on a lower speed
- beat on high until you get a nice fluffy texture (it will turn to a cottage cheese kind of texture about half way through, just keep beating)
- add the maple syrup, honey and cardamom and combine

Enjoy :)

Categories: other sweet flavors | 3 Comments »

Apr 24 2011

Tarte Tatin

by Virginie

Since my dad is in town this week and it is his first time in Vancouver, I decided to bake up something special. When I saw him at Christmas he bought some delicious tarte Tatin, so I decided to try to make one of my own. Tarte Tatin is a French dessert similar to an apple pie, but single crust and baked upside down. It involves caramel, butter, apple, and puff pastry. Puff pastry takes a long time to make since you have to let it rest after each fold, but it creates this wonderful crust of layered butter and dough. When your dough is ready, you prepare your caramel and add the butter. This buttery caramel goes in the bottom of a cast iron skillet. Then you add the apples and make sure they are tightly packed. This goes in the oven to bake. When the apples are baked, you put the puff pastry on top and put it back in the oven to bake the crust. The very last step after letting it cool is flipping it over! Warm slightly and serve with a dollop of vanilla ice cream. Yum!

Just out of the oven, before flipping it over.

Enjoy!

Categories: Fruits | 4 Comments »

Apr 17 2011

Cherry blossom

by Virginie

The cherry trees have been in bloom for a few weeks now. Its simply beautiful. My sister suggested to do a cherry cupcake to celebrate this. And so was born the cherry blossom cupcake! Since cherries obviously aren’t in season right now, I used bottled, pitted sour cherries. To add a flowery taste I used lavender and rose water. I also added a full cherry in the middle of the cupcake between two scoops of dough. Here is the recipe for 18 cupcakes,

cake:
- 3/4 cup of butter
- 1 1/4 cup sugar
- 2 eggs
- 2 cups of flour
- 2 tsp of baking powder
- pinch of salt
- 1/2 cup of cream
- 1/2 cup of milk
- 1 cup of pitted sour cherries (I chopped them up with a bit of the juice from the bottle of cherries in a food processor to get smaller pieces of cherries)
- 1tsp of rose water

method:
- preheat the oven to 350
- beat the butter until it is light and fluffy
- add the sugar and beat thoroughly
- add the eggs one at a time and beat in between each addition, then beat on high for 30 seconds
- sift the flour, baking powder and salt together and combine with the butter/sugar mix
- add the cream and milk and combine until smooth
- add the cherries and rose water
- line a cupcake pan with paper cups
- bake for 20 minutes

icing:
- 2 cups of water
- 2 tbs of lavender
- 3 egg whites
- 140g of sugar
- 1 1/4 cup of butter cut in 1 inch cubes
- 1/2 tsp of rose water

method:
- put the lavender in the water and let sit over night to flavour the water
- reduce the flavoured water on the stove to about 1/4 cup
- strain the lavender syrup to remove the lavender flowers, reserve
- combine the egg whites and sugar in a double boiler
- whisk a little until all the sugar is melted away
- take off the double boiler and beat on high until cooled and turned into a firm meringue, touch the bottom of the bowl to make sure its at least body temperature
- add the butter one cube at a time while beating on a lower speed
- beat on high until you get a nice fluffy texture (it will turn to a cottage cheese kind of texture about half way through, just keep beating)
- add the lavender syrup and rose water

Enjoy :)

Categories: Fruits, other sweet flavors | 3 Comments »

Apr 13 2011

Chocolate chip cookie dough

by Virginie

This weekend was filled with baking related events! I started off by going to Thomas Haas for breakfast on Saturday. On my way there, I stopped by some friends’ house to drop off a cupcake pan that they wanted to borrow. Now, I bring these good friends of mine cupcakes every week so to thank me they gave me a gift certificate for Thomas Haas. What an awesome gift and great timing! So I treated myself to a butter croissant, a pain au chocolate, a cappuccino, a pack of three chocolate truffle easter eggs, and some chocolate sparkle cookies. I didn’t eat everything in one sitting, but I was very tempted. Everything looks so good over there and everything I’ve tried is just perfect.

When I came back home, I booked a chocolate making class at CocoaNymph with my sister and mom. I can’t wait. I’m really excited about this! Of course, I’ll be sure to tell you all about it right here.

Then I experimented with savoury scones. I enjoyed making the lemon ones so much, I wanted to try again! I started off with the same basic recipe but flavoured it with parmesan and paprika instead. They were very good, not too salty and full of cheesy goodness. I think everyone really enjoyed them.

On Sunday, I went shopping at the Call the Kettle Black. They were (and still are I believe) having a sale with almost everything in the store at 25% off. There’s something I’ve had my eye on for a while, but its usually rather expensive so I’ve held back. With the 25% off though it was an interesting deal and these things don’t go on sale often. I went to the store to see if I would be tempted in this particular item. I was. I am now the proud owner of a Le Creuset cast iron skillet. I can’t wait to try it out. I’ll be making so many tarte tatin you guys won’t believe it! It was rather hard to wipe the smile off my face after that :)

And then, to bring my weekend to a close, I baked some chocolate chip cookie dough cupcakes with some new friends. I ask you, what could be better? Oh yes, doing it with a glass of white wine in one hand and the Sound of Music playing in the background. Now that was a truly girly evening! The trick to getting raw cookie dough in the middle of a baked cupcake is to freeze the cookie dough for at least 2 hours. I used my moms chocolate chip cookie recipe (minus the walnuts since one of my guests is allergic to nuts), but you can use your favourite recipe. Once the dough is made, form small balls and put them in the freezer. If you have some dough left over you can use it to make little cookies to be used as cupcake toppers or just to be eaten as is. Here is the recipe for 24 cupcakes:

cake:
- 3/4 cup of butter
- 1 1/4 cup sugar
- 2 eggs
- 1 tsp of vanilla extract
- 2 cups of flour
- 2 tsp of baking powder
- pinch of salt
- 1/2 cup of cream
- 1/2 cup of milk
- 24 balls of chocolate chip cookie dough, frozen

method:
- preheat the oven to 350
- beat the butter until it is light and fluffy
- add the sugar and beat thoroughly
- add the eggs one at a time and beat in between each addition, then beat on high for 30 seconds
- add the vanilla
- sift the flour, baking powder and salt together and combine with the butter/sugar mix
- add the cream and milk and combine until smooth
- line a cupcake pan with paper cups
- place one frozen cookie dough ball in each cup and cover with cupcake batter
- bake for 20 minutes

icing:
- 3 egg whites
- 140g of sugar
- 1 1/4 cup of butter cut in 1 inch cubes
- 3 tbs of cocoa powder

Enjoy :)

Categories: Chocolate, other sweet flavors | 3 Comments »

Apr 3 2011

Pavlova

by Virginie

This week’s cupcakes are pure experimentation! I have a friend in New-Zealand who posted a picture online of a dessert I had never seen before. After exclaiming how good it looked he told me what it was, a pavlova! Its kind of a meringue with whipped cream and fresh fruit on top. He then offered to mail me some mixes for me to play with. I received them a couple of weeks ago. I’m keeping one of the mixes to make a traditional pavlova, but used one to experiment and try to make pavlova cupcakes. They turned out quite good! I prepared the pavlova by following the direction on the box, but instead of making one big cake, I split the mixture in cupcakes. I baked them for half the time the instructions said since they were smaller. I then made a vanilla cake dough which i scooped a small amount of on the baked pavlova and put it back in the oven for 10 mins for the cake to cook. I made blueberry icing to recreate the fresh fruit toping. Here is the recipe for 24 cupcakes:

cake:
- 1 pavlova mix
- 1/2 cup of butter
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 1 egg
- 1/2 tsp of vanilla
- 1 cup of flour
- 1 tsp of baking powder
- pinch of salt
- 1/4 cup of cream
- 1/4 cup of milk

method:
- follow the instruction on the pavlova box, but put in cupcake cup and bake for half the time.
- preheat the oven to 350
- beat the butter until it is light and fluffy
- add the sugar and beat thoroughly
- add the eggs one at a time and beat in between each addition, then beat on high for 30 seconds
- add the vanilla and combine
- sift the flour, baking powder and salt together and combine with the butter/sugar mix
- add the cream and milk and combine until smooth
- scoop a small amount on the small pavlovas
- bake for 10 minutes

icing:
- 3 egg whites
- 140g of sugar
- 1 1/4 cup of butter cut in 1 inch cubes
- 1/3 cup of blueberry jam

Thanks PodgyPanda!

Categories: Fruits, other sweet flavors | 4 Comments »