Pound Cake

Tonight, Betsy and I made pound cake, and it was delicious!

Modifications? Butter instead of shortening, lemon juice and rind instead of lemon extract (in a non exact amount) and 2 9-inch round pans instead of a loaf pan (didn't have any!). Also, we put a lemon glaze on it: butter, lemon juice, powdered sugar, and milk :D

Mmmmm....we ate almost a whole cake!!

On a side note, I also made Back to Nature Macaroni and Cheese (bug shaped)....and it was awesome! I recommend it :D

Carrot cake

I tried making a carrot cake on Sunday and what I got was a carrot blob :(

As you can see, one layer of the cake stuck to the pan...a lot! And I am sure I greased the pan.

The second layer was better, but this is still how the end product turned out:

Fortunately, it tasted good. I followed the recipe above, except I used 1 cup of white sugar and 1 cup of brown sugar, added a little nutmeg and I used walnuts instead of pecans. I think the cream cheese frosting was a little wet...maybe I didn't add enough sugar? Not my best creation....

omg chocolate cake

This was my greatest cake creation of all time!

I followed this cake recipe to make 3 layers of chocolate cake goodness. In between the bottom two layers I put some chocolate ganache :D The quantities in that recipe were perfect for my cake. I also probably ate a bunch before I put it on the cake, though.







After putting the ganache on the bottom layers, I was alone in my apartment literally BURSTING with joy and anticipation! Then I need to add frosting!!! I was so happy I could barely work the mixer!!! I halved this recipe, and had a bit leftover :D

I think this was one of the happiest moments of my life :D

Apple Crisp!

I made some apple crisp for a friend's birthday.....too bad I helped her eat half of it :P

Here's the recipe:

1 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 cup rolled oats
1 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 cup butter, softened
4 cups peeled, cored and diced apples
1/4 cup white sugar
1/2 tablespoon cornstarch
1/4 cup water
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 extra dash of cinnamon

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) and coat an 8x8 square pan with oil or non-stick spray.
2. In a medium bowl, combine flour, oats, brown sugar, cinnamon and butter. Cut the mixture until crumbly.
3. In a medium saucepan, combine white sugar, cornstarch, water, vanilla and an extra dash of cinnamon. Cook, stirring, until thick and clear, 10 minutes. Pour over apples in pan. Cover apples with crumble mixture.
4. Bake in preheated oven until bubbly and golden and the apples are cooked :D
5. Eat with vanilla ice cream....mmm.

The above recipe is my modification of an allrecipes.com recipe: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Apple-Crisp-II-2/Detail.aspx

mediocre muffins

I'm obsessed with Allrecipes.com's rating system. So, last week, I took a shot at the TOP RATED RECIPE OF ALL TIME: Banana Crumb Muffins.

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Banana-Crumb-Muffins/Detail.aspx

They were mediocre, at best. Easy to make but dry. In other words, not worthy of the TOP RATED RECIPE OF ALL TIME distinction.



Since , I had some leftover bananas, I gave the recipe another try tonight, but this time I ignored some of the recipe: I used oil instead of butter and increased the amount of oil to 1/2 cup instead of 1/3 cup, and added extra butter to the crumb topping. The results were THE GREATEST MUFFINS IN THE WHOLE WORLD. They look the same as above, but taste more delicious. Take that Allrecipes!

Christmas cookies

Last Sunday, we made Christmas cookies! There were two batches of Alton Brown's sugar cookies (the roll out kind). The recipe is very easy. Rolling out takes some time, but it isn't hard since the recipe calls for them to be a quarter inch thick. We frosted them with a white frosting from Allrecipes, which I'd recommend. Nothing special, but it was the right texture for cookies and it hardened slightly. I did use butter instead of shortening because shortening weirds me out.

Alton Brown also has three chocolate chip cookie recipes: chewy, crispy and puffy. We made one batch of the chewy. I usually have very good results with this recipe, but we messed up somewhere this time and the cookies went from underdone to overdone way too fast. Still, I'd recommend this recipe based on my past successes.

Here's are links for the cookies/frosting:
Sugar cookies: http://www.foodnetwork.com/food/recipes/recipe/0,,FOOD_9936_25187,00.html
Sugar cookie frosting: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Sugar-Cookie-Frosting/Detail.aspx
I used butter, instead of shortening, in this recipe.
Chocoate chip cookies: http://www.foodnetwork.com/food/recipes/recipe/0,,FOOD_9936_13617,00.html
I used unbleached, all-purpose flour, instead of bread flour, in this recipe.

Here's me rolling out the dough:


And here's the finished product!