Easy Cake Cookies

My littlest valentine and I made cookies while my bigger -but-still-little valentine was at a birthday party this morning.  We made cake cookies, a thing I've never done before.  

1 box cake (in this case, strawberry, an artificial flavor I will never get again)

2 eggs

1/3 cup oil

Mix 'em up, drop 'em on a greased sheet bake 'e, for 8 - 10 minutes at 375.

I shaped half of them into hearts while he stirred in the very small amount of white chocolate chips we had left into the remaining batter.

Of course, quality control is very important when it comes to chips, and we encourage that in our house as long as we're the only ones eating the result.

On the sheets:

Baked.  They puff a little, but don't spread much:

We made vanilla butter cream frosting, tinted pink.  Because how else are the sprinkles going to stick?

1 stick unsalted butter at room temperature

4 cups confectioner's sugar

6 TBS cream

2 tsp vanilla

Alternate sugar and cream into the butter in about three or four rounds for best results.

Safe keeping until the cookies are cool and everyone is packed up and at my parents' house, where they can get sugared up while Mama and Daddy go on a date for Valentine's Day.

Did I mention the quality control?  We split one.  It was 10am.  I'm a good mother.

Pinkalicious

You know me.  I'm not typically a from-the-box kinda gal.  I like to make things.  But sometimes, you just gotta add three eggs, some water, some oil and dump the box of cake mix in.  Oh, and add some NEON PINK FOOD COLORING!!

Then you need to open the can of frosting.... no, wait, I take that back.  I totally should have made the damn butter cream frosting.  Oh well.  At least I didn't make the fake strawberry flavored cake.

Because of their love of the book Pinkalicious, here's what I did with the kids today.  (AFTER we ate green food.)

"ingredients"

batter

my kids made 'em pretty

And yes, if I'm seeing you this week - hell, if I see you on the street tomorrow - I'm giving you some of these pink cupcakes.  I will not be responsible for consuming them.

Let him eat cake.

Oh, my blog, how I've missed you.  I was on vacation for a week in Columbus, Ohio for Easter.  I gotta figure out how to update from my iPhone.


The day before we left was my husband's birthday.  I made him a cake.  Well, I made him six cupcakes and a half a layer cake.  I knew we were going to have to eat most of what I made, and give the rest to my parents as payment for taking us to the airport, so... there it is.

Bill loves coconut.  He especially loves Almond Joys.  Was I going to crush up a bunch of Almond Joys and throw them in a box cake for his birthday?  No, sir.  I made him an Awesome Almond Joy Cake from scratch.  

I looked at a lot of recipes online and in my cookbooks, but none of them seemed coconut-y enough for me.  I also noticed that because of my extremely efficient clearing out of the refrigerator before going on a trip ninja stylings, I had exactly three eggs.  I was going to have to make half a recipe.  (Two and a half eggs is always fun to add to anything!)

The closest recipe to what I wanted came from Ina Garten, so I adapted her Barefoot Contessa's Coconut Cake recipe and created a coconutty-almondy-chocolate-chunkity masterpiece.  Here's my version of the recipe. (I made half of the recipe shown below.)

Roots And Zest Coconut Almond Chocolate Chunk Cake

Ingredients

3 sticks unsalted butter, softened + more for greasing pan (or use spray like lazy me)
2 cups sugar
5 eggs
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp almond extract
1/2 tsp coconut extract
2 1/2 cups white flour + more for dusting pan
1/2 cup almond meal
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1 cup coconut milk
4 oz sweetened shredded coconut
1/2 cup chocolate chunks (the big guys - not chips)


Instructions


Preheat oven to 350F.  Butter or spray two 9" round cake pans and dust them with flour.


Cream butter and sugar together in a large bowl until fluffy.  Add eggs, one at a time, mixing in between each addition, and scraping down the sides. Add the vanilla, almond and coconut extracts and mix well [Ina's note here was, "The mixture might look curdled; don't be concerned."  It did.  And I wasn't, thanks to her.]


In another bowl mix together the flour, almond meal, baking powder, baking soda and salt.  Alternately add these dry ingredients and the coconut milk to the batter in three rounds.  Fold in the shredded coconut and chocolate chunks.


Pour the batter into the two pans and smooth the top.


Ina says to bake it for 45 - 55 minutes at 350F.  I think that sounds like a long time.  When I did half this recipe, here's what happened next:


For my cupcakes, I used the six silicone cups that came with this cook cookbook for kids.  I also made one 9" round.  The cupcakes took 15 minutes.  The one 9" round took 22 minutes.


I used Mark Bittman's Butter Cream Frosting recipe from page 727 of How To Cook Everything. I substituted 1 tsp coconut extract for half of the vanilla in his recipe.  I also made the whole recipe for my half cake + 6 cupcakes.  Because I'm like that.

Butter Cream Frosting


Ingredients


1 stick unsalted butter, softened
4 cups confectioners' sugar
6 TBS cream or milk, plus more if needed
2 tsp vanilla extract (again, I used 1 tsp vanilla, 1 tsp coconut extract for mine)


Instructions


Cream the butter with an electric mixer.
Gradually work in the sugar, alternating with the cream and beating after each addition.
Stir in the extracts.
If the frosting is too think to spread, add a little more cream, a teaspoon at at time,  If it is too thin (unlikely, but possible), refrigerate.  It will thicken as the butter hardens.

Layering and Decorating


Ingredients


whole almonds (I toasted mine a little in a dry pan on medium heat for a few minutes)
chocolate chunks
about 6 oz sweetened shredded coconut

Instructions

When layering the cake, whether it be a 9" round on top of another 9" round, or half of a single round on top of the other half like I did, let the cake cool completely before frosting it.  Smooth frosting on the bottom layer, sprinkle with some of the chocolate chunks, then lay the second layer on.  Smooth the remaining frosting over the top and sides of the layered cake.

Press shredded coconut all over the top and sides of the icing.

Decorate with whole almonds and the rest of the chocolate chunks as makes you happy.  Let your kids decorate the cupcakes to make them happy.

This cake was really, really awesome.  

Happy Birthday, Bill!

Irish Soda Bread

I love making Irish Soda Bread with my kids.  It's quick, I always have all the ingredients on hand, and the results are really delicious.  The kids love making Irish Soda Bread for this reason: I let them put their hands in the dry ingredients and mush it around.  Once we put the wet ingredients in, they use their forks (raw eggs, you know).  Then Mama blobs it all out on a cookie sheet and sticks it in the oven.  This St. Patrick's Day, we put butter on the warm bread, drizzled it with honey, and ate it as dessert! 

Here's the recipe:

Dry: 

4 cups flour 

1 tsp salt

1 tsp baking powder

1 1/2 TBS sugar

2 TBS caraway seeds Optional.  I usually add another 1 tsp

1 cup raisins  I usually add another 1/4 cup

Wet:

1 beaten egg

1 cup butter milk

A scant cup of milk (any fat content) with 1 TBS lemon juice works just as well - mix this up first and let it sit on the counter while you're mixing the dry ingredients

1 cup plain yogurt  Fat free and reduced fat works just fine if you prefer.  I like to use fat free Greek yogurt.

1/4 tsp vanilla extract Optional.  

I tried adding vanilla (some of my life-time supply from Mexico) for the first time on St. Patrick's Day because I knew these loaves had dessert as their fate.  It was really good!

Steps:

Preheat oven to 375.

Mix together dry ingredients in a large bowl.

Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients.  Mix until just combined - do not over mix.  Dough should be very sticky.

Place dough on lightly greased cookie sheet - I always make two loaves and just drop the two roundish blobs on a single sheet.

Bake at 375 for about 30 - 35 minutes.  The outside should brown a little.

You can make one big loaf if you want to, just bake it for longer - 45 minutes.

If you make two, you can always freeze the second loaf, wrapped in tin foil.

What fun!

The raw dough.

The finished loaves.  MMMM!

Honey- & Goat Cheese-Filled Fig Muffins

That's right.  The time has finally come.  I made the muffins.  I had A LOT of help.  Luckily, the recipe calls for three bowls to be going at the same time.  2yo boy got to mash and chop and stir to his heart's content, the goat cheese, honey, lemon zest(!) filling.  The entire time.  4yo girl got to "sift" (ie stir with spoon, rake with very clean hands) the dry ingredients.  And I got to stir up the wet ingredients and assemble everything.  That being said, I have no pictures of the actual MAKING of this recipe.  Please enjoy the results, however:

This is an amazing recipe. I tried one right out of the oven - because how could I not?  It was warm, gooey, moist, explosive, sweet - but not too sweet, creamy.  Everything I wanted it to be.  An hour later, I followed the directions for "make ahead" version.  I wrapped one in a paper towel and microwaved it on high for 30 of the 30 -45 recommended seconds.  The filling pretty much disappeared into the muffin. And it was scorching hot.  The kids ate it (after it cooled) for dessert, and thought it was the bee's knees (and of course they did - they made it, after all!).  I nuked one at 20 seconds  for myself, and it was a little better.  When I have one for it's intended destiny of breakfast, I will try 15 seconds, to attempt to preserve the integrity of the goo inside.

A few ingredient notes:  I did use Whole Wheat flour.  I think it makes a big difference not only in nutrition, but also in texture and flavor.  I used "soured milk" (1 cup less 1TBS of milk and 1TBS lemon juice that I let stand while I got everything else together) instead of buttermilk.  Worked like a charm as always.  I got dried Black Mission Figs at Trader Joe's and they were wonderful!

I will definitely make this again.  I may futz with it a little to keep it a little more moist while re-heating.  If you have any ideas or insights on how a person might futz in this way, please tell me in the comments below.  When I microwaved it, I was very happy for the little goo that was left, and the sugar sprinkled on top.  I will also NEVER eat two in one evening again.  This is a VERY filling muffin.  It actually *is* the meal that it is intended to be (and at 6 Weight Watchers' Points, that's a very nice breakfast!)  This is a fantastic brunch party recipe.  Right out of the oven, these are truly outstanding.  It even looks like the picture in the magazine! (Though Eating Well doesn't take pictures with an iPhone, I'm sure.)

UPDATE:  15 seconds in the microwave this morning gave perfect results.  It also preserved the moistness of the muffin itself, so I think no futzing is necessary.  I had posted earlier that I would up the honey and down the zest, but the next day, the proportions in the recipe are really balanced and nice.  I think right out of the oven is, of course, the best, strongest flavor, but these sure hold up.  I'm going to freeze a couple and see how that works out in a week or so.  

Seriously.  Do yourself a favor and make these.