After the Thanksgiving turkey is done and it is still a month before the next turkey roasting, there is always that 1/2 jar of cranberry sauce sitting in the fridge looking lonely. When I happened upon a recipe that used cranberry sauce instead of jam in a filling for a cake I thought hmmmm that might be a good idea. I have made coffee cake with fresh cranberries and it was yummy so using cranberry sauce should be even better. We have cranberries growing in the wetlands in our area so my Mom is always picking baskets of cranberries in the fall. She also makes most of them up into cranberry sauce, so having another recipe that will use cranberry sauce is a welcome addition to the recipe box.
We had the first heavy frost of the season last night and it was so beautiful that I was outside in my pyjamas taking photos before the beauty disappeared. It was 4 degrees Celsius at 7:30 am, but it was so worth it. I hope you enjoy my frosted nature.
Peanut Butter cookies are a classic cookie that everyone should have in their cookie repertoire. This is a cookie you can mix up with everyday ingredients and enjoy for dessert on a weekday. I have fancied this classic cookie up with a little drizzle of white chocolate. The white chocolate gives a little extra layer of flavour, but it is definitely optional as they are just as delicious plain.
When I first saw a recipe for home-made marshmallows I was a little intimidated. It looked like it was going to be difficult, but I had to try it! Am I ever glad I did as these marshmallows are delicious and not that difficult after all. I have made them for quite a few times and each time I make them someone is always amazed that you can actually make marshmallows from scratch.
It is bread making season! Saturday morning, the cold October winds are blowing and it is raining…..time to put a pot of chicken and barley soup on. That is the definition of a dreary autumn day here in Northern Ontario. But the upside is that the house is going to smell wonderful. Now we need some fresh bread to go with that simmering pot of soup. Today’s bread is going to be hearty, stick to your ribs sort of bread. This bread is an old-fashioned bread made with oatmeal, molasses and some whole wheat flour. If you have only all-purpose flour you can use that as well.
This Apple Bundt cake recipe makes a cake that can go from breakfast to dinner and everywhere in between. There is a crumble topping made with oatmeal and brown sugar – that is breakfast right there. The crumble topping when baked gets nice and sticky so putting it on both the bottom and top of the cake will make you very happy. Then the actual cake is full of bites of apple so that makes it snack worthy. With a dusting of icing sugar or a drizzle of glaze it will look right at home on the dessert scene. For whatever time of day you decide to indulge in this apple cake I am sure you will enjoy every bite.
The cool days of autumn call for spices to warm up our food and drink. Cinnamon and ginger have hints of heat and they pair beautifully in baked goods. So why not add these spices to shortbread? Surely they could only make my favourite cookie even better. This basic shortbread is made with just a wooden spoon so there is even some exercise worked into recipe – which means the first 2 cookies are calorie-free.
Another oatmeal cookie recipe, really do I need to keep trying different ones? The answer – YES! Even when you think you have the perfect oatmeal cookie recipe you always wonder, what if…..So that question is what has brought us to this cookie recipe. After making the cookies with the ground pecans, I started to think about what other ingredients I could grind up to enhance the flavour. So why not grind up the oatmeal and make almost an oat flour. Out came the food processor again and sure enough, it worked!
Cookies….such wonderful little things…small packages with immense flavour. There are so many recipes for cookies how would it be possible to make them all in one lifetime. Sometimes you get lucky and try one of those combinations that seem like it might be a great idea and it turns out that is was an absolutely fantastic idea. That is what happened with this recipe. I was reading a recipe that used ground pecans as a coating on a cookie and thought hmmm what about in the cookie? So then the experimenting began. I started with my standard shortbread recipe and substituted part of the flour for ground pecans.
Well it is chocolate cake # 2 for the month of September and again a birthday cake. But this one is special, this one was for my husband’s birthday! He is a definite chocolate cake sort of guy. When I asked him what kind of cake he wanted for his birthday, he said the chocolate torte. We just had it 2 weeks ago for the rest of the September birthday folks! So after him being adamant, I caved and I made the same cake, but this time I changed it up a little bit.
This time no whip cream and no frosting with Belgian chocolate. This time I made it an old-fashioned chocolate birthday cake complete with home-made strawberry jam in the middle. The frosting is a cocoa based frosting, so chocolaty but no melting of actual chocolate required. Cocoa is a bit messy when it comes to putting it in frosting, but if you start off with whipping the butter and the cocoa together you can avoid the cocoa cloud. The cocoa cloud is what happens when you dry to add the cocoa after you have whipped in some of the icing sugar first – it will fly everywhere!
All this birthday goodness served up at my friend Lisa’s home on her beautiful old china that she received as a birthday gift from her husband earlier this month. What a thoughtful guy to search out this old pattern that her mother had. Chocolate cake tastes even better served on fine china!
Preheat oven to 350 ℉. Butter and flour 2 - 9" round cake pans.
Cake:
Whisk together in the bowl of a stand mixer the flour, sugar, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Add the eggs, milk, oil and vanilla. Mix on medium speed for 2 minutes. Add the hot coffee slowly down the side of the bowl while mixing on low speed. Remove the bowl and using a spatula ensure the batter is well mixed. It will be very thin.
Divide evenly between the 2 pans. Tap gently on the edge of the counter to release air bubbles.
Bake 30 to 32 minutes on bottom rack or until toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.
Let cool in pans 10 minutes, then turn out onto rack to cool completely.
Frosting: Beat butter, cocoa and vanilla. Add ½ the icing sugar and cream beat until combined. Add in the remaining icing sugar and beat until fluffy.
Place first layer on cake plate and spread the jam on top.
Then carefully spread a thin layer of the frosting over the jam.
Add the second layer of cake. Frost the sides and then the top of the cake.
