Your Daily Sweets: What Are You Making and Baking? (2015)

[rotuts]

AnnaN  : how did you make the crumble topping ?

 

good idea BTW

[Anna N]

AnnaN  : how did you make the crumble topping ?

 

good idea BTW

It is nothing more than butter, flour and sugar whizzed in the food processor. I dislike oats in most forms so none appear in my crumbles.

Proportions here are not critical.

3 heaping tablespoons sugar

4 heaping tablespoons flour

4 ounces butter

You can also rub the butter into the flour and sugar mixture by hand for a more rustic look.

[Franci]

Thanks, FrogPrincesse, I'll try your recipes next. So, today I baked the Claire Heitzler's madeleines I linked yesterday. They were more fussy to make than previous recipe. The batter cold from the fridge was much stiffer. The first batch of madeleines were baked at the recommended temperature of 180 C. That produced madeleines with no or little bump in the middle. I increased the temperature to 220 C and lowered to 190 C when baked the 2nd batch. Also I double panned to avoid too much browning at the bottom. That worked.

But...but, my girl yesterday won't stop eating madeleines... I had to take them away from her. Today she took a bite and left her madeleine on the plate. Also my son preferred yesterday's version. These madeleines are lighter, sweeter, more buttery and slighly crumblier.

[CatPoet]

I made a Swedish   brownie like thing called Kladdkaka, that is all the baking I have done and I took one piece and placed it beside my friends urn...

[FrogPrincesse]

Racines cake that I served with eggnog ice cream. I forgot to take a photo after it came out of the oven.

[Franci]

I made Alice Medrich's raspberry chocolate cake

[cookingofjoy]

Anna N -  your crumble looks fantastic!  I have some blackberries and pears waiting for me. 

 

Franci - great cut of those raspberries!  The cake looks delicious.

[CatPoet]

Ann that looks ace!!

[Kim Shook]

Franci – that cake is tremendous!  What impresses me the most is how lovely and even your layers are – all SEVEN of them (if I’m counting correctly).  It looks utterly delicious and beautiful. 

 

Modified Tin Roof Brownies for a co-worker of Mr. Kim’s birthday:

He always requests them without the peanuts, which is a shame since the salt help balance out the otherwise extreme sweetness.  I did make them with dark chocolate this time, which was a bit better.

 

I need a little assistance here.  These are made by baking a pan of brownies, taking them out and spreading with marshmallow crème.  Chopped chocolate is sprinkled over the top and they are put back in the oven for a couple of minutes for that to melt.  That is spread to cover and they are cooled.  I always refrigerate brownies to make the cut neater.  Every time that I make these, the tops break apart when I cut them.  They seem to be impossible to cut neatly – you can see how only on one of them is the top chocolate layer in one piece.  I do use a knife that’s been heated in hot water.  Any advice?

[CeeCee]

I made a Swedish   brownie like thing called Kladdkaka, that is all the baking I have done and I took one piece and placed it beside my friends urn...

 

Sorry about your friend, but what a nice gesture. Reminds me a bit of offerings to gods.

Speaking of offering, would you mind sharing your recipe for kladdkaka please?

[Norm Matthews]

At my DIL's request, I made this chocolate raspberry torte for Valentine's Day.

 

 

[rotuts]

WoW

 

looks so delicious

[Toliver]

I need a little assistance here.  These are made by baking a pan of brownies, taking them out and spreading with marshmallow crème.  Chopped chocolate is sprinkled over the top and they are put back in the oven for a couple of minutes for that to melt.  That is spread to cover and they are cooled.  I always refrigerate brownies to make the cut neater.  Every time that I make these, the tops break apart when I cut them.  They seem to be impossible to cut neatly – you can see how only on one of them is the top chocolate layer in one piece.  I do use a knife that’s been heated in hot water.  Any advice?

I was also going to suggest the knife-in-hot-water trick. 

Is it possible, after taking them out of the oven, to try and pre-score them? Or would the topping just melt back together? Hmm. Or maybe let them cool and then use your hot knife to do the pre-scoring of just the topping. Then when you'd go to actually slice them through with your hot knife, the topping would be more forgiving.

Good luck! Let us know what works, if anything. 

 

edited for clarity

Edited February 11, 2015 by Toliver (log)

[rajoress]

All these desserts look gorgeous - love the brownies with marshmallows, raspberry tart, madeleines, and all the rest! Some cookies for Valentine's Day for my staff - chocolate chip shortbread dipped in milk and dark chocolates (although they look the same!) and some solid chocolate hearts. The cookies are a variation of a Dorie Greenspan recipe. Thanks for looking!

Ruth

[ChocoMom]

OMGOSH!!!!     Between the madeleines, the Raspberry-Chocolate cake, the Tin Roof Brownies, the Chocolate/Raspberry Torte, and the Valentine Cookies....Good Lord, I must have gained 10 pounds just looing at them all!  It's totally worth the mess I have cleaning up the drool from my keyboard.

 

All I made recently was a Tiramisu, which wasn't terribly gorgeous- so I didn't take a pic.  One of my dear friends asked me to make it for a dinner party. In anticipation of the caloric bombardment, she even ran six miles earlier that morning.  I gave her another 4 servings of it to take home, so I expect she could have run to another county and still not been able to work it off.  LOL!  What are friends for?

 

Beautiful work, everyone.

[cookingofjoy]

Kim - I could sit down with a pan of those brownies for myself!

 

Ruth - the edges of the cookies are so clean!

 

Norm - the torte looks delicious - you found some great raspberries!

 

After finding organic lemons at Costco (organic citrus is hard to find here in Wi), I've been loving a lemon meringue ice cream based on a Sherry Yard recipe shared here.  It's just a cup of lemon curd, 1-2TB lemon juice and 1 1/4 c half and half.  I use the whites leftover from the curd for the meringue, then cut up the meringue and blend it in the ice cream. 

 

Then I've been looking for a dark chocolate bundt recipe. I got the heritage pan for my birthday, and so far I've tried the one from Malgieri's perfect cakes and now this one from food and wine.  My favorite chocolate cake is Toba Garrett's chocolate fudge cake but I think that would be too dense to try to adapt?  I've also liked one of the revisions on the forums here for the epicurious double chocolate layer cake.  I'm thinking for the bundt, I'd like a blend of butter and oil, and I really need to increase the cocoa powder.  I'd love any recommendations for good recipes, too!

 

 

[Kim Shook]

I was also going to suggest the knife-in-hot-water trick. 

Is it possible, after taking them out of the oven, to try and pre-score them? Or would the topping just melt back together? Hmm. Or maybe let them cool and then use your hot knife to do the pre-scoring of just the topping. Then when you'd go to actually slice them through with your hot knife, the topping would be more forgiving.

Good luck! Let us know what works, if anything. 

 

edited for clarity

I think that if I did it right away, the pre-scoring would just melt back together, but your idea of cooling and pre-scoring just the chocolate layer would work.  I could do all that before refrigerating.  Thank you!  I'll try it next time I make these.  They are always going to be a bit of a mess with gooey marshmallow creme and (normally) the peanuts, but I'd like them as neat as I can get them.

[Franci]

For my son to bring to school. White chocolate and rice puffs hearts.

 

 

[Franci]

To take to my PIL today

[Anna N]

Franci,

That is just beautiful. Can you tell us more about it?

[rotuts]

It looks so delicious

 

however

 

I do not know what ' PIL'  means

 

even GOOG  does not know

 

maybe something Delicious ?

[Franci]

Sorry Rotuts, that's for Parents-in-law. Too bad I didn't take a picture of the slice.

 

I'm just exploring some of Alice Medrich recipes lately. I made her vanilla cake cut in 3 layers, 1st and 2nd layers were spread with a little bit of strawberry jam, topped with some white chocolate whipped cream (from her easy delicious desserts) and some cut strawberries. I made a crumb coat with that cream as well. To cover I used a white chocolate ganache from Paco Torreblanca, here for details, that's ok for a 30 cm cake, I scaled it down to 20 cm. Overall it was good, not memorable. My son (who is my critic) says the white chocolate cream is very good on his own but he didn't like in the whole with the cake and I think he is right.

 

So, tomorrow I think I'll use this ganache as glaze but as filling something else.

[Anna N]

Thank you. It sounds even more delicious than it looks if that is possible. I am not sure I would be brave enough to attempt it. The cake looks easy enough to pull together but once I am faced with then making a filling and a glaze my mind retreats.

[Franci]

Thank you. It sounds even more delicious than it looks if that is possible. I am not sure I would be brave enough to attempt it. The cake looks easy enough to pull together but once I am faced with then making a filling and a glaze my mind retreats.

 

Anna, I'm not really cut for this kind of pastry. I'm trying to learn it because sometimes it's required. Some jam or pastry cream (or lemon curds) as filling is not complicated. And honestly, I love ganache as glaze, the only thing you need to do is pour and spin (and I like the taste). So go for it. I'm sure you can do it.

[Smithy]

Franci, I want to add my compliments also. It does look delicious - and I'm very impressed that you found strawberries that were red all the way through. Lovely! Those are difficult to find, in my experience, except from the farmer's stand at the peak of the season.