Your Daily Sweets (2005-2012)

[Kim Shook]

Curls – those cinnamon buns are perfect. I want to make some soon!

RWood – what did the quinoa add to the cupcakes – texture, taste?

The CSA box this week contained zucchini – something that neither of us really cares for. So in the spirit of lemonade out of lemons, I made some zucchini muffins:

The recipe was from Smitten Kitchen. They were pretty good. Nice texture and with raisins and walnuts, you could hardly taste the zucchini . Next time, I’ll add some lemon zest, I think.

[Panaderia Canadiense]

Lemon zest is almost a must with zucchini, Kim. Have you ever tried Death By Chocolate Zucchini Cake/Muffins? They're truly faboo.... Yours also look extremely tasty - I've never tried vanilla/zucch as a combo.

[RWood]

RWood – what did the quinoa add to the cupcakes – texture, taste?

Not much of anything that I could tell really. There was a slight texture thing going on, but I wasn't really sure what the point of it was. I think it was more confusing that anything. A lot of the people were thinking it was gluten-free, made with quinoa flour, and I had to explain that it was just added to a regular cupcake.

[lironp]

Lemon madeleines from Laura Calder's recipe.

Those look just perfect

[DianaM]

a Chocolate and Cabernet Sauvigon Italian Cake

RobertM, the desserts look delicious! Can you elaborate on the Cabernet Sauvignon cake? Is the wine in the glaze on top, or in the filling also?

[RobertM]

The wine is actually in the cake batter. You infuse the wine with cinnamon and juniper berries and use that in the batter for the cake. It's super simple. Everyone loved the cake, it turned out very light.

[Panaderia Canadiense]

What do you give the man who has everything on his 29th birthday? 29 Key Lime tarts, that's what.

I have only one excuse for the colour - the customer is always right.

[Darienne]

What do you give the man who has everything on his 29th birthday? 29 Key Lime tarts, that's what.

I have only one excuse for the colour - the customer is always right.

:laugh:

[heidih]

Love the tarts PC - is the green color natural?

[Panaderia Canadiense]

Not nearly. My limes are that vivid green, but I have yet to figure out a way to transfer that to the cream without causing the final product to be unduly bitter. So that's good ol' food dye. The cream actually turned out to a sort of baby-sick blah-beige, so the colourant was a blessing.

[Kim Shook]

Beth – I have not tried the Death by Chocolate zucchini cake, but I just found a recipe online and bookmarked it. I know that we will be overrun with zucchini this summer and I am already sick of fritters and the muffins! Thanks! Your key lime tarts are great – one of our favorites. I had to laugh at your last sentence – my MIL always insists on dyeing her key lime pies that neon green! I don’t and EVERY SINGLE TIME that I’ve served one in the last 30 years she has mentioned it !

RWood – odd. Sounds like what I call ‘Agenda Cooking’ – using an ingredient for no real reason – just to be able to say that it is in the finished dish .

I made a cake yesterday that I’ve made before and it gave me some trouble. It’s called Black and White Celebration cake – white cake layers with ganache between, iced with white buttercream and decorated with ganache and chocolate curls. As you can see, everything didn’t quite turn out:

My ganache ‘broke’, I guess:

I did some research today and found that there are ways that I could have fixed it – unfortunately, I’d already decorated the cake. I also put it on the cake when it was too warm and it threatened to slide down the side. A quick trip to the fridge fixed that.

I have never been very successful at doing chocolate curls. The Pioneer Woman has a method that sounds easy and hers certainly looked beautiful – it involves melting 3 oz. chocolate and 1 tablespoon of shortening and spreading it thinly on the back of a baking sheet. Once it gets to the right temperature, you are supposed to be able to make curls with a small sharp edged spatula. All I got, trying over and over at different temperatures was either shards or sheets and some had bits of scraped off metal imbedded in them!! I ended up re-melting the non-metallic chocolate, spreading it on a Silpat and cutting out discs. I did some research this morning and what I’ve found suggests that you need to use molding chocolate to make good curls. Is this true?

My cake top with the big ganache shoulders and dots reminds me of those mushrooms from the Mario Bros. video game:

It all tasted great, though!

[Panaderia Canadiense]

Kim, couberture-type chocolate would likely solve both your broken ganache and curling problems. IIRC, coubertures have a bit more fat in them, which makes them easier to manipulate than something like baker's chocolate, which is all about the cocoa mass. They cost a bit more, but it's soooo worth it in the final result.

This is a Death By Chocolate Zucchini cake glazed in a dark couberture ganache - you can really see the difference it makes.

Also, too funny! I prefer the natural beige look with green zest flecks in key lime anything, for the most part - maybe it was the great big batch that made it look iffy.

[flourgirl]

Your cake is lovely. Where do you find couberture-type chocolate? I have the book Death By Chocolate and have followed Chef Marcel's recommendation of Baker's Chocolate when making his recipes. Although his cakes come out excellent, I did feel I would have liked to try a different chocolate. I have never made this cake. It looks fabulous.

Edited May 30, 2012 by flourgirl (log)

[DianaM]

Your cake is lovely. Where do you find couberture-type chocolate? I have the book Death By Chocolate and have followed Chef Marcel's recommendation of Baker's Chocolate when making his recipes. Although his cakes come out excellent, I did feel I would have liked to try a different chocolate. I have never made this cake. It looks fabulous.

Hi flourgirl, and welcome to eG!

Couverture chocolate is available usually at pastry and confectionery ingredient distributors. For example, in the GTA (ON, Canada) you could try companies like McCall's Bakers' Warehouse, Lentia, Signature Fine Foods, Qzina.

[Panaderia Canadiense]

Your cake is lovely. Where do you find couberture-type chocolate? I have the book Death By Chocolate and have followed Chef Marcel's recommendation of Baker's Chocolate when making his recipes. Although his cakes come out excellent, I did feel I would have liked to try a different chocolate. I have never made this cake. It looks fabulous.

Thank you for the compliment. The cake itself is made with unsweetened, unleavened cocoa powder; it's only the ganache coating that involves couberture. Unfortunately, anything I have to say about sourcing couberture is going to be completely useless to you. I buy from Ecuacacao, one of the country's largest producers of fine coubertures.

[flourgirl]

Your cake is lovely. Where do you find couberture-type chocolate? I have the book Death By Chocolate and have followed Chef Marcel's recommendation of Baker's Chocolate when making his recipes. Although his cakes come out excellent, I did feel I would have liked to try a different chocolate. I have never made this cake. It looks fabulous.

Thank you for the compliment. The cake itself is made with unsweetened, unleavened cocoa powder; it's only the ganache coating that involves couberture. Unfortunately, anything I have to say about sourcing couberture is going to be completely useless to you. I buy from Ecuacacao, one of the country's largest producers of fine coubertures.

Oh, I didn't realize that. Thank you, though. I appreciate your response.

[flourgirl]

This afternoon I baked the Banana Cake with Carmel Sauce from the Bourke Street Bakery cookbook. It was the first time I attempted this recipe.

The cake took less than an hour to prepare and was baked in 55 minutes. While the cake was baking I made the carmel sauce.

When my husband got home from work, I served it to him warm. The cake is delicious. The crumb was perfect and the cake was moist.

I was disappointed with the finished height of the cake which was almost 2 inches. The recipe calls for 300g self rising flour. I might have over mixed the batter by using a heavy-duty 11-tine whisk attachment instead of the whisk which came with the mixer.

The recipe calls for a 28cm tin to be lined bottom and sides with parchment. Instead I used an 11 inch cheesecake pan and lined the loose bottom with parchment and floured and greased the pan.

I will definitely be making this cake again.

[cookingofjoy]

I'm going to school, and it's a cohort program, and we're a small group, so for new babies and weddings, I try to make little treats for class. So for a classmate getting married, cupcakes with Toba Garrett's moist yellow cake and Rosenberg's buttercream and little sugar cookies from my mom's recipe.

[Darienne]

cookingofjoy, those are so pretty. Really, really, lovely.

[Lior]

very nice! Lucky classmate! ENjoy the day!

[flourgirl]

That cupcake is beautiful!

[cookingofjoy]

Thanks for being so nice! I've followed this thread forever and finally got the guts to post

[ChrisTaylor]

Lemon tart. I started with the Keller recipe but after a couple of attempts have made it my own. It's a 100% flour case, altho' at some point I mean to experiment with using almond meal. It's a much larger tart than Keller's is, so I double the quantity of filling mixture. And, too, that business of 1/2 a cup of lemon juice to 3/4 cup of sugar? I reverse that. And add a few drops of orange bitters.

[flourgirl]

Usually I am very critical of everything I bake but I just have to say this is ONE DELICIOUS CAKE !!

This cake was easier to make than any I have ever made. It is light, tender, sweet and melts in your mouth.I glazed it but it didn’t need it.This cake boasts 5 egg yolks, 142g butter and 200g milk so I won’t be having any but I did sneak a crumb that fell on the plate as I cut a piece for my husband. WOW!!! It’s great, it really is

[cookingofjoy]

ChrisTaylor - I hadn't seen Keller's recipe before just googling it now. Did you broil it? Does it taste lighter than a tart with curd?

flourgirl - your cake looks delicious, and I love glazes Beautiful tin!