Category Archives: cake

You Know Me And Lemon

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Rustic Lemon Lavender Cornmeal Pound Cake

If I don’t eat something lemony at least seventeen times a once a week, I go into withdrawals.  I love chocolate… and Twinkies… and Cheetos…and Twinkies stuffed with Cheetos…and Cheetos stuffed with Twinkies (sorry. I’ll stop now.) but sometimes I just have to have that kick from lemon. Mind you, unlike my 15 year old son, I do NOT suck on lemon halves *shudders at the thought*. And while I actually like the new Lemon Twinkies (c’mon, did you really think I’d let those pass by without a try?) even I have to say that they can’t compare to home made treats.

I mentioned in the last lemon post I made…erhm, which was one of my last posts actually. Is this a sign of a rut? Nahhhhh.

Moving on. I mentioned in the last post that lemon has always seemed a good Spring flavor to me. It also works for Easter which would be a good excuse to make the recipe I’m sharing today.

I wanted to make a pound cake. I wanted lemon. But all the lemon pound cake recipes sounded boring. So… say it with me, regular readers… I played with a recipe. Like most cooks, I love Cooks Illustrated recipes. But today, I was antsy and even their stuff seemed boring to me. Heresy, I know. That’s like saying Martha Stewart doesn’t look good in an orange jumpsuit or Sandra Lee is a tee totaler. So I took one of their pound cake recipes and made it mine. Mine I say!!! Buahahahahaaaaaaa. Then just to add insult to injury, when I was done making it and glazing it, I covered it in Easter sprinkles. Why? Just cause I’m that kind of a gal. Continue reading →

Sometimes Simple And Old Are The Best

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Yum

I have NO idea who ate some of this before I could get a photo *blinks innocently*


I should know… I mean, look at my husband. Ok, I’m so gonna die for that but I couldn’t resist that one hehe

Seriously though… have you ever noticed that in the blogging world, it is always something new, something unique, something that is all about “OMG, I made elk tongues with a balsamic reduction and served it with bacony coleus plants sauteed in bear fat!”

Mind you, I love the new stuff; don’t get me wrong. I’m no different there than anyone else in trying to be unique and have something here on my blog that isn’t on 396 other blogs. Erhmmm, other than that elk tongue thing… you can have my share. Honest; I don’t mind.

Sometimes though, I just want something comforting, easy and old fashioned. Especially recently. I’ve been battling a fun fun fun tooth and jaw infection (thus my absence {didya miss me? 😛 } and also why no new posts recently) and have been taking massive doses of Penicillin. And while I’m not allergic to it, I’m sensitive to it big time and spent the better part of a week nauseous and unable to eat. I’m eating again but am still doing better with soft easy foods because my jaw isn’t 100%.

Point being (whining over lol) that when I’m down, physically or emotionally, I like, as I said, easy and comforting. One of my go to recipes for that (other than the ubiquitous mac and cheese that is practically everyone’s fave comfort food) is an old Amish recipe. I absolutely LOVE so many Amish foods. I have the same fascination with their culture, religion and foods that so many living in the mainstream world do.

Continue reading →

The Lonely Outcast Citrus

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Yes, this is already sliced in thick slabs and ready for me to dig in….




You all know the one I’m talking about. It’s the citrus that gets grimaces instead of drools, the one that never gets invited over for dinner and a movie, much less dessert and an attempt to get to third base. It’s the one that get ignored because it has a tendency to be a bit…shall we say… bitter about life. It’s the citrus that has very little middle ground. You either love it or you hate it. I’m one of those weirdos in the love it camp. Just add that to the list of things that makes me strange and wonderfully lovable.

What citrus? Why Grapefruit of course. People tend to think of it in terms of either juice for breakfast, juice beverage aka grapefruit juice that has been sweetened. I admit that I prefer that to the straight up kind myself, or as a fruit to eat, grimacing the whole time, because they are on a diet and their mothers best friends sisters cousins stepgrandmother lost 45 pounds in two days doing that Continue reading →

Are You Feeling Crafty??

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Hello dear readers, fellow bloggers and those who come here to roll their eyes and sneer. I need some advice. We have realized that we can not afford even one Christmas present for my boys who still live at home. Not even one. I thank God that we tend to be food stockpilers so that I have an ample supply of baking foods and other stuff to make Christmas (and the blog) merry with yummy foods. But it still kills me to have to tell my boys that I can’t afford to give them Christmas presents, especially since my youngest, at three, is having his first year of talking about Santa Claus and asking what Santa is going to bring him. Moving tapped us out money wise and our bills are higher now. We can make ends meet but there is absolutely NOTHING in the budget for extras and since we moved rather quickly, I hadn’t thought to save extra towards Christmas or to stockpile gifts early. So I need your advice.

I absolutely SUCK at crafts. I mean, really really bad with no artistic bent whatsoever. I can crochet but I can only crochet straight lines. I can draw but only if it’s in a coloring book and even then I go out of the lines 😛 I can use scissors but I am probably better off with the safety type they give kids in Kindergarten. I don’t want to use food as gifts because 1) I make goodies anyway so it wouldn’t feel like a gift to my boys, just more food momma made and 2) they would scarf it down in five minutes flat and that would be that until the aching tummies happened.

But I know that some of you are the crafty sorts. So my hope is that some of you can give me ideas on some crafts to make that are doable by Christmas by a woman who can only crochet straight lines. I don’t have a whole lot in the way of supplies (that pesky money thing again lol) but I have old clothes I can cup up, paper, pens and pencils and even some fabric paints (the kinds you squeeze out of tubes) from a time when I was deluded enough to think I might be able to use them w/out covering everything in paint.

So there is where I am hoping that you, my much more talented and creative friends, can help me. I am also looking for just general ideas for Christmas gifts that aren’t necessarily crafts but are doable for free or so cheap as to make a penny cry. I think if I have to wake up Christmas morning and have my boys see a tree that is empty underneath it, I will crawl under a rock and stay there forever.

So moving on. I have an amazingly yummy and easy recipe for you today. We all know I went through an apple phase earlier in the Autumn season. Well… it’s backkkkkkkk! I found a recipe in a Southern Living Baking magazine that I had been wanting to try. I wish now I had tried it sooner because it so so simple yet with a taste that made me want to stick my face down in the frosting and never come back out. I didn’t do much to change it though what I did do made this even better than what it would have been, I believe. I added some crystallized Ginger to the cake batter, used Gala apples instead of Granny Smith because that’s what I had, added more vanilla and a slug of bourbon and added maple flavoring to the frosting. These changes put this into the realm of ove the top wonderful. Yet still very homey, very comforting and very easy with just enough batter to hold the apples together. Another bonus is that this smells like a big gigantic snickerdoodle cookie as it bakes. So give this a try. I think you’ll like it.

Apple Ginger Cake With A Browned Butter Maple Frosting

  • 1 1/2 cups chopped pecans
  • 1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted
  • 2 cups sugar
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
  • 2 cups flour
  • 1/4 cup crystallized ginger
  • 1/4 cup bourbon (optional)
  • 1 tablespoon cinnamon
  • 1 tsp. baking soda
  • 1 tsp. salt
  • 2 1/2 pounds Gala apples, cored, cut into 8 wedges then each wedge cut in half (the original recipe called for peeling but I didn’t bother)
  • Frosting-
  • 1 cup unsalted butter
  • 1 16 ounce box powdered sugar
  • 1/4 cup milk (I had to use like a tablespoon or so more)
  • 1/2 tsp. maple flavoring
  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Toast the pecans in a single layer on a cookie sheet until lightly toasted and smelling yummy, about 5 minutes.
  2. In a large bowl, stir together the 1/2 cup melted butter, sugar, eggs, bourbon and vanilla extract.
  3. In a small bowl, mix together the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, salt and crystallized ginger.
  4. Add the flour mixture to the butter/egg mixture. Stir just until combined then add in the apple pieces and 1 cup of the pecans. The batter will be very thick; that’s who it’s supposed to be.
  5. Spread batter into a lightly greased 13×9 inch pan.
  6. Bake at 350 for 45 minutes or until toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean and cake it golden brown. Cool completely in the pan.
  7. FROSTING-
  8. While the cake is baking, start your frosting.
  9. Cook the 1 cup butter in a heavy bottomed saucepan over medium heat. Stir constantly until the butter turns a golden brown. This will take about 6 minutes or so. Immediately take off of the heat and pour into a bowl. Refrigerate until the butter is just beginning to solidify.
  10. Beat the butter in a medium bowl until fluffy. Add in the sugar, milk and maple flavoring. Beat together until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Trust me… the more you beat, the lighter and fluffier most butter based frostings become. Keep beating.
  11. Spread the frosting on the cooled cake and sprinkle on the 1/2 cup of pecans.
  12. Eat. Moan. Repeat.

 

Same Theme, Different Yummy Recipe

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I know I know, I just did a recipe for a cake… and it too had apples in it. But I can’t help myself!!!! It’s Fall and apples are in season and they are totally delicious this time of year and they go so well with spices and cake and and and… you love me and will forgive me for being a wee bit repetitive. I just know you will!

You will won’t you? You’re not currently changing your bat channel are you?

Get back here young lady!! Erhmmm, no, I wasn’t meaning to insult your manhood sir. Though I’d like you to stay too. Yes, I know your wife thinks you are very manly.Yes, those are wonderful biceps. Sir, put your shirt back on please.

My husband is manlier though. He carried a tree out of our forest today. All by himself. One handed. He even grunted and said “Ugh. Me man, you woman. Cook me a whole Elk, wench”. Ok, no he didn’t and if he had, I probably would have beaned him upside the head with one of the heavy branches I was toting. I’d have made a terrible submissive cave woman. I’d have been the cavewoman berating her hubby for not killing a larger Mammoth. “Whadda ya mean, your spear broke!? I’ve said time and time again that you don’t pay attention to spear upkeep and this was gonna happen! Now what am I gonna do with this tiny 1500 pound Mammoth!? All the OTHER husbands get bigger ones! How can I show my face at the Junior Cavewomans League NOW?!”

But really… he carried a tree. Maybe it wasn’t big but I was impressed. I even swooned a little and I’m pretty sure it wasn’t from his pit smell.

Then I came home and cooked Mammoth  this cake. He deserved it. For the tree thing, not the smelly pits. And cause he likes apples. See? It’s all HIS fault I’m posting another apple cake. It had nothing to do with the fact that I like spice cake and had apples I needed to use up.

Seriously though (I hear you saying “yeah, right, Janet. YOU? Serious?) this is yummy! I told all of you that I was going to post things for your Thanksgiving/Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanza/Day of Any Worship/ whatever/ table and so I am. I mean, I’m the first person to go grabbing a Pecan or Pumpkin pie or twelve and eating every bite as I growl at anyone who ventures near me but I wanted to give you some choices that aren’t necessarily the normal holiday fare. This fits that bill quite well.  It’s a one layer spice cake that is redolent of Autumn and makes your house smell fantastic. It has a layer of caramelized apples on top a la upside down cake. It’s then served with the caramel that you didn’t use for the apples. Can we say “OMG”?

This isn’t hard to make at all. I’ve made it a gazillion times over the years. The hardest part is the homemade caramel and slicing all the apples. I don’t know about you but I HATE slicing apples. It’s a testament to my love for desserts like this that I do it at all. It’s originally a recipe from Epicurious.com and I haven’t really changed it a whole lot. I’ve added more spice and added a bit of vegetable oil because originally the cake was a bit dry. Otherwise, it’s the same recipe they have up. If you like apples, caramel and spice cake you sooooo have to try this.

Winter Spice Cake With Caramelized Apples

  • 13 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
  • 6 medium Golden Delicious apples (about 2 1/4 pounds), peeled, cored and cut into 6 wedges
  • 4 tablespoons plus 1 3/4 cups sugar
  • 1 cup heavy cream
  • 1/2 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
  • 1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
  • 2 1/4 teaspoons ground cinnamon
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger
  • 3/4 teaspoon ground allspice
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
  • 3 tablespoons vegetable oil
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1 tablespoon vanilla extract teaspoons vanilla extract
  • 1/2 cup sour cream
  1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
  2. Spray bottom of 9-inch-diameter springform pan with cooking spray. Line bottom of the with foil; spray foil. Wrap outside of pan with foil. Wonder why you didn’t take stock in a foil company.
  3. Melt 3 tablespoons butter in large nonstick pan over medium-high heat. Add apples; sprinkle with 1 tablespoon sugar.
  4. Sauté apples until almost tender and beginning to brown, about 6 minutes. Sprinkle with 3 tablespoons sugar. Wonder why you didn’t take stock in a sugar company.
  5. Increase heat to high and toss until sugar melts and apples are deep brown, about 4 minutes. Pour apple mixture onto large plate (do not clean skillet; you want all that apple and buttery goodness).
  6. Melt 4 tablespoons butter in same skillet over medium-high heat. Add 3/4 cup sugar and cook until mixture is deep golden brown, stirring often, about 7 minutes (mixture will be grainy). Add cream and vinegar (do not stir).
  7. Cover skillet, reduce heat to medium-low and simmer without stirring until most of caramel bits dissolve, about 8 minutes.
  8. Uncover and whisk until sauce is slightly thick, deep brown and reduced to generous 1 cup, about 3 minutes longer. Pour caramel sauce into small saucepan.
  9. Spread 3 tablespoons caramel sauce over bottom of prepared pan. Arrange apple wedges side by side, rounded side down, in caramel in 2 purty overlapping circles.
  10. Sift flour and next 6 ingredients into a medium bowl.
  11. Beat 6 tablespoons butter, 3 tablespoons oil and 1 cup sugar in large bowl to blend (mixture will be grainy). Beat in eggs 1 at a time, then vanilla and 1/4 cup of the caramel sauce.
  12. Beat in half of dry ingredients, then sour cream, then remaining dry ingredients.
  13. Spoon batter evenly over apples.
  14. Bake cake until tester inserted into center comes out clean, about 1 hour 15 minutes.
  15. Cool cake in pan 5 minutes.Cut around cake; remove pan sides. Cool cake 15 minutes longer.
  16. Place platter atop cake; invert cake onto platter. Remove pan bottom and foil. Replace any dislodged apples. Rewarm remaining caramel sauce. Serve cake warm or at room temperature with sauce.

 

I Have A Confession To Make

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Darn turkey was trying to eat my cake!

You ready for this? I’m hoping that none of you leave and never speak to me again because this is a big one.

*Takes a deep breath*

Ok, here goes.

I’m glad Halloween is over! Glad!! Glad I say!!

There!! I said it!!

*Sobs uncontrollably and hides under a blankie, peeking out to see how many of you left*

You’re still here!? To quote my three year old, “Awesome, dude!”

I really am though. Beyond the candy, as a holiday it really doesn’t do much for me. I get tired of trying to catch something decent on TV and only finding scary movies and things titled “The Exorcism of The Three Legged Emu That Ate Manhattan”. I find myself longing for Thanksgiving and Christmas movies and TV shows. I also get tired of every food product being based on the idea of how gross can we make this? Mind you, I get/got a kick out of seeing how creative my fellow bloggers can be with Halloween treats and some sounded amazingly good but I was aching for something that was homey and cozy and Autumnish.

Like I said though, the candy part? Yeah, I can deal with that. Especially the day after sales when you can snag 73 pound bags of assorted Hershey products for less than the national debt. I grab those bad boys and save them to put in Christmas stockings and pray that the kids don’t really notice the Halloween wrappers. Honest… I really do save them. Ok, most of them. There usually aren’t many any Kit Kats left. But who can blame me!? I mean… it’s KIT KATS!!!

With just two teens and a three year old at home, there wasn’t any trick or treating. I figure Joshie can start going when he starts school. I’m mean that way. Plus, he is pretty timid and I really didn’t want to carry him as he clutched me in traumatized fear and then had nightmares for a year or twelve.

So I’ve moved on. I’m back to loving the idea of cozy Autumn style dishes; things that can be served to the family or maybe put on the table when Thanksgiving comes around which is getting here quicker than I’m ready for. So today I made an awesome (awesome, dude!!) caramelized apple pound cake. This is an older recipe that I only slightly adapted from Food & Wine magazine and it’s a bit more time consuming than things I usually make but it’s well worth it. I added a cider & ginger apple compote to this and it works wonderfully to add that extra pizzazz to the cake. I also didn’t use their glaze because it just sounded too sweet and heavy.

Cider Caramelized Apple Pound Cake

With An Cider, Apple & Ginger Compote

  1. Cake-
  2. 2 cups apple cider
  3. 3 cups white sugar
  4. 1 1/2 cups plus 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
  5. 1 1/2 pounds granny smith apples, peeled, cored and sliced thin
  6. 3 cups cake flour
  7. 2 teaspoons cinnamon
  8. 1 teaspoon nutmeg
  9. 1 teaspoon ground ginger
  10. 1/2 teaspoon cloves
  11. 1/2 teaspoon salt
  12. 1/4 teaspoon baking soda (yes, you read that right)
  13. 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
  14. 6 large eggs
  15. 3/4 cup sour cream
  16. Compote-
  17. 1 20 ounce package refrigerated glazed apples (the kind that is by the ready made meals)
  18. 2 tablespoons maple syrup
  19. 1 teaspoon cinnamon
  20. 1/2 cup apple cider
  21. 2 tablespoons crystallized ginger
  22. 1/3 cup heavy cream
  23. Glaze-
  24. 2 cups powdered sugar
  25. 1/4 to 1/3 cup apple cider (will vary depending on how thick or thin you want your glaze)
  • In a large saucepan, boil the 2 cups apple cider over high heat, stirring occasionally, until reduced to 1/2 cup. Add 1 cup of the white sugar to it and cook over moderately high heat until it is a dark amber color.
  • Take pan off the heat and add in the 2 tablespoons of butter. Add the peeled and sliced apples and cook over medium high heat until the apples are tender and translucent and most of the cider syrup is absorbed. Set the apples aside and let cool.
  • Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour a 12 cup bundt pan (I used Bakers Joy spray- I love that stuff!).
  • Sift together the flour, spices and salt.
  • In a large bowl, beat the 1 1/2 cups butter until creamy. Add the remaining 2 cups of sugar and the vanilla and beat until light and fluffy.
  • Add the eggs one at a time. beat well after each one.
  • Add the dry ingredients a third at a time, alternating adding it with adding the sour cream.
  • Stir half a cup of the batter into the apples to lighten them up a bit, then stir the apples into the rest of the batter.
  • Pour the batter into your prepared pan and smooth it out. Bake for 70 minutes or until the top is dry and cracked or a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean.
  • Let cool in pan for about 20 minutes then turn it out onto a rack to cool completely.
  • When cool, whisk the glaze ingredients together and drizzle over the cake… or just eat it with a spoon. WHAT?! Quit looking funny at me!
  • To make the compote-
  • In a medium saucepan, mix all the ingredients except for the cream. Bring to a simmer, stirring frequently and cook until the cider has been absorbed. make sure to stir this often or it WILL stick. Don’t ask me how I know this *cough cough*. When pretty much all of the cider is absorbed, stir in the cream. Heat JUST until the cream has warmed up; don’t boil it.
  • Serve the cake with a nice dollop of the compote on top.
  • Say yum.

Taking a decent picture at 2am with no natural light (obviously) & a point & shoot camera is pretty impossible. Sigh.

‘

Let Them Eat Cake

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As you can see, I stink at decorating 😛

 

But if you let them eat cake, make sure you refrigerate it after frosting it. Why you ask? Oh, just go look at the picture at the bottom of the post and you’ll understand hehe. This is what happens to a butter based frosting when left in a warm kitchen for too long. All I could think of was “omg, I am SO glad I got the photos taken!” My husband has more than once paid me the supreme compliment of calling me the most laid back person he’s ever known but I’m not sure how laid back I’d have been if the only photos I had to show you were the last ones lol. Though I did die laughing when my son called me (my husband and I were out) to tell me the cake had “collapsed”. I figure it still tastes good and I’m sure not out to prove to all of you how perfect I am so I want you to enjoy the laugh too.

So do as I say not as I did in this case. REFRIGERATE THE CAKE!!!! And maybe don’t put quite as much frosting in between the layers as I did. 😀 Just eat it from a spoon because you are going to have extra frosting because I am feeling too lazy to refigure the math to cut down the amounts so that you don’t have too much frosting between your layers. Just give the kids a spoon or offer the neighbor some frosting. They won’t refuse; I promise 😀

Ok; moving on (hehe… I think those words are becoming my trademark. I can’t write them now without giggling. I’m not going to tell you that this is a quick fix cake or something to start when you need a quick dessert. But for a special occasion or just cause you want to treat your family, this is an excellent choice. It’s showy (especially if you are better at decorating than I am which isn’t difficult because I’m horrible at it), rich and moist and tastes great. But it DOES take time. You could use a box mix for the cake I would guess and it would work but I make no promises as to whether it would be as good.  The cake recipe comes from Food Network and the frosting is from me.

Chocolate Fudge cake

With

Chocolate Raspberry Butter Cream Frosting

  • CAKE-
  • 3 cups brown sugar
  • 3/4 cup canola oil
  • 3 eggs (bring to room temp)
  • 2 2/3 cups all purpose flour
  • 2 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
  • 2 1/4 teaspoons baking soda
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
  • 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
  • 1 1/2 cups milk
  • 1 1/8 cups cocoa powder (unsweetened)
  • 1/3 cup seedless raspberry jam, melted (you will be using this after the cake layers have cooled and this is my own addition so feel free to omit if you want)
  • FROSTING-
  • 1/2 cup pureed and strained raspberries (2 pints got me the half cup and some extra raspberries for decorating)
  • 1/3 cup seedless raspberry jam
  • 3 sticks unsalted butter, softened
  • 3 cups semi sweet or bittersweet chocolate, chopped
  • 3 to 5 cups powdered sugar (will vary)
  • 1/3 cup heavy cream
  • 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 teaspoon raspberry extract (optional; I didn’t think it needed it but wanted to post it for those who might like it)
  1. Cake- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour three nine inch cakes pans (I used Bakers Joy instead; the spray that has both oil and flour in it and it worked fine)
  2. In a large bowl, combine the brown sugar and oil. On low speed of your mixer, add the eggs. Set aside and mix together your flour, salt, baking powder and baking soda.
  3. In a measuring cup, mix your vanilla into your milk (yes; this recipe makes a lot of dirty dishes 😛 ) and set aside.
  4. Bring the water to a boil and pour over the cocoa and whisk until it is well blended and smooth.
  5. To the egg mixture, alternately add the flour mixture and the milk mixture, beginning and ending with the flour. Make sure to scrape the sides of the bowl off after each addition.
  6. At low speed, add in the cocoa mixture.
  7. Pour into the prepared cake pans and bake at 350 until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean, about 20 to 25 minutes. When cake layers have cooled, remove from pan and refrigerate the layers while you make the frosting. If you have no room to put in the fridge, just cover and set somewhere cool.
  8. FROSTING-
  9. While cake layers cool, make your frosting. Melt the chocolate with the heavy cream in the microwave until chocolate is melted (about 1 1/2 minutes). Stir until smooth. Set in the fridge to cool down somewhat, about ten minutes. Don’t leave too long or it will harden back up.
  10. Beat the butter, raspberries, raspberry jam and vanilla extract until well blended. Beat in the chocolate mixture.  One cup at a time, beat in the powdered sugar, stopping at four cups.
  11. Refrigerate frosting mixture for one to two hours.
  12. When thoroughly cold, beat mixture at high speed until thick and fluffy. If not thick enough to be spreadable, add more powdered sugar, one cup at a time, beating well after each addition.
  13. Take melted jam and using a pastry brush, brush generously over two of the cake layers.
  14. Set one cake layer (one of the ones with with jam) on serving plate and frost generously (but…ummm… not too generously like I did lol). Carefully top with the other jammed layer and frost. Top that with the last layer and frost top and sides. The cake can now legally use the name “Mount Cakesuvius”. Decorate as desired.

 

Mount Cakesuvius after it exploded

Courtin’ The Volcano

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You know how there are some things you just don’t ever make for whatever reason? Some people are fearful of working with yeast (that’s one that never bothered me. I think I was so young and inexperienced when I started using it I didn’t even realize I was supposed to be nervous lol), others don’t like grilling (I do it but I can understand the fear… I was there the day my two oldest boys and my son in law almost set the back porch and back wall on fire “lighting” {translate- using far too much lighter fluid and loving it} the grill.) Still others hate working with puff pastry (I still get nervous with it myself), others hate baking cakes (that’s why God let us invent box mixes 😛 ) and so on and so forth.

One of my things has always been the Lava Cake. I wasn’t scared of it in the least. I had read many recipes for it and for some reason it just didn’t appeal to me so I never tried it. But today, trying to figure out what to do for the blog, I was looking in the cabinets and saw that I had some bittersweet chocolate I needed to use before the boys decided my 3 dollar and fifty cent bag of Ghirardelli’s chocolate was perfect to make the “trail mix” they love to use odds and ends to make. Then I would be minus two teenage boys for a while as I hung them by their toenails off of the roof. Hmmmm, thinking about it, that sounds like it could be fun just for general purposes 😀

Moving on (titters and knows regular readers know why I am)… bittersweet chocolate to use. I also had some Raspberries and Strawberries that were beginning to look a bit peaked. So I decided that ok, it was time. I would make a Lava Cake and try to figure out what all the fuss was over a half cooked cake (cause really… that IS all it is if you think about it.) I figured I’d make a berry couli with it and if nothing else, how bad could ANYTHING be with smooshed berries and whipped cream with it. 😀

All I have to say is this… WHY THE HELL DIDN’T SOMEBODY MAKE ME ONE OF THESE AND FORCE IT INTO MY MOUTH YEARS AGO??! Shame on all of you for not writing me, say a decade ago (not knowing me then is no excuse darn it!) and telling me that I just HAD to try a Lava Cake.

Erhmmm, that was my way of saying I kinda liked it. Admittedly, I can’t lie, the berry couli was a big draw too but the gooey chocolate (aka the half cooked cake; I can’t lie to myself about that either) with the slightly crispy edge of the cooked part was…ummm… ehhh, it was ok I guess, if you’re gonna pin me down. FINE!! It was good! Happy now? I said it. Sheesh; some people. 😛

So try this. Right now. Go. Shoo. Get to the kitchen. Well, copy and print out the recipe first. But THEN… go. Cook. Eat. Drool. This recipe (the cake part anyway) comes from Paula Deen.

Chocolate Lava Cake

With

A Double Berry Couli

  • 6 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped if needed
  • 2 ounces semi sweet chocolate, chopped if needed
  • 10 tablespoons unsalted butter (NAHH!!! Not butter from a Paula Deen recipe 😛 )
  • 1/2 cup all purpose flour
  • 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
  • 3 large eggs
  • 3 egg yolks
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 2 tablespoons orange liquor (Optional. I didn’t use it since I was using the berry couli)
  • For the couli-
  • 1 cups raspberries
  • 1 cup capped and sliced strawberries
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1 tablespoon lemon juice
  1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
  2. Grease 6 6 ounce ramekins. Melt the butter and chocolates in the microwave (took a minute and 15 seconds in my 1000 watt microwave).
  3. Add the flour and sugar to the chocolate. Mix well.
  4. Add the eggs and egg yolks. Stir well until smooth (I used low on my mixer; worked fine) Stir in the vanilla and liquor if using.
  5. Divide the batter evenly among the ramekins
  6. Bake at 425 for 14 minutes. Do NOT over bake. The edge should be firm but the middle still goopy (yes, I said goopy 😛 )
  7. Loosen the edge carefully with a butter knife then invert onto a dessert plate.
  8. For the couli-
  9. Mix berries, sugar and lemon juice in a medium saucepan. Cook over medium high heat, stirring frequently, until mixture is slightly thickened. Strain through a fine mesh strainer, pushing down on it to get all the juice.  Let cool. Serve the cake in a puddle of couli with lightly sweetened whipped cream or serve the couli on the sides for people to put on the amount they want. If the cakes cool down too much and the inside thickens up, just microwave it for 20 seconds or so.

Just An Old Fashioned Girl At Heart

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18

Until you surround it with juicy fruits and some pillowy whipped cream it can seem....

Although I’m sure if my kids had their way, they would delete the fashioned part and just say that I am old. But what do they know? What’s the old saying? Youth is wasted on the young. 😛 Let us old farts be young…or something like that. If I think of a way to put that logically, I’ll get back to you. Until then, I guess I’ll just stay old and feeble minded .

Seriously though, I really am an old fashioned girl. It took me forever to join the 20th century and get a cell phone because I thought they were silly. For the longest time, I only had a 20 pound Tracfone. You know the kind. You had to pull up the antennae to get it to work and even then it only worked on alternating Tuesdays in months with J in them. I still haven’t joined the 21st century when it comes to phones. My phone may be smaller now but it doesn’t have any bells or whistles. I can’t use it to go onliine, I can’t play games on it, I can barely make calls on it half the time. But hey, it’s not 20 pounds! I’m getting there!

I’m old fashioned in other ways too. Ways that make my teen boys still at home roll their eyes and give me the “but the other kids get to!” routine way more than is probably good for my eardrums. I limit TV watching, they aren’t allowed to watch anything over PG unless I’ve seen it myself or know from a reputable source that it’s ok. They are only allowed on the computer one hour one day a week and then an hour and a half each weekend day or vacation day. I’m so cruel. It makes me happy. 😀

I’m pretty old fashioned in many ways when it comes to food too. I absolutely love the recipes I find online from fellow bloggers or cooking sites or what have you and am constantly needing a bib to sop up the drool over so many of the desserts posted. But when it comes to cake, I’ve never been a big cake eater. My vice has always been more along the lines of ice cream. So unless I am craving gooey frosting like I was the other day with the Caramel Cupcakes I made and posted here, I prefer a simpler cake. One that always works for me is pound cake. You can do so much with it. It’s good warm, it’s good cold. It tastes great plain and it can be fancied up and made oh so fattening by adding creamy sauces and sugared fruits. You can change the flavoring in it and get an entirely different cake from the same recipe. Bottom line, pound cake is, in my opinion, the best all around cake when you want a cake but don’t want either a whole lot of trouble making it or something over the top rich and goopy. The one I am posting here has been my go to pound cake for about 15 years now. It has a fine tender crumb and a nice crispy crust; the quintessential pound cake assets. With the lemon flavor I post here, it is a mild sweet NOT tart lemon flavor. If you want more flavor just make a glaze of lemon juice and powdered sugar. So get to cooking!  I hope you enjoy it as much as we do. 🙂 This is also excellent with the almond extract variation. In some ways, I almost prefer that one; depends on my mood. 🙂

SOUR CREAM POUND CAKE

  • 2 3/4 cups sugar
  • 1 1/2 cups unsalted butter, softened
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
  • 4 teaspoons lemon extract or 1 tablespoon Almond extract if you prefer an almond flavored cake (yes, you read that right. Four. If you’re not wanting lemon, just omit it and the zest and juice.)
  • 6 eggs
  • 3 cups all purpose flour
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 cup sour cream
  • zest of one lemon
  • juice of half a lemon (again, omit the zest and juice if you’re not wanting lemon)
  1. Heat oven to 350 degrees. Generously grease and flour a 12 cup bundt pan. Or spray with cooking spray that has both oil and flour.
  2. In a large bowl, cream butter and sugar together until light and fluffy.
  3. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add vanilla extract, lemon juice and other extracts, if using.
  4. Combine the flour, baking powder, salt and lemon zest in a small bowl.
  5. Add the flour mixture to the butter mixture, alternating it with the sour cream. Beat well after each addition.
  6. Bake at 350 for 55 to 70 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. A few teenie tiny baby crumbs are ok, but no loose batter and if’s it’s dripping, you may want to make sure you turned the oven on. 😀
  7. Let cool in the pan for ten minutes then invert onto a serving plate. Serve cold, serve warm, bury your face in the plate, smear it on your toes… whatever works. I won’t judge. 😀

...pretty unassuming can't it? But don't be fooled.