Buttercream and Party Cakes

You can lick the spoon

Among the world of bloggers are an amazing group, consisting of over 600 to date, who once a month conspire about one recipe challenge, chosen by a different member each time. The monthly challenge remains a secret until the last day of the month, when everyone blogs about their results; a kind of gang-blog. These are not your run-of-the-mill bakers, friends. They are the Daring Bakers, and for some reason I thought it would be fun to join up. What was I thinking? I should have been thinking that I was out of my league.



I am not a fancy-pancy cake decorator. I think I’d rather pick nits off a monkey’s back than to obsess over making intricate flowers made out of sugar or enrobing a cake in fondant. It’s just not my thing. After looking at some of my blogging friend’s jaw-droppingly gorgeous creations, I became comfortable with the realization that I am a peasant cook at heart. When I bake, I always gravitate toward the simple and rustic, like free-form tarts and cakes baked in loaf pans.



This month, the recipe was chosen by Morven of Food Art and Random Thoughts; Perfect Party Cake from Dorie Greenspan’s fantastic book, Baking, From My Home to Yours. I enjoy Dorie’s recipes because they aren’t too fussy and she obviously writes them after lots of testing. In fact one of my all-time favorites is Dorie's Lemon Yogurt Cake (baked in a loaf pan!).

The party cake is a fairly simple recipe, and I can see why it should become a stand-by recipe. Plus, I have a weakness for any cake made with buttermilk and lemon. I love the tangy moist texture of this cake, and would make this again just smeared with some jam, lemon curd and powdered sugar.

However, the highlight in my house was the luscious meringue buttercream. I can’t remember the last time I smeared a cake – or anything, for that matter - with a substance containing three whole sticks of butter, multiple cups of sugar and fluffy marshmallow-like beaten egg whites. This stuff should be classified as a dangerous substance by the DEA. My kids were content to lick the beaters and spatula (and I was too, just in case you were wondering), to the point that there was barely enough left to frost the darn cake.

Now that I think about it, that seems like a perfect arrangement. Piece of cake, scoop of buttercream on the side.

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Copyright (c) 2008 FamilyStyle Food

Crispy, Creamy Chocolate Cookies

It’s no surprise around our house that when I get ready to bake cookies, it usually means I’m craving chocolate. True, I sometimes distract myself by making other kinds of cookies, but every time I take a test-nibble of a freshly-baked gingersnap, shortbread or snickerdoodle all I can think is how much better they'd be if only I'd thrown a scoop of cocoa or a handful of some chocolate chunks in the dough.

I tell myself that responding to my brain’s internal cry for some dark, sweet chocolate has some kind of medicinal effect on me - at least if seems that way, because I always feel a lot better after consuming some.

I flagged the page with this chocolate cookie recipe - adapted from one by French pastry master Pierre Herme - from Peggy Knickerbocker’s cookbook Simple Soirees. Not only did the name of this recipe call out to me with the words “chocolate” “crispy” and “creamy”, but I liked the idea of an icebox cookie; you can make the dough a few days ahead (or up to 3 months if you freeze it) and simply slice off what you need and then bake.



But, cookie bakers beware – the original recipe as printed in the book is incorrect!

I came this close to making a big chocolate mess of good cultured Plugra butter and pricey Sharffen Berger chocolate. When I mixed up the dough – right after adding the 1/4 cup flour called for, I had a soft blob of chocolate-flavored butter that I knew would never bake up into a respectable cookie. I decided to do a little research before baking.

After a brief Google search, I found a review by Ann Ellenbecker on the Powell’s Books website along with a corrected version of the recipe – yes, there should be 1 cup PLUS 1/4 flour in there!

Phew. Baking Disaster averted.

The cookies turned out just fine, although the dough does crumble a bit when slicing and I’d describe them as more crispy than creamy - mine were soft inside, but not really moist enough to be called creamy. But they are sweetly, demurely, bite-sized - perfect for those private feed-the-craving moments.

Do you want to win a trip for two to Napa Valley? I do too! Enter the Death by Chocolate Contest over at Culinate starting February 4 through February 8. Vote for your favorite chocolate post (mine would be nice) and at the same time YOU are entered in the sweepstakes. Fingers crossed...

Vote for me in the Death by Chocolate contest!


Crispy Creamy Chocolate Cookies
adapted slightly from Peggy Knickerbocker

1/3 cup excellent-quality cocoa powder such as Scharffen Berger * see note
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
11 tablespoons (1 stick plus 3 tablespoons) unsalted butter
2/3 cup dark brown sugar
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt or fleur de sel
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
5 ounces excellent-quality bittersweet chocolate, roughly chopped

Sift together the cocoa powder, baking soda, and flour. In a large mixing bowl, using a mixer, cream the butter until smooth, add the brown sugar and granulated sugar and blend again.

Add the salt and vanilla and blend for about 1 1/2 minutes. Add the flour mixture to the butter mixture and mix on the lowest speed until the ingredients are incorporated. The dough will be crumbly. Stir in the chopped chocolate.

Turn the dough onto a work surface. Press the mixture together with your hands, forming a ball. Cut the ball in half and work each half into a log about 1 1/2 inches in diameter. Wrap each log in plastic and refrigerate for at least 1 hour. (You can enclose in foil and freeze the logs for up to 3 months - thaw slightly before slicing)

Preheat the oven to 325° F. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment.

Slice the logs into 1/2-inch-thick rounds. Place the rounds on the baking sheets, 1 inch apart. If the cookies break apart, press them back together.

Bake one sheet at a time for 12 minutes. The cookies will not be firm nor appear to be done. Remove them from the oven and let them cool on the sheet on a wire rack until they are barely warm. Store the cookies in an airtight container.

Makes 4 dozen cookies.

* The original recipe calls for sweetened cocoa powder; I didn't have any, so I increased the amount of granulated sugar from 1/4 to 1/3 cup.

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Copyright (c) 2008 FamilyStyle Food

Cherry Pistachio Biscotti Dipped in White Chocolate

Festive treats for holiday cheer

Biscotti are great all-around cookies. I like that they're easy to make and keep for a week or two on the kitchen counter, so you can bake them ahead of time. It's also a cinch to take a basic recipe and play around with themes and variations - you could mix in any kind of nut, chip or dried fruit in endless combinations. Think apricots and almonds, cranberries and pecans, hazelnuts and chocolate chips.

Sometimes I like to drizzle my biscotti with melted chocolate, as I did here. They look especially festive on the Christmas cookie tray.

Cherry Pistachio Biscotti
Yield: 1 1/2 dozen

6 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
3/4 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1 tablespoon freshly grated orange zest
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoons orange extract
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/3 cups dried cherries, coarsely chopped
1 1/4 cups shelled raw pistachios, chopped
4 ounces chopped white chocolate

Heat oven to 350 degrees.

Beat butter and sugar in a large bowl at medium speed with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Add eggs, beating well; beat in orange zest and extract.

Combine flour, baking powder, and salt; add to butter mixture, beating at low speed until blended. Stir in 1 cup each cranberries and pistachios until evenly mixed.

Divide dough in half. Using lightly floured hands, shape each portion into a 14" x 2" log. Place both logs 3" apart on a large baking sheet lined with parchment paper.

Bake for 20 minutes or until firm to the touch. Cool logs on baking sheet 10 minutes. Lower oven temperature to 300 degrees.

Cut each log into 1/2"-thick diagonal slices with a serrated knife using a gentle sawing motion. Stand slices on their sides on baking sheet. Bake 15 more minutes. Transfer biscotti to wire racks to cool completely.

Melt chocolate in a small microwave-safe bowl on medium-high heat in 2 15-second intervals, stirring in between. Try not to overheat, because white chocolate can burn easily.

Dip one end of each biscotti into the melted chocolate and sprinkle with reserved cherries and pistachios. Allow to set about 1 hour before serving.

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Maida Heatter's Chocolate Whoppers

My favorite cookie is a Whopper

A long while ago, I lived in Miami and spent a few years working at a wine store; tasting, spitting, not spitting (a job perk), unloading cases of wine and every once in a while selling wine to customers.

One of my clients was none other than Maida Heatter, renowned cookbook writer and baker. She lived (and probably still does) in Miami Beach and would come in periodically to stock up on wine and gourmet goodies. She had a sweetly disarming way about her; she'd usually bring in some of her cellophane-wrapped homemade cookies for us to sample.

When we'd swoon with delight and thank her profusely she'd yell, "Honey, I can't hear you, I'm deaf as a post. Now where's that chardonnay I bought last time?"

I hope that she's been outfitted with one of those high-tech hearing aids these days, because if she were listening I'd tell her, loudly, about how I've been collecting her cookbooks and using her delicious, never-fail recipes for cookies and sweets for years and years now. I just love her.

In fact, my most favorite cookie is Maida's Chocolate Whopper, a big, fat, brownie-like confection with a crisp, shiny top and a moist, dark and nutty chocolate interior worthy of the word "devilish".

They come together in minutes, and all you need to do is drop blobs of the batter onto baking sheets.

You will be very popular if you make these and then give them to people. Just keep a few for yourself, too.

Check out everything Maida at Squidoo Food, Anna's Whoppers at Cookie Madness, and Mondays with Maida over at My Little Kitchen.

Chocolate Whoppers

Makes about 15 large cookies

6 ounces semisweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, coarsely chopped
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into tablespoons
1/4 cup sifted all-purpose flour (sift before measuring)
1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
2 eggs
3/4 cup sugar
2 teaspoons instant espresso powder
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
6 ounces chocolate chips
1 cup pecans, toasted and roughly chopped
1 cup walnut halves, broken into large pieces (or use all pecans; I do because I’m not a walnut fan)

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Line 3 large baking sheets with parchment paper.

Place the chopped chocolate and butter in a medium saucepan over low heat and stir until gently until just melted.

Whisk the flour in a small bowl with salt and baking powder. Beat the eggs, sugar, espresso and vanilla in a large bowl using an electric mixer on high speed until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes.

Mix in the chocolate mixture until just blended. Add the flour mixture and beat at low speed until incorporated. Using a wooden spoon, stir in the chocolate chips and nuts.

Use a 1/3-cup measure to form the dough and drop onto baking sheets, spacing about 2 inches apart.

Bake 17 minutes on the upper and middle racks, or until the tops are dry and shiny, shifting the sheets halfway through baking. Slide the parchment with cookies onto wire racks to cool completely.

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Old-Fashioned Sugar Cookies with a Twist

Spoon Cookies filled with Chocolate

A while back, I clipped this cookie recipe from Gourmet magazine, filed it away and forgot about it.
But in a fit of house cleaning, which is ongoing and never ending, I found the recipe in a crumpled pile under some old notebooks and 3rd grade homework. Before sticking the page in the recycling bin, though, I went over to Epicurious and added it to my online recipe box.

(And just to digress for one second, is anyone else as irritated with the "new and improved" Epi as I am? What was wrong with the old one? Now I sit and twiddle my fingers waiting for the pages to load and the annoying little pop-ups to go away.)

As much as I enjoy having some quiet time flipping through my favorite food magazines, they multiply like mold spores and I never seem to catch up. I make a mental note to remember a certain page or recipe, which everyone over the age 35 knows is a bad idea. All those notes end up in a dusty corner of my mommy brain, lost forever.

Since I'm still in the gather-it-up-and-get-rid-of-it stage ever since The Big Flood, I'm liking the idea of flagging favorite recipes and menus on sites like Epi and My Recipes. They pretty much have every recipe that's been published in the last decade available for free, so there's no need for me to stockpile issues in the basement, where I trip over them. I even bought new recipe organizing software that allows me to import recipes and their swell photos. I know! I'm all 21st century now.

Anyway, I'm glad I saved this one since they were so simple and fun to make. This is basically a shortbread dough made with brown butter, which is the secret to their extraordinary flavor. I love the little nut-like bits of browned butter in the baked cookie, too.

These seem to be fairly unusual; in my brief search for similiar cookies, all I found was one in a cookbook by Beatrice Ojakangas, The Great Scandinavian Baking Book. She calls them Finnish Teaspoon Cookies.

I chose to fill these with chocolate because, why not? My second choice would be some good apricot jam.

Cook butter until it turns the color of golden honey

Form cookies with a deep-bowled spoon

Spoon Cookies

2 sticks (1 cup) cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces
3/4 cup sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/8 teaspoon salt, slightly rounded
Chocolate ganache * or fruit preserves

Melt butter in a medium saucepan over moderate heat. Cook 10-12 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the butter turns golden, smells nutty, and flecks on bottom of pan turn deep caramel brown. A thick foam will form and cover the surface just before butter begins to brown - keep close attention and stir more frequently.

Pour the butter into a medium bowl set into a larger bowl of ice to stop cooking. Stir frequently until butter appears emulsified and opaque, about 3 minutes. Stir in sugar and vanilla.

Whisk together flour, baking soda and salt in a small bowl; add to butter and stir until a dough forms. Shape the dough into a ball, wrap in plastic and let stand at room temperature 1 or 2 hours.

Place oven rack in middle position and heat oven to 325 degrees.

Pinch off a piece of dough and press firmly into the bowl of a teaspoon. Slide the dough off the spoon and place flat-side down on an ungreased cookie sheet. Continue forming cookies and arrange on sheet. Bake until very pale golden, 12-15 minutes. Cool cookies on a rack 5 minutes before transfering to a rack to cool completely.

Spread cookies with soft, spreadable chocolate ganache or warmed preserves.

Makes about 2 dozen sandwich cookies.

Chocolate Ganache

8 ounces dark chocolate, chopped
1 cup heavy cream

Place the chocolate in a heatproof bowl. Heat cream just to a simmer, then pour over chocolate. Stir gently until smooth.



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Brown Sugar Brownies with French Sea Salt

Time for a chocolate fix

Every once in a while, my sluggish sweet tooth wakes up and reminds me it’s time for a hit of chocolate. I suspect it has a little bit to do with the dew point, the Dow Jones average, Tony Soprano’s anxiety level and the price of tea in China. When certain things line up a particular way, well, watch out. I’ll be on the prowl for chocolate.

It’s a good thing I have a stash on hand for just those moments. It makes it so easy to wander into the kitchen and mix up a pan of deep, dark, moist chocolate brownies.

I strayed from a basic brownie batter by using some brown sugar and fancy fleur de sel because I wanted to intensify the flavors. But now I’m thinking I should have used some of the salt to sprinkle over the top of the ganache icing, to really point up the flavor. Yes! In fact, that’s what you should do if you happen to make these.

Update:
Fellow blogger Myriam at Once Upon a Tart is hosting Brownie Babe of the Month - check out her round-up of delicious brownies from the blogosphere....

Brown Sugar Brownies with Fancy French Sea Salt
makes about 16 bars

8 tablespoons unsalted butter
12 ounces dark chocolate, chopped
3 eggs, at room temperature
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon fleur de sel or flaked sea salt
1/2 cup heavy cream
1 tablespoon corn syrup


Heat oven to 325 degrees.

Line an 8-inch square baking pan with a sheet of overhanging parchment paper.
Melt the butter in a small pan over medium heat. Stir in 8 ounces of the chocolate over low heat until melted and smooth. Cool 10 minutes.

In a medium bowl, beat eggs with vanilla and the two sugars. Add the chocolate mixture and stir until blended. Fold in the flour and 1/4 teaspoon salt just to incorporate.

Pour batter into prepared pan and bake 35 minutes, or until edges are firm and center is still slightly soft. Remove from oven and cool completely on a wire rack. Remove brownie in one slab and wrap in plastic wrap. Refrigerate until cold, at least an hour.

Place the cream in a heatproof glass measuring cup and microwave on high for 30 – 40 seconds. Pour over the remaining chocolate in a small bowl and let sit 30 seconds. Add the corn syrup and stir until completely melted and smooth.

Set brownie slab on a rack over a large piece of parchment or waxed paper. Pour ganache over the center of the slab and gently spread to the sides. Sprinkle remaining 1/4 teaspoon salt over the top. Let set about 1 hour before slicing into bars - use a knife that has been heated under hot running water, wiping the blade clean after each cut.



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French Lemon Yogurt Cake

Getting ready for baking

I've been hauling Dorie Greenspan's new book, Baking From My Home to Yours around the house (it's heavy) for weeks now. I look at it while I'm drinking my morning tea and I get all geared up to bake something. I take butter and eggs out of the fridge to come to room temperature and I turn on the oven.

And then my day happens. The butter sits there until dinner time, looking all sad and flaccid. That's when I face the fact that there'll be no baking today, again. I heft the book back upstairs for some bedtime reading, and I fall asleep dreaming of French Yogurt Cake.

I think the only reason I got around to making this cake today is that I had a half-cup of Total Greek yogurt left in the container, which is just exactly the required amount for this cake. So I seized the moment!

There are a few very nice things about this cake:

1. You don't need to soften butter.
2. There is no electric mixer needed.
3. You have to massage lemon zest into a bowl of sugar.

If you've never rubbed lemon zest between grains of sugar, you haven't lived. It's smells way better than that aromatherapy pillow I get to wear around my neck while I'm getting a pedicure.



Dorie's recipe calls for a lemon marmalade glaze, but I didn’t have any lemon marmalade, so I took her suggestion and topped it with a mixture of crème fraiche, lemon juice and confectioner's sugar. Somehow that makes it seem really French. She also says this cake is even better the next day. Great! I'll have a thick slice with my tea while I dream about my next baking project.

Lemon-Scented Yogurt Cake
Adapted from Baking: From my home to yours by Dorie Greenspan.
The author describes this simple cake as a cross between pound and sponge cake.

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup finely ground almonds, or substitute another 1/2 cup flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 cup sugar
2 teaspoons fresh lemon zest
1/2 cup plain yogurt
3 eggs
1/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup flavorless oil, such as canola or safflower
1/2 cup crème fraiche
2-3 tablespoons confectioner's sugar
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice


Center an oven rack and preheat to 350 degrees. Butter and flour a standard loaf pan and place on a baking sheet.

In a small bowl, whisk together flour, almonds, baking powder and salt.

Put sugar in a large bowl with the zest and rub with your fingertips until sugar is moist and aromatic. Add the yogurt, eggs and vanilla and whisk until blended. Whisk in the oil. Add the flour mixture and fold with a spatula or wooden spoon.

Scrape the batter into pan and bake 50 - 55 minutes, or until cake is golden brown and beginning to pull away from the sides of the pan. Transfer pan to a rack and cool 5 minutes. Run a blunt knife around edges before unmolding onto a rack to cool, right side up.

Combine crème fraiche, sugar and lemon juice and spoon over cake.

Copyright (c) 2007 FamilyStyle Food

Sweet Hearts

Sugar Cookie Jam Hearts

A long time ago and very far away, I fell in love with food. I spent my free time at the public library or bookstore, studying cookbooks on every topic, and wouldn’t hesitate at the idea of spending my entire weekend shopping for ingredients and cooking. I’d happily lose myself in the process of preparing a duck confit, cultivating a sourdough starter, or building the layers of a fancy cake.

That was before, and this is now. Now my life is mostly about parenting, so by necessity it’s all about multitasking. Right now, as I write this, my daughter is breathing over my shoulder, the phone is ringing, and my son is requiring some chocolate milk.

I have to steal time to read cookbooks, and sometimes manage to carry out my plans to cook something that requires hours of advance prep. But mostly, because I’m not the girl I used to be, I’ve also had to reconcile myself to using some store-bought products that help make my desire to cook something a reality rather than pure fantasy. I just make sure the ingredient list is short and easy to pronounce - after all I am not Sandra Lee, people.

So yesterday - GASP - I pulled out a package of store-bought cookie mix so that during one free hour of our day, we made some Valentine treats for the kids’ teachers. We made jam heart sandwich cookies with Betty Crocker cookie mix and some raspberry jam that I heated and strained. Sweet and easy.

Copyright (c) 2007 FamilyStyle Food

Show Me the Muffins

Italian Orange-Almond Crunch Oat Muffins

I’m starting off the week with some shameless self-promotion. Check out Quaker Oats and my muffin recipe, which recently netted me 2K! I made them today and added an embellishment of orange marmalade glaze.
These are very popular with my kids, too.

Italian Orange-Almond Crunch Oat Muffins
Makes 12 muffins

1 cup oats, quick or old-fashioned
1/2 cup low-fat buttermilk
1/2 cup orange juice
2 teaspoons grated fresh orange zest
1 1/2 cups packaged baking mix (I use Bisquick “Heart Smart”)
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup crushed amaretti cookies (about 6 small cookies)
3 tablespoons melted butter
1 egg, lightly beaten
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1/3 cup orange marmalade
1 tablespoon amaretto liqueur

Heat your oven to 375 degrees. Line 12 muffin cups with paper liners or spray the pan lightly with non-stick cooking spray.

In a large bowl, stir together the oats, buttermilk, orange juice and zest. Let stand 10 minutes.
Combine the baking mix, sugar and cookies in a medium bowl.
Add butter, egg and extract to oats and mix well. Add the dry ingredients, mix just until moistened.

Fill the muffins cups about 3/4 full. Bake 20 minutes, or until tops are light golden brown. Cool in pan on a rack for 10 minutes. Remove from pan and place muffins on the rack over a sheet of wax paper.

Melt the marmalade and liqueur in a small saucepan. Drizzle over the muffins. Serve warm.

Passing the Meme



Lydia of The Perfect Pantry tagged me for this meme: Five Things Most People Don’t Know About Me, so here goes:

1. I’m devoted to entering cooking contests. It started out as an innocent way to indulge my creative side in the kitchen, and became kind of addicting.

2. I can put my leg behind my head in this bizarre-looking yoga posture.

3. Lilacs are my favorite flowers.

4. I always arrive five minutes late for everything.

5. I cannot tolerate cooked green bell peppers. Blech!

And now I’m passing this along to:
Anna of Cookie Madness
Nupur of One Hot Stove
Kristen of Dine and Dish
Bruno of Zinfully Delicious
Janelle of Talk of Tomatoes

Copyright (c) 2007 FamilyStyle Food

Chocolate Chai Snickerdoodles

Spice is Nice

Today I needed to make a batch of these cookies, because I saw them in the recipe magazine my grocery store publishes with the disclaimer that their testing panel couldn't stop eating them. That's all I need to hear; plus the recipe is simple AND they boast the wonderful name "snickerdoodle".

When I told my son what they were called as I held one out, he looked at me as if I'd just offered to give him an atomic wedgie. They're actually a very old-fashioned type of cookie that expert Nancy Baggett describes in her comprehensive book, All American Cookie, as "remarkable" for their good keeping quality and especially their texture: crisp on the outside and more chewy toward the middle as you work your way in.

Aside from their plain-prettiness, I found them a little too sweet, I mean my teeth actually hurt when I ate a few. But don't let that detail stop you from making these. I'm known for my sugar-sensitive pearlies!

Chocolate Chai Snickerdoodles
adapted from Dierberg's Everybody Cook's magazine

2 1/4 cups sugar
1 teaspoon each: ground cinnamon, ginger and cardamom
1/2 teaspoon each: ground allspice and white pepper
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 cup softened unsalted butter
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 1/4 cups flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder



Stir together the sugar with all the spices in a small bowl; remove 1/2 cup to a pie plate on the side for dredging the cookies. Add cocoa to small bowl with sugar/spice mixture and stir to blend.

Beat butter in an electric mixer bowl until fluffy. Add the spiced cocoa mixture and beat until creamy. Add eggs and vanilla, then add flour and baking powder at low speed until combined.

Form 1-tablespoonful sized balls. Roll them in the reserved sugar mixture and arrange 2 inches apart on parchment lined baking sheets. Bake at 350 degrees 12-15 minutes. Cool in the pan for a few minutes before transfering to a rack to cool.

Makes about 3 1/2 dozen.

Copyright (c) 2006 FamilyStyle

Raspberry Delights

Raspberry Martini


Best of the Berries

I had a very Martha moment this past weekend, when I woke up at the crack of dawn and drove to a pick-your-own raspberry patch. It's kind of a family rite in our house - berry season starts and we feel the need to seek out the ephemeral glory of locally grown, ripe strawberries, raspberries or blueberries.

I have a vivid image of of our daugher A, almost a year old, crawling around in the raspberry patch on her first picking expedition and cramming her mouth full of them. Before we left the farm that day, we insisted that we pay for the extra pound of berries that she most definitely had packed into her distended belly.

For the past couple of years, however, we've let the need to sleep in on weekend mornings overtake our desire for our favorite fruits of summer.

It must be that I'm feeling well-rested these days. I checked the weather forecast and saw that Saturday morning would offer a stellar berry-picking climate - temperatures in the 60's and low humidity. That's important not only for the comfort and happiness of the picker, but raspberries are on the fragile side, and will begin their decline into soft, moldy piles soon after picking, especially if it's hotter than a roofer's armpits outside. Of course, you can always just get home and stick a Ziploc bag-full of berries in the freezer for mid-winter muffins, but I wanted to use these red, red lovelies in their fresh-picked state.

Plus, my sister-in-law was on her way from Maine to visit us for her birthday, and I had a special cake in mind. I made it about 3 years ago for A's 5th birthday, and she's been asking for it every year since then. It is quite a beauty, Raspberry Lemon Mousse Trifle Cake from the August/September 2002 issue of Fine Cooking. The recipe is rather lengthy, but it's totally worth it for making birthday memories.

Layers of sponge cake, lemon curd-mascarpone mousse, raspberry syrup and a good dose of fresh raspberries. Yum.


This is how the cake turned out...well worth the groggy morning and prickly raspberry bush scratches. I made extra raspberry syrup so that I could shake up a few batches of martinis. What better way to celebrate a beautiful summer birthday?

Raspberry Martinis
for one drink:
2 ounces gin
1 ounce fresh lime juice
1 1/2 ounces raspberry syrup (see recipe below)
1 plump raspberry

Pour the gin, lime juice and syrup in a cocktail shaker filled with ice and shake briskly.
Strain into a cocktail glass, and plop in the raspberry. Sit down on your favorite lawn chair and sigh before taking a sip.

Raspberry Simple Syrup:
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup water
1 cup fresh raspberries

Bring the sugar and water to a boil in a small saucepan, whisking to dissolve sugar. Set aside until cool.
Puree the raspberries in a food processor or pass them through the fine disk of a food mill. Strain into the saucepan of syrup.
Makes about 1 cup.

Rosemary Snack Bread

Rosemary Snack Bread

I've been craving this bread after seeing its tempting photo in Desserts and Sweet Snacks, Rustic Italian Style by Viana La Place. It's called Sweet Olive Oil Quick Bread in the book, and it really is simple to put together - I mean all of 5 minutes, in 2 bowls. My son was my very willing mixer.





I varied the original recipe somewhat by omitting raisins ( I have a thing about raisins embedded in my baked goods, but more on that later), and added some chopped rosemary from my garden. I also replaced milk with an Australian Muscat wine that I had languishing in the fridge, which adds a slightly sweet tang that reminds me of the Italian wine biscuits I used to eat when I was little. This really is a perfect snack because it's not too sweet. Wrap it up and it will keep for a few days on your counter - maybe. Mine is already vanishing...

2 eggs, lightly beaten
3/4 cup sweet wine, such as muscat
1/2 cup olive oil
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup chopped pecans
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1 tablespoon chopped fresh rosemary
1 teaspoon grated fresh orange rind

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray a standard size (9 x 5 x 3-inch) loaf pan with nonstick spray.
Whisk together the eggs, wine and olive oil in a medium bowl.
In a large bowl, combine all remaining ingredients; add egg mixture and stir with a wooden spoon until flour is incorporated. Scrape into pan and bake 50 minutes, or until the top is rich golden brown.
Cool in the pan for 15 minutes before turning out onto a cooling rack. Slice into thick slices while warm or let cool completely. (We have a hard time waiting in our house).
Makes 1 loaf.