7 cake: this is halloween
03 Nov 2011 Leave a Comment
in cupcakes, sweets Tags: baking, cake decorating, halloween, icing, royal icing, sprinkles
the chocolate chips in the yellow cake sunk to the bottom of each cup, but what really matters on Halloween night is the decorating options.
most importantly, icing quickly made – because there’s make-up to be done – and divisible into colors enough to satisfy. purple seemed appropriate for the thinning of the veil feast (see also, mushrooms). Then green for a witch’s striped socks sensibility. black sprinkles and green and orange teeny balls of sugar.
thus – although i usually go in for meringue-ish toppings for cupcakes and royal icing flourishes like candied white sugar plaster – straight up confectioners’ sugar and liquid alone were ideal for treats for the costumed hordes. Sift three cups of powdered sugar into a giant glass bowl. By hand or electric hand mixer, whip in a shot of lemon juice, a shot of vanilla extract and about a quarter cup of whole milk. Adjust with sugar or milk to thicken or thin; thicker to pipe and thinner to spread. We had a pastry bag of thick purple icing for piping details and a big bowl of thinned out dragon green for coating the tops of the cakes by dipping them in headfirst.
now, the writing of the cakes is officially out of order of the making of the cakes: a pumpkin bundt and chocolate birthday cake preceded these twisted fairy cakes. anticipate…
kale pasticcio
11 Nov 2010 1 Comment
in bread, casseroles, cheese, cupcakes, eggs, greens, onion, recipes, vegetables, vegetarian Tags: autumn, bread pudding, Brooklyn, CSA, dinner parties, gummy bears, kale, sprinkles
fantastical cupcakes
the radical muffin kitchen hosted dinner to celebrate our new winter farmshare wherein we decorated these schnazzy cupcakes. Seems the artists were either too enamored with the art or too stuffed from supper to eat them. So although the buttermilk cake is worth a post someday, the recipe everyone has been clamoring for is the make-do casserole served up alongside the root veggie soup.
let’s call it brioche kale pasticcio, shall we? In Italian, literally, “a mess.” Yet in la buona cucina, it is something divine. In the classic Italian kitchen, veggies and béchamel would snuggle amongst themselves or with some macaroni. This version holds custard not classic white sauce and is dense with rich bread, so emerges a golden savory bread pudding bedecked with greens.
slice and caramelize one medium mild onion in a heavy skillet with butter. Rinse and rip a generous bunch of kale into bite sized pieces and set aside.
butter a large casserole dish, and set your oven to 375°.
slice and cube a heap of day old brioche. We happened to have an acquired loaf lying around; brioche ain’t cheap. Although it is incomparable for soaking and cooking, as in for French toast or this, any dry bread will do. Play with whole grains, baguettes, etc. to create varying textures of wholesomeness. Toss bread cubes in a big bowl.
melt ¾ stick of butter in a small saucepan over low flame. Add a dash of salt, pepper and paprika, and slowly pour in about a cup and a half of whole milk. Bring just to a simmer then turn off the heat. In a bowl aside, whisk together three eggs. Pour the milk/butter in a thin stream into the eggs, merrily whisking all the while.
crumble about a cup of fresh white cheese. We had some marvelous German-styled something from our CSA. Farmer’s cheese, ricotta or feta would also work well. Shred as much hard salty cheese, like parmesan (as was used) or gruyére.
dump most of the custard and half the cheese into the bread crumbs and turn turn turn until all combined. Add in the onions and kale; mix well. Turn out into the casserole, shake the pan to settle it all together and maybe give a gentle pat. Drizzle with remaining custard (dot with butter if it looks too dry), and cover with the remaining cheese.
bake until the custard is cooked through and the cheese is all melty and browning in spots. About half an hour. We used a pretty deep casserole here so the high temperature did not overcook the delicate custard. Similar recipes often call for baking in a water bath, which hasn’t proven necessary. Of course, if you are a crunchy top junkie then use a broad shallow pan and cook for less time. Keep on eye on it any which way.
sweet transcupcakes from transsexual transylvania
it will be difficult to keep waiting diners at bay, but do let this set ten minutes or so before serving. More mouthwatering than cupcakes, apparently. Certainly, there was none left to photograph.
ridiculous pumpkin mini muffins
03 Nov 2010 Leave a Comment
in bread, chocolate, cupcakes, muffins, pumpkin, vegetarian Tags: accupuncture, autumn, baking, chocolate chips, neighbors
pumpkin chocolate chip muffin with eggnog maple glaze
i don’t usually go in for the sugary-sweet, myriad flavored or, as Nigella would say, twee. The pumpkin quick bread batter, however, made far more than anticipated so the overflow went into a mini-muffin tin. Thank providence there has arrived a second mini-muffin tin to the radical muffin kitchen, because, have mercy, there was still more of that batter. More-mini muffins, even itty-bittier than the first.
frankly, i over-baked the teeny things, so to make amends I glazed them with what happened to be handy: maple cream and eggnog.
evoking a text from angela of acupuncture (my downstairs neighbor upon whom I foist so many baked goods her three year old thoroughly associates me with cookies): that was amazing…would love the recipe for those pumpkin maple muffins. Ridiculous!!
So here is the recipe:
cream together a softened stick of butter with a cup of sugar; to achieve ridiculousness, try turbinado sugar that’s been stored with a split vanilla bean. Blend in roasted pumpkin, about two cups. I busted out the electric hand mixer for this because my pumpkin was stringy like spaghetti squash and needed to be really whipped into the creamed fat and sugar.
care bear gummy in a star cookie
our sweet pumpkins arrived to squat on the steps under the looming giant glittered fake flowers, wired to the stair rails and strung with cobwebs, leading up to our apartment door for Halloween. They only offered up their autumnal aesthetics for a few days, because I promised the shop-keep I would cook these particular pie-pumpkins, as he chastised me these were “not for carving.”
to roast a small pumpkin, slice it in half and scrape out the seeds and fibrous pulp with a spoon. Leaving a few seeds to cook with the pumpkin to join it later in the bread keeps it real. Sit the halves, hollows up, on a parchment paper lined baking tray, and pour in a few slugs of good olive oil, turning the squash to coat the orange flesh. Add sea salt and a grinding of pepper. We also added saffron threads. Roast in a hot oven, 375°, for half an hour (more or less, depending on size and stove) until a fork easily pierces through its flesh. Flip the halves over about three quarters of the way through cooking. When thoroughly roasted, let them cool then scrape the flesh right out of the shell into, well, whatever you’re going to use it for. We had three pumpkins, and only one went into this bread and muffin extravaganza.
returning to the batter: scrape half a vanilla bean into the pumpkin etc. Beat in three eggs. Stir in three cups of flour total, adding about ½ cup of sweetened condensed milk in with the last cup, graham flour following two cups of all purpose. A dash of salt; ½ a teaspoon each baking powder and soda.
pour to fill a lined and buttered loaf pan a generous halfway. Add a cup of small chocolate chips, these were from Caluccio’s Italian grocery, to the remaining batter. Then fill (so it turns out) two mini-muffin tins. I lined them with papers but ended up peeling the papers off before glazing so might as well grease the pan and do without the papers to begin with.
fit it all strategically into a 350° oven and bake, pulling the muffins out at about 9-12 minutes then the loaf half an hour after that. Free from their respective pans to a rack to cool before glazing.
the glaze: cream two cups powdered sugar with one tablespoon of butter and two of maple cream. Admittedly, maple cream is an odd thing to have on hand outside of Vermont; all butter will do. Work in about ½ a cup of maple syrup and enough eggnog to make a glaze the consistency of good melted chocolate. Dip those wee muffins head first, let them dry, and dunk again. Let drip dry right side up on a rack.
the loaf doesn’t really want a glaze, being dense and damp as it is, but mini-muffins dry out quicker and appreciate a sugar shellac. Give them away lest you eat them all and go into sugar shock.
