Baguette's Bake Shoppe

Fanci-fill Berry Cake

2010-12-07T11:03:00.000-05:00

Put on your yalmulke, it's time for Hannukah! No, we're not making sufganiyot (jelly donuts). My sister got me a Wilton Fanci-fill cake pan as part of my present, so we tried it out over the weekend, using a golden yellow cake mix and a strawberry filling recipe off the Wilton website. I used a Pillsbury Golden Butter Recipe Cake Mix because I wanted to make sure this cake pan actually worked before trying any custom recipes out. It came out delicious and it was pretty easy too.

For the filling:

Start with 1 pkg (16 ounces) of frozen fruit packed in sugar. The Wilton recipe called for sliced strawberries, but I used a mix of blueberries, raspberries and strawberries. I also misread the packaging and didn't see the 'packed in sugar,' so I added 1/3 cup of sugar to the frozen berries so that they could macerate while they thawed. Luckily the recipe called for the same amount later on, so I just didn't add any then. It still turned out well.

After the berries completely thaw, there should be a good amount of liquid in the bowl. Drain this into a measuring cup and add enough water to equal 1 1/4 cups.

In a saucepan, combine the liquid, sugar (if you didn't add it before), 3 tablespoons of cornstarch (I thought this sounded like a lot, but it didn't come out too gelatinous), and lemon juice (I used the juice of half a lime). Mix well and then heat and continuously stir until it boils and thickens.

Cool completely and then stir in the berries. I sort of mashed the whole strawberries with my spatula so that no one got a mouthful of strawberry. Refrigerate until ready to use.

Prepare the cake mix according to the package directions. Well, maybe. I replaced the butter in the directions with low-fat sour cream and it came out moist and delicious.

Spray the cake pans with cooking spray. I used Pam Baking spray. It worked very nicely.

Distribute the cake mix evenly between the 2 cake pans and bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean. Mine baked for 23 minutes.

Let cool in the cake pans for 10 minutes and then remove from the pans and cool completely on wire racks.

After cakes are cooled, pour the filling into the recessed area. Then, very carefully (good luck!) and very quickly invert one of the halves of the cake onto the other. My cake was very moist and kind of stuck to my hand a bit. But, it still worked. If anyone has any suggestions on how to do this, please, feel free to explain.

I made fresh whipped cream and topped the cake with that. Delicious!

Hidden surprise cupcakes

2010-11-17T14:53:00.000-05:00

This post is a little late. I was trying to think of things to do with leftover Halloween candy. I had a bag of mini Twix bars that I wanted to use up. I decided to try to hide the candy inside of a cupcake. While delicious, they didn't turn out exactly as I had hoped.

The best thing about these cupcakes was that I learned how to make caramel.

Twix-filled Vanilla Cupcakes
with Salted Caramel Buttercream Frosting
(Doesn't that sound healthy?)

First, place the mini-twix bars in the freezer.

Then, start out by making the Salted Caramel Frosting so it can cool in the fridge while we're making the cupcakes. This is the part where you learn how to make delicious caramel.

Mix 1/4 cup sugar and 2 tablespoons water in a small saucepan and bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Boil without stirring, until mixture turns yellow in color. The original recipe says dark amber, but I ended up having to make 2 batches because I burnt the first one. The sugar goes very quickly from yellow to dark amber and if you are too slow pouring the cream in, it tastes burnt. I'll show you what I mean.

Batch #1

I think my problem was also that my saucepan wasn't over the heat evenly, so as you can see the sugar started to burn in that one corner way earlier than the rest of it. I quickly poured the cream in, but it was too late. You can see how dark the first batch of caramel turned out here.

Looks like chocolate, tastes like... burnt sugar. Blech.

Try #2.

Took it off heat at this point and added the cream...

Yum... creamy caramel. Keep stirring until completely smooth. You'll get little lumps of sugar stuck to the bottom like this:

Set aside to cool for about 25 minutes while you make the rest of the buttercream.

Combine the softened butter and salt and beat on medium-high speed until light in
color and fluffy for about 3 minutes.

Reduce speed to low (or you'll end up with a powdery mess), add powderedsugar, and mix until completely incorporated. Scrape down the sides of the bowl.

Once cooled, add your caramel and beat frosting on medium-high speed
until airy and thoroughly mixed, about 2 minutes. You can use immediately after this. The original recipe calls for refrigeration after this, but I found it extremely too hard to spread or pipe onto the cupcakes.

Onto the cupcakes.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and fill a cupcake pan with paper liners. I only made a batch of 12 cupcakes. Use a mixer to combine the butter, brown sugar and eggs, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed.

Then add the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt to the bowl, alternating with the milk. Don't overmix, just get the ingredients to be just incorporated. Then mix in the vanilla.

Fill the prepared cupcake pan 2/3 full with the cupcake batter.

Take the frozen mini Twix bars and place one on each mound of batter.
The batter will bake up over the bars.

Bake at 350 for 16-18 mins. I actually had to bake mine a little longer. Take them out of the oven when the edges are a golden brown. I took mine out too early and after a few minutes the centers collaped into gaping holes. I put them back into the oven for a few more minutes and they came out fine.

Right out of the oven, but too early. Notice no browning at edges.

Much more golden brown on the edges. Notice the remnants from the sunken areas. They pretty much filled back in after re-baking. No worries, that gets covered with the frosting.

Time to frost. I tried to use the frosting straight out of the fridge, like the recipe says, but it was waaaaay too thick and hard to pipe out, or even spread with a knife. I let it thaw a bit and it made it much easier. You don't need much frosting though, it is very sweet.

Added some sprinkles for fun.

Time to dig in!

The result is a super moist cake with a salty, sweet topping and a crunchy surprise inside! I was sad though because the bar melted so much despite the freezing. I think it has something to do with the caramel. Some didn't melt all the way through to the bottom. The cookie from the Twix bar was a nice crunchy addition to the very moist cupcake. You can try this with any mini-candy bar.

What would your surprise be?

Salted Caramel Frosting Recipe

Ingredients:

1/4 cup granulated sugar

2 tablespoons water

1/4 cup heavy cream

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

6 tablespoons unsalted butter (3/4 stick), at room temperature

1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

1 cup powdered sugar

1. Mix 1/4 cup sugar and 2 tablespoons water in a small saucepan and bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Boil without stirring, until mixture turns yellow in color.

2. Remove from heat and slowly add in cream and vanilla, stirring

with a wooden spoon until completely smooth. Set aside until cool to

the touch, about 25 minutes.

3. Combine butter and salt in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with

the paddle attachment and beat on medium-high speed until light in

color and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Reduce speed to low, add powdered

sugar, and mix until completely incorporated.

4. Turn mixer off and scrape down the sides of the bowl, then add

caramel. Beat frosting on medium-high speed until airy and thoroughly

mixed, about 2 minutes.

For the cupcakes (makes 12):

1 1/2 sticks softened butter

3/4 cups light brown sugar, packed

2 large eggs

1 1/3 cups all purpose flour

1/2 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1/8 tsp. salt

1/2 cup milk

1 tsp. vanilla extract

1. Preheat the oven to 350° F. Place mini-Twix (or other candy bars) into freezer.

2. Line cupcake pans with paper cups.

3. Combine the butter and brown sugar. Beat together on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Mix in the eggs and scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed.

4. Combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a medium bowl. Stir together to blend. 5. Add the dry ingredients to the bowl on low speed, alternating with the milk, beginning and ending

with the dry ingredients, mixing each addition just until incorporated. Mix in the vanilla.

6. Fill each cupcake liner 2/3 full with the batter. Place a frozen candy bar on the top center

of each cupcake.

7. Bake at 350 for 16-20 mins. Let cool completely before frosting.

Sandra Lee's Red Velvet Bars

2010-11-15T19:11:00.001-05:00

The good thing about living in Hoboken is that there's lots of opportunities to meet new people in town. My husband and I tried out a couples meetup group for a pot-luck game night last month and it was loads of fun. One of the girls brought Sandra Lee's Red Velvet Bars for dessert and they were to die for. I was discussing my new blog with my friend who told me that he was going to have a bake-off at work the next day and that he wanted to throw a curveball and use a boxed cake mix. I immediately thought of these delicious bars and recommended that he make them. A few days later he told me that he was disappointed at the results... that they were really dry and the topping was thin. I thought, how could that be?? So, I set out to try the recipe for myself... and here are my results.

Why aren't they red? Well, because this was my fourth batch of the bars and I decided not to waste any more red food coloring if they turned out badly. Read on to discover why it took me FOUR batches to figure out the correct way to make these bars....

Red Velvet Bars: Takes 1-4

My first try, I followed the directions to a T... sort of.

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Check.

2. Spray 9 by13-inch baking pan lightly with cooking spray; set aside.
Well, I lined the dishes with parchment paper.

3. In a large mixing bowl, beat with an electric mixer on low speed,
cake mix, butter, egg, and food coloring until combined.
Okay, here's where I found that I needed to change something. The recipe calls for softened butter. My first batch I found it very hard for the mixer to incorporate the butter into the cake mix. It was SO dry. So for all future batches, I melted the butter completely and mixing was much easier. I have a KitchenAid Mixer and I set it to the lowest 'stir' setting and mixed the ingredients until JUST mixed.

Also, the store only had gel food coloring so I just squeezed some into 1 oz. hot water. For the 3rd and 4th batches, I just used 1 oz. of water and no coloring.

4. Press cake mixture into prepared pan; set aside.

The first dry batch was so tough to press into the pan.

The rest of the batches were much easier with the melted butter. The one on the left has an additional 1/4 cup of cream in the batter. The one on the right is the original recipe, only with melted butter.

5. In a medium mixing bowl, beat cream cheese and sugar on medium speed until creamy.

Add eggs and vanilla, beat to combine. Spread cream cheese mixture over cake layer.

Here's what I'm talking about. You MUST cream the cheese and sugar together before adding the eggs. On the left, you can see all the lumps from the cheese that would not incorporate when taking a shortcut and trying to mix all the ingredients at one time. On the right, the topping is much smoother and creamier. Not only is it more attractive, but for the finished result, the topping will actually stay adhered to the cake. (Side note: I used neufchatel cheese or 1/3 less fat cream cheese and it worked just fine.)

6. Bake in preheated oven for 40 to 45 minutes, or until bars barely start to pull away from sides.
Cool completely before cutting.

Batch 1: 45 mins. They came out dry. I'm not sure if it's because it was baked too long, or if it was because the mix was overbeaten.

Batch 2: Baked for 33 mins. Reviews on the Food Network website said to bake for 25 mins, but I thought that the cheesecake topping wouldn't set up. This batch turned out much more dense. The topping was also less like cheesecake and more like cream cheese frosting. When I brought batches 1 and 2 into work for a taste test, everyone overwhelming chose batch 2. Personally, I thought that the topping was a little too gooey.

Batch 3: Baked for 40 minutes. This is the batch with the cream in the cake batter. The cake rose up much more than the others and was more moist, but not what I was looking for. Too fluffy.

See how much more the edges puffed up?

Batch 4: Baked 40 mins. Made with melted butter, and creamed the cheese and sugar together before adding the eggs. I also let it cool completely before cutting into it.

It looks really yellow, but it's not like that in real life. Bad lighting. Oops.

Verdict and lessons:

1. Use MELTED butter, not softened to avoid overbeating the cake mix.

2. DO NOT OVER MIX the cake layer, or it will be tough and dry.

2. Cream the cream cheese and sugar before adding eggs, or you well end up with a lumpy mess and a topping that will not stay attached to the cake layer.

3. DO NOT CUT INTO THE CAKE WHILE WARM. This is a hard one. It will be very tempting and you'll want to taste, but I promise that the results the next day or when cool will be much better.

4. Overall, I would say that these bars are much better the next day, after being refrigerated and thawed. They would probably freeze well.

5. Serve at room temperature.

6. I asked the person that originally baked these bars for the meetup and she said that she actually reduced the temperature by 25 degrees because she was using a non-stick pan and baked it the full 40 mins. I decided not to make a 5th batch to try this out, but next time I make them I certainly will!

The easiest pumpkin bread ever!

2010-11-05T12:42:00.001-04:00

I'm going to Florida for four days and my husband, who is now spoiled by the treats from my blog trials, was upset that I was leaving the cake dome filled with only one cupcake (the recipe will come when I get back from my trip). So, I realized that I had some pureed pumpkin left over from my Biggest Loser cupcake debacle and decided to make some pumpkin bread. Quick, easy and delicious!

This bread is super moist, but read the notes at the bottom of the recipe for some possible modifications.

Quick and Easy Pumpkin Bread

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups flour
1 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground ginger
1/8 tsp ground allspice
1/8 tsp ground nutmeg (see note 1)
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1 cup pumpkin puree
1/4 cup vegetable oil and/or 1/4 cup fat-free greek yogurt (see note 2)
1 egg

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan,
or line with parchment paper for easier removal!
Mix together dry ingredients in bowl. Add pumpkin, oil/yogurt and eggs; mix until fully incorporated (you can do this by hand, no need for a mixer).
Bake for 1 hour or until inserted toothpick comes out clean.

Voila!

Notes:

1. This recipe is very conservative on the pumpkin pie spice. You might want to double the cinnamon, ginger, allspice, and nutmeg if you like a lot of that spice profile. Also, you can substitute 1-2 tsp pumpkin pie spice if you have that instead.

2. This bread is VERY moist!!!! I used both oil and greek yogurt, but I'm thinking that next time I might just try to omit the oil. I think the pumpkin and yogurt do quite a sufficient job.

3. You could also sprinkle the top with a cinnamon sugar mixture before baking.

4. Of course, feel free to play with any mix-ins such as chocolate chips or nuts!

What would you mix in?

Biggest Loser Cupcakes by Curtis Stone

2010-11-03T00:31:00.000-04:00

After making those incredible rich and delicious Chocolate Peanut Butter Pretzel Bars, I thought maybe I'd switch it up and try something that was lighter and no so bad for you. I was catching up on the Biggest Loser Season 10 on the new free primetime On Demand that Cablevision is offering and on episode 4, they had a temptation challenge featuring cupcakes! Turns out that some of them were only 100 calorie cupcakes created by Curtis Stone and they actually looked pretty good from what I could tell. The recipe can be found on the NBC website.

This wasn't my most successful baking venture... scroll down to see the step-by-step and verdict on these diet cupcakes!

Curtis Stone's 100 Calorie Vanilla Cupcakes

Preheat the oven to 325F. Place 5 egg whites in a bowl and whip the whites using a mixer on medium speed for 3 to 4 minutes or until the whites begin to lighten up and hold their shape.

Increase speed to high and whip in the salt and honey until the whites hold a soft peak,
then add the vanilla extract.

Fold in the yogurt. The recipe called for 1/4 cup of greek yogurt. I had on hand Oikos 4oz. greek yogurt with honey, so I used one container of that and just added a little less honey than required.

In a separate medium mixing bowl combine the flour and baking powder and mix well. Sprinkle the dry ingredients into the egg whites a little at a time, gently folding them in with a rubber spatula. Now, I've read a bunch of other reviews of this recipe online and a lot of people said that their cupcakes turned into hockey pucks. It's very important during this step that you are very gentle and delicate while folding the flour into the egg whites. You want to keep as much of that air that you just whipped into them as possible.

Once fully incorporated, scoop the batter into cupcake tins lined with cupcake papers. The recipe called for 14 cupcakes, but I didn't feel like waiting around for 2 extra cupcakes to cook since most muffin tins only hold 12. It seemed to work just fine this way.

Bake the cupcakes for 15 to 20 minutes or until they have colored and
gently spring back when pushed with a finger. Remove from the oven and cool the cupcakes at room temp.

They look good right now, don't they? Well...

This is what they look like after a few minutes of cooling. They shrank down a bit. Essentially you're making an angel food cupcake and when you make an angel food cake, you're supposed to let it set upside-down to keep it from falling. Too bad you can't do that here.

His version called for a "frosting" made out of only non-fat cream cheese and raspberries. I wanted to do something more seasonal and tried to make a pumpkin cream cheese frosting.... That didn't work so well. I used 1/2 cup canned pumpkin puree, 8 oz. non-fat cream cheese, some Splenda, cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg. There were 2 problems. The spices had a really muddled flavor and added a weird texture. Also, I think I added too much pumpkin puree and the moisture from that made the topping too watery to frost with. Back to the drawing board...

I spent some time searching for another light/diet frosting option and stumbled upon the
Flat Belly Diet Maple Frosting. Maple syrup is fall-ish, right?

Start out by boiling some water in the bottom of a double-boiler, or if you're like me and don't own one, a regular pot that you can finagle into one with a glass bowl.

Combine the syrup (I used Maple Grove Farms pure maple syrup), egg whites, and cream of
tartar in the top of a double boiler. Beat with an electric mixer until well blended.

Place over rapidly boiling water. Beat for 7 minutes or until stiff peaks form. Your arm WILL be tired.

Remove the top of the double boiler from the water and continue beating for 5 minutes or
until thickened and fluffy.

Load the 'frosting' into a piping bag (or a large zip-top bag). I find that it's easiest if I place the baggie into something shaped like a pitcher, so that I don't have to hold the bag open while trying to get the filling in there.

Remember how much the cupcakes shrank after a few minutes of cooling? Well, here's after a day of rest:

Man, those suckers shrink! Good thing we're covering them with frosting!

Cut the corner of the zip-top baggie off (or use a normal piping bag) and frost away! I need some practice as you can see, but I'm going to blame it on the texture of the frosting.

I tried to make them more festive by topping them off with candy corn.

Time to taste:

Verdict: If you're on a diet and want a cupcake, I don't think that these will really satisfy your craving. I say, grab a friend and share a real dessert that actually tastes good. The cupcake part wasn't horrible, but it was bland and rather small. The maple frosting was basically all air and it had more of a coffee flavor to me, but I'm guessing that's just from the type of syrup that I used. Needless to say, I wouldn't recommend this recipe to anyone. In fact, even though I hate to waste food....

Oh well, better luck next time!

Chocolate Peanut Butter Pretzel Bars

2010-10-27T10:11:00.001-04:00

This week, Wednesday night is girl's night with Nicole and Jen. We're going to Nicole's place to make dinner and watch Hellcats or some other ridiculously girly show (that I love). Since Nicole put in a request for something with peanut butter, I thought I would contribute some dessert to our get together.

Chocolate Peanut Butter Pretzel Bars

If you love Reese's peanut butter trees, eggs, etc. (the big ones they have during the holidays) and the salty sweet contrast of chocolate covered pretzels, you'll die eating these. The full recipe and verdict is at the bottom of this post, but read on to see the step-by-step process. Just try not to think about the butter that's in here... that's why it makes more than 16 servings of this rich deliciousness.

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. I decided to use pretzel waffles instead of sticks, because I thought they would be prettier at the end for garnishing. Take 2 cups of pretzel waffles into food processor and do 15-20 long pulses until they are coarsely chopped. There will be fine pretzel in there as well. Just make sure there are a good amount of coarse pieces.

The original recipe called for regular salt, but I figured why not just use the salt from the bag?

Add the brown sugar, pretzel salt, and evenly distribute the butter in the processor. Process with long pulses until the butter has been incorporated and mixture begins to form lumps. Don't just leave the food processor on because the butter chunks won't go down to the bottom near the blade. I had to pulse to get them to fall to the bottom.

Pour mixture into a glass or ceramic 8" x 8 " baking pan. Using something spatula-like (I used a gelato scoop... the kind that they use at Cold Stone Creamery to make your custom crush-ins... I've seen people make crusts with the bottom of measuring cups too), press the mixture firmly into the pan, forming a level, compact layer. Bake crust at 350 for about 20 minutes or until you can smell the sugary aroma. Remove and place on a cooling rack for 30 minutes.

Take 1 cup pretzel waffles and place into food processor on high for 1-2 minutes, or until you no longer hear any grinding, indicating you have a nice, fine crumb.

Combine fine pretzel crumbs, confectioners sugar (No, Archel, that white, powdery substance is not crack, even though you think I put it in my cookies), melted butter and peanut butter in a mixing bowl. Mix all ingredients together until fully incorporated. Set aside.

Once the pretzel crust has cooled, make the chocolate topping.
Put 8 oz. chocolate chips into a mixing bowl.

Pour 1/2 cup heavy cream into a small saucepan over medium-high heat, watching it closely and stirring occasionally. Once bubbles begin to form at the edge, you are at the scald and
should take it off heat. This will be very quick.

Pour cream over chocolate chips. Whisk until all chocolate has been melted
and mixture is shiny and smooth. What you are actually making here is a chocolate ganache. In the future, if you want to make a chocolate dipping sauce, just add more cream to keep it liquidy... or take some away to make it more pliable. Also, I've made ganache with light cream or half and half... just no skim milk! You need some fat to help incorporate the chocolate.

Spread the peanut butter mixture evenly over the crust, first very gently with your fingers to avoid breaking the crust. Then press a little more firmly with a spatula (or gelato scoop!) to make it smooth and even.

Pour the ganache over the peanut butter.
Use a spatula to spread so that all areas are evenly covered with chocolate.

Evenly place pretzel waffles and gently press them into the chocolate layer at a 45 degree angle to garnish. I also sprinkled the little bit of leftover pretzel salt on top, because I'm one of those freaks that likes to eat salt from the bottom of an empty pretzel bag.

Chill pan for at least 1 hour, or until the chocolate has set before cutting into bars into small squares.

Verdict: The bars are delicious, but once I started cutting the bars into squares, the crust would not stay attached to the bottom. Maybe next time the bottom needs more butter/less crumbs. Or I'll try putting a layer of chocolate under the pb as well. OR... instead of making a crust, I'll just crumble the crust mixture on top, like a streusel topping. Also, they are REALLY thick, so I'll either lessen the ingredients for the PB and chocolate, or use a larger pan.
What do you suggest?

Chocolate Peanut Butter Pretzel Bars

For the Pretzel Crust:
1 stick (1/2 cup) cold unsalted butter, cut into chunks
1 1/2 cups coarse pretzel crumbs (I used 2 cups of whole pretzel 'waffles')
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1 teaspoon pretzel salt (from the bottom of the bag)

For the Filling:
12 oz creamy peanut butter
1 1/2 cups confectioners sugar
1 stick (1/2 cup) butter, melted
1 cup fine pretzel crumbs (I used 1 cup of whole pretzel 'waffles')

For the top layer (Chocolate ganache)
8oz semisweet chocolate chips
1/2 cup heavy cream (or half&half or light cream... no skim milk!)
16 pretzel 'waffles' (or whatever other type of pretzel to use for garnish)

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Put 2 cups of pretzel waffles into food processor and do 15-20 long pulses until they are coarsely chopped. There will be fine pretzel in there as well. Just make sure there are a good amount of coarse pieces.
3. Add the brown sugar, pretzel salt, and evenly distribute the butter in the processor. Process with long pulses until the butter has been incorporated and mixture begins to form lumps.
4. Pour mixture into a glass or ceramic 8" x 8 " baking pan. Using the bottom side of a metal spatula, measuring cup, or your hands, press the mixture firmly into the pan, forming a level, compact layer.
5. Bake crust at 350 for about 20 minutes or until you can smell the sugary aroma. Remove and place on a cooling rack for 30 minutes.
6. Take 1 cup pretzel waffles and place into food processor. Put food processor on high for 1-2 minutes, or until you no longer hear any grinding, indicating you have a nice, fine crumb.
7. Combine fine pretzel crumbs, confectioners sugar, melted butter and peanut butter in a mixing bowl. Mix all ingredients together until fully incorporated. Set aside.
8. Once the pretzel crust has cooled, make the chocolate ganache topping.
9. Put 8 oz. chocolate chips into a mixing bowl.
10. Pour 1/2 cup heavy cream into a small saucepan over medium-high heat, watching it closely and stirring occasionally. Once bubbles begin to form at the edge, you are at the scald and should take it off heat. This will be very quick.
11. Pour cream over chocolate chips. Whisk until all chocolate has been melted and mixture is shiny and smooth.
12. Spread the peanut butter mixture evenly over the crust, first very gently with your fingers to avoid breaking the crust. Then press a little more firmly with a spatula to make it smooth and even.
13. Pour the ganache over the peanut butter. Use a spatula to spread so that all areas are evenly covered with chocolate. Evenly place pretzel waffles and gently press them into the chocolate layer at a 45 degree angle to garnish.
14. Chill pan for at least 1 hour, or until the chocolate has set before cutting into bars into small squares.

I'm taking requests!

2010-10-25T21:46:00.002-04:00

If there's anything you want me to make, please leave a comment and I will add it to my list of things to try. I'm sure my co-workers will appreciate it.

White Chocolate & Butterscotch Blondies

2010-10-25T21:33:00.003-04:00

Happy Birthday Jen!

Since I love to bake, I usually ask my department at work to put in a request for a special baked birthday goodie. So far this year, I made Angel Food cake (so hard!) for Jess and mini apple pies for Liuva. When I asked Jen what she wanted, she said she wanted something with white chocolate. Now, I don't know about you, but white chocolate is not my favorite ingredient. I couldn't make white chocolate and macadamia nut cookies because Liuva is allergic to tree nuts. So I found a recipe for White Chocolate Blondies. The original recipe called for white chocolate and semi-sweet chocolate, but I modified it to become....

White Chocolate and Butterscotch Blondies

These things are delicious! I have to admit that I was skeptical at first because as I already mentioned, white chocolate is not my favorite. Anyway, here's how it goes.

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. I highly recommend getting an in-oven thermometer to make sure that your oven is calibrated correctly. Once I started using mine, I learned that I have to wait a good deal longer than when it beeps at me for the oven to actually be preheated to the correct temperature.

First the recipe calls for 1 stick of softened butter. Mine was completely frozen, so I threw it in the microwave in a 4 cup pyrex dish to get it started.

Next, you need 8 oz. of white chocolate. I used regular Nestle white chocolate chips, but some of the comments on the original recipe mentioned that if you use better quality white chocolate that it's easier to incorporate the chocolate and the butter. After my first mishap with the chips (you'll see in a sec), I had no problem with the chips, but I did get an arm workout!

(PS - This scale is from Ikea and it works great. You can measure in both grams and ounces.
I think it was about $20 a few years ago.)

So anyway, one of the shortcuts that someone listed in the comments section of the recipe was to put the butter and the chocolate in the microwave in a glass bowl for about 4 minutes at 40% power, stirring halfway through. This is what it looked like after 2 minutes.

This is when I learned that I did not actually know how to correctly put my microwave at 40% power. Oops.

Anyway, despite the curdled mess that you see here, it actually smelled pretty good... almost like caramel. But, it was unusable. A bowl full of burnt sugar. Apparently, I had put the micro on at full blast for 40 seconds.

I only had 4oz. of white chocolate left, but a whole bag of butterscotch chips. I contemplated for a second to make a batch of butterscotch bars, with the white chocolate mixed in, but I thought that the butterscotch flavor would be too overwhelming for a whole bar. So, luckily I live in a walkable neighborhood and ran across the street to the grocery store to pick up some more white chocolate.

Back to square one. This time I followed the original instructions, and melted the chocolate and butter in a double boiler (a make-shift one anyway).

I've got another lesson for you. If your pot has a spout on it, be VERY careful. I burned my finger on the steam that was escaping from the hole. :(

Back to the stirring. The chocolate melts in three stages I noticed. I actually thought I messed up again, because the chocolate looked smooth at the beginning, but then after a little bit it began to look a little curdled again (just not burnt). I turned the heat off, but kept the bowl over the steam and continued to stir. And stir some more. Just keeeeeeeep stirring. I promise it will all come together eventually.

Next, butter or line a baking dish with parchment paper. I love parchment paper! It is so easy to use and makes cleanup so much better. The recipe actually called for a 9x9 dish, but I only had something that was like 8x11 and they came out fine.

Using my pretty, yellow KitchenAid mixer, I beat 2 eggs until foamy.

With the mixer still running, gradually add the sugar, salt, vanilla and white chocolate.
Taking pictures while pouring is not the easiest. Haha.

It should look like this after:

At this point, the recipes tells you to fold the flour into the mixture using a rubber spatula, which I did. But I think you could just as easily add the flour to the mixer. Make sure you scrape down those sides! Fold in white chocolate and butterscotch chips.

Spread the batter evenly into the prepared pan. Bake for 25 minutes (mine took 27) in the preheated oven, or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean (honestly, mine wasn't COMPLETELY clean. I pulled it out when the top got a few golden brown spots). Cool pan on a wire rack before cutting into bars.

And voila! As you can see, I wouldn't really classify these as blondies. They are less cookie/cake-like, and more melt-in-your-mouth like fudge. Definitely very dense and moist... and most importantly delicious! I think that you could make this recipe with any type of chips. I think next time I'm going to try a chocolate bar with peanut butter chips mixed in.

What combination would you make?

Enjoy!

White Chocolate Blondies

Ingredients:
8 ounces white chocolate, chips or chopped
1/2 cup butter, softened
1 tablespoon vanilla extract

2 eggs
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup white sugar
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup white chocolate chips
1/2 cup butterscotch chips

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease a 9x9 inch
baking pan. Melt white chocolate and butter in the top of a double
boiler, over barely simmering water. Stir until smooth.
Set aside to cool.

2. In a large bowl, using an electric mixer, beat eggs until foamy.
With the mixer still running, gradually add the sugar and vanilla.
Drizzle in the melted white chocolate mixture. Combine the flour and
salt; fold into the white chocolate mixture using a rubber spatula or
wooden spoon. Fold in chocolate chips. Spread the batter evenly into
the prepared pan.

3. Bake for 25 minutes in the preheated oven, or until a toothpick
inserted in the middle comes out clean. Cool pan on a wire rack before
cutting into bars.