Life Saving Measures

Church dessert potluck means a new recipe to try out on a all sorts of people. I had one picked up and ready to roll... The Oreos ready and hiding from one Nicholas because he will eat them all... I went to print the recipe and as he stood over my shoulder he noticed it had one star. Oh man... we read the review and the follow up response from the baker, and it was NOT great. Oh man we need to pivot and now. Bundt. What works better at a church function than a bundt cake? Nothing! I found this Oreo Bundt cake and while I didn't have black cocoa powder, I did use regular cocoa, and it was just fine. I saw several people have a slice and they all told me how great it was, they didn't even know I baked it. Although instinctively my mom knew it was mine, so did a few others. Apparently it was the magic sugar my father needed to up his glucose. Haha! Life saving measures over there! When I asked what he wanted me to bake for his birthday dessert, "Got any more of that chocolate cake?!" Haha! Did I get any? Nope... not a bite. But I'm going off what everyone else said that this one was fantastic and it should be made over and over again. The frosting was surely delicious; I did try some of that. So this one will get baked again so I can have a slice or two. After all… it saved a life!

Cookies and Cream Oreo Bundt Cake
Ingredients
For the cake:
1 cup unsalted butter, melted
1 cup whole milk, room temperature
1/2 cup black cocoa powder
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 3/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
2 large eggs, room temperature
1/2 cup sour cream, room temperature
18 Oreo cookies, roughly chopped

For the frosting:
1 cup butter, room temperature
1 7 ounce jar marshmallow fluff
3 cups confectioners' sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
2 tablespoons heavy cream
12 Oreo cookies, chopped

Preheat the oven to 350 °F.
Add the melted butter, milk, and cocoa powders into a large bowl and whisk until smooth. Add in the sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and flour, continuing to whisk until fully incorporated with the chocolate mixture and no streaks of flour remain, scraping down the sides of the bowl.
Make a well in the center of the batter and add the vanilla, eggs, and sour cream. Stir together until thoroughly combined. Gently stir in the chopped Oreo cookies.
Grease a 12-cup bundt metal pan. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 45 to 50 minutes, or until a tester inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Remove the cake from the oven and allow the cake to cool in the pan for 15 minutes. Invert the pan over a cooling rack and allow the cake to cool completely before icing.
To make the frosting, beat the butter on low speed using a mixer until smooth. Add in the marshmallow fluff, continuing to beat until well combined. Slowly mix in the confectioners' sugar, half a cup at a time, followed by the salt and vanilla. Turn the speed up to medium-high, then add in the heavy cream and beat until light and fluffy.
Cover the top of the bundt cake with the frosting. Sprinkle the chopped Oreos on top. Refrigerate for 30 minutes before serving to set the frosting. The cake will keep at room temperature for up to 3 days.

Cat foot prints not welcome

Vanilla Buttercream frosting, while it is delicious, chocolate is better. I'm saying it. Fudgey frosting is pretty amazing too... but fluffy chocolate buttercream on yellow cake? Yep, amazing. I used this recipe on top of a cake I made just for fun. It was my "I had no cake for my birthday and as a 47 year old person I can do what I want and just make a random cake on a Saturday afternoon" cake... Yes... that's what I did. It's pretty delicious. Everyone in my family at some point has had some of this cake and agreed it was great, even the frosting. Ok... some of them weren't super fans of the frosting... but STILL they humored me and gave it a try. Now the cake sits under a metal bowl because I don't have a cake saver, and I really don't want cat foot prints in the cake. I think that's fair, right?

Chocolate Buttercream
1 and 1/2 cups (339g) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
4 cups (480g) confectioners’ sugar
3/4 cup + 2 Tablespoons (76g) unsweetened cocoa powder (natural or Dutch-process)
4–6 Tablespoons (60–90g/ml) heavy cream (or half-and-half or milk), at room temperature
1 and 1/4 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon salt
optional for decoration: sprinkles

Make the frosting: In a large bowl with a handheld or stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat the butter on medium speed until creamy, about 2 minutes. Add confectioners’ sugar, cocoa powder, 4 Tablespoons of heavy cream, salt, and vanilla extract. Beat on low speed for 30 seconds, then increase to high speed and beat for 1 full minute. Do not over-whip. Add 1/4 cup more confectioners’ sugar if frosting is too thin or 1–2 more Tablespoons of cream if frosting is too thick. Taste. Add another pinch of salt if desired.

Let's have cake!

A funny question I often get asked on my birthday is about cake. Maybe not a question but a comment, "I hope someone makes you a great cake!" Since I make cakes for everyone else, there's this assumption that someone is going to make me a cake. Here's the secret... no one makes me a cake... no one offers or even suggests it. Weird right? Same this year... in fact I even had to pay for the ice cream when we went out for ice cream on my birthday. I was feeling fussy about it and realized I could make my own dang cake. Problem is, the kind of cake I like? My family isn't going to eat... Yellow cake with chocolate frosting. I mean maybe the yellow part, but chocolate isn't always their jam. You know? too bad... so three weeks after my birthday, I decided to make myself a birthday cake! Now, I'm NOT one of those people who act like a princess all month "oh it's my birthday month" and all that... I'm 47, not 4. I did say it to be silly... but my family knew I was goofing around. I made this Yellow Cake from scratch, and it was delicious! The wild thing? I had it sitting on the table so the critters didn't find it - and after dinner, everyone said "Are we having cake?!" YES!!! Let's have cake!! SO next year? I’m just going to bake my own dang cake from the start. No fussiness, just make what I want and enjoy it!

Yellow Layer Cake
2 and 1/2 cups cake flour (spooned & leveled)
2 and 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
1 and 3/4 cups granulated sugar
1/3 cup vegetable oil
4 large egg yolks, at room temperature
1 Tablespoon pure vanilla extract
1 cup buttermilk, at room temperature
2 large egg whites, at room temperature
1/8 teaspoon cream of tartar

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Grease two 9-inch round cake pans, line with parchment paper rounds, then grease the parchment paper. Parchment paper helps the cakes seamlessly release from the pans. I recommend using nonstick spray for greasing.
In a medium bowl, whisk the cake flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together. Set aside.
In a large bowl using a handheld or stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat the butter and sugar together on medium-high speed until light and creamy, about 3 minutes. Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a silicone spatula as needed. Add the oil and beat for 1 minute until combined. Beat in the egg yolks until incorporated, then beat in the vanilla extract.
Add about 1/3 of the dry ingredients and 1/2 of the buttermilk and beat on low speed until combined. Add 1/3 more of the dry ingredients and the rest of the buttermilk and beat on low speed until combined. Add the rest of the dry ingredients and beat on low speed until combined. The batter will be very thick. You may need to whisk it all by hand to make sure there are no lumps at the bottom of the bowl. Set aside.
In another large bowl using a handheld or stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment, beat the egg whites and cream of tartar together on high speed until fluffy, medium-stiff peaks form, about 3 minutes.
Fold the whipped egg whites into the cake batter. Work slowly and gently, as you don’t want to deflate the egg whites. Pour/spoon the batter evenly into the prepared pans.
Bake for 27–31 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean. Cool the cakes in the pans set on a cooling rack for 1 hour. Run a knife around the edges to loosen the sides, remove the cakes from the pans, peel off the parchment, and place on the rack to finish cooling. The edges of the cakes can be crumbly; this is normal. The cakes must be completely cool before frosting and assembling.

Good help was easy to find this time.

This year our fruit trees have had an interesting season so far... Our peach tree had so much trauma I'm sending it to therapy.... Our pear tree provided lots of pears for us, our friends, then a huge storm came through and shook all the rest of the pears off the tree and they were on the grass. Our apples are going gang busters... bug lots have bugs and our baking apples are either really green or barely blushing. I decided to try to usher in some fall weather with the baking apples. Picked a few to make some muffins. Thankfully I have a great helper whose main interest is muffins, but hey, he CAN be bought! With muffins! So he helped me peel and chop them. This muffin recipe is great - easy and they are delicious! I don't keep buttermilk on hand, so instead I use whatever milk I have with a splash of lemon juice - works for me! These muffins were a hit. We baked them on Saturday morning, I was thinking for Sunday breakfast but it's hard to hold the family at bay with warm delicious muffins! So we all enjoyed some for lunch. We have a LOT more apples on that tree, I'm sure we'll be doing more baking this fall. Especially since the weather finally cooled off enough to open some windows! Phew!! Give the A/C and our pocketbooks a break!

Apple Cinnamon Muffin
3 cups all purpose flour
1 cup granulated sugar
½ cup brown sugar
2 tsp cinnamon
2 tsp baking powder
½ tsp salt
2 large eggs
¾ cup buttermilk
½ cup vegetable oil
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 cups diced apples, cut into 1/2 inch chunks
Cinnamon Sugar Topping
2 Tbsp unsalted butter, melted
½ Tbsp cinnamon
2 Tbsp granulated sugar

Dice about 1 & ½ apples into ½ inch chunks. You want 2 cups diced apples. Set aside.
In a mixing bowl combine the flour, granulated sugar, brown sugar, cinnamon, baking powder, and salt. Stir with a spoon to combine and set aside.
In a larger mixing bowl combine the eggs, buttermilk, vegetable oil, and vanilla extract. Stir to combine with a fork or spatula.
Gradually mix in the dry ingredients and the apple chunks, mixing just until combined. The batter will be very thick!
Cover the bowl with a towel and allow the batter to rest for 15 minutes. During this time, preheat the oven to 425ºF.
For bakery style muffin tops, line a 12 count muffin pan with 6 muffins liners, meaning you’ll only fill every other muffin well with batter. Filling every other well allows the muffins to spread and dome without running into each other. Fill the liners to the top with batter. Yes – to the top! Use a butter knife to smooth the tops of the muffins if lumpy.
Bake for 7 minutes at 425ºF, then keep the muffins in the oven, and turn the temperature down to 350ºF and bake for 16-21 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Allow the muffins to cool in the pan for 15 minutes before removing. Repeat with the remaining batter, making sure to bump the temperature back up to 425ºF.
Once the muffins are cool, assemble the cinnamon sugar topping. Melt 2 tablespoons of butter. Use a pastry brush to brush the melted butter on top of the muffins. Roll the top of each muffin in a bowl of cinnamon sugar.

Weed whacking in my garden

First day of high school felt a little special so I decided to make some homemade bread to go with our super fancy store bought Chicken Kiev (this was the requested meal). We have lots of basil this year but it's really strange. I've weed whacked it at least once... yes... I weed whacked it... I saw somewhere that if it's bolted, just cut it all low and it'll come back. It did come back... but it's bolting again.. maybe this weekend I'll go back and do the same thing. It could have something to do with the insane amount of rain we've been getting this summer. It's like we live in a rainforest, every day more and more rain, it's getting really old. My rug on the deck is green from just always being wet and hot. Gross. Back to bread. This bread was super easy, super fast rise, and baked up faster than it was supposed to. Remember... if your baked items are 190 inside you are good to go! Less, they will fall, more they'll be dry. Everyone enjoyed this warm from the oven, but I bet it would be great in the toaster as well. First day of high school? Went great! Next week is 6th grade! (as of this writing anyway....) hip hip!

Basil Bread
2 1/2 teaspoons instant dry yeast (rapid rise works well too)
1 1/2 cups warm water
2 Tablespoons white sugar
1 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup fresh basil, minced (measure before chopping)
2 Tablespoons vegetable oil
3 1/2 cups bread flour

Preheat oven to 375*F
In a stand mixer add yeast, water and sugar. Mix.
Cover with a dish towel and let stand for 5 minutes. Yeast should poof.
Prepare a cookie sheet by lining it with parchment paper, silicone liner or non-stick foil.
After yeast proofs, add salt, basil and oil. Mix well.
Add bread flour 1 cup at a time, mixing between additions.
Once all flour is added, continue to knead dough for an additional 5 minutes. If dough is still sticking to sides of bowl, add an additional 1/2 cup a little at a time.
Place dough on a lightly* floured work surface
Roll out dough to a rectangle that is about 1 ½ inches thick.
Roll up dough like a cinnamon roll and place on prepared cookie sheet.
Cover and let rise for 20 minutes.
Bake for 30 minutes. (inside temp should reach 190)
Remove from the oven, let cool, slice and enjoy.