Marbled bundt cake

It was cold, dark, rainy and a Saturday afternoon. ….. time to bake a delicious, simple cake.
 


Marbled Bundt Cake

• 3 cups all0purp0se flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 1/2 cups granulated sugar, divided into a 1/2 cup and a 2 cup portion
• 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1/2 TB espresso powder
• 1/2 cup bittersweet mini chocolate chips
• 3 tablespoons milk, at room temperature
• 2 sticks of unsalted butter (cold from the fridge warm for 20 sec in microwave)
• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 5 large organic free-range eggs, at room temperature
• 1/2 cup whole milk

Preheat the oven to 350 (F). Spray the baking pan with baking spray, and set aside.
In a medium bowl, whisk together 3 cups flour, the baking powder, and salt. Set aside.
In a separate medium bowl, combine 1/2 cup sugar, cocoa powder, espresso powder and 2 TB milk. Whisk until mixture is smooth. Set aside.

Place the 2 sticks of melted butter and 2 cups sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Beat on medium-high until the mixture is blended, about 1 minute. Add in vanilla extract and continue beating until combined. Add the 5 eggs, one at a time, beating each egg until it has been incorporated. Now, turn mixer down to its lowest speed and add the flour mixture (from the first step) in three additions, alternating with the whole milk in two additions and mixing just until blended.

Add 2 cups of batter (from the fourth step) to the cocoa mixture and stir until blended.
Using a spatula, pour enough vanilla batter into the pan to fill the bottom. Now the chocolate batter on top of the vanilla mixture and distributed well. Finish with the vanilla layer. Use a chop stick and draw it once through the cake better to get the marbling.

Bake for 55 - 60 minutes in the preheated oven, or until a cake tester inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Cool cake in the pan on a cooling rack for 15 minutes, before turning out to cool completely.

Small marbled bundt cake

What better to do on a rainy, cold October evening than to warm and sweeten it up with a small marbled bundt cake!

Small marbled bundt cake (for small, 6 cup bundt cake pan)

• 10 T. (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
• 3/4 c. sugar (135 grams)
• 1/4 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 2 free-range organic eggs
• 1 2/3 c. (185 grams) all purpose flour
• 1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 ts baking soda
• 1/4 cup buttermilk
• 1/4 c. cocoa powder 

Preheat oven to 350F.

Cream butter, sugar and salt together for several minutes until light and fluffy (best in a standmixer). Add vanilla extract and one egg at a time. Mix well, and add in second egg.

Sift flour with baking powder and baking soda. Add flour in two parts, alternating with half of the buttermilk each time. Divide batter equally into two bowls.Sift cocoa over the batter in one bowl and mix well. Add 1 tablespoon of milk to cocoa batter to thin.

Spray the bundt form with a baking spray. Place half of the “white” batter in the form or pan. Add all of the dark/chocolate batter on top and distributed around the form with a spatula. Finish with the remaining white batter. Place a spatula vertically in the batter and draw it around the form once to swirl. Smooth the top.

Place the cake in the oven and bake for 35-40 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out cleanly. Remove from oven, cool slightly and then turn out on a cake rack to cool further.

Home-made chocolate glaze:

• 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
• 2 TB unsalted butter
• 1/3 cup confectioners sugar
• 2 tablespoons warm milk
• 1 ts rum extract
• 1 ts vanilla

Pour the chocolate chips in a glass bowl or a ceramic bowl, and set it over a pot with boiling water on the stove (the bowl should not touch the water). Stir continuously until the chocolate chips start to melt. Add in the butter, and melt it with the chocolate chips. Once it is all a creamy, lump-free consistency, add in the milk, the rum and vanilla extract. Once incorporated, take the bowl off the pot, and continue to stir while adding in the confectioners sugar. Keep stirring. Brush the cake with the chocolate glaze. The glaze will thicken when cooled, and it is great to have a 1/4 of an inch thick glaze on the cake. (Leftover chocolate glaze is great on graham crackers… )
Let cool and dry for about 4-5h before serving. The cake actually tastes better with time; at the beginning it is dry and light and slightly crumbly, and after a week it becomes moist with an intense nutty flavor. It should be stored cool and airtight. 

 

Mini bread loaves

Fall was definitely in the air today. Walking around with a tee shirt with no jacket made me sneeze and catch a cold. When I came home I started the winter migration of the deck: the plants came inside the house, and it was time to light a fire in the wood stove.  To add to the comfort, I baked off the mini bread loaves which had been rising since noon (I used this recipe, just split the dough into 2 parts and let the dough rise in the mini bread baskets). The rest of the comfort meal was half-clean eating dinner --- a can of 50th anniversary of Andy Warhol’s Campbell tomato soup with kale from the garden, pasta and some cannellini beans.

Russian Chocolate, Date and Walnut Torte

These are the days of world wide culinary social networks and recipes and…. google translate. Which means with some fantasy (and baking wisdom) I can make a Russian cake which had me at “hello”. Or is it a Bulgarian recipe? As Russian grad student said it is not Russian, more likely Bulgarian, cyrillic and all. With some fingers crossed it came out just fine. The raw dough tasted marvelous, the torte even better: light, fluffy, rich, not too sweet and one would not suspect dates I think.


Russian Chocolate, Date and Walnut Torte
a 10 inch non-stick springform pan.

• 2 cups medjol dates
• 1 1/2 cup strong hot coffee
• 10 TB butter
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup flour
• 1/2 cup cocoa
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup chocolate chips
• decorate with powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 370F. Spray or butter a 10 inch springform, and set aside.
Prepare 1.5 cups hot, strong coffee (best in a French press with ca 3 TB of fresh ground espresso). De-pit the dates, and cut them into small dice. Place them in a large coffee cup and cover with the hot coffee. Soak for 5 minutes.
Now, mix the flour with the baking soda, salt and cocoa and set aside.
In a standmixer, beat the butter and sugar until fluffy. Add one egg at a time, and incorporate well. Add vanilla.
Turn speed to low, and slowly add the flour mixture to the cake batter. Mix well. With a large spoon, retrieve the dates from the hot coffee, and add to the cake batter (add a bit of coffee at a time). You should only have about a 1/2 cup of coffee let in the pot after the figs are removed. Incorporate well.
Pour the mixture into the prepared form and sprinkle top with chocolate chips.
Bake for 35-45 minutes or until ready by checking with a stick if you spend dry then the cake is ready. Cool before removing from the form.

No-Knead Bread

Years ago, when everyone was baking the New York Times no-knead bread, I tried it out and the only thing that happened was that I ruined a perfectly fine le creuset and generated inedible bread. Not sure what made me try it again (I used the already wrecked le creuset) but this time it worked out beautifully. Maybe, I understand bread a little bit better. Also, I used the kitchenaid standmixer for some good kneading, which allowed the dough to rise in record time (a few hours). Once the bread was baked, it was perfection! This is a really simple recipe with few ingredients; however, the salt should be added late in the process (salt and yeast don’t work together that well during the initial rise process). The trick with the preheated cast iron dutch oven creates a very crusty bread. It is like fresh French bread.   (The recipe is actually very similar to the NYTimes recipe, a bit less water and more yeast, anyway it worked!)


Minimally kneaded bread:

• 3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
• 1 ts yeast
• 1 ts bakers milk powder (King Arthur Flour website) (optional)
• 1 ts salt
• 1-1/2 cups warm water

1. In a standmixer bowl with the kneading hook attachment, whisk together the flour and yeast. Slowly add the lukewarm water and mix until a shaggy mixture forms. Knead for about 5-10 min., Add the salt, and knead another 2 min. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and set aside for 6-12 hours (up to 24h if you knead by hand) at room temperature. 
2. Preheat oven to 450F. Place a cast iron dutch oven with a lid in the oven and heat the pot for 30 minutes. Meanwhile, pour the risen dough onto a floured surface (mixture will be sticky) and lightly shape into a round loaf.
3. Remove the hot cast iron pot from the oven and carefully place the dough into it. Cover with a lid and return to oven for 30 minutes. Then, remove the lid and bake an additional 10-15 minutes. Carefully remove bread from oven and from pot and place on a cooling rack. Enjoy!

Zucchini Carrot Bread

It is the time of the season when the reliable production of zucchini in the garden leads to.... zucchini bread. I made this recipe with lower calories by adding kidney beans instead of half of the canola oil, and the NuNatural Stevia based baking mix instead of a 1/2 cup of brown sugar. You'd never know -- it tastes great!

 

































Zucchini Carrot Bread
1 loaf (22 servings)

Ingredients 

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour 
• 2 teaspoons baking powder 
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda 
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon 
• 2 free-range eggs 
• 1/4 cup canola oil
• 1/2 cup cooked kidney beans (rinsed, no-salt) 
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 cup NuNaturals baking mix 
• 1 TB vanilla extract
• 1/2 ts salt 
• 1 3/4 cup grated zucchini (squeeze out excess moisture) 
• 1/2 cup grated carrot

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Spray a 8x4 loaf pan and set aside.
In a medium bowl, whisk the flour, baking powder, baking soda and cinnamon.
In a larger food processor, whisk oil and the kidney beans, until smooth. Add eggs and mix until well blended.  Add brown sugar, stevia baking blend, vanilla,  and salt, and puree until smooth.  Pour mixture into a mixing bowl, add grated zucchini and carrot, stirring gently until combined. Add flour mixture to zucchini mixture, folding until just combined. 
Pour mixture into prepared loaf pan and bake for 50 to 60 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.  Let cool in pan for 5 to 10 minutes and then move to wire rack to cool completely.

Maine coast crackers, again

It’s been busy around here, including baking another batch of the Maine coast crisps (the fancy English/Canadian term for crackers). This time I used 3 small loaf forms, and the crackers came out just the right size. I hope I have enough for the party tomorrow.

Find the recipe here.

And a shout out to the U.S. swim team!