IC : Earth voting

This month's IC:Earth challenge involved nuts and seeds. If you wish to vote for my almond, aniseed and lemon cupcake (shown here http://snookydoodlecakes.blogspot.com/2009/03/almond-aniseed-and-lemon-cupcake.html )

Vote here http://www.ironcupcakemilwaukee.com/ voting is open till noon April 3rd.
Thanks for your votes :)

BEN 10 cake

Here's another two BEN 10 cakes. What can I say Ben 10 is very popular here. :)

Caramelised pine nut tart

I made these tarts with some leftovers, but I have to say that I had a pleasant result. These tarts are made with pine nuts and a caramel mixture. From the quantity below you ll make about three 3" tarts. As I told you they were leftovers so only made three :)

The recipe for the pastry comes from Joy of Baking and its the one for Pate Brisee. Here's the link http://www.joyofbaking.com/PateBrisee.html

Caramelised Pine nut tart
2 tbl brown sugar
4 tbls golden syrup
2 tbl cream
2 tbl butter
1/2 cup pine nuts

Mix all the ingredients in a small bowl. Fill tart cases with filling and bake till caramelised.

Carrot cake

I found this recipe in http://www.seriouseats.com/. It’s adapted from The Sweet Melissa Baking Book. I didn’t use the frosting in this recipe but I bet the orange cream cheese frosting would be a nice variation to the normal cream cheese frosting.
I halved the recipe and baked it in a 6” cake pan. I also substituted the walnuts with almonds and added a layer of honey in the cake. The cake is decorated with cream cheese stars and some powdered sugar.
This cake was good however I wish to try another lighter and fluffier version. If anyone has a nice carrot cake recipe who would like to share it with me I’ll be more than happy to try it.

Carrot Cake with Fresh Orange Cream Cheese Frosting

Adapted from The Sweet Melissa Baking Book, by Melissa Murphy.

For the cake :
2 cups all-purpose flour

1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

3/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon baking powder

4 large eggs

3/4 cup vegetable or canola oil

2 cups granulated sugar

1 teaspoon kosher salt

1 pound carrots, grated medium fine

3/4 cup walnut pieces, coarsely chopped (used almonds)

For the fresh orange cream cheese frosting:

12 ounces cream cheese, softened

2 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar

Zest of 1 orange

1/2 pound (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Before you startPosition a rack in the center of your oven. Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Butter and flour two 8x2-inch round cake pans. Line each pan with an 8-inch round of parchment paper.
To make the cake
1. in a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, cinnamon, baking soda, and baking powder.
2. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the whip attachment, beat the eggs at high speed until light and frothy, about 1 minute. Decrease the speed to medium and add the oil, sugar, and salt, and mix until just combined. Decrease the speed to low and add the flour mixture, mixing until just combined.
3. Remove the bowl from the mixer. Using a rubber spatula, fold in the carrots and walnuts.
4. Divide the batter evenly between the prepared cake pans. Spin the pans to level the batter. Bake for 45 minutes, or until a wooden skewer inserted into the center comes out clean. Remove to a rack to cool for 20 minutes before turning the layers out onto the rack. Cool completely before filling or frosting.
To make the frosting
1. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine the cream cheese, sugar, and zest. Start on low speed and then increase to medium-high speed and beat until smooth, 1 1/2 to 2 minutes. Scrape down the sides of the bowl.
2. Add the butter and mix on medium speed until just fluffy and smooth, about 45 seconds more. Add the vanilla and mix until just combined. Do not overbeat.
The cake keeps in a cake saver in the refrigerator for up to 4 days. It tastes great eaten at room temperature or chilled.

Almond, aniseed and lemon cupcake

This is my entry for this month's Iron cupcake challenge. This month the chosen ingredients are nuts and seeds. I chose to use aniseed and almonds.
This is a vanilla almond cupcake with aniseed and a hint of lemon. It has an almond centre (although not much visible in the photo cause it has the same colour of the batter) It is topped with whipped cream, aniseed, chopped almonds and a drizzle of caramel. A cookie made from ground almonds, lemon, semolina and aniseed compliments this cupcake.
If you like this cupcake don't forget to vote for me, don't worry i will remind you :)

Our March ETSY PRIZE-PACK is from artists:A Bunnycake Easter Plushie by DOGBONEART, http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=21636297.A whimsical piece by CAKEASAURUS, http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5729584.as well as a pair of cupcake earrings from LOTS OF SPRINKLES at http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=6057281.a collection of all new printed cupcake liners, 200 in all from Sweet Cuppin' Cakes Cupcakery, http://www.acupcakery.com/PLUS, IronCupcake:Earth can not forget our good friend, CAKESPY, http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5243382, who is now going to be doing a piece for our winner each month until further notice - sweet!
Last and certainly not least, don’t forget our corporate prize providers: HEAD CHEFS by FIESTA PRODUCTS, http://www.fiestaproducts.com/, HELLO CUPCAKE by Karen Tack and Alan Richardson, http://blog.hellocupcakebook.com/, JESSIE STEELE APRONS http://www.jessiesteele.com/; TASTE OF HOME books, http://www.tasteofhome.com/; a t-shirt from UPWITHCUPCAKES.COM http://www.upwithcupcakes.com/. Iron Cupcake:Earth is sponsored in part by 1-800-Flowers, http://www.1800flowers.com/ .
And go to No One Puts Cupcake in a Corner on the 1st of the month to vote for your favorite cupcake!

Hazelnut Pie

For this pie I used the same ingredients as for the pecan pie. In fact I had some leftover filling and no more peans so I just substitute them for crushed hazelnuts. I like this version too :)

Inside-out carrot cake cookies

This month's Cookie Carnival recipe comes from Gourmet Magazine. The recipe is Inside out carrot cake cookie recipe. I made some modifications to the recipe. They are in brackets and bold. These cookies where not bad without the filling however when paired and filled with cream cheese they were really good. Mine spread a little maybe the oven temperature wasn't what it should have been.

Inside-out carrot cake cookies
Gourmet April 2004

1 1/8 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 stick (1/2 cup) unsalted butter, softened
1/3 cup plus 2 tablespoons packed light brown sugar
1/3 cup plus 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1 large egg
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup coarsely grated carrots (2 medium)
1 scant cup walnuts (3 ounces), chopped (I used almonds)
1/2 cup raisins (2 1/2 ounces)
8 ounces cream cheese (used low-fat)
1/4 cup honey (didn't use it)

used some icing sugar

Put oven racks in upper & lower thirds of oven and preheat oven to 375°F. Butter 2 baking sheets.
Whisk together flour, cinnamon, baking soda, and salt in a bowl.
Beat together butter, sugars, egg, and vanilla in a bowl with an electric mixer at medium speed until pale and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Mix in carrots, nuts, and raisins at low speed, then add flour mixture and beat until just combined.
Drop 1 1/2 tablespoons batter per cookie 2 inches apart on baking sheets and bake, switching position of sheets halfway through baking, until cookies are lightly browned and springy to the touch, 12 to 16 minutes total. Cool cookies on sheets on racks 1 minute, then transfer cookies to racks to cool completely.
While cookies are baking, blend cream cheese and honey in a food processor until smooth.
Sandwich flat sides of cookies together with a generous tablespoon of cream cheese filling in between.
Sandwich flat sides of cookies together with a generous tablespoon of cream cheese filling in between.

Yield: Makes about 13 cookies

Barney without friends :)

This must be my fourth Barney cake I make. I try to make them quite different however I m running out of ideas now. Anyways hope you like this one! this is a vanilla sponge cake filled with cherry jam and whipped cream. It's covered with fondant and some royal icing.

Cream biscuits

These biscuits are very easy to make. They don't contain oil or butter since the fat in these biscuits comes from the cream. They're soft to the bite and good especially when paired with chocolate. I sandwiched mine with some chocolate ganache and they were such a nice treat :)

The recipe comes from an Italian blog. Here's the link http://blunottelive.blogspot.com/2009/03/biscotti-alla-panna.html . I also translated the recipe. From the photos below you can see they got devoured quite quickly.


First bite Second biteLast biteThen 'Poof' vanished.

So here's the recipe to make more :)

Cream biscuits

250 ml cream
350 gr flour '00'
150 gr sugar
1 tbl baking powder
pinch of salt

chocolate chips

chocolate ganache

1/2 tsp vanilla

Sieve the flour, baking powder and salt. Add the sugar, cream, vanilla and chocolate chips and mix till a soft and smooth dough is obtained.

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celcius.

Cover a baking sheet with baking paper. Roll the dough and using cookie cutters, cut biscuits in the desired shape. I just rolled in small balls and baked them. Leave enough space between them cause they get quite big :) Bake for about 10-15 minutes.

Let cool and fill with chocolate ganache if desired.

For the ganache I used 1:1 chocolate to cream.

Chocolate on Chocolate

These are some of my moist chocolate cakes filled and covered with chocolate ganache. A slice of this cake is delicious with a cup of coffee :)

Note

My friend Leesa has launched her new website http://www.cupcakeprincesse.com if you live in France and wish to order cupcakes visit her site especially if you live at Antony and the surrounding banlieu... Sceaux, Bourg la Reine, Parc de Sceaux. She also offers cupcake baking classes for kids as part of a Cooking/Baking class in English and can be delivered even in Paris.

Mini pecan pie

This is my fist pecan pie the recipe comes from Joy of Baking. I had never eaten a pecan pie before.I'm glad I tried this recipe cause it's delicious. The one underneathis a mini pecan pie since it's about 5". The one above is a super mini pecan pie :) Here's the link to the recipe http://www.joyofbaking.com/pecanpie.html

More cupcakes

I've been sorting my photos and came across photos that I've taken before I started my blog. Here are some of them, Hope you enjoy them :)