Tag Archives: chocolate

Black Forest Cupcakes for my beautiful mother’s birthday!

Posted on by

0

Black Forest Cupcakes

My mom’s birthday was on December 21st, and aside from wanting to spend some time with her family, she said that her favourite cake was black forest. Mom suggested making the black forest cake into kid-friendly cupcake portions, and this awesome dessert creation was born. These treats are perfectly portioned, not-too-sweet treats that have all of the black foresty goodness, without the black foresty effort! Happy Birthday to our wonderful mother whose love and support has gotten us through this difficult year and who, with our amazing father, made us into the women we are today.

Black Forest Cupcakes

INGREDIENTS

  • 1/4 cup butter, softened
  • 3/4 cup sugar
  • 1 egg
  • 1 tsp vanilla
  • 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
  • 1/4 cup dark cocoa powder (regular is fine too)
  • 1/2 tsp baking soda
  • pinch of salt
  • 1/2 cup buttermilk (make your own with 1/2 cup milk and 1 tsp white vinegar, let sit for a few minutes before adding to recipe)
  • 1 can of cherry pie filling
  • 1 cup heavy whipping cream, chilled
  • 1 1/2 tbsp icing sugar

DIRECTIONS

  1. Heat oven to 375°F. Line 12 muffin cups with paper liners.
  2. In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the egg and vanilla. Beat until well combined.
  3. In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, cocoa, baking soda, and salt. Add dry ingredients to the butter mixture alternately with buttermilk, beating well after each addition.
  4. Scoop 2 tablespoons of batter into the bottom of each paper cup, allow it to spread across the bottom. Dollop a heaping tablespoon of cherry pie filling on top of the batter (include 4 cherries in each scoop). Top with another 2 tablespoons of batter, or enough to fill the cups 3/4 of the way. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until the tops are firm to the touch. Allow to cool before topping with whipped cream.
  5. When ready to top the cupcakes, whisk together the heavy whipping cream and icing sugar until stiff peaks form (this will allow the cream to hold its shape in the fridge). Dollop a generous bit of cream on to the cup cakes and top with a spoon of cherry pie filling. Serve immediately, or refrigerate (these keep well in the fridge for a couple days).
Cherry layer.

Cherry layer.

Topped with batter, ready for the oven.

Topped with batter, ready for the oven.

Little pockets of cherry deliciousness.

Little pockets of cherry deliciousness.

Ah, so wonderfully decadent.

Ah, so wonderfully decadent.

My lovely niece Brooklynn demanded that sprinkles be added! She did a wonderful job of decorating for Grandma.

My lovely niece Brooklynn demanded that sprinkles be added! She did a wonderful job of decorating for Grandma.

Chocolate Chai Cupcakes with Honey Cream Cheese Frosting — 100th post! HUZZAH! HURRAY!

Posted on by

2

Well, time flies and so do posts! I can’t believe this is my hundredth post, and squashing 100 posts into a year filled with grad school, internships, and family devastation has been a bit of a whirlwind. I’ve loved almost every post, and am looking forward to 100 more! I was going to do a giveaway for this occasion but have to amass things to give away first, though I have some book-like ideas, but also I have NO activity in the comments, for all the lovely readers I have. Hmm. I must need to be more provocative in my posts, thought provoking rather. Still figuring out the engagement bit of all of this.

Continue reading →

Black Bottom Meringues— Chocolate meringues with dark chocolate and espresso bottoms

Posted on by

1

Alright, alright, the bottoms are less black than brown but brown bottom sounded questionable, so I went with it. These are easy meringues with a dark chocolate and espresso ganache for the bottoms. The ganache mellows out the sweetness of the meringue, it is a lovely pairing. I mentioned my friend Angela in the last post, and I will mention her again! These meringues were made in celebration… in mourning… of her imminent departure. Angela is leaving us Vancouver folk for the wilds of the Sunshine Coast, she is moving on to bigger and better things, though we think she’ll come back to us, we’ve got all the beer here!

Black Bottom Meringues

INGREDIENTS

Meringues

  • 6 large egg whites (save your yolks for icebox cookies: to be posted this weekend)
  • 1 1/2 cup sugar
  • pinch cream of tartar
  • 2/3 tsp vanilla
  • 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

Ganache

  • 2 squares of dark bakers chocolate (or 2 oz of dark chocolate of your choice)
  • 2 tbsp of room-temperature espresso or very strong coffee
  • 3 tbsp of whipping cream

DIRECTIONS

  1. Preheat your oven to 175°F.
  2. Cover two cookie sheets with parchment paper.
  3. Combine the egg whites, sugar and cream of tartar in a large metal bowl set over a pan of simmering water, not touching the water, and not boiling water.
  4. Whisk the mixture constantly until the sugar has dissolved and the mixture is smooth and warm to the touch (roughly 3-4 minutes). Remove from heat and beat the whites until stiff, glossy peaks form (this is most easily and quickly done with a mixer, but I am sure it could be accomplished by hand).
  5. Add the vanilla and stir to combine.
  6. Using a sifter (or a mesh strainer in my case) sift the cocoa over the meringue and stir until no streaks remain. I am not usually this particular about sifting stuff, but my cocoa was lumpy as all hell, so I did it and it worked beautifully.
  7. Scoop the meringue into a pastry bag or a large ziploc with a corner snipped off. Squeeze out quarter-sized dollops onto your parchment paper.
  8. Bake for 2 hours, until they lift from the pan easily, mine took a little extra time because I wanted them quite dry. If you want them a little chewy, check after 1.5 hours. Allow to cool completely.
  9. While the meringues are cooling make the ganache.
  10. In a small pan over simmering water, melt the chocolate taking care not to scorch it.
  11. Add espresso and cream and stir to combine, it will come together… trust me.
  12. Once meringues have cooled smooth a layer of ganache across the bottom, place meringues bottom-up on a baking sheet as you go. Refrigerate for at least an hour to allow the ganache to set.
  13. Serve.

The meringues are starting to stiffen.

Folding in the cocoa powder.

Chocolate & Nut Date Balls- chocolate cravings killer

Posted on by

0

These sticky treats are not your grandma’s date balls. They are fudgy and packed with chocolate flavour. I added a lot of nuts, probably more than you might want, but they are tasty. And they are easy to adjust to what you have on hand or what your tastes are. I am often finding myself pining for chocolate and these have successfully satisfied those cravings time and again. They keep wonderfully in the fridge and travel well. While I happily used my food processor that I got from my friend Kim, these could be made without it by chopping things up very small by hand and mixing well, though they will be less fudge-like. They are pretty darn healthy, there is no butter or sugar added as the dates act as both.

Chocolate & Nut Date Balls

INGREDIENTS

  • 2 1/2 cups of pitted medjool dates (can be whole, chopped, whatever. You are processing them)
  • 1 1/2 tsp vanilla
  • 1/2 cup walnuts
  • 1/4 cup sliced almonds
  • 1/2 cup salted cashews (I just had these on hand and they were awesome, the saltiness added a new dimension)
  • 1/2 cup shredded coconut
  • 2-4 tbsp cocoa powder (start with two and work up to your desired fudginess)
  • 1/3 cup dried oats (whole oats if you are using a food processor; quick oats if not, as they are already chopped up)
  • 2 tbsps of semi-sweet chocolate chips are optional (totally not necessary but will further amp the chocolate factor)

DIRECTIONS

  1. Chuck everything into the food processor and blend. Start with only 2 tbsp of cocoa powder and add more as needed. If the texture isn’t coming together more dates will add the necessary stickiness. Add more nuts, coconut, dried fruit, etc. as desired.
  2. Once things have been chopped down to your taste, roll into balls, place in a tupperware and refrigerate to firm them up. Feel free to roll these in some additional cocoa powder or coconut.
  3. If you are making these by hand, which is definitely possible, chop all the ingredients that need it, as well as you can. Pop everything into a bowl and stir aggressively (that’s right, aggressively!) to combine. You are looking for the ingredients to stick together and distribute evenly.
  4. Eat morning, noon, and night.

All the good stuff, ready to mingle.

Guinness Cupcakes with a fluffy Mascarpone Whipped Cream Frosting “Head”

Posted on by

5

Oh my. OH MY. These are so frigging tasty. I already loved the Guinness chocolate cake recipe, as evidenced in this really early post, but this light, fluffy, erethreal frosting brings them to a new level. They are not weighed down by sweetness. Oh man, so delicious. Guinness brings a deep, dark, stouty note to the chocolate cake, and the whipped cream and mascarpone frosting is rich and lightly sweet, avoiding the too-tangy zip of cream cheese frostings. The fluffy, cloud of frosting becomes on the rich Guinness cupcake.
These cupcakes are part in honour of the Olympics in London… but truly they are in honour of my wonderful friend, Caelin who horribly left me to live in London, yesterday. She loves her a pint of Guinness, and I love me some Caelin. I think these would’ve been more appropriate an honour had I baked them in time for her to have one, but she can eyeball them from across the pond and weep at all the mistakes she’s made (ie. leaving me). Anyway, the cupcakes are the same that I used before, just halved, though it still made 22 (I made them smaller this time).

Guinness Chocolate Cupcakes

INGREDIENTS

  • 2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 3/4 cup cocoa powder
  • 1 1/4 tsp baking soda
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1 cup unsalted butter, softened
  • 1 1/5 cup dark brown sugar, packed
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1 tsp vanilla
  • 1 1/2 cup room-temperature Guinness

DIRECTIONS

  1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Place the rack in the middle, and prepare muffin tins by lining with papers.
  2. Whisk together flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.
  3. Beat together butter and brown sugar until pale and fluffy. Add eggs one and at time, beating well. Beat in vanilla.
  4. Add flour mixture and beer alternately in batches, beginning and ending with flour mixture, and mixing until just combined.
  5. Fill cups 2/3rds full and bake until the tops of the cupcakes are spongy to the touch, 18-20 minutes.
  6. Cool on a rack for at least 30 mins until cool before frosting.
  7. Feel free to eat one while still hot, sans frosting, these are DELICIOUS.

Mascarpone Whipped Cream Frosting

From justJENN.

INGREDIENTS

  • 8 ounces mascarpone cheese
  • 1 cup powdered sugar
  • pinch of salt
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 1/2 cups heavy whipping cream

DIRECTIONS

  1. In a medium bowl, combine mascarpone cheese, sugar, salt, and vanilla. Stir together until smooth, and set aside.
  2. In a large bowl, whip cream to stiff peaks. Fold the mascarpone mixture into the whipped cream until combined.
  3. Keep refrigerated, this isn’t a frosting to stay out overnight. That said, it keeps on the counter for a few hours if you are setting them out for people to munch on. Also, fold in some nuts and/or coconut for a funky, fun fruit/cookie dip!

Guinness, cocoa powder, and flour. Ready to go!

Poured and ready to bake!

DSCF4319