Pumpkin Whoopie Pies

Oh hai, we are pie.

The whoopie pie has been one subject of a few attempts by major media outlets to connect the rising popularity of homespun "throwbacks" to economic agony and escapism in nostalgia. I'd like to think that the whoopie pie could elude connection to national gloom, but hey, if the recession is where I find my right to eat pumpkin whoopie pies for breakfast, well then thank you New York Times, I'll take your hypothesis and run with it.

The recession is fun! It resuscitated the whoopie pie! And farming!

Pumpkin Whoopie Pies

My thusly only successful recipe baked from Baked! New Frontiers in Baking

This pumpkin version is excellent as is, but I think it would also be good if you dialed back the sugar in the filling and added some maple syrup instead.

Cookie tops and bottoms
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 generous tablespoons cinnamon
1 tablespoon ground ginger
1 tablespoon ground cloves
2 cups firmly packed dark brown sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
3 cups chilled pumpkin puree
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Filling
3 cups confectioners' sugar
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, at room temperature
8 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Make the pumpkin cookies

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper. In a large bowl, whisk the flour, salt, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, and cloves together and set aside.

2. In a separate bowl, whisk the brown sugar and oil together until combined. Add the pumpkin puree and whisk to combine thoroughly. Add the eggs and vanilla and whisk until combined. Sprinkle the flour mixture in thirds over the pumpkin mixture and whisk until completely combined.

3. Use a small ice cream scoop with a release mechanism to drop heaping tablespoons of the dough onto the prepared baking sheets, about 1 inch apart. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes, until the cookies are just starting to crack on top and a toothpick inserted into the center of a cookie comes out clean. Remove from the oven and let the cookies cool completely on the pan while you make the filling.

Make the cream cheese filling

1. Sift the confectioners’ sugar into a medium bowl and set aside. In a separate bowl beat the butter with an eggbeater until it is completely smooth, with no visible lumps. Add the cream cheese and beat until combined.

2. Add the confectioners’ sugar and vanilla and beat until smooth. Be careful not to overbeat the filling, or it will lose structure. (The filling can be made 1 day ahead. Cover the bowl tightly and put it in the refrigerator. Let the filling soften at room temperature before using.)

Assemble the whoopie pies

1. Turn half of the cooled cookies upside down (flat side facing up). Use an ice cream scoop or a tablespoon to drop a large dollop of filling onto the flat side of the cookie. Place another cookie, flat side down, on top of the filling. Press down slightly so that the filling spreads to the edges of the cookie.

2. Repeat until all the cookies are used. Put the whoopie pies in the refrigerator for about 30 minutes to firm up before serving. The whoopie pies will keep for up to 3 days, on a parchment-lined baking sheet covered with plastic wrap, in the refrigerator.

Vanilla Bean and Whiskey Pudding Tartlets

My sister’s apartment is sort of an apocalyptic mess. She has three rolling pins I can never find, always appears to have some sort of meat carcass in her fridge waiting to be cooked into stock, and on my most recent trip to Pittsburgh, also had an ice formation in her freezer that I think she left there because it looks like, well, a certain male bathing-suit part. Her apartment is scattered with clothes, children’s books, crafting things, leftover art, and library DVDs, and also, she keeps ceramic figurines of ambiguously rendered farm animals in her plants (the donkey-cow-pig, for instance). There are wool sweaters in the freezer too, and the contents of a jumbo box of Nerds spilled across her coffee table.

Oh hai! I'm just a stack of pans, chillin' in the freezer with an icy phallus.

My cataloguing of her domestic detritus might not show it, but my sister is flat out my hero. The Atlantic published an article in May noting that 93% of the happy and healthy adults Dr. George Valliant measured in his lifelong psychological study on happiness had had good relationships with a sibling when younger. Well, from partnering to steal all the neighbors’ sample boxes of cereal, to getting the pride kicked out of me in every single board and card game ever, to catching tadpoles and crawdads in New Hampshire and jumping into slimy lakes and an eel-filled quarry in Maine, we have the kind of relationship reinforced by frozen wool sweaters, moldy dishes, and other things that take the sort of roundabout way to get where they're going. And when not preserving phallic ice sculptures or eating Vietnamese soups full of MSG, sometimes we make things in the kitchen. This time, it was failed butterscotch tartlets that turned into a serendipitous, vanilla-whiskey mistake, which I think sounds just about right, all things considered.

To keep the inside of the freezer warm.

Sometimes Whole Foods just, aherm, gives vanilla beans away.

Vanilla Bean and Whiskey Pudding Tartlets (with Chocolate Espresso Beans)
Adapted clumsily from Baked! New Frontiers in Baking

This recipe was supposed to make butterscotch tartlets, but they came out vanilla-y. I might not have cooked the caramel long enough and that's what did it, but I was using raw sugar, so it looked a little "amber-colored" from the get-go. Whatever I did wrong, these still tasted really excellent, and the whiskey adds a great punch to the vanilla. If you want to limit the butterscotch taste, simply do not caramelize the sugar. You might wonder what the point of going to the hassle of crusts is. I still wonder. In the end, they add some buttery goodness, and butter is nearly always the right decision, so if you can handle the additional steps, I say go for it.

Oat Wheat Tart Crust
1 cup rolled (oops! couldn’t find these, so I used 1 c. wheat flour)
½ cup whole-wheat flour
1cup all-purpose flour
¼ cup dark brown sugar, firmly packed
1 ½ sticks (¾ cup) cold unsalted butter, cut into cubes
¼ cup milk

1. Normally you would use a food processor to grind up the oats, if you had them, until ground but not powdered. Add the flours, sugar, and salt and pulse until combined. Add the butter and pulse until sandy. Add the milk and pulse a few seconds.

2. Scoop the dough out, form into a large ball, wrap it tightly in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 1 and up to 3 hours.

3. Unwrap the dough, put it on a floured work surface, cut into 8 equal pieces. Gently shape each into a smooth disk (dough will be sticky), and then slide onto floured parchment paper and refrigerate for ten minutes (I skipped this). Using a floured rolling pin, roll the disks into a 6-inch, ¼-inch thick rounds, and place gently into tartlet pans, pushing gently against the sides and rolling down or trimming any excess.

4. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F, and put the tartlet crust into the freezer for 30 minutes. Place on a baking sheet and bake, rotating halfway through, for about 15 minutes or until the crusts are golden brown. Transfer to a rack, and let cool while you make the pudding. Remove shells from pans once they are cooled.

“Butterscotch” Pudding
6 large egg yolks
¾ cup granulated sugar
¼ cup water
¼ cup heavy cream
½ cup dark brown sugar, firmly packed
1/3 cup cornstarch, sifted (tapioca starch would work a-okay too)
1 teaspoon salt
3 cups whole milk
1 vanilla bean
1 Tablespoon unsalted butter
2 Tablespoons whiskey (or you know, more than that)

1. Put egg yolks into heatproof bowl and set aside. In a small saucepan, combine white sugar and water and stir over medium heat until the sugar is dissolved, then increase heat to medium high and cook until mixture turns dark amber. Swirl the pan if necessary to distribute the color evenly, but do not stir. Remove form heat, let stand 1 minute, then stir in the cream. Pour into a small bowl and set aside.

2. In another small saucepan, combine brown sugar, cornstarch, and salt. Stir in milk, and whisk to combine. Split the vanilla bean lengthwise, and scrape out the seeds into the saucepan; toss in the bean husk. Cook over medium-high, whisking occasionally until the mixture comes to a boil. Remove from heat and add the caramel, whisking until combined, then pour one-third of the mixture over the eggs. Keep whisking and add another third, then transfer the egg mixture back to the pan with the milk mixture in the saucepan, and bring to a boil over medium-high. Boil 2 to 3 minutes.

3. Remove from head and add butter and whiskey. Keep whisking for about a minute to cool then let pudding sit for 15 minutes. Remove vanilla beans. Whisk pudding again until smooth, and divide into shells evenly, saving just a couple tablespoons in a separate bowl. Cover the tarts and bowl with plastic wrap, and chill in fridge for 2 hours. Before serving, whisk the pudding in the bowl, and add a dollop to each tart. Top with some chocolate-covered espresso beans, and you’re all set!

Cakewalk: Best Chocolate Cake Recipe with Almond Buttercream

This is a weighty claim to make, I know, but this is the best g.d. cake I have ever eaten. It seems like it would be a mocha cake, but it's really just a rad cake that gets all rich and delicious with the addition of coffee, which through some sort of chemistry science I do not understand, makes chocolate taste better. Science=delicious.

According to Corby Kummer, the cupcake pandemic is really only worth cheering on in the hopes that somebody somewhere will finally get the cupcake right. Novelty cupcakes and overkill cuteness be damned, and let’s get rid of dry cakes and grainy or greasy frosting while we’re at it. Excepting the rare encounter with a truly killer cupcake, I always leave bake shops feeling totally suckered by cute decorations and swirly buttercreams, and then immediately disappointed by bland cake and stale frosting. The proceeding recipe is like the panacea for paltry cake.

Besides being sifter-less, I was (and still am) clearly pastry-bag-less.

Best Chocolate Cake

To instantly disenchant yourself with cupcakeries, top this recipe with your favorite frosting. I'd recommend a boiled vanilla-bourbon frosting or chocolate ganache, because really I'm not so into buttercream. Butter=good on bread, freaky on cake. I'm not sure where this recipe is from originally. It's ubiquitous online, though you might see it with different proportions since it was originally made to be a ten-inch layer cake. The following proportions will work for two dozen cupcakes or a double layer caked baked in two nine-inch pans.

2 ounces high-quality semi-sweet chocolate (I used Ghiradelli)
1 cup hot brewed coffee (high-quality coffee is preferable, decaf. is fine; take care to avoid burning the coffee)
2 cups sugar
1 2/3 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (not Dutch process—I used an extra dark powder)
1 1/3 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 cup well-shaken buttermilk (1 cup regular milk plus 1 tablespoon white distilled vinegar, mixed together and left for ten minutes to curdle, will also work)
1/2 teaspoon vanilla

Preheat oven to 300 degrees F and prepare cupcake tins with liners. Lightly grease the pan before inserting the liners for easy removal of cupcakes.

Finely chop chocolate and in a bowl combine with hot coffee. Let mixture stand, stirring occasionally, until chocolate is melted and mixture is smooth.

Into a large bowl sift together sugar, flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. In another large bowl with an electric mixer beat eggs until thickened slightly and lemon colored (about 3 minutes with a standing mixer or 5 minutes with a hand-held mixer). Slowly add oil, buttermilk, vanilla, and melted chocolate mixture to eggs, beating until combined well. Add sugar mixture and beat on medium speed until just combined well.

Divide batter into cupcake tins, filling each one 3/4 full of batter. Bake for 25 to 27 minutes, or until a tester comes out clean. Do not overbake. If your oven bakes unevenly, be sure to rotate the pans halfway through baking. Let cupcakes cool in their pans for about 10 minutes, then gently remove, place on a rack, and let cool until ready to frost. Cupcakes are best eaten within the day, but will keep for three.

Almond Buttercream

1 cup sugar
1/4 cup water
3 egg whites
3 sticks unsalted butter, at room temperature
2 teaspoons almond extract

In a small saucepan on medium heat, bring sugar and water to boil. Stir to dissolve the sugar, and use a rubber spatula to scrape down the sides of the pan and keep the sugar from building up. Boil until the mixture reaches the soft-ball stage, or 238 degrees F. If you don’t have a candy thermometer, test for doneness by dripping the mixture into a glass of cold water; the mixture should adhere in pliable balls when ready.

In a large bowl, beat the egg whites on medium until frothy and pale, and continue to beat while slowly adding the hot syrup. Raise the speed to medium-high after all the syrup has been added, and beat until the mixture has cooled to body temperature.

Reduce speed to medium, and gradually beat in butter, 2 to 3 tablespoons at a time. At the end of adding the butter, the mixture will fall apart, but don’t despair! Keep beating and eventually the frosting will come together in a fluffy whip. Add the extract, and continue beating on medium until buttercream has the consistency of whipped butter. Frost your cakes, leftover cinnamon buns, your ice cream, your baby brother, what/whomever.

No-Nostalgia Chewy Amaretti Cookies

Just discovered: Click the photo to see a close-up of the amaretti crannies—food pornography at its finest.

There is nothing nostalgic about these cookies. "Chewy amaretti" doesn't exactly scream "childhood," and thank goodness because I am perfectly sick of nostalgia these days—no disrespect to my previously reverential posts. Simple and satisfying but wearing a fancy dress, the cookies provide respite from wanderlust and from your urgent desire to get back home. These will snap you into shape, reminding you that new good things are at your fingertips all the time, and that San Francisco is not a panacea, though it is a nice idea.

This is a delicious and welcome change from the everyday cookie—make them. Fill them with lemon curd or cherry jam. I think the chocolate ganache was a little overwhelming and that an almond-complementing jelly (raspberry or even strawberry if you have a sweet tooth) or custard (vanilla) would work best. And don't worry if you don't actually own a food processor—my housemate's coffee grinder and some of my most unheard of patience worked just fine.








I had no idea what amaretti meant before I made these. I thought it was a liqueur. If your taste-testers need help understanding what exactly it is you are foisting upon them, say these are "Italian macarons" and you'll be on the more right, less booze-guided track than I was on. Also, as you can tell from the photos, I baked cookies that were both well-done and medium-rare. I ended up preferring the lighter set, but the almond flavor is more pronounced in the darker ones. I'd say make 'em both ways.

No-Nostalgia Chewy Amaretti
Adapted from Gourmet, January 2009

1 (7-ounce) tube pure almond paste (not marzipan)
1 cup sugar
Pinch salt
2 large egg whites at room temperature for at least 30 minutes

1. Preheat oven to 300°F and line two large sheet pans with parchment paper (splurge for the parchment paper if you don't already have any!).

2. Pulse almond paste, sugar, and salt in a food processor until sandy, then add egg whites and puree until smooth. If you're me, you'll do this step in a coffee grinder, meaning that egg whites should be added in a large, separate bowl and mixed with an egg beater.

3. Transfer batter to pastry bag fitted with a 3/8-inch tip and pipe 3/4-inch rounds (1/3 inch high) about 1-inch apart in pans. Dip a fingertip in water and gently tamp down any peaks. When I read that step, I saw a bunch of numbers flying at me and decided to just cut the corner off a sandwich bag and pipe out rounds through that until I thought they were big enough—about the size of quarters.

4. Bake, rotating and switching position of pans halfway through (but only if you don't want to test the light-dark thing), until golden and puffed, 15 to 18 minutes.

5. Let cookies cool almost completely in their pans. Once cool, lift the parchment off the pans and slide the cookies off with a spatula. Sandwich the cookies using jam (cherry! apricot!), ganache (about 4 ounces semi-sweet chips to 2 tablespoons heavy cream), or a custard.

Eat, enjoy, and forget about San Francisco—they don't have chewy amaretti cookies there anyway.

Kale Rebellion: Double Chocolate Rads

Well I have certainly been having an embarrassing time at the grocery store lately. Last week after leaving the gym, I stopped at my neighborhood grocery store (understocked and overpriced as is the DC way) and pranced around the baking and dairy aisles looking for ingredients for one set of cookies and anticipating ingredients for the next. I ended up at the checkout aisle behind another young woman who had also just left the gym and who had actually been walking in front of me and down most of the same aisles during my ingredient-finding endeavor. The difference was that somehow her basket was filled with produce, dried fruits, nuts, whole grain everything, and enough plain yogurt to make this creamy-grits-wielding, yogurt-scoffing baker feel ashamed of her chocolate cache.

My tiny kitchen (employed by six people) makes multi-tasking a necessity.

Behind my fellow gym-goer’s sort of beautiful and rather inspiring lode of healthy food, I plunked down four pounds of butter, two pounds of bittersweet chocolate, two bags of semi-sweet chips, some heavy cream, all-purpose flour, and a head of purple cabbage to confuse anyone who might have been wondering what sort of flagrant disregard for diabetes and cholesterol I have. My gym pal eyed my soon-to-be-purchases and assessed my gym outfit and my flushed cheeks before I asked her save my place in line while I ran 15 feet to the produce section. I returned triumphantly with a bunch of kale, which I laid conspicuously atop my butter, leaving that gym-going girl to wonder bemusedly what sort of diet I must be playing at. In any case, this was neither the first nor last time I have left a grocery store feeling rather shamed, but it is the first time that I felt pressure to buy kale to make up for it.

See how airy the batter is? Those bubbles signify ungodly delicious things.

Well, I guess I was hoping that the kale would be some sort of talisman to ward off my bad habits and sugar binges, but that forgotten green bundle sat around in my vegetable crisper until it wilted. Apparently, I had bigger, sweeter things to worry about. I don’t want to get into the habit of proclaiming “favorites” and “bests” on this blog because I don’t want to have to stop baking at recipe number 10 and admit that I don’t have anything amazing left to make. With a resounding however, however, I have to say that that chocolate cookies that resulted from my shaming shopping experience were the singly most delicious cookies I have had in years. I might insert my big foot into my big mouth later this month when I take a stab at the famous World Peace Cookies, but until then, I have to assert that these Chocolate Rads are, quite simply, tops. My sweets-loathing friend referred to them as “incredible,” and they made my CFO stop mid-sentence and mid-bite to utter a mild expletive and turn really far-away-eyed and quiet.

Like the crackled crust of the pound cake, these crinkled tops were nearly impossible not to detach and eat alone.

This reminds me that I have been very content to cook on Sundays these days since I can foist my leftover baked goods upon unsuspecting, Monday-bummed coworkers. Last Sunday was no exception. After a baby mouse (not as cute as he sounds) made a throne atop my Sunday-afternoon oatmeal cookies (which I promptly threw into the trash), I decided to double-do my Sunday and go for the Chocolate Rads I’d been drooling over on Orangette for weeks. Well, their crispy crust is reminiscent of pecan crackles and other cookies that rely on egg whites, but this recipe relies on chocolate. The batter is so fluffy, yielding, and rich, it has the texture of softened rocky road ice cream without the nuts. A brief round in the fridge makes the batter workable before you drop it by hearty scoopfulls onto baking sheets and let the oven do its alchemy. Actually, before the melted chocolate is added, the batter has an airy texture not dissimilar from fresh meringue. In any case, these cookies are delicious and dangerous, and even though I accidentally left them at home Monday, they held up perfectly in the designated cookie tupperware until Tuesday, and my coworkers appreciated the crinkly shell and gooey interior just as much as I had on Sunday night.

I make no excuses. Four of these composed my Monday-morning breakfast.

So even though my Thursday night ended in post-gym sheepishness, my weekend was without kale and my Sunday culminated a chocolate bliss that was a subtly and just-so rebellious way to ring in a new workweek. When kale is unthinkable, I'd rather rejoice with cookies than sulk with a carrot, so enjoy! Again, coffee is the perfect accompaniment, and if you're a fruity type like my mother, a swath of good cherry jam might be the perfect breakfast accessory.

I love how distinct the skyline of the chocolate-y shell is in this picture. The insides gush with chips and a soft center that contrasts satisfyingly with the cookie's crackled outsides.

Chocolate Rads
Adapted from Bon Appétit and via Orangette

1 pound bittersweet chocolate, chopped (I used Ghiaradelli)
1 ¾ cups granulated sugar
4 large eggs
4 Tbs unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly
1 Tbs pure vanilla extract
1 tsp instant espresso
½ cup cake flour (I used all-purpose, and it worked fine, but the original calls for cake)
1 tsp baking powder
¼ tsp salt
2 cups (about one bag) good-quality semisweet chocolate chips (I used Guittard)

1. Melt the bittersweet chocolate in a double-boiler or metal bowl set over gently simmering water. Stir until smooth, then remove from heat, and set aside.

2. In a large bowl, combine the sugar and eggs, and beat with an electric mixer until thick and pale yellow and somewhat fluffy, about three to five minutes. Add the melted chocolate, melted butter, vanilla extract, and espresso powder, and beat to mix thoroughly.

3. Sift the flour, baking powder, and salt into small bowl. Add the dry ingredients to the chocolate mixture, and stir with a rubber spatula to just combine. (The batter will be sticky and hard to work with, but it's okay!) Stir in chocolate chips. Place the bowl in the refrigerator, and chill until the batter is firm, for about 30 minutes.

4. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Either lightly butter and flour two large cookie sheets or, better yet, line them with parchment paper. Drop the batter by large scoops – I used an ice cream scoop and a big spoon, both at about two tablespoons each – onto sheets, leaving about two inches of space around each mound of dough. With moist fingertips, press down on each ball to flatten it slightly. Bake the cookies until tops look dry and crackled, about 11-13 minutes. Do not overbake. Transfer the cookies on the parchment paper to a wire rack, and allow to cool completely. Repeat with remaining dough, remembering to keep the dough in the fridge between each set of cookies. Remove finished cookies from the parchment paper, and store them in airtight container.

Note: I froze a portion of these cookies for my housemates, and they were delicious once restored to room temperature, and even a little delicious still frozen. They hold up wonderfully to a frozen wait!

Do It Better than Sara Lee

I fear that I might be setting a bad precedent here. First with the boxed brownie praise, and now I am going to confess another unrespectable crush from my childhood relationship with baked goods. I, dear reader(s), was mighty obsessed with Sara Lee pound cake. Truly. The cardboard label atop the buttery brick of a cake was held in place by a roll-up-roll-down aluminum frame, whose ridges I would ceremoniously pry up one by one until the cardboard top had been released from its holder, and I was free to dive into the cake. “Plunge” might be a more accurate verb since it better connotes the cake’s bulky thickness; Sara Lee never made a light and gracious pound cake.

I had to splurge for an egg beater--finally! It is necessary to have some sort of butter-whipping device, or a very strong and committed arm, to make this cake.

I must admit that I even had a favorite knife for cutting the cake. It was a mock-pearl-handled silver knife with brass screws and a serrated edge—it cut the cake into smooth, crumbs-intact slices. I used to spin circles on my family’s wooden bar stools, eating one thick slice after another with piles of Reddi Whipped Cream (oh, cringe again!) and strawberries if they were around. A few times, I tried broiling slices of pound cake with honey in our oven, but for some sugary reason the habit never caught on. In any case, that cake was the stuff of after-school dreams. Buttery as all hell and with a smooth crumb and a delightfully browned crust, I don’t mean to sing its praises so heartily, but my goodness, was it ever a mighty fine cake.

Good gracious. This crackled crust is the most delicious. I would slice it off and eat it alone were that not arguably an act of baking sacrilege.

Fast forward to the maturation of my taste buds, and you’ll see that I have come very far in my development of a properly discerning palate. Like brownies, however, pound cake has frequently lurked beneath my homebaking adult radar because I’ve had a hard time imagining the dessert in any form other than coffin-shaped and heavy as a brick. After making a few lemon pound cakes here and there, but not really liking them at all, I sort of forgot about pound cake. At my favorite cafe in Berkeley, I would always bypass the pound cake for a vegan cookie, a chocolate cupcake, or a few macaroons. Well, along came a recipe for cream cheese pound cake via Deb over at Smitten Kitchen, and I realized that it had been some years since I’d even attempted to recall the taste of such a cake. Suddenly those chocolate cupcakes I’d been meaning to make took a backseat. So did the lemon meringue pie, the pistachio-cherry chocolate squares, and the chocolate chip gingersnaps. I refreshed Deb’s pictures of the cake for days before I finally found a decent excuse (Lady Adventure Evening) to try out the recipe on some similarly food-inclined friends.

You can see at the bottom where the cake sunk a bit, but it didn't get gummy, just richer and more delicious.

Let me cut to the chase and tell you that there was not a crumb of disappointment. This pound cake tastes, looks, smells, and feels spectacular. It rose marvelously, and while it did sink a touch, I am convinced this was because my Bundt pan is ten cups when it should be 12, and so the cake did not have enough support. But the vanilla taste is smooth and inviting, the crumbs are velvety, and the cake is thick and buttery without being dense or gummy. What’s more, the addition of cream cheese makes a delightful crackled crust that is nearly impossible not to pick off and eat once the cake is out of the oven. This is a tremendous cake. I can only provide so much external feedback, because between my six friends and I, this cake for 12 was gone in two days. What’s worse is that this cake gets better with age, or sweeter anyway. I had a slice for breakfast with a heaping cup of coffee in the cake’s fortieth hour, and it was even more delicious that it had been straight out of the oven. Without further ado, I should present the recipe to you, with the suggestion to stick with the almond extract--overwhelming though I know it can be--and adapt as you see fit. I think it would be delicious with some crystallized ginger thrown in or eaten with some fresh berries. At ladies' night, we topped ours with mango, and if you were so inclined, I think a mango coulis would be good because you could get a spoonful of syrup with every bite. Seriously though, this cake is delicious plain, and with a twirl of honey and a handful of chopped almonds, you could have yourself a pretty impressive brunch contribution. Bake away and let me know what you think!

Cream Cheese Pound Cake
By Way of Smitten Kitchen

Here I must implore to you get a baking thermometer. I recently discovered that my oven is a whole 25 degrees cooler than it should be. This will be the best six bucks that Target ever set you back if you're a committed baker. And if you're not a committed or ever a frequent baker, I still highly recommend one because it's made my relationship with my oven tons more harmonious.

1 1/2 cups (3 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 package (8 ounces) cream cheese, at room temperature
3 cups sugar
6 large eggs
1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract plus 1/2 teaspoon almond extract
3 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt

1. Preheat the oven to 325°F. Lightly butter and flour a 12-cup Bundt pan.

2. Place the butter and cream cheese in a large bowl and beat with a mixer on medium speed until smooth. Add the sugar, increase the speed to high, and beat until light and airy, at least five minutes. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating after each addition and scraping down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula as needed. Add the vanilla, almond, then the flour and salt all at once. Beat just until incorporated.

3. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and even out the top with a rubber spatula or by shaking gently. Bake until the cake is golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the cake comes out clean, 1 1/4 hours.

4. Place the pan on a cake rack and cool for 20 minutes, then remove the cake from the pan and let it cool completely. Serve at room temperature.

Pudding Packet Revolution

I grew up baking brownies from a Duncan Hines box. I'm not certain I know anyone who really didn't, and I remember feeling revolutionized when they added pudding packets to the mix. I don't like to credit boxed mixes with having too much to do with my baking upbringing, but I reveled in measuring out my three-fourth cups of oil perfectly and cracking the single egg directly into the powdery center of my baking bowl. I think that the pudding packet is what gave me my taste for dense, fudgey brownies that have some structural integrity, but are most lovable for their profound, chocolate overload.

Ghiradelli 100% unsweetened chocolate, chopped for Cook's Illustrated batch

I'm not sure that brownies and I got off to the proper start through. I can claim an early love of the aforementioned DH pudding semi-masterpieces--though I wouldn't touch boxed brownies now unless you menaced me--but the first time I baked brownies from scratch was when I was going through my requisite vegan phase at Berkeley. What eventually became my go-to recipe impressed the hell out of me because until then, my vegan dessert staple had been a scoop (or several) of peanut butter, rolled in chocolate chips and coconut. I guess my brownie bar was set pretty low, and it wasn't until I started feeling serious about baking that I realized that my brownie repertoire was in dire need of some updating. I had always been scared to bake brownies from scratch, however, because their deliciousness is seriously embedded into my memories of childhood, and I was nervous to upset the nostalgia.

Cook's Illustrated final product--a touch underbaked, but cohesive, delicious squares

A good brownie, in my opinion, is the best inducer of childhood indulgence. It should be undeniably rich but not overly so, fudgey in the middle with a satisfyingly crisp outer shell. Crumbs should be manageably sticky, but not gummy, and I prefer a deep dark chocolate to the pale and milky sort that leads to a rather Play-Doh-tasting brownie. This may be a holdover from my vegan days, but I think that a cold glass of almond milk is a terrific accompaniment, since its nutty flavor cuts through the chocolate and brings out all that is deep and earthy about proper brownies.

Cook's Illustrated stacks--crackly shells with a soft, thick interior

In my quest to pinpoint exactly which brownie satisfies my demanding and indulgent need for baked goods, I narrowed down my recipe bloc to two contenders that have been beckoning to me for months now. The first is a product of Cook's Illustrated wiz Erica Bruce, and the recipe was published as the perfect response to our childhood need for decadence with simplicity. The second comes from the two fellows behind Brooklyn's inspiring (seriously, inspiring--their baked goods are so toothsome) Baked bakery in Red Hook.

Baked version--ungodly rich and so fudgey, underbaked in spite of an additional 20 minutes of oven time

The first three photos in this post are from the Cook's Illustrated recipe, which uses an amount of chocolate that is modest compared to the Baked brownie, and swaps out all-purpose flour for cake flour which reduces the granular feeling that can sometimes accompany baked goods that use quite a bit of white sugar. The CI version baked nearly to perfection, even though I have a tendency to underbake (I will readily eat an overbaked brownie, but the texture reminds me too much of dry, store-bought cake to be thoroughly enjoyable), and the taste and texture were everything I needed: crackled exterior, rich, fudgey middle, and with an expansive chocolate taste that made it nearly impossible to stop myself from eating four in a row. These brownies were ever better on the second day, and next time I make them, I think I will refrigerate the batter for a few hours before baking, to allow the egg to thoroughly absorb the dry ingredients and promote that fugdey taste that is so crucial. The Baked ones would have been delicious over ice cream, but alone, they were simply too rich for me (who thought this day would ever come!). The Baked brownie uses two types of chocolate and is absolutely, deliciously decadent, but I prefer the simplicity of the Cook's Illustrated brownie. I think with its incredibly deep chocolate profile, however, the Baked brownie would take a spice (such as smoked paprika) or a stripe of caramel nicely. Let me know if you try anything!

Classic Brownie
Cook's Illustrated

1¼ cups cake flour
½ teaspoon salt
¾ teaspoon baking powder
6 ounces unsweetened chocolate, chopped fine
12 tablespoons (1½ sticks) unsalted butter, cut into six 1-inch pieces
2¼ cups sugar
4 large eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla extract

1. Adjust oven rack to middle position; heat oven to 325 degrees. Cut 18-inch length foil and fold lengthwise to 8-inch width. Fit a length of two of foil into a 13 by 9-inch baking dish, pushing it into corners and up sides of pan; allow excess to overhand pan edges. Spray foil-lined pan with nonstick cooking spray.

2. Whisk to combine flour, salt, and baking powder in medium bowl; set aside.

3. Melt chocolate and butter in large heatproof bowl set over saucepan of almost-simmering water, stirring occasionally, until smooth. When chocolate mixture is completely smooth, remove bowl from saucepan and gradually whisk in sugar. Add eggs on at a time, whisking after each addition until thoroughly combined. Whisk in vanilla. Add flour mixture in three additions, folding with rubber spatula until batter is completely smooth and homogeneous.

5. Transfer batter to prepared pan; using spatula, spread batter into corners of pan and smooth surface. Bake until toothpick inserted into center of brownies comes out with few moist crumbs attached, 30 to 35 minutes. Cool on wire rack to room temperature, about 2 hours, then remove brownies from pan by lifting foil overhang. Cut and serve brownies, and keep remainders in the freezer to eat at your leisure.

Baked Brownie
From the folks at Baked bakery

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons dark unsweetened cocoa powder
11 ounces dark chocolate (60 to 72% cacao), coarsely chopped
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, cut into 1-inch pieces
1 teaspoon instant espresso powder
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
1/2 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
5 large eggs, at room temperature
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Butter the sides and bottom of a 9 x 13 glass or light-colored metal baking pan.

2. In a medium bowl, whisk the flour, salt, cocoa powder (and spices if you’re using them), r.

3. Put the chocolate, butter, and instant espresso powder in a large bowl and set it over a saucepan of simmering water, stirring occasionally, until the chocolate and butter are completely melted and smooth. Turn off the heat, but keep the bowl over the water and add the sugars. Whisk until completely combined, then remove the bowl from the pan. The mixture should be room temperature.

4. Add 3 eggs to the chocolate mixture and whisk until combined. Add the remaining eggs and whisk until combined. Add the vanilla and stir until combined. Do not overbeat the batter at this stage or your brownies will be cakey.

5. Sprinkle the flour mixture over the chocolate mixture. Using a spatula (not a whisk), fold the flour mixture into the chocolate until just a bit of the flour mixture is visible.

6. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top. Bake in the center of the oven for 30 minutes (I had to bake for 50, to no avail), rotating the pan halfway through the baking time, until a toothpick inserted into the center of the brownies comes out with a few moist crumbs sticking to it. Let the brownies cool completely, then cut them int osquares and serve.

The Gastronomical Me

The thing is that I am worried I won't have enough to share. For someone who has her fair share of things going on, I am concerned that the good words will fail to come, and this blog will lilt into an overly prose-y sinkhole. I will always try to get back to what I know, however, and forget the poetics of blog-writing so I can tell you straight up what I'm all about: Food.

Eating, cooking, occasionally foraging, but mostly baking, I have realized that food has become my lifeforce in the totally non-nutritional, non-science-y way. People, art, wanderlusting, and academics (my former full-time pursuits) still decidedly revolve around my newly created planet of food exploration, but my greatest joys have, for the past oh say lifetime, consistently come from the process of making food. I could get into the historical connections, hypothesize about rebelling against the microwave TV dinners of my childhood, or explain how much I like the ritual of preparing food, but I haven't yet figured out how to be charming enough for musings. I'll save the anecdotes for later on if you can just stick with me for a tick.

I hope for this to be a space of baking experiments, comparisons, learning, and critique, as I attempt to negotiate what it means to be a food blogger and find a way to avoid the drudgery of adult life with a real job.