Tag Archives: sweets

Cranberry Upside Down Cake

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Cranberry Upside Down CakeCranberries happen to be a delicious, fall fruit that Wisconsin harvests a lot of. Thankfully, they’re abundant at harvest time, and freeze so easily that I stock up every year. Just for times like this – dreary, cool summer days. I love these little fruits. And, they’re wonderful in this easy to make cake. The subtle tartness of the cranberries mixed with the sweetness of the cake are perfect together, and remarkably light, making this a perfect little desert when Wisconsin weather can’t make up its mind about which season it should be in.

Cranberry Upside Down CakeLike I said, it’s easy to make too, with minimal ingredients and an eight inch cake pan, an electric mixer and a few mixing bowls.

Here’s what you’ll need – the ingredient list:

  • 8 tablespoons of unsalted butter, room temperature (Earth Balance vegan butter sticks work so good here, and bonus! No cholesterol in them!)
  • 1 cup granulated sugar
  • 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon (as always, I highly recommend Saigon cinnamon, it’s fabulous!)
  • 1/4 teaspoon allspice
  • 1 3/4 cups cranberries
  • 1 large egg
  • 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
  • 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 cup milk

The first thing you’ll want to do is preheat your oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Since the last time I posted a baking recipe we got a new Samsung oven that actually heats up to 350 degrees! Quickly! It beats that 20 year old Jenn Air I used to bake with. Yet I do miss it. Don’t tell Hubby please. You know that was an old oven when the new oven’s delivery man says at first sight of the old oven, “Wow, that’s old.” Yeah, whatever, just give me the new one…..

Anyway…

Cranberry Upside Down CakeNext, rub the sides and bottom of the cake pan with a couple of tablespoons of your butter.

Cranberry Upside Down CakeThen, in a small bowl, whisk 1/2 cup of the sugar with the cinnamon and allspice and sprinkle your mixture evenly over the bottom of the cake pan.

Cranberry Upside Down CakeThen arrange the cranberries evenly over your cinnamon mixture on the bottom of the pan. Oh how I want to dive into this picture….

Cranberry Upside Down CakeNow, in your electric mixer, cream the remaining 6 tablespoons of butter with the last 1/2 cup of sugar until light and fluffy. Now add the egg and vanilla and beat until combined. Yours will look better than this, I promise. I can never achieve the proper creaminess of that fluffy texture. I’m guessing because the butter is never quite at room temperature.

Cranberry Upside Down CakeIn another medium bowl, whisk the flour, baking powder and salt together.

Cranberry Upside Down CakeWith the mixer on low, add the flour mixture to the butter mixture in three separate batches, alternating with the 1/2 cup of milk until all the ingredients are well combined.

Cranberry Upside Down CakeIt will look a lot like this. So pretty, in an appetizing kind of way.

Cranberry Upside Down CakeTake your beautiful cake batter and spoon it over the cranberries in your cake pan.

Cranberry Upside Down CakeI used a small rubber spatula to even out the top for optimum cake beauty.

Bake cake on a cookie sheet for 30-35 minutes.

Cranberry Upside Down Cake Yeah, so much for optimum cake beauty, right? Doesn’t matter, this side is going to be the bottom of the cake. Whew.

Cranberry Upside Down CakeOnce the cake has cooled on a wire rack for 20 minutes, run a knife around the edge of your cake to loosen it up.

Cranberry Upside Down CakeThen invert it onto your favorite cake serving plate.

Cranberry Upside Down CakeYour beautiful cake is done. This is so simple to make. I keep saying that, but it bears repeating because it’s just so good! Honest.

Cranberry Upside Down CakeDive in and enjoy!

Martha knows cake: This recipe is adapted from one by Martha Stewart in her cookbook, Everyday Food.

Serves 8. (We actually got about 12 smaller servings)

Per (8 piece) serving:

  • Calories – 349
  • carbs – 55g
  • fat – 13g (7g saturated)
  • protein – 4g
  • cholesterol- 31g

(These numbers were figured on the Fitness Pal recipe calculator using regular butter. Calories, fat and cholesterol levels go down quite a bit when using Earth Balance buttery sticks instead.)

Cardamom Braid

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In the scope of things, this bread has been the teensiest little ray of joy in the past few days. I’ll take it. When it turned out, I actually stopped and smiled. A new thing for me, since last Friday anyway. While I had no plans of writing a post this week (I am having a hard time just completing a sentence), I absolutely had to share this. With the hope that one of you will try it just to see what I mean. If you were here, I’d make it for you. I wish you were here.

This Cardamom Braid is a delicately sweet little bread that takes very little prep time and is easy to mix together. Serve it warm, with some honey butter (just add honey to taste to your butter), and you’ve got a little slice of paradise. It’s one of those things I love to have on hand for weekend (or Holiday) mornings.

Cardamom BraidOkay, so mine isn’t beautiful, but it doesn’t need to be to taste good and make you smile. Can you see the little pieces of orange zest in there? Oh my. For me, they’re everything (along with the cardamom) in this. There’s just enough to sweeten the bread a little bit, making it downright perfect.

The recipe is below, but here’s a few photos of it along the way:

Cardamom BraidFirst, you have to activate the package of yeast in warm water. Let it sit for 10 minutes while you mix up the other ingredients. Once the yeast is activated, add it to the mixture of other ingredients. Let it rest for another 10 minutes, then turn it all out on a lightly floured surface. Add enough of the flour so you have a smooth, elastic dough. Knead for 3-5 minutes by hand, or a little less time with your electric mixer and dough hook. Shape into a ball and place the dough in a lightly oiled bowl. Turn the ball once, to cover it with oil. Mine looked like this. Then, cover the bowl and set it in a warm place to rise (I always use my microwave for this) for an hour to an hour and a quarter. You want the dough to double in size.

Once it’s risen, punch down the dough and let it rest for another 10 minutes.

Cardamom BraidNow, split the dough into 3 equal parts. Roll each part out into 14-inch long ropes. (You can see mine weren’t perfect, but it didn’t matter in the least, they were still remarkably good). Place the ropes on a lightly greased baking sheet, one inch a part….

Cardamom Braid…then loosely braid. Start in the middle, it’s easier. Braid both ends…

cardamombread5…pinch the ends together and tuck under. Cover the cookie sheet, and let it sit for another hour or so, until the braids have doubled in size again.

cardamombread3Once the final rising is done, lightly brush the braid with water and sprinkle with coarse sugar. I used Raw Sugar, and it worked very well.

cardamombread2Bake at 375 degrees F for 25-30 minutes. I had to place some foil over mine after about 15 minutes to prevent the bread from over-browning. Keep an eye on it to see if you need to do the same.

Making bread seems like a long, complicated process (at least I used to think so), but it’s not. The truth is, the hands on time for this bread is less than a half hour, the rest is rising and baking. And THAT is time well spent, in this case. I’m sure yours will be prettier than mine, but either way, the Cardamom Braid is such a joy to eat. And we could all use a little bit of joy right now, no matter how small it is. Take your time and enjoy it….

Cardamom Braid Recipe

Thank you Midwest Living

Ingredients:

  • 1 package active dry yeast
  • 1 teaspoon sugar
  • 1/4 cup warm water (105 degrees to 115 degrees )
  • 3/4 cup warm milk (105 degrees to 115 degrees )
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1/4 cup butter, melted and cooled
  • 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
  • 1 tablespoon finely shredded fresh orange peel
  • 3/4 teaspoon ground cardamom
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 3 1/2-4 cups all-purpose flour
  • Coarse raw sugar

Directions:

In a small mixing bowl, dissolve yeast and 1 teaspoon sugar in the warm water; set aside for 10 minutes.

In a large mixing bowl, combine the warm milk, 1/2 cup sugar, the melted and cooled butter, oil, orange peel, cardamom and salt. Beat with an electric mixer on low to medium speed until combined. Stir in 1 cup of the flour. Add the yeast mixture. Beat with an electric mixer on low to medium speed for 30 seconds, scraping bowl constantly. Beat on high speed for 3 minutes. Using a wooden spoon, stir in 2 cups flour, one cup at a time. (The dough should be slightly slightly wet.) Cover; let dough rest for 10 minutes.

Turn out dough onto a lightly floured surface. Knead in enough of the remaining flour to make a moderately soft dough that is smooth and elastic (3 to 5 minutes total). Shape dough into a ball. Place in a lightly greased bowl, turning once to grease the surface. Cover; let rise in a warm place until doubled in size (1 to 1 1/4 hours).

Punch down dough. Turn out dough onto a lightly floured surface. Cover; let rest for 10 minutes.

Divide dough into thirds. Shape each portion into a 14-inch-long rope. Place the ropes 1 inch apart on a lightly greased baking sheet. Starting in the middle, loosely braid to each end. Pinch the ends to seal and tuck under the loaf. Cover; let rise in a warm place until nearly doubled (about 1 hour).

Lightly brush or mist top of braids with water; sprinkle with coarse, raw sugar.

Bake in a 375 degrees oven for 25 to 30 minutes or until bread sounds hollow when you tap the top. (Internal temperature should be 180 degrees ) If necessary to prevent overbrowning, cover loosely with foil for the last 10 minutes of baking. Remove from baking sheet. Cool on a wire rack.

Blueberry Dumplings

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It’s shameful that I’ve never shared this recipe before. It’s one of my favorites. I’ve been eating these blueberry dumplings for several years now. They make a sweet little weekend breakfast for us, but an equally good dessert. If you like blueberries you will love this, I promise.
BlueberryDumplings2One of the reasons I love this recipe is because it’s from one of my favorite places:

contextThe Gunflint Trail region of northern Minnesota.

The Gunflint Trail is a 57 mile scenic byway from the north shore of Lake Superior to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area. The scenery is incredible, the people are some of the nicest I’ve met in my travels and I love the quiet places I always seem to find up there. The trail has been, and still is, dotted with little inns and lodges filled with history, and yes, some pretty amazing old family recipes. This recipe comes from The Rockwood Lodge, and it’s owner Ann Clark, who served it to her guests when she and her husband Dave owned the lodge in the late 1940′s. It’s still in business today.

I have to wonder what else they served at the lodges back in the day? If these dumplings are any indication of the food they served on a daily basis, I’m sure I would have lived there. :)

There are three things I adore about this recipe: 1. It comes from a place I love; 2. It’s very simple to make; and, 3. It has blueberries! I have such a big crush on blueberries…

Want to try it?

To make the dumplings:

BlueberryDumplings5Mix together 3/4 of a cup of all-purpose flour, 1/4 cup of sugar, 3/4 of a teaspoon of baking powder, a 1/2 of a tablespoon of butter, a pinch of salt and 1/4 cup of milk. I used a hand mixer, but you can do it by hand too. Either way you’ll get a little ball of sticky dough that looks like this. Set it aside, and move on to the blueberry mixture:

BlueberryDumplings4Heat 2 cups of blueberries (fresh or frozen), 1/2 cup of water, 1/2 cup of sugar and a pinch of salt over medium heat. Bring just to a boil, then drop teaspoons of the dumpling dough into the blueberries.

BlueberryDumplings3Place a cover over the mixture and let it cook for 10 minutes. Don’t take the cover off while it’s cooking, just let everything boil. After the 10 minutes, your mix will look like this and your house will smell terrific. You’re welcome :)

BlueberryDumplings1Serve warm for breakfast, or for dessert.

This recipe makes 4-6 servings, depending on the portion size. I used an 8 ounce ramekin to serve it to myself today. It is so hard to control myself with this one! But I promised to save some for Hubby. If you have leftovers like I did this morning, just store it in the refrigerator for up to 2 days. Reheat over medium heat.

Enjoy!

Blueberry Dumplings Recipe

from Ann Clark, late 1940′s owner of The Rockwood Lodge on The Gunflint Trail

Ingredients for the dumplings:

  • 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
  • 1/4 cup sugar
  • 2 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1/2 tablespoon butter
  • pinch of salt
  • 1/4 cup milk

Ingredients for blueberry sauce:

  • 2 cups blueberries (fresh or frozen)
  • 1/2 cup water
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1/8 teaspoon salt

Directions:

For the dumplings: Mix flour, sugar, baking powder, butter, salt and milk until a sticky dough is made.

Combine blueberries, water, 1/2 cup sugar and 1/8 teaspoon salt and cook over medium heat until berries are tender and mixture just begins to boil. Drop dough by teaspoons full in boiling blueberry mix. Cover and cook over medium heat for 10 minutes. Cool slightly, but serve warm.

Honey Yogurt Ice Cream

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Um. Remember yesterday when I was all excited to travel with Hubby to his job meetings this summer? Well. Guess who left without me this morning? Apparently, 200 pounds of dogs, the wife and 2 guys from his office would make for a very crowded Ford Edge to ride in for six hours. I didn’t get to go this time.

Of course I pouted. For a minute. Then I got over it, kissed Hubby goodbye, and made ice cream.

Really, really good ice cream. This Honey Yogurt Ice Cream was so much fun to make. It’s the first time I’ve used eggs to make an ice cream (remember, I’m a rookie at this). Using them makes a fuller, richer ice cream than the others I’ve made so far. I was surprised at how well the honey flavor broke through the tangy flavor of the yogurt. This recipe of creamy goodness had the perfect blend of flavors and took just 10 minutes or so of hands on time. It came out perfect. Again :)

NOTE: If you don’t have an ice cream maker, read David Lebovitz’s terrific instructions on how to make ice cream without an ice cream maker right here. It works very well!

To start this recipe, you’ll need to slowly heat 3/4 cup of milk, 3/4 cup of heavy cream and 3 tablespoons of honey in a large saucepan. You’ll want to bring it close to boiling, without actually boiling it. And, you must stir constantly as you heat the mixture. When it’s good and hot, remove from the heat and set aside while you do the next step:

In a large bowl, add 4 egg yolks and a 1/2 cup of sugar.

You can use regular sugar, but I highly recommend this superfine baker’s sugar (in the same aisle at the grocery store as regular sugar). It’s, well, super fine and dissolves nicely into whatever you’re making. I recently discovered it and love the creamy texture it gives things. Like ice cream! :)

Whisk the eggs and sugar together so they’re nice and smooth.

Now, add just a little bit of the milk, cream and honey mixture you heated through in the beginning. Just a little. To temper the eggs so they don’t scramble. Whisk constantly until your mix looks like this.

Now, put the egg mixture into the pan with the rest of the milk, cream and honey mixture and whisk over low heat until you start to notice it thickening a little. At this point, pour the mixture in a bowl and let it cool. Then, put it in the refrigerator for 30 minutes.

After you’ve refrigerated the mixture, add 2 cups of plain yogurt and 1 teaspoon of lemon juice.

Whisk it until you have a smooth mixture like this, and pour into your ice cream maker. According to your ice cream maker’s instructions, turn it on and let it process into a magical, wonderful ice cream. This took my Cuisinart model about 15 minutes.

Yay! Ice cream! I let mine sit in the freezer, in a covered container, for a couple of hours before I tasted it….

…with a little bit of orange blossom honey. What a great summer sundae! This recipe made about a quart of ice cream. At this point I really didn’t care anymore that Hubby left me home today. :) There’s always next time, right?

Yep, Day 2 of my 98 days of summer has gone pretty well so far. How was your day?

Honey Yogurt Ice Cream Recipe

Ingredients:

  • 3/4 cup milk (any kind will do)
  • 3/4 cup heavy cream
  • 3 tablespoons honey
  • 1/2 cup superfine sugar
  • 4 egg yolks
  • 2 cup plain yogurt
  • 1 teaspoon lemon juice

Directions:

Add milk, cream and honey into a large saucepan and bring slowly almost to a boil. Stir constantly. Remove from heat

Beat sugar and egg yolks together in a large bowl until foamy. Slowly pour in a little of the milk mixture, stirring constantly. Combine with the milk mixture in the saucepan and return to stove. Cook over low heat, stirring constantly, until the mixture thickens slightly. About 3 minutes. Transfer to a large bowl and cool. Then, refrigerate for 30 minutes.

Stir in the yogurt and lemon juice, then freeze in an ice cream maker according to manufacturer’s instructions. Transfer to a covered container and keep in freezer.

If you don’t have an ice cream maker you can still make this! Read David Lebovitz’s easy, detailed instructions on how to make ice cream without an ice cream maker HERE.

 

Tangerine-Pistachio Sticky Buns

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I hereby swear that this will be the last sweet thing I eat in 2011. Because of the holidays, I’m sweetened out. Are you?

Try these anyway, they’ll make you happy. :) Despite my sugar coma, I just HAD to post the recipe for these Tangerine-Pistachio Sticky Buns because they are marvelous. We made these Christmas Eve morning and they started the Christmas holiday off perfectly.

This recipe is adapted from one in the December issue of Everyday Food (that I can’t get to on the internet for some reason). They’re nice and fluffy with a balanced blend of sweet, tart and a touch of nutty flavors. The tiny bit of crunch the pistachios give these rolls is perfect.

The smell and taste of the citrus in this recipe takes me back to summer, and there’s nothing wrong with that. Why? Because we’re stuck in some kind of funky weather pattern that has left us with no snow and a lot of dark, dreary, gloomy days. This is Wisconsin for Pete’s sake, we’re supposed to have snow, and lots of it, by now. Instead we have muddy gloom. THAT’S why I’m loving the reminder of summer these precious little buns brought with them :) .

The printer-friendly PDF recipe for these delicious sticky buns is below.

To get started, put a 1/2 cup of shelled pistachios with a 1/2 cup of brown sugar in a food processor and pulse until you have a course ground mix.

Then sprinkle 3 tablespoons of the pistachio mix over the bottom of an 8 inch cake pan.

Next, drizzle 2 tablespoons of melted butter over the pistachio mixture….

…don’t worry about covering every pistachio with the butter, everything’s going to bake together perfectly in the end.

Martha’s original recipe in Everyday Food called for using frozen pizza dough. We couldn’t find that in our grocery store, so we used 2 of the refrigerated tubes of pizza dough. No worries! It worked fine! Better than fine.

Whichever dough you choose to use, you’ll need to roll it out on a lightly floured work surface into a rectangle that’s approximately 12 by 18 inches. Then, spread it with tangerine marmalade. I made our marmalade for this from another recipe in the same issue of Everyday Food, but a store-bought orange or tangerine marmalade will work just fine too. Make sure you leave about a 1 inch border around the rectangle.

This is my first time making a marmalade of any kind, and I must say, it was so much easier than I thought. Both hubby and I absolutely love it. Not only in these sticky buns, but on toast, an English muffin, Paula Deen’s biscuits, etc., etc. I guess I better post the recipe for that later…anyway…

Once the marmalade is spread over your dough, sprinkle the remaining pistachio mix right over the top of it, still leaving that 1 inch border (roughly) in tact.

Beginning with one of your long edges, start rolling the dough up. Kind of like you would with a jelly roll. Roll it up tight and cut it into 8 equal slices…..

….and place them into the cake pan over the pistachio mix like this.

Bake for 35 minutes or so at 350 degrees. Make sure you put your cake pan on a baking sheet before baking so you don’t have a mess in your oven – You can see how some of it will bubble over.

Don’t these look amazing? Incredible? Heavenly? All of the above? Wait until you smell them!

I thought they were perfect when they came out of the oven, but the proper thing to do now (according to the original recipe) is to run a knife around the edges of your sticky buns and invert them onto a serving plate. Still. Beautiful!

The only thing left to do is dive in and enjoy!

I’m so hungry after writing this post…I hope Hubby saved me one more of these wonderful things. THEN I’m done with sweets for 2011. Probably.

Have a great Tuesday!

xoxo

Tangerine-Pistachio Sticky Buns Recipe

Adapted from the December, 2011 issue of Everyday Food

Printer-friendly PDF version

Ingredients:

  • ½ cup packed dark-brown sugar
  • ½ cup shelled unsalted pistachio
  • 5 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
  • All-purpose flour for work surface
  • 1 ½ pounds (2 tubes) refrigerated pizza dough (or frozen)
  • 1/3 cup tangerine marmalade
  • ¼ teaspoon kosher salt

Directions:

In a food processor, pulse brown sugar and pistachios until coarsely ground. Sprinkle 3 tablespoons of the sugar mixture into an 8 inch round baking pan (2 inches deep). Drizzle with 2 tablespoons of the melted butter.

On a lightly floured work surface, roll and stretch dough into a 12 x 18 inch rectangle. Spread with marmalade, leaving a 1 inch border. Top with remaining sugar mixture, sprinkle with salt, and drizzle with remaining 3 tablespoons of melted butter.

Starting with long edge of rectangle, roll up dough like a jelly roll. Cut crosswise 8 pieces and place in pan. If using frozen pizza dough: cover with plastic wrap and let rise in a warm, draft-free place until buns are puffed and begin to touch, about 1 hour. No need to let the dough rise if you’re using the refrigerated dough.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place pan on a rimmed baking sheet and bank until buns are golden brown, about 35 minutes. Immediately run a knife around the edge of pan and invert buns onto a serving platter. Serve warm.