Category Archives: baking

Pioneer Woman chocolate sheet cake

baking, dessert 11 Comments

It’s time to speak the truth about the Pioneer Woman:

She is out to make us all overdose on chocolate.

And I love her for it.

The Yankee bought me her cookbook for Christmas and it’s fantastic. This chocolate sheet cake (also on her site here) was the first recipe I tried out of the book and it certainly didn’t disappoint! Try it yourself.

Pioneer Woman chocolate sheet cake

Ingredients

For the cake:
  • 2 cups flour
  • 2 cups sugar
  • ¼ teaspoon salt
  • 4 heaping Tbsp cocoa
  • 2 sticks butter
  • 1 cup boiling water
  • ½ cup buttermilk
  • 2 whole eggs, beaten
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
For the icing:
  • ½ cups finely chopped pecans (I omitted; Yankee is not a fan)
  • 1 ¾ sticks butter
  • 4 heaping Tbsp. cocoa
  • 6 Tbsp milk
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1 pound (minus 1/2 Cup) powdered sugar

Instructions

Make the cake:
    1. Combine flour, sugar and salt in a bowl
    2. Melt the butter in a saucepan, then add cocoa and stir
    3. Add boiling water to saucepan and boil mixture for 30 seconds, then remove from heat. Pour this mixture over the flour mixture and gently stir to cool it off.
    4. In a separate boil, mix together buttermilk, beaten eggs, baking soda and vanilla; stir this mixture into the chocolate mixture
    5. Pour batter into a jelly roll pan (I used a 9×13 Pyrex for thicker layers) and bake at 350F; a jelly roll pan will take about 20 minutes; add about ten minutes onto that for a 9×13
While the cake is in the oven, make the icing:
  1. Finely chop pecans, if using
  2. Melt butter in a saucepan (same pan from earlier is fine) and add cocoa, stirring to combine
  3. Turn off heat, then add milk, vanilla and powdered sugar. Stir, and then stir in pecans if using

Nutritional information: one bazillion calories (roughly) per serving. And worth it.

Flourless Nutella cookies and crisps

baking, dessert, kids 14 Comments

I came across a Food & Wine recipe for flourless peanut butter cookies in The Tennessean over Christmas and jotted it down. Then I thought — hey! NUTELLA! Because, you know, it’s Nutella. How could it NOT be good?

Because these are flourless they crisp up a lot as they cool. You can control the thickness with cooking time; around 10 or 11 minutes gets you a thicker cookie; more than 12 minutes gets you a crisp, thin wafer. Both are crispy after they cool, and both are fabulous. Make a tray of each and see what you like.

Flourless Nutella cookies and crisps

Ingredients

  • 1 cup Nutella
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1 large egg, lightly beaten

Instructions

  1. Mix all ingredients together and drop by tablespoon on parchment lined cookie sheets
  2. Bake at 350F, but don’t go far! These go from cookie to crisp in seconds, so watch for when they rise and start cracking on top
  3. Take them out just after cracking for a thicker result, or let them rise, crack and fall for thinner crisps.

Blue velvet cupcakes

baking, dessert 186 Comments

Ohai, cupcakes.

I’m kind of at a loss for words with these. Can you imagine how good they were by looking at the pictures? Because let me assure you… they were BETTER than whatever you’re thinking.

Kiddo and I wanted to do something lovely for our local police force because they are awesome. They always take the time to say hi to Kiddo and all the other kids when they’re cruising our neighborhood, they do all they can to help with the issue of our neighbor’s dog that will. not. quit. barking. ever. and they solved both lame crimes of which we’ve been a victim in the last year. They’re awesome. So what better for the boys in blue than blue velvet cupcakes?

I found this recipe at the incredible Sprinkle Bakes. Aren’t those great? She was SO helpful in helping me adapt the recipe to the food coloring I had to that perfect Cookie Monster shade of blue she showcases. It’s exactly what I wanted them to look like! She adapted her cupcake recipe from Paula Deen’s recipe; I adapted it with Sprinkle Bake’s help only to use all gel food coloring. The frosting is all Sprinkle Bakes.

A note on gel food coloring: this Wilton gel is what I used; I got mine at Joann, and I believe I’ve seen it at Michael’s as well. The ready to use gel icing for cookie and cake decorating (like this) is not the same thing, and will not get you the color you’re looking for.

Blue velvet cupcakes

Yield: I got 26 cupcakes out of this

Ingredients

For the cupcakes
    • 2 cups sugar
    • ½ pound (2 sticks) butter, at room temperature
    • 2 eggs
    • 1 tablespoon cocoa powder
    • 1 Tbsp Wilton royal blue gel food coloring
    • 1 small dab of violet gel food coloring (I dipped in a toothpick and used that much)
    • 2 ½ cups cake flour
    • 1 teaspoon salt
    • 1 cup buttermilk
    • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
    • ½ teaspoon baking soda
    • 1 tablespoon vinegar
For the frosting
  • 1 pound cream cheese, softened
  • 2 sticks butter, softened
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 4 cups sifted confectioners’ sugar (I hate sifting; I whir it up in the food processor instead to aerate and get lumps out)

Instructions

Make the cupcakes
    1. Preheat your oven to 350 F and line cupcake pans with liners
    2. Cream sugar and butter in mixing bowl till light and fluffy, then add eggs one at a time, mixing well after each egg
    3. Mix cocoa and food coloring together to make a paste — this took a while to mix thoroughly with all gel, but it came together nicely; add this paste to sugar mixture and mix well again
    4. Sift (or buzz in food processor) flour and salt, and add to creamed mixture a bit at a time, alternating with buttermilk, then mix in vanilla
    5. Combine baking soda and vinegar in a small bowl and add to cake batter; mix just to combine
    6. Scoop thick batter into cupcake liners, filling about 2/3 full, and bake for probably 25-30 minutes, but start checking at 20 — mine were done at about the 22/23 minute mark; watch for toothpick inserted in center to come out clean
    7. Remove cupcakes from oven and allow cool completely on a wire rack
Now make frosting!
  1. Beat cream cheese, butter and vanilla with electric mixer until nice and smooth

Frosting time! I use a giant star tip from Bake it Pretty, or The Place I Could Spend All My Monies (and the stardust). I dusted on a little edible blue glitter on top because hey, why not.

Cappuccino fudge crinkles

baking, dessert 12 Comments

Kiddo and I had the urge to make cookies, and since he doesn’t actually eat any of them, I get to pick the recipes. This one jumped right off the page at me, I swear: cookies plus chocolate plus coffee? Sign me up.

This one is from the Better Homes and Gardens New Cookbook — you know, the red and white one. It’s a classic.

You will need:

  • 1/3 cup butter
  • 1 packed cup brown sugar
  • 2/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 1 Tbsp instant coffee (I used two packets of Starbucks VIA sent to me gratis by the awesome Maris)
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1 tsp ground cinnamon
  • 2 egg whites
  • 1/3 cup vanilla yogurt
  • 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1/2 cup granulated sugar

To make:

  1. Preheat oven to 350F
  2. With a mixer, beat butter on medium to high speed for about 60 seconds to soften it up, then add in brown sugar, cocoa powder, coffee, baking soda, and cinnamon (not granulated sugar). Beat till combined, scraping bowl as necessary
  3. Add in egg whites and yogurt, and beat till combined
  4. Add in flour, 1/2 cup at a time, beating till just combined (if you’re using a hand mixer you may need to finish off with a wooden spoon — the batter gets pretty thick and sticky)
  5. Pour granulated sugar in a shallow bowl, then drop teaspoons of the cookie dough into the sugar, a few at a time. Roll the dough into balls, coating with sugar as you go. The dough will be crazy sticky, but you’ll be able to handle it easier once the white sugar is stuck to it
  6. Place cookies 2 inches apart on an ungreased cookie sheet and bake at 350 for about ten minutes, or until edges are firming up. Cool on a wire rack
  7. Eat with abandon Carefully pack up to give away

Strawberry layer cake

baking, dessert, kids 9 Comments

Yesterday was the first birthday of One Particular Kitchen! Yay! So I did what anyone would do: I made a cake. My mother made this cake for my birthday a few times and it was always spectacular and pink and fluffy. I was am the kind of little girl who thinks there can never be too much pink, and this cake was just the prettiest, most precious thing my birthday-girl self could dream up while I was running around in Gunne Sax dresses (which were, of course, pink).

Did I mention I make this in my pink Kitchenaid mixer?

I have a copy of this recipe, officially called Strawberry Layer Dessert, that came out of my mother’s cookbook, and I’m afraid I’m not sure which one it was; likely early versions of the Better Homes and Gardens or Betty Crocker picture books, but it’s nowhere to be seen in either one of those books I have on my shelf.

This one involves some downtime between steps, so be sure to allow yourself time to get everything done.

Strawberry layer cake

Ingredients

  • Two 10-ounce packages frozen sliced strawberries, thawed
  • Two 3-ounce packages strawberry-flavored gelatin
  • 2 cups boiling water
  • 2 cups whipping cream, whipped to stiff peaks
  • One 10-inch angel food cake

Instructions

  1. Drain strawberries, reserving 1 cup syrup (see note below)
  2. Dissolve gelatin in boiling water, add reserved strawberry syrup, then chill mixture till partially set
  3. Beat mixture using whisk attachment of stand mixer until light and fluffy — this took quite a few minutes for me till it was lighter pink and fluffed up nicely
  4. Fold in whipped cream and chill another 30 minutes or so till the mix is thickened up again
  5. Transfer 1 1/2 cups of mixture to a separate bowl and fold in strained strawberries
  6. Split angel food cake into three layers, and use the smaller bowl of mixture with the strawberries to fill between layers, then frost top and sides of cake with remaining mixture. Garnish with fresh strawberries if you have them on hand

Notes

I ended up with frozen whole strawberries that did not have syrup, so I put them in a bowl with some sugar while they thawed, which produced some lovely syrup. Instead of slicing I just broke them up a little with a fork before folding into the whipped cream mixture and they were lovely!