Boo!

Happy Halloween Blog Monsters!

It's been a while since I posted anything.  I do have some projects to put up but I'm in the midst of Nutcracker Mania so who knows when I'll get around to it.  In the meantime, I'll share with you the little treats I made for Halloween: Mummycakes!

 These are surprisingly simple to make if you have basic piping abilities for the frosting.  I decided to use a red velvet cake since it evokes a nice, bloody, Halloween mood.  The batter starts off innocently enough...

But then, you grab a bottle of this stuff.

And then you do this.

Yes, that was the whole bottle.  Deep breaths.

Interestingly, this turns the batter a pretty hideous shade of pink.

But then you add in the dry ingredients (which in this recipe includes the sugar) and something magical happens.

Good god!

I used some primary red cupcake liners found at AC Moore which ended up matching the cakes exactly.  And voila!

For the frosting I went with an improvised version of cream cheese frosting.  I used one tub of cream cheese, one stick of butter and then just added powdered sugar until it was as sweet as I wanted (not too sweet).  I also threw in a dash of vanilla.  I like to use the whisk attachment on the mixer and really whip the heck out of it.  You get more volume and it's not so heavy and cloying.  It ended up being a pretty close amount to what I needed for the 24 cupcakes.

So, to dress these guys up, I started with a flat piping tip and drew on some horizontal lines.

Then I drew some diagonal lines.  The great thing about these is they don't have to be perfect.  Mummies are not the neatest dressers.

For the googlie eyes, I used white M&Ms and some black gel frosting (also from AC Moore).  I found the white candies in a bag of Coconut M&Ms.  You can usually find some form of white M&M nowadays with all the different holiday varieties they sell.  I'm sure you could use pastel colored ones too and it would be cute.

 So just stick them on and paint in your pupils.

And here's my little creation.

Also at AC Moore (Are we reading this AC Moore people?  Perhaps we could be compensating me in some way...?)  I found these great little cupcake boxes.  They hold four cakes in their own little holes and keep them from bumping into each other and starting fights.

These guys arrived un-blemished to a Halloween party and were a big hit.  Maybe you can make some up for next year's festivities.  They were super easy and mummirific!

"Hey Joe, where we goin'?"  "I don't know, but I don't like the looks of this..."

Byeeeee!

Southern Red Velvet Cupcakes
Adapted from Cakeman Raven, Cakeman Raven Confectionery, NYC

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon fine salt
1 tablespoon cocoa powder
1 1/2 cups vegetable oil
1 cup buttermilk, at room temperature
2 large eggs, at room temperature
2 tablespoons red food coloring (1 ounce)
1 teaspoon white distilled vinegar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Place cupcake liners in cupcake pan.

In a large bowl, sift together the flour, sugar, baking soda, salt, and cocoa powder. In another large bowl, whisk together the oil, buttermilk, eggs, food coloring, vinegar, and vanilla.

Using a standing mixer, mix the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients until just combined and a smooth batter is formed.

Fill each cupcake liner about 2/3 full. Place the pans in the oven evenly spaced apart. Bake until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cakes comes out clean, about 22-25 minutes.

Remove the cakes from the oven and let cool in pan for 10 minutes. Transfer to a cooling rack and let cool completely.

Makes 24 cupcakes.

Formaggio

Buon Giorno!
Last weekend I took a trip to Boston to visit my good friend Ruth and her fam.  You may remember her baby girl, Babs, from such previous posts as this and this.
I always have a nice time visiting them.  They live in Back Bay where you can walk to everything.  I can pretend I'm hip and live in a city for a few days which is just the right amount of time for this small town girl.  Plus, they are super laid back and very generous hosts.  For example, Ruth treated me to a vichy body scrub at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel's Spa.  Unbelievable.
On Saturday morning we ventured out to Cambridge to find a cheese/gourmet food shop that I had read about online called Formaggio.  It's located in a really cute neighborhood with cute little shops including the Marimekko store.  Dangerous.

*cue angels singing*

After dropping too much cash on some very small floral printed items we found Formaggio.  

It turned out to not only be an amazing cheese shop but an all around amazing food store.  They had fresh produce and lots of imported dry goods.  They had incredible pastries.  We bought some macarons.

Oooo la la!

The best thing is that they had lots of cheesy samples for everyone to try.

free + sample = happy me!

A beautiful bell shaped soft cheese to try.  Nice and stinky!

And check out the cheese counter.

I

And salamis below.

I got a few slices of the saucisson sec.  It was wonderful and brought me right back to France.
Another great feature of Formaggio is that they have a weekend BBQ.  They just set up on the sidewalk right out front and grill up amazing meats and sides.  

The menu:

Check out this cornbread:

And this chicken was amazing:

One interesting thing was there was a Boston Firefighter standing there the whole time.  I guess maybe that's a requirement if you want to grill on the street?  Anyway, he wasn't hurtin'.  He was getting free BBQ!

Byeeee!

Minnow and Boy Bait

Hello again, blogochums!
This post's title may lead you to believe it's about fishing but believe me, it's not.  I don't fish. Today's post is dedicated to the delicious blueberry cake recipe that my mom's good friend Minnow gave me.  Minnow was my mother's catering partner for years and a wonderful influence on my life.  She would let me come over to her beautiful farm where I would play with her daughter Joanna.  We would ride horses, tease the cranky goat, play games and eat lots of yummy things that Minnow would make.  Her husband Tony would entertain us with tractor rides and one particularly wet canoe adventure in a nearby creek.  I have such wonderful memories of spending time at their farm.  Minnow, by the way, is not her real name but a nickname given to her by a sister who couldn't pronounce her real name, Maryanna. 

She gave me this recipe when I was home visiting and had stopped by her house to pick blueberries.  The recipe's name is really "Melt In Your Mouth Blueberry Cake" but after reading it over a few times I realized that it's a lot like a recipe I'd seen floating around called "Blueberry Boy Bait".  So what I made is kind of a hybrid of the two, although really they are both pretty basic recipes.  I prefer the name "Boy Bait", because well, it's hilarious.  To think you could get a boy interested in you by baking a cake is such a quaint 50s idea.  Actually, when I think about it it's not so dated.  What guy wouldn't be attracted to someone who could make a decent baked good?  I know I would, which is why this recipe will probably also work just as well on girls.

Of course the first thing you need is some blueberries.  These were picked at the Hand Melon Farm in Greenwich, NY.  I love picking berries.  Nothing is more satisfying and fun.  Plus, it's cheap!

The only thing that would be considered tricky in this recipe for those who don't bake a lot is the separating and beating of the egg whites.  The easiest and safest way I find to separate the yolks from the white is to crack the egg on a flat surface (this avoids puncturing the yolk on the corner of a bowl) and letting the whole thing slide into your hand.  Let the white run out through your fingers into a bowl while cradling the yolk (this is a wonderful, jiggly sensation).  Then slip the yolk into another bowl.  Be careful because if you break the yolk and any gets in the white you will have a harder time beating the whites.

It really helps to have an electric mixer to beat your egg whites.  If you don't then be prepared for a major upper body workout.  You want to beat the eggs until they are just forming stiff peaks.  You want to keep stopping the mixer to see how stiff the whites are.  When you pull out the beater you will see a little peak form.  If the peak flops over then you are in "soft peak" land.  Once the whites stand up at attention you have reached "stiff peak".  DO NOT get distracted and over beat your egg whites.  You will end up with a watery mess and will have to cry into your mixing bowl.

Peaks!

I tried mixing the blueberries two different ways.  The first time I mixed them into the batter before adding the egg whites.  This worked fine except that most of the blueberries ended up sinking to the bottom of the cake.

 Where'd they go??

The second time I tried sprinkling them on top of the cake after it was poured into the pan as I'd read in other recipes.  This worked ok but they didn't sink into the cake as much as I wanted them to.

Too many on top!

I think the best way would be to mix half of them into the batter and then sprinkle the rest on the top.  Then you should get good blueberry distribution. 

So I've made this cake twice now and it's been a big hit.  It doesn't look like much but when you bite in it's moist, light and delicious.  Bake one now while there are blueberries about!  And thanks, Minnow... for everything.
Byeeee!

Blueberry Boy (or Girl) Bait
adapted from Minnow's recipe

2 1/2 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
2 sticks butter, room temperature
1 1/2 cup sugar, plus 1/4 cup
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp vanilla
4 eggs, separated
2/3 cup milk
2 cups blueberries (if frozen keep frozen until ready to use)
1 tsp cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350˚.  In a medium bowl, sift flour and baking powder together, set aside. In a large mixing bowl cream butter and 1 1/2 cups sugar.  Add salt, vanilla and egg yolks and beat until creamy.   Add flour and milk alternately and mix until combined.  Pour into a large bowl.  In clean mixing bowl beat egg whites until they just reach stiff peaks.  Fold egg whites a third at a time into the batter.  Fold in a half of the blueberries.  Pour into a buttered and floured 9 x 13" pan.  Sprinkle the rest of the blueberries on top.  Combine 1/4 cup sugar and cinnamon and sprinkle over the top.  Bake for 45-50 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean.  Let cool in pan and serve warm or room temperature.  Cake keeps sealed in an airtight container at room temperature for three days.

Knit v Sew

Welcome back, blogfollowers.
I have been pretty productive the past week and hopefully I will not be a lazy bum and do some posting about what I've been up to.  The other day I baked a delicious blueberry cake AND I made myself a brand new purse.  Then the next day I didn't do anything more inspired than brush my teeth.  Hey, that's how it goes sometimes.  More on the cake later.

I believe that there are two kinds of people in this world, knitters and sewers.  Well, in my world anyway.  Hey, I just noticed that sewer (SOH-er) and sewer (SOO-er) are spelled the same.   Anyway, I have always considered myself a knitter.  I like sitting in front of the tv knitting away at something for weeks (sometimes months).  You can't really sit in the front of the tv and sew (big minus). Still, I've always envied sewers.  Sewing takes a lot more precision and lot more planning.  Sewers must have minds like engineers.  I just don't have that kind of brain.  I like following the "knit 1, purl 2" pattern and seeing a scarf or a sweater develop stitch by stitch.  Sewing patterns scare and intimidate me.  They have weird symbols on them for things like darts, grain line and gathering line.  They are as thin as tissue paper and once opened, can never be folded back again to fit in their paper sleeves.  Sewers have to worry about construction, lining, interfacing.  They use machines.  They have to follow complex directions to the letter.  Sewers need to make a garment fit perfectly because, let's face it, a dress is not going to be as forgiving as a big baggy sweater if the fit is slightly off.  Because of this I've always shied away from sewing, despite my sometimes meticulous nature.  I can handle sewing some trim on a costume or hemming a pair of way too long H&M pants but besides that I don't really sew.  I faux sew. 

Here was my problem.  I wanted a bag.  I wanted it cute.  I wanted it now.  I had done my usual three days of research on Etsy and came up with nada.  Then I remembered that I had bookmarked a page from one of the sewing blogs I read, Sew Mama Sew.  It's a great site with an online store and blog.  They have the coolest fabrics imaginable and on the blog they post all kinds of sewing projects, tutorials and sew-alongs.  They had a little tutorial once of how to make a fat quarter bag.  I thought, I could make that.  Probably. Maybe.  And then I did what I usually do.  I bookmarked it and completely forgot all about it.

So the other day I thought, this is it.  This your time!  I studied the tutorial carefully.  It was not very detailed (for a knitter like me) so I had to read it a dozen times.  I actually set my computer up on the desk where I sew so I could refer to it as I went.  The bag had lining and interfacing.  It had a snap.  I took a deep breath and got going.

I bought two fat quarters from the quilting shop which has conveniently moved right now the street from my house.  Literally.  Walking distance.  Scary.  A fat quarter, for all the sewing neophytes out there like me, is a quarter of a yard that's cut differently than a typical length of fabric.  Here's a handy little diagram I drew up so you can see what I'm talking about. 

 

This is how a typical quarter yard is cut as it comes off the bolt of fabric at the store.  What you end up with is a skinny strip of fabric. 

This is the same yard of fabric, but instead of cutting it in strips, the store takes the yard and cuts it into rectangular quarters.  This means you end up with a fatter, more useful piece of fabric.

The fat quarters were $2.75 each which makes this bag relatively cheap to make.  You can definitely find fat quarters for less at Joann's.  Last time I was there they had them on sale for $.99 each.  This store, however, has the cutest fabric ever so I bought a beautiful red bold print for the outside and a cute green polka dot for the lining.

 Outer fabric

Lining fabric

The lady at the shop recommended fleece interfacing which turned out to have a nice body to it.

I already had some purse handles that I got ages ago with my mom at M&J Trimming in NYC. 

I won't go through step by step because, if you sew, you could probably do this in your sleep (I bow down). Here's the tutorial again if you need it.  After about an hour and a half and no big disasters I came out with this! 

I even added some interior pockets made from scrap fabric.  I hate bags without pockets.

Pocket before being sewn into bag.

I ran a seam down one side of the pocket to make a little pen slot.  Aren't you so impressed?

I am really pleased with the bag and I've gotten quite a few compliments on it.  I was even asked to make one for someone which made me quell with fear.  Quell... what a great word.  Not sure I'm ready for mass production yet.  So, in the end, I feel really good about my purse project.  My first love will always be knitting, but maybe there is hope for the sewer in me.  That's SOH-er, people!

Byeeee.

A Tale of Two Cookies

Happy Summer Bloghoppers!
It's been hot hot hot here in upstate NY which means I've been mostly laying in front of the AC watching HGTV all day.  I have been productive but it's just been too humid to blog.  That's not really an excuse but it's the one I'm using. 

Anyhoo, before it got beastly hot one of my friends' fathers fell ill and had to go into the hospital for a while.  When he got home (and is thankfully doing quite well) I decided to bring over a little spirit-lifter in the form of cookies (which I think were much more welcome than a get well bouquet).  One is soft, chewy and spicy, the other is crisp, buttery and fruity.  Kind of a yin and yang of baked goods. 

First contestant, Chewy Ginger Cookies:

Second contestant, Cherry Almond Jumbles:

And here they are all wrapped up and ready to cure what ails ya.

Recipes are posted below.  Stay cool, friends.

Byeeee.

Chewy Ginger Cookies
3/4 cup butter, softened (no marg!)
1 cup sugar
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 cup dark molasses
1 egg
1/2 tsp ground cloves or allspice
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp cinnamon
2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
3 1/2 oz or 100 grams of crystallized ginger, chopped fine

Preheat oven at 375F. Combine softened butter, sugar, molasses and egg. Beat well. In a separate bowl, mix dry ingredients together well. Mix the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients until incorporated. Add crystallized ginger. Chill for 1 hour (or several hours, can be chilled overnight.) Once batter is cold, form 1 inch balls and roll each one in granulated sugar. Place on greased cookie sheet, 2 inches apart. These will spread out so don't overcrowd your pan. Bake 8-10 minutes. Do not overbake! Makes about 5 dozen cookies.

Cherry Almond Jumbles
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup butter (2 sticks), at room temperature
3/4 cup sugar
1 large egg
1 teaspoon almond extract
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup dried cherries, roughly chopped (you can use cranberries)
1 cup sliced almond, lightly toasted* and roughly chopped
Preheat the oven to 350° F.
In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.
In a mixer bowl, beat the butter and sugar until smooth. Add the egg and beat until fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add the extracts and beat.
With the mixer on low, gradually add the flour mixture, mixing until just incorporated. Add the dried fruit and almonds and mix well.
Make cookies by either dropping a walnut size mounds of dough using a tablespoon/s or a 1.5-inch cookie scoop.  Bake until just beginning to brown, 20-24 minutes. Makes 28 cookies using a 1 1/2 – inch cookie scoop

*Toast the almonds in a dry pan on medium-high heat for about 5-10 minutes. Keep shaking the pan until they get a nice light brown color. DO NOT leave the pan unattended. Your almonds will burn and you will feel like a big fat failure. No, but really, they will burn.