Neufangled Desserts has moved!

Happy New Year to my faithful readers!

Wondered where I’ve been lately?  You need to head on over to my brand spankin’-new website at: http://www.neufangleddesserts.com!  Check it out, and make sure to subscribe so you don’t miss anything new! (Hint: there will be no new posts to my Word Press blog…)

Thank you for following my Word Press blog these past few years.  I’m excited to take Neufangled Desserts in a new direction with the official website.  Hope to “see” you there and best wishes!

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Spicy Election Palmiers

From Baked Occasions

For the recipe, follow this link to Baked Sunday Mornings:

Election Palmiers

S’More pudding, please!

Pudding – specifically, homemade pudding – is really one of those somewhat humble desserts that has rightfully earned its place in the dessert canon.  It’s right up there with roast chicken and mashed potatoes as true comfort food.  Aside from canned (shudder) pudding from school cafeterias or the powdery mixture put out by Jello and dumped into warm milk to thicken, I don’t think too many people go to any kind of trouble to attempt it.  Perhaps it is a texture thing for some people.  I love the silky smooth feel of pudding on my palate (I really tried to phrase that without sounding faintly dirty, but it still reads rather funny, I must say), but it may turn others off.  Regardless, if you are a pudding fan, the enlightening news is that it isn’t all that difficult to make.  With some practice, you too can master the art of homemade pudding – though you may have to suffer some over-cooked, grainy textures and/or burnt saucepan bottoms along the way!  Have patience.  The pay-off is worth it.

Baked’s S’More’s-Style Chocolate Whiskey Pudding takes the traditional campfire treat to all new heights altogether.  It’s sexy, ultra-sophisticated, and very adult.  While some kids may not turn their noses up at it, this is definitely one for Mom and Dad to savor first and foremost (it contains booze, after all).

There are several different assembly components to this luxe, chocolately dessert, but surprisingly, I didn’t find this recipe as bowl- and utensil-intensive as some pudding recipes can be.  A lot of pudding recipes require passing the cooked pudding through a sieve after cooking for an ultra-silky texture, removing any bits of cooked egg yolk or lumpy cornstarch.  This is sage advice when making a pudding, but with this recipe, this step wasn’t really necessary and isn’t advised in the instructions.  I’ve personally gotten into the *somewhat perfectionist, I know* habit of pinching the stringy white chalazae strands from my egg yolks prior to adding them to desserts such as brownies, cheesecakes, or puddings where a smooth texture is really key.  It’s picky, I know, but it’s one little step that further ensures a decent final result.

For the first s’more flavor component – the graham – you’ll grind up a few whole graham crackers in the food processor to coarse crumbs, along with some room temperature butter, cinnamon, and sugar.  This mixture is baked off to lightly-browned, crunchy crumb clusters on a small sheet pan in the oven for about 10-15 minutes.  I enjoyed the touch of cinnamon, as it pairs rather nicely with the whiskey in the finished pudding.

The chocolate pudding mixture combines sugar, cornstarch, a couple tablespoons dark cocoa powder (you can go for regular cocoa here, I’m sure, but the dark cocoa really provides that wonderful bittersweet flavor), instant espresso powder (to bump up the chocolate even more), salt, and 3 large egg yolks in a heavy-bottomed saucepan.  Whisked together, these ingredients form a slightly dry, grainy texture akin to wet sand, but once you gently whisk in whole milk and heavy whipping cream, no worries – it all starts to incorporate and smooth out.  A fellow BSM blogger mentioned in her blog that it resembles dark hot chocolate to begin with, and it does.  Cook this over medium heat until it starts to bubble and thicken up – and believe me, you will want to, and need to, keep whisking to keep the pudding from developing hot spots and scorching to the bottom.  Be diligent, keeping a watchful eye, and don’t walk away from the pot.  I usually use a combination of whisk and silicone spatula to scrape up the pudding from the bottom as it cooks.

Once the cooked pudding is removed from the heat, even more delicious bittersweet chocolate – 8 ounces, to be exact – is melted in to make the mixture even more decadent.  As this recipe is truly focused on chocolate, use the best chocolate you can reasonably afford.  Don’t break the bank, but do what you can, as it makes all the difference.  I recently started investing in pound-sized chunks of Callebaut bittersweet chocolate from Whole Foods.  While the extra money shelled out was a tough thing for me to swallow initially, the results truly are worth it.  I tossed some Ghirardelli bittersweet baking chips into this pudding and they were terrific, but I can only imagine how fantastic the Callebaut might have tasted in this.  Typically, I would argue that anything “s’mores” really only deserves milk chocolate – and not dark or bittersweet.  (Did you ever try s’mores with Hershey’s Special Dark bars?  Yuck.)  When it comes to chocolate, I go dark/bittersweet most all the time.  With s’mores, I make an exception: only Hershey’s milk chocolate will really do.  It’s a nostalgic taste that seems only essential.  I had to stash these thoughts to the side with this pudding, however, and I’m glad I did.  This pudding screams for sultry, smoky dark chocolate (though I wouldn’t be averse to experimenting with milk chocolate in this recipe sometime).

I should mention that – oh yes – butter and whiskey are also folded into the warm pudding at this point for an extra hit of fabulous flavor.  Chocolate and whiskey are truly a seductive pairing – as I discovered with the luxurious Simple Chocolate Whiskey Tart a while back.  I’ve developed more of a taste for whiskey in recent years, and – at Baked’s recommendation – I usually bake with (and yes, make cocktails with) Knob Creek Kentucky Bourbon Whiskey, which I used in this pudding.  I love its smoky and somewhat sharp flavor.  I know bourbon whiskey is not for everyone.  Instead, I would suggest a good Irish whiskey like Jameson or Concannon. I’ll be honest; I get a little concerned about adding alcohol to warm, cooked mixtures right off the stove, as I worry the boozy flavor will immediately evaporate once it hits even a slight heat.  I tasted the pudding after adding the whiskey, and felt it was a bit too subtle, so I added an extra tablespoon of whiskey (for a total of 3!).  My initial concerns may have proved unnecessary.  While this pudding chills in the fridge, the whiskey flavor deepens – so my puddings were exceptionally boozy.  I liked them that way, though, so absolutely no regrets here!

I decided to assemble my puddings in some small, wide-mouthed Kerr mason jars I had handy, for a rustic look.  I love Baked’s suggestion to serve the puddings in an assortment of vintage-style containers.  You will need six dishes or containers, and do your very best to layer and distribute evenly.  First, a layer of chocolate pudding is laid in the bottom of the dish, topped with a strata of crunchy graham crumbs.  A final dollop of chocolate pudding tops the graham layer, and with a small piece of plastic wrap pressed firmly onto the tops of each pudding to prevent a skin formation, these gems are placed in the fridge to cool down and muddle flavors for while.  I put mine in the fridge overnight, which worked well.  With the crispness of the graham layer, you won’t want to keep these around too long, or the crumbs might absorb the moisture from the pudding and turn soggy… but trust me, these are so delicious, they won’t last long.

The glorious finishing touch to the s’mores pudding is a homemade toasted marshmallow creme swirl spiked with a whisper more of whiskey.  What would something “s’mores” be without the requisite torched marshmallow, right?  Don’t be daunted by making your own marshmallow creme; you may be surprised how easy it is.  Remember those egg yolks you used in the pudding?  I hope you saved 2 of your egg whites; you’ll whisk these with sugar, water, corn syrup and whiskey in a mixing bowl set over some simmering water (to safely “cook” the egg whites a touch).  Once this mixture is warmed up nice and hot and the sugar feels dissolved, you’ll transfer the bowl to your mixer with the whisk attachment and whip it up to a fluffy cloud of stiff, satiny meringue.  Remove your puddings from the fridge, and top each with a healthy slathering of this gooey, dreamy meringue.  For the final pièce de résistance, get out your handy kitchen torch and toast that marshmallow topping off.  I like burnt marshmallows in my s’mores myself, so I made sure there were some good burnt spots on a couple of these!

Now, I realize that I started out this blog saying this pudding is simple… yet my writing became quite lengthy in describing the process of making this recipe.  I do advise you give this recipe a whirl, however, if anything about it even remotely intrigues you.  It is fabulous in every sense of the word.  As you dip your spoon down into the cup, you first hit the sweet, toasty marshmallow, followed by the deep, dark chocolate tinged with smoky whiskey, then the spicy, crunchy graham cracker crumbs… on my.  Sinful.  Try your best to get all three textures in one bite.  You owe it to yourself.  This is easily a romantic dessert, where one serving of pudding can be shared by two, snuggled under a blanket by a cozy fire… or even in front of the TV.  Jake and I each polished off our own individual serving immediately after I assembled these, but with stomachs full of decadent pudding, we decided that one serving could easily be shared or savored over time, as they’re pretty rich.  I would argue that the sugary marshmallow topping might be a little much, and next time, I may not pile as much on each serving – but this is really a minor gripe.  There wasn’t much about this treat we didn’t like.  I’m thrilled that it was our final recipe to go out of Baked Elements on, as it was a wonderful finale-type recipe that I’ve only come to expect from the Baked guys.  So incredibly good.

Follow this link to make your own pudding:

S’Mores-Style Chocolate Whiskey Pudding with Whiskey Marshmallow Topping

…and please be kind and visit the blogs of my fantastic fellow bakers by checking out the “Leave Your Links” page for this particular recipe as well.  It’s always interesting to see how the other bakers fared, and let me tell you – this is a pretty talented group of folks working on these recipes together.  I’m privileged to be among their company, and so happy to have made some new friendships with many of them, especially after meeting a few of them only recently in NYC.

Now that we’ve completed Baked Elements, here’s a little wrap-up of my personal favorites among those I made… along with some of my least favorites.

THE WINNERS: Oatmeal Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Scones, Lemon Shaker Pie, Antique Caramel Cake, Triple Rum Black Pepper Cake, Simple Chocolate Whiskey Tart with Whiskey Whipped Cream, Whiskey Peach Upside-Down Cake, S’Mores-Style Chocolate Whiskey Pudding, Toasted Pumpkin Seed Brittle, Chocolate-Chunk Pumpkin Bread Pudding, Pumpkin Harvest Dunking Cookies, Devil Dogs with Malted Buttercream Filling, Malted Milk Chocolate Pots de Crème, Spicy Brownies, Brown Butter Snickerdoodles, Orange Almond Ricotta Cheesecake, Chocolate Mayonnaise Cupcakes, Chewy Chocolate Mint Cookies with Chocolate Chunks, Honey Banana Poppy Seed Bread

LEAST FAVORITES (because “Losers” just sounds too mean): Good Morning Sunshine Bars, Bale Bars (these were just inedible to me), Lemon Pistachio Cornmeal Muffins, Alfajores, Brooksters, Chocolate Banana Tart

The Elements chapter with the most personal favorites: BOOZE (go figure!)

Of course, these are not all of the recipes I made out of Elements, just the ones that stood out to me the strongest either way!  So far, out of all Baked’s books, Baked Explorations still stands out as my favorite (their second book), with their first, Baked: New Frontiers in Baking, not too far behind.  I find that I bake most frequently out of these two.  I particularly appreciated Baked Elements, however, for how it spotlighted Matt and Renato’s favorite ingredients in their own separate ingredient chapters.  I loved that we shared so many common favorites – in particular: booze, citrus, caramel, cinnamon, cheese, CHOCOLATE (of course), and pumpkin – but I was also challenged to try some recipes with ingredients I typically do not like – nuts, malt, bananas (though I still didn’t really appreciate that bananas chapter too much).  I also have a little bit of a soft spot for this book, as it was just published when I first met Matt and Renato in person in Woodstock, IL.  I’m looking forward to diving into Baked Occasions next.  I may not be contributing and/or following along with Baked Sunday Mornings with as much frequency, but since we are heading back into an every-two-weeks baking and blogging schedule, it may prove more manageable.  Along the way, I will let you know which recipes I was lucky enough to test, and you may just get a glimpse of some photos from my initial testings!

Until next time, good friends… Happy Baking (as always)!  Now, go and make these puddings!

 

Roll out the pumpkin… again

Is it just me, or does the pumpkin gluttony seem destined for an earlier overkill this year?  I’m a self-professed pumpkin fanatic.  I could eat anything pumpkin year round, not strictly relegating it to the fall months.  I’m in love with it as a baking ingredient.  However, it seems 2014 has definitely been the year of “pushing the pumpkin”.  It began around August and is reaching its zenith, a full month well ahead of Thanksgiving.  I will even admit that I’ve gotten a touch tired of it.  Still, as I sit here drinking my third cup of coffee today (at 3 pm) on a Sunday afternoon, breathing in the intoxicating aroma emanating from a cake pan full of Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls, I can’t help but remain drawn in by the spell wrought by this fragrant and delicious autumnal squash.

This recipe from Baked Elements was undoubtedly one I was intrigued to dive into when I first perused the book, but I’ve held off until it was assigned through Baked Sunday Mornings this week.  I love a good cinnamon roll, but ashamedly admit that I’ve usually caved in to buying those Pillsbury “Poppin’ Fresh Dough” cans that magically pop open at the seam with the slightest press of a spoon.  The pre-made, ready-to-bake-off glob of dough contained therein also typically contains a sickly sweet can of faux cream cheese glaze to slather on top of the finished rolls.  Let’s face it, yeast kinda scares me.  While it’s true that there is something therapeutic about putting your heart and soul into a well made loaf of bread or a beautiful pan of dinner rolls, I tend to avoid it and stick to my pies, tarts, cakes, etc.  I leave a lot of the homemade bread baking to my boyfriend, Jake.  He’s got more of a knack for it – and definitely more patience for it.

These Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls beautifully paid off with a little persistence, a lot of coffee, and a good measure of patience… for yes, I needed to make the recipe two times.  I really try to overcome my perfectionist tendencies, but it’s not always easy.  Well – wait a minute – for yours truly, it’s never easy (Jake is an exceptionally strong man to live with and deal with me).  And when it comes to turning out delicious baked goods, I’m simply not content to make do with “well, they taste wonderful”.  I want them to look pretty too.  And photograph beautifully.  I really don’t deal in outside appearances in my everyday life, but I suppose I expect quite a bit when it comes to the baked goods I make for my loved ones.

The dough for these rolls comes together pretty easily in a mixer – incorporating bread flour, butter, brown and granulated sugars, yeast (for that rise you’ll eventually desire), pumpkin, whole milk, egg, and most importantly – those wonderful warming spices that meld so harmoniously with pumpkin: cinnamon, ginger, and cardamom.  The initial trouble comes with this dough.  Be mindful from the start that it is an exceptionally soft and sticky dough.  I had to chuckle at Baked’s tip to “remove the dough from the [mixing] bowl, carefully form it into a large ball, smooth the top with your hands, and place it in a clean, lightly greased bowl”.  Uh-huh.  Right.  I simply dumped the whole lot of dough into the greased bowl, using a spatula to scrape it out from the mixing bowl.  There was no way that dough was going to form into a nice, smooth ball in my hands.  No sir.  Cover the ball of dough with plastic wrap and let it sit while you make the delicious filling of melted butter, brown sugar, granulated sugar, cinnamon (even more – these are cinnamon rolls, after all), nutmeg, cloves, and salt.

Not ashamed to post… this was my first pathetic batch. Yikes.

When it’s time to roll out your dough, here’s what I learned after my initial first (hideous) batch:  first, flour your board or counter like crazy.  I mean, excuse my language here – but flour the shit out of it.  If you do not, this troublesome pumpkin dough is going to glue itself to the surface.  Turn the dough out onto the counter (again, that spatula will comein handy – it will plaster itself to your hands; this dough is a monster, I tell ya), and flour the top of it.  Again, go for a liberal sprinkling of flour here, as you don’t want it sticking like the dickens to your rolling pin.  Another thing I discovered was that it did me no favors to roll it out to the dimensions (10″ x 20″ rectangle) the Baked guys instruct you to.  It will be way too thin, and your rolls will collapse.  Just roll it out to a good-sized rectangle, and not too thin.  Bear in mind that you will want to cut the rolls out, when the entire thing is rolled up, into 1.5-2″ inch pieces, numbering about 10 total.  Eyeball it as best you can.  Butter the rolled out-dough with melted butter, then, with your hands, spread out the filling and press it into the dough gently with your palms. Roll the whole lot up into a tight ball, turning from the longest side of the rectangle.  As I rolled, I used a dry pastry brush to brush off all of the excess flour from underneath the dough.  When the dough is completely rolled, cut the log with a sharp knife into 10 rolls and place them in a 10″ cake pan lined with buttered and floured parchment.

You’ll definitely want to let your rolls rise a little more in the pan before baking them off (Baked suggests for about 45 minutes).  I didn’t notice a tremendous change in size – you may, depending on the strength of your yeast and/or temperature of your kitchen.  It’s chillier here today in Wisconsin, and we’ve held off turning on the heat, so that may be why I didn’t get a ton of rise.  I also used active dry yeast and not the instant yeast designated in the recipe, which I’m sure had a lot to do with my rolls being denser.  Plus, I did not activate my yeast by proofing it in warmed milk… d’oh!  (Remember, I did mention I don’t do yeast recipes all that often; it’s painfully obvious from this faux pas.)  Still, my rolls puffed up beautifully while baking in the 350-degree oven.  While the rolls were baking – and man, it smelled wonderful in the kitchen while they were – I whipped up the glaze, which consists of cream cheese, a bit of buttermilk, and sifted confectioners’ sugar.  Let this beat up well in your mixer using the paddle attachment, as it is prone to lumps from the cream cheese, even if you’ve softened it.  It’s a delicious glaze, with the perfect amount of tang from the cream cheese and buttermilk to complement the spicy pumpkin rolls.  Be aware, though, that it makes a goodly amount.  If you want to douse your cinnamon rolls with it (Southern-style, as Jake calls it), go ahead and make that full batch the recipe calls for.  I drizzled the tops of my rolls using a whisk dipped in the glaze, and truthfully, having done that, I realized I could have easily halved the glaze recipe.  Still, it may be nice to have a little dish of extra glaze on the side when serving these, for extra dipping!

As you can tell from the photos, I had terrific results with my second batch of these.  The first batch was horrendous, and I very nearly threw in the towel.  I’m glad I woke up this morning, took a deep breath, and gave these a second try.  They’re delicious on their own, nicely warm, but absolutely wonderful with a cup of coffee or glass of milk.  The buttery cinnamon filling is decadent with the soft pumpkin roll encasing it, and the glossy glaze is a fantastic crowning touch.  One final note:  though that luscious gooey-ness that results from the cinnamon filling migrating to the bottom of the pan while baking is quite enticing with any cinnamon roll, I found it a good idea to bake these about 5 minutes longer than suggested.  My first batch – which, granted, was a mess to begin with – came out with roll bottoms that seemed soggy and under-baked.  For my second go-round, I let the rolls bake in the oven slightly longer.  While they’re still a touch gooey on the bottom – again, not an altogether bad thing – they hold up nicely, come out of the pan cleanly, and don’t taste too doughy.  The bread was nicely baked, but still moist and flavorful, not dry – with that enticing ribbon of cinnamon in the center. The caramelized, buttery clumps of cinnamon and brown sugar at the bottom remind me of the fabulous cinnamon rolls I used to enjoy at a restaurant I worked in during my college years, back home in upstate New York – Kellogg’s Pan-Tree Inn on Canandaigua Lake.  When a recipe can turn me nostalgic like that, it’s a winner.

All of this being said, I will probably hold off on making these again anytime soon.  They’re good, yes – and this pumpkin fanatic was ecstatic at the thought of incorporating pumpkin into a cinnamon roll – but I personally felt they were not as “simple to put together” as the recipe makes claim in the book.  Be prepared to throw a little bit of elbow grease, and a ton of flour, into these.  If you decide to give them a try, the pay-off is worth it, so roll these out (excuse the pun) for a special get-together with your friends.

Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls

Hard to believe that next week, our Baked Sunday Mornings group closes up baking from Baked Elements!  Wasn’t it just yesterday we were all a-buzz with excitement from just getting that book?  Time has surely flown, and we’ve had a lot of fun.  The great news is – we have another new Baked book to bake from – Baked Occasions – beginning November 9th!  I’m still not positive I will be baking along as frequently, but who knows.  Given my past track record, you know by now that I can’t stay away for too long…

Okay.  No more pumpkin recipes for a while.  Promise.

Happy Baking!

 

 

Hello Cupcake!

First things first… and I won’t sugar-coat it: I don’t like, or ‘do’, cupcakes.  I find them ridiculously cutesy, overly trendy, and just a touch passé.  (I know, *gasp*.)   I’ve heard in recent months that they’re kinda going out of style, thanks to cronuts, doughnuts, whoopie pies, mini pies, and the like… and frankly, I say “good riddance”.  If I’m going to bake a cake, I want to put all of my effort into a triple-decker layer cake with luscious, buttery frosting.  Or better yet, a PIE – or pastry of any kind.  No disrespect meant to those bakers who love making cupcakes – or even have a business in them.  It’s just a preference of mine.

I suppose it doesn’t help that a baking job of mine a couple years ago had me responsible for making a majority of the jumbo cupcakes the restaurant was – and still is – overly famous for (and their recipe is darn good, I will say).  I just got tired of them.  I was the day baker – and the day bakers were responsible for churning out the cupcakes, while the night bakers dabbled in the pies and cakes I would have preferred to create.  I wanted the day schedule, so I guess I couldn’t rightly complain to my kind boss that I was baking something I really didn’t like all too much.  Still, when I finally had to leave the job, I recall writing many a Facebook status update in which I rejoiced that I didn’t have to make the darn things any more!

But – enough of my cupcake grouchiness.  Looking at these photos, I suppose I can’t help but feel a slight smile encroach upon my face.

All of this being confessed, if I were pressed to make a chocolate cupcake, chances are I would willingly fall back on Baked’s Chocolate Mayonnaise Cupcakes, this week’s Baked Sunday Mornings assignment.  They’re tender and light with a moist crumb – a little subtle on the chocolate flavor because they do not include salt in the ingredients, but not as bland as the Chocolate Cheesecake Muffins I posted about a couple weeks ago.  Best of all is that they are amazingly simple.  They’re a workhorse recipe for any baker – from amateur to professional.  They really don’t take a great amount of effort, and they’re just a darn good cupcake to make, whether you’re a cupcake naysayer like yours truly or not.

Dark chocolate and dark cocoa powder are first mixed with boiling hot water;  this is gradually added along with the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, baking soda) to a creamed base mixture of mayonnaise, dark brown sugar, granulated sugar, eggs, and vanilla.  I always find those chocolate cake recipes which start with cocoa mixed with boiling water or hot coffee to be the most magical.  I’m not sure what the alchemy is exactly, but chances are pretty good you will end up with a moist, dense cake – especially if the fat is an oil of some kind.  This recipe does not contain butter as the primary fat – the mayonnaise does that, providing a nice, delicate richness and softness to the cake.  If you’re not a mayo fan, don’t let this recipe detract you, as you do not taste it in the finished product.  I strongly suggest using Hellmann’s mayonnaise – not only in this recipe, but any recipe calling for mayo.  I’m a bit snobbish when it comes to mayo; I just think Hellmann’s holds up and tastes the best. I know plenty of folks who find mayonnaise a little gross; I love it.  I slather it on sandwiches, and yes – it’s good in baked goods.  (You would be more likely to see me eating a spoonful of mayo than that icky mud called Nutella!)

For the frosting crowning these cupcakes, I made the standard chocolate buttercream accompanying this recipe, which is slightly different from Baked’s other buttercream recipes in that it doesn’t begin with a cooked milk and flour mixture.  Instead, you’re just dealing with butter, confectioners’ sugar, vanilla, and melted chocolate.  Pretty simple, and pleasantly rich enough without being too rich.  The frosting suits these cupcakes nicely.

I decided to finally test out another frosting recipe which caught my eye a couple years ago – Jill O’Connor’s Caramel-Butterscotch Buttercream from her book, Sticky Chewy Messy Gooey.  She tops her own Chocolate Mayonnaise Cupcakes with this delectable frosting, and as I am a huge caramel and butterscotch fan, I knew that I finally needed to attempt this frosting as I prepped Baked’s cupcakes.  The recipe takes a little bit of effort – it involves making a caramel sauce, cooking/whisking whole eggs with dark brown sugar in a mixing bowl over simmering water, then whipping them up nice and foamy (almost like a meringue) as you slowly add in chunks of soft but cold butter.  Finally, you add a touch of vanilla, salt, and bourbon, and finish by folding in a bit of the cooled caramel sauce.  You definitely work for this frosting, but let me tell you:  it is AMAZING.  I’m seriously not a huge frosting fan, but I could eat this frosting with a spoon out of the mixing bowl.  It’s just that good.  I halved the recipe from the book; a full recipe makes 5 cups frosting and uses 6 sticks of butter and a half dozen eggs!  Crazy, right?  Honestly, though… if you like caramel and butterscotch, you really owe it to yourself to make this frosting as soon as you get a chance to.  Seriously.  So good.  And on these cupcakes, it was divine.  The cupcakes themselves do not contain any salt to bump the chocolate flavor too much, but topped with a swirled crown of this buttercream, the entire flavor profile is really kicked up a notch.  It’s buttery, a little salty, ever-so-slightly kissed by that bit of bourbon (which you need for that ‘butterscotch’ component), and rounded out with the warm caramel notes… dangerously yummy.

By the way, I yielded about 32 cupcakes with this recipe; the recipe states that you should yield about 2 dozen.  Rejoice!  You have some extras to snack on or share!  I took a bunch to the theatre where I am in a current production of Geoffrey Nauffts’ play, Next Fall (running through October 25th at Soulstice Theatre; for tickets and details, visit the Theatrical Tendencies website!  Shameless self-promotion there…) The cast loved them – especially the cupcakes with the caramel-butterscotch buttercream.  Not too surprised.

If you are “meh” on cupcakes like I typically am, chances are you may be won over by these treats.  Or, if you are just looking for a simple, but delicious cupcake recipe to whip up for your parties or family gatherings, these are worth filing away in your recipes. Make your own – and read on for my fellow BSM bakers’ results with these – by following this link:

Chocolate Mayonnaise Cupcakes

… and if you’re intrigued by the intricate Caramel-Butterscotch Buttercream recipe, here’s a link with the recipe, courtesy of Leite’s Culinara (with Jill O’Connor’s own Chocolate Mayonnaise Cupcake recipe):

Chocolate Mayonnaise Cupcakes with Caramel-Butterscotch Buttercream

Lastly – New York City was fantastic!  Matt and Renato were charming – as always – and it was so nice to catch up with them.  It was especially wonderful to meet some of the Baked testers who made the trip (quite a few of them Baked Sunday Mornings bakers).  It was a blast getting to know one another.  Delightful people, all of them – fantastic new friends!  The new Baked TriBeCa space is going to be amazing (they’re still finishing up on construction; nonetheless, the party was still held – yummy treats, great conversation, photos, music, burlesque dancers and all)!  Check out a few of my photos below.  And while you’re at it, you may want to head on over to Amazon and order your copy of Baked Occasions.  After all, you know one of the “Badass Recipe Testers”!

Happy Baking!

Now THAT’s a great pumpkin cookie, Charlie Brown!

The following blog was written 2 years ago, believe it or not.  These cookies were the very first recipe I made out of Baked Elements, and obviously, I simply couldn’t wait another 2 years until they were scheduled to bake and blog about them!  I re-read what I had written and saved in my drafts, and decided to totally keep the blog as is.  It’s certainly proof that my writing has become a bit sluggish over time!  I adore these cookies – and without further ado, I present a 2-year-old blog post extolling their many virtues… and why it was the very first recipe I baked out of Baked Elements.  I’ve kept some of the original pictures as well, but also tossed in a couple new ones, because yes, I may have written about them long ago, but I couldn’t resist baking up a new batch this week.  Enjoy:

I confess that when I pulled my first batch of Pumpkin Harvest Dunking Cookies from Baked Elements out of the oven, I snarfed down probably 4 of them after the first delectable bite.

Being a huge fan of pumpkin, the pumpkin chapter of Baked Elements is naturally the first chapter I turned to, and this recipe, tucked away at the end of the chapter, caught my immediate attention.  With the exception of biscotti (which I typically find too dry), I gravitate toward cookies that you can eat with/dunk into a cup of coffee. The intermingling tastes of strong, nutty coffee and buttery, spicy goodness is so nostalgic for me, as I was practically raised by a family that drank coffee religiously and had coffee klatches in which we savored wonderful treats with good coffee.  When I read in the book that Renato created a pumpkin cookie that could be dunked into coffee – with some semisweet chocolate and chewy, yummy dried cranberries tossed into the mix – well, I was so there from the get-go.

It’s a fairly easy recipe to put together.  The dough itself is a pumpkin cookie dough fragrant with warm fall spices and studded with oatmeal – topped off with the inclusion of chocolate chips and cranberries.  I suppose you could toss some kind of nut in there, but why spoil a good thing?  (Aside from almonds and pecans, you will discover I have a pretty big aversion to nuts – most kinds.  They just turn me off and have no place in good desserts.)  The hardest part is waiting for the dough to chill 4 hours before you bake these little treasures off.  In several of Matt and Renato’s recipes, I’ve noticed they suggest chilling the dough after it’s mixed all together – often for a few hours or even overnight.  This allows the dough to relax for a while – think of it as all of the ingredients partyin’ and chillin’ together for a little bit before things ‘get hot in here’!  It makes perfect sense and often leads to a better cookie which holds its shape.  I have a nemesis in chocolate chip cookies – I have NEVER made a good one – but the one time I finally did have minor success, it was with making Baked’s Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe – and that recipe suggested an overnight shindig in the fridge for the cookie dough.  Soooo… don’t skip this crucial step with these babies.  Chill your dough.  Yes, 4 hours.  The cookies, when scooped uniformly with a 2-tablespoon cookie scoop, held their shape and puffed up nicely.

The beauty of pumpkin as a main ingredient in a cookie, or even a bar cookie, is its ability to keep the cookie moist.  These cookies are no exception to the rule.  Matt prefaces the recipe by suggesting that you may want to over-bake these cookies a touch, in order to have a nice golden, slightly crunchy exterior which complements the pillowy, soft, and chewy interior.  And by all means, dunk them in a nice “hot coffee bath”… they’re even more heavenly and happy.  I made these in the later evening hours, and had to make a pot of coffee (decaf, of course) to test them out.  Trust me, it’s a flavor experience you don’t want to miss.

This is a keeper recipe.  Make this one to take your fall holiday or football parties, folks.  They make a fairly good-sized batch (the recipe says 36; I got 48, which is good, because I probably ate a dozen myself right away) and will be a bona fide hit among pumpkin aficionados.

For the recipe, visit:

Pumpkin Harvest Dunking Cookies

Brew up some coffee, and enjoy this delicious start to your fall!

I’m off to NYC to see the Baked guys and their new location in TriBeCa! I’ll be sure and take plenty of pictures to share!

Bundt Adoration

I absolutely love Bundt cakes. I sense that I have a kindred spirit in Matt Lewis (of Baked), with his glorious collection of beautiful Bundt pans. I’ve tried several times to restrain myself from amassing my own crazy stash of pans – and so far, I feel I’ve been somewhat successful.  That being said, I think I still own a good 4-5 Bundt pans.

The wonderful thing about Bundt cakes is that they are simple and relatively easy to make. You don’t need to bother with frosting – perhaps just a simple glaze to drizzle over the top. This is especially good if you prefer the cake over the frosting, like yours truly. The trickiest part may be unmolding the cake from the intricate crevices of the pan; if you practice making enough Bundts, however, it is possible to learn how to craftily butter and flour the pan for smooth release. You also become more discerning of which Bundt pans are suited for particular batters and cake crumb. For such a humble kind of cake, it can be an art, that’s for sure.

This week’s Baked Sunday Mornings Bundt cake was a “Tunnel of Fudge” Cake incorporating ground hazelnuts for a Tunnel of Hazelnut Fudge Cake.  I swapped out the hazelnuts for ground, toasted almonds – not being a big fan of hazelnuts.  The batter is a dark chocolate batter made rich with the incorporation of dark cocoa.

The tricky part of making this particular cake is understanding when exactly to take it out of the oven.  You want that thick, under-baked channel of fudgy goodness in the middle of the cake, so you can’t use the toothpick method to determine doneness.  I trusted both my oven’s temp and the suggested 40 minute baking time designated in the recipe.  When I removed the cake from the oven, the top was delicately crunchy, and the sides appeared done.  As it cooled, it caved in a touch, which further confirmed for me that the middle was still soft.  I eased the sides of the cake away from the pan gently with a metal icing spatula to loosen it, and let the cake cool overnight in the pan.

The next morning, I was relieved that the cake released, for the most part, from the pan and onto the plate – aside for one messy chunk on one side.  With some gentle coaxing, I removed the errant chunk from the pan, patched it back onto the cake and dusted it with confectioners’ sugar, to hide the mess and provide final presentation.  The taste of this cake is quite good. The crunchy and chewy texture from the ground toasted almonds is especially pleasing against the soft, gooey dark fudge center.  This cake is really scrumptious paired with a cup of hot coffee.  In place of the hazelnuts, I found the almonds to be just dandy!  This cake is also wickedly good cold.

The second Bundt cake I experimented with this weekend was scheduled quite a while ago with Baked Sunday Mornings, but I never got around to it – possibly because I was out of poppy seeds!  It’s a delightful Poppy Seed Pound Cake with Brown Butter Glaze.  I’ve been eyeing this recipe in Baked Elements for quite some time, and figured I may as well tackle it as we wrap up this book.

A delicate richness in this cake comes from the addition of cream cheese in the batter.  I once made an especially delicious Poppy Seed Cake from Cooking Light that also included cream cheese, so this reminded me of that recipe straight away.  A ribbon of poppy seed filling containing a half cup – yes, a whopping half cup – of blue poppy seeds meanders lazily through the center of this buttery, dense cake. Poppy seed lovers rejoice – this is heavy on the poppy seeds!  I’ve always been a big fan, especially when nutty poppy seeds are paired with citrus – as they are in this recipe, with the bright flavor inclusion of orange zest.

While the cake came out of the Bundt pan cleanly (phew!), I suspected right away that I may have over-baked it a touch – and I did.  It has a delicious buttery flavor and crumb, and the poppy seed trail in the center is certainly whimsical, but I will definitely dial the baking time back a little bit, perhaps to 50 minutes instead of an hour, the next time I make this cake.  There will be a next time, as I really enjoyed it.  Again, this is another cake perfectly paired with coffee, or perhaps especially, tea.

The glaze crowning this cake is heavenly.  It begins with brown butter – need I say more? – and incorporates powdered sugar, milk, orange juice, orange zest, and finally, (more) toasted poppy seeds.  It provides a wonderful extra punch of citrus and poppy flavor.  I did find that it was a bit thick when I attempted pouring it onto the cake, and it didn’t drizzle down the sides as I wanted it to, so I thinned it with more milk to achieve this effect a touch more.  It didn’t yield the prettiest results – there’s nothing to quickly ruin a perfectly turned-out Bundt than a gloppy-looking glaze – but I think the ribbon of poppy-seed filling is the “a-ha” moment of this cake when sliced, anyhow.

To try your hand at both of these lovely Bundt cakes, head on over to Baked Sunday Mornings via these links:

Tunnel of Hazelnut (or Almond!) Fudge Cake

Poppy Seed Pound Cake with Brown Butter Glaze

By the way, I used Baked’s signature Bundt pan to make both of these cakes.  I know, perhaps I am hawking it a little bit more for my friends at Baked, but truly, this is a great investment for any baker. It’s been worth every cent I paid for it. This is a standard Bundt pan to end all standard Bundt pans.  I adore my fancy, swirly Heritage Bundt, but not all Bundt cake recipes work in it (it has very sharp, peaked crevices that can really grab the cake crumb).  If you want to go for a good, fail-safe, heavy-duty pan that will do the job – and release the cake easily – try out Baked’s pan.  It’s fabulous.

Enjoy!

 

Muffin-top musings

Faithful followers of my blog will recall that within the past year and a half, I’ve been pretty good with watching what I eat and exercising.  This is no small feat for yours truly, especially given that my diet consists largely of sugar, butter, eggs, flour, and chocolate in various delicious combinations.  I managed to whittle myself down about 30-36 pounds within a year, but confess that I’ve probably packed on about 10-15 more in recent months.  Still not too bad; I’m at a healthy weight for my age and height and I manage to walk and run as often as I can, with a week or two of cheating once in a while.  I’ve successfully run three 5Ks and am training myself for a 10K.  I’m grateful that I have gotten myself into these better habits.

Friends have remarked upon my weight loss and said, “How can you bake and eat all of those things you bake – and still stay so THIN?”  I won’t go so far as to say I am overly thin, but believe me, it is a struggle that requires lots of self-restraint. This is especially so when it comes to ice cream, potato chips, or making yummy treats like this week’s Baked Sunday Mornings assignment: Chocolate Cheesecake Muffins.  I realized going into this that I might be faced with the battle of the good ol’ ‘muffin-top’ (in more ways than the obvious one) all over again, if I’m not careful.  A good exercise in self-control is definitely in order.

Baked’s recipe from Baked Elements is pretty simple, but has several steps to it, so plan ahead and read the recipe thoroughly.  I have a bad tendency to skim a recipe and – feeling I have a good gist of it – forge blindly ahead.  As a result, I made three mistakes with this recipe: I neglected to fold the white chocolate into my cheesecake filling (luckily, I remembered to do so right before assembling the muffins).  Then, I forgot to toss my dark chocolate pieces in flour before adding them to the muffin batter to keep them from sinking. Finally, I had to open up the oven while the muffins were baking and reach in to sprinkle each muffin with sanding sugar.  Don’t be like me: read your recipe!

The inclusion of a tablespoon of white vinegar in the ingredients is intriguing.  Every so often, you may come across a recipe that contains an unusual ingredient and you have to wonder, why was this included?  In my past baking experiences, I’ve come to understand that vinegar often adds not only a slight tang of flavor which provides some balance to other flavor notes, but it also provides a bit of tenderness as it interacts with baking powder or soda in a batter.  My only guess with this recipe is that it provides the latter.

The recipe yields a dark chocolate muffin which I’m certain on its own is wonderful, but in this instance is jazzed up by the middle pocket of cheesecake, studded with bits of white chocolate.  I wasn’t a fan of the white chocolate inclusion and feel that, in all honesty, it can be left out.  It may have just been the quality of the white chocolate I used (which was actually Ghirardelli white chocolate chips), but I found that it actually caramelized a bit during the baking process.  While ‘caramelized white chocolate’ is a bit of a new rage in baking these days, I’m not sure it produces an attractive result with these muffins.  The cheesecake filling on its own would have done quite nicely.

As for the chocolate muffin, it wasn’t quite as decadent as I anticipated.  I felt it was lacking something and, despite 2 teaspoons of salt, was a touch bland.  I really can’t put my finger on why these didn’t ‘wow’ me all that much.  Perhaps it needs a touch of vanilla extract; maybe a teaspoon.  They also were a bit dry and could have possibly benefitted from a little more oil to keep them moist.  Then again, I suspect I over-baked these, as the cheesecake center was also strangely lacking in moisture and unattractive (see photo above), so take care not to bake these too long.  Would I make them again?  Quite possibly, but they aren’t a showstopper by any means.  I suppose I was expecting these to rise above the ‘humble’ expectations one would associate with muffins, and they really didn’t all that much.  That being said, they are fantastic with a good cup of coffee.

One additional note: if you’re a bit skeptical about baking anything straight in a muffin tin, sans liners or baking papers, follow your gut with these muffins and use liners, to be safe.  I followed the recipe and baked my muffins right in the tins with a good coating of canola spray.  I was able to coax my muffins out of the muffin tins by jerking and shaking the pan while they were still a bit warm (after the 15 minute muffin tin cool-down stipulated in the recipe).  It was a bit humorous to do so and have them ‘pop’ out of the tins gradually, one at a time, but I found that there were still several I needed to pry out with a metal icing spatula.  Unfortunately, there were also a couple that were unmitigated, stuck-in-the-cup messes I prodded out with my fingers.  If I were to make these again, I might use some nice foil or pretty parchment liners.  I also yielded about 2 dozen in standard muffin pans, rather than the 1 dozen yield noted in the recipe.  I even had some extra cheesecake filling remaining.

If you feel ready to take a slight break in your exercise and diet routine to splurge on one of these muffins, I suggest you try these out and head on over to Baked Sunday Mornings and whip up a batch:

Chocolate Cheesecake Muffins

Don’t forget that you will need to toss out your calorie counter.  Only temporarily… as you devour one… okay, maybe two of these treats.

Next week, Baked Sunday Mornings tackles a tempting tunnel of fudge cake from Baked Elements.  Given that the fudge is swirled with toasted, chopped hazelnuts, I may need to beg off making this one, as you know I am not a huge fan of nuts (with the exception of almonds or pecans).  I’m wondering if a swap-out of hazelnuts for almonds might be acceptable?  It’s something to consider.

Believe it or not, the Baked Sunday Mornings crew has nearly completed Baked Elements!  We are all very excited for the release of Baked Occasions in October.  While I personally have managed to work along with the gang through a majority of Baked Elements, here are the recipes I skipped – either due to dislike of the recipe, or just because I needed to take a hiatus for a bit.  If any of these recipes sound tempting to you, please visit Baked Sunday Mornings and read up on how my fellow, talented bloggers fared with them. I’ve set up the links for you.  Simply click on the name to view the recipe – “In the Oven” – and check out the other bakers’ results via the “Leave Your Links” or “Round-up” pages.

Crunchy Peanut Butter Banana Bread

Oopsy Daisy Cake

Lime Angel Food Cake with Lime Glaze

(I did, in fact, make this, but did not blog about it; it was a complete flop for me!)

Sunrise Key Lime Tarts

Easy Candy Bar Tart

Turtle Thumbprint Cookies

Bourbon, Vanilla, and Chocolate Milk Shakes

Malted Vanilla Milk Shakes

Milk Chocolate Malt Semifreddo with Chocolate Syrup

Malted Madeleines

Cinnamon Chocolate Souffles

Cheddar Corn Souffle

Poppy Seed Pound Cake with Brown Butter Glaze

Lemon and Black Pepper Quiche

Lemon Pecorino Icebox Cookies

Bananas Cake

Banana Mousse Parfait

Banana Whoopie Pies

Banana Caramel Pudding with Meringue Topping

Banana in a Blanket

…and I did make, but did not blog about:

Classic Carrot Cake with Cinnamon Cream Cheese Frosting

Here are some of my carrot cake photos:

In this same vein, I do have a final, somewhat sad note to make…

Many of you may have noticed what I have called a ‘catastrophic’ rise in butter prices recently.  As butter is basically an essential bedrock of most baking, I unfortunately may need to cut back on my baking activity for a while – at least until the prices are somewhat reasonable for me to afford again.

This does come at an interesting time, however, as – with the impending release of Baked Occasions – I am considering no longer doing Baked Sunday Mornings.  Honestly, the weekly baking schedule is too much, time and expense-wise.  I have enjoyed blogging and posting with this fabulous group of folks, but do not feel it is feasible that I continue.  Rest assured, when they are scheduled, I will be sure to post blogs and photos for the recipes I tested for the book, and I will also return from time to time when a recipe really piques my interest, but I’m not sure I can bake my way through the entire book with the group.  With my full-time 9 to 5 job plus play rehearsals, finding the time to whip up a recipe, write about it, take photos, edit, and post the blog has become a bit too much to squeeze in.  If you subscribe to my blog, please stay tuned for many future wonderful things in store, as I don’t intend to completely go away. I just may not be here as often as I would like.

Thank you to all of you for your understanding.  I feel so fortunate and lucky to have so many fans of Neufangled Desserts!  Happy baking!

One tough (sweet) cookie: from candy dish to cookie jar

Last week, I was absolutely thrilled to finally dive into a recipe for Baked Sunday Mornings which immediately caught my eye when I received Baked Elements – the Chocolate Chunk-Pumpkin Bread Pudding.  It was scrumptious, and lived up to all my expectations and then some.   This week, we tackle a recipe that I was a little less than enthused with when I saw the recipe and photo in the book: Candy Bar Cookies.

Apparently, Renato from Baked was inspired by European treats to create the recipe for these cookies, which feature a small candy bar – or piece of candy – completely encased in cookie dough, baked, then capped off with a finishing coat of melted chocolate.  While this is an intriguing concept and I admire his fortitude to recreate it, I personally subscribe to a train of thought that if you want your candy or your cookie, why go to all of the trouble of putting them together to eat them?  Why not just eat the candy bar, and avoid all of the steps to put these cookies together?  Obviously, I’m a big proponent of instant gratification when it comes to chocolate!

It is a slightly intensive recipe.  First, you put together a cookie dough I found quite troublesome, consisting of, basically: flour, sugar, salt, dark cocoa, butter, and an egg yolk.  No vanilla, no leavening agents of any kind.  Once mixed together in a mixing bowl, Baked mentions that the dough will have a sandy texture, which indeed, it does.  To gather the dough into a ball and wrap it up as a disk for a quick chill, I needed to dump it all out onto a counter, push it together with my palms, and knead it pretty brutally – the heat from my hands transferring to the butter and melting it a bit more in the dough – to get the dough pieces to bind and adhere together.  I did follow the recipe and chilled the dough for over an hour – a point which, in hindsight, I realized was not necessary.  The dough was perfectly fine to roll out immediately after kneading it together. 

Once the dough is rolled out, I used a 2-inch round cookie cutter to cut out circles of dough, which is then wrapped around individual pieces of fun-sized candy bar.  (Side note: I’ve always felt “fun-size” was a terrible misnomer for those little candy bars you buy at Halloween – isn’t a larger candy bar more “fun” than a smaller one? Ha! Plus, they do seem to shrink more and more as years go by!).  I went for the suggested Mounds candy bars, cut in half, and also Reese’s mini peanut butter cups, which I did not cut; splitting the dough in half among the two candies.  I rolled the balls of dough and candy gently between my hands, put them on a baking sheet, and baked them off.  The cookies came out a rather unattractive pale brown, but never fear – the finishing touch, once cooled, was to dip the cookies in a luscious coating of melted chocolate. 

Baked suggests the pretty effect of double-dipping the chocolate, first in white chocolate, then dark.  It’s difficult for me to find good white chocolate here in Milwaukee outside of baking chips containing emulsifiers, so I skipped this and just coated mine in dark chocolate (the cookies with Mounds in them) and milk chocolate (peanut butter cups).  Plus, I’m going to be honest – by this point in the process, I was bored already with putting these cookies together.  I wasn’t going to get more fussy with the decoration. To designate which cookies were which, I sprinkled the tops of the Mounds cookies with a bit of toasted coconut, and the peanut butter cup cookies with white and dark sprinkles.

The cookies turned out better than I imagined, looking like little truffles bathed in a smooth coating of chocolate.  They would look pretty displayed in a bowl or gift box, perhaps nestled among some mini paper cupcake liners.  I was disappointed when I bit into them, although the taste result was something I could have predicted from the get-go.  They are overly sweet; almost so much so that my mouth hurt eating them.  I cannot imagine how much sweeter these would be coated with both white and dark chocolate.  These might be favorites with children, or an adult with a massive sweet tooth.  I have always considered myself one of these, but not so much here. I know for certain I did not mess up my sugar measurement in the cookie dough; these are just all around sweet because of the cookie and candy combination.

All due respect to our Baked friends, I think these are a pass for me in future baking.  As I anticipated, these were just not exactly my kind of cookie.  While “fun” in some respects (“fun” being the word Jake uttered when he first tried them), I think I’ll just stick to eating my candy bars and/or chocolate on their own, no cookie required!

You can find the recipe at:

Candy Bar Cookies

…and see if these sweet gems were hits or misses with my fellow Baked Sunday Mornings bakers.  I’ve observed that several times, without any intention on my part, I seem to be the contrary male among the group (if not the only male baker, at this point!), so I have a feeling the other bakers will greatly enjoy this one!

Previews for Baked’s new book, Baked Occasions, are steadily leaking out to the public via Facebook and Baked’s homepage, and it’s a beauty of a book.  In case you’re wondering why my blog is coming out with such ferocious weekly frequency, our anticipation of this book is exactly why.  We’ve upped our Baked Sunday Mornings baking schedule to wrap up Baked Elements.  I can’t wait to tell you the recipes I was fortunate to test.  For now, however, in respect to Baked and the publishers, mum’s the word!  Until next week, my friends…

Pumpkin All Year-Round

I’m not one of those people who relegates pumpkin solely to the autumn season.  I typically have about 3 cans at a time of pumpkin puree stashed away in my cupboard.  If we’re going to keep it strictly fall-themed, I look at it this way:  when July comes around, I am already rooting for crisp air, color-changing leaves, sweaters and jeans… and chances are pretty good I am pining for pumpkin too.  Intense sun, begone.  Bring on fall.

Before I wax even further poetic on a squash, I better jump right in with this week’s assigned recipe.  With the dawn of September, Baked Sunday Mornings is beginning to wrap up the pumpkin-themed chapter in Baked Elements, and what better way to do that than making an absolutely scrumptious Chocolate-Chunk Pumpkin Bread Pudding.

When I first received this book, I’m fairly certain my jaw dropped when I fell upon the page with this recipe.  I mean – think of it: a homely, spiced bread pudding made with a delectable chocolate-studded pumpkin bread?  Sign me up, please.  Why did it take me so long to make this?

Your first try with making this may feel a little labor-intensive, but the results are well worth it, trust me. You could probably start out by using regular day-old bread for this pudding, but why?  Baked suggests making your own pumpkin bread as the base for this pudding – and with their easy chocolate-chunk pumpkin bread recipe, you’ll want to take them up on the suggestion.  You don’t even need to break out the mixer for this bread (or the custard for the pudding, come to think of it); it’s all whisked and whipped up in bowls, so just go for it.  Using homemade pumpkin bread deepens the flavor of this dessert – and overall, it just makes perfect sense.

Think chocolate and pumpkin sounds like a strange combination?  Once you try it, you’ll be hooked.  The warm flavor of the pumpkin matched with the earthy chocolate are a match made in heaven.  I used Ghirardelli bittersweet chocolate chips in this pumpkin bread.  A good-quality, chopped up bar of chocolate would be heavenly, but I didn’t want to deal with the fuss of chopped chocolate flecks all over my counter.  I find the Ghirardelli chips to always be reliable, with a pleasantly smooth punch of good bittersweet chocolate flavor.  They also have a disk-like size to them that is larger than an average chocolate chip, so they substitute well for the chocolate chunks called for.

Once your bread is fully baked, cut it up into cubes, spread the cubes out on a sheet pan, and toast them for a bit – tossing them occasionally with a spatula for even toasting.  When making bread pudding, it is essential for the bread cubes to be somewhat dry, so they soak up all of that luxuriant custard.  I actually toasted my pumpkin bread cubes for a touch longer than the recipe advises, as the bread is quite soft and moist, particularly with the inclusion of the chocolate, which stays all soft, gooey, and melty in the warmed bread.  Let the toasted bread cubes warm for a bit while you make the custard.

The custard consists of 2 eggs and 4 egg yolks, which are the principal thickening agents of the pudding, whisked together with dark brown sugar, half and half, more pumpkin (stock up on a couple cans before making this recipe; or use your own homemade puree), melted butter, vanilla, and a wonderful mix of fall spices.  As the ingredient list notes, it helps to have your half and half and eggs at room temperature so that when you whisk in the melted butter, it doesn’t solidify.  As for the spices, I always like to recommend Penzey’s Vietnamese cinnamon, which provides a higher ‘heat’ than typical Cassia cinnamon.  I was also intrigued by the touch of cayenne pepper included in the spice mixture.  Unfortunately, I was out of cayenne, but I dumped what little bit I had into the custard.  As a companion to the cinnamon, I’m sure it provides a nice, subtle bit of heat to the flavor of the pumpkin pudding.  A good majority of the bread cubes are then soaked in the custard for about a half hour; a cup or so of remaining cubes is tossed with some extra melted butter for a good crunchy texture on the top.

I toyed with the idea of baking the bread puddings in individual ramekins or muffin tins, but decided to stick with baking the pudding off in a glass 9″ x 13″ buttered baking dish this time around. I like the rustic look of a square-cut piece of bread pudding.  When you pour the custard and soaked bread cubes into your baking pan, don’t panic if it seems like a lot of custard; the beautiful alchemy that occurs when a bread pudding bakes off in the oven is that the bread cubes almost expand and absorb the custard even more.  The creaminess of the custard and crumb of the bread meld into an irresistibly silky texture.

I baked the pudding for about 50-55 minutes.  When I removed it from the oven, I found that I did need to sponge off a bit of grease from the buttered bread cubes, which had puddled on the surface, but that’s really a minor gripe that is easily taken care of.  Let the bread pudding cool for about a half hour, then dust the entire pudding with confectioners’ sugar, slice it up into squares and serve.  I drizzled each serving with Baked’s standard caramel sauce (slightly warmed to drizzle easily), and this was a perfect, fitting complement; if you prefer a dollop of whipped cream, I’m sure that would work just as nicely.

Honestly – one bite, and I discovered that this may just be my favorite recipe in Baked Elements.  I’m relieved it lived up to my high expectations!  Fresh from the oven, this is a delightful dessert for a chilly fall or winter’s night, and it makes a good amount, so it’s perfect for a dinner party or gathering with friends.  It may even be a good substitute for that traditional pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving.  As Matt mentions in the recipe preface, you might be tempted to warm up a slice for yourself for breakfast with a cup of black coffee.  That’s exactly what I did as I sat down to write up this blog.  I simply cannot rave enough about this dessert.  It’s just amazingly good.  You’ll have to try it for yourself to see what I mean.

To do so, follow this link:

Chocolate-Chunk Pumpkin Bread Pudding

And be sure to visit the blogs of my fellow Baked Sunday Morning bakers, to see how they fared with their bread puddings.  If this recipe doesn’t reinforce my firm belief that pumpkin is an ingredient to be savored and treasured all year-round, I don’t know what would!

I also cannot contain my excitement that in almost a month, I will be attending Baked’s new store opening and book launch for Baked Occasions in TriBeCa!  I have been invited to this event as one of the recipe testers for this new book, and I am thrilled to meet up with some of my fellow BSM bakers, as well as Matt and Renato.  The countdown starts now!