Chocolate Pumpkin Cake

Aside from the obvious link between October and pumpkin season, there's another great reason for slipping some pumpkin into your baked goods this year. It's extremely low in calories, and canned pumpkin can act as the "fat" in many recipes, replacing butter and oil. Try making boxed brownies with pumpkin: to one box of store bought brownie mix, add a can of pumpkin and nothing else, and bake as directed on the box. Bet you'll never know the difference.

Of course, when you slather a pumpkin buttercream over the cake, you've pretty much negated any benefits to replacing butter and oil with pumpkin inside the cake, but outside of this lovely season, how many other times of the year do you really feel like digging into pumpkin anything?

Ah, autumn. The great justifier in orange sweets.

For the cake, you will need:

1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
1 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg
1 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup Dutch cocoa powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 14-ounce can pure pumpkin (not pumpkin pie filling), 2 tablespoons reserved for buttercream
1 tablespoon pumpkin pie spice

For the pumpkin buttercream:

2 sticks unsalted butter, softened
2 tablespoons canned pumpkin
1/4 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
5 cups powdered sugar
4 tablespoons milk

Preheat the oven to 325°F. Butter and lightly flour a 9×5x3-inch loaf pan.

In the bowl of a stand mixer on medium speed (or in a large bowl if using a hand mixer), cream the butter until smooth. Add the sugars and beat until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add the egg and beat well, then the buttermilk and vanilla. Sift the flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder and salt together and add to wet ingredients. Stir pumpkin in with a spoon until well-blended, but do not overmix.

Pour the batter into the prepared loaf pan. Bake for 60 to 70 minutes, or until a cake tester inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean. Cool in pan on a rack for about 10 to 15 minutes, then flip onto a plate for further cooling.

While cake is cooling, prepare buttercream. Cream butter in a bowl until smooth on medium speed. Turn off mixer and add half of powdered sugar. Turn mixer on lowest speed to combine (otherwise powdered sugar will fly all over your kitchen). Turn mixer off and add second half of sugar, beating on low until combined. Add vanilla and milk and mix on low speed until completely combined. Stir pumpkin and pie spice in with a spoon until blended.

Once cake is completely cooled, spread buttercream on thick with an offset spatula or butter knife. Serve immediately or refrigerate.

Chocolate Chip Bundt Cake

I don't usually jump on a recipe - often, I'll see something online and let it bounce around in my head for a while before I take the time to cook whatever it may be. But having only recently acquired a bundt pan, it seemed meant to be that I would happen upon this Chocolate Chip Bundt Cake when I had a bundt pan to break in, when I was on vacation, and when Alyssa, the ultimate connoisseur of all things chocolate chip, was in my midst.

This recipe was actually adapted from a fruit and nut cake batter by Dorie Greenspan, only as Bridget over at The Way the Cookie Crumbles pointed out, the ingredients are quite similar to what a classic chocolate chip cookie would call for, so why not replace pears and walnuts with chocolate? Alyssa had multiple pieces over the weekend, so I would certainly classify this one as kid-friendly.

You will need:

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 sticks (8 oz.) unsalted butter, at room temperature
2 cups (packed) light brown sugar
3 large eggs, at room temperature
1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1 cup buttermilk, at room temperature
1 cup semi sweet chocolate chips
Confectioners' sugar, for dusting

Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 350º F. Butter a 9- to 10-inch (12 cup) bundt pan, dust the inside with flour and tap out the excess. Whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.

Working with a stand mixer, preferably fitted with the paddle attachment, or with a hand mixer in a large bowl, beat the butter and sugar together at medium speed until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add the eggs one at a time, beating for 1 minute after each addition. Beat in the vanilla. Reduce the mixer speed to low and add the flour mixture and the buttermilk alternately - add the flour in 3 additions and the buttermilk in 2 (begin and end with the dry ingredients). Mix only until the ingredients are incorporated and scrape down the bowl as needed. With a rubber spatula, stir in the chocolate chips. Scrape the batter into the pan and smooth the top with the spatula.

Bake for 60 to 65 minutes, or until a thin knife inserted deep into the center of the cake comes out clean. (If the cake looks as if it's browning too fast, cover the top loosely with a foil tent.) Transfer the cake to a rack and cool for 10 minutes before unmolding, then cool to room temperature on the rack.

When you are ready to serve, dust the top of the cake with confectioners' sugar.

Pumpkin Cream Pies

I caught wind of a possible canned pumpkin shortage through one of the blogs I regularly read, which I shared in passing with Josh at the grocery store as we passed the canned pumpkin display. I then watched as into the cart went 7...8...10 cans of canned pumpkin. "Think that's enough?" he asked.

Enter the first of at least 10 pumpkin desserts/dishes I'm sure I'll find myself making this season: pumpkin cream pies (or whoopie pies).

For the cakes, you will need:

1 cup brown sugar
1 cup sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
1 can pumpkin (15 oz.)
2 whole eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 tablespoon pumpkin pie spice
1/2 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Beat together brown sugar, sugar, oil and pumpkin. Add eggs one at time, mixing well after each addition, followed by the vanilla.

In a separate bowl, mix together the dry ingredients.

Slowly incorporate the dry ingredients into the wet until just combined.

Cut 3 inch squares of parchment paper, about 48. Using a pastry bag with a round tip, or a big zip top plastic bag with one corner snipped, squeeze out concentric circles of batter (spirals), starting from the middle and working outward until the circles are about 2 inches in diameter.

Transfer each square to a baking sheet. Bake for 11 minutes, or until firm, and cool on a rack.

For the filling, you will need:

1 package cream cheese, softened (8 oz.)
1 stick butter, softened
1 package powdered sugar (16 oz.)
3 drops vanilla extract
2 dashes cinnamon (1-2 tablespoons)

Beat together cream cheese and butter. Add powdered sugar, vanilla and cinnamon.

Match similarly-sized cakes. Frost flat side of half the pies and sandwich with its match.

Enjoy right away, or chill overnight. These keep very nicely in the fridge for at least a few days.

Chocolate Peanut Butter Birthday Cake

Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me...

I'm a bit late as I actually turned 27 six days ago, but this cake was simply too phenomenal not to blog. It was by far the richest, most decadent cake I've made since I shunned the boxed mixes for cakes from scratch. And seeing as how I've made cakes for several (7) friends and family members this year, I figured I may as well go all out for myself.

There are certain flavors and combinations I am always drawn to: marshmallow and chocolate, caramel and graham crackers, and of course, peanut butter and chocolate. I considered a drizzle of caramel over this cake, but ultimately decided to leave well enough alone. It certainly didn't disappoint!

So far, 27 is sweet.

For the cake, you will need:

2 cups all-purpose flour
2 1/2 cups sugar
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder, preferably Dutch process
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup neutral vegetable oil, such as canola, soybean or vegetable blend
1 cup sour cream
1 1/2 cups water
2 tablespoons distilled white vinegar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 eggs

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Butter the bottoms and sides of two 9-inch round cakepans. Line the bottom of each pan with a round of parchment or waxed paper and butter the paper.

Sift the flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt into a large bowl. Whisk to combine them well. Add the oil and sour cream and whisk to blend. Gradually beat in the water. Blend in the vinegar and vanilla. Whisk in the eggs and beat until well blended. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and be sure the batter is well mixed. Divide among the 2 prepared cake pans.

Bake for 30 to 35 minutes, or until a cake tester or wooden toothpick inserted in the center comes out almost clean. Let cool in the pans for about 20 minutes. Invert onto wire racks, carefully peel off the paper liners, and let cool completely.

For the frosting, you will need:

10 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
1 stick (4 ounces) butter, at room temperature
5 cups powdered sugar, sifted
2/3 cup smooth peanut butter, (commercial, not "natural" PB is best - I used Jif)

In a large bowl with an electric mixer, beat the cream cheese and butter until light and fluffy. Gradually add the powdered sugar 1 cup at a time, mixing thoroughly after each addition and scraping down the sides of the bowl often. Continue to beat on medium speed until light and fluffy, 3 to 4 minutes. Add the peanut butter and beat until thoroughly blended.

For the glaze, you will need:

8 ounces seimsweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
3 tablespoons smooth peanut butter
2 tablespoons light corn syrup
1/2 cup half-and-half

In the top of a double boiler or in a bowl set over simmering water, combine the chocolate, peanut butter, and corn syrup. Cook, whisking often, until the chocolate is melted and the mixture is well combined.

Remove from the heat and whisk in the half-and-half, beating until smooth. Use while still warm.

To assemble:

I cut one of my layers in half - you can skip that, or cut them both in half (though you may want to double the frosting if you cut them both into two layers).

Place one layer, flat side up, on a cake stand or large serving plate. Spread the PB frosting evenly over the top. Repeat with the next layer. Place the last layer on top and frost the top and sides of the cake with the remaining frosting. This should be a thin "crumb coat" to seal in the dark crumbs against the light frosting. Refrigerate the cake for thirty minutes to an hour, then frost completely with a thick layer of frosting.

To achieve the drip-glaze, start by pouring the mixture over the top center of the cake (freezing the frosted cake for at least an hour before topping with the warm glaze will help). Using an offset spatula, spread the glaze over the top of the cake and let it drip slowly over the sides.

Adapted ever so slightly from Smitten Kitchen.

Champagne Cake

While I was at home with my parents, we had a smattering of desserts available any time of the day, mostly attributed to the fact that I couldn't get enough of cooking in their lovely kitchen and therefore, baked every day. Between my mom's blueberry fluff, my blondies, chocolate syrup, caramel sauce and the refrigerated organic cookie dough my mom spotted at Kowalski's, the most gorgeous grocery store I've ever set foot in, we certainly didn't need to add a cake to the list of endless choices.

Ah, but add we did.

Wisconsin residents are able to buy wine and liquor on Sundays (lucky them!), so mom and I browsed the liquor store in search of a sweet, sparkling Asti or Moscato, which we figured would work best with the sweet buttercream. We settled on Barefoot, which was nice for drinking, but didn't pack as much champagne taste as I was hoping it would. Dreamy and light as the cake may have been, next time, I'll use a drier champagne.

For the cake, you will need:

2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
2/3 cup butter
1 1/2 cups white sugar
3/4 cup champagne
6 egg whites

For the buttercream, you will need:

3 1/4 cups powdered sugar
1 cup butter, at room temperature
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 tablespoons champagne, at room temperature

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Prepare 2 9 inch cake pans: grease with butter and coat with flour.

In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until very light and fluffy. Sift flour, baking powder, and salt together, and then blend into creamed mixture alternately with champagne.

In another large clean bowl, beat egg whites until stiff peaks form. Fold 1/3 of the whites into batter to lighten it, then fold in remaining egg whites. Fill the cake pans about 2/3 of the way full.

Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 20-25 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the cakes comes out clean.

Adapted from Gimme Some Oven

Alyssa's 8th Birthday

I've been itching to entertain. Since Josh and I had yet to throw a party at our place, when conversations about Alyssa's birthday started coming up, my mind started racing. We quickly decided that we would go all-out, to simultaneously satisfy my entertaining itch, and to give her an 8th birthday to remember. Or hopefully remember. Try as I might, I can remember my 7th and 10th birthdays, but 8 and 9 are for some reason lost forever. Good thing we're in the age of the digital camera!

Alyssa made up her mind while I decorated Andrea's birthday cake back in April that she wanted a heart-shaped, pink strawberry cake for her birthday, much like the one we made for her last year...

...which was monstrous. Rich, crazy decadent, and tipping the scales at 10 pounds of sweet birthday evil. Or goodness, depending on the circumference of your waist.

So we designed the whole party around the cake. I did my best to channel my inner Amy Atlas, found leftover Valentine's decorations at various dollar stores (I was surprised but giddy to find them in June), created a dessert table, and did the place up in pink, red and white.

I'm pretty proud to say I did this all myself...cooking, baking, decorating. It's nice to remind myself from time to time that my degree in Event Management didn't go completely to waste. Josh told me "I don't want you to stress about this." So I started everything on Tuesday, and listed out what to do and when to do it throughout the rest of the week.

I'm a chronic list maker. They make me feel in-control.

The heart/pink/red theme was also carried over into some of the food:

 533 pink and white marshmallows, counted by hand...the winner took them all home (thank God)

Pink Party Punch (Simply Raspberry lemonade, Sprite and frozen raspberries)

                                                         Muddy Buddies with red M&Ms

Candied pecans

Strawberry Whoppers

Chocolate covered strawberries

 White sangria...for the grownups only, of course

 Cookies, dyed with red food coloring and decorated with royal icing

Maui onion dip

 And of course, the birthday cake!

The turnout was great. We came up with some great games, Josh surprised me with a hidden talent:

And everyone enjoyed themselves - especially the birthday girl!

Happy birthday, Alyssa! I hope it was everything you wanted and more than you expected.

Andrea's Birthday Cake: Part Three

Not Andrea - this is Josh's daughter Alyssa.

There's nothing better than the stiff but creamy, grainy but smooth, tangy and sweet goodness like cream cheese icing.

I sat watching the blinking cursor for a moment, contemplating how to elaborate upon that sentence, but I'm not sure I need to. If you know the pleasure of red velvet cake, then you know the pleasure of cream cheese icing. And I can stop there.

To this particular cream cheese icing, I added fresh strawberry juice revved up with simple syrup. You could probably use frozen strawberries and do without the simple syrup - it just so happened this time around that strawberries came into season about the same time as Andrea's birthday.

Strawberry juice:

To start, you will need about a pound of fresh strawberries, hulled and halved. Puree the strawberries until completely pulverized, then add simple syrup (recipe follows) a tablespoon at a time until you reach the desired sweetness. Don't make it too sweet - you're about to dump it in 6 cups' worth of powdered sugar. The goal is to even out the taste and sweetness of the strawberries, compensating for the inevitable few in every case that are underripe or too tart. Pour the mixture into a fine-mesh sieve or over cheesecloth into a small bowl. Set aside.

Simple Syrup:

1 cup water

2 cups sugar

Bring the water to a rolling boil and add sugar. Stir and heat through until sugar is completely dissolved. Cool to room temperature and pour into a glass bottle. Keep in refrigerator for up to a month.

For the frosting:

2 8-ounce bricks cream cheese, room temperature
1 stick butter, room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla
6 cups confectioners’ sugar

Once your frosting has come together, slowly start adding the strawberry juice. Mix well after each addition and taste - you will probably not be able to detect strawberry flavor right away, so keep going. Stop when you can taste strawberry (the flavor will develop as the cake sits).

To assemble the cake:

I cut each layer in half so I ended up with 4 thin cake layers. You don't have to do this, but like I said before: I had a lot of frosting. Place the first layer on your cake plate and drop a large blob of frosting on top. With a spatula, work from the inside out and cover the top of the layer. Place the next layer on top and repeat with as many layers as you have; just frosting the tops at this point.

Next, frost the sides of the cake. Don't worry about crumbs - this is your crumb coat. A thin layer of frosting seals in the crumbs, and when properly chilled, your second, thicker layer of frosting will glide over the crumb coat perfectly, flawlessly. Having said that, after you frost the sides, keep the cake in the refrigerator to chill - preferably overnight. Add your final layer of frosting and decorate.

Andrea's Birthday Cake: Part Two

I'm slacking on replacing my camera, but for the meantime I suppose at least I have my cell phone's camera. The lighting is horrible and the shutter is far too slow (resulting often in blurry, unappetizing food pictures), so please forgive the lack of cake-baking-in-process pictures. That's not just an alibi - I swear I didn't use a box mix!

I purchased cake flour for the first time in my life and, proceeding with hopeful caution, modified Dorie Greenspan’s Perfect Party Cake recipe. Why cautiously? Honestly, I didn’t know that it would work. I ditched the lemon zest, substituted vanilla extract for lemon, and did away with the raspberry filling and coconut. There’s a distinct reason I feared baking for so many years: unlike cooking, there’s no way to taste-test before serving, lest you hack off a piece of somebody’s else’s birthday cake – but even then, if you screw up, you can’t add a little of this or that to doctor it up. Baking is a science of leaveners and acids; a science I’m learning but on which I'm certainly not an authority.

The original from Dorie Greenspan's book, Baking: From My Home to Yours. Photo from a fellow food blogger.

Fortunately though, the baking gods smiled upon me and it was better than I could have hoped: moist but spongy, airy but firm, and it rose perfectly and evenly during baking, eliminating the need to even the tops out with a serrated knife. The two nine-inch layers (that I cut in half to make 4 layers – I had a ton of frosting) were a perfect, gorgeous canvas for my also-experimental strawberry cream cheese icing (see part 3).

Here’s my modified recipe, and a link to the original:

2 1/4 cups cake flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/4 cups half and half
1 tsp red wine vinegar (trust me)
4 large egg whites
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 stick (8 tablespoons) butter, at room temperature
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees, and place a large baking sheet on the top rack of your oven (I'm not sure how, but I believe this has something to do with the evenness of the cake tops). Butter two 9-inch round cake pans and line the bottom of each pan with a round of buttered wax paper.
Sift together the flour, baking powder and salt.

Whisk together the half and half and egg whites in a medium bowl.

Put the sugar and the butter in a mixing bowl, and beat with a hand or stand mixer at medium speed for a full 3 minutes, until the butter and sugar are very light. Beat in the vanilla extract, then add one third of the flour mixture, still beating on medium speed. Beat in half of the milk-egg mixture, then beat in half of the remaining dry ingredients until incorporated. Add the rest of the milk and eggs, beating until the batter is homogeneous, then add the last of the dry ingredients. Finally, give the batter a good 2-minute beating to ensure that it is thoroughly mixed and well aerated. Divide the batter between the two pans and smooth the tops with a rubber spatula.

I know it seems very specific, but even though I happen to hate sifiting, I followed the instructions to the letter and arrived at the best cake I’ve ever pulled out of my oven. It’s worth it to do as Dorie says.

Bake for 30 to 35 minutes, or until the cakes are well risen and springy to the touch – a toothpick inserted into the centers should come out clean. Transfer the cakes to cooling racks and cool for about 5 minutes, then run a knife around the sides of the cakes. Cool to room temperature (or be impatient like me and stick them in the freezer), turn over on to a plate and remove wax paper. If you choose to cut the layers in half to double up, use a serrated knife and make a clean cut halfway through each layer.

Next up: frosting and assembly.

Andrea's Birthday Cake: Part One

My dear friend Andrea's birthday was fast approaching when she was still deciding how to celebrate. Once she'd settled on a low-key get together, I offered to make her cake. But what kind of cake? Andrea had a few specific parameters: no chocolate, no lemon anything, no mint, and most especially, no cooked fruit. Such specifications immediately knocked about every cake in my repertoire out the window.

But, after tossing around a few ideas from Dorie Greenspan's Baking book, we ultimately settled on a white cake with strawberry-cream cheese icing. Not a huge stretch, but different nonetheless. Since I made it a personal goal early this year to bake every cake I make completely from scratch, I'll be blogging the creation of this cake in parts. Today's topic: decorations.

I knew from the start that I wanted to make the cake's flavor obvious on sight. I hemmed and hawed for a while over how to decorate it so it was obviously strawberry, but cutting up fresh strawberries and arranging them on top seemed too easy and overdone. Did I want to pipe on buttercream strawberries? Did I want to shape the cake like a strawberry? Finally I settled on cutting out and decorating butter cookies as strawberries and strawberry blossoms and plopping them on the cake.

But I couldn't find a strawberry cookie cutter to save my life. Even after the clerks told me they carried no such cookie cutter, I wandered nevertheless around a new baking supply store for inspiration (not that I'd need a reason to wander around a baking supply store). I happened upon a row of silver heart-shaped cookie cutters on wall pegs, in varying sizes. As I removed the smallest cutter from the wall and held it upside-down, I felt a stroke of genius. Surely I could decorate the hearts as strawberries!

Upon finding some teeny white sugar flowers:

I nixed the cookie blossom idea, picked up some royal icing powder, and headed home.

I made about 50 tiny heart cookies using a very simple butter cookie recipe (it didn't need to be an earth-shattering, delicious cookie, as it's just being used for decorating).

3 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 large egg
1 stick butter, softened
3/4 cup white sugar
2 tablespoons corn syrup
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Combine flour and salt, set aside. Cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy; add egg, corn syrup, and vanilla and beat until combined. Slowly add dry ingredients. A slightly crumbly dough will form, but should come together when pressed. If your dough is too dry, try adding half of another egg (beat it in a separate bowl and pour in half of the mixture) and beating together again.

Roll the dough out onto a lightly floured surface until about 1/4 inch thick. Cut with cookie cutters into desired shapes, then place on a greased cookie sheet. Bake at 325 for 12-14 minutes (with such tiny shapes, mine took no more than 10). Allow cookies to cool while you prepare your royal icing.

If you aren't lazy or in a hurry like I was, you can make your own royal icing, and here's a good recipe (see "runny icing" section). If you do opt to use a mix like I did, just add about 5 tablespoons of water to a one-pound bag and mix by hand with a wooden spoon. Make sure you follow the directions on the bag for "picture/flood" icing, otherwise you'll be creating a whipped icing for decorating cakes - not ideal for cookies. Basically, you want it to be thick enough not to run right through the tip of a piping bag, but thin enough that it will easily "flood" the inside of a cookie outlined in icing (for reference).

Divide into small bowls with lids (or use plastic wrap), to keep the icing from drying out - which it will do, more quickly than you may think. Color the icing in each bowl with food coloring, and mix well. You can use a spatula to spread the icing, but I prefer the piping bag/squeeze bottle method.

Tada! I successfully transformed the tiny hearts into tiny strawberries. I'm still not completely sure how I'll lay them out on the cake with the sugar blossoms, but I think I'm off to a good start.

Now I just need to find an application for the other 30 naked hearts...

Stay tuned! Next up: white cake from scratch.