DANISH BRAID

Here we are at the end of another month and I have completed another Daring Bakers Challenge. This month we were challenged to make a Danish Braid. This Danish Braid is made of a danish dough in the family of butter-laminated doughs. This dough is sweet and super yummy. Since I have NEVER made any type of danish, I was very scared to see the results of what was to come out of this. I kept checking the Daring Bakers Website to see what results other bakers had with the recipe and what fillings others were using. I began thinking of just what fillings were going to be just right. I finally decided on making the first one a Strawberry-Rhubarb with Sweetened Cream Cheese filled Danish and the second one a Sour Cherry Cream Cheese Danish. I was just hoping that the dough would turn out so that I could get that far with the recipe!!!

I started on the dough one afternoon after lunch. I got out the ole' Kitchen Aid and started the dough and then the butter block. I rolled out the dough and then smothered 2/3 of it with the butter block. I folded the dough according to the directions and put it in the fridge to chill for 30 minutes. After the 30 minutes, I had to get the dough out and roll it into a 18 X 13 inch rectangle. Then I had to fold it according to the directions again....this took place a total of 4 times. After the 4th time of rolling it out and folding it, I divided it in to 2 pieces and I had to let the dough rest over night in the fridge.

The next morning I was so excited to start the danish making process. I got the dough out and rolled it into a 15 X 20 rectangle about 1/4 inch thick. This proved to be difficult since I broke the rolling pin handles from pushing so hard! I trudged on and cut the dough so that I had a base area for the filling and then I had the strips on both sides so that I could braid it. I put the cream cheese mixture on first and then the fruit fillings. I then braided the top of the danish. This was another thing that was difficult, I didn't know what I was doing....my braiding technique needs help to say the least! I will have to practice when I get another rolling pin!

I put the danishes in the oven for 10 minutes on 400 degrees and then another 15 minutes at 350 degrees. I couldn't believe the smell in my kitchen. Good thing that we live on a large lot of land in the neighborhood or the neighbors would have been coming by the flock if they would have smelled the aroma!!! I let the danish cool and then drizzled a little powdered sugar/milk mixture over the top! I then proceeded to eat almost 1/2 of the Strawberry Rhubarb Danish that late afternoon. I packaged up 1/2 of the Cherry filled one for my girlfriend and took some of both over to my neighbors......if I hadn't of done that, it would have been very bad for the waistline!

I am very happy that I had the time to tackle this challenge this month. Everyone that tried the danish couldn't believe just how wonderful it was. I think that I have something new to give at Christmas other than my boring Banana Bread!

Rhubarb & Strawberry Crumb Pie

Ever since I was a very small child, I have been intrigued by the taste of Rhubarb. My grandmother grew it in her backyard and every spring we would always break pieces off and laugh as the sour taste made us have what seemed like lock jaw. We never made anything fancy with it, just ate it raw (from what I can remember). So, when grandma sold her home a few years back, I inherited half of the plants for my home. Last year I found a Rhubarb Strawberry Crisp recipe that I thought wasn't worthy of my "heirloom" Rhubarb. I have been on a mission to find that perfect recipe and this Crumb Pie was given the thumbs up by everyone that was given given the privilege to have a piece. (Arrogant, huh? Yeah, we are talking about my precious rhubarb!) My brother-in-law actually hinted that he would like to see another full pie like that again soon! This recipe is very simple to make and everyone that is privileged enough to have a piece or your pie will think that you have slaved away for hours! Without further ado, here is the recipe that I found in my new recipe book, "Pie" by Ken Haedrich and tweaked a little by moi!

Skillet Crust:

2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

1 cup sugar

1/4 teaspoon salt

3/4 cup unsalted butter

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Combine the flour, sugar and salt in a medium size bowl. Set aside. Melt the butter in a large skillet over medium to low heat. Stir in the vanilla. Add the dry mixture and turn off the hear. Stir the flour and butter with a whisk (it worked GREAT). It will be a little clumpy, but just keep working it. Set the crumbs aside to cool for several minutes. When the crumbs are cool enough to handle, transfer about 2/3 of them to a buttered 9 1/2 inch deep-dish pie pan. Press them into the bottom and up the side of the pan.

Filling:

4 cups (1 1/2 pounds) fresh rhubarb sliced 1/4 inch thick

2 cups sliced strawberries

3/4 cup sugar

Juice & Zest of 1 lemon

1/2 cup all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon cardamom (if you have it, if not it is alright.)

In a large bowl, combine the rhubarb, strawberries, sugar, lemon juice & zest, flour and cardamom. Set aside for 10 minutes. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Turn the filling into the pie shell, smoothing the top with a spoon. Crumble the reserved crust mixture evenly over the pie, pressing down on it gently. Place the pie in the center of the oven rack and bake for 30 minutes @ 350 degrees. Reduce the oven temperature to 325 degrees and rotate the pie 180 degrees. Just in case of spills, slide a foil lined baking sheet below the pie to avoid a huge mess. Continue to bake until the top is golden brown and the juices bubble thickly around the edges, 40 to 50 minutes. If the top starts to get too dark, cover with loosely tented foil during the last 15 minutes. LET COOL FOR AT LEAST 2 HOURS BEFORE SERVING, while cooling the pie will thicken.

Drumstick Cake Dessert

Yummy stuff, trust me!

My little kitchen helper :)

On a recent trip to my parents house, I rummaged through my mom's recipe box for some new recipes. I found this recipe from one of her old co-workers and she swore that it was something that I would love. Well, she is my mother and she does know me very well and she wasn't wrong! This recipe tastes similiar to those icecream drumsticks that you buy at the store, but this is made in a 9 X 13 pan. Oh, it is so good and a small piece really does satisfy a sweet tooth. Here is the recipe:

DRUMSTICK CAKE

Base:

3 Cups Crushed Vanilla Wafers (1 box)

1 Cup Chopped Peanuts

1/2 Cup Melted Butter

Mix the 3 ingredients together and pour 1/2 of the combined ingredients in the bottom of a 9 X 13 pan. Reserve other 1/2 for topping.

Filling:

1/2 Cup Sugar

2 Tablespoons Vanilla

1 (8oz) Package Cream Cheese

3 Eggs

1 Large Cool Whip (16oz.)

1/2 Cup Peanut Butter

Topping:

1 Jar (16-18 oz) Hot Fudge Topping

Mix cream cheese, sugar, peanut butter, vanilla and eggs together. Mix well until smooth. Fold in Cool Whip and pour onto base. Place in freezer to set for approximately 1 hour. Heat Hot Fudge topping until it is pourable. Remove pan from freezer and pour Hot Fudge topping onto the top of dessert then sprinkle with the other 1/2 of the base ingredient mixture. Cover and freeze.

ENJOY!!

Chocolate Strawberry Trifle

In honour of Mother's Day and my own mother, I made this awesome quick recipe given to me by my neighbor, Caroline. This is so tasty that all of your guests will think that you slaved away in the kitchen for hours....my brother-in-law actually had this thought! What you do is just bake a box cake in a 9 X 13 pan and then cut it into cubes. Mix 2 (8ounce) cool-whips with 1 (4 ounce) instant chocolate (or any flavor) pudding. And last but NOT least, slice up some strawberries.

First (Bottom) layer: cake

Second layer: pudding mixture

Third layer: sliced strawberries

Repeat layers until your Trifle dish is full

Enjoy and let me know what you think of it!

Daring Bakers Challenge for April

The challenge for this month was Cheesecake Pops. This recipe looked almost like several other cheesecake recipes that I have made in the past, but only you cut (Scoop) them into little balls or shapes and then dip them into chocolate. While looking at the recipe I had to gasp, I have been trying to loose weight and the thought of all that cream cheese.....oh my! I got the cheesecake mixture into the pan and had to cook it about 65 minutes. I wanted to make sure that it was indeed done and it didn't appear to look done at the suggested 35 to 45 minutes. I put it into the fridge overnight on a Friday night and on Sunday morning I carefully cut the cheesecake (with a plastic knife, I don't know why that works so well!) into triangular shapes and then dipped them into mint chocolate. I got this minty chocolate at a cake supply shop near my home and oh it is really good! I then put lots of cute spring color sprinkles on the still wet chocolate and did they look cute and tasted WONDERFUL!! I would make these again for a special occasion -- or even just one day that I want to splurge! Here is the recipe if you would like to try them for yourselves! Sorry no pictures my camera isn't working...need to go and get a new one! Here is the recipe:

Cheesecake Pops
Makes 30 – 40 Pops
5 8-oz. packages cream cheese at room temperature
2 cups sugar
¼ cup all-purpose flour
¼ teaspoon salt
5 large eggs
2 egg yolks
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
¼ cup heavy cream
Boiling water as needed
Thirty to forty 8-inch lollipop sticks
1 pound chocolate, finely chopped – you can use all one kind or half and half of dark, milk, or white (Alternately, you can use 1 pound of flavored coatings, also known as summer coating, confectionery coating or wafer chocolate – candy supply stores carry colors, as well as the three kinds of chocolate.)
2 tablespoons vegetable shortening
(Note: White chocolate is harder to use this way, but not impossible)
Assorted decorations such as chopped nuts, colored jimmies, crushed peppermints, mini chocolate chips, sanding sugars, dragees) - Optional
Position oven rack in the middle of the oven and preheat to 325 degrees F. Set some water to boil.
In a large bowl, beat together the cream cheese, sugar, flour, and salt until smooth. If using a mixer, mix on low speed. Add the whole eggs and the egg yolks, one at a time, beating well (but still at low speed) after each addition. Beat in the vanilla and cream.
Grease a 10-inch cake pan (not a spring form pan), and pour the batter into the cake pan. Place the pan in a larger roasting pan. Fill the roasting pan with the boiling water until it reaches halfway up the sides of the cake pan. Bake until the cheesecake is firm and slightly golden on top, 35 to 45 minutes.
Remove the cheesecake from the water bath and cool to room temperature. Cover the cheesecake with plastic wrap and refrigerate until very cold, at least 3 hours or up to overnight.
When the cheesecake is cold and very firm, scoop the cheesecake into 2-ounce balls and place on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet. Carefully insert a lollipop stick into each cheesecake ball. Freeze the cheesecake pops, uncovered, until very hard, at least 1 – 2 hours.
When the cheesecake pops are frozen and ready for dipping, prepare the chocolate. In the top of a double boiler, set over simmering water, or in a heatproof bowl set over a pot of simmering water, heat half the chocolate and half the shortening, stirring often, until chocolate is melted and chocolate and shortening are combined. Stir until completely smooth. Do not heat the chocolate too much or your chocolate will lose it’s shine after it has dried. Save the rest of the chocolate and shortening for later dipping, or use another type of chocolate for variety.
Alternately, you can microwave the same amount of chocolate coating pieces on high at 30 second intervals, stirring until smooth.
Quickly dip a frozen cheesecake pop in the melted chocolate, swirling quickly to coat it completely. Shake off any excess into the melted chocolate. If you like, you can now roll the pops quickly in optional decorations. You can also drizzle them with a contrasting color of melted chocolate (dark chocolate drizzled over milk chocolate or white chocolate over dark chocolate, etc.) Place the pop on a clean parchment paper-lined baking sheet to set. Repeat with remaining pops, melting more chocolate and shortening (or confectionery chocolate pieces) as needed.
Refrigerate the pops for up to 24 hours, until ready to serve.

My FIRST Daring Bakers Challenge

These last couple of months I have been bored with my cooking and decided to browse some cooking blogs that I stumbled upon. I found a really cool food blog that I found some great recipes on and read about a group that bakes a different recipe together each month. This group is called the Daring Bakers and is the real reason that I created this food blog. I joined the group last month and received my challenge for March 2008. The challenge was to make a cake named, "The Perfect Party Cake". This cake recipe is from the recipe book, "Baking from my home to yours" by Dorie Greenspan (Who is the best-selling author of Baking with Julia Child) I was instantly intimidated! Oh my, a butter cream frosting, 4 layers and filling..... The last cake that I remember making from scratch was when I was a teenager and decided to make my dad a birthday cake. It was pretty awful and I still get teased about it.

I decided that I needed to make this cake for Easter Dinner Dessert. Easter morning the kids hunted for their baskets and then it was time to bake. I got the Kitchen Aid out and away I went. I couldn't believe it; I was making this cake and actually had some confidence that my family would be able to eat it. I got the cake batter into the pans and waited patiently the 30 minutes for the cakes to bake. I just knew that all the running around the kids were doing was bound to make these cakes not rise. I pulled the cakes out and they looked just perfect. Perfect until I flipped them out of the pans and saw that they didn't rise real high. So, I decided that I needed to make the recipe again to make sure that I didn't screw something up (as this is common around here!!) I quickly made another 2 cakes and of course they turned out the same. Oh well, I now had 4 layers that would look like a decent size cake when it was finished. (Decent size was an UNDERSTATEMENT!) I proceeded to make this awesome butter cream frosting and couldn't believe that I actually made this masterpiece frosting myself! I then had to put all of this good stuff together! I started with the first layer and spread the raspberry filling onto the top of it, then put a layer of frosting. I repeated these steps until the last of the four cakes were placed onto the top. At this point I was freaking out, this cake was just crazy HUGE! I looked at this thing and just started frosting, frosting and more frosting. I am NOT by any means going to make a living by decorating cakes. The original recipe called for coconut over the butter cream, but Grandma Madeline doesn't appreciate coconut, so I just placed a few little nests of coconut and jelly beans on the top and around the bottom for a little Easter decoration. No one that ate the cake could believe that I made it. So bring on the next challenge Daring Bakers, I AM READY! Email me for the recipe if you too would like to challenge yourself!

Easter Birthday Cakes

Aunt Gaby's "29th" Birthday Cake
G1's Birthday Cake

Tomorrow is our annual Egg Hunt and this year we will be also celebrating G1's B-Day early. Since he was born on Easter in April 2001 and we will be gone on vacation for his "real" B-Day, I decided to do a combo party. So it is G1's 7th B-Day/Egg Hunt. It is also Aunt Gaby's "29th" B-Day again tomorrow so we made 2 cakes (actually Brownies since cake doesn't pass through the mouth of my little prince). I never claimed to be a cake decorator, so I am sure you're laughing at my cakes right now!