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Homemade Ice Cream Cake

January 23, 2012 by Leave a Comment

It’s not often that I have spare room in my freezer. So when I noticed that there was a little bit of room, the first thing that came to my mind was that I had to start trying to make Ice Cream Cake! Isn’t that the first thing that would come to your mind too? I didn’t follow any recipes or anything like that. There’s not a whole lot that goes into it. But the most important part of it is the center; the crunchy part! Wouldn’t you agree?

WHAT YOU’LL NEED

  • loaf pan
  • parchment paper
  • off-set spatula
  • half gallon of ice cream (if you are using two flavors, use half of each container)
  • hot fudge sauce
  • oreo cookies

ASSEMBLY

I decided that I was going to make mine in a loaf pan. It doesn’t take up a ton of room in the freezer and I figured it’d be easy to slice. So I started out by lining my loaf pan with some parchment paper. I cut a strip for it to go long ways, and then I cut another piece that would fit the other way. This way it would be easy to take it out of the loaf pan to cut.

I let the base flavor (chocolate) of my ice cream soften a bit before starting on the assembly of my ice cream cake. I wanted it to be easy to work with. I used a medium sized cookie scoop (you could use a regular ice cream scoop if you prefer) and scooped the ice cream out of the ice cream container and placed it in the bottom of the loaf pan. I placed one scoop right next to the other scoop so that they were closely touching. Once I was done that I took an off-set spatula and smoothed it all out so that it was a nice flat surface. You want the ice cream to come almost halfway up the loaf pan, but not quite all the way.

I don’t know about you, but my favorite part of the ice cream cake is the middle! I put some oreo cookies (maybe like 10 cookies?) into my Vitamix and broke up the pieces. I didn’t make it a fine crumb or anything. They were little round pieces of cookie. I tried getting it as close to those Dairy Queen “crunchies” as I could. It’s hard, though. I took half of the cookies and put them on top of your base layer. I pushed them in a bit so that they would stay kind of glue themselves to the bottom ice cream layer.

Next it was time for some hot fudge sauce! I recommend using some amazing homemade hot fudge sauce, and you can find the recipe here. Take some of your hot fudge sauce and drizzle it over the cookie pieces. It would be easiest to use a squeeze bottle, but make sure it can be heated up a bit so that it’s squeezable (recommendation: pancake syrup bottle that can be heated up!). If you can’t use a squeeze bottle then just take a spoon and lightly drizzle it over the cookie pieces. Once you have an even layer of hot fudge on top of the cookies, take the rest of your cookie pieces and place them on top of the fudge sauce. Push down a bit to make sure it sticks to the fudge sauce.

Take your top flavor of ice cream (in my case it was cookies n cream) and scoop the ice cream and place it on top of the cookie mixture (just like how you did it for the base). You want to make sure you cover the entire cake. Once that’s done take your off-set spatula (rinsed off, of course!) and smooth out the top. Do not cover it yet; place in the freeze for about 30 minutes and let it firm up a bit before covering.

After it’s firmed up a bit, cut a piece of parchment paper that fits right on top (so the length of the loaf pan) of the cake. Then take some saran wrap and wrap up the loaf pan and place in the freezer.

I know that Dairy Queen does that whippy icing on top, but I’m not a fan of that so I left it off. But if I were making a round ice cream cake for someone’s birthday I would probably pipe some real buttercream icing around the edges.

TRIAL & ERROR

Now on my first trial run of this ice cream cake when I was making the middle layer, I combined my hot fudge sauce and the oreo crunchies. That didn’t really turn out all that well. When we went to eat the ice cream cake the center was quite hard. So this is when I knew I had to go back to the drawing board to find “the perfect recipe.”  Don’t get me wrong, we ate that ice cream cake! But I knew it needed work.  So then I tried doing the cookie/fudge/cookie layer in between the two flavors of ice cream and that worked out so well. It was not hard and it had the right amount of hot fudge to go with the cookie pieces. I was so pleased with how it came out!

This is probably as close to Dairy Queen’s ice cream cake that I’ll get without buying a cake from them. I’m pretty happy with how it came out. There are so many different flavors you can use! I really want to try cake batter flavored ice cream with the chocolate ice cream.  I also plan on experimenting with middle layers – like perhaps a brownie batter middle layer. How amazing would that be?!

 

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Homemade Hot Fudge Sauce

January 19, 2012 by 1 Comment

So we’re currently on this Homemade Ice Cream Cake kick in my house. Now that we’re in a tiny apartment we don’t have an extra freezer, so I don’t have a ton of room to store frozen items. An ice cream cake from Dairy Queen is usually quite large (which is a good thing, don’t get me wrong!) but I don’t have room for it. So I decided to work with what I do have and I set out to make my own! I’m still working on “the perfect recipe,” but in the midst of it I made an amazing Homemade Hot Fudge Sauce. Once I get the Ice Cream Cake recipe down pat I’ll share that with you all. It’s definitely something that you should make at home as opposed to spending $20 – $25 for one.  I made mine for less than $5.

Okay – now let’s talk about this Hot Fudge Sauce! I used up the Hot Fudge that was purchased from the grocery store on the first Ice Cream Cake run. I needed some for my second Ice Cream Cake (since the first one was all gone!) and I didn’t have any more. I didn’t feel like going to the grocery store, so I started looking up some recipes online to make my own. I came across one on Allrecipes called Sue’s Hot Fudge Sauce. It got 4 1/2 stars and looked pretty simple so I figured I’d use that as a base recipe and make a few of my own modifications to it. You can find the original recipe here. The ingredients/instructions below include the changes that I made.

INGREDIENTS

  • 1 cup butter
  • 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 2 1/2  cups white sugar
  • 1 (12 fluid ounce) can evaporated milk
  • 1/4 cup chocolate chips
  • 1 cup mini marshmallows
  • 1 teaspoon espresso powder
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

INSTRUCTIONS

Combine butter, cocoa, sugar, chocolate chips, espresso powder, marshmallows, and evaporated milk in a saucepan over medium heat. Use a whisk to combine everything. Continue to whisk while the mini marshmallows melt.

Bring to a boil and boil for about 7 – 8 minutes.

Remove the pot from the heat; stir in vanilla. Pour the hot mixture into a blender and blend for 4 minutes.  I would not skip this step – it’s essential. Some people have used a hand blender – you could probably try that if you wanted. I used my Vitamix and it worked perfectly.

Once it starts to cool it will thicken up.  Store in refrigerator.

 

This Hot Fudge Sauce was amazing.  I really loved the addition of the marshmallows – it seemed to make it more fudgy. The espresso powder brings out that rich chocolate flavor. It’s not the end of the world if you don’t have the espresso powder. I think it’ll be fine without it. I don’t think I’ll ever buy jarred Hot Fudge Sauce again!

 

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Kelsey Nixon’s Carmelitas

January 10, 2012 by 1 Comment

Over the holidays I made a variety of baked goods to give to some of my family members. I love baking, but I never  have anything to do with all of the baked goods, so I don’t get to bake stuff as often as I’d like. Mr. Curly Fry doesn’t like any kind of nut, so if I make something with nuts in it I’m on my own to eat it. And while I’d LOVE to have an entire 13 x 9 baking dish full of Carmelitas for myself, I know it really wouldn’t be a good idea.

The night before I was going to make the Carmelitas, I decided to make the Salted Caramel Sauce. I wanted to give it plenty of time to cool and set up.

SALTED CARAMEL SAUCE:

  • 1 cup sugar
  • 1/4 cup water
  • 3/4 cup heavy cream
  • 3 1/2 tablespoons unsalted butter
  • 1 teaspoon gray sea salt, crushed or kosher salt

In a heavy-bottomed saucepan, combine the sugar and water over medium-low heat until the sugar dissolves. Increase the heat and bring to a boil, without stirring. If necessary, use a wet pastry brush to wash down any crystals on the side of the pan. Boil until the syrup is a deep amber color, about 5 to 6 minutes.

Remove the sugar from the heat and carefully whisk in the heavy cream. The mixture will bubble. Stir in the unsalted butter, and salt. Transfer the caramel to a dish and cool.

I transferred it to the fridge once it cooled and let it set there over night. I took the caramel sauce out of the fridge about an hour or so before starting the Carmelitas.

CARMELITAS:

  • 2 cups flour
  • 1 3/4 cups quick-cooking oats
  • 1 1/4 cups brown sugar
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1 1/4 cups (2 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
  • 1 cup chocolate chips (I didn’t use the chocolate chips)
  • 3/4 cup chopped pecans
  • 1 1/2 cups Salted Caramel Sauce
  • 2 1/2 tablespoons flour

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Grease a 9 by 13-inch pan.

Combine the flour, oats, brown sugar, baking soda, salt, and softened butter in the bowl of a mixer. Mix on low until crumbly. Divide the mixture into 2 equal portions.

Press half the crumb mixture in the prepared pan. Bake for 10 minutes. Remove and cool slightly.

 

Sprinkle the chocolate chips, and chopped pecans over the cooled crust.

Mix the salted caramel sauce, and flour together, and drizzle over the chocolate chips, and nuts.

Top with the remaining crumb mixture. Return to the oven and bake for an additional 15 to 20 minutes or until the crust starts to brown. Allow the pan to cool, and refrigerate it until the caramel filling is set.


Cut into bars and serve.

They were all ready to be delivered to my family members!

I can’t even begin to tell you how delicious these bars are. The Salted Caramel Sauce is so good! The recipe really only made enough for these bars, so if you want some for the Milkshake or something else I’d double the recipe. I really loved the bars straight out of the fridge. They were very good when they weren’t refrigerated too. I highly recommend these and I’m plotting out the next time I can make these! I know it won’t be soon enough!

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Cake Batter Cookie Sandwich

December 19, 2011 by 3 Comments

I’m baaaaaaack! I was out of touch last week because I was summoned for Jury Duty and I was picked to serve on the jury for a trial. So I was out of the office all week. This was the first time I was ever summoned for Jury Duty. I was picked for a criminal case and I have to say that I found it to be very interesting. I’m interested in that stuff  though – I could watch the Investigation Discovery Channel all day long! So pardon me for my absence – it was not intentional!

As we all know, I love cake. I also love cake batter. I love cookies. Put the two together and you have Cake Batter Cookies! I was catching up on my Google Reader and came across Lovin’ From the Oven’s blog post for Cake Batter Cookies. I knew from the second I laid eyes on them that I had to try them. So I did! I wanted to try them out before making homemade gifts for the holidays. So I did a test run. And I loved how they turned out. I decided to take it up a notch and make Cake Batter Cookie Sandwiches!

  • 3/4 cup flour
  • 1 1/4 cup funfetti cake mix
  • 1/4 tsp. baking soda
  • 3/4 cup softened butter
  • 1 egg
  • 1 egg yolk
  • 2 tsp. vanilla
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1/2 cup brown sugar
  • sprinkles (optional)
  • buttercream icing

Note: The recipe on Lovin’ From the Oven’s post called for chocolate chips, but I didn’t want to put those in.

Cream together the butter and sugars. Mix in the egg yolk, egg, and vanilla until creamy.

Add in the flour, cake mix, and baking soda. Stir in sprinkles.

Refrigerate for at least an hour.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Scoop heaping tablespoons of dough onto cookie sheets. I used a medium sized cookie scoop.

Bake for 12-15 minutes, until the edges are golden.

Let the cookies cool on a baking rack.

Place a cookie upside down and pipe some buttercream icing on the cookie. Place another cookie (bottom side down) on top to make a sandwich.

These cookies are also delicious plain if you don’t want to make the sandwiches!

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5 Ingredient Friday: Sauteed Peaches

July 22, 2011 by 2 Comments

This week’s 5 Ingredient Friday recipe was inspired by my Fruit Share from the CSA. I got a bunch of Peaches in my Fruit Share this week that have ripened up very nicely, so I wanted to saute some of them to serve with dinner. I love this recipe because it can be used with dinner OR dessert! I’ve served this on top of some chicken breasts before, and let me tell you how amazing it was! This time I served it as a side dish. It’s been so hot here in Philly that I have been trying to use the stove top instead of the oven whenever I can.  So I decided to throw this together! It’s so simple and you can use whatever spices you want. I happen to love Cinnamon and Nutmeg, but Allspice and Ginger is wonderful in it as well.

Ingredients

  • 3 Peaches; peeled & sliced
  • 3 Tablespoons butter
  • 1/3 cup packed Dark Brown Sugar
  • 1/8 teaspoon Cinnamon (I recommend Penzey’s extra fancy Vietnamese Cinnamon)
  • 1/8 teaspoon Nutmeg (I recommend Penzey’s Fine Ground Grenadian West Indian Nutmeg)

Directions

If you haven’t already, peel the peaches and slice them up

Melt the butter in a pan

Add in the Peaches and stir around;
let cook for about 10 minutes until softened

Add in the Brown Sugar

Stir the Brown Sugar until incorporated;
Let cook for a bit until the sugar starts to caramelize

Add in the Spices and cook for 3-4 minutes.
Serve!

These Peaches are great served with a Protein (Chicken, Pork, etc), served as a side dish, or even for Dessert! They go great over Pound Cake, on top of Vanilla Bean Ice Cream, etc. The possibilities are endless! Be creative and have fun with it.

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5 Ingredient Friday: Homemade Caramel Sauce

July 15, 2011 by 1 Comment

One day we took a walk to Franklin Square in Philadelphia. There’s a little Burger Shack there called Square Burger, and they have something called a Cake Shake. Now you know I’m ALL about cake. So of course I had to try one of these bad boys out!  The Cake Shake is a Tastykake Butterscotch Krimpet and caramel sauce blended with vanilla ice cream. And let me tell you – it’s out of this world!  It costs $4.75 and I knew that I could probably make this myself at home.

So I set out to try to make my own Cake Shake (recipe coming soon!). I had the vanilla ice cream, the butterscotch krimpet, and the milk. The only thing I was missing was the caramel sauce. I’ve made my own caramel sauce before, and it was pretty simple. So instead of buying caramel sauce, I wanted to make my own. I came across a 5 ingredient recipe for Caramel Sauce, which was definitely an added bonus!

Ingredients

  • 2 1/2 cups brown sugar
  • 1 can sweetened condensed milk
  • 1/2 cup fresh butter
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 3/4 cup whole milk

    • Instructions

    Prepare the sugar. Mix the sugar and condensed milk together in medium saucepan, and cook on medium heat until sugar is dissolved completely. Set aside.

    Mix the sugar and condensed milk together

    Prepare the butter. Melt the butter in another small saucepan, and stir in the vanilla and milk. Leave to simmer on low heat until mixture is smooth, about 1 to 2 minutes.

    Melt the butter in another saucepan

    Add in the milk and vanilla to the melted butter

    Finish the caramel sauce. Slowly stir the butter mixture into the sugar mixture and leave to stand 3 to 5 minutes until mixture becomes thick.

    Stir the butter mixture into the sugar mixture

    Sauce will thicken as it stands

    Pour into bowl or small pitcher and cover. Store in refrigerator until ready to serve and enjoy!

    My thoughts…

    This caramel sauce was very good! I loved that it was so simple to make and I didn’t need to rely on store-bought caramel sauce. I had everything on hand to make this.  It thickened up very nicely. I dipped some apple slices in the sauce and it was to die for!

     

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    5 Ingredient Friday: Cherry Pie

    July 8, 2011 by 2 Comments

    This week’s 5 Ingredient Friday recipe was inspired by my Fruit Share from the CSA.  I got some sour cherries and I figured the perfect way to use them would be for Cherry Pie.  I wanted a recipe that was not very difficult and that didn’t require too many ingredients. I found a recipe on the Food Network’s web site and I saw that it had a lot of good reviews, so I figured I’d try it.  For this one I used refrigerated pie dough because I was short on time, but you can feel free to make your own if you want (although this wouldn’t be a 5 Ingredient recipe then! :) ) The original recipe calls for an optional ingredient, almond extract, but I’m not a fan of that stuff so I did not include it. So that’s how I got it to be 5 Ingredients.

    Ingredients

    • 4 cups fresh or frozen tart cherries
    • 1 to 1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
    • 4 tablespoons cornstarch
    • Your favorite pie crust or pie dough recipe for 2 crust pie
    • 1 1/2 tablespoons butter, to dot
    • 1 tablespoon granulated sugar, to sprinkle

    Directions

    Place cherries in medium saucepan and place over heat. Cover. After the cherries lose considerable juice, which may take a few minutes, remove from heat. In a small bowl, mix the sugar and cornstarch together. Pour this mixture into the hot cherries and mix well. Add the almond extract, if desired, and mix. Return the mixture to the stove and cook over low heat until thickened, stirring frequently. Remove from the heat and let cool. If the filling is too thick, add a little water, too thin, add a little more cornstarch.

    Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.

    Use your favorite pie dough recipe. Prepare your crust. Divide in half. Roll out each piece large enough to fit into an 8 to 9-inch pan. Pour cooled cherry mixture into the crust. Dot with butter. Moisten edge of bottom crust. Place top crust on and flute the edge of the pie. Make a slit in the middle of the crust for steam to escape. Sprinkle with sugar.

    Bake for about 50 minutes. Remove from the oven and place on a rack to cool.

    Heat until the cherries lose a considerable amount of water

    Add in the sugar & corn starch mixture; It will start to thicken

    Prepare your pie crust in the dish

    Pour filling into pie shell

    Dot with butter

    Place top crust on; fold it over and seal

    Flute the edges

    Cut some slits into the top to allow steam to escape

    Bake for 50 minutes at 375 degrees

    The middle of the pie; it held together very well

    Let me just say how it was so hard to wait until dessert to try this pie. It was sitting there taunting me all day long. The pie was absolutely delicious. I loved how it turned out. It was the perfect sweetness, and it had a wonderful consistency. It was truly a very simple recipe to follow. The recipe online mentions that it’s an intermediate level, but I don’t agree with that. It was very easy! The filling thickened up perfectly and I didn’t have to make any changes to the recipe.  I think you could probably use this recipe as a guide for any fruit based pie – I would probably just adjust the sugar. If you’re using Raspberries or Blueberries, they aren’t going to be as tart as sour cherries, ya know?

    This is the perfect pie to take to a summer barbecue!

    Filed Under: 5 Ingredient Friday, Dessert, Desserts, Food Network, Recipes · Tagged With: , , , ,

    5 Ingredient Friday: Cookies & Cream Pudding

    July 1, 2011 by 1 Comment

    This week’s 5 Ingredient Friday is something that is quick and easy to put together! It’s a great go-to dessert for the summer when it’s hot and you don’t want to turn on the stove or oven.  I love all things Cookies & Cream, so I love this Cookies & Cream Pudding! It’s just something that I threw together in a pinch one time when I knew I wanted something for dessert, but didn’t want to bake anything.


    Ingredients

    • 1 box Chocolate Instant Pudding (any size, I only had a 5.1 oz box on hand)
    • 1 box Vanilla Instant Pudding (I used a 3.4 oz box)
    • Milk
    • 10 – 12 Oreos
    • Cool Whip

    Preparation

    Make the chocolate instant pudding according to the directions on the package. Refrigerate until ready to use.

    Make the vanilla instant pudding according to the directions on the package. Refrigerate until ready to use.

    Put the oreos in a food processor or a blender (my Vitamix worked great for this!)

    Blend until they are fine crumbs.

    This is what it should look like

    Reserve 1/4 cup of the oreo crumbs to use when you put everything together.
    Right before serving, mix together the vanilla pudding and the rest of the oreo crumbs.


    Shortly before you’re ready to serve the dessert, take the chocolate pudding, vanilla + oreo pudding, oreo crumbs and cool whip and layer them in a dessert dish or parfait glass.  I spooned in the chocolate pudding, then oreo crumbs, then Vanilla + oreo pudding, then cool whip, chocolate pudding, vanilla + oreo, and cool whip. I sprinkled the oreo crumbs on top.  You can do it any way that you want – be creative!


    Here’s what the middle looks like:


    You can get creative! Use different flavors of pudding. I think a butterscotch pudding would be good with vanilla! Then you can add in some chopped up Heath bar or something like that. Or if you have some fresh raspberries on hand, that would be very good paired with vanilla and lemon pudding!

     

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    Cupcake Monday: Whipped Bakeshop

    June 27, 2011 by Leave a Comment

    Welcome to Cupcake Monday! Last week we reviewed the  Sweetbox Truck which is a mobile gourmet cupcake truck in Philadelphia.  This week we’re taking a look at Whipped Bakeshop that is located in Fishtown, which is a neighborhood just north of Center City Philadelphia.

    According to their website, they are a custom bakery located in Philadelphia, specializing in custom cakes, cookies and cupcakes. The bakery was founded in 2008 by pastry artist Zoë Lukas, and their retail store opened in October 2009. I know that when I stopped in to pick up some cupcakes there were about 4-5 people in there working on different cakes, cookies, and other goodies.

    As of for the cupcakes, I was actually pretty disappointed in the flavor selection when I was there. Before I left to go to the bakeshop I looked at their list of flavors from their web site and I was pretty excited to try some of them.  But when I got there, they only had about 5 flavors to pick from.  I asked about a few flavors, and they were able to frost them for me pretty quickly, but they weren’t really what I had in mind.  I just thought that since they were a bakeshop, they’d have a larger selection. It sounds like Pamcakes spoiled me! :)

    Their cupcakes range in price from $2.75 – $3.25 each, depending on the flavor. If you buy them from the dozen they range in price from $33 – $39.

    Chocolate Truffle: Chocolate fudge cake filled with truffle cream, iced with chocolate buttercream, drizzled with ganache.

    I’m not sure that the cupcake I got was the true Chocolate Truffle or not. As you can see mine wasn’t drizzled with the ganache.  But anyways, this cupcake was pretty  good. The cake had a very deep, strong chocolate flavor.  I really enjoyed it. The truffle cream filling was very smooth and gave the cupcake more depth. The Chocolate Buttercream wasn’t the kind of buttercream that I like, but I didn’t absolutely hate it. It was more along the lines of a meringue buttercream, which I’m not a fan of.  If you ask me, it’s go sugar, or go home! ;)

    Vanilla: People talk about vanilla as if it means boring. We think it means bliss.

    So as usual, I picked up your Classic Vanilla Cupcake with Vanilla Buttercream.  I thought that the cupcake part was a bit on the tough side. I didn’t find it to be moist at all, and it was a bit crunchy on top. It didn’t have a very vanilla  flavor either.

    As for the Vanilla Buttercream, it was way too buttery for me. Again, I think it was a meringue type buttercream icing as opposed to a sugary buttercream. In my opinion it didn’t have a vanilla flavor at all; it actually had no flavor whatsoever. That was quite disappointing since the frosting was plentiful. I loved the confetti on top…at least it looked nice.

    Banana: Everyone loves this moist, delicious banana cake topped with vanilla or chocolate buttercream!

    This was one of those cupcakes that I had to ask about. I was very interested in tasting the Banana Cupcake with either Vanilla or Chocolate Buttercream, but they didn’t have any in the case. I asked about the Banana Cupcake and I was told that they could frost one with Peanut Butter Buttercream icing for me.  That was fine with me!

    The Banana cupcake was nice and moist. It had a very good flavor and a nice consistency.  I was pretty happy with it. The Peanut Butter Buttercream was light and fluffy. It didn’t have an overwhelming Peanut Butter flavor to it; it was a pretty light Peanut Butter flavor. It almost tasted like Peanut Butter mixed with some Cool Whip (although I know it wasn’t).

    Lemon: You can’t go wrong with lemon buttermilk cake and delicious lemon meringue buttercream.

    After I had that absolutely amazing Lemon Cupcake from Pamcakes, I wanted to try one from Whipped Bakeshop. I didn’t see one in the case, so I asked about it. I was told that I could get a Lemon cupcake with Vanilla Buttercream. After waiting though, they asked me if I wanted Lemon Buttercream. Sure!

    The Cupcake had a faint lemon flavor. It wasn’t robust at all. The cupcake was a bit on the heavy side, almost like Poundcake. I wasn’t really sure how I felt about it – I didn’t love it, but I didn’t hate it. I was somewhere in the middle, and I figured I’d let the frosting make the decision for me.

    The Buttercream didn’t have much flavor at all. I couldn’t really make out what I was tasting, which isn’t good if you ask me. I should know what I’m eating. So needless to say this buttercream was a big miss. It’s a shame because the Cupcake has potential.

    Vanilla cake with Chocolate Buttercream (this wasn’t listed on their flavor menu, but it was available)

    This Vanilla Cupcake was much like the other one. The Cupcake part was a bit on the tough side and I didn’t find it to be moist at all. It was a bit crunchy on top. It was definitely lacking the vanilla flavor that a Vanilla Cupcake should have.

    The Chocolate Buttercream had a faint chocolate flavor. It was a light and fluffy icing, lacking the sugar to give it that good flavor. It just seems that Whipped Bakeshop prefers the Meringue Buttercream as opposed to regular Buttercream, which will keep me away.  But hey – that’s their thing and if that’s what they like, so be it.

    So all in all, this was a very cute bakeshop, but it wasn’t for me. The cakes weren’t all that moist, and the buttercreams weren’t the kind that I like. They really lacked the flavor and sugar that a buttercream should have, in my opinion. There really wasn’t a cupcake that had the total package. It seems like you had to sacrifice one thing for another.  The best cupcake that was taste tested was the Chocolate Truffle Cupcake.  I could really do without the others. They had some very pretty LOVE Park cookies there but at $57 for 12 small cookies, I’ll never know if they are good or not!


    Filed Under: Cupcakes, Desserts, Philadelphia · Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , ,

    Rhubarb-Raspberry-Strawberry Galette

    May 16, 2011 by 1 Comment

    I got some Rhubarb in my first CSA box this past week so I knew I had to make something with it. I’ve never had it before, but I know that it’s usually paired with Strawberries. I was all set to make a Strawberry Rhubarb Crisp that I saw in the Food Network Magazine, but then I saw an email in my inbox from Fine Cooking. It was a recipe for Rhubarb-Raspberry Galette. I really liked how they were little individual desserts. So I decided to give this recipe a whirl. I had both raspberries and strawberries, so I used some of each. I cut down the amount of rhubarb since I wasn’t sure if I would like it since I’ve never had it. I didn’t want it to ‘ruin’ the recipe.

    Rhubarb-Raspberry Galette

    For the dough:
    10 oz. (2-1/4 cups) all-purpose flour
    1 tsp. sugar
    1/4 tsp. salt
    6 oz. (12 Tbs.) unsalted butter, chilled and cut into small pieces
    1/2 cup ice water
    For the filling:
    1-1/2 lb. rhubarb
    1 cup raspberries
    3 Tbs. flour
    1 to 1-1/4 cups sugar
    Melted butter for brushing
    Sugar for sprinkling

    To make the dough 

    Combine the flour, sugar, and salt; cut in the butter until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Add the ice water and toss just until the mixture holds together. Be careful not to overmix. Press the dough into a ball, cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate at least 30 minutes.

    Line a baking sheet with kitchen parchment. On a lightly floured work surface, roll out the chilled dough into a 14-inch circle, about 1/8 inch thick. Transfer the dough to the prepared baking sheet and refrigerate while preparing the filling.

    To make the filling

    Trim the ends of the rhubarb and, if the stalks are more than 1 inch thick, cut them in half lengthwise. Cut the stalks into 1-inch-long pieces. In a large bowl, gently toss the rhubarb and raspberries with the flour and sugar. Let stand until moist, 5 to 10 minutes.

    Heat the oven to 400°F. Remove the dough from the refrigerator and let sit at room temperature until it’s just pliable, about 5 to 10 minutes. Gently spread the fruit in the center of the dough, leaving a 2-inch margin around the edge. Carefully fold the edge of the dough over the fruit, pleating it as you go. Brush the edge of the dough with melted butter and sprinkle with sugar.

    Bake until the pastry is golden brown and the fruit is soft and bubbling, 45 to 55 min. Set on a rack to cool slightly.

     


    Dough is ready to chill in the refrigerator

    Rhubarb, Raspberries & Strawberries

    Up close & personal

    All lined up ~ waiting to go in the oven

    The finished product

    My thoughts…

    This is an example of how not every recipe that I try works out very well. LOL! Now as you can see mine definitely didn’t turn out looking like the picture on their web site, lol! But I did the best that I could do given the humidity and all of the jazz.  Truth be told, I really dislike making my own dough and rolling it out, etc. I  just don’t like doing it because it seems like something always goes wrong! Looking back, I should have made them a little bigger. I had to put the dough back in the fridge for a bit after cutting out the rounds because it was so warm. I think I also let the fruit mixture sit too long with the flour & sugar because it looked like it had too much juice in it.

    These really didn’t turn out all that well. They opened up a bit and the filling came out some. I tasted part of one and I thought that the rhubarb tasted pretty good. I can totally see how those flavors go together.  But I will be honest – we did not eat them. The trash can did. So while it wasn’t a successful recipe for me, at least I got a blog post out of it! :) I still have some rhubarb left that I threw in the freezer for another day. I think I will try to make that Rhubarb Crisp I was talking about earlier. If only I hadn’t changed my mind… ;)

    Filed Under: CSA, Dessert, Desserts, Fruit, Recipes, What's in the Box? · Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,
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