Lemon Poppy-Seed Muffins

Reasons why I'm really lucky:

1. I have really amazing friends.

2. All my friends really like to eat.

Here is Roz:

Here she is madly zesting a lemon:

She's zesting to make this beauty:

We had a rather exciting time, because our baking fest required an emergency to the grocery store for lemons, apples, poppy seeds and chocolate. We had a little too much fun at the grocery store. We sampled all the chocolate covered nuts and in the bulk candy section. And then we went home and made these.

Like I said, I'm lucky.

Lemon Poppy-Seed Muffins

For the Muffins:

2/3 cup sugar

grated zest and juice of lemon

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

3/4 cup sour cream

2 large eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 stick butter, unsalted, melted and cooled

2 tablespoons poppy seeds

For icing:

1 cup confectioners' sugar

2-3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

Preheat oven to 400 F.

Butter, or line with paper cups a twelve regular-size muffin pan. In a large bowl, rub the sugar and lemon zest togheter with your fingertips until sugar is moist and fragrance of lemon is strong. Whisk in flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. In a large glass measuring cup or another bowl, whisk the sour cream, eggs, vanilla, lemon juice and melted butter together until well blended. Pour the liquid ingredients over dry ingredient, with whisk or rubber spatula, gently but quicklystir to blend. Don't worry about being through, lumps are better than overmixing. Devide batter evenly among muffin cups.

Bake for 18 to 20 minutes, or until tops are golden and a thin knife inserted into the center of the muffins comes out clean. Transfer pan to rack to cools for 5 minutes, carefully remove muffins from tin and cool completely before icing.

To make the icing: Put confectioners sugar in a small bowl and add abotu 1 1/2 tablespoons of the lemon juice. Stir with a spoon to moisten sugar then add additional lemon juice, a dribble at a time, to get icing that is thin enough to drizzle from the tip of the spoon. Drizzle tops in zig-zags over tops of muffins, or coat tops entirely, the better to get that extra zap of lemon.

This is just to say....

spring has sprung:

peach blossom.

Perfect Chocolate Sheet Cake

Two words: Chocolate Sheet Cake. Actually, that's three words, but whatever.

For the uninitiated, this cake is long and flat and thin. And delicious. It's like a very spongy, cakey, frosted brownie. Except better.

My mom used to make this cake alot. Not too long ago she made it again, and while I was able to choke it down, I was little dissapointed. The cake wasn't chocolately enough, and was way too sweet.

Perhaps it's my developing taste buds. I have adolecent tastebuds. (A random sidenote: I HATE the word puberty.)

I've been pretty excited about PioneerWoman's chocolate sheet cake. Just because it's SO PERFECT. It's everything a chocolate sheet cake should be and more. So much more.

Perfect Chocolate Sheet Cake

from The Pioneer Woman Cooks

• FOR THE CAKE:
• 2 cups Flour
• 2 cups Sugar
• ¼ teaspoons Salt
• 4 Tablespoons (heaping) Cocoa
• 2 sticks Butter
• 1 cup Boiling Water
• ½ cups Buttermilk
• 2 whole Beaten Eggs
• 1 teaspoon Baking Soda
• 1 teaspoon Vanilla
• _____
• FOR FROSTING:
• ½ cups Finely Chopped Pecans
• 1-¾ stick Butter
• 4 Tablespoons (heaping) Cocoa
• 6 Tablespoons Milk
• 1 teaspoon Vanilla
• 1 pound (minus 1/2 Cup) Powdered Sugar

Preparation Instructions

In a mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar, and salt.

In a saucepan, melt butter. Add cocoa. Stir together.
Add boiling water, allow mixture to boil for 30 seconds, then turn off heat. Pour over flour mixture, and stir lightly to cool.

In a measuring cup, pour the buttermilk and add beaten eggs, baking soda, and vanilla. Stir buttermilk mixture into butter/chocolate mixture. Pour into sheet cake pan and bake at 350-degrees for 20 minutes.

While cake is baking, make the icing. Chop pecans finely. Melt butter in a saucepan. Add cocoa, stir to combine, then turn off heat. Add the milk, vanilla, and powdered sugar. Stir together. Add the pecans, stir together, and pour over warm cake.

Let cool a little. Eat with a tall glass of ice cold milk. Oh yeah.

Pink Lady Cake

This is the final cake in my birthday cake marathon:

I wanted to make one final cake and I was undecided about what I was going to do until I noticed this picture, on our fridge. This is me at age seven:

Even then I loved cake.

I saw the picture and decided I had to make a cake that looked exactly like it. Of course, nobody could remember what kind of cake it was, so I went with SmittenKitchen's Pink Lady Cake. Which was unbelievably caloric and delicious.

I also thought it was a bit on the dry side, but then again, that's just my perfectionist tendencies.

It was really good.

It was even better the next morning when the strawberry flavors had gotten time to develope and ripen.

That's right. You heard me. It's a strawberry cake: there are actual strawberries pureed into the batter. The batter turned light pink. It was so pretty. It was a very girly cake, one that my 7-year-old self would have loved. And my newly minted 17 year old self? I loved it even more.

Pink Lady Cake [Strawberry Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting and Filling]

From Smitten Kitchen, who adapted it from Sky Hight

For the cake
4 1/2 cups cake flour
3 cups sugar
5 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
3 sticks (12 ounces) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 1/2 cups pureed frozen strawberries
8 egg whites
2/3 cup milk
1 to 2 drops red food dye, if using (to make the pink color pop more)

For the cream cheese frosting
3 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese, softened
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks; 6 ounces) unsalted butter, softened
3 cups sifted confectioners’ sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Make the cake
1. Preheat the oven to 350»F. Butter three 9-inch round or 8-inch square cake pans. Line with parchment or waxed paper and butter the paper.

2. Put the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt in a large mixer bowl. With the electric mixer on low speed, blend for 30 seconds. Add the butter and strawberry puree and mix to blend the ingredients. Raise the speed to medium and beat until light and fluffy, 2 to 3 minutes; the batter will resemble strawberry ice cream at this point. (Deb note: I must warn you not to try the batter at this point. Not even a smear of it. How unbearably good it is will shock you, and lead to more dipping. Only you can stop this from coming to pass.)

3. In another large bowl, whisk together the egg whites, milk and red food dye, if using, to blend. Add the whites to the atter in two or three additions, scraping down the sides of the bowl well and mixing only to incorperate after each addition. Divide the batter among the three prepared pans.

4. Bake the cakes for 30 to 34 minutes, or until a cake tester or wooden toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Allow the layers to cool in the pans for 10 to 15 minutes. Invert and turn out onto wire racks and peel off the paper liners. Let stand until completely cooled before assembling the cake, at least an hour.

Make the cream cheese frosting
5. In a medium bowl, cream together the cream cheese and butter until creamy. Mix in the vanilla, then gradually stir in the confectioners’ sugar. Store in the refrigerator after use.

Frost and assemble the cake
6. Place one cake layer on a cake board or platter. Tucking scraps of waxed paper under the edges of the cake will protect the board or plate from any mess created while frosting the cake. (I forgot, as can be clearly seen above.) Spread about 2/3 cup frosting over the layer, spreading it to the edge. Repeat with the second layer. Add the top layer and frost the top and sides of cake with remaining frosting, reserving a small amount if you wish to tint it and pipe a decoration on the cake. If not, you can decorate the cake top with thinly-sliced strawberries. Remove the waxed strips to reveal and neat, clean cake board.

Decorate with lots of stawberries, tall crazy candles and other exciting things. Consume. Enjoy.

Sweet Potato Fries

Two of my best friends are vegan. Which is no big deal, except for the fact that I have this compulsion to stuff people full of dairy and refined wheat products. Two things that are not so good for some people. Anyway, I had them over, and I made these. They loved them. I loved them. THIS IS ONE OF MY FAVORITE FOODS. It's perfect. It can be adapted. It's delicious. And simple. And perfect. And I love it with all of my entire soul. And here's the thing, they're even better cold. It sounds weird. But just out of the refridgerator, they make me swoon. Oh yes they do.

Roasted Spiced Sweet Potato

from The Gourmet Cookbook

1 teaspoon coriander seeds

1/2 teaspoon fennel seeds*

1/2 teaspoon dried oregano

1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes

1 teaspoon kosher salt

2 pounds medium sweet potatos, scrubbed

3 tablespoons vegetable oil

Put rack in middle of oven adn preheat to 425 F.

Coarsely grind (or finely chop) coriander, fennel, oregano and red pepper flakes in coffe/spice grinder, a mortar with pestle, or chop them together very finely. Stir together spices and salt.

Cut potatos lenghtwise into one inch thick wedges. Toss with oil and spices in a roasting pan and spread out in one layer. Roast for 20 minutes.

Turn wedges over with a spatula and roast until tender and slightly golden, 15 to 20 minutes more.

* Um, excuse me? Fennel seeds? Really? Well I'm sorry, but I just DON'T HAPPEN TO HAVE A BUNCH OF FENNEL SEEDS ON HAND IF YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN. I just substitued with something I figured was similiar.

Moosewood Sour Cream Coffeecake

It's a cake marathon this week.

This is the second cake I made in honor of my birthday, inspired by my Aunt Eileen, (who makes a wicked coffee cake), this cake is something else: light, rich and creamy, with a pleasant crackling of pecans. Despite the fact that it's from the Moosewood Cookbook, don't worry, this was before they got all healthy, there are enough calories in this baby to keep you on the treadmill for a week.

Moosewood Sour Cream Coffeecake

from The Moosewood Cookbook

1 cup butter

1 1/2 cups plus 1 tablespoon sugar

2 eggs

3/4 cups sour cream

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 cups white flour

1 cup toasted pecans

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg (optional)

about 1 tablespoon powdered sugar (optional)

Preheat oven to 350 F. Butter and flour a bundt pan.

Cream butter with 1 1/2 cups of sugar. Beat in eggs until throughly blendt. Beat in sour cream, vanilla, baking powder, soda and slat. Gently stir in flour until totally incorporated.

Coarsely chop pecans, toss with nutmeg, cinnamon and remaining sugar.

Spoon half the batter into prepared pan. Sprinkle nut mixture evenly over batter in pan. Spoon rest of the batter over the mix. Bake cake until knife inserted in the middle comes out clean, about 50 to 70 minutes. (50 for a bundt, 55 to 75 minutes for cake baked in a square pan.) Cool in pan on rack. Turn out onto plate after 10 minutes. When completely cool, dust cake with powdered sugar. It makes people think you worked a lot harder than you actually did.

Chocolate Roll with Cappuccino Cream

My 17th birthday was Tuesday. It actually snowed, and because everything was cancelled or closed, I had time to bake my birthday cake.

I make the best birthday cakes.

This is the first roulade I'd ever made, and it suprisingly wasn't as difficult as I thought it would be.

The cake itself was flourless, so it had a very decadent, smooth texture, and with the capuchino cream.....Needless to say I had two slices, because you know what? IT WAS MY BIRTHDAY.

Plus because the cake is a FREAKING LOG it makes for very exciting candle blowing-outing:

Chocolate Roll with Cappuccino Cream

from The Gourmet Cookbook

For Cake:

7 ounces good bittersweet chocolate, chopped

1/4 cup water

6 large eggs separated

2/3 cup granulated sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar

For Filling and Rolling Cake:

1 cup very cold heavy cream

1 tablespoon instant espresso powder

1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon

5 1/2 tablespoons confectioners sugar

1 1/2 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder

For Garnish:

1/3 cup very cold heavy cream

1 teaspoon espresso powder

pinch ground cinnamon

1 tablespoon confectioners sugar

chocolate-covered coffee beans

Make the cake:

Make sure rack is in middle of oven, and preheat to 350 F. Lightly butter a 15x10x1 inch baking sheet. Line with foil, butter foil and line foil with wax paper, butter paper.

Melt chocolate with water in a metal bowl set over a saucepan of barely boiling water, stirring until smooth. Remove bowl from heat and cool for 10 minutes.

Beat yolks with 1/3 cup sugar in a large bowl with an electric mixer at high speed until mixture is thick and pale and forms a ribbon when beaters are lifted, about 5 minutes. Beat in chocolate mixture and vanilla.

Beat egg whites with salt in another large bowl with cleaned beaters until frothy, then add cream of tartar and beat until whites hold soft peaks. Add remaining 1/3 cup sugar a little at a time, beating until whites just hold stiff peaks.

Stir one quarter of whites into chocolate mixture to lighten it, then gently but throughly fold in remaining whites. Pour batter into lined sheet and spread it evenly with a metal spatula. ake until cake is puffed and just set, 12 to 15 minutes. Cool completely on sheet on a rack. ) Cake will sink as it cools.

Make the filling while the cake cools:

Beat cream with espresso powder and cinnamon in a medium bowl with electric mixer until it holds soft peaks. Add 4 tablespoons (1/4 cup) confectioners' sugar and beat until cream holds stiff peaks. Refrigerate filling, covered, for 10 minutes.

Fill and roll the cake:

Stir together cocoa powder and remaining 1 1/2 tablespoons confectioners' sugar in a small bowl. Sift about half of mixture evenly over cake. Cover cake with a sheet of wax paper, invert a baking sheet over paper and invert cake onto baking sheet. Carefully remove foil and wax paper. Spread filling on cake, leaving a 1-inch border on short ends and a 1/2 inch border on long sides. With a long side nearest you, and using wax paper as an aid, roll up cake jelly-roll style, keeping it wrapped in wax paper (cake will crack but still hold together). Refrigerate cake, in wax paper, on baking sheet for at least 1 hour.

Garnish the cake:

Beat cream with espresso powder, cinnamon, and confectioners' sugar in a small bowl until it just holds stiff peaks. Transfer to pastry bag and pipe decoratively on and around cake roll. Top with chocolate-covered coffee beans if using.