Keeping it Short and Sweet

For this post I am going to keep things short and sweet. The goal of my latest baking experience was simple, make a kick ass carrot cake cupcake. With this objective in mind I searched the web to find a great carrot cake recipe. I succeeded. Smitten Kitchen's blog was the recipe of choice http://smittenkitchen.com/2008/12/carrot-cake-with-maple-cream-cheese-frosting/

Here are the images of my baking process:

I think the photos speak for themselves. 

When Life Gives You Ripe Bananas...Make Banana Bread!

Having a (guy) roommate has allotted me a few new joys. There is always someone to talk to. There is always someone to clean up after (not truly a joy but you know what I mean). And most importantly, there is always someone to bake for!

Two weeks ago my roommate bought a bunch of bananas. However, before he could eat them all, he had to leave for 9 day business trip. We are very considerate roommates when it comes to food. I don't eat any of his without permission, and the same goes for him. Not that either of us would really mind if we ate the other's food, but we try to be polite and considerate of each other's things. So needless to say, the bunch of bananas that he had bought continued to ripen and go uneaten, until he returned.

However, even upon his return, he realized there was no way he could eat all these bananas. So the question became "What are we going to do with a bunch of ripe bananas?" MY solution: make banana bread!

A day and a half later this was what had become of the banana bread

I think my roommate is enjoying my solution.

*For the recipe check out Banana-Bread-Recipe.com

MIA but still baking, cooking, eating away!

Ok, ok so I have been extremely MIA. If my old boss and friend, Mark, were here right now he would be shaking his head in disappointment, since I have not kept my promise to blog once a week every week. My sincerest apologies Mark...and anyone else who reads this and has missed me (I know you're out there).

What can I say? Life has been busy. My move from NJ to San Fran has been a huge success. It took a while for me to get settled in, but I am finally in my apartment, making friends, and eating, baking and cooking like no other. San Francisco is a foodies paradise. There are a million different restaurants to try, lots of fresh and healthy produce and food options to cook with, and lots of dinner parties with friends. So needless to say, I have been in food overload...in a good way.

Here are a few things that I have been cooking, baking, eating, just to bring you up to speed.

Halloween: My friends out in Palo Alto had a Halloween party. I was asked to partake in devising the menu as well as cook and bake some things. The end baking result were the following cupcakes

Chocolate cupcakes with chocolate frosting decorated to look like garve stones and pumpkin cupcakes with cream cheese frosting to look like, well,  pumpkins.

Dinner with Friends: Some of my new friends and I decided to make dinner one night. We worked up a menu and each took one dish to buy the groceries for and cook. We decided on baked cod, a mixed green persimmon salad and a warm couscous salad with roasted butternut squash. The salads were a thing of beauty

The rest of my experiences I, unfortunately, don't have photos of but I'll give you a run down and try to provide you with as many links as possible so you can get the best possible idea of what I have been doing.

For "Friends"giving I made an oatmeal nut crunch apple pie

Also at that Halloween party I made "Hungry Girl's" pulled pork sliders

I made spaghetti squash for the first time, with sundried tomatoes and garlic. Just whipped that up on my own.

I have eaten at The Plant, Marlowe, Super Duper Burger, Susie Cakes, Kara's Cupcakes, Bar Bocce, Tacolicious.

So you can see, I have been busy. I will try not to stay away for so long from now on, but if I am please know that I am still baking, cooking, and eating away!

New Chapter

So normally I write about food, but I am taking a break from food to talk about the new and exciting chapter in my life that is about to begin. Tomorrow morning I am getting on a plane and moving to San Francisco. I have lived in New Jersey my entire life. Even my college experiences (both undergrad and grad school) were in New Jersey. So when I was out in San Francisco this summer I decided that at this point in my life, it is time to make a change. I love the city. I have been there about four times over the past three years and the more I visit, the more I fall in love with San Fran. Therefore, why not move to a city that I am crazy about?

I have been counting down the weeks, and finally the day is here. I am ready to try new things, meet new people, and most importantly eat lots of amazing food. San Francisco is a foodie's paradise and I am more than ready to go out there and conquer! So next time I write I will be telling you all about the foods I ate, the restaurants I have been to, and the things I have baked...all from the West Coast!

Get ready California, a Jersey girl is making her way over.

A Sweet Spot in Morristown

This past weekend I decided to surprise my friend with a visit up in Morristown, New Jersey. She is a hair stylist and just moved to a new salon (For Hair and Body) right in the heart of the town.

So upon my visit, we decided to go and get some coffee. "Our options are the following," she said to me. "A Starbucks down the road, a bagel place, or this cute little cafe around the corner." Well I immediately pick the cafe, and what a great choice. We walk around the corner and entered The Artist Bakery

What a find! A diamond in the rough, if you will. We walked in, greated by a display case filled with sweet treats. Miniature cucpakes, freshly bakes pies, tarts, muffins, and even s'mores lined the shelves. As you walk further in, an eclectic mixture of chairs and tables awaits, making it feel like you are sitting in the comfort of someone's home as opposed to a carbon copy of a coffee house that started in, let's say, Seattle.  The staff is small but welcoming, and the baker is there to answer all your questions.

My friend ordered a chai latte and I a regular cup of coffee. But the best was the dessert that I ended up taking home with me. I decided to get my dad a lemon tart, my mom a warm chocolate souffle cake, and a s'more for myself. Everything was AMAZING! Good thing Morristown is not one of the closest towns to me, otherwise I think I would be at the Artist Bakery all the time. But for now, I know where to go when I am in town and I need a sweet treat.

The Test

So as I have said in numerous posts, I am kind of obsessed with ice cream. Now as we all know, ice cream comes in hundreds of different flavors and can be eaten in hundreds of different ways.

Some may prefer hard cherry vanilla ice cream, while others prefer soft serve vanilla/chocolate twist. Some like to drink their ice cream in the form of a milk shake, others prefer having it scooped or swirled onto a cone. Some like hot fudge or caramel sauce, while others just like whipped cream and a cherry. Toppings can be placed on top, or if you like, blended right in. Either way, ice cream paves the way for multiple flavor combinations and textures.

But how do you tell if a brand or an ice cream parlor has the best ice cream? Well I have devised a method. It’s simply called “The Soft Vanilla Ice Cream Test.” In my opinion, the more basic the ice cream the easier it is to tell if it is truly amazing. Like anything in life that is good, it needs a good base, and what’s more basic than vanilla???

So over the past few years I have heard of two places in New Jersey that supposedly have the best ice cream around, Polar Cub in Whitehouse Station and Hoffman’s in Spring Lake. So naturally, they both got the test…and passed with flying colors. I brought my family to Hoffman’s this past weekend and as we were driving there I told my brother (who tends to be very good at knowing good food) about how it passed my Vanilla ice cream test. At first he was skeptical. He hadn’t known about “The Test” up until that moment. He took my word for it and ordered the vanilla anyway…and low and behold, he agreed with me (a rarity between us siblings).

So if you don’t think “The Soft Vanilla Ice Cream Test” holds water, go try it for yourself.

Feeling Inspired

A few weeks ago I was watching the Food Network, when they did a segment on this show called “Unwrapped” on Mallomars®. Now, for those of you who don’t know, a Mallomar is a vanilla cookie, topped with marshmallow which all of which is coated with a milk chocolate shell. And if you are a marshmallow fan (like I am) they are truly one of the best cookies on earth.

So I got to thinking…what if I made a Mallomar cupcake? The cookie actually translates quite nicely. Vanilla cake, filled with marshmallow filling (Fluff® would be used for this), coated with a chocolate ganache frosting. Genius!

Here is the recipe:

Vanilla Cupcake (courtesy of Foodtv.com)

• 1 cup unsalted butter
• 2 cups sugar
• 1 1/4 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 4 eggs
• 3 cups sifted cake flour
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup milk
• Regular or silver cupcake paper liners
• 2 cups Fluff®

Make the Cupcakes:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

In a mixer with a whip attachment, cream the butter until light and fluffy. Add the sugar and continue to cream. Gradually add the vanilla and eggs and mix in well. Sift together the dry ingredients; then mix into the butter mixture alternating with the milk. Pour batter into cupcake paper-lined muffin tins filling them 3/4 full. Bake until puffed and firm in the center and light golden brown on top, about 20 to 25 minutes. Let cool. (Freeze at this point, if necessary.)

When cupcake is cooled fill a piping bag with Fluff®. Insert the bag into the top of the cupcake and squeeze Fluff® into the center of the cake. Note: the Fluff® is a little tough to work with so you may need to “fill” the cupcake more than once to get the right amount of filling.

Ganache Frosting (courtesy of Foodtv.com):

• 3/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips
• 1/2 cup heavy cream
• 1/2 teaspoon instant espresso powder, optional
• Mini marshmallows (optional) for decorating

Place a heat-proof bowl over a pot of simmering water, and whisk together the chocolate, cream, and espresso powder (if using). Continue whisking until chocolate is melted and the mixture is thick, about 4 minutes. Remove from heat and let stand for 5 minutes.

Here is the end result:

After my Mallomar cupcake creation came to life, I was left with a good amount of Fluff®. What do you do with an almost full tub of Fluff®? The first thing that came to mind was that now I get to eat lots of fluffernutter sandwiches! Again, for those of you that don’t know, a fluffernutter sandwich is simply peanut butter and fluff between 2 slices of bread. Delicious! Soooooooo, why not make a fluffernutter cookie sandwich?
The execution was simple: bake peanut butter cookies and sandwich Fluff® in between two of them.

Here is the peanut butter cookies recipe (courtesy of allrecipes.com):

Ingredients
• 2 cups peanut butter
• 2 cups white sugar
• 2 eggs
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1 pinch salt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions
1.Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease cookie sheets.

2.In a medium bowl, stir peanut butter and sugar together until smooth. Beat in the eggs, one at a time, then stir in the baking soda, salt, and vanilla. Roll dough into 1 inch balls and place them 2 inches apart onto the prepared cookie sheets. Press a criss-cross into the top using the back of a fork.

3.Bake for 8 to 10 minutes in the preheated oven. Allow cookies to cool on baking sheet for 5 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.

Then simply spread a tablespoon or so of Fluff® between two cookies.
I didn’t get a chance to take a picture, but the result was exactly what I had hoped. They were delicious and enjoyed by all.

A little inspiration can go a long way!