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ursamajorI know, two baking entries in a row, but I really do need to write down my riffs and recipes when I make them so that I actually remember what I did! Especially when I use up the tail end of things I don't always keep in stock. So playing a little bit of catch-up here.
For choir baking this week, I started with Nik Sharma's Spicy Chocolate Chip Hazelnut Cookies, and King Arthur's recommendations for making drop cookies into bars.
- I knew I didn't have jaggery or muscovado on hand, but I did have some leftover thnot sugar, which was pretty close, texturally. It wasn't quite 200 grams, so I covered the last 30-ish grams with brown sugar.
- I've added cinnamon to this recipe before and liked the results; I decided to gild the lily and added half a teaspoon of baharat. Baharat's one of those spice blends that varies depending on who you ask, but the one I had on hand is primarily cinnamon, allspice, and rose.
The original recipe calls for a fair bit of black pepper, which I kept in, seeing as it's also sometimes a baharat ingredient, and it worked well.
- Vanilla is so freaking expensive these days that I'm subbing for it everywhere or just leaving it out. Since I'd already decided to add in baharat, I subbed the vanilla with rosewater.
- I included the candied ginger, but left out the chocolate this time, deciding I wanted to focus the flavor on all of the warming spices for this new iteration.
- I thought I had four cups of material, which should've been plenty to fill a 9x9 bar pan, but it wasn't sufficient, so I went back and doubled the recipe, using brown sugar for the second batch. It yielded enough to make bars slightly over 1" thick, good enough.
- Baked at 350F, checked at 30 minutes and they still needed more time, same at 35 min. Pulled them out at 40, maybe slightly darker than I'd intended, but they vanished quickly enough at break time!
Spicy Hazelnut Ginger Bars
Ingredients
* 330g hazelnut flour
* 400g brown sugar
* 3t baking powder
* 1t baking soda
* 1t freshly ground black pepper
* 1t baharat
* 0.5t kosher salt
* 2 large eggs, beaten
* 4T unsalted butter, melted
* 1T rosewater
* 110g chopped crystalized ginger
Directions
In a large bowl, mix the hazelnut flour, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda, black pepper, baharat, and salt. Add the eggs and stir until incorporated, then add the butter and rosewater and mix until uniform. Stir in the ginger until sufficiently distributed, then pop the bowl into the freezer for an hour.
Preheat oven to 350C. Line a 9x9 square pan with parchment for easy removal later, then spread the batter evenly into the pan. Bake for 35-40 minutes, until golden brown. Cool on rack before slicing.
*
I also made Smitten Kitchen's Chocolate Toffee Cookies for the first time in awhile.
These have beenhyounpark's fave ever since I first made them, probably shortly after Deb hit publish, and I read "a very small amount of butter, a colossal amount of chocolate, and a few chopped up candy bars" and went "BRB, going to Stah Mahket!"
Turns out I've been eating relatives of those cookies for a lot longer than I thought, though! Not just because the original recipe was in the March 2000 edition of Gourmet, but because they bear a strong resemblance to Narsai David's Mudslide Cookies, which I remembered eating as a kid. Which he and his co-developer Maggie Mah said they adapted from Maida Heatter's Chocolate Whoppers back in the day.
Anyway, in the 17 years since I started making those cookies, I've made a few mods, and converted the measurements to weights, so noting for the record. I also skip the walnuts from the original recipe because most cookies do not need nuts in them, especially not these ones.
Chocolate Toffee Cookies, Modernized
Ingredients
* 60g AP flour
* 1t baking powder
* 0.5t kosher salt
* 1t espresso powder
* 1 lb chocolate, semisweet or bittersweet
* 4T butter
* 375g brown sugar
* 4 large eggs
* 1t vanilla extract, though I used hazelnut this time because it was what I had on hand today
* 8 oz Heath bar bits*
* Flaky sea salt for sprinkling
* (I'm still looking for a non-Hershey substitute for Heath bar bits, as I'd prefer to not make my own toffee bits every time I want to make these cookies. I mean, I know how to make toffee,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
kallmir2000 taught me, but I don't want making these cookies to be a multi-day production every time. And I don't always have corn syrup or lecithin on hand.)
Directions
In a double boiler, melt the butter, then add the chocolate and gently stir until melted and uniform. Remove from the heat to cool.
In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, kosher salt, and espresso powder.
In a mixer bowl, blend the brown sugar and eggs until thick; it should be a fairly light color. Add in the vanilla or hazelnut extract (almond would work just fine too), then mix in the cooled chocolate.
Stir in the flour mixture until just incorporated, then add the toffee bits. Chill the batter for 45-60 minutes or until relatively firm.
Preheat oven to 350F. Scoop tablespoonfuls of the batter onto a baking sheet lined with parchment. Bake 12-15 minutes or until the tops look just dry. Cool on the pan, at least 10 minutes to solidify properly.
*
I had a glut of carrots, so I tweaked Serious Eats' Brazilian Carrot Cake recipe to fit a 9x9 pan.
The original recipe called for both frosting and chocolate sprinkles, but I needed to transport this to choir by bike that week and pre-cut it, so I skipped those options. I suspect that pivots it further away from being bolo de cenoura; next time, I might try to incorporate the chocolate sprinkles on top by shaking them on just before baking. But getting to throw most of this in a blender rather than having to grate so many carrots my wrists ache? I'll take it. (Yeah, I know, we should replace the food processor at some point, but also see: tiny weird urban kitchen.)
Blender Carrot Cake
Ingredients
* 1 lb carrots
* 525g sugar
* 1 1/3 cups oil
* 4 eggs
* 320g AP flour
* 1 1/3T baking powder
* 1 1/3t kosher salt
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350F. Line a 9x9 pan with parchment.
In a blender, blend carrots, sugar, oil, and eggs until uniform. (I have a high-powered blender, this took about 90 seconds. If your blender is less powerful, you may want to chop your carrots into chunks first.)
In a large bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and kosher salt. Pour carrot batter into flour mixture and stir until lumps are gone. Pour batter into pan and smooth until even.
Bake 45-50 minutes, or until your tester comes out clean; cake should be golden brown on top. Cool in pan 15 minutes, then remove to a wire rack to finish cooling. Don't be startled when you cut into it and it is pretty electrically orange, you did put a full pound of carrots in, after all! :)
*
Cramming one last recipe riff in here while I'm thinking about it: yet another choir bake, furikake marshmallow bars. Basically crispy rice cereal treats with added furikake, black sesame, and a little sesame oil.
Furikake Marshmallow Bars
Ingredients
* 8 oz butter (1 stick)
* 1T toasted sesame oil
* 4T furikake (my fave type is wakame (o)chazuke, extra added rice ball crunch), divided
* 2T roasted black sesame seeds, divided
* 6 cups of crunchies; I usually do a ratio of 5 cups crispy rice cereal to 1 cup arare
Directions
Line a 9x13 pan with parchment paper and butter it.
Melt the butter and sesame oil in a large pan and stir until uniform. Add 3T of the furikake and 1T of the sesame seeds to the butter-oil mixture to toast it a little, then stir in your bag of marshmallows until melted.
Pour your crunchies into the pot; mix until well-distributed. Scrape your mixture into the prepared pan, and with oiled/buttered fingers, press until relatively uniform. Sprinkle the rest of the furikake and sesame seeds on top.
Let cool for half an hour before slicing.
For choir baking this week, I started with Nik Sharma's Spicy Chocolate Chip Hazelnut Cookies, and King Arthur's recommendations for making drop cookies into bars.
- I knew I didn't have jaggery or muscovado on hand, but I did have some leftover thnot sugar, which was pretty close, texturally. It wasn't quite 200 grams, so I covered the last 30-ish grams with brown sugar.
- I've added cinnamon to this recipe before and liked the results; I decided to gild the lily and added half a teaspoon of baharat. Baharat's one of those spice blends that varies depending on who you ask, but the one I had on hand is primarily cinnamon, allspice, and rose.
The original recipe calls for a fair bit of black pepper, which I kept in, seeing as it's also sometimes a baharat ingredient, and it worked well.
- Vanilla is so freaking expensive these days that I'm subbing for it everywhere or just leaving it out. Since I'd already decided to add in baharat, I subbed the vanilla with rosewater.
- I included the candied ginger, but left out the chocolate this time, deciding I wanted to focus the flavor on all of the warming spices for this new iteration.
- I thought I had four cups of material, which should've been plenty to fill a 9x9 bar pan, but it wasn't sufficient, so I went back and doubled the recipe, using brown sugar for the second batch. It yielded enough to make bars slightly over 1" thick, good enough.
- Baked at 350F, checked at 30 minutes and they still needed more time, same at 35 min. Pulled them out at 40, maybe slightly darker than I'd intended, but they vanished quickly enough at break time!
Spicy Hazelnut Ginger Bars
Ingredients
* 330g hazelnut flour
* 400g brown sugar
* 3t baking powder
* 1t baking soda
* 1t freshly ground black pepper
* 1t baharat
* 0.5t kosher salt
* 2 large eggs, beaten
* 4T unsalted butter, melted
* 1T rosewater
* 110g chopped crystalized ginger
Directions
In a large bowl, mix the hazelnut flour, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda, black pepper, baharat, and salt. Add the eggs and stir until incorporated, then add the butter and rosewater and mix until uniform. Stir in the ginger until sufficiently distributed, then pop the bowl into the freezer for an hour.
Preheat oven to 350C. Line a 9x9 square pan with parchment for easy removal later, then spread the batter evenly into the pan. Bake for 35-40 minutes, until golden brown. Cool on rack before slicing.
*
I also made Smitten Kitchen's Chocolate Toffee Cookies for the first time in awhile.
These have been
hyounpark's fave ever since I first made them, probably shortly after Deb hit publish, and I read "a very small amount of butter, a colossal amount of chocolate, and a few chopped up candy bars" and went "BRB, going to Stah Mahket!"Turns out I've been eating relatives of those cookies for a lot longer than I thought, though! Not just because the original recipe was in the March 2000 edition of Gourmet, but because they bear a strong resemblance to Narsai David's Mudslide Cookies, which I remembered eating as a kid. Which he and his co-developer Maggie Mah said they adapted from Maida Heatter's Chocolate Whoppers back in the day.
Anyway, in the 17 years since I started making those cookies, I've made a few mods, and converted the measurements to weights, so noting for the record. I also skip the walnuts from the original recipe because most cookies do not need nuts in them, especially not these ones.
Chocolate Toffee Cookies, Modernized
Ingredients
* 60g AP flour
* 1t baking powder
* 0.5t kosher salt
* 1t espresso powder
* 1 lb chocolate, semisweet or bittersweet
* 4T butter
* 375g brown sugar
* 4 large eggs
* 1t vanilla extract, though I used hazelnut this time because it was what I had on hand today
* 8 oz Heath bar bits*
* Flaky sea salt for sprinkling
* (I'm still looking for a non-Hershey substitute for Heath bar bits, as I'd prefer to not make my own toffee bits every time I want to make these cookies. I mean, I know how to make toffee,
kallmir2000 taught me, but I don't want making these cookies to be a multi-day production every time. And I don't always have corn syrup or lecithin on hand.)Directions
In a double boiler, melt the butter, then add the chocolate and gently stir until melted and uniform. Remove from the heat to cool.
In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, kosher salt, and espresso powder.
In a mixer bowl, blend the brown sugar and eggs until thick; it should be a fairly light color. Add in the vanilla or hazelnut extract (almond would work just fine too), then mix in the cooled chocolate.
Stir in the flour mixture until just incorporated, then add the toffee bits. Chill the batter for 45-60 minutes or until relatively firm.
Preheat oven to 350F. Scoop tablespoonfuls of the batter onto a baking sheet lined with parchment. Bake 12-15 minutes or until the tops look just dry. Cool on the pan, at least 10 minutes to solidify properly.
*
I had a glut of carrots, so I tweaked Serious Eats' Brazilian Carrot Cake recipe to fit a 9x9 pan.
The original recipe called for both frosting and chocolate sprinkles, but I needed to transport this to choir by bike that week and pre-cut it, so I skipped those options. I suspect that pivots it further away from being bolo de cenoura; next time, I might try to incorporate the chocolate sprinkles on top by shaking them on just before baking. But getting to throw most of this in a blender rather than having to grate so many carrots my wrists ache? I'll take it. (Yeah, I know, we should replace the food processor at some point, but also see: tiny weird urban kitchen.)
Blender Carrot Cake
Ingredients
* 1 lb carrots
* 525g sugar
* 1 1/3 cups oil
* 4 eggs
* 320g AP flour
* 1 1/3T baking powder
* 1 1/3t kosher salt
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350F. Line a 9x9 pan with parchment.
In a blender, blend carrots, sugar, oil, and eggs until uniform. (I have a high-powered blender, this took about 90 seconds. If your blender is less powerful, you may want to chop your carrots into chunks first.)
In a large bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and kosher salt. Pour carrot batter into flour mixture and stir until lumps are gone. Pour batter into pan and smooth until even.
Bake 45-50 minutes, or until your tester comes out clean; cake should be golden brown on top. Cool in pan 15 minutes, then remove to a wire rack to finish cooling. Don't be startled when you cut into it and it is pretty electrically orange, you did put a full pound of carrots in, after all! :)
*
Cramming one last recipe riff in here while I'm thinking about it: yet another choir bake, furikake marshmallow bars. Basically crispy rice cereal treats with added furikake, black sesame, and a little sesame oil.
Furikake Marshmallow Bars
Ingredients
* 8 oz butter (1 stick)
* 1T toasted sesame oil
* 4T furikake (my fave type is wakame (o)chazuke, extra added rice ball crunch), divided
* 2T roasted black sesame seeds, divided
* 6 cups of crunchies; I usually do a ratio of 5 cups crispy rice cereal to 1 cup arare
Directions
Line a 9x13 pan with parchment paper and butter it.
Melt the butter and sesame oil in a large pan and stir until uniform. Add 3T of the furikake and 1T of the sesame seeds to the butter-oil mixture to toast it a little, then stir in your bag of marshmallows until melted.
Pour your crunchies into the pot; mix until well-distributed. Scrape your mixture into the prepared pan, and with oiled/buttered fingers, press until relatively uniform. Sprinkle the rest of the furikake and sesame seeds on top.
Let cool for half an hour before slicing.
