Chocolate Beet Cake

Well, March has arrived, and I am very surprised to report that I have made it through this winter in one piece. It has actually been a very nice winter! Maybe I shouldn't be saying this, though, could I be jinxing myself? The wind is blustery outside, and still slightly sharp even in the sun. The rivers and streams are running strong, and I can see the mud just starting to appear. I went to a sugaring event the other day and was told it was a good maple syrup season. I've been seeing bluebirds cavorting in the front yard! However, it still doesn't smell like spring. Do you know that smell? It's when the ground really starts to defrost and release it's earthy smell. It's still not there.

I can't quite believe that in only two weeks I'll be digging into my garden and planting kale and pea seeds. I also have a few trees to transplant--two crab apples that I started as whips and now are quite sturdy. Down with the rest of the baby orchard you go! Along with the quinces, plums and apples. And before you know it, the perennial patch will be sprouting asparagus, rhubarb and strawberries. This is absolutely my favorite time. The feeling of anticipation and longing is sometimes what makes winter so worthwhile.

But it's still cold, and baking little goodies is still on my mind, albeit made with low sugar and maybe something healthy tucked in. I'll say it again: I'm not against butter laden cookies or sugary cakes, but when I make something for the house (read: something I'll have constant access to) it has to be a healthy treat. I save my splurges for the bakery or chocolatier. And, if you have a little one in the house, you might want a treat like this. Though I will warn you: these are not sweet. At all. Even with a half cup of sugar! But the moist chocolatey-ness is really gratifying. It might be better, though, with some cream cheese frosting sweetened with maple syrup. Let me know if you do that, would you?

Chocolate Beet Cake
Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease a 10 inch spring form pan.

1.5 cups white whole wheat flour

1/2 cup cocoa powder

3 teaspoons of baking powder

1/2 teaspoons of baking soda

1/2 teaspoon of salt

1/2 cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon molasses
1/2 cup canola or coconut oil
1/3 cup milk or coconut milk

1.5 cups pureed beets*

1 teaspoon vanilla

Whisk together dry ingredients. Beat oil and sugar together until fluffy. Add molasses, oil, milk, beets and vanilla. Add wet ingredients to dry, and blend until smooth. Bake for thirty minutes.

*Preserver's Tip: Back when local beets were abundant, I boiled a bunch, peeled them and sliced them and threw them in the freezer. I was thinking future borscht at the time, but now they are all destined to become cake. Beets freeze phenomenally well. I also had some golden beet puree that became Golden Beet Blondies, but I neglected to write down the recipe. They came out quite nicely!

Cocoa Cake (sweetened with honey)

My refined sugar-less month continues. I realize that my sugar-free January is not entirely sugar-free. Laura from Glutton For Life, who has a gorgeous and beautifully written site that you should subscribe to if you haven't already, has thrown down the gauntlet and proposed I take on a real challenge of entirely no sugar (in the comments of my last post). No fruit!? To me that is almost impossible to even think about. Inconceivable! says my inner Vizzini (Wallace Shawn in The Princess Bride). So, I said maybe next year. For now, I am learning plenty by making sure to eat sweets sweetened only with fruit, honey or maple syrup. I know agave has fallen out of favor, but I might succumb to Cashewtopia's Vanilla Bean gelato. It's really amazing.

I might be a big sugar-baby, but the emotional undercurrent of this detox has taken it's toll. I've had irrational moments in which I wanted to tear into cupcakes and chocolate bars. One of these moments prompted this cake. I think one of my biggest weaknesses is a chocolate cake. I don't need much, but I so desire it. In my impatience searching for a no-refined-sugar-added recipe online, I gave up when cakes with a 1/2 cup of honey also added a cup of sugar! That is an incredible amount of sugar, in my opinion. So, I riffed on some easy cakes in my repertoire and came up with this. It completely satisfied. And, ever the addict, although this cake is pleasantly not-sweet, I did drizzle some maple syrup on it and it fully squelched that cupcake piled with frosting lust I had been experiencing. It's also made in a snap. You can always add some sugar if you want, or more honey.

Cocoa Cake

1 cup of AP flour
1/2 teaspoon of baking soda
1/2 teaspoon of baking powder
1/4 salt
1/4 cup cocoa powder

Mix all dry ingredients thoroughly. My baking soda and powder often clump, and so does the cocoa, so I run my fingers through to disperse any clumps. I guess I could use a sifter, but I'm sort of a hands on kind of gal.

1/3 cup of oil (vegetable oil, though I bet coconut oil would be delicious)
1/4 cup of honey
1/2 cup buttermilk (yogurt would be fine here)
1 egg
1 tablespoon of vanilla

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Grease a square 8x8 pan. Mix wet ingredients to fully incorporate. Add to the dry ingredients quickly. Bake for about 20 to 25 minutes.

What it looks like in the Hudson Valley this morning.

Sugar-Free January

Right now I'm in our basement, which is actually the coziest room in the house. There's a wood stove right next to a rough-hewn bar, and a very 70's style rec room that has the TV, a dart board and an old Wurlitzer organ, the Funmaker edition. I like to call it the Honeycomb Hideout, for those of you oldsters who remember the old cereal commercials. The rain is coming down, freezing and slushy, drumming on the metal Bilco doors that go to the backyard. It's a miserable January day, which I'm not all that disappointed in, as the days have been quite forgiving of late. Since the new year, we've been taking hikes down along the Hudson river and up on the Shaupeneak Ridge, favorite local walks of ours. My son's latest fascination is ice, so we've been finding safe spots to poke with sticks and crunch with our boots.

Another thing I've been doing is staying the course on my New Year's detox. I have been given up meat, dairy, alcohol and the biggest one for me, sugar. The sugar rules are this: for two weeks, nothing but fruit sweetened things. At week two, I will introduce honey and maple syrup. I was encouraged to go a full month without refined sugar by Rebecca at Cakewalk; originally my goal was two weeks. We set up a Facebook page in order to discuss our sugar-free month. It's a place where we can post links to recipes we can make, or recipes we are looking forward to making when we can eat sugar again. Or maybe complain about how badly we are craving something. Or talk about the dreams we have about food. So far, I've had dreams about eating blackberry jam filled donuts and a large spread that included charcuterie and cheeses. My dreams lately have been fairly obvious.

Let's also note that as I've removed these foods from my diet, my son and husband are still eating them. That means, I'm still cooking things like chicken and dumpling soup, and personal pizzas that I can't eat. It sounds horrendous, doesn't it? But it's really not that bad. I just keep on thinking about how quickly two weeks pass. On New Year's Day, I made pan-seared duck breast with quince jam, and I didn't eat it. Not sure if I'm stupid or strong, but I really didn't feel denied. I had sauteed kale with preserved lemon and baked french fries, and they were incredibly savory.  (Did you read Mark Bittman's article and recipes in the Times magazine on going semi-vegan?)

I'm most fascinated by giving up sugar, probably because I've never done it before. Never crossed my mind! What's most interesting about it is how many things there are that you don't think have sugar in them. Like some of my homemade pickles. Oops! Forgot they have sugar. Or almost all condiments, aside from mustard and soy sauce or tamari. I realized that I pop a piece of gum or a pastille more often than I thought. And I knew this, but coming to terms with it was hard: how many muffins, pancakes, cookies or sweet breads I eat. I don't think the baked goods I eat are entirely bad for me, as they are homemade and I always lower the sugar, but they are pervasive.

One of the reasons I gave up sugar is that I need to be more responsible with it. This idea comes from watching my son start to have a similar relationship to sugar. I was starting to see how most of his diet was in some way sweet: toast with jam, peanut butter and jelly, yogurt with fruit. He used to eat everything, but slowly he's begun to refuse the savory items. In the short time I've giving up sugar, he's most certainly been eating better too.

I think the best thing I've learned, so far, from giving these things up, especially the sugar, is that you become more thoughtful about them. I think a big problem with how people eat today is that they are attached to craving something. People used to eat the same thing everyday, with special things every once in a while. Now we can have those special things every day, whenever we want.

Another benefit of cramping your style is that you get out of your cooking ruts. I found that when I needed a quick snack I would most often melt cheese on top of something. If you're concerned at all about your weight, you'll agree that this is not a good idea. Now I keep a container of brown rice in the fridge. My quick indulgent snack is rice with avocado on top, sprinkled with a bit of tamari. (Not that I will ever give up grilled cheese sandwiches. They are one of the best things in life.)

The foods that I am allowed are better than I ever thought. The other night I was craving a sweet and I ended up with a banana. And it was one of the best bananas I've had in a long time. There's no doubt that the reason being was because of giving up sugar. My palate has been cleansed. My best friends for the first two weeks have been fruit and dried fruit. And it's amazing how sweet they are. Now I'm on to honey and maple syrup, and I must say I am breathing a sigh of relief. It's really easy to make things with those two, and I won't feel so denied. However, I'm still dreaming of that jelly donut.

Here's some of the things I had to sweeten things up:

Apple Cider Syrup: This is a brilliant thing to have on hand. Lots of recipes add sugar, but really all you need to do is boil down apple cider. I used 8 cups and boiled it down to almost 1 cup. It's not super sweet, and has tons of deep apple flavor.

Applesauce: I like to make a chunky version with a few pounds of mixed apples, a little  more than a splash of apple cider, a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar, and a sprinkle of cinnamon. The vinegar boosts the natural sweetness of the apples, and, along with the cider, also deepens the apple flavor.

Dried Fruit and Nut Balls: Sounds dismal, right? A handful of apricots and a handful of almonds thrown in a food processor, with a little cider syrup to bind are just amazing, actually. There are a ton of variations on the internet. I'm going to make some with some cocoa added today.

Banana Cocoa Muffins: This link is to a great article on NPR about baking with sweet alternatives. I made the muffins, scroll down to see the recipe, and they were great.

Fruit-Sweetened Jam: Whoah, this was a revelation for me. We eat jam everyday. It's my profession now! But you know what, that's a lot of sugar in there. I just made a strawberry raspberry jam with Pomona's pectin, and it does the trick. I can't believe I've never done this before. Now, our everyday jam is no-sugar, and my regular jams (for my personal stash I use about 60% sugar) are for special times.

Vegan Fruit-Sweetened Applesauce Cake: I ate this so quickly that I didn't even take a picture. My son loved it too! I want to develop a banana bread and carrot cake version, too.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a square 8"x8" pan.

2 cups white whole wheat flour
1 teaspoon of baking soda
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1/2 cup of vegetable oil
1 cup of applesauce
1/2 cup of cider syrup
1/4 cup of raisins

Add mixed wet ingredients to mixed dry ingredients quickly. Pour and smooth in pan, bake for about 30 minutes.

Did you give anything up? Have you given up sugar? What did you eat? I'd love to know.

My besties, clockwise from right: dates, prunes, apricots, and swoon, dates covered in coconut.

Quick Fruit-Filled Coffee Cake

Blueberry coffee cake? Who turns that down?

I think I mentioned my stem to blossom-end philosophy last year during Tigress' Can Jam. I love using up everything I can, and that means that when I make juice or jelly or do something that leaves me with fruit pulp I invariably find a way to use it. This cake was born of that compulsion. It's incredibly quick and easy, and not too sweet; a great every day cake. One that you can leave out for a few days--it stays moist and if heated up for just a few minutes and you have a tasty treat.

I used rhubarb pulp from making rhubarb juice for the cake pictured below. It's color is a tad dull, but tasted great. The blueberry was leftover from syrup making. I really couldn't leave that goodness to waste. Spread over a thick batter and covered up with crunchy crumbles, and no one's the wiser. Saved from the compost!

Combine:

1 1/2 c. AP flour
1/2 cup of sugar
1 teaspoon of baking powder
1 teaspoon of baking soda
1/4 teaspoon of salt

Mix in a separate bowl:

1 cup of buttermilk
2 large eggs

Add the dry to the wet until just smooth. Don't over mix. Pour into a greased 10-inch spring form pan, and smooth the top. Spread about two cups (give or take) of fruit pulp over the batter. Cover with streusel topping. Bake at 350 degrees for about 45 minutes.

Streusel topping:

4 tablespoons of butter (oil works too)
1/4 cup of slivered almonds
1/2 cup of whole rolled oats
1/2 cup of sugar

Note: I do not sweeten the fruit, but you may want to depending on your tastes or the tartness of your fruit. The blueberries didn't need any extra sweetener, but for the rhubarb I sprinkled sugar on the layer of fruit before adding the streusel.

I love that this recipe only uses a few ingredients. If you don't have buttermilk, go ahead and use yogurt!

If you want to step it up and get fancy, head on over to these two amazing takes on a recipe for Rhubarb Kuchen:

Cakewalk: Rhubarb Kuchen
Tigress in a Jam: Rhubarb Krack

Dull, but tasty, rhubarb.

Vegan Chocolate Cake

I should call this Ridiculously Easy Vegan Chocolate Cake. That you don't need much on hand to make. No milk? Eggs? Butter? No problem. It's a tasty, moist cake that will not disappoint! Even if you're not vegan. With all the holiday tasks to finish, sometimes you have to take care of yourself. That means that dinner last night was steamed veggies over brown rice. That also means beet carrot ginger juice. But it also means a little cake. And this is a nice way to indulge lightly.

I used a recipe from the Joy of Cooking called Dairy-Free Chocolate Cake, but I've also seen it on the internet in many places and variations.

Oven preheated to 375 degrees. Square 8" pan greased and ready to go.

1 1/2 cups flour

1 cup sugar

1/3 cup of cocoa powder

1 teaspoon of baking soda

1/2 teaspoon of salt

Mix together in a bowl. Add to the dry these mixed wet ingredients:

1 cup of water

1/4 cup of vegetable oil

1 tablespoon of white vinegar

2 teaspoons of vanilla

Bake for 30 minutes. Let cool in the pan for ten minutes, then removed from the pan to cool on a rack.

This cake gets that reddish tinge from the cocoa powder, where red velvet cake possibly originated from. The baking soda and the vinegar react to form this great squishy cake. You need the vinegar to activate the baking soda. You won't taste it!

Applesauce Cake

The other day I went apple pickin' with Kaela and Kate and Liz. Not like I need any more apples. I bought a measly nine pounds just because it was crazy not to. We went to Fishkill Farms, which I had been wanting to visit for a long time. What a great place! I will definitely return. It seemed like the place was run by women. I love that.

Apple season is pretty much finished in these parts. Now comes the long, cold winter. The Farmer's Almanac predicts a very cold winter, with little precipitation. I've been seeing tons of wooly caterpillars. Not sure if that's just an old wives tale, but I've never seen so many!

I picked Ida Reds, which are some of my favorite cooking apples. I love to make jelly with them. And the by product of that is lots of applesauce. Thusly, the need for an applesauce cake. My version is lightly sweetened and filled with either raisins, chopped pecans or both, or none. You can really play around with this.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

2 cups of flour
1 tsp of baking soda
1/2 tsp of salt
1/2 cup of sugar

Mix the dry ingredients together.

1/3 cup of oil
1 cup of unsweetened applesauce
1/2 cup of yogurt
1 cup of nuts or raisin or a mix of both


Then mix the oil, applesauce, and yogurt together. Then add wet to dry with brisk strokes, adding the nut/raisins as you do.

Bake in a square pan for an hour. Check it ---it can be tricky!

Chocolate Cake with Figs in Sweet Red Wine

Okay, so this isn't chocolate cake. It's really vegan low-fat chocolate pear sauce (one word?) cake. It sure doesn't look like it, right? I hate to say, though, it tastes like it! By which I mean, it tastes like a cake with no fats in it. I mean, for what it is, it's good! Really good. And if you are vegan, or have little kids with constant cake cravings, or maybe big kids with constant cake cravings (or maybe it's just you, let's face it, huh?) but you want to curtail the fat intake, this might be the cake for you. And it's the easiest cake ever. Truly. I had lots of pear sauce in the fridge, and a bit of nice cocoa sitting around, so this cake came to the rescue.

More honesty: it's dry. But that's where this fig compote comes in! I had no idea how nicely figs and chocolate pair together. Maybe it's the wine that brings it all together. Fresh organic figs (from California, but I'm still poking around people's yards, and looking for some nice Italian folks who might have a fig tree around here) with sugar and a red dessert wine. I halved the figs, covered them in the wine, added a half cup of sugar and boiled for about ten minutes. They are incredibly good and dress up this cake perfectly. A little mint doesn't hurt, too! Just remember for your next photo shoot: figs, booze and mint. You'll look great.

Jam Cake

Now that the new canning has begun, there are a few old jars (by old, I mean from late last summer) that need to be used up. I canned a lot of plums last year, and I'm on my last four jars of jam. And of course, there are quite a few open jars in the fridge from all of this year's work. The other day, early in the morning I made this cake. It's very moist and dense, due to the jam and olive oil. Not a refined cake for company necessarily, but a perfect breakfast cake.

Mix in a large bowl:

1 1/2 cups flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

Whisk until light:

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup olive oil

Add in and beat well:

3 large eggs

Then add in:

1/4 cup or milk or yogurt

Add the flour mixture into the egg mixture.

Then beat in:

1 half-pint of jam

Bake at 350 degrees in a 9-inch plain tube cake pan for thirty minutes. Let cool at least ten minutes before unmolding.

Angel Food Cake and Mayonnaise

The way I get better at cooking is usually tied directly with having too much of something, or needing to get rid of something, or if something is on sale. I'm a frugal girl and don't like anything to go to waste. Now that I have a constant supply of huge, fresh, amazing eggs there are a lot of things I'm now tackling that I hadn't thought to before. There are always recipes out there that focus on a glut of something, as that's what people had to do. One year blight robbed you of red tomatoes, so you learn how to make green tomato chutney (last year). A glut of eggs allows me to be generous with them and still have enough left over to experiment. And what delicious experiments!

After I had made the pot de créme, I had some whites leftover. I added a few more whites to the batch in order to come up with the 1 1/2 cups of egg whites needed for angel cake. I used the recipe from Joy of Cooking and even though I didn't add the cream of tartar, I was still pretty happy with the outcome. And with some of that mulberry rhubarb lemon jam over it, I was even happier!

With the four little yolks leftover from that, I had to make mayonnaise. I can't throw anything out, and why should I when this is the result? The mayonnaise is so rich and gorgeous, if I didn't have to go in for a cholesterol check soon, I'd want to eat it with a spoon. We had it in salmon salad, and then with cold boiled potatoes for dinner on one of these hot and sultry days we've been having. Salads are the thing for this heat wave.

p.s. Do you call it Angel Food Cake or Angel Cake? The recipe calls it Angel Cake, but I always knew it as Angel Food Cake.

N.B. Popular consensus says Angel Food Cake. Herewith amended in the title.

Buttermilk Cake

Since I've made buttermilk I haven't gone without it. It ends up going in a lot more things than I thought and makes all my baked goods more tender. The other day it was summertime hot, and we had dinner outside at a friend's house. I brought over this strawberry buttermilk cake and we served it with fresh whipped cream.

I had been meaning to make this for awhile; there was a version of it in Bon Appetit over the winter. Then I saw it, this time a version from Gourmet, on The Kitchenette, made with blackberries. It was time. I adapted both versions and came up with my own, made with olive oil, which I like to bake with. Nothing against butter, it's just that it's always that much easier! And I like to think it's healthier, which may or may not be the case.

1 cup of flour

1/2 teaspoon soda

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/3 cup olive oil

1/2 cup buttermilk

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 egg

A cup of fruit, more or less depending on your tastes or you can leave it out, add spices, be creative and use what you have!

Mix wet and add to dry. Drop fruit (sliced strawberries, whole berries--you get the idea) on top of the batter. It will sink a little; no worries. Bake in 350 degree oven for 25 to 30 minutes. I used a 10 inch spring form pan, and it seemed to be better on the 25 minute side.

This cake was so easy and delicious that when my in-laws came to visit this weekend, I decided to make it again, this time with the brandied apricots that I've had in the fridge sitting in a shot of their brandy. I pulled the apricots and arranged them on the batter, which I had added vanilla sugar and extract to. Then I downed the last bit of brandy. Waste not, want not! We finished it for breakfast the next day.

Marmalade Quick Bread

When March rolls around and buttermilk goes on sale I always get it. I bake a lot with yogurt, because I always have it on hand for so many uses. I've really got to start making my own. Buttermilk is a little less useful in my household. I hate that I can't drink it straight, for example, but I think some people can or do. Which is repulsive, personally. It's also somewhat expensive, comparatively. But I do love baking with it. So, I've been fiddling around with a few recipes and also keeping in mind the many jars of jelly in the fridge that I have to use in some way. In that spirit, I made Marmalade Bread.

The marmalade I had on deck was a tangerine microwaved version with vanilla that had set a little too firm, and the chunks of peel were like soft candy. I warmed it up a bit so it would mix well in this batter. The resulting bread was a gorgeous yellow, flecked with orange bits and vanilla flecks. It is a lightly sweet bread, fluffy and soft, and perfect for a mid-morning snack. The recipe has only two tablespoons of sugar in it, plus the jam. I didn't feel too bad having a second slice! And either did the baby.

Preheat to 375. Grease a square 8x8 pan.

1 2/3 all purpose flour

2 T sugar

1 t baking powder

1/2 t baking soda

1/2 t salt

1 egg

2/3 cup buttermilk

1/4 cup light olive oil

1/2 to 3/4 cup of jam or marmalade

Mix wet and add to dry. Batter will be sticky. Bake for thirty minutes or until golden brown.

Plum Ginger Cake with Lemon Vanilla Jelly Glaze

Reading the posts from the last few days paints a picture that somehow I subsist on a diet of jelly. Which is probably not so far from the truth in relation to other folks, but I do eat healthy meals consisting on brown rice and legumes and meat and vegetables. Really! But winter beckons with its snowy claw and so I'm forced (forced!) to stay inside and create sweet concoctions. That's the view from the kitchen. Just yesterday it was all green and muddy. Sigh. I know, it's still January!! Leave winter be!

A much needed ray of sunshine: Lemon Vanilla Jelly. I did a small batch with some leftover apple extraction from the Tangelo Lemongrass Jelly I made for month one of the Tigress' Can Jam (follow link on sidebar for more on that). I didn't have any half-pint jars left, so I used a pint jar. My yield was a pint jar, sealed, and a half-pint in the fridge. A pint jar of jelly is an absurd thing. That's a lot of jelly, people.

1 cup of apple pectin extraction (see linked recipe above for directions)

1 cup of fresh squeezed lemon juice

2 cups of sugar

1/3 of a vanilla bean pod, scraped

Combine all in a pan and bring to boil. Boil until jell point is reached, 220 degrees, about ten to fifteen minutes. This one jelled up quick! Can and seal, process for fifteen minutes. (I would do ten minutes for half-pints.)

It tastes tart and lemony, not too sweet, a delicate but firm set, and a hint of vanilla wafting through. Great tart glaze, I'll bet. And so...

So, what? So: I made this little cake based on my quick Lime Curd Cake recipe, but subbed plum ginger preserves in for the curd. The preserves were from this summer, rosy pink, tart and spicy, made from local Santa Rosa plums and Stayman Winesap apples. I glazed the cake with a spoonful of jelly heated and turned to syrup.

I was going to dust it with confectioner's sugar, but it was too pretty to cover with snow. There's enough of it outside!

Brandied Apricot and Almond Cake

It is bitter cold outside--blustery, snowy and f-f-freeezing. I am not going outside at all today, especially since I am nursing a cold. I have the help of a big pot of mushroom barley soup that has leeks and leftover chunks of that awesome lamb roast in it. And a big bowl of greek yogurt with walnuts and honey on top, as per my mother. We are going to make it through all right. Sometimes you have to do battle with a cold, and I am breaking out all the artillery. Citrus, lemons in particular, ginger and all sorts of tea are working their jujitsu on this congestion. It's a very restful war, but a war nonetheless. I hate colds.

Moving on. I want to quickly post this cake, because I love it. In thinking about it, I realized it's not quite a cake, although it could be with more refinement. Like with separated eggs and beaten egg whites, for example. It's more of a sweet bread or a tea cake. Or perhaps I can call it a rustic cake. It's the kind of cake that you can leave out on the kitchen table so when passing people can cut a hunk off and eat it right then and there. It's available. Not too precious. I like a cake like that.

I used my lemon curd cake recipe and just subbed in pureed brandied apricots for the curd. Then I made little balls of almond paste and studded the batter with them so each piece gets a bite of almond goodness. Blast, it's good!

So, with hunk of cake in hand, off I go to wrap myself in a snuggie knock-off and read the new re-vamped issue of Organic Gardening. They've done such a good job with it--you should check it out. Time to start dreaming about next year's garden!

Key Lime Curd Cake

Holy shizz. This cake is outrageously good. The other day I made some lime curd which was delicious. But I wasn't very careful with it, and it came out with some stringy egg whites in it, which is less than appetizing when you are slathering it on bread or some such. I couldn't find a proper cake recipe for the remaining curd (I love saying it--cuuuurd) so I put this little number together based on my banana bread recipe, and I might just make more curd just to make this cake. It's that good. Very soft and moist, sweet but with such a tangy bite! It's got my kind of crumb. And, need I say it? It's so easy. Check it.

1 1/2 cups flour

1 1/2 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. salt

1/3 cup oil

1/2 cup sugar (I used vanilla sugar, hence the little black specs in there. You can add some vanilla extract or a bit of scraped vanilla bean if there is no vanilla sugar to be had.)

1 egg

1 cup key lime curd (here or use Joy of Cooking recipe for lemon curd, subbing lime juice. Joy's is equally simple and a little more descriptive on execution.)

Beat up that oil and sugar. Add beaten egg and beat more. Gently fold in the curd. Add mixed dry ingredients into wet ones. Pour batter into greased pan. Bake for thirty minutes or so in a 375 degree oven. (I baked it for forty minutes and it gave resistance upon removal from pan. However, that might have been because I couldn't wait to eat it, and thus, rushed it...)

Casserole and Cake

I'm not sure if it's necessary to mention what kind of casserole this is. And honestly, it's more shepard's pie than casserole, but I just like to call it that. Chopped up aromatic veggies, turkey, the rest of the gravy, some bread crumbs, an egg, and herbs comprise the bottom layer. The top is mashed potatoes with paprika and turmeric. Baked for thirty minutes at 375.

Today is what we refer to as "Clean Out the Fridge" day. We have these every so often to make sure we're not being lazy and using up some perfectly good food. The cake falls under this rubric because it's that awesome yogurt cake but made with sour cream that I wanted to finish up. I also used apricot brandy for the rum, and almond extract for the vanilla. We polished off the apricot brandy last night but not the boozy soaked fruit, so I used them to make a thick sauce for the cake. They weren't very pretty, so I pureed them and added powdered sugar. They had some kick! I made sure to leave the cake plain so the baby could indulge. Cleaning out the fridge (and liquor cabinet) never tasted so good!

P.S. On the cleaning out the fridge line, I also made a Potato, Sauerkraut and Turkey soup. I wasn't looking forward to it, but it ended up being really good. I just sauteed onions and garlic, then added my fresh sauerkraut, a few large potatoes cubed and added water to cover. A bay leaf, rosemary, thyme, three juniper berries, salt and five peppercorns. Fresh parsley at the end. Not a bad left over soup!

Late Night Chestnut Cake

I know that almost nine p.m. is not really late for many folks, but for me it is just a half hour shy of falling fast asleep. I wake up at about four a.m. due to a certain toddler in the house, so I have an excuse. No more late night partying in this house. So, we do what we can to keep ourselves amused. Like making this cake last night with the sweet chestnut puree I made on Friday married to the yogurt cake I made last weekend. It is very dense and chewy, so I think I need to tinker with it a bit, but it didn't stop me from having two pieces before bed. Quel scandale! It wasn't very sweet, which I like, and the chestnuts impart a slight nuttiness.

2 eggs
1 cup of whole milk plain unsweetened yogurt
1/2 cup sweet chestnut puree

1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder

1/4 cup milk

Preheat the oven to 350° F, grease a round ten-inch cake pan. In a large mixing-bowl, gently combine the yogurt, eggs, sugar, and puree. In another bowl, sift together the flour and baking powder. Add the flour mixture into the yogurt mixture, and blend together -- don't overwork the dough. Pour the batter into the prepared cake pan, sprinkle with nice shiny organic cane sugar, and bake for 45 minutes, until the top is golden brown and a cake tester comes out clean. Let stand for ten minutes, run a knife around to loosen, and turn out on a rack to cool.

Zucchini Olive Oil Cake

I saw this recipe the other day on The Amateur Gourmet and I knew I had to make it. There was precious real estate in the freezer being taken up by some grated zucchini and summer squash and I thought aha! that's what we're doing! So, I did a little tweaking, like omitting the walnuts (as in the original post), using wheat flour, brown sugar (and I scaled it back to 1 1/2 cups--1 cup of oil and 1 3/4 cups sugar?? Of course it's going to be good!! Not that omitting a 1/4 cup is going to save much, but...) and I added some lemon zest. I only used two cups of squash, half grated and the other half pureed, with maybe a quarter of it being summer squash.

So, I am pleased to say that this cake came out spectacularly. Spicy and soft. The original has a lemon glaze that looks so perfect, but I think I'll just keep this plain. That way I won't feel so bad when baby and I have big, fat pieces for afternoon snack.

This was done early in the morning while baby napped, so now we are free to head into New Paltz to eat at the Bistro, then hit an estate sale. Pretty much a great start, wouldn't you say?

Cranberry Spice Yogurt Cake

As I went for this morning's walk, which was truncated due to the nip in the air, I could smell winter lurking. The leaves are all down, smoke is churning out of a few chimneys on this quiet Wednesday morning, and the wind is blowing the water on the pond making it choppy and gray. The smell is welcome, really, because it's new and it made me excited about the holidays coming up, mostly for the food. Gravies and creamy potatoes, and all sorts of heavy things. I'm never able to fit too much dessert in because the main course always ruins it, doesn't it? So, I'm making some holiday cake a little early so I can enjoy it while it steams away in my hands, not ruined by a crispy pile of turkey skin (yes, I can't resist it) or a gratin of some sort. I'll still make it for the holidays though because it was one of the easiest recipes around, somewhat good for me (yogurt and whole wheat flour! Come on, give a girl a break!) and looks just so homey and pretty with it's sparkling cranberries and crisp layer of brown sugar crust. Visions of sugar plums, indeed!

This is based on the yogurt cake I wrote about here. I tweaked it to make my own slightly tart, not too sweet, holiday version. I also made some cranberry sauce with cranberries, sugar, orange juice and zest to plate the slices with, but I'm not sure I'll get that far today!

2 cups of whole wheat white flour

1 tbsp. baking powder

1 cup brown sugar, and a handful extra for topping

1/2 cup vegetable oil

2 eggs

1 cup of whole milk plain yogurt

1 tsp. of pumpkin pie spice (cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg and cloves--yeah, I'm lazy, so sue me! I got this at the health food store in the bulk section to save me some time this season. Also, it's fresher!)

1 tsp. vanilla extract

1 tbsp. spiced rum

Preheat the oven to 350° F, and grease a ten-inch springform pan. In a large mixing-bowl, gently combine the yogurt, eggs, sugar, vanilla, oil and rum. In another bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder and spices. Add the flour mixture into the yogurt mixture, and blend together. Pour the batter into the prepared pan, and top with cranberries--as many or as little as you like. I didn't pack them in so they could have space to mix with the handful of brown sugar that you need to scatter over them. Bake for 45 minutes, until the top is crispy brown, the cranberries are popping and oozing their tart goodness, and a knife comes out clean. Let stand for ten minutes, run a knife around to loosen, and turn out on a rack to cool.

P.S. I entered my Cranberry Spice Yogurt Cake in the Bon Appetit Holiday Bake-Off contest. You can vote here.

Yogurt Cake

I was so excited with this cake that I took a bunch of pictures, cooing over it like a little baby. Once I ate some of it, I ran to take more pictures, thinking in some way that would document the deliciousness. To me, cake is the sine qua non dessert. It's the spongy, chewy texture I'm after. Something to bite into and fill the mouth. I'm serious. I love ice cream, but I get sick of it. Chocolate is incredible, but I don't indulge every day. Sweet breads (the breads, not the glands) must be what I crave. That carbohydrate loaded softness. Oh! And this delivered in just the way I like it. It was easy peasy and the texture made me purr. I ate it plain, and by evening there was only a wee slice left. I didn't eat it all, mind you, I did share. A little.

I got this recipe from my friend Eve, who knows my predilections for easy and sweet. I resisted the urge to mess around with it, for example, when I saw it asked for a tablespoon of baking powder and that it didn't ask for salt?? But I reigned myself in and trusted in the recipe, and lo, it repaid me twentyfold. Or, something like that. Actually, not entirely. I used vanilla sugar and omitted the vanilla extract. And I didn't use the rum, although next time I will. I'm such a rebel.

Gâteau au Yaourt

2 eggs
1 cup of whole milk plain unsweetened yogurt
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder

1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon light rum

Preheat the oven to 350° F, line the bottom of a round ten-inch cake pan with parchment paper and grease the sides. In a large mixing-bowl, gently combine the yogurt, eggs, sugar, vanilla, oil and rum. In another bowl, sift together the flour and baking powder. Add the flour mixture into the yogurt mixture, and blend together -- don't overwork the dough. Pour the batter into the prepared cake pan, and bake for 45 minutes, until the top is golden brown and a cake tester comes out clean. Let stand for ten minutes, run a knife around to loosen, and turn out on a rack to cool.