apples and apple cake.

One recent Saturday, a small group of us escaped schoolwork and the city for a carefree, sunny morning. We drove to Linvilla Orchards, where we picked apples and peaches, took a hayride (minus the hay), and picnicked on apple cider and cider doughnuts.

See also C.'s account over here of our sunny day and the subsequent festivities.

Because festivities did indeed follow. Once we had returned to the city - dusty, sunburned, sleepy, and satisfied - we prepared to celebrate our dear C. with a good-bye party before she leaves for a year in London. [Sniffle.] Because we tend towards themed parties, this one was BYO: bring a few bottles of your favorite American beer for the whole group to taste. We ended up sampling about a dozen different beers, accompanied by various snacks and desserts. Yum. Although no party can convey how much we'll miss you, C.

my loves. (photo lifted from c.)

The evening's menu, along with evidence of former M.-hosted parties.

M.'s renowned hummus and bummus (black bean hummus).
Fresh figs from the orchard farmstand.

B.'s impressive cheese sampler.
C.'s amazing peach-apple pie - recipe here.

I made the two desserts on the right: chocolate pistachio torte (back; recipe to follow) and apple cake (the monstrosity in front). This is - normally - one of my go-to, fail-safe recipes. And it's not usually covered in powdered sugar; this was a cosmetic choice to cover what happened when I tried to coax the cake out of its bundt pan:


[Sigh.] The apples were just so juicy that they destabilized the layers, leaving one in the pan when I flipped it over. Despite this mishap, though, I'm sharing the recipe anyway because this has never happened before and this is a delicious cake. I got it from my friend S., who got it from her mom, and I make it whenever I'm in the mood for something autumn-y. Perfect for showcasing the Macoun, Jonamac, and Cortland apples I'd picked just that morning.

Apple Cake
adapted from Mrs. S.'s recipe

4-5 med. apples, peeled, quartered, and sliced thinly (I like a mix of tart and sweet; slicing them in the food processor speeds things up a bit)
2 tsp. cinnamon
2 tbsp. sugar
3 c. flour
3 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
1 c. sugar
4 eggs
1 c. oil
1/4 c. orange juice
zest of 1 orange
2 1/2 tsp. vanilla


1. Grease and flour tube or bundt pan. Preheat oven to 350F.

2. Mix apples, cinnamon, and sugar; set aside.

3. In a small bowl, combine flour, b.p., and salt; set aside.

4. Mix sugar, eggs, and oil until thoroughly combined. Add o.j., zest, and vanilla and mix some more.

5. Gradually add dry ingredients, stirring until combined.

6. Pour half of batter into prepared pan, distribute apples evenly on top (try to keep the slices all relatively flat so you don't create air pockets), then pour in the rest of the batter. Bake at 350F for 60-75 mins. (top will be browned and firm to the touch).

peach shortbread.

First of all, happy back-to-school season!


"Do something: Academics are back!" I took this photo at Paper Source in Brookline back in August because it made me chuckle. Ok, the whole awning actually reads "Do something creative every day." And the sign is talking about academic calendars. But still. It made me think about those like me coming out of their summer hibernation, shaking off the fuzziness, and returning to the books, the classroom, and life as we like it.

Second of all, I'm on something of a peach kick. They're just so good, and they won't be around for much longer, so why not? Multiple friends mentioned this recipe to me as soon as it appeared on smittenkitchen, so I complied with the not-so-subtle request (your ploy worked, friends) and gave it a try. Yum. Shortbread + peaches + crumbly topping = happy friends. And happy me.

This was my first attempt at brown butter. Nerve-wracking but ultimately rewarding, as you could definitely taste the nuttiness in the shortbread. However, it would be just fine and still delicious with regular softened butter (plus a few extra tablespoons of flour) if you don't have time to hover anxiously over the pan.


Peach Shortbread
adapted slightly from smittenkitchen

2/3 c. sugar (*I reduced this from the original and it could probably be cut even more.)
1 tsp. baking powder
3 c. minus 2 tbsp. flour
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/8 tsp. nutmeg
1/4 tsp. salt
1 c. cold unsalted butter
1 egg
2 peaches, peeled, pitted, and thinly sliced (1/4"- to 1/8"-thick wedges)

1. Brown the butter: melt in small/med. saucepan over low heat. It will melt, then foam, then turn clear gold, then begin to brown slightly, especially on the bottom. Stir frequently so that it doesn't burn, especially at the end. Pour into heatproof container and freeze for 30 mins. or until solidified. (Not rock hard - just the consistency of normal butter.)

2. Preheat oven to 375F. Lightly butter a 9x13" pan.

3. In med. bowl, combine all dry ingredients. Then add egg and solidified butter and mix with your hands or a pastry cutter (*I like to use my hands) until mixture is well-combined and crumbly.

4. Pat 3/4 of the crumb mixture into the bottom of the pan for your shortbread base and press down firmly. Arrange peaches on top in a single layer. Scatter remaining crumbs evenly over peaches.



5. Bake for 30 mins. or until top is slightly browned. Cool completely in pan before cutting.

peach cake.

The majority of my friends, both near and far, need little excuse to cook, bake, and/or eat. So when a handful of us gather to watch Mad Men or Project Runway, the evening often involves food. Last week, C. hosted a lovely ladies' night: we shopped for, cooked, and ate dinner together. From the spoils of the farmers' market, there was zucchini soup (M.); eggplant parmesan featuring three colors of eggplant, homemade tomato sauce, and fresh mozzarella (C.); peach cake and peach crumble (me). There was also watermelon and feta salad (M.) and plentiful beer (B. and T.). It was, in short, a feast. It was also one of those evenings that makes me pause and think, I am so very fortunate.

*Thanks to M. for the majority of these pictures. Giving her free rein with my camera has great results.

The peach crumble (basic) and peach cake (simple) were to throw together on the road, so to speak. The cake would probably be good with a variety of other fruits; it's really just a simple cake that features the tasty peaches. Indeed, the original recipe calls for nectarines, one of my favorite fruits, but the first time I made this cake, the peaches looked too good to resist, and they kind of stuck. C.'s suggestion of lemon zest really brightened it up nicely. And it's very tasty with ice cream.


Peach Cake
adapted from Gourmet (September 2009)

1 c. all-purpose flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1 stick (8 tbsp.) butter, softened
1/3 c. white sugar
1/3 c. brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
1/8 tsp. almond
zest of 1 lemon
2 peaches, peeled, pitted, and sliced into 1/4-inch wedges


1. Preheat oven to 350F. Lightly butter a springform pan or a 9" round cake pan. (Either works.)

2. Combine flour, baking powder, and salt in small bowl.

3. Beat butter and sugar in electric mixer until fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each one, then beat in extracts and zest.

4. At low speed, mix in flour mixture until just combined.

5. Spread batter evenly in pan, then arrange peach slices on top in concentric circles.

6. Bake 45-50 mins., until cake is golden brown on top. Cool on wire rack; remove from pan after 10 mins. if using springform.

chocolate chip muffins.

Sometimes, I just want to be able to throw something together 1) in one or two bowls; 2) with ingredients I already have on hand; 3) in under 10 minutes. This recipe? Check, check, check. I was curious to try it after it was billed on smittenkitchen as "Perfect Blueberry Muffins." And they are pretty close to perfect. I particularly like that the recipe only makes 10 muffins, so, especially if you're sharing, you're not stuck with too many muffins that never taste quite as good the next day. Also, I'll take any opportunity, even if premature, to use my fun muffin liners with autumn leaves on them. (Thanks, Mom!)

I was enjoying eating my fresh blueberries by themselves too much to sacrifice them to muffins, so I threw chocolate chips in here. If you use blueberries or any other berry, a little lemon zest would be nice.



Chocolate Chip Muffins
adapted from smittenkitchen

5 tbsp. butter, softened
1/3 c. sugar
1 egg
3/4 c. sour cream or plain yogurt
1 1/2 c. all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
3/4 c. chocolate chips

1. Preheat oven to 375F. Line muffin tin with paper liners.

2. Beat butter and sugar in electric mixer on med. speed until fluffy. Add egg and beat well, then sour cream/yogurt.

3. In separate bowl, combine flour, baking powder and soda, and salt. Add half to mixer and mix until combined. Stir in the rest just until flour disappears. (*Overmixing = tough muffins.) Fold in chocolate chips.

4. Distribute batter among muffin cups. Bake for 25-30 mins., until tops are golden and a knife comes out clean; let cool on rack.

birthday surprise ii: boozy brownies.

And the second part of B.'s birthday baking: boozy chocolate cherry brownies. This recipe popped up on 101 Cookbooks back in the spring and making it became a matter of not if but when. And while I think they would make a great dead-of-winter dessert, these port-soaked-cherry-studded brownies made a nice addition to our themed menu.

I made a few adjustments, mostly cutting back on both the sugar and chocolate. I know, cut back on the chocolate? Was I not myself? But these are more than rich enough even without the extra cup of chocolate chips in the batter. I also chopped the cherries roughly to distribute them more evenly - both my hands and my kitchen smelled strongly of port for an hour afterwards. Yum.

As the recipe warns, these are messy: chill them first, rinse your knife in warm water between each cut, and you'll still end up prying squidgy, sticky squares out of the pan. But no one will mind uneven edges or fudgy fingers, because these are deliciously intense. Intensely delicious. Yes.


Chocolate Cherry Brownies
adapted from 101 Cookbooks

2 c. (10.5 oz.) dried cherries (*I used tart rather than sweet)
scant 1 c. port wine
1/2 c. all-purpose flour
1/3 c. unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 tsp. salt
2 tsp. baking powder
10.5 oz. dark chocolate
5 1/2 tbsp. unsalted butter
1 1/4 c. brown sugar
4 eggs
scant 1/2 c. sour cream

1. A day or two before you want to bake the brownies, combine the cherries and port in a med. bowl or container; cover and let sit, stirring every 12 hours, until almost all of the port has been absorbed. (*If you'd like, you can then chop the cherries before adding them to the batter.)


2. Preheat oven to 325F. Lightly butter and line a 9x13" pan with parchment paper in both directions - you'll need this sling to lift out the brownies later.

3. Sift together flour, cocoa, salt, and baking powder; set aside.

4. Heat chocolate, butter, and sugar in double boiler until chocolate has just melted. Transfer to bowl of electric mixer and allow to cool enough so that it won't cook the eggs. (*I turned the mixer on "stir" and let it go for a few minutes to let out some of the heat.)

5. Mixing on slow, add the eggs one at a time, letting the first get incorporated before adding the next. Scrape down bowl as necessary.

6. Add flour mixture and stir by hand until combined, then add sour cream and cherries, stirring again until just combined.


7. Spoon into the pan and bake for about 1 hour, or until just set. Allow to cool completely in pan. Chilling the brownies will help to slice them; rinsing off your knife between each cut helps too. Bring to room temp. for serving.

birthday surprise i: tiramisu cake.

Last week, B. had a birthday. And so we celebrated. The actual birth-day included mid-morning kir royales at Parc, sipped at a sidewalk table, followed later by dinner at Stella. Pistachio and red onion pizza; black truffle and egg pizza; margherita pizza; broccolini and garlic pizza. All-around pizza goodness, capped off with ice cream at the Franklin Fountain.


Impossible to top, right? Wrong. Even more yumminess ensued the next day. Surprise yumminess!

We plotted a boozy birthday party complete with multiple kinds of cocktails and alcohol-infused desserts. C. and I baked, M. and T. went on a hunt for cheese so that we didn't all go into sugar shock, and M. tended bar despite her jet-lag. We schemed, we decorated, we waited eagerly for the surprise moment, and then we celebrated. The final menu:

DRINKS
Ginger lemonade
M.'s concoction, with fresh mint and honey - yum!
*
Gin & tonic
Made with Fever Tree tonic water; impressive.
*
Old-fashioned
Potent.
*

DESSERTS
Tiramisu cake
See below.
*
Peach and blackberry trifle
Joint desserting effort with C. - wonderful.
*
Bourbon pecan pie
C.'s. Oh. My.
*
Chocolate cherry brownies
Details soon.

C. made an official menu. It was beautiful. In fact, thanks to lovely friends, the whole evening was beautiful:

Before the party, though, there was baking. Much baking. Wish-I-had-two-ovens-or-at-least-more-counterspace-so-that-I'm-not-balancing-bowls-on-the-edge-of-the-sink baking.

I love to cook and bake for people - especially to bake. Being able to present someone with a pretty treat lets me say, "Hey, I care about you." It's not the only way to do so, of course, and yes, I realize that I'll have to seriously revise this strategy before I someday have children and inadvertently turn them into little butterballs of baked-good love, but it works for me.

First up? Tiramisu cake. Tiramisu was a no-brainer for this boozy bash, but we needed a cake for candles! Enter this recipe from smittenkitchen. The final product was delicious. Getting there was ... tricky. This is something of a fiddly recipe, and it wasn't helped by the significant heat/humidity going on that day. The frosting was particularly troublesome; I ended up whipping an extra 3/4 c. of heavy cream and folding it in so that I would have enough to cover the entire cake, and it was decidedly lumpy-looking. Still, though, the cake turned out well, and I would make this recipe again, perhaps with a bit more experimentation and a bit less summer ickiness.

Tiramisu Cake
from smittenkitchen

Cake layers:
2 c. cake flour (*hint: you can substitute for 1 c. of cake flour with 7/8 c. all-purpose flour and 1/8 c. cornstarch; easier than keeping cake flour around)
2 tsp. baking powder
1/8 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
10 tbsp. butter, at room temp.
1 c. sugar
3 eggs
1 egg yolk
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
3/4 c. buttermilk

Espresso extract:
2 tbsp. instant espresso powder
2 tbsp. boiling water

Espresso syrup:
1/2 c. water
1/3 c. sugar
1 tbsp. amaretto, Kahlua, or brandy (*I used rum)

Filling and frosting:
8 oz. mascarpone
1/2 c. confectioners' sugar, sifted
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 tbsp. amaretto, Kahlua, or brandy (*again, I used rum)
1 c. heavy cream
bittersweet or semi-sweet chocolate (*finely chopped, chips, or grated from a large bar, as I did)

Make the cake:
1. Preheat oven to 350F. Butter and lightly flour two 9" cake pans, then line bottoms with parchment paper. Put the pans on a baking sheet.

2. Combine dry ingredients (except sugar) in a bowl. In a stand mixer, beat butter on med. speed until soft and creamy. Add sugar and beat for another 3 mins. Add eggs one by one and then yolk, beating for 1 min. after each one. Beat in vanilla.

3. Reduce mixer speed to low and add dry ingredients, alternating with buttermilk - add dry ingredients in 3 parts and buttermilk in 2, beginning and ending with dry ingredients. Scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed and mix only until all ingredients disappear into the batter.

4. Divide batter evenly between two pans and smooth down tops with spatula. Bake for 28-30 mins., rotating the pans halfway through. Cakes are done when golden and springy and a knife inserted into the center comes out clean. Transfer cakes to a rack and cool for 5 mins., then run a knife around the sides, invert them, remove paper liners, turn them back onto rack and cool right-side up.

Make extract:
1. Combine boiling water with espresso powder in small bowl; stir and set aside.

Make syrup:
1. Stir water and sugar together in small saucepan until barely boiling; pour into heatproof bowl, stir in liquor of choice plus 1 tbsp. espresso extract, then set aside.

Make filling/frosting:
1. Whisk mascarpone, sugar, vanilla, and liquor in med. bowl until combined. Set aside.

2. In stand mixer, whip heavy cream until it holds firm peaks. With rubber spatula, stir 1/4 whipped cream into mascarpone mixture; fold in the rest lightly.

Assemble cake:
1. Place one layer right-side-up on a cardboard round or cake stand (protected with strips of parchment paper slid under the edge of the cake so that you won't get frosting everywhere). Using pastry brush or small spoon, soak layer evenly with about 1/3 of espresso syrup. (*I found that the cake soaked up the syrup really, really quickly. Next time, I'm using a pastry brush instead of a spoon. Once I buy a pastry brush.) Smooth some of the mascarpone over the layer - about 1 1/4 c., or enough to cover. Sprinkle/grate your chocolate of choice on top.

2. Invert the second cake layer on a plate/counter and soak the bottom with half the remaining syrup, then turn it over and position it, syrup side down, over the filling. Soak the top with the rest of the syrup.

3. For the frosting, whisk 1 to 1 1/2 tbsp. remaining espresso extract into remaining mascarpone filling. (*This is where I ran into trouble: there wasn't nearly enough mascarpone mixture to cover the cake, so I whipped an additional 3/4 c. of cream with a dash of vanilla and a sprinkle of instant espresso tossed in so it wouldn't be too bland and folded it into the mascarpone mixture along with the espresso extract. It did increase the volume of the frosting and certainly tasted good, but the texture was a bit off.) Taste frosting as you go to decide how much espresso flavor you want. If the icing looks a bit too soft to spread, press plastic wrap on top and refrigerate for 15 mins.

4. With metal icing spatula, smooth frosting around sides of cake and over top. Decorate with chocolate-covered espresso beans or cocoa powder.

5. Refrigerate cake for at least 3 hours (or up to 1 day) before serving to let the flavors set.


A word about decorating the cake: Deb at smittenkitchen cut out a wax-paper star stencil and grated dark chocolate over top, which looked great. It inspired me to break out of my usual piping bag routine and try a (slightly more ambitious/compulsive) stencil of my own. I wrote my happy birthday message on a legal pad, using the lines to get the letters even, and then traced on either side of each stroke to create thicker letters. Then I glued each word to wax paper and cut them out for my makeshift stencils, then pressed them lightly onto the cake (wax-paper side down).


Then I microplaned dark chocolate on top:


And, after giving a light puff to the chocolate and thereby scattering it all over my counter and myself, carefully removed them. Cool trick!