Raisin bran muffins

I had read about raisin bran muffins with cream cheese as being a suggestion for a light (Lenten) luncheon in an old (early 1960s) Home Ec textbook that I had gotten at my local Salvation Army thrift shop.  Surprisingly, the textbook did not provide a recipe, so, wanting to try ‘em,  I looked up “Raisin bran muffins” on line.

Though there were recipe versions which made smaller quantities, and variants with additional healthful ingredients such as Flaxseed, I chose this version from BreadNet back in June because I had half a quart of buttermilk that had just passed its “use-by” date.  I had a bit of trouble mixing the ingredients up because I simply don’t have mixing bowls quite big enough to hold everything.  I ended up mixing the batter ingredients and adding the flakes last, which made the flakes crispier than intended, I’m sure.  The muffins themselves came out with a light batter matrix, crispy embedded flakes, and a somewhat insipid taste. Though my mother ate one in the spirit of adventure, I ended up eating the vast majority of ‘em for my breakfasts (after about a week they were getting pretty dried out and even more insipid-tasting) because nobody else would touch ‘em.  I made two dozen because the largest plastic container I could lay my hands on at the time could only hold half the batter.  The flakes will be soggier, though no less insipid-tasting (I had used Post, not Kellog’s Raisin Bran) when I make the second batch.  The instructions on the recipe, thankfully, say that the raw batter from this particular recipe will keep for two months in the fridge, which is good, because right now New York is in the middle of a massive heat wave and (to a sigh of relief from my family) I am not cooking again anytime soon.  I have also been dealing with a sick cat and the necessity of getting food & medicine into her.
I’d like to try this recipe for raisin bran muffins sometime; I think the cloves, molasses, etc. might add something.

Add comment July 19th, 2008 Laura

Duelling Coffee Cakes

Before the heat wave hit, I made not one but two coffeecakes in one day in the kitchen: blueberry coffee cake and cocoanut coffee cake.  The dough for the two of ‘em is similar in formulation and ingredients (the blueberry coffee cake calls for butter milk while the cocoanut coffee cake calls for sour cream) but because of the difference in the sort of pans I used to bake ‘em, the texture & character of the cakes was very different.  The recipe for the cocoanut coffee cake specified a bundt pan and the cake came out very coarse and porous but evenly done.  I used a common layer pan for the blueberry cake which came out with a very fine-grained texture and much more dense than the cocoanut cake.  Alas, the blueberry cake overflowed its banks and many of the actual blueberries ended up on the oven floor. This is because, while the recipe called for a 9-inch single cake pan, unbeknownst to me, my common round layer cake pan was only an 8-inch pan.  They should mark that on the pan itself, but at least on my pans, they didn’t.  So, the blueberry coffee cake (what there was left of it) nontheless came out well though I lost some to overflow and it made a huge mess.  Maybe next time I’ll try the recipe in my somewhat larger (hopefully the right size) square corning glass pan.  I’ll lose some distinctiveness but save some mess and blueberries.  Either way, it looks like these two coffeecake recipes will be added to the family repetoire because both came out to be very moist.

Coconut Coffee Cake

Filling

1/2 cup coconut
1/2 cup chocolate chips
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
1/2 cup sugar

Cake

1/4 pound butter (do not substitute)
1 cup sugar
2 whole eggs
1/2 pint sour cream
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 cups flour (measure, then sift)
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour a 10-inch tube pan.
In a small bowl mix filling ingredients - coconut, chocolate chips, walnuts and sugar. Set aside.

With an electric mixer cream the butter and sugar; add eggs and beat well. Add sour cream and vanilla and mix well.

Laura

Cooking Catch-up

Just because I’ve been away from the computer for a while doesn’t mean I haven’t been cooking…on the contrary, I’ve been too busy cooking to be typing.  And when I have had time to type I’ve been too mentally and or physically tired to do so. 

For mother’s day, I made the light strawberry cake again but this time with the proper (larger) amount of strawberries and the regulation white, not angel food cake mix.  It came out more evenly in shape and texture, but without as intense a flavor and interior color as the one I described in my previous posting re: light strawberry cake.  You win some you lose some.  It took a while and visits to several different stores in several different areas to get proper white not angelfood cake mix.  A lot of grocery stores in NYC are hole-in-the-wall affairs and even a lot of the big ones have minimal baking supplies/accessories and very often may only have brownie and yellow cake as the cake mixes they stock.  Related to the endeavor I will mention next, I also bought a nice big Ginseng root.

I tried two new recipes recently: one for myself: Gingerbread Biscotti , and one for my mother and sister, Soft Molasses Cookies.  As expected, they really didn’t like the Gingerbread biscotti, but that’s ok, they loved the soft molasses cookies.   The irony is that the two recipes contain may of the same ingredients.  (see recipes below if the links don’t work).  Baking the biscotti was fascinating: until you cut it into slices it is really a loaf and is really soft.  Also after you bake it for the second time, homemade biscotti turns out somewhat softer than the ones you get in stores and coffee houses.  Until some of your batch sits around for a week or more because you’re eating ‘em one at a time.  So…I’ve now found out the ones in shops and cafes are old and stale (and not nearly as flavorful as the ones I made at home).  Both my mother and I liked the pre-biscotti soft loaf better, and she thought that the minced ginseng was too strong and the extra texture too distracting.  I agree that it is a bit distracting but not necessarily bad.  The one thing I would change, however, were I to make this recipe again, would be to add some citron or candied orange or lemon peel to “brighten up” the flavor. I definitely plan to make more varieties of biscotti in the future.

I made a second batch of Soft Molasses Cookies (the first batch plus the Gingerbread Biscotti having been made shortly after Mother’s Day).  With this one I made up teh dough at the beginning of the heat wave  that hit NYC last week and then it sat in the fridge for about a week and I baked it during a break in the heatwave.  I think this batch came out firmer in texture because it went straight from fridge to cookie sheet unlike the previous batch which I made up and baked at the same time without having put the dough in the fridge to chill.  Unfortunately we have very few of ‘em left, the majority were a present for some new neighbors, who last week shared some barbecue and birthday cake with us, and this was the handiest way to reciprocate at the present moment.

Add comment June 15th, 2008 Laura

Marshmallow Mermaid Misadventure

A couple of weeks ago, I was sufficiently motivated to try making Marshmallow Mermaid Pie.  As Recipe4Living describes it, “From the movie Waitress, this marshmallow pie was one of Jenna’s creations.”.  It sounded simple enough, and I used a pre-made store-bought graham cracker crust like the one who wrote in the comments section on the recipe 4 living version suggested:

From the movie Waitress, this marshmallow pie was one of Jenna’s creations.

Ingredients

9 graham crackers
1/2 C. sweetened, flaked coconut, toasted
5 Tbs. butter or margarine, melted
34 lg. marshmallows (8 oz.)
1/2 C. whole milk
1 1/2 C. heavy or whipping cream
1 oz. unsweetened chocolate, grated

Directions

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Combine coconut and graham crackers in food processor until coarse crumbs form.

Combine crumbs and butter with fork. Press to bottom and side of 9-inch pie plate. Bake 10 minutes and cool on wire rack.

Heat marshmallows and milk in 3-qt. saucepan over low heat until smooth, stirring constantly. Remove saucepan from heat. Cool completely (30 minutes.)

In large bowl with mixer at medium speed, beat cream until stiff peaks form. Fold marshmallow mixture into whipped cream with grated chocolate. Spoon filling into cooled crust. Refrigerate pie at least 3 hours or overnight.

Top with mini marshmallows, maraschino cherries and rainbow sprinkles.

Add comment June 15th, 2008 Laura

Pride Goeth before a fallen cake

This Easter, though having intended not to have to make a dessert (I in fact bought a dessert from a local bakery, namely St. Joseph’s Pastries, a seasonal delight here in NYC) but with about a cup of strawberries going soft (the sad truth is that if you buy a box of strawberries and stick ‘em in the so-called “crisper” drawer for a few days everybody in the family forgets about ‘em, nobody eats ‘em, and when finally confronted with them, nobody wants them.  Yet a hue & cry arose from the family when I decided to bake with ‘em). I had to do something with ‘em, and I was just itching to try the “light strawberry cake” recipe posted below on the grounds that it would be both delicious and low cholesterol.  So, acting on an impulse, and realizing that it was an incredibly wonderful coincidence that I had a spare box of strawberry-flavored gelatin and an angel-food cake mix that had passed its expiry date late last year, I threw it together before any one could effectively stop me, and was proud to pull from the oven a light, airy cake that was a deep rich pink inside.  I was proud that I had been lucky and the cake had been browned and risen fairly evenly and had not fallen during baking.  However, the top of one of the layers “deflated” upon exposure to the cold air (it could have been far worse considering the dire warnings they give you not to bake Angel Food cake batter in layer pans and NEVER to grease the pan (both pans were greased & floured).  Alas, this happy outcome was not to last.  Having greased & floured my shallow round layer pans thoroughly, I gave a vigorous “shake” to each to help move the cake out.  The cakes came out of the pans with no trouble, but you know how they say “if something seems too good to be true it probably is”.  That was precisely the trouble: the cakes came out of the pans a little _too_ easily. My shaking of the second pan must have been too vigorous, because layer #2 not only ended up breaking apart, but on the floor.  The remaining cake, though not looking as good or as “polished” as I had hoped tasted better than store bought mixes for pink strawberry cake and I think it was more moist.  I’ll probably make this again for Mother’s Day.

—-

Light Strawberry Cake

Dear Jeanne,

I love this cake, but a cup of oil is a lot. Can you make it just as delicious with less oil?

— Jo Ann, Dallas

STRAWBERRY CAKE

1 box white cake mix

3 tablespoons flour

1 box strawberry gelatin

½ cup water

1 cup oil

4 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 cup frozen strawberries, thawed

ICING:

¼ pound butter or margarine

1-pound box powdered sugar

Strawberries, thawed

Preheat oven to 350 F. With an electric mixer, combine the cake mix, flour, gelatin, water and oil. Beat well. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the vanilla and strawberries. Divide the batter between 2 or 3 round layer pans. Bake 25-30 minutes.

In a large bowl, combine the icing ingredients, adding as many strawberries as needed to make the icing spreadable.

Makes 12 servings.

Dear Jo Ann,

This is a delicious and beautiful pink cake. I find that reducing the fat in cake mixes works very well, and the strawberries added to this one really add a lot of flavor, moistness and color. If you wish to reduce the amount of icing, use only two layers of cake and put the icing only on the tops, not on the sides. This method adds plenty of icing, and looks very nice. Adding fresh berries on top of the cake or on the serving plate adds extra nutrition and beauty.

LIGHT STRAWBERRY CAKE

1 box white or yellow cake mix

1 small (4 servings) package sugar-free strawberry gelatin

3 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1 cup strawberries, thawed if frozen, pureed if fresh

½ cup water

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

4 egg whites

FROSTING:

2 tablespoons butter, softened

4 ounces fat-free cream cheese, softened

3 cups powdered sugar

Strawberries and juice to moisten (about 2 tablespoons)

Preheat the oven to 350 F. Spray 2 cake pans with nonstick cooking spray and dust lightly with flour. Set aside.

Place the cake mix, strawberry gelatin and flour in a large bowl, and mix together. In another bowl, combine the strawberries, the water and the vegetable oil. Pour wet ingredients all at once over dry ingredients and combine. Add the egg whites, one at a time, beating after each addition. This should take several minutes.

Pour batter into prepared pans and bake for about 25 minutes. Remove from the pans and cool on a rack.

For frosting: In a large bowl, mix together the butter and cream cheese. Add the powdered sugar and beat well. Add the strawberries a little at a time until the icing is a good spreading consistency.

Place the first layer rounded side (top) down on a serving plate. Spread with about ½ cup of icing. Put the second layer on top, rounded side up, and spread it with another half-cup of the icing. Spread the rest of the icing on the sides if using, then refrigerate.

Makes 12 servings.

Each serving contains approximately:

Original Recipe: 623 calories; 31 gm fat; 83 mg cholesterol; 296 mg sodium; 84 gm carbohydrates; 5 gm protein; 1 gm fiber.

Revised Recipe: 311 calories; 8 gm fat; 6 mg cholesterol; 289 mg sodium; 57 gm carbohydrates; 4 gm protein; 1 gm fiber.

For more information, go to jeannejones.com. Send your recipe for revision to: Cook It Light (Pocono Record), P.O. Box 1212, La Jolla, CA 92038. Please include a stamped (63 cents), self-addressed envelope.

Add comment March 29th, 2008 Laura