My Tivo is my best friend. I absolutely adore the thing. I actually have two, one of which is connected to a TV with a cable box (for shows on the premium channels), and the other resides in my office – my main TV viewing room. I know, you’re wondering why I’m talking about Tivo when the title is about cupcakes. I’ll get there . . . I watch very little network TV (The Closer, Oprah, Grey’s Anatomy and CBS’s Sunday Morning being exceptions) Most of my Tivo-watching comes from a variety of other cable channels. I simply can’t get enough of Meerkat Manor. I’m still mourning the loss of Flower. I love Miami Animal Police too. Antiques Roadshow. House Hunters. Little People, Big World. Dog Whisperer (and we don’t even have a dog anymore, but I love Caesar Milan.) And it was smokin’ during the Olympics. I couldn’t quite keep up with the Olympics and ran out of space on my 40-hour Tivo. I also record a variety of art and painting programs, plus a few esoteric cooking shows. I do like the Barefoot Contessa, and Rick Bayless too. And Michael Chiarello. Then there’s Ellen, and Oprah (she’s on hiatus at the moment). Fortunately, not all of these programs are running at the same time or I’d not be able to keep up with my regular programs. I just recently started watching Martha. Sometimes her subjects don’t interest me, so I just delete. But the subject last week (of re-runs, actually) was cupcakes. Okay, see, I told you I’d get there.

I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve made cupcakes since my daughter Dana was a little tyke. But, as I’m sure you’ve seen, they’re all the rage now, with really unusual cake flavors, frosting and decorating. So Martha had a guest on from a bakery in Santa Monica the other day. And one other day she entertained a group of three women who have the blog called Cupcakes Take the Cake. All three ladies post about cupcakes. That’s it. Cupcakes. Martha asked each one about her favorite cupcake. I don’t even remember two of them, but Allison Bojarski said it was her Chocolate Spice cupcakes with a Chocolate Spice Glaze.

Being about 8 feet away from my computer, I hopped over to Google them. Bingo. Got it. Since we were having guests for dinner a few nights later I decided to try them. I’m usually game for trying new recipes for guests (I know, call me crazy). Not having made any cupcakes for years, it was fun to do, and these are very unusual. They have a warm-mouth and warm-belly feel to them because of the addition of ancho chile powder in both the cake and the glaze. And there are a bunch of other Fallish kinds of spices in there too (like cloves, nutmeg, cinnamon, and ginger).

I don’t dislike Red Hots, but I wasn’t going to buy them just for these cupcakes, so I used some chocolate nonpareils I had in my chocolate stash (the chocolate-eating bugs hadn’t infiltrated the hard plastic box they were in). I bought them for a cookie I made last Christmas, the Chocolate Kiss Treasures that I will be making again this year – they have a nonpareil nestled on the top of each cookie.

The only things I’ll tell you about these are: (1) the glaze is gooey and needs some finesse putting it on to avoid letting it drip down the sides; (2) the measuring of all the spices takes an extra few minutes; (3) if you don’t have ancho chile powder, order some from Penzey’s. Ancho chile powder is very mild – you could add a lot of it to a pot of soup and barely know it’s there. Anchos are not hot, just barely warm; (4) because the cupcakes are made with cocoa, they’re not as wicked as some. The good stuff (chocolate) is in the glaze, which is applied while it’s meltingly hot.

A cupcake stand is not in my repertoire (and no, I don’t really want one) but I do have a double-decker plate/stand thing that perfectly fit 9 cupcakes, exactly the number of guests at our table. That’s one end of it you see in the photo above. We were dining outside, so I just walked the plate around and served each person. (Next time I’ll serve each on a plate with a paper napkin.)

My DH didn’t love these – but he’s not particularly a chocolate fan, either. Would I make them again? Yes – maybe for the right meal. They were good. At least I thought they were. Different. But, maybe not to everyone’s palate. My guests all said they were good, but I don’t know if they were just being nice. Maybe some of them, if they read my blog, will leave a comment here and let me know what they thought. That way you can get another opinion or two.
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It intrigues me, always, when I read a recipe and find some new or different technique. Such was the case with this recipe. It’s not exactly an innovative instruction, but normally you don’t cover a cobbler or cake while it’s baking. In this case, you cover it with oiled foil for half the baking and uncover for the second half. And this fruit pudding cake requires about 80-90 minutes of baking. That’s a heck of a long time.

Before we get to the recipe itself, I want to talk about peaches and nectarines for a minute . . . I know (because Carolyn knows all, tee, hee) that some of you, my good readers, who subscribe or use a reader, chose not to read my instructional pieces about how to buy great fruit and vegetables (I’ve done two so far – peaches/nectarines, and cucumbers). I suppose in the big scheme of things, I shouldn’t care, but I’m merely telling you, it’s worth the reading. Really it is. (If you want to read it now, just click on the links above to go to each of those posts.) I’ve learned things from the book this info has come from. In this case, when I was shopping for peaches, I remembered what Russ Parsons had told me – and I’m doing this from memory – firstly that peaches and nectarines are interchangeable, for all intents and purposes, (okay, good so far, so I chose nectarines) – then he said choose the white-fleshed fruit if it’s available (check), and choose fruit that has less rosy tinges to them – in other words, choose the more yellow skinned rather than the red skinned (I did my best, check). Once home, I placed them on the kitchen counter (check) for about 4 days, actually, until they were perfectly ripe. That day wasn’t one when I could use them, so I popped them in a plastic bag and into the refrigerator (check). It’s been 3 or 4 more days since I did that, and amazingly, they were perfectly okay once I removed them from cold storage. I’m a happy camper.

I haven’t done much cooking of late. No particular reason, other than I’ve been busy doing other things (like painting, for instance, going to my weekly art class, shopping, going out to lunch with friends, movie-going to see Mama Mia). And, we had lots of leftovers in the refrigerator. I don’t mind leftovers at all, and my DH is wonderful about eating them. In fact he rags on me something fierce whenever we have to throw out something. Alas, we do now and then. But our refrigerator, finally, is more or less bare. Well, that’s not exactly a truthful statement. If you opened my frig you’d find nearly all shelves half full – of bottles and jars of things that have to be refrigerated all the time (pickles, dressings, marinades, mustards, some liqueurs, crème fraiche, still some Devon cream leftover from the tea about 6 weeks ago, oils, jams, condiments, hot peppers, and on and on it goes). The vegetable drawer is crammed full too, as well as the shallow cheese/salami drawer. Of course, there’s also some milk, fat-free half and half, some cream, sour cream, fresh salsa, and lots of Greek yogurt too.

So, now we get to talk about the recipe. Sorry for the diversion . . . I went to my recipe trove and searched for something to do with the nectarines. Out popped this recipe. I adore pudding cakes – you’ll find that I posted a lemon sponge cake and a gingerbread pudding cake in months past, both really tasty. I’d never made a peach (well, nectarine) one. First I peeled and sliced (and measured) the nectarines. I took two little slices to taste – oh my goodness were they fabulous. Now, a slight confession: the original recipe called for 4 cups of sliced fruit. I had 4 rather smallish nectarines, and I thought I’d be lucky to have 3 cups. Actually, it was a bit over 2 cups. So, I halved the recipe. The list of ingredients, when halved, was difficult (I hate it when you have to measure 7/8 of a cup or 3/8 of a cup). So, the recipe you’ll see below is the full 9×13 size, since I didn’t think you guys would want to have to do all the odd-estimating measurements, either. I baked mine in an 8-inch round cakepan. I don’t own an 8-inch square pan (just a 9-er), so figured the 8-inch round cakepan would be a better use of the volume/space.

The recipe appeared in Bon Appetit, in August of 2007. It was in the column where people write in to ask for restaurant recipes. When I searched online for it, it wasn’t AT the epicurious website (odd), but I did find it at somebody else’s food blog. Before I made it I wanted to read what others thought of it. Several people who have eaten at the restaurant, and had moved away from Austin, were thrilled to find the recipe online (per the comments to the blog). Apparently the pastry chef at this restaurant is Asian, as the recipe on the menu is called Wom Kim’s Peach Pudding.

Remember, pudding cake is a unique chemistry – the batter separates into a pudding layer, and also has a second layer more resembling a cake. When this pudding cake was sliced and served, it didn’t have much ooze left (probably because I baked it too long). In this particular recipe you spread the batter into the baking dish, then spoon the freshly sliced peaches/nectarines on top. Once baked, the fruit has settled (mostly) to the bottom and the cake is on top. In my instance, since I was using a smaller vessel, I cut down the baking time. Next time I’ll bake it less time. You can see from the collage of pictures, the one with the shiny center is halfway through the baking – from then I probably needed to bake it about 30 minutes and check it with my tester in 5-minute increments. And next time I’ll know to make the full 9×13 glass pan full, and to have at least 8 peaches or nectarines on hand to make it!

The results? It was delicious (is that my most favorite word on this blog? sorry . . .). Ahem. It was very good, but I think the cake overpowered the delicate flavor of the nectarines, though. If you want straight, unadulterated peach or nectarine flavor, cut them up and serve with cream or eat out of hand. If you don’t mind the mingling of flavors (the cake part was a bit crunchy on top – which was a great texture  . . . I liked it, it was perfectly baked, a bit darkened around the outside edges from sugar caramelization, just as the recipe recommended). I served it with a small globe of vanilla ice cream rather than whipped cream – I wanted the cold contrast.
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If you’re a regular reader of my blog, you already know that I rarely buy a box mix of anything. That started a long time ago when I learned a lot about food additives. So I prefer to use fresh products whenever possible. But I’ve been known to be lured into trying a few boxed things. My friend Cherrie (who doesn’t bake) started buying some of Ina Garten’s Barefoot Contessa mixes and gave them superlative accolades.

So I chose a chocolate cupcake mix with a peanut butter frosting, thinking that our granddaughter Taylor would be particularly interested (she takes after her grandpa, since they both love all things peanut butter), and would like to make them. Uh, no. She was more interested in playing and taking care of her baby cousin Vaughan, so I whipped them up myself. It wasn’t much different than a regular cake mix. But oh, the taste. Oh my goodness. How in the heck can she/they make a box mix taste so darned wonderful? Will I buy one of these again? Oh yea!

We had the family over for another outdoor barbecue dinner for 9. We ate leftovers of our 4th of July meal, and added about 2 pounds of some wonderful grilled Italian sausage to the menu. And rounded out the dinner with these fabulous cupcakes. So if you ever have a time when there simply isn’t time, or you’d rather spend it creating something else, these cupcakes are highly recommended.

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Well, no, Martha wasn’t there. But one of her big fans was the hostess, who prepared a dinner using four of Martha’s highlighted recipes from the Martha Stewart’s Living July ’08 issue. Kathleen invited us to her home for dinner, and we had such a fun evening. We had wine (of course) and I helped just a little bit in the kitchen with the aioli sauce. Other than that, Kathleen had done all the work ahead.

Each magazine always includes a four-recipe perforated card in the issue; color pictures on one side, recipes on the back. The recipes are designed to go together to make a full meal. Here’s the delicious menu. Click on each title to link to Martha’s website for the recipes:

Grilled Lamb Shoulder Chops with Herb Aioli

The lamb shoulder chops were grilled briefly (perfectly) and served with the cold herb aioli on the side which took but a couple of minutes to whiz up in the food processor. It was delicious – the hot meat and the cold sauce were great together since it was a warm evening.

Couscous Salad with Cherry Tomatoes

Israeli couscous is different than ordinary (fine-grained) couscous. The Israeli version is more like the size of the large round tapioca grains. Traditional couscous is kind of irregularly shaped, but the Israeli are perfectly honed little globes. They make for a very pretty bowl. This is prepared just before serving (it can sit at room temp for awhile, so the recipe says). And this is an extremely low fat dish – only one tablespoon of oil for the entire salad for four people.

Minted Watermelon Salad

In Martha’s version, you use ricotta salata cheese. Kathleen couldn’t find it, so she used feta instead, which was wonderful. I’d never have thought to pair watermelon with feta. It was delicious, especially with the fresh mint too. I’d probably use more mint, but then I like the stuff in lots of things.

Raspberry and Lemon Sorbet Floats

Kathleen couldn’t find sorbet, so she used sherbet instead. These were just delicious with Vernors ginger ale poured over the sherbet. I mean it – so easy – and so refreshing on a hot summer’s night. She served them in brightly colored glasses, and we just sipped away. I looked up some info about Vernors – they claim to be the first American soft drink. The story is interesting – James Vernor went off to fight in the Civil War, leaving behind an oak cask in the pharmacy where he worked. It was filled with ginger, vanilla and spices. When he returned 4 years later, the cask was still there and ginger ale was born. And even more interesting to me, was that from 1866 to 1991 Vernors ginger ale was sweetened with stevia, but when stevia was banned by the FDA in 1991, they began using corn syrup. An even more obscure factlet, being the English nut that I am, is that in 1950 the company decided to drop the apostrophe from Vernor’s.

Thanks, Kathleen, for a very tasty Martha dinner and an altogether lovely evening.

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I’m a regular reader of the Brilynn from Jumbo Empanadas. And I’ve tried several of her recipes over the year I’ve been monitoring her blog. So when this recipe popped up the other day my taste buds went into zing mode.

Probably about 20 years ago my DH and I and our good friends Bud & Cherrie used to go to San Diego on an occasional Saturday and have a wonderful wine tasting lunch at the Wine Sellar and Brasserie.  You can go for just the wine tasting, but for a nominal fee, you can have their pre-set light lunch (very gourmet, I might add) to accompany it.

Anyway, at one of those tastings, the dessert was home made vanilla ice cream with strawberries, balsamic vinegar and cracked black pepper. Yes, you read that right. Since then I’ve seen it served at other places, but at the time my taste buds just went into overdrive. It was about the cracked pepper, but the combination of strawberries and balsamic vinegar is simply a match made in heaven.

You can see why, then, the Jumbo Empanadas’ recipe title put me into strawberry-balsamic nirvana. Just had to try it. And since strawberries are definitely on the wane here, I needed to do it right NOW if I was going to do it this season! My kitchen freezer is nearly chock-a-block full, but I just had to find room somehow. Even if I had to defrost something else to make room. I’m embarrassed to tell you how big this freezer is and it’s absolutely full to the brim.

The idea of roasting the strawberries with the balsamic seems like such a novel idea, and makes this luscious juicy mash of fruit and juice. And you can get yourself a little spoon to slick up the very last little droplets around the pan. It’s that good.

And don’t forget to reserve a bit of the fruit to drizzle on the top of the ice cream when it’s served. That’s a really nice touch. The taste: oh my goodness. Rich. Sweet. Delicious. Over the top. Fabulous. Wanna have it again SOON!
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My problem is: I love “afternoon tea.” It’s just so fun. And I love the food that is typical of such a tea. So it was that my friend, Cherrie, and I joined hostess forces and invited 10 of our friends to tea at my house last week. We started planning it a couple of months ago, and within about 5 minutes we’d decided on the menu and who would be invited. The date was set, invitations were mailed, and we both did an ample amount of cooking. Anyone who says doing an “afternoon tea” is easy is crazy. Even with both of us cooking and preparing the food, and with one of the guests helping an hour ahead and at hour after (thanks again, Joan), it was a tremendous amount of work. We made everything (except the fruit tarts) ourselves. I got to dig out all of my grandmother’s fancy frilly china plates and teacups and saucers. And used some beautiful pink hydrangeas from our garden as a centerpiece.

We had decided to do it at lunchtime, so we called it a “Luncheon Tea.” But the menu was typically English tea. We had:

Pink Champagne with Strawberry Puree Ice Cubes
(I didn’t take a photo of that – oh darn – but it was VERY pretty and everybody loved it – no recipe for this one)

Watermelon Blueberry Soup
(delicious – just delicious – most people liked it, although not all)

Chicken Salad Sandwiches
(different, with chopped smoked almonds on the outside edges)

Ham Mousse Sandwiches
(very different – with whipped cream in the filling)

Smoked Salmon Sandwiches with Dill
(just buttered bread, smoked salmon and fresh dill peeking out of the edges –
no recipe for this one as it’s so easy)

Mini Fruit Tarts
(the only thing we purchased)

Sarah’s Ginger Scones
(uses candied ginger pieces in the batter)

Golden Raisin Scones
(my tried and true favorite, posted long ago)

Chocolate Scones
(posted recently, also well liked)
(All of the scones were served with lemon curd, clotted cream and black currant jam)

Chocolate Ribbon Dessert
(like a chocolate pie but in a 9×13 pan, cut into small squares)

Earl Grey Tea
Lemon Rose Tea (herbal, from Peet’s)
Marco Polo Tea (a blend from Mariage Freres in Paris)
(from when I was there 2 years ago, and this was the hands-down favorite)

In the next week I’ll likely post most of these recipes. The only one I’m missing is the ham mousse (from a cooking class herrie has it and I’ll get it from her.

The ginger scones are Sarah’s recipe – from a cooking class in San Juan Capistrano. Sarah is from Scotland, and over the years we enjoyed several of her family favorites on the cooking school menu. These are easy to make, and I decided to do something totally different – I made the scones and froze them all raw the day before the tea. Gosh, why didn’t I do this years ago? All you have to do is take them out of the freezer about 20 minutes ahead of baking (when you turn on the oven) and increase the baking time by a few minutes (maybe 5 or so). I may never, ever, make them fresh again – just pop one or two out of the freezer when I want them for breakfast. Or a bunch when I need to serve something for my DH’s Bible Study Group. Of course, they won’t keep indefinitely in the freezer, but will likely be fine for a couple of months!
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My mother came from the era of 3×5 cards for her recipes. And when I was searching for just the right chocolate dessert to serve at the tea the other day (more about the tea later), this recipe floated out of the stack. It’s not an old-time recipe (probably it’s from the 1970’s), after the advent of Cool Whip and instant chocolate pudding anyway. I found some other versions on the internet, but none by this exact name. So I have no idea of the origin of this one. It’s basically a layered chocolate (and whipped cream) pie with walnuts.

The crust is a simple press-in bottom layer in a 9×13 pan (walnuts, flour, butter). Once that’s baked and cooled, you make a cream cheese layer (with powdered sugar, Cool Whip and the cream cheese), then a thick chocolate pudding layer. Then it’s topped with more Cool Whip and chocolate shavings and more nuts on top. This is a VERY simple and easy dessert. And it could feed a big crowd if you don’t cut very big pieces. It went well with the tea because I could cut it up into smaller pieces to look more like “tea” sized servings. We had ample leftover. It is best made the day ahead, and actually keeps for several days.
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The other day I walked into my pantry – I have nice, big walk-in type – and glanced around at the bulging shelves. What to fix? I was looking for something else, but my eyes landed on this box mix for panna cotta that I bought many months ago.

I don’t know about you, but I’m a sucker for any jars and bottles of things, like pickled onions, relishes, chutneys, toppings for cheese, or fruit. Even occasionally a sauce. But this was a box, and even those who don’t know me well, will perhaps recognize early on that I rarely use a box mix for anything.

Panna cotta happens to be one of my favorite desserts. It’s relatively easy to make, but when I read the ingredients in this little Canadian Dr. Oetker panna cotta box mix, there wasn’t really anything suspicious in it. And it looked like it took no time at all to make. Even less time than the real thing, and it didn’t have to bake or cook except for heating milk and water.

Sure enough, it was absolutely cinchy easy. It took less than 10 minutes to make the entire thing. You heat up a cup of milk to a simmer, remove from the heat, and stir in the contents of one of the little packages in the box. Once whisked in, you add a cup of heavy cream and whisk some more. Pour into serving bowls and cool, then chill. Meanwhile, the other package contains a nice raspberry sauce. This dry mix is combined with a half a cup of boiling water, and it’s done too.

I didn’t have time to chill the pannas for 2 hours, as suggested, so I put them in a pan surrounded by ice cubes and they were well enough chilled to serve (I did it in the little bowls instead of turning them out onto a serving plate) in about 45 minutes. I was amazed. They were delicious. I may need to have one of these boxes on hand for those occasions when I need a dessert – quick like. I bought it at Cost Plus World Market for $2.49. Probably last year. It’s Dr. Oetker brand. I’d recommend it, believe it or not!

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Strawberries are on the wane here in Southern California. They’re really at a peak of ripeness and sweetness, though. So I bought two big boxes of berries to use for a company dinner. First I made my much-loved Strawberry Gazpacho. Since I’ve written it up before, you can click on the recipe title above and get to the original posting for it. With super ripe berries, the gazpacho had a wonderful sweet taste.

The remaining I used in the dessert. No longer do I have the original recipe for this. My notes, though, tell me it was in a Sunset Magazine. Since I found it listed in one of my military officer’s wives’ cookbooks dating back to about 1968, I know it’s at least that old. I even remember when I first made it – I was living at Whidbey Island, Washington – learning to cook and enjoying the compact kitchen I had in the small but new home I was living in at the time. Strawberries make their entrance there in late May or early June (my recollection anyway) and once the main crops were picked, the fields near Oak Harbor opened up for people to pick their own “jam” berries. But even those were very tasty; they were just small. Perfectly ripe, however.

Making this over the years (but not for at least 15-20) I’d forgotten some of the procedures, and had to refresh my memory. My typed up recipe also contained an error; fortunately, however, I recognized something was missing and went to look it up on the internet. I found several sources for this recipe, and with the exception of two ingredients, they were all the same. The differences were in the original recipe too, as I recall. This can be made with frozen berries if you want – in which case you decrease the amount of sugar. A more recent version suggested using Cool Whip instead of heavy cream if you prefer, so I included that in my recipe, although I’ve never made it that way.

First you make a sweet crumb mixture. While it’s baking you can work on the filling (strawberries, lemon juice, egg whites and heavy cream or Cool Whip). Once the baked mixture is cooled and crumbled up well, 2/3 of it is sprinkled on the bottom of a 9×13 pan. I stuck that in the freezer while I finished up the filling. The recipes all said to combine the berries, the egg whites, sugar and lemon juice and whip it all up until soft peaks form. I thought that sounded so very odd – the sliced berries would be totally decimated. I wanted them to remain in a more solid form, so I only folded in the berries at the end. Then you combine the whipped cream or Cool Whip with it, carefully spoon it over the crumbs in the pan, sprinkled the remaining crumbs on top and freeze. When ready to serve, you can decorate the square with some additional strawberries, even drizzle some strawberry juice around the plate.

What I did forget was that once frozen, this dessert needs to defrost a little bit before you even attempt to cut it up. Ten minutes out didn’t seem to be enough time. It still cracked in odd directions, and is hard to eat. It still tasted good, but with mostly frozen chunks of berries in it, it really needs that defrosting time to make it easily edible. None of the recipes I found online indicate that, and it’s been too many years since I made this to remember. So, whatever method you use, fresh or frozen berries, cream or Cool Whip, this is a refreshing dessert, and really quite easy to make.
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Admittedly, I’m a fan of ice cream. I came to this anomaly honestly. My Dad was an out-and-out obsessive-compulsive about the stuff. I grew up eating dessert after nearly every dinner, and I can still remember (and hear it in my head) my Dad’s spoon against the side of the bowl, systematically scraping around to get the very last possible speck of it. After going around once, he’d change the angle of the spoon and scrape around one more time. Remember, my Dad was an engineer, so methodical was his middle name. His favorite dessert was vanilla ice cream with chocolate sauce, or rocky road, just plain.

We go for periods of time with no ice cream in the freezer. As summer months approach, though, and the last of our home grown Meyer lemons reach mid-to-past maturity, I need to use some of that lemon juice. So, a new recipe streaked past the recipe trove – from Bon Appetit, May, 2008. It sounded delicious. And indeed it was.

You simmer water, sugar and freshly grated ginger, strain out the ginger, then chill. Add the yogurt, buttermilk, fresh lemon juice and some grated zest and freeze in your ice cream maker. Freeze further for a couple of hours and serve.

The ginger flavor does not predominate at all. In fact, if you weren’t TOLD it was there, you might not be able to identify it. I adored the elusive flavor. A lot. Enough that the next time I make this I’m going to use a bit more ginger, but not much. The frozen yogurt/ice cream has more of the texture of sorbet – to me anyway – although it does have more dairy (buttermilk and yogurt) than water. It was very, very refreshing, and with a bit of crystallized ginger on top (and maybe mango as suggested in the recipe), it’s an easy dessert to make. Next time I may try using 2% yogurt, just to see if there’s any difference. In any case, it’s a very low-calorie dessert, but lovely enough for guests. I’ll be making this again.
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