Chocolate Banana Stud Cake

The banana with it's more than 500 varieties is one of nature's more perfect foods. It contains 3 natural sugars, several different vitamins, minerals, and fiber. It is not only healthy but helps to overcome and prevent many illnesses and conditions. They can be eaten straight off the plant, baked into desserts, fried, broiled, steamed or sauteed. Bananas can be pureed and used to replace eggs in a dessert to reduce the fat content or aid in the conversion of a recipe to vegetarian. This week however, my mind was not on the healthful aspect of the banana but on it's sweet, heavenly flavor. Keep in mind when matched with chocolate its flavor can be over powered and may also result in a rubbery texture. This week the Heavenly Cake Bakers project was Chocolate Banana Stud Cake. Sounds sexy and complicated, right? Well, not this time! So, let's talk cake: The list of ingredients doesn't skimp on the good stuff, like butter, eggs, cake flour (ah, the promise of a soft crumb), cocoa (yes, again not an overpowering of chocolate- the banana will shine), sour cream (makes for a smooth consistency), vanilla extract and leavenings. Just a reminder: I hope that in not listing the measurements and recipe details that you are sufficently teased and are more likely to purchase your own copy of this lovely book (enough sales!!!). One of the details that seems to be repeated in many of Rose's chocolate cakes is the use of cocoa instead of squares or slabs. The baker is instructed to moisten the cocoa powder with boiling water and stir until smooth, then cover to cool. This technique I like very much and is probably one of the things I like best about this book. The remainder of the steps are very easy with no suprises. For this cake as with much of my baking I chose to make a half batch and use a smaller cake pan. It baked up nicely and unmolded without a hitch (thanks to the use of my beloved parchment paper). The cakes is finished off with a chocolate ganache which I applied thinly. As you will remember we are not big chocolate lovers. The "stud" look came from applying chocolate chips upside down around the top of the cake. I used both semi-sweet and milk chocolate chips. The slight haze over the top of my chips is from storing them in the refrigerator. If kept too cold some of the cocoa butter will rise to the surface of the chocolate. This does not alter the taste. If this cake was to be given away I would have used a new bag to avoid that haze.

The banana shares the spot light with chocolate amicably. The cake presents itself well and the taste is phenomenal. The fine texture and crumb earns it's place on my "favorites" list.

~Wordless Wednesday #5~

An unexpected dinner guest. Too late or too early?

Mini Vanilla Bean Pound Cakes

This week's project with the Heavenly Cake Baker was Mini Vanilla Bean Pound Cakes. Pound cake is one of my favorite cakes and coupled with the star ingredient vanilla bean, I was looking forward to this from the time I spotted it on the schedule of projects. The cake in this version is soaked with a vanilla Cognac syrup too, yum! Pound cake is a British creation dating back to the 1700's. The original recipe used one pound each of eggs, butter, sugar, and flour. No leaveners were used except for the air whipped into the batter. Over the years the ratio of these ingredients has changed and leaveners are used to lighten it up a bit. The pound cake is very versatile and has many variations and versions. Rose Levy Bernanbaum, author of the lovely, "Rose's Heavenly Cakes" gives the baker a short ingredient list, nothing complex for technique and flavor that raises the bar on this version to excellent. So lets talk. The star ingredient here is the vanilla bean, two to be exact. Then there is sugar, eggs, milk, cake flour (yes, a fine crumb), leavening, salt, butter (of course) and vanilla extract. The vanilla beans are to be split and scrapped into the sugar and rubbed to distribute evenly (.a.k.a: vanilla sugar which on its own can be used in many applications). The liquid ingredients are mixed together as are the dry ingredients. Then the butter is added to the half the liquid mixture followed by the dry ingredients and the balance of the liquid. See? Simple......remember the vanilla and the delicate cumb is what makes these little cakes so special. As the cakes cool a vanilla Cognac syrup is prepared. I used Vanilla Schnapps in place of the Cognac along with sugar and water. After bringing the mixture to a boil remove it from the heat. Cover and cool. Once the cakes are cooled the syrup is brushed over the cakes. This cake rates high on my list. It was a breeze to prepare, the fine crumb and moist cake was delicious. The syrup inhanced the beautiful vanilla flavor. This is truly a keeper as "J" would say.

~Wordless Wednesday #4~

Promise

Tomatoes and basil oh my!

So did you guess? It wasn't hard, there are actually two correct answers to my previously posted question from my favorite market stops. For the first delicious combination we took the semolina bread, tomatoes and mozzarella and them up about 1/4" thick. A chiffonade of basil was made and the olive oil was standing ready. A slice of tomatoe and cheese is placed on the bread sprinkled with basil and drizzled with olive oil. Wow....yummy! Now I'm sure you are looking for a photo of this delicious finger food but, sadly it was eaten faster than you can say "wait for the camera"!

Anyway the second delicious combination was set up for a grilled pizza (thank the stars the camera ws ready for this one). The dough recipe is easy and I have posted it in the past (you can search it or use your favorite). A light marinara sauce was prepared and set aside. Again sliced tomatoes, mozzarella and a chiffonade of basil was ready to assemble. Cooking pizza on the grill is fun and easy. I use a bread stone on the grill top with the burners to it side on only so as not to burn the bottom.

The two combinations here are our favorite summer-time eats.

Chocolate Ice Cream Cake

Chocolate cake and ice cream, let me see......is there anything here not to like? Thought so. This week with my fellow Heavenly Cake Bakers it was Rose Levy Beranbaum's recipe for Chocolate Ice Cream Cake. I was so looking forward to this project I couldn't wait to get started. There are three components for this recipe and all could be made in advance. Perfect!

For the ice cream portion Rose suggests a home made version. The reason is that commercial ice cream contains more air and will loose two-thirds its volume when softened. Well, we can't have that happen! I chose to make some strawberry ice cream. And being the end of strawberry season I wanted to showcase the little red orbs one last time. Sadly, there will be no more talk of strawberries until next year. The recipe and photos for this egg-less version of ice cream was posted a bit earlier this week. To see it just scroll down a little. Now that the ice cream was safe and sound in the freezer, I moved on.

Rose recommends using the recipe for her German Chocolate Cake when making the cake portion of this project. Remember if you plan on serving a cake cold or even frozen it is important to choose a cake that uses oil rather than butter. This will insure the cake maintains a soft texture. The other interesting technique in this recipe is the egg whites went into the batter unbeaten. The cake rose suprisingly high without the addition of air into the whites, hmmmm. Rose also suggests that you only need to use three-quarters of the batter for this project. I decided to make the full batch and use the last quarter to make a "mini-me" cake. Look left....cute huh!

I would like to take a minute here to give Rose's Heavenly Cakes some praise. I do hope you put this book on your "must have" list. I have yet to be disappointed by the instructions, technique, photos, or results. Please see her book for the ingredients and instructions for this wonderful chocolate, light as air cake. Back to the matter at hand.

The last component is a hot fudge sauce. Since "J" and I don't really like an abundance of chocolate I knew I wasn't going to use much. Luckly I had some of the Dark Chocolate Frosting in the freezer from the Strawberry Cake we made a few weeks ago. Now that the components were prepared I could compose the cake.

This really was quick and easy. The cakes were sliced so the top layer was thinner than the bottom layer.Place the ice cream in the refrigerator for about 30 minutes to soften (a little less if you use a commercially made ice cream). Using an offset spatula spread the ice cream over the bottom layer. Top with the thinner cake layer and drizzle with the fudge sauce or in my case, the softened frosting. Cover well with plastic wrap and place the cake back in the freezer. The hardest part was waiting for the ice cream to firm up!

I can't say how thoroughly please I am with the cake and it soft, light texture. I will definitely be using this again. The ice cream.....well, if you know me you know I could probably survive happily on ice cream! All were very pleased to help with this one!

Favorite Saturday Morning Market Stops

Farm stands and quaint italian markets are among my favorite Saturday morning stops. I just had to post this picture quickly since these beauties will be eaten quickly. There aren't too many farm stands in my local area so I make the trip when we are yearning for something special that can not be gotten at the local grocers. Today I picked up just a few of our favorite treats. No, you aren't imagining things there is nothing with sugar here today. Oh what a feast this will be, I can hardly wait!Can you guess how these items will be used?