Someone recently asked me what my favorite thing to bake was and I was stumped because it is difficult to narrow it down when I like so many things! The truth is that I like to bake just about anything, but if I have to pick, I would say that brownies are one of my favorite things to bake. They’re easy to bake, huge crowd pleasers and you can put many different spins on them to change their flavor completely. These Banana Brownies with Cacao Nibs, for instance, definitely stand out from your average brownie.
The basic brownie batter here is one that I use often, made with melted dark chocolate and cocoa powder for a strong chocolate flavor. I added mashed banana to the brownie base, along with chocolate chips and cacao nibs. Cacao nibs are chopped up pieces of roasted cocoa beans. The nibs usually go on to become chocolate, but they can also be added to chocolate bars and baked goods for a little crunch and a slightly toasty, nutty, chocolate element.
These brownies are pretty amazing and a fantastic change of pace from your standard brownie recipe. They are super moist and fudgy, yet still tender, and they have a great balance of chocolate and banana flavor. I used dark chocolate chips, but semisweet are a good choice here, as well. The cacao nibs add a crunch, but are more subtle than a big pecan or walnut is going to be, and they enhance the overall chocolatiness of the brownies. You might have to look to a specialty baking store to find the nibs, but if you want to skip them you’ll get good results by using walnuts or pecans in this recipe, too.
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- A dessert could not look more perfect for a summer picnic than In Katrina’s Kitchen‘s Picnic Tablecloth Cookie Bars. This tray of buttery sugar cookie bars is topped with a sweet layer of vanilla and almond frosting, but the fun of the dessert comes from the decorations. The frosting is sprayed with edible food coloring to give it a red and white checkerboard effect and make it look like a tablecloth. The “tablecloth” is decorated with an ant trail and cookie crumbs, giving it a very cute and whimsical look.
- Barcelona is a very inspiring city, especially because of the fantastic food that the city is known for. Bittersweet used a bit of Spain for inspiration in creating a Saffron Cashew Ice Cream, rich with a intense spice of saffron. The nondairy ice cream starts with nondairy milk that is infused with saffron until it has captured its strong flavor and bright color. The milk is combined with roasted cashews and lightly sweetened with sugar to highlight the saffron flavor before being churned into ice cream.
- The Highway to Heaven Cupcakes that Sweetapolita baked up are definitely over the top – and that is what will keep you coming back for more. The moist chocolate cupcakes are injected with salted caramel sauce and splashed with coffee syrup before being topped with a velvety chocolate ganache. Then, as if that weren’t enough, the cupcake is then topped with salty ruffled potato chips and drizzled with even more caramel sauce. Yum.
- Kugelhopf is really just another word for bundt cake, but it definitely makes the cake sound a little more elegant than your standard bundt. This beautiful Coffee Kugelphof from Cook Republic is definitely not your standard bundt. The rich sour cream batter is divided into two parts, and a generous amount of melted dark chocolate and instant coffee is added to one portion of the batter. The chocolate batter is poured on top of the plain batter, and because it is more dense, it sinks to the bottom of the pan during baking. When the cake is ready to be sliced, you’ll find that the delicious chocolate-coffee swirl is now on top of every slice.
- Philadelphia-style ice cream is the common name for ice creams that are made without eggs or egg yolks. This style of ice cream is a little lighter than those made with an egg-rich base, and a little easier to put together, but just as delicious. Zoe Bakes‘ Philadelphia-style Chocolate Ice Cream is definitely rich, eggs or not. The ice cream is flavored with cocoa powder and with dark chocolate, and is made with a combination of heavy cream and milk. It’s a great base and can be used to make many variations by adding other flavors – such as orange zest or mint – or mix ins – such as chocolate chips or oreo cookies.
Quick breads are breads that are made without yeast, hence they are “quick” to prepare. You probably think of banana bread or pumpkin bread when you think of a quick bread, as sweet quick breads are a brunch staple, but there are many savory quick breads out there that make a nice addition to other meals – like this Cheddar Onion Quick Bread. The bread mixes up in a few minutes and bakes in less than an hour, which means that you can even fit it in on a busy weeknight to have fresh, homemade bread along with dinner.
This bread could not be any easier to make, and the resulting loaf is delicious. It has a light, but moist, crumb and packs in a lot of flavor. The onions cook right in the bread, so you get a very sweet onion flavor in the finished bread, which compliments the cheddar cheese nicely. Both sweet onions and regular onions will work beautifully. I tend to use sweet onions, but use what you have on hand. The cheddar also adds a few streaks of orange here and there in the loaf for color as well as flavor.
This recipe could be easily adapted to use other types of cheese – pepper jack would be something spicier, for instance – to suit your preferences and what you have on hand. However you make it, it goes well with all kinds of savory dishes – and since it is so easy to throw together, there is really never a bad time to whip up a loaf. I like to keep it simple and serve it with soups and salads. Classic tomato soup and gazpacho are two of my favorite pairings with this bread. It is good plain and even better when you smear it with a little bit of butter. The bread can be sliced and toasted, as well, to add a little crunch to it.
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It is always fun to sneak a little taste of homemade cookie dough, whether you’re a little kid or a big kid (adult), even though eating raw cookie dough isn’t necessarily the best idea because of the raw eggs it contains. There is something about the flavor of cookie dough that draws us in time and again. Ben & Jerry’s capitalized on our love of cookie dough by turning it into ice cream, and The Cookie Dough Lover’s Cookbook uses it in a whole host of different recipes and takes cookie dough a few steps further than just putting it into a batch of ice cream. Every recipe in this book – from cakes to candies – features cookie dough as a flavor and ingredient in its own right.
The book starts off with an eggless chocolate chip cookie dough recipe. This is the basis for all of the other cookie doughs in the book, and it is a dough that you can feel comfortable indulging in because it contains no raw eggs. You will be amazed at the variety of recipes that the dough gets incorporated into here. It is used as a filling for cupcakes, a center for candies, a layer in cakes and even as a surprise base at the bottom of a creme brulee. The recipes are very creative – and they’re also easy to follow along with, with clear directions. There are many beautiful pictures throughout the book that make the recipes look as fun as they sound, and are a great source of inspiration as you read through. In addition to the basic recipes, you’ll also find lots of tips for perfecting the techniques used in the recipes and suggestions for variations on them.
The only thing that a chocolate chip cookie fan might find a bit unusual about this book is that these egg-free cookie doughs are not meant to be baked. They are designed to be at their peak when uncooked. In addition to excluding eggs, they also do not use any leavening, so the baked dough would not have the texture of a regular cookie. Fortunately for those looking to pair the raw dough with a real cookie, there are a few recipes in the book that have that concept (raw dough + baked cookie) covered. The book is definitely indulgent and, while these recipes might be a little over-the-top for everyday baking (since you can get tired of the dough if you eat too much), the idea is well worth a try for anyone who has every snuck in a second bite of cookie dough when mixing up a batch of chocolate chip cookies.
Rocky Road is a popular ice cream flavor, and the combination of chocolate, marshmallows and nuts is so well known that it can be used to make a lot more than just ice cream. For instance, these Rocky Road Scones will be instantly recognizable to fans of rocky road. They are chocolate scones with mini marshmallows, walnuts and chocolate chips. Definitely not your usual breakfast fare!
The scone dough is made much like other scones, with butter cut into a flour mixture to give the finished scones a light, flaky texture. I recommend sifting the flour mixture for this recipe because it contains cocoa powder, and you don’t want to get unincorporated lumps of it in the dough. Mini marshmallows add some extra sweetness and walnuts add a nice crunch, while those chocolate chips up the chocolate factor considerably. Walnuts could also be substituted with almonds, if you prefer almonds to walnuts in your rocky road.
These scones have a great, brownie-like chocolate flavor to them along with that light texture of a regular scone. They’re moist and not too sweet, so they still seem like a good breakfast or brunch treat, rather than a straight dessert. They are best when they are still slightly warm and fresh out of the oven, while the marshmallows are still soft. If you can’t eat them all at once, however, they will keep well for a day or two when stored in an airtight container after cooling.
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