- Sometimes, cake is nothing more than a frosting delivery device. Sometimes, if you have a frosting that is unusually good, you want to skip the cake altogether. The Novice Chef Blog had this happen after making a batch of Butterfinger Swiss Meringue Buttercream. This light-yet-creamy frosting is rich with butter flavor and full of chopped up Butterfinger candy bars. Butterfingers shatter when chopped, leaving you with tiny, crisp bits of peanut butter toffee and chocolate that actually incorporate very well into a frosting. Of course, it’s still a good idea to bake some chocolate or banana cupcakes to load this frosting into , but if you sneak a spoonful or two straight from the bowl, I won’t tell.
- Chocolate cupcakes are delicious just as they are, but it is easy to put a little twist onto a basic recipe that will make them more unique and even tastier. Always With Butter baked some Coffee Chocolate Cupcakes with Baileys Frosting, getting a batch of cupcakes that have the nostalgia of a classic with more grown up flavors thrown in. There is coffee in the cake and in the frosting of these cupcakes, and it is the combination of the two that makes that coffee flavor come through into the finished product. The Baileys is a nice touch for sweetness, and it’s a great way to spike a frosting for any flavor of cupcake.
- Orange gets paired up with chocolate frequently in desserts, but lemon is another citrus fruit that can go ex exceptionally well with chocolate, although it is not used quite as often. A great example is The Pastry Affair‘s Lemon Chocolate Tart. This simple tart has a buttery almond crust that is topped with a thin layer of rich, chocolate ganache. The chocolate is then topped with a generous amount of sweet-tart homemade lemon curd. It’s a great combination of flavors in an easy to make, yet elegant, dessert.
- Another chocolate indulgence can be found in the Chocolate Cinnamon Gelato with Toffee Bits that Cheese and Chocolate cooked up. The recipe comes from Bon Appetit magazine and is quite easy to make, although you will need an ice cream maker to get the best texture on the finished gelato. The gelato is made with a generous amount of cinnamon and bittersweet chocolate, with toffee bits adding sweetness and a little texture to the finished product. This sounds like a great recipe to make some affogato with, if you’re a coffee lover!
- The Oscar’s may be over for this year, but all you really need to do to create an excuse to bake a batch of the Popcorn-Raisinet Cookies that Jonesing For baked to watch the awards show is to rent a favorite movie and pop it into the dvd player. These movie watching cookies are inspired by the movie theater snack bar. They actually have kettle corn and chocolate covered raisins baked in. As odd as the combination sounds, like eating a handful of popcorn and Raisinettes at the movies, it actually works together very nicely.
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Jessica
March 2, 2011Thanks Nicole for including me! The way you describe the frosting makes me want another batch now! LOL 😉
JJ
March 2, 2011Thank you so much for the mention! Happy Baking! 🙂