We wish you a merry Christmas ...

… and a happy new year.

This will be the last challenge in 2009 and we are looking back half satisfied with what we achieved and experienced this year and also half expecting of what 2010 will bring. The upcoming year will bring most definitely some big changes in our both lifes and it’s good to know that no matter what life will dish up, there’s always comfort food to make the day a bit brighter and the hips bigger. :)

This months challenge looked very promising and we had so many ideas of how to decorate this lovely gingerbread house, since there are endless options to play with. In the end and in the pre-Christmas stress we didn’t quite manage to meet up before the 24^th though and I made the gingerbread alone. Since a house seemed a little too time consuming, I ended up making gingerbread heart and -men rather than a whole house. The recipe worked out pretty nicely and I had fun decorating the whole thing.

Now the only thing left to do is eating all those wonderful Christmas Dinners and cookies and enjoy the rest of this year.

Hope you can all enjoy it as much as we do and look forward to what other Daring Baker’s Challenges the next year will bring.

The December 2009 Daring Bakers’ challenge was brought to you by Anna of Very Small Anna and Y of Lemonpi. They chose to challenge Daring Bakers’ everywhere to bake and assemble a gingerbread house from scratch. They chose recipes from Good Housekeeping and from The Great Scandinavian Baking Book as the challenge recipes.

Y's Recipe:
Scandinavian Gingerbread (Pepparkakstuga)
from The Great Scandinavian Baking Book by Beatrice Ojakangas http://astore.amazon.com/thedarkit-20/detail/0816634963

1 cup butter, room temperature [226g]
1 cup brown sugar, well packed [220g]
2 tablespoons cinnamon
4 teaspoons ground ginger
3 teaspoons ground cloves
2 teaspoons baking soda
½ cup boiling water
5 cups all-purpose flour [875g]

1. In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar until blended. Add the cinnamon, ginger and cloves. Mix the baking soda with the boiling water and add to the dough along with the flour. Mix to make a stiff dough. If necessary add more water, a tablespoon at a time. Chill 2 hours or overnight.2. Cut patterns for the house, making patterns for the roof, front walls, gabled walls, chimney and door out of cardboard.3. Roll the dough out on a large, ungreased baking sheet and place the patterns on the dough. Mark off the various pieces with a knife, but leave the pieces in place.4. [I rolled out the dough on a floured bench, roughly 1/8 inch thick (which allows for fact that the dough puffs a little when baked), cut required shapes and transferred these to the baking sheet. Any scraps I saved and rerolled at the end.]5. Preheat the oven to 375'F (190'C). Bake for 12 to 15 minutes until the cookie dough feels firm. After baking, again place the pattern on top of the gingerbread and trim the shapes, cutting the edges with a straight-edged knife. Leave to cool on the baking sheet.

Royal Icing:

1 large egg white
3 cups (330g) powdered sugar
1 teaspoon white vinegar
1 teaspoon almond extract

Beat all ingredients until smooth, adding the powdered sugar gradually to get the desired consistency. Pipe on pieces and allow to dry before assembling. If you aren't using it all at once you can keep it in a small bowl, loosely covered with a damp towel for a few hours until ready to use. You may have to beat it slightly to get it an even consistency if the top sets up a bit. Piped on the house, this will set up hard over time.

also check: www.thedaringkitchen.com for other really amazing entries.

NEW LAYOUT

As you can see, we have a new much more classy and colourful layout.
The picture used in the header is self-made. It shows some gorgeous cupcakes we've made last week. If you guys want, we could post the recipe as well as some changings we've made.

We wish you a nice evening and a good next week!
Yours,
CUTECANDYCUPCAKES

All good things come in ...Twos.

The 2009 October Daring Bakers’ challenge was brought to us by Ami S. She chose macarons from Claudia Fleming’s The Last Course: The Desserts of Gramercy Tavern as the challenge recipe.

It was Daring Bakers Time again this month and the given challenge was a promising one - French macaroons! Unfortunately last month we just couldn’t find the time for the puff pastry that was asked for, so it was good to get the hand mixer and pastry bag out again.

Neither of us had tried making macaroons before, even though we read quite a lot about that on various other blogs. This month’s challenge looked not as difficult as e.g. the puff pastry last month with its 5 pages long recipe but it turned out we shouldn’t have underestimated the macaroons. We used a slightly different recipe than the one Ami gave us, mostly because it seemed a little easier and offered some ideas about the filling. The dough came together pretty easily, we used half skinned and half unskinned powdered almonds, mostly because the skinned ones were really expensive and we didn’t want to skin and powder our own, maybe next time though. We were happy that the recipe didn’t take really long, we worked, in total, maybe about 2 hours with baking and drying. Sometimes it’s fun to prepare something that takes quite a bit effort but then there are days where you prefer a quick and easy going recipe.

So after making the dough, we divided it into three parts that we wanted to colour individually. The first batch was turned into a turquoise plus we added three teaspoons of coconut flakes. The second bit of the dough was supposed to be red, but looked more of a pink in the end, but that was still fine. For the last one we just added some cocoa powder to turn it into brown which it did wonderfully.

It was really tricky to pipe the coloured doughs onto baking tray because the pastry bag’s tip was way too small. In the end we just piped the dough onto the tray without using any tip at all. It took a lot of patient to shape our macaroons into circles because most of the time they ended up looking like paramecia rather than circles. The dough was also either too runny (the pink one) or too solid (the turquoise one). We were quite happy with the cocoa macaroons though, they seemed to be the only ones keeping their shape.

Only a bit disappointed about the look of our work we put the macaroons into the oven to dry which they did, unfortunately none of them developed even the tiny hint of a foot. We still baked them but an unpleasant surprise awaited us, when we took the tray out. The coloured cookies were not only slightly burned but also lost all their nice colouring. We can’t explain how that could have happened and again, only the cocoa ones stayed just as brown as they were in the beginning.

Unfortunately, since we don’t like to throw things out but rather eat them, good looking or not, we had to throw the pink and turquoise ones out.

The next step for the poor lonely remaining macaroons was to prepare a filling. We used some simple whipped cream to which we added vanilla bean. It wouldn’t have made much sense to make a fancy new filling for the only four remaining macaroons.

About the taste isn’t much to tell, because as soon as we left them for a couple of minutes unobserved, they were all gone and apparently “surprisingly good”. At least something. J

Still not tired of macaroons the better half of this blog tried the recipe again another day and the result turned out to be miraculously good. The macaroons had a proper texture, a feet and a perfect round shape. It’s a mystery to us what she did different this time, but the picture speaks for itself.

She filled the macaroons with a simple chocolate ganache filling, which went really well with the chocolaty flavour of the macaroons itself. All in all a success.

It shows again that you shouldn’t give up even though the first try was a failure, because maybe next time you get a really nice result.

Thanks for giving us an opportunity to try something new again, we are looking forward to more ‘daring’ next month!

Here’s the original recipe, slightly modified by Ami:

Macaroons

Ingredients
Confectioners’ (Icing) sugar: 2 ¼ cups (225 g, 8 oz.)
Almond flour: 2 cups (190 g, 6.7 oz.)
Granulated sugar: 2 tablespoons (25 g , .88 oz.)
Egg whites: 5 (Have at room temperature)

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 200°F (93°C). Combine the confectioners’ sugar and almond flour in a medium bowl. If grinding your own nuts, combine nuts and a cup of confectioners’ sugar in the bowl of a food processor and grind until nuts are very fine and powdery.
2. Beat the egg whites in the clean dry bowl of a stand mixer until they hold soft peaks. Slowly add the granulated sugar and beat until the mixture holds stiff peaks.
3. Sift a third of the almond flour mixture into the meringue and fold gently to combine. If you are planning on adding zest or other flavorings to the batter, now is the time. Sift in the remaining almond flour in two batches. Be gentle! Don’t overfold, but fully incorporate your ingredients.
4. Spoon the mixture into a pastry bag fitted with a plain half-inch tip (Ateco #806). You can also use a Ziploc bag with a corner cut off. It’s easiest to fill your bag if you stand it up in a tall glass and fold the top down before spooning in the batter.
5. Pipe one-inch-sized (2.5 cm) mounds of batter onto baking sheets lined with nonstick liners (or parchment paper).
6. Bake the macaroon for 5 minutes. Remove the pan from the oven and raise the temperature to 375°F (190°C). Once the oven is up to temperature, put the pans back in the oven and bake for an additional 7 to 8 minutes, or lightly colored.
7. Cool on a rack before filling.

Yield: 10 dozen. (more or less)

A Daring Disaster (Daring Bakers' Challenge August 2009)

The August 2009 Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Angela of A Spoonful of Sugar and Lorraine of Not Quite Nigella. They chose the spectacular Dobos Torte based on a recipe from Rick Rodgers' cookbook Kaffeehaus: Exquisite Desserts from the Classic Caffés of Vienna, Budapest, and Prague.

This challenge was a disaster like no other. However, we completed it.
At the beginning we were quite exited and motivated about this month’s challenge, but as soon as we start baking, the problems began.

We chose to use semi dark chocolate for the butter cream. The mixture worked out rather well. At first it seems that the cream would not be think enough like the recipe said, but was rather runny. However, after beating in the butter it reach the desired consistence. So far so good. The trouble started when we were preparing the sponge cake layers. The egg whites turned out too hard, which might had influence on the outcome of the layers. We combined the ingredients as it was ordered in the recipe but somehow forgot the flour! It was a bit busy in the kitchen and we over read that part in the recipe. So when we took the first layer out of the oven it was not airy or anything, we couldn’t even peel off the parchment paper and the layer completely crumbled. So we had to throw that away. Damn. Here’s a photo of that disastrous layer…


We pondered why it didn’t work out, it wasn’t the first time we tried sponge cakes in general so we knew how it should have looked and felt like, so we checked the recipe again and saw with a sudden shock that we forget the cake flour! Very embarassing! We folded that into the egg mixture and tried again. This time the cake was at the edges too brown and therefore cracked, but in the centre it was not completely done. The other layers were alright, not very pretty to look at, but still better than more misbaked ones. Because we wasted one layer we only got four layers in total. We also used a 26 cm springform tin so the layers were bigger than they should have been anyway. We would really recommend using a smaller one but to end up with more layers. We couldn’t even decide for a proper layer for the caramel bit because all looked rather badly.
Next came the caramel. We followed the sometimes a bit confusing instructions (that was probably our fault. It's quite possible we overread something again or mistranslated it) and waited for the bit when the water-sugar liquid should have turned into an amber colour. It boiled and boiled and boiled and nothing happened. So after quite some time when we were really frustrated we decided to just leave it and skip that part. It wouldn’t have looked half decent anyway. So we assembled the cake and poured the butter cream, which was the only thing alright on this cake, between the layers and also spread some on top. We decorated the whole thing with some iced raspberries and sliced almond bits as well as some chopped chocolate flakes.
As it we tasted it later on we found that it was not worth the trouble. We might dare and try to make it again, this time with using smaller cake rounds and this time with the flour.
If you want to try this challenge at home, here’s the recipe:
http://thedaringkitchen.com/recipe

Daring Baker's Challenge July 2009

The July 2009 Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Nicole of Sweet Tooth.

She chose Chocolate Covered Marshmallow Cookies and Milan Cookies from pastry chef Gale Gand of the Food Network.

This was our second Daring Bakers Challenge and after seeing the recipe we were eager to try this lovely cookies for ourselves. We decided against making the Marshmallows ourselves for we couldn’t get our hands on the required light corn syrup. Luckily this challenge’s host Nicole said it was alright to use the ones you can buy in store too and so we did.

The cookie’s base required a bit of time because it has to be refrigerated for some time and the also has to set down for another two hours after the Marshmallows are piped onto it. The dough came together pretty easily and there were no problems in baking it. The recipe said the dough would make about two dozen cookies, we ended up with approximately 40 though, which might have been because we didn’t use an exact 1/2 inches cookie cutter.
Everything worked out fine with the Marshmallows who only were a bit too big for the base, even though we cut them into halves. When they cooled down we prepared the chocolate glaze, but modified the recipe a little. Instead of using the roughly 320g of semisweet chocolate we used 300g semisweet and 200g milk chocolate.

To completely cover the cookies turned out to use up too much chocolate too fast, so we decided to just glazed the top a bit which was still alright. In the end we sprinkled a few 100 and 1000’s over the still wet chocolate.

Our result was in our opinion a bit too sweet, next time it would probably be wiser to use only semi sweet chocolate for the glaze. However, the cookies turned out to taste really nice on the second day, straight from the fridge. It has been fun making those and we’ll look forward to the next challenge.

Our adapted recipe:

Mallows(Chocolate Covered Marshmallow Cookies)

Recipe courtesy Gale Gand, from Food Network website

Prep Time: 10 min
Inactive Prep Time: 5 min
Cook Time: 10 min
Serves: about 2 dozen cookies

• 3 cups (375grams/13.23oz) all purpose flour
• 1/2 cup (112.5grams/3.97oz) white sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 3/8 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 12 tablespoons (170grams/ 6 oz) unsalted butter
• 3 eggs, whisked together
• Homemade marshmallows, recipe follows
• Chocolate glaze, recipe follows

1. In a mixer with the paddle attachment, blend the dry ingredients.
2. On low speed, add the butter and mix until sandy.
3. Add the eggs and mix until combine.
4. Form the dough into a disk, wrap with clingfilm or parchment and refrigerate at least 1 hour and up to 3 days.
5. When ready to bake, grease a cookie sheet or line it with parchment paper or a silicon mat.
6. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.
7. Roll out the dough to 1/8-inch thickness, on a lightly floured surface. Use a 1 to 1 1/2 inches cookie cutter to cut out small rounds of dough.
8. Transfer to the prepared pan and bake for 10 minutes or until light golden brown. Let cool to room temperature.
9. Pipe a “kiss” of marshmallow onto each cookie. Let set at room temperature for 2 hours.
10. Line a cookie sheet with parchment or silicon mat.
11. One at a time, gently drop the marshmallow-topped cookies into the hot chocolate glaze.
12. Lift out with a fork and let excess chocolate drip back into the bowl.
13. Place on the prepared pan and let set at room temperature until the coating is firm, about 1 to 2 hours.

Note: if you don’t want to make your own marshmallows, you can cut a large marshmallow in half and place on the cookie base. Heat in a preheated 350-degree oven to slump the marshmallow slightly, it will expand and brown a little. Let cool, then proceed with the chocolate dipping.

Chocolate glaze:
• 300g semisweet chocolate
• 200g milk chocolate

1. Melt the 2 ingredients together in the top of a double boiler or a bowl set over barely simmering water.

Daring Bakers Challenge June 2009

The June Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Jasmine of Confessions of a Cardamom Addict and Annemarie of Ambrosia and Nectar. They chose a Traditional (UK) Bakewell Tart... er... pudding that was inspired by a rich baking history dating back to the 1800's in England.

This was our first challenge and it has been – to our great joy- a success. The result tasted really nice, only the pastry was a bit too salty in our opinion. It has been great fun making this, thanks!

Chocolate desires~

I think everybody feels like cookies every now and then. After a long day of work or school or uni or whatever it’s just comforting to nibble on something sweet. Something like a cookie! So when I was home yesterday, slightly bored, I had the urgent desire to bake something and what would be better than a delicious chocolate cookie? So I browsed the internet for a nice recipe and stumbled across this:

Klick

I’ve heard a lot about Martha Stewart and her recipes but never actually tried one. So I decided to give it a shot and the result was not bad at all! I adapted it slightly though. I didn’t use milk chocolate only, I thought it might be too sweet and took some semisweet chocolate. The original recipe says to use 225g in total, I only had 200g, but that was still chocolately enough. And 1 ½ cups sugar seemed a little bit too much as well, I didn’t want to fall into a sugar coma, so I reduced the amount as well.

I probably overdid it with the baking soda so my cookies were quite bulky.

All in all they still tasted really nice, crisp on the outside but still soft and chewy inside, and I’ll definitely try them again, maybe with white chocolate as well.

Enjoy,

Cherry Cupcake

Double Chocolate Cookies

120g all purpose flour (1 cup)

56g unsweetened cocoa powder (½ cup)

½ tbs baking soda

½ tbs coarse salt

100g semi-sweet chocolate

100g milk chocolate, roughly cut

115g Butter (½ cup)

300 g Sugar (1 1/3 cups)

2 large eggs

1 tbs vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 180 °C

2. Whisk together flour, baking soda, cocoa powder and salt in a bowl and put aside.

3. Melt semi-sweet chocolate with the butter in a heatproof bowl set over a pan of simmering water; let cool slightly.

4. Put chocolate mixture, sugar, eggs and vanilla in a bowl and beat electric mixer until combined. Then gradually mix in flour mixture. Fold in milk chocolate chunks.

Put baking paper on a baking sheet and drop dough onto it by using either two spoons or a small ice cream scoop. Be careful not to place the dough bits too close, leave a bit space between them.

5. Bake until cookies are flat and surfaces crack, this will take about 15 minutes. Be careful not to overbake them because they will become hard as rock. Don’t worry if they seem too liquid after 15 minutes, they’ll harden after a short while. Let the cookies cool for a short while on baking sheets, then put them onto wire racks to let cool down completely.
Serves 12