Chocolate Sliders w/ Honey Spice Buttercream filling (aka Whoopies)

Last October for my brother's birthday, instead of giving Mr.I-have-everything-I-need a monetary gift, I decided to bake him something. Every year, for his birthday (and of course for Thanksgiving) there has to be a Sara Lee pumpkin pie baking in the oven. Sara Lee, you ask? Yes. My parents were Mexican immigrants (no, they're not dead, just American citizens now) and marveled at all the things that came in packages: oatmeal, french toast, macaroni and cheese, pie. So Rene won't have it any other way, he must have his packaged frozen Sara Lee pumpkin pie.
Knowing he loves pumpkin pie, I decided to make him something called "Pumpkin Whoopies" which I found on popsugar.com's food section, yumsugar.com. Since I couldn't remember their names and they looked like raw little burgers to me, I called them "sliders." They were so easy to make, so tasty, and so darn cute, that I made them again and again.
This year, my BA (best amiga) Kelly said her friend and her were throwing an appetizer's party. My immediate thought was: can I please make dessert?! I had been mulling around the idea of using a specific frosting I'd baked a cake with (for this very same amiga's Halloween party) three years ago. I thought to myself: what would be good with a honey spice butter cream frosting other than pumpkin? Chocolate was the most feasible answer I came up with.
So, armed with my blog links and a go-head from Kelly and gang, I proceeded to make my chocolate whoopies with honey spice butter cream frosting. I'd looked far and wide and was torn between using this recipe, from Sunshine Mom via Food BUzz and this recipe from Cakespy, but I ended up using Sunshine Mom's because of the buttermilk ingredient. I'd only used buttermilk once and it failed, so I thought I'd give it another go. So here is the result:

Halfway through the process.



Um, yum! (I did end up eating the remaining of the batter, couldn't let it go to waste!)



Now its time for frosting after they cooled:





I had to take a bite, to taste of course!



And the conclusion: I thought it was really tasty. I liked how the chocolate was spungy. This is the second time I've mixed together two recipes I'd separately, but the first time I'd taken a risk and used something that wasn't specifically for the inside of a whoopie. I thought the mix of flavors was delicious, however, the consistency of the filling was not to my liking. I'm not pastry chef so I don't understand the science behind it, but baking in my kitchen the size of a normal person's closet, no A/C and in the middle of Portland's summer heat wave, was probably not the best choice of butter cream. I had to put it in the fridge for it to harden because any feel of heat, would make it start melting. So when I decide to make another flavored whoopie, I'll be sure to pay attention to what kind of frosting it is and what weather we are having. Plus, it was just a LOT of butter, but ever so tasty! As an experiment, I put a couple in the freezer, you know, in case I get a craving for a chocolate honey spice slider at a future date.

Tres Leches

When I was a wee lass, I used to help my mom make sopes. I'd sit there on the counter and tortear the masa (tortear comes from the word tortilla. Its has become a verb), pinch the little edges and make little baby sopes for myself. That is the only memory I have of cooking with my mom. Growing up, she was the cook. She provided all food for us. If we wanted to help, she's hush us along to do our homework. Fast forward to a 19 year old in college and I knew NOTHING of how to cook.
This is what a sope is supposed to look like:


What I have more memories of, however, is baking. I'd help my mom crack eggs, use the hand blender to make pan as a desert for my dad. Of course, the pan was actually Betty Crocker pound cake or chocolate baked in a bunt cake mold. Not until I was about 13 did I learn how to make an actual cake with frosting in the middle. It always seemed like the whole "ship in a bottle" thing. How did these AMAZING people get the frosting in the middle? Well, I learned. Just how I learned how to make french toast when I saw Kelly dipping a perfectly beautiful white piece of bread into egg yolk . . . my sophomore year in college.
Now, what I am most comfortable with is baking. I love to bake. I never really knew I did. I know I enjoyed it with my mom: scooping up the cookie dough, tasting the vanilla cupcakes raw, etc. But I never knew it was something I could accomplish myself, let alone make elaborate things like Tres Leches.

Tres Leches is a pretty traditional Latin American dessert, much like flan and arroz con leche and tamales dulce (sweet tamales) strawberry or pineapple flavored, however, this is a cake. I hadn't tackled it yet because I thought it was just too hard. How do you get the milk to soak up in there? It must be magic, is what I thought. But this last weekend, I decided to challenge myself in honor of my mom's birthday. My family doesn't have a HUGE sweet tooth, but one thing they all can agree on is that Tres Leches is yummy. I thought, its now or never.
I went to one of the many food/baking blogs I go to called Lottie + Doof They have the most amazing display of (mainly) sweet stuff I have seen. The photos make my mouth salivate, and even though most of their food looks fancy and gourmet, its is still looks easy enough to make and not intimidating at all. So I decided I'd make their recipe of Tres Leches because by looking at their gorgeous picture, I asked myself "how can I pass this one up!". So I was going to get armed and ready. Usually the day before I go shopping, I look at the recipe to figure out what I have at home and what I need to get, I write it all down on the recipe and add up all the ingredients if it calls for one item more than once. I had a question about the sugar, so I asked my friend Devon, (pastry chef extraordinaire) and sent her the link to the recipe. She suggested to me that I try a different Tres Leches, something a little more traditional. Looked at the ingredients of one and the other and agreed with her. If I was going to do this, I was going to do this as authentic as I possibly could, but I just could NOT get the image of that whipped almond topping and blackberry coulis out of my head. I decided: I'll add them together.
So that I did. I used the Tres Leches recipe she found for me on allrecipes.com and I used Lottie + Doof's blackberry coulis and almond cream. A little bit tradition, a little bit fancy, which is how I roll. Instead of blackberries though, I used my favorite berries: raspberries.
Needless to say, the cake was a hit, even I was impressed. I was worried the whole time because with all the milk it said to add to a punctured cake (with a fork) it was not absorbing. But since I took it to my mom's set it in the fridge, then we cut it 2 hours later, all the milk had finally sunk it. With each slice, I added a little bit of raspberry coulis and tada, success.

Easter Dessert

Ah yes. My favorite time of year . . . dessert making time. My SIL #1 and I were chatting yesterday about our love for the holidays. We, as a family, are not religious folk, but we celebrate hard just like the rest of them. We enjoy the holidays cuz is just an excuse to get together with our families (which in all honesty, we do anyway), plan an elaborate meal, and I challenge myself by making a dessert for the entire party. A few years back, our parties consisted of 6-8 people, give or take two. One was born, one passed away, etc. Now more recently, we've added about 6 more people! So making dessert has been quite the challenge. Do I make two pies? Do a make a large cake? What about cupcakes? I've been making dessert for about the past 5 years. My ex-bf hated sweets, but enjoyed pies so that was the first thing I made one Christmas, an apple pie and it came out pretty well. From then on, I was hooked. One Christmas for gifts, I made cookies and chocolate bars. As the years have gone by, I've slowly increased the degree of difficulty. For Kelly's Halloween party, I made a pumpkins spiced cake (so good, must make again!) and I was impressed with myself. Last easter, I made a Almond Cake with Lemon Curd sauce and fresh berries. Most of the recipies I'd get from magazines like COoking Light, Bon APpetite and Counttry LIving. NOw, I get most of my baking recipes, as well as just food, from daily plog post from the woman there on the right hand side, and then some. It's really broadened my horizons with baking and helped challenged and focus myself on the end result.
This past Sunday, I came a cross a dilemma. What was I going to make for 17 people, 4 of them children? I didn't qutie want to slave over the oven, and a couple weekends ago, I made a super rich tart (see previous blog) so I wasn't really going for super sweetness. On the "Goey" website, I came a cross a simple Easter ice cream recipe called Toffette-Tortoni It's just little cups of ice cream and cream with Sees Candie Toffettes mixed in the middle. I got to my SIL #1's house early and was welcomed by a little assistant. And I must say, he was a very good assistant. He measured out the things I needed and even pounded the nuts with a rolling pin while I caramelized the almonds.

After doing all the prepping and the whipping, I had to scoop it all into little cups and put it all back in the freezer and these were the results.

It's fun playing a 50s house wife. Signing off for now!

Baking is better than eating ice cream.

I've never been much of a depressed ice cream eater, so instead I think I found my new "Ben and Jerry's" and it's baking.

This past Saturday after about a month and a half of my brother and Kim having gotten married, we finally had a family dinner for them, us and a few close family friends. They had their own separate celebration at their home with their friends, but this one was intended for old family friends, you know those "second parents." The ones that have seen you through braces, weight fluctuations and different partners. The ones that say "I remember when you were this tall". Yep, that's what this Sunday was. Had I not been on dessert duty, had this not been my brother, had this not been a family event, I would have stayed home and probably tried the ice cream thing, but I'm glad I had the obligation to try a new dessert out on the family.

I got the recipe from a new food blog I'm reading called Sticky Goey Creamy Chewy
The actual recipe is called "Thank Heaven for Little Girl (Scouts) Samoan Cheese Tart and you can find it here, with better photos. I must say, it was quite the hit.

First, I bought the finishing ingredients on Saturday at Zupans. I had no idea "Dulce de Leche" was actually what us Mexicanos call "Cajeta". I should have gone to Hillsboro to get it (probably cheaper) and given it that Mexi-twist. Oh well, Italian Dulce did just fine.



It said that I could either use a food processor to destroy the Samoans or a ziploc bag. At first I used the ziploc, but then the bag ripped and there was still no destruction, so I opted for the blender:



Next, came blending the crumbs with butter:



So far so good. After the mix, I had to pack it all in the tart pan and chill for at least 30 minutes. While that was going on, I made the goey middle:


And then back into the fridge for more chillin' of 2 hours. After that, it was time to put the rest of the cajeta on top, the roasted coconut flakes and the chocolate.




And done!


Congratulations Renato and Kim!

It's the most wonderful time of the year!

Graphic by Kelly Powers

And I don't mean Christmas (even though that comes to a close second/third.) HALLOWEEN! It's my favorite time of year! The leaves begin to turn, Starbucks concocts new and classic ways to get us fat (pumpkin spice lattes anyone?!) The air is crisper, the wind a bit more biting, and people nuzzle into their sweaters and scarves. How I love fall. Not only do I get to wear sweaters, boots and scarves, it's Halloween season and I get to dress up one day of the year and be who ever I want. It's also a good time to proclaim my love for calaveras (or skulls) and not seem like a morbid goth!
This weekend marked the first of many baking sessions. I'd stopped baking after Easter, not much to bake for. Summer is kind of a tough time to want to eat warm goodies and as mentioned, there is something about fall and all of its baking possibilities. So this weekend's excuse? My brother's 39th birthday party. What do you get a person who has and can buy anything they want? Well food of course! In my case, you bake them something yummy! Since my brother has a very soft spot for pumpkin pie (his birthday "cake" every year) I thought I'd make him something along those lines and I found some treats called Pumpkin Whoopies from yumsugar (apparently, they're a Rachel Ray recipe.) I tried to describe them to Isaiah, but all I could think of was little burger sliders, so thus, they became known as Pumpkin Sliders.
Finally come Saturday, my bank filled with payday money, off I went to Trader Joe's. I know Joe's didn't have parchment paper so I decided to skip pass them and head to Fred Meyer. I figured all I'd need from Meyer's was the paper and off for my one stop shop at Joe's, bu that was not the case =( I finally came back to Joe's with the paper and pumpkin spice (just in case they didn't have it at Joe's) and did my shopping: cream cheese-check, confectioner's sugar-check, unsalted butter-check, pumpkin puree-.... pumpkin puree . . . Where is the pumpkin puree (the SOLE ingredient that makes my sliders Pumpkin.) "We haven't received our holiday shipment yet, " a dude at Joe's told me. Well crap! So here I am, a medium sized tiangis bag full of ingredients and no pumpkin puree . . . back to Freddy's I went.
I finally come home and start preparing everything for this day's bake. I like setting everything out so that it's more accessible as I go makes it more streamline. I must say, I totally recommend parchment paper for baking. It's so easy!
Below is the finished product. My Pumpkin Sliders:

Saturday BBQ

Saturday was quite the eventful day for me and I must say, I'm pretty exhausted and haven't yet been able to catch up. It all started at 7am ... I decided to wake up with Isaiah (he needs to be at work by 7:30am) and get an early start to the day. My plan was: gym-hour work out, shower, walk to the farmer's market at PSU then take the Portland street car back home (or close to home.) And the plan worked out.

I decided while at the gym, I'd walk all the way to PSU. Let's see, I think that was about, oh about 1.8 miles? Usually I jog that much, but it was quite tiring. When I hit the pearl I saw Braille Graffiti.



I'd seen this before and it made me laugh, so I thought I'd take a picture. I decided to take pictures of my adventures so here goes.


This is the 405 over pass looking toward NW 23rd.


This is the same spot, but looking toward the Pearl.

A shot of my walk down town.

Here is our beautiful downtown public library. If I could, I'd hang out here all day, buuuuut it kind of smells cuz the bums decided it's a great bathroom.


And here is the Old Church. I LOVE photographing old churches. I'm not a religious person, but there is something about ancient churches that I find so beautiful.We performed here last year for my Caroling concert. It was built in 1883 and now is a nonprofit historical site used for functions.
Can you see that detail?


Now I've reached the farmer's market.


Time for some baking!

Cherries, Blueberries, black-raspberries and raspberries.


This is me making Lemon Curd. Unfortunatley, since I was rushed, I didn't measure out the lemon well enough and I think it was too sugary. Oh well.


And finally:


Cherry Crisp and Triple Berry Crisp! Bon Appetite.

Baking is fun! (past, present)

A while back, I contemplated going to culinary school to become a pastry chef. After having mentioned it to a few people, I got a few discouraging words: it’s hard, it’s crazy early hours, very manual, etc. I was in a very vulnerable time in my life, so any sway toward the negative was enough for me to pack up my things and walk away from the idea.
I’ve always liked sweets, pastries, cakes and pies. Not until middle school did I discover how to actually make a cake with frosting in the middle as I had seen on so many boxes of Duncan Hines, you either make two, or cut one in half! Who knew! You see, my mom didn’t bake when we were growing up, she cooked and is still fantastic at it! All the sweets she ever made came out of a box: cake, pound cake, cup cakes, waffles, French toast, (not till College did I learn how to make French toast from scratch!)

Once I lived on my own, first with roommates and now just myself, I started to buy baking books like cookies and desserts. My boyfriend does not like sweets of any kind unless they came from nature, although he is partial to lemon tarts. He had mentioned early on that he liked pies, so for our first Christmas in Portland, living together, I announced to my family I was going to make dessert, (but of course, please have a back up just in case. Mrs. Smith never fails.) I decided since Isaiah likes pie, I’ll make the classic: Apple Pie. I searched around the internet and magazines for the perfect recipe and I decided on The Oregonian’s Food Day holiday apple pie. I dove in head first. If I could have picked the apples my self, I would have! But I didn’t of course, since it was winter, but I did end up making my own dough. It was exhilarating and frustrating at the same time, but once it was all complete, I felt such a sense of accomplishment. I even made a lattice top for it.

Sure, my poor little pie looked a little ugly, but I must say, it was tasty and Isaiah had a slice.
Fast forward a few years, and I have become the dessert maker of the family and I am quite proud of that. For Christmas one year, I made four different kinds of cookies (with Kristin’s help) for my dad since he and I both have a sweet tooth.


Isaiah helped me make these Chocolate Dominos for both my nephews that year.

For Thanksgiving this past year, I made a Butternut Squash pie.



And for Halloween a few years back, a cake!



Last Easter, I made a Almond Cake with Lemon Curd and Berries. That was yummy and you have no idea how proud I was that I could make lemon curd.

Then, I made a pear stroussel, that sadly, I felt did not taste very well but everyone was nice enough to say it was good.
This summer, I had been receiving my cooking magazines that all featured cherry pies. Since it had been a while since I was able to make dessert (I usually enjoy a full day off prep time with music playing in the background,) I decided to make a Cherry Pie with lattice top. I grabbed my Cooking Light Magazine and bulked up on my groceries. Below you can see the results.




Explaining the two bathrooms shots: I was kind of a fool and didn’t pull out the dough from the fridge ahead of time, so I was a bit under the gun. So as the cherries soaked in their dressing for the 15 minutes remaining of the 30 the recipe said, I decided to put the dough in my teeny tiny bathroom, turn on the hot water and steam them to room temperature. It worked! It’s a good trick, but I don’t recommend it.
Continued





Nope, I'm not done with this blog yet!

I still had one more bag of cherries in the fridge, so tonight, I write this blog as my Cherry Crisp bubbles in the oven and man, does it smell good!


9:05 pm Here is the result!