Daring Bakers: L'Opera Cake

This is my first Daring Bakers Challenge. And oh my, was it a challenge. This was my first cake that had so many elements that became very time consuming. These past few days have been busy since my friend is in town for 2 months so I had to find time to finish this cake. Tonight I finally did.

First let me describe what a opera cake is. It is a layered cake with layers of buttercream, nutty flavored thin cake, ganache, and glaze. Usually the flavors are coffee and chocolate but since it is spring time the daring bakers decided that light colors would be more appropriate.

This is how the cake is set up (jaconade, syrup, buttercream, jaconade, syrup, buttercream, jaconade, ganache/mousse, glaze).

I made a jaconade using hazelnuts instead of almonds and vanilla extract. A jaconade is a cake that does not rise. it is very very thin. I decided to not make the syrup because the jaconade was already sweet enough and i didnt want to make it overly sweet with the syrup. It was also already very very moist. Even after 2 days it was incredibly moist.
I didn't use the Daring Baker's buttercream frosting recipe because of the issues with eggs and how I didn't think the syrup would actually be hot enough to get rid of the bacteria in the eggs. So I actually used the buttercream recipe in Dorie's book. Finally Dorie didn't let me down. Hah. The buttercream was really good. The only thing was it was more buttery then sweet so I added about 2 TBSP of icing sugar and a lot of fresh lemon juice and frozen blueberries in juice. It turned out great. Not too sweet, but still a great thick consistancy. This was a great buttercream to experiment with.

For the ganache I use Gharadhelli (hopefully I spelled that right) white chocolate I got from Trader Joes. Trader Joes is my new place to get baking chocolate. You get a big block of nearly 9 oz for pretty cheap. At grocery stores it can get really expensive which adds up. So, I learned that my mixer doesnt whip up egg whites or heavy cream that well because I halved the recipes so its about half a cup at a time since I dont like to make a lot. I whipped out my hand held mixer that I have had since I was little. The instructions to make a ganache is you have to melt chocolate over the stove with a few tablespoons of heavy cream. It turned out oily and i had to use a spoon to get rid of the oil that built up. After I put the ganache in the fridge and it turned out GREAT! So far everything turned out as great as I wanted.
For the glaze which I didn't end up using a lot of in the end was blueberry glaze. Not the white chocolate glaze like in the recipe. I used corn starch to thicken it up. A lot of people use agar agar or gelatin to make a glaze. I have yet to try those, I will in the future I am sure. It ended up so well and very blueberry tasting.
Finally everything came together after 3 days. Attempt the recipe for yourself!

TWD: Berry Cheese Cake

Recently I joined 2 group baking blogs. TWD (Tuesdays with Dorie) is a group of bloggers who use the book "Baking: From my home to yours" by Dorie Greenspan and bake something weekly then post it on Tuesdays. This weeks challenge was Mandelines but unfortunately I do not have the right pan for it and I have yet to buy it, maybe sometime in the future but not now. So, we were allowed to do past challenges. Since this is my first challenge I got to choose from many. Everyone in my family has been craving cheese cake and this one seemed like a great one to do.



This cheese cake definitely needed to be eaten cold to taste good. It wasn't a great tasting one and I will probably try finding another recipe that taste better. Along with cream cheese this also had cottage cheese which my family and I are not a fan of. The texture of the cottage cheese really came through but luckily the taste of it didn't. It wasnt as creamy as I would have liked. The crust was great and I will use that recipe again for sure. I also liked the idea of having a layer of jam in it, I used Raspberry Jam.


Hidden Berry Cream Cheese Torte

Cream Cheese Blueberry Bars

The crust for these bars are made of hazelnut, what a wonderful wonderful smell to have your house filled with. The nutty flavor of the crust goes great with the cream cheese & blueberries.

I had to use frozen blueberries so the blueberries didnt spread out as much as i would have liked.

I think this could also make a great cheesecake recipe or the crust could be used in a pie.

Sorry for the bad picture, the lights in my house are dim and dont make for great picture taking especially since i dont know how the flash on my camera phone works.

If anyone is in the market for a new book I highly recommend the William Sonoma Baking book. It is probably the best one I have and use it often. Also I just got the Martha Stewart Baking Handbook and can't wait to try some of the recipes out. I will making so much this month with graduations, mothers day, and daring bakers!

Apples Apples Apples! (Tartlets & Muffin)

I have had 2 huge green apples sitting around for a while now and haven't been in the mood to eat them so I decided to bake something with them.
The tart crust is made from cream cheese, butter, and flour. Sat in the fridge over night. Roll out and pressed into the tart shells. The filling is a apple filling I created cause I love experimenting with different things. It is apples cooked in brown sugar, lemon juice, vanilla extract and cinnamon. Used corn starch for thickening. For those who don't know, if you ever want to bake with apples make them green apples. They turn out the best and never get too soggy as red apples tend to get.


The muffins came out really great. I decided to add cinnamon to the batter and topping along with nutmeg in the topping for more flavor. You could really taste both spices when eating it and they always go well with lemon. I didnt have enough brown sugar for the batter so i added half brown sugar and half granulated sugar. I also ran out of buttermilk so I used milk and it came out great

For the first time I am going to add the recipe because I didnt really adapt this recipe like I have other recipes because it wasnt necessary:

Apple Pie Muffins

2 1/4 c. all purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 egg
1 c. buttermilk (I used milk for half)
1/2 c. butter, softened
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 c brown sugar (i used 3/4 c brown sugar & 3/4 granulated sugar)
2 c diced apples (no skin, green apple)
**1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 c. brown sugar
1/3 c all-purpose flour
**1/2 tsp cinnamon
**1/2 tsp nutmeg
2 TBSP butter, melted

**I added to the recipe for more flavor

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Combine 2 1/4 c. flour, baking soda, salt, and 1 tsp. cinnamon in a small bowl
3. Cream egg, buttermilk, butter, vanilla, and 1 1/2 c sugar together with a mixer
4. Add flour mixture to the wet ingredients until combined. Make sure you don't over mix because muffins will come out dry.
5. Stir in diced apples until just combined. Do NOT over mix
6. Using a ice cream scooper scoop into greased muffin tins
7. Mix the dry ingredients of the toppings in a small bowl (1/2 c brown sugar, 1/3 c flour, 1/2 tsp cinnamon, 1/2 tsp nutmeg)
8. Slowly pour in melted butter while mixing.
9. Using a tsp pour over batter in muffin tins
10. Bake for 25 minutes or until cooked (using a plastic knife place in the middle of a muffin to see if it comes out clean).

I think everyone should try these, they are pretty easy and fun to make and make for a great breakfast.

Super Lemon Pound Cake with Lemon Curd Filling

Where do I start. This cake took so long to make, maybe I am just not that fast yet but this cake took a lot of components. The recipe was made for a bundt cake but I always picture a pound cake in a bread pan. This recipe also called for lemon extract which I didnt have and dont really like to use because extracts cost a lot of money that I don't think its worth spending. This was the first recipe I really really really adapted and totally made my own.
First you make the batter for the cake and I wanted to use fresh lemon juice instead of pre-bottled. Then you make a syrup to pour over the cake once baked fully.
Then I thought it would be great to make a lemon curd filling which really didnt turn out the way I wanted to. It turned out a lot more thin and liquid like then I imagined. I think it might have happened when I split the recipe. The recipe a friend gave me called for 5 egg yolks and to split it I used 3, maybe 2 would have been better.
Overall, everyone really really liked the cake. However, I do not like the flavor of lemons so this cake wasnt for me. If you are a fan of lemons then this cake is for you.
So far I have only plated one of the cakes and I think for the other one I won't cut it in half put the "lemon curd" on there and just pour it over the cake.

This was the lemon curd, sad it didnt turn out the way I wanted to but next time I am sure it will:




I noticed that I named this blog and it makes it seem that I just bake cupcakes but I have been making anything but that lately. Hopefully that will change soon. I am thinking of changing the name of this blog. If you have creative names for a way to show that I am a baker please share!

Raspberry & Blueberry Cream Cheese Stuffed Bread

First of all, I want to say sorry I haven't updated for like 2 weeks or something. Since I've been working I have been busy trying to focus on that.

Since I have gotten the idea of how to make bread I will be making a lot at home. This is my first one and I made 2 different sweet breads, both with cream cheese filling. One with raspberry filling and one with blueberry filling.

Blueberry:



Raspberry:




after proofed for 45 minutes and egg washed:

Out of the oven (right blueberry, left raspberry) :

Apple Bundt Cake

My first ever Bundt Cake. I bought this silicone pan for it a while ago that I have been dying to use. I love the way that these silicone pans work because none of the cakes stick at all and you can get the cakes a lot easier then metal pans. So if anyone is in need of new pans or cupcake pans or anything I recommend silicone, all the way.
I was asked by someone how I make my cakes. I generally go off a recipe since I am learning but I always try to add ingredients. I am a big fan of making a cake taste a lot like something. For example, if it suppose to be a chocolate cake I will add more chocolate in various ways to make it super chocolate-y but not dark chocolate like. Or with this apple cake, I added spices that bring out the apple flavors more. So, I just add ingredients I know will go and experiment with it.

This cake is a Apple cake with pecans and apples folded into the batter. It has apple glaze and apple topping I made with fresh organic apples and roasted pecans. The cake was very light and didnt have or require a lot of butter.





I got a job at a bread bakery that I took after thinking hard about it. I decided to take it because I know that the experience will be worth it in the end.
if I don't get the chance to post tomorrow: HAPPY PERSIAN NEW YEARS TO ALL OF YOU!

Blueberry Scones

There is nothing like waking up to fresh blueberry scones. And making them is even more fun.
They were made with blueberry yogurt and fresh blueberries.
Great 'til the last bite!

Chocolate Chip with Vanilla Strawberry Buttercream frosting

I decided that from this day (well last week) that I was no longer going to let myself make cakes the easy way, the cheap way. I am taking out box mixes and will figure out how to make my cakes the real way, through measuring out flour, sugar, baking soda and powder, and so forth. I have worked at 2 bakeries which both use box mixes, I don't think you can find fun in just pouring in a bag of ingredients that are so important and just add liquids to it and get the same feeling as measuring it all out by yourself. I think that any form of baking whether it be cupcakes, cakes, muffins, or scones that there are only a certain amount of ingredients that work and those ingredients should be handled with care and be the best quality possible.

I am still learning but here goes my first attempt to make something from scratch, and it turned out successful. I only say successful cause watching people eat the cupcakes they didnt get a look on their face of disgust which is a good sign for this being my first time.




I also made healthy pear scones but I didn't take any pictures of them cause I was too busy eating them!