There's Nothing Like Good Ole' Carrot Cake....with Maple Cream Cheese Frosting

Don't start with me with carrot cake...It's by far one of the best and still the best cakes out there. Yes.. we like our souffles, blackout cakes, ny cheesecakes..etc.. but nothing beats a traditional carrot cake. This will be my first time making this delight, unfortunately... I should be making this years ago.... A. because its da bomb.. and B. no one will turn away from a slice. And surely you know not only is it an awesome cake...but its a healthy cake..so to speak. You get your carrots..(think of how great your vision will be enhanced!) walnuts...(great energy booster and good fats) raisins...(yeah well..raisins..) And the spices in it too! such as cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger...oh yes.. such a hardy hearty cake! And to top it off.. with my twist on this? Well... it's something like maple cream cheese frosting...need I say more? This is not any normal plain philadelphia cream cheese frosting peeps.. this is more like cream cheese with a dollop of pure maple syrup.. oh yeah babeh..

......I hope I haven't lost you yet...

Okay...so I chose this day to make it because for some reason our fridges are filled with 3, 3lb bags of carrots.. and even though I tried to use up our supplies I managed to use about 1.5lbs..not really the best use but hey you know what!? at least I used some of it! Anyways lets get to the nitty gritty .., I preheated the oven at 350 F, then grated about 7 carrots and left it aside. Meanwhile I sifted flour, cocoa, ginger powder, cinnamon, baking soda and powder, and salt in a bowl. Then... In another bowl I combined eggs, vanilla bean paste, granulated sugar and brown sugar, and vegetable oil. Then when that is well combined, add the dry ingredients to the wet and fold in carrots, raisins, and walnuts. Pour them into 2 or 3 greased 8in pans (in my case I chose to do 2 layers) and bake them for 45-50 minutes. Meanwhile...make the maple cream cheese frosting! I would die and go to heaven for some good frosting.. it's like the cherry topper on everything cakey..seriously.. I do enjoy creamy and not overly sweet frostings. And for my carrot cake? I like a LOAD of frosting.. like not the skimpy skinny layers of it you know what I mean? I want like the hunka chunka 1 inch think all around kind! So that called for a larger batch of frosting.. 24oz cream cheese..(I used a 1 full fat philadelphia 8oz block and 2 blocks of fat free cream cheese) Yes.. it is still good! In with the softened cream cheeses I also added 1/2 a cup of softened unsalted butter and creamed them together till they were silky smooth. Afterwards I whisked in 4 cups of confectioners sugar and for the final touch.. yes.. the maple syrup..not too much! just 1/4 cups worth. Now leave it to chill in the fridge while you wait for the cakes to come out! Just make sure that when you insert a satay stick or toothpick that it comes out clean! Leave them to cool on a cooling rack till you're ready to frost them!





Once the cakes are cool enough to frost, frost them immediately because like me, you probably would not have the patience! Frost and design how you like.. I did some kind of criss cross fence pattern...just play with it! You'd be surprised by your creativity! Once frosted place it in the fridge or if you really want to...heck..just cut a slice! You deserve it after all! Unfortunately I had to wait till 10pm to take a bite out of mine.. I had a pretty eventful day trying to ease this one stupid bolt latch into a radiator..it took skill and finesse..which T actually surprised me with at the end! (: Hah! Anyway... the cake.. according to T.. was the best dessert I've ever made..to date. Quite a statement I'd say? Haha! It sure made a wide smile on me face toos!

Not even 24 hours after making this and already the cake is nearly half gone. Gahh! I think this is reassurance that this cake is worth making! I was afraid that I wouldn't have enough time to take pictures at the rate the cake was disappearing. But if that were the case..I guess I'll just have to make it again...I still have a million pounds of carrots waiting for me... Maybe I'll make carrot cake muffins instead!... ahh.. perhaps.

Have a wonderful day guys!

Profiteroles!

I first encountered profiteroles in my past life as a major glutton for desserts..Eclairs, cream puffs, pate a choux.. whatever it is they are GREAT. My very first time making them was actually during culinary school with the coolest pastry chef ever! Chef Chad! He was the best..he always had the weirdest stories about his past.. like how he was with the army jumping out of planes!? and then now he's this big time pastry chef!? Yeah... talk about career change here..but we are glad he did (: So ever wondered how these lovely babies are made? I questioned that a long time ago too but now it's all so easy to do..especially if you have a standing kitchenaid. (but if you dont..more power to you..you'll be doing some major arm work..Like I did) Worth it? ...Most definitely.

I wanted to make these delightful cream puffs because T loves 'em... and not only that.. I like them too! They're fun because they become these versatile pockets that can be stuffed with ice cream, whipped creams, vanilla pudding..chocolate creams.. oh gosh.. all sorts of things!! And not only that.. they can be dipped into vats of warm chocolate...who wouldn't like that!? Well what I wanted to do was make a riff between a normal cream puff with chocolate and a boston cream pie. mmm...boston cream pies sure are addictive.. and so.. this is 2 great things that will = AWESOME! And..they will make the people around you very happy campers.

Alright.. so let's get started.. there's a trick to making these bite-sized devils and sometimes your first attempt may turn you off completely..but I'd say just keep on trying till you get it and you can be making these with your eyes closed! The tough part is about temperatures in the oven.. they are first baked HOT at 475 F for 10 minutes then at 375 for around 15 minutes to ensure full done-ness in the inside. Once they're done they are poofy and have a hollowed center!

So this is what I did first.. made the vanilla cream filling. Very easy.. Now it is an egg based but you can easily skip the eggs if you are allergic by adding only cornstarch. I love the taste of eggy custards...therefore I prefer making my custards/puddings..with egg yolks. Firstly I combined sugar, a pinch of salt, 3 Tbs of cornstarch and milk in a saucepan. Lowered it onto medium heat stirring constantly ...it will thicken in about 5 minutes, make sure that the cornstarch is fully mixed in.. you don't want a clumpy mess. Once it is to a boil you want to temper the eggs with the mixture.. to temper them, while whisking the egg yolks in a separate bowl pour in the hot milk mixture in a slow steady stream.. just a little bit at a time.. you don't want your eggs to become scrambled eggs.. thus the reason for tempering! Pour in about half of the amount of hot milk mixture to the eggs and whisk thoroughly then pour that eggy mixture in with the rest of the hot milk mixture and lower it onto medium heat again.. Stir occasionally till thickened about 6-8 minutes and add in vanilla extract.. or in my case vanilla bean paste. Pour it into a plastic tupperware and cover it with saran wrap directly on the mixture itself so it doesn't form a skin. Leave it aside to cool and place it in the freezer for faster cooling! don't forget to take it out after 2 hours or so.

Now for the puffs! Pre-heat your oven to 475 F. Combine in a saucepan water, butter, salt and sugar..bring to a boil until the butter has melted completely. Take it off the heat and pour in the flour and stir rapidly with a wooden spoon..(This is when you put your "guns" to the test) Stir and stir until the floury mixture peels away the saucepan.. (not sticking) it will look shiny and gummy almost.. then you add a total of 4 eggs one at a time incorporating each fully at each addition. There is your pate aux choux done! Now.. my method of piping!? ..it is called a gallon sized ziploc bag..yes.. as simple as that! Just scoop the mixture into the bag and push it down to one tip, snip off about 1/4 inch off the tip and pipe them onto a wax paper lined sheet tray. Bake them at 475 for 10 minutes then lower down the heat to 375 for a further 15 minutes!

After a total of 25 minutes in the oven.. they are finally done

he always knows when the goods are ready...those large nostrils of his me thinks..

all donned with rooster mitts!

I made a simple chocolate ganache for the topping.. I broke up some 65% good quality chocolate into a bowl and brought a cup of heavy cream to a boil with a pinch of salt. Poured that hot mixture into the bowl of chocolate and nudge the bowl a bit to get things going. I allowed it to sit for about 5 minutes and after that just use a spatula and stir it in to combine..Afterwards...drop a cube of butter one at a time until it melts to cool it down and finish it off. And just like that you have a chocolate ganache!

Now all you gotta do is fill in the puffs with your chilled vanilla cream.. them dip it in the chocolate! then.. i think you know what's next.. eat eat eat!! T was so thrilled.. and to my surprise Mrs.M couldn't stop raving about them days after.. she was so upset that I threw them out (after 3 days) that she complained about them for about 2 days straight.. I think she wants me to make them again..?


I'll post the recipes up soon! (I promise!)

Goldfish Breaded Chicken Nuggets and Homemade Ketchup

can you spot the little chickadees? there are a few shaped
of little piggys too.. heh

I have just returned from a weekend in Nantucket.. it was my first time there and I fell in love with the gorgeous island. It was such an adorable place with the most interesting finds..oh and not to mention the unbelievably decadent fudge.. this little store (Aunt Leah's) was a fudge enthusiasts heaven.. fudge of all flavors, combinations, and it's famous.. nantucket "red" fudge. My favorite by far is the kosher salt laced fudge and the peanut butter with mini mnm's sprinkled on top YUMMM!! ahh! and for T the creamy oreo filling fudge...omgahh! I know! I need to go back already! My trip was far too short. I'll show you the other things that I picked up.. some of them were steals I tell ya! great deals.. seriously!

But lets get down to what this post is all about... So T has been complaining about the goods that I make..not that's it bad or anything..but the fact that a little pouch is forming in his gut.. So of course I had to change a few things up a little and believe me every little bit counts! For example..ground meat.. or lean ground meat.. 99.9% lean or.. 70 30..your supermarket will carry what you want or just ask the local butcher to grind up any meat you prefer. For my Chicken nuggets I wanted to choose only lean ground meats.. I chose a blend of 99.9% lean turkey mince and a 80 20 chicken mince. I was a little skeptical that if I chose only 100% lean minces T would probably be an unhappy boy.

This meal is easy, delicious, and ridiculously AMAZING... It's chock full of flavor, herbs, spices, and trust me honey... it's definitely not you're run of the mill frozen mickey d chicken mc nuggets. And on top of that..making your very own ketchup is super easy too! And it tastes a lot better than the generic corn syrup laden ketchups we're used to. Oh.. and it also gives you an excuse to learn how to can! It's the in thing now isn't it? ..can your own pickles, jams, jellies, ketchup...gosh the list is endless and the best thing is you can just keep it in your pantry and it'll be there if you ever run out!

First step to this is to have a few herbs and spices on hand.. The herbs can be oregano, thyme, or tarragon.. rosemary is a little too strong but you can add a pinch if you really want to. For mine I went with straight thyme (20 sprigs or so of it), then for the spices some granulated garlic, a little paprika, pepper, then a dash of whole grain honey mustard, about 1/3 cup of parmesan (grated) a pinch of sugar, salt, an egg, a squirt of lemon juice and to finish it off a splash of milk to keep it moist. I mixed it all by hand making sure all of the flavors combined and everything was evenly distributed together. I preheated the oven to 350 and whipped out a cookie sheet and placed a cooling rack on top of that. For easier cleanup I lined the cookie sheet with aluminum foil. You know.. I thought it'd be cool to mold my nuggets into shapes with my cookie cutters.. I did attempt to pull of some and somehow they managed to hold up better than I expected! haha! But really.. don't bother unless you really want to because they are cute.. but molding them into "nugget" shapes are just fine too. So while mixing this all up together I was wondering what I could bread them with.. I thought breadcrumbs were boring.. panko was ehh.. and what's not better than to utilize a bag of goldfish! We love goldfish in this household and we buy by the boxful... I mean the three big bags in a box from costco! Ohh yeah! I kid you not folks.. they are great to snack on.. and the puppies love em too! So goldfish it was.. to crush em? I laid out a sheet of wax paper on the board, sprinkled the fishies out and used a tupperware to crush it into smithereens! smithereens of different sizes..to create the nice textures when it was done. So once that was done with I begin to make my nuggets come to life!

I poured a bit of evoo into a small bowl so I could coat my hands when I made my nuggets.. You don't wanna have sticky fingers! I took about a golf ball sized amount of mince and flattened it out to about 1/3 inch thick and just rolled it and dipped it around the crushed goldfish and once all was coated just plate it on the prepared rack! continue till there is no more space and let it cook in the oven for 20 minutes. Or until firm to the touch. These will be by far theee best chicken nuggets that will be quick and easy, great for snacks and good enough for your kids! And think about cooking with your children too! They'll love doing this.. We all love a baked chicken nugget (: juicy tender and packed full of flavor.

good enough for you, ...you think?

oh goldfish.. crunchy..cheddary.. we do love you

picked this up at my local grocer.. I couldn't leave without getting it!

The ketchup that I made took a little more time. It was simple enough to prepare and the best part is..you place it over a low heat and forget about it for about an hour. I coarsley chopped a whole vidalia onion and caramelized it on high-med heat with some evoo and a sprinkle of salt.. I really let it cook down slowly to get its sugars going and softening it up nicely. Once that was caramelized I basically started adding different spices..allspice, cinnamon, nutmeg, cumin, coriander, mace, ginger a drizzling of molasses and honey, a tad bit of apple cider vinegar and a dash of pepper.. I allowed that to cook down and intensified its flavors by lowering the heat and letting it simmer just a tad allowing the flavors to meld together..about 10 minutes. Then I opened an 8 oz can of chopped tomatoes (juice and all) and half a can of tomato paste and mixed that all in.. Lowered the heat way down, placed a cover on top and kind left it to do its own thing! At the end I pureed it all with a hand blender till it was smooth. When it was to the consistency and taste I liked I had already prepared my canning process and pretty much poured it into the mason jar, released any air, capped it tight and lowered it into the hot boiling water for about 1-4 minutes.. and done! I had some leftover in the saucepan so I used that for T's lunch!

The recipes will be posted soon!

the home canning kit!



nice huh? once you get the hang of it..you'll want to
can everything..