Tag: baking

Christmas is for family traditions.

Christmas is for family traditions.

  It wouldn’t be Christmas without a massive cooking extravaganza and that’s just what it was this holiday season. I was able to have time time off from teaching to just work on tamales and pozole and hang out with my family and enjoy every 

Coconut Cream Pie

Coconut Cream Pie

I haven’t written about anything sweet in a little while. I’m a pretty savory type of person, but I won’t say that I don’t have a couple of sweet teeth in my mouth; okay maybe more than a couple. My family really does love coconut 

Vegan clementine blueberry cupcakes with candied blueberry compote

Vegan clementine blueberry cupcakes with candied blueberry compote

Baking as you can tell is something I’ve grown to love. There is something that is to be said about a perfectly chewy cookie, a beautiful cake, or a wonderful sweet flavor combination and during my chef days I probably would of never said that to myself. When your a savory chef you hate baking and for the most part that’s what I used to be like. The patience it takes to bake and the precision it takes to make beautiful pastry is something I never thought I would be able to do. So many bloggers have inspired me to bake beautiful pastry, with fresh ideas, classics, as well as amazing ideas drawn up from some of the most eager imaginations, with this inspiration I’ve even been able come up with my own favorites a long the way. These cupcakes are something I’m extremely proud of.

I made these because vegan baked goods are something I love to toy around with. Tofu Cheese cakes, cupcakes, cookies whenever I can I try to test some out. These are really beautiful. Sure maybe they aren’t regular cupcakes but they are wonderful none the less. I hope if you make them you’ll love them just as much as I did when making them for the Online Bake Sale to Aid Japan put on by thetomatotart.com. Sabrina owner and blogger at Thetomatotart.com and Clemence From France bid on these cupcakes and I’d like to take the time to say thank you so much for your donation. Sabrina is currently in a battle with Paypal to get the funds released and sent to Japan’s Second Harvest food bank.  If you have time please click on this link The PayPal Saga, or Let’s Get Some Money To Japan and comment about how horrible it is to be holding these funds that the people of Japan so desperately need.

Clementines (Cuties) are small California mandarins. They are small tart and sweet and one of my very favorite snacks. These cupcakes came to be because I wanted to make My friend Virginia and her boyfriend Jimmy a dessert for Jimmy’s birthday. They both are crazy dieters but they love blueberries so I dreamt up this recipe with them in mind, for a special occasion. Unfortunately our plans fell through that evening and the cupcakes stayed at home, my family and I promptly devoured them anyway, this is one of my sisters new favorite desserts. But these are still something that Virginia would love and they are with her in my heart and mind, I love you dude.

So here’s the recipe I hope you make these and enjoy them as much as I do. You’ve seen these in photos before but here’s how to make them.

 
Vegan clementine blueberry cupcakes with candied blueberry compote

Ingredients
• 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
• 2 Clementine’s zested
• 1 1/2 cups almond milk
• 2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup unrefined raw sugar
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil or canola oil
• 2 Clementine’s juiced

Candied Blueberry compote
• 2 boxes of blueberries
• 2 tablespoons of water
• 1 teaspoon of vegetable oil or vegan margarine
• 2 juiced Clementine
• 1 pinch of Clementine zest
• 1/4- 1/2 cup of raw sugar (depending on your sweet preference and how sweet your berries are)
• 1 tablespoon of corn starch (optional)

The Way

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Line with 18 paper baking cups.

In one small bowl add almond milk to it and the apple cider vinegar, the liquid will start to curdle and change into this weird swirly liquid that’s what it’s supposed to do. leave it there for about 5 minutes


In a separate bowl, whisk together the almond milk mixture, Clementine juice, vegetable oil.

Sift together the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Then zest Clementine into flour


Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and stir just until blended.

 

Spoon or pour the batter into the prepared cups, dividing evenly.

Okay so here’s the deal. I tried these like three different ways
1) I put the candied blueberries on the bottom
Result- too mushy from the liquid
2) I put some fresh blueberries on the bottom
Result- not as mushy but still a little mushy
3) I put fresh blueberries on top then pushed them in the batter a little so they were in the middle
Result- they came out probably the best
4) place blueberries on the top
Result- the look like blueberry muffins.

So over all I think the best way to go may be either omit the berries in the cake which I think is no fun. Or put them in the middle of the cake about 4-6 per cake for a little accent of goodness, or on top if you don’t mind berries coming out of the top of your cake.

Bake in the preheated oven until the tops spring back when lightly pressed, 17 to 20 minutes.

Meanwhile take 1 teaspoon of vegetable oil or vegan margarine and melt it at the bottom of a small pan. Once melted add blueberries, zest, juice, and raw sugar melt and cook about 12-15 minutes till the blueberries are still somewhat intact but almost thickened a bit like jelly, if your berries are not thickening up or you’d like your compote to be thick add water and corn starch together in a separate bowl and combine till the corn starch is dissolved then add it to the blueberries bring to a boil for maximum thickening.


When times up for the cup cakes… you can use the tooth pick method on these also

Cool in the pan set over a wire rack.

Then wait till the mixture of berries is cooled as well. It will thicken more

Put the cooled berries on top of your cooled cupcakes and you got it

depending on how much liquid the berries have is how thick your sauce is going to be you can continue to adjust the thickening by reducing as well if you’d like to omit the corn starch, I’ve made it both ways i like without corn starch but if your cupcakes are going to sit for a while the corn starch might be a good option for you.

Enjoy!

Unrivaledkitch
Twitter and Foodbuzz

Simple Whipped Cream Pistachio Pie

Simple Whipped Cream Pistachio Pie

  Pistachio Pie is one of the things I remember as a child. My sister would ask my mom every year to make this simple pie for her birthday dessert. There would be blue candles atop (her favorite color) and she would smile big as 

Love yourself Everyday! Happy Valentines…

Love yourself Everyday! Happy Valentines…

Love yourself Everyday! Happy Valentines… I don’t really stand on the same side of the street when it comes to Valentines day but my best wish is to show people that you don’t just need one day to show people you love them. You need 

Zesty Lemon and Raspberry Jamwiches

Zesty Lemon and Raspberry Jamwiches

I saw this beautiful entry anecdotesandapples.weebly.com/1/post/2011/01/strawberry-jamwiches.html about Monet’s Grandmother and her Strawberry Jamwiches. The story is beautiful and inspiring, just how food should be. There’s something about certain dishes, their story and the beautiful artistry of cooking that not just Chefs have but everyone who makes something that means something to them. This is an example of one of those beautiful stories. Thank you Monet for sharing this with everyone and I wanted to pay a little homage to the beautiful innocents these cookie bars showed me.

Please Enjoy Monet’s wonderful Food blog
http://anecdotesandapples.weebly.com/

She’s truly an inspiring person and Baker. Thank you Monet!


Zesty Lemon and Raspberry Jamwiches adapted from Monet’s Strawberry Jamwiches

I decided to adapt this bar to a couple of flavor profiles that I adore. Raspberry and Lemon. When I thought about this beautiful shortbread cookie bar I thought to myself something about raspberry and lemon was screaming at me to make them that way. As with any recipe that I see I try and take inspiration from the pages of whatever I look at and make it something I identify with. There really wasn’t much I needed or wanted to change from this recipe. It was a really simple delicious straight forward cookie bar.

The reason I made these was my sister was having a surprise baby shower last Sunday. The story was that we were supposed to be going to a friend of hers house warming party. If I didn’t make anything for the party it would be just unacceptable for me, so I was so busy on my lap top which my sister was going to use. I wanted to keep her off the internet so she wouldn’t check her registry for the baby because then she would probably know something was going on seeing as no one really knew she was registered yet. So I was using my computer and she fell asleep. Whoa close one. So I made these beautiful buttery wonderful cookie bars. I used very coarsely chopped almonds which gave a nice varying texture in the cookie bar with the sticky seedy warm jam and the light touch of lemon zest.

The Stuff

3/4 cup butter at room temperature
3/4 cup sugar
2 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
1/4 tsp ground allspice
1 cup almonds, coarsely chopped
3/4 cup raspberry preserves/jam
pinch of salt
3/4 of a small lemon zested

The Way


Preheat oven to 350 Grease a 9’9 pan with butter and set aside

In a stand mixer, or hand mixer or what you got place butter in and sugar and cream till fluffy

Then add vanilla, lemon zest leaving aside a small pinch for the top of crust, and egg mix till well incorporated



During this time sift together flour, baking powder, and salt
I only had whole allspice so i had to use a grinder if you have powdered skip the grinding

and then after that stir in almonds till incorporated well through out

With a wooden spoon mix the dry ingredients into the wet until everything is evenly incorporated this dough looks dry and kind of crumbly


In the greased pan place the dough inside and press it down with your fingers to form the crust but leave aside about ¼ of dough to place on top.

(i almost spread the jam before i took the picture woops)

Spread jam over the top of the crust evenly then add the dough chunks to the top of the jam and sprinkle over the top a little of the extra lemon zest

Bake in preheated oven for 40 minutes till the top is lightly golden


In the oven

out of the oven


Cool and then slice into bars or into bite sized pieces for treats

I really did love these and everyone at the baby shower really enjoyed them as well.

Thanks for stopping by enjoy

Kimberly
Unrivaledkitch

Twitter and Foodbuzz

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas Everyone and happy holidays for anyone else who isn’t celebrating. I hope every one is sharing these awesome days of happiness with the people you love and the friendships you cherish. I’m so grateful for you all and I hope you have an 

Soft Clove Sprinkled Molasses Gingerbread

Soft Clove Sprinkled Molasses Gingerbread

I think the best thing about cookies is once you have the core ingredients you just bunch together something else you like and you can make another cookie which is also a bad thing because it leads me to having about three million ideas I 

Coconut white chocolate chip cookie… Here we go

Coconut white chocolate chip cookie… Here we go

Here’s the deal with my cookies… I try and make them so they aren’t crazy sweet these one though are on the sweet side but not too much I found. They have lots of nice texture from the chocolate chips to the toasted coconut on top.

Coconut white chocolate chip cookie

1 ¼ all purpose flour sifted
½ teaspoon baking soda
¼ teaspoon salt
½ cup butter room temp (no really room temp don’t mess with that)
½ cup brown sugar
¼ cup white sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/3 cup coconut
1 cup of white chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

Line two cookie sheets with parchment paper and set aside

About 1/2 coconut put it in a small pan and heat for about 5 minutes on low till some of the moisture is extracted and it has a couple of little brown specs amongst the flakes but it not fully toasted or brown set aside and cool.

Sift flour, salt, baking soda together and set aside

Cream with a hand mixer or in a kitchen aid whatever you got works… I’ve done cookies by hand too so no excuses which is why the butter needs to be room temp it helps. So add the sugars brown and white and butter then whip till fluffy.

Scrape down the sides of the bowl

Add egg and vanilla mix till incorporated

On low speed slowly add flour to wet ingredients
Don’t over mix it up

Then with a spoon mix in the none toasted coconut and the white chocolate chips leaving some aside from topping

Shape cookies into balls of your desired liking. I made mine about the size of in between quarter/ silver dollar

Place so that 3 cookies fit in a row with 4 rows

Place fingers over the top and flatten

Press in some of the dried coconut and one white chocolate chip

Place in the oven and cook for about 9-11 minutes till coconut is lightly colored and cookies are brown around the edge


Let cookies cool

And enjoy

Not A Baker

Not A Baker

But I bake on Occasion… I’d sell a bulldozer of sugar for salt any day of the week… But of course with the season were in I can’t get myself away from it. I’m tired of dry boring cookies out of the package or even