Cherry Almond Crisp

Yesterday while out grocery shopping I came across cherries for the practically unheard of price of $.99/lb!  I didn't have a plan in mind for what to do with them but figured I'd be able to whip up something with the basics in my pantry.  A simple crisp or cobbler crossed my mind and then I remembered making a Cherry Crisp from Iowa Girl Eats a couple years back, so I decided to go that route again!

The ingredients:

First things first - pit the cherries.  If you don't have a cherry pitter an empty beer or soda bottle and plastic straw works wonderfully!  Next, slice them in half and toss them with some sugar, flour, cinnamon, and vanilla.

Then, mix up the topping ingredients using a fork and knife or your fingers until it's all nice and crumbly, and pour it over the fruit.

Bake until golden brown and crispy! Allow to cool a little bit and serve with sweetened whipped cream or vanilla ice cream.

Cherry Almond Crisp

1 to 1 1/2lbs cherries, pitted and halved
1T sugar
2t flour
1t vanilla extract
1/4t cinnamon

Crisp Topping
1/2c old-fashioned oats
1/2c brown sugar
1/4c flour
1/4c cold butter, cubed
1/4c sliced almonds

Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.  Combine cherries, sugar, flour, vanilla, and cinnamon and spread into greased baking dish or pie pan.

Recipe lightly adapted from Iowa Girl Eats

Rhubarb Streusel Cake with Vanilla Sauce

The rhubarb abundance continues and therefore so do the rhubarb recipes!  This is actually the third rhubarb recipe I've made in the last couple of weeks but only the second I'm posting about.  (The other recipe was a Strawberry Rhubarb Pie, which while delicious, was not very pretty.  I'll try again on that one!)

This is one of those recipes that sounds kind of fancy but is actually fairly simple to throw together! First, fold 3 cups of chopped rhubarb into a buttermilk batter.

Next, spread the batter into a greased pan and sprinkle a simple streusel topping over the top.

Bake at 350 for about 45 minutes and until the top is golden brown.  (Mental note to self:  use Windex on glass cooktop prior to taking and uploading photos for blog post.)

It will look golden and beautiful and you will want to dig right in, but for the love of baking powder, please allow it to cool a bit!  Make the vanilla sauce while you wait.

Once the cake (and sauce) have cooled to a not mouth-scorching temperature, pour over a generous amount of the vanilla sauce and serve!

Rhubarb Streusel Cake with Vanilla Sauce

Batter
2T salted butter, softened
1c sugar
1 egg
2c all-purpose flour
1t baking powder
1/2t baking soda
1c buttermilk
3c fresh rhubarb, chopped

In a large bowl, cream butter and sugar.  Beat in egg.  In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking powder, and baking soda.  Stir flour mixture into creamed mixture, alternating with buttermilk.  Beat just until moistened - do not overmix.  Fold in the rhubarb and pour into a greased 9" square baking dish.

Streusel Topping
1/4c all-purpose flour
1/4c sugar
2T butter, melted
Combine all ingredients.  Sprinkle over prepared rhubarb batter.  Bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.  Allow to cool.  Top with Vanilla Sauce and serve.

Vanilla Sauce
1/2c salted butter
3/4c sugar
1/2 evaporate milk
1/2 vanilla bean, scraped

Melt the butter in a saucepan.  Add sugar, evaporated milk, and scraped vanilla bean.  Bring to a boil, stirring constantly for 2-3 minutes or until thickened.  Remove from heat.  Allow to cool slightly and transfer to a storage container.  Refrigerate leftovers.

Lightly adapted from My Baking Addiction

Rhubarb Pudding Cake

An abundance of rhubarb in my and one of my good friends backyards meant it was time to get baking.  (It's good to have friends with gardens - she gave me a lot of rhubarb!)  First on my baking list is the super easy Rhubarb Pudding Cake.  With an ooey gooey not-to-sweet center and a crispy sugary crust, this recipe is sure to be a hit with kids and grown ups alike!

Here we have about 2 cups of chopped rhubarb spread across the bottom of a 9" square pan.

Next you'll spread the prepared batter evenly over the top of the fruit and follow that with a healthy (ok, not "healthy" per se...) sprinkling of sugar and cornstarch.

Now for the part that made me do a double-take the first time I saw this recipe:  Pour boiling water over the top.

"Did I read that correctly?"   Yes you did.  Yes it's very soupy looking.  Yes it will be ok.

Bake at 375 for 45 minutes and you'll have this golden brown dessert that is both gooey and crispy.  It's best served hot straight out of the oven with some sweetened whipped cream, but isn't too shabby eaten cold straight out of the pan the next day either.  Not that I would know that personally. *cough*

Rhubarb Pudding Cake

2c rhubarb, chopped
1 3/4c sugar, divided
3T salted butter, melted and cooled
1t baking powder
1/2c milk
1t vanilla extract
1c all-purpose flour
1T cornstarch
2/3c boiling water

Preheat oven to 375 degrees fahrenheit. 

Spread chopped rhubarb over the bottom of a 9" baking pan.

In a bowl, mix together 3/4c sugar, butter, baking powder, vanilla, milk, and flour.  Spread batter evenly over rhubarb.

Combine remaining 1c sugar and cornstarch and dprinkle over the batter.  Pour boiling water over the top.

Bake for 45 minutes or until golden brown and bubbling.

Easy Pumpkin Bundt Cake

A couple of weeks ago it dawned on me that fall was nearly over and I hadn't made a single autumn-type baked good. Typically I'd have made a batch of apple butter weeks ago,  followed by baking so many muffins and loaves of pumpkin bread to go with it that I'd almost be sick of them by now! 

Last weekend my house was filled with the smell of Slow-Cooker Apple Butter so I decided it was high time I got to using the case of canned pumpkin in my pantry.

 

 

This cake is absolutely wonderful and is super easy to whip up thanks to boxed cake mix.  It's also super moist and delicious on it's own - no cream cheese glaze or apple butter necessary!  (Though I always slather a slice with the latter because, well, apple butter is amazing.  And I have 6 jars of it. ) :D

 

Easy Pumpkin Bundt Cake

1 box yellow cake mix

1/3c granulated sugar

4 eggs

1/3c vegetable oil

1/4c water

1/3c sour cream

1 15oz can pure pumpkin

1T pumpkin pie spice

 

1 - Preheat oven to 325 degrees.  Generously grease and flour a 10-cup Bundt cake pan.

2 - In a large bowl, mix all ingredients with an electric or stand mixer on low speed until moistened, then on medium speed until well combined.  (Or mix by hand 2 minutes or until well combined.)  Pour batter into prepared pan.

3 - Bake 45-50 minutes or until toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.  Allow to cool in the pan for 10 minutes before inverting onto a cooling rack.  Cool completely before serving.

Recipe adapted from Betty Crocker

Project: Recipe Cleanout - Chocolate Cake with Pudding Frosting

My daughter requested a chocolate cake with chocolate frosting for her birthday.  Baking this cake was somewhat of an adventure despite the fact that I’ve probably baked close to one hundred cakes previously.  Both of my daughters were in the kitchen helping measure this or adding that, and after we put the pans in the oven and were cleaning up, I grabbed the sugar canister to put it back in the cabinet and  thought, “Sugar...  I don’t recall asking anyone to measure out sugar.  Shoot.”  So, the half-baked cakes came out of the oven to cool, were tossed in the trash, and we started over.  I decided it was good lesson for my daughters to learn -  the importance of carefully reading and double-checking a recipe.

This is the first recipe from my binder that is part of my Recipe Cleanout project.  This is a cake recipe that I’ve had on file for years but have never gotten around to making until now.  It receives very high ratings on Hershey’s website so I had high hopes. The only adjustment I made for the cake batter was to use coffee in place of the water.  (Coffee enhances the chocolate flavor in recipes in case you weren’t aware.)   Then, instead of their frosting  I decided to pair it with a delicious but simple frosting recipe that I've been making for eons.  I used chocolate pudding for this recipe, but it’s great with other flavors (like vanilla and Oreo) as well!

 

True to my Project: Recipe Cleanout commitment, I’m letting you know that this is not the best ever chocolate cake as the multitude of 5 star reviews would lead you to believe.  It looked beautiful out of the oven and it’s super moist, but the flavor of the cake by itself is just sort of “meh”.  The frosting is what made it delicious overall (and I’m wondering if their frosting too is the reason for the great reviews.)

Since the cake was a bit of a let down I won't be posting the recipe here.  The recipe for the super simple and versatile pudding frosting I will share though!  It's the perfect frosting for cake or brownies, as a dip for animal or graham crackers, and as a layer in pudding pies or trifles!

Easy Pudding Frosting

1 - 3.9oz box instant pudding mix

1c milk

1 - 8oz tub whipped topping, thawed

In a medium mixing bowl, whisk together pudding mix and milk by hand for two minutes.  Allow pudding to set and thicken for 5 minutes.  Whisk in whipped topping.

Makes enough frosting for a 2-layer cake.  Refrigerate any leftovers.

(Cake recipe reviewed here was slightly adapted from Hershey's . Pudding frosting recipe is my own.)

Blood Orange Cake

The first recipe that I tested from Rachael Ray's latest book, Everyone Is Italian On Sunday, ended up being a cake instead of a pasta dish as I originally planned. The list of pasta recipes that I intend to try are approximately a mile long, but since I love to bake, cake won out.

Here is the Blood Orange Cake in all of its fresh out of the oven glory.

 

 Rachael’s recipe as written in the book calls for the zest and juice of 2 large blood oranges (Seville or navel oranges mentioned as substitutes).  Blood oranges are not easy to find in my area, but I wanted to try and stay true to the blood orange flavor, so I opted to use dehydrated blood orange peel in place of freshly grated zest.  I then used the juice of 2 large fresh squeezed navel oranges.  (If you're using dehydrated peel and don't want to use fresh squeezed juice, (or don't have oranges handy,) you can simply use 1c of orange juice.)

You can really smell the orange while baking and it made my kitchen smell delicious! It is not an overtly sweet cake, so definitely serve it with some sweetened whipped cream. This is a great “mid-day with a cup of coffee or tea” light dessert or snack.

 

Blood Orange Cake 

4 large eggs, separated                                          
2T blood orange peel                                            
2c flour                                                                 
1/4c sliced almonds, finely ground                       
2T baking powder                                                 
1/4t salt
1stick unsalted butter, softened
1c sugar
2T blood orange peel (or zest of 2 oranges)
Juice of 2 large oranges (approx. 1 cup)
1/4c milk

Place a rack in the center of the oven and preheat to 375 degrees.  Grease and flour a 9” round cake pan.

If using dehydrated orange peel, rehydrate by adding 6T of water and setting aside.

With an electric or stand mixer, beat the egg whites on high speed until stiff peaks form.  Set aside.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, ground almonds, baking powder, and salt.

In a large bowl, with an electric or stand mixer, beat the butter and sugar until fluffy.  Add in the egg yolks one at a time, beating well after each addition.  Beat in the orange zest and juice.  Add the flour mixture alternately with the milk and mix on low until combined.  Fold in the egg whites.

Pour the batter into the prepared cake pan and bake until golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 30 minutes.  Allow to cool for 15 minutes in the pan before inverting onto a cooling rack.

(Recipe adapted from Everyone Is Italian On Sunday)