foodlove

the most amazing double chocolate cookies ever

adapted from a ghiradelli recipe from some years ago.

in a double boiler over hot water, melt a 11.5 bag 60% cacao bittersweet chocolate chips and 6 tbsp sweet butter.

in a large bowl, beat 3 eggs and 1 cup sugar with electric mixer until thick thick thick.  stir in melted chocolate mixture.

in a small bowl, stir together 1/3 cup flour, 1/2 tsp salt, and 1/2 tsp baking powder.  stir into chocolate mixture.

gently mix in 12 ounce bag milk chocolate chips and 1 cup chopped pecans.

use a sheet of plastic wrap to  create two logs, each 2" wide by 8" long.  the dough will be so soft you'll have to help it make this shape.  i place the two logs side by side in a loaf pan to retain height.  wrap tightly and refrigerate at least 1 hour or until firm.

preheat oven to 375.  unwrap dough and cut with a sharp knife into 3/4" slices.  place slices 1.5" apart on parchment-lined cookie sheet.

bake 12-14 minutes or until a shiny crust forms on top but the interior is still soft.

cool on baking rack.

tastes like a crisp-edged slices of gooey brownie heaven, omg.

yields 2 dozen cookies.

my mother's chess cake

i think this was originally in an auburn university cookbook.  my mother whips them up and takes them absolutely everywhere, and they just disappear.

melt 1 stick margarine and pour into 9x13 pan (pan size is key, she says).

combine 1 egg and 1 box yellow cake with pudding.  spread over margarine.  (bear with me.  it's actually really good, not that you will eat it anyway.  its for the other people.)

combine 2 eggs, 8 ounces room-temperature cream cheese, and 1 box confectioners' sugar.  spread over cake mixture.

bake at 350 degrees for :30.

cut into squares.

peach cobbler (variation 2)

so classes start this week and i should be perfecting the assignment for essay 1.  but here i am, cobbling together this little personal cookbook space.

which means a cobbler recipe is probably just perfect.

this is a "hot fruit"cobbler, a very southern sort of thing, something i've seen done in cast iron skillets.  but the dough is plopped over the top, which brings to mind new england-style fruit puddings.  it's a simplish, wonderful, high-summer thing.

this recipe calls for peaches, but really any summer fruit (blueberries, nectarines, even cherries) will work well as long as it's not too watery.

peel and slice 3 big peaches.
mix with 1/4 cup sugar.
put in am 8" pan or cast iron skillet at 375 degrees while you make the dough.

mix:
1/2 cup flour
1/2 tsp salt
3 tsp baking powder
1 Tbsp sugar
1/3 cup softened butter

then mix in 1/2 cup milk and 1 beaten egg.

spread dough over hot peaches.  (i love the sound of that: hot peaches. oooh.)

sprinkle with a quick dusting of sugar.

bake for :40.

lovely, lovely topped with homemade vanilla ice cream after a barbeque.

dirt cake

not really a cake at all -- but kids love it.  we're taking it on our picnic at the lake today.

clean and set aside:
1 plastic bucket & shovel

Crush 1 lb. Oreo cookies with a rolling pin.  (I dump them into a gallon ziploc bag first.)

Mix 2 pkgs. vanilla pudding according to directions on box. Add 8 oz. softened fat free cream cheese and mix until well blended. In your clean bucket, layer half the pudding, half the cookie crumbs, the repeat.

Keep refrigerated (or in the cooler) until ready to serve. 

At serving time, serve with the shovel. If kids under the age of ten are involved, I also  have several gummi worms wriggling out of the dirt.  Younger kids -- especially boys -- love it.  For girls, i use light plastic flowers that are "planted"in the dirt.

Sometimes, a little dollop of whipped topping (whipped  cream, tofu whip, cool whip, whatever) is a nice addition.

caramel glazed pear cake

so yes.  you will see so many cakes here.  and yes that's bad, bad, bad.  i agree.  i should behave. 

my longtime trick in the sweets area is to lovingly carefully make something i love -- and then take a slice for each family member, just one (just one), then take the rest to friends or the office.

social responsibility, waistline management, whatever.  world peace could happen this way, i swear.  try it.

this recipe is not for anjou pears.  it's for those awful texture-y bartletts that some people have in their yards.  at the end of the summer, the pears fall like mad, and the pear-tree owners look at you pleadingly like, you know, zucchini gardeners, and beg you to take their pears.  take a bag, they say.  here, go into the yard and just take what you want.

this cake gives you permission to go and take all the pears you want.  it's cheap, super easy, and delicious.  make a few at the same time and take one to your friend who's had a shitty week.

first:

peel and dice 4-6 bartlett pears.  toss them with 1 tbsp sugar.

beat:
3 eggs
2 c sugar
1.25 c melted butter (eeek! yes this is a southern recipe)
2 tsp vanilla

add:
3 c flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp soda

mix all together with 1.5 cups chopped pecans.  walnuts will work but they sometimes get bitter.

pour into a prepared bundt pan.
bake at 350 degrees for an hour or until a toothpick tests clean.

turn it out onto a rack.  place a plate beneath it.

when it's cool to the touch, mix:
1 c packed brown sugar
1/2 c butter
1/4 c evaporated milk

bring to a boil in a small saucepan.  then cook on medium for 2.5 minutes, stirring constantly.  ooooh, caramel or something like it.

pour the glaze over the cake.

it helps if you move the cake to a plate with parchment or wax paper beneath; otherwise the glaze sticks.

works well without the glaze as well.

and yes, then go to the gym.  but with love in your heart.

blueberry buckle

when we lived in athens georgia many years ago (1989-91), things were good.  we saw peter buck at the grocery store, michael stipe actually walked the streets without any fanfare, and we made a few pilgrimages each june to miller's blueberry farm in watkinsville to pick blueberries.

for years, i made their blueberry buckle recipe.  sometime in 2003-04 (it's important enough that i remember when), i lost the tattered paper from miller's on which the recipe was printed.  i've tried since then to replicate the recipe, and this is as close as i've come.  thus far.

it is luscious.  made it midafternoon.  tonight, after grilling out, we'll have it, topped with homemade ice cream (recipe to follow, perfect, yum, oooh la la.).

and then, of course, 70 hours of cardio.  heh.

cream together:
1/2 c butter, well softened
1/2 c sugar

add:
1 egg, at room temperature.

add:
2 c flour
2.5 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 c milk

pour into a greased deep dish pie pan or 11x8 casserole.

pour 2 c fresh blueberries.

mix together:
1/2 c sugar
1/2 c flour
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 c butter

sprinkle over the berries.

bake at 350 degrees fahrenheit for :45.

total summer-only yum.  don't you dare use canned fruit in here, though you can use almost any combination of fresh fruit.  one of my aunts used to mix pecans into the streusel; another would mix pecans into the actual batter.  the true southern cobbler has the fruit stirred in, but you'll see that the batter rises around the fruit as it cooks.

coke cupcakes

first, a failure of sorts.

gabriel says they taste really good.  but something went pretty wrong.  the leavening worked out great, the cakes have a delicate crumb, and the flavor is faintly but not overpoweringly chocolatey.  but they are really delicate, falling apart or collapsing as i remove them from the pan. and something went funny with the marshmallows.  so here they are: coke cupcakes.

a family friend's recipe.

with an electric mixer, combine:
1 c butter
2 c flour
1.75 c sugar
5 Tbsp cocoa
1 tsp soda
1 tsp vanilla
2 eggs
1/2 c buttermilk
1 c coke

When the ingredients are well combined, fold in 1.5 cups miniature marshmallows.

Bake in muffin tins :20 at 350 degrees fahrenheit.

the icing (yes, it's an alabama recipe, so of course there's icing):

beat together:
1/2 c butter
3 Tbsp cocoa
1/3 cup coke
1 pound confectioners sugar

then stir in 1 cup chopped pecans.

spread icing on cooled cakes.

makes 24.

this always tasted wonderful when i was a girl.  was i delusional?  is memory really so unreliable?  am i just a bad or unreliable cook?

who knows. 

they do taste rockin.  perfect for the teenage boy crowd.