Bride and groom Oreo pops

My friends Molly and John are getting married tomorrow!  Tonight is their rehearsal dinner, and Molly's mom and sister asked if I'd make treats for tonight.  I was more than happy to make the treats.

I wanted something that was transportable and able to be made a little bit ahead of time, since I needed to drop them off a few days early.  See, today is also my dad's birthday, and I'll be home celebrating with him tonight (remember these basketball hoop cookies?  Those were for his early birthday celebration).  So I decided on Oreo pops (and no, I will not be renaming this blog JulieMakesOreoPops, because - with the exception of one more event - I will be taking a long Oreo pop hiatus).

First, I bought these adorable bride and groom royal icing decorations.

Then, I made the Oreo pops (tutorial here) and applied the bride-and-groom decorations to the still wet chocolate, and set them in the fridge to harden.

While they were in the fridge, I made little tags that said "Molly & John," and cut them out with a cute little flower-y paper punch.  I finished them off with a single hole punch for the ribbon.

Lastly, I wrapped them all individually and tied them with a ribbon.

Congratulations, Molly & John!  Can't wait to celebrate with you tomorrow!

Oreo pop "flowers"

Two of my cousins were visiting for a few days this week and they asked if I'd bring them baked goods when I saw them.  Of course school got busy, and I never did get the chance to bake them anything good. But, I was able to make a few Oreo pops with flowers on them. 

But then I got to thinking about all the cute things I could do with these cute Oreo pops.  And I came up with a super cute Mother's Day idea!  I'm working on getting all the ingredients and tools that I'll need, but until then, enjoy this bouquet of delicious flowers!

Mini cupcakes with lemon

I needed to test out a recipe.  Well two, actually.  In a few weeks I'll have an exciting blog post up about cakes...but I'm getting ahead of myself....

I needed good yellow cake and lemon frosting recipes.  I hate making things for the first time and serving them.  Do you remember those Thanksgiving pies?  I always think to myself: What if they don't come out well, and people are let down?  So I've made a habit of testing out recipes before serving them to others.  If they turn out well, then great!  I'll serve them to friends, family, my doormen.  Anyone who will take it off my hands.  If they don't turn out well, they go in the garbage and I start trying to figure out how to tweak it or searching for another recipe altogether.

This recipe is the product of testing out two new recipes - both of which (happily) did not disappoint - and using a tried and true recipe to tie it all together.  The finished product?  Mini yellow cupcakes stuffed with homemade lemon curd and topped with lemon buttercream.  They are tangy-sweet bites of deliciousness (but I am admittedly a little biased).

And what did I do with these little bites of yumminess?  I packaged them into one of those adorable egg crates that I had ordered (if you're confused as to what I'm talking about, I direct you to the JulieBakes Facebook page....I'm still trying to get a "like" button on here for Facebook, but I've been having some difficulty.  But please go ahead and like JulieBakes...and forward this on to your friends - sorry, shameless plug), tied them up with yellow twine, and brought them to my friend.

Mini Cupcakes with Lemon

Cupcakes (from none other than Smitten Kitchen):

Yield: Two 9-inch round, 2-inch tall cake layers, and, in theory, 22 to 24 cupcakes, two 8-inch squares or a 9×13 single-layer cake (I have yet to audition the cupcakes, shame on me) - I halved the recipe and got a thick 6" cake, 4" cake, and 2" cake (more about that later), PLUS 14 mini cupcakes
Ingredients:
4 cups plus 2 tablespoons (480 grams) cake flour (not self-rising)
2 teaspoons (10 grams) baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon (5 grams) table salt
2 sticks (1 cup, 1/2 pound or 225 grams) unsalted butter, softened
2 cups (400 grams) sugar
2 teaspoons (10 ml) pure vanilla extract
4 large eggs, at room temperature
2 cups buttermilk (475 ml), well-shaken

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter cake pans and line with parchment paper, then butter parchment. (Or, use paper cupcake liners, or you can use a cooking spray.  I used Pam for baking and was very impressed with the results.)

Sift together the dry ingredients EXCEPT for sugar in a medium bowl.

In a large mixing bowl, beat butter and sugar in a large bowl with an electric mixer at medium speed until pale and fluffy, then beat in vanilla.
Add eggs 1 at a time, beating well and scraping down the bowl after each addition.
At low speed, beat in buttermilk until just combined (mixture will look curdled).
Add flour mixture in three batches, mixing until each addition is just incorporated.

Bake until golden on top and cooked throughout (the mini cupcakes took about 10 minutes, give or take a few).

Cool in pan on a rack 10 minutes, then run a knife around edge of pan.
Invert onto rack and discard parchment, then cool completely, about 1 hour.

Lemon Curd:
Check out the recipe here, originally from Smitten Kitchen

Lemon Buttercream Icing:

Ingredients:
3 1/2 cups confectioner's sugar
1/2 cup butter (1 stick), softened
1/4 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla
1 Tbsp lemon zest (fresh)
2 Tbsp lemon juice (I went with freshly squeezed)
Directions:

Mix the butter, lemon zest, and vanilla together until smooth.
Add milk, and quickly cream it into the butter mixture.
Mix in the confectioner's sugar 1/2 cup at a time.
Once the sugar is all in the bowl, cream on "high" for two minutes.
Mix in lemon juice.

Pipe onto cupcakes using any tip you'd like.  I went with a star-type one.

Thomas the tank engine chocolate covered Oreo pops

My parents have new neighbors.  They have a son, who will be 3 soon, and his 3rd birthday party is this coming weekend.  He and his parents stopped by when I was home over the weekend and dropped of an invitation for my parents to attend his third birthday party.  His third Thomas-the-tank-engine themed birthday party.  When they came over to drop off the invitation, my mom (the ever gracious hostess, and yes, that's where I get it from, along with my grandmother) invited the little boy and his parents in to chat.  He ran around the house and played.  My mom chatted with his parents.  Somehow, it came up that the little boy likes chocolate.

My mom, unsure of what to get a soon-to-be-three year old boy for his birthday (and knowing full well that a box of Godiva chocolate would not go over well by his parents, or be considered a worthy gift by him), enlisted the help of her daughter who works with children (that would be me), and I gave her a few suggestions.  Then the "baker" in me came up with a great idea.  Thomas the tank engine chocolate covered Oreo pops.  I had just been at the baking store the week before and I came across these adorable sugar Thomas-related decorations, so I went back and bought them.

These came out cute, and luckily the trains fit onto the Oreos perfectly!  The "icing on top," so to speak, was the blue 3 that I piped onto another Oreo pop.  I tried to match the blues as perfectly as I could, and I'm pretty sure the birthday boy won't mind that they're not a perfect match...

For the complete directions on how to make adorable Oreo pops, check out my original Oreo pop post.

Funfetti cake balls

Confession: I made funfetti cake balls/pops last week and I was less than impressed.  Rather, I was decidedly unimpressed.  See, I bought this new cake pop baking tray and I tried baking the cake balls in it.  I thought that it would be great, especially for funfetti cake, since it would bake up like the regular cake and you'd be able to see the sprinkles.  I followed the directions in the box - add pudding mix, change the number of eggs, use milk instead of water, change the amounts of liquids - and I just wasn't impressed.  Less impressed when 17 of the first 18 cake balls/pops I baked broke in half when I separated the pans (disclaimer: I was a bit impatient and the cake pops weren't completely cooled when I separated the pans).  Then I had to clean them, re-spray them, and bake another batch.  Tedious.  Frustrating.  And then I still had to mix it with the icing, since I had 34 cake ball halves, and couldn't do much with them.

I decided to try to correct this brilliant idea that I had.  Since funfetti is just all the rage right now, I wanted to make a funfetti cake ball and I wanted to make it right.  So I started with my original cake ball recipe using funfetti cake mix.  Then I used funfetti icing, too (funfetti icing is vanilla icing that comes with it's own little package of rainbow sprinkles to mix in).  And I threw in a small handful of sprinkles, too, just for good measure.  I made a few big balls (four, to be exact) to attempt to completely recreate these adorable ice cream cone cake pops (I gave all the original ones away and never kept one for myself.....rookie mistake!).  Then I used my trusty little scooper and scooped 56 little cake balls.  Then I got frustrated and wrapped up the remaining mixture for later use (I find that it generally freezes well, especially if pre-shaped/rolled into balls prior to freezing).

I wanted to have them coated in white, but vanilla funfetti cake with vanilla icing AND vanilla coating seemed a little much.  So I went with regular chocolate CandiQuik coating, and I think I'll make some more coated in white chocolate.  I adorned them all with a few rainbow sprinkles to match the inside of the cake balls.

Ice cream cone "cake pops"

Delaying gratification is not a strong suit of mine.  So that new cake pop baking pan that I bought earlier today?  Well yeah, I couldn't wait to use it.  Nope, couldn't wait till next weekend, or even tomorrow.  Passover ended at sundown on Saturday, and I could bake "real" baked goods again.  So new pan + being allowed to bake things that actually rise = must use new pan that night.  It's a character flaw, but one that I have embraced.
This new cake pop pan also has an additional advantage.  I can make funfetti cake pops!  Funfetti cake has been all the rage lately, and I wasn't sure that my original cake pop recipe would work with funfetti cake (I thought with all the mixing that the colored speckles would disappear and I'd just end up with a slightly off white cake pop center).  But this way, it should work well.  And I can adorn them with sprinkles to mimic the funfetti sprinkles inside.  Genious!  At least I think so ;-)

And....just to mix things up a bit, I decided to make these into Ice Cream Cone Cake Pops.  Yup, you read that correctly!  I mean seriously, are these not THE cutest thing in the whole wide world....ever?!

There's only one problem.  Remember that inability to wait for just about anything baking-related?  Well I tried removing the cake balls before they were completely cooled and I ended up breaking 17 of the 18 cake balls in the first tin right in half.  So I reverted back to my crumbled-cake-plus-icing cake balls, and made the first batch with those while I baked the second batch of cake balls up.

My Directions:

All you'll need are the regular ingredients for cake balls or cake pops (a box of your favorite store bought cake mix, the ingredients on the back of the box, and about 1/2 can of an icing flavor that goes with the cake flavor), 2 boxes of ice cream cones (with about 1-2 inches cut off the top), and candy coating or chocolate....lots of it!

Start by baking the cake according to the directions on the box, allowing it to cool, and crumbling it into a bowl. 

Mix in about 1/2 container of regular icing.

Shape into balls (I like to leave mine in the fridge overnight as I find them easier to handle that way).

Cut 1-2" off of the top of the ice cream cones

I chose to dip the top 1/2" of the cones into the candy/chocolate coating, but you don't have to.

Dip cake balls into coating and then place on wax paper or parchement paper-lined sheets.  If using sprinkles, make sure to put them on when the coating is still wet.

Let the coated (and decorated) cake balls harden so that you can handle them.

Dip the top of the cone into the coating and apply the cake ball.

Place upright in a styrofoam block, then chill.

(The directions from the CandiQuik blog are a little different, and probably a little more logical than the way I made them.  Those can be found by clicking on the link above, Ice Cream Cone Cake Pops.)

I succumbed...

The cake pops - and balls - that I've always made are delicious, but they are time consuming to make.  I usually spread the work out over a few days.  Day 1: bake cake and let it cool.  Day 2: crumble and mix with icing, let chill overnight in the fridge.  Day 3: roll cake-icing mixture into balls, allow to chill overnight.  Days 4&5: dip cake balls into chocolate, again allow to chill overnight.  Delicious?  Yes!  Pain in the ass to make?  Well, yeah, kinda.  But they are always so well received, so I continue to make them.  Plus, have I mentioned that they're delicious?

Then came all these new cake ball making contraptions.  Now I'll be honest with you (which I know is exactly what you want), and tell you that I think all of these cake pop baking things are just making baked donut holes, since there is no icing mixed in, but there is some appeal to their ease of use.

There's one that looks like a small George Forman-type grill with cavities for cake batter, and then there's this thing, which I impulsively purchased today at Bed, Bath, & Beyond when they didn't have the gift I went there looking for.

I'm planning on testing this out with boxed cake mix, but I'm also excited to try it with homemade cake batter, since I don't need to worry about the ratio of cake to icing when I use this.  Stay tuned!

Hazelnut thumbprint cookies (kosher for Passover!)

I made these cookies last year for Passover.  That was pre-food processor, in which I attempted to pulse the whole nuts, sugar, matzah cake meal, and salt in several small batches in what I'll call a "mini-prep," a sad mini food processor wannabe.  Needless to say, they had bigger chunks of hazelnuts in them than I think the original recipe calls for.  I also made big cookies.  Big enough that I was able to use a big piece of chocolate as the center.  This time, I opted for mini cookies (by now you should not be surprised).  These are significantly smaller, and all I needed was one (upside-down) chocolate chip in the center.

The nice thing about these cookies is that they have a non-kosher for Passover (aka "regular") version, as well.  You know, for the other 357 days of the year then you don't have to use matzah cake meal.  I also think that those would be great with nutella in the center.  I mean whats better than hazelnuts and chocolate?  Hazelnuts and hazelnut-chocolate spread, I presume!

Hazelnut Chocolate Thumbprint Cookies (Thanks, SmittenKitchen!)
Makes about 24 of the Passover version (I got 45 mini ones, plus some extra dough and a lack of patience to finish making them)

1 almost-full cup (4 ounces) hazelnuts, toasted, skinned and cooled
2/3 cup sugar
2/3 cup matzo cake meal (you can substitute 1 cup plus 1 tablespoon flour)
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 stick (1/2 cup) unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly
1 large egg, lightly beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Chocolate (I used chocolate discs last year, I stuck with chocolate chips this time around)
Pulse hazelnuts, sugar, matzo cake meal (or flour), and salt in a food processor until finely ground. (Be careful not to grind to a paste.) Transfer to a bowl and stir in butter, egg, and extract until combined well.
Chill dough, covered, until firm, about 30 minutes.
Put oven rack in middle position and preheat oven to 350°F.
Roll into 1 tbsp balls and place 1 inch apart on a parchment lined cookie sheet (you could do it on an ungreased cookie tray as well). 
Chill until slightly firm, about 10 minutes (I skipped this step).
Press one piece of chocolate firmly into the top of each ball of cookie dough and bake, 1 sheet at a time, until tops are pale golden and undersides are golden, 10 to 12 minutes (it took about 7 minutes for my mini ones).  Be careful not to overbake.
Transfer cookies to a rack and cool completely.

Smitten kitchen also has a jam-filled version and directions on how to make almond thumbprint cookies, too.  Check them out through the link above.

Matzah gnocchi

Two thumbs WAY up to Bon Appetit!  In the April 2012 issue, they have a section on an Italian Passover Seder.  Instead of matzah balls, they have matzah gnocchi.  Now, I'll be honest...matzah balls are one of my all time favorite Passover foods, and I've even been known to order them at the diner when it isn't Passover.  So while part of me was intrigued - and excited - about trying these gnocchi, part of me was thinking to myself "why fix something that isn't broken?"  However, I think they're different enough from matzah balls so that they aren't trying to fix matzah balls as much as they're a great addition to the soup (my mom served both matzah balls and this gnocchi at the second seder).

Matzah Gnocchi (from Bon Appetit)

1 large (11-12 oz) russet potato
1/4 cup matzah meal
1 Tbsp finely minced fresh chives
1 Tbsp finely minced flat leaf parsley
Pinch of freshly ground nutmeg (I used the pre-ground stuff and it was fine)
Kosher salt
3 large egg yolks, beaten to blend
Freshly ground black pepper
Extra-virgin olive oil (for drizzling)
Chicken broth

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400F
Bake potato until tender, about 1 hour.  Let cools lightly. 
Peel potato and pass through a ricer or food mill (or press through the holes in a colander) into a medium bowl.
Add matzah meal, herbs, and nutmeg; season to taste with salt (and pepper, I think they left that out)
Add yolks, stir to form a dough.

Divide dough into 4 pieces.
Working with 1 piece at a time and keeping the others covered with a kitchen towel, roll dough into a 12" roll.  Cut into 1" pieces.  Transfer gnocchi to a parchement-lined rimmed baking sheet.  Cover with a towel.

Bring broth to a simmer (I used salted water, because I wanted to serve them with cheese, and couldn't if they were cooked in chicken broth).  Season with salt and pepper.  Add gnocchi, simmer until tender, 4-5 minutes.  Divide among bowls.  Drizzle with olive oil. 

ENJOY!

Chocolate macarons

The other day I made these pink lemonade macarons with lemon curd filling.  While they didn't end up quite as pink as I had hoped, they definitely tasted good, and that made up for any lack of pinkness that existed.  While I won't use pink lemonade mix for Passover, I liked the idea of the lighter, coconut-free macaron as opposed to the coconut macaroons synonymous with Passover.  I decided to go with chocolate macarons because, frankly, I think anything with chocolate is better than plain old vanilla (I know it's a personal preference, but hey, i'm the one baking, so what I want is what you're going to get!).

I made the chocolate macarons from Tartelette as part of her Snickers macarons (which I've made before and highly recommend), but I swapped out the peanuts for more almonds, since peanuts are not kosher for Passover.  To get some extra-chocolatey flavor, I went with special dark cocoa instead of the plain cocoa.  They came out a little thicker than I had hoped (unsure what the culprit was), which I thought was fine until I baked them, and most of them ended up going leaning-tower-of-Pisa on me. 



The good thing about these macarons - despite their slantedness - is that they taste good.  I even think they're too rich to fill with the ganache that I had planned on using.  The beautiful thing is that I can serve them as they are, without the filling and a little slanted, and they'll still be great.  And it just means i'll have to make some more macarons again soon :)

Chocolate Macarons (from Tartelette, slightly modified my way, but I'd stick with her original)

3 egg whites (Tartelette likes to use 1-2 day old egg whites, I'd stick with one day old)
50 gr. granulated sugar
200 gr. powdered sugar (minus 2 Tbsp)
55gr. almonds (I used 110 grams of almonds and no peanuts, since peanuts aren't kosher for Passover)
55 gr. peanuts
2 Tbsp cocoa powder

For the whites: the day before (24hrs), separate your eggs and store the whites at room temperature in a covered container. If you want to use 48hrs (or more) egg whites, you can store them in the fridge. 
If you use fresh whites, zap them up in the microwave on medium high for 20 seconds to mimic the aging process.
In a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, whip the egg whites to a foam, gradually add the sugar until you obtain a glossy meringue. Do not overbeat your meringue or it will be too dry and your macarons won't work.
Combine the almonds, peanuts, cocoa powder, and powdered sugar in a food processor and give them a good pulse until the nuts are finely ground. Pass through a sieve.
Add them to the meringue, give it a quick fold to break some of the air and then fold the mass carefully until you obtain a batter that flows like magma or a thick ribbon. Give quick strokes at first to break the mass and slow down. The whole process should not take more than 50 strokes.
Test a small amount on a plate: if the tops flattens on its own you are good to go. If there is a small beak, give the batter a couple of turns.
Fill a pastry bag fitted with a large plain round tip with the batter and pipe small rounds (1.5 inches in diameter) onto parchment paper baking sheets.

Preheat the oven to 300F.
Let the macarons sit out for an hour to harden their shells a bit and bake for 8-10 minutes, depending on their size.
Let cool.

Fill with the filling of your choice.  Enjoy!

G's kosher for Passover crinkle cookies

My coworker, we'll call her G, makes crinkle cookies every Passover.  These are the cookies that her family eats, even after Passover.  She raves about them - and understandably so.  They're chocolatey and yummy, and best of all, don't taste like Passover cookies!  They look just like regular crinkle cookies, too!

For the past several years, just before Passover, G tells me about all the fantastic things she's making, but you can tell that by the amount of time she talks about these cookies (over the other foods), that these are her favorites.  So when it came to making my list of Passover desserts this year, I asked her for the recipe.  I ran out of time to make all the things on the list, but this year the crinkle cookies made it into the rotation (sadly, the brownies didn't make it in for the seders this year, but maybe during Passover I'll get around to them).

G's Passover Chocolate Crinkle Cookies (I, of course, made a half batch)

Cookies:
2 cups potato starch
1/4 cup oil
3/4 cup cocoa
2 cups sugar
4 eggs

Powdered Sugar:
1 cup + 1 Tbsp sugar
1 Tbsp potato starch

Directions:

Beat one egg at a time, then add potato starch.
Add the rest of the ingredients and mix until a thick paste forms (mine didn't turn into a paste, so I added a little extra oil, but then it still wasn't a paste, so then I just put it in the fridge as it was)
Put in the fridge.

In the mean time, mix the sugar and potato starch, for 10-15 minutes until powdery.

Preheat the oven.  Except the directions don't say what temperature.  When in doubt, I stick with 350F

Assemble cookies:
Coat hands in oil
Form small balls, and roll into powder, put on cookie sheet and bake 10-15 minutes until they start to crinkle.

L&A's kosher for Passover mandel bread

I have to be honest with you.  I don't really like Passover food (well, I guess that's a technicality; I just really miss the foods I can't have during Passover).  But particularly, I don't like the desserts.  I guess absence makes the heart grow fonder, since I don't usually go for desserts, but I always find myself wanting one during Passover.  Maybe it's the lack of other carbs in my life?  But I just find that most Passover desserts are not really good on their own, they're more a sad substitution for real desserts.

This recipe, however, is different!  Mandel bread - for those of you who don't know - is, for all intents and purposes, Jewish biscotti.  My friend L sent me this recipe last year (I'm sure I was lamenting on Facebook about how there are no good Passover desserts for me to make, and she commented and then sent me this recipe in response to my plea for good Passover baked goods).  I believe it's her husband A's family's recipe, but I could be mixing up stories.  All I do know is that it is heavenly.  And, unlike any other Passover food known to man, I actually found myself finishing the mandel bread after Passover had ended!

L & A's Kosher for Passover Mandel Bread

2 3/4 c. matza cake meal
1/2 lb. butter
2 c. sugar
6 eggs
3/4 c. potato starch
1/2 tsp. salt
6 oz. passover chocolate, or chips and/or nuts (I leave the nuts out as I have a nut-allergic cousin and if it is nut-free, it is one of the few Passover desserts she can have as most Passover desserts are made with nuts)
2 tsp. sugar
1 tsp. cinnamon

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Cream the butter and sugar
Add the eggs one at a time, beat until smooth.
Sift the cake meal, potatoe starch, and salt.
Fold the dry mixture into the egg mixture.
Mix thoroughly.
Add the chocolate, and chopped nuts (if using)
Form into 3 or 4 loaves on a greased baking sheet (I used parchment paper-lined sheets and they work just fine), about 3 inches wide.
Top with the mixture of 2 tsp sugar and 1 tsp cinnamon.
Bake 40-45 minutes
When mostly cooled but still a little warm, slice into 1-1.5" slices

Passover goodies

In less than one week, the Jewish holiday of Passover will be upon us.  For 8 days, I won't be able to eat anything leavened (such as almost every single type of baked good) or pretty much anything that expands during cooking (such as rice and pasta).  It's a diet rich in protein, potatoes, and chocolate, at least for me.  No rice.  No pasta.  No soy products.  No bread.  No peanuts or peanut butter.  No corn.  No cookies.  No brownies. 

Scratch off "no cookies" and "no brownies."

Sure, the dietary restrictions over Passover are stringent, to say the least.  But I don't want you, the faithful JulieBakes reader, to think that just because I can't eat any of the baked goods you'd expect to see from me normally, that I won't be baking at all.

Over the years I've collected some good kosher for Passover recipes that use potato starch and matzah meal in place of the flour, or simply just no flour.  A brownie recipe from a patient.  A mandel bread recipe from a friend.  A hazelnut thumbprint cookie recipe from SmittenKitchen.  Meringues with chocolate chips that we've been serving in the family for years.  My mom's flourless chocolate cake.  Matzah candy, a recipe my mom got from her friend.  Of course I'm not going to make them all.  My mom makes the chocolate cake and candy, and my grandmother makes the meringues and a nut cake (I'm not a fan of nut cake; although there are a few nut cakes in my life, and I love most of them).

But then I got the brainstorm to make French macarons for Passover...they are, after all, almonds, sugar, powdered sugar, and egg whites.  Maybe some flavorings, but definitely no flour.  Or corn.  Or soy.  Or rice.  So in my book they're completely kosher for Passover!  (Don't worry, the ones I'm making for Passover will be more traditional than these pink lemonade ones I made yesterday...think chocolate + ganache.)

Stay tuned for some of these Passover-friendly recipes to come over the next two weeks.