Chocolate Heart of Darkness Cakes

Chocolate Heart of Darkness Cakes

April'15 for Baking Partners we were to bake one delicious cake that I knew the girls will love.

 An amazing molten lava cake… but I postponed making it as I knew my younger daughter who was out of station will love it. Plus she was to come back with my niece another chocolate crazy kid!

Plus given the fact that I was totally lazy and barely in the kitchen it made sense right?

This amazingly delicious cake that fell on the kitchen platform as I was transferring to the rack. I called my elder one, her solution was to fetch a spoon and finish it straight from the platform....:)

Chocolate Heart of Darkness Cakes

Anyway here is awesome cake that will wow your family and guest alike.

Chocolate Heart of Darkness Cakes

Recipe Source: Death by Chocolate Cakes: An Astonishing Array of Chocolate Enchantments by Marcel Desaulniers

Ingredients:

Chocolate truffle:

• 227 grms semisweet baking chocolate
• ¾ cup heavy cream

For the chocolate cocoa cake:

• 142 grms butter cut into pieces +2 tsp melted
• 2/3 cup Maida/All purpose flour
• ½   cup Unsweetened cocoa
• 227 grms Semi sweet baking chocolate
• 3 Eggs
• 2 Egg yolks
• ½ granulated sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

Method:

To make the truffles:

• Place the chocolate in a bowl.
• Heat heavy cream in a small pan over medium heat and bring to boil.
• Pour boiling cream over the chopped chocolate.
• Let it sit for five minutes and whisk until smooth.
• Pour the mixture onto a non-stick baking sheet and slightly spread it with a spatula.
• Place this in the freezer for 15 minutes.
• Divide into two and roll into balls.
• Place the truffles into paper lined plates and place in the freezer.

To make the chocolate cake:

• Preheat the oven to 325 degree F.
• Lightly coat the inside of muffin tin (3 inch diameter cups) with melted butter. Set this aside.
• Sift combine flour and cocoa powder keep aside.
• Melt chocolate and butter in double boiler or in a microwave and stir until smooth.
• Place egg, egg yolks and sugar in a bowl and beat on medium high heat with an electric mixer.
• When it is frothy add the butter chocolate mixture and beat for 15 seconds.
• Fold in the dry ingredients along with vanilla extract.
• Fill three forth of each muffin cup with the batter and bake for about 5-6 minutes.
• Remove the truffle from the freezer. Quickly take the muffin tray from the oven and press one truffle each to the centre of the muffin. Immediately return the baking pan into the oven and continue baking until a toothpick inserted into the cake (not the centre truffle portion but the edge of the cake) comes out clean.
•  It will take 15-17 minutes.
•  Cool in room temperature for 20 minutes.
• Run a knife around each cake to loosen it and then gently pull the baked cake out of the cup.
• You can serve while still warm with whipped cream or ice cream but we had it plain.

Chocolate Heart of Darkness Cakes

What else do we have?

Well come back on the 10th to see that…

Meanwhile today you can check my other friends 

Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing BM# 53

Hi! First time here? Well then you are Most Welcome! I hope you keep coming back for more here. If you are my regular visitor then Thanks, for you encourage me to experiment more!! I would like you to please click on my link below and like my Facebook Page. I will be happy if you can follow me on on Twitter too!

 

Nachos and Salsa

Nachos and Salsa

Nachos is a Tex-Mex dish from northern Mexico. The dish can be as simple as tortilla chips (totopos) covered with cheese or cheese-based sauce fr a snack. Want a main course add more stuff.

Nachos were first created circa 1943 by Ignacio "Nacho" Anaya.   

In the city of Piedras Negras, Coahuila, Mexico, just over the border from Eagle Pass, Texas, In 1943, the wives of U.S. soldiers stationed at Fort Duncan in nearby Eagle Pass were     on a shopping trip, and arrived at the restaurant after it had already closed for the day.

The maître d'hôtel, Ignacio "Nacho" Anaya, invented a new snack for them with what little he had available in the kitchen: tortillas and cheese. Anaya cut the tortillas into triangles, added shredded cheddar cheese, quickly heated them, added sliced pickled jalapeño peppers and served them, called them  "Nacho's especiales". As word of the dish travelled, the apostrophe was lost, and Nacho's "specials" became "special nachos".

When I choose my theme I had visions of serving nachos with different fillings all the pictures of nachos I see were dancing in front of my eyes. I knew how I wanted to serve them right down to photographing them…

;(  But I could not. Not because I was lazy, me have a lazy bone in my body? Of course not… but   it was too hot, no maid, the kitchen lights conked off, the kitchen fan was not working …..

Anyway we had store brown nachos and store brought salsa and a very funny movie. So much that finally hubby told me take your picture before everything gets over….

Nachos and Salsa

What else do we have?

Well come back tomorrow to see that…

Meanwhile today you can check my other friends



Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing BM# 53

Hi! First time here? Well then you are Most Welcome! I hope you keep coming back for more here. If you are my regular visitor then Thanks, for you encourage me to experiment more!! I would like you to please click on my link below and like my Facebook Page. I will be happy if you can follow me on on Twitter too!

 

Popcorn

Popcorn

Popcorn, also known as popping corn, is a type of corn or maize that expands from the kernel and puffs up when heated.

Grains like amaranth grain, sorghum, quinoa, millet and corn are able to pop because, their kernels have a hard moisture-sealed hull and a dense starchy interior and some oil. When heated, pressure builds within the kernel, and a small explosion (or "pop") is the end result.

There are various techniques for popping corn. The commercial popcorn machine was invented by Charles Cretors in the late 19th century. Now we have along with pre-packaged popcorn can be prepared in a microwave oven, pressure cooker plus we have there are small home appliances for popping corn.

Some consider popcorn to be a health food it can also be used from holiday decorations to packaging materials.

Corn was first domesticated in Mexico 9,000 years ago from a wild grass. A few thousands of years later it then made its way across Central to South America. Popcorn is one of the oldest forms of corn; evidence of popcorn from 3600 B.C. was found in New Mexico.

Corncobs found at two ancient sites in Peru (Paredones and Huaca Prieta) may date from as early as 4700 B.C. This suggests that people living along the coast of northern Peru were already eating popcorn by that time.

Do you know that ….

In popcorn jargon, a popped kernel of corn is known as a "flake". Two shapes of flakes are commercially important. "Butterfly" or "snowflake" flakes are irregular in shape and have a number of protruding "wings". "Mushroom" flakes are largely ball-shaped, with few wings.

"Mushroom"-shaped popcorn, left, is less fragile and less tender than "butterfly"-shaped, right. Courtesy: Google

Popcorn is eaten by movie goers either salted or sweetened. In the 1800 century popcorn, milk and sweetener were breakfast in USA. Popcorn balls (popped kernels stuck together with sugary "glue") were hugely popular around the turn of the 20th century. Cracker Jack is a popular, commercially produced candy that consists of peanuts mixed in with caramel-covered popcorn. Kettle corn is a variation of normal popcorn, cooked with white sugar and salt, traditionally in a large copper kettle.

(Courtesy: Wikipedia).

Small wonder that when movies are watched we have popcorn….

Here I have just popped the pre-packaged corn in a pressure cooker without the whistle.

Delicious popcorn ready in minutes…

What else do we have?

Well come back tomorrow to see that…

Meanwhile today you can check my other friends 

Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing BM# 53

Hi! First time here? Well then you are Most Welcome! I hope you keep coming back for more here. If you are my regular visitor then Thanks, for you encourage me to experiment more!! I would like you to please click on my link below and like my Facebook Page. I will be happy if you can follow me on on Twitter too!

 

Pound Cake

Pound Cake

This month for Baking Partners we were to try a Pound Cake.

Simple and beautiful!

This recipe is different from that I follow here & here.

The main points that surprised me was that we were to bake in a cold oven, that is the oven is not be pre-heated and the batter after mixing is to be beaten after all the ingredients are mixed. 

Since I was baking this cake for my daughter’s birthday I pre-heated the oven but I did beat the batter and the cake rose beautifully.Also I used my regular 150°C/302°F and not the recommended 190°C/375°F.

Coming to the birthday cake since the theme my younger one had chosen was childhood, she wanted me bake a rabbit cake.

She got out my old book and showed me what she wanted. The book had asked for coconut flakes but she did not want the flakes. Personally I feel the cake looks like a cat the girls were satisfied so who am I to complain…

Also I forgot to take pictures of the pound cake and the cake also in my setup. So this is what you will get for I do not think I will be making this shape again. 

Pound Cake

Recipe Source:Gourmet | September 2005

Ingredients:

• 1/2  cup unsalted butter, softened, plus additional for buttering pan
• 1 ½   cups sifted cake flour, sifted before measuring plus additional for dusting
• 1/3 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/4 cups sugar
• 3 and 1/2 large eggs, at room temperature
• 2 teaspoons vanilla
• 1/2 cup heavy cream

Method:

• Generously butter pan and dust with flour, knocking out excess flour, line the bottom  of the pan with parchment paper.
• Once you sifted the homemade cake flour for 5 times, then add salt and sift together once again.  If using cake flour then you need to sift only 3 times.
• Beat together butter and sugar in a large bowl with an electric mixer at medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about 5 minutes in a stand mixer fitted with paddle attachment or 6 to 8 minutes with a handheld mixer.
• Add eggs 1 at a time, beating well after each addition, then beat in vanilla.
• Reduce speed to low and add half of flour, then all of cream, then remaining flour, mixing well after each addition.
• Scrape down side of bowl, and then beat at medium-high speed 5 minutes. Batter will become creamier and satiny.
• Transfer the batter into pan and tap the pan against work surface once or twice to eliminate air bubbles.
• Place pan in pre- heated  oven  at 150°C/302°F.
• Bake until golden and a wooden pick or skewer inserted in middle of cake comes out with a few crumbs adhering.
•  Cool cake in pan on a rack 30 minutes.
• Run a thin knife around inner and outer edges of cake, and then invert cake onto rack to cool completely.

Pound Cake

Hi! First time here? Well then you are Most Welcome! I hope you keep coming back for more here. If you are my regular visitor then Thanks, for you encourage me to experiment more!! I would like you to please click on my link below and like my Facebook Page. I will be happy if you can follow me on on Twitter too!