Dark Chocolate Raspberry Truffles

These are one of Christmas chocolates I made this year (technically last year, but you know what I mean). On a related note, while these were Christmas chocolates, they could very easily be Valentine's Day chocolates; between the flavor and the red sugar on top they'd be perfect. The dark chocolate raspberry ganache recipe is from one of the Baked cookbooks. It's raspberry purée (made from frozen raspberries), honey, heavy cream, and good quality dark chocolate.

Wedding Cake Tasting

I am making a wedding cake for a wedding this spring. I know the bride and she asked me to make the cake. As this is a proper business request (even though it was a friend) not a favor I felt I should give her and the groom a proper cake tasting--plus the groom had never tasted my food. They were pretty sure they wanted white cake, but they really didn't have much of an idea other than that. So I made 2 types of cake and 6 flavors of buttercream for them to try.

Gluten-Free Chocolate Orange Almond Cake

This is the same cake as the cake I made both this Christmas and last Christmas but with leavening. Last Christmas I made the same cake without baking powder because I didn't have gluten-free baking power. This year I do have it so I figured I'd give the leavened version a shot on Dec 23, in case it was better than the unleavened version. As a plain, unadorned cake I like it like this (probably more than the unleavened one). It looks lovely with the raised edges and it's a little damper. But the unleavened version is definitely better to decorate because it the top is pretty flat (instead of the raised edges and sunken center).

Salted Almond, Chocolate Chip Cookies

There's nothing more relaxing than making (and subsequently eating) chocolate chip cookies. I've made all sorts of chocolate chip cookies but I've never tried salted ones. I decided it was time. I based these off of Tate's bakery's "chubby Tate's” chewy chocolate chip cookies. Their recipe uses corn syrup to make the cookies nice and chewy. I then added chopped, blanched almonds and sea salt in addition to the dark chocolate chips.

Chocolate Bark

As I mentioned, I made chocolates for Christmas. One of my favorite yuletide chocolates is the mendiant--a chocolate disk it the dried fruit and nuts. But these are time consuming. And chocolate bark is basically the same thing, but easier to make. So tempered some high quality dark chocolate and white chocolate and got to work.

The Best of 2013

It's that time. The time to look back over the previous twelve months and see where you've been and what's happened in your life, both good and bad. For me 2013 is the year I started grad school. It's also the year I made a wedding (okay, anniversary) cake for a real couple, crafted a TARDIS out of chocolate cake, made hundreds of chocolates for the holidays, and so much more. So here's to 2013.

French Toast with Caramel Sauce

I forgot to post this last year. When our friends came round (and we baked cookies) the girls had a sleepover while the parents got some alone time. Alaina and Tegan are great kids and I wanted to surprise them by getting up early and making a special breakfast. Unfortunately they are morning people (at least Tegan is) so I couldn't really surprise them. But I still banned them from the kitchen, so at least the type of food was a surprise.

New Year's Eve "Party"

I was invited to New Year's parties, but I don't do New Year's parties. Ever. My family has a rule that you must wear stretch waist pants on New Year's Eve. We eat snacks and party food and go to bed at 12:01 (which is earlier than we normally go to bed, but that's not the point...) The point is, this year my mom, my friend Adriana, and myself stayed in and ate our way into the new year.