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.

My Favorite Holiday

I love Halloween! It's my favorite holiday. You get to dress up in silly costumes and eat sweets without feeling stupid or guilty (respectively). Because Halloween fell mid-week, I got to celebrate it twice! Once with my friend Katy and her flatmates--it was a Halloween party crossed with a birthday party for Katy's flatmate Lucy. The invitation said come in fancy dress (that's British for come in costume) or come dressed as Lucy. So I decided to try out a costume I've been wanted to do for a few years: Lucille Ball. I found a close to perfect Lucy dress at a charity shop near me. The pearls and pumps were mine already. The real effort was getting my wavy red hair curly and pinned up (I think I used over 30 bobby pins!) The party was good fun even if I don't think any of the Brits there knew "I Love Lucy."

White Chocolate, Pumpkin, Sage, and Brown Butter Mini Muffins

The pumpkin, sage, brown butter loaf cake recipe was supposed to make 8 mini loaves. Unfortunately my mini loaf pan only makes 6 loaves. What's a girl to do with left over loaf cake batter? Make mini muffins of course!

Since I had 6 mini loaves I figured I'd have a little fun with the mini muffins and add some chocolate. Pumpkin is delicious with dark chocolate but because this batter bordered on savory (with the brown butter and sage) I thought dark chocolate--even semi-sweet--might be a bit too bitter. So I tossed in a generous helping of good quality, white chocolate chips.

Pumpkin, Sage, Brown Butter Loaf Cakes

As I mentioned, I have a new eCookbook. Since the orange yogurt cake and fig olive oil cake both came out so well I decided to try another recipe. Pumpkin, sage, brown butter loaf cakes seemed sufficiently autumnal for the end of September and I love any recipe that has "butter" right in the name.

There is something very dignified about these cakes that I can't put my finger on. Perhaps it's the sophisticated flavor profile or maybe it's how perfectly these miniature loaves came out. It could possibly be the lack of glaze. I'm not sure. But whatever it was it made me feel as though these cakes (possibly sliced nicely) would be fit for a proper, English afternoon tea at a fancy hotel--you know, like the ones in the US that do traditional afternoon tea but with a distinctively American take on sweets.

Clementine Mini Loaves

Remember the lemon loaf I made at the FCI? These are the same recipe, except instead of lemons I used clementines (they are more wintery) and just a dash of orange extract. I also broke in my new mini loaf pan and made a half dozen mini loaves instead of a normal size loaf. I think they look very nice in miniature and the clementine gave the loaves a slightly sweeter and milder flavor than the lemon one did. Delicious!

Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Loaf

The color of this photo is oddly yellowed and I can't seem to fix it,
so you will have to imagine the rich warmth of the
orange cake studded with deep brown chocolate chips.

I like pumpkin, but I'm a bit picky about it. I don't like pumpkin pie or other overly sweet applications. In fact I tend to only eat pumpkin in savory dishes, such as pumpkin soup or pumpkin risotto--yum! I digress. I happened to have a few cans of pumpkin purée in the back of the cupboard and I decided it was high time I used them--plus I always like making pumpkin recipes for Halloween and I'll be traveling on the day so I figured I'd do it early. I found a recipe for chocolate chip laden pumpkin loaves in the original Baked cookbook and decided that chocolate was bound to improve on the pumpkin. I was right! (I suppose it was their idea first, so they were right...but I take credit for choosing to make the recipe!)

The loaves were delicious! The pumpkin wasn't overwhelming, nor were the spices (I find many pumpkin dishes tend to use far too much cinnamon and nutmeg). The bittersweet chocolate cut the sweetness of the loaves and actually enhanced the pumpkin flavor. The were dense and moist but still tender and the chips added some texture. Definitely my favorite pumpkin dessert recipe!

Lemon Loaf

This was really quite nice. The lemon-y flavor came from lemon zest, lemon glaze, and lemon pieces mixed into the batter. I have to say the lemon pieces were quite unexpected, I've never seen them in a lemon loaf recipe before, It was tart yet sweet, tender and moist yet not too crumbly, yum!

Quadruple Chocolate Loaf Cake with Vanilla Custard Sauce

I made this last weekend to bring to a, for lack of a better word, dinner party (but is only 4 people a party?).  The cake was from Nigella Lawson's cookbook, Feast.  The custard sauce was from her cookbook entitled How to be a Domestic Goddess.  The cake was excellently moist and chocolaty.  I was going to serve it as a whole cake, but I changed my mind and cut it into cubes.  Because I did that, I really needed to serve it with something.  So, I made the custard sauce, which is just to say creme anglaise.  I just served it with some fresh strawberries.  YUM!

What is great about this is it travels well.  I put the cake cubes in one tupperware and the custard in another.   And brought a pint of strawberries.  Just serve in three separate bowls and let everyone take what they want.

P.S. Sorry, I completely forgot to take a picture!

P.P.S. Don't listen to Nigella about using plastic wrap to line the pan...use parchment instead.  The plastic melted a bit (I know she says it won't, mine did, perhaps the plastic wrap she uses is more heat resistant than mine.)  It was a nightmare to clean off my lovely loaf pan.

Dense Chocolate Loaf Cake

This is an amazing cake! It is from Nigella Lawson’s “How to be a Domestic Goddess”. As she describes it, it is rather like a chocolate version of gingerbread, dense and moist and aromatic and amazingly flavorful. I think that pretty much sums it up. That all said, I don’t make this very often because it is a bit of a pain to make. You have to add the dry ingredients a tablespoon at a time alternating with boiling water. It really isn’t hard to do, but it’s tedious.  I got over that tonight though, because I know that once I take one bite of this delicious cake it will all be all worth it. This is great served with vanilla ice cream, fresh berries and white chocolate sauce or just plain (which is what I usually do).

P.S. I'm sorry I haven't written for a while, I started the second semester of my junior year of college last week and it hit me like a ton of bricks.  But I've managed to crawl out from under them and I'll be posting plenty more soon.