Celebration time! Chocolate Hazelnut Torte, here I come!

I took my last final two days ago...I finished my last college app yesterday...it's winter break and I have no more essays to write...

I am now OFFICIALLY a second-semester senior!!!

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY (and PHEW!!!)

Time to cook and sew to my heart's content!!!

Yesterday I was so intoxicated by my newfound freedom to do whatever I wanted (as opposed to studying and writing essays bleagh) that when Serious Eats emailed me a recipe for a chocolate-chestnut torte, I was like LET'S GO FOR IT!

I actually ended up adapting a hazelnut-chocolate torte recipe instead, because I like hazelnuts better and I didn't have any chestnuts. Unfortunately, I didn't have any eggs either, which I was so excited to get started that I didn't realize until halfway through making the confection, which led to me running down the street in my slippers to borrow eggs from my angelic neighbor. Thank you Edye!!! I also accidentally added double the sugar I was supposed to at the beginning, so I had to make a batch of cookies instead and start the cake over (you can't let butter and sugar go to waste!). Not my smoothest dessert, clearly. Cut me a break. I'm still getting back in the groove ;)

But eventually all the right ingredients ended up in the mixer together. I think the cake came together quite nicely, don't you?

I decorated the top with powdered sugar using a homemade cake stencil. Within a few days I'll post a tutorial about how to make your own reusable cake stencil from stuff you probably have lying around your house! If you're reading this thinking, "Less art, more eating!", a liberal dusting of powdered sugar would, I'm sure, look just as inviting plus have the added advantage of covering in all the bald spots. Or you could just cut to the chase and slather the thing with Nutella ;)

The cake turned out to be pretty good! It was moist and fudgy and tasted like Nutella. Here's the recipe!

Trick or Treat? Well, peanut butter chocolates, to be specific

BOOOO!!!!

It's the day before Halloween, and I am preparing accordingly.

Usually, holidays mean dessert. Halloween is a slight exception; Halloween means candy. Which means, I'm off the hook!

I have never seen a more excited jack-o'-lantern in my life!
picture courtesy of drinks.seriouseats.com

I confess: I am a sucker for Reese's peanut butter cups.

Image courtesy of Wikipedia

But around Halloween, you start seeing a deviation from your traditional round, notched peanut-filled candies. The Reese's marketing team starts doing backflips trying to give you even more reasons to buy candy on Halloween. They start producing things like 

This pumpkin-shaped Reese's! --Or: 

picture courtesy of whatimdoin.wordpress.com

A Reese's with a pumpkin on it! 

My response? 

BRING IT ON!!!!

Honest-to-Goodness Chocolate Chip Cookies

AP tests are OVER!!!

I deserve some chocolate-chip cookies.

Chocolate Chip Muffins worthy of the most important meal of the day

Sometimes you need to function at 6:00 in the morning. Sometimes, you need chocolate to get you through it. Your answer :)

Baking against Butter: Caramel Brownies with a pound to spare

There is a situation at my house.

I went to check the freezer the other day, and was confronted by ONE, SOLITARY, MISERABLE POUND OF BUTTER.

You may be looking at me like how can you possibly be planning to use an entire pound of butter?

A statue of Benjamin Franklin made out of butter. Can you tell I've been spending a lot of time studying US History lately?
Picture courtesy of mariasols.com

Um,  do you want brownies or not? I have a baking blog. I put butter in EVERYTHING. I have a screensaver that says

Happy people eat dessert, and if you're going to eat dessert, it had better taste good, and if it's going to taste good, you have to add butter or carcinogenic chemicals, and butter is SO much tastier and healthier than chemicals. Therefore BUTTER MAKES YOU HAPPY.

Well I AM REDUCED TO ONE DINGY POUND OF HAPPINESS!

I tell you I do not know how my kitchen arrived at this state. I am used to having I-kid-you-not twenty blocks of reserve butter holed up in my garage (you would be shocked at how quickly we go through it.) Usually my mom stocks up on good-quality butter when it's on sale and we stash it in the freezer for consumption by my baking fanaticism, but I guess we haven't bought any in a while and now due to my negligence our supply has run perilously low.

So I had an unfamiliar experience while preparing to make this recipe, which was calculating if I would have enough butter to make this dessert. It was an unsettling process. Butter is just one thing I don't want to have to worry about while baking. Sort of like how you don't want to wonder if you have enough toilet paper to last you until your next trip to the store.

Thankfully, this recipe only took about half a pound, and boy did it do justice to my half pound of butter! I've escaped the scourge of butterlessness for now...but still living dangerously!

Chocolate Bundt Cake (and how to get it out of that stunning pan)

I made the mistake of looking up bundt cake pans on Amazon one day...

And you didn't think you needed a new bundt cake pan ;)  

(Here's the link, in case you need more eye candy :D). 

Here is my bundt cake pan: 

Admittedly not as dramatic as a pumpkin, but altogether superior because it does not place seasonal limitations on my bundt cake. I mean really, a couple of components, beautiful presentation, mouth-watering taste, chocolate: this is going to be a year-round staple.  (And you can probably tell my pan gets some wear.)

I suppose I should comment upon the difference between chocolate bundt cake and regular chocolate cake. Now you might not think you care, but it's actually really important because if you can prove the distinction it means you can have chocolate cake twice as often :D  My standard normal-round-pan cake is incredibly soft and delicate. When you cut it open you can see the system of air pockets. I can report with conviction that it would not survive extraction from a bundt cake pan. It is covered in traditional icing, essentially whipped butter and powdered sugar with some cocoa powder thrown in.

Bundt cake is generally denser and has a sturdier crumb so that it will hold its shape. I notice that it tends to develop something of a thin crust on the outside, which also helps maintain the structure, especially if your pan features crisp lines. And because there is no way you are going to spackle those beautiful designs, it is covered with ganache, which is essentially a melted mixture of cream, chocolate, and butter. And of course, there's the distinctive circular shape with a hole in the middle. 

Remember that scene from My Big Fat Greek Wedding?
Image courtesy of Oh Heather

Unfortunately, that beautiful pan can quickly become prohibitive if you don't know how to get your cake out of it in one piece. Often, just buttering doesn't work well enough. Instead, what I now do is make a type of paste: a mixture of powdered sugar, melted butter, and in this case cocoa powder that I use to coat the inside of the pan.

It's thicker and it doesn't run down into the bottom of the pan, so it gives the cake better coverage. And it WORKS. Not only do you not have problems getting the cake out in the first place, but when it emerges the lines are exceptionally crisp and the design is clear. I don't really have a recipe for this paste--I just sort of melt butter and throw equal parts sugar and cocoa in until I get the right consistency--but I'll do my best below!

Here's the recipe!

Finally...chocolate.

It has come to my attention that except for its foray into my pumpkin bread, there has been no chocolate on this blog yet!!!

And I call myself a baker.

It's ok, because believe it or not I can redeem myself. In a single individual confection, within the confines of a 4-inch-wide ramekin. Without floof or decoration. Just chocolaty goodness.

I present...the molten chocolate cake.

It is a rich, decadent dessert, served piping hot and still syrupy in the center, with a dollop of melting whipped cream to cut the depth of the chocolate. In my quest to define this cake-encircled elixir of sugared cocoa, I asked my younger brother to define my molten chocolate cakes. He replied "It's something that I want...and don't have."

That pretty much covers this dessert's role in my family. Either I am making them for my brothers or I am receiving injunctions to produce them. Bottom line: they are delicious.

They are also deceptively impressive, because they have to be served right out of the oven. That's really just a matter of putting them in 15 minutes before dessert is served, but it's a flair that cannot be purchased in a store. They're a great dessert for a dinner party, since they're elegant, remarkable, and yet quick and easy to put out once it's time to eat.

So without further ado--I give you--a unique staple of my dessert repertoire: