Tunnel of Fudge Cake

Recently I made a birthday cake for a good friend with the fairly limited palate of a 10 year old boy. He wanted chocolate, and I wasn't going to mess around. I knew that getting fancy with flavours would not be appreciated-no wacky fruit filling or liqueur infusions; some nuts would be okay, maybe.

Still, I hadn't made a cake for a while and wanted to test my baking muscles. Browsing through Cooking with Les Dames D'Escoffier, I found a winner. Shirley Corriher, biochemist and cookbook writer, and her update on a Pillsbury classic, the Tunnel of Fudge Cake. A runner-up in the Bake-Off contest in the 1960s, this recipe helped popularize the bundt pan and developed a cult following. A simple chocolate cake with walnuts, its secret is an inner ring of fudge within the baked cake. This was originally achieved with a Pillsbury frosting mix, now discontinued, but Corriher re-worked the recipe without. Published in the NYTimes Science section, it is extremely detailed and Corriher explains exactly why it works. All baking demands precision, but I was careful to follow to the seemingly minute detail (natural cocoa, as she insists the more commonly found Dutch-processed will cause the cake to fail). She explains it much better than I could, so I am linking to her recipe and the accompanying article.

The method is fairly standard, beginning with creaming butter and sugar (usually a pain by hand, a greater pain with flimsy forks). Make sure butter and eggs are at room temperature, both for ease of creaming and the benefit of your end result.

School was briefly out for me and I re-purposed my book stand into a cookbook stand.

The finished product, dusted with confectioner's sugar. You could do a frosting or glaze, but the cake itself is so rich and sweet that it isn't necessary and may be too much.

The birthday boy and cake in action.

A terrible attempt to show the inside tunnel of the cake.

I was a bit nervous about the tunnel effect and the consistency of the cake-you can't check for doneness with a thermometer, but rather must trust your oven temperature's accuracy, or use an oven thermometer if you lack this trust. All in all, the cake was a huge success and great for chocolate lovers. I will definitely be making it again.

DIY Thin Mints

I was once a girl guide. Then my friend and I turned 12, got too cool and peaced. I was never a cookie selling champion but I could sure put them away. Thin mints are my favourite and I was psyched to see various successful attempts at recreation. I am using the recipe from Baking Bites, also featured on The Crepes of Wrath.

Thin Mints
from Baking Bites (my notes in italics)

Homemade Thin Mints
2 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1/4 cup cornstarch
6 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup white sugar
1/2 cup butter, room temperature
1/3 cup milk (any kind)
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
3/4 tsp peppermint extract (could be upped to 1 tsp)

In a small bowl, whisk together flour, cornstarch, cocoa powder and salt.
In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar. With the mixer on low speed, add in the milk and the extracts. Mixture will look curdled. Gradually, add in the flour mixture until fully incorporated.
Shape dough into two logs, about 1 1/2 inches (or about 4 cm) in diameter, wrap in plastic wrap and freeze for at least 1-2 hours, until dough is very firm.
Preheat oven to 375F.
Slice dough into rounds not more than 1/4 inch thick - if they are too thick, they will not be as crisp (seriously, focus on your cutting, you also want them to be flat and all approximately the same thickness)- and place on a parchment lined baking sheet. Cookies will not spread very much, so you can put them quite close together.

Bake for 13-15 minutes (err on the less crispy side if you want them to taste authentic/max delicious), until cookies are firm at the edges. Cool cookies completely on a wire rack before dipping in chocolate.

Dark Chocolate Coating (2 logs, 2 rounds of baking-first round I went with nice quality dark chocolate, but found them a bit too intense. Round two I started with straight up milk chocolate with 30%cacao, but though the taste was awesome, the melting quality was not so great and they coated the cookies a little gloopily. So I went for a 2/3 milk chocolate, 1/3 dark chocolate, no butter mixture which worked out great)
10-oz dark or semisweet chocolate
1/2 cup butter, room temperature

In a microwave safe bowl, combine chocolate and butter. Melt on high power in the microwave, stirring every 45-60 seconds, until chocolate is smooth. Chocolate should have a consistency somewhere between chocolate syrup and fudge for a thin coating.
Dip each cookie in melted chocolate, turn with a fork to coat, then transfer to a piece of parchment paper or wax paper to set up for at least 30 minutes, or until chocolate is cool and firm.
Reheat chocolate as needed to keep it smooth and easy to dip into. (This part gets messy/awesome)

Makes 3 1/2-4 dozen cookies. Store them in the fridge or freezer if you like them extra crispy.

Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

I have been reading The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan lately, and everytime I am craving something sweet and might normally think about maybe grabbing some Reese's Pieces or gummies of any kind (fyi I have a bit of a candy problem, if you are enabler, stick with these kinds to be safe), I read the label and look for corn/derivatives from corn/generally get freaked out by all these mono/dextrose/acid sounding things in my "food", and justify baking another batch of cookies.

These are a classic, tasty and quick. It makes for excellent dough snacking as well.

Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies recipe (originally from Cook's Illustrated)

Note on chocolate chips: Using fancy chocolate chips makes a huge difference in my opinion. My preferred brand is Ghiradelli's Semisweet Chocolate Chips, both for taste and the way they melt. I was almost out so this batch was half and half (the other half being plain old President's Choice), and I, for one, could taste the difference. Not my best work, but for quick and somewhat wholesome (extremely wholesome when I think about HFCS, antibiotics-loaded cows, and scary chemicals) cookies, these did the trick.

Oatmeal-Walnut-Craisin-Chocolate Chunk Cookies

This is what resulted from looking for a more acceptable way to eat Craisins than by the handful, adapted from Cook's Illustrated.

Makes 16 large cookies

Ingredients

• 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 1/4 rolled oats
• 1 cup walnuts, toasted & chopped
• 1 cup Craisins (dried sweetened cranberries), chopped
• 4 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped (or chocolate chips)
• 3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
• 1 1/2 cups brown sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 tsp vanilla

1. Heat oven to 350 (you can also toast the nuts at this temp)
2. Mix flour, baking powder & soda and salt in medium bowl. In a second bowl, mix oats, nuts, Craisins and chocolate.
3. By hand or using electric mixer, cream butter & sugar. Add egg and vanilla.
4. Stir in flour mixture.
5. Stir in oat mixture.
6. Divide dough to form 16 balls roughly 2 inches in diameter. Divide between two cookie sheets lined with parchment paper, flatten to 1 inch thickness.
7. Bake 20 mins, rotating the sheets halfway through. Don't overbake, they will look slightly underdone at this point, edges should be browning but the centres should be soft. You want them to be chewy.
8. Cool on wire rack and enjoy.