Ginger.....cookies?

The event: Brut Sun Bowl.
The goodie: Dark, spicy Gingerbread

The goal was to bake a moist, dark, spicy gingerbread for the Brut Sun Bowl. Every winter, I get a huge craving for ginger in baked goodies. And what completes a cold winter day than gingerbread? So, I found a recipe off of Allrecipes and decided to go for it.

The first thing I noticed was the amount of molasses in the recipe: 1 whole cup! I'm not that big a fan of molasses...I find it a bit overbearing, but since the recipe was highly rated, I decided to go for it. After putting it in the oven, I set the time to what the recipe had suggested: 1 hr. Ok fine... it seemed a little long for the amount and the stickiness of the batter (1 9x9 square brownie pan), but I trusted the recipe and toiled on. About 45 min later, I went to check on my gingerbread. By now, I could smell the molasses wafting out of the kitchen. I opened the oven door, took out my pan, and poked at it. Rock solid. Crap.

In a moment of panic, I decided that I could just buy some gingerbread at Safeway and pass it off as my own. But I knew I couldn't make myself do that...and my ego was stopping me from it. Quickly, I changed plans to keep the ginger as the main ingredient and decided to fall back on a reliable choice: cookies! And voila! These big, soft, ginger cookies were born!

Might I say, that I think these turned out very well. So well, that, upon taking a bite, my friends were surprised that I had made them:

- Friend 1: These cookies are good! Did Ji make these?
- Friend 2: No, Penny did actually.
- Friend 1: Really??? Penny made these???

Don't worry. I wasn't offended. In fact, it gave my ego a giant boost after hearing that. So, hopefully these will bring you the same joy that it brought me and my friends on that cold Saturday afternoon.

Ingredients

• 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup butter, softened
• 1 cup white sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 tablespoon water
• 1/4 cup molasses
• 1/4 teaspoon orange extract
• 1 teaspoon of orange zest

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Sift together the flour, ginger, baking soda, cinnamon, cloves, and salt. Set aside.
2. In a large bowl, cream together the butter and 1 cup sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in the egg, then stir in the water and molasses. Gradually stir the sifted ingredients into the molasses mixture. Shape dough into walnut sized balls, place the cookies 2 inches apart onto an ungreased cookie sheet, and flatten slightly.
3. Bake for 8 to 10 minutes in the preheated oven. Allow cookies to cool on baking sheet for 5 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool completely. Store in an airtight container.

The Lazyman's Pumpkin Log

When I was in college, my roommates and I one Christmas somehow came up with the idea to look for a Yule Log. Maybe it was because none of us had had one since we were kids or maybe it was just the thrill of the hunt. Who knows? Amazingly...or not, Berkeley turned out to be a difficult place to find one. We went from Safeway to Safeway, bakery to bakery, and yet nothing. We didn't find one that year, and we didn't try any other years. Being that the holidays are upon us made me reminisce to that moment and made me wonder why we didn't just bake our own Yule Log. Well this year seemed like as good a year as any to start! Of course, being the lazyman and a pumpkin lover, I decided to just make a simple Pumpkin Log.


This recipe itself is an adaptation of Libby's Pumpkin Roll. I like my spice breads with a generous amount of spices, but you can adjust that to according to your preference. Also, just to add a little more texture, I incorporated some chopped walnuts into the filling to add some depth :).

1/4 C. powdered sugar
3/4 C. all-purpose flour
1/2 t. baking powder
1/2 t. baking soda
1 t. ground cinnamon
1/2 t. nutmeg
1/2 t. allspice
1 t. ground cloves
1/4 t. salt
3 eggs
1 C. sugar
1 C. canned pumpkin

filling:
1 pkg. (8 oz.) cream cheese, softened
1/2 C. powdered sugar, sifted
4 T. butter, softened
1/2 C. chopped walnuts
1 t. vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 375°F. Grease a 15×10 jelly roll pan (also known as half sheet pan); line with parchment or waxed paper. Grease and flour paper; set aside. Spread out a clean, thin dish towel on the counter (make sure the towel is larger than your jelly roll pan); sprinkle liberally with powdered sugar (this can be done using a mesh strainer).

2. In a small bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon and cloves.

3. In a large bowl combine eggs and sugar; beat until thickened. Add pumpkin; beat until well mixed.

4. Stir in flour mixture into egg mixture. Spread batter evenly into prepared pan, easing it carefully to the corners with a spatula.

5. Bake in preheated 375 degree oven for 13 to 15 minutes or until center springs back when lightly touched.

6. Immediately loosen cake from edges of pan; invert cake onto the prepared towel. Remove pan; carefully peel off paper. Roll up cake in towel while hot, starting with 10-inch side. Cool completely on wire rack (will take at least an hour).

7. When cake is almost completely cooled, make the filling: beat cream cheese, powdered sugar, butter and vanilla extract in small mixer bowl until smooth. Fold in chopped walnuts.

8. When cake has cooled completely, unroll, spread with the cream cheese filling then re-roll cake. Wrap rolled cake in plastic wrap then refrigerate at least one hour (overnight is best).

9. When ready to serve, unwrap cake and place on a platter. Top with walnuts for decoration. Sprinkle with powdered sugar if desired (sift the sugar through a small mesh strainer for a nice presentation). Cut into slices.

buns are hard

While I was in Korea over winter break, I got this amazing baking book by Young Mo Kim, THE man of the Korean Bakers Association. This book is full colored and has a range of delicious, ornate pastries and cakes including the ones you find in asian bakeries with custard and red bean filling inside. 

I had the urge to try baking something different last week so I made my first brave attempt at baking asian buns. I made one batch of sweet bread dough to make three different types of buns -- custard filling, red bean filling, and some with sweet crumb topping.  

I mixed all the ingredients and kneaded, pounded the dough for about 15 minutes manually (per instructions in the book) and my arms almost fell off so I think next time, I'll just use the KitchenAid mixer. The result was just okay. The bread was not as soft and moist as I had hoped. The custard filled one was my favorite because the custard gave the bun that extra moisture it needed. 

Next time, I think I will try a couple of things differently:

   1. use KitchenAid mixer to knead the dough more thoroughly

   2. use a combination of cake flour and bread flour as the book suggests rather than just all-purpose flour 

   3. find a good place to proof the dough (needs a constant 28 deg C environment.. perhaps a space heater and a bowl of water in a box will do?) 

   4. put more filling in the buns! 

cranberries

Have you seen fresh cranberries before? On the outside they're smooth and round, but on the inside, they look like four-leaf clovers. I had a bunch of cranberries leftover from Thanksgiving, so I made a cranberry upside-down coffee cake from this recipe. I brought this to a house-warming party, and the combination of cranberries, pecans, brown sugar, and spices baked together was a perfect contrast to the cold weather outside. Next time you have fresh or dried cranberries, give this a try!

i heart gingerbread men

They just look so adorable when they are in a cluster, don't they? I made a personalized gingerbread man for each of my coworkers and since our group works on cameras for Google Streetview, I made little cameras to go along with it. They were an instant hit of course :) 

I used this recipe but substituted margarine with butter.  Make sure you watch them while baking because they are soft and chewy with slight crunch normally, but will turn hard and dry very quickly if overbaked. For the frosting, I mixed 1/2 cup of confectioners' sugar with 1 tablespoon of nonfat milk and a pinch of cinnamon for more flavor. 

Happy Holidays! 

apple pastry cake

My first entry! 

I baked this apple pastry cake for Thanksgiving. The recipe was from a book A Passion for Baking by Marcy Goldman (this is an amazing book for those home bakers out there).  It is a hybrid between a pie and a cake. The entire cake is filled with plumped raisins, cinnamon, nutmeg and sugar coated apples (I think I used at least 8 medium sized apples) and after about 40 minutes of baking, custard is poured into the filling and popped back into the oven.  

It can be served warm or cold. The apples still have a bit of a crunch and the creamy custard filling between these apple pieces give each bite a wonderful mix of textures. 

 

I wish I had a picture of a piece cut out... 

A Thanksgiving Treat...

Ahhh Fall. I love how as Summer melts away, it brings a crispness in the air and a dash of color to the trees. One of the other things I love about fall is the seasonal food -- PUMPKIN! I love pumpkin everything -- pumpkin pie, pumpkin cookies, pumpkin soup! Just writing this makes me crave more. If only it were available year-round!

Thanksgiving has just come and gone, and of course, a Thanksgiving meal is not complete without a pumpkin dish of some kind. Normally, I would've subsisted on buying a pumpkin dessert (Andronico's has the BEST pumpkin bread, btw), but I wasn't about to go this year without making something from scratch. And of course, since I have such a sweet tooth, I decided to make a lighter version. So I present to you my Pumpkin Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting.

Now, I'm not quite the baker that the other girls on this blog are. In fact, this is actually my very first cake! I do think it turned out quite good though... at least that's what my Mommy told me. But maybe she was just being nice :P.

Pumpkin Cake

1 1/2 c. + 2 tb. white sugar + 1 pkt Truvia
3/4 c. unsweetened applesauce
1/2 c. Canola Oil
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 c. canned pumpkin (Trader Joe's Organic Pumpkin)
4 eggs
2 c. all-purpose flour
3 tsp baking powder
2 tsp baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp cloves
1/4 tsp allspice
1 c. chopped walnuts

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour a 9 1/2 inch springform pan. Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and spices. Set aside.
2. In a large bowl combine sugar and oil. Blend in vanilla and pumpkin, then beat in eggs one at a time. Gradually beat in flour mixture. Stir in nuts. Spread batter into prepared springform pan.
3. Bake in the preheated oven for 30 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Allow to cool.

You may have noticed that I've included an item called "Truvia" as part of a substitution for sugar. Truvia is the branded version of the sugar substitute Stevia. Stevia actually comes from an herb and is supposedly sweeter than sugar! It's a zero calorie food, contains no aspartame and is completely natural. It also doesn't have a weird fake sugar taste like Splenda or Equal do. For more on Stevia, keeps your eyes peeled for a post dedicated to the substance.

I happen to like my pumpkin cakes with rich spices...hence why I added so much variety of the warm winter spices. The applesauce kept the cake very moist and tasty, while also reducing the amount of fat originally in the mixture.

In addition to having this be my first cake, it was also my first time making frosting ... of any kind. To say it was a daunting task was an understatement. Also, I had no confectioners sugar....so I used granulated sugar and some Truvia packets as well, along with some corn starch to give it a thicker consistency. It was completely ad-hoc...sad to say, but I think it turned out quite well. And of course, if you don't think it's sweet enough, feel free to add more sugar. Me? I don't like my frostings to be teeth-rottingly sweet.

Cream Cheese Frosting
4 oz. fat-free cream cheese (cold)
2 tbsp butter (room-temperature)
1 tbsp granulated sugar
2 pkts Truvia
1 tsp lemon juice
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 tsp corn starch

Directions:

1. Cream butter and cream cheese together. Slowly add sugar while creaming until smooth.
2. Add wet ingredients and mix.
3. Add corn starch as necessary for consistency.

I had enough to frost the top of the cake. Added some chopped walnuts and some orange zest and Voila! Pumpkin Cake!